she said, “I cannot have anything”

and he replied ,”Ask and you shall receive”

and you, you told me,

“I have nothing left to give.”

and who was it?

who was it?

That fell asleep

and dreamed of a woman abandoned on the Sea?

floating beneath the burning sky,

searching for her lost things.

and she said “I have nothing.”

and he replied “Ask and you shall receive”

and you, you whispered,

“I do not know what I need.”

Do you remember me now?

Can you see me among these things?

and do the winds

that blow through the caves

remind you of the words

I used to say.

Oh these things I have left behind..

Do you remember what it was like,

to have the world laid before you

conquered without a fight?

Oh these things I have left behind,

do they still think of me?

My name is Liiv, and I was once

the Goddess of Peace.

Now I sit in this room

forgotten by everyone.

If you could go to those places

where man has yet to plunder,

you would see the altars once dedicated to me,

statues line the cracked basin,

a hundred images of a goddess

whose lips are sealed in silence.

Oh these things I have left behind…

If I were to pour my life onto the floor and write my history,

I would destroy this grey with my red red love.

But I choose to lie down instead and close my eyes,

letting the dust drift over me.

I will trace the speech of my heart onto this darkness.

The weight of my words bending the silence

until they fall to the floor and disappear.

Oh these things I have left behind,

do they still think of me?

And is it with kindness?

she said, I miss nothing that I had before

and he said,

what must I sacrifice to gain back what I have lost?”

and you, I remember

the song of your voice reaching above…

There is nothing we can give

to bring back the things that are missing.

Yet knowing this, why is it that we still try?

You must cling to what it is you love.

You must choose for what is to come.

Isn’t that what life is about?

she said, “The answers were once so simple.

The shadows become the air become the night.

and as I drift away

beneath the waters of my dreams,

I hear a voice whispering,

‘You only get one chance.’

My name is Liiv

and I was once goddess of peace

now I lie forgotten

in this garden of lost things

what the world has given up hope on

my company

and I look closely at these things

in hopes a message may have been left for me.

The language is here.

buried beneath the sand.

only I do not understand

what is it they try to say to me.

Go. .Stay…Forget.

This is a language written in glimpses of the past.

Not mine,

but from others who have come

before me. Only they have moved on.

she said, If I had only known

what this emptiness would be like.

If only I had known all this,

I would have bound us together

with the veins of my body so that nothing…

could have torn us apart.

My heart told me to do such things,

yet I did not listen Can you forgive me?

Oh these things I have left behind,

do they still think of me and is it with kindness?

My name is Liiv

and I was once the Goddess of peace

and the world used to worship me…

and she said,

” It will the be the end of the world,

when it is love that embarrasses the Gods….

and he replied,

This I will remember

So that you will never forget.

and in my dreams

you turn to me

together

we pull these words from the air

and plant them

in this

garden of lost things.

-Cassandra Tribe

My grandmother taught me to pray:
“Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep,
If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take…”
Who better than a grandmother
To remind you that you
Very well could die before morning?
Who better, indeed,
Than the very woman whose life yours will replace?
You remind her by your presence she will die;
She reminds you by hers that you will, too—
And that, I think, is a beautiful thing.

In the lesson of these ancient words
She taught me to pray another way:
With my eyes wide open
Barefoot in the grass,
Still, and silent,
Aware of the fragrant ripening tomatoes and wild grapes
On a summer evening,
To look at heaven full of clouds,
A heaven traversed by Canada geese
And to feel more than anything in the looking up
The needle-like ends of the grass
Pressing into my tender insteps
And to know that it is good to be still and silent
Whenever the geese pass.

My grandmother told me once
They reminded her of her father who built the house
Behind which we stood, who raised his family there,
And treated his wife like a queen.
We watched the geese together.
We prayed:
We would think of her father
And feel our roots
Growing deep into the ancient soil of the backyard
As those beautiful brown birds
Sent heaven to us in song,
Just enough to hold onto and be pulled up by,
Roots and all and the earth with us.

- Sandy Carlson

(N.B.: In England, most judges of Criminal Courts are addressed as “My Lord.”)

