Ruby stained lips uneasy in this grey atmosphere
Latching on to shark skin
Broken nails with peeling varnish
Clawing at the back of heels
Naked and drowning in forgivable sin
Because it brings a smile to your face
Your usual sour frame of mind
Wants a ride on a roller coaster
To bring it back to some love song you lost a long time ago
And you use that sadness and fear
To manipulate her body
Into pretzels for you to unwind
No thought to the mess left at the end of the evening
When she is left there to try and coil back up
Watching the door
Not having the strength left to close it behind you
Only the will to reach over to the crooked bedside table
And consume another shot of hatred

Have you lost what sense you claim to possess
Rainy sky streaked with your sticky neon bliss
You can't go home yet fella'
With your secretive explosion
Still tickling your brain
Maybe there is a place around the corner
Where you can perch your old jeans and tell the boys
Of your conquest
Don't forget to tell them what it cost

Grace was a girl
Never really a woman as she liked to make believe
Made up of translucent colours
Covered up with a blanket of soft curls and hand me down dreams
Waiting for Prince Charming to come and rescue her
Like in the movies she used to sneak into
I wish she'd been able to focus enough to see
What was hidden out back
A cemetery alley
Of unmarked graves being filled up one dollar at a time

Precious these days
The audience quieted by responses
That don't quite fit their existence
Pain of forgiveness without rightfully knowing
The reason why
It doesn't mean so much
When fingers are crossed behind your back
So you can reserve your despair
Because it's the only thing you know how to respond to

Without the darkness
There is no light at the end
Or the beginning for that matter
Comparisons and faces with shocked expressions
When statements become twisted
In their Chinese phone call game

She asked me if I remembered the lighter days
Yeah, but I can't put them in the correct order
They have been lost in time
Warped by a medicated bliss
Ensured of their return
But eying it with suspicion
My job is to be on the lookout for the enemy

This theatre cannot afford security
Just an individual with an old rusted shield of thick skin
Hand drumming the vibrations and sounds
That make sense at the time
The only ones that bring any radiance
I forgot you were there watching me writhe
And listening to these frightening bits of prose
That have escaped the confines of their prison

I broke the volume control last night
Now it does go to 11

Music, quiet voices
Strings attached to my piano
Where expression is what I need
Struggling to find it without you
Paintbrushes thrown against walls
Finger painting on floors that can always
Be covered over with old carpets

Word games that never exit my mind
They can't find their way out
Stuck in bubblegum, keeping me awake at night
Can't even count sheep
'Cause I end up sheering them, spinning their wool
And crocheting scarves
Recesses that don't seem to know how to stop
Processing

At times I miss the jargon and confluence of thought
Other times, it gets me through the day
I have remained at the mercy
Of things I cannot change
And liberated by hasty retreat
When mood strikes melody

Not much can be said for one so handsome
Invisible smile
The urge to set him free and have his chance
For the fog to burn away
Just reach across the water
Pull him to shore
Where it costs nothing
To steal a nap under the shade of a wild oak
And feel the warmth of the breeze
Carrying the scent of native Southern blooms

Expressive shadows
Timely divide of paint colours
Sharing the ink of time on paper
Stylized by some unknown sentient disguise
Such temptation to fortify another
Before this armour has been fully rebuilt

Creating as one
Doesn't seem that life's course is asking us
To take the same ride
How much begging can affront this question
Before time and two
Smears and tidal waves of emotion
Left on broken, concrete steps
Icy pavement stealing voices
Trying to slip away into the night
Mistakes of comfort and no one to know
The difference
Just us and we can't go back and
Change the lyrics now

Life is not a Shakespearean dream

Busy with these thoughts
Soft skin goose bumps
You are in my head again
My admittance
Still stirs
Where you are concerned
Bothers me
Because I can't seem to get a handle on it
I hear your voice and feel
You inside me
But I can't see your face
Like I've forgotten
How to visualize the moments
That are blind truth
Only scars for you to heal
With your charm
Your tears, your hands
I'm reflecting this desire
I want to love you
Feel you slowly
The weight of your body
These thighs begging your presence
Wanting it all
Any cost
To sanity or will
Melting with you
Beneath my opinions
And lust for a body
I am only imagining
Under me
This bed is empty
At times full of dreams
Conjured between bouts of
Idiosyncratic wanderings
And delirious echoes
That I can only find in my own time
I want to tell you
But I am pushed back by
Invisibility
And fracture
When I see you again
You will know
My temptation and weak devotion
I wish I knew you tonight though
So you could
Take me away to a place
On some island
That exists
Between these sheets
Silently turn me over to the moon
So we can
Try and make sense of it all
Quiet, still grip
Storm outside the window
Late night shower
Tumble to the floor
To mop up the laughter
Falling asleep beside you
Listening to your silence

