n_ - Hello Poetry

I am learning that connection is pure. It can be. I met a person on the internet who sent me a song. And I hear the neighbors through their thinly-laid walls, see them every day, watering their plants. And I know their voices, though I've never heard their names. On my walk through this same community, I smelled a rose that was densely packed, tightly woven ‘round the central bud, and this rose that I smelled was fragrant and had been smelled by all romantically inclined passers-by since it’s first dawn. Strangers’ noses touch, through dimensions, spatial discrepancies, through the harsh needle of time, align. And at the park I saw visitors meet, with their dogs inching ever-closer to discover one another’s peculiar scents. And I've found a girl online who reminds me of my friend. And I love her for reminding me.

0

Sep 7, 2021

Sep 7, 2021 at 10:09 PM UTC

connection

I am learning that connection is pure. It can be. I met a person on the internet who sent me a song. And I hear the neighbors through their thinly-laid walls, see them every day, watering their plants. And I know their voices, though I've never heard their names. On my walk through this same community, I smelled a rose that was densely packed, tightly woven ‘round the central bud, and this rose that I smelled was fragrant and had been smelled by all romantically inclined passers-by since it’s first dawn. Strangers’ noses touch, through dimensions, spatial discrepancies, through the harsh needle of time, align. And at the park I saw visitors meet, with their dogs inching ever-closer to discover one another’s peculiar scents. And I've found a girl online who reminds me of my friend. And I love her for reminding me.

8

Do you know how beautiful it is to be empty ? Hollow, - Like a drum. - When you touch me i rear your sound: Irreplecable, new, bright. I am your echo - the thought that spurs you The art that haunts you, The woman who cleans you.

0

Sep 7, 2021

Sep 7, 2021 at 7:24 PM UTC

- - -

Do you know how beautiful it is to be empty ? Hollow, - Like a drum. - When you touch me i rear your sound: Irreplecable, new, bright. I am your echo - the thought that spurs you The art that haunts you, The woman who cleans you.

8

The soft edges of femininity, Round, ******* complements, Heels, ***** of the feet, sockets, Soft eyes, soft hearts, soft hands Tinkering, thanking, crossing, legs. Girlhood is enclosed in a silver box With mute pastels and a heavy soundtrack of strings, Strings which bifurcate, dissect, divulge, Horrors, bells, instruments and lush melodies. Girlhood smells of iron, hot animals, heaving, Converging, pin ****** the sharp alacrity of Knowing. Eyes are wet, armpits go black , round edges Protrude into a potbelly, grow and stagnate, expand and collapse.

0

Jul 9, 2021

Jul 9, 2021 at 3:06 PM UTC

The soft edges of femininity

The soft edges of femininity, Round, ******* complements, Heels, ***** of the feet, sockets, Soft eyes, soft hearts, soft hands Tinkering, thanking, crossing, legs. Girlhood is enclosed in a silver box With mute pastels and a heavy soundtrack of strings, Strings which bifurcate, dissect, divulge, Horrors, bells, instruments and lush melodies. Girlhood smells of iron, hot animals, heaving, Converging, pin ****** the sharp alacrity of Knowing. Eyes are wet, armpits go black , round edges Protrude into a potbelly, grow and stagnate, expand and collapse.

14

You are the wheat, you are the marrow. You are wholesome and life-giving, where the disease takes hold and lays waste. You are dizzy like a wildfire, cut loose and vengeful. You have arson on your mind and crime on your bloodied lips. You speak in a contrived directness which is apparently an act. People find you sick when they love you. I wear socks around you and I am callous. You invoke the terror, beget the night sweats. I grow my teeth for you and clamp down on the nearest artery I can find. You think about French ideas and German systems. You meditate without much meaning. I don’t recognize your face when I see it. Yours is a disembodied voice which haunts me all the way to my echo chamber so that I may never be free from the resonance of it.

