"unthreatened" poems
I sit patiently waiting to spoil.
The rays bouncing off emerald leaves
Cast tiny shadow displays
that synchronize with blades of grass
dancing in the summer wind.
They're coming.
Laughter is silenced by
the impending crash
and rumble of mechanical
horses travelling down their rails.
The cries overpower the ruckus.
Bodies surround me
like a zombie honing in on
its next fleshly morsel.
Yet I feel unthreatened.
But I feel alone.
Outnumbered.
Their joy draws out the sadness in me,
their fear my anger.
I am as empty as my bank account.
Sheltered by the elements of
social interaction.
Black bars all around me
It's a prison with tiny loopholes.
Only the intelligent may escape.
Dead trees are responsible
for holding the weight of
my body, yet I thank them
by stirring its slumber
and passing gas on the
twigs below me.
I hope they forgive me.
For I have nothing materialstic to give
but my heart, body, and soul.
Maybe sanity if that is still left.
I require the basics.
No more, no less.
But even that is too much to ask.
Where has humanity gone?
Stripped of its original nature
and replaced by dollar signs, profits, greed.
Take me back to the simpler times
So I can go back and read.
My life is no good here.
Let me spoil.
May 3, 2012
May 3, 2012 at 8:28 PM UTC
~
lost in thought, a deepened musing,
far away from noise and music,
welcome silence, unthreatened hush;
twilight’s western curtain of dusk,
slowly lifts, unveils her features,
displays a show for just two creatures;
celestial risings’s muted dance,
neath the moon one takes his stance,
the mighty hunter, Orion’s threat,
till from the chase he falls in sweat.
the stars connect in tale by numbers,
whispered tell from lips each utters;
in dreams our bodies join the arch,
heaven’s hosts with whom we march,
a nightly parade of planets calling,
till herald sounds the curtain falling,
when daybreak brings them sweet relief.
as one by one they fall... in sleep.
~
*postscript.
a trip to Central Washington's wine country last week under a rising harvest moon begged a nighttime detour to Maryhill’s Stonehenge. the starry night, free of city light pollution, the constellations, the shadows of a full moon on cold granite... all so hauntingly beautiful... reminds us that we are gifted our role in the nightly parade of stars, the breathtaking march of planets that we need only look up to join.*
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPK6iq0gnks&
Oct 13, 2014
Oct 13, 2014 at 12:42 AM UTC
It's always the same story, never a true story
These stories of power and stories of glory
They fill me with rage, they fill me with fury
A culture unthreatened has room to grow,
while it beats down others, left with nowhere to go
They didn't "evolve," they were destroyed
Shoved into the crevices of history and into the void
It's the politics of denial,
A nation where those of color aren't even given a trial
I want to one day live in a country where the severity of the crime isn't determined by the color of your skin.
When with equality conquer? When will it win?
Dec 8, 2016
Dec 8, 2016 at 9:08 AM UTC
I know you're feeling like a failure,
starring at the white ceiling
of your pale bedroom for the
seventh night this week,
and I know you slept
through three
alarms this morning
you set last night with
constellations in your fingertips,
I know you tossed around
your satin sheets
holding back tears with
nothing but the notion that,
"hey tomorrow I'll start over"
and now you're wondering why
you ever trust your own intentions
Well I know you feel helpless
and you don't know anymore
if your life even serves a purpose
But I hope you get
some sleep tonight
and I hope that tomorrow morning
at seven AM, the sun creeps
through your curtains and lays
its warm palms into your eyelids
& I hope you sit up feeling calm
& unthreatened & you think
to yourself how peaceful
a walk might be,
and then I hope to god
you get out of your coffin
and slip into clothes
that make you feel small
but capable and cute
but powerful
And I hope you take that walk
and I hope the fresh air
feels good on your tired skin
and I hope you see someone
you used to love about a mile
up the road, and I hope instead
of glancing down at the pavement,
you look directly at him with
brave eyes and say "hello"
And I hope when he asks
how you've been,
you say "better"
And even if it's a lie
I hope you believe it
And I hope you smile
until your jaw aches
& you eat until you're full
And I hope you keep moving
even if the ground you walk on
is quick sand,
I hope you keep on moving
even if you don't know where
you're going,
I hope you find a reason to
greet the day,
even if
for now
it's nothing but a pretty new
sweater you want
the world to see you in
Jan 9, 2015
Jan 9, 2015 at 10:59 PM UTC
When I am happy,
I am brighter than the most radiant light,
My mind a conflagrant forest;
a blinding light devours wrong and right,
making me believe, unlike Icarus,
the sun could not burn my wings;
she could never shun my deliverance.
