Fragile egg-shell mind on dawn’s highway bleeding the segue between times traversed only in momentary dreams or in enduring excursions

We drag our droll and quaint 60s baggage like the luggage of a safari made of concrete girding a cavernous expanse of unheralded ground

With our ears oriented to the floor, we leap out of body never to deplore….never to ignore….never to miss the blue bus of our drafted imaginations, so carefully culled from brash elitism

I trounce the intervening time between being friendless and an ironic end, and an irenic comrade becoming the dearest amazed but always aplomb friend

We simper in our glorious traversal, and though bedraggled through an ornamented cavern we linger just long enough to be celebrated

Then a blues riff emanates from a vapid bar, and finally someone heralds my exhumed memory still rusty with the pavement of encased concrete on an empty or full tomb

So I wander in my mind to that roughshod Paris glassy tincture a romanticized gild of proper sensibility crafted in the tongues of lizards emulating the tongues of serpentine Anglicans

As the power of love transcends the love of power, both are afforded serendipitously upon the stately occasion of a fitful revolt where heads literally rolled and deaths still unfurl from the slippage of a violent malevolent eternity, crafting a new creative way to expedite the smite of preventable scourge

So, I see your picaresque side and your wide-eyed love for a listless ship anointed of a crystal blip just detectable long enough on RADAR to become the statistic to crack the slim WHIP

No wigs are needed at this formality, no figs grow from trees forty-five years buried and almost a full month unsung

Pitiable cretins of an invented insanity, they scoff at my ravenous and portentous heart for its excess and for aligning with an upstart verging on only a specious insanity

Why in all humanity could a month be mustered with every defense of history and yet for it to be so widely flouted as a risible exercise in futility

The irony that the artistic glamor of a past vogue becoming a revival that is often toked only to one song but never to the memorial of great cavernous and commodious imaginations, staggers with dismay where otherwise the mayday would be a disaster but still a great day

Then I look at a triggered-fingered omen of a death so ominous yet so brazenly confronted as the ambassadors of time provide plaudits to a fearless martyrdom

Why such a sad spate, why such a stringent but malevolent fate a malediction on a family whose crest is not crestfallen like rolling waves but ornamented with gravity impounding its own weight

A fugacious tomb, an eternal flame, a swan song announcing an independent authority on a prescient demise mashed and deprived

A single shot rippling through the broadened space between clasped eternity and a histrionic disgrace as a psychological confederate pays lip service to a reiterative applause

A cousin hardly American in a defected record of incendiary plumes of a hoarse hatred of waxen discs and flying discs alike,  climbs out of a bonfire mounted purely out of vindictive spite

Then upon a great white buffalo a wrapped package of Californian love before California ever alighted like something beyond an avaricious dove, saw a rocky park and a hearth of illuminated darkness the singular spark

Captain Morgan knows the jackknife applause of a botched deal morphing into a disbelieved spiel. A shibboleth of enormous mystical weight crashing down from an ethereal abode and heaven heavily saddened cannot hardly appeal

Then a loving spoonful of crystal blue persuasion led me to Ethel’s regimented keepsake and for once in my life nobility and I became a grateful waif. But temerity laughed, splintered spacecraft, and the wooden paws of a bearish applause led to resurgent clarity

Blinking stars shattered by knighted and raw applause punctured the liberated might of a sentient hortatory savior grasped by the internecine wrench of a waxen time

An indie track slides by unnoticed in an aleatory time, and the threadbare whine of centuries of lament becomes a dastardly barn set ablaze with the fury of ancients and the scurry of faineant patents

Perfidy slides in recess, and in gentle forbearance the winged angel lingers like a halo on conifer and spring above a remedial ring

I dial frisky celerity tingling the dangling claws of a raven’s screed and in plunder of all history’s pilfer secrets I eagerly weave a tapestry Indiana Jones himself would be proud to watch

Not the riotous ruin of a mystery tour of verdure crippled by genocide but overcome by the revived life of raised rain razing the moments of indelible pain

But the culmination of a proffered time taken at its word for its every careened bird, for its every brazen gird. The manger of proctored stars calls us home tonight and home forever. Life in quaked timorous stumbles suddenly no longer so fitfully absurd.

