Friday, September 1, 2017

KENNETH NORMAN COOK


KENNETH
NORMAN COOK

THE MOUNTAIN

I stand trembling
atop an icy mountain
of hollow stone
where thin pale shoots
squirm up between
the cold gray rocks
and poke feeble heads
toward a wide sky
of heartbreaking blue -
My passion for the stars
whips and whistles
and disappears into the wind
leaving me paralyzed,
my mouth agape
and staring into chasms
of blackest nothing,
laughing hysterically at
the withering flowers
with their puny petals
that curl from shame
into dull exhaustion -
I heave a heavy sigh
for the dark hourglass
of measured silence
which trickles dry sand
in subtle but certain finality.






WAVES OF MEMORY

Here come
those waves of memory
once again -
bubbling up
into my throat
like hot black tar
and squeezing
my chest
with a grip of iron.
Here come
those waves of memory
once again -
spinning my head
like an insane carousel
and scalding
my aging brain
with manic pulses
of rhythmic fire,
while nursing my soul
with a milk born
at the breast
of a nauseating
but vigorous
nostalgia.






YOU CANNOT TOUCH ME NOW

You cannot touch me now -
You reach out
with razor-claws
and hiss at me
through blood-stained fangs
but I'm just outside your grasp
like a forgotten dream.
You cannot see me now -
You peer and gaze,
squinting your goat-eyes
of liver-disease yellow
but I'm safe inside
my darkness,
out of sight and alone.
You cannot hear me now -
You hold your breath
and quietly cock
your hairy, waxy ear
but I'm like a rumor,
for you sense me
but I'm a whisper
lost in the winter wind.
You cannot reach me now -
You jump and you grasp
but you might as well
reach for the farthest star,
for I'm gone... I'm safe...
and you cannot touch me now.

ALL POEMS COPYRIGHT 2017
KENNETH NORMAN COOK

KENNETH NORMAN COOK is an American, born in the United States and raised in California in the 1960s. (English is his native language.) It was there in Southern California, in grade school that he began to fall in love with words, through a sixth grade English assignment to write a poem about Halloween. His entry was selected to be published in the school newsletter and that started him on a lifetime sojourn through the creative world known as poetry. After living away for many years, Kenneth is back in California, where he continues to write daily. He is a regular contributor to several magazines, including Wildfire Publications Monthly Magazine, where he is a co-contributor for a section on tips for writers. He has been featured in numerous poetry anthologies and has released a newly revised edition of his poetry collection, Shadow Walk With Me. He is also the author of a second book, This Side of Nothing, a third: a collection of haiku and senryu poetry, entitled Theater of the Absurd, and a fourth: From Dark Corners and Dusty attics, which is a combination of older poems, both previously published, as well as published for the first time. Here is a writer with over one thousand poems in his writing arsenal. Be prepared for a literary roller-coaster of emotions, imagery and intense imagination, for this is the poetry of Kenneth Norman Cook.


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