The Prince's Crown

I kiss my mother's feet 
She has walked the valley of shadows
With those feet she has aldo stood stead fast
Waiting for her champion.

I kiss my father's hands
He has fought for his place in this world
Lost and won but built his life
He continue to protect his queen.

I kiss my sister's forehead
her knowledge and guidance
Patience and peace
She gives to me in times of need.

I kiss my brother's shoulder
A fellow knight and shield on my right arm
To fight and Strive
sharing in the spoils of our endeavours.

I touch the crown of my head, I see my Kingdom.
I look at my shoulders, I know the weight I will need to bear.
I look at my hands, I know the fight they will be asked for.
I look at my feet, I know the faith and patience they are capable of.

Made from strength t so I am strength
Made from love so I possess it's inner core
Descendant of gods as it were
To carry the torch and pass it on.

Her Rock

I'll wait I'll wait I'll wait

Hold on, hold on, hold on.

don't do anything, don't change anything

She'll come back and it'llbe ok...just wait

Sit here, like the Rock of ages

Still and silent but smiling

Still and quiet...still, I'll be still.

For her.

Let the years pass, let the hopes pass, let the dreams pass

she is bigger

let the chances pass, let the offers pass, let the memories pass

she is worth more

I kneel covered in dust and stillness like a samurai in prayer

I will wait

She will come back, I know she will

Everyone changes their mind, right?

She will come back

she will remember that I'm here, she will.

Dust will turn to stone over my eyes

I will wait, she will feel it and come back

The ache in my knees bent for years will surge in her dreams.

The wind with carry messages from my dust to her ear

and tell her how much I miss her...right?

The vibration from my slow heartbeat 

will resound in her hands as she holds the steering wheel

The light will turn on from where she left dark and see me

and she will come back...right?

Altar

Your whirlwind into my life then you disappear

And Just when I'm picking up the pieces off the ground you bring an earthquake and swallow them up.

Just when my tears start to fall you bring a monsoon and drown me.

I look up to ask God why and you scorch the sky with a hurricane.

I seek comfort to regain strength and erupt a volcano and burn my inner piece with lava.

You strip me, you take from me, you leave me bare and broken

I didn't know looking in your eyes was going to be an apocalypse.

There's nothing I relied on still intact, 

Shield and spare lost in the waves...of you.

But it was what you required

It was what you needed

The love you were about to give needed me to walk away from everything before I met you.

You needed me exposed, you needed me vulnerable.

Something so powerful yet fragile at the same time.

But your request was simple...me and nothing else.

I let your whirlwind in, 

I nodded to your earthquake, 

I stepped aside for your monsoon and 

I sacrificed my peace in your fire

What you showed me you were giving me

The price is understood

The price is paid.

I am delivered.

We all feel

The pastor that asked his wife for a threesome
The con artist that finally asked for forgiveness
The bullet that finally got permission
At some point, we all feel

The hard man that finally broke into tears
The high school popular girl that gave away her crown
The rich lady that left her coat for the sleeping homeless man
At some point, we all give

The hunted meal finally clutched
The moment you chose to awaken your soul
The sleepless nights preparing
At some point, we all take

The dreams that never stop
Those moments we get lost in a hope
Sights that pull our groins and drown our tongues
At some point, we all want.

We build a world based on rules and borders
While we dream of being the lion and the eagle
We exchange pleasantries in our suits
When all we want is to sink our teeth in our passions

Living the daily fight between what you want and what you need
Set to carry equal value under free will in a world of rules.
We can define and organize and require.
In the end, we all feel.

Flutter

I've chased her for years
She changed her face, her color, her hair, her skin
Everytime I think I've found her, she dashes off
But each time instead happy giggles of a friendly chase
It's tears and heartbreak.

The Experiment

Lay in my hollow
Feel my emptiness swallow you
My darkness gouging your eyes
Silence screaming in your ears

My hands seep inside your veins, up your lungs...cold
Your gasp feeds me, your fright fills me
The terror in your eyes are my joy
This is my freedom, my prison.

I take when I want to give
Replaying the scene over and over,
Trying to get it right, the way she did it...to me.
She did it so perfectly an I must know how.

So I become her, over and over again.
Test after test, heart after heart, I plant the fatal stab
But I can't seem to walk away, guilt free..like she did.