The quixotic plundered of pirates and emperors in direct emulation of some crooned pastiche of whittled integrity, surges above any encased blurb and any vain testament to a pyramid rigid in destiny and ragged in desultory and sturdy sincerity

Multiplying the ineffable by the division of arable divorced from edible is too creative to be eaten as pabulum when sparks curdle flickered moonlight crimson and that become golden only to the last laugh of ennobled ragamuffins

Frankly the desert of melliferous gorillas abetting the lark of a heavily vetted camarilla engaged in the sinecure of a rigged wall on a main street to block the tall from the lame bleat. Stocks grazed, costs engaged on a littoral beach at the end of a Bossy promenade

This prayer is a cutthroat collapse of a merry spare, a ribbed ****** waiting to plunge into the antithesis of female despair, but sincere in its restraint that vixens courted in love aren’t courted in litigation of a wagered dare

Ambulances chase Deloreans through the desolate moon-stricken skies of a time agape with fleets of phantasmagoria on a Cliffside too wise to ever mince words or excise cries

Skulking the red-teared caverns of entombed films and lampooned tinctures on a passion vetted only for certain and utter deracinated disguise, I wallop with winged men in a single soul Armed to the Teeth with inveterate tithes to eternal internments of poached and endangered gazettes

As growth older in wizened skin bets on epithets rather than epitaphs for rinsed peace and triumphant clefts we leap above in orbit of only the bellowing nether of blown tolls and untold souls aggregating the esoteric grasp of Alexandrian tomes

The denumeration of certainty is a carousel of wonder, a splurge of time ripped asunder with majesties of paparazzi scuttled impacts a throttled iniquity of regalia’s indicted blunder frenchified but still clean with inestimable sheens

With twenty-five dollars, a dime an assist and a nickeled reiteration of currency already so personable it is divine and sublime in crazed desist I watch the embroiled natives clash in denatured violence with the warriors of a crossed repast hearkening to an old land much of ire but too much of grandstand to ultimately last

Itching for a holy field husk of peerless ties listed as rumpus and beer, a two-packed smoked by bludgeoned blokes careless in irascible sputters of a muffled doom, a Vegan becomes the author of too many sacrosanct homilies becoming defiled witchcraft brooms dead on arrival too many lionized tombs

In plaudits and the scause of an amplified “what if?” of an olfactory nightmare of petrified fog of effluvium bogged in Wade and in heat it is always clogged, sinewy libations of toasted preemptive revenge become a powerballed hog

A castle in the sky founded on Franklin but scourged of wineskins brimming with a distilled time, a swift repartee becomes the whispered ladder of saints blather becoming not rather other than a Dan Rather spatter

A door breeched by a broached inconvenience of amphigory beyond common reach, I clamber excess and whisk the lingered love into destiny beyond any word other than a beseeched preach of nothing tired but everything inspired of noble love with abundance often to teach

Fireworks of turned tides of fallow tithes to aliens beyond any conceivable bribe the bushwhacker writhes but survives Stayin' Alive without even a hint of garbled jive a 27th floor glass elevator is quite a resplendent ride

Wellsprings knowing radical rolled tides of errant dice also themselves guilty of confessional tithes to the monolith of avarice at the nooked cranny of an evaporated time we whine as the police sting the album rained with songs too lugubrious to sing but in their elegy every lonely heart has a propinquity phone of souled resonance ring

Iterative mastery of a mathematics of love, loss decay and the dross of a dental Occidental floss, the sweep of screened queues become questions of inestimable importance to foreign dues on A Horse With No Name but so consumed with fumes

A fright occultist Thriller prowls in a waylaying daylight, masquerading an innocent confection for a rescued triage of a dawn stabbed with knives in our last dying days of trembled plight

He resurrects only the wraiths of detest, squinted at by the putrefaction of summoned cardiac arrest and littered with bullets that somehow can penetrate even impregnable bullet proof vests the wrapped carcass of the mummified husk of ready despair offers itself a ghoulish and raspy prayer

Synchronized in a low roaring swathe of rollercoasters too immersive to ride, the terpsichorean obscurantism of deliberately shattered fragments becoming blurbs dismissed with hijacked deride the carnival of a summer sun becomes the ocean of limitless love becoming endless fun