Wish you were here

Winter's heavy passing
Leaching life from my veins
Can't it be over in the morning
Whenever that comes
If I can awake

This is what I wanted
And now cannot give away
Stale heartbeat
Surrounding me in all it's frankness
And solidarity

The gleeful glance down the highway
Through fields
I'm a few years late
Taking so long a path
Getting there taking it's toll
On these hands

Keeping up appearances is getting me down
I don't really want to be here anymore
Anyway
But there is always something to
Keep the excuses on the top
Of a pile of shit

Underneath the bruising
Who cares who is to blame
Time to lose the shivering guilt
Lease out the tension
To someone
Who needs some inspiration
For painting their masterpiece

Bored of everything
Uninspired to truly
Breathe
Without interruption
Lost here where
I got found

This void
Need to fill it up
With something fresh
Follow the truth right out the door

Summer breeze dress
Hands on hips
Toes tingling in sand
Scars open to the truth
Sorrow of hope in daydreams
That never made it to the screen

The warmth of stars bouncing off you
Stumbling through Charleston
Succumbing to desires
Neither of us knew we had
Secrets left in a small Florida town

Once in a while I go there
In disguise
Just to see if it's all the same
The city though will never see my light of day again
Memorial and fantasy
Wrapped up together and left
At Cherry Beach
To decompose

Galt Ave. and everything Under the Carlaw Bridge
The song, the Only, the whole broken scene
My life out of sorts
And pieced together again
I still sing along
When the mood strikes
That old CD is scratched and I can't find a new one

Me too

These lost days
Will not forgive me
For the words
Forced through with a slim breath
Your letting down will not
Allow me to follow
If there were any way to stay, I could do it
For you
And swallow this with the weather's woes
Shuffle off this shoulder sparkle
And continue
I still think of the day I sold
You down the river
And never let you have the paddle
I was hanging onto
Your voice in my mind
Calling back over turbulence and fear
Algonquin lost me
And I turned out to fuck you over
And it was so long ago
I hope everything is so well for you
Trust me, by this time
You would have let me go
I would have made sure there
Was something
You couldn't forgive

Middle of the road
I want to be in the middle of the road
Not waiting for traffic
Not trying to hitch a ride with a stranger
Just walking
Barefoot
Right on the yellow line
Balanced, breathing

It's a grave apprehension that accompanies
This lightness of days
Fearing gravity and it's gloom
If I lose all the helium in my balloon
All I'm left with is
A squeaky voice
That is far from amusing

If it gets loose
Who knows where it could end up

I see the future, bright and clean
Anxious heart holds me here
Hope for contentment though
Pushes me on
I am not blind to that sentiment
At the moment
So I will
Hug it close to my skin
And keep it alive

Today I am a Goddess
This morning the coffee tasted of sunshine and vanilla
I bought yellow tulips out of season
And I'm going to love them anyway
I gave myself a break
A wee time to not ponder
Still it creeps like ivy on a wrought iron cage
Knowing that at some point it will flutter
And fly away again

But today I could be a mermaid
Swim with the fishes and ride turtle backs
Swoosh
Wet hair dripping on hot sand
So tricky to just let it be
To take the risk of plunging off this imaginary tightrope
That is so trying to walk upon
Tiptoe quietly

I grasp it upside down with monkey toes and hang on
Maybe to swing, to fly and twist
Damn it
This is when I feel free
Is it enough to have just one foot touching the wire?

Would you rather be a caterpillar or a butterfly?
Butterflies are so lovely and free
While the caterpillar is kind of ugly and hunted
The safety then is in the cocoon
Warm, velvety soft and self contained
Huh