Ghosts

Ghosts

“Justified”

A term that seems so distant,

Too simple to explain the blood

The secrets

The lies that I tell myself

So that I might have one good night of rest

So that the night does not keep me

This monster that I am becoming

Fed by failed relationships

And the desire to escape critical eyes that know

That the seances that I agree upon with myself are futile attempts to call upon a once joyful soul

Maybe, just maybe, if I meet this ghost enough, brought up in longing conversations of a lover I have lost, or just chosen to forget

I will finally get to rest

In knowing that what I longed for was never to add up, or to be accepted

But to know that a ghost is only something to be afraid of if it’s blood is on my hands

Calluses from this dagger that I hold close to my own heart have become the only thing that lets me feel

Through the padding of cells I recall pressure that I once knew to be touch

But that is now covered in tough skin that protects me from this ghost

One that speaks of a time when he remembered that the sacrificial knife that I hold inches away from me was once held by another for reasons nearly forgotten

Nearly

Freedom will not be found in answers

But in the quiet

Where I know that this blood on my hands was not the result of self inflicted wounds, but the opening of old ones that never quite seemed to heal

The dried blood on my clothes toe the line between “I survived” and “I’m to blame”

Only revealing in myself that this heart pumping out blood must not know the difference between arteries and veins

One gives, one takes away

No newness

Just old wearing the mask of life

But, as long as this organ of love keeps beating, I get farther and farther from my fears

As long as there is oxygen in these lungs and blood in these veins, no matter how adulterated or full of half truths and ghosts they are

Life still happens

And I am still breaking down the walls of stone that protect me from the unknown

Or simply protect me from being known

My bloodshot eyes reveal the truth

My veins are full of blood with no life

This ghost tells me that maybe one day we’ll get back

Back to a place where I, in my blindness, won’t be able to tell the difference between pain and happiness

Where the grey is my drug

And the silence my fix

“Come let us sing for joy to the Lord; let us shout aloud to the rock of our salvation”

What an easy escape for ones whose lungs haven’t inhaled and exhaled enough to understand that the collapse of these lungs came from just that

Just as I hold my breath as I pass graveyards, this ghost doesn’t reside in a place of final rest, but in the inaudible sense that what this tongue speaks will never be enough to shake the sweet film of a memory of a spirit that once filled me

Maybe that’s just it

Holding my breath as I pass graveyards isn’t a tradition

Or a belief of possession

It is the reminder that no matter how much I inhale this ghost

I may never see him again

Possession might be the answer if I have you

If presence is the trump card to answers, then I am surrounded

This ghost I cannot seem to shake asks me why I have forsaken him

Why I hide the blood on my hands as if telling him that I am guilty would satisfy him once and for all

But all I can come up with is silence

So if presence is greater than answers, if he comes looking for me, tell him this...