The walk from Eden: a collection of poems on the struggle of man

An explanation of part two’s structure…

 

 

 

When We Remained In Eden

 

Were we all not children once?

Crawling from the soils of the Earth

with eager limbs, veins filled with passion,

dancing in meadows and blind to the world,

but happy, content,

dreams drenched in faith.

Then we fell to the dirt of Eden on our knees,

mistakes, regrets, decisions dripping down our chin

from the sweet juice of that forbidden fruit-

and so we were silenced! Exiled!

Sent into deserts of the unknown,

drowning in sweat called by the burning sun

as we journeyed under it, unsure of what we sought,

with sweet memories of paradise being naively remembered.

We came to hate the freedom of our release,

overwhelmed with angst, but yet tired of prayer

to the lord who had brought this upon us,

to the one who would not let us be.

 

Well, be I say.

 

Forget the smiling grass that rests behind those bars,

you still have the stars above you when the night falls.

While the petals of her blossom glowed,

your man, your woman’s eyes provide the same sight

as they restlessly share your fate.

There was no pain lurking in that land,

only pleasures and peace,

of which you would have not appreciated

because they were all you knew.

Though you’re now faced with sadness,

let your thoughts bask in all of the possibilities

that paves these winding roads.

For on paths lie cracks, but also potential smiles

if only you would bravely walk down them

and let them be revealed,

forgetting the garden of Eden

which echoes in your soul.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Man and emotions are like butterflies under the sun. They have beautiful wings but their wings can only be seen and appreciated upon the exiting their cocoon and treading into a dark, unpredictable world. Some flutter into heaven, while others are poked at, stepped on and shot down by life’s cruelty. As a child trapped in my cocoon I longed with a burning desire for the day that I would finally be able to be free and get a chance to explore the world on my own. Yet experience caused me to lock myself in my cage, where I remained helplessly terrified to exit for years. The world would tease me from my nest, shooting me images of open skies as I cowardly crouched in that cave, hiding my wings from the world and never revealing them to myself, but always driven restless by the curiosity of what my wings might look like if I let them dance.

 “I would sit and stare, knocking back and forth between the lines of endless cocoons that hung from the meadows of trees. My favorite time of the day was when the evening rain would flood the air with its raging winds and electric thunder. This was when I saw some of the butterflies racing back to their cocoons, fighting the forces of nature only to find that their sanctuaries were forever gone. I ignored the butterflies that happily danced in the rain, believing them to be mad and secretly miserable. During a frightening storm was the only time when I would really appreciate my hidden nest though. I was shut out from the world but I would feel safe, secure. This allowed me to sometimes convince myself that I was happy and I would fall asleep with a smile on my face, entering a state of dreamless rest. Then, I would wake to a brilliant sunrise and cry as my heart fell from where it statically sat on the dusty shelf nailed in the deepest corners of my mind. In these moments I wanted nothing more then to flutter my wings in the warmth of the world’s fire. The overwhelming desire to experience life was eating away at me. I grew tired of my fear and became astonished by the beauty I could see from my nest alone. I longed to explore every field, every jungle, every ocean. My growing frustration slowly began to make me remember who I was, the person I was meant to be. Then came the day when I told myself that I would become this person no matter the struggle endured in doing so. I wanted to feel alive.”

 

-Extract from The Flight Of Butterflies

 

 

 

 

 

 

I.

 

I Dreamt of Cats

 

I have no bigger regret in life

than the day of I dreamt of a poem to write and then ignored it,

too stunned from mind’s fantasy thoughts.

As I lay in bed, kissed by the cool breath of the evening’s lips,

I drifted into dreams and danced in my imagination,

where I saw images of cats on walls, speaking to me in strange whispers

as they led me through a stroll in my mind, through a walk in the night.

 

We journeyed deep into the city;

where old woman shuffled the sidewalks, whispering secrets to themselves.

Pupils colored with insanity.

The cats led me to where groups of children played in the streets;

some whose hearts were filled with warmth,

but also to others who were filled with such terrible sadness

that It starved their souls, it broke their branches.

 

The cats led me to alleyways flowered with dumpsters blossoming art.

