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The GrottoI'd been searching for the narrative stream
of angel-headed hipsters,
walking straight and sweaty streets,
wondering where the empty guitar cases
and their young, poor, semi-talented
but enjoyably beatnik players were
when a yellow-stained finger hooked mine
and showed me the mystery-marring light
at the corner of a southern no where
where the best minds of my generation are laughing,
burning bright cherry pinpricks in a welcome cancer cloud.
That night, hiking up four flights of stairs,
the blackened ache in my chest
felt only like a fair price
for my stay in this seedy underworld of light companionship.

self-gratuitous love poemwhen we are time-wise old together,
if you're not as super-hero strong as you are now,
I'll push your wheelchair around Disneyworld
and we'll still laugh at all the funny people
from behind our mismatched hands
because we'll still be the hopers
who talked on a public dock until the sun rose around us
and I'll still tug the shoulders of your shirt with my teeth
and you'll still lift an eyebrow and ask, "Oh really?"
and we'll still go home and make crazy, passionate young-people love
because we'll really only be time-wise old
and souls are the parts that actually do the li(o)ving.

Tiger, Tiger Nothing in this story is real, I'm going to tell you that right now. But that's really only because nothing in this story has ever happened to you. It has happened to me, in a universe parallel to your own, where you might say I am the equivalent of you, but it has not happened to you. So when this story is over, after you have heard all that happened and all that I did as your dark twin, your doppelganger, there is no reason for you to fear that these circumstances have somehow crossed dimensions and that you are living this very same drama yourself. Such a thing is mathematically unlikel

bad influence.he says it like it should stop him
but won't
as she passes him the cigarette
and teaches him to inhale,
laughing sweetly when he coughs up the cloying smoke.

he says it unsteadily,
to cover up his excited fear
as she undoes each worn button,
smiling at him devious and unsure,
though her hands remain calm.

he says it contentedly
through the morning-after smoke,
watching her stretch with soft and intense eyes,
wearing nothing but the shirt she stole last night
and his virgin kisses.

a whore to the muse"let's get two bottles of good champagne,
drink one,
make love,
then drink the other."

she's a classy
drinker (meaning wino, not
alcoholic) with a craving for champagne
and the taste of skin.
she's a classy
lover (meaning silk scarves, not
handcuffs) with her secrets
stashed beneath A-lines and sweaters.

"do you ever wish you could be
like me?"
"where sex came naturally
and meant nothing?
Sometimes."
"why?"
"inspiration, mostly."

J. Alfred was wrongthey say that love is a glowing thread
tying us together.
I have no twine,
but your letters are lights
in the darkness
that does not befit this spring.

sadness is overrated,
and none of the true songs
say enough about time.
I only want a little more;
please, sir, may I have another
moment?
I will not lie
and promise one;
I would not be satisfied with years
of moments,
though weeks
will have to do
for now
but I promise
with my weak poet's power
to dig a hole in the continuum
and hide us there.

Old Kilgore Was RightTucked into the eaves of my rainbow-colored umbrella,
I blow smoke, watch the rain shoot it down,
and think about stories from my father's youth,
when the world was a more human place
and you could meet a banjo player
or a pretty girl (who you would later stay with
and send pretty things from gleaming cities)
on a train ride from Georgia to Ohio.
It seems a time of cross-country hitch-hiking,
when $25, a backpack, and a fearlessness of being dirty
could bring you all of Europe,
when knowledge was experiencing life
and poems and novels lay waiting
in all the places you hadn't been yet.

Tucked into the eaves of my rainbow-colored

Make it FitMy greyblue eyes
are underlined in ash,
as though to emphasize a point
I must have forgotten,
like childhood androgyny.
I stare at their blackhole centers,
trying to fit them
in my round child's face.

TV says "Would you run away with me?"
I pause for a moment to appreciate
the idea of escape
before remembering that the reality
could never remain as beautiful
as the idea.

"What are you thinking about?"
"Walking in front of a car."
I place myself there,
wanting to push her out of the way,
wanting to stand beside her,
wanting to understand
what God hath wrought
and why He wrought it
this way.

