Tell Me Lies

Hide me away. Tuck me in a safe little corner where the monsters can't find me. Tell me that if I close my eyes then I am invisible, and not a thing can harm me. Hold me in your arms and promise me that the shadows won't consume me. Make me laugh and smile and assure me that as long as I do the tears and pain won't find a way towards me. Feed me a mountain of lies and let it hide reality from my sight. Let the feeble lies shine so bright they blind me from everything that is true.

Look into my eyes and see how bare and broken my soul is. I promise I will try with everything that is left in me to let you see what it truly looks like. Strip away my outsides, pull away the shell, the little pieces of hard metal and unyielding rock. Scrape them off the skin they are stuck to, and peel off the masks that became a part of the bones. Get those hundreds of layers out of the way and tend to the creature that I am underneath. Rock me gently to sleep and promise me that as long as I keep the shields away the nightmares won't come near me.

Tell me everything will be alright. Say it over and over again. Yell it at me as loud as you can until your voice drowns out the endless noise that surrounds me. I promise to try to let you say it, I promise to try to believe you when you shout. Comfort me as you would a child. Tell me empty words that won't make a difference, and make me promises that you can't keep. Hold me as I cry and don't try to make me stop. Tell me that you will never leave. Promise me to be my constant in an ocean that is anything but. Tell me to break down, and promise me that you will hold all my pieces and keep them whole and safe for me.

Make me a child that can hide and believe the troubles won't find them. Reverse the clock and undo my adulthood. Take that horrid thing called being a grown up away from me, and throw it far enough that I can never find it. Do the impossible. Hide me from my responsibility. Tuck me in a safe little corner where I no longer have to fight. Tell me that if I close my eyes then I am invisible, and invisible people are allowed to give up. Hold me in your arms and promise to keep me safe from everything,  most importantly myself. 

They Never Tell You

They never tell you the full truth. They never tell you that your life will never be whole again. They never tell you all the things you need to know, and they never tell you all the things that by all rights must be known.

They tell you you'll be homesick. They tell you it's going to be a difficult adjustment. They assure you that eventually you'll be fine. They tell you time flies, and eventually you'll come back home. They tell you a lot of things, but they never tell you the bits that matter.

They don't tell you that you build a life for yourself. They never tell you that the homesickness goes away because eventually it feels like home. They forget to mention that you find yourself friends that become your family. They fail to tell you that you get attached.

They don't tell you that it feels like that very first goodbye, that first time you left home, when the journey ends and you must go back. They don't tell you how much more it hurts because it's permanent. They don't tell you how painful it is to say goodbye to a place that became your home.

They don't tell you that you'll be filled with a sadness that doesn't ease when you should be happy. They don't tell you that you'll shed tears when you pack. They don't tell you that you will break down what you built brick for brick, and you will end up missing something that is a mere memory for as long as you live.

They don't tell you the truth of it. They don't tell you that it starts with being homesick and ends with it as well. They don't tell you that your life becomes nothing but a series of goodbyes and hellos, and that you'll spend the rest of your life missing someone, something, or somewhere. 

Choking

I'm choking on contradictions. A hundred opposites coursing through me and fighting their way to the surface. Happiness and sadness. Excitement and dread. Hope and fear. Faith and loss. I feel them all. I smile as I sob and I find myself crying when I laugh. I skip around in joy, and then all of a sudden I shrink back into myself and drown in despair.

I feel too many things to feel anything but a lack of air. The tangle of emotions inside me is too loud to be ignored and too messy to be faced. I try to figure them out and to feel them all, but the more attention I give them the stronger they grow. The more I ignore them the more tangled they become. Any way I handle them they grow heavier on my chest, heavier in my throat and behind my lids.

I'm suffocating. My strength is battling my weakness, trying to dislodge the mountain of rocks that is keeping me from breathing but it won't budge. A hundred contradictions is one too many and I'm just lost in the storm they've all wrought up, running around blindly looking for air. I'm tired of it all and yet I am so energized. I want to despair and yet I am filled with boundless hope. I wish to cry but every tear comes with a laugh and the balance carries no relief. I want to scream but the only sound I carry is a whisper that's lost before it ever finds its way out.

I'm being torn to pieces by my contradictions. I'm choking on their fights, and I'm losing my battles because of them. All I know to do is to ride them out. All I can do is choke and choke and choke until they somehow all balance out. 

In The End

I wrapped my body around his leg, holding on with all my strength. I didn't care that I was being childish. I couldn't bring myself to care how silly I looked. I couldn't bring myself to care that I was forcing myself on him. I held on with arms and legs, and I closed my eyes and willed reality to not be real. I willed the goodbye away, I willed the ending away.

He tried to pry me loose. He tried to talk me into letting go. He told me how it was for the best, how we would both be better off without each other. He said it would never work. He said it didn't matter how long I held on, eventually my strength would waver and he would shake me off and walk away. He said I was delaying the inevitable. He said I should just let go and let things take their course.

I held on through all his words. Through the nice ones and the harsh ones. Through the tenderness and the yelling. I held on with all my might and believed with every fiber of my being that if he would just accept that we were destined for each other, then everything would be fixed. I held on as he tried to shake me off. I held on as he began hurting me to get me off of him. I kept holding on.

