My Refrain

my refrain

original words and others you’ve heard written, spoken & sung by allié merrick mcguire

dedicated to wisdom seekers & word lovers in honor of those who don’t hide under society’s covers

sometimes you don’t need rhymes or reasons

but the reason for these rhymes is that there are those times when life feels better with a beat and lines that repeat making sense of madness can in fact lead to sadness but with frown upside down we refuse to bow down

we choose to find comfort in refrains and verbal campaigns to freely express what we choose to confess these are my confessions this is my refrain

So, I’ve color coded these pages to define and denote spoken vs. sung pieces.

The white pages are meant to be spoken.

The black pages have lines intended to be sung (often to familiar refrains). The lines intended to be sung are italicized

my refrain

this is my refrain my soul’s campaign to sustain that which i’ll now explain without complaint or restraint you think i’m a saint i ain’t but i’m real the real deal and feel we can heal through word like you just heard

just a spoonful

just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down but with no spoon soon you’re just down no energy to be found don’t frown you’ll come ‘round in the most delightful way you’ll find the light the will to fight the strength to stand the grace to land on your feet where your will and your want meet greater than your diagnosis stronger than your prognosis while your body breaks and bends your spirit holds and mends what can’t be touched, only felt when doubt and worry melt sugar may help the medicine go down but you need to rise up wear your crown day by day while spoons come and go full or not up you’ll go

hide and seek

as hard as i’ve tried i can no longer hide from the truth no amount of gin and vermouth can conceal what i feel time to deal with what’s real time to heal

as hard as i’ve tried i can no longer hide

it’s eating me up inside from within i sin against me daily truths denied are justified as pride maintains despite these refrains

as hard as i’ve tried i can no longer hide

sooner or later you find the traitor you sought to find within your own mind who knew it was you who did you wrong all along truth i spied as now i confide

as hard as i’ve tried i can no longer hide

satisfaction

i can't get no time to find myself so potential sits in a jar on a high shelf that i can't reach as you preach what i should and should not do but who are you to keep me reigned restrained i can't get no space no place to spread my wings as the choir sings

i can't get no air to breathe can you conceive such a notion such an emotion so intense it paralyzes while hiding behind disguises of satisfaction

sing-song

some people call me a genius genius i’m not sure i’ve learned a lot but most i forgot

now, please don’t get me wrong as i sing-song

212 degrees a left boiling pot overflowing here on the spot my mind is all i’ve got in every direction with little connection one thought to another dodging detection imitating perfection please and thank you, mother behind the scene thoughts careen go to war as they have before question and quarrel over every moral

gilded ideals are not immune to my mind’s tune as on and on I

sing-song

give it away

if i can’t sell it

i’m gonna sit down on it there’s no reason to give it away but give it she did to the highest bid over and over she gave forgetting to save her soul her only goal was getting a dollar to make a guy collar spending time on her back to get back on track yet she sang as though it wasn’t so

if i can’t sell it

i’m gonna sit down on it there’s no reason to give it away

then she found a reason an attempt to season a life she could not taste with assets no longer to waste but with unchaste hips, glossed lips tight thighs, bedroom eyes a figure that was unforgettable it’s regrettable she chose to maintain in terms of this refrain

if i can’t sell it

i’m gonna sit down on it

there’s no reason to give it away

just a thought

just a thought

life happens more than not and who the hell are you to tell fate what to do and who the hell am i to attempt to deny the course of fate to debate what’s not fair how dare i try to spin fate in my favor living only to savor the moments i desire as i conspire to dictate circumstance as if i had a chance to choose what can’t be chosen future assets frozen in time, on loan as seeds are sown for tomorrow’s crop that i can’t stop nor should for the better good

of all the things i know and know not it’s best i forgot what myself i taught just a thought

existence inquisition

i wonder if i exist and insist on finding out what it’s really all out you, us, me

could it be we’re nothing more than a mirage a collage of assumed reality visions of what we believe to be

it’s like that tree that falls the man that calls if no one’s around do either make a sound with sound waves made but not received it can be conceived that nothing then was heard not a single word

i realize that’s all rather scientific and rarely am i ever that specific

getting back to what i was debating when earlier contemplating in regard to what i just said perhaps i’m in over my head

however, if am here but not seen if i look at the lines and read between unless there’s something i missed i have to wonder if i exist

disclaim it all you know the protocol

why do more when it’s enough life’s already too damn tough

you want more? more i’ve got but not willing to a lot it not a bit stand? no thanks i’ll sit rest my bones on numbing tones sounds of whatever whatever’s my pleasure

what’s your fancy? suddenly antsy?

