First, a mediocre joke:

Today my sister wondered where I get my poems (or as I call em “syntactic artifacts sourced from a bittersweet worldview”) and I joked that it was God’s way of making up for razing my once blooming garden of hair.

But, just wanted to add that today marks a one year milestone being here and it’s been a greatly rewarding journey that helped me refine my poetic stuff, and abundant thanks is due to Jeff and a number of you, who have very kindly liked, shared, commented on my poems and helped nurture a hospitable sensibility that I hope I’ve afforded the same to you.

I put my very first poem up on here early in the morning when I was visiting Savannah, Georgia and was so happy to get kind words and feedback from Jeff and others as I just unloaded each poem (later, discovering I was able to add pictures and tag people to thank them, which I was clueless about at the start ha).

There are some exemplary writers on here of whom I truly admire your artful craft, heartfelt work and daring literary exploration that I won’t tag, but your work and kindness to me, both are inspiring and wonderful.

I owe Jeff, Mariah, A, Andy Betz, Mnezz, Mavia, Mamba, Huck, The Naz, Rlove, Schatz, Dr.Semicolon (now renamed) and a number of others my great thanks for their earliest encouragement when I first started putting up my very first poems here in the first few months of 2024.

Of course there are so many other exceptional writers I’ve met since through last year to present that I actively enjoy and am awed by (I’m sure I’ve told you so!) and others who’ve left a nest egg of greatness that I still marvel at even if they might be hibernating new gems to one day add to their already curated brilliant collection.

I also appreciate every writer’s contribution here, and while my tastes lean a certain way, I’ve still read some captivating material on here.

Navigating the choppy waters of my struggles with autism on a platform with a lot of virtual people and personalities can be a bit of a challenge, but I have to thank my dear friends here (you know who you are) for encouraging me beyond the platform to be confident and sure of myself.

Your friendships have been of tremendous benefit and value that is perhaps the greatest joy that my year long journey on here has brought me.

Looking forward to 2025 and I sincerely hope this post doesn’t come across as self aggrandizing or anything, but just wanted to share thanks to the community and friends both here and beyond!

Very gratefully,

LDW

violins' echoing

dreamlike in my spirit

they cry

they moan

they wail

stirs my soul to pain

tearing my beating heart

a voice sings

it floats with the music

like a specter,

a liquid like

dirge

now it swoons my heart

to melting

of its beating exudes,

a yearning

a haunting love

unbridgeable by unfathomable

distance

separation

the voice as it softly wails

in song,

overwhelms my soul,

it floats with the tune

it merges with melody,

this voice

and music,

softly

rising

to the strum

of mexican bass guitar

captivates me in chorus . . .

". . . take flowers, . . ."

his voice gently

flows

pleads,

with violins' cries

". . . to my tomb

take, . . .

i gently request,

your flowers,

that you

my beloved,

bring

be sure they're violets,

a wreath of roses

and gardenias"

"oh,

how i love you

my dear,

please do not forget me,

you and your flowers

and nothing more"

"perchance,

if you go to that remote,

the lonely,

that country place,

to the remote,

wherein lies my grave

where now,

the dead reside,"

"i say,

'again,

if perchance

you go to that,

in that lonely place,

there,

find

my solitary tomb,"

"take there

flowers,

gardenias, . . .

and a wreath of roses,

made by your own hands,

your flower gifts

with you,

and nothing more

and do not forget me"

" . . . oh,

how i love you,"

violins

echo in the distance

their subtle muffled trumpets,

softly sound

to wistful accompaniment,

of rhymical bass guitar

his voice

it wails pure,

swirling flows hypnotic

streams of a love

separated

. . . your voice,

my sweet friend,

i hear from your tomb,

your strong passion

resounds, . . .

