Another poem...

Void

I hate that cold space,

that voided place we come to

at the end of our hurt

When the words end

and the silence begins

and the coldness fills

in the distance between

I hate the empty hole

that part of my heart’s whole

that’s been sandpapered away

with indifference’s tools

Taking, talking, lashing back,

then I’m taken aback

by the willfulness of it all

You go, I go, we go

where we should never

and are left hanging by threads of piano wire

garrotted for the music we make together in anger and rage,

red and black and purple and blue

like the marks I give myself when we’re through

But we’re silent in the end

and the void seeps through

I hate myself for feeling pain

and punish myself for feeling nothing

~Sherry Lore, July 02, 2016

Random Scenes of Autumn's End...

Berries for the Wild

The Death of Flowers

Sunset in December

Blessing of Love

Photo -Antique Rose by Sherry Lore

So, I couldn't find the card I bought over a month ago. Heck, I can't find my mind, my voice or my sanity most of the time. So I found a card that had a blossoming flower on in that was blank and wrote a cheesy, but loving, sentiment in it. I love you, you know who...

Anniversary

I am not changed by you or from you,

but with you

Like the earth and moon

your pull attracts me, moves my ocean’s tides

and I hold you steady, in an orbit,

We dance of pushing and pulling

a starlit spin that lasts our lives

I am not made by you or you by me

but nurtured and renewed

Like the wilting bud that life has already cut

closed and confined,

You are soothing water and I am allowed to open

You fill me with so many possibilities

and I bloom

Sherry Lore - Sept.22, 2015

For a friend... Another older poem... (warning explicit)

I could have swore I put this one on here already, but maybe I didn't.  Originally meant for spoken word but I never had the courage to get up on a stage and speak it at an actual reading... Which ironically led me to writing the previous poem as I was about to post this one.


Where the Beauty is
where the beauty is?
why do we only see the beautiful ones on display, 
perfect as complete perfection, photo/makeup/cosmetic correction can make them stay...
replay, forever young, caught in some perpetual still life like on a canvas, 
flawless, braless with ever perky nipples and bright white teeth polish, 
bronzed skin and too tight everything, my god how the world must sing 
whenever they strut their shit all around and bring 
the rest of us less than perfect ones down by saying... nothing

according to the magazines, there go my dreams, 
all in a too fat, too flat, where the fuck's my shit at, 
reality in play, myself is where I stay,
stuck, in 6 weeks you can be like them, in six months you can be like her, 
in 6 years you'll be like you... cause that's the cards we're played, 
the genetic makeup, life breakup, reality shakeup is 
that the impossible really is just that, 
the beautiful really are just that, 
and inside I'm just that

so wake up all you magazine covers, look up and take notice all you trend setters, 
stuck up, rich bitch, fake ass, wanna be real but gotta fake it fuckers
this... is where the beauty is

~Shery Lore
8-1-05

The forgiveness of paper

I always wanted to do spoken word poetry, 
but paper is too forgiving.  
It's so easy to pour onto paper 
what you think, 
how you feel.  
To become what they want... 
expect, hope, fantasize... 
to hear.  

If there is a misspelled word: 
bitterness, anger, frustration, blame... 
there is always the spell check. 

Or if there's a typo: 
misunderstanding, miscommunication, 
misappropriation, miss-everything... 
there is the backspace key.  

And if all else fails, 
and the words are too much: 
too far, too long, so long... 
there's always delete.  
And start again.

Paper is too forgiving, 
I've imagined how it feels: 
scribbled on, removed from, blotted out.  
And then discarded once it's been read, 
or not.  

I mean, how much paper is recycled 
that's never even been touched... 
till it's tossed in the shredder to be 
reshaped, remolded, reconstituted... 
to become something else.  

How many poems are written 
that never even get read.  
At least words spoken out loud 
have a chance if screamed... 
or whispered... 
loud enough, 
to get heard.

Yes, paper is too forgiving.

