poetry submission

spend our lives building these dreams
    piling up the broken pieces
        that should instead have made us whole
      always yet higher,
        until the destination lies beyond any hope of reach
        and the origin beyond conception
  this is where we set our eyes
    lest we see the depths in which we dwell
      the truth beyond the reason,
        the simple fact of its nature

call to me...
  I still long to touch something real

through a child's eyes #17

"Hey Jason," Erik spoke softly so that nobody else would hear. "Do you ever wonder what it would be like to kiss Mrs. Louis?"
"Eww... she's really old!"
"I think she's beautiful."
He didn't respond to Erik's last comment; clearly, Jason hadn't reached the stage in which his attraction for the opposite sex would develop.
The silence went unnoticed as Erik continued. "She's not too old... she's eighty-three, and I'll bet her kisses taste like wisdom."
Shaking his head in disgust, Jason began sharpening his knife.

Erik had been fascinated with the elderly for as long as anyone could remember. When he was very young, he would allow adults he knew to kiss him, but would cry if his grandmother's kiss wasn't performed with an open mouth. All he ever wanted was for her to massage his tongue with hers, but like the rest of Erik's relatives, his grandmother fell short of reasonable expectations.

His current target was well chosen, as Mrs. Louis was in dire need of someone to run his fingers through her hair and wrinkles.
She easily caught his eye while giving a lecture on vowels. "Erik, would you stay after class please?"
Elated with hope and fear, he nervously replied, "Why?"
"We're going to make out, Silly."
The whole class giggled; Erik was quite embarrassed.

Jason waited outside until Erik finally came out. "Did it taste like wisdom?"
The look of shock and disappointment on Erik's face answered the question for him. Erik stifled a tear, "No... more like potato chips."

whispers

Giving myself this chance to speak; to be the sound that even I can barely fathom. Bend ear with me and give a breath of notice. Give way, that the sound might pour itself in.

There are words within words, changes to bridge desire, and these still moments which seem to bind them all together. This is just a moment, marked by the subtle sound of pen scratching against paper - whispering its secrets to the page, but the page holds no recollection of the sound. This won't last... this won't be what it was, when it began. When it actually happened.

These are traces of a moment, of a thought, of a secret lost.

flailing

We see the life we'd like to be ours, but refrain from reaching out for it. Hang our heads in their distraction, trying desperately to hold onto what we have... things that maybe would be traded, if we had enough faith to let them go. Splinters of a life left breaking.

But I can't see where this is going - drifting in its own way, on its own path, with me trailing and straining my eyes at the sight. Sometimes nowhere, at others everywhere, and I barely know what's in between. Emerge to both sides, and the edge of reason, which brushes up against the edges of many nameless things.

Waiting, and this is what finds me. This, in itself, is but a shadow of the course, but it's the only piece I can see. This is what I'm holding onto, as the rest falls away... everything is falling, and the ground trembles beneath me.

through a child's eyes #16

Before Jason was born, his older brother's problem became apparent to his pre-school teacher. Holding up a large, plastic, blue square, she said, "Henry, can you tell me what color this is?"
Henry arched his head. "What do you mean?"
She sighed sadly; the boy was too stupid to be taught.

"I don't understand why you wanted to see us." Jason's mother nervously took her husband's hand. "Is Henry misbehaving?"
"No, no..." Henry's teacher paused a moment to think of a way to break the news delicately. "Sammy, can you come here please?"
A young boy named Sammy rolled up in a wheelchair, and politely waited for further instructions.
The teacher smiled thankfully. "Sammy, could you now stand up for us?"
Obediently pushing himself out of his wheelchair, and onto his feet, Sammy fell to the floor in a heap.
Seeming proud of the result, the teacher said, "You see, most children are able to walk sometime around their first birthday, but Sammy is already four and can't even stand."
Jason's father jumped in, "Well, it seems like his legs are somewhat deformed..."
Shaking her head, the teacher stopped him, "No... Sammy's simply too dumb to walk. As intelligent as he may seem, his mind is like that of an infant - that's how it is with all physical disabilities."
Jason's mother unknowingly squeezed her husband's hand tighter.
The teacher lifted a pencil and went on. "Can both of you see this?"
They both nodded fearfully.
"I'm afraid that Henry isn't even able to do that... he has a severe form of mental retardation called 'blindness'."

Placing their hope in a second opinion, Jason's parents took Henry to a specialist.
"Amazingly enough, Henry's IQ is off the charts."
Jason's parents beamed at each other.
"Oh, I'm sorry... you misunderstood," said the specialist in response to their positive reaction. "I meant that Henry is immeasurably stupid."
The look on their faces became what the specialist was hoping for.
He removed a piece of paper from a folder and handed it to Jason's mother. "This is the multiple-choice portion of Henry's test. He didn't circle any of the possible answers - he just drew scribble down the side of the page."
Jason's mother burst into tears. "What can we do?"
The specialist's face became very firm, yet compassionate. "I recommend having another child... perhaps Henry can be his pet."

Jason's mother had a particular knack for interior design, and always felt that her great efforts were overlooked by Henry.
After Jason was born, and was finally able to speak, he looked up at the painting of a kitten and said with murderous intent, "It's pretty, Mommy."
Interpreting his statement as a compliment on the way the painting's colors went with the couch's upholstery, Henry's fate was easily decided.

It took some effort to find a doctor who would perform a twenty-eighth trimester abortion.
Henry asked where they were going throughout the entire trip to the clinic, but it was assumed that he'd be far too dimwitted to understand the explanation.
Jason's parents stood firm in their decision as they said their stoic goodbyes to Henry. Despite the fact that he was sobbing in confusion and fear, they left him sitting alone on the examination table, so that the doctor could see him.
After the door was closed, Jason's mother could no longer contain her emotions, and ran up to the window to get one last look at her son. With tears pouring down her face, she mouthed the words 'I love you', but Henry was too stupid to notice. That moron.