Look around you,
at the dead faces;
hollowed-out eyes,
empty, open mouth;
broken visage of a human being,
far removed from their soul.
Satellites drifting,
in lifeless space,
occasionally banging,
against something,
occasionally, someone.
No connection,
no meaning,
no passion,
to be kindled.
The lost years,
in full swing.
Look around you,
at the dead faces.
There is a confidence problem,
people have too much,
or else, too little;
there are few in the happy medium.
People blanket themselves with pictures,
and get the same comments;
"so pretty"
"purrtttyy"
"damnn!"
"qt!! xox"
"hot! lol"
Don't you ever get bored of that?
Isn't there something more to communication,
than surface-level interactions meant to stroke,
each other's egos and need for acceptance?
Confidence is not relative to the size of a person's self-portrait galleries;
hordes of photos does not translate into high confidence,
in fact, the opposite may be closer to the reality;
who knows?
The base-level interactions worry me;
we now have the tools to unite behind common goods,
and we waste it uniting behind fake comments on good looks.
Sure,
you might be beautiful,
but I want you to offer me more;
I know,
I'm demanding.
Where is your essence;
the artistic photography,
the metaphysical poetry,
the social commentary,
the inspired music,
or philosophical comments?
Feed me something real,
not just pictures of how almost-naked you can be.
She's going to destroy you,
believe me.
Twice bitten,
never shy;
the words of youth or bravery,
somebody with an invulnerability complex,
or maybe all of the above.
I'm guilty,
to hell with the consequences,
there is no judgement coming,
save for self-judgement,
and the judgement of your peers,
and if you can't handle that yet,
you haven't really been living.
Watch out for the pessimists,
along with their poison words,
and the way they sap life from everything,
and give life to nothing.
Be optimistic,
I know life sucks,
but suck it up and move on,
that's the only way to be happy.
Insanity is an interesting follower;
it stalks you like thoughts of death,
or a jealous ex-lover on Facebook,
though less aggressive than the last.
There is no rush for death or insanity,
they will visit us all some day,
and when they sink their teeth in,
I imagine it's permanent.
Imagine something being permanent,
in this world where even love decays and hollows out,
and eternal is beyond comprehension.
Imagine love as it was meant to be,
romantic,
innocent,
unconditional,
we're not strong enough to love,
unless it's a love of self.
Look around you,
endless self-promotion,
meaningless back-patting,
and barely any words of meaning;
what do you think this poem is?
If we wish to fight against the growing distance,
between us and the people we could love,
we must first battle with ourselves,
and understand our failure.
We will look past our too-easily-hurt pride,
our limping-but-still-alive modesty,
or will we just see our powerful egos?
Will we change,
for the better?
Of course we won't,
but the thought is nice.
There's a cage not far from here,
it holds all the pieces of my heart,
that have been swept into dustpans,
and deposited along with the memories;
nobody can put all that back together.
Pieces of heart lay on the cold, damp metal,
and sparkle when the light hits them right,
pieces of sanity sit there just the same,
those pieces smile in a devilish fashion,
they know what each loss means to the whole.
One step closer,
one mile further,
from it.
One more day,
one battle won,
against it.
It's important to win the battles,
even if the war is open for debate,
it's the only course of action for me,
save for abandoning the campaign.
Come ride my sanity,
come into the cage with me,
I promise I don't take hostages.
Leave it alone,
just let it die,
some attempts were meant to fail,
some mistakes were meant to look honest.
The perception isn't always far away,
from the reality,
but sometimes there's a world of difference.
I watched you change,
or maybe I watched my perception fall apart,
and you were revealed again.
This isn't about anger, sadness, or betrayal,
not about who feels what or when they feel it,
this is about truth and expression,
and as long as I breathe I'm going to record my life,
for everyone to learn from my mistakes and success.
What a breakdown from my poetic voice,
I wish I could justify it as freedom of choice,
but I can't,
it just happened,
I kept writing while my poetic soul was napping,
and my rational being came out to play,
I fear he's gone away,
again,
just like a lot of the people in my life,
there's a build-up of personal strife,
dating back to the time I was young,
when memories would stay forever,
and now it's just the scars that last,
I don't think that's too far-flung,
or rather, far-fetched,
I know in your memory I'll remain etched,
because I threw you my life and dreams,
catch!
And you dropped them,
which was kind of ironic,
considering the way we used to throw around a baseball,
and we were so close,
until we left our ambitions, dreams and hopes fall,
so far away from one another.
We worked so hard to exclude each other,
We were both too egotistic,
Lex Luger style narcissistic,
Each other's worst habit,
that we refused to help kick,
out, and there was nothing more to talk,
about,
when our egos occupied the room,
white elephants,
and we'd have shouting matches,
on that old used-up mattress,
where I wasn't your first love,
and won't be your last,
and that's the past,
so it can't touch me now,
I lie to myself,
just like you did,
all those years,
and through all those tears,
when life broke down,
and all you need was to have me around,
but I left you there,
crying by yourself on the ground,
walked away as you fell apart,
like I had no heart,
but that wasn't true,
and that's the hardest part.
You had your hooks in my heart,
and you ripped it out as I walked away,
and that was my most difficult day,
or maybe most difficult year,
but who cares about that?
I look at you now and see ribs from the back,
so what's happening to you?
You're wasting away,
malnourished,
living off fake love,
and the young boys who think you're pretty,
and they're not wrong,
but they can't sing a tune to match your song,
but that's where reality kicks in,
you better notify his next of kin,
because you're going to destroy him,
like you tried to do to me,
but he won't handle it,
unless he's too unintelligent.
