Category: Poetry

Haunting the kaleidoscopes in visual minds are the poltergeists of trauma.
We feel & revisit these visceral scars; recall them & relive the drama.

The only way out of its gauntlet is thru to the other side bruised & bloody.
But it abides in the wings, while we play at life; our covetous understudy.

Our wounds trip us up again & again; even more if we don’t deign to face them.
Yes indeed, our monsters command our respect if we hope to survive their mayhem.

Injuries eventually knit into scars which remind us what we’ve endured.
We tend & we treat our harm so it heals; forgetting frailty assured we are cured.

A quilt is no less than a sheet for its stitches…in fact, I’d say it is stronger.
Trauma’s a map tattooed on our hide that takes a lifetime to read…maybe longer.

Moths & butterflies, squirrels & rats; different as day & night.
Though, afternoons have their eves & what would the dawn be without light.

We  connote value & appeal by granting names with innate worth.
Taxonomy of the reviled & adored our grasp over Earth.

We label offspring to inspire our love & our esteem for them…
Willfully ignorant both are imperiled by opinion’s whim.

The love we garner & esteem we earn are born of our actions.
One of which has been to name the world & break it into factions.

Across the universe we lord our power while accruing blame.
For in the end outcasts will rule by defying what’s in a name.

Poking fun’s not a victimless crime to subjects of derision.
Where no effort’s spent at being kind there’ll only be division.

You are rude & think it’s cute-that when it’s done by you it’s charming.
You think yourself a faultless fool unaware of who you’re harming.

Laughing with undeserved confidence at the expense of others, 
You’re beating brows & bending vows with an arrogance that smothers.

Your assumption that you’re better than most doesn’t leave room for growth.
With no travails you weaken like veal wallowing about in sloth.

We unappreciated few will bear just as much of the blame.
We’ll be the targets of your cruelty when you are deaf & lame.

So much of me’s filed away safe on a shelf.
Welcome to my apothecary of self.

I collect pieces past & pieces prologue.
All neatly archived in my mind’s catalogue.

My shop is always open, just read the sign.
My life’s curios gather dust in yon shrine.

Curious to see what’s in my library?...
Ribald receipts of the fun & the scary.

I constantly reference my whole collection.
Reflection informs my future direction.

 We all are subjected to good & bad weather.
Some bear it alone & some weather together.

Some strive to be solo while some need a tether.
Some risk all & find themselves covered in feather.

Some cling to sound earth; making homes among heather.
The paths are to stay or to go, you choose whether.

A few take to power; their heart & hides leather.
Their lives mostly spent punching down at what’s nether.

But space is created by matter’s endeavor.
The constant is change & nothing is forever.

I care not for the bustling crowd, it’s driven greedy scheme.
Of lonely peace I’ve learned desire, I need not be supreme.

I lust not after worlds renowned, or fame’s phosphoric gleam.
Give me space to wander & roam, inside halcyon dreams.

No seething places people packed, nor froth at life’s extreme.
Ambition’s bane is wanting all, o’er-minding how you seem.

Living beyond the means you have, consumption’s doomed regime.
I’ve lived that way, I’ve felt the press & did not like it’s theme.

I know the love of few & true, I have what I esteem.
I n’er belong among the throng. There’ll be no I in teem.

Here, what kind of poet am I? I thought you already knew.
I feel a word & I find it’s mate & chart their pas de deux.

Backwards they waltz & forwards they spin dancing their synced soft shoe.
Rhythm evolves with meanings just so; each phrase the next one’s clue.

Enter the May Queen, her maids in tow around the theme they screw.
Then witches writhe around their cauldron tossing rhymes in the roux.

My imagination flits & jumps making so much ado.
My thoughts now spit & sputter their steam while falling into queue.

A dance of ideas & a dance of rhymes born from just the two.
Created, counted & metered out; this poet’s piece is through.

“Mind how you go“, said the crone to the world; as all the good deeds of her long life unfurled.

Death had come knocking so often before. But, this was last call & she’d stall him no more.

Leaving the world better than she found it…she quit with Death & her exit resounded.

What would they do now that she was not here? Who’d they now look to; she’d lived long without peer?

She’d  mentored her heir; prepared her a pitch. Now all would come down to a tough maiden witch.

The lines in your hand & the tears on your cheek, speak to your future & this unhappy week.

I call on you now & I’ll be back around to offer my service to which I am bound.

The language I speak is the tongue of concern. I do for you now without want of return.

I’ll offer my best while you are not at yours. I’ll hold you and feed you; replenish your stores.
 
Because one day you may lose me, I’ll smooth the road ahead for thee.

I figure that living may outweigh dying… But letting death go was a few years trying.
Relearning life was indeed petrifying…Although needs must when the devil is driving.

Being born in summer & living in spring…Sudden chills in the eves are a frightful thing.
In frost scented air as the long nights take wing…I sit by my hearth & of color I sing.

Life flows like birth & death’s cycles on repeat…We trod o’er the starts & the ends under feet. 
Ignorant of nuance in seasons so fleet…The rush of life intoxicating & sweet.

Towards death hewn horizons we all do rush…Mistaking the future as golden & lush.
Collecting burdens that are destined to crush…Thinking they’ll make our destination more plush.

I once saw clearly my future in vision…Halting my progress in wrecking collision.
Long I sat licking my wounds of abscission…But now bloom in snow by warmth of decision.