A storm is raging
The heat of my heart beating
Burns me from the inside
I can not bear it much longer
Tag Archives: poetry
I fell asleep but my dreams chased me away
The nausea of what I’d done still in my head as if to say
That it was not a nightmare but a premonition
A promise of my continued condition
That there is no peace to be had in the future
That I should just tear at this suture
To let all the chaos flow from me like a river
And into the void my soul I should deliver
The Train
Last night I watched a train enamored with it’s presence and show
I wondered what it’d be like to race one, really give it a go
Or cross it’s path and leave this world in a violent spray of sparks and fire
The sound of screeching metal the last song I’d ever hear, bellowing higher
Than any scream I could muster, than any cry of anguish I could ever hope to make
But it didn’t take any energy to not accelerate, another instance where my own life I could not take
The simple beauty of the metal wheels hurling past me was enough for me
It’s speeding mass a reminder that no matter what I do there’s a one way to guarantee
An end to the chaos in my mind, a simple solution to a tiny complex conundrum
So I closed my eyes and just listened to the train sing away my depression’s tantrum
Who knows
I want to give you better but that might not be me
It’s just like me to not see what kind of man I am
All this time I’ve been hiding the sadness in me
Or maybe you saw it in me
Who knows
Killing myself every other night because it’d feel so good to just not
To just not be the thing that held you down, to not be the thing that held me
So close to the ground, I’d hate to be buried because some of me would exist
Isn’t that sick
Isn’t it funny, I’ve been making jokes at my expense
People have been laughing that awkward laugh like where they’re looking
At the person next to me so they don’t have to make eye contact
It’s the burden of my presence but I think I’d be happier if I wasn’t present
At least I couldn’t be depressed
I wouldn’t forced to see the happiness in everyone around me
Or I won’t let me or I won’t let me
Who knows
It’s all in me but I can’t seem to parse through it
Breathing has become weirder like the irregular fluttering of a hurt butterfly
I catch myself thinking of what it could mean to be free
And if that freedom comes at the end of a barrel or at the top of a ladder
Like atop of a mountain there’ll be salvation for this turmoil
Who knows
I’m on one of those trips again
I’m in love with the sky when the sun is going down
Like maybe it’d be that way when I ride off into it
I’m the king of nothing but me but that’s nothing worth being
Kiva
My cousin took a shotgun and shot himself when I was young
He was cooler than I’ll ever be and had a silver tongue
But a mother had to find her son that day
A mother had to try and piece together a memory of his smiling face from all the little pieces left behind
A mother had to clean those walls and the sheets but a mother could never clean her mind
Of the image of her only child
Recently I haven’t been able to stop thinking about them
I remember gathering at a home and all the women in our family screaming in agony surrounding her on a bed
Her husband, a bear of a man who I had never known without a smile, just staring blankly at the front door down the hall
Surrounded by quiet men but somehow seeming a million miles away and a thousand feet tall
It kills me to say this but I think that he was waiting for his son to walk in
The waves of despair that bellowed out from them was deafening but even then I knew to force myself to listen
She didn’t speak English very well and before we hadn’t talked much because I think she considered the language barrier a burden
But after she never spoke to me, seeing a little brown boy with a beating heart must have been agony
She would smile at me though and it was the most loving and devastating smile I have ever seen
She would touch my face and bring me so much food it’d felt like my blood was mostly anti-histamine
I think about them all the time because I wonder if he’d have done it if he knew what he left behind
I think about him all the time now because I’d like to know if he’d do it one more time
Because I’ve been thinking about the pros and cons of suicide
I keep weighing the suffering of my breathing against those who would care if I died
What my mothers face would be like whenever she looked at my brother
If he’d be the one to break the cycle or if he’d be another
Tragedy, one more chain in a link of broken sons
I don’t want to be a burning memory like a field of blood soaked suns
I’m okay
I’m not well, but I’m okay I guess
Just a trickle of whispers adding to my troubled existence
A constant tug to shoot all of my sorrow out
But I’m not sure if that’s what I want to talk about
Maybe for a moment instead talk about the growth in mental health
Bloodied knuckles that have racked against that door to a better self
I have a schedule now, items to keep myself busy and on track
I am not without motivation but it takes concerted effort of which I fear I lack
But growth is not a series of uninterrupted steps to the end
It’s faltering through a looped and winding road of memories
Waking up further back than I was, clawing at the dirt hoping for remedies
I’m getting better and clearer
But I don’t think happiness is much nearer
There’s a good chance it might be
But I worry that I’ve plucked out my eyes and I’m wandering blindly
Guided by a numbed sense of touch and a nose filled with ash
I do hear well though, not just the whispers but faint laughs in cache
Playing louder or softer down different paths so I try to find it’s crescendo
I’m not honestly sure if it’s progress or just an echo
Waking up is becoming less and less of a tragedy every day
I’m not well but I’m okay
If I hurt you
I want to keep holding on
Warm my heart with this golden sun
Stability’s just a block away
Keep walking is what they say
Yeah! Yeah, I know
Yo, but do I though?
