Tag Archive: prose


Can you stop it?

 

I can’t breathe. No, I can’t go on. I hope you understand.

My life, with you, is in a paper bag, in-and-out hyperventilation.

 

You can’t find the answers. Let it be—

 

Oh, you agree it’s a riddle, and yet you feign sanity as if the weight won’t crush you like a boysenberry. Splat! Blood and unwillingness everywhere.

 

Look! The shrubbery is green, the flowers are trying desperately to hold-on to Spring, but that blessed time has passed.

The ever-present avoidance. 

Yes, nature, a glorious magic spell. I am aware, but please.

 

Why, because two espressos, and the morning’s black and white print, reading between the lines, makes you self-assured. In the meantime, the sky went grey hiding from a pessimistic interpretation.

 

To the contrary!

The sun called my name, and I was singing its praises.

I was spinning in optimism, about to create seven perfect days ahead.

You, however, toil for whatever tidbits the world feeds you, gullible—a sponge for imaginary gossip.

 

That’s your problem in life, taking it for something it is not intended to be. Dreaming of Eden.

Hard work and planning, I tell you! 

I wish you’d wake-up in the truth far from expectation and madness.  

 

When in the end, the plan of hard work and no pleasure are a tombstone and daisies?
Honestly, I would not die from your silence. Being captive in its daily oppression is overrated.
Do you remember being inquisitive, less stringent?  

 

I recall more space in your voice for reason, less bitterness, long locks of auburn hair that embraced simplicity sweetly, a blade of grass, the vase-center table with tulips.

 

Before I became a victim! A scissor for a tongue, cut-out replicas of a heart,

tore to pieces, and the hardness in bones that struck the core, oh such pain

inflicted by arrogance.


Sorry.

(Black, shark eyes, no emotion. There is no sincerity in apologies). As if I could believe, and even if possible, would no longer want to. This time I will be a bird, courage, soaring into a time that is generous with love, reciprocity, a field that never ends in gratitude, sees me as fragile and simultaneously powerful, then takes me to its heart—a new home.

Unphased. Imagine his silence—

I will clear the gutters before the storm, board the windows, keep nature and life far from us.

I shudder at the earth that never moves inside of him, even on fire. For this, I can always
trust—insipidness, steadfast in the things that hold us secure in mediocrity.

I want to die, at least, in the fever of reckless abandon.

Each step was carved-out in the endless days of years that passed too quickly, and I, waiting, always waiting, for the one thing to save me, lost myself in the process.

I adhered to expectation, stretching only my fingers and toes to brush the excitement of a churning sea or dreaminess of a Marigold. I remained sincere to fear, and the guilt that prevented ever fully submerging and emerging.

I am confident that I could breathe underwater living as I imagine:

Free from solid ground, as a yellowtail fish, a seeking white gull, as salt in waves, and mist in the air, the moon when it rises—the whole majesty, or each star’s wish,

and the glorious sun like an urgent heat that falls onto shoulders embracing a new day.

I want to be who I am unapologetic, free from the memory, delighted in a moment.

 

Maria Pisciotta-DellaPorte ©2020 All Rights Reserved

Fuck you! I didn’t do anything wrong. FUCK YOU!

 

I was fast asleep. Dreaming about details. You know? I wasn’t dreaming about Paris or the Amalfi Coast. No. I was dreaming about a list that I had to write: The shit details of my life…

 

I heard breathing. In the noisy sleep that I was experiencing I heard loud breathing. It was dreadfully close. Someone with his jaw dropped-open and head hung back. An exhausted pulling of air in and out in counts of threes, then a whistling through narrow airways until it gasped for more and saved itself from choking.

 

It was close I tell you. Caterpillars with their sixteen legs crawling upon my skin, I could feel a thick presence—A humid sweat caught by a chilled breeze.

