Poetry as Risk

If we were to shut ourselves off...how would the poetry find us?

The world would have us think we should be tougher. Take charge of our emotions. Be able to turn them off like so many of the relationships we have been forging in this new age of information.

Friend has turned to follower. A digital footprint of what could be 

If you agree

To see

Them beyond a number.

What risks we take to open ourselves to this abuse. The scars are shown in words. In the saddest lines of a heart forsaken for the new and unknown.

The pulse of poetry is changing,

Rearranging.

Are you prepared to be the subject?

Prepared to admit that you never acknowledged the human behind the screen?

Are you ready to stand accountable for the example you're setting for the new age?

Words have always been weapons,

Now we must battle them from unknown enemies

Who are not at all what they make themselves out to be.

I will not harden my heart to be like yours.

I will not kill the human I have struggled to become by hiding behind a fantasy

A disguise worn only so I can show off just how terrible I can be.

I will always seek beyond the screen,

Reach beyond the handle,

Read the words and feel the pulse

Of the one who really wields the pen.

Though it may leave me shaking,

Terrified and hating

I will never not sign

My real name

I will never send my words to harm,

Alarm,

But I will hope to disarm

The hate that charges your weapon,

The fear that makes you hide.

In the end

We only exist as poems unwritten

Until we find the courage

To take the risk

Reveal our truth.

N.Head

2013