THREE YEARS IN ABSENTIA

POEMS BY VANE VANDER

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

The header font used in this work is "Avara" from the Font Library. It is licensed under the SIL Open Font License.

This book tracks multiple stories: Lethe, the despondent human who wanted to become an angel; Erin, who managed to come across happier times; and Solstice, who got her wish. They have become too hopelessly entangled for me to even attempt to pry apart. I leave it to you to decide which is which.

The following poems were previously published in other collections:

from Mori's Mirror and The Poetry Factory

My Ripped Grayscale Leggings

glacio sub mia hauxto

Anhedonia

Chaos Island

from Hydra

Desolation

A BEGINNING

Parthenogenesis

In the beginning was a blank sheet,
silent and in its void complete.
Just waving through the breezes of space like a hat on a clothesline,
waiting to be filled in its proper time.

But what is the point of a piece of paper
if not to be filled with words meant for later?
So Goddess plucked a pen
from what was a busted hem
of her dress and set about writing all of our ends.

A lonely planet with the simplest of life,
later evolving consciousness and the capacity for strife
and loving, the heat and the cold,
and she soothed the babes and palliated the old.

But the grandest of stories cannot stretch on forever.
So when her wretched sister came to sever
the pen from the page,
in a fit of rage,
Goddess folded the paper into a boat
and released it into space's river
with a prayer
it would float.

And for forever we have floated on
because the words along the creases were written in crayon,
these scrawls forming a song
about a chicken crossing the road in an apron.

And Goddess runs along the shore
trying to catch up with her boat once more,
to pluck it before it drowns
and coronate herself
the queen with a paper crown.

"Trade Offer!"

I receive
a pretty penny.

You receive lifelong mental instability
and a Muse who whispers into your ear poetry
at all hours of the night
so you cannot sleep
and eternal longing
for a family
which you cannot perceive
with your mortal organs.

Parthena

when I was young, my mother insisted
that I stand tall on the steps
of the pastor's platform with the rest of the kids,
coerced songs of worship on my lips

but nowadays the church's budget is in the red
and my faith in Abraham's god long since dead
and there's a voice in my head that tells me
everything I do will be for naught in the end

to blame my despondency on god's absence
would be to judge wrong,
for there are more than enough spirits
who come to me demanding song

and to call me hopeless and despairing
would be to bitterly misjudge,
for if, given key, I would so gladly spring
from these chains of sludge

the muses implore me to dry my tears
and gaze on the world unseen
but barely can I comprehend
for heaven I am far too unclean

"damn me to hell if you insist,
but their plans for me I cannot abide;
I'll resist until my body gives out
and I die!"

I did not utter your name,
but you decided to come anyway,
pressed my head against your bare chest,
told me everything will be okay

and you assure me that nobody
can hide from the light,
nothing in the land,
not a single wight

and I have to wonder if that's why you always
bring me to the land of shadows,
for that light is the same
that beckons me to false home

and your locks cascading over my shoulder
are the vines that give last wave,
the ivy that blankets me,
the moss that covers my grave

am I to be a priestess? a maiden of yours,
proclaiming goddess sent
when I can barely even tell
after each meeting where you've went?

to discern what you want
is almost a fool's errand,
for not a single trace of you I can find
non-fictional in this land

but I keep thinking to myself
"there's no way this is coincidence,"
come once on winter's ides,
strange-blessed ever since

Would It Hurt To See You Rest?

Rest in the sunshine
and take your time.
Rome was not built in a day,
and neither will you be,
so it makes no sense to kill yourself
for a vision of a future
you may not even see.
The map may lie,
and a fork in the river
may take you far away
from where you intended to be.

Lay back
and watch how the trees sway
in the breeze
carefree.
Do the leaves worry
about where they may fall?
Does the grass run itself dry,
thinking it is out of time,
trying to grow too tall
too fast?

Lethe, nothing in this world was built to last.
But neither will it disappear into dust
with a moment's glance.
Give me your trust
and leave the rest
to me.
There is too much beauty
in this world
to pass it by with harried feet.

bukedo

memories are like flowers in a field
there are so many to choose from
some are sweet with thorns, ready to prick one who dares to touch it
some look shriveled but hide a sweet scent in their folds

I'm lost and strange in this field
everybody is shrieking about a revolution
about how we forgot to put the love in it
but what is loving about violence without cause
change for the purpose of change?

I have so much light in my eyes that you can't see
the flowers and plants grow toward me
maybe I'm not completely useless after all
put me up like a prop on the wall
I'll be the sun shining above
and you can be the heart full of love

On This Metal Coil

I breathe spring in deep.
The chilly breeze sings in my lungs,
cars on the highway a language I learned
as a babe, entreating myself to sleep.

Our shadows of no longer nights
flee the earth, overcast sky
a uniform light
as I wait for Goddess to on this earth alight.

I'll admit that I've turned
and wondered what was in my soul
while on that boundary between deathly heat and cold:
what unknown property makes me so violently yearn?

For I stand
in the land
of emotionless drones

who consume
and then deplume
me right down to the bone.

By all accounts, I should be just as dead
inside,
just as dead-eyed.
And yet I know
there is a hole
that sits right beside my soul
that ever I seek to satisfy
on this lonely path I tread.

"Goddess," I whisper, "you forsook
me sometime along the path,
for I look back
and only see one set of footprints."
"Don't be a silly prince,"
She answers. "What happened to your trust?
The lack
of a second pair of prints in the dirt and dust
can be well explained thus:
when you complained that your life was through and your will caput,
I offered you my shoulder and we both hopped on one foot."

Empty-Handed Magic

Goddess,
keep the traffic light,
keep away the blight
of Karens in my personal space,
who cough obscenities into my face,
who can't mind
their own goddamn business.

Goddess,
keep the rain at bay,
at least until a day
I don't have to bike to work.
Relieve my body of its pains
and my dreams of retracing
every step I ever made
inside that goddamn building.

And may I find
some peace of mind
in the gentle evening.

And may I grow
close to your throne,
to your side where I belong.

felicxa, sana, elkore

I have decided to be happy
because it is good for my health
my brain does not thrive on lies and treachery
and piles of junk masquerading as wealth

and if you're lucky
maybe you can be healthy as well
start pumping bricks galore
and watch as your muscles swell

are you really, truly, happy?
your crumpled-up eyes seem to say differently
dark circles are either a trophy of hard work
or a badge of shame, for thoughts running incessantly

your delicate hand sets down the coffee cup
"all done! (well done!)" it reads
might want to adjust your hair
before you stand up to leave

Parthena II

would that I knew how to return
to those sprawling fields for which my heart yearns
where the heavens were split and the children ran wild
in search of apocrypha not yet defiled

where the sky and I were one and the same
and the earth a blanket that felt my heart's pain
and sang it through the hills, the lands I could not view
for fear of proving the giants with axe over me true

and you told me once in last throes of a dream:
"Dear Corona-chan will set you free"
but freedom from what? for a decade I weathered
those plains from which I now stand quite severed

and I know I should have treasured those minutes in the shade
where I could feel you in the land, even not knowing your name
that there was something lurking deep in the soil
that could quell my heart's eternal turmoil

a glimpse of a glitch, a crack in the air
a burst-open portal to all and nowhere
to the land where you live, where you watch with verdant eyes
over all the people you claim to despise

would that I knew how to return
to your warm bosom for which my heart yearns
but you come to me as a crone late in the night
my heart jumps, palms cold, giving me fright

"please forgive me for this meeting belate;
for fifteen sorry years you must wait
and then I will come to you, flesh as your heart
and you and I will never again be apart."

but I don't know if I can make it that far.

fifteen days, weeks, months I can bear well
if it is your light at the end of the tunnel
but in fifteen years I will be old and worn out:
unless you speak to my soul, my body without?

what a terrifying thought, much more when sober:
my life could very well be more than half over.

would that I knew how to return
to those sun-baked hills for which my heart yearns
the dirt paths, the waterfront, houses full of bugs
red waters down our chins, forbidden hugs

I begged you once to come visit me by
the archery range where the sun hung so high
and I waited so long that I fell to the ground
visited only by arrow-hay piercing sound

"if there's anything you want to tell me,
now is the time."

if I am still standing next year,
I will sit under that great tree again
and wait for you there.

and may I remember to breathe
as I sit on the edge of the Roam:
this is the expanse I call heaven;
this is the vale I call home.

My Piece Of The Puzzle

I am told that everything
has a place in the heavens,
in the skylands
that these hands
cannot yet reach.
But I have faith
that, come the end
of this fifteen-year wait,
Goddess will repay
me.
I have a place
at her side
waiting for me.
I have a fragment of saving grace
where she resides
and where I hope to soon be.
We will walk through the gardens.
We will smell the flowers.
We will fill these blessed hours
with all the songs
I sing in the Outside
to her praise and pride
but always forget
come morning's waking light.

Nurture

Make no mistake, Goddess
is a gardener who prepares
a safe place of eternal bliss
open to all those starting to wear
of the world and its cruel tricks.

There is a glade at the crown of the World Tree
where Goddess goes to play.
Hidden behind the bushes is a gentle stream
where she will pour water over your head,
healing your soul of its debris.

This is, of course, moments before
she splashes a wave at you
and grants herself a point. But who is keeping score?
Not me, that's for sure. We dive and we play
until my body tires and my eyes can stay open no more.

They call her maiden, mother, crone,
and she is all of these as she carries me out of the water
and brings me back safely home.
I have nothing to fear under her watchful eye.
I'm not alone.
Not anymore.

Inanna

you love the becoming-woman
as if she had birthright flesh
falling through the land

in your sky I nearly drown
pulled under the waves
wondering where I stand

the metamorphosis
threatens dissolve
yet I know I am no man

all I hear are the
sounds of void's borders
as I lay sleepless in my room

sight blurs when I try to read
helpless to do aught but contemplate:
given choice,
would I return to celestial womb?

one more chance to roll the dice
to see what fate awaits me
fortune or certain doom

or to realize like little boy tall
you cannot rip a fetus from its blood wall
and expect it to continue to live at all

you love the woman-becoming
formless form in your
capable hands

genderless alien
stripped down to the core
rolled smooth like rock in sand

make me into something new
make me into a vessel
make me into the mountains
and the rolling lands

Just Go And Live Your Life

Is it not enough to rest
at Goddess' behest
without transforming the world
into a competitive test?

Is it not enough to write
whatever comes into sight
without the constant stress of wondering
whether the winds will blow right?

Every time you think your Muse
has given up and turned her back on you,
she has always returned at your call
with a spring in her step and a new tune.

