I am

the pitch-perfect persona

of avoidance

and disillusionment

I am not omitting

Denial

in error.

I am acutely aware

of how fucked up

you have been.

My petition on excuses

for bad behavior

has been echoing on

rebound throughout the whole of

this Life.

No blame

No blame

despite this frisson of pain,

for the reasons

justify the rage

No blame

for we are all circumstantial victims

No blame

I can nail to the source

of your shame

No blame

pleads the heart (mine,

yours?)

that resides so resolutely,

Impossibly

beating and bleeding

and continuing

so annoyingly...

R. Padilla

Still dripping wet from

tears on the inside,

I fight to find a

place in my throat,

where the guilt horror fear disbelief

selfishness lies

can harbor for

just the right amount of time

that it will take

for this flash of

Painsight

to shred itself down onto these pages,

and then disappear harmlessly

into the vapor which has been

behind the sturdy shield of

blissful malignance,

shallow self-deception,

and careless, wanton emptiness

cultured all in this hotbed of cruelness

that is me.

Ahhhh, it's gone,

left a little behind in the back of

my conscience,

tucked into the soft spot

of my throat,

where the vulnerability is the hardest

to ignore

whenever I try to swallow this,

which has been

shoved

down

deep.

The Art of Keeping Still

With your fists,

you can show me the

right path

With your fists,

I am no longer

angry

back

and I think i've

dropped

off

some of my craziness

with you

my silence

is not weak,

nor merely submissive.

No,

it's the hush

like sand

that is stepped on

and shaped

and molded

easily

to one's will....

but prevails still

exists still

is strong

is mighty

is gossamer

is rock

R.

(late 2014)

Don't you see that this pushes

me, pushes me

shoves me back in this corner

where I can't breathe

makes me feel like I'm not good enough, worth enough

decompresses me

unempowers me

desanctifies my needs

until yours have swallowed me,

devoured me,

slithered into every part of me

until

there is no me.

And so this is why, don't you see.

But the ultimate blame

falls and stalls on me

because I invited you to

let this bad blood seep into

us

I now see

how blinded I turned you and me

in the first place.

R.

She is angry

the Universe has not been kind

lately

But the galaxies

owe her nothing

They have their own troubles

Their own demons

In the shapes of meteors

And Gods

She is disgusted with

her helplessness

her pitiful attempts at

explanations

She is so sick

Of that

Merry-go-Round in her head

Pick me

Pick me

Such a silly answer for this ridiculousness

And she is out of questions

December 28, 2011

Today

could be the day

that I lose it all

fall from grace

break every promise

and vow

on my way

down

Today

might be a day

where nothing

happens at all

Save face

lose my place a couple of times

without any witness

to my non- existent will

Today will come

by and by,

doesn't appear

as though I even try

But there are wits

battling within my mind

Forces I dont

have the strength

to cast aside

Tomorrow

I might run from you

and hide

Today

I will just endure

and wake up from

the dream,

try hard not to cry

Where the best man survives...

R. Padilla

I used to feel guilt

I used to feel shame

I used to be the victim

of my self-inflicted, sadistic rage

Change

Blackness

the dark place

Maybe I hid it well

still had enough prideful strength

to smile through the pain

reassure all those fucking faces

( the kindness, the compassion, their pleading faith in my halo; churned my stomach with sickening disgust)

But I finally.........

slipped away.....

out of the limelight,

safe in my isolated cage

Then alone

and so fucking afraid

of myself,

so empty, only the shadow remained.

And the shadow reigned

Almost succumbed to the bitter hollow emptiness

....almost

Change

Read Sylvia

and Zamora

studied Trent

Read all their pain

Suffocation was everywhere

trapped inside the Bell Jar

Can't feel my chest

Then couldn't feel, couldn't cry,

Couldn't move

unless pushed

Cared so much, lost all feeling in both

Became afraid

of unpredictable joy

This, I cannot name.

In and out

Of the blur

Stuck

and mostly never at ease

anymore

until the darkness is surrounding her

erasing her presence

Breathing comes easier now,

and she feels absolved somehow

When In the blur

she feels connected

never rejected

but the blur is conditional

...and never dependable

You know we're stuck

it's like a time warp in here

and even though we feel like what

might pass as real,

I think we've been distracted way too

long behind this veil

sore throat spray

Cuz I like the feeling of numbness

the shower so hot

It hurts

the curiousness in the

Scarlet of my blood

Staying high all the time to keep you off my mind

the violence of thunderstorms

and furious rain

Almost,almost enough to satiate

this rage

Bruises from your fingertips

on the insides of my thighs

the memory of your grip on my trachea

brings back my smile like sunshine

But still, I have to try to stay high

all the time, to keep you off my mind