So many thoughts feelings expressions emotions
locked behind deadpan eyes and a voice that's toneless.
A mountain of a person consolidated to this form.
A body unimpressive.
A face unexpressive.
The chaos upstairs requires all of my attention.

Conversing takes a back-seat which is why I seem distant.
Too many things to say only leaves me in silence.
I don't know how or where to begin.
If only I could let you inside to weather the storm
maybe you could make sense of this nonsense and bring me to port.

In this Monody the author bewails a learned Friend, unfortunately
drowned  in his passage from Chester on the Irish Seas, 1637;
and, by occasion, foretells the ruin of our corrupted Clergy,
then in their height.


Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more,
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,
I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude,
And with forced fingers rude
Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year.
Bitter constraint and sad occasion dear
Compels me to disturb your season due;
For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer.
Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew
Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.
He must not float upon his watery bier
Unwept, and welter to the parching wind,
Without the meed of some melodious tear.
         Begin, then, Sisters of the sacred well
That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring;
Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string.
Hence with denial vain and coy excuse:
So may some gentle Muse
With lucky words favour my destined urn,
And as he passes turn,
And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud!
         For we were nursed upon the self-same hill,
Fed the same flock, by fountain, shade, and rill;
Together both, ere the high lawns appeared
Under the opening eyelids of the Morn,
We drove a-field, and both together heard
What time the grey-fly winds her sultry horn,
Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night,
Oft till the star that rose at evening bright
Toward heaven’s descent had sloped his westering wheel.
Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute;
Tempered to the oaten flute,
Rough Satyrs danced, and Fauns with cloven heel
From the glad sound would not be absent long;
And old Damoetas loved to hear our song.
         But, oh! the heavy change, now thou art gone,
Now thou art gone and never must return!
Thee, Shepherd, thee the woods and desert caves,
With wild thyme and the gadding vine o’ergrown,
And all their echoes, mourn.
The willows, and the hazel copses green,
Shall now no more be seen
Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays.
As killing as the canker to the rose,
Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze,
Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe wear,
When first the white-thorn blows;
Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherd’s ear.
         Where were ye, Nymphs, when the remorseless deep
Closed o’er the head of your loved Lycidas?
For neither were ye playing on the steep
Where your old bards, the famous Druids, lie,
Nor on the shaggy top of Mona high,
Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream.
Ay me! I fondly dream
RHad ye been there,S . . . for what could that have done?
What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore,
The Muse herself, for her enchanting son,
Whom universal nature did lament,
When, by the rout that made the hideous roar,
His gory visage down the stream was sent,
Down the swift Hebrus to the Lesbian shore?
         Alas! what boots it with uncessant care
To tend the homely, slighted, shepherd’s trade,
And strictly meditate the thankless Muse?
Were it not better done, as others use,
To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Neaera’s hair?
Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise
(That last infirmity of noble mind)
To scorn delights and live laborious days;
But, the fair guerdon when we hope to find,
And think to burst out into sudden blaze,
Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears,
And slits the thin-spun life. RBut not the praise,”
Phoebus replied, and touched my trembling ears:
RFame is no plant that grows on mortal soil,
Nor in the glistering foil
Set off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies,
But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes
And perfect witness of all-judging Jove;
As he pronounces lastly on each deed,
Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed.”
         O fountain Arethuse, and thou honoured flood,
Smooth-sliding Mincius, crowned with vocal reeds,
That strain I heard was of a higher mood.
But now my oat proceeds,
And listens to the Herald of the Sea,
That came in Neptune’s plea.
He asked the waves, and asked the felon winds,
What hard mishap hath doomed this gentle swain?
