July 2020 – Lauren M. Hancock Poetry and Prose

Poem: You Can’t Be Here – 31/07/20

You can’t be here, she tells me,
her mocking voice, her stuck out tongue.
Yeah, you can’t be here! another girl joins in,
you’re not wanted here,
won’t you learn?
 
My eyes become downcast, I shuffle away,
my upper back curved, I want to shrink,
disappear,
I’ll let them have the final say.
 
I don’t know why I’m so undesirable,
this group is cruel, I only have one cause –
to be loved and accepted and appreciated for who I was,
because now, I am falling apart.
 
With each taunt, each nasty means of bringing me down,
you can’t be here, you can’t be here their words ring,
I want to wring the danger away from my heart,
the warning siren’s sound.
 
Because part of me wants to hurt,
to annihilate,
though I am not vicious,
not violently inclined,
but how nice it would be to erase their memories,
cause hurt, anger, and other feelings,
to replace their nasty words of their days.

It is as though I am unworthy,
unworthy of being within their friendship group,
and what, and why?
I simply wanted to be seen for who I am,
who I was, too.
 
These two forms of me are different,
one naïve and gullible, and the other jaded,
yet saddened and broken,
slightly hostile,
what is it I am meant to do?
 
To repair myself will take time,
and to expose myself further to them will
cause my soul to divide,
but I yearn for their acceptance, their precious time,
though it’s really worth nothing,
or at least should be worth nothing as compared to mine.  

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Photo by Rodolfo Quirós from Pexels

Return to All Posts

Join me also at:

Words Out Loud: My first performance in a spoken word podcast

This evening, Words Out Loud Ballarat held their podcast for the 2020 Melbourne Spoken Word Festival Online.

I am so thankful and grateful to WOL to have been selected to be a part of the podcast, where I recite my piece, “Depression: A Realisation”. Thank you to Jason and Kirstyn for the opportunity.

This is the first time I have entered a spoken word event so I was really surprised and excited to be accepted. Please have a listen here at Words Out Loud.

July 30, 2020

Poem: Lovesick – 30/07/20

Lovesick…
he yearns for you,
he apparently cannot live without you.
 
Darling, can’t you tell,
won’t you comprehend,
he much he needs you?
This is not a truth which can be bent.
 
But, my sweetheart,
why does he need you?
Where is he calling from –
low, high, the hay,
but my precious, won’t you see,
that his neediness for you
reaches both night’s lapping shore 
and the brightness of your day.
 
But, of course, if he possesses this need for you,
every single moment, of every night and day,
perhaps this makes his need genuine,
and truthful,
and right,
is this not a possibility,
aren’t you swayed?
 
Do you understand that this man,
he needs you more than anything in his world?
Timely circumstances, truth be told,
your heart, extracted,
threaded,
hurled.
 
Your organ now,
he dangles it from a string,
and swings it round and around,
because, really,
he wants this game to be seen,
to show he holds concern for holding you,
whatever will these antics result in,
whatever shall they do?
 
He does not bother to extract his own heart,
to meld with the string of yours,
like a yo-yo you’re toyed with,
a sign of a desperate need,
he just wants the amusement
of love, and life, and his validity to be seen.
 
He needs you, darling,
why can you not see?
Why can't you see what he’s doing to you?
I suggest you snatch your heart from him
and willingly set yourself free.

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Photo by Magdaline Nicole from Pexels

Join me also at:

Poem: Relocation – 30/07/20

Sometimes it’s positive to relocate,
a subtle change of scene,
a change of pace,
being stagnant,
stuck in the same room, same world
for so long,
it can drive me around the bend,
four walls enclosing on me because
 
they can do so with
the slipperiest of ease,
despite my view from above,
the wondrous blue sky,
down below, quaint houses and greenery,
 
I need an alteration at times,
stitch stitch stitch
a change of colour,
won’t you permit this
on my threaded line?
 
So, I move outside,
settle myself into place,
hear the soaring birds in their flocks,
as my heart begins to race.
 
I’ve not been outside in so long,
breathing stale air unknowingly,
my own carbon dioxide from my own body,
slowly poisoning me as I tried to breathe.
 
It’s ironic, isn’t it,
that while I dredged sorrows while
trying to expel to become free,
I essentially was breathing my very own poison,
while typing it all out also so freely.
 
But now that I am outside,
the sun permits her joyful gaze,
upon me I feel her love,
her warmth
all around me
because
 
sometimes a change of pace is what is required,
a change of scenery, more like,
I absorb the wonderful ambience out here,
and know, that of my mindset,
I have altered it in a means that’s wanted,
desired,
from this new world,
I feel its love.

