Souvenirs

You wear scars
Like a badge of honor,
Memorials of valor
And manhood
As if these things
Could be distilled
Into surface fibers.

I only see pain
And permanence
And more pain,
An ugly constellation
Of sinewy stars
Collapsing
Into supernovas
Of space between
Time and tissue
And skin.

NOTE: Special thanks to De Jackson at Whimsygizmo for suggesting the title!

A Life of Their Own

We bury unwanted words
To forget them.
But in the dark
Is stubborn growth,
Unseen movement
Pushing toward
The surface.
Though no witness
May ever see
Their beauty,
They bloom
In secret gardens
Without promise,
If only
For the lonely
Sake of extravagance.

The prompt from Poetic Bloomings was to write a “seed” poem. It could literally be a seed of a plant or an idea that sparks a greater effort. My inspiration came from a quote by Bear Grylls, host of Man vs. Wild on the Discovery Channel. I saw the actual episode he’s referring to and it’s one of my favorite moments of the show.

“I remember when I was in the Amazon, in the middle of a really dense bit of rainforest, where no human would have ever been or probably will ever go again, and looking up and seeing at the top of a tree a beautiful bright purple flower, and thinking ‘Nobody’s ever going to see that flower. That’s God’s extravagance.’ Even though no-one’s ever going to see it, he just can’t help but create something beautiful.”  ~Bear Grylls

Well, I just completed my very first Poem-A-Day challenge! I’d like to send a big shout out to the hub who has supported me all month. He read all of my poems, usually with hilarious and grossly incorrect interpretations. Thank you!

This has been such a learning experience. I am both emotionally drained and envigorated, which I suppose is true of any creative process. When I started writing poetry last fall for a class, I wasn’t prepared for the soul-rending that went along with it. Many of my poems are fictional, but I’ve found it impossible not to bury some piece of personal truth into every poem. I resisted this at first by writing only fluffy stuff (aka crap), but it wasn’t long before I opened up and let the words come out the way they wanted to. Regardless of the quality of my work or whether it’s “poemy” enough, I consider this self-awareness quite an accomplishment.

Today’s final prompt was to write a poem about leaving. Back in my radio days (believe me, it’s not as cool as it sounds), I was on air when Rich Mullins died in a car accident. I played his song “Elijah” as a tribute to him. With all this focus on leaving and things coming to an end, I was reminded of the song.

“When I leave I want to go out like Elijah,
With a whirlwind to fuel my chariot of fire,
And when I look back on the stars,
It’ll be like a candlelight in Central Park,
And it won’t break my heart to say goodbye.”

Leaving Kansas

Chasing rainbows,
Catching wind
Of blue skies,
You learn to fly
Like witches,
Make believing
There is technicolor
Power within,
When all
That remains
In waking dawn
Are wounds
In black and white.

Ode to the Atlantic

I arrived on your shoulder
Where the brackish mouth
Of Chesapeake Bay kissed
The western hem of your veil.

At the tender edge
Of horizon’s throne
You showed me who I was,
A speck among billions more.

You hid treasures for me
In shadow and sand,
A lifetime of memories
Gathered in faded baskets.

Though I left you for newer gems –
Brass rings and gilded inklings –
I am a shell that holds
The echo of your distant waves.

The World Without Rhythm

The world without rhythm is no world.
A vacuum of rapid eye movement
Without the perpetual blink of time.
Earth’s metronome drones on,
Rippling through dirt and molecule,
The staccato of life to death to life,
Circadian pulses of Monarch to Milkweed,
Relentless
The chisel of days, seasons,
Cycles of blood, heart palpitations,
Electric currents, tongue inflections
In cadence with tempos of sex,
Long-suffering geysers,
And ticking of breaths,
Singing
In dissonant harmony
To the steady
Steady
Steady
Beat of the drum.

_______________________________

Potty Poem

A world without plumbers
Would not flush down the drain.
It would overflow.

_______________________________

A World Without Blue

No one would notice

my bruises

fading to vapor

in the breath

of your cold mouth

This one was inspired by an article I read in the news this morning.

Gravity

There is less of it
In the ocean
And on the moon,
But each one
Reaches for the other,
Pulling across expanse
Of sky and lungs,
Of time and dreams.

I lay down in sand
Beside Cyrano, soaked
In ocean dew.
We long to rise
With tides of night,
Until the moon
Within our reach,
Laughs
With his old friend
And I fall down.
________________________________

Welcome to the Fall Out

You changed my name
Against my silent will,
Preferring Imperial sounds
Over morning calm.

You buried me alive,
Dancing on pulsing graves
Still fresh with dead voices
And muddy upheaval.

You caged my youth
In comfort stations
Forcing pleasure squeezed
From lips and legs.

But when the bombs fell,
The melting of children
And skin like dripping wax
Brought me no joy.

The rain of ruin seeped
Deep into marrow and mind,
Till our mingled ashes forever
Stained the white of rising suns.