So that you will hear me
my words
sometimes grow thin
as the tracks of the gulls on the beaches.

Necklace, drunken bell
for your hands smooth as grapes.

And I watch my words from a long way off.
They are more yours than mine.
They climb on my old suffering like ivy.

It climbs the same way on damp walls.
You are to blame for this cruel sport.
They are fleeing from my dark lair.
You fill everything, you fill everything.

Before you they peopled the solitude that you occupy,
and they are more used to my sadness than you are.

Now I want them to say what I want to say to you
to make you hear as I want you to hear me.

The wind of anguish still hauls on them as usual.
Sometimes hurricanes of dreams still knock them over.
You listen to other voices in my painful voice.

Lament of old mouths, blood of old supplications.
Love me, companion. Don't forsake me. Follow me.
Follow me, companion, on this wave of anguish.

But my words become stained with your love.
You occupy everything, you occupy everything.

I am making them into an endless necklace
for your white hands, smooth as grapes.

There is a paradox of space for the individual in this sea of voices
An amorphous body of metaphorical sound that we avoid and ignore with our sense of selfishness and superiority
And yet we burn our civility to ashes for the sake of making sure that stranger knows we don't ******* agree with them
Here in this valley of poets, what is trending and popular, what is held dear is similar explorations of pain and adversity
Experiences of love, life, loss
And as I try and to distinguish myself by expressing my own uniqueness
I am a self indulgent hypocrit, who wants the same things as the idiots and disagreeables I try and hold myself superior to

At least here, on this little page away from the flow of superfluous information I can speak to a void of similar voices, where more come to speak than to hear, forgive me for saying

I am here to speak too
I'm no better
My voice may be different or distinct, I try to play with vocabulary and the conceptual
But you probably do the same
And art comes from pain so...
In the end, I'm still a weak ***** who holds onto to old images of love
Wishing the naked ****** friendships that took so long to build in the past will fall out of my phone when I wipe my thumb across it
And hoping the efforts to create something basic and tangible, and the efforts to create an identity worthy of societal admiration
Will deem me worthy to experience love again, part of me feels

But I'm not deluded by that. I've given up looking for something that comes when you aren't looking
The lost keys that turn up when you've looked everywhere and finally give up
Instead I am driven by the craft that I want to define me
And the satisfaction that the work gives me
It makes me happy amongst this mess of information overload and malnourishment I experience socially
By my own fault
Probably

As I let go of the catharsis of self expression now, petering out to a conclusion that has hopefully, a decent punch line
I know that I probably won't be heard, will be skipped over for stories of bitter broken hearts or tangible stories of adversity defeated
Skipped over in greater terms for the latest bag of shallow consumable ***** in the unhealthy social media world that I know you reader, hate as much as I do
The greater ocean of self expression that washes into a noisy murmur, the internet echoing the street

Who knows
You've read this haven't you
Maybe I'll get over my narcissism long enough to hear you too

Fight or flight button upgrade in process,
pleas,
beggings,
wait. Wait and see. Selah. Wait...

there. The next para-digm pop, you opt for geotime mode...
think
I am a rock... not the whole song, at this speed that takes a mortal ever.

Hyper awareness arousal, slow and steady mode...

startle response seen in squirrels and lizards and me, the re
sponsor of what... ? nada,
oftener than not.

The trigger is a ***** from a point being ig-nored in ignoble folly
iggie popped a bubble,
iggie lived an ugly life at the same time as earth was living an ugly life,

pop aster risc pop star ish pop

horse feathers as a load, ye gotta tote that bale, bher the forbidden burden.

Ye never read? Is that the message ye come t' judge. Will ye find me those winged
messengers of old, mercurial bherers of points in the right way
popping boundaries to progress, in time,

laughing at the rock I imagined I am, or am I?
Am I the rock Sisyphus rolls?

the time scale has wobbled,
ever just threatend to end free will,
-- is this suicidal imagination killing its own self?---
you can't die if you want to.
Not here.
Up the road a bit there is a bridge. Sure thing. For normals, who
never been this far before.

Would that be Sylvia Plath paying me back
for knowing nothing of the effect her work had on
the message McLuhan got...

next generations are pre-enabled to be skeptical,
the medium is the message,

resonating into ever, since October 27, 1954...

singing- chorus of smallworld voices

Soaring strings... whennn you wish
upon
a star, makes no difference where you are...

the
first American Television
generation with unformed frontal cortices in 1954,

sang that song, in their hearts, and truly,
wished on Venus, often,
that supposed to be the wishing star,
all things considered
combining into les confused knots
Pinochio/Tinkerbell dust/ Magic wand

the besom, broom, for sweeping up destruction,
Fantasia ai ai ai
was animated. We saw it with children's eyes,
in darkend rooms that poured
our mass attention into the massive window
staring into the windows of our souls,


---- the effect of truth
---- war loses its honor, its only supposed reason.
---- war it self crumbles under truth flowing in the at most fears
---- made superficial, top ply, last layer losing wind

breathe, soft yes, nothing is funny any more. Ah ah ah waht if
it always was a literal joke...
high brow,
a maze, to entertain life... in 2020 there is tech for this.

