mask (Remove filter)
This is not a draft
I don’t want to mask my poetry
I want you to understand me
Curse your perfect rhythms, rhymes, haikus
Your lyricism, your literary
When I try to adopt it, I turn mute.
Something channels through me
(I’ve never really found the root)
A demanding stream of consciousness
That cannot stop to breathe, let alone
Wait, conceptualise, draft, redraft
I can’t!
...
Monday 7th October 2024 10:25 pm
How do you dance?
I was once a dancing flame but I forgot how to dance so I mimicked others until one day... pft.
I am unable to see myself burning out untill I spit, clinging to the bitter end of the wick.
At first, I am a soldier, fighting because I know the end is coming.
At the end is a void. Nothing in it and nothing can fill it. Nothing matters.
DESPERATION. Pouring everything and anything into th...
Tuesday 21st February 2023 8:34 pm
Closet with a handful of Masks
I keep drowning
in the noise
Of
Others opinions
on how
To live my life
Their expectations
Only stress and scare me
If only I knew myself
Inside out
Through and through
If only I've finally become
Deaf and dumb
To this noise around
If only I can make
A decision
and swear on my integrity
That it's truly
Mine own
If only I stop
Striving to prove myself
to this world around......
...
Tuesday 21st February 2023 12:02 am
Sealed Units
next door they've got new windows
all triple-glazed for noise and heat
hermetically sealed against society
frost and storms designed to beat
yet other enemies will get through
invisible demons with wings of fire
on those panes reflections of one
mountainous molten funeral pyre
coming round but I'll never be right
lungs crackling like broken glass
legs potent...
Friday 6th August 2021 10:52 am
Back To Basins
those unsanitary days of yore
any hand-washer or hoarder
was deemed to be a victim of
obsessive compulsive disorder
gel meant KY or Vaseline, for
painful episodes down there,
often after inordinately free
bouts of sexy wear and tear
hands red raw from washing,
loft creaks with boxes of SPAM,
DT's swimming through my visor,
gel and tonic beats any dram
...
Thursday 26th November 2020 10:44 am
The Swinger
Its always the same old story
I meet a woman and we click
We go out for a while and talk
Time seems to go by so quick
After a bit something happens
Signs of unease appear, frowns,
My mask slipped for she's seen
The dark side of my downs
Moods are fatal for couples
You have to banter and smile
Hide the despond with a grin
Play happy families for a while
...Monday 16th November 2020 10:57 am
THE MASK
I can’t see
But I can dream
It’s like wearing a blindfold
On my brown eyes
I can’t watch, but I can feel
All these weird wild vibes
All these angelic faces around me
But those diabolic souls surround me
Are they real or are they fake?
It’s like watching a blue snowflake
Falling for smiles and grace
All night murdering for a race
I can’t wait
Ti...
Saturday 1st August 2020 12:02 pm
A poetic justice
He took his wife
A punching bag
He is at liberty to hug
Or to blow up steam
By her hairs to drag.
As it may sound sad
He opted to project
A doting husband facade.
When she became vocal
About this
To his parents
Who she called
Mom and dad
"We do not expect
Our well brought up
Son with
Something underhand!"
"We are afraid
The complaint is not
Plausible as he has
A cool head...
Friday 24th July 2020 4:20 pm
Freedom to Breathe
Don’t wear your mask if they ask
just bask in your task —
–your task to free you and me to be and to plea:
“I can’t breathe through a mask”
“I can’t breathe through my nose”
“I can’t breathe through my mouth”
“I can’t breathe on my toes”
Breathe out breathe in
It’s no sin — you win
Inhale Exahale
Tell a failed pale tale–
–A tale of Michael who couldn’t breathe
a...
Wednesday 22nd July 2020 7:23 pm
The Poor Little Dove
The Poor Little Dove/Michael Kwack
To watch the wave play with the wind,
I sat by the museum garden pond.
Then a small pigeon came flying,
Landed to her feet, tiny and cute,
And stared up at me, a bit intensely,
Only blinking her eyes, no other move.
She was like a camera model baby,
And I recalled my infanthood pictures.
I started taking some ph...
Thursday 25th June 2020 11:55 am
Mrs Todd
She wears sneakers and
Uses the back streets
Dark alleys cover her tracks.
Its like the days of
Prohibition only without the
Tommy guns and as
The first bit in any book on
Economics is
Demand and supply and
They're crying out for her
Services the price is steep.
She sees a police car but it
Zooms off, a false alarm,
This is nerve-racking but a buzz and
She...
Tuesday 19th May 2020 11:54 am
Safe
Battle-hardened Sister Yvonne
Missed nothing
Double-checking mask, visor, gown
Everything.
Colleagues, even
Consultants, relied on her to pin-point
Gaps in their armoury.
If anyone was safe from patients
She was.
After her shift last night she
Clocked off and
Walking to her car
Got hit by a taxi taking home a patient.
Reliable to the end
She did not troubl...
Sunday 17th May 2020 12:50 pm
Underground
They'd seen each other on the
Tube, followed day after day by glances and
Hesitant smiles and he'd meant to
Make his move
Break the ice but then came
Lock-down.
Now he's mobile again, wondering if
She'll sense the smile beneath his mask
But there's no sign of her
Is she scared to emerge, furloughed or God forbid, sick?
Will he see her again?
Last night he watched T...
Friday 15th May 2020 11:35 am
Snuff
Did old Polly really drop her
Mentholated into my pram or
Was I too young to remember?
If so, why the link with Farley's rusks?
Later, one student summer
At the discount store in the market
I nicked a gross of tins and
It took three weeks to flush away the contents
Without my mother knowing and
One night I gave it a go and sneezed like a trooper yet
It did the trick f...
Tuesday 12th May 2020 11:30 am
Unmasked - a snippet from Buzzin Bards Anthology
The following piece is a snippet from Buzzin Bards Manchester Poetry Anthology, submissions are still open at: https://www.localgemspoetrypress.com/buzzin-bards-poetry-anthology.html
While you’re too busy being two-faced
I’ve got one face with many layers.
Take me at face value, or take a detour,
reforged, like Ant Man upon my deep pores.
Tryna get 1UP, that’s a weak score...
Friday 2nd August 2019 11:47 am
Demise
I feel dead inside
I can no longer hide
For so long I've lied
I promise, I truly tried,
But today is the day that I died.
Monday 18th June 2018 3:19 pm
True Face
The mask has fallen.
Like glass it has shattered into tiny pieces,
Never to be repaired again.
Every piece representing a lie behind the truth,
A secret that was thought to be better off hidden.
True light revealed itself today.
Shining bright like never before,
Exposing all the darkness nearby.
The shadows disappeared,
The ghosts all fled,
Yet you showed your fa...
Saturday 3rd June 2017 2:01 am
BRAVE FACE
How brave, in reality, is a ‘brave face’?
A facade shared, it would seem,
by the majority of the human race.
Beneath the flaking paint of a painted mask
lies a truth too long and painful to explain
no matter how oft you care to ask.
How long before the cracks become too wide
to conceal with powders and creams
and the crimson smile starts to slide.
How long...
Tuesday 9th June 2015 10:49 am
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