Madness:

every time
I take the time
to clean the house
from top to bottom
I find in some unlit corner
a madness
that cannot be banished
or tamed
or quenched
or killed
lurking
in the darkness
waiting for his turn

Stars:

our lives
are lit
by
distant
burning orbs

raging
through eternal night

fueled
by
violent
chain reactions

consuming
themselves
in a race
to become
pure light

our lives
mirror
that
of those
that
illuminate us
from afar

our fight
our rage
our striving

burning

until
we too
become
someone else's
stars

Boxes:

we are all the same
every one of us
packaged
in people-shaped boxes
built from bits and pieces
held together by
people-grade wires

just trying to be human

Puppets:

never content to leave

well enough alone

one or two strings

in my hand

would never do

not to be

a mere puppeteer

but a veritable master

my fist full of threads

pulling each in time

Tempest:

the tempest swells
by both courage and fear
and I stand here
admiring the stirring storm
rallying in force
on the horizon
soaked to the bone
and exhausted
as its horsemen
charge
ushering an impenetrable
wall of darkness, rain, and debris

I stand soaked to the bone
and exhausted
as the wind sounds
the storm's war call
thundering
imminent doom
across the expanse

the tempest swells
by both courage
and fear
and I stand here
admiring the stirring storm
rallying in force on the horizon

soaked to the bone
and exhausted
I stand

the tempest swells
by both courage
and fear
and as its horsemen charge
thundering imminent doom
across the expanse
soaked to the bone
and exhausted
I stand

for when doom calls my name
through the darkness
and ruin comes
to collect my soul
I will face them as adversaries

when the tempest swells
I stand

Holes:

the holes in our lives
are not marks
of souls
un-whole

but merely
windows
that
let the light through

for
throughout
our fray
with this mortality

we shine
brightest
not in our strength
but in our weakness

when
the world
leans against us
with its might

daring us
to falter
beneath
its weight

taunting us
as we bend

haunting us
with the echoes
of the lives
it has
already
crushed

we need not fear

we are not broken
just unfinished

our value
does not lie in perfection
but in potential
and good intentions

for
we touch others
most deeply
not in our success
but in our struggles

through the holes
in our lives
we reach out to others
to heal them

through the holes
in our lives
we let others in
and are made whole

Photographs:

photographs
are poems
too beautiful
for words