Each smile a map, each line a trail,
Etched softly on the skin's embrace.
A journey marked in fine detail,
The story written on your face.

The laugh that danced around the eyes
Still lingers in a softened fold,
A map of moments, lows and highs,
A quiet story, gently told.

Not every crease was born from pain,
Some stem from joy that overflowed.
Expressions that we can't restrain,
Emotions that our hearts bestowed.

So wear these lines with quiet pride,
They are the footprints of your days.
A testament to life applied,
A living poem on your face’s page.

I woke up this morning.
Everything as is.
Masks, adorning.
Again, the slider has slid.

I went to work today.
My effort to have shelter.
My role, dollars play.
Same-y, helter-skelter.

Prescribed breaks, no aid.
Job in jeopardy.
Technologically afraid.
'Management' in Ed Hardy.

I serve my time.
Come home, unwind.
Here to find.
A lonely mind.

And I ask,

Myself:

"Was I 'me' today?"
"Did I do things 'my way'?"
"Did  relinquish to the fray?"
"Can I survive another day?"

I Feel lonely all the time.
Just an idiot behind rhyme.
To be lonely is to not be alone.
Words make you a home.

At least in yourself.

Out of time, pantomime.
The Meister of innocuous rhyme.
A seed of what we cannot hold.
Fulfillment of stories told.

An idea.

Dangerous things.

A person, long gone.
A recurring song.
'Stoic' or 'complacent'?
Interrupt 'merriment'.
There is time better spent.

Watching grass grow.

There is something to be said.
For the decree of of the 'serene'.
Those people are dead.
We need something to 'mean'.

Lost and lonely, adrift, a storm.
Tired, fruitless; colors worn.
Nonconsensually born.
Ripped, tattered and torn.

Years ago, in a snow drift
To right a wrong was done amiss
A coward not worth a ****
Wants to dictate your status

Knees bloodied.
Hands shredded.
I went for you.

Upon the sea of broken glass.

Every inch of you.
Carved in my miles.

The shape of who I am.

I dragged my corpse.
For years, and years.

Blood fornicating with tears.

I bring this body beside you.
My culmination of fears.

You rest my mind.
You rest my soul.

Peace for a heart out of control.

You read my poem,
sighed like a widowed cello,
told me I was
so brave.
So sensitive.
So real.

I said thanks.
You asked if I was free
Friday.

You wanted to know the man
behind the wound.
The author of ache.
The architect of vibes.

So I showed up.

A little unwashed.
A little twitchy.
A patchwork of trauma
in ill-fitting pants.

You blinked.
Twice.

Like I’d just tracked in mud
on the white carpet
of your curated suffering.

You wanted a candlelit meal
with my metaphors.
But I brought the cow.
It shat on the floor.

I tried to explain—
the sadness isn’t a costume.
The pain isn’t prose.
The blood on the page
was mine.

You said,
“I just thought you'd be more… together?”
I said,
“I thought you knew what empathy meant.”

Turns out,
what you really wanted
was artisanal anguish
with the trauma locally sourced
but ethically removed.

You can cry to the soundtrack—
just don’t ask where the violins came from.

Because—

Nobody is amused with a stray cow.
But most people enjoy
a good hamburger.

i am not strong
i am not wise
i am not
whatever they think i am

she said she saw me
and i believed her
and now i don’t know
where to put that belief

it doesn’t fit in my chest
it spills
it burns
it ruins the neatness i made of my pain

i thought if i kept everything
inside the lines
i would be safe
but love
doesn’t care about borders

i want to say thank you
but my mouth fills with apology
i want to say stay
but my hands are still shaking
like i’m holding something
i didn’t earn

i thought being soft
was a secret
but she held it in the light
and didn’t flinch

and now
i am undone
not ruined—
just
undone

She loves me.
She wants me to run.
Not away—
but through.

Through brush and bramble,
collecting spurs in my coat
like medals no one pinned.

She wants my tangles.
My matted fur.
The parts of me
I tried to groom into quiet.

She says,
“Bring it all.
Let it snarl.
Let it reek of survival.”

She doesn’t flinch
when I bare my teeth
without anger.

She knows the difference
between danger
and damage.

She doesn’t reach
to smooth me.
She walks beside me
and watches me shed.

And I think—
maybe this is what love is:
not a leash,
not a cage,
not a cure—

but a clearing
where I can pant,
live,
bleed,
and be seen.

I betrayed my sadness
the moment I let her
touch my face
without flinching.

I fed it for years—
grief, my quiet tenant.
We slept in shifts.
I mopped its floor.
It whispered bedtime stories
in a voice that sounded like mine
but colder.

Sadness was loyal.
It never left.
It kept me honest,
hungry,
hollow.
It taught me to build poems
from absence,
to see beauty
in staying behind.

And now—
I’ve let the door swing open.

Let her walk in
with warm hands
and eyes that do not apologize
for seeing me.

And I laughed.
Once.
Loudly.
And for a second
it didn’t feel like treason.
It felt like
oxygen.

But now my sadness
sits in the corner,
quiet,
watching me
like a dog I fed for years
that doesn’t understand
why I’m not
starving anymore.

I didn’t mean to betray it.
Only—
to rest.
To live.
To be something
besides
the ache.

But I miss it.
A little.
How it curled around me
like smoke,
like a certainty
that asked nothing
but silence.

Still, I let her in.
Still, I let go.
Still, I know—
some ghosts only leave
when you stop
feeding them.

I fed grief for years—
now joy knocks, and I answer.
My ghost waits outside.