"Nothing is built on stone"

It is a concept.

A perception of sorts, where we perceive this idea of a place where we stand upon a platform of stand where if we dwindle long enough, it might become a paved road beneath our feet.

Tromping through places where feet press into watered grounds,

you might hear your feet sluck as you try to trudge forward,

sinking further into sands that looked stable enough to hold us.

Here it is for certain that I must tell you that no platform is built upon brick, stone, or any other form of concrete material.

We must depress out growing sentiment that we can pave the path before us.

Build the bridge from stone to stone, and use the wood in order to traverse between it.

That is what they tell you in your youth, but that is the lie that is to be sold.

That is the lie in which you might become obligated to an expectation that would drive you to anxiety, desperate to rebuild any crumbling stone platform sitting on sinking sand.

Splitting on loose granules that give no rigidity to the place you aim to build your foundation.

For who are you but one in many, building your dreams and hopes upon a platform believed to be hardy.

Building up with your twig-like wood on a rickety scaffolding set to fall when your neighbor might plow through you.

Yes, toil.

Toil away.

You are one of many.

Another who "must build as if the sand were stone" and that anything born from that might become your home.

Twisting the fibers,

dangling down over a background of haze;

of hues of browns and beige.

She hangs,

head falling back,

one leg bent and toes pointed down as she twists right and

racks layers of cotton beneath her hand.

Twisting around, until it all comes undone.

Falling down, fabric floats like white blossom petals.

She hits the stage, coming to a halting stop against the wood grain covered floor.

The threads pulls taught,

dragging her up.

Ankles,

Hands.

All bound by tiny cotton weaves.

Three spun fibers,

make her dance though it cannot make her sing.

Watch her dance against the warming wood stage.

Hanging by the thread.

My marionette,

poor thing.

She's always been nearly dead.

"If I dig too hard..."

I might drag up beads of blood,

that spill like rivers down my arm.

Cackle to my inner teenage self,

and twist a little in.

Curl over my arm, like a madman covets his spoils.

What could you call mad, if it's perfected to a feigned innocence that shines like pearlescent white plastic orbs on a table?

I think I could admire the blues and pink hues captured in the false pearls,

but I think that you'd like to think I was just some twisted bitch bent on a rage ready to fall off the bench groaning under my sliding feet.

Hooking my knife into their ears,

tearing their reputation to shreds and burning my own glass house down to the ground.

It's the glass fire we all seek to churn.

For what is madness when there isn't a loss of self preservation?

You're not insane until you're ready to burn it all,

to take everyone with you, but yes, "dig a little harder."

Cut me until I'm gasping for air.

Because I love the way your torture makes me hurt,

gives me internal scars that makes me a little more bent inside

like the crooked man over the crooked road, waiting for all the black to consume the world.

I swear to you, I'm not the monster you think I am.

The empty smile isn't one you'll find on my face.

It's only when the light fades from my eyes,

and we meet each other with that same cold ass stare.

After all, aren't we mirrors of one beast in the same?

I'm not insane.

I'm perfectly fine.

Let me fix my face.

Let me make it all right again.

I'm not insane.

I'm perfectly fine.

Let me fix my face.

Let me make it all right again.

I could gnash my teeth in some form of sputtered word,

drool down over the white sheet until blue and red ink bleeds.

Bled.

In all technicality, here, I could speak the written word until eyes glaze over.

A stage of my single body, a crowd of faces shadowed in black.

No lights to break their glossy hearts, sharp with ice.

Glistening wet lips, ready to rip my art shred to shred.

Lay that review over me,

let me know what part of literature I missed.

What major I didn't achieve,

of what poetry is.

Ought to be.

For what is a green bowl of lettuce,

is my spoken word.

I'll take the flakes of fluttering broken white over green any day.

For if I could draw the ink pen down against my veins,

I'd hope it bled black, not red.

Pink like the rouge snake between your lips,

pressed and plumped thin.

Thick when pushed out.

Lapping at the tingle of citrus pricking your lips.

And I sigh into the cold ice swabbing between my cheek and teeth,

avoiding the burn of cold against my inner mouth as if the melting object might coat my throat with a sensation less tart.

Still, I could stare up at the sky,

bask in the sun of my sliding glass window and take it all in.

But the sun can't scorch my tawny skin much longer,

but I like to pretend that it can.

The summer hasn't ended.

It hasn't ended.

Dazzling the brown in my eyes,

That it can watch my skin turn from taupe to a cross between chestnuts and coffee

before breaking through the expanse of the door onto the porch that rots beneath my feet.

Here, I can exist.

