Red Sunset

The pic for August, don't ask about July. That month is dead to me.

When what was once
your world is now
a collection of fading
photos in an unmarked
box in the back
of the garage propping
up the broken shelf you
promised to fix when fixing
things was still possible

Do you ever pause
replay the ending?
Was is a slow crack
that gradually rifted
you apart or a swift
shattering that scattered
shards of combined lives?

And now, days and decades
have smoothed and rounded
those memories and a lifetime ago
things that never mattered matter
less, do you wonder if you chose
the wrong adventure?

Me neither

Stronger Through Shedding

June brought this blog post and its pictures to me and the copoet so we each took a stab at what it said to us.  Here's my take, check out her's when you get a chance. 

We mourn the passing 

of those we've loved     

from this world to the next 

we create passage

for their souls 

our pain of missing

burning them as best we can 

into our memories 

promising ourselves to 

never forget 

the tiniest of moments

and at times holding so tight 

to these ghosts

that we cannot move on 

ourselves, held in limbo

afraid to learn what living 

without them means

May Day! May Day!

What are the ways
we choose to prove
that we existed
that we were here
spent time crawling
our way around the globe
spinning years off the calendar
thinning skin and rusting guts

What X marks our spot?
A list of scars etched on foreheads
of your trampled past?
A bundle of poems hidden
rubber banded behind bottom
left handed desk drawer?
A simple, large lettered self chosen
name sprayed on anything that
might momentarily
pause


Inspired by this lovely photo

Tourists

April showers bring super hero pics that the co-poet and I wrote on

Joy spills from between them

flooding the streets

close held hands clasp

the secret that isn't well kept

that we thrive when connected

but our world that spins

information and competition

disconnects and depresses

but a tip of the hat

a smile and a walk

with a friend will

lift

Deepening See

March's picture, The Lost Correspondent by  Jason de Cairs Taylor. 

Silent as if I too were a blank page

still for so long I might as well

have turned to stone with

moss creeping along my

unmoved arm

untouched pen

paper brittling, yellowing

synapses rusting shut

Nothing fires down here

you could have heard me

drown if I had thought to scream

exhaled the deep, that final gasp

words don’t come words don't fill

a mouth a page

cling heavy to an empty echo

these keys, they unlock language

and they create

everything

yet I stare still at them

unable to turn them to any 

true use.

bdr