The Bleak Shores of A Bad Heart

I wanted to be near you,

Cuddled on the chest holding your precious heart.

I wanted to lean into pretty dreams

And lap up the silvery liquid

Of your thoughts,

Dip my hands into the ocean within you

And feel the gentle current

Brush against my fingertips.

.

I dreamed,

Dear God how I dreamed,

Of sleeping on your shores

And soaring through twilight skies

With you and your ever-changing landscapes.

I dreamed of summer moons,

Winter trees coated in hoar frost,

Spring rains, autumn leaves,

And you.

.

But when I peeled back the layers,

Pressed my ear to your chest...

.

I was met with horrid screeching,

The chaos of falling bombs, funeral pyres,

Lynchings, and screaming.

Black acid crept through my blood

And I was drowning in the depths of your hatred.

.

I tried to retreat but I was shackled,

Forced to endure moonless nights

And freezing summer days.

I found your shores and they

Were filled with beached whales

And the bloated corpses of slaughtered children.

.

I found your shores!

They were coated in tar,

Littered with strangled animals,

Black clouds spat flames

Across the bleak horizon.

I was their next victim.

.

The brutal cold of night came and I was forced

To drag the bodies in

And pile them around me.

They caught the wind and tossed the remains

Of the stories it held over their shoulder

Onto me as I fought through hellish sleep.

.

I woke under no sunlight and cold raindrops

Heavy with their poison.

The dead bodies had not toppled and when I peered

Over their nude chests, my heart tripped over dropped hope.

It was there, the thin line between water and air.

Ships come to the horizon

Like leeches to flesh.

.

They would come.

But how long can I stay safe inside the failure of my peers

Neither dead nor alive,

Remaining on the shores of a bleak world of endless torment?

How long can I scan the horizon before I go blind,

Before the world turns me sightless and lifeless?

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Silver Serpent Books

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