We have access to survivor networks of every imaginable ilk.
Meditations on truth, owmmm what is going on gonggggg

And they are off, all the fears and doubts and unbelievable lies
into the stretch
intendere
sistere

pop to Sysiphus Happy Now

Massive multi player game, where all non-player characters
lack masks, they do not play, the masked ones play for them, in the spirit
of
truth
told so suddenly y'gut jumps,'n' sphincters clinch...

simultaneous release of un belief, opening
empty knowledge boxes lined
with cedar, for the smell,

hope, in my chest, where my trea-sure things are.

My grandmother, the idea of her, her life was happy, as far as I knew.
Now, I know she was a  final model of mental upgrades
to the enregizing system we all share,
at v.1.0 white of the egg dna,
some 120 kya a[kilo years ago}... there have been upgrades and repairs

to many lines of YMRCA's since she wombed her way into
our family history,

it must be quite a story, if we can imagine mito mom mighta had a whole

dreamtime life where she snipped the thread of all the other wives,

a vision, she says I see, and I see I say, this is the way

prophecy woiks, woopsie daisy jes' dropptabebe, do a li'l dance,

weep 'n' moan, what could be woice, than a cajun gramma lover voice?

singin' sweet by and by
so long no longer means a thing,

things being what they are, and we being mere words, working
through true trauma beings

lining up for gratulation, grace for grace, eye to eye.
Bad guys lose, good guys win.

_ like I said, there will be times you must start over..
_ but the game goes on.

They don't call me often, but I always  know it's them
When the calls come late at night, or
At moments that pressures from every other part my life
Are unbearable-

That's when they call

With life or death issues
Who is sick or leaving their spouse or
-God forbid I ever get this one again-
In the hospital having failed a suicide?

They call me and I know in their voices
Things are either wrong or very wrong

And something takes over in me, a calm in my voice
A clear head as my heart, which they can't detect,
Races into overdrive and I have to sit or I will fall.

I listen and hear my words as if they were spoken by someone else
Clear they are, and soft, and loving
I wonder how because they come from a man who feels
The pain of his child as his own pain
Yet the words don't betray that…not so far anyway.

These are the times they listen to me without the dismissal
Of the young for the generation above them.
This is when I am Dad, not "the old man"
I weigh more during these calls but I lose more of me to them.

But I don't miss what I have given
Any more than my mother missed what she gave me.

For seasons the walled meadow
south of the house built of its stone
grows up in shepherd's purse and thistles
the weeds share April as a secret
finches disguised as summer earth
click the drying seeds
mice run over rags of parchment in August
the hare keeps looking up remembering
a hidden joy fills the songs of the cicadas

two days' rain wakes the green in the pastures
crows agree and hawks shriek with naked voices
on all sides the dark oak woods leap up and shine
the long stony meadow is plowed at last and lies
all day bare
I consider life after life as treasures
oh it is the autumn light

that brings everything back in one hand
the light again of beginnings
the amber appearing as amber

A reason to live in the lifeless

Hope in lost dreams
Solitude behind broken walls
Creativity from empty pages

Wisdom in foolishness
Knowledge from silent mouths
Voices in a deaf crowd

Love from a motionless heart.

The quickest way to fall apart
Is to pick up the broken pieces of yourself
So we hold ourselves together
And we climb out of our beds
Every morning, we arise and meet the day
Holding our guts in our hands
Wearing scarred hearts on our sleeves

The hardest things in life
Are the little ones
But a thousand pinpricks bleed us dry
And the moments move so swiftly
We feel the pressure in our skulls
Listening to the voices of our fears and doubts
Anxieties clawing to get out

The strongest ones I know
Are the ones who had to fight alone
Nobody else could see their demons
Or carry the weight of the world
Which rested squarely on their shoulders
Dying would be so easy a thing for us
Living well is the real challenge we must face

Empty inside
Smiling out
Trying not to listen
As voices shout

Burns and bruises
Matches and flames
Cuts and Razors
Scars and Bloodstains

How'd that get there
It's only a scratch
A mere paper cut
It was just the cat

Maybe they're gullible
Or they just don't care
Either way doesn't matter
To unanswered prayer

the voices whisper

they call out to me

They scream

They laugh at me



Should I listen?

