ADAM LEVON BROWN - POEMS

Adam Levon Brown is an internationally published poet, Mental health advocate/sufferer, and cat lover. He is the author of six poetry books. He has had his work translated in Spanish, Albanian, Arabic, and Afrikaans. Boasting over 350 published poems, you can find his writing at such publications as Burningword, Epigraph, and The Good Men Project.

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​Romance isn’t a word, it’s a Bonfire!

​Love is an imaginary name,
a number, a reason to smile

Sour resplendence saturates
my grey-cracked heart in anticipation

filling it with ocean air
on a combustible Eugene day

You could say that smitten with fantasy
is the only word for my affliction

but when tears meld together,
forming a synchronicity

between blinks, there is holiness
embedded into every bloody
suture you’re bound to receive.


When Love tackles you into
the bleachers of Autzen Stadium,

there is only so much ice

you can apply to the wound
before it closes and encapsulates
your being in auras of regret.

You will attempt to rip out
your eyelids trying to recreate
the perfect moments you spent together.

You will scream

You will cry


You will douse yourself
in the same gasoline you
used to ignite your first
kiss together.

You will bitch, you will sigh
you will look at everything as
grey without their hand in
yours.


Capture them in a tiny bottle
of Jack Daniel’s and drink
them until your liver fails.


You will lose yourself
like Chris Farley driving
the bus in that one Adam Sandler film

You will die sideways
staring at your ashes spread
across the Dunk N’ donuts
where you first met.

You will lose,
You will lose everything.

 Love them anyway.    

Stars Speak in Distant Voices
​

​For every
juggernaut of crippling guilt
hiding behind smiles of pearls


There is a star
watching over you
who is saying,
"I am you, and I know your pain"

For every
lonely night
which sucks marrow
from bones of hope

There is a star
who is saying,
"I have seen you struggle,
and I know you can get up again"

For every
night you hang your fears
on the nightstand
of your broken trust

There is star
who is saying,
"You belong here"

For every
night you paint a moonless
sky for the darkness in your life


For every
dream you've ever held close,
cracked like eggs
walking on nails,
and spilling misery
like moonlight


For every
silent soliloquy
starved for a hopeless Sun-

There is a star
for you

And all you need to do is
gently push your shadow
aside long enough to
notice it

​Self-Portrait

If I were to paint myself
the hues would speak of pain

Doused in red and black,
crimson ire soaking

the bed sheets of the mind
with sorrowful cries

Blended with narcissistic
cacophony in ears too shadow-filled to hear

Lies and guilt overshadow
the face, with lines too deep to care

The canvas is tarred and mold-ridden
from nicotine stains and a tired heart

 The hands burnt red from caught colds,
staring naked, stripped of pride

The eyes, a pitiful stare off into the abyss,
which never cares to stare back, only glance and grumbles

The mouth, a lost child prying
lips open, hoping to speak

The hair, tangled with four
regretted seasons, locked to the sky
​

​For my Brother
(The Codependent)

​I am a master at putting others first,
a deceiver of my own senses


Headlight eyes blind my hunger;
genies grant 3 wishes,
whereas I try to grant dozens

I am a tree whose sap has all but
run dry from carrying apple orchards
on my back

I see dawn like it's a maze run by Loki,
tricking me into seeing how many people
I can please before I'm able to escape the exit

Sometimes I try to run sideways
to see if my shadow is still watching

Because I'm so enraptured
with other people's lives-

that I'm afraid that even my shadow
has left me, as my black sunglass
memories of self care have

When I see you, I wonder
what I can do for you.


I wonder how I can possibly
fix this person, even though
in my honeysuckle veins,
I know that you are not broken


I use lightning as a reminder
that every life is a crackling force
able to either fry me, or just to
stare in wonder at.


Imperfect,
and yet able to handle the fall
from the sky