The torch of a furnace,
height of summers heat,
radiates through windows
car seats, even the pages
of my journal, like the sands
of the mojave desert in August
these pages radiate
opened and turned
upon a small table
inside the air conditioned Starbucks;
Where poetry evaporates
and mingles with aromas
of coffees, espressos, and iced cinnamon dolce lattes…
The trending status quo,
the mass of apathy,
the rebel sleeps beneath the skin,
for uniqueness feared–
their genius bound in Faberge.
Waters clear and still, slapped
with a flat palm;
watching masses
dither in the ripple,
liquid bands rolling outward,
The artist is inward,
slapping with a flat palm,
all else flows outward.
They wouldn’t say I was “wrong”
perhaps, for fear
a log of judgment would fall
upon them a thousand times.And I, for sure, I wouldn’t say
they were “wrong”,
knowing all along
It was wrong to do so.
There we were
in a stalemate
under the elephant
taking shade,
practicing our liberties…
This has been a long time coming. Special thanks to Ryan Sprinkle who gave me free studio time to record 3 of my poems while we decided together on sound effects. Ryan is a true sound engineer and amazing guitar technician. I am blessed to have friends like him. After listening to the spoken tracks with sound effects, I became inspired to add visual effects. Although this isn’t true to the tradition of written poetry alone, it is true to the creative and expressive spirit which poetry inspires me to explore. I hope you enjoy…
Photography by Reno K Lawrence
Secret Place
You poured out your heart,
without fears
as if cool rain, giving
in dusty heat.
I wade deep
in those pools
spilling in the harmonious
babble bubbling;
mirror of your soul;
shades of paradise,
the lotus cupped in His hands,
between us –
white call to greater abandon
where we
take on new meaning;
Tears of joy welling
from the dark tempest
in my core;
souls undressed
as if a sun
cut through clouds;
your giving rain,
the inevitable tears,
us wading there,
in that secret place.
Slow is tired;
me, a cool festival
hanging limp
as a willow in the night,
you smile
like a moon favoring
one hemisphere
over the other
spraying the dark virgin air
aglow, suffused with blue
livening us, along with you,
celebrating in your over world
over, and over,
above a day,
thousands of miles
beneath our feet,
with sleep postponed
until the morn dawns
when insistent desires
fade, like children
worn with amusements;
curled flat and
heavy as lead,
with festive dreams
inside their head.
This is an older post. I actually wrote this poem when I returned to college at the age of 30. That was over 20 years ago. I was a High School drop-out and lived on my own since the age of 18. While I was attending college full-time, I was also the sole provider of my family of 3-small children and a wife.
Funny, some things rarely change, and right-brained gravity seems to be one of my favorite themes.
Algebra and English Comp were two subjects that taught me that I wasn’t book dumb after all, I just had a very uncoordinated focus that needed some discipline. After learning how to apply my focus, I did exceptionally well. This lesson of sticking to something, never quitting, was the best lesson I ever took with me from college. I learned there is a lot more for us to discover, sometimes it just takes clear determined focus to break through to the other-side.
At any rate, the human mind is amazing, those of us who are strongly right-brained, can become balanced in the left, and those in the left, can become liberated creative thinkers. With persistence we can become far more than the limitations we so often allow to define us. I was able to acquire my HS diploma and finished 2-years of general education with some additional courses of Art and Poetry to satisfy the hungering right brain. The poem renders the true challenges I had from switching from natural creative side to the extraneous work of analytical focus and boring process memorization. Focus has always been major work for me.
After Algebra
My fears are multiplied
By unknown factors
Step by step I am searching
for the undefined variables
The variables are better left
to efforts of desire, colored life,
X-equals my joy to live;
Purple sunsets
I bend against my better judgments
to allow myself
to be yanked from my heaven,
this freedom flesh
I levitate in pastels of soft nature
I dance in a landscape
that changes by factors
of emotional reaction
But the quotients of my efforts,
are reduced to penciled structures,
black bones on a white background
I tell you, I am dead tired!
I have exercised the parts
of my faculties that makes my
neck crawl, fire between the blades
of my shoulders,
I am so right, in this world better left…
I would run for summer meadows;
Sunshine, grass, and sky,
Yet, I am in the fetters
Of methodical deductions
for another semester
The anxiety increases
by exponential leaps;
Plus, minus, minus, minus –
The negative moves
From outside in
I could care
to marvel at a dry honeycomb;
perfectly structured hexagons,
raising powers,
intellectual perceptions —
Just leave me honey of a bee
like after Algebra,
when I go to Poetry.
