My sinful side stumbled on your arrant attraction, 

The way you bit your lip was a welcome distraction,

My bare ego naive, engaged by flattery and flirtations,

I never learned to distinguish love from damnation, 

Surreptitiously sweet as if you didn’t once crave my attention,

If you fucked me for a month you’d rethink your direction.

Yet I barely recall those moments of skin, intertwined,

I don’t overthink shallow things, like your body on mine,

I forgot I can’t swim til I scraped my knees on the bottom, 

I still choke on the words, both unspoken and forgotten,  

If you knew you’d take me somewhere I’m not supposed to be, 

Would you disengage sooner so today I could walk free?

Or do you know me too well, how I am stubborn and raw, 

How I’m addicted to chaos, how I will still take your call. 

Would I go back to strangers to escape my own fate?

Placation with lies and as I say I don’t wait. 

 

 

  

Goodday

 Grief is wild experience. Gutted raw one moment, blood rushing through my beating heart, doubled over, sobbing, feeling as if my rib cage might crack open for the world to see... numb the next, blackness, stillness, staring at an empty by canvas just waiting for the next emotion to paint the next scene... (and man can I make a scene, just ask my family or those I let close to me.) In the next instant I succumb to feelings of pure joy, laughing and smiling as I drift through the memories of kindness, connection and love. Overwhelming gratitude fills my soul, that a life has touched mine so deeply. I try to pause to thank the universe for those rare people who come into my life and show me grace and share wisdom and their truth.  I feel so vulnerable and open... and just as quickly I am then usurped by fear and utter disbelief. I feel it all at once, and then in a moment I feel nothing at all. I don’t know how to do this, to walk through this without something to put me on autopilot. My body feels clumsy and awkward, and I don’t know what to do with my hands or feet.  I begin to understand how beautiful that unknown can be.  I am in awe by how much power there is in love, a power that prevails over even the greatest pain. It must, or we would never ever open our hearts to one another and risk the tidal waves of emotion that come when it is time to say “until we meet again.” I am so incredibly lucky, or maybe stupid, or maybe brave, or all of the above, to believe with all my being that love is the most powerful energy ever created. I am so humbled to stand at a place in my life where I have been given the gift of understanding that pain is temporary, and it only exists in such a raw and borderline violent form because today I have real love, and I have relentless hope, and I have been given the grace of forgiveness and a heart that is soft but strong. My heart is broken, but I am still whole. Yes, grief is a wild emotion, but love truly binds the Universe together. I love you, my friends. Thank you for sharing your lives with me.  💔♥️

A Reflection on Death Calls

 So, as it were, I have recently undertaken a new position in the grand scheme of time. Call me what you will, as my official title is "removal technician," but this new job has begun to reveal a different perspective in my view of life and death.  The work I do is for the living, and to honor the bodies of the souls who no longer live within their human home. I transport the bodies of the deceased, yet I do not seeing it as a job in the "death" industry.  To me the "death" industry is more akin to capitalism, to the fear of death, to look young, to take that pill despite the side effects, to live in constant panic of what you do not have.  While possibly considered a morbid obsession, there is a part of me that has always been fascinated by death, probably a part that exists within all humans, yet it is just one I have been given the opportunity and willingness to explore. 

There is something to be said about my new experience, as I process it, and as it continues to mold and shape my outlook on the value of life and the inevitability of the end of it. It is a wild and solemn and, for me, curiously exciting experience, the process of receiving a death call, of letting myself into the funeral home, picking up the van or Yukon (me looking something like a soccer mom to anyone pulling up next to me, with a very different cargo load in the back), ensuring the mortuary cot and blankets and cover are all in the van and ready to go, and meeting the funeral director who is mentoring me through this process. There is a distinctly unique smell to the back rooms of the funeral home, and I can tell you that working as a nurse and smelling the smells of the sick are not the same as the smell of death. I have seen the inside of the crematorium, the dust that settles over everything near it, felt the heat that still remains days after it has cooled. I have seen more bodies in the last few months than the average American, and I am confident that they are empty shells, with the glow of the soul gone, transformed into wherever our energy goes after this life. That's not to say there is no presence left in the building, but in and of the body itself, there is nothing that has yet made me uneasy, however surreal this has been at times. 

As it is for me in nursing, to be able to be allowed into a persons life during their most vulnerable moments and to be given their trust is a truly humbling action, which is an honor to be given. Pulling up to the homes of the families, I have often seen them waiting in the window for us, families in all different stages of the grief process. Their attitudes and expression of emotion varies widely, but the underlying theme so far is one of gratitude extended to us as we ensure that their loved one will be treated with respect and dignity.  Some are eager to help, some just want to allow us to take care of it all, some have many questions, some have a lot to say, and some just remain quiet with tears in their eyes. To witness the exchange of emotion between the family members, their support of one another, their goodbyes to the deceased, is to exist right in the dead center of pure, vulnerable, strong and raw love. What a gift it is, to be able to witness and support a persons grief, because isn't grief a window to the story of a persons love? 

