When a picture doesn't speak a thousand words and actions fall short of miracles

Slow and steady does the trick,
Trying to make each one a little more thick.
Dont tell me you know, dont tell me you care
I know what I've done and honestly its not despair.
Broken words once said, you may hurt me but only I can create scars.
I look up every night searching for a star,
Yet its hard to stand when its all been cut loose.
So here I lay, beyond your repair
Torn by the world and mocked by the stars.

A quiet hymn echoes from the past,
This peace and bliss is not eternal but not forgotten.

It seems like the lingering spirit of creation is looming inside of me with a design for the future. Sometimes you just have to take a leap of faith, even if it means falling on your face. Stand, walk, run, and finish the day. I know how hard it can be to be knocked down, but the mistake made is letting it keep you down.  

Culture Shift

I find it interesting how the world turns
With each passing day, another new horizon is ignored, and the expired beauty of yesterday diminishes. The contrast of a bright screen in a dark room is enough to keep our minds at ease. its gotten to a point where we can't relate to one another unless behind this screen. Like a net to keep away the bugs, it shields us from the ever looming eye of the present. Things have not changed though. I find my mind sitting back in its seat waiting for the next big moment, and despite the plethora of new sights and sounds, my mind doesn't really seem to care. Its as though it has its eye set on one fixed goal that I don't understand yet.

But I have an idea.

Cigarette

Here I stand. Or should I say sit? Typing away on a screen with one thing hanging from my mouth. Or should I say mind? I have divided my life and wardrobe into two colours, black and pink. Over the course of the years I found myself longing for that embrace, sweet hospitality of false security, purity of motivation. Even after this seemingly distant time span I still see that face, a face I find nearly impossible to forget through time or distance. As the ashes fall one by one, they transform from a burning inferno of comfort and pain to a chilled form of what was once a heart that now lay scattered across multiple provinces. Music and faux reality settle with the now dull embers that burn the hand that came them heat. Questions are no longer few and far between. They haunt my dreams, similar to a nightmare that haunts the weak minded in unforgiving times. I stare at fate and it stares right back. No amount of training or mental wellness could have prepared me for this fight. I stand here as though I am David facing Goliath. If only I hadn't forgotten the hammock for my sling. No tools exist to erase this nightmare I face; That face... Maybe I went wrong, maybe I'm too weak, maybe I was never meant to win this battle. If David ran away, how would the story turn out? Would there be salvation for a coward? It seems that is always the case. People lose faith the moment they see you turn your back. It is not about this battle, its about this war. I am not standing against Goliath, I am standing against his entire nation. I don't see any one else up here but myself, yet I become the coward? How many times have I reached out now? I cannot take away from the system, only attempt to get on board with its flow. Once I am there I will jump higher, high enough to make the stars seem small. I will likely fall, just as I have many times so far. It only becomes more difficult. Until I get knocked down again, its just one cigarette at a time. One friend who doesn't help after another. False promises. I hold up my part, as small as it may be, the potential exists. It just needs some water and light to grow. So far, I'm just drowning. How long till I see the light?

Coincidence is an understatement

I need to shave.
Not because my youthful beard grows more prickly by the day; I just need to shave.

I want to remove the growth I gain with each tormenting day and shave off the dead skin that the growth seemingly hides.

As if a paid promise to fly in the sky is enough to keep me chained
I remember a day of youth
My mother gave me five dollars
Just enough to buy that game I always wanted
With the money came a promise
"When we get to the store, you can buy that game."

Upon arrival I was struck with shock when I realized I lost that piece of trading paper. I searched and searched but it never turned up. The entire way home I searched and finally once I walked into my house, there it was... In my back pocket. No matter how much I begged over the course of the year, we never returned to buy that game. I wasn't allowed because I missed my opportunity.

I don't care about where we go or what we do. All I know is every moment feels, eh... Slightly off. Its like a your favorite ride at the amusement park gets closed for repairs the day you get there. You can ride every other ride, some fun and some scary, but they are not quite the same ride. You start to miss the feeling you would get as the ride would speed up at that special point to make it just right, and slow down before it became too much to bare. Why else would it be your favorite ride?

Life is an ever changing ride. One you slowly carve out of stone with each day, not knowing where your next corner or dip will be.

I still find comfort in my car. As it grows older and more in need of costly repairs I still drive knowing I'm safe. There is nothing this car can do that would surprise me because I know it too well, and it knows me. It times its breakdowns almost perfectly and works perfectly when such need be. There is a different feel to it though. Like a group of people invaded my car and want a ride every moment. Its not quite the same ride anymore, the weight ratio is slightly off. Although its a very minor change, its a change I feel in every corner and every straight. I don't like it.