Sherry Lore
Sept. 2015   

On the Edge of My Soul: An experimental writing exercise

"As a body everyone is single, as a soul never." Hermann Hesse

I’ve always wondered what makes up a soul.  Dr. Duncan McDougal thought it could be quantified into 21 grams.  I can only quantify mine as lonely and dark at times .  I’m trying hard to focus, but the everything around me, including me, is so out of balance that I can’t function properly.  Too much computer, to little humanity.  Too many walls, not enough world.  It’s all a giant hazy perspective that my soul is screaming at me about.  You know, that nagging voice of reason, yearning, hope at the back of your head.  No, not the ones that tell you you’re a failure, you’re pathetic, insignificant, hopeless.  Those are the reflections of all the pain and anguish you’ve gone through.  Ironically, they are usually more of a reflection of others pain, forced and inflicted upon you, as your own.  

I sometimes wonder how much of a mirror the soul really is.  I always imagined it like a reflecting pool.  What you see is partially what is inside but also what is outside, reflected back.  But, instead of being completely separate from everyone else, we’re more of reflecting pools, we reflect and refract all that’s around us; intermingling with the waters around us.  If all we surround ourselves with is ugliness, how do we not start mirroring some of that back.  How do our waters not become tainted.  If we surround ourselves with beauty, how do we not mirror that back, our pools clearer, cleaner and deeper than before.  But for every ugliness, pain, jealousy, doubt... that is put upon us and that we put upon ourselves, our soul becomes marred, tarnished and scratched… polluted, cloudy, shallow; less reflective and interactive, more murky and dark.

So, today, I need to remember to polish my mirror, or... share my water with something beautiful. 

And here you are.       

Poem - Poetry

Here is another older poem done for both written and spoken word... Enjoy!


Poetry
(for spoken word and written)

Words, Thoughts, scenery
nothing but random memory
passion in me
Slippery soliloquy
Sounding possibility, 
chance derived, probably 
I mind it like I find it
Deriving, aligning, designing…  bit by bit
Thrown together, fantasy is what I take, I make
all the words strung together like so many pearls, I break
all the rules and boundaries
Giving me power, and power frees
the mind, my mind, my body, my soul, decrees
That I do what I please, 
with ease...
I tease... the words, the form and find the heart
just one part, 
the start
of the whole, the body, the soul
of sound, its bound
within me I struggle to make it resound
and this is what I found
I finally see, what's deep within me
I'll be... Poetry
and I'm free

by Sherry Lore

Here are some older poems I thought I'd share

I decided to put some of my poems on Hello Poetry and came across a few poems that are older but that I've never posted here before.  Some are angry, some are hopeful, and some are better as spoken word.  Anyway, I thought I'd post a few.  I know no one really reads this anyway, it's mostly just for me, but I hope anyone who does, enjoys and remembers these are words from different time periods of my life.

 ~ Sherry Lore

Dark Forest

The Scar
(I Know... Mommy, Step-Daddy, Boyfriend and Me)

I don't trust myself 
with a razor today
I might slice to fast, 
I might cut too deep
The bruises are all 
I can give myself now 
a consolation 
of my past memories
Self hate made 
into physical reality
I feel the scar 
pulling at me

I feel your fist punching 
into me, 
no sorries or worries, 
just guilt trips and stories
I see your tears, 
I hear your words, 
you've had it hard, 
you've had it rough, 
you've had the whole world 
against you from the start
Men betrayed you, 
women resent you, 
self-pity and loathing medicate you
Like the only one who can feel rage is you, 
like the only one who should feel ok is you
I know your shame, 
But I feel my own,

and run, the floor pounding against my feet
I stumble into the silence of my own private hell

I smell your breath,
aqua velva, cheep wine and beer, 
I hear your slurred screams, 
BITCH, SLUT, WHORE, CUNT 
I feel the flush, the excitement, the fear, 
I see your face, 
a mask of desire, frustration and rage,
empty and scared, 
like an animal starving and caged
and then feel the vibrations of your fists 
punching empty walls too near
I know your shame, I know your pain
But I feel my own,

and fall, from the top floor of my temple in hell... the dream 
where your chased by the unknown, unseen,
Choose - capture or death... 
capture or death...
Death... 
and 
I 
fall

I feel the hands grabbing hold of me, 
molding me, throwing me
I see your face looming over me, 
threateningly
I feel the loneliness seep into me, 
set me free 
You isolate me from what little sanity 
I have left, 
you steal away my soul
You belittle me, cheat on me, break into me, 
violating all I have or control
I know your shame, 
I know your pain, 
I know your blame
But I feel my own,

and I dive, 
into 
myself 
as far 
as
 I
can
looking for the quiet piece 
within me that still 
holds what little self
 I have left

you took it all, 
So... I search for the silence inside

I can feel the knife cut into me, 
hear my pain, feel my screams
I see the scar, over my heart, 
thudding gently in time
so small, a reminder of all I've endured
 for others shame, 
all I've endured 
for others pain, 
all I've endured 
for others blame.

