It's funny how I wait, for you to find me here.

It's funny how I waited, for you to call me dear.

It's funny that I believed, one day you would be mine.

It's funny that I believe, without you I'll be fine.

What once was my heart, is now a shattered fragment of your cries. What once was your heart, is just a coffin full of his lies.

Take my hand please, let me pull you from the madness. Through my pain and tears I promised to exile your sadness.

So here I wait, my broken heart still yours to fill. Yet forever I'll wait, because you took some pills...

Written By: D. L. Smith 3/14/2016

the grit courage of trust**

still too young and now, too old, to comprehend,
love~trust and all its secondary derivatives,
not extant on a plane of new bed sheets of
silk~linen tablecloth rectangularity

go into the park's garden;
black soil fingernail coating
awaiting, impatiently for you,
dig in direct hands ungloved

is it not,
sensual and yet gritty,
two coextensive sensations?

slip inside (you/me, me/you),
there is a razor's edge duality duty,
trust, serve and protect,
take and
handle with rough-care, for this our state of beauty
au naturel, the rush and the fall,
the climb and the conquering,
only to start again, each step, each rung,
coated with the
the grit courage of trust -
                                          do you begin to comprehend?

trust is a bumpy landing on a glide path that is strewn
with potholes that can grow into sinkholes without
the grit of trust

the soles of my feet are a message,
gritty from walking
all-life, not just the edges,
is a two act play of roughening,
upon the limbs the things,  
that carries us *****
but bares the wearing of
unkind touches of reality
working us over

why the soothing,
but not the smoothing
daily twice is the cream that
emerges from the grit courage of trust

even the vinery's progeny of great love,
grapes that must
embrace the wind and rain,
the wearing down tools of
the exterior that brings an acknowledgement -
                                                            do you begin to comprehend?

this is not an algebraic formulaic solution solvable problem,
this derived from dirt, access to accidental, the tongue and the nail,
the cracks upon the skin, that grow wonderful deeper, unfillable,
where the love gets in,
were the words are written and stored,
rough to the touch,
under the grit courage of trust -
                                                       do you begin to comprehend?

this grit is unbelievable beautiful  
only a love po-em.      


5:22am

No such beauty
           longer dwells
         under the guise
      of flesh and bones,
           in the garden
      of a sullied heart

           fallow heart
     barren and longing                                                  .
      ­  time built walls
      an unfillable void
           burdens tall,
      beggared of light
        befallen within

  a devolving moment
so many flowers wither
       left in a broken
         heart of gold
          
    a gardener knows
        sweetest soils
     of love and light,
     without sunshine
              sour
    as unripened fruit

     memories fading
          as if florae
    never blossomed
        perpetuating
     wholly starving,
    unweedable roots
            too deep,
  rupture when pulled

        a **** let be
            beauty

   unfertile seeds sown
       where nothing
        longer grows
    in an uninhabited
             silence

raging unseen within
  the fires of the ages
still smoldering inside,
   mingled with hope  
        left for dead

hidden in the shadows
an engulfing stone cold,
handwriting on the wall
of silence growing taller

1)

don't forget to keep breathing
cradle-rock your heart
soothe your ribs
don't forget to breathe

2)

the cold is natural
bundle up now
you can always shed
your skin
when the sky turns

3)

don't linger
in the places you once Were
keep moving else
your blood settle

4)

late night parking decks
hotel rooftops
yourSelf a whisper
honeysuckle blooms through
concrete wounds

5)

don't think about waking
ripping out of your body
clawing through the coffin and up
and up

your gravesite is spotless still

6)

dream
cool rich earth
lilies and lavender
whisper rustle of leaves
dream

7)

dream
heavy water
lake mud and rock ****
desperate silence
dream

8)

dream
hunger
Hunger
H u n g e r
dream

9)

dream
slow opening
granite doors and damp moss
spaces between absent heartbeats
wake

10)

the hollow is natural
the brain craves familiarity
the phantom mirrors the physical
the hunger will fade
for a time

11)

when eating cherries
don't forget to imagine a tongue

12)

remorse with me
may the living one day
bestow our graves with offerings
we starve in silence

13)

hollowing may beget holiness
but it doesn't denote such
divinity must be earned
few buildings have managed

