TLD's Poetry

self-made nightmare

i dream of myself, bearing that
perfect image of a wounded
beast, drowning in
mindless mental images
of itself, gazing, fearing
an impending death,
a candle flame, flickering,
about to go out.

i dream of myself, mending my
glass heart, shattered,
a broken flow of mental
sanity, wounded, wound and
bound, tangled within the
cold, entrenching embrace of my
own, war torn heart strings.

i dream of myself, mind bent by
greedy fears, an inner light that's
stolen, embezzled in motion, my words
hindered, meanings intangible, cloaked,
impossible to grasp within when
mind and heart are separated,
like music whose notes bear
nothing but abrupt
emptiness.

i dream of myself, shielded by
unloving forgiveness, deep,
forged, forgotten emotion
bound by all that is nothing,
my fearful understanding lost
to a simple limitation, a glorious
anxiety, searching for words
when none are available.

i dream of myself,
forging "self" out of
mind-heart disharmony,
mind-mind imbalance,
shining light from veiled darkness,
from two benevolent demons
in a simple mind, heart,
routine dissatisfaction-seeking
organism, birthed from a small
void of limited humility.

i dream of myself,
playing my own
war-torn heart strings
hoping to get a single harmonized
sound, out of a place filled
with broken, abrupt feelings,
before simply collapsing in,
like a candle flame, flickering,
about to go out.

look into my heartbeat

i look into my heartbeat,
stare into the sound of moments
passing, moments passing
looking deeply to its rhythm, now,
i dance

as moments pass
i struggle to the rhythm
of my own erratic heartbeat,
stare into its changing
nature, sometimes frantic,
always graceful

i stare into its changing
wonder, somewhat constant,
always graceful,
in its light, i glimmer,
dance as it repeats,
repeats, repeats,
i dance, enraptured

its subtle changes
capture me, i see
every rhythm and beat
now, simply letting go
of every moment,
every time, caught up
in time, caught up
in times caught up
to me

i dance to my anxiety
to every simple beat,
and every moment
which took hold of me,
i let go, learn to let go, now,
i dance to my anxiety

its grasp
enraptures me
as still, i look into
my heartbeat
and i dance.

the scars of a turbulent trauma

every thing i feel and suppress
time seems to slow down. i regress --
i fly within reaches of my own insanity,
fall into place in my secluded dreamland, and
my heart goes numb, my grace now broken, my
light abruptly lost in triggered chaos
subdued by the scars of a turbulent trauma

every rhyme i spark, express,
time resumes in its perfect flow
i soar, i rise, i remember -- i
heal the cracks in my fractured heart
i release, to let go, to set myself free, to
rise, to kindle my flame, to fly above my sorrows,
renewed from the scars of a turbulent trauma

every time i fall,
my light subdued,
every time i heal,
i rise renewed.

Far Night

i hear the voice of the night sky
subtly calling my name
it beckons, it echoes, it echoes
a silent calling to my wounded spirit.

i look to the night sky
its voice echoes in my mind
it's screaming of sadness, echoing fear
though somehow it keeps me sane

its motherly rhythms
though hostile and sweet
cradle me, reassuring,
a cold embrace of fear

each star calls within me
a memory,
each comet
a troublesome trigger,
each galaxy
a deep-rooted longing
each breeze, a cold love
i belong

each wind echoes sadness
each tree translates to sounds,
"i am an archetype of mental projections
transient, ambient, but eternal

i have a subtle calling
that one day, will reach"
as it speaks without words
to my wounded spirit.

"i'm your companion
all throughout time
i resonate through you always
without words, without rhyme."

the distant night surrounds me,
an all-encroaching grasp,
the moist winds an echo of my tears
falling down to the ground

i surrender to this voice
of a cold and lonely love,
into my inner darkness
staring back at me.

through my mind's echoes
i belong.
through my heart's calling,
i am loved.

i hear the voice of my night sky
subtly calling my name
it beckons, it echoes, it echoes
a silent calling to my wounded spirit.

trigger

calm

deep breath

worlds fly by when
words are choked
calm

deep breath

when heart is still, but
mind is overcome
seduced

deep breath

by repetition
serene
calm

deep, breathless

when mind is still, but
heart is overcome
deep

breathless

over-anxiety
mind and heart are
numb

the body, a shell

breathless
hyperventilating
calm

deep breath

words fly by when
worlds are clashing
numb

rhythmic, breathless

my mind
in need of release
calm

the trigger
overcomes me
silent
relentless
fading, distant
calm

This one was written by myself for my birthday on May 10.

