Song

Who were you when I was me, when I was you then who was I

When I was her and she was me, when he was she and she was he

Then who were you when I was you, when you were me then who was she

And who was he when I was me, when I was he then who was me

What did you do when I was true, when I was you, what did you do

What point of view, what style renewed, what word to give a meaning to

What single thing, what uncrowned king, what words to say to help me pray

To help today, when things go wrong, what God to love, to sing a song

What song to sing, oh what a choice, the melody and then the voice

As lyrics bring the need to sing and all the world is listening

What was the start and what began, when I was he, a broken man

And she was you, so beautiful, I can't believe there was a plan

But if there was, it strikes me dumb, I breathe alive, a single lung

But not for fun, or anyone, it works for me but not for some

If some were true, then so were you, then so was I, perhaps or die

Perhaps if I could sing that song, the concert wouldn't seem so long

Born to Write

The world is blind, I see that now
I'll show them all, some way, somehow
That I am here, that I exist
I'll give them what they can't resist
The words that float around my head
The best that I have ever read
The thoughts that come in deepest night
That make me feel so good, so right
I'll make these people understand
That I was born with pen in hand
That when I write I come alive
My very essence does ignite

But who can see, who looks at me
Who reads these words upon this sheet
Who takes the time to really see
The power of the pen gone free
But pens are now in short supply
We writers now, we swiftly type
Upon the keys we loose our souls
As cells of skin slip through the holes
This isn't like the greats of old
Who wrote with quills, such tales they told
But just like they, I have that light
For they like I were born to write

For they, like I, like you, like all
Have brains that work and not at all
Invisible to human eyes
So very small, the world goes by
Whilst few of us are hypnotised
In battle with the T's and I's
They tease, they lie, they pass the blame
This isn't life, this is a game

But this is life if life you lead
With lines of ink and paper leaves
On metal, plastic, boards of keys
The words they haunt, they speak to me
In silence in the dead of night
Or in the day, the height of light
In company or all alone
Or miles away or safe at home

The words become my only friend
They give me strength like some pretend
The words are strong but safe to bend
They let me make a line of them
A line of them and then with friends
A rhyming trend and meaning then
It scares me how it somehow fits
I had not much to do with it
It comes from somewhere deep within
Behind my eyes, beneath my skin
I know not how but it feels right
I only know I have to write

I write these words upon this page
They capture all my joy and rage

It makes me high just like a kite
I think that I was born to write

I know that I was born to write

Self Definition

How do you define yourself

By name, by job, relationship

By house, by car, where do you fit

What do you do?  Just who are you?

What of belief, your point of view

How many parents, one or two, 

Or maybe none, or maybe few

Or maybe you don't have a clue

Or maybe they all lied to you

Or better still, perhaps you grew

In endless fields of endless blue

If that were true, how many grew

And do they ever write to you?

By what do you define yourself

By who you are or what you do

When someone says 'what do you do?'

Is that the best that they can do

Why ask me that? A pointless fact

it matters not, it's just a job

We all have jobs, to pay the bills

And very few like what they do

The question isn't quite the point

The answer is the thing they lack

And power lies behind the finding

What they think the answer means

They think that what you do is you

They think that you are what you do

So when you tell them what you do

They formulate a point of view

They think they have a hook in you

They think that what they know is true

But how do you define yourself?

By what you are to someone else

Or by the things you know yourself?

Just how do you define yourself

When face to face, what face reflected

Just what action self elected

Always someone will reject it

Do not ever feel affected

We all sometimes feel rejected

Face reflection, smile and wave

From the womb and to the grave

Know yourself like no one else

That is why they call it self

Who are you?  What do you do?

Know the answer, speak it true

Ask the question  only you

Has the right to ask of you

How do you define yourself?

