Poetry Wednesday #65

I'm bringing back Poetry Wednesday!  For a while anyway.  The next several weeks will feature poems I wrote in middle and high school for my creative writing classes.  Some of these are really quite good.

Osawatomie State Hospital

This was written my freshman year. ~AJ

They Said I Was Crazy

Dark, empty halls
     of an abandoned asylum
     black-red with the blood of
     worthless, psychotic humans
     long since gone.
Dead bodies
     piled high in a room
     we can no longer get to–
     too many dead, can't open the door.
Another room filled,
     looking like it's going to
     burst—POP!—like a grotesque
     cartoon
Deep puddle of blood
     to swim in, to use as a pool.

Hotel of dementia–
Only me to keep myself company, and
Shadows dancing shadows
on the walls.
Trying to get rid
Of the souls of the damned,
Voices running past,
Singing their screams into my head.

The grandfather clock strikes thirteen–
That isn't even a number–
The candle brings the shadows and the
Voices again and again and again
And again and again and again and again
And again and again and again and sudden
SILENCE.

Poetry Wednesday #64

I'm bringing back Poetry Wednesday!  For a while anyway.  The next several weeks will feature poems I wrote in middle and high school for my creative writing classes.  Some of these are really quite good.

By Steve Kaiser from Seattle, US (WTO protests 10) [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

I had to write and perform a rap for my poetry writing class my freshman year of high school.  This is it.  One day I'll tell you about the difficulties I had with this, but for today just enjoy the poem.  There are pieces here that work, but only pieces.  It's too bad.  Those pieces show promise.  ~AJ

"Cynical"

We live to survive, we survive to die.

We say we don't trick ourselves, but all we do is lie.

Lying,

Cheating,

Stealing,

Conning our way though life.

Running, running, running from death,

And what do we get for our strife?

We were dead before our lives began.

We're all dead before we die.

We were scared, so scared, and so we ran,

Thinking it'd prolong our lies.

As we ran we killed each other,

We killed our home, we killed our mother.

As we killed, we welcomed death,

We beckoned death, we embraced death.

Death scared us, and so we ran.

Running, killing, hiding, surviving,

That's what we do with our lives.

We live to survive, we survive to die.

We say we don't kill ourselves,

But all we do is lie.

Poetry Wednesday #63

I'm bringing back Poetry Wednesday!  For a while anyway.  The next several weeks will feature poems I wrote in middle and high school for my creative writing classes.  Some of these are really quite good.

This next poem I wrote for the boy I was "dating" my freshman year of high school.  Yes, the same boy I mentioned ever so briefly in the previous Poetry Wednesday.  I gave him my virginity and used him as my inspiration for this poem.

I don't know how I feel about that.  You'll understand once you read the poem.  It's . . . Well . . . 

I'm not sure I liked that boy very much.

~AJ

                Jon

Young girls in pigtails

Small reptilian creatures

Dead metal poles lying on the pained expressions

          of little boys

Healing a timely death

Just to go through it again

Powdered jellyfish in the form of Jesus Christ

Blue-haired women

Settling at a hard life's end

Living one more hour for old lovers' memory

Mud covered prick in a basket

Hungry cat eating the flesh of its master

Roses in an open grave covering the stench of the

           living for the dead

Armageddon and dry martinis

Starving children that could be fat

The rich toasting the depletion of the poor

Words lying sleeplessly on a paper doll's head

A loaded semi-automatic pistol floating dreamily in the air

The dangerous and holocaustal attitudes of opposing forces

A psychopath of 18 years

Graduating into cold reality

Destined to some day rule the world

Death, the beautiful lady,

Creeping closer to oblivion

Screams to hold on to the wounded

Poetry Wednesday #62

I'm bringing back Poetry Wednesday!  For a while anyway.  The next several weeks will feature poems I wrote in middle and high school for my creative writing classes.  Some of these are really quite good.

By Miguel Carrillo Villarreal [CC BY-SA 4.0],
via Wikimedia Commons

The following poem I know I wrote my freshman year of high school, because I wrote it for the first girl I had a crush on.  Laura.

Now, I mostly prefer men, but every so often a woman will come along who is just . . . breathtaking.  Laura was such a girl.  And she was lovely.

