Breath of Life
My happiness floats on the trills of your laughter –
And the sacred light waves from your eyes.
Wave after wave of love’s deep communion
Drown me in thoughts of you with carefree abandon -
A soft, loving mist born from the womb of time.
You come to me from crushing eons of longing -
On soul prayers scrawled across the pale sky;
Describing a need and unquenchable desire
Carried from wind-swept paths of infinity.
Somewhere in illusion’s towering presence, you came,
An unforgettable image, dwelling in my soul;
Beauty personified caressing my thought waves;
Not born of imagination, for I knew you were real.
You, my answered prayer, flew to me in a rush,
Bringing with you all the love I had longed for,
That I might come to life on your in-drawn breath
I’m the Golden Little Girl
I’m the golden little girl who talked to trees;
Who, barefoot in the garden, chased the butterflies,
And ran laughing through the summer rain.
I’m the child who crept from the house at night
And sat in the darkness staring at the stars.
I’m the little girl whose eyes reflected the wonder
Of long tailed comets streaking across the sky -
Who clapped her hands exclaiming, Oooooo.
I’m the child of bass-throated bull frogs,
Flashing fireflies, noisy cicadas, fiddling crickets
And night birds, rustling, in the darkened trees.
I’m the child at home in the shadows of night,
Walking barefoot through the dewy grass;
Hearing foxes barking in the far-off fields
And feeling the deer sleeping in the deep woods.
I’m the child whose lips touched the blades of grass
As she whispered to the earthworms and ants beneath.
I’m the child who felt a reverence for everything,
Who, in innocence, knew nothing of the word,
Holy.
Annie Johnson is 84 years old. She is Shawnee Native American. She has published two, six hundred-page novels and six books of poetry. Annie has won several poetry awards from world poetry organizations including; World Union of Poets; she is a member of World Nations Writers Union; has received the World Institute for Peace award; the World Laureate of Literature from World Nations Writers Union and The William Shakespeare Poetry Award. She received a Certificate and Medal in recognition of the highest literature from International Literary Union for the year 2020, from Ayad Al Baldawi, President of the International Literary Union. She has three children, two grandchildren, and two sons-in-law. Annie played a flute in the Butler University Symphony. She still plays her flute.
IN THIS FUNERAL OF LIFE AND LIGHT WHEN WILL THE DARKNESS COME?
Some of the things I see
Haunt and torture me.
I scream for silence.
I dream of confidence,
But it is never still
And I have a fractured will.
My conscience grows numb.
When will darkness come?
I need to escape the day.
Please make it fade away.
Crows congregate to murder 'pon murder
Whilst I contemplate things that once were.
wishing they had never taken foot in my way.
Though they made me who I am today.
We all have our plagues that devour us like locusts.
Ravenously, relentlessly eating at us with great lust.
Leaving us with no other choice as to burn the fields.
Lest the plague never yields.
It's a funeral of life and light
As we bury our haunting plight.
And the dirges drum; dum dum dum.
When will the darkness come?
I so need the rest from this ill
That hacks with murderous swings upon my tattered will.
As were the shadows that linger o'er head
Not enough I must too dread.
Fear this beast for its procrastination.
We are all doomed; damned in my interpretation.
It is a matter of perception
When viewing this twisted reflection.
In my search for peace I found madness.
In my madness I found a peace in sadness.
Mourning every waking day.
Wishing it would go away.
Emitting prayers to Anubis' ear;
To the Reaper, to any that might hear.
I know now the Gods must be deaf.
My only wish remains bereft.
I ask no more and question less.
Tired of feeling defenseless.
I tried to be wholesome
Waiting for the darkness to come.
The longer one sits and thinks
The more they are devoured by the Sphinx,
Whose riddle hangs like residue
And can only be answered with 42.
I care no longer for the why.
The answer lies behind the sky.
When Ravens Cry
When mourning ravens cry
it disturbs the silent sky.
The bells of afterlife toll
Welcoming yet another soul.
When a black heart bleeds
It spreads sorrow's seeds
Sowing the fields of pain.
Loss remains relentless grain.
I loathe the sight of raven tears;
Loathe the taste that lingers for years.
Oh, how I do so despise
When a mourning raven cries.
Oh, how do I deeply mourn
That which is forever forlorn.
I can relate to Edgar Allan Poe;
'Tis such misery that I know.
When mourning ravens cry
So too does a black heart die.
From South-Western, Michigan, Jerry Langdon lives in Germany since the early 90's. He is an Artist and Poet. His works bathe in a darker side of emotion and fantasy. He has released five books of Poetry titled "Temperate Darkness an Behind the Twilight Veil", “Death and other cold things” “Rollercoaster Heart” and “Frosted Dreams” Jerry is also the editor and publisher of the literary magazine Raven Cage Zine poetry and prose. His poetic inspirations are derived from poets such as Edgar Allen Poe, Robert Frost and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. As well as from various Rock Bands. His apparently twisted mind, twists and intertwines fantasy with reality.
This Calls for an Exorcism!
I wanted to belt one of those nasty
guttural screams, like a long-dead
hollywood actress in a movie I’m too
afraid to watch. “I hate gore” I tell
people, but how poetic it must feel to be
covered in the innards of a pig. Pretty,
done-up face splattered in thick blood and
smeared in sweat, ink and bile, perfume.
I’m logical. But sometimes I’m clawing.
At my eyes, and neck. Like a possessed.
A panic, conceived and birthed in the manic of
self-loathing.
“‘I’m not a real poet’ says the poet”
Said a poet,
now says I.
