Gardens are a special secret place Where the spiritual is separate From the wagging-fingered preaching. Frog friars croak hymns and read From the gospel of survival. I hear the organ hallelujah In the bees and in the wind. I'll sit in the pews of grass and dirt, Bury my sins under thick mud. And even as I'm plucking out The weeds, the roots of suffering, And even as the burning sun Guides me farther down the labyrinth, I am so spectacularly alive. I am part of green and brown And trees and tiny yellow flowers. I am part of that bright blue sky And the entire blue-green marble Earth Hides and thrives under my nails. And here is God - Not in heaven or in hell, But in the dusty, colored in-betweens. Here and now, in baby grass, I believe in life and green.
"You can love someone so much...But you can never love people as much as you can miss them."
Alone. A place where Memories go to die And light fades Down my fingertips. Silver incandescence Paints my lamenting Serendipity. Where I go to sleep Is where sunsets Kiss my lips; Dance on wooden fences Under emerald shades Where paths lead to my heaven, Where I am Night and day. All the while dreaming Of earth’s rug under My toes. I am here On breaking bows, Turning my limbs to copse. For there’s only the wind And soft light’s beam. My feet stick in the mud, Beneath nimble green. I am now, I am time. I am Alone.
#3
Brick buildings gaze upwards: Painted cathedrals of loss and death And the desire to rebuild a lifetime. We wander in the shattered alleys Between the shrines that force us to remember Everything we thought we were. The color-splashes of some Misplaced young boy - almost a man - Hang with broken fingers to bleeding walls. They'll stay here and remind us Of what we sacrificed for. To become shiny stars to wish upon We wander down the human tunnel Complete with places where we will Worship the city rats we created.
#4
You loved me pink while in a world Made with shades of grey. You loved me the color of mo(u)rning skies – Sugar-spun clouds painted in rose petals.
Loved me red like the blood in my cheeks And the fires I’d burned for you. Loved me the color of autumn leaves: Brilliantly alive before they fall.
Loved me yellow, a summer sun; Kissed my skin with a golden hello. Loved me like a saffron fish That never remembered but still came.
Loved me blue, water and sky, Like the ocean after a storm. Loved me in mosaic tiles – We fit together here and there.
Loved me purple, sweet and dark, An intoxicating wine. Loved me slow with a muddled head, Loved me like a grape-stained favorite.
Loved me green in untrimmed growth, Wild vines and budding leaves. Loved me like Pacher’s devil, In a shade of electricity.
But I loved you colorblind, A silent black of secrecy And winter’s first white frost. I loved you grey in fading dusk.
I loved you in the wa(i)sted space Underneath my bone-white ribs. I loved you in the black of eyelids And all the shady in-betweens.
"You can love someone so much...But you can never love people as much as you can miss them."
I love it how when I read other people's poetry, I learn something each time. From you I have learnt that, even at the best of times, putting a whole chunk together (as in the case of poem #3) is hard to read all in one go, and the words just kind of move into each other - however, in poem #2, this is fine, because the lines are short and sweet.
Just wanted to say that the fourth poem was absolutely beautiful - I have reread it about five times now I will not forget it in a hurry!
#4 is good, though I think you could have done better with the love-me-insert-color-here segment. The idea is wonderful -- it's just that the execution is a little cliche. I think that your connection between purple and grapes, yellow and sun, water and blue are all pretty run-of-the-mill. However, your last two stanzas helped me put aside those imperfections -- great closing.
Although, if I may, knock it off with the parenthetical spelling. It's really gimmicky. I used to do stuff like that. People told me to knock it off, too, I didn't believe them at first, and then I learned the hard way.
-Kylan
"I am beginning to despair and can see only two choices: either go crazy or turn holy."
Spring in the ghost town inside my run-down mind Is hardly perpetual. Greyscale phantoms flit in corners Like disintegrating newspapers left to burn In the funeral pyres of forget-me-nots That have long since been forgotten. I can't Walk down these half-innocent roads without Tripping over chipping white paint and The remains of drunkards; broken glass Fossilized into the concrete - hand prints Left behind by yesterday's abused runaways. And I'm left behind, haunted by gauzy memories.
