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Nolan Willett Apr 2019
I want to live in an age of letters
Of horse-carriages and cobbled roads
Maybe I glorify the past too much
But nowadays it seems we’re always in a rush
Nolan Willett Jun 2019
Maybe I went a hair too far
And maybe should have cared a little more
Maybe I said some things I shouldn't,
But you said you loved me for my candor
I was never one to apologize
And I hate that about myself
But even so I’ll never call you back
Or collect my things from your shelf.
Just know I’ll not forget
The time we spent together apart
Talking about poetry silently
And bashing modern art.
Did you see the signs?
That I valued time most when I spent it alone?
That I love that Keats quote,
“The poet has no identity of his own.”?
For even this is a manufactured feeling
I tell a lot of lies
I never had a loved one
And I live a lot of lives.
What do you want to hear today?
Nolan Willett Oct 2019
Your typical conceited bore,
Forgot what they’re searching for,
Everything becomes a chore,
Others’ pains don’t register anymore
Can’t resonate anymore
Can’t be held accountable anymore
Cause you can’t even see the shore
Anymore
Lock and bolt the door,
Pass out on the floor,
To dream of things which you adore
A mental sub-conscious war.
Nolan Willett Mar 2020
To sleep again,
To seek the dreams
Left behind
When intruded by the real
And inhospitable
Nolan Willett Jan 2021
Raw and uninhibited
Passion is unlimited
Lethargy’s been,
redistributed
If you’re a rebel without a cause
Than I’m a dreamer with some to spare
Our entropic revelry we’ll share
To make the world fair
Burn it down
Without a care
Put them on the ground
Smug when caught,
No longer when shot
A ringing, melodious sound;
Wall Street,
on its back feet,
Tumbling down
Avarice assailed,
No other options when
Democracy’s failed
And either side, is on their own side
And neither dissent abide,
They can’t break free
Of their lust for currency
So when mere anarchy is loosed upon the world
We’ll just love to watch it all unfurl
Nolan Willett Oct 2019
Do not worry;
They are footnotes in our biographies
Nolan Willett Oct 2020
Take a breath, we are free,
Shut our eyes, and now we see,
Forget what’s right, forget what’s wrong,
And now we dance, to an inaudible song
Nolan Willett Apr 2020
I haven’t been myself lately,
And by lately I mean about 6 or 7 years.
Nolan Willett Nov 2020
Just one, red rose,
Red lips, cute nose,
A smile, bright eyes,
An hour, time flies,
Dancing, the rain,
Car drive, fast lane,
Forget, the time,
Useless, bad rhymes,
A drink, or two-
No, never that few-
The future, the past,
The outcasts, outlast.
Nolan Willett Jan 2021
This is where our course had led:
On your bed,
In my head,
Your errant thoughts were read:
Why is it we so dread
Joining ranks with deathless dead
When they their mortal cares have fled?:
These thoughts you gave to me unsaid
As our blood was shed
Beautiful, crimson red:
To new horizons tread
Nolan Willett Apr 2020
If we can never sail the ocean
We’ll still dream of the sea;
all have their own notion,
Of what it means to be free.
Nolan Willett Jun 2019
Maybe it’s me who’s changed,
And I dread to sound
Old,
Or pretentious,
Or out of touch,
Or Like I’m trying to sound like something
I’m not,
But the world seems a bit more superficial
That’s it used to be
Nolan Willett Aug 2023
headed west
different from the rest
left behind
things on my mind
dreams to pursue
though I suppose so do you
Nolan Willett Jun 2019
You think ‘cause I’m not saying anything,
I haven’t anything to say?
You’re an idiot.
Nolan Willett Feb 2024
Try your best
To remain unfazed
The world will test
You, leave you dazed
But you don’t have to change
In order to be free
Compromise or rearrange,
Who you want to be
Wear your heart on your sleeve
And embrace the pain
Dream a dream, make-believe,
And cast away disdain
Nolan Willett Apr 2024
Patiently waiting
There, in the next world, where you
See all coming things.
Nolan Willett May 2020
How terribly dull it must be
Relating exclusively with fact
Where everything is a known quantity,
Is your sense of wonder even intact?
Or did you leave that behind too,
With everything interesting about you?
Nolan Willett Jan 2024
There’s a secret path to walk
A language that nobody talks
A different world to see
Another way to be
Irrefutably
Nolan Willett Oct 2019
I want to have poet friends
Where we sit in coffee shops
Caffeine and idea high
Until we find our flow
Laugh and cry
Bring each other low
So we can fly back high
And we can’t pay our rent
And we are disappointments
But in those little moments
We are finally something to be jealous of
A clandestine union of talkers!
Nolan Willett Sep 2022
Hollowed out dreams
Cracking at their seams
Still grasping for the star
Which never seemed so far
Still searching for that fire
That shields from all that’s dire
The cathartic placation
When you satisfy inspiration
The iridescent heat
That comes when lovers meet
It must be real obscene
To be this routine
To stretch that errant prime
Into a lifetime
Nolan Willett Feb 2022
Do not lose sight now
When you’re far enough ahead
It seems you’re behind
Nolan Willett Jul 2023
I’d like to be free
I’d like to be a dove
Fly from my tree
And believe in love