Take 16, take, 30, take 42...action!!!
Flawless falling, but I can't walk away smiling...like she did, to me.
How did she do it, I must know.
Get a new test, make her fall and do it again.

Maybe I need to make them fall, faster, deeper, like I did?
Maybe I need to be their sun and moon, like she was to me?
Maybe they need to feel like they'd die, like I did?
Maybe the harder they fall, will make it easier to drop them and walk away?..like she did.

Maybe this is my Sisyphus. 
Forever trying to understand how she could walk away
From the one thing I breathed for, the one thing that truly made me feel alive.

Day after day, each boulder a new heart, a new test,
But never the answer, as I loop without knowing.
Looping, yet a forever thirst.
My prison, my experiment, my prison,...

Broken Cage

The overdone football comments when we spoke.  The bro laugh even when I didn't say anything really funny.  The questions where the answer was then seemingly obvious, but the staggered stare was the only thing mutual.  I rushed in late that morning, but it was just us still due to the weather.  Still getting settled I decided to hit the restroom before I hunker in for the day's lull. An empty corridor echoes my shoes along the walls, my own fans cheering me on in its reverb, today will be a good day I said. The clean bathroom with its cold stiff unused air ready to be the conveyer belt of relief for the day welcomed me with a nod as the door swung shut behind me, the urinal with its porcelain innocence, a standing throne in its own right awaited my service. 
The silence broke as the door swung open, a sound that shouldn't even mean anything on a normal basis, this morning sent a shiver down my spine as the only other person who could have walked in, was him.  Steps you should hear as someone walks to another urinal didn't echo as they should.  Instead, a shiver ran down my spine as without turning around I realised the steps were absent because he was now standing behind me. Shivers ran down my spine and over my ears and my skull, in surprise, in fright and in anticipation.  
A tension that I've been hiding for years poured down as I exhaled the smell of his cologne. I leaned my head down as his left hand calmly grasped the nape of my neck only to see my member that I had pulled out to urinate turned into a swollen pulsation.  He stepped in closer and his breath on the back of my neck now was like fire against the chill of my shivers still playing in anticipation like waiting turn in double dutch. 
My ignorance was present, so in fear of making a fool of myself I placed both hands on the wall over the top of the urinal like a criminal about to get searched by a cop.  The relief breath I just breathed from all this hiding now picked up speed as his right hand glided around my side and grabbed it.  Before he moved me, he leaned in and bit the open side of my neck with the mouth that laughed at my corny jokes and asked me obvious questions...now igniting a secret. Slowly gliding me with his right hand, he went faster. My head spun, and time slowed like a witch casting a spell.  I could feel the swirls in the air.  I open my eyes to see his gold college ring on his finger, shiney going back and forth contrasting against the porcelain white background.
An explosion of my body in that moment was like a tiger restrained for years made to live one way... made to love her... made to raise them, now feeling the bars break open and the hot pieces of iron bouncing off me in this baptism.  Now free to finally breathe and walk and talk, they way I want to, the way I've been dying to.  As I caught my breath, he let go and walked out, his shoes echoing down the hall until the door swung shut again leaving me to my silent kingdom and I stood there looking down at a new me out of breath and rebirthed.  A hunger allowed to be hungry, a thirst that has now been offered the drink, a new me walked back to my desk.

Run

Night, she doesn't flinch
That engine she's heard before.
Moving in this darkness as my fingers used to run through her hair.
Night's cold back echo's my engine as she sleeps.
Neglecting my rage and loud music as I shift into 5th.
The wind whipping the car like running through tall razor grass.
Again, I'm on the run.

Where?...this time
Anywhere but here...just like the last time
Anywhere from her...just like the last one
Torment at 95...on 95
I know I just need distance right now

The dark night, her hair on my chest, all the same now
seem to still wrap around me
I run away from her face but all I see...is...her face.
One hand on the wheel the other on the shifter
Gripped tight to affirm my decision 
But they may as well be her body
As each passing highway sign still reflects her face.

Faster, dodging cars and 18 wheelers
hoping to outrun my mind
Hoping to outrun her.

Telling myself that I can love again
Telling myself I can spark anew
But each time a new face comes close
All I want to do is turn and run.


