Saturday, July 25, 2015

Thunder Without Lightning

There are times in our lives when we feel helpless to help. On a note of transparency: this is my greatest fear. We experience something: an event, an emotion, a conflict or existential dilemma in the overarching narrative that is our story. We grow confused when our minds cannot rationalize life. We may not be able to comprehend what to do, or how to cope with the situation, but when the people we care about are being effected negatively the game changes. I personally am a guardian, protective by nature. It is, therefore, more difficult for me to be forced into a stoic state. Sometimes we must be strong for others. Ultimately, we must realize that we are human and we bleed. We may not be able to fix every situation. Some days may be darker than others. The poems that I write are taken from personal experience. Sometimes I wish that they would read themselves to whomever they are about and in a more eloquent manner say, "Someone thought about you today. Somebody cares." In the end, that is all that matters. Alas, the following words were written amid a recent summer:

"Thunder without lightning"

I'm holding a picture of her. Right before her eyes, but there's a disconnect, some disagreement between her right eye and what's left of her grey matter. It might be because she is having one of those days where the monster she rides around on, is winning. She asked politely the first two times, but the phrase never seemed to resonate enough meaning. So she tossed it to the wind.

And still the monster won't leave her alone.

Incessantly reminding her of this present state of being. Haunting. Catching her eyes every night before bed, winking, and blowing kisses as she grew up and into the coming storm that would mean everything to her. Every now and then, she hears thunder, but there’s no lightning. Feels rain, but no clouds. What began as confusion has matured into questions. Options. Ideas held by impossible strings and swords for fighting invisible things, like the wind. Slowly, she is becoming completely dependent on it.

Dependence: the name of that coat she refused to wear even when the weather begged to differ. Perhaps this word explains why the more I tried to lift her smile, the less receptive she grew, as her tongue adamantly wrestled to convey a message so perfectly she must have been holding onto it for years. It looked like a pearl when she said it.

"Who is that woman?"

Her eyes are reading the picture now, as if it’s some piece of literature she's never seen, but all the pages are blank so she is helpless when using context to figure out what the author was intending to say. She's lost her point of reference, the compass telling her who is sailing the ship. The doctor's diagnosis confirmed the what, but she can't seem to remember why she is here, and all she keeps hearing is that Dementia does that; and the side effects of medications are as normative as she will ever be again.

But what do they know.
The sky can rain without clouds
And thunder without lightning.


On the spectrum of little to nothing, their definition of dependent is useless. The monster still helps her crawl into bed at night. Although her curiosity hadn’t aged a day, her sight had been well seasoned. It doesn't bother me when she seems to recognize my face, but never recalls my name. So she waves, and I smile; then I wave, and she winks and blows a kiss. This is our timeless space called ‘remembering;’ our haven away from a world of pre-determined concepts where life and death rehash their sibling rivalry at the expense of human existence.

This time, I had hoped to get it right. But there's a disconnect, some disagreement between her right eye and what’s left of her grey matter. And for now, all she's asking is, "Who is that Woman?"

And as she lets go of some impossible string she had come to cherish,
I wink, and blow a kiss.
And it rains down her cheeks with no clouds
As she hears thunder without lightning.
Today, the monster, is winning.


~Deus Fortuno

Wednesday, July 22, 2015

Talking with my mouth open

Time has passed since my last post and a great many things have happened. In some strange, ritualistic act I would like to attempt to resurrect this place I once knew. This sanctuary. I've graduated college now and will soon be attending graduate school to attain a Master's in Counseling. This post, or should I say, this blog may aid in collecting my thoughts about life. I still write poems and pursue art. I am still an introvert and geek. I am a big philosopher with a beard; a teddy bear who reads and listens more than speaks. Here is a work that wrote itself. Any thoughts or comments are always welcome.

"Talking with my mouth open"

I’ll give you my pen if it helps. I keep it close to my heart, so you can make note and watch how it keeps time and track of your eyes when you look down or away from the elephant in the room that reminds you that what you are about to say is deeply personal.

You grow roses in your cheeks whenever others touch the buttons you hide in plain sight and your palms rain when too many questions approach without asking for permission. I ask because I care and I care to ask because you are here, but your eyes are wandering. We are sharing the same air, and I am reading, feeling the vibrations in your fingers as you twiddle and twitch. You have your own method of measuring the worth of a conversation and it begins and ends with being noticed. You go about your day caring for others in a way that seems strange, or perhaps abrasive. But really, you play surgeon in a hospital overflowing with casualties who don’t know they are dying. The woman in the corner just lost it all in one phone call, and the man next to her has no more teeth to lie through so he smiles, but never opens his mouth. Silent are your eyes as they scan the environment for signs of compassionate life. You monitor your thoughts like a warden put in charge of canaries: entertained, but ultimately afraid of the existential anomalies you’ve put behind bars as though at any moment they will be released, and you will be revealed for what you truly are: thoughtful.

