The Seven - The Mashup


In memory of my mother who passed away recently, I wrote, or intended to write seven (only six were actually done) new poems themed about her, her passing and some perspective on life and death.  All were read and I am deeply appreciative.  I have consolidated them all here, in order, though not necessarily the order in which they were written. But the order does matter, as it reflects the change in my mood with each passing day.   Perhaps I will write the seventh someday, but not now, not soon.

Thank you all so much for incredibly kind words of sympathy. I am not a dweller, so I set myself a goal to complete this vow, this task, in a week to correspond to the seven days of mourning the immediate family observes after the burial (the shiva, shiva meaning 7).  For seven days, the bereaved family "sits shiva," sitting on low, uncomfortable stools and the comforters come to share their grief, praise the deceased, from mourning till late at night

#1 Shiva

I am confused - what day is it?
Windows tell day or night, a necessary but a condition insufficient.
The days have no distinguishing marks, a video stuck on
Repeat - a single track of recollected tales, prayers add a mild seasoning.

Though brief is this week of pre-sentencing hearings,
If one cannot dice the time into portions,
Then, there can be no pardon,
No early release date, from Phase One.

Rinse grief. Repeat. Seven cycles.
Apply stain-stick at the intersection of
Bloodied hurts and dimming memories,
Strangers secreting, spilling on you secrets unwanted.

This play, saw it many decades ago,
Before there was poetry, children.
A young man of twenty one,
Very afraid, silently, of the newest unknown,
His father, cancer won.

I hated it then. Now experienced, I hate it more.
This semi-catharsis, a tapestry tale wove of faded pasts
Twisting an heirloom blade into an old wound,
the original cast, a new revival, playwright, regrettably, deceased...

First time at bat, hid in a small room, away from this tradition.
Beating my head against a wall privately,
That being my preferred manner of mourning,
Not this Broadway show, twice a day, seven days.

Rituals well intentioned, a time tested method,
nonetheless, jail time for me, a/k/a, the boy, the brother.
Familiarity comforts some. Me? A prison uniform.
I write my own poems, I am not a Borg collective.

Cast as Son, my obligations specific, aged.
My Hamlet doublet, cut/torn, messaging my somber status,
The cuts deepest, invisible, but all see this child
Drowning in eye pools that continuously self-replenish.

I'll do the time, this show the longest running ever,
Did forty years as son-shadow of a father-man,
Tacked another concurrent sentence for his woman,
End Date: Indeterminate...

The low stools will reappear, seven days for me,
Yet my job as poet not fully done, until this be read!
Leave 'em laughing o'er this Official Release from the obligatory,
Read, sit but once, read this poem, this script, this story, and be freed.

#2 Hover^

My Children:

Ancestral homes oft possess,
a unique scent, product of an atomizer, a memorizer

Musty time, the odor of
faded and shadow,
hollow, yet hallowed.

Somewhere along the road,
a residence transforms from home to
shrine-storage unit-hospital room-tomb-records depository.

Dust, expired perfumes,
the sweet odor of crumbling, yellowing books, disinfectant,
stale medicine chests, years of furniture polish, sabbath candles.

It is my smell -
the parfumerie of my history, a customized blend,
a commissioned work in 1964, entitled, more accurately, emitted,
"Her-Story."

Photographs, memories, and paper scraps
my very own Preservation Hall Jazz Band.
Yet the most potent firing pin for historical retrieval,
the molecules of scent.

Soon all will be dismantled, discarded,
just plain dis'ed.

Confused and disenchanted,
my departure orderly but, in a disordered fashion.
unable to seed one last kiss upon your forehead,
nonetheless, surreptitiously enter your neurons
though my entity, away, across the miles-wide Hudson River.

For three days, I will hover invisible,
implanting myself once more,
slapping your mucous membranes,
transversing this pathway, an additive to your cells, nuclei,
where my markers always reside.

Adding one more ingredient to your inner vision,
strengthening the formless structure, my altered state.
This odor, keep close, fresh, no becoming musty too, my scent,
the last of your senses knowing me, a true keepsake.

Hold me close and hold me fast.
This one last magic spell I cast.
This one last magic smell I set fast.
You cannot hold it, but it will cradle you.
You cannot see or touch it, but when contact comes,
You will see me, hold me, as in the days of your youth,
When you loved me best,
And I, you.

^According to the Talmud, the soul hovers over the body for three days after death.  The human soul is somewhat lost and confused between death and before burial, and it stays in the general vicinity of the body, until the body is interred.

#3 Orphan

The funeral will commence at 11:30 am.
Gives me one last review time before the
Final Exam.

Panicked, I discover a whole new chapter
for which I am wholly unprepared,
though its inevitable presence was
assuredly knowable long in advance.

Orphan

It doesn't fit, occur, imagery is of a young child to
soon abandoned, not a late-in-life curmudgeonly poet-boy,
who has been multi-times reincarnated.

I add this title to my list
of proper ways to address me,
titles earned by dint of hard work,
or just unlucky luck.

This new status, orphanhood,
bequeaths no special privileges,
other than, a semi-official
societal permission slip
to feel bereft, lost, and compose poetry.

Know a real orphan, from early, early on,
has never recovered and
never will for it is just impossible.
Just impossible.

So whom am I to make light of
my undesired, unrequested new degree?

I accept it and to my surprise,
It hurts.

# 4 Judgement Day

After you put in some time on this planet,
You kinda know what the world thinks
About you, your rep, what they don't say to your face,

Sure, thingies, time and incidence and circumstance
Can sometimes cause makeovers external,
But each of us know the quality of ourselves,
Self-certification, you can out your internal self,
Better than anybody else.

So I inquire of myself, about myself,
what will you be remembered for, if at all?

Why do I ask, today, now?
Do we not ask ourselves this
On the low down, subconsciously everyday?

Is this a poem?
Most assuredly...
And a trial.
You, the judge the jury and the prosecutor,
The defender, if u can, if u will.

For seven days my mother was adjudged,
Family, friends, hers, her children's,
Almost an 80 years of live, in color, HD, looking back video,
Tales told, memories dug up, old photos explicated,
Who what when where of the details of one women's voyages,
Creations.

I cannot, I will not, do the details here.
Suffice, acts of kindness, faith in people,
Feminist in a strange land, a chance taker,
Gifts of memories, streaming of adoration,
Many strangers are witnesses to me,
This trial a runaway train.

I am outed.  There will be no such verdict for me.
I am outed.  There will be no trial needed, just a
Summary judgement delivered.

Out yourself.
What will you be remembered for, if at all?

#5 Summer Girls In Their Summer Clothes

Oh yes!

The streets of Manhattan, jewel dusted,
Summer girls in their  summer clothes,
Bedeck the streets and make men say, Thank You!
To their creator.

Little black dresses, previously immortalized^,
Seasoning and sauces, halter tops and jeans cutoff,
Give thanks for the tanks, revel in the revelations,
For God created man and women in his/her teasingly bare image.

Yo! Dude!  This is number 5 in the series,
Of sad and somber, re dad and mother, ***?
Have you lost perspective, not read the directive,
You're in mourning, time to be introspective,
Not dis-respective!

My mother was a beautiful women.
Till the day she died.
Yes, physically beautiful at 98.

She, was a poem.
For her exterior was suffused, burnished,
By the spirit residing within her body

I ask myself, why not judge a book by its cover?
Her cover was exquisite, but what gave her a glow,
A radiance, was her modesty, her love of humanity.

What's under our cover?

^ Nat Lipstadt · May 30
The Little Black Dress (and its magic prowess!)

*#6 & 7 Live like you're dying

Perhaps you know the lyric, the song?

Live like your dying.
Dying caught my ear, my eye, can't imagine why.
Con-Textual emendation, Natalino style.

Live like your writing.

Yes, that makes sense...
Embrace with passion each new session
Charge every second stanza with ruminating rhythms,
Cut the wires to the air traffic control sensory tower, go solo,
Pulse each word, beat all into a plowshare, even the anger,
Even the hate, dressed to ****, in words, forgivable...

Grant the mundane, the insane, even the pain of tragedy,
You refuse so hardily to glorify, grant it and
Record it all - a moment,
A royal audience with all
Your writing parts.

No fancy footing, keep it simple.
No jesters in rain puddles,
Let images of clouds of sand
Born and perish  in other's eyes and sighs, let verbal games bedevil other
Wooden puppet princes drinking fairy ales.

Huh?

Write clean and clear,
Let the sheerest wonderment of a new combination,
Be the titillation of the tongue's alliteration,
No head scratching at oblique verbal gestation,
Let words clear speak, each letter a speck,
That gives and grants clarification, sensational.

You, afternoon quenching Coronas, white T shirts,
Sun glazes and later, a summer eve's Sancerre,
Wave gazing on the reality of rusted beach chairs,
Babies sandy naked, washed in waves of Chardonnay,
The traffic-filled word-way highways and bay ways,
Exiting at the Poet's Nook, for exegesis & retrieval.