Should I care?



The screaming won't stop

I can't tell the difference

between the screaming in my head

and my own



Stop it, stop!

I can't ignore them anymore



For the voices whisper

They call out to me

They scream

They laugh at me



I can't ignore them anymore

No, don't pity me

They are right

and this is my goodbye

The Prelude begins with:

The vibrations,
     Of a cell phone alarm put on snooze.
          Creating a slow start.
The buzz,
     Of a hair dryer.
          Making me speed up.
The deep thump,
     Of feet .
          The accompanying cadence,
               Of creaky floors.
The reeds squeaking,
     Of my bed,
          and the door.
The cymbals slap-slap,
     Of feet
         hitting the floor.

And now the song get’s going with:

The roar,
     Of students on the way to class.
The bright melody,
     Of laughter.
The slow harmony,
     Of inside jokes.
The percussion,
     Of pencils tapping
          and pages turning.
The brass line,
     Of teacher’s voices.
The bass drum,
     Of snores
          In math class.

Now for variations on the theme:

The triple forte,
     Of lunch,
          And final bells.
The frenzied trills,
     Of finishing homework.
The rushed bridge,
     Of practices,
          With the same melody.

And finally the finale:

The decrescendo,
     Of the ride home.
The ritardando,
     Of the walk inside.
The final burst,
     Of sound
          As the day is retold.
The squeak,
     Of the bed
          As I lay down.
The yell,
     Of good night.
The cut-off,
     Of my eyes finally closing.

Torch light illuminates the chamber.    
The porcelain dungeon...    
      
Lost in darkness.    
Room keeps spinning...    
      
Tearing wakeful memories,    
I awaken from a restless sleep...    
      
In the dungeon there is still creeping    
      
Like piercing eyes watching...    
I feel their gaze    
      
Like wandering spirits voices...    
I hear them whispering    
      
Silent like they're listening...    
But I am now alone.

She sent a package
tied in this biege tweed cord.

It turned out to
be a picture of you two
at the lake,
that day it was cold
and she wore that beanie with the flames,
her hair all curly and escaping,
your lips all red and chapped.

A folded note tucked on the inside
of the frame reads:

"I have Connie,
*******

Love always,
smiley-face,
smiley-face
smiley-face,
smiley-face,
me."

­Connie: your/her rat terrier.

You put the picture
in its black frame
on the tv table.

The tweed
you nail
to two spaced planks
on the wall above the tv.

It's like abstract
modernist-expressionist-
constructionist-art.

It's just one string.

A taut cord
of brown tweed.

The black night comes,
over and over,
over and over,
she doesn't return,
but the tweed remains
as taut as a fingernail
or an exposed artery.

Somehow
it's so human and obstinate
that the woven vertebrae
seems to curve minutely
and femininely.

As time passes,
the tweed moves
from beige
to golden
and gravitational.

A call to a friend goes something like this:
"Come over here, I've got this amazing thing on my wall."

The friend, Eric,
calls more friends.

The friends come over,
all piling around this golden tweed
after they've taken stock of the kitchen
and Wild Turkey.


They take turns
plucking it,
thumbing it,
putting their ears to it,
and studying it,
all
at your insistence.

Somebody,
******* Eric,
coughs in the room.
More people begin to cough.

Eric walks up
to the the string,
that is nailed at top
and bottom
on two spaced planks.



Eric gives it a final hard tug,
snapping it like a belt.

the tweed hums and shivers off a few flakes
of dust and amber material.

"I've just wasted five minutes
with this thing,"
Eric says

to the string,
and you.

Eric speaks for the group.

He turns and leaves,
taking the whole group of
twenty
with him.

They trail behind Eric
like a great, long tail
flicking
and knocking things over
in your apartment
out of sheer agitation
on the way out.

The golden gravity subsumes you.

You do not close the door behind them,
you can't even hear their tiny, black voices
as they all clamor into the elevator
and ding.

I'm drowning in my fears
Crying all these tears
The sadness overbearing
The messed up voices all I'm hearing
When will the abuse end?
Will this shattered soul deserve a friend?
Someone who does not treat me like an outlaw
But loves me for every part and pushes through my flaws
I can't take this on slaughter each night...
I'm breaking more with every fight...

