Well

My tears are shaped like words
When everything goes well
Only on my pages
Is where the thing with feathers fell

No one ever notices
And there’s none I’ll ever tell
That I was ever feeling this
When everything goes well

Surface

The fading lights clear the mist
Of old memories left behind
Moments passed and best discarded
Ancient griefs and wrath unguarded
Terrors that need to exist
Only in your mind.

Grave Troubles

There are many troubles in this life
But as for grave ones, there’s few greater
Than to find yourself at trouble’s door
Without a sense of humor.

Dependent

How I long to leave your shadow!
To be none but myself;
But so long as I am flawed and shallow,
It would be me and no one else.

Copacetic

Nothing, no one;
Weak, pathetic.
But I assure you, it’s all
Copacetic.

Filter

There’s a part of me that hates the lie
When I am told to be myself;
I’ve felt pieces of me die
To preserve another’s sense of self.

Yet who is there to blame, but I
Who made the choice to hold my tongue
And not to let the thing untie,
Lest I make another come undone?

Better that I rage and sigh
In quiet places no one sees,
And let that part that hates the lie
Find truth in tending others’ needs.

Constitution

On any given day,
I am glass or I am stone;
A reflective, fragile thing,
Or else incredibly alone.

On any given day,
I choose which one to be:
Someone reflecting pain,
Or one who does not see.

Compartmentalization

There is only little boxes
And one big grave
I can use the little boxes
Little things to save

But big things are left out in the sun
To fester and turn rotten
I can choke on things left in the sun
Or have them buried and forgotten

My Mission

I am alone of my own volition
Friendship contrary to my mission
To be, as much as one can be in a day,
Never in the way.

At the End of the Day

We learn who we’re supposed to be
From the people in our home;
And then again from those we meet
When we go out to roam.
We learn well, eventually,
All that must be shown;
But who are we supposed to be
When we’re all alone?