Don't Let This Be the End

“Stop!”
Ears pressed
Hands straining
How many voices need to speak before silence comes?
I am three again
Stop, please stop
Please stop, please

Lassoed into the middle
Not the middle
Lassoed nonetheless
Why did you have to tell me
Everything?

Stop

Please stop

Angry words are steel swords
They aim to rip hearts out
Leave the whole bloody mess on display, dripping

Why did you bring me in?

Do I join the burgeoning war?
Or choose to hold my fury mute?
These inherited passions threaten to kill, maim and destroy
I want, with a calm mind, to reason
But my mind wants to rage
And the raging mind disembowels

Why can’t you stop?

Hurt blossoms at the fingers of wrathful hearts
Pain births its children
And I am
in
pain

why could we not have been patient instead?
calmed our hearts to seek
calmed our minds to understand
it is not our place to decide the motivations of another
and yet we do, calling it righteous fury

Life and death lie as choices
On our hands
on the hands of everyone rearing for expression

I want to scream so you will stop
Why
Why did you choose this?

Destruction has expensive PR
compelling branding
an award for the path of least resistance
Its fans, its followers
Hold to their lips a megaphone
Preaching quick success
All while
The jaws of their master
Tighten unnoticed around their waists

I am pulled by its sway
It promises distraction with cacophony
Security with chaos
The assurance of everlasting invalidity
My senses are assaulted
Do as we do
And you will be justified
Your foes will be quelled

But they aren’t my foes
They aren’t anyone’s foes

Is it simpler
To drown in the sea of perception?

Wait
Wait
Eyes closed
Head down
Quiet
Quiet, please
No more

Volcanic winter falls as fire ebbs
Ash in hair
Mouth
Breath
Like snow, minus healing
Excrement instead of clean water

We have ruined this island
It stands disconnected
Sullen in its cover of failure
Will it re-emerge?
I pray not
Its land may become fertile
But only when the volcano dies
Alive, it forms clouds
But soot can neither bring rain
Nor dissipate

And I am afraid
Afraid of this island dying
And staying dead
So please stop
Please
I am afraid

‘Come to me,’ whispers life.
‘Come to me.
Bring me your sorrows,
your detached, bleeding heart
Bring me your blackened life
and watch.
Allow a single drop of rain
onto your dying skin.
Cup the leaves of one seedling
in your hands
whisper songs to it.
Calm the force behind your violence.
It is not what you think
Build again those dreams and visions
Yours, and of those around you
Strengthen the architecture of wonder
Do this
And you will turn around
To find beauty
Already emerged and flowering
Already waiting
For those who have eyes to see
Come
Choose me;
your world will burst
into green.’

Can’t you hear it?
Won’t you hear it?

please stop

listen

before you destroy each other

But you are still yelling
How do I turn away without shutting my ears?
My eyes?
I want my heart to receive sight of you
I want to breathe in your words
Please
Don’t let
This

Be


the



end.