I walked to the mirror when I woke
I noticed that pieces of myself still lingered on my bed
cracked fragments of plaster made a trail behind me with my every step

I looked into that mirror
That mirror that told truths I did not want to know
It revealed a face wrought by troubles
A soul diseased with woes

This plaster was my makeshift armor
that I encased my too delicate self into
The plaster was hard and white
and just beneath it was my spirit
Still intact, though it only emitted a faint light

I can still recall a time
When I was allowed to broadcast my spirit
in all her riveting splendor
She was a kaleidoscope of lights
like the aurora borealis
dancing among the stars

But these systems and these expectations
Knotted her into limitation
Suffocating her every dream
and damning her to a life of monotony and trivilaity
Surrounding her with people
Who don't have the eyes to see
A destiny beyond their constant, choreographed agony

I quieted my mind
And pondered all these things in my heart
I took a sledge hammer
to the remaining plaster on my body
My armor broke to pieces
Strewn out on the floor, no longer serving as protection
and suffocation
I can finally breathe again.

My spirit is regaining her health
Soon she will soar
I'm stepping out on this journey
And though in leaving the past there is so much uncertainty
I think with glee:
Oh, the things this magical existence has in store!

When, on days like this
It takes everything in me to stay
To remain,
With my feet planted on this decaying ground,
That's collapsing under me
I lift my heavy head toward a cloudy sky
and cry out silently: Why?

And on days like these
I know I will find a way in no way
To get out of here
Out of this stagnation and this fear
One day, I know
I will be out in a field
Where the air is so crisp,
And I will feel it against my singing lips,
Singing sweet songs of praise
For once again my sorry soul God will have raised.

On days like this the bleakness feels inescapable,
I wonder if I am in any degree capable
To rid myself of my hindrances
and set forward on the path that God has set before me
I can't lie to you
and tell you I am naturally brave,
for I am shaking at my knees,
So scared I am indeed
But I can't keep my feet planted in this deteriorating ground much longer,
For the dirt of this town breaks through my shoes and eats at my calloused soles
I need to find a way to stop the bleeding.  

Jesus showed me how to give up everything
for the will of our Father
It's so daunting to be called to this,
but something deep within me
tells me I must follow.

So what will I give up,
What will I sacrifice
to follow the call God has on my life?
My answer: everything.

I created all these ideals in my head,
I'm going to be the famous writer
With the perfect family I never had
But I just learned
You have to live at rock bottom for a while
Until you can live a fulfilling lifestyle

So, I'll brace myself,
I'll be prepared
For these ideals I have
Will take time to reach
Each a perilous path to the top of my dreams
No matter how much I scream
From the pain this upward climb will bring
I will persist, evermore
Until I have all that I deserve

I need to live fearlessly,
And do what I love
Because it's better to follow your heart's plan,
Than fail at something you never wanted in the first place.

Touch space and time
With my fingertips
The ambiance carries me on a wave
Echoing vibrations crawl up my vertebrae

This music is untypical
Just take a sip of it
It's better than your daily drug
It's a kaleidoscopic hug
Increasing dopamine
Close your eyes,
This experience is unlike anything you've ever seen.

Take my hand,
We'll dance on top of this barren land
And give it life *again

Happiness in a bottle cap
Where is my home?
Cause I'm never going back.

Bruised and bleeding knees
I stood still to befriend the bees
I stood as still as a tree

This mirror is fogged
But I can still see
The beautiful me
A halo of light surrounds my silhouette
My inner self I will never forget

I don't really care
About trends and fads
I am concerned with eyes and hands
Let's look each other's eyes
and reach out each other's hands
To support one another
To share love
To recognize the Oneness of everything.

Let's just do what we love to do
And forget the worries and anxieties that bog us down
Come on now,
Turn that frown upside down ;)

I always gripped the steering wheel too firmly
Feeling blood coursing through my veins,
Vehemently
Calculating all the pitfalls
But it was too aggravating
So I let go of the wheel
And drove into the wildness of oblivion.

