Ashes in my soul Fire in my veins Standing in the cold Staring at the flames All that I have been Every wish and dream Matches in my hand Light the gasoline I didn't know I was hiding... I didn't know you would find me... And I'd miss you Oh, that I'd miss you I caused this myself Now I miss you Oh, how I miss you I caused it myself... Echoes of the past Nothing left to die Burned it to the ground Couldn't tell you why Everything I am Will never be the same Beautiful is gone I am what remains I didn't know I was dying... Burned this whole house down inside me... Tortured by the fear Haunted by the rage All that I held dear Locked me in this cage All the tears I've cried Thought I'd set them free Set my life ablaze To chase a world I'll never see... I didn't know what I'm fighting... I'm just so tired of trying... But I miss you Oh, now I miss you I caused this myself But I miss you Oh, how I miss you Destroyed it myself Now I miss you Oh, how I miss you... But I can't undo my
It's hitting me Father The gravity of what this means And what I'm doing Heavy on my heart Is this bittersweet goodbye A tear-stained sunset That must come before the dawn Of a new day And the joy You promise That comes in the morning Shield and protect This piece of my heart Lord For I know This is the way forward Gifted by You But please remember how it hurts Just the same And while the sadness Claws at my conscience I put my faith in You For my strength and hope That though I go against The grain I know I still seek to follow Your word Sacrificing Everything of this world To be what you say I am
Don't look in that place of old for me For I'm no longer there That place where old habits and mistakes Muddied the waters and the whitest snow Though my heart skips a beat With every hint of you Like the invisible breeze that rustles the leaves I long for you to see All that is made new Don't hide your eyes from me For I have given those foretold years To no longer hide myself from you
Father I should have known Somehow That You would once again Take these broken pieces from me And replace them with something of Your goodness. This moment in time That I have most dreaded With a broken heart Overshadowed by Your light Illuminating the moment You said would come. On the darkest day of life Your promise Filling me with hope And Your words Stirring my weary soul To rally one last time For the door is open.
My dear This is not how it was supposed to go. My weakness front and center and my apologies the words leaving my lips from afar rather than my confessions made directly to your heart. Please forgive me my failure to keep the one promise of my heart known only to me and to God. Though my actions may never have been perfect, please know how deeply my heart has loved yours from day one and through every existence then, now, and forever.
And though I may be Beaten And wounded Bruised And bleeding It will have all been worth it When you are safely by my side And our battered hearts Are able to smile with each other And laugh again Once more
Come at me I dare you Do you not realize that I am now familiar with the snake's lair and am not afraid for determination is my middle name Though you may have the advantage for the moment you are no match wielding the dark against the light You can startle me awake night after night crawl beneath my skin throw rocks at the windows and threaten to take away all the things you think will break me You can prod at my weaknesses remind me of my flaws thinking somehow you will shake the walls and I will crumble falling silent but I will only speak louder You can do anything to me and think anything about me But don't you dare think that my beloved belongs to you
Don't you remember There's a reason why The way down Is so far Or have you forgotten? The ember That once burned Inside your heart Telling you You don't belong here The sun That once shined On the surface of the water That we swam in Drawing us to land The hope That once lived In your eyes And in our home As life waited on us to get it together The warmth That touched our skin Just enough To keep us In pursuit of the light You can blame A predisposition But you can never deny The whispers Of your own heart That you had once been So confident in
Lord If I asked You To set my battles aside For the sake of saving My one and only Friend Would You? For he has fallen further Than I ever could have Imagined And only Your hand And Your spirit Can reach down that far To pull him out The darkness that manipulates Thick like tar in a pit And though I've plunged in With my arms outstretched I am up to my shoulders, Father And cannot risk falling in myself For if I should slip From where I'm kneeling Steady on Your ground It will devour me head-first Fill my mouth again With its lies and hate While I suffocate So I ask you, Lord Call him away For what is this life You have given Without him in it? Though I can't stand idly by Waiting on the shore I will truly be helpless Should my cord sever from You Holding on for however long This battle rages I will continue to speak life for him Until my last breath
I don't like this Father Each time You take me deeper Into this web As if I couldn't already Fully grasp Just how dire This situation is And yet My mouth is agape Unable to swallow the horror That a soul who once Chased the sun Has found solace in the depths Beyond where any light Can reach
The wheels ground to a halt for a brief second; just long enough that it drew my startled, blurry eyes up from the screen of my iPod to glance out the window at my surroundings. If I were honest, I still, for the life of me, didn't have my bearings. Even if my life had depended on it, I wouldn't have known which direction I was facing. And truthfully, I didn't really care, because right there in that moment, my sole focus was on trying to keep breathing. The ache in my chest was beyond description. A tightness that required a conscious effort to inhale and exhale. The unease within my system coursed through my body with each beat of my erratic pulse, and it was as close to agony as I'd ever felt. As if somewhere on an other-worldly level, the tiny fibers that made up my soul were being torn in half. I closed my eyes gently, forcing another deep breath and willing my tears not to spill over as I felt my chin begin to quiver for the umpteenth time. How pathetic. The rattle of the bus