My Lord, in spite of this one small offence,
Have pity on my youth and innocence.
I lay my guilt upon society,
On sleazy bars and on my family;
On ignorance and on a broken home;
On films of sex and violence, and the bomb:
But never for a moment on myself.
Drugs lay in easy reach upon the shelf,
And bad companions held me in their spell,
Till I had mortgaged all my life to Hell.
I blame the television for my crime:
The fault (if fault there be) is none of mine.
And now my Lord, pass sentence: calm my fears!
What? Twenty years in prison? Twenty years!
Of course I killed the old bitch - but the truth
Is, that was the exuberance of youth!
My Lord, you have no mercy! Wall me up
In prison, if you can - your Summing Up
Is bound to raise some technicality
That only a sharp barrister could see:
However much I murder, cheat or steal,
I’ll get round any verdict, on Appeal.

- Geoffrey Hoffman

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

- Robert Frost

Artist: Mandi Lourenco

“What do you want from me?”
I stuttered, “Your time.”
I didn’t want to say that I want
Honesty
Mental
Stimulation, Physical
Satisfaction, Emotional
Support
I didn’t want to ask
Him to let me in
His personal
Space
Or tell him that I want him
To realize that I’m enough
 
So
I didn’t tell him that
I want him in my future
As sure as some War
As solid as Peace
Or that I want him
To dare to trust
In love one day
Dare as bold as teenagers
Playing the game of truth
In the back of the bus
Daring as a Bush
Running a country
Daring as lovers
Who turned into haters
And dare to love
Again
 
Didn’t want to overwhelm
Him, with my womanly demands
Didn’t want to be like her
Or the her before her
Just wanted us to be
Us
Without the heavy expectations
So I stuttered, “Your time.”
Because I’m hoping
That his time is all-
Inclusive of everything
I need

- Ain Drew

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.
Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
‘Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.
Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.
Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.
Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don’t you take it awful hard
‘Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own back yard.
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.
Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I’ve got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?
Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

- Maya Angelou

At a young age, my great-grandmother opened the fridge
to show what was on the menu. I think I was twelve. I
went to a school in Mt. Prospect. I stayed with my
mother and grandparents. My grandfather passed a few
years after he was able to save enough money for his
pink carpet. It wasn’t pink for long. His house
smelled of carpet cleaner. My grandfather had
slicked-back hair. He wore white socks. My grandfather
had coughing attacks. His poor carpet. He saved his
hard-earned cash to get this carpet. Was it for
grandmother? Who knows? All I know is he had coughing
attacks. He may have coughed up blood. Me and my
mother visited my great-grandmother and uncle. It was
a twenty-minute journey. We went by way of Toyota
Corolla. Betsy was the car’s name. My
great-grandmother opened the fridge. There was the
carp, Jell-O, stew. A delicacy, my uncle would say. I
don’t remember sampling this delicacy. Jell-O and carp
didn’t make sense.

- Jason Prather

Late night travels lead to left side pained
Cassidy’s “I’m a hustler…” plays for a minute then fades 
when the scene returns the tale of
18 wheels desperately trying their hands at grabbing ground,
stone, rock, pavement was what played next
and he, the one that hustles and is known for just that,
is laid up,
collarbone,
four ribs,
pelvis and lung
scream internally
while he whispers from the good lung…
“…this sh!t hurts man…”
and for the first time since being there
I see pain drape over him…
his girl,
out of the room,
mine,
with his
and we talk like hustlers do on the block…
the room
became our corner
and we kicked it like we were smoked out and gettin’ it…
only interrupted by
the nurses need to take his temperature
right in the middle of us talking…
“No fever,” the nurse says as she leaves
“…I think I’d be aiight if the pain was spread around…”
“you aiight now,” I say,
“you could be worse, right?”
he smiles that half smile
and I half smile too…
moments later I watch as hustler tests his lungs strength…
blue ball dancing at half mass
hustler breathes his strongest…
I see strength in his eyes…
I hear go get it in his voice…
I say to myself he’ll be aiight…

On May 19th my car was hit by an 18-wheeler. The accident left me with four left ribs broken, a fractured pelvis, a left shoulder fracture, a collapsed left lung, and a concussion. Due to the accident I had to cancel a lot of show dates, but I am alive and performing! God is good. 

- Lamont Carey

Sometimes when I’m alone
I Cry,
’Cause I am on my own.
The tears I cry are bitter and warm.
They flow with life but take no form
I Cry because my heart is torn.
I find it difficult to carry on.
If I had an ear to confiding,
I would cry among my treasured friends,
but who do you know that stops that long,
to help another carry on.
The world moves fast and it would rather pass by.
Then to stop and see what makes one cry,
so painful and sad.
And sometimes…
I Cry
and no one cares about why.

- Tupac Shakur