Identity

LISTEN

/ deuxiemepeau / 4 Comments

  

We cannot truly change that which
we are, we cannot really laugh louder,
be brighter, stay longer than our journey
has already jotted down in a journal
whose language is not our own.
We cannot truly change the air,
the ocean, the fire that forges its way
through us, leaving us inspired
or expired, hot or just overheated.
We cannot truly change much
but we can cast corrections
into the darkness caught in corners,
we can see sages that hover over heads
if we need to add meat to the monotony,
singing songs of stories never too old
to be retold, never too new to be anything
more than necessary.
We cannot truly change that which
we are, we cannot promise to hold
any longer than time allows us,
we are tied to the tension of the knot
that knows more than we do,
whose heart lays on a hinge
that hangs both the hope
and the hammer. We cannot truly
change much but we can learn to listen
to lips that have lingered, that have
laughed in the face of lies
and been nourished by the face
of the fortunate who found favour
with who they were and then substance
in the soft stream of steady words.

   

All words and photographs by Damien B Donnelly

From the series A Month with Yeats

 

 

 

THE BEAT OF THE BAT

/ deuxiemepeau / Leave a comment

 

The brighter man, the lighter man,
the darker truth, the deeper vein,
bind me to the rough, the real man,
I beat as a bat.
The clearer glass, elusive glass,
the broken bed, the better lay,
tie me to the rider, all night,
I beat like a bat.
The gentle rose, considered rose,
the troubled torn, the rotting root,
plant me in the wild field, riled field,
I beat as a bat.
The sweetest light, the sun light
the witching hour, the darkest night,
pitch me in the rainstorm, windstorm,
I beat like a bat.
The house plant, the tendered plant,
the raging bark, the twisted branch,
nature’s not calm, not quiet, nor I;
I beat as a bat.
An angel rises to heaven’s skies,
bats hang downside, looking inside,
teach me what’s inside, light the dark side,
I’ll see like a beating bat.

All words and photographs by Damien B Donnelly

This is one of the poems from the A Month with Yeats series

TO LINGER, LONGER, MAYBE

/ deuxiemepeau / 8 Comments

 

Like a whisper
tissue is painted with purpose,
silk spun from crisp cuts,
white scented with sapphire
parading into Prussian
(fragile of frame and filigree),
like a thought
an image opens, a petal unfolding,
shades seep into substance
as the edges fade
(how quickly we fall to forgetful)
light, liquid, linger, a little longer.
Thoughts tied in twists of emerald
shimmering,
simplicity on a simple stand,
in a liquid light
and the memory leans in.

We are more fragile
than we know.

We could be more lasting
but only time will tell.

Not everything will linger
on after our whispers
fall to a fade…

  

All words and photographs y Damien B. Donnelly

This is a Repost

OUR SHADE IN TIME

/ deuxiemepeau / 3 Comments

 

Look for me
in the layers lost,
in the careful caress
that concerns the contours
of form and finesse. The million
meters mounded into magic, turned
and twisted into tastes now termed timeless,
look for me in the yards that yield towards yellow,
that burn into beauty, like ochre opening, that grow towards
the gleam of green, that flit and flow like a feather in flight, like rays
of the old days that ripple on the water. Look for me by the curt corners
of concrete where complacency converges, look for me where the columns congregate,
creation is not just a concept concerned with procreation
but with the colours and costumes

we claim to parade our personality.

   

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

This is a Repost

 

THE NEW LOOK

/ deuxiemepeau / 20 Comments

 

I am
that fine line
that divides
what is feminine
from what is
futuristic.
That fine line
that flushes
the fabulous
out the fickle.
The reflection
of what once was
encased
in something else
that might
one day
be called
another new look.

   

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

This is a Repost

 

IN THE ARCHITECTURALLY FASHIONED MEMORY OF WHAT IS NOW MODERN

/ deuxiemepeau / 8 Comments

 

I am of an age that is ageless, the very essence
that lingers somewhere between shadow and light;
that indescribable grey matter separating all that
aligns itself with black from all that derives its purity
from white. I am the illusive thread tying together
the journey, the twisting and twirling of cloths weaving
together past, present and briefly imagined futures.
I am the force between that barely dreamt dream
of what will be and that longing, lodged in the memory,
that leaves logic out to recall that single magical moment
from that day, long ago lived. That room in the mind
that holds so tightly to that taste once passed over lips,
ripe for the tasting, I am the emphasis of purity
in the remembrance of that very taste. All else,
long since, fallen by the wayside or lost out amid
the uncertainty of what’s remembered and what’s real.
I am the playfulness of the light you see cast bright
on your tall towers with their windows onto the world.
I am the linear contrast of urban lines, rising sharp
and structured amid the chaos. I am the smooth sleekness
untwining myself from a frivolous mess. I am
the seduction salvaged from the superfluous. I am
the impression left on the skin long after I’ve parted,
the mark of what once was, what is and what will be.
I am what makes the melancholy magical, every mood
a melody; the manufacturer of the moments the mind
will muster. I am the lines that will lead you on, latitudes
to rise upon and longitudes to fill your form. I am a city,
seen from above, with straights of sky-scraping streets;
lean lines, lengthy and lasting, marching triumphantly
forward as if to herald one’s rise out of confusing chaos
and stake your claim to stand above, alone, assured
and reassured, calm and confident, always exceptional,
occasionally eccentric, uniquely independent and always
individual. Modern made from a blend of what is
both memory and what has yet to be. I am everything
you put on to be who you are. Yesterday you dreamt
of me, tomorrow you’ll remember me, today, you are me.

