Awake you suck
The air molecules into lungs that
Unknowingly go on with their work
To provide oxygen to brain cells
That send the neurological signals
To your writhing muscles as your
Thumbs, sliding and pounding
Crush all the candy.
Alive you scream
The air out of freezing lungs as feet
Burn with friction from the downhill sprint
The wet grass soaks your clothes
And the fog breaks open to a view
Of the ocean, which fits itself through
The windows of your eyes and crams
Into your mind and spirit causing it to expand
Yes, it threatens to explode
By Friedrich Schiller
Translation by Daniel Platt
A stream of rain from fissured mountains,
It comes with thunder’s vehemence,
A shattered peak pursues its fountains,
And oaks beneath it tumble hence;
Amazed, with dread anticipation,
The wanderer listens, and he harks,
He hears the roaring inundation,
Yet knows not, whence its rush embarks;
And so a wave of singing courses
From out of ne’er discovered sources.
In league with dreadful beings fabled,
That calmly weave life’s fateful strands,
Who has the singer’s spell disabled,
Who can his melodies withstand?
As if with Hermes’ staff supernal,
So he commands the heart bestirred,
He dips it in the realms infernal,
He lifts it, dazzling, heavenward
And rocks the scale, ‘twixt grave and merry
Where myriad emotions vary.
As if at once, into joy’s sphere, it’s
Gigantic stride comes instantly,
Mysteriously, like to spirits,
Intrudes a monstrous destiny.
Then bow the great ones of all nations
To the stranger from another world,
The din of idle jubilation
Is stilled, away the masks are hurled,
And ‘fore the Truth’s triumphal splendor
There flees each work that Lies engender.
Thus roused from all the empty rigors,
Whene’er the call of Song resounds,
A man becomes a soul transfigured,
And enters into holy grounds;
Unto the gods on high he’s suited,
Naught earthly draws into his pale,
And every other power is muted,
And no misfortune may assail,
Each wrinkle born of worry dwindles,
Where reigns the magic Song enkindles.
And just as after hopeless yearning,
The bitter pain of years apart,
A child with tears remorseful burning
Will fall upon his mother’s heart,
So back to childhood’s habitations,
To innocent felicity,
From foreign ways of distant nations
The singing leads the refugee,
Away from frigid rules he races
To faithful Nature’s warm embraces.
4-14-14
Matted hair
Worn souls
Tattered tales
Patched holes
Amber ale
Five fold
Staring red eyed down the alley way
Dumpsters frame the skies of gray
Garbage is a place to lay
When hunger makes a rebel sway
Or stray from strength
And fall in stench
Alive by night, asleep by day
The blare of noon will wake him up
A collared heart, a savage pup
The picket fences weren’t enough
Nor were the steeples
Sunburned
Leathered rather
Face frothed
With lager lather
Fountain bath
Coming after
Pigeon droppings
From the rafters
Hidden deep
A heart that feels
And longs for meaning
Respect and meals
Not for food but company
Not for shoes but eyes that see
Past dumb decision
And unhealthy patterns
Harmful addictions
And through to what matters
A traveler
Throwing himself on concrete stairs
At the old catholic church on fifth and Madison
Crying himself to sleep
Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.
By Gerald Manley Hopkins
As king fishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’s
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves — goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying What I do is me: for that I came.
I say more: the just man justices;
Keeps grace: that keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he is —
Christ. For Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men’s faces.
By Torri Horness
I will not try to convince you to love me.
I am not a shout,
but a whisper,
& if you cannot hear the
sounds of wonder
coming from my life,
it is not I who need to scream,
but you who
need to learn to listen.
you keep waiting
to be startled awake, to
find something loud enough to love.
nonsense.
love is not a surprise party
thrown in your honor,
& I will not throw a single punch
in this fight for your attention.
there is beauty in the quiet,
in the still & homespun.
I am a whisper,
& a whisper
is enough.
Read more at www.notesontheway.com
The present moment
slowly lumbers by
steals our perception
like wind rustling leaves
of trees planted by the stream
flowing, driving, never stopping
until you stop and watch it pass
which velocity is real?
