TruthSoul Armor

Dan Ke l le t t

truth

horizon

want

outweigh

mama soulja

crow

drift

dead poet

napalm

penance

may steal my feathers

poetry by Dan Kellettdesign by Glorianne Kada

the bent of cornelius

TruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthD K nudge away from tremendous

rhyme away from truth

TruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruth TruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruthTruth

dan Kellett

Truthnudge away from tremendousrhyme away from truth

It’s always been a prelude To the way down For me Being of stone inscribed descent The bloodline of blood shot eyes close enough to liars to known verityYet too close to trust my own tongue

My hope is reluctantly perpetuated in slow moving glances of blured tender chaosIn that screaming divide between what blooms And what wilts

Sitting beside worn down messiahs Cookin up mountain words and ocean songs Irreverent revelry A nudge away from tremendous A rhyme away from truth

truthtruthtruth

truthtruth

truth

It’s always been a prelude To the way down For me Being of stone inscribed descent The bloodline of blood shot eyes close enough to liars to known verityYet too close to trust my own tongue

My hope is reluctantly perpetuated in slow moving glances of blured tender chaosIn that screaming divide between what blooms And what wilts

Sitting beside worn down messiahs Cookin up mountain words and ocean songs Irreverent revelry A nudge away from tremendous A rhyme away from truth

oiloiloiloiloiloiloiloil

oiloiloiloiloiloiloiloil

oiloiloil

oiloil oil oil oil oil oil oil

oil oiloil oil oil oil oil oil oiloil

oil

oil oil oiloiltruthtruth

oiloiloiloiloil

horizon with symptomatic palms guiding our animal hearts to doom in blind herdschasing the seedy scent of gain carving checkbook scripture peeled from egocentric visions of The Profit

the inner walls of purest fertility seep mournfully from a global womb alive spawning sedition an Apache resistance between my temples

as she bleeds like a hemophiliac lanced by an appetite of unnatural hunger known to no inborn belly only to corrosive heads with corrupt tendencies who march steadfastly towards breaking their own backs

WantA wind rips rise through my prisonmismI find it’s about the wing and the want to fly

It’s A level down,Swift to Broken......Swarming mindful taverns of grief mythology,

Not capable of,Compliance,Or Complacence,Or The swoop of warm delicate things,

I’ll close myself away,Before the wars

Scrape severed signs of where I’ve been, cross my face,

Displayed dismay,The crutch of squander,

I have my way out.I know where to burn through.

My healing lays still, Soaking on shores,

WantA wind rips rise through my prisonmismI find it’s about the wing and the want to fly

Soaking un(sure)To where the taint of wrongs swell, to just below desperate nostrils but just above guilty lips,An ever-present-death threat.

It’s been a dereliction of my symphonic sky,Bow down days been flowin,Bow down days declared dead,

(do not resuscitate)

A wind rips rise through my prison-ism,I find,It’s about the wing,And the want, To flyIt’s about,the wing,and the want, to fly

so i carve my nameinto the s t ra tosphere

the f ra i l reasoningof t i red oaks

in the face o f swooping gus t ssend for lorn ’d l imbs

toppl ing l ike a mighty a lbatrosss t ruck f rom the b lue

by a v i scous arrowlaunched f rom a jea lous bow

exposed tavernsse t t le in s t i f l ing layers

of gr ie f doc t r ineswhere d i sc ip les are bound to the d i r t

gumpt ions id ledwi th in the damning wal l s

of a shr inemasoned

by a depravedse l f i shcor tex

outweigh

they read of warsmarr ing themselves v icar ious lymeat tagsscrapedcross f leshby a ly ing handsord id c la imants o f scarswho are absent the wounds they d i sp lay by leaning on squanderl ike a c rutch

so i carve my nameinto the s t ra tospherewhere the pure tonesof per fec t symphonies form a be l lyand l ingerand dr ip in to the mouthsof those who sp l i t j awswide enoughto consume a th ingthat outweighsthemselves

Out hereWorld slipped crimes between us

The kind that bombast decrees can level downMow tips

off the screen Thunder rattle rip cage

The bellow moan of mama souljaSpeak back gainst the wares

That tarePoint out for them that spine

That runs straightand right

to the head

Mama sOuljATo where we should not

seek out the brilliant things

but seek out the brilliance in all things

To where we should not seek out the brilliant thingsBut seek out the brilliance in all things

“We had seeds to raise’Time forged scholars in the ways of men

In the ways of themIn the ways of you

In the ways of us

Sycamore worries may bow branches to weekBut there are no lies in bloomIn the whites or the greensIn the loving, bellow moanOf mama souljaThe eyes of a motha fuckaForever this side of the dirtImmaculate perception

i am in the incisioni must still be in this skinsomewherei still feel that plundering back sprung rageripping me from the pillowpouring me into the dayto move amongst clay mindsin brick buildingsmy temples pulsinglike a liars heart

grief clubs me like incestsplayed and lashedkeeping me writhingdown round the dripof my own slimein the lurchdefused in the eugenicsof scribing corinthianswho’s frames know no swayand bare no weight

i must still be in this skinsomewhereor i could not pile this rage

into the graves of my eyeswhere philistine crows by my carrionred their black beaks

death is closer to me in this minute than it was the minute before but not closer to me in this minute than life

the clock pounds like a smug bullyruthless like gravitymatching the pulses of my heartbeat for beatonly one of the two will stop

i am left with fist-fulls of freedomthat i rip from the shallows of these daysand i will fill my fiststil the last clickechoesin my mind

crowcrow

crowcrow

i held you thereJust above gnashing torrentsKeeping you from the swallowThe sinkThat slow false dissolve to pity

Earnest in your un-movementYou achieved Suicide by atrophy

You were the ProteusThe keeper of your own panaceaSo I let you goAnd I have since Let them all go

I let them drift away.

