My nights
Are a tortured canvas
On which dreams
Can paint their worries
Leaving streaks
Of scary futures
Staining scenes
Like blotted ink –

All these visions
I can’t flee

Or avoid
By praying daily,

Those empty pleas
I bargain
Beneath bedsheets
Soaked in sweat,

Every evening
Floating free
Over coffins
Where my loved ones
Gather mourners
Throwing flowers
Besides caskets
Housing bone.

For some fears
Will still remain

Though I choose my colors
Darkest,

Hiding memories
Forming thickest
Inside substance
Made of ash –

Facing death
Towards coming days,

Finding sunlight
Mixes nicely

Among shades
Whose waking palettes
Seem important
Besides black.

Yet my bad ways
Keep repeating
Thinking drawings
Have existence
Outside sketches
Demons conjure
Within confines
Called our nerves,

As they outline
Every wish

Then divide them
By obsession

Doing math
That predicts nothing
Proving faith
Just doesn’t work

While both eyes
Are closed to God
Signing portraits
Through His promise
Letting art
Hide better angels
Behind terrors
Sleeping brings.

  • J. Pigno

Somehow
I always miss

When the aim
Is easy targets

Like forgetting
Memories useless
Whose presence
Lingers still –

Within this mind
Unsure

Some bullseyes
Even matter

Now wavering
Through these feelings
Shifting centers
Out of place,

What pasts
Have grown askew
Watching lifetimes
Turn indecent

Twisting traumas
Into moments
Dreams keep playing
On repeat,

Hanging crooked
In my sights

Staying focused
Towards redemption

Hitting walls
As fear intended
Blocking progress
Beyond doubt

Over distance
Never bridged

Hardly breached
Yet seeming bigger

When our task
Means shooting arrows
At such figments
Made from straw.

All agony
Follows guilt
Deeming prospects
Far too dangerous,

Soon illusory
If accepted

Most deceptive
By their reach,

Leaving monsters
Lurking deep
Even though
Old evils dwindle

Once diminished
Chasing freedoms
Behind answers
Anger marks –

Where today
Resumes that goal
Scoping scarecrows
Gaining practice

Knowing failure
Offers vision

Swearing loss
Another chance.

  • J. Pigno

I’ve watched lives lose every semblance of real hope and fair redemption in pursuit of this fucking “hustle” that we’re told is worth our souls.

For the Bible warns its readers against serving dual masters, and yet still, we always fail one thinking somehow God won’t care –

Like that lord of making money and the Christ we pray ignores us, as each person writes their downfall citing reasons said secure.

But what’s safe is far from murder of our innocence being threatened, as we steal and stab towards greatness claiming tables beg more food – how our families might just starve, when in truth, they’re probably hungry not for feasts but faith more nourished than these sins could understand.

Who assigned such ugly terms turning all men into convicts – every child another player thinking games mean growing up?

Like adults, they learn to win cheating rules so rigged they’re broken, chasing prizes death can’t envy knowing life itself is hell.

Those eternal risks we wage aren’t questioned much by people, looking outwards upon failures knowing greed will trump their code – that high standard often blessed before turning into envy, never seen as devils birthing further evils we should fight.

I’ve heard mothers tell their sons that they hate them for not working, and fathers wish their children would employ what demons sell.

I’ve let lovers try to kill in pursuit of being normal.

I’ve found knives in pretty boxes wrapped in paper made of lies when her Christmas card had sworn season’s cheer is why she slayed me, skinned my flesh and mocked its weakness waving wisdom like her flag – feigning warmth by teasing hate, having kisses with disaster while she plotted leaving early because poets weren’t tough.

Now that face I can’t regain is a mask with painted symbols, trading mouths for false protection against judgments spread through air.

I’m voiceless insofar as these talents seem aggressive, falling deaf on ears ignoring every warning words can make.

Those who listen swear I’m nuts, and the rest believe I’m lazy, even if I’m earning penance pointing flaws out through my verse.

No, your “hustle” is a joke and I’m glad this phrase offends you – you’re the virus taking victims never asking if they cared or agreed with selfish whims called success by those without it, dragging kingdoms down besides you since that cash can’t buy you breath.

Heaven fails the ones who try, and rewards its idle heroes – crying champions of expression who create instead of earn.

Wealth is missing from that peace.

It is not a saintly virtue or your sacred quest which mandates choosing labor over love.

I’m sure this naive plea for revolt means almost nothing, even though my fear can’t save you from our natures flawed with need.