Awakening to this grand mystery
My mind-- blistering
Sitting here
Fidgeting
Thoughts in constant loops spinning
I'm sipping
On consumption
Reaching for more
But wishing for reduction
Production is what we're aiming for
But all I want to do is break this world a part
Because this world is like a broken clock
Still ticking but spinning into chaos
We need to stop the running away
From our problems
Before we spiral into oblivion
Instead, our calling is
To break a part this world
And all it's corrupt systems
So maybe,
In destruction of the old ways and the old world,
A new, loving earth can be born
One in which we will hold each other in inifinite compassion,
An earth beyond our wildest dreams,
The dreams of our innocent childhoods
Before we awoke to
This nightmare.

What I really hate about POLITICS
Is the herd mentality it incites
We're choosing sides
And steadfastly holding onto our right to fight
We see division and
spill over with hate
I look at these people wrapped up in and
warped by their politics
While someone's loved one is dying
While another is being born
A butterfly flies in a windy meadow
While someplace else there is a
tumultuous storm
We become blind to this beautiful earth in which we reside
Living within this beautiful sentient gift
Because all we focus on is who is right or
who is wrong
We waste away in our hate
But it's pointless,
Because either way, it doesn't matter anyway
Fifty years from now this will be put down in history
As the worst debate of the century
The youth in the future
will be too absorbed in virtual reality
To care about our country's history.

Now I tell you this,
Do you want a REAL revolution?
The real revolution would be to
LOVE
just love, and don't hate
AT ALL

Right now I see two presidential candidates
going at each other like toddlers
One says: I'm better! You're bad!
The other says: No, I'm best! You're worst!
It's ******* ridiculous
Aren't those supposed to be two grown adults on that
stage?
Well anyway,
What should I expect from a mostly un-awakened country?
This all breaks my heart...

I'm in my hideaway
A cave of glorious wonders
Where in my lonesome,
I stay
Having no sense of time,
Having no sense of days
Each day melts slowly into the next,
In the thick glittering summer haze

My hideaway has miriad iridescent shells,
Reflecting the sparse light that makes it into the cave
In the cave I feel safe,
Finally
So far away from the
Bustle of life
Finally, finally
I can close my eyes and
Say goodnight

But in the morning I awake Replenished,
In the morning I awake anew
I take in a fresh breath
Of the crisp and salty air,
For I am in a cave,
By the sea
In my mind's eye
Far away
To gain some clarity.

When all the lies fade away
You in the corner, ruminating
The sun shines forth on this sullen day
And you realize your prized life has been forsaken

When you're too in love to see
Your blinded by compassion
You have so much of it that you live miserably
And now your stunted by inaction

I tread through the snowbank
I slipped down deep into it
And now everything is blank
So in the frozen stillness I sit

Within the center of the chaos
Resides the truth
Life is a multitude of revolving clocks
Spinning in alignment with abundant life which moves

Whenever you find yourself confounded
Instead of forcing a solution through manipulation
If you just surrender you will be astounded
By the simple ebb and flow of creation.

Why?* is all I can manage from my lips
I don't understand this life
It's like some sort of cruel game
You think you know where you're going
But then everything gets taken away

All I ever wanted was certainty
Before I give my heart away
Because I've loved before and
I loved hard
But the ones I had loved left my bleeding heart dying on the floor

I can never quite express accurately
In love my heart races and my mind scatters, incoherently
I've got so much suppressed I say you've got to be kidding me
All I want is authenticity
But I'm so scared to be the real me

All I can see is me repeating the same cycles relentlessly
Love is the drug I shoot in my veins
To relieve all the suppressed pain
But it's all in vain
Because when I finally wake up from the daze
I realize the love I clung on to for my very life was shallow and blind
For the love that I put on a pedestal
Is revealed
No longer can infatuation conceal
The demons of the object of my affection
My head now is in a daze,
My life is in upheaval and needs correction
I sit here on a naked floor
Like lava the floor swallows me alive
As I witness the dream I dreamt of love
Disintegrate
Turned to ash
Right in my very hands
I smother the ashes on my face
As I wipe away the tears
Of another love gone asunder
Fake love,
Okay, I said it
Fake love.