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Photo by Artem Beliaikin from Pexels

Join me also at:

Poem: Fumbling Fawn – 28/07/20

I am struggling to rise to my little hooves, 
I am failing to grasp hold of balance,
I am calling, calling, for this ability to visit me,
the skill to be mobile, to be free.
 
For so long, I’ve been unable to properly walk and stride,
how problematic for a soul for whom the desire to explore is so vividly alive!
Alas! I fumble, my extremities dance, not so subtle, nor nimble,
this fawn, I need my mama to guide my hooves,
my awkward legs, they wobble and tremble.
 
I tentatively rise,
she nudges my behind, permits me balance temporarily,
while I sway and sway
and then blindly fall, this time I smile
because it is between fawn and mother,
this clumsy style,
I am dancing my own moves,
and I treasure our routine for this little while.
 
Because Mama and I, she has not much time,
she must set off to forage, to collect for the needs of hers and mine,
she will leave me alone all day
while I manage my practice of walking,
try as I may,

perhaps she’ll not return in time,
perhaps she’ll never return at all,
how can I consider this?
My heart breaks,
my stomach plummets, it falls.
 
But for now, we dance,
she smiles, nudges me left then right,
steps upon my hooves to steady me,
as though a gentle holding of hands,
 
I am one of her truest loves;
Papa is busy leading the herd.
She knows she must leave me again for some time,
she promises to return later,
she nudges my cheek,
licks this warm nose of mine.
 
Oh, how I wish more of our time could
be spent all together,
Mama, Papa,
fawn/baby, mother, and father,
but it is not meant to be so,
we each have our set roles,
and I most certainly will take this challenge,
I will become nimble and learn not to fall.
 
It is essential to stand with my own sets of legs,
because one day, oh God, please don’t say when,
Mama and Papa may suddenly be required to go
and perhaps they shan’t return again,
it's a truth I do not want known.    

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay

Join me also at:

Poem: Already Departed – 27/07/20

I am sick to death of this draining,
this haunted state of false reverie
where I’m lulled into a state of dumbfound and airiness,
because the flow, it has ceased, as I know it to be.
 
Beautiful melodies once soared from my throat,
from my lips,
blustering blight, I’m not at all pardoned, from losing bliss,
I appear to have lost my creative flight and drive,
of its absence, won’t someone please answer to this?
 
Soar, will those wings, the fingertips of eagles?
Mountainous sky beings which thrive and are so free,
I wonder whether my syncopation, smooth and erratic rhythms
will return,
they used to project from my energised hands and mind
with accepted and utter ease.
 
And now, I lie in my bed,
immovable, helpless, irritated by my brain’s inability to cope
with an increased stimuli,
rather than thrive, it appears to have been fried,
rather than embrace the challenge
of increasing my ability to dictate and describe
I feel I must simply wave them goodbye.
 
It appears they’ve already left,
there is no danger at facing the wrong direction
which may lead me to a path ill-sent
because there’s nothing left here to detail,
I’m drained, empty pickling jars, lined upon the shelf,
nothing to cure, nothing to consume,
little, no, nothing at all,
to scrawl, to capture, for you to view.
 
The eagle soars;
he’s already discovered another’s truths. 

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Image from Pexels.

Join me also at:

Poem: Flawless? – 27/07/20

Flawless, how can I feel flawless
when beneath the spotted mirror my reflection barely lurks?
Flawless, how can I feel perfect
when my heart is blotchy like Grandma’s inky, moody pearls?
 
A broken smile, a set of hounded eyes reflect back at me,
finding a perfect circumstance?
Tell me this: does perfection truly exist?
I wish someone would answer me this.
 
The tug of war, the push and pull,
the night and day is cast,
to find myself,
within myself,
perfection will not outlast.
 
I treasure me, I wish to be free,
of my selfish expectations,
which seem never to quietly pass,
I call and call into the mirror for myself,
but nothing surfaces, truly I am lost.
 
Meanwhile, you don’t strive for flawlessness,
you embrace subtle cracks, your broken is your triumphant wholeness,
from lost lands, from hell you’ve been,
and back again; sights, minds, and feelings sometimes unseemly -
 
you toss and turn,
can’t cease your thinking,
the power of that on/off switch is wide-eyed and blinking.
 
I do not know why, but collided worlds,
frozen time,
hands at opposite ends of a spectrum,
I delve into lost moments which presently arrive,
this time is no longer only mine.
 
Words coagulate in Chemistry’s positions,
bewitched, enchanting?
flawless, so it seems?  
 
