The Cartography of Skin

photo credit: my bloody valentine via photopin (license)

A tattoo of scars
Draws a map of how I’ve sinned.
It shows the route that I have travelled
In my journey on Earth, from birth until today.
Continents drawn contain the highest peaks
Where eagles dwell, then swoop down into
Vast valleys of despair lit only by lights absence.
There are islands of love here and there
Set adrift on barren seas.
While monsters lurk beneath the waves
As ocean tides rise and fall
With the pulsing of my heart.
With this tattoo of scars
I travel; on a path mapped by
This cartography of skin.

© 2017 | Frank Regan, All rights reserved

Originally Published 5 January 2016

Vagabonds

photo credit: haslo 324/365: Sunset Colors via photopin (license)

We were behaving like outlaws
Way out on the edge –
We’d lost all sense, all control
In the silence. In the dark –
No one to see our crimes,
The self-delusions denied.
We were lost souls
Set adrift far from the shore.
The unknown soldiers wandering far.
 
© 2017 | Frank Regan, All rights reserved.

Chasms

photo credit: Graeme Pow Helical Staircase via photopin (license)

There is a gap in this virtual life.
A black hole in the centre of perfection,
An absence in the heart of my world.
And perhaps this shadow, is for your silhouette to fill.
Or perhaps it is for teardrops and stardust instead.
Maybe the void gets filled by the journey.
Maybe this nothing needs to get broken. Reshaped. Reborn.
Perhaps it gets forged by the fire.
A burning passion, assuaged, a million one-nights.
But at times when I listen in silence
Or forget the worries and just laugh.
Forget my worries and let go.
SCREAMING out at the top of my lungs!
And wondering if it is not in the spaces instead,
Those gaps themselves, that are making me whole.

 

© 2016 | Frank Regan, All rights reserved.

The Cartography of Skin

Day 6 of my review and a poem about the journey.

Made of sticks and stones

photo credit: my bloody valentine via photopin(license)

A tattoo of scars
Draws a map of how I’ve sinned.
It shows the route that I have travelled
In my journey on Earth, from birth until today.
Continents drawn contain the highest peaks
Where eagles dwell, then swoop down into
Vast valleys of despair lit only by lights absence.
There are islands of love here and there
Set adrift on barren seas.
While monsters lurk beneath the waves
As ocean tides rise and fall
With the pulsing of my heart.
With this tattoo of scars
I travel; on a path mapped by
This cartography of skin.

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Sadness (Summertime)

photo credit: dead red via photopin (license)

Clouds,
Gathering of tears,
Obscuring
Obsidian, shroud of feeling
Keeping us apart,
That sun and I.

Pathways,
In shadow hides the fear.
Serpent,
Scarlet warning
Of the dangers.
Between the sun and I

Burdens.
The weight I bear,
Dread
Darkness waiting.
Shunned by the light
In the setting of the sun.
 
© 2016 | Frank Regan, All rights reserved.

Otherways

photo credit: Unheard / Unseen via photopin (license)

I travelled the world
But I missed the sights and signs
Outside the window.

Closed my eyes, looked away
And never went back again.
 
© 2016 | Frank Regan, All rights reserved.

What Happiness Means to Me

photo credit: F is for Flight – Flight of the Valentines via photopin (license)

It is an illusion
But then so much is these days.
…
A journey,
Not a destination.
…
Because you’ll find it
Where you don’t expect it.
In the little stops
Scattered like raindrops
Off the path
And out of your way.

© 2016 | Frank Regan, All rights reserved.