MARCUS SEVERNS - POEMS

Marcus Severns has published in over a dozen magazines and journals including Leaves of Ink, Picaroon Poetry, and Meric Magazine. His also has poetry featured in the MadnessMuse Press 2018 chapbook. His most notable accomplishment from writing is winning 1st place in a regional writing competition for SE TN EMC.He currently resides in east Tennessee.

At The Open Gate
​

​Where my mother lives
She is alone
With no husband to care for her.
 
No one comes up here,
Not even the mailmen.
 
At the open gate
 
There is a severed head
With tongue hanging out
Fake blood all around the plastic lips.
 
At the open gate
 
Barbed wire is wrapped around posts,
With spikes just below a sign
That says
“You're in range.”
 
A few paces past this
Is a rose bush,
All thorns
 
For now.
 
But if a brave man dares,
When you get closer
And you wait a few seasons
Until spring
 
You shall find
It has pure white blossoms.
 
If you are careful
They can be smelled
And the thorns
Will not pierce the skin
Or cause harm.
 
When it comes to love,
Tread softly
 
A sudden wrong move
Could be painful,
But to be a gentleman
Is to go unharmed. 

Cold Day On The Farm
​

​Snow fell yesterday
When I had intended
To cultivate the clay
And stone
Into fertile soil.
 
Today
A cold rain falls.
 
I don't bother to look out
To see this,
 
I hide my head
Under a blanket.
 
The sun will rise again,
Life will begin anew.
 
Until then
I practice at death
 
So when it finally arrives
I wont be surprised
 
At how comfortable it is
To rest
 
In a private bed
With no obligations
To bother me.

Never Ending Stream of Consciousness
​

​Dreams flood every night
With past phantoms.
 
Cooking meals on an assembly line
In a building
That stretches
Farther than the ocean horizon.
 
The boss says,
Thanks for coming in,
Now
Get into the clock
And start on the line.
 
Today
You're doing a little bit of everything.
 
So,
Through the eternal halls
I go
 
Washing
Cooking
Preparing meals.
 
After what seems like
A dozen years
Someone says,
“Hey,
This is your day off,
What are you doing in here?

Get out of the clock,
Go home!
 
Enjoy your life
You're wasting the companies money,
Go,
You're free.”
 
And then
I wander away
 
Weightless
Into some strange building of peach walls and mirrors.
The floor has Jacuzzis built in
And there dozens of women wearing multicolored yet transparent draping fabrics
 
As they wander towards me
With cloth draping languidly
Like smoke
 
They show their shark like teeth
And I jolt awake.
 
Even when we're over the past
Parts of it linger
For a life time.
 
The only way to escape the trouble
Is to
Awaken.

Eternal Youth
​

​The soul has no beginning
Nor does it have an end.
 
Like a flower bloom
In the rain
On a spring morning.
 
Moving in the pale light
Beaming through clouds
Upon the floral-soft and fragrant surface.
 
We too have this,
All of us,
A morning glory
An angel trumpet
 
A song for the heavens.
 
Let that shine into us
And then return to source
                        Creation
Where we have always been.
 
Never born,
Never dying,
            Forever
As a piece
of The whole.

Breath of Life
​

​Into the heart of the receiver,
Like oxygen
In blood
 
From my lips
To them
 
I breath out
What I
Could have accepted
As my own
            and
Only my own.
 
Yet,
I release it
 
To you
 
I give
A piece of
My very life.
 
I hope it fills you
With as much vitality
And mirth abundance
 
As it did
Me
            When I let it pass
Through me
To your heart
 
When you
Forgot to breath.