Thread: October Challenge - Healing

obi_have, our lasr month's winner has chosen the subject:

Healing

for the next challenge.

Remember that you may approach the subject in whatever way you wish, though of course site rules apply. If you are unsure of the challenge rules please read the 'stickies' at the top of the board, it is disheartening to disqualify people for things like a trivial edit, but will be applied.

You have two weeks to post entries. Challenge will close on the 4th November.

Please make sure that your work is properly formatted before pressing the submit button. Work edited after posting may be excluded from the challenge.

A Tree Lives On

Green sprouts innocently
in short vicinity
of a scorched trunk;
begged by a blackened floor,
urged on by fallen rain
in birthing red of dawn upon
the night when lightning struck
indifferently.

My heart is
broke in half,
devils laugh
angels cry,
I was burdened
by the lie
and damnation
against my will,
ruthless provocation
gave me chills,
I was left
in the dark
no sun, no moon,
no twinkling stars.

I needed time
to mend,
away from the dismayed
or even the sublime,
just a friend
with an open heart
and listening ear
was the best start
of my healing years.

Lanza's luscious voice,
yet to hit a skip,
beckoned me to the parlor.
It was time.
Upon his throne of faded green tweed,
hand cupping a tepid Rheingold,
Daddy began to sing.
Ash from his Raleigh
snowed down on forest shag
as he glorified Christmas trees
drowning tenor with booming bass.

My chubby hands (later slender
as calendar pages turned to dust)
embraced their cue
to unwrap the fabulous four
reluctantly gifted by his sister.
Two of felt, the others dressed
in synthetic sparkles,
three emerald and one ruby,
the official family jewels.

With one eye squeezed tight
he would study, then point
and I obliged him
until each had a perfect home
nestled in fragrant pine
and glittering lights.

When the next platter descended,
Polish carols blared
with Dad quavering along.
Down the craggy mountain of his face
his annual snowmelt teemed
for the Mom he lost at eighteen.
Pretending not to see, I would retreat
as he purged grief with salt,
a fourth, lesser known
gift of the Magi.

Twenty one years ago,
the elves became mine.
Mom handed them over
with jittery fingers and eyes of brick.
With no one to point, I placed on my own
transforming my tree
into a happy girl's memory.

This year my buckled hands
did not place my faded friends
(but they're so old and ugly, Maaaa)
upon boughs belonging
to a stellar generation.
They've a new home
flanking my kitchen clock
on a catty-cornered shelf
where my eyes are most drawn.
Each was given a buss
before being seated.

They will watch me toil,
and on Christmas Eve attend
a private concert
as I softly sing carols
in a language not my own
with Dad and Gram hearkening
as seasonal salt cleanses my despair
and restores my brittle backbone...

a tradition altered yet still true
that grants me the only gift
I've ever really desired.

Thank you, Daddy.

The rain has finally relented,
and nature seemed relieved
that the angry storm
has subsided.

In its place,
a chorus of colors
filled the sky,
bringing a smile
to the young child
as he gazed
above.

Joining in the festive foray,
crickets chirped in quartets
while flowers woke
from their fitful slumber.

The butterflies
fluttered once more,
showing their vibrant colors;
while the bees
buzzed buoyantly
across the bushes.

"Who could be living
above the clouds,"
asked the curious child,
"that his colorful smile
could bring back life
to those who have once
died?"

The act of hurting
Is dangerous.
It kicks, and screams
Like the unborn and spiteful child
Of a dreaded union
Yet, or never, to be,
And coerces me
To be this.

And yet,
Each,
Like those before,
I cut away,
To save my self the trouble
Or the burden of emotion.

I disassociate, cauterize
And cast that which would trouble me
Into a hellish box for later reference
And pray,
To never recall
The scar or cause
Until such time
As such would be.

Hurt,
Like most things,
Leaves me rather
Unimpressed.

Healing Rains

Everything is washed and clean,
washed and clean.
Sky is grey but grass is green,
grass is green.

Oh so late the rain comes now
when it comes at all.
After all that daylight sun,
it's raining after all.

And hiding here it's all so wet,
all so wet.
Shedding tears and not through yet,
not through yet.

Watching clouds come visit me
is the saddest thing I've ever seen.
But everything is washed and clean,
washed and clean.

faithless but bound

if I could tune back the clocks and go back to nought
then I would propably stumble,
if I could block out the hand that showed me the time
then I would surely trouble,
if I could reminisce and string back the thoughts
I would frightefully mumble,
and
if I could raise the past and put forward a present
I am sure I would halt and fretly frazzle,
what has been done is complete,
He who must rewind is oblique
and
what has remained is obsolete,
no going back is what Is,
the maker of fake has cold as a stone
a figure of doubt, a weight in excess,
a word with no ends
a soundless echo to a mindfull effect,
attention to details have not had a say,
residue of regrets
tripped up the fights
a strength of true minds has not had a friend,
the salient of proof
the reasons of great,
neglectful it felt
misguided it went,
and so it must end
for better or worse,
in hope it may find
advances of kind,
a trust and a bond
the stamp of esteems,
and
without any fuss,
a healing is out ,
send on a seal
of gold and saphire,
to lighten the shields
reviving the spheres,
of whom it may reach,
and
thus as a bless
the tiniest of wears
saddness and tares
must all come undone.

