216

Day 216 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day erubescent meaning "reddening or blushing."

War Zone 

You have your orders

I expect they will be obeyed 

Trudging through the snow 

This isn't what I thought 

This isn't what I expected 

Failure is not an option 

Absolute loyalty is everything 

The wearer of my flesh

These weak twiggy legs

My pulverised brain

My erubescent cheeks 

It won't take anymore 

I smile like a retard 

You must endure

You must push on

Your victory will only then be assured

The ends of it are messy

My odds and ends 

Without exception I'm broken

Without rest we toddle on

You cannot break

You must be strong

Abandon all weakness

Leave your flesh behind transcend it

No. 

This is the end of the line

The final bitter pill

Whether it be stinging pellets

Raining on us through the mud in front of us 

Or the whips of our taskmasters behind it's done

My body smacks into the hard clay like a dream

I can feel my skull bending 

It's beautiful and impossible 

The colours blend all together.

215

Day 215 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day doryphore 

"a pedantic and annoyingly persistent critic of others."

Discontent before the Law

The Court could not 

Account for the doryphore

At its doors

The army of panel wavers 

In angry bold letters - times new roman, Ariel even Comic Sans

The opulent gowned figures

Could not fathom the discontent

Brewing 

They wanted blood 

They wanted their blood 

There was a visceral mood

To the crowd and they needed 

It torn down 

They needed to see some symbolic destruction

Some reality to their agonies

The men and women in their suits and ties 

Did not see the yowls, mewls or screams 

Though they passed the throng each day 

There was a collective deadening of sensation as though their skin had turned to cobblestone, brick and sand 

The people demanded something

They could not say what it was

They could never account for it

Put it into the necessary terms 

So it remained lost 

Security hurried them on

Official business carried on 

Another day inconsequential as all others.

214

Day 214 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day Divaricate meaning "to stretch or spread apart."

Oysters 

Fresh from the sea 

There shells divaricated 

By strong arms 

The lemon commingling

With the shimmering white flesh

To lick and slurp 

That sweet gurgle as 

It slides through your insides

Pearl soft cream 

Feeling the brine briefly

Whisper at the tail end

The sea in your mouth.

213

Day 213 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Effable meaning "something that can be put into words."

The Silo

Tall corn rests shadowed by the 

Silo 

It rests in its shade 

The corn is restless the farmer 

Ploughs through it the stalks are tossed up all in sight of the silo

The farmer rests 

A kind hand greets him passes him orange juice freshly squeezed 

He inspects the crop 

In the tall silo stacked dry and barren

There is a pause 

An effable silence 

In the line between the shade of the silo and the white light 

On the yellow stalks of corn 

There is a meeting 

It is sacred and silent 

It occurs in the shadow of the silo

There is guilt and giddiness and trepidation 

The silence is all the more chilling and exciting 

There is something being born here in shadow of the silo and it is not corn 

The farmer has neglected his work

The tractor lies barren

There is only one place he may be

But who with?

212

Day 212 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day edacious meaning:  "having to do with eating or fond of eating." 

A tired sort of love 

I love you in a tired sort of way

Which is the best in bed 

It is the feel of a cold morning 

My edacious stomach embracing your breath of garlic and onions from a warm hearty meal the night before 

I love you in a peaceful sort of sense

When work is done and I'm stretched i feel my body shrinking gradually on that long road home to you 

The compression is joy 

I love you like the stiff pain of a Sunday morning 

Knowing the bliss of waking and knowing what lies behind the next horizon 

But knowing in this moment

As light shines upon us two balls side by side 

Anything is possible today 

We can do anything we want today.

211

Day 211 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day Deracinate meaning "tear up by the roots."

You're the Worst 

You're bad for me 

You're the worst 

It's time to deracinate

To grab you and draw you out like a weed

You robbed me of myself

You took so much of my time

(But it wasn't mine was it?)

You're a curse 

You're a disease

You took it all my name

You took my money

And my self-respect

They lie when they say you can get it back

I'm less than what I was now

Thanks to you 

You're poison 

You're rot of the most ignoble sort 

All the words you made me scull

All those lying and dirty words

That you couldn't hold back

Tried to pretend that you were

That I was bad

That I was the reason for your failings

You're bad for me

You were the worst 

I will be better 

Perhaps one day.