Careless with my body, baby
I’m just one misstep from crazy
I wonder if I love the calamity of my insanity
It’s a cold caress on the ember and coals of my hearth
We both know that it is fifty-fifty if I ever find my worth
I used to be to happy I think
I wonder if that’s true
A little kid chasing the dream of a family
Is that me?
Is that a false memory?
Do I really feel pain this intensely?
I’d hate to think so but then again I know I do
Hey you little asshole let me fucking love you
Sorry about that, my inner child likes to play hide and…stay fucking hidden I guess?
He’s a pest
I want to strangle him till there’s no breath left
I’m just kidding I’m just ornery. You see I’ve been the victim of a theft.
Robbed of a childhood with loving parents that tell me the truth
No, it doesn’t really take much of a sleuth
To figure out what’s wrong with me I’m a product of misanthropy
A little bit of a chemical mix-up, the son of a psycho and a hot blooded lady
Oooh, if I could just throw it all up I would
Take an ax to this evil tree and make me some firewood
Burn away all of this into ash and dirt
Take the carbon and hug it into a tiny diamond of some self-worth
Baron
I persist
Seconds into minutes and still I resist
Concentrated effort poured into my gullet and yet you still exist
Simple, elegant and just out of my reach so I tear at the tendons of my wrist
To try and touch you, memories plague this mortal coil shrouded in a purple mist
Milky mirrors make me mourn the mire of of my melancholic mind.
But I keep staring into the abyss because you’re the one thing I hope to find
Traveling on the road of hope in search of better times
Lost in the limelight of a brighter future moving past my pastiche rhymes
Your silhouette is fading and the distance between us is growing
I stumble and fall, frantically crawling but my pace is slowing
I wear a crown of lilacs because I am the baron of hopelessness
Of course you wouldn’t want to be this miasma’s baroness
Without a care I dare to live in the hope of a better tomorrow
The limelight flickers and shatters revealing the shade of my sorrow
I am the baron of hopelessness, I am the king of my own black hole
A castle built with bricks of imbalance holding up the tattered flag of my soul
Slumping into my throne a varied bunting sings heralding his presence
A grey hood shifts in stale air, two bright bulbs of heliotrope confirming his omniscience
A violent maw splits spewing thunderous cackling laughter
An indigo fire rages burning my kingdom floor to rafters
Minutes become months and I build again
A monument to my every sin
I am the baron of hopelessness
My ribs bow with the stress
Am I going to fail to keep you inside
And whose place was it to decide
That this evil would be paired with me
A demon demanding to be set free
Enveloping me in this putrid mist
Razor petals cut my wrist
Excruciatingly I exist
Pathetically I resist
I persist
Untitled
I wrote this in 2009. I was 17 years old. A sobering and morose reminder that this thing in me has been there for the majority of my life and I’ve yet to conquer it.
Insecurity.
It lurks,
threatens my every thought
Even those I don’t yet fathom.
I must be strong.
Wakes me with a kiss,
and with duplicitous panache,
stirs bittersweet introspection into my tea.
I must stand my ground.
Derisive laughter heralds it’s presence,
Ha! Ha! Ha!
an un-winnable internal battle ensues…
Please, no…
Really now?
What shit is this!?
Do you think these words, your words, matter?
How laughable! How pathetic! How naive of you!
Shake it! Just shake it off, my words DO matter!
Bullshit!
There isn’t any talent
inside your addled head,
even if there was,
who could possibly care?!
