Wave Function

High and dry I stand above the waves
Watching them dash themselves upon the rocks.
Some small part of my soul obliquely craves
The strong sensation of such simple shocks,
But greater reason rationally blocks
Those mad desires, holding me away,
As my more temperate partition mocks
The urge to throw myself into the fray.
Yet still I fear that some oblated day
My eccentricities will overcome
The wiser part of me that tells them nay,
And I will march to an inconstant drum
Leaping and crashing like the waves I see
Upon the empty beach so desperately.

Kaos

Chaos is come again. Not stealthily,
As demons ought to, though in dead of night,
But as a drunken, rowdy roommate might,
Barging in to land on top of me.
He drinks up neither beer, though, nor whiskey,
But my soul's essence, which, though labeled light,
I do not wish to lose - still he is tight
With it, and stumbles on me heavily,
Crashing me down. I tumble on myself
Alone yet falling from his violence
Clutching at anything - a chair, a shelf
A door - to break my fall from innocence,
But slam into the ground. Chaos is come
And all around me, his infernal hum.

Whipping

The swirling wind insists that it is here
As if I could deny it - every day
I hear it race around me, robbing cheer
From even sunny days. Its constant bray
Wears tidally upon my soul, and sweeps
My sanity to sea with every wave.
Even at night the howling never sleeps,
Nor will the sunlight shining brightly save
Me from this demon. It forever breaks
Upon the outer wall, and always shrieks:
That shrieking in its turn forever makes
My mind seep from my brain through tiny leaks
Yet none of this hurts worse than how my heart
By constant absence is pulled hard apart.

Windy City

Sunlight is deceiving in its joy
It claims such warmth, and yet will not deliver -
A miser, lest its happiness should cloy
By being something of an overgiver,
Instead of that, it keeps its heat its own
Maintaining such an insular degree
That, as the blasts of winters winds are blown,
It seems to suck the very soul of me
Despite the sunshine all is cold and grey
Within my quaking body. I am done
And all the lovely visage of the day
Cannot - or will not - give me even one
Moment of life. The cold is cold despite
The so-called warmth of day - I think it night.

Geography

The city spreads out north, south, west - not east.
There is the barrier; there we can't pass.
This does not trouble most men in the least,
For there is room enough, and more than room,
Where we may go to build towers of glass,
Steel-ribbed and grandiose. But why should we
Yield to this inevitable doom
And leave the east alone? Shall we not rise,
As does the sun, over the eastern sea?
And is it not our duty to declare
We have the right to spread across the skies
As widely as the sun we block out there?
I say build on the lake, and let us swim
Rather than let the sun outshine us, dim.

Absentia

Absence doesn't necessarily
Mean something merely physical. It can
Be so much more, and such it is to me:
I miss her touch, of course - I am a man,
And so feel as men do, and all for her -
But also miss - so much - her liquid smile,
The way she knows me, and the way we were
Inseparable. It all combines to pile
Down on me when she is gone, and make
Me linger longing looks on her grey dot,
Glance at my phone in vain, and nearly quake
With hope that she has called when she has not.
It is all one - all absence is a pain
And either this or I must swiftly wane.

Migrant

I cannot say how much I miss her: no,
That's far beyond my power to express.
But she could see the pain in letting go,
And it is plain I did so in duress.
I would not let her part from me, could I
By any means available and fair
Have kept her with me, for I need her by
Much like I need to be myself: nowhere
Can I be me if she is far from thence,
Nor can I smile with full eye and mouth
If I am singled. It may not make sense
To others, but when she heads to the south,
My happiness is also wintering
In warmer climes, and I am splintering.

Pay

Grace must be undeserved, and freely given;
It cannot be a wage that virtue's paid.
Mercy and justice are, by nature, riven,
The one to sway, the other stand unswayed.
Grace, delivered for desert, must be
A pale wraith of itself, but half-sincere;
To be substantial, it must openly
Be self-produced, self-motivated, clear
Of too much justice: what is earned is earned,
And is much mocked by being laid to grace:
Where cause of worth is easily discerned,
Merciful grace perforce must yield its place.
Love works in mercy, grace, and open arms
Not payment for commodities of charms.

ETA

Why would I ever go away?
What would my purpose be to leave?
I cannot understand a way
In which it would not make me grieve
To part with her to whom I'm bound.
Why then would I be dumb enough
To find a foolish, useless ground
(Perhaps to demonstrate I'm tough?)
On which to bring down that much woe
Upon my own and proper head?
If I were sad, I would not go;
I would much rather stay instead
For staying would more joy allow
In future times - as it does now.

Warty

Sometimes I over-worry: this I know
Has been a problem often in my past.
I do not let the situation grow
Into fruition, when it should, at last,
Be fully understood. Instead I fear
Before the time has come for fearful things,
Flinching before the stroke ever comes near.
This over-worried way of mine then brings
A great deal too much stress considering
It isn't necessary. I should be
Much calmer, but instead I always cling
To worry, and then let it get to me.
It's silly to be so, but I can't choose:
Could I do so, this is something I'd lose.