Cambridge is screaming
and as a result its throat is sore.
Everyone is every park and porch
stopped, looked and saw
the shot and killed on a Willow Street floor.

For a girl whom walked as if wind
over little river stream, ******
was the last thing that made her scream.
A thundering absence laid seldom slain
with a bolt of blood spelling innocent pain,
on porch-wood-decking painted cream green
salad leaf fresh, cut from the root with melded flesh.

They sent you in to say farewell to me,
No, do not shake your head; I see your eyes
That shine with tears.  Sappho, you saw the sun
Just now when you came hither, and again,
When you have left me, all the shimmering
Great meadows will laugh lightly, and the sun
Put round about you warm invisible arms
As might a lover, decking you with light.
I go toward darkness tho’ I lie so still.
If I could see the sun, I should look up
And drink the light until my eyes were blind;
I should kneel down and kiss the blades of grass,
And I should call the birds with such a voice,
With such a longing, tremulous and keen,
That they would fly to me and on the breast
Bear evermore to tree-tops and to fields
The kiss I gave them.  Sappho, tell me this,
Was I not sometimes fair?  My eyes, my mouth,
My hair that loved the wind, were they not worth
The breath of love upon them?  Yet he passed,
And he will pass to-night when all the air
Is blue with twilight; but I shall not see.
I shall have gone forever.  Hold my hands,
Hold fast that Death may never come between;
Swear by the gods you will not let me go;
Make songs for Death as you would sing to Love—
But you will not assuage him.  He alone
Of all the gods will take no gifts from men.
I am afraid, afraid.

                               Sappho, lean down.
Last night the fever gave a dream to me,
It takes my life and gives a little dream.
I thought I saw him stand, the man I love,
Here in my quiet chamber, with his eyes
Fixed on me as I entered, while he drew
Silently toward me—he who night by night
Goes by my door without a thought of me—
Neared me and put his hand behind my head,
And leaning toward me, kissed me on the mouth.
That was a little dream for Death to give,
Too short to take the whole of life for, yet
I woke with lips made quiet by a kiss.
The dream is worth the dying.  Do not smile
So sadly on me with your shining eyes,
You who can set your sorrow to a song
And ease your hurt by singing.  But to me
My songs are less than sea-sand that the wind
Drives stinging over me and bears away.
I have no care what place the grains may fall,
Nor of my songs, if Time shall blow them back,
As land-wind breaks the lines of dying foam
Along the bright wet beaches, scattering
The flakes once more against the laboring sea,
Into oblivion.  What care have I
To please Apollo since Love hearkens not?
Your words will live forever, men will say
“She was the perfect lover”—I shall die,
I loved too much to live.  Go Sappho, go—
I hate your hands that beat so full of life,
Go, lest my hatred hurt you.  I shall die,
But you will live to love and love again.
He might have loved some other spring than this;
I should have kept my life—I let it go.
He would not love me now tho’ Cypris bound
Her girdle round me.  I am Death’s, not Love’s.
Go from me, Sappho, back to find the sun.

I am alone, alone.  O Cyprian . . .

To see this old man shaking here
In rage at boys whose apple-throwing jeers
Reduce him to impotent rage and tears
Is to know Odysseus, home from Troy,
Battle spent, no Cyclops left to blind,
And no more Stygian puzzles to unwind.

The threats he hurls are hollow stones
Coming now from a man whose bones
Once cracked beneath a decking plank
As Scylla searched with serpent heads
For men to crush and swallow, dead,
But ***'dy now remains to save the day.

The hapless tree whose apples green are peltering his home
Is now an oar, pole-planted tall a thousand miles ashore
As penance for the years of taunting gods of wave and foam,
And boys be savages unaware of what an apple's for.

