Rahsash Geldich

She snapped out of her dreamland only as the bus let her off at the end of the cul-de-sac she lived at. The other two houses might as well be empty, one having been up for sale for ages now and the other inhabited by a little old lady and her yorkie. The old woman never spoke to them, and Alaxis never talked to her. "I probably scare her..." She held her body hunched over the painting that had been reviewed, having wrapped it in an old towel to protect it from the rain that still drafted down steadily from the clouds. She opened up the front door, then paused. The front door was never open. Ever. A scream struggling out of her mouth, she threw her bag and picture against the wall and dashed through the house, looking, searching. A taint hung in the air, a shadow upon shadow that lingered with the stench of cheap cologne and alcohol. Her father was here, somewhere... She dashed into her room, grabbed her knife and stuck it in her pocket. Its flashing blade and sharp edge cut through the threads of hysterial, leaving her head clear. And then the motorcycle engine roared, crying, a demon revving its divine Davidson engine. "NO! No, not that you bas**rd! Leave my motorcycle alone! Get the f**k out of my house and get your a** off of my bike!" Tears were streaming down her face, the black once again dripping, draining. The rain wept with her, and she streaked after the retreating motorcycle with every ounce of strength she could muster. "Ha! Come and get me, b**ch! You'll never be able to catch me or your dreams! You'll always be in the gutter! Thanks for the wings!" He gunned the gas a little, just enough to pull farther ahead. But he was enjoying playing with his daughters head, so he dropped back, leaving her to trail about ten feet behind once again. They rounded a corner, pulled into another, different section of the neighborhood. The houses were less nice, no longer the mansions that Alaxis was used to, but more people-oriented suburbs. Few people were home, or looking out their window at the strange sight. Her breath was ragged in her throat, and she whipped her head to the side, clearing the water, not all of it rain, from her face and her hair slipping from its confines and spilling down her shoulders. Her legs ached, unused to the exertion, near cramping and the stitch in her side was unrelenting. But her thoughts were on her wings. "Suffer! Suffer through your entire life! The best you'll ever be able to do is become the whore your mother was!" With an animal scream of rage, Alaxis put on a burst of speed she didn't know she had, pulling the knife out of her pocket and running with it in her hand. Her fathers eyes widened as she came within reach. He suddenly got a devilish grin and came to a complete stop. She stopped and almost fell, blood pounding and breathing labored. A quick glance showed that they were on a deserted stretch of road, a line of trees and an overgrown hedge cutting off everything else. "Daddy's little girl come to say goodbye?" His devilishly dark eyes burned with his hate. Brown hair was plastered to his head, he reached up and ran his fingers through it, then flung the water in her direction. She flinched unconsciously and he snickered. "Didn't even have to hit 'cha that time!" Her grip on the knife became white knuckled. "You don't have the guts..." He growled, leaning in, tantalizing. Alaxis lunged forward and swung, ripping the chest of his shirt and pulling a narrow stream of blood down the front, purpling the baby blue. "You hell bound piece of rotten s**t! You'll pay for that!" He flung the bike down on the pavement and struck at her, catching her cheekbone again. "Stop! You lie! I'll live longer than you ever will! And I'll be better than you ever can be! So just shut your f**king mouth and get the hell away from me!" She tried to hit him with the knife again, but he just snatched her wrist and drove a fist into her ribs. She let out a yelp of pain, switched her grip on the knife and jerked. The blade nicked the back of his hand and he crushed her against him, getting his blood on her, blood, tears, rain, all dripping and blinding and fueling her urge to kill the man who had destroyed her. She swung her fists, catching him in his stomach, but her tries were futile. "I'm too strong for that, I could hold you with one hand!" Proving it, he snatched up her thin wrists in one of his giant hands, holding them high above her head. Her chest heaved, teeth bared in a snarl, and she let fly with her foot, catching him in his only vulnerable spot. He jumped back, wary now. Freed, she flung herself over the bike, the blade held menacingly. "How disapointing. You never used to hurt me, little nymph." "You started it." The words sounded childish in her mouth. He laughed then, laughed in her face, laughed at how little she had become. "I may have started it, but who's going to finish it? You?" "Leave us f**king alone, you son of a b**ch." He read the rage in her stance, and deciding he'd wreaked enough havoc for one day, the once-charming woodcutter ran off, jumping a fence and dissappearing from sight. It was then she really cried. Lying over the bike, in the rain that began to fall harder as if to shroud her pain from the world. She was alone, completely so. "He destroyed us..." She whispered hoarsely, for once not caring if anyone saw. The edge of her blade was stained, and Alaxis could almost feel the black of depression creeping into her heart. Edited by: Rahsash Geldich at: 6/26/02 6:38:44 pm

