Ten Year Reunion

Some looking the same while others new inventions,

Some with different coloured hair and others with thinning,

Some still learning and others still choosing not to learn.

More chapters in every story,

Woe and joy mixed up

Like a cocktail we’re now old enough to drink.

All those years ago I had been in a storm,

And though I didn’t know all of them

They were the other rocks that the spray fell on.

I the most prominent point

For the breakers to break upon

In the tempest of my youth,

But they were there too

And I mustn’t forget that when

People at home left

They never did.

Stupid, smart, ugly, and cute alike

Their familiarity something I could count on.

Ten years later and I’m nearly rebuilt,

Strong and safe and surely surrounded by love

As I near completion I’m reminded

Their may be some stones here yet worth keeping.

– Vagabond Prophet

Real Rainbow

I’ve known anger burning red

And despair oh so blue,

Envy green and cowardice yellow.

I’ve had my countenance turn black

Under a sky of grey

A real rainbow of disdain.

I am not lazy or sloth like as of late,

Come here touch my brow

And feel the residue of my toil

That brings me naught but rot.

Until you came into my life

Breaking dams that held nothing in only out

Flooding dry lake beds

And sprouting gardens where there was dust.

Because of your works not mine

I can call myself justified in time,

A second hand treasure

Better than anything wrought

By these calloused hands.

You can still feel the sweat on my body

See it drip onto a brown soil

Watch me work a land green and budding

See the sun set red

And rise brightest yellow.

I can push off into a vast blue sea

And not care if I sail or get swallowed

For both is to be loved.

You’ve carried me in your shadow of light

Through the deepest blacks

Protected by your majesty

Into a brand new country

With brand new colours

A real rainbow of joy.

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @josy57 for prompting me with “Second Hand Treasures.”

Night Sky Conservatory

Do you remember the night sky conservatory?

The time we picked the lock at the gate

Snuck in after dark?

So innocent we felt like criminals.

Little did we know we were stealing

Each other’s hearts.

Do you remember the blanket I spread out

Beneath the stars that slowly revealed themselves

One constellation at a time?

Learning that darkness and light

Can really coexist quite beautifully,

Each gaining significance from the other.

Do you remember the bats

Scattering their silhouettes

Across our unhindered gaze?

Do you remember the creature

Moving not far away?

Do you wonder as I do,

If it was our budding affection manifest

To warn us we were falling?

Do you remember when you said,

“That was my first kiss”

And your very words

Altered my body chemistry?

Do you remember from all the years gone by

Amidst the tangled breaths and foggy windows,

All the vapours of pleasure

Turning into solid child?

How could I not believe in magic

When what I’ve known with you

Is the opposite of tragic?

– Vagabond Prophet

@delightfulharmonypoetry

Fireside Memories

Some trains won’t return to station

Yet as I travel long I see

Limbs tossed aside.

The thin arms that carried me thus far

Cast into the ditch

Now flaunt no leverage

Only strength,

Now travelling at great length

Finding enough pieces for a creature.

Pieced together makes a person

That I sit with at fireside,

Telling stories until stars illuminate

More than last remaining embers.

Telling me my own tales

That are strangely familiar

Yet gone unthought of for years.

Young enough to think

The weather man made decisions

Rather than predictions,

A man behind a desk with buttons

Overwhelmed by choice

And always choosing to be unkind,

Rather than a simple man

Trying his best to convey bad news.

Old enough to know that

Black is the colour for mourning

Because it attracts the most heat

Those grieving hearts need

As much as they can get,

Almost like an embrace.

Watching moving pictures with the neighbour

Father implores me to send him home,

Takes me to the driveway where

Man’s best friend is wrapped

In a yellow wool blanket.

People came to help

Digging a hole next to the tree

That reached halfway to heaven.

Now his bones are turned to soil

That roots wriggle against

To further their kingdom

Spreading fingers spreading shadows

On a boy fallen fully awake and weeping.

He’d been companion

He’d been protector

He’d played catcher and outfielder,

But most of all

He’d played my friend.

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @josy57 for prompting @mildreflections and I with “dismembering a memory”. A great prompt, hope I did a halfway decent job with it.

Shapeless

Souls, water, wind,

Angels, demons, and love.

Things most likely to dance

Between polar opposites of good and evil

Can’t take shape, won’t take shape.