...one for each day since I fell apart...
I toy w

would youYou would think that kissing a poet would be different,
that in that moment,
your souls would touch and sizzle like fire and water,
that a gateway between minds would expand
into being,
and you would share the deepened images
outlined in words, words, words
to give them definition
that only poets' minds can see.
You would think...

You would imagine that in tiny valleys
of each puckered lip
would reign the fertile soil of concept,
expelling long planted ideas as they met,
a wicked cross pollination of images,
blossoming into new species that bathed in
the tropical heat-moisture of human contact.
A natural spreading of the seed

skinhis skin is soft --
not woman-soft,
but soft over solid man-hardness and bones,
like pieces of smooth stone held together
just below his surface.

the smell of him hovers above his skin like a morning fog
of heat, a knowing wildness, an unassuming soap,
and the cigarettes he smokes before and after,
that are in his bloodstream and his sweat.

the smell and the soft hardness of his skin
is what erases her already-wavering uncertainty,
allowing instinct to press her nose,
her lips to his unnaturally pigmented shoulder
and follow that thin edge up his neck to his earlobe,
eliciting those captivating,
bed-spring-vibrating growls
and

Wait like the dawn"Two hundred and forty-three days," he says.
"I've loved her for two hundred and forty-three days."

We have not yet begun to grow old,
but already we are furrowed brows,
wristwatch eyes,
waiting for the knowing spark
that we were promised.

We have knelt, heads bowed,
eyes wet with sincerity
before their graven images,
praying only to hear that three-word melody
played smooth, no hidden clauses or
"That is not what I meant at all."

They are the only shapes we'll pray to,
but they are blind as we are hammered
like sinners on crosses made of dreams.

untradtionalI do not have the long, slender fingers
associated with artists,
nor the depressed, shadow-eyed aura.
I am not a tall, underfed recluse
or a dilapidated drunk passed out on opium
in the arms of an inexpensive lover.
I have no terminal illness brought about by my bad habits,
and I lack the seemingly critical element
of mental disturbance.
My love life, while not always blissful,
is not an overly-complex labyrinth of long-losts and should-have-beens.

In short, I lack the obvious, popularly familiar traits
that announce an artist

but do not doubt that the only thing I will always be
is a poet.

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Of Singers and Saphites (A James and Fidel Story) It had all begun with a simple, singular shout of “Saphite!” at that damned woman’s lecture on the importance of history in the collection and interpretation of music. What a woman was doing giving a lecture on musical theory in the common room of an inn or a drunk was doing using words like saphite, James did not know, but both had caused quite the row, with other villagers immediately joining in the chant of “Saphite! Unholy abomination! Snake of Satan!” and the like. Apparently this day had been a coming for a long time, and when James, Fidel and the woman’s French companion had stood to defend her, the

ElementalNestling into my side on the couch,
she murmurs half-asleep that
“Home always had a fireplace
for the winter,
even when we lived
in the Winnabow boonies.”
Her father would buy dried oak logs
from the beds of pick-ups,
later hauled in by her brothers
to join wood-smoke
with the home-smells
of vanilla candles,
baking bread and Brunswick stew,
drifting outside on wisps
of chimney smoke.

“When we were younger,
we were always dirty,”
she tells me, smiling at her dusty feet
buried in the light, silty soil
of her early-childhood island.
“But in a healthy, little-kid way, you know?”
They did not believe in shoes

