B.H.H. Burns

Living in a ghost town.

Haunted by the spectres
of other people’s sins.

On all sides hemmed in.

Still caught by the fetters
that had kept me down –
That had taught me to feel
I was imaginary,
And no more than a spectre,
A shade in your shadow,
A waste of a wraith, so
unfit to be seen.

But now I know.

I must let go of Limbo,
Break free from Hades, and
return to the real world
Where I can once again grow,
Flourish and show
the beauty that flows all through me.
(Inspired by #MadVerse Prompt ‘We Are Dust And Shadow’)

These antipathetic pedants
choose to spew their spurious life lessons
in fitfully furious successions
of tweets, streaked with weak expletives.

These pixilated pipsqueaks seek to speak
with such a dearth of tact, that
(added to their aversion to fact)
it serves merely to render their weirdly
distended versions of the truth
as truly foolish and uncouth
(and quite profusely useless too)
as time and logic always prove.

So these masters of glasshouses
waste away their days espousing lies
whilst sitting safely behind their lines
of glittering, brittle screens;
Where, encased in anonymity,
they belittle better people’s dreams
as, bit-by-bit, they whittle down
their victim’s self-esteem.

And yet, these crown princes of pedantry
(and princesses of incessant jealousy)
altogether fail to see
that their faulty, paltry, pathetic polemic
is endemic to their species;
The one now known (if truth be told)
as the ruthless, toothless
troll.
(Inspired by #microprompt ‘Web’)

Dig down deep, my darling,
Burrow through your buried sorrow,
Drill and prize through those fossilized
dreams, and prayers, those layers
of sentiment like sediment,
That form such firm impediments
to your deep-dwelling goal.

For there within your core
you hold the goldmine of your soul,
A place laid to waste with silt,
Obscured by other people’s guilt,
Yet underneath their lies, still filled
with ore of purest Hope.

So dig down deep, my darling,
And find the greatest gift of all
which, whether it be big or small,
Is yours to own – and yours alone;
There’s no way that they can take it,
Nor buy or sell, steal or break it,
For Hope is gold only your soul keeps –
So dig down, darling, dig down deep.

Tonight, my dreams float like driftwood.
Like flotsam from an empty wreck,
Whose shredded sails slap, flap and flail
like dying fish caught in a net;
Such do my dreams now seem to me.

Tonight, Hope flies on broken wings.
Besieged by Fate’s four fickle winds
blowing hot and cold and high and low
in a storm so unremitting,
Hope can only admit defeat.

So perhaps, for tonight, all is lost.
In the dark, my dreams seem shrouded;
Hope cloaked and conviction clouded
by this darkness that surrounds me,
And confounds my clarity.

So I must just hold on til dawn.
Because I know when light returns,
My eyes will yearn to readjust;
My soul will seek enlightenment, as
my mind mind becomes cognizant
of my ability to cope
with all life throws at me.
(Inspired by #MadVerse prompt We Never Sleep/We Want To Live)

Two types of sticks –
but both will rot your gums;
One’s for sweet-toothed addicts
to pick with sticky thumbs,
The other’s for fidgety digits
as yellow as the sun,
But both will drag you down
the more you suck them up,
It’s just a case
of whether you waste
your liver or your lungs.
(Inspired by #bstarverse prompt Cigarettes and Candy)

I am of finite matter;
My physical strength comes
from my sinews and flesh.

My wrists can be restrained
my energy drained
and my form constrained.

But my soul is my own;
And it can never be stolen,
suborned or owned.
(Inspired by #MadVerse prompt Never Get Enough)

This is the beginning and the end.
This is the journey and the destination.
This is a finite point that replicates infinitely.

Within this exists all that you can truly know,
All that you can truly remember, and
all that you can truly believe.

This is your time.
This is your life.

Don’t waste it.
(Inspired by #microprompt ‘This’)

You may think you still control me,
You may think that you still own me –
But there’s something you should know.

I was never your possession,
I was only your obsession,
And the more that you suppressed me
the lesser grew your hold.

So stop clawing at my shadow.
Stop trying to keep your choke-hold, and

let me breathe,
And be my own soul,
For it’s time you let me go.

(Inspired by #microprompt ‘Go’)

The problem, you see, with this life of mine
Is it’s bloody challenging all the time,
Nothing follows the routes I’ve designed,
It’s like trying to turn water into wine –
Which (now I mention it) I wouldn’t mind,
In fact, that’d actually be just fine,
Cause though my woes wouldn’t be redefined,
At least I’d be splendidly drunk all the time.

If Cthulu comes for tea,
Don’t serve him calamari
For I’m sure you’ll quickly find
He’s not that way inclined –
in fact, if I were you
I’d leave off the sushi too
or he might loose his noodle
and use his chopsticks to do
something gruesome to you.
(Inspired by #microprompt ‘Find’)

Flattery does not soothe the soul;
It merely embalms a wounded ego.
One needs a more absorbing lotion
to mend the rends of intense emotions.
(Inspired by #TLPoetry prompt ‘Lotion’)

Your imagination
is what transforms
the impossible into
the improbable.

And your determination
is what will turn
the improbable into
the norm.
(Inspired by #DimpleVerse prompt ‘Impossible’)

Dear TARDIS, quo vadis
in such a hurry?
You’ll upset the equilibrium
in the space-time continuum,
And give me a dicky tum –
So just take it easy!

Our love is like a Russian doll
Or perhaps it’s like a Tardis,
For it seems that the deeper that we go,
The greater it is from where we started.
(Inspired by #IntrigueVerse Prompt ‘I Carry Your Heart With Me’)

They say beauty lies
in the eyes of the beholder…
But –
That which you can’t see
can be far bolder,
And more alluring
than the blurred and erring
surface of that person
would have you believe.
(Inspired by #DimpleVerse prompt Unknown Depths)

Sometimes, it seems
as though my dreams
are like whale song;
a long, melancholy sound
that drifts around
my mind,
Desperately
trying to find
a way home.
(Inspired by #lionsighs prompt Mind’s Deep Ocean)

Easy come and easy go;
Just let the inspiration flow,
It makes no difference where it goes –
What it discovers, what it shows,
What it’s flux may juxtapose,
If it’s discourse overflows
and forces your thoughts into prose,
Just follow where the story goes
and let your ideas flow.
(Inspired by #MadVerse prompt ‘Easy Come And Easy Go’)

The summer surf swishes against the shore
like a flowing calico dress,
That ripples and rustles in frothy ruffles with
a breezy weightlessness.

The waves slip and sweep like satin-shod feet
that gracefully race ‘cross the sand,
Til the tide turns around, and the tempo dies down
as peace takes her seat ‘pon the land.
(Inspired by #lionsighes prompt ‘Dance against The Shore’)