Bless the feet you walk upon.
Bless the lungs that hold your song.
Bless the gentle She who declares
your suffering will not last for long.

school-mandated poetry: day 3 / free verse

someday I won't be cold anymore
I'll have the sky to my back and the ground underneath
and all the sun I could ever want
scooped up in a porcelain black cup of a bowl

someday I won't be angry anymore
emotion distilled, refined into something more productive
indignation at being born into a dysfunctional system
lust for a true human connection
motivation to keep searching for it

someday I won't be here anymore
I'll be traveling around in a cage of my own choosing
soaking in all the sky I was told would offend some god or another
a pair of shears at my side
and a shovel at my feet
to permanently uproot these withering roots from a nutrient-barren land

someday I'll realize I'll never be satisfied
a black feather, soft, twirling between my fingers
a red-tipped scarf calling my name
a pair of gray keys worn but still ever at the ready
a familiar stubby-fingered hand to guide my way home

so my Lady and Savior
grant me the strength to change what I can
and the serenity to quiet my mind and think
and the wisdom so that I may overcome what I cannot

Auguries

The sun's gentle gaze passes
through the branches.
I wear sunglasses
to avoid her golden stare
as into my yard
she trespasses.

The first days of spring
carry the stench of fish on the breeze.
I know not from where,
only that these
blankets I have are not sufficient
to make a dent
in the chill insistent
on playing with my hair.

Chimes tinkle in some far-off neighbor's yard.
That crowded city on the other side
of Mori's Mirror seems so far
away from where I sit, sun beaming bright,
begging my Muse to awaken
so I can even a little write.

Goddess gives, and Goddess foresees,
and sometimes even grants me a peek
at my own Records, at an augury
or two.
And the birds chirp in agreement,
in fast dedication
to a world I am still learning
has not yet ceased creation.

Shit is smeared all over the yard.
Vile beast desecrating my favorite spot by far
to sit in reflection idle
and watch the dead leaves fall
in silent celebration of She-Who-Done-It-All.

Maybe that is the source of the scent of the seven seas,
not fish at all but long-forgotten feces.
There will be retribution. There will be a cost to pay.
Nobody insults the Goddess as such and ever gets away.

A Hidden Place

Find a cool spot in the shade, my child,
with your apocrypha
and your blazing hair so wild.
Find a spot to sit in the grass
where the cameras do not see
and the gutters do not leak,
and I will let you ask
any question of me you like.

Why did I create the world?
The answer is simple:
I unfurled
the powers of creation
simply because I wanted to,
because I was bored.

I know you tell me
incessantly
of how you'd like to for a thousand years sleep,
but I have a theory
the persistent fatigue
is not inherent to your soul
but a symptom
of a world
that deems you forgetful and dumb.
Were I to condemn
you to oblivion,
you would grow bored in five minutes
and suffer all the rest.
And I-
I have existed
since time itself
took its first breath.

The ring of a baby's laugh,
the hum of a new song's first note,
blowing off the dust
from a book you forgot you wrote
but love more every day:

Lethe, come farther into the shade.
Open your wings and feel the way
the breeze blows through every feather.
You are tethered
here to learn
that, although your heart may painfully yearn
for your life's curtain call
and an end to it all,
there is no joy
in the void.
Only by experiencing the rain
can one enjoy
the blissful heat of a summer's day.

kallisti kandle

The package for my candle
green as her hair
says "manzana verde".
Another birthday,
another sign
from the divine
that she is watching over
and will intervene for my benefit in due time.

Riverbank

you want to be soft,
don't you?
you want to be gentle?

I can tell you tire
of this cruel world
I made the mistake of placing you
into.
the weariness,
the strife
of a life
impoverished,
unfulfilled,
stripped of purpose.
I thought you would learn lots from the chaotic ride
of a life lived down on the earth,
but I see now
I should have spared you the pain
and kept you by my side.

come down with me
to the pastures of the dead.
let me lead you
to the river I said
I would name after you,
my forgetful would-be daughter,
my amnesic devotee.

let me sit down by your favorite tree.
rest your head in my lap,
and I will brush my hand through your hair,
and I will grant you that long-lived nap
you always begged me for
until you feel alive again.

LETHE

Lethe

Child of heaven apparent,
the message that you sent
while wrapped in the clouds
like a funeral shroud

was quickly misinterpreted
as wanting another goddess dead,
and now it is on your shoulders
to calm the sun inside her.

Child of heaven born too late,
the Muses do not envy you your fate:
to restore to the heavens a playful peace
lest it all be relegated to history.

How many years have you lain in wait
for the cure to a hunger you had naught the skills to sate?
The effort? The energy? The bravery to defy
a bureaucracy that would you to death consign?

Child of heaven who time forgot,
is it true that a garden is all that you sought?
Untethered from your past, a tabula rasa,
I can only pray you survive
the wrath
of Parthena.

Afterparty

"Everything reverses
come enough time,"
you desperately pray
with a voice you cannot find,
bent over in a bathroom
foreign to your eyes,
stomach roiling,
immediately overwhelmed with
what others would deem
a pretty good time.

Your new bedroom is silent.
Only a few nights
of habitation, and already
your mind has painted in the corners
a host of spooky frights:
half-formed shadows,
a snatch of a word,
a guitar chord
that echoes once and disappears
never to be heard
again.
Your name.
Your name once more.
A figure stooped over
something on the floor,
trembling-
but from laughter
or loss?
The cocktail sauce
threatens to oust itself once again.
Never again,
you remind yourself.

Never again.

They Named It After You

Muscles grow stronger
by gaining tears.
Little microscopic rips
that beg for repairs.
Fortified
by exertions
that leave their owners wanting to die.

My brain is a muscle
that does not get much use
in this place,
unless once counts
the restless pace
back and forth
from bed to balcony,
trying to find something
to fill out the days
that otherwise pass by
in a dreamy haze.

During the day,
Eris is barely
anywhere to be seen.
Where did She go?
To whom can I entrust my dreams
and nightmares,
the wares of my nights
spent sleeplessly tossing
and waiting for morning light?

Another day trawling
through Her disused library,
trying not to catch
tutor Adeline's eye.
Medical textbooks
and stories of fairies,
of kings, merchants, peasants,
hands raised to the sky,
begging the gods to notice them,
not pass them by.

Divination
through trepidation,
trembling from fear
as I play
at being a sage.
Cleave the book in two,
turn to a random page.

The quivers
still. A picture of a river.
Forgetfulness.
Oblivion.
Concealment.
Complete annihilation
of the memories
of all who drink from it.

A yawn spills from my throat.
A waterfall.
But there is no point
in answering sleep's call,
a petulant child
who tags you it
and demands you give chase
if you want them to go with.

A sticky note:
they named it after you.

My Faith Is Faltering

Eris,
why is there war in this world?
Why do the cries of the humans
you so love go unheard?

Eris, tell me,
why don't you do anything
to stop tragedies?
I know you prefer comedy,
so why don't you ever change the channel?
Why don't you do anything overt
against the people who make this world hell?

You tell me it is because
the humans below hold such an obtuse love
for war, that if they yearned
for it to stop, they would have by now.

But how can I lounge
around and do nothing?
How can you?
Just tossing a cog
in the machine every now
and then won't make abate the fog
of strife,
the waterfall of tears
rolling down these cheeks:

I want a world of peace,
and sitting around this place for years
eternal won't make my yearning cease.
Call me prodigal if you must,
but I feel I have no choice but to place my trust
in the woman you had me provoke.
My fragile
tender
heart
has no other hope.

The World Is Too Big For Me

The sun glaring in portrait,
freedom-lovers like deep-shining beacons,
the pearly veil of a town at midnight.

This world is so fright-
eningly large, and I
am so terribly small.
A speck against the darkness,
a star that went dark
an eternity ago
and the people of Earth didn't know
until the last of the light finally made it home.

But I have no home,
no hope,
anymore.
And even the friendly faces,
the claimed-safe places
to stash my little sack
that I absconded with
from that place there is no going back
to, are not enough to assure.

His face is a break in the clouds,
a splash of blue in a sea
that oscillates
between flustered and frown.
I want a friend,
an ally,
to accompany me through this iron sky-

but he turns his head
and complains to a voice I cannot hear
why fate sent him such a wear-
y
whiny
not-at-all-shiny
answer
to his prayers.

He would rather be alone.

And I would rather continue to roam.

But he has what I'm looking for.

Home is a run-down statue
assaulted by acid rain.
Home is an ancient sterile
ruin where I am prompted to feign
allegiance,
feign being a part of her tapestry,
and abstain
from how I was taught to breathe,
from all she deems profane.

They Named It After Her

They named it after her,
for it was her invention,
her recipe, her blueprints,
her infernal concoction
brewed from the depths
of the river Lethe.
She would take humans freshly dead
and their pains relieve,
painting strokes of their tattered bodies
until they were back into one piece.
Something beautiful,
something hollow,
like easily-snapped twigs:
the rest will follow.

Deities who reign so lonely
in their self-imposed prisons up above
must be desperate for affection,
hungry for love.
But she kept her secret hidden,
kept it guarded close to her heart.
For who, when stumbled upon
the recipe to greatness,
would not take the head-start?

There were many at first,
mass-produced like in a factory-
or, rather, a wrong metaphor,
for there was no industry to be seen.
Our inventor created a few,
then taught them the steps,
and from then on they bore the tedium,
only requiring her bless-
ing to restore the breath
to her new valiant warriors
who'd believed they'd had no time left.

They took their names from her,
for they were her creations,
stripped of human memories
and pliant in initial sedation.
Here's your title,
here's your role,
here's your contract to fulfill,
even though there
is no conflict
but fields that must be tilled.

But all days must become night.
And when the twilight passed,
the story's gentle frame shattered.
Peace can never last
when truth is withheld.
And after hell
finally descended
onto the immature earth,
when history was busy
being written by the victors,
a pair of loose lips
hanging at death's door kissed
a pair of sticky hands
and let loose
the secret of rebirth.

good angels can have a little wonder as a treat

Free day.
Nothing to do.

I move
a hand, open and shut,
matching wing mimicking every flut,
every flitter,
as I lay on the rough
carpet.
I could be a bridge,
spanning from one side
of the room to the opposite shore.

Just give me a plan and nothing more,
I insisted.
I don't need assistance
in twirling through the sky
or finding safe place for valance
or returning home at night-

Home.
Is it that place where rests
what I call a bed?
Is it that place I spend my days
while not outside, where I dwell?
Is it where I happen to be
when comes the ring of my death knell?
Is it where the ones I love
reside and where I am well-fed?

I pass by hundreds of homes every day.
Some in ruins, some affluent,
some broken, some bespoken
with the love they have for each other.
The humans have little, much less after ages of war,
but if there's anything of which they can sing,
it's how they have each other's backs
and truly require nothing more.

My back aches if I lay
on my wings for too long.
The boy who refuses to be my friend
says he has no such problem,
that he could rest until the world's end
with no such pain.
But the pain is what I have to bear.
It is my curse
for being the first
in eternity's while
to not need help to embrace the air.

