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Jun 2020 · 102
Home
Kimball Jun 2020
We've taken the fire from the gods
and held it tight with all our might
not letting go of any power
until our dying breath
adding more and more to the flames
so that the heavens themselves
dim and in turn so do we
focusing only on the external fire,
forgetting the one within
until it's almost fully out.

In some cases, never remembering
the internal dwelling of our soul
that lights our way.


Why would we when there are
always the streetlamp and car lights
and flashlights and blinkers and stoplights
constantly directing us home?


Too bad that home is dark and empty,
damp from the cold, long forgotten.


Too late to catch even those
last embers of what once was
though living constantly in the state
of what once was
rather than what is.


Our original sin, our theft
from the gods haunting us
until our very end.


Choice is always ours however.


Turn away from the flame, that screen,
that false blue light and
turn in to the warmth of
your own hearth that awaits you.

Brush away the cobwebs and dust bunnies.


Though forgotten, home never left.

Home was never lost.

Home is never lost.

Home can always be found.
Jun 2020 · 90
Morning Show
Kimball Jun 2020
Front seat tickets
to God's morning show,
though I didn't know
that I was going to go.

Soft whispers waking me
earlier than wanted from bed
out to the porch to see
a glorious red
lined with yellow
growing into pink
with geese making a stink
while I'm called to
record it all in ink.

Not much sleep behind me,
but what a treat to be had
happening every early morn --
wake and take in the dawn.
Jun 2020 · 83
Ugh
Kimball Jun 2020
Ugh
Born white
onto my own
boat at sea
‘Tis the privilege,
you see
to seek far off shores
confident and entitled
in every land.
But where is home?
Still alone
in distant lands
Still alone
when nearing the mainland
looking, searching
for the comfort of home, belonging
but no familiarity found
in the sea of other
white faces alone
greeting each other
with a pat on the back
and farewell.
We see boats
intermittent among us
chock full of people of color
taking each others’ hands
and into one another's arms.
What jealousy
we have of belonging,
seeping out of us
in childish hatred and rage,
tantrums sweeping us
into hungry tyrants
without home,
but with power.
Jun 2020 · 89
Oh dear
Kimball Jun 2020
A dream a little too literal
for me to take
in a wild dream world
with Grace (Jane Fonda)
as my mother
living in an insane asylum
seeming perfectly sane to me
sometimes fully dressing
and going off into the “normal” world
only to always return
never remembering a single day
that passes
some fresh blood out of college
replaying her day in day out
though she’ll never remember
that either
or does she? Choosing to forget.

I found myself sneaking
into the asylum
in patient dress and messy topknot
my mother always returning
to hers after leaving
though never a day
without eyeliner and mascara.

I wasn’t supposed to be there.

In comes the fresh blood out of college
taking me as another patient
Am I stuck now?

He plays the recording
of the day she just spent
without a memory.
She won’t remember
the recording either,
or does she remember it all,
letting her life be what it is,
a series of defunct rituals
semi-trapped, semi-imprisoned
semi-free, semi-sane?
Jun 2020 · 98
Enough
Kimball Jun 2020
I’ve always felt forced
to look at my life
from above,
evaluating myself
in the light of
others’ judgment,
assessing my appearance
and interactions
as the breath
feels closer
and closer
to my back.


Step in closer to
the freedom
that your life
is yours
and yours alone.


Of course,
their judgment
will continue,
but yours need not.


Feel into
the freedom
to let yourself be
without assumption or shame,
for you are so full
of life and beauty
despite constant
criticism and cut downs.


You are built
so strongly from
the inside out,
but let yourself
sink into
the satin and silk
that softens you.


Open yourself to
the wellspring of love
that outpours and overflows
from your giving heart
and let it always
bless yourself before others;
let yourself drink
freely from all that
you have to offer;
let your lips
always be wetted
by your own freshness
and brought into a smile
even at the thought
of all that you are.


