Fade

My mind weeps from struggling thoughts
set down on the living room table.
Thoughts that are known, but are also unrecognised.
Thoughts that are expressed, but are also forgotten.

There are seats by the table, addressed by the shadows
each with their own agenda.
I cannot touch them.
They mutter but I cannot hear them.
Now and then they may embrace me,
but I cannot feel them.

I once knew these shadows
yet I have never been more apart
and I have watched flesh turn to shadow.
Will the shadows fade as does the light
that flickers on the ceiling?

I want to leave the living room.
I want to pick up familiar paintbrushes and pens
and splash colour.
I can't.
I'm not sure why.

Instead, the room is both quiet and loud,
and although many journeys have sung chords of poetry
my throat coughs dry.

It is a long tiredness,
a still tiredness,
another drone.

A radio plays in a corner.
The static interrupts my sight, my ears, my feelings,
and melts into a slur of a pitiful consciousness.

It's been so long,
dancing and singing and shouting
that I feel much more of the nothingness
that begun my art.

The Evening Train Home

The southern orange glow
regrets its departure
and dives into the ocean
as its platform descends.
The light strikes the train window
like a weeping glare
burning the eyes
until it has finally been overthrown
by the purple night clouds
and the green bed.

Just a discord (of a poem that says it’s not a poem.)

I'm sorry kid but no poetry today. I'm cross legged in a room full of pictures depicting the deflation, the declination and deletion of a place that's derelict to me. Can't stand it. I'm sorry kid, but there ain't no poetry today. I'm a boulder, a pillar, in the way of a structure that wants to crash down above, pushes hard this way and that, shoving my back this is anger my friend. I'm seeing red. So there's no poetry today. You see, I'm not delicate with my words today. I don't feel gentle, I don't feel kind I don't want to tiptoe across puddles of water I want to break the ice. I want to scream so many things that would only be a symptom, not a description of everything that's screwed up. I've tried, I've tried. But I can't sing poetry because I've died. There's a lacking soul in here kid, been hibernating for too long under a smothering winter that reeks of sickness. “Dead, dead, dead,” The madness dances from across the room and that laughter that is so loud inside it's tearing my lungs it's messing my eyes. I'm seeing shadows hiding behind the doors I'm haunted I'm torn I'm wrecked I'm displaced I'm anger. And to resist that calling, that faithful, honest calling to break break break break break break break everything. To pick up the phone and say goodbye To walk out the door and imply forever. When I can't remember an entire summer When I can't consider a newborn spring When everything that makes sense disintegrates and the only thing the only thing I hear is “destroy.” There's no poetry kid, there never will be. Poetry is the assumption of a picture, it's lace it's a window, an image a portrait or a landscape what is this? That's simply the point. It is. It says. It does.

Everyone gets a little angry.

but I have to mute this. This kind of recklessness doesn't make for good art. This kind of hopelessness doesn't make for a good heart. I'm resting. The dragon sleeps. Inside there's a monster. But it's name is not “inevitable.”

A Discord of a Friend

I didn't think goodbye had any meaning until I met you.

A thousand words but I couldn't pick one, that spoke about the damage that's been done.

You're someone I can't let go, someone who won't disappear by will alone.

And I wish you had known

That everything had a connection to a suffering that poured storms of rain

That smothered the ground along with the dust, along with our trust.

I always thought 'Til I see you again'.

But you've gone, leaving me to blame pain that is a constant arrival on platform one,

A timetable strictly woven to begin over and over

'Til the birds cry 'Tis really over!'

And I too am gone.

A daunting arrival, settle thee none.

She's a sea swan sailing low
with silver feathers and a silver glow
the sea sings calm roses red
the moon sets sail a simple dread
because she, the swan sees them all
dancing; dancing to and fro.

On one strange night a magic spell came to be

Now for something rather different and a change of mood... This is a spoken word story that was commissioned by a member of an online forum. The aim was to use their two original characters, Joel and Jenny, and construct a nonsense story completely in rhymne.

Click here for the spoken word version.

I have also made a transcript as you can see below:

On one strange night a magic spell came to be

Where words tended to whisper

Some kind of tricky philosophy.

It twas when curses quiver

And the old anger shiver

When the words didn’t quite deliver

Their intended esprit, you see.