i seek support it terms to consort my new found savior my waiver disclaimer

in ink

i write these words in ink impermeable, inerasable they’re irreplaceable traceable?

to me, i’ll admit more than happy to submit to the truth of it all as far as i can recall

i’m showin’ you my hand if by now you can’t understand you never will even standing still you’re moving too fast recollecting your past forget it all don’t withdraw to the comfort of what you know some way, some how let go trust you must

if you don't i won’t be able to help you at all please recall lasting longer than a first kiss in permanent ink i wrote this

this moment

this moment i own it

this is my style declared without denial my ideal of what’s real i feel it can’t peel it off excuse me while i cough

and say again my friend i own this moment and refuse atonement for right or wrong to me it belongs for better or worse my blessing, my curse

i would not take it back not take another track i won’t live with regret although please know i don’t forget

and you can more than bet this moment is all you’re ever guaranteed thoughts of tomorrow tend to mislead

so take this moment and own it

tired

i’m tired and wish i were retired from my mind for i find it races and paces endlessly relentlessly seeking aroused, but no peaking dissatisfied feeling denied with no end in sight it’s just not right to keep living this way day after day

words tripping on top of each other there simply isn’t another way to say

what can’t be adequately expressed only clumsily confessed

concluding now on paper with pen tomorrow i’ll begin again as there’s too much left retrained too much sill contained

hence the reason i’m so tired there’s too much left desired

i

imperfectly perfect

i am imperfectly perfect

random random r-a-n-d-o-m

random see, i can spell it sure as hell i can tell it and yell it

through words and/or actions self-serving distractions diverting attention from prevention of thoughts that cross my mind from time to time thoughts that mislead indeed

it’s random r-a-n-d-o-m

random see, i can spell it sure as hell i can tell it and yell it

in various forms but not one conforms to norms from here to there and everywhere in between or so it seems to masses in rose-colored glasses they see what they see but they don’t see me a version it’s a perversion of who i profess to be in terms of pure poetry

the rhyme you heard but what about the word syllable spent on deaf ears leant on loan not owned used rather, abused to me, it’s random r-a-n-d-o-m random see, i can spell it sure as hell i can tell it and yell it but why you don’t hear me even with you right near me you don’t get it at all please try to recall what i just said it went over your head nevermind you can’t find what’s lost but not sought and that’s all that i’ve got

it’s random r-a-n-d-o-m

random

see, i can spell it sure as hell i can tell it like i did

i’m done gotta run

my favorite things

raindrops on roses

perfect poses assumed fragrantly consumed unforgiving thorns prick a cruel, concealed trick

whiskers on kittens

bitten once now shy whisked away by conjured details, detail, detail the strong are often frail

bright copper kettles

copper, gold, silver, metal will we ever settle for anything not shiny, bright unworthy in simple sight

warm woolen mittens

grandma used to knit we used to sit talk no longer do we talk we just walk away

brown paper packages tied up in string tied up set up fed up give up

bring it to the table i’m able these words i write these lines i recite these are a few of my favorite things

i’m okay

it’s okay

in words i say and thoughts i convey i tell myself every day

it’s okay

a plastic cup of milk spilled mom’s not thrilled it’s still half full, it’s still okay but mom’s not trilled she turns away don’t cry over spilled milk so they say but i cry anyway then say

it’s okay

in words i say and thoughts i convey i tell myself every day

it’s okay

when we the war of 1812, he’d ask no answer came for this simple task when we the war of 1812, he’d ask but no answer came for this simple task when we the war of 1812, he’d ask still no answer came for this simple task my blank stares returned by glares 1812, use some damn common sense too nervous to answer or provide defense

too scared to be wrong though i knew the answer to give and what was true

it’s okay

in words i say and thoughts i convey i tell myself every day

it’s okay

matrimonious intensions made known now a gown to be sewn or not logic then forgot, now remembered a status ‘to be’ dismembered

i wasn’t this or wasn’t that he deemed i wasn’t enough it seemed i was also told i change to much and such but that’s me what you get is what you see

i’ll always be one who spills things who can’t answer things who is or is not things but i’m okay

