spoken in broken tongue

I take your poetry on my tongue
Constrict my airway and pace my breath
Just enough to recite
With buttery harmonics
The words your heart bled
The words your heart bled

I take your poetry on my tongue
And wish to carry some of your burden
Live for some of your lifetime
See with some of your view
Feel the pain you felt
And hear
The words your heart bled
The words your heart bled

I take your poetry on my tongue
And I apologize
I've felt the crushed bones
Of my thorax
The taste of metal from the clench of skin in my teeth
The force of those fingers prying on my skin
Scratching on my skin
With hatred
All the tools for colorful imagery
But all I could yield was grey muddiness
A muddiness
A muddy mess
Left by tears mixed in disillusionment

I hold your poetry in my tongue
I know the poetry written in this heart
Spoken in broken tongue are
The words your heart bled
The words your heart bled

something not quite compelling

Something not quite compelling
You are more in love with that person than they will ever be with themselves
And, although you're pretty smart
You sound like a fool when you want to engage her
Even in silence

And, I ask you

And I ask you

Do you still fight your sleep, old man?
With your rough hands...you...rub your face off
Those memories of wrongs done...at a time when you were young...barely...a man...
With your rough hads, now lifting the barrels...you splash off your face...the memories of wrongs done...at...a time when you were merely a boy
I ask you...have you any memories...recollections
Regrets from a time or the thoughts marked by tombs with few words...beckoning...always remember that it was never spoken willing to forgive that which men readily forgive
Sadly understanding....they understand in unison...this wrongful death of...when I think
I ask you this. You, as a man, have created these laws for me to abide and it seems...as the sun unveil...as she schemes to strip you, like a whore, and bare your lies as if dirty skin...marked...bane...caste...filth
Dishonorable.
You created such words to strip it of all use when I moralized
Made extinct that which you taught...lies...truths...control...
You are a pick for this rock but as you chip me to stones and your mind makes of me...memories...like your stoning
I ask you this, does your mind dream of ways to forget...invent arts hoping to muse...you'll forget...bid you her way to the ease you've always chosen...
And, I ask you this...are you ashamed.