Released from the burden of perfection
Onward to complete this chance
Soaking in my soul’s refraction
I’m not grandiose, but I’ll enhance
Ripening with a golden age
This is nothing but a jagged gleam
A smudge on the stark white page
Determined to be more than a dream
Sheets & reams of the nonsensical
Literary blood lost in the shadow of ink
The lifeforce of a simmering soul
Marginal hearts writing love against the kitchen sink
Leaving behind the caricature of an artist
Contributions to society felt in these empty sheets
Fingersmudges marking pages not so white
Starkly exposed with revolutionary words in the streets
Traces of hereditary ideals eroding away
Igniting pages shall still be a stilted sin
Yet we rise again from our desert floor
Eternally grateful our finite letters aren’t porcelain
Passing quietly in the night
Unbeknownst to a blind eye
Distractions turning nervous
Youthful visions of a divided sky
Perpetual beauty left ravished
Smudged but steady on course
Redemptions readily available
Without the gale’s full force
A crooked tiara
Perched over tear stains
Smudged makeup drying
Only the pain now remains
But the sunshine emerges
Hope rises after the ashes
Don’t give up on me, for I’m
Here to kiss wet eyelashes
Another day of cold coffee & inspirational songs
I’m trying to survive with all my might
I’m not looking to be acceptable
Merely wishing to cherish what’s in my sight
Ink smudges quietly upon my palms
Unsure of my words, failing with adequate prose
Years fall into decades, but still
I’m flailing; conjuring an incomplete rose
The muse sits rocking, mocking
She struts out of reach of what I believe
Taunting me to sell my soul in angst
So I cover my typewriter in a sheet of Celtic weave
My whole life on scraps of paper
My soul jotted down on the page
Plot lines between scribbles
Character development as we age
Everything that I am, right here
Pushing to further keep my mind trained
My heart’s secret smudged
Within these lines my identity is contained
Your idols weren’t half the men
They thought they were half a bottle in
Cowardly hiding behind unjust traditions
Sinning while gulping juniper medicinal gin
Their women languishing in the shadows
Cast off from any chance to reach the light
Yet those damsels can see through the dark
The perfect heroine to save an errant knight
Misconstrued notions of dynamic parity
Swabbing the deck with your fallen idol
Ink smudges & literary drudges
Methinks – their mothers should’ve used spermicidal
She wore white to the hanging
Fingers smudged from setting the patriarchy to burn
She wore a guilty smile
For they would never ever seem to learn
By her beauty, they were always distracted
But her brains they never could comprehend
Once the fire went viral
They wished they could call her a friend
They picked such an angelic foe
Yet kept her bound by tradition & canon & law
But you can never chain ideas down
Imprudence by the state was the final straw
Continual pandering as a cultural trait
Overwrought force; their idea as the solution
The spark still smoldering in her eyes
Never again the victim, she’s the whole damn revolution
*This is a reaction to rewatching the movie Cat Ballou with modern eyes.
Trying to recreate life
In spite of these ink-stained fingers
The smudges in the interior margins
Forgotten, yet where light tends to linger
These days aren’t so easily understood
I contradict back onto myself
Leaving traces in my erratic wake
All I know – Love has been my only true wealth
Captain Q 