And in the mirror, I now aim to find
you stitched together almost,
almost flawlessly,
though I’ll need to buff the reflection,
because it’s time to fall into it,
allow a shadowy presence to return and brighten,
rise to his worldly heaven,
to reign over his own kingdom,
won’t he permit his return to rightful power?

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Photo by Thiago Matos from Pexels

Join me also at:

Poem: Unspoken Reasons – 26/07/20

Don’t tell me why.
Don’t avoid the how.
Reveal the when.
Tell me now.
 
I must hear it.
I’m telling you,
you must breathe it,
speak your whole truth.
 
I beg of you:
Why did you leave?
Each time I saw you,
afterwards, silence lingering.
 
A hollow yawning,
gaping in my chest,
my repeated pain like
parading bull ants,
nipping, biting –
you were never my best.
 
Sticks and stones,
your omissions broke my bones,
I’m a fragile girl beneath it all,
 
my bravado and shine,
wipe them away,
so much emotional investment,
mere wasted time.

User and abuser, 
you never made me yours,
though for you, parts of me self-sacrificed,
my yearning the cause,
 
then,
without an utterance:
your tepid goodbye,
re-connection to be made months down the line.
  
© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Photo by Lucas Pezeta from Pexels

Join me also at:

Poem: “Autobiographile” – Text and Spoken Word – 24/07/20

“Autobiographile” audio

I have experienced this before and triumphed. 
I have ridden the tempestuous waves and reigned freely.
I have arisen from the waking dead and become full of life,
now an ability to see, to breathe.
I have lived, and I have learned,
and this is what I wish to be seen.
 
Personally, I’ve taken chances, I’ve danced around the point on many occasions,
I’ve felt exalted and indulged in certain forms of delectation, 
those which cut the edge, which sharpened minds,
but which drained a soul, caused a family’s divide.
 
I am lucky to be unconditionally loved,
I was always forgiven.
 
No matter the paths I took, I sought, I willingly wandered down,
because my curiosity definitely killed the cat and allowed certain truths
to be explored and owned,
I didn’t decide to perform such missions as a means of breaking others,
it was simply my choice,
selfish decisions, that reflected upon a family unit, 
brothers, mother, father, others.
 
I know their love for me is ever-lasting, ever-supportive,
ever-growing,
they are there for me,
to watch me grow, as I stem the pain from my soul,
and to exuberantly join in to celebrate my rises, 
and encourage me to soar from my falls.
 
Their support means so much, 
I'm so lucky to have them in my life,
everlasting is their love, their joy,
for me they'll never cease their mission, 
their encouragement, their fight.
 
No matter whether I’m being positively critiqued,
or with crushing honesty,
appealed to to sound less selfish, or self-centred,
even when it wasn’t my intent, 
I know they’re meaning to help me,
to disallow my work from seeming egocentric, 
but Family!
my work is central, it is about me,
that is my style, I’m an autobiographile, a new term I’ve coined for me.
 
And now I smile, because things are going on their way,
I write, create, edit, release every day,
I feel my efforts are appreciated by others, as well as myself.
The simple joy of learning and loving and embracing the art of poetry,
it makes me tingle and shiver,
this is the genre, the art form for me,
nothing else.  

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Photo by Karolina Grabowska from Pexels

Join me also at:

Poem: Good Tidings – 23/07/20

Good tidings from myself to you,
I wish you the very best, for all to be well,
because I see the hurt in your eyes,
I view the sorrow
within your words,
I feel your heaving chest,
wracked cries.
 
You speak of the brokenness,
you detail existential pain, despair, and hopelessness,
your expressions are potent,
they are sheer melodies,
songs so brilliant,
they bring me into your world,
I bring myself further into yours,
you’ve breathed life, despite your depression,
into mine, and theirs,
your calligraphy formed from up above.
 
Your revelations,
your keen overexposure without fearing,
without caring for potential consequences,
why, what are they? Who would dare think them?
Like me, you bare your soul to be seen.
 
A pair of birds spreading their wings,
light and dark,
but with shades of in-between,
we mesmerise, you stun, I daze,
our feathers spread impressively,
we take flight,
some don’t wish for this,
fearing tales are set to leave,
our inability to continue to amaze.
 
But, we’re merely rising higher,
seeking inspiration,
I am a peaceful dove,
and my fellow raven is not so far behind me,
but then he falls away,
he prefers to remain, remain,
his caw-cawing is personal, insightful,
his deliverance -
it's himself, 
he's the one he saves.  

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Image by Alexas_Fotos from Pixabay

Join me also at: