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Shelbia Chandler Poem
With bone dry eyes she studies
The shattered crystal at her feet
Seeing each tiny fragment
As a lost day in her wasted life.
She never meant to be here,
Expected implosion rather than explosion,
But sometimes things don't go as planned
and tripping through broken glass
is all there is.
A broom she thinks,
But sweeping would be symbolic
and she cannot--
Will not be erased
Falling to her knees,
She bloodies her fingers
in an attempt to place the pieces
but her dreams are too badly broken
and glue only blends with the tears
She doesn't know she's cried.
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2011
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Shelbia Chandler Poem
When Steffie died,
She lived on
as tears on Mama's cheeks.
The bright colored dresses
with delicate lace
and the dolls with button eyes
were put away
But, still Mama cried.
Why is death?
she asked me,
And I tried to remove the tears,
But like hot metal
They were molded to her cheeks.
I couldn't answer her question
And I cried too
Because I didn't know.
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2008
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Shelbia Chandler Poem
Kiss me while I sleep," you said.
Then you closed your eyes and left,
And I just sat beside the bed
Feeling alone and bereft.
I know we had a deal
And I promised not to cry,
But even as I said it,
You had to know it was a lie.
Alter loving you so many years
How could there not be tears?
I kissed you while you slept
And I tried to hold back my sorrow,
But I couldn't do all that you asked
and I can't even fathom tomorrow.
I know life will go on
and that you're in a better place
But how do you seal a lifetime
With just a kiss upon the face?
"Kiss me while I sleep," you said.
"It is just a long goodnight.
Wake me when you get to heaven
I promise it will be alright,
Kiss me while I sleep,
And know you loved me well."
I did as you asked,
but still a teardrop fell.
Still I'll kiss you one last time
And I'll hold it deep inside
One more kiss that says you love me
And our love can never die.
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2010
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Shelbia Chandler Poem
I waited for you with bated breath
In hopes that once again
We could share that oneness
we knew when we were friends.
But has time and distance erased
The closeness we once knew?
Because I feel so very alone,
Even though I am here with you.
You offer me love I cannot touch
As I sit drowning outside in the rain.
The simplest things matter so much
Can a voice from the past ease my pain?
Our wandering feet took separate paths
Straying far from the ones we once knew,
but I thought I might unlose myself
Once I found my way back to you.
But my journey was over even as it begun
And hot tears burn a trail down my face
Because some broken hearts can't be re-strung
And true friends are too hard to replace.
But what good is a heart that you cannot touch?
Or a hand that you reach for in vain?
Must I run from the place where I once sought my shelter
To stand shivering alone in the rain?
Sometimes old clocks can't be unwound
Are time and love ever truly free?
Each journey is long and painful
As I long for how things used to be.
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2007
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Shelbia Chandler Poem
The hourglass was now empty
And suddenly she was out of time,
So she walked away from a life
That no longer seemed to rhyme.
The sand had slipped through her fingers
Through a crack in the bottom of the glass
Canceling out her future,
Mowing her down like old grass.
She couldn't see beyond the moment,
Couldn't save the inked out dreams.
The hands on the clocks were all broken
And forever is as long as it seems.
Time cares for no one.
Sometimes it just stops on the track
Refusing to let life move forward,
Like a demon, it sits on your back.
The hourglass still stands empty
And the clock with no face has no hands
While the watches all run backwards
And no one understands
That tomorrow was never an option
It lies dead amid the grains at her feet
As she walks away from her life
And a poem she just couldn't complete.
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2008
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Shelbia Chandler Poem
Lonely teardrops
snake down her cheeks
as she sits alone in a crowd
breaking down the barriers
between life and death
while watching her life's blood
drip slowly down a rusty drainpipe
She falls softly
into the arms of no one
To die scattered on the floor
And the people tread roughly over her
As they make their way to the door
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2009
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Shelbia Chandler Poem
I knew it was finally over
when I looked into your eyes
and saw nothing more
than yesterday's news.
nothing different in the headlines,
just crumpled yellow paper,
faded words
disintegrating between
grainy images of the past.
I knew it was finally over
When your eyes
once the windows to your soul
became just a vacant camera lens
with its dusty shutter drawn
And our painted pictures of better days
began to crackle and peel
And fall from the walls
melting into the dust.
I knew it was finally over
when I could watch you
wander aimlessly away and feel nothing.
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2008
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Shelbia Chandler Poem
Sometimes------
Things get so bad
And you can't even tell God
So you prop yourself up in a corner
And you wait for the world to stop moving
And you think that the spin might subside
But it doesn't------
So you sink to your knees
Pulling the crumbling walls down upon you
Waiting to be buried beneath them
Wanting to lie flat,
be insignificant
unseen, unnoticed.
Not quite----
But the world closes in
Squeezes you so tight
Until you can't breath.
Nonexistent air floats around your face,
Teasing your nose,
almost crawling through closed nostrils.
But instead becoming tears
And burrowing into your cheeks
Leaving dry cracks and crevices in their wake.
You push yourself back
Wanting to fall into darkness and hide,
But it is too bright where you land
And your painted on pupils boil and melt
Fusing to your skull
and dripping poison onto your brain.
Not a dream--------- no escape.
Sometimes it is so bad
And you can't tell nobody
Because even God
stopped listening months ago.
The angels stuffed their wings into their ears
and your prayers go straight to voicemail.
And your hurt is so deep
You just want to furl into yourself
becoming a ball of tears
but you can't even cry
cause your eyes are puffed
and swollen shut
even a teardrop can't squeeze through.
And you tell yourself
that you've been here before
It is all the same,
but so much different than then.
Sometimes you've just got to
sit on your hands
waiting for an end to the chaos.
waiting for the world to just--
Stop
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2012
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Shelbia Chandler Poem
Sometimes I believe my dreams
Are nothing more than empty schemes,
And far from standing great and tall,
The truth reveals me, insignificant, small,
And all the words I say or write
Will vanish with me in the darkest night.
But inside I know I don't dream in vain,
Even when dreams die amid tears of pain.
Because all I dream and all I do
Is dreamt or done for love of you.
So when I die and they forget my name,
If you have loved me, I've got my fame.
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2008
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Shelbia Chandler Poem
I was more than a little in love
Fitted to you----The proverbial glove
Caught up in requited fire
Touching the stars, yet ebbing higher.
Didn't matter that we'd barely met
My first--my last----I kinda forget.
It was more than a sensual fling
Couldn't be--but it was---that's the thing.
A lifetime and many miles apart
Yet you managed to capture my heart.
Don't know when that plan of never
Turned into some kind of forever
But it did-----Just because
And we liked how it was.
What do I do now that you're gone
I can't just erase and move on
But somehow there's no choice
So I hold on to your voice
And save your words in my mail
just in case old memories fail.
I never got a real goodbye
And I miss you, but I will not cry
That isn't what you'd want to see
Life stages--changes, meant to be.
There's a hole in my heart, but I'm standing strong
Anything less would be all wrong
Yes, I fell more than a little in love
What began as a nudge became a shove
Knew I could love you if I just let myself
You always stood apart from everyone else
So you you gave me permission to love you
To caress your very soul
And the part of heart you gave to me
made my broken spirit whole.
Yes, I was more than a little in love.
Copyright © Shelbia Chandler | Year Posted 2012
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