POEMS & LYRICS BY JRS 10 

 

DREAMS AND GHOSTS

Never Love A Fairy 

Forgive Me, Fairy Princess

Now That I'm Dark 

Everybody's Like That 

Your Prayers 

A Donkey To A Fairy 

Another "It's Over With"

Ghostly Chains  

You And Me Without A Phone 

One Believer (Lyrics) 

We Don't Work Yet (Lyrics) 

Loneliness 

Ships Look Different

On Seeing Seagulls Eating Garbage By The Ferry 

A Sudden Swarm Of Pigeons 

If My Heart Will Release Me  

 

Never Love A Fairy

 

Never love a fairy

if you’re a man,

never love a halo

that you can’t understand,

a mystery intangible

that hovers in the night, and though a woman seems,

leaves you with the feeling

that you just awakened from a dream:

with that same emptiness

and sense of disbelief.

And your joy will have a long way down.

And your joy will have a long way down.

 

Never love a fairy

if you’re a man.

Never love what would be bliss

if it could be - but can’t.

Her magic face of light

will but destroy you with your human expectations,

for you can never live

within the bosom of her fairy nation,

where there’s not food, nor drink, nor flesh -

and never a moment beyond "not yet."

And your joy will have a long way down.

And your joy will have a long way down.

 

Never love a fairy

if you’re a man.

Never try to hold a body

that will just blow away like sand

whenever your heart cries out in need

and your bed seems big enough for you to become lost at sea.

For for her, being held

means not being free;

and freedom is the soul

of fairies.

And your joy will have a long way down.

And your joy will have a long way down.

 

Never love a fairy

if you’re a man,

for though you love her as much

as any can,

it won’t be enough -

unless your love can become pure light, which means to die,

and unless you can cease to be what comes between you,

which is all you were

and had to do.

So just stand back upon the human shore,

across the sea from fairyland,

and say good-bye:

she won’t be yours.

She is already everything

without you.

And your joy will have a long way down.

And your joy will have a long way down.

 

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Forgive Me, Fairy Princess

 

 

Forgive me fairy princess,

I thought you were of the

earth

but now I see

you’re not.

You do not need a man

nor can you

ever leave your fairyland.

Your palace on the

lake

shines only in my dreams

and my heart’s too heavy

to cross the

bridge.

Could I but ride

a spirit horse to you,

and never come back,

I’d leave my body

and its worthless tasks

to another

beast of burden

and

disappear with you

into the golden light

where love

always is

and can wait

forever.

I’d love you as gently

as a dragonfly

sitting on the water,

I’d love you like a sun flower

caressed by a hint of fire.

 

Forgive me fairy princess

for my stone hands and feet,

for my earthly needs

that keep me on the shore of you,

not comprehending our marriage,

already consummated

in a place unseen by me.

Forgive me for dying at the hands

of solitude,

though you are at my side,

forgive me that my happiness has died,

waiting,

even though I am already with you

the only way

you will ever be with anyone.

I love you enough to change

the meaning of the word

"alone" - but my body

speaks another tongue;

and it will not follow

my heart to you.

As the body dies

so the heart doubts.

What is within is choked

by the death of what’s

outside.

 

Forgive me fairy princess

for my stone hands and feet -

for my earthly needs.

 

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Now That I’m Dark

 

 

Now that I’m dark

you don’t want me.

Now that the shadows have

fallen over me

and covered me with the wounded animal

that I am,

jealous,

lonely,

and afraid.

Now that the clocks

of our souls

have struck the hour

of the truth,

and left behind

the foreplay

and the masquerade.

Now that it is finally time

to come out from behind the fantasies

that have hidden us, protected us,

and face the other as a real human being…

Now is the time

you had to leave.

 

Why do you look at me that way?

You look at me as though

you can’t stand the sight of blood.

Why do you look at me that way?

Don’t you know,

yesterday I thought your sweet voice

was going to be my bandage.

But, just when I needed you the most,

you couldn’t bear to look…

 

Now that I’m dark

you don’t want me.

Now that I’m falling out into the open,

out of the closet

of who I wish I was but am not,

now that I’ve reminded you

that ideals are not what we are,

but only what we’re reaching for

out of the mess.

You don’t see me as you used to see me:

as the knight in shining armor

come to rescue you;

now you only see the dragon

I failed to kill,

the dragon inside

of me

burning down my soul.

 

Now that I’m dark

you don’t want me.

