Hounds

The howls are recklessly closing in,
Once barely a sound, a hint of nothing,
Now viciously, their icy breath chills my bones.

Such a naive thought of being immortal,
No matter what decoys or diversions we pretend to spring,
Those bastard hounds always find the trail.

Such blood thirsty, cold blooded killers,
Driven through the abyss of forever,
feeding on every pitifully helpless soul that falls into their path.

We run aimlessly, hide carelessly,
But these cunning predators never stop,
Such a simple vapor on which they follow and selfishly dine.

The howls, near deafening,
Once a mortally tipped scale now becomes eternally balanced,
Does it matter now which ladder rung you futilely stand on?

A single common thread we all fatefully share,
In the end, we are all reduced to nothingness,
By the wolves just outside our door.

Egg Shells

My dimming eyes watch on as the world slowly waxes worse.
The egg shells we all tread upon are cracking,
giving way to reveal the rotting beast within.

Instead of caring for the corroding behemoth,
we poke our crooked sticks in it's eyes.
Just to see the ruthless ratings go up.

Civil unrest will soon transform into uncivil retaliation.
Peace will become as the giants that roamed the land in millennium's past.
Conflicts of the present day will melt down into war machines,
feeding on us without cause or prejudice.

What are we to do?
The lost souls desperately seeking clarity in this bitter cold sea.

For now though, I worry not about my own fate but instead of the destiny that awaits
the tiny eyes that so innocently stare back deeply into mine.

I collapse to my knees, kiss the ancient dirt,
then rise and turn to the sky.
Hurling prayers to the heavens in hopes that there is some supernatural deliverer in all of this crumbling chaos.

Secretly fearing though that in the end though, there might not.

Dam

Once a simple stream
misdirected and held back
with sandbags and driftwood
creating a stationary place of life

Time brings the rain
the fragile stream steadily grows
sand bags and driftwood give way
to bigger, stronger barricades

A river now replaces the tiny waterway
the dam begins to flex under the pressure
fissures and cracks start to form
as the riverbed slowly starts to erode away

The vicious rains never cease
and the river waxes ever so violent
churning and thrashing
testing the integrity of it's buckling captor

Will this dreadful downpour ever dissipate?
Will this raging, wrathful river ever find peace?
With all these inquiries, one stands above the rest
will the deteriorating, damaged dam hold it's place
or be breached by the wicked waves below?

Heal

At this bitter cold crossroads,
A body lies naked, broken, bleeding.
A hole embedded in his chest,
once covered with self constructed scars,
now ripped open, helplessly exposed.

The blood rushing out, each faint heart beat,
one step closer to the last.
What was once reality, seems like some twisted dream.
The air that once gave life, has turned toxic,
choking the very life out of what was meant to be.

Such a tragic accident, such a horrible mistake.
Going left, going right, going wrong.
5 minutes early, 5 minutes too late.
The innocent lives, once lived,
now thrown face down, breathless in the street.

The bones, so badly broken.
The damage, so devastatingly deep.
The life that was once lived, now lost.
The body that was once whole, now disfigured, disconnected.
The wounds that may never heal..

Embrace

Before you read this, I wanted to give a brief introduction on where this particular poem was born.

It's a rare occasion that I reveal where things are born inside of me and why I write what I do. I believe deeply that whatever I write should stand on its own and to take on a life of it's own to the reader without my personal interference. That being said though, I felt compelled for this one piece to share a few of my thoughts.

Most people in this world share a common thread. The desire to love someone and the longing to be loved. If you ever find that love then you will do almost anything to keep it a part of your life. Eventually it slowly consumes your life and no matter what you have to sacrifice, it will always be worth it to keep what you have been truly blessed to find.

This is sincerely dedicated to my wife Cindy, my son Sam and my daughter Marlee. Without them, I barely exist at all.

Embrace

The day falls heavy again
A trek through the monotonous
A trudge through the mundane
The sky has been gray for such a long time

Rushing to arrive nowhere
To produce empty, senseless fodder
To once again give life away
Rushing for no reason at all

Why turn time into a commodity
Being sold at a paupers rate
Being spent so rapidly
Why eagerly pour out what is so dear

For the simplicity and complexity that co-exists in life's mathmatics
Two broken hearts becoming as one whole
Two soulful eyes becoming an adoring six
For the complexity to understand existence and the simplicity of not being alone

A life just spent is not a life at all
Given carelessly to the wind to land where it may
Given is a choice, so I choose it wisely
A life well spent is the only life to live at all

I embrace today to carefully give myself away
So I might obtain something that transcends my own being
So I truly come to know what it is to be loved
I embrace today not only just to love, but to be loved by you.

Hermit

He lived his life in quiet obscurity
only emerging briefly
for the ones closest to his heart

His cave was his sanctuary
A place of peace and solace
shelter from the acid rain

He pondered fantastic thoughts
of venturing away
from this cold, dark place he called home

Out into the endless expanse
the universe of the unknown
that lay just outside his doorstep

One small day he left his little sanctuary
to see with his own eyes
what he had imagined for so long

Oh naive little hermit
your innocence will be your undoing
your kindness will become your demise

He was taken by utter surprise
by the wolves that were hidden and lurking
waiting to feed their own disease

Battered and broken
the hermit narrowly escapes
with only his tattered life now to show

He swiftly retreats back
back into his solace, his sanctuary
hoping the wounds will somehow heal.

Oh naive little hermit
Your innocence has been undone
Your kindness, viciously murdered

Go back to your cave
and hide in your quiet obscurity
let father time bring you back to health

For if you ever recover
and dream of exploring the universe again
the world will be waiting at your doorstep

and the wolves will be hiding quietly behind your door

Ever

Heaven, a place of peace or only of dreams
Ever wondering, ever seeking, ever searching
Lost in this abstruse state of reality

Praying for rest, pleading for release
My concrete heart, heavy and fractured
Escaping through the cracks, the life that once filled it

Inside, a deep chasm of emotion
Moving downward, broken spirals
Absolutes and axioms once solid, become shaky at best

Lamentations pour out of my soul
Over and Over, from knees buried in the dirt
Needing answers, longing for salvation

Ever wondering, ever seeking, ever searching