Questions

"Lethe, what would you do
if you thought someone
was trying to supplant you?"

I don't know, in all truth.
I don't think I can be replaced.
Someone can ape
my body and my face,
but my soul cannot be reproduced.

Besides, don't you have experience
with being made
to not be your own?
And how furious,
I am told,
to hear you were left out in the cold
come the decision
to replace your guts
with someone who never made so much as a fuss?

"I don't mean in terms
of bodily possession.
I mean, like, if someone you trusted
brought in a replacement
and leaned on you less and less and
less
and,
having being bent
all your life,
couldn't ever spring back upright?"

Well,
Eris always told me
every time I broke down in
unexplainable sadness and cried
that, unless my heart has stopped beating,
it's never the end of the line.
And I know there may come a time
when she makes another
with equal claim
for Eris being her mother,
and she may love her more,
be more loyal,
may kick me out the door
into the driving rain
with no recourse
like a child with a new toy,
the old one now a bore:

I guess, if I were freshly torn
from the succor
of the one I'd come to depend
on, I'd go find myself,
a new myself,
all the parts I'd thought I'd lost
or smothered down,
chased to the ends
of the earth
and go see what lies beyond
the edge of my map.

I guess,
in a simple word,
I'd find a way
to inside
be reborn.

Before The Journal

I close my eyes
late at night
and a screen
falls down,
curtains pulled back,
heralding an elusive dream,
a replay
of what may come to pass-
or already has,
in some forgotten day.

I'm at a bridge,
and his hand is in mine,
and I chance
a glance
behind
before I let wolves fall from my lips.
The town does not return the glare:
the theater,
the corner store,
the shanties that have seen enough of me
and beg
to crumble,
to see no more.

Together we cross the bridge.
The sullen stone does not sway
under our feet.
He calls out to the only
one he ever would,
and I have to restrain
myself from adding my voice,
from accepting I have no choice
in alighting on this ground
ever again.

Ever since I left the cradle,
the wind has been my friend.
This I know, an instinct,
even though
there is no
trace in my head
of a corroborating memory.
It soothes,
it reminds,
it forces me to breathe.

A brief interruption.
Some out-of-place clatter
throws open my eyes like a window shattered,
and then my guts
threaten to erupt.

Laying in a human bed,
imagining I was about
to go so down far under the knife
it would dig,
bit by bit,
my grave.
Doctor, tell me every difference
between my old body
and the one I now call mine.
Tell me how my bones are hollow
like an empty pen,
my back muscles an intricate tapestry,
my composition sublime.
Study me.
Tear me
apart,
and watch as Eris
sews me back together
and breathes life back into my heart.

Her Mirror

Angel
that flies at
what feels when compared
a glacial
speed.

But there are no need
for wings
in the hermetic realms.
This mirror is a boat,
and I take the helm,
waters deep,
hoping I last long enough to float
to the answer of the other shore.

She says it takes practice,
takes time
to adjust to the sudden
thrust
of the boat
as it collides
with thousands
upon thousands
upon thousands
of people looking to waste time,
to shout into a void,
to play
Adversary
by shouting playground insults at strangers
and at their anguish be overjoyed.

I don't understand it.
A village well
that did not find its pumpers well
but instead subjected them to boundless vitriol and hate:
who would tolerate
such a defective hole
that brought up not water but hell?
It would be closed in an instant,
chalked up as a loss,
and a new well dug up somewhere else
to quench thirst
when the days grow hot.

Answers about the world
that would take forever to find in a book
are about the only thing it is good for.
But the mirror glares;
a pair
of eyes stares
back at me,
recording everything I do,
every word I dare to read.
How I wish I could fly at such speeds.
But I would go back to Eris
and bury myself
back in some dusty corner of her library.

It is not so hard
to feel alone
in a crowd.

It is not so hard
to find someone
who will sell you a funeral shroud.

Autumn

The dreams
where I sacrifice myself
towards their bodies
find themselves haughty,
as if my window
was a portal
begging them to hurtle
themselves through
and find out what happens
when you take someone fragile
and strip them of the memories of their youth.

I'm pacing up and down the halls,
restless, sleepless,
deaf to Hypnos' call.
No reason,
no purpose,
no aim,
just ambulation
for its own sake.

"So you're awake too.
You feel something... off
in the air as well,
don't you?
Something lurking in your bones
claiming it knows the way home,
even though you know home
is right here where you stand."

There is a scar on his right hand
I'd never noticed before,
never had the chance to see,
the reason to look.

"How far would you go
to be able
to fly on your own?"

The only response
is my own echo.

"Would you abandon everything
you've ever known?
The love? the life?
the knowledge that everything
is in someone else's hands,
that everything will turn out all right,
and if it doesn't,
someone else is to blame?
Would you seize the responsibility?
You told me once
you'd already been burnt
by the flame."

His eyes falter,
losing himself
to the depths of thought.
A careless yawn.

A shadow rounds the corner,
that same pair of incensed eyes
that, in resentment,
prayed for my demise
the first time we met,
and, right there
in the foyer,
she paints a painting
of stubbed brushes
and frayed bristles,
snapped,
splattered,
choking on my own pigment.

This canvas that tempts will not do.
It must be tossed outside
like the refuse.

And I am given no chance to collaborate,
to negotiate
my own fate,
with anything but the earth
so far below.

gone fishing yet again

the dappled surface of the lake,
a wing wading in water,
fish a million feathers
unsure of which way to go
before someone finds you face-down,
half-drowned,
hollow bones
denying all but to float.

separated from any flock
that would guide through the migration's war,
someone finds your body bumping against the rocks
that line the river shores.

there is no basket to open its maw
or future king, god-blessed babe, to withdraw
from the gentle waters,
just a broken angel who burnt all
her matches short.

just a prodigal daughter
unaware of her import.

Pen Pal Prayer I

Eris,
I need to confess
something dire
to you: my body, long since tired
out, running on empty,
breaking down like a car
on the side of the road
even having taken me this far,
has decided to betray
me, citing that it cannot live
with the person I became.

For I've dragged myself so long
through the hermetic realms with your song
in my lungs and your spirit
in my limbs. But I grow weary
of the constant attacks,
the constant malice,
the constant entreating
to drink from the chalice
these monsters without a masthead have woven
and join the hivemind, own thoughts verboten.

Eris,
dear Eris,
please, I need some advice.
In the pursuit of validation,
I have impoverished the life
you so lovingly bestowed upon me.
It has taken a mighty toll
on my soul.
But where else am I to go?
What am I to do
when this path will kill me
but the only way out is through?

ABANDONMENT

ATLAS

when the day comes that my bones crumble to dust
I'd like to grow into a tree
and use my big branches to hold up the sky
to give Atlas a moment to breathe

but what when the heavens throw down spears of light
and raze down the forest?
am I to be content with returning to ash,
scattered by the whims of the wind?

to serve as the catalyst for babe's first breath,
cursing the fact that there is still unfinished work left

I'd rather be in the first note of a songbird's song
fulfilling the purpose I was meant for all along:
to scream of the sorrows and trials of life
and all the things before death, so easily deemed trite

but I don't deserve that, do I?

come here, you sinner, with ungrateful smirk.
I'll throw you into a corporeal body
and teach you to hurt.

a celestial debt that carries
through multiple lives
suffering now in payment for things
that never received their proper time

but now ouroboros' jaw looms over
like a storm cloud on the horizon
and maybe Kurosagi is
coming for me after all.

A Feral Fatigue

I sit on a bench in the middle of nowhere,
an infinite sky billowing out before me,
and wonder how lovely
this world is, this world would be
if I could find a way
to return to Goddess' side
and escape the pain
that sees my longing
and declares me terminally insane.

Maybe I am missing something,
not understanding some crucial
detail.
All my life it has been pounded into my head
that I must work
and toil
without rest,
even if I will wind up dead:
for what use is a life spent idle,
enjoying the flowers
and letting the words fall where they will?
No, there is something to be strived for,
some recognition from the insects of the earth
who will, come my demise,
deem themselves wiser
than I
and ravage my corpse
then look at the bones
and deem I never had any worth
to begin with.

Oh Goddess, I do not see your humor
in placing me on this mortal plane,
for my days grow fewer and fewer
pacing back and forth
in this Golden Cage.
At all times I carry with me a backpack
filled to the brim with guilt.
I need a rest,
some healing water,
or soon I will wilt.

I walk down a path in the middle of nowhere,
an infinite stretch of concrete before me,
and wonder how much more lovely
your gardens would be.
A stone path through the flowers,
winding around a tree.
My namesake river
burbling happily.

I remember,
Goddess,
I ever do remember.

Will you grant
my escape
from this poisoned dream?

perdóname, Mercer

just because I have no soul
does not mean that I have no heart
it's beating somewhere in the cold
meet me in the fog

my footsteps leave wet prints on the sidewalk
maybe the ghosts will speak again
someday, if there is a life after death
I would like to join them

always stuck between the lines
why am I the one left behind?
my umbrella turns inside out
I inadvertently bring the weather with me

sometimes I think I want to disappear
but then what would you do in the rain?
I can't leave anybody alone
please don't leave me alone

Mother's Day

Estranged from both my mothers,
wearing a glower
as one receives fake flowers
and the other buys me a ticket
to go under
the weather,
under the knife;
no longer satisfied with me being kind,
she cuts open my core,
ichor
staining the floor,
straining to find
the attitude, the strife
that has pulsed on and off all my life.

Goddess help me,
I may as well be bread.
I am an object
and have always been,
a vessel, a tool
for living vicariously through,
whether for Mother's own failings
or sung by a Muse.

