this is my paper soul struggle.

kit. this is where i let my mind roam and shout. i write and rant and spew my mind vomit here. feel free to talk to me any time. Copyright © 2007-2015 Kelci Keeton. All Rights Reserved

[papersoulstruggle]

living in an overturned boat

drinking from the owl’s ear,

i taste the pretty tears all the way down my throat

i am forever choking

counting the dust particles in the air,

i heard the curtains shift and longed for a shroud

i need insulation

there is safety in unreality

jaws forced open may bite harder

starving carvers hone their cutting eyes,

still moving faster

i lose my equilibrium in utter stillness

but i lack the strength to dance

i use my red voice when there’s no other choice

but you don’t like the shade

how else could you be made to understand?

i try to be gentle, i try to be kind

but you keep asking me to weave safety nets 

with broken hands

i’m losing my mind

[papersoulstruggle]

monstered

beautifully terrifying

check its teeth

test the reflexes

and the angles of its knees

snarling heat

cover its eyes

weigh its acrimony 

in carefully considered measurements

study the irreverent temperament 

with a curious mind

aching beast child

watch it suffer

first and last of its kind

prisoner in one cage

and pet in another

[papersoulstruggle]

old enough to run young enough to cry

i am i am i am

never going back i said

right before i turned around

i am i am i am

undone and so unclean

buried beneath mountains of blood & gold leaves

but it was so fucking beautiful

now all the days are one longest day

the sun never sets

it just hides behind my eyes,

shakes my brain,

rattles my spine

til its time to burn me all over again

i find it hard to stay vertical

i chew my own skin to try to contain the mess but

i am i am i am

getting smaller and leaving pieces

everywhere i’m dragged through

[papersoulstruggle]

existential excess

have you ever felt like the sounds of others’ actions are judging you? 

i always wake early & sick, spewing sacrilege between coughing fits. everything is teeming with careless noise. i don’t mean to match the loudness. i don’t mean to be.

in what myth do i exist? a game is anything you make it. there can be no faking it when everything is wrongly perceived. i have so much love & hate that i can’t reconcile.

we lost it all to contrived meaning. there is illness in our very being and even fleeting moments can last too long. none of it eases the pain.

we fall prey to our deepest attractions, lying about past injuries & newly found passions.

can you lose yourself imagining another’s perceptions? how fiercely anchored to yourself are you?

i’ve been trying to understand but now its just static.

[papersoulstruggle]

stray in the quarter

chewing on a piece of my own throat, 

i dropped some notes and left some things behind 

hind legs shaking with grave unmaking, 

 i swallowed my tongue and arched my spine 

i am the glitter child, i am the gutter swine 

the heat of the streets spurns my feet 

i shatter city sounds and weakened grounds 

with my chattering teeth 

eyes wide with manic fright, 

my gaze belays with wicked spite 

bold men in expensive coats folding glass with paper mattresses, 

hoarding ass and borrowing actresses for plain arms 

they stare at me and mean me harm 

faster bastards have never gotten very far, 

but they still tried 

they still fought and died

[papersoulstruggle]

unmattering

with a sick churning they regurgitate old sentiments 

in yellow fits of self proclamation

they outline waged defense, hedged bets,

hefty deficits in fields of love & war 

in relative dissonance,

they sit

chaos reigns

the sky bleeds thickened etiquette

maybe the heat evaporates the sin

gracious smiles thrown haplessly all around

as they wade through the stinking ashes

to burn each other down

[papersoulstruggle]

dead dogmas don’t lie

i’d rather kill myself and let you argue with someone else

i don’t believe ideals can carry us anymore

everything between is marbled with uncertainty

why can i instinctively trick everyone but myself?

all of it seems archaically wrong

and i can never reproduce this absolute mirage of me 

that you’re so enamored with

[papersoulstruggle]

you killed me a while ago

mourning crows pry me open

i greet them leeringly

with my rawhide smile

when the old blood touches the sand,

it falls gold

in fired delight

the dry whimper that follows

cuts close to a late death rattle

but its stifled in my crumbling maw

[papersoulstruggle]

i was

is this relevant to your current interests? 

i can't define what i need 

fixations are so humbling 

i am stung by honest diction 

the love comes in then leaves

[kksqueaker]

as hollow as it is unfair

there’s a chemical burning in my chest when i think of you

like something is unhealthy there,

yet its still medicine somehow

i have to deny my urge to be more refined

i have to side-eye silhouettes to fake my smiles

and every bad thing is the best that i can do

[papersoulstruggle]

lost instructions on how to make sense

i’m in the middle of some very important work

unfinished business and unpolished hurt

i’m using dried up pens and rusted tools

i’m painting with underwire and a mouldy noose

belt buckle teeth cutting it clean

precision dreams and tree ring bruises

where’s the fun in breaking lucid?

i don’t want to know what it means

i don’t know nothing

i’m still grinning green

pull it out to pull the punches

i talked sweet as honey to the machine

but it still won’t function

[papersoulstruggle]

being is hell

keep your space to your self

keep your comfort close

there’s no time for fire

danger hides in uneven folds

everything is seen as a bother through tired eyes

we lie hungry and motionless all through the night

[papersoulstruggle]

celestia unbound

i am not a thing

i am not a toy

i am not nothing

i am ripe & coy,

thorns in yawning reach

the spring folds in on me & i am weirdly young

the screams fold in on me & i blossom new lungs

i am not unclean

i’m gold & green,

the dirt beneath,

the stars pristine

none can lay a claim on me

[papersoulstruggle]

spoken without language

the metaphysical pain in my chest serenades you

but you’re an inattentive receiver

how can you sleep with it so loud?

what did you do while it was quiet?

you’ve blurred my lines unquestioningly

i regret my sound

[papersoulstruggle]

ill kilter

i think about it all the time

sporadic happenstance punctuating loss

long enough intervals to kill my smile

and curve my riven spine

i stifle the rise in bracing acrimony,

but my throat still tightens

i taste coal

my own fault,

my own forthright shortcoming

a little late foretold

i cut if off with the mildest title

now its spinning and thin like floss

or spiderwebs or silken thread

the softest things i’ve ever fought

the hardest things i’ve tried to hold

[papersoulstruggle]

a cold sort of warm morning

i love you in some small way

but the smalls are the hardest falls to retrace

often mistaken and inverted by my insides

coherence is the antithesis of yours truly

we look so young for how archaic our smiles have come to be

i can’t remember who i was with you before

the hail comes down in steely sheets,

but we still call it heavy rain

[papersoulstruggle]

people pretend to like or not see

often you would say you mean well when you don't. predetermined guilt is neverending. cutting ties and severing anchor lines seems more logical, but the rational thought is lost among the bitter pale. i wanted soft blooms of color, but my skin is pocked with mold spores and bound with gnarled roots. how could i be born with scars? the world ignores me but implies it's with my best interest in mind. i just wanted to be gossamer and velvet. i wanted to be sweetly seen.