The liquid pain looks at me with my own face
What’s there to fight for when I’m just my own trace
My reflection shouts at me she begs me to differ
Asks me to stop but we don’t know each other

My blood paints a rose of the death on the floor
I’m dripping from sorrow don’t want this no more
The scent of the iron and silk of red water
Colour of love flows out as I suffer

I judged them too hard when I heard on the news
Thinking that sadness is just an excuse
I thought I would never betray family
But this darkness is bigger than reality

Contemplating if it’s worth it
Calling the line or just end it
Silver sharpness invites me to dance
Drawing on my skin it’s final sketch

Caveat Spender
by Michael R. Burch

It’s better not to speculate
"continually" on who is great.
Though relentless awe’s
a Célèbre Cause,
please reserve some time for the contemplation
of the perils of EXAGGERATION.

Stephen Spender in his best-known poem wrote: "I think continually of those who were truly great." This near-limerick suggests that Spender may have exaggerated the time he devoted to hero worship. Keywords/Tags: caveat, spender, truly, great, think, continually, hero, worship, exaggeration, contemplation, awe, fawn, fawning



Caveat
by Michael R. Burch

If only we were not so eloquent,
we might sing, and only sing, not to impress,
but only to enjoy, to be enjoyed.

We might inundate the earth with thankfulness
for light, although it dies, and make a song
of night descending on the earth like bliss,

with other lights beyond—not to be known—
but only to be welcomed and enjoyed,
before all worlds and stars are overthrown ...

as a lover’s hands embrace a sleeping face
and find it beautiful for emptiness
of all but joy. There is no thought to love

but love itself. How senseless to redress,
in darkness, such becoming nakedness . . .

Originally published by Clementine Unbound

Keywords/Tags: caveat, eloquent, eloquence, sing, enjoy, enjoyment, inundate, earth, thankfulness, praise, song, light, welcomed, enjoyed, enjoyment, bliss, joy, love

The days haze woefully gray
as I sit here, alone, and my blaze decays.
Empty promises never go away,
and so I swear to close their place
in my desperate heart. But the night
lives as long as it is tenebrous. I’ve tried
to hide, to bide my time until they see
the type of person that I can be. To me,
it was a waste; they didn’t want to be
the friend that I needed. And so I pleaded
with myself to never be so weak. But the ends
of my week stayed littered with fleeting
hopes to be included, to be one of them.

I attempted to be bold and put my fears on hold
because regret lives longer than the night.
And yet I remain here unnoticed and unwanted. I hate
how my doubt distends and bends so bitterly.
But perhaps it is my fate? Am I destined to be late
from the gaze of my peers; to be deaf in their ears?
But I can’t deny that it hurts as I am a blur
in the vision of my friends. My patience is evasive.
I am set to wait, while they are sated and I hate it.

The night is a heavyweight and I am too weak.
I strive to not be so jealous. I wish to not feel so much.
I want to need myself more. But the night is not light,
it is an empty reach, stinging with envy. My eyes
are sorrowed by such a shade, but they despise
by their lonesome. So loathsome is the blight
that comes with the lonely night. It arrives
much unlike a good knight. It lurks there despite
my might, and it is never defeated when we fight.
The white of daylight is gone by the sight of the night...

how will I again
rejoice in pure solitude?

when can I bear witness
to the symphony of silence?

what must I forgo
to understand the Truth?

who should I become
so that I receive your grace?

why am I still searching
for sesame oil in sand?

where else must I search
for a place to breathe in God?

The wild wonderland
of believed dreams with
good outcomes resting
in the minds of poor kids -
patted down like
little mud cakes and shaped in
old pans on culled lumber porches.

Who's ever gonna fix that rail?
No one.

Kids are busy baking cakes
and the older folks couldn't
care less..

Only those in the middle
are blinded by conformity
and set on edge by competition..

But, in this light, who couldn't surrender their darkness
of cold competition to the light and warmth of these lads?

Who wouldn't make way
for such a thing to happen?

Little lights of
hope that will only fade
into the sunset of adulthood
in due time...

But not today.

Not for them.

They have cakes to bake.

I feel like I’m just in time wondering why
That I should live or die
Though life is changing all the time
My light it flickers telling me live or die
Though not I know the reason why
I feel that I should live this one last time
Though mark those words have I
I chose to live then to die

I stole the words from her throat
the ideas of a
far more brilliant
far more innocent
far more gentle                  
        
mind -- the shattered memory.
The polite inquiry of someone with
a recollection of broken glass,
gathering the shards in hope
of recalling that
passing
        
brilliance--something she's told to be;
smart
smart nice smart nerdy smart gentle smart
violently capable smart
tearing at the seams smart
not knowing who she is besides

smart--whip shot fast
got through high school but
but what now, she just
justifies jammed memories
with things she used to do.