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 Sep 2016
anonymous999
i am 18 years old and i've kissed 17 boys. i've passed 16 classes, and cried at school 15 times. sophomore year i missed 14 days of school. i've figured out 13 ways to say "i didn't do my homework," and i am halfway through the 12th grade. my longest relationship lasted 11 months. i once left a picture up for 10 minutes, and received 9 comments about how unacceptable my shirt was. i have gone through 8 best friends and 7 phones. i've gotten lost on the road 6 times and i have 5 friends i plan to keep in touch with for the rest of my life. at my first job, i made $4 an hour. i've fallen in love 3 times, i've seen two therapists and i'm still holding on to this one thought that everything is going to be okay.
everything is going to be okay.
 Sep 2016
b e mccomb
eyeshadow ground into
a finely powdered bath rug
feet stained gold and as
straight as sink ringed coffee

(it's a perfect day
to run away
from all the crew neck
collars choking you)


fall face down into a
cornfield and climb
dead pine trees clear
up to the blackbirds

(i think you were once
upon a time the one who
never spent weekends
home and hurting)


i am not your past
not your mistakes
i am not who you used to be
but won't say it didn't shape me

(clattering red and
white checks skittering
across the floor as
hydrogenated oils)


i know you're
disappointed
sometimes in who
i've turned out to be

but i am also
disappointed
sometimes in who
i've turned out to be

(only ever thinking about
ceiling fans and my latest
mistakes or an odd assortment
of unspoken disagreements)


i can't breathe under
highway overpasses
in parking garages or when
my hands are made of leather.

(suburbia is just a
repainted mid-century
modern way of covering
up dysfunctional families)


here and there
then and again
i remember that you
probably don't love me anymore

i understand that
neglect destroyed you
but you don't understand
that involvement destroyed me.
Copyright 8/19/16 by B. E. McComb
 Sep 2016
spysgrandson
you were born in Denver
during a white out blizzard

like all round babes,
you had no clue, what was in store for you
you couldn't have known...

you would be
the last nickel to ***** through
a five-cent coin phone box,
in El Paso, Texas

or that you would sleep
for a year in a piggy bank,
of a boy named Felipe, who would die
of white blood cancer, before
he could spend you

and who would have thought
you would be in the linty pocket
of a serial murderer named Ray, when
he was captured in Santa Fe, a sunny day
on the ancient square, stalking
his next victim

a jailer used you that very night
with a twin of yours he found in
another picked pocket, of a drunk drifter,
to buy a Hershey's bar, from a machine
that would have taken a dime as well

your face began to show the fingered
signs of age by the time the choppers found sky  
above the Saigon Embassy, where you had spent
an aching April night in the Ambassador's pants

when you turned a half century, you were tossed
into a gallon jug, e pluribus unum, no more special
than others a third your vintage

I finally met you today, only because chance landed you on
the top of the heap, waiting to be saved from further folly
 Sep 2016
Alessander
I like dancing and drinking, sometimes fighting and *******, and not necessarily in that order.

Life isn't an equation. It's not a folded napkin, windexed decanter or applebees' reservation.

Sing, smoke, scream. When you laugh, let it boom. Howl at imaginary moons.

Roar to life
 Sep 2016
b e mccomb
a panic attack
in a parking garage
and an elevator
to escape

(a closed box moving
rapidly downwards is
not an especially
relaxing means of escape)


a summer of brief
digital inhalations
watermelon candies
sticking to teeth

(there's nothing like
rainy cities at night
to hurt your eyes and
make you dead inside)


cold feet somebody
has got cold feet by
the air conditioner
phone in hand

come to think of it
i never really asked
for love just expected
somebody would supply

i see everything
reflections and spray
painted numbers and
multiple ellipses too many

(i say nothing
let all the images and
thoughts collide so you
think i see nothing at all)


i'm afraid and my
hands won't stop
shaking so i'm never
going outside again.
Copyright 8/13/16 by B. E. McComb
 Sep 2016
Stephan


A bloom is not forgotten for its fragrance lingers on
Captured in the morning dew that plays upon the lawn
Delicate the petals when no longer we do find
Still its beauty follows us forever in our mind

The melodies of nightingales within the trees do sing
Until the time they wander off, the wind beneath their wings
When off into the distance finds these birds no longer near
Still their song it plays its tune that we shall always hear

On the beach we build a castle very tall and fine
Made of tiny grains of sand this summer day we find
And even when the tide does wash away our grand surprise
Still we find the magic it did play upon our eyes

When the sun is setting out along the western shore
The warmth upon our skin we felt, we come to want once more
Now as the darkness falls and this new day does turn to night
Still we can remember that the sun was shining bright

As we turn the pages in the brand new book we read
Every new found place into our minds we slowly feed
Coming to the last page and “The End” the words do say
Still we find the story it shall never go away

A bloom is not forgotten for its fragrance lingers on
Captured in the morning dew that plays upon the lawn
But like its beauty this I see when you come into view
I can’t forget a blossom that’s as perfect as are you
 Aug 2016
Elioinai
Love explodes like little paint tubes
pressurized inside my heart
color shoots
and streaks
across all these walls and chambers
dripping down through all my veins
a rainbow stretched from chest to feet
 Aug 2016
Stephan
.

