My grade school
burned down
twice.
Once in the 1930's
then again in
the 50's.
They rebuilt,
there were two
large black and white
framed photographs
of the school houses
begore both fires
hanging in the
hallway.
At some point in
the reconstruction
someone had decided
on two boys
restrooms.
The one at ground level
was always clean.
There were small white
tiles and fresh blue paint.
It always smelled like
pine cleaner,
never ran out of
papertowels.
There was always
sweet smelling
liquid soap in the
shinny silver dispensers.
There were doors with
shinny silver
locks on the stalls.
It was a timeless
space,
prestine and somehow
preserved.
Free and unscathed
by the ugliness of
the world.
Then there was the other
one.
The basement restroom
was below ground.
There were windows
with wire cages over them.
Their view allowed
a look at the scabbed knees
of the children
who ran about the
hot black top of
the playground.
There were no doors on
the stalls,
yellow stains beneath
every leaky
urnial.
Smears of rust around the
faucets ,
a coarse hand soap
in the often broken
dispensers.
More fit for prisoners
than students.
It smelled like
piss and was always
cold.
I don't know why
one was always cleaner
than the other.
Maybe it was an
unwritten janitor
law.
Maybe they seen it
as somehow lower
than the other.
I always chose the
basement restroom.
It just seemed more
natural to me,
it made me feel strong,
made it all more real.
Now after so many
hardships I can't help
but look back and
remember.
Then ask myself
maybe I've always been
ment for a dirty,
harsh environment,
even way back then.
The only legend I ever loved is the story of a daughter lost in hell and found and rescued there. The best thing about this legend is I can enter anywhere.
Later I walked in a summer twilight searching for my daughter all the time. Winter was in store for every leaf and about time to fall off all the trees.
It is winter and stars are hidden. As I walk up the stairs I can see my child sleeping besides her magazines and a plate with uncut fruit, the pomegranate. She could have come home and been safe and ended the story of all.
Our heart broken searching but she reached out her hand and plucked a pomegranate. In the place of death at the heart of legend full of tears. The legend will be hers as well as mine, she will enter it.
She will wake up. She will hold the papery flashed skin in her hand and all I can say is nothing.
Today I’ve decided
To rush my weeks no more
I’ve chosen, from now on,
To be happy…
When-ever I am
No more depression on Sunday
Dreading Monday
No more “Can’t wait ‘til the weekend!”
While in Wednesday’s traffic jam
Because for each of us
The moment will come,
When we’ve consumed
Our respective allocated days,
That we will leave this life
With what may possibly amount to
No drama… Nothing exciting
A singular non-event…
Merely go out… quietly
No glorious blaze…
You see…
I’ve had an epiphany...
I don’t want to find
That when it’s my time
My last thoughts are of all the things I
Should have done
Like
Hugged each baby
Especially when life was crazy
Been a little less busy
Had a hellava lot more fun
Made more recitals
Missed more meetings
Told more jokes
Gave more enthused greetings
Asked “How are you doing?”
And actually waited for the reply
If you were doing well… Rejoice
And if you were doing poorly…Cry
With you…
I still have time…
To stare into the fire
Crackling in the fireplace
To kiss his neck while he’s sleeping
And take in his much loved face
To rest my hand upon his wrist
While we’re riding in the car
To laugh ‘til I cry at his made up songs
To accompany him
By guitar…
I’ve always wanted to learn to play guitar…
So today
I’ve decided
To rush my weeks no more
I’ve chosen, from now on,
To be happy… where I am
And live each day
Maybe not
As if it is my last...
But possibly
The day before
100 years from now
No one will say your name.
75 years from now
No one will hold your hand.
50 years from now
No one will recognize your face.
20 years from now
No one will tell your story.
10 years from now
No one will remain unhaunted by your laugh.
5 years from now
No one will take down the pictures of you.
1 year from now
No one will be tearless at the anniversary.
So tonight
Don't take your life.
You could have a future.
Please remember that.
A product of an given environment.
A democracy being ran by tyrants
A offer of change..
Jesus Christ is hiring
Spiritually jobless cause the worlds firing..
Only thing worst is death and that fire pit..
But my Lord is a fireman..
With living water..
For you that fire could be a mist..
But know that hell is not a myth..
Know that heaven is at hand come on take sip..
Matter of fact take a gulp.
My Christ the sacrifice his blood
Overflows like a flood...
Talking oceans beyond a gulf..
Move mountains he can swift a coast..
Strength of the uttermost..
My stewardable host..
Came down to earth yes he left his post..
Just to have his flesh left on a post..
A passion that no other being could
fathom ..
the True definition of compassion..
He took on all our sin Nothing was rationed ...
His beard striped off..
His bones exposed..
His feet n hands left with holes..
Extreme bleeding..
Yes beaten to his skeletal system no x-ray was needed..
Not one fracture..
He took it all for us our true Master.
Damaged beyond human appearance..
How can u not be down in allegiance
With the Christ of this World
The only being to embody all that is right in this World..
Yet we hold on to darkness like he not the light to this World..
He died for us Yes he fought the good fight for this World..
We are to be his bride
Yes the church but Look at us yet he still won't pick another girl..
We cheat on him..
Our selfish desires
We beat on him..
Oh how we conspire..
To destroy the truth..
Yet we need to cling to it like Ruth..
Did to Naomi..
And react better when rebuke by a pony..
Stop dancing around the truth like its going to result in a Tony ..
Award..
Too many people are phoney
Randomly comprised like what resides in bologna
I am down with Christ .. Geronimo
See the signs of his coming its almost time to go...