Write of:
Body shakes and juices, skin-staining tongues,
Taking her, afternoon, unexpectedly, her noises your derring-do!
Broken tear ducts, the Off switch, so busted, write about
Real stuff.

Write not in fear of dying
Angels delivering bad news in vacuum tubes,
Write joyous, psalms of loving life,
Live like your writing,
Write like your living,
So you may die well.

It has been a while since we've spoken
I have been tugging on a broken line
May be too gone this time, Lord
Been too low to be grounded
My demons dancing in a conga line
I am surrounded

You made me in your image
But what if I don't like what I see?
Is that insulting?
Is that absurd?
I made almost all my angels flee
It keeps me knocking on heavens door
So tell me, are you listening??
I'm not feeling assured

They say you turn water into wine,
But none of that tonight
I can settle for a bitter cup of coffee,
For a bitter state of mind
To keep me up so I won't dream of
Grandparents who can't walk
Or my lifelong companion
In a wild dogs jaw
Or an angry pair of sapphire eyes
I know I've failed them all

Water into wine, maybe two or three
Will make me numb enough to remind me
Of what their love was like,
Like the warm screams secreting
From my windpipe, do you hear me now?
Can you listen to me tonight???

I know I can be cowardly disciple, even a sheep
In lions clothing- wasn't your book written for
People like me
No, I don't want to be
Self loathing, another fallen angel
You lose hope in, don't let me go
Off the deep end, let the bitterness
I've been sipping on be sweetened
Please

In a wayward adventure in curiosity —
lured away from savvy of cooler judgment,  
he oversteps the bounds of reality 
into a state of altered awareness.

Overwhelmed by a rapid beginning
of a buzzing sensation — The Rush;
emanating from deep inside him, 
surging along the veins streaming 

euphoria through cells of his entire body:  
inside the body, with warm pleasure waves
flushing over the by now tingling skin
soughing off all unpleasant feelings.

Mouth numbed, limbs heavy, and eyeballs 
rolling back from hitherto an unimaginable
state of bliss, he savours the calm explosions
of the pulsating bubbles in his head.

A magical moment of sheer ******* 
rapture—that ends in a lasting sedation—
during which he's dazed with wonderment
while covered by a cozy blanket of content.

He falls in love with the insidious drug.
And he begins to relish its sweet fruition
in a seemly pattern of use that is put
in the shade to protect his best interests.

A stake in normalcy that seeks to confine
his usage of the opioid to a social occasion.
But soon enough he drifts towards a regular
recreational use; indulging on weekends,

floating, flying, and soaring in wonderful
ripples of pure delight, feeling very mellow
and satisfied, in an illusionary paradise of
forgetfulness where nothing hurts any more.

Bit by bit as time goes by his body builds up
a tolerance for the sedative, prompting his
intake of higher and more frequent doses
to feel as well as to sustain the desired effect.

This occurs because his body attempts to
adapt to the presence of the drug by quickly
breaking it up and purging it out of the system,
thus making it less potent as it was before.

At this stage of his drug abuse he's still able to
control whether to use the stuff or not, where
and when to use it, without stress. He could
also abstain from the opioid fairly responsibly.

But at the limits of his body's flexible response
to the dangerous substance, he begins to suffer
from its unpleasant side-effects that show up
a short period of time following his last use.

The pleasurable, but short-term, therapeutic
effects of the hard drug are now being
overshadowed by several of its undesirable
withdrawal symptoms that manifest as:

fatigue, irritability, cold chills/sweat, itchy skin,
muscle spasms and tremors, body ache, and
stomach cramps among others, with an
increase in his body's cravings for the opioid.

The onset of these torturous side-effects of
the stimulant marks the beginning of his body's
physical dependence on it, as he now relies
on the drug to fend off the terrible affliction.

He has bitten at the bait of pleasure oblivious
of the hook beneath it. The once casual user,
who had thought he could quit the habit at will
without stress, has advanced to problematic use.

The drug has become an integral part of a daily
routine that is gradually heading towards chaos.
Regardless, he's still able to go to work and
take care of his day to day responsibilities.

In time, a new sickness begins to fester inside
him: the opioid is tightening its grip on him,
as his body's physical dependence on it
is now generating his addiction to the drug.

This psychological dependence on the drug
has set in with anxiety disorder accompanied
by emotional and behavioural problems:
the duo classic signs of a progressive disorder.

The drug has become something he needs
to sleep or to fully wake up. His sleeping
pattern has also been altered; up at night
and intermittently dozing off during the day.

As dosage of the narcotic rises, so does
the torture of the painful lows and other
symptoms of addiction, making his cravings
for the sedative increasely more intense.

As it is, he's needs several hits of the drug to
make it through the day. All at once he wants
to use! He begins to look forward to using.
He would ingest the drug in risky situations

such as, while at the wheels of his car or
working at his job; always desperate to avoid
withdrawal symptoms as well as to revel in
the bliss of the drug's comforting warmth.

At times he'd skip work 'chasing the dragon':
pursuing the out-of-reach elation levels of
his initial euphoric high, swinging between
feelings of mediocrity and that of ecstasy.

Always, his body would afterwards crash
below baseline, barely able to cater for his
daily needs. The habit has long ceased
to be the fun that it was intended to be.

Like a vicious cycle the relief from the opioid,
which is not justified by external reality,
is being obtained at the cost of the
worsening addiction and a spike in distress

whenever his body is low on the drug.
The more he indulges on the sedative
to calm his racing mind, the more
its comfort zone seems to be desired.

Disoriented in the rigours of his vice,
he strays in the abyss of drug addiction:
a dark, weary place where priority disorder 
is dictated by events outside of his control.

It is this corrupted impulse control that
causes his sick obsession with the narcotic,
rendering him unfit to articulate rational
thoughts: a chronic brain disorder.

In this harmful shift away from reality,  
utmost in his mind is the insidious drug:
over and above his job, his goals, family,
love, friends, hobbies and personal hygiene.

Oddly enough the foremost essentials of life
like water, food, and sleep are also not spared.
He could be ill and he won't care.
No other thoughts can cohabit in his world.

Emotionally invested in his fantasy world,
the toxic substance has kindled in him
an inner turmoil — setting off an overriding
feeling of emptiness that aches in his heart.

The habit much harder to lose than it was
to find: an ongoing effort to wean himself off
the drug is being crushed by a dysphoric mood
and a sickly feeling that intensify in severity.

These horrifying withdrawal symptoms
are a result of the sedative's induced
alterations in the biochemistry of his
brain's system of reward and punishment.

Instead of a mild, blissful flow of the brain's
happy hormones, as is experienced while
one is indulging in a tasty food, on receiving
a great news, or while engaged in any other

kinds of novelty that fill us with a delicious
pleasure, the opioid whose chemical structure
is similar to that of the natural chemical
messengers of the brain, Happy Hormones,

by mimicking these primary drivers of the
brain's reward system the psychoactive 
drug sends a false signal of euphoria to
the complex *****, triggering an instant

and fast secretion of an abnormally large
amount of the 'feel-good hormones', that
begin to surge along its pleasure pathways
overwhelming the reward centre of the brain.

It is this huge outpouring of happy hormones
in the region that elicites in him a sudden
burst of energy, a pleasant state of mild
drowsiness, mental alertness, relaxation, ...

This already intense, euphoric effect of the
opioid is further amplified by the drug's
blocking of the pain partways of the reward
system, thus dulling his emotions and worries

by eliminating any feeling of sorrow, regret,
guilt, fear, or loneliness. Upon intake of the
mood-altering drug, he would feel warm when
cold, calm when angry, bright when grumpy,

filled when hungry and happy when irritable,
with almost a total refrain from the tendency
to view anything in bad light. This dramatic
result makes every normal thing look better

and brings forth a deep sense of satisfaction
as though all his needs have been met.
However, this almost perfectly desirable 
body and mind experience is an artificial

feeling that only lasts a few hours at most.
When the drug's effects wear off, because
the brain, which has come to rely on the steady
supply of happy hormones, cannot adjust

all at once, it gets stuck in overdrive which
results in the withdrawal symptoms. It is so
because his brain, whose system of reward
and punishment has been tampered with,

seeks to counteract and accomodate for
the sweet thrills of the drug's euphoric high,
by secreting much less happy hormones while
the foodgate of pain hormones is thrown open.

Just like a huge surge of happy hormones
elicits unnatural levels of euphorical pleasure,
a spike in flow of pain hormones produce
in him the torturous withdrawal symptoms.

These unwanted side-effects whose rise and
fall are subject to drug levels in the system,
is the debt he has to pay for the supreme
bliss that is relished during his opioid highs.

It is all about his brain seeking to maintain
Homeostasis: a normal, healthy body function.
Once he's able to amerce with penance due,
he'll feel good again with no need for the drug.

Another flip side of the illicit habit is that over
time, the regular surge in happy hormones
disrupts the resilience of the reward region
of the brain, causing physical changes that

have drastically reduced his brain's ability
to produce the 'pleasure juices', or respond
to any stimulus other than the one being
triggered by the psychoactive substance.

