At low of night she strokes
Familiar tastes exquisite,
And quietly invokes
The spirit of laureate --

An orphic instrument
Unfit to take for granted.
It’s profound atonement
Stirs in her heart despondent.

Her fragile shell’s embrace
Of wood and gut and metal
Point out her shallow race
And weakness fundamental.

Yet all the night she moils,
Mistrusting augmentation,
And secretly despoils
The overzealous beacon.

-- Kerry Herrmann

Called by dolorous prayers
spawned at the hand of pandemonium
the fearless mercenary
extends her silken wings

Living pinions
enshroud the broken hearted
cultivating safety
and validation
allowing sincere grieving

Her gentle but fearless nobility
confronts the vulturine beasts
of doubt
angst
and despondency
freeing the wounded soul
now progeny of  hope

Her perceptive optimism
is discerning
of the healing path
as she carries the revived chrysalis
to sovereignty

Once there
her wings separate
to release the newly formed star
luminous and vivid
as though plucked
directly from the castle of God

- Kerry Ann Herrmann

You are gathered with your friends
to play a board game
called "What Next"
Four people total, Including you.

First, the person with brown hair
and blue eyes to your right,
filled with HATrEd,
withdraws a card and
deciphers its MYstery:

"You are lost
at sea on a wooden
catamaran. There are others
with you. The phone that shows
where to turn is broken.
How will you unMASK
the land?"

The pitiful one across
from you whispers
the answer: "Unlock
the old, rusted telescope."

It is the pitiful
one's turn, who reads
with self-reproof, "You are on
an island. The boy child
with a broken glass face,
exposing the fire
in HIS head, looks
at you accusingly.
How do you extinguish
the volcano?"

Raising a hand in ANGER
is the disdainful person
with brown hair, who yells,
"Punish the boy child!
His SCARS will never heal!"
The loving soul in red
smiles and says: "Wrong,
you silly creature.
You solve the MYthical puzzle
by joining the flesh
on the boy child's FACE."

It is now THE loving
one's turn to select
a card (the ticket?), done
with a GENTLE flick of the
delicate wrist. One singing
VOICE chimed, "Spoiled farmer
makes you confine the
bamboozled man that names
your strengths. He
SUGGESTS
THAT
the befuddled
has already been put away.
How can you possibly
solve the Conundrum?"

You must answer. Relax!
I order you! Find the solution!
The patriarch has ordered it!
Or else you MUST walk through
a curtain of falling bullets
showering down.
It is the only ESCAPE
back to the beginning.

Kerry Herrmann

Strangers acquaint, announcing particularities.
Thrills run across hungry nerves;
pleasure mounts in rising expectations:
First ruminating, next devouring,
then coalescing into one complete whole.

Gently the wintry chill advances
imperceptible to unschooled senses.
Mirages of fullness fade while realization grows.

Ah, the tender vulnerability of intense gratification.
Discovery of naivety’s betrayal is complete
in the consumption of perfected death.

(Cold as mirrored glass, rebounding time,
numbing fire.) An embodiment of suffocating pain,
The paroxysm climaxes... waiting for release.

(Stretched, drained, quietly entertaining sympathy.)
This sultry expansion - extended abeyance of joy -
turns knowledge of fulfillment into hope that
blends with the waters of insecurity.

(Moments of compression, burning sickness
intensifying with each presentation,
development of indeterminate expectations,
vacillation between stimulating passion and alarm.)

A formidable moment charges toward the funambulist.
Balance seems impossibly demanding.

Abruptly the event ends, time stops, breathing ceases …

        The babe is held in loving arms -
        forgotten pain, dissolving woe.
        Her tender grace, alluring charms
        beget a great, supernal flow.

Kerry Ann Herrmann

I jump through the loops
     on River Styx Street.
Sharp clicking from my tapping shoes
     produce haunted echoes
to which the ****** can dance
     and celebrate their
     hollow chocolate existence.

The false front city surrounds me,
     its victim,
     patiently biding its time,
stalking,
     breathing,
          watching
     with empty square eyes.

Unalterably, feline curiosity
     will consume me,
and I will enter into
     an unlocked mouth.

Until then, I jump through
     candy cane hoops,
Ignorant of the concave heaven
     hovering above.

