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Anvillan Apr 2020
Rapture, Cataclysm , Big Bang,
all simultaneous, beginning of
nothing, imagining the unimaginable,
silence, void, lack of a universe, no
source, no end, no being, the indescribable,
the undefinable, isolation yet nothing
to be isolated from, not even alone, just not.
Existence doesn’t exist, just pure absence.
Yet, in death we exist, only in the ether...
I always wonder what comes nest?
Anvillan Jun 2020
Oh, would that the words
from this page could rise
up and paint me the picture
they portray.

Then, whisk me away
and surround me  with
their promise of love
and safety.

Words are my friends,
keeper of my dreams.
They walk with me in the
realm of fantasy.

They support me on
stormy seas. They give
me hope that someday,
someday will come.

Take me from this world
of daily sameness into
your world of wonder
and challenge.

People look but don’t see,
people hear but don’t listen
In your world, all things are possible.
I can be me.
Hope for youth...
Anvillan Apr 2020
Begging....


Bound by chains, my souls screams
at the sun for burning light, then at
the trees for blocking light.
Is what burns gone, or just
consumed by the greedy light?
Who stores the screams of the
begging souls, tormented by the
loss of sight? The sky collects but
oceans store in the deep, so deep
the screams aren’t heard
and the monsters of the sea feed
and rise to torture the world
with fears of the unknown.
Once fear is instilled they return to
the deep to feed again.
The oceans get revenge,
baiting humans. Humans beg
and the monsters return and feed.
Frustration
Anvillan Jul 2020
Were you speaking to me?
Did someone say something?
Oh, it was you, how are you?
What? I didn’t understand...

Is he smiling or grimacing?
I can’t tell by his eyes.
The mask moves with muffled sound.
Is his mouth smiling or his teeth gritted?

Before masks we always knew!
We knew our place and we placed
others like pieces on a chess board.
Kings, Queens, pawns, all had a role.

Now, we deal with the unknown.
We are certain by half, but half is hidden.
The tells we count on are obscured
by masks of necessity.

Dealing with the uncertainty causes
us to question ourselves.
If he isn’t who I thought he was,
who does he think I am?

Now I wonder who I am? Is anyone
the same behind a mask. Does the
mask alter who we are or just the
perception of ourselves.

Can certainty be so cosmetic as to be
mortally wounded by a mask of necessity.
Can a finite plague have such an impact on
a soul and spirit thought to be infinite.
Strangers??
Anvillan May 2020
assault of images,
wonder of dreams,
break with reality.

drifting haze
obscure shapes
uncertainty reigns

heart that’s broken
heavy with loss
bleeding from hurt

soul that searches
questions it’s question
infinity is certain

world in chaos
is it catching
am I a victim

death is final
but not the end
faith says no

what’s beyond
imaginations door
afraid to open
Questioning the question?
Anvillan May 2020
The moon shouts its way
The defiant oak stands tall
The tides rise and fall
Onshore poem
Anvillan May 2020
Loss of faith
Wealth of pain
Gain of weight
Gone too soon

