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Fear and Trembling

Work out your salvation with fear and trembling,

You told me long ago whispering in my ear.

I was wondering about resting sometime soon.

I was wondering about the load on my back.

Work a miracle in me, turn my weakness to strength

Make my sleep actually do something.

You who sees beauty where there’s none,

But you see it til it’s real.

You who hears music in the stillness

Until we all sway to an ancient melody.

Work a miracle in me,

For I am afraid

And I am trembling.

– Vagabond Prophet

Underneath

Madness can consume you,

Make you quake in the night,

Sadness can grip you

With all of its might.

Anxiety, depression

Spectres that may dare

To follow your steps,

Never playing fair.

If it twists your shape beyond

Anything I know,

Punching holes in the gunnels

No paddles left to row.

You sinking ship

You vessel capsizing,

I won’t be idle

Carefully strategizing.

I’ll dive headlong

Into that nameless place,

Searching for you

Looking for your face.

I’ll try to pull you out

Save your from its teeth

Yet if I can’t

If we’re stuck underneath.

That’d be alright

I’ll fall in love with every version

That insanity creates

Every stray thoughts stray excursion.

– Vagabond Prophet

Calm to Thrill

Hot to chill

Calm to thrill,

Rage to despair

I don’t even care.

You can throw your mood up and down

You can rent a loft in town,

You won’t beguile

With either tears or smile.

You can use all your wit

You can throw a fit,

Reloading your charm

Like it’s a firearm.

You want between skin and rib

You cancer so glib,

You’re very scent presaging

The war that you’re waging.

I don’t care what you want

Nor how you may haunt,

I’ll leave no quarter

You miser you thwarter.

– Vagabond Prophet

144 Hours

You rode into town a most glorious king

Riding on most humble of beasts,

We adorned the very street

With garments and garlands alike.

We fought to get a glimpse,

We pushed to touch your feet.

Now this, how did we get here?

We’ve now begged for your death

Begged a murderer free.

You’ve been whipped,

You’ve been beaten,

And most of all

You’ve been silent.

In 144 hours it changed

From a mob kissing your sandals,

To a mob spitting in your wounds.

We’re a fickle bunch

Most of us just wanting miracles,

Some believed your claims true

And some more afraid the same.

Can I just say thank you,

For ever thinking us worth it?

When I come knocking at your door

After breathing my last

Please don’t take me in,

Only to toss me back out

144 hours later.

– Vagabond Prophet

Solitary Refinement Chapter 33

Dear Diary     June 18th 2019

It’s been just over a year! The air is so much cleaner and bright out here. Especially after breathing that stale concrete air of prison for so long. I’m so glad I’m out of there. The guard who’d told me he was surprised at how long I’d lasted as Kal’s cellmate, he testified for me in court. Just self defense he said, everybody knew what Kal could be like. The other guard, the one who’d ignored me said much the same. Must have felt guilty.

I’m finally with my kids! Full custody once the divorce was settled, she didn’t even fight me hard on it. I think she and Josh moved downtown to a fancy apartment, good for them I guess. I’ve got the real treasure as far as I’m concerned. The first time I saw them I just stared at them unblinkingly and wept. They’d changed so much, Alister had gotten so much taller and stronger and Nina taller as well. She had gotten longer hair and her face didn’t have as much of the baby fat it had when I left.

I don’t think it really even hit me until after I got released what happened with Liz and Josh and the divorce. She cheated on me, with my best friend, while I was wrongfully imprisoned. Wow to put it into one sentence like that really makes it real. It really happened, I’m a divorcee. I always imagined going home and having Liz in the bed next to me to wake up to. I woke up the first morning and there was just nobody there. Once I realized it was time to move on that things were never going to go back to the way they were, it was like trying to pull off a jacket that was stitched right into your skin. It hurt, in a very private way that I don’t talk about much and I try not to let the kids see. I don’t know if I’ll be able to trust somebody again like I had trusted her, I gave her everything, I shared all of myself and she rejected it. I tried so hard just to please her and do right by her and she left me for my friend. Every time I say it, even write it it’s like shoving a razor blade into my heart. It’s easy for me to say I’m over it, that that was over a year ago and I’m ready to move on. It’s a lie though, I’m not ready, it’s all about the kids now and I’m happy with that.

I’ve learned a lot and changed a lot since I’ve gotten out. When I’m home I’m playing with the kids making blanket forts and racing our bikes and having them help me make pizza and cake and different things like that. We read stories and sometimes make stories up too. It is the absolute best. When I’m not doing that and I’m not cooking at the diner down the street I’m reading books myself. A few months ago I was in the library looking for some new books. I stumbled across this big brown paper bag, full of books. You couldn’t see what was in it, just a mystery bag of library books. ‘Heroes’ was all it said on it. I grabbed it and started reading the stack. There were some fiction and some true stories and the thing that struck me was how different they all were while still residing under the heading of ‘heroes.’

