empty moments

"empty moments"
there's a somberness that exists in the dark now,
an emptiness
that lingers on the shores of silence,
a gentle swaying of
melancholy
and
contemplation,
my mind
dangles doom
in these empty thoughts
as the slithery seconds
of every moment
slide over my skin
leaving me
no peace
in the blackness
behind my eyelids,
only
the swirling formless colors
that wash over
from the edges
in watery waves
and
as memory fades
I won't understand
this hole
I have
or
know when the pain
first came,
leaving only
solitude in the end,
its sad
to think
I'll never love you again
even when
I can barely remember you.
-Armando Torres

a hint of winter

"a hint of winter"
a cold gray
     lingers
          at the edges
     of everywhere I look,
a hint of winter
     hangs on the air,
bringing with it
     a crisp freshness
that courses through my lungs,

as my eyes close
the cool air
     floats by and
my thoughts find you
     again
as you swirl and form
     from the endless waves
          of blacks and grays
               in my mind
and I see you,
     only for a moment
before I open my eyes
     again
and forget
     again
what your face looked like,

a life once lived
     now gone
to the infinite dark of time,

I see winter creeping in from the North,
     there's a hint of memory
on the cool air,
          reminiscent flashes
of you
          I so long to believe
were true
     however
I never know now,
     only remember
just enough
     to feel the desolate pull
of what once was
     at the mercy of the wind
hoping for another glimpse.
-Armando Torres

Empty Spaces

"Empty Spaces"
I still see you in every moment,
     in empty spaces
          overlaid as memory,
all that remains are
     walls full of empty spots,

empty corners and doors,
          just echos of a past no longer,
there was a lifetime worth of things
     not said
     between us,

our purpose that once meant so much
     no longer means much
     of anything now,
          except as a ghostly relic of antiquity,
     just thoughts
     separated by time,
               a cesspool of lonesome questions,

I see you there,
     still,
     in front of the mirror
          fixing your hair,
and there on the couch
     leaning into me,
I hear you in my thoughts,
     as whispers
          slithering
     in from the edges of silence
     on the delicate tips of memory,
          bringing with it
               the icy chill of remembrance,
       only I remain now,

I feel solely the essence
     of your memory.
-Armando Torres

the creeping fear

"the creeping fear"
It's there all the time, the creeping fear,
     the hidden horrors deep within my own mind.
It is not the unknown I fear,
but the thoughts that creep in
from the depths of My darkness.

And With every moment I endure,
I exist
     alongside
     the agonizing thoughts
     of my own design.

Slowly sliding
further away.

It is ourselves I have found
we should fear
for we,
on our own
harbor the sweetest kinds of terrors.

And With time
My lies have become the truths
     I so desperately denied,
I shroud them over
this hideousness of my life,
losing the delicate honesty of fear to shadow.

I exist now only,
     as a moment
     folded into infinity,
     forever captured
     beyond the fabric of comprehension
     and only as a reflection of lies,
a moment,
     extending forever inward,
          as I forget
          I too am just
          one of the many reflections,
     multiplying
the miseries of an existence
     that perhaps may not exist at all
     inside a boundless and infinite abyss,
     void of any truths.
Just A relic of horror and antiquity,
     wrapped in nightmares
     and thrown into the fires of agony.
However
     there is an echo that remains,
     beyond perception.
A lie that I fear perhaps says
     I must endure.
A shadow that crawls as it watches, a hidden horror,
     salivating on my very torture,
     whispering the sweetest things from the deepest recesses
          of my mind,
          telling me I Must endure.
A shadow that crawls in from the edges
     bringing with it
     the torments of memory,
          clouding all
          that was
          once me and forging
     a lie of agonizing truths,
     peeling away
     a fabric of reality
I once saw as myself and replacing it with misery.
-Armando Torres

pray

"pray"
Awake again
in the middle of the night
with the soft glow of the television screen
spattered on her face, and nothing more,
She remembers again
as the silent night chill
creeps
into her small apartment again,
her eyes weary and open
are but
another reminder
of her dreary life, nothing more,
she holds on to the cold staleness of memory
only for them to exist as
more regrets
to rewind
over
for another countless time,
she searches for the strength
to keep hoping.
she prays.

Her tired eyes finally find
that slice of sleep she's been waiting for
and a familiar image waits in the darkness,
once more her eyes open,
she can't sleep,
she can only cry again,
she looks over to her tiny bed again
and she remembers
the way she felt
when she held her
in her arms,
the look of her tiny face and her tiny sounds,
her tiny mouth and little hands, her little smile and tiny breaths,
She can't move on
when all her being
is bound
by what happened,
hoping and praying
every night,
She did all she could
with all she had,
she prayed everyday
as she watched
her baby die,
she prayed everyday.
-Armando Torres