We forget the drawl of the droll old tales that haunt like specters in the closet and beneath the bedridden valetudinarian of an effrontery of shackled fright, we sprawl the innumerable caverns of prophetic insight afforded by the pantheon of history enter stage left, depart stage right

And with their insight I write and write, I grasp the tusk of democracy and wage an insurrection against the doubt of plodding limitations in otherwise immaculate sight

*** and tyrannosaurus rex, of litigable offenses leading to pardonable arrests, the gated entryway of a poetic splurge leads to the demiurge of a demotic enlightenment and suddenly the frank becomes the frazzled retirement and that haunting hounding bunny transmogrified by a shattered eye averts the car crash that careens ponderous engines out of limitless twilight blue skies.

Diamond lightning in pristine skies escorts the telegraphic totems of riddled modems from distant forbearance to nescient ultimatum and suddenly all venerable personages converge on a teeming scene of a union unified by a universal dream. To become everything and yet nothing and out of light and darkness to become a beatific beam

I am a Forget-Me-Not,
budding into spring.
I am shy in my shady place;
I still wish to dream.
My petals will remain around me,
Until I feel safe.

You've planted me, watched me grow.
You've whispered words of encouragement, promising me I'll be so much more.
I reach out, as far as I can, my feet have taken root into the soil.
My leaves want to reach you, but you've turned away.
My courage falters, I retreat back to security.
Forget-Me-Not.  

You've returned. My heart flutters with joy.
It's okay, I want to tell you. I understand.
I am not the only flower in this bed. Of course you have more.
Many require your attention more than I do.
It'd be selfish of me to consider otherwise.
Just Forget-Me-Not.

I can feel my petals unfurling. Soon I will be beautiful.
But I'm slow.
My brothers and sisters are ahead of me. Why won't I grow?
I want to ask you, but you're so busy. I shan't disturb you. It'd be wrong of me.
I can do it myself, I know I can. They have, why can't I?
Please Leave-Me-Not.

I can feel the taunts now, the humored jeers.
I thought they were funny at first, but now they're spoken too often.
I can no longer deny them.
They came from my fellow peers first, it was all in good fun.
Yet things have changed, and each uttered word is a jab of pain.
Stop. Hurt-Me-Not.

I was one of the first you've sown, yet I have not grown.
I feel the youngest, my siblings tower over me.
I want to join them, to show what I can do.
But my confidence is gone. I wish to hide in their shadow.
If I am not noticed, I cannot be made fun of. I won't be criticized.
I'm still here, Forget-Me-Not.

Tell me the words again. Tell me what I'm capable of.
I need your voice, your reassurance. But I dare not ask.
I am not weak. You've said so yourself. So why am I still a bud?
Can you hear me? Do you see?
In this mass of plants you tend to, in this bed of problems presented, I am buried beneath, my own only my own.
As small as me, but please, Forget-Me-Not.

I'm dying. I thirst, but no water graces my face. It does not soften the soil the petals of my family block.
It's the survival of the fittest, my only chance my silence.
I must stay hidden, not draw attention to myself. But you notice me. Sometimes you do.
Your presence draws me always, it's the only thing I reach for. I'll stretch until I'm nearly pass the other flowers.
Just let me have the sun for five minutes, I implore you. Ignore-Me-Not.

Your smile makes me want to, but then you laugh.
I've made a mistake. I've shown how stupid I could be.
I try. I really do. I try my best, but when I attempt anything, I make things worse.
I cower back to my place, wrapping my petals around me, my only solace.
My siblings stand tall around me, and whether it's honor or arrogance, I wish I had it.
Ask-Me-Not.

Regardless of my shortcomings, I don't blame you. They're my own fault.
Because of them I cannot grow, I hold myself back.
There are times you try to help. You urge me to grow stronger, and I want to oblige.
But you push. You push too hard, too harshly. My instinct is to withdraw into myself,
But I've made you sad. You think I hate you. And that makes me sad, and angry.
I want to tell you: Force-Me-Not.

