#0136 - Месте

Это не Россия.
Здесь не русские горола.
Здесь нет русских домов.
Здесь не русские люди.

Однако,
Если ты не думаеш
Я русский шпион,
Это может быт мое место:

Как Россия,
Как Америка…

#0125 - We will dance

through fires,
and frostbite;
‘neath sunlight
and starlight.

We will leave footsteps
—pellucid relics
of spirits lifted high
and worries hung to dry.

There’ll be paths where we’ve been:
Waltzes in the frost of snow,
Polka ‘pon the coals of fire,
Charleston in the sands of time.

The world will tell
a simple tale:
Entranced,
we danced.

And everyone will wonder
how, in darkness immured,
we laughed in the night
as we kept our sights centred
on the light of our gaze
and our endless embrace.

#0123 - "My bed without you"

A little too cold,
a little too small,
a little too quiet,
a little too empty.

No one to steal the covers,
No one to steal the pillows,
No one to approach,
No one to accompany.

Nothing but inanimate covers
laying like forgotten rags.
Nothing but inanimate cushions—
fabric instead of skin.

That's my bed without you.

But I'll think of your company
and maybe you'll think of mine:
I'll make do for the night,
'til we're again side by side.

#0121 - Attachment

Some will only bivouac,
And others mean to stay a while.
Neither’s ever out of style,
So when you are to be attached

Be sure to know if this will last
a century, or pass too fast.

#0119 - A Moment Amongst Sunlit Waves

The sun-streaked waves, they roll across
the ocean's tranquil, sapphire blues.
The sun, while watching many ac-
-res, colours skies with splendid hues.

All moments turn to memories;
although they're gone in rapid time,
their lucid shadows never cease
to paint a landscape in your mind.

So take your senses, dive within
the sky, the sea, the sun, the rain—
they won't again, while you still live,
appear the same as on this day.

#0115 - "Blind"

Blind,
he began to hear
and smell
and feel.

He uncovered a world
which had always been there,
but whose presence he had never felt—
never thought to perceive.

#0111 - 30 Days

{NaPoWriMo 2017 ~ Day 30}

These varied rhymes
'cross 30 days
have found their way
through different styles.
The month has gone,
but coming times
should soon bring on
new written lines
continuing
to sing like songs
or strum like strings.
Rights and wrongs
     will always ling-
     -er 'mongst these things.

#0110 - Musings

{NaPoWriMo 2017 ~ Day 29}

I

I wouldn’t say I’m sober now,
But neither am I liquored up.
I guess I’m just preoccupied
With existential thoughts.

And that is why I seem distraught:
While part of me’s awaiting death,
The second part is clinging on
To this simplistic life.

I’m floating by and trudging ‘long,
I’m hoping that a glimmer of
Enlightenment will find its way
To this imprisoned mind.

I wish I were a bird because
I’d have to move through air instead
Of trudging through these expecta-
-tions, sorely overwhelmed.

II

You’d think that air would rightly be a breeze to travel through.
But something ‘bout these sounds and stares keeps holding back my feet:
These horrid expectations that are always finding me
I’d rather have replaced with clubs or knives of crimson hue.

This populace is filled with people that refuse to care:
A massive presentation of this world’s fatuity.
These ersatz feelings pave the way for thoughts that torture me:
That everyone is simply waiting for my mind to tear.

The stares devoid of any thought replace the dreams of past;
Forgetting what they once lived for, these people are now grey—
Their dull indifference seeks to spread its deadly grip to me.
I’m chained and beat by glares and stares, but hold my ground, steadfast.

III

There are a million paths through life, and e-
-very one is forked to form a million more.

At every gateway there’s a second door
To lead you faster to your final end.

It offers you a short respite, an end
To all the gloomy things that may assault

Your mind and propagate your countless faults,
Which never cease to bring torment and doubt.

Thus, Death is there, awaiting your last bout,
Which drives you grimly, quickly ‘cross the edge—

That ever-present scythe with sharpened edge,
That cloak of darkness standing motionless.

Don’t let yourself be drawn by what Death says;
It’s easy to be happy when some nic-

-eties find you, but not so otherwise.
If life were not made up of darker times,

The better times would not be so sublime.

#0109 - Światła

{NaPoWriMo 2017 ~ Day 28}

Światła,
jak les Simples Soldats
maszerują przez czarną pustynie.
Niecierpliwi, ale wolni,

oni przez sto lat już
formują kręcące trasy
przez urbanistyczne mokradła
i polowe niezwykłości.

#0108 - Silhouettes

{NaPoWriMo 2017 ~ Day 27}

Silhouetted against the night sky,
stars form shapes—
patterns and contours—
in a puppet-show display.

White Rorschach splatters
perform their artistic stillness
on a pitch-black canvas
of infinite vastness.

This is white shade
creating analogous long ears
and slender muzzles and showing
that shadow is a point of view.

#0106 - Stockholm Syndrome

{NaPoWriMo 2017 ~ Day 25}

Do you remember when,
upon a successful landing,
the passengers of a given flight
would give a round of applause to the pilot?

It's that type of unconditional respect
that is progressively becoming extinct;
it is that mutual altruism
that's being replaced with stoicism.

It's Stockholm Syndrome.
People like acknowledge each other
only when they are held inescapably
captive by one another's company.

Unequivocally self-centered
they will remain
for as long as they're offered
any means of escape:

Blasting beats,
ductile displays,
or just something to stare at
in infinite space.