For Clara

(who leapt to her death from the
high window from which her her child
had fallen a year past)
_____________________________________


(See how her gown flutters dark
in the air as her soles leave the frame
of the sill? Strange how the pane
and the pull of the edge make
a leaping-place fast for the kill.)

See how the storms have tempered
the stains, how the stones scarce
remember the child? Strange
how forgetting is its own kind of peace,
how the tame die slower than the wild.

See how the shoots on the low
earthen mound spindle light
from the brown, sodden ground? Strange
how the dark and the rot of the earth
make a growing-place ripe for the sound.

(See how her gown flutters dark
in the air as her soles leave the frame
of the sill? Strange how the pane
and the pull of the edge make
a leaping-place fast for the kill.)
_________________________________

Sam Emily K.

Needles and pills and poisons
that make me feel high,
like a bird, majestic
in a black hole.

Flying in a piss-stained sky
with a frantic wingspan
that knocks my life
off the shelves.


Grim and unstable and vomit
that tastes foul
like death, beckoning
from an abyss.

Falling through a dismal ocean
with a cold knife in my chest
that threatens my life
with a painful end.


Locked and trapped and crying
in a room with no walls,
like a prisoner, skeletal
in my own world.

Dying slowly on an earth of my own
with invisible boundaries
that keeps my life
from loved ones.


Lost and reaching and needing
in a body with no home,
like a lifeless husk, unmoving
and still in time.

Expecting help from the
betrayed that only wanted
to keep my life
on track.


Unforgiving and broken and over
without any happy ending,
like the villain, evil and vile
in my own story.

Faded from light and love
in an eternal hell that holds
me down and ends my life
for good.

For my uncle with no chance of
Healing

Chemistry

One bottle of Mothers hug,
And a packet of 'There There,' please.

Guilmond

Ere the dagger raked the bone
Or axe or mace or lance
Waif were sent to fetch alone
Guilmond to smite the trance
Brake it, rent it twice in twain
‘Fore death could take its hold
Chase aground the suff’rer’s pain
With poultice bristled bold
Conjure blooded remedies
Of brackish bog and field
Powder crushed extremities
A healing potion yield

In claymore’s breech a salve to stave
And stem that clotted flow
Or mayhap piece yon piercing grave
From the archer’s bow
Guilmond learn’t it all from Haaz
The Wizard or’e the fallen
In time there came no greater cause
Nor no greater callin’

Then Guilmond set it in a scroll
And teach’d all who would seek
To mend and make the broken whole
Broken, smit or weak
And studied he more the same
As years unlock’t the way
The viper’s strike, or cradle’s lame
His passion ruled his day
So many days in night were lost
But Guilmond’s mind were driven
To hold the key at any cost
His lot in life were riven

Into th’ moor, or ‘neath th’ cleft
Of rocky mountain crag
No stone unturned nor hollow left
To add unto his bag
With slime of slug
And lizard scale
Scarab bug
Tongue of rail
Skin’t th’ swine
Soak th’ snout
Under wine
Wring it out
Scab of hare
Spent cat paw
Slay a mare
Quarters draw
Dry th’ mix
Scrape th’ bowl
Sliver’d sticks
Of severed mole
Venom drip
Feather’d drop
Off th’ hemlock
Berry crop
Niteshade gather
Dig and root
Asse’s lather
Chimney’s suet
Leaf and flower
Stem and stalk
All their power
None can balk
‘neath th’ pestle
Grinded mortar
Hell’s celestial
Holy water
Thin th’ mix
Mix th’ mixture
Final fix
Rich elixer

Guilmond’s hands the magic clutch
Through grace he claims a healing touch

Consequential Formation.

The deepening brown of rust grows harsher
Each flake forming from the shadows of a previous life
Remembering, yearning, clinging on to the base of truth from which the joy has been stolen

But then, each flake that forms must, in turn, be caught on the breeze
Pulling away from the life-line it has trusted
Tainted by inner despair, taunting it down the path of neglect that guides it on the wind

And that metallic base of iron, like a ship without an anchor, floats
Helplessly groping for the stability of time on its surface each flake teaching it a cruel lesson in life
Its skin ripped clean of a life-belt it so desperately desires

And there it sits, the iron mass skulking, until it one day grows a new shield of rust
Security in an object never as close to the true form as before
Although tighter in everyway to the metallic skin it hides beneath.

Tilly.

Global Warming

A fact that the devil's concealed
Is that one day this world will be healed
That's good news for the hungy and cold
But a truth that's not often retold
By the preachers who "come in His name"
While ignoring the reason He came
Putting focus on the scene of His birth
And forgetting the fate of the earth:
The deserts will bloom like a rose
When this trial run comes to a close
It's not coming quite yet but I yearn
For the healing triumphant return

Scars

crumpled paper doll
smoothed by tender fingertips
the creases remain