Poetry

I have been writing poetry and songs since early in High School and I always seem to come back to it as the truest form of writing there is.  I think it’s the discipline and gut-feeling required to pare down all I have to say to a stark few lines filled with just-the-right words that makes me keep at it.  I’d love to hear what you think about anything and everything you read here!

Coping With Terminal Stillness

Click to Read!

Coping With Terminal Stillness: Poems, Short Stories and Other Broken Things is my third collection of verse and prose, and was just released January 17th, 2012.

It’s an interesting combination of poetry, essays and short stories revolving around three themed sections: Creation, Terminal Stillness, and Random Acts.

My goal with this collection was to marry all three of the aspects of my writing that this blog focuses on in some sort of cohesive whole.

So, the first section, Creation, includes poems based around nature themes and my view of the outside world.  Then, I also included a short story I wrote about nature running amok, called Mosquitoes.

The second section, Terminal Stillness, focuses more introspectively, or my view of the inside world, if you will.  The poems in this section are a bit darker and more intense, mostly with an autobiographical leaning.  Then I included a series of essays from the Timeless Principles posts on this blog because their focus is on self-improvement and development of the inner person.

Finally, the third section, Random Acts, is a loosely defined hodgepodge of poems and two short stories that involve random events or a loss of control.

I’m thrilled with the result, and I hope you find something of interest and value as well!

Here is a sample including the first twenty pages of the book, which gives you the full table of contents as well as the entire first section, Creation:

Coping With Terminal Stillness Sample

Please consider buying a copy for yourself or a friend if anything in the sample moves you!  Click on the cover to buy direct from the publisher.

My second poetry and essay collection.

The Ectopic Epiphany

The Ectopic Epiphany is my second and latest collection of poems and essays, nearly all of them examples of what I term “speed poems”, which basically means I do not agonize over the poem for hours or days, removing commas and adding them back in over and over again.  Rather, when the inspiration hits, I grab the pen or keyboard and blast it out as quickly as I can.  I read over what I wrote, and if glaring issues present themselves immediately, I fix them immediately.  If not, I don’t.  Then, at a later date, I read it again.  If it still has the same raw power, humor or smirk I felt originally, I keep it.

Check out the Book Store to purchase a copy!

 

 

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My first poetry and song lyric collection.

Sanity is Boring

Sanity is Boring – Verse and Prose From an Interesting Mind is my first collection of poems and song lyrics.  It spans a fifteen-year period between 1994 and 2009, during which I was first getting my feet wet with poetry and started really hitting my stride writing lyrics for a garage band I played with called Random Sample.  The collection shows some immaturity and some genius.  Some of it feels dated and uncomfortable, while some of it makes me shake my head and wonder how I came out with it at the age I did.  Either way, it is exactly what poetry is supposed to be: a window into the soul of its creator.

Check out the Book Store to purchase a copy!

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Below are a few sample poems from each collection.  I’d love to hear your comments on these and any other poems of mine you read!

Afternoon Nap

Quiet light filtering in through lace-capped panes of glass
A puddle spilling silently across hardwood floor boards
A tiny hand making shadow puppets, graceful arm swan-necked, quacking
Dust spinning in whirlpools of invisible currents, mottling the pond
That was not there.

My daughter smiles with sleepy eyes as her hand mouths the sounds
A floating menagerie in light and shadow
Her dreams beginning early as her body battles the darkness
Unbroken animals call filling the space between waking and sleep,
As daylight fades.

Dust ebbs and flows around a perfect arm floating south
Her eyes slowly draw the blinds on what is left of daylight
And her dreams continue behind closed eyes, mind drifting
On that invisible pond, swan pulling her further below the surface
And she sleeps.

Self-published in “Sanity is Boring”, 2009, Justin P Lambert

Betrayed
(from “Made From Nothing”)

I opened myself, you let me get closed down.
Reassured myself, you broke all my confidence.
I emptied myself, you filled me with your lies.
I wasted myself, you threw away the rest.

Permissive, submissive, I followed where you led.
Obedient, and lenient,
never questioned what you said
Confused, abused, I just accepted it as fact.
Never knew that I was being betrayed.

I blamed myself, you left me no choices.
Justified myself, you tore me back down.
I caved into myself, you piled more on my back.
I gave into myself, you accepted my surrender.

Permissive, submissive, I followed where you led.
Obedient, and lenient,
never questioned what you said
Confused, abused, I just accepted it as fact.
Never knew that I was being betrayed.

I’ve regained myself, don’t need you anymore.
Reassured myself, I don’t care what you say.
I’ve fought myself, you won’t win this battle.
I’ve found myself.  I will not be betrayed.

Permissive, submissive, I followed where you led.
Obedient, and lenient,
never questioned what you said
Confused, abused, I just accepted it as fact.
Never knew that I was being betrayed.

Self-published in “Sanity is Boring”, 2009, Justin P Lambert

 

Honesty
(from “Buffalo Fuel”)

Disguise the truth in lies,
feel it eat into your mind.
Soon you realize
all you value is left behind.
You hide yourself behind
a wall of insecurity.
Then only to find
the truth has lost its purity.
You fight the constant fright
of being exposed for all to see.
What you know is wrong seems right.
Forget about your honesty.

Read between the lies.
Open up your eyes and see:
Honesty

Return to what you learned,
had to cover your mistake.
You find the trust you earn
justifies the risk you take.
But you must follow through,
find yourself supporting lies.
And when you lose the truth
someone’s bound to realize.

Read between the lies.
Open up your eyes and see:
Honesty

Concealing all you feel,
how can you escape from you?
Forgotten what is real,
one thing left that you can do.
You lied, so you decide -
only one thing can set you free:
Undo the knot you tied -
reach inside for honesty.

Read between the lies.
Open up your eyes and see:
Honesty

Self-published in “Sanity is Boring”, 2009, Justin P Lambert

 

Just Goodnight

You grasp my hand
beneath the sheets.
This poem’s not going there,
this is just Goodnight.
But as you give one squeeze
to sound the words
you are too tired to speak,
and I return the squeeze
lightly to reply silently,
the thought explodes within
my soul like confetti:
With two barely-felt
palm-pressure moments,
I’ve reaffirmed a decade’s
shared embrace and memory
with this woman whom
I take for granted every single day!
I could not, would not
touch another in this
simple, silent way;
I could not, would not
say so much and
understand so much
without a word with
any other in this
simple, silent way.

Self-published in “The Ectopic Epiphany”, 2010, Justin P Lambert

 

A Cry in the Dark

The lonely poet’s voice
is a cry in the dark.
A horn in a rolling fog warning
of rocks no one cares about
Echoing off nothing
and fading with time and distance.
But it never completely disappears
or loses the power or conviction
of the initial peal.
Because one need not heed
a warning to know
the benefits of having heard.
One only needs listen
and admit one lonely poet’s voice
one cry in the dark,
one horn blast from a distant
shore and a distant evening
could have kept their flimsy
raft afloat just one more day.

Self-published in “The Ectopic Epiphany”, 2010, Justin P Lambert

 

Unread Books

Unread books
sit staring at me.
Sightless, with a thousand
sights and sounds suspended
in thousands of ink-stained
pages.  Thoughts meandering
like swallows or darting
like hummingbirds
inside the minds of a hundred
authors: some are dead,
some are struggling to survive,
all have given heart and soul
to send a second chance
to me, to my mind, to my heart
a second chance to reach
the same conclusion
any human being would reach
when sharing the universal
experience and asked to
comment on its specific sense
in ink-stained pages
sitting sightless on a shelf
staring at me.

Self-published in “The Ectopic Epiphany”, 2010, Justin P Lambert