. .
Such silly smiles that split the planes of our faces
Vacations have a way of doing that
Pictures taken visiting places
So happy anywhere we’re at
Dressed in our Formal Night styles
Now looking over these
Staring at our smiles
I’m on my knees
Tell me why
I cry
<>==========<>==========<>
I recently came across some images of my late-husband and I on our very first cruise together. It was a bittersweet discovery to say the least.
I haven’t done a form in a while and what better way to kick off National Poetry Writing Month? This form is called Emotive Ten.
Emotive Ten (nonce form) An Emotive Ten describes some form of emotion and has ten lines, the only restrictions is that it is syllable based. It starts with twelve syllables and throughout the poem working its way down to two; it should describe usually an emotion in paradox, i.e. life to death, loneliness to love, light to dark etc.
If rhyme is used it must go with the syllable count in numbers and rhyme in letters:
12A, 10B, 9A, 8B, 7C, 6D, 5C, 4D, 3E, 2E
An alternate rhyming suggestion is a/a/b/b/c/c etc. The form can also be done in reverse, still ten lines, but starting out with two syllables and ending with twelve.
The good times that made us friends
Between the breaths of mine you took away
How the simple thought of you
Kept playing over and over in my mind
Remembering the day that we met
The emotions that had no words yet
I fell in love with you again today
The hard times that made us strong
The way I made you smile to learn
You were the shoulder when I need to lean
The ear when I need one to bend
There was that magic in the past
That makes our love today still last
I fell in love with you again today
The sweet times that made us lovers
And I smile remembering
Those first fears, the arguments
Yes, even the break-up and reconciliation
For in your smile I still find peace
In your arms I still find release
I fell in love with you again today
The best times that made us spouses
And all of those old feelings
Came rushing back on fresh wings
Once again brand shiny new
For after all our time together
I still believe this is forever
And I fell in love with you again today
====================
I actually had an entirely different poem in the queue setup for today. Then a friend posted a link to the Braden Summers collection on Buzzfeed that contains the above photograph. I, and apparently my muse, was enamored of this image, the last one of the set shown on the website. This is an image of a mature love, but clearly a still very happy and giving love. Whether a real couple -oh I hope, they look so happy together!- or merely models, I felt the couple looked like new lovers and the write you see above was born.
. .
We embark upon this life
Go through the stress and strife;
We fall in queue for our brief time here
For no matter how long we last,
It won’t be as long as our past
And it’s all but a token homage my dear
For this gem of a love
Above all others love
Yet we know nothing’s perfect and only God is truly divine
Some say love is just a sell
That heaven is as well
But I know both are real when your hand is holding mine
For you know, I give all of my love to you
From now until our time on earth is through
Because I know you give all of your love to me
And that’s all there ever needs to be
That’s all there ever needs to be
Some days are just hell for us,
Some days all we do is fuss
Some days we cook, other days we freeze
Some days we can’t do without
Some days all we do is pout
Some days we’re brought right down to our knees
Some in big mansions live,
Some inside hovels give
Their all in all to get through the day
Some love’s an orchard to share
Some love’s a cupboard bare
But our love’s beyond what mere words can say
For you know, I give all of my love to you
From now until our time on earth is through
And I know you give all of your love to me
And that’s all there ever needs to be
That’s all there ever needs to be
What I believe is this
We’re touched with heaven’s bliss
Living day by day in this Fool’s Paradise
This love’s where we live and die
This love between you I
At the end of day that’s enough to suffice
Sometimes it’s a slippery slope
Sometimes we can barely cope
But to know these joys we’ll risk pain’s chance
Day by day we grow old,
Others rust, we stay gold
Two left footed steppers in an intricate dance
For you know, I give all of my love to you
From now until our time on earth is through
For I know you give all of your love to me
And that’s all there ever needs to be
That’s all there ever needs to be
. .
It’s been two hours,
I’m trying not to let the sadness bombard
Wondering how to heal this heart so scarred
My body gasps for air, but it’s too hard
It’s been two hours, and I want to stop breathing
It’s been two days,
I’m worn out from the sleep denied me
From the fullness of the pain inside me
When I’m as empty as the bottle of Jack beside me
It’s been two days, wondering why I bother breathing
It’s been two weeks,
I said I wouldn’t write another word
About you and all that has occurred
Yet fresh tears making new lines blurred
It’s been two weeks, the hurt tells me I’m barely breathing
It’s been two months,
No longer needing Mister Daniels to cope
For the first time not wanting to wallow and mope
Resolving to end this broken heart trope
You unexpectedly run your fingers gently along the side of my face and, knowing me well, before I can think to question you about it, you place your lips upon mine and we kiss.
Gently.
Passionately.
Tenderly.
Hungrily.
When we slowly pull away we are breathless and I open my eyes to the dark emptiness of my room.
And realize it was only a dream.
Now, I lay awake undecided.
