Adulthood clings
patchwork to this suit of skin
Frankenstein named
and Frankenstein burned
an ill-tailored suit
lunatic suitors sewed
as clouded eyes beheld
silhouettes beyond the street
scissors dancing in the dark
could not return light
notions on the periphery:
dreams of what I used to wear.
Father…
Why is it I should wait?
Wait too long and it will be too late–
there is a world in front of me,
perhaps you’re just too old still to see
there’s nothing I can do as but a boy,
I’m nothing more than the world’s toy
it takes a man to travel
and in unfettered heights to revel;
why do you hate me so?
Why do you treat me as a babe so low?
I want to learn, I want to help
I want to be more than a fleeting yelp.
Child…
What would you call a yelp?
Why are you so eager to join the kelp?
Swim, swim away from time;
oh, what I wouldn’t give to know again the easy rhyme
you name stagnation
in your howl for the abdication
of the innocence of love and play,
oh child, no, if only you could hear me pray–
I pray for you and for your soul,
a soul from me the world so stole–
perhaps it’s curse you never could
know there’s no return to bartered childhood.
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Absent light
We stood before the mirror
To laugh away the night—
To watch the ebon shearer
Carve away all trace of color,
No escape within the muddled dance
Like finest wine tread through the muller
Far and away from time’s own chance.
Some men would brawl
To preserve that childhood lie,
Yet all must face the wall—
The iron mask—or die.
Photo Credits: MSU Commencement. Year Unknown.
Graduation is here at last. If you needed an explanation to why the Den’s been a little quiet this week – look no further than that. In a wash of green robes and final papers, my week has been a flurry of continuous movement, continuous demands, and this single Saturday stands as the peak at the end of the long crescendo. After this, I still have a few finals (really, whose idea is it to have final papers AFTER your graduation?) but they are merely the final stepping stones bridging the gap between this life and the next – the entrance to reality.
All next semester will be spent hunting down a job, sending out swarms of short stories, poems, and (hopefully) my novel to contests, publishers, agents, and what have you on the march to creative advancement, and preparing my law school applications. Just have to remember to keep telling myself to breathe in the meantime.
I’d like to take the time to thank you all for all the support and kind words all of you have shown here on my blog over the past year. I never would have thought I’d find such a warm reception to this little creative outlet of mine…and it’s been a kindness, truly. I’ll be back soon enough with more. In the meantime, though…excuse me as I step off into reality. Be back in a bit.
Set me off into the Black
far beyond the stars
set me off into the Wild
far beyond the wilderness.
Set me free of mortal hearts
and weighted thoughts,
so low, so low,
and break these chains that
bind me to this coil—
what life,
what prison
now is this?
Press the suit and
straighten up that tie,
you are a man, it says
but you are just a boy
playing at a world of
mysterium and drama that has
devoided itself of plot.
–
There is a key
to thee and thine and mine,
and nestled just behind that door
is freedom yet incarnate.
In a breath, breathe—
so few have ever tasted
the freshness of the air—
recycled reconfigurations of reality—
that will be your paycheck please—
and this feeling is not falsified,
unbound, unguarded it yearns
for the taking—just breathe—
and feel the air,
feels, felt, feeling
this momentary being—
all I want is to breathe
and to feel, yet to be,
to stretch beyond perception
and feel the days beyond
that calendar—no shifts scheduled here.
–
No vacancy,
sincerest apologies
this mind is mine and yet
one waits beyond, yet yours—
this mirror of a soul you grasp
what a reflection is it not?
There is the dawning,
the rain is falling down
and through the swirl of purple haze,
these diamonds dribble through the
emerald leaves, like tiny lovers—
in your caress, this breath unbidden
slithers through my chest
and down into my roots—
I am born again, stretching
for the clouds.
Air, give me air,
Prayer and dream and reverie
are forever in the field—
give me space to work.
My latest contribution to the wonderful One Shot Poetry Wednesdays! Once you’ve had a look, check out some of the other One Shot Poets as well– they’re a skilled bunch of poets, looking to form a community and support one another. Enjoy!
“The great challenge of adulthood is holding on to your idealism after you lose your innocence.” ~Bruce Springsteen
Well, well, the day has come. According to society, I’m a man now.
Twenty one years have come and gone, and while I’ve been able to go off and die now for the past three years, I am now apparently old enough to legally have at the alcohol. Michigan, true to form, however, seems to have little interest in embracing summer just for such a silly little occasion, though. Clouds encompass everything in swirls of gray and black, threatening rain without ever working up the energy to do so. Lovely–I just hope it’s not a sign of things to come.
Regardless, I take this to be a time of reflection. Nearly a quarter of a century has come and gone–and the real world looms so near. College is nearly at its end, and I suppose I’m to be all grown up now. Will I be ready when the time comes?
I suppose many people ask themselves the same question. I wonder how many have the answer.
The Waking Den 