Veteran

By Myself
11-28-09

You can't kill the fighter within
Bloodstained and weary though I be
Somehow there's always strength to rise again
The truth weakens you and upholds me

In spite of your bullets and poison arrows
I won't deny thier pain is real
I still walk where you fear to follow
On I stand even when the wounds won't heal

Wounds run deep on either side
And much blood has been lost
Yet always victory for either denied
Every war has its cost

And on you've waged this war
Against me laid a seige
Taking over the entire world
See it destroyed no matter the casulties

Your hope of my surrender is futile
Nor will you outlast my resolve
Yor tactics worsening all the while
But on the battlefeild I have evolved

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Untitled

By Myself
11-28-09

Can't trust myself anymore
The resolve is there but the will wears down within
It's all places I've been before
And waters I refuse to drown in

The life that was left behind
Was too much for time to erase
And there are moments alone I find
It drags me hostage to that place

No matter how I try to win
Or even keep the darkness at bay
The shadows come slowly creeping
Doing all they can to force me to stay

Pulling me down, in over my head
A spirit to be crushed and broken
The silence heavy and thoughts unsaid
The words rise but upon them I'm choking

I gave up everything
All I've never wanted
And left claiming nothing
But it's left me haunted

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Like Alice

By Myself
11-24-09

There was a place and time
And you see it in your reflection
When lost was the way you'd find
Any hope of direction

Like Alice, through the Looking Glass
Scared to rise above
The dreams and the lifetimes past
Unknowing what you're made of

The cast and characters
Too real to be fictional
The ending nowhere happily ever after
Fear of downward spiral

You're just an Alice
Whichever side of the mirror you land on
Each side reflects the other twice
The journey only just begun

Irony

By Myself
11-20-09

You're stuck at the crossroads
Your current path disintregrating
Your shoulders wearied by your heavy load
Sorrow anticipating

It has to be me
No one else whose will to break
Can't you see the irony
If this choice you make


The plot ever thickening
Who, what, why, and when
The irony ever sickening
To speak the past lives again


~~~~ more to come just not tonite...

Glass House

By Myself. to them
11-18-09

There's an old saying
Bout people in glass houses
Like a broken record it keeps playing
Echoing the losses

It's a fine shiny house
And transparent within
Just like the common fishbowl
No oxygen within

You shouldn't throw stones
and other ammunitions
Your closet hides bones
And other evil ambitions

Perfect aim every time
The heart or the throat
A triumph you find
To lord over and gloat

You dont see and you dont realize
Your house is made of glass
People can see through the lies
In every window to the past

You cant hide it always
Somewhere a voice lies waiting
It may not be tomorrow or the next day
Your stones will be ricocheting

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Stranger

By Myself
11-16-09


I cant change
What it was
Or rearrange
Just because

I'm a stranger in my homeland
Nothing there makes sense
I watched it bind my hands
Heard a voice silenced

Havent set foot in that land
In many a year past
The tallest I can stand
Was leaving at long last

No longer reconizable
Here upon these shores
What happens to those expendable?
No return to the place before?

This is now, that was then
Shadows ever cast
And time cannot mend
A broken, stolen past

Yet every night I'm given a ticket
No sentimental journey to there
No matter how badly I wish it
All that awaits is a nightmare

A stranger in my homeland
Guess I can live with this
Like a Gypsy in a roving band
Never had a home to miss

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ashes

By Myself
11-16-09

Ring around a memory
A pocket full of gold
No offer you make can tempt me
The damage is too old

You can keep your gilded cage
Oh yes I remember that song
You can use your empty rage
Now to sing along

I still talk to that girl
The one I used to be
Trapped in your world
Until I set her free

There is much to discuss
But only so many hours in a day
You sure had her lost
But somehow she found a way

Lost for so long
Now ashes, ashes
We all fall down
Fearing what the past is

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Revelations

By Myself looking inside
11-15-09

You could've had it all
Had it even been worth keeping
But you threw the cards- wherever to fall
And somehow it's not worth greiving

Was it too long, too many tears ago
Was it finally the liberation
Was it the resolve you built- free of sorrow
Was it determination

Can't really say it was time itself
But can't shut the past out
You keep telling yourself
Whatever it is that shakes the doubt

Hopes of clouds lifted
Though roots remain in darkness
Ashes all been sifted
Someday put to to rest

~~~~~~~~~~~
More to come........

