michael-valentine
American
Taoist, Heathen, Chaos Magickian, Geek, Programmer, Gamer, Husband, Son, Brother, Frater, Consumer, Writer, Addict, Lover... and now Poet, I guess. / / I've only recently started to try and express myself through poetry. I tend to hate everything I write. I hope it makes you feel something.
In the cold November night
She had given us a fright
So we ran arm-in-arm away
Running towards forgotten days
And the sorrow of that
woe-begotten light
We had told her what we'd done
And she'd said I'm not her son
Then we'd bolted out the door
Left your bootprints on the floor
And were gone before she'd
leveled out the gun
The shots rang high and loud
And I swear that we were proud
To have made the Beast so ******
To be the Devils atop her list
Of all the evil Hell hath spat
on this gray shroud
Into the Night we ran and played
For we had met our Judgement Day
Burned it down with light and love
Killed the monster, came the dove
And forever on we knew
we'd have our say
There's no one could tell us "No"
If our Way wound to or fro
Our life at last was ours to live
And Death our gift to give
So we'd return for her at sign
of year's first snow
And return for her we did
Deep in the cellar where she'd hid
Her thrusting cross and sobbing loud
"In Jesus' name I cast you out!"
For all the good that useless
trinket never did
She wept and screamed and prayed
Hoping she'd at last be saved
From this night that wouldn't end
And her faith that wouldn't bend
And these children with their teeth
like razor blades
We ripped and tore and fed
While she cried and shat and bled
Until her flesh began to cool
Her life now just a crimson pool
Puddled under her like Satan's
marriage bed
We left her there on that stone floor
Behind us closed and locked the door
Our mother's blood across your face
Looked to me a veil of lace
In all our endless life I've never
loved you more
Oct 22, 2015
Oct 22, 2015 at 4:52 PM UTC
It's a stupid song
Hearing it come on the music station in the restaurant
after the thumping House music that preceded it
I laugh
because it's an old song
a stupid song
so familiar song
My eyes close heavy, rebellious
all I can hear is the song
it comes back to me in the wave pattern
vibrating the memory loose
In the back of the old station wagon
Vista Cruiser
with all the other kids and cousins
on our way to Summer camp
windows down Summer wind lovingly whipping us
with salt sand scrub-pine lashes
making fun of the drivers behind us
SCREAMING this song
Top of our lungs
All of ourselves lost in THIS SONG
This stupid song
that I loved so much so long ago
playing overhead in this stupid hipster sandwich shop
with the sudden ocean-salt taste of these tears
being back there in that Summer
flying to Adventure in the Vista Cruiser
Nothing but open road ahead of us
As far as the eye can see
Feb 9, 2015
Feb 9, 2015 at 11:43 AM UTC
first days of Summer
early childhood
first, second, third year of school
when Summers first started to mean something
*Free.
I am Free.*
i remember
i remember those days
i remember that feeling
only remember
i remember one morning
early
seven or eight
both of us
myself and the day
just starting to heat up
i remember finding our front door open
wide open
propped open
because we'd just bought a new screen door
our first
to let the Summer in
i can still remember the sweet smell
of the soft blond wood frame of our new door
blending with the scent of suburban Summer wafting through
cut grass and pool water
dandelion and hot asphalt
i remember the sparkles of dust twinkling
through the enormous beam of radiant Sun
pouring through our open front door
flooding through our new screen door
pooling in two golden domino blocks
on the orange **** carpet
i remember lying down then
right there on the carpet
right there at our open front door
in my pj's
in that bath of light
and doing nothing else
doing nothing at all
i remember it was so warm
so comfortable
so wonderful
so perfect
i didn't want to leave
i didn't have to leave
i could lay there as long as i wanted
i had nothing else to do
all i had to do was whatever i wanted
and what i wanted was to lay right there
and let the blissful Summer Sun caress me all over
until there was nothing else
i remember i felt free then
absolutely felt it
for the first time
a sort-of tingle in the belly
like falling
or flying
the exhilaration of that new-found freedom
knowing i was free
knowing this was only the beginning
knowing there were months more of this left
months more to look forward to
the upwelling joy that knowledge brings
the surge of happiness at having nothing better to do
than drown in a pool of starlight
i remember recognizing
even then
that there was something special happening there
i didn't know what it was
not then
but i knew there wouldn't be many days like that
and there haven't been
this is the only one i can remember
anymore
but i'm glad i remember
it feels good to remember
it dulls the ache
left from wondering
if i'll ever get to feel that way again
Jan 16, 2015
Jan 16, 2015 at 3:10 PM UTC
the Man is no longer a Man
in this day and age
he is a strange Middle-Aged Boy
an Aging Adolescent
hair going grey
with the hours whittled away
on Xbox video games
the Man that is a Man
is of a bygone age
The Real Man in the films of old
Age-ed Anachronism
strong and proud and brave
standing tall to face the day
and keep the wolves at bay
that I am a Man-who-is-not-a-Man
a product of this modern age
has vexed my Heart and Soul
my Arrested Ascension
how can I always play
when a Real Man works all day
but really who's to say?
