miles mean nothing to a heart that is pure
words penned in grace, sent to ether
give heartease to the overstretched
sowing stiches of understanding
in tapestry threadbare

little suns and stars
shining bright in love and hope
from face unseen and adirondack chair
gives strength to one down, from down under
allows grief, the words needed the abilty to care
for these simple gifts, no payment required
from the heart open to care...

If tomorrow I shattered and fell, pieces skimming across dark secrets
Through the thick fog of my broken heart, the damp heat of desperate whispers
Would you gather my jagged edges, and hold me close until you bled?
Drown in that seductive ******, the digging of hard lines into flesh
The intoxicating raw agony like wildfire and the wetness of crimson liquid
It tears at old wounds, gnawing and ******* at bone
A mad beast too long caged, ravishing itself from within

Would you let me mark you with my teeth and tongue?
Rough and hard and lingering
A whimpering plea, breath ghosting over scars
Uncovering the smothering labyrinth of your release
Soothing away shadows of the cold and sharp blade

Would you help me swallow the suffocating lump in my treacherous throat?
Forget the dull fever of words left unsaid
Yearnings buried
Tears of blood left unshed
As the merciless flames tingled beneath weak fingers
Would you bear witness to the raging fire inside me
The warring instincts, the fierce longing to engulf and devour you
Destroy you as you destroyed me
As this toxic void between us became my most exquisite form of torture

Would you let me drown out the numbness?
Fill you with pain, and peace and rage
Slash at your adamant walls, the pillar of steel you’ve become
And banish the biting chill gusting from your icy core

If at dawn my own prison cracked
And the harsh porcelain surface screeched under quaking talons
If the watery depths of the gaping bowl enticed me deeper
And you could see the insatiable itch twitching in my wrist
If you saw nails plunging into my own gullet
Coaxing and tempting the gurgling lava to dry lips
Determined and sinful, like a lovers’ sigh

If you could hear the filthy slap of moist skin, sickeningly ****** in its lethality
And the frenzied spasms of a retching savage
That yields completely to the pounding rhythm
To the animalistic beat of the tribal drum and the eager cave below
If you saw the burning inferno of tears stream down  my cheeks
Would you trace soothing circles upon my back?
Would you lay awake at night, staring emptily at the swirling blackness
Drowning beneath regret and confusion
Skin a flaming wasteland of death
Like I did for you

If they could all see the wretched creatures that cling to me
The incubus that rocks me back and forth
Lulling me to that macabre slumber of death
And whispering sacred screams into lovesick years
My saviour and tormentor, lover and abuser
If they could hear those sickly voices, see earth through my marred eyes
If they could feel the anathema of our thoughts
The loathing and self-hatred
The disgust of one’s own skin
And the monsters closing in
Would they still laugh?

If mother could see the ink sprawled there
Across the overstretched canvas
Of fat stuffed thighs
Each word a puncture, a proud and gaping ****
Would she still dare to strike?

If they knew for themselves
Gluttony itself has a taste
Could feel the poisonous **** slither down throats
And the comforting familiarity of its dead weight
Would they dare meet the molten daggers of my eyes?

If the lifeless blinking light is no longer enough
When the hollow words on screens do nothing
If I grow tired of the scraps you toss me
And the ravenous hunger hatches
Would you join me in destruction?

When both our demons are unleashed
And the skies cry black tears of anguish
When the makeshift smiles finally fade
And we walk among them naked
When they pay for their assumptions
And mother Earth howls for her loss
When angels flee their impending judgement
And there is nothing left but dying embers
Will you sit atop a throne with me
And embrace the madness we once feared?

It was so many months ago,
On the feast of the deceased,
Jack-o-lanterns' gleaming glow,
Soul tormented by savage beast.

Overworked and overstretched,
On cold nights, with howling wolves,
Loneliness had scratched and etched;
Pride been trampled by heavy hooves.

Agony ached through my body,
Poisoning mind and spirit's heart.
Workmanship's been so shoddy,
Every day was a hard start.

And so I thought, 'Why am I here?'
'Nobody cares or even thinks of me,'
'Only torment strikes mine ear,'
'Better to shut up and dare not plea.'

So they checked me out of school,
Bunch of suits forced me to hospital,
Examined by creeps while on the stool;
Why was everyone so hostile?

That night, I tried to fall asleep,
Poison and toxins flying 'round,
Cruel cameras watching me weep,
Whatever happiness had been drowned.

Forlorn,
I sit and mourn
What could have been,
From the boundary, trying not to be seen.

Misanthropic.
A tiny nick
Has snuffed out my life,
Success always resting on the edge of a knife.

Melancholy,
I sit here pondering, sorry.
Should be out there fighting.
Every strike sounding like lighting.

Company,
I rushed too hurriedly,
Spurned our honour
And became connon fodder,

Because I got the plan wrong,
Sung the wrong song,
Overstretched,
Regret etched

Across my face,
Death dressed in lace,
Struggling on a sticky wicket,
I guess that is just cricket.

