The New Gods

The other day, 
I caught myself thinking, 
Wondering whether the old Gods, 
Still walk this earth. 

Do they anymore dwell,
In the din,
Of our shuddering cities? 
Or is the fuel for the fires,
The flames in our engines, 
All that remains,
Of their lifeblood we drained?

In the dust, ash and grime,
It is hard to find, 
Marks of the divine, 
When these desolate lands, 
Like the bent broken backs,
Shells of their bodies, 
That still stand. 

Maybe the old Gods are lost to us, 
We've been left abandoned, 
To perish by the torments, 
Of our own devices.

Yet we need to hold on, 
To hope,
That hiding in the breeze, 
And the shades of trees, 
In the gurgle of a cool stream, 
Are the new Gods, 
Gods who will rise to reclaim this earth, 
Gods who will heal the creation we've hurt, 
They who will lead us to rebirth. 

Love, Undefeated.

This time, last year, 
I'd been writing about love, 
As something that could only be, 
Spoken about in abstractions, 
A feeling which, I feared, 
I'd never again encounter, 
Blooming inside my barren heart. 

Love seemed to dwell in my poetry, 
Like a shadow that was just out of reach,
Words stained by the remains, 
Of what I ached for, 
And couldn't find. 

But now that I can breathe again, 
Feel the heart in my chest beat again, 
See my mouth open in laughter and kisses again ( Oh the kisses! ) ,
And notice her touch warm my blood, 
I know fortune has smiled once more, 
I have found what I thought I'd lost, 
I am in love once more.

The love that she has granted me, 
Makes me feel ageless and pure, 
I feel boundless when I look into her eyes,
Her love gives meaning to my life.

Revive

It's been a while, 
Since I've written some poetry,
And I think I know why,
That words now elude me.

Over the years, poetry,
Had become for me, 
A way to survive,
    The hell inside,
A silent scream for help, 
Words that hoped to be heard,
All the cries that they held.

I had learnt those words so well,
Words of sadness and pain, 
That when you arrived, and the hurt ebbed, 
I  was left unprepared and ill-equipped, 
Stranded with phrases that didn't fit. 

Can you tell,
That I am trying to write something happy?
That I am once again learning to smile?
And I am looking for words anew, 
That let me show you, 
The light and the joy,
That inside me rises once more.

I am in love, 
I have the strength,
To not drown in the deep, 
In the sea of darkness that I've let,
Lap on the edges of my soul.

I am happy, 
And I am alive, 
Maybe now I will find words that glow,
Write a little poetry,
With lines that flow,
To honor what you've made me see,
That I am revived, 
At a place where we can thrive.

A Broken World

When last I wrote,
I thought I could break through,
Stir something in you, 
Find the depths of apathy,
But maybe there's still some ways to go, 
Until I find the collective limit. 

Would it be more sad, or less?
If the other reason, 
Is that all of you are now just numb, 
To the pain,
That there's just too many words around,
Too much of the same,
And if that's the case,
I don't know what to say.

But that doesn't make the pain,
Any less real, does it? 
And those who can write about it, 
Perhaps they're the ones speaking,
For the rest of you. 

Tell me, we're all so angry now, 
All the time, aren't we? 
Pretending to care for others,
Acting as if we can feel,
Their hurt and agony,
Yet all the while, 
Unable to care for even our own selves,
All of us are in grief, 
Just beneath the veneer of peace,
There's so much hostility,
But surprisingly,
I find myself simultaneously,
Incapable of violence.

I think we're an angry people,
Living in a broken world,
A world of rising seas and burning forests,
Of tyranny and failing democracies,
And I think that you need to wake up,
Wake up to the fractured society,
Wake up and let yourself feel,
Because words are failing now,
Falling on tired eyes and frozen hearts,
Words are no more enough now, 
It's time we rose, it's time to move,

So what are we going to do?

Would Kafka Be Proud?

A little every day,
I inch towards certain death,
A worm eats its way,
A gaping hole through my head. 

Defenceless, I bear witness, to the hurt,
And the cold, cruel, unfeeling,
Hearts of the new world,
From which to flee,
I dream, 
        Of either my own dying,
Or I scream,
For destruction, 
The unravelling at the seams,
Of the world around me.

This darkness that I carry, 
                             I would shed gladly, 
This wall of words, 
                           I'd let crumble freely, 
If I was held today, 
Cradled by gentle hands,
Caressed, 
By a solitary sign of being wanted,
Onto the scraps, I would hold, 
                               Shreds of desire,
Swinging from the pegs of hope,
I could rest my shield, 
                                Quench the fire,
I would finally yield,
Walk away,
                  From the blazing pyre.

Alas, this earth is tired, 
Over us all a dismal, desolate shroud, 
If he knew, of the depths of my despair, 
Would Kafka be proud?

Silence

I don't feel very good today.

The skies are overcast, 
But the clouds,
Aren't as dark as I'd like them to be. 

