Unbearable gallery projects us all.
Our desires to be seen, and soon, folds.
I need no direction.
Told that everything means nothing,
propels us to be alone.
Shut into shutter speed.
Lock ourselves away behind lock screens.
But tell our tales to everyone. Silently.
We let all pride slip away.
For the need to be known.
To make it into the forgotten gallery.
More at http://leahshort.wordpress.com.
I see how fast new passions
finally become old-fashioned
what was once avant-garde
has slipped onto its derriere
songs of peace or protest
are now sung to sell soup
songs of a coming revolution
rehashed on PBS fund drives
change at glacier speed,
“We shall overcome,”
has been self-embalmed
I’ll make my own peace
go at my own pace
write my own song
in my own words
that’s all that’s left.
Love trials
Couple of empty vodka bottles in the trash
You’re still looking good for the camera
Back story
Star power
Salty tears
Hard work
You’re like a stock I’m holding through losses
The minute I sell it, it goes up
Holding on
It’s what we did before the fame
Innocence
Determination
No Botox baby
Story of an elephant
felled, a travel guide back
to reality,
trial after trial,
another culture spread
through words and syntax,
given the hollow voice
of a native tongue, thick
and still rounded out,
a world I have not seen,
a place I have not been,
seeing my world in a new
lens at the last page.
More at http://jddehartpoetry.blogspot.com/.
I was the open shirt
and the journal palm,
not a pair of wings,
the recorder of passersby.
They did not know what
to do with me. I strung
together metaphors while
they talked about baseball
cards. While they volleyed
juvenile experiences of lust,
I read the thoughts of
expatriate Parisians, sarcastic
polarizing prophets, and poems
balanced on an image. Popping
in compact discs, I imagined
the world I might one day
engage in, sketched in pencil.
I am a Muslim
I am a Jew
I am Catholic
I am an Arab
I am Protestant
I am Agnostic
I am Baptist
I am Secular
Feed me please
Love me
All I ask
At skyscraper’ edge
I can see clean to the spot
of sidewalk where I stood
looking up.
Clean back to the place
I was born.
I think of the balance
of the tightrope
walker, adjusting for the
wind. Now, here it is.
I’m tired of walking
on eggshells. Such a worn
out phrase. Like the phrase
worn out. But I perched
on pristine shell a few
years ago. Afraid to speak
and afraid to offend.
This may be tenuous,
but I’m tired of people
pleasing and saying yes.
I’m not going to offend
for a pastime.
Never on purpose.
What I’m talking about
is liberty to be without
straining each word
and thought like a fine
soup, served flaccid
by the time it arrives.
I’m sorry, dear words,
for promising you place
then being fidgety.
Tossing you out.
I’m sorry, dear poem,
for failing to write you
down. You see,
I thought you’d stay
awhile but then you
ran away with whatever
else was in my shopping
list, never to be reclaimed.
Sorry at last for being
fickle with art, instead
of tender, reassuring, true.
Instead of a space
I offered a vacuum.
No amends can be made
now except a new draft.
We all must have our anchors
to keep us sane, whether they be
family, friends, a job or hobby,
solid things to ground us in reality
or perhaps enable our escape from it
too much truth being dangerous
as the wise old poet once claimed.
Alas, she, she who had all of these
has slipped free of her moorings
and has sailed far out of reach
her mind adrift on stormy seas.