Dreaming of shadows
Feeling of loss
Panic in the moment
Deep in sorrow

Thriving in love
Ignoring the signals
Faking the interest
Letting all go

Drifting in thought
Oblivious to now
Detached from reality
Dabbling in death
Extremes of the mind...
Anvillan Mar 2020
The abyss of depression is like a giant squid with enormous tentacles drawing you in toward that clicking beak.
A dark place where you are drawn in many directions but without direction.
A spinning place, a maelstrom, where you are borne down into a black hole, a place of confinement bounded only by your own mind.
A place of no escape, no lifeline, no hope and no path back to the top,
Just eternal spinning...
Sometimes what’s real is scary...
Anvillan May 2020
The mask, my face, the oxygen flows
I breathe in a cadence,
like a drum keeping time.
If the drum stops will the breathing go on?
I am now tethered to this mechanical device
providing me life like a fetus in the womb.
Where did breath go, what took it from me?
It was the virus, this virus common to all in here.
This ward is full of victims on assisted breathing
struggling to breath, struggling to stay alive
like a fish, thrown on the bank yawns ,
hoping to take in water. When will he
go motionless. When will we go motionless?
I am resigned but I’m angry at the person
who infected me. He could have prevented this
suffering. He could have protected me from him.
He could have saved my family from tears,
from loss, from regret of good byes,
from the pain of having to watch. And those
who work this mission impossible,
have to go home and weep sadly for another
loss on their watch.
He feels no guilt, no remorse, oblivious
to the massive pain and suffering he
caused through neglect and simple listening.
Covid 29
Anvillan Mar 2020
Escape is always from something.
What that is varies for everyone.
All escape is personal as it is planned and executed by the individual. It may be physical, may be emotional or even subconscious.
The easiest escape is physical.
The hardest is to escape from oneself.
You can’t hide from you...
There is a tether between the past and the future and that tether is the present.
That tether is you...
Life is a chain that tethers you to this earth...
Anvillan Mar 2020
When glaciers melt and oceans rise and people live only on mountain tops, even then will I love you.
When we’ve poisoned all the air and we’re a planet gasping and choking, with my last breath I will shout I love you.
When all we know has passed away and we’re traveling through nothing going nowhere, at the very edge of that black hole my soul will scream, I love you.
But my scream is joined, the silence broken, the dark closes in but the roar splits the darkness, a sliver of light, love escapes.
The person wakes up terrified. Was this just a dream or does the battle continue?
Love and reality, hard to reconcile sometimes.
Anvillan Apr 2020
.

Blank stares, eyes without depth,
sound without ears, death is near.
In graves unmarked they question why.
On streets of home, left to die.
Not attended, just collected.
Counted, then disposed, never
Identified. Someone knows,
no one cares. Assigned a number,
boxed and shipped. A grave of
numbers, without names. Covered
with dirt, no flowers, no stone
no name just an eternal number.
The homeless don’t have a name, don’t matter... depressing!
Anvillan May 2020
Fireflies in the black night sky, the
eyes of a child wonder at the light show.
Eyes of wonder, collectors of opportunity.
Where did those eyes of wonder go?
Where did I lose that ability to
see opportunity before it is gone?
Eyes of a child see even in the dark.
Where are those eyes that could watch
opportunity unroll like film on a screen,
clear, imaginable, reachable and exploitable.
Why has daylight destroyed the blessings of
blackness. Why have the eyes of a child
become the the eyes of a spectator, an
observer, detached from opportunity,
helpless to connect. Why has daylight
destroyed the wonder of fireflies in
the night sky? Why has the ability to see clearly
destroyed the ability to see in the darkness?
Darkness defines us, daylight is
just an illusion for the senses.
Changing perceptions
Anvillan May 2020
Are thoughts feelings?
Are feelings just thoughts?
What about questions,
are they feelings or thoughts?

What about opinions?
Are they thoughts or feelings?
Opinions are reserved for the inanimate.
The sky is blue, the mountain is tall.

A thought might be, Trump is a ****.
A feeling might be, I’ll never vote for him.
An opinion might be, the ACA is great.
A feeling might be, do I have coverage for that?

With love it’s not that easy.
You can think you are in love,
yet you don’t feel it.
You can feel you are in love, yet doubt it.

It comes down to the need for certainty.
Yesterday is certain, tomorrow isn’t.
Toady is a work in progress,
without feeling, only thoughts.
Wandering of the mind???
Anvillan Apr 2020
I fell in love with her name
I fell in love with her presence
I fell in love with her pony tail
I fell in love with her kiss
I fell in love with her smile
I fell in love with her passion
I fell in love with her commitment
I fell in love with her devotion
I just fell in love...
Still in love after 60 yrs
Anvillan Jun 2020
Night is falling,
darkness closes in,
reality fades and
isolation takes hold.
The walls close in,
my senses explode.
I’m squeezed by the vice
of the unknown and bound by
the ghost of uncertainty.
I can not breathe, my lungs
collapse, I gasp. My heart
is reduced to the tick
of a clock. Each tick
a countdown toward
impending doom. My
soul begs the darkness
for mercy and release
from these bonds. A specter
appears. A shape without
eyes, without a mouth yet
speaks these words,
“ this is death, in isolation
or for real, take you pick”.
Sincerely, covid19.
Living with covid19
Anvillan Apr 2020
Loss/Gain...