..
(If I were writing this to anyone else, especially and most probably a woman,
it would go something like this:
I would like to unfold you one layer at a time;
I will peel off clothing
until I hit bottom
until there is nothing between
my hand and your drumming heart
except trembling skin.
But writing you right now is different; those soft words would feel forced, fake, hollow and pretty and attractive and wrong. I can’t tell you why but I know my heart has a song of its own
for you and if I get it wrong you know you can laugh at it.)
Do you know how overpowering you can be?
Do you know what it is to draw a breath,
one tiny insignificant breath,
and feel my entire body throb to
touch you?
To run my fingertips across your skin
(not necessarily gently)
to press my hands into your skin until the impress -
like a flower pressed in a book -
remains.
I don’t want to peel your clothes away from you,
slow and confident and assured, (not right now).
There isn’t always confidence in want, is there?
I’d rather tear them away from you,
quest for your beating heart and the shape of
your hip and the long line of your spine attempt,
with my lips on yours,
to take your breath and make it ours.
My hands are hungry;
they feel empty, grasping, needful.
My lips are wet.
I love you.
(I ask what I am saying and I wonder if this is weak: I want your body against mine.)
Death is the disintegration of the body,
Life is the death of the mind.
Evaporating from shackles
The jester is here on time.
Mischiefs taken from the book.
You do it so well
That only time will tell.
Another age old being
Left to be forgotten.
You forgot again jester
And the sand timer
Has been smashed.
Take the clocks hand
Jester
It's the only applause you'll get.
Breathe them in jester
They'll never be whole
Within themselves.
Take a chance jester.
You're already dead
can the cacophony of roaring waves
and the familiar sting of salty wind
restore
my tired-of-fighting soul?
and can the soft light of sunrise (when no one suspects
me to take time to let envelop me) and the
out-of-the-ordinary
snatch from my hand
these regrets I'm
maintaining?
-Isaiah 58:8
I'm leaving for the beach Friday, so I'm not sure how much poetry I'll be able to write/post until I return. I may be gone a bit, but I might not! :)
(I think I've lost the ability to start things, so please forgive this poem for not having an attention grabbing genesis)
I've been twiddling my thumbs for almost eight months now
Putting off all that I care about
(And especially everything that I don't. Here's lookin' at you, AP World History)
Sitting around amassing a booklet of words to use in the future for novels and whatnot
But only using them in essays so I seem smarter than I am
(For example, susurrus means 'a whispering or rustling sound; a murmur')
Hoarding anything affiliated with Ben Folds because he makes me feel things on occasion
(I currently have 189 songs of his on my iTunes library; No one understands me.)
Making dick jokes at lunch while masking the thoughts of substance ricocheting around in my head
(Also your mom jokes because no one would think that you're crying internally about the uncertainty of the afterlife whilst making lewd stabs at their mother's integrity(and vagina. Ba dum tss.))
Apparently craving the lingering feel of another's touch
(I had a dream a few weeks back that Ben Folds licked my hand; My stomach folded (hahahah, folded) in on itself.)
Thinking that my feelings of misanthropy and apathy and everything else I can't find the words for yet are mine alone because everyone else is too stupid to have thought them themselves
(Even though I know that I'm not particularly special and I should stop being so elitist and stupid)
But I've finally found a light at the end of the table in the last place I'd expect--
(I meant to say tunnel, but hey, the source of said light does sit at my lunch table.)
A cherubic Presbyterian boy with an aversion to all things perverse,
(Which includes my sailor's tongue and occasional tendencies to want to put it on a member of my own sex, thought he doesn't know about that)
A spec of cleanliness on the grimy waistcoat of humanity who makes me want to be the best I can be
(Today when I saw him, I only swore once; I was very proud of myself)
But maybe I'm just jumping the gun
Because what would a good Christian boy want with a heathen like me who isn't even sure she believes in God?
Maybe his prolonged contingencies were merely contingent and I'm just overreacting because of my few and far between incidences of human contact.
(Seriously. Don't touch me.)
Maybe I just want someone to talk to for hours about everything and nothing at all.
(What with me being relatively antisocial, it's hard to find people with similar mindsets.)
Maybe I just want someone to funnel my adolescent attention to
(Because teen movies have taught me that one obviously can't be happy without having a crush on someone at any given time.)
Or maybe it's just because the way the Bible quote on the back of his t-shirt conflicted so humorously with the way he shook his hips to a J-Lo song on "Just Dance."
(Seriously, though, it was hilarious. I was dying.)
Or the way our fingers brushed when we were catching frogs
Or the way he blushed when I stepped out in my bikini
(I went to a pool party today.)
Or the way he held me momentarily in the delirious confusion of the flashing strobe lights
Or the way he got one point higher on his research paper than me a month ago
(He was excited; I was upset.)
Or the way that he does everything nearly to perfection.
I could go on..
But I don't know.
Maybe I'll get over him in a week and slip back into myself.
Because, like I said, what would a good Christian boy want with a heathen like me?
Irony stains the laughter of a boy.
Following the railroad tracks,
Walking like a mindless toy.
But still he walks on with his
heart in his hand, palpating violently.
For every inch he walks, drip by drip,
more is stained by irony.
Not a soul knows where the railroad tracks go,
they only see the light.
The mundane train made the boy insane.
But not giving up this fight.
Though, soon he his hit, but never with pain,
curiosity of sight.
Irony stains the laughter of a boy
lying on the perplexed thinking tracks.
with his heart in his hand,
palpating violently.
