Tag: poetry

This Season Doesn’t Come Every Year (A Poem)

This season doesn’t come every year

but it comes at the same time of the year

when it comes, and I know where it comes from

this fire that flares up in the midst of me.

Exhilarating, exhausting, hurtful

blessing, when I am the walking maelstrom

amongst the mostly oblivious, but

some can tell and sorrow, no–don’t sorrow.

Don’t sorrow, this tempest doesn’t own me,

only understand all my sensations

aren’t tethered to it out of season and

this season doesn’t come every year.

Hebrews 6:19 “Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast…”

Is She Worth A Poem? (A poem)

Is she worth a poem?

Either I have enough love or she has enough

hatred, but lukewarm or apathy doesn’t make

for a good recipe, but it looks like it’s too

late so now the only question is “the degree?”

Better yet, I’ll just write it and in the end you

tell me.

It began with me liking the sound of her voice

Intelligent gentleness best describes the thing

that didn’t often ring because she didn’t want

anyone to know her outside of anyone

who already knew her and it wasn’t just me

it was all of society. When I am left

with a mystery, I fill in the history

and it must have been uncomfortable that I

looked at her like I knew her better than anyone

else in the world. And the hurt when she so often

pulled away, and my reaction “Don’t you know me!”

Well, not out loud, that would have confused her even

more, but in my head we were planning on going

to a play sometime next month, after all when you

actually know each other…there’s plans of some sort.

Skewed Embers (Poem)

Either the past was the Garden of Eden

Or like the flaming heaps of Gehenna

Or our love was like the Garden of Eden

But left among the heaps of Gehenna

.

To the fiery throes, where young love goes

That smoldering pile right there–that’s our love

Grasp an ember so I can remember

Only an ember, the past that I chose

.

Look backward while nothing to see forward

And backward was always warm summer nights

Especially, always warm summer nights

Reminiscing in the dead of winter

.

And what song was playing on the radio?

It probably wasn’t that song, but it

will be that song years down the road, that song

we liked, but wasn’t playing on that night

.

That moment just before the first kiss is

the best part of the first kiss, that moment

when her eyes approve of the foregone move

It’s like our souls kiss before we touch lips

.

Strange how something dies after that first kiss

Knew not what it was, nor that it had left

Not at that time because euphoria

is a euphemism for carelessness

.

The ember partly made of memories

partly made of fantasies, fades away

relunctantly, that time, that place, that person

now only exists in some part of me

Somber Poem (A Poem)

Poetry when you are grave

is like poetry from the grave

It’s like writing from a tomb

and waiting to be exhumed

I am doing nothing

but waiting for something

Last time I did something

it resulted in nothing

That girl was like the damn boulder

that Sisyphus eternally pushed

Thereafter I hated all women

But deep down inside I want

my love to be awakened again.

{sigh}

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Love & the Leviathan (Poem)

My secret love burned but
my love is no secret
my countenance exposes
other-worldly roses
but she was only flattered
whilst I was enamored

Lovelorn as if I had been
born to burn inside for
the rest of my days
Torn by desires to fulfill
an unceasing fire or
simply get away

Limbo, my final abode
if I stayed on that road
Happy was she, to keep me
romantically hopeless, a
personal Sisyphus
I was sick of this

Her stare turned into frost
my flames did not exhaust
she was forever lost
fervor grew only higher
inferno absent of pyre
I was about to expire

Months, my mind and body waned
to others, I was insane
I kept on praying
Then one hopeless afternoon
like the harrowing of hell
my soul, did swell

Jonah 2:2 “And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice.”

She cannot Love–She must be Evil (poem)

Wasted love on a woman who could not love or
could not love me. I will believe the former, for
it is more comforting than the latter; therefore,
she cannot love–she must be evil.

Better to be in Limbo with somebody than
to be in Limbo with nobody, but she chose
nobody; thus, nobody is better than me?
She cannot love–she must be evil.

I am not allowed to say her name aloud, but
I will! I will! Her name is Countess Bathory,
bathed herself in my misery–epiphany!…
…she cannot love–she must be evil.

Nearly died did I of an unknown malady,
indubitably, twas the fault of my lady,
Oh my, nevermind, she was never mine, but
I am still in love with one who must be evil.

The Poem that Nobody Likes (a poem)

O’ love is so cliche, they say.

Perhaps verse about struggles

with society or sobriety

if you desire notoriety.