MG

Mechanic

I need to fix her.
Her broken body, heart and mind piled at my feet like a dump truck that just left.
Broken pieces rolling off the mound of what was.
Her dust reaching for my shirt, my face, crawling up my nose.
I need to fix her.

I kneel down and start to sift
Broken screws and pieces of wood
Ripped bandages with dry blood
I find 4 bolts but 3 nuts
3 corners but 4 brackets, nothing matches anymore.
I need to fix her.

Eyes rusted shut from years of tears
As I swiped her dark hair from her face
Only her right cheek showed what's left of her innocence
I need to fix her.

Her pile laid there, the discarded heap
A position she seemed all too familiar with
While a slight wind moved pieces of her tattered black clothing
And her silence crying in my ear.
I need to fix her.

Scooped up like a pile of dirty clothes
I bring her inside and lay her on the table
Eyeing my toolbox and flipping on the light
I need to fix her.

Her mind: dead, her heart: dead her soul: dead
I reach for my toolbox
My broken hammer and rusted off screwdrivers
Perfect for the fix, I start to clean her other cheek
I need to fix her.

This Frankenstein built by the scourge of men
Now my charge to raise from the dead.
Maybe no one will want her
But she will be alive
Only time will tell what she will become...again.

Love's Death

I'd like to announce the death of Love

Our world has killed what Love is.

What we idolize of what's left of Love is not much 

Not much different from an Orbit of Broken planets

Crumbs and clues of what was a greatness never to be seen again.

Now roaming in modern minds with limits and clause and flaws

Ruined.

But what is Love now?

2 people stuck together by financial ties, so "they make it work"?

What about those who go to bed with one and dream about a love lost?

Is that where true love has to live like a sewer vagabond, scorned and hidden?

What about the dreamer scared to tell their true love?

Has love become a stifling  spell, never to be called on like BeetleJuice?

What about the damaged couple who had it, but too hurt to just be innocent again?

Is Love a show of weakness and has to be paid in full before it's returned?

"Fuck Love", "Love is all we need"..all said by our confused generation today.

Love doesn't care about title, position or color, it just was, is and will always be.

It is in fact that it is we who have grown too weak for Love.

So we broke it, we tore down its curves and gave it edges to fit our fears.

We beat it, we hid it and we threw it away

We prefer it in our dreams and our silence because it steps on our lives that we "need" to live.

So if I am forced to accept this broken fitment 

Then let me be the first to announce that Love is dead

Don't force it to exist as a crippled beggar on the street that we give a dollar to once in awhile.

Don't hide it from everyone only to stare at it with wanting when everyone is asleep.

We, weakened by this world, by its premises, its status quo, its or else's

We do not deserve to Love the way Love needs to be Loved

But I cannot just forget Love even if Love dies

For her face lives on that planet

She clings to its rocks, calling my name.

She Loves me still and I cannot Love her back

Life tore us apart and all I can do is stare when no one is looking

All I can do is lay in bed with my back turned thinking about her

All I can do is stay silent and make it work

All I can do act like it doesn't matter, when it fucking does.

Love isn't broken. I am Broken.  We are broken.

Dawn's Gift

I used to believe my life was going to be dark forever
Like a kid staring out the back window of his parents car as they drove through the cold night country roads.
No stars, no street lights.  Not even night eyes of the nocturnal wanted to be in my presence.
Black was my night, black was my day, black was my all
I grew used to the cold, I grew used to the air.
Until my dreams stopped, until my hope froze, until my inspiration died.
A frozen river of black tar was my home.

These streaks, these lines, these moving invaders
Welcoming themselves on my plain of darkness.
I quieted my mind and my heart as they had grown angry 
They  wanted to shout "why...why now....why me, you have forsaken me...keep your glory!"
But just as my hope froze , it unfroze as if it were only frozen for a second and not a millennium. 
My dreams turned from that river of frozen black tar to river of hope flowing to meet this Sunrise.
Those streaks and lines now playing with the curves of my river rushing...a dance as it were.

The light coming in was as stunning as my dark leaving was numbing.
All I can do now is stand in now as I stood before, but...
No longer frozen, no longer hidden
Recognized, placed and called
This time is mine now and I will own it as much as I owned the dark
I will let it go, I will let it come, whatever it may, I am ready.