Midnight stars
infinite spray of light rests
reflective on my eye
The hope of youth
is fragrant
and sweet as Fennel
combed by wind
blowing through
the coastal canyons
near my beloved sea
I am fluorescent and luminous
tossed in a perpetual rhythm of waves
tumbling to no end,
and you are eternal
as the ever changing moon
pulling me where you will,
shining upon me this dark night.
Linked to Seedlingsinstone Blog Spot
Urgency builds
waiting in the womb,
first gasping breath
demonstrates the power
of capturing immediate responses;
The very first fix
gets our lungs purged,
we get a bathing, then
immediately following,
soothing comforts
of a breast full of milk.
As with everything in life,
a certain way that works,
does so for a short season —
Our strategies sophisticate;
Baby once again takes the floor
uttering first angelic syllable;
Repetitions of “da, da, dad..,
or ma, ma mm, with cute gestures
drawing celebrated smiles
coupled with chattering
adults answering back
“woo woo’s, lookitdababyyy”–
Baby feels that surge
of power once again.
This continues with the tugging
of clothes, raspberries,
silly dances,
being a good or bad girl or boy,
and the list goes on.
All in the name
of being a center for attention.
We learn to be masters
taking our skills with us
into a world of sage communicators;
We lay camouflaged and stealthy
ready to demonstrate our wits.
Leveraging the wit is found
to be most effective
while speaker speaks
and we yield to the listening
yet, talk thinking is
peripheral behind the white dazzle,
and sub-rosa flirt of cinched lips —
This poise is inadvertently perfected
through years of towel drying
and primping before a mirror.
The yielded silence is a barter,
cloaked behind smiles
and utterings of “uh huh”, or “ya don’t say”
Disciplines of listening gives way
to weakly muttered syllables;
(as if fore-shocks were acceptable
and eruptions could be contained.)
Undefined grunts and blurbs
sporadic and breathy fill fractional
spaces between speaker’s words.
frozen thoughts begin thawing
under warm deceptive expressions
of interest while words silently
assemble, bulging into sentences;
The words line up like race cars
waiting for the vocal pause
of a checkered flag.
Nods pose for interest
as glyphs, with or without serifs,
fill and clog the ears prior to
spilling out; slinking and sliding
into the crease of smile’s edge.
This is where the chewing starts;
rabbity, and clandestine,
as if particles of food
were loosened
between listeners teeth
Subtle jawing motions are peripheral
while one repeats
opening lines
silently beneath breaths,
the head nodding continuous;
Is the meter
of a ticking countdown.
Opportune moments,
where words convert
to first audible burst
is like a swift changing
of lanes in the thick stress
of rush hour traffic-–
new voice wedges hard
and is heard
taking the old speakers floor;
(The power once again surges!)
while old speaker’s voice sputters,
fades, halting in a syrup of discontent.
The stealing of the floor is complete.
The involuntary listener soon
forgives offense
While chewing
on new strategy
demonstrating the insanity
for an art of interruption.
This post is linked with Seedlings In Stone Blog spot.
From freedictionary.com:
amaranth [ˈæməˌrænθ]n
1. Poetic an imaginary flower that never fades
2. (Life Sciences & Allied Applications / Plants) any of numerous tropical and temperate plants of the genus Amaranthus, having tassel-like heads of small green, red, or purple flowers: family Amaranthaceae See also love-lies-bleeding, tumbleweed, pigweed [1]
I thought about poems,
being like photographs;
highlights,
and shadows
balanced in contrast;
With words free,
I shun the junk heap;
cynical breaths of vapor,
smoking hearts.
Causing eyes to sour
Where Emperor
is purely naked,
and we wish to say so;
Say leave the smoke,
the toxic, it’s noxious,
and I
need to breath;
Infancy
coming from nowhere
familiar;
not here, nor there,
yet pure,
bare, and fresh.
Joy again!
I would rather pick
from dawns drip
brilliant yellow
bananas;
coated
with glossy beads of dew,
dangling bundles,
ripening in fields,
sweeping Mid-West,
plains with tall stalks
that roll forever
buzzing with summer
into the horizon
of a coastal dream. 
