jake-sullivan
Hello, I'm Jake. I'm lost, but am trying to be better. I don't like emotions, but I thrive typing them into stanzas. I’m that person who obsesses over the cinematography or symbolism of a scene in a movie. I have an undying love for movies and tv, thunderstorms, and new words. When I’m older, I hope to live in a log cabin with three dogs, and I spend way too much time watching log cabin real estate videos. I think I want to be an English teacher or a psychologist but honestly, I'll change my mind twenty times before Sunday. Writing is what gets me through my days.
I can feel their gazes
the strange look on their faces
their eyes black and still
and when I look at myself
mine just trace the cracks
I can feel their gazes
the sun heats the ground
my forehead sweats, it aches
I stumble on nothing, I fumble smiles
the sun heats the ground
and I fumble smiles,
and I stumble on
nothing
behind me, behind me
goosebumps, on my neck
under my blue fleece jacket, and scarf,
hands in, and out, of pockets
such inconveniences when I need to hold them
behind me, behind me
the air sings?, flattening each note?
the atmosphere, gets,,, caught,
in my, grasp, in my,,, lungs,
behind me?, behind, me?,
I can feel?, their gazes,
?smiles?, I fumble, on,
?and I stumble on,
nothing
Oct 12, 2015
Oct 12, 2015 at 11:18 PM UTC
if i believe
in death be sure
of this
it is
because you have loved me,
moon and sunset
stars and flowers
gold crescendo and silver muting
of seatides
i trusted not,
one night
when in my fingers
drooped your shining body
when my heart
sang between your perfect
*******
darkness and beauty of stars
was on my mouth petals danced
against my eyes
and down
the singing reaches of
my soul
spoke
the green-
greeting pale-
departing irrevocable
sea
i knew thee death.
and when
i have offered up each fragrant
night,when all my days
shall have before a certain
face become
white
perfume
only,
from the ashes
then
thou wilt rise and thou
wilt come to her and brush
the mischief from her eyes and fold
her
mouth the new
flower with
thy unimaginable
wings,where dwells the breath
of all persisting stars
Oct 10, 2015
Oct 10, 2015 at 6:39 PM UTC
Twelve o’clock.
Along the reaches of the street
Held in a lunar synthesis,
Whispering lunar incantations
Dissolve the floors of memory
And all its clear relations,
Its divisions and precisions,
Every street lamp that I pass
Beats like a fatalistic drum,
And through the spaces of the dark
Midnight shakes the memory
As a madman shakes a dead geranium.
Half-past one,
The street lamp sputtered,
The street lamp muttered,
The street lamp said, ‘Regard that woman
Who hesitates towards you in the light of the door
Which opens on her like a grin.
You see the border of her dress
Is torn and stained with sand,
And you see the corner of her eye
Twists like a crooked pin.’
The memory throws up high and dry
A crowd of twisted things;
A twisted branch upon the beach
Eaten smooth, and polished
As if the world gave up
The secret of its skeleton,
Stiff and white.
A broken spring in a factory yard,
Rust that clings to the form that the strength has left
Hard and curled and ready to snap.
Half-past two,
The street lamp said,
‘Remark the cat which flattens itself in the gutter,
Slips out its tongue
And devours a morsel of rancid butter.’
So the hand of a child, automatic,
Slipped out and pocketed a toy that was running along the quay.
I could see nothing behind that child’s eye.
I have seen eyes in the street
Trying to peer through lighted shutters,
And a crab one afternoon in a pool,
An old crab with barnacles on his back,
Gripped the end of a stick which I held him.
Half-past three,
The lamp sputtered,
The lamp muttered in the dark.
The lamp hummed:
‘Regard the moon,
La lune ne garde aucune rancune,
She winks a feeble eye,
She smiles into corners.
She smoothes the hair of the grass.
The moon has lost her memory.
A washed-out smallpox cracks her face,
Her hand twists a paper rose,
That smells of dust and old Cologne,
She is alone
With all the old nocturnal smells
That cross and cross across her brain.’
The reminiscence comes
Of sunless dry geraniums
And dust in crevices,
Smells of chestnuts in the streets,
And female smells in shuttered rooms,
And cigarettes in corridors
And cocktail smells in bars.’
The lamp said,
‘Four o’clock,
Here is the number on the door.
Memory!
You have the key,
The little lamp spreads a ring on the stair,
Mount.
The bed is open; the tooth-brush hangs on the wall,
Put your shoes at the door, sleep, prepare for life.’
The last twist of the knife.
Oct 10, 2015
Oct 10, 2015 at 6:35 PM UTC
I feel happy
but all I want to do is cry
like I just saw the boogeyman
lurking in between my jackets
and grinning with his
sharpened teeth
With a child on a chain
the name on his collar is
scratched, unreadable
Who?
When I peer from my sheets
all that remains across the room
filled with summer’s breath
I lose my own
He’s gone
The child remains,
back to me,
shivering
but the boogeyman
He’s gone
Where?
Where?
What was I sayi –
Who?
Where?
…
Oct 10, 2015
Oct 10, 2015 at 6:23 PM UTC