This is clearly seen in his lost of interest in
activities that he once enjoyed, since his brain
suffers from lack of happy hormones which
influence one's capacity to be in a good mood.

Because the narcotic has also disrupted
activities in the control region of the brain,
his whole thought pattern, perspective and
behaviour, all radically change along with it.

It is this reprogramming of his brain that has
altered the interior reality of his mind, in ways
that result in him going into 'survival mode'
in the absence of the drug during a withdrawal.

While in this irritable, aggressive and erratic
state, he would forego anything and everything
to obtain the narcotic because he's thinking
of his drug use the same way an individual 

who is parched with thirst thinks of water.
This desperation in seeking out the drug as
a vital lifeline is due to his compromised brain
'thinking' it needs it as a matter of survival.

A habit he had maintained at the outset
because it made him feel extremely good
has tuned against him, quite often, coercing
him to use for the avoidance of pain.

The sedative as dear and painful to him
as an imbecilic child is to its mother,  
he continues on the foreboding route 
for which he has no power of deviation.

Despairing in the clutches of addiction,
the drugs traumatize him, they infuse
toxins into his spine, and he wouldn't
know whether he's coming or going.

He's kept on saying to himself, 'I'm going
to quit for good after using one last time.'
But that remains to be seen as the drug
goes on dulling his inner light day by day.

In a downward spiral that stuns those 
acquainted with him, he loses his job,
his car is repoed, and he's evicted from
a nice home that had been stripped bare.

Drowning in unpaid bills and desperately
in debt having blown an entire life-savings
on the drug, the loss of everything and a few
remaining friends leaves him fatally devastated.

The dangerous drug has evoked a negative
ripple that is felt throughout all that he's
part of. An awful realization that settles in
with cold clarity, eliciting a lurch of dismay

over his dire ignorance about the drug
which has led to the ugly entrapment.
In deep, sorrowful thoughts consumed
with self-loathing he puts a curse upon

the day he first laid eyes on the hard drug.
With the best resolve he's able to muster,
driven by exasperation to kick the habit,
he strives to make his will like stone —

a facade that is soon razed by his urgent need
for the ****** to stave off withdrawal. With a
burden of guilt and shame that can't be faced
he retreats into the haze of his own misery.

With more problems and stresses than ever
he plunges from troubled life to no life,
completely losing touch with reality as the
disorder assumes a more dangerous form.

His fixation on the ****** has taken a turn for
the worst. Besides his strong cravings for it
to ward off withdrawal as well as to experience
its euphoric high again, it has become more

crucial than ever for him to keep his emotions
constantly desensitised to life, by numbing
the agony of living to ease the passage of
day with purchased relief from the sedative.

Locked in this highly destructive pattern
of drug use, he would stop at nothing
to feed the habit: he would cheat, steal,
lie or betray no matter who to get his 'fix'.

Like the spreading of cancer in the body,  
his affliction has metastasized way 
beyond him, chipping away at the sense
of wellbeing of everyone around him.

As frequent and ready targets for theft
his family have to always watch out for him,
in a resentful relations in which they never
could feel at easy with him around their home.

Wallets, jewellery, gadgets, or any other
easy to carry household valuables, that are
not safely locked away, will go missing.
For days at a time he, too, will vanish.

He'd eventually return like the 'prodigal son'.
Always, he's found the door open after
prolonged periods of avoiding home, even
on occasions when he'd been kicked out.

In the many months gone since losing his
source of livelihood, he's been pushed
into a number of rehabilitation facilities,
but as yet has failed to clean up his act.

He's also been in and out of rehab thrice
following hospital discharges for drug
overdose. On the last occasion, he was
found passed out in the family's bathtub.

Timely arrival of the paramedics had saved
his life. Notwithstanding, a nagging urge
to 'use' continues to feed and reinforce
the habit after each discharge from rehab.

It's been most upsetting to the parents
who have had to watch him visibly change
before their eyes: from a good, healthy
son, who had always had his act together,

to as it is, a thin, patchy-skinned loner with
a baffled demeanour — who buries his head
in low self-esteem to conceal the frequent
dilated and glassy pupils from mutual gaze.

Nothing points more to the helplessness 
of the family's plight than having to finally
admit to their little, or no influence, over
the ravages of the stigmatized disorder.

A harrowing experience for a household
whose life-savings, along with compassion
for him, have completely been exhausted
with no more tears remaining to shed.

The hurting family at the end of its tether
confronts him with an ultimatum:
to get his life in order or face the music.
Coldly, they all watch him leave home.

His descent into the final stages of rock-
bottom has been swift. He starts by crashing
on fellow addicts' couches and floors,
but soon his welcome quickly wears out.

Now among the ranks of the homeless the
hobo would wake up feeling sick, and his day
would consist of shoplifting, petty thefts,
begging, and struggling to find others ways

to obtain money in order to feed the habit.
At nights, even on stormy ones, the rough
sleeper would crash wherever there's shelter,
never worrying about waking up the next day.

A hellish existence on the street that has
provoked a string of run-ins with the law. 
Nabbed stealing on ill-fated occasions,
he's manhandled in a most indecent way.

Tired, hungry and sick, the erstwhile ray of
hope, who once had a strong sense of self,
is currently a nervous wreck who envisages
life through the lens of opioid stupor.

Much beyond his ability to ask for help, 
his hurting family proceed to rescue him.
Under the humbling load of drug addiction
he staggers into another rehab facility.

But the often slippery climb to recovery
is never easy. It's yet another chance for him
to submit to a slow and delicate therapy on
his brain, whose structure and functions are

badly impacted by years-long use of the drug.
The healing process is a labour of discipline
and commitment, coupled with patience
in order to allow the brain to adapt back

toward normalcy by gradually regenerating
and rebalancing itself. In a gruelling task he's
expected to learn to care for a body that
now must struggle to work in a different way.

Desiring to put their lives back together many
druggies have been able to crawl their way out
of the murky shadow — a big chunk of them
through the guiding light of structured help.

Amongst them were 'walking corpses' whom
possessed by their 'enough is enough', were
enabled to find the inner fire vitally needed
to rekindle the cold embers of self-image.

There's the fella cast adrift feeling wholly
disconnected from self and the world.
He's mourning the loss of a vital lifeline
that has always helped him cope with life.

He had been through it many times before,
the fatigue, stomach cramps, aches, itchy skin, ...
But, he's in the early stages of withdrawal when
cravings for the narcotic are at their worst.

This initial withdrawal agony is the biggest
hurdle any addict has to overcome in the often
stop-start journey to recovery. If he could
somehow find the courage to suffer through it,

the fierce and ceaseless cravings for the drug
would be considerably reduced, making
them easier for him to deal with. Eventually,
they will dissipate the longer he stays sober.

He's being offered a way out of his captivity,
but he's unable to embrace the opportunity
with open arms because the addiction,
which convinces him the only option available

is to indulge on the drug, is blocking him from
seeing the available escape route. It has shut
off his ability to get up on the inside to face
the seeming overwhelming barriers to sobriety.

Like one in the grip of Stockholm Syndrome,
he has developed a type of trauma bonding
with the treacherous drug: the more it hurts
him, the more his irrational affection for it.

With his consciousness constantly revolving
around the insidious substance, he just
can't imagine a chronic user like him
being sober and happy again without it.

That being the case, he fails to see any point
in struggling to remain sober when in such
times he's beset by an awful illness attended
by a serious depression that is no help.

Regardless of the wreckage of his past,
everything that is dear to him plus the very
essence of life on the line, he's left convinced
that giving up the destructive habit would

mean endless suffering and feeling deprived
for the rest of his already sad existence.
More than any other reasons, he just
won't quit because he's powerless to resist.

In default of any dreams of ever recouping
losses that are manifestly out of reach,
the drug with a firm grip on him serves 
as a buffer to keep his ugly reality at bay.

All that he wants is to return to the 'loving
arms' of the opioid, very much aware that
the feeling of the drug's high now that he's
in pain can be one of the best things ever.

But even so, as tempting as the desire to jump
the healing process may be, he's bitterly
mindful of the horrors of street life that
loom upon him with such frightening aspect.

Savagely trapped with no good choices he
slips into a real fear of relapse. In anguish
withdrawal and cravings plague him daily,
and they won't allow him a moment's peace.

Utterly incapable of rising from the ashes 
to hold it all together—no hope—
nothing to hope for—everything out 
of focus—mind spiraling out of control.

In a fit of extreme anxiety the now rampaging
urge to 'use' prods him, closer and closer,
to the brink of a nervous breakdown. Suddenly,
his need for a 'hit' becomes most vital as.

Sweating profusely and trembling all over
with fear clutching a pilfered smartphone,
forgetful of future suffering the rehab
jumper hurries along the forbidden path.

All alone with the merciless companion: 
nowhere to go and no one to turn to. 
Wretchedly wretched in additive agony
the ****** fades away into nothingness.








AUTHOR'S NOTE


The Abyss Of Drug Addiction is written in 112 non-rhyming quatrains.

