NATIONAL POETRY MONTH
|
DAILY RANDOMNESSParadox
by Jami Williams I have been evil
And good In the same breath Forward and Completely backward In the same step Answering Questioning Same sentence Loved Hated By the same man Daughter of no one Mother of sorrow Still same man My contradictions Make me beautiful And horrendous. On the Approaching Storm
by Jami Williams It is already here You can hear it whine against the ground Pushback from hell No one likes to be cold Sky and sun hold hands Belying nothing And it is hard to remember That my sky ends somewhere A warning has been spoken by man But nature gives up nothing It holds its secrets Like a dead child in feather-down tomb At the wall of the storm They must cling to each other Sky and sun, Mother Clouds will shred them both As trees bend to the ground Reaching for the last bit of heat I am reminded That warmth is better than cold Even if it comes from the fire of hell Clan
by Jami Williams for Allison We dance around the same fire You, young and brazen And I, old and wizened Our heads were plunged into the same river And they took us into their houses of bone and mud And they branded us Low and small where none would see And mourn the clan They dressed us in thorns and reeds Shamed us and set us outside To warn But we, We made wind chimes of their bones Sun catchers of their eyes And canopies of their skin And then we lived With the dirt of their fingernails Embedded in our arms And the threads of their filth Embedded in our hair We lived We lived This is the song of our clan. Mukbang
by Jami Williams Mukbang, muk-bang or meokbang (/ˈmʌkbæŋ, ˈmʊkbæŋ/; Korean: [mʌk̚.p͈aŋ] ( listen)) is a live online audiovisual broadcast in which a host eats large amounts of foods while interacting with their audience. Blank eyes Mouths agape They stare at me Disbelief dripping Mukbang I am old Because I do not Understand the idea Behind a Mukbang Sounds dirty but it isn't... Sounds illegal... isn't Sounds painful... well You watch people devour Plates full of food On YouTube Kind of like being social But with the anti upped They don't like people They don't like being out They don't need friends They can watch anonymous strangers Devour plates of hotdog spaghetti And be more fulfilled at 15 than I am at 47 I shake my head Splatter confusion on their walls I am still winning LIFE is my mukbang Delete Key
by Jami Williams I miss pencils
The cedar-like smell Yellow paint Tribal pattern Wood grain Graphite I miss pencils Sharpen Lessen Erase Smudge Reminders of work Of creativity burned down Of running out of words I miss pencils Half tool Half weapon Impossible To impale one's self On a delete key. Rooted
by Jami Williams I hear you baying at the night
Shaking the windows Jarring the sugar bowl Beckoning to the parts of me That have died I hear her screaming in delight Shaking my heart Jarring the barren brain And I remember my feet on the path To the roots That ground you My saving grace Those roots Imprisoned there Where first you shed my blood To fertilize your grow You bay, they come to you To uproot To own you I prefer you where you are Stuck in the ground Rooted in the blood of my thorns Fiery Arrows
by Jami Williams I ponder
The idea Of fiery arrows It seems to be a bit of overkill... Or is that just me? To shoot someone with a fiery arrow I question this portion of history Heavy with doubt and disbelief The fire would burn the wood, right? The arrow is wood, the arrow head is... What? What burns but does not consume? Fiery arrows were the conundrum of my life Until you. You burn but do not consume Leaving blisters where you kiss my skin And holes where you plunge in. Desire. Fiery arrows are made of desire. Millisecond
by Jami Williams I am the dust
Kicked off of boots On a dirt road Floating into the air Like steam on a hot lake In a cold sunrise I am the scratch On a wood floor Beautiful only when the light Hits me and I disappear I am feedback As you put your mouth Treacherous, and terrifying To the part of me That amplifies you I am scar tissue Under the skin And radio waves bounce To warn of my presence Vaporous and infinite I beg to be considered More than a passing thought A travelling light Shot from here There is no there Anywhere I am the memory Tangible and passed on Once on your fingertips To your brain Where I evaporate Into the smell of your breath. The Sound of the Frozen
by Jami Williams Everyone is mistaken: the snow does not crunch It moans, twisted and pained, I walk Those are the sounds the frozen Ghost Tree
by Jami Williams I saw the Ghost Tree, white and bare Hiding but rooted Going nowhere The more we try to disappear, The more that we are here. Threadbare
by Jami Williams I put on the coat of many colors And I follow after my brothers And scream for you from inside the pit I am the grand marshal of the blood parade Watching my own embers fade And you are there to embrace me when I quit I holler to the atmosphere Tell me, tell me why I’m here! And the silence echoes back with gentle love And I muddy myself and claw and dig And I run off the cliff, the evil-grasped pig Only to find that you still lift me above How am I, your tapestry Example of your mastery Worth so much of the grace that you freely share You smile and lift my weeping head And bring to life what once was dead And remind me that this cross is not mine to bear The dirty hands are clean in you The lying lips now speak what’s true It isn’t just, it isn’t logic and it’s never fair You tie the knot and pull me in Forgiving me of my doubt and sin For there’s still a tie that binds when I’m threadbare. Auld Lang Syne...
by Jami Williams Whether I'm healed or whether I'm broken The silence I kept when I should have spoken The letting go and the holding on to it The apprehension instead of the going through it The laughter that came in and fell out as tears The seconds more fragile than millions of years The end's a beginning that will end just same And I cannot find fault and I cannot place blame It took what it took and it gave what I let it I'll forgive the year and I will never forget it |