Geino Äotsch

Marked

Parlay my heart into
A time when I forgot about
Being too much for someone

An hour when my mother didn’t
Call me a user
A morning when my father didn’t
Call me ungrateful

No losers

We all have our damage
But what is in our valise
How do we unpack it?

Don’t accept things as they are
Make them what you see
Kiss it goodbye

Tree reaching for the sky
I see you, I feel your branches
Like tentacles of hope

Earth you can be my mother
Spirit you can be my father
Sky you can be my lover

Am I causing isolation
To gain strength and closing
Myself off to oblivion

Water tank
Dunk me in the light
Target practice

Turning

We’re just taking turns
Going in circles
Ready to manifest out from
Our cocoons of healing
Unbroken start over again
Introductions

Recall the security blanket
If a routine and a method suffice
Hold tight to knowing
The unknowable is
Always there for you

In a foreign land
We feel further away
From our internal land
But closer to who we
Truly are

Look into the eyes
Of someone you hope to
Kiss one day

Look into the eyes
Of a stranger and wonder
Who they will become

Gushing to share
Eager to listen

Where do we get off
And when can we begin?

I don’t deserve delicious
Self deprecating wishes
I don’t deserve the moon
The sun can turn its face too
I found my father’s touch
Of gloom in my veins
Residuals of pain remanufactured
In me the stress of eternity

Stretching to be better than
The very best of good
I cry to laugh instead of
Remembering the cruel
Cool, cool, cool

Do other humans
Scold themselves or
Overthink to the hilt of difficult
What if you are truly someone
And you still feel like no one

Make champion to the disdain
Exonerate my guilt
The given displeasure of
A childhood I didn’t request
Feel the love spilt over the ground
Of a father who also forgot
About his sons
Drowning in themselves
Or rivers that pull us under
His best whatever that is

I don’t deserve deliciousness
If I am his I am at best nothingness
Like hugs and affection and
Kisses and pardons and wishes
Granted by the sea I am the
User my mama said I am
Ungrateful my father said the
Sky is darker than it was the
Day before there is no lawyer
For self inflicted discontented
Polydactyl internalized sewer like
Sores of contradiction

To be truly honest
The vulnerability forces its way
To the top but at what cost
Broken glass against the skin
Or walk with wounds from
Deep within we carry on…

Ponder

Clarity versus mystery
Clearness versus true belief

The line that separates
Is the line that magnetizes
Love, hate, peace, war

What is logic and emotion
If we think before we think
Without thinking about it at all

Will mystery moot its discovery
Arriving in an absent need?

What mystery is depending on science
What science is depending on God?

And in one fell swoop
An ultimate acknowledgment
What is a mystery if it cannot be found?

Hackneyed

She gave me stability
Whether it was right or wrong
Something to hold onto
A thing to fight out
I had no value for turmoil

If I had chosen differently
Would I not want this?
Is my singular existence
Less than what I pictured
For myself then or now?

As I walked forward
The pink sun kept going down
In flashes I could not keep up
I saw her face longer hair here
A spirit guide?
I’m not sure but I wanted to avoid her
Still she came towards me
Not the one that I was looking for

She noticed the fast diving
Pink sun into the sea as well

Then without refrain or warning
Threw her arm around my neck
And we were walking together
Not sure who she would become

Many footsteps first over
A security fence and then down
Down, down into a
Greyhound bus station
We watched a man push a table
Picnic style out into the courtyard
From inside but kept walking

Not our circus
We were still figuring ourselves out

Into the airport and her flight
Was conveniently the same as mine
So I invited her to my friends house
Where we fell asleep together
I awoke to a see her in
A much shorter afro
What a gorgeous shock

When had she time for a haircut!
No matter it looked nice

I found my music equipment and
Decided to play a song
Not long before a band had jumped in
To join me in the living room
But it was over too soon
I was nervous anyway
I play the piano not the guitar
Still I would try
But not before someone
Invited themselves
To take my amps

We started up a game of cards

Frustration settled in soon
When my surprise was my demise
She was leaving as expected
She made new friends
No new news there
And I would be holding back
To ponder and gestate
Feelings of despair

Somehow I knew this
All from the beginning
Standing in the overview
Of a drowning pink sun

Deus Ex Machina

Working in the garden
Maybe digging a hole to China
I followed the instructions carefully
Not knowing

