Folie à deux

Like lighted wick, does ardor burn
Too deep, alas, grief can run.
Yearning spouts, much like rain,
Pride to lose,wounds to gain.
Heavy are these words, much debt they bind,
To this leaden conscience of mine.
Blessed is that heart which bends,
Beginnings never know our ends.
Measure by measure, fate will avenge,
Each kindness it could not prevent.

Let me. Not be. That obvious.

From crest to dale (back around)
Wound, is interminable dearth
To the conflict of extravagance
To the dispute of mirth.

Measured out in quints
Would be remnants of fear
The marked need for something
To make my tragedies more sincere.

Repentance.

An anthology of small crimes,
lost and found in bits of rhyme.
From pitch to throw,
a little desperation, a bit of woe.

So thinly spreads,
irony or dread,
and brutal allay,
on easy prey.

Indulgence in the Witching Hour.

Half-light and stalled time,
fingertips in rhythm and rhyme.
Some of your truths,
turned to some of mine.

Muted.

The ego
and the cold,
cold night.

Collisions were never
known to be...



this hollow.

The Faustian Barter.

Your ages traded
with demons and gods,
the debts remain
do bear in mind.

Even if you tread
the earth like you own it,
it's only leaden feet
you drag behind.

Closure.

Pennies and strings
and a button or two,
maybe a picture
perhaps of you.

Little lost treasures
I was carrying
in a pocket,
all these years.

Some gathered
to capture that,
which could not be
held in constancy.

A few things
to remind us,
that the past
can breathe life
into the present.

All of which
will be thrown out
with the trash tomorrow.

Except the letter.
.......................................................
That, would have to be burned.

Of Tales That Will Never Be Told.

An unlikely congregation.

You and me,
and all of our friends.
Some old,
most found anew.

Whispers passed,
among prattle and cheers.
A twinkle caught,
by one too many.

The illusion,
of much being said.
When realities
stay much too fragile.

Perhaps a skeleton,
waiting to tumble out.
Or a secret- bound by faith,
and a forgotten promise.

Distortions, scandal,
deception, treachery.
Lost in days of inebriation,
and nights of debauchery.

Tiny Russian Dolls.

(Because the Russian variety is harder to find.)

The oddities are not,
what they are thought to be.
Not spread over space,
but coalesced into layers.

One within the other,
another within the last.
A million different people,
intertwined through many pasts.

Like tiny Russian dolls,
that tell stories of their time.
Enclosing a million little secrets,
or an odd, unforgivable crime.

All that glitters...

and that which glows.
trinklets, threads, beads.
and memories.
some collected, some received.

These Lives of Quiet Desperation.

My words are never found
where you like to look for them.
But in the 20 inches
of sparks and smoke in between.

Draped on bare walls,
spilled on the red carpet.
Or perhaps in your black coffee,
that tasted like Quinine.

Mute, and silent.
My words still hang in the air.
Though they would rather
be wrapped around you,
than nestle in melancholy.

You ask me why
I do not speak.
My silence is awkward,
jarring, and indiscreet.

And yet those words of mine,
will still wish upon a lost cause.
That you grasp them soon,
and stay.

I Think

There is something to be said
about the finality
of a small black dot.

And the
continuity of three...

Amusing,
that hope comes in shapes
of bent teardrops.
(,)
Not of beginnings
and not of ends.
Separating instances of many,
and mildly disfigured sentiments.

Approximation. Not Quite.

These almosts.. I think,
have a knack for quiet.
I tell you, they are muted taciturns.
Unkind, almost.

The fault, I believe
is not their own.
Disappointment, after all
was never clamorous.
Settles in melancholy,
breeds in silence.

It rained today.
Well, it almost did.
The sky did turn gray.
Winds did blow.
Birds did crow.

But that's the thing about almosts.
Almosts and half-promises.
Uncertain. Dangling in between..
of is and isn'ts,
of have and have-nots.
And among losses,
of an entirely different sort.

Music, When Soft Voices Die.

Music, when soft voices die,
Vibrates in the memory.
Odours, when sweet violets sicken,
Live within the sense they quicken.

Rose leaves, when the rose is dead,
Are heap'd for the beloved's bed.
And so thy thoughts when thou are gone,
Love itself shall slumber on.

-Percy Bysshe Shelley

.............................................................................................................

This is about beautiful poetry, my immense liking for Shelley, and my new-found love of a camera. There is more than one way to look at art. There are far more to create it. But only one way to experience it. With all of your senses, and all of your self.

Tacit, Interrupted.

