by Kimberly Richardson

Created on: November 19, 2009

Standing.

I fall within the building's shadow, graced to just be alive.

Is it, then, my lot in life

To be consumed so willingly?

My eyes are dry and I am humbled by the experience.

This is the real moment, when we as Man come to the realization

That we are not as limber as we once thought.

I, however, am different; I turn to my place of solitude

To find refuge when all others look to the neon.

I am relieved to be home, simply for the sake of being

Surrounded by what is real and alive.

No others can come before me

For my brown eyes are enough

To send them away, desperate and unforgiving.

My Muse has led me here, for she knows me well

And I must plant the roses at her feet for such a gesture.

The slow and cold leak finally crawls inside of me

To feed on whatever I have not used yet.

It is a an extension of what I used to be-

A shell of a woman who lost her way and refused to find it again.

My dried out skin is laid silently on the rock

By the place that gives me light,

An almost heady desire to fall to my knees

And prostrate myself on the ground as a willing apprentice.

My Muse stands behind me, watching my moves,

Making sure I am truly what I claim to be

And still so much more.

My blood, her tears, mingled carefully,

Are placed in a bowl as an offering

To grant me acceptance, denying all others

Who lack enrichment and hedonistic suppliers.

I would rather be poor and in this current state of pheromones

Than to wallow in my own glands, fat and glistening,

Praise be! Jealously has its advantages.

The door is opened and I step in,

My face caressed by the cool and musty air

That seduced me so long ago

And yet I still cry when it takes me back

To when I was still feeding from my mother's breast

In hopes of a better world.

I am no stranger, here, yet, desolation,

Afraid of my own shadow, never again shall I be spineless.

Are you too afraid to step forward

To accept that which you can not escape?

Shall there be more, others like me

Who have tasted of its flesh and hunger for more- literary cannibals

Tearing apart Dickens and Shelly and Weldon Kees with bare hands

And nails that once caressed lovers and children's cheeks?

I can feel the strength slipping from me

To only be replaced with something older, darker, more discordant

Than what I was ever used to.

She stands behind me still, her arms scented with roses and pearls

Are now linked with mine in an effort to keep me from screaming,

Saints above and below, how I deserve thee not!

Be still, she tells me as we walk, be still

And allow your mind to simply think.

Can you do that for me?

Will you show me where you threw your dagger

To defeat the foe that was never there?

Shall you offer your liver to me be pecked out

By a bird that winces at the sound of a child laughing?

Shall you give yourself to it to become the monster

You so very much desire and loathe?

I am torn but I continue to walk,

Her words whispered are drenched in insanity

And literary sexuality that makes my knees buckle,

Cracking along the floor, distant and hollow;

Am I already here?

I long for the dust to cover me

A baptism preparing me for the trial by fire.

451 a number so heinous

That I disown its very existence.

We walk, she carries me, I love her

But I am no longer hers; I lay my body down before it

So that it could see I was no longer afraid

But merely curious to know

If I could ever bleed again.

My skin is now covered in words

Written by people who never knew me

But they gave me the stale breath I breathe today,

Keeping me alive, keeping me moving,

Keeping me a sinner to my own worst shadow.

So, then this is it.

My world is here before me, ready to be seized

And treated with emotions I never felt on my own.

This, then, is my reason.

A sanctuary for those who have none.

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