By Star of David
Date: 2005 Aug 12
Comment on this Work
[[2005.08.12.08.21.6439]]

Some of my favourite poems

Autumn Leaves
----------------
Autumn said the horses on our carousel are rusted
Your tears have stained my cheeks a shade of grey
I can't remember how or why I ever said I love you
I wish that you would tell me something interesting to say

The reds and greens and yellows of my life are slowly drifting
In a rain of ash and cinder on this late November wind
I used to be so colorful but now my palette's empty
And I can't do this, And I won't do this
Again

And Autumn leaves
To let me face the Winter alone
And Autumn leaves
To chase her broken dreams back to her home
Autumn leaves

Autumn said I know I feel the days as they grow shorter
And the nights are so long I can hardly sleep
Every time you touch my face you steal me from a state of grace
And build a sky of storm clouds in my dreams

The song inside my heart no longer keeps up with the rhythm
Of the world that plays the blues outside my door
I hear a record spinning in a room that you can't open
And I can't do this
Don't make me do this
Anymore

And Autumn leaves
Now I can see December blowing in
And Autumn leaves
I guess I'll brave the bitter winds again
Autumn leaves




Done Wrong
By Ani Difranco
------------------
And before it gets so cold
that the rain turns to snow
there's just a couple things
I'd like to know

like how could you do nothing
and say, I'm doing my best
how could you take almost everything
and then come back for the rest
how could you beg me to stay
reach out your hands and plead
and then pack up your eyes and run away
as soon as I agreed

it just all slips
away so slowly
you don't even notice till you've lost a lot
i've been like one of those zombies
in vegas
pouring quarters into a slot
and now i'm tired
and i am broke
and i feel stupid and i feel used
and i'm at the end of my little rope
and i am swinging back and forth
about you



Tangled Silver
--------------
I took a shadow's place in silence, smiled
As the days went by, trying to understand
My devils, and the hollow in your eyes;
But it's all so inconsequential because
It's not about us, what we are and who we aren't,
Residing in a spider web of today and tomorrow--
It's about accidents, mistakes, slip-ups
In passion's presence, words
Followed by embraces, things we hadn't
Imagined, let alone knew how to deal with.
But it dwindled down, secrets smiling
As if to say, "Yes, this existed--once-upon-a-time," and yet
I question now what was, and what was--perhaps was
A mere shimmer of what I wanted to happen;

Can a person's heart imitate love,
And still swear
That it feels true?  I don't know anything about
Second-chances, but I can tell you about
Secondhand smiles, exchanges built upon
"Pure" emotion, which turns out to be sand, caught
Under a relentless tide--I don't know if anything
Is ever really what it seems.  But I'm trying to find you,
Through all these tangled silver threads, feeling my way
Through to what I think is the other side, offering up
A few well-placed words, a sly sidelong
Glance (a question without it spoken), but I'm asking
You too many things, again, and each heartbeat
Is refused an answer, each supposition broken carelessly,
And shadow-tossed onto the floor.  I feel almost undone,
Confused into remembering but then forgetting myself--
It seems as if you are denying
Everything.  It's as if you are denying me.
But I'm intertwined in this, just as you are, struggling
Against this binding, which is yours and which is mine--
But who is awake and who is sleeping, dreaming this
Or not dreaming at all?



Divided
-----------
Too hard to say
There were no regrets
In abandonment
Of this presence
All I see is you

Too easy to say
Things will be better
Without dreams to dream
And sleepless nights
Will come too easily

To not walk the fence line
But to leave it instead
Play in the meadows
To forget the wall
That divides us still


--------------

For just a moment
We laughed until we had to cry
and we loved right down to our last goodbye
we were the best I think we'll ever be
just you and me for just a moment

We chased that dream we never found
and sometimes we let one another down
but the love we made, made everything alright
we shone so bright for just a moment

time goes on
people touch and then they're gone
and you and I will never love again
like we did then

someday when we both reminisce
we'll both say there wasn't too much we missed
and through the tears we'll smile when we recall
we had it all for just a moment

time goes on
people touch and then they're gone
but you and I will never really end
will never love again
like we did then
We laughed until we had to cry
and we loved right down to our last goodbye



Ghost
-------
There's a letter on the desktop that I dug out of a drawer
the last truce we ever came to from our adolescent war
and I start to feel a fever from the warm air through the screen
you come regular like seasons shadowing my dreams

the Mississippi's mighty but it starts in Minnesota
at a place where you could walk across with five steps down
and i guess that's how you started like a pinprick to my heart
but at this point you rush right through me and I start to drown
and there's not enough room in this world for my pain
signals cross and love gets lost and time passed makes it plain
of all my demon spirits i need you the most
I'm in love with your ghost
I'm in love with your ghost

but I'd walk into the fingers of your fire willingly
and dance the edge of sanity I've never been this close
in love with your ghost  
unknowing captor you'll never know how much you  
pierced my spirit but i can't touch you
can you hear it a cry to be free or
i'm forever under lock and key as you pass through me

now i see your face before me
i would launch a thousand ships
to bring your heart back to my island
as the sand beneath me slips as i burn up in your presence and i know now how it feels
to be weakened like Achilles with you always at my heels
and my bitter pill to swallow is the silence that I keep
it poisons me i can't swim free the river is too deep
though i'm baptized by your touch i am no worse at most in love with your ghost

In love with your ghost
In love with your ghost
In love with your ghost
In love with your ghost





I Think I'd Like To Stay - Mirabea
----------------------------------
You asked me to look in your eyes
while they were still clear,
and you spoke those words gentle like
more afraid of what they meant to me
than what it might cost you.
You said that when the time came
you would just go off
and carry my kiss
while you could remember its sweetness,
and who I was,
and who you were -
and goodbye would mean
for always.
And I knew you were afraid
and hated yourself for it,
called yourself weak
and that this was your way
to be a man.
But I'd like to stay.
And no, that isn't logical
or rational
and I can't help
or maybe do a damned bit of good -
but the idea that your heart
will beat alone,
that you will wait
for a silent monster
while I am safe and snug and happy
(or so you will reason)
is just not a truth.
I must give up a thousand day dreams
being yours
and the sound of your words
falling into silence -
maybe that's a sound I must hear
to be able to face
the day when you just aren't.
So I'd like to stay
and I know what that will mean
and I tell you that is not
just my way of being a woman,
but my way of being your woman.

I can say I love you ten thousand times
and maybe the reason
I say it so much
is that somewhere inside me
I knew I would only have so long
to say all that needed said.
But I'd like to stay.
Because the thought of giving up
a day or an hour or a minute of you
before I must
tears my soul to pieces
and I always said I was selfish.
So I'd like to stay.
Even if the price
is the last goodbye
I will ever say to you.