And questioned every gust of rugged wings
That blows from off each beaked promontory.
They knew not of his story;
And sage Hippotades their answer brings,
That not a blast was from his dungeon strayed:
The air was calm, and on the level brine
Sleek Panope with all her sisters played.
It was that fatal and perfidious bark,
Built in the eclipse, and rigged with curses dark,
That sunk so low that sacred head of thine.
         Next, Camus, reverend sire, went footing slow,
His mantle hairy, and his bonnet sedge,
Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge
Like to that sanguine flower inscribed with woe.
Ah! who hath reft,” quoth he, Rmy dearest pledge?”
Last came, and last did go,
The Pilot of the Galilean Lake;
Two massy keys he bore of metals twain.
(The golden opes, the iron shuts amain).
He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake:—
RHow well could I have spared for thee, young swain,
Enow of such as, for their bellies’ sake,
Creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold!
Of other care they little reckoning make
Than how to scramble at the shearers’ feast,
And shove away the worthy bidden guest.
Blind mouths! that scarce themselves know how to hold
A sheep-hook, or have learnt aught else the least
That to the faithful herdman’s art belongs!
What recks it them? What need they? They are sped:
And, when they list, their lean and flashy songs
Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw;
The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed,
But, swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw,
Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread;
Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw
Daily devours apace, and nothing said.
But that two-handed engine at the door
Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more.”
         Return, Alpheus; the dread voice is past
That shrunk thy streams; return Sicilian Muse,
And call the vales, and bid them hither cast
Their bells and flowerets of a thousand hues.
Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use
Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks,
On whose fresh lap the swart star sparely looks,
Throw hither all your quaint enamelled eyes,
That on the green turf **** the honeyed showers,
And purple all the ground with vernal flowers.
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies,
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine,
The white pink, and the ***** freaked with jet,
The glowing violet,
The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine,
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head,
And every flower that sad embroidery wears;
Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed,
And daffadillies fill their cups with tears,
To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies.
For so, to interpose a little ease,
Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise,
Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas
Wash far away, where’er thy bones are hurled;
Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides,
Where thou perhaps under the whelming tide
Visit’st the bottom of the monstrous world;
Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied,
Sleep’st by the fable of Bellerus old,
Where the great Vision of the guarded mount
Looks toward Namancos and Bayona’s hold.
Look homeward, Angel, now, and melt with ruth:
And, O ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth.
         Weep no more, woeful shepherds, weep no more,
For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead,
Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor.
So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed,
And yet anon repairs his drooping head,
And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky:
So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high,
Through the dear might of Him that walked the waves,
Where, other groves and other streams along,
With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves,
And hears the unexpressive nuptial song,
In the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love.
There entertain him all the Saints above,
In solemn troops, and sweet societies,
That Sing, and singing in their glory move,
And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes.
Now, Lycidas, the shepherds weep no more;
Henceforth thou art the Genius of the shore,
In thy large recompense, and shalt be good
To all that wander in that perilous flood.
         Thus sang the uncouth swain to the oaks and rills,
While the still morn went out with sandals grey:
He touched the tender stops of various quills,
With eager thought warbling his Doric lay:
And now the sun had stretched out all the hills,
And now was dropt into the western bay.
At last he rose, and twitched his mantle blue:
Tomorrow to fresh woods, and pastures new.