Big Bad and Little RedWith her cherry-red beret
topping the sweet-scented braid
that falls down her back
to touch just the beginning
of the mysteries beneath those
too loose pants,
she makes me hungry, so hungry,
no.
She is good, she is God’s,
she cries when she prays
and she stammers when I smile,
and look at her eyes, she believes
she needs me. I could sop up
all the uncertainty from those
pools of grey-blue sky, just,
little girl -- “It’s very nice. Your hair,
I mean.” -- come to me,
run from me, I will eat you up,
eat you up and still be hungry,
but I will never lie to you
like others do.

~~~~~~~~

There are children playing

La Petite MortI’ve tried to find that place
in the coastal-plains forest
where he took it,
that first time
when I shivered
in the Southern summer
and couldn’t meet his eyes,
but it was always secret
and now it’s lost
down the twists and turns
of narrow roads.
I only remember scratching bites
for weeks, little red reminders
of what I’d lost in the pine straw.

Later, it was never
rolling waves of hot pleasure
or toe-curling, mind-melting anything,
so I started to think I was broken,
that he’d broken me.

I stopped caring –
Men were built like mountains
and trees and draft horses
and I liked the smell of them.
They would c

Elegy for Ancestral WaysThe instruments of my ancestors
played the music of battle –
the wailing of the Great Highland pipes
weakening would-be Roman conquerors;
the bodhrán’s menacing rhythms
summoning the shade of still-fierce warrior
Cúchulain and the Crone, the Mother, and the Maiden,
sisters three of the Morríghan goddess-head
to frighten foreign enemies
on dark-spirited nights.

These were the war horns
of the blue woad-painted Celts
and the cattle-raiding Gaels,
these the rhythm keepers
of the sword dancers
and the Dál Riata oarsmen.
Now they only keep the time
for my toes tapping softly
on the scuffed floors of buses
t

Twenty: I'm afraid I'm growing oldi.
Coupons and sales magazines
have become more than just junk mail
and the holes in my pants
seem more patchable
and I wonder just how much
my sparse jewelry would fetch
if I said I saw the face of Jesus
in the glimmer of my pearls.

ii.
I am beginning to miss the sea I grew up on
so much that I will read bad poetry
just for the mention of a salty ocean breeze.
I feel landlocked and sometimes I'm afraid
that I will never see the world
until I have retired from it.

iii.
Faith says her life is full of asking.
I wish mine were full of answers,
but I too have many questions
and only Time will answer them for me.

iv.
My mothe

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Notes for Lilith -Top Words-

by ~oracle-of-nonsense, Dec 9, 2010, 4:45:16 PM
Scraps

God is not a Man
or a Woman;
God is our name
for the best qualities of both,
wanting to believe
that at least the intentions were good.

Love is not dead, my daughter,
not yet or ever, and anyone who says so
is a coward, or a foolish cynic.
Love is what makes us like the angels,
Daughter of Men, Daughter of Women,
and even the angels linked together atoms
to express their Love
the way we do.
Never let anyone convince you that Love is wrong,
but do not make it an excuse
to be careless.

Daughter, you were named for the seldom-mentioned First-Woman,
who, wanting an Equal, not a ruler,
left the Perfect Garden
in search of Love.
The story went on without her,
but I think she found what she was looking for,
that Someone who was the other half-soul
that God had sundered.
Daughter, never settle for a 'maybe',
for an easy, pleasing, but slightly discordant song.
Too many people do, living with okay-ness
because they are afraid
to wait for really-beautiful-ness.

Children die, mothers die, fathers die,
lonely people and happy people all die,
but Life continues.
All bodies become a part of the ground,
atoms remaining while the soul part goes
wherever soul parts go,
perhaps some peaceful darkness,
some deep un-knowing,
perhaps some perfecting middle ground,
some hazy Sheol,
perhaps some omniscient world of created dreaming.
Remember this
should you ever miss the dead,
remember that the 'Why?' of Death is Life:
Death is the price of Life,
and if one makes Life worth it,
they've cheated Death of any profit
and may go gently, laughing,
into that good night.

People kill people, my love, just as animals kill animals.
We are not set apart by our ability to kill
more inventively or more dispassionately,
we are set apart by our ability to mourn,
the flowers on the graves an enduring, reminder
that we
have
evolved.

34 Comments

Notes for Lilith -Top Words-by ~oracle-of-nonsense

Scraps

Okay, so, on Facebook, I created a meme. There's that thing you can do to find your top, or most used words, right? I decided to write something using all of my top words. I challenge others to try this as well (if you do, send me the link). It makes Facebooking a little more artistically productive, no?