14)

you can almost smell his skin
stomach rising and falling
best not to dwell
his life is no longer yours

15)

phantom petal flesh
teeth and thrush
rosethorn oleander s e e p ing black
curses and
sinking
  forest rot
    deep
       soil


16)

do not follow
when the wind asks your counsel
when the moon thorn buds
when the night screams bruiseblueblack
do not seek the woods alone

17)

don't dwell
it's natural to feel exposed
keeping space beside you
will only make missing them worse

18)

let the ceiling fall
it is beyond your power
stars make fairy lights
through the frame of branches
as it should be

19)

Death is a story keeper
an archivist
a library of everything
from the first atoms
to the last sparks

20)

don't worry
the house hasn't moved
since you last saw it
though the tree seems closer

21)

press yourself into
the size of a fist
wrap clockwise around
his heart
cherish the fleeting creature

22)

there is always
my s p a c e
left in the bed
when I come home to
haunt

23)

there is
My space
left in the house
when I come Home to
Haunt!!!a

Zombie

24)

missed exit
streetlights smeared by rain
vacant hotels
liminality made nostalgia

25)

tracing paper kisses
early spring thaw
did I melt away too

26)

isn't is strange
your shadow doubles
film printed over film
light runs through you
heat waves off pavement

27)

time will slip off you
don't cling to it
you'd have better luck
holding the sun
time is beyond you now

28)

the hunger doesn’t fade
it twists itself into sickness
an unfillable void

29)

let your heart fill
with paint and
dust
like the nail holes in plaster
last remains smoothed over

30)

there is no place
for you here
why do you insist on
lingering

31)

this house is a heart
you
are a phantom gunshot

32)

do you remember
a sharp pain where your lungs should be
the pressure of blood stagnant

33)

molars, incisors, canines
rigid and Real against
the memory of your tongue
a sharpness drawing blood
staining the sidewalk beneath your false feet

34)

your body is
wet rot and beetles
a collection of rooms
teeth and stomach and hollowing all disarticulated
a knife in a box

35)


sunlight breaking dust layers
the curtains wave lazily
someone has tracked mud through the halls
a splintered attic door hangs off
its hinges
the air tastes green

36)

when you finally become hollowed
the space between houses
the space between ribs
the space between teeth
the light that pours out
you will be made holy
in your Own image

37)

thick ozone at the back of your throat
rainless thunder rolls
the old piano shuffles untouched
a discordant funeral keen
the air ignites

38)

elevator doors close
open
close
stale cigarettes and cleaning chemicals
fluorescent buzzing
vacant sobs in an airy tomb
of concrete

39)

parking decks remain
a kind of home base
for those of us lacking liminality
every one is the same
and as such becomes intimately familiar
no matter how far it means you are
from home

40)

how many eyes are you supposed to have
what about teeth
count them in the mirror
again
again
Again

41)

beauty is in the eye
gnashing teeth
silent weeping
love lies not in the heart
nor head
but in the stomach

42)

skin peels back
muscles made of embroidery thread
birch bones bleeding
indigo
flesh transmuted

43)

you move through the world
as it moves through you
silently creeping
swirls of smoke and fog
filling up to your sternum

44)

wander
for a time
everything will be unfamiliar
on your journey and
return
to a stranger’s home

45)

dust to dust
and ashes to ashes
your headstone crumbles
your bones are meal
the world in which you haunt
will one day be far removed from
your own

46)

study the web
the winding and stretching of gossamer
collapsed in on itself
clustered with dew

47)

study the shell
the crests and smooths hard as bone
fragile against your fingers
an inner matrix of holes

48)

study the nest
the braiding weaves of branch and thread
fractured to one side
feathers slip asunder

49)

study the desk
the crags and slopes of precarious inkstaining
spilling frozen towards the floor
fine filtering of dust

50)

remember
what Precisely is a
Haunted
house

51)

Congratulations on Completing Part I of Your Introduction Handbook
Please Continue onto Part II

52)

fallow hearts sewn full of seed
bones with the crack and bend of trees
pressed petal flesh bruiseblack at the knees
when building a new body don't forget what it needs

53)

liminality is a current
riptide in some places
burble in others
watch for waterfalls
death doesn’t mean you're a strong swimmer

