"shackles" poems
How do you explain
to your children that the
horrors of the world are real?
How will I tell my son, We
found a place you can call home but
your bus might not make it to school.
Do not look too Jewish in this part of town
Do not play in the train station
Do not get used
to the weight
of a machine gun.
Or look my
daughter in the eye and say, someday
you might say “no” and someone stronger than you might
not listen
You will not tell me
Know that this happens a lot
Know that your wrists pinned against a
backboard will
echo in the way you move your hands
for as long as you let it
But
human hands aren’t as heavy as metal shackles
And I’m so sorry
but I won’t be able to
take the weight for you
You’ll wake up in the morning
That I can promise you
You’ll wake up
and your lungs will fill with air
whether you tell them to or not.
One day
I will hold someone
small, with my face
and they’ll cry and I’ll say,
*I know.
I know you’re tied with little yarn strings to the last life
I know it hurts to be here and
(honestly)
you’re never going back
But
the older you get the less you’ll remember
what it was like
before you had a body
when you were made of ash and infinite light
You’ll convince yourself you live here and
that your hands are you,
But remember that once you were boundless
Inside my body, without yours.*
Jul 27, 2011
Jul 27, 2011 at 2:34 PM UTC
~for those who will read this and weep~
*the quiet ones,
the silent Job ones,
who quote not from the
Book of Lamentations,
but author their own,
based on-the-job experience
localized versions of cryptic elegiacs
accepting the wooden crosses borne,
stepping up to the
unrequested unforeseen,
then buried under, burnt alive,
yet never relieved by dying,
nailed by words, stronger than iron,
promises sworn, promises kept
with no ending date relief,
promises by and to themselves,
but not for themselves!*
*the wearers of crystal glass shackles,
adorned with decorative locks for which
no key did the maker make,
nor any divine creator
dare conceive an early release,
never no escape contemplated,
for the lock human, unrepentant unbreakable,
a decorative useless metaphor gesture,
a blunt “life ***** advertisement
I compose amidst a
bus pond of mismatched city folk,
a tapestry of ages colors and differing views on god/no god,
none would believe that as the bus sways me,
it’s in rhythm to holy choral music,
hundreds year old,
divinity masses and motets worships,
where one human can hide temporarily
a safe house,
to calm his questioning relentless
from the horrors of no answers,
for when the mind has no solution
to the rough and tumbling lives,
lived in glass shackled confinement,
the poets desperation equals theirs*
*summon eagles to transport these imprisoned,
but the shackled refuse,
I come to them but they wave me off,
I go crazy for once I was enslaved,
thirty years war that left devastation,
from which so many poems created
so I speak with heightened regard
of one who planned futures for others where his
non-existence was a founding father (ha!)*
*but the day came and
I was released by my own inactions,
but means nothing until a way to
away found
to release the yet bound early*
got a couch, airline miles, hundred dollars
in my pocket and an unrelenting need
to save them, a consumption disease,
the glass shackled, at ease,
won’t rest till all are freed
this my creed
no one left behind
these cyber words do not mock
for they are unbounded, set free,
when
the flesh connects and the needs of the flesh
are stronger for they are in heart conceived
Jun 23, 2018
Jun 23, 2018 at 5:45 PM UTC
My mother should be an author
She carves her soul into millions of pieces
Leaving it behind all of the family photos
When I see my mother
I see a woman
Who wants to hide her soul in a needle
Just so the screaming can stop in her mind,
These bottles are rattling in the living room
You see they have put shackles on her heart,
She can't love anymore
Without having ***** in her water bottle.
Where is she hiding her beer?
I feel like my mother is giving me a scavenger hunt
From the shards of glass that were left on the baseball fields
My mother used to take me to.
You know she always wasn't like this
She was strong minded and had a big heart
Tonight I will tell you the story of a woman
Who lost her soul to the Keystones to the Miller Lites
To the ****** Mary’s.
Let's rewind time
See how to **** the soul in ten years
10- I look into my mother's eyes and I start to cry
Because I'm looking at a woman who I don't know anymore
9- I refused to bail her out of jail again
Because I'm afraid her kidney will fail if she drinks again
8- My mother staggered into the theater and disrupted the whole play,
My cast mates turned to me and asked, isn't that your mother?