A leaf falls into the brook
and to it’s eyes the world is rushing by
sweeping beneath and about
faster than a bouncing deer
but not quite as fast as lightning
yet to the world the passing leaf
enters and leaves and is forgotten
yes every system seems as reality
when we are in it
I was in a machine
that taught me to claw and growl
and fight and sweat to stay alive
and ahead
of those who were losing the race
by sleeping
in the sun. one day
I will have enough money to play
and relax and watch the sacred sparrow pass
singing songs about flowers in some unkown field
that I blow dust into from the gravel road
running late to work
late or scared, can’t tell which
sometimes the same
scared of wasting time or falling behind
completely unable to rest in the moment
the moment when the dew clings to the end of the leaf
not desperate, but waiting to be filled
to the point of dropping
the moment when the steam rises from the coffee
demanding my patience until the second law
has normalized the drink to a level suitable to the human pallet
the moment when the engine dies and I have no cell reception
and the impossibility of the situation leaves me lying on my back
in a bed of cutgrass, scattered in dandelions
the aphids hop onto my sweaty legs and I am slowly aware of a brook
that seems to laugh not in spite but in joy
that I have found what I was not looking for
and that I have inadvertently arrived where I was trying to drive to
like some strange children’s board game
I threw the dice that screwed up my day
and somehow landed me on the square
that the rules dictate moves me ahead ten spaces
to the moment that is now
to the present
and I am here
without strength or answers
finding that no striving serves me
any good. I am defeated
in my defeat I feel the crackling and popping
of a log slowly burning away into nothing
until I am left stranded in the present moment
without refuge or hope of return
to the wildly tumultuous stream of moments
that carried me along like a seed on the wind
waiting my whole life to be planted and grow
roots into who knows what
only to find myself upset and discontent
with my adobe pot and fill out the seven page form
in triplicates, petitioning my immediate transplantation
without a second thought to severed roots and the system shock
trees
are too slow. Tumble weeds are the way to go
but they have died because they let the wind
pull up their only source to eat
like sowing one’s mouth shut
or pouring cement in the well
all in the name of adventure or progress
or self development or a career path
the present moment lies up over the next hill
it is the promise of a quiet pool
for me to lower my sore and aching bones into
it is a paradise, but one that I have been walking in
for some time. In fact, the now has stretched from my invention
my first breathe introduced to me the miracle of life
and the blessing of every heartbeat. I was promised nothing more
indeed not even that
so I entered not reading the signs and found myself
ten miles into the reserve before I realized
that everything those old men with pinched up faces have been toiling for
has been mine for the taking since the start
I found the joy of gratefulness
and have learned with Paul the secret
of lying in a field with a busted radiator
and no care in the whole singing world
but to lie back and be completely content
knowing that I am held and that I am loved
in the present moment
and possibly the most meaningful and satisfying thing
that I can do on this earth is to admit the fact
and receive the love
Love is in the present tense
and holds me up like scaffolding
every second of life is a gift to me
that I’m learning to say thank you for
with every beat
of the heart that slowly learns
not to set it’s longings on the past
or be overcome with worry for tomorrow
but to be still and at peace in the lake of love
untroubled on the waters of God.
By Graci Gilroy
Hold my heart out for the world to pass over with the rage of a midnight storm,
Anything to feel more than the tugging of lines, rehearsed to better this state of mind.
A walk through the pines, the touch of mist,
It evaporates too fast to believe it exists.
Flowers blossomed when he arrived, colors swirled with thoughts of him,
But I only felt him close by the time he was gone
I read a poem, wrote a song –
But all taste like stale bread on the tip of my tongue.
Oh, I want to see home for the first time,
Hold the warmth of its embrace like a cup of earl grey
Instead everything slips from my grasp as soon as it comes;
Is this all my doing? The tendency of those inclined
To irrational anxieties?
I’ll dream of colors that must exist, of their vibrancy and light,
And face the rain till its presence is undeniable.
Until His touch is on my skin once again.
Read more at https://callmegraci.wordpress.com/
I am peeling back the blinds to find myself
Blind
At blaring light last night hid from my sight
Blind
Not only to my surrooundings but to the one who found me
And wrote a more beautiful history
Who wanted more than this for me
Wistfuly I recount the dreams and aspirations
That were planted like seeds in the soil of my heart
I start
To remember that they are true
though they seem too good for this dusty life around me
I’m grounding
My direction in the words you spoke to me
delicately directing my life out to open sea
I’m constrained by your stars but otherwise free
To be
Everything written in the DNA
Of this burning coal you placed on my lips
On this road trip the cd skips
When I hit bumps I bite lips
And my tongue
Sore from abuse might stay silent
Might not show up for work
But stay at home sick
Might forget how to spit
Sickly the very anthem that kills the enemy
When have we ever been at ease with
Not talking
Loose lips sink ship, change lives, patch rips
In the holes of our identity
Maybe we are stuck between
A lofty self image that seems too good to be true
And a battered distortion served up as truth
Mute
And unable to speak the speech prepared
Long before the creation of the world you cared
Enough about me to choose my hair color
What mother would bear to watch two brothers
Silently tear apart
Well I start to do the same
Every day that I live differently than my name
Every day that I wake silently to the pain
Of pretending my calling was only a dream
Of watching the mural washing off the walls
Of the house that is also crumbling
Stumbling through the house of mirrors
Hall of dreams, running with scissors
Cutting the time it takes to get
To the other side of regret
And yet
I woke up this morning and stared in my coffee
And somehow the Spirit reached out and sang to me
More than a melody, it was a symphony
Of everything I was formed to be
Of all the things that have ever excited me
Written in my very bones
Fitted in with other stones
We make a wall to make a home
For the only muse, for the Father of Futures
For the real dream catcher and keeper
The Author, Spellchecker, Finisher, and Reader
Of our faith
Our faith
Is not in our own ability to create something with this life
Our fight
Is not to scrape meaning out of grey painful existence
Our life
Is to tune our ears to hear not fear but beauty
Not strict but loosely
Choosing from a wide array of choices
All pointing quite directly to the very First of Voices
The very Fount of Goodness
The very Point of Life
The only one able to peel back the blinds of the blind and speak life
To write a better story with our meager scraps of life
depthofpoetry 