Smoke and Mirrors

By Myself, to someone I can never understand
11-15-09

High on your throne
Loyal subjects below
Your expression that of stone
Of what, no one has to know

Accustomed to your bidding
Your word is law
Truth remains hidden
Betrayal your only flaw

Smoke and mirrors
Beauty is the beast
Illusions ever stirring
A hollow royal feast

Cold calculating eyes
Follow every web you spin
Skillfully told lies
Smoke never grows thin

You've mastered the breaking of wills
Modern day Circe
The pain of others is the cup you fill
Savoured in your mirror

Speak and all must listen
By your decree all must obey
Refusal is your castle's cave-in
There is a capital price to pay

Those not broken by you
No longer yours to command
You didnt have everyone fooled
They can't bow if on they stand

Cold and calculatory
Ever the Queen of Spades
Using your own light for
Digging your own grave


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Raven's Song

By Myself. For one of my novel's characters
1998

This Mystery
Double-edged cruelty
Echos down the hall...

She appears
No sign of tears
But your heart hears the call...

~Chorus~
Crying again, into the night
Crying again, her heart's flight
Crying again, a war inside
Crying again, nowhere to hide

Morning again
Smiles warm a guant face
A touch of your hand
Erases any trace
...She was....

~Chorus~

Darkness falls
That sound again
Creeping down the hall
If you're wondering...
..She was...

~Chorus~

She doesn't envision
What some call freedom
Freedom's been her prison
In the dark that's been her kingdom

Her hands are tied
Bound by blood
Fate cannot lie
But neither does love

...So it leaves her...

~Chorus~
~Chorus~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This song I wrote to set the tone for a femme fatale character in a novel I'm writing. One who had to choose between killing paradise or breaking her heart everyday to preserve it, but either way denied it. Maybe someday more to come on that...

Kaleidescope

By Myself
12-14-95 &
edited 11-14-09

There it lies quietly waiting
What secrets does it reveal or hide
Good or bad deliberating
Shadows on the inside

Chorus
Kaleidescope of memories
Peices of the past
It's all just an illusion
Still just broken glass

You can take it in your hand
And have a look within
See as much as you can stand
And make your own interpretation

Sure the colors are bright
Sure the pattern changes
But it's a trick of the light
The way it rearranges

~Chorus~

It's all smoke and mirrors
Just another way to hide
A past that wont leave her
A change she hopes to find

~Chorus~

Still just broken glass

Secret Garden

By Myself
11-11-09

Walls overgrown
Ruins camoflaged
A key nowhere found
A door never dislodged

This is my Secret Garden
This is where I hide
Walled up in a Secret Garden
Peace then I find

No one ever comes here
A patch of earth unwanted
No one ever sees the tears
Or the seeds I've planted

This is my Secret Garden
Where I come to escape
A treasured Secret Garden
Imaginary real estate

The walls are old as time
And too thick to scale easily
But safety within is mine
And defended tenaciously

This is my Secret Garden
Doesn't everybody have one?
This is my Secret Garden
For peices left undone

Seasons go and seasons come
Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall
But still I am the only one
That ever gets past the wall

This is my Secret Garden
So easy to shut out time
This is my Secret Garden
A ruins yes, but ruins mine

~~~~~~~~~~~

maybe more to come.......

Imaginary

By Evanescence

I linger in the doorway
Of alarm clock screaming
Monsters calling my name
Let me stay
Where the wind will whisper to me
Where the raindrops
As they're falling tell a story

In my feild of paper flowers
And candy clouds of lullaby
I lie inside myself for hours
And watch my purple sky fly over me

Don't say I'm out of touch
With this rampant chaos- your reality
I know well what lies beyond my sleeping refuge
The nitemare I built my own world to escape

In my feild of paper flowers
And candy clouds of lullaby
I lie inside myself for hours
And watch my purple sky fly over me

Swallowed up by the sound of my screaming
Cannot cease for the fear of silent nights
Oh how I long for deep sleep dreaming
The goddess of imaginary light

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When I first heard this song it was like Yeah! Finally somebody put into words what it feels like to rely on escapism when day to day reality is too awful to take. That in order to not lose oneself in that reality a person would imagine themselves as anything else but swallowed into thier environment. And in my imaginings I was anywhere else but there.

The Road Not Taken

That poem has been stuck in my head for the past week, ever since I was in the same situation Robert Frost found himself in, and it followed me home reguarding my own roads not taken.

" And that, has made all the difference. "

