#A maelstrom of petals and prose

[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.17.2022 “Kinship as Rare as Emeralds”

Why don’t we be friends? No notion of predisposition A relation that will round hills and bends Two of any is better than one

I’ve sailed on ships of love and wood Across romance and roaring waves But never has distance seemed less than it should Than traveled with folk I’ll shoulder ‘til our graves

It isn’t an intimate act To intertwine our lives as victors Champion one another’s lasting impact Tough troughs and luck are lousy predictors

I only wish to be more than your acquaintance Be a shoulder to lean on, and be leaned on No qualms, no quarry, no pretense I simply am afraid I will miss you, when you are gone

So coast along the shore together Full sail, the distance feels but a trifle For you, stormy skies I’d weather Explore the world, a pair, an eyeful

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[sasorikigai]

Ashes to Vision || Scorpion (Post-Revenge)

▬▬ι═══════ﺤ 🔥|| Memories remain shrouded in the flickering glows of dandelion petals; as the most halcyon, content days spent in the clan becomes more fabricated, ephemeral dreams and fantasies than substance of consciousness, unfurling untainted, not tampered by the gray wash of present time continuing to float. How his heart throbs, with renewed love and devotion springing, and people of the Shirai Ryu manacled to blind obedience to suffering, torment and inevitable slaughter. Weakened and beaten, as desiccated remains remain hanging like empty frames stripped off of their contents; rotting, souls damned. All the good, capable ones falling, without the cure and infinitesimal hope to those who are afflicted, separated and sinking, damned to be doomed under the crimson rivers squeezing them dry of thirst and famine. 

All his life that had once been doomed and offered as a devoted pawn to the Netherrealm’s stridency of pain. The empty lanterns once emitting guidance of hearthlike warmth now paint tenebrous shadows on Scorpion’s skin, as the village shivers in ashen hues and indistinct lines around him. The Spectre is a mere silhouette in the brief flashes of dimness; with his features melted and smudged, a charcoal sketch, a brushstroke of a depressed man, even when the swirls of moonlight, along with the starshine passes over his face like the once ghost of a smile he couldn’t fathom to express. There could be no end to his sense of emptiness and incompleteness. 

As the volatile heatwaves pierces his skin the only thing holding him together from going self-flagellating rampage once again. The glare of the sun imprints upon the opulescent, pupiless eyes, as the grief-embedded hollowness of them stare at the moribund-saturated, barren desolation that was once frolic and rampant with energy and vigor of camaraderie. In his bottomless grief, the haunting trauma that would forever alter the life of not only Hanzo Hasashi, but Scorpion’s eternal damnation as a tangible spectre, the faucet of his anger, frustration, the tunes of dismay becomes the crumbled sand castle as every facet of contained emotions rupture. In his erect posture, he thinks of the memories he once thought he’d repressed deep within the buried chambers of his heart as he excavates them. How he holds his tears back, as regrets fill his body, and shame writhing slowly. 

How scalding streams of waterfall tears rupture out of him, wrapping around him, forming a whirling maelstrom as it sinks him deeper and deeper into the trenches of re-blossomed grief and unbearable pressure. Trudging towards the center of where all of the tragedy and inevitable madness unfolded, driving him further into the collision center, all the septic, suppurating scratches and dents keep bursting as the images of rotted red flesh flattened like putty with the every reminiscent of life rendered into nothing and insignificant under the settled cruelty as the human indifference was sacrilegiously degraded into slaughtered animals, which nauseates him deep within, despite having witnessed multitudes and degrees of horror, nothing desensitizes it when he could still perceive etched harrowing fear and embedded pain in the withered, desiccated skull and bones, sprawled and drowned in the fissure of exsanguination, becoming event horizon of exploding polluted stars. How expanding emotions fiercely burns like an inextinguishable ache in his chest, becoming both a balm so relieving and a hole so painful it hurts to breathe. 

He’s looking down at his hands again, cradling Harumi and Satoshi’s bones, looking out into the barren road. The jangling noise of his retrieved possessions in the sack over his shoulders become the Atlas he will forever carry, and beneath the howling whistle of the winter’s might, the world creating melodies in the shiver down his spine, strumming through the fibrous musculature as the guitar strings of melancholy and excruciating torment clumps in the chambers of his heart and weighs him down. And all he does is to relinquish beneath the streams of time and catching a more than a glimpse of moistened earth as knees crash onto the earth as letting his onslaught of emotions become a skin of unspoken words, flesh of ideas, bones of verses and a body of prose. Once lost words reuniting with him, as his shaken voice becomes the manifestation of his soul that will escape as ravaging rattle of his diaphragm swells and extends, seemingly beyond the boundary of his being. 