7- I had to hold my mothers hand
Because she was throwing up the cocktail of drugs and alcohol
6- Daddy had to get mom out of jail she was drinking again
5- My mother throws the bottle across the room
And told me the reason why she drinks is because I'm Autistic
4- My mother overslept for my piano recital,
I didn't think it was a big deal
But I remember she spent the whole night crying
With a wine glass in her hand.
3- Mommy I didn't know your prescription came in a needle
2- Mommy the prescription say 2 pills a day
why are you taking 6?
1- My mother went to the doctor
Found out that she has Rheumatoid Arthritis
I don't know what that means,
But I know she will still be strong right?
0- She took me to a Dodger game for my birthday.
I remember Sammy Sosa hitting a home run that game
She told me that the only person that can **** your soul is yourself
Apr 27, 2014
Apr 27, 2014 at 12:16 AM UTC
gently
so gently
you pulled the
threads loose,
set me free
but the relief lasted
barely a moment -
you tied me to
you, chained me,
and even after
you decided
you didn't want me
anymore
you left me
with the shackles
and the bruises
and the empty bed
and the sheets
that still smell
like you.
Aug 4, 2019
Aug 4, 2019 at 9:48 PM UTC
I am the ******
Singer of songs,
Dancer...
Softer than fluff of cotton...
Harder than dark earth
Roads beaten in the sun
By the bare feet of slaves...
Foam of teeth... breaking crash of laughter...
Red love of the blood of woman,
White love of the tumbling pickaninnies...
Lazy love of the banjo thrum...
Sweated and driven for the harvest-wage,
Loud laughter with hands like hams,
Fists toughened on the handles,
Smiling the slumber dreams of old jungles,
Crazy as the sun and dew and dripping, heaving life
of the jungle,
Brooding and muttering with memories of shackles:
I am the ******
Look at me.
I am the ******
17.4k
self-congratulatory nonsense as the
famous gather to applaud their seeming
greatness
you
wonder where
the real ones are
what
giant cave
hides them
as
the deathly talentless
bow to
accolades
as
the fools are
fooled
again
you
wonder where
the real ones are
if there are
real ones.
this self-congratulatory nonsense
has lasted
decades
and
with some exceptions
centuries.
this
is so dreary
is so absolutely pitiless
it
churns the gut to
powder
shackles hope
it
makes little things
like
pulling up a shade
or
putting on your shoes
or
walking out on the street
more difficult
near
damnable
as
the famous gather to
applaud their
seeming
greatness
as
the fools are
fooled
again
humanity
you sick
************
13.9k
My curls are everything you wish you knew about me
But it won’t reveal my inner mystery
My hair means young, it means wild, it means free.
My Latina nature sometimes precedes my personality
People try to tell me who I am and they whisper, “I bet she…”
My curls are everything you wish you knew about me
He says, “I know about you Latin girls…” but the only one who can enlighten me about me, is me.
To them I’m nothing more than another Jenny from the Block, but I’m not here to entertain you, let me educate you
My hair means young, it means wild, it means free.
My curls exude confidence, beauty, and *** appeal; they keep secrets, create dreams, and remind me how bright I expect my future to be
My hair does define me. But not as you define it, as I do. I am everything I believe my hair means
My curls are everything you wish you knew about me
Latinas are fierce, they are fire, and they are dangerous. Maybe we’re that way because you won’t let us be.
Can I just be me? Why do I have to be the person you want me to be?
My hair means young, it means wild, it means free.
I’m tired of society’s shackles, so I ignore what society expects me to be
I love my curls, I love them when they’re frizzy, unkempt, and unruly. My curls are me.
My curls are everything you wish you knew about me
My hair means young, it means wild, it means free.
~Karina
Apr 20, 2014
Apr 20, 2014 at 10:39 PM UTC
I walk with a straggle,
The chains become tighter with
Every step.
You see, this is my reason for
Giving up.
