the victim in a horror movie

is always the girl

pretty

long brown hair

perfect body

boyfriend who is crazy about her

but she's always a little dumb

and it comes back around to get her

in the form of a knife

or a guy

who just can't control himself

can he?

her pretty blue eyes

pierced with the white and red

of a gory death

yet i sit back and laugh at her

i wonder why

i never root for the good guys

As Aaron and Carolina lay there, her head on his chest, gazing endlessly into the starry sky, listening to the rush of cars on the interstate, he realized he was falling in love with her. He yearned to tell her how he felt: that he didn’t need anything but her. That he loved her. Because he did, he did love Carolina Peterson, and he always would. But he just stared into the night. She looked lost in her own thoughts. He wondered if she somehow knew that he could not stop thinking of how perfect they could have been together.

The bed in the guest room was comfortable, but wasn’t the same as home. Lying on her back, she willed herself to sleep.

A cat jumped onto the bed near her feet.

Oh, she thought, hello bedmate...

She felt the cat walk over her legs, felt its feline weight as it draped its body over her abdomen.

Friendly...

She soon drifted off to sleep hoping it wouldn’t begin that kneading thing cats sometimes do and wake her.

In the morning, she poured herself coffee and commented, “I didn’t know you had a cat.”

Her host’s face grew pale, “I don’t.”

The details were laid out on the gurney

for his kids to sift through, like

pieces of glass

in his hair, the note

in his pocket

He took too many pills

then tried to gas himself

and our family dog

Lucky lived.

Dad dialed for help, but

died having his stomach pumped

Half-truths like this are told

to spare children the details.

The full weight was broken

into bits I could lift

once I tore grief and anger

into smaller pieces still

Your Dad

jumped out

of an ambulance

on the high way

en route to be convicted.

I have worn my heart out

wrestling with this

I drop it

Feels right to release these ashes

like all the apologies, the excuses,

the verdict that need not burden us...

Sometimes pain

weighs less than the justice

we inflict upon ourselves

Sometimes...the right choice is the heaviest

Photo by Egor Ivlev on Unsplash

#Suicide #Justice #Trauma #poetry #truth #grief

Heavy snow struck the first toll

A cross continent storm

Paradise lost to sleet

Please stay home

Yes, feels good. Our king has come

No, we can't complain

Even if

We run out of alms

Yes, we can dig deeper

Earth is only frozen over

And we are only

Rolling in our graves

Photo by Tom Wheatley on Unsplash

I do not think I know how to write anymore.

There was a time it was bobbing towards me in a sea of such vastness and mystery, like a pure sunbeam, untouched by the cold. Like the sun, it lifted me closer to the sky, sought colour within the squeeze of lemon-rain. In the night, it sunk below my feet, through my body and into my heart, and beat and beat and beat.

I do not feel it now. It floats a little, it dangles, it crashes over and dissolves into white specks that travel through me, upwards and upwards, lighting the dark, dissolving in daylight. It is a specimen, a sample, an infinitesimal bite of creamy and tart toffee, a bare sip of 7-Up's latest lemon-and-lime summertime invention. It comes back in a mortar, smeared on the table, crumbled in school essays and writing comprehensions and debates and the next big thing that will destroy me.

I do not doubt it will stay so, because I have learned to swim, and I do not create without the imminent threat of sinking. I have dipped my toes into the heart of the ocean and felt the beating there, into my chest, beat and beat and beat. The hundreds walk and follow. When I sink, I will, the ocean will open its maw and and crack my bones, and split my jaw, and let pieces rest. And then I will explode, upwards and upwards.

There was a time it was bobbing towards me in a sea of such vastness and mystery, like a pure sunbeam, untouched by the cold. It sunk below my feet, through my body and into my heart, and beat and beat and beat.

Why do people say,

do not look back at the past?

How are we to know

just how far this road has gone?

To see the progress,

and reflect on the journey,

is the greatest gift.

Reflection on the past times

pushes us to be better.

Suffering whispers

from happiness

that elusive bitch

she teases

while issuing

promises of grandeur

hinting at

peace of mind

what absolute bullshit

happiness cannot

compete with

life itself

as it will

force feed you shit

expecting you

to ask for seconds.

In moments of silence

hope sneaks in

offering

the weak-minded

reconciliation

while silently

pushing towards

the abyss

one step further

from the insanity

of life

pirouetting

into the void

and to the freedom

of death.

I have decided to no longer use the expression, “falling in love.”  I have used it countless times in the past to describe the depths of love I have for another.  However; upon further thought and experience with love, I have come to the conclusion that it makes little sense to me. Love does not slam me to the ground which is the inevitable fate of falling. While it can be sudden and make us feel vulnerable, I think love would be more accurately described as a feeling of elevating or rising. Lifting me to a higher state of being altogether.

I would compare it to the feeling that is felt when flying in the air while jumping on a tramline or swinging high on a swing set. To me, love is more like a continual state of those few seconds when your feet are lifted off the ground and all you see are the clouds in the sky.  When your stomach seems to delay its arrival from meeting the rest of your body, because it’s being filled with butterflies. That short window of time spent in weightless freedom from within the fleeting moment. The one you cherish and absorb every nano-second of just before it comes to an end.  The seizing of that very moment is what love feels like to me.

Love transcends not deeper, but higher and higher, that is until its downfall.  This descend, when one falls out of love or is thrown from it, that is like falling.  Falling from heights for which the fate of your survival is uncertain. Pushing you down deeper and deeper until there is no more oxygen left to breathe. The bright clouds that once surrounded you become dark just before you crash.  Leaving you to walk blindly into the unknown in search of all the scattered pieces of yourself. Once you’ve exhausted the energy that is needed to walk. You are then forced to resort to crawling in an attempt to not fall into the unseen pits of darkness that sink you even deeper than before. This is falling.

Being in love with another is an elevating force that inspires you to claw your way back to the surface, tired, dirty, and utterly unrecognizable. Providing you with the light from above that you need to see your way through the darkness to find your missing pieces. It’s the glue that fills the empty spaces from within and makes you into an upgraded version of the person you were before. The more light from love you allow inside of yourself, the higher love will take you. Love wraps you in its arms and becomes your sanctuary. It warms your cold body and lifts your heart giving you hope, strength, and shelter as you ascend higher and higher.

No longer will I fall into love, but my heart is open to rising in it.

12-11-2022