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When reached by phone
Your face proclaimed
That haunted look—the one
Which has become the rule
Rather than
The exception now—the one
Which hangs so permissively on your features—the one
Which has subtracted your once noble façade,
The curves and minute indentations
Which made your beauty formidable.
I can sense this immediately
From the low quiver in your voice, the
Resignation dripping and eroding
Cruel avenues down your ashen cheeks.
Don’t reach for another pill, I ache to shout
But I know, I know, you’ll fire down 4 or 5
Of the Ocean blue ones the moment we
disconnect
And then you’ll
Secure their safe passage with two
Welcome swallows of ice cold gin
Without a faint flutter of your whispergold lashes.

I bathe with the words that nourished my soul,
These emotions ran through the very being of my existence.
All that is there are epiphanies that wake my spirit,
Every tingling sensations that I can afford to feel,
Some feelings I cannot afford to have but cannot lose.

Leaving the moment of the fleeting memories that haunts me,
The strength I found to seek salvation within myself,
Refocusing and balancing with what is left with my essence,
Humming to the sounds of calmness and resolution.
Finally coming to conclusion.

To see what dreams may come,
Glowing in the daylight and even at night,
Me, myself, and I all rolled into one,
Fighting is not a solution to this debatable argumentation,
Fairness I see, the only solution.

Achieving happiness may sometime be a struggle,
All good things should be free and unchained.
Struggle and pain felt are my stepping-stone to awakening,
I found the passion within me.

At the peak of my existence,
I finally found worthiness within myself,
To never be inferior to what bad mouthed people say.
With the realization, that each of us deserve to blossom,
Be part of the society,
To set forth and be the magnificent gem cut from a rugged stone.

The hour has arrived for us to act.
You and I, we are both concerned.
Our environment is threatened.
We long to save it, and not see ourselves perish.

As conscious beings,
We must to make life livable in our world
Obeying its natura l laws and principles
Will bring forth a better life.

Our responsibility grows greater and greater,
And our answers less useful, changing day by day.
Oh my God, what then should we a ll do?

Faced with this alarming situation,
Should not we see ourselves as one single family,
Striving for a world that is our only consolation?

I am that black boy tamed away
like a slapdash pellet fired into a space

without behest. I cleaved with everything
I see. I, too, must survive in this race.

I have many razors in my body already;
My father, who was killed by his own car

like a cacoon seed hearsed under the ground.
My mother turned grief to a wrapper—swathed

around her torso. Each time we pray, grief
hunt on us till it stole my mother’s soul, too.

I wonder the kind of mutualistic affairs we
shared. I still want to believe, “blood is thicker

than water.” But everything in my own family—
love, ecstasy & bloodline—are watery. They

dissolve in hasty into the air.
I was wallowed like a tattered cloth.

I am here again, to make this redemption
an ink and wet my grief with poetry.

© Lillian Brummet (www.BrummetMedia.ca) Sept 30, 2021

I woke to find a familiar weight on my chest.
It pressed and crushed the air from my lungs,
Shredding and shattering something inside;
I felt the crackle and the sharp stab in my heart.
My chin drops, I glance down at my chest
To see the familiar grey, wrinkled foot
The ivory toes spread across my chest.

As my gaze travelled upwards, our eyes met
Hers full of regret, remorse, sympathy, empathy…
…Sorrow.
Mine, full of the awestruck knowing – it has come.

Yes Grief, the elephant, visited me again
And I do not feel angry… this time.
I saw Grief’s compassion
Her eyes spoke to me “I am sorry, but you must go through this.”
It made me think of the dentist, having recently been…
Does she, hands loaded with syringe and tray full of tools,
Does she say to herself:
“I am sorry, but you must go through this”
Just before entering the abyss?

Yes Grief, the elephant, visited me again.
Though her stay was quite brief
The ache of my lungs
The throbbing pain in my heart
Will not let me forget the weight,
Nor the damage that remains.

…I shakily continue
Busy work spreads out my ability to focus
And relive her visit.

