Laughter

I heard a child laugh today
Peals of unadulterated laughter
Her small body swallowed by bellows of joy


Her voice reached into my world and caressed my mind
Assuring me that color would someday return
to the dull washed out pages of my life


Then there was silence
And I was left with fragments of jarring joy
Bits of untethered emotion

And as the joy floated up beyond my reach
I remembered that I lost my joy
The day I gave up life

Rape

I was a child when we met

You a decade or so my senior and I a newly considered legal adult

You raped my mind and then you raped my body

You twisted my mind around your own and used your cleverness to reach upon my weaknesses

you convinced me to go to a secluded house in the country with you that I later learned was some sort of home for troubled men from Hassidic communities

You convinced me that your sperm had some kind of godly property, and that if it would enter me all of my mental pain would be healed

I believed you

I lay there unmoving and unprotected and I let you rape me

You then told me to leave, and I did

Death (May 12, 2013)

When I was a child I saw death

                                                           A glowing mass of fire

            A smooth sphere of smoldering stone

I reached out and felt the warmth

Emanating from the fiery depths

                                               Warmed my fingers in the light

I was cold

Reached out to flickering flames

                                              Trying to feel

                                                                                    Time passes

                                                                                                     I grow closer to the fire

                                                                           Away from cold clammy earth

Flushed with warmth

           I touch the globe of fire

                                                                                  Sizzling flesh

Skin heals leaving only scars

           And memories of burning in flames

                           Yet I am still cold

So I grab hold of the fire

      And I am warmed

                                         But burned

Scars on scars

         Red welts that never heal

              Comforted by the light

Fire is my friend

                  The warmth of touch

                                              Felt through burning skin

Far below me

                                                                                                                                         A person with no eyes

                                                                                                                          Asks me how I feel

                                                                                                   A cold body

                                                                                                   Far away

                                                                               Out of reach

                                                                                                    I stroke the warm glowing orb beside me

                                                                                                                                                            And smile

Poem By 16-year-old Self
(7/24/2006)

Is war a man's plaything
knocking down building blocks
caving in to crush them
plastic faces smiling
stiff bodies are frozen
Eyes that wont ever close
stop!

They want to shut it out,
yet it keeps on falling.
Thinking it will end soon,
yet someone continues,
crushing, grinding, breaking.
Who?

Evil that never ends,
keeps it all from going,
thirsty for your fresh blood.
sucking on your bare bones.
What?

So it all continues,
no side ever wins,
in this child's play
Toys!

Giggling children gleeful
They're holding up their loot
content.

Destruction continues
Why?