Monsters

Monsters crawl beneath my bed

They hide in my cupboard

They live in my head

 

Hideous creatures who slithers about

In the dark hidden corners

Of perpetual doubt

 

Out of rational reach

They hiss horrible things

And I try to remember

That none of it’s true

That this is not me

These thoughts are not mine

 

But as I look in the mirror

It silently screams

This is you!

This is you!

This is you…

 

In the shadows of sorrow

A creeping thing crawls

Quietly nesting behind

The paper thin walls

Of my mind

 

I wish I could catch it

Before it melts in my brain

But I wonder, what if…

I’m already insane?

I am invisible

I know you can’t see me

although I don’t know why

I know you can’t hear me

no matter how hard I cry

 

I weep in the night but

I get up each day

I wonder what more

what else I should pray

 

I don’t understand it

I scream so loud

How can you not hear me

or see me,

what makes you so god-damn proud?

 

I go to the mirror

to rant and to rage

but there’s nothing to see

my image is gone

I can’t see … me

 

I open my mouth

to scream in despair

But I can’t hear a thing

The voice I thought was in me

is nothing but air

 

There’s nothing to see

There’s nothing to hear

turns out, I have nothing to offer

… why am I here?

The Storm

The storm scares me.

I hear it howling around the corner of my bedroom wall, fiercely shaking the trees from side to side. It’s so dark outside. Even the full moon hides behind the thick, black clouds. Lightning flashes in a white, ragged line, momentarily slashing the sky and horizon. I count… a thousand and one…. a thousand and two… a thousand and three… a thousand and …. the deafening crash of emboldened thunder cracks through the clouds.

4 km.

It’s probably an old wives’ tale, I didn’t investigate the claims, but it sure makes waiting for the storm more dreading, but it also tells you that the storm is passing: the counts from lightning to thunder is how far the centre of the storm is from you. Every count is 1 kilometre. And as the wind tears at the leaves of the trees, grabbing on to anything – everything - with invisible fingers that is intent on taking it all, it brings with it the eye of the storm.

Lightning. Thunder.

3 km.

The light in the hallway casts a dim, but comforting glow around the sides of my bedroom door. A window bangs shut. I must’ve missed that one. Do I get up? Or do I hope for the best? I can still hear the neighbours’ loud, irritating music thumping relentlessly to the same beat… Is it still the same song? Or do they all just really sound the same? My thoughts are interrupted by another flash of light… another crash.

2 km.

I decide to leave the window and crawl deeper into the depths of my warm, soft blanket. A gift from my grandmother when I moved into this place. When I think of my grandma, I smell cookies, cinnamon and lemon. But there is no smell tonight. Except for the smell of my own fear seething through my pores…

1km.

Suddenly it’s quiet. The monotonous beat from the neighbour is gone. Not one bird is tweeting, not one rooster crowing, not one dog barking. The trees are standing still, as the wind have pulled back and disappeared into the black sky. The ominous silence forces my head out from under the blanket. My eyes peering into my room, wanting to see something, hoping to see nothing. The curtains are lifeless, hanging from the rails. I can’t breathe.

A flash of light explodes just outside my bedroom window. And even before the light dissipates, the thunder explodes, cracking open the night sky!!

The eye.

As if it was waiting for the cue, the wind blows again. Instantly with full force, slamming my open window shut. I hear the glass shatter as it falls onto the floor. The wind is mercilessly throwing the empty window against the frame. Again. And again. And again.

I close my eyes.

And then it is over. I wait a couple of moments, holding my breath. It’s quiet. Except for the sound of dragging footsteps in the hallway. I gather my strength. And when I dare to lift my head, I can see him slumping away, blood dripping from his swinging hand onto the floor.

My blood.

The storm passed.  


Written by: Marista Grobler
Date: 2017
Copyright reserved

Sorrow

Sorrow is grey, oh was

it but black or white!

The taste thereof is lukewarm 

coffee

and it smells like a rubbish dump

burning

It looks like a mother mourning for her

son

the sound thereof: her cry!

Go and feel an orphan's hands

and you'll feel

sorrow

Written by: Marista 

Date: 1995
Copyright reserved

Looking Back

Today is gonna be the day that
you'll search your heart
and you'll search your soul
but you won't find me there
for tomorrow I'll be gone

I'm a superstitious girl
but I talked to God in a phonebox
He said that life is life -
this is what you get

I wish you were here
so you could take me to the place where you go
a better place to play
but all the lights that lead us there are blinding
we'll search no more

How do I live with or without you?
I gave up forever
They said we'll never make it
yet those days were the best days of my life

I don't know where we went wrong
maybe we've gone too far
I got more than I could handle
and it's all your fault
but what goes around never comes around to you

I can't forget the things you never said
It ain't easy to say goodbye
but all I really want is deliverance
and nothing else matters.

Written by: Marista
Date: Unknown
Copyright reserved

Info: this poem is made up with single lines from the lyrics of various songs by various artists

I loved you

I wish you would come
to whisper my pain away
and to kiss peace in its place

I wish you would stay
to keep watch over me
and be my handsome bodyguard

I wish you would leave
so I can find myself
just to lose it in you again

I wish you would die
so I could be the door to your heart
for all eternity

I wish you would live
so you can share my life
and I yours

I wish you would wait
for me
for my body to heal
my heart to ripen
and my mind to clear
so everything would be perfect

I wish you would love... me.

Written by:   Marista Grobler
Date: 1999
Copyright reserved

Defeat

I am defeated.
I am lost.
I am ignored.
I am nothing.
I am a zero on a contract.
I am useless.

I am also tired. No, exhausted. From trying and trying. And failing. Every, Single. Time. It is not a single rejection or even a cluster of failures to recover from.... no, it is a continuous rejection. One that has followed me since I can remember.

I am never good enough. Never have been.
Ok, ok.... I have to admit that is not entirely true. My family thinks the world of me. My mom and dad are proud of me, my children respect, obey and cherish me... my husband accepts and loves me. He is my best friend. My only friend, actually. I have acquaintances, yes. But there is no-one that actually goes out of their way to be with me.

So, I am nobody's friend. I am a loss and a failure as a business thingy. I am not an entrepeneur. Calling myself an entrepeneur would mean that I actually started a business and have sold something. I have sold, yes. Considering the quantities in the period concerned, it is miniscule and negligible.

My last facebook attempt at an ad didn't even get a like. I got 1 share. Not 1 comment and not 1 response. My camping initiative failed. I can't sell my soap or clay. I can't sell anymore Annique. Nobody is interested in my photography... I struggle at homeschooling, I am one hell of a big failure...

My fight has been against believing all that. Fighting harder to succeed. Stand up and try again. And again. And again.... You don't just quit!! And all that...

Maybe it is truly and really time to give it  up.

I am there now. Tired of trying. Tired of failing. Tired of being ignored. Tired of being such a big nobody. But you know what? I am sitting in front of my laptop, with a glass of low-kilojoule crisp white wine, eating droewors and baby corn, watching Deep Blue Sea.... and I know it doesn't matter.
What I feel, or the fact that I am feeling it, doesn't matter. Why I am feeling it, even less so.

Metallica said it best: Nothing else matters...

Now, to be honest, I never quite got the thing that actually matters. But for me... I know I am unworthy and unliked, I am rejected and despised, spat upon and ridiculed, ignored. For me, the "nothing else" would be my husband and my kids. Apart from them, nothing else matters.

Not even me.


Written by: Marista Grobler
Date: 2015
Copyright reserved