 

Why, Dante already thought that

and Shakespeare already brought that

and Shelley already wrought that

and Poe, too many know.

 

Caverns measureless to man (1)

are no longer in demand,

So–go back to your unreal city! (2)

for your poetry is pretty…

 

The moon, is a naked whore,

no ballads to her anymore,

Spare us all the old tropes,

We want desire, without hope! (3)

 

We want racism! we want sexism!

You don’t speak to our activism,

Your idealism, your romanticism

only warrants our vandalism.

 

We want subversion and perversion,

our interest is the inversion

of Philippians four-eight,

verse that inspires our hate.

 

1) Kubla Khan, Samuel Coleridge

2) The Waste Land, T.S. Eliot

3) Close enough to Inferno 4.42, Dante Alighieri (Longfellow version)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unnamed Poem (a poem)

O’ to engage my beloved again,

For all is dross that is not(1)…her,

For me to speak her name would cause her rage,

I–a wild animal in her sight, not in its cage,

Her–a muse that escaped antiquity,

A fugitive from Botticelli’s imagery,

Perfumed with gentleness & grace,

and I–a wild animal, quite out of place.

As if I had ignored the markers of Heracles,

When I came into her presence,

And why, O’ me–should I write this?

Because that is how love works,

Some of us merely breath air for it,

Some of us must conquer Troy for it,

Away from my beloved ye feminist beasts!

Like the Furies wrapped about the towers of Dis,

They hiss & hiss to lead her amiss,

O’ how I miss my beloved, my Beatrice!

But my Beatrice doesn’t miss me.

1) Dr Faustus, Scene XIII, by Christopher Marlowe

 

Limbo (A Sonnet)

Limbo, confusion, a decision that
never comes for paths never presented.
The weight of the wait for another day,
for another way, yesterday, today
or tomorrow, not enough for sorrow
not enough for joy, not enough to be
enough, it’s like a bluff, but bluffing what?
Cards not dealt, feelings not felt, waiting on
the big break to break the big wait, the break
is my fate, but don’t ask me the date, for
too much is at stake, to make a mistake,
but the wait for fate, might be a mistake.

I’m not even sure what I’m waiting on
but I am sure that I will be waiting

Purgatorio–Turning Point (Virgil’s Discourse on Love)

Dante Alighieri’s Inferno is a fine standalone. Hell is thick, dark, exhausting & simply escaping it offers satisfaction enough for the majority of readers. There are more reasons people often vacate The Comedy at Purgatorio. If one continues to climb Mount Purgatorio it is at Canto 51 & 52 (of 100) that we reach the turning point or prime catharsis for Dante’s real life. Catharsis (Greek) & Purgatorio (Latin) are close to the same words.

The dilemma of the entire poem is love.  Dante had a secret, burning, never realized, thus unrequited love for Beatrice. Also take into account his later exile from the city of Florence. On top of that, consider that Dante poetically tells us in the first three lines of the book that he was in the midst of most likely a PTSD episode or emotional time travel event (love madness or obsessive love can manifest due to PTSD). All the former emotions from Dante’s Vita Nuova time period may have flooded back in coupled with the emotions from his recent exile.

I must point out that Dante’s Limbo is the first circle of the Inferno because that is the initiation for a similar experience to Dante’s. The modern usuage of “Limbo” is not knowing something or waiting for an answer–incorrect according to Dante’s usage. His Limbo is a constant desire coupled with the tormenting knowledge that there is no hope of fulfillment:

“For such defects, and not for other guilt,
Lost are we and are only so far punished,
That without hope we live on in desire.”

Inferno 4.40-42

Dante may have been experiencing a PTSD duality when he began writing  The Divine Comedy as they call it, but the proper title per Dante “Here beginnith the comedy of Dante Alighieri, a Florentine by birth, but not in manners”:

“MIDWAY upon the journey of our life”

Inferno 1.1

It is our (plural) life (singular). It is not our lives because Dante is not including our lives in the equation, but the separate parts of his life, to wit–him from sometime from the past occupying the same space as him from the present.This time-travel duality was best reflected by Dante in Inferno 8 & 9. The cantos reflect emotional events from two distant times in Dante’s life. Both events are portrayed just outside the walls of the city of Dis.