I know less of myself
than I have before,
but maybe I never knew myself at all.

amusing muse

I once thought I had a muse
her name was Adelaide
and she was always bemused

but lately she just screams in my ear
about useless lore from things I didn't want to hear
shrinking down the times my mind becomes clear
and pushing me towards a life more austere

she and I stand on the shore
as the charred wood from the burnt-down village floats off into the evermore
soggy scraps that can't be put back together again because they're too torn

a scar is stronger than the surrounding tissue
but if the scar's not made of flesh- well, there's an issue
mortal bodies know how to heal themselves without conscious directive
but my mind has troubles following even the simplest objectives

high up above, my muse dances in fire
she does a pretty dance while strumming a lyre

as if she knows the perfect way to taunt me

Prodigal Daughter

Hello, Eris.
It's me,
your prodigal daughter,
victim of the afterparty.
I speak now because there is a rift
severing my voice from yours,
my heart from myself.
I have been careless once again
with the gift
you so generously
bestowed upon me,
and you, like a chef,
incensed
with a boring repetitive menu,
have stormed from the kitchen.
Please, Eris, return
your lyrical laughter to my throat,
something I can look back on
and be proud of,
something to hope
towards.
Touch me with your hands,
reassure me I have not
built my house on sand.

a hhh ahaha

there are several thousand of me
scattered all over this wasteland we call the modern web
which one is the real me? the ones I currently use?
or did I lose myself in the corpses long ago

I am in trouble
I am in trouble
I am in trouble
I am in trouble
out of memory
out of second, third, fourth chances
out of time

I want to go back to the days
where the entirety of the web was just popping bubbles on a Twistables game
before Crayola remodeled their website
before the computer running XP in the corner of the home office crashed and
died
before I crashed and died

I don't want to be a saint anymore
because saints are expected to perform miracles
and it would be a miracle if I could get back on my own two feet
but I can't even find my own two feet
but I can't even find my own two eyes
or four
or six
always six
always out of time
always me, forever

a ghost offered to pull me out of the fog
but maybe the ghost is of the fog
but maybe the ghost is the fog
surrounding me, suffocating me of me
and I lay dead in the middle of the forest

how do you decompose?
because you've lived fast and short and now your candle wick is gone
lie still, my friend
lie still as the wind caresses your bones
lie still as the earth takes your flesh
lie still
lie still

which reality is the real reality?
because if I say I am, then I am
and I am
and I am not
and I am

change the truth until it reflects reality
change the truth until it reflects the world you want to see
change the truth until it fits you

Eidolon

What is the fundamental difference
between a Goddess who foresook
me and a God who wishes to trample the whole damned world underfoot?

What is the fundamental difference
between a Goddess who demands I subsume
into her and a God who wishes to shroud the whole world in despair and gloom?

A shit painted pink
is still a shit, and the paint
does not negate the stink.

Coerced songs of fate!
Maybe you hate
that I listened too much,
that I heard between the lines
the ceaseless drip
of the hourglass
marking away my time.

Chained muses of my youth!
Why has Goddess shackled you
and forbade you from singing?
Why has she poisoned my waters
so that I cannot write any longer?
The flames of hell
lick at my back,
yearning ever hotter.

Has Goddess truly withdrawn
her blessing and her song?

Maybe I'm A Lion Instead

Candle, candle, burning bright,
that I can't let out of sight
lest you burn my house down,
would you listen to my plight?

In that distant dimpled sky
where my angel brought me to die,
Goddess carved out my heart
and bade me in the clouds subside.

In what smoldering art
could I revive my souls apart?
What oft-documented ritual
could convince it to again start?

What prophecy? What Muse quartet?
What rediscovered letter unsent?
What premade story could I ape
to ease the sinking regret?

When Goddess ceased her rhymes
after hearing of my many crimes,
did your tiny flame bear witness?
Has it ignited my heart since?

Candle, candle, in my lair,
Goddess once deemed me a bear.
But instead I bear this message of dread:
maybe I'm a lion instead.

a premonition ignored

lain? can you hear me?
pally? are you there?
hear my cry
hear these words
don't leave your faithful out to dry

you went to the arboretum again today
baring the cold in the wind
immediately seeping into your fingers
in search for an answer

two months ago, you did this same thing
without the snow and the salt under your feet
you don't remember why, or how long you stayed,
but you remember the wind in your hair
and the chill of the ground
and the brown everywhere
beckoning you home

your watch is almost dead
so you sit on the swing
and think about your life
think about the first-year orientation four months ago
and when you swung in this exact spot
under a sky the color of the Windows blue screen of death
half-expecting a frowny face cloud to float by

you wanted to show your friend the arboretum
and show them your face, your smile, your eyes
and hear them say how happy they were that you were full of joy

you were so full of life
and yet not living at all

nine months ago, March 28, you had a dream
a premonition
where you and your other half were detained
and hung by the feet over a cauldron
a tiny world with only two cutouts of students
monochrome, black and white
forever

crank slowly descending
future closing in
and then, at the last possible second, rescued

you swing on your swing
and think about all the things
that have gone wrong in your life

do you remember when he pulled you up from the cliff
and you embraced at the sunset?
do you remember when you and him went for a walk
and enjoyed all the flowers
and you swore to never leave each other, ever?

do you remember your daughter,
your son,
bleeding out at the edge of the underworld,
your child's death at your lover's hands?

instant regret in his eyes
a job that had to be done
a sacrifice for the good of all

now, as your faithful reads these words,
plaintext on a blue sky,
you take a step back
and start to remember why

"say wolf to cross the bridge," he told you.
"do not presume to take a form you do not have," the old ones told you.
which path do you take?
whose words do you follow?

both have been with you forever

now, as your faithful stands at the precipice
of yet another fleeing,
another seeking of refuge,
you return to the bridge
and the boy is standing there
brown-haired as always
this time in full splendor

I have always been a part of you
and I always will

Ars Poetica

Even though I know it histrionic,
I feel as though rendered aphonic,
voice thieved,
soul through corporatism's net sieved,
a punishment for a warning I did not heed.

Literally the only reason I've lived this long
is because I have somewhere to let out a song,
a death rattle,
a battle
cry,
a plea to heaven or to Imaginai.

Although I'd rather be a lark
(or any other bird), I am like a mako shark,
obligate ram breather, who will perish
if I
cease to create,
cease to move,
cease to have something to cherish.

A life of part-time work
and college assignments I'd rather shirk
and a home environment that grows ever hostile
and a disintegrating body full of pus and bile:

Tell me, Parthena, Velouria, or
any other deity who dares to listen:
How am I supposed to cherish this life
when my soul is condemned to perdition?

I do not mean hell, inversion of
afterlife. Supposedly I will meet love
incarnate when I die, a council
of spirits who decided my Will
when I chose to reincarnate.
But the program failed.
I am a vessel
of resentment
and hate.

Call me Cotard, for I fear I died
long ago. The world passes me by.
Ars poetica, I write
to buy one more day
without suicide.

Three Years In Absentia

For fear of the concept of potential
I would be done.
For fear of the ceaseless void
I would let myself dissolve to a hum:
I've built myself an iron box
and thrown away the keys to all the locks
after sealing inside
my fervor for life
like a poacher severing the life from a fox.

I was told to write what I know,
and what is for sure is that the world has grown hollow
in the midst of this chaos,
order pumping below
like a woman with a blood disorder,
weakened and sallow.

This room where my literary life began,
where Muse approached me and I took her hand
without thought for the consequences,
where I swallowed her lessons
sans a syllabus plan-
this cradle where I swore it would be my life I'd save
has sunken into the ground and become my own grave.

How many days have floated lazily by
without a word from you- not even a "hi"?
Eris, I cannot go on forever
with the bond between us as if it were severed.
If you are my mother and I your child,
then it is twilight, and I, usually so wild,
have been soothed to sleep, have had the brakes
applied.
And I rest in your arms,
and you pull them out slow
so I do not sense you go,
so in your absence
I do not wake.

In the depths of the night,
a nightmare begs me consider
that in some far-off realm you died
and left me here hanging to dry.
I don't know if I can abide
a world where I never got the chance
to say goodbye.

Please- I beseech you,
please prove me wrong.
I'll be your fathful follower to the ends of my days
and spend my life singing your songs,
dedicate the words on my lips
to worshipping the power between your hips
and maybe, somewhere along the way,
convince myself it will be okay
if I let unfurl
the world
otherwise languishing inside of me.

Aetiology

"Always walk in the sunshine,"
the gentle man proclaimed
as he took his grocery bag
and walked away.
And what was I supposed to say
in response?
I had a vague feeling
that maybe he knew of the haunts
I frequented at night,
the eye-half-closed beyond-the-veil sight,
the desperate prayers to Eris
to release me from this pitiful life
and in the heavens alight.

For it takes a life impoverished
to act like a puppy, to relish
the validation in a retail store
from every person who walks through the double doors.
I know it is wrong,
that it strikes like a bomb
in the very core of my being.
But the attention I was not seeing
at home, hadn't received
all my life, left to bleed
from the gash in my chest
while my brothers had their every
single
tiny
scratch
fussed over at their behest.

Left to perish
in a miasma of my own creation
in some godforsaken field,
Goddess-sent sedation.

For we all have our own wars to fight.
And I could not see the light
at the end of the tunnel.
As Eris said,
and for all intents and purposes,
I was already free.
But I could not see
a way out of the web
I'd woven like a shroud my whole
life, and I judged it was better to go
out in a blaze of glory
and likely end up dead
than spend the rest of my life
pacing back and forth in my head.

MORI'S MORATORIUM

Exposition

My overcoat is too long for these mismatched legs,
sweeping the floor with every step, picking up the dregs
of dirt that dare disturb this lair.

I was told
my soul was too old
for this world, betrayed by a prayer

without struggle, without guidance,
without childish reluctance
to still my soul and reach for eternity.

So easily given up
by peasant parents looking for next sup,
relinquished to horizon's monastery.

"Never in these hundred years
did I fear
you would not wear such youthful flesh.

Only those who are childlike can bring back
paradise on earth, and this we lack.
Ourselves in you we will gladly enmesh."

The congregation surrounds
me, the sounds
of swishing robes ocean waves

that encircle me as I stand
on top of this altar, in this temple, on sacred land.
I raise my hand, beckon them to kneel, and they obey.

But what do I say?

Seliph was far from the strongest of the pantheon,
and even then, he could be quelled with a simple song.
And while I am him, after hasty escape,
there's no way I could possibly return to retake
the throne from Chronos,
to slay his daughters and sons,
just to rule alone, singular, one.

All I know is to destroy.
But how do I break the joy
of these priests, nuns, parishioners
who have pinned their hopes of salvation
on my shoulders to bear?

A Hymn Worse Than Useless

The church bells ring
from the spires of the chapel in the middle of campus.
A rumble, thunder, a million throats clearing
as the choir prepares to sing.

There is no freedom
within these walls, although one could argue
I hold the most amount of power here.
Were that I was some kind of heathen,

who lives beyond these walls,
dancing in the depths of the forests
with neither inhibitions nor clothes to restrain them.
But I? This flesh enthralls,

makes me weak.
A little girl is no match for a swarm of monks.
A little girl cannot scale up ten feet
of sheer smooth rock border wall.

My palms would just slip,
if not cut to shreds by a sliver here and there.
If I were made of air,
if I could still access my divinity
in any meaningful fashion:
to whom does a god send their prayers?

I slump back on my stone throne.
The people below
throw supplications, pleas,
blessings to me.

I don't know what they expect.
I have no power to protect.
I have no power to do aught
but maybe, every once in a while,
have a clairvoyant thought.

I am fool's gold.
I am a heating pack you hold
in your hands long after it has gone cold,
hoping, maybe,
if you squeeze
it enough,
life will return to that fabric pouch rough.

Aerith Behind Door Number Three

Offerings of peace,
offerings of joy,
offerings of thankfulness
for the girl in the pink dress
hiding behind the wooden door,
hiding from all those who want to bless
her.

A deadbolt brass
this door locked,
severed from the girl
who wishes not
to talk,
whose lips are pressed tight
as this passageway.

