Follow who you may
But don’t tell us you’re the ones wide awake
You’re still following what another shepherd says
Underneath we’re all the fucking same
Smiling under skin
That bears our shame
We’re all sheep
That the androids dream of
In their sleep
Poetry
An accumulation of things
I‘m standing in the hallway
I forget why
Looking between the doors
At the walls that try to contain
This accumulation
Of thought
And all bought
A place that can’t contain me
Yet still stands.
Sadness enveloped in each room
Permeating an existence
Empty and cruel
With screens to look into
And forget this hell on earth
We all bought into
No room left for rebirth
Tattoos & Scars
We tattoo and mark or shame
Hoping symbols
Will communicate
The things we cannot say.
Another one on Absence
Your absence rings
In my ears
As if
Every voice
Not yours
Is a gunshot
Reverberating
In my skull
Your absence lingers
In every musical interval
As if
Every note
Sustains your existence
Behind my eyes
Yet my mind’s eye
Continues to blur you
As if you’re fading, still
Not quite a ghost, but not quite true
A shadow
I must hold onto.
Reflections
Photograph by Matt Johnson AKA Silverbackgorillapoetry
Freedom is an illusion
We’re all imprisoned
By something or other
Tethered by a thought or dream
Or perhaps a nightmare
Or something else somewhere
Maybe someone or nowhere
Imprisoned in our individual encounters
With ourselves in the mirror
Reminding us we’re not who we envisioned
Smiling underneath our emotional contortions
This rag of flesh
A world for life
Microscopic critters
Replicating themselves
As we duplicate ourselves
Simulating one another
Looking into mirrors, looking into reflections
Looking into ourselves
Studying the world
And in the world we are reflected back
And hoping no one noticed
We don our masks.
Irony
The more you resist the more it sticks
The more you distract
The more it comes back
Try to let go
The more you hold
Try to stop thinking
The more you think
I think I’ve found the meaning of life
It’s irony
Clown
I etched onto my face
A fucking clowns grin
An inside out frown
So you wouldn’t know
I was down
But I’m down and out
I took my clothes off
I shaved my hair off
And I walked down the road
Police picked me up
And took me to the hell hole
And they wiped my grin off
They said I was crazy
Said this is who you are
The man with a perpetual frown
So they sewed up my mouth
And pulled the strings
Until my lips smiled
Like the skeleton beneath
They took me to a clown show
And they stood me on a table
Shifted the corners of my mouth
Looked at my teeth and then turned me around
Said I came third
Pinned a rosette to my collar and cheered
But I was the only clown
And then I pinched my nose
And the crowd laughed out loud.
The man I want to be vs the man I am
Wrestling with these thoughts
Pacing up and down these four walls
Trying to contort myself
Into feelings I don’t have
Hoping to Box myself into the calm
Contorting myself into someone
I could never be
Wishing I could just
Pull myself up by the bootstraps
Twiddle and twirl my moustache
And be the man I keep thinking I ought t be
An epitome of man and calm
But with assertiveness as my next charm
Perhaps if I part my receding hair to one side
And wear a pair of matching socks
Suit and maybe a tie
To strangle the feelings in a noose
I’ll become the man I envisioned
Instead of the patchwork of a man
Barley complete and far from calm.
Stickleback
I fight like a stickleback
When I’m home I’m the strongest man inside
And I would beat anyone who troubled me
But out there I am meek
A boy playing hide and seek
Hoping no one notices me.
Dysmorphia
Ugly
Fugly
Staccato of laughter
Echo
Echo
After time
I don’t hanker
Staccato of footfalls
And dripping taps
Remind me who I still am
And have.
Drowning
realising there is no rafter
Pastel face smudged away
No happy ever after
Paint a crooked smile
A clown, a gargoyle
A monster
A crocodile
Frankenstein
Fucking mouths
Hostile
Mutant
Ogre
The periphery
Of mirrors
Framing the freak
The words on my lips
“Please don’t look at me.”
