Today begins the Tenebrae
The extinguishing of candles
The gradual diminishing of light
Then a loud noise in the darkness
It's not practiced much these days
You need the requisite clergy
And the will to witness after midnight
the desire for which deserts me
It seems older than Christ
Redolent of the Egyptians
Like Sekhmet in her Karnak chapel
Unlit
Against time
Resistant.

Far from the chatter of the daylight hours,
Away from where the fireflies buzz.
The street lights hum with moths aflutter,
The river froths and churns.
She sits suspended in the air;
Her  arms are slack, blank is her stare;
Oh she wishes, floating there,
For the river to take her away.

You are my tangerine,
Brimming bitter-sour
Across the wretched, dusty room.

And you brought me
An orange touch of sun
Glitter glowing on my skin.

To wake wide in the morning,
Curtain dances with fresh air
Into my smoker's lungs.

Even to my deathbed remains
The scene of you that will
Leave me between the walls

Of longing and regret.
And to my morning sunlight,
I will never become better.

I say to you, my tangerine,
You are my very will to live,
And to die, if I cannot save you.

Julie you we're there for me when
I needed you Julie.

Julie you cared for me when I couldn't stand.

Julie you held me up with a giving hand.

Julie you would die for me just like I would die for you.

I was there for you Julie when you needed me
I cared you Julie when you cried to me.

I fought for you Julie when you couldn't stand.

I held you up Julie with my giving hand
I would die for you Julie.

Just like you would die for me Julie

I'm not soft,
but I'm not cold.
I'm made of edges
that know when to hold.

I laugh loud,
love louder,
and walk like I own
the ground I was told
not to stand on.

i want to peel your skin back
and reveal your deepest sweetness.
to look at your veins
and memorize their paths.
maybe then i’d understand
why you are so rough on the outside.
it takes a lot of work,
digging your fingernails into the flesh,
pulling and pulling until you are bare.
but it is all worth it;
to visit your center,
to break past what conceals you,
and take you apart
slice by slice.

She walks up to me curiously,
Head-tilted; her innocent eyes stare into me.
Constellations on her face - I count one, two, three blinks followed by a grin.
A child sees herself for the first time.

Now she’s taller, her face a little broader
she looks into me;
a smile replaced by a frown, she pulls back
inspecting every line that marks her skin

then returns with paint which she brushes over her skin.
It marks her eyes, her lips; her cheeks
full of pink as she admires her work.

The paint never washes off, you see, it stains.
She returns to me regularly, rivers of ink running down her face,
her eyes clouded; the illusion of beauty hangs in the air.

Society’s product stands before me, reflections of her.

-thelostpoetjournals

i may have dug the hole
but you pushed me into it
now i’m stuck down here
buried in this mess