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We met three times
Over fifteen years.
The disagreement paled
In light of his diagnosis.

He unexpectedly appeared
At my door, then stood in my kitchen.
He had a few serious questions
About brotherly affections,
And after spitting into my sink
(the poor man)
He wondered if I thought less of him
For not sending cards at Christmas and birthdays.
Is that what he came to say?

Next was at our last family wedding.
He was still steady on his feet.
We were five Irish lads.
The sisters said he was the handsome one.
He was.
There are six of us posing in this final shot.
He's wearing a Lucille Ball tie,
Losened around his neck,
Yet covering the gill-like scar
Running from lobe to lobe.
His hands are buried deep
In his pants' pockets.
His smile says Good-bye.

I saw him for the last time
A few weeks later,
Standing, bent and coughing
At the intersedtion of the roadway and Nature Trail.
His rib cage raging from contortions.
He waved off an offered ride.
And then he was gone.
It took us years to get here.
Sean Lynch, 1952-2019.
Ayesha Zaki Oct 14
The soft murmurs
of deep repose
whisper to me,
a breeze across my shallow heart,

As I slip into blurred lines
between life and eternal rest.
The unruly yet calming
resonance blesses my weary eyes
with a tender kiss.

Above, clouds continue
to grace the sky,
and even then,
I can't seem to muster up
whatever resides within;

This tide of once pure emotion,
I now must learn to resist.
for a moment, everything seemed to go still.
Emery Feine Sep 24
For bloodlines are linked only by blood
My emotions come out in a drowning flood

We only share a last name
For all these years I’ve fallen fool to your game

No remorse to the ones with the worse
Only greed and fame, it’ll always be the same

We are linked not by love anymore
The stress laid down is like an aching sore

I’ll no longer be trapped in your thickening mud
For bloodlines are linked only by blood
this is the 4th poem i’ve ever written, created on 11/1/22
Malia Sep 24
I struggle between the truth and peace
Balancing on this crystal beam—
So fragile, on the edge of breaking
As I try to make myself lighter
To keep it in place.

I keep it in place
And it keeps me in pieces.
I would shrivel to nothing
For this.
I would disappear—
Just say the word.

I’m sorry.
How many more times
Must I say it?

I’m sorry.
You never said that to me.

I know I’m the one in the wrong
But it hurts like white-hot tongs
And I cannot ever sing you this song
So I let go of the pain and move on.
is it dramatic? is this feeling too dramatic?
Abi Winder Sep 8
i killed a bug today.

in a moment of panic
squished it until its corpse
combined itself with the page
laying underneath.

remorse washed through my entire body.
guilt lay at the foot of my stomach,

and for a moment i wonder if God feels the same.
guilt for crushing me
with the weight of all the pain
i am forced to withstand.

i wonder if he ever feels sorry
for letting me go through that.

for letting me suffer.

if there is ever any remorse
for almost killing me.

surely he does right?
feel sorry for it all?

please tell me he feels sorry for all of this.
If she met him in a different life,
Not this one,
Where he lost his wife;
Would she give this guy a chance,
Despite his failed and trying romance
With her.
Could she understand the shortcomings and frays,
And take a chance he's changed his ways.
Could she touch his skin, smile with her eyes,
And realize he's not the same.
That man died
In remorse and regret,
He did what she can't forget.
Now years later,
Could she live -
Not with a man she can't forgive-
But with a man who doesn't show
The hidden scars the damaged know.
Good deeds don’t go by unnoticed,
just like a daisy,
rose,
or lotus.

I try hard to treat people with kindness,
but seldom rewarded respect or politeness.

Only the sane come back to their senses,
with an act of kindness,
your self-esteem enhances.

I’m never reluctant to lend a hand,
those in need I do understand.

People are born with tempting desires,
Love and compassion,
is what you require.

For all my sins I have remorse,
may God forgive my wicked thoughts.

If I'm to blame for what was done,
in God I trust and not someone.

I thank the lord for all his gifts,
my time on earth had passed so swift.
Nat Lipstadt Aug 30
A single lyric on a single song, sung, by one of my chosen ones, a brother and friend,
a brethren, whose hidden meanings are never hidden from me,
as we both, both gentle souls who, when lost, have been
lost
witnesses and also been witnessed:
weeping into the rags of remorse

this season is nearing conclusion, I know the sun rays penetrate, in a vain vanity of a last attempt to purify and make my soul stains,
a burnt offering, rising as smoke up to the wind,
my hearted words lifted,
letter by letter, to whence they came from

My senses are not cold, rhymes run, forgiving the sun for it’s inevitable disappearance, so it shall be displaced,
just lie us,
over then under, a nearby horizon,
with a sunset wave goodbye, a multi colored coat spectacle,
that reflects well off & on
my pallid skin

When it returns, it will be a different star, re-angled, in such a way that it can no longer do heavens work on my body and soul, both
kindred entities, each with each other,
a commemorative tree ring commonality,
a newly incised cain mark

sensitive locomotives ply between the sides of my head, knowing better than most the true meaning of fleeting, for although I am in my eighth decade now, and those words,
“there is nothing new under the sun,”
ring inherent inside like
they too newly born
 but,
running on a track well worn,
now nearly scrap iron

yet clothed in my sinner’s wet rags, the remorse ever lingers,
directed to mine own mark of Cain,
awaiting the day when the sun touches my
forehead, and those loco- motives ride higher,
for their denouement, their untying(2)

Aug 30 2024
fini 2:17 pm
by the Sound
(1) The Window Lyrics by Leonard Cohen

[Verse 1]

Why do you stand by the window?
Abandoned to beauty and pride
The thorn of the night in your *****
The spear of the age in your side
Lost in the rages of fragrance
Lost in the rags of remorse
Lost in the waves of a sickness
That loosens the high silver nerves
(2)literal translation of denouement is untying
With coarsest sackecloth cloath my naked soule;
     Construct for me a throne of ashes blacke;
Place on my lying lipps a liuing coal;
     Cast me asea inside a sackcloth sacke;
I am a rocke of great offence, a rocke
As stonie-hearted as a stvmbling blocke.

Not any man hath greater loue than this,
     That hee should for his friend laye downe his life;
But I betray'd my friend without a kisse
     And stabb'd into his backe a butter knife;
And hee who loues his life his life shall lose,
And I, by louing life, my death did chuse.
Francie Lynch Oct 2023
I remember.
I forget.
I wonder why.
You're so easy to remember.
You're so hard to forget.
Time ticks out no respite.
Today I am wrong.
The other day,
I was right.
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