0

Jun 16, 2021

Jun 16, 2021 at 2:43 PM UTC

II

You are the wheat, you are the marrow. You are wholesome and life-giving, where the disease takes hold and lays waste. You are dizzy like a wildfire, cut loose and vengeful. You have arson on your mind and crime on your bloodied lips. You speak in a contrived directness which is apparently an act. People find you sick when they love you. I wear socks around you and I am callous. You invoke the terror, beget the night sweats. I grow my teeth for you and clamp down on the nearest artery I can find. You think about French ideas and German systems. You meditate without much meaning. I don’t recognize your face when I see it. Yours is a disembodied voice which haunts me all the way to my echo chamber so that I may never be free from the resonance of it.

1

The world is at a dizzying standstill. All I can do is eat and clip my fingernails, while I grow and stagnate, expand and collapse, exerting energy in vain to bring the air into my lungs and grow eyelashes, then pluck them off with heat. I have detritus, waste, bycatch, excess, growing and detaching, living and dying. I am a Monotony, a repetition of ****** functions which persist blindly, in spite of my sinking heart and my fleeting mind. I am dense with lint, heavy with lungs. I stand upright with my bones and gawk at the pallor which has overtaken my gaunt and plump adult face.

0

Jun 16, 2021

Jun 16, 2021 at 2:42 PM UTC

MOTION PICTURE standstill

The world is at a dizzying standstill. All I can do is eat and clip my fingernails, while I grow and stagnate, expand and collapse, exerting energy in vain to bring the air into my lungs and grow eyelashes, then pluck them off with heat. I have detritus, waste, bycatch, excess, growing and detaching, living and dying. I am a Monotony, a repetition of ****** functions which persist blindly, in spite of my sinking heart and my fleeting mind. I am dense with lint, heavy with lungs. I stand upright with my bones and gawk at the pallor which has overtaken my gaunt and plump adult face.

1

my breath smells the same as my sister's. not our explicitly clean breath, nor our post-meal breath, but the natural essence that diffuses from within that cavity. our parents were the same so the germs- the bacteria that populate our orifices must be related too. twin tongues, the same undulating monuments of calcium and cavity.

0

Apr 18, 2021

Apr 18, 2021 at 2:20 PM UTC

breath

my breath smells the same as my sister's. not our explicitly clean breath, nor our post-meal breath, but the natural essence that diffuses from within that cavity. our parents were the same so the germs- the bacteria that populate our orifices must be related too. twin tongues, the same undulating monuments of calcium and cavity.

7

What can I say of a father Who was too ill to notice my birth? Whose gentle nature at once endeared him to me and caused me the greatest pain of my whole life. And Dad, when I went to wake you all those mornings in vain, Did you notice the fear behind my squeaking laughter? Or the sound of my retreat? Did your love for me grow when I sketched your sky And folded the laundry while you were away? I think of the slow droning burn of the days, How my life was a struggle for power, a struggle for words. I waged war at seven. There had to be violence and noise and ruin, For the tumult that surrounded me never ceased And had never before been produced By my own small body, Though I believed I was the perpetrator all along. Our finest chinas grew fewer as I grew older, And the laziness of my household grew too. Gnats swarmed our remaining plastic bowls As the rooms expanded both in fullness and in void. A lack. A lack of mom. Dad away in the shed, tinkering. Sometimes, Dad, your face took on a look of health. A health whose glow radiated unto me, your satellite. And in those moments of brightness, i believed in god, In everything, in your capacity, in your love, your promises, In my own beauty. I brought you my words and lavished upon you my art, my books, My trinkets of artistic arrangement. I showed you the house of my creation where there were girls With blue shoes and there was peace within the six pink rooms. The moon learns in time that there are passing phases And that the constancy of the sun’s luminosity is illusory. But i was too young to know of ancient cycles, And in my beating heart it was unlove and there was no trace of hope when you turned face And eclipsed me.

