The Poetry Marathon

“The Adventure”

I’m back up on my feet!

I will succeed!

I’m doing this for me!

So, don’t call me WEAK.

Don’t try to get in my way.

If you’re not here to support me, you’re no longer welcome to join me on this journey!

The adventure is HALF the fun of getting there!

Yes, life is going to try and change your plans.

Sometimes you have to detour.

Maybe today, I didn’t make the mark.

But that’s never going to stop me from trying again!

So yes, I will succeed.

Because the way you measure success is differently than me.

Now, are you coming or not?

I can guarantee
Beyond a shadow of a doubt
That you will find love someday

Your soul will cry out
When you meet them
And weep to realize they were

Waiting for you their whole life
And you have been waiting
For them.

And when you find that love
You will hold on and let go
You will find a way to be with them

You will climb mountains
Swim oceans
And move continents for them

You will shakedown
The whole earth
Just to hear them say ‘I love you, too’.

So don’t tell me you’ll remain alone
Because I sure as hell know you won’t
Not really.

You just haven’t yet found
The one who sparks your soul
And leaves you breathless

In the sight or presence of them
You will find yourself weak
And they’ll be there to catch you

When others had let you fall.
Even if it seems impossible-
You will wait or you will fight

to be the one to hold them
from now through the afterlife.

Hour 10, Prompt 18, Year 2021

It’s Friday afternoon but there’s no parties
Such is the story of quarantine
Work is over but it all feels the same
Can’t tell Friday from Monday or Tuesday
As this nightmare drags on and on and on
In someone’s mind, a bright idea takes form
We switch from our work files to Airbnb
And decide to embark on a little journey
We drive a few hundred miles north
Already, we feel reborn
We enter a beautiful vacation home
And forget everything that had happened before
All of our anxiety and fear
And the trauma from the first half of the year
In times like this, the littlest of things
Are unparalleled in the happiness they bring
Next morning, as the sunlight streams in
We wake up in a warm blue cabin
Instead of skyscrapers, we see rolling hills
Little bluebirds on the windowsills
We manage a quick walk outside
Not another soul far and wide
And then we sit by a large window
With hot coffee and warm fresh oats
Ready to start our work for the day
Working, but still partially on holiday
It’s true that quarantine seems the worst at times
So when you see an opening, catch that little ray of light

I am trying to tell you
but knife-edged dry ribbons
spill from my mouth.

You ask what happened.
I tell you about the humiliation,
the intimidation.

The lies told to embarrass
to destroy trust; to break apart the bonds we shared
to which he was not a part.

I remember the threats of physical violence,
isolating me from others;
feeling vulnerable and unsafe at work and where I lived.

Almost wanting the blows to fall
to shatter the anticipation of not knowing
when they would come

But he was clever
drawing the torment out to its apex
always just short of culmination

amplifying a festering heat of fear and hate.
You ask
and I am trying to tell you.

But you interrupt
and say, I thought something really awful happened.
I thought you were raped.

What, this doesn’t measure up?

Am I to choke up these ribbons of pain
until they unfurl and twist at your feet,
a pretty bow?

Until they make of this something you can understand,
something
really awful?

These knife-edged memories
are no longer to my taste.
I’m going.

My throat is sore;
time for waiting is
over.

Hr. 6 Prompt 18
Picture Image: Shloka Shankar

Can you not hear that
The movement is irritating
Rushing, rushing- stopping
Faster, faster- slowing

My mind is all over the place
Can you not hear that
I know it’ll be over soon
Just be still, and listen

Wind blowing

Leaves rustling

Birds chirping

A rooster crows

A dog barks

Twigs snapping

Creek flowing

My heart

Happy

Sirens wake me
when most we
want to sleep
before
another day
demands our stay.
A day to
restore

and best keep
hopes we steep
like tea –
full,
brimming warm,
cupped in form,
still.

Butterflies dance in the sun
A dragonfly joins them
The children have made a new friend.

In the culpable darkness of the shadows, there is a thin stream of light, bordering the darkness, shining mutedly- patient, and cynical of the possibility of dawn or rainbows

Homely little pockets of grief simmer at the edges, waiting to be cultivated by greedy words. At the porch there are streams of dust revealed to the eyes blinded by light

Beyond the darkest corners, stand the grey domains of remedial relationships, vouching for a healing as one bleeds. Countering it nothing noteworthy happens

At the gates in the distance, a humble matador leans on to the armoury of death, promising nothing, relinquishing nothing, pedalling a fate foretold.