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Dorothy A Jan 2015
Shane Page made a quick call to his daughter, LeAnn, as he waited in the hospital lounge. “Hey, Dad, what’s up? You sound kind of upset.”

“LeAnn, Grandpa had a heart attack…”

LeAnn’s dark brown eyes grew large. “Is Grandpa dead?”, she asked. She was fourteen years old, and a wise, sensitive girl who cared a lot about her grandpa.

“No, not that, hon. The doctor says he will recover, but he had some blockages and he needs some fixing up.  He’s resting right now, pretty comfortably. I just wanted you to know where I was and that I’m okay—so don’t you worry. Look out after your brother…” He sighed in exhaustion and ran his fingers through the top of his dark hair. “It’s going to be a while before I’m home.”

“Well, wait a minute!” she protested.  “Why can’t Trevor and I go with you? Maybe Mom can drive us up there.”

Shane started to raise his voice, “Leave your mom out of this!” Then he realized his tone was a bit harsh and said more calmly, “You two got school tomorrow and there’s no need for you to be here now. Anyway, I don’t want to involve Mom.”

Shane and his wife, Megan, have been separated for four months now. It would be more than likely that they would be getting divorced. LeAnn, and her brother, Trevor—who was eleven-years-old—were staying with their father. It worked out that they remain in their home.  

“Dad”, LeAnn insisted. “She’s still our mom…”

“Just look out for Trevor. Ok?”

Shane got off the phone, and just sat there staring at the television but having no real desire to even pay any attention. That was the farthest thing from his mind. Around him were a few other tired people, looking about as frustrated, tired or worried as he was.

It has been a trying year for him. Still struggling with his marriage issues and now he was dealing with his father’s health problems. At age thirty-six, Shane was a young father when he married Megan. He felt it was the right thing to do considering she was pregnant at the time. The odds were against them remaining married, but they made if farther than anyone would have expected.  He certainly remained married longer than his parents—who were married for seven years—but he blamed his parent’s divorce on his womanizing, cheating father, a man he did not want to follow in his footsteps.

Dr. Bakkal had spoken to Shane, earlier. “Your father’s fortunate he made it in when he did. He was in requirement of two stents, and he was resistant to having them put in. I told him if he wants to continue to live, he’d be wise to get them. Otherwise, he’ll be in the same boat, but now we can prolong his life.”

“So he’s refusing?” Shane asked. That was his father, alright, stubbornly pigheaded to the bitter end.

“Thankfully, he signed for consent and he’s allowing you to be included in conversation over his medical issues. But really it is a good idea for him to have a power of attorney. You are his only son? ”

“Right.—I’m it”, Shane responded. “Well, that’s my dad for you. He thinks he’s got it all under control. Anyway, I’d be okay with being power of attorney, but who knows if he’d even have me. I don’t need to tell you he’s a stubborn man. He’s a proud man—too proud.”

“That he is”, Dr Bakkal agreed. “He doesn’t have a wife who can step up to the plate?”

Shane laughed a little. “He’s had four wives. My mom was the first. The lady he has been seeing now I’m sure saved his life. She was the one who demanded he go to the hospital and she drove him here. But she called me up and says she’s done with him.” The strain was obvious, as it was written all over Shane’s face. “He’s a headache, Doctor. He drinks too much. He smokes. He has yet to meet a vegetable…”

The doctor stated, “But things don’t sink in until we are forced to face them, sometimes. And he thinks because he looks alright on the outside, he’s okay on the inside—a fairly handsome man—a ladies man—who is, one used to being his own boss.”  

Shane agreed, but his face was grimaced. “That he is, Doctor. That he is. Yeah, but when the ladies get wind that he ends up treating them pretty shabbily—well, I’m not going to fill in the details. Four wives should tell you the answer.”

Dr. Bakkal put his hand on Shane’s shoulder. “Ah, but you seem to have a good head on your shoulders. I’ve no doubt you have some sense.”

Shane nodded.

Nodding his head—drifting in and out of sleep—Shane continued to wait in the lounge. Soon, Shane’s dad, Carl, had been able to get into his own room. Shane was able to go in and see him. Like Carl had told one of the nurses, he was “all wires, tubes and coils” and he had “enough numbers lighting up on fancy gadgets to keep the place busy” as his vitals were constantly monitored. Soundly sleeping, he seemed much smaller in his hospital bed with his face half shielded by an oxygen mask. What a strange sight it was. He hadn’t seen his dad in the hospital since his gall bladder surgery several years ago.  It was a bit unsettling for Shane to see him this way.

He didn’t want to wake his dad, so Shane just grabbed up a chair and sat by the foot of the bed. Before long, he had fallen asleep, too. When his phone range, he was entirely confused as to the time, even to what day it was.

“Hey, Dad, how’s grandpa doing?”

Looking at his watch and then peering out into the darkness out the window, he answered, “What’s that I hear…in the background? LeAnn, is that your mother there?”

“Yeah, Dad, I told her. She felt like we needed her and she’s making dinner for us.” Megan could be heard in the background talking with Trevor.

Shane frowned. “Oh, great! Didn’t I tell you not to involve Mom? You are perfectly capable of cooking, LeAnn. You do a good job, and—“

LeAnn abruptly handed her mother the phone. “Shane”, Megan said. “You can shut me out from helping you, but you can’t shut me out from helping my kids. Don’t act like you couldn’t use a hand.”

“I’ll be home soon”, he insisted. “It’s really not necessary. I’m not trying to be a **** about it…”

“You stay there as long as you need to. I can call Uncle Sal and tell him you might not be into work tomorrow.”

Shane worked as a manager and mechanic in his maternal uncle’s car repair shop. “Megan, I am quite capable of doing this kind of stuff, you know!” He hesitated and gave in to what he saw as interference.  Perhaps, guilt compelled her to come over. After all, she was the one who walked away. She was the one who was unfaithful, the one who strayed.  He added, “You want to look after the kids—then fine. I’ll worry about me”.  

“Well, you got it! I won’t interfere too much in your life, Shane. You’re just a chip off the old block,” she remarked, referring to his stubborn father. “The kids and I are doing just fine. I got it covered! Okay?”

“Hi, Dad! Love you!” Trevor boomed out from the background.

Megan laughed. “You caught that, didn’t you? I think the whole neighborhood did”.

There was no use trying to resist Megan’s help. “Tell the kids that their grandpa is comfortable, sleeping like a log. They can see him soon enough.” He stopped as a nurse came into the room to check in on his father. They briefly smiled at each other.

“Give them each a kiss and a hug for me”, he said, lastly, almost choking up. He wished it was like it was before—the four of them under one roof. But that was not going to happen.    

Shane met Megan at a party. She was a college student learning to be a teacher. He was working for his uncle in his auto repair shop. The plans were set for Shane to take over that shop one day. Uncle Sal had three daughters, none of them the least bit interested in taking over the business. When he met Megan, he was doing well for himself.

It was love at first sight for him. He was attracted to her fun loving personality, as well as her beauty. Her blue-green eyes would light up the room. At first, Megan wasn’t feeling the same way. Shane did slowly grow on her, this “grease monkey” with his serious nature and beyond his years. They would talk about their future together, for they really did enjoy each other’s company. But then reality hit them in the face when Megan became pregnant with LeAnn, and they married very soon. He wanted to marry her anyway, but now it was a matter of integrity. Shane wanted his child to have parents who were married and for his kid to know him better than he knew his dad.  

Megan gave up on her schooling, not becoming the teacher that she dreamed of. Shane often wondered if she resented him for this—like it was entirely his fault—though Megan never expressed that to him. A few years later and Trevor came. Plans to go back to school were put on hold. That light in those eyes seemed to grow dim, but he didn’t really notice that she was unhappy. He seemed to lose focus.

Such thoughts were punishing at this time, and he tried to bury them deep down. It was amazing that he was able to have a sound sleep in the hospital, resting in the chair in his father’s room. Next time he opened his eyes, the sun was shining. He looked up, disoriented a bit, as he noticed his dad looking at him, a small smile on his face and no more oxygen masks.

“Hell, Son”, Carl said in a gruff voice.. “You look worse than I do”. Carl’s thick head of grey hair was disheveled, and his usually, neatly trimmed mustache was invaded by surrounding ****** stubble.  

Shane got up and stretched and said back, “Thanks, Dad. Good morning to you, too.”   He looked at his watch and added, “Glad you’re alive. You scared the hell out me. You got your grandkids worried.”

“Well…get me out of this ****** hospital and I’ll show you I can get around just fine”.

“Whoa! Whoa! Superman—you are not! Just lay back, relax a while, and do what the doctors tell you.”

“Like what?” Carl asked with a furrowed brow.

Shane was careful not to lose his temper. “Well, for one, you can quit smoking. Two, you can give up the *****. Three—take your cholesterol medicine…”

“Ok….ok….you sound like your mother now”.

Shane knew it would go in one ear and out the other. He stood by the window looking down in the parking lot. “Yeah, Dad, Maybe I do sound like Mom, but someone’s got to tell it to you straight. Put some sense into you. Stop just for once and think of someone else besides you. If no one else, think of LeAnn and Trevor.” He paused and added, “Think about me for once.”

Carl laughed and mocked him, “Poor, little Shane’s got it so bad. I’m not against you, Son, okay? You’re a big boy, so man up! I’m sixty-nine years old! My old man was gone by fifty.” He started having one of his coughing spells, his cough like an old smoker’s cough.

Shane shot him a sharp look. “I guess I’m a fool to expect any better. Can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear—as mom always says. Obviously, just wasting my time here!” He went to grab his jacket to leave.

Carl boomed, cheerfully, “Well speak of the devil!”

“What?” Shane asked, unaware of what was going on. He turned around and there was his mother standing in the doorway. He smirked and said, “Mom, I’m surprised to see you! LeAnn, right? ”

Rosina smiled and nodded as she entered the room. With salt and pepper hair, and an olive complexion, she commanded the room with her presence. Carl always referred to her as “Queen Bee”, for she had that quality—regal like a Roman statue when he first laid eyes on her—though she was down-to-earth in reality.

Carl groaned at the thought of her coming. “Is it safe for a person to be in here?” she asked, in her grand entrance.   She whipped Carl a stern glance. I’m not here for you!” Then she gave a look of concern her son, and told him, “I’m here because I’m supporting you, my dear. And yes, LeAnn called me.” She gave him a kiss on the cheek, and a quick hug, and he returned the loving gesture.


“Mom, you didn’t need to drive over an hour to come up here. But since you are—have a seat.”

“You sure as hell didn’t, Rosie”, Carl echoed.

“Oh be quiet!” she ordered Carl, putting him in his place. She dismissed the offer of the seat, and told her ex- husband. “I’m worried about my only son, but I also am interested in how you’re doing…if my grandchildren will still have a grandfather. Take better care of yourself and maybe they will.”

Shane comments were sardonic. “Maybe miracles still happen…like quitting smoking, boozing, and maybe doing some walking and healthier eating…but since when has Dad ever listened to you or me?”

Carl attempted to sit up and get out of bed, but the effort was ridiculous. He groaned in pain. “Give a poor guy some rest, already! You two are just a couple of nags!”

Rosina sneered. “Old nag—old hag—*******—say what you want about me, but you know I’m right! Anyway, you are outnumbered. Or am I, Shane, and the nurses and doctors all talking out their rear ends?”

Carl made a face. If only he could just get out of here.

“Honey”, she said to Shane. I’ll be downstairs in the cafeteria. I’d like some coffee. You can join me down there if you’d like and we can talk.”

