Serve Conditioned, Salt to Taste

It seems I’ve leveraged my happiness,
To a paycheck that comes belatedly ...
Whilst the wilderness within is slowly stepping down,
Into a steady trickle of adult compromise.

Fond are the days I roamed free, full of abandon;
And there was a fire that was repulsed by the idea of adherence,
Throwing caution and picking apart structures meant to shackle
And where all that used to be, is tameness and lamenting.

The effervescence inside killed by spirits in bottles that money can buy,
Accepting nonsensically biased validation of skill and commitment
Regurgitated by the same vermin
That sell prescriptions to wild children to curb the untainted embrace of individuality.

What is this vortex that I don’t seem to remember ...
Signing up for whilst whimsically immersed in young delirious daydreaming,
And now as I bleed my need to escape on the strings handed to the puppeteer
The old road I yearn to travel has descended into a soft melancholy sympathy.

Dreams had never been the answer, dreams never made my bed
They never put bread on my table, never a roof over my head
So do I forsake them for illusions of acceptance and grandeur?
Long enough for the sweeping wave of lost identity to return home to unapologetic anxiety?

But I dream, as I write, the words no longer needing audience or applause ...
Ecstatic with the scars they seem to carve, a swansong of sweet wounds in even lit corners;
Tracing paths of previous strife and memorised coping mechanisms
To remind myself to hurt, to see if I still feel.

Scars

I care less for all the things you have going,
It's your scars I saw fleetingly that had me at hello
Longing to be acknowledged and loved ..
While like strangers in travesty, we grow to show each other our cuts and bruises.

What a wicked game you play,
‎To make me speak in rhyme this way,
What a wicked thing that you do,
To make me long for you.

I'm not fascinated by how you have it all together,
Now now, I can see through those rose-tinted shades honey-
And though you may ramble on about how sorted you keep it,
I long to hear how you bruised when you fell, just to pick yourself up and walk on your feet.

What a wicked game you play,
‎To make me speak in rhyme this way,
What a wicked thing that you do,
To make me long for you.

Hidden beneath coping mechanisms and captivating storytelling,
Is a battered soul who needs to see that travesty is best shared -
So whilst we're here entertaining our fascinations,
Indulge me and say you'd be willing to humor my madness for fleeting moments

What a wicked game you play,
‎To make me speak in rhyme this way,
What a wicked thing that you do,
To make me long for you.

All the world is a stage and we're the puppets tonight,
You have my strings and I have your cloak,
This tryst of ours, never could exchange fuzzy pleasantries
But by all means pull my strings and I will  push your buttons ...

What a wicked game you play,
‎To make me speak in rhyme this way,
What a wicked thing that you do,
To make me long for you.

Yours anxiously,

I always feel a surge of inadequacy coursing through my veins,
If I said it was a one-off and dismissed it with a joke ...
You've seen me for the pathological liar I can be,
Offering up meek witticism to swallow down the bile of my own uncertainty.

This stream of anxiety far outmuscles the ebbing brilliance,
Carefully constructed to divert how longing I am suspect to become of approval ...
Although sometimes the barebones wit and the stumbling boyhood charm break the ice,
And we happen to be doing well beyond the perpetual jitter, know that I'm a ticking time bomb.

I have this scar inside my head that seems to have developed unshakable inadequacies,
And on days I refuse to acknowledge him and flutter about with a contentment,
He leaves me bleeding at the throes of Mercy of someone else's fascination ...
Where my diminishing sense of self-worth is overjoyed that I've handed the keys over, one more time.

Look carefully into my eyes with all the sincerity you can muster when our paths do cross,
And you'll see me wearing all my life-force on my sleeve, like a pooch in much need of just your love.
If you think that makes me needy, I need you to politely step away,
For not even self-preservation interests me when I've succumbed to the charms of your existance.