You maintain control of your life via a cage with a lock, and when it’s not big enough, you turn the lights out-hoping silence will fall on the ringing in your ears. Your thoughts are creatures repeating the same phrases over and over, until out of frustration you write poems on your arm or punch stonewalls in the nose because nothing, in this moment, is concrete. There must be something more behind the veil, some puppet master pulling strings with cruel intentions, and you’d like to teach them a thing or two about pain. What the words on your wrists say is that “We are all searching for something.” What they mean is between you and God and whoever hurt you bad enough to stain your body with permanent ink deserves to be sentenced to walk an eternity on legos. You are alarmed by the sound of complaints you hear each day, how some humans actually believe they are entitled to every basic human need, albeit safety, or love. Once in awhile, someone will talk with their mouth open, saying things to make you stop and think, but those moments are few and far between and there aren’t enough hours in the day to make all the assumptions necessary to conjoin your notion of the way the world should be, with the way the sidewalk containing your future just ended a few feet ago.

So you stand still.

Give the sun the middle finger you’ve been saving for a rainy day and sigh because you really had been saving that passive aggressive gesture for something more worth your time. To you, Mother Nature is hardly an adequate adversary, and Father Time stopped writing eons before you were born, so why bother.

You’ve had enough lashes for one day. But you’re still standing here. In the same spot where your consciousness left you, reassembling your shell for a moment because, for once, your cage was broken into. Not by force, but rather a question asked by someone who has been reading, wondering why a warden is wrestling with God at the edge of this sidewalk. A simple curiosity: How old is your soul really?

The roses on your cheeks bloom, and as my pen meets your hand you reply, “I found something worth searching for.” And just then, another canary enters your cage.

So you stand still.
And the elephant in the room reminds you that you are about to say something deeply personal.

~God Bless

Saturday, October 9, 2010

Maybe,

Maybe,
Next time the chaos will
leave you
in a place where
you belong.

Maybe,
Someday
the silence
will bleed through
wounded grace
where
you feel loved.

Maybe,
Somehow
their sorrow
shall seep to
broken dreams
and restful homes.

Maybe,
someway
this hollow
will fill you
til beyond
is well behind you.

Maybe,
they say
in prayers
for those thens when
faith still
believed.

Maybe,
we pray
in hope
of words
worth far too much
to know.

Maybe,

Thursday, September 30, 2010

sleep dreams
everything shall change
all i ask
is that you remain calm

-Deus fortuno

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

fear

there was no time
-you taught me terror
to grieve
-i learned
to breath
-between suns of fear
or feel the need to be
-beneath a frigid moon
anything
-repressed, i slept
less
-in and out of this reality
than this shell i
-kept
concealed
-from them, the chaos of theirs
unhealed
-waiting for help
helpless to come
-on those stairs
weeping
-while,
as you slept
-there i sat
hours away;
-learning
of terror over time
-with no alibi why
thanks anyway...

~Deus fortuno

Monday, September 20, 2010

amor

good eve
to thee
some sweet
gone bye
song
so sudden did
startle this wound
awake

please forgive
my passive stance
to tell
of my
disappearance from
mists of memories
drenched in sweat
and fury far from faded

there was a this
and this knew that
its time had come at last;
thus this sat,
not knowing still
how still can be so patient
nor where to set
its final breath
free from fear
and failure

amor now lost
was held by nights
when dreams
would sing
pleasantries
while slowly drifting by;
now rings a voice
in muzzled tones
and gentle disposition
apologizing for all
gone lost
that eve you said
adieu

i miss you this
and every eve
though you
sing so often now
yet only when
i dare not listen;
sleep well
all now gone away
may life be better
than together, we deserve.

~Deus fortuno

Thursday, August 19, 2010

l i m b o

Why are you patience
please talk to me
still here, am I
in limbo
learning
as quickly as my mind
can understand my bodies
release
what am I to learn?
What are you to teach?

What if there are no answers?
If it, this place,
kills me

silence
will remember
my questions until
they forget
the reasons why
their curiosity forced
air from lungs
too ruptured to tell.

I don't recall
why snow falls
on days when it was
meant to rain.
why panic
smiles so cynically
on faces in
visible pain.

Intensely the tremors
spread
shaking
the air
from its vacuous throne

of course it matters
it always does
except for moments like these
in places not unlike this
where truth loses
the when and why
and doubt fills this abyss.

