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Dec 2023 · 84
Untitled
Sal Gelles Dec 2023
how can silence be so loud?
i can hardly stand it, i want to put on a record and turn it all the way up.
i want to plug my guitar in and crank the amp the whole way and just play one chord.
i want to scream out, curse the day, feel the echo from my voice hit off the walls and come back to me.

i want to stop keeping everything so quiet, i want to stop saving the fights for when you feel like it, and i want you to open your ******* mouth instead of sitting quietly waiting for me to be ready to fight.
Dec 2023 · 90
Untitled
Sal Gelles Dec 2023
my kids sleep without knowing
that soon their home will be broken,
that they'll have to live in 2 houses
instead of one home.

I just hope they know someday I did the best I could.
Dec 2023 · 175
Untitled
Sal Gelles Dec 2023
my fire's burnt out
and i don't have another match.
i'll freeze, for sure.
and i can't expect you to reignite it,
since i blew yours out years ago.
but it'd be nice to at least
have you by me to watch these embers fade.
Dec 2023 · 107
Untitled
Sal Gelles Dec 2023
numbing the parts that fought
to numb the parts that say it's best not
to fight.

flight, ascension and self-destruction, enough to keep icarus grounded.

another day clawing for basic needs,
basically drowning in self-doubt.
enduring self-harm for denial elsewhere.

flying again, too high again, too much. Too much.
Nov 2023 · 88
I bought my wife flowers
Sal Gelles Nov 2023
I bought my wife flowers a week after she told me about her affair
-----she promised me it wasn't anything physical, but that didn't stop me from being physically ill.
I framed a wedding picture so we'd finally have one after all these years
-----it doesn't stop the good memories being shattered by the words of her confession.
I changed my ways, started being loving again, did the dishes more
------but it wasn't time spent healing the gashes her lies cut.
I continued having passionate *** with her, trying to please her
-----even though all the messages I read told me she was never happy.
And I still try to do the best I can for her, through the pain, the death of my life before this, the silence that's now so loud in our house
-----because one day, when she leaves, I want to know I did the best I could for someone undeserving.

i hope this heals.
Mar 2020 · 136
O(PEN)
Sal Gelles Mar 2020
I'd empty every devilish idea
in a minute to fulfill your imagination,
And I'd open every crack in every corridor
so passing wasn't such a passé,
And I'd push every moment to be better than the last
and sleep soundly at night with you.

I'd pour my heart and soul into our lives
to make you happy again and see you truly smile,
And I'd hamper your days with love and beguile you again
if you'd focus on more than the bigger picture
And be ****** sentimental and loving
again.
Feb 2020 · 140
wipe yer own ass
Sal Gelles Feb 2020
it isn't some hard thing you have to do
you bunch it up in yer hands---

you can't seem to let it all flush itself out anyway,
how's me telling you anything any different any way
different than it was from last night.

you can't seem to ride out the storm on the back porch roof,
how i'd **** to lay out there, soak in the incandescents,
no different than being nowhere like we were before.

you can't seem to take the blame for anything anyway,
how i have to take the head on every thing any way
i can and it's destroying how we even talk anymore.

anyway, i hope you're happy while i'm up, drunk, tired, bored, nothing but what we could've had running through my head.  you're dead, asleep, lonesome.  just flush the **** already.
Oct 2018 · 226
Untitled
Sal Gelles Oct 2018
Emptied of empathy
I forget
Anyway
Jun 2018 · 254
Untitled
Sal Gelles Jun 2018
old scars, picked and bleeding.
a half empty bottle of whiskey,
violence in my headscape, escaping unnoticed,
and i wait for the trueness of my own emotions.

they won't come, she said.
they weren't here in the first place,
and if they were i'd throw them out
and lock the door without a second glance.

i know what's missing but i'm stubborn.
i don't let myself have as i'm a have-not,
i haven't had a chance to get out as much,
not like i really did before anyway.
Jun 2018 · 244
I SLeeP
Sal Gelles Jun 2018
I sleep in your dreams
And awaken in my own.
My own nightmares
Shrill, silent and symbolic,
Now your passage of time.
May 2018 · 216
Untitled
Sal Gelles May 2018
i won't face my own facts
and flip a coin for :yes: or :no: questions
and hope i get the opposites of what i want
so i stop being a spineless ****
and ;actually do; some self-improving that doesn't just hurt
everyone else.
May 2018 · 195
semblance
Sal Gelles May 2018
wondering if i'd done enough to keep myself happy,
this constant pursuance of happiness always just out of my grasp,
i'm still reaching and searching for something.
i want to be so much more than i am,
and i'm not sure being anymore will bring me the peace i want
so desperately, nor will it fulfill, i'm sure.
Mar 2018 · 214
cry
Sal Gelles Mar 2018
cry
pieced panel ceiling-aloof, unaligned/
broken bottle drunk neck.

