Tag Archives: Poems

Dearly Forgotten

I didn’t write this for the majority.

I didn’t write this for the generation of entitled personas mimicking the human form.

You know the ones that ridicule you for being different because what the majority says goes- and they created this dystopia where anything that is different is not welcome in this bar, store, school, park, bus, train, sidewalk, church, earth.

I wrote this for the vast generation of have nots.

Those who picked the shorter stick by proxy-

Via decisions that were not of their own-

Decisions chosen by those who chose not to try harder-

Decisions chosen by those who chose to not clear a safe path for us.

I say this with pride- We are the have nots.

We are the ones that were trained to endure walking barefoot- down roads littered with shards of fractured dreams – and promises- 

With jagged edges that are inoculated with the past transgressions of others and we suffered from the subsequent wounds that festered deep into our soul- 

We were eager to wash away our sins by running to get  baptized in muddy water and drinking spoiled grape juice with stale crackers- because the silver lining is not always sparkling, fresh and new. 

And we struggled to keep our mind free of gangrene, which is rampant because we have to trudge through the unsanitary conditioning strategies of society- you see-

Decay of the mind starts with the censorship of our thoughts, emotions and truths. 

So I urge you to continue to make as much noise as you can-

Our voices in -unison can break many glass ceilings throughout eternity. 

This is for the have nots-remember- Losing is never an option

Manifesto

I was birthed in an altered dimension constructed by the hands of deferred dreamers’- souls bludgeoned by burdens until they turned into concrete slabs and bricks, which were used to construct cities of catacombs with exits that only put you right back at the beginning of a path of footprints that lead to self destruction.

Can you imagine being buried alive for over 30 years?

I was forced to draw the frames of a million windows on miles of stone walls using blood from the wounds of my wounds that had been standing one on top of another fighting to get some fresh air.   

The toxic environment caused parts of my soul to slough off and evaporate into the stale atmosphere , which mocked me with precipitation that consisted of my innocence dispersed into rain drops which would form twelve feet deep lakes that would taunt me with the reflections of what was lost, taken by force, and I had no choice but to swim across and continue on my path to the surface.   

It took me years to slither above the layer of sediment made from decaying past forms of me that I shed in order to lighten the load-

while I  struggled to ascend mountains of spines, the remnants of skeletons in the closet, navigating across fractures caused by the weight of the world on weak shoulders demineralized by societies leaching tendencies which erode souls and strip the nutrients needed to produce creativity which in turn depletes the energy necessary for survival.

Now I sit here free. 

Dictating this manifesto, unafraid to call out the wolves in human skin. 

The life force behind the revolution is us!

We emerge from the swaps, we emerge from the sewers, we emerge from the slums of nightmares holding hands-tattooing your mind with diamonds from the abyss every chance we can get because this is the movement of the rebels.

This is the movement of the rebels. 

This is the poet’s manifesto.

Sangre

Yesterday I drove through a thick, blinding fog.
I hoped it would lead me into a portal that would take me to the places that I visit in my dreams.
The places where unfamiliar faces greet me with familiar smiles and hugs.
Here they remind me that eternity is a real place.
This fog caused me to levitate in memories, and before I knew it –
There I stood.
Lost in my mental Labyrinth, which shape shifts with my emotions-
filled with dark alleyways lined with street lamps with flickering bulbs that hold the pieces of the souls that still continue to guide me with the light of their memory and love.
I soon found myself in a house of mirrors.
As I walked down the forgotten corridors- I started to break every mirror because I didn’t want to see the reflections of me-
Images of my past – the puppet that I used to be.
The wooden girl without a cricket for a conscious- who just wanted to be free.
I painfully stepped on every fractured piece of me – as I remembered that I was
a shattered girl living in a shadow world, trying to hunt for the sun- barefoot on hot city concrete, standing in line waiting to get baptized in the river of illegally open fire hydrants- which was the only time I felt relief.
I always watched where the water went as it trickled down the grates into the belly of the beast.
Wondering if it all ends up in the same place that the blood went when it spilled onto the city streets?
I was the forgotten Tarzan, a child raised by sewer rats, swinging through life’s jungle holding on for dear life to the lines from discarded children’s bibles and National Geographic magazines that I saved from trash piles and used them to build paper houses for me to hide in, while I treated my wounds alone.
Lifes lessons built a warrior like no other.
I am a walking, talking enigma.
My soul is grotesquely disfigured with scars and missing parts, but the one thing that was never touched was my heart.
My blood type is the rarest of them all, not A , not B, Not AB, not O-
It is light, it is heat, it is energy, it is unapologetically me.
When I get hit by the fists of life, this rare emulsion flows freely from my busted lip and bleeding nose onto paper – and dries into fragments that form love notes from my soul reminding you and I that anything can be conquered with love.

