Testimony

I have watched and listened,
Suffered from contradictions,
Those gaps in a man’s life.

There are misconceptions,
Blatant mental posturing,
Delusions defining a man.

They are misguided, shortsighted,
Easily manipulated, injected,
The vinegar of male inoculation.

These vocal dystopian needlers,
Miserable cretins of neutering,
Harpies eating the grist of manhood.

We need not fear them, ignore them,
Pay no attention to them, for
A man is no one’s beast of burden.

Some may think this folly of conjecture,
But, it bears the soul of Occam,
Simply put, we are what we are.

Acceptance is a harsh reality, truth,
The granite laid by human history,
It is the blame game between sexes.

Wasted posturing, justifying micro-niches,
The piddling prattling of wannabe’s,
Never reaching the true stature of a man.

Hold this truth close to your breast,
There is hidden danger in masculinity,
Subtle skirmishes can have dire consequences.

Even a male praying mantis is comfortable,
Feeling safe in his exoskeleton,
Until a satisfied female devours him.

©2021 Donald Harbour

 

Things Possessed

Are we not possessed of possessions.
Things in transition from one state,
to becoming something other than they are.
Every pot and pan, each book and tablet,
a garden, and home, all transitory.
Even the thread that binds a shirt,
changing, neither a possession nor
possessed, used, not owned, allowed.
This mind that writes these words,
changing, what was thought possessed,
now gone, here given to the reader.
We are all things that ever were,
recycled particles of the cosmos,
what we will become is never kept.
The only real thing that can be possessed
is this moment, this second of time,
a sweep of a tick-tock on  the eternal clock.
Things do not belong to us, as we do not
belong to ourselves, for we are only,
an earthly dalliance of creation, and
that too is a possession of eternity.

©2021 Donald Harbour

 

Retribution

Slipping on his father’s shoes,
the little boy was beaming,
“daddy, now I’m just like you”,
and so, begins the journey.

It is a rugged path to manhood,
the shoes do not fit, but
he will grow into them…one day,
and so, begins the journey.

We leave footsteps in the past,
young men stumbling, to keep up,
driving to fill fading imprints,
and so, begins the journey.

It is a human obligation,
from father to son and so on,
each stride planted in different dust,
and so, begins the journey,

Some shoes become boots, hobnailed,
footprints in sand or jungle paths,
a nations youth slide into memorium.
and so, begins the journey.

Old men once in their youth,
now tamed by time and disappointment,
heads bent with anticipation,
and so, begins the journey.

Souls beckon for their escape,
a pursers bell chiming debarkation,
husks arriving at the final shore,
and so, begins the journey.

Creation’s retribution, a return,
fresh consciousness to begin again,
a new being, a new life,
“daddy, now I’m just like you”.
and so, begins the journey.

©2020 Donald C Harbour

 

Death of poets

We are all scattered,
autumn leaves cast before the wind,
scraping across the face of time.

We are all scattered,
Remembered only in the past,
lost to scribbled words uttered in silence.

We are all scattered,
Drifting beggars in poetic rags,
a dispersal for unremembered causes.

We are all scattered,
become tribe of wandering word smiths no more,
rocks pounded to dust by digital prose.

©2019, Donald Harbour

Time and old dogs

In the yard under a majestic poplar tree is an old hound,
The  tree has known him since he was a pup,
Its roots having grown around his favorite spot.
He slumbers, a reposed puddle of black and tan,
Ears marked with nicks, pieces missing,
His gray muzzle a scarred testament to his years.
He does not know time as we do, he knows seasons.
When the fall air turns crisp he acknowledges it,
Rheumy eyes peering at the woods around the house.
There is movement, scent in the air calling him.
Though instincts overcome his painful indolence,
He is no longer able to break brush on the hunt.
Once his strong voice told game he was on their trail,
Now, only a whispered rasp announces his wakefulness.
He believes he is still that force of nature and he speaks to it.
When the stars are spread like diamonds on black velvet,
On clear full moon nights, golden light fills his soul.
With nose pointed skyward he stands before heavens altar,
Howling a mournful comment for times lost, memories regained,
The lament a tribute to his cascading dreams of the past.
He is close to his time for his forever long last hunt.
He doesn’t know that he will be missed, hearts broken,
Those that know him will be burdened with that sadness,
Remembrance of a life well lived, the passing of time and old dogs.