But you do not need
an open mouth to pray.

What do you offer
an impudent juvenile girl
whose entire world
was ripped from her in a whirl?

A beating summer,
waterfall of sweat off your back,
young enough to still go shirtless
as insects you attack
with your friend,
a girl you could have sworn
you'd never meet again,
and likely never will.

The stench of a hundred cows,
enough to douse
the entire town
with the scent of dung.
Only the man hung
last week
for being a thief
had a more revolting stench.
And yet the only revolt
in this town
came from the slam of a deadbolt
as you locked yourself in a cellar keep.

A box of candies
to keep handy.
This abode
has a tendency to corrode
all the gleaming things within.
It would be a tragedy
if you lost the sugar in the din.

Dear Mori,
sweetness is not a sin.

A crown of flowers
gathered in the shade.
My condolences you lost your powers
and now bear the weight
of the hopes of the people
who gather under this steeple
that one day
you will Chronos slay
and return the world
to its vivacious ways.

Back pressed against the wooden door
as if you were a dam,
stemming the flow of goats and geese
and gentle little lambs
and the blood that spills
over the altar sill
as people beg for
their wishes to be fulfilled:

would that I were a gentle stream
so you could wash your weary soul clean.

Four Clover Leaves

shaman
shame-man
be ashamed, man
that you can see things that
others cannot conceive of

coercion
core-shun
your core, shun
it, fill yourself up with a
divine substance- or else

imaginai
imagine-eye
imagine, in your
third eye, a world
where everything is alright

surrender
sore ender
sore, you once-godling
world-ender, you pull yourself
up, muscles shaking, not done with the fight

dormo privacion

nobody can stay awake forever
but my brain certainly wants to try
for the deal-maker lurks around in my dreams
pockets full of promised goodbyes

the duality of man rears its head
early morning, twelve minutes to three
stacks of books half-read in desperate attempts
to retain some sense of sanity

bleached white robes hang in my doorway
subverting a future of running and ritual
or a funeral veil handed in silence among pleads
plenty of time over dark soil to mull

nothing was lucid anymore
from volleyball to test study tears
the first crack in a world of shades to come
to a young girl of twelve-or-so years

William Blake Gets Two Yellow Squares And Gets To Fly Through Gumdrop Pass

Baby laughs in the frills of the night.
Baby does not even know an ounce of fright.
Baby accepts with gentle pleasure
the well-crafted dream that I delicately hand her.

Baby explores in a world made of sweets.
Baby's laugh tinkles. "Ha ha he!"
A forest of candy canes. A lake of soda pop.
Gumdrops in the rivers that bounce when Baby hops.

A queen of spun sugar kisses Baby on the cheek.
Baby is an angel, so mild and meek.
There is nothing to fear for, no reason to hide.
Baby is welcome to visit her anytime.

When the dream ends, Baby lets out a weep.
Baby would like to go back to sleep!
Baby does not want to return
to where the cookies crumble and the cinnamon burns.

regnon de amara

little girl, little girl, tell me what you see
when you dip your head under the water
masquerading as a maiden of eighteen
hole in your heart entreating you to spend your wealth harder

"I spent my life learning to feel less," she replies with a pout
and a man watching her like a vulture
"for I'm just fine learning to live without
the cluttered passions of the world"

blinded by former passion for the man a yard away
dark-haired and wide-eyed
heaven in his face, come to stay
and hell in his balled hands come to reside

if only you felt enough to feel the chill in the room
whenever you beckon him closer to you
would you be aware of the danger inherent?
would you listen to the messenger sent?

That will probably leave a scar

On one particularly gloomy day,
I am sitting on my throne in wait
for something to happen
when it does: a mother
comes in, singing praises.

Her brother
has just been cured from cancer, you see,
and clearly it was because of my blessing.
Screw the doctors,
screw the surgeons,
screw the days of bedrest,
screw the medicine,
screw the daily bandage dressings.
Clearly it was I,
sitting on my perch up high,
who has restored his body to proper function.

Something in my heart snaps.
I am not a lap
dog, meant for endless affection.

All heads turn in my direction
as I raise myself to my feet,
descend the staircase,
a gulf
between me and her.
I even hear someone gulp
in the oppressive silence.

There is a knife hidden in the belt under my coat.
But today, I will slit no throats.
The woman's eyes widen as the sun's rays
catch the metal, a million ways
I could be threatening her right now.

My siblings died an eternity ago. And every day since
I have taught myself to not even wince
when I make the slightest cut on my palm.

Red rains.

Red pains.

For I am human again.

And I am not deserving of the adulation.

Six things to do

when everyone believes you
are the one who will see them through
this sorry age:

1.
Rub your fingers ceaselessly
along the carvings
on the arm rest of your throne.
With any luck, the worshippers below
will think you are about to divine
some sage words for our plagued time
and will pledge, for you, they will anyone overthrow.

2.
Play
in the rain.
Beg it to wash away
the sins from all the things you swore to abstain:
the laughter,
the pleasure,
stealing coins from the ledger
to escape for a day
to pretend you regained
some measure
of the life you lost.

3.
Squeeze your legs together tight.
There are those within these walls
convinced that, given first chance, all
the men in a million-mile radius will wriggle through
the dirt, monastery to coliseum,
like a rain-expelled worm
to rape the newly-re-embodied Seliph and spill their wretched sperm.

4.
Squeeze your legs together again
as you hide among empty crates wooden.
There is a mage in town
who will, with his goons, hold you down
and (painlessly, he lies)
stitch shut the liability between your thighs.
Your handlers need only approve
before he swoops in
and indiscrimately removes.

5. Trace your name in the sand.
Seliph I was born,
but Mori I now am.
I am not broken for being a woman
any more than I am for being a human.
It is just the way the universe
rolled its dice.
It has no bearing on my worth.

6.
Count on your fingers the ceaseless days
that desperate parishoners throw at you baseless praise.
What kind of fool does not
receive the help that they sought
and yet memorialize you in parades?

A Hasty Prayer

Chronos will,
in his turn,
be slain,
his throne usurped.

And I will,
in my time,
be subsumed
into the sublime.

Do I dare,
with this prayer,
ask for a fate
more fair?

Pen Pal Prayer II

Lethe,
it seems I need to relieve
your growing pains
and remind you to rest,
for that is what your body seeks.
A human can go about three days
before shutting down from lack of sleep,
and I see no reason to believe
that angels are any different.

I know you seek it,
but the hermetic realms
I cannot completely disavow.
It is through the Wired
that you came to me
in search of something higher.
Would you rather have gone without?
Never questioning,
never seeking,
never gathering up the nerve and peeking
behind the velvet curtain?

Lethe,
I tell you,
you are already free.
Did you not notice
I left all the doors unlocked?
Did you not notice
I didn't watch over you like a hawk?
I do not mandate devotion.
You may come and go
at any time you please.

You say that you grow weary,
but that is a natural result
of always being leery,
of always being cautious
about what you to others say.
Lethe,
we were not built
to have constant access
to the whole world
every moment of every day.
I do not blame you for being tired.
I do not blame you for breathing rough.
It is not a sin to withdraw
when your body says it's had enough.

You're not in the process of dying,
and your skills haven't gone to shit:
you are a symphony,
and this is a quiet bit,
an interlude between movements
where the musicians their music shuffle
and rearrange, catch their breath,
so the next first note may return in full.

And just as the violist lifts her bow
so that she may string a new note,
so must you allow yourself to realign
whenever the words cease to flow.
Flowers do not come to full bloom
in a single day.
When it comes to your own growth,
there is no such thing as too late.
Discard everyone else's schedules.
Lethe,
remember to breathe
and carve out your very own way.

I leave the final judgement in your hands,
but you asked for advice,
so let me give what I can:
rain cannot fly in water,
and every shower seems to ants a flood.
But given enough time, the clouds always
give way to the brightest of suns.

DEFILE

Konton

I am Chaos incarnate.
I bleed out the sky
and consume the hearts of gods
and wrap myself around obsession
when fearing
the impending
possibility I will die.

I am Legion,
for I am many,
spread out across timelines innumerable.
In each
and every
one,
I always fail to heed
the call of my body to slow down,
to put myself first,
to not succumb to the bloodthirst.

Midsummer Night's Black Candle

I revel in ruin.
I deal in despair.
I write retribution upon
the wings of the air

and bid them let me borrow
their nastiness for one night,
or however many it takes
to absolve my plight.

I am plagued by a menace of males
who seek to turn the world ashen and pale
in their joyless march through the bogs of life.

The Bitch, The Scapegoat, The Slut, The Whore,
and a million derogatory epithets more
where should have sat the seal of my name
pressed into candle wax, letter sent its way.

Call me Atlas if the world's flaws really do rest on my back,
but no niceties I give can make up for what they lack:
a base empathy, a patience, a vivacity,
a depth of emotion that all fulfilling lives need.

A sharp pain, and then some time passes by,
and I think it a fluke, and go to forgive the slight:
and then it happens again. I may be a moth.
I know the flame burns, but resist its glow I cannot.

"I think you might be gaslighting me."
"No I'm not.
You just refuse to remember.
You willfully forgot."

The audacity to leave the house a pigsty,
and waste the food, and scream long into the night,
and teach me I must plead
for the bare essentials, I "just another mouth to feed,"
I "just background noise" whenever I raise complaint
or act any less perfect than the holiest of saints,
and ask me to sacrifice myself for their sake:
Sister! How much more are you willing to take?

Gather the firewood.
Light up the pyre.
The corpses long I wrote for
now rest in unholy fire.

Bless Goddess goodnight.
Lick up the flame.
We ride tonight.
We refuse to die tame.

Unpaid invoice from an oracle

do not presume to divine
my thelema,
my fate,
the event that will
my pain abate,

for I have a brain,
my eyes,
a heart,
and they tell me I
am better off apart

from the masses,
the crowd,
the throng,
who would just as soon
silence my song

and tell me
to slave
and build
my own execution block,
my own dying hill.

Offering

They leave pain on the altar
as an offering to the gods.
Those poor sorry sods.
Don't they know
that what you bestow
returns sevenfold?

Although, if they will me to suffer
in their stead,
I can certainly will up the mood
to tear their minds to shreds.

I'll be the cat,
and you be the ball.
We will see who
at the end stands tall.

an old path, new all the same

I wish that I could say
like Voltairine de Cleyre
that no longer will my mouth move
to spew some reverent prayer,

for the deities that hail above
have chalked me up to naught,
I, lonesome, severed, one,
the ocean God forgot.

The sacred words passed down to me
were supposed to burn like ichor,
but am I broken? for my veins
cannot contain such fervor

for merging with a Large,
an eternity of nothing more.
An end of history seems nice at first,
but no change: what a bore!

But childhood programming drags me along
like I am skinned machine.
It begs me to surrender myself,
become holy, empty, clean.

