My skin caught on fire at the touch of your lips

The warm tender skin of which love drips,

The sensation you give is fire and ice,

This is too good to be true there must be a price.

Your hand brushes my cheek and your eyes seem to shine,

If only this moment could last a life time,

With another kiss I sink a little more,

My heart screams, my heart yells, my heart roars.

Your hand slides down my side and around to my lower back,

And every time you do it my mind wanders off track,

I wander so far, I get lost in a jungle,

I tangle around you like a vine, without trouble.

I love you so much and you love me

Sometimes I wonder 'could a stronger love be?'

Of course one cannot because although our love is a mess

Our mess called love is surprisingly a success.

You and I go together like the moon and the sun

I am the bullets and you are the gun,

You kiss me once more and a fire burns again

And underneath the surface burns a love that will never end.

And so I carry

What's left

Of who I am

Of a life

Thus far

All that I am

By straps tight to my shoulders

The weight of which

Always pressing

So I reassess

Continually

Who I am

Prioritize

And shed pieces of myself

That I can't carry any further

And never look back

At ideas with outstretched arms

Abandoned

Though I still covet

The best made plans

Morph

Into burdens

When the path is this long

Pressing forward

I know I am lost

Perhaps by intention

Or anxiety

Of being found

And forced

To walk my path

Of best made plans

Does anyone have an idea as to why The Prose FB page has been archived and its status changed from Public to Secret? I see we will no longer be able to post, comment, like, share, etc. Is this becoming some kind of a secret club instead of the inclusive forum we've all believed it to be? This concerns me greatly.

when all the words

I've chiseled out of myself,

break the surface of flesh,

and I bleed out the blackened scabs,

I'll stand naked in the light,

and look down

on my shotgun-shadow,

and see myself for the first time

in a mirror made of dirt.

and I will build a rake made from the bones

of empty pens to scratch the itch

of phantom phrases,

ones cut off long ago,

before I really knew how to use them.

and I will erase my ink with flame,

and filter the fumes through myself

in one final attempt to say it all

in signals of smoke that rise up

until sunrise smells like death

and looks like the silhouette

lying on the ground before me.

There was a crooked man

With crooked little hands

Elected to a crooked office

Where justice no longer stands

In his crooked little mind

He had a crooked thought

On how to line his crooked pockets

In a way he won't be caught

This crooked man with little hands

Had crooked dreams of grandeur

Addicted to grasping for ultimate power

He was also a pee voyeur

This crooked man had a crooked mind

With crooked greedy aspirations

With thoughts of gold covered Mar-a-Largo

Where he took his weekend golf vacations

A crooked government was formed

Led by a crooked crony named Bannon

Because the crooked man with crooked thoughts

Was too much of a loose cannon

Appointing other crooked men

This crooked man built his throne

Moved in from his Manhattan tower

The White House was now his home

Replacing all the colors of red white and blue

With the color he loved of gold

Honesty and integrity now for sale

The government to be bought and sold

With each branch of government in their pockets

Checks and Balances don't work very well

Runaway greed fleecing the poor

A government gone to hell

The destruction of democracy

Replaced with an autocracy

Leading with his crooked cronies

A banana republic in infancy

Just what would our forefathers think

Of this leadership today

They would be spinning in their graves

Much to their dismay

(c) BAM

A poets ponders what to do

With pen in-hand he weeps

Words and phrases passing through

Determine what lines he keeps

From a sad and lonely table

Working feverishly and alone

A poets dreams and hopes are dashed

As spelled out through his tome

In a tenement house he ponders

His small room bare and cold

A stack of poems unpublished

Gathering dust and growing mold

Yet the poet is undaunted

His writing is what keeps him sane

Poetry keeps his mind off hunger

The hunger pains they tame

He wonders in his loneliness

If he is really alone

Accompanied by his writings

In this sad place he calls home

In quiet desperation

The poet slowly rises from his chair

Shuffles over to the window sill

Looking out to only stare

Tears run from his reddened eyes

It's a struggle just to stay alive

When he gives in to the temptation

Taking now that final dive

(c) BAM

I first met Charlie,

When we were just five,

What I loved about him,

Was he was always so alive,

He said, "Let's be spiders,

You can play on my web!"

So I called him "Charlie-the-Spider"

Yes, that's what we said,

We became friends-for-life,

Charlie-the-Spider and I,

Till our childhood adventures,

Were just memories by-and-by,

As we grew into manhood,

We both took a wife,

Who became the closest of friends,

For the rest of their life,

When our spouses gave birth,

We were there for each other,

Sharing our joys,

And our sorrows together,

This web we had woven,

Since we were just five,

Was an enduring friendship,

That continued to thrive,

It was one summer day,

That I got the call,

Charlie-the-spider,

Had taken a fall,

He's in hospital now,

Was what I was told,

In the Intensive Care Unit,

My heart it grew cold,

"Is there anything I can do?"