Why waste valuable time
energy and emotion when
not a single person gives a shit!?
Artistic expression doesn’t have to be anything but what it is. . .
What artistic expression?!
When I write…
Who ARE you kidding?!
I’m not trying to kid anyone.. I
Why pretend? We both you aren’t worth shit in this world!
I..
You’ve nothing to offer of yourself or anyone else
with your pitiful ”abilities”, nothing!
Look at the records!
How many have left you?
How many respect you?
How many have given you the slip?!
I begin succumb to the doubt, why fight it?
What’s the goddamned point of it all?
Fuck it!
I give up… no… we give in.
Just being a mess
Roses are red
Violets are blue
I want to be dead
Can’t you take a clue
I just want to choke and die because one of my biggest flaws is that I always make myself my feel all the things that hurt. I know what was it was like to lose you way before we ever broke up as kids. I’m all too familiar to being too into what’s not into me. I’m, always the one to reach out first and put myself out there but never cool enough to hold back and let good things come to me. Stare in a mirror and realize I’m physically weaker than I was five years ago. I’m heavier, I have less hair. The small physical reasons to die are adding up like extra rounds in a revolver. I’ll never grow taller or be a lot smarter. I’m falling farther and farther and farther from all the things that I made to mean me. I’m holding myself back because I’m afraid of not being successful. I hate myself because I was never honestly loved as a kid or even if I was I was so preoccupied with making sure I knew that it was all a lie to ever feel it. I can’t tell if I’m the demon or if he’s in me holding all these memories above my head like a hangman’s post. Laughing and pulling this noose around my neck with my eyes closed tears slipping past those pathetic gates that couldn’t see my worth even if it was wrapped in a chest of glitter and gold. My eyes are closed as I write this because I can’t bare to see if I’m breaking through or being left behind. If I can’t let me live then why won’t I kill me. Why won’t I let me kill myself. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die. I want to love you, me. So why can’t you learn to breathe easily.
A Dissonance: Part 3
Then you didn’t pull the trigger
You’re not dead, you linger
The pain comes screaming out of your gut and the hint of peace
Is soured into a realization that you decided to not release
All of the suffering in your heart and chose instead
To wipe away those tears and get out of bed
A Dissonance: Part 2
She whispered into my throat
A blood soaked gaping hole
There’s no dignity in suicide
Your horrible visage is all you’ll leave behind
Followed by broken hearts and dry mouths
And people talking at your funeral like they really knew what you were about
You become a martyr for nothing, a rotting statue in the memory of you
A burden on the hearts of your friends, “Oh no! What shall they do?”
They’ll be sad. They’ll be devastated. But they will always be normal
Six months to a year life’s moved on for most and even the worst it’s a numb turmoil
Eventually it’ll have been years and they’ll remember you and cry for an hour
Then the next day be smiling stronger than ever because you have no power
You see they’re not the fucked up thing that you are
You don’t get to fill up a heart and you don’t get to leave a scar
Because normal people get up and move on
It’ll be selfish in the moment but then you’ll get to move on
A Dissonance: Part 1
As I watched the sun set down on me
It suddenly dawned on me
That I was letting life stall on me
And I slipped and fell fast into an economy
Of perfectly palatable platitudes praising my positive life plans
Just boring banalities sounding like brittle bones breaking against my bereaved brain
Doomed to die a definite death in the dungeons of my depression and desire
Lukewarm attitudes and watered down sentiments
Better than yesterday
I need therapy
You know I haven’t been very fair to me
I’m sure my mother wanted to be at my elementary concert
I knew she couldn’t but it didn’t stop me from lying that she had to work
It didn’t change that when I looked out at that sea of faces
My innocent eyes fell onto two empty spaces
The man, by all accounts my father, couldn’t even bother to show
So my gaze kept pacing across all those loving smiles with no where to go
I’d never felt real heartbreak until that day
“Why don’t they love me” was the first thing I’d ever heard the demon say
And he’d orate to me the many sins of my being alive
His diction nasty and gnarled behind snapping teeth but he never spoke any lies
My insecurities about never having felt like a son
Led me to toxic blood that picked me up and made me into one
I was driven to hurt and be hurt out of a sick sense of loyalty
All the while that blood stroked the fires of my entropy
I dipped my hands into the sweet release of violence
The pain a welcome ringing to buy me some silence
Suffering offered up to satiate the evil inside
