He twists and turns

Bend to the thought

of break

Pain that strikes

Bruises that arise

Shockingly

hidden

Shockingly

Easy to see

Loose and stretchy

“Party trick”

For thee

Pain within

For he

She laid there in pain

After the heartache

Her joints stiffened

Her muscles cried

Up her legs and down her back

Coursed through

It flares

Moves

And changes

Bone

Muscles

Joints

Veins

And all

Taken in this cage

Of red hot

pain

That used to not be

There

Doubling over

She spills all she has

Gripping onto the bowl

With blisters in sight

And rashes that spread

She stays in the dark

ness of her room

Cramping up

Confused and weak

She wonders how

Far she's

fell

Into this

hell

Of pain and confusion

Her mind swirls

Her skin itches

And she stays in the dark

And hopes it passes

But like the sun

It'll rise

again

I had become unreal

Or well

never was

Strung out from a brain

If that is, what you call

a void

formed some

Shape

It was never real to begin with

This thing in the mirror

Is an illusion

Made up from nothing

Because

[ ]

She laid there like a broken doll

Like I've never seen before

Unmoving

Pale

Looking upon her

Brought great pain upon my chest

And great waters to my eyes

She laid there like a corpse

Still

And quiet

I didn't know what

to do

Yet her eyes have movement

Scanning my face

Broken

Like a doll

And in every moment

we

are real

i sit with my knees up

at the kitchen table

cleaning the peanut butter from my teeth

while my oldest brother

tells me a story;

his voice competes with

the sizzling of bacon strips

on the stove

the days have already melted together

in my mind,

like honey in a hot cup of coffee;

it must be summer

freshman year

now exists only in retrospect,

and from this two-day distance

every failure becomes

painfully plain to see

in this moment

hugging my knees to my chest

i am so aware that i am a child

with everything to learn

and so much more

this morning in the city,

the late april sun lollygags

behind a carbon dioxide curtain.

my cappuccino has gone cold;

i just shiver and wait.

It has been a long while since I've logged on here. I have been totally changed by Jesus since then. Part of me wants to delete all my old posts and start fresh, but so much would be lost from those seasons of my life. So I am keeping them. But I am not that same poet or person, by His grace. May that hope and joy be evident in every poem from this point forward.

i guess

i never thought

i could be this much

we could be this much

you see,

there's more than lies,

more that lies

under passive waters

where all the colors

of the eyes of the oceans

have been bled out

and we're all just an expanse of gray

i like to tread carefully

but sometimes i

take the dive

and i choke, sputter,

but pain gives way to

that Something more

and you are something more

we are something more

if we only accept it

if we only accept it

here in the deep

where don't get me wrong, it's dark

it's like nighttime is squeezing my soul

but then i see you

and i see there's others down here

as you cry to the counselor

and we scream that none of us are heard

but maybe we can

hear each other

and i think i hear you

where water fills my ears

i hear you

through the ink-stained waves

and suddenly it's all teal and beautiful

glances whispers rumors spark feelings without names igniting icy rage tinted jealous jarred thoughts unglued scattered lacking sentence structure because my mind has no lines no boundaries no control when wandering wanders too far i can’t retrieve the wanderers from the wilderness so i weep for the nameless soldiers of the war within the battles beneath breasts behind smiles masking chaos at its snowcapped peak cracking sliding an avalanche of aimless agony burying the excess emotions undesirable and ugly for no eyes but His and even those glint suspicious with partiality unspoken prejudice unrevealed instead put away privately but sensed and unraveled at the battlegrounds now a graveyard littered with death but bursting with new life choking out the mundane existence until the mundane departs and superficial standards still stand they still stand they still stand i can’t stand it any longer