Feel 


1


Crazy, 

The questions come swirling out and pile into my lap,

Daring, i thought they were,

I can't stand long enough to bare.


Storm clouds dim the light i try to find, 

Grass doesn't grow but in tiny, brown, dried up patches,

Wave my hand in the air and slap myself in the face,

Only way i know i'm real anymore.


Lonesome days accrue faster with each passing, weathering week,

Faces can't harbor their true mannerisms,

Feeling is nothing but a thought,

Treasuring their painted-on smiles,

And the absence of assimilation,

Of reality and imagination, 

I can't tell who's who anymore.

I never knew these people had it in them.

All of the skeletons stay in the closet,

No new year or promising resolution can sway the fire toward the doors.

Houses of soul and reservoirs of pain burning and drying with every fleeting minute,

They can't find it in them to puff out their chest....

Oh wait i witness chests every day, if only in a methaphoric manner. 

But that doesn't reveal the bitter truth.

Neither do they. 

But i do. 


I face the evil and their evil,

I guess the joke's on me, 

Because i'm in more pain than i have to be,

Or at least that is what everyone is telling me. 


You tell me, 

Because i don't know anymore,

How i'm supposed to feel.

But no one else does either. 


2


I know now, 

I feel, I fell,

Their enumerating, copycat feelings. 

I have my own,

They can't ever take that away from me. 

I will fight too hard to keep it. 

They don't have enough fight in them to even try. 




Life


I am too bitter too walk on with the past buried too far. 

I am too hardened too make me strong. 

22 is not what everyone said it would be. 

They said whatever doesn't kill you will make you stronger. 

That aint true. Whatever doesn't kill you the first time will probably kill you the second time. 

You just won't know it. It's like a sniper droppin a bullet in a terrorist's skull-

It sneaks up on you even though you think you can handle everything.

You think you're getting stronger, but your only getting weaker. 

I know, i feel it now, i don't know what to do. 


The memories piling in my mind like wet snow on a power line,

The scars eroding the layer of skin on my body,

The evil feelings and excruciating bitterness eating away at my heart,

I am bending and breaking from the weight of life. 


This may sound weak, hollow, ungrateful, self-centered, or unintelligent.

It's all of those things. 

But when life hands you a series of bad cards, you don't have much choice but to act this way.  

I guess maybe its a way to see who's strongest and who's weakest. 

But you gradually weaken as life continues to chip, peel, pull, cut, slice, and break away the layers of toughness you built up. 

But they were always there from the beginning. 

I suppose whoever survives always had it in them. 

Whoever doesn't, never did. 

I hope i do because i am bending and breaking. 

Life is doing a number on me. 


My smile will tell you though, that it always has. 

So maybe i'm getting used to this. 

I don't know. 

I guess time will be the only way to know for sure. 



A Sobering Question


Winding and spinning down the barren strips of yellow and black, 

The arrows all pointed to the asphalt.

Cheer up, baby those were good times,

Horns of seemingly innocuous presence,

Slowly steaming its influence unto my head.


We had the laughs of sailors,

But the personalities of factory workers,

Or introverted loners.

We had the cries of conquering kings,

But the dispositions of frantic hostages.


All of the raindrops and blurry miles,

careening with the placid drops and heart-bending rides,

Boy those were good times.

All of the cd players lost, the crusty eyes, 

the smelly fabric, and the good friends,

Boy i wouldnt trade those memories for anything. 


What happened? Where did they go?

Where did we go? 

Were all still here. But were not really here.

Not the way we used to be. 

Was last friday night, the last friday night?

The past is the past, but the present can't be the future,

can it?