In Space
is the silence so sacred
that stillness is a solace
to the spinning?
Are star lights
like dainty daisies that illuminate the night?
Is the earth
but a beacon of beauty
when viewed from afar,
so far that you cannot hear
Man and his kind
screaming?
All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly
This is a repost for a week of Stars and Moon
What is life but a book to read from both sides,
from either end, from all there is to see here
below the constant clouds of consideration,
from far on high where the clouds are carpet
and the stars as close to perfection as we can get,
for midway through this meander of noise
and nonsense, of love and what is left in its place
when it has parted, I am no closer to the correct
question as I am to the unachievable answer.
What is love but a sunlight seen out of season,
a breath to better us when there is no air,
a rainstorm when all we can see is desert dust
sweeping over the highway where our hope
is headed while are we are bound, barely,
to faithful, to fearless, to ferocious, as we falter,
fail and fall and rise again, better for the bruises,
ready for the next round, prepared to bleed out
our lives along this road we are rocking. And still…
I can drink another case of you,
and you, and you, and you, and you…
What is life? What is love?
What is the point in asking?
We are here… happy, hurt, healing.
We have cut through the clouds
and reached the other side…
What more is there to fear?
All words and photographs by Damien B Donnelly
From my Joni Mitchell inspired series of poems from a few years back.
And as you dove through distant dreams
just beside me, you left to my centre,
I woke to the night sky splitting above me,
the stars were burning, bleeding through
the darkness as the heavens opened,
their gates no longer golden as the
rooks took flight, soaring into my fright
here in this cold night as you tossed
through thoughts and I watched mine
beating, beaten with feathers on fire,
the disparate darkness drawing delight
in my downfall, in my blindness, and you
turned in sweeping motions, your back
to me as I should have done, as I could not
and I wondered where you had wandered
as I was culled into consciousness, frozen
by the flames and shivering, were you
moving through memories we made
or making room for more to come
in other beds, in other arms, and then
befell the bodies, bound, in chains locked,
in flames crying, cursing, trying to pull
apart bonds that should have broken,
and you turned again and your arm
came over my chest and the vision
was smashed in contact, reverie
retreating but the burning continued…
All words and photographs by Damien B Donnelly
From the poetry series A Month with Yeats
Photograph taken at La Lune exhibition at Grand Palais, Paris
Oh child, sweet child, sleeping so
beneath these big shoes and ties
knotted to a life of change and choice,
but we had to run, had to keep going,
didn’t we have grow up so quickly;
stand up, show up, give up, pay up.
Oh child, sleeping child, so sweet
beneath this bitter battle we must wade
through, the waves come not solely
on the current, not timely like the tides
but in the solitude, in the silence
we thought to be a comfort, I feel you
twist through the dreams you still dream,
that I have lost hold of, that I have let
slip from a grasp now older, less bolder.
But you, dear child, sweetly sleeping
as I make movements meant to be manly,
meaning to be mature, how I hear
your voice, amid the louder, broader,
vulgar tones beyond the preying
playgrounds of concrete corporations
and communal conformity, yours
so soft and gentle amid the riots
and the roars, yours so soothing
amid all that is smothering. I see you
too sometimes, in the mirror, briefly,
a spark of what was once a projection, now
but a reflection; wide eyed
and hearty of hope, I see you, laughing
at my troubles, calling me to come play,
to see the adventure in the danger,
to see the impermanence of these little
interruptions that come a calling.
Oh child, sweet child who painted
pictures to make the grey days
more grand, who penned poems
to let the pain find its place to perish
on the page instead of in the person.
Oh child, sleeping child of my youth,
how much I still have to learn from you.
All words by Damien B Donnelly. School photo aged possibly 5.
From the series A Month With Yeats
I love and lose in circles, scratching
at skin tipped in ink, trying to find
the truth beneath the colours
I’ve let others colour in, hiding
the paler flesh I held from view,
we always need to hold on to something.
I am not comfortable over quiet dinners;
too much stilled air coursing
through the courses as I question
the seconds ticking by, in silence;
will you find me failure and flee?
But I’ll always be the first to fly
since that first flight I had no hand in.
I stir the stilled air with performances;
shy boy in the spotlight singing songs
he can’t quite find the notes for
or find the right to call his own.
I love and lie in circles that spiral
back on themselves, that cast further
reflections, not quite clear, on the boy
now faced as man in the mirror,
that flood more ink into that fading flesh.
‘Chromolume No. 9, Georges?’ she asked,
once, in a play, how many more?
