Really
It’s just me
Now

Left
To my own
Devices

Startled
As I am
Empty

Relieved
No help
Ever comes,

Despite
This loudest
Scream

Or cry
That’s barely
A whimper

Come lights
With sirens
Blaring

Through quiet
Thick
As that dark.

Regardless
Of constant
Need

No matter
What cage
I can rattle

Or noise
Which warrants
Attention

From bars
I gather
Are best,

When apathy
Mounts
To belief

Of death
From fears
Unspoken

Among silence
So bravely
Indifferent

Like a body
Slouched
All alone.

Perhaps
They’ll find
Me too

Upstairs
Passed out
On the toilet,

Cold
And pale
Unresponsive

After dreaming
The ambulance
Came.

– J. Pigno

I live each day
For God
Even though things
May not
Seem it

When yielding
To these anxieties
Which keep me
Shackled
At home

Believing
Only in prayer
As the power
To what may
Question

Answers
For a soul
Left begging
This miracle
Which never appears

Like damges
Already done
From years
Of faithful
Service

To a dream
With martyred
Chances
For tomorrows
Always at war

Within
This deepest trench
Obscured by
Shells
Now empty

Teeming
With painful remnants
Of bullets
From a past
Which kills

Knowing
The fault is mine
Regardless
Of best
Intentions

Or sincerest hope
And wishes
To escape
These cannons’
Bursts

As they riddle
An ashen sky
With dark
And powdery
Fragments

That scatter
And line
Our faces
Like debris
Of fallen worlds

The ones
Our hurt creates
By destroying
Risk
Of happiness

Expecting
Routine disaster
Among ruins
We make
Ourselves

Fearful
I may just end
When life
Might grow
Too pleasant

Passing
From sudden illness
As the smile
Just reaches
My face

Cause mom
I’m going to
Travel
For I want
Such desperate freedom

From images
Of constant
Heart attacks
Amidst rides
And moments of fun

Thinking
I’ll break that nerve
Which tethers
Me down
Regardless

Of defeat
By frequent submission
To the safety
Of remaining
In place.

– J. Pigno

There is nothing
Remotely masculine
About this way
I bleed

After years
Of nearly risking
Myself
For the cost of sex

In ways
Such soul convicts
My mind for
Sacred pleasures

From lives which
Hurt me greatly
When pursuing
Fates not earned

Those girls
I longed to need
Without real means
Or substance

Genuine
But hardly capable
As the men
Who hold them now

While I strive
To soon forget
What pain
Deters my feelings

Each day
This future crumbles
Between fists
Of wrenching guilt

Tightened
With that grip
Assuring how
I’m unworthy

And convincing enough
Through memory
To assume
Such fate is sealed

As the days
Come flooding back
Where you left me
On that doorstep

Or weddings
Spent in bathrooms
Crying
At tables alone

Writing
Frantic verse
To keep up
With my rages

From knowledge
Of such destiny
To bear this burden
Whole

Aware
I’m just some boy
Stuck inside
These stories

My games
My colored pages
With heroes
Who give me hope

Running
Always scared
Fearful
Death is waiting

At the end
Of every sentence
I finish
Before his chance

Far from
Being ready
To tie this heart
Unwilling

Eternally
As expected
For a girl
Who brings me joy

As I’ve yet
To go and find
One person
Of such rearing

Tolerant
Of my frailties
And inspiring
True belief

But today
I think I see
My blue
Is turning pinkish

My walls
A different color
Than the ones
Which broke me down

For perhaps
I’m more in tune
As a sister
Of these muses

Soft
Immensely passionate
Nurturing
Burning needs

To create
And birth these words
Through expressions
Unrelenting

As the gender
Of my betters
More beautiful
And divine.

– J. Pigno

Let these words
Be bullets of God
As I shoot my truths
From the hip

Spraying
That painted vengeance
With damages
Across this soul

Unleashing
A spoken fury
Like shells
Of loaded phrases

Ready
To conquer demons
By combat
Known as prose

Verses
Meant to lift
By affirming fate
Through action

Demanding
Simple pleasures
Which pull this trigger
Quick

To inspire
Poems grand
Or eternities
Briefly stated

Where love
Is wounded genius
Of a humble hurt
Which stings

Like art
As weaponized choice
Of the freedoms
Left inherent

By divinity
Whose expression
Was extension
Of that need

To grow
And feel redeemed
As unities
Lacking question

On a canvas
Now exploding
With colors
Made for joy

In language
Bloody red
From human tongues
Of fire

That spell
Their fading image
With an urgent
Sense of bliss –

Angry
Nothing lasts
As periods
Trail each sentence

Chasing
Tragic endings
Without ever
Knowing why.

– J. Pigno

To think that
All of this time
I should have been
Asking myself

Perhaps
The reason I’m single
Is because she’s
Better than me –

For what
Have I really secured
To earn such love
From a woman

When writing
A few weak phrases
And calling them
Art with a cause?

As poetry
Isn’t some gift
But the job
Of heaven almighty –

A calling
Which can be serious
If honoring God
Through your voice,

For money
Isn’t its bliss
Or message
Of written salvation

And that’s hardly
Deserving of safeties
Or a chance
At making her swoon.