I went to an arts school for middle school and my freshman year of high school.  One I sorely missed after my family moved to the Kansas suburbs.  My school focus was writing and drama. I was confident and knew my own beauty in a way I haven't since, but the different arts didn't mix much, and Laura was both a dancer and a year ahead of me.

I never even talked to her.  Just watched her from afar.  I didn't have the courage, or the awareness, I guess.  Besides, I was dating a really cute boy.  Still, even though I haven't thought about her in decades–barely remembered her until I found this poem–I wish I had talked to her in high school.
~AJ


. . . For Laura

   Soft golden ribbons
Floating 
             Falling
                            Flying
Sweetly seductive             dancing
About heavenly shoulders—
      beautiful face
lighten a room
a soft glow of fire
Laughing eyes
Cat-like curves and angles

Grace in motion
      No restraints
Freedom at its finest

Poetry Wednesday #61

I'm bringing back Poetry Wednesday!  For a while anyway.  The next several weeks will feature poems I wrote in middle and high school for my creative writing classes.  Some of these are really quite good.

by A Vahanvaty from Dubai, UAE (Creepy Doll, Barnaul, Russia) [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

This poem I actually have a date on: May 3, 1996.  So I would have been either a sophomore or senior in high school (I skipped my junior year).  It was originally typed on a typewriter, believe it or not!  There's a note at the beginning that reads, "inspiration-- short story "Miriam" by Truman Capote" It makes sense.  That creepy little tale was a favorite of mine.  Again, I'll try to recreate the formatting here.~AJ

       Miriam

Left alone

     Husband dead, gone. . . an old woman

Who doesn't realize that she is

     Lonely

     Beautiful young girl

          With almost white hair

And large eyes

Knowing, knowing

     Old eyes

Knowing, knowing

And pretty silk dresses

"What's your name, girl?"     "Miriam."

Poetry Wednesday #60

I'm bringing back Poetry Wednesday!  For a while anyway.  The next several weeks will feature poems I wrote in middle and high school for my creative writing classes.  Some of these are really quite good.

Edward Crawford returns a tear gas canister fired by police who were trying to disperse protesters in Ferguson, Mo.
 Aug. 13, 2014. Robert Cohen / St. Louis Post-Dispatch via Zuma Press
This is such an iconic image.  The strength of that man at that moment.

I want to say the following poem was actually written before high school.  I think in 7th or 8th grade. This would have been in 1993 maybe, '94?  I know it was after the '92 LA Riots, but only a year or two.  This was actually a really exciting find for me because I remember the first several lines, but not the rest and it's driven me crazy for decades!  It was originally written by hand on notebook paper, and I will try to recreate the vagaries of my handwriting and strange capitalization in my transcription below–it means something, you know? Anyway, enjoy. ~AJ


Lifetimes of Lifetimes
covered in STEEL
don't Believe
What they say is real
Life is Life
and widows cry
Who are you
to do and die
What is lost
can never be found
ALL is buried
deep underground
where the worms
wiggle and eat and crawl
The sons of daughters
Fall and Fall
Lost within her
deep despair
Old women pull
the young one's hair
Death is Death
and will live on
Until the coming
Of the sun's bright dawn
Nothing matters
and time moves on
that is the way
the world works.

Poetry Wednesday #59

So, this started out as a regular post and turned into some not-bad prose poetry.  I guess I'm restarting Poetry Wednesdays! ~AJ

by Charles Hamm [CC BY 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Odd Angles

I don't fit.  Not really.  Not at my job.  Not in my life.  I'm angled where I should be round, round where I should be smooth, and smooth where angles are meant to go.  Not that I actually have much in the way of smoothness.  I'm more lumps and spikes than anything.

I don't fit.  I don't say this to garner sympathy.  I say it with only the tiniest smidgen of self pity.  I say it as a value-neutral statement.  Something true, or true enough.  Like saying I'm tall (I am).  It just is.  I just am.

I don't fit, and that is not to say that I don't want to fit.  I do.  I want to fit somewhere, with someone.  But I don't.  Not right now.  Maybe not ever—though I hope to the gods that's not true.  I just haven't found my place, my puzzle.  My job.  My person.  Whatever.  I haven't found it yet.