He, lived with me, white man,
Dancing, skimming, swinging,
And his body overstretched on primroses!

On the dandelions he climed,
On the walls he skidded,
On the grass he slumped,
On the boughs he slep,
In my orchard, my guest!

With stealthiness-footfalls
He peeped in through windows,
And my drowsy-drunk body caressed!

He welcomed butterflies,
He whispered to birds, passing by,
He made my Bulbul, the nightingale, his buddy,
And lost in her mellifluous lyrics!

He hugged the world,
He hugged my soul too,
He loved apples,
He kissed the lilies!

Ah! Things are bound to farewell,
As time scratches their beauty,
And they slide into nothingness!

Oh! His journey is over,
He is going to the house of the moon!

Only I, with sobs smearing,
Is in the lawn to see him off!
O butterflies, O birds, O Bulbul,
Play the requiems,
Winter is going, dying,
Our friend is going, dying!

I overstretched my arms into September,
you watched my limbs break off on the first day of November.
I counted the days until everything would come back together,
I ran out of fingers to count with.
I coughed up enough gun powder to finally go back,
knocked on your door,
dropped myself straight on the porch in front of me.
I rang the doorbell until my fingertip started to bleed.
Your neighbors are telling me to stop grieving over someone
who still has a pulse, but I can't stop looking at our pictures
like a finalized headstone after the engraver asks,

"Is everything spelled correctly?"

I'd tell him he carved in the wrong date of death,
that's not the day you left, you never left.
You're going to answer the door,
everything can come back together again.
I won't have to count the days anymore.

I'm still right here.
I know I'm here because the storm drain hasn't moved me yet.
It hasn't taken my head and shoved me under your debris,
because I haven't let it.
I spent so long trying to figure out where it hurts,
and wound up right here.
This is where it hurts,
I'm not on your porch, my fingertip breaking,
I'm laying right next to you,
your arm draped over my shoulder,
your groggy voice in my ear.
This is where it hurts,
This is where everything fell apart.
This is where everything will come back together.
Everything will come back together again.

It's pull and push,
It's hard to predict what I want in this moment
It's always a stretch,
my mind is overstretched
Playing this game.

The lines don’t cross. They never cross. Like connecting the dots, he pulls one string to the next. This is the only way he knows how to make sense of a senseless world. It is geometric. He points at the points placed by the power of his imagination. Then he twirls them in every possible angle. “There is a deeper truth in this,” he swears.
For fifteen hours he has stared at the puzzle. Cursing, and circling, every corner he could conceive of, seeking ultimate truth. His blues eyes blink with the powerful pulse of unrelenting fatigue. Soon he will succumb to slumber. This obsession may wane for the night. Although, he fears that in the morning he will lose the patience to pursue this line of reasoning.
Loose leaf papers filled with colored equations lay scattered across the room. He mumbles, “Sleep would be good.”  Instead of going to bed he clears the clutter from the frigid floor. Pushing his papers to the side. Then watches as they lift off the ground and float gently to the left and right. Dust particulates dance in the air, swirling and glittering in the morning glow.
The white t-shirt he was wearing comes off then his tight blue jeans go as well. “This will allow the free flow of blood to pass unconstricted throughout my entire body” he thinks.
“The answer is somewhere here,” he stutters. Slowly he seats himself on the floor, shivering as his naked flesh settles on the cold concrete. His legs curl and cross each other. Closing his now reddening eyes, he begins to breathe slowly. In and out and back again repeating and repeating the same breathing patterns, he focuses. Letting his consciousness float inches away from sleep, uncertain on which side of slumber he is sitting on.
Smooth round stones of various colors and sizes fill and form a shore in his mind. Then a pool of glimmering water appears from nothing. No scent exists here.  Aluminum foil wrapped potatoes are scattered all around him coinciding with an itch forming on his left foreman, diverting his attention for a minute. The landscape begins to dissolve, and he struggles to regain control. Bit by bit he regains control breathing in and out and back again.
His skin vibrates, or twitches, he is uncertain. The rhythm remains consistent. Thin lines of blood cross his entire inner body. In and out and back again. The shape from his room reappears with a white glowing sphere circling it. In and out and back again.
Inside the sphere a speck forms then disappears then forms again. In and out and back again. He wonders were this is going. Where does all the meaning in the universe come from? In and out and back again.
Is flesh the meaning or is it spirit. In and out and back again. Is life death and death life. In and out and back again. Is time a true measure of my existence? In and out and back again. Dam, what does the shape mean?
A small hand pushes his shoulder jerking him to the left. The world shifts colors. They pool and rock phasing into a grey scale then return to their original color, then shift back and forth for a few minutes until they settle into the original color scale. “That was like adjusting the color in a tv,” he muses.
Suddenly, a thin white light explodes piercing his retina, causing him to shudder in pain. In and out and back again. Why? What? Why? How? In and out and back again. The pain of uncertainty gnaws at is being. Fear begins to tighten its grip but he is too deep to withdraw.
Every book he has ever read appears fluttering freakishly fast opening and closing like a strange mousetrap. In and out and back again. Every experience he has ever had replays and is reintegrated into his being as he struggle to return to true consciousness. In and out and back again.
For a second the breaths stop. He can hear the words “in and out and back again.” A finger of light pushes its way into his mind pulling out strings of lights. He forgets all that he is and was. The strings explode and spread like a million lasers. Each lasers latches on to a book and pulls every words into him. Then he becomes himself again. Another round of lasers explode from his brain. This time these strings of his being reach out. Each one exploring the world around him. Just as he begins to feels like there is nothing of his being left the lights fling back like an overstretched rubber band and smack his brain with even more information.
After what feels like hours of this exploding and reforming he opens his eyes. The shape no longer cloud his thoughts. He jots down a few notes. After a couple days of intense study he adds to and passes the notes on to a friend. The friend reads them then passes them to, and again and again. Someone adds something new reshaping the ideas, then passes them on as well.
Years later the ideas comes back to their beginning. The young man reads a new book. He smiles as he absorbs the new ideas that linger in the mix with his old ideas. He sits down to breathe in and out and back again assimilating and integrating these new things into his being. In and out and back again.