“In a little while, Mom, thanks”, he replied.

Rosina walked up closer to Carl and put her hand lovingly upon his chest. “I really do want you to get well, old man. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t care.”

“I know you do”, Carl admitted. “That is one of your faults. You don’t stay ****** forever.”

Carl was more scared than he would let on. He hated hospitals. He would do anything to just be back home in his recliner, watching a football game and having a few beers. What he wouldn’t do for just one puff on a smoke, too. Anxious, he tried to hide his fear, but it was just a smoke screen. He didn’t want anyone to know how he truly felt, nor did he want anyone to feel sorry for him.

There was silence for several minutes. Shane had said all that he should say. After all, he knew his dad probably wouldn’t listen. “Hey, Dad”, he finally said. “LeAnn’s going to her school dance. There’s a boy that likes her, but I’m really not ready for that.”

Carl grinned. “She’s a pretty girl, alright. Takes after her grandma when she was something else—way back, you know. The girl looks more like your ma than you do, though always felt you took after her look instead of me”. Carl’s background was English, Scottish and Welsh, and Rosina was full Italian. To Carl’s side of the family, he looked like his dad. To his mother’s side, he resembled her. Trevor took very much after Megan, with light brown hair and those blue-green eyes.

“Yeah, she is growing into quite a beautiful young lady”, Shane agreed “I got to still go dress shopping with her…and, oh, let the fun begin!  Can’t think of anything more enjoyable than a day of running her all around the malls.”

“Well, let Megan take her, for God’s sake! Or let your mother do it.”

“Dad”, “It’s fine. It may not be my thing, but all the stuff I do with Trevor—going to his baseball games, soccer, to karate. Well LeAnn was more into that stuff but she’s getting more into girly things.”

Soon, a young woman came in with Carl’s lunch, and placed the tray in front of him on his table. “Cute, huh?” Carl remarked about her after she left. Shane did not say a word.

“You need to get back out there. Get out and meet a nice girl”, Carl said, picking over his food. Jell-O, apple sauce, broth, a roll and juice—he wanted a hamburger. But how could he get a good one here? There were too many “spies” as he called them watching over him.

At the moment, Shane seemed miles away from his dad. Whatever he was saying made no impact. He made it a point not to speak of his problems with Megan to his father, and he liked it that way.  By Shane’s expression, he felt his son was holding back on something. But the truth was, so was he hiding something.

“I got myself into this mess, I know”, Carl declared about his heart attack. “I came close to saying, ‘Sayonara—that’s all, folks!’” His remarks were typical—just blow everything off. He joked as if he wasn’t fazed by it all.

Shane had now closed his eyes, and kicked back a little, “Uh huh”, he agreed, though he was simply responding without thinking about what Carl really said.

Carl didn’t want to be tuned out. He had something to get off his chest. He said, “ Well, all that’s done and said, maybe this is the right time to tell you. Got plenty of time here with my own thoughts.” He hesitated, for it wasn’t easy for him to say it. “ It’s bout time you know”, he said. “I think with me almost bitin
Nigel Morgan May 2014
She opened the door of the gallery and there it was, there it lay, before her, nearly perfect: her exhibition. The opening was an hour or so away and there were, naturally, a few adjustments to make, but in essence it was right, and as she walked to the middle of the rectangular space (to survey the full effect ) she felt held by the quiet wonder of it all; that she had made all this and with ‘the quality control of nature’s accidents’. He’d written those words some years previous when a solo show was but a dream she would enter between sleep and wakefulness, when she would think of the west coast of Scotland and the poetry of its seashore, the infinite variety in the seashore strand between sand and sea. It was such natural accidents of form and transformation by nature’s hand that had guided her imagination into rightness and towards this exhibition.

At breakfast that morning she had come to the table dressed to greet her audience, and for the first time as a featured artist in a festival of some repute. She had felt the quiet joy of choosing the right combination of clothes to be the public person she had now become. He had loved the new dress she had bought to clothe her gallery persona. She had been conscious of his eyes following the lines this frock so generously drew around her body’s shape and form, the way the material fell across her *******, lay smoothly on her thighs.  It was a very grownup frock and with the jacket and scarf made her look purposeful, confident. His looking made such confidence possible, his admiration and what she could tell was that coming together of love and passion that, her being dressed in this formal way, so often evoked.

In the gallery she had worried over the lighting, climbed up the metal ladder with the fluffy green glove thoughtfully provided to enable those small adjustments of direction to be made on a hot spotlight. There were four large pieces flanking a corner that had embossed lines running across their surfaces, lines that needed oblique light to reveal the shadowing of this effect of swirls and marks of a retreating tide on sand.  Two smaller pieces needed rearranging; she’d placed them, late the evening before, in the wrong sequence. Poster boards were to be filled with her poster and put outside on the pavement by the gallery entrance. She opened the main door, a very green door with its top and bottom bolts and black-painted handle ring. The street outside was a welcoming mix of 18th and 19th C buildings, hardly one the same, the sort of three storey buildings that had simple plaques prominently placed into the brickwork from a distant past when proud builders would describe a structure’s use or ownership with a title and date. By ten o'clock this one-way street was lined with parked cars, but now there was little traffic. It was a quiet sunny morning in a market town.

‘Don’t mind the dog, ‘ he said. ‘He’s used to coming in here.’ It was a long-haired verging on the side of scruffy sort of dog, used to keeping its own counsel, probably used to being taken to exhibitions. ‘Just popping in,’ he said, this man who, and she couldn’t help noticing this, seemed to hold much in common with his dog; the long, but retreating on the forehead, hair, slightly scruffy from the want of a comb or a good brush (like his dog), he had dressed without much thought (because who dressed thoughtfully to walk a dog?), and that’s what he was doing, walking the dog and, seeing the Gallery open, thought he ought to look in.

Giving him her brightest smile, she embarked on performing the artist’s music of conversation, that score holding gentle melodies and welcoming harmonies. Although she had become quite practised in talking to her audience there was always the challenging inquiry that would catch her off guard.

‘Well, are you finished with the seashore now?’ said the man with the look-alike dog. For a moment a half dozen possible answers seemed possible. ‘Could one ever finish with something so extraordinary and various as that hinterland between land and sea?’ No, that was seemed a mite critical and clever. ‘Oh, I’ve hardly started’ was tempting, but rather smug and too confident by half. ‘I just love the seaside’ would probably do, as no one else was listening. ‘Merleau-Ponty says the complexity of the seashore is a metaphor in the search for self-identity’. She did wonder what he’d make of that, but finally decided on ‘It’s such a rich source of ideas and images I’m sure there’s a lot more I want to do with the subject.’

”It’s all the same colour”. She’d had that one a few times. ‘When I’m on the beach I’m fascinated as much by the texture and shape of what I see  and feel than the colour. I like the subtlety of the colours in the sand. I think my pieces – and she waved her hand towards what she had titled her Sand Marks pieces – show so many of the different shades of colours you find on the seashore.’

Those Sand Marks, a collection of variously dyed and marked two metre plus linen-lengths, dominated one wall of the gallery. They floated a few centimetres from the white wall, and when people moved past them the slight shadows cast by the linen lengths seemed to ripple in the human-made breeze. She could never look at them without thinking how their very accidental making – binding a linen cloth with inner placed objects and using the natural dye of tea – could create such absorbing results. She would follow with her gaze one of the linen-lengths from bottom to top (or top to bottom) and find herself walking on the wet sand of a Scottish beach, overwhelmed by the clear light and space with only the sea sound surrounding. He would tell her, had told her often, how moved, how affected he had been when he first saw them hung. To him, these ‘marks’ carried an essence of this aesthetic she now owned and for which had become recognised.

Even on this, her first day, she had been visited by a small number of admirers and supporters, some travelling distances to see her work with the aura of the original, a truer view than that possible on the back-lit screen of their computer monitors. Ladies who loved textiles, the containment and privacy to sew and stitch secured in their busy lives. These friendly and smiley women (the comfortable side of sixty) understood something of what she was doing here, and perhaps imagined themselves as thirty-somethings walking Scottish beaches free from children and the relentless list-making of house and home and occupation, able to create imaginary worlds of marks and folds, pleats and textures. Full of enthusiasm for the medium, what they perhaps didn’t have was the skill of seeing, a skill she had grown up with, had always owned to some degree: found, fostered, honed, developed into a second-nature activity of always looking.

There would be the occasional brief lull when the gallery was empty or close to empty, as though needing the space to come up for breath after being occupied by people and their movement. She would then walk slowly around the long well-lit room viewing her pieces and her arrangements of pieces from different angles. She would look at his poems placed antiphonally between her work, commissioned for her catalogue, her book of images of the sea shore paired with, incorporating even, her made pieces. She’d chosen a favoured few she’d felt caught the essence of being in the sea’s company, in the sand and shore’s domain. Like everything he did it had been undertaken with the utmost intensity of purpose. She saw him now in her mind’s eye with his notebook sitting against rocks, paddling in the great shallow pools, walking head down along the tide line, those bright days on a Scottish island and before, before on that ellipse of beach by the fishing station.

He would tease out an idea formed from a little motif of words, perhaps like the very music that was his private territory: here, alone, apart we are marked by the tide’s turn. Yes, we are marked by being solitary in such unconfining space, the marks at our feet become the lines, the mounts, the fingers, those interruptions, breaks and blockages found in the tridents, chains and crosses of the art of palmistry. We read the seashore as a psychic oracle reads the hand, hoping, as Kathleen Jamie so rightly says, for the marvellous. And marvellous it so often is.

Standing in this gallery was like being gathered about by the seashore. It was a short jump in the imagination’s miracle to hear the soft breathing of the sea, the wind caressing the face, the warmth of the afternoon sun on the freckled cheek.

See how those we love are transformed
when the sea is their only boundary

a figure stands before a sand bar
in a crescent of water left by the tide
an affecting geometry of solitude
. . .


These words had always stopped her in her perambulating tracks. She thought of her son, far distant on the beach, at rest for once, still, motionless within the confluence of the elements of the beach, at the epicentre of her gaze, all things flowing to and from his tiny, far-away figure.
Samuel Lombardo Nov 2014
There was once a parable,
an earthly story
portraying a message that would
be told in reference of our life:
A sower goes out to sow some seeds.
However, there were some seeds
fell on the wayside, and
were swallowed up by the birds.
Yet, some seeds fell next to the ricks,
but there was not enough earth
to keep the growth of the plant-
so, when the sun came out
the seeds were scorched from the earth
with minimum growth,
but without the roots
to carry on its growth process.
Yet, some seeds were placed in the thorns;
so, those seeds were choked by its death.
The last sower was able to find good land,
where seeds would grow to a hundred fold.

There is a mission:
When God asks us to plant seeds,
we are asked to have the oil with us.
Without the right concentration,
there are concerns of thorns
who can choke you up.
Because the thorns are sharp and dangerous,
only God has the power to devour
or to destroy them.
A thorn is stubborn, and will continue to process
threats of no promise, but the cuts it can process.

Some thorns can be hidden,
while a red rose blooms beautifully
on the branches of a rose bush,
there is no reason to believe-
the thorn bush wants you
to grab the beautiful rose
to dig into your skin
the anger it holds
for you.