Angels come in a variety of ways
When life is cold and stark
And you can't seem figure out where to turn
The ones you thought loved you burn you instead of lift you up
And you end up feeling misunderstood and hurt,
With no where to turn

But God doesn't give up so easily, you see
He won't allow you to believe your misery for too long
For God will flood your life with angels in disguise
Who fill up your darkness with blinding light
From such love you won't be able to escape
For you cannot run away from God's grace

It comes down like a tidal wave
This overwhelming love I can't explain
It gives me an over-abundant bounty to be grateful for,
How could I be so blessed?
And how could I ever deny God and the realness of his love?
I just thank the people,
These angels on earth,
Who surrender their hearts to God
So that they can become vessels of his unconditional love,
Touching and transforming each person they come in contact with,
As the love of God that is coursing through their veins,
Gets transfused into the person who needs it so desperately.

I am deserving
And I don't need to produce reasons
For why I am
I just am,
And I know it,
I'm convinced of it,
And nothing is gonna put out
This fierce fire
Of my new found self love.

I see pouting lips,
******* and hips
Wrapped ******* clad,
Skin tight

I see muscles and chiseled lines
Lust in their eyes
I see vanity in nearly every face
And I think it is a disgrace

For when I look instead
At a face so pure
Like the one of Mother Teresa,
Or MLK
I wonder,
What has happened to the valiant hearted today?
And why have they all gone away?
Where is their voice among all of this vanity?
I can't see them through all of this triviality.

reverberating through the beat
every wavelength of sound is a stream
like an iridescent waterfall
with bubbles at the base
i fall with grace
i fall with grace
music erasing the pain
like blue hair dye escaping down the drain
cool down
slow down
put your mind in autodrive
let the music revive you
you haven't yet died
feel your heart beat to the tempo
blood flowing through
your arteries
your eyes roll to the back of your mind
your body shakes
your mind is finally awake.

I never learn. I just continually recycle thoughts. It's just a game of big words with the thesaurus on my lap. And, heck! Do I think I'm the only aspiring writer? Breaking my hand over words that could be so useless to another individual? I mean, I'm stuck in this stupid little bubble of my reality, my life and my everything-- I never see the big picture. The world in all. But, I have to face that I am incapable of knowing beyond my corners. That every self-created problem I make for myself is only a problem taken for granted and used in the wrong way. And maybe every mistake is a new beginning.

I look over my shoulder
To all that I have lost
I look into the mirror
And see all I have become
And I can’t quite say I’m satisfied
With who I’ve grown to be
I just remember all the useless striving
And now all the monotony
I’ve always been searching for something more
But what if this is it?
What if my life is just old wounds and festering sores
With no real hope and no real bliss?

I think I know what I want
But when I get it I push it away
Or I run
My mind is vague and tired
My heart seeks for relief
I’m stuck in patterns that will result in my demise
I just want to experience life again through a child’s eyes
But I know too much now
I’m cynical and guarded
My heart just wants to love but I’m hurting

I can’t feel anything too deeply anymore
I smile, but what for
It’s merely a mask to conceal the endless yearning within me
And all the regret lurking inside me
My pain echoes like a dull drumming
No one seems to understand me
So I just keep running
Maybe, one day
I’ll run right into
What I’ve been hoping for
I’ll run right into the bright warm light of the sun
And it will absorb my misery
It will illuminate my small life with expansive love.
Under every vain pursuit I’ve chased
Has been the intrinsic need to be unconditionally loved.

Close my eyes
Unaltered,
No faults
A soul full of thoughts
And whims
And musical notes that consist of hymns.

Desperation, perspiration
Fear has left here--
The inhabitants of my heart
Because tomorrow is for a new day to start
To leave behind this mediocrity.

Trails
If you're feminine you're too frail
And vulnerable
You can't follow where your heart wants to take you
Your dreams-- You have to stay home with them.

In many ways our collective intellect is growing
Seeds of reasoning have been sown
Leaving very little left to be known
But sometimes you need to disconnect from your society
And be alone
In order to truly understand
That your mind is your only home.

So goodbye to everyone narrow-minded
Your attempts of kindness were spoiled by your shortsightedness
and your closed hearts
I don't need you
I only need water to drink and air to breathe
I'll set out on a trail and never look back
Only up to observe the sky and the trees
And one day on this journey, I'll find what I'm looking for inside of me.