The rendition is a poignant story depicting the sad existence of many drug users. The verse uncovers and illuminates, step by step, the different stages of drug addiction and the mental processes of the unable to function drug users.

The paramount aim of the work is to shed some light on the sinister shadow of drug addiction: to unveil to all and sundry, especially teenagers and the youths, the hazards of drug abuse and the vicious downward spiral that can be caused by it. 

Just as the euphoric experience of all kinds of hard drugs differ significantly, so are their withdrawal symptoms. Despite their seeming surface unrelatedness, whichever hard drug it may be, the creation of an illegal and dangerous dependency in users is a common denominator.

[The Rush is described as a feeling very much like a heightened and prolonged ****** ******. A great relieve of tension. It is mostly felt when ****** or any of it's derivatives opioids/opiates is administered intravenously].

In quite a disturbing hyperbole a ****** addict described the drug's EUPHORIC RUSH as follows:
"Take the best (******) ****** you've ever had, multipy it a billion and you're still no where near it... "

Peoples’ lives are dying in consistency;
Greed in their pedestal has corrupted this world’s societies.
A fruitful opportunity, a gold rush was encountered!
Underlying the main ambition of many unfortunate ambitious desires.
  
Persistently seeking an object of materiality,
Children have become contracted to labor endlessly till mortality.
The corporate pose has overshadowed humanity,
Predetermining existence through living in a vision of obscurity.
  
Freedom has evolved in many attaining their dreams,
Yet, failing to realize their limits in overstepping boundaries.
Morality has been compromised to new opportunities.
Ultimately, corrupting one’s essence in living spiritually.
  
We have eluded to perceive the subtle communication they have established you see.
Projecting honesty while planting a seed, they enrich themselves invulnerably.
Enabled through the loophole of ignorance attracted by social mediocrity,
Revealing a battle between each other secretly disguised as insecurity.
  
Asking how do I seek success, freedom, and happiness endlessly.
Indubitably, the answer relies inside, secreting awareness internally.
Discovering that the war begins within may end the violence indeed.
Extinguishing eternal destruction of the world through peace and harmony.
  
By: Michael M. De La Fuente

Seven New Poems For Seven Days #1: Shiva

Shiva means seven. For seven days, the bereaved family "sits shiva," sitting on low, uncomfortable stools and the comforters come to share their grief, praise the deceased, from mourning till late at night.*
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~­~~~


I am confused - what day is it?
Windows tell day or night, a necessary but a condition insufficient.
The days have no distinguishing marks, a video stuck on
Repeat - a single track of recollected tales, prayers add a mild seasoning.

Though brief is this week of pre-sentencing hearings,
If one cannot dice the time into portions,
Then, there can be no pardon,
No early release date, from Phase One.

Rinse grief. Repeat. Seven cycles.
Apply stain-stick at the intersection of
Bloodied hurts and dimming memories,
Strangers secreting, spilling on you secrets unwanted.

This play, saw it many decades ago,
Before there was poetry, children.
A young man of twenty one,
Very afraid, silently, of the newest unknown.

I hated it then. Now experienced, I hate it more.
This semi-catharsis, a tapestry tale wove of faded pasts
Twisting an heirloom blade into an old wound,
the original cast, a new revival, playwright, regrettably, deceased...

First time at bat, hid in a small room, away from this tradition.
Beating my head against a wall privately,
That being my preferred manner of mourning,
Not this Broadway show, twice a day, seven days.

Rituals well intentioned, a time tested method,
nonetheless, jail time for me, a/k/a, the boy, the brother.
Familiarity comforts some. Me? A prison uniform.
I write my own poems, I am not a Borg collective.

Cast as Son, my obligations specific, aged.
My Hamlet doublet, cut/torn, messaging my somber status,
The cuts deepest, invisible, but all see this child
Drowning in eye pools that continuously self-replenish.

I'll do the time, this show the longest running ever,
Did forty years as son-shadow of a father-man,
Tacked another concurrent sentence for his woman,
End Date: Indeterminate...

The low stools will reappear, seven days for me,
Yet my job as poet not fully done, until this be read!
Leave 'em laughing o'er this Official Release from the obligatory,
Read, sit but once, read this poem, this script, this story, and be freed.

I had to write a process analysis paper for my adv. comp class Senior year.
My topic was an acid trip. Hope you enjoy.


Bored with the various street drugs that you take daily to achieve a mediocre high, you long for something new. You're striving to reach enlightenment, mental clarity, and an escape from your worldly woes. By chance or fate, you come across a man selling what he claims to be the best of all drugs: LSD, lysergic acid diethylamide-25, better known as acid. This appears to be the only way your mind and, in turn, your soul will experience the mysterious and desirable acid trip.
Upon impulse, you purchase the drug. This was saturated in a piece of newspaper. As you survey your ticket to mental bliss, you read the words on the small paper. The sentences of the article were cut to meet the spacial requirements of the acid. This made the paper difficult to read. Deep within the mess of incomplete thoughts and ideas, your eyes cross paths with the word peace. The simple but powerful word that was camouflaged in the unfinished article increased your desire to take the LSD. The "peace" was your chance to free your mind and consequently yourself.
Giving into impulse, you place the paper under your tongue. Like the words on the paper, the acid dissolves into your glands entering your body with aspirations of arriving upon your brain. Moments later, you feel nothing. You were expecting the drug to work immediately upon contact. This was far too big of an expectation. LSD like many other medications needs time before it comes to life. Disappointed, you retreat to your living room to watch a film on the television. As you sit in the dark, ruby red chair, your only thoughts are about acid.
An hour later you feel nauseous. Racing to the bathroom it starts to hit you. The porcelain toilet and clear water within is your muse. With each heave, you notice a minor change in your mind. When finished with vomiting, you realize your stomach is empty. You try to think of something to eat but your stomach has no desire to take anything.
The mirror catches your attention and there you stand staring at yourself. While gazing upon yourself, you notice your pupils have dilated. The large black circles that were once small now resemble the largest craters on the moon's surface. During this moment of time, your vision is misty. Every shape has a fog surrounding it.
When your hand reaches the forehead, the temperature of your skin burns it. As your hand rests there longer, your fingers are cooled by little drops of sweat that slowly flow down your forehead in an effort to cool your body. You conclude that the fever has created the sweat that is secreting from your body. The moisture from the evaporating liquid has created a misty air. This realization leads you to believe that the acid was beginning to take control.
An immense thirst has dried your throat and mouth. Like a desert they both need water. You have this newfound energy and possess the amount of adrenaline that can keep you up for days. You feel invulnerable and this is the healing hour for the body and soul. As the second hour of your experience comes to a close you have covered a lot of ground. You have gone from having control to no control. The acid has changed you. The man you were two hours ago was in a different dimension. In this dimension you are a new and different man.
The third hour has brought the acid to its maximum power. Your high is peaking. The visions you see and the sounds you hear paint beautiful hallucinations. They feel sensational and bring waves of shivers up and down your spine. The television screen looks like a portal to a new world, and the sounds it makes sound like greetings in a foreign language. Your eyes close and you open them immediately. Realizing this is not a dream, a state of confusion fogs your mind. Despite reality, every thought and action feels dreamlike.
Contemplating the situation, you ask yourself if this is normal. Cackling, you scream, “Normal does not exist. Normality is simply an impossible goal that has plagued society since the beginning of time." The once well known actions and thoughts that molded you were strange and unknown. This was the point of no return. You would never go back to the past. Normal process occurs no longer this far into an acid trip.
You feel groovy. Everything is fine. Your face is frozen in the shape of a smile. Nothing can take you down. The serotonin in your brain has been altered, making every moment feel good. Still staring at the screen, you see a tiny man waving at you. The physical greeting he gives you carries the sound of a hello. When he opens his mouth you see what he says. Each word is portrayed by a symbol in an unclear language. The symbols hypnotize you and give you comfort. The mind without acid would see nothing in the hypnotic symbols. But the symbols converse with you. Your sensations have now crossed over. Sights have turned to sounds, and sounds to sights.
Matter is glowing with a faint rainbow that lies on each objects surface. The fourth hour of your high is ending, the man in the television is becoming harder and harder to see. Like your high, the man is leaving. Over the next two hours, you slowly drift back to reality. The once sea bound boat is approaching land and, with each passing wave, you are coming closer to sobriety.
The loud song of the cuckoo clock has marked the sixth hour. LSD no longer controls you. You are a different man but in the same respect, the same. At your command you gave yourself to a higher power, one that intensified your emotions and took you back to man's primitive mind set. Drained from the crusade, you turn off the television to rest in the quiet. The sun is leaving with your energy. A cool breeze travels through the room which carries you to sleep.

"The thought of  the future we will never have was pollinating foul fuzzy particles in the air, slowly following the wake of all those tasseled dreams I had held onto for all those years but had to let go."

The most intimate revelations can often expose plagiaristic suppressions that we've most likely tried to already forget. Suggesting to anyone on the outside looking in, that there is a rancid cowardice secreting from the pores of all those who would deny the most basic of fundamental decencies to their fellow man.