Hence we have the earth to produce God's mission,
but without the oil and concentration,
there are only rocks that will go nowhere.
Yes, unless you plan to move the rocks out
of the way, those things will always remain.
Only God has the power to remove the
blockages out of our lives to make
success in His mission, not our own.
Rocks also causes pain. They are
heavy, stubborn to move, and are often in the way.
When dealing with rocks,
their mission is to block the truth
blind us for which what is said is to be
hypocritical to the naked eye.
However, what the rocks do not know,
they may block our message from reaping,
but God can remove that rock,
placing them where they will work better.
The rocks are the most stubborn for sending
a message when the rock says,
"Here I am try to move me,"
however, if you remove a rock from its place,
they too have a purpose, and knocks the
whole scenario outta-kilta.
The situation is that while seeds could grow,
they die off very quickly without roots.

The question is:
Does it take a brain surgeon
to help us decide where to plant seeds?
Do we need to express the dangers
of rocks and thorns?
Where do we lay our hearts?
Is our hearts in the thorns, being tangled and sliced-
or is our hearts being crushed by rocks?
Is our oil being dripped by the holding back of thorns,
or are the rocks dying the oil up?
Our hearts need to sow where there is promise.
#Sower #Distractions #Plotters #Hypocrisy #Love #Heart #Salvation #FindingtheLight #Promise #Choice #Freedom
His suit is taggered. Bullet holes and tears but finely pressed and clean. Still recognizable as a cop's beat uniform. He unsnaps his gun holster clip. No one uses the old guns anymore. Electronic laser weapons are the fad in the end times. I got a Desert Eagle .45 that has something these fancy tech-lovers don't. Two point three seconds...

You see, it takes a Lectro two point three seconds to charge-up and that happens to be more time than it takes a 'cowboy-movie-loving' quick draw to end you...

"Hi boys! You've got a Buzz here I see? Well...time to move along and let me buy the next round 'eh?" -I say

"Look, there's a drink shack right about a block up from here. Let me get you." -said with a wink

The three look rough as they all do out here in the runs. That's the wasteland roadways in the inner cities. Least that's what they are known as these days. If you're guessing the futures part of that wasteland you got it right. The last war was the Great War. The one that ended all government. Now we have two realities; the corporations large enough to maintain some order and the publicly disordered nightmare.

You'd a thought systemic breakdown would have released the minds of the many from their company masters but it was quite the opposite. Those left and afraid flocked to join the barons making them even more powerful. I work for one of these new titans; Altria Group.

The three look at each other with queer smirks and grins as if their figurin' on what move to make or perhaps figured it already? The middle one draws his Lectro-gun...bad idea.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Three down. I walk over them to make sure,

BOOM!

...one last slug in the ringleader's face clears this route. These ******* have been hitting our trucks for weeks from this alleyway. My shots draw out more vermin...Chicago is a mecha for filth. Our heavy operators in the dozer-rigs clear the blockages but it's up to me to stop the vagabonds and hijackers. Only losers don't have a job.

"Well boys you had the chance to take this one to the bar and drink it off...instead you got a buzz still ringing in your ears!" -I tell their dead bodies while reloading my clips

That 'buzz' would be me, Buzziah. I'm The last cop in Chicago. Maybe the last one in America, who knows?

BOOM!
BOOM!

Down go two more ****...I hate sneakies. I lean down to make sure my body cam gets a shot of their faces. I get paid by the ****. My bosses at the cigarette company still want to see their faces for some reason. I never ask, I don't care, I'm just a camel cop...

"Sounds like a ***** joke..." -I say out loud

I know it's confusing. Reynold's used to make camel cigarettes. I'll light one up while my brain explains it for you. When it appeared that the U.S. government had lost control...the major multinational players took action on their own. Some of them, like my employer, they literally killed their competition. Thirteen years later they're the only game in town for smokes, jobs, housing, protection and food...and I am the only cop left. I stop a ****** running by,

"Hey you stop!" -I tell him

He freezes and stares at me shaking. I'm a bit of a celebrity in downtown.

"Do you like the uniform or what?" -I ask him

"Uh-uh-uh man, man just let me go I ain't after your loads?"

I chuckle deeply inside. It is a ***** joke after all.

BOOM!

I turn on my Beats-Sat uplink...

"All clear on routes a-go, all routes a-go..."

Switch the channel to the network Apple link...******* rap. I love it. I catch a tune on the heavy guitar riff and backbeat intro...

<Double forty-fives, double forty-fives>

<YO> -chorus

<Jumped out the War like G I JOE!>

<Landed gig/wid Nort Gruman.>

<Patrollin' my beat as-a-GUN MAN>

<Double forty-fives, double forty-fives>

<BLOW> -gunshot sounds

This feels so right. I hop on my motorcycle and tear-off.

Time for my buzz...

I am the Lord's Strength.

Buzziah Willis...remember it.

I run the streets of downtown Chicago.

I am the law here.

"Wanna smoke?"  He says to the air.
The Last Cop short story intro. Buzziah Willis.
Amanda rodeiro Feb 2015
I think my dads heart is breaking, his body is slowly shutting down on itself as if to tell everyone he wants to pack up and leave. 

I think my dads heart is breaking, too weak to even pump enough blood anymore as if to tell everyone he’s giving up.

I think my dads heart is breaking, he doesn’t try to catch his breath anymore as if saying he wants it to stay lost.

I think my dads heart is breaking, every absent look in his crystal eyes is a reminder that he’s so much sadder then he lets on. 

I think my dads heart is breaking, every time he looks in the mirror his mothers reflection is staring back at him. Gaunt cheek bones and sunken eyes, they could be twins.

I think my dads heart is breaking, his body looks like it’s ready to conquer the world but on the inside its ready for retirement.

I think my dads heart is breaking, his smile keeps fading a little each day.

I think my dads heart is breaking, he used to say karma catches up to you, is it bad I think it’s finally caught up to him?

I think my dads heart is breaking, I don’t know how to fix it.
K Balachandran Mar 2014
Water color painting of her mindscape
visualized by an artist of repute
and its map, though not drawn on a scale
yet shows the topography and neighborhood,
gives a concrete idea to plan the conquest.

A route map to her heart, meticulously prepared
marking all shortcuts and blockages of passages,
that may lead to confusion and mix up
is an essential tool now at hand

A modern day marauder is just that
he has no time for sentiments of a pusillanimous lover
sentiments are bothersome,  portend troubles in store
if logistics are right, plan is great, any peak will stoop,

But yes, the moon they say plays havoc,
love poems that knead the hearts, songs and music
too, if comes between, the project may go bonkers
the problem here is the reign of unpredictability
when love starts its gallop and emotions the other horses
just follow without rules  whatsoever,
isn't it unwise trying to stop a dam breach?
Not even the dam breach software be of any help here,
no study is yet available on dissipating such passion,
dynamics of love is an unknown country altogether
no intelligence available is effective to move
against it and make the conquest certainly possible.
Chaotic Melodic Aug 2010
So sweet
It’s a lie
It’s sour, salty
And bitter
Like water
With bacon grease
Bubbling to the top
They expect her to swallow
With a smile on her face
The way she swallows
Her sadness
Letting it coat her intestines
The blockages
Embryonic emotions
In hibernation
As warrants
For soul arrest
© Cory McQueen
Dre G Feb 2013
heather why did you
come at this time, in the
midst of all the cacophonous
panic? forgiveness aside, i know
you're lifting lids from my
third eye, a gift you always had
in life, you still share selflessly
from the other side.

heather why did you
leave so ripe, in the
mist of a summer's moonset
cultivating cold? all my guilt
creates blockages, it cannot
fit inside me, it sits instead
as a crown in a place from which
you would pluck out both
horns and halos, and toss them
while laughing, into the stillness
of the sound.

i know these false records and
moon shifting memories are not
all i am left with. last night
when you laughed, it relieved some
of the pressure, but many times
i've seen you laugh when you were
sad, so how do i pull this
fringe all together?

heather why did i
ignore you for so long? was it just so
the scale could tip now, or are there
signals in the circles of the ripples
that rebirthed you?
Keith Trim Jan 2010
Grimly the silent crowd paces the familiar path
their faces fixed on some imagined horizon
they flow like water
around bins and blockages and around those who stand
briefly entranced by shining windows
gazing at glittering treasures
eyes lit by reflected streetlight.

The measured tread echoes in their heads
each with its own rhythm
but part of the dark symphony of progress
every mind focused on getting there
getting through
making it
making sure that none takes their place.

The dull streets carry the flood
as it moves like a hunched beast
shuffling mutely toward the holes in the ground
pouring down the gaping throat
into smoke and noise and heat.

And those of us who stop and watch
suddenly aware of the futility
stare in horror as we wonder what happened to our hopes and dreams
and , rejoining the march of the ******
we cling like drowning sailors to the floating thought
that we may be trudging life's filthy pavements but in our hearts we fly.
Amy shata Jan 2018
Sometimes I have these head blockages. Where my head gets lost. I don't where but it's almost like am out of my body.
I believe that I can't move like am screaming inside to tell myself to move but then nothing.
PARALYSED.
Confusion more than anything but paralysed.
When is it when u open ur eyes? in the morning or when you see your life for what it really is.
Still frozen in that moment it must have only been a minute but it's been an hour and I still haven't moved.
Can anybody else hear my thoughts?
I need to know why time moves faster than I can.
RB
I was red wine,
You were blueberry.

I was robust and full-bodied
Maybe the only one
As unpredictably
rich as you

And much worse
At concealing it

We joined in
Meals where we only
Discussed
What we were hungry for.

But in our starvation
We confused eachother

For food
And we tore
Ourselves
Apart

Imagine Breakfast
Lunch, and Dinner

Smiling across
at you
From the other side of
Your pillow

Because we
Weren’t after sustenance

It was never your taste
That satisfied
but still I had been licking
The salt off of your skin

Somehow, I was the one
That felt raw in the morning

But we were new to
The institution
Munchies were to be
Expected

But our empty calories
Created blockages around my heart

Only the basic needs
Slipped through
Reminding me of
The hunger I was stifling

We boiled over
And looked elsewhere for feed

You had broken
Your diet lifestyle
Not seeing how
Emaciated it had made you

You indulged yourself
On the richness of being filled

And you threw it up
Silently in the bathroom
Flushing away
The burning

So no one
Would ever know

But I saw the color
Return to your cheeks
As we set our table
For the meal we would

Never eat.
Candra Sifuentes Jul 2018
My Love
All those years we were lovers
and bestfriends.
Well in my mind we were soulmates.
Now I see my love really never meant anything.
All those 'I love you' you were lieing through you teeth.
Your so cruel to let me believe you loved me.
Now I see my love never really meant anything.
How can you take my love and play those wicked games.
I gave you all my love you were my everything.
Now I see my love never really meant anything.
I hope you unthaw that ice cold heart emotional blockages shaping your reality.
Now I see my love never really meant anything.
One day you will think of me you will miss me and I will be long gone in love with someone new and happy.
Gods1son Jan 2019
Life is like a maze
Lots of turns,
Blockages
But there is always a way

