Mar
Literati,
I am so pleased that the number of writers who chose to respond to our contest prompt with poetry is on the rise. Poetry is an oblique art, more so than narrative fiction, and often, understanding comes only upon reflection and not with the immediacy of the word as it is written. So it is with Grant Laurence’s contribution to this contest. His poetry has a profound effect, felt only after it has cascaded into your consciousness, there to linger for a while. (about 5 more entries to post before we select finalists)
Colorless,
by Grant Laurence
Gone the dreamless nights and carefree mornings
Now shadows of the past, with truths that have no virtue
Shattered by a conscious fog within our suits of status and glory
Love battled for on the synthetic field of life
And death to spontaneity
Dead are the children who want no gold
Washed are my hands that no longer seek to hold you
For it was us who ran without cause or destination
Ahead of the breeze and unknowingly complete
Our carefree steps unmeasured by time
And it was you who truly loved me in our naked bliss
As we became one under the etched tree of many
Your face then plastered across the walls of my mind
And everything I touched was you
Your salty glaze
You were my weightless burden, a vacuum for my soul
Where days became soldered
Until it rained
The barren dandelion with no chance to bloom
The outcast
Its yellow hue denied for another
A wish undisclosed falls heavy on a muddy grave
Only the breeze offers comfort to the lonely walker
Colorless is the rainbow after the storm
As I shelter under the old oak, and wait patiently for you
Kicking my heels and remembering the faces that no longer exist
For those roads have new maps far beyond my compass
The leaves on the big oak have now fallen
And I sit amongst its scattering
The earth’s new cloak a reflection of my mind
A puzzle that was never meant to fit
And my eyes drip with envy
As memories of youth cut their path to pitted fruit
As I reach for you, my heart will no longer stretch
Hardened by too many days alone and too much thought
The glory that was real, now dust
The bitterness of blood caked on my hands from untendered wounds
An old man in a frayed gray coat, waiting on a bus
Fumbling onboard
A seat to anywhere with no bridges to the past
Now that tomorrow does not speak to me
And today has turned its back
——-
Here is a rainbow in three stages of molting, fading into a colorless state:
(Sometimes, the pot of gold is not at the end of the rainbow, but at the end of a poem)
Noooooo! Too sad but oh so perfect in catching the essence of love, now gone and to never be again.
“Take away love and our earth is a tomb.” – Robert Browning
My favorite entry of “Love Lost”, because through “Colorless” I channeled Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
For a fuller review, Grant, I am at “kittydebear” which is a dot com.
Please add “@cox” which actually is a dot net not com for my full review.
Grant, we are in competent hands here: From a love so complete to a rain and death, and utter desolation. This contest brims with such poetry and prose, but your classic pen has sketched a level others can only imagine.
What beauty you portray with your words – and the emotions that go with them. Love this.