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 Jan 2016
Craig Verlin
My father used to call them
stitches in the ground.
He said they were
just like mine,
only bigger.

Big metal tacks of red-iron,
breaking through the brush
on planks of driftwood,
placed methodically
by his grandfather—
a patriarch I will never meet.

Miles of them,
pacing the landscape,
allowing direction for us to walk.
I asked how the ground
cut itself so bad.
He said it was an accident
just like mine,
only bigger.

I imagined an old man
drubbing stretches of metal
between wood and dirt;
green earth-blood stemmed
by scarred, titian hues.

My father used to call them
stitches in the ground.
He said it after I cut my arm open
so I could feel better about it.

My son is in the hospital
with new stitches.
My father is dead—
a patriarch he will never meet.
The tracks sit stolid
and indifferent;
red and brown between the
buried remnants of timber
stifling the undergrowth.
 Jan 2016
Bianca Reyes
I bury my face in the pillow
While the pillow smothers my dreams
And my dreams devour my heart
But none of this can be seen
When it's covered by my sheets
Shared on Hello Poetry on January 20, 2016. Copywrite under Bianca Reyes.
 Jan 2016
ryn
I was once a shape...
Equally jointed,
at four opposite points.

I was a square...
I never knew the way of the world.
Never open to new experiences,
even when they presented themselves bare...
Even when the shrouds of uncertainty
were wiped away leaving the future unfurled.

I grew up...
Huddled under the roof set above me,
with four walls that kept me safe and sheltered.
That was the entire universe.
That was all I saw...
Views so narrow and uneventful...
A life so bland with the fun bits all sheared.

Never brought up to question...
Never given the time and space to think.
There was always a yardstick upon which I was measured.
The sea of expectations was vast but shallow...
So I could wade forever,
but never sink.

I was once a shape...
No one then expected me to be other than a square.
I had everything I needed,
all within the confines of imposing cordons and tapes.
But the world would constantly rap on the windows.
Peddling its fantastical ware.
It would entice with its secrets and mysteries.
Boasting the wonderful stories it'd like to share.
 Jan 2016
Aztec Warrior
Falling Man & The Mountain**

The gathering of stones grew
the higher I climbed,
I could climb no more
realizing too late
the mountain would never touch your sky.
~~~
Never meant as invasion,
just some coffee and hi.
Maybe talk some about
the Birch and Oak
down by the small stream;
or the way wild marigolds told
of their sun soaked scent;
and how long ago our youth was spent
star gazing from our grand mother’s porch.
Your’s from a small town in Italy;
mine from the country side of Pennsylvania.
~~~
While I will climb no more,
I am not sorry for the journey
as it was made honestly
like the wind, Spring touched,
as it whispers through the valley
bringing green grass and clover.

Aztec Warrior 1.15.16

NOTE: I wrote this poem after reading Nagi’s poem (“High Value”)
and Vicki’s poem (“the moss and the moon”). Both poems spoke to me and inspired this poem of introspection, since I have been chasing “skies”
and am in need of a “waning moon”... Thanks Nagi. Thanks Vicki.
Your poetry truly does inspire. So I hope I have not in any way
disrespected you or your poetry.
 Jan 2016
Makenzie Robison
A majestic beast that runs on four legs
A wolf will stand tall when a good leader comes along.
A wolf is humble
But oh so very proud
The wolf will not stand to be kicked when he is down

A poet is a person who stands on two legs
With two arms to pick up things
We are just sheep without a second thought
when  a wolf comes running up and picks us off.
What happens to that sheep no one knows

A pack is a great place to be
Yet only when the wolves all get along
Some packs don't accept a lone wolf
Others are packs mostly made from rogues, yet
Everybody looks down on wolves
But they never tell them no

A tiger and lion have performed in a circus
But have you ever seen a wolf in the circus?
No you probably haven't
For they are too prideful for that

Poets are like a pack of wolves on a hunt
The hunt that takes them through the jungle of words
They try to catch the catch of the day
"A poem"
That's the catch.
When they get back a  lone wolf is standing with a limp tail
They surround the wolf with love and admiration.
The wolf grows to be strong and proud and surrounds itself with a pack

