Poetry 3-14-24

Posted on by sereichert

In honor of spring, I’ve dug this little gem out of one of the many unmarked-but-filled journals in my desk. My poor children will one day find all of these scratchings and will have to make sense of them, or they may chose to burn them (I will be gone and won’t offer protest). I hope some of my words survive. So they know the normalcy of a heart, wild-raging and how undefinable a life really is.

Sown

I am wakening
though this small seed planted
seems stagnant
and it is cold and dark 
the surrounding day
so dense and ungiving
but the seed is planted
and every seed has 
potential
for awakening

And this seed...
I know her concrete shell
her impervious coat
you think the darker,
the colder,
the absolute absence of love
would kill her
dead pod in ground
served justice for even thinking 
of blooming on her own

But you do not know this seed,
no one does
except me.
I knew when I plucked her 
from my heart in the solitary depths of 
lovely dispair, and whispered
incantations of self-worth
of imperviousness
of an unbreakable shell
an unkillable flame
the magic was set and 
it no longer needed 
what living things needed 
to survive

because she is survival
and her words will tendril
into the hard pack of your indifference
and she will feed off of your apathy
and she will shoot forth
arms to the sky 
that you cannot hold down
with guilt or obligations
or crocodile tears

because she is the boundless
and unshakable irreverence 
of me, 
and I will awaken 
in the absence of your love

Poetry 2-22-2024

Posted on by sereichert

I know its still Winter, but these are the gray months that beg my mind wander back to the comfort of knowing Spring will come again. I don’t really know how many more Springs the world has left. It’s all so complicated and teetering on death, isn’t it? We take so much for granted, we kill, and destroy, and maim and use up…as though there is no other fate left us, no generations in our wake that have to live in the wake of our destruction… How ridiculous and short-sighted humans are. We absolutely deserve everything Nature throws at us.

Photo by Alesia Kozik on Pexels.com
Spring Beneath

The shudder of new leaves
arriving to a world 
in its heyday of destruction 
is such bitter sweetness

Life, searching to be, 
striving to find its balance
even when we've already tipped the scales
too far
    for hope

I mourn these spring petals
littering the ground,
beauty fallen to lifeless concrete
and wonder, 
what she ever did
   to deserve us.

Poetry 2/1/2024

Posted on by sereichert 

Obstinate

My mind is obstinate today
though the sun is well past up
and the traffic is growling 
on soft streets
like wild animals rejecting suburbia

my lights have gone out 
and I'm wrapped in gray
struggling through the muck
of a thousand demands, 
mostly self imposed
to keep me from slitting my wrists

I am obstinate today
walled up against progress and productivity
I scarcely believe there is blood 
in my veins to let out
not in the tub
not on the page

I am obstinately hollow
and feeling undeserving of the titles
"woman" and "mother"
aren't these strong, unshakeable elementals?
I am not either today

I'm simply
obstinate

New Horizons and Old Loves

Posted on by sereichert

Life, man… It is a perpetual state of change. In fact, one of the only certainties about life is that it will change. And humans are no different than any other oxygen breathing, carbon-based sack of stardust. The world changes. We change with it, whether consciously or not. We discover things we didn’t know (I hope) we learn and make different choices (also—I hope and that they are in positive directions). We take hurt and either learn to heal or use it as a weapon on the other stardust sacks near us. We find excuses to fall back into bad habits, or reasons to springboard into better ways of living. We are a constant swirl of contradictions and brilliance.

As a beginning writer, I always thought I’d write the same kind of book for my whole life. Because I loved love. And I loved romance. And I enjoyed participating in the happily ever after of a good swoon-worthy book. But as the world evolves so do we, and I am no different. This is not to say that romance is some basic-bitch level writing, it absolutely is not. Romance is hard to pull off (sexual pun completely intended) in a way that is both believable and reaches for something we all wish we had. Its maddening and beautiful and some of my favorite books are still romances.

Back to my evolution.

It didn’t take me long to realize that while I love romance…it wasn’t the genre that fascinated me. The trouble began (I feel like this is one of those old 1960’s “don’t let this happen to you” videos in health class) probably when I started genre hopping like a vagabond onto railway cars in whatever direction the tracks were going. Just anywhere but here. I was thinking about how and why I seemed easily distracted into forays of genre crossing, experimental writing, and odd formats…And I just figured it out.

