Forgiveness’

There are who need this from me

An overwhelming need to do so has struck

I have no need to like you, I won’t

But I will tolerate you

Because we are intertwined.

Hurt comes in many a guise

Hurled at each without thought of feeling

Just because I have no emotion did not mean I do not feel.

Because we are intertwined I must forgive

I must for those I still love and love me still

For those who will love me forward.

For all those years where love should have been

Inflicted pain, ignoring even for yourself

“this hurts me as much as it hurts you”

So not true, but it does hurt you felt you needed to hurt yourself

In order to hurt another.

I forgive you

I wonder, can you forgive too?

Folgian

You, you are right

there!

Liege yes we follow

Embraced in warmth

Aglow

This spark blown afar

Raised through friction

Loathed and loved

An appreciative audience

We follow your lead

Yet want to know

Where?

Do you go from

And return to

Hmmm

The Fit

You go right there

A little over

Bored

You're not quite in place

A case of identity

Loss 

Lost

Who am I to you

And to you too

These pasts haunting

Ghouls at roost

To unrest

I can take it I think

Still the heart

Does hurt why

A question

And switch mute

For naught 

Prehensile Apprehension

I've never known fear really

Oh certainly I've been afraid

Yet now suddenly there it is

Aptly described it is, a pit in the belly 

That's where I am

In a pit

It started simply enough

With a rare dream and rarer still

A nightmare

A simple white square

Illuminated onto a dark wall

In a dank room

Exploding a flash and gone

Suppressed to nothing

And while I was in fear

My faculties were all with me

An acute awareness of my surroundings 

Where everything is

In my enforced and unwelcome blindness 

It follows me you know

This pit hangs there

Sending waves of anxiety

An embarrassment that I will be noticed

A fraud walking among us

He lacks confidence

He must be extricated from the herd

A cull eminence in constant attention

Where indeed can I be

He seeks

I shall shout here

One day

A brave force against timid survival

But now I am in this pit

Hidden

Clawing the walls down about my feet

Filling this hole whole

Rising grain by gain from an abyss

To be seen again

Lincoln’s Rose

David’s song was tending his garden today

Gentle memories for the woman he loved

Every petal caressed with memory

A clip here, a trim there

Here, he snipped

This is the hardiest rose in my garden

Many look like it

Bright red, velvet allures

The Lincoln Rose

Named for the president you know

I like to think it was the last scent he knew

Smell it, you’ll see

It is unique from all others

My father brought it from Britain

Illegally of course, when he came to visit

Things were lax then

He taught me two things my father

Develop a thick skin

Develop a sense of humour

Oh and let strength work through you to grow

Like these roses

As they age they get strong stalks and spikes of stone

And they provide larger flowers with finer perfume

They tell me to see the good

To talk with all

To see the humour, sad and funny

And to present these symbols of love

And for those who are sour

Stay beautiful and spiked

Either they will be hurt and drop you

Or they will learn to understand, become gentle, work around your pain, and celebrate with you.

Eye

It burned

Two wheeled gain four

Stopped the hair bristled

An illegal traffic infraction 

Reconnoiter and satisfied

My defensive stance

Parked and ready

The threat foregone

The loves in my life surround me

Taking Life

The plunge into the dark
Tunnelled through these barriers
Mountainous impassable monuments
Hidden views of dark
Turn on the lights
Avoid passing
Safety from dangerous loads
Anxious fear sticks to a singular pathway
Souls passing risk
Risking past
Plunging to the dip
The sinking
Into air thick of fumes
Confusing clamors of constraints and starts
Warning
 
The plunge from the dark
Upwards the base pinnacle despair
Pointing accelerates
The climb commotions building strength
Joined builders to the light
Given to find a way
The out from out
Into the light living
A way can be found
Relieved to breath the air
Fresh of sound
Vale of life
Ribbons relief
We can reach
Understanding
 
Kindness lost in frank
Frank a tough pill
Energy drained
Stolen and outward controlled
Preserve it and close
Repair the lights
Shut the dark
And find a surface
Lay naked in the sunlight
Exposed sensuous to the elements
Sacrificed upon self
To supply too others
Murdered
 
Taken life
My owned
Taken life
Your own
Taken life
From life
Taken life
This love
Taken life
My love
Taken life
Your love
Taken life
This end
 
Resurrection comes from a dark place
And the stone is pushed away
Guarded by angel’s light
Vinegar turned sweet to water
A woman life of giving
Will receive the message first
I am alive
I matter
I am the one
And you have tried to place me away
But I have believers
And they will walk with me hand in hand
Overcoming
 
Together
And I will love always
And am with you
From you was taken life
To you is freely given, take life!