You have your own difficulties. It's selfish of me to ever think of a bad thought of you. It's not your fault.
I want to help, but your own experiences have made me cautious.
There's no such thing as love. It's always one-sided.
Even as the bees buzz around, I keep myself hidden. No matter how friendly they seem, what promise the wind brings,
I know the truth. I've seen it happen to you. I don't want to endure that heartbreak, that stupidity.
Love-Me-Not.

Despite my own consolation, my own redemption to your faults, I feel the anger burn within me.
Always the nagging inside my head, the jab of rage when I can't do something right.
Your words always echoing in my mind: You're grown. You're not stupid. Figure it out. I know you can.
Then why can't I ******* do it?! What am I doing wrong?!
I need you to teach me; my teacher, my sensei. You've taught every single one of them. What about me?
Remember-Me-Not?

Each time I think you'll turn to me, each time I feel that you care,
Your attention averts elsewhere. Always someone before me, always someone else who needs you.
Like someone cheated, I am plagued by jealousy. I disgust myself with my petty emotions,
What right do I have? What do I have that makes me more important?
But would it **** to have five minutes where I'm the center of attention?
Hear-Me-Not?

It's a battle inside,
Logic against Pride.
I feel alone,
Though I know I'm not.
Do you see me in this garden
You've reaped and sown?
Can you hear my voice over your own?
Take on the world, I know you're able.
But do not forget what's beneath your feet,
I am not a fable.
In this unbearable heat,
I am still here.

Tend to your children, to those brokenhearted. To the confused and betrodden you save.
Those with no home find it within you. But don't I live here too?
Save,
Give,
Provide,
Love,
Care...
Do all of these things, give it all you've got.
But please... Please....
Forget-Me-Not.

towering gently overflowing with heightened awareness
subtle hints of blade’s keen glittering chiseled edges
untamed rugged surface powerfully averts gale’s acrid tempest
vigor pulsating that doth persuade the cloud’s reflections
if i shall not again embrace a meager glimpse; a demure echo
of thine towering mounts my soul shall ever suffer

my spirit soars with e'er one glance of thine majestic presence
replete with reminiscence seasons stir and beg thine tender mercies
to house the changing leaves at dusk of autumn’s auburn portraits
and give birth to crystal snow cascading peripherally in winter
which melding into spring then begs thy bluffs to cover
in soft amethyst of columbine blossoming first light of summer

‘tis not paramount to scale high aloft thine peaks in escalation
for small sheer glances stamp forever with imperial impressions
and ‘tho i’ve traveled ‘round and savored nature’s varied essence
none can compare thine evergreens laced in aspens nuance
my breath is gone and shan’t return ‘til in thy shadow casting
i stand and look upon thine hallowed face the rocky mountains

©2016 janetaylor

I stare in her direction.
I look at her eyes.
Big and beautiful in lights reflection.

Emerald green and she glances
My eyes meet hers,
And for that moment my heart dances.

She averts her emeralds
And I am left in awe
Lips like pillows of rosy gold.

Does she realise?
What she does to me
With those emerald eyes.

elephants stomp with stone-laden feet
back and forth, back and forth,
creating cracks in my already-battered skull,
weakening the very foundations of my sanity.
their trumpeting echoes through cold corridors
flooding my thought capacity to the brim.

a tightrope walker stretches me, thin -
i feel the shifting pressure of her nimble feet
treading the territories of my weathered frame,
back and forth, back and forth,
my skin reddens beneath the incessant crossing
as the sinew within me starts to atrophy.

in my chest cavity there is a ring of fire,
manipulating my lungs and feeble heart to mere ash.
two golden eyes seen beyond the flames,
ready to leap through them - without the
inconvenience of fear weighing down his agile paws,
both capable and likely to tear my veins to shreds.

a grisly strongman has my bones in his grip.
he smiles malevolently, gloating his strength over me,
squeezing the life from my cartilage - awaiting the snap.
i am cognizant of the sound, but i won't flinch.
next, the imminent collapse of my vertebrae -
i feel them crumble to dust. he laughs.

but it is in the pit of my stomach the ringleader sits -
commanding me into subsidence with every crack of his whip.
i want to meet his eyes but he only averts my gaze.
his twisted circus nearly through, the audience begins to dissipate.
i stare through the blurred smoke, desperate for his visage -
when i see on one of his faded lapels, the embroidery spells out your name.

