I know I said I’d be better by now
But I wander through like a ghost in town
And I can’t live with the person that did that to you
It’s not unlike a wounded heart
It bleeds and aches like dripping art
And yet it beats in rebellion to keep the pain in
I have hurt you
I have lost you
I have let you down
And now you’re forced
To keep me around,
Safe and sound
We both know I’ve been here before,
I’m a coward commanding a broken horse
Expecting him to move on like a machine
Ignorance is a travelled arch
But recklessness is the patriarch
It takes the lead and decomposes all your progress
I have hurt you
I have lost you
I have let you down
And now you’re forced
To keep me around,
Safe and sound
I have no pride in what I did.
It makes me question my will to live
But then again, that was questioned before
I know that’s not what you want to hear
But then you ask me to draw you near
And I cannot shield the darkness as it’s around me
Hold me softly
Don’t forgive me
Here I will sit down
I’m sorry you’re forced to keep me around
Safe and sound
elephant tusks
harvested for ivory towers
truncate the wisdom of time
blizzards hail snow flakes
weather a storm or two
before they melt into memories
Babylon refutes Jericho
an eye for an eye
that money can’t buy
Rosetta’s stone
gives a clue to incomprehension
and sometimes the monolith
takes on new meaning
when frosty crystals meet
eternity in shining armour
Midas touches mammon and greed
blistering peeling forms scabs
on lost conscience and souls
the snow flake melts
because it knows about destiny
eventually ivory decomposes
once humanity has died
If red is your favourite colour,
Then let there be blood in the sky,
Bleed out would I,
Just to appease your preferences,
Plant one million roses,
As the lavender decomposes,
Just to indulge your eyes.
Ruby rivers cover silver streams,
I could not comprehend even in dreams,
What I would do for that scarlet shade,
Saturating my days, it is not afraid,
To discolour my vision,
‘Twas a lie of omission,
To make you my perfect rouge.
Turquoise tears stain my face
Like violet varicose veins
Stains of sentimental sensuality
Wrapped in white fears and black feathers
For love has fuschia flown away
Ruining reverie’s red roses
Turning them black decomposes
Any ink dried died in letters for love
Would have fell on silver sword
Sacrificed, sliding through heart
Silky bloody poetic death
He saves a cutting of brown hair
And a crimson rose of despair
Pressing between pages of art
Like my onyx broken heart
Was only a notch on burnt belt
Firey from love’s hazing hell
Wicked love spell wilting passion
Kisses rationed refusing
To hold wet tongue’s telling
Of rebelling rose’s rise
In spirit despite demise
Petals of purple pain
Painting passion with rain
And teal tears tangerine train
Of torment trailing behind
Like a wedding dress
Of jilted beauty
Doing duty during dilemmas
Flower to remember
Pressed between pages
Of a little black book
Of love unreturned
Can we let our bodies touch
Breath in unison
Transcendental moments will only take us so far, away from all the beauty and its meaningless glory
If I let you look, would you promise to only see me?
If I let you hear, will you promise to come listen?
If I let you in, would you still leave me?
I’m not afraid of death, only of the loneliness
Tie your arteries with mine and let the blood pour out as it floods every town and city
Listen to my heartbeat before my body decomposes and you, too, will leave me
Truth, a blazing sun, burns bright and clear,
Its scorching rays both banish and ensnare.
It can ignite a fire, chase shadows out,
But fear may flicker in the light's sharp shout.
Silence, a shrouded well, with deep secrets,
It holds fragile trust, a promise others keep.
Within its depths, forgotten wisdom sleeps,
But buried truths can fester, and secrets weep.
The weight of words, a double-edged blade,
It can heal a wound, or leave a soul betrayed.
A whispered truth can mend a broken heart,
A shouted truth can tear the world apart.
So when the urge to speak the truth ignites,
Consider well the cost, of the burning lights.
Is silence wisdom, holding knowledge close?
Or is it cowardice, where truth decomposes?
There's beauty in the dance, the constant fight,
Between the burning sun and shrouded night.
To speak with grace, a measured, gentle art,
To find the truth that heals, not tears the heart.
For in the tapestry of life, we weave,
Both light and dark their wisdom can bequeath.
May truth guide us, a beacon in the storm,
But tempered with the hush of a silent form.