Saturday, August 14, 2010

a wake

i dreamt last night
a nightmare
real and living
filled by walls
and ceiling shaped
memories
with people
barely breathing.

familiar these relics
pass
in screams and pleads
and dying grasps
of realities
much afraid
to lose a sense
already lost.
with nothing lucid
about this place
but a final longing
to escape.

led through halls
clawed hollow fallen
in love
with lies
behind a moon
who-
pretending time away
ignites a sky
in starry
hostile
bitter
cries

just say it
cope
accept the fact
that this is no release
if in dreams death comes
where goes the soul
to rest or sleep with ease?

perhaps solace
is the myth
we tell those
still
too young to fall;
in painted dreams
within these walls
called safe
or not at all.

remember that castle,
made of sand
it is whatever exists;
waiting;
buried
lives
a nightmare

who knows so little of sleep...

~Deus fortuno

Friday, June 25, 2010

what wisdom

Teach me,
a learning mess
the vessel
now and changing;
always
goes
the wand'ring soul
until we go
til nevermore
a masterpiece
in the making.

~Deus fortuno

Monday, June 21, 2010

Deus ex perditus

Dear pain, good night;
good evening apathy,
welcome home.

~Deus fortuno

Monday, May 31, 2010

why.

be.
here.

gone,
if you
take
my
breath
it
is

noise,
for
each
excuse
an
alibi lives
in foolproof
lives

please,
survive
so
why
and
why not
may cease
this childish
folly while

humility,
raped
of
pride
died
in
piece
of mind

~Deus fortuno

Friday, May 28, 2010

now live

wake
shudder
the
feel
of boiling
sheets
too cold
to sweat

rest
breathe
something
new
other than
fear;
irrational
as that sound
resounds
between each lung
holding a hearts
murmur

still
can't shake
this
trembled
sensation,
no matter,
what just happened
this room
refuses
to let go;
internal bleeding
holds nothing
to moments
betwixt
the river
and mortal
existence

what bed awaits
the fear of fallen
fates;
dear angel
pray
as ye yet may...

~Deus fortuno

Saturday, May 22, 2010

just love

What is
that place
where time
and space
made
humans face
irrational
fears
and
clouded tears
form rain

Where is
solace
this gift
from pride
to humbly
forsake
those every
moment
like it or nots
learning
to cope
while
hoping
to learn
of things
before their
time

When
is enough
the word
absurd as
their dancing
may seem
to say
the beats
between
a melody
pitched
away

Why was
this
the all
that every
other curiosity
questioned
yet fate sat
silently to obey

Please breath
the more of life
no more
shall not
doubt them
if they
defy themselves
before leaves leave them
this way

too soon
the sun
shall sleep
nights to dream
of waking
but once more
when then was
not just a memory

Be still,
be loved
just be...

~Deus fortuno

Thursday, May 13, 2010

Why not...

everything
and
nothing-
held
by words
painting
deeds
picturing
people
and
things
invaluably,

perishable
thoughts
muzzle
half-hearted
almost-perfect
slurs,
queued
through
moments
when silence
was
the only
decent
end,

there it is,
or was;
or was it...
is this
that feeling
they warned
us of
yet never
told;
the truth
behind
the vale,

hints-
of love
abandon
for any
weary enough
to claim
themselves
this prize of
atrophy,

why not...
catch on,
listen
while blood
and smiles
reconcile
between syllabled
punctuation,
feelings
wean themselves
from thought,
thinking only
hurts when it breaths
and being
became
the nothing
everything
never
fathomed
to be,

~Deus fortuno

Saturday, April 10, 2010

so it is

Pain
when does this madness
trickle away
life
like dews
the dawn cried to
dusk

Billows
the grains
and wanes
the owls
eye closed
one
last-
willow away
from comfort

Danger;
was safe
once,
promise.

Icarus
was only
trying
to please
that little
pleasure
poseidon thought
success
wished
or ought
to be

Underestimated,
undermined
uninvited
emotion

How
mortal
death
is

Vicious
cycles
render helpless
rinse, repeat;
finally,
a repose
worth falling for;
tar and feather
the sheepish wolf
they'll never know
the difference

Heaven
was
everything
Hell
threw away

Was this
it;
what waiting
waited so
desperately
for;
what does
worth
have something
anything
to do with this,
now,
let it be

~Deus fortuno

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

purgare

Maybe
eternity is
best lived asleep,
or memories
their life
outlived to
perish

Never
was then
about the angels
of heavens lust
or demons
through zeal
untame
but matters
of them
between death
and death
the same

Leave
water away
from blood-stained
grip
in moon
shown seal
and stain;
loss is safe
in secret
though
deep truths
reflect
Dear Hollow Night,
Take not
my friend,
yet in return,
my soul
thy snare,
do wed;

just breath..
it is what it is

My tries of Ash
no fire forgave
maybe, if
fate shall twist
mercy
Breath,
almost natural
almost dangerous

Everything
and nothing
its only,
what it is
I can take it
whats the worst
that can
happen
The need
to find
another
need grows
colder
in desires wake
to find
the pleasure
within pain
and want
the needs
desire

What
could words say
to fool
a fool;
Go,
disappeared,
why not
Be responsible
Do as ye must.
No promises,
none after.

hope
and sweet
love
whisper
but thy
swan song
only once;
madness waits
for none
yet welcomes all
The mourning
spills hope
eclipsed
into deepest dark;
Unwell, unwell
indifference brings
before the tollsome
bell
fate, bittersweet, judge
no rest
the wicked befell.