"You hold the key
to your own shackles"
I can set myself free,
With what ambition,
when my hands are tied?
What's the point of changing
When I've lied
For them to Believe I'm fine?
They say you can change,
They say it's possible to Believe
In something other than pain.
For this, I won't give up.
For this, I'll keep going
Until my hands don't reach
As low as my shackles hang.
Nov 26, 2018
Nov 26, 2018 at 4:43 PM UTC
The Ocean is her home,
But she wishes to venture places Unknown,
Above her world, The Surface world
Bottom feeders have left her post modem bored,
She is convinced to Pursue "New",
Can you blame her for chasing Waterfalls,
Instead of sticking to the rivers that she is use to,
She fiends to be Free,
From the shackles of conformity
Jun 3, 2015
Jun 3, 2015 at 2:10 PM UTC
Breathe in some gasoline
As I fly down to greet
Trade my butterfly wings
For a touch of machine
Take my evergreen
Get some new gleam
Your noxious fume spoil
Find some Asfalt sheen
My freedom I trade
For rusted shackles you see
Mar 8, 2016
Mar 8, 2016 at 9:09 AM UTC
I see the soft, charming ringlets bounce up, down, and around
As my little cousin opens her gift.
I hear the tinkling sound of her excited voice,
but feel sick to my stomach when she tells Mommy and Daddy what it is.
She squeals "Barbie!"
And I want to scoop her up and run,
Far, far, away from the little plastic doll,
On, on, onward toward a safe view of beauty.
Her ignorance is bliss, but I know better,
And I pray with a heavy heart
For that beautiful, creative mind underneath the ringlets.
I desperately ask some higher power
How we can protect her from that little doll.
What were you thinking,
I want to yell at the grown ups.
Didn't you learn from us?
Don't you know that Barbie cut open our hearts and sewed in her plastic ideal
Before they had beaten long enough for us to walk?
That she shoved sharp words in our head
Before we could string together full sentences?
That we never stood a chance,
From the moment we tore open the shiny paper
Dotted with cartoon Christmas trees?
That the "must-have" gift for a little girl
Would enslave our bodies and minds to a "must-have" torture for the rest of our lives,
And teach our brothers and classmates to look for the woman
With not enough calories in her body to sustain a simple memory,
With not enough room in her waist to hold a kidney?
Maybe it's not all your fault, you grown-ups.
Maybe you've been chained to the unattainable images for so long
That you've forgotten the shackles were even there.
But does that not scare you?
Maybe you'll remember the strain
When you see a beautiful young woman's scars,
When you hear a breaking voice speak about her friend's final breaths
At her own fragile hands filled with little pills.
But most of all, I pray to God that you won't have to remember too late,
I hope you don't have to remember when you're chained to her hospital bed
Because the insufficiency you gifted her in a shiny plastic box
Started a cycle of sinister self-hate and destructive delusion
That she cannot outrun.
I won't let you forget, because you cannot remember that way.
I won't let you forget, because she can't end up that way, like we did.
You think you gave her a pretty little toy in a shiny little package.
Didn't you learn from us?
You gave her Pandora's box.
You look at me funny,
When I replace the impossibly-sized plastic "woman" in her hands
With a toddler-sized plastic piano.
You may not remember, but I always will,
And I will dedicate my life to making sure
These beautiful ringlets will never have to.
Dec 19, 2013
Dec 19, 2013 at 1:43 PM UTC
Rage fills you
with endless fire
Leaves nothing
but ashes of life
Rage chokes you
with foul decay
Shackles the spirit
then tears it apart
May 3, 2014
May 3, 2014 at 2:28 PM UTC
I used to think that sadness was beautiful,
But what is the point of it all? We're supposed to be youthful!
They said time and time over that it would pass, but to be truthful:
The feeling and expressing pain or sorrow for sins, it's all we feel: ruthful
So in the end, what is the point of life at all?
When all we do is sit around and bawl,
"I just wanted to be pretty Cristi, just like a doll!"
But isn't it more important to be happy, above all?
