Weight, Love, and Ashes

 Weight, Love, and Ashes

That was one of the heaviest things I've ever held:

That tiny plastic bag filled with a half a pound of ashes.

Right up there with my little brother when he was a newborn,

And my own shoes when I put them on and walk into who I am.

Life, love, and loss are not alliterations to me.

But, sometimes, it seems so much simpler to think in terms of matching the preceding,

Marching in step with nobody,

Too skittish to be called a one-man waltz; A littering lunatic, leaving logic and love Behind.

Trash, blowing along your highway; not mine, not anymore.

Yet I still get lost in all the letters, mail I get from my heart to my head and back again,

Each saying to the other nothing more than: "Feel. You're just as blind as I am."

But there is no brail for a man who sees too much, and wishes he could take shallower Breaths.

And I don't get things as right as you say,

Writing out your own inner thoughts on your outer layers, keeping nothing back but

Your fear of nothingness Itself,

Lighting yourself up so you won't ever, ever feel down.

But you're right:

You can't always set yourself on fire only to be put out,

Shutting away your best qualities so they won't get

Water damaged.

Little realizing they're burning behind your back like so many dishonest friends,

Each wanting a big piece of your littlest moments,

leaving you with nothing but the heaviest failures...

And the largest joys.

 

They look away and though you light the match again,

 I outlasted knowing you wish you'd never been.

 

 

Reviews

[Vain Apocalypse]

One of the more satisfying things I've read in some time. The ambiguity of the subject matter is too great for me to assemble any concise thoughts on the poem's theme or meaning, but it left me charged with a plethora of vaguely connected feelings (titanic responsibility, forsakenness, self-deceit).

There are so many lines in this that ring with inspiring insight and perspective, that really have the potential to move a reader, leaving them seeing something in a way that they never had before.

If this is how you always write, then I'm certain to be a fan of yours.

[Song of Mercy]

It took several reads before I caught. Barb

[Markymark]

Incredible in prose and content.

Well penned my friend. It also left me fragmented and frazzled, like Vain....but I too was captured from the first lines.

Great write--

markymark