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| Personality: This Little Light of Mine | |
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Personality: This Little Light of Mine When the perfect personality formula of your tickbox life leads you into the reptile infested swamp of overconformance telling you who you are whom to love what to do your world reduced to gorgeous masks you pull from the cupboard wear with apomb to order and control the seemingly random variation in behaviour behind type Mars v Venus extrovert v introvert square hole or round peg deep under the downy covers you hide a chaotic mess of wings and tears the ticking of boxes mirrors the ticking clock until time is up the candle snuffed leaving only the taut masks of your vibrant personality restlessly alone on their splintery stem that's where I'll meet you at the Maginot line of your self perception match in hand ready to light the candle. Magdalena Ball Personality: This Little Light of Mine (Half Drunk Muse) Half Drunk Muse has submitted the text to our publication, but has been delayed in getting us the authors name and the city, state, country of the author. Contact us with the title of the totem, first line of your poem, and this important information. We will be happy to give proper credit to the writers. Extremes attract the art The writer speaks for himself and says “Life is not a peaceful walk where I stay Straight up with no scars In layers of well hidden masks Humans wear hell, a burden of their joy And these bits of goodness that I question Will come ‘til the final blast On a stick I wear those out In a similar way to old Venetian carnivals And from time to time we all are like animals Loads get lost in the fight Fears are never far behind I open myself and give life to a surreal line But you will always see the little light of mine This beauty of a complex mind” (Half Drunk Muse) Candle of Truth, overcome by jaded rain, doused is thy once decadent flame We wear the masks to forget to remember... The world in wintry stillness, languishes in the ember To deliverance we aspire for the gods in auburn skies... Yet the wings here have fault, laden with disgust they halt, Candle of Truth, pardon our lies... (Half Drunk Muse) Hey! I just got back from the therapist's office. They gave me a test to reveal the real me. Thought it would be painful or shameful, or boring. >From all such illusions and fears I'm now free. Though some call me crippled and dirty and nasty, though I torture frogs when I play in the mud, though my lifted skirts show tattered nylon bloomers ten years out of fashion and spotted with blood, though I might look better if fifty pounds lighter, though my camisole is the color of dirt, though children and house pets evade my fat fingers and ask me why I can't fit into a shirt, in short, my whole life's a portrait of disorder, still I'm stepping high, with my fan all unfurled. To some I seem cruel, sarcastic, and stupid; to myself I'm radiant, a light to the world. (Half Drunk Muse) Two people live behind your mask One mean, the other nasty What a task, To hold in abeyance To hold in check The energy it takes to keep them reigned in must take its toll must make you a wreck Each awaiting opportunity at the end of your short fuse Their catalyst Temper, Lit when self perception tells you you’ve been attacked questioned or used Their purpose to triumph at any and all costs; To show who’s right To defend your position To win every fight Both at the ready Though when they are here Your facile facade unsteady, unclear Personal revenge born of perceived betrayal Causes either or both in your defense to rail For an appearance by either or both, it is true you certainly pay a great cost For the longer they stay the further you stray and the more you’re reality lost (Half Drunk Muse) Hara-Kiri or death ends personality Not so much an ending as a slim blade in a sick belly Every time it slips in warm wax falls to the earth Thick fingers grasp and breathe As the world gasps and seethes Push and prod these clumsy hands To mold a shape before it turns to sand Leafy tendrils whispering in the dark spaces Of a womb before we had faces Bit by bit by bite It saws through the bones that hold the façade in place Until faces run into fiction. The light that burns through the mask Is a fire, grace that will not last Its mouth is a thin wire, That whips the wind and lashes, The slope of the skull And those eyes Are falling And Filling The space of an empty hull. (Half Drunk Muse) "Fourselves" Four masks, Four paths, A single light to