Author: Kevin J

I think of wells
The faces at the bottom that are singed in the subway pavement
If you take away the walls,
The faces still scale them, but get mixed up in water rushing toward the tide
The waves leave periodically, but faces get materialized in footsteps
And souvenirs to the unaware
Bottles of sand represent more than they can bear
Or they’re put to work
Industrialized for pardon
Pushed so thin, but presence still felt through distortions in the looking glass
And their inflictions on reflections
Reason for easiness when mirrors met in passing
Seems… fine
But think: “something doesn’t feel right”
Think that someone else fills that space that was reserved for you
Eyes met with a emptiness you don’t know but have forgotten
Think that maybe you shouldn’t have left them
Yeah
Their names will not be forgotten

I watch the jubilation
Of the millions, of the nation
And awe struck how one man could bring back our belief, as a whole
On some catch phrases that we should have learned a real long time ago
And I wonder
How will they feel when his appeal doesn’t stretch past the inauguration?
And we are left to fend for ourselves
It wouldn’t be any different, but the disappointment will be unparalleled
If they saw that no matter who headed the throne, our lives only existed in nightmares
I shudder to think of the consequences…
But I watched the jubilation, and I understood the faith in
That man
I had it before I started looking at the facts
But I fight with myself
I ask “if we are stuck in this corrupt, democratic system
And only the fakes and bought-offs can be elected,
Why not him?
His face alone will be the emblem for the possibilities of everyone
No youth being excluded, giving life to rhetoric ‘We can do this’
Seeing older generation’s faces, you can tell this is their reparation
His speeches have the same rhythm of those who marched
He is the culmination of many lifetimes waited,
He is the reason our ancestors survived”
How can I argue with that?
As I watch the jubilation, I realized the trepidation
Among the many just looking to get our collective soul back
We believe in all his statements because all we’ve had is specifics of hatred
The future – his vague statements let us create our own
The people made the selection, but the important choices never given to them
We the people, have mobilized and believed in something beyond our minds
That defies all logic.
So my hope is that we take this power and use it
Outside of voting booths
This thought that we can make anything happen if we believe in the action and put to work his maxims
Don’t look for a savior to shoulder our burdens
But cope with the fact that it is all up to us
And embrace that
Be the person you want to see the world become
So whether or not I’m wrong about the person that triumphed in this election,
I want everyone to use him as their stepping stone
Don’t wait for presidents to save you
Be that allegory you’ve been waiting for
And that will be the change I can believe in

Take a look at my vitality
Using words to mask an illusion that has fathered me and left
Bastard credentials
Could define me, but I only try to show the best
Of a character that never was me
Never will be
One that you were never even supposed to see
But I use it as my energy, countering a tank that was born on E
So I make it through each day
Mind gassed but soul even more incomplete
Eyes fixed on ceiling, back is floor ridden
Throw some daggers out, keep the holsters in my kitchen
Grenades in my pocket, target has been set
Aiming at the ground, no need for practice in my version of Russian roulette
Perfectly aimed, but still can’t make contact
Gift and a curse of a disguise that holds lies inside and pain on the outs
Underneath it all, body lays lifeless
Never knowing what ups and downs are about
That’s why the words are glossy and the structure is well planned
But the man behind the veil can never be had
Or caught, or felt
Destroyed, or willed
To come out of a cage he knows too much about
If you feel nothing when you read these words
No emotions, no familiarity
Know that the man with the pen has tried everything to connect to the stance he is in
But no rush, or surge
Blood riddled with insulin
If you hear nothing
Then you know my voice and you see me
You feel me
Completely

Can’t walk away, won’t wave it off, don’t try to breath to take it all
In
So you know the path to let it out
No tears fall fast to point you south
Normally, go where the rivers flow
But water cascades off of crimson slopes
This time
Cliff’s edge used as beginning of sentence for behind the time repentance
Too late
Add your blood to the pot of the dreamer’s non-place on this earth

3 miles… gone
A long way from home when the light that you see has been turned off
You see, only in memory, but determined, you are
Learned before you came here that love ain’t shown the same where
Your come from it depends on
Can’t look at world around you for something felt within
Won’t listen to mouths telling you how it should have been
That’s what I had, and all I got
So don’t tell me not to want it again, you say
That deep breaths always help
Help you rationalize, help you compartmentalize
Help you speak in a way to show people what your needs are and why
Nerves always get the best of you
Life seemed like it was always testing your will to live or will to survive
Never both… well, at least, not at the same time
So you passed, so you made it
But no one at the finish line to tell you congratulations
Others tell you you’re not done, to keep trekking
Cause when you make it, you’ll feel like it’s yours
But you’re tired
1 mile… away
And the same thing that would make you keep going is the same thing that caused the almost-turn-back
The hits, the bruises, the chains, “he’s useless”
The cold summers, the purposeful blunders, to feel all the belts characteristics and wonders
Know them better than the makers
Study the acoustics when off the flesh
The tone, the pitch
Memories still fresh and would welcome them back if only for their intent
You
Complete and utter focus, but whip is inanimate
Credit to the master of ceremonies, have to excuse the range of emotions
From neutral to rage
Love you could never locate, but actions speak louder
Some people you tell this, for you, are incensed
But you don’t ask for much
Just… intent
2 knocks… to go
This porch evokes things you promised you would never show
Thought you’d find some kind of peace in the place you once knew, but now you remember why you often forget
No one came looking for you, and that one fact should make the feelings of forgiveness dissipate
They were right, you deserve better to have rejection being your only recognition
So do you stay or do you go… in?
You’re better than all that, but once you step into those walls you start to resemble pieces of shattered glass
No reflection needed, only know where you don’t need to be
But you’re tired
And you shouldn’t have to always be on the run
Maybe it could be different, you’ve grown and achieved some perspective
Just get what you need, the cold bed they provide
Because in the end, you’ve got more than enough
Deep breaths help you sleep at night
And…maybe… you just want to be home

