I Am Santo

Fiction, poetry, music and mindscape pictures by creative artist Jason Santo

The voice, gruff and staticky, asked him the same questions as the night before and in answering them he had a moment of hesitation, a flittering thought of Daneen that reminded him of the way sunlight stung through rustling leaves when you looked up, into and through shade. He didn’t think of her much anymore; she’d been gone since Kaily was eighteen months and Alec had just started to use the potty by himself. His chest felt empty as he answered that he was still interested in the work, whatever it was, and that he agreed that he was willing to accept half payment at the start and the rest once he was done. The voice gave another location and then told him to take the phone with him and call once Simon received the tools, money and instruction there. The line went dead abruptly.

Simon drove to the next location with a lump in his chest, an uneasiness that moved from above his heart and into his throat like a carpenter level bubble. He was uneven. He thought about Daneen again, the last time he saw her as she grinned through the car window before backing out of the driveway. Simon couldn’t remember if he kissed her that day like he usually did. Even then routine ate away at memory, repetition a cancer to the awake mind. He shrugged her grin and bright eyes away as the thoughts inevitably turned sour every time, her lips sutured together in his final view of her at her wake through his tear-blurred eyes. Senselessly gone, a light stolen the way starlight was by the future. She felt light-years away now and glimmered at him from the past like an echo he hardly believed was ever real.

XXXXXXXXXXmovie Transformers: The Last Knight 2017 trailer

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TIMELAPSE

Clocks spent their winding hands as if they were folded on felt, minutes wasted in an ante and the litter of this dying season trying to hide belief. No poker face here, faded bliss grows vibrant, a flashbulb churn of willingness gone like green lost to autumn. And the combat of seconds clashing now into disdainful futures has casualties on all sides, but with each lost there’s no accountability. Does anyone count each grain of sand fallen in the hourglass? The souls flit like expired leaves on the shakiest branch, the gales of whimsy, lust and adoration buoying them on air currents the way a lover’s kiss lightens steps. And yet all bets are off, time ruined by attempts to measure it. For days are prison cells and years are maximum insecurity. Bleed divine colors. There’s no moment but now to do so.

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A careless fire, this blister-founded lust chews mercilessly through the dogeared days of apart; of longing for one another in the soft glow of morning, before the hard shadows retreat and stretch and the fight of hours quake minds preoccupied with petty things, the digressions, the supposedly important tasks of responsible souls with rents, loans, the odd piece of material nonsense that drags like a lifeless body through unstirred woods, picking up pieces of flim and flam and weighing it all down, an anchor to free living and immovable even with the most ferocious of tugs pull, pull, pulling with the tenacity of Helios and his solar chariot, a deus ex machina of failure to unshackle from the torture rocks crack, crack, cracking but never breaking, uncrumbling, resistant to this blissful ardor arousing senses and grand seas of emotion that flood, capped and crest-waving, the threaded clouds of belonging mixed with the brine of release, the saltsweat stinging on tongues and the tidal wash of such smooth imaginings, like polished stones, a communion bathed in alter wine and somewhere He laughs, the grand joke of distance, of years and miles, such cruelty that the afflicted lose their blessings, cower under parchments consumed with blast furnace passions. Alone they wish for answers, their begging like snowflakes on their tongues, the taste of each appeal as cold and vanished as their constant goodbyes. It’s twin-soul yearning, this filament illuminating, heating, bringing light where darkness governs; a plea like a star fallen from a galaxy. “See us? We are light. Together we are home apart from Your design.” And the dark, weakened by their rapture, surrenders, a light-year devotion blinding the scared and empowering the dreamers, the lovers, us.

#poem #poetry #poetic #igwriters #instawriter #writersofig #poetsofig #igpoets #igpoems #mobileartistry #creativewriting #fiction #flashfiction #writing #writer #story #shortstory #microfiction #poetrycommunity #igwriters #forest #woods #trees #winter #snow #snowstorm #blizzard #noreaster #winterstorm #newengland #newhampshire #dovernh (at New Star)

Published by Jason Santo on | Permalink

A careless fire, this blister-founded lust chews mercilessly through the dogeared days of apart; of longing for one another in the soft glow of morning, before the hard shadows retreat and stretch and the fight of hours quake minds preoccupied with petty things, the digressions, the supposedly important tasks of responsible souls with rents, loans, the odd piece of material nonsense that drags like a lifeless body through unstirred woods, picking up pieces of flim and flam and weighing it all down, an anchor to free living and immovable even with the most ferocious of tugs pull, pull, pulling with the tenacity of Helios and his solar chariot, a deus ex machina of failure to unshackle from the torture rocks crack, crack, cracking but never breaking, uncrumbling, resistant to this blissful ardor arousing senses and grand seas of emotion that flood, capped and crest-waving, the threaded clouds of belonging mixed with the brine of release, the saltsweat stinging on tongues and the tidal wash of such smooth imaginings, like polished stones, a communion bathed in alter wine and somewhere He laughs, the grand joke of distance, of years and miles, such cruelty that the afflicted lose their blessings, cower under parchments consumed with blast furnace passions. Alone they wish for answers, their begging like snowflakes on their tongues, the taste of each appeal as cold and vanished as their constant goodbyes. It’s twin-soul yearning, this filament illuminating, heating, bringing light where darkness governs; a plea like a star fallen from a galaxy. “See us? We are light. Together we are home apart from Your design.” And the dark, weakened by their rapture, surrenders, a light-year devotion blinding the scared and empowering the dreamers, the lovers, us.