~~~~~~

Tsunami

By Myself contemplating a good metaphor
~Thanks KL, for the wake-up call
11-10-09


On seas smooth as glass
Belies a hidden undercurrent
The present hides the past
Calm belies the fervent

You think it's easy out there on your little boat
Just weather anything coming your way
Just withdraw and on you float
No Harbor needed in which to stay

Faint rumblings off in the distance
Taken as just another day
Drop ancor and show persistance
And on those waves you stay

Calm before the storm
Batten down the hatch
Waves anything but safe and warm
Sails anything but patched

Here comes the Tsunami
Can't hold back this tide
Heaven watch over me
There's nowhere to hide

Here comes the Tsunami
Anchor chains snapped
Here comes the Tsunami
Upon the shore to crash

Oars and rudders useless rendered
Fraility the consequence
Flashflood of pasts remembered
Drowning hope's deliverance

Never had a crew allow'd,
And fear the Captain's lost
Deeper and deeper the bow
Sinks into the froth

Waves against a wooden hull
Here comes the Tsunami
Praying for a miracle
The Unconfining of me

Pondering the Tsunami's origin
Pain more than any sea or river
Seeking Strength within
Praying calm to be delivered

Here comes the Tsunami
A world turned upside down
Here comes your Tsunami
In it don't you drown

~~~~~~~~ Thank you

Obviously Oblivious

By Myself, to an oblivious father
6-26-09

What difference does it make
You didn't know me then or now
You set your pride on delusions of the fake
And to change you have no idea how

Nothing ever more than a cull
Cast aside to be forgotten
Only so much room and then it's full
Numbers dont matter of children begotten

Imprisioned by your pride
And fears others feed
To know the truth you could have tried
But you did'nt and you don't see the need

So ironic how you fear
The victims who've moved on
How you treasure and hold dear
The ones who did the wrong

It speaks volumes you don't see
Either you've accepted thier crimes
Or you lack clarity
So where is that fine line

And now it pains to know
What was hoped will never be
Yet as far as wisdom goes
It's the only way to be free

Free of concerns you avoided
Free of the past I was given
Free of those whom you've annointed
Free to have a life worth living

Too bad the price was everything
Everything I hoped to salvage
But if that is the nature of things
Onward I will manage

The truth survives
Beyond hopes or deceptions
Beyond threats and lies
Buried in the wreckage
~~~~~~~~~

Unravelled

By Myself as it were
11-7-09

A single strand
Carries the theme
Woven by heavy hands
No thing of any beauty

Weaving in and out
Desperately leaving traces
Fear, pain, doubt
Issues, people, places

Leaving snags, leaving knots
Laying waste in its wake
Its purpose long forgot
No purpose does it make

The strand is woven in
Ensuring its signature
Too tightly to dislodge within
The ridicule and the censure

Oh to have a Scissors sharpened
And new threads of beautiful kinds
A tapestry no longer darkened
Unravelling in a hidden mind

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Motionless

By Myself wishing I wasn't.
Poem Renamed by K. Larson
11-7-09


You dont seem fazed
In all your grandiose scemes
You can ignore for days
All the internal screaming

You dont need a voice
An empty stare will suffice
Or even a hidden tear not of your choice
Keep appearences shallow and nice

You observe too much
But speak the wrong context
Meanlingless topics and such
Avoiding the interior complex

You run without motion
Scared time will close in and hurt ya
Shattering your illusions
Governed by laws of inertia

Hating the flip side of the coin
The thoughts creeping in all alone
Hating the issues reborn
Hating the coward undone

~~~~~~~~

Blame

By Myself as I am to those I once knew
11-7-09


All I ever was
Was just simply there
But if you need a cause
It doesn't have to be fair

You can dump your guilt
An art you've perfected
Enforced by an iron will
And fears you've infected

So lay the blame at my feet
All I ever was was present
Pray no one will ever seek
A reason you to resent

Silence was the golden rule
Bought and paid with silver twenty
Violence the needed tool
We shouldn't speak such things, should we

So you can keep your facade
As mine lies crumbling
Clear eyes see through the mirage
Even if the path is stumbling

