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All I Am

In truth, all I wanted to say was:
“I love you, and that is all there is to me.”

Looking into the eyes of the sea,

I see everything going up and falling down,

Like tides that hide as waves,

Slapping the shores ceaselessly,

As if trying to write its secrets on sands,

And cannot help but come back to wash them off… again,

I see people opening veins, as if trying to bleed out a memory,

And they dress up, as if threads can stitch a wounded soul,

Your long goodbyes cut the thread that stitched you,

And your long hugs leave the needles inside me,

Time is an ache that demands to be felt,

And you feel it as your hands graze a wrinkle on your face,

All the time you spent asking what life meant,

Life spent collecting what your time meant,

Life is a dream you live by waking,

And the deepest holes in the world are found in people,

Oh, I wish that I could fill your emptiness, 

But all I am is a space in time,

I see your skin stained by letters and apologies,

And I wonder what it is that makes your soul bleed,

I see all the self-destruct buttons you hide as the rain washes your skin, 

And I wonder how I can make my umbrella cover your fractured soul,

I wish that you would know that,

The wind that blows out all your candles will one day make you a wildfire, 

And that if the wind doesn’t carry you to shelter, 

It may be because it knows that the storm is your glory, the sea, your home,

But if your eyes must rain, let it pour upon my desert,

I promise you a land of me, with a roof made of warm arms,

With kisses as deep as the sky weeps,

And sands made for just your hourglass, 

Now, promises like people are made to be broken,

And sometimes even a sea drowns of thirst,

But my promises are me, and when I’m broken you will be found in me,

On the days I couldn’t breathe, I learned to paint air,

So that on the nights that you cannot breathe, I will become oxygen for you,

I have learned that everything ends,

So I welcomed the breaking of my heart, 

And hid the fragments in-between the sands of your hourglass,

Now, the broken and the beautiful have something in common,

And the lucky and the loved are often the same people, 

This poem was meant to be a short song,

Of stolen kisses and missing heartbeats, 

But my heart went on and on and on about I and love and you, 

In truth, all I wanted to say was,

I love you, and that is all there is to me.

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I Painted This

And on the days I could not breathe, I learned to paint air.

Rain makes the flower grow, 

Rain kills the flower that grows,

Was it him or I that wouldn’t let me grow,

Is it the chicken or the egg that first knows,

Was it pride or shame that brought me low,

Was it I or love that first let go,

My eyes are glassed with tears that dare not rain,

My life is painted with all shades of pain,

What once I loved, I now disdain,

What once was me floats by no more again,

Tears tear down every wall of pain I once ignored,

Cold is a state that lets me be more,

With no hope, no reward,

Of love to keep me warm.

The road I paved was sorely flawed,

My heart is in heat with a song,

That pleads to find a home to belong,

This being has been hollow for far too long.

A lie after a lie became the song I swore,

The darkness became a cloth I wore,

To swim through life to heaven’s shore,

This heart knows no law, it just knows war,

If I had been who I could be,

I would now have been who I should be,

The battle that rages in me,

Between who I was and who I am and who I will be,

Takes no cognizance of how or what or if I feel,

Or why I no more can see.

The fears in my head that keep me dead,

Are often by the monsters in my mind fed,

Fear and sorrow and confusion have only led

Me to curl alone beneath a broken bed.

Darkness stole me from the face of the sun,

The sun turned around and found another one,

The stars found me lying in the dark forlorn,

The sun loved me again when he saw that the stars would not abandon me.

Sorrow in her finite mercies floated these words to me,

And on the days I couldn’t see

I painted souls,

And on the days I couldn’t hear

I painted hearts,

And on the days I couldn’t speak

I painted thoughts,

And on the days I couldn’t feel

I painted desire,

And on the days I couldn’t breathe

I painted air,

And on the days I couldn’t live

I painted love,

And on the days I couldn’t love

I died,

And on the day I died

I painted God.

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Things I’ll Never Say

When the world turns,

And you’re still standing still, 

When everything you want, 

Speeds right round the rings of Saturn,

Scream at the sky if you must,

And if your shooting star passes by,

Then in your quietness you’ve won.

I didn’t want to tell you, 

That what you want doesn’t want you,

But if it’s meant to be yours, 

It’d find you, it’d hold you,

It would call you home.

In solitude, find solace,

In silence, feed your voice.

I wouldn’t say 

“Do not reach for the sky”,

Just don’t weep like rainfall,

When it reaches back.

#jenimdibie #poetry #poems #love #life #loss

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A Smile To Remember

For my first blog post, I want to introduce myself.

I am a poet and writer. I have written since I was a kid to overcome sadness.

Writing has saved me more times than I can recount. Writing gives me a reason to live.

I have two published books but decided to start blogging to give the world a warm hug just as words have embraced me all my life.

I laugh a lot, I laugh out loud but I’m sad all the time. Hope makes me sad, and I am the most hopeful person you’ll ever not meet.

Some poets have helped me feel “understood” or in modern terms are very “relatable”. Charles Bukowski is that poet for me.

So, before I start sharing my poems, stories, struggles, loves, loss, hopes, and journey with you, allow me give you one of Bukowski’s most poignant poems.

I hope you find colour in my black.

A Smile To Remember by Charles Bukowski

we had goldfish and they circled around and around
in the bowl on the table near the heavy drapes
covering the picture window and
my mother, always smiling, wanting us all
to be happy, told me, “be happy Henry!”
and she was right: it’s better to be happy if you
can
but my father continued to beat her and me several times a week while
raging inside his 6-foot-two frame because he couldn’t
understand what was attacking him from within. 

my mother, poor fish,
wanting to be happy, beaten two or three times a
week, telling me to be happy: “Henry, smile!
why don’t you ever smile?” 

and then she would smile, to show me how, and it was the
saddest smile I ever saw 

one day the goldfish died, all five of them,
they floated on the water, on their sides, their
eyes still open,
and when my father got home he threw them to the cat
there on the kitchen floor and we watched as my mother
smiled