I don't fit.  Sometimes I feel like I'm stuck, perpetually, just outside the group.  Whatever that group may be: coworkers, classmates, family, friends.  I'm the one who doesn't quite get it, get in.  I'm the one who stoops to fit in the photograph.  I shrink myself to fit in the frame, cutting away chunks of flesh and bone, and still I rattle the edges.

I don't fit.  I don't know where I would fit.  Or how.  Or with whom.  I can sand the rough edges, but I can't change the basic shape of me.  Not without losing much of who I am.  And I've given up too much already to give up that much more.  There'll be nothing left.

I don't fit and I'm sick and tired of trying to force myself to fit.  It's painful.  It makes me doubt.  It makes me unsure and unfun.  It makes me tense and afraid.  And I think it makes me stupid.  I know it makes me awkward.  Who wouldn't be awkward covered in open, oozing wounds, and missing some of the parts that make up the whole?

I don't fit.  And, mostly, I find now that I don't care.  I will heal and move on.

Poetry Wednesday #58

My niece's first birthday last week.  We had a terrible time finding a card that wasn't hideous, so I made my own using some faery notecards I bought years ago and writing a message inside.  This is the little poem I wrote a a message.  It's a little Hallmark-y, but, whatever.

For my most magnificent and wonderful niece, M— S—, on the occasion of her first birthday:

It's been fun to watch you grow

And learn the things you didn't know.

Of course, it will be more fun still—

O! Just the thought gives me a thrill—

To watch as you grow bigger yet,

And cast a wider knowledge net.

It's so much fun because it's you,

And you bring fun to all you do!

Poetry Wednesday #57

The nights grow long

The nights grow long,
The wind brings chills,
The moon whispers
Of ghostly thrills.
I'm excited,
It's just so keen!
Only two weeks
'Til Halloween!

Poetry Wednesday #56

By en:John Anster Fitzgerald (1823-1906) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Oftentimes, at least with my rhyming poetry, the first verse comes to me all at once.  This is a perfect example.  I just started singing it a couple of days ago, adding more verses as I did so.  I'm thinking it needs at least two more verses, which I'll write–or won't–sometime in the future.  Enjoy! ~AJ

Untitled, Unfinished Song or Ballad

Away with the faeries

The girl goes to play,

In the land of enchantment

Between night and day.

She runs with the spirits,

And dances along

To the instruments playing

Their magical song.

Forgetting her sorrows,

Forgetting her woes,

She leaves all behind her,

As away she goes.

She leaves for the weekend,

And is gone for a year,

Since, through fae magics,

She's forgotten her fear.

Poetry Wednesday #55

I wrote this some 10-12 years ago.  It's a song, meant to be sung in a march.  It's infinitely unfinished.  I wrote it with the idea that I'd just keep adding names and stories to it.  You'll get the picture when you read it.  I hope. ~AJ 

Army of the Damned

There's a ghost.  There's a ghoul.

I'm a fighter.  I'm a fool.

In this army of the damned.

We will march.  We will fight.

We will bleed through the night.

O! This army of the damned.

Look there's Fred, lost his head

In a battle with the dead.

Now he's joined their ranks instead

Of still breathing.

Here is Jon, he marches on,

He swears he'll never see the dawn

Pretty soon he'll be long gone

From the living.

So we march.  So we fight.

I hope I live through the night

In this army of the damned.

We have men.  We have might,

But we don't know what is right,

We're the army of the damned.

Poetry Wednesday #54

Sea-change

I see Manannán's horses crash upon the shore

Transforming into foam

And slipping back to sea—

An abundance of colors chase them,

As the moon and the sun 

Chase each other.

Reflections of reflections

Turning into something new.

Poetry Wednesday #53

I got this from here.

Call to Manannán

Wave-riding magician,

Guardian of the Blessed Isles,

Mist-cloaked guide over open waters,

Keeper of the Crane Bag,

Wielder of the Answerer,

Lawgiver among the Tuatha Dé Danann,

Hail Manannán, son of the sea,

Lord of the Strand.

Hail Manannán,

Lord of the liminal realms,

I call to you.