Climing the ocean stairs
Flipping through neon pages of
"I don't care"
My copious apathy makes me scared
But really, I probably feel this way
Because my mentality is stuck in: "life's not fair" mode
I can't  seem to reset my brain
It likes to fight, sleep and dream away
My dreams are so vivid and so real
It feels better to live out my adventures
In my dreams

I'm Holden Caulfield
I'm a brat
I think everyone's a phony
But I know I'm just a hypocrite,
Because I'm a phony too in a way
I just see all these people
So locked into a system of capitalism,
Locked into vanity and materialism and self centered-ness
I think they're stupid and dumb
They complain about what goes on in the world
But they're a apart of the problem
I am too, but I least I don't have this whole song and dance to try to woo people
Seriously, at this point I'm just going to be my eccentric self
And not care about people's opinions
Because I know I'm not perfect,
But at the end of the day,
I'm not self absorbed, and I'm out there being kind and doing little deeds of kindness
I put kindness first,
But even with me, kindness doesn't always win

I told someone at work that I'm going to
Live off the grid because
I'm tired of society
And he said "but you won't have anyone to talk to"
And I said "I'll talk to the trees and animals"
Like some sort of Snow White
I wish I could tolerate people better,
But I have this strong inclination to
Slap the phoniness out of people,
And it's becoming more difficult to restrain
Day by day
Ignorance truly is bliss
Because being able to see so clearly
That each person is the source of their misery has got me going crazy!
Because even I can't snap my fingers
And be be released of all my negative patterns!
They're like chains, or
A maze I'm stuck in, that I have to keep repeating over and over again.

Last year I was inert,
A desert of my own
A planet out of orb
I saw things from a distance
I felt things, only safely
And I only did things
When no one was looking

But I grew, boy, did I grow
Like a ***** breaking forth
From a sidewalk crack
I externalized a long held internal scream
And I let,
Yes, I allowed
Myself to beam
To show the world
The very best and the very worst
Parts of me

These days,
I refuse to feel shame
For the things about me
That are less than
I am broken and beautiful
Incomplete on my own, yet strong
And I refuse to hide myself
In fear of being attacked by an onslaught of criticisms,
Telling me of everything about myself that is wrong
But I choose to take the risk,
Everyday,
To walk out into this world,
Armorless and brave
So maybe I will have the chance
To reach out to an ailing heart,
Like I once had,
And help those hurt people to see that
They are so loved,
By Jesus
And that in Him we are made complete.

I walked up the steps in
this old building
The steps called out to me
Eerily, and I followed the tug
in my soul
I am anxious
But I follow wherever it
tells me to go

Big windows
In empty rooms
Look out onto the street below
I'm so high above everyone
I say I feel like God
I see all my friends
Down below
I am unattached,
looking down
on the world

Nothing compares to a warm embrace
and eyes connecting and
a radiant smile on a loved one's face
But their is nothing quite like solitude
It's quiet
It's haunting,
it's serene
In solitude
you can hear the whispers of your soul
and discern clearly what they mean

I've always had trouble with connection
I feel perpetually an alien
even when I see I am loved
I could never be
truly convinced in my heart
But I feel most loved and
understood
In the silence,
In the comfort of withdrawal
Is when I feel most connected
To the life force from which
I live.

As I walked down those steps
Back into the living, breathing life of
contradictions
In it being so much futility and
triviality
I know that everything will be okay
Even if, among a sea of people
I feel as if
I were the only one.

Shimmering, glittery, golden
Basking in the sweltering sun

The sun is an orange orb
Big, giant, hot, burning.... burning

Feeling skin brush againt cold flesh
Feeling another heartbeat pressed to your chest

Beating hearts intertwined
The golden orb consumes

Honey drips down
Glittery, golden, sweet

On our way to being complete
Yet seperated by a chasm so deep

How shall we build a bridge?
I want to get to you

You're so far
I'm in the passenger seat of your car

Chattering like a gang of birds
You smile, but it is rehearsed

I want to dump honey on you
Thick with love and affection

So your heart will be revealed,
And also my heart for you

Glittery, shimmering, golden, true
The orange orb is you.

Do you see my hands,
My open palms
Clamped
Sometimes
Because I close
And I find it so hard to open to you
Love has always hurt before

You said you’re independent but tender
You make me feel so warm inside
Like fireworks or rainbows expanding inside me
Like the sweetest melody
Brewing inside my heart
You give me hope
Beautiful love.

