December 21, 2014

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?

December 12, 2014

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

December 01, 2014

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 

November 02, 2014

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

October 20, 2014

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.


October 16, 2014

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

August 13, 2014

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!

August 10, 2014

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

July 22, 2014

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)

April 28, 2014

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

April 10, 2014

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.

April 08, 2014

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.

Poem-A-Day
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:

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.
The Borzoi Reader Poem-A-Day 2013
Borzoi
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March 27, 2014

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

 

March 20, 2014

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.