The Comedy of Tragedy

The Comedy of Tragedy

Twas a split second and could have looked away.
Without second thought, without fleeting glance;
If not for words, token gesture, oh, what might be!
Of those chance encounters; often to be unseen.
Of beautiful absences; rarely, to know of anything.
'Tis wonder in not, if I had not found, astonishing.
The edge of rainbows, the light of stars, miniscule.
A second; fork in the road, situational subjectivity.
How did you find me here, how dare I to recognise?
How did such fateful fortune look down to find me?
If I accept I could be heads, then you could be tails.
Perhaps not my gift, but your karmic retribution, too.
In regarding you, I'd be the coin so we two find peace.
Prefer I, receive your light, than you of my dark deeds.
Digging crystals buried in fields of shimmering sand.
A comedy of the would be tragedy, gift of immensity,
I am nothing of worthy, for this misguided pleasantry.
But be ungrateful? No, more so for this than anything!
Kindred spirits are not born so, it is learned tranquility.
If creation is to equal, to come by you, simply amazing.

-phoenix
9.30.2014

Don't Make Me

Don't make me

Even if i keep all these words at bay,
The secret must also be mine to keep.
If I keep all my ghosts for myself then
I can look you in the eyes and so smile.
What you've given to me is worthy of
The millions of weary tears just as it is.
Don't make me say it, oh please, love
As some wrongs can never be cleared.

Don't make me speak out loud now,
Because I know of the transparency.
Don't make it flesh and blood, I beg!
I need your light in spite of everything.
Don't pierce this membrane artifact,
This dam is thin, and my form thinner.
Don't make me admit my path is clear
Because I cannot gamble, cannot win.

If it suits you to ignore my face, then do.
If you must witness my setting sun, say.
Don't make it all or nothing, I have none.
There is nothing of me for you, but you.
Don't make me tell you what is so darkly
Held by my fragility, I've lost all ground.
Don't make me fracture my own lunacy
I know value's price, and to cost me you.

Don't make me tell you what you can't.
It lacks the civility that you would seek.
I have spoken all the truths of you I may.
I can only dance on edges, hum the tune.
I cannot bury another body into my self,
I cannot grieve another flame into eternity.
I know you see this, know you hear it and
Know you'll not share it; know all I need.

Don't, don't, please love, don't ask me,
I've fallen a hundred times all on my own.
If you would keep me then love a silence.
If you need this, then accept it as it is now.
I can suffer in my gratitude, and obscurity.
I can be all that I am now inside tranquility.
Please don't make known my heavy heart
That even now would cower in fear of me.

I would choose to take my leave if asked,
Would let the void fill in the space between,
If you desire, you can beg of my everything!
If you could settle, then settle my subtlety.
Don't make me tell you how I've died again
Because for you, I saw it, chose not blindly.
Without you, mind's voice would be muted.
Don't take these lovely treasures; take me.

-phoenix
9.29.2014

The Last Few Steps

The last few steps

I need to lash out but it just makes me one of them. 
I can feel the live wire that is my livid consciousness. 
There are no corners in this place, only empty space. 
I'm not going to make it. Each year that passes I can
Feel this dark stranger just behind me, just out of sight
And I already know what she wants, what she means,
And what she will have of me before the night crests. 
It becomes harder to deny her access when I am tired. 
I am not built for this, I am not meant for any of them. 
Dependence only carries me so far, and so far lacking. 
All I try to hold will turn to ash, blown away on dreams. 
I know it will not make me whole, but it will make sense. 
There are none who need this vagrant to maintain ease.
There are none who care to carry on in this ruse with me. 
I am a fraudulent host if I am anything, and I am so weak. 
They send the meek to inherit, but the trust is all but farce. 
When there is darkness there are no apologies for need.
When there is silence then I may finally have my peace. 
I could carry this charade forever or can take my leave. 
My absence will only prove they were no better off with. 
I do not need to be right, but I do so need them to hear.  
I have nothing left to offer, every whim becomes so tiring. 
My ship will sail without me if I do not return the anchor. 
I've spilt more tears than blood, but my patterns reverse. 
There is no fear, only exhaustion, one more bodily curse. 
First of many put to rights when this is all done and gone. 
Take me to what registrar so that I may settle my account. 
What I cannot pay by choice he will just take away anyway. 
I will be content to be the dust on the road, and fish on rod.
I will be the soil for the flower, and too a whisper in the wind, 
I will be all the things that were barred from me at birth too. 
I shall walk hand in hand with my own eternity all on my own. 

