you are the eye
of the storm that

I watch and stare
and follow in

desperation
to live again

and I am the
wind that circles

around you I
empower you

but you don't look
or acknowledge

me you just keep
standing there and

be carried by
the hurricane.

Vines clawing out the heart
and breaking through the bark;
Claiming every broken soul
whose mind has grown apart.

Wind slicing open wounds
And winter splicing eyes;
A wood left in solitude
for countless empty moons.

If you find yourself lost
within these dark’nd depths;
If your fears gnaw you to bone;
It’s too late.

was there even a sound?
tumbling to the earth
landing awash in our sins

one, two, three, or more
and then it's dark
bones taking root on the floor
then, a spark—
a little flicker, just enough
then bound in starlight

things are rough
but I'm gonna be alright

can you see the sunset over the hill?
grass long forgotten, now only a pile of bones

and the stars hang over this church of ours
do you remember their names?

hope coiled like a serpent around my neck
suffocating, like the smoke that fell from your fire,
burning away everything that stood here

but I kneel in the blackened soil
and rub charcoal and ash in the webbing
between my fingers—where yours once rested

appeased, she slackens, falling from my shoulders
as though dead, before slithering into the night,
beckoning—to follow her farther into the wasteland

I find my footsteps falling in her path
though she asks only one thing of me—to believe
to ration my reason, starve off my doubt

I protest with silence, but hope is a dangerous thing,
and knows that despite her, I will always return—
and never with a sword

tell me a lie.
tell me I'm beautiful
even if I'm not.

tell me a lie.
tell me you care
even if you don't.

tell me a lie.
tell me they chiseled the world in gold
even if it was stone for us.

tell me a lie.
tell me everything's fine
even if the world is burning down.

Echoing across my mind
A sweet harmonic symphony
Your voice, the melody

A rose blossoming
in the midday sun
And the light
that gives it warmth

A heart bound to another
A call across the sea
To a sinking vessel

Her crew adrift

I hear it under the wind
a whisper so faint, to be taken back
as if it was never spoken

I hear it over the hill
a murmur betwixt the grass, cut short
out of fear it was remembered

I hear it in the woods
a slow chanting, but shrouded
in the night, away from starlit eyes

I hear it on the wind
it travels to me now, a whistle
harmonic to the air and the sky

Try as you might,
the birds are singing the song of the people.