Sometimes I turn around to see
everything I have left behind me
It’s weird to think of who I was
compared now to who I am
I never knew it would be this way
But still, I’m content

It’s just really different you see
Becoming the person
I never knew I could be
So many things on the inside are changing in me
And that’s okay,
I’m happy

I don’t know what the future holds,
I can’t know the indiscernible
I’ll have to put my mind to rest
And open my heart to the unknown
But it always seems
That there is a deep wisdom in me
Only accessible past the mind,
In the silence of peace

As winter descends
I will guard this flame growing in my heart
I live in a cruel world full of endless distractions
But I will remain, standing firmly in love
Now is not the time to cower,
Now is the time to rise above.

The past
Can grasp
For me
Plead
For me to pay it mind
Spare it my time
But if I did, that would be a self-destructive crime
Because life is too short to be wasting my time

Antiquated journal entries
Scorching my eyes
I thought I threw them all out
I thought I did away with my past entirely
But this journal entry
Brought me back to a day I have no recollection of
It made me feel like I felt five years ago,
Lonely and seeking attention in all the wrong places
Scared and shielded.

My, have I grown
Not in size or shape
But in destiny and fate
My life was heading in an ominous direction
How many times did I call out to God
Until I finally became humbled
And welcomed the Angels protection.

It's been a long journey
Through attempting to conform to dogmatic ideals
to becoming overwhelmed and lashing out in bouts of departing--
Dissociating
To allow the pain to be released in some rebellious way
But the core of me was still ailing and not okay
And only recently have I started to discover my self worth and potential
Not by comparing myself to others and deeming myself superior as to soothe my raging pain
But by listening to God and allowing Him to show me what steps to take so I can get out of life the most gain.

Pianist playing right now,
thank you for quieting the storm in my mind
It's moments like this one
That cause me to believe in God
Right when I felt like I couldn't bare the storm
within for one second more
You sat down at the piano
in the room next door.

Ocean blue
Washing over me
I feel pleased and relieved and at ease
I close my eyes and see my childhood memories
I feel the nonchalance of my young self's naivete
Only in God's presence can I truly release
The strain of this flesh and
the push of society

I used to watch National Geographic all the time
when I was a kid
Sometimes I would watch deep sea divers
I would imagine being a deep sea diver myself
when I grew up
Now, I've yet to deep dive in a literal ocean
But I've recently been deep diving into the
Realm of spirituality

I see
Darkness and Light
In this realm
Sometimes,
my heart becomes curious of the darkness
It wants to understand what is concealed
What is distorted, what my eyes can't easily
perceive
But a call to Light is beckoning within me
It says
Get out of darkness, confusion, deception.
Truth resides only in the light,
It is Open, and never hidden, as darkness hides
Darkness is heavy, it weighs you down
You try to hide it,
But it's visible on your face
Light is buoyant
It brings you to the surface
It brings you life, Light fills you and
Renders you Alive.

viridescent vines
cloud my view
of the horizon awaiting me

i'm making my way through
a victorian garden
the fragrance of the many flowers
puts me under a spell

i fall down a winding spiral
and plummet deep in to my heart
it is dark,
within each beat silence reverberates

i'm drinking rosehip tea
it's so pink
rose petals float on top
steam rises to kiss my lips

should i continue to repeat the same mistake?
or take the road less travelled by my heart?
i'll have to venture beyond my habitual vices
i'll have to step out beyond the known

stick my thumb out into the galaxy
catch a ride to my next divine destination
i'll laugh every step of the way
and be okay with the oblivion that saturates my mind
i'll learn to live through my heart,
whole and complete,
spreading love.

Had to
shuck the rules
and be un-cool
I had to leave the trodden path
and set out in the grassy field
I had to feel my anger
and scream:
*******!
To a sky so quizzically blue
I had to laugh til the point
when they questioned
if I was on drugs
No, not at all
Just having some childlike fun
I had to get a puppy
and learn responsibility the real way
I had to stop listening to people's stupid criticism
Their endless, meaningless remarks
I had to stop taking it all so seriously
I had to stop overthinking everything
and just feel it, and let it be
just as it is, in the moment
I had to smile anyway
Even if they don't smile back
I had to not let myself get confused about
evil; it's just a separation from God
I had to live fearlessly
and not anticipate the consequences for doing so.

