Legends of the Fall? Not Quite

Published on by Tosha Michelle88 Comments

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The one I crave isn’t aware of me.
The man I long to hold,
my lustful thoughts lodged
in his belly like hunger pains
forgotten, forgets me.

So I become my heart’s curator
of insignificant, seeing love
this way, through blotted out clouds
and a tenuous contract that I’d never
break. The weight of words growing
heavier with the passing of each year.

Other men perform hard labor
trying to win my wilted hand.

I wish for the hush of his name.

I imitate the motions.
Living means dancing
like I know the choreography.

Then no one notices
I’m with the wrong partner.

Even now I still love the unbearable,
the unbridgeable distance
of the choreographer of my destruction.

I strike matches against my chest.
I peel back my flesh
and wear my the despair out
on a Saturday night.

Languidly, I wobble around
in my heels of suburpia
I write to dreg my nonsensical senses.

Shouldn’t art and love destroy us?
Saturated us?
Redefine us?
Burn through us?

Dark body of my soul fall through
this lonesome space.
You are the ache in my ribcage.

Come read my dreams back to me
on crumpled sheets of paper.
My heart its own Museum of
Unnatural History. I can no longer
separate desire from truth.

-Tosha Michelle

Demarcation

Published on by Tosha Michelle60 Comments

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Self doubt creates a slavish universe,
where we are constantly lugging our
insecurities in a backpack up a hill
that gets farther away the closer we get.
Along the way we keep looking
for disaster while trying to breathe.
Our catastrophic mind only perceiving danger,
creates a wedge between reality and self
where we only see the flaws and fractures.
Forgetting where we buried the bounty,
forgetting their is a bounty. We attempt to control
our bodies without mastering the spine.
Our souls become a membrane of
hopelessness, happy to reveal all we are not.
Our foolish spirits chose to adhere.
In our hand we hold a gun and a map of our head.
We journey on trying to find our way
with a broken flashlight, forgetting to
open our eyes, we cut our foot
on a shattered mirror. Briefly, we stand still,
and await clarity’s arrival. Satisfied. We turn and
head back towards self worth.
Finally, remembering, we hid the key
to the treasure chest
in perception’s drawer.

-Tosha Michelle

Politics

Published on by Tosha Michelle128 Comments

Guess what? It’s not Sunday. I can’t stay away from you people. I think it’s safe to say I have an addictive personality. Fortunately for me, I’m not much of a drinker and I’ve never tried drugs. I suppose there’s worse things to be addicted to than blogging. Dr. Diva, I’m looking at you.

The following poem is a commentary on politics and politicians in general. I apologize for the bitter tone of the post. I’m just truly fed up with the current political climate.

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Amplified darkness.
No music, just noise.
A voice of self, of selfishness.
The handiwork of greed.
This me-ness of rancid meat.
Broken into bitter bits, then
cut into sharper pieces.
No integrity as a whole.
Just hungry overgrown babies
crying and clawing, howling in
the wind, choking; on the last bit
of protein. Washing it down
with well water; trying to soothe
their unwell throats.
We the people become the soil
trying desperately to reabsorb
that which is lost.
Only there’s no pureness left
just toxicity. Acquainted only with squalor
and dehydration. Constricted, but still
we resist and hope for higher ground.

-Tosha Michelle

Love Me

Published on by Tosha Michelle134 Comments

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Hello. This will be my last post until Sunday. I leave you with a (gasp) love poem, done my way. Hopefully, devoid of sap.

Love me, not just my body,
but the curvature of my being.
Take me as I am, as I’ll be.
Give me the quiet music
of your heart. Teach me
the lyrics and tune.
Love me for infinity, and not
just indefinitely. Tell me
we can work, if we work
for it as if it were our livelihood.
As if it were our art.
Love me enough to make
revisions to replenish.
Let me be the black and
blue uprooting your veins.
Love me from the inside out,
where the echos are heard everywhere.
Let me be your irreplaceable.
This body, this spirit, this future corpse.
Let me translate and soothe in a language
that’s never been anywhere but us.
Love me with substance and let our love
be a love of existence. Knowing I’m flawed,
that I’m nothing special but knowing
I’m enough for you.
Love me, like an
idea fully formed, like a love poem
filling the paper to capacity, full of hope,
written at the desk by heart light.
Love me, like yours is the hand
holding the pen.
Let the rhythm belong to you.
Love me, like I’m the
syntax of your verse,
the reason behind your rhyme.

