The Monsters I Keep in My Mirror

19.

what light shines invisibly

Light refracting and reflecting
Colors dispersing in wild directions
Never restricted
Blind to the stares of passersbys
Shining unrelentingly
Until the power is drained
Watching endlessly as gossip and laughter echos
I am like the Tiffany lamp
Always watching and wishing
To shine a little brighter
Hoping that someone will look to my shelf
And smile and marvel at my color
All my broken glass and see some value
Mourning myself when the light drains
And everyone goes home
And I am stuck in this endless loop
I hope atleast
Even with my last breath
I might someones path
Or brighten someone's day

20.
the beauty of the Lilly

A lilly blooms in the summer sun
beauty in the midst of the storm
A hand covered in dirt from a grave
Reaches out to caress the lilly
The lilly once pure and white
now tarnished with this sorrow
A man comes a long in a neat pressed suit
picks among the lilies sisters
And sets it in his lepel
He sets off to sell a soul
The lilly weithers from the mans scornful stare
a parade of people beautiful and cheerful
Waltz by with clumsy steps and wine fueled laughter
They wear masks to hide their dispare for life
The lilly is trampled by forgetful feet
This lilly has learned this world of hate
Understood this fear we feel this greed this self obsession this envy
And all the things we bear alone
a little girl comes with her crown of flowers
A smile on her face
Joy in her heart
Unwaivering faith in her soul
She looks upon this broken lilly
And smiles and proclaims that it is beautiful

21.
the layers of my heart

I think I am too old now
To be someone's first love
While the world was out embracing love
I hid in my corner and swore the world hated me
We all grew up
And you learned about the world
And I learned about myself
Carved myself like wood
Until I saw a clear image and artful rendition
You were carved by your first lover
who told you how to feel
you felt heartbreak at the hands of a love
My heart was broken by the passage of my childhood
I suppose though we are one in the same in some ways
I will have my first love who will break my heart all over again
and you will understand why a heart can be rebuilt
You will come to the edges of yourself
and I will learn to find the center of who I am
find the planet I orbit
And we will find out who we are
Sing requiems for who we could've been
so I won't be anyone's first love
but first love never lasts
it sits like layers of paint on a well loved wall
Always there but no longer what defines you
I wonder if my first love is in the stars

22.
The waters edge

I feel like stagnant water
no rock to send ripples to shore
a sign that I am alive
too comfortable in this stillness
there is nowhere for me to go
I am not a stream that flows constantly
only a still pond that few will visit
no forward movement
I could just let myself evaporate
become one with the dark sky
but beneath this still black depth
I hold an ecosystem relying on who I am to keep functioning
plants that live within me
fish to eat the plants
an never ending system of living just to live
they rely on me
I examine my reflection in the still black water of a stagnate pond
I cannot see all the life below
just my imperfect face
I wonder if the world told me there was nothing more
if I would believe them
if friends and neighbors insisted that there was nothing more
then the reflective still surface
and when someone dips their hand in and sees what is really there
breaks the pristine glass
will the world call them insane
and will I fear the same admonishments and
never reach my hand into this life sustaining water
so we all sit at the bank for an eternity obsessed with our reflections
jealous of the perfection we see in others faces
never seeing the truth
But I am this stagnant pond
and i reflect who you are
words the stone you hurled into my depths
the ripples I wished for
now the thing I lament the most
will I ever see the truth?
the truth of what lurks in the depths of who I am?

23.

my heart has sunk a million times
coauthored with: @fatherfig






Text version:

Spoiler

i saw you in a refraction a light
i chased into the cold blue
illusions of who you claimed to be
my only source of light in this darkness
had i known you were a reflection
i may still have chased after you
i am entranced by the promise of your hateful love
you draw me in like a foolish moth to the flame
but only fools are truly free in this ocean
and the water burns my lungs yet i swim on
stuck in the endless loop of chasing something worth feeling
drowning in the depths of my total emptiness
this sand in my palms feels like rock bottom
and the light doesn't cast so far anymore fading
just as who i am has faded completely
the versions of myself i tore apart for you
i hear their whispers through the water
they call me icarus but i call myself alone
my childhood screams for me to remember why i am here
why i stray so close to the sun in this lonely sky
why when i've fallen i drift finding my way
to the boiling vents in the sea floor to find a new sun
i embrace the darkness like an old friend
tired of looking for the light in this sea of sorrow
only to be reborn and given fresh wings
made anew in this plight for freedom
i realize i'm chasing hope

24.

