the artist

Slam Poetry

aren't sunsets lovely dear
just like my dreams lately and your freckles
lovely the way that wrinkled old man sits at the corner bench.
and the stars, i think that ones venus but
i've never taken the time to learn
the way your brother never took the time to smile.
i wished on a shooting star
and on every wishable time on the clock
and i never told you my wishes because
each wish was a prayer.
and the moon is dark.  a sliver of light and i think God drew it
there just for snowshoes at midnight,
just for the scientist to play with probes on
just so the cow had something to jump over
just for the cheesemakers.
the stars are lovely dear,
but it hurts to breathe.
this air froze with my fingertips and i'm breathing down too many icicles
but the breathing doesn't stop.
its a humanity problem
they're addicted to this thing called Life
and some of us wish we weren't,
because the problem with this addiction is that
it doesn't give you lung cancer.
it shows you beauty and it hurts. like the icicles in my lungs.

i was rocking out to the latino radio station
and so were you,
and it scares me that we're so alike.
you wonder if anyone cares enough to tear down these walls you've built up,

well Last week I dreamed about you five nights in a row
and I'm still afraid.

you're afraid of cake boxes and barbie dolls and a long list of other things
with a list of reasons to match
and you say you're afraid of cake boxes because you never know what its really gonna be like
and of barbie dolls because people act fake enough as it is

and we're caught in some kind of Limbo where no one can tell what's real and what not
Least of all you
and maybe if things felt more real you would be honest, but
you're still convinced the top never stopped spinning...

These are the things I understand.

I understand that you exist on a colorwheel, that you breathe color and even though your lungs
are drowning in them
color is all that keeps you alive,
and the paint inside your veins is all that keep you real.

But the reason I never showed you my soul is that
YOU SHOWED ME YOURS FIRST
and its still stained in acrylics
You thought that if you drew on enough hands and
etched your name into enough hearts
it would make up for all the plastic in the world and for
all the illusions we've penned onto our faces

but I think you've got some kind of color constricting your lungs because
you
CAN'T
KEEP
BREATH.
It slips out.
and your lungs are filling with
drowning with
the illusions of paint
and real life.

There are things I understand and things I don't.

I understand that blue is too many dreams to call a color but people do it anyway
I understand that pianos are black and white but
give me one and I'll create all the color you've never dreamed of
I understand that you've got a color connecting you to reality
because it has always been easier for you to pretend
until
maybe it had something to do with the starlight
but you
finally
exhaled
all the color you've kept in.

and because you've never really known what was real
you closed your eyes for seven seconds

and asked.

this day was lost

I'm just trying to connect the dots

I feel like I'm waiting for something
that isn't even there
and too many of my thoughts are dead-ends.

because, I don't want to think
but I'm stuck
on remembering
a little girl whose clothes are dirty and whose hands are dirtier,
and she wouldn't meet my eyes because her pride is stained darker than them both.
The bruises across her back hurt
but nothing like the welts on her innocence, so
she paces the house that is her cage with her head down and her eyes hanging even lower

and SHE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ME

but my heart won't let me forget

There's a little boy who didn't walk at all
he just cried, on the floor with his back pressed against the wall like it would save him, like that wall was his father and nothing would separate them again.
because he is only 9 and Seventy is too many years of waiting to hug his Papi again.

And i couldn't even tell him I Care.

so I know its been said before, but

you've hurt too many people

and maybe your name is Death                                            but maybe that doesn't matter.

you've been known as Divorce, and She called you Abuse,

I know too many people who think you're a mirror telling them lies, 

but

we've all got a common problem.

our problem is you, its the fact that

YOU WALK LIKE YOU LIVE HERE

And you don't. You shouldn't.

We never let you in, we never gave you permission, we never gave you anything

let alone our souls.

and for some reason you exist

YOU ARE TRAGEDY

and pain and fear and hatred

the tragedy of people with hearts so Weighted down they're leaving footprints deeper than their souls

and i hate the fact that blaming her too-many-tears-to-cry on you changes nothing

so i guess i'm just asking
questions.
too many.

because Somehow the sky is still lovely
and my best friend still exists
but so do the heavy hearts.

And laughter is real,
just like saxophones and snowflakes

and somehow,

SHE GOT A HAPPY ENDING.

maybe this is just me
thinking things out
thinking about how things aren't perfect and they never will be
but
that little boy has a friend who loves him, and
that little girl learned how to draw.
and maybe we've got it better than we think because
I know a widow who started taking walks and
a Shell who picked up a pen,
it may suck but
orphans find God all the time
the depressed found a piano and lemonade
& the broken tend to pick up books

its not easy but survival isn't the issue
it never was
we're just looking for

hope.