Sunrise was just a red line in the inky void, as Lisa and I reached the harbor decking stairs,
but at once, the brazen slash began widening, like a silent, slow motion explosion,  
thin, smoky wisps of cloud, like flammable tissue, prismed the stage light ignition.

bee-de-deep my phone chirped. It was Peter (my bf).
“Hey you,” I pronounced, as Lisa took off her left sneaker and shook it, upside-down.  
“How’s the harbor?” Peter asked. I glanced at my watch, it was 5:32 am in New Haven.
Peter must be at lunch (in Geneva) and tracking our morning run with the ‘Find My’ app.
“Beautiful,” I pronounced, “they’re really putting on a show.”
Of course, I meant the universe, the sun, the turns who were already at work, and Long Island Sound.
The gulls, perched on whatever, and grousing at each other, obviously haven’t had their coffee.
I read that AI had decoded bird talk and on a wire, they chittered, “Move over, you’re in my space.”

“Just wanted to say good morning,” Peter confessed, “Good Morning.”
“Good morning,” I wished back, “gotta go,” I replied, Lisa had finished de-pebbling her shoe.
“Yep,” Peter agreed, “Seee ya,” he quipped. “See ya,” I chuckled, smiling.
My watch asked, in my Air Podded ears, “Have you finished your workout?” because I was motionless.
I pressed the crown of my watch and slid the phone back in my pocket, our jogg’s only half done.

We began our harbor exodus, by turning our backs to the haven. It was already beginning to busy with boats.
We slipped on our hats and protective, polarized sunglasses as we began to run directly into the blazing sun.
.
.
Songs for this:
Sail on Sailor by the Beach Boys
Dancing in the moonlight by Toploader
Cold Heart - PNAU Remix by Elton John, Dua Lipa, PNAU

Rollin up at school
Mates and I loving to fool
Graffiti on the walls
Bullies decking the halls
An out-of-place Christmas
Dis this ***** I'll dish licks for spits
Revenge counteracted and counters counteract
Mother ******* follow law of Chemistry: react
And that's that, it's a fact
Evil reigns supreme
I'm evil too yet Devils be
Hating on me
You see?

There's no justice just depression
No real law just suppression
It's hard to imagine
That a devils invention
Is invested in protection
Law
And Order for Chaos
Does it work?
Nope
I walk down the street see six ******* blazing dope
Walk into school toilets and herb is in the air
******* blow smoke in teachers ears
They don't care
There's no prayer to save those so gone
The world is a cruel place and erases those when they are alone

So we band together
Rule of strength and defence
Is for us altogether
Never sharing secrets in our minds we be keeping
We stay awake to 8 past 8 in the morning, no sleeping
No rest for the wicked
I guess I'm just sick of *******
Because every lyric I spit
Falls ******* deaf ears
Still listening?

I reminisce blue skies
That I see through crystal clear tears
No solution or absolution to resolve this malicious premonition
The worlds in despair
No repair
Disrepair
Fire flashing embers swirl and smoke is in the air

We destroy and conquer and thrive off death
Fighting others killing hope until we pass our final breath
If this is a test
God we failed
Eons ago
I'd like to rest peacefully now
If you don't mind
I just want you to know
Action brings reaction, reaction brings pain
Don't question the truth
It's ruthless but we ****** in the brain
Insane
Now if you don't mind
I got business to attend to
And a brand new life to find
Or a new rap to recite

We're doomed, we failed,
Good didn't prevail
Evil conquered long ago
And sanity set sail

To somewhere better,
Perhaps another land
Maybe there peace and hope
Is something people understand

And prosper from it

You feel it coming
should be in, on and
around everything
Expiration Dates mean something
pay heed from the beginning
Ignore it,
fight a battle
backing zero winners
Flexing pure prays weight
cutting down
on the sinners

All of us are rotting
ever since our precious birth
Expiration Dates foretelling
of what we’re really worth
Ignore it,
face a conflict
stuck forever in debate
While I rest adjacent
decking your
days hate

All men created equal but,
don’t practice what they preach
Expiration date’s approaching
we were taught, now we must teach!
Ignore it,
keep on walkin’ till
you know it’s much too late
a victim of
your own accord and
the next stirred Nations fate

She by him like an angel always stood.
Her presence often gave him true joy
And warmth, her words were like food
To his soul, and never was his love coy
In her heart, nor was her affection with
Guile beclouded too. She's a babe unique--
Decking out in virtue, diligence and divine wit,
One that could make mortal men weak.
Howbeit she has left him in the lurch all alone,
His life and authorship to paddle on his own.