But give them the motivation
of more pay or a better place,
and they'll suddenly will themselves
to speak with someone else.

#0104 - "Phobias...haze"

{NaPoWriMo 2017 ~ Day 23}

Is society so anarchic
because it's people are anarchic?
Or because everyone's view is laser-focused,
but on a superficial goal?

Xenophobia, homophobia,
amongst many other phobias,
are the perpetual insomnia
of society, keeping people awake at night.

Aspirin, Aderall might help a little,
but only for a one-time headache.
If the migraines persist perpetually,
will you just keep yourself doped up perpetually?

I guess the "doped up" makes sense:
everyone sees the problem,
but they only ever stare at the elephant
in the room as if in a cloudy haze.

#0102 - "Patience"

{NaPoWriMo 2017 ~ Day 21}

If patience lasts for centuries
and rashness lasts for only days,
then which of these is always bound
to go a longer way?

#0097 - "J'ai rencontre un homme"

{NaPoWriMo 2017 ~ Day 16}

J’ai rencontre un homme:

En un café rempli des démons et monstres
il était assis, espérer que le temps
passé avec sa peur, son stress
restaurerait sa innocence épatant.

«Je sais que je suis une proie,» il a dit.
«Je me demande seulement qui
me chasse maintenant; je fais face mes peurs,
mais je trébuche sur formes nouveaux des douleurs.»

Mais il craint quoi; ses vices voulusses?
Son humilité, ou caché égoïste?
«Tous et tous; ces et plus—
c’est l’espoir, c’est la vie.»

#0078 - Quicksand

Reality is alit with dissimilarities and likenesses:
duality.
Moving through crowds and emptiness with subdued celerity,
the steps of a klutz overtaking finesse,

the stint I find sitting upon me oppresses
my individuality,
trapped in crude arrest: a mentality
of denying creative access

that would otherwise roam free, God bless,
in a virtual reality
that is at least real to me -
more real than the hermetically sealed casket that bears our address.

#0075 - Nighttime

The window of my darkened room
gives way to moonlight's lunar rays,
and as I sit here, grimly think-
-ing, peace leaves me while silence stays.

Here I think of all and no-
-thing, mind confused and soul attuned
to this strange night where I have quick-
-ly found myself a sullen lune.

I think I think of something, but
I'm not sure what I'm thinking of.
The gears within my head are shift-
-ing as the shadows dance above

my head that rests upon this pill-
-ow softer than my hardened feel-
-ings, catching all my unknown doubts
in restless peace, in restful sleep.

#0069 - Advice

I promise I am not controlled
by failure or by fear.
I simply take advice where I
can find it, far or near.

And I have learned a simple thing
about others' advice:
that those who give wise words are oft-
-en scarred and bruised by vice.

The best advice will come from those
who've rolled and bathed in mud,
and those whose countless leaps of faith
have colored them in blood.

The best advice will come from those
who've felt their kind hearts shatter,
and those who stare at blades and rope
and into murky water.

The best advice will come from those
who've screamed and fought and cried,
and those poor souls who've been betrayed
or to whom others lied.

Though when the times are good the on-
-ly thoughts I need are mine,
in darkness I'll take words of those
whose times are worse than mine.

#0056 - "Sometimes my poetry is a puzzle"

Sometimes my poetry is a puzzle or struggle;
a challenge overcome, a mystery to be solved.
The word I choose to rhyme with “stomp” or “sell” or “sea”
is an answer to a question in a game of Jeopardy.

Assonance in my tertiary troubles
turns out to be a tool of the trade.
Alliteration also,
and always alluding to Ares and Achilles -

Greek legends, unique, but both bound by war;
not much different from men -
whether writing haikus or taming wolves,
always drawn to bullets and pikes.

The pieces come together.

Sometimes my poetry is a river:
it flows and flows and doesn’t stop until it’s run dry.
Even a mountain won’t stop it;
rather, earthen masses simply split one stream of consciousness into two.

Sometimes my poetry is a painting
I’ve stared at for hours without finishing,
and sometimes it’s an accidental coffee stain
from which I draw my inspiration.

Here or there,
this or that,
my poetry is always the universe of my mind
finding its way into tumultuous reality.

#0044 - "Drizzle, drizzle, little weasel;"

Drizzle, drizzle, little weasel;
Let your tears fall to the carpet.
Trick me once, you’ll be forgiven.
Trick me twice, and you’re a weasel.

Laughter comes to you as sadness:
Fake and underpinned by cunning.
Tears and laughter that you offer
Only search for thoughtless pity.

By your tricks I’ve been deceived, but
I won’t in your presence falter
Once again, for what you’ve done has
Left its mark upon my conscience.

Thanks to you my trust has faltered:
I no longer wish to be a
Punching bag for honeyed parlance.
Drizzle, weasel: I’ll ignore you.

#0039 - "While walking through this sunlit glade"

While walking through this sunlit glade
Well-brightened by this sunny day,
As I was passing, 'long the way,
I chanced upon a fresh bouquet

Of Daisy, Lavender and Rose,
Whose florid odors filled my nose.
From this bouquet my vision rose;
Among the trees were scattered does.

With wary eyes they stared at me,
Who in their home they first time see;
They wonder who this beast could be,
Residing in their forestry.

The flowers are of lovely hue,
But stirring fear I'd quickly rue;
And so I move along in lieu
Of picking florid red and blue.