It's time to light bonfires
Heat up some witches brew
Light up some incense
Cast our blessings
Churn some spells
Fear not thy winter
For autumn is first
It's time to enjoy
evening walks under the moon
Time for us witches
to prepare & craft some
Halloween decor
And to enjoy our time with
nature for soon we will
stay more indoor
So brew my coffee as , I do
I think of creative autumn
things , I need to do
Autumn is such a blessed
time of year
So here's a cheer for
this blessed time of year
© Jennifer L DeLong 9/28/22 🕸🌰

my feelings are the splattered inks
bold, italics
threatening to spill
weighing on every meaning
words could carry
scrambled up, juggled
those who’ve yet to feel
shall not speak
and pray tell, words
do you realize what you amount to?
what’s behind was for a reason, a person
clear as day, solid reverie
what lies beneath shan’t remain between the lines
and if it reaches you, we’re alike

The grey lines etch
Her eyes, her mouth and her hips;
A blade makes contact through the fine, stone mist.
Stagnant,
Sanding down the beating end of a hammer,
Trapped shapes appear,
Revealing new ways to approach
Her eyes, her mouth and her hips.

Finishings can be
The hardest part
In these final steps
All the craftsmanship
Has already occured
The finishings are
Mere inevitabilities

You must
Come to terms
With the idea that  
Perfection is a
Necessary goal
Precisely because
It is unattainable

You must reconcile
Yourself to failure

It's not perfect
You have to make
Your peace with that

How?
Well..
You lay out
Your tools
And you
start again

~
Black as coal.
Moth or myth?
It helps with the lights out.
And travels by thought.

Cleopatra enters Rome,
Dropping names,
Reciting pagan poetry,
Knocking on forbidden doors.

Nicole sees shadows
Of her former self
Staring back at her,
Rock paper scissors,
The color of three.

Give and take after take
On the burning soil
Of a blurred crusade.

Typewriters
And other assorted weapons
Form white lies and alibis,
Calibrating the dusted variations
Of a caught-on-camera obscura,
It is a dark waltz,
Some small hope still,

Yet there's a comma after still.
~

You have memories
to look back on,
on-this-day ago
one year, three years, five years
ago, all-your-yesterdays

fade, perhaps repressed
or once carved with care
to exhibit the best
to omit the stuff you'd rather forget
and so the sculptor shaved

keeping with the grain
until the rather-not-dwell-ons
fell before the sweep of grace,
each scrape joining
other eliminations
to be gathered up
and cast into the fireplace.

The sculptor sanded, polished
and revealed the much loved
gargoyle within
proving once again
the effectiveness
of shaving away the best
forgotten.

It's heavy on the head,
that letting-go part.

The whole,
"We need some time apart;
it's just too draining.
Maybe in a few years we can see
how much you are
and where we want to go
from there."

Figures.
Always running the show,
always giving me a hard time,
lifting me up
just to slam me down,
whooping my *** while I'm
sprawled out like roadkill.

(Though it's so hard to turn away...)

The lies are told to desperate ears,
making the pickings ever sweeter.

Thanks for the pick-me-up!
Now where's the put-me-back-down?
When do we plummet
way past our infamous goals
to the deeply imagined?
More than a fair share of fun
for the measly price of living!

Too many goodnights
haunted by negativity,
when sleep is better
than anxiety.

(The real test is when it decides to show its face again...)

Bah,
that won't be for a while,
at least until I've
made a name for myself
in some...
other way.

Once the mirror shows beneath
the tailored suede suit;
then we'll see who separates the lazy
from the dead.

I wonder if there will be a day
when I can wake up,
sure that there will be no more
condescendence
from my craft.