The Queen Removes the Thorn ~ 1.21.14

Terrible is the blemish that shatters our window panes, 

Rips the stars from the sky, hurls ancient light in explosive

Ordnance, flees our homeland, sees on TV the destructive

Ubiquity of violence, and laughs for art explains

Beauty as detached in her observations, for the brains

Littered across washed cobblestones reveal the devisive

Engagement of sectarian warfare, the constructive

Solution to civil strife, disarm the men whom hate trains.

Understand the future of our island is in the hands

Left to those with wrists still attached, prosthetics can't perform

Surgery with stillness and precision, the cancer stands

To win against surgeons trained to remove this perfect storm,

Entitled to conduct herself as a lady in lands

Removed in language and culture, the queen removes the thorn.

Monsters ~ 1.17.14

The monsters weren't under my bed, they were hiding inside my head. With no way to flee, they kept watch while searching for an escape hatch. If I were a painter, I'd draw you a picture (without a flaw) of a monster waiting to flee, but as I never found the key to artistry, they're locked away behind steel bars without a say in the matter. If they could help me describe, instead of just yelp like a beaten dog, I could write their way out into bright sunlight. But my monsters are neurotic and hang out with a psychotic demon in the lobes of my brain, you'd think this would drive me insane, and it has before, long ago, they don't fit in with my ego, but times were tough and in the past, I learned to tie them to the mast (the trunk of a conifer tree) on a schooner and let them be. Let them ponder their evil thoughts in a mind that cannot be bought. 

"In this life..." ~ 1.5.13

I've made mistakes, mistakes I can't correct, / people I've hurt, mom, dad, brother, and friends, / people who will no longer talk with me, / I can't blame them, I too feel such remorse, / for living this life, not knowing the rules, / staying true to what was once in my heart, / covered over with shame, guilt and sorrow, / a fine layer of dust, dust upon dust, / year after year, until the light goes dim, / no one tells you how to clean up past wrongs, / they tell me to forgive myself, move on, / and get on with my life, but the cycles / circle like a gyre, to which I return, / I meet the same conflict over again, / I learn the same lesson since the first time, / but everything changes, nothing remains / the same, so how can I improve myself, / how can I help others if I can't help / myself, can I trust I won't lie and cheat / just to get ahead in the business world, / my karma faces me like a brick wall, / I cannot scale its height, like a mountain, / the snow-capped peaks gleam with a clear conscience, / I've carried the weight of my wrongdoing / for so long, my body slopes mis-shapen, / I try to accept my faults, past mistakes, / shortcomings, and not dwell inside my head, / full of arguments with others unseen, / angry for so many years, I can't stop, / I don't have the tools to replace the pain, / I live as honestly as I can bear, / the burden of life is too much for me, / much of the time, I just want to give up, / to quit this world, end this life and be done, / but I was there at my friend's funeral / after she successfully hung herself, / her dress and make-up, her open casket, / she would not have chosen any of that, / her mother wailing, her little girl gone, / it was her second suicide attempt, / I've witnessed the after-effects her death / had on her family and friends, so young, / so beautiful, so full of life, now gone, / I knocked on her front door that afternoon, / either she was alive, or she was dead, / (like Schrödinger's cat), her death still haunts me. //