~Deus fortuno

Monday, April 5, 2010

godspeed

violence,
in sky
awake
by heartbeat
of sod
trembling to
sleep;
what solace
awaits their
nightmares
too patient
to listen,
too loving
to care
where or why
it happened

breaks,
the ground
feels
cold
despite
constant pressure
to live
by them above
its infinite
grave

them,
who know
pain
knew its roots
rain deep
ever adoring
its sharp-
subtle alarm
forsaking
their solace
of sleep

who,
or what
existentially
equal
with why
these pitiful
trees
host funerals
for leaves
that die
with seasons
too young
to notice
the shrill
impatient,
deceitful
days
sear nights
requited
rest

breath,
peace
asthma only
holds
to breathless
hopes of life

its only pain
~Deus fortuno

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

feels

please
make not
me ask-
the
silence
to
resonate
dissonant
sound,
when eves
shut eyes
weaving tapestried
lies
somewhere,
deep,
they sway
through dawns
swept dusks
others softly
setting say
this
emptiness,
chaotic as
it may;
could have,
should have,
merely must
may

what crisis
identity knows not,
how closing that
cosmos and stitching
stardust have
anything done with
their everything
gone

and afar
they drift
when apart,
to memory,
succumb;
their keep,
in cherish
of thought
they pray

oh fire,
please kiss them
this evil to rest,
in folly and fate
a bittersweet crest;
their, flame
fettish waltz
any weighs worth
through poorly knit
cobblestone
country and girth
o'er brooks of ms. mary
and grace do them drift
the solace of lily
in amber embrace
a solemn serene
fades entropy
clear to focus
fell

in heavens envy
of hells apathy
rest as ye must dear,
rise as ye may,
forget not the feel
either way


~Deus fortuno

Thursday, November 26, 2009

that

something
vicarious
whispers
them;
stay,
gravity
shall return
when safety
forsakes fear
and shakes
delirium
between fragmented
thought
and naive reason;

this them
they see
shall change,
resistant
to fiction,
lived once,
lost twice,
beneath
realities
faithful to hope
while hoping for faith,
that this them shall remain
when all else
shall
change.

what is love?
how dare you
understand its
immortalized
understanding
of yours;
the whys
inside;
hugged
away from
pain;
mortality;
themselves-
these never meant to-
couldn't help moments,
alone
in the dark,
disappeared,
in cold thought,
completely missing
the point,
of purgatory;
the is of this
what-
coping
with knowing not
what to ask
or how to accept
the answer
in question.

They know,
no better
than experience,
but believe
in experiences
which have yet
to be;
born of
believing
wholeheartedly,
that these could
should or would
maybes
hold purpose
in this present
disbelief,
certainly they know
that then was when
is gone
the comfort
of sheets snug
and moons warm
of ignorant
understanding,
and innocence
who never felt
the dissonant
relationships
of soul
and spirit;
better them that
never learn,
than never live,
or live
without experiencing
the love,
of something
vicarious.

~Deus fortuno

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

be

she
doesn't get it,
the whole of
this nothing;
her purpose
within each word,
the sounds she heard
haunting
each breathless slur
of her

she questions,
how absurd,
that sense
should spawn of
nothing but his
absent presence;
dwelling,
where answers wait
beyond now yet
before then,
when his
present absence
first became nothing
but his memory
of her

she knows,
the sights
he sees
in search
of her
how rivers
flow
when he lives
these days
and survives
those nights
drown them;
save them all,
in ships
and sands
above this place
of complacent
existence.

she feels,
emotion-
distress, yet
knows she is
no damsel.
He is
no prince.
This is when
pain was named;
when neither hers
nor his served
any deference;
these faithful games
which loved for years
to play
would lust no more for seconds

She believes,
that belief in her is
Here,
beneath covers
tucked in,
ready,
his courage
waiting
to carry them where
found was safe
and lost no longer cared to lose her.
where madness meets method-
who said
they could not be-
should they
depend upon
perception or make
their own bed
for those weary few
who defy gravity
and live
themselves to
death.
How dare fate
be so cruel yet,
too kind,
to thieve what she
graciously sacrifices,
in faith blind;
that she shall breath;
hope,
in this apnea,
resting only
in daydreams
of her.

she holds,
that moment
close to her memory,
when his absence
meant that world
forgot to
feel; to be,
before he forgets
to live,
she visits
to give
a kiss,
to return this world,
to his lips;
that he may hope
to hold
some semblance
of her.

~Deus fortuno