Sometimes, one has to go back
And follow another track
Ensure to pick all the gems on the way
Including those along the blocked path
butterfly May 2017
the unbroken in the air flowing
sprinkles universe, earth and trees
chrysoprase of the land

the unbroken in the water flowing
soften the stony,  tamed the beasts
rhodonite of the mountains

the unbroken inhabits the earth
soil fertiled, flowers bloomed its grace
cease insecurities

the unbroken in the air flowing
sync yellow n blue, yin n yang
engendered the earth

the unbroken in the water flowing
rage calms, exhausted nerves revitalized
prisoners unchained, free'n blockages

the unbroken flowing
universe stands
serum of the earth

the energy
flowing within and without
the unbroken
Journey into the unknown : From darkness to lightness
Mateuš Conrad Aug 2016
sliding your slippers against the wooden flooring
for the grit, the sand, the rattle, is very much like playing
the jazz drums while shaking the maracas... jazz drummers
with brushes, ever so slightly the sand-timers' expression...
horace silver's sighin' n' cryin'... it's sandy, shaky,
a 40 degree heat  off the isle of Celsius...
boom boom bara boom... ta'dum  ta'dum tapas baked at noon...
i love the all the instruments can break away from their rhythmic
roles and do a solo... everyone is minded, no one is dismissed...
everyone take a part... once the base freed from rhythm,
takes to solo, another instrument takes the leading
role in providing the rhythm, the many
handshakes in jazz, the merchant's ergonomics,
then the piano solos... then the sax,
and then the drums... while some other instrument
takes the lead for the rhythm...
maybe my love of jazz stemmed from
never getting to grips with rap: the deviation
from the puritan practices of poet-speak...
but we're far removed from philosophers...
they can take their comparisons and
arguments elsewhere...
compared to philosophers and novelists...
who **** out a constipated 600 page novels
weaving, constantly weaving...
we're journalists in the ozone layer...
poetry forgot the old grievance with philosophy,
it just said: i attire myself with journalistic ambitions,
that's where i preside, and nowhere else...
indeed, jazz means much more than it did
in the 20th century, in the 21st century we are just
about seeing it's status improved as equal to a Mozart,
adding the spontaneity... forever divorced from
mingling with poetry... because no one would
dare to mash-up a session with Mozart playing
in the background... well, adding the Operas...
no jazzy operatic would ever work, even
with Porgy & Bess...
but still, the sandy rhythm of the drums...
like rain on umbrellas, but in reality like
Sahara dropping on an umbrella in Algiers...
the laziness and fulfilment...
i simply can't despair like some poet
commenting on a Liszt performance...
i love the lazy Caribbean approach...
if it ain't broke, don't fix it...
and if it's broke, allow at least a few days of
fermentation... never be too busy as to later
bust on what life means to only relieve yourself
with a meaning: just work, therefore it works,
life just means work... they've been selling
us the Auschwitz slogan for a long time.
it wasn't a wet crash cymbal, crash or splash as such...
it was the sand-paper scratch of the brush-strokes
on the floor tom and the snare;
as some might consider arithmetic the quantum
physics of the other linear expression of counting -
quantum (a particular source of all our mental
blockages, call the plumbers of our blanks) -
so too the keeping of rhythm as superior against
keeping count... just when the two seemed identical,
keeping rhythm: 1, 1, 1, 1
            rather than keeping count: 1, 2, 3, 4...
came on top... just like 1 x 9 made more intellectual
improvements to sentence the symbols to
that hide & seek of binary (0-0, 1-1, 2-10, 3-11, 4-100, 5-101,
6-110, 7-111, 8-1000)...
keeping rhythm and the original spontaneity,
keeping count and the precursor of pre-ordained script;
i don't see what certain words should become like castles,
with moats and bridges and hot-melt poured on
the attackers... but they have become like castles...
totally deviating access with our request for accessing them...
while other words lie about like pennies on the pavement...
where everyone can pick them up and exploit them...
flick them, make them crowd gathering utensils,
shame that some words ended up so sacred as to be
commonplace in our adventure into ignorance...
while other words became the crowd-pleasing
five loaves of bread and two fish... sure enough
certain words became just that...
other words became elephants... like calculus... or
evolution... it's not that people wouldn't reach a zenith
of sustenance with them, that their stomachs would be
filled... it's that eating such words was impossible...
because they couldn't stomach / digest them...
it was really like trying to eat a whole elephant in one
go, rather than a small portion and freezing the rest...
these days people still try to compete in the eating races,
trying to eat the entire elephant in one go...
and every time they try it, they fail, by simply regurgitating
what they couldn't eat for another person to eat...
given the span of 2000 years from that famous
spectacle of 5000 x 5 x 2....we hardly know whether
1 multiplied by anything will be adequate to satiate us
to have the cement dry and
allow certainty to provide us with established norm,
and the process of forgetting the instigator of
the original idea.
Lone Wolf Oct 2014
I've always loved color symbology
The silver of the sharpest blade
Is fluid, emotional, sensitive, mysterious.
Is soothing, calming, purifying. Silver
helps with the cleansing and releasing,
mental, emotional issues and blockages
My pink tinged, pale skin
Is a sign of hope. It is positive, warm
comforting feelings, everything will be okay.
Suddenly violated by a shock of red, which
can give confidence to those
who are shy or lacking in will power.
the color red symbolizes and awakens
our elusive, physical life force.
And after all is said and done
All is wrapped in white clothe bandages
purity, innocence, wholeness and completion.
white is the color of new beginnings,
wiping the slate clean,
It is the blank canvas waiting to be written upon.
Yet these colors together, are never positive.
vea vents May 2016
If you’re sad; let it tell you what you lack, what you yearn for but are disconnected from.

If you’re afraid; let it tell you what you evade, what you need to confront and forgive yourself for.

If you’re mad; let it tell you what boundaries in you have been crossed, what aspects of you have been left invalidated.

If you’re happy; let it tell you who you are — outside the blockages of time and space.

And if you feel a burst of sensitivity; express it in art.

*Express it in art.
Homunculus Jan 2019
As the hour draws late,
      all the tribes gather,
The band begins to play, and
      in the midst of their serene
Exchange of musical phrases,
      I meet a quite peculiar man.
His dreadlocks hang way
      down past his shoulders, and
Above his rope sandals and
      patchwork pants, he sports
A shirt, emblazoned with
      a portrait of Lord Ganesha
Seated serenely in Lotus posture,
      overlaid by a wire wrap necklace
With a large piece of opal in the center.

His pupils are the size of
       dinner plates, nearly
Eclipsing the irises of his eyes.
       his musk is a distinctive mixture of
Body odor, *** smoke, and strong incense.
       we exchange our salutary pleasantries, and
As I absorb the spectacle of his appearance,
      he begins to discourse, saying:

"I charge my crystals
    in the moonlight, and
Keep them close by day,
   they clear my chi blockages, and
Realign my chakras,
   I burn sage and patchouli
To invoke the goddess
   spirit of the forest moon,
We are all just cosmic vibration
   expressed as living matter in
The timeless unity of
  the flowering astral plane"

He pauses for a moment,
     to light his spliff, and
After a few large tokes, continues on,
     describing the events of one fateful night,
When he "sat for a long spell, and
      experienced an unbridled quiescence of
Meditative stillness, culminating in a
      stream of flowing fractal visions, and a
      Whirlwind of
                             Pulsating
                                  Kundalini
                                       Energy

I listen with a sort of
   detached amusement, but
My brain is filtering his words out, and
    all I can hear are bursts of Charlie Brown's
Parents from the old Peanuts cartoon
    Interpolated with sentence fragments
That all seem to say the same thing:

"Look at me, I am so spiritual
  I am so profound I am so wise
I know the Truth I am enlightened"
"mwah Mwah mwah Mwah mwah
Mwah mwah Mwah mwah Mwah"

and then, suddenly, this haze of
  pseudo profound spirit science is
Interrupted by a phrase that grabs my
  attention, with strange immediacy.
"Also, I've got some fire doses. 5 a hit."

"Oh yeah?" I say. "ME, TOO, and
"I know mine are better, best on lot!"
He seems taken aback, as if offended.
He says he'll Pepsi challenge mine, and
That I'll be proven wrong. I accept.

He then pulls out  
a shiny vial of
Lucy in the Sky, and
Without hesitation,
squirts a generous
Puddle of it onto my tongue.

"Alright" he says "your turn."
I reach into my pocket,
Produce a small vial, and
Reciprocate his action.
"Now, we'll see!" He says
to me, with an air of smugness.
"That, we will" I retort.

We talk a bit longer, and
I look down at my watch.
"I must be off!" I say
"It's time for the show!"

We exchange our goodbyes, and
I wander off into the night,
Feeling rather odd,
He thinks he's bested me, but
I laugh quietly to myself,
Knowing in my mind,
That my vial was just eye drops, and
He just gave me nearly 10 hits for free, and
All for the sake of inflating the ego
He supposedly didn't have,

and you know...

I never saw him again after that.
This satirical ode is targeted at a very specific type of person. Some of my friends are what you might call "hippies"; and within the various circles associated with that subculture, you almost inevitably encounter the self styled guru, spouting off loads of pseudo-profound hogwash, using buzzwords from cultures and traditions he doesn't really understand, and effectively cheapening and undermining them in a vain attempt to make himself seem enlightened (probably to try and get laid). What's worse is that almost just as certainly will you find someone, perhaps even a group, who hangs on to his every word. These types are especially common at big music festivals.
Sirenes Jun 2016
The darkness is treacherous
There's beauty here
All the things
We've gathered around us
Mere reminders
Of when that heart-shaped locket
Was hung around our necks
As a compliment of being loved.

In this we relish too.
The beast sits in the corner
Content that it's dark here.
Content of the care
You've devoted to it.
The love you've bestoved upon it.
You write the letter
To the ones who await for a word from you.
There's a pillow
Where the wood planks
Stand angeled across each other.

We stay calm
We know our limits.
We know how far we can go
Before we awaken the beast.
One loud noise
And it will open it's eyes
And send it's roar
In to the night.

We know it will not harm us
It will only harm itself.
And so each day
We recondition it
To know that a roar
Is just a roar
And not all men
Who carry sticks
Use them to hit you.

*caring for the beast is love and light in it's own right. For all things that were build to protect us, will one day come to hinder us.
"Love melts all blockages and transforms all life"
Psyche, it's a story about forgiveness!
*** the beast is just a kittywitty who needs hugs and kissies
Take care of the beast before you revist that heart-shaped locket.
Dan Hess Feb 2021
Sun and moon in me

river of light and ocean of emotion
always spilling over pulchritudinous petals
of the unfurling lotus of energy

til comes the withering of flowers
when love ceases to flow
inertia, become inert
dormant in my hurt
i shrivel
so

now in night, when i sleep,
the mind unwinds there in the deep
my hidden, hollow heart it keeps

a home, alone, within me
aching emptily
in nightmarish symmetry
i view myself, unruly

but I know I am alone
to undertake the healing
of the heart I call my home
to fill me up again

so in the light of day I rise
open my mind
and beckon starlight

to shine a beacon through me
connecting everything to nothing
Earthbound energy in true reunion
with the cosmic overflow

Balancing duality of being
love of light, and darkest night
in honoring and seeing
my virtues and my plight
my stardust, gleaming

