I explored @artsinmaroondah exhibition at Maroondah Federation Estate today and found this beautiful piece, “Poise and Pride”. Here is my poetic response to the talented, beautiful, and wonderful soul, Hsin Lin’s, “Poise and Pride” @helloinnerpeace.
“a flowering beauty” (c) 2022 Lauren M. Hancock
luxe curls cascade waves frame luminous face the blooms they blossom unto her, grace, reverent, safe, strong heart, more,
her poise, pride and passion, delicate petals at her angelic core, she was born with trust to capture, listen no mauves to be seen near or far.
only cyan blues and fuchsia tips and rich light bright living greens a yellowing spontaneity drip drab, no, drops of reverent expression there, ‘tween. so hear, so hark, so listen, envision, her pristine soul to be seen. (c) 2022 Lauren M. Hancock.
I’ll take you on a personal path, one where love and light exist. Where the flowers blossom and grow so large we might mistake them for a place of romanticism and trysts. Where the stars will never cower in shame, where the voice within will speak truth all the same, where your eyes will widen, and childhood memories will become unfrozen, the melodies of the world will sing to me.
I shan’t dance along by the riverbed, though dead it may appear, for underneath there is life, true life, crawling with breaths, bubbles of air. The animals are there, causing sabotage and strength and they won’t ever be tamed, not even during Lent, for their position in the world is clearly at large, big, white beautiful snow leopard, and he’s keeping you and I in perfect charge. We are allowed, no permitted, to wander the garden at large, we are allowed, no, promised to be taken upon deck, above board, of this world, heaven-sent. The charms and wonder within our scope, prisms here, envelope hope, do not chide us for having fun beneath the sun, we are special, we are wanted, and our skills shall never ever come undone, in fact, they’ll soon take hold.
Jerusalem is bathed in the most portentous of light for this place it has time time for the change of seasons for a time of worship for my lover who would fly there in a heartbeat
the land I cannot describe nor can I open my mind, to this world their sacred words are like churning songs in my mind where I will listen, I will pray, I will TRY TO FIND the answer that’s on everybody’s lips who is He and is He to stay? Is he a human being this time or did a demon meddle, this is NOT to stay?
the dream scapes in my mind show delve and ride alongside hell horses they have reigned this time what with our earth spinning with nuclear and disaster and foreign aid and daddy oh papa he understands this situation is dire we must reunite before it becomes so much harder
the flag our peoples flag waves in the dainty breeze, red yellow and black Mabo, Mabo, Mabo, won’t you see? I organised my time into ins and outs, meetings and times, I’ll be talking to another master soon, already inspired by one living close to one night, former words writes, so devout.
But it shouldn’t matter for this is my own path, forging ahead is the pathway to choose, I choose to continue, I desire to be seen, to be heard, and if I can’t, if I’m such a joke then why is it that when those whom I love hear my creations, my poems, my words, they are impressed, surely I’m not being humoured by all, that their words are to me a version of being blessed? No, this cannot be the case with all. I do not believe it to be as such, I know I can in thrall.
I can make my mark, in my main world I already have, and if this is how I’m met elsewhere, with hostility and dangerous eyes, and allusions, and insinuations which are mean and cruel and unkind, well, dears, I will still continue on my path, it’s not even a fight. It’s a means of reckoning with myself, telling, assuring myself that I am worthy of freedom, expression, and here, those foes, once-friends, there is nothing more important here, nothing more, if anything, than this I will put on the pulse. I was ill. I should not have to make amends. Feel my heartbeat, I am still here, breathing and living, and I will not allow others to dictate my fall. I can do that all by myself, and through experience I have learned to soar so well.
I will be the boisterous me I will grin and bear the dreams I will heal and steal that light the sun of the Son of the Sun I will rise when the prisms sparkle rainbow sheens I will be fortuitous and reach for desired dreams I will call and call for items like sticky pearls because they satiate my need for nourishment be and end all.
I won’t fold beneath pressure I will contemplate and begin to once again know my other my shadow self I will tame and feed her charisma my Peter-Pan syndrome my rainbow sprite self won’t go under
I will live with an inner dream childhood fantasies of writing and creating art and music are everything, as they seemed I will not complain nor will I whine because within is my great divine and I will reach it, reach her, the moment I speak I will become of her
Let the laymen understand me and even let the complex mock me I won’t heed their warnings their shooting signs because this is my life and I’ll direct it just fine.