All the while, boasting a loud tolerance that would be found on the very last Autumn-the very last colorful arrangements of watering oranges and smothered reds our world was ever going to be privileged to witness again.
The thundering drumming of my own beating heart gave my freshly dead and bland reaction a neon personality, with a few extra *******, lingering, successful gestures that reflected a sparkly prism of tracers.

Tracers that were birthed from the most brilliant of lasers, as I was radiating something that was blindingly gorgeous, something that was heightened with more sensitivity as it shadowed over the complexity of every kiss that I had ever been given in my life..

Spinning a silk and gold web around me that was almost as intricate as an alarm sounding earth quake.

This flaccidly tight response came at a price, leaving nothing but whispers and the wrong kind of impressions at the sight of  it's unwanted face..

The time of dignity and grace felt decades away as your tiny little temperaments began to attempt to soothe me into a very still silence.

"Wooing" me and "seducing" me with such a strong touch of romantic readiness, I knew it would never be matched or found again causing me to feel a stroke of sadness at the single sentiment.  

This dramatic departure killed any interest that might have supported the abortive sorrows and short winded elation’s of men, but instead the idea of a possibly new tasseled dream, sparked me into a shimmering prism bouncing glittering, glimmering, glowing rays off my skin, as I put the shine in the sun.

the cherry blossom accord/equation

”perfumers use aromachemicals to recreate a cherry blossom accord...(an accord is a scent made up of individual aromachemicals, that when combined, create a harmonious blend where none of the individual ingredients are able to be detected on their own).”

the odor of our lustful eyes,

the sweat, a unique commingling,
a sheen of salted oils body bathing,

crushed green petals of peaches,
crumbled together with the softy fuzz shavings,
the sediment of aromatic fruit juices drippings

our blending bottled in our brains,
none other would recognize but we,
to too two smell each other through and over
floors, concourses, cities, disparate distances

our ingredients secreted (secret),
our flavors cell secreted (secreting)
the world’s silly tittering aroma inserted,
our sparking fingertips touching
add a bush burning burnt odiferous

we seat across from each other in an airport
plastic restaraunt and everyone asks out loudly,
what is that smell, feed me that, taste me that,
as we are irradiating the atmosphere,
as we renegotiate our cherry blossom accord,
fresh signatures, updated, harmony of harmonies, notarized

she smiles, I joke, winking,
we must continue
to meet like this,
the fireworks of we,
of us,
to-gather to-gether,
a getting of giving,
she answers:

take me home and
bathe me in love,
give our bodies shelter
from the world outside,
beside a new spice
have I uncovered,
this will require some
discussion+exploration,
the quantity to be added,
the when, and the how!

what is this new ingredient?
asking puzzled and aroused,
she laughs
(a spice already included),
why it’s called
only love poetry






8/23/19 4:55pm

Pyres of cityscapes burn contingently in the distance
ever drunk with blood of a mother, a nurturer who asks
nothing of the morose, self-consumed existence
she cares for. Her brow cocked,
wrinkles descend like
rain that tears down
a window.
Pain.
You're bleeding out! But she'll never put herself
forefront. How could she? Sitting, reflecting.
Tormented by incompetence, her soft
voice silently flutters the leaves.
Drearily an extension of her lips, the words
escape the cusps like a cautious prairie-dog.
Smog obscures
the senses, a haze
darkening the pupils of your celestial eyes.
I still see You
drooping in the rocker under a hard light. Retaining know-
ledge of past and present, through spectacles.
Her deflating ****, secreting
concrete into the sucklings, cementing fate,
as the clock that hangs above her falters. I shutter to think of the
future that's afore. When the one who's raised me is not.
No more.
Your timber limbs look awfully thin. Restless and alone,
she's tired. "Abandoned"
we're all alone,
but your company means more to me than a sustainable
stone.

i am of the light
despite
my shroud
that crowds the villains in the toppled telemetry of my steeds
galloping gallantly from the burning cities of my dreams

i shall gleam from her or he
that which delivers
their truths faithfully to their dreams
open wounds turn invitation
in the pity of hungry thieves
who dared to dream
of peasants king-ed.
as we sing
sing
of desperation
in passionate confessions
of jaded wisdom
passed on through every failure
never to falter
in the betrayals of Walters
lost
in loss-less flac files
i have miles to go
smiles to grow
daggers projectiles
from mild mannered children
freshly ridden
of maniacal miracles
spiritual
but not stupid
we are troopin
this lucid movement
grooving
to the repetition of the drum
the gas blow back of a gun
the bursting bubbles of bubble gum
having fun
i learnt goodly on the run

learned nothing in victory

learned nothing in simplicity

complacently

snickering it all away
bullet by bullet
case by case
and eventually the blade
in my compassionate displays
we shall congregate
and hate ourselves
**** the donks to hell
dwelling on the cellar doors
that darkos teacher adored
in verbal massacre
of the written literature
of cracked brain fixtures
seeping the lines
in cold tingles
down the spines of maniacs

just relax

mix it down on a track
spit the thesis into pieces
through the creases of cracked sneakers, and out the speakers
of trouble seekers.

mistakes make us

deliberate chaos
tossed  
upon the fakers
who cry to think
the dream
became a reality
mistake us
for serrated blades that rip the hearts from beasts
sometimes i stop to think
while having a drink
conclusive brinks
of sanity creaks
of my humility
secreting
frivolously
the disposing of my jealousy
of your feelings

hellaciously
i rip a felony
from a face
in appealing agony
antagonizing me
in the frenzied forensics
of my oblique
outlooks
none of us
were ever crooks
speaking to self
while being booked
in hell

Bump,thump,bump,thump.... the bass cases shake and quake  
Secreting heat, my skin blushes, that rush of a new secret crush.
She passes and her scent renders all around helpless.
The DJ's plush talons tow and myre you soul's wires.  
Seeping through, the beak crushing your conscience,  
falling, sleep down, the sound grounds you.  
Sowing the seeds of desire on the stone below.  
Called by the thumping, bumping beat,  
You jump from your seat into a market of meat, a sea of shifting feet.  
10,000 lights spin like sugar bright.  
Blood fuels your feet,  
feats of flight,  
blurs of sight.  
Spinning like cotton candy with all your might.  
Body overheating, heart overbeating, grains of lust over seeding.  
Your scars begin to heal as glassy eyes not blue appeal to your "at first sight" senses.  
Senses slow there motion to primal, tingling too much,  
not too much to touch, no sting as such.  
Such a blissful kiss t'would be from she before thee.  
Snip the wire.  
Feed the desire.  
The need grows to fan passion fire.  
The potent scent of dripping skin steams up like the devotional incline of nine combined love potions.  
Love, as real love, survives as only a notion in this moving motion of lust's contrived plot...  
But to feel alive, even for a moment,  
love's emotion fails... drawing bust to the ever opulent opponent of lust;  
a proponent to disguise the potent demise of the heart's conscious component.  
Gas and smoke blows.  
Beats high and low.  
The dancing mass of suppressed woes ebbs and flows,  
capturing the seconds, snatching your essence, rapturing your ethics.  
Feeding the peak you seek, heart weak, roaring soul silenced to squeak.  
Waning away your stay with the sweating sea of swing and sway leaves you adrift.  
The waves of the DJ begin to hammer you into enamerment  
Did this quaking wake the sober state of your forsakenness?  
That complaicent stained vacant place aching to be filled.  
A painful, dizzying blood rush floods your mind and muck the feeling first struck secret love crush  
Were the judgment-blurring thoughts occurring so alluring? They fought off pure thoughts sought before she heart-stopped me.  
In light of a moment caught, wrought with knots of naughty thoughts.  
Light and sound and the thumping, bumping ground drown your bounds. 
No more, no more. 
"Now I remember" internally sounds, profound rebounds. 
Lore from before when the last passing blue-eyed leggy lass tore the door off your soul's core.  
No more, no more.  
The crush becomes dust. You become stone.  
Cut to the bone. No seed will be sewn.
You face the floor and breathe. alone.
  
 "Cameo Theater South Beach"   
R. Craig David-Copyright 1995

Philosophical epistemology strumming adventures
Albeit, coherent mental decoding stratifications structured
Supposedly our world rests in our minds, revolving knowledge
An entwine of conceptual abstract flowing within oneself
The mind in the “I” the “I” a reality lived in my experiences
George of Leontini, a mine mind approving solipsism exploring innatism
Imaginative insights that nothing exists, the secrets secreting secrets
The knowledge behind the veils that remains un-communicated
A reverse of normality and known existences, moral disposition
Hypothesis of depersonalizations, adventures of self internalization
Justifications for what lies outside the Medulla Oblongata
Skepticism and just alternatives to western philosophy
Subjective unapproved experiences only robust in one’s mind
Descartes abstraction of inner experiences, reciprocated paradigm
Intuitively, perceived lived formulations of "Cogito Ergo Sum"
Psychological conscious undoubted individualistic thoughts
Berkley explored perspectives that physicality is an embodiment of the mind
The mind a decoding visualizer, that encompass the non-existent
An idealism marriage of ‘metaphysical’ and epistemological philosophy
The intense esoteric “dualism” verses the fiery “monism” reality
Mind boggling differentiated truths bleeding with blinking unresolvable hypothesis
The jiggered methodological, streamlining the un -logic sequential beats

In the garden in Corniche
In the playground bound by a metal fence,
While the Arab teenage kicks the ball,
The feet of the Sudanese, sitting on the stone bench nearby
Start prickling;

Cries out that
For one who knows how to score goals,
The hunger to kick a ball
Is the ultimate one!

