Surrounded By Surroundings

A poem collection written from September 4th to November 3rd, 2024

Entrenched - 9/4/24

Torquing hips
Rotating spine
Thrusting arms 
Dirt in my boot
Dust in my teeth
Digging into the ground 
And into myself 
Making room
For seeds of change 
And eventually 
The fruits of new perspectives 
The load is heavy 
Physically 
And 
Emotionally 
I’m trying my best 
To lift with my legs  

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Time Is - 9/11/24

The present
Reminds of 
The past
Reminds of
The future
Like tree roots
Anchored to the Earth
When the wind moves through
With ideas of what is to come
Leaves harmonize
A beautiful melody
Or
Branches break
Sap spills

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Change With Change - 9/16/24

We musn't cling
To relationships
Environments
Dreams
This world keeps churning
Folding
Reproducing
We must let go
Open up
Change with change
If not
We'll be left with
Sore hands
And a heavy heart

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The Recipe of A Memory - 9/22/24

A gentle shower falls
Starlings dart in a seemingly 
Sporadic way
The tide of my breath
Washes over
The ocean of my ribcage
Memories come to me in feelings
Personas, activities, locations, seasons
All culminate
Forming something utterly specific 
Never to be made again
Because
The ingredients don't exist
These feelings are ingrained
Fossilized in the mind 
The clearest remembrance
Of lived experience
I'm transported 
Upon their arrival
It makes me wonder
How the scent 
Of this current recipe
May reach me one day

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Ailing Orchard - 10/5/24

The trees are bleeding
Their fruit rots before harvest
Chalk is wiped on their trunks
Oil sprayed on their leaves
In an attempt to
Protect them
These are merely bandages
Nursing symptoms
Of loneliness
They need companions
Community
We are not so different
Us and them

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Black Horehound - 10/7/24

Indigo flowers
And small green leaves
A large patch lays before me
I've come to them begrudgingly
With shears in hand
Their home is coveted by others
I am supposed to evict them
Though I do not want to
Nor do the bees by their petals
And the worms by their roots
I will find you all a new home
I promise

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Mount Olympus - 10/14/24

Grand mountains loom over
Staunchly still
Century old Pines
Lead the way
The ocean sits in fog
Flooding the horizon
My extremities are cold
But my core emanates heat
Tired legs
And heavy breath
Persevere in tandem
Step by step
The journey is realized
The summit arrives
Though the clear view
Only yields more peaks
Onward we trek!
Jarred by excricuation
Awed by utter beauty
Grateful for both
And everything in between

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Momentarily - 11/3/24

With my head held high
Solid ground beneath me
I can tell you
With no trace of doubt
The answers
To your burning questions
The world speaks through me
With such clarity
As if I am the omniscient
As if I saw early humans
Stand for the first time
Soon thereafter
I recoil
Responding to your questions
With merely more questions
Slipping on rocks
Bowing my head in exhaustion
To the great mystery

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