My encounters with these humans are brief, and I have only been on a handful of calls so far, but the magnitude of what I witness is powerful. It has me reflecting on all of the interactions we have with one another while we are alive. How each one impacts us in some way, shapes our experiences of love, pain, joy, and ourselves. It makes me realize my own mortality, and through that I am praying for the ability to more than ever appreciate each moment I have and those who choose to spend their moments with me. While at times I will admit, I have later become overwhelmed with a sense of urgency to accomplish more, to love harder, to say what is left unsaid, to hurry life... but I am able to use the tools I have learned in my recovery to breathe, to pause, to meditate, to pray, and to recognize that because I am human, sometimes fear will creep into any new experience, and then I get to choose to live in faith, and not fear. To remind myself that my job is allowed to impact my experience of life, and that it in fact SHOULD impact my experience, because I am human, and I never want to allow my experiences in life to cause me to seek to be desensitized from what I am feeling. 

I have already lived a life where I ran from all that made me feel vulnerable. I have been a ghost wandering around the town I love while I was still alive. I sought to numb everything, the joy, the pain, the love. There is no strength in pretending to be strong at all costs. To be fake and plastic and robotic and self centered. Life for me is about fully embracing this human experience, and allowing it to shape my heart and soul. I am not saying I have mastered any of it, but I am truly giving it my full effort. I am making progress in this journey of self and journey of connection with others. So much of love was taught to me by placing myself in positions that showed me what love is not. It takes courage to be vulnerable, in a world that seems to profit on fear, jealousy, and hate. It takes courage to be vulnerable, to explore the parts of us that are dark and uncomfortable, to try to grow into something better than we were yesterday, to learn what real love could be, because so much of my life's experiences have been shaped by my own inability to accept myself and recognize that I am whole even during this growth process.  I am learning that I do not need to hide the parts of me that are still unrefined and unpolished. That I do not need to have it all figured out, that I can have faith and embrace uncertainty, that what is right will come when I am ready to receive it, and that the only thing that I should never leave unsaid is that I love all of you who take the time, or have taken the time, to connect with me on some level. True connection, it is beginning to appear, is based on my ability to be vulnerable, because who could ever connect with perfect? Time is a gift not to be taken lightly, because it is the one of the few gifts we can give that can never be replaced. I am so grateful for you. Thank you for helping me learn love.  

Nonsensical

Boldness beats in hearts of glass, 

Tethered between free will and fate,

Raw and restless, I repeat the past, 

So quick I am to hesitate. 

Plastic heart pinned to my sleeve,

I am fickle and I am planted, 

I block the exit then try to leave, 

Give thanks and take for granted,

 I hide disgust under a filtered face, 

My soul is bare and it is deep, 

I’m lost, I’m guided, I stumble with grace, 

Wounds of victory still weep,

I seized a ship but lost the sea, 

It’s new to me but slightly used,

Chaos seems my cup of tea,

Though pretty I am bruised,

I’ve tried blood and bleach to clean the slate, 

My patience never waits patiently, 

Somehow love and me are always late,

Torn and tethered, set me free. 

 

remember

 

Nomad soul frozen,
Direction seems lacking,
Perfected facade,
Deep surfaces cracking.

Running on pause,
Quickly losing races,
Vivid the bodies,
Blurring of faces,
Locked in people,
Losing soul in places,
Who exists in the body,
My finger traces?

Future in shackles,
Love my addiction,
Lacking completely,
In truth and conviction.

Wide open windows,
Fixed gaze on closed doors,
Failure of distinction,
The pain,
Mine or yours?
Slipping away,
Crawling towards,
Sitting with angels,
Disguised as whores,
Torn by the memories,
The heart it stores.

Do I only exist,
Your simple placation?
Does this mirror reflect,
Love, or desperation?
Sex and my soul,
Painful separation.
Passing the point,
No return or reparation,
Patient is the noose,
While awaiting salvation.

Megan Forrest
December 20, 2019

It rattles like a freight train, 

A frantic fever burning in my head, 

With Lucifer I play a wait game, 

Before the rush I'm seeing red.

There seems to be no end in sight, 

Our body count begins to rise, 

This demon claws at me with all its might, 

Indecipherable, me from my disguise.

My escape, a quick and simple plan, 

Evade the darkness in my life,

With greed my soul it now demands,  

I must choose a needle or a knife. 

Disgusts me how I feel inside, 

The shame, the guilt, the fear,

Wasn’t it today we took that ride?

How did yesterday become a year?

I've told you how I'm oh so sorry, 

Over and again I pay this debt, 

They think my life's an endless party, 

Honest truth? It is just regret.

