writing live

[OtherMan]

I recognize
in some moments
the tree
in me lifted,
shaped by
circumstance
of ground
and sun
and rain
into a perfect
unique beauty
of form
and purpose,
and the glory
that fills
all things
so made…
is also
you.

5/26/23

 

[4degrees]

Now you’re forty six and
I am 53
The past will be the past
It was never meant to be
But days gone by
Will still remind and
I float on fantasies
Of times I saw
You as the sun
Burning right through me

 

[4degrees]

What’s a fool to do
But make rhymes
I tried
And got tired somewhere
In the middle
Of middle age
I don’t want to
Drink those memories
In anymore
But I do
Maybe some day
I won’t remember you
Or who, is the tattoo

 

[OtherMan]

There is this cut I drag through me
just healed this now and then -
the slicing of the want to be
so I can feel again.

6/25/23

 

[butters]

wait, what...?

heat and humidity
my daily whine right now
can't trust my brain
to hold onto a thought
let alone a

 

[butters]

grief eater

anxious in its greed
to feed
skips starters
moves straight to entree
snatches gluttonous bites
before wiping its mouth
then toys with its food
scared its main course
will be gone
before satisfaction's achieved

happens every time

and part of it wails
a lost child in need
of more more more
its adult self obliges
hangs around
delights in the pain
its actions cause
as—by the forkful—
it relishes dessert

 

[butters]

heretical thoughts on a hot day

i'm betrayed by this flesh:
blood beats tattoos against
the underside of skin flushed
in its steady push to expand surface area
on palms and soles, prime targets for a
body demanding to be cooled, dilating
veins, capillaries, speeding respiration,
boosting perspiration till this body is a cross i wear
and i wonder (in a quite non-violent way)
if i took a blade to these hands, these feet
released the pounding pressure
pricked my sweating forehead
pierced ribs beneath breasts
would the drumming slow
would my body cool
or would i simply feel
stigmatised?

 

[GuitarGawd41]

.

 

[HarryHill]

An anniversary just passed,
a time when cocksure finger and toes went tumbling down the road,
helped along by shoddy merchandise and my own big mouth.

I read back and want to delete all,
not share this twist in lifes highways,
deny reality, obsess in silence, keep that big mouth shut.

But then again, that wouldn't be me.

 

[29wordsforsnow]

Oh Captain, my Captain,
see the wind in your fairy sails
hunting the sailorman's robin
in your back, never us, but the gales
carry the leftovers of homes sobbin'
upon the graves of the whales
dance along the midship's bobbing
so amain, aye, amain

 

[Winter_Fare]

I am water, not the weather.
Not the gully cut through mud
Complete in a lonely raindrop
Complete in the roiling sea

I owe nothing to the serpent
I owe nothing to the fish
When we all are rent to stardust
I will still be all of me.

 

[butters]

the visit

once upon a time
back in England
i visited a friend who'd moved
to the edge of the Norfolk coast
and we drove out to the tip
of the crest
of the curve
and she sat on the beach as i walked out to the furthest point the pier allowed:

more used to gently curving concave sands
i felt uprooted and unsure
for every where i glanced
terra firma had receded leaving only blue
except, i knew, that point behind me
i felt exposed
untethered from my land
adrift and maybe lost should i let go

looking down, my hands were wrapped
white-knuckled round the railing
and i wondered how an astronaut
might feel on leaving Earth for the first time
if they sense that same core need
to return to mother world, belong,
as they float clear of our precious
spinning globe

 

[butters]

the sensation of a guy getting kicked in the nuts

as a woman
i can listen
understand at an intellectual level
empathise

by drawing on my own knowledge of pain
even visualise the gut-sick, blinding burn
that white explosion
that prone foetal-position inducing
primal moment—a heart-stopping
noise-canceling, breath-denying,
throat-crushing mushroom cloud of being
where nothing
else
exists

but i will never
ever
know it

 

[Winter_Fare]

Before there was hatred
Before there was hurt

There was a mountain
A mountain of dirt
Blessed by the hand of the Lord

A beautiful land
Where by His command
The people gave thanks
rom the work of their hands

One gave up a white lamb
One gave a portion of wheat
And love undone in ignorance
Unkind
Became curse and cure
To this day blood is thirsty for more

Those that remain give the same
Until nothing is left but a mountain of bones

What is justice to the sky?
What is vengeance but a lie?
We are damned by the sins of our fathers
And the river has nowhere to go.

