Where I lived

This poem in a way is an allegory that reveals struggles that I went through in my adolescence. I hope those like me who tend to dwell on what take away something from its lines.

Where I lived

They told me to come away,

that the edge would pull me down

to where even the birds would fear to fly,

just to escape,

and I dreamt of death this day

only to realize that I was never dreaming

that He had come for me,
but it made me think

that perhaps my life had been the real dream

because as I died my illusions fell away

and I saw finally that I had wasted so much time in reminiscing,

in living a past that was gone.

I lived it far too much that it pushed my mother far away,
brought troubled stars to life in my father's eyes,

drove my brother towards that place I'd left.

He sought me in bottles and under empty bridges,

amid graffitied walls that bore names of people I once knew.

Little Eric who spoke too softly but ran too much,

ran right into Neverland and odied on cocaine at age nineteen,

my friend Sarah who wrote her pain in a forest of scars

that she left lying pale against her skin,

I still wonder where the world has left her,

her eyes searching the heavens for signs

that tomorrow just might be better than all those bitter yesterdays?

Yes I dreamt I'd died

and realized as night surrendered to the pale light of the new sun

that I had never dreamed,
that Death had found me silent and raised me up,

now as I hover above it all I marvel at my clarity,

I should have dreamt more of the road ahead,
Of a future I'd left wanting

because the past has never loved me but that is where I lived.