The walls of Dis separate the Inferno’s 5th & 6th Circles. The 5th Circle is the punishment for the Irascible & the Sullen or those overcome by bitterness–wrath. Both real life events (Beatrice & Exile) threatened to leave Dante in a stasis–bitterness. In the poem both events attempt to permanently halt his journey in the circle of wrath.

Inferno 8 reflects the emotions from Dante’s exile. The city of Dis is a hellish representation of the city of Florence (IE it has mosque towers instead of Christian spires). When Dante & his guide Virgil reach the walls of the city, the denizens on top of the wall state that Virgil can come in, but Dante cannot pass. Virgil is the symbol for Dante’s poetry. Florence wanted the poetry (or an association with it), but not the poet. Dante could have been in a perpetual state of bitterness over his exile.

Inferno 9–we are still outside the walls of Dis. This canto reflects the emotions from Dante’s episode in Vita Nuova XIV. In the Inferno, three Furies land on the mosque towers & call for Medusa to turn Dante into stone–a transfiguration. In Vita Nuova XIV, Dante was neck deep in his love madness for Beatrice. His friend invited him to what was allegedly a simple gathering of lovely women–he did not even know Beatrice would be there.

The entry & sonnet are slightly ambiguous, but the historian Boccaccio believes it was a small wedding reception dinner. The new bride–Beatrice. At the sight of Beatrice & her love interest, as Dante puts it, he suffered a transfiguration. He became pale & sickly. A few of the women at the gathering (The Furies) & Beatrice (Medusa) began to giggle & mock Dante for his sickly appearance. Dante was mocked by the woman he loved during a great moment of suffering. Again, Dante could have been perpetually bitter over the matter.

“You join with other ladies to deride me
and do not think, my lady, for what cause
I cut so awkward and grotesque a figure…”

Vita Nuova XIV, 1-3

Dante & Beatrice’s reciprocal relationship prior to his transfiguration, according to Dante, was nothing more than Beatrice giving Dante one friendly greeting on the street (love madness). It was a long, secret, building, burning love I had for a woman that initiated my event. Like Dante with Beatrice, I fell in love with her at first sight, but it was a long time before any association. At best, it’s climax, the relationship was only an association between us in the setting of a formal environment.

It was so much more to me because the long building secret desire (Proverbs 27:5). Once the association went south, even though it never actually went north, I had heard 2nd hand that she claimed, “We were never even friends.” You can be frozen in a state bitterness over such a thing.

Once you are able to resume a fully functional state after a bout with love madness or unrequited love, you desire answers. It is apparent Dante long sought answers to the same questions I had.

When we feel the true emotion of love, we believe it is automatically good. But if it is good, how could it lead us into disaster? How can the recipient hate it so much? Was a person’s love madness a simple pride problem instead? Most importantly–was it actually love?

In Inferno, sin is punished. In Purgatorio, vice is purged. Both realms have circles of wrath. Dante spends much time & was halted before leaving the circles of wrath in Inferno & Purgatorio. It is Purgatorio’s circle of wrath where Virgil provides the discourse on love. This discourse provides Dante with some answers to questions I posted in the paragraph above:

“Hence thou mayst comprehend that love must be
The seed within yourselves of every virtue,
And every act that merits punishment.”

Purgatorio 17.103-105

“The natural was ever without error;
But err the other may by evil object,
Or by too much, or by too little vigour.”

Purgatorio 17.94-96

“Now may apparent be to thee how hidden
The truth is from those people, who aver
All love is in itself a laudable thing,

Because its matter may perchance appear
Aye to be good; but yet not each impression
Is good, albeit good may be the wax.”

Purgatorio 18.34-39

I love the allegory of the wax. The wax is love & good nonetheless–regardless of the impression (seal) in it.

Love in itself, is intrinsically good. Enter the object/subject of that love (John 3:19) or the degree in respects to a certain object/subject. During my event, which included the unrequited love, those I told said it was obsession. I was offended by the claim & countered that it was love. We were both right according to Dante. Love madness is love…but it’s not destiny. There is the rub–the thought that it must destiny due to the personal strength of the emotion.

In conclusion, if you suffer through obssession or love madness (I consider the latter a more accurate label), even if it is or isn’t a byproduct of something else–you want some answers. Is loving someone who doesn’t love you (or doesn’t return it to nearly the same degree) some sort of crime? No, because who can understand the subject of unrequitted love better than God?

John 1:11 “He came unto his own, and his own received him not.”