This is great! The internal rhyme scheme in the third stanza strikes me as particularly vivid. Kudos to you!

::walks up to Heart and places her hands above her head to say a blessing:: May you fix your wings so you might fly May tears heal hurt should you cry Escape the broken cage of trust Fly, angel, its Heaven or bust! ::with that, she grins cheekily and scampers off:: Nice poetry by the way, I've always enjoyed the way you incorporate things from everyday life into your poems, it roots them where other poems just drift around and while you feel them, they don't connect.

I love it! particularly these lines: Why don't you learn to find yourself Before you tell me how to be. They ever present attempts at goodwill are drowned in ignorance! ::applauds::

Its almost about how you can write, draw, something so strong, so important to you and they either don't understand, don't get how important it is to you, or overly criticize. But you understand also you've never told them, so how could they? And then you wonder if they would understand if they did, and you know by some means, that they won't, or rather, Can't.

Alaxis got into the passenger door of the white geo, her blue backpack covered in black marker the way her room was in white. A few sketches had been done too, those in gel pen that she occasionally washed off and re-did. Her motorcycle, the only remanant of the King in all of her fairy tale memories, was proped up on the far side of the garage, hidden partially by a plastic kiddie pool. She wasn't sure why she still hid it, but she never could leave it out in the open. Her mother came out, dressed for work in a black buisness suit and stilletto heels that gave her five foot five body a little more height. She would tower over Alaxis in her skateboarder tennis shoes, Alaxis herself only being five three and a half. She wasn't sure why the half inch was important, but then again, when you were short, you craved height. The rain came down harder as they neared Darken County High School, a school renowned for having very little besides a decent football team. Personally, Alaxis didn't care about the football team, or sports, or school really. If she really tried, she could probably do better than the 3.0 average she held, but she didn't feel like it any more. When her 4.0 grade avgerage in her all-advanced classes had dropped to hardly passing, the counciler had called her in with her parents for a meeting. She remembered that day vividly, however, the next was a blur as that night, as her father often did in the times after, he let his anger get the better of his judgement. A broken arm, seven stitches on her shin, and a duped nurse later, she was back at home and much changed. Her mother pulled up in front, and Alaxis gathered herself for a dash into the building. "I won't be home untill late tonight, scrounge or order." "Alright." She jumped out and shut the door, waiting untill her mother pulled away to actually open the doors to the school and go inside. Oh, so much had changed. That, she supposed, was the point she could affix to her own deterioration. She had been going downhill already, but Alaxis always thought that assistance in improvement was better than punishment. "Morning Mr. McGrench." The man that had been rummaging in the dark room turned around and affixed her with his sharp blue eyes before smiling a warm greeting. "Ah, hello young imp." Their traditional meeting phrases said, she sat her bag down and pulled out a set of watercolors and a board to use them on, putting on a headset and playing her Korn cd quietly. "How did your art piece do in the show?" He inquired, not at all botheirng her as a similar comment form anohter person would have. "The critic said it was too dark, that even though the subject was well done, the tones made it seem an entire room in shadow, not a spotlight." She frowned at the mentioned piece, leaned against a wall. A dancer was supposed to be lit with a blue spotlight, reaching out for a male dancer in a street-clothing costume mainly red. Stormy scenery was in the background, and a shillouteed audience was captivated by the moment. "Hmph, what do critics know? I'll put it in your portfolio for you." "Thanks Mr. McGrench." She hummed softly to Freak on a Leash, moving the brush in small strokes on a woman that was half horse, galloping madly across a field awash of color. "I'll call this one freedom, for running is the free-est horses ever get I think." With a small smile to herself, Alaxis leaden over the picture. Where would she be without art? Mr. McGrench sighed to himself. His pupil was intelligent, dilligent, and often quite witty. But he was afraid for the girl's health sometimes. A skilled artist himself, he could read where the highlights on the skin were slightly off because of darker undertones. He noticed fine details, like the unusual scarring on her fingertips, and faint tracings of pinkish silver on the braceleted wrists. As much as he noticed, there was little to say.

