Fiction-Poetry-Life Imitates Art

When was the last time you took a chance?

Did you give it all up for one slow dance?

Did you hold your head high as you crashed and burned?

But in the end, did all that you'd lost return?

When was the last time you made a mistake?

Did you come clean to God, were you burned at a stake?

Did you stand your ground and learn something new?

Or did you pretend that you 'didn't want to'?

We all take the chances, we all fall down.

But God picks us up, we can know that we're found.

Taking chances, making mistakes.

It's all part of finding it's all about grace.

Fiction-Prose-What Liars Do

A Note From The Author: Don't take this work at face value. It probably means more to me than it does to you, and if you can make some sense out of the drivel that comes out of my head I will be astounded. But...this is a work of fiction. Read it as such. This is not for young readers, or those who blush easily. It is honest and real and frankly, when I wrote it, it frightened me. So...read, if you'd like.
*******************

I shiver at the touch of his lips upon my earlobe. His voice whispers to me, words long forgotten, a sweet song that dances upon my skin like silk in a breath. I sigh lightly, my eyes closed. My skin is hot to the touch, betraying the pleasure I do not want to feel at those words he so quietly says. His voice is beautiful, like a dream, and I tell him so. He laughs, his chocolate brown eyes sparkling like a lamp in the darkness. He is wonder and mystery and beauty personified, and I tell him that, too. He stares deeply into my eyes, and I am drunk with pleasure at the simple warmth of his presence by my side. His hands take mine and press them carefully to his warm chest, right above his heart. I can feel him, his heart beating in his chest. It is a soft, gentle ‘thump, thump.” Entranced at this discovery, I rest my head against the soft skin above his heart. The sound of its pounding is as melodic and sweet as the voice that falls so beautifully from his lips. He entwines one hand in my hair and whispers the three words I both love and hate to hear…

“Lie to me,” he says softly, and for a moment I am confused. When the phrase registers fully in my mind, I pull away, shocked. He takes both of my hands in his once again and repeats the sentence that throbs so painfully in my ears. “Lie to me.”

I think that his eyes are boring a hole in my own, but somehow, I can’t bring myself to look away. “Are you sure?” I ask, part of me hoping he says no. But I already know the answer. He nods rapidly and I turn, not wanting him to see the pain and disappointment etched in my fallen face. I stand and begin to undress, the cool air sending my heated skin into shock. His soft, unmarred hand runs across my newly bared back, and then wraps around to cover my stomach. His fingers are brushing at my skin. I am fully bare now. I flush under his searching gaze. Wordlessly, he takes my hand and pulls me to him. I sit next to him, and he kisses me. It is nothing like any of the kisses we share under normal circumstances. There is nothing sweet or gentle about a kiss like this. It is hard and bruising, and he knows it, too. Pulling back slightly, he grins wickedly and beings to undress himself as well. He resumes his kissing as soon as he finishes, this time kissing my neck. He intersperses them with tiny “love bites”, though there is nothing loving about them. They leave my pale skin a harsh, angry red.

He moves down my body to my breasts and stomach, and I try not to flush with embarrassment. His hands are stroking my bare skin, and as much as I try to enjoy the sensations, I am too horrified at my own actions. For I am responding, kissing him back, touching, feeling, being…

I am no longer me. I am someone else. When he looks at me, he does not see my naked body before him. It is not my neck he’s kissing. It’s not my breasts he caresses carefully. These are not my legs that he runs his hands over. I am used to this though. I have never truly been me, at least not around him. I am a lie, someone he can turn to. I fulfill his fantasies when they will not. I am a substitute. I am a lie. I am a lie. The mantra is repeated in my head, like a record long broken. I am a lie. I am...a liar.

He is pushing me now, pushing me down, and the burden of hating myself is no longer the heaviest thing weighing on me. He closes his eyes; he hates to look at me. Tears well up in my own eyes as, yet again, I realize that he can’t stand the sight of me. But I will not cry. This knowledge is nothing new.

After all, this is what liars do.

Non-Fiction Essay-Who Can Say If I've Changed For The Better?

Certain times in our lives change us. Some force us to make an external change. Others prompt an internal change instead. For me, this change occured this past year. I made several very poor choices, all of which I still regret. They caused me many hours of guilt and tears. They also caused me to put my life into perspective.

It went something like this. I was a young, innocent sophomore, on the brink of discovering my full potential. But I was struggling, searching for an identity. I would be happy with any identity, as long as I could convince myself that it made me truly happy. So I made poor choices. I poured a lot of myself into people who didn't deserve me. I convinced myself that I was of such low worth that I needed other people to fulfill me. I convinced myself that what I was doing was truly the right thing. In fact, I convinced myself that I was happy with this new me. That summer, I went to a national youth gathering, and on a youth team that traveled around the country. I discovered that there was much more to me, to my identity, than I had at once given myself credit for. Throughout the time that we were together, the story came out, and I allowed myself to feel the pain that I had been hiding. I dealt with my past, which was a big deal for me. I had spent so much time running from my mistakes, closing myself off to those who truly cared about me.

So here it is, all on the table. My past, the pain it's caused me, and the fact that a healthy support system all but forced me to deal with the skeletons in my closet. I made bad choices, but in a way, I'm glad that I made them. After all, I can't say that they've changed me for the better, but they sure as anything have changed me for good.

Fiction-Short Story-End of Days

She never knew the cold to be painful. But there it was, screaming deep within her bones.

She hated herself, for being afraid, for not speaking up. She knew the truth, knew that the world was ending. But she had fear in her heart. Fear of the cold.

And so, she ran.

She ran with a purpose, ran to get as far away from that....that hell. And she knew. It was Hell. She knew the moment she saw the lightning rip, and the stars die. She knew it in the very marrow of her bones.

