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Yenson Nov 2021
She had her stall by the corner of the dusty inroad
just four sticks square and palm fronds for roof
a cool shade from the biting sunshine
we call her Mama Leaves
because she sold bundles of leaves and large shards of banana leaves
she would wave at us as we walked by to school
and when in the afternoon we returned she would still be there
though most of the leaves would have been sold

she did a brisk trade
corn meal, cassava porridge, bean cakes and a lot more
came cooked and wrapped in fresh leaves
at the markets the butchers wrapped beef cuts in leaves
kola nuts, pounded yam and even slabs of pig fat came in leaves
and you've not lived until you eat charcoal-grilled
pork bellies with pepper sauce off a banana leaf
yes! Mama Leaves had reasons for her wide pleasant smiles
some days her teenage daughter would sit beside her
sprinkling water on bundle of leaves to keep them fresher

I grew older and went away to college
I no longer wore shorts but trousers now and some fur
had begun to spurt under my top lip and my voice was hoarser
and mama Leaves was no longer at her stall
no bundles of large green leaves in buckets in front of her stall  
no neatly squared cut banana leaves laid heaped
on that old weather beaten table in her stall
the rustic olde wooden shack now had corrugated tin side panels
as also the roof
and inside her daughter now sold gaily coloured plastic bags
and thousands of small clear transparent cellophane

I asked my mother what happened
where is Mama Leaves, where are the Leaves, where is her smile
young man, mother replied, we have to move with the times
The Ministry of Health says leave wrappers are unhygienic
cholera, Tsetse fever, small-pox and all kinds of transmutable diseases can be easily spread
now we wrapped everything in plastics
they come from England and all the civilised top nations
look around you, see how everything is nicely wrapped in plastic
Mama Leaves has retired, her daughter now sells plastics
that's progress and modern civilisation for you, young man
when you're older with your own family you will thank plastics

last year I drove my Mercedes past my childhood home
my car came minted new plastic wrapped from Germany
the locals call such cars 'Tear Plastic cars'
as you spend days tearing off plastics from headlights to console
to gear stick to steering column not to mention the seats

Mama Leaves stall was no more, in place an asbestos built store
they sold Alcohols, Coca-colas, tapes discs, all things plastics
all things imported from England and all the civilised top nations
Mama Leaves and my mother are no more
my mother had said
"that's progress and modern civilisation for you, young man
when you're older with your own family you will thank plastics"
I wonder what she'll say.....today!
Scott M Reamer Apr 2013
Man life know just set eyes way like young world soul day hunger space mouth earth thoughts ignorance blind things mind knew final moment human creation kind creatures souls high forgotten dream love spoke self existence face holy deep bound think home void say surrender ear forever called held ephemeral red state end shall heed hope edge living waking fall sea wake garden need February thought past wanderer got men page colored tepid terrible **** proudly untitled features point painted faceless box forgot render wild spring splendor  handfuls looking half brain lost torn ancestral  unseen vision inner summer honor mister owned banner save today fear groans wasn't smoke  street fable strange year contrast black years  able pain body spoken word known motion  palpitate reeling nature culture disclaimers  cancer beg attentive frames ****** base profound double remember wholly finger death token  cries continue folk oh fishing form broken true  divides spread ah twas away breathe wait 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You are what your reading lady. Now would you hold this gun?
Paige  May 2014
Beauty
Paige May 2014
I'm not sure how to wear self confidence
but I do know how many calories are in every food I consume
And my heart may be bottomless
but my make up seems to claim my entire room
And my mirror may be shattered with disgust and desperation
but at least my closets are full of Gucci, Prada, and Dior
And maybe I can be happy with lonely isolation
Gives me more time for the materials I adore
And you might as well chain me to my shopping bag
That are filled with platinum, silver, and gold
Cause I will make up for the soul I lack
With the plastics, metals, and materials cold
Francie Lynch  Mar 2015
Garbage
Francie Lynch Mar 2015
Start and stop
Up the street,
Turn 180,
Repeat the beat.
The gurus on
Confessional wheels,
Absolve our sins,
Emptying bins.
I swear
They swear
A solemn oath
Never to
Disclose the truth
Found in our garbage
By the brethern,
Garbage stinking
To high heaven.
Bottles, syringes,
Boxes, bones,
Peelings, plastics,
Old cell phones,
Discarded trash
From our homes.
Wrappings bleeding
Seeping ****:
*By our garbage
Ye shall know us.
Barton D Smock Mar 2013
we went to soften the dog in the way we’d seen our sister softened.    

when her heart  
was still
a hiccup’s
echo.

her eyesight the sound of a drill.
her eyes
two holes
in a turtle’s
shell

     her eyes for seeing

the food in her mouth.
Evan Ponter Apr 2014
His words stitched like rail road ties
through sentiment and simile.
His fingers like slaves to emotions in his brain.