 

As if we were on a train, or that he was at one point, alone. Traveling east through a foggy mountainside. The curves around stirring nausea in his gut from one shot too many of whisky. I could smell it, and sweat through a damp, dark trench coat. So slovenly, and my naval began to pull inward hoping to find the womb in which I could crawl back.

 

I was aware of my bed, the permanent hip-imprint, and unraveled sheets like unsettled sleep. I was aware of the stranger in my bed breathing down my neck, and I wondered why I had to be aware of his travels. I imagined papered-tulips on old plastered walls covering sounds, yet I could not stop the noise!

 

My entire body was begging for quiet rest. Only, good sleep comes when I need to focus. In the numb zone! One day, Alzheimer’s will come and take the focus like a bird to a land of thoughts, and I will be left a shell. Somewhere in my confusion, I know I’ll feel relief.

 

Yet, another detail to get done. I always cared about each one too until the broken pieces of the world around me built a cage, and I couldn’t pass beyond, or find myself. Ah, that fog and fucking breathing!

 

Eldin, was looking at pretty young girls with firms asses, middle-aged women with full-fallen tits, thin, full-figured, dikes, druggies, and dumb bitches. I wondered why each one, not fair or smart enough to shine my shoes, made me feel disfigured in my own skin? I hated them, and him for his weakness. His profoundly firm arrogance initiated a want for him—to ravage and engulf that persona until it became my power to crush him to death!

 

The rain began to splat down in sharp speeding darts. I could hear each one bouncing back upward off of the asphalt. I knew sleep would not come but at least solitude, a most valuable commodity helps assess the loneliness.

 

I’ve been thinking about breaking into pieces leftover ceramic tiles from a shelf in the garage, and painting them then puzzling a feminine sculpture—torn-apart and gathered back together with all of her scars. I’ll prop it against the happy green dining wall so that it stands-out and screams: I am here! I am here!

 

My skin begins to itch. Blotches between dry-aged lines connect thoughts to an overwhelmed brain, between two swollen red ears. Perhaps I listen too well—Things you do not know…

 

©2019 Maria DellaPorte – All Rights Reserved

(Me to my dear friend, Amanda – What do you think? It’s amazing! You are so talented. Thanks, but do I sound insane or scary? Not at all! I love it! I love to write, Amanda. Ideas come to me a lot in my sleep. Out of the blue it’s like someone is telling me a story. I then incorporate my own emotions, but I worry: What if people can’t tell fiction from reality? For instance, I’m done writing today and going to the gym, but someone may think that I’m Annie Wilkes. Who is Annie Wilkes? Yes, let’s go with that.) Have a nice day everyone! 🙂

 

 

Understanding Daisies

On a Thursday morning, like any other, they realized she was no longer breathing.

 

When she woke-up dead they poked and prodded.  Aloud, they fretted—insisting she had no more dreams. Time would gather-up everything that could have been.

 

They attempted to delve into her psyche, made accusations – each wrong, and from her tried to steal all secrets.  Three remained anonymous in the room—one screaming for answers!

 

Those least close to her insisted they understood most.  I remember when we…  And she… Oh, pity!

 

A man in the corner of the room faced the wall like a prison, free of restraint.  He gulped on his tears, and the acid coming-up pungently from his stomach.  Her shadow draped-over him warm like blood and tangy like guilt.

 

Separately, a thorn forever in her side wickedly counted cash in his head, already pawned personal items thriving on the attention he’d receive for his loss.  Poor Sir with his stocks and bonds.

 

Don’t touch my photographs!  My words… my words… What you don’t know is a lot!  In my Will I bequest…  There is only one.  Shut-up, goddamn it, with this stupidity!

 

The picture of God on the wall shook his head, “Not yet, my dear.”  But you’ve become like a brother?  God kissed her right ear with a whisper—you know, goodbye.

 

Her heart merely broken, momentarily-reflecting in the space between, not stopped like a nail at the end of a wood-plank.  It was a willing dream no cardiac arrest.  A sad cry from it all couldn’t escape if it tried.