For when dear Jenny and Joel sat down,

And the sun began to frown

(Er, that’s a way to say it set, if you hadn’t guessed yet)

The spell began thusly.

“Call of duty? You are joking right? That game is dull, it’s all just fight.”  Jenny huffed tugging the blanket across her shoulder, seeing Joel’s smoulder, as his eyes lazed upon the rest of the games.

“Well, I like the game, but if you’ll complain, make a better suggestion, something sane.” Joel grumbled while thumbled his cookie that crumbled, how jumbled his thoughts came to be. “Hold on-”

“What’s wrong?”

“This is odd. I sound like dod!”

Jenny raised her eyebrows high, the night now nigh, (that means it’s very dark outside!) and thought her friend too tired to play.

“What is that Dod you say? I’ve never heard of a name like that in a day!”

Joel frowned and stood up. He looked around. He sat back down. “Dod, my friend, my eager poet, had a voice like you’d know it, if you were far away. He tended to rhyme, ALL THE TIME, and did my head in, like others in crime.”

Jenny slowly nodded, trying to let Joel’s words sink in. Since when was he a poet, though his rhymes were thin, Joel hadn’t cared for the rhythm within. 

“Joel you’re being very weird.” Jenny feared. “It’s almost as if you’ll grow a beard!”

“DON’T MENTION MY LACK OF FUR, IT’S SOMETHING THAT MAKES ME VERY MURRR.”

“That doesn’t even make sense.” Jenny cried. “You’re making me very tense!”

“For bouncy squirrels and acidic slime, I can’t help but do nothing but rhymne!” Joel raised his hands in the air, it was tragic time, a literacy affair. For he was known for his foul mouth and tough declare such as ‘You funny mumma.” Hmm, seems even the spell works on the narrator, I hope there’s no side effects later.

“I don’t like this at all, why on earth is life so cruel.” Joel’s anger started to grow. He wanted nothing more but to cause a KO.

“I realise now. I think I see. You’re starting to rhyme. A bit… Like me!” Jenny exclaimed, and fast proclaimed the title for her slowest gain of the situation. A fixation. Dilation. Of true plot manifestation. For all they were doing was procrastination, annihilation of a giant mis-celebration of a poet’s translation of some kind of story that was nothing more but a vocation to provide sensation. (GOLD PLEASE)

“What shall we do?” Jenny wondered. “Shall we still play or-“

“FOO.” Joel growled.

“Did you try to swear again?” Jenny tried not to grin.

“Let’s just play games and say whatever. Maybe this curse will be bored forever.” Joel suggested, vested. He wasn’t going to let the spell win. “How about Tekken?” He threw in. He paused. “Tekken…. Tekken… Tekken… Tekken.”

“Chicken.” Jenny said and gasped. “Oh, I wasn’t calling you a chicken,  that was… This… Weird… Thing that is happening to us. Something I can’t quite suss.”

“Just thinking if there are words we say, that would make this spell go away. Like words that don’t really rhyme, or at least not in today’s time.”

Jenny put the Tekken disk into the machine. She was now keen, and maybe quite green to remove the spell on. They played for sometime, each thinking of a non-rhyme, something to break the hell. (Although quite admittedly, Jenny is quite amused by the whole thing, the fun it would continue to bring silently makes her chuckle.)

Just before Jenny won the next game, Joel pressed start and paused the frame. With a burst of thunder he roared a chord that cried “ORANGES!”

“Oranges?”

“ORANGES.”

“Oranges...? Ah! Oranges! Orange!”

“Oranges, oranges!”

“Oranges, orange-oranges. Oranges!”

“Oranges.”

“Orangey Oranges. Oranges.”

And that is how the rest of the night went.

When they woke up the next day, the spell was spent.

Perhaps pure nonsense was the true intent,

And silliness was all it meant.

Through oranges Joel felt happy to breathe,

For Dod’s memory and poetry he could leave.

But back in his mind, a single sentence lay low,

For it if it was spoken, it’d be quite the blow.

As Sporanges  grow Orange in Blorenge.

I leave you my adieu.

The end.

50 shades of stupid

So I'm sitting at work
(there's a) thinking singing ringing in my head
words been said
that seem so strange to me.

That's not right
I wanna say, I should say
but I'm afraid.

