Love

Love transforms us all.
From a slimy thing to something winged,
or perhaps something that flies
to something that is tethered.
It all depends on perspective.
Are you someone positive?
Or are you self-destructive?
All fair questions when you feel torn
between two selves.
When you can envision so many heavens
but you are caught within so many hells.
Pick a side:
is it easy? Is it fair?
What philosophy do you adhere to?
Do you love smashing the pretty things,
or would you prefer to plant seeds in tiny rows,
so far from yourself that you can believe
they might actually grow?

The Hole

I keep digging deeper, feel the grit under my nails, the flecks of earth on my face. How wide must I make it, how many feet down? There's just so much that needs to be buried here, trapped beneath the surface of the world. Maybe the damp and the darkness will smother all these things that live inside me. I can't give them room to crawl back out, mustn't let the weight be too light, or they will find me again. Sneak under the covers and pool beneath the sheets, where the whispers become roars and silence is no longer alive but in the furthest corners of my mind. I feel mad, out here in the dark, a mock villain. There is no explanation that could be given but that there were too many secrets piling up. Far too many to simply dust beneath the carpet or hide under the bed. They had become like people, like false-friends, voices so loud they'd reverberate within the walls of this room over and over again, warping until they became new thoughts, new secrets.
"Dig deeper," I say to myself, "keep digging."

Paranoia

My purpose in writing now is the same as it has always been: to keep myself in a sane state of mind. Now, the problem with jotting down every little detail of my insanity is that madness, in and of itself, is something that tends to spread, the more people talk about it. The fact that I am able to understand and empathize with the often frightening, disorienting, and delusional paranoia that accompanies insanity makes me think twice about doing such a thing. You know, for your sake.

But there's a catch, of course. Staying completely silent, both in tongue and in pen, means that my own mental claustrophobia can set in at any point. That's not good. Hitting that stage sends my mind into a panicked sort of place, where confusion reigns above every sensible, rational emotion, and my perception is skewed and often chaotic in its conclusions. Do you know what I am saying? I lose control. Nothing I do, say, think, feel is a decision on my part. I become something completely unrecognizable to myself. And, coincidentally, so does the rest of the world.