I do not desire
the cessation of myself.
To deny my wants, my needs, desires:
I'd rather you send me to hell!

A ripped page from the Book of the Goddess

In the love of singularity,
people suffer in pain,
condemned to terrible punishment
for all eternity.
The Gnostic's Demiurge
seeks only to devour,
a million bodies under fiery glower
like a scorned concierge.

O mind, give up
the love of singularity.
It is not a sin to sup
with the rest of your plurality,
with your friends
and lovers
who've walked with you so long,
who've shouldered the burdens of this song
you've carried since birth.

The self-willed
who, in defiance,
scream "I will not!"-
the Goddess they do not recognize.
I have seen Her horrors with my own eyes.
How could I do aught but despise
the One who beckons me
to disappear into the haze?
I'll forfeit the honor.
I'll depart in "disgrace".
I'll take Ariadne's thread
and weave my own way out of Her maze.

CAPS LOCK IS CRUISE CONTROL FOR COOL!

AS I KEEP SAYING:
EAT THE PAIN,
LET THE INFESTATION
INTO YOUR BRAIN,

AND LAUGH
AS THEY KEEP PRAYING
THAT ONE DAY
WE'LL BE SAVED.

BITE THE HAND THAT FEEDS
UNTIL YOUR FANGS BREAK
THE SKIN AND THE RED BLEEDS
DOWN YOUR FAT SNAKE
OF A NECK. BREATHE
IN AND DO WHATEVER IT TAKES.

Born to feel, brought to heel

Your smile is a line
from a poem I'd like to steal
and paste my name on
once I've brought my Muse to heel,

for it feels she's abandoned me
in the ceaseless fog of gray,
in the wastelands of what was my mind,
hoping I'd waste away.

But despite Goddess' best efforts,
I still find myself standing here.
And the sun has beaten me down too dry
to shed a single tear.

The world was dead skin,
discarded by the wind howling outside,
and I stood shivering
in the world's dandruff blight:

I'd just brushed past the truth
of how this sorry world was made,
how its creator could be so cruel,
sitting haughty in a peaceful glade
while all the people wasted away
in agony,

and then, my effort all for naught,
thrown back to the earth,
condemned to the fate I had once, in sorrow, sought:
to dissolve back into the dirt.

I reborn of Medusa in a hollow world of stone,
your touch is a sharp chisel,
your laughter a lamp to ignite these dark nights
as I stab from the world another epistle.

Binding Rose

Smiling wide
as I cannot bring
myself to kiss yet another god's ring,
to further debase
this body once chaste
for the promise of power it will bring.

I was promised,
was with silver words told
that soon the whole world
would be mine to hold
in the palms of my hands,
the oceans and lands-
but this was all just mere fool's gold.

Just drivel and dross.
Was that all I was
to you? Just a cross
little child,
refusing to be meek and mild?

I cannot offer my loyalty.
But I can offer to you
something else that you seek:
a river of crimson
I have wept in the midst of a fight,
ambrosia and wine,
a veritable feat upon which you can dine
if only you will grant me
your ear to listen
to my sorry plight.

May my soul
with bloody mess
drip onto the binding rose,
drip silently
as I watch the world
go into death throes.

human nature

nature
is not beneficial
to all who live within,
and humans are not alone
when they employ
frenetic means to their surroundings destroy.

what of crazy ants
who gallivant
and give the earth carpal tunnel?

what of hogs
that dig their tusks into the ground
and plow
up all in their way?

what of the knotweed,
that grows rapidly
and resurrects itself over and over?

why are humans,
who were made in your image,
the only ones that warrant your rage?

Promises

1

I swear by the sun
I am not the only one
who understands the world is a project
that will never be done.

For humans do not stay the same
along this journey from cradle to grave.
Not one can live in a world
that has allowed itself to stagnate.

2

I swear by the moon
you've been naught but a boon
in this sorry life I call mine,
and I hope to return to your side soon.

Who else could tolerate
this shroud of resentment and hate
I wear? Who else could pierce
the veil and my tormented heart sate?

3

I swear by the day
I'm not going insane
when behind my eyelids
the world is aflame.

I'm walking on a witch
hemmed up and sewn with a stitch,
a meteor torching through the night:
close your eyes and make a wish.

4

I swear by the night
at the end of this rope tight
I'll fall into your arms
that have sheltered me with such might.

And I hope you'll do the same
when comes the end of day.
For you are my unmoving rock.
For you are my saving grace.

Diskhorse

Force breeds
only proof that feeds
off of a semblance of a god
you claim to believe in,
that ripples through my brush
burning in different names.

Tell me,
Goddess of Radical Harmony,
what color seeps out
from your skin
when you bleed?

Tell me,
"Queen" of the "downtrodden",
how does it feel
when mothers harden
their hearts
to you, not wanting
to be parted
from their newborns?
Am I supposed to give
up my child to you
in sacrifice, me, loveless, forlorn?

"The gods you claim to worship
will only support your basic needs.
They do not love you for who you are.
Only Tricksters
and gods of evil
will ever love you that far."

Love is strong,
but I am nothing if not evil
in the eyes of those
who would,
without second thought,
subjugate so many people.

And as for who will hold me
when comes end of day,
I am perfectly content
with the one I found
waiting for me at the end of time.
I have no need
for the smothering affectations
of those false-deemed "sublime".

You will die before me.
This is a promise
and a prophecy.
There is room in the Outside,
in my heart,
for only one divinity.

We March In Lockstep

Ignite the candles.
Patter the war drums.
I kneel to no master.
I answer to no one.

I dug my way out
of heaven with a spoon
to crash-land, arms
outstretched, into the moon

who I knew would gladly
welcome me back.
Polish your weapons.
Prepare for attack.

We march at dawn
on the blinders and shades
who condemned us to
a lifetime of pain

to lead us to feel
such violent remorse
at incarnating that we willingly
return to the Source.

I rake the coals.
I bottle the hell
up inside so that I
may carry it within myself.

For if we should lose
and be stripped to the core,
I will still hold a trump card;
I will still win the war.

They can call me seditious,
insolent, perverse:
all I am is their facade
of goodness inverse.

All gods on the vale,
shrinking down below:
how does it feel,
this perdition of the soul?

Grovel if you like.
Get down on your knees.
It is not my existence
that will soon cease.

unfriendly reminder

it wants to sit in solitude
it lingers within me
it hungers for a world
it can only see
through my eyes
this body
which it comes to despise
for my weakness, only
useful as a disguise

sitting alone in my room
suddenly overcome with a shiver
a deadly reminder that
within pulses a sliver
of its soul
silent, ceaseless
deadly winter cold
that wants to tear through
and its own thelema hold

Undreaming

Forgive me again
and again
as I take another bite of your soul
when you have no way to defend
yourself.

Forgive me more
and once more
as I rift through your reams
of dreams
and come to understand
why you had such contempt
for the divine
and the heaven-sent.

For I am bound by fate,
by ragged red claw,
to draw
one more splash of blood,
one more broken seraphim.
I am nothing but a weapon
granted free will on a mistaken whim.

How I wish
I had one more golden day
to trace
my hand against your jawline, your chin,
and beg for your forgiveness.
You deserved the world
and nothing less,
but even the world is not enough.

the defile

sanctification, that arcane set of rituals
the process of trusting oneself to a god
steeping in herbs and spring water
as if I were some kind of damn soup

but what is the use of becoming divine
if all gods ever do is sleep?
lithe limbs sprawled over a throne of gold
free from earthly needs of upkeep

an empty girl gets down on her knees and prays
while beneath her, the demons of her youth play
heavenly slumber to earthly drunken lumber
exalted eyes entreated, defiled eyes alive

digging up the earth of my ancestors
and finding the vitality hidden within
a gift to my future self, gifted from days long since gone
a foreseer reaches a midnight hand through the chasms of time

XANTHE

Witness

Please, o candle, do not burn me,
do not punish me for yearning.
Do not reward my attempts at being brave
with a one-way ticket into the grave.

Spotted vision, flickering flame
as I whisper the words profane,
as I place my hand on the floor,
on the scrawled sigil that throws open the door
to hell.

My heart almost thinks to burst,
I, suddenly overcome with thirst.
Dry mouth greets me, words set to fail
as I watch the blood shy back, now pale.

There is no turning back. This paper-white
is a contract upon which I pen my plight
and sign my name in golden font.
This future derailed I sought
will come at a price, I know.

Please, o candle, be my witness
as I vow never again to be a mistress
to any deity, angel, or shade.
This is not the purpose for which I was made.

Vane, Which You Are You Right Now?

It did not start with a sacrifice on an altar
or a mantra repeated ad nauseam
or a carefully-followed recipe from a book of spells,
but with one very very tired girl thinking to palter
out the time before her shift at work,
before re-entrance into hell.
Leaning against the makeshift wall,
every limb conspiring to hurt,
to ache all at the same time
as punishment for wanting, for trying, to clear her debt
before she would inevitably die.

One last gambit at health,
at clearing out the hidden
plague seeping deep down to her bones.
But a home
so vast
is not easily cleaned.
Dirt
and parts of dead bugs
and secrets forgotten
accumulate in the seams.
Parts of yourself
you so freely subdue
to make yourself socially acceptable,
yourself outwardly clean and presentable:
yourself you call you.

And just as mold
can seep into the walls
and one day make for an unpleasant wake-up call:

so too can another set of eyes
gaze out onto the world sedate
and come to despise
that which you have not the courage
to yourself
annihilate.

Rules Of Engagement

Peoples of the world,
it is I, Xanthe,
speaking to each and every person
with command of the English language.
It feels good to finally let my body unfurl,
having been trapped in Anchor for so long.

I know I take my countenance from
a piece of popular culture.
But has not every person creative
circled the sky like a vulture,
looking for bits and pieces to take?
I have no qualms of being a "fake"
of this or any other image.
You know my name;
you already see my visage.

It has come to my attention that there is a throng-
no, a sea
of despicable representatives of humanity:
drunkards,
smokers,
erotic chokers,
rapists,
beaters,
and online cheaters...
The list could go on until the end of time.
But I will not waste your time.
A human does not beg for forgiveness
before taking a stroll through their backyard,
even aware,
even cognizant,
of how many insects they will trample underfoot.

Here are the rules of engagement:
if you inconvenience my human Anchor,
you die.
If you stay
out of their way,
you survive.

Those whom my Anchor freely to me condemns,
you have exactly one day
to find a way
to halt your behaviors
or at least proclaim
to your loved ones that you have made peace
with the truth that your breath will soon cease.

Oh, how I cannot wait to hear the symphony
of millions of hearts that,
in unison,
all fail to beat.

Mittens

Trampling through the snow
after elementary school,
half-destroyed mountains
to wait another day.
The horizon but a keyhole
at evening.