That Special Day

your life takes on the rhythm
of your heartbeat
this is what i came
to learn so far

it came together just
as if the moon and stars
aligned in perfect harmony
in love, united

then it came
a brand new heartbeat
a direct result of moonlight
copulating starlight

and i, a son,
or should i say, a sun
that brought into their minds
and hearts the rhythm
of another shining heartbeat

i am sure we all remember
it's those days that we commemorate,
(our Birthdays, right?)
that light would soon eclipse

i say,
your life takes on the rhythm
of your heartbeat
i would say i wasn't there
or not aware, but soon
that rhythm that united me

and Mom
and Dad

started falling apart

ever
disconnected
ever
tormented
ever
changed
rearranged
with no way out

my mind would try
to assimilate -- if
life should always follow
what was in your heart
then why was mine so broken?

and if love should be
confessed with words
and actions, why were ours
so much unspoken?

our ways divided in two, and as if
a simple thought of the past
became a memory of the future
three worlds were torn apart

one could never hear
the others' heartbeats
anymore

but though our hearts eclipsed
and minds were full of darkness
that burning light came back,
slowly, shyly, but it came back

between two worlds, it came back --
an eclipse had ended, i began to see
reflections of my true light coming back
to show its face just once again

and as your life should follow
what is in your heart
for me, this came to be --
two worlds had reunited
steeped within their troubles
and began to understand

our Birthdays
are not just "special days"
within the year,
but when we understand how we
are brought together
we see it as our first new day of life
to breathe the precious air and take in

all that is special
to us, and that
is what i came
to learn so far

This poem encapsulates my views about autism.

our language is sacred

to those who don't understand
we live in a world of sound
our thoughts merge deeply
with the rhythms of nature
unbound

to those who don't understand
our sounds and our rhythms,
our thoughts become rhymes
and our language is sacred
defined

to those who don't understand
we may get angry, yes, we may cry
but what else can we do, when
we walk among sharp fragments of our
memories?

and what should we do
to conform to your standards?
or why, even,

when we grasp the transparent
subtleties of our own bleeding hearts,
should we try to speak a foreign mind?
to those who don't understand, just
look and find

you say your words,
clashing in self-isolation
the sounds become an empty shell
from an unknown source
and meaning has fallen out,
lifeless from an awkward
rhythm

we walk through life with diamond shoes,
our glass hearts balanced by
strings of interwoven sounds
kept together through loving
expression

to those who don't understand
we live in different worlds
our eyes are windows to our world
and lenses to yours

maybe you can see it
through our eyes
our transparent systematic emotions
or the immense barrier between
our hearts and minds

our language is sacred
when sounds are woven
carefully into colours,
colours into words,
then sentences and worlds

we speak no isolation,
we form no violence
but we are fragile
when even our own
memories cut so deeply

glass hearts
shattered, diamond shoes
unfitting and awkward
we cry out in our own language
to be safe

our language is sacred
and we are safe within its bounds

a killer by sunlight

i stare into a fading evening
its peaceful presence surrounding me
embracing me as who i really am
a fervent spark of life

i stare into an evening jaded
losing lustre, its complacent blue
construction paper sky, sitting
still as the silent breeze begins
to slowly fade away

i stare
admire all the natural flows,
the cycles,
the flowers,
the trees,
the rhythms,
the beauty

as if, entranced,
my narrow brain could even grasp it all
my heart, entranced,
remembers how to take the sunlight's early fall...
with love, or pain?

maybe madness killed the
sun, it seems? or sadness
drenched its sacred flame?
one that rises early
always has an early fall, they say,
or maybe it had lost at its own game
responding to the call
of natural ways?

i'd never thought that night
could coldly kill the sunlight, now
scarcely scattered in confetti bits
across the ever-dimming sky
as if the sun is slowly
bleeding its light
away

to rest in peace
among the sleepy
fragments of my
mind that never
wondered why
it cannot stay

their shadows yet uncast

from dust to dust
and beat to breath
we divide by life
and unite by death

from mind to heart
and earth to sun
the times have passed
and deeds are done

from heart to ground
and seed to seed
all changes flow like water
to the ones who need

from heightened frames of mind
to capture simple frames of time
who seek to hold on to those valued things
their memories an empty mime

to mourn a silent ode
to all the ages that have passed
to those who hold in memories
their shadows yet uncast.

i look and see inside my heart
those very shadowed fragments
now revealing somber solitudes
from things i had attachments

their shadows yet uncast
chained to the walls of my own mind
those things become my lonely company
still blinded by the light i cannot find

their memories an empty mime
i lose myself inside that solitude
retracting from the world of absent mind
into my shell of bliss and gratitude

away from ways in which we take for granted
i am firmly planted in my own internal world
unaware, my rhythms slowly fading
the flowers of my mind become unfurled

still blinded by the light i cannot find
i look and see inside my heart
those shadows i'll now cast away
from me that do no part

from dust to dust
and heart to ground
i put myself at ease
my healing has been found.

song of the gentle wind's breath

the wind chimes a memory,
go home, now, go home,
the wind chimes a melody,
go seek, and go find,

the wind sings its sadness,
so softly, so soothing,
the wind chimes a memory,
so faint but defined.

the shards of my sadness,
so bleak, but so clear,
ring forth with this melody,
my memories refined.

the wind sings its song
to each of the trees
to capture its rhythm
to hiss in the breeze.

i ring forth this melody
now caught in its rhythm,
its motherly nature
now soothing my wounds.

i sing in its embrace,
a chorus of silence,
its loving caress
now bringing me home.