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Best Poems Written by Chris Fortin

Below are the all-time best Chris Fortin poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

Drifting

I tied a balloon to my heart,
  and watched it float away
up up up
( 1416 days since your suicide )
  heading off towards Cheyenne,
( where you were a girl )
  slowly, foolishly drifting you down.

As you left, so have I,
  Like a figure cut from a picture,
  and poorly pasted back.
Among/upon the picture,
 but no longer, of it.

I shall put a smile over the hole it left,
  and stoically wait out this body,
  cueing up an "I'm OK"
  to club those who ask.
Hoping to not be damned
  with too many decades.

Because, I have learned you 
  have not left me.
Every time I work at higher math,
every time I focus on science,
every time I revisit the place
we worked together, 

there you are. 
 
And the hole my heart left 
turns cold and numb,
and I descend into (hidden) tears
and crumble into despair.

A logic bomb to blow a hole
  in my head, 
to match the one in my chest.

Love ties us together, 
  and draws me after you.

Wait up, dear.

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

Beads

A bead of red rolls down my arm,
an eloquent prayer, a scream.
Alive in a way the arm is not
coming awake in a dream.

A drop of swirling living cells,
abandoning a foundered host,
drawing a line on the curve of meat,
segregating machine from ghost.

Cousins drop from a fluttering lid,
another line following a tear,
rolling along a wrinkly nose,
washing away horror, sorrow and fear.

life turned liquid
flesh to dust
aspirations unmet
iron will to rust

either

[ caught between galaxy and quark
a trivial flame in the dark
nothing cares that a mind was here
the flicker of a trivial spark ]

or

[ as my eyes dim, and drop finds drop
your voice, Erin, fills my mind
your hand reaching out to help me forth
horror sorror fear left behind ]

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

Audience

Your symphony cut short. 
My heart rings with the tension 
of your unresolved fugues.

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

Dark Now

i see you
standing in the cold quiet snow,
watching me through the night
through the dark

I see us
talking together once more
sprites nostalgic for a superior game

I see me
counting now the moments
till this now boring sim
stops

and I can meet you in the room
of remembrance
and bow to you,
conceding a perfect game.

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

For a Time

I dreamed for a time, 
as I walked with you, 
that I was an ascendant being. 
Now that you have left me, 
am I doomed to wake?


Either

you were a guide to my lost soul,
leading me from the sewer and swamp,
reminding a confused heart
that I too could glow.

Or

you rained light down upon me,
such that I confused
immersion 
with
absorption,
radiant warmth for internal glow.

So

wait a moment, dear, while
I catch up, deferring
the question, while
I bask in you.

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

Haunting

Erin,

Dead flesh accretes as I age
as I die
as I too slowly join you

I am not I-that-knew-you
anymore

I am immigrant cells, inhabitants
squatting in a once holy land

The flesh that touched you
flakes
The ears that heard you,
the eyes that loved you,
replaced

The heart that beat your name
gone
a simple pump
takes its place

A confused mind realizes
the memories of you
are not mine
belonging instead to
he-who-was

I do not belong
in this dusty mansion.

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

You Said

you said to me once - that 
you would let me know - if 
there was anything I could - do
to help

and at the end, lying in that
hospital
all your futures lost to an
unlabeled sickness
all your brilliant pasts
standing in stark relief with
the pain

you must have not thought ...
that I could do anything to
help,

but

you were wrong. you were
you were you were

'cause I could have come to you, 
and held your hand,
and looked into your eyes,

and left with you.

i could have kept you from being
alone

and myself from being left behind

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

Trails

these skis look like hell,
old, scraped and gouged
but still they carry me
down this dark white trail

I've learned to keep myself upright
stumbles earlier almost forgotten
jerks who pulled or pushed me over,
fading/falling behind me

its cold now, snow fills the air
as I turn a corner, trees inches away
my poor and dirty clothes
still sufficient to keep me warm

and there she is, coming from
a different trail, forming up
to my left her eyes flickering at me
as mine lock on her

and she is just perfect. Easy
grace in opposition to my brute force
beautiful outfit, new skis
and a ready confident smile.

She yells, 'hi!' and I say 'sup?!'

as the trail turns, our speeds matched
we start turning, towards and away,
an impromptu dance, snow filling the air
the wind and hiss our only music

faster now as the trail drops away
and for one perfect moment, we
both catch air together
flying now

turning a tight corner, I look over
and find her .
.
.
gone.

Reflex viciously kicks out my skis
and I come to a snow-cloud stop.
eyes spinning everywhere, thinking
where are you?

A separate turning, a different trail?
She's nowhere I can see, nowhere I can
help
not with me anymore.

and my skis are old, my clothes dirty
but the person I was uphill,
is no longer here.
don't feel like skiing anymore.

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

I Am

i am
a softly glowing spark
looking out of these eyes, driving
this meat machine around,
feeling my way forward

a memory bank holding
my treasures, a library of embers and
shadows, glowing itself, growing
here while bits there fade away

a soft thumping heart, saying
i wish i wish i wish
as the spark sits in the shadow
where you once lived.

Details | Chris Fortin Poem

Burning

eyes screaming, out of the smoke
out of the flame
out of the meat

all pretension
all aspiration
whither in the heat and flame

of seeing you walk away

of seeing the light turned on
roaches scuttling into the shadow
my mind, revealed as junk
as scum
as waste

in your absence

i stand (crouch) 
a stink in the clear air

a mistake

waiting for when i truly
truly

fail

as i failed you
as i did not rush to your side
offer my flesh my skin my heart

let you despair, let you die
helped you 

leave