I’m a character follower. I can’t stick to a genre because my storytelling is like a puppy out on a walk that wants to jump on and follow every new person home. I want to stick my noses in their crotches and find out where they’ve been. Ok. That—that analogy went too far.

The point is… People interest me. Characters interest me. Whether I’m watching them pirate a space ship, imagining them breaking up the scar tissue of a thoroughbred horse, or fear for them as they get possessed by the spirit they’re hot for. I’m curious about people. How they live, how they deal, how they fail. How they love… what they love. How they keep on keeping on and manage to use their big old squishy hearts towards better ends. Or bitter ends.

So I guess I don’t stray too far from love. But I like the depth of how love incorporates itself into our lives, whether its romantic or not. Knowing this about me feels like untying a corset, a big breath in, a cutting of old ideas binding me into “what kind” of writer I am.

I’m a character writer.

Which means I can write poetry, or gay romance. I can write socially conscious plays, or epic space farmer odysseys. I can write song lyrics or philosophical observations on love and meaning (but I repeat myself). I can write about characters because I love and respect each of them. I care about them. I am curious about them. I am compassionate for them. I can be the journalistic eye that follows character and changes the world and myself through their experiences.

This year I’m wrapping up some older projects (urban fantasy-erotic-trilogy based on the legends of Norse and Scottish mythology? Yes please…Genetic killing machine learns she has a conscious? Don’t mind if I do… A time traveling, hot as hell gay romance between two of my new favorite characters? My heart is all a-twitter… A literary first person POV exploration of grief, loss, and how we let go without losing our hearts? My soul didn’t know my brain could write like that…)

But I’m also hopping on new rail cars. Tentatively, 2 plays covering everything from the cost of pro-life legislation on a micro level and the oft-ignored life ruination of the high school to prison pipeline for black youth, a book of erotic poetry, and exploring my horror side with short fiction. It’s all a little ethereal and unsettled yet, but I see the stardust of potential, tossed out in the frozen dark of space, lying in wait for a gravitational pull to gather it into new universes.

Oh, and signed up for another fucking marathon so…that was stupid. That stardust seed is a cackling massive black hole I should have clicked away from instead of looking at the price and going… “Hey! That’s a cheap way to suffer immensely.” I bet I could have paid somebody less to take a bat to my knees, with the same outcome…but here we are. Eternally hopeful and stubborn.

So here’s to new endeavors, in your writing and your life. Open up that perspective a little wider and let some of the stardust in. But keep love…at the heart of your universe.

Poetry 9-21-23

Posted on by sereichert

Hey kids. Just a quick note to remind you that my next, unrelated Vella The Three Hearts of Eve is up and available (first three are free) at Amazon. It’s a fun little romp into espionage, genetic experimentation, forced proximity and questions of ethics. Still, oddly light hearted.

Also, I’ll be in Wyoming the weekend of September 29th through October 1st to celebrate their annual Bookmarked Literary Festival. If you’re in the area, come check it out, lots of awesome writers looking to connect with new and equally amazing readers.

And now, enjoy some Verse:

The Heart is A Terrible Driver

I am the owner of a body in the trunk
the forgotten musty trunk
in recesses of my memory
muffled and tied up
speechless to the ways my heart fell

Hearts do what they do
and mine
she is so big
so eloquent a speaker
so deviously soft and swaying...

she convinced me that 
she was the only one 
who could drive the beast of me 
through life, and it would all
work out

while my brain 
sat in the back seat,
shaking her head and looking at me 
in the rearview mirror
mouthing the words

You know better
Your gonna hate yourself for letting her drive

Brain was right
Heart took us off a fucking cliff
the first chance she got
giggling with the thrill
the free fall of Love
drunk on its chemical cocktail

all the way down
Brain stayed silent, 
arms crossed over her chest
as if to say

nothing I tell you will matter anyway
We were already over your head
the minute you gave her the keys

the carnage at the base of the canyon
was ruinous
the destruction, 
complete
Heart took the hardest hit
split down the middle in two ragged
pieces of desiccated meat
devoid of reason, or rhythm 