A hot wave of nausea nearly brought me to my knees behind the dark red barn, my stomach muscles clenching as the bile rose into my throat, making my entire body heave. Leaning down, I rested my hands on my knees for any form of support. The violence and sheer force of it making my eyes wet with tears that I refused to cry in that moment. I glanced around at my surroundings, the magnitude of what it would actually take to leave this place weighing me down with infinite hopelessness. Escaping this nightmare was an impossibility. At least not without a miracle. Don't, my mind immediately scolded me. Don't even think it. It was the last place left to turn, and it mortified me to even think of uttering such words after the way I'd acted... all of these years. And... what if I got nothing? What if it was too late? Surely I'd been too far gone for way too long to be worthy of any sort of intervention on my behalf. And how stupid would I feel... finally lowering myself to beg for help
Holding the lifeless body of someone you love inflicts, as you might imagine, one of the worst types of trauma that a person could experience. I had lived through it -- barely -- once before, and it had taken close to a decade before I was even remotely alright. "The price of love" they call it. So much love, that had been given to me unconditionally, and twice now I was unable to protect it. You're a complete failure. I was right there. Right there. Close enough that I could have actually done something about it this time. But no. Instead, I was on the phone, scrambling to put an international business deal together in a desperate attempt to save my skin from the most evil force I'd come to reckon with yet in my meaningless life. Trapped, like a rat in a cage. I could feel the walls closing in. This violent force leaving me no way out, except... well, like those scenes in the mobster movies, when the boss says the only way out is in a box. I had been lured in, like a
I didn't even remember knocking. Only my eyes opening at the sound of the doorlocks being undone, my silent prayer coming to an abrupt halt as the door jerked open, instantly stopping my heart. My eyes locked with his; blue-green against blue-green, before raking over his physique. A tall man, older than me, with broad(er) shoulders, and narrow(er) hips, and long(er) legs. My inner monologue ticked the boxes off as we went along. Almost immediately, he said something to me, drawing my attention back up to his face. His strong(er) voice, his sharp(er) jaw, his high(er) cheekbones. My brain whirred, making me dizzy, as it tried to make sense of his words. All of those years of practice and preparation, gone in an instant. My mind drawing a complete blank. My eyes fell to his lips; lips, that had probably kissed my person. Then to his wide hand resting on the edge of the door. Hands, that probably held the hand that belonged to me. I felt my body take a step back. If I even so much as
"Sir, would you like something to drink?" The stewardess' polite gesture jarred me from my thoughts where my forehead was plastered against the window. Rum? Gin? Vodka... "Uh," I choked on my own nerves, turning away momentarily from the span of blue sky and fluffy clouds at 30,000 feet. "I'll have a ginger ale, please, if you've got it." Nodding curtly, she rummaged through her service cart before handing me a glass filled with ice, followed by the can I'd chosen. Cracking the lid, I poured the amber liquid into the glass, drawn abnormally to the way the ice melted as the carbonation fizzed all around it. That's how my senses felt right now. My blood. Fizzy. As we climbed higher and higher. I stared at the map on the screen in front of me. Eyeing the familiar course. It was so close. And yet so far. How cliché. Raising my drink to my lips, the bittersweet taste that never ceased to take me back in time lulled my imagination into the familiar depths of that forbidden
Walking up to the doorway, I fumbled for my keys, shifting the stack of folders I was carrying into the crook of my arm. The strong scent of the freshly painted entryway hung in the air. It was hard to imagine still. This was a long way up from the floor that had been my place of rest for the last year or so. As my fingers eventually found the right one, my eyes were averted to the folded paper wedged into the door jamb. I snatched it out, quickly scanning over the bolded, capitalized phrase glaring back at me. “LOVE NEVER FAILS!” I groaned, folding it back up and shoving it together with the rest of my paperwork. Love. Psh. The door slammed behind me. I’d spent a lot of time chasing this fleeting feeling, only to continually come up empty-handed. It seemed that no matter how much I gave... and gave, and gave... it never earned me the one and only thing I coveted most. Now I was a young adult; destined, it seemed, to repeat all of the same mistakes. Because I didn't know any
The car ride was completely silent, save for the occasional sound of the blinkers as he changed lanes. For the most part, I kept my gaze out the passenger window, fighting my quivering lower lip that threatened to unleash a deluge of tears each time we’d pass a certain exit or ‘landmark’ that held a memory of better times. Times when the relief of escape from the world's judging eyes was enough to drown out the desperate cries that echoed deep within my chest. But it wasn't enough anymore. I felt sick, and defeated, and broken. I couldn’t even imagine what he was feeling. Every now and then I’d sneak a glance at him. His red-rimmed, glassy eyes remained locked on the road. How is it that two people who, in theory, were so perfectly made for each other couldn’t even make it work? Scratch that. It could have worked. It could have been beautiful. If not for me. Honest to God, I had tried. I tried so hard to ignore what had been gnawing on my soul for as long as I can even remember.