Hmm, I believe eloquent is a good word to describe this, it flows so well. Even though the topic or tone is one fo sadness and wishing for help, you make it a plea and nto a scream fo help. Admirable. ::Applauds::

Alaxis watched at the Blonde sat down across from her. Their eyes met, turned away. Every morning, their eyes met, and they turned away. The Blonde was pretty, her namesake long and silky, hanging in gentle shimmering waves, and she had somehow managed to get the ends all cureld under. It baffled Alaxis how girls had the paitence to do that. Her own hair was thick and straight, naturally a burgandy red that had been popular the year before, around the time she turned it black. The girl's real name was Angie or some such. Her friends called her Gigi. Alaxis turned up her cd player, irritated for some reason. "So much gold... Angel dust... Contaminated by angel dust..." Something about the phrase stuck with her, and she wrote it on her backpack, some empty space left near a zipper. Picking back up the brush, she reviewed the painting critically, caustically. The woman's expression bothered her, something about the way the mouth turned that suggested anger instead of the freedom she was searching for. She absently tapped her sneaker against the table leg, shaking the off-balance piece of furniture and sending a bit of water out of the conatiner she had been using to rinse her brush. "Da**itt." She cursed, sitting down the picture and taking off her headphones. The sounds of a post-tardy bell classroom replaced the rock music that she had been listening to slowly, and she still hummed Freak on a Leash to herself, unaware she was doing so. The morning announcements were almost lost in the murmur of voices, and Mr. McGrench good-naturedly shushed them. The old man could control a classroom of misrecreants with a few gentle words. All the trouble-makers, loudmouths, smart-a**es, and even the drunkards and druggies listened to him, knew him as a friend, and respected him for the most part. To offend Mr. McGrench was to offend the majority of the student body. Alaxis mopped up the water then tossed the wad of paper towel into the trash can, watching as Blonde took up the seat in front of her. As usual, there was a guy hanging off of her arm, some Junior that needed to find someone other than the Freshman Blonde. "Aww, c'mon Angie, you know you want to go out with me!" Alaxis rolled her eyes and snorted, but Blonde just giggled, blue eyes sparkling. "No! I have a boyfriend!" Jack, not at all stopped by this, sat down on the table to bargain, narrowly missing Alaxis' still wet watercolor. Scowling, she prepared a long string of curses. But he was too busy trying to convince Blonde to break up with her boyfriend to notice, much less care. She put it in an open-sided set of drawers, the one that she had claimed since she was a freshman. At that time, she had shared, but gradually fewer and fewer people had wanted their things near hers, and had claimed other drawers. When the bell rang, Mr. McGrench gave a short run-down on what was due and what was soon going to be assigned. Blonde pulled out a watercolor also, a blue and purple rose that was really pretty well done. She began to outline a few of the petals in a black sharpie, and one of her cronies sat down and began using a similar marker to begin her dot drawing. The pencil outline of a peach on a fencepost was there, waiting to become an image. Alaxis sighed and began using charcoal to do a skull. An open book held the picture reference and she began to sketch, turning on her walkman to waste another class doing ahead of and behind time work, passing but slipping. Suddenly, the music that was booming in her ears quit. Blonde looked up, as did her friend, stunned by the loss of thumps buzzing out of the headphones. The battery was dead. Mumbling curses, she dug around in her backpack for spares. Brass, Blonde's friend, known to the rest of the world as Britt, was back to her commentary. "He's so cute though! He's got short blonde hair and these absolutely stunning green eyes." "You said he moved in when?" "Last week, I was talking to him over our fence and he said he'd be at school next week. I don't think he's much of a people person he's really more..." Brass threw a glance in Alaxis' direction and leaned over to whisper in Blonde's ear. Alaxis finally found the batteries and plugged thim in with a contented sigh. She knew by the glance that whoever Brass was talking about was really more of the kind of person that was generally associated with Alaxis. Of course, that meant very little to her. She was a loner, with a few people she could call buds, friends maybe, but no best friends, no one to ask her what was wrong. "Not that anything is, I'm perfectly sane." The comment was a whisper, less even. Brass looked up when she heard it, her prying blue-green orbs trying to open up the shields of black eyeliner and read Alaxis' soul through her eyes. After a while, the girl shrugged and went back to dotting and talking, eyeing the skull with aprehension. Although there was no sign in the picture in the book, the handle of a blade stuck out of the cranium, shatter marks all around it. The detail was amazing, but the whole image just gave Brass the chills. And such dismissed, the world of school passed Alaxis by.

