1.
Life is a shallow pool.
And the younger you are, the shallower it is; though you think its depths are endless.
A sunflower is god, because it is yellow. The fucking blue sky burns your retinas with glory.
A rotting, wooden board is a pirate ship and you are the captain.
You can believe lies so easily, when you are young.
2.
I am almost-young.
A fading. My new self is forming within my youth, like a pearl forms inside a shell: surrounded by weak flesh.
This may sound all well and good.
You may be saying to yourselves, okay, so she can be more of a realist now. She can stop living in careless frivolity. She can step up and become something.
3.
Um, hello?
Don’t you know me but at all?
Jesus, readers. Pull yourselves together.
If I don’t have my fairy tales, what am I? I won’t make it through that kind of transition. I’m not built for it. I need my worlds and my universes and my fancies. If my existence becomes mostly about doing dishes and seeing a rotting board instead of a majestic vessel, obscurities will bury me. A literal sort of burying, like taking too many sleeping pills. You will hardly see my shadow on the wall.
4.
Now you are certainly saying amongst yourselves (yes, I can hear your muttering) that realism and fantasy can hold equal magic, but you are wrong. Because I know we are all headed in the same dusty direction through sinks and riverbeds into stone. I know that we are all lost. I feel pointless.
5.
I am the oyster. The pulled apart flesh. No more shell. You might gain a pearl from my life. I hope you do. But I won’t be there to see it.
6.
I wish to find personal galaxies in the evolution of the sky during a partly-cloudy afternoon. There are at least seventy worlds in the sky on any given partly-cloudy afternoon.
Don’t let me live myself into death. Help me go back. I want to un-know horrors.
I want to live in a sweet, sordid euphoria.
7.
“But I won’t be there to see it.” Nicely done! Thanks for stopping by stillvoicing.
need my worlds and my universes and my fancies…. we need your words….
And here I thought the Jumbotron was the sun…;)
I will NOT…repeat: NOT–give up my “once Upon a Time…” Awesome insight on becoming…don’t become…
Moving, with depth and an overriding feeling of truth…Well done…I can feel your words…
Beautiful imagery, excellent writing and self expression.
Poetry is the language of the soul, and the self-reflexivity of this piece was what made it stand out for me in particular.
Specifically though, the imagery in “…I wish to find personal galaxies in the evolution of the sky during a partly-cloudy afternoon. There are at least seventy worlds in the sky on any given partly-cloudy afternoon…” was/is fantastic.
a primal scream, i hung on every syllable.
reading work so different from my own always captures my interest. mostly a storyteller, i’ve decided to write more poetry and i will dig a deeper into your work for inspiration. thanks for liking my poem, it’s only my second attempt. means a lot to this week old blogger.
You must keep writing, most definitely. Poems are of the divine 😉
Beautiful writing. I love your photo and thanks for liking my blog post ‘solitude’.
wow, the growing up process is painful. this poem made me realize that storytellers have a lot of responsibility – to capture beliefs, give hope, or take it away. thanks!
What a nice surprise to connect with another free-spirit in mind, heart and body-soul with her-story in poetry about this Life…..to me the Sky People are visions to be manifested…..for you to manifest 70 worlds in an afternoon is euphoric and magical at the least, and to seek your visions, dreams and heart’s desires that’s more natural to true Bliss on Cloud Nine of a who, what, why, where and when Spirit manifests into Stone…..
Powerful Medicine!!!!!…..inyan~wicasa~waste`…..good stone man
thank you so much, I love it when people can relate!
age,
you are but my
timely poison;
my drug,
chaining me
to your perverse humor.
age,
what am I without you,
but I certainly
want to shun you
on a forgotten, forsaken island,
but I know,
your crushing persistence
will force me,
will burden me,
to take you along
and smile in pretense
as I lose what I was,
as I embrace,
with a frown,
what I am to become.
pray,
don’t make me hate,
what I become.
lovely
thanks
“don’t let me live myself to death ”
except i find that preferable to
never having lived
you have a fine shadow to cast
this comment is beautiful. thank you.
Hi shrinksarentcheap. Thank you for calling by and liking my poem ‘ The Last journey’ i do like what you write. Best Wishes, The Foureyed Poet.
thank you.
Thanks for stopping by my blog…love your work…I will be back often!
Thank you, your work is wonderful!
this is some seriously fucking beautiful work…really, very few writers and their words stop me, completely. thank you for sharing, i really appreciate the realness of your poetry. so happy to have found you! cheers!
I’m happy you found me, too! Thank you for saying those beautiful things.
“I wish to find personal galaxies in the evolution of the sky during a partly-cloudy afternoon. There are at least seventy worlds in the sky on any given partly-cloudy afternoon.” love this. worlds over our head and under our feet and we have not the wits to see them. Lawrence Kushner observes that every word in the sacred text (the Tanakh) has seventy faces and 600,000 meanings. And most of us just yawn and turn the page… love your work…
Thank you so much for sharing that with me, I love it.
i love it! i smiled sadly and felt the same at lines re. doing dishes and living myself into death.
thanks so much, perhaps we will escape, yet 😉
amazing!
thank you so much!
Take me with you, please…
Sure : )
Powerful and quite moving. Thank you for the gift. Fine writing is rare.
Thank you. I would describe your writing much the same way.
Poetry that reads to the beat of the pitter-patter of my own heart. Loved every word of it.
I’m so glad. I love your writing as well.
yours is infinitely superior
Nah, not at all. The beauty and pain of the first part of this reeled me in and stuck with me all day.
I’m glad : ) but I meant that your god is infinitely superior, and she is. that is certain.
oh, the glorious maker of messes, and alive in the middle of it? Yes, I liked her. Thank you!
she was perfect : )
Thinking about rewriting the ten commandments: “Thou shalt have no other gods before joy” would be a great place to start.
Oh. my god. Yes, please!!!
A lot to ponder here. Your pain is palpable and the imagery of it glows and rends.
Beautiful work.
Thank you so much.
Reblogged this on Susan Daniels Poetry and commented:
Of course, god is yellow.
Wow. Honored. Gracias.
Beautiful. Had to share.
Magnificent! Would love to hear this spoken aloud.
Now there’s an idea…
“Because I know we are all headed in the same dusty direction through sinks and riverbeds into stone”- superb
Your words are pearls. If a sunflower is god because it’s yellow, then we are gods because we’re alive. And if you’re fading, then the rest of us are already dead. But then again, I’m not you young enough to know everything.
Of course we are gods. Of course we are dead. Better to know nothing and make everything alive with your words, as you do.
As we both do. I’ll drink to that. Sublime work.
cheers.
“The pulled apart flesh.”
someone broke my shell.
You and your imagery again. I could really FEEL this line in particular. It made me shudder.
sorry/you’re welcome : )
Let there be pirates and ships and realms unknown…
Something on Theo Black’s blog got me pondering the beauty of innocence and how, sometimes, two people together, exploring each other and willing to be open and vulnerable, can create that childlike joy again.
Thank you for your dreams.
What about when they are tired of exploring each other?
This part spoke to me, “If I don’t have my fairy tales, what am I? I won’t make it through that kind of transition. I’m not built for it. I need my worlds and my universes and my fancies. If my existence becomes mostly about doing dishes and seeing a rotting board instead of a majestic vessel, obscurities will bury me. A literal sort of burying, like taking too many sleeping pills. You will hardly see my shadow on the wall.”
I like to think of poetry as a way to express what I feel is otherwise inexpressible. It’s how I would face the little realities I couldn’t in life.
Yes, poetry is that, indeed. Thank you for your comments!