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 Jul 2011 Nash Sibanda
Keith Ren
Be my water, dear,
Leveled.
Be the truth in me,
Fevered.


  Be the now.

       Be the now.


Be the shine in me,
Present.
Be the line in me,
Drawn.


Be the offered.

Be the taken.


   Be the the dawn,

          
                        Be the now.
 Jul 2011 Nash Sibanda
Keith Ren
Verbose as the Sky,
Heavy handed I,
Released to the thoughts of the seen.

Pneumatic in-tension,
A flexible mention.
Meaningless,
Emphatic, and
Green.
I computer

Woken, I push my start button and reboot to the shower
For breakfast a bowl of italics, **** no milk, memory needs upgrading
Then to my automated job in my automated life
My thoughts are in word ,then filed in documents
My moods change with every toolbar, features and characters
I choose daily from my vast database
At 8.59 and 58 seconds precisely I am surfing
That vast blackness of space, I am never alone
Our names are inscribed on the dark side of the moon
On the super highway at full throttle of 32mb
My attention was distracted by a **** blue from clip art
Suddenly I did not see a stationary font (size 28)
After the crash they laid me out on a spreadsheet
My life deleted, my soul sent to the recycle bin.
Often, I am a bluebird.
In the holes of trees I build my home
of twine small as bones.

Indeed, the air tumbles like memory
soft and worn, twisted like string;
and in my wings I capture the silence
In-between
all the trage     dy

When I die my body will soon forget me
Just a passerby, blue feathers streaked
on a sidewalk.
The soul will slip out of my chest, yes,
and yet I'll still fly
anyway
 Jul 2011 Nash Sibanda
JM Romig
Sitting a corner booth by herself,
sipping on a Long Island Iced Tea
and reading Keats.
Hands down, she's the most
captivating person in this bar.

Fingertips calloused, and hands nicked and scraped
like she'd been in a fight with experience
and went down swinging.
Eased into her seat like slipping naked into a hot bath.
Smiled with all her teeth
like no one was looking.

Left her phone at home,
in pieces on the kitchen floor.
Tonight was the night she was going to forget all about the custody battle
the bill collectors
the late night fights about who was right
and who was left in the room with all this shattered glass to clean  up
the long sobbing nights with her pillow and her secret shame
the regret for time poorly spent looking for love in bars and cold blue eyes
the years that separated her from twenty-two –  when she was young and delusionally happy.

With her body language, she unknowingly spoke to me:
Tonight, I came to drink and dance.
Don't bother me with pick up lines.
Pick up artists, go find another canvas.
Mine's been painted over plenty.
I don't have the time to save anymore white knights from their mother's ***.
That fairytale story always ends in Shakespearean tragedy.
Plus, the **** horse leaves scuff marks on the dance floor.

I take one last sip
and slip the bartender an extra twenty-
tonight the nightingale drinks for free.

I leave before she can thank me.
Copyright © 2011 J.M. Romig. All rights reserved.
That summer dawned with fire in its heart.
Its eyes cried with moonlight and the dreams of the night,
So soft in their whispers and their catastrophes.
The sky burned bright with vivacity redder than the earth
And the drums of war rang out.

The red sprung forth in rivers on her cheeks
As she watched the men go silently into the sun;
Their eyes gleamed with glory and the soles of their shoes
With some sort of victory
They might soon be able to grasp between their fingertips.

And too, their bodies would be christened
With the sinuous springs of scarlet
There would be no hands with palms of tenderness
To wipe the salty tears from their bloodstained eyes
So that they may see the glorious fields of wheat,
And flowers (heads pointed to the sun)-
So that they may have a last glimpse of beauty
On a summer morn
The days keep passing, don't they?
Even when I watch with my unblinking eyes
the stoic clocks that only emanate innocence.

Time passes slowly, here.
The languid ways with which the water careens
and sways
-and how even the air stands still
wisping softly between our fingers
and our hair.
The space between then and now grows
smaller, yes
despite the sorrow that comes with
dwelling and indifference.

And each day, I and the sun
will do that which is impossible-
endure
patient
ly
you had birds in your mouth and sunlight dripping from your eyelashes.
i promised i wouldn't speak if you wouldn't change faces twice an hour.
we made conversation under a tree and sleep-walked through your kitchen.
i couldn't stare for your poetry disguised as fingers, always moved your hands.

i opened your window and slid to the street, took a walk with the recycling.
my hands looked tired the next morning, and you wouldn't take no.
when the lights fell asleep, we ran for the boats and slipped into the water.
the moon smiled and pulled us apart, i never matched your shoes again.
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