I know he’s been pulverising steel 
I can see it in the way he feels 
When he looks in my eyes
As if he knows everybody dies 
And it’s an awareness kept from many 
He looks for my butterflies but there aren’t any 
Because they’ve all flown away
At my last gasp attempt at catching what you say 
And you’re all money and cash 
So I take hot sauce and smash 
The windows out your car 
Coz you chose another star 
To orbit around
And I always thought the sound 
Of my voice and truth 
Would bring back the wings of youth 
And entice you to stay 
But you tell me I don’t care anyway 
And there’s nothing I can say 
To convince you of the ardent heart 
That beats beneath the engine you start 
With my key 
If anyone asks, he didn’t choose me 

Image Credit: https://pin.it/37s9oZeDE

I’m getting old, I see it on my face
And on all the boys I love to taste 
There are lines round their eyes 
And ones I can’t disguise 
From my nose to my lip 
It’s all this fucking weight I let slip 
Up my skirt 
When I was trying to watch the way it hurt 
When they lashed me with a whip 
And the track on the player skip 
When I play it in the meditation room 
It was Marina and the Diamonds, boom 
A girl had left it there 
Then she said did you hear about Jasmine, I swear 
She’s some fucking bitch 
And I pull the switch and agree 
And realise it’s not just me 
And she said to me
In incompetent tone 
“Are you still here?” as if I wouldn’t go home 
If I had the chance 
I just dance 
In that quiet place where the lights fluctuate 
And Steve and I had a date 
In that room with the number on the door 
I could feel his silent pulse when he wanted more 
Than just an adequate interaction 
But I’m not here to gain traction 
But to lift weight from the floor 
So all the people I adore 
Don’t have to bear it all alone 
And I don’t care what you say on the phone 
I can see the demons that have infected 
Some people here and fucking wrecked it
I picked it up from that lady by the window 
And once I had I couldn’t drop the sin though 
It flew into my hair like bees 
And I scream and drop to my knees 
And roll on the floor 
To put out the fire I adore 
If it leaves her a little better off
I guess I’m down to pay the cost 
And not go into anaphylactic shock 
Like every broad on the street 
It was Flatbush Avenue where the cascade meet 
My waterfall 
Now I’m in the room at the end of the hall
And I keep a magazine 
Of a man I can only dream 
Of ever having 
But he’s cute to look at and imagine 
So I keep it cool and sweet 
Like the music that played on the street 
When I was half mad 
Or just too right it was too bad 
To contemplate 
So I can’t blame the man I date 
For all that befell 
Me when I ran away from hell 
And into the wishing well 
Locked into St. Pat’s like a bad smell 

It’s giving blank space vibes 
And I was barely alive 
Reeling from a trauma of my own making 
My mental health and the forsaking 
Of all I knew
Just to get away from you 
But you stayed with me, you haunt my dreams
I only run on moonbeams
And the doctors say they’re not there at all 
So I’m sitting staring at the wall
In Dean Swift 
And the gift 
Of the moment was music 
The cocaine I’m on and I choose it 
Like a hit 
They took my phone and that’s a bitch 
So I steal into somebody’s cloud 
And post what I am all about 
And Aoibhín said I had a broken wing 
But I’m just like her and, damn, she can sing 
About the tormented, tortured poet’s department 
My only escape was the little garden
Out the back where I sat with Michelle 
And asked her what she knew about hell 
And she said I would be just fine 
But I just feel like I’m doing time 
For a crime I didn’t commit 
And I’m bubbling so I can’t even sit 
And the poetry deserted me for a day or two 
Or maybe it was weeks, it’s hard to tell when you 
Measure time by a clock up high 
And you’re surrounded by people who want to die 
And it’s a tragedy, I know 
But could you just let me go 
The doctors click their pens 
And I know we can’t be friends 
Because I can’t be trusted
I told him the truth and I was busted 
Now I just gain weight 
To make up for all the hate 
He piled into my pillow 
And I once was a willow 
Bowed to the ground weeping tears 
I cried and cried for years and years 
And she sang of something ordinary
But I was somewhere kind of scary 
Asking the nurse if the devil was real 
And she freaked out so I don’t know what to feel 
It was an abject situation 
And I can’t go back and insert education 
Into the dial 
It was like the green mile 
I walked toward the brink 
I could feel my trembling hands start to sink 
Into the soft of the bed 
And I know that it’s just all in my head 
But then why do they fear me 
I can feel it when it gets near me 
And threatens to overwhelm 
The boat I float from the helm 
Of going to China slow 
And they all tell me I must let go 
Of the man who’s name I keep a secret 
But I promised him so I must keep it 
Delusional in my own parade 
Did my beauty start to fade 
When I left the shore 
Now you don’t want me anymore 
In meek surrender 
I don’t want to remember 
But I do 
And no medication erases you 
From my memory 
So there you’ll be 
For eternity 
Just you and I and infirmity