The Message in the Bottle

I am the remnant of an empty bottle-
Forgotten biofilm that mutated under the pressure of a toxic environment and I flourished- even with little to no light.
I emerged from the bottle, reborn, rebranded as a genie.
I am the genie of the common man, woman and child.
A master contortionist, skilled at finding comfort in any space.
Here I stay, hidden in things that will never catch the eyes of aristocracy.
I prefer to be the diamond in the rough, the fallen angel who is able to fly with one broken wing while holding the hand of men and women while we trip on the same concrete stairs of life.
If only we could all witness the beauty and power in transcending the eyes and using our souls for viewing the world.
I am the remnant of the empty bottle.
While inside I draw the images of my dreams on the walls in star dust and bring light to my small space, I become lost in my personal galaxy, and the sounds of shooting stars, eventually lull me to sleep.
I am the genie of the common man, woman and child.
People seem surprised when I tell them that we all are able to grant wishes.
I have given the gift of long walks.
I have given the gift of silent, strong, warm embraces.
I have given the gift of holding the hand of strangers while they are in the midst of taking their last few breaths.
I have given the gift of spending my last few dollars on a happy meal for a hungry child, standing on a busy NYC street corner, wearing a mask of shame as he watched his mother begging for money for her next drug fix.
Me having nothing did not impede my need to give him something, even if it was just ten minutes to imagine feeling like a child with a mother who just wanted to make him smile.
I am the remnant of the empty bottle.
I leave one bottle and flow into the next, like the fresh ocean breeze.
I am the message in thousands of bottles lost at sea, hoping to reach those intended to receive solace in the form of a simple poem.
I am the genie of the common man, woman and child – and I do not wish to be free.
All that I ask is for you to continue to leave your empty bottles out for me.

A Poets Pantry

I remember when I took my first bite of heartbreak.

I didn’t see ill intentions hiding underneath the perfect layer of milk chocolate-because I was only dipping the tips of my fingers in the icing.

I was enticed to take a bite, and that was when I first experienced the taste of malice.

The bitterness hugged on to each of my taste buds, like the barnacle colonies on the hull of my self esteem’s sinking ship.

I couldn’t eat for days.

I remember laying in a fetal position, retching in my sleep.

Everything reminded me of him- and I was sick to my stomach over and over again.

I thought I knew what the scent and taste of love was, but my senses were so immature.

Eventually, this taught me to observe more.

I have a habit of reading people like nutrition labels- because I need to know what your value is to me.

I need to know the repercussions of adding you to my diet on a daily basis.

Do you increase my risk of heart disease by clogging my arteries with false friendship, fake forevers and parasitic tendencies that hardens not only my heart but the vessels that lead in and out of it?

I want to know what percentage is organic-natural, real, wholesome, fresh, light.

Are you a superfood- packed with dense nutrients?

You see, I am a glutton.

If you invite me to a buffet, I will pile up my plate with fulfilling, perfectly seasoned conversations that have been marinating in this frigid world.

I prefer to leave my food for thought out in the cold – on the back porches of society where other poets also thrive.

It’s a place where we can have a better view of the stars as we allow our brain cells to marinate into a savory fusion of enigma, dredged in understanding about the beauty in our differences.

Differences that amalgamate into an exquisite delicacy that we deliver in the forms of verses.

Bon Appetite!

Oh, The Webs She Weaves

My mind is a jungle of words suspended on vines.
My thoughts crowd every corner.
In order to make sense of it all, my subconscious mutates into millions of spiders-
They collect my thoughts onto a spindle and weave a network of webs made of gold.
Sometimes they craft dreamcatchers that are able to recycle my nightmares-
Turning them into fabric that I use to dress scarecrows who protect my field of dreams from destructive thoughts that inhibit my growth.
Destructive thoughts that still sneak in from time to time and blow out the flames in my eyes, which darken my mind and mutes my voice.
When this happens I can’t see my poems.
So I have to walk with my hands stretched out in front of me- desperately searching my mind-
Feeling for my words suspended on vines.
My thoughts crowd every corner of my mind.
In order to make sense of it all, my subconscious mutates into millions of spiders-
That catches and records the passing conversations of my soul transcribing them into a network of webs made of silver.
I like to sit in the center of my mind and watch my desires, my fears, my pain, my love, my passions, my daydreams, my infatuations, my memories all coexist in this vast web of silver and gold.
I inhale deep – and
I inhale deep -and
I inhale deep-
and with pursed lips I exhale slow-
With just enough force to release the breath from my soul and the webs of silver and gold become windchimes playing the melodies that you hear in my poems.
These vines in my mind are my lifeline.
These vines help the world make sense to me.
These vines suspended in my mind, lined with words, binds me to my network of enigma-
My own secret garden.
My safe place and many days I don’t want to return.