"My soul is cracked," he reads verbatim from the book poised perfectly on his crossed knee, the words dripping like liquid off his tongue. I couldn't tell yet whether velvet or venom. He pauses, lifting his dark brown eyes to meet my widened blue ones. "Is that how you feel?" Fuck. I could feel my breath hitch in my throat, causing me to swallow convulsively as a thousand words formed in my brain that would never actually make it out of my mouth. "Is that. How you. Feel." He repeated himself more firmly. Pointedly. A blend of shock and annoyance evident within his voice. My mind was racing, ceasing any further ability I had to think, let alone speak clearly. I didn't know what to say, and his face showed that he'd garnered that fact. Lowering his eyes back to the page, he continued to read. "My own skin, a villain, holding me hostage..." he paused, "...for a ransom I can't pay. A role I can't seem to play." He looked up at me again, expectantly. No. I was not going to deal with
We were staying in Paris... The door swung open to one of the most stunning hotel rooms I'd seen in a while; the overabundance of white and marble everything coupled with the palatial King-sized bed off to the side making it look more like a honeymoon suite than anything I'd been expecting. Dropping our bags just inside the entry, I watched as she eagerly strode across the room, going straight for a set of double doors on the far side of the seating area opposite the bed. "Kai, come look at this!" she called excitedly, twisting the knob and pulling both doors open. I could already see the glow of the city lights from where I was standing. "Coming," I answered, shoving the luggage further to the side as best I could while I kicked off my shoes. I could hear her sigh contentedly as she leaned back against the door frame, eyes focused on what I didn't know yet, but the closer I got, the more I was able to see that there, right off our balcony, was a perfect view of the Eiffel
So for the final time, I went to bed questioning my readiness for this one-way ticket.. not because I doubt myself, but because I doubt what’s around me. The age-old worry. How would you ever explain yourself if… It’s nagged at me since I realized something was different. But.. never before then. And I think after the couple days spent observing my childhood playing back on the TV screen it is readily apparent that I never worried – not even for a second. Not until I was forced to be conscious that something was amiss. Looking back now, and watching my antics, my actions, my personality; I remember. I’ve caught glimpses of it here and there at times, but never actually realized that once upon a time it was in the constant free-flowing state in which it appeared all those years ago. The self-assuredness oozes out of the pixels on the screen, and I realize now that in my clean, untainted brain, I never saw any option; any alternative. I just was, and that was that. I wasn’t
uselessly lamenting the state of things by scheherazades, literature
Literature
uselessly lamenting the state of things
Oh hell I could have been halfway to nowhere by now the rain fell over the hills and vanished becoming blades of grass or yellow flowers again I am desperate to get out of my body the habits of hurting are wearing me down my data is corrupted I know crazy peace where was I when the rain fell over the hills —I was leaving again I need to fall in love insanely there is no other way I dream up a thousand unsatisfactory men and kill them all. This week the world is ending and I am running out of laundry pods. How long do you love something before you stop. Still I know this bus route like the back of my hand—Stray is in my nature. Do you dare To say something is good. To say something is worth loving where the rain goes after it falls over the hills that’s where I'll be there was a time I wanted nothing more than to make beautiful things now I just want to become one before I die
i choke on my own identity by cursors-and-ellipses, literature
Literature
i choke on my own identity
if i peel my skin away, could you learn to love me? my bones are brittle, but at least they won't burn under your stare. [i don't know how much more i can handle.]
God speaks more to our heart, when we speak less and listen(1) more to HIS words. 1. Listen attentively with faith— with a calm spirit— and live in HIS love. HIM= Jesus Christ, the Beloved Son of God.
There is a way to the altar, a way to win, a million desires to be found within. There is a peace to be opened, a power within, that overflows with kindness and hope. There’s a million ways to get there, there are many paths to take, but only one way to fail, only one that stands in the way. The part that turns away is the part that gets in the way; a shadow of scorn and hatred. This demon, fed by fear, threatens to ruin us; it’s ugly snarling figure can be seen behind every regret and shame. For we are the children that are always hiding from the light; in sin and darkness, we are always scowling, but we don't have to stay that way. Do not give up, do not look back, push out the self that doubts and search, for hope is there. Look up, believe that love will win- let light love, for to believe anything else is to become the child that looks away.
You're very welcome. I consider myself lucky to have found your work. It is inspirational, and has been excellent food for thought during a pivotal time.