Almost Freezing

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Killing my mind every evening, holding it back from the green light.

The current hits it with pleading but I won’t budge or put up a fight.

My fists are by my side if I ever need a savior for my tongue’s messes.

While everyone’s running in circles, the generals are launching stresses.

It’s too risky to reach my arm out for that green flame in these times.

But what if I don’t and it’s over, there’s no substance in between these lines?

Ah! The sweat dripping down my back are almost freezing as I plan the escape.

Three years later I’ll either be dead or in a desperate need of the brakes.

Give me a break. Put a pause on this and rewind in a more peaceful decade.

Decadence is slipping through their fists but the damages are prepaid.

So I keep on slaughtering my brain at every crooked turn, at every twist.

To cut these demons out of my dysmorphic body I might need an oculist.

-JW

Rules Of Fleeing The Burning City

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You can’t rely on this path dug by rebels like me.

It’s been crossed and dulled, impossible to see.

Can’t ride, can’t crawl through it in your Ante attire.

You won’t find a patsy to help you escape this fire.

Neon boneyards flaming in distance, viva Las Vegas!

Leave! Take all you can carry, call a powerful magus.

Hide with someone you trust in the city of betrayed

And hope this isn’t a night that you get played.

Cut all contacts or sweep them under the rug.

Don’t tell them what’s going on, don’t give a hug.

You can only swear on words of a rebel, hold on tightly.

Move up to the east, and keep moving there nightly.

Once the neon pollution leaves your left lung, sleep in.

The river is poisoned, the hills can always steepen.

As the air of the burning city flees your thirsty lips,

You’ll look back just in time to see how it still grips.

Staring back at you with its promise and realization –

Nothing incinerated, your mind was the ruination.

Those city towers were toying with your psyche.

You can’t rely on this path dug by rebels like me.

-JW

Covering The Petals

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Running for your life is not good enough, go faster, over the speed limit.

Ruining everything sacred in this looped fantasy of yours taught me to skim it

But never showed me how to sit through a storm with my blinders shut.

Your neck twisting around mine, pulling away, and we’re stuck in this rut.

“Life has no meaning,” they say, “if you waste it trusting your own guts and bones.”

“It has no meaning,” they repeat, “if you share love through cables and telephones.”

But it’s not easy to follow someone playing god with menacing conviction.

It’s hard to walk down the road of not being able to tell apart fact from fiction.

I keep bleeding on the razor’s edge, fingers all cut up from pretending I’m fine.

I leap forward and rock back, knowing too well that they’re approaching from behind.

But the mountains echo my pleas for safe escape and I see dew covering the petals.

The melody goes silent as I escape this dead-end of dead eyed people

Giving souls out as rentals.

-JW

Hometown Blues

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Eyes wide open, staring into the one hundred little defeats they’re selling.

Their children – infected with prejudices, it’s the only sound they’re spilling.

Broken childhoods sold on every street corner, spreading faster than rabies.

Their boys never learnt that girls don’t have to grow into convenient ladies.

Hair locks daintily combed back to avoid any confusion or unspoken rumor.

In towns like this word spreads through gazes and bites harder than a tumor.

If you think I’m too harsh, go ahead and cut those looks out of me, I dare you.

But let’s be blunt – you can’t imagine the suffocation if you weren’t there too.

All seven heavens could open for me but I’d still look back, scared to be followed.

Don’t beg me to sing those hometown blues again

If you’re not prepared to be swallowed.

-JW

Tightly Sealed Freedom

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The three musketeers of the end of all things are coming to our town.

The fake sun is trembling and neon is shining through a worn-out frown.

Apathetic noon showers my neck with kisses it doesn’t really mean

And I can’t remember how I lost my lustful self and turned into a fiend.

The target on my back is turning redder each day, getting lighter by minute.

Once it gets as big as the Ritz, you’ll see how Fitzgerald is going to spin it.

I embrace the last days of this tightly sealed freedom with the force of a madman.

Not packing much for the departure as you can never be ready for badlands.

Scoria and erosion reaching for my pound of flesh, is resisting even an option?

