Stealing Summer's Breath

Helplessly I feel,

stuttering my goodbyes,

I wish I had more to give.

but I fear my veins are dry.

Before the dawn will sing again

her lonely songs of sun

and wind

I wake and wander the

empty paths carved

in rows of wheat 

and empty heads

by the

eyes of angels falling

from the sun darting

‘cross the sky as

rays of color on the run.

I fear I’ve lost

the will to speak,

for I’ve no words

to bleed and no

thoughts to reap. 

For now I recede,

lips sealed and tongue

knotted behind

rotting teeth.

Without a foot on the ground

the earth shall turn without a sound,

you will shiver in stillness

while the world changes herself around.

A fire chased the rain away,

from ash and brimstone she came.

Towards the clouds she bowed her head,

horns sharp and bitter aimed to tear

down the sky.

As she carried her formless flame

upwards towards the sun,

the heavens fell and cracked 

wide open on the ground below.

Through the clouds she carved

a path to bring the sun

and stars to the darkness below;

to usher in an era of change,

of endless dawn and roaming rays,

she ripped apart the stars

as we know them seam by seam

to recreate a newer home,

a home atop the older’s resting place.

Though these lips are jagged

and rusted, their crevices and canyons

teeming with sodden vows and solemnly

sang tunes, an occasional droplet

of beauty may fall from their

wicked grips.

But it seems as though lately

they refuse to even ooze the slightest

bit of nonsense, not even the

excess bullish praise or

a breath of callous haze to pass

the days.

All the dreams inside me

died and fell away 

the day I realized

my eyes were flawed

and opened only

when the lights dimmed

and the colors of life

faded into black.

What dreams may I seek,

if all I see is but a breath

of consciousness,

wispy and vaporous?

I wonder where I’d be now had I saved you.

I spend my time in

searching for the mind I had

never thought to lose.

Daylight stood trial

before a firing line,

shooting stars

from muskets at

the feet of the

morning light.

She danced and

twisted, bending

her knees to 

escape the end

of day but she

buckled and tumbled

away, struck

with a bullet of night

bleeding blues

and reds into the

open hands of the sky.

Strangling the stem

of a rose with two

hands dead and cold

she laid her head to rest

beside an open road,

relinquishing a dream

so woeful and old

to run its legs to stubs

in search of a newer soul.

If I had a choice

between being

effortlessly infuriating

or passive aggressively nagging,

I’d choose death.

Learn to speak your mind

for the sake of expression,

not for the smell of your breath

and the reaction you get.

While loitering in the pharmacy of the Hospital I volunteer at today, I decided to take a peek inside myself to see what was brewing.

I quickly came to the conclusion that I, Steve, am at the center of the universe. Memories revolve around me like planets; I yearn and struggle to pull them back but they drift in circles around my head. The people I surround myself with are distant stars; I feel their warmth and dance in the light of their past, that is, the person I perceive them to be. Fact of the matter is; they grow faster than we respond (generally). 

I decided to draw this out even further to discover a painfully obvious perspective we all tend to dabble in that I spuriously seek to reject. We all reach the same set of answers in the end, as morose as it is to say.

We stare out our windows reflecting on the toils and joys of our lives with our heartbeat dictating the tempo of the memory. In essence, everything we see, do, feel, ponder, discover, etc, is done from the perspective of us.  We see the world through our eyes only, and the struggle certainly is to see through another’s. But in the challenge of “traveling a mile in their shoes” or whatever cliche you prefer to drool, it seems as though we follow the same cycle. Alternating human perspectives only yields the same results; tunnel vision. 

Thus I reached a conclusion about my ambitions for edifying myself and growing outwards from this mold; I struggle not to see from the eyes of others, but to see with no eyes at all.

That is, I wish to think alternatively; to think from the perspective of it all. Adopting a certain omnipotence when assessing the values of life and experience will yield something fresh, at least.

/endrant

From nothing we came,

towards nothing we aim.

Yet in something we worry

after nothing we’re named.

As if meaning is picked

from birth, 

As if taking form from

dust yields

worth. 

Dabbling in the depths

of seas parted within,

I stand between the waves

of time, ignoring the sand

crawling up my skin.

I seek not the life on

either side of tides,

not the pleasant beach

nor the mystic, wat’ry bind.

I yearn only for the dream

revealed when an ocean splits

and a man learns to feel.

Not of himself,

but of his presence 

in a world with no ground

to touch our feet down.

My fingers skated

‘cross the crest of her moon;

carving my name into

the ice of her formless tomb.

She pressed her cheeks

to the tides,

I pinned her hands to mine.

Though she felt, long before

she could not feel 

a story in her bones;

my words were wasted

my songs amiss of meaningful

bites upon cratered lips.

With memories etched

and dust left behind, I

parted myself from darkness

creeping about the surface

of her frosted moon,

what lay beneath her formless tomb.

A memory bruised

and an all too fertile soil

tilled with bad news;

the dreams to which

I yearn to escape 

have been corrupted

by the seedlings of my

misery,

who grow and commiserate 

with flecks of moments

poignant and stale 

sprouting before my eyes.