From The Back of The Mind

Mom

The baby looks up at the eyes of love
Looking back upon him they gave him peace
Against all others they put him above
Hold him high with no intent to cease
Connecting with this baby boy
Dug in deep to his sole
They leave him joy
And have yet to let go

The infant is moved by the feet of sacrifice
They set him moving in the right direction
What they do for him no words will suffice
For a thanks there is no proper diction
Just the words laid out on this paper
For they give up so much with nothing to ask in return
Even if left with just a copper
They will never reverse or turn
The toddler is held in the arms of protection
Through sleepless nights and on sleepy days
With baby boy hugged against midsection
They keep all wicked things at bay
Warding off bad dreams and boogie men
Soothing stomach aches and curing colds
Taking on everything and everyone when they can
No evil is safe from them and they’ll always be so bold

The child listens to the mouth of wisdom
From its words he learns of the world
And its stories teach him of faraway kingdoms
It explains everything he sees around
And grants him the imagination to question what’s shown
It tells him tales upon which his mind can feast
He’ll use what is taught to make legends of his own
With faraway kingdoms and worlds with great men and great beasts
The teen speaks to the ears of caring
They listen intently to his words 
They give each as much value in hearing
Never ignoring a single one heard
Every concern is taken into account
And no problem is too soft
To them everything said is important
They will never be covered or shut off

The adult knows the mom who made me what I am
The mom who protected me when I was young
The mom whose love for me always came
The mom whose wisdom imparted me with gifts that clung
The mom who cared about every little problem I’ve ever had
The mom who sacrificed all she could for me
The mom I can’t ever hope to thank enough outside this notepad
The mom I Love, You who I appreciate dearly
             I Love  You

Eyes of Despair

The boy stares outside looking deep into the eyes of despair reflected in the rain falling upon his window

They stare back at him blinking in time with his own, following from droplet to droplet he can not escape their sorrow

They eat at him with their sadness, taking bite after bite trying desperately to devour his hope whole

Taking in all happiness and joy’ destroying all who look on them, they feed the beast who sucks all light from this world like a black hole

The beast is their master they look were he does, they take in what he wants and they blink when he blinks

The child looks at those eyes that follow him everywhere, as he gets closer and the beast comes clearer into view, he starts to shake

He screams and the beast screams, he cries and the beast cries, the boy breaks his view from the window looking on his hands he sees them dark twisted and shadowed in the light of the room which he is trapped

Are they his or despair’s these hands he is looking on, were they despair’s eyes or his which he could not escape, was that his reflection his twisted grin and his piercing scream he saw and heard or were they despair’s as he had thought

The boy looks back at the window his heart filled with fear, he sees his eyes and the faint flicker of his reflection with every string of lightning thrown across the sky
      and his voice fills the room as he cries

His eyes pursue him, his reflection haunts him, his tears rain upon his window, his mind imprisons him and his voice kills him for this poor child has become his own nightmare
      and his name has become despair

A thousand candles (a eulogy)

We light a thousand candles
Use them as a thousand handles
To hold on to a thousand memories
A thousand different ways
To remember the thousand places
With those thousand faces
Finding the thousand smiles
Forgetting the frowns that happened every once in a while
He’s kept in our hearts
And tucked away in our thoughts
Never to be taken from us

Hold Strong

When love dies
        and your heart lies
                in the wake of its destruction
When there’s no hope for reconstruction
When all that’s left is a recollection of the past
        and your heart is stuck in over cast
That’s when you must decide to hold strong
Even if the road seems long
it’s better than running back to that same old sad song
        and getting your mind stuck on replay
                as your heart skips beats like a broken record every day
Pick up the pieces and continue on your way
Never look back
Just pack
       up and go
                and never slow
Always look towards that open road
        and walk down it until you escape from the cold
Hold your head up high and smile wide
Open your eyes to the world outside
Even if the one inside is dark and bleak
        it is weak compared to what’s in front of you and your heart
                and if you need to just go to the start
And remember that if love is dead
        and your heart’s been lead to destruction
                with no hope for reconstruction
Just continue on
        down that road holding strong