As if allowing myself to dream of the sensation of if I ran my tongue across my arm, it wouldn't prickle my tastes with the sensation of milk-tinged coffee.

Oh, but I could dream that my coffeed skin wouldn't cover up the tartness in my mouth from the clink of iced drink against my diamond decorated glass.

Knowing I'm dancing against the time.

The summer that threatens to bleed out.

Still, I let the breeze coat my ears.

The sound of the leaves brushing against one another here.

Squeezing out every last glisten of pink syrup coated yellow lemonade that coats my mouth.

The summer hasn't ended.

It hasn't ended.

But I love the sensation.

If I tipped back...

Oh, you could tip me back, over the outdoor lounge to drape over it in sun-speckled dazzles.

Basking on the cushions of ocean blue olefin covering the metal bench that singes my fingertips as I play pretend with the scorch of metal to my skin.

God, I could dance upon the wood til' it broke under foot.

Broken, rotten things. Full of mushrooms, memories cast and faded.

A new growth in my mind as the taste of lemonade brings me into the haze.

Summer hasn't bled out of the sky.

Hasn't left my mind.

I could turn in it,

tasting the sweet and tart flavor,

of pink lemonade,

of sprinkles of water over my fluttering eyelids like citrus stars blossoming and fading away.

Sensations so vivid,

so serene.

If I opened my eyes, I know that the night would welcome me into the end of the season.

But I can keep the sun shining through, blocking out the dark blue.

Because I can taste her on my skin,

taste her summer in me,

smelling of lemons.

Tasting like sweet, pink- lemonade.

I think there's a sort of comical sensation in being American.

In living a life in which cynicism is my second language,

dark humor is my first language,

and the look on my face is something akin to disdain when I'm merely regarding what I'm observing just for what it is.

I cannot, in my life, bring more to the center stage, my poignant dislike for the things that are real.

The very essence of what makes us human.

In how our skin feels,

how our ears hear,

how we touch and caress the smoothness of one another's lips that we deem to be our significant other.

It's like a fragrance.

Strong on the first spray,

subtle after walking away.

Rather funny how I can hate it for its messy composition,

then love it for all its imperfections later.

I think there is some love for it.

Some hate for it.

Either way, it is a colloquial thing.

To abstain from being everything short of the Perfect Thing.

The texture is dry,

like running my tongue against wet sandpaper,

until the roll of the wet food balls up on my tongue.

Pushing it away,

I try to repress the internal gag.

This must be what it means to be older.

To lose the sensation of what should be an enjoyable small meal.

Only for it to make me regret everything that has to do with this texture.

The only reprieve is the sugar crunch of compressed dyed sugar in each bite.

I swore that my childhood made this taste much better.

I tried to cling onto that, to will the memory forward as if it might make the texture and flavor come into one.

And then I remembered something.

Recipes are a potion in themself.

A bottled flavor and texture that could either become the thing of nightmares,

or the thing of bliss.

And here I was, acknowledging how water in a recipe could never replace milk.

Just like oil is no substitute for butter, and that's all the difference.

It's what makes the cereal taste bland,

what makes the texture hard to blend.

And when I remember something tastes off,

I know it has everything to do with what was replaced.

What was changed.

What was lessened to a degree to cut corners and costs where need be.

We are all operating in different voids,

expressing our descent on the minor differences.

On the change of the layouts of aging stores.

Of the refresh of products that once started to mold.

To keep our eyes moving, or minds going.

For if they didn't, we'd break into a routine.

Of the dog walking the barn,

and when it was long gone,

we'd walk around instead of across it out of sheer memory.

There is the difference.

There is a sort of mold, that our body naturally molds to,

like we're meant to settle in as we get old.

Habits, tricks, tastes, and ticks.

We're all eventually settling in, to find our place within a shelf,

along a wall, maybe driving ourselves into a spiral of insanity

as if that might not be a stationary place just like them all.

We are no different.

But we are not all the same.

We are the taste of memories, of experiences one alongside another.

Twins, and singles. All the same.

But not.

We are not one.

But we are one in the same.

Human.

The experience.

The everlasting existence.

Imprinting on our tiny differences.

Until someone notices our impression.

Our difference.

One... Two. Close my eyes.

Cover the black canvas with a new surprise.

Paint the sky blue, wave your hand over it with streaks of whitened blue

til' flecks of black specs dot the horizon and sing me wonderous tunes.

Dull me to sleep, cast the blue sky a hazy pink.

Wrap me in mountains, cold and gray.

Let the brown soil rinse away.

Wrestle back my wicked thoughts.