What Happens

What happens when you notice 
That your life is out of focus
When you dread the day the morning brings
You cannot see the light
When the only thing that means a thing
Becomes the thing you hide within
A moment when you stop and say
This cannot be my life

What happens when these feelings take ahold of you around the heart
What happens when you realise you want it all to fall apart 
The rules mean less and less to you
What people say that you should do
With every thought
Rebellion
But still you seem to carry on

What happens when you realise
you want it all to stop
Like a pebble falling from a height
You're tired of the drop
Do the sights and sounds still seem as fine
As when you had the time
To appreciate the falling
When you understood the climb

A Question of Faith: Faith No More

These words will be my weapons

With these weapons I will war

I will war upon the heavens

Like nobody has before

And before I learn my lesson

I will lessen this religion

I will keep the Bishops guessing

As they kneel for their confession

I will make them face their demons

Make them smile whilst they are screaming

It will be too late for penance

When the faithful turn to hatred

Faith no more

Do not bore me raw, love is not against the law

Woman - Woman, Woman - Man, Man and Man, holding hands

Contraception, is essential, keeping clean without disease

World of people, population, over-spilling, poverty

Faith of no real relevance, book of insignificance

Christening of innocents, priests corrupting innocence

Buried by the Catholic Church, Starts with 'P', ends with 'verts'

No more faith in hypocrites, all that I believed in bits

Nothing left to pray for so these

Words will be my weapons

With these weapons I will war

I will war upon the heavens

Like nobody has before

And before I learn my lesson

I will lessen this religion

I will keep the Bishops guessing

As they kneel for their confession

I will make them face their demons

Make them smile whilst they are screaming

It will be too late for penance

When the faithful turn to hatred

Faith no more

Look what faith has brought, planes left safely from the 'port

In the air all went to hell, three planes crashed, two towers fell

Then the buses, then the tubes, someone tell me what that proved

Such a waste of human life, suicidal sacrifice

Children born on British ground, British roots beneath the mound

Brain that spends in pence and pound, thinks to take our Britain down

Not a thought they have themselves, turned extreme by someone else

Victims turned to killers then, still I have to pity them

No one left to pray to so these

Words will be my weapons

With these weapons I will war

I will war upon the heavens

Like nobody has before

And before I learn my lesson

I will lessen this religion

I will keep the Bishops guessing

As they kneel for their confession

I will make them face their demons

Make them smile whilst they are screaming

It will be too late for penance

When the faithful turn to hatred

Faith no more

Copyright John B.O'Halloran 2010

Nothing More Than You

There was nothing that I wanted
More than you
More than you

When I first saw you
Then first I knew
At first I knew
Then feelings grew
At last I knew
As people do

That there was nothing
Nothing that I wanted
More than you
More than you

When I first saw you
When you saw me
You looked at me
You looked right through
I thought you saw
You did not see
But I was sure
You needed me

But nothing that I did or what I said
Seemed to make you see
That there was nothing
Nothing that I wanted
More than you
More than you

When I smiled at you
You turned away
I waved at you
You turned away
I spoke to you
You turned away
I called for you
You turned away
Gave gifts to you
You turned away
Wrote songs for you
You turned away
I killed for you
You turned away
What must I do to make you stay?

What must I do to show you

There is nothing that I long for
More than you
More than you

I would live for you
Or die for you
Give up my aching soul for you

If just to have you here to stay
To stay with me for just one day

I'd give up all of everything
Take punishment for every sin

For there is nothing that I want

Nothing more than you

Books

When life seems so mundane
When I resent my name, can't cope with blame

And need someone to help me through the shame
Someone who feels the same

A faceless friend who will not judge
To clean the mud, who holds no grudge

I need a place to hide away
A shield to keep the world at bay

These pages are my portal
And
This story is my saving grace

This made up unreality
Is made for me
A private place

This person that I read about
Is less than me
And more than me

But more than that
Is nothing like me

I am made irrelevant

Along with all that bothers me

I swear these books were heaven sent

Too Many Rules

Too many rules and not enough schools
Or too many schools and not enough rules
Or too many fools who think they are cool
For breaking the rules, destroying the schools
Or too many rules for too many fools
Or not enough fools for not enough rules
And not enough fools to fill up the schools
And not enough schools to make up the rules

