Remember to keep smiling
Keep smiling even when you don’t want to
When the world won’t stop spinning till you can’t breathe
When everything is fighting againist you
When the tide is pulling you down
When you can’t see the life cycle your in
Remember to keep going everyday
Chasing the simplest things
The sunsets keeping you moving
The way a stranger will compliment you today
The new friends you will make
The new memories you will create
The way someone will laugh around you
The moon shining bright
The way someone will treat you right
The deer that you saw on the way home
The way your dog licked you this morning
Snuggling up against you
The way they look at you
Loving every part of you
Keep smiling like there is no tomorrow
Keep smiling to make someone else’s day
The way you inspire the people around you
The way you lift someone’s spirt
Be someone’s whole world
Be the light in someone’s darkness
Remember to continue being you no matter what

I am a desert flower.
I bud and bloom in the dryest and darkest of places.
I will find a way.
I thrive in cold or extreme heat.
No sun damage for something so sweet.
The moon illuminates the obstacles in my way.
He was always keeping me in check.
I no longer flirt with death.
In the solitude is where I am blessed.
All my colors bleed into your subconsciousness.
I have trained with the best.
In the darkness is where you thought you had me.
Secluded and alone, but like a desert flower, I continue to grow.
The night wouldn’t last forever, and the sun began to shine.
Now I am feeling just fine.
The desert wasn’t the hell you hoped it would be.
It was a place where all the bad was stripped from me.
Though I mourned my former self I finally saw how much it helped.
Finally, my cells can breathe, and my soul is free.
I am a desert flower.
I am determined to grow.
In the face of adversity, I found I was never alone.

I remember, Laying sedated on a hospital bed. Angry and sad. Starring Into the dark hollow eyes of the officer dispatched to question my sanity.
I remember… Having the enemy of my enemy , kick in my door to save my life only to further make dim and tarnish my soul of drowning light.
I remember… That day in September when I regressed in meditation, asking God to show me what it was about me that attracted you.
I remember drifting into the void as the images of my uncle flashed upon mind between the basement and the water bed.
I remember the movie reel of the many lives, including my own daughter flooding my mind exposing the shared trauma.
( You were my uncle’s shadow)
In my mind I went crazy saying “ No! not my daughter!”
I remember the slander, the gossip,and the gaslighting between you and my family , who did nothing even when I was a child.
I remember sitting with grandmothers medicine in a field with other beacons trying to grasp for purpose … unpacking this , This hurt ,that goes deeper than DNA in a band of several life times , twirling around tree branches of the longest standing oak.
Ive battled demons that are not my own. Every moon cycle , through every upgrade of consciousness
I Rose above it all after every attack sent to my spirit that felt like lashes of fire being burned into my skin.
My inner child screamed louder than a death whistle on a foggy night of darkness, left to die .
They were wrong all wrong, every last one.
Because ive Opening doors in the darkest portals to only be handed a sword to slay every single figure of darkness.
I realize that After every blow of pressure I became a red diamond of cosmic power . A being birthed from many creeds
I know now that I am, and always was protected.

A product of humanities primal inclinations
To be stripped of my own
Without consideration
Persistently reminded
Through shame & ridicule
To give it a name, assign it a place
But bury it deep within you
And save face
Just now making peace with my sense of being.
I’m born again, curious & fearful.
The mentors, therapy, & books are but a safety net
For the force at my disposal.
It lays dormant- but it pushes & pulls
Til it humbles us, a reminder
That it is OURS to express
Each it’s own power.

every day i wake and wonder why we have to be so distant,
i love you enough to let you go,
i am selfish enough to ask that you stay,
loneliness belongs to the both of us as it belongs to everyone,
there are no other emotions so entitled to your being,
so entitled to your suffering,
there is nothing more human than to be lonely,

every night i talk to you in my head like a prayer,
every night i pray for a future that feels like a day dream,
there is nothing more to me than you,
there is nothing more lonely than to be with you and know i can’t be with you forever,
there is nothing more for me to belong to,
there is nothing more for me to want,

i die every night when i give myself to my body,
i must be lonely.
every day i wake and ask myself why am i doing this again/getting out of bed is the hardest part,
i must be lonely.
i wish i could nothing else but write,
i must be lonely.
if for no reason other than to make the indifference presence of a wretched inhospitable place buried beneath my soul material- empty, silent, unknowable.
i must be lonely.