54)

builders write messages
on the innermost workings
of their buildings
behind the plaster disintegrating and
the wallpaper peeling
a belly button
a birthmark

55)

when the moon calls your name
listen
when the raven screeches warning
heed
when the voices of a house offer deals
Run

56)

kitten-footed fog
follow it through
the tall thin trees
until you see lights
then follow it
home

57)

tell me about humanity
does it hurt you
is it heavy to bear
or is it just breathing
one foot in front of the other
a faded photograph

58)

rivers slip blue
through the land like veins
cornflower and cobalt
cold tissue paper flesh

59)

missed connection
you left flowers
three graves down
I was in white
under the maple tree

60)

missed connection
you look so lovely
in blue
I'm right here
just turn around

61)

missed connection
every sunday
you walk
bakery library home florist cemetery
you talk to yourself
I always answer

62)

missed connection
you talk in your sleep
do you sense I'm there
deep in your bones
do you know you'll never
be alone again

63)

missed connection
I smashed a plate
and spent all night playing
in your wires
can you feel me now
in the light bulbs humming

64)

missed connection
you haven't spoken since
it's so silent I could be heard
I'm sleeping in the walls
singing for you

65)

missed connection
you were up all night
researching the supernatural
I'm right here
just see me

66)

missed connection
sunday you started talking
to me
we took a new walk
library shopping district cemetery home
notes and candles and blacksalt
a rubbing of my gravestone

67)

missed connection
nothing we tried worked
you still can't see me
you can just hear
my humming in the power sockets
my singing in the walls

68)

missed connection
I wrote you a letter
with leaves under your staircase
you swept them without noticing
singing one of my songs

69)

missed connection
you found a picture of me
framed it
sometimes you leave letters
my name on the front
hidden in the table drawer

70)

missed connection
I tried writing on glass panes
whispering in your ears
you tried spirit boards
seances and divination
I'll never stop
as long as you live

71)

missed connection
you stopped leaving letters
sunday walks abandoned
for living friends
I shorted out the tv
you don't come home much
anymore

72)

missed connection
you started driving
to nowhere
I tucked myself
between
the back seats
you locked eyes with me
through oncoming headlights

73

missed connection
I broke every mirror
ran screaming through the wires
the curtains are catching fire
can you still feel me
do you still know I'm here

74)

missed connection
you look so lovely
in black
just turn around
please turn around
I'm right here
always

I am fragile as glass, fragile as silk.
You could but look at me
And I might crumble, a sculpture made of sugar.
And yet I have stripped away the layers of myself
Going on, always going on
Trusting you
To foolishness, to distraction, (to destruction?)

And I keep on shedding my disguises.
I keep tearing them down
Each after each and /oh!/
I am so small inside,
The universe pressed into a pebble
And trembling with its unresolved might.
And what if you touch me
And I shatter?
And what if you touch me
And find I'm not what you were hoping
You would hold in your palm?
(And what if
You recoil
And don't touch me at all?)

What if
My shivering gravity
Meets your soft light
And muddies it somehow, makes it less?

Sometimes I fear I am
Untouchable
By nature.
At once delicate
(the way a butterfly's wing will crumple and wilt
If your fingers touch it)
And devastating,
For there is so MUCH in here
So much that wants out.

So much that /bends/ toward you when you come too close
Like glass heated to smooth billows
Where once it was sharp and brittle
(and will be
Again.)
Don't you see?
You could take me in your hands and shape me,
Make me different forever,
And walk away to leave me cold and cutting again.
You could,
And I would leave such burns on your palms
And you would create
Such edges in me
Such fingerprints
Such caverns of space where the light gets in and won't leave, trapped and pressing and empty,
Unfillable.
You could do all of that.
And I could let you.
And I could let you close, knowing this
And... I /do/
I do and it amazes me.
I do, I tear off my many masks with eager hands
And smash them at your feet.
And I don't know
Why.