210

Day 210 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Deglutition meaning "the action or process of swallowing."

Rainy Day

Do you hear it trickle like a hydrant

Gushing and gushing 

They are scurrying like rats

Forced down gangways, footpaths, fortresses of construction and industry and into slew ways 

Mewling trampling 

The bolts of water smack their faces like curry 

Their pink swollen heads having difficulty with deglutition 

This wet shiny world 

The cracked asphalt, the broken paths, the eternal dirt and pebble, the dominance of the microbe and dust  

The trains rumbles their frames 

The trains shake and shatter 

The foundations tremble, yet somehow hold fast 

The carriages away and shake like the sense of the commuters 

Like a pendulum begging to end

Can you hear the trickle like a hydrant gushing

The sound of thousands of soggy feet.

209

Day 209 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Coriaceous meaning: "like leather." 

Dead needles 

There was panting on the balcony

A dogged and laboured series of breaths 

There was beer, vomit and sweat 

There was a wart crusted coriaceous mouth

and a surly gent who enjoyed the feel of a lash and the way his victims curled like delicate pine

Needles bending backwards and 

Snapping collecting into a pile

At his feet 

the colour of autumn.

208

Day 208 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day disenthral meaning: "to set someone free from enslavement."

A couple holds hands in the Family Court 

They were separated

I thought

There were issues 

But they were at peace 

The two of them like 

Old souls that had withered a battle

He was gentle 

She was happy to be guided 

She took his hand 

She sat across from him

They made a joke across the Court room

They nodded compliantly 

They departed having found the decorum an amusing joke and experience 

Never the word attached to this experience 

Never attached to the secret words behind their eyes 

Never attached to the hints of smiles and hope 

There was a deep love there 

Something arrive at after a long journey through darkness and danger 

So much in a single look

They weren't slaves to it anymore

They'd been disenthralled

Hate had withered 

But not broken them

Their hands held by finger tips 

And still so much there that still might not be.

207

Day 207 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day deterge meaning: "to cleanse something thoroughly."

Unworthy poem

Who is to say what is worthy 

To write about 

I am not sure this is worth your time

But apparently it's not something

That time will let me let go of

So a man sits on a train in Sydney

The trains have these three person seats (designed for three modest persons)

So what does this fellow in the stripe top do

Sit right at the edge of the aisle

He had essentially blocked passage to the two other modest persons

He knows what he's done

I wonder if he feels a burning pain in his heat and he knows my contempt my narrowed eyes

If I could shoot some guilt into him I would 

Maybe he's too old and worn to care

No he's barely a sextenarian 

There needs to be an exorcism 

A deterge of the fools heart

Anyway I am spent 

And am left in contempt

For this gent

This perfectly able bodied arse wipe

I pray someone will ask please shuffle on over

Someone may eventually and then my rage will spike again as he turns his fruity eyes 

And in them you'll find one thing only

I'm sure of it

Indignation.

206

Day 206 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Coprolalia meaning "the involuntary repetitive use of obscene language."

Coprolalia

Don't send it 

Don't send the damn email

The fuck wit will spin it

He will spin it 

And float it like a paper aeroplane

Around your ears

Don't press send you'll regret it

There too many run on sentences

There's no punctuation 

It looks like a wall 

He doesn't have time for that

Don't toss some garbled Picasso of words at him

That fucker pig 

He deserves worse 

To be brought down a peg to be reminded of respect 

Glutton 

No don't press it, don't you can't un-send it

Think what would he do

He'd do it different

I bet he would too

Fucker fuck him 

I'll send it.

205

Day 205 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day Constellate meaning "to gather together in a cluster or group."

Movement and Sound

Feeling the mesmerisation of the cosmos

Touch it the intangible glowing lights pulsing gyrating 

Seize this 

Rotary shimmering skittish 

Diamond sand and glitter streams 

Warbles drones as wind blows 

And kicks and fires in the chest 

Like explosions of life

Constellating.

Lingering as the pulse fades

As the tones die down

Thuds to a final stultifying halt.

Club X (204 of 365)

Day 204 of the 265 day poem challenge.

Word of the day Comminatory meaning: "threatening, punitive or vengeful."

Club X

What is there about it
The rounded flesh
The way it spins
The tease of it

Step back through the haze
see the full haired persons
rioting silently rocking
like morphine hit hospital patients
rocking their intravenous drips

Their words
You like the shape of the their words
On oval lips
You imagine that your name
will be upon them those
pink oval lips
You imagine the power that comes
with a name
Remembrance

The smell is acquired to say the least
the vomit stain on the carpet from where
they got too wild

There is skill
that one was nearly an acrobat
Could stretch in so many ways
The thought could make you ejaculate
That's the smell like your father's old
vinyl collection wet and collecting dust

The movements are slow
Undulate a nice word
that encapsulates what happens
with the hips and the way
this resembles waves
but we're far from sea breezes here
this is a hot sauna
not like at the spa house
There's spit and alcohol and crack
There's pinched lips

There's a phantasmagoria
With these chimerical dames
Blowing smoke through hot pink lips
and Blond manes

The drones and flares of dance music
The monotonous comminatory stares
and slaps
Dissapointment eats into the late night
early morning folk
who lose focus and seek contrition
from the wares here on display
This is a lascivious excursion
A tantalising holiday
...only it isn't

The hot fuzz of smoke contaminates
The hidden brawl and testosterone,
Estrogen filled sauna room
low lights and bodies silent in the dark
But not them they stand in dim pale moonlight
Like shining ghosts with fat milky thighs.

Waiting in the Dark (203 of 365)

Day 203 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day cantillate meaning: "to chant or intone a passage of religious text."

Waiting in the Dark

The thunder cracks
Lightning scrapes the sky
It seems like it will eat you
like a monster

But it's outside
Inside is the danger
in the blackness
between the halls and the cold tiles
and the cold snarling sniggers
of secret dark lips
that wait in the night
no cantillation shall halt it

Under covers pulled up
Under covers warm and snug
the monsters can be heard
a cool gust presents itself
noises happen - common noises
but not tonight - nothing common about them

The thunder cracks
It is closer
the lightning is a gigantic flash
and what will you see through the window if you
dared to look
will that dark face be there staring with
its wide clownish eyes
twisted into a gruesome look
resembling a smile
but there is no word for the way its lips are
its no smile
Smiles are after all for kind things.

Subtle Touch (202 of 365)

Welcome to day 202 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day breatharian meaning: "A person who believes that it is possible through meditation to reach a level of consciousness where one can exist on air alone."

Subtle Touch

She raked her hands over me
She dug in her claws
She breathed as a breatharian
Each breath was her last

My skin has lines
a microscope is no longer needed to see them

Her skin is always silk
I touch it
in my dreams and its like milk
I can drink it
I can consume it

My skin is wrinkled like a dry lake bed
It will peel off each night form
a scaly thing underneath my back

There are tiny hairs under her chin
They are delicate white whisps
I long to pluck them
Watch them germinate like seeds of her
Let them wilt and fade away

She bit me with such vehemence
She chewed away
my subtle touch.

Push & Pull (201 of 365)

Day 201 of the 365 day poem challenge.

word of the day barmecide meaning "illusory or imaginary and therefore disappointing"

Push & Pull

I was attracted to the polar opposite of you
I was drawn to your antithesis as though
my feelings were barmecide

I was pushed
that feeling of falling
except I was being pulled by my heart
That irrepressible urge
to fall forwards into the infinite possibilities
between us

I was drawn to your eyes
Your bold black pupils and the way they spoke to me like aliens
The discs of your milky white
The incomprehensibility that there was thought and feeling
Somewhere inside

I was attracted to you
We had a magnetism
That I could not pull against

I was drawn to your eyes
Lovely blue iris salt of the sea eyes
Lovely deep staring all seeing eyes

I was pushed
that sensation of being pushed and yet held
Like a vice as you dissected me.

Silence (200 of 365)

Day 200 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day cerulean meaning "deep sky blue."

Silence 

Pause.

What do you expect between breaths, between pages, between caresses.

Stop.