0

Mar 21, 2021

Mar 21, 2021 at 3:45 AM UTC

Dad

What can I say of a father Who was too ill to notice my birth? Whose gentle nature at once endeared him to me and caused me the greatest pain of my whole life. And Dad, when I went to wake you all those mornings in vain, Did you notice the fear behind my squeaking laughter? Or the sound of my retreat? Did your love for me grow when I sketched your sky And folded the laundry while you were away? I think of the slow droning burn of the days, How my life was a struggle for power, a struggle for words. I waged war at seven. There had to be violence and noise and ruin, For the tumult that surrounded me never ceased And had never before been produced By my own small body, Though I believed I was the perpetrator all along. Our finest chinas grew fewer as I grew older, And the laziness of my household grew too. Gnats swarmed our remaining plastic bowls As the rooms expanded both in fullness and in void. A lack. A lack of mom. Dad away in the shed, tinkering. Sometimes, Dad, your face took on a look of health. A health whose glow radiated unto me, your satellite. And in those moments of brightness, i believed in god, In everything, in your capacity, in your love, your promises, In my own beauty. I brought you my words and lavished upon you my art, my books, My trinkets of artistic arrangement. I showed you the house of my creation where there were girls With blue shoes and there was peace within the six pink rooms. The moon learns in time that there are passing phases And that the constancy of the sun’s luminosity is illusory. But i was too young to know of ancient cycles, And in my beating heart it was unlove and there was no trace of hope when you turned face And eclipsed me.

37

I am afraid of the stench of death, Rigor mortis, The sound of my own heartbeat. I am afraid of things that breathe Things that can see me, and things that can be heard. The roughness of my knuckles, The warmth of my own neck, And the movement of aimless leaves. I am afraid of the howl a car makes as it starts, The pitch of a human voice, What is hidden beneath a lampshade, And the sound of fake grass beneath my shoes. There is no solace from turbidity Nor respite from that booming entropy. Leaves are always turning, corpses always rotting, Dishes left unclean and toenails that go unclipped. There are turgid limbs and dying calves, Budding flowers that twist senselessly Toward the sun. There is the mist that infects the air And the suited men who come to **** it. Asbestos, saccharine frosting, ugly babies and an unending parade of horrors which present themselves in my dreams or in busy shopping malls. So i clutch my heart, wear my seatbelt lock my doors, count the unending corners, mark the burgeoning rooms in a hallway, wash my hands twice with soap, and pray to a baleful god for my immortal soul and supple skin.

0

Feb 26, 2021

Feb 26, 2021 at 2:27 AM UTC

Bloated Fears

I am afraid of the stench of death, Rigor mortis, The sound of my own heartbeat. I am afraid of things that breathe Things that can see me, and things that can be heard. The roughness of my knuckles, The warmth of my own neck, And the movement of aimless leaves. I am afraid of the howl a car makes as it starts, The pitch of a human voice, What is hidden beneath a lampshade, And the sound of fake grass beneath my shoes. There is no solace from turbidity Nor respite from that booming entropy. Leaves are always turning, corpses always rotting, Dishes left unclean and toenails that go unclipped. There are turgid limbs and dying calves, Budding flowers that twist senselessly Toward the sun. There is the mist that infects the air And the suited men who come to **** it. Asbestos, saccharine frosting, ugly babies and an unending parade of horrors which present themselves in my dreams or in busy shopping malls. So i clutch my heart, wear my seatbelt lock my doors, count the unending corners, mark the burgeoning rooms in a hallway, wash my hands twice with soap, and pray to a baleful god for my immortal soul and supple skin.

