Original Poetry about anything and everything.
The surgical blade
The drape that was laid
Upon skin built up for years.
Flat on your back
Ragged breath gone slack
Clamp down the mask
Begin the task.
The harm always starts
Before the healing can,
The cracking of ribs
The loss of blood.
If this is you
Going under the knife,
Remember some go a lifetime
With nobody seeing their heart,
For the struggling pump that it is
Trying to bale out a boat
Under constant downpour.
– Vagabond Prophet
“Bags under my eyes
Hammocks in disguise”— Vagabond Prophet
This is exhaustion
This is where my mind hibernates
And my arms and legs
By rote accomplish much.
No path less traveled
Was ever tread by rote
No trails blazed by bravery
Ever made half aware.
Shock me with lightning
Make my smile frightening
Scatter the bones of the strong
Into the soil of the weak,
Inferior they rise
With nobody paying any mind.
With banners high
And sharpened spears
Remembering the pain
Throughout all the years.
Though these thoughts may abate
My soul I prostrate
Riddle me with tumors
Spread vicious rumors
Leave me torn asunder
From every past blunder.
– Vagabond Prophet
What good can come
From his habit of sleeplessness?
Is this your question,
Friend that ones easy.
It’s true summer is defeated
By the frozen blows of winter
Yet winter begets spring.
The ore scorched by fire
And beaten by the hammer
Turns into brilliant jewelry.
All my hobbies and interests
All of my leisure and yard work
Put on the bottom shelf
Just for a time.
This brief opportunity
To affect change in the lives
Of desperate children
With no place to rest their head,
Is worth every minute of rest
That I put to death on the altar
Of servitude.
Are you sure? Is it working?
Do your yawns create some virtue
Does your unrested mind
Really get any good work done?
You queried
Arms crossed
Smirk pulled up high
Like a flag on holiday.
In midwestern climate
Can you trust good weather
Long enough to shed
Your cynical husk?
The sunrise is majestic
Whether I’m waking
Or not yet found my bed.
It is brilliance like this
I was made to reflect
And my silver mind
Pounded into mirror
By this bludgeoning war
Of attrition will serve me well.
I care not for
The scathing mockery
For I know that through strife
I may find
The unpopped kernels
Of my genius.
– Vagabond Prophet
@josy57 Thank you for the prompt “On the bottom shelf” I enjoyed that.
Like a shooting star
Could my death inspire
The minds of those
Standing far enough away
To only see the beautiful
The luminous.
Having stood any closer
They may observe
I carry as much darkness as light
But in the night sky
It’s a fact I hope to hide.
Having come from
One of those voids
That we still bother naming,
That I may one day
Land on a tangled
And ropy shore and climb
My way to legend.
Crawl to higher ground
To see my own fiery wake
Burn the gaze of watchers
Take their thirst to slake.
– Vagabond Prophet
First date I brought you a blue rose
You said nobody had ever given you one before.
A blue rose?
No.
A flower.
I couldn’t believe it,
You, my pride and joy
My flower everblooming.
I’ll spend my days being your soil,
Pruning bits that
Hinder growth.
It’ll be different for our daughter.
I’ll see to it.
One day a boy will knock for her,
Baring a flower in his hands.
Our daughter will say,
“That’s it, just one?,
Thanks but no thanks
I’ll stick with my daddy,
He knows I’m worth much more.”
– Vagabond Prophet
The most skilled of cashiers
Couldn’t make change of this noise
For some quiet.
I’d wrestle the sun
To keep the night from coming
With its sinister grin
And loud taunts
That daylight may never return.
These thoughts drowned out
With songs sung in every tongue
Of good hope and love.
If your belief
Grants no reprieve
From the devil on your sleeve
Your anchor set in ground
That avoids its touch.
Leave now!
Run fast!
Take your coat
And a boat
And row right out to sea!
Rivers flow to oceans
And oceans feel the union
Deep inside themselves.
This is the answer
The remedy from cancer,
All roads don’t lead home
But all homes do have a road
Leading to them.
If you’re found with a heart
Eager for sanctuary
Having fainted exhausted in the ditch
It’s still better than having never set out.
The guide may come correct
Misguided steps but beginning is a must.
You are worth your weight in gold
Let timid souls grow bold.
– Vagabond Prophet
Firewood stacked in the cellar of my heart
Waiting for some rogue spark,
To make the whole thing catch,
The inferno lying in wait.
Everything takes its turn in the sky
Like the sun
Like the moon
Like my own judgement of myself.
One of those confused souls
Living vicariously through the toilet
Taking everyones shit
Except my own.
To end this marching
I just might have to
Euthanize my own legs.
Sometimes I feel like an electromagnet
With no current running through,
Having lost all of its virtue.
Unless you wanted something cold
Something hard
Something that will never
Grip you tightly.
At this particular juncture I realize
Something strange even to me,
Reality never contradicts itself
Except in the presence of hurricanes.
That the most tranquil of eyes would beget
Such a tempestuous halo dancing round it,
For cows give milk and sadness gives tears
How is it that peace births terror so strong
As to peel roofs from homes.
The typhoon that stops its spinning
To focus its efforts inwards
Inducting some insanity and rage
To that placid and torporial center,
Introduce some apocalyptic worry
To the serene eye.
This would make far more sense.
How do these coexist?
How do they share a bed
Without one taking the blanket
To let the other shiver and die?
How do black and white dance
And in their twirls and pirouettes
Not ever turn to grey?
Yet that’s what has occured in me
A rotten center amidst alien goodness
That eventually makes itself back to the center
Until it all dissipates, leaving not but calm.
Skin stretched taut over
A rib cage mast to make a sail,
Blood fills it like a gale
To push me ever onwards.
On my way one foot
In front of the other,
Trudging the road
Of happy destiny.
Though I don’t quite emit light
The disease is in remission
I’m casting a lighter shadow.
– Vagabond Prophet
– Hey @josy57 ! Thanks for the great prompt
“Casting a Lighter Shadow”.
On the eve of higher learning
Keep your bright heart burning
That amongst red apples and gold stickers
You’d be the only flame that never flickers.
With hair as curly
As the shapes
You first drew on paper,
Eyes as brown
As the coffee I drink
Each and every morning.
If I could pluck your brightness
I’ve little doubt I’d live forever,
To be a father
Is to never die.
But rather have my blood
Pump through better veins,
To have the apprentice take the tool
Carving the block in ways
I never could with hands
I helped form.
One day I’ll be humbled by age
And you a shining knight
Will have your own page
To raise up with wisdom I will give thee.
Tonight just rest your lovely head
Before this new journey,
When the sun rises
On your keen brow
Know that it never sets
On your father’s prayers for you.
– Vagabond Prophet
– Son starting kindergarten. I’m not crying you’re crying!
Love does not sit still
Love is always in motion
Love turns tables
Love will cut your bonds free.
It keeps me warm when
Frost kisses the grass
And keeps me cool when
The grass wilts in summer heat.
Love carves canyons
With its tender restless ease,
Love filled this green book
By pouring from this pen.
– Vagabond Prophet
Vagabond Prophet 