It was the Winter wilde,
While the Heav’n-born-childe,
  All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;
Nature in aw to him
Had doff’t her gawdy trim,
  With her great Master so to sympathize:
It was no season then for her
To wanton with the Sun her ***** Paramour.

Only with speeches fair
She woo’s the gentle Air
  To hide her guilty front with innocent Snow,
And on her naked shame,
Pollute with sinfull blame,
  The Saintly Vail of Maiden white to throw,
Confounded, that her Makers eyes
Should look so neer upon her foul deformities.

But he her fears to cease,
Sent down the meek-eyd Peace,
  She crown’d with Olive green, came softly sliding
Down through the turning sphear
His ready Harbinger,
  With Turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing,
And waving wide her mirtle wand,
She strikes a universall Peace through Sea and Land.

No War, or Battails sound
Was heard the World around,
  The idle spear and shield were high up hung;
The hookèd Chariot stood
Unstain’d with hostile blood,
  The Trumpet spake not to the armèd throng,
And Kings sate still with awfull eye,
As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by.

But peacefull was the night
Wherin the Prince of light
  His raign of peace upon the earth began:
The Windes with wonder whist,
Smoothly the waters kist,
  Whispering new joyes to the milde Ocean,
Who now hath quite forgot to rave,
While Birds of Calm sit brooding on the charmeèd wave.

The Stars with deep amaze
Stand fixt in stedfast gaze,
  Bending one way their pretious influence,
And will not take their flight,
For all the morning light,
  Or Lucifer that often warn’d them thence;
But in their glimmering Orbs did glow,
Untill their Lord himself bespake, and bid them go.

And though the shady gloom
Had given day her room,
  The Sun himself with-held his wonted speed,
And hid his head for shame,
As his inferiour flame,
  The new enlightn’d world no more should need;
He saw a greater Sun appear
Then his bright Throne, or burning Axletree could bear.

The Shepherds on the Lawn,
Or ere the point of dawn,
  Sate simply chatting in a rustick row;
Full little thought they than,
That the mighty Pan
  Was kindly com to live with them below;
Perhaps their loves, or els their sheep,
Was all that did their silly thoughts so busie keep.

When such musick sweet
Their hearts and ears did greet,
  As never was by mortall finger strook,
Divinely-warbled voice
Answering the stringèd noise,
  As all their souls in blisfull rapture took
The Air such pleasure loth to lose,
With thousand echo’s still prolongs each heav’nly close.

Nature that heard such sound
Beneath the hollow round
  Of Cynthia’s seat, the Airy region thrilling,
Now was almost won
To think her part was don,
  And that her raign had here its last fulfilling;
She knew such harmony alone
Could hold all Heav’n and Earth in happier union.

At last surrounds their sight
A Globe of circular light,
  That with long beams the shame-fac’t night array’d,
The helmèd Cherubim
And sworded Seraphim,
  Are seen in glittering ranks with wings displaid,
Harping in loud and solemn quire,
With unexpressive notes to Heav’ns new-born Heir.

Such musick (as ’tis said)
Before was never made,
  But when of old the sons of morning sung,
While the Creator Great
His constellations set,
  And the well-ballanc’t world on hinges hung,
And cast the dark foundations deep,
And bid the weltring waves their oozy channel keep.

Ring out ye Crystall sphears,
Once bless our human ears,
  (If ye have power to touch our senses so)
And let your silver chime
Move in melodious time;
  And let the Base of Heav’ns deep ***** blow
And with your ninefold harmony
Make up full consort to th’Angelike symphony.

For if such holy Song
Enwrap our fancy long,
  Time will run back, and fetch the age of gold,
And speckl’d vanity
Will sicken soon and die,
  And leprous sin will melt from earthly mould,
And Hell it self will pass away,
And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day.

Yea Truth, and Justice then
Will down return to men,
  Th’enameld Arras of the Rain-bow wearing,
And Mercy set between,
Thron’d in Celestiall sheen,
  With radiant feet the tissued clouds down stearing,
And Heav’n as at som festivall,
Will open wide the Gates of her high Palace Hall.

But wisest Fate sayes no,
This must not yet be so,
  The Babe lies yet in smiling Infancy,
That on the bitter cross
Must redeem our loss;
  So both himself and us to glorifie:
Yet first to those ychain’d in sleep,
The wakefull trump of doom must thunder through the deep,

With such a horrid clang
As on mount Sinai rang
  While the red fire, and smouldring clouds out brake:
The agèd Earth agast
With terrour of that blast,
  Shall from the surface to the center shake;
When at the worlds last session,
The dreadfull Judge in middle Air shall spread his throne.

And then at last our bliss
Full and perfect is,
  But now begins; for from this happy day
Th’old Dragon under ground
In straiter limits bound,
  Not half so far casts his usurpèd sway,
And wrath to see his Kingdom fail,
Swindges the scaly Horrour of his foulded tail.

The Oracles are dumm,
No voice or hideous humm
  Runs through the archèd roof in words deceiving.
Apollo from his shrine
Can no more divine,
  With hollow shreik the steep of Delphos leaving.
No nightly trance, or breathèd spell,
Inspire’s the pale-ey’d Priest from the prophetic cell.