The contagious final gasp that we see on news each evening – its our equal end that’s coming whether wallets bulge or not – so I’d rather bleed in red, for what fate should wait beyond us, neither classy nor expensive where our roles do not exist.

Be kind and do what’s right.

That assumes your heart is beating before naming different bosses then ignoring dreams divine.

  • J. Pigno

I saw her face
In the paper
And immediately
Thought of you –

Wondering
If I’d became something
More than a man
Unknown,

Tracing days
Which lost their voice
During times
Much better valued
Than what way
This feeling lingers
Reading names
I can’t forget.

But still won’t
Though moments try
Passing judgments
Years keep making –

Thinking back
While looking forward,

Wishing sadly
We had worked.

Yet despite
How long I cried
There was always
Room for leaving

Once explained
In daily poems,

Now neglected
Held inside –

Hardly truths
Worth selling news
Keeping papers
Printing headlines
Bound to praising
Local heroes
Saving lives
Though earning cash.

See real dreamers
Missing marks,

Every addict
Beating demons,

All those artists
Chasing muses

Aren’t stories
People tell –

Swearing egos
Wearing thin
Showing proof
That life is worthy
Blessing some
Through failing others
Almost flawless
By design.

Though our fate
Means dying out,
All these writings
Offer chances

Left behind
Since silence lingers
Among souls
Who read as hope –

Unlike me
So awfully jaded,

Fairly certain
She’s remembered

Finding relics
Far from funny
Beneath captions
Laughing hard.

  • J. Pigno

Raise those kids
Like wolves
Who growl at the sight
Of weakness
To excuse what hate
Your privilege
Has reared alongside
That pack

As hunger
Becomes their excuse
For behaviors
Based on distinction
Where predators
Execute prejudice
Declaring
Difference is prey,

Never questioning
Evident fears
Or perhaps this
Negative instinct
From assuming
Otherness dangerous
Since beasts
Engage ignorant thoughts

Slaying nests
Hunting animals young
Finding bloodshed
Beyond satisfaction
Telling children
Murdering innocents
Should accompany
Natural success –

Such forests
Are filled with deaths
Inexcusable
Though they continue
Choosing greed
Over true coexistence
Seeking peace
Among dangers unseen

Beneath trees
And branches more thick
Learning bias
Leaves trails only witnessed
Below pathways
Paws always shuffle
Barely noticed
But knowing its there,

Unless traced
Between places obscure
Near emptied bones
Amid thickets
Piecing lives
Around artifacts gathered
Housing flesh
Whose failure insists

Triumphs empathy
Pouncing in groups
Upon creatures pure
Without motive
Eating berries
Carnivores damage
Simply begging peace
Among fiends.

  • J. Pigno

I am equally
Too rebellious
And anxious for existing
Outside of words
Indignant
Every open mouth
Should bleed

Or wound speak
Gaping truths
Like these tears
Our lies have mended
Over holes that
Preach poetics
Where most stitches
Bind our dreams

When damage
Means release
But forced healing
Keeps on closing
Weeping veins
Which build connection
Through what gore
Contains this gift

By it spilling
Mutual faith
From such flesh
That fragile vessel
Harboring feelings
All inclusive
Across peoples
Willingly scathed

Sharing rawness
Pleasantly real
Besides scars
Already fading
Between years
Their injured wisdoms
Find distraction
Worth belief

Trading God
For wasted breath
Chasing papers
Pressed obscenely
Counting souls
Amid disasters
With intentions
Green as sin

Unlike crimson
Bearing strength
Shedding evils
Being punctured
Atop crosses
Called existence
Every moment
We forget

How deep red
Reminds us life
Flows forever
Within humans
Fallen angry
Though together
Raising voices
Staying hurt.

  • J. Pigno

I think
We finally know
What that song
Had meant
To you,

Crying
In my sleep
And hearing it
Play
Once more –

Unconsciously
Though I loathe
Living something
Missed
Through memories

When hearts
Still always question
Whether love
Feels real
Or not.

Was I ever
Good enough
As a friend
Worth calling
Family,

Like cousins
Cut from pictures
Where intentions
Failed
At best?

Perhaps
This melody burned
Inside souls
Whose ears
Keep ringing

Plays viciously
Ever angered
Fueled by fires
Lit
Long past –

Warm smiles
During car rides
Finding cities
We’d never
Visit

Again
Since trusting silence
Fanning embers
Hot
From blood.

Some people’s faith
Will burn
Chasing guilt
Towards far
Tomorrows –

But me,
I blame those closest
For infernos
Sparked
Near home.

