Use flowery language to
dress up the dreadful things
pin to them silken wings
adorn them with golden rings
and when a dark memory sings
dress up the dreadful things.

"The pity of war, the pity war distills". - Wilfred Owen"

Just as a feral war begs for armistice,
    a season of peace engenders
a violence vacuum that begs to be filled
    as surely as a hollow begs for a pond.

It seems a cosmic battle rages
      between the oversouls of people
who would chisel a sculpture to grace
     and those who would hack off its arms.

History’s fools fire up their bully horns
     shouting proud oratory to ignorance -
and lemmings goose-step to the precipice -
      doomed to plunge into a sea of misery.  

Then there is quiet - guilty and reflective.
     How could we let this happen
with so much gain and loss in the balance?

and the sculptors of civilization
      find fresh marble to once again
carve reason, beauty, purpose
      from the acrid ashes of pride.
    
But the oversoul of hate will brood and re-fester
     as long as it's thought noble to **** for a cause.

© 2016 by Robert Charles Howard

You're sewing the reasons to your boat that's drifting away

Your writing your own meanings to the words that people say

You're drifting drifting yourself away.

I can't help you i can only hope you'll be okay.

I only tell you because you've never asked.
I only tell you because I don't think you seem to have the slightest idea of who I am.

Would you believe me if I did tell you?

The only clothes on my body were those of my 4 year old brothers.
The only shoes on my feet were so weathered and torn I could feel the cold concrete with every step I took.
The meals on my plate were only those from the school in which I begged for seconds and dreaded the empty weekend.

Would you believe me if I told you that the only food that filled our cabinets were expired cans given from the food bank.
Dinner time meant hiding under the table, avoiding the drunken blows of Mom's new boyfriend.

Would you even believe me?
Months would go by without water or lights.
Our home was no home.
But a shelter for those who had dragged their bodies to the bed of an 8 year old girl.
My mother was no mother at all but a slave to a chemical mixture.

Would you believe me if I told you?

I fought my fight.
Through blood and tears, I fought my fight.
I chose to stand in the crashing waves against me.
I chose to stand strong with the heaviest weight resting on my shoulders, I fought.
& I won.

Here is to the roses that smelled like lies.
Here is to the kiss that burned my lips.
Here is to the time you held my hand while looking at her.
Here is to the passive-aggressiveness in your love.  
Here is to the day you promised me everything, and the day it washed away.

Here is to the day I said I would never stay.