Remember those pills you swallowed
that numbed you.
Remember that alcohol that followed
that numbed you.
Remember that hit that made
the world dizzy.
Remember how you thought
this was the only way to be.
Numb.

Remember how death was
close
But never close enough
and how you didn’t know
if you really wanted it.

Remember last night
coming back in the morning
sitting in a bed
soaked in piss
and vomit
you barely remember
coming up.

How bleach
couldn’t wash you.

Remember
begging for death
while clinging to hope that
one day
one day
it would all be different.

Most of all
remember that day
where you had enough
of your own bullshit.

Remember that day
when you decided
numb
was not a state of living
but a breathing version
of being dead.

Remember that day
that you chose pumping blood
discomfort
and fear.

Don’t ever forget choosing fear.
It breaths life
into collapsing...

I beg myself to be
more generous
more loving
more open.
Free.
Decisive.
Able to throw hats over
fences and catch them
on other sides.

But I look down
holding a hat that’s
been with me for years.
And I bang it against
my face.

I draw blood
but no solutions.

Time
playing a cruel game
as why am I still
sitting
while in my mind
I flew away
but
wings will not carry me.

I wish to be
in water
cleansed
born anew
but water isn’t holy
in a hand that tore
off a cross years ago.

But I’m learning
and my aged soul
begs to differ the words I
say
that I have not made progress.
But I am progress
and it has made me.

A broken body
teaching me to find peace in
stillness
begging to slow down
lessons taught on dark and darker days.
You can’t rush your healing.

And so they say.

Just as she says
slow down
slow down
But I feel like
I’m only
moving backwards now.

Replaying...

Remember those days
when you were wild.
Your heart open
and a bottle was never needed
to bring you to the surface
of a world
that begged for your existence.

Speak my child
in that tone you knew as
free.

Sing my child
in that voice
that wasn’t muffled.
Not in closed spaces
in cars racing at speeds
that the slightest glance
could kill you.

Forget my child
that you could ever
be killed.
You cannot be killed
except in those moments
when you sit quietly
with so much to say.

Speak.
And learn again
what it means to live.
You only kill yourself
in your silence.

I tripped on words over
days that wouldn’t end
And ideas that didn’t see the light
except in my mind
when the sun went down,
And I whispered,
“Tomorrow.”

I couldn’t wait to work
on fantasies that I believed
deep in my core could be
realities
But then I woke and
all I had were tired lids
my mind on slow,
and a pessimist sitting in his
throne,
saying,
“How silly was that?”

As the day rolled on
and ordinary pulled me
apart so much that room was
made once again for fantasies
I day dreamt with what
could be
And the sun went down
and I whispered,
“Tomorrow.”

This little demon
has set-up camp in a place
where they ask he get a permit.
Yet he parked illegally
but no one hears the noise he makes

But me.

When I arrive
they just won’t believe it.
Confidence pouring from
the seams
tearing through a room,
that puts its gaze on me.

He giggles,
I grimace.

“Don’t you hear it?!”
My pleas
with responses of,

“No.”

“So what you’re saying,”
she says,
“Is that despite the tightness
despite the noise
you’re managing
to get it all done.”

“Yes.
Managing.
But
I’d rather have it
that there’s nothing to do.”

The harsh breath pierces the
waves of my mind.
Frantic.
Panic.
Regret for the past
fear for the future.
“You fucked up!” he screams.
“You fucked up!”

Silence.

The man sits in the corner.
His breath
sucks in the words of the
other.
They come out
smoothed over
reflected upon.

“There is no such thing.”
He whispers
as if to me...

You don’t hate cooking. It’s just that, like most things, you like to do it in solitude, with music filling quiet spaces.

It’s totally cool that most days, you’d rather spend your days with books than with people. But remember, people wrote those books, so make time for them too.

Always buy a round trip ticket for business. Or you’ll pay for it in the end.

You may always be the one to hold on tighter, communicate more often, and fight to not let go. Stop looking at this as a curse; your desire for connection is a blessing.

Be more flexible. Or…be flexible. A change of plans is not the universe’s way of giving you the middle finger, it’s a change of plans.

Maybe not everyBODY is meant to be vegetarian. That doesn’t make you a terrible person, just as they aren’t terrible people. The best you can do now is shop mindfully, and be grateful for every animal that feeds you.

...

My dear creative being,
I wish only that you learn to live,
To be,
As if life depends on your being.

To see,
Not those mistakes,
Dark specks,
But the light within them.

To respect a control beyond yours,
Which does not wish to control,
But merely,
To be.

To take light,
And make life.

To be tethered,
Unmoving,
Yet ever changing,
Always reaching for the light.
Chemical reactions,
From inability to take flight.

Oh how I wish,
You were,
This simple,
Yet intelligent form.

That lives,
And dies,
Like you,
But suffers less.
As it hurts,
But doesn’t spend its days,
Contemplating pain.

This face was not made to be hidden,
Skin covered,
Barely breathing.
Unable to look in a mirror,
Unless the tone was even.

And scars unapparent,
Not distracting from eyes,
The color of the soil,
That made me,
That I wanted to alter,
To the color of the sky,
That would take me.

And these eyebrows,
Were not designed to change with the seasons,
A bold Russian look,
Minimized with tweezing.

And the courage it takes,
To walk out with a naked face,
Not the kind that was painted,
To look natural,
But the kind that was,
Washed,
Cleansed,
Of man made beauty,
That ruined me.

Now I must create new habits,
That don’t allow me to damage,
Because I have the power,
To cover up.
But I want the power,
To stand naked,
And fearless,
Without chemicals,
That make me spiritless.

A power that comes from,
A core that is created,
Not infinite commercials,
That leaves mankind...

I am peace,
Radiating through dark spaces.
I am a yes.
An experience.
A lifeless, yet life-full form.
Untainted by worldy falls,
By worldy climbs.
I know not of ups and downs,
I only know of never-ending balance.
I have not tasted water,
Or felt a need to quench a thirst.
No,
I am fulfilled by mere existence,
And not consciousness of such.
Just simple being.
I breathe,
Though unaware,
As I do not know an exhale, from an inhale,
Nor suffocation.
I am everything.
I am nothing.
I only am.
And I,
Am not aware, of what it means to be.

As I am free flowing,
Unhindered,
Unattached.
I am space, and all that fills it.
Imagine,
Light that enters darkness,
And darkness that holds the light.
I am void,
Where there is none.
And it’s beautiful to be.
It is beautiful to be.
I float,
I move, but have no direction.
As I am not running from a past I do not know,
Or crawling...

At that age, it seemed freedom reigned,
The rules set by the sun.
They gave us colors, they gave us brushes,
They let us paint the fun.

Then that day came,
I don’t remember when,
But all we had was ink.
It was blue, or it was black,
And they told us how to think.

So we thought, their straight-edge thoughts,
We filled bubbles on the test.
They told us what to memorize,
We put our art to rest.

Years went on, we learned nothing new,
Just that already taught.
We followed rules, we went to class,
A system seldom fought.

Then one day, the rising sun,
It reminded me to play.
I picked up paints,
I colored fun,
And art was here to stay.