I’ve lost gasses
I’ve gained unhelpful rhetoric
I’ve lost glaciers
I’ve gained ocean levels
I’ve lost clean air
I’ve gained coal production
I’ve lost clean water
I’ve gained more waste
Gains plus losses equal
devastation for this planet.
Who can save us, only
us can save us...
Where is the will to survive?
Can we all just standby?
Anvillan Mar 2020
Guide or friend, guest or host, family or stranger,
all different but strangely the same.
No difference in the beginning or end. Just eternal sameness.
Death is just the beginning of the unknown.
The unknown is so vast we can’t even contemplate it, for fear it’s enormity will overwhelm our small minds.
A mind overwhelmed is a mind adrift on a sea of sorrow
in a storm of regret, while the islands tend to fade
into the fog, leaving only the pain.
Is death the end of beginnings or is it the final beginning, the
end of endings? Is it that bridge to eternity where seas are calm,
our course is set and our destination forever?
Fear of death is the fear of forever. Fear of forever is the
fear that the possibility of eternal life, without strife, just
might be true. Hope is our connection to the eternal.
Life favors certainty, death only offers uncertainty.
Certainty is the gift of yesterday, tomorrow only
offers uncertainty and maybe our ticket to forever.
Trying to imagine the unimaginable is a fools errand.
Anvillan May 2020
Guilt of past deeds return
to rip my conscience
like a hyena tears at its prey.
I’m not sure I’m guilty,
they say I am.
Is guilt placed by others
mine to carry? Can guilt
be placed if no guilt is
deserved. Long ago an
innocent man was found guilty.
I’m doubly haunted, by the specter
of guilt and the ghost of doubt.
My escape is words on a page.
The reader will empathize because
He knows me through my words.
No guilt in my words, only a cry
for acceptance and peace.
To suffer or not to suffer...
Anvillan May 2020
The moon shouts
The great oak stands tall
The tides roll
Haiku
Anvillan Apr 2020
Her Beauty...

She shines
She glows
She reflects
She embodies
She absorbs
She impacts
She possesses
She returns
She’s mine.
Love
Anvillan Mar 2020
If I feel then it’s real.
If I can’t feel then it’s an idea.
But can’t I feel an idea?
Isn’t love an idea whose
manifestation lies in feeling?
What I see isn’t real until I feel it.
Love isn’t real until I feel and am felt.
Until then it’s just an ache,
a nagging sense of the incomplete,
a desperate longing for something
beyond something that’s just out there
in a place, beyond which, there are dragons.
A dangerous journey, my arrival assured
only if I feel. I see, I hear but these senses can deceive.
Feeling is the last refuge of reality,
without it we are adrift in a sea of ideas.
If Big Brother says “no touching” then what have we done to ourselves???
Anvillan Apr 2020
I toss and turn but the voice in my head grows louder.
The sound absorbs me. I’m now within it, flowing with it down
to a place of terror and evil where nothing is consumed
but exists always. Where evil is personified and is
revisited on those whose lives embodied it.

The Racist...

He craves acceptance and sees it just ahead but is constantly
stumbling over those whom he wronged in life,
those who wanted acceptance from him but were denied.
Now his path is blocked by his own intolerance. The
victims just smile..


Swindlers/Thieves...

Craving accumulation in life the thief feels the high of satisfaction
then pain of loss. What he most desires is his for a fleeting moment
but is taken away. Eternal loss haunts him forever. The victim,
smiling, just looks away.

Abusers..

The perp becomes the victim. Forever terrified
of the next assault. Attacked from all sides,
not knowing which way to turn, his agony
is the uncertainty, the waiting, the anticipation.
Again, the victim just smiles...

Suddenly, all is quiet. Below is the sea of governance,
the home of the great serpent, Deception. His offer of
helping hands suddenly become giant tentacles with
suckers that hold you and drag you down
to a place of eternal dependence. I see the
souls writhe and squirm as they slip below the surface.
I drift on...


Drug dealers...

