Haiku: Bleary keystrokes

They call to me; early, impatient,--and creaking. Looking down at the keysand squinting through a cracked mirror of blur,raising hands which are balloons of lead,to push into life words that wait in the queue of the addled Tilt-A-Whirl in my smeary mind. I find that the "T" key and the Space Bar will have nothing...

Haiku: We are all in The Village

Freedom is but an open door to illusion.When we are "entertained" we are numbed,numbered...and herded. For we all live in The Village,all bright and colored and quaint,yet impossible to leave and driven to stay yet we dream of freedom that laughs at us...and raises it's skirt to promise easy love.We are flowers in a terrarium;growing...

My life as a Bagel

It's 4:00 in the morning and I have risen from the all too brief, coffined sleep; driven by both insomnia and thoughts that race as shards of glass from a mirror cracked. There in the dark of one small lamp, I see the keys and they call again to feed from me, from my soul's...

Haiku: Thorn in my Eye

A sudden look from afar this smoky room,A fleeting dream of hearth and home...only a glimmer;A dream caught and trapped forever in gleaming glassWhile the thorn of her gaze both punctures my mind and brings my heart of rusty gears to full stop.

Stuck

He was stuck in a placewhere he saw his broken visagereflected in the screen of sheer honesty;wasting away from decisions from the long road and regrets from the short road he could not resist. He pounded his fist towards the unforgiving skyand screamed at God for creating his own existenceand asked--begged--for it to be done....

Haiku: Storm in the Night

Light and fury,shrieks of a sinner's windawaken the numbed souland sweeps away the dried heart.

Standing by the Shore: A Short Poem

He stood gazing out at the sinking lightThis ragged, tattered man dressed in a fine suit,holding his alligator shoes in one handand his life in the other. He was a teacher,and a good one at that;good enough to survive the endless days of chaos and stagnation;riddled with obscenities directed at him...and by him. He had...

Haiku: The green Rain

The morning spent in blankets of grief; a memory of leaden edges,a glimpse into life's new breach while green rain fell and pooled==in silent witness

From the Balcony with Tarot

I spent the night and shared it's embrace;watching the rain of diamonds and wrapped in a cold blanketthat kissed me all over like a lover. The cards spent that night with me too.They had become a face to my souland a portrait of the longingsof my heart. They were laid out more times than I...

Tight

He woke with "Danny Boy" stuck inside his headand forced himself to get up while his body screamedfrom it's every part, "stop moving!". The chemo had done it's part,he was suitably exhausted and looked the part of Karloff's stand in. He was as tight from head to toeas an old war-drum.The heart inside him beatas...

Awake–and numb: A Haiku

Six months....and sober; Finding my way back from blind rage and drunkenly hurting others still numb inside waiting for a drink that won't come.... The numbness envelops me at times making me want to experience an altered state where my mind can go rogue and make my body it's weapon of choice and leave my...

Uncertain Journey

I heave my life onto my shouldersas an anvil that bears down on my soul, Each step along the cobbled path of my existenceseems to sink deeper into the stones on which I walk.I look around me and see others who are on my roadand struggling under stones and boulders of their ownand force my...

Pushing through

On any path to a new chapter there stands a wall. It rises from the asjes of the past and spans the width of the dreams it pushes against. My wall is constructed of used liquor bottles, broken hearts and dreams, paperwork and reports piled up, and shattered emotions from my loved ones. It's mortar...

Glass Doorknobs

They opened doors, to home naked pies and a gentle smile. They were there to greet me and smile with a crystal grin promising a love beyond measure, and leaving a world of troubles behind ...at least for a small time. She lived behind those glass jewels, and made her home in my heart. She...

Unmutual: A Short Poem

There is a law unwritten but enforced called "conformity"....and it is lethal. Breaking it means a death osentence of the mind although a life sentence follows. I have broken that law. I have become a number, and my identity replaced and re-written by a society that demands I remain in line, and graze with the...

“Don’t Tell Everybody”

Stepping out of the usual haikus and short poems, I wanted to get something out into the world. I was recently given advice I am not going to take. It was given with the best of intentions and with a giving heart, but it was inherently wrong for someone like me. You see, I am...

A Haiku with No Name

Awake so very early-- feeling, for once, at peace with how the book of my life is now being written. Chapters newly scribed, not repeated; Pages newly turned, not yellowed and moth-eaten; A binding no longer cracked and useless; A new tome with a new story to tell.

Quiet morning: A Haiku

It settles in on me like a welcome friend, or a kiss from a new lover. As I sit and watch the fire begin to spread across the open air, I feel within my spirit a fresh wave of hope for a journey that beckons me onward and a past will now leave behind. Lead...

Alone in the Rain: A Haiku

The rain is driving and beating me; it pelts me like a scorned lover and soaks me to the bone as blood soaks the soul, and with the same unmerciful guilt. Wherever I go, it is there; Whatever I do or choose, It lives-- and closes its' frigid grasp around my heart and tears it...

Falling Up

When I was a boy, I would stand on my head a nd gaze at the deepest blue sky. Surrounded by grass as green as emerald fire, I would wait there, baffled as to why I could'nt just let go of Earth and tumble into the blue. @baffled#haikuchallenge