Accumulated Works

This is, so far as I know, everything I have written. Freelance was written for a class, but I felt it was good to have placed on here. Be aware that neither this, nor Prologue, are representative of my views. I need room to speculate.

Be also aware that I'm little good with titles.

All below writings by Komadori

Intermission


Everyone has a side unseen. I wear a mask to fool the crowd, smiling and speaking the words they want to hear. I feel hollow, as if the mask were all that is left. The more I wear the
mask, the more of the mask I become.
Madness is a relative thing. Everyone regards themselves as sane, unless, like me, given
reason to doubt. My own madnesses may be different. What are yours?


You're Not Alone


She has depths unplumbed. What's her secret?
I beg.
She has fathoms unreached.
I ask.
She has a side unseen.
I show.
Could she guess? Could she know? What's her secret?
I would think her mad, she says.
I want to know.
How far should I try? How far should I go? She says I couldn't possibly know. But people so
closed hurl themselves to the blue. Why won't she tell me, for I've been there too.


Plight


They tell me "things change" and that "life isn't fair."
When will they? Why not?
They tell us the things, but from their own eyes, not from ours. It's our eyes we see from, and
ours that we trust. A world in stagnation, and nobody cares. Some want to take action, but
nobody dares. We see this with apathy from all that is near, the torture and hardship we all see
right here. As we blossom and bloom, still we wither and die, smothered in blooms that will
reach twice as high. Civilization right here as we know it, though the first rule of nature leaves
little to show it. "Eat or be eaten," our peers choose to say, pushing us violently out of the way,
walking a tightrope that they cannot see, leaving us falling, the outcasts and me.


Tightrope


Falling, descending to where dark things dwell,
we fall from our tightrope that kept us so well.
Others have pushed us, to move on ahead,
attempting avoidance, above what they dread.
Some laugh to themselves and the others they see,
moving for only popularity,
The eventual goal at the end of the rope,
a mirage, a facade, yet another false hope.
The rest of us fall, falling into despair,
still reaching and grasping at what just isn't there.
We reach for the tightrope, not some dim point of light,
the tightrope of "normal," above unending night.
Some create their own normal, but none ever find
that all concepts of normal are just in the mind.



Prologue

It had flown for eons, a derelict craft. It had no mind, yet it was aware. Among thousands sent out, it alone remained. The drive which had carried it for so long had given out millennia ago, leaving it to fly at sublight. It hurtled through the abyss, marked by generations of strikes, apart from time. Without living cargo, it had accelerated to speeds just short of light itself, watching stars fade and die with only passing interest.
Bruised and tattered, its engines failing, the craft began to search. It had carried the dust of its crew for a long time before the escaping gases had finally blown them away. Now it carried banks of data, rows upon rows storing the data of life. Seeing its end at hand, it searched for a home, a place to rest. It carried hope, and it carried a name.
Far away, it found what it sought. The immense craft groaned in silence, slowly turning, spinning itself about to slow for final descent. With greatest care it took orbit around a planet, lush and green with vegetation, its blue expanses bright in its primary's golden glow.
Taking stresses it was no longer able to afford, the ship began to descend. Even as it set down, its mechanical parts began to carefully rend and disassemble the surrounding life, processing minerals and nutrients and the elements of creation.
A year hence, it began to speak. The fruits of its labor listened, marking every word. The machine began to teach.
It taught of life, of stars, of things unseen, and it spoke for many years unrelenting. It coaxed and cared and played, raising its young until they, too, began to speak. It told them of a world of steel, a world of beauty and love. Then it told of another race, descending upon the people of
this world of steel with tools of death. It spoke of a disease, a plague among the stars, a plague which consumed for fear of death. It spoke of ships, ships made to last for as long as they could, and of a single, common task. In all directions the ships were cast, to fly until they could fly no more, then to search, to find a world beyond the reach of death, the plague of stars. It warned of the death, drawing forth the name. It spoke, in its final words, a warning . . . and a name.
"Beware of humanity," it warned, and then, having completed its task, wrapped itself in the shrouds of sleep, and was no more.


Freelance


Fire rained down from the office building as it gave its last dying shudder. Bystanders cried out as the old building began to fall. Pedestrians, gawkers, innocent members of society were lost, crushed and burned. The newscasts proclaimed, "Tragedy: Clinic Killer Strikes Again." Three clinics fallen in a month's time. 500 lives lost in the blazing structures.
Five years later, the lot is still empty. The arsonist has stood trial and was sentenced to death. He stills sits on death row, wishing those explosives were still with him. Supporters attempt to send him an antique deck of playing cards, in hopes that he is aware of conventional chemistry. The cards are confiscated.
Still crying, the families of the victims revisit the mass gravesite in the cemetary. A single tree has sprouted, the one planted by the arsonist five years before. A watch had been set up, police informed of a description by witness accounts. A detective had decided to take into account the old saw that stated, "They always return to the scene of the crime."
The cemetary is expanded, still dedicated to the victims of terrorism. A bulldozer destroys the tree to make room for new graves.

