Original Poetry

#1 (February 09)

You are astounding

In this colorless, gray maze

You are a phoenix, rising, ablaze

But you are more than beauty to me

You are hope that someone can again make me feel the way I did then

You are proof that the boy inside is alive and well,

Even buried beneath the avalanche of responsibility and the mundane

You see, I had almost given up on poetry

For nothing struck the spark of astonishment and wonder in my heart

Nothing begged the cosmic question the way still water in streetlight does

Or a dazzling October moon, or the towering evergreens of the Cascades

But you do

Now, it is true, I am no Shakespeare, and certainly no Milton

My words do not enchant

Nor are they silk at the utterance

But the fact that my poetry is not graceful

And that its lines are inelegant

Is trivial in my mind

For I thought poetry dead to me

And you have resurrected it

On the fringes of your wings

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#2 (March 09)

Blank pages full of writing lie on this desk

Confirming unexpress(able)ed ponderings

The frustrated lines, with no meaning or art

Beg for release from their tortuous cave

But I am ill equipped to lead, having neither map nor staff

And so I am confined to the company my torments

Such irony that I am both prisoner and warden.

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#3 (April 09)

You are the ache of every waking hour,

The haunting in my dreams.

My sleeping sorrow, my waking pain

I stare into your eyes, and you look away again.

Beauty unsung ends this poem short.

You bitter, two edged sword!

I cut my finger on the gleam in your eyes.

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#4 (June 09)

I don’t know you

But I wish I did

Meeting you tonight set me on fire

A panic to be noticed

I’d act like an idiot if I thought you’d see me

Casual talk of romance by the fire

And we disagree

“Sweet simplicity” you say

“Complex,” the Cynic replies

I wonder

Did your amber eyes pierce my sophistry?

For the real disagreement was between mouth and heart

Just look into my eyes

And I will embrace sweet simplicity

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#5 (June 09)

I am Abelard

You are Heloise

No metaphor

No symbol implied.

Our once burning passions,

were reduced to ashes,

under buckets of water

poured from the sky.

And under what remains

Embers still burn

Hot at the thought

An inescapable Hell.

Sadly Love, there is but one

conclusion,

One righteous end.

You go your way,

I go mine

And if our love will not relent

We’ll escape the day that we die.

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#6 (July 09)

If the green light means go

Why am I sitting here watching colors pass?

Green, yellow, red

Green, yellow, red

The night is young

Don’t stop the music! Rihanna tells me

But no amount of fast food or late night hip hop

will press this gas pedal down

Same intersection. Still no movement.

Don’t stop the music…

I feel empty.

Do I want Taco Bell (left) or McDonalds (right)?

Wait why the hell am I thinking about feeding my full stomach

When my soul remains so very empty, my heart so very dark?

Don’t stop the music…

Ah!

I remember now

It’s just part of the game

Juggle your passions, and maybe you can satisfy the monster

That’s how you play, right?

Shovel in as much shit as you can

And maybe the monster’s watering mouth will overflow long enough for you to run

Don’t stop the…

But…

Our souls were meant to be filled

I mean, really filled

I was never meant to feed a monster

My soul was never designed for substitutes

music…

But tonight, that is what it will get

I will distract myself with cheap fast food

And late night hiphop

I’ll feed the monster

Then I’ll step on the gas, and make my get-away

Maybe I even have enough fuel to drive myself to exhaustion

If I can’t think, maybe I’ll be able to breath

Maybe I’ll be able to sleep

Maybe I’ll tell myself tomorrow will be different

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#7 (Sept ’09)

You, my dear, walk a razors edge

Once your loveliest attribute, independence is your curse

And by calling me ‘friend’ you pour it over my head

Friendship, far from a virtue, is your childish passion

And you experiment wickedly

You lay your bait and cast your spells

Who could resist your charms?

But your praise is cheap

And that is your great rebuke

The victims of your experiments are toys, the instruments of your self-study

They are your living, breathing, feeling

trivialities

You are the worst breed of tyrant

You poison your own wine

And pass the cup

We are all sick.

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#8 (January ’10)

Be you friend or foe

Oh fickle guardian of love?

Under your spell hearts grow fonder

Or forgetful

As for mine

It waits

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#9 (February ’11)

Oh to be like the poets

Who need neither God nor lover

(though they long for both);

Who find rest for their tired, trembling hearts

In the curve, sweep, and loop of the pen.

The poet cares not if his lines are searched

by the object of his attention.

The words are sufficient to supply

release, relief, rest.

This comfort I am without

The poet inside has again gone away

His desk cleaned but for a thin layer of dust

and a few scattered jottings.

“Sight, sound, and smell” they say.

“Show, but don’t tell!”

These rules I cannot obey

For to show is not enough.

To tell of love is the anywhere but here.

Look above, see what I see;

Jumbled lines and disordered desires

Obvious inadequacy

Insufferable secrecy

Words

Thoughts

Nothing