There's a breeze but,
It's undecided.
Much like me,
It isn't sure which way to go.

I feel a little sad today.
There are some,
Who I'd like to reach out to,
Some, I wish would text me hello.

I have been silent,
Trying to listen,
But if my heart's grown quiet too,
Who'll talk me through?

When I am lost, 
Like I am today, 
Who can I turn to?

When my silent heart, and an empty room,
Tell me in so many ways,
That I am afraid today.

I feel unsteady,
My thoughts all over the place,
Like the weather,
I'm not sure who I am anymore.

If You’d Only Ask

If you'd only ask me,
Say, " Tell me what you want? "
I'd let my tongue be set free,
I would show you what I need,
Speak of what I want. 

I lean in close,
To whisper,
Softly in your ear, 
Secrets that I've held in my heart,
The depths of my desire.

If you ask me what I want, 
I'll tell you, that I want you, 
That I long to breathe in, your skin,
Drink long and deep,
The scent that flows from every pore, 
Intoxicating. 

In a trance, a slow dance,
I'll undo the knots and the clasps,
To peel what covers you,
To reveal, the flesh that holds me,
Captive.

Enraptured, an eternity in time,
Where our bodies lay entwined,
When the world holds its breath,
And the earth stands still,
By the hand I take you, 
Lead you up to a breathless peak,
On that burning, shimmering hill.

Afterwards,
When the outside world,
Has started creeping back in,
And the light of the fading day,
Across the floor is spread thin, 
In my arms you shall lay.

And then, 
In that shadowy space,
We'll speak of our dreams, our lives,
The ideas we chase,
Bridge our wishes, shape our fates,
Of what we are to build, 
The legacy we'll create.

If only you'd ask,
I would tell you,
Everything that we need to know. 

The Kingdom of the Clouds

When you look at towering clouds,
Rising in thick spires,
High into the heavens,
The rolling ramparts of white,
Shifting, growing, ascending,
What do you see?

When the dark clouds move towards you,
Heavy and slow,
Silent and vast,
Carrying in them the weight of,
An unending love that,
The divine holds for the Earth,
What do you think?

In overcast skies I have seen, 
A kingdom,
The kingdom of the clouds,
Of white and gray, 
A realm in a field of blue,
Where they live, the tribe of air, 
The beings of the wind.

It is a forbidden world,
To us earthly mortals,
Soaring, unattainable ,
Always moving, 
Conjured on a whim, 
A dominion of light and shadow,
Suspended over our vanilla cities.

The eagles and the kites,
Guard the parapets of that kingdom,
And we can only watch and wonder,
Or from an aircraft, 
Peek into the valleys,
Hidden to our eyes,
Unreachable in their dizzying height,
Always washed by the bright sunlight. 

An Offering To Death

Oftentimes, I've imagined myself sitting in a field,
Alone, in the middle of an empty expanse,
Away from spectators, and their prying glance,
I listen to the heavens in their silence, 
And think, is this where I shall finally yield?

But in that sanctuary, I fret in an uneasy peace,
Far in the distance, there is a growing gloom,
and I am defenseless in the face of impending doom.

Often, I've found myself in a field of grass alone,
While around gathers an awful storm,
So before I can rest, and take a breath,
I have to brace against the rising gale,
I must first stay and wait, to keep ruin at bay. 

There have also been times, 
When I've sat under the bright blue sky,
I've looked into that limitless depth and wondered,
A question that perhaps is as old as thought itself,
And has already been a million times pondered.

In the scale of the Earth, and immensity of space,
What import do our lives hold, what are they worth? 
How do we dance and sing, and write about our dreams,
In letters so bold,
When it will all be gone without a trace?

I've sat under the wide spread of the sky,
And felt that all of the art we make, the words we write,
Hold eternity inside them, a hope that our fleeting lives,
Though nothing at all, but a blink in an instant of time,
Reach out to become everything at once, 
That is wondrous in the universe,
And endure until long after our days have ended,
A reassurance to those who are to come after, 
That it all means something, 
That to be human is know of coming death, 
Yet to sing.

So I still go to sit in that empty field, 
Listen to the coming storm,
Look up to the skies, laughing I wield,
Words that I form, into a shield,
To death an offering of this verse I give.

Longing

The wind carries a scent of regret, 
With a touch of forsaken love, 
Of hopes and wishes that were buried dead, 
Yet linger and lurk in the depths, 
Of the damp tormented earth. 

In despair, I've grasped at hope, 
Scrambled to cling to scraps of comfort, 
And if to me the breeze should carry, 
A sweet scent, fragrance of a woman heady, 
Fleeting respite, I've snatched from melancholy . 

Starved of touch, my flesh yearns, 
For a loving embrace, and gentle caress, 
I seek the warmth of entangled arms, 
But the wind today tastes of unshed tears, 
Stifled cries, and the sting of salt, 
On the wounds of solitary years.