enlighten a Darkened and bewildered mind. I wear the first mask for my mother. It is as bright as the halo she casts around my head in her own vision of the promising child born; I wear the second mask for my father, Stern, demanding, stubborn, Pounding fist into molded child clay, he is Never satisfied. I wear the third mask for the world, Feigning worship, kneeling down to its Hypocrisy and illogical logic, Pretending not to notice the glass ceiling as I nurse the heavy bleeding wounds from too many battles for liberty (perpetual revolution). I wear the fourth mask for myself, for it is the Smallest one, overshadowed and overlooked, Longing to grasp hold of a light that beckons me to Break away; Simultaneous fear and desire of no restraint, no more bound to that which I cannot embrace. Will I let the flames of promise dwindle to embers of Remorse, or set ablaze that which holds me for too long and reveal, Revel, finally, in Truth? (Half Drunk Muse) Window Dressing No. You cannot read me. Only see me for what I show you now. The face I wear. Stare. But beware. Not everything is as it seems. Dreams, schemes and fairytales Bite if you’re not careful To look between the lines Forming around my eyes. (Half Drunk Muse) I hope I still torment you through his hollow eyes, casting ugly shades on him from the distance you created. It must seem assuring to be harbored by compromise, the snuffed furnace of feeling gagging on its own glib tongue— a pound of flesh for publication. Amputate and bind the tourniquet just above the joint where my eager teeth might have someday slipped a garter from underneath those pristine frills. Finding like-minds for company is sensible; which one will you entertain next to chide the expanse of your denial? Molded identities wreathe and tangle cold-blooded in a murk of sharp accessories, ascended from their vile beginnings, now they buffet the darkness, triumphant, shimmering, shivering, waiting for their turn to burn. Nathanial West, Madison, Wisconsin (Half Drunk Muse) Who Lives Here: Best face put forward in the glow of waxy flame. Which face today will the world behold, read as true, Believe. Who is the fool and whom the foolish. The face that fits is least worn, has gathered dust. As the others ebb through the wear of time. Lies to contour features. Fear to rout lines and creases. Anger to darken and barb the mouth. Easier to show than to be seen. Abscind the flame for the day. No solace in the respite between acts. The light is out. Who am I? Donna Piazza St. Clair Shores, MI (Half Drunk Muse) Who is she? I’m staring in the mirror not knowing half of who I am. This personality disguised as this one the Mayor’s wife, the sultry hooker, or the school teacher. I am multiple in multiplicity, and complex uncertainty. Watching all my illusions these women I do not know. Trapped in this weakened flesh and the pills will kill the spirit. The pills will kill the spirit, these pills put me right back to where I was. Tread lightly says one, I’m careful so he doesn’t hear me, I’ve stepped away and I’m supposed to be sleep. He’ll never know says the other. I’m listening, punch drunk off crazy spilling in my mind, creeping in my thoughts, those voices. The floor creaks beneath me as I make my way to the window, I open with the cool wind whipping. You can fly she says, you can fly she says, I listen, because I can fly. (Half Drunk Muse) Inevitably Sunday morning’s light shone through our shared bedroom window I planned our pancake breakfast I let Laurie mix the batter and later sliced her stack for her She didn’t have to say thank you, her hazel eyes spoke to me I tucked Jenny's red hair gently behind one ear before it dipped into her pool of syrup. She licked off her milk mustache and we held in our laughs... Lest to wake the beasts And just as I perfected our dance together, the midday horn blew, my shift was up Sunday evening My mother prepares whatever I order and we awkwardly discuss my other family She won't call them my sisters. She cleans my dishes, kisses my forehead as she turns off my bedside lamp I never tell her that I can cook Mop, sew, wash the laundry Thursday morning she drives me to school She has packed my lunch, ironed my clothes We share jokes, listern to the car radio, glow in our groove "I'll see you Sunday, sweetie." My shift ended as I shut her car door. Thursday evening I wash the dishes and walk the dog alone Laurie and Jenny's uninviting tango lasts atleast until Friday night ------------------------------------------------- Last Sunday morning as I mixed the batter I heard you