The deep end

I should have stayed in the shallow end of the pool
Getting nothing wet but my feet and legs
Risking nothing more than a chill
But I’m drowning
Choking on all of the right choices I’ve made
I’m drowning on all my loyalty and love
My lungs are filling and I die
I die
The air that I try to breathe
It’s not air
And my lungs fill while I panic
Clamping,biting and heaving
And I’m in the deep end of the pool
Drowning
Feet trying to find the bottom
Drowning on people dying and hurting
Drowning in all the pain that they are not willing to face
And I’m under the water with no way out
And I don’t know what’s worse
To die and stifle and suffocate
Or to wade in the shallow end of the pool
And not care and just watch
While everyone else
Slowly goes under

Why I hate Mondays

Monday morning

Friday evening

It’s back

And if you don’t know the story

Here it is: http://murderpedia.org/female.S/s/spencer-brenda.htm

It sucks to be a poet

Some days it sucks

To be a poet

To have words

Softly banging

In your head

Clouding your sight

With visions

Of things pictured

Or perceived deep

Within your brain

Incomprehensible

And duplicitous

Swirling and straining

To chain

Into verse or prose

The Goddesses of words

Unasked and uninvited

Laboring in your mind

Squatted down and

Birthing broken strings

Of words

That linked correctly can

Make them demi- gods

Half God

And

Half lyric

Spelling out the Iliad

Perhaps…

But you are left

Walking through the day

In a daze

Quietly tasting words

As they flood

Into your mouth

And onto your lips

From the jumbled maze

Inside your brain

The song of Emmanuel Tsongranis

He pounded coffin nails
With a hammer forged of fear
Every word of spite nailing in and holding
Badged and vested
Death and bullets resting in his gun
But still frightened by this woman
Standing proud
Whom he could not bully
Nor subdue
Hammer, hammer, hammer
Testimony to the judge
That in all his years
He had never met a woman like her
Who acted like her
No respect
No fear
Of course not you fool
You charged into the camp
Of Boudicea
Come to rape and pillage
And fell beneath her sword
Hammer, hammer, hammer
You can lock her up
But you can never bury fear

The dogs

The dogs have all had a piece

They lay and eat their bloody feast

Yet still he does, still he stands

That tattered remnant of a man

With just enough flesh to go around

To sate the slavering red eyed hounds

But they’re almost done

They crave for more

Not this sorry motherf@cker

He’s out the door

They stop and howl

‘What have we done’

They’ve put their food upon the run

They snap and snarl

All in vain

Aught to stop their hunger and pain

They cry with sorrow

To the empty wind

‘Please come back we’re famished again’

 

@1992

A gift of butter

I got a gift of butter, now
Good butter it was claimed to be
I don’t think it was from a cow
And if it was, it cowed me

A beard was growing on the stuff
A goatish beard without a doubt
Ah. it was sickly, sour and rough
With poison juices seeping out

Ah, it was slick. ah, it was grey
I don’t think any goat produced it
I had to face it every day
Oh, how I wish I had refused it

The salts a thing it never knew
In fact I’m sure they never met
It sprouted spots of green and blue
It made me ill. I’m not right yet

‘Twas made of grease and wax and fat
And substances too vile to utter
You may be sure that after that
Ive rather lost the taste for butter

From A 12th century poem, author unknown

From texts at the time the case seems to be  that poet felt obligated to eat the butter because it was given to him by the attractive woman next door

Some things never change

Chumley the cat

Whilst strolling through the woods one day to while away the time
I came across a creature, orange furred and fine
He had pointed ears and bright green eyes
And a tail that kept in time

He sat on the path quite relaxed and squarely in my way
He did not move, he did not budge, he would not let me pass
“Good day to you and how do you do?” Said I in my merry way
“But please move aside, as you’ve broken my stride
and let me continue with my day”

“Hello”  Said he, as he sat on the path, in a soft and purring way
“Let me introduce myself, my name is Chumley and I am your cat
I’m pleased to meet you, pleased to see you, so glad to be your cat”

“It’s a fine thing you’ve done and a fine man you are
to walk your cat through the forest
A cat could ask for no finer master, could find no better man.
So, let’s finish our stroll on this beautiful day and continue on our way”

“Hold on!” Said I, quite taken aback ” For surely you are mistaken.
I have no creatures great or small and most certainly not a cat. You are wrong good sir, a mistake I,m sure, for I know that we’ve never met.”

“Oh master!” Said he, with a sorrowful cry “What is it that I’ve done? Whatever would make you treat me so, the pet who has been like a son?”

“Step aside!” Said I, becoming irate “The day is fading, the hour is late.
You are not my pet, I know for sure, your mind is muddled, go find a cure! Now move from my way and allow me to pass. I’ve had enough of you blocking my path!”

A tear seemed to form in his green hued eyes
and next when he spoke he asked me why; why after all these years
would I forget a pet of mine

I’d had enough and told him so “Move from my way and let me go!
I’ve things to do and things to see, begone from my path and let me be!
You’ve wasted enough of my walking time, now out of my way, you are not mine!”

The cat finally spoke in a wavering voice ” I will leave you alone you give me no choice.
But I will always remember our time together, long nights in bed and walks in the wood.
I will always remember the love and the good

Later that night, I’d dined and I’d supped, I’d closed the curtains
and turned up the light
I thought of that cat I’d met earlier that day
The thought of him would not go away

I sat at my table, full from my meal, of bread and cheese and wine and veal
I wondered if he hungered, whether he had any meat.
So just to be sure I put a bowl at my feet……
For my cat Chumley

Ever run into that cat that insists it is yours just because you petted it?