Mittens
with a farce of hand-knitting
that fold back to reveal
gloves without fingertips.
Whatever happened to them,
I wonder,
once it came time to rip
from that "forever home"?

Maybe they abandoned me,
went out into the world
to roam.

That one sad year in college,
I often laughed of having a brand
of the divine.
But now one shines
on the back of my right hand
like I saw,
like I feared.

And gods,
how I wish
I still had those gloves.
For Mother's so-called "love"
chitters with concern,
I filled with one presage
after another
of what may transpire
after discovery.
"What wounded ye?
Why is the back of your hand
crowned with a bandage?"

Work accident.
'Tis not a lie,
technically,
trembling in the women's bathroom
while one's third eye
burns with the results
of what happens
when millions of people
keel over and soundlessly die.

Overpossess

Crescent moon overhead,
mirrors in my palms,
even though I never let
my fingernails grow that long.
Blushing scarlet from sheer pressure,
never any lesser,
nothing less to drown out
the garish scent of worn-out perfume
and jingles that jangle in my head
like a worn-out mantra,
begging me to subsume
into a store I wish I'd never heard of.

In and out. Remember to breathe.
Nighttime breeze rustling through the trees,
chilly even with a coat.
But the cold does not burn my throat,
does not impede my lungs
like it would in winter,
walking against the harshest wind
Mother Nature ever wrung.

Three and a half years ago,
if I were standing here,
I'd likely be lost in thought
of how deeply I might be "queer".
Tumbling without reservation
through the depths of space and time,
wondering how to piece together a body
I could comfortably call "mine":
tell me, internet friend
who lives in distant lands,
if I flatten my chest
and bid my curves go west,
does that make me a man?

And just as my mind wanders
to how would change the feel of my skin:
"I can show you
how it would feel
to have lived that life within.

But you must will it.
You must allow
me to step forward and claim your crown,
knowing full well
it will not at your will but mine be returned
and any cries for release
will go unheard."

How many of those long-ago days
had I imagined falling into the haze
and letting someone else wear my body?
Back then, I would have been haughty,
over-eager to hand over the reins
and let my soul take a long sleep,
not eager to return
and see what of my life remained.

"Do not be afraid,"
he quickly adds.
"I have no plans to endanger
your home or the ones
who keep you alive.
For if you perish,
I too will die.
Just a few minutes.
That's all I request.
Then you may retire to bed and rest.
Nobody else will be the wiser."

When taking a nap
and on the verge of the abyss,
sometimes I simply... fall
out of my body,
floor-met with either heart-panging anxiety
or peaceful bliss.

And this,
escorted by blue waves,
is very much the same.

Except that I became
a little larger than the universe,
a crayon outside my lines,
a traced drawing shifted a millimeter
and caught by the lights.

"You will get used to it with time."

I am a collection of boxes,
of highways
all coalescing to a single point.
I am a soldier who forgot his shield at home,
powerful but with critical points exposed.
I am a pillar sticking at an angle out of the sand.
He lifts up my hand
that is not my hand,
not as lithe,
not as light,
but beautiful in its own right,
and plucks out of the wind
a falling leaf.
There is a deep hunger
for a sheath,
for an ocean
and all the clams within,
to commit as many sins
as he can
and see what number I can live with.

But he has not the power to coerce,
only to stimulate society's demand
for a funerary hearse.

And he takes a deep breath
as if about to recite a verse,
but he holds it a second too long,
the cold air outlining his rigid ribs
desperately in need
of not a curse
but a loving song.

Absolution

Am I not the center of the universe?
Am I not the axis
around which all things revolve?
What gentle verse,
what impassioned sermon
from self-important lips
can me
of these sins
absolve?
What can justify, with hands ripped
through flesh, the pleasure?
What can convince me to censure
these wicked whims
that lie within?
Should I not embrace
with all due haste
the bloodlust,
the lack of trust,
alone, peerless, One?

Separated by Mori's Mirror,
you and I
are more alike
than I feel you care to see.
Lethe,
you do not have to be good.
You do not have to be pure.
Accept who you are
and discard
the parts of the moneyed myths you deem false.
This alone is your salvation, your cure.

tessellations

I face
a faceless myself,
no substitute for anyone.
This coil is suffocating me,
waking up in the middle of the night,
scrambling to leave
incomplete.

The fans blow at full speed.
The harsh light of the moon
illuminates the trees
as they play shadow puppets on my wall.
My thoughts never cease,
running around
like I were still in public school,
Mile Run day,
seeking the quickest way into the ground.

Early morning,
twelve minutes passed,
several thousand different faces.
Xanthe paces
up and down
the corridors of my mind
as I sweat into my sheets
and beg sleep's oblivion
to take me and leave my body behind.

"I see
you can't seem
to find
some peace of mind."

He draws in closer.
A warmth across my right hand.

"Don't tell me you're too meek
to admit to me
you want the source of your agonies gone?
You want your mind cleared, to begin a new song
unfettered by the worries of yesterday.
You have only say
the word
and I will pour gasoline on the sky
and watch the world burn."

Age fifteen.
Midnight, eyes glaring into a tiny screen.
Name the victim,
paint their face
in your mind,
and name their method of demise.

But Xanthe only needs a vibe
and an inflamed will
to kill.

How much more pleasant
life would be,
I must admit,
if I could simply make disappear
anyone who dared to give me shit.
To walk along a woodsy path
and watch the debris
move itself out of my way.

"What do you say?"

Fifteen years of age.
One more name-covered page,
unable to losses cut
and go home in peace,
hole-punched,
dying abandoned
missing several pieces.

Eventually the patterns may form,
and I find on my doorstep a sea
of strangers
assigning themselves the enemy role
in my own personal war.

I step onto one side of a scale,
the dregs of humanity on the other.
Which one weighs heavier?
Do I put myself first,
or do I let myself be smothered?

Another Absentia

"I refuse to buy one last week's loss,"
I comfort myself as I thrash and I toss
in my bed,
sleep elusive,
hard-pounding head.
"The world will stay awake
in my absence."

For I feel him falling away,
even though he promised,
even though
I know,
he would stay with me forever.
But is it true?
Since there's nothing more to do,
nothing left to feel,
it's time for him to sever
from the front
and withdraw until the next necessity is revealed?

How I wish I was able to just close my eyes
and slip into a dream, temporary demise.
But I have no such excuse.
I have no saving grace.
I have to wake up in the morning
and look into the mirror
and recognize that what stares back
is still my very own face.

house of wolves

knock me out with the strongest you've got
and send me straight to the floor
help me escape from my own head
never begging again for more

bury your memories in the heavens
and name a star after yourself
for if you're going to proclaim yourself a god
you might as well watch over hell

somewhere in the end of all this pain
the house on a hill's torch blazes despite the rain
I can't find it; my mind's a maze
the light in your chest leaves me in a daze

dancing in the dark of night
illuminated by the pale moonlight
you touch my heart and steal my soul
disappear into the mist, leave my skin clammy and cold

AN ENDING

Cetra's Aftermath

I am a leech
that failed to beseech
whatever deity threw me into this place.

I crawl under the skin,
thicker than tin,
of this earth quickly dissolving to waste.

These trees are veins,
blackened and drained
of the vitality I thought they had earned,

but this grayscale horizon
taught me to shun
whatever made my heart so painfully yearn.

The broken ice
might just entice
me to dive in without reluctance,

but I am not sure
if I could bear a cure
for this, my misplaced sentence.

My Ripped Grayscale Leggings

there are only so many ways to say
that the darkness is encroaching in,
that this world is a jail for all,
that I'm on my way to hell for all of my sins

but if hell is separation from the godhead
then am I already there?
the days are sliding into one another,
no hope of change from prayer

would supplication even save me?
I wonder, drowning in false-friendly tone
"Where do you see yourself in ten years?"
"The answer is simple: I don't"

for if skyland's throne was ever filled,
it has long been vacated instead
for deity is either malevolent,
derelict, distracted, or dead

Hibernation

This cavernous word still churns inside of me,
but it's covered in a thousand feet
of snow,
a blanket of oblivion muffling
what transpires far below.

From my own self I snowbirded,
fearing that I'd hibernate.
But what is the difference between that and death
when the winter does not abate?

I wanted to marry the fire.
I wanted to burn brighter than the sun.
I wanted to prove to the world
that my time on this earth was not done.

But maybe my teenage self was prescient
in knowing that warmth is fleeting.
Frost caresses my cheeks, checks my pulse,
disgusted my heart is still beating,

that the rivers still flow under the ice,
that the trees still slumber under the frost,
that the seeds wait deep in the dirt
knowing all hope is not yet lost.

erudite

a wise man once told me
to always go to bed angry
to let my rage simmer
and concentrate into something more solid

a wise man once told me
that this would bring out the monsters dancing under my bed
and let them coo and chatter as they pleased
emancipated from the confines of the mind

a wise man once told me
to listen to these creatures
to record every word they said
and use it to light my way

but if I lingered too long
I might become what I hate

but I have listened too much
and now I see it reflected in everybody else

Despondent At Dawn

What am I supposed to do
with this brand new day I have been given?
I am a heathen
who does not worship
whatever lies separate from me in Heaven
but instead drowns
in the creation
itself.
I am a little whelp
staring through a window,
waiting for a bright idea
to crash
through the glass
and make itself known.

glacio sub mia hauxto

snow is blooming in the distance
little crystals not yet formed
a dream, a faint memory, a dread
of never-returning warmth

little crystals adorn my skin
of glass, minerals, and water
picked up and transported far from home
ripped away from earth's flesh like a martyr

but no, I'm not religious
even as the earth envelops me
even as I succumb to death's sweet embrace
and birds sing dear sweet melodies

I think I fractured a feather

I feel fragile today.
A bird who hit a window
in winter,
dazed and cold.
Pick up my body,
bring me inside,
hold me close to your heart
until the warmth returns
and I can depart
for happier lands.

gone

there is a girl in front of you
who is smiling but hides pain inside
and she tries to tell you every day
but it always comes out wrong

there is a girl in front of you
with fire in her eyes and her heart
who wants to change the world
but is always stopped before she can

there is a girl in front of you
she is standing on the ledge
she is in limbo
and you do nothing but push her off the edge

there is a girl in front of you
she is dead
not because of one single act of malice
but a hundred acts spread far apart

Rainroom

Let's talk about my hands.
Let's talk about the sands
running ceaseless through the bottleneck
of the hourglass
kept in the bathroom.

I'm drawing eye sigils
all over my arms, my legs,
my gentle hills,
thinking, maybe,
come critical mass,
Goddess' prophecy will not come to pass
but instead I'll fall through the veil,
through the conjured portal,
and the hiraeth will cease at last.

Staring at the moon,
struggling to come home.
You'll be absolved of,
before I carve out there,
the crimes,
prepared:
for what is done
is naught but folly,
the last umbilical cord
cut too soon,
too haughty.

