rewrote "You did not go", i think it sounds better now

Quarrel

My face is blurred
by the mirror
fogged by the steam of my too hot shower
I rub at it with my palm
but it does not clear
I grab the towel from my waist
and run it across the smooth surface
Still, it does not clear
I blow on it
my breath cool and minty fresh as the company guarantees
The condensation vanishes for a second
I see my face, wet
It fogs up again
as the steam condenses, engulfing the mirror once again
images
two droplets come together
a duo surrounded by a ring
of drops of varying sizes
they run down the glass
disappearing images
I rub the glass once again
and see myself
smeared slightly by the lines of water

You Did Not Go

for Michael Egerton

Kicking screaming
crying bleating
you did not go

Complaining, bitching
swearing offending
you did not go

Showing your misery
your failure your strife
you did not go

Stronger smarter
quicker better
you did not show

You did not show
your pain or anger
your sadness and hurt
but I saw and did not feel

I saw, and did not know

For you did not go
loudly or recklessly
messily or forcefully

You walked away
closed the door
and left this world

Unknowing and misunderstanding
wondering waiting wanting worrying
woefully yearning

You went
Forgotten

You went

alone.

Quiet

A pin drops
on cotton white
shattering the silence
the pristine silence
that her gaze creates
Eyes flutter
cheeks blush
she opens her mouth
and never shuts up

so yeah, i wrote another poem-like thing, and if you want to read it, you'll have to e-mail me because, well, i don't feel like posting the actual thing on here

Evening Symphony

The crickets chirp
And the black bats fly
The owls hoot
And the frogs croak
The night-time symphony
Beautiful in simplicity
Eerie in tone
Comes and goes
Loud and soft
Like the ebb and flow of the sea
The moonlight shies
Sparkling on the surface
Beneath the still waters
A hand floats
Suspended halfway between the darkness and the light
Pale, blue-white skin absorbing and reflecting the light
The symphony continues

Survival

For as long as she could remember, the tree had always been there. It had withstood the fiercest of winters, horrifying thunderstorms, and several tornados. The great willow had stood the test of time as all around it other trees had surrendered to nature. In the end, the willow had stood all alone; it had been that way since she had taken over the family farm. Through everything the tree had been able to survive, but it had finally fallen by nothing more than a rusted piece of metal and mans own hand.
This winter had been the hardest on her family. Half of the cattle had frozen to death, while the other half had succumbed to disease and died. Wolves had taken nearly all of her hens; leaving the rooster to walk aimlessly around the coup. She couldn’t blame the wolves though; they were just trying to survive, after all.
Survival: that’s why she’d had to chop her tree down. They’d run out of wood the night before and, in desperation, she felled the tree. Killing the tree might mean life for the rest of her family. Well, what was left of her family, anyway.
They had lost Clementine to the cold and disease, and her husband Michael had not returned from his desperate attempt to ride to the nearest town for food and medicine. She figured he had frozen to death, like the cattle had, weeks ago. It was so cold and bitter out, that they had not even been able to bury Clementine, her body sat out under a pile of snow in the barn. Now, all who were left were she and her two twin children: Sarah and Nathaniel. They were too young to understand what was going on around them, too young to understand death.
Everyday they would ask her where Clementine was, or when Papa would be coming home. Yet, as hard as it was, she could only lie to them and say, “soon”. That’s when, when they would ask her about the ones she’d already lost, that’s when she would go to her small window and gaze out at her willow tree. Her strong, resilient friend. She would stare out at her and remember all the warm summers she had sat under her branches and dream about her life to come.
Reality was not that kind. Reality was not what she had dreamt. Not this one anyways. Food was becoming dangerously low, and this willow tree was going to be the last of the wood. She had thought they could survive any winter.
She had thought wrong.
Nearly all the cattle meat was diseased or rotten; she had no chickens left to give her eggs or food. All that was left was the rooster, a bit of flour, and a couple of roots in the clear. Unless a miracle happened upon their door, they would be dead within a couple weeks.
The previous week, she had had to kill their dog. Faithful and loving as he had been, he ate too much food and didn’t do anything else. Her children had been starving and she couldn’t find the rooster.
She told them that she had found some good meat left on the body of a cow. She had resisted the urge to throw up as she watched the children eat their lifelong pet. When she hadn’t been able to hold it in any longer, she ran out to her tree and dry heaved; nothing came up because she had not eaten in days.
She sighed.
That had been last week. She now knew where the rooster had been. She knew why she hadn’t been able to find him the week before. The bastard had decided to fly up, freeze, and die on the top of her willow tree. She’d never really liked him. Come to think of it, she really didn’t like any of his ancestors either. It angered her to remember that she had felt a pang of sorrow for him when all the hens had been killed. That damn chicken had probably been hiding in her tree the whole time.
When she finally retrieved the rooster from under the mess and tangle of branches, she saw his last ‘fuck-you’ to her: he had barely any meat on his body. He’d pulled out or had lost most of his feathers to show her that he had nothing to give her for all her hard work.
Bastard.
She threw his stiff body on the ground and smashed his head with the flat end of her ax. Tiny chunks of frozen chicken head flew up in the air, sprinkling the ground like the toppings of a cake.
Standing up in the open field, she realized just how cold she actually was, and how late it had become. A cold breeze flew by and ran up her coat. A shiver ran down her spine as she grabbed the broken body of the bird, a few logs that she had cut, and headed back to the house, her heavy boots crushing and sinking deep in the crusty snow.
Near the door, her foot caught a heavy piece of ice and crusted snow and she tumbled over. She dropped her load as she went sprawling across the ground.
She let out a gasp as she hit the hard ground under the snow. She swore under her breath as pain rang throughout her body. She lay there for a minute, letting the cold wind whip her body and slash at her with hard snow drift. Taking a heavy breath, she pushed herself up to her knees. She took in her surrounding: the logs were strewn all over and the rooster’s ass was sticking up in the snow a food in front of her, mocking her. She let out a long, desperate sigh, pushed her hair out of her face and up behind her ear and tried to stand.
But she couldn’t.
She looked to her legs, they weren’t broken. Why couldn’t she move?
It was then that she saw a slight steam rising out of the ground from beneath her. Slowly she turned her gaze down.
There, buried deep in her stomach was the ax. Her blood slowly ran down the handle and onto the ground. The entire bottom of her jacket was saturated with blood.
Feeling woozy, she turned and fell back on the ground. Her breathing became labored as she blinked blackness from her vision.
Hearing a soft crunch ahead of her, she turned her eyes to the top of her head to see in front of her as far as she could. But all she could see was the splintered trunk of her willow tree, silhouetted by the setting sun, sticking out in the barren field. A low growl sounded from her left. She heard more snow crunching around her as her fate surrounded her. She closed her eyes, and let the teeth begin to rip at her body.

