I'm afraid of the above
More often than not enough

I'm afraid of the air that I breathe
I'm afraid that they're watching me

I'm afraid of going outside
Whether it's day or whether it's night

I'm afraid of the lurking shadow
Especially if it's my own

I'm afraid of the very fact
Of the courage that I lack

I'm afraid of getting sick
Cause I'm afraid of the medicine

I'm afraid of the outcome
Before I've even begun

I'm afraid I may be too late
Which makes me more afraid

I'm afraid that if I had one
I might lose it and then I'd have none

I'm afraid that you may find
What it is that I'm really like

And I'm afraid that once you do
That you'll be afraid too

Excuse me
Mr. Poetry
May I ask a question
Of you please before I leave

It's something that's
Been on my mind
For longer than
The longest time

Why I'm just a simple poet
If you must know the truth
But I promise that I'll try hard
To give a good answer to you

So go right ahead now
With what you have to say
Do your best in all of this
Don't be shy, fire away

I was just wondering
And this may sound dumb
But where in your poetry
Do all your ideas come from

What ticks the tock
Inside your head
Is there a subject
You haven't met

I'm not really sure
Of just where it starts
Perhaps the tiniest of sparks
Deep inside the heart

Or a tiny voice
Somewhere in the mind
Feeding me what I need
In the daily rhymes

Are you kidding me
Surly you jest
There must be more to it
Than what you just said

I've seen you take the sorrow
Of all of mankind
Pour it out on written page
Line by saddened line

I'm sure that that
Has something to do with it
After all you can not write about
What it is you have not lived

And if you have not lived
While in this life
What would be the sense
In what it is you write

Dear Mr. Poetry
Those are the wisest words
I belive this day
That I have heard

Thanks for explaining
It all to me
That answers my question now
As I take my leave

She dreamt of sunken people who spoke of hope
And iron hearts who bled empathy
Hunger that fed on peace
War which longed to unite with life
Immortal ethics set in practice
Children who never escaped childhood
Flowers that refused to die
And love which was incapable of lies
She dreamt of dreams coming true
But awoke to a full blown strife
Still she believed with all her might

I'm tired of beauty
incessantly meddling in my affairs

luring me to venture outside myself
revealing hidden radiance within

disguising life's dismal undercurrent
reducing it to a superficial veneer

randomly appearing by surprise
stubbornly eliciting a smile

performing alchemy on the mundane
dousing my awareness in the elixir of life

beauty...
the pulchritude of spirit...that's all it is...

"Goodbye."

My heart explodes.
Clutching my chest in pain, I sink to my knees before you.
My lips part in a silent scream as you walk away.
NO PLEASE! I want to cry.
Darkness envelopes my being
tinged red with crimson tears.
I'm so weak.
You're out of my sight
and I'm trying to salvage the pieces of my heart.
I get cut with every piece I retrieve,
it's filled with your memory.
That night in the trees,
That evening downtown...
I want to beg you to turn around,
to come back to me.
I open my mouth to speak
and hear nothing but silence...

I have faced the days of danger
Even faced the gates of hell
So why is it so difficult
When I try and face myself

I can't even look in the mirror
Fearing what I may find
Will it be me,
Or the demons I harbor inside?

Is it my soul that cries out for justice
Or the inner depth that wants to be fed
It's hard to tell in this moment of silence
As the white noise screams inside of my head

What once was wrong is now right
And I'm losing the fight
For control of my own mind
Every day I'm changing into something I don't like.
I need to face myself and confront the monsters within,
I cannot ignore them,
To ignore them is to give in and let them win

Perhaps it's not myself that I'm afraid to face
But that which I was foolish enough to create
That part of me that I don't care to see
That part of me that I can't help but hate