The pretense of youthful ignorance prepaid her attractiveness for
ohh... so many reasons and times.
(wannabe predators salivate)

She knew her allure
but not if it is truly real.

At least she did realize (thank you Damion) that when the attraction fades out,
so will she...

when you trim your ***** and your mustache with the same pair of scissors
when you hand over your entire paycheck to the bartender of doom and glee
when you write a bounced check at the grocery store
when you sleep with a girl who isn’t clean
when you’re young, lost, broken and poor
when your childhood runs hard and your luck runs out
when your best friend is dead and your other friend is ******* your girl
when your dog sleeps in the afternoon and dreams of the neighborhood *****
when your nutrients gets replaced with Xanax bars over the one who just left
when your tired eyes meet the brick & mortar of strenuous labor
when the smile is so fake that it appears genuine
when you go all in on someone you weren’t 100% sure of
when you wait on bleeding knees for the unreliable god
when you bet on the boxer that crashed to the canvas
when the interest is high and the banks are closed and the creditors don’t care about grace periods
when you understand very little and you expel a whole lot
when the cord of anxiety strangles your very essence
when you turn out to be just as everyone expected

don’t worry

it’ll all turn around

and find you again

someway

somehow.

a poet's heart
is a thing of ink

pigmented with equal parts
hubris and anxiety
rage and hope
passion
and tears

narcissists filled with self loathing

composed of shouts inarticulate
and whispers of intricate craft

our thoughts and words rushing
through us
barely legible

defining our days
with explosions of fathomless obscurity
or flashes of visceral clarity

our nights consumed
in communion with paradise
while teasing secrets from the abyss

couplets and quatrains
providing us the space
to live
or to die

running breathless in free verse
we grasp at perpetuity
yet find ourselves doomed
to ephemeron

like the sky
we are rewritten each day

yet as the sky remains the sky
so do we remain
what we are

pages
in a book we can barely read

remaking and trimming

editing ourselves

to fit within the margins
of our paper souls

Thank you
for thinking I needed to listen,
thank you for believing
I am too generous to remember myself.
But I don’t feel like an afterthought
in my life—not anymore.

I’ve stopped waiting to be seen.
I see myself now—
in mirrors,
in puddles,
in the snow stretched on a lawn
where no one else is scooped but me,
and the sky that keeps showing up,
soft and unafraid, filled with purple.

There were days
I confused invisibility with peace,
but now—I sit in silence,
and it feels like breathing,
not vanishing.

There were years
I tried to earn love,
like a merit badge for good behavior—
with quiet hands
and a heart willing to split open
just to make someone feel whole.

But now—
I know it doesn’t mean being full of others.
It means being full of life—
even when I’m tired,
even when I’m messy.

I don’t feel like a supporting role anymore.
I am not waiting for someone to write me in.
I am not the pause between someone else’s sentences.
I am the storyteller,
I am the ink,
I am the paper.

And if no one claps at the end—
that’s okay. I was never performing.
I was just being a friend to myself,
with the best seats in the house,
and that is more than enough.

So thank you
for your tenderness, and rage at times.
I hold it in my palms like a gift.
But please know—this life is mine,
and I do not feel like an afterthought in it.
I feel like the beginning
of taking care of myself
when I choose you as a friend—
over and over again.

A puppy had a mouse in its mouth,  

The mouse was wrestling for a breath,  

Puppy had no compassion for mouse,  

Puppy knew only one thing that is hunger,  

Mouse was disparate to have a breath,  

A combat was there between hunger,

And a breath, what was choaked by hunger,  

Puppy like a hunger heartless and callous,  

Mouse like a breath tender and helpless.

I used to think
healing meant changing—
that I needed to shed old skins
like lobsters do,
like progress does.

The truth is,
I am the guy who wants
to sit in the back
but is always asked to be in front—
who can be a fierce storm
but would rather be the calm after,
still every version of myself,
like laundry I never put away.

We don’t change,
we just learn how
to hold ourselves better,
carry the mess quieter,
make peace with the mirror—
to be less turbulent
and more assertive—
call it healing,
even if it’s not easy.

You are a big part
of everything
that makes me better.

Some days
the storm is inside me—
a scream that learned manners
a panic attack at the dinner table.

I sit still
pretending the world isn't moving
when really—
it's me
sloshing around inside my ribcage.