in words i say and thoughts i convey i tell them all every day

i’m okay

refrains

i’m only happy in refrains

refrains of a note coat theory and thought time bought logic spent with intent of consuming the unassumie i.e. me just a tune, just a verse no need to rehearse let it go let it flow so i do as silence is a note i never knew

mic in hand i found as the world poured down

i’m only happy in refrains

perhaps its insane to maintain structured repetition in habitual submission becoming a fix to feed with the need to say once and then again and again the same word, the same line repetition makes them mine

i’m only happy in refrains

there’s something to be said about over and over, on and on on and on and on and on some would have simple words deleted but i prefer they were repeated words, my drug of choice my addiction, i rejoice i say and say again a word, a line and then repeat once more i adore a simple verse along with those diverse but words simply stated are easier contemplated and easier is often said, not done this i said when i’d begun admitting without shame

i’m only happy in refrains

maybe maybe you’re gonna be the one that saves me save me from me on my knees please save me from being numb from the pain as i remain a slave that can’t save this moment or the next i’m hexed and after all it’s last call closing time time for a rhyme that makes sense for a change as i rearrange words and lines that reminds me of you who i know and knew not or knew but forgot remind me

maybe you’re gonna be the one that saves me from an unknown plague that’s vague in nature and intension a plague without prevention content to reside and hide in the mind that i call home unable to roam without charges and fees my soul flees but my mind will rewind again and again unable to mend fences broken with no token to be paid ropes frayed that bind my mind to sanity too fragile that i can’t reconcile so, maybe you’re gonna be the one that saves me

these days and times

in these days, in these times thick with crimes against our souls mere buckets with holes it’s never enough it’s too tough to fill a cup that never runs over moreover in these days, in these times we are but mimes walls of a box that can’t be seen lie between reality and our perception truth and its deception we have no conception of what’s real we rely on what we feel ignore our past convictions along with their restrictions in these words i exhaust i tell you, we’re lost with a great cost we can’t pay to return to yesterday in these days, in these times

please tell me why

please tell me why when i cry you don’t care you just stare the other way day after day night after night it isn’t right that i fight to save what we have or what we had

please tell me why you pretend it’s not the end when it is just that can you see where i’m at?

i’m tired uninspired

i’ve fought too long, too hard for your blatant disregard

please tell me why i should stay another day another hour no, our time is done you’ve not begun to answer yet so before you set into doing so

please know

i’ll not cry as you try to tell me why as i say goodbye

oh, it don’t mean a thing if it doesn’t make you wanna sing seek out a precious ring or something that binds that reminds our mins no, it don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing swing low swing high but swing on don’t rely on a beat to be provided don’t be misguided by anything that does not swing

it don’t mean a thing

the sun will come out tomorrow

but if tomorrow never came would you live today the same live a life with shame pass along the blame tomorrow they’ll be sun but if clouds consume the light would you still do what’s right remain in flight despite clouded sight

when i’m stuck with a day that’s grey and lonely you remain despite the circles you maintain

i’ll just stick up my chin and grin and say most sincerely with hope very clearly

the sun will come out tomorrow

over the rainbow

somewhere over the rainbow

red, orange, yellow, blue, green, indigo, violet violent - the storm before the shades solidify one can’t deny or be so bold to assume that there is gold at the end oh, my friend all there is to gain is found within the rain without which no rainbow would there be no array of color to see if what you seek is gold while the rain pours down, behold keep it save it learn to love it love to crave it after all… skies are blue and boo-hoo if they’re not take what you’ve got it’s more than some will ever possess though this they’ll not confess things are not always as them seem and…

the dreams that you dare to dream may one day come true

yet to come

the best is yet to come come don’t play naive surely you believe the best is yet to come

hmm-hmm, humm-humm, hummhmm

if this isn’t so i don’t know just what to say or how to play with you this is new for often i hum

hmm-hmm, humm-humm, hummhmm

the best is yet to come

if this is not the case what is there to embrace where is the saving grace in this place it’s required to be inspired thus the best is yet to come

hmm-hmm, humm-humm, hummhmm

all that jazz

hush… the rush riding high falling fast even though i know it won’t last i want all that jazz to be filled by the thrill the unknown embraced pure panic faced my heart begins to race i want all that jazz thrust i must hold and be bold as i do it’s true i want all that jazz