The lonely mountains o’re,
And the resounding shore,
  A voice of weeping heard, and loud lament;
From haunted spring, and dale
Edg’d with poplar pale,
  The parting Genius is with sighing sent,
With flowre-inwov’n tresses torn
The Nimphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets mourn.

In consecrated Earth,
And on the holy Hearth,
  The Lars, and Lemures moan with midnight plaint,
In Urns, and Altars round,
A drear, and dying sound
  Affrights the Flamins at their service quaint;
And the chill Marble seems to sweat,
While each peculiar power forgoes his wonted seat

Peor, and Baalim,
Forsake their Temples dim,
  With that twise-batter’d god of Palestine,
And moonèd Ashtaroth,
Heav’ns Queen and Mother both,
  Now sits not girt with Tapers holy shine,
The Libyc Hammon shrinks his horn,
In vain the Tyrian Maids their wounded Thamuz mourn.

And sullen Moloch fled,
Hath left in shadows dred,
  His burning Idol all of blackest hue,
In vain with Cymbals ring,
They call the grisly king,
  In dismall dance about the furnace blue;
The brutish gods of Nile as fast,
Isis and Orus, and the Dog Anubis hast.

Nor is Osiris seen
In Memphian Grove, or Green,
  Trampling the unshowr’d Grasse with lowings loud:
Nor can he be at rest
Within his sacred chest,
  Naught but profoundest Hell can be his shroud,
In vain with Timbrel’d Anthems dark
The sable-stolèd Sorcerers bear his worshipt Ark.

He feels from Juda’s Land
The dredded Infants hand,
  The rayes of Bethlehem blind his dusky eyn;
Nor all the gods beside,
Longer dare abide,
  Not Typhon huge ending in snaky twine:
Our Babe to shew his Godhead true,
Can in his swadling bands controul the damnèd crew.

So when the Sun in bed,
Curtain’d with cloudy red,
  Pillows his chin upon an Orient wave,
The flocking shadows pale,
Troop to th’infernall jail,
  Each fetter’d Ghost slips to his severall grave,
And the yellow-skirted Fayes,
Fly after the Night-steeds, leaving their Moon-lov’d maze.

But see the ****** blest,
Hath laid her Babe to rest.
  Time is our tedious Song should here have ending,
Heav’ns youngest teemèd Star,
Hath fixt her polisht Car,
  Her sleeping Lord with Handmaid Lamp attending:
And all about the Courtly Stable,
Bright-harnest Angels sit in order serviceable.

I

It was the Winter wilde,
While the Heav’n-born-childe,
All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;
Nature in aw to him
Had doff’t her gawdy trim,
With her great Master so to sympathize:
It was no season then for her
To wanton with the Sun her ***** Paramour.

II

Only with speeches fair
She woo’d the gentle Air
To hide her guilty front with innocent Snow,
And on her naked shame,
Pollute with sinfull blame,
The Saintly Vail of Maiden white to throw,
Confounded, that her Makers eyes
Should look so near upon her foul deformities.

III

But he her fears to cease,
Sent down the meek-eyd Peace,
She crown’d with Olive green, came softly sliding
Down through the turning sphear
His ready Harbinger,
With Turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing,
And waving wide her mirtle wand,
She strikes a universall Peace through Sea and Land.

IV

No War, or Battails sound
Was heard the World around,
The idle spear and shield were high up hung;
The hooked Chariot stood
Unstain’d with hostile blood,
The Trumpet spake not to the armed throng,
And Kings sate still with awfull eye,
As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by.

V

But peacefull was the night
Wherin the Prince of light
His raign of peace upon the earth began:
The Windes with wonder whist,
Smoothly the waters kist,
Whispering new joyes to the milde Ocean,
Who now hath quite forgot to rave,
While Birds of Calm sit brooding on the charmed wave.

VI

The Stars with deep amaze
Stand fit in steadfast gaze,
Bending one way their pretious influence,
And will not take their flight,
For all the morning light,
Or Lucifer that often warned them thence;
But in their glimmering Orbs did glow,
Until their Lord himself bespake, and bid them go.

