Author: poetryfest

The silver trimmed tub which sat on all fours
Patiently waited through both of the wars

It yearned for the day
It could fill and then drain

The dusty old window
And creaky wood floor

Offered solace and kindness
But the tub wanted more

Chips became cracks
And leaks rot its frame

When the owner returned
Things were not quite the same

One chilly fall morning
He stumbled home drunk

He had the intention
Of washing ‘fore bed
Slick floor, drunken stupor,
Slipped, fell, hit his head
The tub’s copper walls
Were stained solid red.

He said it once,
standing in the garage,
his hands smeared with grease
from the lawnmower engine
he was coaxing back to life.

“I served because I never want you to.”

The words hung in the air
like the smell of cut grass and gasoline,
both familiar and strange.
I didn’t ask what he meant,
not then,
too young to untangle
the weight of armor and duty
from the man who taught me
how to tie my shoes and check my oil.

Later, I learned about the tanks,
the monstrous steel behemoths
he commanded,
rolling across a landscape
that must have looked more like
a nightmare than a country.
I imagined him there,
a helmet too heavy for his head,
a rifle slung over his shoulder
like an afterthought.

But what I couldn’t picture—
what I still can’t—
is the silence between battles,
the quiet hum of fear
pressing against soldiers’ chest.
The letters home,
each word a cipher,
meant to say everything
and nothing at all from them.

When he said those words to me,
I realize now,
he wasn’t talking about patriotism
or sacrifice,
but the hope that I’d never have to learn
what it feels like
to weigh your life against the life of another.

He didn’t want me to carry
the sound of shells
in my ears forever
or dream in shades of khaki and smoke.

So I listen now,
to the spaces where he doesn’t speak,
to the pause in his stories,
the moments he hands me a wrench
and shows me how to fix something
he hopes I’ll never have to break.

When we as the soldiers
Of the Army
Of cold shadows
Present our hearts
To the sun,
Let us do so
With our sabers held high,
With a chunk of flesh
On the tip.
By the courage
Of our souls
We fight as an offering,
Like a gutted stallion,
Our insides given
To the carving party
Of the King.

My earliest memory was encoded as a war zone.
Desperate screams to rescue my father from drowning
while fleeing on foot from our would-be captors.

Forced to urinate on graveyard headstones
before finding safety amongst the towering trees.
Terrified into silence as enemy choppers circled above.

We had just buried my maternal grandfather the day before.
The very next day my mother would be gone for at least 72-hours.
This is where my seven-year-old brain stopped remembering.

We never talked about what happened the day after
our papa died or the fact that almost every woman
in my family had been sexually abused.

So, the war zone of my childhood continued.
My daily alarm clock became my father
verbally abusing my mother.

My adolescence was about helping raise my
sisters’ children, who as young, single mothers
needed our mom, but mom’s depression needed me.

My battle cry became a mission to break the cycle
for myself, for my future family, for others.
I thought I had finally escaped the frontline,

but the enemy eventually found its way
to my perfectly curated front door
and didn’t bother to knock.

They barreled in with explosives
and my world crumbled like papier-mâché
left exposed in the middle of a storm.

Those sisters whose children I helped raise
sided with the enemy and said I should probably
disappear for at least 72-hours like our mother.

The father who verbally abused my mother,
publicly told strangers of my demise
while not even so much as asking if I was ok.

I realized I have been a warrior my entire life
and I am exhausted, no longer willing to sacrifice
my peace for those who would discard me.

The only peace I have ever really known
is that false sense of it offered by religion
with quid pro quo like prerequisites.

I now recognize
war and peace
require different attire.

I hereby relinquish my battle armor for peacetime garments
even if I am resigned to live my remaining years
behind the protective walls of an impenetrable fort.

i stood in the middle of a war
and held my brothers shoes
they were muddy
they were bloody
but they were his at least
the father passed me by
his hand already on his bible
when i asked him for an answer
he just pointed at my brothers boots
and fell back into the crowd

It had been years since
I’d gotten out of the Army.
No excuse then.

But someone had dumped
four bald tires on the lot line
shared with an incorrigible neighbor.

The city sent me a letter—
brusque, mean-spirited, informing me
of my violation: No tires allowed
for disposal and a fine if I did not
remove them.

