In a white book, writing was done with tears,
And so we cannot figure out a single line;
Memorized and though about since early youth,
It eludes one’s wit even as one has aged and greyed.
When mind seeks it out, love turns up in the heart,
When heart pursues it, love is in the mind, escaping wit.
Regarded at close range, love dissipates,
Leave it aside and love turns sad and grieves.
When loving is intense, love resists the long wait,
Like a lightning bolt, it streaks across the dark.
The kiss that sears is a kiss given only once,
And when the river swell, only once will flooding rise.
Love that is timid is a river still and currentless,
No falls nor torrents, no tears nor unbearable loss!
But when love has dared, the heart is swept away,
Honor, wealth and wisdom, love will drown them out!
When love is yet a bud, it heeds an elder’s counsel,
Such is not yet love, for it still sees the light.
But when it bursts aflame, what matter the universe —
That’s real love, so lose yourself in it with all your heart.
When you balk at the threat of ill fortune and hazard,
Truly your wit is lit and your mind at dull alert;
Your love is cautious yet, you have not
learned to really love,
For once in love, the grave itself is heaven’s gate.
Love has eyes, love is never blind,
having learned to love, one’s wounds turn into blossoms,
Love is selfish and cannot bear to share,
It’s either you get it all, or get nothing at all.
“Mother has been watching me, so I cannot write..”
Friend, that’s a sign you have yet to win her love.
But when she dares write even at her very grave site,
She has come to love you more than her very life.
All you, young people. who are in quest of love,
Moths who are fluttering around the lamplight,
Once in the grip of love, danger you will seek out,
Ready to love your wings to the very flames of love.
Standing at the threshold in the silent space
between thunder and lightening
Straddling the door sill of uncertainty,
stranded in a continuum of discontent
One foot in…One foot out
It's just a step away…One foot forward
while the other follows the wanderlust
of an evolving enigma
The first step begins
a journey of a thousand miles
Walk to the end of this long and winding road
Carry the weight of an unfinished life in this soul
Breathe in the stillness
of the tempest calm
The ethereal instant within
the eerie pause of natural hesitation
The exhilarating silent fusion linking the anticipation
between the bolt of lightning and the thunderclap ;
nature’s well performed sleight of hand
Two souls touch igniting carnal synthesis
Reaching upward to the heavens they draw strength
from the spirit of the lightening and the hail
The ominous sky’s anger … the storm’s fury fuel's the essence of verve
Vibrant celestial elements manifests a drenching downpour
Heightened senses are enhanced by an electric aura
squeezing out every last drop
from the enchanting moment of stunned silence
Spirits transcend a cleansing rain ... invigorating heart of soul ~
©Harlon Rivers 2013 ...February 28th, 2013
Have you ever thought about the space between? Recently I sat writing a list of such things...
This is a poem about what can go on during the waning moments between thunder and lightning
Creative writing is a type of subjective practical magic for the times when imagination
knows no boundaries limiting access to dreams of other realms
It may surprising to know how many you can come up with, if you made your list.
So as the list grew, so did emotive thoughts expanding upon
what the distance is or what it can mean to us....
Okay so things like the space between a rose bud and a blooming rose...
planting a seed and then waiting for the harvest, the first step in a journey
and then arriving at a destination, the space between love & hate,
birth & the passing of life, black & white, The silk cocoon & the Butterfly,
the moon & the earth etc...
The space is as infinite as the list of possibilities.
In this case I was thinking about the silent void of anticipation between a visual bolt of Lightning
and the raucous thunderclap breaking that silence...
how many times I have waited in that "space", that "limbo"
counting the distance between ...
I sit on my arse by the fireside chair
and talk the mill talk to the calender man
but he doesn't care
he just watches his gauges and pressures
how precious he is
to the factory owner who allows him to live
on a pittance each week.
And while he clothes the World
in his mind he would seek
a botany bay
where his ancestors lay
and put roots in that ground.
The sound of the press, blocks the sound from the bell
just as well
because that ringing in his ears is not the bite from the future
but the teeth in the fears of his past
and another bolt of cloth has been passed by the foreman
and ticked off the list that he keeps in a book
to read to the crook who works in accounting
and pushed to the double entry
in another book amounting to
daylight robbery
but the snobbery of the age is another page set
in the mill town you get
bugger all.
The fine hall's for the Master and all you survey
are the ruins that lie in the ruins of another day.
Get away
to get away and walk through a gateway into a better day
but the Devil you know is the Devil you pay and what would he say
if you jacked in the mill
and worked down the mines
better times indeed?
Leave a light on,
The teddy bear tickles
An itchy red nose,
Clutched to the chest
Tightly wound arms,
The window shows a
View of thunder, clouds
Of a deeper blue as
The horizon stretches
Across forbidden plains,
She breathes fast and in
Short gasps, toes curled in
A state of mild fear—
Shifts of electricity,
A bolt of lightning across
The broken cerulean,
One-elephant, two-elephant,
Three-elephant—
Again,
The moments
When your teddy bear was
A fierce midnight warrior,
Shining silver armor
In the dark elements of
A childhood forlorn,
The red curled
Fingers around the metal
Of your umbrella,
Rubber boots squishy in
The dark gray mud—
Excuses to become
Brave against the world,
When nature joined forces
In starting a fright—
Inside your belly,
That sweet tucking lurch,
You wonder why you
Have your father’s
Eyes, the night a soothing
Blur as those little specks
Of dust tickle your nose
In the dark,
A reminder of the safety
Nestled in your arms,
A trait to inherit
From the wise and the old—
Who vowed to protect
But were too busy.
