Winter will always take the light.
The birds will go too.
The cold returns.
The leaves abandon the trees.
You live with it.
You survive.
Knowing it doesn’t matter,
you still hold the birds in the
lushness of green.
The magnolias bloom.
Alive in your mind.
-Tosha Michelle
On those rare occasions when the
stars in the sky fail not to disappoint
And even the earth is winded from
the sky’s beauty.
Stop. Just for a moment
and let the night light absorb you.
Our lives are painted as simply and as
haphazardly as a pre schooler turnned loose
with their first art kit. Leaving a trail of x’s
and o’s behind us in the grass until the
entire lawn shifts.
Tonight, for a second, let’s tear away
the leaves from a trees and dance
with the branches to the song of
a whippoorwill
In the morning, the sun
will pull us forward.
-Tosha Michelle
If only I could find the train
back to you.
The crossroads are nothing
more than a Trader Joe’s now.
And I can’t even get you on an
imaginary phone.
All day long I try and call.
You were always the sky
that drowned me the most.
My heart stiffing faster
than clothes on a line,
then turning into a hard
remorseful verse of poetry
to be recited under a full
moon by the river’s dark mouth.
Fire feed the soul.
Breathe in ash.
The spirit swims away.
The body dredging dirt.
And in the distance a train
rounds another bend.
-Tosha Michelle
Our love was a dark continent
we shared, violent and untamed.
It was unholy and seductive and left
destruction in its wake.
We were wind and fire.
Hot beginnings and painted
roads that led to secret gardens.
How quickly heaven was lost to us
when the sky destroyed the night
and the night decimated the sky.
When the lightening struck
we weren’t surprised when
the tree limbs splintered.
Knowing the branches couldn’t save us.
The storm burning away what
was left of the twisted roots
but never the wildness of our hearts.
The moon and I still yearn
for the chaos. Stealing our
breath and taking out sanity away.
God, how I wanted the pain,
the pleasure to abide,
but you can’t control the weather
Now the aftereffect remains.
and the wind goes on.
Closing all the windows as the
chill sets in. The cold comes
and you live with it.
-Tosha Michelle
Today I sat on a swing
and swung for hours.
I could do this forever.
Perhaps I’ll be a child,
cradle to grave.
Flying through the girlish shadows
of the magnolia trees.
Eternally in love with the beauty of life.
I am most myself when
I recall my innocence, the nectar of sweet fruit
You’re welcome to join.
Come swing with me.
We’ll sing a duet and watch
our melody fly high above the breeze
our lyrics floating into the evening,
marking the setting of the sun.
In the aftermath, we’ll sit moonlit, and heart swept.
There in the meadow with our spring minds
and a cotton candy glaze.
At peace we won’t begrudge
the extinction of the day.
-Tosha Michelle
My rendition of “Dream”
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
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.
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
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
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
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
Everything I Never Told You 