The hum of his instrument,
so rich and so right.
Constructing soundtracks to stories
about what it means to be alive.

Tapping beats from the back of his thigh,
bop-bop, doo-woop.
Turning feeling into vibrations
that shake the walls of the bus station.

What change he got shaking like a tambourine
inside his cardigan pocket.
The gold trim on his six string
shines like a locket under bright orange lights.

I called him the Musician.
his mother called him Bentley.
his father never called,
the streets called him crazy.

His audience passing cars.
Cigarette butts and trashed plastics.
The Musician waxed and waned
as the world kept on passing.
My life is my story. I'd love if you continued reading by giving me a follow on Instagram/Twitter. (@evanponter)
Madelin Nov 2012
The oldest one has set the bar -
Brown eyes, brown hair, natural tan,
Teeth that look just the way teeth should with no aid from metal or NASA-patented plastics.
Kappa Alpha Theta, college homecoming queen,
Following in the footsteps of our parents,
To someday hand out bottles of pills with her God-given smile and white coat to match.
I know she's not perfect, but I like to pretend.

Then there's me.

Then the next youngest,
Long brown hair, massive brown eyes, pale skin with the occasional freckle.
Her awkward phase - back brace, teeth brace, allergies, inhaler, tall and gangly -
paid off in the best way.
She wears her high heels to high school and looks straight off the runway.
She wears her pointe shoes and unfolds like a plant growing in fast-motion.
She sits at the table and draws and eats nothing but carbs and still looks made of sticks.
She wants to be a cartoonist, people tell her to be a model, a ballerina,
Our mother insists she's far too brilliant.

Then the baby.
Thin blonde hair, blue-grey eyes with a ring on the outside, grey skin when she's tired.
As Dad says: the printer ran out of ink.
She's beautiful like the rest, of course, but
she's not finished yet, still learning that her peers are generally wrong.
She frets and worries, but she listens to the music I tell her to,
and her expensive pockets have less and less rhinestones.
I tell her not to hug me so much when I come home,
But it's fine. I'm proud of her.
Someday she'll stop screaming at our mother and realize what she has to look forward to.
s  Dec 2015
society won
s Dec 2015
We are the field of flowers. Society, the weeds.
They have an unhealthy obsession with the flowers.
Prickly vines, ripping open the silk petals.
The teardrops dripping to the filthy dirt, slowly sinking further.
Flowers have this dry chalky taste from being smothered by the ground.
The bitter sweet sound from being simply buried.
Weeds want to smell the absence of breath in the stems.
The Plastics ruling their high school kingdom.
Decorated vines. Vultures, waiting for an innocent death.
Kicking us when we are already down.
So done
More and more billboards killing little girls.
“Sometimes you are putting more into it than you could ever get back out.”
The silent thunder of hatred.
The fake love shown by the weeds.
The plastics shrinking everyone to the size of flowers,
So they can tear them from their roots and put them in their hair.
Quiet Girl hiding away, terrified of peoples opinions.
Eventually Quiet Girl will be worn as an accessory in the Plastics hair.
The dark lightning of reality.
“You are like the missing word in sentence, pointless.”
Hakuna Matata,
Doesn’t exist.
The flowers scream. The weeds are too strong.
Little girls ***** fingernails scrambling to dig up their busted petals.
I found this poem I wrote last year. Its kind of a mess. But I like it.
Micheal Wolf Aug 2018
We tried to be better with each new cause.
But while we tried to save the whale, we polluted its home.
We tried to save the tiger but its home was used for lumber.
The orangutans deminished for Palm oil and crops.
Now the globe is warming and the oceans rise.
They're full of plastic and everything is dying.
So now we have only ourselves to blame for plastics, Monsanto and wild hurricanes.
The next great cause will be because of effect.
No one to save mankind, as he killed everything else.
Frank Sterncrest  Jan 2014
Faulty
Frank Sterncrest Jan 2014
My family eats dinner underwater.
We bounce between the seats of our chairs
and the bottom of the table,
we pass the stuffing
as it floats off the plate,
and no one seems to blink.
My parents just talk about how safe
it is, here,
below the surface.
No gay fiances
or athiests
or postmodernists
or liberal Christians.
I am the only one with an oxygen tank.
“I have never owned a tent that kept the rain out.”

My family camps with gear from the 80s.
We cook in bare aluminum
and eat with volatile plastics,
a crusty dining cloth pinned
to the warped picnic bench.
My feet and head push
through the tent wall
and into the rain fly.
I always wake up wet.
“I have never owned a bed that was long enough.”

In house 1 and 2,
my feet hang off the end
of the bed, circulation halted
at the ankles
by the wooden frame.
In dorm 1 and 2,
I lie diagonally on the bed,
my shoulder hitting the wall.
In dorm 3,
My feet are pressed
flat against the wardrobe.
I fall asleep not knowing
who I wake up for.
“I have never loved anyone I didn't have to.”

— The End —