Nowhere Man
He’s a real Nowhere Man
Shivering in his hazmat suit
Cowering behind his border fence
Waving his gun at the shadows inside his head.
He fears the dark, he fears the light.
He fears the colors.
He thinks the world has changed
When all it’s done is move on.
The Chaotic Sea
We are all adrift on a raging sea, in boats of all sizes
Some tiny, some huge,
Most barely more than cardboard boxes.
Tempest-tossed and turned, all will perish
Some on Charybdis, some in Scylla,
Most from the enervating exhaustion of navigating shoals.
We would die alone, drowning in sorrow and filth
None will live, none will survive.
All will sink deep from the sun’s sight.
A great deep sea awaits us, none can avoid.
Some embrace it, some fear it,
Most know not about it, and go about their lives.
Living as if built inside a glass bottle.
The world moves about them, but they know not of it.
Glittering Disaster
She left me in the lurch
Like a lonely groom at the church
In the spring.
Memories of a happier
Time fade like a chalk drawing
In the rain.
Replaced by the blackness
Of the tunnel in the wake
Of a train.
I try to drown my sorrows
But only I go farther and farther
Down the drain.
My friends and hers console,
Call me, but no need
To explain.
A glittering disaster
Of shattered alabaster,
My illusions lie in ruins
At my feet.
Fog of War
An arrow sizzled out of the roar
of the night And knifed into my back.
I writhed in agony, the terror of pain
As my eyes faded to black.
Egyptian escalator focused my dreams
Of the things that I lack.
The dread of the wood, fear of the limb
Stopped me dead in my track.
Bitter smell of rolling leaves brought
My mind to wake, the places I’d leave,
The people I’d bleed, the vows I would break.
I am alone, crawling through a forest
My mind, my heart, know no rest.
The darkness sneaks in, blessed.
The darkness bleeds in blessed.
Arguing with you is like
Catching an excellent bird
You move your tongue
But utter not a word.
My volleys land in marsh
By your ears unheard.
A sky fire rises in the north
And covers half the world.
Time holds no meaning
And space holds no form
As blood pulses and throbs
From leg to heart to arms.
The evil in your heart
My love would warm
Fool that I am to love you
After you have long gone.
My eyes are unfocused.
My tongue is slurred.
You had your chance
You only had to keep your word.
Some Fantastic Place
The half light leads the way
From the night to the day
Our lives lived in the shadow
Become exposed
And so we know
What stuff dreams are made of:
Of clay and iron and lacquer paint
And colliding cars.
All original images and original text © 2014, 2015 Carl Salonen dba Creating Imagery
I Dive In
Her rhythmic siren song fills my ears
As I nestle gently in her bosom, rocking
She beckons me with her music by a deep blue melody.
A deep breath, an exhale, another
And hold on for dear life itself
The champagne bubbles fizzle about me
As they dissipate,the great kaleidoscope comes into focus
A firework of yellow and red and orange, blue and green
Dazzling colours and glowing, shining silver and gold.
The sweaty colours swirl and mix like ethereal pinwheels
Blurs and smears and streaks and stripes
Her skirt unravels and flows.
Down, down, down I go, enraptured and enslaved
Like a willing servant, I offer up my heart as payment for her favors
Each flick, each glimpse, each flip, like gooseflesh on a hot summer’s day
I linger over her mounds, exploring her meticulous beauty slowly
I slip between her fronds and drift to her stem.
I look up.
I observed being observed.
There is no sound but the roar of an ocean in her lungs.
Weightless, timeless, days in an hour.
We embrace and tumble through the chaos of colour
Creatures great and dangers small parade by.
Finally, time has come of age: exhausted and breathing my last, I float skyward
Piercing the heat, I climb up
And once more, rock gently in her sodden samba.
Five Dreams
A sunny, sultry, sandy beach
Two chairs, two drinks
Footsteps to the sea
A warm, calm, azure bay
To stare too far
Horizons of the sea
A flashing flare of firefight
Two guns, two men
The red pool tide to the street
A smoky thick grey day
To bear to the grave
A grudge buried six feet
A windswept white wasteland
Too frozen, too fallow
A blanket of snow and ice
A bright sunny icicle day
To promise to the future
Of a coming paradise
A deep dark dive below
Two fins, two hands
Fin flips to the sea
A cold black surging depth
To drown, too far
A graveyard in the sea
A puffy pink playpen of cotton
Two parents, two children
A wide swing towards the sun
A warm sunny gentle breeze
To forget, to ignore
The dirt-covered box about him