-- Kerry Ann Herrmann

How did you die?  Were you ever alive?
Questions asked by a torpid fool
executing the sterile interrogation.
Capricious witnesses laugh in pain
as I sit, strapped by leather bands
to a frigid porcelain bench.
This is the bloodthirsty courtroom of innocence
translated into cadaverous endings.

What can a fool gain through conviction?
Perhaps the eradication of necrosis.
The fool views the substance as trivial nonsense.
His purpose is to convict me, the wraith,
the amenable child, the abject wretch.
A conviction that will never arrive,
led by a foolish prosecution that cannot rest,
as long as I, benighted and unredeemed,
lack power to loosen the fearsome leather bands.

Kerry Ann Herrmann

CHECKER GIRL’S REVENGE

I.
Where is he?    Tee Hee!   Oh **!

   His ******* up   whacked out
whatever you want to call it girlfriend
sat
in her blue checkered hospital gown
that exposed

her colorless back. She felt
****, turned on, empty

when she WATCHED
her useless boyfriend

(or was it her brother,
or perhaps John Travolta-
I think his name shall be JayTee).

JayTee was
NUMB TO HER
HE NUMBERED HER
NUMBER TWO-ED HER
NUMBER TWO – HA HA!
(blue checkers,
what a dull, ugly blue).

How could blue be that boring?

(( Dull, Boring, Blue, Ugly ))

?
CHECKERED [============]CHECKERED
[============]CHECKERED[============]
CHE­CKERED [============]CHECKERED
[============]CHECKERED[============]
CHE­CKERED [============]CHECKERED

Checker girl was strange   amputated
in the hospital

staring at JayTee’s  shadow.
If she
listened intently
she could almost hear      JayTee playing
outside with his friends …
*****, undesirable boys.

Are girls also ***** and undesirable?

Only those
in blue, checkered
hospital gowns.


II.
Checker girl laugh Checker girl cry
Checker girl scream Checker girl wiggle
Checker girl fidget Checker girl anything!!!!!

  She just sat…flat…water-
  rat…doormat…aristocrat,
the others HATE THAT.

There       were       at       least       five
  women sitting in a circle TALKING
                    aaaaa-bowwwt their hospital
experience. CHECKER GIRL could not,
would not feel, couldn’t sing. Her
head was numb buzzing sound of power-
lines in a snow storm.

JayTee paced in the room     staring violently
At checker girl.
She was afraid.
He was now known as THE leader
of all the Cruel and Nasty Boys
       They did
EVERYTHING he told them.

Checker girl didn’t want to do
what she was told

STAY IN THE CIRCLE *****!

Trapped in the stiff gown
Exposing her blank back.


III.
WAKE UP! checker girl,

Time to SHOUT!
Time to GET OUT!
To RUN ABOUT!
Out of the bleak dismal hospital.

She now walked   the   streets
searching for home.

JayTee spotted HER <><><><><> the EVIL WITCH
checkered[=========]checkered
[========] checkered[========]
checkered[=========]checkered

HELLo,
how­ can I
HELP!!!!
you today?

GET AWAY FROM HIM!

JayTee San,
he has fun
with a gun
a loaded one
saved by none
need to run
Run Run Run

She stared down the barrel
the boys behind JayTee laughed.

Checker girl wanted to get away,
tried to get past the sentinel.

TEE HEE!  checker girl OH **! come on now
HA HA! slink past
fearfully
carefully


?
IV.
Checker Girl sat alone
at the round yellow table
in the dimly lit McDonalds

--Browns and reds draped by
apprehension—

“WHY AM I HERE!”  her brain shouted
As if someone could hear.

She was waiting for JayTee to arrive.

she loved him
she feared him

<>A Young Mother<> ***** blonde hair
   was sitting with her
newborn baby girl

quiet lullaby

at a table.

JAYTEE IS THE FATHER.

But when JayTee arrived
(ignoring checker girl)

he was ENRAGED about the
baby. coo ahh blub

DIDN’T WANT IT

He pointed
his pistol
at the baby.

Checker girl do not allow that

Checker girl
DO NOT
allow that

CHECKER GIRL
DO NOT
allow that

DO NOT ALLOW THAT!!!!

