Disposable Poetry

Hand of love
hand of pain

Who have yours
touched
and how

What’s on them?

Dirt, grime, blood,
the scent of soap

What do they tell
others

Do we know
the truths that
lie in our hands

(D.James)

Is there no fixed
meaning in words

Are they merely
like dice,
toss them

Win or lose

(D. James)

Water for washing
Water for rain

Where does it
all come from?

And why am
I never able
to stay clean?

(D. James)

In a dream
I searched for
myself

and found
nothing

In the rain
I see clearly
the shelter

In life
I see death
as well as
the other
way round

But I have
yet
to find my
way home

(D. James)

A bird sings his song
sounds like a broken whistle
still it brings the sun

(D. James)

A trick of
the mind

Memory

Not what’s actually
happened

but what you believe
to be so

Yet it makes
up who you are
or at least
who you think
yourself to be

What has passed,
that which is no more

But lives
in your bones,
shapes your face

and makes you
feel whole

For who would
you be without
memory?

The elusive
unreliable
self-truth

The only record
you have to live
by

Like a taste
of something
you can’t quite
name

(D. James)

Words like broken glass
scratch my throat
silence me forever

(D. James)

for red-headed Heather (R.I.P)

Desire is red
while soul is yellow
and heart is black

Silent footsteps
in the clubhouse

Silent screams
at the theater

The dream speaks
of mad, deadly bikers
that you have tamed

Silent death of love
laid at your feet

I am not dangerous enough for you

(D. James)

Words like fire
burn bright
for the moment

Then eventually
die out

like passions
of young
lovers

And the rebel
too

(D. James)

All this time spent
looking for light
in the darkness

Groping, stumbling
looking for something
in nothing

Trying so hard to
find a meaning

Yet denying
true substance

Go back
Go back
Go back

To where you know
to what you were

But you can’t
because that doesn’t
exist any longer

Perhaps it
never did

(D. James)

I’ve spent countless
nights without sleep

just to be awake
when the sun rose

Climbed a thousand
steps to stand
over the city

and watch its
lights shimmer
in twilight

Sometimes lost
and wounded
Others found
and made whole

All this
and I’m only
half-way
home

(D. James)

Each day
new questions

Are we here
simply to ask
them?

Do they have
definitive answers?

“When will
I die?”

“How should
I live?”

“Why is Hell
easier to find
than Heaven?”

Will these questions
drive us or
drive us crazy?

“Could you even
call this a poem?”

Should this be
the end or
have I already
gone too far?

(D. James)

In a quandary
a bind

Can’t keep it straight
in my mind

Want to kick
to throw
break

Something
anything
nothing at all

Scream my throat
raw

Create something
out of this destructive
compulsive

Fucked up
state of mind

(D. James)

Surrounded by feelings
like small scraps
of paper

Tiny notes
to myself
of what’s been
and where I’m at

Scatter them with
a rush of breath

Or light a match
and watch them
burn

(D.James)

That I will
never understand

The depths of
emotional complexity

Thoughts tied
to feelings in ways
I cannot fathom

This, my fate,
to be near
yet far

To hear
but not see

Though at least
I know this
and do not foolishly

Think I know
much more

(D. James)