Some were brave and cunning warriors who could defeat any enemy in combat no matter how bad the odds. Other’s were non-violent, creating change with their kindness and patience. Some who were rather silent and provided behind the scenes support for others, things they couldn’t have done without. I suppose courage takes many forms. I don’t know who put this mystery bag together but it was very interesting to see the different interpretations of what it means to be a hero. These heroes were so vastly different from one another yet it is obvious to anyone who reads their stories that they were heroic in their deeds. They were all joined with a passion for justice, but with such different avenues they all explored to get there. Justice, what a joke. Justice has never gotten me anything but trouble and regret. I went in to jail innocent and came out guilty. How messed up is that, after a year of trying to ignore it I can say it’s really not working. I’m not sleeping well again. Now when I close my eyes I’m transported back to that night.

I remember the look in Kal’s eyes when I killed him.

I remember the look in Trevor’s eyes when I killed him.

I remember the look in Ziggy’s eyes when I killed him.

It was the same look I had seen in my own eyes a hundred times in the mirror. I saw the cave in their eyes too. I couldn’t think about it then, I couldn’t have the distraction from what I thought was a terrible but inevitable and necessary duty. The veins in their eyes like roots running along the forest floor, stopping abruptly before the rock. The stone cold unblinking gaze of being petrified with terror the moment before they didn’t feel anything at all. I watched the moment their eyes changed from portraying fright to simply nothing. They were all scared just the same as me, the three people in the entire prison I thought least likely to be afraid. How did they hide it so well? Maybe they didn’t but I didn’t notice because I was so afraid myself. Kal, huge hulking Kal who’d terrified me for months and made it difficult for me to sleep. What had happened to him to make him feel fear? Those are questions I don’t have answers for, all I really know is that I saw the same fear in their eyes as I’d seen in my own. After seeing it I still decided to end their lives. So if I can make those decisions after seeing that those other people were just as frightened as me maybe I’m not a hero. None of the heroes in these books are like that, there’s such a vast array of characteristics but none of them would have done something like that. I’d like to be counted among heroes but I don’t think I can be.

I reminisced on the incident again. I was absolutely in control of my actions, as soon as Trevor walked into my room that night I calculated exactly what was going to happen and it did. Kill Trevor, kill Ziggy, make it look like they killed each other. I didn’t even question it or hesitate or try to reason with the idea I just did it. I executed that plan, with the deft fingers of a man who’s done something a hundred times.

For the first long time after I got free I slept so well, it was wonderful. After a while though I had this dream once or twice a week. A month later it was every other night, now it’s every single night. In this nightmare there was the cave again but different than when I was young. I wasn’t in the forest being dragged into the cave. In this dream I found myself in a dark place, I couldn’t even see my own hand in front of me. I started scratching at the walls, noticing that my fingernails were longer and stronger and sharper than usual. Soon I realized I could see a faint path, and my eyes were different. Everything was grey, no colours to speak of. I followed the path with haggard breath and staggered steps but at a quick pace. Then around a bend a wide opening and three men all looking at me like they want to kill me. I didn’t waste any time, I leapt out from the darkness of this place. To my own astonishment I heard growls and barks come from my own mouth and saw claws long as sabres coming out of my hands, except they weren’t hands. Mercilessly cutting into flesh and tearing the men to pieces, I felt afraid when I did it because they were trying to kill me too but I didn’t stop. When they were dead I took their bodies one by one into what was now clearly the cave and when I was dragging the last one, I saw my own reflection in a puddle. I had long claws, fur, bright green eyes and a lupine face. Long dark snout and nostrils releasing spurts of hot air into the sky. That’s when I woke up. I’d always been curious but too afraid to explore the cave, and now it had explored me and found I belonged there. That I had experienced being both the scared man in the forest and the beast coming from the cave that was also curiously frightened. I couldn’t deny it anymore, the truth was unavoidable. Everybody is scared, and everybody is capable of terrible things.

I’m not so naive anymore, I see people for who they are and I don’t trust everybody so easily now. I see that everybody is looking for the same thing. Everybody wants to feel accepted, like home is a real place. Like somebody could know them through and through and not hate them. People don’t often get that acceptance or feeling of security so they act out, or do things that make them difficult to trust. I just have an easier time seeing the disease rather than just the symptom now.

Prison changed me, made me a person that sees more and understands more. I know I’m not a hero, and there are real people who are heroes. So maybe it’s possible to become a hero, somebody the kids can really look up to. They look up to me now, but they don’t know what I’ve done. The way I talk to them, about homeless people or about mean people we see on the street they probably think I’m passionate about justice just like all the heroes, but I know better. I can’t sleep, this is tearing me apart. I’m a murderer and liar walking free and everybody believes I am simply a wrongly accused man. Some people recognize me from newspapers and say things like, “I’m so sorry,” and, “so tragic, what a world we live in that things like that are even possible.” They don’t know the half of it. It makes me sick, literally. I’m losing weight. I don’t have that much of an appetite these days. I just feel like I don’t deserve it.

Everyday that I am free I feel like the gap between me and the heroes in those books widens and widens.

I can’t get this one quote out of my head, “You are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean.” Maybe if I had a real passion for justice I’d do something about it, and I think I know what it is too.

It terrifies me.

Well that’s a start.

THE END

P.S. Leave me a message, would love to know what people are thinking.