come what may

i have no choice

i have but once voice come what may my life my strife

come what may a lot i’ve lost and will still lose nevertheless

it’s what i choose come what may through pain through sorrow

today tomorrow come what may

i have to trust

it’s not all in vain

i do what i must to do more than maintain come what may can’t pause can’t stop

’til i get to the top do all that i was meant to do to myself be true

to this i’m bound no excuse have i found to take the road more traveled by my goal, my soul

i can’t deny come what may after all i have no choice i have only this voice come what may

someday when i’m all alone

and all by myself please don’t blame yourself you did all you could but steadfast i stood turned away had to have it my way someday when i’m all alone

i’ll wish i’d known what you tried to teach when you tried to reach out to m sorry i didn’t see someday when i’m awfully low i will feel a glow because i know you tried to help me fight my fight and i’ll remember…

the way you looked at me that night

spellcheck

i don’t feel the need to bind my words in an electronic state in a word document or excel worksheet no cells for my syllables thank you, very much i’m touched

i don’t rely on spell check if my words carefully chosen but not carefully spelled are misspelled i forgive myself for that and applaud my attempt to employ applaudable vocabulary in a grammatically simplistic society if i’m to be called the oddity i’m odd and that’s fine there words are mine i own these so please if you need a word but a fancier version control-shift-f7 will provide a conversion no need to open a book to find words not networked to your mind let your fingers do the talking click, click, click, click put down the paper toss out the bic you’re quick

not me i’m slow i write as i go and i don’t feel the need to bind my words in an electronic state in a word document or excel worksheet no cells for my syllables thank you, very much i’m touched

ode to chardonnay

it was many years ago with a bottle of chardonnay that i first fell in love with wine in a whole new way

before this bottle i swore an oath to drink just red and never both red for me was nearly ideal i’d have it with every single meal

carnivorous when i dine it just made sense to drink red wine

then one day i was poured a wine in a home that wasn’t mine what filled my glass wasn’t red not even pink but white instead not wanting to offend and come across as rude i swirled the glass a bit and shifted focus to my food

the focus never came as i became distracted it was to the aromatics of the wine that i reacted bright, steely notes swirled and sped as i sat up inhaling with intention in attempt of keeping up

sipped and savored layers of flavor streaking by breathing in each nuance i exhaled with a deep sigh

“what just happened” i asked out loud unaware of the nearby crowd

“it’s chardonnay” someone said i grabbed the bottle and then i read it was indeed chardonnay but i’d never had one taste that way had i known it could be like this like an angel’s tear like first love’s kiss

like heaven’s mist and morning’s dew like promises and oaths held true i would have never turned away and silenced a wine with so much to say speaking of which here’s what it said as i now hungered for what it fed while i’m not red like cabernet much like pinot i have much to say

while i don’t shout but whisper by choice you’ll find there’s value in my voice

i speak from vines of burgundy from a place that’s called chablis i carry with me little weight but substance that will satiate forward fruit that will not bend my acidity knows no end

you’ll find that i am beautifully brisk worthy of one taking a risk

the chardonnay had made its case and with it built a solid base on my palate that now craved chardonnay for which i raved cheers to you chardonnay may more explore what you have to say

about the author

Allié Merrick McGuire, as Co-Founder of AwareNow Media and Editor-in-Chief of AwareNow Magazine, has dedicated her professional and personal life to the service of others through raising awareness for the causes we're all tied to one story at a time. With original and organic content, she seeks to educate and empower others to rise above circumstance and pursue their passion with purpose. Recently diagnosed with MS after losing vision in one eye, she also serves as an AwareNow Official Ambassador for Multiple Sclerosis.

Prior to AwareNow, with a love for words and a 'translator' for wine, Allié built a career in independent content production with a unique, untraditional voice. As the producer of ‘The Allié Way’, she created a lifestyle platform publishing original posts and projects representing brands in a number of verticals from wine to film to fashion. From serving as the Cannes Fashion Festival Wine Ambassador to producing three seasons of ‘Trainsipping’, Allié has worked with a number of brands, in front of the camera as an ambassador on red carpets and behind the camera as a photographer, videographer and designer. As a brand consultant and developer, she has an extensive portfolio of work developed for major brands with her branding/marketing agency - J+A Productions. In addition, she is a professional speaker and performance poet having presented at multiple TEDx events, conferences and private venues.

cheers (the end)