I Shall Die of Having Lived – A Book Poem

Death Comes for the Archbishop

To live! To live! exist be damned

To dwell inside the great I Am

So at the end of life you may

Say I have lived my life away

To view the past with little shame

And see your friendships just the same

To understand your trial here

As fire refining, making pure

So at the end of life you may

Know that you’ve lived your life away

Writing Prompt: Use These Three Words: Mint, Spare Change, and Confetti

     Please resist pointing out that "spare change" is two words. I already know this, and I didn't make up the prompt. I did; however, create something incredibly ridiculous out of it:

     “Hey do you have any spare change?” I turned to see an earnest young androgynous face peering out from under an overlarge hood. I muttered something about not carrying cash and began to walk away. “How about a mint?” I stopped in the midst of my escape. “A mint?” I asked.

“Yeah, see, I’m going to this interview downtown and I was told to bring a mint, some spare change, and some confetti.”

     I raised a brow. “I don’t believe you,” I said peering deep into the hood. “Why would your future employer ask you to bring confetti to an interview?”

     The face in the hood looked down at the sidewalk for a while, “I’m trying to be a magician,” he muttered. I must have continued looking skeptical because he came a little closer and whispered, “I feel like I’m David Copperfield reincarnated.” I didn’t object by saying David Copperfield was still very much alive. I frankly thought this young person was a little out of his mind. I decided to strike what I felt was a good balance and handed the young man some confetti in a little baggie. I was on my way to clown class and happened to have an extra bag in my pocket.

     His face lit up. “Hey thanks!” he said, “No one ever has confetti these days.”

“It’s hard to come by,” I said, “use it well.”

     He stared at me for a long time, too long I felt. “Why do you have this?” he said in a tone that conveyed that he trusted me about as far as he could throw me. “Listen, kid,” I said, “in times like these it is best to count your blessings and not look a gift horse in the mouth.” As soon as I used the old fashioned catch phrases I knew that if the kid was working as a free lance sniffer, he’d be onto me. There was a tense moment where we both sized each other up, but eventually the kid pocketed the bag of confetti and nodded slowly. I nodded back and he turned and walked down the street, hunched up against the cold protected by that ludicrously big coat.

     As he walked away I felt a little nervous. What if I’d given my confetti to a complete stranger who was just going to squander it? Lately the Anti-Entertainment industry had been cracking down pretty hard on confetti users. It wasn’t illegal yet, but you could still face severe ostracizing if you used it in front of the wrong people. Clowning wasn’t easy. I had already lost one apartment lease over it. My landlady tried to say it was because she saw me smoking inside, but I knew better. Plus, the kid could have been an agent, and I wouldn’t even know until I was suddenly struck from behind and arrested for some trumped up charge. I could not handle that in front of my co-workers. Especially Peanuts. That guy was such a jerk.

     I kicked at a puddle and immediately regretted it as the cold water seeped through my mesh tennis shoe. It was going to be a long day.

How To Write of Love

It is easier to write the sadness

The dark you cannot understand

The heartbreak and mourning

It is easier to become cynical

And let your poems flow like tears

Down your page

But what can a poet in love tell you

What words can she say

That do not hint of mawkishness

That will tender the hearts

Of even the deepest cynics

I still write

But lately it has been slow thoughts of love

Not the pain of brokenness

That the broken world knows too well

But the giddiness and the skip-to-my-lou

For you, dear reader

I attempt to not shove

The candy coated cupcakes cast up as words of love

But I want to whisper the name of my beloved

Into every ear that hears me

And understands me not

Please do not think I’ve stopped my writing

Because I’m dizzy with joy

I’m just trying to relate

The pure unadulterated joy of late

Love rising like the sun in an exultation of birdsong

But there, I’ve dipped into silliness

And how can I tell my fellow mortals

Of a glimpse inside of heaven

Unless they see it with their own eyes

My eyes unclose his love

And I still cannot believe I’m attempting to tell you

What transport is mine

What all the hardship of my short and coddled life

Has fashioned me into

Something he wants for forever

And forever, dear reader, is long

And long will I write

Trying to understand how to be so happy and beautiful

In a sad and sinful world

God lets in crepuscular heaven glances

And sometimes they shine on our heads.