I know their shame, 
their pain, 
their blame, 

I made it my own
A physically manifest, eternal reminder, 
for ever a part of me, 
mine alone
I made my own

Sherry Lore-December 2002

Storm night

Do you know

Do you know how it feels to be 

yelled at

screamed at

bitch slapped

all that

Hiding in a corner praying that it's over

Do you know how it feels to be 

called names 

shameful things

head games

things you can't bear to hear

Do you know how it is to feel

dirty and unclean

terrified, scared, mean

angry enough to scream

fuck you to all the world and fuck you, to you too

Do you know what it is to feel

like the bad words stick to you

running you all through

ripping at the real you

rip and cut and fuck me too

Do you know how much I just need to take a bath

wash away all the mad 

rinse all the sad

scrub all the bad

be careful you don't wash away, too

Sherry Lore-July 2003

A Poem You've Already Seen

I sometimes wonder how different my world would be if I were completely alone.  

Papered skin stretched thin. Like autumn leaves after winter's hands have scraped them clean.  
I am a poem you've already seen.

Dusky dark life of hollowed spaces, 
my body filled with regrets and angry places. 
I am a poem you've already seen

Tears of joy and sadness fill air
a void of soul I expect to be there
but not made whole.
I am a poem you've already seen

Thoughts so primal, urgent passions
Racing, raging, our words... our worlds clashing
but saying, holding, nothing
I am a poem you've already seen

I sometimes wonder how different my world would be if I were completely alone, 
and I wrote the poem you've already seen

-Sherry Lore, March 2015

Winter and the Green

 Winter is such a cold season.  Not just in temperature but in how much else it removes from the world.  It removes not only the warmth, but all of the color, leaving only dull browns, grays and whites.  A monochromatic photo of the world around.  I long for the color of green again.  The pines, yes they are green, but even they have that lusterless hue that is washed in sepia.  

I'm not asking for the garish neon of summer or intense pastel of spring, just the green of warmth, of hope, of a promise that world has not lost it's life just yet, but is waiting to awaken from it's slumber.  And that I too will awake from this slumber... to come alive once more.  

I have whispered green

I have whispered green

The grass so thick and lush like 

velvet upon my bare skin

Prickling, tickling, touching

making its way in

I have whispered green
Into the sun and the forbidden
cracks in the broken asphalt road
Jutting, cutting, strutting
pushing through to the world above

I have whispered green
And broken free to the other side
and the thing that keeps me
rooted, muted, suited
in these too tight places is the earth that keeps me alive

I have whispered green
Sherry Lore 6-21-05

Solstice Meditation 2014

Solstice Meditation 2014

In this time of year, 

everyone holds their breath…

Till the sun rises.

Instead, I say, 

Embrace the darkness

Hear the silence of the world,

Feel the oneness of the universe

In that moment of fear and awe

And hold it dear to you

So we can be ourselves, as we truly are

Stripped bare of the world around,

Without the colors and lights crashing into us,

Pummeling, blinding, our every waking thought

We are so much more than the light and the world around us

We are dreams and hope, we are joys and pains

We are memories and loss, we are life and light unto ourselves...

We are stars in our own right

Reflect and refract upon that darkness,

Enrapture yourself in it...

so you can remember

Who you were and are 

and learn who you want to be

Before that light breaks the sky

and you are pulled

Once more 

into the glaring world

Lost in the light 

of another star

Lonely Swing in the Autumn Twilight

I am waiting for the Spring and hope, warmth and green to sprout again.

