Monthly Archives: August 2010
letter to mother nature
where do i begin? never felt like we were friends
and then religion taught me to hate you:
“look at those pagans beneath the constellations
demonic stations, only jesus saves you
she’s just a bitch with an ironclad grip, fleshy fists
she’ll grab your soul and cage you”
awkward kid with backwards lid, a fat wordsmith
so of course i longed to escape you
with ammunition from a tradition or superstition
docetic, domestic jesus call it gospel
reading those who wrote in paul or moses’ name
dimly through lens of plato and aristotle
with half truths abounding it was easy to believe
we were fairly representing the apostle
pitting flesh and spirit we understood that we’ve
got to escape, and can’t escape being docile
so we took to militancy with surprising resiliency
suing teachers dismissing finds of fossils
extremist took drastic measures against doctors
while children died from swollen tonsils
were they afraid you’d woo us with your beauty
when they started questioning your years?
maybe if we believe you’re younger than you look
we’ll stay gridlocked in all these fears
question your wisdom and integrity and our ability
to read the signs that you give us
feeling filthy, i’m just as guilty of such propagation
now i’m praying dear god forgive us
trying my best to resist the ever present temptation
to pit one mother against another
the church is still my station despite all this vexation
and so i hope she knows i still love her
i just want to pay the respect that’s long overdue you
’cause in both your waters i find life
the modus operandi is god’s hand working through you
despite suspicion of you that runs rife
confess but maybe don’t believe the word became flesh
and in flesh and blood there is life
sometimes i wonder why he didn’t just stop the 5th day
say it’s good and make you his wife
~wwb
(picture of Grand Haven pier at winter sunset taken by Erin Bowerman)
some eloquent graffiti for the pearly gates
i was gonna write some more words about me
and my self loathing and then i thought of you
i was gonna fight more of my demons publicly
it seems sometimes its all i know how to do
but there’s a difference between community
and struggling openly, i said at your memorial
friend i think if there is to be any hope for me
i need to revisit the music and that pictorial
i feel like your sad eyes and heartbreak smile
sometimes dear friend they’re just like mine
unlikely kindred spirits, quite different styles
give tangible expressions to a tortured mind
failing to differentiate as if we shared a mind
but sometimes i feel our heart and soul are one
as if there could ever really be two of any kind
like maybe i’ve played and my run too is done
there i go making this to, too much about me
still missing the essence of all you’ve taught me
there i go breaking the tooth loose, its about free
from the cold face and angry jaw of my humanity
won’t you come to me in a dream, flap your wings
this has me trying to talk to myself in your voice
“smile, its just life its worth the price of suffering
you know i know you can make the right choice”
what would it mean for me to really break free?
like a trapeze swinger between answers i sway
i could do it for you but it really has to be for me
so fuck please remember me, ryan i want to stay
ryan, i miss you dearly my heart continues to break in your absence. i am just really starting to scratch the surface of what it can mean to really love myself. i am just starting to see around the corner, peering out from the darkness i have been stuck in my whole life. i love you and miss you so fucking much. i am angry. i am angry with you for leaving. i am angry with god for allowing it all as if you were were to become some sign or sacrament for others like me who looked to you and might in your absence learn from your mistakes. i am angry with myself for not being there more because i was caught up in my own darkness much like you. i am angry with parents, family friends and enemies. “so much anger.” angry for different and similar reasons but angry just the same. i am letting go of it ryan. i will see you when i see you. i love you.
~wayne
7×70
Erin,
I hope that its okay if I share your seven year gift with the world. I hear people say it’s that seven year itch that can kill the love of a boy and a girl; a woman and man; the way they say its true for any business endeavor or plan. But Erin, I need you to understand that on August 9, ’03 when I took your hand, I knew you were no longer a girl. And you make me more than just man. And its no business of theirs; there’s no institution or business at hand. Erin, I need you to understand, I need you like I need to write and anyone who knows me knows that means more than blood and more than just air. Just your breath and God’s love could ever compare.
Erin, please know that although adversity has greeted us many mornings anew. I’ll continue to meet you in those places and navigate through. For seven more years times seventy, even if you have days when you don’t treat me fair; you won’t hear me say that I know longer care. ‘Cause I’ve fucked up again and again and you still meet me there, and there and there and all of the places my anxious mind wonders. Many nights I just sit and ponder where I’d ever be without you. I hope to never know the answer, although worries plague my soul and eat at me like cancer. Since that first time I called; I’ve just thank God that you answered.
You told your sister you saw a boy who loved Jesus and you. Erin I’m a soul whose life’s thesis is to serve God and serve you. And these two children with which we’ve been blessed. And any enemy or friend we’re blessed to encounter I guess. Erin, I confess to you my mood flips my faith dips in humanity, in God and in you. But you make me more human and my faith you renew. Stay with me Erin, seven more or seventy-two or seven times seventy. And I promise you too, that two things I’ll do i) I’ll fuck up: I’ll say things, I won’t say things I’ll forget flowers cards and letters and ii) I’ll stay by you I won’t quit and I’ll keep getting better; for better or worse; for now; and forever.
I love you.
Love,
me.
I’m Still From
i’m still from too much butter and coke
and clouds of winston smokes
bedroom closet with mother’s empty cartons
and the shit used to make us choke
baseball cards ticking the bicycle spokes
on my brothers trike outside my window
while i’m dying inside just trying to cope
through food and classic television shows