You don't believe I miss your smile, 

Matter of fact, I miss mine too, 

You see, its been missing for quite awhile, 

Sometimes I think it left with you.

I'm uncertain I've left any hope, 

My past overshadows the best in me,

Weary hands bleed, clinging to this rope,

Tomorrow remains impossible to see.

For you and I, I hate me just enough, 

Every day I struggle to forget why, 

I’m afraid and honesty is so tough,

I’m only safe within this lie.

To lie here in sweet silence, 

For a moment I escape the screaming in my soul, 

Did you know the Devil ain’t so good with guidance? 

Try to fill the void with another hole. 

Please don’t fret, do not waste worry, 

Tonight I am inside, and I’m not cold, 

For just today I don't have to hurry, 

Addiction has not yet killed my body,

It has only claimed my soul.

Megan J Forrest, 

March 13th, 2019

Push and pull my souls on fire,
My head spinning like a top,
My heart a book of matches,
Lit them one by one, you couldn't stop,
Appears to me with no regrets,
You and I went up in flames,
When you were cold I knelt by you,
Now you won't even say my name,
I wish I knew how to put us out,
Without burning with you to the ground,
I feel there's so much left to say,
Somehow I always seem to let you down,
My souls is shaken but I can't run,
I love to burn until I blister to the bone,
So much easier to save yourself,
Even by your side I see I was alone,
I don't think you'll come to rescue me,
Too hard to run while looking back,
I hear you like to play with hearts
I hope you burn mine until its black,
I hate the way I melt into your touch,
I admit I can't help but play with fire,
Been known to douse myself in kerosene,
So powerful the heat of this desire,
So hot we burn when our bodies collide,
Our passion set the world ablaze,
Now I choke on tears and smoke,
Left to smoulder in this haze,
I'm sorry I can be so reckless,
I never mean to incinerate my world,
I always believe fire is so simple,
Just a spark between a boy and girl.

Take whatever is left of me,
Please hold it in your heart,
I'm not quite sure what's left you see,
Been losing pieces from the start.
One by one, piece by piece,
For every wrong thing that I found,
Unknowingly my hands filled up,
Until shame matched me pound for pound.
I tried to hide it in my pockets,
I willed it not to make a peep,
We hid together quiet in the shadows,
Save for the screaming in my sleep.
Please don't stop to pity me,
Though lonely I've never been alone,
Always together, pain and me,
So long it kind of feels like home.
It lives right behind my biggest smile,
It's voice the echo of my laugh,
It holds me when I get too close,
To living in the present not my past.
I thought it left me a time or two,
So empty are my heart and hands,
Insidious it moved into my soul,
Doubt stole my best laid plans.
I heard somewhere I must unbecome,
Everything I think I am,
I must believe I can come undone,
However I'm not sure if I can.
There is no place like home,
Yet now I'm told I may have been misled,
Over the river and through the woods,
My path disappeared like crumbs of bread.
The fairy tales just aren't true,
My mother failed to mention that,
For even someone loves the witch,
Yet only wrote about her hat.
So maybe it's not about becoming something,
And when they tell the story of me,
Once upon a time she lost her fear,
Everything she never hoped to be.

1-9-21

Soulmate debut, fuck me once center stage, 

Smitten by stature, relaxed by your rage, 
Sun spoils the night, numb pleasure by pin, 

Insatiable hunger, echo empty, nothing within, 
Head halted in red, bet our souls all on black, 
Gaslighting love with the arch in my back,
Hoping hell hurts, constant counting on that,
Push harder, push faster, my heart beat feels flat,
I cough, sweet choking, we are healing and broken,
Do me, do nothing, so long as it rips me right open, 
Addicted to your anger, yell at me in your sleep,
Get off me, don't touch me, please pull me in deep,
Trace the tears on my cheek, leave me on scene, 
Whatever you want, I crave your kind of mean,
My vice is your voice, I beg you to breathe,

Cut me, seductive, my heart stuck to your sleeve,
Don’t trust me, please lust me, just fucking give in,

Fuck you, I won’t love you, this time you win,

Take space, take a mile, keep keeping me near,

Smiling I skip back bound by hope and by fear,

So I’ll lie, say my sheets solicit more than your skin, 

Miss you and the devil, love, your blonde broker of sin. 

Impatient

Slow down impatient girl,
You’re running too fast,
You push so hard to get in,
You break right through the glass,
And still you wonder why you bleed,
Chasing away everything that you need
You watch me shoot whiskey like I think this is fun
While my demons rejoice in what I’ve become,
My soul is tired, I put in work to stay numb,
Arm wrestled the devil and that bastard has won,
I'm a drunk, I'm a lush, I'm a blonde broker of sin
Can’t find where your heart ends or where mine begins
I rise each morning crash to my knees by days end,
Life is fucking cheap when its your soul that you spend.
Megan Jean Forrest