Rosanna knew she was kidnapped. She was taken all those years ago. She never knew her new family was really as bad as they were. Her older brother Liam changed after high school. He wasn't ever really normal. This was something she always knew.
Being nine years younger than him, he was her protector. The day he snapped was about a week after he turned nineteen. He killed his parents and buried there bodies in unmarked graves behind the house. He was ready to **** himself when Rosanna got home from school.
He knew that before he took his life that there was something she should know. He told her that she was adopted legally but not obtained that way. The family that adopted her were the ones that took her away. He told her that he loved and her birthday was her own, that he had killed their parents and she would have to survive on her own. He said his final goodbye but he never would have known that she would snap to that day and he wouldn't let go.
She took the gun from his hands and threw it out the window. She pulled a chair over from the kitchen table and smacked her brother in the head with tears rolling down her face. She told him he was an idiot for forgetting the promise that he made just a few years ago. He said she'd never be alone, that he'd always be there. She reminded him of this while hugging him around the waist.
He wanted to be alone and tried to push her away. She wouldn't have it, especially not today. This only made her hold on tighter to the only family she had left. He picked her up and carried her back up to his room. She was still crying when he sat down on his bed and told her that he was sorry. She cried in his arms, late into the night.
She woke in her brothers room, on his empty bed. Frantically she ran down stairs to find her brother there. He was setting the kitchen table with a breakfast made for two. He saw her and he smiled. He went and scooped her up. He was feeling sorry for making her cry. He didn't  know his actions were the partial onset of her taking her life.
She was diagnosed as schizophrenic exactly one year from that day. He had no idea she would trip the way she did. The year she turned fifteen she went on a trip. She heard her brother and her boyfriend, they were the voices in her head. They were telling her to **** herself and that is what she did.
She thought about taking a rope and jumping from the balcony but she didn't want to display herself  for all the world to see. Her next option was to take a knife and slit both her wrists but that was just the thing everyone would expect. Finally she came to the decision such as this, she would get the bottle of ibuprofen and take all the pills at once.
Her brother had come home to find her laying on her bed. He thought she was sleeping but really she was dead. She wasn't too far gone, though, she was barely breathing. He sat her up against the bed, laid a towel on her lap and stuck his finger down her throat. She threw up the contents of her stomach. The whole pills and all.
She woke up unexpectedly in her brother arms. Another body was now laying in another unmarked grave. This one belonged to her ex-boyfriend. Liam's reason for this crime was this and only this. His sister nearly took her life because of the voices that were triggered when her boyfriend told her to the face that he was cheating on her.
He got all this from the note that was on the bed beside her. When she laid there on her bed going cold from all the poison. After he had saved her life he took the life of the person that didn't deserve any affection from his angel ever again.
Liam now has a new toy, a nineteen year old name Niall. It's been four years from the day his sister tried to take her life. She is happy with a guy that she can truly love. Caleb is the cutest thing and he doesn't mind that sometimes she is going to breakdown and he will see her cry. He doesn't even mind that fact he's going to have to share with Niall and Liam at times. She knows that Caleb will protect her just like Liam had. He knows of Liam's crimes. It's all happily ever after because her heart won't be broken this time.

The world needs more lovers
With rose colored glasses
Forever worn
With glass hearts
And stoneless hands
With roses growing
Down their spines
And stardust
Coating their lungs
The world needs more dreamers
With centuries in their cells
And galaxies in their bones
With fiery passion
Boiling their blood
With trembling voices
And wonder in their eyes
With music in their souls
And freedom on their minds
The world needs more you's
Who are more than a number
And are wildly outspoken
Who have an insatiable lust
For knowledge
Who love endlessly
And dream all day
Who search for the beautiful things
Only our hearts can see

you are a blue button down, filled to the brim with smiling, sparkling, brown-eyed boy

she is a small blond girl in a gray sweater. you kissed the top of her head, and she leaned into your arms: smiling, safe, dancing

the man in the front of the room was giving a grand speech about dreams, about the hidden passions we fail to act upon;

i couldn’t stop staring at your hands.

it has been a while since my feet have graced the dance floor. i’m not sure if i remember the way the music sounds, but i know the steps: one-two-three, one-two-three, kiss, linger, leave. it’s muscle memory, it’s clockwork.

often, i think about the one who taught me how to dance. he twirled me around so quickly, it felt like floating, up into the sky, fingertips brushing the clouds. sometimes, i think i’m still dizzy.

you are a warm winter coat, all coziness and comfort and soft, slow smiles and sleepy voices on Sunday mornings

i am a small dark-haired girl who can’t quite figure out how all of her limbs fit together. i would dive off cliffs if it meant i could land in your arms.

you are the very best parts of all the things i should not want

the worst part is, i actually believe you could fix me.

Waxing Eloquent: Life, Death, and Everything in Between

Sessions:
I: Birth of a Song
II: Experience of All
III: Loving and Longing
IV: Life
V: Adventures at the Edge
VI: Transition
VII: What Comes After
VIII: Another Brick in the Wall


Old age hath yet his honor and his toil,
Death closes all: But something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done.
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: The slow moon climbs: the Deep
Moans round with many voices, Come my Friend!

