Soft voices. Gentle expression.
Grief fastened to each whisper,
ever the sentiment.
This is not the first time.
Sympathy flows, reservoir of
emotion. Kindness embraced.
Soothing words
the placebo effect, for nothing
replaces what you know.
Nothing exists now
to compare it to.
This is not the last time.
Ever the thought, ever
the imperative. Before, of course,
we had the time.
© 2018 j.g. lewis
Perspective,
perception, space
between each line.
The subject
bare, a body
in its most poetic form.
Two-minute sketch,
a pose,
little time to see behind
the image.
Like any other person,
a life, nobody truly knows.
Exposed. Angles and
curves, skin, illustration,
details, expression,
impression
of all that is there, and
what is accounted for.
Here. Now.
Depiction of a moment,
reality marked
by seconds.
A figure captured
on paper. Briefly.
Deliberate, though
inconclusive, pencil stroke
softening, straightening,
shading, sorting out
what is on display.
Temporarily.
Art is not
what is there,
rather what you see.
Time defines authenticity.
Another page, a different pose.
Two minutes; all you know.
© 2017 j.g. lewis
April is Poetry Month
We have faith.
We have doubts,
commensurate
with
unknown fears and
undetermined factors.
That which you feel
I see as well,
differently.
We pretend
we belong.
In many ways
we share the same grief.
We are afraid of
all the wrong things.
We doubt
our faith.
Everything is temporary,
even our fears.
© 2018 j.g. lewis
April is Poetry Month
Lives forged by experience, altered
by those who encounter
the same things at the same time.
Friendships mark our years, hold us
accountable to our humanity.
We discover most friends
mainly by accident. Circumstance
or circumspect, intimacy implied by
mere presence, accepted as we walk,
as we talk, as we see
the same things at the same time.
We come to trust,
offer what little we know, barter
our wisdom with that which may be
only an illusion of understanding.
An exchange in kind, shared
timidly at first. We are vulnerable,
to the same things, at the same time.
Kindred, courageous souls;
they too must confide, you try
to be worthy. With neither pride,
nor modesty, we place value on that
which lies before us.
Lives shift, locations change, yet
displaced by age, distance, or devotion,
a certain mercy keeps close
those whom exchange,
without further thought,
the same things at the same time.
We rediscover, even much later,
how friendship marks our time.
© 2019 j.g. lewis