AML

Fierce Is She

Dashed against the sand, left for dead
Stripped of her smile, stripped of her soul.
Sentenced to be pummelled by a fire of her demons.
All she could do was hide behind the rocks.
Her frail pale skin hugging the jagged black rock.

Like constant crashing waves,
This fire storm seemed never ending
Slowly heating the rocks
And they never stopped
She even believed this was all her life would ever be.

But while her tears fell and her tyrants blazed
Something started to happen.
The heated rock and her frail skin started to bond.
But more, the rock started to become her.

She opened her eyes and she thought the fires stopped but it wasn't
She stood up and thought there were gone but they werent
She was standing in their fire
And she no longer felt its burn.

A new blood flowed through her
Her frail skin now infused with the rock that she hid behind
Her eyes now filled with passion
And all the fire turned her hair red

She stands on a rock now
She is a rock
Her tyrants and demons no longer have power over her.
They saw and they fled.

A new her has been born now
With dreams and goals that she will hunt
Nothing will stop her like an arrow that has been loosed.
From years of being pulled back and held down,
She is new, she is ready, she is strong.

..."And though she be but little, she is fierce."

Red Air

Don't you see the way she wears her hair everyday around you
She wants you to run your hand in it and grab a fist full.

You hear her heels clicking slowly down the hallway?
She wants your to hear her and follow her 
To that empty conference room being remodelled.

All her dresses stop at the same length just peeking the side of her thigh
Begging for your hands to push her down on the table 
And slide your hands up.

She smiles and lowers her head every time she sees you.
Not from being shy.
But because she calls you master in her soul.

The red ribbon around her neck
Is more acceptable in the office than the black leather choker
engraved with your name that she keeps at home.

The red ribbon, the red heels, is not her sign of confidence
It is the power she wants to give you
Take her Soul, take her breath, take her hair, take her neck
Pull it, Squeeze it.

When you walk buy her desk, you have no idea how she stares.
She breathes you and you will never know
I swear she collects these snap shots of you 
Then goes home and releases to you.

The air we breathe is not the air she breathes 
You're her red, you're her master
You're everywhere for her
You're her red air.

AF 6/6/2015

War Lord

This is not a war of bombs

This is not a war of guns

Not of guns and not of sticks

This is war of stares and kissing

You called out my passion,

So come out and fight...

fight.

Fight for what you've earned

Stare deeper into my soul

You must, I need you to.

Hold my head and kiss me deeper

match my fire.

Warmonger.

All this time, well kept, hidden, defended.

You walked right passed the blockades

You walked right in as if you built the hidden trail 

You sat at my table behind my secret vale

And my spirit served you wine right in front of me without my permission

So fight.

You can't get my love that easy

So fight me and show me that your passion is worth every ounce of mine

Stare farther, kiss deeper

Let me feel your fire.

My stunned heart that you exist.

My exhale, that you stand looking at me, looking for me.

My finally, that you want me even if my want doesn't match yours

Ransom my tears of happiness for my loyalty

My spoils are yours.

Show no mercy

Pull me closer, kiss me till I can't breathe

Fight for this love that I need to give you

This love I thought would never be given ever again.

So fight.

This is not a war of bombs

This is not a war of guns, knives or of sticks

This is a war of giving love

For I did not know my love would be given

So fight me with your passion and free me of my suprise.

AF 6/4/2015

FREEDOM

I'm from a different country so I have to work twice as hard just to fit in
I'm black so I have to keep my hair cut properly at all a times
I'm big so when I have my hoodie on I have to accept when I small white lady crosses the street instead of saying hello as we pass each other on the sidewalk.
I drive a nice car so I can't put tints on because that's the final piece of probable cause.

When people are extra nice to me I can't get caught up in thinking if it was out of fear 
or surprise that I was actually a cool dude.
I do get to smile when your girlfriend looks at me like I'm what's been missing in her bedroom though.
Being stared at like a piece of meat has it's limits though.
When I'm in the cashier line behind a biker with "those kinds" of tatts, he puffs his chest up a little higher. "Remember to breathe bro".