  • J. Pigno

I’m alive now
More in my dreams
Than this slog
During daylight hours
When waking up
Just for nothing
Provides failure
Slowly achieved

As morning death
Appears real
Since accomplishment
Hinges on pushing
While triumphs pass
Between heartbeats
Skipping often
From facing defeat

Beating drums
Whose war was waged
With poetic words
Interrupted
Amid battlefields
Relishing bloodshed
Choosing images thick
Running red

Like rivers poured
Behind eyes
Gushing crimson truth
Spouting lyrics
Riding scarlet waves
Skirting beachfronts
Near shores gone dark
Losing minds

Pacing memories
Patiently waiting
Underneath thick skin
Building boundaries
Between what lines
Provide meaning
Found below that wish
Overdue

Still expressing hope
Remains left
Finding tears themselves
Become vessels
Where pure cascades
Relieve longing
Through drops so clear
They’re unseen

Spilling forth
When veils should lift
Only sleeping now
Fearing rhythms
Broken soon
By sunshine‘s arrival
Here to kill
All cadence believed

How spoken knives
Conquer beasts
Deep inside these pains
Never silent
Wielding weapons
So openly scathing
Tomorrow can hear
Every thought.

  • J. Pigno

We’re taught
To withhold our truths
Like a dam
For their finite wisdoms
By minds
Which rear exclusions
Through what fears
These words become

And built from scratch
Since school
Or that day
When scolding parents
Remind us
Honest feelings
Should be hidden well
Till death

While expressions
Go unsung
As all childhoods
Will perish
Without laughs
But spoken wishes
Only nurtured
If they’re hushed

Thinking frailties
Dreams reveal
Can exist
Beyond this sentence
Of long lifetimes
Hiding failures
Behind safeties
Silence molds

Into shapes
Still lacking mouths
So each voice
Containing secrets
Stays repressed
Beneath obsessions
Pride convinces
Wards off threats

Hiding passions
Once proclaimed
Now protected
Though uncertain
Full disclosure
Offers solace
Besides sharing
Open grief

During muted years
Imposed
Watching distant stars
Fade slowly
Streaking light
Across those heavens
Bursting bright
Before night ends

Proving time
Between lost souls
Means exploding
Amid darkness
Glitter always
Makes much better
Along empty space
Grown cold

Sighting colors
Within reach
Yet inspired
Falling neutral
Among palettes
Most pedestrian
Finding hues
Emerging new

Under blankness
Quiet veils
Drawing lines
Connection beckons
Soon embellished
Trading poems
Loudly said
Exploring skies.

  • J. Pigno

Our struggle is not against words,

But the lies and misunderstandings of a world whose fear kills freedoms in the pulse of hearts who speak-

The ones which dare obsess and defy that erroneous cadence at the core of bodies tethered by what strings our art can snap.

Their continuous, maddening rhythms pulsing still with beats expressive are indicative of sheer
potential that will prove our masters wrong.

Amiss, much like our roles inside vacuums called existence,

Playing jobs unlike our forebears working hard by embracing life.

This joy seems out of touch, vaguely sick and strangely nauseous, as our poems grow redundant seeking paths towards shedding shame

How such pleasures could endure within spaces man inherits where our loss itself feels welcome as each term inspires death.

Torn, from limb to phrase –

But ignored, as every sentence misses marks of punctuation hanging corpses margins pose.

Though I’m privy to such ends, its perhaps the other doorway swinging open out of blankness which appeals to fading breath –

Empty slates that just appear during memories least expected since unlocking shuttered portals hinged on moments gone too soon.

Feelings almost find me warm beneath prose I’ve sewn like blankets, fighting frigid air exclusive to an atmosphere so cold –

My page, a fallen tent,

Among lines of ruins scattered

Where the snow of dreams writes wishes between trees of forests thick.

Some men build camps for fire.

I destroy them without question

After spending nights enduring every thought that shows me home,

Far away, beyond these fears made of saddest whites encountered any winter’s touch should sully raining soot upon those drifts.

For Bohemia, my sun, melts this path which morning beckons and tomorrow’s gift of promise slowly guides through trusting faith –

Believing God has plans better loved than daily torment of our middle roads we travel from complacent hopes they mark.

What war we wage with beauty is that battle for transcendence, fought by idle prophets begging and impoverished saints who sleep –

Who fuck, who eat, who dance,
who in laziness bear wisdoms,

And by victory usher daylight

Bringing dawn upon their gifts.

  • J. Pigno