New Poem

Soar

Soar,  soar,  rise above it all
Let yourself jump from that cliff
And  feel yourself fall

Fly high above the green leafed branches
Above the concrete,  steel and angry glass masses
Above the pettiness, fear and the pain
Past the anger,  frustration,  you,  me, and blame

And soar,  soar,  rise above it all
Let yourself jump from that cliff
And feel yourself fall
Like the fool you have been...
Ignorance is bliss
Blind to the acts that bring about consequence
Thinking the world revolves around you
Acting like there is nothing more you can do

But soar,  soar,  rise above it all
Let yourself jump from that cliff
And fall
Then hit at the bottom  till you find your own wings
Funny how life's hardships bring about change
Evolving,  revolving, surrounding ourselves in the misery...
life's history...
of everyone else

Till we soar, soar,  rise above it all
Jumping from that cliff is just our chance
To fall... then soar

~Sherry Lore
December 2014

Qualities of True Compassion

This is another writing assignment done a couple of years ago exploring what compassion means to me.  After rereading it more recently I've wondered again about the true meaning of it and how we each show it to one another and, most importantly and often forgotten, to ourselves.  

True Compassion: The Pinocchio Experience

I think compassion is a quality that is both taught and experienced; changing with time, age and self. When I was a child, like most little girls, I was expected to play with dolls, a metaphor for life and self if ever there was one. Now, some of my first dolls that I remember my aunt gave to me. A Raggedy Ann and Andy set of dolls that had cute gingham clothes that came off of them so you could learn to tie the bow of the apron or zip the zipper or button the buttons on them, very educational and fun, kinda like her. And, if you took off all of their clothes, they had a perfect red heart where there heart was supposed to be. For some reason that was the coolest thing, their maker giving these dolls a heart, something only a real girl or boy would have. I think these were some of my favorite toys that were ever given to me as a child. My aunt always did seem to know what I’d like. Even with cut off yarn hair and colored on fabric skin, I loved those dolls unconditionally. But, like many things, they got lost in the shuffle of growing up and moving to and fro and were lost, first Andy and then Ann.

My Grandmother gave me the next doll I remember well, a baby doll that I kept at her house. A simple, soft and cuddly one that came in swaddling and drank from ever emptying and replenishing baby bottles. No bells or whistles came with this baby doll, but the bottles were cool and my grandma even gave me a dress for it she bought at the church bazaar. It was an ugly bright green hand knitted thing that smelled like Tupperware. I both loved and hated that doll because it reminded me of my grandma, with her seemingly ever replenishing cookie jar and soft cuddliness mixed with a home spun, kitsch flair, but in a baby doll form. Sadly, by this age, I could never get passed the dress.

But the doll that affected me the most was one my mother gave to me. I think I was five or six when my mother bought for me the latest thing, the most expensive baby doll that both walked and talked. The ultimate Christmas present if ever there should have been. No mothering necessary for this hard plastic, batteries not included, not so cuddly baby doll. Just stand her up and watch her go according to the shiny, new packaging. So, after supplying her with batteries we went to try her out. My mother seemed so proud of this gift and I had high hopes because it seemed to make her so happy. I always wondered if it was the fact that the doll was supposed to be self sufficient and already came pre-trained that that was what my mother loved about this gift or if it was the fact that it cost a lot and was popular that made her think it was going to be perfect for me.

After setting the baby doll down on the floor and turning her on, she would take a couple of wobbly steps with her arms outstretched and then a hollow sounding recorded, “Mamma,” would be uttered from her non-moving lips. Perfect, in my mother’s eyes until, ironically, after those first couple of steps, my mother’s doll would inevitably fall down but creepily keep moving her legs, crying for “Mamma” never knowing or understanding that she’d fallen. After it did that time after time my mother was so frustrated, she ended up taking it back to the store and getting a refund. I remember feeling sad for that broken doll, never able to walk without falling. I think that was the first time I remember feeling compassion so strongly for something, first for the doll who would always stumble and not be able to pick herself up again, and then for my mother who seemed so upset and embarrassed that her shiny new gift for me just wouldn't work like it was supposed to. That experience changed me somehow in both scary and lovely ways. After that, I never looked at dolls the same way again.

As for myself, after saving up my money from birthday cards and Christmas checks, I bought myself what I thought was the creme de la creme of girly dolls: a Barbie. A fully grown up, completely independent doll that had tons of accessories and her own car and penthouse to boot (all sold separately of course). I loved my Barbie, with her long hair and perfect smile. You’d think that a brand new doll with tons of accessories would make me happy, and it did for a long time. But, after a while, ironically it wasn't the fancy newer Barbies that held their sway with me, it was the broken ones that I liked the most.

