Worthy

Perhaps
With time
I’ll be able
To change myself
Enough
To be worthy
Of your love

Because
I know
Who I am
Right now
Isn’t even
Worthy enough
To be
In your presence

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This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Trapped

I find myself trapped
By the very rituals
I made to survive

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This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

That Comes With A Question

There is a twisting
An internal shifting
A tangential listing
That comes
With a question of existing

There is a thirsting
An internal enlisting
A tangential resisting
That comes
With a question of persisting

There is a wanting
An internal insisting
A tangential manifesting
That comes
With a question of coexisting

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This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

The Knife Of Hypocrisy

The knife of hypocrisy
Cuts deep
My shadow’s blood
Leaks
Painting an already ruined floor

The boat’s mooring
Has come undone
Now we drift
Upon the whims of a moon
Covered by cloud

The dehydrated man
Dares not drink
Because he knows
He cannot swim

The monkey
Rages in the cage
He created for himself

The ant
Toils with its fellows
Oblivious of the destruction
Left in the wake
Of their queen’s rage

I write
Words on a page
Knowing they will never be understood
By those
Who inspired them

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Toward Eternity

The small
Quiet voice
Asked me to write
Of the highest of callings.

That I should turn my gaze towards the gods.

That I should speak of grandeur, greatness and glory.

I was not moved.

No words came,
Other than these few;

I feel nothing
But the sun upon my skin,
The dirt under my feet,
And weight of this moment
Stretching toward eternity.

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

spider

i killed
instinctively
moving before thought
its body crushed under my heel
only in death
could I see
the beauty
of its life

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Mere Imaginings

Almost everything
I remember
Of you
Are mere imaginings

Just the stories
Shared
Of a man
Long gone
Made real
By the desperate
Longings of a son
To feel
Something
Anything
For his father
Other than shame

My dwindling pride
Clinging
To the hope
That perhaps
You were once
Something more
Than the shell
You became

I tell them
I never knew that man
That those memories
Are not mine
Yet now
Those lies
They are all I have of you
Beyond the small scatterings
Of pain
I learnt to forget

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Triggered

I cannot whisper
The words I wish to scream

Tears fall
At the precipice of silence

Unmoving internal chaos
Catatonic rage

Memories of the present
Give way to realities of the past

All again
All at once

Visions flash
To the beat of the body’s rocking

The internal observer
Watches helpless

Why can’t you see I’m suffering?
Don’t you dare touch me

Thank god
For Valium

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

These Words

These words
Are such a limp expression
Of the rage
You’ve evoked
Within me

You cannot fathom
The pain I could induce
Were I to yield
The full weight of my mind
Upon the sole task
Of destroying yours

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

The Mountain

If I knew
How hard
I’d have to work
In order
To not have to
Work so hard
I’d have probably
Settled for a day job

Only now
Do I realize
Just how tall
The mountain
Truly is
And how strong
I’ll have to be
To climb it

Nonetheless
I am grateful
For my ignorance
For it made me
Strong enough
To believe
That I can become strong enough
To make it
To the top

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

The Candle Burns

The candle burns
Giving light
Giving warmth

By fulfilling its function
It destroys itself
By destroying itself
It serves others

The candle burns
Sacrificing itself
For us

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Seen Through Their Eyes

Seen through their eyes
my father’s shame
a new disguise.
Their questions,
first responded to by lies,
then by compromise,
and finally by a summarize
of all the things I despise.

Somehow they are surprised
to find me so compromised,
so paralyzed,
So utterly debilitized
with my inability to
sit analyzed
and scrutinized
and demoralized
and so clearly despised.

Of course they’ve taken offence
at my dropping of the pretense.
How could I have been so dense
to think they could handle my defense,
to think they’d want me to get off the fence,
to think they’d want my two cents?
Yes I’m intense.
Yes my pain presents as a nuisance.
Yes my demons are immense.
It’s common sense
All they see is my father in me.
How’s that for a recompense?

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Unfortunately

How
Can I accept
Your offer to help
When that very offer
Is tainted?

By opening myself
To your love
I would also be reopening
The old wounds
Inflicted by you

Unfortunately
For both of us
Your love
Isn’t strong enough
To stop that pain

Unfortunately
For both of us
I am not
Strong enough
To move on

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Pretentious Words

Insert pretentious words here
To abstractly elucidate beauty
Ensure reader’s confusion
And thus embarrassed admiration
As they critique themselves
For not ‘getting it’
Then watch as they lose interest
Relegating all poetry
As something beyond their reach

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Mourning Song

a man
played a song
in my dreams last night
it was a eulogy
a homage to a life lost
it was a simple song
softy sung
but powerfully prosed
i woke weeping
mourning a man
that I never knew
mourning a song
that no longer exists

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This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

release

calm
within the eye
of the storm

joy
vicariously
obtained

warmth
besides
growing fire

clarity
from duty 
beyond self

peace
of a riptide’s
pull

focus
alongside
fear

awe
at primal
efficiency

pleasure
in
pain

release
through acceptance
of death

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Of Myself

If I could just
Monetize my pain
I’d be able
To exist
In this world
As myself

Until then
All I can offer you
Are these
Few
Words
Of myself

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Moment

There is a moment that comes
Just before a lightening strike
When I notice an ever so slight shift
A constriction
A dropping
A sense of dread mixed with wonder

In that brief moment
I feel truly connected to the world
No longer merely observing it
No longer apart from it
But a part of it

It’s feels as if time stops
As if there is an eternity between that moment
And the flash
And the rumble
And the rain

It’s just one moment
But that one moment
Is enough

---

This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Panic Attack

You know what’s worse
Than feeling completely overwhelmed
By the mundanity of normal life?

The shame

The knowing
That I
Now must
Make plans to cope
With things most others thoughtlessly navigate

The knowing
That I
Now must
Choose between
The embarrassment of bailing
Or the embarrassment of failing

The knowing
That I
Now must
Accept
The fact that I am limited
That my desires will forever outstrip my capacity

All in order to survive
A crowd
A noise
A smell
A look
A word
A touch
A thought

Yes
Even a thought

My mind
In its infinite wisdom
Sometimes views the thoughts it itself creates
As so dangerous to its own existence
That it deems it appropriate
To shut itself down

The shame
The isolation
The confusion
The loneliness
The limitation
The fear
The inevitability
The holding back
The rumination
The depression

The shame

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This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken

Regret

From the first
I could see that you
Were wrong

Only now
Do I see
That I was too

How much
Would we have saved
If only we both knew?

Now I sit in regret
Wondering if you
Are sitting likewise too

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This poem is from the book A Requiem For What Could Have Been: Poetry For The Broken