Anyway, my top words were: Love, People, Really, Should, Song, Fact, Best, Think, Why, Life, World, Children, Let, Someone, Maybe, and God
And yes, before you say it, I did not use 'fact' because that is a hard as hell word to use in a poem, and I couldn't find a way to put it in there without making the poem blegh. 'Really', 'maybe', and 'should' were hard enough as it was. >.<

This is a poem of things I would want the daughter I may or may not have in the future to know, if I'm not there to show her. I mean, they're good for other people to know too, but I'd really want a child of mine to know.

Critique-ers/Comment-ers(

and others):
1.) Unique imagery/wording, not cliche, striking, touching, and what-not? In other words, general critique.
2.) What would you want to tell your daughter/son?
3.) What do you think of my opinions on life as I have observed it thus far? Agree, disagree, any additions?
4.) How does this poem affect you?

Critique by ~DownwardsSaint Dec 10, 2010, 4:31:48 PM

Sometimes, when one tries to create a poem using a meme, or a concept, or some trick, it comes out quite badly. This is not one of those times. It is written as a letter to a daughter, but is full of beautifully written spiritual advice for anyone who wonders about God, love, and death. And perhaps it is just because my own opinions of such things fall so close to the author's, or those expressed here, but the whole thing appealed to me in a way that not a great deal of poetry does. Perhaps it is the fact that so many poems touch on such things, but this one did it in a beautiful and well-written way. I wrote, long ago, a letter to a daughter I will never have... but this poem makes me think, perhaps, that I need to touch on these subjects, in it. And perhaps I shall.

What do you think?

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~TalentlessArtlover Nov 5, 2012

~oracle-of-nonsense Nov 5, 2012 Student Writer

Haha, thank you.

~TalentlessArtlover Nov 15, 2012

You're very welcome.
Thank you for sharing that wonderful piece.

~Jonothing Dec 9, 2010

I like this one. I already liked the name Lilith anyway. I don't really know what to think of the ending though. Apologies for my brevity, but I think this is sound advice for a daughter...

~oracle-of-nonsense Dec 9, 2010 Student Writer

As do I. I know you like the name Lilith, I think you've told me so before.

I rather liked the ending, myself. What didn't you "know" about it? I concur, obviously.

~Jonothing Dec 10, 2010

I disagreed with your statement of equality with humans and animals. I do agree that humans are not equal to animals, but I feel like when you say we've "evolved" because of our mourning, you mean to say that is a good thing. I believe that humans 'evolved' into something different or in the least much more complicated. Where animals kill animals, just as people do, people don't always have to do so. Sometimes it's a choice. Sometimes it's from cruelty. Sometime, it's justified but for no reason at all. I don't speak of anomalies either. While we may mourn, we also kill w/out reason, and I believe that we've evolved into something of lesser stature morally, than any known animal.

~oracle-of-nonsense Dec 10, 2010 Student Writer

I knew it was bound to happen eventually. I did mean that as a good thing, yes. Some animals (chimps) do kill for territory, but I understand your point. I don't think you can say that animals are moral or immoral, because they don't really have the choice. We know, and have the choice to do what is right or wrong. So we are moral beings, while animals are not, and I think that on the whole, more humans attempt to do what they feel is right than don't.

~Jonothing Dec 10, 2010

Chimps fighting for territory is borderline, as other animals are also territorial. That being said, a 'territory' is at least something that is concrete and tangible, instead of some ideal that many are convinced is 'right' or 'the truth'. Neither of us can say whether or not animals have the choice. Do predators only kill when they're hungry? We'd hope so as that makes sense. Unfortunately, humans being the apex predator don't even need to hunt, but they do. Again, when you speak of ratios, I just want to remind you that I don't speak solely of anomalies. While you may be right in that more humans 'attempt' to do what they feel is right, you have to ask yourself if these people consider killing wrong. I personally know four people who actively kill or have killed things just because, and thought nothing of it. Even the little boys and girls kick over ant hills...

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