loose leaning retribution-painful and stern/
paradise as senial.

enigmatic electric violense-warmer, lonelier/
painted process of elimination.

aromatic angular pilot-slim and simple/
stupid half-witted brain.

faraway friendship-slightly stable/
hopes for the future.

obediently originating psalms-studied and preferred/
crack-*** simplification.

readied and reticulated-never worried/
worn'd through and through.

satiable sanctity-calm, cool/
collecting mindfully.

angular and semiconductive-angles, man/
prospective deafness.

nuisance noose brain-heavier still/
cloud nine.

idiocy-simple/
fragmented head.

trivial temptation-fighting demons again/
old moldy records.

youth in riot-pure and satanic/
enslaved and emboldened.
Nov 2017 · 218
preservation ward
Sal Gelles Nov 2017
i'd given up enough of myself to see this may just have to be the last time.

i can sleep wholly, warm and perseverant,
cold to the touch and collected, calculated,
;ambivalent; broken to bits for second-hand consumption
;solvent; pieced to placeless points and to absorb
;coerced; begging for some unanswered sole surprise
;preserved; in warding.

I Am Whole.
Aug 2017 · 258
beatneck bob
Sal Gelles Aug 2017
irrepressible satiated purpose/followed by volcanic mental expansion
littler impression/prose out of poignancy/ambiguity and alterations
         explicative social media outrage/FAKENOOSE
   entitled generations of disenfranchisement and grandiose foresight
placeless outrage and fitful penniless homelessness/losses of hope/dreams deadened by the deafening sounds desire

                                wanting more only gave me less
                                                    for you anyway.

                 i'm sorry there wasn't enough to go around the first time.
Jun 2016 · 772
Drunk (venom)
Sal Gelles Jun 2016
poison coursing through my veins,
parting ways in my brain,
separating me from my own mind,
i flock to what’s left and she waits.

i can’t remember where she slipped in,
more so when she slid out,
and how it got to the point now
where my drink is flooding me
with anticipation.

some knowing, unknown in its right,
the idea wasn’t here just a night ago,
but now it won’t leave,
it waits, just as she does.

and once this moves into motion,
the ground will tremble.
with such force, such intensity,
and i will show her the way,
what i mean, how i pursue it myself,
as she does, as we had,
and now cannot.

i’ll show her the dead tissue,
hanging from my shoulders,
how i have to lug it around
and one day, will unload.
Mar 2016 · 444
Untitled
Sal Gelles Mar 2016
i'd rather lie around in bed and drink wine all day
than exchange moments of my life for money
but if I wasn't out there, slaving away to the system,
I'd only get to lie around under bridges; begging
for change, to end how things are in the world,
and to find serenity amongst humanity as it should be.
Jul 2015 · 591
Copernicus dies
Sal Gelles Jul 2015
My dreams are getting better
so I must be as well.
My streets getting cleaner
so the world must be too.
My ‘self’ is getting stronger
so my mind has to.
My ideas still aren’t coherent
so I don’t think I should be.
Nov 2014 · 1.1k
last stand
Sal Gelles Nov 2014
It's the worst when you have to convince yourself
that the lies you're laying on everyone else
are the right ways to justifying actions
instead of dealing with a guilty conscience
Is this where you wanna be when Jesus comes back?
Nov 2014 · 476
another daily reminder
Sal Gelles Nov 2014
I just need reminded
this isn't what I dream of
and I have to keep dreaming
through each day
and soon, the dreams
can manifest themselves
in my work, in my mind,
in my actions, and in time
I can start living them.
Nov 2014 · 464
i can't write
Sal Gelles Nov 2014
pain is pointless
and feeding into it
hurts worse than ignoring it
so I guess I can't write
to satiate your desires
in the pains of others
and instead I'll stay alive,
numb to it's existence
and also to my own.
Nov 2014 · 663
propagation proliferation
Sal Gelles Nov 2014
steadily, all grows, like the tower of Babel,
numbers and figures,
measurements and monotony,
all come falling down
and syntax is sequestered down
to simplified ideals,
and yet you overcomplicate it all.
give me liberty or give me a graph to show how bound you still are.
GET OUT THERE AND VOTE FOR PIGEONS.
Oct 2014 · 584
tidal
Sal Gelles Oct 2014
I believe the sun sided with the moon
long before man came to roam the earth,
that they did so to plunge man into darkness
as he'd grown accustom to the light,
and to bring him into the dawn
just as he'd felt comfort in the dark,

