Let Your Light So Shine

“We are all worms—”

Most people

Are earthworms.

Some

Are cuter,

Or pinker,

Or slimier,

Or scalier,

Or wigglier

Than others;

But they all still

Eat dirt

To help the plants grow.

I know a few tapeworms:

They make me sick,

But

They’re really hard to get rid of.

Lastly,

There’re the ones

Like Winston Churchill

And me.

I—

“But I do believe I am a glowworm.”

The Fourth Fury

Hope is the thing with a whip
That's always there at my back
Shoving me on to tomorrow--
Crack! Crack! Crack!

It drags me through the days,
And scrapes me up real bad;
Or grabs me by the scruff of my neck
And shakes when I feel sad.

Hope is the thing from Hell,
I bolt whenever I see
It clamoring up from its sulfurous hole--
I hope it's not coming for me.

The Wanderer

I'll make it up! I don't care!

He may laugh, and she may glare.

I'll tell them that I went to Maine

And kissed an Aussie in the rain;

Or once a rajah sent me pearls

And sneered at all the other girls;

I dated several football teams

And started having crazy dreams;

One night a hotshot movie star

Proposed to me in a crowded bar;

A whole boy-band once sent me flowers

Then serenaded me for hours.

Yes, (I'll lie) I love to roam...

Although,

Last weekend,

I stayed home.

Throughout These Otherwise Gloomy Centuries

Throughout these otherwise gloomy centuries

Songs and tales were passed,

Like jasper and amethyst in paper cups,

From the mouths of parents to the hearts of children.

Orally, now, we take things;

Then, they were given.

I write this in a panicked scrabbling of

Flurried fingers and nails

Clicking against keys.

The Visitatio Sepulchri was

Kept sacredly,

Covered heads bowing

Reverently before an awed angel.

Smooth, the continuation of tradition;

Holy, the preservation of revelation;

Sweet as manna, gold as flax, rich as a Jew.

Immortal

I’m tired of writing poems, I’d rather write

A flaming melody to make men dance.

I’m tired of staying home, someday I might

Expend my efforts on a half mad chance.

 

I’m tired of reading books, I’d rather read

Men’s minds; even the parts they haven’t seen.

I’m tired of bleeding blood, I’d rather bleed

Pure love; until physicians intervene.

I’m tired of leading men, I’d rather lead

An angel army wielding starlight keen.

I’m tired of needing men, I’d rather need

The North and South and everything between.

 

I’m tired of breathing air, I think perhaps

I’ll breathe pure gold until my lungs collapse.

(Sick of My) English Assignment

Stop analyzing, my gosh;

it’s not a blood type or a

Sudoku puzzle, it’s a time to take a break

and just drink it in,

enjoying a sliver of communal soul.

When I Am Old and All Alone

When I am old and all alone

I’ll pull your letter from a drawer

And see you gold and taut with youth,

Though sure you must be grey and poor.

 

I’ll pull your letter from a drawer,

And rake it like a desperate lover,

And laugh to read “my sweetest friend”—

And wonder if you still think of her.

 

And see you gold and taut with youth

With me beside you, slim and white;

Hot words between us, chasming,

Though I was bright, and you were bright.

 

Though sure you must be grey and poor,

By now forgotten and unknown,

I’ll pull your letter from a drawer

When I am old and all alone.

 

*I think I may have invented a new word. Just for clarification, “chasming” means to create a chasm, as in “Let’s get some dynamite and go chasming”; or to become full of chasms, as in “Then the giant hopped up and down and the earth started chasming.”