Fraction
And there I stood silent
in a vast empty field
with the East wind
flowing steady
against my brow
And there I
swallowed memories
of past horizons
every emotion
illuminated by the sky
in teal blues
emerald greens
And there I heard
your voice
echoing gently
on the skin
of the black sea
whispering
eternity
to the lost
believer within
Sinnerman, a mind horse, a sky in haiku, anxiety, stigma, and luckier than most.
The satin chalk tone of Nina Simone formed today's intro, and was followed by five pieces authored with the feel only our writers deliver, every line, every time. Led by a new kid on the block, three more add to the lift, with a close by our man of the SoCal streets, to make episode 36 one mean mofo of a show, yo... Yeah, tons of coffee...
Anyway, here's to the week ahead. Summer is officially usurping the west, and the road east is looking really good.
Here's the link to Prose. Radio.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljZo8mlUCMg
And here are the pieces featured.
https://www.theprose.com/post/815461/mind-horse https://www.theprose.com/post/815448/a-vibrant-blue-sky https://www.theprose.com/post/815436/the-red-man
https://www.theprose.com/post/815376/stigma https://www.theprose.com/post/815402/ayahuasca-death-trip
And.
As always.
Thank you for being here.
-The Prose. team
In Blood
Dear Plexiglassfruit,
Of all the letters I may have sent, I have never written to my mother-- my real mother. I suppose I never believed that she was there, waiting, as recipient, and I'm not sure what I would have said, in years past, on paper.
My mother-in-law says she cannot imagine, as a mom, not being proud of me. She is very kind. There is pride, and Pride; and I have understood that for my mother I am on the cold inverse of the sentiment. Mother puzzles over me and makes comparisons. I tacitly admit the rationale. I make odd choices; everyone voicing an opinion, has told me as much.
Mother has graciously let it go after all, as notable, but uninteresting. We both know that I don't have anything to offer her--- I am useless as a backscratcher. There is simply nothing I can do for her, pragmatically. She has lived life as a sort of barter, with the eye on always coming up ahead. Having expected a man to take care of her, she has learned that money takes care of her. She steels herself to this state of affairs.
She told me a few years ago that, for Enlightenment, I am not ready.
(*My sister, yes; She has paid her dues, I suppose.)
I can only marvel at the confidence of the proclamation. I lay no claims, and wouldn't dare cast judgement... I guess I hadn't much thought about reaching Enlightenment, sitting out here in the dark peripheries of our misunderstandings. My childish hope was that we take care of each other.
If I were to write to my Mom, in abstraction of all that binds us in our interpersonal experience, I would write something she would likely dismiss as "dispassionate essay:"
Dear Mother,
Motherhood is not at all what I expected.
You cryptically said to me, a couple years in, when my child was almost three that "Now" I understand, and know. Truly, I do not. I rather sense some discrepancies in our perceptions and acknowledge the inaccuracy of my own viewpoints. The insinuation I feel is that, now, presumably I understand what it is to be pegged. Saddled. Of course, with affection and responsibility. Because that is the sentiment that I associate with our family reflection of child rearing-- The burden wrought.
And I observe the key differences that may or may not have been fully voiced. That motherhood "happens" in different ways. It has been expressed as lament, in our family circle, as the limitation of self. The facts remain, Mother, that you yourself said you were "not ready," and my sister though eager, was "surprised" by pregnancy. You've each countered that I was so reluctant and calculated as to "sap the Romance out of it"... well, certainly everyone's notion of such fantasy is varied. I have never doubted anyone's Love, in the short- or long-term.
I understand that having a child, or children, is tiring. The state of being on alert, all the time, is not necessarily shared by all parents though. I have learned this in watching the families of my preschool students. I also know it, from being left, so often unattended as a child, without adult supervision; under the care of my sister, two years older, and sometimes not even that. I understand the impulse that sometimes overwhelms and makes a parent want to withdraw. I have felt it.
For whatever it was that made you want to pull away, Mom, I am sorry.
I hope I never hit you, pinched you, scratched you, spit at you, demeaned you or otherwise made you feel faced with contempt. I am wracking my memory for any such incident and cannot remember. And I cannot think of a thing more heartbreaking, abusive and demoralizing. A form of domestic violence that has no legal recourse, the abuser being a minor and outside of the law.
So, as you have doubtlessly wondered: what then do I think of Motherhood? I have not found that being a parent is aww and diapers, sleepless nights, and adventures. That was understood. To be sure, I expected it to be, for lack of a better word, "work." I hoped for Motherhood, as an ideal; an opportunity I suppose. I was looking to be fully present, and now, have these constant questions: ...Have I done the right things? Where have I gone wrong? ...What can I do to make a correction for my apparent, yet undeciphered, errors? ...for surely, the evidence shows, if only in my own sight, that I am doing something not right... to have fears about my child.
Of all of this, naturally, you are unaware. You are not here; pictures sent show only smiles, and I have said nothing, except the underlying truth that yes, I am happy to be a Mom.
Perhaps it is of these misgivings that you speak of... when you say, "Now...you know."
M.
