Tag poems about life
Our Numbered Days, Neil Hilborn’s debut book, is full of old soul poetry for the young mind. Hilborn is most known for his spoken word performances, specifically his poem “OCD,” which went viral on YouTube in 2013.
“OCD” sets the tone in giving a transitional look into Hilborn’s outlooks on mental illness and how it plays a critical part in navigating love and loss. With his poignant style and lyrical tone, Hilborn not only speaks about his struggles from an outside perspective but writes a letter to them for all that they are worth.
Spent in a restless night
They come and go
Between turns in light-stars
in the shaded dark
And how many thoughts on my mind
Papers thrown out in a basket and
How much nonsense exists in a sigh
How primitive is
Man at first rising in the early morning light
Celestine is the color of the sky today
And she smiles at the scent of coffee
Poured in a ceramic brown cup that steams vaporously
Today I am no longer attracted by the
Chasing after of a dream
For those who want it
They can go and get it
Today I am alone with my thoughts
In my silence
I have no worries
I am convinced that life is sincere
That death is accepted
that starts out from a seed
it needs some love to make it grow
and help it to succeed
It becomes a tiny sapling
that plants its little roots
then from the stems
buds soon grow
with leaves and little shoots
As time goes by a petal forms
that’s just how nature grows
before too long that little bud
evolves into a rose
a simpler time
when dad would come in
and we could smell the fresh icy air
of a day working in the yard
draped around him still
like the cloak of fatherhood
When the burn of the cold
still pricked our cheeks
as we giggled and slurped up
hot soup, strained of course
with spongy white batch
all prepared specially to thaw out
our snowman building bodies
and Christmas lights flickered
across our steamed windows
as the blue-black night pulled itself over
like a vale sprinkled with glitter
long, grey spirals of dusk
skirr in.
The moon hangs
out of its socket,
dripping.
The lovers don´t touch,
final lies freeze their breath,
a brittle, vertical icicle.
Even if I’ve sagged and wrinkled
would you find me beautiful when I laughed?
Could you possibly recognize what will
be me in so many years, or will you pass me
by? Even if I do not recognize myself?
Will we ever even speak again, like we used
to, like good friends should? Or will a nose be
turned and no words spoken as we walk back out
of each other’s lives. I sometimes wish I knew,
so that the time I waste wondering is not in vain.
at the Capitol Drive-In.
The VW’s black vinyl
stuck to the backs of my thighs.
I sat in the passenger seat,
a habit from when I was little.
There was a smell
I hoped my parents wouldn’t notice.
I was allowed to hang
the heavy speaker on
my half rolled down window,
to control the volume.
We brought our own cans
of pop in a cooler stashed
on the floorboards.
Slunk low during the trailers,
Dad reached through
the bucket seats into
a bowl of popcorn from home
balanced on the parking brake.
I live another day,
adding to the potential years,
of a life well lived,
so they say.
In the shadow of yesterday?
Will they say this upon the grave?
Yet, that which was lost yesterday,
can be regained tomorrow,
again, so they say.
Do I understand?
Where is today?
The choice lays within,
the question mark of a new day.
is the first day of the rest of your life
Tomorrow is an adventure in the making
Yesterday is a memory of
a moment we cannot return to
Even if we wanted
What’s done is done
All we can do is learn to accept it and
move forward graciously
Time waits for no man
And no man achieves by waiting
but not the same lungs
hold the same blood
but speak different tongues
we cry the same tears
and wash the same pains
but we are not one
and yet here we remain.