 

A gaping breath filled the room!  The yellow paint on the wall came alive like the mid-morning sun.  All the dreariness like politics was a lie.

 

Percolated-coffee and old-fashioned oats scented the air with business as usual.

 

The one closest held her warm white-flesh, tingling alive like orgasm, and cried: “I’ll lay-out your clothes,” pink spring!  We can be happy again.

 

With no voice to be understood, she secretly wished to be free from it all, like the end-of-season’s daisies, holding-on for dear life to their pretty once-blooming smiles.

 

Maria Pisciotta-DellaPorte ©2018 All Rights Reserved

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Sufficiently Undernourished

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It is when I’m carrying my most weight that I am profoundly undernourished. I do not speak of the physical, though certainly it factors in. I am talking about enrichment. Soul nourishment. Love. Care. Empathy. I give it away—

 

To him, and her, and them. To all. I feed everyone around me graciously with what I need, and it brings such joy to witness joy, such sorrow to see discontent. To feel gratitude, I want to give gratitude. To be the furnace in winter, wood on the fire, for those coming home with cold toes.

 

I must confess, however, from time to time I desire a return. A warm afghan… Surely sometimes one must want. It is human, and I am not God whom has no worries, but cry out silently from the heart. Hope someone notices: Please take care of me. Not in every moment like a child, or a pathetic Alzheimer’s patient (my fear that’s how my prayers will be answered), but a few scattered generous moments so that I too may experience the pleasure of comfort, feel secure, fueled by a tenderness capable of building strength to go forward. I could build empires on such goodness! Dreams would be awakened into blessed realities, diminish the current status quo.

 

Life could be a country cottage set on a path of greenery. Honeysuckle scented. Wildflowers with all of the answers: Lemonade and butterflies!

 

I am not broken, or by any means defective, but coming-apart, yes, in tainted pieces by way of life’s harsh blow’s. One by one, stories that affect a psyche. As if a bee searches nectar in the snow, the death of a queen—

 

I cried today because the summer is here in all of its glory, and I am not pretty for it. I wished for and waited for it. The freedom of the warm sun would come with resolve. All of winter’s tribulation could not survive a lightheaded month of July. I would not be burdened by wool’s itching to be a pastel, but come alive – a festival. A carousel of laughter, like a rainbow in clearing skies, would distance the remnants of pain and tears. But I waited too long.

I didn’t water the flowers in spring. I watched them grow and die, colors of red and yellow hope. I didn’t know how to sow anymore. Perhaps it was not knowledge missing but heart. A clever excuse to mask fear: Thorns that cut my skin deeply each time I tried in the past.

 

It’s the change of seasons inside of me that are stuck. Like a broken record, I’m listening to yesterday’s music like an aging ballerina in a box, ’round and ’round. Waiting for someone to fluff her tutu. Shine her up!

 

I want to come un-perched and fly to Jupiter, with a smile above my chin, full of wisdom. Leave every regret behind, ablaze, for earth to bury in the soil with my worn out skin.

 

Grow a tree for humanity in my name.

 

©Maria DellaPorte 2016 All Rights Reserved

 

 

Need

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What I need-

Time:

to float, at ease,

catch-up,

dare to get ahead.

Fall-apart,

remembering…

Forget again…

Rebirth—

(Hope it catches you

on an upswing.)

A bonfire for burning memories,

and for watching their essence

become black-smoke-ghosts.

See them dance like swirling twisters,

hot in your dreams!

A guitar,

keys, to play my tune:

God’s mercy

in the lyrics.

Someone or other

to understand

every expression:

It isn’t all a straight line,

but molded

perfection.

Simple, complicated, or broken,

is as it should be—

(Pain remains only when there’s doubt.)

Arms that wrap around,

thank you, thank you…

A half-moon on the horizon,

its’ missing piece in my heart.