Press on and glimpse the cerulean night, so clear and blank, is it a canvass for us? Was it intended?

No answers. Silence.

I met a man with gums on him that liked to run and squidge together making a hollow croaking noise.

Pause.

Consider the nonsense, consider that we only have so much time. I check it regularly to ensure I am on time.

Appointments are satisfying. 

Pause.

Dare I continue, what lays between us that I cannot reach you? What is missing to complete us? I only feel shadows and claws that dig into me - you insist that I stay away.

Silence.

That's what I see in my heart a pendulum ticking back and forth, it reminds me of the end, if gravity will eventually allow it.

I am a pendulum and my life swings back and forth, back - 

Silence.

Pause. 

Nothing more. 

Nothing.

Camisado (199 of 365)

Day 199 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day camisado meaning "a military mission occurring at night."

Camisado

It is raining

It is so wet tonight

It's the type of night you 

Feel in your thighs 

The coolness tickles your warmest bits

It's the sort of night where you sit in your underwear

And the sun was there but now it's gone and the moon is ice 

And feet are cool and clammy

And you are there 

And we are there and the fan blows

And the bed takes us and me into you

And we complete our assault on each other and we lay and we mate

And then we sit quite as gnomes and listen to the tapping of rain on glass

Which leaves tiny slivers like sparks of ghosts grinding against the unknown. 

Candidate (198 of 365)

Day 198 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day Bruxism meaning "involuntary and habitual grinding of the teeth."

The Candidate 

The pursing of her lips

The bruxism of her teeth

The schism between her mind and heart

The amorphous space about her

The aura and the projections

Blue, purple, green 

The bottom of a sea choral bleached faded

Her knees knobbly poke out her skirt

Her stomach knotting over and over again and doing somersaults

Silhouettes in the adjoining board room

Tap tapping of pens 

Scrubbing out

Erasing whiting out 

White tight knuckles 

Brittle smile caving at the edges 

Hair tidy, makeup mild (relatively)

Skirt modest (relatively)

Jacket and coat formal pressed elegant.

Transit Lounge (197 of 365)

Day 197 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day fuselage meaning: "the main body of an aircraft."

Transit Lounge

The tall windows

Stare back at me and in them

I see my reflection 

A young boy runs up to the Windows

A battle weary mother at his side

He jumps up and down and exclaims with the only words he knows

I think there must be a word for this excitement

He stares out at the nose of the plane, it's great white fuselage

and the wings

His arms fidget and he points 

As if it's impossible to describe the majesty of what he sees 

There is wonder 

Nothing is mundane to him 

This is the discovery of flight

This is the discovery of the giant 

And indecipherable 

This is the discovery of the modern

The boy jumps about and takes his leave 

Then calls his father near to him

Gesturing frantic and wild 

With a smile a wingspan wide

The boy's father smiles

I find myself smiling too 

Suddenly I recall where I am 

In this great fortress that we made

That somehow belongs to them

Maybe they are alive

Maybe these great birds that beat us

Deserve more respect

The boy goes

It is time to board

Time to fly. 

Portrait of the Dying (196 of 365)

Day 196 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day sallow meaning: "

(of a person's face or complexion) of an unhealthy yellow or pale brown colour."

Portrait of the Dying

An elderly man lies upright in his hospital bed

He makes no fuss

And all noise he tries falls mute

On every ear 

His harsh complaints might as well be a dogs bark 

The man becomes sallow

Withdrawn 

There are few flowers or photographs nearby that draw him

The flower petals are turning brown

The stems sag and turn the vase water cloudy 

The tubes connect him to the hospital and to life

This is his life 

The words palliative and care

Displayed proudly beside one another

Oxymoron he considers

But no one is here to experience his wit 

Not anymore.

My fat blue tie (194 of 365)

Day 194 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day autotomy meaning "The casting off of a limb or other part of the body by an animal under threat, such as a lizard."

My Fat Blue tie

My fat blue tie rests 

Like a cow tongue on my chest

It's tip lays just above my belt

And trousers 

My fat blue tie is knotted

And tight against my white neck

It melds my shirt against my skin

Seals me into my suit and

My work persona

My fat blue tie 

Slips and slides 

Eternally shifting but to me

It is always stationary 

And time is frozen to its autotomous tail Like a pendulum.