And too many kings for not enough thrones
Or too many dim and slow witted clones
Or not enough homes for people who need
And not enough pairs, too many alone
Too many who care, too many to love
Too many who love are no longer there
So many not there, as distance creates
Unbridgable gaps, suspicion and hate

Or too many words and too many books
Or not enough words, just feelings and looks
As silence is bled, as nothing is shed
With not enough said, just thoughts in the head
And not enough shared, in secret despair
Too many who care, too many alone
So many alone and not enough pairs
And not enough said, sweet secrets instead

Lay blame at the schools with not enough rules
Lay blame at the fools who think they are cool
Perhaps at the feet of all whom you meet
Perhaps with yourself and everyone else
But understand sacrifice, simple and pure
It isn't a burden, it isn't a cure
But it is distraction, a moment, no more
A moment that maybe is worth living for

Journey

Doors open, same faces, same old thing

Sitting here, same spot, head down, no eye contact

Same old journey, stop to stop, minute to minute, check point to check point

Lost in my own thoughts, mind drifting, scant attention

Trying to block the sounds, some vulgar, all invasive

Lambs pretending to be lions, showing off to their peers

Uniform becomes a costume, same old story, second hand

Once the story was mine, long past, been and gone

He who was, no longer here, died and burnt, turned to ash

Ash to flame, flame to birth, birth to growth, here I am

Sitting here, same spot, head down, no eye contact

Thoughts combine behind the eyes, words come, questions form

What am I still doing here...and when will this journey end?

Lost (Without a Trace)

Dedicated to victims of bullying

Feeling lost amongst the popular, a pin within a stack of hay

When waking up feels way too hard and harder still with each new day

No friends at all who understand, no one to lean on for support

Nothing to do and here I am, a rabbit, in the lights I'm caught

Don't tell me that you understand

Not even if you've felt the same

You don't know how it feels for me

It's brand new rules, a brand new game

It's such a shame

Nobody sees

They're hurting as they hinder me

But they will know, I'll make them see

They never should have messed with me

I'm lost amongst the popular, one blade of grass, a field of green

The superficial, all the same, they do not even know my name

They think they do, they make them up, they taunt me as they steal my lunch

They never stop, they never will, they do not even have a hunch

Don't tell me that you understand

Not even if you've felt the same

You don't know how it feels for me

It's brand new rules, a brand new game

It's such a shame

Nobody sees

They're hurting as they hinder me

But they will know, I'll make them see

They never should have messed with me

They never should have picked on me

Revenge is sweet and all my teeth, yes they are sweet

Not just the one but all by gums, perhaps my tongue

Enjoys the taste, no thought for haste, it's such a waste

I'll take my time to prove them fools,

These faceless tools that rule in school

I swear I will forget them all

Don't tell me that you understand

Not even if you felt the same

You don't know how it felt for me

With brand new rules, a brand new game

It's such a shame

They could not see

They hurt me as they hindered me

But they will hinder me no more

I'm stronger now than once before

And when in years to come I find myself reflecting on these years

I'll shed no tears, recall no names, or evil games or faces all the same

With cruel expressions, no, not one more second of my life will go

A waste of time, a waste of space, now gone, without a trace

Copyright 2010 J.B.O'Halloran

She

She dreamed of twisted butterflies and seeing still with hollow eyes and colour blind though she was still she wasn’t blind to see the kill at least until she felt the thrill and felt the chill of broken will upon her broken window sill her molten pill it made her ill

She dreamed of death and cheating life so much she took her blade her knife and took her mouth she opened wide and made her smile last all her life she smiled for pain and smiled for screams she smiled for terror haunting dreams she smiled because she couldn’t speak she smiled as blood fell down her cheek

She was the one she always knew the dirty things that she could do and long she dreamed she'd do to you the very things she'd seen you do and now has come her time to shine to play Picasso with your mind you only have yourself to blame and long will you recall her name