My Barbies, and I had a few of them, were as abused and tortured as any child’s dolls that are truly loved. They were the subject of hair cutting experiments (I swear I was just trying to give her the Sabrina bob off of Charlie’s Angels), broken chewed on legs (the result of misplaced kitty aggression), dislocated arms (an experiment to see how she was put together), and random tattoos of permanent markers and pens (I was bored and thought new makeup would do her some good). But instead of abandoning these broken dolls for new ones, I think my previous experience with the baby doll who couldn't walk changed my view and priorities on the subject. I felt sorry for them so I would try to fix them, help them. Or, maybe, I just felt guilty for having broken them in the first place, I don’t know.

My first acts of true compassion as a child may have been towards these inanimate, pathetic creatures of imagination. I bought an accessory pack that had both wigs and boots in it so as to fix the balding Barbie as well as the Barbie with the chomped on leg (it’s amazing what a pair of knee high boots will cover up and help with). I traded some shoes and an outfit for an arm from a friend who wasn't as in to “saving” her Barbies and had a completely ravaged one but with the correct arm still intact. You could tell I already had aspirations of being a doctor by this point because of the elaborate “operation” I held for her. The fact that the arm was a little off in color was inconsequential and was gotten around the same way I got around the permanent markers and pen marks. I made them superheroes by stealing my mother’s old eye makeup and completely coloring them blue as though they weren't human, but some half alien being turned super hero that made looking weird and exotic okay. It was an imaginative solution to a problem that I think was more in my head than in reality. But that was how I dealt with life back then, if it wasn't perfect looking, fake it or come up with some other plausible explanation as to why it was just as good if not better than the norm.

I thought I was being compassionate for these poor, abused, sometimes neglected dolls. And at that stage of life, I think I was. I didn't expect anything back from them, so I wasn't looking for something in return other than toys to play with once more. I used this line of reasoning later in life as well. If someone was hurt, I’d help them. If someone was being made fun of or yelled at, I’d stand up for them. To be honest, in part, I did this because I thought I might get something out of it, whether it was a new friend or just to feel better about myself, but ultimately I don’t know if I always thought about it at all. I just did it, because that was the right thing to do. I was much better at being compassionate with others rather than myself. So much so, I think my friendships have always seemed to be filled with characters from the island of misfit toys rather than seemingly normal people, and I still the unlucky reindeer who never had a redeemable nose to work with. I never tried to change my friends, just to help them when they needed it. If only I could have been that compassionate with myself.

I think, growing up, I tried so hard to not think about what I was going through, I became one of my own dolls, always “fixed” to look okay or seem better or unbroken. To some extent, I've still kept that unfortunate practice going to this day. Not all of us should be the tortured Pinocchio, striving to be “real” boys and girls, sometimes being who we are, doll or not is okay, too.

Until well into adulthood, never did it cross my mind that the ultimate form of compassion I could have had for my broken dolls, or for myself, was acceptance, and that by trying to fix them, I was actually doing them a disservice, and limiting them and myself to a set of standards that could never be met. Nor should I have assumed that anything should, could or would be gained or lost by my actions. Just that the act itself is the point, nothing more and nothing less. That connection between without conditions is sometimes all that is needed for true compassion. Now, that doesn't mean that if I see a doll that is broken or fallen, I shouldn't help it, it just means I should do so without expectation or without preconceived notions about what is broken and what is fixed. And that sometimes the best thing I can do for a “broken” doll is to just let it be broken, because what is “broken” is okay, too.

I Am Divine

Goddess In Violet
by Sherry Lore

It's been a while since I posted anything. I kind of lost my self and my sense of hope... Pandora's box open and empty for a while. So,I thought I'd try again, mostly for my current self, a little bit for the lost part of me, trying to find my way back from the empty box.

The Following essay came from a discussion I had a few year ago after a long session of therapy. After talking about feeling lost even after being in my new home for years, I found that I wasn't just physically and emotionally lost, I was spiritually lost as well. So, in response, my therapist asked me to write about what divinity was to me.  