Prelude to my novel I’m writing

      The day was bright with life, nearly overwhelming my senses, bombarding every inch of my being in a wonderfully chaotic mess of light and smell and felling taking me on a journey I never wanted to come back from. The colors besieged my eyes; from the greens of the grass which tickled the bottoms of my feet and seemed to drip up before me as I walked on it, the amalgamation of blues and yellows and reds of the flowers which sat to my left and beseeched my nose and lungs to partake in their sweet smells as their colors streaked across the ground like a bright rainbow, to the blues of the sky spotted with many billowing and wispy shapes of white dancing above my head in poetically smooth motion. The wind swirled in many hues of blues and whites and purples as it blew across my bare chest, legs and feet as I walked. As the world in front of me materialized and I came to see my destination my dad called out to me, “Come on in Nicolas the water’s fantastic!” the melodic tones of his voice mixed with the sounds of the trees with their chorus of leaves, the birds with their swooping singing of their tenor voices and the swirling air with its constraint flowing waves of tones all around me to create a beautifully majestic song. As the world sung to my heart it grabbed my soul by the arms and lifted it as high as anything in this universe could reach and I was happy. As my toes hit the water I knew this is where I was meant to be; at this exact moment in time with my father in front of me and this beautiful mess of life, of color, of sound and overwhelming sense flowing endlessly around me. My body shuddered as it sunk into the cold clear waters which chilled me to the bones for the split second before I dunked my head under and the rest of me adjusted. When I came back up, the sun glaring on my face, I opened my eyes to look into my dad’s face for the encouragement to leave the step. “come on son, you can do it!” his words seemed to make me grow, I felt larger then I was as I jumped from the only solid thing that kept me afloat, alive, and I kicked my legs and paddled my arms as furiously as my five year old appendages could. The water splashed my face, shielding it from the heat of the sun for slip seconds at a time before it dried again, and every muscle in my body aced to keep me afloat and moving forward and my brain raced with fears and delight and the thought of all that was around me. Then I became self aware. I became aware of the skin I was in, the body beneath me and the thoughts racing through my head. ‘Who am I? How old am I? What year is this? Who am I swimming to?’ with these question I had been asking myself the whole while finally being noticed the sounds and colors and life around me slowed and began to stop. My sight became fuzzy and I blinked my eyes a couple of times to clear them and focus on my dad’s face again, but that wasn’t right either. ‘My dad I’m swimming to my dad, but how?’ as I looked up into his face it faded to nothing but blackness as I forgot what he looked like. At that the song of life distorted and wavered at odd intervals, the colors dimed and faded to washed out grays, the clouds above my head stopped dancing and collapsed dead upon the sky and the world faded away until I was left bobbing in a lonely pool in front of the dark figure who was my dad. ‘Maybe if I reach him I will remember, maybe he’ll be back… maybe it will all be bright again.’ now I could feel tears streaming down my face and tasted their saltiness on my lips. As hard as I tried, however, I couldn’t get any closer to the phantom before me to clear my memory. I was getting tired fast and every muscle in my body burned despite the cold of the water. I began to sink and once I began the water seemed to be drinking me up and with my last breath I yelled as loud as I could. “DAD, HELP ME!” at that his hand reached out to me and I reached for it but when I grabbed it my fingers went through his and I fell like a stone through the water thinking ‘Daddy, come back to me, please!’ as my tears floated before me with the last of the air escaping my lungs and I drowned.

A Star In The Night

I look out to see the struggling
        to see the beaten and the suffering
Whose spirits are never defeated
Whose spirits are forever firmly seated
The tears come for those brave and those bold
        that have beautiful hope to behold
Those who scream out through the dark nothing will break me
        God will not yet take me
               I will not be yanked from this shell
                       no matter how much I am dragged through hell
They defy despair
       continually climbing the steep stair
They Shake the daemons off their backs
Even as they get tripped by every single crack
       they continue to sing that song
That triumphant tune carries on
       as their life shines bright
               as a star in the night

Trigger

My soul is burning cold
My heart has begun to mold
        from sitting out on my sleeve untouched
Too long it’s waited to be embraced
Too long it’s waited to be taken in to a warmer soul

Instead it sits and molds

I’ve gotten used to having nobody
I’ve become a one man army
My hand on the trigger
The barrel to my temple
I squeeze my itchy finger
Time around me lingers
The pop’s followed by the bullet
But my mind just implodes around it

And I open my eyes

Good as new am I
No I’m better
For I’ve blow my mind away with this pen and paper
These words are my bullets these verses my bangs
These letters the blood that drips from my veins
With the gun unloaded on this once blank sheet
For the first time I feel the warmth of my heart beat

I do not die

Instead I finally awaken where my hand lies
At once my eyes pear out through the clouds
They part before me as shrouds
Then I see the sun and the sea
The mountains of life’s majesty

And there I stand

My feet never sinking in the soft sand
Walking tall through the thick trees
Never again getting tangled in the dense leaves
And I rest my head down on this bed of rhymes
And close my weary eyes to its sweet chimes

Love Shouldn’t Love Should

Love shouldn’t be fleeting 
it shouldn’t leave your heart bleeding 
it shouldn’t tare you down 
or leave you crying in that lovely little gown 
those beautiful eyes should always stay dry 
and always look up to the less beautiful sky 

never lose your cute little smile 
you never need to walk alone for awhile 
you never need to fear 
never need to think I won’t be here 
never look away when your mad 
don’t hide behind your hands when your sad 
don’t be afraid to let me wipe those tears away 
don’t be afraid you won’t have anything to say

I will always be around 
and pick you up if you fall to the ground
you don’t have to be the one to cry alone 
or the one to stand strong and cold as a stone

you can have my shoulder and my sleeves 
I will not be the guy who leaves 
I will stay standing by you 
for as long as you want me to 
with my arms stretched out 
to catch you when you trip over doubt,
To hold your hand
When you can’t stand
To give you breathe when you can’t breathe
And to take it away when you lie beneath

That is what love should be
When you get caught up completely