It was a great effort to pull herself out of the bed, an even greater one to turn on the light. She hated getting up early, but whenever she did, she would use the extra time at her high school. Opening the door, she peered down the hall. Her mother was in the kitchen, probably sipping on her coffee. She walked tentatively in and poured herself a cup, the mug decorated only with a Harley Davidson embelem. Her black oversized tee had the same one, and the orange cotton shorts she wore with it were hidden completely. Her mother looked up at her, dark green eyes appraising. They were the green of a dark forest, that strange green that communicates death instead of green life and light. Framed by a thick mane of deep sable, the fae features that Alaxis had inhereted seemed particularly magical. "You need a ride?" Alaxis nodded, hearing the thunder of her dream crackle outside. "Be ready in about an hour." She nodded again and retreated back into her room, the first raindrops hitting as she shut the door. With a sigh, she turned on the radio and dug through her drawers to find something to wear. When she was younger, in the time before, she used to think she lived in a fairy tale. Her mother was always the princess of a dying king, with no one other than her to inherit the kingdom, or its riches. One day while visiting the village tavern- Alaxis grinned. As a child, she hadn't know what a tavern was. Now she did. With a mental brush, she pushed the thought away and pulled on the black parachute pants. A glittering red shirt with the number six on it completed her outfit, but she added a spike choker for the effect she wanted. The princess had been enchanted by the young rogue, and they met many times afterwards. Each time seemed more magical than the last, and finally, he offered her a ring to marry him. The princess exclaimed over the small diamond in its dainty gold setting and insisted it would always be priceless of what it meant, not worthless for what it was made of. She pulled her hair back, letting some fall to frame her face and putting spiker on the hair pulled back so it fanned out. Someone had once said it looked like the statue of liberty, but she paid very little attention, and cared less than that. Alaxis quickly smeared on some black eyeliner, some blue-black lipstick and silver eyeshadow. In the beginning of after, her mother had said she looked like the angel of death. She didn't seem to care now. The bruise was once again carefully concealed and she pulled on her boots, finishing off her coffee. Slinging her backpack over her shoulder, she turned off the music and disarmed th alarm. "I'm leaving for school my sweet. I wish I could take you, but they seem to dislike that kind of behavior." Brushing off the insisting memory that bubbled up with the comment, she shut the door. The sun tentatively peeked into the room, wondering if it might ever shine in on the girl inside again.

