ALAS AND ALACK

If only philosophy was the answer.
It seems giant slices of our pie
have the fruit squeezed out and
all the flavor of what could have
been is pooled in a big empty
chock full of can’t be done.

There was a time,
I was young, so that’s my excuse,
I thought I’d be an artist, but my father
disabused me of that foolishness.
I was good at it too, just not good enough.
Oh! The things I did with red!

I traded my brush for a fountain pen,
a Waterman for my poems, and the
nib is gold. I have a rainbow of inks
made of words ground to powder and
mixed with saltwater from seas whose
waves I rode till I was beaten, almost dead.

I paint on loose leaf canvasses
that never get hung on walls and
cannot be seen with fewer than three
eyes. Stop, children, what’s that sound?
It is the echo of what we were before
we exchanged beauty for delusion,
truth for knowledge.

I paint because I must, the voices are
too loud, the demon’s snarl too urgent,
full of flames, full of force, fueled by
burning coals of cold doubt and empty angst.
We stir our masterpieces with skeletal hands
and with bones of destruction in flawed bowls.

It is all I can do to not paint
everything red as fire, or yellow as
a bobcat’s eye because the world
might end in Ragnarök, after all,
we the people buried under sparkles
of glacial aquamarine, bleak as dreams.

Even our passions fall short, for we are blind,
looking through a darkened glass. Creation
is fraught with the imperfections we’ve come
to expect in this disappointment of desires. 
We plunge into shallow waters, miles from shore
satisfied, but afraid of being, afraid of depth.

We fools aim higher 

than our wings can go:
beat the air,

follow the sun,

drown like Icarus.

Reviews

[Joss Jeffrey]

Your work is absolutely remarkable, and I will love to help to bring it to life through story art and animation and also i can help you to reach a broader audience. Do you have any other social media account when we can connect? you can find me on this Telegram: @Yaroslava_6ixyes or discord: @yaroslava70

[Vol]

You work for free?

[Joss Jeffrey]

I can't say i work for free but you text me on discord to proceed?

[!AMJ!]

I loved this Poem! The way it flowed is seemingly relaxing, like a lullaby to pacify the chaotic. Congrats on your work and effort, your work is awesome! (I'm surprised you are not famous already)

[Lara]

This piece brings my mind all the way up to when people went swimming, wrapped with inflated bubbles, wearing respiratory masks in triplet, and denied funeral rites of loved ones who died of car crash or cancer (but nah, it was covid...)

I'll trade you one song for another: "now there's a wall between us/something there's been lost/I took too much for granted/I got my signals crossed..."

[Joss Jeffrey]

Your work is absolutely remarkable, and I will love to help to bring it to life through story art and animation and also i can help you to reach a broader audience. Do you have any other social media account when we can connect? you can find me on this Telegram: @Yaroslava_6ixyes or discord: @yaroslava70

[Ms claws]

Again, the mind I so adore...Plants all these vivid pictures of life and its stages. The fruit squished out of my slice of pie. The sacrifices that may seem small to others but huge to us. Everybody look what's going down. And, yes, the higher we soar, the farther we must fall.. desperately flapping our melting wings. Thank you for sharing your awesome gift. (*Come on over and watch Barfly and Hacksaw Ridge with me)