lay dead . do not speak nor ask for   fear.

lay quiet. do not write nor tell. there    are

new shoes by the wardrobe.     at an angle.

still. do not move nor participate in  any

way.

do not breathe, nor cry. there are    new

shoes by the wardrobe,            new shoes.



sbm.

Friends come and friends go
As I go round and round in circles

Love someone change your mind
Decide he was a swine
As you go round and round in circles

He who knows does not speak
He who speaks does not know
And I go round in circles

Dislike someone and will not bend
Later they may become your best friend
As life it goes around in circles

He who knows does not speak
He who speaks does not know
And I go round in circles

Soul takes on a body with each birth we make our date
With life and death along the road the soul reincarnates
The show goes round and round in circles

When loss and gain and up and down
Becomes the same, then we stop going in circles
Round and round in circles

I hid you under layers
Bright lies I told myself
In order to forget.
The words you sent
Once catalogued & treasured
Stopped my progress
Or the days that passed.
My eyes closed
Trying to unthink you —
A ghost in the attic,
The pain I can't be without.
I erased emails.
Messages.
Phone numbers.
My heart. My soul.
Yet you still remain.

There are no Apaches
With flaming arrows and piebald ponies
There are no writhing jungles round here
There are no lost temples
Hiding untold treasures
There are no damsels to be rescued
By a knight on a white charger

There are no pirates on the high seas
No skull and crossbones flying
Above a deck bristling and glistening
With cutlasses and flintlocks ready
And hook hands and black eye-patches
In the sunlight of the Spanish Maine

There are no interplanetary wars
With hand-held laser guns
And weird creatures from strange worlds
They just do not exist
I learned this when
I was very very young
And I really wanted to be a pirate

                                    By Phil Roberts

Phantom Itch
A Poem by Corset




Right there...
...and... not...


I've got that itch again,
the one
that Amputees
know so well...

He always loved the color of my eyes
after tears,

you would laugh at me and still
court the silence

process the cold
without me.

Sing off key
without fear...

brave the holidays
but still remember
you were once a part of me

Phantom Limb
that was loved.

A soul ache of compassion
the severed branch
untouchable,
the occupied
empty.