It was a dream. She knew it was a dream, but that didn't make her any more likely to wake up, or anything in the dream less frightening. There were screams, distant like thunder, but the lightning punches that accompanied were already striking. Alaxis drifted into the dining room, could see the living room where her mother and father stood arguing. She realised she had her knife in her hand, the nine inch razor sharp blade glittering reality in the surreal feel of the dream. She saw her father swing, an arch of amber liquid splashing in a wide circle. Her mother recoiled, then lunged forward like a snake, thunder rolling from her mouth in unintelligable waves that crashed into Alaxis, flung her up against the wall in a thump that was never heard. "Never heard my sweet, I've never been heard... They never listened..." She could feel the edges of the dream deteriorate with wakefulness, but the image of her father turning towards her captivated her, kept her where he could still have her. As the storm cloud of his drunken anger approached, his lightning arms struck out at a lamp, shattering it in slow motion. She watched the pieces fall in facination, the sound drawled over to her, some strange warped noise that was lost as she fearfully watched her fathers fist back up, to expolode in a crash of pain. She shut her eyes, gripped the knife tight. it never occured to her to fight back, the thought never came- BANG BANG BANG She sat up, stifiling a scream. Beads of a cold sweat were on her face, and her beathing was labored, heavy gasps that wanted to channel life into her, exhale the terror that gripped her int he dream. Her mother was giving the morningly wake up call, the one that was always unnessecarily early. Alaxis looked blearily at the clock that was partially covered by her leather jacket. The red numbers gleefully informed her it was six thirty, and she had an hour before she had to be up. She groaned and rolled over, letting her fingers rest on the blade, its cold steel calming her from the memory of the dream. Edited by: Rahsash Geldich at: 6/9/02 6:14:05 am

Hmm, a star of light in the black of night. Sometimes looking at what we're standing on is enough to make us continue. Very nice.

I would like to make a comment about the idea of a mature writings section. My newest story, "Feel So Small", might be a bit heavy for some readers, but I would greatly like to continue it where it will be open to acknowledgement and not just sit around int he dusty files of my computer becasue I feel discouraged by lack of intrest. Of course, some of that is my fault. An idea if the Elders are getting swamped: What if to recieve a promotion, you help an elder that is particularly fluent in your main area(s?) of expertise, similar to an apprenticeship. That way, we are helping out with the whole Guild concept, and maybe we can get more responses around quicker, as I for one greatly appreciate any kind of review on any of my work.

Rahsash ran out the door, tripping over her ink stained skirts and doing a few summersaults in which deposited her at Vincent's feet. She grinned cheekily up at him, then stood. "I would be delighted to join, would anyone happen to have a pen?" Everyone eyes her apprehensively, and her friend Katiya is soothing a few giving her an overly unwelcome look. No one seemed to want their white quills in the ink-stained, dusty, and slightly paint-stained hand. Only minimally crestfallen, she put her fingerprints on the line then ran off, shouting at a large lizard shape. "Wyv! Wyv! Do you know where my book is?" Vincent shook his head. Rahsash was normaly very level, even too serious on occasion. But when her precious books were missing, chaos would always prevail.

Rahsash stomped a foot. She had no idea where to look, but she decided that the book that had been found would be a good place to start. Wiping her hands uncaringly on her dress, she opened its cover. "Look!" She shouted gleefully. "A clue!" Katiya rolled her eyes, stifiling a giggle. Rahsash oened the folded sheet of parchment, reading the magazinge cut out letters once, then twice. She held out the paper and Katiya took it with a pained look, grabbing it tentatively by one still white corner nad reading it at arms-length, holding it as if it were some biting thing. "Who on earth does ransom notes for books." "Sicko," muttered Katiya. "An absolute sicko." The girl was thinking more along the lines of making her put up with a hysterical Rah than the person, whoever, whatever it was. "Honestly! What does it say?" Katiya gave her an absolutely caustic look. Clearing her throat, she read aloud. "To find the rest of your books, look." Rahsash stopped tearing apart her room for a moment. "Look where?" Katiya shrugged. "You're guess is as good as mine, it looks like the person got tired of clipping all of this." Rahsash snatched the paper and Katiya backed away from the ink-stained page warily. "But who?!"

