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 Feb 2015 Andrew Kerklaan
Mosaic
You stare at a black box
You say you like it better this way
Where the disconnect
Cannot affect

Troubled by this regurgitating behavior of  
Reducing our senses to sight
Because we barely listen

The box doesn't stare back
A disease lies hidden underneath
Asking permission to speak

She pulls the wires from her wrists
Audible pops
Like octopus suction cups
come from her brain

Shocks like jellyfish
And static
sizzle sizzle
In her eyes

Her lips on mute
Like she is the device
 Feb 2015 Andrew Kerklaan
Love
Being gay is a disease.
A sickness of the mind
And a corruption of the body
It's a curse to be born with
A damnation to choose
And a life of hell
Bestowed to us by others
Carried on by us.

But we lie, hold our heads up and smile because #pride.
I can't go on living like this.
in
my
own
skin
i'm
uneasy
I dont give a **** if you say my body is a temple I just want to feel at home.
new, warm, cozy
became
threadbare, faded hope
that -- with each wash --
became weaker.
i held on until the holes caused blisters,
and regrettingly disposed of my
tattered protection.
barefoot, i feel everything.
what kind of socks walk all over **you?
"If some people like your painting, fine.
If some don't, well, there's the door.

Take your work seriously
But don't take yourself seriously

Paint for yourself
Enjoy yourself"

I was watching a show on PBS today
"The Beauty of Oil Painting" with Gary & Kathwren Jenkins

Gary said this and I marveled at how much this echoed the attitude we should cultivate when writing poetry.
I think we could also consider writing poetry as a painting of sorts
Ignore me
I am too blind
To see
What you mean
When you say,
"I don't want to see you anymore."

Ignore me
I am too deaf to hear
Your voice in the crowd
I can't even control my tears
When you shout out loud,
"I don't want to see you anymore"

Ignore me
I am too clingy
I don't know
When you don't want to see me
Because you're being polite,
So just don't talk to me.

Ignore me,
I don't deserve anything,
I don't deserve to get fake love
I don't deserve these useless white wings,
I am satan,
I don't deserve any kind of love.
I just deserve to be left alone.
You told me that if you drink
before 10 A.M. you were a pirate
not an alcoholic.
But pirates don’t drive,
they sail.
They smoothly sail.
And as the Captain,
abiding by the code,
you went down with your ship
but then again,
you washed up in a jail cell.

© Matthew Harlovic
Don't drink and drive, kids.
Have you ever been afraid to write?
Almost like you don't want to feel what you would write about?
Yet at the same time you're craving it?

I want to write,

I want to write about the offset piece of sidewalk outside her house
     that I always managed to trip over no matter how many times I had
     before promising I would never trip again.
I want to write about how I would drive the long way to get to where I
     was going for months after we broke up just so I could pass the road
     leading to her house just to have a chance of seeing her, even if she
     never noticed me.
I want to write about how I'm afraid I'll never feel the static race down
     my spine when I kiss someone ever again because after she left no
     kiss has ever managed to spark anything inside of me.
I want to write about how I sat for hours on the ledge where we first
     kissed because I could let my tears fall down off the cliff like rain
     that I hoped would water the ground enough for a flower to grow so
     if she ever came back she would have something almost as beautiful
     as her to see there waiting.                                    
I want to write about how I now understand how Jesus could die for
     people who hated him because even though she hates me,
     I begged God to forgive her, because she knew not what she did to
     me.

But I don't write any of it,
Because I’m afraid to feel like that again,
Because It's pathetic,
Because I'm afraid she will see it,
Because it's not love,
It's poetry.

And no matter what her reply was,
it's still poetry.
And even though I don't love her anymore,
she’s still my stanza,
And I'm trying to find a new poem to write.
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