Each of us wanted safety.
Father, from trouble’s horde.
Mother, from father.
We chickens, from the storm.
All of us were running,
and love was hard pressed to keep up.
Adolescence held confusion, guilt,
and strange desire.
I looked for yellow bricks,
on the cusp of a fireworks life.
Category Archives: mental health
Shamblings
I taped my mouth shut
for ten years,
‘til a professional told me
it was wrong,
I should wean.
There were pills, too,
that hypnotized
the disobedient sleep,
then upsold themselves.
On my knees,
I considered cuts,
and reached for a siren’s call.
But here
now
today
biding time.
Foreigners
If you would,
talk some sense into me.
Or,
just talk some sense.
I am in short supply,
you see.
I have broad and muscled shoulders
from clenching the etched-in tension.
A hard head with a coconut brain
to unveil the dumb mornings.
Those that move in this captivity
are bound to me,
but we are foreign
to one another.
Earnestly
Remember how to sing.
If not, to hum,
or whistle a waltz.
Understand the beast,
and restrain it
with a stumbling spot dance.
Think of your goodness,
and not of your sin.
Of the young,
for they are short of life.
Of your faith, or your doubt,
and the quality of prayer.
Unclean
I dreamt of dirt.
Of its sloughing off under the tap.
But oh, the horror of the pores
that extruded anew
a brackish paste,
a troubling stew.
And here I thought
my virtue bought,
until this taste
the nightmare wrought.
And a stern bellowing voice said
~WASH YOUR HAND~
Homeless
What’s pulled us so far from shore
Tethered no more to the drumbeat of the soul
Senseless we fish further afield
Stymied by the junk of jetsam
From others who’ve been here before
And shout for joy at fools’ gold
So easy for the taking
Then turning to tarnished tinfoil.
It’s in the wind
Walk with me today, I beg.
I feel as if there are corpuscles of sunshine,
even though the day’s light is grey-filtered.
It’s all bought and paid for, no?
So come, if you please.
I hope you are not afraid
that I might tell you secrets kept too long,
and all the reasons for a fateful change of mind.
Madmen
Pain spreads into virgin veins
and newly thought-of branches.
An insistent fist,
twisted and knuckle-pressed
into the backs of us.
We have looked, dry-eyed,
into the dark drear,
contriving a laugh,
picturing courage and rebellion
while fetal in our dampened beds.
And, in the light of day, we walk,
zombified and smiling.
That’s the spirit
There’s no one to adore it.
Too hard-shelled and prickly,
I guess.
Transgressions bought and paid for.
Still, there are soft surfaces of want.
In the shower,
(hotter, hotter),
there’s that brain stem shiver.
White-eyed,
photogenic as an actor’s orgasm.
The house that Jill built
The house she built
is nested inside
the one they bought together.
It’s been long in its building,
with slow accretions
wrung from unshed tears.
A desperation. A resignation.
It has gift boxes, unwanted.
Empty bowls and jars
on brazen display,
meant to catch a beautiful rain
that never came.
Aremyfeetofftheground 