Thursday, December 24, 2009

Forcing the Hand.

"The danger and the power; the friend and the foe."

What is it that
compels you;
magnetic,
helpless,
like a moth
drawn to the flame.

Even so,
I am the same.

Threads have woven
bleeding hearts,
and as they pull apart
they're broken.

Worlds apart,
two spheres that spin,
gravity won't let them
touch,
nor let them drop
as fallen stars.

Stuck.

Magnets
repelling,
and yet made of the same
power,
tired, attraction
tries them (over and over)
with the same reaction.
The spark,
electric hitting water;
though attractive,
it has no power.

The moon draws tides,
I draw you.
I am True North.

Your compass broke.

A desert island
without harbour,
you're circling in lonely waves.
You like the thrill of the water;
I like the home that holds the flame.

So leave me to my own
to live; to love.
In another life, I was the one.
Eternal flames cannot die;
so this one,
I will hide

to save you;
to save me.

December 24, 2009

Monday, December 21, 2009

Poet Girl.

I start to get hungry to see a new picture of you.
I've memorized every one I've got.
The list of poetic one-liners I've typed in my head
are growing into a quote book,
quips and, honestly, slightly quirky little thoughts
I think Death Cab for Cutie might like,
if they still made new music.

I trip on my own toes,
and my own heart that thumps against my chest.
I'm nervous to be estranged from my old familiar;
it makes my mouth dry and my fingers go cold.
I can't turn off the acoustic guitar
that strums in the background of my life these days.
Some unknown guy sings my life in my head,
one of those voices that kind of shuffles
and meanders 'cos he's a hippie and comfortable
in his own flannel shirt and sense of artistic self.

My life is sketch pencils and too many pillows on my bed,
the girl who wears five colours at a time,
and startles herself with the dreams she wakes from,
remembering them every morning.
They either find his lips on hers or a crazy fight on the phone.
Either way, they're shocking when the real world is very
singular: a loner's life stitching quilts from past experiences
that tuck me in every single night.

I have too many scarves hanging on the back of my door,
one around my milk white neck, and still a dozen more in the store
waiting for me to fall in love with them.
I've got a dozen thoughts about plane tickets,
and writing my first book, and the pile of Scriptures I've been
contemplating lining my life up, row by row,
laying a form to stretch the canvas of me over.
I like the easy-going sense of Being I have,
lying in my bed, or staring up at Christmas lights,
or sticking my fingers in the snow just to
know that I'm alive.

I used to only picture walking sidewalks with an arm
linked with mine, but now I carry piles of books and
it's all right. My nose goes numb, the snow glow the only
colour this girl ever gets; cold rushing against my face.
I have pictures of a little boy and girl in my head,
scruffy sneakers, and some sort of summer tryst,
where it's Bridge to Terebithia--
magic that can leave one crying.
They say anything good never lasts.
That's not so. The best kind of Good keeps on playing
in every step you take, tough love that said it would fight you
if you beat yourself up one more time.
And that's when you know,
you can never lose the best friend you ever had,
even if you are the fastest runner in the fifth grade.

I've got this sense of satisfaction,
one that puts an upbeat in my theme song;
I'm doin' all right, with question marks dangling over my head
and no sense of perfect direction.
You know I get lost on my own street; I forget what I'm saying;
I laugh in the middle of a serious conversation.
But I'm learning myself.
I sit cross-legged with a dictionary open,
my cuppa tea forgotten, my ring spinnin' on my skinny finger,
memorizing the definition of Me.


December 20, 2009

A Slip of Paper.



I think I'll write your name on a slip of paper
torn from the corner of my favourite book.
I'll scribble it with a black ink pen,
a little twirl underlining those few letters
all in a row,
those few little letters that spell out
the name I like the best.
I'll trace over it a couple of times,
each rounded edge thickening,
as though every time I highlight it
will make it last for me.
On impulse, I'll crumple it,
feeling kind of silly,
like a school-age girl still crushing
or a lovesick boy's initials still killing trees.
Then I'll open it back up and add your last name;
an average name,
a perfect name.
I'll cover your first name with my thumb
and picture mine is written there
and kind of smile,
then shake my head,
my finger running over the ridged edge.
Before I'll think, I'll quickly kiss it,
as if my thoughts could kiss you
from a daydream far away,
folding the little piece in two,
then four,
and tucking it in my jeans pocket.


October 10, 2009

A Long Day.

I'm very tired, you see.
My head feels heavy on my shoulders.
I think I need another one
to rest it on.
I find myself staring at nothing
and thinking.
My thoughts want to run away
with me to you.
They tug on your sleeve,
tiny but eager,
and whisper,
"Have you been thinking of me too?"

I'm very tired, you see.
I run to my car in the rain to escape
and find I have nowhere to travel
that I want to go.
Just a long, long drive
and a chill in my bones,
and a coffee held between my knees.
(You never wanted me
drinking it like I do.)
But it's warm.
It's a comfort.
So it reminds me of you.


October 16, 2009

Revisited.

If I could but know you, this life over;
I met you once when time
was kind.
Or maybe it was simply young.

I remember you like a perfect face
where brush met God
in a stroke of Divine,
mimicked
with canvas and paint.

You hang on my wall.
You don't need a frame.
I have you edged in
precious thought,
and
feelings far too strong to bear.

I like you there.

You move through time,
escaping age,
where wrinkled hands
and twinkling eyes will find you
laughing,
and us alive.
(We have no grave.)

To brush up against it once more,
like a flower,
its fragrance (accidentally)
released by the touch,

yours is that power
to conjure the picture.
(This is its child.)

