The too-long constipated pen
Strains for movement
And it hiccups out a line
That joins the rest in
Mediocrity and dross.
          ljm

Waiting for a muse to whisper
Into the partially deaf ear of my soul
Exhuming arcane truths from the source
Distilled through the ephemeral mind
Shadowy vestiges reflected in spirit
Fluid spirit flowing through pen
The ineffable spoken in sacred tongue
Ink revealing more than mind dictates.

      --Daniel Irwin Tucker--

Wrestle me well, my love,
     For we were star-crossed enemies,
          And I miss you.

My shoulders miss your caring arms,
My lips crave your pale-red tongue,
     A slice of refreshment, watermelon,
My chest searches the rise of your chest,
And my torso longs only, and is only,
     For your leg locks.

     Grapple me and my lightweight heart,
     As the backbone of this world breaks,
     As the sun sinks into final submission,
          But I will never tap on this love out.

               Never.*

© 2017 J.S.P.

Smile, hold that ever-smile.
Tonight, you will witness a brave star
     Unstitch the shadows off his feet.
He will high dive and unload
The weight off his chest
     Then burn himself gladly
     Towards the law of gravity,
Just to break the icy walls
Of the heart you once thought
Impenetrable, and you will smile,
     Sweetly, the smile of smiles.

     But someday I will circle you,
          One in six, seven on seventh,
     Forevermore, and you'll hear me
          Say I love you, then you will fall.*

© 2017 J.S.P.

At what point
does writers' block
become retirement?

I've been drawing
blanks for six
years straight.

What am I now, if
not a writer? Nothing echos
along the walls of my skull.

But to be nothing is more
poetic an existence than any.
I am not worthy enough

to be nothing.

As soon as I have left, I have returned,
Such is my fate, as though
A sudden wave recedes
From the shore, the nomadic wind
Brushing your shy cheeks by,
Lifting your hair, glorious,
     In a captivating moment.

No shadow, nor faint light,
Could ever walk with me
Like you do, always. I will roam the Earth
And will not lose you, for a part of you
Is etched, scratched, on melancholic fibers
This heart has. You are,
But a far-off thing I see
     In sleepless nights.

I have limited my words among the crowd.
     I have limited my self
To an “I love you”, day by day, intending
To say it right there and then,
On that soft cloud you are sleeping on,
     Snow angel.

My mouth is not satisfied
From our last kiss, for your laugh
Is for my lips, your lips are,
     Your silence.

I have limited my steps into an island.
     I could never stray from you,
Though you tend to stray from me,
Little by little, word after word,
     Look after look, blink
          After blink,

Pardon me, if I see to it,
That you sit gracefully,
     That I see to it that you are simple
As a white rose, that I deeply feel
That your heart, dear, is across from mine,
That I see to it that my feet
Are across from yours, even that,
     Even just that.

Forgive me,
If I have limited my self
Into a question
     For you to answer.*

© 2017 J.S.P.

I would draw a curve like those
Of a fishing boat, its bottom,
Or the body of the moon sometimes
     In its perfect time
          And begin to dream.

And google things like,
"a small depression in the flesh,
Either one that exists permanently
Or one that forms in the cheeks
When one smiles",
     And then write poetry,
          Subpar to the actual thing.

You don't know the magic that you are.

Through your smile,
I learned to cheat all death, all life,
All me, all being, all being,
     All what-ifs and trying-to-be-s.
Through your smile, I knew,
     That God is good, has been
          And always will be.

Through you, I knew,
     I have always been happy.*

© 2017 J.S.P.

A storm brewing at the back of my head.
Moving towards my temple region.
A forecast of words to come.

Ideas, as clouds, forming in my mind.
Thunder strikes, a bulb lights up.
Words come pouring after.

As the land of script, the words
touch. Influenced by the winds
of doubt, they may stray off path.

*Here I am, waiting
for the storm, thunder roars but
no words.

poetry
used to rush out of me
like raging angry tides
but now that
my demons are sleeping
i cannot seem to remember
how to write