Stigma
As far back as I can remember, I've always had this vague notion that there was something fundamentally wrong with me. Something I could never quite put my finger on. Yet it was there, lingering in the background. A subliminal message playing on repeat my entire life. I've no idea where it originated. It's almost as if I came into this world feeling inherently flawed. An obscure birth defect, prominent to everyone but me.
Whatever it was, most people took notice. And much like having a huge stain on the back of your shirt. It isn't until you catch everyone staring that you become aware of it's presence. Though to this day, not a single person has been able to articulate what it is they find so terribly wrong about me.
Ayahuasca Death Trip
I’ve got an empty
Kitty litter bucket
Outside my garage
Filled with $3.000 dollars
Worth of cigarette butts
A $600 dollar laptop
Compliments of Covid
Thanks Uncle Joe!
And a woman
With a heart of gold
I’ve got an ounce
Of mushrooms too
Not to brag
I’m just saying
Some of us
Are luckier
Than most
David Burdett
5/12/2024
Awaiting a growth spurt that never happened
When a boy,
I wanted to be as tall as my father
(he passed away October seventh
two thousand and twenty
linkedin to congestive heart failure),
who stood at his prime
about six feet and two inches
and tipped the scales
close to two hundred pounds.
Teachers and other familiar adults
chimed in that though diminutive
(yours truly, he unwittingly offered himself
as the ideal scapegoat
courtesy being longitudinally challenged,
weighing no more than an ostrich feather,
and hashtagged as "the quietest student,"
a flower child of the ninety sixties
always kept mum every single day of school),
would unexpectedly experience
peak height velocity.
Neither at ages eighteen, nineteen, twenty...
sixty three, sixty four and sixty five
bore witness to any added inches,
which topped out
around my sixteenth birthday
approximately seventy inches tall
and attendant weight a scrawny
one hundred and
twenty five pounds or thereabouts.
Actually since graduating
from Methacton High School
two score and seven years ago,
my weight ballooned
an avoirdupois unit of weight
divided into 16 ounces,
and equal to 0.453 592 kilograms
approximately forty plus times
such said constituent parts
first thing in the morning
after eliminating evacuating
re:excreting bodily waste.
A preponderance of adipose tissue
long since upended my once upon a time
twenty nine inch waist.
Slab of flab protrudes from ab - feel free to grab!
What follows initially written
quite some years ago
when being skinny as a rail meant
no meat on these lovely bones,
thus hired myself out as scared crow,
now excess adipose tissue thy foe
losing battle partially explaining
why knight spends inordinate
amount of time in his grotto.
Twas an incremental
subtle expansion of waist
plus olympic challenge to tie shoes
most likely side effects of one
or all nine prescription medications
to stave off severe melancholy,
social anxiety, panic attack, et cetera
when yours truly merely
prepubescent self starvation courtesy
emaciated Anorexic skeletal ribcage
traced (about two score
and a baker's dozen years ago),
now whereby most everything
thy tongue doth taste
immediately delivered
a randy (new man) paunch
to former washboard six pack
smooth as a fresh application
of gesso like paste
readying fleshy canvass
for partially nude
self-portrait masterpiece
(adjacent to barenaked lady)
lived three doors down
depicting mine once perfectly,
(albeit one scrawny lad)
proportioned body electric laced
with flat as a washboard physique
unlike present disk graced
whereat when sending a photograph
of shirtless self-try with futility
utilizing photoshop to get erased
displeasing equatorial zone of anatomy
saddled with unwanted
fatty tissue that defaced
proportionate rock hard stomach
one generic measly slender adult man
about five foot and ten-inch build
evincing an aura of being chaste
gone forever analogous to temptation
gobbling house constructed
of cake and confectionery,
that nearly did likewise
to Hansel and Gretel
readying their not quite
plump enough bodies
tubby slathered with baste,
yet just in the nick of time
the two abandoned minors
actually removed courtesy
children, youth and
family services (CYS)
under care of adoption in sync
with spade work
aced the sinister plot outwitting
cannibalistic cackling
croaking old woman
inducing all to break out into song -
singing the following tune
I learned in grade school.
Loose air into pipes and croon
solo loud enough audible to man in the moon.
Sarasponda, sarasponda, sarasponda rat tat tat
Sarasponda, sarasponda, sarasponda rat tat tat
A doray-oh, A doray-boomday-oh
A doray-boomday ret set set
Ah say pah say oh.
Turbo Lover, fast and loose, noble sufferings, substance, and light from stars.
Judas Priest inspired today's show, or rather informed the mood of the morning and coffee while a handful of writers waited to be read and heard, by you. One hell of a show today. Sit your asses down, grab a tall, cool beverage of choice, and go into this world of words by these stone statues of stanza and ink.
Here's a link to the show.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soR_UH--EbY
And here are the featured pieces.
https://www.theprose.com/post/815271/fast-and-loose https://www.theprose.com/post/815219/substance https://www.theprose.com/post/791497/lamentations-anew-a-poem-by-tf-burke
https://www.theprose.com/post/815261/remember-that-time-i-thought-i-was-dying https://www.theprose.com/post/815249/i-am-insatiable https://www.theprose.com/post/815229/starlight
And.
As always.
Thank you for being here.
-The Prose. team