"i love you,

if you go to the remote lands

if you go to the place

where i reside

therein in repose

lies my grave"

My castoff capsule heart

Set to burn at slow release

Marches to metronome sadness

While I swallow the loveless machine

Leper beaded pods rupture

Under hand grenade skin

As space boiled delirium

Begins to set in

Because I’ve always been an undissolved pill

Stuck like a bad dream down your throat

You never loved me as I am

And you probably never will

I am deflowered vinyl on looping static

Martyring heaven’s airwaves

How crystal cracked clear you made it to me

That you preferred your cold moon knives

Pinned in my butterfly back

Though I sauntered my pantomime soul

Just to make you notice my faraway mirage

But our wasted conversational charade

Burned up its petty painted masquerade.

Because I’ve always been an undissolved pill

Stuck like a bad dream down your throat

You never loved me as I am

And you probably never will

I was there the day you died

And between the torn curtain

Shouted back defiant light

My tears slipstream balm

Murdering devils

And briar clawed chokeholds

In a defiant grapple

For your soul’s return.

I dreamed

About how I would

Die

Last night.

Hinging right,

Turned me

Towards

The towering hoofs

Of an unyielding bull,

His

Deep lethal charcoal

Storming my mortal gates,

Smothering me

Into a splat human accordion

While I prayed

To God

That He would

Take me to heaven

And that my underwear

Would remain clean

For all eventual

Investigating parties.

My smart Hemp-Gummies with Super-Keto are more powerful than your Shark Tank Dubai Escorts using Testosterfo and Bitcoin

September 19, 2024

Most of the crowd was utterly confused. Henry was one of the crowd and was utterly confused. His boss ordered him to attend the lecture as part of team building exercises designed to make him a better employee.

It didn’t.

And he was still confused.

Why be outside on an overcast day when I can be inside, at work, producing a product someone will buy making real money?

The speakers spoke of the required sacrifices, both in extra time at work and decreased production in desirable consumer goods. They spoke of a pie that could never grow. They insisted that it was natural for each person’s slice of that pie to shrink. It was better, according to his boss, if he just forgot any claim he had to that pie and let people smarter than himself decide who needs pie today and who does not.

Henry stood, daily, in the line for “just forgot.”

Why not go back to work and make things people actually want? Why not listen to the loud and ever present market forces and satisfy their demands instead of creating artificial ones?

Why not just expand the pie?

Henry put his hands in his pockets, feeling the holes preventing him from carrying anything in those pockets. Not that he had anything to carry. Not that he could locate anyone to fix the holes, let alone pay them for their services.

The applause signs required “polite” positive reinforcement. The secret police would remind those who didn’t understand. Henry clapped just enough to blend in with the masses who learned the advantages of the phrase, “just enough to blend in.”

Why create a narrative from a self-fulfilling prophecy that ensures an outcome of little or no value? Why not search for a reason to act and then create a product or service to assist in the act? Henry Ford raised minimum wages to get the best workers to build cars that the best worker (and then everyone else) demanded.

A baton brushed against his neck as Henry mumbled a bit too loud for comfort.

Life is too short for this nonsense.

And with that, Henry tried to return to his job.

But, the barbed wire and police checkpoints prevented him.

But, since he was first, he would be first to be branded. The inker made short work of his left arm, adorning Henry with his new bar code and ID number (A0025639B).

The new speaker was extolling the values of collaboration to make all, into one. It would be easier. It would be for the best.

It was a sacrifice that needed to be made.

I was ordered to make the sacrifice.

I made the sacrifice.

Somewhere, in some box, lies the information crystal proving A0025639B did.

Guilted reflectors

Stand face to face,

One salted with guile

One oiled in grace

Yet bearing each other

With the slightest of pace,

A stillborn empathy

Deposed from its place.

Each colored with

Obsequious aim

But bottoming out

In apathy grey,

With stilted tongues spilling

Raw words each can taste,

And each saving face,

Holdout egos

For the rainiest day.

