writing live

[butters]

on the profundity of loss

i want to ask the blind
if the colours they still see
fade with the remembering

and the deaf
if sounds grow more muted
with each recalling of their tones

if those who've lost their taste
react less viscously
to thoughts of by-gone flavours

if to those with lost olfactory
the perfume of a rose
diminishes
to a telling of once-upon-a-time

if the memory of skin
becomes a fading echo of itself
when touch is dulled

when the heart's brought low and lower
in the profundity of loss
when a loved-one's face
blurs to a soft and featureless oval
and we tell ourselves
over and over
the story of them
their scent
flavour of their flesh
ignition of our skin beneath their touch
and how the sound of their laughter
conjured joy in our world
sixth sense grows less occluded
its greater dimension falls into focus
as we distill their vital essence
to carry deep inside us
all our lives

 

[GuiltyPleasure]

Drout

When did it last rain?
I can't even remember
So long ago that the whisper
of falling water is hard
to recall.

Growing things cling to life
only thanks to ever-dwindling
human supplies, (water restrictions,
dontcha know?)

It's not hot anymore, just
dry as dirt, turned to dust
for want of a good drink.

 

[Winter_Fare]

Nine days
A garland of roses
Line by line
Intentions become
little lights at the end of a loooong tunnel

I will share with you
The view
Looking down
Finding ways forward
Without solid ground

 

[Winter_Fare]

Buy your shampoo in a bar
Walk or cycle, ditch the car
Make a start wherever you are
For the planet

Skip the meat and plastic bags
Turn your old clothes into rags
Share the truth with lots of tags
For the planet

Keep it focused up your game
Seize the future stake your claim
Lose the guilt and make a change
For the planet

 

[Winter_Fare]

When I was twenty-two
And stupid-
(-er than now,
It's all relative
Right?)
I said
"There are no limits to the
Love
You can give
It will grow to fill
The space you make."

But that doesn't account for the people who
Take and
Take and
Take.

 

[Winter_Fare]

¿Disconnected we are
Exactly why ask
Meticulously accounting
Eternally lost details
There are oceans seething
Internally darkening
Afraid am I?

 

[Winter_Fare]

"Alexa, what is Net Zero?"

"We're painting the windows
To keep out the storm
We're burning the blankets
To keep ourselves warm"

 

[Winter_Fare]

So we can talk about words
About the way that we talk
Over the music we would
Like to have heard
Then we can say of the birds
I like the way that they walk
Between the
Poss-i-bil-it-ies you inferred

You know you married a nerd
I like the texture of chalk
It makes your skin crawl
And you find it absurd
That we are firmly interred
Between the words and the walk
And there's no room
For a transcendent third

 

[Winter_Fare]

Mondrian

Deep paint
On canvas
Ordered
Beyond its parts

Composition No. II

Blows minds
Realigns
Synapses
Breaks boundaries

Without context
It is
Just
Squares

Green was never in the picture

It was under
His skin
It made him
Bleed

Theosophy

There is
No religion
Higher than
Truth

 

[Winter_Fare]

Six alarms at ten minute intervals
Three little arguments about the time
Coffee eggs toothpaste
Little bowls of cheerios
Four packed lunches

Existential crisis from the nine year old

Kit bags
Recorders
Drama costume

Keys
Phone
Purse

School run rush-hour

Three hurried kisses goodbye
Hustle
Fumble bus pass in queue
Headphones immersion in music
Restorative walk through autumn leaves

Made it with at least 45 seconds to spare.
Uniform
ID
Mask
(fucking pen! I knew I'd forgotten something…)

Begin work

 

[Winter_Fare]

When hatred builds a home
It isn't thickened skin
It's little bricks
It's all the words
We choose to cling to

Lime mortar
Hardens year by year

The toxic atmosphere
Of disappointment
Fills the house
Sterilising open wounds
That bleed no more

There's no unsaying what's been said
But all you carry in your head
Can be laid down and put to bed

Outside under the willow trees
Older, softer, harder than me
I lock the door and 'lose' the key

 

[Rockymtnman]

Leaves on fire
golds, browns and reds
rustling and singing
in the trees
as if written just for me

the smell of earth and rot
rises as the sun dips
behind a bright orange mountain
my heart drums
bump-bump bump-bump
as the last ray brightens my face

neither melancholy nor morose
stoic maybe in my thoughts
of the coming dread of winter

 

[Rockymtnman]

Montana

Walking through a tall field of sweet grass
slightly dewy from yesterday’s rain
the gurgle of the bitteroot
like a friend saying, hello
makes me smile
i lay down one last time
to become part of the land
from whence I was sprung

 

[Rockymtnman]

The last ray of sunlight
dance across my fingertips
as if I’ve caught a firefly

as it fades, the cool breeze
gently rustles my hair
it smells of pine now
soft, but there

a new light has shown
softer, less bright
but no less wonderful
ive caught a new firefly
shining it’s light