Me? I shall remain nameless!

The fisherman
Whose whole body tingles
As he espies a shiver of gigantic sharks
Even while swimming for life,
Having lost his boat and fishing net in the deluge,

The nun, whose ******* start secreting
As she watches a bawling baby,
Standing amidst toddlers of the nursery

The swimmer,
Who crawls through the desert
On camel-back

I do not ask for anything else
Just the ball and the opposition
Let a thousand, or tens of thousands come,
Let the goal-mouth
Be miles distant,
I do not ask for anything else

Once, while carrying a load of cement
On the tenth floor,
For a moment,
A moment,
The sun tempted, as a huge ball.

The scar of the beating received
While dribbling the sun on the sky meadow
Remains on the back..

There are ***** anyone can play with.

No, all surges ahead
Do not end in goals.
There are no games that do not have ‘foul’ -
Even in dreams.
There are no Arab children
In the playground now.

Jut the ball, ball, ball alone.

It scurries hither and thither
By itself,
Races outside,
Speeds towards the goal-mouth,
Sometimes ducks out of sight.

Very privately,
And even more secretly,
Ball smiled at me.
A shudder of incarnations
In my toes.

As soon as the ball and feet
Left the playground,
Two legs
Started dancing,
Betwixt twilight and night.

The dark and devilish nature of her words



Strike my soul with bone crushing impact



Delivering me to unfathomable heights



Soaring beyond valleys of unspoken truths



I swear I could feel the searing pain secreting



From the puddles of ink unmercifully *******



From within her little black pen of revenge



A cold, hard case of poetic justice iced my veins



Slashing fiercely through the tender tissues of my heart



Leaving a dreadful scar of excruciating scorn



Forever embedded in what was once a sacred home



It was as if a voodoo ritual was taking place



Possessing every inch of my flesh successfully



Soaking my skin with tsunamis of fear



Compelling my body to dance with the spirit



As I danced to the rhythm of the drums



A cloud of smoke was blown to distort my vision



In the wake of the smoke I began to hallucinate



The image of a **** harlot equipped with a machete



Appeared before my eyes taking me by surprise



Ready to slaughter and **** all who oppose her



And rob them of their oh so precious manhood



She pressed her lips against the blade then blew a kiss



The kiss caressed my lips with the taste of honey



By the swift blow of a gentle breeze she was gone



When I returned from this coma of entertainment



A severe addiction was unmistakably evident



My taste buds craved for more of this woman's literature



I had fallen victim to her powerful hex of poetic justice





By Glenn McCrary





© 2011 Glenn McCrary





(All rights reserved)

Mos Def addict practicing my mathematics
multiplying gross deaths stacking high in my attic
banishing, your batting eyelashes in my hatchet
brandishing a reflection of death nothing can match it,
a packet of matches, three cans of gas am I mad *****?
I’m a man mastering cracks of dark arts from a sad witch,
tears of evil, blasting apart marked hearts, sew they can’t stitch,
so I can cross your eyes and harvest every last inch
of your body I’ve got hauled high with my crass winch.
Dangling like abattoirs meat hanging upside down by your feet,
never is the time that I will retreat,
secreting discreetly in your petite physique,
desecrated secretly I never cease with the heat.
I’m a clever beast with the sweet smile of a pre-school teacher
I’m a leach, I’m an evil preacher,
I’m worse than a priest with someone not quite senior in reach.
I beseech you to keep my smile in mind when I breach
the regular limits of sin, an when the victim begins
spinning within the rhythm of my limb precision
positions a physician would think weren't natural
constructions. Causing concussions with my bone crack percussion
discussing the disgusting repercussions of being obstructive
with a kind as destructive as mine its reductive to imply
that I’m stuck with a mind superior to thine, let the subtleties shine,
you’re an inferior design, obsolete, so the premise is supremacist
there’s no preventing this, the evidence is left in every crevice of the premises.

One by one they stagger in

And one by one
They are stabbed again

And there is not a single thing
That you or I can do for them

As they are they
And we are we

And we
We are Americans

All us worldly citizens

And we
We will do it all again

But

Bigger better
Smarter harder

Bigger bombs
Bigger bonds
Better arms
And better cons

Smarter teams
Smarter dreams
Harder fiends
With harder clings

To speculative seams

Sinking into the dreams
Meaninglessness

Free will
A cress

Made in the finesse of last laughs

Trapped in a maze
Amazed in lapsed..

Pain
The same as sympathy

Empathy fills me
But not you

Who the **** are you
Feel me feeling you

I am the impossible
Possibly hostile

Martyr to a better place
From carvers of the human face

Disgraced

Plucked and pruned
Fallen from space
****** imprudent
Shielded in hate

Grace is made this way

I can
I will
I am

And we can
All relate

From sculpted slates
We can blame the genetic traits

I stand
I ****
I am

Still me

But a who the **** are you
Is still a who the **** am I

And I am merely me
Marrying myself to the breeze

Flowing dis-compassionately

The woe only in I
Same goes for you

What’s mine is yours
And what’s yours
Is mine too

And you
You are
So ******* beautiful
To me

For me..

Waiting patiently
For us to meet

As this
This ******* dream

Is disintegrating

In graying hair
And brittled teeth

Right before me

Between my fingers
Secreting my completeness

The sheen that lingers
Of what may beat this

You are Less and less
Amiss and drifting through an abyss
Of timelessness
Or *******

Lighting the nothingness
With the something’s we have lit

Crumpling the summoning
Under running concepts

I flip it
Loop it
Re-repeat it
Speak it
And there it is

Until it's all there is

To be convinced
Of it ever being

It is what it is
It is what you make of it

But it
It is non-existent
Despite the coherence
Of the zing

It's still *******

However you paint it
Manipulative and complacent

I still sing

And once you get it
The pit still sits

Right where you left it
And you still aint ****

Merely being

We Just ride it
Until the end

Slowly declining in its decent
Commending the contempt
And spending our worth

To vent and purge
The splurging words
While observing the swerves
Of our naked nerves
In the sunlight

I writhe in light
Like in the warm shower insights
To my life
Lost when I dry

I'll be alright
When our eyes
Lock on the same night
On the same starry skies
Hypnotizing our lies
Into drive
As we drive
Off the same cliff

It's candle lit
Convalescence
To our testaments
To love and hate the love
In the wretched lessons
Lessened by the blessings
From the others projecting
Our chances of living
On our setting sons

Till the dawn of war drums
Strum with our fathers guns
On the gumption
Of the stun
As it fades away
As the faces deteriorate
From pictures framed of mind

Despite the rewinding
To the reeling back
Of everything that happened
In the snap back

Unto impact
It is the rubber band that snapped

That held it all together

Facts are still facts
Or perhaps
A map
To what happened
And trapped it
To one singular act
Of submission

The intuition
A mere vision
Made to action
Seeing is believing

The deceiving traction

Mashing the imagination
In its station for supremacy

Satisfaction

A ration
Of the disbelief
Molding into my souly retreat
Where I shall lovingly
Accept defeat
And fall upon my knees
Unto your love for me

Seeing you reflecting
Your similar beliefs

Once unbeknownst in the grief

Simply beautiful

I see us disappearing in the seas
In pulling tides
And swirling cities

Where we complete
Upon meeting
As we sink

I confabulate with thee,
Your words cut me so deep,
Leaving scars beneath the holes piercing in my heart,

Your voice so unreachable,
I try to connect with you,
But the feelings of complete and utter love, far gone.

Uncontrollable urges dwelling inside me,
My mouth so dry, out of words,
Trying to communicate in terms of getting thee,

Tranquility far from being found,
Loneliness scares me,
Your presence though, takes my breath away and calms me down,

My weak heart,
Wilts without you,
Defoliating internally and breaking me,

My nervous system,
Secreting enzymes from the pituitary gland,
Enzymes of hopelessness and heart break,

It feels like an ocean without water,
Incomplete and dry,
Waiting to fulfill that thirst of love,

A day without you,
Feels like an era passed,
Changing my surrounding and you on the way,

Devastated I am,
Deprived of that charismatic love we once shared,
Now bond-less, like oxygen being separated from hydrogen,

With ever drop of blood that falls,
Draining all my veins and arteries,
I can swear, I will always love you till the day my heart stops beating.

her blooming figure gyrating
arcing, tilting, wilting above;
my tasting her secreting prose,
licking all the lines

that come
and go

like fallen petals hugging themselves
in moonglow spell,
lit with an aftercoil meld, blueblack waters stilled

894

Of Consciousness, her awful Mate
The Soul cannot be rid—
As easy the secreting her
Behind the Eyes of God.