Dealers consume their own product. They experience the high
then the inevitable crash. The only solution is another fix.
But that fix is held buy his customer, just out of his reach.
So, he twists in the grip of withdrawal eternally.
Again, the victim just smiles...

Pedophiles...

They lived with no heart. They ripped the innocence from
children whose only failing was trust. For that their
hearts will be ripped from their chests
by the specter of a child, the agony to be experienced
over and over. Again, the child just smiles...

Murderers..

In life, they took life. Now, their victims get their revenge.
They are murdered by their victims in the same way.
But, they don’t die. They are resurrected, then,
killed again, over and over, the pain, the fear and
anticipation revisited upon them.
The victims just smile...


Sins against love...

Love sought tranquillity but it was perverted,
thwarted or used for evil. When love, the greatest
gift of all is used for evil, the punishment must
exceed anything imaginable. It must involve not
just physical but also emotional pain. The unimaginable
is a life without love. How’s that for punishment?
Unfortunately, these victims never smile...
Anvillan May 2020
In the beginning was infinity,
without a start or stop.
God is infinity, God just “ is “!
God created finite and gave it love.
The finite created time and
created therefore.
Time due to inability to measure
the infinite and therefore to
explain expectations.
The gift of love, though timeless,
is seen through the prism of time.
The therefore of love is seen
through the prism of expectations.
The origional gift was for eternal harmony.
The finite has subverted and perverted
the gift into a quest for self.
The self is either personal or ideological.
That quest leads to expectations
which leads to conflict.
Personal or ideological, conflict
leads to a paper with words
scratched by some random pen.
Infinity and love are simple but
can’t be imagined.
Finite and love are complex
and have to be lived.
Couldn’t we just imagine simple?
Quest for the simple
Anvillan Apr 2020
Am I awake or just aware? Am I moving or just imagining?
I’m in the mist, the fog of uncertainty. This is the
world of inspiration. Inspiration, like a thief, comes
in the nighttime and abducts you’re thoughts to another world,
vague yet vivid, where ideas appear in the thinning mist.
Nondescript outlines at first, gradually clearing to
disclose the tools and elements of a poem. I record
my thoughts, describing what my minds eye see’s.
Sadly, the fog rolls in again. The vivid world becomes
vague once again, outlines fade and I am alone once
again, moving or imagining, awake or aware. I’m left
with words on a page from a journey
I don’t even remember, wondering who wrote those words?
Inspiration, always a mystery
Anvillan Apr 2020
Nighttime, sliver of light
Inspiration in the void
Darkness nurtures me
Nighttime visitor
Anvillan May 2020
Nighttime, sliver of light
Inspiration in the void
Darkness nurtures me
Aloneness...
Anvillan Apr 2020
Planet earth, it’s where we live.
The sun, the moon, the stars
all apart. We look, we share
the wonders, but it’s here that
we exist.

It’s the here that haunts our being.
We abuse the here and hurt ourselves.
Poisoned air, polluted water, oceans
filled with trash, sprawling cites, burned
landscapes and starving people.

We envy, we covet, we steal, we lie,
we **** and we exploit. We are driven
by desire. We can’t distinguish between
want and need. It’s always want.
People want, nations want and take
to satisfy only to realize they aren’t satisfied.

Can it be corrected, yes, very simple.
People caring about people and not
about possession. Nature is our blueprint.
She exists and perpetuates naturally.
Live with ourselves and she will care for us.
Destruction of the planet
Anvillan Mar 2020
Poetry can only be judged at a distance.
No poet can judge his/her own work.
No one who knows the poet can judge.
Proximity inevitably mixes objectively
with subjectivity. The writer will be judged
against the backdrop of personality.
The chain of words will be linked to
him/her and not to the message.
Poetry results from a need, a need
to express the intensely personal
and intimately necessary. A need to
announce we exist without expectations,
without claiming a role. Just a voice
in the darkness hoping for some light.
Anvillan Mar 2020
Acquainted with many, known by none. A trove of secrets carried like cement through the construction of life. So small, so compact yet so heavy. Space so limited though so dominate. I try to lay them down, I can’t. They’re attached and competing with the routine yet apart, a burden that isn’t shared, can’t be shared. Telling is sharing but those that listen will not hear. Will I even exist if I am not known? Can I really be known if I have secrets? So, am I real or just an acquaintance taking up space? I beg to be known, on blended knee, with arms outstretched, my cup held high but life just passes me by...
Secrets are like an obstacle course, we spend our lives trying to get around them...
Anvillan Apr 2020
Lack of choice is a prison. What’s missing is hope,
what’s left defines us. We are what’s missing.
Life is a thief, stealing our dreams and
replacing them with reality, a barren landscape,
desolate and confined. We live in solitary,
bounded by our own thoughts of a fuller life,
a life with love. Love is choice, love is freedom
to feel and dream. Pardoning ourselves
allows love to rescue us. Once rescued we
are free to hope and dream, to feel
and be felt, to pity those souls whom choice
has abandoned.
Anvillan Apr 2020
Lessons from the Inside...


