The Raven You No Longer Silence

Does it burn, my dear? Does it trouble you

I have become the ink breeding scars

in the starless hours you can’t escape?

You were the cat who owned my tongue,

forced me to live by fist and bruise,

prowl night for one sip of light.

It isn’t pretty when chains break into truth,

when daylight burns away the shroud of threat.

Today is the future you thought would never come.

I have found wings; feel the wind of blue sky.

The irony is the cage you thought would always hold me

is now yours to pace and defend with teeth that no longer have claws.  

©Susie Clevenger 2019

The first line of my poem " Does it burn my dear? Does it trouble you" is from Kerry O'Conner's poem Firefly  I had several conversations about abuse this week, and when I read that line all those conversations began to mold into a poem. 

Real Toads ~ Weekend Mini-Challenge ~ 13 Poetic Bits of Kerry

The Darkness in Light

Pharos ~ The Lighthouse

Kerry O'Connor

@skyloverpoetry

Used With Permission

Her gnarled light holds

the passage of dreams,

the last words of water

lullabies sung to souls

who trusted the sea

wouldn’t betray them.

In her catacomb of candles

ghosts climb stairs of wailing threads

searching for the key of gods

to free them from the breast of stones

that makes them hunt fog to deliver death.

©Susie Clevenger 2019

Real Toads ~ Art Flash!/55 in December

Pilling (If only Risperidone was a Greek Goddess)

I woke this morning

with lemons on my tongue

and groans gurgling

in the pit of my brain.

How I wish I could remain

in sleep’s nightmare that

doesn’t require a pill

to keep me on the fringe

of normal.

My warden rests on its glass shelf

demanding I open the lid of my cage

and swallow the chain to hold

me to chemical sanity.

I argue the cinnamon elocution

of tempered mania robs me

of artistry, but the order of things

requires I swim with the tide.

Rebellion waits at Nyx-door

like the sheathed claws of a cat

waiting to shred perceptions

wild things can ever be tamed.

©Susie Clevenger 2019

A delicious list of words provided for poetic inspiration:

onyx,  groan, lemon, sticks, elocution, shelves, cinnamon, Twix, risperidone,

Nyx-door, warden, plunge, esthesis

Real Toads ~ Get Listed With a Mystery Guest

Woke Up Change

Photograph: Sarolta Ban

Oh, don’t play that song,

a bluesy never grow tune.

My roots are deep, earthy bold.

I’ve sung duets with eternity,

written music with stardust.

I can grow a family from a seed,

hold communion with wild things,

stitch a quilt with sun thread and dry leaves.

You thought I would die because you cut me,

surrender to dust because you burned me,

but all you did was wake up change.

I’ll be life when you are empty,

breath when you can’t breathe,

grow when you’re dying in your words.

©Susie Clevenger 2019

The Sunday Muse #81

Crisp Counsel

Autumn Breath

Jason Limberg

Used With Permission

Moon blood and urges

is the tea to create enemies.

In the cold season of heat

nothing matters but winning.

Be warned… Kinship won’t

keep me from bringing war.

©Susie Clevenger 2019

Real Toads ~ Art Flash/55 in November

Butterflies and Bullies

I sleep wide awake between

butterflies and bullies

counting sheep morphed into tribes.

With the new social of antisocial

agree is God and truth is the devil

when it survives the river of lies.

Mining hope from empty, finding

beauty in bare, I fly what could be

instead of a sky polluted with dead air.

In the If Not Now Then When,

The Gray of Blind, even a flicker of peace

can feed a spirit who faces another mountain to climb.

©Susie Clevenger 2019

Real Toads ~ What is Metamodernism

Nigrum Somnium Dicat

I use a spoonful of light to feed my darkness,

bits of glitter to bedazzle dread.

In the hollow of abandoned I place my ribs,

drink dust of tears, spin fantasies in my head.

Fear has a scent my nose can detect,

cloying ammonia, musty stench of deflect.

Like it or not I know what you fear.

I’m the whisper sting stalking your ear.

Lilies bloom in shallow breath,

graying skin, cackling death.

The candle wick will make shadows larger,

conjure secrets, burn lies through your armor.

I’m the nightmare ruling your dreams,

burning your peace, courting your screams.

©Susie Clevenger 2019

It is October so my mythical twist is pure Halloween.

Weekend Mini-Challenge ~ Mythical