If it all adds up,

or it’s only love I give,

that you’ll remember

some random moment…

Grasp

what it was…

Smile subtly aware

Maria Pisciotta-DellaPorte ©2015 All Rights Reserved

Still Consciousness

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It is not the years that put on age but the predicaments we travel through…the slicing and dicing of our hearts and souls…draw deep lines of regret on our faces and weigh down our breasts in the gravity of despair…adorn you in white turbulence…remove your hair in literal losses…Eventually give-up your mind most willingly, though subconsciously, to dementia, deafness, going blind, because the safe-havens built as the foundation of your life have always been but mere illusion, a formed quicksand.

If everyone remained as his or her innocent child, in his or her natural state of potent life force, birthright, the sunlight in us would never stop enriching each cell with exuberant flow, the bodies we host. The light abounding in the universe would cup us in stunning perfection and peace.

It is when we separate from our Source that we succumb to the cruelties of nature and life outside of ourselves, foreign to our natural state and whither in its grasp. We become the earth in all its beauty and frailty, giving way to changes that are purposeful and significant, if you are a rock or fields of grass, the tide or seasons, but we are not…

We are the stillness of consciousness that never dies and always knows inherently all that is and isn’t present in perfection.

This beautiful lesson here on earth, poignant in pleasure and pain, is magnificent as we leave grateful to have experienced every tingle of emotion. Back to the place we came…we are…and never left…never born and without death.

It is glorious intellect, sensory, source, and movement,

God—

One heart galaxy in love, all there is, ever was…

Being—

Maria Pisciotta-DellaPorte

© 2014 All Rights Reserved

The following excerpt is from, Dan Millman’s, The Peaceful Warrior:  “The universe is, well, there are theories about how it’s shaped…” “That’s not what I asked. Where is it?” “I don’t know–how can I answer that?” “That is the point. You cannot answer it, and you never will. There is no knowing about it. You are ignorant of where the universe is, and thus, where you are. In fact, you have no knowledge of where anything is or of what anything is or how it came to be. Life is a mystery.” “My ignorance is based on this understanding. Your understanding is based on ignorance. This is why I am a humorous fool, and you are a serious jackass.”

And below is a poem of my own from my upcoming book.

(Sometimes “I’m the humorous fool, and other times the serious jackass.”)

     ***********************************************************************

I feel as if I came to earth by accident.

An unfortunate event occurred:

Somehow I was disconnected

from something vaster, universal,

far more intelligent, sensory…

than that of earthly things.

I am an extra sensory being—

That very disconnect,

or floating if you will,

separated, alone –

Is my fear!

I detect the detachment.

On a subconscious level it lives within me-

the mind-body connection:

My soul that gathers in my gut,

all knowing –

the seed of me…

I feel that cell!

In every thought,

Panic—

Been trying to fit in all my life,

into a place I don’t belong.

The struggle is the internal structure,

a program that is wiser and unwilling,

to adapt to the stupidity

that brings peace.

OH and I want peace!

To be accepted by the very things and people

that I can’t accept, won’t…

that I frown upon!

I never would want to be like…

I simply envy the ability to be oblivious –

to nature and the universe,

to sound and sight,

and energy…

To the point they are happy!

Because it is true:

“Ignorance is Bliss.”

When you are a mirror,

the truth is evident,

and what I speak of

evokes fear in those

and sadness in me

because I am alone.

When I go into their notion it is

a vacation. I can take the weight off…

The philosopher, philosophy,

Aesthetics.

I am—

Detesting what surrounds me.

Wildly fearful there’s not a living soul to trust.

So smart….

to be a dope is easier!!

An OBLIVIOUS WONDERLAND!

Do what IS civilized society:

Detach joyfully,

tread on one another,

make a life of greed and war,

Things and more things…

Have your spawn shadow you.

Build an empire on illusion.

When I am in the light,

the sun-home,

I feel connected to the heart of mine.

Only then I can be free and walk among

the fools!

Those are the days of my innocence.

-Maria Pisciotta-DellaPorte

© 2014 All Rights Reserved