VII

And though the shady gloom
Had given day her room,
The Sun himself with-held his wonted speed,
And hid his head for shame,
As his inferior flame,
The new enlightened world no more should need;
He saw a greater Sun appear
Then his bright Throne, or burning Axletree could bear.

VIII

The Shepherds on the Lawn,
Or ere the point of dawn,
Sate simply chatting in a rustic row;
Full little thought they than,
That the mighty Pan
Was kindly com to live with them below;
Perhaps their loves, or els their sheep,
Was all that did their silly thoughts so busie keep.

IX

When such Musick sweet
Their hearts and ears did greet,
As never was by mortal finger strook,
Divinely-warbled voice
Answering the stringed noise,
As all their souls in blisfull rapture took:
The Air such pleasure loth to lose,
With  thousand echo’s still prolongs each heav’nly close.

X

Nature that heard such  sound
Beneath  the hollow round
of Cynthia’s seat the Airy region thrilling,
Now was almost won
To think her part was don
And that her raign had here its last fulfilling;
She knew such harmony alone
Could hold all Heav’n and Earth in happier union.

XI

At last surrounds their sight
A globe of circular light,
That with long beams the shame faced night arrayed
The helmed Cherubim
And sworded Seraphim,
Are seen in glittering ranks with wings displaid,
Harping in loud and solemn quire,
With unexpressive notes to Heav’ns new-born Heir.

XII

Such Musick (as ’tis said)
Before was never made,
But when of old the sons of morning sung,
While the Creator Great
His constellations set,
And the well-ballanc’t world on hinges hung,
And cast the dark foundations deep,
And bid the weltring waves their oozy channel keep.

XIII

Ring out ye Crystall sphears,
Once bless our human ears,
(If ye have power to touch our senses so)
And let your silver chime
Move in melodious time;
And let the Base of Heav’ns deep ***** blow,
And with your ninefold harmony
Make up full consort to th’Angelike symphony.

XIV

For if such holy Song
Enwrap our fancy long,
Time will run back, and fetch the age of gold,
And speckl’d vanity
Will sicken soon and die,
And leprous sin will melt from earthly mould,
And Hell it self will pass away
And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day.

XV

Yea Truth, and Justice then
Will down return to men,
Th’enameld Arras of the Rain-bow wearing,
And Mercy set between
Thron’d in Celestiall sheen,
With radiant feet the tissued clouds down stearing,
And Heav’n as at som festivall,
Will open wide the gates of her high Palace Hall.

XVI

But wisest Fate sayes  no,
This must not yet be so,
The Babe lies yet in smiling Infancy,
That on the bitter cross
Must redeem our loss;
So both himself and us to glorifie:
Yet first to those ychain’d in sleep,
The Wakeful trump of doom must thunder through the deep,

XVII

With such a horrid clang
As on Mount Sinai rang
While the red fire, and smouldring clouds out brake:
The aged Earth agast
With terrour of that blast,
Shall from the surface to the center shake;
When at the worlds last session,
The dreadfull Judge in middle Air shall spread his throne.

XVIII

And then at last  our bliss
Full and perfect is,
But now begins; for from this happy day
Th’old Dragon under ground
In straiter limits bound,
Not half so far casts his usurped sway,
And wrath to see his Kingdom fail,
Swindges the scaly Horrour of his foulded tail.

XIX

The Oracles are dumm,
No voice or hideous humm
Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving.
Apollo from his shrine
Can no more divine,
With hollow shreik the steep of Delphos leaving.
No nightly trance, or breathed spell,
Inspire’s the pale-ey’d Priest from the prophetic cell.

**

The lonely mountains o’re,
And the resounding shore,
A voice of weeping heard, and loud lament;
From haunted spring, and dale
Edg’d with poplar pale
The parting Genius is with sighing sent,
With flowre-inwov’n tresses torn
The Nimphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets mourn.

