How Do You Fight Demons?
How do you fight demons?
With the smiles of children.
New toys and candy,
the smell of apple pies
baking on a Sunday morning,
jumping in dead leaf piles,
swinging and sliding,
running and playing.
How do you fight demons?
Not with guns or swords,
not with strength or power,
but with the sweetest,
gentlest, kindest,
most innocent,
least violent of things.
With the smiles of children.
Hummingbird
Her presence filled the garden, encompassing my soul.
Like sunshine in spring, dewdrops on petals, the lightest of breezes - whispering, echoing along the winding path.
I paused, watching her fairylike approach, ever sure that the spin of the earth stopped in wonder, like the beat of my heart.
Cycles of Existence
Beneath moonlit skies,
A newborn's cry breaks the night,
Life's first breath in awe.
Years swiftly pass by,
Youth's fleeting flame burns brightly,
Adventure beckons.
Midnight's stars now fade,
Wisdom etched on aging skin,
Time's gift, bittersweet.
Autumn leaves descend,
Cycles turn, life finds its end,
Peace in twilight's embrace.
From ashes to stars,
In the cosmic dance we roam,
Eternal journey.
Something In The Orange
I drew my last breath with her in my life as she drew away from my arms for the last time. The sun was rising when she said goodbye. She'd never looked more beautiful in the dawn's dewey stand. She told me she couldn't wait for me anymore. I wished it wasn't true.
"I need you to be there for me, but you're not willing to show up. It's been over a year. I can't wait for you to love me. I've given you all the time I can give. It's too hard. I can't do it anymore."
I tried to keep my welling eyes from overflowing. If only I'd tried this hard to keep her. I waited until that last moment to offer the commitment she'd been needing.
"I care about you so much. I don't want to lose you. I don't want to lose your friendship." It was a lame effort, and it came way too late.
"That's the problem. You don't want to lose my friendship, but I don't want to be friends with you. I want to be everything to you. I'm willing to lose you completely if I can't have it all."
Her tone was soft, kind, and rhythmic, but her words were cement. Listening to the sweet cadence of her voice was heartbreaking. The moment slid over me in slow motion. It still plays on repeat in my memories.
"Can't we still be friends? We can talk occasionally and hang out sometimes, right?" Warm tears left my lashes as I asked for her grace. She'd never seen me cry, and I hadn't felt that helpless in my life. I couldn't remember the last time I'd cried before that morning.
"No. We can't be friends anymore. I'm sorry. I don't want you to call me. I don't want to see you. I just can't do it. I'm sorry." She didn't waver, but she fought welling tears too. "I love you. I wish you loved me too. I know you do, but not the same way I love you."
The rising sun danced in her chocolate brown eyes. I never noticed how deep green forest colors blended into mahogany and espresso until she was breaking my heart. The dawn tortured me with refracting amber and copper iridescence as the sun rose behind me. Her eyes said things I wish she'd say out loud, but I didn't deserve to know those things. All I knew was she'd never be mine again. I tried to keep her one more time.
"I do love you. I don't us to end like this. I can't lose you."
"I know. I love you too. I'm sorry. I'm scared we're making a mistake, that we're messing this up, but I have to go. I'm sorry."
She kissed me for the last time, and I knew we didn't make a mistake. I made the mistake. I messed it up.
I drew my last breath her with her still lingering on my lips. She turned around, and she was gone forever.
Hungry
Chalk lines washed away easily enough, but bloodstains didn’t. She dipped the brush back into her bucket of water. It stained a lovely pink to match sore knuckles. She furiously worked the brush until the floor was lathered in frothy red. It was almost beautiful in the late afternoon light… almost, well, no–not almost: definitely a bit seductive. Fuck it. She frantically pried up her loose floorboard and plucked out the knife with blood still crusted around the handle. Lovely. She stood, hungry for more than the mere memory of blood on her hands. The mess would wait. She couldn’t.
Echoes of Starlight
When I saw the moon, I thought of you.
A compliment, to be sure, because this was no ordinary moon.
This was echoes of sunrise all bottled up in the darkness of night.
A moon so bright, it cast shadows of midday on the forest floor and sprinkled the perfume of romance across a late summer night.
I thought of you because the moon was like you: brighter than the stars, but only brave enough to shine every now and again, more beautiful than the sun because I could behold with my eyes all the splendor of its light. One cannot look upon the sun, but the moon? In its ever-changing cycle of wonderment? One could look at the moon for all eternity and never grow tired of seeing the marvelous little ways it had changed.
And when the moon hides?
That reminded me of you, too.
For when you are gone it is the blackest of nights and the echoes of starlight no longer reflect in the shadows, so I hide in my pillow until darkness passes and the morning light shines through my curtains. A comforting light is the sun, but none so precious as the moonlight. None so precious as you, ever-changing, ever the same– a tide in the marrow of my soul pulling me forever into your gentle gravity.
Yes, when I saw the moon, I thought of you.
Djembe
Maybe we're Litmus Test
The Universe testing out
Limits of its own Biases...
Tonality is blind in death.
As much as Skin in Life,
is tonally Deaf...
07.30.2023
Myth: Skin Tones @Ola_8
* Djembe is a drum thought to originate in Mali, West Africa southeast of Algeria. Its name comes from the saying "Anke djé, anke bé" which translates to mean "everyone gather together in peace," ...signifying the drum's purpose. In the Bambara language, "djé" is the verb for "gather" and "bé" translates as "peace."
Tracing in the Dark
I am a fine ribbon unravelled.
I follow the curves of a woman. Defining her sultry shape without revealing any real anatomy. There is only one silhouette that can beckon in the dark, a tenebristic sliver, delivering a lifetime of promises with a coastline of enticement, whilst flying at night and willing to cross borders.
Behind closed doors.
I am a fine ribbon of paintbrush bristles, dipped in unrequited inks. I spill over her shoulder, swell out a gentle arc at the periphery of her breast, then return to dip back in at her waist, a speckled hint of belly chain glittering here and there to solemnize her center of gravity. I flare wider then again at her hip--the true gift from God Almighty--only to dip back in again and fall to the floor.
She is beautiful because darkness makes the perfect airbrush. But it is the artist who succeeds in painting her inner beauty. Obscured in the shadows, but there for one who knows how to look. That's why it's art.
A Quiet Bang
She hadn’t known what to expect, but it was not this frenetic silence. Her eyes never strayed from him as he gathered up those things which accumulate over time, those personal things someone brings with them which somehow become your own as “I” morphs into “we.” But all through it he never glanced back. Had they, words might have made space, wedging themselves in. The dreaded silence might have been broken.