I’m dreaming about running but doom might be the answer for this corruption.

“No, don’t listen,” I hear someone whimpering right beneath my bleeding helix.

The three musketeers are approaching in distance and I sigh.

“Let’s give this place another shot but not lend it any credence.”

-JW

Iron Boots

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Forceful interrogation tactics greedily pushed on fragile necks.

Overturned rules pawing their ways to palaces built out of gloomy wrecks.

No monster frightening enough to make me look back at the fear.

I’m not putting my head down for you, I’m tired of speeches so insincere.

Pressure me all around the clock, dig me some ditches and holes.

You’re still the one who compensates just to feed the moles.

The water you fed me was poison but why would you bat an eye.

You’d rather ignore the pain you cause and scream at the man in the sky.

I’m tired of seeing your filthy paws reaching for the promised glory.

While you’re building skyscrapers, I’m glad I reached the second storey.

So I’m keeping my head up despite you stepping on it with iron boots,

And if you decide not to shoot, we both might see the day when our spite

Turned damaged flowers into fruits.

-JW

A Pin Drop

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What do you expect me to say? There’s nothing left.

It’s so quiet you can hear a pin drop, or a heart stop.

All the exits guide to the left.

Was there any fresh love between the two of us anyway?

Maybe we left it to rot for too long and forgot,

And decided to give it another day.

Is there a nice way to say “thank you for letting me down”?

I hope you don’t overreact when I lose my selfless act

And start selling the love in pounds.

Why are you always so quick on your feet to chase self-pity?

The night I went silent the first time, you became the mime

And I ran towards the city.

…I should’ve known when you came back, it felt annoyingly iffy.

Tonight I’m shaking you out in beams like a fever dream.

I’m free and I’m claiming this neon city.

I’m turning my kisses into hickeys.

-JW

Whatever Rhymes

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We’re all raised with these naïve ideas of our identities but we don’t know,

We sing along to whatever rhymes and when it doesn’t, we amplify the audio.

“You’re not the bad day in your story, you’re not even the narrator.

You’re neither the background noise nor the all-knowing, sad traitor.”

This is how we’re guided through earlier years, believing it’s all there is –

Why wouldn’t it be, if it makes so much sense and makes our lives muy feliz?

The faster we grow, the harder it gets to find truth in those poorly written tales,

And with every piece of faith we breathe in, there are seven parts of us that exhale.

“You’re not the worst day in your story, you’re not even the almighty narrator.

You’re neither the background cacophony, don’t be a goddamn traitor!”

The more they repeat, the quicker you reason your way out of their crossroads,

And once the spell’s broken, the princes turn back into the ancient swamp toads.

But don’t be ashamed or worried – we’re all raised on these old world remedies.

We’re safe as long as it seems to a passerby that we’re still on our knees.

-JW

Blocked Out

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And I can’t spill ink on this page with all the pressure on my chest,

All the well-meaning souls yelling, knowing – it’s not for the best.

I can’t speak up when you only taught me how to be silent as a grave.

No second chance left for those who stab you to death

Claiming they’re trying to save –

Save what exactly, what are you protecting here?

The sound of your cruel intentions is unbearable to hear.

And I can’t waste time spilling ink for those who spilled their guts,

Re-imagining trauma, stealing my pain and romanticizing the cuts.

You can claim you’re also struggling but how does it make it better?

Analyzing my mind as if it’s yours, giving me a straitjacket,

Calling it a wool sweater.

How could you even assume I’m going to take that beating?

You were slamming my warmth but your soul has no central heating.

Don’t be mistaken, if I ever need someone to help me with the climb

I’m going to choose my own two feet over your cold shoulder

Every single time.

-JW

Symphonies

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The monster I raised is no longer inside.

No running or hiding from the spoiled evening tide.

Relief bouncing off walls, exploding from the chest.

I want to rest. I want to rest. I just want to rest.

Birds chirping to some long forgotten symphonies.

I dance and I swear, no one sees –

I can do as I please.

When I’m alone, I control all the seas

But only as long as the monster agrees.

-JW