She snuggles into her warm
green winter blanket  
disturbing the last seeds of summer

That will be a welcome winter feast
for the small winter birds
As they forage around her bedding
collecting their winter store

Spiders casts their webs
around the sea of green sagging stalks
Hoping to fill their nets with
one last harvest

The light dims

A sleepy mouse shows its head
from under the garden shed door
Zig zaging across the decking
munching on a slug
who stayed out a little too late

The toad
who has been eyeing his supper
As the sun was setting
over the now sleepy garden
Was not amused
and puffed his body out in anger,

only to spy a worm
peeking her head out of the decking groove
Checking out all the commotion
Gone in an instant
to the now happy toad

A black and white cat
quietly surveys
from her vantage point
on top of the tired sagging
roofed garden shed

As the still night
washes over the garden
the animals blend
back into their garden home

Waiting

The wood chimes are clunking
with each sweep of breeze,
lending melody in this space.
This is where I dig,
dividing root from soil,
time from life, and us
from everybody else.

Squirrel scampers the border,
raising hackles and creating a
two-legged dog and mayhem.
This must be his habitat,
passed down through generations
until the brick and concrete conspired
to break the oak stronghold.

The view from the decking
throws itself through other gardens
to the far distant fast lane.
Noiseless here, with only
the high haunting whistle
of the slow circling
red kite.

There's a hurdler in the distance,
Approaching from afar,
Nothing struck him in this instance,
Though the setting was bizarre

He somersaults each in a flurry,
As the clouds threaten to rain,
The flowers flutter with worry,
As they sight the old warplane

He runs straight out the exit,
Takes a right onto an avenue,
Where streetlights line the docks,
And pebbles question you

Waves crackle over the pier,
As he flies across the decking,
He throws his hands up and volunteers,
To the cold hiss of forgetting

Some time later he awakes,
On a beach of pebbles and shells,
Hasty escape perhaps a mistake,
A fall from carousels

A tower commands the sea around,
Windowless, aged concrete,
He laughs and spins at what he's found,
Alive but incomplete

Don't go leaping
Into water
chasing after
Cute disaster
Noughan's daughter
Sings to fishers
Young and old
they lose their decking
All their wishes
All  untold
Skinny boy or
Old man whiskers
drowned-a-calm
by Noughan's daughter
smiling even
as they're weeping
in the deep
where they lay
sleeping.

To see this old man shaking here
In rage at boys whose apple-throwing jeers
Reduce him to impotent rage and tears
Is to know Odysseus, home from Troy,
Battle spent, no Cyclops left to blind,
And no more Stygian puzzles to unwind.

The threats he hurls are hollow stones
Coming now from a man whose bones
Once cracked beneath a decking plank
As Scylla searched with serpent heads
For men to crush and swallow, dead,
But ***'dy now remains to save the day.

The hapless tree whose apples green are peltering his home
Is now an oar, pole-planted tall a thousand miles ashore
As penance for the years of taunting gods of wave and foam,
And boys be savages unaware of what an apple's for.

It seemed a good idea at the time
the wide beam
protected by a wall on one side
another intersecting beam on the other
and composite decking above
a perfect place build a nest
to raise young
but now that the chill of spring
has given way to the warmth of summer....
many large feet beat the deck above
and slide furniture around
in a never ending thunderstorm.
Second thoughts perhaps?