Sometime when you're feeling important
Sometime when your ego's in bloom
Sometime when you take it for granted
You're the best qualified in the room

Sometime when you feel that your going
Would leave an unfillable hole
Just follow these simple instructions
And see how they humble your soul

Take a bucket and fill it with water
Put your hand in it, up to the wrist
Pull it out and the hole that's remaining
Is a measure of how you'll be missed

You can splash all you want
when you enter
You can stir up the water galore
But stop and you find that in no time
It looks quite the same as before

The moral of this quaint example
Is to just do the best you can
Be proud of yourself but remember
There is no indispensable man

©The Bible Friend

Protector of the night,
Lighting my path as I venture in the shadows
A comfort of beautiful tranquility
Almost angelic with its dim white milky silhouette
Hovering over with unearthly eloquence

Touching me with silvery grace
Engulfing me in a winsome embrace  
Glaring into my soul, caressing it with godly elegance, as
Lovely little embers of affection burned through your skin
Sorrowful distance separated us, leaving an unfillable void

Half of the day you are nowhere to be seen
But I never am alarmed
Feeling ever so calm because I know your insightful presence is near
Never leaving me in the dark of the night
You are my soft light- a promise

-EC

Loss of you
Has left me blue
Filled with hate
My loves abate
To find another
My one desire
To fill the space
Unfillable
Forever empty
Without you here

Her shrill call comes carrying more
than this hour we keep.

And we desire a feather
to arrange for each hour,
as those before

but receive only hunger:
carnivore's memory,
an unfillable bucket.

Not to awaken us entirely
we fall into soft beds,
feathers.

See the fact of tomorrow and
tomorrow provided

like the floating "here"
in another's eye, this meal,

the uninterrupted dive.
We do not remember it.

I strip down and look in the mirror.
I see your mark everywhere.
The scars you put on my body
And the scars you put on my soul.
The scars I made with my own hands.
All these scars that carved a hole
In me, unfillable abyss.

Then my eyes trace familiar lines
From the crows feet at my cheeks
And I can't help but stare
At the genetic inheritance
You left to me.
These angled ****** planes and
Auburn highlighted hair
Are all I have left of you.
My last mementos.

The longer I stand with my scars in the mirror,
The more the pain becomes real.
The more times I trace the last of you in my face,
The smaller the imprint of your touch on me becomes.

The double-edged sword of reality:
You hurt me,
You raised me,
You hated me,
But I think you also loved me.

Confusion first swirls
Then quickly fades.
For none of that matters now does it?

All I know is you're gone
And that's now what's real.
And I miss you
And that too is a fact.

is it wrong to miss you,
wish i could kiss you,
20 months later it still an issue,
maybe its physical,
but im still miserable,
iv touched other skin but my heart is unfillable,
ive tried to run tried to hide,
but you cant escape your unconscious mind,
ive had to stand my ground and face it,
unravel my thoughts right down to the basics,
thinking about you like it or hate it,
stuck in a prison that i created,
though it appears im gathered and calm,
and carry on as though nothing is wrong,
bite my tongue and swallow the pain,
never make that mistake again,
i cant be mad, i did this to myself,
i only wonder, if there's anyone else

Because my heart I wear on my sleeve
Exposed, helpless, visible for all to see.
Each hope of new love,
Every dream of a happy ending
Naked in a crowd of leeches
Watching, waiting for their chance
To bleed it dry of every emotion,
To **** away the desires of a pure soul.
Using their main weapons of silky words,
Promises of paradise
Whispers of eternity
Sighs of ecstasy
Shrouded by empty vows of love.
Blinding my reasoning with every embrace
Every kiss filled with the poison of deceit
Your touch leaves me paralyzed, empty
Left with a unquenchable thirst in a desert of lies.
Left with nothing but an unfillable void
A Black Whole devouring every vision of fate or hope
Desperatley wanting to believe every syllable

i. What I mean to say is, I’m sorry. I’m sorry everything’s changed. I’m sorry my bones are dark with mourning and need, sorry I don’t feel the way I used to, sorry the light doesn’t catch in my eyes. When I was 17, I’d lie in the grass near my house and watch the sky with such wonder, it’s astonishing I didn’t implode on the spot. I was so full. Where did she go; that marvel, that gleam? I miss her terribly.

