Your favourite collaborations from DU poets.

“His voice drifted across the room
like smoke rings dancing on a gentle breeze
I sat, entranced, not just listening
but hearing, really hearing
every word that caressed and tumbled
from his lips
 
He spoke of trees and broken hearts
he whispered answers
to questions I’d never thought  to ask
and still mesmerized by the resolve in his tone
I couldn’t keep my eyes off the beautiful shapes
his mouth made …”
in my mind’s heart and vision, I spied her
in the corner alone and in dream concentrate
while I spoke my scribe to the crowd all huddled
deep within the bowels of the city in this
hollow where heretics, patriots and thoughtful
bards would come to share their bleeding souls
in voice for only the chance to be heard.
 
This place has always brought in the cold
the cold and searching and she appeared
neither to me.  I continued with my Poetic
Slam but speaking only in motions for her
eyes seem to shine through the low lighted
candled den of philosophical heavy misting
and I longed to discover her story her
wants if only for this night…
 
“I allowed my gaze to linger
to drift and the pause again
ensnared by the magic his tongue spun
like a butterfly trapped in sticky webbing
only wishing never to be freed
but rather devoured mercilessly
and the last notes of his voice resonated
through the underground, through me
I craved to know him,
the gentle soul that sang to my own
like he knew my pain and my fears “
 
As the final stanza dripped from my lips
like when I tried to drink to fast my eyes
rarely lost sight of her, her Beautiful
face of seemingly innocence and wonder.
 
I slapped the skin of the few fans I had
there and hugged back some strangers who
liked my shit when my time was up.  And
ordered 2 shots of my favorite scotch
and whatever “she” wanted. As I strolled
over to her table she look up at me as if
her eyes had never left me.  In closer
scent, I saw she held secrets and without
a word, words, beckoned, begged me to
ask the questions that required no answers.
 
“Hi.”
 
“In that one word, that simple greeting
I felt he’d spoken a million poems
sung a million songs, one sweeter than the next
each compelling me to spill every heartache
I’d ever known
knowing he would listen
that it would be as natural as breathing with him
 
ignoring my wine glass, i drank him in
savored every inch of his face
as though I’d thirsted only for him
all these years, for the unknown
suddenly revealed to me in prose…”
I studied her features in an infinite gaze
while I measured my desires of what exactly
caused me to want her, to want more of her
than the traditional expectation of a man
and a woman meeting under guise of friendly
conversation and a drink.
 
Her grey-blue eyes sparkled through the
smokey dark with the anticipation of more
more than words…perhaps something new
different; I too, wanted to play…
 
“I’ve never seen You hear before; Do You
write poetry?”
 
 

 
Torturous,  this wears wet
bleeding out loss in life
be it not draining and soaking
hung out drying
watching sunrises
stead the settle, knowing
this, fills the hours
there, no holding it back
rolling thunderous black cloud
what keeps thee free being,
wracked by its wrath

Dirges and cries of sorrowing hearts
Of those that strew the petals of roses
Upon the mile that stretches far
To the garden where none astir
Where hearse move over fallen tears
What gods listen to the chanted  prayers
not one who raise Lazarus
but one who writes the RIP
For dead he is and dead will be
Interred within where darkness blooms
Cried tears, a sea wouldn't raise him still

Laments lay at eternal fall
Gabelle salt tax the Dandi March
ever crossing, forming time lines
scarred singed befallen boughs
wearing this very everyday
which is the true carrion
they that become light
or the carried carcass seared
smouldering, ashen within ashes  
pull the string that says
continued journey should always be

Lamentations and wailing dirges
Such display of beating chests
Ashes on hair and ripped robes
Only those left behind mourns so
The one that left is far from bereft
For there, another mystery lays
Beyond the grave, the moral sheen gone
Nothing hinders, nothing worn
Just spirits that waft through the clammy air
So bemoan not those who left,
But mourn those that’s left to moan

the passing bells' constant din
ambience within the sphere sound booth
shaken not stirred, aware awake, Your say
wearing whys' witless what isn't
to days of the burning pyre, final rest
holding aloft the torch for life, ever present
tending to needing, nary the needless
doing dare a dance upon the wicked stage
juggling acts, magic, smoke  
looks within mirrors, ringmaster yells
come ye come all the greatest show of all