-m.f.

The state of being with no suffering is Shakti
The state of awakening beyond sleep is Shakti
When love matures and sweetens that is Shakti
The fullness and fulfillment of masculine is Shakti

When the sweetness matures that is Shakti
The divine which resides in the thoughts is Shakti
Whatever work comes before us is Shakti
The state of mukti, the end, is Shakti

The braveness which destroys laziness is Shakti
The flame which is instilled in these words is Shakti
When the best of fruits are eaten that taste is Shakti
When thoughts of divine arise that is Shakti
Shankara who lives on top of the huge mountains, his lovely flame is Shakti

The lap where life flourishes is Shakti
The strength which guards the earth is Shakti
The flame which stops one from falling is Shakti (denotes inner strength that averts fall/defeat)
The tapas that eliminates confusion is Shakti

The finger which stops downfall is Shakti
The one who spans the whole expanse of sky is Shakti
Her highness who eliminates karma is Shakti
The inner flame which shines from within the heart is Shakti

oh, san juans, your riches beckon
your wealth, your beauty calls
your waveless, salty waters blue
my heart since childhood draws
your waters lap at darkened rock
'round islands, bays and inlets fill
with returning salmon teeming
your breaking waters thrill
your tide, oh ever river changing
charges muddy oyster flats
your thriving pods of orca leap
o'er spray in mid-air acrobats
from seabed swift, cold and deep 
the lushness of your green hills rise 
your sun falls fleet like shooting star
your sparkling waters mesmerize
sailing craft from ’neath horizon
angels spread their wings of color
skirt your shoals and ply your straits
find safety anchored in your harbors 
oh, san juans, your wonder waits
your treasure and your magic calls
your waveless, crystal waters blue
my heart since youth still draws
calls me to return each year
to dip my paddle deep
when life averts the journey there
in dreams you beckon while i sleep

SOH: (Sins over Humanity)
CAH: (Chaos averts Hope)
TOA: (Truth obliging Ambition)

Find the triangles within our hearts.

Stripped, naked. Flesh, raw.
Eyes burn like lasers, though you are bare.
The light: “a” light illuminates your limbs.
Its gleam reflects each angle of your body.

A nod of the head and there intent is set.
The stroke of a brush, a flicker of lead.
An artist’s projection upon the canvas.
You are: living, breathing and true.

Each curve invites inquiry; of shadow or shade?
Minds race to undress you further,
they peel at your skin.
Attention averts, bound by the three dimensions of your being.

On a pedestal you stand. Flushed and raw.
Though scrutinized and scanned, they cease to see you.
Simple minded are they,
foolish and dull.

The light grows dim.
Squinting with strain, they cannot grasp you.
You laugh and grin
…
Warmth melts your play-dough skin,
as a light illuminates from within.

Eye contact leaks personalities
You hope stay secret
Yet
They beg to be seen,
Recognised and conversed warmly with

They only wish to feel not as strange
As their owner fears they are
Be held, loved, cherished even,
Just not shunned

When lids shut,
or gaze averts,
Believe safety is inside yourself
But please,
Know that's a curse

The door is shut.  She leaves the curtained office,
And down the grey-walled stairs comes trembling slowly
Towards the dazzling street.
Her withered hand clings tightly to the railing.
The long stairs rise and fall beneath her feet.

Here in the brilliant sun we jostle, waiting
To tear her secret out . . . We laugh, we hurry,
We go our way, revolving, sinister, slow.
She blinks in the sun, and then steps faintly downward.
We whirl her away, we shout, we spin, we flow.

Where have you been, old lady?  We know your secret!--
Voices jangle about her, jeers, and laughter. . . .
She trembles, tries to hurry, averts her eyes.
Tell us the truth, old lady! where have you been?
She turns and turns, her brain grows dark with cries.

Look at the old fool tremble!  She's been paying,--
Paying good money, too,--to talk to spirits. . . .
She thinks she's heard a message from one dead!
What did he tell you?  Is he well and happy?
Don't lie to us--we all know what he said.

He said the one he murdered once still loves him;
He said the wheels in wheels of time are broken;
And dust and storm forgotten; and all forgiven. . . .
But what you asked he wouldn't tell you, though,--
Ha ha! there's one thing you will never know!
That's what you get for meddling so with heaven!

