A poem about contemplation and writing by David Tombale: The days

There are times when you intend on writing and yet nothing worthwhile comes out. Moments like that are what The days describe.

The days

There are days when the words will not

hear me out, when the dried out version

of my remembered youth will not fill

a page or ten, a book or a passage in my

Bible, the words fulfill me but the present

needs me so the clatter of my keyboard may

have to cease, may sit out silent beneath the

shade of a blacked out screen while the

white buzz of sound runs out.

I could not write a line that felt like my beating

heart beating out a memory of a summer’s day,

the heat and flight of birds in June,

there is no music, no hope or fury,

 I place my book bag by my dusty window where

the sun will see it, where the wind will blow

against its glass perhaps to wake the thoughts

that rest inside, the note pads full of scribbling,

the pens half filled with ink.  

A poem about love and heartache by David Tombale: Carry out

Carry out is really about the end of a relationship and how that can affect your thoughts.

Carry out

The streets wind and weave begging me to roam,

daylight calls to me but it’s evening that takes me home,

back to the fiery crackle of the logs upon our hearth,

back to the U-haul van sitting upon our curb

There are enough memories left to bury so I might

not make it out, tonight the rain clouds gather

and tonight these wounds begin to hurt

When you are thought to me, when you are some

distant figment that rests like violets around our deck,

it’s I these songs speak of, it’s I they’ll carry out,

past the foyer, past the window that opens on your

pile of clothes that sit beneath our transistor radio.

A poem about family and loss by David Tombale: Invisible Love

The loss of a loved one is a hard thing for anyone to bear, whether it’s a child or an adult and that terrible struggle is what Invisible Love is about.

Invisible love

She lies there whispering like a madwoman

his name repeatedly like a chant or the beat

from a war drum but his love is invisible,

it carries across on the wind like autumn leaves,

shatters against the glass like ice,

it resides no place that the eye can see,

that her hands can touch,

that’s why her thoughts bleed enough to build

a river of blood that her children inherit

along with her hate, a frozen picture of parent,

an absent father as dear to their mother as the

portrait of Jesus that hangs on the mantel but

his love is invisible, it will never hold them,

never hold back her hair like the leather thong

that holds tight her black and white hair,

never raise their son into a man or walk their daughter

down the aisle, there is nothing left but his old boots,

their leather hard enough to creak when

their little boy wears them trying to summon his

ghost from out of his tombstone but nothing lives

but his tears.

A poem about art and love by David Tombale: The kiss of my muse

Some poets are inspired by the people in their lives and the void that grows once those people leave creates the kind of feelings and responses that I put in this poem.

The kiss of my muse

I have no words left,

the lingering kiss of my muse has faded

like the light of morning fades from my watching eyes,

as dusk grays the evening shade

and my love for you takes on the hue of winter,

all white snow and gray ice that hangs like daggers from my

windows.

I have no words left,

spring has yet to shatter the freezing

shutters that keep me trapped in a world

of ash and snow, love and ice.

I have prayed for many months for

some warm breeze to blow,

to thaw these waking thoughts into a steady stream

that might one day ink a landscape of a better

rhyme, perhaps a battle scene,

a ballad of a fallen soul

but tonight I’ll drink alone and wallow

while a single raven perches outside this hollow,

to cry its sorrow across this field of letters and

aging books, their pages curling daily,

too brittle to understand.

A poem about love and contemplation by David Tombale: Cool Waters

I’ve felt a genuine need lately to define love and Cool Waters was one of the answers I came up with.

Cool waters 

Fires burn short and fast much like we do,

much like lovers and poets who trade words

for stolen moments in hay ricks and what you

don’t know is, that it is cool waters that love best,

that take the shape of whatever heart they pour in,

that calmly ease the fevered rise and fall into a steady

beat that will warm your toes during the lonely winters

and wash you clean, salt licking at your wounds in summer,

sun tanning your skin while you lie before me

and love me like a good friend.

A poem about beauty and the night by David Tombale: The beauty of the night

The beauty of the night is about creating a heightened image of what there is to be seen and experienced after the sun goes down.

The beauty of the night

I have often written about the beauty of the night,

of the loving way the moon shines across her velvet

skies or how the stars gambol round like little kids

until their black mother holds them down,

this one a dress, this one a shirt, she dresses the stars

in dreams, in our dreams that spin like spider webs

that join our hums and often mumbled words across

the distance of our homes and sometimes we dream

together, dreams of oceans and birds we pass in

flight.

I have often written about the beauty of the

night and found in the hem of her reverie a quiet

moment to lay my pen right by my side and pass

my eyes across her perfect form. 

A poem about love and regret by David Tombale: Where the palm trees stir

Where the palm trees stir is largely about trying to run away from your problems and learning that you carry them with you.

Where the palm trees stir

Some days the words will not be spoken,

some nights the thoughts will not be shared

but I was there and you were there when

the crumbling walls we built went down,

in the earthquake of too many fights and

the stubborn will of a silence kept and kept

still, for I won’t begin to talk, I turn the key

and the lion’s roar of this diesel engine will

only ask for more.

I will hide my tears amongst the gravel stones

of the great outdoors, hide my love and the crimes

I did in a stolen kiss some place far from here where

the palm trees stir, but when the miles have blurred

and I have loved and left every place I’ve found

I fear I will only mourn us more.