Haiku

My feet hurt.
Pink sky, tired clouds
Sun, bed, love

Poetry by J-Ray

Angels, Daemons, and Giants


Giants are ordinary men
But will the world remember them as angels?
Or Daemons?

There are those who strive to do good
To do the best job they can
To do what they believe is right.
Few in number,
Their wings concealed
And wielding great power
Empowered by those they are sworn to serve
With no written obligation at all.

These human angels
Were once ordinary men.
None were born to shake the earth
They hat to find the tremors within themselves,
Like a treasure that is steadily unearthed with each shovelful taken away,
The trove within the hearts of men grows as they dig deeper.
Many of their shovels are named
Gumption, says one.
Chutzpah, says another.
Determination says a third
And Will, says a fourth.

The toils of the outside world are trivial
But their battle within the earth with a spade
Will last a lifetime.
There are also daemons
Who work the same earth.
Their horns are concealed,
And though few in number,
They swell by making slaves of lesser men.
The bearers of malice are powered too by those they swear to serve
So that they may serve only themselves.

Small wonder it is when they dig in the earth
With spades named strife
Greed,
And death
They can dig to find their treasure more quickly than others
But they find themselves wanting more
Never satisfied with small heads of Caesar
Or old pirates dubloons.
They toss them away with the dirt.
They man digging next to him cries out in anguish
But rejoices when he finds his fortunes have multiplied.

Some men dig forever
Hitting rocks that destroy their shovels
Excavating until their hands are blistered,
Their backs stooped.
Still, they find nothing.
But in the deepest crevasse of that which bore us
These men will find the greatest reward.

At times when men become frustrated
And their grip on the spade of greed becomes so tight
Their spade becomes a sword
And their horns are revealed
As this man the daemon threatens his neighbour.
His neighbour with only a shovel named Will.
A tail lashes and eyes burn with rage
As the daemon demands his treasure
For the daemon is poor
Having passed up what wealth of treasure he had
Looking for something that wasn't there.

The man with a shovel named Will refuses
So spade and sword are unleashed.
Sparks fly and dirt is thrown
As blood is spilt
By the man with the sword.
A shovel named Will lunges left and right
Protecting those around him from being bloodied
The angel receives cuts of his own in reward.

In the end, the shovel named Will gives of his master
All that he has to give.
But the people he protects
Become better for it.

For the daemon finds himself without wealth
Because not evil men, but the world at large receives the riches of angels
And the blood spilt by daemons
While daemons inherit the riches of none.

Giants are ordinary men with spades
Purchased with blood
Or gold.
And it is by this that they leave behind
That the world remembers giants as angels
Or daemons.

Poetry by J-Ray

Literary Ambiance

A sea of heads at eye level
With philosopher kings humbly sitting in creaky chairs
In an old ibrary
Or a new one, I 'm not sure
There's not ill effect on the mysticism by the fluorescent lights above.

Children gather around old souls
Or young, depending on perspective
And wisdom flows like milk and honey
While the audience loses themselves in time and space

There's a feeling of tempered ambiguity
And you get this off and on feeling of wanting to speak
Express
Or divulge
But you restrain yourself
Just to keep the seemingly fragile moment intact
When it is in fact rock solid

Inspiration, grooviness and funk pulse around
Beating in time with the rhythm
Of the hearts of the philosopher kings
While souls ebb, wax, wane, and sing
In a deep, dark, infused silence of richness.

Then the bell rings
And a harsh unseen light causes the listeners to squint
Shake their heads
Trying to clutch at the memory of the moment

Some do
Some don't
But they all hunger for when the dense, deep darkness of literature
Will come into their spirits again

To put a log on the fire that is their self
That it may burn slow and hot
For a long
Long
Time.