Molded my nurturing and vitriol,

Only shaped by what it pushes against,

I’ve been shaped by a God above

That loves me somehow,

A devil below

That loves me like

A beautiful yet poisonous plant.

I’m shaped by people on either side

That love me wonderfully

And hurt me wonderfully.

A candle burned at every side

Not just at the ends

Until all that’s left is wick.

Needing something to slow my melt

But God is above and that doesn’t work

Until he turns me upside down

Whispering in my ear,

“I’ll shape you masterfully.”

Cut away the gnarled bits

Sand the rough edges.

Wipe stain upon the wood

Bringing out the grain

That needs that touch

To come to the surface.

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @mildreflections for prompting @josy57 and I with “the shape of a soul.

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

Shackles

Punish me brutally

Lock me up in shackles

Give me what I deserve.

All these years I’ve begged

Just to get what I’m owed

Only to realize

There is nothing worse.

Now learning my earnings

Are what you’ve saved me from

I’ll swear my allegiance

To your promise

That doesn’t fit on paper.

Who else has threatened death

With life

And won?

– Vagabond Prophet

Wrought Iron

Watching her preen herself with envy green

Attempts to sharpen herself

on the surface of you

Only left her more dull.

Shavings scattered on the ground in a rainbow arc.

By this method you’ve been tempered,

From fire to water and back again.

This is what the bellows wrought

A blade both cunning and beautiful.

Wrought iron sought no siren

To draw attention to herself,

Unlike the one who gouged bits out

To begin this brutal work,

The catalyst of forges holy.

I’m no dummy I know

What swords are made for

I’ve only nicked my knuckles

And I can’t imagine the blows you’ve known

To become this instrument honed.

But you don’t use your edge

For causing harm, pain, or alarm

Rather to protect the loved ones you collect

A guardian, a safe place, a strong defender.

– Vagabond Prophet

Prompt Day 26

The irony of pleasant weather

When we learned we’re not to be together.

The currents of discontent

Loosening you from the riverbed.

Nearly thirty long years of marriage,

Erosion is a persistent thing.

I think you taught me that

Driving past canyons

Above river beds long gone dry

Water having spent itself

On carving things uncarvable.

The worst storm for me was this

Most strange in its calmness.

No screaming match

No begging at the door.

Excepting of course for

The screaming match days later

Where I spoke my greatest lie.

The cold front met the warm front

Swirling around dancing beautiful

Save for its destruction

Ash clouds floating down

To smother what was left.

I said very little.

What is there to say

To the one who taught you speech

When he leaves.

Plates shifting earth quaking

I was shaken awake

By a thirst unslaked.

I’m not thirsty anymore,

And we still touch

Though from opposite sides

Of the canyon.

– Vagabond Prophet

– Today’s prompt:

Write about the worst storm you’ve ever experienced.

So this might be cheating but it’s what came to mind.

Prompt Day 24

I tied a hangman’s noose

Within the womb

Around my neck was slung

And from those gallows swung.

I was six days late

The pressure wouldn’t abate

I’ve always been

Afraid of change.

I came out looking blue

Foreshadowing how I’d feel

Writing this at all.

I was timid, I was quiet,

Sleeping days away.

Always compliant

Never outspoken.

Obedient, a good kid

They’d say.

Now looking back as a man

With fissures throughout my heart

I think it’s not that simple.

Never outspoken sure,

For every strongly expressed opinion

Was shouted, and frightened

This gentle child into quietness.

So I grew with roots reluctant

To claim soil another may one day want,

Older brothers younger sister

More abrasive than I.

I like tile they like sandpaper,

Every attempt to rough me up

Only made me smoother.

One day I was called to manhood

By nothing but necessity.

At an age that couldn’t be expected

To swing a hammer well.

Hell I couldn’t even swing a decision yet

How could I possibly step into shoes

Strangely unworn before

And with strength strike

The nail on the head.

I filled those shoes in time

Sometimes feeling room still

By my big toe.

I swung a decision,

I’d be the man I wanted to be

To be different than the example.

A timid trailblazer still covers ground,

A kite broken free may crash,

Or fly higher than ever imagined.

The world needs good men

I’ll fill that need or die trying,

She needed me to be more,

My soul began
To grow chest hair.

So that’s where I’m from

There’s my past laid out.

My future?

Well that’s up to me isn’t it.

– Vagabond Prophet