Head pulled her from the car, drug her through
the sharp pebbles and burning metal
shook with disappointment and 
carried her to a lesser used path
and I followed complacently
my own wounds stinging

Brain barely spoke, 
in all of those tender months-turned-years
up from rock bottom
winding on trails
of drunken malestorms 
and pious sobriety
We are a heavy load

Heart sometimes regains consciousness
and clings to the brush, on the side of the trail
striking out with bloody, broken hands
against the pull
trying always trying to get back
to the wreckage
to somehow make it all work out
make that car and joyous ride
run again

Brain cuffs her, hard
Sometimes it's just easier to knock her out
and keep her from making any decisions
then to try and reason 
with her stitched up pieces

from here on out,
my heart must remain bound and gagged,
the body in the trunk

we won't survive another crash like that

Poetry 9-7-2023

Posted on by sereichert

These are a pair. And a combined homage to a novel I’m currently and carefully crafting. One that’s been itching in my soul for over twenty years probably. I’m out of words for a scholarly post, so I’ll leave you with these instead. May you always tag along in all the adventures you can… and when you are weary, may you always find a port in stormy seas. 

She confesses, if Only to Herself...

I have always loved you.
In darkened closets, 
in alleys devoid of hope
in all the twisted ways 
propriety and opportunity
told me to back away
slowly

my heart connected 
and remembered
would not let go
through a thousand days and
the ups and downs
of a character arc
I never felt I was writing
myself
Still you saw me, front and center
wasting time on fallible side characters

You were there…
a reasonable voice
that seemed crazy
but for an unreasonable world
you were a calm sanity
a smile
I can’t help smiling
a joke at the ridiculous
that no one else sees
a port...
my port
in such an unimaginable storm

and I thank the universe
that I could read your stars
between the angry clouds
and find myself
in you
 


When He Looks at Her, the Voice Inside Says...

years are unkind
to souls that sit 
stagnant in their fate
you and i were dreamers
swaying towards
stories in the stars
to the detriment of the souls
already in our company

i never saw you coming,
didn’t know your name
or the hurt you spawned from

i didn’t know, because
you hid the scars so well
until we were thrown together
and i wondered,
where your prologue was
beneath them all
where did you begin?

i have always loved you
in quiet acquiescing,
of what i could not have
from afar,
a statue, ever smiling and dancing
round the fountains
a muse to keep me enamored
with a life i was resigned to grow still in

you made me feel 
young
as though I could tag along with you
on every adventure
even when my ship had long since sailed
you were the coastal drift
keeping me afloat

Poetry 8-24-2023

Posted on by sereichert 
Discovery

I did not find myself
in the bottom of a glass
The burn to numb poison
and all the untethering promises
she made

I did not find myself in 
the narcissistic hearts
parading in poets' clothing
promising ideas of my self-worth
while making me kneel before them

I did not find myself
by losing pounds
or cutting hair
or searing the wrinkles of 
a thousand laughs away

I did not find myself
by giving my love and my years
away to those who only wanted
to own me
collect me, 
objectify and fantasize
who never gave credit to the soul within 
only loved
the pretty, fading paper

I found myself beneath
the starlit sky, high up
in a meadow between mountains
cold and alive
brave and scared
breathing deep as though
it was my first air taken

I found myself in tumbling footfalls
one after another, up and down
careening not controlled
alonside pain
pacing with anxiety
but listening to my own heart
beating out

you can
     you can
         you can

I found myself in the holy land
of pine needles 
and mocking bird cries
silent stage, calm in a chaotic world
and herons in silent coasting flight above me
communing with their soul's solitude
in search of quiet shores

I found myself between pages 
and tattooed in ink
words and ideas and truths 
unknown to any other heart but my own
learning that, 
without meeting requirements first

I am enough
     I am brave
         I deserve love

I found myself in the faces
of women I've raised
to listen to themselves in ways
I am still learning
I found myself in their beautiful complexity
knowing I would never allow them to be hurt
in the ways I have accepted hurt for myself

I am finding myself 
and it has taken a lifetime
I just hope
I can take my heart
and lead her away from the dark

I hope I can find myself 
in time.