(checker girl shot JayTee)

B-A-N-G!


V.
JayTee lay dead,
waiting for help.

The stretcher arrived,
carried his stiff body,
his arms dangling
like drinking straws.

Could they **** life
into his body as they
stroked the air?

The paramedics had
covered his body, his torso,
with a hospital gown,
designed with blue checkers,
the ugliest blue checkers.

Existence in the quiet place
between the changing of times
is safe, is sad, is constant, and
filled with disdain. That is where I went
to escape the cruelty
of your bawling silence.

With whom does my anger more agree?
Should I blame your disgusting selfishness
or my callow desire to please?

How can a man not love his daughter?
How can a person ******,
hate, and distort the world...
yet think himself desired and puissant?

I cannot say I hate you,
because to do so is to deny
the vulnerability of my injury.
But I can and will shout
to the farthest corner
of my and your collective universe...

"Your apathy sickens me!
Every tense muscle in my body cringes
as I ***** your feigned love!"

I will no longer rehearse
your betrayal over and over,
hoping each time for a
different conclusion.

My days twisted between the years
have reached their conclusion.
I am starting a new season,
leaving your carcass
to be eaten by the passage of time.

- Kerry Herrmann

Which hurt is greater?

Is it the fall from virtue and descent into madness,
where nerves are fully recognizant of an escalating torment
caused by the imposed absorption of each stinging needle,
where the active mind possesses complete comprehension
of the delicate innocence inherent in spirit and individuality?

Or is the true injury created when the biting freeze
finally penetrates through skin and bone,
creeping into vital organs of existence,
numbing the senses, slowing functionality,
tempting with graceful rewards the soul to carefully enter
into nightmarish sleep filled with related frozen carcasses?

No.  The greater hurt is felt during the resurrection of spirit –
when the overwhelming barrage of thunderous rain,
crushing hurricanes of agonizing recollections,
create a thaw in the protective safety of barricaded sensitivity.
Thick ice covering the immense lake of uncertainty begins to melt;
the chimera of safe passage over unsteady waters dissipates.
Then the feeble heart is left to drown in sorrow and panic.

Old wounds, formerly numb, awaken with prickling heat,
memories of betraying constraints and adversity.
Unable to see the source through the blackened fog,
counterfeit thoughts of exaggerated truths abound:
Is it a lie?  Is the need for sympathy greater than integrity?

But truth will no longer be constrained by blind adherence;
the waters of valor and virtue must flow again.
Verity and invention collide with booming force
and the healing spirit feels the formidable winds of anger unrestrained-
ugly, deafening, painful, and necessary for acceptance.

Somehow through this torment of perceived destruction,
through the bitter tempest of denial’s end,
the melting of all that is familiar,
somehow through all the chilling disquiet and daunting tumult
leagues of tender buds surface,
searching for light of day and moisture from the weakening storm.

Slowly, clouds begin to part and nourishment becomes available.
Life grows, colors deepen, and warmth spreads.
It is then that the still heart beats with vigor,
strength is recognized and gratification restored,
and a letting go of the greater hurt is complete.

Kerry Ann Herrmann

(Strands of blue satin water flowing)
A girl runs naked, terrified,
through the marshy grass near the river.
The man who dwells in my shadow,
clean shaven, neatly combed hair, only twenty years old,
will delicately violate her.
The camera is filming this for my entertainment.

I am sitting with my family (my mother),
watching this film broadcasted live on PBS.
The phone rings, how irritating!
It is Her.
I hate Her! the naked, terrified girl.
I am polite and say, 'hello.'
She speaks with Her annoying rhetoric.
I lay the dead body of the phone receiver on the floor.
**** Her voice! I can still hear it!
It is taking my attention away from the show.
I grab the receiver and hang up the phone.

The camera continues to film the young, clean shaven man
with perfectly combed hair.
He is now in his backyard, in a cage with his slaves
(fathers of the violated girls).
The man uses a small garden shovel to dig out the fathers' faces
replacing them with that of a hairless, toothless canine.
Will these deaf and mute creatures survive
in a world of supplied narcissism?
The camera is still running for the entertainer.