When did I ***** these parameters,
From which I can't escape
Since when did I hem myself in so tightly
That I can't breathe, that I refuse to let myself be
I made rules for myself
To deter myself from getting hurt
But these rules are suffocating me,
Suffocating my autonomy
What happened to the days when I proclaimed boldly
That I would grow up to be just like Amelia Earheart
Fearlessly flying beyond any limitations
Until I am boundless,
Beyond the limitation of my body
Why has the trauma of adolescence and the uncertainty of adulthood
Made me such a calculated, cynical being,
Begging the ineffable for meaning?
Digging for the answers of what I'm supposed to be
Can females be forward and pursue their dreams?
Without the fantasy of a man who would provide stability
I guess the world has made me scared
Of the reality of being a woman
That wanting a man
Feels like a necessity, like a security blanket,
Or a gun
To ward off these crimes against womanhood
But it's really a flaw in perspective,
Women may be the victim of ****** oppression,
Being used as flesh mannequins to penetrate and beat,
A weaker vessel on which to release the pent up rage of the patriarchy
But I shall persist, nonetheless,
For when the whole world is against me
I rise
I've been a victim for too long
But in my victimhood I have found that I am strong
And that the only security I need
Is this relentless heart,
Living for a cause
So that maybe oneday, more people's eyes will be open to see,
And soon we'll just be able to breathe
Without all this trauma and worldwide unease
Death has become defeated,
So, I must live without parameters,
I must be fearless.

I feel hollow,
Thrum thrum thrum,
See? Hollow.
It hurts to feel hollow
I miss things I shouldn’t miss
I’m remembering incorrectly
It hurts, it just hurts
I want to feel the sun and be whisked off my feet by joy
But my heart is heavy
I miss things I shouldn’t miss
That relationship, was a drug
An addiction
I miss things I shouldn’t miss
My mind and body and heart
Are craving a hit
I’m in withdrawal
Ouch
Shaking, hollow, thrum thrum thrum
Who am I?
I’m missing things I shouldn’t miss.

Tonight I search aimlessly and find nothing
Nothing that resonates with me
It rains outside and the air has become crisp
I breathe it in clearly through my nostrils
And I feel at ease

On this rainy day I envision snow,
even though snow is an unlikely prospect for now
Snow is an emotion I am experiencing currently
That feeling of stillness, of a deep, deep knowing
That you don't understand
You don't understand how you know,
you just do

I see deep blue eyes in this snow
and a bearded chin and a mouth that speaks slowly and deliberately
It beguiles me and yet puzzles me
For it is an oddity
He, whom I behold tenderly with my dazzled and curious eyes

Is it a bird I hear in the distance
Quietly chirping out for help?
How many of us are quietly chirping out for help
Yet too scared to scream for help?
Well, sometimes we just have to scream.

Forever my soul has been a soujorner
A constant fighter, a constant learner
A rebel against the odds
A girl blossoming from a barren pod
And so how could it be
That my resilient soul can never rid itself of melancholy
It's trivial, not pivotal
The emptiness inside echoes in my being
I walk these dead streets at night
Not even the wind is breathing
I think about how
There was a time before I existed,
And yet here I am now
Realer than a cloud

Tears start to well in my eyes
I keep walking and think how no one ever will realize
The deep and constant pain I have inside
It would only burden them to let them know
That I'm sad because life can't be the way I dream it could be
There are just too many "should be"s I have to attend to
There's no time for childhood pretending
Where dreams are possible and opportunities unending

It's just another sullen day
That I realize I'm so far from my dreams
I'm still riddled with all my therapy resistant foibles
And I will just live this monotonous day,
Again.

Listen,
I know times are hard,
Listen,
I've been there before
Crying on the floor
Bare and scared
Talking to the walls,
Wishing someone was near

Listen,
I'm right here
And I'm real
Reach out your hand to touch me
So you can feel

Because I know you're heart is beating
But your blood is stale
Gasping for sweet air,
Gasping for love
You fought until your knuckles bled
For a love that could quell the demons in your head
But that love never came
And it never will come

Because that love is a mere fantasy
Fed to us by our t.v.
Movies like Casablanca and Gone With the Wind
Momentarily appease
Our hungry hearts pleas
But it's not reality,
These promises of perfect love
Wrapped in packages of perfection
Because loving is agony,
It's deception with a kiss on the cheek

But listen,
It's real,
And I'm not perfect
But at least I'm here
I don't look like Audrey Hepburn,
And our love is not worthy of storybook fantasies
But I'll stay by your side
Until the very day you depart to the sky
I'll never have you doubt the tenacity
Of my imperfect love

So listen,
This is what I can offer,
With open arms
Come find comfort with me
Admist this harsh world.

