The Poetry Marathon

#9 – Surrender (Image Prompt)

She breathed life to me by Carter’s mill,
beside the walk cradling the edge of the river
I didn’t know it at the time,
I was full of myself and the future and grandness
but I learned, eventually, those are illusions
created by ourselves and fostered by others
to make life more bearable
If I had known it then, perhaps …

Perhaps? No, she is lost to me,
except in my meanderings of possibilities
and those things I sometimes regret
Not the knowing, but the escape, the avoidance
I lived and questioned it,
foraging for some answer, some explanation,
accepting eventually, the acknowledgment of life

The mill has been gone for twenty years now
The river diverted for a power plant installation
Yet, that moment still lives
There is the spot, the place
There is her breath and there is me,
as I should have been, not as I was and am
He is much more real than what I have become

9

we live in glass buildings
or so we try to appear
getting naked for the public
not so much physically
but baring our souls
out on facebook and blogs
on tv shows and advice columns
painting our lives
in the colours we choose
but what happens
behind the closed curtain
when viewers are shut out
but the show goes on
as it surely must, yet in private
we pretend that we live
in glass buildings – all windows
but don’t we know
how easily they shatter

4:00 pm ~ The Party

The celebration commenced

without event.

The party swirled around me

— like a square dance

around me–

as I stood

totally still

in the middle of the dance floor.

Totally still.

For here was life, dancing.

And I knew then

that life was…

still.

How can life swirl around…

just go on

as though all were well?

When a heart has stopped

and first breath

will never be.

No need to ask, No one to tell

We take a walk down to the rivers edge,
trailing the wooden planks that host our feet above the water,
dried pine needles evoke the smell of winter,
you hold my hand,
nothing but dried brush and a chilled air greet us,
we make our way down the trail reaching a dead end,
we sit down on the platform and allow the silence to swallow us,
I dare not let go of your hand,
partially because it brings me warmth,
mostly because it is the first time I hold it without fear,
we stare at each other for hours,
I never leave that place.

Along the Pathway

Steeling herself against the cold

Looking at the path unfolding

The planks brittle and splintering

Creaking beneath her weight

Breathing in the cleansing air

Knowing her dreams

Are out here, somewhere

Searching for what she thinks

Is lost to only her

If she’d only still,

They would speak to her

Quiet the mind, slow your pace

Open up to the universal grace

Her toes catching,

on a warped and twisted board.

Catching a splinter

So deep in her center

Remove it now, before it festers

The blood and pain, oozes out

She feels it all

Clammering about

Breathing in deeply

She sighs relief

If only

The peace

Wasn’t so brief.

 

©2016 Amanda Potter

 

Pulsed

I am beating that deep, only in your arms…

Musings of a Forgotten Sunflower

Would that I could be built by man

So that beyond my weary growth

I could be reflected and simultaneously reflect

Which would allow my structure to stand

Up above the weeds and flowers
both

Unable to upon my roots project

A strangled and cramped space

Stifiling all that goes

To my head from my toes.

Making what little sun I feel upon my face

Useless, stolen, a total waste.

Goodbyes and Other Words (half marathon #9)

I’ve never liked goodbyes.

They are not a forever sentence

Nor are they a guarantee of a final meeting,

But they do hold those possibilities.

The entire word is about possibilities.

We say goodbye because

Life is short

Life is unpredictable

Life can eliminate things

Without warning.

We say goodbye because

We have learned to expect

Every possibility.

But the last thing that we should say

To one another

Should not be

Goodbye.

We need to tell people

How we feel about them.

We need to use our words

To express

Love,

Gratitude,

And strength.

Word are our universal power,

And like goodbyes,

They possess endless possibility.

 

 

#8b

iwalk the line
you in my view
somewhere at the edge
i see it coming

you in my view
i run to meet you
i see it coming
faster than i know

i run to meet you
a smile upon my face
faster than i know
i fall for you again

a smile upon my face
i walk the line
i fall for you again
somewhere at the edge

Poem 8

Boat of empty Love

 

Sailing the boat of friendship,
Never thought of that stored bricks.
Collected to make the love wall,
Which never thought would ever fall.

The stored bricks were not strong,
As they left unburned.
Those were collected for love wall,
Lost in the hope to get another turn.

Bricks of love were left unburned,
In the fire of friendship.
Lost in the hope to get another turn,
They left as empty sticks.

In the fire of friendship,
They fell asleep.
As they left as empty sticks,
The love blew in the wind that friendship picks.

As Friends fell asleep,
Love boat shakes with a thrill.
The love blew in the wind that friendship picks,
All went wrong because of lies and tricks.

Love boat shakes with a thrill
They did not get time to fill,
All went wrong because of lies and tricks.
Boat of empty love and their unburned bricks.