The deepest hid is sighted first
And scant to Him the Crowd—
What triple Lenses burn upon
The Escapade from God—

I don't know any lady
without eyes with zero dreams!

I've found two female legs
walking on the rainbow
At the top of the tree with birds;
I've seen two hands of a damsel
touching blue lotuses
Within thrilling waves of low air!

A pea-green lady soul secreting moonlight
Around orange-sun cracking jokes with clouds.

I've perceived weighty eyes
in the deeper black lake
Swimming with multicolored fishes;
I've seen an off-white body limbless
into an unknown folder
Walking slowly on the water!

I haven't noticed any woman
flying like kites together with a butterfly!



Poem 22
Book 'Beckoning Jade-Dreams' April 2007
Copyright Musharrat Mahjabeen
Mizan Publishers, Dhaka, Bangladesh
ISBN 984-8700-82-X

Infectious smile
Like the sweetest disease
My lip have never touched
Such a delicate taste
As the gentle toxin
Secreting from your lips

I Sleep ;
I Slip
In Doze, I Seep out into the Scenes ;

In Potions Deep
In Notions Cold and Preasuring
I Fit and Knit my Crown
I Coral
I Knot and Concrete a Frown
But though I Invite my Efforts
My Thoughting is Leaks and Tearing *

Over Whale but Underwater
I Recover Nothing Reassuring
Slowing to a Pale
In Ocean Cold
My Feedings are Slurring to a Drown
My Motions ; Enwombed and Collected
An Unfoetal, my Body Undertakes a Vulnerable Mould

Above
The Surface
The Ship Blinks, on Fire
And Gifts from the Broken Hold Sink to me
It's all a Wink Directed at me
A Humour

But I am become Prepared Still
For the Next Life
I Discard, Decending Still
A Treat Sunk Below
A Monsterous Breakfast

                                                 *note­ : as in, secreting saline, watery fluid

A false hope
of belonging

shaded by disappointed lectures
by an idolized puppeteer of authority

shameless
we toss our ideals on the roots below
to gain one free moment
from thought

look back on that body
think of the grunting
sweating
pouring ink onto pillows
secreting through stretched pores
letting the dreamer sleep,
and the others dream
on these brightest nights

no more possessive pronouns
no one wonders
like we used to
no greater power is knocking

we're convicts of our own convictions

a paradox
air gets hard to swallow
hide under your quilt
of disdain and guilt

keep me afloat
but never show me how

Along the gallant road rides a superfluous vibe,
Secreting utter destruction as it strides through massive vines.
It clasps its form against the almighty wind,
With every curve, it steeps into a lifelike kin.
  
When midnight turns, it taunts with vigorous fear.
Growing its momentum as it creeps near and near.
Suddenly, faint noises reeled in and appeared! Creak…Creak…Creak….
The wind slams into the mahogany door without any presence becoming clear.

What might it be? Who could it be?
Had the door not been closed when I went off to sleep?
The infant child began to ruminate about all the possibilities,
Until the moment it grew tired and drifted into a dream.

The child became the rider of the wind.
Dreaming of endless encounters with other hopeless victims.
Have you not noticed the source of energy imposed from within?
It was the child who crafted this skin of sin.

The silent scream soared throughout the sky.
Until the unconscious mind transformed, as it stroked midnight.
Ding…****…Ding… The animal awoke from its den;
After a superfluous vibe was intuitively picked up from within.

By: Michael M. De La Fuente

On a human journey reaching inner peace.  
Providing love and inspiration to all whom I meet.  
Spiritually inclined in this world so diverse.
Seeking wisdom from those who inspire me the most.  

Socializing is in my true nature.  
Establishing connections to expand positive vibrations.  
Understanding and accepting that people may come and go, while others maintain a constant flow.  
Learning how to live, while judging no soul.  

We must seek within to develop a pivotal foundation.
Secreting awareness to increment our minds potential.
Such beauty is accessible for everyone to know.
Being in the present moment will enable that for sure.

Enriching this worlds energy by kindness with whom we meet;
will profoundly nurture one's ability to absorb positivity.

By: Michael M. De La Fuente

Still searching for something...

I silently shifted past silhouettes of strangers for I am a shadow formerly named.

Someone said you felt the same, a sorceress seeking solitude inside a spire, a safe haven for all those stolen souls.

She was of the sea and softly spoke to me sowing smoke in weaves but I knew of no vowels that could commit her senses and yet sentences slowly slid from my mouth stolen by gravity towards the south where soldiers slept beneath the sands of sorrow.

Surrounded by sounds shifting from silence to song something sang sweetly secreting secrets only the stars dared keep.

So I buried my past somewhere in tomorrow somewhere I would never reach nor no longer seek for slumber is my only ally as I succumbed to sleep for the final time surrendering my soul to the valley of shapes and signs.

His diction
Fictitious
Mincing
Spit and ****
In ridiculous
Versus
Versionless
In vicious
Dispersions
Of his bluffs
Staining rugs
Enough
To know
What hes
Made of
Through the
Fluff
And he was
A weak hearted
Blabber mouth
Sporting
A verbal blouse
With a gerbil
Where his intellect
Was housed
And he is
Without
A doubt
A *******
Clown
Lying down
At the first
Shot
And hes not a poet
Without flow
To show it
And he knows it
But its rough
To huff
And puff
Before a smarter
Man
With harder
Hands
And solid tramps
Trampling
The dropping pants
With open mouths
As they fall down
To their knees
Pleasing
The release
Of a king
He
Kisses
The key rings
And sings
Of sheep
Dreaming
The dream
Was a dream
But still sees me
Even after
Stopping
Breathing
From floor
To ceiling
Revealing
The butchered
Meat
Secreting
The feelings
Fading away
And he looses
But nothing new is
Brewing there
He can glare
From down there
But aware
I'm better
More clever
And severed
His vendettas
beheaded him
Before the sedatives
Could wear off
The kids
The wife
The dog
Just *** socks now