I'M SORRY IF I HURT YOU
I'M SORRY COZ I CANT FIX YOUR HEART
ID RATHER DIE NOW THAN TO HEAR YOU CRY
IM NOT SAYIN THAT YOU LIE
SUN WILL SHINE ON US PLEASE DONT HIDE
TEARS ARE FALLIN FROM THE SKIES
I DIDNT MEAN TO BREAK YOUR GUTS
NOR WRAP A THORN AROUND YOUR HEART
I JUST WANTED TO SEE YOU HAPPY
AND WEAR YOUR SMILE EVERYDAY
FOR THEM TO NOTICE THAT YOUR MY ONLY
AND NO ONE COULD TAKE YOU AWAY FROM ME
I ADMIT MY FAULT
SO CUT MY HEART LIKE A BOLT
YOUR MY LIGHT THAT SHINE SO BRIGHT
I WANTED TO HOLD YOU SO SAFE AND TIGHT
...Out of the corner of her eye,
a bolt split the endless blue horizon in two,
shattering Neptune's fork and sending the cold king cowering back to the depths,
A new day had Dawned,
and the sun endlessly wrapped her in his,
protective,
Warm,
Embrace.
Heard the rustling of track pants,
It brings out agility I did not know.
Just to avoid the annoying rants,
I quickly shut and bolt the door.
The whining of my name begins,
And my hands itch to slap,
His face or break his shins,
But I pretend to take a nap.
He keeps banging at my door,
No choice but to let him in.
Spoilt retard child to the core,
If I rid the world of him, is it a sin?
I dread to let him sit,
His ass will glue onto the spot.
I dream of throwing him in a pit,
And just leaving him there to rot.
The sadistic pleasure I feel,
When he is bestowing unto others,
With what I must everyday deal,
Like an unbreakable curse.
a shooting star is born
from the bleakness
of the heavenly spheres
racing to earth
the flashing streak sears
a burning path across the sky
at dazzling speed
it accelerates, slashing
the porous atmosphere
like a laser bolt from
Zeus's own hand
then evaporates
into the nothingness
of the midnight sky
the universe remains
little changed from its
advent and passing
Charlie Parker:
Star Eyes
jbm
Catskills, NY
8/88
Six feet and thunder
where I'm under the bolt and the surface
finding refuge in a hollow hole knowing not home
Six feet under yet alive and death of me wonder
how it could miss me?
thereby chance would frisk me
find me worthy and whisk me
away to not-a-north unearthly
Cascading in the bright holographic shadows of the horizon
Learning about this fairytale
Y fair tale or furry tail
Will it ever end? Will I go back to my hole?
Playing chequers with moths
using rocks for marbles, shooting away to pipelines
the rock finding its way to tunnels
I play relay but I'm still here
The rock is gone, it the only thing I can enliven,
the closest I can get to freedom - for now.
It's dark, I'm all alone
weakened, betrayed
ask me I will tell you all about despair
so far away is cheer and merriment...
Winter comes and it will pass
its the coldest time of the year
I cannot wait for Spring so the flowers can grow and give me hope
I'm here in my tomb, begging, crying, pleading:
somebody hear me, somebody set me free
this cannot be all I can be
Would mystery fool one to take a shovel and dig me out? Would it? Can it?
Six feet under, buried by the thunder
carried by the moments of impact
where the world hits and the winds clap
Wondering if I will ever shine again
even suicide would do me no justice,
you could hand me a rope and I couldn't hang myself upside down
and my fellow skeletal inmates wonder why my heart doth frown
Sand we once were, now as dust we linger
Waiting for the next wave
hoping for sunshine, if not then heat waves.
A full day's work
Has me feeling exhausted,
But as I take hard rights
And skirt the uneven pavement
I am a machine.
I am fused to my seat,
And two spinning plates
And one fork are
Extensions of my will.
The nine point five miles
Seem so much shorter at night,
After the suits have made Their daily rushed exodus,
And the streets and avenues
sleep, quietly.
It rained all day, so the road
Is wearing a blanket of diamonds,
And the motor oil wrinkles shine.
The downpour has filled the world
With fragrance,
And as I pass through
Affluence to arrogance
To intolerance to vagrancy
On my trek across
A divided city
I'm overwhelmed.
Honeysuckle and lilac
Give way to pine and dogwood,
Then car exhaust and a polluted river
Precede wet garbage, dog shit
And marijuana.
I saw my first rat in the District tonight.
Nine months in,
And I've only seen one.
It makes me glad I grew up
Where I did,
Where all you need for
A rat in your apartment
Is a baseball bat
And a Lightning Bolt record.
I'm glad I learned how it feels
To live with two feet
Planted firm to the earth,
To feel harsh 1930s sidewalks
Haphazardly littered
With broken glass
Burn my bare feet
Every summer,
To feel the cool
Narragansett Bay sand
Sleeping just under the surface,
And to feel the sole
Of my five year shoe
Finally give up.
I'm glad I've seen success
From the underside,
So that when my arthritic hands
Finally reach up and grasp it
I'll know what to do with it.
But mostly I'm glad
I get to pull up to my building
At ten past midnight,
Sweaty and tired,
Climb three stories with a
Bike on my shoulder,
Pet my cat, and crawl into
Bed with a warm soul
Who was brought up the same,
With no clouds
For her lovely head
To get lost in.