3 and a half years from now, if our fingers are no longer intertwined, i know i'll see you someday at the bar down the road. i'd imagine you to be taller but donned with the grin i've grown to love as you pass me in the hallways. you owe me a drink anyway

with you, with you it feels like i'm going places - not that i have a destination in mind but usually i can't see past the finish line, but i can't see the finishing line with you. let alone a path off of the shore as the waves crashes against our ankles. but here i am, ashore caught between letting go and running to higher ground and i all see the sunset caught in your eyes. we both can't swim but at this point does it really matter? years from now, maybe they'll be cafés we've sat across the table from each other, whispers in the dark in cinemas as pictures dance across the screen. dancing like how two figures will attempt to one day. different sceneries and cities with a familiar face. little fairy lights decking the ceiling for countless of miles to go but all i can see is the moonbeam resting against your cheek.

i want to hold your hand at hospitals.
i want to kiss you at airports.
i want your scent against my skin.
i want to forget how to stay sober with you.

i would like to forget sometimes, in this dazed illusion you're one of the few things that seems to stay vivid around me. a glimpse of sunlight in the moonlight

you're the outline in blue tracing commotion in my mind.

My friends and I are having a ball.
We are dancing and chancing and decking the hall.
I'm so busy, I have no time to fall.
I'm not lonely.
You're lonely.
I don't miss you at all.

My friends and I are carefree with glee.
We joke and we choke on the best hydro green.
I'm laughing so hard I may even ***.
I'm not crying.
You're crying
These tears are happy.  

My friends and I are coquets, so flirty.
We use a*holes and leave them right after coffee.
I don't want your commitment; I just want to be free.
I don't love you.
You love you.
Do you still love me?

by Ryan P. Kinney and J.M. Romig

The coy house thinks, “Should I let this man enter me?”
Although she pretends to resist at first
She soon relents,
The pressure giving way and her door granting passage

He pledges to give her hardwood floors
To put a swingset in her backyard
The finest dressings on her windows
Painting her face,
Decking her out
To show the world how much he loves her
Softly wooing, he promises her a family

She hopes this one will make good
As he begins his work,
She watches the swell in his young wife’s womb
And for a while, believes in life again

For the first time in years,
She breathes fresh air as they move in their boxes
The melding of their past and her future
An image so bright,
That she is almost blinded by the light
When one night,
The soon-to-be mother misses her first step

At the bottom of the stairs,
He finds his world in pieces
As the paramedics pack the body and cart it away
The door closes behind them
And the air grows stagnant

The only boxes he ever unpacks,
Contain spirits
To numb him from the haunting emptiness inside
The past becomes nothing, but a foot stool
Slowly crushed and deformed under his weight
Her rooms,
Built to house new memories, home cooked meals, and laughter
Now nothing, but
Stale beer, chips, and wasted life


Created from prompts at the Winter Writing Workshop (Dec. 27, 2015),
HEYMAN! Productions

A stunning morning.
Sunshine decking the glory filled lawn.
Night's swept away on the brush of a fox.

Lamenting my flowers.
They have passed.
A natural tragedy.
They have withered and died.
Disappeared, in what seemed like the blink of an eye.
They shall be retained.
Deep in the brain.
The brain of the lady.
Work is bereft.

Final recollection, that all things must pass.
Their beauty shall not be ashes,but scrunched up dry dust.
I shall find a spot in the garden.
Where I shall lay memories of my friends to rest.
And hence I explain my flowers away.
So precious were these flowers.
Burnings' so final you know.
Once they were beauteous.
Once so was I.
A bouquet of beauty.
Sadly they've died.
True beauty lives in the beholders eye.
(c) Livvi

Hanging the Mistletoe, decking the tree. Getting a shopping list or 3. Hurrying to get all of the gifts, forgetting what the season really means. All of the hustle and pomp, overlooks the thankfulness that we should show. Taking a few moments to be kind to our fellow man. This is what holidays should truly mean.

waken
I awoken with a sound at the door
I shouted hello
Silent
Then creaking on the decking boards
Runs down the stairs
And peels back the curtains it's a
LOADING...............