Struck with the realization that the ******* the phone
had been violated and is now dead,
I pick up the phone.
She is still there, but is now silent.
I tell her that I did not mean to hang up on her,
but I wanted to see the film.
'That is alright,' she says, and remains silent.

She closed her eyes and allowed
the slow, heavy notes to ground her.
Her body became heavy,
with each somber chord her back
and shoulders sank into the bed.

She sensed her still fingers and toes
as the simple musical phrase
continued to build upon itself,
becoming more defined,
increasing in intensity,
creating complex serenity.

Pain became sadness,
sadness became comfort, and somehow
peaceful joy emerged.

This happy intricacy climaxed
into melancholy abruptness.
Painful chords, angrier than before,
had been betrayed by hope.

Her blood felt thicker, slower.
Her nerves seemingly stopped
sending impulses to her brain.

She continued to sink into the bed,
perhaps through the floor,
deep into the ground beneath.

Pressure of sanctimonious earth
pushed down upon her,
mocking any arranged attempts to breathe.

She didn't resist. She felt comforted,
secure in the unforgiving earth.

The music ended,
as did her emotional anesthetic,
and she was finally able to cry
into the safety of her
comforting pillow.

the bus ride would be long
                                             quiet whisperings of passengers all around
                                             LOUD AND OVERWHELMING
                                strangely quiet      still     distant

feelings of OVERWHELMING INTESITY
                                              of every empty word
                                                                                  spoken by the dejected

hum of the bus engines
                                                            ROARING SCREAMS

                   surrounded
                                         by a thick blanket of silence
                    alone
                                          feeling burning numbness

With the bus's QUIET loud RUCKUS
                                       BRAIN filling with television snow
               VENOMOUS VAGUE SHOUTING RAVAGING blank fields
                                                                                  lacking understanding

body oversized and heavy
                                                                                        DiFfErEnT
                  UnFiTtInG
                                                         UnBeLoNgInG
          too transparent for an earthly realm
                                               TOO HEAVY FOR THE DIVINE

Gum stretched     t--h--i--n     from a child's mouth
           into the ethereal
                                          with filthy fingers
                                                                            of decussated spirits

                             the lowering sun shining through
                                                                AcloudedBUSwindow

              Shun the BRUISED skY
                                                                    hints of deep purple and red
                                                                    glimpses of blue.

a small girl with her mommy
gently caressing her cheek
against a teddy bear's soft fur.

                                 EVERYTHING IS OKAY!
                                 EVERYTHING IS OKAY!!!
                                 EVERYTHING IS OKAY!!!!!
                                 EVERYTHING IS OKAY!!!!!!!
                                 EVERYTHING IS OKAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
                                 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!­!!!!!!!!!!
                                 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!­!!!!!!!!!!

Our empty graveyards full of quiet death,
With hardened earth, a darkened road,
Unseen names and lives untold,
Restricts our chests, discontinuing breath.

Found a flame to illuminate the depth.
But can we trust enough to hold
A light that only shall unfold
Our empty graveyard full of quiet death?

I am so happy... NO, I am!
This is THE RED TABLE can stand in the window of a broken house.
No car to move on the parkway.

Don't walk across THE MOUNTAIN is tall in shadows of a river,
a dark water.
Fish haven't eaten the tree of bait.
Circles around the sky?

I'm happy today IN AN AMOUNT avenue of trees,
an affair of ****** nothing.
I am not here... THIS IS EASY... Time is ticking... See:
The broken watch
The broken
WATCH THE BROKEN!!!

The singing computer and yellow paper
give messages of cordiality.
Voices behind add to SILENCE AROUND thick mists.
I am happy, not sad, with blue eyes and green.
While the sky above is rising to the sea.

The body was found
Naked, composed
Indigent from the sea.

Prometheus bound,
Frightened, exposed
Silent epitome.

A deafening sound
Violently chose
Ceremonious ring.

Though stiff, she still pounds
Her tears from a rose
The Eagle's silent queen.

It is funny how arrows go in so smoothly
But to take them out causes so much damage
As the broad back of the arrow head
Tears the flesh on its way out

What a liar,
sitting there, wringing your hands,
trying to act like you have so much anxiety.
You know it is not true!

You know he can see right through you;
you are just making a fool of yourself.

The sickest thing about you
is that you want to be sick.

