depression

Driven

lillian48 Comments

He lost his head that day.
Disappeared into green lush woods,
the gardens of his mind.
Some nurturing space of his own design
between the borders of insanity and reason.

City engineer.
Day in and day out
he plotted and planned.
Highways, byways
throughways and roundabouts.
Traffic control,
exit ramps and entry lanes.
Cement road-snakes for autopilot mannequins.
Metal caskets on wheels,
rushing here and there and everywhere.

Head full, he just stopped.
Could not cope.
Could not recognize
patterns, directions,
escape routes from today
into the morrows.

And so he stared,
that morning at his desk.
Never moved.
Retreated into a nowhere,
his forest of nothingness.

IMG_6094

Written for Tuesday Poetics at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets. Today, Grace is hosting and asks us to use the word “border” within the poem or in the title. And, extra credit if we write somehow about a mental state.
Sculptur is in the de Cordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Lincoln Massachusetts. Eternal Presence by John Wilson, 1987; a study for the full size, seven-foot tall sculpture which stands outside the National Center for Afro-American Artists in Boston.

 

Misfit

lillian46 Comments

Like a magnificent crystal chandelier
in the wake of a coarse wind.
Swaying erratically. Shards of glass colliding.
Each piece hitting, pinging,
clinking cacophonously.
She felt like this.

Except she was enclosed. Caged.
Stifled in some cold garment.
Arms wrapped around her torso
in comfortless embrace.
And the ceiling was bare.
And the walls were bare.

But she was that fixture,
except without light.
—————————-

Sia – Chandelier (Official Video) – YouTube

Sharing with dVerse for OLN where Bjorn is hosting from Sweden.

THANKS to Bjorn for pointing me to this video after my poem was posted with the photo below.    Bjorn’s poem written on October 2015  was inspired by the video. I wasn’t aware of dVerse at that time and never heard the song or saw the video until Bjorn mentioned it. The video does uncannily fit Misfit which is very eerie!  Stop by dVerse to post your own poem (the more the merrier) or to imbibe/read other posts. Tis an amazing place!

chandelier-1004574_1920

Cruelty

lillian60 Comments

you loved me
as I was you said
then dismembered me
your hands, your will
debased my sense of self
erased my core
left me sightless
looking for me

face-1279654_1920

Hosting dVerse for Tuesday Poetics — a virtual pub for those who enjoy working with words and creating poetry. Today, I’m asking folks to find a sculpture that inspires them — and then to write in the voice of that sculpture — become either the artist who created the piece, or the subject of the sculpture. Don’t tell us about the sculpture, rather take on its voice.  Come on over and see what others do — or how about joining us and lending your voice too?

Glass Jar World

lillian9 Comments

I am afloat
no eyes, no touch
in this senseless world.

This cadaver cavernous world
dreams dissipated, despair afloat
you see me, but do not touch.

Ignored. Here, not. Not for touch.
Gasping in your fragile world,
I am no one, simply afloat,

afloat, a glass shard, in your no-touch world.

IMG_4099

Tritina written for Day 7, NaPoWriMo. The Tritina: three, three line stanzas and a final concluding line. Three “end words” are used to conclude the lines of each stanza, in a set pattern of ABC, CAB, BCA and all three words must appear in the final line. Another poetry sudoku! Photo Credit: Pickled 2, 2009 by Antoine A. R. Hunt, Bermudian, 1967: in the Collection of the Bermuda National Gallery.

Oracle

lillian13 Comments

Card table covered in dusty gauze scarf,
book case with tattered paper backs
two chipped coffee mugs
and one stuffed black bird.
This basement flat, windows dark
gold stars and silver moon
taped on black garbage plastic.

She sits, tarot deck in hand
gnarled fingers poised to read,
nail tips brown from nicotine.
Curling grey wisps of hair
bejeweled barrette, three stones
so obviously missing.

I watch wearily. Smell her breath
and incense stick. Shove down
this nauseous urge. I must hear.
She must tell me what I need to hear.
And she hoarsely begins to speak.

SONY DSC

Written for Ms. Quickly’s prompt, this way to the oracle.
Photo Credit: Ruxandra Moldoveanu.

Loretta

lillian3 Comments

Happy in her new digs,
plywood and metal scraps,
original resident dead.
A step up from cardboard,
if she could eradicate the smell.

Comic strips, the colored ones,
wallpaper of choice.
Condoms stored in knock-off bag,
Pick your flavor, pick your place.
But no, not here. Not in my space.

Golden locket round her neck
broken knotted chain.
Daddy’s picture kept within,
missing god knows where
always hangng near.

Mama’s image burned one day.
Albatross memories
seared in heart.
Flailing arms and slurred tongue,
bottle thrown. Crashed into her soul.

YOU. GET. OUT.

And so she did,
grabbed the locket and ran.
Happy sweet sixteen.
Birthday promise made that day
always kept, these many years.

Sobriety.
Eyes tired, never shut.
She saw their faces, every john.
Every thrust she felt,
every punch and hunger pain.

But slurring, oblivious sot?
She would NEVER be her.

a-girl-eerily-exhausted-1537602

Photo credit: Linda Lacerna. Somehow, in this holiday season, my heart is drawn to those who have not – the Lorettas of this world.