-----

The birds are chirping, and their softness is unsettling. A peaceful sound is nice to wake up to, but peace isn’t what raised him and plunged him from the depths of his shackling quagmire of depression and grief. It’s an anger-subduing hope; without it, his lungs would refuse to function like they used to do, and the scintillating lights of the morning would never be bright as he used to remember. As the wafting incense fill the entirety of the room, as the cremated remains of his family remain encased in the urn, along with artfully rendered portraits of them on an unfolded table. The fragmented halves of his soul is better than all the splintered pieces of a jigsaw puzzle of before, as an intense anticipation of seeing the grandeur and magnificence of the First Shirai Ryu itself transforms possibility into reality; Scorpion’s desire being often, but precursors of the things which he is capable of performing. Even when he still has himself defeated, taunted, shattered, dismantled by the past’s surging memories, the comprehensible world unfolding before him helps his unhealed bruises to heal and his soul replenished. 

For he had long conquered his fears and apprehensions and survived them by cheating Death itself. He will always prevail and win, even when he’s sinking to the bottom as his bones too, fell to the ground as the damage left a raging thunderstorm inside his gut and head to cause calamitous avalanche. Scorpion witnesses his world dancing again seamlessly, as the wind of the encompassed reality carries not the dread of a feigned peace, but the projected tranquility he once sought in his mind with helpless hope. 

No longer he would harbor his isolated heart, and self-destruct his dreams, believing he won’t be ever happy and content with what he has and what he severely lacks in his life. For the Sun will shine on him again, and this couldn’t ever be how he ends; for Scorpion will live in every dimension and reject the idea of forgetting; as he remembers and stomps his feet into the unfurling world where more struggles and trials will test him in the long run. ▬▬ι═══════ﺤ 🔥|| 

[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.16.2022 “Devilry Denouement”

There's more Satan in you than these books will ever know More errors made by crooks than they’ll ever show All the worries that you bottle up inside Crack and simmer to the top to never hide

All the demons that we hold inside of us Only few from dozens asked for thus Some for knowledge and others power Pale at that book, at how you cower

Laid to rest beneath thin olden page Misspoken words that did not age Stolen deeds plundered from meaning Your deviled deeds gathered in steepled teeming

The devil in me is not the devil in you My horns are grown to press my purview To keep me safe, and keep it controlled Do you face your fears, do you do as you’re told?

If they were filled with ink Scribbled full of words that make you think Or every tome you roam is left unadorned You wrote your Satan that you forewarned

What gave you the right to make it be real? Spilled from the minds who took to kneel There is more Satan in you than these books will ever see If you let it all fade, like a cold-front cloud, it won’t be

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.4.2022 “Day Gardening”

Days pass like petals from the garden Slowly upon the lazy wind In and out of my mudtracked home Where footprints fade like prairie-mice tracks Who ascended from their route Angels too must be as terrifying Only birds to not tell us, “Be not afraid” I have come to believe they feast upon it Slow are the days when birds flit A wisp of smoke dancing across the sky Like petals caught in a cold front Pulling away the sun on a sailors bowline

The wind comes with sickles and chattering teeth To slice through and bite at my toes and hedged rows Flowers retreat into their bud, and in layers Retreat into my lair and lay my unbloomed mind upon a pillow Not of loam nor dirt, but bamboo So the coming wind will make a morning melody To give rise to me And my garden’s fading petals Put haste in my step to avoid sinking into the mud “Be not afraid” as I walk beyond My grasses and my gardens Eyes always glancing higher Death may come on swift wings, But so too do sweet dreams Carried on storm clouds Feeding my fatal fading petals

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.20.2022 “When do the Warriors Sleep When it is Still Raining?”

After battle always came a respite Of this, our warriors were always sure To pause and catch one’s breath a bit For tomorrow had battles still yet to endure

From the scattered field of conflict Where remains fell disregarded from fingertips No more shall their blades do harm, no more shall they inflict

Stripped of ardor and armaments of great virility the storm before the storm has broken There was a certain comfort to be found in predictability Within their crumbled hearts what has awoken

Dust settles in the eyes of the disillusioned To grace excuses forgiven staining tears How else can they accept the shunned?