Yeah it’s that cat

This is a children’s story I wrote about 20 yrs. ago at work

The entire thing was written on post it notes

Boy, I sure was a productive employee back then

The blue shed

She caught him out in the shed
Like a thief
Stealing a moment of pain
Wracked by sobs and pouring out tears
Over small and faded pink canvas shoes
The shoes had supplanted his purpose
Sapped his intent
They made his tools indifferent
And uncaring
Turned them into nothing more
Than rusting steel and hanging shapes
Outlined on musty pegboard
That meant nothing
Nothing at all
Until her small and gentle hands touched him
And in shame
He dried his eyes
And put the shoes away
Back in their box on the shelf
And became a man again
Lived again
And worked again
In his shed full of tools

Lies in the hospital room

My words became roses
And made bouquets
To brighten her room
Beautiful red roses
Without any wilted petals
Of sorrow or fear
I left them laying
Strewn carelessly
About her bed
And left the crying
For the cold hallways

Some would say I’m odd…….

I am odd
Some would say
But not to me
Living here in my own skin
In my castle of bones
Listening to words
Beating like my heart
Some would say
I am odd
But not to me

Beneath the mountain

Leave alone what lies beneath the mountain

The labyrinthined caves and deep burning fire

Take instead the cold stinging creeks

The summer pines and pale blue sky

Take the rocky trails and sharp stone

And all the beauty for your eye

But don’t stray below and leave alone

What lies beneath the mountain

This is the poem that was made into a Bluegrass song by a string quartet. I am still awaiting a copy of it . The concert recording at strathmore did not come out well and they are going to forward a copy when they record it in studio.

Melancholy in my coffee

Melancholy in my coffee
Subdues my day
Dresses me in drab
Lifeless clothing
The smile I wore yesterday
Left hanging in the closet
Slightly wrinkled
Sends me out the door
Under the grey sky
My vision clouded
My mind numbed
Even your warm skin
I kiss goodbye
Can’t make the sun shine today
Tomorrow, I think, I’ll take
My coffee black

Leaving her

I can’t bear the thought of leaving her
My heart that races when I see her
Stopped and still inside my chest
My life’s blood
That I would so gladly bleed for her
Dead within my veins
Casting off that cold corpse like a blanket
And flying into the darkness
Leaving her so alone
A broken widow in this world
Her soul mate flown
Gone away without her
I can’t bear the thought of leaving her
Just going away
Leaving her nothing
But my cold flesh to cry on

Picking wild berries

I hope that wild berries
Will bring some joy to her
I wander the spring woods
In search of  sweet treasure
My footsteps are all that break
The mornings bleak silence
I slowly fill my basket with Blueberries
I pick our life with each sweet fruit
Our ripe destinies gripped in my fingers
My eyes fall upon dark Raspberries
They hang in the sun in  juicy prime
Suspended like treasures, Plump sweet jewels
Dangling from thorny crowns
Greedily they are plucked from their vine
For a moment I am happy with my bounty
My basket is full of ripe and plentiful fruit
Then her pain comes to my mind
My happiness is clouded over by worry
Cast into the shade by the dark shadows
I wonder if my basket of wild berries
Will be enough
I hope it will

The hearth

I require no company
save those that gather
’round the warmth
of my fire.
Late at night
hushed talk floats
in the chill air
like wisping tendrils
of smoke.
Faint firelight gropes
at the surrounding darkness
after imparting
it’s warmth.
Hours burn as embers
and laughter flickers
like flames.

Two track

It was a gash in the forest green
A two track
Run red with clay
Smelling of grass
And laid down below
The ocean of humid air
And it carried off miles into the swamp
Riding on the back
Of the long, long Island
And my feet followed it
Like a river of earth
‘Til its end
At the old Indian mounds
Mountains of men
And the ghosts of long ago
Just sitting there in the lonely forest
Reaching up to the sky
And every time I arrived
I always thought the same
Such a lonely place to die

Dangerous ideas

Just some ideas

Thought outside of the lines

And without the box

Ideas so dangerous

They comprise a crime

To think to be free

That your laws

Without my consent

Mean nothing to me

imprison for life

For thinking such things

But

A lonely cell

Just won’t hold

All of those

Dangerous ideas

Rape

I wield my words viciously

Like a knife

I slash at her

As I rape her

Hold her down and penetrate her

Blood showers from my blade

As I overwhelm her

But slowly my ravishes

Thrust after thrust

Turn into love

And I wonder

What have I done?

A little explanation on this one.  It was written about a year and a half ago after a particularly vicious fight with my my wife. As most married people know, it is easier sometimes to hurt the one you love the most and know the best.

You know how it is; you know all of their triggers and weak spots. I am not normally a cruel person nor is my wife ,but in this instance, I started throwing low blows while we were going at it. Immediately , I regretted it because I could see that I had deeply hurt her and she is the last person that I want to do that to.

So, there it is. Yeah, I was really an asshole that night.

I’m back, but I’m not bad….

Leaving her

I can’t bear the thought of leaving her
My heart that races when I see her
Stopped and still inside my chest
My life’s blood
That I would so gladly bleed for her
Dead within my veins
Casting off that cold corpse like a blanket
And flying into the darkness
Leaving her so alone
A broken widow in this world
Her soul mate flown
Gone away without her
I can’t bear the thought of leaving her
Just going away
Leaving her nothing
But my cold flesh to cry on