I:

I beat away several pounds of unneeded and unwanted flora. The brush was becoming increasingly thick. Sad, but I had no choice. The fruit that had sustained me had shriveled, disappeared! My choices were few. Either stay in the oasis where now only water remained, or take my chances with whatever lay beyond, outside of my paradise.
How loathe I was to leave the oasis!
I looked around, distraught with my efforts. It was getting hotter and hotter. It was sweltering outside, and it felt as if my entire body was being compressed and beaten down by the heat. The cool breeze and the rippling water were far behind me now. The jungle held no care. I pushed on.
The path narrowed. I tried several times to push my way forward, but something held me back. The jungle tried to stop me but I continued pushing the greenery away. I could feel it! There was a clearing up ahead. I can even see it now!
But it was so far away! I couldn’t go on… there was no relief, the jungle was relentless!
But with a sudden, final, desperate heave, I was through!
What is this? The entire land is white! I squint and peer a bit harder; The world comes into focus.

……

Dear God,
The Beauty!

II:

The top of the mountain is a lonely place. Overlooking the crystal peaks from my frozen sanctuary, it’s as if everything seems like nothing really matters. The problems of the earth are no longer my concern. I must be content with being the watcher. I have no true power however; no true reason for my haughty airs. It is simply an illusion granted by the monolith.
The cold is near unbearable. The skies don’t show it though. There is no sign of all the freezing rain, and all the snow that lies below. All that exists is a single moment of perfect clarity and reflection, untainted by anything.
The sun hangs at the lower edge of the eastern sky, partially obscured by the crystal peaks. Such power! Even the sun cannot move them, Its rays blocked by their forms. A lightshow emerges, terrific hues play over the scene, giving the entire skyscape a pastel aura; Orange near the horizon, and red, then purple, and finally a dark, dark blue as the sky reveals itself. A single bold star defies the sun, refusing to give up it’s light just yet. The moon is the stars consort, and they stand together in inevitable rebellion.
It is a time of compromise however; The sun and the moon can coexist. They agree for that a few moments, they can share the sky. The harmony remains unbroken for the moment.
Poetry? Prose? No. It is simply an experience. A discovery for the curious and bold; The ones of wit and cunning. The sun paints no picture, there is no armistice in the heavens. The sun and the moon hold no compacts, and I?

I start back down the mountain.


III.


A winter’s day came through with eyes for me,
And it gave to my person a lovely gift,
One of sweet charm and a passionate wit
Who would come with me to the Azure Sea.
True, unworthy I was of her, indeed-
But even her longing look was a lift!-
Given to me by one of perfect lips,
And a stout heart beside her perfumed breeze.
Her smile would give Queen Helen envy,
And her gaze could melt a man’s icy heart,
Her laugh would give pleasure never-ending,
And a frown could give a titan a start.
I simply cannot be without this light,
And I will fight forever for the right.

Will you join me for forever, and go to the Azure Sea together?

IV.

The man looked over the edge of the cliff, contemplating his fate. Thoughts raged through his mind; the doom at the bottom of the ravine, the loss of his Lady, the end of the world. Well, his world at least.
It was a terribly folly he had made the autumn day, as the leaves were burning. After everything he had done, seeing the Cascading Falls, watching the Pandorian Sunrise, climbing Mount Gaze, it was as if everything was a dream. Could his misfortune be real? Surely there was no such injustice in this world! No kind God would allow such things to occur. She didn’t deserve such a fate that befell her! The Azure Sea would have to wait, there was no reason for him to pursue it any longer.
He threw her ruby brooch off of the cliff.
“I am only a man! Do I deserve no sympathy?” The wind wailed, but not for him.
He stepped over the edge of the abyss.

........

“Wake up! You shouldn’t have drunk so much!” The man lifted his head slightly off the table to meet his wife’s gaze. Looking into her eyes, even through his alcohol-induced delirium he could see the loving look in her eyes. A tear slipped down his cheek.
“Love, you’ll never lose me. I may go away, but in the end….” He looked at her.
“Nothing but nothing could keep us apart. Let’s get ready, our ship leaves soon. The Azure Sea waits.” The man grinned, and he sat up. Together they exited the inn’s bar.

.........

The world will never wait for those who tread it’s path slowly, for those the Azure Sea is the end. The ones who travel the Sea have had their fill of the surface life and seek to forge a new path into the great unknown, unrestricted by the laws of the world. They seek something, something out there in its waves.
The story goes that people who travel the Azure Sea must relive every moment of their life, and at the end, they will realize the truth; The reason for their existence.
And so, Life continues, and the Azure Sea will reveal all. The ship awaits, and forever will not be left alone.



