Category: Poetry

maternity

 a childless mother of none
 a heathen,
(To fail)
 her purpose redirected at the tender age
 of twenty two

 (a walking casket, the crowd
 throws flowers,
and mourns, 
 spitting sentiments of well wishes and
 good health. Rejoice!)

 open up the hollow points
 of her decaying 
Womb, 
(the space has been labeled
 an empty tomb)
Wasted
 and stripped, for her purpose is
 not
 but to exist, and 
Nothing more


~A. L. Stippich
1

intention(al)

(bang!)
 
the echo stretches
 for miles
 
 even the trees
stop
 and turn
 
 and all is 
still
 
 one slip
 of a finger on
 the silver
  hammer
 cuts a clear path
 through the
 front wall and
out
 the back
 
(enter
 through the side
 door, exit through
the window)
 
 and everything
 you know
(every idea)
 every picture
 (everything you carried,
loosed)
 
(every first love)
 
 spills back into
the earth
 (your mother
 receives you in
gallons; in pints)
 
 if all is not
 lost, then, for
now,
 it is only
you


~ A. L. Stippich
0

deep

 I am in the winter,
 and I am in the snow.
 I am the child of a vengeful cloud
 Through the black trees, my sharp winds weave
 and grow (echo,
 I echo)
 
 I am a quiet death,
 I will take them while they sleep
 I am the rattle of their window pane, 
 And the numb beneath their 
 feet 
 
 I will wake you at the moment,
 in the deepest of your
 slumber
 When the moon wanes to the 
 center and lightning meets with 
 thunder
 When a rush sets through the freezing
 streams
 I’ll bleed you out, and strangle 
 your dreams
 I’ll spend the last of the air that I breathe
 to bring you down here, into the deep
 with me
 
 (into the deep, you will be
 here, with me) 


~ A. L. Stippich
0

dear brother

 dear brother, don’t forget
 to turn out the 
lights
 (dear brother, don’t forget
 to let go)
  
 the leaves will still choose
 to change their
colors
 and the earth beneath you will
 still turn
 all the same
  
 what is gone
 is over,
 the dead cannot
speak
 any more than they can hear;
 your cries remain
foreign 
 to closed ears
  
 (brother, to stay inside the still
 is a slow way
 to die)
  
 tragedy is every crack 
 in your road;
 every fistful of sand in your 
eyes
  
 we can make up
 our minds 
 to wash them clean
 or let each grain
 bore holes
 ‘til we go
blind
  
 so let, slow
 the veil that
 covers your soul
 slip back down
 from your face
 to the floor;
 mourn yesterday when 
it is
 (and only when
 it is)
 and close that
door
  
 and, brother,
 don’t forget to
 turn out
the lights


~ A. L. Stippich
2

Internal

 i just want to hold us and make us feel 
 new
 we’ve been in this space and we’ve always been 
 two
 i’ve grown such a fondness for what
 we could do, would you cling to 
 my hand
 if I reached out for 
 you? 
 
 (To suggest such a thing would make fools, of us both
 I would suffocate, snap, and 
 Twist you like 
 Rope, 
 I would tear through your
 Soul, if you gave me
 Your reins, would the thought of me still
 Be one
 And the same?)
 
 i am sorry we are not, though i’ll always
 give it thought, I will watch you from
 over here
 but know that I will always be near, so don’t fear
 for the day, when you are ready 
 to shed that first tear 
 i am always going to be 
 right here 


~ A. L. Stippich

0

am i here?

 If I should die
 And no one knows
 Well, 
 That’s alright, it’s how it goes,
 I suppose
 that is, if no one knows
 when it’s time for me 
 to go,
 you know?
 
 I suppose, if no one knows
 and the sun still rises and the grass
 still grows, 
 that’s just how the world has a tendency 
 to flow 
 if no one knows and it’s time for me
 to go
 
 so I leave these words and I leave these
 notes
 as a piece of myself that has no plans
 to go
 so that more would know (far from when I go)
 that I once walked the same ground
 you do 


~ A.L. Stippich

0

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