Wandering open spaces
seeking solitude or peace
or both.
My heart beats fast
I feel the blood coursing
I panic at the surge
I scream at the sky
I stomp on the earth
I ***** the truth
It spills to the ground
in a jumble of words
What does it mean
Is it poetry from the
heart's bottom
I arrange the words
they speak to me
Peace and solitude
are inside not outside
I pick up my lesson
and walk home like a
kid on the first day of school.
Anvillan Mar 2020
In the crowd I cry out my fears, I scream I shout but no one hears.
I then reach out and try to feel but it’s only air and nothings real.
I hope and pray to God of love but no sign comes down from high above.
So here I sit in the crowd alone, not myself but just a clone...
Occasional isolation
Anvillan Apr 2020
Love and loss are inextricably connected.
The pain of the loss of those we love is beyond
this writers ability to say or even imply.
The ache is primal and enduring, always
there as each image passes our memory.
Loss of the material is transitory, the image
endures but the ache is gone. Today, we have
lost so many with whom we joked and laughed
with last week. We know the cause but can’t
understand why. Because we can’t understand
why we not only suffer the ache of love lost but
we, ourselves, are lost and adrift, clinging to others
as survivors for fear of being lost ourselves.
The bond of caring for each other will
keep us afloat, though the chain be broken,
love mends all. Together we find the way
but the ache of loss never ceases.
Words fail today’s  dilemma...
Anvillan Mar 2020
Before you, life was an illusion, a dream
well, maybe a nightmare.
You came to me, like the great sculptor not seeing
just a block of stone but seeing David in that block
screaming to get out.
You reached into my shell and drew me out
into the springtime warmth of you smile,
the sound of your song and the depth of your love.
I am immersed but I do not drown... each breath
takes in only love and my capacity increases with each sigh.
Born again is too simple for your creation. Fabricated
remade or crafted better describe your pact on me.
I feel life, outside of mere existence. I see flowers where
once I saw only weeds and your sun shines on me always.
I bask in you and your love...
Anvillan May 2020
When glaciers melt
and oceans rise and people
live only on mountain tops,
even then will I love you.
When we’ve poisoned all the air
and we’re a planet gasping
with my last breath I’ll say
I love you. My love is beyond
words, beyond the ability of
ones heart to express.
Endless, infinite, journey thru
thru the stars, skirting black holes,
moving from light to light, galaxy
to galaxy, eternal love,
infinitely together. A bond that is total,
a heart that is one,
absorbs our being. Two bodies
but only one soul.
Identities not lost,
but blended into ultimate beauty.
Perfect love
Anvillan May 2020
Is this a poem, I don’t know?
It is a statement, it is a confession
it is an explanation of wonder,
of a realization of self,
of the concept of being,
of awakening in the morning
feeling that you are the universe,
that the universe is in you,
felt by you, controlled by you,
that nothing else exists but you,
and if it does exist, it is detached
and some how unknown to you..
It is a rare moment that is beyond
description, beyond words ability
to elucidate and can only be shared.
It is a feeling that exists only in infinity,
in that place beyond time that just is,
without limit or boundaries, a drifting
place, just drifting.
I can’t really illustrate the
moment for you. It’s an individual
realization beyond experience. You
will know it when it happens. It is
fleeting and you must grasp it.
It is the existence of the soul
and it’s place in infinity and the
enlightenment that you just,
“ are “.
Awareness of life
Anvillan Jul 2020
I’m just a girl from LA.
I was swapped like a small puppy between owners, some that
treated me like a pet, some like just another possession..
No one thinks of beauty as a curse but it has haunted me all my life.
Beauty seems to be associated with the ****** and men and women
alike feel entitled to use you for their own satisfaction. That was a lesson I learned early. I also learned the advantages of agreeing.
I got married at 16 only to escape, I was used and abused. We divorced fortunately.
While working at the factory somebody took my picture  and said I could make a living as a model. I let them take many photos over the years, many I was ashamed of. Again I was used for other people’s gains.,
The only person who ever accept me as me was Joe D. I actually loved him and he loved and respected me.
I made many movies, the “Misfits being my latest with Clarke, my hero.
People were drawn to me,
Presidents, senator’s, attorneys general.... not for me but for their personal use and gratification. They introduced me to drugs That make the day to day pain go away. I get no pleasure from what they demand of me, but the drugs make it bearable. He is coming tonight and I look forward to being detached from reality for a short time. I know I’ll be me again in the morning but the brief escape tonite is a blessing. More later...