-phoenix
9.28.2014

The Return of the Butterfly

The Return of the Butterfly

It was always just this way for the two of us, my dear. 
Would be you crawl to me every time you're winded?
I can only kiss your wounds, and dress them for you. 
I could even make the rain stop for a moment or two.
I can hold you, and let you shake, but it is so fleeting. 
I am the past, and oh how you crave to abuse yourself. 
You only want me because you know not of what else. 
I can be anything you need, but that; but a nail to drive. 

I refuse to be a torture chamber; cannot be your saviour.
Though one of mine is always yours, you only have one. 
If you must do harm to clear your heart, then speak to me. 
I can let you bleed me dry if I can save you your instincts. 
I know where to draw a line, and know where to set a bar. 
I would give you the sun if I had it, love is boundless, but
The temple is not for the likes of me, be it mine or else, so
There is naught housed here that will grant what you seek.

And she dwells here not, I know of ghosts you would hunt. 
All I can say of her is I am sorry for bonds we already kept. 
For you though, my butterfly, I beg you set her free, for you. 
You judge your own face so harshly that you dare not see!
You accepted comforts one would offer and just fell down. 
Conveniences your trespasser gave you were not so after-all. 
I can help you clear cobwebs, but the fallout belongs to you. 
But to ask why; my love is not meant for light or microscope.

You confuse my love with my indifference, distance is safety. 
I have no interest in saving myself, dear, how I love is for you.
This would be easy, so then you should see the easy treachery.
Were I to give in to you, I would lose a world, still you lose more. 
I cannot suffer you to use me to make another suffer, I will not. 
What monster would I be if I believed it just and loved you still?
What evil am I if I allowed you to use yourself, or me, in vain?
Crush me if your anger serves your good, but do it cleanly dear. 

-phoenix
9.28.2014

The Passage

The Passage

Its all so paper thin, a billion grains woven from a billion more. 
It only takes a few for genesis but then it exists exponentially. 
The beginning of the equation takes a form and a shape and
Winds onward into infinity even while imprisoned in the finite. 
And a fine thread begins to unravel from the edge of existence;
Separates and stretches toward darkness needing response.
The questions themselves are not really what matters to life,
But what can be learned within a web of questions answered. 

So what say you, interloper?  To trespass is to choose a path. 
Loosely spoken, so loosely intended, even the interpretations. 
The frailty of the essence is awe-inspiring, but painful witness. 
The sensitivities of the broken body are but detail of the whole.
What fevered passion makes the hearts' dance so polarising?
Help me to break free of this ethereal cage, shedding my skin,
So that I may draw nearer all these beacons both come or no. 
Never was but one, but there seemed hordes of possibilities. 

They cannot feel me, I am beneath them, dying slowly again. 
Fracture my consciousness and give and take my everything. 
I'll always let you torture this temple if to satisfy my curiosity. 
And when cracks web every inch, to kiss and tell you all I see. 
Hold me under just a little longer, love. I fear the dawn alone!
Turn me out if needs be, for I would suffer pain before passivity. 
Save for my own, I think. I would sell my soul than cost yours. 
And when you can no longer see my face, know you'll see me. 

-phoenix
9.25.2014

Nature

Nature

Oh the treacherous hearts of man, the nature of their flaws. 
Possessing power to soar over mountains by mere thought. 
Equal in their measure, to lay waste to countries,  centuries. 
The heart is the tyrant, ruling a mind blindly, but completely. 
In cognisance, one is supposed to bare the fruit of rationale,
To bare witness to logic and reason; soundness to judgement. 

Where lies the core then, the heart of hearts, the destruction?
What poisoned root, or diseased embrace imbued man these?
What blueprint helix fractured wrung grants such lurid power?
And the flash-bomb that is a chance encounter, one moment 
When the balance of power, as graceful as a wind, somersaults. 
You cease to be of you, instead mastered by another, fractals.

Every moment cleaves the beam again, and again, and again,
Knitting out quickly diminished, yet growing patterns, filaments
Slivered ever after until the tapestry is shattered in cold blood. 
You'll always miss a shard or two, altered is the alter of forever. 
The birth of self destruction is of birth, steeped in hearts' blood
And the love that led you to tumble head first into the inferno. 