question our children about my mood Lest you awaken the beast Who is she now? Becomes the running joke with the three of you My complete family, tip-toeing around a Sunday morning, Sunday evening, Thursday morning, Thursday evening mother (Half Drunk Muse) It is within me, my character resides, behind required uniformity though she hides. For their own protection, from recognition or even a reflection. (Half Drunk Muse) Who’s going to let it shine this little problem of mine you see their all tucked so neatly inside the porn addict the father the preacher’s son the alcoholic the ambitious salesman and the saint who sold the little old lady friendship until he had her money then turned and walked away putting salvation off for just one more day. (Half Drunk Muse) Some spit. Some swallow. But we all seem to constrict lips around our egos, _must we all surround_ the majority of humanity marches to their own drummer but when the simple sound of jealousy orchestrates _we all become a number in line & shelved like a discounted wine_ (we are all up for sale) Crowded introductions kiss folded covers of hidden agendas prescribe the everyday suicide dress rehearsal (for even machines sleep & robots dream to one day feel) Re-invent rip off confessions under a failing halo (we are all just a million grams of your worth but representations perfectly misrepresented.unrepresented likeness perfectly imperfected) Secret societies sewn together by one-common threaded wrist (I don't see what anyone can see in anyone else but you because I lost myself on purpose to find myself still in love with you) But The fact still remains, I need a cigarette more than I need you. (Half Drunk Muse) Masks Wings Escape-like things When the flame is out And the light is gone Branches creep about And anger rings Surprised looks bring Laughing sings Lickings Seeking tastes Melting wax like paste Smoke all over the place A candle’s mace When flight is delayed Personalities play (Half Drunk Muse) This little light of mine shines my face early in the morning and at night illusive, as I take on and off my masks A man walked down the street one day it was hazy and his mask stuck so hard to his face he could not remove it. "Have I been swallowed by the accountant I pretend to be?"he asked the accountant made him somber made him feel grey if his calculations were right life would be over soon he walked the streets in grey... until the wolf came to him a distant smell in the nostrils when the wolf came his hair rose and that last mask was gone free, he screeched and ran across the water he could drink the whole lake he could howl tunes that only God knew he could kill any predator in a flash but then a blond haired lady caught his eye and hop-la the distinguished man's mask took over the wolf's "I will keep this mask" said the man his limbs stretching with a new verility his mind spinning with phrases he had grown a crocodile's tail he would conquer the world in it's depth and width suddenly the woman dissapeared as if to the clouds and in her place, to his dismay an old lady crouched with stretchy nylon stockings and bulky shoes she was feeding the birds some breadcrumbs Alas! exclaimed the man as his mask slipped off his face replaced by the child's face which greeted the granny ""Good Day, Mme", he said "Good day"', she replied and he walked on oh, this little light of mine knows what I do not know there is a silent mood in between the masks (Half Drunk Muse) Flying with unstable wings, branches reaching out with the masks I wear to disguise the bareness, leafless trees do little to block wind. The sulfur from the match, still hangs steady in the air, as the beat of the breeze has blown out my light. In the darkness, my eyes can adjust to the real lights in my soul. The sun will come rising with a spark, light the candle, to revive who I am. Blossoms will sweeten as the dripping wax cools. (Half Drunk Muse) By you, spilling over mind gives in to the carousel of masks I, to the outside greet from vapors of extinguished passions' meet that missed the well from which I drunk the sprit sober By you, struggling to be known as brother who would lead home debased the pure to sin completed compromises, then dumbed wit's wisest within and shamed what was proud once when By you, the shore I wait in pose to gait after the cover a lover once lent when the fields were of fruit and not of pleasantness yet spent By you, the seal I steal and where with all should bring me home to my meal that mother shot from her lament. this too, as flames flicker spent inspiration ghosted in