"When I am writing, I am trying to find out who I am…" –Maya Angelou
I don’t know why I have such anger
Such pointless, bitter rage
Some poor soul may be in danger
If I’m ever more than just a turning page
I too have heard the well-worn stories
And cried fire for the witch
Well-forgotten all the glories
A mere moment for the switch
And so I dread the inevitability
Of my place upon the pyre
The inadvertent victim of my villainy
Perceiving just another burning liar.
Well, I don’t know how young it is
At times it seems most ancient
But its decision making’s hit-and-miss
Even when it’s trying to be patient
Some people say it’s fragile
I can’t say I disagree
Some folk have worn theirs ’round a while
With scars for all to see
But mine is little painted on
By life’s harshest of arts
Still it carries glad and sadder songs
My own sleeve-worn heart.
Maybe tomorrow it is better
And you won’t be my yesterday
Of misery and terror
But then, that is what you used to say
You turn your frustrations outward
Just like the people I resent
You may well think me a coward
For requiring assent
But when I cast that to the wind
All the worst things become true
And you may well unhappily find
That I turn into you
I am still uncertain
If you can do what must be done
Or if it must be done at all
Maybe I have it all wrong
I have always gone around
Stepping past all others’ shadows
You are one who stands your ground
I hope that what’s beneath your feet still grows
I have things to dread today,
And I don’t even know why.
He’s said, and she’ll say;
At this point, my eyes are dry.
All the connections that I took for granted,
All the wrongs that were someone else’s right…
Now maybe that’s just a seed I planted
That only blooms at night.
Please disregard my last letter;
Eternity is not long enough.
Tyrants think that they know better,
Until they meet their match — like us:
No one ever could compare to you
In twisted misinformation,
And you still hold to this ridiculous view,
Saying the outdoors are better than in!
You believe in your right;
Leaving us to only believe in our wrong.
I don’t want to fight
But you keep telling me to stand up strong
And I’m tired of feeling powerless,
I’m sick of all this shadow-sight…
Yet it couldn’t matter less —
This is not my right.
Is the world in which we live
So faithless as portrayed?
Is that we end where we begin
The only promise to be made?
Is there honor to be found
Beneath these shallow waters?
How many look and merely drown?
But how I pity all the others.
Pretty pink flowers
Dance to the rhythm of death
Little do they know
Writer In Retrospect 