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Unless your bucket list is in pencil
Unless you’re content in front of your television
And your eyes see better than your heart does
If you heard on the radio that intellect killed hope
And read on the message board that we never needed hope in the first place
Unless you see unfiltered
And the light in your eyes is not a reflection of anywhere you’ve been
If there is nothing out there
And you’ve seen it before anyway
Take note:

When every metaphor ever built
Has fallen apart
Love will be a voice saying, here I am
Saying fight to take that deep breath one more time
Find me up ahead and run to me
The horizon isn’t as far away as you made it out to be
And looking over the edge will be the sweetest thing you have ever done

When every metaphor ever built
Has fallen apart
Love will still be saying: “get out there and find me” as directly as it can
Pleading with you to be a part of something bigger
Something lasting and dangerous
And hard to believe
The evidence is the beauty that you’ve seen
Miracles are not so different than dappled light through the canopy of trees
And that judging by the way it dances down the creek bed, water must hear music that no one else seems to believe
But there is a peace in that music
And a whisper in that dance
And if you listen long enough
You will feel some of your coarseness wash away
And that refinement is love
Look, even the stones lose their edge
Here’s to saying: “Look!”
To saying “You have to see this!”
To: “Come with me!”
“Let’s go!”
“Hurry!”
“Don’t miss this!”
“We’re explorers!”
“Let’s get out there!”
Adventure is only half going
The other half is who goes with you
The eighth wonder of the world is being together
And while all stories will end they can be shared forever
No paradise is complete alone
But love is an eternal home

When all metaphors ever built
Have fallen apart
Love will still be saying
Get out there
Find me
This poem was actually inspired by a photo submitted to my website as part of a little contest I held. Thanks to Jolene OBrien for the photo, which you can see at anthempoet.com
i.

the mule’s belly
travels with the mule
makes in sand
what my son claims
as a whale’s
bed    

to ward off
the otherness
of any creature    
appearing to him
that is not
or that is my

whale

ii.

a son

I always say

a son
for every
sadness

iii.

one dreamless mule
Divine Minds Transcend

Take a deep breath
are you ready to hack reality
Lay down and close your eyes
this is going to be amazing
Are you ready
ready to breathe into a cosmic smack down
and plunge into the great divide
Get rattled
Get shattered
Get snatched up from life
then drift into the glowing maze
a place to laugh and cry
Minds rewire during lunar flight
the blue monkey will grin from ear to ear
Strike a pose for your third eye
then return you back to life
© JDMaraccini 2013
no babies, yet, in the newly funded baby jail.  

a pair of baby handcuffs, though, shiny as two ideas.

as for baby prisons
they are still a thing
of the past.  

with any
Ohio luck
you’ll spot a garage sale cashier
sitting in a small
electric chair.
the kid shakes salt from his palm onto a dead mouse.  his girlfriend’s cat slicks itself as if its spot as a pillow in hell has been filled.  I can’t see the look on your face but my imitation comforts me.  I once lived nearby but had a dog and moved to be closer to it.  

    yesterday, the kid’s father sold me a mirror.  said I would have second thoughts.
I cracked my ribcage open.
Finding a pomegranate in the center.
I pulled it out, ever so slowly.
Cut it open right down the middle.
Ate all the little seeds,
Filled with little screams.
My fingers stained red.
And very ******.
Then I realized,
it was the heart of
Persephone.
*And she was me.
I'm back, *******. Haha.

© Amara Pendergraft 2013
If you roam around my house,
              look about,
        up & down,
                           you'll find many paper cranes.

When I feel empty, I make so many,
                     and leave them random places.

You can find them here,
                and there,
          pretty much everywhere,
                              lined up on window panes.

I never felt the need to gather them,
                      and I most likely never will.

If I put them all together,
                 made sure it was forever,
           they could withstand the weather,
                             and there would be a thousand.
              
They say with a thousand cranes,
                       a wish is granted in your favor.

But I have no wishes,
               so I'll sleep with the fishes,
           after my hands tremble to the point of refrain
                                  & I can no longer make anymore paper cranes.
Amara Pendergraft 2013
I was raised in a silence and went on to *******.  I was not close to any named animal.  I let my brother's leg break in the barn and watched as he appraised the length of the rope he jumped with.  when hunting together we followed telephone lines and shot into the air.  birds did more than resemble the feet of our jesus.  our mother was glad we lived but couldn't recall which of us snuck up on her.  our father let us call him by his first name.  his logic remained impenetrable.  he smoked to remember smoking.  slept on the floor so mother would stop making the bed.  before standing on his head in a full bath he'd promise to breathe with his brain.  he'd introduce us as my son the tattoo and my son the artist.  I loved him so much I had to run away and come back.  to this day my brother doesn't know if he was taught to distance himself from prayer or to embrace it

to distance himself from god.
i.

in no dream did I see you emerge naked from a lake smoking a cigarette you seemed afraid to touch with your fingers.  in no dream was there a ruined enough tree that could take your ****.  

ii.

we are not doing too many things at once.  we are merely extinct.  god's final act is god's only.  we harp.
he ended by saying surely it is evil to live.


I have not been stunned by fiction since having hands.  


he started by asking silence to observe the audience.  
he crushed a cocoon under foot because it had no god.  


I have not been beautiful since needing nourishment.  
I have not sinned since taking an active role in my dreams.


he arrived in a white limo.
he applied to his body a lotion of black milk.
he penned in the asylum we’d sun ourselves with angels.


he cried like a baby he’d seen.
I have not cried like that since being cut in half.


I was not ***** in a field of vision
nor have I been
since refusing the kit.
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