I wanna dance the night away away from the tirades and smiles and the drains from the bastards and the potions and the trees that won’t bend to them the portentous little rascals who think they have the best of them.
I won’t dance in the ocean, no, no, I won’t dance in the lukewarm sea, I won’t float in the bubbles where the fish might surface without mermen I won’t dance in the ocean I won’t toil, succumb to the lot of them.
What I will do is this, I’ll prance to Schumann and Liszt and Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov Prokofiev and Dvorak, and then Mozart and Handel will grasp my heart with the lot of them I will perform Bruch and Lalo and beg, no, beg, for future, golden tomorrows.
even when I’ve not everything I need all around I have all I need when I’m here the bare minimum does not contribute to any sense of gloom nor quaint snipey conversations within the room my face doesn’t grow tired or long because I am here and now and by my side is… you.
I know you’re tired of the same old love poems dedicated to you and I, perhaps things are about to change, perhaps we’ll move on, move forward, move forth, we are too good for dwelling upon the prior circumstance –
we will move forward.
no matter how long it takes, how many angsty bitter tunes and rhymes I won’t be like that today, at least, not this time,
I wander our memories, childhood, adulthood things as I clean with slow ease, wondering what to bin, what to keep, what to allow as designated for others,
and I realise how quickly time’s passed before my very eyes, and I contemplate what happened to the stars, the moon, oh the stars when my world was up in arms, I was angered, bitter, untidy, nasty, cruel to mankind, it wasn’t pretty, but it was only a spell, for a tiny moment in time, and recovery is poignant, it is turbulent, but it’s occurring, within hours. within minutes and seconds, darling.
And those who decide to stand by me, as friends, as warriors, as heroes, times three, many have been here in the making but only three remain somehow, maybe more, but they’ve no designated doors, not yet, anyhow.
I am watching and waiting for the complete revelation, about the words they will say and unravel tongues engorged like a tame good-willed Cerberus, I don’t know, not quite, what they can do, but I’m excited to see how the utterances will help me, assist me, my mindset, my confidence to entirely return.
Lovingly, achingly, away from me, I’ve made my childhood bed, and what about you, dear sir? Shall you rise from my head? A memory, a mere memory? No, shadowy darkness and smiles, spirits assured.
choosing which side to take, it’s really not that hard, to rise and rise with great distinction or to sink and remain at large.
there’s no shame in being positive and pretty with my words I will conflate them, will engorge them with slim and shaded shadows the truth has already been forged, lusciously, freely.
the time I take with every piece I spit it out as though an undesired precious dream, a nightmare in fact, some have come to be but only in my dwindling ill-durations, irreverently.
have respect for some and respect for all but what matters most when you’re in the presence of ghosts who make you laugh and cry and everything in between is this truth in itself is this really what it seems?
more so humankind who seemed to prey upon me seemed to play with my weaker points reading my life enabled the training those clicks and turns all the while delicately, indelicately? there’s nothing, just an indelible style.
I did not, do not appreciate being treated with operant conditioning I am not an animal, I am myself I am a woman above and underneath and between.
speak not of those sickening months and years nor my fears, anxiety, poor Jurassic tears there is nothing sycophantic in my words right now.
I will rise and rise and you’ll see – you’ll see how far I’ll go.
fighting against the turning tides, the waves rise and crash upon the open shore, begging for appeasement, begging the waves for more. The fish and seashells and mermaids and mermen crawl from well beyond the shore. There’s barely anything left upon the seabed, so tumultuous it has become indeed, from tridents these waves of terror have been sent, and wreaking upon my life the charlatans and evidence of danger all around, whose going to reinstate that purple crown? That glowing iridescence that lingers above my head, once there, once gone, and once again now dead, then revived all around?
There are starfish lingering in the bed, in the crevasses, and one large, large star within my head. “I am terrific,” it says, “I am here and now, won’t you reveal, won’t you remain unashamed, somehow?” I smile to myself, for this pink and yellow starfish is actually amazing to me, she’s how I see, I breathe, I be, through the very evidence that is wrought deep within me. Myself as a mermaid, no, that is not right, I need to be five pointed and note-worthy, without means of a fight. And toss and turn now, deep within my rest, I grin widely now, because I feel blessed for having entered into this scene, this amazing joy it does bring, the tides crashing upon the shore, shall I ask for more, for more, for more?
Lauren M. Hancock Poetry and Prose 
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