Tag: Sonnet

Unread books placed carefully in boxes 
moved and removed from house to house so long 
I forget who I thought I would be when 
these books transformed from pages on a shelf 
to synapses renewed from consciousness 
to consciousness proving books are magic 
are words meant only to be potential 
dear reader all apologies are due 
I still do not know who you were back then 
thumbing recklessly through the alphabet 
knowing unfixed syntax is what is left 
between thought & expression lies a lifetime 
unloose the doorjambs from their enjambment 
I is an other book I never rent

Last night I had no dreams to remember 
I only woke up a few hours too soon 
with the anxiety of fifteen months 
weighing down on my chest a sudden shock 
accumulated irretrievable 
time a physical fact preventing sleep 
as it has so much over these long nights 
numbers that once spoken could not be saved 
seasons still perpetually delayed  
hanging in the darkness heavy ether 
moments lost now repeating their losses 
ouroboros suffers from hunger pangs 
I returned to sleep that would not suffice 
to dissipate undefined sacrifice

Lifting restrictions kept normal in check 
now normal is suddenly coming back 
with a vengeance witness democracy 
dying without supermajority 
will we ever know what the lab unleashed 
or behave like citizens of the world 
better crowd already crowded spaces 
so that species waiting seventeen years 
remain submerged under concrete we paved 
to get from point a to point b faster 
or build bigger houses on smaller plots 
of land and stories wasting our treasure 
on keeping up with neighbors never met 
normal: a masked face we cannot forget

Tonight I choose to remember the me 
who almost thirty years ago stayed up 
all night as the weather turned to summer 
writing songs ten at a time on loose leaf 
paper the tunes only known to my mind 
at the time if I saw them now I’m sure 
I could sing them sometimes even the words 
come back to my senses as I’m loading 
the dishwasher thinking of what I will 
write this night before I fall sound asleep 
those songs still exist somewhere on paper 
waiting in their way singing to be sung 
the pencil faded but still legible
places I left myself incredible

Somehow the frustration 
Of the pre post pandemic 
Has usurped the lugubrious 
Hyper anxiety of boredom 

From wondering where on earth 
We could get toilet paper 
To navigating inscrutable websites 
For a shot of science in the arm 

From realizing a slight pause could 
Reevaluate every human endeavor 
To understanding courts still bypass 
The right to avoid AR rifles at King Soopers 

Basically the world still sucks 
Why are we so eager to restart it as is

History repeats not in the same way 
But similar to a rhyming couplet 
Never to be resolved decades apart 
Just when you think you know the whole story
Revelation peeks behind the curtain 
Unexpectedly anticipated 
By everyone paying attention to 
Intersectional substantiation 
Did you really think these legacies would 
Be resolved with a sermon or a song 
Or that codependent cacophony 
Of confirmed media institutions 
Simply go along with things as they are 
Better to leave to get away and far

Strange to inhabit thoughts as they arose
Twenty years ago on the radio 
In the car moving into the future 
Have I not listened to this song before 
Not in this context which is my age now 
Perhaps the age this song was written for 
When there is less time to look forward to 
Than accounting the ways it has been lived 
Which way led to this wayward distraction 
The closest distance between there and here 
Immediate to this situation 
How could these instruments play my feelings 
Or construct them as my reality 
When I did not know they would play along

Admitting I could never understand
The language claiming God victorious
The suffering of neighbors was not planned
To glorify what is inglorious
We love so much we have to count as loss
Appearing there before us like a dream
Our ship is dashed before the storm can toss
Us on the shore where shards of darkness gleam
Though memory remains ephemeral
Our bodies light and carbon captured still
The soul a drop of water flows withal
Who walk in ways of yet unraptured will
     The victory: existence as it’s known
     Is now and always will have been our home

Time is relative to measuring time
As if it were not merely a constant
Nothing is linear curved or straight lines
Balancing between two never fixed points
The road sign you left behind to get here
Already receding into the past
Like some future thing you forgot to do
The wheel in the sky interrupted by
The birth of the expanding universe
A reboot takes quite a bit of effort
Holding the power button down so long
So numb a finger pointing at the moon
As long as time insists on keeping us
We live forever if just for a day

Some worlds have not quite been created yet
That is why they need us to dream them true
Sitting in our homes or a theatre
That much more lonesome at the loss of you
All the characters you will not create
May not overshadow those whom you have
Spirit is more than destiny or fate
Or joy that those who knew you knew you gave
So much is silent and now quieter
It seems too much for us to persevere
Your example just might make us better
Though we can’t yet see past this cursed year
Wakanda forever—now about you
We are not ready to be without you