Alchemizing mind, body and soul;

effervescence, as the salt of the earth
dissolves in the endless ocean
restoring emotion
allowing tears to flow freely
once again
Mateuš Conrad Sep 2020
i was aiming to sort out some computer
details outside the realm
of the corporate world of hierarchy...
something like that...
talking to a 56 year old kazakh in
romford: about the turks and the mongols...
about giving up smoking (not really):
and how i am addicted to carbon
monoxide while he is bagging big chews
from the nicotine gum: fiddly fingers
and something akin to peeling carrots
and power-tame-toes!
fiddles for foreskins...
in this one instance i am... beside buying
into... "the narrative"...
a crown descends...
   a crow is the equivalent of crown:
phonetically: in greek... amore...
                  the rest of the day completed
itself... with me walking from
Chadwell Heath to Romford...
marking my feet on a shortcut through
the green belt...
the traffic noises died...
i just stood in a middle of a field
the vikings might have envied...
no no no...
   the blistering azure piercing breath
and making me embody a loitering of a soul...
three birds of prey...
how is it... that birds of prey rarely
flap their wings... they... just... hover...
impossibly perfect...
they hone in on something...
circle around and around
like a vultures' manifesto...
     i was waiting to see the dive
but i didn't see it: not out of impatience...
i was in a secluded partition of england
yet i was still attempting to buy a bicycle
in Chadwell Heath -
i looked at myself not looking at
anything prior...
this solitary whitey:
i don't mind the remark...
thank god the slaves of colour want
to either see no colour or... too...
the hues of copper, cinnamon...
      teases of cacao...
                           a cuban ****...
                so much was poured into
a runic revision -
    best: an invigoration...
                    toothpicks for words:
an arithmetic of my teeth...
        i am beside myself welcoming
the intrusion of "minority":
perhaps in little ol' removed Swansea -
i am the lord mayor the city might
need me...
   in somewhere like Chadwell Heath...
buying a lion white chocolate bar
is perhaps sub-cultural -
the same old pauper of what-a-load of
violins bundled up on a bench
by the church... a last imploring gesture...
drinking that gorgon's blood
of a dutch equivalent of carlsberg's
spezial broo (or -ew)...
          on these isles: these bright and beautiful
isles:
you can't "sell me": the irish are still
speaking... english?!
the irish are not speaking gaelic -
my god... this terrible hammer from
Lincolnshire -
     when and as to how...
the Welsh took it upon themselves
to become this sacred heaven of bilingualism -
so much for learning Dutch -
or... Bel-ge-an -
  Flemz? Flimsy Choc-a-Block...
       choke on a tired rubber of a tire...
stage a newbie ***** flick from
the dungeons of **** Bruges...
or some ***** / wide my pony: rha rha rho...
that the Welsh still cling to a tongue:
spirit pairing:
of the Polacks under the geography
of the third partition...
of the czechs under the habsburgs -
          history as a fetish...
no... more... "natural selection" beside
the already prescribed antics of ape ****
and meteor... and time impossible...
to have... selective historicism...
naturally?
             that "we" are at a stage where
something is deemed necessary - otherwise not...
but then again it's not...
since: who the hell will remember "us"?
i drink... but i also write...
i guess the writing is more of an exercise
in amnesia than the drinking -
the drinking helps: in that i am more blunt,
boringly honesty:
un-spec-tac-ular for the best...
  i just can't imagine myself writting anything
worse than a journalistic tabloid
palette will allow...
    sure: no rhyme no river for a narrtive:
concretely focused on an (a) through to a (z)...
pay... i guess the concept of
pay is showing through...
          well then... my whittle hobby:
my whittle: it can become impossible -
that the secular niqab
   will not protect you from the stench
of old goats' **** in a public toilet -
the solipsism of farting in a cogested
public "picturesque"...
to have to believe in both narratives:
the mainstream of lies and these -
offshoots of the best / better informed...
my little paranoid agenda is no
agenda... but enough of my beard
shackles a: thorough "through"...
red is longer a bull pointer antagonist...
up could be a down...
but it's not that: well... it is...
that people made a constituted forward:
towing - best kept replicas...
how could it be possible to procrastinate
a diminishing of transcendence:
that freedom is already a pork-pie glutton
and constipation...
"think-tanks"...
      tanks... ego rifles?
      shoot the dummy... play the cerebral
palsy mannequin tossing...
the utopia of hyperhondriacs...
a diaspora of polacks and the greeks...
that the machinery has been
well established... that the machine has
been well oiled...
and is "econimally" sound...
     gentle rub rub gentlest rubbing rub-up...
and down...
and my flesh this least copernican
crux... which has not orientated
itself around either sun, star...
earth or moon...
          
            expanding cycle lanes will
not bring about a new dutch republic...
nor will i sell a pancake for
the purpose of levelling the himalayas...
this brittle conundrum of bogus...
two narratives:
alter-alter -
what-if and... what-if...
                but red's not red:
there's no shawl for a hemmingway
for sooner last:
for a Catalonia...
to romance the world afresh...
but now there's a McDonalds in
Stockholm: future knowledge...
a globalist ghetto -

how the joke that  was once
Sweden is no longer...
this same... cyclops of culture mantra...
of lore: Sveeden: "so tolerant"...
and now the world and no...
this is not a world...
based on the focus of scrutiny
of a world: no... there's
no heidegger's dasein:
there's...

the magic trick for the masses...
which is much more spectacular...
and how willing there's a dulling of perception..
i am of the custard pie...
i am the custard pie...
            
              hiersein: "there" or "here" of...
ahem...                wohin?
that word comes with a question puncture...
you don't actually use the word:
where... without a question mark... no?
you can compound a complexity
akin to heidegger's with: here-being
alias "concern"...
well then... the solipsism of: "over-there"...
a pointer... it's a lack of reconciling the masses
with any ontological... "scrutiny"...

plus up: ++++ pardons for:
blistering of and this leftover scab of narrative...
before the double knee of
b.l.m. and beijing -
now... best left with fighting the nazis...
i'll say it outright...
best left with fighting the nazis...
best fighting a well attired SS-man
in some hugo boss suit...
of pristine khaki... grey or black...
but no... not now...
dulling of suits...
              
   now i'm on par with the argument:
i want nazis! i want to fight nazis!
oh... wait... they're not blonde...
or german or... believe me:
they could have hidden in the Crimean
peninsula...
             but no... but not now...
i want to fight: the *******: good-luck
joke of history...
but this evil is so bland...
it's so terrestrial...
   the same mundane evil coupled
with my own terrestrial existence probing
of conversation / no argument...

the Welsh still speak: "Welden"...
   Velsh... in a climate where... the union
jack is looking up the h'american *******...
but the scots but the irish don't retain
their ******* gaelic...
good for you:
like a nuanced slang of the english cricketer...
tourist... hello... world...
tourist... hello world...
               my now new reality:
legal immigration this little ******...
this no burden of a Ruś -
a warraring burden from a scent in the air...
that there's no concrete:
sulphur stinking zeppelin ruining the skies
at: come night... come lazily this lost day...
this lost day...

once more: when st. patrick met up
with a mule that became
a farce and a ghost-face
of sitting loiter:
anti-saint: humpty-coŁal-sky-
             dumps a truce...
valiant against the propaganda cogs
and blockages...
the retorts of the salvaged plumber...
my new authority: my lost authority...
F'f'f'f'fever pitch for a hannibal...

Carthage must counter: euthanasia...
me best sold "neuter"...
that there is an unconvincing this:
bias this base...
******* on a whiskey soaked
cigarette...
that a guinness can only be drank
from a glass of a measure of a pint...
don't blister me with
this and these details of a gargantuan
t'is... i want a poetry on the basis
of future: dead...

            ****-soaked revelation
of a brick willing: to sell a "hybrid"
sorta-glue: a congestion...
           this my sacred ****...
my tongue this lesser oyster -
      a skull that cannot fathom
   the jaw line...
      witness my own very little...
my leisured attention span...
no new no wriggling of index
as the best pickled earth-worn...

              habitually: a shirt worn
to expand upon an objectivity for
the tow of a shirt with...
creases...
this lesser ambiguity of
a prompt that preserves itself
with a: lost project of ambiguity -

that we somehow accepted
a new, a nuance... a blister and a heaving...
catterpillar dues...
count! count the arithmetic per-take!
back in the ***** of mother russia...
little people do little things...
big people do: crab load of ****:
this sort of philanthrophy...
because: aghast...
the mistantrophe is the next
best fang...
like chewing gum and mawler
of a fake tooth:
my best kept bones...

              heritage of radio and a ******...
but, once upon a time...
my little overt detailing...
romance mr. marshall this little
casablanca and my own tunis -
chasing shadows with
a little insy-winsy spiders to tow...
my own cob...
my own prague pangs of summer
that they are still:
the cobblestones to resound
with horse hoofs...

the last... lost... project...
to have to rejuvinate the revision
of the roman empire...
that there was no james joyce's ullyses
from 200 AD...
there was an old greek in
the new greek in the byzantine choral
chant...
     goody-goody-fwyfays
2020 my lost year...
the year when i begged for a slack:
a diminished point of a pair of *******...
how sober somehow worked...
that drunk was no new sensible...
doubt and its plethora of all the least
possible jargon of emotions:
a McDowell a McCurieal...
   a Dot MacKenzzies...
a lord assumption of surnames that:
there was no ever...
Hogwarts of the choicest of godfather
names... when this blessed babe
of the agony srap..
this tendering of bones...
          my little mongolia...
a variation of Kiev that could expand
into Ukraine...
                       but: ah... now...
a little chisel of england or...
aa bandage off...
this whittle hinter of big bypass flyover
most pristine:
utopia h'americana...
                          Boston bleeds:
Chigaco sort of... fakes...
on the cackle of a letter...
gate? i say... Gate?
      shique: cack: ago: co: go...
no "lord assumption"...
my lord this same ***** diary
this rusty panser..
                                 and i have
to somehow embarass myself
with a "belief" in a... god?!

                  of the non-exisstence of
a god among "sensible" people...
this little deity of transcending...
my quest for a satanic project
gorgon...
         stashed up conjure:
of.. the death-litany...
my own explanation...
            my own little wording that
has to arrive at a...
******* and a variation of hues
that borrows from green...
blue... and the mediating...
              hard-world-of-grey...
this my loosening of tendons...
the easing of muscle to tow
some fat...
my new: hammering...
chicken shackles...
rummanating the lost
ordeal of the perpliexing *** ordeal
of catholicism -
time to *******! time to!

my best pointers:
corpus christi:
we did start off with cannibalism...
we did start off with cannibalism...
metaphorical?
was it ever really a posit of
images that were only read by braille
sooths?
christianity is a cannibalism...
it's so hertbreaking that:
there's no god or an infinite man
of the little things to make
a composition of polyphony...

i can't read into a jesus when there's
the cannibalism:
a "metaphor" for a metaphysics...
a death of poetry: hell...
**** me for the necessary death
of rhyme...
            now "jew" like any basic
posit of a yew...
    prior to the real established
scrutiny of a nation-state...
which has to be fathomed
with Israel...
the hebrews have finally found
their: woke and roll...

           the jews were excused from
towing along to the crucifix...
and when all was done...
and this new camel jockey prize...
king crimson...
isn't cited: unless in the spanish circles
along with portishead...

i have desired this blatant death
that it might contend with Barcelona...
or a sequence if a brothel
from Bulgaria imitating throttle Thailand...
my little ex-girlfriend...
come 5am... and it is still
oxford st. and a flagship wake-me-up...
this old leveraging London matters...
i am but the sharpnel of words
that cannot possible reproduce:
brick-top sensibilities...

my litter interludes basket of futurist "what if"
existences in the Bedlam of epitaphs...
i might have been crowned the prince
of Anjou...
   i might have cradled the thirds
of the third crusade...
i might just as well be the beggar from
the annals of history making journalistic
progressions... to sow: death... to tow...
belittling creases of lost
adventures... creasing the skin prone:
proof... a detail of a scalp that's not...
  em... retail... wigs...
                          you wanna make me a glutton:
fist based... there was no turmeric involved...
the "convenience"...
yes... a bone-ah-tomahawk...
  my best attired cannibal...
it's such a taming project...
i want to be chemically sedated by disproofs...
but then... i am...
squandering what little i have
of romancing russia...
or thereby greece...

  this is the part where i try to borrow from
a differentiation of...
second from last:
stream of borrowed cocktails...
or...
my best screaming streamer -
i nice unto you...
you...
no... i very much like this cul de sac
of: i nice unto you...
why? the work invites no
technicality that can be
detailed into a trans-generational...
my last Epicurus joke...