Now that I’m black

as the night in which

I dreamt of loving you.

For you are white,

your soul is white,

your name means white,

your hiding place is white,

the door you closed is white,

while I am black,

which means "outside."

I am the darkness

of living without you.

 

Now that I’m dark

you don’t want me.

Now that I finally tried to take

the step

from dreaming

to being.

From far away

to next to you.

Why didn’t I lie?

Why didn’t I hide who I was,

just a little longer?

 

Now that I’m dark

you don’t want me.

Now that I’m dark

you don’t want me.

 

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Everybody’s Like That

 

Everybody’s like that.

But you believe myths.

You believe facades

and frauds.

For you,

transparent people are devils.

Opaque people

are angels.

Those who bare

their hearts

are ugly

because what’s beautiful for you

are lies.

Everybody’s like this,

but you fall

for the disguises,

and honesty

that tries to

hold one human flag

above the rubble

of what a human being is,

is for you, a thing to be

despised.

You let con jobs

be your eyes

and believe in things

that never were,

so you can only hate

the things that really are.

And I am dead, now,

in your eyes,

because you never

knew the truth.

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Your Prayers

 

People die in minutes.

People die in hours.

Those weeks you were

gone

were the weeks

I needed to feel you

beside me.

Prayers are just like

bottles thrown

into the sea.

That’s how far away they are,

that’s how small

is the chance

of being

saved by one.

The prayers you made for me

are still floating

in the ocean,

I never felt them.

Don’t you know?

Sometimes prayers need to take the form of a voice

right next to one,

a hand holding a hand.

Sometimes prayers

need to be a kiss,

or just a phone ringing,

or a letter

with the ink

of loneliness

that ends loneliness.

I didn’t need a miracle

in those days,

just a little breeze

to let me know

the earth wasn’t dead,

that something

was still moving

or trying to move.

But you were silent

as I lay dying.

As I hinted

that I was dying,

and as I slowly

died.

Silent with your prayers.

Like a child

with that tiny hoop

children

sometimes hold close to their mouths

trying to make bubbles,

so you stood there

with the angel wings you thought you had,

trying to blow bubbles

to the other side

of the world…

While I was dying…

I thought you could

hear my death,

I thought my heart

was that close to your ear,

but like those animals

that freeze with fear

when a predator is near,

so your soul’s sense froze

in the shadow

of the terrible beast

of my unraveling.

You imagined all was well,

because you did not

know what to do

except in the sun;

you imagined that I could still

be left alone

to play.

You would not see the damage

that wanting you

had done.

And as I lay dying,

you sang songs, most beautiful,

to yourself;

you danced

across the sea

and thought your joy

would reach me.

But it didn’t.

No, it didn’t.

It sank beneath the sea.

Your joy,

and our love.

Like Atlantis it sank,

without ever having been.

Sweet angel (the part you tried to play):

You forgave me for things

I hadn’t meant to do.

But your forgiveness

destroyed me

because you kept it

to yourself

by hiding it in prayers

that fell dead

at your feet.

Like butterflies

kept too long in a box

who, when released,

falter and then die upon the ground -

like withered leaves.

Where was your body,

your face?

The vigor

of your earthly presence,

temporary,

but for that one brief moment

more powerful and brilliant

than any spirit

ever was?

Flesh to flesh -

it’s an illusion

only when it’s gone.

While the firefly is lit

it’s as much the truth

as eternity.

Where were you?

Where were you

when I needed

to be shaken

and to feel, and be felt,

when I needed to roar

like a lion,

when I needed to cry like a volcano

erupting tears

over the whole world,

to bury the city

of your holiness

with my foolishness,

with my blindness,

feeling for you in the dark?

Where were you?

When even a word would

have been enough -

no touch,

no life together,

just a word,

a pitiful word,

a pitiful word -

alms to the poor -

just one word…

People die in minutes,

and hours.

But you left me

for weeks,

when

my blood

was spilling from everything

I did,

and you, who could hear

the pindrop of a thought,

could suddenly hear nothing.

I was dying,

and all you sent me

were your prayers.

You asked God to do

what you would not;

but it was your work,

your work to do,

you couldn’t pass it off

on God.

All His glory,

His thunder,

His sunshine, His radiance,

His flowers blooming,

His waves crashing upon the shore,

His rocks not destroyed,

His starry nights

bewildering, and dancing above the bewildered,

his jewels appearing magically

from holes in the earth,

from dust,

they weren’t what I needed.

