Tag Archives: depression

Inquiring Minds, Poetry Work

The Mucky Muck

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Muckymcuk

The day’s
doldrums drone
on from dawn until
dusk and the mucky muck
lurks.

An insidious thing
the mucky muck,
pulling life out,
removing all
motivation for movement
as the spirit tries to escape
a maze never seemingly meant
to be solved.

With a thrum, thrum
insistence to be heard, the mucky muck lurks
skulking deep,
latched on like a
fat tick needing
to be pulled out,
cut out, or burned!

Mucky muck leave me be
For I swear, with
sword in hand
I will cut thee

And I will see you bleed, bleed, bleed

even ever as my blood

leaves me, running in rivulets

down and dripping off

the cufflinks of my sleeves

You then mucky muck will finally surely

be free of me.

by Philip Wardlow March 27th, 2023

Inquiring Minds, Poetry Work

The Everything and the Nothing

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If I were to suddenly evanesce, to flee, to disappear, 
to run fast and headlong into the bright nothingness of the night,
what ruin would find my absence?

Would their be sick wailing siren calls of the once was
reaching my soul's ears 
through the
nothingness of me?

I hope not. Not Wailing over me.... a tear or two will do, followed
quickly with a laugh.

But I do not wish to know the old world anymore after I am gone.
Why dry up and go, if to only to still receive drops of the
once-was in a teacup, to simply drink bitterly
of.

Remember me or don't, for I will not care as
I lie afloat amongst the stars, dreaming of new
things, new worlds, new excursions to catapult
a frayed mind to healing, to repair a ripped soul
torn asunder.

Cry and smile in the same instant is
all I ask of you if you do remember, for I
liked to be missed in both respects.
So I guess I do care a little at that.

I believe in everything and nothing in this Universe and I
would miss both aspects were I to finally fall into the
abyss of what-not and possibly nothings.
 
I enjoy the Everything of  people healing of the
cuts they give themselves and get,  and its wondrously satisfying
to partake in living in that magical epiphany 
of them 
I do not enjoy the Nothing, in the sense that 
they will continually scratch the scabs to bleeding
every so often and there is no mop big enough, 
nor pail of water full enough 
to ever fully clean it all up.

I am tired of slipping in their blood.
The Everything of them is wonderful
buy sometimes the Nothing of them
becomes all too much. 


By Philip Wardlow Dec, 2021










 





 

	

	
	




	
	

				

			GiFs for your Entertaiment, Inquiring Minds, Poetry Work
		

			
I know I won’t cry

		

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They say parents shouldn’t outlive their kids, but should an older brother outlive their younger?





Much like a parent, the older brother directs, and protects the course of the younger.





Unlike parents, the older brother can also be a partner, a fellow perpetrator of many a fun misdeed gone awry. That is where bonds lie deepest, where intimate secrets are kept and held between a kin closer than that of the mother or father.





Sharing of sins, and the punishment of those sins, sharing in the joys and  adventures that is youth in its whole.





You share a core with that little brother that none may know. It’s unspoken but known to the bone between you two.





To the Bone.





It’s honored, it’s delicate. It’s something that always dwells.





So when you see your little brother, dismal and seemingly damned, fallen and fragile,  raging against an unknown foe and miles from the place in him from where he was once was, you know.





Where  in the core  that you share, now only dwells despair, you weep, and you weep, and you weep in the silence where no sees, because a man doesn’t cry, they simply don’t. 





You know you won’t cry as he lies in a casket, all dressed and prettied up. You know you won’t cry when other’s speak of him in passing or come up to you with a hug, and “I am sorry for your loss” 





You know you won’t cry simply because you have already cried so much as bit by bit of your little brother was pulled from you, excised with a sharp knife, and put into a blender and pureed to mush.










By Philip Wardlow June  2021   





 

	

	
	




	
	

				

			Inquiring Minds, Poetry Work
		

			
Plants need watering

		

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The flower sits on the table, withering,

it looks tired now. Slumped.

Sad.

Dead dry leaves litter the ground

around it.

Perhaps not watered enough, perhaps

drowned with rotted roots

Perhaps too much sun as it

sat in a hot room,

or were the shades drawn too tight

not allowing enough light?

Choked off in some way

it was, to look so.

Either way it was neglected.