ii. What I mean to say is, what am I doing? I’m split. A part of me is hanging on so hard to the past I think I’ll die if I let go, but a part of me wants to cut those years off like a rotten leg—pretend I only just came into being, that I have always been like this. I’ve carried so much shame with me all my life, but I’m just realizing it now. Or, maybe I’m finally realizing how not okay it is. How somewhere along the line I stopped believing it was alright to call myself Writer or Poet or Author or Warrior or Brave, just because I wasn’t doing those things well enough. I read great literature so I’d have something to aspire to, fueled by the hot, strange beauty, but in doing so, I burned myself. I began to feel like an imposter among my own words. I gave up Writer and Poet and Author and Warrior and Brave, because they just weren’t mine enough. I let them belong to others. I became a spectator to myself.
        
iii. What I mean to say is, it’s a hard world. There are beautiful things, yes, moments that catch me off guard and stun me with love, but they seem to grow further and further apart. Nothing is easy. What use are those once beloved flowery words and strung-out phrases of effulgence, which now make me squirm with embarrassment? I don’t write like a child anymore. I write like someone who’s worn out, someone who just wants to slip off her shoes and rest for a while. I am trying to be okay with that. I’m trying to accept the lostness. I’m trying to exist, somehow, in this jumble of souls. I’m trying to figure out my place in it all. I used to know everything, but I don’t know anything anymore.

iv.What I mean to say is, life isn’t romantic. The human heart isn’t romantic. Romance isn’t romantic. The poets were right when they said blood was never beautiful, it was just red. I want to spin you a story of angels and upsurge and glow, but I can’t. I can’t be silver. I cannot be delicate. I can’t breathe lilacs or moonbeams, when what I really need to breathe is oxygen, right down to my belly where my soul has clenched itself tight. I cannot live like poetry, though I tear myself apart trying. I can’t.

v. What I mean to say is, I’m Still Here. Even though it feels like I’m not. Even though I go home and wash the dishes and stand in the dark watching the skyline under its field of stars while this gnawing, unfillable pit within me writhes to be heard. I’m still here, writing these flawed sentences, wondering at the meaning of everything. The world isn’t familiar anymore, and neither am I, but I still have some things. I have my voice. My resilience. A body that sobs and laughs. Love. Clouds and water and comets and bees. The sky. The earth. All of it.

I write this for those
Who are complicated like me
Too busy to find a relationship
But not busy enough to be

Lonely as ****,
And when I say that to some,
They are puzzled and befuddled
A single parent raising his son?

How can you be lonely?
That's when I feel the guilt,
Like I'm ungrateful, cuz it's painful
Explaining a brain full of silk

Emotions, that aren't fulfilled
By a child who's a dependent
I can't express the stress on my chest
And secretly lie like a defendant

And whisper everything will work out
When I'm not even sure it will
And it's emasculating to mask the failing
Without someone to distill

Like I do my son, and fill
My head with optimism
That I reciprocate and return, concerned
When they feel like earths a prison

And I'm not asking, ans this isn't
For the pity I despise when given
I just miss, the bliss of a hug and kiss
To remind me I'm still livin

And yes my son gives me this in
The daily grind, but my mind
When I get a minute that's mine
Always wander to nostalgic times

When I didn't question if I'm
In the place that fate with signs
Led me to. Or like many do
Am I lost where you can't find

A lost in found, lost in frowns
Can't find what I lost, no solid ground
Where you say fake smiles are around
And hate it. Only to realize that now

You do the same, another clown
Who seems anything but profound
I use to be royalty. Had loyalty,
but somewhere it all crashed down

So in my Burger King crown
And my throne, built with a stapler
Made of cardboard, matching my scepter Made of
that hallow cardboard tube you get from wrapping paper

You wrap Xmas gifts with,,
and if you Wonder what the paper was used for
It was used by the me in my past, high off his ***.
Who wrapped up my future

And inside was a dead end job,
Sobriety, and some ****
So when life ***** me, I can be lucky
And slap it on my rusty, ... Well you....