I ask just one last thing human, if you see me care too deeply and you are not wired to return my affection,
Treat me like a fine piece of China and leave me on the shelf, for on it's own, my solitude is retrospective.
But don't cut me with mind-games and finely tweaked monopolisation and polarisation of my senses,
Because I'm anxious people, and we, are but a stone's throw away from being fed up of an existance validated by vicarious judgement.

Yours cryptically,

I talk better in rhymes than I speak in conversation, precious
My charm works better when my anxiety is hidden well, behind the limited dexterity of my fingers,
These lines, they sell an idea of me sometimes far removed from the uncertainty of myself,
And the words take shape better than I, to ask you with quiet confidence for what we may seek.

But when my fingers fade away,
And the conditioned brilliance dwindles,
When well practiced eloquence is replaced by feverish lines on a broken crutch,
And an identity rooted in myriad confusion fogs away the last bit of verbose illumination  ...

Would you still be enamored to know that I'd be a train wreck that's yet brighter than a star or two?
Maybe go out walking by the lake and find out what makes me tick?
Take a swim in my mind that is seemingly deeper than most care to dive in?
And would you care to decorate yourself in there whilst I watch you pick away with wide-eyed wonder?

For I talk better in rhymes than I am clear in conversation love, but do bear with me ...
You'll soon appreciate that I'm far more distinguishable by my silence
And if you must wish, you could have that too.

Stranger

I love it when we're strangers babe,
I love the fascination we have with what we don't know,
I'd trade this familiarity in a heartbeat,
For I hide my flaws behind a veil of mystery.

I love it when we're strangers babe,
Knocking down shots of tequila with a glint in our eyes,
I'd do us one better and tell you a joke,
Whilst you are still mindlessly receptive to the dwindling brilliance of my wit.

I love it when we don't know each other, gorgeous,
For it charms the life out of the lies I have ready at the corner of my tongue
All the while, while I pretend to be fascinated by the idea of you,
Whilst I'm terribly ignorant, drunk and desperate  for anonymous loving.

I love it when we're strangers babe,
Cause we may cut each other wide open like landscape,
And amuse ourselves with all the booze, banter and sex,
While we totally throw oblivious at how we may grow to despise each other with burgeoning familiarity.

I love that we're strangers babe.
And isn't it like a pretty gash on the vein that bleeds away ...
That when I do really get to know you,
Your fascination of me will flush itself in the confines of that pretty fucking mind.

A Muse Me

Loosen those locks love,
I like it when you let your hair flow,
Let me pick your brain,
The whiskey is abandoning my reason
So before it completely strips me to the bare threads of myself,
Let me in, inside that head, that, which the travails of man seems to forego in baser pursuit of the flesh,
Allow me there, where your darkest desires and your brightest flashes dance embracing your intricateness,
Let me in, love, while you move like droplets on a leaf, with cruel clairvoyance of my existence in your head,
Armed with practiced mischief and subtle arrogance about my whimsical dwelling;
Show me your songs and sing me some bars while we dance away each other's vibrations together in our little heads,
All the while, whilst looking into mine eyes with clandestine clarity
And remember me for who I am when we're this intimately platonic about our adoration,
That it scares me

That once the whiskey takes over, I'll be just another muse for your nights, intertwined in clumsiness and lust.

To Be

Be in wonder.

On those mornings where the rising sun is a little more than an alarm clock for the daily grind.

Be in wonder.

Of people, constantly evolving and reinventing themselves despite being circumspect to limitation and judgement.

Be in wonder.

Of things that humble and lay there with your humility stripped wide open.

Be in wonder.

Of love, and her many intricacies that follow no whimsical need of logic.

Be in wonder.

Of rum, cigarettes, coffee, sweet perfume and the blunt that goes by

Be in wonder.

Of things you understand and be in awe of things that understand you.

Be in wonder.

Of the sins of the flesh, for your habits are the only thing real about you. Indulge me.

Be in wonder darling, and if you're not drunk with the madness of your amazement, at that exact moment, be real.