I am learning to live a life away from prying eyes.

Not all who watch from afar are there to clap your successes,

Some are there to revel in your downfalls.

-JF-

I’ll wait here in the dust of our lost love

The home we once decided was our own.

It’s slowly crumbled and succumbed to the earth,

Yet I’ll sit firm stubbornly decaying in this gown.

“Miss Havisham” the shadows chant taunting my sorry state,

They have watched me reduce to this shell

Surrendered to the sorrow and cobwebs.

A blackened heart to match the walls,

A once white dress a tear soaked mess,

Just an armchair left amongst this turmoil.

A seat for me to rot

To fester

Degrade and deteriorate

Until I’m a ghost left to haunt this place,

To haunt you.

My love for you once a cure

Now the root cause of my disease.

-JF-

I felt a vivacity
I hadn’t felt in a long time,
as if my soul was returning
to my body,
flooding my fingers and toes
with life again.

- G.L. Angelone

I spent years acting

How they’d want me to

Took me a long while to realize

I need to have my own rule

Ask the person who called you names

“Do you mean all that now?”

Never hold onto things you should let go

People and their opinions change as they grow

What someone says is not who you are

Look back at lessons, you have come so far

You do not rise without falling

I hope you follow your calling

The sun rises and I open my eyes with the first ray of sunlight that kisses my eyelids. The first breath exhaled is one that carries your name. The warmth of the love I feel for you lights up my soul like the dawn at my window.

e.v.e.

Some nights, I get drunk on us, sipping on temporary from bottles I labeled forever, black marker on blue post-it notes. It’s a bittersweet hobby I like to do on weekdays, when I feel too unloved. But you didn’t love me. I also didn’t. Love me, I mean. I didn’t love you either. Just the way you made me feel. But it’s always warm memories with you. Then I wake and realize I was asleep the entire time I thought I was awake in my dreams. I get hungover on almosts.

k.e.

It’s taken me so long
to grow up,
so long to recognize
the cages that have 
held me back,
kept me tame. 
So many of the things
I thought I wanted
were not even my ideas.
Who am I when I strip away
what the world expects of me?
What do I truly want
when I silence the voices around me
and listen to my own?
I am finally learning
that this life is mine
and explanations and apologies
are no longer needed. 

He latches on at the slightest bit.

To souls who show him a sliver of kindness

Because he’s lived all his life without it.

To souls who give him a tiny bit of love

Because he’s lived all his life not feeling it.

To souls who show him little attention

Because he’s lived all his life giving others it.

To souls who show him momentary forever

Because he’s lived all his life

like his entire lifetime

will only last for today’s bit.

k.e.

Loved the way you made me feel good,

you didn’t even have to

take me to bed.

Cause when you should’ve been kissing me,

you wrote me poems and

read them to me instead.

k.e.

Practice shots compose the sky,
solid picket set [future event
testimony] background
         slightly off.

On New Year’s Eve [1965]
we sat around the backyard;
quarries & tunnels,

Into the unknown— Eros Plan 9.

they mistake black bodies for battleships

i love to see black bodies at rest,

black faces at peace

unafraid

we fight to keep our head above water

and i love to see us submerged in tranquility

i love us for the way we go to war

steady persisting despite opposition

the world waged war on us before we even knew we had enemies

born into battle, i love to see us resist

and i love to see us relaxed because that is also resistance

they say we can’t afford to be tired or anything else that shows we are human

so i love to see us claim our humanity anyways

i love to see us at peace

head leaning

eyes closed

we are warriors trained to wield our weapons and be wary

we’ve mastered our teachings of fear and now we learn to relax

we learn that we are prepared even when we can’t see what’s coming

granted

They heard the whisper

There was an answer

But not quite sure

If it was from heaven or hell

It is in poetry that I embrace my emotions better. A huricane that abates in blank sheets and ink.

k.e.

Cherish the Days

high tides erase

footsteps in beachsand

wash memories away when

waves roll in…

time bends… blends…

warps everything that was

that is

etched forever

in the firmament of tender hearts;

walks along the water

remain long after low tides

retreat to record levels

we will remember

we will cherish the days

we will recall unforgettable times

we will hold onto how beautiful we were

before tides and time

do what they ceaselessly do

move us along, move on

it’s got nothing to do with us

yet it has everything to do with us

©️ @followcb ☆ October 21, 2020

It has been lovely being stuck in my head.

Today, I can finally leave my bed.

I want to tell her,

I have painted the clouds colorful,

they’re no longer gray.

I want to tell her,

I tried to make poems

for every raindrop I tried to catch.

I want to tell her,

I missed laughter, and smiles.

I want to tell her,

I am okay now.

k.e.

everytime you say you’re leaving,

i want to say take me with you.

when you turn your back to me and walk away

i want to ask your shadow,

reaching out to its hand,

can i come with you too?

k.e.

Why can’t it be you?

Speaking to mirrors

Asking a question

To an empty reflection

k.e.

1. Heavy is the head that doesn’t know what to think. 
2. Irrational anger filling the void of validity and core values. 
3. I’ve once drenched myself in the sweetest hatred of others.  
4. Now I have no time for such immature indulgences. 
5. I will walk away at a pace befitting my journey.  

that subtle sudden light

barefoot in my garden

underneath a veil of light

silver tears of dew cover the grass

a hungry blackbird joins me

searching for wurms to offer

the family a festive breakfast

somewhere in the bushes nearby

but all i long for is coffee while

inhaling the smell of late autumn flowers

which offer me

sweet consolation for

what is ahead of me

I pick a few to put them in a vase

on my kitchen table

watching dawn take care of those

outside

a most delicate moment

of sharing serenity

*

dezewachtuiltjes 🗿🗿2020

the false dusk of spring

is a rare phenomenon.

interplanetary dust

born from comet tails

& asteroids,

joins the rays

of the sun, to create

a uniquely haunted sky.

luminescence reaching out

from earth’s yellow dwarf star,

scatters & reflects to form

a phosphorescent cloud,

concentrated yet diffuse,

along the ecliptic line of sight,

the sensation

empyreal lovers call

—zodiacal light.

RhymingTherapy—October 2020 (my photo - true dusk - Hervey Bay in August) poem inspired by @Writerscreed Challenge “false dusk of spring”