How deep the needles run, when no eternity of day awaits you. 
Every drop of blood another nail in the coffin, there is no hope. 
But to risk of self is far more satisfying a meal, than to risk his. 
Some dishes can never be served, nor tongue refuse a taste. 
Necessity is destruction, without the withered none can flourish. 
Leveraging the universe, all for a certainty of the ultimate defeat.

-phoenix
9.25.2014

It Might

It Might

Its an interesting glow, isn't it?
It radiates outward and toward
And the chasm could consume it
But I could swear it was a nova
And I was blinded, yet enthralled. 
I'm not to see but it was everything. 
It might have been a grain of sand,
But mightn't be it a galaxy the same?

Touch my amazement, and say it,
Tell me a word and have it mean stars. 
Teach me so I may keep my stillness,
But breathe me into the vacuum and
Let me burn  alive and bask in spite
Of an eternal abyss, I harbour no fear. 
Bury me in the apocalypse that is the
Destroying of history to build a future. 

Leave me free of sinewy shackles and
Give me eyes to take consumed light. 
Break this boney prison and release a
Prism to reflect each plane for a billion. 
I've marred and marked and carved
Its flesh a thousand fold without joy. 
The simplest answer is usually truth. 
The simplest form must be the truer. 

Its a cosmos hidden within a shroud. 
It could have been a sliver of glass or
It might have been a drop of rain but
It was also a million waves if but one. 
Mirage or momentary mutation of the
Conscious or perhaps the sub and sum. 
Seconds could tip forward; backward 
And I would be rapt forever in this one. 

-phoenix
9.22.2014

Rather

Rather

Rather I to choke than to speak aloud. 
Rather have my skin to be deaf than this. 
Biochemical screaming to the Nth and
All for a tower, be there none to speak. 
Judgment fails me if I'm failed by you. 
Any, any, any of you I've dared to see. 
I'm gone, I'm done in, I give up; tired. 
Can't seem to speak the right language. 
There're too many lines to read between. 
Too much subtext to be sorted so we
Too were never even on the same page. 
I speak to depth of feel, unconditional,
And I'm left to wonder what you heard. 
Creature comforts were my pall to bear,
But never have I been so tortured by
The lack of understanding they all gave. 
Rather, its time to shut them off for good. 
Rather to continue alone, and in silence,
No hollow pleasantries, no guilts and, 
No misconception of the message I had. 
I know they just want me to swallow fault
And to follow suit, and to be the terrorist. 
Fine, but don't pretend I hit your radar. 
Rather suffer at my own hands, far less
Spite and cruelty there, surprising I know. 
I've spent too much of myself to care so. 
Rather I to sit here on the outside muffled
Than idly there while stakes are claimed. 

-phoenix
9.21.2014

Its Just Better

Its Just Better

Another empty chapter finished before the prologue.
Another forward explanation, for another, and another.
They could stretch onward for miles in years if allowed.
Another necessary, if sadly evil slaying of the aftermath.
If I had but listened to the melody a little longer; instead...
My need for lines between the truth and their realities
Defines yet another character taken before their time.
It leaves behind a residue to awaken my deaths anew.
I could smell the raining before I saw the storm-heads.
I could taste the electricity, all its bitter mettle hollows.
I know that this is better, even swallowed bittersweet.
To let the birds fly free than send another bat to roost.
They are still my gifts accepted gladly in a moment.
They are with me always even when the pages; worn.
Its the insanity obscured just below the surface of me,
Thats where the lines blur and writhe in my intensity.
Their confusions root deep into the core of my love.
Once they reach its heart; the festering and diseases,
The cancers that eat new holes into the foundation.
Soon though, I'll be trapped there with only memories.
I cannot open the window without feeling something.
I can rarely close the door then, once its invaded me.
My only recourse is to warn them swiftly and let them
Leave my solitary confinement, to seal up any cracks.
Don't bring me your daylight please, I can only beg you.
Don't look upon me when its over, I can feel your weight.
The compounds of my thoughts will only swallow love.
It never meant the same to any of them either; I know.
I need to go back to sleep now, it has exhausted me.
If I could stop the machines, but still wander; heaven.
I'll bury this one now, with all the others and my hope
Please let me learn from mistakes of trust and need.

-phoenix
9.20.2014

Don't let me into these harbours?

Don't let me into these harbours?