Wrangle down, the 'man' society's wrought.

Three... Four. Open my eyes.

Release I'm no longer awake because the skies...

Are littered in stars, in hues of pinks and greens. Of memories long past,

until the demon sings. Sings my name, pursed on wrinkling lips.

Shorn short hair, in gray odd wisps. Wicked, evil, spiteful witch.

Setting up her little picket fence.

And there she might have, her generational surprise.

The one with matching all green eyes.

Smile pretty, a devil's sin. Preach the words of 'God' and blame her sin.

No recollection of an apology, somehow there here to steal from me.

Taking, grasping, tugging so.

Yanking away, my work and more.

Claiming it all for their greedy hands,

shoveling my good deeds and work down until gagging on hems.

Hue is a color, and the color is bleak.

Why do they steal from me only in my sleep?

It's hard to believe, something so long gone crosses distances to drown me in its pond.

Yet here I am, until I can force the my eyes open to release that reality is long gone.

Pouring salt,

rub the skin as if it might remove the excess.

And then, feeling for the smoothness that lay within.

Sprinkles of sugar,

excess of sweetness too good for the times of later dates.

And then, lick the icing off until it burns down the throat.

She is the thing of blackened dreams.

The mental anguish she brings is a burn that can't be reprieved.

Torturous agony, she brings on again. Tempting me, tempting me until I come undone.

Bleed into me.

Bleed the full length of your needs into me.

Despite the desire stretching long into my belly, dig into me.

Take me on the ride I know you never meant it to be.

And I can hear her, hear her sing to me.

Break my heart, bend me over backwards to bring her into me.

She wants to be my muse.

And I want to tell her no, but the word is used against me.

Playing on her vengeance so...

Bleed into me.

Bleed the full length of your desires into me.

Despite the gnawing ache of desire, pouring from your soul, dig into me.

Take me on the ride I know you unintentionally paved for me.

There copper tang in my mouth reminded me how I couldn't remember when I ate last. And with the unsavory taste coating my tongue, I placed a hand over my stomach, feeling the ache of hunger come up. I knew I had missed one too many meals. Couldn't remember when I last drank anything, not even water. And every idea of food or water sounded so disgusting, I finally had an answer for the teenage version of myself that loved food, that shoveled it down without waiting for a taste.

"It really is easy to forget."

And so I had, had forgotten to eat. Had forgotten to drink. Until the sleep came crashing back into me, and the food I was forcing down ran right through me. My body rejected it despite my mind saying that if I went on any longer, I might make whatever damage I was incurring worse.

"God. I think I've ruined myself."

Truer words couldn't have been spoken. Tiredness seeped into me, and I plucked up whatever sounded like it wasn't going to make me gag - literally everything - and begrudgingly forced it down. The taste hit, and I don't know why, but I was almost trying to choke back the substance from coming back up.

More. "Oh, God."

And I choked down more, forcing more substance down into my throat. And the small little beady eyes staring up at me started to catch on that I had something, and they reached for it. No. Not this time.

"Sorry, this one is for mommy."

For once, I didn't give up whatever I had to them, to their cries, and the one who screamed for everything she couldn't receive. I choked down that piece and the idea that I shouldn't binge stuff came to mind.

A thought for a later date.

I told myself that, in emergency, that excess of one thing wasn't the priority. I needed to catch up on food, on water, and everything I had deprived myself of for some weird reason to make sure I was keeping my health up. Creeping thoughts edged my mind, wondering if this is why we might age horribly, why we might struggle with our health. Keeping track of so many living things, keeping track of one's self, it was a task that took more hours in the day and I was being sorely reminded of it.

Reminded of what could happen if I wasn't careful. My health was already steps from being back in the gutter. But things needed to be done. My frustration wasn't going to come undone by watching my needs and desires stay unmet. No, it was going to come in one crashing burst after another as I tirelessly pushed myself to down myself for the next few days. Rinse and repeat.

"Rinse and fucking repeat. Get your shit together."

And I talk to myself like I talk out loud, like I walk through a crowd. Real, honest, and skeptical of the world passing me by.

If heaven so above me asks me to do my due diligence, hell below me will cast me a place for failing to meet those expectations. And I'd die, toiling it, only to recast myself in that seat far below, toiling again and again in my frustration to portion myself, my time, and everything around me until the memory of my childhood hit. When I was seven, and some thought bleached itself over my mind like a permanent stain. "You can only handle one person at a time." And that limiter resonated so hard with me in that moment of brevity, I hardly realized how much it would eat its way into everything else around me in my older age.

"When am I going to get my shit together?"