and I believe there's some celestial understanding
that no man, philosophical nor mathematical,
who could ever be able to explain it
in its proper stance, as no man
had the proper training in stars and bodies of the skies,
for they've existed longer than he.
Sal Gelles Oct 2014
MOMMY DEAREST*
sadly,
you killed everyone in your head
including the loving person i knew,
growing up with a best friend
that ended up being my mother,
and the past twelve years i watched
as you died and the heartbreak
you caused all who loved you
and by denying the help they gave you
by denying the help you needed
to accept reality the way *we
have to,
and so as you've killed us all
and isolated yourself to the point
that i'd had to write your eulogy,
for you couldn't accept your life's detachment
from everyone, ties you severed yourself,
and that me being the only one left
left me with no choice
but to bury you six feet deeper
than the demons i created on my own
because I can't take care of yours too
in the fifth circle of hell
after I've escaped purgatory senses
and discovered my freedom's as a man.
I hope they can forgive you and you can get your wings.
I'll cry harder this year watching It's A Wonderful Life alone when that bell rings.
Oct 2014 · 1.1k
atom bomb
Sal Gelles Oct 2014
we can't stop our hearts from beating,
our lungs from breathing, so why
try and stop our minds from thinking?
they can destroy us once they're
overclocked and overloaded,
over-simplifying complicated situations.
we still try to forget ourselves,
and how they're always there,
but it's inevitable, atomic,
how time moves us, but we cannot move time,
only by falsifying hands tracking
secondary measurements, little ticks
that eventually drive us mad.
not with anger, but with sadness,
time slips, and we slip with it
back to innocence, perseverance ensues,
and we soon see how time changes
without our hands in the clock.

you can take your hands off the gears now,
and keep the time set where it was,
and before you know it,
that too shall pass.
passing time without reason or rhyme.
Oct 2014 · 918
comforting collections
Sal Gelles Oct 2014
I built myself up
in comfort
and in closeness
to the idea
I wouldn't have to feel
the ways I used to.

Now I build up
collections
of books
and others' ideas
to pass times
I can't comfort myself

with the way I am now.
Time can change everything
Even the value of the change in your pocket
Sep 2014 · 585
reluctant
Sal Gelles Sep 2014
i felt the reluctance
in your movements,
in your touch,
in your hair and fingernails.

i heard reluctance
in your voice,
in your word choices,
in your subtleties and screams.

i knew, reluctantly,
that i wasn't there,
and that, reluctantly,
you were. i'm still not.
Aug 2014 · 781
portraiture
Sal Gelles Aug 2014
I don't mean to be an inconvenience
but it'd be irrepressible to be alone
and, given time to find out my own flaws,
I can rework myself, digest myself a bit,
and have a better way to present it,
even though I know you'll resent it.
Just please try not to resent me.
Sal Gelles Aug 2014
every morning's the same thing:

awaken, fight another hang over,
coffee and advil, water, coffee,
coffee, coffee, coffee, shower,
then work.  forget why i'm here,
remember who i am,
change subjects, mindsets,
did i change my underwear?
oh, i forgot about that shower.
did i change my life?
i forgot to start that, again.
Aug 2014 · 338
Untitled
Sal Gelles Aug 2014
i’ve watched my wounds heal
      as these past few days went by
   and now that i’m alright again
      i can say the scars will fade too

                someday soon.
Aug 2014 · 387
shelterforsheep
Sal Gelles Aug 2014
let me stray from this flock,
get eaten by wolves,
as you've been misled
by a sheep in wolves' clothing.
it's the only true form of justice
i can serve as now.
Aug 2014 · 370
prospection
Sal Gelles Aug 2014
one day this vessel i sail
will sink in the ground
and escape this hell

until that day, for now,
see i only do as needed
as i need to somehow
some say life on earth is hell.  
some say the weak-minded seek help.  
some say the mind is the loneliest place to dwell.
*************************************************************
nothing i say isn't something you'd try to foretell.
Aug 2014 · 441
Hallow
Sal Gelles Aug 2014
I'd be okay
to die disappointed.
That way
my hopes never held
weight
Heavy heavy heavy
Heavenly
Aug 2014 · 495
salivating poison
Sal Gelles Aug 2014
Break your jaw,
reset it before it's recessed,
then try to make your tongue
flick the right syllables
my way.
Jul 2014 · 422
alphabetically
Sal Gelles Jul 2014
i was alpha,
creating the beauty
set before my own eyes,
built with my own hands;
it was the beginning.