Their rims were filled; packed to the top in seas of swimming tints and hues,

winds of various scent, duty of so many essences.

I dug through them and found a book of written pages by a man;

thoughts of a stranger

as he painted the pastures of those pages with every aspect of his body.

I discovered nibbled dinner that had sat in houses whose walls

were decorated with: dim, quiet, dusk.

I came across the ring of a lover disposed of in rage,

with flames of the passion’s late bearer still beating wildly from the metals.

 

The cats took me to an ocean shimmering with tired night mist,

sprinkled with the laughter of the moon.

In it sailed creatures straying towards the shallow shore,

curious of the light that rained from the sky,

yet others fled to the depths of its bottom,

hiding in the thunder of silence, wrapped in the blankets of the black.

 

Then suddenly, the cats all turned and each wandered out a different way,

never looking back; and I stood there on the spot,

as the scenes playing that night evoked

every emotion I had never known; along with all of which had not been felt,

and like a cool black tide upon static waters,

the pounding of my heart showered me,

and I stood there for hours before I woke.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

II.

 

Mother

 

You were once my womb,

I was a leaf on your branch.

Together we watched a vast horizon of possibilities

underneath the sky of your flesh.

A new star lighting the sky

each time you sang a breath.

 

But the leaves outside turned brown,

their dust blew into the sea

to sit and drift on the dreary bottom,

mixed with weeds,

unable to recall memories of the sprouting of their seed.

 

Your laugh flickered, fading those stars,

covering me with grey clouds of a storm.

Your heart was my sun, but it soon set

into a bed of black.

 

Your soul was my paint, your smile my brush,

but time burned my canvas,

flames cast a shadow,

drowning the world’s warmth, making me shiver,

leaving me with a heart bitter.

 

So I left that nest I called home, to roam and fly,

exploring the world’s skies and trying to find your eyes

in every stranger I came by,

but though the candle of your pupils had burned through its wax,

I watched my memories of you like an old favorite film.

Yet these images alone could not fill my heart,

I realized that I needed a mother’s arms.

 

We can’t blame the clouds when they cry,

the cycle of raining is just a part of life,

but instead of hating these falling waters

we can walk in them warmly, dancing in the tears,

let go of our fears of being soaked,

and realize that it’s better to be drenched outside

then to be alone, watching the rain pour

from behind a foggy window as we hide.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

III.

 

 

“Far in the pillared dark

Thrush music went --

Almost like a call to come in

To the dark and lament.”

-Robert Frost

 

 

 

Drifting Upon Shore

 

I sway like those weeds beneath the sea

that twist and tangle, sitting long and forgotten

in pits dead and deep, buried in the sand.

I dance in the dusk as I yearn for the sun,

that is rumored to be above this dreary darkness,

which falls on me,

holding my roots into the ground with clenching fists,

shifting with my shadow.

I am left without the sound of sweet music,

and the sensation of scents that frolic so freely with the leaping wind.

The fish peck at my skin chewing on my branches,

their vibrant blush contrasts against the night,

that is stained upon these broken leafs as they wither from shade,

breathing with madness, stuck in this state.

 

The internal currents of the sea slowly drift the sand off me

and I am released, wiggling my feet to kick away from the cell that was that floor.

I arrived upon the ocean shore,

drowning in the waves that refused to break away from me,

like the guilt of a sin that consumes those in shame,

burning at their flesh with fierce flames,

they cry my name,

they beg me to come back,

but my roots have been released from the swerving of the sea-

and even if I so wished, if I returned to the ocean I would only aimless drift

subject to the tide, and I refuse to go back

and rest in those murky waters that crawl in my soul

and indulge in my pain that sets itself like a feast upon a table

which was burnt and turned away.

 

When at last I crash upon the earth, the wetness of my skin

picks up chunks of dirt that sporadically streak upon these leafs,

which are bland and brown compared to all that is around me,

but yet I cannot ignore the glimmer of the soothing sun as it rains upon the ocean,

tattooed in red vivid hues, shinning like blood on a tissue.

Oh! How warm it feels as it’s wild rays caress me and release music from my soul

that chirps with the birds as they flutter around and beside me.