Instead of asking yourself: Will this matter in 5 years?
Ask yourself: Will this matter in a billion years?
NOPE.

2012 had been warped by the contents of a vile,
A hallucinogenic liquid that I would put on my tongue
And ingest like a good sport
I so very much liked where it would transport me
Far away from any perceivable misery
I floated out of my body
And my circumstances had no emotional pull over me anymore
But the consequences were beyond therapeutic
I transcended so high
That I became disassociated from my body
And corrupt thoughts sprouted in my mind,
Ones that didn't really belong to me
This liquid separated me from my earthly misery but also cut me off from my human empathy

2012 was about being pretty
It was about being the prettiest girl I could be,
Even while wasting away inside
The first thing I would do in the morning was smoke a joint to myself,
Which would trigger a panic attack, something I had not experienced before that time
And then waste nearly an hour painting my face
And never being satisfied with the end result
That year was surrounded by other pretty girls,
Who were callous and self centered
Who frivolously ignored my intense well of sadness,
Exacerbating my wounds by their self absorption
Every time I reached out my hand to my friends for genuine comfort or alleviation
My hand of slapped back down and instead a joint was passed to me, or a bottle of alcohol, or an adderall, or a bottle of robotussin, or a pill of ecstasy or a liquid hallucinogenic in a vile
And I imbibed and imbibed and imbibed
In a desperate attempt to suppress everything
Up until the point where when I looked into the mirror,
I couldn't recognize myself anymore
I felt so detached from everything,
Including myself

Like all extreme ways of escapism,
Everything ended with intense chaos
Hitting rock bottom
Is God's final and loudest wake up call
I literally ended up stranded in the rain oneday,
With no where to go and no one to turn to
So I was just there, in an unfamiliar place
In the pouring rain,
Sobbing profusely
All the anguish pent up in my body decided to release itself all at that very moment
One of my parents had betrayed me yet again
And I would have to pay a heavy consequence for their lies, for their incessant blame of me for everything wrong in their life
I would have to pay that price for a whole year following
I don't like to think that all things are God's will and that bad things happen for a reason,
But I can't help feeling like all the chaos that led to my wake up call were so integral to me becoming clean,
Because I just know that if I went another year the way I was living I was going to die

The chaos in our lives, the unwanted discord we so desperately try to escape
Is a catalyst to the realization of our true self
Chaos is like fire that burns away all things that aren't in alignment with our indisputable truth
I can't help being grateful for everything that didn't go the way I planned,
Because when my plans failed
I came upon an astronomically more fulfilling path that I didn't even know existed because I was so focused on the plan I had created
What if we stepped into the fire, instead of trying to bypass it
What if we allowed it to consume us, the traits that originate from our ego, until all that is left is our essential self
Our simplest and purest form in which we become agents of love and radical reform,
Selfless and humble vessels of God
Renewed by reliance on Him
And not hustling for our self worth by our own means
Each of us, in our unique way, are heroes,
When we own our war story
And share our transformation produced by surrender to God
Saints who are far from perfect
But courageously living out the truth and love God has planted in our hearts.

Having dreams of tripping on the road
I'm a beatnik
Convulsing under the constraining wait of conformity
I hiss out like a strangled snake
One that has knotted its own body into limitation
I yearn, cry out to a infinite void
I want so badly
For the warm sun to envelop my body
and for my heart and spirit
to be my sole and only compass

Sometimes,
I have flashbacks
of a girl who paid no mind to rules
And lived life fully
Why did I bury her,
just to survive?

