Jeremy Krach: Poet

There’s a scratch on the wall,

Boring into my skull,

Tearing into my mind,

Driving me out.

I can’t stand it, that scratch,

It’s staring me in the face

With a hateful glance

That makes me uneasy.

I kick and I scream,

But no one will help

I’m alone, with the scratch,

And I can’t even help myself.

I took a bucket with me

Down to the lake,

Full of my flaws and worries.

For awhile I just reveled

In the glory of the place

And eventually I thought on my life’s story.

I spoke with the wind, the fountain, the frogs;

I watched the soft ripples break up the pond;

I thought on my life

And all I had done

And realized I’ve lived both right and wrong.

I took then my bucket

And held it up high,

Proud of these things

Knowing that I

Could pour out my bucket,

Into the pond,

And forget all my worries,

My rights and my wrongs.

So now I’ll return

With my empty bucket

Knowing full well

Where I want to go.

And one day I’ll return

With my heavy bucket

Again to pour out my soul.

The child in green

Hands out a piece

To his peer in red

She carries it down

Over some figurative bridge

Into the realm

Where imagination is.

Then as an assembly

Each kid places his piece

With meaning and purpose

Found only in the hands of a child.

Striding as a team

Their goal is achieved

And they sit down again

In another room with friends

To pursue another creation

Completely their own…

In the hands of a child.

Our Mother,

Who art in nature

Hallowed be thy name

Thy kingdom has come

Yet thy will undone

In cities and soon all the world

Give us this day our daily breathe

And forgive us our footprint

As will forgive those who step on us

Lead us not into destruction

And deliver us from pollution

For thine is the Earth, the laws, and the wonder, forever and ever-

Amen.

For a whole entire year, nightly, I sat here

Composing a few short lines to summarize

All that I had experienced and felt

Throughout the past few hours.

Now I look back on the towers

Of text in graphite built tall,

Touching the sky, as in Babel they tried

To become immortals themselves.

I reminisce the time I spent

Writing and thinking, and the places

That I pursued such goals.

It has been a very long year.

365 days and just as many poems,

Few attaining status worthy of praise,

But nevertheless worth the time.

I used to be so hopelessly romantic,

But nothing ever improved, how tragic!

I kept dreaming for change,

But more of the same was all I got.

I feel I’ve wasted a year sitting here

With only poetry to prove that it passed,

But maybe, just maybe, I can muster

Up the hope to have one last breath

And live the next year as I wished the last.

I didn’t truly achieve my dreams; perhaps

This year will yield a better crop.

All I can do is cross my fingers for good luck.

I surrender my life to fate now,

May it do as it pleases.

I can only pray for a favorable season.

So now, my friends, goodbye at last

This year went by much to fast

I missed it all, so now I’ll go

And try to conquer all my foes.

How does the moon live up there?

In the cold, nothing to wear,

His imperfections dazzling and bare,

For all the judging world to see.

Is he modest or most vain?

Are his tears the cause for rain?

Tears of loneliness and pain

Brought on by isolation’s fee.

Are they tears of joy?

It’s quite possible the hov’ring boy

Found a star to be his coy,

Yet perfect match in heaven.

They could even be tears of laughter,

Brought about shortly after

Viewing the flawless human disaster,

The show that is our daily lives.

And so the moon,

Unseen at noon

Up in his room,

The endless vacuum,

Above our dizzy heads,

Looks down on us

In pity or hate or solidarity,

But yet always responds silently

In tears.

I lick the acid off my shoes

The poisonous rain was eating through

So I needed to slow it down

Or provide it with a better target

I need my shoes to

Where I am going

My tongue- Not so much.

Off I walk

Into the night

Of blazing suns

Spitting fire upon me

Where to now?

The deed is done! I’ve written a poem a day for one full year! Congrats to me! Now I’ll just finish up the month. Then I’ll work on more quality/lengthy/refined poetry and prose. 

A full year of challenges

Has passed me by

I’ve watched them retreat

As the shifting tide

And the new takes their place

So I am left

Without any trace

Of the washed away sand

That once filled my cracks

And now has been shaken out.

There is a bag of bones

On a dusty road

Where nobody goes

Anymore.

I stumbled on down

And then right around

The corner I found

The rotting bag.

I kicked it as hard as I could

And watched it bounce of my foot

Down the bumpy loose dirt

Road it was on.

I approached it with caution,

Heaving with exhaustion,

Because the distance from the junction

In the road was so far.

I slipped out the drawstring

And removed the old king,

Decayed and rusting

Due to his position.

He opened his mouth,

I suppressed a shout,

But nothing aloud

Was uttered at all.

Gravity played its trick,

That’s all there is to it,

Just the inescapable grip

Of the force that pulls you down.

It succeeded with his soul,

But his bones are still cold

And where one can hold

Them up in the physical world.

They will soon be gone,

But don’t be alarmed

It’s just the long

Nature of things.

So I pocket the skull,

The magical hull

Of knowledge and lull

It safely to sleep in the rocking of my steps.

I watched her sleep
And counted her sheep

From a tree out of sight
And out of mind.

I whispered my love

From my place above

And guarded her rest

With compressed yearning.

I wanted to descend

Down into that bed

But knew I could not

Because I was dead.

Well not really dead,

But dead in her head

Because I was forgotten

As if I were dead.

Aren’t we all forgotten one day?

Hopefully, for most, one far away

And so distant you cannot even smell it

On the sweet billowing horizon. 

Where’d it go?

I let it slip.

It fell through the cracks

And I’m left with nothing.

I’m so empty,

With nothing to fill me.

How did I let this happen?

I cannot live with this anymore.

In a crowded room

But still alone

Out of place

In my own home

I could run away

But that’d just cause

More and more problems

For me to solve