Where have you been, old lady?  Where are you going?
We know, we know!  She's been to gab with spirits.
Look at the old fool! getting ready to cry!
What have you got in an envelope, old lady?
A lock of hair?  An eyelash from his eye?

How do you know the medium didn't fool you?
Perhaps he had no spirit--perhaps he killed it.
Here she comes! the old fool's lost her son.
What did he have--blue eyes and golden hair?
We know your secret! what's done is done.

Look out, you'll fall--and fall, if you're not careful,
Right into an open grave. . . but what's the hurry?
You don't think you will find him when you're dead?
Cry!  Cry!  Look at her mouth all twisted,--
Look at her eyes all red!

We know you--know your name and all about you,
All you remember and think, and all you scheme for.
We tear your secret out, we leave you, go
Laughingly down the street. . . Die, if you want to!
Die, then, if you're in such a hurry to know!--

. . . She falls.  We lift her head.  The wasted body
Weighs nothing in our hands.  Does no one know her?
Was no one with her when she fell? . . .
We eddy about her, move away in silence.
We hear slow tollings of a bell.

Inferiority Complex withholds goals.
The fear of failure averts gold!

When a woman averts her eyes,
I feel the snow has secrets to hide,
Or from the small crook of her arm,
I feel the warmth of buried sunset,
In the charm of a country steeple.

A bee whistles past his ear
He feels the sound . . he doesn’t care
Averts his eyes in case there’s others
Raises his hands to fix his hair

Divorced from reality somewhat: from feeling.
Or at least extremes of:
Never exceeding amounts unfeasible:
Pertaining to the limits thereof:
Plateaued at governable levels in present:
Exempt from enth
Kept in check
His whistle wet & he’s well fed

Real words strewn along the ground
Discarded leaves fallen
Left decaying: mostly forgotten

His pants look to him pantaloons
For the good they do representing him
the man chases an end necessary; resenting
not waning, he feigns stoicism
then his creeping cynicism clouds his eyes

‘u know what buddy, u can honestly get ******’ he says ‘the 1st world cries the loudest; but is softest.  Thinks it is toughest; it is weakest, smoothest, creamiest.’
‘u know what buddy u are honestly right’ he says to himself not wanting to admit to himself that he agrees with himself,
but despite this all, his gaze’s focus still lowers
the edges become softer
& he does what he does

he wraps up in his blanky
with his bottle; safe under cover
among some big ******* to feel warm
but the swarm of bees they circle
twitching fever; rippling waves

hope to god that they don’t sting you
as u hide & feel their sway
lapping closer swooping hawk like
collective wind; they rearrange

and then

they push left !swoop! they raise u up,
( a cloud of black and brown and yellow arches and hums, hums like a razor on steroids, seeping potent purpose, pushing, coming: close your eyes for impending hell)
leaving bumps that swell and burn, they grab, they encase, they consume, they drive, they raise and they push
and they deliver u
and u obey them
and u relinquish; u fold enslaved
they push u forward  !the buzz! it wakes
it makes u groan,
u can’t ignore it
u know u need it
u’ve got to do it
u need to go


toil on & reap the spoils
another set with the walking beige

go here go there: be happy
u have no reason to not this day
just keep on going, mate my mate
lulling deep into the beige

Elevated position
strategically sitting
following a script
she says apathetically
three words
An audience a witness
Differently they speak
a language of friendliness
and graciousness
Lying on the innocent
she spreads confusion and doubt
Around the corner
a ray of goodness manifests
She averts her head
the mirror to a heart in crystal white
and guilty
is the Satan in her eyes

Poets to come ! orators, singers, musicians to come !
Not to-day is to justify me and answer what I am for,
But you, a new brood, native, athletic, continental, greater than before known
Arouse ! for you must justify me.

I myself but write one or two indicative words for the future,
I but advance a moment only to wheel and hurry back in the darkness.

I am a man who, sauntering along without fully stopping,
     turns a casual look upon you and then averts his face,
Leaving it to you to prove and define,
Expecting the main things from you.

Twitch of the eye, recorded.
Beads trickle down rippled foreheads.
The Voice is loud, but lips are sealed.
The pawns thoughts remain concealed
As the mad King addresses the board.