crease a child an ultimatum of
competition...
conjunctions of grief...
not biggest thank you...
i thank you as to why
i... not because i wanted
to drink...
sober people are splits and
just plain boring...
towing toes to tango:
no game of twos...
sober people have no...

   my best tomato ketchup fake
blood load of argumentation...
bias / basis...
generic *******...
cause no happy bride:
was ever to be prized...
or prided..
my little gimmick wonderland
of a shtick...
no thank god i never married...
thank god i toiled around
with...
bread-knit...
and... cuneiform woke...
best kept islam: a foretold
variation of agriculture...
the plantation ridicule plumber of
eastern european choice:
****-dumbdumb...
dies with... incorporated
neu-Birmingham...
******* polacks...
too proud to think they could replace
us *****: first prized Pakis...

ahem... yes... what?!
this be Westminster...
tax haven collector's bias?
do i have a face that might coincide with:
i had...
but right now?
no... i couldn't give a tonne's load
of ******* to mind
it being a copernican: first invoked
sort of... affair...
savvy?!
Joana Silva Oct 2018
I feel the green grass under my feet and I feel blessed.
Whether my skin is being kissed by the sun
or dancing with the waves of the sea,
I feel blessed.
When my feet are ***** with dust,
My lungs feel the clean air around, smelling the Nature,
And my hair is a complete mess,
I feel happy.
I love the little things life gives us.
I feel so grateful for those people who made me grow,
Even if it was hurtful in the past,
Because I am learning to forgive.
Forgive and let go.
Heal. Myself and others.
From the past and from the fears about the future.
Because miracles happen. No, not only in movies.
I've heard about them, I saw them, I felt them before.
Sometimes I have doubts and fears
And I let my Ego speak louder than my Soul.
But my Soul is patient, kind and she knows wounds need time to heal.
So she whispers nice things to me when I'm scared
or feeling lonely,
or feeling sad.
My Soul puts her arms around me in a giant hug of Love,
Compassion,
Forgiveness,
Peace.
She tells me to believe.
That I'm worth it.
That I have miracles happening in my life too,
"or did you forget?" she asks.
She shows me my past, when I thought I couldn't make it,
But it did,
When I though it was impossible,
But it wasn't,
When I thought I was alone,
But I had so many people right there, waiting, with their arms wide open,
And with lots of Love to give me.
Suddendly I feel myself smiling,
Sometimes crying at the same time,
While I feel more and more gratitude in my heart,
Because the messages I need to evolve, to break all the chains,
and knots, and blockages,
They always find a way to get to me.
So to all of you, right there, I love you
And I'm grateful you are part of my life
That last conversation we had was the one I hate the most ..
That conversation made us what we were years ago "Strangers"
But now we only "act" as one
No.. I can't block you anywhere neither Facebook, WhatsApp nor Instagram
For those blockages are temporary
For to test my mettle I have to let you settle and drain out of my brain ..
Maybe every love isn't the Shakespearean comedy nor it is a tragedy ..
Some love are just meant to be incomplete..

Time elapsed , tears collapsed and now I'm ready not to let you go but to accept the fact that I can't let you in anymore ..
For I can't write this down again and again...
This is only for one last time ..
Yes you'll be missed in every phone call that exceeds the safe time limit
Yes you'll be missed every time I sit in that back row seat, this time watching at the screen
Yes you'll be missed whenever I have a news to share

I don't know the reason for the breakup you gave, that too just a few days short of our 7th anniversary...
My best guess is I'm not perfect..
Maybe you expected more from me than it was humanly possible to give ...
Maybe I sometimes forgot, when you needed  me the most ...

So, thanks for bearing with me all those years ..
Which were the best ..
Now I have story to tell...
And an aching heart to feel the emptiness..
An emptiness which is too deep to be filled ..
So, guys love is beautiful until it ***** ..!!!
Day #9: Grand Canyon to Williams Arizona (p.m.)

The East Entrance to the Canyon had always been my least favorite way to enter the Park. I usually arrived by the elevated and back canyon road from Flagstaff known as Arizona Rt.# 64.  Alpine and rural, it was more than a mile up in the clouds. Today though, I had no other choice and would enter the park from the lowest depths of a barren landscape.  It was dusty and hot (106’) when I passed the old Cameron Trading Post just before the Park’s entrance.  I turned onto the park road and looked high up into the distance before me. The greatest sight visible anywhere on earth, and the standard bearer of all God’s creation, was just beyond my reach — but it wouldn’t be for long!

I climbed the twenty-six miles toward the rim, and as the temperature dropped, my spirit soared.  The memory of Sam was now a spiritual bead on my Rosary to be remembered in my thoughts and prayed for every day. I saw two great hawks soaring overhead.  They were not moving their wings and remained motionless as they went higher.  I knew they were caught in the great updraft of something whose true height could not be measured and whose depths would never be fully explored.

The Comfort Zone Of Relative Size And Dimension Was About To                                           Disappear

At the top, I saw at least 100 cars parked along the canyon’s edge.  This marked the first series of rims and lookout points for what no first visitor was ever ready to see.  As I searched for a place to park the bike, the returning vision of something I had never been able to explain rushed out and overtook me again.  

I knew, after so many visits, you never looked into the Grand Canyon without permission. The only way to truly see what your eyes were about to embrace was to accept the changes happening inside of you as you stood in her presence. The Canyon took hold of all searchers and played with their sight while making it her own.  Finally, she gave back to the lucky few a new vision of themselves, affirming those things that they had up until now denied.

It was a mid-August day, and I had never been here during the height of tourist season.  As I walked to the Canyon’s edge, I had to weave through the packed in crowd of European and Asian tourists lining the rail. Looking off into her distance, a blessed transformance emptied my soul. It created space for what I was hoping to take with me, and with each visit I knew the cost increased. Each time I left, there would be an even greater part of myself left behind — a part that would call out when my confusion returned.  The Great Canyon cared not about reasons or circumstance, she stood only as she is, a GIANT, isolated from all ordinary things, a connective force that allowed us to dream beyond ourselves … and to eventually see.  

It led you beyond what you thought yourself capable of before.  And without guidepost or roadmap, it brought you only and exactly to where you most needed to go.  The Great Canyon began where your imagination ended and, by looking into her depths, you were at once changed and transformed.  Transformation being measured by what you left behind.

The Great Canyon neither pretended to know what you know nor portended your future. Timeless and unchallenged, she stood guard over all that is. Your questions here were but echoes from a distant memory.  It was, the one spot on earth, where you stood and heard the answers returned to you for what they were — disturbing reminders that much of your life had been spent in denial.  

She neither blessed nor forgave, and her message spoke only of today. Whether you looked one time or stared into her unending depths forever, she treated you the same.  All meaning was derived from what she taught and the immediacy of how that made you feel.

Like two things that must be shaken together to be truly mixed, the Grand Canyon joined your mind and spirit in a cocktail that intoxicated your soul. She inebriated your entire being.  Yes, she was that big and more.  To say otherwise only reinforced what you still needed to know.  She continually poured all that she was, and is, into everything that you were not. Like the arid canyons and valleys that were overflowing with her waters, our spirits hoped to become a small tributary into what she had become.  

Becoming was all that mattered in the Canyon, yesterday and tomorrow were for those already dead inside.  I looked up again and saw the Great Hawk. Its wings were tucked back in dive position, and it was headed toward its destiny in the Colorado River below.  All of life’s summation was contained within its dive, and all that would ever matter in my own life was contained in the connection I felt.

I stopped at ten different rims that afternoon, but one would have been enough. What stared back at me never changed until everything inside of me was again new. My first look into the eyes of my Spiritual Mother 30 years ago, and the one again today, released me from ever having to be in only one place. She called to me in the most distant reaches of my isolation and reminded me that whenever lonely or confused, with her — I would always have a home.

There was never a way to come ‘to terms’ or to ‘make peace’ with what the Canyon taught. The very best you could hope for was to live unguarded and within the message of her timeless beauty. Within your spiritual awakening there would be found an eternal connection, and in the release that it brought you … you could make peace with yourself.  

There were no rooms, either inside or outside the park, as I passed by Canyon Village. I gladly bypassed the tourist frenzy that happened at both sunset and sunrise and pointed the bike further South.  I did not resent or begrudge the tourists for what they did or for what they thought they wanted.  I just needed to be alone with my mother, but for today that might have to wait.  As I left the Park, I spotted the long gravel road that was used only by the park service. It was open and still had not been paved.  I turned left and traveled its half-mile length to a ****** rim which faced off to the East. I had worried, when coming up from Cameron, that it might no longer be accessible.  It was here that I had always been able to talk to my mother alone, and the place where her voice had always been loudest and strong.

  As She Sensed My Approach, The Ancient Memories Returned

It was a private access road, and by design was restricted to all trespassers like me. My mother had called loudest to me from here, and I liked thinking of this place as hers and mine alone. After less than five minutes in her presence, two hikers came out of the bushes saying: “WOW, the view is really spectacular from here.”  I realized at that moment that the concept of ownership was still one of my many faults and one that I had to work on if I was ever to become totally free.  I shared my mother with the two German hikers, as we celebrated in communal reverence an unspoken reflection.

An hour later, and having made two new friends, I was again on my way. I eased the bike down the old service road and made the left turn onto Rt.#64 toward Flagstaff.  From this spot on the Canyon’s Far South Rim, I had only eighty more miles to go.  In her neither giving nor taking away, my mother had put me at rest about Sam. As she said goodbye she left me with the words: “Your sympathy will never change what only your empathy can set free.”  

I exited the Park in a southerly direction and saw no other people.  The only sound I heard was my mother’s heartbeat. It was from the current she carried deeply inside of her so far below.  I thanked her again for having kept me close and reminded her of how much my father loved her. By returning me to her this week, he reaffirmed his deepest feelings.  And from the High Northern Regions that fed her each spring, he stood forever vigilant and on-guard. She smiled back at me from her great distance and expressed with her silence the things that only he could hear and the things that a son, no matter how dutiful, could never truly understand.  

The high pines that lined this back road out of the Canyon made it one of my favorite rides.  It was getting to be late afternoon, as I rolled past the cattle herds and cut timber that filled this high mountain plateau. Most would never associate this landscape with Arizona, as it more resembled Idaho or Northwestern Colorado. This part of the Great Canyon State was atypical of what you expected and special unto itself.  In thirty miles, I came to a major fork in the road.  To the left was Flagstaff, but to the right was Williams.  Both towns sat on Interstate Rt.#40, but Williams was closer, and since I had never spent the night there before, I took the fork to the right.

        Newness Was Always Birth Mother To My Anticipation

In a long hour I was in Williams. It was one of the old original stops along the Mother Road. At one time, Rt#66 was the main artery East and West across America.  It was along its corridor, and before the interstate highway system was built, that the great motorized migrations of Detroit iron began. Williams was still trying to eke out a living based on the myth of the old road, and a resurgence and hunger for 1950’s glory kept the tourists coming … especially those fifty and older. It was quaint and touristy, but then it always had been. It was also mostly authentic and looked just as it had when the autos were carbureted, the air-conditioner was a hand crank on the inside of the car’s door, and families were large.

After I circled the town twice on its two parallel (and 1-way) main roads, hunger overtook me, and I was in search of good food.  I was lucky enough to get the last room at the Red Garter Inn where I parked the motorcycle for the night.  After a quick fresh up in the bathroom, I left my helmet on the bedside table and hung my Kevlar riding jacket on the back of the closet door.  I was still in the lower half of my riding suit, with my boots on, as I headed into town.  It was something that I had learned years ago and was now a rule that I carefully observed. Staying in my riding suit prompted conversations with strangers and other motorcyclists that would never have happened otherwise.  Tonight turned out to be no exception.