I'm afraid you'll say it's ok
for you to one day
thrust into me when I say no
and that-
it's romantic to be draining in cuts and blood when-
bdsm is an expression of love
and marks of the skin is an expression grim.

so do tell me.
how you can justify an abusive biograpy
praised as if it were new
like hell praised for killing you!
would you say sex is the decision of your lover? when you don't want it
and you're being the bother?

I'm afraid you'll say
"oh grow up, you don't understand.
love is what the lover can stand."
perhaps you don't know how it feels
when the blood's draining down your heels
and it kills
tell me sorrow
your heart'll follow
a knife or two.

I have a proposal for you
why don't you read between the lines
and stop watching the disguise
grin.
It's laughing at you, it's watching you
and it knows
oh my friend
it knows it's got you.

but when you are there
you're stuck.
struck
and broken.

Now tell me how that is sweet, sweet love.

Song of feathers

I am no flower
I am not vulnerable
and I do not wither.

I am not beautiful
like my genitils
deem me to be.

I need not beauty
Nor great strength
to simply be me.

I do not need
his delicious fruit
nor prestigious parties.

I am wholesome
I am made of feathers
and I dine on freedom and the far trees.

Let the winds guide me
Not your philosophy
that guides you dull.

Let the winds send me home
to the home
many paths lead to the same end.

Guests

Sharks cross shore showing nothing more
than sheer intimidation
with their wet blankets
and their careless roar.
Unaware their presence marks for
a discomfort in the waves
they brought to the floor
and the air made core
to their discord and gore.
Voices unwanted
Voices unknown
Voices I want gone
Far from my home.

Shrunk

I feel like the world has shrunk,

and I'm balancing on one leg

and on my shoulders are weights

and I'm being pulled in several directions

and my hands want to burst forward,

but my back is stiff and leans back

while my head, like lead, stays still and dead

as thoughts race and dull at the same time

fade quickly and reappear

repetition, repetition,

sensual inequations unable to meet user demand.

I feel like the world shrunk without me

I feel like I've left the world far behind

and I'm not in space, just a void

no direction, no destination,

no voice, no mind.

Where is the journey, where is the journey

that I thought I was walking

but lost the path a long time ago.

I feel like I'm sick but my body is empty

and tired

and slowly, slowly, wanting to sleep

and rest

and weep

finally, something I cannot endure

that wants my bones to break

but will not ensure their destruction

because I'm not on earth anymore.

I feel like I'm so far away

that rules don't work

yet twist and insert

in ways that stretch me far

like a red goo

but not allow me to snap

so I wait

exhausted.

You tease with teeth and whispers.

You assassinate close strings that held me up

but until you strike the final blade

I shall keep wandering on

in the new land I've made.

We broke the house

You wrote me from a book of disorder.

You stole an identity

painted my name with a tattered brush

long, old, and worn.

Paint thrown thick and black

onto walls, onto paper,

onto stone, brick, and a cold house

yellow wallpaper no longer kind, gentle

the place that you longed for

torn, ripped, decayed and unloved.

The paint drips onto your shoes

as you remember where the first cracks appeared.

But you don't remember how.

Or what.

Except, the hate you have of me.

Grown, kept, nourished

by desperation.

That poison
My dear, it is called addiction.

You cannot resist to taste and paste

my name like lyrics to explain your hate.

To everything purple and green, yellow and red,

you compare me to everything you love and dread.

For all to see and share and learn

the evil you see

the satisfaction you feed

desperate

to help support your sadness as it burns.

Hungry child weeps.

Away with the fairies

 I see shadows in the distance,

They follow me.

Tired memories polluted with drink and darkness.

A mist ventures from shadow to shadow,

it falls and rises

As poison presses deeper into the veins of willow trees.

A smile that lingers on the lips of a fairy

hides and sings

“Dance, dance with me.”

Spiders fall from dead leaves

Onto ground scattered with thorns and blood.

The naked feet of a traveller

Blisters with hate

As the song of the hopeless

drifts further into the forest.

The Moments Between

There's a chair in the middle of the room,

It presses against carpet with four thin legs

and is stuck rigid

forced to endure.

It's master gives no promise

that it will be relieved of it's duty,

the wooden frame groans

as decaying muscle waits.

Brown jacket sits on an unfamiliar lap.