I met a man once.
He was everything,
everything I was supposed to want.
He,
brought coffee to bed in the morning,
gave massages before I went to sleep,
drew me a bath after a cold winter walk,
held up coats and opened doors,
was thoughtful and listened.
Wanted a life with me.
Wanted me in his life.
All of me,
all of me, it seemed.
Me
and a sparkly karat on the third finger of my left hand.
Me
his hand on my thigh and the other on the steering wheel of a jaguar XJ50.
Me
and a house with a back yard.
Me
and 2 to 4 car seats in the mini van we’ll drive to soccer games and ballet classes
Me
and a Sunday roast every week when he gets back from golf.
Everything.
He wanted that life and that life was, everything.
And he wanted me
in it.
And Hollywood taught me to want him.
Him.
And that.
All of that.
Of course,
what else is there to want?
You’re a fool if you don’t.
What else is there to want?

Well I don’t know,
a life outside of prison maybe?
My greatest misery came from rejecting that perfection.
How dare I betray this rom com bliss?
How dare I not accept God’s gift?
How dare I choose myself over what Hollywood has laid out for me?
How dare I see through what my lover sees in me?
How dare I realize that that’s not love?
How dare I walk away from what could have been?

Did I doubt and hate myself for not being able to “love”?
Yes.
Did a part of me believe I gave up every chance of ever finding happily ever after?
Yes.
Did I consider going back and suck up the misery so at least I would fit in?
Yes.
But guess what,
dazzling diamonds
aren’t worth shit
if you wake up every morning and can’t breathe,
if you look into a man’s eyes and all you see is a Macy’s mannequin who likes it when you wear lingerie
and thinks
that’s who you are.

So,
I killed off Cinderella.
I walked away from a fairy tale that was never gonna be one.
I spiraled into pain and darkness, yes.
Had question marks so threatening that I almost crumbled.

But only that way,
finally,
I used my beating heart as a compass.
Tasted freedom I never had a clue existed.
All because,
I murdered the queen of Disney.
She has no place in our stories,
she can’t tell us where to go.
All she is,
is scribbles on a screen and thinks she knows love.
Thinks she knows everything.
I thought,
she gave me everything,
everything that is nothing.
Nothing but a lesson to find in us what only we can see.
If we just,
kill off Cinderella.

in the wind blown nearby park, tall trees twist and dance .

in the far-flung world, war, famine, drought, and death stalk the living.

But flowers blossom and the earth births a return to life.

http://dskane.com

Whoever described them as butterflies,
Did not see her face
Did not hear her laugh
Or smell her magical scent
An earthquake shook my very core
When she smiled at me,
With her head tilted and her curls descending,
Her shoulders and my heart
She walked closer to me
And I forgot to breathe
Her hand touched my arm
“You ok?” she asked
I was not ok that day
I was reborn

If I could see today a tomorrow of many years to come, would I see a world at peace where human beings care for all in times of need? Would I see a humanity that has overcome its selfish and indigent behavior? If I could see today a tomorrow of many years to come, would I see the beauty of the earth in all its grandeur? Would I breathe clean air and drink pure water? If I could see today a tomorrow of many years to come, would I see all who are different accepted and all who believe coexisting? Or, if I could see today a tomorrow of many years to come, would I see a world still entangled in hatred, bigotry, and the mistreatment of all citizens of the world?

I pray that today there are tomorrows of many years to come.

Phifer E. Howell

Never MORE not to say will be today

Today That’s all there is to say Today will be tomorrow
the telescope without a compass
the swan song
the wet morning
the summer sun
the aqueous lamp

tremor
night without thought
TREE WITH BARELY A FLOWER

dromedary roots

CITY WITHOUT DOGMAS AND WITH STARS
NEVER SAY MORE IS GOOD FOR YOU

say perhaps tomorrow a whisper a murmur of clawed walls

BETTER SAY TOMORROW

Ileana A.Gómez Gavinoser (2022)