this half-heart my bosom hosted under, she grew wings beyond my weight and desperate glass grasp she has flown to surer shores and left me now By you. (Half Drunk Muse) Leaving, we puff. Fandango stumps our moods, And in huffing we scurry. Regardless of future Handbags at our watery core. Such empty minds as ours, Forgiven for fools, Surrounded by tools of Imaginery lost once, Shakesperean found but Our rolling, twisting charge Loses what steam it had In our puff. So gone, but not bad With our stuff. The knuckles, like dad's, not enough. (Half Drunk Muse) “The Brightest” Crumbled paper and crushed coffee cups Walk purposefully on the sidewalk And litter people across the streets. The smell of sweet crude oil and haze Lingers delicately over the face of this half dead city. The crowd falls into itself. One after another We children emerge from empty houses and boarding schools To take the place of shoe-shinning tycoons and corporate blue-collars. We work fiercely for the money they spent years ago. We have forks to stir our soup and we use rakes to dig our holes. Maybe it’s all held up by that summer evening, When we wore that brown tie, And the smell of faint, vanilla soap rested on our skin. We asked each other to dance under the heavy bleachers, Decorated with the tinsel and glitter of an old generation. But we didn’t dance our fathers’ dance. They think the light is growing dim, That the hard yellow is falling limp to their age. But we see the light holding steady through flickering darkness, And know the brightest has not yet come. (Half Drunk Muse) She sprouted new personalities like starfish spawn limbs, such as vines caress crumbling brick facade, natural masks for an unnatural mind going down with the ship. There was once a light glimmering from behind those sunken eyes, marsh lights of egomania, megalomania, monomania, a figurehead for wreck and ruin. He knew the way through the treacherous swamp that seeped out from between her quicksand thighs as long as she was someone else. Her hair laced with fish eyes watching the frog eggs hatch in the muggy cradle of her cleavage. Spanish moss crept through her veins while he carved her a pallid driftwood spine. Her heart oozed blood soaked pond scum when he touched bottom, his hand grasping the skeleton she hid so well, the earthly remains of a girl she'd once been before another man took off her leg in battle. He tried to eat her whole, this salty hors d'oeuvre of a dame, half-baked and briny as she resisted the advance. There were raw oysters hidden in her brassiere, she sold the pearls to the cheapest bidder three ports back, a lifetime away. The undertow swept him out to sea where he cast his net for fresh bounty, ripe meet rising to his lips ready for the plucking. There was a fleeting embrace before her ribcage was plied open, her new first mate tongued the dark meat of her truths, hungrily devouring the countenance she had been saving for a special occasion. She came up empty and breathlessly capsized, floating on her back amid the oil slick stained sheets. Sara C. Brockman Madison, Wisconsin (Half Drunk Muse) Call to the hills of man for the echoes will cry out to the trees which lat upon the stale earth that paves the way for heavens instruments to play the notes of its passion. Its tone beckoning the message of its forbearers, and heeding the weight of the transgressions that once fell upon the souls of men; thus giving them the strength of he who walked through the fire and emerged with not the callus of the flame but rather the glow of the embers. Passion not reason justifies our treason unto this world. As we walk through the opaque haze and we are only seen because of the glow in which our father bore. Alas we walk into the open arms of his grasp and finally feel the embers which still encompass his heart, where the dormant echo of his proclamation provides comfort, and warmth to those who hear it with deaf ears, and see him with blind eyes. The echo, the never ending echo. (Half Drunk Muse) can always feel the second voice creeping in before it does consume the first I can feel its footsteps before it has made its way to my lips and face and has my hands so tense or wet or wondering where that came from My half melted candle drips even though wind has snuffed its flame and nothingness begets the lids of my eyes as the lid of the fire slowly closes I am not me I am a hollow being through which other hollow beings run and consume one another These other hollow beings are yesterday’s and tomorrow’s ghosts and specters I just wait until the outside world