Something so minor has thrown off my harmonic balance in life. It presses with expectations and guilt, sometimes forceful pain. It tests who I am without knowing I am still locked up. It lives with ignorance of everything but itself and feeds off strength. Its the world. Or what some call the world. Constantly spinning so fast it might throw you off its surface, but so slow that you still stay perfectly grounded.

I dream of stars. Someday owning them. Its a selfish hatred my heart has held since I was young. That everyone was wrong about me. That not one person has yet to place their finger on me as if to say, 'I have you figured out.'

I tore my face off and made it into a mask. I would rather my face be bare to others. Be seemingly real yet completely fake. Except for two people I know.. Two very important people who will never leave my heart. I'm still here. I just dont know where here is because I'm lost in the stars...

Genome pool

DIf you take a rose and paint it purple, you will still have the same rose.
If you break that rose, find a new one and paint it purple.
It always be a different rose.

Change

A verb and noun.
It means to make something different, the process of alteration.

So many people focus so much thought into the matter. Few and far between do you find the unique individual who would rather simply ask and observe.

I find many days where I am bothered by the question of 'why'.

"You have changed."
"You use to be different."

I find these days it's almost impossible to be myself with anyone I know, set aside a few individuals during select times. When I sit in my car alone, I'm more comforted than I am with a loved one in my arms. Beneath the uncertainty of a rolling steel chassis, I find not shelter, but a voice.

With two ears I listen to each word I silently speak. I sit on the cement to see with two eyes the view of a stray cat. I feed you, groom you, and expect nothing in return from you. Silly cat, can you not see me with your own two eyes? Can you not hear each of my words with your own two ears?

The words softly echo off a nearby fence and ricochet into my ears,  my voice softens not out of shame, fear or anxiety, but from empathy. I stroke your back to remove the dirt you have laced upon yourself. You walk away into the night without second thought.

I think back on the times I chose not to speak because I learned that I do not always have the right words.

I think back on the times I chose to speak with confidence, but was easily ignored.
I think back on the things I told others with faith that they would try to gather more understanding or be accepting rather than quixotic.

If people stopped focusing so much on change, maybe they would see what hasn't changed. The essence of who I am is adamant. Stronger than diamond or alloy, relentless in its behaviors. Yet the strength of essence is not the essence itself.

An honest smile and heartfelt words are extended by rarity now. An elderly couple about to exit a store, a man with a small dog on a bridge, a boy who is looking for activity amidst a broken life. These people have seen because they looked, they didn't understand yet, were accepting.

Why don't you stop talking with a single mouth.
try to see with two eyes,
Hear with both ears.
There is a vast world that will  strike you blind and deaf instantly.
You deserve it.

While you have chose to live your life, I have lived mine.

So far, I can honestly say I have yet to change for anyone or any reason.

Can you say the same?

The stray cat comes back nightly, knowing I will be there, speak softly, groom gently and be accepting. The same as I have always been, haven't you noticed?
I have slowly worked through my experiences, each sleepless night is another haunting nightmare, time which I spent alone without telling you thoughts or ideas that pulse through my veins.

Change?

No.

This is growth.

Silent, patient, unyielding

Ella, have you changed or have you grown? Tell me. For the love of god, tell me you grow stronger instead of finding comfort in the fresh pages of a new and different book.

My pages are a collaboration of effort and willpower.
My language is still the same.
Can't you see this?

How much self sacrifice does it take before you run dry? Is it worth the risk?
Tell me what do you sacrifice daily? What do you know of drought?

J.

How many times will my friends see me look down before they realize I'm still looking up? How many unspoken words will they hear? I wonder how your perspective would change if you saw a subtle shade of blue rise and fall with each moment. How this shade is perceptive and analytical, yet understanding and steady in motion. The kindness it holds can never be drown out or covered because it leaks through every crack and ever seam, every window and door that grant access.

Yet the devotion it shows is never enough to keep you interested.

No, you are like the cat. Only come to be fed, groomed and to hear comforting words at the end of each cycle. But even the cat knows more. it has come back to be fed, groomed and inevitably listen to carefully chosen and softly spoken words.

If I had a cool catch phrase that people used to identify me, the most commonly used phrase would be "the welcome mat that smiles back!".

J. Never Had A Name For You

Ella again:

I hate how people change. Goodness knows we all need to change or else how dull would life be? But there are some people I could still be the best of friends with, still see every single day of my life but they have changed so very much that I actually miss them, like they'd gone somewhere far, far away. 

It takes so much for me to realize that how they were, how they are now and how they will eventually be are all THEM. It all counts towards who they are. And you know what....

... that bites....

...it really really does. 

Accept. Exist. Move forward. Change. Accept... the cycle goes on. 

A 02:00 Call and tears that aren't swept away by your hand but by your strangely soothing voice has uncorked the bottled up thoughts, and though this message is brief, it is so heavy for me right now. 

J. and J.'s friend: my gosh, I miss you both!!