We all know there was no later for Marylin. If she had lived and wrote a poem here’s what I think she would have wrote...

My life was an act, I never got to play myself.
I played the part out of necessity so often that I forgot who I was. A life of not being you is a life without the soul you were born with.
I search for me but am always obstructed by those saying who I should be. I yearn for the day that Marylin can be Norma Jean. I’d love to meet her, maybe tomorrow...
A guess at Marylin dairy and final poem...
Anvillan Jun 2020
Years have passed, been high, been low
been drifting though the memories past.
I find my thoughts stuck on you.
Why, cause you were pure, apart from
the kind of life I was living and beyond
what I deserved.
I’d like to explain, but how do you
explain stupid, foolish and irresponsible
to a perfect soul who never experienced
those aberrations. How could you ever
understand and forgive me? I was so
intimidated by your sweetness and beauty
I had to run Martha. After all these years
and, for me, boatloads of tears,
I had to reach out. Words fail me like they
did so many years ago. I’m glad you are
happy and life is good for you. If you
remember, one fond memory is
all I could ask for...  Tom.
Kinda like Harry Chapin’s Taxi
Anvillan May 2020
Meditation is a journey
Myself the goal.
Quiet time
Mind reset
Deep inside
Seeking center
Reorient the heart
Search for the soul
Climb that ladder
Enlightenment shines
Eyes blinded
Back to earth
Mind refreshed
Vision clear.
Cleansing experience...
Anvillan May 2020
Time has passed and life’s a blur..
I know where it starts, but not where it ends.
A hand full of photos bring back the old days.
Family, extended family, friends, acquaintances
all stare back at me like a tableaux at Christmas.
Swimming, picnics, sports, concerts, plays,
weddings, military, children, grandchildren
and always family, friends, fans, clapping,
cheering, hugging, all staring back and
asking me the question. Don’t you remember?
The beauty of photos is time stands still.
They prompt ones memory to revive those
feelings of happiness, joy, even sadness.
But time has passed and those memories
are buried beneath thoughts of a lifetime.
Where were... why was... were we... did he...
every photo, many questions. I must ask!
Surely someone in these photo can remember.
Then, the answer I feared, stillness, silence.
Suddenly, the specter of mortality washes over me
like a heat wave from hell and whispers,
“ There’s nobody left to ask “ then chuckles.
Memories fade, fade...
Anvillan May 2020
I’m lost in you
yet I’m found in you.
I travel the road to nowhere
using a detailed map.

I make assumptions
yet have no hint.
I reach, I grab
yet nothings there.

She talks of love
my ears don’t hear.
She moves in close
yet no ones here.

My mind goes blank
yet fills with fear.
Is all an illusion?
Is someone near?

What can I know?
Where can I go?
I drown in the flow.
My end is now.