Variations grow stale, thought becomes
tension, creation becomes controlled,
breath becomes bearer, bleaker. My chest
beats too quickly to let in fresh air,
fresh flesh, compressed, repressed.
I cannot lie in these circles,
these spirals that seem to linger,
longer, no longer. I am looking
to find a new shape; turning back,
returning, recalling that first mark,
to measure how far from it I ran,
to see what was left behind,
to lay it to rest and find the rest,
the rest of me beneath the red ink
tipped into this fragile flesh.
All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly
18th poem for National Poetry Writing Month
I
glisten
to distract,
like a snowflake;
the sparkle before the melt.
Particles of fleeting perfection
floating through the hands of time,
falling through all these imperfections.
If only my clutch were tighter, truer, if only
I knew more of my own truth, too many skins
already slipped through, too much prediction put on that perception
of perfection that can never be preserved. A snowflake
cannot be caught intact. We cannot catch a cloud.
We cannot always clear the way for the truth.
Perfection: a twist of our perception,
a precious perspective
from a single point
never again
to be
seen.
What if it’s never seen at all?
Glistening
like a snowflake,
falling.
A snowflake
can be a melting tear
or a tiny miracle on track
to disappear.
Truth;
an elusive illusion,
a deathly desire tenuously tied
to what we present and how you perceive.
To what we fear and what we are willing to show.
I glisten,
to distraction attention
from all that doesn’t sparkle.
All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly
Blanket light,
blinding
in the back seat,
not all light is light,
the sun can burn through its beauty,
the mind can tear through its thoughts
as wheels will themselves
across these bridges,
feet too far from the ground
to feel its gravity,
we build our own graves
along these roadside reveries.
Blanket light,
burning
in the back seat,
leather licks skin,
we cannot wash away the dust,
we cannot break away
from that grey light
burning bright behind the sunlight,
we are desert bound or ocean open;
we either dry up or seek salvation
in the comfort the current creates.
Blanket light,
a burning blindness breaking
through the open window
on this back-seat taxi-taker.
Destination is not always the desire
when running from reason.
All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly
We still taste the scent
of semi lucid laughter
edging over apples
being skinned and sweated
on extra ordinary Saturdays
of sweeping and stews,
still taste the crisp coating
of confusion beneath smiles
barely swimming over tears
there was not enough threat to trace.
We still trace, still blindfolded,
those outlines of imagination
now fading on distant walls
when dreams were seductive serpents
sucking the deafening dullness
out of roast Sundays
seasoned with unsensational rain
falling like the granulated gravy
that drowned our plates
as we looked to escape
the smell of a fear we couldn’t
pull the trigger on.
—
All words and photographs by Damien B Donnelly
For every push,
for every jibe,
for every spit
upon my childhood,
my conditioning,
my inability to conform,
I kept walking onwards
believing I was better,
never being allowed
to acknowledge
how I’d been broken,
how I’d carry
these bullies like bites
to forever sting
beneath the skin.
All words and drawings by Damien B. Donnelly
Walls can comfort or confine,
fine is the line between
what to fear and how to flee,
freedom is not found
in any one format,
it is not math,
we can only count the cost
of what is lost.
Walls can be a comfort
and still surround like a cell.
All words and drawings by Damien B. Donnelly
Poems, Poetry, Poets
Some lays of the Fianna, translated from the Irish by Annraoi de Paor with illustrations by Tim Halpin
A small press
The Things That Are In My Head.
Stay Bloody Poetic
Author of 'Sent, 'Fall', 'Unmuted' and 'Saudade'
home of the elusive trope
Fantasy Author
Words about pictures by Michael Scandling
Writing, Poetry & Creativity | Angela T Carr, Dublin, Ireland
Kay McKenzie Cooke Website & Blog
My journey through photography
landscape and change
My poetry is my religion.
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Expressing moments of Inspiration within a cozy setting
"He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds." Ps 147:3
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Peter Hillman's Photographic Exploration of South Staffordshire and Beyond
Poetry inspired by ethereal feelings, life events and personal philosophy.
A Journal of Brief Literature
Film, Music, and Television Critic
Writer
Art and Lifestyle by Brandon Knoll
New Zealand
French magazine - art & visual culture
A palette of general thoughts & travel stories from all around the world
Jack Bennett
If you want to be a hero well just follow me
a writing space curated by José Angel Araguz
Thoughts and Perspectives From the Mind of a Common Girl
Cooking with imagination
Damien B. Donnelly 