poetry online

This evening should never
have happened, the die had
been cast, the road ended
and things let loose
in mayhem of sadness
which overcame the reticent
looseness, the mind pondered, the road ended
swashbuckling traffic mended, all in hush,
all in spate of rush
the mind’s strange phenomena, no acid test
noumena, I wondered at this lacklustre road which
could end so suddenly
so strangely leaving me
in a forest I never saw.

My Mom had the most common sense of anyone I’ve ever known
She was right about everything, so much so, it was infuriating at
times
I bucked her many times thinking I knew better
Which of course I didn’t, I was no match for her

The only thing she wasn’t right about
Was her need to always be right
She didn’t go looking for problems to solve
Situations presented themselves and she always had the answers

Somewhere in my 50s I discovered the joy of not being right all the
time
Like her, I possess great common sense
There is a burden however for always trying to be right
If you are never wrong, how do you learn from your mistakes I asked

I’m not sure she saw my logic
Being the matriarch, being right was burned in
It’s been 15 months since her passing
I miss her greatly and could use a few answers, right or wrong but
probably right…

Life can often throw a sucker punch,
sometimes crippling blows
come along like buses… three in a row.
Absolutely everyone hits the floor,
there is nothing unique or shameful in falling,
it’s the getting back up wiser that counts.
The real secret is to bounce back brighter each time,
get in a few jabs of spontaneity of your own.
Do something different regularly, go places new,
comfort zones are for recharging batteries
not camping in… where’s the adventure in that?
Laugh at the strange and ridiculous,
never let fear guide you to nowhere.
You’re full of life, possibility and magic
get out there in that big wide world and enjoy it.
Collect memories not grudges,
don’t follow others unless they’re going your way
and may your way be vast and multiplied by many.

More at http://paultristram.blogspot.co.uk/.

As a child
dreams were of crumbling ruins, matchless in Greece and Rome,
travelogues of the home
the clash of the sword the word of god, dreams were a river, the
Tiber, Romulus and Rome, a mind quiver
the empire and Charlemagne’s home
the myth of Sisyphus, Hector’s modus, the vulnerable heel, all like
the keel, it hovered wavered. History phased into phantom, dark and
bright,
inner light, the world mine.
I mimed, chimed.
Dreams not Jungian, not Freudian. Only livid, vivid.
Metaphors of dark horses,
meditative Norses.
History shuttled, opened and closed. Me, daydreaming.
One day put on all shutters, broke gates, threw them
into an abyss of gutters.