Don't stand still.

Don't spin your wheels.

Don't follow the crowd to the next big thrill.

Don't pretend.

Don't bend.

Be true to yourself, until the sidewalk ends.

"But for the grace of God, go I." They say when they see someone like me.

Worst-case scenario, lowest of all,

I roam the streets hopelessly.

"But where was God's grace for me?" I cry

when my life was mauled apart.

Clawing bills , chewed up jobs

and a vicious attack of a beaten heart.

I swallow the bottle of pills in one go

and I repeat my question once more.

"I shall ask God face-to-face." I vow,

as I pass through those heavenly doors ....

...

It’s funny, really.

How we stare from our balconies at the ants scurrying below. How we pass them on the streets—the wanting eyes, the starving mouths, the empty hands. Hair stiff as wire, clothing an amalgam of layered coats and scarves, mismatched socks, worn-out sandals.

We pass them, and we think.

That could never be me.

Look at here. Look at now. In this moment, I’m all set. We get so acclimated to small comforts that our minds can’t even meet them halfway down. We can’t see ourselves in their shoes. Our imaginations just aren’t that big.

I used to think like that. Before the divorce and the alimony, before the recession, before the unemployment and fire and the insurance company refusing to compensate because I didn’t insure every blade of grass in my yard or knick-knack in my study.

I downsized to a trailer. But welfare cut my benefits again five months ago, and just like that I was another ghost at the panhandle. It all happened so slow. It all happened so fast.

And time don’t wait. They say it moves quicker as you get older. All I know is, as a starry-eyed grad student, I never pictured it would end up like this. I never pictured myself as a middle-aged loner sleeping with the rats under blankets of corrugated tin. This isn’t the life I went three-hundred-grand in the hole to build.

But where did I go wrong?

One minute, everything was falling into place. The next it was falling to pieces, and as hard as I tried to preserve it, the decay was just too persistent. It spread too fast, and overtook my future.

Everything’s decayed now.

Even my memories are starting to rust.

There’s a lady out here I used to pass by on my way to work, every day. I used to avert my gaze, never locking with her hungry, pothole eyes. Her chessboard teeth. Her gnarled, swollen hands and yellowed, untrimmed nails. They would reach. And I would walk. And she would call. And I would walk. And she would say “God bless you” anyway. And smile.

And I would walk.

Silent. Distracted. Too consumed by dizzying fantasies of the trophy wife who left me. Our future children that we never had. A bigger house, twice the size of the meager three-bedroom apartment we shared. I always wanted bigger, I guess. Now I have nothing. Now I’d settle for what we wanted to leave behind in a heartbeat.

I met that lady again just the other day. Apparently she’d found a shelter uptown a few months back and they’d helped her get her life in order. She got on as a dishwasher at this little diner. She looked a lot cleaner. Not fancy, by far. But she looked...ever-so-slightly like I used to. It was a sobering reversal, watching her hands.

They reached. And I couldn’t walk anymore. And she called, and from my teary eyes I could make out that her hands were no longer empty. They didn’t ask; they offered.

At the end of the day, I never had the heart to take her money.

But I learned her name.

It was Lila. Lila McPherson.

She had a name.

They all did.

Oh, and one more little bit of information I left out. The last doctor visit I could afford didn’t go so good. Not that it mattered. At this point I’d give anything just to get out.

Another year at most I’ve got to rot in this place.

I could look for the shelter that rehabilitated Lila. But why? I’d be getting polished up just to die. Anything from hereon out is an exercise in futility.

So now all I can do is find my reflection in passing. Wait for a bus window or puddle or mirror. Find myself, and try to recognize. Find myself, and try to remember. Still, it seems every newest version of myself I find, he’s so far removed from the man I knew. And there’s no strength left to change him.

All I can do is remind him, reassure him.

He has a name too.

#fiction, #prose, #challenge, #homeless, #depression

Most People Think That War Is When Two Countries Fight

When You Bring Out The Guns And Your Hatred Ignites

But A War Is So Much More Than That

It Can Happen In Your Heart, And In Your Mind

War Can Be A Battle Deep With In

A War Can Be The Demons Trying To Win

A War Can Be A Fight For Your Life

A War Can Be The Path To The Light

A War Is A Battle That You Have Fought

A Battle That Might Have Left Permanent Scars

A Battle That Might Do Your Loved Ones Harm

A War Might Not Always Be A National Thing

It Might Be At Home Or In The Streets

It Might Be Hidden Deep Inside

It Might Be Where The Darkness Hides

When You Think Of A War Remeber This...

Not Every War Takes Place On A Battlefield

Some Happen On Your Wrists

i'm not sure

if i can ever love

the person looking back at me

but i'll try,

at least for a second

hazelish-green eyes

that water so often now

that i wonder

if i'm ever not ready

to cry

dyed-red hair

to mask the things i didn't like

cut in layers and ready

to run at the first sign

of anxiety

a smile that

used to light my face

but now the frowning,

unsure, wavering lines

of anxiety chase it away

hands that shake

every time i'm nervous

hands that are ice-cold

with worry and fright

hands that don't quite warm up right

a body that curves

"in all the right places"

but makes me uncomfortable

every time i'm made

to acknowledge it

there's a lot of me

there's some i hate

some i don't really like

not much i take care of;

been so busy thinking about everyone else

i'm not sure

if i can ever love

the person looking back at me

but i've tried,

at least for a second

When I look in the mirror, I see 3 people.

Me, Myself and I.

I see Me, a person no one ever notices.

I see I, who pretends to not care.

I see myself, somebody who so desperately wants to be someone,

to have an identity.

I see a human that is nothing similar to me.

You ask me if loving my reflection is possible.

But how can I love my reflection

when all I see is nothing?

i am selfish by nature.

my horns are hard to hide

and my wings don’t fit right

under the tarp of my skin.

i walk with an uneven stride

and my is tail long and thin,

flicking side to side in a pendalic swing.

you’d think me a sin.

but should you look beside me

you’d find the strangest sight.

a glowing smile filled with such light,

and a heart tucked away from warm delight.

she is a blessing, and always set aside

by her “friends”, used and abused -

but still, she lets them in.

my own evil is nothing compared to them.

so i stalk beside her, my angelic friend.

spitting glares and snide remarks

at her so-called “friends” who never end

their abuse of her bottomless mercy.

i hope that one day, she will drop to her knees

i hope to see when her feathered wings are freed.

oh i’d look to her, my grin as wicked as me.

and i’d say to her, “come. come with me.”

and maybe. maybe she'd escape her misery.

Don’t you remember the better days

The one’s where nothing seemed to age

But, when all was done

I made a run

And fell from heights unknown

From summer rains

To pure back pains

Time just wouldn’t stop

The lilac skies looked endless then

Yet, night always caught up to them

I watched the salty breeze rip through your hair. You sat in the sand just close enough to the ocean to put your feet in. The ocean that took you from me.

You dug your hands into the sand and closed your eyes breathing in the air. As I breathed with you, I watched as you faded away, and all that was left was me and the thieving ocean.

A young sailor once told me the sea was his therapy.

The waves rock me to sleep like a baby, he said.

It’s so peaceful at night, he said.

I go out every weekend, he said.

Except last weekend, you liar. Because the sea swallowed you up the Saturday prior.

The sea never soothes you like therapy does, but it does coax you into its embrace so it can drag you down to its depths and use your body to feed its creations. It’s alluring. Addictive. Like a drug. An organic hallucinogen.

I think that’s my favorite part of it.