Boy, you just love acting
like you have had so many problems,
don't you!

Do you really think
in your tiny, little, desperate mind
that pretending like you had
such extreme pain in the past
will make you more liked?

You are nothing,
and you will always be nothing.

You know,
nobody really cares about you;
any concern people show to you
as a result of these lies
will turn to annoyance
when they see
how manipulative you are.

Making the stories sound
so much larger than they are
is just making you look
like the idiot.

Shadows of stone and of light
scream in the still, lonely places.

Through quiet panic, they bite,
leaving immovable traces.

Spent nerves, defined by the fight,
saddened by betraying graces,

remember the tender height
of broken dreams the fall faces.

While spirit sleeps through the night,
feeble thought manically races

toward the deity of sight,
reaching for golden embraces.

We repent and cry out to a distant God
Then recite apologies to all that hear
Knowing that our regrets are but a façade

Our footsteps are heard throughout the metal rod
Longing and fearing a punishment severe
We repent and cry out to a distant God

Ringing and singing, our voices sounding odd
Fumbling through early laws, trying to adhere
Knowing that our regrets are but a façade

Feeling around, we find the dark firing squad
The purpose of it shall be ever unclear
We repent and cry out to a distant God

Panicking through the grainy darkness we clawed
Seeing nothing but what is in our own sphere
Knowing that our regrets are but a façade

The reality is that we are all flawed
Is our final repentance not insincere?
We hope for our stone hearts to become unthawed
Knowing that our regrets are but a façade

.                             In////Out
Forward               In////Out
drawroF               Robotic
Forward              
Again again
                               Same Answer
Balloon                 Always Moving
Expanding           Rock-A-Bye
Without
Energy of
                              Exhalation
Vessel               ­    Conscripted growth
Desiccated           Passive breathing
Air shifting
Over lesions
                              Reminiscing
Make it                 The comfort
Stop!!!!                  Of wanted breath
Ringing
Banging
                               Against the
Ending                  Affected placenta
Beginning             Of the inner ear
Newton’s
Cradle

In distress, I cried for help
But became engulfed in deep waters

From the midst of the dead I called for you
And was hurled into the wild currents

I looked toward your Holy Temple
Yet was banished from your sight

I sank into mountain crevices
And felt ignored

          From those depths I listened to your cries
          I brought you life from the realm of the dead
          I allowed all of these experiences and that has created you

Right now to be frank
Well never mind
I don’t know I can’t tell

Two thawed tingling tongues
Trudging through teddy-bear tantrums

The white space is calling
Clawing through air
Retching up a thin stream of nothingness

A veil of darkness, swirling as a hurricane
Decimating my armor and removing my crown,
Dark and silent, yet full of crashing debris,
Choking my heart, piercing my spirit,
Left my broken mind and mangled body
Desperately reaching for thy comforting arm.
Oh, how I lamented my miserable state.

Yet thy glory is a sword to cut through the veil, and arrows are but slivers of dust in thy presence.
The mighty hand that parted the waters
Has power sufficient to silence all great storms.
I shall turn my heart to thee
And thou shalt dash to pieces the chains that bind it.
Through thy unyielding love, my mind and body shall be made perfect at that bright and glorious day.

Serpentine tendrils of memory
Wrap themselves around the brain
Emitting noxious fumes into crevices
Poisoning the blood and spreading through the body

I disappear through the doorway of petrified thoughts
It was ages ago when I last saw myself
Sometimes I dream I see a familiar face
When I wake I wonder if it was me

I fear the creature in the closet
It used to be my child, the babe I starved through negligence
At night it haunts me, always peering through the darkness
When I wake I wonder if it was me

Through the cloudy window I hear a sweet voice
As comforting as the sunshine when it touches my skin
Warming my feet while I nap quietly
When I wake I wonder if it was me

I see a ship on an ocean attempting perfection
Hallucination of substance that never existed
Feeling shame with each unpredictable wave
When I wake I wonder if it was me

Eyes closed, fear closing in, panic approaching
Unable to face the beginning
Reaching for myself while running away
Whenever will I meet the unattached shadow?

