The year I became seasick
I lived in a bungalow on the edge
of a wilderness moor.
The sky and land
grappled together
for supremacy of my soul,
Inner dogs whined,
my eyes were portholes
where cats watched
the turbulent dance
of garbled mind waves.
I had to leave a wife,
but knew I could not swim,
couldn't drown, nor float.
I stumbled across high wind-woven gorse,
ghosts crying through my hair.
in the end,
the crashing sound of breakers
smashing against cliffs
made me vomit, I staggered
choking still
into a pathless night.
A cloud garden had to
wither and bloom,
toes had to learn to grip
ever shifting sands.
Time whittles,
it sharpens the bones of your throat
until you can consume
the stale and the fresh,
while riding a moon crazed
rocking-horse.
Frost has cracked the sky,
the air scintillates,
fragments and splinters of light
shred through layers
of any a softer luminescence.
Blue and white shrapnel
bounce off a shattered vibrancy.
A few autumnal leaf's slow burn,
they are last embers, a crumbling rust
whittles at thinning stems.
Singularly, they fall
sparking into invisibility.
This morning the air is not broken,
it is a fanfare of ice-pierced brightness.
it's a stained-glass window
as still, and as perfect
as a prism set within
a dragon's gleaming eye.
Hearing
my thoughts
I considered
again
Last chance
to refashion
What time
whittles thin
Word after
word
They pass by
in refrain
Assuaging my
doubts
Repeating
— my name
(Dreamsleep: September, 2024)
The con man wears a greasy, porcelain grin.
Trumpets like a swan but has the soul of a raven.
From a paper mâché pulpit, he'll surely sling.
Thrice tainted blood drops passed off as gems.
His compliments are marbled with plastic.
Spray-painted over in fool's gold.
From your bones he whittles drumsticks.
His words are lukewarm, but the heart rattles cold.
Simply put, he's flaccid and fancies attention.
A little imp tugging at the locks of his fantasy.
Wait long enough and his porcelain cracks.
Leaking out a blackness and horrible stench.
When exposed, he'll suddenly slink away.
Rest assured, this vampish chameleon.
Will reinvent and sniff out a fresh vein.
I don’t want to die,
the spring doves cried.
Down the streets and coffee shops
each step in the pavement whittles it down
bit by bit. I don’t want
to die, the flyers say,
through ten layers of
broken staples, of
missing pets. I don’t
want to die, says the cat
on the large wire fence, where someone
has woven it through with leaves.
It meows at me, and I
don’t want to die, the world
spins around with no thoughts
in mind, the people spin around
with their thousands of wishes,
planets of desires,
orbiting each other, and everyone keeps
crashing, the world caves in quietly,
silently so no one else can see
the sinkhole splitting open
I don’t want to die, I don’t want
to die, I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die
the tempered veil of years with a weave of sweet and sour
can be lavish like the pleasurable return of good deeds
take what you learn from sky high places
that bleed clouds to the hills
weave towards green with its hypnotic continuity
reach for the weightlessness of a dandelion seed
in a breeze of somersaults
weave away if lies spoken with zest
become believable
seek a safe place from huff and puff winds
woven into refuge like design in a quilt
find what's essential like peek-a-boo games
that tickle a child to glee
work strains
whittles at days
the hourglass sighs at what sags away
summer still holds the chatter of birds
young buds still weave upward
ungloving hands holding chains and fear
joy still roams to signboards above
nothing desolate
a sanctuary
Elysium
in walls that rise
in stars unnamed
As the queen of the night,
the lamp blooms
on my study table,
illuminating my thoughts.
In the darkness,
the torch whittles
a way for my vision.
The timepiece teaches me
time can be musical.
Each ticking has a meaning.
My radio catches
a flying voice.
I ruminate nonchalantly
under the eaves of the song.
Everything is enticing,
energized by the battery
that remains inside
like my father.
First published in The Literary Hatchet (issue#28).
Fear not that critique whittles my will,
Fear that lack of such may wilt my quill.
Fear not a lonely path in the dark,
Fear my pyro craft runs out of spark.
Fear not golden age’s silent byplay,
Fear that wondering mind goes astray.
Fear not that I find I don't belong,
Fear I won't find lyrics to my song.
March 13, 2023
It's fall and trees are turning brown,
they beat small and swirl in the air,
wavy, curly, crimson, blonde, bare.
Life's gold ring slightly free to drown,
around a bright world went dull gray,
in hope of having one more day.