It Also Allowed Me To Travel Out From Pennsylvania With Only                                          One Small Bag

As I walked up a side street from my hotel into town, I heard one of the two things I was looking for, ‘Live Music.’ The guitar player was halfway through ‘Gentle On My Mind,’ by the great Mississippi River banjo player, John Hartford.  Most people thought Glenn Campbell had written the song on his famous Ovation 12-string guitar. He did have a big hit with it back in the 60’s, but it was actually written by John Hartford and a song that I had always loved.  As I followed my ears, the guitar player morphed right into the great instrumental, ‘Classical Gas,’ by Mason Williams.  By now I could see the café/restaurant at the next corner, and from all outward appearances, it was everything I had hoped for.

It Was Called Pancho McGillicuddys, And The Food Smelled As                             Good As The Music Sounded

The waitress seated me at an outside table with a view of the street.  I was less than thirty feet from where the guitar player sat, as he started to play the great Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg song — ‘Somewhere Over The Rainbow.’  This is the greatest American song ever written, and he performed it well.  Upon finishing, he took a break, and the waitress came back for my order.  The quesadilla combo, refried beans, and local micro-brew, sounded perfect, as the sun disappeared behind me and off to my left. The last table was being seated, as the gas lights came on that lined the streets, and darkness became a backdrop to a magical sky.    

I couldn’t remember the last time I felt this hungry.  The waitress brought my food as the guitar player returned.  The first song of his new set was ‘Fire And Rain,’ by James Taylor, which is my favorite song of all time. I knew at that moment, that on this night, and in this town, I was exactly where I was supposed to be.  I decided to give my mind the night off and just go with the music.  If you’re ever in Williams, and in need of a travel break, I can’t recommend McGillicuddys highly enough.

Sometimes, Like Tonight, The ‘Road’ Presents You With A Special                                                    Gift

A big smile was permanently implanted on my face, as a family of four came in and was seated at the table to my left.  It was a father and mother in their late forties, and two teenaged boys. The father was wearing a lacrosse t-shirt from a school I didn’t recognize, so when he looked over and smiled, I said, “Nice to see a Lacrosse shirt so far from home.” He answered: “We’re from Portsmouth Virginia and out here on vacation, I played at Woodberry-Forest, and both boys now play at their respective schools.”

He then said, “So what are you riding?” The boots and the riding pants were a dead giveaway, as the guitar player started ‘Cheeseburger In Paradise’ by Jimmy Buffett.  He was sure it was a Harley, as I explained I was riding a Honda Goldwing. I told him that after 40 years of riding, the Goldwing was the best touring bike that God, or any engineer, had ever made.  As I explained to him the benefits of shaft drive over a belt or chain, his eyes widened, as he finally grasped where my travels had taken me during the past ten days.

“You went from Vegas to the Canadian border and then south to Arizona, all in a long week?”  Yes, I answered him, and every mile was a joy to ride. I wish there had been more time because then I could have gone further north, maybe even to Alaska.  At this point his wife’s eyes glassed over, as women’s often do, when mentally picturing their own husbands riding a motorcycle. They often saw only the danger and not the thrill and joy of riding to new places.  It was a shame, but it was a reality and a major hurdle that most men had to get over at home when they made the decision to ride later in life.

We continued to talk while they ate, and I came to find out that their oldest son’s high school coach had been a teammate of my sons when he was in high school. They were both on a team that had won the Pennsylvania State Lacrosse Championship back in 2000.  Sometimes, the very best things in life also had the smallest following.  Small, in terms of the numbers they produced, but large in the effects that their participation created.  Both long-distance motorcycle touring and lacrosse had been two of those special things in my life.  They created a spiritual and permanent bond between all those who had either played or ridden together and resulted in lifelong friendships that are cherished to this day.

On 9/11, Almost 100 Of Our Beloved Lacrosse Alumni Lost Their                                              Lives

His wife then asked me where my son had gone to high school.  “Haverford School,” I told her.  She brightened up immediately and said, “I went to Haverford College which is right next door.”  “Amazing,” I said, “how small the world really is.”  She then wanted to know what the college lacrosse recruiting process was like during the third year of high school. I was glad to share with both her and her husband what my son and I had gone through only ten years ago.  That small world we rediscovered through our common experience continued to get smaller throughout the evening. We continued to share more of where our lives had taken us and, in being together in this remote spot along old Highway Rt. #66, we grew bigger inside.

As the waitress passed my table again, I realized that I had already had one beer too many and was enjoying myself entirely too much.  I said goodbye to my new friends and started the walk back to my hotel glad that I didn’t have to get back on the motorcycle again tonight. After four beers, I knew that I would never try to ride, but the removal of temptation went a long way.

Sleep came easy on that night, and I did not dream —the effects of having lived beyond what on most days I only hoped for.  I thought to myself while still awake in the darkened room, with only the light from the train-yard filtering through my window, how truly lucky I was … even if everything ended tonight.  

Just then, the high-pitched whistle of a distant train approaching Williams, came through my wall.  It was a fitting exclamation point to another day beyond all planning and another example of why without a fixed itinerary, I continued to ride.  Just before sleep, the immortal words of Crazy Horse and the Oglala people flashed before my eyes. “HOKA HEY’, it is a good day to die.”  The Lakota knew that a good day to die was an even better one to live, and on this incredible day that ended in Williams Arizona, so did I.

My Prayer That Night Was To Avoid All Future Mediocrity, As The Back-Half Of My Life Continued To Unfold



Authors Note:
These chapters became longer as the sweetness of the days they told of increased.  Each one built upon the other until blockages were unstopped — with all knowledge running back to its source.
OnceWasAskim Jul 2021
I miss you so much. I know I’m not supposed to. Im not supposed to verbalise it.
I’m supposed to be on top of the world right now. But I miss you. So much it hurts. Still.
I’m not even supposed to write this.
Maybe I should just delete everything and start again writing where you’ll never find me. That would be best for you, right. Best for me too.
I broke.
I’m broken.
I saw a psychic. A proper one. She saw right through me. She saw you. She knew us. She knew everything about me. Everything. Down to the last detail. Warts and all. It was the most uncomfortable feeling I’ve ever had. Everything I’ve hidden laid bare.
She said we shared a past life. She knew how intense we were. She knew it all. Scarily so.
I should really let you go.
I’m trying.
I’ve been meditating and working through my energy blockages. It’s brought up so many memories that I’d repressed. Dreams too. Of us.

Just for the record. I don’t expect a reply. I don’t want one.  I don’t write these for you. It’s my therapy.
Maybe I should just disappear again. Delete my account and start a fresh. I think you’d breathe a sigh of relief. I don’t blame you.
**
IrieSide Apr 12
A diagnosis identified,
of a splitting pattern,
preventative
defenses
of the ego

barriers and blockages
of concrete nature
preventing the flow
of the
sacred

a self that wants
expression,
an eternal
spirit
suppressed

come unbound
and reach this
Heaven,
a place where freedom
abounds
Let the light shine through.
Ken Pepiton Apr 2022
Paleovirology and the study
of endogenous viral elements (EVEs),
corresponding
to ancient viral sequence insertions
in eukaryotic genomes, (these)
are unveiling the long and rich interactions viruses
have entertained
with their host
{sssssspluralized)
From <https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3758193/>

A fine story, we may imagine it being read
by two minds as this computer-carnal mind
bios has accepted the upgrade…

Let us all hear the cheer, GO COOKIE MONSTOR
prepare the way before us,
make straight our path,
HA a joke
already we have insider yokes tugging religatory story
threads,

who has a hell we can **** time with?
who gots hangups from way back?

c'mon, ******* you, take me to your bossssssss
so I can say I know the snake lick trick,
I kiss the snake, I listen to the lizard, squeeze the toad
and croak
like I am the magic fish, being treated
dry and salted, for pre
servation. Later.

Blessed is the eye that read… you know what it said
and here you remember,
you felt alien… in all the way, familiar.

I saw attraction before I knew beauty,
it was not beauty I saw, it was bait,

I took it,
didn't I? Come up from deep worthless, light as air,
no lighter.

Think a friend, at gnosis level, I know you know me level.
Edge-wise, plane
existence, look on any vector, I'm this near,
yet you do not notice, until I touch your
nerve tuned to me, in the re-cog circuit.

-- it is the idea from field of dreams, used.
but it works, gets to those daddy shames,
and mommy blames, and social order error blames
that become shames in one generation,
if the hero goes mad in the process of maturing.

----
History. Today, we arrived  in this dry and empty place.

Lead to believe, that is all any told tale does. Led be.
The first rule of any story is be three parts,
Begin middle end
and those have common courses set for various outcomes,

now - on all the levels we have measured
mankind are of many minds on things that are mono polar
gut level direct control-
no free will after the taste test,
or the pleasure sense note is struck,
sequence
look it up,
after the hallelujah, comes the sequence of events
in order of meaning
in order of sense

intense the feeling men say they feel,
so big they feel the rapturous joy of knowing finally,
I see,
she is naked.

On that same day Adam discovered fleas.

--- how could he not know?

Chocolate, if I lacked the word,
would you know I had eaten it when we kiss?

Would you think I taste good, or I had tasted good?
---
Knowledge taken from trees in the forest,
where the fruit of life is living in order
for now,
we think,
we think everything, so far,
had no option in the math-gravity given.

The beginning we have, middle we got,
the book of life with my name in it,
seems to enfold along the ending edge and stretch.

Rumors of wars,
those are in all never ending stories, if we, a we,
I mean, I'm not

well.
I am. I am imagining that actual happy
is a state and state is still not settled
so we accept cookies and cash.

In case. Case meaning some literal thing,
this case, we are making up or for
all we can or may imagine we
are worth, just me and my innards.

Writing from the gut, unbalanced, pickled
pretty much hooked on dissolved carbon,
long before the duodenum - doncha
'magine, major blockages must form
to extend a gut enough to live on grass.

Slow belly, soft belly - be meeting the need
a we to be, be a friend to me, your most hated
other kind of person.
Not the serial killer sadist mad role from stories,
told to provoke
some minds developed to react addict, as told,
during 10, 000 hours of cop shows,
a role, watcher, grows hero as
spirations, selves extend in hope of seeing evil,
and stopping it,
secret, no body knows. But the hero.
Raven May 2022
I've been, at a loss for words.
Drowned profusely in my own fears, nightmares, horrors and blockages of my own.
Scared to take the first step, confused and in a state of loss and emptiness.
Scared to put myself out there.
I've been, hateful, judgmental, bitter, spiteful.
I lost motivation.
I don't know what I want to do with my life, with myself.
I've started to hate men to the core and I turned into a bitter self sabotaging demon.
I deleted my online poetry book because I was getting no money for it from my bank, because of currency fees.
I have no idea what to do next once I complete my studies.
I am at a loss for words.
I feel empty, bitter, lonely, and full of misery.
I don't want to see people or leave the house.
I don't want to deal with people.
I don't want to talk to anyone about my issues, it's pointless, it won't change how I feel.
I have a hatred towards people.
Something inside of  me that I cannot control.
My pride, my ego.
It's trying to protect me, keep me safe.
I don't ever want to get hurt again.
I don't ever want to be betrayed again.
Protecting myself so strongly that I don't even have any friends.
Instead, I judge everyone else and beckon everyone to be fake and false.
I am in my own cage, my own feelings, my own darkness.
And I am too scared to get out
Ryan O'Leary Nov 2022
.           Smoking Salmon


     When we retire it gives us

      ample time to look after

     our failing health faulting

     minds and broken spirits.