::unable to say anything, she simply stands and applauds::

Rahsash was not in a good mood at all. Her three most important books in the world were missing. The place on her desk, always the only neatened corner of the piece of black furniture, was startlingly empty. She haphazardly sifted through the papers scattered across the top, scraps of poetry and old math homework scattered together with sketches that seemed to be out of some person's dark corner of mind. She payed them no attention, and neatened them all into a pile. "Alrighty then, lets try this approach." She then sorted them by what book each SHOULD have been in. The math homework and a few notes she had passed back and forth with her bud Katiya were tossed into a garbage can. The contents immediately burst into flame, the spell leaving nothing but a few pieces of ash. "Hmm, I really need to re-bind all this" She mused to herself, sifting through the stack that had mainly art in it. Finding nothing, she shoved it in a drawer, and moved onto the stories section. This was much smaller, and she quickly tossed it into another drawer. Left with the stack of poetry, she waded through the phrases, finding the lack of organization with the snippets, stanzas, and side notes very much so annoying. "Ah HAH!" The shout echoed loudly down the hall, and she could hear a few doors open, including her own, to find out the source of such an exclamation. She slid the papers absently into yet another drawer, and held the piece of still-wet paper aloft. It was then she noticed that the same ink that was staining the paper was dripping onto her sky blue skirt. "Bloody ashes." She mumbled, one of her favorite curses from one of her favorite books. It was then Katiya walked in, seeing Rahsash standing with a piece of dripping paper that was getting black ink indiscriminately all over everything. "What on earth are you doing?" Rahsash ran her hand swiftly over the desk. "Someone has stolen my books." Waving an ink-stained hand around, she stomped out the door, the answer to the question drifting back through the hall. "And they spilled ink on them, its all over the floor. I bet if we follow the trail, we can find them." Katiya sighed. Since when had it become "we"?

I agree with Zool, but also, sometimes we try to disguise feelings of self-dissatisfaction with anger at something else. When that displacement is removed, we are surprised and are left to wonder why we still feel all of this. Very nice work

As I read those words again, Sprawled upon the screen. Background swirling gently The script all written green. I wonder at their meaning, The why behind the rhyme What had made them feel such In that place and time? And I shudder as I read the author And recognize the name as mine. Why do I feel all of this? I have very little reason. But my stories seem to course When my poetry is out of season. And sometimes I have this fear That creeps along my spine. That one day my parents will find That this blackness all is mine. And I know with a sickening feeling I've been lying all this time They think I'm just rebelling, But I'm crying for their praise. I'm not sure that they don't know If they do, they haven't shown in days They don't realise how shattered How easily broken I really am. And how with their 'advice' They can easily condemn. Maybe they're just speaking English And I'm speaking some tai dam.

Hmm, the essay sounds like a collision between this poem and 'Tracks'. Its not so much about retreating, its about accepting and not worring about the small things that we tend to fuss far too much over.

:;giggiling slightly at Zool's comment, she turns to HLaH.:: Excellent, it speaks immesurably of pain that is fixable, but fear of rejection is also a powerful weapon when wielded in our own hands. It gets more detailed, more anguished as you go along, but the last line settles the matter, as if its a lid keeping a bottle full of rampant emotions in check. Once again, marvelous!

This poem reminds me of music, how even if the words don't seem to fit, the more you see it, the deeper and more meaningful it gets to you. And rather suddenly, you get this feeling of settling, and it all makes sense and you feel the melody all the better. Well done.

