Death

(Written at age 25.)

Did you hear Death knock
And grumble about the lock
On the door it didn't know would be there?
Did you hear It sigh in despair
That you were trying to resist
And that It'd have to insist
On taking you?

Did you turn the music up loud
And decide to be too proud
To acknowledge that you can only ever be free
Not inside your mortality,
But outside of it?

Or did Its tired heave
Make you believe
That maybe you shouldn't fight?
Were you tempted to invite
It in
To share a Lagavulin
And ask for Its wisdom?

Did you have a conversation
About the constellation
of Life in the universe of Death?

Was It grateful for the chat
And decide that at
This time it didn't want to take you?
Did you bid it adieu?

Did you find yourself left with an inexplicable frown?

Did you finally close your eyes
And for once,
See nothing?

Look at Me

(Written October 25, 2012, at 8:36 pm.)

Wake up and look at me.
I don't know how much longer I'll be here.
Seeing recognition in your eyes
Might give me a few extra breaths
To look at you.

Wake up and look at me.
I don't know when I'll become someone else.
A familiar smile from you
Might slow the departure
Of everything I know as me.

Wake up, please, and look at me
Before everything changes except you,
And before I can't even lament that I don't know who I am
Because I'm so busy turning to stone realizing that you don't know who I am anymore, either.

Stranger.

Heart

(Written October 13, 2012, at 4:24 am.)

Stab its muscle.
Let spill its contents
On the indiscernible context.

As it empties and becomes still,
Let the colour of its contents
Seep into the topography of its paradigm.

Most parts will return
To their black, white and grey,
But some will shone a pale pink,
Some will breathe a bright red,
Others will groan under a heavy scarlet.

Look at these coloured parts.
They are all that mean anything,
The ones that retained any of it.
They absorb the liberated energy.

The pink ones will pulsate ostentatiously,
Trying to draw attention to mild matters
That once mattered.

The red ones will throb at a steady pace,
Not complaining,
But never forgetting.

The scarlet ones will barely be able to beat
Under their own weight.
They are too significant to forget,
And too dangerous to remember.

Faces will carve each other
In thick streams
In the scarlet.

Faces will stare at each other
Through thick streams
In the scarlet.

They will each feel diminished
In the gaze of the others,
And they will attempt
To extinguish themselves
For lack of definition.

If one triumphs,
And finds its way back into the muscle,
Let it.

Do it thus,
So I will know
Only if it's worth knowing.

Unfinished

(Written September 29, 2012, at 11:00 pm.)

Chew my flesh between your unforgiving teeth.
Forget the funeral and forget the wreath.
Massage my neck until it breaks.
Feed me the truth until it takes.

Kiss my fingers with unwilling lips.
In an undesiring embrace, take my hips.
Lay your palm on the lowest of my back.
Breathe once, then let the universe crack.

As the world crumbles, and you panic,
Hear my reluctant heart painfully tick.
Your head against my broken breast
Can unsatisfactorily go to rest.

Even as you dream of better realities,
Think of me as your terminal tease:
Nothing you ever wanted, yet all you had,
Painting the pathetic and singing the sad.

Feel my mouth against your chest,
Fail my desires in every test.
Scatter my pieces on every part of you,
As all the Love in the World smelts into Blue.

Breathe in the colour of the subsuming nullity.
Revel in yourself, and forget all of me.
Bite me, in farewell, one last time.
Leave me unfinished in your memory sublime.

Make or Break

(Written September 26, 2012, at 10:00 pm.)

You found some part of me I didn't know was there.
You gave it blood and you gave it air.
Then you left and it turned to stone,
And I learned that we are all alone.

You told me that when push came to shove,
I could always rely on love.
Then you moved on from this,
And proved that transience is part of bliss.

You taught me hope and taught me to believe,
That when we are willing to give, we will receive.
Then you showed that willingness to give doesn't last,
And the best can often be lost in the past.

You convinced me that unconditional exists,
And through ups and downs, love persists.
Then you proved that forgiveness is an order tall,
That mistakes of a moment can end it all.

And I'm just now wondering:

Am I better off having felt your kiss?
Or worse off aware of what I miss?

Am I better off knowing that there's love in hearts?
Or worse off knowing it ends as easily as it starts?

Did you make me?
Or did you break me?

Dead Stars

(Written September 24, 2012, at 3:15 am.)

Every dead star in the sky is us.
No longer extant,
But reaching across time to the present.

Friendship

(Written August 13, 2012, at 1:40 pm.)

Friendship is an interesting proposition,
Meant to share in one's true condition.
But life brought cynicism, and cynicism reserve,
And reserve many bumps along a presumed smooth curve.

Many thought to be fixtures walked out with a strut.
And I was left bumbling with a "what the fuck" and a "but."
Guards went up like a dick on the blue pill.
And I'd sooner freeze than learn to chill.

Yet somehow friends find a way through,
And just when you want to be alone they stick like glue.
Maybe the glue will fade and they will also be lost.
But for now I lurrrrrve them with abandon and accost.