Each like the rickety ship

Which bares

Her angular body

Of cracking groans,

An up stream fish

Once steady,

Now lost

Delivered to the inky rings

Whirling into nowhere.

Then-lost!

As it were

Captive again,

Chained to the sea

And lodged in its den.

To emptily glide,

On brackish water

And surging,

Swallow the screaming tides,

Twin heartbroken arrows

Aimless and shadowed

In darting pursuit,

To taste divine love

Not bittersweet fruit.

So love turns dead corners

Its beacon en route,

Its devil red wings,

Grown black

With death’s bruise.

But bandage the other

With Samaritan eyes

And in doing so,

The ship realigns,

Steadies her course

And now sails upright,

Guided towards glory

Graced with merciful might.

And we are the same

Far as I can tell,

For I can love you like heaven

Or hate you like hell.

And girded truth readies

Her halting heart whole

To mend all the broken

Bones of the soul.

The captor is captain

If each wants it to be,

And such lies the choice,

For love starved of need.

Forgive all their sins

And turn up cast down eyes,

And be still in the shelter;

Let sleeping dogs lie.

Captor or captain,

The wheel remains yours

And such is the choice

For each guides a course.

The ship ports at land

And tied to the mast

Is a tear written letter;

“I am home now at last”.

Once a young girl visited the local shop where the kind elderly man there made teddy bears with his own hands.

She was extremely excited as she walked inside the shopkeeper’s large workshop and was greeted by a seemingly endless sight of hundreds of beautifully crafted smiling teddy bears.

However, after excitedly peering around the shop in starry eyed admiration, she noticed one rather rough looking bear that stood quite conspicuously to her from amongst all the others.

This bear was stitched all over and wore rugged patches that were faded by the march of time.

She reached for him and then rather bluntly said to the shopkeeper;

''It looks like you've done a beautiful job of making your bears and taking care of them, but why is this bear so neglected?

He's been ripped all over and is covered with so many ugly patches!''.

The girl’s mother flushed with embarrassment and was taken aback by her little daughter’s rather terse words, but the tender hearted and kindly shopkeeper simply smiled.

Walking from behind his antiquated work bench with hobbled steps, he gently took the tattered bear from the young girl's hands and held the patch covered bear ever so closely to his chest.

In fact, with eyes closed, he took a few seconds of deeply reflective poise as tears rolled down the rough leather of his wizened cheeks.

He paused softly, head now bowed in an almost hushed reverence.

As hundreds of his bears seemed to look on at their creator, he finally broke the solemn silence and gently said;

“Why this bear knows my love greatest of all.

For every patch was put on him by my own hands many times.

You see, no other bear here has received such greater love and care, though advancing years has worn him down to what you fear to hold.

He is older than time but wears love over his scars.

This one is so very very special and I do believe he is ready for one such as you, for you are the only child who has ever even acknowledged his presence, as hundreds of other children have passed this one by.”

The little girl’s heart swelled to match her oversized eyes, as a smile grew wide upon her face.

She reached up for the patched up bear, and as she then hugged him dreamily, one could not help but think that the bear himself quickly smiled then fell asleep in her adoring arms.

The old shopkeeper’s words kept ringing through her excited thoughts as she walked out the door, head buried in the pillowed belly of her newfound furry friend;

“Older than time, but wears love over his scars”.

She smiled like the sun.

Night’s martyred dove

Opens exit wound eyes,

Decaying prey bird memorial

Offered to black December fire,

The powdered curtain drop

Unearthing Lazarus

Waxing poetic

To dust bunny skies.

God boldly downs

These bitter chasers

Raining wine and winter hymnals.

What once bared

goes back to bear

What bared teeth

closes its mouth tight

neither happy nor sad

not shocked or afraid

What bared heart

shuts itself up &

wipes fingerprints

on cabinets off...

What bared feeling

turns the sheets

down dog eared &

folds, lights out

What bared soul

loses it in sleep

2024 SEP 11