Am I more afraid that I won’t have that dream again…
I have a Facebook friend who recently loss her husband. Like I did then, she feels all alone on her path of grieving. I wrote the below a few months after the loss of my husband. As others who walked the path before me reached out to me, I share this now so she knows she’s not alone on her path either.
<>==========<>
What Is Proper?
I look over these years of my life from childhood until now.
Intellectually, I know I’m just a brief dash of eternity. But in my heart, half of that “dash” was my entire life with him.
What is the proper form of grief? I’m being told how well I am doing, how strong I am. If I don’t look as though I’m going to huddle in a corner and sob my eyes out any second, is that sufficient token to gauge my passion? I sometimes feel as though, I was expected to immediately fall apart and because I have not, it’s as though all these years with him have been a farce. For every few sets of real flowers he gave me, he also gave at least one artificial one “because like me, they will still be here when everything else is gone.” But since no one is there at night when I’m falling asleep exhausted clutching those same flowers on the bed, is that form of sorrow any less worthy? So who was pulling the masquerade? Bill? I honestly thought the artificial flowers would be gone first.
What is the proper time of grief? My mother passed away years ago and I still deeply feel her loss, but there is no expectation of a potential replacement for her. I’m expected to carry on and someday find a replacement for the irreplaceable. But when is ‘someday’?
If a year from now some new form of happiness enters my life, am I in too much of a rush to dismiss what was by pursuing it? What if a year from now I find I still cannot take off my wedding ring, am I flat out holding on far too long?
Oh God, a year from now – another dash of eternity I can not comprehend when I’m trapped in pseudo time warps.
I hear a song on the radio and for a moment we’re dancing so close together. But then it’s over and I’m forced back into the reality that he’ll never dance with me again. Then I’m feeling even more the fool for once again letting myself get sucked into a happy memory when I know the end result of such reminiscence is pain. I know it won’t always be like that, but right now I feel like I am wading and wading along a shore of my own tears, trying to find an answer in the tide, but it’s on a crest just out of my reach. I’m so close, yet so far from the solace there.
“One day at a time” I’m told. Right now, I’m just trying to get through one minute at a time.
These things and more I’m powerless to stop,
Thoughts of you coming unbidden and unblocked,
Enchanting and bewitching, you have captured my soul,
Lost and helpless, my body aches anon with your toll.
Lucius Kane / Unbidden Thoughts
Time’s jests had fooled us all to think of spring
Oh but winter but still had some fight within
Exposed by the elements did bring
Torn umbrellas now tossed into trash bins
The sudden storm made mockery of the thing
Just walking in the rain, garments given to sop
It takes away all pretense of privacy
Our peaked bodies’ crow with immodesty
It is sooner to control the next dew to drop
These things and more I’m powerless to stop
Oh send in the clowns for surely it’s some joke
How thoughts of that day even now make me swoon
And the fire within the memory doth stoke
It moves in from the dark side of the moon
And decorum evaporates like smoke
I watch my resiliency become something to mock
Trapped within my own dreams hot finish
With relief I succumb to my soul’s wish
I suppose by now I should not be shocked
Thoughts of you coming unbidden and unblocked
We’ve known each other since youth, shoes unlaced
And long ago packed away the trappings of such
Do I mistake that your feelings are of even pace?
Or do I project on you that which I do want so much?
For you to yearn for my touch upon more than your face
And there’s naught but one way for this ache to console
For without you I find I can’t breathe none the less
When with you I find I’m completely breathless
When the seeds of patience blossom into reality whole
Enchanting and bewitching, you have captured my soul
I dared not imagine it could ever be like this
That this joy wholly felt I’d even be worthy of
The elation of knowing your sweetest of kiss
Or the love that came from up above
Now just footsteps away from consuming bliss
Your crooked finger beckons in sweet cajole
And I decide there are few sweeter sounds in life
Than heard quote the words that made you my wife
No cost so high of favors – this heart can deny dole
Lost and helpless, my body aches anon with your toll.
Don’t think about all the things you fear, just be glad to be here
Eyes meet across a noisy, crowed room
Think long, think wrong it’s just for show.
Fire weds desire, emotions in bloom
Don’t over think the moment just go with the flow.
Whose to say that this mutual attraction,
Is just momentary thrill?
Is this another chance you let go in your lifetime?
Or do you do what you will?
Don’t think about all the things you fear, just be glad to be here
Do you want the comfort of a perfect stranger?
Do you feel you’ve known each other all along?
Do you want safety? Do you want danger?
There is no right or wrong.
‘Cause in the morning you may not care.
‘Cause in the morning you may want it all.
It may not go any further from there.
But if you’re to rise, you’ve first got to fall.
Don’t think about all the things you fear, just be glad to be here
Tomorrow may be joy, the day after sorrow,
Don’t fret about what the Fates will allow.
You’ve only got right now.
Only now.
Don’t think about all the things you fear, just be glad to be here
Raivenne-lations 