XXI

In consecrated Earth,
And on the holy Hearth,
The Lars, and Lemures moan with midnight plaint,
In Urns, and Altars round,
A drear, and dying sound
Affrights the Flamins at their service quaint;
And the chill Marble seems to sweat,
While each peculiar power forgoes his wonted seat.

XXII

Peor, and Baalim,
Forsake their Temples dim,
With that twise-batter’d god of Palestine,
And mooned Ashtaroth,
Heav’ns Queen and Mother both,
Now sits not girt with Tapers holy shine,
The Libyc Hammon shrinks his horn,
In vain the Tyrian Maids their wounded Thamuz mourn.

XXIII

And sullen Moloch fled,
Hath left in shadows dred,
His burning Idol all of blackest hue,
In vain with Cymbals ring,
They call the grisly king,
In dismall dance about the furnace Blue;
And Brutish gods of Nile as fast,
lsis and Orus, and the Dog Anubis hast.

Robots and gods.

Is this madness?
It must be.

On one hand, the robot feels.
The robot knows what it wants, takes it.
But has difficulty feeling what other people are feeling.

On the other hand, the god watches.
The god orchestrates and plans things to go its way.
But feels as though it doesnt have control over itself.

It manipulates and prods.
It is calculated.
It is watching.
It is observant.
It is careful, caring and emotionless.
Yet full of it. And still yet unexpressive. Full of life. Trapped in their vessels; their roles.

What am i?

I didn't want to open my eyes. The sight of him made me sick. I hated his short, hairy legs. I hated his eyes. They looked at me with sadness, but sadness couldn't hide the evil that stared at me. I hated the way they looked hollow and dark when he took his glasses off. I hated his beard. It scratched my skin when he tried to kiss me. And when he thrusted his lips at mine, hoping i wouldn't run.

I hated his hands the most. His hands radiated with his disgusting desire. Every time he touched me, from the day we first met, i knew something was wrong. Maybe i was just being too "closed off". Thats what my dad always said when i didn't let him hug me. When he touched me, i could see his hands for what they really were. Slimy tentacles, lusting for their prey.

I should have seen it coming, the things his hands did. They hit me. I saw stars and my ears rang. They scratched me. The marks would be there for days. They gripped my throat so tight i could feel my life slipping away as my vision went dark. He released just before i passed out, letting me breathe.

Sometimes i wish he had kept choking me. I wished he had killed me that day, putting an end to my torture.

All the pain and lack of oxygen made me weak. Too weak to try to fight. He was bigger and stronger. And i was just a battered little girl, terrified and trapped. I couldn't get away. And who would hear me if i screamed? We were alone and i was pretty sure he'd keep hurting me if i tried. He restricted my breathing every time i made a sound.

So i just laid there. I closed my eyes, pretending i was dead. I waited for it to be over, trying to **** my mind. I didn't want to feel a thing. I didn't want to be there. If i could somehow slip into death in my head, i wouldn't have to be here anymore. Killing myself in my head was the only escape from my terrible reality.

It was over and he drove me home. He tried to talk to me. He tried to reassure me that everything was okay and i wasn't a bad person.
"Don't feel guilty, he doesn't have to know." He kept talking but i was silent. In an emotionless trance, my face was still and unexpressive. Tears came slowly and silently. They rolled down my stone cheeks, my statue of a face.

What just happened? Did he forget the events of the last hour? Did I?
"Don't feel guilty. He won't know."
Had i just cheated on my boyfriend? What have i done?

He made me think that i was the one to blame. I'm a ****. *****. Disgusting cheater. What did i do? I hate myself. I deserve to die.

I knew the truth. I knew what happened. I knew what he did and i knew how horrible it felt. So how was he able to convince me that this was my fault? Was it because i didn't want to think about that word? ****.

No, i had not been *****. I cheated and I'm a horrible person. He means the world to me and i am a horrible ****. That's what i told myself. And didn't tell anyone else anything about cheating or ****. It's a terrifying word. Once the reality is seen.