Get the picture. And if it sounds familiar
Or not. But still feel a spot
Inside that you tried filling with ***
An unfillable void, u avoid, but can't stop

Feeling it, when you stop. And got
A moment to yourself
I hope this consolation, for the constellations,
not aligning, is a help

Cause I write this, to get it out,
But I post it publicly, for those at home
Who feel the emptiness. When the phone isn't ringing ....
Your not alone

In being alone, which sounds
Like another of life's contradiction
But contradiction is a literary term,
Almost as if to give u a vision

Of poeticness. Where mine is given,
But the give of irony can be fun
Leaving only humor, left for the tumor
That teaches us, that when the sun

Is out. Not not to take it for granted
So I circle back to my son
And I'm sure, that if still unsecure or
Unsure, whenever this poem Is done

Maybe it's time to train your brain,
To regain a perception, that we
Inadvertently trained it to ignore, in horror
Witnessing what wasn't meant to be

And find solace in all or it ...
I know, I sound like a clicheè
Like a cheesy, hallmark card,
that makes you wish, the author had aids

Ok.. Not aids ... But ******, or something
Now I sound like a *****,
But sometimes I see public display of affection
from couples, and I think

You ******* PPL MAKE ME SICK
HES PROBABLY FUVKING UR SISTER
AND WHEN YOUR AT WORK SHES PROBABLY ....
Wait... I can't be bitter

And you shouldn't be either ..
I know it's easier that it sounds
When robin Williams committed suicide
I swear i couldn't help drown

In thoughts. Of how, somebody, so famed  And Loved,
would want to die
which means there's no chance for me..
But logically, it proves that inside

We all have that void. Annoyed,
Wanting it to just fuvk off
But the hard part in life is concentrating on.
What we have. And not, .... the have nots

And remember what you forgot..,
The annoying, overbearing, ones who
Actually do care, about you, are priceless
And trust me, if you have one too,

A mother. Who tries to smother,
so u run For cover and don't visit
Are the ones you give away, on the days
You rather be Alone to pivot

In worthless worries, only to revisit
The same pain, u feed as you fear it
And as I write this I'm rolling my ****** Eyes too,
cuz nobody wants to hear it

But the truth is *****, just like ur mom
But in end it's the only honesty
Left in a life full of broken dreams and fake smiles
toco-sign the promising

Promises no one kept,
when they said "I love you" or I'll never leave
So I'll try to take my own cheesy advice 
 Left in this poem if u do the same for me

So I gift this to you. And my future self
As well, and I can only hope he
Takes the message inside and abide, or try ...
And Remember,lastly, when coping

That just because your lonely,
It doesn't mean your alone ...
Just because your lonely doesn't mean your alone ...
For u.. I wrote this poem ...

behind the smiles a vast chasm opens
unfillable, unfathomed, unknowable.

Another empty hall
Where, just yesterday,
You both laughed and cried.
A dismal silence
Hangs
Where recently
Your spontaneous chatter
Filled the space.
An echoed
Recollection
But unfillable
This vacuum.
Interminable,
The expanse,
The sense of
Loss.

Jillybeans and Neddo,
My dear, dear old friends,
I ache for the
Familiarity
In this
Cavernous remnant
Of Life”.

M.
Winter 2022

To say that I hate her
would be to suggest that
there is a version of this story
where I can still sleep with the lights off,
there is something strangely familiar
about the glow of fluorescent lights at 2 in the morning.

It is also to say that her letters no longer
gather dust in the boxes underneath my bed.
That there isn’t a picture of her still between the tired
pages of the old family bible I no longer read.
I have never been good at forgetting
the walls after dusk still remember her name.

Maybe it is because I once loved her,
Or maybe it is because I still do
Like the way Daedalus still
loved the warmth of the sun
even after it took away his everything;
I too still sometimes smile at the bringer of death.

Though this is not to say I still don’t
try to fill what the gods have named unfillable.
It is not to say I no longer believe in magic,
it is just  to say that I am tired
of trying to summon what is not coming back,
I am tired of hating me more than her.

In twilight's embrace, I sit alone,
Melancholy's touch, a gentle moan.
My heart yearns for you, my dearest love,
In these moments when the stars weep above.

Whispers of your laughter, once so near,
Now dance as echoes, faint and unclear.
Your touch, a brush of fingertips so fine,
Chased away fears, a warmth divine.

Your eyes, a galaxy of love's embrace,
Once held me close in their tender grace.
But now they dwell in distant memory,
Fading embers of a vibrant reverie.

The world, a canvas devoid of hue,
Since the day you bid this realm adieu.
No vibrant strokes, no colors bright,
Just monochrome days and endless night.

