The Black Dog

 

Title.

The Black Dog.

(A tired voice whispers)

It was 3 years ago that I first saw it in my long mirror.

A black dog watching in the shadows.

Then 6 months later, in full view but at a distance. Watching.

Now four years later, it's my best friend.

He follows me everywhere. Sleeps beside me, and lately I can hear him talking.

Talking about my father and about his end.

I went to see Old Shala, and she read my aura and said I was being stalked by a Lylak. 

She asked if I had lost anyone. I said my wife, and she said depression had opened a portal, and it had gotten closer and closer.

So with her permission we had a ceremony. Candles, incantations, and incense.

 Looking in her long mirror, I sensed and watched my only friend leave my side with sad heavy eyes, and slowly move away to the shadows.

When it was in the shadows, the mirror was suddenly broken, trapping it, and another thing happened, which I cannot say to this day.

I paid and left.

Now back alone. 

I still see its red eyes in the dark.

Everywhere in my now empty home 

Shall I call it out?

That old friend of mine or ring up my real friends?

(C) Copyright John Duffy

This poem is about:

Grief after losing a spouse.

Depression becoming identity.

The danger of romanticizing pain.

The loneliness that follows healing.

It does not glorify the darkness—it shows how seductive and persistent it can be.

The voice is reflective, aware, and conflicted. That self-awareness is what separates this from despair and turns it into literature.

For depression doesn’t vanish cleanly. Even after treatment or ritual:

Traces remain.

Fear of relapse lingers.

Familiar pain still “looks back” at you.

If you're feeling depressed, talk to someone. It will make all the difference. Try never to face anything alone. Salute.

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The Atlantean

 

It's rather strange where creative writing can lead you.

Have you tried automatic writing where you just write what comes through?

One of my explorations is below.

The Atlantean

(A lone voice whispers)

I am the tip of the divine spear when it comes to facing fear.

 For I abide under the shadows and protections of the Most High.

So heed me, creatures of the night.

Abandon any means to attack my soul, for I am already on patrol.

So be it.

Amen.

(C)

Copyright John Duffy 

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The Monologue of Saul

 

Do you live consciously—or does the world live through you?

A piece about reclaiming your spiritual agency in a digitized, engineered reality before life ends.

Not with fear, but with awareness, responsibility, and honesty.

A whisper, not a sermon.

A mirror, not an accusation.

(A lone voice whispers)

Have you ever wondered if your soul is just mirrored reflections? 

Fragmented shards of an augmented reality.

A divine kaleidoscope of your own perceived ideas.

Of what to do to get to your version of heaven and how to avoid hell?

Overlaid onto a real-world environment.

Are you too logical to ever really understand, but just bravely parading around like another human being? 

Locked into a social engineer's dream.

Trying to live within and under its dark, magical, mesmerizing spell.

Hypnotized by whatever is subliminally repeated on your handheld screens.

Slowly waiting unconsciously, before it's too late for spiritual understanding.

To return to just you.

To truly see there's more to life than chasing paper dreams.

Before you catch the last bus to take you home to atone.

In The Great In-Between, where you'll be asked,'

Did you live a clean life, or did something happen that was unforeseen?

 That caused you to live temporarily unclean?

(C) Copyright John Duffy

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The Southern Belle

 

A poetic exploration on romantic longing, emotional stasis, and the way we protect love by housing it inside ourselves when it can’t survive in the real world.

Title.

The Southern Belle.

(A lone voice whispers)

There's a room inside my head all white. The purest color you've ever seen.

All white walls and ceilings—with fields of never-ending green.

Playing on loop is some deep southern blues.

While I wait for you.

The firewoman who once said, “Well, bless your heart.”

Whenever we fell apart.

(C)

Copyright John Duffy 

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Truth

 In a corrupt world, does only one thing start the changes in the paradigm?

It may change everything—but in a corrupt world, may it also leave you standing alone once it does?

Is that why modern whistleblowers choose anonymity?

Truth.

(A lone voice whispers)

Everything changes, and seeing you just brings it home.

But once the sword of Damocles falls, you could forever be left standing all alone.

(C) Copyright John Duffy 

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The Silver Fence

 

A poem not about getting back together but a poem about honoring what was, surviving what is, and wondering—gently—what might still be allowed.

Title.

The Silver Fence.

(A lone voice whispers)

Life without you is a strange thing.

It's like living divided by a silver electrified fence, and the fence runs deep into infinity and is uncrossable.

I live on one side, and you live on the other.

The fence has memories and mementos hanging on it, and every once in a while, when we feel brave, we climb to the fence to look.

Look, but don't touch. See, but leave be and climb back down to be swallowed up by our worlds.

Swallowed up until the next time we are feeling lonely and brave enough to return.

I really still miss you and think after all these years we could build a doorway in that silver fence.

A doorway that leaves us the option to cross over.

Cross over to perhaps say hello.

Put new mementos on show on the other side but simply to rebuild old bridges.

We may never be whole like before, but sometimes snow in April isn't everything. XXX

(C)

Copyright John Duffy 

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New Orleans Dreams

 

A poem exploring love magic—does the power lie in some ritual ceremonial candles or the heart lighting them?

Answers after reading, if you choose. Salute 

Title.

New Orleans Dreams.

(A lone voice whispers as the speaker writes in his journal.)

I went to see the Bayou Queen yesterday.

Deep in the Louisiana Mississippi Delta.

She bade me sit and began to say as nearby drums played.

“Boy, you got it in a bad way. These cards say that even the world's against your love this time around. 

But I feel your special one you've already found. So take these candles and just light one each day. 

And its smoke will carry your aura her way, so she can know and feel you when the nighttime crickets sing and the nighttime bats play.”

That was three weeks ago.

Each night after 9 pm, before I light a candle, I smell such a scent it drives my senses wild, and even my dog, Billy, barks.

Could it be her attracted to my aura through the Bayou Queens candles?

(C)

Copyright John Duffy 

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Concilium

 

An original symbolic and experimental piece that reads as a ritual invitation—part manifesto, part incantation.

Exploring the theme that words thrive on the subconscious or spiritual level—felt more than understood.

Where some poetry lives.

Not in heaven or hell but the human condition when stripped bare.

Title.

Concilium (L)

(A lone voice whispers)

You do know these low whispers of mine, which I channel to flow through inquisitive eyes—like yours.

Carry a deep glow and hum within them. Now that you've begun reading.

Invisible frequencies to light up the deepest recesses of your very soul like a bright new Star of Bethlehem.

To open Seen and Unseen doors.

With golden spiritual keys to enter the sweet center of my Great In-Between.

Using secret olde spells rearranged as simple stanzas > To enter some of the deepest, oldest, and newest mythical wells.

Knee-deep as time slowly dances and advances.

With some cleverly smiling or some chillingly rhyming. 

Created just so through the light and dark caverns of my soul—you can perambulate. 

Whenever I write > inviting you to open their luminous gates.

To just read on and be illuminated before the world burns, and it's too late to be recalibrated.

(C) Copyright John Duffy 

Concilium > Public meeting.

Life

 

Title.

Life

Inescapable 

This visceral thing we share

A thing of beauty

(C)

Copyright John Duffy 

# Senyru 

A lone voice whispers

 Have you ever felt the cold cut of Dolor? 

One of the inner circle high rollers who stands just below one of life's ultimate controllers.

Death.

(C)

Copyright John Duffy 

In Latin, dolor means pain, grief, sorrow, or heartache, a word stemming from the verb dolere (to feel pain) and used to describe physical or emotional suffering.

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