; (amphibology) (195 of 365)

Day 195 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day amphibology meaning: "a phrase or sentence that is grammatically ambiguous."

; (amphibology)

A passing passion

Hangs in the balance

Without determination

Spiralling endlessly and myopically

The tower cranes 

Hoist an interminable load

An interminable loads continue

To be stacked like Duplo blocks

And the tower cranes are unwieldy as a toddler

Joe Bloggs catches a whiff of

Industry on his way in 

He catches up and does his business

Then he's on his way out

His suit and tie trailing

His white collar subsistence 

Failure (193 of 365)

Day 193 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day argute meaning "shrewd."

Failure 

Reading stories of long fought battles and hard fought alliances

Reading stories of helpless victims and argute defilers

Reading stories of (perhaps) wasted efforts and wasted lives

Reading stories that are inconvenient and non-ending

Reading stories about relentless forces of darkness and nature 

Reading stories of impossible struggles of tsunamis, volcanoes of famines of wars of corrupt rulers 

Reading stories of false hope felt too late

Reading stories of selfishness without remorse or recompense

Reading stories of victimisation

Reading stories of the helpless become dependent and then of the dependent slammed with sharp inflammatory stones

Reading stories of condemnation and rejection of religion of secularism 

Reading stories where there is no truce

Reading stories of rebels and regimes

Reading stories of countries lost and founded and raped and pillaged and historically languishing or historically spurned 

Reading stories of twisted orthodoxy and radical affiliations 

Reading stories of conflicting ideals and the plunge to violence

Reading redundant histories

Reading repeated mistakes

Reading forgotten failures of wars and conflicts and where it all went wrong...

Rotary (192 of 365)

Day 192 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day apoptosis meaning: "the death of cells which occurs as a normal part of an organism's growth or development."

Rotary 

The rotation of wheels 

Became the way of the world

Horses pulled wheels

Then engines pulled wheels 

Then electricity was forged by wheels 

The breakdown of the atomic wheel heralded a modern age

We each have our conception and apoptosis.

Each day the balls of my feet 

Contemplate and resist fatigue

They know only one way 

They roll forward just as sure as gravity 

My wheels turn

The wheels of my eyes are tired and dry 

Shapes blur in and out of focus 

Images projected onto the retina 

A turning projector wheel

In my mind sends ragged clips

Of memories and thoughts, lists, tasks operations that circulate back and forth 

There is a wheel pistoning 

Neurones and impulses 

I feel it zig and zag like lightning

Is my grey matter scorched 

It seems so 

Where did this weariness come from

When did I lose the momentum of polished wheels

Where did the inertia go

What was the trigger for this grounding deafening halt 

I demand that the wheels turn

I demand an end to these wearisome tones 

I demand an end to this

I demand an end.

Ocean Waves (191 of 365)

Day 191 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day anfractuous meaning "winding or circuitous."

Ocean Waves 

I feel at peace in the sight of 

Ocean waves

The ones that look green 

The ones that ripple and swirl

And circle the rocks playfully

The water is freezing 

Unpleasantly so 

Until I dive all the way in

There's no peace until after the plunge straight down

The cold evaporates and the murky world splays itself before my eyes

There is life and dust 

There are so many invisible stories here

I throw my head back like a surfer in a perfume add 

The pretentious type 

Where there's a new world 

And there's nothing but me and this cold blue 

There is no end to it

You can't break this down

You can't make it less

The greatness is there

It dwarfs everything

I am so small

I am nothing here 

I could dissolve and my skin and bones become dust 

I could become the bed of this great pythonic sea 

I lie on my back 

Allow myself to sink down

My nostrils teasing at the surface 

I feel the water smear my insides

It's salty and penetrating and itching and biting 

My lungs hiss and garble 

I jerk up

Another wave comes and laps at my waist 

Then another comes anfractuous

And another and another.

Doubting my place (190 of 365)

Day 190 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day bibliophile meaning: "

a person who collects or has a great love of books."

