I used to look to you,
and saw my baggy
of my darkness
but your humor
and I saw me in you,
never so strangers,
until a facade,
in my deepest
of fears
not of a mirror,
but swollen
eyes
left behind my dangers
and troubling,
fading
and I never wished it.
but those blue eyes
won't so call denial
escapee of the fleet,
of a falling harrowing,
spades so deadly
and
we tread
around
broken
glass....
simple
piano keys,
heart
may
be faster
as you
grow warmer,
with simplicity
And lost,
are
the tones
or estranged
and now dust
are worshiping
at Sunday's mass....
smiles so troubling.
Shaking her wet ears, uncertain
How her purpose may be best served
Stagger concealed in immersion
Shown the pasture that she deserved
Frolicking safely within a flock
Diminutive trot to the beat kept timid
Faithfully bides time, tick clock
Offer of grace to God signals her limit
Wool washed, cleansed by clan
Coddled offspring wrapped with cotton
Shepherd held title, simple plan
Dinners prepared, archaic ideals rotten
Bristling beneath her softness
Fibres frayed at what her life signifies
Dismayed to only boost profits
Loyal lamb follow is forsaken sacrifice
Fuming, she rips off her fleece
Livid lion malicious marauder dormant
Roars revenge, discards peace
Trek to reckless, divorce her informant
Taught to shelter, even in harm
Trust husband’s will, cutlet finale fate
Savage feline, leaving the farm
Sleek escapee lapping blood off plate
Sacrificial Sixteenth November
Once, this hollow
in a washed up fish head held
an eye. Now it's just a skull,
an escapee from a crab pot
where it hung as bait to attract
a wandering claw.
I cradle it in my hands,
its flesh picked back to bone.
I see through its ghostly eye
into a submarine world of weed
and waving fronds tipped
with leathery fruit, spiked urchins,
dancing sea worms
and teeth readied
to seize unwary life.
All seems horror, hidden menace
beneath sand or tucked away
in crevices. There, poison barbs,
razor teeth, gullets big enough
to swallow whole lay in wait
and dream beneath
moving shadows.
And then, cast down from above,
a barbed hook baited
with subterfuge, sharpened
to anchor hard in flesh
and be hauled up to drown
a victim in air.
Fish….forgive me for having
commandeered your eye,
but I have done so to honor
your short life
before I lay your head down
on the soft sand and let
the tide take you away,
forever.
Chill confines a diary of absence
as September keyholes a papered wall.
A smirk tears a face--escapee silence
--styles wall with nothingness, dead ends AWOL.
A bottle of spent wealth parlays about ...
tangled weaves justify the performance.
Pebble leather worships darkly, blacks-out
a ghosted pundit building blocks, mischance.
Cold fashions the well, tilt pour sands reserves.
Alas, pitched secrets facades of falsehood,
its prisoner scopes round a war of words,
sheathed arrogance knells myPhone, knock on wood.
Crinkled gone days lay ... flattery goes on.
Scrawled lines drown, looming voice curts; "My Dear John".
Out of my beachside window
I see the dawn, red each morn.
The seascape a blue-white scene draped,
Upon the green and yellow of the landscape,
Of vegetation and ocean adorned by belt of sand,
By hiss and fizz, roar and rumble, of waves relentless,
Surging into the shallows and spreading gently onto sandflats,
Like a bride's embroidered lace wedding veil impelled gently by the breeze.
For every day here, is a celebration, a marriage of earth, sea, wind and waves.
A scene repainted every morning by the sun that rises from the sea,
Blushing the attendant clouds with red, orange and yellow flush.
Casting bright sunbeams into the clouds above.
My window a canvas on easel, for the seascape,
Painted just for me, an escapee,
An obsessed devotee of sea.
I was distracted
and could no longer recall
the thought that had just
occupied my mind.
There was only
the pleasant afterglow
of whatever it was,
a sweet residue lingering
in the place where
the thought used to be.
I was annoyed
that I'd let it go.
Most of our identity,
our past, is like this,
a vast ocean of formless haze
floating between small islands
of what's remembered.
Sometimes, that haze is toxic,
sweeping in from an unnamed
place with it poisons
deposited by an event
long erased of detail.
Others come in gently
as a feeling that settles
like perfume, driftings
from a contented moment
of love set free of time
and place, an escapee
from memory.
It can be electric.
Who we are
seems mostly hidden
in that vague region
where the aura and lint
of our lives accumulate,
too ethereal for memory
to hold captive and replay
in the now, no more than
mere notions arising
out of the nowhere
from where we come.
It was the sign that stopped us
And then we saw the stone
Dedicated to an escapee
Who had died there alone.
We read the inscription
All the time being aware
Guards in the tower watched
Every move we made there
Halte Hier Grenze!
(Stop this is the Border)
The sign displayed
To avoid any possible disorder.
Behind the wire were the mines
Then the strip, totally bare of green,
Raked and swept twice a day
So new foot prints can be seen.
In full view of all
The observation towers
Directly in line with the stone
And commemoration flowers.
He is standing there watching us
Bins lens reflecting glare of the sun,
Slung over his shoulder
His loaded automatic gun.