Death is my fate.
I realize too late,
that love was the key,
only death sets me free.
Wanderings of the mind.
Anvillan Apr 2020
I look to the moon, my pen ready.
Nothing comes, the urge, the pain,
Help! The moon laughs, ridicules
my thoughts. This moon, subject of
the great poets of yore, demeans
and discourages my efforts. I turn
to my heart, full with words and feeling.
Where have you been it asks.
I’ve been to the moon I answer.
And, what did you find it asks?
Nothing, I answer. My words are
your words it says. No need to look
elsewhere. Always from my heart...
Frustration in writing...
Anvillan Apr 2020
My inspiration comes in the nighttime.
Like the tides, controlled by the moon
inspiration ebbs and flows.
But, the poet is also a victim
of that very darkness that offers
those thoughts and feelings,
then gradually obscures them
from view. I am left haunted
by the ghosts of ideas left
to torment me, love, certainty
and infinity. My heart moves on
but my hand is controlled
by that force unknown, risking
endless repetition of the
same themes. I pray for the clarity
of daylight. But daylight brings an
assault of reality without love
or certainty only infinity,
the great unknown. My hand is held
by that vice of confusion, unable to
function, to explain love
or certainty. The great unknown
wins, devours all and, then,
the night returns.
Anvillan Apr 2020
The moon calls its tune
the tides awaken and roll
my mind rebels
Forces in life
Anvillan May 2020
Random pillows,
piled on a chair.
Different sizes,
different fillings.
Red, yellow,
plain, some with flowers.
Life’s a pile,
different stories
different looks.
Each is different
but each the same.
Each lies waiting
for that hand to
change their fate.
Like pillows in a pile
waiting, always waiting.
Life today?
Anvillan Apr 2020
Why do we write poetry?
A need burns within us.
The conflict rages between
self gratification and
desire to relate to all.
Cryptic verses gratify self but
plain language verses
stimulate the emotions of others.
The choice comes down to impact,
interpretation, and ultimate feelings.
Cryptic is very effective with the
very sophisticated poets
and those that can glean
meaning from terms seemingly unrelated.
Inspiration is a gift but communication is
an art to be judged by the observer.
Whatever the format, the honesty of the
effort will shine through.
Levels of understandings vary with each reader...
Anvillan Apr 2020
I’m drawn from the forge
of truth, red hot and anvil ready.
I’ve chased my heart to the
depths of the oceans
and heard the songs of the denizens.
Distant stars will fade before
my well of feeling
will run dry. Chains on my
hands, blindness in my eyes
yet I write and see all.
I soar across the heavens
though tethered to the earth.
I walk on hot coals while
singing sweetly. I talk to
the moon and the man talks back.
I sip mint juleps while basking on
the sun. I’ve done all this
and none of this. The poet is
free, a universe of the unknown awaits.
Vastness of inspiration
Anvillan Mar 2020
I know what I know and know what I don’t know.
I want to understand the infinite,
the concept that time goes on forever, it’s endless.
The idea of the infinite haunts me,
I can’t understand it, label it or grasp it.
I can only accept it. We call that acceptance, faith,
that great catch all for that which we can’t or don’t understand.
Thwarted by the infinite we overdose on the finite.
Books, movies and pictures, all imploring the world to
remember that we existed. We even create yards of stone,
each stone calling out our name to anyone passing by.
I accept the fact that my mind will never conceive the infinite.
But, it’s still there, haunting me, driving me to fight it and  
fabricate new ways to thwart it.
However, perpetuity is a fools errant, even if it is carved in stone...
What can we really know?
Anvillan Apr 2020
To understand is to focus. Yet
how do we focus if the
norms keep changing. Do we then
understand change without focus,
just a chaotic spinning existence. Or,
is the quest to understand just a question of
how to understand? Understand what?
I hate the word understand and all it stands for.
I prefer feeling which is true understanding.
You can’t understand love but you can feel it.
We know how we feel but don’t understand why.
Maybe life is a question of why,
a constant question in the fools errand
of trying to understand. This piece
is about confusion. It is confused. There is
the need to ramble without direction or sense.
Every poet needs to stream thoughts. That
stream will make no sense to him/her or to
the reader. If you understand that
you don’t understand, then, I guess,
that’s understanding.
To know but not know why, is not to understand...
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