I was once the lone wolf with a limp tail
You guys were the pack that were so strong and prideful
I stood in the middle my legs all shaking
You guys shrouded me with love and turned me into a majestic beast
With skills still untouched.
My life was fixed.
 Jan 2016
SassyJ
Wailing walls, howling fences
Encaged and blocked by barriers
All smashed, sorted in security fence
Miles of humanity and flesh torn apart
Why is it that we can’t live together?
We bleed the same coagulating blood
Lined up and humiliated in alleyways
Paths of iron bars and imprisonment
My veins wringed, intensive torment
Mentally distracted, strained by grief
Settlement, conflicts and border struggles
Governance, religious trickles of disunion
The biblical birthright verses human rights
The unsighted straining peace settlement
Shadows of the peace blueprint screams
Ongoing reconciliation, milked in small doses
Whose home is whose? Subdivided in areas
Controls of disillusionment undisclosed
Unmanned checkpoints evokes fears
Revolving cameras tossed and turned
Bansky slogan “make hummus not war”
Smashes freedom to uproot  and merge
Constitute and construct peaceful resorts
All horns blowing to collapse duality
Passing through the Palestine-Israel controlled areas hit me really hard. Walls so high evoking fear. More so, lining up for few hours was draining, as got cleared to end up again on the Palestine area . This time the queue was longer than before. Another traveller got very upset and passed the line. The locals were complaining asking me to "speak to your friend" but she would not listen and passed the queue. I had decided to line up again and this made me become more empathetic about people who have to undergo such security checks on regular basis.
 Dec 2015
Craig Verlin
You can follow
the path back
into the woods,
walking
over loose rocks
and balsam firs.
Fallen leaves, thick
with the night’s rain,
line the old
hunting path.
Keeping eyes on
the brush, you might
be lucky enough to
see hint of a deer,
hear the snap
of twigs
away in the dimness—
Not much today,
however.
Not much
but the rocks
and the rain
and the far
off lull of
rustling water
forever over
the riverbed.
 Dec 2015
Tara Marie
Strange feelings swim inside me,
confusing and alert.
Prodding me to make a move;
assume, affirm, assert.

Yet these tones only arise
within the realm of me.
I'm building solid structures
from only misery.

Misery imagined
Misery, elusive
Why do I question everything
being inconclusive  

Like happiness backfiring
scrutinizing itself
to pick apart perfection
and pity all the wealth

To find a problem buried
where graves have not been laid
and ravish in the thinking
I should be getting paid

I'll sit and whisper to myself
I should be getting more
of everything completely
as if love is but a chore

He tells me things I know.
The things my heart is saying.
Why does the mind escape the heart
all certainty decaying?

But he is right
and I am wrong
I love all of this man.
Expectation kills livelihood
He does everything he can

Overthinking hurts
when none of it is true.
We cannot build reality,
fake disappointment--brewed.

So holding hands with him
and I love you's ARE enough.
The feeling IS the knowing.
Uncertain, true and tough.
 Dec 2015
Craig Verlin
All alone tonight;
everyone everywhere else.
"Good riddance!" I spit,
"what use are they all anyway?"
It seems there isn't much use
for anyone at all, but that's alright,
that's alright,
nothing to get worked up about.
Instead just lay here,
try to enjoy the rarity of each moment,
passing by as faces on a train.
Do you remember Paris?
That was nice,
remember?
All of those pretty people
with their pretty words.
No one needs company when
you've got that.
You don't need company so long
as you have Paris.
It makes it alright to be alone.
But even now, it seems
the color is all drained
from the frame.
What was it she said?
I can't seem to remember
her face except in the photographs.
"Good riddance!" I spit,
"what use is it all anyway?"
And it seems there isn't much
use for anything anymore,
but that's alright,
that's alright.
 Dec 2015
Bunhead17
You see things,
you keep quiet about them
and you understand.
Because life changes, friends leave
and life doesn't stop for anybody.

You feel more deeply, isolated
your true heart, so understated
but things you see
as they flicker by
keep that strong resolution within held high.


Pain & suffering are always
inevitable for a large
intelligence and a deep heart.

Time stands still
as life takes your photo
feeling outcasted like Quasimodo.
Life is but a tapestry
one part you and another, me.


You are confined by the
walls you build yourself.

*But never limited to your imagination and desire
Copyright 2015
Inspired by (movie),''The perks of being a wallflower''.
 Dec 2015
Craig Verlin
The eyes glowed as she nodded
into the apartment. She’s been out.
She comes and she goes
as Prufrock once lamented;
all of that banal nonsense.
She always has things to do,
she only stays the nights,
worn out and turned on.
She begs it all from me,
the self, the mind...
It is all I can to simply
bend the knee.
I concede as man has
conceded since the first in Eden.

I write late into the night,
but not when her footsteps
echo up the stairs.
Not when she nods in,
eyes glowing,
lips silent and pressed tight,
legs, ears, fingertips;
all of the above moving vividly.
I have nothing to
do but sit. I have nothing to
do but wait.

She drags her mess in
with beautiful disaster
and I with eager anticipation.
The pen is mightier than the sword,
but not this.
I am not even a writer anymore
but a servant, a vassal.
She comes and is gone by morning
and the mess is left,
and the page is empty,
and the door shuts silently
but it keeps me from going back to sleep
all the same.
 Dec 2015
Dark n Beautiful
Do not pretend that you don’t like it
when we have mind ***
you sigh! and said to yourself
“I just don’t get it..
That was so awesome, so real
Who need them?
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