They spew forth ***** and bitter bile
As they spin their deceitful web of lies
The common man to take and hold
Their seat to win by ways not bold

Not for us do they want political power
Not for us do they want better
But rather a name up high in lights
Though we be the ones who work and fight

We who as a nation once held heads high
We the ones who once would fight and die
To keep our nation proud and free
A nation once born of democracy

Perhaps 'tis that I'm just growing old
And must conform or so I'm told
Adapt to the ways of this modern life
Of food banks for the poor, overstretched national health

The nearest hospital now over 30 miles away
Along a road over crowded both night and day
Far enough away so that people die
Because the ambulances can't get through

Our land overburdened by immigrants
And an infrastructure that can no longer cope
And so the people now must suffer
The lies and deceit of those we empower

To serve our will

shrivelled smokers hands
skin overstretched bones
so many someone counted
and I count on fingers-
literally and in so many ways
touched by so many others
centuries of hands all moving
pointing out the stars

The truth is
I don’t feel strong
I feel weak
Dehydrated
Anxious

I woke at 3am covered in sweat
5am again
Got up at 6
Worrying about the day ahead

Tiny things
Simple things
That seem way beyond me

She cannot bear my weakness
I cannot bear her indifference

I watch with envy
Travelers boarding the train
I imagine their successful lives
Whilst denigrating my own
Asking, can I ever ever ever be happy?

I travel to a place I don’t want to go to
But there is no place
I do want to go

Last night I said I was overstretched in all areas
And yet here I am still
Fighting for myself
Fighting for...
What?

More of the same?

A letter to Rona

It was the best of times, it was indeed the worst of times.
Rona, You take our breath away ……  and livelihood too and here we were thinking, you were just the flu. You are here, you are there, you are everywhere, yet seriously, Rona why don’t you just disappear.. 

You lurk in crevices and all sorts of spaces and even in my favourite places. You’re well travelled, exploring the world, effecting every creed, religion, with no stone unturned.

You’ve taken loved ones, friends and strangers too, you’re not biased, we’ve been told by the WHO. You’ve exhausted our systems and national health, they are overstretched, what a blow we’ve been dealth.

Some are out of jobs and kids are home schooling …could this be any more gruelling?
Everyone is paranoid when they feel their throat a tingling and still it's hard for some to maintain 'social distancing'.

Now Rona, you’re a foe who's time is coming to an end, although you're teaching us lessons, while we pray for the curve to bend. We’re at home, some with families and animals too, and we can listen to the birds tweet twooo..

And remember this we are the human race, we will turn this around, your effect we’ll erase.
We’re coming together in all different ways, helping the ill, the poor and the frail.

Our singing resonates through streets old and new, we are all in this together, we will definitely pull through.

We are clapping for our champions, who are working all hours. Please God, help them with your super powers.

We are entertaining ourselves, at home and on the net, our spirit is relentless, we will succeed with the right mindset.

Just remember, our scientists are busy figuring you out, so we can one day again, get out and about. And our healers are channeling God’s powerful energy, so this will one day be but a distant memory.

While we pray, I thought I’d write this poem, so please let’s all remember to #STAYHOME


Helena Hyde

Wind,
You are the word
On so many inept lips,
Brother to a dozen others overstretched:
"Love", "I", "heart", "me" ..
Your powers are great,
Though you are known to whisper,
Then whisper this,
To the copy pasters
"Lad 'n Lassie,
put down that ******* pen."

Rock the boat,
  I'm fine
Little waves won't hurt me.

Rock the boat
    I'm fine;
What are a few more,
  I can handle it.

Rock the boat
       I'm fine
   I'm fine...
I can handle it

Rocking
    rocking
   rocking
         rocking
      To and fro
                Overflow-
                      Underwater,­ can't breathe--
               Overhauled, overstretched
             Inhale
          Deep breath
I'm fine...