Author: michael raven

  • ask

    person foot on water
    Photo by Kaique Rocha on Pexels.com
    asking the wrong questions
    if only we could
    take them back
    and ask the answers
    instead

    blind to deaf
    my mute mouth moves
    in time to raindrops
    on summer's hot 
    metal roof
    waiting to forget
    all that i sought 
    to know

  • nightmare fuel

    Image of a writing journal and a pencil.
    Photo by Dariusz Sankowski on Unsplash
    grundylocks and grimley
    gone running through the green
    chasing after unicorns in
    the backyard of childhood dreams
    waving with their hacksaws
    and their axes and their gonnes
    grind a horn to tincture, say they
    to drink to gruesome songs

  • half-penny thoughts | 03jul25

    Photo by Anita Jankovic on Unsplash

    I seem to have puppets on the brain these past few days. In part, it has something (in part) to do with purchasing and playing a game that I wasn’t sure I would like. But that’s not the only thing prompting the ponders on puppets.

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  • pop

    Campfire
    Photo by Ville Palmu on Unsplash
    gather bones
    gather leaves
    gather poppets
    gather strings

    pop cracks stone

    dancing fire
    dancing sparks
    dancing poppets
    dancing leaves

  • puppets all

    Photo by Tengis Galamez on Unsplash
    puppets all, we dance to
    another jag-time waltz
    thinking we set the rhythm
    by the fumble of feet

    we ain’t no hep cats
    jazzing our bluejeans
    the strings tangle to bind
    as we stumble that last
    drunken mile home

  • rattle the bones

    Photo by pedram ahmadi on Unsplash
    everything too suchness
    fan rattle to flame seething
    and shudder limbs shake

    ragged wrap in arms
    of rags and wraith
    chasing all elder ways

    knock the stone fell
    rattle the bones
    shake in clenched silence

    rattle all those bones

  • Dark Angel

    Fair use image of DVD covers for “Dark Angel”

    The James Cameron produced television scifi/drama that aired for two seasons between 2000-2002 was one of those shows that missed when it was “a thing”. I was still fully into my turn-the-television-around-to-face-the-wall-except-when-I-really-wanted-to-watch-television phase. By the time I finally got in the mood to watch it, there was almost no way to do so easily (YouTube bootlegs were so awful that I didn’t make it fifteen minutes).

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  • thistle & woad

    Photo by Mandy Bourke on Unsplash
    with a head full of thistle &
    hands stained of woad
    skating away over water to
    while away a spell
    with the acorn man

    you probably
    would not understand
    that has become a given
    over these near
    twin scored years

    and so it comes to
    wander this wodewood alone
    chatting with oaks
    in the blackthorn
    with a head full of thistle &
    hands stained of woad

  • in the weald

    a path in the middle of a dark forest
    Photo by Wes Hicks on Unsplash
    gone to wode
    in the weald
    gone to fever 
    in the head
    would he to wild
    oh darkling, at
    spanning rivers
    in his bed

  • woodenhead

    Photo by Alberto Arroyo on Unsplash
    oh, woodenhead
    come in from the rain
    quit your thefts
    seeking a beauty
    outside for a one
    that is within

    all crows make argue
    for your eyes—
    you do not use them
    anyway, they say
    instead, my woodenhead
    you are a' thieving out
    in the pouring rain