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Letters Unsent

You began to grow hazy

At the edge of my memory,

Sharpening your knife

On the spinning wheel of my mind.

You took my foggy view

Folding to make some clarity

Shouting words unkind

About different timelines unexplored

Involving strange knots in ropes

Involving headstones with your name.

I lied to you that day,

Left letters unsent, clinging to my tongue

Like bungee jumpers that

Can’t trust the harness won’t

Stretch into oblivion.

I was so shaken by your absence

I couldn’t tell you the truth

So I said nothing at all for months.

I left letters unsent

Words blurred on tear soaked pages.

I grew past you in a year

Like a bamboo grows past an oak,

Me young and strong, sprouting suddenly

You old and creased and resonating

Of my childhood forests

Where we’d collect the biggest leaves.

Now I can see you were

Marred from the start

With regrets running so deep

As to be confused with roots.

You were small and passionate

And you made human mistakes,

I’m strong now,

Like a plant forced to climb

The cracks in the sidewalk.

Stronger for it

And marked by it.

The letters are burned now

And we can embrace again

Though I still get confused

Whether I’m looking up at you

Down at you

Or if we’re at last on level ground.

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @josy57 for prompting me with “letters unsent.”

Brushfire

Your mother said I wasn’t right

Not serious enough,

Now we laugh until we’re pink

Thinking of being with anyone else.

Resonating something deep inside me

I didn’t even know needed vibration.

I was kindling

You were a match

Together we’re a brushfire.

Burning and spreading until

Our love insisted on having

Skin of its own.

Now you’re a mother

And I’m a father

And together

We are the stewards

Of the miraculous.

– Vagabond Prophet

@delightfulharmonypoetry

Bang the Drum

I bang the drum just with my thumb

Till the knuckles gone numb,

Both the drum skin and mine hurting

And better for it.

Safety never inspired

Any marching orders,

Calm seas never filled

Any sails,

And the pursuit of safety

Never protected the innocent.

Denatured eggs turn white with heat

And in turn give me strength.

Ironic that to spread some hope

I need to scratch out my doubt,

Burn away with love something

Terrible but naturally part of me.

Ironic not like the boss cracking jokes

While firing you,

Ironic like a vaccination scar

That resilience should be marked by harm.

Fight your nature,

Fight the cancer that makes

You cower in the night

And walk past the hungry.

Wrestle and arrest

The thoughts that push you

To hurt just out of curiosity,

Like thieves lacking nothing

Only doing it for sport.

Don’t be so alarmed when good news

Threatens your way of life

It only seeks to remind you

It’s always been a way of death.

– Vagabond Prophet

– Thanks @josy57  for the prompt “denatured.” It’s always a joy.

mildreflections:

Fruits of the Spirit #5

Self-Control as defined by the poetic dictionary:

To take a breath and count to ten, dissolving vehemence without spiting venom. To hold your ground and be the bigger man, even if your world is in mayhem and the frenzy overwhelms.  

Other definitions include:

· To want patiently, never forcing or pushing for things forbidden.

·  Never crossing the line between desire and greed, knowing the worth of               morals over ambition.

·  Letting ripples of stones gently pass, finding stillness soon enough.

Synonyms Include:

·  Patience

·  Calm

·   Balanced

Antonyms Include:

·  Hot headed

·  Reckless

·  Careless

Self- control is to love cookies but never finish the box, always keeping something for the rest of us.

                                            -Mild Reflections

Pleased to be working with @vagabondprophet. Thank you for bearing with my delay.  

I like this a lot, beyond pleased to be collaborating with you on this, I can’t think of anybody I’d rather tackle this with. Check this blog out people it’s amazing.

Return to Sender

I opened the letter as it arrived

Hoping it would buoy her spirits

And diminish the long shadows ahead

Only to find the screen displaying

A line flatter than a prairie.

The code blue was issued

And skilled men and women

Sprang into action

Making the bed springs squeak

Their emergency made plain.

I should be used to this by now,

Death is part of every life,

Irony is cruel sometimes,

Just like the irony of a body bag

That insists on sterile packaging.

As though the dead would complain

About the cleanliness of

Their final sleep.

The medicine we needed

Not found in this world,

Now here we are hoping

She can still find it somehow

The fountains of joy

And streams of love

No doctor can prescribe.

I am sorry but I must

Return this to sender

For the woman in my care

Has died this afternoon.

A letter from one heart

To another no longer beating.

– Vagabond Prophet

– Thanks @josy57 for the prompt “The medicine we need”

There’s me
And then there’s you
And all I want to do
Is climb into your heart
To make in me a fresh start.

Dissolve like sugar
In those warm cleansing waters
No longer able to discern
Where I end and you begin.

Vagabond Prophet

delightfulharmonypoetry:

vagabondprophet:

Hurricane

I don’t believe in true love

Or in soulmates

But I know what happened to me

And I believe in  addiction.

You did not screech or beseech

With kissable lips

And raised eyebrow

With clever fingers set your snare.

I was yours.

You hooked me

With the efficiency of a hurricane,

I became forever yours.

– Vagabond Prophet

@delightfulharmonypoetry

How crafty, I seem. But I do not recall it quite that way. 

Around the corner you might find him, they said to me. 
Turn the right or left and there he will be 
Cautiously I inched around each turn that came about
For fear that a pair of eyes and lips would wipe me clear out

There was no corner when I saw you
Just the bones of trees reaching to sky
The brown and gold of burnt grass lost to summer
With clouds ashen blue bearing no lie

Honey gold, ice blue you smiled
They flocked to you, bees to flower
Children to sugar, and all the while…

Roots became of my feet, 
Whispers buzzed in my ears, 
The triple flap of a hummingbird’s wing where my heart used to be

All that time wasted, peeking around corners
But it was the trees that hid you, the clouds that gave you asylum
Attacked without warning, I was
An ambush

Run, said my mind, rational where the rest of me set to fire
Run, for there he is. 
There he is there is he is. 

Mister Right. 

I am glad I tore the roots of my feet from the earth, 
Spun on my heel and set to fleeing
For while you were Mister Right

I was yet Miss Not-Ready.

@vagabondprophet

I’ve wracked my mind

And combed the ashes

But this tale can not recall

For you fled fast and fled well.

You were gone before I saw you,

Naturally I tell the story differently,

The next several years afterwards

I can only theorize.

You were biding your time

And stocking your weapons

Braiding curiosity with courage

To fortify yourself.

You waged a cold war

With a hot body

And a warm tongue.

Studying my heartstrings from afar

Learning which ones to tug

To bring it all crashing down.

The first day I recall seeing you

I recall your pose, and your hat

Slouched nonchalant on the couch

Looking radiant and speaking thoughtfully.

You sharpened and blunted me

In equal measure,

Always useless for the task at hand

Except for finding yours.

Ten long years later and

Your presence is indelibly

Pressed into my heart.

You sunkissed beauty,

You steward of joy and kindness,

You exquisite queen of our little kingdom.

– Vagabond Prophet

@delightfulharmonypoetry