I’d like to see a God
I’d like to be like the rest
Not be so odd
I’d like to be the best

I’d like to want life
I’d like to write prose
See the end of strife
I’d like to know repose

I’d like to follow through
I’d like to wave goodbye
Maybe start anew
With a different kind of I
Nolan Willett May 2024
There’s still places, I’d like to see,
People I’d still really like to
be,

A hundredth chance; in theory,
I really love
humanity,

But there’s a voice, in my head,
And it says everyone wants you
dead,

It doesn’t matter, where you have
been,
Nobody gets to go home
again,

So what’s the point, no one will
tell,
They’d rather see you live in
hell
Nolan Willett Nov 2019
Ah, the Spiritus Mundi,
The culmination of what I have searched for,
Finally you unveil yourself to me,
And it is all worth it.
In my dreams,
The world has gone to waste,
Everyone has gone sane,
And I am the one again left behind:
No different from reality.
I no longer care for structure or for rhyme,
Or if my words mean anything to anyone
But me,
For I am finally free,
From what seems an eternity,
Of torment by confusion,
A sentence from a past life,
If you believe that sort of thing.
Like the modernists of the past,
Stream of consciousness,
I am disillusioned, and
Yes, my vision is assisted
By drink, and by drug,
A revelation unplanned,
But not unwelcome.
I can only hope my rhyme
Scheme and my structure
Parallels the nonsense
That I am seeing,
And that it makes sense to some kindred spirit
Somewhere,
And I love them.
I will not hide how I feel for your reposts
Nolan Willett Nov 2019
Bile risen,
Unbidden,
To my throat.
Liquid crimson,
Of my own volition,
Reminds me I’m still human.
In spite of what I’ve wrote,
I crumble up the note.
Crimson liquid spite note human suicide blood
Nolan Willett May 26
Like a shadow upon the wall
You don’t mean nothing at all
Nolan Willett Jan 2020
Cast out your hate
And cast out your sorrow
No matter how bleak
There’s always tomorrow
Nolan Willett Jun 2019
20 something year olds should be writing about how in love they are,
Or about how they’ve come so far
Or the beauty of a day,
How green the grass is in May.
Not about our collective disappointment,
Our detestable confinement,
Trying to find a culprit,
For a hostile employment market.
Celebrating illness and anxiety,
Losing hold of sanity,
From feeling superfluous.
God, who failed us?
Nolan Willett Nov 2024
Playing nice, my favorite vice,
Don’t think twice, roll the dice,
This high price, will it suffice
To see a slice of paradise?
Nolan Willett Oct 2019
The weight of the universe,
But I’ve never had such strong arms
Seems to me a bit perverse
Deliver the sleeping to life and then immerse
Them in hostility and harm,
But for a few consolations
We would refuse to bear it
Preferring the cessation
And subsequent damnation,
And misery outwit.
But that imperfect face,
And the words it leaves spoken
Gifts me trust in the human race,
A suit of armor encased,
Until my faith can again be broken.
Nolan Willett Sep 2020
There’ll be another day
When the night is through
A time to get away
A chance to start anew

