The Voices

The pain ignites my brain, and pierces my heart. I curse the endless battle between mind and soul. The cries grow deeper and stronger, I am helpless to decline, instantly I rise damp from the night's heat. My scream of horror is lost in the dark empty room.

I pull aside the bed curtains. The unbearable pain again brutally reminds me of its presence. The cries grow louder with each careful step. I reach the desk and sit each drag on the floor echoes through the room, and my fearful head.

I feel for the small, sulfur stick. As it glides across the wood the spark quickly turns to a small flame which brightens the lonely room.
I touch it to the candle which has long ago passed its usefulness. I free the quill from its wet home.

The first droplet of black is absorbed into the smooth white sheet. It is then and then alone that the deadly and powerful screaming grows quiet.

-Johnny V.

America

Do you ever get the feeling that America is the Duck Dynasty, Beverly Hillbillies of the world? We by pure luck and some slight gumption fell into amazing riches, power, and influence.

People looking to and watching us yet we have no Fucking clue what we are doing. The biggest difference here is that many here believe that just because of that luck we somehow deserve our situation and that we really are better than everyone else.

I know that many will prove my point by yelling at me telling me how lucky I am and if I don't like it I should just get out. But see I never said I didn't love my country. But we are at a crossroads now where we need to drop our arrogance, and understand that we are not perfect. We need to accept our faults and weaknesses before we can fix them. Otherwise we will become a third class nation still acting like we are in charge.

Angel

Why, she asks why? Trying to hide her fear with pride. But the silence from her protector was deafening.

Stubbornness lifts her to her feet. She is surprised that she is as tall as the woman who once towered above her.

Why she pleads. Her salty tears having begun long ago, for she new this day would come.

The beautiful woman sighed and allowed her wings to take their full breadth. The girl felt the blocking of the sun.

Isabella this is your time. It comes for us all. Now go forth and take pride in your task.

Isabella allowed her wings to open. Noticing for the first time that they were larger and stronger than her mentor.

She leapt from the secret spot. And with her single push of faith a new guardian was released.

-Johnny V.

Whispers of Silk

Her beauty, on its own, could bring rulers down off their golden thrones.

But, mingled with her cold deceit, she tempts revolutionaries to deliver the heads of emperors on silver slavers.

She long ago mastered the ability to isolate her defenders to wage her private wars.

Her voice is as temperate whispers of silk lifted from the dress-maker's pulpit.

Shield against her charm, for her soul is ice and incapable of giving credence to true devotion.

Stand prudent, her tears are not trustworthy, but merely calculated weapons to harmonize the order of battles.

-Johnny V.

Dust

I stare into my destructive past, I rehash a history of tasting the dust but never the savor of answered prayers.

My yet unborn dreams simmer in the fertile soil just beneath the blackened rose, but offer little joy.

Love passes thru barren, strident veins forever will betray my withering heart. The infection of denial feasting upon the flesh of my sanity.

The pyre of hope ignigites, passion is turned to smoke above the trees. Desire, blackened with soot takes wing and her black fragments  sore to their untimely end.

The frigidness of death will come for us all. Some she takes quickly without a ripple.

Yet for those whom she favors, her touch Is less tender, the end comes with torment and scintillation.

-Johnny V.

Reunion

I remove my thick cloak, wet with prideful tears. My shoulders weak, and heavy from nights of loneliness.

My face is dark, and stained with worry, my beard long, thick and untouched.

My skin hardened and experienced, my smile confused, from a thousand days of travel.

I stand, my once powerful arms opened to your doubtful gaze.

The moment you spy my deep dark soulful eyes you know my soul.

You step into my familiar embrace. Our aching hearts healed and combined. Your tear dashed face buried in my broad chest.

"Daddy!"

-Johnny V.

Jennifer's Beauty

Her long, red locks cascade down her shoulders like a cool mountain stream.

Her eyes reveal a troubled yet gentle spirit. She has a charm which demands attention.

She smiles and the sun's jealousy is forced upon the world. For its shine is at last bested.

Her beauty rests in her soul like a gentle spring rain. Leaving the joy and sparkle of a morning dew.

Her soft delicate feet leave marks in the sand visible only to the gulls as they pass across the ocean.

-Johnny V.

Forgiveness

She was quick to appoint me the sole trustee of her false needs.

I yearned for her delicate breath, long after she was disposed to relinquish.

I clung to her, as hopelessly as the final leaf in a cold autumn wind.

She, in the end stole my dearest felicity, and carried it off in her tattered valise of empty dreams.

I sink into the seductive melancholy resignation of what little exists.

What once held the sweet scent of lilacs, now raw with the stale stench of unanswered prayers.

Far too many times she cut her name into my battleworn heart.

Still my joy remains, for within the caverns of love there exist no sin beyond forgiveness.

-Johnny V.