No calm waters weary to wake or wave Only from the iron tears weeped shall reprieve What rest is had from this onslaught life gave? Each day following the next, unrelentingly, until we leave

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.3.2022 “Fury like my Father”

I used my youthful rage like fire To burn my world around me Broke my door frame till I was tired Scorched my throat eager to disagree

I learned my craft well from my father For whom I sure had his own to thank To the origin of this rage, reaching how much farther? It took too many years until the fuel shrank

From father to son with holy spirits Poured down our throats in congregation Mine is a righteous rage that never quits Turned inward upon each subsequent generation

My scalded hands, burned on my fury Devoid of light, of love, of purpose I am my judge, my own foolish jury Where goes my anger, the fire that flows?

Into my blood each family formed Now that it tells me how I’ve been wronged In the winter it keeps me warmed I wield my anger, astride me, just where it has belonged

Each day I know, with me it ends No fire will survive when my generation ascends

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.15.2022 “Spring Cleaning Carry Me Away”

Each morn’ I rise to watch flowers bloom To witness each stretch and groan Assisting with what little there is to groom Minding each budding word’s tone

Toe-touching reaches, pulling at knee backs I never gained a green thumb Only blisters, blood, and mud stacks Too shy to ask where it really came from

Each falling bough, a drum-like blow Green streaked highlights sunburnt Much like spring robins nesting season go Piece by piece, twig and tuft to make homes current

Do the robins tend their hedges? Before their chicks leap from wooded ledges? I scraped my knees on the sidewalk Cutting down the tall grass stalks

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.10.2022 “How Often Do You Practice?”

   Hope is practiced and refined as a skill    Like a weapon you wield, trained at-will

   A  plant watered and cared for    Like high tide reminders that there is a shore

   A discipline sharpened to a fine tool    Like a #2 pencil you once used in school

   A painting you make for eyes all your own    Like a bird's jubilation, first time having flown

   A backpack you fill with trinkets; belongings    Like a burdensome load, still carried with longings

   Hope is inside you, a bud; maybe nipped    Given little reminders, like “Your order is shipped”

   A kick to the gut, just narrowly missed    Like watching a sunset, just the way that you wished

   A word that you whisper, in prayer    Like a cry out for help, set alight as a flare

   Only four letters that you give power to    When your time comes for you; oh, what will you do?"

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[env0writes]

Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.2.2022 “Repeat Until True”

I said I’d begin to be The man that you deserve to see That with your applause, like Tinkerbell I’m sure that things, will go as swell

That with your praise, The world, I would appraise Crack its shell like my oyster Say, “It was all done for her”

You want me, to want to be A better man, for only me How was I supposed to see My world was worth the guarantee

You always hated how I said I’m only here Always ready to do more than just lend an ear If only I just listened to what you said Instead of prattling on instead

Maybe you would begin to see The man that I promised to be Hold the world inside my hand Holding yours, just as I planned

What more is there to want Than all the world pouring from a font? If I could be what the would would choose How much of myself, is there to lose?

Can I really be as good as you state? You’re no saint, let’s get that straight As adored as anyone could ever ask I have to be sure, I’m up to your task

Can I just begin to free Myself of all the social potpourri Plunge my hand into my breast Behold my heart! I’ll do my best

Now I say that I’ll begin to be The man that I deserve to see That when I believe, in my ability I could transform into any possibility

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.8.2022 “Tercet Verdant Paths”

We used to lay about playing games On the streets and the park, Dousing knees in grass stains

Sticks and stones were swords and shot Fired in the tournament-blue sky Cloudlessly, we rained supreme our plot

Out past sundown star-shining light dark Tracing TV static constellations and future contemplations Well past cries for dinner, candy will have to hit the mark

Bare-chested Ursa Major suntan tie-dye Green knees and black soles No matter the melanin we all ended red by-

The end of the day No matter if, what, which way Aloe allowed, we were reluctant to say,

“Goodbye”

Goodbye means the fun has to end The conversation has to cease 'Til our waving arms pass around the bend

Praying, once more, to see tomorrow The sun to rise, our eyes to meet Goodbye is just a word we’ll have to borrow

“Goodbye” smells of cold breeze sweat Shared with every cumulative cumulus day When painted, what colors of fun have we not discovered yet?