She hears the song of a glazed crown,
as remembered echoes unfold,
the real story that isn't told.
leaves were blown on the entire ground,
I smiled and felt so blight alone,
Earth and sky fused by flesh and bone.
I expect all these shades could sound,
maybe stretch fall by a little,
I groove how it looks and whittles.
It's fall and trees are turning brown,
Life's gold ring slightly free to drown,
She hears the song of a glazed crown,
leaves were blown on the entire ground,
I hope all of these hues could sound.
Written: September 17, 2022
In Remembrance of Connie
Autumn Theme Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Suzanne Delaney
Bedsprings crochet bones together.
His back is sutured to gripes
stitched to gummy joints.
In the toilet, avoiding the mirror,
humming softly,
shunning conversation with himself -
the ceiling drips a sump of memories.
The park --- Frances revolves confused.
"I don't understand."
A phrase with self-winding words.
A slight miscalculation,
a turning away at the precise moment
she turned towards him;
an error of timing really.
Frances whirs on "I don't understand."
Later he understood she overdosed.
He imagines this lethal power
over her life to be his.
Time whittles cavities with calcifications.
Softly the spine of a storybook breaks -
where one stitch patches a sorrow
a spur prods and rips.
When he listens to the hollows
between the long vertebrae of his life,
he hears a theory crumbling away
under slowly grinding cogs.
The cedar dock splinters out to the moon's shine
Like the second hand ticking along
A white-faced clock
Drawing in loose boats and green moths
To its sweep of time
Is there any difference
Between those little dots of cabin lights
Strung like pearls along the shore
Three miles across Torch Lake
And the stars crowded light years away?
Orbs swirling with life in the dark
Even now
We only but understand the skin of the universe
The ripples of a lake
Thin clouds aching like fossils
Under the moon’s archeological search by headlamp
My wife and I at the campfire
Measure distance
By the relief of this quieted July Sunday night
And the passing orbits of the space station
Three cycles
Is the most we’ve ever survived
Depends on how full the cooler is
And how many words we have left to hum and turn
Holding hands as the night whittles away
And the flames lower to a bath of embers
To the tapping Morse code of our bare toes.
Hours nibble at a back strain.
Tenuous strings were pulled
lifting water bottles.
You wonder how weak and fragile
you are. How vulnerable to
these ancient red tides within
that can bend your iron like plasticine,
turn you into a crooked question mark.
The body is quartered by straining horses,
a torture of disruption
condemning the spine to the wrenching rack.
After the sudden blind attack
sharp incisions tear apart and spasm,
keep you shuffling into dark corners
where ghosts groan over their
twisted bones.
Crab-walking time whittles away
at your shrunken being.
You feel as if you are bottled by water,
a sloshing on a rocking skateboard,
wakes crash - splashes of awareness
witnessing a sudden fragility,
the awkward creaking of your soul
being stretched too taut
on its desiccated elastic band.
Bedsprings crochet bones together.
His back is sutured to gripes
stitched to gummy joints.
In the toilet, avoiding the mirror,
humming softly,
shunning conversation with himself -
the ceiling drips a sump of memories.
The park --- Frances revolves confused.
"I don't understand."
A phrase with self-winding words.
A slight miscalculation,
a turning away at the precise moment
she turned towards him;
an error of timing really.
Frances whirs on "I don't understand."
Later he understood she overdosed.
He imagines this lethal power
over her life to be his.
Time whittles cavities with calcifications.
Softly the spine of a storybook breaks -
where one stitch patches a sorrow
a spur prods and rips.
When he listens to the hollows
between the long vertebrae of his life,
he hears a theory crumbling away
under slowly grinding cogs.
it hangs over her bed
s
w
i
n
g
i
n
g
with sinister smile, a
r
e
d
lipstick—smeared
m
a
r
i
o
n
e
tt
e
with awful strings
it is despicable in the dark
she’s not scared of it
it’s not frightened at all
b u t i am
i can’t lay my finger on it
nor can i pinpoint it
that c l o w n i s h grin
it’s e y e s follow me
i pull the c o v e r s over my head
and peek from time t o time —
— at it, as the clock whittles sharply
at
the
h
o
u
r
s
11/26/2017
IT Contest
John lawless - Sponsor
There is hearsay of a brighter day
And if it does come my way
I hope it will stay
While the time whittles away
There is no game to play
Struggling with life's daily melee
All I can do is pray
I wont be lead astray
By the things that outweigh
Like the debt of sin I must repay
Only I can defray
With little time there can be no delay
Gods word I must obey
And his love I will never betray
For then he will take away all this dismay
4/19/2017
Sub Categories
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