Do you play basketball or football?  Oh you're Jamaican, do you smoke weed?
They'd be surprised to  know I have Aerosmith, Guns N Roses, Melissa Etheridge, Counting Crows and  Hootie and the Blowfish on repeat in my playlist along with Lil Wayne and Rick Ross and
My friday nights were spent listening to Shadow Stevens on American Top 40.

Freedom isnt free
Especially for "me".
So I smile and say hello, I say nice tatts man
I laugh and say no I've never smoked weed.
And I've put my size to use to help the weak.
I'm ok with those stares from your girlfriend though.

TOXIC

The only way to get her to leave is to make her see a demon
She will never accept responsibility for anything
She has to, she needs to... play the victim
She lives the life the sloth and pity, enabled more by her weak friends

I played into her hands, but I myself was less of who I am now
She was running from another demon, so I played hero 
As I was running from my own demons and this felt good
So we saved each other.

I awoke from my sleep and saw the remnants of my debacle
I weighed and measured myself and I was found wanting
She played along on this journey to be better
But in truth it was all a play, to start getting me to pity her
To never ask her to be better but yet applaud her dreams

That cycle has run its course, after years I realised that was all she had planned for me
Someone to hide behind while she spun a web of greatness only to opiate.
with no intent to make anything real except for the thought that she might.
I was carefully crafted to ensure her safety and happiness but to never ask anything of her.

Of course in showing that my eyes were open, 
She's perfectly prepared to enthrall me with guilt from my own mistakes
And because she's never actually done anything but weave dances of intent
I was left with nothing to battle with.

Whatever love there was in our finding each other
has now been boiled down to a thick glob of frustration, pity and resentment
Poisoned by my own weakness blindness and her need for my brokenness
Our jagged edges glued together but now its time to rip apart, but
The only way to get her to leave is to make her see a demon.

I Finally Went A Day Without Thinking About You

I finally went a day without thinking about you.
A breath was a breath and it didn't hurt to breathe
A smile from a stranger didn't remind me of yours
And the Sun was just light and not torture of another day without you.

I finally went a day without thinking about you.
I ate and I was only hungry, for food.
I walked to my car and I didn't hear your heels clicking beside me.
I saw a happy couple and I was actually happy for them.

Yesterday my right arm didn't need hugging.
I ran my own hand over my head and didn't need to imagine yours doing it.
I brushed my teeth without gazing.
And it didn't bother me that I only washed up one dinner plate.

I walked a little taller yesterday, propped up by hope it seems.
But I didn't realise until today when I was doing all these things again.
Yesterday I finally went a day without thinking about you
Today I wonder what else will I notice, as I come back...to me.

When Beasts Cry

I borrowed your time because I didn't want mine.
I made you smile at me since I forgot what that looked like 
I spent your company to fill in the blanks of my loneliness
I made you think about me because my head is hollow.

I stole your heart because mine is hardened
I took your kiss because it allows me to remember when I was good
Your gaze at me is that ray of sunlight coming through my prison window
Making you fall for me is all I know how to do.

Some collect expensive works of art
Others collect heads for trophies
I collect love
And I hang them off my belt

Walk into my fire, my kiss is deep, your breath will be taken, your body will quiver
You will forget who you are, you will forsake others and run to me, to be ...swept up.
But each time, I actually wanted to, each time was an effort to break my chain
But each time ended as I just don't know what to do next.
So I start over, looking for the 'it' that I made you find.

I found it once and it was torn away from me with such a wretched despise it taught me it must be so precious and so limitless, it must be fought for
And it must be sought after with no compromises and there will be that one difference
To let me know that I've found it...again

It must exist beyond her smile, beyond her kiss, beyond her fire
So I search and search....I has to exist...beyond her
I need to find it...again.
So I turn over hearts like rocks...searching.

But my hunter's art has become my craft and meaning has been lost
Now it's all I know to do
Am I meant to find it or or has my search lost sight?
What am I looking for, it or you?

My hunt continues, my craft has become me.
Strong enough to walk away.
Nose like a wolf to sense the next.
Cunning as a fox to make them fall before I do.
Cruel as a vulture when their love was not good enough.
Fast like a cheetah to get back on the trail.
The beast I've become is only to endure, to protect me.