As is in my nature, I took what was supposed to be a simple assignment of a paragraph or two about what I thought divinity was and made it into something more akin to a map. Perhaps I could find some clue as to where to go if I figured out where I'd been. A fortune cookie if ever I heard one.

The Divine Within

I’m not sure what specifically makes me, or any other, divine.  This has always been a tough concept for me.  My scientific mind trying to reconcile with my spiritual soul has been a difficult thing.  We are all made up of atoms, which combine to make proteins, which string together to make up DNA, which is the blueprint for our being.  This I know and understand.  How those atoms came together, becoming proteins and DNA and eventually us, or me, is quite another.  That speaks of something divine...  

Now, here’s where it all gets fuzzy for me.  My search for the divine has taken me many directions.  I've read parts of the Bible, the Quran, the Torah, the Bhagavad Gita, the Upanishads, teachings of Buddhism (everything from Theravedic to Tibetan), the Tao Te Ching, some Confucian writings and some Shinto teachings.  I've been to formal Catholic high mass to Southern Baptist fire and brimstone sermons, from Evangelical prayer circles to having at least read the pamphlet version of the good book of Mormon.  Most believed there had to be an outside source and only they had a direct connection to it.  Others believed there was no source, there was no connection there wasn't even a tangible reality and that it was either the consciousness or the journey of said consciousness that held the truth.  Okay, at least in a theoretical way I might buy that, but it still didn't take into account that intrinsic place that the Universe and the tangible held for me.  

After a while I think I felt like Goldilocks. Nothing fit, everything was either too short or tall, too hot or cold, too hard or soft and with something as personal as my eternal soul or whether or not I even had one I was looking for just right.  

And then came Wicca, which came closest to just right for a long time. There was both masculine and feminine power, there was nature and it was both without and within.  But in some ways it wasn't enough, or maybe it was too much, I don’t know.  I think after a few years when my concept of God and Goddess, Lord and Lady became more and more abstract and my idea of magic dealt less with will and power of my own energies over or with permission of  the external energies of the rest of the universe and more with the interconnection of all, I became disillusioned with all forms of formal, or at least semi-formal, religion.  So, I decided that my subscribing to a specific form had done me a disservice.  What I had been truly seeking all along was my own spirit.  A spirituality without definition, without limits, without rules and without dogma, but with full blessing and permission from the only thing I had left:  me.  

I give myself permission to be divine, not limiting myself by other people’s dogma and to create an ever changing and evolving version of my own spirituality. So far I have a hand full of truths to hold on to...  A truth that because everything in the universe is made up of energy, atoms, protons, neutrons, electrons and so forth... the Universe’s building blocks... and it all shares and interacts with each other, giving and taking pieces of itself on a regular basis, a giant cosmic dance that creates all, and we are all a part of this dance, we are all, thus, divine.

Another truth, or natural law in this case, is that everything I do affects everything around me and vice versa. Cause and effect in both a physical reality and spirituality.  What we put out comes back to us. Now, the degree to which this truth is true, is subject to debate.  In Wicca it is threefold, in Hindi and Buddhism (and a few others) it’s a karmic law that is dependent on outside sources or inside sources and has a lot of quid pro quos to it, dependent on repayment of said actions either in this life or the next.   For Wiccans it’s sometimes a literal threefold concept or can be a theoretical threefold, i.e. mind, body and spirit concept (this one is closest for me).  For other traditions there are various texts and/or God(s) involved and it all goes back to someone else having said it is this way or that way and that’s the way it is, which comes into direct conflict with my final truth... there is no absolute truth.  Just when I think I have it figured out, something new comes about to change my view.  Some call this evolution, others call this the path to enlightenment.  I call it just another step in the dance of the universe or maybe just a misstep depending on my daily view.  A constantly changing, ever evolving view of reality that sometimes takes a wrong turn at Albuquerque.   

What/who came up with the specific blueprint for the Universe itself or whether there even is a specific blueprint, I don’t know and I’m not sure I want to. Some mysteries are better left that way or would be lost, as much of religion seems to be, in translation.   But that doesn't mean I’m separate from it or that IT isn't as much a part of me as I am a part of the whole.  Thus, I am divine.