  

All words and photographs by Damien B Donnelly.

This is a Repost.

BALLOON

/ deuxiemepeau / 1 Comment

Balloon,
the balloon,
see the balloon…

see thoughts float
through space,
meander through the mind,
wild thoughts, drifting thoughts,
black thoughts, orange thoughts,
thoughts arriving unannounced,
uninvited, unaware of the current climate,
thoughts that rise like balloons
on silent streets
on sleepy Sundays
in the suburbs
to shock and surprise

(though if no one ever sees it
was it ever really there?)

Thoughts float
through time,
suggestions, signs
from unconscious minds,
disruptive thoughts, distracting thoughts
(I held his hand in a taxi while thinking of another)
Time ticks through thoughts
as we scurry through strange streets
grasping the wrong hands
throughout this diversion,
this constant drawing in of air,
drawing in on inspiration
wherever necessary
wherever noticed

(see the balloon!)

Thoughts float
like balloons,
like bodies,
never knowing
if it’s a considered curve
or just a current we’re caught in

(if it cannot be captured
can it ever be caressed?)

Thoughts float
like balloons
though the air

(oxidising, fuelling, thinking)

Thoughts float
fragile and free

some never to be caught,
some never to be caressed.

Thoughts float
and then fade,

balloons blow
and then burst.

Capture me, it, them, all, everything

before I/we/it all fade

before I/we/it all burst.

Balloon,
the balloon,
see the balloon.

See,
see the being,
see the beginning,
see the beginning of something bright

even on silent streets
in the sleepy suburbs
on Sundays

where simple things can shine…

   

All words and photographs by Damien B Donnelly

This is a repost

 

DAFFODIL DREAMS

/ deuxiemepeau / 10 Comments

 

I climb clouds
between the night’s blanketed sleep,
a billowing blossom of smoke
that never chokes the mountain moon,
where the world is a warm walk
through a blue breeze
and the only plight
is to find your path
within a forest of daffodils
on a prairie of peace.

On a prairie of peace
within a forest of daffodils,
beyond the billowing blossom of smoke
that never chokes the mountain moon,
I climb clouds
as a blue breeze uncloaks
the confusion of consciousness
and the sky glistens
with a golden glimpse of tomorrow
tipped in a topaz tempered truth.

I climb clouds
to sleep in a dream of daffodils.

   

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

This is a re post of one of my older poems

BOY SO BLUE

/ deuxiemepeau / 6 Comments

 

Sitting in a park in Paris, France as kids climb
trees they’ll soon outgrow and birds busy
their feathers in a dance of freedom we’ll never know.
I fall through your thoughts as someone tickles
strings on cords too distant to be discovered
and wonder where you sat; on the orange carpet
caressed by concerns of a girl growing
through her own song of sorrow? Next to the guy
with the hat and harmony, no doubt, who guards
his guitar from the bright light, in the as yet
starless sky, as if he knows how celebrity
will one day cripple his creativity. A blackbird
bows before me, burrowing his burdens
into the road, looking for crumbs cast off,
for a little refuge, like you did, like we all do,
a little distraction from the circling sun
and shining skins blustering under bland and blander.
Sitting in a park in Paris, France, as if in a trance
from 22 to 42, when I first found favour
with following you; back room, no light, bedsit;
we were masters of the Marais, simple singletons,
senselessly sinking innocence into the marshes,
courting kisses for a single spark and rising
over all those losses we thought at the time
to be utterly insurmountable disasters.
But they were just dances, like these tiny birds
around me now, prances we perform, up and under,
over and through. We are all naked birds flirting
with honesty and invisibility under the sweltering sun,
sometimes remembered, sometimes forgotten
before begun. Sitting in a park in Paris, France,
still trying to understand the message in the melody
underlying and still trying to comprehend
the cords forged in the flesh of the boy so blue.

   

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

This is a repost from my Joni Mitchell Series

SUMMER SUN IN THE MARSHES

/ deuxiemepeau / 3 Comments

 

Three boys and a girl, coasting carelessly
from teens to twenties and coping lazily
with hangovers beneath the summer’s sun.
One blonde and three browns, laughing
amid golden rays that filled the most perfect
of squares in the once marshland of Le Marais
with its cobbled streets, men of elegance
and women who followed their trend.
We were setting no trends, the four of us,
but caught up in the richness and comedy of it all.
We were Irish and English and one of us French,
young, unknown, foolish and arrogant
to everything but ourselves and ignorant
to who it was that we were.
We were like the ground we sat on;
a once sinking mess belonging to a world
of daylight dreaming, where un-cautioned laughter
tickled our sleep though not our feet, but suddenly
we’d found potential in possibilities
seen through slumber-less eyes, far from dreaming.
I was laughing with one, blushing with the other
and was sleeping with the one so typically French.
I’d befriended the one I’d hoped to sleep with
and undressed with the one I should’ve remained
discreet with. I would later miss her, lose contact
with him and wonder how to stop sleeping
with the other. But that day, in that light, in that heat
of that summer, we’d found our way, heard our voices
and finally found what it meant to belong.

 

All words and photographs by Damien B Donnelly

This is a repost of one of my older poems