And her, exuberant
with bursting femininity,
running, spinning, dancing
in light purple and white
gauze flying like silk
gracious, long , and alone;
tethered to wordless poems
anchored only
by whimsical bliss;
All rational
turn-arounds
banned
so I can serve
plantains, corn
and sheer
Amaranth joy.
Note: I am always grateful to LL Barkat @ Seedlings in Stone for allowing me to share on her blog site “On and around Mondays”
It’s said the good ones are taken
they say, what’s left is left for reason.
Like fruits fallen to ground
bruising makes them undesirable
for tables, picnics
or even jelly preserves.
With dirt in eyes,
the color of hope fades
to shades of umber and sienna.
Sun toughens skins,
while birds eat insects
feasting upon aging nectar.
Wasn’t long ago, brilliance
glistened at tree’s top, robust,
full of fragrance, confident,
pickers would never resist
the offering amongst all others.
Now, amongst dry mulch
the melt of mold’s croon
sinks and tilts
through night’s, and noon’s;
Glossy globe
once rustled by leaves,
in the sway
of wind and branches,
vanishes in lapses
in a vague place alone;
where a hardened seed
encasing hope,
may sprout
through the flesh
of a bruised heart.
Note: I am always grateful to LL Barkat @ Seedlings in Stone for allowing me to share on her blog site “On and around Mondays”
I often remember
your faint smile,
like sunlight;
found me through
the heavy slit
of a waking lid;
Sounds of rustling linens
approaching in my sleep,
illumine light
reflecting soft white
from the pale in your cheeks,
my consciousness
drawn out of me,
became filled
with glowing satiety.
The morning pours
sensual as Hollandaise
on poached eggs;
it’s spilling embrace,
slowly sprawling over
buttery whites,
thinning vague
upon the yellow,
oozing off-white wave,
sliding, rolling
surreal and slow.
I moved slower
as if to dictate the pace
of a morning’s passing,
and often, I did;
simmering into an afternoon,
melting with the light of evening,
reduced, thick, and heavy
through the midnight,
another morning;
The morning freely gave
away it’s moments;
It too, being intoxicated
with our love.
In many ways,
the length of a life
is a slow and steady
evaporation of emotion
through the pores.
The magmaculate want, unsatisfied,
love like sunshine,
often hidden behind storms
starves the land and the child
whom grows in it.
The unseasonal torrents,
perpetual wet of Winter, bleeds
into Spring, Summer, Fall,
and Christmas, the high noon
of Winter, Christmas; an island
where Ark may, or may not land.
Youth is tenacious
is a cope, is a callous,
the blind necessities
build dams where we near drown
before the spill out,
the gush, unpredictable falling,
wild rapid running, and we,
get tired as all war,
find our foot standing on a stone
while the other searches.
I often look back,
and see layers of sediment,
visible lines of a melt
cut impressions on the soul
polished, shaped, and shiny
When all released in the quiet cry
the inevitable giving back,
as much as earth and world
could bear it;
no longer volatile,
but surrendered
no longer turbulent,
now rests in the gravity;
migrating elephant transformations
takes us through lush valleys,
beneath veils of thin cloud,
steep canyons kissed by sunshine,
streams spilling to rivers,
descend, and meander
where remnant flow
gives itself, once and for all,
back from whence it came.
The moon, near full, rose from the eastern horizon.
The sun set; transitioning
beams of it’s remnant light
upon me by way of lunar lamp
which now dangles above
in the spacious dark of yester-day’s sky.
It’s the weekend’s Saturday night,
I am free for an evening and a day
it’s enough to keep me creatively at play,
outside on my patio, at my keyboard,
gratefully reflecting in mimicking fashion.
Spun in nautilus shadows,
reared back into small
spiral smears of misty flesh
with eyes rolling
behind world’s luminous smile;
behind you.
Her image, a motif;
a bowl, a glove,
a bird, a mirror;
Her breasts ablaze
in spilling light
oozing onto the
lead grey tones
sweeping where corpse
or ghost host whims
of gothic admiration.
I am soaked in surreal blurs.
Her’s is a white vapor
permeating paranormal plains.
Shudder exploits,
evoking subtle pain,
bathing nude in silky dust.
Embrace of disintegrating
ruins and rustic
neutral haze, silver
burnishes, washing
her blazing heart,
leaving passions
actively spiraling
into the eclectic underground
forever six feet
above where she lay.
renokingswordsnpoetry 
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