We are tossed by every uneven street
And I try not to recall the ocean
In the heart of this great city-
The cobblestone! The church! The mansions! The soviet blocks!
Wordless stanzas.
Watch the ink
Scratch at half-utterances
World churning
In Grandma's kitchen
1998-
Memory please
Catch the hot wind.
I will be airborne
One day fly back to you
and patience
My virtue dies.
Billboards scream
But I have
Just
Like love, don't want.
My keyboard, the typewriter.
My hand quills
My two-lung stone slabs
Mindless etchings.
Faint anger
And the distant sound of you-
Singing?
This garden’s neglected, the grass grew too tall
The bushes and plants look half-dried
Cracked slabs lay uneven, the dog’s water bowl
Is covered with leaves and dead flies
Front door’s off the latch, windows wide open
No photos in frames on the mantelpiece
A phone on the table must’ve been broken
Unlikely it held fingerprints
Wormwood and ivy have grown way too large
Almost conceal the brick walls
Everything seems like completely discharged
Unavailable to any calls
Was it the other day I saw you there?
When was the last time we met?
Tomorrow can’t come, cause it’s busy somewhere
No time for tea can be set.
In the remote landscapes away from modernity
stand the stone-cold monolithic monuments.
One, the Georgia Guidestones, the American Stonehenge,
and the other, the Neolithic Stonehenge, the British cultural icon.
The stone slabs are roughly cut by primitive tools
and astronomically aligned with the zodiac design.
These are set in an intriguing geometric configuration,
wrapped in controversy, the megaliths incite curiosity.
The stones are systematically arranged, not as walls,
but as questions framed by the blocks of ambiguity,
leaning onto the winds of whispering mystery,
their shadows stretch longer than human memory.
It’s not yet known if the Stonehenge
marks the ritualistic ancient burial sites
or the prehistoric religious healing place,
erected as the conceptual symbol of peace.
The nameless builders of these structures are history now,
but the stones remain as the perplexing patterns
of their thoughts, now the sentinels of silence,
and the enigmatic ancient thingamajig of riddle.
If it were tonight
If you're lonely come to me
Take the train
It stops by you at ten twenty two
Its a long train ride for you
Along through the Bible belt
Sweeping across the tops of trees
As they stand naked in the cold
Its as if the cold remembers me
As if it were at tonight
Tonight the night when all our passions touched
Our walks along the ancient slabs of glacier rock
how did I get so far
Without a God
How did I get so high
If not to want to touch the Sun
The things I forget about appear in my dreams
To touch to hug to laugh as if for real
To that if there is one to thank
I thank you
To have that chance of love
It takes a while,
time gets trapped behind closed doors,
mice need to be nudged into awareness,
whiskers electrified.
A sleeper adjusts its mouth,
for often lips arrive
behind a scream.
The brain is now ready for its screenshot.
The body stretches to a window,
neuronal mice
pull upon somatic ligaments,
yank upon slabs of connective tissue,
slowly reshaping a new reality.
Unfortunately,
you are not exactly transferable,
you can’t get on the same hamster wheel.
A new you must be rehabilitated,
the world also must be trained
to accommodate this au currant -
this avant garde prototype
of an old guy.
Beyond two tiny
unhinged-gates,
a cobbled path
paves eerie tones.
It guides one through
its labyrinth maze--
of toppled-over
defaced stones.
The specters grace
the weepin' trees,
with prayers--so they too
can rest in peace.
For what lies below
its caved-in slabs--
with wicked weeds
that pricks then stab.
Ghosts' jewelrys, mostly those
of golden round, within each pile
of shredded clothes--attached to
dusty scattered-bones are found.
Orange cars are on their way
Pavement slabs are sinking
Water streams in disarray
Rather I’d be drinking
But today I have no wine
And I’m short on beer
Come to share my tea with thyme
Time to take a veer
In the autumnal decay
Feeling very sober
For today’s a special day
The fifth of October
Here’s the best news of the world
Back in times of peace
Zep came out with their third
Genesis released
Selling England, Elton John
Said goodbye to his
Yellow road he walked upon
Quite a date this is.
The clothes lines hang empty the grass has grown tall
The apples rot down on the ground
Too thick is the fence around this garden wall
From the house of yours there’s no sound
Unfortunately, this is not a bad dream
But a matter of fact that maintains
When changes come somewhere it seems a routine
But when they come close it looks strange
The slabs will crack more, and it’s only the rain
Looks after the flowers you loved
The generous watering comes down again
The autumnal sky hangs above.
Night,
Ageless and porous,
Sang screeches of fireflies of
Crescendo-diminuendo sparks.
What hour?