I heard the voice instruct
Knocking at all sides
Of the earth

I left my grassy post to
Collect more plants and returned
To watch the most beautiful
Rainbow earthworm rise up
Unfolding

Out of the soil
It twisted upward
From end to end
I couldn’t see the beginning
Bright rainbow colors
Every solid shade in the spectrum
Hexagonal

The head found its way
To the front as it rolled and
Slithered off and my Irish Setter
Stood atop the front
Riding next to a streaming river
I ran to catch up
I grabbed my camera

No one would believe me
And water was spraying everywhere
Like fountains of joy

I kept up speed and followed
Until I couldn’t match the pace any longer
And watched him glide
Into the distance

I called out
Find your brother
You resolve me

Onward prisme

Meninges

Her brain can look
Far enough ahead
To answer the question
In a way that won’t
Bite her in the ass later

Should we then faint for the drugs?
What brings the stars wakes the sky
Whatever it takes!

We haven’t any headphones that
Could possibly capture the sound
Of the future clamoring back answers

Somehow she knew how to hear them

Might be the experience of
Disappointed results
Still hanging from the
Meninges

Prevention of duels
Gracefully worded
What was not said
Was safe in her shed
Of matter

Her brain could look
Far enough ahead

Blindspot

Whatever made this person that way
Why do I feel asselpated
If it’s raining or not
There is a fun house waiting
For us

In the corner of the car
Diagonal and behind
To my right I find
Nightfall calling

Black and red diamonds
Chapped from life experiences
Hold me upside down by my toenails

What torture will awaken the truth
What lack of need for security
Will give this piece of mind

Burning burning burning
Believing in nothing
Confetti showers from above
Glimmering hope

If we leave the door unlocked
Is the home inside secure
Do we need a lock to prove
That no one can get in?

My security rests in the
Basement of unpredictable charms
The outside worst that doesn’t care
Is invisible

Free, free, free!
Liberated by unsafety
We are not secure from
Anything

Everyone is susceptible to
The gift of an inconspicuous game
What detectable ghosts
Remain mundane

Contending

They’re not here to help anybody
They’re here to help you make their numbers
They don’t care about your feelings
I am ultimately non-secular so
It is difficult to touch the abstract numb
The narcissistic unfeelingness
Of the earth people around me

Hanging new life on the walls
To inspire others planting roses
In the garden cleaning up the shop
I find others rearranging my efforts
Not in a way to make it beautiful
In a way to make it theirs

What if this then pushes the great escape
To fall into a well of mollies and
Swim away where I one day soon
Arise to see my face aimed at the mirror
And not recognize my eyes or my smile

Meeting new beings I often
Double check my eye contact
With myself to see if the human in there
Is ready to be observed by the world

Without a false sense of security
Without nuisance

Hugging someone else’s dog
Sitting on someone else’s couch
Planting flowers on someone else’s property
A ricoche effect that leaves an uneasy
Lack of security wavering in the
Cold or hot winds that pass by
Comforting children that don’t belong to me
Am I the renegade of unowned property
Caring for the world that does not belong to me
Just nurturing life around me
As the excitement with the reception
Of my feelings and nature catapult

Good will is often like a head on a stick
Though it sounds gruesome
To an empathic person the gore
Is in the details of explanations
On how a sensitive soul
That wants to live and be loved
Feels rejected by its surroundings
They need to check in with

Roses love you unconditionally
Plants love you unconditionally
Dogs love you unconditionally
Emotions leave earthlings feeling
Uncomfortable and for that

How do you tell people to stop running
Without knocking them down!?

I understand it is easier to be
Unfeeling apathetic and indifferent
Perhaps even hateful

I only have love to give
The leftovers of a human heart
Laid plainly on the table

Swingset

Untenable
I guess it’s a river in all of us
Love begins where ignorance stops

Giant swings inside
Three as a pair
Swinging as high as we could
To the ceiling
Careful not to wake the guests
Reeling with laughter
Not too careful I guess
How did this swing set
Get in here?
I can feel the wind rushing past me
As you climb higher and higher

No one knew exactly why
Our fathers fought
Some brothers get along
Ours were different
And so were the relationships
We had with them
Especially you
Even though he brought out the belt
You loved him in a way
I never felt a bond with my father
Two brothers two kids
Two totally different experiences

Why do some people feel
More secure than others?

Dark sky grey tree
Trust the unknown

Author: Geino Äotsch