Category: POETRY

I did not come here
to be judged and cursified. [1]
for your sins and failures.

I will not carry your cross of fears on my back,
thorns piercing my brow,
my bare feet bleeding from the cuts
given by the sharp slivers of glass
hidden in the cracks of the sidewalk.

I see you are not one I can trust;
though you say differently,
you’re trying to peel my skin off with your words.
I have closed myself to you;
you can never enter again.
I’m afraid you might steal something else.

1
I gave you love in bits and pieces,
the only way I know
protection maybe
but you don’t have the right
to stand there
screaming at me,
accusing me of hating and using you.

There’s nothing that says
you can’t call me.
You accuse me of drifting,
of being tortured.
The words confuse me,
disorient me.
I feel like a traitor,
drifting confused.
I feel bloated from similar feelings.

The answer:
knocked out with Ludes and Scotch,
and sucked into a deep deep sleep.
What should I have done?
What should I have said?
What I didn’t say.
What else are we caught between?
Another sky?

2
I found myself walking down Broadway,
long fast strides
my arms slapping my legs:
ropes on a flagpole on a breezy winter day.
I was trashed,
drunk, stoned, and wired.
I was cold,
real cold.
Thoughts jumped around in my head;
but I could never keep one down long enough
to see what it was.

The prophecies speak for themselves;
nothing can be added.
They bred among themselves.
But what of us?
Do we have lives then?
Can we change fate?
Can we decide,
we don’t want to move the arm that way
but this way,
and the fingers like this?