Author: lbstowe

Isolation breeds boredom & getting lost in thought. The poets’ pen, not ink.

We sit in boredom & see things in macro just thinking thinking Think!

Then thought is broken by the voice of the heart & that’s when things get murky.

The collision & friction of the mind & heart produces an alphabet soup that’s quirky.

None of it forms words or makes any sense… blood rises & we get busy.

Arranging & rearranging letter by letter the heady task makes our heads & hearts fizzy.

As photons of inspiration crash into our brains considering the best words to write next.

We rack our brains for rhymes & our hearts to divine the great connects.

Couplets or stanzas start to form & all falls into place.

Next thing you know there’s a cloud on your page carrying the weight of a mace.

The hands can’t keep up with the frenzy & then it’s over as quickly as it started.

With every piece, thought & heart separate & we despair they’ll forever be parted.

There’s a dirty greasiness in the air; a fell voice upon the wind.

Democracy is barely holding against the gale. It hasn’t broke. It’s meant to bend.

Where there is fire there is always smoke. It’s drought & zephyr fed.

How many deaths will it take to see this period dead.

We fret that our new normal is not just temporary.

We’re in close quarters with a deadly animal, scared & constantly harried.

Things are rough. There’s no denying it. The country’s running scared.

Half are running one way & everyone else the other. The one half with their arms bared.

Mother Nature is screaming at us all no matter our material issues.

She’s pissed & out for revenge for centuries of rape & misuse

I have no happy moral here for I am caught up too.

All this is very clear to me but I don’t know what to do.

In a beam of light filled with mystic gold that turns to dust when it passes through.

Worth about as much as money which is our agreed upon lie between me & you.

It’s as real as the gold dust in a passing corona of light.

Do we still agree upon this lie when we both know it’s not right?

Paper, gold, pounds & pence the lie can’t go on forever.

But not many agree with these words & can’t let go…not ever.

They’ll ride this horse towards a burning barn & be engulfed in flames.

But, when the lie fails & it’s masters have self immolated we won’t recall they’re names.

Yes there are dragons here in brilliant binary code.

Here today & gone tomorrow along with all our gold?

This binary digital social scape we made is nothing but 1s & 0s.

It’s so much gossamer & agreed upon lies & we no longer manufacture heroes.

Digitally banking our data away these dragons are so constant & persistent.

The dragons have counted & hoarded us while we chatted to our contentment.

So since we can’t slay them, can we contain them? Can they be wrangled by Laws?

We’ve already lost so much of ourselves & all around me are still gaping maws.

I’m not conveying anything you don’t already know. It’s about participation.

As long as we do, we might well get used to a permanent occupation.

I only had one heart to give away & I gave it away in youthful exuberance.

Now I lean forward into a short future & a long past passing from remembrance.

I only had one heart to give away I’ve spent a long time “in love” & I’m weary.

Now I still wait for him to sit by me cause that’s all you want in your life when life’s dreary

I only had one heart to give and I shouldn’t have given it to him in Springtime.

I sit chilly in Fall facing winter & my lover/friend is lagging his way behind my Time.

I only had one heart to give & I gave it away to carrying friendship instead of a love I wanted.

Yet I still hold out hope that he might one day see that it’s better to be loved than flaunted.

Even evil can dress in white even as it strikes to bite.

Even tears shine. Whether happy or sad light finds them.

Even in death bluebells blossom in spite.

Even in sickness the cream rises to the rim.

Even destructive fire reveals the ancient Pines’ seeds.

Even in the midst of failure a lesson lies just for you to see.

Even in hate is the opportunity to change a heart.

Even after lies we can make a fresh start.

Even in love our hearts apart can be broken

Even I learn & am a different man with each word I have written & spoken.

There’s alway always always a choice & and I choose life.

Not because my future is shiny but because I value my strife.

Not love it or like it or even look forward to it but strife has value.

It’s the ebb without which there would be no flow through.

Life’s turning wheel has fortune & misfortune that switches like the tides.

Accepting the fact of this is the sustaining light in which life can be taken in strides.

It doesn’t make it easy, just easier to handle, due to understanding.

You’re promised only the scant knowledge that life will inflict good & bad things.

That’s the way it is & everyone knows it consciously or unconsciously.

Cognizance of this is what allows me to always see the paths that are open to me.

There isn’t ever nowhere to go…take it from someone who once lost their way.

So when your feeling blue & trapped & lost in the woods pull out your moral compass & give it a day.

I sweat letters I bleed words. My whelps rise in prose. I’ve got bruises shaped like poems.

My blood is ink; my tissue it’s blotter. My hands are printers & I’ve got verses on my bones.

My skin is a infinite page; tattoos my prologue. My nails are commas; periods my moles.

I feed my body with the world & my mind with what it does. People fill my heart & soul.

My fingers & toes tap to the sound of typing; a rhythm like angels singing & devils dancing.

Is it any wonder that my professional proclivity is language & my inevitable romancing.

I walk to you leaving a trail of shedded pages in the hopes that you read the body proffered.

I won’t be around forever so don’t waste time procrastinating the volume offered.

I think every day on my own mind & the flaws I know it bears.

It puts me in mind of a bottleneck & my sanity has to squeeze through there.

We have limitations in our lives; an obstacle strewn course.

I question my feelings of doubt, worry, fear & remorse.

I’ve lost more than I’ll ever remember. I have reason to question my mind.

I’ve spent so much time alone because not many have chosen to be kind.

My flaws are more than I care to count.

My limitations are the kind I can’t surmount.

My limbs don’t do what I tell them to do.

So I find a way around if I can’t get through.

This is a strength of mind. Yes, I think on them too.

I speak to you of flaws & limitations but it’s not all doom & gloom.

I can’t run or dance but I still know how to sit & groove.

This bottleneck of Can’t I squeeze though daily gasping

Trying to find a stout hand hold that’ll gain me purchase grasping.

My life is much like rock climbing horizontally.

And when I reach the summit of life I’ll know I did it because of me.

So yes I’m constantly concerned with my sanity. Who wouldn’t in limitation & isolation?

Though, the fact that I’m worried at all is proof I can let go & purge my mind of fixation.

We revere the veneer of history. Why?

We know it’s not really what’s gone by.

We know it’s been whitewashed by victors.

Wanting the poor & colored living even stricter.

Though we know that History has two sides.

Which side you’re on by two things is tried.

Either you see the truth 20/20 in hindsight…

Or use your moral compass & hope your choice was right.

So many events & people are ignorantly lost to time.

Wrong color &/or wrong gender so history never dropped a dime.

This is the way it’s always been & I fear will be much longer.

But many have gotten a first look at their compass; making the movement that much stronger.

I hope for once that we find ourselves on the right side of right.

Else we’ll find that we are in for one long hell of a fight.

Just to get the facts right.