The cameras don't feel the chill
Nor the barrels, aiming still
Yet as the hairs on the necks, they stand
Fellow comrades of the land
Blandly hiding their rebellious wills.

His voice is ice, his head is earth.
His heart is fire but his gaze averts
The marble army changing sides
And as the jester laughs and cries,
Whites turn black and aim as one
And fire as if through just one gun.

No sudden moves
But the King is down.
No one comes to claim the crown.

Earth’s still-born sister

Cast-away
Aborted

Your ghostly image
Pock-marked and pale

Follows

A haloed haunting
Forever drawn
By primitive
Family ties

Shy sibling
Nightly your clouded iris
Averts our gaze

But this evening
In wonderful dilation

You stoop low
To peer

In magnificent bloodshot beauty

At what might have been

© Marcus Lane 2008

With the lost boy syndrome that he once did know,
Chained to Ockham's Razor and a broken window,
The eternal optimist averts his gaze
From shadows projected upon Plato's cave,
To the world outside beyond shattered glass
Where taking flight or falling fast
Is boon or bust
And fairy dust.

And the old Clown demands a sad goodbye in a way you can't deny,
And it turns out your the one who feels bad because you were both young Clowns together.
But now your all grown up and your fear of being dragged into old nonsense is forcing you to say goodbye.
Again.
"Goodbye." not "See you later," because you might not.
And the old Clown emphasizes your departure and your mutual goodbyes because he's not afraid of dealing with the way things are now.
He knows he probably won't ever see you again,
And he's realized it's not his choice even if it is his fault.
So he has a smile on his face and looks you in they eye and says "Goodbye."
You respond with "talk to you later"
And you know why his silent response is so loud in your head only.
And it's because you feel bad.
Not because it's your fault but because you know that he knows you won't risk being a Clown again, at least not with him.
So he looks you in the eyes with warm, comforting, open eyes chilled by remorse.
You try not to look at them again because regardless of how warm they are,
And how comforting they want to be,
The chill in those eyes pierces your heart and makes you feel like bursting at the seams with why's and how's of why your not Clowns together anymore or ever again.
He sees your pain more then you know,
Even tho you don't notice he's looking at your feet when you look up again. Only to make you comfortable.
And he would choose to make you comfortable by averting his warm empathy cooled by years of tolerance rather then force his warmth on you and risk burning you,
But only because he knows he can't comfort you anymore.
So he averts his eyes and doesn't look back.
The old Clown hopes you noticed.
He hopes that you know why he acted the way he did.
But not because he wants you to feel as bad as you do,
But because he wants you to know he's not the same fragile clown he was.
He knows that he wants but does not need your help.
The funny thing is that you were the older clown,
He's not the same young Clown you knew,
And he's just changed the way he perceived his life, and done so without actually changing his environment. And he kinda thinks you did the opposite,
And he feels bad for not helping you.
Just like you feel bad for not helping him now.
But all he really wants at this moment,
Is for you to know he doesn't need help anymore
And he won't ask.
Not because he doesn't want to be your friend again,
But because he knows he only makes you uncomfortable now.

I see you stand and gaze around the room
Looking for Mr. Who Knows Who
I wonder when you stare who is it you see
and have you seen me...

the one over in the corner
the one always out of sight
the one that's barely mentioned
the one hardly given the time

You walk along the ocean, enjoying the surf and sand
The shells are secondary as you search for the perfect man
I wonder as you walk by the sea
have you seen me...

the one on the single blanket
the one who averts his eyes
the one that tastes the ocean
in the salty tears he cries

As you sit at your computer browsing through the dating sites
Filling out the questionnaire of your does and do not likes
Looking for that true companion on the newest dating scene
have you seen me...

the one that's also on the computer
the one that's anti-socialized
the one the goes unnoticed
even in his own eyes

have you seen me...