A reprieve from all the voices that made wish I had prematurely died
And even they left me behind
My softness a reminder that I was a broken find
A weak heart that wanted to be loved and to love
A sick mind that knows I’ll never be enough
But it’s harder now than it’s ever been
Because with you I found some kind of salvation
You’re supposed to be my chosen family
How the fuck can you abandon me
I never wanted you to be unhappy
So why didn’t you fucking slap me
Push my face into the wall
And let me know that I was at risk of losing it all
Wait, stop I need to be be better than I was yesterday
I need to be better than I was yesterday
One step ahead of the other keep focused on the light
But actually I’m stumbling around in the middle of the night
Wondering if you’re out there trying to replace me
Clawing at and fighting myself trying to not disgrace me
Seeing you so quickly put me on the shelf
Please I need to stop this and be better for myself
Trying to stay true to the man I want to be
For when you think of me
Even if I knew I know I wouldn’t find peace
And all that’d come of it would be that I’d know with a mentally ill guarantee
That you’re laughing and smiling with some other man
I’d never ask you to be unhappy but couldn’t there have been a fucking plan
Couldn’t you have given me a chance to be by my side while I got better
A moments notice before you pulled that fucking lever
Because now I’m swimming in this sea of depression
Flailing and grabbing at anything to lessen
The burden of my heartache
And it’s not your fault that I’m sick every minute that I’m awake
It’s not your responsibility to watch over me while I rest
To keep the demon from crawling back in and out of my chest
But you’re supposed to be my family
Some part of my sickness thinks you take moments out of each night to laugh at me
That when we see each other again you’ll smile and look down on me callously
Like it isn’t a fucking fallacy
That you want me to be happy but you didn’t think to let me in on the fact you weren’t
You used to mention that it made you sad that even when I was mad at you
If you cried I’d immediately try and comfort you
But I can’t expect that of you or anyone else
Because you can’t really love someone who doesn’t love them
I need to get some fucking therapy
Because if I don’t want to kill myself all I want is for you to marry me
I need to be better than I was yesterday
I want to find the good parts of me and throw the rest away
So that I can stand up tall and be righteous in my affection
And to be free of all remnants of the unhealthy obsession
I want be better than I was yesterday
And find the little boy looking out at the crowd for his family
To see you smiling back at the man I want to be when you think of me
One moment at a time
A little preamble on this. I wrote the first two lines of this in 2013 when I started to feel suicidal again. It felt like a huge step back for me. I honestly don’t know much about depression and anxiety. I was diagnosed when I was a child and put on Zoloft for about a year and when on the medication I felt either numb or severely suicidal. So I stopped. I stopped taking the medication and for a while I struggled with my insecurities, anxieties and depression but it was manageable and over time I felt like I had entered a better place. I still had crippling insecurities and anxiety but my depression was much less of an issue.
Fast forward to 2013 and it started to rear it’s ugly head again. It’s been five years now and I recently have hit a peak in my emotions and it really tossed the balance out the window. I am not sure if I will be able to love myself. Part of me wants to try and looks for reasons to live. Another part of me finds each of those reasons excruciating because that part wants to die. The obligations, connections and logic behind living is traumatic. Another barrier to finding peace in not existing.
When I wrote these two lines I assumed that I did love myself. That that’s why I was struggling so much with killing myself. But now I know that I don’t love myself and maybe that’s okay. I thought about slitting my wrists length wise and then shooting myself. So that even if I miss my brain stem I’d bleed to death. I googled the best way to shoot myself to ensure that’d I die. I found some forums discussing it but with platitudes about not hurting yourself and it start the hum of disassociation in me. That I didn’t want read or hear about being safe or better. On my third search result I read an article about a woman named Christen McGinnes and she saved my life this morning.
I love you, me
Then why don’t I want to breathe
I love you, me. So why don’t I want to breathe? So obsessed with doing right by people but I’m not doing right by me. I’m not doing right by me. I’m not holding true any of my principles and philosophies. I’m begging you to hold on, please. But it be can’t her and it can’t them. It has to be me. I love you, me. I want to love you, me. Let me hold you and make still this heart attack.
How Hope Was Lost 