#poem #poetry #poetic #igwriters #instawriter #writersofig #poetsofig #igpoets #igpoems #mobileartistry #creativewriting #fiction #flashfiction #writing #writer #story #shortstory #microfiction #poetrycommunity #igwriters #forest #woods #trees #winter #snow #snowstorm #blizzard #noreaster #winterstorm #newengland #newhampshire #dovernh (at New Star)

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If it’s said aloud enough, then maybe it’ll be true. Love you. Love you more. Love you most. The repeated assertion that you’re the sun around which orbit is necessity for being. The light of you breeds possibility, even in this world of reigning confusion, where clouds billow tall in once perfect skies and shed tears of regret to feed the bloom of wisdom; oh it’s pain. It’s the latest tattoo on thinnest skin stretched taut across bone. A foot, a rib, a shoulder blade. It’s the trial of being marked by permanent commitment. And you are the dried ink justice of these most cherished successes. Or are you? Is it you that sits at the front of each choice as is told in the countless fables before night swallows this busy mind? If that were truth, then would each day be entropic origami folded into itself? Would lust swim so deep in these choked veins, threatening to burst with yearning for more, better, different? No one is a moonlit night in the middle of summer over the still waters of a quiet lake. No one is that freedom to plummet, swim, stroke, hold, and breathe in naked surety. And maybe nightswimmer love is impossible, yet each decision played gambles the ever increasing ante of your future. It has to stop. The selflessness hinting at corners and plaintive claims require action, as this fumbling is Coptic spoken to the deaf ears of now. No one is listening but this cracking heart and your young one which looks this way and to the sun for guidance. May each guide you to new discovery safely. May each dispell the long shadows of a failing self.

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#poem #poetry #writing #writer #poetic #creativewriting #igwriters #poetry_addicts #literary_imagery1 #igpoets #igpoems #mobileartistry #dusk #woods #forest #sundown #sunset #trees #plants #daysend #sun #solar #sunflare #nature #child #youth #discovery #silhouette (at Discoverer)

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We shared the close breath, both in the quiet solace of release and the noisy satisfaction of killing hunger. Drinking the courage. Letting our atoms spill in every direction and flailing with wild hearts; there was little to be said in the darkness afterward. Tears glimmer and streak, surmounting Sisyphean hills of cheeks rounded by son smiles. Alone is cruelty and the prison warden is this failure to see through routine, to adhere to the course of greater things. The sun makes a promise and keeps it. The man stumbles at each word, no confidence exuded and no sense of duty maintained. No matter how much truth words appear to hold, the hollow echo of their utterance carries more weight than any alluded sentiment. They are as thick as wind, pliant as rainwater and a disease worth inoculating against; a breeze of uncontainable virus sought, dissected, blamed, fought. A bit of air puffed in the face of ardor. A bit of science slighting the horizon, like dusk in the gray. Crack open consonants and each is a yolkless egg chanceless at birthing anything but the space lying between angry neurons, a symphony of rage given tempo by a lazy conductor who waves his arms like that grizzled tree standing long in the day, shadows carrying more weight than any declaration. Fool heart, how you give. Awaiting to receive. More than seed, but in a vacuum devoid of truth’s sun or water. Wretched destinies unfold. All due to the rusted stain of what’s said and what’s meant, the delicate imbalance of candied candor made sweet with sugarcoating, yet lingeringly bitter with coy deception. So it happened. So it’s ash. Sweep up the print and tidy away memory because it fails every time with applied meaning where meaning was absent; where the clutch and fuck were only that and the rhythm behind the chest was a wind up toy’s synthetic patter, graceless and predictable, but never reliable.

