The main theme of this poem is um, triumph
So uh the secondary theme of this poem is defeat?
How could that be? Is that even what a poem is?
Is my life a song? Is this the ******* chorus?
Something crawls up from the drain through the ***** dishes and out of the sink. It grips me! It’s got me!
[This is the part I want to hide]
I saw a man so beautiful
Rarely is there ever a beautiful man--
a man so beautiful you want to kneel
and scream “You’re so beautiful!”
But instead I’ll worship him in the ways he insists:
by stepping aside on the sidewalk,
by laughing at the jokes he steals from me,
by squandering the money he pays me to do his job.
Is my life a song? Is this the ******* chorus?
It took me three to four years to learn
the difference between worshiping and begging,
between faith and belief
And now I have neither and engage in both and yet
My life feels like a free coffee and bagel
My life feels like an unwrapped candy bar
My life feels like a compliment from a stranger
My life feels like a birthday card with cash in it
Is my life a song? Is this the ******* chorus?
This is my once-yearly poem.
It’s like a broken perfume bottle at the bottom of my bag.
Look at it-- read it. Smell it. Literal swill. Most things make me feel sad, even more things make me feel threatened, especially this poem.
What is there to do but put my head in my hands?
What is there to say if not sorry?
May 21, 2023
May 21, 2023 at 11:49 PM UTC
And when I let the maelstrom of my life wash over me,
I cried and cried and cried
And I let my body lie in bed
until the blood pooled at the back of my legs.
There is no good way to fall out of love:
there are only the meandering strides in and out
and back again.
Aug 4, 2021
Aug 4, 2021 at 4:24 PM UTC
Mmm, the sound babies make
before they know how to speak.
Small murmurs in the dark, waiting for light through the window.
I try to follow the recipe:
Hazelnut, flour, pretense.
Stir, stir, stir.
I hear the radio from the living room:
Silent night, o holy night
My mother sleeps on the sofa,
and she’ll sleep until the light comes through the window.
Coffee sloshes against the back of my teeth like whistling wind on a train through Mumbai, and I hear the voice in the back of my head:
Take your mother to India before she dies.
Eggs, butter, time: whip and stir.
I am trying myself to bake the cake for my mother’s birthday. She deserves so much.
I think of the summer in the south
The neighbor with the baby
The mother wailing
I can’t do this I can’t do this
And I hear my mother’s voice in the back of my head:
If you want something done right,
do it yourself.
Aug 4, 2021
Aug 4, 2021 at 4:10 PM UTC
Oh come on,
What is it with you
and the setting sun?
You are like brothers.
You both need something inside of you
that burns no matter what.
Aug 3, 2021
Aug 3, 2021 at 12:17 PM UTC
I am a signed document
a fit of freedom written in last minute ink
My hair the lustrous curls of knowing
what it’s like to unwind a little.
My breath is the mist of the Baltic Sea, rising to meet the heat
of an argument, a moment, a feeling.
I light a fire with my pen.
I hide my tired eyes, clenched jaw
and write with a tight grip.
Voices echo through the forest,
Révolution ! Commencer la revolution !
Trees fall to thunder.
Self-doubt sinks to the bottom of my sea
like a shipwreck. My armies trench through fields
mowed in circles
the rings moving out like zen,
and I practice tai chi in the middle of battle
finding peace at last.
Now I live a lifetime of summer.
Sep 12, 2016
Sep 12, 2016 at 2:30 AM UTC
I want to be the reason
Why you never give up.
I want you to glance
Over to your side when you're
Tired, defeated, forgotten, forlorn;
Uninspired, depleted, rotten, and torn
And see me there and hear me say:
"Don't you dare."
and those words would send you wild and running and driven into your dreams--
Only to find me there again.
Jul 8, 2014
Jul 8, 2014 at 1:02 AM UTC
The star that rises in the morning
Hangs irrevocably above me.
Its light is the product of the mind.
It casts my shadow by the doing of brilliant light. Freeing myself from its follow is a plight
I know well.
You are the closest star until the morning
Living and burning and being in the dark
--the splendor of that lightless radiance;
but where there is no follow there is no guide:
You are a proxminity never the vicinity of something I could see.
You are the closest star until the morning.
Although you are closest you are still far
Even the sun is closer to me than you
Mar 27, 2014
Mar 27, 2014 at 12:38 AM UTC
Give them no plea,
Stay steadfast in your way.
Do it, do it, do it for me.
When they set flame to all you see
The fire will surge and rage, but
Give them no plea.
They will wait for you to change your decree
But sit silent, lips pierced too quiet —
Do it, do it, do it for me.
When they hold your judgement over high sea
During the toughest storm,
Give them no plea.
Do not accept what they say is to be
As what it is to be, or how it has been.
Do it, do it, do it for me.
When they strive against your way
And your will strives at your mercy,
Give them no plea.
Do it, do it, do it for me.
Oct 20, 2013
Oct 20, 2013 at 12:26 AM UTC
Soldier,
Do not tell me that
All is fair in love
and in war;
Especially when nations
are tried
For crimes against humanity
When they lose a war.
Trust me, Soldier:
Love is a war you do not want to lose.
Jul 7, 2013
Jul 7, 2013 at 12:10 AM UTC
I want nothing more than to
Burst apart
And let the sun evaporate this heavy feeling
That has weighed me down
Ever since I realized
You'll never love me.
Jun 27, 2013
Jun 27, 2013 at 9:35 PM UTC