the Boy is also a Man
in our culture at this stage
in truth both young and old
Advancing Adolescence
we get to play our lives away
yet still have bills to pay
the balance of the middle way
I am a Boy and I am a Man
by internal and external age
work only to play is my road
an Admirable Aspiration
that I get to live My Way
a little boyhood every day
is the great gift of this age
**** it
I'll be okay
Sep 11, 2014
Sep 11, 2014 at 4:23 PM UTC
they're not nightmares
anymore
and i should think that would make a difference
but it doesn't
my dreams are a plague
infecting every part of me
every vessel, every *****
every nerve and every cell
every night
a Wonka riverboat ride down the rabbit hole into Madness
and mixed metaphors
a kaleidoscopic psychic calliope
of psychedelic psychosis
i remember when dreams used to comfort
bring relief and restitution
or delightful reminiscence
or strange beauty
but my dreams are now a plague
they exhaust me
all vivid surreal visions
of mundane interactions
with a world I do not recognize
that feels uncomfortably
intimately
Familiar
waking in those peaceful hours of pre- and post-dawn
that peace is lost on me
lying there, almost paralyzed
i do not remember my dreams
so much as i
Recover from them
Sep 4, 2014
Sep 4, 2014 at 11:24 AM UTC
I killed a man in my sleep last night.
strange albino maskface
cueball head coated in alabaster
greasepaint of a clown
skin white as the sharpened teeth
tearing through a bloodred slit of mouth
that wound the only color in his face
he was keeping me there
in the darkred room with no windows
holding me there in fear
terrorizing me
torturing me
delighting in it
consuming my fear like a drug
lusting after my pain
pleasuring himself with it
It had been a very bad day for me.
but then he brought Her in
so She could see what he had done
witness the mess he was making of me
brought Her in so I could see
the pain and the fear twisting Her beauty
but then he lost himself
in his lust and hunger for our degradation
he leaned down
face to "face"
pressed his sickening skin to mine
to whisper in my ear
all the things he was about to do to Her
He shouldn't have.
my hands were on his head
fists closed around ears
and pulled
thumbs went into eyes
and sank
and his bloodred mouth opened in glorious tortured screaming
my teeth clamped down
tearing into his bottom lip
with everything i had
i pushed and pulled and tore and ruined
eyeballs popped wet and cold like rotten grapes
ears gave in came off ripping strips of cheek revealing bone
lip tore down down down over chin and neck and red flowed free
free as i felt
free as i now was
as we now were
and i looked to Her
worried for us both
for so many things
and I saw Her
standing shocked
and there was no more fear in Her eyes
and there was no more love in Her smile
there was only the dumbfounded awe
of the newly awakened
all i felt
was justified
Aug 19, 2014
Aug 19, 2014 at 3:48 PM UTC
try hard as we might
there was no
ignoring
the scratching
coming from the walls
and there was no
reckoning
to be had
with the things
crawling on our skin
but we laid there
together
all we had
each other
and my arm was around you
and your head was on my chest
as you softly slept
and in your dreams
the storm must've turned
the scratching of the things
finding its way through
the tempest inside
and i heard you
start to mewl
and whine
and cry out
from the dark place
down where your dreaming
had taken you
and so i raised my hand
from its home on your hip
and softly
smoothed your hair
away from your troubled
beautiful face
so near to mine
and i cupped your head gently
and i loved you
and you were quiet again and
everything
was
perfect
Jun 30, 2014
Jun 30, 2014 at 4:25 PM UTC
today
was the day
i turned it all off
all the noise
all the chatter
all the distractions
all the fear and fervent mysticism
all the pain and errant prophecy
all the useless superstitions
and endless contradictions
because i realized
i didn't need it
i didn't even want it
so that's when
i decided
i reached over
and out
and deliberately
pressed
OFF
and then there was Sky
and Sun
and the Grass-scented Wind
flowing all over my skin
sensuous as a silk gown
and it was then
i felt the Lift
i've been waiting so long
i'd forgotten it
what it was like
that merciful
glorious
gods-send
Lift
like in an elevator
that falls too fast
and stops short
in that half-second
when you taste your heartsblood in your mouth
and your mind floats weightless in your skull
and you know the Secret of All Things
in the Lift
as i was then
as i was flying
doing a hundred-and-one through the soft-blue sky
the midsummer wind pulling the tears from my eyes
as i remembered Her face
all over again
for the ten-thousandth time
Jun 23, 2014
Jun 23, 2014 at 12:29 PM UTC
i was so afraid
so afraid of
not needing you
so unaware
that i was
loving from fear
so confused
thinking love
demanded need
too oblivious
to see
my desire
pulling you under
as soon as i
gave up
gave in
let go
stopped
needing you
i was suddenly
Free
finally free to
see you
hear you
know you
your real you
because you
were finally free
of my weight
of my need
what i needed
what i really needed
after all and everything
is over and done
was to get out of the ******* way
and just be me
and let you be you
so we could meet each other
again
and fall
for the first time
Jun 12, 2014
Jun 12, 2014 at 11:59 AM UTC
all sons
at some point
inevitably
face the same
dilemma:
either
figure out a way
to be
more successful
than your father
or
figure out a way
to deal
with the inescapable feeling
of having
failed
at being a man
Mar 10, 2014
Mar 10, 2014 at 2:47 PM UTC