29

I’m afraid of entropy. A thing so fearsome, it can only be alluded to with the letter S. It is haunting; it looms silently over everything, only expressing itself materially in the mess that litters itself on the edges of highways, in a crowded mall, in a subway full of disparities, in images of landfills. Images so foul and beyond our imagination, they look almost like artful depictions. We find beauty in them, abstract them to colors and shapes and assure ourselves in the efficacy of our ideology. Chaos surrounds us, makes a necklace around the circumference of the ocean and hangs upon the necks of its oldest inhabitants. The shell of a sea turtle looks like infinity. It carries the resonance of a pool of water, an entanglement of snakes, a rat king, a mangled mess of necklaces. Unbreakable chains. Putrid and infinite. The stuff that emerged from Pandora’s box. We yearn for boxes, we want to contain our sins, our sorrows, our shame. We look for safety within four walls, in the shadows of concrete structures, in straight edges, things we can count. But silently, we despair, because we know, for all our effort, it does not suffice. Everything around us builds in complexity and in inextricability, linking the mother and child to the predator and prey, holy things become impure, ugly things become common in our collective imagination. We try to filter out the horrid symbols completely, but they linger like an albatross hung round our necks. Our spines weaken, our postures relax. We feel the humidity and the stench of garbage follow us to the countryside. Poppies lined in gunpowder and pain. ***** tinged with the scent of blood. Products spring forth from the ground, but they aren’t the bounty promised by our ancestors. They are made of plastic and tin. They long to be recycled, made homogenous again, but that fearsome letter. Will always have its way.

0

Jan 31, 2021

Jan 31, 2021 at 2:53 PM UTC

S

I’m afraid of entropy. A thing so fearsome, it can only be alluded to with the letter S. It is haunting; it looms silently over everything, only expressing itself materially in the mess that litters itself on the edges of highways, in a crowded mall, in a subway full of disparities, in images of landfills. Images so foul and beyond our imagination, they look almost like artful depictions. We find beauty in them, abstract them to colors and shapes and assure ourselves in the efficacy of our ideology. Chaos surrounds us, makes a necklace around the circumference of the ocean and hangs upon the necks of its oldest inhabitants. The shell of a sea turtle looks like infinity. It carries the resonance of a pool of water, an entanglement of snakes, a rat king, a mangled mess of necklaces. Unbreakable chains. Putrid and infinite. The stuff that emerged from Pandora’s box. We yearn for boxes, we want to contain our sins, our sorrows, our shame. We look for safety within four walls, in the shadows of concrete structures, in straight edges, things we can count. But silently, we despair, because we know, for all our effort, it does not suffice. Everything around us builds in complexity and in inextricability, linking the mother and child to the predator and prey, holy things become impure, ugly things become common in our collective imagination. We try to filter out the horrid symbols completely, but they linger like an albatross hung round our necks. Our spines weaken, our postures relax. We feel the humidity and the stench of garbage follow us to the countryside. Poppies lined in gunpowder and pain. ***** tinged with the scent of blood. Products spring forth from the ground, but they aren’t the bounty promised by our ancestors. They are made of plastic and tin. They long to be recycled, made homogenous again, but that fearsome letter. Will always have its way.

1

A girl is but a girl. Her skin is gilded with Truth Her truth is covered in lustrous things Like makeup, purity, and the Way of being Chaste. A girl is but a girl. The frivol of her day-to-day Is the fascination of none who admire her. She isn’t real, but a phantasm of Their charitable Imagination. A girl exists in Relation to other things. These things are truer, in form and in function, They may occupy the same space in the same fashion, but One has the mercy of inanimacy while the other is a lacy white lampshade.

0

Jan 25, 2021

Jan 25, 2021 at 3:39 AM UTC

Girl

A girl is but a girl. Her skin is gilded with Truth Her truth is covered in lustrous things Like makeup, purity, and the Way of being Chaste. A girl is but a girl. The frivol of her day-to-day Is the fascination of none who admire her. She isn’t real, but a phantasm of Their charitable Imagination. A girl exists in Relation to other things. These things are truer, in form and in function, They may occupy the same space in the same fashion, but One has the mercy of inanimacy while the other is a lacy white lampshade.

14