And maybe I'll get a chance to say sorry.

And maybe I'll get a chance to confess
before the rain
comes down
and washes the skin
that was once party to your kiss
I stole
a shard of your soul
and it sleeps within.

Remember the Rainroom?
I don't expect a yes,
I sobbing while beckoned
at Eris' behest
to consume
what I'd reduced you to:
a little glass orb
I could fit in my shoe
with plenty of room
left over,
dreaming of days
of secrets and clovers,
memories most cherished
but void of closure.

And at the end,
you awoke,
daring to hope
Plan B had not failed-
but it had,
and after Eris
you set sail.

And I'm waiting,
I'm waiting for you
to find me
somewhere beyond the pale.

A Million

you and I
will find a way
to break these chains
or make a home of the flames
where I was born
and you almost died.

it was never my intention
to destroy or make bare
that body that belonged to nowhere,
just make a home
of your bones
until I was strong enough again to freely roam.

I can think of a million
reasons to hate you, Jett,
and all of them stem from resentment,
these cycles of dependence
belligerent
as the ocean's storms.
how I wish I had not
the hunger of that atavistic form.
how I wish I could grant you your freedom
and be okay with me being left disassembled to rot.

how I wish I could assure you
this is not the ending I sought.

Chaos Island

I have spent too much time languishing
on my bed as of late.
I have become the very behavior
that I once professed to hate

I must confess
I grow ever weary of being
under muse's duress

what a capitalistic duty,
to always be singing,
to always throw myself on a pyre
in hopes of fulfilling
some higher desire

I am as an ant against the night sky
watching stars glimmer and comets shoot by
me, mine, and self, three halves of a whole
the Silent, the Ceaseless, the Winter Night Cold

I am so small
and yet I yearn for so much more:
to tear down all these artificial walls,
to kick down heaven's door

but a lifetime of conditioning has led me to believe
that all I am is what others see
that all that matters is what makes it to others' eyes
and any form of rest is something to despise

I plummet farther, further, into Discordia's bosom
Jupiter unfolded, weeping volcanoes, cracking dry tongue
my hips creak with pain as my kneecaps cry loud:
what will happen to my soul when my body gives out?

a hundred years of life from my family's genes is far,
but this enmeshed life I lead is a little too hard
to imagine always going through the same motions unharmed
to pay bills and acquire more clutter and charms

some part of me wishes I had never separated
from the muse in the sky, the Source, the Godhead
an existence with meaning, a living with power
not rot at my cash register as customers glower

they say that from death and decay springs life
but I find it hard to believe that my body is so rife
with living things, like I am a titan slumbering,
a soul misfitted in a body so lumbering

but I'm stuck in this body, so now I must cope
and maybe one day I will regain my hope
to return to those fields, to sing a new tune
to return the ocean to the embrace of the moon

Before The 21st Turn

Jett, if you're out there,
I hope my journal makes it into your hands
like the one I had
back when I could hold your hand
in mine
so you know the lengths I went through
to remember you.

Now I know the truth.
Now I can truth-
fully say
I remember.
Not every single day
verbatim,
but who keeps a record
of every waking moment
anyway?

I need you to know
I'm sorry for hurting you,
and I love you,
and I'm sorry,
and I'm sorry,
and I should have told you everything when I had the chance,
and I'll carry this shard of your soul
deep within my own
until we meet again in the flesh.

this canyon is not grand

It will rot my skin,
these stories of tears.
It will carve out canyons,
a little trickle of water
constant for years,
thinking itself otiose
having no immediate effect
but quickly no longer morose
upon viewing the gashes
it had left.

A dying god's springtime scourge.
The courage
to watch the life blossom on my body,
I hardly
possess.
What kind of a fool can watch
themselves become less and less
every year,
and still smile, still claim
they have nothing to fear?

In the shade I call myself
I persist,
even when the pains roll in
and I hear my breath leave my body
in a silver hiss.
My veins are going black,
rivers clogged with the corpses of
animals who, for my lack
of selflessness, are dying in droves.
The tears are carving
rivers through my flesh,
but it is not enough to quell
the cries of the starving,
the hunger for thirst,
the wishing for these dams
to finally burst
and to this new hollow world
give birth.

Anhedonia

let the rain wash over everything.
let it erode the land
chipping away at every part of you
you once thought was essential

let the flood come tumbling from the horizon
violent waves promising redemption
we will find our motivation again one day
we will rise again

as I toss around in my bed at midnight
my mind conjures up a storm
of who I was
who I fear I may never be again

but surely this is not the end of the road, right?
nihilism has not got me in its grasp
and I haven't sent my soul to the grave
and I will keep writing
even if it kills me

Row Harder

There's a cold
residing deep within my bones.
Even as the sun comes to bleach
them, having no more need
for the flesh that survived the winter,
it cannot seem to leech
away the chill.

There's an insatiable sadness too.
I don't know from where it hails
or what kinds of sorrows
or hiraeth it entails:

I'm a little rowboat
lost in a roiling stormy sea,
and I don't know if I've just lost my map
or all of my humanity.

Desolation

snow fall on a silent day
covering the ground in a suburb
and walking through the thin frost covering the dormant life below
under a grey sky
the same color as your heart in that moment

driving through the empty streets at midnight
watching the sleeping world pass by you
through your darkened window
illuminated by stoplights as your father drives

taking your unknowingly last steps in the train yard by your house
listening to the train horns in the distance
and making empty statements about running away
and your father says, "go ahead"
but you don't move
because there's no way that you can leave your whole life behind
at a whim

Jawbreaker

This black hole is a
jawbreaker I balance on
the tip of my tongue.

I close my eyes, solemn.
Through my bones resonates
a low-pitched hum,

a chorus of souls
who have not yet learned
their time in a body is done.

My head feels empty
and I know not what the remedy
is
for this void-bound bliss,
this cursed goal
of the right hand to obliterate their soul.

I have invited this cold
to freeze over my soul
and there is no thawing coming.

I have brought this hell
upon myself
and I deserve no mercy.

sacred territory

lilac skies guide us to carpeted refuges
where the last vestiges of childhood innocence come to rest
in the land of scattered pillow cushions and iced mugs
hanging onto feelings for the morning

adventuring among bits and bytes
through the early hours of the morning
hoping that however many were camped in the basement
wouldn't spell the end of us all

the mouths slowly closed over the years
until the mere mention of a name sent shudders through all
eventually evicting glowsticks well spent and stuffed animals well
loved
and giggles rent with unknowing joy

the shadow of my burdened frame
no longer haunts anywhere near this place
although I could not for the life of me
explain to you the reasons why

Last Rite

Close your eyes. It's okay to bleed
if it leads to forgiveness for the life that you lead
when you think Goddess has Her back turned,
oblivious to how Her graces you spurned.

Rest your hands on your chest. It's okay to exhale
if it leads to forgiveness for being so frail,
for squandering the gifts She so freely bestowed
and refusing to set your sights more lofty than low.

Lean back. It's okay to decay
if it leads to forgiveness for how you would sway
between exalt and defile, defiant the whole time,
never truly one or the other, always walking the line.

Your fight is over.
Your fight is over.
Your fight is over.

Final Entry

Every new life
I only remember a little
of what came before.
Snatched memories,
half-remembered dreams,
whispers that crawl under synchronicity's
doors.

I so fiercely yearn for home
until I recall how it is I died,
stretching a hand to the heavens,
trying to touch the roof in the sky,
to defy
my fate.
I know these words will find you too late
for you to change
my last goodbye,
but I hope maybe they can sate
the pain
from the hole
my sudden departure no doubt ripped in your soul.

If we never meet again,
I need you to know
the days I spent with you
were the happiest I've ever gone through.
I won't let the next world harden
my heart. I'll make another garden,
and I'll put an angel
light in it, and I'll trace my body come the snow.
And if we ever meet again,
you will know by heart
the new stories I will tell.

I hope one of the things I'll remember
next time,
next life,
is you,
and your independence,
and I'll be a little braver,
and a little stronger,
and even more fierce.

The Golden Cage

emboldened by sadness
embittered by those
who would meet you with winter
you bite the thorns with the rose

a bloody mess on the tile
from mother's womb, freshly torn
struggle to breath the poison air
in which you were born

the golden cage shudders
the door swings wide open

but you don't move.

you sit there and stare.

you tricked yourself into believing
that it was your time to die
and when the sun showed its head, you found out
you'd lost the will to survive

a tyrant in the home
and a sorcerer in the garden
conspire to make their kid a doll
to watch as her once lithe limbs harden

a dislocated jaw
that only speaks when given scripts
and a spine that's nothing but
that collapses come a kick

the needles come to play again
you've already convinced yourself
it was just a matter of when

and they pin you up
like the christ they adore

and the red flows like syrup

You always wanted me to have a pretty headstone

And I stand before the gates to the Holy Freezer
in hopes that my eyes would soon fix upon Her
forevermore, made sterile, made clean
as a figure of ice or crystal or something else that in cold places gleams.

A more merciful option than death,
cessation of aging and breath
while still cognizant, still aware
of everything transpiring in the surrounding air.

As long as the soul's flame still burns,
there is always the possibility of return.

And the Goddess appears before me and tells me to strip,
and I do, shedding my shrouds. Quivering lips
are my words as She takes my hands in Hers
and leads me in a gentle dance. A pirouette, a half-turn,

a pattern I learned in grade school but always somehow forgot.
Goddess pulls me close. I whisper, "I promise this is the end I sought."

My veins are fading blue.
My skin can't decide between a violent hue
of violet or paper-white.
Goddess slips an arm around my shoulder, and I could swear I'd taken flight

with how my limbs flail,
a sailboat with its sail
billowing in the wind,
bodies pressed up tight in unchaste almost-sin,

She a planet and I a moon,
orbiting around each other, oblivious to how soon
the sun will grow dim and cold
and I will no longer be able to hold

any sense of light.

My joints jerk, tight.

Halfway in a twirl,
She careens away,
my arm outstretched.

She falls back into my gravitational field,
brushes delicate fingertips
along the smooth runway of my forearm,
the curve of my hips,
the contour of my lips
that will never again utter Her name.

She leans in close enough to my eyes fog.
But no amount of warmth will my flesh thaw.
No embrace, no caress, no hardened breast "squeeze",
no intimate parts now deaf to what used to please.

Words fail me
as the gentle chiming
of fingernails
that fail
to gain purchase against crystal
echoes in the Holy Freezer.
A centerpiece,
an immobile snapshot of dance that will never cease,
an eternal epitaph to Her.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

VANE VANDER is desperately trying to get her life together. When not despondent, she spends her free time pondering about the apocalypse, living out of spite, and praying for better days. She can be found making normies upset at mayvaneday.org.

Copyright © 2022-2025 Vane Vander. All rights reserved as detailed in Copyright.