My body never gets cold because I burn to feel like that again.
That's the warmth you wrap yourself in.
You breath is taken away because my claws squeeze your heart looking for what comes out.
Your body quivers because I've turned you upside down, inside out.
Searching every part of you, vigorously, assiduously...as if on a rampage.
To see if you could be 'it', to see if you could love me...the way she did.

I leave you scattered like a room vandalized
Your heart unable to bleed again
Your love...taken
Now on my belt with the rest, as I run.

All I hear now, my hands and feet pounding the night forest floor 
and my breath fueling my fever, my anger, my hurt.
Anger that you were not her, hurt that I had to give of me.
Only to be disappointed, again.

YOU DID THIS TO ME!
THIS MONSTER..IS YOUR PET!
WATCH ME SLASH MY WAY BACK TO YOU!

Scratches

As we put our ties on,

All we want to do is tear our skin off.

We use the mirror to put on a face everyone will love,

While we hide the true animal...beast...demon.

Sitting in traffic going to a place to take orders,

While our minds pound to run naked and free and fast, screaming.

Spending every ounce of energy to keep our hearts beating slow and quiet,

Because hearing it beat heavy in our ears reminds us that we've denied being alive.

We call 'them' animals yet we want their freedom, their limit...less...ness.

We impose and conform; cuffs, belts, ties, lipstick, ponytails, etiquette; elbows off the table, cross your legs...making every attempt to drown the banshee screams bubbling, swelling to come out.

We deny the essence, the energy, the true center of the very thing given to us that makes us unstoppable and we cover it up. 

But...it scratches, gnaws, snarling and biting like a wolf scratching at a trap-door to run free outside in the sun.  To run, to sweat, breathe, feel its heart pounding in its chest, hear it in its ears, love, hate, bite, fuck.

Fix your collar.

Sewn Oats

Your beauty has inspired dreams

Your beauty has made men walk away from their own dreams

Your beauty has also killed dreams

Your beauty has left men wondering in a black abyss

I've thrown away my life for you

I've walked away from my dream for the dream you are. 

Letting your beauty in was the loosening of the pillars under my world

Chasing after your beauty was my plunge into that abyss I now call home

Torment could never be more creative than to see a face I will never touch again

To remember a touch, a kiss a smell that will never repeat 

I open my eyes and see black

I close them, I see you.

This devil...this hell...your face...my heart.

Given, taken, ruined, cursed.

The Herd

I live among the lost, but I am not lost
I live among people who hate, but I do not hate
I live among the desperate but I have found my peace
I walk among the blind using my third eye.

I've unlocked my flesh and given power to my soul
My body is but a vessel and I have stopped listening to its cries.
I walk away from herded sheep and get the head nod of acceptance by the wolf to pass.
For I am no longer one of 'them'.

My Soul is alive now and it feeds on life as my flesh feeds on food.
They wear their burdens as trophies seeking pity as would a lying addict
I stretch my hand to save and help and show, but ignored like a beggar on the street.
My tears I will not shed.

An awakened soul must seem selfish because it is a light seen only by the seeker.
It's glory must be earned and thus cannot be given as a gift
Giving to the unappreciated is vampirical to our spirit
So we must ignore to lost who want to stay lost.

Life has more to offer than the desires of the flesh
Because even when the flesh is full you still feel something missing.
It's the acknowledgment of a soul unborn, with more to offer
A completeness of spirit and happiness, the real circle.

Searching for what you feel is missing is not in the desires of the flesh
Neither is it in the attaining of things
But in the elevation of soul healing and awakening
Divorce your flesh and fall in love with your soul.

Her Name Was...

If jet black hair was the sign of sorcery, she would be the Witch Queen
When stares turn others into stone, her glance rips your world apart
A singular gesture of her smile emotes a thousand whispers in my head lasting weeks.
Leaning in for the kiss was no different than moving in for the kill.

But what good is mystery if you see the reveal
The moving horizon envies her 
Even though she walked into my world, she crash landed in my heart.
Poisoned my lungs sneaking in like a mist
Then disappearing like a fast sunrise

The wind along my neck reminds of her jet black hair as she slept.
Echos of those whispers play around like butterflies in my ears
while I stare my world in a debacle
Yet all I want is a kiss.

Mystery woman, mystery love, mystery torment.
Licking my wounds waiting for the next coming
A love I may never have
Yet I have it so great.