Tending to my fruit stand,
another lonely day
Hoping for a customer
to happen ‘long the way

When then I saw approaching
a funny colored van
It pulled off on the shoulder,
I wondered of its plan

The back doors slowly opened
and there before my eyes
Stood a gorgeous woman
beneath these sunny skies

Her eyes were soft and sable
with hair a darker hue
She smiled and said hello to me
I said, “How do you do?”

She stood before my table,
I couldn’t help but stare
First she touched an apple,
then she touched a pear

Suddenly she shouted,
for now her hand did reach
Excitedly she questioned
“Please may I have a peach?”

All I could do was stutter,
as I could barely breathe
She took a bite and then exclaimed
“The sweetest I believe”

Then she grabbed a couple,
and walking to her van
Sat upon the rear end sill,
then patted with her hand

I stumbled there to join her,
she handed one to me
“I just adore your peaches”
“Yes ma’am, that I can see”

I sat there with her eating
and maybe I am dumb
But juice was dripping from her lip,
I brushed it with my thumb

This seemed to make her happy,
her beauty such a view
Then I could not believe my ears,
She asked, “Can I kiss you?”

Well, forget what I said earlier
the “dumb” part wasn’t right
I pressed my lips against hers
and held them there real tight

They were sweet and sticky,
delicious like the fruit
Then we separated,
she grinned and said, “You’re cute”

“I really think I love you
and will forever true”

I felt my heart just skip a beat,
“Yes ma’am, I love you too”

“I just adore your peaches,
they’re the best in all the land”

We kissed again, this time good bye,
she climbed into her van

I watched as she departed,
standing on the curb
Thinking of her kisses
and the last thing that I heard

Then felt kind of lousy
this pristine summer day
Not for what had happened,
but what I did not say

I didn’t have the heart to tell
this woman of my dreams
The fruits this day that she enjoyed
were really nectarines
 Aug 2016
b e mccomb
it wasn't until years too late
that the oceans once painting
your skin into a weepy
vacation canvas finally
dried and made their salty
descent down your throat.

i hope that one day
you find your mind wandering
back to some sunbleached
air conditioned antique shop
a cool and dim refuge of
kitschy proportions

and i hope one day you can finally
appreciate an afternoon that
may or may not have held
your greenesque day of peace

(by greenesque i mean that
not only was it green but
it also held whispers of the last
chapter in your favorite book
the part where all the pieces fall in place
and nobody is happy with the outcome)


you're just a bundle of
nerves and memories
the kind that keep you up at night
and your hair uneven lengths
the kind that flash before your eyes
through grainy old photographs
and pictures engraved so deep
inside a screen you question
whether or not they
ever even happened.

there are gravel roads
somewhere out there
that smell like home and
kind cold water in a july drought

and i sincerely hope
that you someday find
one of those state-parkish
leafy hollow spring hills
settled deep somewhere
inside your heart

and i hope that someday
you drive all alone for an hour
park on the side of the road and
watch the woods for no reason
except to listen to every love song you
ever knew in your youth
and i hope that your breathing stays steady
and your eyes stay dry and starkissed.

i would cross my fingers
shut my eyes and tie my
esophagus in a knot if i knew
my wishes could grant you peace

and i hope that when you're older
your beachside sunburns and
deep fried fatigue are washed away
by all the seasons of upstate mountain air.
Copyright 7/22/16 by B. E. McComb
 Aug 2016
b e mccomb
i had a houseful
of old friends
milling around
a lakeside town

their summer was
my half of a winter
and they spoke things
that i believed in
but had absolutely
no reason to say.

they were
alive to me
more alive
than anything else.

i don't know where
they went
trapped somewhere
inside a screen
buried alive under
my own problems

are they still
sleeping
in a graveyard?

or is she in jail
and is he seeing
someone else?

they were my
friends
just pieces of
fiction

and i'm hoping
that somewhere
inside me he's still
strumming a
ukulele and she's
standing on the side
of a waterfall and
looking down
i hope they're
alive and well

(knowing them
he's probably
sad but fine and
she's probably
just as crazy as
when i left her.)

but i don't know
i can't promise anything

i lost them
and i lost who
i was when i was
with them.

take me back
a year
take me
ridgeside

i can only promise
one thing

that i haven't
forgotten you.
Copyright 7/31/16 by B. E. McComb
 Aug 2016
mikecccc
I went there
for justice
silly me
all I found was clowns
and A Ferris wheel.
A simple misunderstanding
 Aug 2016
N
Lady made out
of magic and mayhem
bottled along with stars
and flowers
and hurricanes
and volcanoes

A brutally lovely poetry

A work of art--
not post-modern but
pre-apocalyptic

and
if he lays his eyes on you
even Narcissus
will launch
his ship
---
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJkItLf3XqE
---
 Aug 2016
Shylah S
Do you like science? Cause I've got my ion you
we're a dance of subatomic particles, you get my cardiovascular system worked up

"Nerd," you declare with a smile sweeter than C6H12O6
I glare at you and giggle louder than 194 decibels, we break all the laws
I'm so attracted to you, scientists will have to make a 5th fundamental force

we fit together like sticky ends of DNA
I fall in love with you every time I see you, faster than my DNA replicates
being in your arms feels like homeostasis, we'll last longer than thorium

I think I'm kinda maybe trying to say
every time light reflects off of you and onto my retina the sudden protracted cardiac arrhythmia I get tells me that gulp Iloveyou
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