Best just to throw

it way now.


by Philip Wardlow 2019

	

	
	




	
	

				

			Inquiring Minds, Poetry Work
		

			
Padded Perfection

		

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We slave to have everything,

we fight the world for “ours”,

we strive for perfection,

we seek a look of a dream

that shimmers and undulates

from a hot arid

plane

at the edge

of a  horizon

containing all our  fears and doubts


This seeming perfect way

of anything is bullshit

it’s just bullshit

everyone thinks they’re better than the other

vanity abounds as pride flattens them

under the gravity of their

making

always pushing, and pushing

down, down, down.


Their way is the best way, cant you see?

And if you can’t, well sorry, you are just

not as cultured as them.

There are no gray areas, only

high contrasts and muted voices

in a bubble.


Light and dark

banging against the other

until all the world

goes mad

held tight in a bright white straight jacket

in a dark as pitch

padded room.


by Philip Wardlow 2019

	

	
	




	
	

				

			Inquiring Minds, Poetry Work
		

			
All the Happy that Comes

		

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Happy is never

a permanent state of

mind.

More often than not

it isn’t there.

But it is there

at times.

Oh, most assuredly it

is there.

I feel it

smiling along side

a character in a book, or

lifted by that actor or actress

in a poignantly profound scene.

A hug from across a room by a

friend with just their eyes alone.

To be seen, truly seen when

I speak my words aloud

or write them down

for a stranger I have

never known.

Often times I am melancholy,

weighted, and in disarray

But a shared laugh or smile brings

me back home to me

in all the electric intimacy

life brings,

and I glow inside,

lightened and floating in

the midst of that connection.

Accomplishments, with mountains

climbed, my nature nourished

on the struggles conquered

and obstacles surmounted

that I never thought

would come to pass.

I’ve realized the Happy Comes

when I reach for it,

inviting it in to come

stay for just a bit

until it decides

to leave

and having faith it will

always be right around

the way

waiting to say

hello again.


by Philip Wardlow 2019

	

	
	




	
	

				

			Inquiring Minds, Poetry Work
		

			
What Dreams may Come

		

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One day I will know me,

where my dreams and fancies

meet my real reality,

where veils are lifted

and the stars cease

in their laughter

of me,

where seeming gods

big or small

give pause

and throw me a wink

and nod my way

as if to say,

you finally get

it son

you finally get

it, now move forward

and flourish.


by Philip Wardlow 2019

	

	
	




	
	

				

			Inquiring Minds, Poetry Work
		

			
Tacos and Tequilas

		

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Sometimes its tacos and salt rimmed tequilas,

movies and lonely couches,

cold beds and cats, tongue twister

and tying up,

a plethora of pleasures in the grab bag

of life

followed by a deluge

of desiccated numb bodies

dumped on your front lawn.


Sometimes its a magical arc of light

swinging in the breeze

by a delicate hand on a dark path


It’s sweet sugar on your lips

tongue licking,

as you slowly, reluctantly

back away from the most

wonderful kiss.


It’s a flurry of heavy punches

to the gut

tickling, because you have been there

before, and you can take it.

Can you not?


So you emit a raucous laugh

at the absurdity

that the day has wrought.

Jaded in your green dreams

you wake to breathe

in new air

to expel the stale.


Grab a Bagel and go out the

door

as you think of the

sweet sugar

that still lingers

on your lips

from the night

before.


By Philip Wardlow 2018


 


 



	

	
	




	
	

				

			Inquiring Minds, Poetry Work
		

			
Starting out

		

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Starting out,

she was perfect,

snow white in complexion

with hands and legs of delicate

moving intent.

She had a curious furious mind,

flitting like a butterfly.

Her dreams took her everywhere

she wanted to go,

just to be.

Her smile was pure and outpouring

magical and inviting.

Her laugh was infectious and inclusive

Her empathy for a friend

heart rending and knife cutting

to the bone of the soul.


She was what beauty was always meant to be.


Then one day she heard the words and phrases

of the malintent

she’s not as pretty as some, or that

brain between yours ears

will never get you very far

And thoughts of fancy are

best left forgotten,

placed in a locked box

and dumped into the sea.


All her seeming sins were brought up from the depths

and laid bare by muted lovers never seeing their own

ill gotten gains.

Violent beating words, followed by choking pushing

declarations of malevolent “loving” motives

left her mind a fractured land

she was scared to travel,

day or night.


At the start of my first

pause at seeing her

really seeing her,

she was magic personified in flesh.

A bright pulsing blue

engulfing.

A rushing vibrant river come to claim

and I smiled inside

at the taking of me.


I saw in her the inception

of the girl and the woman that was always there

I saw all those things they could not

in her

And I told her so.

as she smiled

tears falling.


by Philip Wardlow 2018