Adolescence

May 24, 2023.Reading time less than 1 minute.

Poem and image my own

That Kid

June 4, 2017.Reading time 4 minutes.

I am that kid. First day of school, teacher proudly organized, in charge, forgets she is addressing humans not machines programmed to comply. I cannot tolerate oppression: authority already overbearing in my life. I am a pressure cooker, combustible, ready to explode, like an uncorked grenade counting down the seconds. “We need to set some […]

Mother Never Warned Me

September 8, 2016.Reading time 4 minutes.

He’d always come early, my sister’s beau, hover over me with what I mistook for childlike interest, invite me to go for a ride in his shiny new sports car – a two-seater with overdrive. I was barely fifteen. Looked like Bert Reynolds: dark hair, dark eyes, a stylish moustache. He was Russian and broad-shouldered, […]

Discord

Does illness have a voice,and if so; is it melancholy,or dark and dank, divulgingdeepest despair, or revealinga vileness of nature? Discord creeps along my veins,disrupts muscles, systems failingunder the oppression –“Stay strong,” friends counsel,cannot hear the gathering storm,feel the heaviness cloaking me. I am not myself, but then;who am I? Is disease a mutationof the […]

Save Us

Discharge the gun –protection a vesselthrough which our depthsare undefined…adrift Fear is a burrowerwears a false crownbirths losstrusts danger Hearts beg,amid this trigger-readinessfor a guardian – unafraidto court this meaningless Futility unchecked –to study productive optionsunimaginable in the current state of chaos on repeat. (Art my own)

I Am Willow

These bones, they saywill finish me – too brittleto withstand the race But I am Willowrecollection wispymy dance defiant Porous as a sea spongesoaking up each daymettle despite the rattle (Tuesdays I borrow from Twitter @Vjknutson. Image my own.)