I reach out for you, in empty spaces near,
Longing for your touch, your presence so dear.
Silent tears trace paths upon my pillow's crest,
Yearning for your head upon my chest.

Our hearts, once united in rhythmic dance,
Now play a symphony of solitude's expanse.
In night's embrace, your essence I feel,
Yet cruel illusion shatters with dawn's appeal.

Alone, I navigate this world unknown,
An empty vessel in memories sown.
Your absence, an ache that pierces deep,
A void unfillable, where tears still seep.

No time or distance can heal this pain,
In my heart, our love forever remains.
Tethered eternally, our souls entwined,
Until the day our paths realign.

I'll count the stars, and whisper your name,
Hoping my love reaches you, all the same.
Until that day, know you're missed profound,
In depths of my soul, your longing resounds.

Yours in a world where colors fade away,
Ikimi Clifford Festus, forever I'll stay.

A void. With no visible end.
No edge. Boundaries not tangible.
Just as you were. A professional at leaving holes.
A crater of a footstep. No positive impressions.
Lessons. Yes.
Stories to unfold. Many untold.
For the scars they would behold.
The tears. No control.
This is why I to this day try.
To bury what was. To leave it behind.
Let it be a shadow. No disguise.
I will not let it catch me by surprise.
I wait. For the call one night.
For the hole to sink further.
I will miss you my brother.
No amends. Just emptiness.
No forgiveness. No open space left.
No wrongs to right. Nor a new page to start.
No end in sight. Perpetual pain.
Whole lot of open space. Endless.
But a pressure neither of us can fix.
Heavy weight. Blame fate.
Blame our past. All but ourselves.
No chance. Too late.
No light. We will not open our eyes.
Refuse. Too much dirt to fill back in.
Too much time. What an excuse.
I wait for the call.
You pretend it was all, nothing.
We bore swords in our words.
Bullets in our actions.
One day we shall rest on mattresses closed.
In a place we cannot escape.
Forced to repent. Accept our mistakes.
Our souls to take. A will. No fight.
Brothers by blood. Enemies by treason.
With no secure reason.
A lesion. A missing piece.
A unfillable space.
Brotherless. Still.

I'm not putting myself out there anymore
I spent enough energy
on relationships that were setup to fail
No more love-seeking
No more latching on
to whatever pretty girl comes my way
No more being a hero
I'm not a perfect man,
so I can't be your perfect man
I've spent enough time
trying to be one
for the women I've been with
I have to admit it's lonely,
but it's time to stop trying to fill
the unfillable hole

The leaves groan
And fall down
From the bare boughs
In a pitiable abundance
Like a profusely weeping
Timeless wound
Forming a carpet
Of rusted blood beneath
The waning warmth
Of melancholic sunsets
Isn't enough to infuse
Life into them
And the soulless wind
Refrains from picking
Them up
Only mocks at their plight
Which it cannot
ever fully comprehend
Soon the blanket
Of a wintry frost
Will strangle the breath
Of their dying hopes
For forever and ever
And through a dreary mist
No one will ever know
That a season of
Unrequited longing
Has passed into
An unfillable emptiness

I reached as far as I could
but I was left painted in shadow.
There was nothing left
for me to gather.
Taken away as quickly
as it was given.
Nothing lasts forever
but this barely existed.

If you love it
let it go
but I can’t bear to part with it.
It’s all the proof I have left.
My humanity.
My normality.

Emptiness lingers
with the scent of it
but it is unbearable.
The void is unfillable.
Scraping at every surface
and coming up empty.
There is nothing
nothing left.
I am alone
with my thoughts
emotions
and empty
cavernous
mind.

horrific manifestations
stuff i never want to come true
pushing myself through the monotony
never losing track of you
i'm just so far that i know
it's easy to forget how much i care
i'm worried about the things you might do
when i'm unable to be there
imagined getting the call right then
and when my phone rang i began to cry
it was just another telemarketer
but it was too real in that moment in time
imagining a world without you
broken as it is
your absence so unfillable
no way to make amends
i don't wanna have any regrets
and you're right when you say i'm wasting time
i know if i lost you today
i'd wish i'd have taken fifty flights
just to see you once
but i'm trying to not let the intrusive thoughts win
even though i can feel you fading away
a horrid paranoia sets in
please don't do this to me
i knows its not about me but i'm just afraid
i already lost him i don't wanna lose you
on the last leg of my faith