Poetry 8-10-2023

Posted on by sereichert

Good morning all.

I took a little break from the interconnected world of social media this week, but despite that little vacay, I’m still not feeling up to par. At first I thought I was approaching burnout. That I needed a reset. But the truth is, after self-reflecting…I’m past the point. So far past, that I’ve built up a whole township on the far end of it. I think for the last year I’ve been operating in the midst of burnout…just digging myself deeper into a hole of meeting demands I had no energy for. And now, I’m, smack dab in the middle of my own little cavernous oubliette.

I don’t have sunlight, or stars to navigate by, and the walls are much too steep and slick to entertain hopes of climbing out. So…I’m going to sit here, in the dark for awhile. Contemplate my purpose. My next move, if any.

Here’s a poem I wrote months ago. Seemed appropriate on a day such as this. A week. A month.

Last Day

If this is the last of my days
will I have done enough?
loved enough?
Fought enough?
   smiled
    and danced
      and kissed enough?

Did I hold their hands long enough?
   Did I forgive?

Did I let go so much
   of this useless weight?
      to travel light into the next world?

What are the chains I regret most?

The lack of wonder in my eyes
   a boredom with the world
      a seeing through of everyone's angles?
  
Or is it the rusted and heavy links
 cutting in tetanus scrapes 
   boring out the sinking pit
      dark nemesis, regret?

That I was unkind
   to myself.
That I gave away heartbeats
    to the undeserving?

That I don't remember 
the last time 
   I told you
      that I loved you?

If this is the last of my days
   will I have done enough?
      Loved enough?
        Fought enough?

For them?
For myself?

Poetry 6-29-2023

Posted on by sereichert 
Distance

There is a particle of smoke in the air
a memory of a tragedy
carried from miles away
from a place where someone's world
was lit on fire
and nothing but the traveling ash
remains
now an infinite shudder
rippling across the world
of their universe, destroyed
muted with the distance
into one particle

and I wonder
who is tasting my tragedy?

on some distant shore
does someone lift their nose to the breeze, 
close their eyes inhale and think

There's a bit of heartache in the air
I wonder who's world burned down
I hope they're okay.

I hope I'm okay
Guilt

Someone said to me today,

not all guilt is bad

she said, 
you feel guilt
because you stood up 
for yourself

because you showed someone
that you matter too

that this guilt is learned
when we constantly put others' happiness 
in front of our own
we feel guilty 
for not giving away our light
to help them shine
we feel guilty
for not allowing them
to dictate our actions 
out of fear for their feelings

but this guilt
should be unlearned

and maybe the true source of the guilt 
should be reimagined

that we feel guilty 
because it took us so long
to stand up for our own heart

Poetry 5-1-2023

Posted on by sereichert
Photo by James Frid on Pexels.com
Full Stop

Have you ever fallen
tumbled so terribly hard
that when the ground comes up
to meet you
it knocks your soul out
so you lay 
dead for a full moment
without air in lungs and 
blood stopped
staring into the thin blades of grass 
and the tiny loose pebbles of concrete
the smallest of worlds
in sharpest of view

full stop

world stopped
no more spinning
in dizzy laughing love
an idiot comprised of chemicals 
and false hope

and the ground beneath 
certainly has broken 
your kneecaps 
and cracked your sternum
into your faulty heart 
and bruised your hip bones
in ways he never did
and the bleeding of your palms
is communion to the earth
paid in full 
for the first reality you’ve known
since the daydreamy excursion
that robbed you of self

I have fallen
and I see the ground for what it is
and the weightless joy of you
is nothing more than
the precursor of pain
one more round on a faulty
merry-go-round
with rusty handles pulling free 
and rattling with 
uncertainty
until it tosses me off 
into the grave of ground

full stop

I stare at the grass
the small pebbles
and make myself soak in the shock 
as it rides over my body 
like waves
and I open my arms wide
to each salt spray of pain
until they pull back

full back

into the sea

and I remember

to

breathe
in full

don't stop.