The Good was Taken out of the Summer
The good was taken out of the summer,
With her garden patch left abandoned,
Lettuce heads and scallions gone wild,
Her sweet summer plans all spoiled.
The good was taken out of the summer,
With green fly festering her roses,
Overwatered orchids on the sill
As her plastic bread bowl lay still.
The good was taken out of the summer,
With Hunter, her dog left in waiting
For her voice, her footsteps, her care
And the fridge in the kitchen left bare.
The good was taken out of the summer,
Put on pause til her homecoming came,
While in convalescence she lay
In a nursing home, day after day.
The good was put back into summer,
When she returned to where she belonged,
To her garden patch, Hunter and flowers,
To sit,
To be still,
To be ours.
It started off as a domestic
Nothing new in that
With one word borrowing another
The usual case of tit for tat
Men are not so well versed with verbals
While their better halves have words to burn
Yet her sharp and stinging words
No headway were making to take him down
Until she threw in the dynamite ,"You're driving me mad!"
An opportunity he should have done better to resist
Fool that he was ,he just could not let his flippant riposte
Be missed
And out it came, "It's just a short drive."
His convalescence is going well
I hold three magic rocks, in my hand.
Rolling them over and over and over.
Leaving reality behind, far behind.
once an eagle
with a clipped wing
attempting
without surrender to once again
command the infinite azure sky;
continually nosediving
whenever tossed in the air.
his convalescence
punishingly long;
now complete.
embarking on a mission
to quiet doubting Thomases
that sounded a death knell for him
and laughed him off as
a paper plane
incapable of flying
far beyond the horizon...
look at him today!
look at him soaring above
majestically;
his journey
from the depth of asperity
to the dizzying heights of majesty...
m a g i c a l:
almost miraculous.
he's withered
the slings and arrows of life
intact; he's in flight once again
a testament
to his strength and resilience.
Structures crumbling under the weight of
the decisions made in haste
Beneath the rubble lies all the reasons it was
all laid to waste
The signs were seen but disregarded as mere
means to an end
The golden mean would've sufficed but extremes
prevailed once again
Lack of faith in what is seen lead to harder lessons
learned
Some fight hard for their destruction so their path
is truly earned
You can preach until the cows come home but many
won't give a second listen
I guess the slaughter is more enticing to their
inhumane animalism
We're cannibalistic in a sense with the way we come
for each other
We've been deceived to come against & to fight
one another
Everyone loses at the end of days if we're overcome
by the night
We're in the midst of the battle of all battles with
those that wish to force a fight
They say that all is fair in love & war and that
purple hearts are a blessing
All I see are the wounds that decorate us while we
endure convalescence
Open your eyes unto the message before you take
further steps
I implore you to be righteous in your ways so that
you avoid oversteps
Similar to how
Platypi secrete
Poison from their
feet
the heels of your lips
rips my heart
apart
soul surrender
modern art
Poison guise
covert convalescence
from the claws
of your eyes
Laws of lies'
essence
intrude to conclude
an earnest feeling
dealing with the fact
that I love you
deeply
And much like Platypi
I am often confused
for something
that I'm not
but
in love
with you
this I'm as certain
as Platypi
are to amphibians
which they're not
Tangled branch of sacred knowledge,
These trees are the college.
Buried within cold expression,
there is an ever present lesson.
Consumed by the essence,
of a warm convalescence.
Universal intent,
for the love that was spent,
since the early event,
to besiege what was meant.
I choose to thrive.
I am alive.
I’m sinking in;
eternal spin.
I choose to grow,
the need to know.
To trust the written,
elder scroll.
Significance, magnificence, noncoincidence
elegance, eloquence, grandiloquence
effervescence, prepubescence, convalescence
quintessence, fluorescence, omnipresence
What makes these kind of groupings pleasing
It's not you, dear read, I am appeasing
Nor am I in any way illicit or licentious
~ As I take full advantage of poetic license
Today was a good day
Today he walked on legs unbent
And erect spine of a man intent
On stilling the cacaphony of monotony
And smoothing the callouses of convalescence
For today, we both forgot
The wasting rate this cancer's wrought
Today, he teased and squeezed and poked
Fun at his trademark old school jokes
Laughter's remembered warmth evoked
Today he drove his rattling truck
His feet sure on the pedal's pump
And carried boxes of tradebooks and tools
With hands that know weighted control
Today, without a splint or cane
He tamed steps of receding pain
Today, through a briefly calm sea
He is the man he used to be
So today, I can foresee
The luxury
When days like these
Are ordinary.
