_Land that idiot prodigal

[_Land]

Tongue & Tide

The word hit first—
not as sound, but as surge.
A mouthful of storm.
It dragged her name through my teeth
and left the shoreline trembling.

Water doesn’t fall.
It speaks.
It tells the truth in ruin—
shatters roofs
to remind you what was never nailed down.

I said stay,
and the levee broke.
The syllables wore boots,
stomped across her softness
until she flooded with silence.

Rain was already listening.
Each drop a jaw,
gnawing at the gutters
like they owed it memory.
Every eave broke open with regret.

I learned to weaponize vowels.
Spit them sharp,
let them slice wrists of reconciliation
until every sentence bled retreat.

But rivers memorize what we destroy.
Their bodies swollen with unsent apologies,
they drag our discarded words
under mud, under rot,
and dare us to drink from that history.

You think you're done speaking—
until you choke on what's unsaid.
The ghost of the word
gurgles back up your throat
like swampwater in a drought.

The tide never forgets.
It stores confessions in its foam,
vomits them across the shore
when you think the past
has finally receded.

Language is a floodplain.
Every sentence a risk—
too much,
and it drowns the bridge.
Too little,
and it leaves you stranded on your own tongue.

The sea has no patience
for half-truths.
It pulls your ankles first,
then your breath,
then your reasons.

I built a cathedral of consonants
to contain the ache.
But grief is liquid—
it seeps through the mortar,
it prays in drips.

Even the holy drown.
Baptisms are just drownings
we agreed to romanticize.
The river does not care
what name you scream
as it takes you.

And still—
I write.
Not to save myself,
but to honor the water
that keeps trying to teach me
how to let go.

 

[_Land]

The Blame Game

You point with a trembling halo,
fingers dipped in self-righteous gasoline,
lighting fires in every room
then choking on the smoke like it surprised you.

Your shame wears my face
because you carved your reflection into me—
every bruise renamed provoked,
every silence my stonewall,
every truth an insult
to the myth you still marry in the mirror.

Accountability is a plague you dodge
with the fluency of a serpent in silk,
slithering through syllables like
"if you hadn’t,"
"why did you,"
"look what you made me…"

You juggle guilt like glass balls,
tossing it across timelines,
looping the past into lassos
that tighten around everyone but you.

You weaponize misunderstanding,
recast it as noble ignorance—
as if not knowing better
were a holy alibi
for cutting with dirty hands.

The game is rigged.
The rules?
Whoever cries first,
whoever bends their neck,
whoever holds the pieces
must have broken the vase.

So I hold my silence like a detonator,
refusing to explain why I bled
on the knife you claimed
you never threw.

 

[_Land]

Finding the Beat



I ran to the forest,

half-dead, half-blind,

to bury the noise

that had broken my mind.

-

I fled the sirens,

the neon hum,

the static spin

of a world gone numb.

-

I craved the hush,

the soft retreat

no voices, no pressure,

just the dirt and the beat.

-

I lay on the moss,

cold to the bone,

thinking the silence

would leave me alone

-

But silence lied.

It had its own song

a rustle, a twitch,

a rhythm too strong.

-

It lived in the roots,

it rose from the stone,

it echoed my name

in a voice not my own.

-

I held my breath.

I begged for peace.

But the pulse inside

just refused to cease.

-

It throbbed like thunder

under my skin,

a quiet riot

beating within.

-

Each beat a truth

I couldn’t outrun.

Each beat a spark

in the shape of a drum.

-

I came to forget.

I came to be numb.

But I found myself

in the sound that I shunned.

-

Heartbeat rhythm,

a beat that’s all mine.

Thump-a-thump,

thump-a-thump

now realign.

 

[_Land]

- In My Own Ink

I’ve outlived the rub-off symbols

those cartoon hearts,

crossbones,

the names I thought were mine

because someone whispered them first.

-

I peeled off layers

of what was never me,

scrubbed skin raw

to find the pulse beneath

still beating

in my own language.

-

These days,

I do not borrow lines.

I do not mimic the shape

of someone else’s story.

-

Now,

I dip the pen

into the dark wells of memory,

the molten truths

no one handed me,

and I carve.

-

Word by word,

I tattoo permanence

into every scar

I once tried to cover.

-
because

I am not erasable.

-

And this

is the only skin

that ever fit me.

-