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David Hilburn May 21
Police at the circus:
Ok, buddy, why the scream?
Excitement is for children, here...
Thoughts of adulthood, should learn to be

The juggler says hi
When may has an opportunity, baring a tooth
The fright of charity, is in the air, with silence
Terror came, when pasts are aloof?

The third ring, comes forward...
Sated angels, with misery for needs each?
Knowing a drama in the lie, we sternly compare what starred
A cagey house among many fields, we know the faring vanity...

Letting the culprit, ride the elephant?
We saw the problem, animals with a pace for us...
Have the cordiality to look, and see the limit
Of a surprise, happy enough to feed and pet; with thus?

A happier boat?
With moments to clear the board...
Saintly fights, with the voice of a stranger, are what we thought
Getting hysteria out of the way, makes good nature have a word?

With a wisdom's, shadow?
Prepare our smile, with a remembering guise...
Of what worry was to your fellow man, a place to hold
Ones distance to a wish, that wasn't a person again? home pie...
eeny meeny miney moe, why did the tiger go home? because it smiles better there...
Poetic T Jan 2019
Woven flesh knotted with the confines
of my inner plague.
             A misery of reflections that I would
wish never to gaze upon, as I'm my own
               medusa, confined in stone impressions.

And I transfixed upon my own morbidity.



But then you gave me a tattered box.
                    It's confines rattled like aged bones.
A melody of death sombre in its gifts.
                  I collected them and used the
              webs of decay to knit them hanging
                        like lynched memories swaying harshly.


With this chime of
                               syllable decomposition,
I heard your message.
That even though every gift is concealed in a darkness,
                                          there is always a moment
where its brighter than any luminosity given by the light.
Amit Pokhrel Sep 2018
The ordinates concealed in your infinitesimal rationale
Insufficiencies portraying vestibules in your feverish attires
Every new soul you see makes you feel homeless
Dizzying altitudes you feel inside the depth of cavities
Indifference on pain and sufferings you crave for
And,
Hell; you feel inside grandeurs of perspectives
Hate; for the dearth of adulation on you
Liken Gaia could have never taught you of your frailty
Postulation of Karma and de-carnation of meanings made you converted
You were on the path of revolt
Against, say, cosmos!

Every symbolic gestures remind me of your meddlings
Penultimate; utter grievance of never ending poignancy
The night sky could have never baffled about your existence
Palpitation could have never made you shiver
But you have cried,
Of your loneliness!

Say,
A tiny fraction of clairvoyance I gave
Pulled you down into the puddle of wanderings
Instigation of a melody; created the symphony
A mere touch; drenched you into the silken lake
I spoke for your heart and you praised
Then, I gave you love but I got caged

How could I have done whatever you wished?

Since nobody knows,
The culminating dichotomy of your pantheistic ideas,
And of a maggot growing inside you
Breathless desires governing your feet,
And the time falsifying your plutonic ancestry
Mosaic glittering over your virtuous self,
And the tapestry of vanity covering your abysses
Depleting number of Hordes and Tartars fighting for your existence,
And devalued meaning of your modern-self

All those songs that never could soothe you
Teeny panting of your blasphemous heart
Multitude of distances you travelled
Series of condemnation bouncing between you and me
Your fleeting poverty
Your affections on materials
Like you die the death of pertinence
Love shall never please you

Nonchalant, over the,
Embargo you created on the faith
And the game you created on the bliss
But you shall never win
Since, you are a mere human soul
Bless you!!
Amit Pokhrel Sep 2018
Oh! Wilderness!

My friend from the futile land

I, a devoid soul, of emancipation

Of the wilder lands—

Where covets and virtues of the past

Do not have their say.

The morbid authority of present

Does not have its reign.

And, you from the epitome of pulsating catharsis,

Where—

The falsifying dreams of redemption

Doesn’t bite with it’s jaws

And, doesn’t gnaw with it’s claws!



I seek you

Over and throughout

Where dark alleys do not contain

Souls weeping it’s heart out

Like never-ending rain shower.



I seek you

A longing for the warmth

Where the scorching desert suns

Do not burn the nativity down

Into human ashes!



I seek you

Like in a search for the continuum

Where meek hearts don’t dare to sedate themselves

In the near fear of the dragon inside—

Themselves!