Is he the one who shot the man to
Stop the attempted freedom bid;
If it wasn’t him for certain
One of his colleagues did.
Halte Hier Grenze
What was it all about
Not to stop people going in
But to stop them getting out.
Such a state of desparation
That so many did their best,
And so many failed and died
Just to live in the West.
We took the mandatory photo
And then we didn’t linger,
Just turned our backs and walked
After giving him the finger.
We heard of the ambush
And we remembered George Bush:
A Radio-Announced Ambush
And we made for some bush,
The man in my front continually push …
One hell of a Lazing Runner
While my heart was Bunsen Burner.
Quick was I to condemn his speed,
Ready to it with fuel feed,
Sure survival was The Rare,
Whenever it became Guerrilla Warfare,
Smart shooters picking off their targets
While The pursued chiefly his teeth grits,
Doing the thing like a Mad March Hare
And choosing to not a lot care.
The man in my front was A Lousy Escapee,
Running and you’d think An Amputee.
I have seen the black face of his Kenyan father
With whom he didn’t go farther:
an absolutely Black Papa
Describing not the Diaspora Rappa,
His loudest trumpets for Jomo,
As Barak’s nearly were for The Homo:
Safer A self –reclaiming returnee
Than an ever groping escapee:
Better Kenya’s social leper
Than an American on paper
And heard have I of his unique white mama,
Who wouldn’t the flame surrender to coma,
Rockier getting than Nigerian’s Zuma
And quite the cougar of America’s Puma…
All that for fanciful catchers of History
And zestful peddlers of exciting mystery,
For say it I still
A-top our tallest hill:
The guy was all along full American,
To his boxers so, less Republican
His returns of cheers completely Un African
Ascents of staircases for the Mexican
His oscillating heard during speeches
Electric fan-perfect, no breaches…
Abort this try to find out
And –please- don’t fail to shout:
Ex-president Barrack Hussein
Lost only to the American smoking sin.
Pressed into cavity, wardrobe holds captive
Constrained where space is a premium
Love lodged squashes logic, lungs ravaged
Quicksand scenarios draw a dreamer in
Denigrated to respondee in his spare time
Hung on railing to wear at convenience
Smiling nicely to speeches of a shared life
Passed opportunity pops my congenial
Friendliness strung with fun doesn't endear
Resists my charm like chalice poisoned
Realms kept seperate lest wretch interfere
Rationed portions bring a brief rejoicing
Abruptly leaves, impetus sprung immediate
Swum mosquitoes among murk spread
Sting truth beneath a furtive fable feeding it
Sore heart can't receipt his ebbing debt
Cement devoid of tears ceases to imprison
Desert sand manuevre accomplishes
Shatter of shackles farewell shadow limits
Dazzled escapee has copious oxygen
2nd January
Sacrifice won't suffice
A leaf,
floating downwards,
comes to rest upon grass.
Escapee cutting off the bonds,
unaware of its impending demise;
the umbilical cord severed,
now page-pressed memory;
dried skin cracking,
A leaf.
As time goes by, the anguish shall abate.
To double back my trail, to hide, to wait
for an unwelcome love to go away.
Long distances can quench the wanderlust,
but lust of wonder. Wonder is a must,
but lust is never worth its outlay.
I call upon you both, time and space,
to help the escapee, summon the ghost
of common sense, the coldest and the most
atrocious words to flee from love's embrace.
My dear poems, stories and essays,
forgive the poet: he was too engrossed
in wonder to remember Robert Frost
who said: "The muse is cold, when hearts ablaze".
Most times strangers
react the way you present
yourself to them
At first they may a bit leery
wondering where you're coming from
but once they realize
you are absolutely harmless
and not some strange escapee
from the local funny farm
but a genuinely friendly individual
just wishing you to have a good day
more times than not
they succumb to your friendliness
Try it, success is not guaranteed
but most people want to believe
you're truly sincere
If more of us would try this
it would be more common
and less suspicious
of an ulterior motive
Memories of a seemingly
more gentle and slower life style
in the late eighteen and
early nineteen century
is a driving force in our search
for a more genteel existence
to counteract this fast paced
twenty-first century!
It's all there remains
of their faces and names
in the sanguinous pull of the Ocean.
And ever abides the slow, ugly tides
to the ruin of the ordinary people.
But do they next notice
the burns of their focus
as the days stretch back over
those toxic, dirt fumes they accepted?
And never mind life as it skims like a kite
in the form of a deep Ocean tuna.
Laugh all you want, but still time has past.
And who then is worthy of notice?
A pest and a critic
or serene ancient Fish who awaits next
its ultimate destruction.
Nor acting 'til then, but happier still,
than the fools who know not why they're laughing.
No pity, no time for a two legged beast
rising less than the Ocean turtle.
The swells and the ebbs answered less every day
by Great Dinosaur's failed escapee.
And the waters stretch on,
as long as there's time
with the deep Ocean having its answer.
But these monkeys don't question. Nor make any
difference. And can subside
with the tides pulling out.
(Title ends in an exclamation point.)
I look up to people who are taller that me
Ha! Just made a funny, bet you're slapping your knee
Got a million of 'em
An amazing femme
Wait a minute, I'm a macho male, a fifties escapee
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