Life on the key ring

rusted and old
crafted with care
ornate depictions carved into the soft metal
made to perfectly fit
just as it always should
if it doesn't work perfectly why should it exists
to lay in a drawer forgotten
to be bought and sold for it's beauty
kept so close in your pocket
day after day to let you
this is the life of a key
now tarnished by your fingers you didn't care to wash
warn down by the relentlessness of it's job
but you don't really care do you
you have other keys that do the job better anyway
just forget it in the folds of your couch
that's the easy thing to do

25.
I confine myself with nonexisten chains

The compfort of this lonley darkness
I confess my hate for so often
cry tears as proof of my lothing
for this solitary existence
but when light shines in
i crouch back like a scared animal
afraid of the warmth a strange sensation to me now
i cry at our proxcimity
my words tumble out like a waterfall after a rainstorm
I return to my cold dark home
and recount every mistep
a cut to my heart for every wrong word
so while I pray for the sun to shine on me again
i cower from it like it will burn my skin
afraid of all I wish for
so here i stay cold and alone
waiting for the sun to rise

26.
ode to the ceiling fan

I feel like the blades on my ceiling fan
Always moving in relentless rotations
That bring me right back to where I started
I work tirelessly to cool you down on hot days
And you forget me when summer ends
I watch from above year after year
Spinning spinning spinning
I revolve for an eternity
Collecting dusts
The bits of you that you never learned to miss
I watch you pack your boxes and move away
I watch Your child grow up
And cry at your hand
Watch her find love
And fall out of it
And find who she is in the absence of you
I watch her stare at the ceiling fan
On lonely dark nights
And I watch her
write me a poem

27.
withered and dead

I bought a plant
I set it on my shelf, finding the perfect shaft of light
I watered it daily and watched it grow
I don't remember the day I first forgot to water it
can't remember when the first wilted leaf fell
now I look at it my plant has withered until it is nothing more then dirt
a year ago it was beautiful it brought me hope
but I forgot about it one day
promised myself I would water it the next
but I was too absorbed in pointless wanderings
my attention focused on the faces of the people who left me on their shelf to rot
I sat on your shelf like a trophy
Watered with the tears I wiped from your eyes
I withered away I am long gone from your unforgiving memory
My plant still sits on my shelf
Even now dead and gone
And I tell myself still that someday I will take the time to water it
But I know I will forget
Until I am as desolated
Hold fast dear
You can always buy another plant
And set it upon your shelf

28.
The fates watch me
Fingers pull thread
they move like an elegant dance
in and out intertwined
just like my lifes futures and choices
my fate being commanded
a million small decisions woven into the fabric of me
are the things i say
the turns i make
the people I love and leave
the things that make me who I am
am i defined by the sand
the waves upon my shore
in and out with the tide
always changing
but you can't really tell can you
not until I am completely unrecognizable
i hope when you see the patterns in my skin
they are turned beautiful
covering the stains
places where you see the joy
when a child looks up into my eyes
they see the joy of living
i hope that i have born the pain of life for them
i hope that you lay me among flowers
and talk of the good times
and keep in your hearts the bad
and laugh and say
i would have wanted you to
because I do
so if I am this tapestry
of who I have been
who is weaving it
and who will look upon it
when I can no longer see it in the mirror
and if you come along
and pull one thread
will it all unravel
and will you see the real me

29.
Questions
a question
are monsters born or created
were we destined to hate each other
did the stars determine the words you said
that made me feel worthless
or were we molded like clay
taking in everything that hit us
soaking up the hate of others
like a sponge set on a dirty counter by a tired mom
did you cry one day
and those tears filled your sea of pain
the tide washing in
making you the person who made me who I am
through words you forgot
with eyes you cannot understand in the mirrors reflection
were we born to ruin ourselves
or did someone hurt you too
were you changed in the way you changed me
did we inherit our parents hardships
cursed by circumstance
generations of nothing ever being alright
bur everyone always being okay
okay until we're completely broken
okay until we can't be fixed
and yet they shame us when we try to fix ourselves
is that what made us monsters
or did we do this to ourselves
does the monster lie within me
hiding behind pretty pictures
smiles for the camera
maybe I am the monster
and you're the hero
the world has the right
to keep me locked up
maybe the monster is the world

30.
The monsters I keep in my mirror

these things I hide behind refracted light
fears I keep hidden behind a smile
thoughts of death
the passage of time that leaves me weak
realities that slap me with the burning truth
bodies that lie like a my personal crime scene
people I coerced into using me
thoughts I cannot let the world hear
joy i feel to ashamed to share
eyes i learned to hate
teeth that drip blood and vile words
lips that form a mask
hiding the tears i refuse to let fall
and the tears that flow all too easily
all these things I see in the parts of me I hate most
what part of me could I ever love
will anyone ever love this reflection
i am born anew created from the ashes of your despair
I have grown wings and learned to love them
but like a moth to the flame
i am lost in these temptations
are you the key to my existences
am i the dagger stabbed into your heart
are we drowning together in the lies of the world
the lies we speak into the pains of glass
the words I wish I had crafted carefully
watered them
pruned them
and brought them up like they were my child
blooming into flowers
you stop a second to smell
and they make you smile
but every rose has it's thorn
and now you've bled out from this false beauty
all the things I could never understand
all the words in this harsh world
all the emotions that cut me down to dust
all the tears I tried to make you believe
all the times I wished I held you
all the scars I left on my skin
all the parts of me I hate the most
all the parts of you i wish i loved
all the lies the world told us as children
all the truths we couldn't speak
these are the things I collect fondly
my treasure I value most
these are the monsters I keep in my mirror
and every time I see myself
they come out to play