The part was never resisting your manipulation,
it was the fact that you'd try such extreme mutilation,
on the one that you loved,
and that's humanity,
and the soundest argument for the absence of the man above.
I wonder what runs through your head,
and if you're just the blackest of widows,
who still wants me dead.
Well guess what,
I survived you before,
and I'd do it again,
because in the end,
I'm back on my feet,
and I'm stronger than ever,
that's not just a line in a poem,
where I'm trying to pretend to be clever,
Leave it alone,
just let it die,
some attempts were meant to fail,
some mistakes were meant to look honest.
The perception isn't always far away,
from the reality,
but sometimes there's a world of difference.
I watched you change,
or maybe I watched my perception fall apart,
and you were revealed again.
This isn't about anger, sadness, or betrayal,
not about who feels what or when they feel it,
this is about truth and expression,
and as long as I breathe I'm going to record my life,
for everyone to learn from my mistakes and success.
What a breakdown from my poetic voice,
I wish I could justify it as freedom of choice,
but I can't,
it just happened,
I kept writing while my poetic soul was napping,
and my rational being came out to play,
I fear he's gone away,
again,
just like a lot of the people in my life,
there's a build-up of personal strife,
dating back to the time I was young,
when memories would stay forever,
and now it's just the scars that last,
I don't think that's too far-flung,
or rather, far-fetched,
I know in your memory I'll remain etched,
because I threw you my life and dreams,
catch!
And you dropped them,
which was kind of ironic,
considering the way we used to throw around a baseball,
and we were so close,
until we left our ambitions, dreams and hopes fall,
so far away from one another.
We worked so hard to exclude each other,
We were both too egotistic,
Lex Luger style narcissistic,
Each other's worst habit,
that we refused to help kick,
out, and there was nothing more to talk,
about,
when our egos occupied the room,
white elephants,
and we'd have shouting matches,
on that old used-up mattress,
where I wasn't your first love,
and won't be your last,
and that's the past,
so it can't touch me now,
I lie to myself,
just like you did,
all those years,
and through all those tears,
when life broke down,
and all you need was to have me around,
but I left you there,
crying by yourself on the ground,
walked away as you fell apart,
like I had no heart,
but that wasn't true,
and that's the hardest part.
You had your hooks in my heart,
and you ripped it out as I walked away,
and that was my most difficult day,
or maybe most difficult year,
but who cares about that?
I look at you now and see ribs from the back,
so what's happening to you?
You're wasting away,
malnourished,
living off fake love,
and the young boys who think you're pretty,
and they're not wrong,
but they can't sing a tune to match your song,
but that's where reality kicks in,
you better notify his next of kin,
because you're going to destroy him,
like you tried to do to me,
but he won't handle it,
unless he's too unintelligent.
The part was never resisting your manipulation,
it was the fact that you'd try such extreme mutilation,
on the one that you loved,
and that's humanity,
and the soundest argument for the absence of the man above.
I wonder what runs through your head,
and if you're just the blackest of widows,
who still wants me dead.
Well guess what,
I survived you before,
and I'd do it again,
because in the end,
I'm back on my feet,
and I'm stronger than ever,
that's not just a line in a poem,
where I'm trying to pretend to be clever,
The first picture is the dagger,
not meant for killing blows,
meant for suffering and pain.
Suffering and pain is fine,
that's what fuels the fire,
or passion and growth;
nothing builds like the bad,
times and all the bones I stomped,
on my path to the top of the ant hill.
What love comes for the king ant,
can not be described simply,
in your kiss of death;
it's in the past.
Hearts have moved on,
but some feelings remain strong,
like those of hatred and volatile reaction,
and he way my body convulses at the thought of it.
These kid gloves refuse to come up,
permanently sewn onto my weak flesh hands,
with barbed wire soaked in sulphuric acid and vomit,
a mirror of my corrupted soul;
still trying to get better,
better times happened,
in a past life,
or forgotten memory.
Your ghost is weak,
and my resolve is weaker.
There was a time I was built for this;
mucking my way through some resemblance of hell,
fueled by a passion fallen out of favour,
long ago.
Do you remember it?
It doesn't remember you,
passion forgets quicker than sunsets,
on the boulevard where innocence was lost some time ago,
in its place resounds a soft, unsure echo,
fighting for its own space,
in this timid rat race,
where corpses wed,
the good are dead,
and my soul pukes up daisies,
symbolic of the lies it was fed,
it must have been something that was said,
or the mindless blood that was shed,
ridiculous,
blood doesn't have a mind,
and maybe you're over-exuberant rush of it,
explains something.
maybe the mirror's judging you,
again.
The shadows hang from the off-white ceiling,
made of aged tiles with their black paint spatters,
held together by cheap metal supports,
never moving or changing much,
save for the almost-yellow glow age gives white.
The shadows seem to roll down the walls,
pressing their weight down upon my shoulders,
forcing me to question my lofty dreams and ambitions.
These are the days people don't talk about;
the words never add up;
that sinking feeling,
in the pit of your stomach;
a thick belt of lead,
limiting everything you do,
impossible to ignore.
Anxiety has a way of destroying a person;
the slowest erosion,
a harsh wind scraping the bare, unprotected rocks,
and throwing all the soil away,
until vegetation is impossible;
nothing lives there anymore.
The wind refuses to give up its assault,
my rocky exterior is smooth like glass,
and just as transparent and fragile;
where has all my soil gone?
Andy Veilleux 