Bulletproof

Security and obliviousness for skinny child

With temperament mild,

Never a bruise

And never a ruse.

Until this solid home

Rose up into a treehouse

Just to fall back to the ground.

Debris scattered

None of it mattered

Not the trickle of doubt

Left glinting in the grout

That never made itself obvious before

But I can’t not see it now.

Having been so sure

In a family secure,

Talk so big

The walk was doubly disappointing.

I’m left swinging in branches above

Wondering if I should come down at all.

If too much of a good thing

Isn’t a good thing

Was it ever really good?

Was I fed deceit for breakfast?

My people eating it themselves

Gulping down hot mouthfuls

To make themselves believe?

Why did I never doubt?

So eager to trust

In planks so thoroughly knotty,

So unwilling to question

What I thought was bulletproof.

What can come next

What steps could I take

When ones who held me taking my first

Broke their deepest promises?

Where could I even start

When all I knew was contentment

Suddenly stripped away.

I wonder if it had been wretched all the while

Would it have been easier.

– Vagabond Prophet

Black Out

Trees fall on lines and everything goes dark

The knight has fallen

The night has risen

Suddenly and with no warning.

Like the deepest parts of the ocean

Not yet explored

I delve into closet corners

That I never knew before.

We’d play games

To make the time pass

To laugh away the darkness.

Hide and seek

With everybody hidden,

Scavenger hunts,

For the daylight that we sought.

Amidst stubbed toes

And flashes of smiles with no bodies,

We found family enough shelter

In blackest of blackouts.

As quick as quicksand beneath my feet

Everything comes back with lightning speed,

Ironic, as lightning started all of this.

Hearing furnace pump

A heartbeat ahead of the lights,

Ready or not here I come..

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @mildreflections for prompting @josy57 and I with “When the lights go off.”

Bags under eyes, lids propped open regretfully. Blood slows in a traffic jam uncharged by adequate rest. Steps shorten and stumble. A slingshot, a catapult, a trebuchet will do, give me velocity to find my way to you. Fling me high and send me soaring across the night sky, skip me across calm waters, nock me on your bowstring and give me shrewdest point for wherever you’re aiming today.

Vagabond Prophet

Courage

The war won by cowards.

Not heroes strong and true

Always knowing what to do.

Skinny little boys

Fear rattling their bones

Terror shaking their hands

Trying to aim at heads and hearts

Similarly quaking.

Souls such as these won every war

Girding their loins

Deciding action to protect their own,

To defeat the enemy,

To take back the land

More important than their fright.

The cost is great,

Young men upon dying

Finally sharpened their fear

Into courage in acts of debut bravery.

And now remembered as heroes

As they should be.

Courage casting its lustrous shadow

Backwards upon all past deeds

Redeeming them before falling on its sword.

– Vagabond Prophet

4.5 Hours

4.5 hours sleep

Is not enough to support

Corporate expectations.

I’ll just hope that

I get all my stumbling out

Into this journal.

Oh that my sleeplessness

Transformed to black ink

Would take forms

Unthought of in wakefulness.

So I’ll bleed ink

Until the prolonged blink

Where they begin to

Carve my headstone

With keen edged tools

And heavy blows.

They’ll lower to the grave

Luckily shaped like bed

Then and then only will I rest.

– Vagabond Prophet

Remnant

Oh son with limber ligaments,

Elastic mind and sinew,

Let what remains of your youth

Stretch much further than mine has,

Let your vigour for adventure

Weather many winters.

Let your glittering eyes

Shine through every storm.

Spend your days in innocence

Picking flowers for your mother

And learn nothing of

The treachery of lechery.

Clothe yourself in all things joyful

And arm yourself with skills uncommon

Building bridges to others

Not walls to keep them out.

The flame that burns so brightly

If reduced to embers can survive,

Being blown into action days later

By desperate measures

From desperate lungs.

My lungs.

I’ll be your bellows

To forge within you

Strength I only heard of in age.

You’ll be better than me,

An anchor, a muster point

A lighthouse.

For those surviving the blight

Of those spectres in the night

And for all of them you’ll point

To the rising son.

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @josy57 for the prompt “what remains of your youth”

Deprived

Not enough hours in the day

So I carve into the night

With shrewd ambition

And blades waved blindly,

Forgetting its importance.

So many words in my brain

Rushing to get out

I see a splash and can’t tell

If it’s a jumping fish

Or just my foot at the other end

Of the bath.

Things in my mind stumble out

With little to no coaxing

Found strolling in cursive.

I’ve got battlecries pouring out fingers

And when the muse courses through

I’m it’s slave.

Take my sleep,

Let me eat not but toast

Allow me no reprieve

From the onslaught.

I can’t go back to drought

Not again.

Protect me from the rivers streams

Becoming desert floors,

I can’t bare to see the current

Turn to dust.

– Vagabond Prophet

Virgin Forests

Through virgin forests

And unplucked gems

Twisted vines

Thoughts do stem.

Stroll through winding trails

And I’m nearly planted

By the weight of glory

Pressing me into the earth.

Almost sprouting roots

And taking up residence

In the innocence of things green.

Step back, run home

Think about this maybe forever,

Famous last words.

In my comfort zone,

Where nothing satisfies

And nothing is better than me

Lenses only blur

And spinning the reel

Only lengthens distance between

Me and dreams of late.

Where my appetite can consume,

Crunching through anything

To enjoy a fleeting taste

Of something not even real.

Next time I’ll do it

I will spread roots deep

Shoot my everything

Into the richness of the soil

The only true kingdom on earth.

Keep my ideals high

So I can’t taint or splinter

Keep my foundation low

So I can stand upon it.

Finally find somewhere

For my teeth to be defeated

Turned to dust by a truth

So much harder than themselves.

– Vagabond Prophet

Thank you @josy57 for the prompt “Virgin Forests”

Chattering

Sails flick while chattering

To the wind deciding

How to best throw itself

Into its arms.

Port rocks to starboard

And back again

While I’m throwing my insides

Over the rail into the sea.

Mainsail catches and off we go

Pushed along by nothing

Except the breath of the sea

My stomach as a sacrifice.

The water decides most things

And today to swell and fall

Bucking like a horse.

It’s just the risk you take

When you let her be herself.

– Vagabond Prophet

Such a passionate love

As to spill past covers front and back

And into my veins.

So if I must bleed I bleed for love

Your sacrifice surging forth

From my languid vessels

And into plain sight.

Where devils and angels

Fly unseen by those of us with skin.

Vagabond Prophet