i fell to omega,
destroying my beauty,
not by my own hands,
but those of men in time;
it was then the end.
Jun 2014 · 532
THE END IS NIGHT
Sal Gelles Jun 2014
bleed into forever,
as forever we are sanguine souls,
situated for slaughter.
death's inevitability beating down,
and time slipping behind
the mind, awoken to something;
broken, reconfigured, alive,
it's bred to fulfill situational ideas,
bleeding into annihilation.

forever.
Jun 2014 · 797
rubbed raw
Sal Gelles Jun 2014
we've come all this way
with broken hearts,
found out, and calloused soles,
only to find out
we've all been fooled
as the deceptions of desire take hold.

we'll find no way home,
we've left it all behind,
and we're standing in no-man's-land,
battle rampant across the stars,
stuck here hand-in-hand
with less than a half-thought plan
on how to get back what we need,
where we belong, and how to seed
the minds we've toiled in to make fertile
again.
May 2014 · 611
go your own way
Sal Gelles May 2014
spread endlessly
across paradigms,
thought out of infinity;
overhead, beams stray
to enlighten.
******* 1970's ******* disco trax
May 2014 · 506
unwound quotations
Sal Gelles May 2014
separately simulated
through words; ideally
separated simultaneously.

restrung, hung, ******
far beyond recognition,
misquoted.
May 2014 · 546
sinches
Sal Gelles May 2014
evermore,
sent silently
to mindless receptors
to silence
the screaming
they resonate across
planar lifestyles
Sal Gelles May 2014
suffer and god-speed,
as you spend time, hastily,
spending life's duality,
separated justly in increments
as needed; thusly,
subjected and fermenting,
boldly going where none have gone before.
*******, spock
Apr 2014 · 340
Untitled
Sal Gelles Apr 2014
Spread your wings
my pretty little dead things
and fly from your graves.

Flee the ground you're in
and let renewed life begin
as another sould idea.

You're only restrained
by half-brained
visionary tales and ideals.

So, spread your wings,
my pretty little dead things,
and learn to fly on your own.
Apr 2014 · 891
anxious nuts (macadamia)
Sal Gelles Apr 2014
to blame this
on anyone but myself
would be a catastrophe;
shattering what's left
of humanity.
Apr 2014 · 1.5k
drunk nuts (pistachios)
Sal Gelles Apr 2014
drink, drank, drunk
into submission,
a fact; death awaits.
inevitability flows into
sanctity
at the end of a six-pack.
Apr 2014 · 1.7k
destined nuts (walnuts)
Sal Gelles Apr 2014
heavy concentration in time's
essence, foiled by delights,
intransigent by the world.
lost in paternal void
to fulfill some design
of desire, desolate.
Feb 2014 · 2.0k
control nuts (almonds)
Sal Gelles Feb 2014
driven by self glorification,
built on altruism, untrue
in every sense of self,
losing touch as you lose your mind.
Feb 2014 · 1.7k
religious nuts (cashews)
Sal Gelles Feb 2014
falsehoods spread like wildfire;
spreading like disease, consuming
every speck of hope and dreams,
leaving everyone emptied in the end.
Jan 2014 · 1.3k
Black Coffee Mondays
Sal Gelles Jan 2014
that dissident, bitter taste,
left in perfect circles,
circling keyboard and mouse,
cooking themselves down
to partisanship; put into words,
burnt bottom coasting,
blackened death enticing
as each sip brings on
another cigarette,
more anxiety,
and less objection
to the jazz spewing from my fingers.
Dec 2013 · 561
Debacle
Sal Gelles Dec 2013
There's something about reading your tongues that keep me entranced;
that I know, but you will surely deny, as denial is your self-hatred.
You'll pass the time in every day finding new ways to fulfill it,
and once you've come to another ultimate conclusion, you'll leave
all of it up to somebody else to configure.
Sal Gelles Dec 2013
bathing can’t get me clean.
what you dumped on me
won’t come off with soap,
bleach, or gasoline.  
i’m fading  out of focus,
losing sight of my self
as what you've put on me
consumes, corrodes,
and entirely consumes
what was left of self-imagery.
sure, it was never sterling,
and it certainly wasn't gold,
but I at least had faith left
in most parts of my character.

now i’m just rusting away,
and soon they’ll come to start demolition.
leave little notes to linger in the mail
leave letters unwritten to wander your mind
leave songs ringing in the halls
and leave me alone, you're gone for a reason
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