I needed you.

I needed you.

And you didn’t come,

or even say a word.

You only prayed.

You only prayed for me,

until I died.

 

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A Donkey To A Fairy

 

 

I might have cared

once,

but I don’t care

anymore.

All I feel now

is the hot sun beating down

on me

and the weight

on my back.

The sound of every step

I take

on the road

of uselessness

fills my ears,

drowns me,

my whole universe is this,

everything else is distant,

on the other side

of my daze,

on the other side of my heavy breathing

that’s like the wind

or sea

enveloping me with my labor.

I don’t think,

I don’t want,

I don’t long,

I don’t miss,

I don’t wonder.

Civilizations on other planets,

poems whispered by a flower,

the words of petals,

the footsteps of those who went before me

and the clamor of the unborn,

waiting for a world -

earthquakes in the soft form

of a woman,

darkness and a secret -

a soul’s promise,

hidden in a body -

it’s all just a blur,

a hallucination

on the side of the road,

like a buzz in my brain,

the kind you hear when you are

blacking out,

I fight it off

like faintness,

like sickness,

giving myself completely

to the steps that lead

nowhere.

I stagger past you,

because otherwise

I will fall,

and you’re not there

to catch me.

Today you are as far away from me

as a camel

is from a fish,

I don’t see beyond

the water that engulfs me

or imagine anything more than

this sea of pain

and hopelessness

that is my up, my down,

my here and my there.

 

For a moment, though,

you were almost real.

You almost broke through the tunnel

of numbness

that my eyes had created,

like a shield,

to protect me from what I could

not have,

which was everything

outside my donkey world.

That is how strong you were -

how different.

But now

that you are upset -

now that you have left

and are waiting for me to follow -

to write again or change -

you are

no longer

anything more to me than a shape

flitting about the

corners of my eyes.

I don’t have the energy to follow you.

I don’t have the energy to cry for you.

I don’t have the energy to ask you why.

I am just moving on,

dead as I was

before I met you,

dead as I will be forever,

without you,

because you didn’t bring me life,

only "maybe",

and then your own fears

and disappearance.

And the language of my forward motion

has no word for

"looking back."

I have an appointment with extinction

I cannot miss:

not for someone

who never came,

not for someone

who just watched.

Good-bye.

Should I still feel you?

Should I still call for you?

Perhaps.

But I feel nothing.

You are disappearing.

And my heart

has nothing left

to find you with.

Only with you

could I have found you.

Without you,

I can do nothing

but walk on,

walking is all I know,

walking without questions,

because questions hurt too much

and won’t change a thing.

Walking without questions -

and without you.

Who were you?

Did I love you once?

Who did you say you were?

Walking,

walking without you,

suffering,

but now losing you only seems to be

another part

of the hot sun

that burns down on my donkey road,

I feel the hot sun,

the hot road,

and it hurts more than you

because it’s here

and you’re not,

you are disappearing

into the hot sun,

you are just a few more degrees of heat,

who did you say you were?

Walking

and forgetting.

The hot burning sun

above the donkey road,

it’s here

and you’re not.

Pain

kills pain.

You left me,

but now I am leaving you

by walking,

walking and walking

till you're gone -

just like you wanted.

 

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Another "It’s Over With"

 

Another

"it’s over with."

It seems like only yesterday

since the last one.

One "it’s over with"

after another.

The day the snow came

and the earth declared

a holiday

and hearts ran free;

when the prison world

had to

close down for a minute.

But then,

they dug through the snow,

dug all the way back to "it’s over";

and everyone had

to go back.

 

And then,

the sprouting shoot

of adulthood,

growing green

towards

the soft one,

waiting with her cavern.

Wild joy,

all the horses of all time

running together across the plain,

and the heart pounding

like waves,

like oceans inside

night’s

most precious dreams.

That was over, too,

when the shadows

were stolen,

when the jewels came off

and the faces became clear

at dawn:

when the price was set.

 

And then

the holy ring,

the sacred battle

back to back

never again to be alone,

"we’ll go down together",

dreams surrendered,

but a friend gained,

until that too

came to "it’s over with",

and the mirror

showed an old face

and empty hands

and everything

still to do.

 

And then

the dusk miracle,

walking in

with eyes

of the first day,

one more birth,

one more chance;

and then the ache

of waking up

from the mirage;

and the same old lonely words:

"It’s over with.