When I am sad,
I sit stuck on things once had,
I am blinded by a radiant light,
so I retreat,
to a jet black night;
The sun a lion,
my soul it's meat,
the sun is glutton,
yet he does not eat
When I am happy,
my mind is hot as stars,
and my darkness lies home trapped,
behind honeycomb bars.
Unthreatened by my demons,
with their black suits and white cigars
Mar 24, 2020
Mar 24, 2020 at 6:23 PM UTC
Suspended in plankton waters
Penetrating silence renders neutrality
This shell, a cloak that covers me
I sometimes wish could not be seen
A drifting vessel
I seek peace behind formations
Ominously engaging, yet silently stand.
Crashing waves roll above
The bravado of Mahlerian timpani
Perched yet unassuming
I am the unthreatened spectator
In this subaquatic symphony
Illusory projections
Inverted medusas glide past
Graceful tendrils in tendu
Ballerina specters
Synchronized in adagio and ballon
A momentary desire overwhelms
To move within their majesty
Omnisciently connected by design
But mine is a different course
A willing and solemn stride
To waters of another intention
Nov 27, 2016
Nov 27, 2016 at 6:08 PM UTC
some days I pretend carry no change in them
I pretend in the twenty four hours elapsed, nothing consequential has happened
I pretend that my recovery is unthreatened,
I pretend therapy will work
I pretend nothing inside me has broken
(at least, not beyond repair)
other days, willingly or unwillingly, I remember
change change change
comes back to me like a fire from the past
feeling hotter than it might've back then
here i am drawing it back from what i feared it would feel like
and never really let myself feel
so how am i to know it would've hurt like this back then?
only a guess i suppose
but I go with it, embrace it
reflection is a memory and I think about her once I see her all day
can't bear to look at any new one, the one I might call myself today
the one I need to recognize as myself
but can't bring myself to
here's a confession for no ears, about the bad years
about the longing that so strongly defines my days
i suffocate every few days, lose myself every few hours
then decide to keep going.
this, at least in theory, is a nice thought.
a year ago i never thought to believe i had it in me to live any sort of life, have any kind of continuity.
the latter is still true. i still don't know how to keep going in a straight line. my best friend tells me healing is not linear. so i've embraced it
learned to go up and down and be okay with it
Dec 7, 2017
Dec 7, 2017 at 7:41 PM UTC
There was a man who did not always know his name.
Sometimes, it would be clear as the day and the time and the place,
Sometimes it would be like a forgotten memory
Leaving traces but just out of reach of his mind.
How reassuring it was in those moments
For someone to call him by a familiar sound,
And to know that at least one part of him was fuller than the moment before.
But when he was alone
Or around those who knew him best and did not feel the need to remind themselves of what he was called,
There was a terrifying absence within him, which he was too prideful to admit.
In those moments, the place, the time, the day were as much strangers to him as another universe.
Grasping at them was futile, and only served to remind him of how far he was from the person who had a name.
He would choose to ignore the truth that someone who was him existed, preferring to absorb a meaningless present than to grieve for a lost past.
Those suffering moments between names were a chill which sunk deep into his bones, and slowed his heart, so that even the space between beats, between moments, seemed unspeakably vast, each a lifetime, yet never endowing the wisdom that years give.
Then, all at once, the lifetimes would melt away in one warm burst
As something or someone reminded him of himself.
And for the most terrible moment, he would know all,
Both what is was like to be full,
And what it was like to be emptier than the most infinite void,
Realization and loss would envelop him
And he would understand what it was to not be.
This was the most hideous moment of his existence,
So much the worse for the knowing
Of what had been the lifetime before.
But this too would pass, blown away by the new, old name, and soon, it too would be forgotten.
Then, he was just him, unaware and unthreatened by the memory of nothing.
And that was happiness,
That was beauty,
That was truth.
For the man who did not always know his name,
To know it,
Was absolutely everything.
Oct 16, 2017
Oct 16, 2017 at 2:11 AM UTC