 

[butters]

false prophet

he said he was a fire-eater
so people prayed at his feet
placing their faith in his protection
even as his hunger faded
and their world burned
all around them

 

[butters]

scissors are not a simple machine


they're not a lever to your heart
nor do they revolve around
the greased axle of you
spinning like your ever-turning mind

i cannot pull them
to raise myself in your sight
nor use them to affix myself
—a screw in your psyche

they perform poorly as a wedge
to hold open your doors
and function not at all
as an inclined plane to your soul

i suppose i could snip
parts of .....me.......away
to better fit the shapes of you
but those are prone to changes
i couldn't keep up with

but i do know never to run
with them in hand
because accidents happen
and at a push they'd work
to aerate flesh—
scientifically-speaking
of course

 

[butters]

modified species deemed invasive, useless, and undesirable


twinned bradfords, 40-years old or so
stand quiet in the top front yard
toes dug deep in its gentle slope
the start of a sharper descent

their fellow trees naked
but for the odd tattered leaf
though evergreens boast silently
of countless verdant needles

it rained last night
not heavy, just enough
to lay the dust—temporary respite
grey skies blue to a peek-a-boo sun

greens are greener for the watering
and the bradfords sport
cherry reds and amber-fire
flimsier than their summer garb

in spring their pale fresh sprouts
prelude snowy, bridal whites
short-lived, frothy abundance
delicately brash show-stoppers

when winter's precipitation sits
on bare, generously spreading limbs
they only enhance the moonlight
and glisten frosty as stars

invasive aliens? we've still only two
undesirable? i can't agree
useless? living art can't name a price
but bring priceless joy, regardless

 

[butters]

^^ ignore that last strophe, it's redundant

 

[29wordsforsnow]

what do we have to trade
wherever we import ourselves
the memories slowly fade
what was once upon the shelves
all that went to the shade
like dwarves, giants, elves
a legend forgotten, I'm afraid.
So, aliens, huh? by the twelfth
generation a native clade.

 

[butters]

ticklish

have you ever heard a fox laugh?
pure, manic joy
high-pitched
high-energy
and everso everso ginger

 

[butters]

a theory about 'why?'

The world's eye turned
from Ukraine to Israel
in a blink

Oct. 7th
a black
red day

and despite the horror
it's easier for the mind to grasp
as a terrible thing
as a world-changing event
its terrors parceled in bloody numbers
hard to imagine but understood for what it was
wrapped within a darkened date
and so the outpourings of grief
rage
revenge
are understandable
as totally human

but when voices rise to query
where's the sorrow for the children of Palestine?
there's confusion
disjointed reactions
a lack of focus
because it's only human
easier
to grasp and respond to one enormous
terrible event
mass murder on a shocking scale
than to address the countless years
of dead children scattered
piecemeal across time
bloody debris across burned-out barren lands
labeled Palestine by foreign voices

so many dates, so many names, so many places

the blood is just as precious
innocence as true
fragility of flesh and bone
the same as Israel's own
all mourned
families torn asunder
blown to bits as final
as brutal as beheading
death is death
and there aren't enough tears to cry them back alive
whichever side of the line they lived
and the hate
the rage
the human lust for revenge
is fed and fed

 

[butters]

there are days
such as this
when poetry has buried itself
too deep, map unmarked
or taken wing to fly south
with chattier companions
and it's too much trouble
to go hunt for it
when brain's nagging me to nap
despite only having been awake 5 hours
and all i have are these pale words
tedious and humdrum
to a backscore of buzzing in my ears

mea culpa
mea culpa
oh phooey

 

[butters]

the blind potter

clay sings to him
guides his touch
a shared pleasure
as slick fingers coax
a softly swollen curve
a slender neck
a shoulder, lip or foot
sighs beneath his hands
as he feels his way
reads each ripple
deftly directs
each anomaly
to perfection

his muscled legs
ease the wheel
to still

temporarily sated
he breathes
a timeless moment
neither knowing nor caring
he's confused
his decorative glazes

-----o-----o-----o------

Phoenix Valley Times

Renowned local blind artist wows ceramic world with his new phase, ripping up the rule books to produce brave, genre-shattering, colour-clash co-ordinations and finishes to inspire and delight even the most jaded amongst us. Fabuloso!

 

[Piscator]

modified species deemed invasive, useless, and undesirable


twinned bradfords, 40-years old or so
stand quiet in the top front yard
toes dug deep in its gentle slope
the start of a sharper descent

their fellow trees naked
but for the odd tattered leaf
though evergreens boast silently
of countless verdant needles

it rained last night
not heavy, just enough
to lay the dust—temporary respite
grey skies blue to a peek-a-boo sun

greens are greener for the watering
and the bradfords sport
cherry reds and amber-fire
flimsier than their summer garb

in spring their pale fresh sprouts
prelude snowy, bridal whites
short-lived, frothy abundance
delicately brash show-stoppers

when winter's precipitation sits
on bare, generously spreading limbs
they only enhance the moonlight
and glisten frosty as stars

invasive aliens? we've still only two
undesirable? i can't agree
useless? living art can't name a price
but bring priceless joy, regardless

had to look up Bradfords

 

[goldytheGoldfish]

I think it's a pear tree or something.