In the midst of the hustles, I lost my hoursight
Different, tonight, is my eyesight, seeing even
Through the darkest foliage of gentle, but sinister
Caress sway.
On the broken, cracked slabs, squatting, dark torsos!
Pensive, broken, sad, old and so good the
Work of Italian sculptors.
Further deep in searching glare, the hardened
Mats of hurried sepultures of returning
Soldiers, whose wellingtons have squelched in
Mudblood.
Wars and battles never post blandishments
On peace.
What hour now, brother?
It is so dark and mean, and my hourglass refuses a
Moon reflection.
But now the hours move fast on march of the
Headless feet in wellingtons.
'Left, right, left, right....'
Dolts hasten among fleeing marabouts.
Stench from ailing, balmed smog
Stills the whiffs of roasting deer, all in
One silence of close hour canticles...
Such phalanx, brother, coldens the head.
The raindrops fall into the paper cup of tea
The teabag shrinks as if it could be my remark
Unlatch the green door to the childlike mystery
It’s possible again to enter that old park
The busts and statues of the gods and greats
And shaded benches in the niches of the trees
There in the memory another alley waits
I haven’t walked on it to see where to it leads
Oh no! Those wobbly slabs I’ve walked before
The seagulls cry, the wind blows up the sand
Then comes the sound of the muted piano chords
I’ve no idea why I hear this again.
So many ways to say one thing
More than one way to turn pawn to king
Too many turns to the grocery store
Which turn shall I take?
Countless words to choose from
From sunrise to sunset
Too many ends to be met
With no end
So many ways to say one thing
How will I say this?
The paralysis of perfection pours
A whisper at first
Drown out by the delusion of desirability
Preserved in acid proclamations of praise
Beating echoes in snowy peaks
Peaking in phrases veiled in value
Pouring
Heavy
Heavy
Heavy
On the mountaintop
Failure
Failure
Failure
One weakened layer causing seismic shifts
Elephant echoes fragmenting snowy ideals
Triggering avalanches of lost identity
Slabs of fallen promises break loose
Forming a track of forbidden truth
Too much weight bids perilous
Useless words of compliment
Descend to a suffocating
Ignominious demise
Plagued by tiny
Thoughts of
Fading
Perf
ect
io
n
The remnant of dismantled world war history,
the concrete slabs frame the unleashed society’s canvas,
captures the contours of the off-the-grid lifestyle
where bohemian spirit thrives in the last lawless place.
A secluded haven with no borders and no rules to confine
the eccentrics and impoverished who want to get lost
as wanton wonderers like the migrating snowbirds,
weaving the fabric of life with new meaning in the desert.
The creative tenets of the free life force of the slab city,
vibrant on the façade of the avant-garde harsh beauty,
with resilience etched by the wild winds of desolation
for the secluded slabbers in the last free place.
some level of falling from grace happens in slab city
its twisted humanity
when kindness stops being nornal
when green crusaders are dismissed, unseen
like burying waste in landfill
city of slab-stick
where we live normal lives within shuttered malls
affluence superimposed on poverty
can anything mellow us
with nature clotted under sprawl
here
within plated walls
breeding, feeding, receding
unable to bend the city to one's own wishing
to carry on with things just as they are
slabs pinned to the ceiling of mind
sometimes shutters open
to sun-dappled streaks on slab walkways
what are we to make of the dandelion in the crack?
a dark energy blooming between comfort and chaos
maybe we can piggyback on the hope of others
when small acts radiate
like children who empty their piggy-banks to charity
or laugh in summers of safe places
towers girdle the city
midst what we crave for but can't always name
in our stash of consumer baubles
urges like a swollen river
our weak stock options that never find a ladder
in the meantime we tread on - hungrily
A crystal-pin prick at the beginning.
A monumental vagueness at the end.
The art of carving peace seems quite lost again.
In between granite slabs-a tangle of black tragedies.
Tiny clusters of downy light upon a peaceful being.
The selfishness of flesh drifting atop the brine.
In an endless maze of the triggered mind.
Where blue devils tap dance so raggedly upon God time.
All terrain passing over sand stones from a distance catering to the hillside the mountain sent down a calming coolness while the barrels of oil leaked my minds eye focused on the stone slabs beneath the mountaintop grinding as the convoy entered the hidden nooks conveyed by night hiding under day teal lavender fabric covered my being hints of dates aroused my senses while meaningful gestures crowded my space chatter invaded this telepathically disdained balance covenant by old disagreements that poured out into the caves my knees trembled as I'm being quite pampered by kings giant screems facing every direction nations gathering for a group meet up my hands are kissed peppermint teas are chills served in brass tea containers looking over the world exploding I am comforted i am safe I am kandahar
Written by Mrs Yolanda Joy Nicholsen
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