Untitled

As she lay beneath and stared up at the silvery white leaves of the majestic maple tree, she occasionally caught glimpses of the puffy cotton-white clouds that slowly drifted across the afternoon sky. And as she lay there, her thoughts wandered to the clouds.

“What a life,” she thought, “to just silently and endlessly drift over the land. Everything a cloud sees in its lifetime,” she lamented. “How pitiful that a human will never be as content as a cloud must be. Never do you see a cloud fog its emotions. It rains when its sad, and is playful when its happy. It sees the all of the world that it wants and not once does it complain when it has to end its journey early.” She sat a moment and considered things. “Us humans,” she continued, “what would make us as content as a cloud?”

“Dear child,” a soft, light voice came, “how is it that you think of clouds as content? Do they not ravage the earth when they’re mad? Do they not parch and starve the ground when they are angry or greedy? Are they not always changing shape to hide their true selves, their own fears?”

The woman thought on this for a moment. The wind gently caressed the skin on her cheeks, causing them to flush and become rosy. “Yes…yes. I guess you are right in that. Clouds are like man, then. Never content with the way things are, always trying to hide their feelings and fears.”

And the tree stood content. It had made it’s point.

“I wonder what a cloud really looks like,” she remarked, breaking the silence.

“Why? Why do you want to know?” the tree asked, it’s bark sending fresh, woody smells to the woman, holding her attention.

“I don’t know,” she pondered. She smiled, “Because I am curious, I want to know. Don’t you?”

“Ahhhh,” the tree sighed. “And there is the difference between men and clouds: Men search out answers; they ask questions, they are curious. Clouds, however, never question themselves, or anything. They never want to know more.”

The woman stood up from her spot beneath the tree. “Maybe the clouds are just misunderstood. Maybe they hide themselves so they can learn more, like a spy or something,” she let out a brief sigh, turned to the tree, smiled and said, “Still…it’d be nice to see what a cloud really looks like.” And with that, the woman turned, and walked away into the field of browning wheat.

The tree stood silent for a minute. Unexpectedly, a wind came and ruffled the leaves on it’s branches. Silently, the silver-white leaves dropped from the weathered branches and lifted up with the wind. One by one the shining leaves rose and turned into wisps of puffy white. As they drifted higher and higher into the sky, they whispered soft thanks to the woman.

“We are always changing,” they said to themselves, “because we are curious too. To see the world from simply one perspective is not for us.”

As the last leaf disappeared into the sky, the dead and bare tree looked mournfully to the sky. Slowly it started to cry, sending drops of water dripping, cascading down to the ground. Soon, what was once the tree was naught but a puddle of wet on the mounded earth.

“You are not content with yourselves because you are like humans or are you truly…like me?” The puddle mourned. “You are like that because of me,” the water decided, “Water is always moving, always changing. It is my fault you are like this.”

The clouds looked down at the small wetness on the earth and took pity on their mother, their sister. Always confined to see the earth from one perspective, they thought, has made her feel guilty. How innocent, how naive has she become? What is wrong with change, with wanting to know more?