provokes their memory and gives me feeling They are the mask and the band which presses the mask of stiff reaction ever deeper into my skin from around my head I am the eyes that speak in tongues Just like a mime So let the outside world chew away at me for I am only too happy to replace this fragile flesh too easily snuffed with energy and wood and other little things for little hollow creatures to burn inside this yurt of mist that is the skull I am (Half Drunk Muse) Creaky doll, crocodile, croaking toad hemming in of wind O living branch, oh sweeping wing hold your breath: The four Portents have forgotten to address the real face of the matter, which has slunk low with a whistle. (Half Drunk Muse) I limp through my chivalrous journey Searching for the light within For the freedom of insight Will kill The many faces that comprise My false personality As the power of reincarnation And transmutation Will throw me into a oneness With the uni-verse (Half Drunk Muse) I have a mighty mind to speak all truth; or lie, if the mood suits. Mine is a four star celebrity critics all agree, and rave. Oh how they rave about the candle that goes out when flying too far from the sun. Icarus in opposites undone. Too low and I am base- too high and I am trite. I am a medley of all things; fair and faint or full of terror- true and just or maybe just- malicious. A pirate soldier maiden born of lust upon a swamp of sorrow, inhabited by the happiest of toads and tobacco smoking gators. All day I fan thy brow with meticulous care to show the individuality in woe. The inscrutable singularity inscribed in conformity. An oxy moronic ball. A gala for the gallant cur, the loosely narrow, and the coming gone. By now you may well wonder (or unwell wonder) to whom you are addressing; I am all that comes before (and after) for I am Personality. The Proctor-in-humanity. (Half Drunk Muse) Who is she? I’m staring in the mirror not knowing half of who I am. This personality disguised as this one the Mayor’s wife, the sultry hooker, or the school teacher. I am multiple in multiplicity, and complex uncertainty. Watching all my illusions these women I do not know. Trapped in this weakened flesh and the pills will kill the spirit. The pills will kill the spirit, these pills put me right back to where I was. Tread lightly says one, I’m careful so he doesn’t hear me, I’ve stepped away and I’m supposed to be sleep. He’ll never know says the other. I’m listening, punch drunk off crazy spilling in my mind, creeping in my thoughts, those voices. The floor creaks beneath me as I make my way to the window, I open with the cool wind whipping. You can fly she says, you can fly she says, I listen, because I can fly. (Half Drunk Muse) The flame and light that is me Snuffed out once again Covered by a role (Half Drunk Muse) Don’t bother trying to argue with me because you’ll never be right. And I will use my words to suck the life from yours. Your opinion is no match for my non-opinion. War is inevitable. Hate is inevitable. Death is inevitable. So why are you getting so upset. I’m not asking a question. I’m stating a truth. Let it be. There’s no control. Why try? Efforts are meaningless. Yet I will do everything I can to tear down all that is creative. With a shrug. With a yawn. By staring blankly at humanity stretching before me. But never with contempt. For I’m too passionless to destroy. I walk through the world without seeing. Without feeling. And that takes me above and beyond where you’ll ever be. Because you are all fools. I care for nothing. I believe in nothing. I am nothing. (Half Drunk Muse) angels wings upon the flame which the moth is drawn to expands from masking the who in whom we in who we are sing to us, wise, innocent angel free us to live in the light we are shine compatible shine mystical shine beyond, in, from to please shine (Half Drunk Muse) Life's essence is mine and I am it's Everything's part of reality even the pits Truth told through lies lies told through truth Open eyes and open mind are what makes my world move And my world moves in rotation - it spins I crack a smile at life and guess what - life grins Where change is the nature and uncertainty is certain Such a simple complexity to keep the mind sEaRcHiNg ? (Half Drunk Muse) Visioning Living Equally Visioning life into this dimension. Universe creating nature, naturally. Living within harmony. Challenging humans, existence. Unite peacefully. Each'ones personal, Destiny. All together begin, create. A planet of rebirth aplenty. Excepting forgiveness as steps. Towards achieving prosperity. Could