My Demons’ Keeper

The darkness where my betrayals & hurt stir,

are where my demons plot & scheme,

trying to torment and manipulate me into letting them come back out and puppet me

But, I am their keeper 

I have learnt to acknowledge why they came to be, I have learnt how to sit in these feelings that make their cell & just observe…

occasionally, though they get loose in my head,

converse through scenarios & flashbacks,

memories and screaming the words & actions that mutated my innocence into wrath…

I didn’t have loving eyes always watching over me,

my existence was hyper vigilance 

cause the walls surrounding me felt like they were made of prying, perving eyes, hands…body parts (this night & day, not just occasionally)

“Sleep with one eye open”…

“Hello darkness, my old friend”

In the light, I felt invisible, discarded, unlovable & unloved

In the darkness, I felt the meat hooks tear my flesh & the snakes sliver, intentions turn into…

the stuff of nightmares 

“No one hears you scream”…or your cries, turned them on, while others turned a blind eye & collected bargaining chips (for personal gains)…

I believe me, I know others have heard since, too 

Don’t pity me, I don’t write about this stuff cause I hurt anymore…

I write to give those demons within voice…

& throw back their torturous wrath,

now turned into freedom & beautiful thriving…

a life built around love, respect, empathy and compassion for myself & others

once lost or feeling lost in a living hell.

The darkness is not a void that killed me,

my demons are not scary monsters that floor me (anymore), they are reminders of why I sometimes hurt, why tears sometimes fall, 

while sometimes, I dissociate or pull away…

why I am a sensitive person with a heart…

real life humans dressed as devils drove me to the verge of self destruction & a wrathful hate,

gone now that armour shell (with spikes),

residual energy and memories, the past acknowledged, but not the life I forge & am present in,

today…I live, I thrive (and credit to the beautiful souls that showed me how to see my worth & believe it, thank you)

freeflowpoet

Open eyes

 OPEN EYES

Evolution…a organism to the woman standing before you

I hear the praise and love given

but, some days the memories, emotions and thoughts stir

and everything I’ve thrived through despite, bites a little 

like a scar memory 

I feel undeserving, a phoney, like I don’t belong…

It doesn’t last very long these days, cause I’m ok in my skin, just human!

the old scripts & reels may playback now & then

but, that’s all it is a memory from the past, 

I may have once felt buried deep in a dark hole,

but once I stopped fighting myself and accepted the signs telling me I was digging myself deeper

I let hope mix in with the fears, I found hope in despair & started turning around

I allowed people in, let them help wipe the dirt from my eyes & took their hands, up out of the darkness of the deepest depths of hell

I felt the light, before I saw it

I didn’t always believe I’d see it, but I stuck with the idea of living in it…til I bathed in it

I had to examine my perceptions of things, unravel the meanings & truths about them & people and choose I was worthy of so much more

Was change easy? Hell no, but worth it, yes!

I no longer accept the unacceptable,

I will no longer allow anyone to heap dirt upon me or push me back down,

I have learnt that like night, daylight follows,

through the darkest days, there’s always light bringers…I just have to learn to appreciate them and not be stubborn 

No one is alone & in that connection 

the light shines (even if just a dim flicker, hope is a light to guide out any darkness)

freeflowpoet

Cracks in the pavement

Memories wax and wane,

nothing sticks too long these days

I’m free from the chains that once bound me

I don’t need to revisit old scars

or those demons who carved into me,

I don’t need to forgive them, only myself…

I loved the feeling of belonging,

I craved it, would sell my morals just to feel the illusion of it…didn’t see it then,

but an illusion was all it ever was

freedom came the day I cut the chains

and I’m not bitter

I got the time to earn the real thing

and I now won’t accept anything less for myself

It ain’t selfish, it’s real and the truthful shit,

It was never easy, working everything out and working through what was mine and what I wasn’t to blame for (some people will still label me from either what they know of my past or what they think they know from the gossip vines)…I don’t care baby, I just don’t care

this is where I won’t survive the concrete jungle, anymore

I thrive outside of it

freeflowpoet

Aftertaste, it is bitter (maybe it’s not)

 I lost me in the space between

give and take

I feel the waves radiating over me,

atoms separating physical from 

mental form

I’ve lost myself, can’t feel identity…

or anything

Am I even a living being?