V.

Bronzed waves reconcile with my bow.
Liars, they rescind and form a new front.
Doldrums are occurring now,
Foretelling travel for at least another month.
The season? I cannot truly know,
However the sea holds no such compunction.
Unforgivingly my ship is lashed with rain and snow,
And I clear it, only to find another junction.
Where? Where am I headed?
You ask - Well I can honestly say:
My purpose is to go where even God hasn’t tread,
And find my unknown self along the way.
The destination, Good Lady! Is the end of the world-
The base of the endless falls.
To find the step where Cerebrus lays curled,
To hear the trumpet echo in the Great Hall.
Hark! Over the horizon is the end!
Haste! We’re almost finished with the Azure Sea!
Keep tight! We’re almost of the great bend,
The amber light has ended, now arrives the Eve!
A hall of divinity promises a hallowed tryst,
I.. I can finally see!
Friend, I am truly sorry for this,
But I cannot let forever be.


VI.

Blazing stars will give
Themselves to a heart’s lone aria
Shining with crystal.



VII.

Pastels flow and curve in all directions, rivers
filled
With….
Wondrous!
Creeping - slowly now, over the hill….
What is this! The converse of love-
Blasted landscape, cross the line-
Involved with an eternal struggle?
Absurd!
Beauty and the Beast, An obvious choice!
But why does the light feel so cold
And the dark just the same?
A disguise to hide the truth!
A trick for those uninformed!
A world for the ignorant,
I won’t stay here-
I won’t!
Love! --…
Back to the sand, Back to nowhere land I go…


Salvation was in a single grain of sand,
The end a mist-cover rift.
(I cannot live by omnipotent hand)
I will gladly return to no-where land,
If it means I won’t accept the gift.

Angels, do you hear me?


VII.


The woman sits on the boat, her husband in her arms. Waves beat against the side of the boat, and the night sky shrouds everything. Land is just ahead of her, at most a day away.
The other end of the Azure Sea.
She cradles her husbands head and holds him close. Tears stream out of her eyes and she thinks of all the things that they went through together. Sharp pain racks her, and she sobs even more.
She looks up into the sky, her eyes blurred by her tears. She sees something….something streaming through the sky. She rubs her face and gets a better look.
A series of stars arrange themselves into glowing arches, a single ray of light dividing them. They glow with the magnificence of the divine, a chorus for the ages. Then, suddenly, the image explodes into a series of shooting stars, sending a shower of brilliant luminescence everywhere, and revealing the new sunrise. The light illuminates her husband’s face, showing the smile that she couldn’t have seen in the darkness.
“Love, did you find what you were looking for?” She asks softly.
She already knew the answer and the world faded-

Just another brick in the wall.


-

‘Tis not to late to seek a newer world!
Push off, and being well in order smite
the sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, Until I die.

Tennyson, Ulysses

my eyes stay closed as i awake
darkness staring daylights grace
do I venture into daylight
eyes stay shut into the mist

I hear voices yet move aint there
talking at me still i stare
blackness looking out i see
wishing daylight i should be

doctors.. nurses say all this
yet the dark and blackness lives
wake me from this so called dream
bring me life ..reality

Blinding bright lights and,screeching sirens. Loud yelling voices,the feel of tightening handcuffs. Back seat of a cop car,I'm thinking this is where my time is going to end.

        Thinking about my baby girl, and her soft blue eyes. What does she think,what's
        On her little mind? A little angel who is so warm hearted and innocent,I hope to
            God I never have to hear her cries..knowing I'm the cause of the pain she's
                                                              Feeling inside.

How could I do this to her...to me....to us!? Causing feelings of broken trust, choosing to deface a
Love, feeling trapped..choosing to be on the devils side.

          How Can I break loose from this,one of a kind,truly,****** up,love twisted homicide!?
          Im not. It's not. It's never giving me up,no matter how hard I sincerely try. It feels
          Impossible,while It literally feels of being squeezed,in the grips of an addicting,
                                Controlling,unforgiving,relentless nightmare.
                                                       With the monster.

It hurts to say,that even the strongest feel of genuine love,isn't even enough to save me.
I'm addicted to this love thing,and even I know,it will never fade nor leave my memory
                                      For good,and stay away once and for all.

Trying to be free is not an option. It's like they say,and everyone has heard it before...once
You try it,that's the end of what once was normal. This lifestyle is now normal. For me it
                                                       Was love at first taste.
                        Now I'm willingly a prisoner,drowning in a forever life of sorrow.