Love me,

-Tosha Michelle

Emily

Published on by Tosha Michelle41 Comments

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She spent the month of July
with Emily Dickinson.

The sun burned her eyes,
but she read on.

Her cat napped at her feet.
Nearby you could hear people
playing volleyball.

When inspiration failed, she
looked for a thing with feathers.

She wore an old t-shirt that read
“Heart, we will forget him”

You could see her reading,
into the evening. Her face
lit by moonlight. Every word
her night cap.

While others slept,
she thought about Emily
and what she would do.

Having arrived at a poetic conclusion,
she takes out pen and paper
and writes with modest ink.

For a poem she loses herself
in a room of another life,
in a house far away in Amherst.

Knowing she’s just a small star,
basking in the glow of another.

She composes verse about
her summer companion.
Emily the loner and recluse.

And shares how her favorite
poet became her muse.

-Tosha Michelle

Reprieve

Published on by Tosha Michelle68 Comments

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Leeches and vultures
and time I can’t swallow.
Eyes on the tulips
under ice.
My heart in need of air.

Interior dialogue
Some voice I can’t decipher
endless fears,
needless worry,
and a place to contemplate rest.

-Tosha Michelle

No Gem Here

Published on by Tosha Michelle85 Comments

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Knowing that I’m less than a diamond,
no emerald or pearl, only mere glass.
I’m not afraid of being common,
or choking on insecurity’s bone.

I carry no bitterness in my veins.
Just a faulty valve of naivety.
My blood pulses with compassion.
The flow of humanity.
Brokenness, the barbedwire
fence I like to call my soul.

I trip over needle and thread
trying to sow a stronger spine.
I back tack kindness to my sleeve
and watch as my heart slips to the floor.

Hope perches on my breastbone.
I listen to it’s tune, wanting to soar.
It drowns out the murmurs
of negativity and doubt.
Finally unencumbered,
I sing along, the words repeat
“go on” “go on” “go on”.

-Tosha Michelle

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Another One?

Published on by Tosha Michelle59 Comments

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I know this poem.
It’s another one about you.
In this one you’re the moon,
moving away from the earth.
The nights getting darker.
The poet seemingly losing
herself to longing.
But maybe this is just a
rough draft.
Perhaps in the revision
you’re not the moon,
but the sun she
orbits around and
you take her hand.
Moving closer to her gravity.
Entranced by her softness
and charming ways.
And I feel like I’ve lived
this poem and I know
this man. Alone in bed
I savor evey word.
And for a moment
I get lost in a fantasy
where I believe in the
poem.
I’m holding in my lap
and, in the man, the
poem’s about
His head resting
on my knee.
I memorize every verse.

-Tosha Michelle

Listen to Underneath Adam Lambert Cover by Tosha Michelle 2020 #np on #SoundCloud

Ensnared

Published on by Tosha Michelle69 Comments

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The wind breaks hearts
while the tangled tree branches
shelter their list
of grievances underground.
All they ever wanted was to be loved.
To the forest the tree stands
in regal glory and sweet familiarity.
All the while ensnared in the whims of nature,
the tree can’t break free from
the toxic atmosphere
The branches rustles to offset despair.
The husk marred by neglect
begins to rot
The sun attempts to change the tree’s fortune.
The pine leans toward the light, but the wind
draws it back in a jealous purchase.

Wrung out. Resigned to the oncoming storm’s chaos, knowing trying to shake it off
is futile. The tree lifts its branches in surrender. The
leaves, unencumbered by obligation, jump then fall. They would rather die than submit.

-Tosha Michelle

Own the Years

Published on by Tosha Michelle67 Comments

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Before the years vanish
Let your body wander.
Be a lover, a traveler.

Let the theatrical lights
shine on you.
Bathe in the syllables
of adventure.

Crown the stars, and
dine on constellations.
Drink up the sunlight.

See the Nile, and tropical islands.
Take note of each sunset,
the mountains, the ocean.
Don’t let there be
a single empty page
in your life book.

Be a door swung open,
withhold nothing.
Dare to do, so you have
no regrets.

Don’t let your life
be haunted by dreams
that happened elsewhere,
and to someone else.
Haunted by the ones you never met,
the journeys you failed
to take.

Lift your arms up
and embrace what you make be.
Belong to the jungle,
the marketplace,
the English cottage,
the abbeys of Italy,
the domes, and to all
the scenes of your life.

-Tosha Michelle