I can cry whenever I want
It is an actor's dream
I can cry whenever I want
It's just coursing through my veins
That hurt, ungratefulness
Inner discord
It's calling to me
Let it out!
But I hold it in so well
I am a terrible actor
I have an unexpressive face
Or maybe just a lack of courage in expressing emotions
Tears are physical
Aren't they?
Or are they emotional?
I am a terrible actor
Because I'm so good at catching and keeping
What should be out in the open
I can cry whenever I want

an observer, viewer, purveyor watching your every move
she's the self-proclaimed overlord, claiming secrets and lies
shooting philosophies and judgements into the dark
wielding words as wisdom with very little presence or actual knowledge
an incredible surge of passion that is constantly misplaced
lost within her own head and her own version of reality
pretending to be a master of time, when time is only a concept
full of fickle, non importance, full of everything within all of space
a pathetic attempt to get words to express feelings
trying to hide the pride, the snide, the hypocrisy
a self destructive human being pretending to be more
a core of karuna, purely and simply
full of false bravado and empty promises
a not very smart lady, gaining stupidity and blank memories
losing the past and floating into the future
forgetting the present as it goes
confused yet full of understanding
full of too many unexpressive, unknowable, unaware
girl
girl
girl
short brown hair, blue eyes, plain and uneven face, long legs, veiny feet, skinny wrists, straight teeth, wide nails, confused, sarah.

Where once breathed life
You smell rust
Years torn by strife
Turn to dust!
Where once echoed the sound
Of the pride of might
The nestling bats abound
In the dark caverns of night!
Where reigned the royal whims
Hangs the time-worn portrait
Of fallen hopes shattered dreams
Swallowed like all else by fate!
Where once danced in lust
Warm flesh on soft mattress
Lies a ghostly looking bust
With a stony unexpressive face!
The living comes to visit them,
Awes at the displayed story,
Once living is now an item
From a bygone era, a piece of history!

At the end of the dusty road
where the road yawns with boredom at the stillness,
you would meet a man.
One who walked like he did not care,
laughed loud to hide the tears behind his eyes
and the chest pain from his heartbreaks.
He also scratched his thick beard
just so you would be distracted from its length when he laughed.
Watching him laugh was a sight to behold
for he shook his head up and down
as his jaws tightened with the force of sad stories.

In the afternoons, he sat in his rocking chair
because his bed with the thin mattress had hardened his back,
from the thoughts of his failed relationship.
You see, his woman had promised him, seven fine children.
But she had left him for his best friend, the one who drove a noisy Subaru.
At night, he spent hours staring at the ceiling
twitching his face in thought as if to ask questions.
But, the ceiling as always remained unexpressive and silent.
Providing no solutions for it was made of concrete.
And when he slept,
he did not sleep like a child after breastfeeding.
He instead slept like a man with a ransom on his head.
Today, he sits and pauses for a picture beneath an art piece
the one he received when he left his father's house
to venture on his own because he had become a man.
As the camera clicks away, he smiles and freezes
to give the viewer the illusion that his life is perfect.
But deep down, all he needs is a cold Tusker and a loud laugh
that would make him forget how his back hurt
when he lay face up in bed every night
wondering when his big break would come.

I never planned on falling in love with you.
In fact, I tried my hardest not to.
All those efforts?
All that time?
It amounted to nothing.
I failed.
However, I have never been happier not to succeed.
I adore you.
Every little thing.
You, make me better.
You, make me love everything.
You.
I love you.
I can’t explain it.
I can’t describe it.
Too many words.
Too few words.
I can’t.
I want to, but I can’t.
So, I’m asking you to accept this.
My love.
I wish that these words,
These, unworthy,
Unexpressive,
Uncreative words, find their mark.
I hope they speak to your soul.
The same way that they speak to mine.
A burning whisper that excites and calms.
You, mean everything to me.
I love you, with all my heart.

another seance, gulping
and gasping, in hopes to
welcome the chaos. wistful
with no margins, no colourful
crayons, nothing promised.
unexpressive, at times
dishonest. passive aggressive,
with a mind in *******. the
desire for an end, the wonder
of what is beyond this. a
prayer for love before then, to
one day look in the mirror with
fondness.

-t.m