But he was right. Time passed and my muscles began to ache. I held on through the pain of it, but eventually my grip loosened. My hold wavered. My shaky arms and legs began to ease off of him. He pushed me away from his leg harshly. He shook his leg like he was happy to have gotten rid of me. And he limped away without a backward glance.

In the end all my effort was wasted. In the end I had only hurt myself by holding on for so long. In the end I was left bruised, shaking and hurting, and he just walked away without harm. In the end he was ok, and I was not. 

I'll Close My Eyes

I'll close my eyes and walk blindly. I will let go of all my fear, and I will set aside my worries. I'll forget all about the thorns in my path, the boulders, the rivers of flame and all the other traps. I'll close my eyes and just trust. I will let my faith be my sight, and I will surrender to that deep rooted knowledge that I will be fine.

I'll close my eyes and just walk. I will walk in big sure steps, and I will do so without hesitation. I'll forget all the times my feet wavered, and for this moment I will break free of all my restraints and run without sight. I'll run and just trust. I will let my faith be my guide, and I will surrender to that deep rooted knowledge that no harm will touch me.

I'll close my eyes and run without care. I will run as fast as I can, and I will let the wind chase away my every last doubt. I'll forget all the times I was stuck, and for this moment I'll pretend I'm not bruised, broken or cut up. I'll breathe and just trust. I will let my faith be my healing, and I will surrender to that deep rooted knowledge that Allah is by my side.

I'll close my eyes and surrender my life completely to my faith, and I will let the peace of that surrender wash away every last trap lying in my path. I'll close my eyes and just trust. 

I Wish Things For You

I wish things for you. I wish them for you with a desperation that stems from the very cells of my bones, from those unknown pieces that make up my soul. If I could find a way to make those wishes come true I would pay any price -I would pay in blood and being. I would do all that it takes.

I wish you saw yourself for what you truly are. I wish you could take away all those extra layers and see the person that's hiding underneath. I wish you could bare the true you to yourself, and see underneath all the confusing emotions and all the demanding compulsions that float on the surface of you.

Push those feelings aside. Take away the desperate need for any other soul, strip away the obsessions and all the compulsions that come along with them. Strip away the happiness that you feel in the presence of another person, and peel back the sadness that dampens your mood when you're left alone. Look under all of those distractions and find the person that is truly you. The person that is hiding, shying away from the waves of emotions that it can't handle and can't even fathom.

When you find her in her little corner, when you finally see what has become of her, what you've done to her, take her hand and bring her forth. Pull her to the surface and ask her that question she's been dying to hear; what do you want? What is it that you desire? What does your little heart need?

Perhaps you will find that what she wants isn't what she's been getting. Perhaps you will see that what you've been giving her in her name is the opposite of what she's been wanting. Perhaps you'll notice that you've been underestimating her all along, and while you thought that you and she were weak you were wrong. She was strong, strong as the sun, but you were the moon and you hid her light from view.

Let her out. Let her out of her hidden corner, give her the freedom she needs to break out of you and help you break out of all those mad feelings that are chaining both of you down. Stop abusing her for the sake of a feeling that was born with no cause and will one day fade and disappear leaving the both of you scarred and pained. Love her more than you love any other person and stop hurting her again and again for the sake of another being.

I wish you would believe in your strength. I wish you would bet on yourself. I wish you would take a look inside you and see beyond the layers of illusions you're hiding behind. I wish you would realize that you have the power to walk away from the madness, the hurt, the lies and the the endless ups and downs. I wish you would take the time and effort to walk through a little rain and reach the rainbow on the other side.

You can. I swear, you can.

For my Jay.. 

I Always Will

You came at me. You came at me with spirit and mind. You crushed my defenses with your words, and tore away my restraints with nothing but yourself. You crashed your way into my heart and my life, and forced your love onto me.

I loved you. I loved you with all my broken pieces and with every tiny part of me. I loved you a love that was maddening, a love that shouldn't have existed. I loved you so much that I trusted you with complete abandon. The kind of trust that should never be given, and should never be had.

I gave you all of me. All and every part of me. And you took them all. You took and took until nothing was left of me. And then when you were safely locked within my heart, you stole the most precious pieces of me. You stole everything that I am. You betrayed me. You crushed me. You broke and tore me. You took away my wings and grounded me when I once flew. You smothered my fire until I no longer burned.

I hated you. I hated you with all those fibers that were the remnants of my pathetic being. I hated you with passion and when I used that to light back my fire it was of a new color that I didn't recognize. My flame was black and bloody. My flame was anger and scorn. My flame was darkness and hurt.

I nurtured the black flame and threw it at you. I lashed out with my new fire. I consumed you with that same black that you forced inside of me. And I watched you disintegrate as my poison took hold. I watched as what you did to me drove you over the edge, and I watched as you fell.

My anger calmed. My scorn faded. My black got drained. And I saw what I had done. I looked upon your broken corpse and I let my tears wash away the last of my wrath. For in the end, after your betrayal and after all was done. The truth is simple, and how I hate myself for it. I love you still. I always have, and I always will.

Inspired by Maleficent ..