My thoughts walk barefoot on gravel roads—aching, slow, and scattershot.
My mind drifts like dusk in worn linen—frayed, faded, and folding in on itself.
My mind, grown tired of its tidy metaphors, slumps like a clerk at closing hour—unnoticed, necessary, numb.
My brain, vast as prairie land at sunset, lies fallow—dreaming the hush between thunderclaps.
My brain has taken the quiet path through woods not quite snowy nor lovely—just worn, and wondering where it last turned.
My brain, a lantern gutted of oil, flickers faintly beneath the architecture of centuries—it remembers too much.
My brain, a parched cathedral steeped in sermons long forgotten, weighs the dust in its own procession.
My brain, a faded lyre, trembles with thoughts too tender to hold—each one a ghost of once-bright song.
My brain, like Arthur's helm at gloaming, rests—dented by thought, dulled by long crusade.
My brain, a theater haunted by a thousand borrowed tongues, performs rituals where intention once stood.
Its voice speaks as though the soul were sharp as steel—blunt not by age, but by silence.
Copyright © 2018 by Mickey Grubb
Now and then, quietly without notice,
Time adjusts its spectacles—
Peers through a fogged pane of recall
Where particulars, once urgent, dissolve.
If now and then you find rain in your heart,
be assured it is scheduled—
a punctual drizzle of consequence,
not passion, but the persistence of memory
in its bureaucratic overcoat.
It’s all because of you,
the file states plainly:
signed in duplicate, sealed in dust.
No redress required—
only the courteous nod to causality.
The aged—those quaint accumulations—
become, in the end, detours.
Not disliked, precisely,
but excessive to the route:
a bench beneath ivy, seldom occupied.
So live out your days with decorum.
Attend the rituals of silence.
Polish your small routines.
Let time, that sly curator,
catalogue your exit in amber.
She knocks on my rib cage
seeking access to my heart again
The knock—the pounding pestle—
taunts, its echo won’t stand to be ignored
I hold my knees and cover my ears
as if that’ll keep my walls untampered
I let my flesh wrap me whole—
so tight I might suffocate,
but I cannot breathe outside this
prison, no—this haven
She’s still here at my door,
holding flowers too vibrant in color—
the amber petals too lifeless for summer
Her indifferent smile, gentle and fair,
yet brings chill to my bones exposed in June air
My teeth knock against each other
tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap—
I want to scream for her to leave
but the only voice made out
was the repeating beat of horror
She’ll eventually enter,
one way or another—
Winter takes up a room in my chest
always waiting to host her.
Silence is golden
Brave words
Embolden
Ignite the fire
No refuge
From this pyre
Peace is a myth
Fairytale
Does not exist
True that it might
Most definitely
Be my fight
But I gave up when
This all proved
Pretend
When it's all over
No rainbow
No clover
If this is the cost
Well then
All hope is lost
If my heart you doubt
Then good
Because I fold I'm out
Alas, I thought you loved me
But you did not in reality
I know for facts that you love money
Success, my dreams, and property.
Yes, you did not love me
Because of the fashion you reacted
When you and I were in need of the almighty money
Oh! You became wicked, kooky and swollen-headed.
For some alien reasons, you thought that I was
At the nethermost hull or keel of the ship
But you forgot that life can be a long trip.
Forthwith, I definitely know that love
Had nothing to do with the sweet-smelling rose
I’m forevermore resigned to flee like a brave dove.
Copyright © May 2023, Hébert Logerie, All rights reserved
Hébert Logerie is the author of several collections of poems.
six year old
acceptance speech
“it is what it is”
It felt as though I could not breathe a breath.
My arms and legs were made of heavy stone.
I could not move as though no flesh or bone
and I was primed and waiting for my death.
His fiery eyes caught me in thoughtful gaze.
He stood his deadly scythe upon the ground.
This specter took a somber look around,
then settled eyes to rest on mine in craze.
The hooded figure motioned it was time
that I should attest my final goodbye
and meet impending death with calm sublime.
I leave this earthly place a paradigm.
Amid glad tear and heavy sigh I die
as tolling bells begin to sound their chime.
The Disaster.
When you play the helpless victim,
making me out to be a whore.
I'll move out of the equation,
Your fantasy villain, no more!
When I feel like a worthless slave,
that disappointed his master
Please accept my resignation,
Yours’s Faithfully,
The GrandMaster.
The song of resignation
Memories are not crystal clear, a broken mirror on which the sun shines
The residue of the imagined, what ensued or will happen of equal interest
as time doesn’t, a time within does.
Past and future are the same pains me; I shall not see my savannah again.
No pictures, as a proof it existed, in the tall grass, see no wildebeest
my motorbike is sold, I can no longer pretend to be an adventurer.
What I do remember, through a haze, is my enduring remote happiness
perhaps that was an illusion too.
A vision of human disappointment, to try but never succeed.
In the game,
to the winner,
the victory,
to the loser
the defeat... !
At the finale of life,
the same prize
and reward:
The mortuary coffin,
means of transport
to eternal life...!
sometimes our skin a trampoline
word tricks bouncing outside borders
letters getting stuck in springs
too hard to pronounce
sometimes a male forest
trees and bark and dark animal like that
sometimes I suppose its prose
I don’t knows
it’s the many one thing
scrunching fingers and toes
sometimes teeth and nose
we know exactly what we’ll never like
what we’re never like
not like that
until our eyes and ears
are pinned into the music
and then our skin sinks deeper into
canyons as we realize the trick is no illusion
just another us
protruding from inside youthful insolent springs
Mindful roadside rest
staggered tear nostalgia
tender re entry
some souls can’t be reached from here.
It isn’t planned that way,
it just becomes.
doors are opened, doors are closed
we seldom see a fish swim backwards
more than several feet.
perhaps they just tread water
until their stream rolls by.
bells never stop mid-swing,
mid-ring, mid-everything.
rain falls upward
in weeping dreams
souls fall down
awkwardly awakened by
what many call their life.
I want to paint a broken cup,
to make it whole
but flowers don’t un-grow
they simply die
or maybe not so simply after all.
We’re all caught up in the wiggle and grin
of lives held together
by what’s called a “safety” pin.
when there’s nothing really safe
about you after all.
I have nothing but to this life
My resignation to give
dear annoyance
i hearby surrender my resignation
i am moving on to a much quieter place
where i am going, i will not be by myself everyday
where i am going, i will get adequate replies
where i am going, i will not have to envision rolling eyes
where i am going, people care and into space they will not stare
where i am going, i will finally be rich with acceptance and love
thank you for all that you have shown me
i have learned from you and have become motivated by you despite your ratchet heartlessness
neverthess, my dear annoyance, i wish you all the best
i know i am replaceable, and you will most certainly move on
Sincerely NOT Your ANYMORE,
POETIC LEFTY
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