Above was a canvas, splashed with more stars than anyone could count, except Lorence. Stars shined atop the lavender and cobalt backdrop and encircled the warm glow of the Moon, with hundreds of thousands of eager eyes watching on as a blissful light danced across the sky. Most witnessed this display through their bedroom windows in the early hours of the morning, but some had different ideas. Some had bigger ideas.

The loud creaking was quickly subdued as Lorence, shuffling up the stairs on all fours, held a thick blanket against the aged wood and mouthed a quiet shush to the ground beneath him, as loud footsteps approached from above.  
“What are you doing awake?” Mumbled a lofty bearded man, still dreaming.
Lorence froze, like a prisoner caught tunnelling to freedom.
“It’s a full moon tonight!” He replied, far too energetically for this early hour.
“Alright. Well, get to bed.” His dad smiled. “And get that thing off of your back,” he gestured towards the bulky telescope.

After his dad left, Lorence’s mission continued as he waddled towards the balcony with his blanket around him and telescope clutched by both hands. The magnifying light from above entranced Lorence as he stood outside the balcony door, his eyes reflected the unspeakably stunning gig in the sky. A white light suddenly appearing in a nearby house broke the spell causing Lorence to rub his eyes dry and set the telescope down. He fiddled with it for a moment before peering through the fogged eyepiece. Navigating the instrument towards the window of the lit red-brick house, he spotted a white-haired lady comfortably lounging on the patio, fitted with a smile. Lorence then knew his mission wasn't yet over.

The friendly aged face grinned at the boy from her solitude, as she looked to the heavens, basking in the glory of Orion’s Belt as it wrapped around the sky like a bandage on a wound. She squinted, adjusting her eyes to the pits of black between the pearls of the night, and the eternal unease they brought on – the emptiness of her home a reminder of her perpetual loneliness. She dealt with these lingering thoughts through rhythmically snapping her fingers to some imagined tune in her head, her favourite at the time was Bobby McFerrin's 'Don't Worry Be Happy', which was always bound to inspire glee.

With a large yawn, Lorence darted his eyes around the woman’s house, observing the unkempt lawn resulting in excess shrubbery, the flickering lights almost mirroring her compulsive clicks and the unusually shaded mould growing on the side of her house like a festering wound. The lady, still smiling, still clicking, raised her left hand and signalled to the boy to join her in her stargazing. Getting to his feet, Lorence slung the telescope over his shoulder as he quietly navigated the dim hallway and tiptoed downstairs one step at a time.

Now outside, Lorence raised his hand to lock the door behind him, clumsily dropping the keys on the porch decking and freezing him in place. Realising the house remained asleep, he collected the keys and continued his mission.  As he approached the neighbour’s house, he followed the sound of the rhythmic clicking. Peering over the side gate, he saw the woman, still staring at the stars.

“There’s a better view from here!” She proclaimed, without turning towards him.
Lorence fiddled with the latch on the gate and moved to stand beside her.
“I didn’t realize I had a fellow stargazer living so close,” she grinned, with her eyes still to the skies.
“My dad bought me a telescope for my birthday last year. I try to use it every night, but he doesn't let me stay up late.”

Lorence, noticing the woman’s unbroken gaze, mirrored her as he looked up. The pair now stood, entranced by the astronomical splendour above them. For the first time in a long time, having someone to share in her love of the skies, the old woman shed a tear.  

The boy glanced and noticed the reflection of the bright display on the woman’s cheek.

In their moment of pure bliss, taking in the wonders above them, the world around them stood still, until a loud noise penetrated the moment, startling Lorence.

“Did you hear that?” His attention diverted from the sky.

Before she could respond, the noise intensified until it became deafening. The once picturesque sky lit up to a blinding white. And darkness followed.