Unforgettable,and unable to forgive. I'm forever stuck with overwhelming hunger pains,
Hopefully one day I will no longer fiend for our dangerous,killing love, but for now the soul
Of a once beautiful,pure human being...has been possessed,and the soul has become dark,and
                  Cold..keeping faith that one day,I'll be strong enough to walk away.

  I will never feel the same as i did before. the damage has been done, theres no changing that.
  I hope someday I can feel relief,and feel love again. Not happening as long as the monster has
                                                                   A hold of me.
                                                        TILL **** DO US PART.

the woman with ancient eyes cradles her rosy-cheeked daughter,
wide-eyed and bursting with the innocence of the youth--
she is a tenement child, raised gracefully in the shadowed slums of her father's mistakes,
wears a tattered dress, spinning alone in a whirlwind of dust mites and silenced laughter.
and when she hears tales of the children with taffeta dresses and China dolls, she
smiles--
out of love, replacing envy with euphoric contentment, because
she has her mama's eyes, the voices
of the fatherless children
singing along to her same song,
shouting cries of hope against the crumbling walls
of a broken world she is beginning to heal.

For as far as I can remember I've been going thru so much hurt, so much pain... That only a night filled with a soaked pillow from which my eyes filled with tears that flowed dwn the cheeks of a woman who has a inner demon that's ready to unleash and punish all whom have caused her pain.. Ppl tell me things but yet their actions don't compare.. I look at them with anger but keep a silent tongue, cause if they knew the words I wanted to say.. they wouldn't be able to handle the raft of my rage.. I've been hurt in so many ways that the soft spoken person, caring person that I once was is now gone and sleeping within me that I dnt knw what or how I can awaken her.. maybe I need that one person to come and make her magically appear, or maybe it's gonna take some deep meditation on my own to bring her forth. But I'm afraid that this person I've become is holding my inner beauty hostage and is not willing to allow her to come forth ever again. I've been waiting for so long to be loved that it has now just become a laughing matter that my evil side just smirk and grin upon saying.. **** love it'll never come so just let it be.. I still have moments when the beauty inside me voices out but is still trapped to where she can't come out. So she sleeps now within me while the other person lingers on.. Who has the heart or the strength to awaken my sleeping beauty.. for I have grown weak and can no longer fight.. the other person I have become!

(A play in one act.)

The Knight.
The Lady.

Voices of men and women on the ground at the foot of the tower.
The voice of the Knight’s Page.



     The top of a high battlemented tower of a castle.  A stone ledge,
     which serves as a seat, extends part way around the parapet.
     Small clouds float by in the blue sky, and occasionally a swallow passes.
     Entrance R. from an unseen stairway which is supposed to extend around
     the outside of the tower.

The Lady (unseen).
Oh do not climb so fast, for I am faint
With looking down the tower to where the earth
Lies dreaming in the sun.  I fear to fall.

The Knight (unseen).
Lean on me, love, my love, and look not down.

L.
Call me not “love”, call me your conquered foe,
That now, since you have battered down her gates,
Gives you the keys that lock the highest tower
And mounts with you to prove her homage true;
Oh bid me go no farther lest I fall,
My foot has slipped upon the rain-worn stones,
Why are the stairs so narrow and so steep?
Let us go back, my lord.

K.
                           Are you afraid,
Who were so dauntless till the walls gave way?
Courage, my sweet.  I would that I could climb
A thousand times by wind-swept stairs like these,
That lead so near to heaven.

L.
                              Sir, you may,
You are a knight and very valorous;
I am a woman.  I shall never come
This way but once.
(The Knight and the Lady appear on the top of the tower.)

K.
                     Kiss me at last, my love.

L.
Oh, my sweet lord, I am too tired to kiss.
Look how the earth is like an emerald,
With rivers veined and flawed with fallow fields.

K.  (Lifting her veil)
Then I kiss you, a thousand thousand kisses
For all the days ere I had won to you
Beyond the walls and gates you barred so close.
Call me at last your love, your castle’s lord.

L.  (After a pause)
I love you.

(She kisses him.  Her veil blows away like a white butterfly
over the parapet.  Faint cries and laughter from men and women
under the tower.)

Men and Women.
The veil, the lady’s veil!

(The knight takes the lady in his arms.)

L.
My lord, I pray you loose me from your arms
Lest that my people see how much we love.

K.
May they not see us?  All of them have loved.

L.
But you have been an enemy, my lord,
With walls between us and with moss-grown moats,
Now on a sudden must I kiss your mouth?
I who was taught before I learned to speak
That all my house was hostile unto yours,
Now can I put my head against your breast
Here in the sight of all who choose to come?

