Dark Poetry Prose Poetry October 10, 2004 Dark Poetic Prose

9:14pm sunday 10-10-04

the mask is below the skin. not above it.

the real face. what's left of. just a skeleton covered in maggots. just a long gone memory whispering your name while you assume a new identity. it's just an epitaph above a grave you never visit.

the truth is that truth is a matter of opinion.

the truth is that people are what you make of them. whatever you choose to believe of. that's what they'll be. in your life. below the skin. where all the lies breed indetected.

the mask isn't what the world sees. it's far below. underneath.

the truth is that the outside is no lie. only what you keep hidden.

the mask is below the skin. not above it. cardboard cheeks. and plastic lips. it's not for anyone else. you're only hiding the monster from yourself.

10-10-04 9:43pm sunday

there was time enough then. more than plenty chances. but we still never said. perhaps because it just wasn't true. only some dream whose threads got tangled up in the lives we had already misled.

i feel it. i do. the infection morphing under my skin. changing colors. shifting places. from empty to full.

just one lie was all it took. to raise those stunted truths high as the sun. it's that easy. that corrupt. it's easier to be wrong than.

just one rose was all it required. to take that raw dirt and make a garden from. you just close your conscience and see what you want to.

now that. people always say. now that i am. now that they are. whatever now is.

now in the beat of your brain as it tries to come up with another excuse for why you haven't. now in the curl of your lips as they unexpectedly get a taste of how dry they are. how long it's been since.

some people have more static than others. they cling to whatever is near. we all have static. we're all electric. plug us in and we vibrate until some flips the switch.

but holding on is for claws. and velcro. and i am just flesh and feelings stitched in. i only have my words to hold. that's all. i don't know what else there is.

if there is anything at all. friends like paper dolls. so similar. so easy to predict.

lovers that become. so obvious. tides full of jellyfish. stranded.

if there was anything at all. i never had the opportunity to know it. i just stood there as the tide would rise and ebb. i just stood there. trying to figure out how i could change its mind. but i had no effect.

10:44pm 10-10-04 sunday

i miss the people that i used to know. or thought i did. they disappear like dreams awakened. everything you thought was real vanishes.

it's not that i needed it. but i wanted. not to have. but to be chosen.

it's a long paragraph that takes us from the preamble to the end. all those words left inbetween. who will care for them.

no one. so it seems. no one but me. and how can that even matter. now that i stand here like a lantern. hollow light against the darkness dense.

every page. eevery moment. they fall like rain. disappearing into the ground. that long fall forgotten. no one sees. how long their journey. how much it means. to the rotos they nourish. to the flowers they have quenched.

i feel you now. like i did us then. thick carpet between my toes. the pile soft and reticent under our footsteps. make those indents. no need for words when there are so many other ways to mark the changes in.

i remember now. i'm not afraid. left to myself. it's so much easier somehow.

there's nothing to lose. since everything is gone. every bit of myself i gave away, i did so with every intention of having it be taken.

i know. always have. that what you've wanted has always been within your grasp. i knew. i knew why. why not. the kind of answer you feel in your guy when everyone around you is telling you different. but you know. you know just what they want. just how little they'll leave you with.

but i didn't want it anyway. so thank you for taking it. i didn't want it anyway. all i lost was all i i wanted you to take.