The sun’s bright, even through my raybans
Old school and Black,
I found them at a party amongst some old cans,
Anyway, the sky is clear and bright,
Like the smile on my face and the glint in her eye.
Everything is good and I think maybe I’m happy
The sun makes her glow, sat next to her I’m one happy chappy.
She works the pout because the camera’s about
So I Smile, it’s effortless, it comes so naturally.
Everything is good and I’m thinking I’m happy.
A mouthful of that Sainsbury’s cider
And I’m thinking to myself I want to be inside her.
It’s cheap and has a strange tinge to the flavor
She’s looking at me I’m sure, god this tastes like feet.
But she’s all-sweet, one glance and I’m beat.
It’s all banter and larks from the boys,
Summer dress in February, summer joys
She talks of love and a broken heart,
I’m thinking this girl’s precious like a piece of art.
One of a kind like Mona Lisa
And I’m dying to please her.
Inadequacies kick in and I’m self-conscious again,
What if she likes big muscles, flat stomachs on her men?
**** it she’s here with me now,  
Some guy says something and she laughs,
That cackle that cry, now my minds in two halves.
****, he’s funnier than me, skinnier too,
Now I’m panicking, AH! What do I do?
She’s averts her attention back to me,
She catches me staring  so I look at a nearby tree,
Pretend to be in wonder, at least I stole his thunder.
She thinks it’s cute, if it works I’m not going to dispute.
But the next thing I know
Hours have passed and the suns gone down,
I’m still in sunglasses when we’re off in to town.
Despite the temperature drop, I don’t feel the cold,
Because holding her hand I’m back to 12 years old.
On the play ground and shy, running about like I’m a jedi.
Excitable, laughable and most of all Happy,
Nothing matters I’m care free
Free to be me, even if I did want to be Obi wan Kinobi.
She’s even more beautiful in the pastel orange glow,
The street light warms her face, my smiles still on show.
Beatles hit the nail on the head,
So we twist and shout till we’re talking of bed.
Talking with out words, because its her eyes that speak,
And I’m weak.
Embarressed at the prospect of what to expect
I look at the floor, then her eyes,
Oh God this is happening, I’m about to score.
The awkward thing is
I’m acting like nothing like this has ever happened before.
Im not saying I’m a *****,
just I wouldn’t complain if it happened a bit more.
God she’s Beautiful, and what was half is now full.
Her dress comes off and and so does my jaw
I could’ve rubbed my eyes red raw,
but I don’t
I appreciate every dent every shape,
Don’t get me wrong my mouth was still agape,
And something downstairs was trying to escape.
My hands tremble as I place them on her skin,
And we begin,
She softens my nerves with a kiss,
What more can I say… That night, was bliss.

Tom Sutton

Knocking down this broken fence,
I wander through the fields
Headed for a line of trees
to find what all it yields

Foot prints in the fresh plowed earth,
my mind so longs to see
What the world does have in store,
now offered up for me

The sun sits shining over head,
so bright its warming rays
Hanging from a sky of blue,
a beacon on display

Still I see horizon’s faire
of shadows on the wall
Wandering, I take a breath
and wonder of it all

I travel on my journey still
when there before my eyes
A flower like a special song
averts my lonely cries

Beautifully it stares at me
with hope for all to share
Bending down upon my knee,
this flower waiting there

Loveliness within I find
of petal'd smiling touch
For my dreams have found a truth
desires felt so much

Many were the days I lived
with nothing much so true
Until the sun did shine its light
and lead me here to you

I shall build a wondrous wall
to shelter you from harm
Tend you now and everyday,
protect you from the storm

Nourish you and keep you safe
for this eternity
So I may keep forever more
this joy you bring to me

Never more shall this man roam
beyond this valley view
For I accept you as my own,
my perfect flower, you

Hundreds of miles away, my heart beats without a regard.

It averts eye contact,
dismissing any suggestions of interest—
knowing well that familiarity is almost as obnoxious as the word “discourse”.

It works aimlessly, wandering for a place to call home—knowing that home is a hostel full of ideas brighter than my favorite constellation.

Even when directionless, it still finds itself waiting at a door half closed—knowing the only safe space it can stand is the comfort of despondency.

It’s a man of few words,
But of infinite thoughts.

It still makes me hope from miles away.

I know that it’ll be okay,
Because uncertainty is my favorite color.

But most of all,
I can still feel my heart here.

It follows me up empty elevators,
And in between street lights that lead back to the only home I’ve ever known.

And I just want to say hi.