March Daily Poetry Challenge 2022
- Shannon Keegan, Mezzo-Soprano
- Aug 20, 2022
- 3 min read
1-8
March is gently slipping away
All my nights fade slowly into day
I cannot close my eyes
Try though, as I might
The dark outside is lonely without sight
Winter lays down its weary head
It’s tired voice says all that can be said
I cannot close my eyes
Even if I could
The cold outside would wake me, as it should
Outside is a hungry maw
Outside is the gnashing jaw
Outside heeds the lawless law
Its howling is a plea to be let in
Spring rattles the afflicted lung
All writhing things are bringing forth their young
I close my swollen eyes
I start a new verse
The outside spits its fury like a curse
Outside is a hungry maw
Outside is the gnashing jaw
Outside heeds the lawless law
Its howling is a plea to be let in
Let me in let me in
Keep me warm beneath your skin
Let me sing for you a hymn
My voice is breaking, hands are shaking
A bloodied “Ave” leaves my lips
As I drink you up in sips
Oh beware the singing girl
She does not dance along
She stands raw footed in the night
And screams her barren song
Inside starves a hungry maw
Inside breaks the gnashing jaw
Inside heeds no lawless law
Its howling is a plea to let it sin
Please oh please oh please just let me in
9
There are many singers and not many artists
A singer is safe
Artistry is dangerous
Singing authentically
Unapologetically
Loving the ugly sounds
The weird faces
The silliness of what we do
Humanity is so much more interesting
Than perfection
10
Not a well cultivated garden
So carefully pruned and presented
A scruffy plot filled with tenacious weeds
Overgrown and tangled with bramble
Scratching out identity amongst the worms
How exciting to dig through loam
Not knowing what your hands will find
11
I have become acquainted with madness
It has three names
The itch one cannot scratch
Something clever I haven’t come up with yet
The endless sitting in an urgent care waiting room
12
My teeth are too sensitive for cold water
But I can eat pizza straight out of the oven
My skin is too sensitive for makeup
But I can sit through at 7 1/2 hour tattoo session with 1 break
My ears are too sensitive to get water in them
But I can sit right in front of the horn section no problem
Circling back to temperature
I can’t hold an iced Starbucks drink for too long
But can yank a pizza out of the oven with my bare hands
Apparently circling back to pizza, too
13
My voice doesn’t do what I tell it to sometimes
Today is one of those times
14
Books are a sieve through which I pour myself
15
Where am I in the world
Now and before
Before and next
Where am I on the map
There is no stopping the pull
And the give
And the letting go
16
Running towards a horizon
That line interrupted
By my hand
Shielding my eyes from the sun
17
Would that I were a bird
I would not hate the sky so
Would that I were of feather and not flesh
I would take to the air
And finally breathe
18
They have no answer for me
I call in the dark
They claim to have light
Yet
No one seems to be able to see
19
Fatigue: exhaustion, bone weariness that feels heavy and sodden
Like I am wearing wet clothes
Sea floor clawing at my weighted boots
Siren song singing; rest
20
Again in the air
Again to the sky
Control lost somewhere down on the tarmac
I fucking hate flying
21
It feels like a womb
In here
Red velvet on every surface
It feels like a throat
In here
Dark and resonating with voice
It feels like a cave
In here
All hollow places filled with expectation
It feels like a tomb
In here
22
Considering sunlight
How it kills as easily as a blade to the throat
The sun beats
Beats down on the dark head
Orange sand blanched by relentless vigilance
23
Food food food food
This place has food food food
Food food food
From everywhere I could want
FOOD FOOD FOOD
24
The most miserable of human creations renders down to two words: red eye
25
26
27
28
29
30
It is late and 7th avenue is bright
Loud and full
A battalion of musicians march like so many ants
From the maw of Carnegie
Black carapaces upon their backs
Cheap tuxedos rumpled from sitting
Endless line of ants weaving their way through the night drowned city
31
I came quietly in the night
I came quietly in the night for music
And I came quietly for its twin
Silence
I made off like a thief
With both, and then neither
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