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(at Wound)

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The sun gives warning before it brings night, the ugly dark preceded by firelight bathing the last minutes of day in Hellstorm hues that mirror the flush of this rage. And so this black descends. How fucking tired, your type. How gracious that you’ve been offered comparison to fleeting moments of day. Even if nature’s palette spills this same masterpiece so often that specifics are easily forgotten, much the way you will be, you earned at least a line of dialogue in this motion picture; a walk-on role that’s far more than an anonymous ill-educated hack should be awarded. Maybe the whole film is a farce, and you’re the voice of an audience that’s suffered enough, a tiny ember of the fire that burned brighter than your paltry intellect seemed it could before succumbing to a cold end; stumbling onto a larger truth and barely coherent enough to fuel notice. It’s richly undeserved, your fleeting spark. And if you stand with others, may the mob incinerate quickly in the crematorium of your adolescent jealousy. And may your ashes be cast to the sea, you all forgotten but still the gesture of your dismissal a fleeting muscle memory, a waste of temper and words that leaves scars far deeper than any pathetic attempt at cutting your frail mind could muster. Such big words you use, little boy! How the heavy shackles of your own wretched decisions look so perfect on a monarch that cares nothing for your plight, but will admonish your disrespect with stern warning before lopping off your head. May this be a lesson to your common dimness; this dark will bury you alive. Don’t waste what little air you’ve left shouting blame. The sun isn’t returning for you.
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#poetry #poet #writing #writer #creativewriting #literary_imagery1 #poetry_addicts #poem #sun #sunset #dusk #sky #clouds #storm #cloudporn #rage #anger #daysend #trees (at Ember)

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Let’s keep our fingers knotted, baby.
Like the briar wrapped under the moon
Let’s give in to the urge and swoon
And sway to our own private tune.

Let’s put ourselves together, baby.
We knew how to once before
When our future held much in store
And affection lived at our core.

Let’s kiss like we used to, baby.
It’s so easy to remember how
Just let that lust in for now
Your pleasure still my vow.

Let’s breathe and grip and sweat, baby.
Let’s take down these walls we’ve built
Let’s crack Heaven like the sinners we are
Let’s die a little in our filth.

Let’s not, you’ll say,
your eyes turned away.
Let’s carry on as we do,
We are different now
Lit differently somehow,
no longer me and you.

Let’s stay focused on tomorrow
where we don’t exist
Because your lips do not belong
On my thighs, my waist, my wrist.

Let’s be friends then, baby.
Because now we’re almost done
In the sherbert spill of sun
Our hearts have stopped their run.

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#poem #poetry #writing #writer #poetic #creativewriting #igwriters #poetry_addicts #literary_imagery1 #igpoets #igpoems #mobileartistry #shadows #sky #night #moon #trees #woods #moonlight #shadow #branches #dark #rhyme (at Let’s)

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It’s what’s wanted. To be parallel. To strive for limitless possibility together. To disrupt nature and Her deleterious claims that that desire sits highborne and companionship, unwashed. Let there be great rage at laws restricting passion! Fuck compromise and the lies that everything is great, fine, and how are you? No one cares. They’re craven in their need for protection against this contemptible virus of unsettlement. Two decades spun out like spider filament connecting loss and regret with yearning and earnestness, trying to catch a nurture that doesn’t struggle, but instead lies prone and awaits such aching hunger as if designed to sate. Quite the plea. Discovered instead are unfillable cups of water at the ends of desert treks. That parallel dream – quite a notion as each line of a web intersects to capture – is impossible art. Yet the prayer for such delicate tribute lingers with naive belief that between those who reach for the sun the same way grows intangible connection. Bending this way and that, crooked, damaged, erring yet always fighting for sky, invisible connections dance like the spark between dendrite and axon. What’s life but a gap filled with currents? The hustle of day and slumber of night awash in unseen sparks leaping from him over here to her over there; is not that too nature? No, no, no. That’s simply youth, as every new twist in the ascent widens the spaces between all, connections failing as age atrophies and faith erodes. To continue is madness, but so be it. A sky without a dream wouldn’t draw eyes heavenward and growth would have no height.

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#poem #poetry #writing #writer #poetic #creativewriting #igwriters #poetry_addicts #literary_imagery1 #igpoets #igpoems #mobileartistry #trees #parallel #branches #nature #sky #reach #tall #grow (at Grow Together)

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At the edge of antiquity, the crumbling vacancy of hope is a mistake taken wind, a mast erected and gathering the warm southern breeze, spread with the fuel of sunlight. The mist rises and the balance of these limited fortunes diminish with each course navigated. Stay or go. Fight or flight. Worry or indifference. The world melts into dusk tones, and the torrential song of rushing to an ocean’s welcome through tight channels deafens. Got to make time and heed that call, bleeding from mountains tears of frigid seasons and expelling rocky nightmares that grind teeth in hollow hours spent holding onto false dreams. Nothing is real except the draw down into something greater where, buoyed on salt and naïveté, the limitless expanse of wet futures are divided equally by drowning and soaring. But her whimsy lists and footing remains even only enough to roll with the fierce motion of her demands. Staying afloat proves to be the goal of tomorrow, sad as that appears; the rapid descent from craggy births to the vast, unpredictable nature of the sea is what so many yearned for. Freedom to choose the path from a humble beginning and draw fractured land and rich soil into this racing grip. What frail ships we sail! Bring everything with you, enrich the terrain with the scars of your hubris and that level becomes a challenge to hold head above water. Such arrogance diminishes in the truth of final rest where tides rule. Wherever the journey began, regardless of accrual, balance sheets even. The depths consume regardless of merit or deficit.

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