And so, she ran.

She knew she shouldn't. She knew she should turn back, be there for her loved ones, even for only a moment. The last moment of life.

And as she steeled herself and turned, the earth opened up and swallowed them whole. She screamed, but no sound came out. Her eyes bled with tears, for her friends, and for herself.

She knew she would be next.

And so, she ran.

She ran with the conviction of someone who had something left to live for, someone who was needed. But she knew all along it was for nothing. She had no purpose anymore, nothing to keep her from giving up. No promise of a future, lullabyes and picket fences.

She cried as she ran. The moon bled into the sun, and the stars cried fire and ice.

A woman screamed, cried out for help. "The end is nigh!" yelled an unseen voice. "The apocolypse is come, the end is nigh!"

It was wrong. This was not the apocolypse promised in Revelation by the God on High. This was the end of the world. The apocolypse promised the end of all sin-this was just the end.

She could feel it. Everything good, and right, and pure, was dying. The demons were rising from the earth, and fire crackled through the sky.

And still, she ran.

It was pointless, she knew. If the devil wanted her, he would take her. But she ran, and ran, and didn't look back. Because she still had hope, and hope was worth dying for.

Then the sky ripped open, and God stood in front of her. She stopped, and tears filled her eyes. Then she dropped to the ground in sorrow and pain. He took her in His arms and curled her into Him.

And so, she stopped running.

And she cried, and cried, and cried.

And then she slept. She slept for hours, days, years. She slept forever, until all the pain had been washed away, and the world was bright and new.

Then she awoke, and saw the New World. And a voice told her:

"So it will be known. A new world and a New Age. And you, child. You too are new."

And so, she smiled.

This was not the end.

This was only the beginning.

Finis.

Poem-Souls Like Butterflies

Souls are like the butterflies

They travel when set free

They go where they feel welcome

Right now, they come to me

Hearts are like the fireflies

They shine when they're at peace

They glow like the morning sunrise

And still, they come to me

Minds are like the birds

Swiftly flying, ever free

They grow stronger and more steady

And too, these come to me

I want you with me always

For you are all of these

I'd never loved another

But then, you came to me

I want to show you to this place

Where ghosts and spirits dwell

And once have I you followed

Hence, none other can you tell

This place shall be a secret

Ours only to us keep

This place where ether travels

Beyond all earthly things

For all souls travel here

Whence they have past and gone

To the land where spirits dwell

With souls like butterflies.

Non-Fiction Essay-All I Wanna Do Is Drive, Drive, Drive…

People are insane. There’s really no other way to say it. People can be crazy, and the place that they act the craziest is in their cars. I love watching people while they’re driving. They do the strangest things-particularly when they think that no one else is watching. It also brings out the worst aspects of people’s personalities. People go nuts when confined in a sardine can with the ability to kill.
Have you ever watched someone drive? They concentrate like if they don’t put every ounce of their being into it, they shall surely perish. They will scream at other drivers, because somehow those people can only hear you if you’re yelling obscenities. When they do finally calm down enough to enjoy the experience, they sing loudly (and often badly) along with the radio, talk on cell phones, or party like it’s nineteen ninety nine by dancing like their seat is on fire. It’s humorous. It’s thrilling. In some ways, it’s better than cable.
The same goes for watching people after one of them has, for instance, rear-ended another. No matter whose fault it really is, both people jump out of their vehicles with a shocked, annoyed look on their faces. They then yell rudely at the other person, and now it doesn’t matter whose fault it really was. Now, they are at Def Con 1. They will struggle at the intersection of No Way and Your Fault until they’re blue in the face, because they refuse to admit that they could be wrong.
There is no better place to observe people than when they are driving. For some reason, people let their hair down when they drive. Nowhere else are people as raw, as human, as utterly stupid, as they are when they get into a car. So go ahead. Jam away to Rick Springfield’s “Jessie’s Girl”* while confined in your car. But be cautious. You never know who could be watching.


*Substitutions may be made for whatever your “guilty pleasure” song happens to be.

Fiction-Short Story-Salvation

An outcast.

That was what she was. She was strange and quirky, and people didn’t tolerate that. She had a classically structured face, but it was not really very pretty. Her hair was dark, kept very, very long because she “liked it that way”. She was short, but with gangly limbs, giving her a very off-putting appearance. Wildly colored clothes, strange jewelry, and rebellious makeup. Music was in her ears, and her nose in a book. These were the things that defined her. She hid her wide green eyes behind black, square-framed glasses. She was always thoughtful, biting her lip, and she moved her hands emphatically when she talked; something she rarely did. Because when she did, there was intelligence in her voice, and an hint of derision for those around her that she was unable to effectively mask. She felt them petty, backstabbing, and irritatingly overdramatic; a fair description. But try as she might to mask her pain with scorn, she could not overcome the hurt that welled inside of her like blood from a fresh wound. She couldn’t cover the feelings that clouded her eyes, not even with those glasses. But it didn’t matter, because no one noticed her distress anyway.

But she was strong, hardened by a world that would not accept weakness. She no longer cried at night. Instead, she wrote. She wrote, and while she wrote she no longer felt the hurt inside of her. The painful longing that crept inside of her very soul like a parasite would leave, and for the few moments that she wrote, she felt a quiet happiness replace the pain.

It was stupid, she realized, to rely on words as the force that sustained her life. For that’s all they were. They were words on a paper, a 1-D surface, unaware that they were swiftly being appointed as her salvation. And she wrote and wrote, perfecting the nonexistent suicide note. The clock ticked and the emotions churned, and she poured them all out onto the paper. It contained the very depths of her soul.

She writes on. And although she does not know it, although they are not aware, her words are swiftly being appointed as my salvation.