Doubting my place

I question what happens next

I hope the answer will come to me and I won't have to find it 

That's a pleasant idea 

But my head burns with longing

To seize upon an invisible thread and pull it bare, to rip open the vein and expose the meat of something

I sit in a chair and drift along 

Quite silent and contemplating

The air is pleasant enough neither stale nor fresh 

My legs are squashed and compressed

I foresee a long hill and the sun beating down

I see water at the top waiting for me

Cool quenching glorious 

I shall not run and the road will be long 

I doubt I'll find anything there than

A mundane pleasant evening 

That I can sink into

Like a fat man groaning into the folds of a familiar lounge 

I know that a movie plot will not find me  there is not yet a turning point im aware of and im the author so that's a problem

I prefer reading 

A natural bibliophile

Writing was never my strong suit.

I lost my patience (189 of 365)

Day 189 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day tirade meaning "

a speech of violent denunciation."

I lost my patience

I arrived and the papers were astray

I arrived and nothing was going my way

I arrived and nasal voices blasted complaints into my ears: why, what will you do about it

My plaintiff reply nothing - (my thought I should do nothing but end this call)

I lost my patience in the blazing heat

I lost my patience in my lack of sleep on sweat stained sheets

I lost my patience at insistence and questions with out end

I lost my patient when the carpet was yanked out from under me

I lost my patience by the sea

As a mother screamed for her girl to return (she was insane but nonetheless)

I lost my patience in a gaggling mob of enthusiasm

Which made me question mine

I lost my patience as the laughter and talk overflowed into my hours of prepared presentation 

I lost my patience when I went to the grocery store and wandered dehydrated and confused (a burger was not the right choice for my throat at the time)

I didn't have any left to bear your criticism with humility and dignity

So I fought

I launched into a deliberate tirade 

I fought because I had lost so many battles and I was humiliated and because I felt useless and deflated

And because with you I could fight and I could be angry 

But I lost my patience with that too

Now that the smoke has cleared

I wished I had given you my patience all of it

...its too late now though 

I can only hope and wish and pray

That perhaps at the end of the day

It will replenish that we will wear another day 

That this can be put behind 

And you'll then have what was denied. 

The Return (188 of 365)

Day 188 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day winsome meaning: "charming in a childlike or naive way."

The Return 

I am sure there will be a return

I am sure that there is a winsome sunny shore for me

Do you recognise the feeling of drowning the way it ages you in an instant and then the tension releases and droops and unspools

And becomes sloppy elastic and tired...

A sunset is a pleasant bookend

It's a conclusion 

No one ever considers what follows it when the Cowboys ride into it

That the orange glow and darkness benign and cool gives way to the radiant tyrant of a new dawn 

And the crow clawed sleep deprivation of the day

I long for a return 

A return to what? 

Going backwards to youth 

To feel sand and nothing else

To feel all the cares being absorbed the clots of problems and issues and minutiae being drained away pouring down the drain swirling the drain oozing out spiralling down 

Accept the hopelessness

Embrace the coolness

And then you'll find yourself there spat out tired but luxurious raking on the shore and your feet will take the sand and you'll rue the day 

You ever despaired 

For respite has come

The redemption has come

The resolution has come

The revolution has come 

The return has come.

Recombobulation (187 of 365)

Day 187 of the 365 day poem challenge.

Word of the day recombobulation meaning: "the act of putting back into order, removing confusion."

Recombobulation 

It might concern you to know 

That murder lurks in he passengers 

To your left and right 

Walk down one particular dimensional gate and shake in just rightly in all the wrong places 

And there it is 

The ugliness

It might surprise you to know

The pairs of eyes that cannot deny your allure each and every day

Many wanted, but unwilling to lock and link and then supposedly love or obsess or lust after or lose control

It ought to concern you 

That when you dream you're dying

Each night switching off and losing all control and yet it's so peaceful isn't it 

You want it now don't you?

Because there's nothing there really

Even when it's made up you'll wake and then know it's nothing

And say you never wake then it won't be anything at all

Each cycle of the sun and the moon

Which is in fact an orbit and gravity plays its tricks which we like to label days and months and years

After numerous bloody battles

The ways and whys have consolidated 

The messy hunk of past has been

Recombobulated.