All I have been feeling for the past couple of years is pain,
Even though all I have wrapped around my neck is a golden chain
Rather than his clenched fingers restricting against my jugular vein,
With a voice in the back of my mind reminding me of my engraved Mark of Cain,
It begs and exclaims, and it can't seem to remain restrained,
But to ease me of my pain, they'd say: "Here, have a glass of Champagne."
Can't you see what this mystery is doing to me?
I can't seem to break the shackles that would set me free,
All I'm reminded of is of my unfinished Master's Degree.
"Is that all that matters to you?!" I dare to plea,
"But what about my happiness, or my hemophilia b?!"
Their expressions are forever carved in my mind: dropped jaws and widened eyes,
"If it is such a sin to be happy, can't one consider the act of decriminalize?!"
They'd all put up such a convincing and eerie disguise
As if it would turn back the clock to avoid their end, their demise
But I could tell by their silenced, hushed lips and snake eyes:
My inquiry deserved a Nobel prize
What was it about my question that turned my loved ones against me?
They wouldn't dare turn their heads my way, they'd continue to sip on their black tea
As if I were a ghost, or some sort of banshee
The loss of my sanity is what they could foresee
-
Jun 23, 2014
Jun 23, 2014 at 12:41 PM UTC
Seek freedom from the anxious mind
For, you have the freedom to choose
Break the shackles of intimidation
Claim your freedom for the sleeping madness
Wake up to a world of freedom, for it’s yours
Freedom for the prejudices and the dogmas
Claim your freedom for the untrusting world
Freedom beckons you from the deepest caverns
Thwart the advances of violence, and seize freedom
Do not pay heed to the abusive words
As your freedom to speak up is jeopardized
The weakest of hearts and minds, resort to violence
And their abode inside is wrecked by loss of freedom
You freedom will come when you walk out
Opening the gates of your heart to freedom
The weak personalities seeks to strangle freedom
To dominate the beautiful souls, as they feel threatened
Assert your freedom; this is becoming a puppet’s world
Always made to act when the strings are pulled
There is a world full of love and freedom waiting for you
You just have to cross the threshold of the murky world
Only you can win your freedom, if you choose to
Seek freedom, and slam the door on the world of captivity
© Amitav (Radiance)
May 8, 2014
May 8, 2014 at 5:56 AM UTC
Shackles and chains
used to run through my veins.
Freedom did not know my name
Now I roam the halls with no shame.
A brand on my torso
haunts me also.
My writing lets out the built-up anger
of the anchor.
Betrayal and sorrow fills the room
but I do not have gloom.
I’m always tired
but I never sleep.
I’m also sad,
but you never see me weep.
Thunder and rain
gave me pain.
Ships and dancing
were never romancing.
And here in the freedom I stay
because the skies are no longer gray.
I am strong and I belong.
And I have known this all along.
Jun 11, 2014
Jun 11, 2014 at 1:50 PM UTC
Contentment is for people who are satisfied to stop thinking.
To turn off all those parts of your head
That constantly generate questions
And continuously probe the accepted.
To hush the cells jumping up and down
To show you a new way to approach a topic,
Begging you to acknowledge the incredible plans
That could be birthed from the impossible way
You see the ordinary.
But I have an obligation to my mind.
Yes, sometimes it feels more like shackles than duty,
And yes, sometimes I want to abandon my notepad and paper
On the bedside table to have a "me day"-
Whatever that's supposed to mean -
Or halt the carousel of whirling thoughts for a nap,
But I can't.
I will always be curious, at my roots.
I grow from the dedication to my thoughts, upward.
A tree straining towards the light of innovation.
Why would I forsake the places my thoughts can take me,
Or the adventures my pen can take in translating them.
For the gifts this head gives me,
I must always be on call, on edge, on fire.
Contentment: unattainable.
Even if it weren't it would interfere with the very process
That would allow me to derive what meaning lies in contentment.
So that's my secret.
The Hulk was always angry, which is how he controlled and dominated.
I'm always searching, which is how I find and thrive.
I can't drown out my thoughts just to soak up the sun.
That's not contentment: that's complacency.
And complacency is not in my vocabulary.