Poetry Wednesday #52

Stormy Seas by Graham Richardson

Whispers of Manannán

The first time I saw the ocean
I was twenty-three
And already half in love with the idea
Of the vast and unreachable
Depths that it contained.
It was nothing like I expected–
It was more.
I didn't feel awe.
Not then.
What I felt that early-autumn day–
Standing on the southwestern coast
Of Alaska–
Was a deep and unrelenting
Calm.
A tranquility that I had never before
Encountered in my waking life.
In my dreams the sea was
Green or blue or tumbled-grey.
The color I remember most,
Looking back,
Is purple–
The dusky-violet of the sky at night–
And I understood what the
Greeks meant when they named it
"Wine-dark."
I heard you,
While I stood there,
Whispering to me.
I heard you,
Though I didn't yet know
Your name.

Poetry Wednesday #51

Evelyn Simak [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Three More Lunes

The myths of freedom

And romance

Forget poverty

Dreaming the wild,

The untamed, the constant movement–

Traveling the wind.

More is in this world

Than we know

We imagine dearth.

Poetry Wednesday #50

湖南张家界国家森林公园 By chensiyuan [GFDL or CC BY-SA 4.0-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Daydreaming

At the height of summer I wish for the cool of mountains,
The deep shade of forests, and the wind that whispers through.
I want a life among the fingers of the earth,
A cottage shadowed by woodland canopy,
And the quiet cacophony of nature at dawn.
I want to breathe the oxygen-rich air with you,
And lounge in bed 'til noon's well past.
We'd eat fruit and laughter with equal avidity,
And need only each other for companionship.

Poetry Wednesday #49

I found this photo on a Pinterest board.
The outfit is sold on Etsy.

Woman, 3 of many

She always wanted to travel against the status quo, and walk on paths less beaten,

But she was met with a resounding "No!" when she tried to dip her feet in.

In greater than ten thousand ways she was told she was worth zero—

For a girl is only good for lays and can never be a hero.

Her courage, once great and true and strong, could not stand against the constant pecking

And soon the disenchanted throng had her to do their becking.

By the time she'd grown she'd lost her joy, and her bravery, spirit, and brain.

All because she was not a boy, she lived her life in pain.

Poetry Wednesday #48

By Jnn13 [CC BY-SA 3.0 or GFDL], via Wikimedia Commons

Independence Day, or thoughts on the 4th of July

We are the conquerors,

The conquered,

The slavers,

The enslaved,

The Privileged,

the poor.

We are the huddled masses,

and those who bar them from the door.

We range in color from the darkest browns

to palest pinks,

And our world is not colorblind.

We make up a nation that is less a melting pot,

and more a large tureen of stew

With the scraps thrown away—

Forgotten.

The air tonight is thick with smoke,

Smelling an equal of gunpowder, barbecue, tobacco, and marijuana.

The pop! and BANG!

of celebratory bombs

Seems unending.

Someone tonight is going to lose a hand

Someone tonight is going to be shot by accident
Someone tonight is going to die

as even bullets obey the law of gravity

And being blasted into the air

by the careless and carefree

2nd Amendment loving

self-proclaimed "freedom fighters"

Or perhaps the simply drunken gun-owner

wishing to look badass in front of family and friends

Shoots his gun into the air

forgetting that the bullet must needs come down again.

It doesn't matter.

It won't come down on them,

But a block or two over,

An adjacent neighborhood,

Where they won't have to see the carnage.

Still,

Fireworks are pretty,

Barbecue is tasty,

And everyone feels a pinch of patriotic pride.

We celebrate.

And don't think of the consequences.

Poetry Wednesday #47

By ESO [CC BY 4.0], via Wikimedia Commons

I dream the crescent moon

I dream the crescent moon—

Pouring out darkness into the sky

Wild-me running, night-hounded,

Chased and chasing madness.

I dream the hunter hunted,

The haunter haunted.

I dream the cold hours of darkness,

With miles to go before the sun.

Colors deepen,

Crimson running blue.

I dream the crescent moon—

Pouring out darkness into the sky.

Poetry Wednesday #46

Pink Sky via Wikimedia Commons

Thoughts driving home after work

Pink sun,

Floating,

       Sinking,

Awash in a orange sky that's

Blued at the edges–

Daylight lingers now,

So, so long,

In high summer.

Daylight lingers, but

Darkness drops fast

And hard

Upon the awaiting world below.

Blink,

And it's upon you–

Shadows hiding in shadows–

And for a moment,

Not even the stars are out.