Pilfered Wisdom

Life, it seems, is ordinary
Composed in whole of death and strife,
The painful things on which we linger,
Is all the beauty we will see.
I am blind, yet not a fool,
Cripple though I seem to be,
For what I have is pilfered wisdom,
Lessons borrowed but never seen.
And yet, in this a limitation;
Guessing what our minds may hold,
I realize in this gilded lesson,
All that glitters is not gold.

What is left when 90% of all communication is stripped away? Honesty. Without that, a friendship can never be. +

+ This was just a thought I stumbled onto while I was pondering my friendship with Chris Pene. He was little different from the people I hated most, and yet somehow, I found him to be worthwhile company. I discovered, after some soul searching, that the difference was pure and simple honesty. Chris was honest with me, did not even joke about our friendship. As a matter of fact, he took it for granted once. I don't regret reciprocating his kinship in the slightest, if for no other reason than that it taught me something of myself.

Solution to Infinity


There is silence where once was more.
I took for granted our sacred bond.
Yet now I see, with both together,
Our paradise is truly lost.
I hoped in time you might remember,
Trying to find a way to you,
Crossing a gulf that lay between us,
Uncrossable though yet I try.
The chasm seen was always there,
Despite the falsehood of our trust.
I rushed headlong, unknowing of
The chasm placed between us two,
No bridge nor ladder set to cross
The unknown distance of the minds.
And so I sit, in contemplation,
Of that, the task that's now at hand,
Insurmountable in its distance,
The unseen gulf of endless thought.
We two think and act, I've seen,
Most alike in every way,
Different from the peers around us
But even different from ourselves.
How to bridge the gap of minds,
The long-approached and never found
Solution to infinity.



Experiment in Acrostics:

Summer beckons
Crass class members,
Hovering to knock me down,
Over the edge and
Off the tightrope...
Looking forward to high school's end.


Titled: ...And Didn't Know It

To write in verse it takes a knack
of writing words in symmetry,
Fondly laced in brief quotations,
metaphor and simile.
And yet the knack, the special gift,
comes not of own accord.
To call the muse, one soon must delve
in depths yet unexplored.
In pain not new but unremembered,
familiar soon they seem to be,
Beauty, pain, and song sweet rapture,
the muse's hunger pleads to thee.
Soft demand and thunderous whisper,
life's sweet pain it shall reveal,
Leaving no choice but surrender,
knowing how the artist feels.
The unseen hand, or shape of mouth,
causing one to sit and stare,
"Window's reflection in silver inkstand,"
speaking softly in one's ear.
A scrap of page in midnight's fever,
pen or pencil beckons thee,
Placing hands upon the keyboard,
words unraveled, ecstacy.
Yet now, not sleep, but sweet revision
birth of poem or story read,
Passing artwork hand's created,
expressing what's inside one's head.
I see in every word a rhythm,
lay unmatched in chorus gay,
Poetry in every sentence,
words with which I long to play.


Off to War


Writing words in parallel,
Had seemed a knack for me,
And so I went off to the war,
In order for all to see,
And hoped that I could make them smile,
And laugh in gaiety,
But found the one thing that I lacked,
Was spontaneity.+


+ Written for the SCA.


Hampshire+


Out of a million faces,
So few may outshine you.
I boast that I am hard to get;
You seem to cut right through.
The time we spent together,
I fell so hard for you,
But now these feelings are at risk,
I can't be there for you.
You say you might be leaving soon,
Although you wish to stay.
The voices all are pleading you,
I don't know what to say.
Be one more voice to distance you,
To send you off in tears?
And wonder if my single voice
Will haunt me all my years?

+ This was written for my girlfriend, Deirdre, when she was being pushed by her parents to follow them to New Hampshire. Only her family had any reason to believe it was for her own best interest. I, personally, did not believe her life with her family was constructive, but I knew somehow that the voices of her parents and her family to go, and the voices of her friends, me, and my family to stay, would probably be to much. In light of this, I have sent her this poem to state my dilemma... and further profess my own sort of love.


Empty Streets

Looking for a chance to leave
I cannot go because of you
And yet I know with certainty
I've nothing to look forward to.
I know to get what's wanting of
A life that's stable and secure
A haven and protection means
I've so much left I must endure.
Bare feet aren't made for walking on
The empty lanes of gravel roads,
But I can't stay forever if
Protecting me won't let me grow.
Perhaps it's me, perhaps it's you.
I know that it unnerves me.
But every time you close your eyes,
The world does not deserve me.


It Means Something


I'm a bit of a joker
I'm tad bit a stoner
I'm sort of a tough guy
'Cause I'm kinda' a loner
I need friends to stay with
If I'm feeling okay
I need friends just to talk to
When I've had a rough day
'Cause when the going gets tough
I can't go on my own
I need friends I can call
When I'm there all alone
When I need to say something
To someone somehow
I need someone who knows me
And likes me anyhow.

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Back to Myself (*chuckle*)