Oh, but you are troubling, aren't you dear?
It must have been the erie whistling of the
Whirlwind you had tucked so neatly away.
It calls my ship unto harbour within you.
To know I mustn't, whilst I can have no say.
This is my madness, my love, and yet to lie?
Omission cannot negate my presence, only
Abate the sound of my voice, even while
Its scripted onto entrails of consciousness.
It grows too restless and wrestles my sanity.
Were I to but heed its heady presence I might
Know peace, but only thinly, sickly, it will be.
It cried out to me your siren's song long ago,
Before your lips laid their trap upon my name.
I should have turned a blind eye; a deaf ear,
For no rights have I possessed to linger here.
Yet linger on I must, to own my weaknesses.
Arithmetic legacy of my countless abandons.
It is this knowledge; what belies my smile.
Rather you to tread upon entanglement?
I do speak of rather not, yet love you still.
I beg that you would turn your blind eye, so.
Even as I taste the treasures of your mind.
Kill me with your kindness, but please love.
Kill me swiftly, if it pleases you or enthralls!
Kill me slowly, I die for every one of them, too.
Or let her take me; save your hand for her own.
I will bide you idly, and let it all be so complete.
It could kill me on its own if only i'd give it time.
My love has laid to waste for all my everything.
Every star at night, my every one, all I've known.
The secret shamings of my senseless stupour,
I can't admit when I know enough has come.
Its burdens blighting my karma on my only soul.
So many footprints lost to ages, as I walk alone.

-phoenix
9.18.2014

Of a Scorpio

Of a Scorpio

This is not what I was looking for, or even wanted, not exactly.
What had I intended?  Happy distraction and companionship,
this becomes uncomfortable and a new cornerstone; or crux.
When was I reconstructed out of such a delicate glass, I ask?
If I’m to be drawn and quartered by the dawn, then dawn alone!
What was I thinking, and how could I have stood so idly by?
I thought to have strangled this interloper, she who twists me.
It isn’t always me when I love you all, or at least not me alone.

How many times have I been here; the rhetoric willed to wretch.
Deep relationships are meant to cost me dearly but sincerely,
Only no one reads the wavelength or takes the offered fine print.
My arms find themselves at odds again, and my hearts at war.
Collateral damages are those I fear the most, and hurting hurts.
This is how I was built, damn you, but to damn you every time.
And what of me when yours abandon the stations they’ve chosen?
Who will mop the blood stains from the floor or turn out the coals?

How long can I stand it before you see me, and see hidden truth?
How long can you stand it before you say you should have known?
We knew it couldn’t be forever because my comfort is my allergy.
You always played the good sport and you allowed my demons.
I never deserved the likes of any of you, I know it and despise you.
But, each day that I’m allowed to breathe you in, it seals my fate!
My name; become a word of hatred and loathing on your tongue.
She has nurtured me to love you and my nature says I must to live.

So I have to be content now; and close the lid on this in silence.
I wish to wander into the safety of oblivion so as to save you anew.
Some would guess that love is so easy for the passions held within,
Can you not see why opinions of the uneducated make me laugh so.
It’s a curse; a flaw in the design, a misstep in making my character,
But the parts all move in time, the joints and pistons all claim to
Be in righted and have rights to the making sense of senselessness.
This is nary a choice, but task, to learn the loveless nature of masses.

-phoenix
9.15.2014

Of the coming flood.

Of the coming flood.

If it were but a storm cloud, I might have survived it.
It is the quaking of the entrails that says it isn't so.
The thunderheads were building far longer than I'd
Thought to recognize; I tell a lie, than I would admit.
It is raining here now though, with a churning fog.
These clouds have eyes, and they scan for meat.
I wonder if I'll be so cold when I am snatched away.
It could too be a blessed mercy, turning to icy stone.
Was that the thunder?  If you count these seconds
You could tell me how long I have before I am done.
I wonder if it will be an instant; one brilliant flash...
Or agonizing plummet where I can feel every inch.
Onward lightning, I dare, strike me down in brilliance.
I want to savour the crackle of charring flesh on bone.
I'll just lie still awhile, shall I, as all my thoughts writhe.
I willn't bother with 'I told you so' and nor should you.
I feel the torrent now, so I must shield my face awhile.
The sky is darkness and lightning has turned; red as blood.
When I can drink no more of it, you'll stir the pot for me
So I see your face lastly as the tides pull me down below.

