Clear the calendar and fluff the pillows
Show all visitors to the door
Lift up my fist and smash all the mirrors
It's not going to be my fault anymore

Lay blame where blame is due
Detach myself from what was you
Love kills even when it's true
Time hurts and heals, too

And though this verse is uninspired
My mind and spirit give it tired
Permission to go wild
A rogue message to no one out there who cares

For there is no solution to sadness
Only the choice between
Strength and madness
And in between
A rebellious and deliberate sickness
A detoxification
A humming, buzzing
Refusal of all but the air

You talked about the hours
I know what you mean
Two cocoons spinning around each other
Waiting to be born

Nothing personal was the agreement
After awhile

It gets lonely
With nothing else to do but be inside

Not wanting to hide
Or collide
Do we really have that much time?

Two cocoons spinning
You became a butterfly
I became a moth
You flew west
I flew north.

If hearts were made of glass
Mine would have been shattered
Into a million pieces by now
Thanks to you

If lies were poison arrows
My chest would display them
While you shot at me
From your articulate mouth

If trust was a golden ring
You would have melted it down
And burned me
With its fire

If your definition of love
Actually had some meaning
Maybe, just maybe
I would have made it

Making me believe I was unworthy
This was the most unkindest cut of all
Wanting to please, I gladly take the fall
Shamed to the core, I feel deeply *****
Seeking self-acceptance, I take love’s journey
I cling to the shadows, feeling most appalled
Making me believe I was unworthy
This was the most unkindest cut of all
Can I forgive and show myself mercy?
And not hit my head against the hard wall?
I long for the light, still I feel *****
Making me believe I was unworthy
This was the most unkindest cut of all

Kelly Rose
© March 1, 2018

The Games we play

This is not an English poem, the fear of showing
emotion, look at my stiff upper lip, wrapping
words of love in cotton wool. The truth is, my
Dear, I don't care for you, but my cowardice is
a deep river so profound I can't come and say:
I don't love you anymore.

Flowers sent, the ring I gave was out of pity
and guilt hoped you would sense the chill
behind the gift and frigidity of feeling.
Under a cloud of pusillanimity, we'll wed, live
near a hairdresser salon for you, and a park
bench of Autumnal leaves, for me.

Unbridgeable the distance between us, I will
go on dreaming, and you will scream at, my
passivity till there is no reason left,
the useless wind brings no seed to replant.
This is how it will end because I lack the gut
to say simply. “I don't love you anymore.”

when i fall,
i don't just fall in love.
clumsily, i stumble
down and then i land

awkwardly and graceless,
stuttering utterly at the foot
of a handsome man,

blundering an apology
out of breath, ineptly
embarrassed about
my shaky hands,

clambering
to dust myself off,
all the while, i try,
desperately, to stand

wishing i could disappear,
i rise as quickly as i can
waving off any helping hand

so he doesn't see
how incredibly stupid
i must be

If that night could remember
it would call him back
to our Chinese restaurant
to fried rice and steaming tea
to our winter refuge of tile and cushions
60s retro black and white
Chrome legs of lacquered tables
with its mural of
our Great Wall

...winding, distant, wonder

If the snow hadn't muffled all
but our voices
we would not be—

so alone

Only I
felt his arm take its chance
around my shoulder
Guiding warmth
as good excuse as any
to touch

Two miles on foot
An arc in time
In lace of white
to hide— what might....

Below my window
“Good Night”
not enough
for troubadour
singing, pleading, stumbling...

(I worry about his long way home)

...and hardly notice...

How gently Time joins Snow
as if they cannot bare
instead, conspire
Decide the crystals
Send the flakes to sift over him

This loss needs snow
to blur his face
to fade from view....

This— tender let-down from the sky
As only snow can do...

Cover with beauty

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6o6zMPLcXZ8

The cloth I gave it as cover for chill
is lying still.

Christmas eve was its last night.

Not that I knew
when picked it up
and gave it back
to the cold night.

I'm still holding it
heavy and invisible
on my heart
as my eyes repeat the scene
of crows pecking out its eyes
the head rolling on the earth
eyes closed.

I close my eyes
scared life could be so thin a thread
barely holding
and incredibly uncertain.

One of these days
When i clear myself
Of the wreckage
Heaped by my own personal
Hurricane
I will write some words
So pretty
That you won't notice
The devastation
All around me.

We'll light a candle
For peace on earth
Goodwill
Toward men.