Naked pockets inside lay thin and sick

as the material weeps over knees

and waits.

Foreign hands curl gently and lame;

they fall loose, then rise

as jacket smothers hair and face

and becomes engulfed

in a smell that stains the fabric

from the outside.

Gentle Fade

You are neither day nor night

Dawn, dusk, dark or light.

You are neither sound nor song,

Nor is there any shade so strong

That could define you, dear friend.

You who have gone so long

Without a word

Without a whisper

A suggestion

A glance

A single drop of something,

Anything

That reveals your existence. 

 

Yet you cause the wind to blow away.

You dare the shadows to lie beneath your feet and tired eyes.

You whistle, you hum,

You throw a stake at the nothingness

When you feel anger you shout

But the shout comes in a wave of thunder

Bursting, burning,

That hate you let out

It twists and turns

And it is no longer a shout

But a single phrase

You say to another ear

But mine.

Slave

Body stands naked and hungry
while drops of white rain fall cold
and the wind whips a mighty sting
as fated is the Slave
to watch others behold.
A beaded necklace pressed against dry lips
sits around neck, sore and burning.
Constant eyes keep on staring,
the flame flickers under bold banner.

And as the bells ring

And the cotton sales begin,

Lonely April does sing

Winter in May.

Whisper

Ah, there they begin again.

Twists of air

Fading in, fading out

Amoré

I want to share this moment's warmth

And sing it's softness with a breath so sweet,

that it would curl around you and hold you tight.

If only I could reach those strings and play those notes

you so easily release into the air,

that transcribed from your voice, your touch, your love,

locks me into a synethesia of rich colour

that bursts beneath my feet

and keeps me         floating.

25th of December, 2012.

Golden Morning Sings

In gentle rain pouring down

Christmas Day again.

House

I feel your anger

Collapse onto the everything

Causing the world to slide down, down, down

Onto the floor

That greyed with dust and dirt,

And the face of a cold, cold darkness

Sunk into the flesh of wooden furniture.

You rush towards the tap

And swing it back,

The hot water bursting onto your tired hands

That always feel disgust.

Old decaying life

Ooze a smell that shrieks loud.

Your longing for a gentle warmth

Spoilt by the shiver of discomfort.

I cannot stand it either,

As your anger builds into your veins.

I fear that it'll burst onto me

And onto you

And onto the everything.

I no longer hope for happiness,

Because you no longer wish to find it here.

And my selfishness is desperate

For you to stay.

Silence on the Borderlines

Logical annotations

To fixed memoirs

Lay on the table.

So subtly label

The experiences into emotion.

Of toil and struggle,

And the laughs of faces

That no longer

Smile.

Lost decaying touch

Fell dead with colour

And leak,

The intended saturation

now weak

And pretending never to exist.

Words we never said,

Words we were too afraid to say

Once we said good bye

Rot on the raining fence.

Stuck, hooked on the spikes between us,

Blowing away in the wind.

You and I

In no more words than

An angry whisper,

Killed the garden we shared,

And slaughtered the keeper.

So that it would grow with weeds,

And then into nothing.

But sometimes I catch your eye,

As you weep in between the trees,

Still tangled by my thorns

Still afraid of new seeds.

And I have sown many more

Bad roses that have wilted.

But when I look into the sky

I see a world untouched by my hand.

I see a world where birds fly,

And colours sing in infinite prose.

Affixed associations,

But escapist intentions

Burn paper by moonlight.

Romanticised hallucinations

Or tangible realisations

Softly suggest

A new way to move from the chess board

Into a snug chair by the fireplace.

High bookshelves stand grand on all the walls,

Crisp, tender new words,

Kiss unknown philosophy gently.

I feel the waves of cold sea

Touch warm toes

Naked hands no longer curled around

Empty glass bottles.

Instead, those bottles are buried in the sand,

Their labels still on the outside

But the corners begin to peel away until

They are all the same,

No longer distinguished.

And that's how I will remember,

The box with your name

that will always hold

All of those memories.

But no longer painful,

As I cut off the canopy

and let the sun fall onto my face.

I still peer over the fence,

And hope that someday,

You too will see the sky

But in your own way.

And feel the gentle breeze,

Not choked by leaf and dirt,

But calm and sweet

In your orange lion mane.