I see you and wow
Its like i can't even think
My mind can't begin to comprehend how somebody like you would ever talk to me
But its like i said when we met.
People always end up ignoring me
Im annoying and people dont like me
I look at you now and think
God what have i been doing
Thinking of you all night
Smiling when i hear your name
Think of your soft curls that spill over your sleepy eyes
Of your sweet smile
What have i been doing
Because god if you so much as smiled at me
My heart would break
Because i know how this will end
What have we been doing
You with your soft skin
That sweet smile of yours
Your beautiful eyes
And your words that made me believe, just for a second
That i was capable of the impossible
What have you done
You let me believe
Of the brush of fingertips
And the shine of moonlight on your face
You let me wonder
How you would blush when i would push back your curls
How you would smell cuddled up next to me.
You let your name become a melody that i could breathe with
A rhythm my heart would beat to
And now my words are spilling out like ink
Upon paper
The softest leaves floating in the breeze
The salty tears spilling over tender cheeks
Are all mine
The brush of lips against skin
Something i could never have
I want to stop dreaming
Because i see your face
I hear your laugh, sweeter than the soft twinkling of bells against the wind
I'm a whisper in the dark
A shout into the void of unfillable emptiness
What the hell have i done
Dreaming of you in my arms
I let myself fall
And believe that it could be you
And i tried
I really did
I tried to be the person you would want
I tried to be myself
For once
But that doesn't help anybody
Your name repeated over and over until the end of time
I fell for you and your words
That made me feel
So **** real.
I want to fall into a dreamless sleep
Without your voice a crescendo in my ears
Louder louder louder until i wake up
Why do i love you
So much that tears threaten to spill just thinking of what you are doing right now
Are you
Are you
Are you happy
I hope you are
Not with this
Or what i've said.
I mean i really want you to be happy
I want you to smile and never feel hurt
Or sad
Or broken
I want you to dream of worlds where you can do anything
Because you can

Do the demons that hide behide my eyes 
sell out my soul before I open my mouth
Do the way my arms fall around my body
Indicate I am lonely
I am sad?

At what point in my pathetic life did I just become this bag of lopsided dough?
When do I become so vuenrable 
Willing to let anyone become a friend
Instead of protecting whats left of my fragile heart
Coffee stirers for bones
wine for blood
nothing for me

Why can't I just feel love
Why does love make me feel so guilty
Why is it everytime I think of love
You're the 1st person to come to mind
Why is it everytime I try to fill this void you left in my soul
It is so unfillable
I know you say you did this out of love
But if this is love, then I dont want to know the other words meanings
hate,
abandonment
Youre not good enough
youre not special

Why do you ask about my brothers and my parents
while i am the person talking to you
Do i not exist?
Do the demons that hide behind my eyes 
Tell you secrets behind my back?
Do you know I stay awake wondering
what life would have been like if we would have stayed together
When did I become so vulnerable 
ready to attch myself to the first thing with a heart beat
Why do I let myself feel such strong connections with temporary people
Or maybe its because I hope theyre permeant 
I guess more importantly why do I still blame you
I mean its been 23 years 23
I have gotten over some pretty rough breakups faster
I just can't wrap my head around this
Was I not special?
Did I not matter?
Or did I matter to much
You never ask about me mom
Maybe its because I dont have any deformities or disabilities
Because maybe if I did you would care about me too
I feel like you didnt care at all
I felt like your life's mistake
Maybe i dont have to tell you this
I dont know who I am
Wynona, Ashley, Sapphire or WAS
I was someone
Somone who was burned for love

light rinses her hair on a taxidermic
dove, sat like wooden wavicles on a
shadow planet.
persued by a scented black candle that
smells of unfillable holes.
as a woman prospects a circumference,
tells herself she came for the music--
not the food.
an angel born of mistaken identity,
walks through the blueprint of a garden--
& is told: 'you didn't touch a thing.'
as with the involution of ears, spirals
whistle like rope thru snake skin.
an evil repellent of sorts, or a courtesy
to superstition.