I learned that healing is not forgetting—
it's watching the sky go quiet
and not flinching or exploding.
It's trusting the calm
even when I am shaking.

Some days
I anchor myself to the smallest thing—
a cat wanting to be picked up
the smell of toast
the sound of my own breath
not rushing anywhere.

I know now—
it takes practice.
I am learning
to arrive
and so will you—
unforgettable you.

Sometimes empty, sometimes full of feeling
Escaping from fear, yet, hesitant of the freedom
Looking away from the glaring light
That flows through the soulless skies

Outside there's rain
Pouring till the warm fear-ridden skies run dry
There's rain that can't be let inside the crevices
It'll flood prairies to drench a paltry mind full of vice

The heart doesn't respond to the warm smile
That kind, beady eyes and an understanding nature offer
On a cold, dead Tuesday night
It doesn't catch on fire in the damp air

It is paper thin, a fragile, brittle being that sways
To the light breeze that blows out the fire
Deep inside, whose warmth
It was never accustomed to, long ago

This twisted vessel with its worn sails
Buoyed toward the ocean for too long
I've been through these preternatural waters
Countless times, always turning back in vain

Sailing into the unknown amid the heavy gales
Hurtling into the distance where water turns into vapor
Levered by every wave that pushes along with the tide
I'm tethered by a thin thread, I turn to my heart

Now wait, from day to dusk
Come night, the stars will disappear
As more questions haunted me
They'll burn the battlements of your mind

Time often harrows those with the will to live
It brings with it profound sadness
And that's the narrow strait pushing us ahead
The oceans aren't meant for us

The mind ought to pour itself into logic
Against all notions, challenging the hindrances
Beyond all reasonable doubt
Building faith forever and ignoring the emotion

Despite having little hope left inside
Drowned in the oceanic scapes of blue and white
I'm washed by the distant sunset
Where the sun draws a line through blood red skies

Where one world ends, maybe another begins
To some the horizon may be worth reaching
But this is beyond the reach of my mortal vessel
And the mind can't fathom the distance

Yet it can take on raging storms
There is no moments of stillness for war-torn ships
So many have retreated into the night
Abandoning the journey

Hesitant on returning
Remaining blind to the brilliant sight
The piety disappears soon after
Only leaving behind a disturbed mind

Benign, hapless skies look upon the fierce eddies
That once threatened to carry them underneath
The way back takes with it the lilt of song
Only leaving behind a disturbed mind

The mind can take the beating of an arduous voyage
So show courage
In the face of utter defeat
Revealing the Achilles' heel of your spirit

You'll never hear the surface crack
But there are screams within the fiery depths
And I fear Death will take what I love most
When the structure falls, the rest won't hold

Still suspended in time
Still seeking an eternal sleep for the mind
So many times, the divine sages wander away
Into a dark copse of patterned leaves and interwoven roots

That the mildew has bowered the empty house
As gargoyles lay dry in a vast garden of vacant roses
Now barren, the thorns stick out
Scarring a mind in a state of constant fugue

It isn't my fault that this mind is ravaged by demons
It is shackled to the past when we waged destruction
It isn't my fault that the soul is a dusty tomb
It is at the mercy of time - a brief life of its own

Death will see the parts of your life
That you once held dear as memories
All as part of the incinerated earth
These possessions will become complete strangers to you

Erasing a fraying mind with pain
You'll spend years shifting mountains
So that swelling waves can fill the deserts once again
The sullied spirit can cleanse itself

Your dormant mind will never recover
From a lifelong journey of seeking forgiveness
The jagged ridges of rocky shores will hold back the tide
And soon, the dam will break unable to contain the past

Letting the waves of passion turn into violet roses
A violent desire turn into bruises
As virulent streams settle into the ocean
You'll be left with the remains of your soul

With every skipping heartbeat
There's are pauses echoing into the unknown
But like everything else, it is made of ether
And you carry it now for the rest of the way

If it means a glimpse of eternity
A moment of beauty
Then I've elevated myself in this love
It is a sinking feeling to be weightless, at times

Back into the unknown
Kicking, screaming, and tearing at the seams
The soul has fallen into an endless void
That the heart calls darkness

That the mind calls folly
That the world calls faith
That the memory calls love
And some of us call it an ocean