I am not a disciple
Though there are times I envy
Those who would follow so easily
I wish I could lose myself
Completely
In a fog of faith, belief
In what I cannot know for sure
But I need something human
Something real
Something direct and bleeding
I will not let myself be fooled
By figments
— A.R.
Wounded Angel by Hugo Simberg
My muscles ache
Fatigued today
I’ve no relief
From memory’s weight
So I will simply sit
For now
Hold my own skin
I’m learning how
— A.R.
Painting by Amanda Rose
Today I sit constricted
My waistband tied too tight
Until I sat down I had not noticed it
Digging into the forgotten flesh
Just below my belly button
But this time
I do not allow myself to fix it
I decide instead to feel it
An irritation around my middle
I hate this
I have always hated this
I have despised the soft center of me
Since I was 8 years old
I have rejected any sensation starting
From this spot
My entire being crawls away from it in all directions
Shattering me and scattering my pieces
I have always had a vague notion why I split
But today I simply feel it and let the thoughts in
And there it is
A memory as clear as the mark it left
HE used to grab me around my middle
HE used our childhood games
Of hide and seek
In a basement, dark and full of horrid hiding things
While the others hid, HE sought me out
HE would take me by my middle
Hauling me off with HIS giant hands
Encircling the entire middle of me
My flesh and guts a handle for HIS gripping
So this is why
I have punished and pounded and pulverized
This pound of flesh that lies
Between waist and once wasted space
This is why I crudely cut a giant jagged hole
And gladly let myself spill out
And happily filled it in with cold concrete
I have been terribly trying to loose his fingers
Trying to pry them off
The memory he buried
In the middle of me
I have been trying to reclaim my own geography
Violence for violence
NOW I return
NOW I am still, here
NOW I sit on solid ground, his hands are not around
NOW I hear the birds sing of safety
NOW after all of this restraint
I decide to forego formality
Before it is officially over
I move of my own accord, free
Not to fix with force but to find out for myself
To feel the spot where he used to handle me
To see if it still exists under there
And as my hands begin to move
The ending bell rings, allowing
Sounding as if to say to me
It is over
His grip is gone
Your center has returned
You may hold your own middle now
And so it is
And so it has
And so I do
Soft and gentle
I take myself in my hands
And I find
Only me
— A.R.
Woman Sitting artist unknown
Calculating satisfaction
Putting possessions in their places
It never lasts
Days dripping past
Control devolving quite to chaos
–A.R.
Painting by Giuseppe Crespi, 1665 -1737
And needing nothing
Today I will bury myself in my art
Bawdy books and meaty music
Six feet under layers of history
Ancient minerals mixed with new
Tunneling of night
Crawlers without a light of any kind
Only in search of warmth of flesh
My movement my breath my life
There will be no separating
Brain from body roots from tentacles
They are all welcome
Because they approach by sense
Alone without eyes
By tonight my body will gladly be
Buried alive
— A.R.
Buried by manuelestheim from deviantART
Talk to me of possibility
And living life alive
Instead of letting life live me
No other lens but this
The rest imposed and make believe
— A.R.
Forgotten Sunglasses by Vladimir Kush
When I try to close my eyes tonight
My face starts its swiveling
Counterclockwise
Or is it my body winding up
Dark red and wavering
Pulses in the liquid air around me
A human shifting form
From what into what and when
I cannot will not do not know
I have been distracted
So she has patiently lain in wait
For metamorphosis or progress
But now she turns to leave
Bored of me
I have heard it said
That once you think about making a decision
The decision has already been made
There is only the catching up
Of story to reality
Somebody please tell her to wait
I have decided
I am finally catching up
To me
— A.R.
Distraction by Kaitlyn Mooney
What wondrous nature I notice
When my bladder calls at night
Emptying
A full moon rising with me
Blue light cast down
Chilling
A clock tower through the trees
Me without my glasses
Fooling
A black bird atop a bare tree
Swaying in an ice storm
Balancing
A carnivore crow weighted carrying
A smaller bird in its beak
Struggling
Leafless sycamore black in winter
Mimicking depths of sea coral
Swaying
Houses cool with outward shadows
Windows lit warm randomly
Living
Smoke ascending from towers of brick
Fuel and wood and home fires
Burning
Me still inside pondering and empty
One day I will just be
Nothing
My window is but a thin pane of glass
Between me and everything dark
Outside existing
— A.R.
Rooftops at Night by Stapleton Kearns
I never said
I was perfect
Or even normal
I only ever claimed
To find occasional
Comfort, joy
With who I am
For now
–A.R.
Photo from Black and WTF
Mind
A relay station
From sensation to story
I am starting to understand
When I sense it controls everything
Captured input turning into impulse
Impulse harnessed creating its charge
Fully charged and humming is possible
But injury would surely change my mind
Disrupt the direction of its conversion
Muddling receptivity and browning out
Or black if total failure would occur
But then there are rare moments
Switches I can control or flip
Process altered on a whim
Sorting signals myself
Another story started
Sparked by senses
Relayed by station
Of the mind
A.R.
Photo of a power tower
Elliot P
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