concrete flinging monkey that i am:
albeit albino -
tinged with himalayan salt hues...
   well this little detail of my working
limbs: concrete -
3 parts of sand 1 part  magic dust:
some water -
here's a dead-earth dough -
it's not a pizza it's not a pizza dipped
in caramel to be subsequently
deep-fried: it's not a scottish ingenuity
project for a heart-attack:
after all... a mars bar battered is missing...
oh my little edinburgh...
one of those nights and mornings:
having finished watching the matrix
trilogy and expanding on:
joys of 5am: being awake prior to
the cockerels shooting out their salutes
to the ***** of white noise and fat
on leaves glistening in: an abyss of a yawn -
the crags and st. arthur's seat:
big ******* volcano sleeping
in the middle of the town...
          such crispness of urban life...
the streets so devoid of noons and...
  buying that carton of cornflakes
      and some milk and enjoying a double
variation of crispness...
well concrete flinging monkey as i
were today: doodling my slow
in the garden... digging a trench for g.i. joe
soldiers in my take on world war I...
so the weeds (morning glory esp.) would
take to teasing its presence from my
neighbour's backyard...
  obviously there was a spider: a glutton
of a eye-fest... whether it was just finishing
its delight or...
           the moth: i guess it was a moth
had a missing head...
  so grand slurp champion was *******
all the details...
   i nudged it once, i nudged it twice...
that bulb of: bottomless pit torso that
probably arrives at secreting a web...
i nudged it once more...
nothing...
no nervous scuttling or having to parachute
onto a sponge of its exoskeleton...
i arrived at the posit: my little world
and my inquisitive lense of the microscope...
apparently a spider will not mind
being nudged by "the hand of god"
should it be eating a moth...
    hardly a lazy sod:
                  what's there to admire the a priori
argument:
   it's not like a spider learns
to become the architect of a web -
it's not like dogs learn to swim...
                     throw a dog in the deep end
and watch the gruff ruffian tread!
duck beast...
                    no... apparently you can try
and try to agitate a spider in the middle
of his meal... even after...
after the meal? the spider had to eat
up some cotton...
    like a bear might prior to undertaking
hibernation... to clog up the ****...
the spider started nibbling on some
of the web...
    and i guess they do that...
go hunting with a web:
                  at the opportune moment...
a day's worth at best to pass the time...
once the meal is over
they figured out to clog up the nutrients
with some of the web...
   can spiders take a ****...
but unlike agitating a hungry spider...
which will scuttle the moment it
is brushed with a tip of any sort...
this well fed specimen took things... lightly...
i could have... done...
the extension of "scrutiny":
buried the ubiquitous bulldozer of fangs
that concentrated on the guillotined
head of a moth in a dollop
of my concrete...
                       i just find it impossible
to **** moths... hell... some night
i'd a proud caricature of man in what
become a nursery -
            come sunrise i don't know whether
i am the graveyard
my mouth the last "search" for these...
        "refugees" from the torment of the night...
conversational overtones in this:
"poetry": it's not something to
make memory architecture of rhyme...
rhyme alone is not enough...
lyricism - i am not gorging on wishing
for a Keats replica...
that it might rhyme and be better
ingrained: a burning coal of fluid ink...
or that horrible alternative of: the haiku...
mash up: i write for the sake of not being
able to afford the paint the canvas
the brushes or the superstitious agony
of what's already preemptive in such
an undertaking...
                     but it's better tested:
      from this day's depth and its
eyes made most pertinent -
      (this shouldn't be hard...
all i have to look for is a -ent suffix
to match)
           toward some forever incessant...
my own limbo toying with body:
to later succumb to an anybody...
                lazily rhymed -
    lazily staged: for all the gold
of the leprechauns... k k k k koch:
                                  chasm and a miasma...
by god's sexless and the devil's
**** and furry *****...
   i want to rhymes...
i wants to rhymez...
               rhymez likes ping-pongs...
in another tongue:
the plural of echo: is not ecce for a cappuccino:
etch 'ere...
         crescendo bother: blues...
i forget there's painting involved...
no crisp solidified sounds:
   a tongue lapsing up a lisp and a labrador
cow-traffic of moo: st'...
                        from colour to a sound...
an alphabet ring-a-ding-ding...
in another tongue the plural of echo:
              ech...
                     not... m'eh... or eh... for an E...
which is first sung and later cited: eeee (longating)
e-ha!-o...
              not e.e.k.o.
                             prune juice fermenting
from drinking: god this brain this sponge...
spiders and spiders...
        spiders and spiders...
first inconvenience is also a staggering
remedy: failure on my part...
hangover from a love that lasted...
well... from april through to september...
           obviously impossible as i couldn't
just see the need to "pet" tarantulas...
           me and my fickle arachnophobia...
it's sometimes there: it's sometimes not there...
and "there"...
hell... if a louis zukofsky can play
the tender part of aristocratic verbiage:
here i come towing a guilty expansion
project: under the proposed guidelines
of: democracy... had i a tongue with
a sidewinding penny to boot...
that i might lisp or spit point blank
an empty fill: and... there would be an
academic career waiting for someone
as i might: provide... postmortem...
                 it's not an agony of
the overlooked...
it's just an agony of agony...
   for some per se pressure to peruse one's
own lack of detail...
to have to complicate the demands
of an audience as a...
  "back-up plan": B-project...
                         in seeking redemption:
or gravity -
   all i know is that i'm not a narrative
architect - i'm too poor to paint...
or rather: i have a photographic memory
and i'd rather make food that cezanne
wouldn't want to paint:
or debase by eating...
          could you paint still life
these days: no... not very: not really...
but i am not a journalist... either...
primarily so...
             i am a democrat on the level that
i would be happy to live
outside of plato's republic:
it's not like plato ever convinced that
figurehead of Syracuse...
                  so... spoilt eggs...
chicken strutting flamingos...
     red's an oopsie come blue and purple
is born...
that's not true...
green and yellow will yield blue...
fair enough...
               but as sure as death: i am...
big credit to punctuation as a revision
of: not anti-rhyme: but certainly not pro- it...
    because i'm constipated on this
type of exertion...
i want as much of the holy fire of lyricism
to burn a mark on the cinema of
memory...
   but... alas: here's my 2nd best take
on this not being tabloid journalism...
               - so how come everyone started
to write: cute?
i mean: if not a cute rhyme then...
some variation of the exasperated haiku?
  - sputnik...
           in sight a digression rubric...
it's the same idea:
   - sputnik
   - moon shards
    - elevations of comparisons
   to match up to a meteor crater with
a slice of apple crumble...
    - sound is most certainly not colour...
- could i call nouns primes:
  or numbers? odd... even...
             red elepahant 1 G
              blue sky 0 K
              horrible hat 9 pro
circus envy... esp. clown envy...
                        this couldn't possibly be...
tabloid journalism...
or "poetry"... it's how far democracy
allows itself the pursuit of: ideals
with a hint of veto... for the pardon
of the status quo hierarchy...
                 concrete flinging monkey...
- robert duncan: nee san francisco -
i write by eyes alone -
i neuter the sounds employed
to challenge like neither *** -
best unscripted and that...
       metaphor of metaphysics
                collage of misnomers -
at best...
                     having to sit with
a slab of lard on your head at noon -
       this least grammar this last exasperation...
a furniture of a "poem"...
an earthworm's guide / guise of the tongue...
wriggling away at the benign...
        postcards and a slick licking of
postage stamps...
                 i forget to pause: i pause...
i paint with this bothersome blood of ink...
the crisis at the revisited crux...
stale europe dying h'america...
                i have yet to read anything
i have written aloud...
   i have yet to read anything i have written
aloud...
i have yet to read anything
i have written aloud:
resonance...
                    revelation 13:5...
          the beast was given a mouth to utter
proud words and blasphemies and
               to exercise its authority
  (for forty-two months)...
time a forgotten space...
or at best: a concentrated suffice of it...
a most bearable 10am in september...
i'd like to think i can't be
exasperated... or i might just:
jest at overt-punctuation...
          - written as pure eyes and
a beethoven towing deaf-        -ness...
    too much of: jack of all trades...
- we once had a "pardon" of handwriting,
in that we once employed a quill
and a detail of ink -
but not now but not now
of this clicking machinery like
chickens' pecking grains or letters...
         spiders and spiders and all those
freelance romantics...
a democracy of language that can
escape a caging formality to the endearing
dear sir, kind regards essay / letter...
language in a tuxedo...
language of escapism...
that one might treat a watermelon
as driftwood... or the crucifix as such...
  - that this can be a language that cannot
be a mechanised slaughter -
  for a throw-away: a 20th century admiration
for some variation of the "up-to-date"...
i am having to diminish
the base of an argued for: carpenter...
by bone... by bone... by each...
carrying of the vowels without:
the pentagram soliloquy -
           that could only be a variation
of rhetoric without an eagering of an audience...
this ingrained son of sam
this glittering blood feud of nights...
a line of an exasperation...
and each and every akin to this "maxim"...
because this is not tabloid journalism...
and it's not because it's
a democratic avenue of would-be squalor...
my niche partitioning
between those literate and those:
hardening a candyfloss of tortures:
       born air: settled in a tomb of fire...
born water: settled in the double sediment
that's once a breathing air comb
into frets of grain...
and earthworm wriggling...
now cement... malicious albino ape jester:
my little evil at the passable concern for
salt and the himalayas...
in that i work on the worth of:
teasing clone i - not in english not in english:
but in english...
  in this... tongue that's a best
butchered body of... a scrutiny that's
almost a... verifying anatomy... best:
   brick by ******* stacked...
a harbour of anathema and dangling
posits of: walking-9-to-5 abortions...
            high cue: but otherwise there's always
a managing of a queue...
that's bottom brass and godhad grey...
with a tease of a concept of hair...
balding snow on tomorrow's mountain...
- that i never hear what i write...
that i see it...
            i see "it" borrowed from somewhere
that has to be revised and revisited and
so-forth backed up renewed into
a ******* Guggenheim... renewing:
          new yorker slang and formalities of
rent... and... shackled up with...
dirtying the shells of oysters with...
prior the lemon and the glug of
the slugging: a word for lessening tourism of
Penzance... or anywhere in south wales:
cornwall...
         i tried loving the russians...
i tried loving the russians...
but then i had a mirage of a girlfriend
that had to tame tarantulas and i was
an arachnophobic tease -
                 - that in poetry the narrator is "somehow"
not the protagonist...
disembodiment via a section by
section - this limit of a candle...
this the kidney... this the heart...
but a "polyphony" of chicken hearts
towed into a broth...
          that poetry doesn't allow
a narrator... that i want to pick out a mask...
and i want tabloid journalism to spew
out of me...
this little detail this grammatical
arithmetic - sound of A...
and the syllable tease of a consonant -
impromptu question:
              asked in between: "in between":
what is a consonant K...
then again: in borrowed rome:
KAY is not the greek kappa...
what is the nurture of over-naming
and what are synonyms?
                      layers upon layers and
this is not a purity of jargon-jesting...
spiders and spiders...
                    - such that i believe in the anonymity
of readers and how i don't expect
a comment section:
   that bukowski made poetry pop
for: a gary snyder admirer...
  
  or - how one hundred arrows were sharpened
on flesh: and were dimmed...
because to crown this crude
metal creed against a stone....
and had to make coagulation of
frothing bloom -
extracting pauses to make a living
with taking wheel:
              burning rubber and burning
kites...
             burning threads and shoelaces...
dissolving sugar into
caramel...             an oyster that became
a tongue.... and a tongue...
its uttermost silence that could be
wrapped up back into a clean
residue of: biting / nibbling
for a piano... because never at a...

           such is the concept of rhyme...
that one can beg for guillotines
to... supposedly... "end".

from latin: a letter i can see...
a word i can: lip-read!
               not this... vanguard
of sanskrit and the glagolitic.

translate the letter to a status of a number...
whole: holes...
from nothing the sieving project.