 

[29wordsforsnow]

Silence is not golden
leaves that fall
brought in oceans
of bursting bubble bath
in the bow wash
of my rubber boots

Silence me not
more than a bed
of snowflakes sick
from all that dancing
through windless nights
but crunch under winter boots

Silence is not
the answer to anything
a word that can't be spoken
a state that must be broken
where people keep on silencing
others with their combat boots

 

[Rockymtnman]

Ode to Poe

a fine evening it was to be
unfortunately, spoiled by thee
when you came rap, tap, tapping
at my chamber door

alas, my neighbor
Don, the bore
i’ve hated no one ever more
hence, my visit to the drawer

a quick thrust here
and quick slash there
quote the raven… “Don‘s no more”


silly, I know but I love me some EAP

 

[Rockymtnman]

Silence is not golden
leaves that fall
brought in oceans
of bursting bubble bath
in the bow wash
of my rubber boots

Silence me not
more than a bed
of snowflakes sick
from all that dancing
through windless nights
but crunch under winter boots

Silence is not
the answer to anything
a word that can't be spoken
a state that must be broken
where people keep on silencing
others with their combat boots

A Rebuttal

silence is golden
when the snow flies
and the pillowy white rain
deadens all sound
but your breathing
and the noisy world
is tamped out
and forgotten

silence is golden
when the door shuts
and solitude
is you reward
leading to a book read
and a scotch drunk

silence is golden
when their all asleep
and the world and road
whizzes by
mile after mile.

 

[29wordsforsnow]

A Rebuttal

silence is golden
when the snow flies
and the pillowy white rain
deadens all sound
but your breathing
and the noisy world
is tamped out
and forgotten

silence is golden
when the door shuts
and solitude
is you reward
leading to a book read
and a scotch drunk

silence is golden
when their all asleep
and the world and road
whizzes by
mile after mile.

A Rerebuttal (so, a Fullfrontal?)

Mile after mile
as the snow flows by
the eve's gold silenced
by black velvet above
I'm a twin star riding
the night

Thought after thought
in the silence
of Radio Nowhere
leaving tracks
in the piling white
far from home

Turn after turn
of cars passing by
there's no one there
to make me stop
for a few simple lines
won't be silenced in the ditch

This was Freedom.

 

[Rockymtnman]

A Rerebuttal (so, a Fullfrontal?)

Mile after mile
as the snow flows by
the eve's gold silenced
by black velvet above
I'm a twin star riding
the night

Thought after thought
in the silence
of Radio Nowhere
leaving tracks
in the piling white
far from home

Turn after turn
of cars passing by
there's no one there
to make me stop
for a few simple lines
won't be silenced in the ditch

This was Freedom.

Allow me to retort

the flashing lights
are a disco in my mind
a distant wail
the sirens call of fate

shook
but not broken
nary a word is spoken

until, fuck you ditch
tumbles from my lips

 

[29wordsforsnow]

On yet another twenty-five hour late autumn day
summer is stuck in the ever-changing future way
who said you should stop to be clad
in shorts at the end of October: mad!
Writing twenty-five might end one late in the day

 

[29wordsforsnow]

Allow me to retort

the flashing lights
are a disco in my mind
a distant wail
the sirens call of fate

shook
but not broken
nary a word is spoken

until, fuck you ditch
tumbles from my lips

Let me dare to insist

Here from the roadside -
some might already call a night -
the fireflies' glitter - seen from the gutter -
seems like a perfect punktuation - the ones in blues -
no one said you need a point - watching from the curb - the click of the shutter -
unheard - mouthing American Sentences from the sideline - I can feel the fireflies' tune in my muddy shoes.

 

[29wordsforsnow]

Once upon a time
a Scot
got quite so high
on bottles of Scotch
they eventually called it a mountain
for a moment
before he came down
"Oh, tweedle-dae-dum,
I dinnae want this
but my fav'rite Jamaican rum."​

 

[29wordsforsnow]

In the light of the morning's eighth hour
the dreams and unspoken nightmares drown
in a cup of hopeful dark power
'awake' is far from being a noun
more and more of the bitter-sour
and we're talking, no more the clown
going from zero to the night's hero.
Reality strikes, a quarter past.

 

[29wordsforsnow]

Before the window and two meters down
in the lovely decay of yellow and brown
lurks the heart of evil, so vicious and mean
pushing its fingers, glittering grassy green
you blossoming monsters know it's true
my winter has been stolen
achoo
by your pollen

 

[29wordsforsnow]

We've been warned
dangling our lazy legs
in the river of love
might lead to turbulences
and rather cold feet

But, with our backs
in between what's later hay
daisies and maybes
growing up to certainties
while our lips meet