Stormy Skies

I fell asleep to the rain
trickling at my windowsill,
another dark and dreary day
in a world full of
sugar plum fairies
and happy people.

I guess it's just my corner of the world
that the malevolent sky's open for.

I had my first dreams in months
while listening to those drops,
they weren't dark like the clouds,
but they weren't as light hearted
and colorful as the world that surrounds me.

I guess my imagination lacks the complexity
of color, but then I'm not like most other people.

Words chiseled me from obsidian,
and it is now words that carve out my heart.
The pen, oh what a love affair we've had,
how many scripted evenings we've shared,
and now that same pen has soiled
my memory and my love.

I guess when I needed to hear the whispers
I was looking for tears,
and I suppose when I should have seen soaked eyes
and tattered feelings, 
I was listening for silence.

But then again, I never was one with open eyes
and the heart of a dreamer.

I found myself sitting in the rain watching
each perfect drop settle in it's place
on the earthen surface,
and I wondered where they went
after hitting the ground...

but I'm not a dreamer, and it's cold outside.
I'm soaked to the bone, and all I can hear
it the chattering of my own teeth.

Introspective...I think that's the word
that might best describe me,
Since apparently all I care about is myself.

I ran down a path thinking that the people following
would keep up with me,
thinking that they were OK
and that they didn't need my help anymore.

The old adage 'If you love something set it free'
comes to mind at the moment and yet it doesn't fit.
You see you can't set something free
that you never had in the first place.

You see you never truly own anything,
you only posses it for a short time
before it morphs or melds into something better,
or worse.

And I'm the catalyst, or so it seems,
for the worst.
this may be one of those half-truths 
that people speak of so often these days.

When does something become a 'half-truth'?
is it when someone doesn't want it to be true?
or is it when the truth just doesn't seem
good enough anymore, not quite solid enough,
or maybe just a glimmering doubt in your mind?

You see questions just spawn more questions...

But then I am deceitful as some might say,
so I could be leading you into my dark grove,
to listen to the whispers
like our friend Denethor.

I don't know how I feel anymore,
I don't feel pain like I used to,
and if joy knocked harder than
what a pin drop sounds like
then I must not have been paying attention.

Some people would ask me what's wrong,
others would guess,
most turn the other cheek and ignore the problem,
and that's just the way I like it,
in my dark little corner,
my shohikan grove,
my grave,
my mind.

© Justin Frieberg, All rights reserved

It Was Once Beautiful (Now it's Dead)

My tongue has gone numb
it seems lately I've been struck dumb
or even just kept my piece quiet
because I don't have anything to say, well not quite.
You see my mind doesn't work the way that it used to
it was left to wallow in the pools of poetic limbo
and it grew fat and lazy, with no thought of tempo,
or beat, or how twenty lines can mean the world
to just one person no matter how timid or bold.
You see, I expected that someone might notice
that this wound rent in my rhythmic being needed a poultice,
and lately I just can't focus, it's just a jumbled mess
that the rest may call poetry but to me it seems less,
not perfect, like a beautiful woman in a ragged dress...

You see I speak my mind on these pages and you're turning
each page wondering what I might say next, yearning,
burning, and maybe learning how I think, how I breathe
how my emotions feed on my fingers,
how each thought lingers
and finds meaning...to me that is, because in reality
no one opinion matters when the ink runs dry.

I have pages stuccoed in my head and they are all blank,
or crumbling because there is no one to thank...
is that poetic? Is it even a complete thought?
Do we all really think about what we write, is it a spark?
Sometimes my fingers fly over keys, scribble letters,
or my lips move to a cadence of something unheard to others.

I can't write what I feel anymore because emptiness
isn't a feeling that can take shape on a page
and be made something solid that people understand.
I have everything I wanted, and yet my hands tremble
at the thought of holding one thing so dear to me
that may break with the slightest touch.

Is a heart so delicate that one may never touch it,
or is it the hand that is so rugged that it
knows no restraint.

just thought I might rant a little at myself,
but please draw your own conclusions
to the meaning of my babble.

God knows I'd like some insight.

© Justin Frieberg, All rights reserved