After trauma, where do we belong?
If we think on it, we are dwelling in the past.
If we ignore it, we are in denial.
If we feel anger, we are self destructive.
If we are bitter, we are unforgiving.
If we are depressed, we are not trying.
If we act happy, we don't need any help.
If we cry, we are avoided.
If we scream, others are afraid.
If we are around people, we feel like outcasts.
If we are alone, we want to associate with others.
There is no place for us after trauma.

The dead and wilted flowers play
Alone inside a dried up vase,
The shocking dance, a sad display.
The happy memories displace
Dried up petals, a fine disgrace,
The dancing stems made up of rot,
Bowing down their balding face.
I look away and see it not.

The church’s walls, a whited gray,
They close in for a cold embrace.
The silent question cast away
Façade of truth, the tears retrace.
Is God alone? The Spirit’s grace,
The Savior of our souls is brought
To witness fellowship abase.
I look away and see it not.

A child, a boy in garish day,
His bony frame, his sunken face,
His skin is blackened in decay,
A ghostly smile that’s out of place.
No kindness shown toward his race,
No sympathy, no solace sought.
The love once felt he will erase.
I look away and see it not.

The boy child lost without a trace,
The flower dead, a new one bought,
The patrons of the church efface,
I look away and see it not.

The old woman Lori
Gray hair, cloudy eyes
Her face tells the story
A hundred black skies

A priest and a baker
Argue over souls
The priest will forsake her
The baker consoles

But she can’t ignore them
Though hard she may try
The cold judge will condemn
While the people cry

She lay in bed, contemplating, not thinking
Her buzzing head, pain abating, love shrinking

Weight pressing down, obstructing nerves, hand prickling
Forgotten noun, empty preserves, arm crippling

The numbness spread, rising body, hovering
Above the bed, disembody, covering

Surrounding space, where she belongs, not breathing
Fathermost place, abandoned songs, notes freezing

Paralyzed thoughts, empty solace, time creeping
Memory rots, darkness flawless, not sleeping


Kerry Herrmann

Deflecting the street
A quiet gray day
  Muted movement
  Empty echo
Estranged heart at bay

Where exposed trees meet
Practicing their play
  Weighed excitement
  Candid outflow
Fate’s stinging array

Breezy love I greet
Though distilled thoughts stray
  Lonely lament
  Distorted row
Malleable heart of clay

Briefly touching heat
Qualities of day
  Stifling raiment
  Annoying glow
Emotions end will fray

Pain I cannot beat
Unheard words I pray
  Empty payment
  Hidden rainbow
Hibernate away

Hearing everything and nothing.
Whisperings from cracks in the walls
Scream louder than words spoken from a loved one.

******* bitter blood from a wound,
Metallic iron coating the tongue.
A relished prize from the clawing and biting.

Viewing an isolated flag at half mast,
A stark contrast to the pearl blue sky.
Red stripes drifting in the wind with no inherent strength.

The scent of decaying wood,
Musty, stale, and earthy,
Lacking ventilation, suffocating in rot.

Flesh feeling swollen and disjointed,
Sensing pressure from an unknown source.
Disabled nerves that are unable to move properly.

Dreams of disappearing,
Yet wanting to stay.
When will the conflict be over?

Your constant cry, beckoning me
Promising safety from the angst
“Come to me, I will give you peace.
Bring your savage desires
And I promise you deliverance.”
But you replaced the angst with destruction.

You declared your promise of joy
“Hide your spirit away and you can sleep.
Put the music down and forget all shadows of independence.
Your song does not deserve to be heard.”
I was enamored with you, and desired your joy.
I put myself away and forgot myself in your slumber.

You became the core of my desires.
What friend could possibly give me more, or so I thought.
“Keep our love secret.
Friends, family will not understand how much I love you.
They only seek to tear you apart from me.
Keep our love close so that I can slowly **** you.”

To end this extinction of character,
I must leave you behind.
You have been my friend, my savior.
You have kept me safe, or so I thought.
I love you, I need you.
How could you be yet another thing that pretended to love me.
How can I trust and believe in deliverance
When all those I have relied on have betrayed me?
Yet, somehow I must put you away.

I don’t want my body to continue to degrade,
My organs to eventually fail.
I don’t want to die spiritually. I want to feel myself again.
I am tired of being numb.
Please, God, give me the strength to overcome this.