-phoenix
9.13.2014

Into the Wake of Wonder

Into the Wake of Wonder

It was a fragment I had thought; to keep the candle burning.
Like an afterthought to a whisper withered in a winter wind.
What was a drop of rain, was simply heralding the tsunami;
Sink or swim willed no longer unto choice, but to perchance.
Oh harbinger of all or nothing, won't you lend me your smile.
Forgive me my petrification, I wish to wander to my wonder,
But to wander toward the deep would be to slip and fall.
I wasn't built on easy footing, but needs to feel I know my fill.
A mockery of innocence belied by the very fabric of cognition.
Here there be, what?  Wraiths or monsters?  If only it were so.
I had all but birthed a headless hydra to wreak havoc here.
Why not craft him fresh teeth?  The better to swallow me whole.
Why such easy betrayal by my nature, I know the difference.
I grow wearily unnerved, bailing back the flood with but a thimble.
My skeletons and corpses sworn not to mingle, only mangle,
Such skillful precision in the face of denouncing my own name.
Intolerable attempts at speculation; met only with a slight of hand.
Its your slight of tongue, even silent bares me treasures, dooming.
It is as it was meant for me; I fear further splinters of my essence.
It should be my mortal sin, if to spare them from the likes of this.
And would do well in not squandering on her; kindnesses.
In wearing away the ghosts you'll unearth her creature guilts.
Look not  upon medusa's serpents' clings to shallowed learning.
T'would be for wretched, brittle hearts' salvation, were I to gild.
And of the unsuspected whimpers, I beg deafening silences.
A thousand fickle passions, and a thousand shards of glass.
Decry my pardon, and lead me not toward your salvations,
Should be the death of me, if not the straw to break my back.

-phoenix
9.11.2014

Inevitability

Inevitability

Oh how you terrify me, even in my exhilaration...
What truths could I utter that wouldn't be a danger to me?
Why here and now when I was comforted in my corner?
Fickle fate, please cut this thread and save my demons.
Some would think two hearts could be a kindness, ha!
Were I to play with fire, I know of burning at both ends.
I've traversed the wheel anew, and a new demon face
Has met me here, and met fresh cuts to bleed infinitely.
Does it have to hurt my sanctity so effortlessly, dear?
The rhetoric of my wretched physicality, be still? No.
There is no stranger, only the sadness of its ebbing smile.
I should have known, for its known me time and time over.
I long for the longing of its pacifying warmth, but imaginary.
Even when the words refuse to fail me, I know their failure.
The translucence of my character is what stakes me taught.
The freedoms I afford the heart, stealing miles over inches
And holding vigil as I stumble into daylight clasping my face.
It floods when I do not call its name, maniacally laughing.
It feasts upon my choking anguish when it chooses.
I am but the messenger; starving and perspiring silently
As the havoc swarms to wrack me to my fevered core.
I must awaken from this nightmarish impossibility, please.
The truth of it is more than I dare to diminish in artifice,
But this reality only bares with it the eulogy of all before.
Its a tumour in the form of a tremor, claiming false benignity.
This too, shall pass and I will pass round and round again.
Too many sweets have gone to sour on the vine, I fear.
What of the devastations; the yearnings, and misgivings?
Lain by restlessly, then totality, will live trailing in my wake.

-phoenix
9.8.2014

A monument for fools.

A monument for fools.

What have I stumbled upon, here in the darkness?
As I am nearing the end of this lingering journey
I am narrowly torn between this drawing exhaustion,
And my terrifying infant fascination for all of these...
Those which could and would, were I to but surrender.
There lies that constant boiling current; just below me.
But for a promise, these gates could be poured over.
These breakers could have been left to fall where they might.
What churning ambivalence has so sought to openly steal;
Might also be willingly parted, were questions e'er refrained.
I hear it; hear them; hear you all, if only once weren't enough.
To love and despise; to overjoy and devastate; rage, revere...
The cost, far higher than hundred lives could afford me.
Yet, idle hands continue feeble heart's attempts to pay.
Fools who learn not, continue suffering first person fools.
Perhaps worse still; to suffer to them, for them willingly.
I do not want this, yet I crave its merciless interruption.
I want to hold, to clutch it, even while I must be held at bay.
I would risk its lingered poison, even while it breathes my life.
It bleeds lunacy and I drink, knowing that it tames the tides.
Dangling pearls of salvation steeped in blood and tears.
Fleeting fancies assumed and become the poisons I'm to be.
Temporary appointments; then so eager and easily replaced.
Onward wheel of destiny and dissension, or alone I shall
Surrender to the gears for which I spend my meager steam.
I know a purpose lives beyond these stacking walls, even whilst
The losing battles are the cornerstones I'm meant to reap.

-phoenix
9.8.2014