So they parted, and let the sun shine down on her. The woman returned, less solid than before, and helped the water rise to her offspring, her sisters, herself. And as she rose, she smiled a great smile, and whispered in awe, “Life is beautiful.”

Stupid Daisies

It had been exactly one year since I’d seen him last, my brother. I stared into the bright blue sky and spoke to hi m about all that had happened in the last year. I told him about sis and her new husband, about mom’s new job and about the troubles in my marriage. Not once did he interrupt me as I rambled on and on. He never interrupts.
After an hour or so of talking, I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and said, “I miss you so much lil bro. I fear I am truly lost without you.” All that I received in response was the soft mumbling of the wind sweeping through the headstones.
I gently set down the bouquet of flowers on the small mound of dirt that is my brother’s home, next to a few sporadic yellow daises that littered the ground.
Every year I, and only I, came to see him, and every year (except for the first) there were always a few lone daisies on hi’s mound before I arrived. I knew the rest of my family never came here, and none of his old friends knew he was buried here. After the first appearance of the daises I’d figured that it must have been Mark who came and seemingly thrust those ugly things on his grave.
I hate that man, as does my whole family, but, unlike them I don’t take it out on my little brother. It’s not his fault what Mark did to him. But my family can’t see past what he was. I guess that to them, Mark, my brother, and his disease were all the same thing. And they hated him for that.
As I walked back to my car, I decided that I’d call Mark and ask him about the flowers. As much as I hate the man, it would be nice to know if it were him putting the daises on the grave.
After I’d clambered into the small, clunky car, I checked my cell phone and listened to my messages. The first was from my mother asking me if I knew where Dad had gone off to. The second was from my wife reminding me about the lawyer meeting this evening, and the third f, again from my wife, but just a huff of air.
I ended the call and sighed. What’s happened to my life?
Pulling myself together, I called Information and asked to be connected to Mark Holburn of Trenton. There was a pause, a click and then the phone rang.
“Hello?” a man’s voice answered.
“Hi, is this Mark Holburn? I asked.
“No, nope. I’m sorry buy my son isn’t here. He’s in upstate Maine visiting his mother like he does every time this time of year. I can give you his number for up there.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” I said. I hung up.
As I started the car, realization dawned on me. Even from Trenton the trek here would take a while, especially for a twenty year old kid. If he’s in Maine always, he could never have left those… but then who would..
My phone rang. I answered it.
“Where the HELL are you?” my wife shouted. “The meeting with the lawyers starts in five minutes!”
I signaled and turned into traffic, arguing with her until I got to the courthouse.
I forgot about the daisy escapade soon thereafter, and didn’t pursue it any further.

A little less than a year later, I was back living with my parents. At dinner one night, I told them that I was going to visit my brother this Saturday.
“You don’t have a-. Oh,” my mother said.
“You’d be better off forgetting about that one.” My father said.
“Honestly, I don’t understand why you feel the need to go visit him every year. I sure haven’t.”
“He was my brother, Mother. Your son. Just because of what happened before he dies doesn’t change the fact that I loved hi as a brother should”
“Anyone who turned out like that doesn’t deserve our love,” mother replied.
Angered, I slammed my fork down and left the table. I got in my car and drove to the florist. I needed to get the order in before this weekend if I wanted a decent bouquet for him. I chose calililies with roses. As I left the store, I remembered the daisies. Whoever put them there must still feel something for my brother. I decided that I would leave early on Saturday and hide to see if I could discover who the mystery person was.
Saturday morning came and I left the house as soon as the florist opened at 7am. As I made my way through the semi-wooded graveyard, I saw a figure standing by Brother’s grave. I could tell it was a man, but from the far distance, I could not decipher much else.
His back was turned to me as I silently approached. I made no sound as I crept closer. About fifteen feet away I stopped dead in my tracks.
The wind whistled as it rounded trees and graves. I saw stunned silent.
Slowly, the man dropped his handful of daises on the ground.
“I was wondering when you’d get here.”
“D-Dad?” I said, almost intelligibly.
He did not move. I walked slowly up to his right side and looked at the man’s face to make sure it was my father.
It was streaked with tears.
“I come here every year,” he said. “The first year after he died I followed you here and saw you sit down and talk to him,” he paused. “After you had left, I came over, and tried to say something. I always try to say something,” he sobbed, trying to keep it in, “but I never can. So, I grabbed a few flowers, some stupid daises I guess, from around the graveyard and threw them on his grave in disgust.”
My eyes flared, my cheeks flustered. What was he playing at? He comes here to see his son, then leaves in disgust?
“Not disgust in him, but in myself.” He drooped his head lower. “How do you do it?” he asked, not looking at me. “How can you talk to him for so long?”
“I don’t know,” I replied. “I just say what comes to mind. I just, talk with him. I know he doesn’t care what I say, he just listens.”
He sniffled. “Could you,” he began, “could you help me. You know, talk with him?”
I put my arm around him and looked towards the sky. It was a beautiful and cloudless day.