My pores open up to the light that is thrust down my throat-

 

 

until I begin to choke upon the dryness

from the rays that paraded through my veins,

sending sweet moans through my throat

after such dense darkness, which appears to have followed me,

and now silenced the song of my pleasure,

which sets like the weather as the sun falls into the waves.

I attempt to roll back into the wet water that could quench my thirsty cries,

but time does not show sympathy, because the dryness grows upon me,

and my veins are drained from the straining of the burning sun

that lingers in the coming dusk.

Then the chirping of the birds stops as they near me in flocks

of angry beasts, pecking at my leafs.

I think that I am dead until I hear the sun scorching my skin,

while the birds tear apart my limbs,

and my screams echo against the pounding of the wind

and I lay like litter decaying into the grave

on the sands of the shore that I had longed for earlier that day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

IV.

 

When It Came to Me

 

It came to me in a whisper,

a soft sound barely heard

and yet I heard it loudly.

Was I afraid?

I do not know.

 

It came to me in lyrics,

music flowing through my soul.

The bells of its beat rung wildly

with my heart,

echoing into my dreams.

 

It came to me in a man,

body rough but warm,

hands grazing every pore upon my skin,

kiss wet with lust,

gaze like thrusts of pleasure.

 

It came to me like fire

before it came to me like rain,

burning me, quenching me,

savage like a beast,

then waters calm after storm.

 

It came to me as a child,

bleached with innocence.

Then one night it came to me as age,

breathless, flickering,

dying stars.

 

Yes, it came to me in many ways.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

V.

 

Sleeping With Summer

 

The tired shimmer of summer has set beneath beds of spring,

the beds in which your lips fled, seeking to join her rest,

snoring next to the beauty of blossoms,

laugh longing for the hibernating hatch of newborn birds.

 

You fled there upon the first leaf of autumn,

when the tint of change painted the tip of it’s stalk gold,

longing to see green forever freckling nature’s face,

to never see the nakedness of bare branches.

 

Your skin cringed at the ice of August

as the wailing wind desired to caress you,

fearing the smothering blanket of shadow,

veins pumping with the ponder of an early sleeping sun.

 

Now you sleep where summer dreams,

and in the moment when your lids burst with wake,

you seek her dormant streams, the exhausted flutters

of flowers dancing in meadows,

only to find the setting drunk with slumber,

her wonders static with desired break,

and you soon begin to realize she wishes

for the absence of your disruptive presence

as it shades the florescent peace of pause.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

VI.

 

Trotting Between Trails

 

Often times I see glimpses of my heart’s thoughts,

pumping passionately in dreams,

but my mind is a cave shading the beats seeking in shadow,

selfish, stubborn, afraid.

It peeks at the glimpses of the risky road my core flashes,

gazing breathlessly at the cryptic colors,

the strange precious tints, the illuminated images of the incessant,

but right when my feet step off this street of the known,

they retreat, They flee deeper back to the journey of predictability,

pacing wildly down the cracked pavement,

staring sadly between that of the voluminous vast

and that of the visible, the road in which I now walk-

linear lines marching mechanically to a mountain in front of me,

the sight I’ll have to watch until my breath stops.

My dearest thoughts, my conscious mind, my reason,

you have to make a decision,

will you live and die on this gravel?

Listening to the successive echo of your soles,

drowning in angst at your fate, the destination of this direct drive.

Or will you listen to the song of your soul?

Will you let your heart gallop,

gliding in the glow of adventure,

swaying in the shimmers of excitement,

kissing the sphere of sky’s secrets,

and finally feel what it means to be living.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

VII.

 

Cocktails Over a Flickering Candle

 

Their voices are loud

but the sounds that escape their lips

fall on me like shadows in the mist

and what they speak of,

I do not know.

 

So I piece their words like puzzles

but the strange, abstract shapes

do not make sense

and the world is bent

into a state of confusion.

 

My imagination rests in clouds

floating through my head,

sending thrills down my spine.

In these images are birds

who speak words of wisdom

as they fly towards paradise.

 

The trees out the window

glide with the wind as their petals

dance dressed in light and oh! What a beautiful sight

it is to see their flight into the air,

but as I gaze, I notice that the others just do not care.

 

Would you like more champagne sir?