K.
Are we not past the caring for their eyes
And nearer to the heaven than to earth?
Look up and see.

L.
                   I only see your face.

(She touches his hair with her hands.  Murmuring under the tower.)

K.
Why came we here in all the noon-day light
With only darting swallows over us
To make a speck of darkness on the sun?
Let us go down where walls will shut us round.
Your castle has a hundred quiet halls,
A hundred chambers, where the shadows lie
On things put by, forgotten long ago.
Forgotten lutes with strings that Time has slackened,
We two shall draw them close and bid them sing—
Forgotten games, forgotten books still open
Where you had laid them by at vesper-time,
And your embroidery, whereon half-worked
Weeps Amor wounded by a rose’s thorn.
Shall I not see the room in which you slept,
Palpitant still and breathing of your thoughts,
Where maiden dreams adown the ways of sleep
Swept noiselessly with damosels and knights
To tourneys where the trumpet made no sound,
Blow as he might, the scarlet trumpeter,
And were the dreams not sometimes brimmed with tears
That waked you when the night was loneliest?
Will you not bring me to your oratory
Where prayers arose like little birds set free
Still upward, upward without sound of flight?
Shall I not find your turrets toward the north,
Where you defied white winter armed for war;
Your southern casements where the sun blows in
Between the leaf-bent boughs the wind has lifted?
Shall we not see the sunrise toward the east,
Watch dawn by dawn the rose of day unfolding
Its golden-hearted beauty sovereignly;
And toward the west look quietly at evening?
Shall I not see all these and all your treasures?
In carven coffers hidden in the dark
Have you not laid a sapphire lit with flame
And amethysts set round with deep-wrought gold,
Perhaps a ruby?

L.
                  All my gems are yours
And all my chambers curtained from the sun.
My lord shall see them all, in time, in time.


(The sun begins to sink.)

K.
Shall I not see them now?  To-day, to-night?

L.
How could I show you in one day, my lord,
My castle and my treasures and my tower?
Let all the days to come suffice for this
Since all the past days made them what they are.
You will not be impatient, my sweet lord.
Some of the halls have long been locked and barred,
And some have secret doors and hard to find
Till suddenly you touch them unawares,
And down a sable way runs silver light.
We two will search together for the keys,
But not to-day.  Let us sit here to-day,
Since all is yours and always will be yours.

(The stars appear faintly one by one.)

K.  (After a pause.)
I grow a little drowsy with the dusk.

L.  (Singing.)
    There was a man that loved a maid,
    (Sleep and take your rest)
    Over her lips his kiss was laid,
    Over her heart, his breast.

(The knight sleeps.)

    All of his vows were sweet to hear,
    Sweet was his kiss to take;
    Why was her breast so quick to fear,
    Why was her heart, to break?

    Why was the man so glad to woo?
    (Sleep and take your rest)
    Why were the maiden’s words so few—

(She sees that he is asleep, and slipping off her long cloak-like
outer garment, she pillows his head upon it against the parapet,
and half kneeling at his feet she sings very softly:)

    I love you, I love you, I love you,
    I am the flower at your feet,
    The birds and the stars are above you,
    My place is more sweet.

    The birds and the stars are above you,
    They envy the flower in the grass,
    For I, only I, while I love you
    Can die as you pass.

(Light clouds veil the stars, growing denser constantly.
The castle bell rings for vespers, and rising, the lady moves
to a corner of the parapet and kneels there.)

L.
Ave Maria! gratia plena, Dominus—

Voice of the Page (from the foot of the tower.)
My lord, my lord, they call for you at court!

(The knight wakes.  It is now quite dark.)

There is a tourney toward; your enemy
Has challenged you.  My lord, make haste to come!

(The knight rises and gropes his way toward the stairs.)

K.
I will make haste.  Await me where you are.

(To himself.)
There was a lady on this tower with me—

(He glances around hurriedly but does not see her in the darkness.)

Page.
My lord has far to ride before the dawn!

K.  (To himself.)
Why should I tarry?

(To the page.)
Bring my horse and shield!

(He descends.  As the noise of his footfall on the stairs dies away,
the lady gropes toward the stairway, then turns suddenly, and going to
the ledge where they have sat, she throws herself over the parapet.)


CURTAIN.

All she ever wanted was to be heard,
Not through her voice or speech,
But actually listen,
Of what she didn't say.

She's tired of people saying that its not real,
That its just her voices in her head,
She knows that in the back of her mind,
Those things are real,
And its been taking a toll on herself.

They're telling her that's not how she actually feel,
But they have never been hungry like her,
Starving for a peace of mind,
How her worries are actually hurting her.

Someone who has never seen her book;
Read her written pages,
Could not begin to imagine the horrors,
Where nightmare and realities are alike.


-HIY