It’s over with."

Your one faithful

companion through time.

"It’s over with."

 

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Ghostly Chains

 

 

Free me

from your ghostly chains.

Free me

from the poison

of the beautiful, unreachable dream

of you.

You are killing me

by keeping me

in this place

that has your name on it,

but not you.

Far-off words

are like distant campfires,

they sparkle

on the other side

of the cold I am living in.

I am freezing to death.

And one day

I will

just have to take

the blanket lying near me,

and cover myself

with something that is

not you.

 

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You And Me Without A Phone

 

 

It’s snowing!

I wish

I could tell

you.

 

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One Believer (Lyrics)

 

I need one believer

to be an achiever

not many

not lots

just one

one believer

one believer in me

to set me free

from the multitudes

who want to stamp me

into dust.

One believer,

just one,

and I’ll stand

against the world

till it’s right.

One believer,

just one,

and I’ll be like the sun

I’ll wait out the night

with my light.

One believer,

just one,

it could be you

baby, it could be you,

help me

stand up strong.

One believer

to be an achiever

to do what someone has to do,

how could it be me?

Stand by my side, baby,

and I’ll see it in your eyes.

And that’s when I’ll know

it’s true.

When I’m looking

right at you.

One believer,

just one.

One believer,

God and me

is still missing one -

it could be you, baby,

it could be you.

One believer

to be an achiever,

it could be you,

baby,

it could be you,

it could be you -

One believer

to bring me and the world

back together again,

just one believer,

it could be you, baby,

it could be you

One believer

just one

one believer

just one

it could be you.

 

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We Don’t Work Yet (Lyrics)

 

 

i was shot

and left for dead

it’s gonna take some time

to come back

into the world

 

i just can’t say yes

 

the last yes was a cage

 

no, just can’t say yes

not yet

couldn’t you guess?

 

what the world’s done to me

is just gonna get in the way.

till I crawl out of here

and get back on my feet

there’s nothing more to say.

 

Don’t come close, baby.

 

Don’t fall into the crater

of this wound

 

Don’t step out over my past.

it’s thin ice

and you’ll fall through.

Your beauty will never beat the pain.

 

Stay away, baby

till i break the chains.

The chains of what they did.

And give it time.

Time to match the crime.

 

Before we met,

they broke us apart

by putting darkness

in this heart.

Wait for the sun to come up

over the canyon of

what they stole.

Wait for the sun to come up

over this hole.

This hole that runs down

the middle of my soul.

 

I was shot and left for dead,

it’s gonna take some time to

come back into the world

I just can’t say yes

but when I can - and when I do -

if you’re still there -

it will be you.

 

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Loneliness

 

 

Loneliness could lead you

to Hell.

Loneliness could lead you

into a cage.

Loneliness could lead you

to make the same mistake

all over again.

You know who you are, now.

Her beauty proved it.

You’re a wolf

and you’ll always be alone,

always need to be alone,

except for that one moment.

And that one moment

is what will kill you,

and her.

All over again.

The door of solitude

that can’t quite close,

that always has to stay open

just a crack.

Just enough

to hurt

and to be hurt:

just enough

for history

to repeat itself.

 

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Ships Look Different

 

 

Ships look different

when you’re young.

They bring hope.

Later on,

they just hurt.

 

Once you watched them

as though you might go.

Now you watch them

knowing

that you didn’t.

 

Ships look different

when you’re young.

 

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On Seeing Seagulls Eating Garbage By The Ferry

 

 

Yes, seagulls will eat

from a garbage bin.

Yes, seagulls

can be stolen from the

sea.

 

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A Sudden Swarm Of Pigeons

 

 

A sudden swarm of pigeons

takes off

just like at the beginning

of the Olympics.

But it’s only here.

Could something great be about to happen

in my little neighborhood?

Maybe life?

 

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If My Heart Will Release Me

 

 

If my heart will release me,

I’m as free as the wind.

I can blow into your room

for a single stormy night

that will last forever,

then disappear

back into the desert.

When you awake

you’ll find a white butterfly

at your bedside.

I have no city to defend,

no rose to water,

I can jump in front of

the bullet meant for you.

I can laugh

at kings,

I can love you.

I can throw my heart

into the earth

and leave a crater

with your name.

I can whisper secrets

to every sleepless ear

in every land,

and carry the seeds

of the dead

back to the living.

If my heart will release me…

 

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