How funny-
I am content with losing that one word
For the chance to be brilliant.
Dec 19, 2013
Dec 19, 2013 at 2:16 PM UTC
The tallest mountain
Once lay dormant
Confined between
Tectonic plates
Tremors and upheavals
Jolted it from slumber
Broke away from the shackles
Of solitary confinement
And oppression
Grazed and razed with every move
Now reaches the summit
To kiss the soft clouds
In silent meditation for ages
Mighty and tall, towers above all
Revered by many
Feb 16, 2015
Feb 16, 2015 at 12:34 PM UTC
Sunshine!
Sickly yellow
slow-light colored streaks
slithering worse than sweat
down my body.
That golden ball stares down at me
like a haughty goddess,
her duality shallow and hot.
She cares not for the freedoms of humans.
She's a two-faced coin,
purgatory masked by the promise
of freedom from pained brains
and scholarly shackles.
The sun laughs at her own trickery, gargling through melting teeth
as she collects suppressed confessions
from weakened teens.
When her crescent counterpart
offers solace from her torment,
the moonlit darkness
only serves to drown us
and we splutter in our own
self-taught
year-round
lies.
And the sun
rears her tattered, flaming mane
at daybreak,
belly-laughing at idle minds now unrefined,
gleefully adding her own scorch
to already inflamed brains.
Jul 16, 2018
Jul 16, 2018 at 8:24 PM UTC
I have been held captive
By this stupid trait
And I'm on the road
To my ugly fate
Jealous: I always was;
Jealous: I definitely still am
Oh, how I wish I were not,
Yet still I am ******
Free from these shackles;
How I wish I were
But what my future holds:
Appears unfortunately as a blur
So I'll be waiting
Right here in agony—
Waiting to be saved
From my utter jealousy
Oct 28, 2014
Oct 28, 2014 at 5:07 AM UTC
Freedom is life
Freedom is oxygen
Without freedom the soul will die
Freedom is water
Without freedom the body will die of thristy
Freedom is the right to express
Without freedom there will be no free speech
Freedom is wisdom
Without freedom there will be no goodness
Freedom is to live
Without freedom is to die
Freedom is happiness
Without freedom is Sorrow
Be free like a bird, like a bird which never worries about tomorrow
Be free like flower, a beautiful flower which spreads happiness with its beauty
Be free like a fish and swim through this ocean of this world
Fear and power are the shackles which keep freedom in solitary confinement,
Break the shackles of fear using Courage and bravery which gives birth to a child called Freedom
Freedom is to bring the inner child outside
Freedom is to break the ice of conventional wisdom
Freedom is to breath free and walk in the sky towards the lights
Freedom is not free, it has to be fought for.
Freedom is not easy, it has be endured tough battles of heart and body
Freedom is precious, do not waste it
Freedom is the heavenly fruit that is worth your time and life and everything it revolves around.
Apr 9, 2018
Apr 9, 2018 at 2:27 PM UTC
Rage, relentless shackles tortuously restricting the beat of my sole drum
Wailing child, aged’s bell, muffled canine whimper beckon
Tempered resignation and guilt overwhelm anger, their bidding masters me
Unequivocal love, they want and need me, as I they
Apr 14, 2015
Apr 14, 2015 at 9:29 AM UTC
I hide behind a mind engulfed with poisonous secrets I dare not to leave my mouth.
My feet are buried in shackles latched onto them while my skin drips in doubt.
My hands are stitch behind my back with threads of weakness.
My mouth expands while the truth is caged behind my teeth because it’s no one business.
I open my eyes and it flutters more than a bird in fear from a threat.
I lean my head to the side and analyze this disastrous home tormented by time but hasn’t given up yet.
I watched it light on fire.
I’ve seen it dismantled by hurricanes.
I heard the walls and wood creak from the distress.
How can a foundation be so strong after a wave of events?
We all are broken homes at some point of life even if it doesn’t make sense.
Financial crisis, heartbreak, anxiety, school, family, work, depression, racism, we all experience a wave that changes us for the better or for the worst.
Sometimes it becomes so consistent like an epidemic that one can feel curse.
