PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

June 12th came and went yesterday…I imagine to most people it was just another date.

But like birthdays, anniversaries and holidays it’s a day we should all celebrate.

This day’s history began in Virginia with Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving who fell in love and thought it would be great to marry and spend their life together…but this was 1958.

Back then it was against the law in Virginia for them to marry…Yes, Virginia law said they didn’t have the right…because Mildred…well she was black…and Richard…he was white.

So they got married in Washington D.C…you see…it was legal over there…but when they returned to Virginia they were arrested…and knowing it wasn’t fair…

they pleaded their case to a judge in Virginia…alas…to no avail…the judge found them guilty and sentenced them to spend the next three years in jail.

But the judge did give them a choice…which wan’t as just as it appears…they could serve their three years in jail…or leave Virginia for 25 years.

Given the choice of imprisonment or banishment it wasn’t hard to see why Mildred and Richard decided to stay married…and moved to Washington D. C.

Although they were legally married in Washington D. C…legally husband and wife…they missed their families, faced discrimination and wanted a better life.

So Mildred wrote a letter explaining their predicament…their particular point of view…and sent it off to Bobby Kennedy (our Attorney General) who gave it to the ACLU.

The ACLU decided to take up the Loving’s cause and lend the Loving’s their voice…for they believed, as many still do, who we marry and where we live should be every American’s choice.

After a nine year struggle through the courts Mildred and Richard finally had a victory to savor when on June 12, 1967 every Supreme Court Justice decided in their favor.

Which is why June 12th every year I find it appropriate to say…with Mildred and Richard in my heart…Happy Loving Day.

Happy Loving Day…it has such a nice ring to it…let me say it again…Happy Loving Day…the day our Supreme Court decided all Americans can be married…

unless…of course…you were gay.

That day would come on June 26th…it would have been nice if there were only two weeks in between…but the Supreme Court didn’t make that decision…until 2015!

In light of recent decisions…it is more important than ever we celebrate every day as Loving Day…and ensure that this Supreme Court doesn’t take these choices away.

Paper trails troll troubling trends into contempt of the truth.

Discount viscounts will turn a rogue rat to a mouse.

No cheese, just smoke them out.

Blow them away with a flash sale.

Beyond the veil is a marriage of malcontent and a desire to fix.

Every troll has a bridge.

Who will hang who with the rope used to support it?

Will you pay per trail that you choose to follow even if it brings sorrow?

Will you step on old branches and leaves in the forest of tomorrow?

To scuttle as a borrower or play possum?

Stiff as the floorboards that formed your house.

Are you leader or louse?

Docile or doused in gangster or grouch?

Is it a straight fight for what you have inside or what you put out?

Sometimes those with those with the most beef will claim vegan for clout?

Sometimes we claim our walls are full of beauty yet we paint them with doubt.

Then we redecorate them and redecorate them until the paint tinge is all we are

So much more

I don’t think you want me to answer,

if I do you will leave me behind,

you have the world to play and I only have one piano.

I can frame what I feel for you with my fists,

love with only half a hand

when you’re looking down at me.

I can smoke you like I’ll never be sober,

risk it all when I fall apart,

keep half of your serenity.

I can only make your face fall when I answer,

give too much when I’m not enough,

leave you in the sky when I’m standing still.

I could want a road that doesn’t end,

I don’t know what I want, too heavy

when you’re looking down at me.

Tangled

messy

choices

your fingers mend with mine

your lips are my addiction

Can’t help

needing this

more than

I want to walk straight

Too many bridges

we can’t burn them down

we have so much fire

and no gasoline to keep us smoothed over,

we will cross this line

again and again

Tangled

messy

choices

I swallow you like the truth I can’t stop pushing off

If this is selfish

I never want to be selfless again.

Smother me in sanity

I never thought I had,

reach the line I didn’t dare to cross

I can stumble,

loathe this halfway

and still love it like my own,

stand on the ledge and keep myself from leaping

Leave my heart attacks at the door,

I can’t afford them

when I need the nervous,

the beats that sprint when I’m pressed close to you

Sin

ought to be something

this exquisite,

something bitingly sweet when I open my mouth,

something heartwrenching

that makes my heels

pound on the pavement

when you’re standing motionless-

I don’t know how long I can do this

without falling or

pretending to fall.

I used to think the chill in the air pulled at my lungs

and brought out the shivers

but we are warm and tangled,

this blanket is more than enough

and my chest is still icy

when you touch me like that.

if you are here it means I am moving,

I can’t sit still when you keep slipping,

please stay no matter how your temperature rises,

we have a cave to mold our secrets.

yesterday there were

bad decisions shoved under the welcome mat,

today I have unrolled them and swallowed the key,

we can’t get back in,

we are unknown.

you move one hand

up and I disintegrate,

it’s all I can do not to lean back and break down.

you move one hand

to mine and I am collapsing,

somehow you can love me with just your fingertips.

You can fuck me up, you can fuck me down

You can feed my closed mouth to the ground

You can give me light or pitch black sidewalks

But you can’t take back all the lines I’ve crossed

You can tell me exactly what you want me to be

Put words in my mouth and make them a memory

You can take it all back and I won’t refuse

I’ll look at any mirror and still choose you

You can fuck me up, you can fuck me down

You can feed my closed mouth to the ground

You can give me light or pitch black sidewalks

But you can’t take back all the lines I’ve crossed

Holding back and holding out so I can’t face no

Should have started, ended, fell apart so long ago

Maybe is a halfway and it doesn’t need brave

But I need you to ask so we can be saved

You can fuck me up, you can fuck me down

You can feed my closed mouth to the ground

You can give me light or pitch black sidewalks

But you can’t take back all the lines I’ve crossed

You’ve built the reasons for this nocturnal mind

I know you can be a liar but you’re not this kind

So I scrape your smile against all I’ve ever been

Try to find fire with imagination and a pen

Blood runs rivers like some sort of paradise

I can see it on screen, drenched in sacrifice

All your innocence swirling down the drain

It’s okay, looks like you made it through the rain

I’d rather have stories to tell than a clean slate

You can mutter or scream and I’ll still stay up late

I don’t know how we still have things to say

but I’ll listen at dawn and ride this till it breaks

Minds run wild, I can’t see past my scars

I run in so many circles to find where you are

My innocence cracks your silhouette just to mend

It’s okay, looks like I made it to the end

All this innocence is blinding half a heart

Sitting here when we don’t know where to start

Second-guessing, all the stars aligned instead

I’d rather have stories to tell than a promise unsaid

Across the desert the wind storms through. Grains of sand cloud the air, hazing over the endless plain. Tiny in size, they unite to form an obliterating deadly force. They swirl, each in their own direction, but still maintain unanimity. Indistinguishable yet individual. Some grains travel miles with a single gust and others never budge. All are unique, which is to say that none of them are.

Once again the wind storms through. I feel the sand begin to prick the back of my neck. Voyaging through the desert, I must choose my own path. Where will the wind take me?