I was living close to the ground 
When I heard the sound 
Of silence in the chaos 
Of summer in the snow 
And I let it fall 
Because I just do not know 
What to do anymore
Yes, I aimless drift
And I have to admit 
My relinquishment was a gift 
As it took it all from me
It was out of my hands 
And I loved that boy
Who loved heavy metal bands
But he told me to get lost 
And to go find a soul 
Who could bear the tide
Of the waves that roll 
And I do not forget him 
And I do not grieve 
I just let it go 
And let him believe 
That he has won the fight 
That he owns the day
I could feel the abandonment 
In the words he say
To me when he release 
Me from the leash 
And now he is studying 
To be somebody’s priest 
But he will never anoint 
Nor will he ever announce
The dawn that broke on me 
When I renounce
All that I am 
For everything I could be 
I just let him look
And hoped that he would see
And as he passed over the obvious 
I could not believe
That I had lost my heart 
To one who wears his on his sleeve

There is a fighting response 
That just seems to arise 
It happens when I’m drowning 
In that look in his eyes
And I prayed for an ocean 
To just submerge
But we’re fighting something awful 
And I am on the verge
of throwing it all way 
Into the mists of time 
And I lose my cool 
And my ability to rhyme
And they trapped me in a cage
For what could not be tamed
Because I speak for something 
That simply cannot be named 
For it exists in silence
And it is there in death
And for my crime 
I renounce regret 
Because I was just a child 
Just a flower in its bud 
I look to the master
To tell me what is good
And he points me toward myself 
And something just opens 
I used to play the slot machines 
For the pink tokens 
That my grandmother and I 
Shared in leisureland 
But I had to let her go
Because life is slipping sand 
Pouring out my hands
And I sigh at the ease
Of finding someone who understands 
The rocky shores of seas 

I hit a bird with my car today
I was crying over Shannon Airport 
On the radio 
And he flew out in front of me
Black wings, orange beak 
And for a moment I could not speak 
Because I knew I could not avoid 
The collision with 
A creature free as the air 
One moment gone where he was there 
And his body was flung out from behind me 
In the wind and the flux of what will define me 
On the road to Roscommon town 
And I want to drown 
In the ocean that rises up inside
Because of the beauty that has died
By my hand 
They don’t understand 
But that’s okay 
There’s nothing I can say
To bring him back 
Or speed up or slow down the massive attack 
Of guilt that hits me too
Because I know that I am one with you 
In the infinite
I fall quiet 
And mourn the passing 
Of the habit I am harnessing 

There is always the fear of tragedy
Because it hit me like a ton of bricks the day you left me 
So unexpectedly
And dejectedly
I walk in my narrow boots 
And I grow roots
And soak up the water in the ground
And the nutrients from all around
And then I just let it go
The burden that I know 
More intimately than my breath
It's a mixture of loss and regret
As I watch in my mind 
The leaves that have been left behind 

The sheer lack of faith she has in me 
I can see it in her pause that setting free
The bird has never been one of her strengths
The woman I know, I don’t know where she went 
Because she used to be a tower to me
Now she just has power over me 
Held like a crutch that is clutched to her breast
And something in her never rest 
As I spilled ink like truth on the desk 
And let my heart burn in my chest 
With the fire that I’ve always known 
And now that I’m grown 
I walk my own boots
Though I still have roots 
That stretch deep into the soil 
And I flick the kettle to boil 
Because tea is my drink 
And it helps me to think 
And become all that I am 
I am part of nobody’s plan 
And just because you’ve dimmed your light
Doesn’t mean I will, not without a fight
As I give him permission to 
Be with whoever he wants to
He doesn’t have to be tied to me
But like the tide that I have set free
I feel him beat upon my shore
Worshipping the girl that he adore 

My fear looms like a sullen protector 
And they think it’s just coz he reject her 
That she loses the will to live
But it’s more that I cannot forgive 
The blatant, flagrant disregard for my soul 
And that’s just not the way I roll 
So I flip the papers in his face
Say I’m done being your disgrace
And run into the arms of thieves
And it’s everything they believe
As they lock me in a chasm perforate
And they do their best to educate
Me how to be appropriately fine 
But if I’ve seen it once, I’ve seen it a hundred time
In the grey and routine learned 
So I took the match and I burned
Everything I thought I knew
And it was not over you 
It was so that I could be 
The quintessence of what it means to be free
And your bullets ring in my ears
But they only echo in my tears 
And ricochet off the valleys and hills 
Of my cheeks as the river spills 
Down the landscape you never knew
I’m highlands and brand new 
Mountainous in my terrain 
And impervious to your pain 
As it seeks to latch and suffocate
All because I wouldn’t go on that date
That you thought had me like a lasso
But you’re just a man and it’s nothing new 
To think you can reign me in 
So I flash you a grin 
And Houdini disappear
I can tell when you are near
But my invisibility cloak 
Only hides me from the unobservant folk 
And once you catch my trail 
The end will come, it cannot fail
To bring the edge of the horizon 
To the colours you have your eyes on
Flying and soaring like a bird 
You did not go unheard