Let us bend our minds
toward simpler times
and hail the coming
of an unexpected apocalypse

Limping toward the infinite
scattering thank yous
and blessings
like popcorn to the wind
a foolish man
am I

This life was supposed to be
different
a changing of the guard
But the guard stayed on
same old starched suits
same old
old

So how did I become
so young?
I woke just yesterday
to a sunrise stretched
like God's fresh linen
across the eastern sky
No idea how I got here

Every memory is dipped
from the well of time
and I draw that bucket well
and carefully

I taste the water
as a sacrament

The tick tock of time
is a goad
and  a constant reminder
that we must never forget
and never should fret

So drink deeply
and know the sacred
in every moment in time
and every moment
long gone from time.

It is a gift that you are given.

awakened
in the silence of the night
unable to return to sleep
i sat listening
as the stars taught me
unheard messages
delivered on a shimmering moonbeam
tho' i did not intellectually understand
i intuitively knew
what the starlight was saying
then sleep returned
and upon awakening
my intellect seems to have forgotten
the message
my heart now knows

©2016janetaylor

one minute you are the love of my life
the next you are the crumbs on my floor
and the sirens in my head
I don't blame you for your faults
you can be so distant when I'm only
an inch from your face to mine
the stitches on my legs are breaking
and I've thought about running
from time to time
I don't know if I can get away
do you love me enough to say more
than what you've been swallowing
throughout the years as they pass and go

I go
do you want to leave yet?

I go for broke and you are my only gamble
you give me **** for roses and laughs for aches
I've never wanted to be so distant
than I am now
I'm pulling myself back to,

how, how,
how?
a funny word I said again to myself
how
am I here again

Muriel, it’s been forty-four years and
I still think about you everyday.
I met you in the rain on the last day
of 1972, the same day I resolved to **** myself.
You were the **** store employee
wearing a chartreuse shirt. I was, of course,
the naked thirty-something with a few good teeth,
unafflicted by any social diseases.
You told me I had great veins.

the busy streets of new york city
never brought a ring to my ear
i silently ordered a tea
with milk and no sugars
by pointing to it on the menu
the phone never rang
and the only conversation i had
was with myself
a loud mind and soul
mixed with a voice box
but no voice

nobody knows of thunder
but the threat of lightning
we didn't fall in awe of the sky
or talk loudly over pouring rain
our voices felt lonely
isolated in this atmosphere
white paper stayed blank
and i know i wanted to write
but i could not hear my thoughts
over the silence that loomed overhead

a world filled with noise
and expression and love
will never win in the fight
against silence
for ultimately it is in silence
that we blossom and make sound