I asked, reaching out to his wife,

"Please, come here quickly."

Her voice trembled with strife.

I rushed to the hospital,

And into his room,

There were IV's and equipment,

And a deep sense of gloom,

There at his side,

Was his dear loving spouse,

Silently weeping,

Quiet as a mouse,

He's on life-support now,

She said, with tears welling,

They don't think he will make it,

The doctors were telling,

He slipped peacefully into a coma,

She explained, with trembling lip,

He never regained consciousness,

She softly quipped,

How could this happen?

She asked, crying on my shoulder,

I don't have the answer,

Was all that I told her,

They said he was brain dead,

In a vegetative state,

They want to remove life-support,

There's no reason to wait,

So as we all gathered round,

When they went to pulled the plug,

We each took our turn,

To give our final hug,

The minutes turned to hours,

Our death vigil not broken,

Waiting to release his grasp on life,

Those words remained unspoken,

Finally that moment came,

And much to our surprise,

Our dear friend Charlie-the-spider,

Slowly opened up his eyes,

He fixed his gaze on each of us,

And held us in his stare,

Although the doctors said it was impossible,

That he couldn't be aware,

Then Charlie seemed to struggle,

To take one final breath,

The moment of reckoning was at-hand,

The moment of his death,

Then a change occurred quite suddenly,

His face turned cherry red,

Then to blue, then to white,

We knew Charlie was dead,

Then the physician in attendance,

Went to whisk the empty shell away,

Charlie is an organ donor you know,

Or so his records say,

There's a woman in Poughkeepsie ,

Who is waiting for a heart,

His liver will save another life,

But that is just the start,

His eyes will go to Syracuse,

To help a blind girl see,

His kidneys will help two others,

So they can finally pee,

Thats really just the beginning,

He was healthy until the end,

His tissues will help others,

And put them on-the-mend,

Those gossamer threads of Charlie's life,

Has cast out many strands,

Charlie will live through others,

Though they may be in other lands,

His remains will go to science,

Where physicians get their start,

Through him many lives he'll save,

Charlie's really has done his part,

The web of life is highly complex,

Touching lives uncounted,

Though that gossamer web that holds us together,

Even in death Charlie won't be uncounted.

(c) BAM

At birth winners and losers don't matter.

in death winners and losers lie abreast...

you came to life aloud with a sweet sob,

your hands cupping an array of rainbows.

you held your mother's bosom and a

lineage dating back to Eve thus affixed.

like a bulbous floweret you blossomed.

now your eyes have slashed and hacked

things once gold; molested rudely by pain.

you grovel clawing your face, two mirrors 

have cracked in the wake of your burdens.

there's a long brook of tears flowing between

black banks of molten mascara at the corners 

of your eyes; cold creature woncha cheer!

heard your laden voice bid your own death, 

your soft orison at the altar suffused the pews.

all monks grew pale, what a scourge to bear!

awful trumpeting thoughts of wrecking passion,

your face always wet like dew on the aeridinae,

applied rouge to your anguish, yet all the more

cracks display in your woebegone countenance.

at birth winners and losers don't matter

in death winners and losers lie abreast...

spring out of this burdened flesh, you can.

bring back your laughter, start a fresh slate.

reach out your hand; supposing your pain

is a battle indeed worth winning. time is at 

hand to restore the soul to its former purity.

it’s a game of balance

toe to heel on a fraying tightrope

chin up, nose to the sky

scared, shivering

ankles quivering

be it that the daintiest darling dove

may dare to settle on your shoulder

and you tilt, off-kilter

but her song can halt the winds

perchance you leap

to land on a cloud

and lounge in its pearly embrace, proud

or you fall through it

snatching desperately at gauzy filaments

it dissolves

like cruel cotton candy

and the next one

reaches out with tender palms

to receive you as you plunge

but with not a flutter of the eye

you soar once again and

return to square one or square

eight, if all squares are one

and you perch, nearly hovering; bound

to teeter and trip

or stagger and slip

and yet you continue

ever enduring

merely mustering the courage to cope

always arriving back at the tightrope

and with a sweeping glance you see

the rest of us danglers

perched on knotted threads spanning the sky

some seek exit

but there is nothing else

and some of us

flirt with the edge

tipped forward

arms up and out

wings waiting to unfold

slanted backs and slanted smiles

unafraid to fall or to fly