Like seeing a baby,
his eyes a past lover's;
to hold what is now
second-best to what was,
cradled as Different
yet loved as his mother;
a secret
that no two souls
usually share.

If I could but know you, this life over,
I'd meet you somewhere it
will last.
Or maybe simply where is best.

And let it go from there.



October 14, 2009

Redemption.

I have traveled many miles,
I have lost myself at sea.
I have found You off to starboard,
I have found You look for me.

I have set my sails too early
in the gale of fright’ning wind.
You have held me in the fury,
You have pulled me safely in.

I have stared right through the mirror,
Dared to hope I just suffice.
I've collapsed in self-confliction,
You’ve aroused me back to life.

I have messed me up in trials,
I have dressed in sad affairs.
With one glance, You robed me rightly,
called me Lovely Made Aware.

I have trouble always standing,
knees give out and hearts give way.
You have been so very careful,
You hold steady when I sway.

I have set my soul to ashes,
I have drowned them in the sea.
You have kissed my tearful lashes,
You have set my spirit free.


November 2 & 4, 2009

Silence.

My life has gone quiet.
It's a still, small thing,
with a few days in my pocket
as the lights go out
and the outside shuffles
with undetermined things.
It's tucked with little comforts;
my favourite pillow;
a bite of ice cream;
a low-lit fireplace and a moment's peace.

Smiles tilt from one corner of my mouth
to the other,
one happiness in the midst of it,
a new song clipping off the ends of fear
that says it's all silence.
It's calm, a life gone quiet;
it's a phone by my head
that doesn't ring,
fewer letters,
fewer smiles,
fewer complications and softer
easing in and out of the day.
It's a work of endurance,
to be all alone and very still,
like a bird perched on its branch
or a cricket in the corner
who hasn't quite found the time
is right to chirp:
for one, it's not quite morning.
The other, not quite night.
I am somewhere in the centre.

I am somewhere in the vast,
and the miniscule,
and the edging around the fast-drawn
breath that tells me I have so long
to go.
I have made it a few days.
How can I do years?
But the slow-drawn breath eases,
taking my shoulders
and sitting me down,
sitting me down in a comfy chair,
with tousled hair,
a long movie I zone out as I wade
through the thick air
of nothing but household sounds;
my fingers typing;
my cracking voice half-whispering
as I write.
It's like sleeping off the longest day.
It's like holding my breath under water.
It's a curious thing;
bittersweet. Something like a test
and reward and a muddled in-between.
A muffled in-between that cannot speak
as the hours come 'round to match
the silence I am keeping.


November 22, 2009

Inconclusive.

In the sight of some conclusion,
in its finality; its fulfillment; its perfection,
I have sought my own connection
to the End; the culmination.

As the heart beats, it burns;
it pulls; it aches; it presses,
presses thought and motive
and our spirit's captivation;
winds our thoughts around
timeless truths, and expressions,
and forces our confessions.

With all explicit definition,
the body longs for its completion;
with greatest mystery,
the mind is baffled in its confliction;
with strange duplicity,
the heart can tear itself from remission;
with perfect chemistry,
the spirit blends its pure confection.

Yes, I come to this conclusion:
I have faith in the inconclusive.
I am thankful, and think well of
every in-between; of what-might-have-been;
of desires piquing thought-life
and curiosities.
I delight in my unknown,
in where I'll go,
in what I'll know.
I trace my life toward something blurred,
and real; desired and enchanting.

I have no answers;
I have no reasons, no rhymes,
except the turn of realization
that my whole existance
is spun upon pure poetry.
There is no tragedy, but there are tears,
and there are very hurtful questions.
There is pure joy, and there are bursts
of healing that soak in with all the answers.

For there are answers, love;
there are. There isn't time yet to reveal them,
their insight, their passion, their overwhelming inflection.
Life would roll itself in raptures and horrors
if we knew now what we'll know then.
There is a joy in the Not-Knowing.
There is a safety in the Near-Sighted.
There is passion in the Vision
that there is vision; revelation.

For there is forward motion in yearning.
It keeps us from the stagnant;
from the passive; from the tepid.
God rips our hearts and bleeds them
until they finally crave.
There is health in anticipation.
There is death, there is sorrow,
there is excitement and frustration;
there is peace that there's a Today
in the movement toward tomorrow.

When Winter comes, it buries the old
and breaks the brittle branches
until it melts away as if decay
is a means of earth's satisfaction.
It is cold and it is grey;
the view is impossible, and strange.
It is silent; very quiet,
like a breath caught under water.
Lonesome and dark-shadowed,
it's a courageous in-between.

Autumn slips beneath the snow
of the Earth's grand repitition.
Seasons don't turn of their own volition.
They are coaxed, and led,
and danced through their pains,
and change, and labors.
God's hand tips the Earth and our hearts,
in their fragments, are sent moment
by moment,
seeking out Perfection.
Does Winter like itself?
It does not choose its own submission.

But inasmuch as we choose
where we go, what we do,
there's a natural order to in,
and out, and coming, and leaving;
to loving, and dying,
and aching, and abstraction,
as the direction is charted
like a sail against the wind.
Pressing us toward the want
of wave and sea to give us up,
we push, and push harder,
for Home is something believed,
though unseen from the water.

And so, we move forward
in due low tides
and illogical reasons,
contented and submitted
to rest, waiting with our visions.
It is a precious thing to want,
to ask, to question, and desire.
It is too much to bear;
it is painful; it is sweet.
There is beauty in the passion
in tired months gone bitter;
to love someone, gone dormant;
to let the roots grow for the better.
Deep in cold recession,
there is blessing in this matter,
for yes, there must be Winter.

But I believe in Spring.


November 28, 2009