She gently ran her fingers along the edge of the blade, just heavily enough to leave a small groove in her finger tip. Other places where she had not been so gentle were criss-crossed there, scarrings that so few knew about. Half the time, Alaxis didn't even remember. She could hear her mother winding down her conversation in the next room, no longer shouting. The woman was pacing now, in and out of Alaxis' line of vision. Tentaively, she stood, tiptoeing down the hallway into the bathroom, where she took a look at herself in the mirror. Her face was a smear or purple and black, red lining her eyes. Her black-dyed hair hung in stiff strands where she had put gel in it this morning. A glitter of a stone in the middle of her tongue was tripled by the mis-matche ear rings she had, two and a cuff on each. Angrily, she threw water on the reflection, smearing it as the makeup on her face was. She leaned over the sink and washed her hair, letting the cold water cool her aching head and rinse the stains off of her. A loud knock made her jump and almost hit her head on the faucet. "Hurry up in there, some of us actually work and are actually tired." "Alright." A long stream of nasty words and smart comments ran through her head, but they washed down the drain with the rest of the black. Clean in body at least, she wrapped a towel around her head and retreated into her room, adjacent to the yelling room, but much more calming to her. A canopy bed stood on one wall, the moon attempting to pierce its blood red curtains vainly, the window it was streaming through bordered by a celtic design in black and silver that merged with a large cross at the top. A dresser had been shoved into the closet, its door ajar and a pair of knee-high black combat boots were attempting to march out. On a desk in the other corner sat a computer, black also, its screen currently flashing with a series of pictures of dragons. The walls were black, with white paint markers standing out because of the blacklight shining on them. Words, phrases of poetry and quotes that had struck her fancy at the time, were scrawled in various styles of her handwriting. She put a cd of celtic flute music in the computer and flung the curtains around her bed wide. Her red and black bedclothes were a rumpled mess, but she straightend them and sheathed ther knife in a scabbard that was hung on the wall. With a sigh, she changed into her pajamas and flicked on the computer. It was eleven o'clock, too early for her to sleep yet. She opened up the internet, looking around for someone, anyone to talk to. She could pretend that everything was okay here, that she was strong, that she led a normal life. Here, she was happy, upbeat, and usually playing another character in a roleplaying game. She heard the shower turn on, a cascade of water that she was reminded of daily by the water bill her mother griped about. In the days before, before her father had started drinking, Alaxis hadn't been allowed on late, due to the 'wierdos'. She smirked, the cahnge in her blank mask lost int he glare of the computer screen. "I've become what they warned me about." The thought was sadistic, she knew, but for some reason it made her want to laugh.

Alaxis huddled in a corner of her living room, slightly shaking. She could her her mother ranting in the next room, the pauses between her answers to her father punctuated by the slamming of two objects together, probably something that would later have to be fixed. The first of a great flow of tears slipped slowly down her face, dripping out of a dark brown eye, dragging black eyeliner down past the bruise concealed on her cheekbone, past the purple lipstick-stained mouth to drop off a pixie chin onto extra baggy paint-stained jeans. Soon another fell, and another, and one more, untill they were comming in a steady flow that pulled the wash of colored life off and left it as just another splatter of color on the jeans. She could see a shadow of her mother grappling with the telephone and its spiral cord, a demon using the serpent to communticate with the devil. Alaxis shuddered, then was unable to stop the violent spazams that wracked her body. There was a shattering of breaking glass and she reached for the knife that sat on the table beside her. The blade reflected her face back at her, fairy features hidden in a silhouette agains the full moon that peeked in on the chaos and fire from a window to her right. "I could plunge this into my heart right now," she told her reflection. "And by the time she actually shut up long enough to find out what I'd screamed about, I'd be dead." But her reflection just stared back with mournful eyes, eyes that showed her soul begging her body to just try, try a little longer. She sighed and lowered it from her chest, unable to actually commit suicide, as often as she thought about it. "Damnit Frank! I don't care what the hell you think you're going to do, you aren't getting custody, or even visiting rights!" "That's my mother," Alaxis told the blade, her only constant companion. "All I am to her is an object to bargain with. To bargain with... Him." She gently touched the tip of the knife to her cheek, the spot where the bruise had been wiped off and now showed itself, swollen and a purply black that hid itself in the shadows of the unlit room. "But we've escaped him, my sweet, we've escaped him for now."

I've reached a state of tranquility Where everything is okay. Actually very little has changed, And none of its gone away. Its not like I don't care, Its that I've learned to accept. I can now roll with the punches, With coping I am adept. It's provided me serenity In my times of want and need. And the leash of anger lost, I am more and easily freed. Its not like I'm unfeeling, For I have felt this before Its more that all of my emotions Can be under control more. In this mental garden of Eden, In times of anger, I reside. And, should I ever need it, Its a wonderful place to hide. You may call it whatever you want Karma, Zen, perhaps peace of mind But you willbe better much better off Once this semi-ataraxis you find

I think this could definitly count as a free-verse poem. A good one in fact. It starts off with feelings of anger and resentment, but the last stanza makes you review it as a cry for help almost, very interesting. ::applause::