Purple hearts made of metals, and gems;
They don't mean a thing;
You see, beyond the reality seas;
Rivers boats filled with dreams and fruits;
For the only hearts that have merited worth;
Is the heart of the Father God and Jesus Christ;
~
Humanity, don't give me;
Your material metals and materialistic degrees;
All of which symbolic, rust, decomposes and burn;
Give me my Fathers Favor, Grace and Love I chose;
For His honor, His glory lasting
For the only hearts that have merited worth;
Is the heart of the Father God and Jesus Christ;
Royality rules I so Desire the Purple Heart of the Lord Our God
3/18/24
Written words by James Edward Lee Sr. 2024©
Dawn again,
novel day of the century...
I await your return
for over a millennium...
I squeeze the longing in my chest,
my intimate decomposes
the soul thinks
my heart drowns me...
food getting cold
your reheated steak...
I call your name,
despair resigned...
You don't come, neither
send message...
My insides turned...
I realize you don't feel desires,
and you're not hungry!
Life, when it ends
reborn because at the edge of life,
we are reborn to another life...
Death was made of rebirth
of life... Biology decomposes
but the spirit continues...
another fruitless day
alas, a buck unearned
uninvolved in the fray
nary a lesson learned
o time, where hast thou gone
where's the spring of my life
whence lovers embraced none
daily struggling in the strife
where, the hours in their haste
have transpired unbeknown
o, the chatter, what a waste
mindly doings of my own
seeking every worldly pleasure
as fleeting as they did turn
wasted o, that divine treasure
youth, begone, not to return
now as I become senile
my soul still youthful and bold
wishes it had seen the Nile,
the Seine, overseas lovers untold
an old man full of remorses
little wisdom, hardly lore
still battling the wild horses
fighter, warrior evermore
for when i stared at the roses
sadly saw with great dismay
how quickly life decomposes
how short is the month of may
then i failed to recognize
that time waits for no man
old age hasn't made me wise
perhaps. when i pass it can
Twilight's color is ashes of roses
as darkness falls on the horizon's line
the cerulean sky decomposes
the night sky and my soul will realign
stars of soft ivory slowly drip light
my eyes see a star beginning to fall
to leave an etching that's flaming bright
burned in my eyes to leave me in awe
peaceful and serene becomes the night sky
a vast spacious splendor of sable dark
with wondrous wonders where my soul can fly
through the night sky with its eternal arc
with glorious glows of starlight growing
my sensitive soul's serenity is glowing
2/23/22
contest The Night Sky
sponsor Anna Marie Kaianah
She was no ordinary witch, and black was not her color oh no
she wore purple robes and red silk hats with bat thorns
as big and fat, as devil horns
Her name was Creepella but they called her the old hag
though barely 62 she was the skinniest bean on a tiniest rag
Once, she had so many kids and didn't know what to do
but then one day she ate them up served with rat tail stew
Whenever someone passed her way and yelled "bless you "
she'd put a spell on them, that no one could undo ...
She was no common witch and wore her shoes too bright
and when the ghost of Halloween came out to glean
she'd rob their candy send them crying, oh she was so mean
and when the kids were bold she'd called upon her big fat Moses
an evil cat from hell that when he meows, everything decomposes
No she was not an ordinary witch by far, she could drive faster then a car,
and turn a baby into tar, with nothing more then the suck of her breath.
Sit still, XXri Brook
Dimples, smile, light
Too much for the heavy flight
Of a daydream, happening
Across from my mother’s anxious look
Is my reason in a book?
Maybe another book
Buried in my room
Me, no doors, nor nook
Dimples overstretched, still deep
I hide beneath a sheet
'Till the sun comes back
I’m counting down from 3
But by 1, they turn to holes
No dimples in the mould
Of the shelter from this tree
Overgrown, still underfed
My father decomposes beneath
Scratching me down
Where I break reality
The garden will pull me back
And I know it isn’t far
But backwards rolls between
As I’m running towards a sun
No one else can see
7/7/2021
They erected a republic
above the earth.
Building materials were
passion, blood, dreams…
Now cracks appear on that
future-proof construction.
Democratic arteries
are blocked
with the plaque of fascism.
Where the majority of voters
are ignorant,
democracy decomposes.
Its ghastly ghost
spooks the citizens.
To be good and glad,
a little brain is enough.
But being brainwashed,
brutes are created.
Communal dynamites
demolish harmony.
Political eclipse
gobbles the light.
Societal cancer spreads
in the absence of
knowledge rays.
Like the chilly and lengthy
Antarctic darkness.
Yet the sun won’t fail to rise.
First published in The Literary Hatchet.
October comes it brings the rain
gently tapping at my window pane
Avoiding its wet touch, indoors I hide
from my warm haven; I peer outside
Amid the gloom their lemon shades
their vivid blooms as summer fades
as the garden slowly decomposes
there still smiles my yellow roses.
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