Ill go
where the match meets the flame
Where embers ignite
the empty space that remains
Ill sit
by the trembling door frame
Where dry bones weep
The words leave my charred tongue,
seeps through my teeth
"5 flares in still waters"
This is where love meets
The croissants of buttered hills
glisten in the searing marmalade
of August's arid oven.
September's cinnamon swirl
scorches muffin-colored homes,
the flames smothered
as October rains
send lives and mud
sliding into the ravines
like apple butter.
On Thanksgiving morning
survivors eat fall's charred breakfast,
then praise God in church.
In the milk of spring
they rebuild,
just like the last time
and the time before that.
In these vertical-eyed times
you've got to move like a cat
atop a shelf of Tiffany glass
can't release your hobbled mind
stay within thinning, spinning lines
stay so very silent or be chastised.
Choking on two-legged fat cats
politically correct fat rats
truth be damned
truth be damned
sooner or later something will give way
man will shiver in dogged summer days.
After the blast and mushroom fire
surely we'll dwell in sewer pipe time
with eyeless things and broken glass rind
foraging for yesterday's brightness
in the valley of charred souls and time.
Going to church,
it’s Sunday morn down south
Giddy feet youngsters
racing to the door of the temple,
having shrieks of joy erupting from their mouth
They are so glad when they get ushered in
While the solemn congregation gathers within
to hear another fiery sermon delivered
with holy conviction
It’s hot down in Alabama, Birmingham,
as the sermon heat starts to kinetically expand
Explosive words demanding social justice
Old black folk hollering: Amen, amen!
They remember
what their parents told them
about how it was back then
And the tears fall ...
as they hear the cry for change,
because nothing much has changed
Then at the rise of the Alleluia cries,
a river of tears gushes out ...
after the bomb explode
Shattering young dreams, windows
and bodies
with terrible, mutilating shrapnel
Prayers of wails without words
from a charred church service is sadly heard
Dedicated to the memory of all the victims
who died during the civil rights struggle of the 60's
This poem was inspired by the poem, “Ballad of Birmingham,”
written by the late great black poet, Dudley Randall (1901 - 2000)
She felt the calloused hands of a wrinkled scheme
around the throat of her pierced divinity.
Loosen another chapter,
let it fall unto the hips
of another severance.
Breathe in the disgust.
Swallow the pill,
and let beauty fade.
Tonight,
is just another plague
on both our hearts.
-James Kelley 2014, All rights reserved.
The kitty is crying
By the door she frets
For her lover is gone
To the war she dreads
She waits and waits,
Day in, day out
Screeching in pain
No end in sight,
Oh drats!
The sky is waiting
To be blue again
For the fire
In the clouds
And the tumbling rain,
O Lord I wish she would be clear once more
So the children can escape from
The black charred door
Kitty,
I will your tongue remove
For your suffering is tiresome
And your paws unclooved
Your master returns not,
Not from the war
And your children
Shall not escape, never,
From the black charred door
And thy shall perish Kitty
Perish, Perish
Thy shalt not escape
From the black charred door
Death has a grip on me. It's charred teeth gnaw and
snarl at me like sharpened swords. Ripping through
my heart with gashing blood eveywhere. Cutting
through the bones like massive blades I suffer
but cannot die.
Death holds me in it's grip and is glorified in
torturing me. It wants me to live in it's grip
and fight the fires of hell for eternity.
His charred teeth will continue to gnaw and snarl
he will laugh and take pleasure in doing so.
My heart will continue ripping until the charred
teeth are covered in blood.
fire is hot
fire is cold
i feel like
i am falling down deep
fire is my world
burning day by day
be still my smotlering heart
i am fire
neither civil
but very evil
not a word to describe it
*writers note:
i have written this poem as an add on to the poem called Frozen Poems, by Ryan Emerald. i
hope you enjoed it :)
Against the seething horizon
you stand malevolently
looming,
gloating over the tragic fate
of the vanquished,
the doomed now dying;
there, the wounded many,
they crawl, drag cold corpses
through bloodied debris;
smoky embers, ashes of home,
shards of shattered hearts,
maimed memory;
the old, the ill, the children,
if you say so, will be
blasted away
as nothing more than burnt
offerings on the charred altar
of peace, you'd say!
As each bitter thought takes wing
another bird forgets to sing
abandoned babe cries out alone
refugees chilled to the bone.
Leaves begin to curl and brown
cold winds whorl through empty towns
ghostly cats creep through the alleys
who will take the deadly tally?
Yard dogs staked and left to starve
scars upon the Earth we've carved
lonely waves still lap the shores
though the seabirds are no more.
Each bitter thought we send aloft
comes back to us at such a cost.
Around the world the death bells toll
the tattoo pounds through dying souls
heaven's gates are locked and sealed
and though we cry, they will not yield.
This blue planet was God's gift
ruined now, we're set adrift
mouths agape in silent screams
we walk the Earth 'til time unseen.
Blackened souls coagulate
clouds of demons, dark with hate
wails and curses fill the void
on our blue planet we destroyed.
I remember when you danced with a flowing
gown of dying embers, as the raging fire roared.
I remember slippers of glass,
made simply of charred sand,
polished clear.
And with that wrecking ball
of a tongue of yours,
you shattered my heart, dear.
For, I long for your embrace,
as the flames flicker wildly in your eyes.
And with perfect grace your beauty lights up
the room, engulfing all in magenta like flames
spelling out our doom.
This fitted femme that flirts
with danger is but a charmed beauty.
charred and smooth
black inside white enamel
decadence from the inside out
that evil temptress here to steal a tooth
and replace it so sweet with caramel
to fatten my mouth and fill it stout
sparkling and rugged
white inside black soot
decadence from the outside in
mine own mistress bruised and mugged
rotten from the brain to foot
whip me right in my ugly sin
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