And I snapped a branch from a gracious intentAnd with a blade I forged you from spiritCarved itSlowlyInto Contempt.

And into these days I’ve used it As a walking stickAs a wandAs a weapon.

There will always be the siege of yourscarsYourCravingsYour Endless disobedienceBound in my obstinate marrow.

There will always be that.

It was when you last laid eyes upon me that I knewA demon was coming

And I braced for impact

Cause you know DadWe NeverRun.

So I dare the wave bare down and halve meSo that I might riseTo spiteWhat took you.

Drift

the bleak then shun light awaymy lament poured upon soulthick enough to cover my years since birtha soul meets stone insidea heart dressed in thrice to hurt it could bearthe way your quiver voice shattered my hopeand my tremble finger touched demisedirectly on its main veinand I felt the death pulsing

late night phone call‘you need to go to the hospital dad’‘no son, I’ll let you take me in the morning’

how stubborn blokes allow the chokesto rip and bury them away

‘okay I love You Dad. I’ll be there early’‘okay Son, I love You’dead poetDead poet is one of the first poems written by Dan Kellett. The poem reflects the style of his earlier writing and he has chosen to keep the original wording and structure of the poem in order to maintain the raw emotion this piece captures.

I kneeled in next days sunas it streamed in through slits of gaping curtain windowsand begged you to move somethinga fingera toetake a deep breathpleasetake my breathpleaseanything to force the blackened endfrom hopeless sunken eyesto bring to riseYou my soldierYou my towerYou my true and solid heartI felt the devils and swarming demonsand in the colossal tragedy a lesson that bore to my coreand the drip and drizzle of at least one truththere is nothing subtlein the deepest of weepsthere is nothing as fleetingas You

dead poet

napalmHe died about three years ago nowA raging alcoholic that died as a result of an upper GI bleedAs a result of chronic alcoholismAs a result of his prior death in Vietnam

Wilting clefts speak in tones of sob and fleetStagger men sink back to mottle streamsDisintegration plotsDrowned by beasts of mist cringe existenceLiar kites wind boundSpiral downEmpathy reductionAtrophy induction

napalmUpper GI Bleed3% mortality rateI learned that as I googled his death certificateTrying to find what I could have done to fix itHoping there was nothingI was disappointed by the answer

Each pulse becomes treasonPumping towards slow drip tragedyDrowning ‘bluebird’Drip drop fade

Vietnam 100% mortality rateI learned that in Irish pubs in the BronxTrying to find out if they could have done something to fix itHoping there was nothingI was disappointed by the answer

War role cast in yellow man fox holesMachine crumble march in devil trenchMortar binge and purge and stomp and dropShrapnel evermoreFaith thwartedBy napalm reality

His shell made it back stateside long enough to give me a last nameI wonder now if escaping the potato famine was a good trade for the draftHe was drafted on St. Patty’s DayLuck of the Irish I guess

Swarms be thick when prison bars are ribsAnd the shackledPumpsDown in the shiverNext to hate and historyHooks in the temples of the martyr drone enlistedEntrapped, disemboweled sent back to scramble amongst warless eyesWith more war

And less I

I found him dead outside his bathroomI could see where he fell against the walland slid down to the sitting positionHe had been sliding down for a long timeSince St. Patty’s Day, 1967

Disheveled patriarch soaked in drop dead airPhlem spit against a tyrant’s breezeLong gone causesThey disrobe and wait to be countedEach throbbing in a lusty, salivary wantFor it’s death creditPicking over a dead man’s heartEach with a trophy grip On the part it killedRegret, pain, loss, ambivalence, melancholy,All lined upSneering

I wondered if he apologized to me as he slid downBefore he fadedFor dying like thatKnowing I’d be the one to find himKnowing I’d be the one to clean up his mess

The rant of a childSteady in the matters of me and meShuddered by carcass and lightLooking for an apologyIn a last breathI was a fool

I owned the apartment he lived inI had to get it rent readyI had to paint over the mural he paintedon the cinder block wall in his bedroomI cried like a baby

Erasing slays the swells of regressionCrippled chaos namedPrayers be something less then thisLess than painting Over paintingErasing you away

I found the poems On napkinsI found black mold in the sinkThe poems were unfinishedThe mold was thrivingThat is what surrender Looks like

Penance

Cast like a tombThis fractureRunning low through my gutA bleak and monolithic bellyOverflowingSending Condemning lamentsIn regimentsOf viral prison songsMarching like faceless paratroopersInto the slump of landscapesThat I ache forThis ruthless gap of reproachKeeping my Sinful Dreadful Hands

From the wanting inner thighsOf wayward maidensWho dance a woeful danceAt the breach of Shrangri-LaSo I swayA captive Grizzly kind of swaySide to sideWith moan, groan, spitIncessantly a moment awayFrom disgorgingThe sickness that is MyPenancePenance

t h i s w i n d m a y s t e a l m y f e a t h e r s

b u t t h e s e w i n g s c a n

f l y o n b o n e

nudge away from tremendousrhyme away from truth

Copyright 2011Dan Kellett