©2019, Donald Harbour

Let your light shine

Damnation is laid in the belly of our fears,
humankind’s quaking horror of everlasting darkness.
Those tiny hairs that first herald a breeze,
the same ones that motivate our souls to scream
alarm us as we are beckoned, peering into the unknown.
There is no choice in the matter, no bargain,
A Cararra trimmed portal cannot stay the nightmare,
No amount of Psalms, incantations, blessings,
no prayers, meditation, or pious beliefs,
nothing will stay that voyage into that gloom,
except, the immutable light of ones spirit.
Let it shine, hold it forth, brighten
each day, each person and all creatures with it.
A sempiternal bit of creation connecting us
with our creator, a beacon to guide us home.
There is no gloaming to our night, only
that warm sunset of welcome shining at journey’s end.

©2019, Donald Harbour

Truth

When I was younger, I dreamed of giants,
overly ambitious thoughts, beliefs,
impetuous desires, falsehoods.

Now, none remain to crash through
the nubile trees of life, only
a slumbering mountain of aged bones.

There is no stench of their decay,
these giants, though their dried husks
have littered the path of the past.

Did I slaughter them, I the giant killer,
or did time become the immortal villain.
Cronus wielding a scythe of minutiae.

The small things unnoticed until they
culminate in a shower of tiny arrows
piercing the flesh reaching into the heart.

The trivia of being a fusillade,
pointed disappointments and failures,
missed chances opportunities.

Count not the past nor the future,
for they exist only in memory, count
the moment, the only truth, a brief reality.

©2018, Donald Harbour

Simba

Watch carefully the path you casually tread,
for silently, I am intently watching you,
each step you take heard, and noted.

You may hide in a rustling grove of trees
however that will do no good for you,
nor will the gently waving grass hide you.

There is no help to call, no savior,
to rise up and thwart my advance,
there is only you and I, soon to be one.

That tawny ripple in the midday sunlight,
it is I devouring the seconds and minutes
until our journey meets in the dust of today.

You should know I have waited for you,
it is on the gentle breeze your musk rode,
a tingling arousal of my senses announced you.

Do not fear me, give in to this chance moment,
opportunity made us companions for our dalliance,
desire’s craving the hunger that feeds this kismet.

We each have a place in this life, to give and to take,
defined by an evolving chain of living and dying.
I feel no malice, we are both prisoners to our birth.

You will be an honor to my ancient royalty,
For I am Simba, King of the Jungle, and you,
are a delicious irony for my kingdom’s table.

©2018, Donald Harbour

 

 

 

Consequences

The years continue to fly by,
casual acquaintances, fleet of foot,
a dimple in time, of no consequence.

We are positioned to  respect authority,
to believe in the system, hide behind
its pseudo shield of  protection.

For order, for the nation’s good.
thus the mind is plowed, sowed
with the seeds of social control.

Beggar of the greedy, manipulators,
fear forged in lies and corruption,
we grow older more complacent.

Place one foot in front of the other,
toe the mark, walk the path, stay
in line, don’t complain, be a patriot.

Watch the shadows created for you,
there is a man behind the curtain,
he runs the show, you have a ticket.

The theater never closes, the show
continues, you are a seated actor,
participant in your own demise.

Wrapped in a shroud of cultural cloth,
buried in a coffin of political dogma,
one cannot escape the future.

What will be is ordained, contemptuous,
manacled, shackled by religion,
society’s boundaries, doomed.

Our beliefs, poisoned by labels
marking others different from us,
shallow humanity lacking compassion.

When you are poured back
into the cusp of creation, what
part of you will you leave.

What will honor your life, how will
consequence have made a difference,
will the hell you left, follow you.

©2015, Donald Harbour

Resilience

In the glade an old Red Oak stands naked,
except for a single fluttering leaf,
still cast with the color of fall.
I have watched it for hours, and
I wonder if is proclaiming a message.
An axiom of life in its resilience,
its tenacity to purpose, to refusal,
a dogged determination to hang in there.
Though the winter wind tugs at its grip,
still it stays convinced that it must,
if not for purpose, then for the tree.

©2015, Donald Harbour