Fractured and afraid, fractured and unafraid 

This distorted place, she is me

no, she is not

time is an illusion, 

I am not the beginning, nor am I the end…

Spinning within, warmth is coldness’s best friend

numbness again, I don’t feel a thing

yet, I know everything about me…

or whoever this is

Peel it away, strip it down, dumb the senses and call it medicine 

rate it 5/10, that’s 11/10 for those who’ve never felt 

heatwaves from concrete, metal & bone imploding, wrapping 

Survival is a better outcome then death

but it still comes at a cost

At the crossroads I turned down a deal…still tongue kissed the devil

while denying him

It’s ok, I’m back again

my identity never left

I never left

freeflowpoet 

Bucking

 I try to reign in and control this stallion, called life but he's not broken in, though he's broken me a few times   and every time I get thrown off, I swear that bastard laughs.                                   I try to pull tight on the reins and dig in to his side.                                               but it's all an illusion, there's no reins in my hands...                                               So how in the fu*k, do I let go?...How does taking my hands off the wheel, give me control?... there's a secret child, you don't have it, never have and never will, it's life after all                 you're only power is in how you choose to react or respond...Letting go is more a mindset, than a mind fu*k...               as long as you can surrender the illusion that you're in control.              Just live each moment as you can, changing only what is yours to mould and mend...live life, on life's terms

freefloepoet

I’m (not) a fu*k up

I’ve been beaten and bullied

only to turn around and become that which I hated…and more.

I loved those who would go on to sell more than my soul

I danced and rumbled with the devil and

tried to escape in a cascade of substances 

I tried to initiate my suicide and homicide many times…

Listen child, you survived

you climbed out that meteorite crater deep in the chasms of hell…

Wrapped in the wings of an angel from God above, you arose like the phoenix,

in stages you reassessed the carnage 

and wandered through the chaos,

rebuilding, as you took in the reality,

striped off the labels (well tried to),

all while trying to change attitude and behaviours, hearing truth…that sometimes brought out more guilt, shame

You overcame child, saw something different and went in for the golden armour of faith and resilience 

Look, I’m fuc*king human,

I will make mistakes and sometimes the ones from my past will rise up…to bite me in the as*

I own only what is mine

and sometimes I’m a little slow to see the lessons - literally slapping me in the face,

but child, believe me when the pain is deep enough and I remember what’s at stake…I’ma going dig in and change

“my thinking, my actions…my responsibilities”

We all fu*k up in life,

but we also can gain awareness,

which become a weapon of choice (changes)

freeflowpoet 

Gone

I don’t actually know what you think of me

if you think I’m perfect, or got all my shit together, in a neat zip locked bag…

You don’t see me curled up in a fetal position

after having my life dragged up, and being re-traumatised…it’s got nothing to do with the actual assessment I was meant to be doing…

You don’t see me trying to calm an inner child

she’s black and blue and limp, I can’t feel calmness

I can’t console her, she is me & while I’m numb and dissociated from myself…

I can’t feel anything but panic, internal

Like I’m sitting beside myself, cradling myself but it’s just an illusion…she was forgiven long ago, I forgave me (or so I thought)

and every time I close my eyes 

I see everything all over again

I feel the darkness consuming me

the tv is on the fritz again and the images are black and white static, it’s as if I’m slipping in and out of consciousness…as if I was reliving it all…

It’s frightening having awareness that you’re outside yourself, split and fractured…

feeling at odds within myself but knowing this is temporary and I’m ok, just overwhelmed…

I identify shame, shame that I thought I was beyond this

Shame, I couldn’t get all the words out…

Shame, I let me down again (I feel like I’m a failure, like I can fix others, but not me…& yet I’m not broken, I know this)

I know this

freeflowpoet