Writing Prompt: It Seems to be Broken

So, I was following this Writing Prompt website that gave you a phrase or an idea that you were supposed to write 500 or so words on, and one of them was "It seems to be Broken." This is what I did:

He peered over the edge of the bed. “It seems to be broken,” he stated matter of factly, as if Koala had not been around my whole life. I covered my eyes with my hands and laid back on my pillow. “Please dad,” I whispered, “can you just check again?” He reached down. “Don’t!” I screamed. He looked searchingly at me. “I don’t want to see it if it’s broken.” He looked over at me lying there and looked vaguely concerned. “I’ll just get rid of it then,” he said, “close your eyes.” I closed my eyes for a long time, but when I finally opened them, the room was empty. Two people had walked out of my life forever, and I only cried over one of them. It wasn’t Dad.

I was thinking about that moment from my childhood as Maria droned on and on above her spaghetti bolognaise. I believe she was telling me about her horrible day at the studio or something like she usually does. Our conversations have become so standardized. I’m pretty sure I could recite the entire thing without her being there. The hum of voices all around us seemed to serve as the background chorus for her complaints. My eyes wandered over to the next table where a young couple sat in a big puddle of disgusting love. His hand was on the table palm upward, and she was tracing lines and squiggles across his hands. They were laughing softly and I guessed she was making him guess what she was drawing. By the blush on his cheeks, I could guess it was something suggestive. I hated them.

            “You know, Maria,” I said right in the middle of the story she was telling about her ‘frenemy’ Josh who I kind of thought was always hitting on her, “It seems to be broken.” She stopped and narrowed her eyes. “What does?” she asked. She was beautiful. Suddenly she was as beautiful as she’d always been. Her edgy short hair cut framed her oval face like it was fashioned just for her. Her blue eyes, so dark they were nearly black, looked suspiciously and searchingly at me. “Forget it,” I said and looked down at my cold spaghetti. “Yeah right,” Maria said, “you said something was broken. What is it? Is it me? Is it us? You seem really distant tonight.”

            I looked over at the two kids playing the hand drawing game. The boy sat at the table alone, weeping. I looked back at Maria. “I’m sorry,” I said, “I just thought of this weird moment with my dad.” Maria leaned back in her chair and pinned her lips together primly. “I’m serious,” I protested, “I just realized that he broke my koala bear and my koala bear was there for me more often than he was. And that’s all he had to say to me, ‘It seems to be broken,’ like he had nothing to do with it. Just like he had nothing to do with me.”

            “I’m pregnant,” Maria said. The boy at the next table paid his tab and walked away.

Prayer for John

It is with gratitude I pray, Lord

Bless his body, bless his mind

And with humility I gaze at

This man you’ve named as mine

But keep his eyes upon you

Keep him walking close to you

And all the love he gives me

Let him give much more to you

Bless our love and future union

Upon us let your face shine

As with gratitude I thank you

For this man you’ve named as mine

Poetry eBook You Should Be Aware of...

     I don't read eBooks, and only sheer Nepotism would induce me to post this, but my brother created a book of poems called Rivers. You can find it now on Amazon for $1.50 (the current going price). You should check it out!

It is Brave to Live (Job 3:11)

It is brave to live in darkness

To continue to breathe through the bullets

When twenty childish souls are silenced

It is brave to think

Tomorrow and tomorrow I shall arise

God willing, in the darkness

I will continue to serve

And some will wonder like Job

Why did I not die at birth?

Why come to this sad broken earth?

But there is bravery in the heart

Beating in the sludge of evil

In the trust of a good God

Who holds back the tremors from the garden

And in each laugh and lovely thought

There’s a bullet for the devil

Hoping to drag us to the hopeless mourning cry

Why did I not die?

At birth, like Job who saw despair’s edge

And lived

And breathed

And never cursed God in the darkness