~~~~~~~~~

Intaglio

By Myself as I am wondering
11-07-2009


Nothing but a girl
Complete with mask and script
Pre-approved to the world
In two a soul ripped

No worth to be claimed
Just expendable
Whatever value maimed
Irretreivable

Everybody's watching
So smile out loud
No hint of wars within
So play the ultimate fraud

For I'm just a girl
Just expendable
A smile for the world
Intaglio

Rapunzel

By Myself as I was Then
1995

There was a one
Locked in a tower
Called Rapunzel by some
No safety in her bower

The walls within
(A villian's contentment)
Concealed the sin
(A victim's entrapment)

Within these walls
Lived an innocence lost
As long as silence ruled
No one cared the cost

Hope in a hollow shell
Fear in a heart gone heavy
Is it a tower - or gates of hell
Suffering at the ready


From such things repulsive
Mercy ever imploring
Escape ever elusive
Anguish guaranteed forthcoming

No soul to hold onto
Sold for a golden stair
Rapunzel doomed
Within her villians' lair

~~~~~~~~

The Hedgerow

The Hedgerow
By Myself as I was
~2001 and ~2005


A bird nest within the hedge
A fledgling too close to the edge
A snakepit hidden below
Where years of thorns had grown

Wings not yet strong
A nest nowhere near safe
Within the thorns festered a wrong
For some it was too late

A snake had climbed
The fledgling froze in fear
As scales wormed along the thorny vine
Slithering ever near

Eyes unfeeling
Snakes savor thier kill
Fangs gleaming
If they can't have it nobody will

Poised for the strike
Frozen in flight
By coils in brambles
Was innocence mangled
One last effort to the edge
She finally fledged

Bruised, broken, poisoned
Left in the thorns and forgotten
Venom never lessened
No song ever spoken

No chance for flight
No hope for dawn
No setting things right
No ending the wrong
~~~~~~~
But along came a Gardener
"These thorns look mighty high"
He searched for any sign of life
But none did He spy

Save for one insignificant thing
-A broken little bird
Too weak to fly or sing
but He knew without a word

He cared for the bird, took it in
Fed it, and bound its wing
It trusted Him
And soon began to sing

The bird was set free
After Healing of the wing
It made Him smile to see
It fly and sing

His next task was to then
Make the garden whole again
With a hoe and with a rake
He set out to right a Mistake

"These thorns have never bloomed," said He
"All they ever do is create misery.
Not even a single flower...
They only seek to overpower"

And when He saw the den
And a flash of glittering scales
He knew what must be done then
And done without delay

From the shadows seething
Cold eyes glittered with hate
To think an insignificant fledgling
Could somehow seal thier fate

Cowered within thier pit
They hissed and they slithered
Soon the bramble will be lit
Thier kingdom soon shall wither

The Hedgerow is burning
The flames leap high
No more slithering
After little birds unable to fly

As dusk descended
Away the smoke was blown
The Gardener looked for His little freind
"See, all that was bad is now gone"

He found her
Slumped on the windowsill
Smoke had charred her lungs
And her song was now stilled

"It's alright," said He most gently
And carried her indoors
"You sang your song briefly
But changed the garden evermore"

He feared the worst that night
Wether she would survive
the Hedgerow had been part of her life
Was its destruction now her demise

First light brought a familiar song
She was waiting at the door
Wishing, alive and strong
To be set free once more

The wind in her face was clean
The air was finally pure
Not a snake was to be seen
She took flight to be sure

High above with her Mended wing
She dipped and she swooped
Down below she heard the Gardener sing
As the ashes away He scooped

She watched Him for awhile
She looked at the charred remains
How things once so vile
Were ashes now on the ground lain

Soon all was cleared away
In time new things would grow
Good replaced the bad
Where once was the Hedgerow

~~~~~~~~~~

Two Roads....

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
and that has made all the difference

......~Robert Frost
"The Road Not Taken"

Because life aint always a basket of roses...

....Sometimes it's thorns too. So the thorns need a place to live where they wont take over all my thoughts and cloud other areas of life. So this is that place. So not much in the way of eath-shattering philosophical ideals, more like a dumping ground for the heavy stuff that sometimes clouds my mind and needs to be released.