On the bathroom floor, in the dark,
I shake with rage and lust
for violence. Force my nails into my palms: I need to lap up the blood, that I swear pools in the basin of my fist like tears once did in the crease on either side of my nose. I’m not wailing out of pain, but
the satisfaction of tearing
my warming skin from my frailing
bones. I have to tell my mother to
hide the scissors: my gut feels awfully pierce-able. Take the towel from my
long, strong fingers; I’m trying to suffocate myself. Every tendon in this body is trying to bend the wrong way. I’ve convinced my parents to order the
priest, hold me down and chant a
prayer. Pull the Devil out of this growing chest. Rip me open and carve me out. Unravel my intestines like a roll of film. My restless arms need the authorities to strap me to a bed and shriek in my face ‘till
I come to my senses. End me, infect
me, declare me brain-dead, I’d rather be numb than curling in my bed. I’m gasping
and grasping at the door.
I’m scared that I like it,
this spirit in my veins, it never controlled me until today. So, I heard the voices
over the phone, all I want is for Mama to listen. My eyes are screaming and trying their best “this calls for an exorcism!”
Roaring (Screaming) 20s
It is the Roaring (Screaming) 20s.
Everyone is in their own world
we all think we deserve one.
We are all at war, we are rotting,
twisted,
mentally ill.
We all hate,
worship,
envy one another.
I am grinning on the sidelines,
like a Goddess
above them all!
Can't decipher,
who is playing the game?
who is manipulating the referee?
I am busy admiring myself
watching my shapely reflection on this mirrored ceiling
as I float through the water.
Gaining self awareness at ten
watching grown men have revelations
I had at eleven.
Tell me my generation is all narcissistic teens
I’d love to hear it,
happy to be a part of it!
Happy to watch us be blamed
for destroying a planet we were labored into
a mere minute ago (we are infants in this timeline)
Happy to be called lazy,
spoiled,
incomparable to the God-like generations before us.
We are going to raise children
who watch the world collapse
on (Apple) VR headsets.
Irony tastes like my grandmother's cooking
when she tells me
my Peers will be the downfall!
When she drove Volkswagens
smoked a pack a day
showered for an hour every time
She and I both think its laughable
how we fight the people
we are inevitably intertwined with.
Going down together
blaming the people
we pull with us (Our elders are the weighted leeches on our ankles)
I am no god
no savior.
Just laughing at our silly flailing arms trying to resist gravity.
Oh well, I suppose we are in too deep
I suggest we keep kicking
our bodies will surface eventually.
The aliens can find our fucked up palaces.
The Real Bird Who Was
I am not a real bird, says the bird that is,
His coiled intestines heavy in his soft belly.
He gathers bark flakes and wooly hair for his nest,
Gathering with wings that should fly.
If I were a real bird, says the bird,
I would do what they do. The bird
watches a trigon of his feather-kin in the sky,
And presses his pinioned wingtips into the wet ground.
The bird plops heavy onto the earth,
Swallowing a worm as he saturates in nutrient packed dirt.
The worm sticks, glued to his tonsils,
And he develops a smell as he rolls over, crushing his wings beneath him.
He gazes with an ache at the seasonally disappearing flocks,
Claws at himself from the inside.
Real birds fly, says the bird who doesn’t,
As he pushes his head in the water and remains just a second too long.
On a branch, he lifts a wing, raises a leg.
He tilts slowly off and the world seems to spin,
But it spins until it doesn't, until the bird recoils,
Nosediving into his breast and imagining what the others would say
If they saw him.
I’m not a real bird, thinks the bird,
I can't be seen if it is like this.
He feels a phantom pain at the gone tip of his wing,
And quietly sheds both tear and feather.
Lost in my own city
I can manage to find gold in a cigarette
Bet you didn’t know that, did you?
I’ll teach you how, but you must swear on your hometown
You’ll never have the nerve to tell another soul
Ok
Are you ready?
The trick is simple as pie and twice as sweet
First off, be born
You may think you’ve got that one down already
But unless you came here through the wrung-out sorrow of you father blasting into your
mother’s womb
You’d be mistaken
Second
Learn everything this world has to offer, quickly as you can
Don’t bother fact-checking, you know your friends in big media aren’t here to lie to you
Third
Find out the truth
You feel that don’t you?
The loss of every direction you thought you new
But its still somehow beautiful outside
Now go buy that first cigarette
You can thank me later
Open Eyes
the rocks echo giddy laughter
a radio balanced unsteadily upon a paddle board
splashes of a dogs paws in the water
as he skitters in circles
soaked with warmth to the bone
music on the beach sends ripples through the lake
small fishes bobbing along
disturbed only by grabbing hands
shrieks replace laughter
as a minnow squirms in your palms
the boat rocks and
we flip
plunging into the cold
bubbles erupting under our bodies
your hair floats around your face
prompting thoughts of eels and gods
my admiration stays mine
as my mind melts into water
your beauty for only me alone to hold
you tug me back to the surface
and the water in my brain slides away
the rocks echo giddy laughter
flower girl
some see objects in the earth where I see lungs.
eyes in the oceanic sky peering down on my
limp overturned body.
i see golden beetles in pupils and stardust on skin,
though nobody will see me like that.
not when i have grown moss out of hair follicles and
flowers out of fingertips.
So that i can blend into the ground.
the floating eyelids above blink to find me but now
i am breathing inside the earth.
where footsteps and handprints on my flesh fire marks
and bruises that don’t appear in the night.
the moon is the only one who’s truly heard my cry
seen my hurt and listened to my poetry.
the shriveled-up poetry that only have
fragments of me.
tiny remnants that shout “i was here”
and although i’m almost down to dirt,
people pick my flowers.
and every person i’ve ever met has taken a piece a me.
