Writings from USAFA

"Trapped"

I don’t know anymore
I go on
Trying to walk through this wasteland
Going around in circles
Stumbling through the wreckage
Who’s doing the shooting?
Is it me or them?
What am I fighting?
Who can I trust?
Dare I trust me?
I think not
I want to stand for what’s right
But I don’t know where I am anymore
But even if I did
Would I even stand?
Or would I run again?
I want to hear
But there’s so much noise
I want to see
But the fires all around
Blind me
I thrash at the bars
Of this cage
But what is it?
Whence come it?
Is it an illusion?
An enemy device?
Or is it something I made?
Am I my own worst enemy?

I realized today that Shadows by Red is a lot of this same feel put to music.


"Broken Again"

Here I am
Broken again
Again despairing
Again crying out
My deafness
My blindness
The doubts in my head
I can’t feel anything
What I know drives me frantic
But the worst part of all
Is that I know this will pass
I’ll fall back into
The deafness and blindness
I’ll stumble about
Careless and inconsiderate
Look at my beloved
Look there
A few unfeeling steps
Look at the hurt I’ve done
So now I’m back here again
Asking for help again
I don’t want
To just ask for help
I want to know You
But the thing that kills me
Is that in three hours
Maybe less
I won’t want that anymore
And I’ll forget You exist
I’m weak and pathetic
Wretched and schizophrenic
I forget so easily
And fall back asleep
Walking comatose
With an occasional lucid moment
So while I can
I’ll scream again
Save me
Show me
Open my eyes
Speak to me
Open my ears
Enter my mind
Dispel the doubts
Free me from my own weakness
Make everything clear
As it once was




How long has it been?
Sometimes I struggle to remember
Was it only a few months ago
That I left my life?
Soft music playing
I got in the car
One last time
One last glimpse of my world
As a part of it
Now I know
That world is gone forever
When I left
So many things
I knew and loved
Fell down
I’m in another world
A place with different normalcy
But I’m a stranger here
What happened to innocence?
Where is the nearness?
No more carefree


"Swindled"

Trusting
Naïve
I believed them
Conventional wisdom
Hearsay
It worked so well
Required no effort
The only choice
A place
Where everything is done for you
Even when you don’t want it that way
I thought
It would be worth it
Just a sacrifice now
For great benefit later
But you can’t get time back
There’s no reclaiming the years
What is our reward
For so great a sacrifice
A pitiful salary
Respect
A fancy uniform
For this we surrender the best years of our lives
Our freedoms
Our thoughts
Our selves
So here I am
Trapped here
Unable to speak
Daring to question
Daring to think
Daring to dream
If only I had known
I wouldn’t be bound here
But will I survive?
Will I come out intact?
Or will I be twisted
Into something I hate?
But I have yet to see
Anyone prove me wrong


Thoughts On Arrival in Colorado Springs
(I sat out alone, looked into the distance, and wrote...)


Mountains in the distance
A desperate desire to escape
A solemn sense of heightened awareness
But awareness of what?
No, just solemnity and solitude
Somewhere out there
A new world
I’m not coming back
This will be my new home
She couldn’t talk
Told me to go
I called the wrong person
What am I to learn?
Discipline? Dependence?
What will it be?
Would it make a difference if I knew?
Staring straight through
It may as well not be there
Words are clumsy
A rugged unknown
I couldn’t tell you where I am
But I’ve been someplace like it before
Quiet
Thinking of a thousand unknowns
That must be out there
But I don’t know what they are
Shouldn’t I be asking questions?
Or thinking of something?
But I’m not
Not really
Alone in the middle of hundreds
Just below me are strangers
Who may as well not exist
Does the desire for solitude makes us more alone because we run away and shut out the world?
Wind
Why do I hear even the smallest footsteps?
Would I be…


"Seeing What You Wanted"

You came
You saw
What you wanted to see
Confidence
Prestige
Money and a uniform
But that’s only the surface
What lies beneath cuts deeper
Maybe I’m dying
I’m not totally sure
Moral corrosion
Is in the air
I see the corpses
Walking about
Submerged in filth
Built on theft
Fighting for thieves
Liberty forgotten
Replaced by greed
Ambition
The whims of those in charge