As a child, I took an art class at the Brooklyn Museum of Art
We’d go to different exhibits and the instructor would explain the context of pieces of artwork
Once us kids stood together,
Looking up at a large canvas polluted with ambiguously painted circles
And the art instructor told us that there was some deeper meaning to it,
Though to our uninitiated young minds,
We couldn’t see this

We went to an exhibit one day full of gods made of stone and wood
Idols, the evangelicals would say
There was a god with a protruding belly and a folded face like a shar-pei
And the instructor pointed to it and uttered its name
I was floored.

My mind raced—
Surely, there couldn’t be other gods besides the one I grew up with,
And yet here I was, surrounded by hundreds of them with names and identifying traits and even faces

When I arrived home I demanded an explanation from my mother,
Who being only a nominal Christian at the time
And not well versed in scripture
Couldn’t give me a satisfactory explanation for what I had seen that day,
She couldn’t provide an explanation that could seal the crack in my perception of reality that had been made

When I badgered her demanding to know God’s name,
Since now I knew God isn’t a name but a title,
And that there were at least hundreds of gods throughout history with names
The only answer she could muster was “lord”
So I continued on in my perplexed state,
Though I stopped inquiring about it

Until my mother became involved with a cult,
Who spoon fed us answers that insure certainty and seal up all the cracks in our perception of reality
With a glue that we aren’t allowed to question
But had to apply liberally to our minds everyday

They provided me a name for this God I thought I had known all my life: Jehovah, they called him
And with God’s new name they provided a personality too:
Jehovah is a god who’s sick of everyone’s **** and is going to destroy everyone in a horrific fashion in Armageddon,
except the true Jehovah’s witnesses plus a few good hearted unbelievers who never had the chance to join the “one true religion”

Nice.

So all my questions were answered...
Until they weren’t
Certainty is a drug like any drug,
It only gives temporary relief
And it wears off and you run out of your supply,
Your body convulses violently
And you can’t stop the screaming in your mind
This certainty was a antidote that could control all of your existential anxieties
But in being exposed to reality,
My false beliefs founded in superstition
Withered in reality’s limelight

Reality bites
Because with reality comes an undeniable truth
A truth that doesn’t have to be rationalized
But is inherent and honest
In an unforgiving way
But honest nonetheless,
And I think I want honesty in my life now,
Yeah
But not the “truth” that religion purports to own,
Giving me the “truth” as long as I adopt its rituals, rules and customs
But the truth that belongs to both ugly and beautiful things,
And how in life there are endless, painful contradictions
And how it can be over anytime for any of us
And how no one really knows for certain when we leave our bodies of flesh if there is a continuation of our consciousness
But I want it anyway,
I want the painful, ****** truth,
And not the lies of certainty.

I've found my voice again
It's cracked through my throat
like a butterfly
that was transmuting in it's cocoon
For five years

It's like the impenetrable dam
I had constructed
to hold back my truth
Has been utterly demolished
By the power of my truth
like surging waters
Overcoming my fears

Right now my words are like tsunamis
I closed my eyes yesterday
And I witnessed a tornado rising up inside from my belly
Someone prayed for me yesterday and said
She saw me at the throne of God,
God laid his hands on my head
And gave me an anointing of power and courage

I am a warrior
Borne of love

There are no buts or ifs or excuses anymore that I can lean on
The truth is spilling through me and for once I'm
not moderating it
It's wild and terrifying
People are scared
I'm scared
Because I realize now
That I can no longer live this lie
that I've been living for so long
The truth is making sure of it
The truth is pouring through me,
And this time,
I'm willing to speak it.

A coy fish necklace sits atop my collarbone
A symbol of growth
For the coy fish's growth is in proportion to the size of it's dwellings
The bigger the pond, the bigger it will grow

I live in a self created world imbued and marinating in meaning
Symbols with stories and so much significance
Objects being personified by the experiences in which the object accompanied me
These symbols both tangible and intangible,
With body and without body,
Are extensions of me
Like arms protruding from my sides,
Deeming me a Hindu goddess

It's getting harder to deny the interconnectedness of everything
And how I am simultaneously in shock and in awe
Of this chaotic masterpiece like a James Pollack piece,
Called life
So simple, yet erratic, untimely, unpredictable,
Enigmatic, glorious, timeless and bursting at the seems with profuse possibility
So brutal and beautiful, I must concur.

And what is it all without meaning,
Why awake another day to a dull definition of self and purpose
When you can fabricate a magical tale of wonders
In which you are the Heroine?