Solitary Refinement Chapter 32

Dear Diary                                    May 20th 2018

   They’ll put me back in general population tonight. They had me in the psych wing for a while to investigate me on account of my saying I wasn’t in control of my own actions when I killed Kal. I heard just earlier today that the man who had ‘hired’ me before I was ever slammed in jail got caught at another robbery. He made a deal to get a few years off of his sentence as he was connected to a whole string of robberies obviously. He admitted that somebody had taken the fall for him before, that they didn’t know what they were involved in. Those dots were quickly connected to me.

    Once realizing that I’d actually been telling the truth I was issued a formal apology and cleared of all charges related to the robbery.

    There’s still Kal though. Tomorrow they decide if I will be charged with the murder of Kal or if I will be acquitted because I acted in self defense and nothing more. It would help if some people who knew more about Kal would testify on my behalf.

Then there’s what they don’t know about… Trevor… Ziggy.

    I did not expect to see Trevor coming in to my room that night. I was in the room trying to sleep without success when the lights went out. Now I’m wondering if it was the storm or if Trevor had Mark or someone else turn the lights off and that’s how he’d gotten into the wing at all. Whatever the case the lights were out. Just the faintest amount of light and it took my eyes a minute to adjust. When they did I saw the silhouette of somebody standing in my doorway.

“About time you got rid of him.” Muttered Trevor’s voice as he slowly walked in. I had forgotten how short he was.

“What the hell are you talking about.” I said to him, I had just killed Kal not long before and had the worst day of my life. Learning about Liz and Josh, I don’t know what happened to me it was both liberating and terrifying. This thought that I’d let things stand in my way that I shouldn’t have. If there are obstacles in my way I should just remove them, the only thing that matters now is getting back to see my children someday, no matter how long it takes and no matter what I have to do. Liberating that I could theoretically just fix this all myself and make it better instead of trying to trust untrustworthy people over and over and over. Terrifying because I didn’t know exactly what I may have to do to get back home unscathed. When Kal was climbing up my bed I just reacted. This was different.

“You finally killed Kal, I was wondering when you’d finally do it.”

“Is that why you told me to protect myself!?”

“You’re so naive, when you walked in hear all those months ago I just new I had to have you. So cute and scared. I tried to get you to trust me but that eventually went south. So then I knew all you needed was a push to get rid of Kal yourself so I could have you moved to my cell. This though, tonight, this is my reward for arranging everything so perfectly.Now I have you, and there is nobody here to protect you and if you don’t cooperate I’ll gut you.” With that he produced a blade from the waist of his pants. I saw it glint in the dim light. It’s strange how I felt in that moment, I wasn’t scared. At first I couldn’t identify what was missing but then I realized I wasn’t afraid, I had been afraid minute of every day since I got here and it had only been getting worse. I had been carrying fear around like a ball and chain getting caught in doors and making me unable to move freely around this place.

    It took all of three seconds to decide how I was going to handle the situation, nothing mattered but survival now. I was going to kill Trevor and make it look like Ziggy’s fault and never doubt that it was what was necessary. Once I’d arrived at that decision there was no way that Trevor was going to have his way even when he had a weapon and I didn’t. The gravity of the decision I’d just made combined with the adrenaline that was still coursing through my veins I felt as though I had the strength of ten men inside of myself.

    Trevor walked closer and closer and while there was still six feet between us I calmly walked over to the wall where there was a box of gloves, I put on a pair. I turned around, and lunged. He swung and missed with his knife and then I knocked him onto the ground. I was moving so fast there was no way he was going to keep up with me. I grabbed the knife from his hands and threw it across the room and then I punched him in the throat, seven times. Every one of those blows was like a freight train taking out all of the pent up panic and fear and rage and anxiety that I had been carrying inside. Then with both hands I clamped down, hard, harder still. He kicked and tried to scream but no sound came. Movies always make choking someone look like a quickly accomplished task. It is not true. I was there, choking that man to death for over five minutes I’m sure. My grip never loosened and my resolve never wavered. In that moment I didn’t even have a choice, I needed to kill everybody that was threatening the safety of my imprisonment. I remember looking into Trevor’s eyes as he breathed his last breath, or tried to breath it I should say.

    Next came Ziggy, I actually liked Ziggy and definitely understand him making security on his own terms now. If he were still alive I might even thank him for that. He was always kind to me, but all the same he had to die. I retrieved Trevor’s knife from the floor and walked over to the room Ziggy was in. I just watched him for a minute. Sleeping peacefully, breathing steadily. I envied him really to be able to sleep so well considering where he was. I regretted not taking his help earlier. No going back though, I raised my knife ready to plunge it into his temple. It was then that his eyes opened.

I didn’t stop.

He was gone in an instant. I don’t want to think about what I saw in his eyes right now either. I set to the work ahead of me. I dragged Trevor back to his own bed and then with much more difficulty moved Ziggy in there too, letting him lie crumpled on the floor. I put the knife in Trevor’s hands.

Removed the gloves.

Started screaming for help.

P.S. Only one chapter left people. Drop me a line let me know what you think.