every night i talk to you in my head like a prayer.
i want to put my heart in your hand.
i want to put what has always been there into my skin.
every night i talk to you in my head like a prayer, and i fantasize your voice responding to cope with eternal isolation. boundless emptiness, the pit that whispers coldly of the nameless dread that exists in the space between every man when we realize the religious gates they deny us access to true connection and comfort we seek from each other. the formless presence of insecurity, the things you distract yourself with when you are too afraid to be alone with the abyss in your soul as the only company.
every night i talk to you in my head like a prayer, and i never allow myself to think about what it means to feel the way i feel.
i will never allow myself to understand.

every night i talk to you in my head like a prayer,
i know you hear me

I’m full of joy
Grace and poise
Giving thanks to source, it’s all a choice

Not worried bout where the grass is greener
I water my own, keep a cool demeanor
Loving and kind I give and receive
Elegance and grace, become the belief

Beauty surrounds, from within so without
You’re gonna be great, without a doubt
Enjoying the peace that’s cultivated
All the fears evaporated
Becoming all that’s meant to be
This feeling really sets you free

Dear Unsealers,

It’s the first day of October.

Where has the time gone?!

The leaves are falling off the trees and changing colors. There’s a bit of a chill in the air and the sun is setting earlier with each day that goes by.

By the end of this week, we’ll be less than ninety days away from ending 2024.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

As is customary, I’ve written a welcome for the new month…

A welcome to October
31 days ushering in the last quarter of 2024

This month sees the first leg of the Poetic Journey come to fruition
As it’s no longer an idea on the wall
I can finally hold the book in my hands
Knowing that there’s more in store

A month where I cross the Atlantic
Hrvatska calls my name
To soak up the Adriatic over ten busy days

Even if there’s still hints of warmth
The leaves are changing as Autumn begins
Soon, the chill will add to the new season

There are no scaries to be found here
At least not until All Hallows Eve

Does it hurt you that just the thought of loving you makes others sick, scared, and disgusted? Does it hurt that no matter how much weight you lose, how much therapy you go through how much you change they view you as a freak? Does it hurt you that the only time you can stand to be alive is when your soul is drenched in the blood of your mind? Does it hurt that the only time you feel calm is when you watch your life drain out your arm? To only feel alive when youre nearly dead? You scream and pray but fear that no one is listening. Do you take comfort in the silence or do you fear looking into your soul knowing that you might finally come to the realization that the only way out is to shed your mortality.

To start at the top from the beginning
My plan was to drop myself from this living
Moving over to the left you’ll see
The pot I grew and smoked at need
Moving down will sum up the whole page
Cuz this life sux so I found rage
Up to the left is 3 empty bottles of Jack
And with one left to go you know trouble will attack
And if you drink all of this bourbon
A migraine I think is what you’ll be burning
Up in the corner with the Marlboro cigarettes
Is a tipped bottle of vodka I’ll never forget
Cuz every morning on the way to school
With coffee and vodka I’d try to be cool
Manson up there to sing about the drugs
With heroin to share my two-timed love
And a Zippo I always collected
To cook on a spoon what I injected
AC/DC is music to my ears
And Budweiser is the king of beers
And if these beers are in your fridge
Then there is a killer in the kitchen in which you live
The cigarette butt shows the most
Of how the cigarettes I smoke are gross
With Rolling Rock beer and kinky games to play
And a bottle of crown Royal I’m King of the day
The long line of beautiful Fame
Are women goddesses who make me want to change
The colorful square of cartoons down there
Is it made up fantasy so life ain’t so bear
The clown is me the poem is mine
Jail is my box and life is my time
And the poem says: “Clown in a box”
(This clown broke down cornered in his room
Inside he found no escape from his Doom
He loves his clown inside the box
Let’s shoved back down under pressure and a lock
Cuz he alone is much the same
In his empty home he goes insane
But what’s not the same as the Jack in the box
Is that he feels pain from life’s hard knocks
And we all know when life has him down
Because he won’t show the true face of a real clown
It’s no big deal because life is a joke
But his pain is real and his heart is broke
Now over time his tears are dry
Through all the years he’s had to cry
So no longer can this clown show any pain
From the box he has found only himself to blame.)
The Harley-Davidson will be my next bike
It’s been a dream my entire life
The beautiful cheeks you see from the back
Represents the only good crack
As I saw the beautiful ass
My jaw dropped down and unwinded fast
America is the land of the free
But sex drugs and rock and roll is what it is to me
When you enter the center I’m a monster inside
A suffering rebel poet freak with no place to hide
The Christmas holiday is my worst
And Pantera will always be first
The watch on the side is there to remind
It’s time to change and not rewind
And with an Irish blessing added to the list
Art doesn’t get any more modern than this.