Then we question, “why did I go through this? What did I do to deserve such a traumatic blow to the head?”
And we search for these answers in the same place that hugged us with so much agony and the countless stress it led.
Early nights turn to restless nights in bed because we force reality to sink in our head but it covers our nose and mouth until we faint in a pool of insecurity and beg for these feelings to dead.
Make it stop,
I’m drowning.
The sky turns to a bruised face and wakes up the roots with its tears.
I feel so connected as the drops fall to the floor because it reminds me we all break no matter how much we can bear.
I observe the rain dance on the sturdy house and admire it as the beauty glisten,
I grew a love for this home because it rebuild as much as despondence knocked on the door, it ignored and refused to listen.
It upholds its commitment to itself to never give up.
That no matter how much times it can get rough,
Know that you can survive and pretending your problems don’t exist will never be enough.
-dpk
Aug 21, 2017
Aug 21, 2017 at 3:05 PM UTC
A self confessed dreamer
One that knew no bounds
Can't keep his mind in tether
It's always fleeing from the grounds
He'd always been the dreamer
Picking the shackles of reality
Always hopeful of finding another
A safe haven, an escape, a sanctuary
Madness is thought of this silly little dreamer
Forever bartering reality for a life of fantasy
"He's moonstruck", said one to the other
Obstinate still he chooses to wander free
Alas one day, he stumbled upon a jewel
Glistening, deceivingly within arm's reach
But a beautiful game was played so cruel
Fate wouldn't give easily what it could teach
Glimpses of undefined beauty
Himself drawn closer to this beacon
He craves for this gem so madly
Didn't care for what's to happen
He descended to the surface
One thing he just did realise
That the jewel wasn't in its place
But a reflection of another in the skies
He looked up, he spun and he squinted
Attempting this search he had just begun
For a moment he found himself to be blinded
For the jewel is indeed the sun
He marvels at her beauty
Till his eyes turned red and sore
But he doesn't stop even briefly
For she's the object of his adore
He gazes at his newfound muse
Till the day grew dim and late
When she sets he would hesitate and refuse
To return willingly to his ****** state
Through promise he returns daily
To catch his sun as she would rise
For she fills him with aplenty
And she listens to his forlorn cries
He loves her much as she did him
In each other's magic the two would bask
As time flits by, the day grows dreadfully dim
Too short a time from dawn till dusk
The dreamer waits patiently
As dusk turns to dawn
The dreamer waits painfully
For she will come then she'll be gone
This rise is somewhat special
For his love he had made known
She admits the love is reciprocal
For him her love had also grown
But the dreamer will soon come to realise
Out of reach his sun he can never kiss
Her bountiful love will be the ultimate prize
The prize he can never claim to be fully his
*"Silly little dreamer feeding your childish dreams"
"Silly little dreamer what fanciful notions you make"
"Silly little dreamer you'll be ripped at the seams"
"Silly little dreamer not every heart you just can take"*
He pays no heed to what the others say
He knows his chances run exceedingly slim
He's walking on tightrope that's doomed to fray
But what happens today is what really matters to him
I am that silly little dreamer
Whose feet is never on the ground
I have chosen to live part of my life in wonder
For it is you that I have found
Jul 18, 2014
Jul 18, 2014 at 5:59 PM UTC
love letters Unsent
because for you? they’re not meant.
though written in this language inspired by you.
this place discovered, with your hand, as it led me to.
but further, we were not to tread.
and some of these words, are not to be read.
thankyou's, are to be sent instead
Thank-you
for opening this door, I could not find,
illuminating what lay behind
i to be seeing with eyes for the first time
that had not, and did not, see
what had been within my capacity
with _shackles_ shook free.
this rusty heart begun to speak
within the flow of my ink
as paper below allowed words to sink,
but to send..was not on the agenda
you cannot hear what I shout
as past fears on ears pound
it’s not meant for you and me
not to be truly or deeply,
was it not the reason fate had written?
our stars were those, that would simply, find each other,
to find ourselves.
May 18, 2018
May 18, 2018 at 4:39 AM UTC