There will be another year
When the year ends
A chance to reappear
A chance to make amends

And when the world is dust
Swallowed by the sun
Apathetic atoms will not fuss
Over the fact that we are gone

‘Cause one day the Universe will die
And Everything will become undone
But human experience imply
There’ll be another one
Nolan Willett Oct 2021
I haven’t the strength
To be the change I’d like to see
I have only just enough
To simply just be me
These shoulders were not made to bear
All the burdens of the earth
Only room for my own trials
Ordained from my birth
It might be selfish
But it has to be this way
Otherwise I’d crumble
Or else be spirited away
Nolan Willett Feb 2022
Ambivalence towards higher station
You have enough apportioned
And your only aspiration’s
To be a full-fledged person
Nolan Willett May 2019
All was given to
Me and I threw it away
To spite existence
Nolan Willett Feb 2024
Untold times reaching
Out with grasping fingertips
But invisible
Nolan Willett Nov 2020
When you've come so far
And you're still not who you are
That's the hardest part
Nolan Willett May 2024
Take this pain, as a token
To trust the heart, is to be broken
The mind alone, sets you in motion
Nolan Willett Oct 2020
Broken seven seals
You will never know what’s real
Spurning the surreal
Nolan Willett Oct 2024
If we could not hate
We would be left with despair;
now, how would that be fair?
Nolan Willett Apr 2022
How far must the honey bee roam
To find an elusive flower,
And return to his honeycomb?

How long must a tumbling stone
Through a lonely landscape scour,
To realize its conclusive home?

How many do their fate bemoan,
Amidst the dark and latent hours,
Staining tears upon their cheekbones?

How do those, resting on their thrones,
Convince all of their own power,
And feign to know all that which is known?

Do we have power all our own?
Our own reasons to scour?
How far ahead is our fate sewn?

Do we let ourselves be enthroned,
To be a humble wallflower?
Or do we let ourselves be flown,
Into a troublesome unknown?
Nolan Willett Nov 2020
When others look into my eyes
They see a thing to despise
I do not know what they see,
I wish they would just see me
Nolan Willett Jan 2020
Watch what you say,
They imprison seers here
Nolan Willett Apr 2024
Feeling warm again:
Clouds, making way for fresh light;
wheels will turn themselves
Nolan Willett Jul 2021
Everything that you do,
Seems so wonderfully new;
It’s so obviously true,
That your kind is but a few.
Nolan Willett Mar 2020
Welcome to isolation,
We hope you enjoy your stay.
Our rooms have no windows
And the WiFi password is decay,
So you don’t have to use data
While avoiding your acrimony,
And you can talk to people from far away,
So you have no excuse to be lonely.
Just relax; it’s just a little illness,
Do not suppose or apperceive.
It’s a fad that’ll end soon,
And at least YOU will get to leave.
Nolan Willett Jan 2021
There’s a selflessness
To selfishness
Only by taking care of yourself
Can you begin to take of others
Nolan Willett Jan 2024
Why, simply because,
I hardly need a reason
To do anything.
Nolan Willett Aug 2023
Heir to a line of poets and stoics
and know-its
Who stoop to assuage
Within cold margins of a page,
Shameless praises take
Grandiose claims
they’ll make
Til 8 lines of nonsense remains
Nolan Willett Nov 2019
Emaciated  eremite,
Elegiac eccentric,
You are seen,
Though not entirely keen
On being so;
Unfortunate that those who wish to hide
Cannot turn invisible,
And that those who are so rare,
Are prone to such despair,
That one capable enough to scry
Cannot yet hide themself from one blind as I:
Nevermind;
Your true self you will find.
Nolan Willett Apr 2019
Show the world you’re happy and revel in its enmity
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