Are the words heard from a waiter’s mouth

and his smile is dim, chill like wind

but not free to be a leaping breeze;

its stuck in the dusk of this room.

 

I finish my drink before I get up from my seat,

where I stumble to the door

to sit upon the shores of the wilderness

where I drift and I dream and things finally seem fine-

but then… I’m dragged by rugged hands back inside.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

VIII.

 

“A child who does not play is not a child, but the man who doesn't play has lost forever the child who lived in him and who he will miss terribly.”

-Pablo Neruda

Stagnate

 

I watched a child today as he swayed

on the sands of the bay,

picking up scatters of seashells

that freckled the white gravel.

 

He came to his knees,

quenching his soul in the water,

dancing to the music of sea

while the sun drenched him in warm rays;

and his heart galloped wildly,

like the movement of the tide.

 

Yet as the moon began to blossom,

the strength of the tide rose.

His parents became consumed with furor,

scolding him, driven insane

by their inability to explain why he wandered,

why he strayed, why he couldn’t sit

like all of the other children,

merely watching the tide drift.

 

They fed on the tree of his spirit like fire

until they threw their towels around their necks

and told the boy that the sun would soon set.

 

As they slithered from the shore

the boy looked back once more.

His face once sketched in innocence

was erased; covered by sadness, age-

So instead he chose to wear indifference.

 

I felt the change inside the child.

I held onto his light that flickered,

but there was nothing I could do.

The sun set and he began to fade,

the water of blackness drowned him,

spitting on his passion.

 

I cried alone as the stars

thrust their shine into the sky that night,

falling hopelessly before me,

still dangling wildly- but only dimly.

 

IX.

 

The Tide Under The Moon

 

I’m like the tide that rises subject to the moon

underneath pale lit skies that dine in starlight.

When the sun is sturdy and strong,

the tide is calm,

the waves roll peacefully and free

to how they please,

but when the sun sets

and sinks beneath the waters,

that’s when the moon crashes into the air

and the night wears darkness,

dressed in dreary curtains,

and the tide is certain that it will glide

to the movement of the moons shine.

The ghastly light is dim

and hides the sight one sees in the day

when the bay glistens with the smiles of the sun.

The moon pulls the tide and it cries while it rides

waves of unpredictability.

Its keys lock the sea into a cage

where rage does nothing

but pound against the bars

and the stars sigh as they lie

miles away, serving as the sun

to the eyes of foreign tides.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

X.

 

The Clock

 

The soles of my shoes have faded away

from pacing this pavement day after day.

The cracks in the road are beginning to grow

like raging tides subject to what Neptune decides.

The tick of my watch beats with my pulse

as my eyes watch it fearful and lost.

I hear the tick ring, the tock measures a second

it pounds in my ears; the day comes to an end

and it echoes the beat deep in my head.

I regret with no doubt the time I spend wasted about

feeling indifferent, strained,

from this growing pain that is subject to the clock.

 

I’m afraid of the sound of the rain

as it drips on my window and falls drop by drop

like the watch on my wrist calling tick- tock.

There are mornings when I wake wanting to make

the day as beautiful as the changing color of trees

as they blow in the breeze humming so sweetly

despite their falling leafs,

But as my feet crush these fallen flowers,

I listen to the crunch and see them turn to dust,

their colors once beautiful have turned brown.

Then the boat of my clock ticks from its dock

and the sails howl with the wind crying: tick- tock.

 

I see a rose whose beauty is enclosed

in petals to blossom. As the day strolls

it begins to unfold to the suns shining rays

but as the night comes it withers away,

its petals undone, right when life had begun.

I turn and I run trying to find silence.

I rock back and forth to the tick and the tock

that scream from my clock.

When I think all is not lost the ticking gets louder-

the tocking will not stop. I’m a brute of a man

buried by the hands of his own flaws

as he tragically falls and is caved by the walls

of his watch as it ticks

and it tocks, until his heart stops.

 

 

Reviews

[Coyote Poetry]

You are a amazing writer. You create a powerful set of poetry. Each part adding to make the purpose of the poem stronger. With pictures or photos this would be a outstanding book. A outstanding poem. Thank you.
Coyote