Collective

 

And I hold the collective us

tightly in my arms, a hug

of hope and dreams.

A belief in the goodness in humanity,

when we cleanse

the dirt from our hands.

 

Then I take a slow walk

between each face,

every colour,

every race, every size, every shape,

every weighted soul,

clean or unclean.

Every dream you've ever tasted, liquid honey,

that I feel in mine.

 

And I say, I am we, we are me,

you are they, and we are love,

 

For I love me

and I love you unconditionally.

Like waves upon a sea, we merge as one.

An open ocean of our dreams and hopes,

our fears and our flaws, our highs

and our lows. A sea of sorrow and joy.

A fluid unity of humanity.

 

And our shorelines glow

with sands of hope and golden futures.

 

So, sink with me under the waves,

for there is still so much more depth to uncover.

Surface glare hides so many layers inside,

so come in, pull up a chair, let us discover

the hidden beauty under the stare of the moon.

 

You can breathe deeply under here.

You can see the truth circling,

like fish in the deep.

And you can feel the love held deep

in the currents that breathe through

every thought. Every seashell of honesty

sounds like waves of humanity.

 

And we won't ever be caught in nets,

for no one hunts.

And our peace is sailing on

the waves of strangers, as they

smile lips of grace.

 

And I am you, you are me, we are they,

and love sits in the waves.

Disassociating

 

Take all of the magic moments,

the hope that comes from first love,

the holidays in the sun,

the hug from a loved one,

the starlight sparkle of midnight,

the dazzle of the stage lights of life,

all the warmth, the love, the hope,

the dreams, the sunbeams

on your cheeks, the stolen seconds

of relief on days when it feels

the world is only rumbling underneath.

 

Because

it can hit like a brick,

the moments

when you feel alone.

Even though

you are surrounded

by those that you love.

The world still swallows

you up, and you feel like all is gone.

Every memory, every smile,

every happy teardrop. Just void.

Empty. Paranoid.

 

And for a second, you feel

every bead of sweat, every regret,

every ripped heartbeat, and every torn memory.

Your muscles feel leaden, heavy,

and you try to swallow the panic.

But it sticks in your chest like

a weighted hand grenade ready to go off,

 as you forget how to breathe,

and your heart sounds alarm bells

in irregular beats, and then nothing

but...

 

The grief, the guilt, the crumbling self-belief

that was beaming only moments ago.

I'm letting everyone down, I'm souring the mood,

it all thaws like snow

in the middle of a summer heatwave,

the happiness drains, in gurgled heartbeats.

Your gargling thoughts just bubble then pop,

leaving you empty.

Colour-blind and depleted of all energy.

 

Your legs don't move, your head

just sits in a darkened room,

you can't find a light

in the deepening gloom.

It's all just empty. Alone in a former war zone

that is now just debris-strewn wasteland,

with no landmarks to help

navigate through the wide-open maze,

all the invisible walls you have built in the way.

And you crash, and crash, and crash. And...

And...

And

 

Nothing. Just pain from panes of glass,

smeared with what used to be you.

The disassociation, like you are outside

viewing in, and the view is just distorting.

 

But those memories, those hopes

and dreams still sit somewhere

deep within you. So, dig and dig,

until you feel your fingertips sinking in,

find a single sliver of a morsel to cling to.

And you will come through this.

Smiling as wide as the horizon,

when the storm is through.

Memento of another space

 

Still silence. A crash,

the moment of impact, a fragile vessel.

Shockwaves carve apart the sky,

before the blast rang out. A fallen star.

A new start. A story born of fire and ash.

Cast to a new home, in a ship of glass.

 

A smash,

as mementos of another

time and space

became tender fragments

of rain on a winter day.

Fire and brimstone to soft skin.

A child alone. Unsure.

Unsteady. A newborn deer

in an earthquake zone.

Stares at the moon.

Uncertainty in how to move.

How to fit into this skin suit.

No instruction manual on being a human.

 

A cry to the skies, primal roar rides high,

for home lies on distant solar tides.

 

The cycle of seasons saunters by,

the moon visits then leaves every sky.

The child cries at every loss,

never grasping that each loss

is temporary, and the wailing

won't stem the rain.

Those monumental stories

lodged in his brain,

a world away from perfect.

No map to this pain.

 

So alone. So alone. So alone.

 

Endless summers into wild winters,

ferocious thoughts from vicious voices.

He simpers. Wilting, a flower in the chill wind.

So far from perfect, he thinks.

 

He thinks he thinks he...

 

And into wavy dreams he swims,

for a brief glimpse at where from whence

his memories seep in - a place

so distant, far beyond the stars,

with crystal skies and flying cars.

 

Back to reality, as a screeching

voice yells at him. These people seem

so certain in their skin, yet don't

see the magic within.

Yet I fall and I bruise, I scream

at the abuse, but hold back oceans

for them.

But the world just screams louder...

Deafening.

 

It's no use. I'm not like you.

 

And avalanching time crashes

mountains into ice castles. Crushes hope

into glass, fragile and weakened

by the thin skin of time.

Life a series of battles, bottled up

and stored in a cupboard.

Drinks them down in cascading sighs

like the tears that fall from his eyes.

Wondering why?

Where was his peaceful sky?

 

Visions of alien expanse, rose-red

fields lit by twin stars, vapour trail

comets dance between them.

But now he just scrawls sonnets

in a notepad always kept in his pocket.

 

Trying to understand humanity,

a line at a time, the beautiful and

ugly combined, to no longer be confined

to his prison mind, or feel the need

for a space rocket, to escape this

angry rock and its vicious wildlife.