     Constipated thoughts are

    the blockages preventing

    us from interacting as we

   did when we were younger.


Some of us become reclusive

   we hide away from society

  our self imposed quarantines

become permanent hibernations.


Expatriation, migration, diaspora,

    the ones that got away fish

always wanting ever wishing to

get back to the spawning ground.


But alas, as is often the case, the

  dam weirs get taller, our lungs

shallower we end up foul hooked,

gasping at the gills, struggling for air.
Mateuš Conrad Oct 2020
now i just look at words:

          i sometimes want:
to describe what the tongue doesn't
need to prompt or cue -

mostly thanks for e. e. cummings...

it's so necessary to find this
metaphysical tongue
in my brain -
how it's a mundane thought:
nothing at all worth
morally questioning -

loitering in a status quo...
or -
        beginning a sentence
with a conjunction:
rather focusing on conjunctions
bilingually...

an hour prior i would really
focus on etymology and
nouns in bilingualism -

something prophetic had to
be excavated from argentina...
it's not like i don't like new
music... it's that there's so much
of it: listening alone
to it is unlike sharing it...

         notably IAH - III...

to: this
tamto: that
tam: there
           w - in
o - about
            even if english allows
i - ja
              or a - the indefinite article...
z - with...
          
what am i with my born
with tongue that...
unlike those who arrived
on these shores as *****...
in the loving embrace...
that they were born
in england...

              some made-up
propensity to teach
others from a native foundation:
because... the bilingual
is somehow less?

spew me canon fire of words...
mesmerize me!
no: clear vantage point for
exploitation...

a long winding crescendo...
a labour under the gravity of using
wings...
a completed dialectical question...
which never allows
a rhetorical answer...
as plato noted:
a mere yes or no...
for the inquirer is asking
a question to further his rhetorical
pursuit of inquiry...

classics... i should read up on
some Aeschylus...
i can't imagine south america
as an extension of spain...
i guess the conquistadors
really did **** with
the aztec and the mayan women...
i find south america as
unique...
devoid of spain's influence...
language alone is not enough...
spanish was never going
to be an undermined language...
it was never to be subverted
by either german or russian...

but this english litany:
how the new continent is still
having to mind inheritance...
how the inheritance "tax" is so...
suffocating and strait-jacket esque...
i can clearly see
argentina for argentina...
is hardly a whole lot to do with
spain being dragged into europe...
into the funnel...

    celt and prior
romans and prior...
  oh no... this is not a history lesson...
then the germans
then the slavs
then the huns the mongols the turks
the... turkmen etc.
this little crevice of land...
this sort of in between
of continental pride:
a place to build a ship and...
******* to new a greater pasture...
to adventure...
to a small island in the pacific...

i never have to think of brazil
as an extension
of portugal...
   even though their language is
so: base... same...
or mingle with argentina a spain...
but in the anglophonic realm...
tightly-knit community
of: 'just across the pond'...
pond: d'uh... the atlantic...

       you can't call it an english
or a spanish diaspora -
                  hardly...
                 i try to think back
and relate to my fellow language
proficiency exemplars...
what chains bind me:
that i am prior to self-first selfish...
my own owning my ownership...
before i am cannibalised
by a national identity...

            it must seem rather strange
to explore these avenues in this tongue...
cry! schizoid! tremors!
blah blah...
                 that i do find immovable
"pawns" in england...
people who will not... dare thread
crossing barriers with exception
to holidaying on some greek island
or... spain... of all places...
they are so intrinsically adamant
in not splitting their mind
with kneading the dough-for-a-tongue
of a second language...
well... i call them immovable "pawns"
rather than n.p.cs...
        
perhaps i would write in my native
zunge - perhaps i'd tease at some germanic:
alt vater albion to boot...
or scribble some cyrillic -
but then: who has that sort of keyboard
and this narrative is begging
for a fluency of time shortened...

         english has no diacritical marks
that i know... which allows speeding
up the process...
if i were to fiddle and playdough with
diacritical markers:
which venture in their idiosyncratic meaning:
stand-alone...
i would...
the english must have thought
they were the afghans of the ancient
world... that they would somehow
inherit latin without...

a german esses und zeds...
    or a french cedilla...
                        or an iberian ninyo...
                             ~ on top of an n...
they had to determine themselves as...
the failure of previous empires
was... their landlocked ergonomic of
spreading...
lend us the greek concept
of free-city-states!
let us use the seas!
the sun will never set!
insomnia barons and pauper maddened
toy kings...

it's  not like the intricacies
of two towing tonnes os tongue is
in anyway unbearble:

w tym - in this
  
but i find it's unnecessary to merely
focus on the disparagement of nouns...
i find red a bogus...
immediately constructed
into plural / masculine / the feminine...
it's never red alone...

czerń is black...
it's almost a verb when being presented
with red...
na czerwono: on red...
czerwony - red (masculine)
czerwona - red (feminine)...
czerwone  - red (feminine plural)
czerwoni - red (masculine plural)...

chechen renegades of post thunk -
the armenians reading into
an ottoman less lightly...

   look here: my prosthetic limb

red is an impasse in my native tongue...
it's like this anglophone
focus on "gender neutral" pronouns...
i can't seem to find...
a red is red...

or what's: back into english...
i read (once upon a time)
coupled with: i read (currently doing)...
there's... red and there's a reed...

what czerń allows is:
czarna, czarny... czarni, czarne...

czerwienić się: to blush...
but the colour red doesn't stand alone
to stress itself without
a "dismabigutation"
when loan grammatical tools
come to the fore...
and implore the "loss od detail"...

for this only one man
has to know two tongues...
and for that i am metaphorically schizoid...
sK-oid... voiding further
the sofa-esque mentality of people:
how i admire those people
with a knowledge of only one tongue...
or two or polyglot with
not dare reminder of
intricacies:
how they arrived at language
proficiency where everything is
either leftover or works just fine:
it's all reflexive and nothing... is ever auld
or odd...

ah... but...
czerwień is an adjective - an allusion to red...
from the burdens of a synonym cloud -
what was once: a bold
introspection... has become an alluded to...
a loan... a gimmick
a burgundy is a hue of red...
a deviation... how it teases
purple...
                 it's a quality... "esque"...
this native tongue of mine...
well... it can't escape gendering certain
words...

white is gender inclusive...
          all the colours are!
                  one has to find onself
a gangrene riddled dog barking up
the wrong tree...
when the anglophone debate over
gender neutral pronouns comes
to the fore:
this here the tornado:
i here, the butterfly...

           biały... biała...
"concern" for things...
well... you wouldn't say: biały rzecz (white thing)
you'd say biała rzecz

i imagine the birth of the concept of:
NOTHING to imply...
i have exhausted a desire for
etymology, for nouns...
for calling things concretely like
some geologists or chemist...
i'm here, socrates... borrowed for
glue and chewing gum and
the leftovers of conversation...

i.e. "thing" is the precursor generic
noun... nothing = nonoun...
something new... pronoun aside...
nothing for me implores:
gesticulating at nonoun -
Kant almost saw this coming
with his noumenon...

to talk without having to implore oneself
the details of seeing a feline marker...
because: that's what we already
do! a cat is a cat is not necessarily
a maine ****... or a siamese!
a dog is a dog isn't necessaarily
a cocker spaniel of a german shepherd!

a tree is a tree isn't necessarily an oak
or an acorn!
this cognitive construct could
only have been invented by the faculty
of memory: how best to filter,
throw a cipher into a bowl of
borrowing deciphers...
memory this formerly grand
cameo cinema that had to become
a fickle ontology... destined for a per se...

yet how i strain myself to
keep it on a leash...
after the acid bath of pedagogy and...
drilling into me the arithmetic of 2 + 2 = 4...
how i "wake"...
that i spell these words with
such adamancy...
is because i want to: i desire for them
to be strictly bound...
i could sooner slash my wrists than
allow myself to turn all sloppy...
lazily prone to heave: third party
slobbering leftovers of ****-towing-curd...

i will not lend my eyes to spell out
either greek or "proto" greek via cyrillic:
it's enough to know the CZ and CH
and this loitering demiurge
phoneticism: riddle a people with
enough mammon worship:
and sooner or later the pennies just
drag: extensive as to how
copper write was invented:
two feeble scots arguing over a penny...

for the nuance of a solitary reader...
had i the fortitude of a single tongue:
a well arrived at presentation
of a universal man...
i didn't have this blockages of
bilingualism:
it's not that i "somehow" find myself
obstructed:
there's this intilled:
reflexive: pronoun compound:
as there's this reflective: my self...

the ancient 'uns speak of a selb
to masquerade an imitation throw...
i dangle my arm and
pretend there's a stone in it..
i have to gladly arrive
at this sorrow for an ongoing praise
of pursuit per se:
i can't imagine chasing ****
was ever much fun to begin with...

but when it mattered and it must have
mattered...
i weaved a loneliness to the prusuit
of staging aloofness:
which married itself to... some german...
and lately had to revised:

jetzt: now...
           hier: here...
this teutonic beer hall:
tam-da-ra-day...
       sing-along...
                          
               limbo wording when finding
awkward "squares":
the geocentric model and the loath
of patriarchy...
the heliocentric model and
the ****** crisp queen
of gynocentrism...

  today i tried to figure out
how a siamese twin could ever
overcome a sstatus symbol
of herr cain... serial killer....
i couldn't: but the image struck me as...
somewhat... belitteling and...
"sincere"...
           how impossible it was...
to ever find... a siamese killer...
beside the serial stressor...

chances are:
if i were not "culturally appropriating"
this english...
if i had questionable insight
into an antithesis of all is well:
western cosmopolitan...
french of service! please amore!

if this wasn't a shadow
of ol' *****: risky...
                risque?
  esque...
               russian: pax varshava...
              such that the sun never itches
to sleep....
aeschylus is to be mourned...
wait 2000+ years from now...
this will translate
into a paragraph of... less conjunctions
and more... punctuation markers...
i hope the diacritical marks still
retain their stature...

i speak two languages
yet it's a burden for 6 o 7...
i only speak two languages...
yet it's a "burden" that would gladly make
an affair of a dozen "creases"...
have... astounding pressure
being met with:
economical proficiency being...
exacted: as therefore stressed...

for the worth of a night arrived at...
i have to spare you...
endearing prospect of a reader..
my limit...
petting cats i fathomed inately...
for the better half of my exposed
self: churned into ***...
i was an amateaur at...

here's to me ******* a headless chicken:
trans-spaecian misinformed "..."
additionally curses never
to revise a 1950s h'american
nostalgia pillow credo...

  sleep tight sleep tired...
my most bothersome lacklustre additive
of spike and crescendo lobough'
tammy... and a led zeppelin's play
on hay-maker... with a jive of:
jai... tell me the difference...
between jai and jay...
i'm dying to know!
i'm so pristine raw and ignoble
to have to... concern myself
with these overshoots of...
why i didn't happenstance
a life... and the end result was always
to be... a riddle of walking...
employing
a pretend walking stick...
a ball and a hole...

i was blindly 'ere... scouting
for rabbits and deer
and grouse... i was 'ere limping for
a wolf to wrestle with:
i was 'ere for the gnashing of teeth!
i was never 'ere for a leisure...
a praying for comfort,
for happiness...
   i need this uncertainity pulpit:
zenith.. this long reserved crease...
like it might be: tied into a butterfly
or a "bow".

— The End —