Write down your prospects
Your seeds of hope rest between the pad and the ink
Light hearted subjects are
Non-ending objects
Contours running deep into the sun’s gaze
Our theories on darkness can slow dance with our deepest thought’s silhouettes
Your mind can be still in your eye of the storm if your pen allows the silence to mourn
Parallels of unmarked synergy can be handed down like dowries
We can wed our unmentionable tensions
And learn of each other on time taken by an hour glass filled to the brim with compassion
Hands on the sundial under a horizon forever set ease the chains on running time’s boundaries
Forever we can drift away on a raft made of memories etched in enclaves of our mind’s crevices
Without missing anything

Lost in an ocean used for stationery’s compulsion
Black water never before used to restore life
Or what fingertips hold can jettison the sun and bring upon the night
If you need it
All emotions revisited but
Never repeated

Ring around the
Rosary your,
Mother left you, Your
Mother left you, Or
Taken, more like it
Faking, you strike it
Or try to
This curveball that life threw
….
Swing and a miss
No time, to wish
That second chances consisted of more than distracted glances
Love preoccupied by all the other things you have to deal with. In this life
Or out
And that’s the best of dreams
Nightmares turn out to be emulated by reality
So it hurts
Unbearably
To hear these voices telling me
When I just want to make it better, that I wasted my one opportunity
Cold and beautiful world
At least she rests, shh…
In peace…

I, still here
In this room, in this house
Home, no longer
Grown? No poem to,
Teach me the ways of saving face when it all falls down
So I lay here, in this empty space
Longing for a moment that has figures and fixtures that cannot be erased…

I wish our destinations were switched
I wish that was enough consideration to stop the pain
But it’s not
Cold and beautiful world
I mirror every one of your circumstances
But with my numbness in feeling,
Reverberating daily
Every minute,
Skipping very few seconds
I hope that there,
Up there
You can’t reciprocate 

I miss you

Mastery of the conflict
Defense mode, all your moves encoded
In my movements
Follow blindly so you have the reinforcements
You don’t need
I’m down for, anything, you ask for
Until it dawns on me that I needed a little more
Than a brain of a drone that was a never ending problem that wasn’t my own
Gotta go…
So I wait on your call
I laid by the phone because I was waiting to fall
For you, and your pass times
Your trail, and my confines
Your disappearing act was damn sexy when the whole room was black
But when the sun comes up, I can only see myself
And the grasping for straws, the looks of my fall
The drawing your pictures on ceilings and walls
I couldn’t anymore
It’s hard cause I know you’ll be back, you’re sure I’ll be here
But the problem is that you know when and where
And I couldn’t keep a straight face if asked if you care
Mastery of patience, or obediently head whipped, pathetic
AKA
Not really, with the former
Was just being polite
I couldn’t… anymore
So this one will be different
I close myself off to not let her know that I’m willing
Unstable
Way more than able to be all that she doesn’t even need
So I’m out to show her that she needs to give it all for me
But me, she isn’t
And I liked her originally because she didn’t want to be
So she appropriately did what took me so long to do
Left, without all the baggage
Left, for me
My past apparently has perpetual consent to make my future have a gray heavy tint
You heard it
So no denying you’re your own reoccurring burden

For being everything you needed and then checking out
How could you know if I didn’t what I was about?
For being the thickest of contradictions
Life description only changed in intonation
For dying on the inside, but sailing on the out
But hearing only my heart when it asked to migrate south
Or whatever
Direction that faced away from you
Value feel more than past days
My molecules only recognize gravitational pull…
For seeing you wholly
You needing me what you need me to be
Chameleoned as holy
Your tranquil landscape
Excused the scorched soil’s uptake
Hell raised in a snow globe
You watch
It burn
In all of its glory
Flames are fine with you as long as it’s contained
Complete
Allegory
But went
Unnoticed
More or less for the better
Wouldn’t want a mental breakdown
You realizing that there is more to life than your shape
Round and round.
For preferring schwiggly lines than your taste
For putting me before you
For once
For the last time
For being able to only to give an apology and explanation in rhyme
I needed to drain the reservoirs to see how far I can go on E
I needed
My own
Please…
Forgive me

Why can’t I do this?
Third time this week that no love alone defeats no love with someone
Nothing with meaning isn’t anything… important
But anything is better than nothing at all.
So why is it that my body rejects it and my mind goes limp
And I end up throwing and waking up face down in my own pool of shhhhh…
Kicks
To the stomach
Thinking about all the times her complaints were valid
And I could have bandaged up the deep but invisible cuts
But I didn’t want…
…to bad enough
All I needed was another quick-fix line assured to just buy me some time to get a better rhyme for her to call shotgun in the Maserati
Stepping on the gas on the highway to one sided “this won’t last”, other sided “if I give him another chance, maybe my half full and his half empty will come together and fill this love starved glass”
But I didn’t,
I couldn’t,
This thinking was diluted
And even though this theorem benefited my new autonomy
Some left over part of me said I
No,
You couldn’t bottom feed me
Or her
Patchwork was no longer an option for the mended hearted
You both deserve better
She’s too good for this
And you use to be worth something
Now a trip with me to the pawnshop will only get you a dirty apology
The gift that keeps on giving
And now I try to drown her out with loose toothed sorrow eaters,
So the world can be captivated by stories of well thought out distractions
Substitutes for the only kind of lust that really works:
Love
But I can’t trick myself
It seems her face shows up every where I turn.
No relief.