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.23.2022 “So There Goes the Teens, So There Goes the ‘Oughts”

Beneath the sun-asphyxiated light of the moon Draped in the finest chiffon clouds of night, Remember the faith,‘Oh ye faithless, Transfixed and transformed far too soon

As above and so below, in the body and the mind Embrace your unchanging state of growth Ephemeral mist mars the mirrors The masses brewing, fate’s loom unwinds

So too the changing of one’s raiment Passing each season, moon, and tide A boiling oil within you rises Minds pierced by winter’s encroaching containment

Do not mourn the ever-coming tomorrow morning Let tears dry, like dusted gospel pages Within your shuttered windows and battered doors Hold fast, ‘Oh quickened one, for the rest will not have warning

Read a verse from your childhood, Any little ditty will do Feel the warmth inside the words Revel warm in the community, as words so often should

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.12.2022 “Rain, Rain, Go Away”

Pink petals populate my greying eyesight Head cocked left to right in floral rain No petrichor presence in my olfactored night Checked planner-boxes, spilled ink, and water stain

We did not plan for the unplanned Whether or not we took the weather into account We will not count on one another, but stand- Huddle tight beneath one single umbrella, purchased at discount

Like sidewalk cracks in the gravel concrete Superstition stitched together my fears Ladybugs and plunging petals dance and meet Beside the places my feet will walk near

Blue skies will return again soon With the winds ever blowing, your words just as blustery As early as noon- I suspect the clouds will be far less clustery

Not even the clouds will crowd our couple No rain, no pain, no stain on fresh pressed clothes Just a petal pressed into our palms, with each other full Interlocked, laced, and well stocked on raincheck oaths

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.7.2022 “Icharal Love”

Fruit of sin caught in my throat Refusing to plunge, Refusing to rise Lodged adjacent to my heart And Icaral pain, Practice with me the words spelled out, “I Love You” Split them apart in the clementine sun In the private places of clemency So that ichor like Greek fire may be unquenched Spreading like subway kneecaps Across the aging, Aegean Sea

Practice once more with me the vowel sounds “I Love You” As the flower gazes at the sun Caught between Stuck crossing the road Just as the light turns green Do I retreat or press onward? How many pieces of myself can be partitioned Auditions start at seven, Will you catch the words before they crash Cold against the graphene asphalt ocean below Would you save Icarus from his highs, And from his lows?

Will you strangle these words from me? “I Love You ” Perhaps I should practice alone, Offer a chance to turn those words upon myself

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.29.2022 “Do Not”

Don’t, say the word Or let it pass from your lips Before you speak, don’t Let it be a restrictive thought Or a constriction sought

Don’t, keep closing doorways with words The halls have long since been boarded up Crosswalks crossed out with [Do Not Cross] Do knot; tie each other together with community Don’t, let inaction interfere in inability If we are to grow, don’t, say otherwise

Don’t, say the word Or let it pass the red-lipped line Lest it be the barricade that averts all gazes And sends the world back Don’t let them go

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.26.2022 “Looking Back, Looking Forward”

Where have the days gone of social circles Entwined as sacred concentric geometry? The passing periods that contained every ounce of friendship’s conflict The secondary school tidal drift of cliches The entire world was only one bicycle away And each day the world was ending in new ways for each of us The evenings where each of us were heroes to one another Each triumph, Everest Each pitfall, Mariana’s Trench Where the windfalls blew me between each tribe A welcomed purveyor of goods and tidings Welcomed in like the cool Summer breeze That desirable breath of fresh air that is ultimately exhaled onward Shut out when Autumn comes again When did my social sphere become a summary Smaller than prestigious top-eight seats on Myspace Now my space is filled with paperwork Planning the steps I once took for someone else Someone who is not me Not my own Not my next of kin If only I saw the grand circle of which I am a single droplet of ink In the past, where I was known I am known of Known for Passing periods through the myriad of the lines we trace Plotting a course A to B to C Skipping letters, steps, and ladder rungs Where each day feels unprepared Now is the afternoon of my day I miss the mornings, fresh with dew And soon I will miss the beating sun high in the sky And then I will miss the cascading sun spilling crayon across the clouds And then I will be no more

I miss what is no longer, As I will miss what is now

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[env0writes]

A Maelstrom of Petals and Prose 3.18.2022 “Blade, of Grass, of a Windmill, of a Knife”

A soft breeze blows Billowing pumpkin field windmills Creaking and croaking late night frogs Whistle through the reeds and over bogs

The sun is setting down on downtrodden settlers Setting up campsites in eyesight of giant hands Quixotic, hypnotic winding Winding down the roads Headed towards hope Headed far from home

Before their feet the leaves are rustlings Towards the city, growing ever-more bustling Towards the trouble our adventurers chase Light on their feet, towards or away running with haste

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