Category: Other

Mad

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I lit a candle and wished you’d never dream of me,

Even in nightmares, even in the deepest sleep.

My condolences to those who loved your charms.

I hope there’s no one left greeting you with open arms.

But my curses won’t haunt you the way I wanted

And my prayers will never be taken for granted.

When my chest was torn open stich by stich,

People helped to dig you a bottomless ditch

Just to bury the witch as it was supposed to be done –

With a hanging, burning and drowning,

Looking down the barrel of a gun…

So I lit a candle and wished I’d never dream of you –

Even in daydreams, even when I greet the tomb.

-JW

Victimless Crime

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I don’t know about your policies or your disclosure agreements.

I didn’t read the papers until I sealed the deal

And caught the fleeting feelings.

You don’t want to hear my arguments, don’t care about excuses.

You didn’t put the pen in my hand so technically

These are self-inflicted bruises.

They don’t notice what’s happening, they claim inculpability.

They didn’t write the contract so perhaps

I should look at my own morality.

So we carry on –

The people don’t mind but they never promise to wish us well,

Faking their smiles and feeding the ego,

Even when keeping one ear to the shell.

We hold each other whilst burning the policies and agreements.

“Burn the pages,” they said.

“Burn the paper planes, not the feelings.”

-JW

Hexes

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What are you thinking, why are you turning into someone I can rely on?

And why are you coming closer when I still have the past on replay

Without a shoulder to cry on?

Not sure how it started but I’m re-reading yesterdays’ words all morning.

This one time you called me enchanting and I wondered

Whether it meant that you’re falling.

Am I growing into a person I once despised because I’m out of options?

Will I push you away, far behind the swinging plywood walls,

Or will I pretend to be less noxious?

So what do you have in store for me, why should I follow?

Before the night fades into mush,

You’re taking my mind down a crisp, cold hollow.

And I don’t know the way back, I don’t see an easy exit.

The way you take me down the path seems steady.

I wish for the strength not to hex it.

-JW

Scheduled

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Two hours forward, eighteen back.

I dance around the schedule,

It’s compromise I lack.

Sixty more clicks on the keyboard.

I’m never done with counting

And putting down a petty sword.

When the dawn arrives, I fidget,

I spin around in my seat.

My moral code’s missing a digit.

And the coffee yawns back at me

When I greet it the next morning,

Hoping to unlock misery’s mystery.

-JW

Grace is off the table.

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I’m taking off my nice smiles and exchanging them for a better price,

Selling them for a hard bargain, melting them into tools I wear with pride.

Thighs scared, elbows bruised, cheeks still bloody but I’m not done.

I’m open to taking another beating, your fists are weightless,

My ego weighs tons.

I’m channelling the boys, increasing the tempo, the values, the voice,

Cooking up the perfect scene, then burying their heads in the voids.

And I don’t take their protests for granted, I fill them with poise.

The moment their act becomes nasty, I turn the volume up

To cut open their toys.

-JW

Insomniac

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I count to ten before letting the medusa hair out of the hat,

Before turning my back, before turning this white rabbit

Into a sickly rat.

I check my own pulse and clear my throat before biting,

Before swallowing the ink and flirting with the end.

Dusk makes this scene exciting.

I imagine a stadium of people before continuing this dance,

Before jumping in front of a fast moving thought and combusting

Into bones and fangs.

I bow before the cheering crowds start pointing sticks,

Before the insomnia once again settles in, drowns me out,

Tells me it’s something that I can’t fix.

-JW

Eight Minutes To Fall Asleep

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The wheels are in motion, I move to the side.

Sounds startle my mind but I still let it slide.

Messages, greetings and formal promotions.

I move to the side, but the wheels are in motion.

An ode to terror, a hymn to my insomniac brain.

I’ll suffer for closure, not gonna let it die in vain.

Booklets, sliding doors and seven errors.

The hymn to my insomnia, the ode to my terror.

Eight minutes to fall asleep, two seconds to die.

Once you pull the ring off, even the heavies will fly.

So I hold myself close, this moment is mine to keep.

Two seconds to die.

Eight minutes to fall asleep.

-JW

Saved?

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Slender figures rushing the foggy streets in agony,

Struggling to pay for the rent of their own minds,

An irony, a travesty.

I run with them past armed guards and loopy culverts.

The dogs are onto us the second we hit the road.

They want to make us the culprits.

We see purple cloaks rolling down the streets like carpets,

Altering the sights of the city, choking out those

That grew defiant.

Rays of sun playing on sharpened edges of machetes.

The weak are taken back to their rooms with menace,

Others become enlistees.

The fog is entering my flaring nostrils, it’s spreading.

My legs become numb to the pain of their teeth.

I fall on the floor, staining the bedding.

-JW

Amusements

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They ensure that we’re kept alone during the nights

Because during the nights time stands still.

It never, ever flies.

It’s a simulator ride through the paths of our brain

That should’ve been kept under supervision,

Locked in the chains.

They ensure we can hear each other screaming at night

Because at night the sound travels faster

And it dims the light.

It’s a haunted attraction we paid for with our last morals

But we never agreed to participate

So why are they giving us back our dollars?

-JW

The Silver Age

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A new foggy moon rises above the city, it burns like acid

And it runs on pain we’re swallowing to keep ourselves gaslit.

There aren’t any blushing faces, only grey wooden sculptures

Carved out of those of us who forgot when to unfollow the culture.

Enchanted silver surfaces set out as traps –

We do know better but we still give in,

We burn the books and the maps.

A new Gravitron sun spins around us making the city dizzy

And it runs on the acid we’re spitting up to pretend we’re busy.

No eyes looking up in the streets, just crowds blending together,

Dragging their feet towards the buzz of heads being severed.

Enchanted silver surfaces set out as traps –

We do know better but we still give in,

We burn the books and the maps.

-JW