The Smile and Sting of Regret, Fear, and the Now
Art: Yossi Sapirshtein
Poem by: JAMES JACKSON
A lovely stare and strings of 3 faces,
One old, Regret.
One fake, Fear.
One real, Now.
Yet but are not all 3 real,
Real and staring, carrying
feeling of fortunes non fortune
and reality’s mistress.
A constant glare yet smile of all 3,
illusion yet not,
real to the unreal
and back again.
Stare not my memories,
Stagger not my intention
and deed.
Stagger not, Stagger not
nor post haste so.
James Jackson is 22 years old from Northern California. “I am addicted to literature, art, and film. I write out of joy, and I write out of pain. I write and create for every reason there is to write and create. Poetry frees the mind and strengthens the spirit in ways nothing else can. Dickinson, Poe, Ginsberg, Pinsky, Cummings, Wilde, and of course the Bard, are just a select few among the many of my inspirations. My poems are pure stream of consciousness. I sit down with a pen and my state of mind and then I let the pen do all the work for me. My poetry is about love, it is about hate, it is about war, and it is about peace. It is about self, society, culture and anything else you need it to be about. You can never be wrong about poetry or any kind of art in general. For art, or creativity itself, is the answer to the problems of humankind. Education and creation, these are our answers.”
