Addict Brain Poetry by Sawyer

Quit Me

April 5th, 2022

Don't think like that.
I'll be gone by the morning.
Smell my favorite sweater,
forget what you always try to remember.
"you're beautiful" are my clever words
because the camera turns
and you're inevitably hurt.
You play with fire
and expect to get burned.
You always said I was thinking of her.
Don't think like that.
You said I was your addiction.
Ghosts of valentines past whisper
this same affliction.
Quit me.
Say it with conviction.

In three months,
I'll ask you how you're doing
and you'll tell me that you're fine.
Such a pretty, busy mind.
We're all doing fine.
Such a pretty, busy mind.
My gentle mermaid.

Sawyer S.

Let’s Play Pretend

March 26th, 2022

Hush. Let's play pretend.
Dig your claws into my neck.
Mark me, so I can remember what I should forget.
Bathe me in your scent.
Remind me, which part of you I should regret.
Hush. Let's play pretend.
Say it again. 
"Stay."

Sawyer S.

love isn’t supposed to feel like this

March 21st, 2022

seventeen text messages. 
left on read.
you still haven't texted me back.

i nestle my pseudo lover. 
i wrap my hands around her neck. 
a bottle of Honey Jack. 
something, anything to shade
this gray into black.
i've always been chasing
that which you lack.

i wonder who you're with,
and where you are.
these privileged thoughts 
are for the naive.
i chew five xanax
for my nightly reprieve.

i hear five knocks at my door.
"sawyer, it's me!"

the onset of vertigo.
my feet betray reason
as i walk to the front door.

both hands press 
against the wooden door.
"you can't keep doing this to me"
my words slur in my pathetic state.
"let me in already, i want you right now"
and just as a puppet dances with string,
i unlock my door and invite you inside.

you're wearing a black, 
faded denim miniskirt.
torn fishnets.
you reek of liquor
and cheap cigarettes.

"have you been using again, sawyer?"
"you already know the answer. why are you here?"
"you're my boyfriend, duh!"
"love isn't supposed to feel like this."
"what is love supposed to feel like then?"
"i feel like i'm dying"
"baby, why don't we die together then?"

remember when we would get high,
just to have fun?

Sawyer S.

Fragmented Ego

March 10th, 2022

Why,
am I so cold?

I visit a headstone
of a man I used to know,
a faint realization
of fragmented ego.

I am
so cold.

I drop a bouquet
of cheap roses
onto filthy soil.

Collapse.
My fists pound the petals 
to make them bleed.

Violence and pain
comfort the parts
of myself isolated to shame.

Why,
am I so cold?

Sawyer S.

Short Story: Stand In Defiance

March 3rd, 2022

My naked body suspended in a glass chamber.
The water is rising. Blue knuckles beat on prison walls. Futility. I see a strange man point his finger. A smile so crooked and ugly. I hunger for violence. For I could shatter his porcelain veneers. Mercy is an allowance for the weak. His face would be an empty page on which I would write three stanzas of vengeance and penance with the tip of my Damascus steel blade. Fantasy is sobered by the icy bite of water swallowing my abdomen. I don't have much time left. The more I struggle, the larger his eyes become. Bastard. If I close my eyes maybe I'll wake up somewhere else. Somewhere far, far away. I stand in defiance. I will no longer give him the satisfaction of my anger. As the water dances along my nipples, I can see my mother faint in the periphery. She is wearing her favorite floral sundress. Black stilettos and the necklace I gave her for her birthday last year. Her skin shimmers in the darkness of my caged eyelids. A single tear runs down her cheek. She mouths the word "goodbye". Water floods into my lungs. They burn like I swallowed cyanide. I am relieved that my eyes are already wet. I hear her voice again, echoing that same word. "goodbye". I love you too, mother.

Sawyer S.

Haiku: Marlboro Mistress

February 18th, 2022

Marlboro mistress
cigarettes, torn fishnets
empty ecstasy

Sawyer S.

“Siren Song For Bottled Blues” Published at Spillwords Press!

February 16th, 2022

It is an extraordinary privilege to announce that my poem, titled “Siren Song For Bottled Blues“, has been published on February 16, 2022 at Spillwords Press! I would like to extend my gratitude to Dagmara K. and the editorial staff at Spillwords for their support and coordination in publishing this piece.

Please visit the following link to read “Siren Song For Bottled Blues” by Sawyer Stewart: https://spillwords.com/siren-song-for-bottled-blues/

Fallen Spirits

January 19th, 2022

As the smoke settled,
I could see fire;
crimson blazed in her irises.
I was but ember and ash
flashbacks of that same shade
twirling in my fingertips
as if I could see fallen spirits.

Sawyer S.

Belligerent Blue

January 15th, 2022

It's a fable now,
of a forgotten town. 

Whispering goodbye
to every belligerent blue 
that must have wasted you.
Two was too many yet 
twenty was already plenty.
When had we subscribed to 
the idea that love was a construct
only to be destroyed by
the vices we employed?
I feel like a child, innocent and praying to God in a church pew as if He could
stop and rewind to that one time 
our fingers intertwined
and I felt truly fine.

It's all a fable now,
of a forgotten town.

Sawyer S.

The Woman Who Taught Me All

December 26th, 2021

Fifteen candles burn bright,

for the woman who taught me how to fight.

Fifteen memories plant a tree,

where we sat, and where I can now breathe.

These years have changed a man,

and I know only you can understand.

Sawyer S.