Darkness comes

Darkness comes and covered the sun

The shadows of my mind

for now

have won

This fear that holds me under

I sit

Waiting.

For what

I do not know

But the anxiety has wrapped itself around my chest

Waiting.

For something

For what 

For something

An impending doom

Clutches at me

Not letting me breathe

Not letting me think

I want to run

I want to scream

But I can’t move

I am paralyzed

By this fear

That holds me under

All peace, all joy

That were once here

Is gone

What I would give

To be free

Of all that has a hold on me

Peace becomes her

*****

She wanders the world as a shadow

Beaten but not broken

She longs for solace in the comfort of kind words, never uttered

In an embrace that never manifests

In the cold of night

In a moment of lonely solitude

She utters to herself kind words

And wraps herself in her own embrace

She has become her greatest ally

Standing strong against the silent world

She settles into the comfort of her mind

She snuggles up to the warmth of her soul

Peace becomes her

*****

Darkness takes its seat

Darkness takes its seat at my table
The places are neatly set
Despite Darkness’s glowering gaze
I rally some conviction yet
I tell it that it needs to leave
That there’s really no place for it here
It smiles with its sickly smile
And tells me to pass the peas
I pick up the ceramic bowl of peas
And set my jaw line straight
This imposter has laid the last straw down
Upon my already handsome weight
“You despicable thing” I say to Darkness
“You really think you can win?
Pack your bags and leave straight away,
Before my Wrath comes in.”
Darkness looks me up and down
Trying to call my bluff
I sit with steady eyes ablaze
And sip calmly from my cup
Just then a deafening noise occurs
Like the cracking of a whip
I turn my head in time to see
My mighty Wrath enter in
“You know not who you have messed with” he says
“You’ll be sorry that you stayed”
And with those words he flies at Darkness
Without a second’s delay
He grabs its neck and grips it tight
Darkness’s face it turns to red
“Please let me go” he feebly croaks
“And show me mercy instead”
Wrath laughs out loud, a glorious sound,
And keeps his hold locked tight
“Why should I show you mercy, you pathetic thing
When you came here to destroy our life”
With that he grabs in one swift move
His sword out of its sheath
He plunges it into Darkness’s neck
And Darkness crumples to its feet

Long after Darkness’s breath has ceased
I sit with morose eyes
Shouldn’t I be celebrating this feat
Of Darkness’s demise?
I know I should be overcome with joy
And breathe a long sigh of relief
Instead I sit with heavy heart
At this recent victorious defeat
See even though Darkness has been slain
No peace to me this brings
For Darkness entered my heart long ago
And has sprouted its own wings
Darkness resides within me now
It hides just under my skin
And try as I might to banish it
Darkness lives on within. *

**

* Thank you Wee Gee for encouraging me with my poems. That is something I can keep doing.

** Artist credit: The Dark Side Art: David Ho

The purpose of poems

When I am doing well, my mind normally doesn’t turn to poetry. I’m not the type of person who typically writes “happy” poems. When I write poems, it’s usually because I’m having a really hard time, and they are often pretty dark.

When I’m struggling, words don’t come very easily. Often I may have a feeling, or a sense of something, but no words to accompany it. So it’s hard for me to write out in great length or detail or description what is going on for me.

Poetry, however, doesn’t need the right words. It doesn’t need to sound pretty. It doesn’t need to make sense. For me, poetry is simply the written form of my emotions. Sometimes they make sense, sometimes they don’t.. Sometimes they might sound nice, other times they don’t.. But the purpose of writing poetry, unlike regular prose, is providing a voice to things buried and hidden. At least that’s what poetry is for me. It gives expression to things I otherwise wouldn’t be able to express.

With my regular blog entries, you get the words that I chose to share with you. A tiny, minuscule portion of myself. With my poems, you are getting to peek into my very core. You get to experience part of the inner workings of me and what takes place in my mind and heart. Whereas with my regular writings, you are seeing purely my shell.

When I was a teenager, I had poetry flowing out of every pore of me. Sadly, when I was about 22, I burned each and every diary and journal I’d ever written in from the ages of 10 to 22. At the time, I was trying to “start anew” and purge myself of my past. That’s one of my biggest regrets – burning all those journals and notebooks full of my writings. Full of my poems. Now I’m getting a chance to make up for that I suppose.

Thank you all for giving me the opportunity to share a deep and personal part of myself through my poems. Please hold them gently, as you would a baby bird, or a precious stone. They are a piece of me, after all.