Author: wjacobr

Visual artist, poet, novelist, activist & Street Medic, living in North. Penn Name: Jacob Russell My blog is a confluence of art, writing, politics. my Art portfolio: Art-by-Willard.com

Journal, August 24, 2021

I came to live in the ruins
of my body
it would not answer--whispered
a passing fancy
a storm that would not stay the night

Ringlets of featheres, curtains of ash
      water washing trails of lumbering beasts
thirsty as owls for blood

White -- or dappled as ponies
on a shield of swords -- 
      their hooves burst
into flames.   
        I am ashamed
of their bones, how they poke 
through the flesh, memories
fresh as wounds, fields
strewn with stones
white as milk
as the lost teeth of childhood dreams.

And then they woke up…

Shared from a post on FB

If you’re lucky in this life, a window
    appears on a battlefield
Between two armies. And when the
    soldiers look into the window
They don’t see their enemies, they see
    themselves as children
And they stop fighting and go home
    and go to sleep.
When they wake up, the land is well again.
     -- Carmen Penny (4th grader, Houston, Texas)