Poem – Page 27 – Poétique

Mal Voix

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…

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

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

Forlorn

I didn’t know how to
Receive her love at the time
Because it wasn’t the love that I
Wanted

She didn’t know how to love me
Even my mother said
“He’s impossible to comfort.”

It’s too bad she came at a time
When I wasn’t prepared
I didn’t have everything in place
The way I do now

I can see hearts everywhere
In traffic lights and taillights
They’re all blurry because
My dog just died

I’m thinking of his love
Unconditional

That’s how it goes
When you truly love something

I’m doing everything just right
Waiting for the knife

A sacrifice for waking up
And organizing life

I reach up into the sky
And kiss your lion nose

You loved me
All the way

Vacancy

I thought I wanted to give up
But then I realized the mail
Would have nowhere to go
Climbing overhead into the upstairs
Attic I peeked into a small
Opening and saw a place
That I remembered hanging
Out in with all of my favorite things

Part of me didn’t want to leave
And part of me felt like I was
Just ordinary as if the things
That made me special were
The same as everyone else
And there was no one to tell him
Any different

I remember holding my cat and
Crying like this once before
Sixteen years ago and still
A feeling of being alone
Except this time it was because
I had everything he needed
Or wanted but still felt unseen

Buying gifts for people one barely knows
How silly who’s doing that?
Someone’s husband is going to
Want to wrangle you to the ground
Someone’s girlfriend will feel
Threatened!

I’m sorry I thought this was how
We got to know one another or
To show that we care
Thinking about it
Almost made it worse; like apologizing

There was no way to confirm
That he was extraordinary
Until he was gone and then
People would say
Whatever they say, when you’re gone

It’s just extra lonely without
His true companion
That walked with him
Every morning weeks ago
And he ached from a time before
He knew that light to fill him
Was back ago and with everything
He had he also had nothing
Again once more

“Maybe I’ll stay,” he said
At least to have somewhere
I can retrieve the mail.”

Funding

There’s only ten thousand steps to climb
Simple as that until we reach the
New apartment we are redesigning
You can see through the floor
Currently there is a family that
Is trying to get their son into a
Good school but he keeps failing
A test that he needs to take
Over and over again and it’s not free
They’re encouraging him
But equally defeated and he is
So positive about the outcome
Saying he wants to take time
To know that he has all the
Information that he needs
To pass and to do it correctly
Mom smiles, her hair is purple
She looks up I look down
We make eye contact
How is this safe?
Our friend who owns a gas station
Said we can bring doughnuts
There to sell to make money
He provided us with our first
Two dozen and we only need
Ten thousand more dollars
Oh no I think it’s twenty thousand
Yes we need twenty thousand more
Dollars and so if we run really quickly
We could make it to the closest
Two doughnut bakeries and buy
The rest of them, bring them back here
Work all night and sell them
For double the price!
As the clock ticks on into
The damp darkness people
Will want doughnuts and we can
Charge more than the bakery
It doesn’t reopen again until the morning
Everyone can contribute money
Drive fast hurry before they close
And then maybe we will have enough
For his education but we have to go
NOW!

Dusted

I’m taking my shot back
At myself
At the stars feeling nudged
By the afterlife silently
Pushing pressing whispering go
Like a shout in my head
An electric shock to the brain
I can feel it in my bones
In the wheat beneath my feet
In the grains

Take your body back
And make it better than it was before
Take your mind back
And make it better than it was before
Take your soul back
And make it better than it was before

I remember you
Everything you did
You have to keep living
It’s all yours to have
On a path of loneliness
Or filled with a million friends
It’s all irrelevant
Just take yourself back
It’s all you have
Pulsating

The sun is rising in your heart again
The algorithm is setting in your hippocampus
Can you feel the rest of yourself rising
Taking every risk
A pillar of satisfaction
A fascinating stretch
A universal length

I’m not giving up on
This body {ANGEL}
This mind {DEVIL}
This soul {HUMAN}

A trilogy of stories
My muscles are telling
My fancy footwork is selling
A juggling act of kindness
And respect for humanity
Especially now when so many
People feel themselves
Falling part

Take yourself back
Pull the trigger
Shoot for the inner galaxy
Dusted diamonds

Mère de Misère

I don’t want you to be dark
I told her
I need you to be hopeful
There’s enough
Darkness in the world

Unreasonable wishes

She loves you with a
Broken heart
Even months in between
Next time a year

Is it a penny for your thoughts
What would it take to bring
The light out of your tunnels
Into my heart to welcome me
With yours

Life can be dark
But I don’t want that with her
I hear myself talking
And I know
I don’t have to say
A word

Greatness comes with
Her darkness because
Everything else
Is early

I know we know
Tension
We share blood
Even bad blood

It’s your time to be
Sustainable with me
Don’t talk about dogs getting kicked
And brothers getting bit

Somehow you make sad
Shamelessly sadder

There’s a space for that
Numbers work
The seasons pass
A comfortable pink
An optimistic sound with you

Nonexistent

It is impossible to trust
The darkness that keeps the faith
With you, a pyramidal parent

Delusional sibling
Resistance assured on my part
I bang my head out loud

Why did I call? Broken lines

Wisp

Healing power
Bird appeal
Acknowledgment of truth
What question deserves the answer
Existing in a better place
A hidden road from within
Two different parties
Meaning is unavailed to
Reveal an identity
Promise to give
Without contract
Any hypothesis can
Turn a key
Find the lock
Open the sincerity
Avoid the internet
If it’s torture
No matter how you do it
What does it matter
Heartache is a river
That runs through
A heightened aloneness
No name
No birthdate
Just ether

Clockwise

We want to get it right
That’s the most important part
We might break it
But don’t throw it away
When do we become sophisticated
If it’s done well it’s not done
To put a spotlight on you as a failure
Can’t a person be good at something?

Is the goal to be alone
It does feel as though the chance to be
Missed is a predilection that
May not be afforded when we’re alive
Do we have to die to be missed?

Write a letter to a loved one
And fill the empty space where
Something else belongs

What could a laugh mean
In its purest form
Heard overhead
Trapped in an echo chamber
Bouncing off the walls
Of the cerebrum

My tiny problems are
Masked by the anxiety of others
I don’t feel pain in that way
To walk fast or slow
Isn’t nearly as important
As the act itself

The cost of being here on earth
Roaming the planet without
The animals that loved us
The people that protected us
The plants that became carbon material

Can we absorb them into
Our ethos like stardust
Resulting in a symbol of their love
To resist the pain of loving those
That we still coexist with
On the planet that no longer care?

Alive but dead to us
No resurrection for the commonality