Oh! Wilderness, my friend

I dream of you—

As a mother gazelle teaches its fawn to nibble grass leaves at dawn

As a clear stream runs south drenching the feeble land

As a man who forgives the crime of a mute with silence

And, as a smile that brightens up the face of a child

—herein, a meek human heart

Dreams of you!



Oh! Wilderness—

You shall be the rays of hope when I run dry,



Oh! Wilderness—

You shall be the joy when I wrench my heart out for a cry,



Oh! Wilderness—

You be the ivy wrath I shall put on when I’m to die!



Dear wilderness,

Let there be no servitude—

Only be there a desire—

To conquer the vacancy in the soul—

The eternal fear of eternity

And, the end of it!
You wouldn't just leave,
that was never gonna be enough for you.

You wanted to drag my soul through the pits of misery,
have it's beauty carved on glass...
...because you knew just how easily it could break.

You wanted to take every part of me there was to take,
just so you could rip me to shreds...
...leaving me in pieces
that could never mend.

Little did you know that I was already detached from my being...
...the moment you thought you were becoming one with it.

That I was so estranged from the person you knew...
...because I was already becoming someone you would never get to know.

You took all there was to take,
not because you had that power over me,
but rather
because I gave up what was no longer necessary for my existence.
The beauty of pain is often found in acknowledging its lesson(s).
Jade Feb 2018
Come one,

come all

and

join me

for a night of

unadulterated madness.
--------------------------------------------------------­-------------------------------------
“I see a dreadful fright in your future.”

–Madame Tarot
-----------------------------------------------------------­----------------------------------
Poor, dizzy fools.

Watch how they

go round and round

until their eyes pop

from their sockets,

until they *****

pink streaks of cotton candy

onto the sweet

horses with golden hooves

and blazing eyes.

–Cursed Carousel
--------------------------------------------------------­-------------------------------------
My lovely Lady Tightrope

I do believe that skirt is

far too short and

that leotard far too snug.



When you said you wished

to put on a show for us,

I did not realize this is

what you had implied.

–Getting Freaky
----------------------------------------------------------­-----------------------------------
They say these grounds are haunted

by little girls in feathered bonnets

and little boys in blue trousers.


And, if you listen carefully,

mingled in with the pervasive

notes of carnival music

are the morbid wails of these children–

children whose balloons have burst,

and whose ice cream cones have been dropped.
--------------------------------------------------------­-------------------------------------
“But Mr. Clown, mama says I’m not supposed to take candy from strangers.”
-----------------------------------------------------­----------------------------------------
How ironic that the ringmaster

is missing his own ring finger.

–She purred like a kitty but knew how to pounce
----------------------------------------------------------­-----------------------------------
“Why, what terribly big teeth you have.”

“The better to eat you with, my dear.”
----------------------------------------------------------­-----------------------------------
I present to you

The Great Dr. Whim.



Watch how he saws his

assistant in half.



Relish in the piercing

serenade of her screams,

and how they ricochet off the

tapestried walls.



Grin wildly as her blood–

thick with candy floss

and other disgustingly sweet

delicacies–

drips down into the

cracks of the floorboards,

slowly inching its way

towards the audience.

–Magician’s Corner
----------------------------------------------------------­-----------------------------------
See there?


Hidden among the

silhouette of the trees

is a man with

blistered lips and

charred teeth.


If you look carefully,

from a distance,

you will notice

a gray fog curling above the

pines–

it is the smoke billowing from his

nostrils,

threatening to wrap

its angry hands

around any guest

who dare venture too far

from the carnival grounds.

–Fire Eater
-----------------------------------------------------------­----------------------------------
More often than not

his daggers do not hit the target,

but instead find themselves

embedded in

the backs of our

lovely attendees.

–Knife Thrower
---------------------------------------------------------­------------------------------------
And to end the evening,

we have something spectacular

in store for you–

our human cannonball.


He is to fly,

but to never come down,

cut from his tether

to this earth

like a balloon that has been cut

from its string.


And at the most climactic moment

of his soaring escapade,

his flesh is to ignite,

leaving for his viewers

something resembling a firework show,

as a mesh of burning cartilage and

scorched bone set the night

sky ablaze with horror.
---------------------------------------------------------­------------------------------------
Oh?