"You can love someone so much...But you can never love people as much as you can miss them."
With regards to your latest one - the 'ghost town' idea IS cliche, and so is everything we expect to see in this ghost-town. So...my advice to you is to remove 'greyscale phantoms' and replace with something fresher, a view we haven't seen before. I liked 'disintegrating newspapers left to burn,' but I thought 'long since been forgotten' is kind of blatantly obvious anyway. Oh...that line 'half-innocent roads' is good, very good. Again 'chipping white paint,' 'broken glass,' is cliche - but 'gauzy memories' is inventive.
Also, I object to it being spring in the ghost town. That's making my head to some basic mental gymnastics - I see that you are trying to put together two conflicting images, but it doesn't work for me.
De toute facon...well-written.
Last edited by Navita on Thu Apr 08, 2010 2:07 am, edited 1 time in total.
I sat in your throne – A girl without a face, Listening for your footsteps Pounding down the hall.
All the false promises, All the broken dreams Cannot make you shed your diamonds.
You threw open the door, The moonbeams too soft And gentle on your face Among the puddles – Leave them for us to drown in.
And I can be polished rock, Another simple looking glass For you to gaze right through; But then you’d only see yourself.
I bit the heel of my palm To stop from crying out the words. You raised your hand and – Quick as lightning, loud as thunder, The smack of steel on my skin.
A pity that your pallid heart Is more frozen than my own. But you are melting ice That I can only hope to thaw.
Your roses brushed the scarlet skin, Whispering apologies. “You are beautiful,” you said, lied, Humming against my ear.
Then why must you insist On hiding me in frills and pearls?
I tore through your lace, your silk, Found the burlap throbbing thing That lived at your core, that beat With a rustle of taut chords. And I could weave it into linen If only you’d let me in.
When we were young and still alive – Smooth pearls with sprouts of corn silk – I swear I saw your edges blur.
But no. You built your walls, your Forts, your moats, and I couldn’t Climb nor swim the distance. Now I live with charcoal dust While your face hides behind A closed, cold iron helm.
Once upon a time We might have smiled, But now we are ice sculptures.
#8
Bright yellow heads dot lawns in spring, Pieces of sunshine stolen when The days are unbearable hot. Unfashionable and deeply frustrating Like the children that pluck them out And make plastic-cup bouquets. They hug the grass, moments of love That must be eradicated, exterminated, Because the roots get too attached. Oh, but slowly, slowly, yellow fades Into a fuzz of balding white. Children come and waste their wishes On a crippled, aging weed.
"You can love someone so much...But you can never love people as much as you can miss them."
He called. And that's the rainbow, The sunshine-vibration Buried in her pants' pocket.
"Honey, honey, Tell me everything, Because I love, care, Want to be with you, And I can't stand to see Your sad puppy eyes."
She sighs, drums her fingers Against her skinny knee cap. He shouldn't worry, I'm just tiny, perpetually Unimportant old me. But if not his sympathetic Whispers that curl up Inside her head - a lazy dog - What would she have left?
A split-second glance At the shiny metal knife, Reflecting back a full spectrum, The opposite of a fair-weather Friend. Free hand reaches towards it - Stops. Drops back down at her side. She punches her thigh, Tugs at the small jiggle.
"What?" he says, demands. What am I doing wrong?
"Damn," She says, laughs Like a child Pulling apart an ant. "I'm just so freaking jaded."
"You can love someone so much...But you can never love people as much as you can miss them."
Daddy, we are too much the same, Too close for comfort To be comfortable with scratchy Paper-cut edges. And though we’re made Of the same stuff, I find I cannot read your Run-on sentences that Crash together and fragment Into bits of exclamations. Write what you know – But God, I don’t know you at all – And you’re made of all The marshmallow fluffy things That I can only begin to guess; And too much fluff Gives me a stomachache. Daddy, daddy, all these sub-plots And forced inclinations to inference The undeniable clichés – no. I will not stain and wrinkle Your fragile paper edges With my salt-watery pronouns.
"You can love someone so much...But you can never love people as much as you can miss them."
I will not forget it in a hurry!
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