I Prefer Not To.
i have worn
this banded armor
shorn away
by silent toll
even now
in days diminished
erstwhile sentiments yet hold
idle hands
have stayed my purpose
vice allays
the spirit’s wake
tears erode
this pallid surface
worthless feelings
ne’er abate
dulling
from the desert sun
has robbed me
of my own perception
burning shadows
stabbed my eyes
and stole her
from the moon’s reflection
our distance
belies summation
amid the sacred frivol
we chose
to quantify
ourselves
defiant
like the sentience
of existence
inundated
with the drivel
waning tides forgot
to tell
timeless dimensions
lay between
the worlds
within these walls
teemed with apprehension
we haplessly watch
verity unfurl
drifting
into ruin
beyond
my front door
lies a great
big world
more vast
than is humanly
comprehensible
a veritable cornucopia
of prospect propitious
and liberty endless
brimming
with untold
opportunity
and infinite possibility
for me
to swiftly
and precisely
meet
my ultimate
demise
with lackadaisical regard
i watch as they dwindle
one by one
and sometimes two
or more
i never formed
a reason to rhyme
until time descended
upon me
like a pornographic impulse
brew me another cup
of disillusionment
while you’re at it
that last one
nearly fit the bill
sometimes
i wonder if i actually will
or would
or could
of course,
there is no question
as to whether or not
i should
though i am
but a coward
in uncomfortable skin
i’ve worn out
since the day
the world informed me
as i swallow
more
to boredom’s pallor
like a Fuller Brush Man
in a town inhabited
by ghosts
where nothing hearkens
but the silence
that consumes me
as a void that lay
between two mirrors
spared of my own completion
it is only
in that darkness
unburdened
by the sun’s insistence
when the vilest
of creatures vanish
do we assemble
in legions
of hypnagogic afterthought
to worship our liege
of argent gloaming
like romans
in their own day
we take
to excess
to banish the dross
of existential blowoff
which echoes in these chambers
of mitochondrial horror
with implore aimed
at staying all tomorrows
whilst stranded
in the dregs
of yesterday
there is a pang
when consciousness
comes calling
magnetic forces
disrupt the atmosphere
and dormant thoughts return
as torment ripples
throughout my being
with the ominous silence
of imminent shockwave
bearing the gravest
consequence of logic defied
tearing me
from the static sepsis
of my heart’s invasion
to answer its unbridled beckon
with blinded reckoning
as i shudder to behold
the untold tale
of my greatest failing
through portals of peridot
long dulled from life’s laments
sodden earth
from sullen stream
once culled from squalor
placed within the bezel
of my breast
and pulled me from this berth
by the undertow’s drag
jilted like sloughed slag
amid a mournful requiem
of shrill remorse
my spirit longs
to be the stars
that fill your sky
my heart would shine
reflections
of its truth
to lift you
up into a realm
where solace
sings redemption
that once
you laid upon me
by the mercy
of your kiss
but even vigilance
has lost its vested path
these broken roads
no longer
reach epiphany
as apathy
alone
absconds
with wistful dew
i thought
would one day
compose a river
through the valley
whence our love
had rent the earth
that i might sail
those tempestuous waters
in search
of where the willows
wept your name
but all my efforts
toiling at the pulley
have only returned
buckets
of morass
wrested hands
from years
of untold callous
now leave me
to attend
this ghostly shore
where sorrow comes
to lay for death
in prostrate
with arms
of clay stretched thin
succumbed to dust
once sought
to sway the forces
of the cosmos
with hope
to never stray
from its embrace
as mountains
birthed of mirthless
apprehension
would vanish
into the silence
of forever
when I tasted
the ground
my world
was no longer
for what I had found
was stronger than death
when my face
grazed the earth
my sight
torn right from me
I gazed at my worth
were life not a freedom
the crashing of bones
knees, elbows, and skull
would fall into silence
upon urgent moment
the brashness of one
fleeing from the lull
appallingly useless
for all, consequent
dispatched
to the hungry umbrage
spindly wraiths
spill ruination
arms athwart
absorb nullity
boots and RIFs
soon disavowed
whistling timbres
so precise
held brimstone fists stripped
knuckled white
waried faith
lest bullets showered
dulled the Duster pastorales
plucked like florets
bare and breathless
strafing nightly
saw them felled
prowess at imperil’s onset
sweat poured down
a poor man’s brow
loud as telegraphed
impressions
dispossessed
like wingless flies
birds took to the sky
in errant
bursts of aril
none were spared
crimson horrors
void of rinsing
from the hands
of shellshocked minds
blind are days
since hell became us
land of freedom
man as god
sadist thieves
left grief besotted
rotting leaves
pinned to dead air
i thought
that you could see me
through the lens
which rend your heart
the foment
of foreboding heed
that sought
to play your part
with every waning
flaxen tide
thus waxing
unquashed tears
comprised
of unseen sorrows
as they fall
into arrears
this blood yields not
to yarrow
‘neath the fields
of monarch sky
the piercing
of your arrow’s wound
seals fast
our love’s demise
Max, or Not 
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