When I carefully consider the curious habits of dogs
I am compelled to conclude
That man is the superior animal.

When I consider the curious habits of man
I confess, my friend, I am puzzled.

allow your voice to venture out into the world
either consciously or unconsciously.
somewhere, someone is listening
to the words you speak —
when you mutter out the words
right before you write them,
or when you whisper out a familiar name
during your slumber.

let yourself be heard;
do not confine these treasures
under layers of nerves and blood vessels.
do not keep it armored in your heart.
these words all deserve
to make a hollow mind filled
such as mine.
i will listen to you, so long as you speak.

I see their brown complexions
With even brighter faces
That drive all day, stand guard all night,
and clean in between.
I am shattered glass,
scattered in the wind,
and thus torn up;
*A Million Pieces.

Existing is comparable to being
stuck inside of a movie theater,
watching the scenes of my life
projected on a screen that is
small enough to represent the
size that I feel.

On that screen would not be a
film that is vibrant in color and
filled with hues found in daylight,
a sight that would be considered
dazzling to the average person.

A black and white motion picture
always was better-suited to my personality,
painting a more honest image of both
the darkness that rests inside me
and of the specks of white light that
sporadically interrupt the infinite canvas of
charcoaled paint that
long ago dried on the
crumbling walls of my brain.

These layers of paint keep
thickening with age
and the heaviness stopped
feeling artistic quite some time ago.
It refuses to be washed away by
compliments, or what I perceive to be
sugar-laced lies told because
spreading goodness is man's civil duty.

But if I'm being honest to goodness,
believing that the slightest
trace of beauty lives within my organs
fills me from head to toe with fear because
the beauty people often see is
the kind that is tragic and
romanticized to new extremes in the
twisted culture that we call ours.

I do not wish to be art anymore.
My life is not a movie plot
waiting to be predicted,
and my mind is not a painting
meant to be criticized.

I want nothing more than to
be whatever creation I was
placed on this earth to be,
and I need at least one person to
accept the parts of me that were
accidental and poorly designed.
I need someone to love me
despite the malfunctions of my making.

-mp