You See I Often Don't

You see I often don’t

Where you feel I puzzle

Where you close in

I need connection

Where you reconnect

I need time and actions

You see I often don’t

Your profound string

To an attached universe

Is a marvelous thing

And leaves us ascribed

Contents floating entities

You see I often don’t

The wounds are bound

And tight I stay awry

Wanting you to admit

To show exposed self

For you and only

You see I often don’t

Yet calculated I know

You because we are same

And opposed

There is no profession of understanding

But relational connecting

You see I often don’t

You matter because

I can feel only you

I understand none of it

I frustrate all of it

And I see love in it

You see I often don’t
And seeing I often do

The Liturgy of the Bull in the China Shop

Be it decreed this bone-headed smithy is the unflinching idiot of idioms
Lexical regurgiltical flim flams emanate from this, the mentality flawed
Whoa Nellie sayeth he, whatever does that shite mean?
It isn’t, no truly and honestly it isn’t.
It is the understanding of the beautifully incapacitated mind
Understood by beautifully creative minds to see capacity sensationed above then under-mind
This is to mean one means this and the other means that and neither is meant to be mean
If you get the meaning.
This vocality (noun: that place where the utterance comes from before the thought is fully articulated)
Is taken at the word whatever
What is experienced is the utterance of the miscommunicated
The cause of the excommunication
Oh what a jumbled word is weaving back and forth till meaning is lost
And in exasperation exaggeration the peddle puddle of explanation excoriation
And is stripped raw
Splat flat falls Jack again for another time passed to try
Forgiven forgotten Jack does not shirk but could mope
Upon my word!... meaning this thing we misunderstand
Verbally it is said unto you subscribe to this
For no harm save harmless is intended
For to do so would render one no heart, the heartless of…
Oh!
 
(Dear Lord, why ever do I get so sensitively confused (just saying), Amen)

Filament

These strands join us all

A single unity

A web with life

With joy and hope

And we can be lonesome

And frightened

This is to be celebrated

For we know we need

And we can weave these filaments

To texture existence

A cloth of the whole

A thread pushed

Will only bend and fold

Let me pull you to me

And you pull me to you

And together

We will knit a fabric of one
A blanket warm to wrap and protect

Danielle

Life!

I was sitting here wondering

This new borne scent

What is it…

Life!

I missed it sweetheart

From so far away

And yet I felt it

Touching you

Across digital miles

A breaking heart

Craving a touch

Feeling your life

Knowing the joy

Seeing familial pride

A memory place

And one I have never grown tired of

My love lives there

Life

I’ve missed the scent

Yet knowing you are here

In this world

A short connection away

My life is that much better.

Blessed.

Learning to Read by Franz Wright

It's not often I feature other's poetry here but Franz Wright's poem touched me.  I've made a point of placing the entire page from the Knopf (e)mailing.  I am hoping I am not breaking any copyright rules here.  Every April Knopf publish a Poem-A-Day, in celebration of Poetry Month.

A window onto the childhood of Franz Wright, who turned sixty last year and won the Pulitzer Prize in 2005 for Walking to Martha's Vineyard. This poem appears in F, his newest collection. To share the poem-a-day experience with friends, pass along this link >>  Learning to Read If I had to look up every fifth or sixth word so what. I looked them up. I had nowhere important to be. My father was unavailable, and my mother looked like she was about to break, and not into blossom, each time I spoke. My favorite was The Iliad. True, I had trouble pronouncing the names; but when was I going to pronounce them, and to whom? My stepfather maybe? Number one, he could barely speak English - two, he had sufficient cause to smirk or attack without prompting from me. Loneliness boredom and fear my motivation fiercely fueled. I get down on my knees and thank God for them. Du Fu, the Psalms, Whitman, Rilke. Life has taught me to understand books. More on this poem and author: Click here to learn more about Franz Wright's F. Browse other titles by Franz Wright. Visit our Tumblr to share this poem and peruse other poems, audio recordings, and broadsides in our Knopf Poem-a-Day series. This year we're hosting a contest called "Portray Your Love of Poetry." Submit your entry!  Buy the Book Excerpt from F. Copyright (c) 2013 by Franz Wright. Excerpted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, LLC., New York. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

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Shoulder

We assume nothing, or at least we shouldn’t

These are strong and will bear much

The links are strong

Strained tenuous for pain

And they are their there

For any and all with need

To push hard in to the solace solid

We will remove obstacles as one

To wrap close and hold

These do care

Yours for you

They are connected to this strong heart

Because you need them

As we do

 

Sailors Warning

The day is starting gravely

With majesty

The full night moon diurnal

Falling behind

The first day of autumn

A pillared tension cumulates

It is coming

Streaks of light

A sun prism blood red

It is coming

The day is attitude dark

The warning

A flash, another, discordance

Ignitions of passion

The match has begun

Torn asunder

And tears hard and cold

Then soft, then warm relief

And stopped.

This too has passed

As it always does

This sailors warning

Turned welcomed

The now warm autumn sun returns

And soon the moon too shall now chase it

Balanced swings the pendulum.