For she needs
You to offer her life
And not such fear
Of resentment

Like miseries
Born of this talent
Which follow hurt
Where they must,

Deep into pits
Of regret
And tragedies
Born from distinctions

Amassed
As failures witnessed
To better relate
Through our words.

So before
Growing easily mad
And questioning
“Why am I lonely?”

Peer within
At those demons
And realize
It’s better to wait

Than jumping
Headfirst into hate
Or pounding on doors
For an answer

Accepting these locks
Are a blessing
Many
Would rather not see.

– J. Pigno

These simple
And faultless lies
Are spun from
Precious treasons
I commit in defense
Of villainy
On behalf of hate
Towards myself

Believing
Careless truths
By wearing veils
Unnatural
So the effort
Of feigning interest
Is work enough
To deceive

What fate
Describes in chance
As the hour
Of fallen pillars
When palaces
Made of answers
Crumble quick
Under weighted dreams

Like ploys
Of heaviest stone
Cracking walls
With daily pressures
And tearing holes
Beneath me
Till the floor
Gives out below

When empathy
Precedes death
As its faulty
Motivation
To maintain hope
By praying
Destruction
Has no cost

But the cure
Of raging souls
Which tremble much
From quaking
As sand
Between their footings
Shifts fast
And calls that bluff

Demolishing
Every inch
Of freedom
Built for changing
Where gold
Along this shadow
Outlines
Empty space

Proving
Words unread
Are the hurt
I’ve always needed
To redeem
My conquered riches
Like castles
Left for dirt

Kingdoms
Once unearthed
By daring feats
And martyrs
With excuses
Made exceptions
For the sake
Of keeping sane

Abandoned
As they lay
Now overgrown
And victim
To my fear
Of being useful
As I know
I’m always not.

– J. Pigno

Our penchant
For mortal weakness
Is the way
All futures end

Knowing things
Left defeated
Are preserved
As living gods

Like tales we mold
As victims
And narratives
Shaped together

Out of remnants
Lost to heresay
Or religions
Carved from stone

Tragic
But never real
When discovered
In ashen ruins

Among heroes
Supposedly worshipped
Made of marble
Or broken clay

As pasts
Are dangrous visions
Of potentials
Often wasted

Enabling
Prior chapters
To glorify
Certain themes

Repeating
What determines
These trails
Of fallen pillars

Achieving
Almost nothing
But a memory
Left to brag –

Wrong
Though easily missed
By men
Who have no wishes

But to leave
Their written legacies
Behind
As fading masks

And marks
Worth being etched
If only where
Few can see them

Like wreckage
Caught from history
Stuck within
Present tense

Where walls
Which bear their semblance
Are bound
To nearly crumble

And conceal
Such painted burdens
Under bricks
Of heaviest grief

Sad as it is
To say
That their triumph
Is our undoing

Building worlds
From pieces
When the rest
Are dead and gone.

– J. Pigno

Another day
Left in
Suspense

When waiting
Is silent
Commotion

Ushering
Such quiet
Distress

With whispers
Of doubt
On my mind –

Begging
Each sun
For a glance

So moons
Come quick
To reveal them

By terror
Of night
Which I gather

Is a waste
Of my time
If at best,

Clinging
This phone
Off the hook

Or wallowing
Idle
From sleepiness

Caught
At tips
Near my fingers

Which speak
Through keys
Out of spite.

Typing
This much needed
Rest

With limited
Means
Of expression

And words
Too many
To gather

Or remember
With hope
They are right –

As penance
Is always
So sad

Yet brutal
Where truth
Is its fiction

Of imagining
Outcomes
On paper

Where the answers
Are never
Enough.

– J. Pigno

We know
How this story
Concludes

Now it’s time
To write
The last sentence

Of a life
That was reared
In phrases

And remembered
So briefly
With words,

As others
Will hardly
Resist

Abiding
By lies
Less exclusive

Of interests
Common
And wasting

What talents
They may
Never seek –

Unlike
Dreams
Of my own

Which speak
As terms
Everlasting

From drudgery
Far less
Defining

Than the beauty
Of art
Meant to touch.

Beyond
How worlds
Do insist

We pursue
Such hurt
Detrimental

In packages
Deemed
Our successes

Or triumphs
As vain
As that choice

For delivering
Knives
As a gift

When inflicting
Wounds
By our message

That idleness
Packaged
As worship

Is the meaning
Our hearts
Do betray –

To find
That role
Worth a chance

And seeking
God
Within reason

Till the need
To feel
Becomes lethal

And expression
Martyrs
Our wills,

Binding fate
To our
Tales

As the legacy
Beckons
To kill us

Despite
Those smiles
We’re showing

As death
Begins
It’s approach.

No,
Im constantly
Saved

By the verse
Which still
Goes wnwritten

As I face
This blankness
Before me

Knowing faith
Is that period
End.

– J. Pigno

God
Changes space
But man
Uses knowledge
To leverage
Simple phrases
And tilt
His perfect Earth

Erecting
Minor heavens
From stone
He chooses wisely
Drawing fates
In marble
And erecting
Pillars weak

Expecting
Steady worlds
From the line
He draws unfinished
Which wobbles
Atop his daydream
Askwew
With fallen means

Twisting
Faultless strings
Of this tethered
Cosmic genius
Undone
At its center
When imagining
Better knots.

– J. Pigno