Technically it’s still Friday where I live, and you know what that means… poat-ree!

Stream-of-consciousness writing inspired by Maya Angelou’s comments about words having life beyond the speaker. She refused to let a guest to speak negatively in her home, because Maya believed that words are real things with power. They linger after spoken, and with time they influence the hearer. She said words have power. They get into your wall paper, into your rugs and clothes, and eventually into you.

I will write and publish the following, and read later. I’m sure I’ll react with surprise and disappointment at what I read. I’ll want to change what I wrote, but it’ll be too late. Right or wrong, I’ll have already said the thing.

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Still Life

Seventeen years of negative talk

Ankles tentacled

Still lives in the second floor apartment

Apart meant our words beating separated paths

…

Elements of speech – created things

Stay and leave speech-colored carpet stains

Invisible lives still-woven in fiber elements

Living in spaces between filling cracks like ivy

…

Sucked into lungs like last year’s cigar smoke

When you were too angry to speak

Infused in hearts two broken

Curtains hang on word hooks

…

Like carcasses of dead dreams

Phones hung in anger up and gone

Dull tones flat lined

Flat lines of hangers where clothes hung

…

Words clung to dresses like buttons

Socks and underworn drawers

Under shirts over coats and through ways

Collared words escape through wisdom’s lack

…

Dried talk on every washed towel

Even white washed words stay

Things stay unwrapped and strapped

Slapped words sting like static cling to us

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Word cling

Word play

Kill things

Hurt fingers cross pursed lips

…

Bandages placed too late

Shhh

Stop

Bleeding

…

Well-meant words cut bone

Never hurt me

Still

Life

…

Gone

Words have moved

Full of care

Next time

…

Used furniture

Two from one sale

Rug rolls like tongues

Jaws of drawers hard to close

…

Floor creak

Broken silence

Speak to me in this new space

You were saying?

…

Just me settling

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