1/23/21
Antiques to ashes
Left with dusty faces
Love birds to broken hearts
Left in a thousand parts
Riches to rags
Left lonely like stags
Life still goes on
In cycles of seasons
Rainfall and snowfall
Reaching out to us on the floor
Our hard hearts softened by the torrent
From fragility we are hardened by the sun
Drop by drop a paddles starts to lift
Till it is a stream with a drift
Ray by ray our eyes overlook the pain
We are healed to live again
Ralph Waldo Emerson: “A woodland walk, a quest for river-grapes, a mocking thrush, a wild rose or rock-living columbine, salve my worst wounds.”
SUFFERING SEASON
broken…
the sediment — a deposition seed,
of what meaning, this scrawl?
splinters splayed, suffering season
comforted by a columbine.
pressed into the carnivorous cranny
of melancholic chords, phantom phenom
appears from sunless shadows,
felicitous with numb heartstrings.
pretense of petals pierced,
potent poison’d creative mind.
woman in white, welded to hatchery,
sings wisdom and solitude —
shy flower cranes its head to listen.
rebirth croons in crannied space,
cramps of convalescence released.
a lonely boy. . . the florid dove lands
on two fingers, he’s mesmerized —
the apparition strokes his hair.
2/21/2020
Flower in the Crannied Wall Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Craig Cornish
Convalescence is possible with the renewal of faith.
Each resuscitation may be found in the power of healing.
I have found rehabilitation from a disease of the mind,
a malady that only existed because of my childhood abuse.
Good counsel and love can restore a wounded spirit.
Rehabilitation Contest
Julia Ward
May 31, 2018
When stuck at home for convalescence
For prose or poem choose acquiescence
Scribble a thought about what is what
Soon you’ll be caught, and boredom forgot
The convalescence occasionally is crushing
When left and right kin struggles
Not just any people, but those dear to you,
You want to reach out
And pull them all into your arms
Only realising arms are too small and few,
And they are with too many
Can't alleviate, can't ameliorate.
Our voices only reach so far
Our ears and eyes fail
As do our helpless hands.
But in this mind, in these words
A world is opened, for you
And you
And you
This heart flies like a butterfly on faltering wings
Soft feathers brushing across the distance
The span of our vast world
To diminish pain
To lessen hurt
***
March 14, 2017
Copyright ©Darren White
Darkness beckons me with each new day
Remembrance of my desolation seems to persistently stay
Cataclysmic past still haunts my troubled mind
Convalescence becoming unwavering, Consummation I find
Anguish constantly overwhelms my aspirations to improve
Vanquish each memory, Condemnation is removed
Unpleasant occurrences that steadily came to pass
Unmanageable situations, My resolution transcends, at last
Ingenuity shall be my guide
In myself, alone, I shall confide
Unworthy existence became my heart's outlook
Reclaiming my resilience that disaster overtook
Self conviction speaks to my innermost being
Realization of reality redirects my life's meaning
Overcome these afflictions through solidarity
In myself, alone, shall I uncover my clarity
A Song for the Hopeless
By All That Remains
Convalescence empathy
removes the grit of wear
my thoughts are now encompassing
before ~ were just aware!
Oh, bide my time in effigy
thee once were all I shared,
now look away in emptiness
with sullen eyes that stare!
That saying Faith brings sympathy
aloneness brings compare,
religious truth seems apathy
and nurtures with impair!
The grace to ride this seamy sea
abridgment rules as care
were not the cost of everything
love lost in virtues bear!
There must be time, repairing, free
that wholeness can entail,
the grudge, and fate, and angers flee
took us beyond avail!
No longer was I meant for you
no longer you for me,
forgiveness was not our affair
all else was enmity!
There must be time of reckoning
just ours ~ just meant to be,
that in this grave, unsettled world
our future holds esprit!
The morning comes ~ the evening's nigh
restoring its' degree,
still in our heart, we stay apart ~
. . . . . . . . . . . a separationing!
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