#jpbrm

[existentialquiet]

how strange, to stand at the very edge of nothingness and return – broken & cleaved & overwhelmed shaking: blood marking my knees

how terrible, to watch deadly wind make deadened flesh (once tenderly loved) and return – grieving & drowning & screaming staggering: swallowed by so much bigger

all but a still small voice: Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

how vehement, to shout against darkness with Existential Mightiness behind me and return – my voice grows & it grows & it grows uncertain: but He is so much greater

how beautiful, to lean against His staff when nothing breaks my fall and return – hardened & healed & still small but shielded: I stand.

I return.

–– e.n

[existential-celestial]

May’s streaming sun: i have shut my mouth & still flowers bloomed under my own tongue. i will hand you a bud, dear —if i speak, will you open your hands? May, you; may i?; the will be done.

j. p. berame // no. 0517

[existentialquiet]

nov. 1, 2018 // my friends and I went to buy books together, and I got a copy of W. Somerset Maugham’s Of Human Bondage! thankful for them as they put up with my weird book photography antics✨😌

[existential-celestial]

& still i am here —nothing much to offer: my heart, my faith my dreams, my prayers —nothing much to offer: & still i am here

j. p. berame // no. 051117

[existential-celestial]

i just noticed some wonderful people on here are tagging their works with "existential-celestial" or "existential celestial" so i could read 'em and i'm really sorry if i missed out on them because having a hyphen/dash and/or a space for a tag is a little problematic (and seriously, i didn't know you people would tag me). so, to solve that little issue—and if you (still) want me to check and read your works—please use the tag "jpbrm" instead. 🤓

[existential-celestial]

dearest there is no death here;

only light.

[existential-celestial]

analemma

the geometry of sun moving across the expanse of rot, this old wooden floor— i count the times the light has transformed & transfixed: since landing on my bare limbs since kissing my right cheek since tracing my eyelids.

now sinking, i feel the bright threads yearning for sleep;

(dear, what i am trying to say to you is that)

i wonder what sky speaks to your eyes tonight.

— j. p. berame // no. 052317

[existential-celestial]

ab[so]lution

i descend to dissolve into the night the stillness, a granting for the lungs to grow teeth for the heart to open the soft cage & release the prowling beast to rattle & claw the mind instead of the chest this speck of unholy (the prowling beast) left in the dust of me —i feel it: the limitations of everything earthly (fallible fallible ashen ontology); where do i run? what of desire for ascension? (the time on earth is not yet done) so i pull the sky down (let’s bend light, love; not break) & tie the heart to nothing but the promise of cleansing—the Word (i hum a name & wield a helve of sharp speaking sun) the prowling beast, subdued the prowling beast, silent & still i know i am nothing (walking dust fueled by prayers & visions) & still the dust dared to dream: IMAGO DEI, i am IMAGO DEI, i shall remain i am  learning to listen.

j. p. berame // no. 051417 ig  |  redbubble  |  chapbook