there's nothing
that i cannot feel-
mostly it's this hollowness
a computer program circuit.
the world makes us all the same,
into malfunctioning robots.
the cogs in my heart
cease to turn
and it's ragged
jagged
numbness

the woman laid her stomach
over the child's soft downy head
as a shield
as armor
to protect such soft innocence
from the grainy world that creeps in
with it's gnarled fingers.
the same world that took
the warm fragile beating
of her heart
and sloooooooowed
it
to
a
dull whisper

he's more than just some boy
with black hair
or eyes that peer from behind trees.
i know because
when he sits on my bed
or my couch
or my chair
or my floor
it's like he's always been there.
apart of a drawing or a painting
something permanent
but i didn't noticed until
his physical form
accumulated in my life.

it's like we are a family
of pressed flowers
slid between glass casings
or dried butterfly wings
pinned on a cork board.
something to be studied
observed
fragility that disperses
between finger and thumb
sorrowfully turning into dust that
coats the surfaces of tables or
writing desks.
i'll always love the colors
always love their hues
shaping me-
they made me the golden shadows
of things, like during sunsets.
but i feel blue
at the bottom
and it's because they are sad
and i know so much
about flowers
that are truly people
and nothing more//

silence leaks like light into a camera
filtering obscure blobs
that take shape
take meaning
take life.
we still the hollow breaths
that tunnel through our black lungs
wanting to hold a white hot
star in our palms
and **** the vibrancy down
inside of us.
its true that emptiness
rests like lions in cages
between our esophagus and stomach-
but its how you choose
to come into your being-
it is what defines
the map and constellations
of our souls.

this heart is like
smoke hanging
in the air
when the ashes crumble
into living things
and it's all
illusions
pressing the clock hands
waiting for your breaths
to come raspy.
who could love what's never been alive?
but he did
he did
"you never had a funeral",
he said
and "when i looked into your eyes
i knew something like that;
those soul windows-
could never be dead."

eyes bloodshot
awakening even in dreams
the dead may rest
but never the living