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are you generally happy?

a semi-innocuous query
now actualized as a two sided bladed poker,
hot stabbing me smack dab in
the chests hollow crown bullseye,
continuously,  as in all life long, and eternal longing for a
“yes”

it fits inside a pubescent aged wound that
refreshes with every breath;
a life long struggle for an accurate definition,
be a general of genuine happy,
that alone would deliver, bringing on bright day satisfaction

as a human, one operates on parallel continuums;
slide slipping on well oiled poles that over the years,
their lengths, increasing with add-on extender poles
formed by
twisty turny slips and falls of sundered hearts and sad loves,
marriages nicknamed Titanic, children found and lost,
complications responsibilities that are denied meeting the words  
  “The End”

a life that many would envy, questioning what’s wrong
with you dude, are you blinded to the riches yours,
reality is
shoulders permanently bent, a spine that’s held together by
spit and solder and curved by wearying wearing longing for
a straightness that is also called crooked unobtainable
and a piece of a peace that comes and goes
like a highway billboard that you pass too fast to be fully read

the body is corroding and worser yet to come and that’s a hand
you selected - luck of the self-selecting-drawing -

the opioids of the mind offers are rejected

the clarity of painful self exploration valued overall -
the place where the poems come from,
and go to die,
a landscape of a scene repeatedly visualized
but never been and never left,
the crazy contradictions come in two flavors;
vanilla smiles and chocolate weeping of tears that have
etched pathways cheek-chiseled

the city is a struggling strife for most,
the next red line on the side
of the measuring cup  and
everyone has a cell, a credit card,
and a measuring cup
<•>
here I stop can’t finish  
someone missing alerts me
to their real worlds troubles
making my complaints super superficial but
the silent running of the stilleto
cuts shallow
repeated hourly
the cut color,

pitch black
20:00 - Dinner
Alone but entertained
I like it that way

21:00 - Skype calls
Not having talked for four days
I've missed her yet the occasional silence is nice

22:00 - Fillers
Scrolling through pictures and sharing thoughts
A pleasant and calm feeling

23:00 - Rethinking
The first hypothetical theories about the day
Laughing at the slip-ups to push them away

00:00 - Reflecting
Doubting choices throughout the week
Faking a small smile

01:00 - Endurance
A familiar feeling spreads
Downcast eyes and a facade of peace

02:00 - Creative
New ideas and thoughts fill up the space
Pick and choosing which ones would hurt the most now

03:00 - Idealistic
Reading stories about happiness, pain and change
Wondering what will become of me

04:00 - Closure
Horrible thoughts tearing down the last walls
Curling up and crying again

05:00 - End
Following a familiar routine before sleep comes
Cradling the broken mind
A familiar Routine
the weight of seven
hummingbirds -- 21 grams --
is what leaves the body
after death

on that hummingbird breath
the soul leaves
a wispering whisper
of seven tiny, winged cavatinas

being sung back
and singing themselves
forward
into the chorus

to enter again
a melody -- in
the Eye Of God

shimmering
iridescent
wings beating
the rhythm of Love



c. 2018 Roberta Compton Rainwater
 Nov 2017 Sierra Pruitt
Iska
My dear,
they say that a poem is a work of art.
they say that It is emotion,
pouring from your bleeding heart.
and I find that to be quite true,
but not every emotion is happiness anew.
the sadness the anger and pain and fear,
they each have a place to reside in here.
for such raw emotion does set the tide
for the torrent of words
that in a poem, does reside.
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may **** me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
I love to be sad.

I adore heaviness in my chest as I inhale.

Nothing makes my heart beat as loud and as strong as sadness.

I feel so alive when hot salty drops of pain slide down my cheeks.

Sorrow is a beautiful thing,

so full of love and care towards undeserving things.

Heartbreak is but an open wound filling us up with life.

I've never felt so raw and relevant in this world.



Happiness can be so numbing,

constant smiling and genuine warmth will dry out your heart like a raison.

Sorrow is moving,

desires broken in two million pieces,

hidden under bones of victims and their killers.

What good can come from a constant state of euphoria?



I love to be sad,

for the dead and then living,

for the living who are dead from ecstasy in life.

I may be nobody,

but in that I am infinite,

and in forever I am sorrow.

Constant and gentle upon quiet matters of the heart.
sometimes sadness is a soft blanket

— The End —