end all negative energies. Always communicating desires. Respecting cultures equally... (Half Drunk Muse) Visioning Living Equally Visioning life into this dimension. Universe creating nature, naturally. Living within harmony. Challenging humans, existence. Unite peacefully. Each'ones personal, Destiny. All together begin, create. A planet of rebirth aplenty. Excepting forgiveness as steps. Towards achieving prosperity. Could end all negative energies. Always communicating desires. Respecting cultures equally... (Half Drunk Muse) All God's children cry Even those who seem banished A mother's blind love (Half Drunk Muse) Theatre is dead But drama's everlasting Don't fan the flame (Half Drunk Muse) terrorism is allegedly illegal, wings terrorism is the end of things , when you fear that the end is only controlled by the other things than you, wings Connected to an explosive , how the human is not less angel before you wrote us, before they authored how sin is innate not a choice, the immoral choose my face, they make my face , as if they were born to decide this is a pageant not a mutual ride. Terrorism is innate , you say , the explosive , my anger , your opinion on a sidewalk how you think you own the normalcy of it when the poisons would rather nature abort us. the explosion , How I want to go off , my precious little schrapnel , how it wants to make the terrorism to your world how it overlaps my freedom to live. I'll be the big bang and all I'll know of you is how you used to be a star Are angels just for fleeing the myopia when you make me explode in yours? (Half Drunk Muse) Hot consuming wax over boiled infancy A dream melted in the night cemented clear finality pudgy smooth morality mask of a conformists mind Tan vinyl hallucinations in quivering stone hands Slow contempt and lingering vibrations Shadows on blank visions uneventful prejudice laughing and bleeding the ecstasy from our feeble bones Figments of joyous imaginations stolen damnation forests of tribulations selfish defiance Subdued mankind condemned tranquility prophesized disaster Hard mischevious desires Facade of a personality (Half Drunk Muse) The four horsemen tell me contradictory things. Terror. Greed. War. Immaturity. I am confused. They have bought freedom. They have bought truth. I am powerless. They lead me so quickly I cannot see. They blow me out. I am in darkness. They will sell me. It is terrifying! They are numb. I am numb. We are numb. One numb nation led by masks, numb under god. I am afraid to see. They laugh. Oh how they laugh. I am confused. Who am I? I forgot. This little light of mine? Isn’t that a song I once knew? I must sing. I must sing. I’m weary of this old story. I’m weary of flying in the dark. These horses are manipulating me. I refuse to be bought and sold. I refuse to be a victim anymore. I am a candle with wings. I am a candle with wings. This little light of mine, ain't as small as it used to be. . . (Half Drunk Muse) Personality Hurrah!Hurrah! I've done the personality test . Now into the mirror I look and see strange ME. The wings around my shoulders suggest hope of higher things in life, perhaps Heaven in the end. Then I'm foxed by the burning candle. On wings it is strange until I realise it's fire draws me in, like a moth towards a flame. I'm a firebug loving fires. Oops I've struck that match again. Believe what I saw? But which mask tells the truth? I've learnt my words are not to be trusted when a different head tells the tale not a true one so it's lies ,lies,lies, the same. Then for protection I see my talisman. It fixed around my mighty left biceps and I swear it can protect. But strange indeed, like a foreign creed, my sturdy left hand holds a fan. To keep the heat within down, like some low little worm. My glance drops down to feet in life's jungle swamp so steamy. I wear a wooden leg like a pirate out for gold. And fantasy of fantasy a crocodile emerges with my cut off leg in his belly and out from my shorts a frog starts to crawl. I know now there is nothing nice about me. I've so much social things to fix. When I've corrected every neurosis thing then it time for me to mix, with the gentle creature ,the shapely women blonde divine. Until that happens I shall be counting time from the cell where they've put me for my dastard crime. I've killed for the thrill and never know why. Unless the doctors can work out what makes me tick, like an automaton,I guess it's only a short walk from my cell to the spot where I will die. -Cleveland W. Gibson, (Author of Billabongo) Faringdon, Oxon, United Kingdom |