You are not sad.
You are not anything
that others have
made you out to be.
You are what you are;
you are who you are,
and what a glorious
creature to be.
May 2020 · 81
Earthangel
Kimball May 2020
As I saw
the sweetness
of the young man’s eyes,
I saw that
it had been
my own
to betray me
with my own
sweetness revealing
my openness to life,
to love and
to all that
masquerade
their ugliness, shame,
and hatred with
facades of
life and love,
when that’s all
that exists here
behind these
precious eyes.
May 2020 · 82
Slow down
Kimball May 2020
This slow down
has brought me in
and wrapped me up.
Two months gone
in a flash, yet
so laden with the
weight of sadness,
reeking of death
and others' misery.

I remain swaddled
within the arms
of this strange
veil, sinking into
the tranquility
while amidst
the teeming anxiety
of complete uncertainty
and consistent misinformation.

All I can know
is my own life
and sit in stillness
to the rhythm of
my own heartbeat.

But to sit
fully still and
remain enveloped
in the solitude when
chaos swirls around
is exhausting in some
unexplainable way.

The chaos *****
away even at
those seemingly unaffected,
and perhaps,
I've been thrashing
more than
I've known.

Chaos pulls me in
different directions,
questioning my own luck,
my every move,
my own health,
my mother's health,
my father's health,
siblings' health,
friends' health,
neighbors', strangers',
dogs', and even cats',
and each of their
moves in relation
to mine, whether
I will affect them,
or they me.

Yet at the same time,
this holy pause
swaddles me so
fully that inner peace
overtakes that noise.
But I'm swaddled
so tightly,
I'm paralyzed in
this situation within
gratitude for it and
deep fear of
making a wrong
move if I dare try.
May 2020 · 97
Untitled
Kimball May 2020
Poems have been trying to pour out
of me for years.
But life gets in the way,
time gets in the way,
anything gets in the way.
But life without poetry,
with outlet, without art,
without the outlook
they all bring
is not life.
Life is meant to be
full, colorful, playful and bright,
even when all that flows from the tip of the pen
is dark and gloomy, especially then,
because when the darkness comes to light
and surfaces on the blank page,
lightness, color and love draw nearer,
swaddle, soothe and refuse to ever let go.
May 2020 · 132
Excuse me, sir?
Kimball May 2020
How did you
pick me?
Why did you
pick me
from the crowd?
What was it
in my countenance
that spoke to you
of weakness,
of prey
of sweet innocence,
of sweet simple
desire for love
and trust?
What pushed you
to your misery?
What knocked you
down that you
must grasp
onto others
in your fall?
Why do you
feel the right
to tear down
and terrorize?
When will you learn?
May 2020 · 121
Hunter
Kimball May 2020
"I've been
hunting
for you."
I took
this for
flattery
instead
of the
true life-threatening
statement that it was
with a
mind warped
from endless
gaslighting
and disappointment
and lowly
expectations that
women are
meant to own,
I swallowed
threat as
compliment.
Threat upon
my mind,
my body,
my soul,
asking me
to leave
behind
all three
to be devoured,
to satiate
the man.
To leave
behind
all three
because they were not
mine to own.
To leave behind
all three,
to be the
hollow beautiful
sack that
men want
to own.
May 2020 · 97
River
Kimball May 2020
I'm currently knee deep in the river of my life.
This past year I was entirely underwater.
I needed air, but I hate to be so shallow.
I like to feel the currents run through me.
I love to hear the loud silence of the water.
I am starting to sunburn and craving immersion.
I don't know how to breathe in the deep,
but at the same time, I can't imagine life without it.
May 2020 · 102
A Suggestion
Kimball May 2020
It was suggested that
I write poetry.
It flows out of me
in spits and spasms.
It is not an elegant
cascade of the senses.
It is as if I am
slowly rebuilding a dam.
It is as if I want
to build a wall so high
it surrounds me entirely,
it swallows me whole.
I suppose that is why
it was suggested that
I wrote poetry.
May 2020 · 153
these little birds
Kimball May 2020
Within my mind, these little birds
fly around, nesting and living.
When one of them decides it's their
time to go,
they come up to the window.
They sit upon the sill and
patiently wait to be noticed.
Once our gazes meet, they
begin their final song, asking me
to memorialize them, their lives
into words and lines.
When they've sung their final breath and
all is done, they fly away
for good and float on.

— The End —