I wrote this at Correctional Treatment Facility in the year 2000, Toledo Ohio

Drawing on top done by: Julia Speedy
http://www.julialovestomakeart.com

I left the door open so that i could walk out
And i stood on the other side of the doorway, encouraging myself to follow
She didn’t move
I didn’t budge

So empty and unsetting
I shouted “come on girl, lets go”
But she followed up with a blank stare

I wondered if i was okay
Was she?
Were we?

I attempted some hand gestures hoping she would move
But she didn’t
And i squinted in confusion

Then i thought about what i needed
From me

So i walked through the open door
Gently grabbing her hand
And walking toward the exit

She followed
She smiled
I smiled
We were okay

Out the door we made it
Leaving all emptiness behind
And we hugged filling the space that once felt unsettling

How loving, accepting, and forgiving Nature is;
How patient IT is;
How welcoming;
For us to trample over you without any sense of direction;
To spit onto you, fostering no sense of respect;
We litter your beauty rather than our abodes;
Yet you love, yet you accept, yet you understand;
You recognize that we are blind to that which we do not see at times and you are patient with us;
Not only do you recognize us as your children, you also recognize that we are you, both individually and collectively;
When will the moment come where I understand myself the way you understand yourself;
When will I open both my eyes and heart as you do;
I wonder

I approached the entrance of the Great Unknown;
Lost I was, I wandered aimlessly in the dark;
I left my mark on a wall bathed in graffiti;
Ears ringing of various noises once familiar to me, but now sounds of a time long ago;
I desire to synchronize with this foreign body once again, so I tread on in paranoia;
I wander evermore;
Deeper and deeper;
Deeper and deeper into the labyrinth until I find what it is that I AM searching for most;
Still I not find this item of magical wonders;
Do I look outward so much that I forget once more that I already possess this treasure

I think I’m the prettiest when I am crying
When a flow of words
Isn’t enough to describe
What overwhelming emotion
Is occupying my heart
A flow of water
Out of my honey colored eyes
Writes a beautiful soliloquy

With dark and dampened eyelashes
And wet rosy cheeks
I can say so many beautiful words
With only the drops of liquid glass
Falling from my eyes

Do you think that it’s possible
for someone to be so good,
that God calls them home
before you think He should?

We say it all the time,
“God must have needed him.”
but a lot of those times,
they didn’t even believe in Him.

There’s no other reason
that you would call Brad home,
and his beautiful fiancé
would be left all alone.

Now our whole family
is questioning your plan.
Why, God, why
would you take this young man?

You’ve broken the heart
of a father and a mother.
And let’s not even mention
what you did to his little brother.

The ripples flow further,
they hit my wife too.
Her mother is his aunt
now SHE is mad at you.

Granny holds it together,
sewing like a thread.
Even though she’s strong,
she wishes it were her instead.

This is so unfair,
and all a bit unusual.
But what do you expect,
when a wedding becomes a funeral?

We see you moving.
Guiding us through.
In all of this darkness,
we’re all seeking you.

So God, move in,
wrap your arms around this family.
You say you’ll work this for good,
even though it’s a tragedy.

Although we’re all grieving,
one thing is for sure.
It is only by your grace,
that we shall endure.

I know Bradley is with you
up there in Heaven.
And I know that he sees
all the love that’s been given.

Please give him a hug
from all of us here.
Tell him we miss him,
and we’ll hold him so dear.

Thank you for what we still have,
and remind us each day
that this life is a gift,
so live it the Bradley way!

~Amen~

RIP Bradley Davis. Forever 23.