I wanted the cops to fingerprint
the tires, find the miscreant
who had dumped them on my lawn.

I thought about dumping them
on that bureaucrat’s lawn
at four o’clock in the morning. Something
for him to wake up to.

I thought of writing a letter,
but it is fruitless to argue with the city.

Nothing but futility and more aggravation
in that.

So I disguised them as garbage
and dumped them at the city dump,
the Disposal Center, as the city
prefers it to be called.

When someone left a grocery cart
on my curb, I called the store
that cart belonged to,
asked them to come and retrieve it.

They did not. Fearing another letter
from the city for this detritus left on my curb,
I called the grocer again,

And again, no response.

The cart sat there gleaming in the sun.
I imagine it carried someone’s
belongings, and the homeless one
left it behind; perhaps an errant wheel
made the cart too hard to push.

Or, perhaps, someone in the neighborhood
with no resources for a car or a cab
pushed his groceries home
and left the cart on my curb.

Regardless,
I called again. Nothing. The next day
I took a crow bar and beat it to death,
bent every bit of wire on that cart,
beat it until it was nearly flat.

I took my reciprocating saw
and cut it into manageable sections,
loaded it up and took it to the dump.

I flung each piece as far as I could
far as my anger took me.
I felt justified in my anger,
felt good about winning the war.

Barbed wires

Barbed wires
Sheltered from within
God’s grace
It was all a mistake

On a cliff
Edge
No escape

Surrender
My dear
And let me whither.

Drums

Drum Drum
The beats of the dumb
The unintelligent, scrawny mass come

Known as the yewts
We are just dumb, that’s all.

We speak Ghetto grammar
We are the unintelligent, scrawny mass of the manor.

Butterfly scape

Erotella
Hatch open
Break away
Time is of the essence

Your shell is no longer a safe haven
It is poisoning you
Erotella
I beg you
Burst through
Time is of the essence

Tosena Splendida
Is awaiting you
Papilio is circling you
Eupale illuminates
Fenutia sparkles
Mynes is lightening

Strike
Heliconius the devil
Come on

You outshine them all
Come out
We want you.
Now.

Plaster

The smoothed edged plaster,
The crowning cornices,
The ornamental mouldings,
The gilded dome of doom.
Oh, the mishaps.

That tweaks and rips
For every sole footstep
Is a silent cry
Of an imprisoned youth.

Youth

Pleading cries
No value of life

A bullseye on my back

Trying to be the light
Of my parents’ eyes

Armed and discharged

Contact lost
Denial at its finest

An impossible youth

Penalty

Plea of guilt
Discharged and met with shame

Payment of dysfunction
Repute of reality

Right or wrong
State of mind undecided

Testimonial controversy
Theories of psyche

Youth explained
An ‘infant brain’

Plea of guilt
Discharged and met with shame.

Pack

God’s law of superiority
Can you differentiate between the two?

Prosecute

Refusal to speak
Incapable of speech
The odd movement
A head tilt here and there
Unbathed and unkempt
A dishevelled old man
Silenced.

good heavens, what do I do now?
I have a text to finish… soon
It’s a light blue typewriter
a bit less blue than when I bought it
and a bit more muddier than when I bought it
Because, good heavens
holy shit
My typewriter fell into the mud!
What do I do know?
A muddy typewriter isn’t really practical
it’s difficult to type, to type
to write, to write
and I have a text to finish… soon
I fear I will never finish it
holy shit
it’s all over! OVER
I can’t write, write
I will never be a poet…
My typewriter fell into the mud!

On a cold snowy night
You told me you lost interest
It hit me out of nowhere
Just like that, it was done
No remorse at all

The snow started falling
More and more,
I was heartbroken
My thoughts were stopped
And frozen in awe

I went outside to watch the snow
My fingers were freezing
But I didn’t care
I get lost in glistening snowflakes
Watching the snow shimmer

My fingers started to hurt from the
Striking cold air,
Before I knew it, frostbite
But I’d rather get frostbite,
Then relive that moment
Of true coldness

Flowers hit pavement, petals fall
Arrival stalls
For what reason?
Tis the season?

Red roses, sent as message of love
But it’s a shove
Meant as sorry
His hopes starry

The apology is too late
He was not fate
She wants him gone
She just feels conned