Three make a quartet today,
But two is still a crime.
Out of a dire puzzle arose,
This subtle piece of rhyme.

Of Mint-Coffees...

... and unregretted regrets
......................................................................................

I see a world in your eyes.

A world more real,

than the one,

I have to live in.

Your world is made

Of thoughts and things,

unheard of, unimaginable..

Of people and places,

so far and many.

But I still live

in the paracosm I’ve made around me,

where thoughts alone are things..

And they are centered around you.

Another season just went by.

And I still stood and stared,

at how I stand where I stood,

Years ago, when I first knew you.

I’ve known you so many times since,

and waited for a day when I finally do.

Your silence deafens me,

It’s too loud, and I yearn for peace.

For I dream too much to tell,

What’s real and what was fantasy.

Remember the streets

we once walked on?

No.. The ones you walked on

and I followed.

Much may have changed,

But I’m still the same..

Only I wish..

I had been walking

Beside you.

I hate you because

you make me forget myself.

And all that I see,

is that world in your eyes.

The one I’m not a part of.

And perhaps, never will be.

Everything is hanging.

By threads.

Threads and cobwebs.

Tries so hard, not to fall apart

But it does.

Every second, every day..and every year.

Look..another knot came undone.

But I’ll fix it again, and wait for it to hurt.

Your silence always says so much.

Much more than you ever did.

So many things, that you never said,

And even if you did,

The ones I never would have heard.

Your whispers, after all,

Were lost somewhere in the void.

The millions of miles,

That separate us.

But your world still haunts me,

The world I saw in your eyes.

The days when love was not just a word,

And faith was not just a lie.

To today, when beliefs are few..

When I’m running out of reasons to try.

She tells me,

Confucius does his crosswords

With a pen.

I know, but I wish

I was that sure.

It’s hard to believe, when things are such,

That you never know

What lies ahead.

Or tomorrow, or today, or tonight.

Time is a strange thing.

You see, it’s even relative.

Your nights are my days,

And my days, your nights.

But twilight is a strange relief,

For such little separates dawn from dusk.

I hear songs..

Songs that echo all around.

Never thought Richard Marx

Would begin to haunt.

Or that mint-coffee would

Be so bitter.

Just because of you,

Or the you that is not there.

But I still stood,

And I looked,

At the sound of your voice.

Yes, I looked. And I heard,

The touch of your hand,

On mine, and I tasted,

The warmth of your embrace.

Of course, that too was all in a dream,

Reality has never been that kind.

But I'm still the same.

And I stand right where I was

When love wasn’t just a word,

And faith wasn’t just a lie.

You would think that I,

Am saying too much.

You may wonder why

I speak so.

But the whys I cannot answer,

So I never ask.

I have too many questions of my own

To trouble you with yours.

But that’s a lie. You know that too.

For somewhere it’s just about a me,

Who is afraid of your answers.

And I am still the same,

as I used to be.

For you see, today I walked

down those streets again.

Alone.

And realized,

they wouldn’t take me anywhere.

Bad Poetry - Volume 2.

Delusional Contentment...

..and similar absurdities

..................................................................................

I don't know how I want things to be,
But I know this isn't it.
I no longer know what to wish for,
Just something very different from this.

If such is the scene,
What comes next, you may ask.
And I would say to you,
That I don't see this moment last.

The inconvenience of truth,
The tyranny of chance.
Or tinted glasses,
And primrose dalliance.

Our beginnings may be beginnings,
But they never know our ends.
This story, you see,
Comes with breaks and bends.

One, however, is left to wonder,
How far really is the end?

If I were a verse...

"To see the world in a grain of sand,
And heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour."
                
                     -William Blake

/* So often, words really are all you have.
Then again, they are so much more serviceable than swords. */

Bad poetry - Volume 1.

Rewind.

Me and my boots, went out walking today,
We talked and we walked, along old ways.
The further we went, the closer we got,
To that old tree, around that old block.

Miles we went, and the miles went by,
To go on forever, I wanted to try.
The wind was cold, the sun was warm,
That old bent road, had its charm.

It led to that place, that old old house,
Where the old old lady, fed her old white mouse.
I walked past the park, where I used to play,
With friends I knew once... but not today.

I walked along that lake, where the water is always blue,
Where I sat for hours, when worries were few.
The birds that knew me, I saw ahead,
The ones I used to read to, but they always fled.

That same old place, with the same old tree,
That same old lake, and that same old me.
Yet something was different, something was new,
And I looked at my boots..I wish they knew.