You say you are afraid?


But I am simply fulfilling

the promise I made to you

upon your initial arrival–

it was madness I promised,

and it is madness you have received.
Listen to Things
More often than Beings
Hear the voice of fire
Hear the voice of water
Listen in the wind
To the sigh of the bush
This is the ancestors breathing
Those who are dead are not ever gone
They are in the darkness that grows lighter

And in the darkness that grows darker
The dead are not down in the earth
They are in the trembling of the trees
In the groaning of the woods
In the water that runs
In the water that sleeps
They are in the hut,
They are in the crowd

**The dead are not dead.
An excerpt by Birago Diop
which can be found in the African Philosophy Reader (Coetzee & Roux 2003: 723)
Something about death always turns into an emotional journey through all and any memories you've had with someone throughout your lives,
Going through the penetrating pain of how you can't not let go when the time comes,
There's no mental preparation for what life without a person you've grown to treasure in your life turns out to be.

That's true,
No preparation,
NONE whatsoever!!!

It is an inevitable part of our lives
that ultimately comes out to greet us
and at that point we really have to smile and wave,
irrespective of our energy levels
A collaboration between Khayalabo Ngudu ThePoet and Nonkululeko Anicia Khumalo describing death.
Martin Narrod May 2016
Winter is up to my ears
Water's in my eyes, the dull chanting squeaks of
Frollicking field mice, dark hungry souls eat dark hungry shrubs
They tear apart the grass until the dirt is overturned. The ministry is dead, into the shapes they throw, weapons in the syllables where voices dear to go. The Spring is hazing the moon, and the gallow falls, the Pines of Rome are just a symptom of autumn's calls. The mouse while he saunters in, gives no notice to the gray wolf's evil grin. Panting the tousle takes them both, no insides give, into the night I sit and stare from my window's ledge.

No apothecary seems to work, all the medicines they give like names, until the doctor fools the patient she's well again. Cloaking in the shadowy stirs of the wicked herbs we picked from our garden and yard. Mellow to the taste, cold to the face, and stings like the tantrum does when the pain is just too much too much.

Have you seen the stirring woes of the frogs, stuck to the cement, thrown from the heavens by so many angry gods. Children hated for their voice, their skins and arms and legs dispersed, any dolt can name a common cure. Sicker than the pain it shoves, while the mood settles into to a rain water bath. In a crevice their may be some thought, but it doesn't even help at all, then the cold comes in and shucks awe and feeling where the aches and screams haunt the unhealthy whims.

After Easter and beyond each birth, no one calls and everything's inert, in the desert we call to the stars, but the birds return to us and make us stop asking for cause. Misunderstanding takes its awful view, and the children stop asking too. The events of hatred unfold weirdly, broken glass bottles splinter on the ears, even blood runs warm, we run hot, and shake our chills through the spine until stranger's call us out on our eyes. Even the wanting can't, and no one can. But the help makes the worst of it even more wrong. Until they can't speak or sing to themselves, whispers on the night break the shapes on the shores.
Sometimes I wake up
And I don’t know how to start the day
My heart beating away
My breath coming out in bursts
Like waking from a fresh nightmare
Then I remember... You’re there...
My eyes close with the weight of fresh tears
And my tearing heart closes down
But I’ll keep on living
Because I know you’re around
The stutters and breaks don’t hurt anymore
And the nightmares are all smiles
Gruesome smiles that haunt the shadows
That keep me awake beside you
That make me think without you...
I just wouldn’t know what to do
And so what if I watch you sleep
Heart heavy as I weep
Over the obvious change going on in me
From love to hate
From now to what was meant to be?
So I go through my day like any other
Picking no direction to walk in
I just take one step, then another
And stop when the road ends
And when I walk through that door
You’ll be there
Smiling at me from in front of the t.v
And I wonder why it is I am there
Watching something that obviously
Doesn’t interest me
The lights in your eyes
And the smile that passes by
That vacant expression once you turn away
So I’m stood in the doorway
Not really knowing what to say
To the person that cares nothing about me
And it suddenly occurs to me
That at which velocity
Would it take to throw you down the stairs
And when you hit your head
How many years would I get
For such a crime of the heart...
Because you’ve already killed me...
Sometimes it hurts so much you do ******.
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