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 Oct 2017
Lawrence Hall
“Render unto Caesar…”

29th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Let us render unto the Caesars
Our sons and daughters for undeclared wars
Each death excused with a telephone call
Each death another medal for a general

Let us render unto the Caesars
Our children for the pleasures of the rich
Each death and shattered heart excused as art
Each death a tribute to some rich man’s lust

Each leader, each Somebody, takes and takes –
They then dismiss their victims as snowflakes
Shadows are taller
run-ups are smaller
throws don't go any far

morale is lower
bat moves slower
no more can hit a sixer.

Muscles aren't sturdy
movement is tardy
lethargic feet hardly run

only lean patches
missed easy catches
nobody says well done.

Can't see it clear
from daze of fear
fumbles my unsteady bat

the opponents dance
they don't miss a chance
the field shouts how's that!

I have a feeling
this body ain't willing
to run on the green anymore

yet the ****** mind
still hopes to find
one last three figure score.
 Oct 2017
L B
“The autopsy will confirm no trauma to the body
no foul play”

Face down in the river
whose name means forked tongue
A crow investigates
where water frowned in flotsam
face down—muddied
hair, mustachio
jeans and striped tee
whose--

“name has not been released pending...”

...His loves
tattooed on upper arm

“Coroner awaiting the next of....”

He'll wait a while
for “Mom and Budweiser” to finally check in
He may have...

“He may have been... ...a resident of
The Cozy Care Home”

where he paid for the care
questioned the cozy whose agent demurs—

“The turnover here is just so rapid... steady current of guests
No one ever noticed....”
“...this is Jacqueline Henry with WBSH News”

“The autopsy will confirm...”
First of the month
to town on a mission
Just a short hop
from stone to stone
from day to day
from rock to a hard place
Looking for a short cut
to Tasty Cakes, bologna
Wise Chips and a 40
cross the gurgling,
glinting light and liquid laughter

...This river has a forked tongue...

...a resident
...a resident
who paid to get missed
who one week before
on the easy way of an April day...
Knocked down, gasping
knocked down
and yanked through his forty-eight years pulled through panic
by lean muscle of current
wishing for something...
for someone
to hang on to!
The autopsy will confirm

This river lies
The local river's name is Lackawanna, from the Native, meaning, "divided."
Neighbor kids found this body.  Another was pulled from the "Lacky" several weeks ago.  Small rivers can be so deceptive.

"40" --40 oz. bottle of cheap beer
 Oct 2017
r
There is a stranger
you see more and more of
every year, He is silt
in the riverbed,
and the water tables
of your mystery
rise to their final levels,
the spitting image
of your Death

He is selling a bed
that belonged to your father,
coming in low dumping
the boots of your brother
in the high pasture covered
deep in your last winter's snow

Like a flower in the night,
Death drifts over our shoulders
like a boat with no eyes for the oars,
no place for a man's cold hands

The Church has a record of your birth,
but Death keeps its own dossier

When the Moon is pulling blood
from all of its many lovers,
Death is caterwauling with catfish,
a bone in its mouth, shedding
all its skins and secret light,
I, like you, set out a dish
of milk before going to bed.
 Oct 2017
Ryan Holden
You don't have to be an eagle -
to see the white stallion in a field
of ponies - nor do I ever feel
like I was the person riding it,
like all of that power was mine -
to command.

But I was George Custer to your
finely edged arrow tips -
I was an easy target and I let myself
get beaten and bruised,
knocked from my mount -
Colliding with every single piece
of stone on the ground.

Cuts, scars, grazes, bruises -
But these stones do break bones,
and these sticks puncture my chest -
Yet this is a mere kiss on the cheek
to the words that cut me so, so deep.

I fell so hard into a bottomless pit
even the ocean hadn't explored
this washed out chest, praying to find
a person who's soul is just as kind.

Now I sit day by day - watching the stallion
in the fields, in all its glory, inside a story,
that I paint inside my proudest dreams -
getting just that little closer to what was,
I look forward to the days approaching -
for the day I get back on my stallion.

And to ride with you - in all of our glory -
inside our story - that we will paint
as we fade into the fields of our dreams.
A quick poem I wrote today. Just about how recent events and past few years has affected my confidence and I feel I can't give my whole self to people. But I see myself getting much more confident recently!
 Oct 2017
CK Baker
A slow walk up Centennial
and I still can’t find the place
it's menacing cold, and muted
and the street sweeper and winter breeze
move the Turkish blend and dust pack

A novice mixed duet plays
Brahms on broken strings
the erhu and overcoat
veiling a blue heeler and sphinx

Maggianos is settled in the center block’s
luminance and seasonal drape
it's festive warmth bringing home Bedford Falls;
the flavour and character and social circles

Annie’s playing and the keeper's singing
(his word pool and slander
raising everyone in arms!)
the crowd chants and mayhem breaks
as crawlers and contemporaries
smash their steins

Dark alleys and dripping holes
hold a grim reminder of the pierced underside
paddies flutter and forge their words
with a broad manifesto

Night gardens come alive
(slowly sapping the respite)
hunched figures and ladies in lace
shuffle inside the big orange door
 Oct 2017
L B
Caught in the tangled, death of weeds
I hear the shots ring out
It has begun--
between the fading day of sky and hollow
crackling ice beneath my feet

Again, resounding shots above my head
with baying hounds
and threat of voices blazoning the prey
I do as I have always done--
make a run for it….
and always, in the past
I seemed to get away

My soul is sinking, this time
along with boots in ******* mud
-soaked panic-sweat
clambering up a bank in naked peril
numb with cold
Heaving breaths billow
onto frigid air
Stumbling sluggish
Moments cling
Inertia--
grapples for an edge...

With all my body's strength
exhausted longing
I heave myself back...

Fear floods out
like birth
into the lake of waking

A long time there
I lay
paralyzed, dumbfounded
My father used to take us with him trap-shooting in the open fields of Hatfield, Massachusetts.  We would huddle in the car and wait for it to end, but this day, I was exploring along the edge of woods before they started, and got caught out....

This is also about sleep-paralysis-- both terrifying!
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