Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
r Feb 2014
Back in my rebel days (yester)
I sported a spelunking bumper sticker
On my 1972  VW pop-up camper van
That read Free Floyd Collins
Totally apolitical well intentioned humor
Concerning one of my pasttimes that surprisingly
Never maimed or killed me
Whilst reporting for an official call for jury duty
The uptight and obviously a **** (did I just say that?)
Prosecutor enquired during jury selection
As to whether any of us prospectives
Had bumper stickers and if so
What they might say
The NRA sticker guy next to me
And the I'd Rather Be Fishin'  and NASCAR
Sticker guy next to him
Passed with smugly flying colors
(red needless to say)
While the 72 year old nun
With the Amnesty International sticker
Didn't fair so well
And was promptly burned at the stake
(I kid you)
Needless to say
The long-haired Harvard educated
Native American
With the Doctors Without Borders
And the Remember Wounded Knee
With a not so discreet AIM sticker thrown in to boot
Also got the boot
Pondering the merits of the court stenographer's
Shapely fingers while judiciously confidently awaiting my turn
It never ocurred to me that Mr. Collins might be
So wrongly accused as to have me
Rejected and summarily ejected
From jury duty
A travesty of justice
I say
If for no other reason than I was so looking forward to
Sticking it to the Man
You can imagine my surprise and disappointment
As I wandered down to the Shamrock
To catch Terry O'Leary do a slam
And raise a glass to
Bobby Sands

r~ 22Feb14
Floyd Collins: 1887-1925. Pioneering cave exploer from Kentucky. Mr. Collins died as a result of exposure and dehydration after being trapped in Mammoth Cave despite many attempted rescues. RIP, Floyd. True that my Free Floyd Collins bumper sticker resulted in my not getting selected for jury duty. I kid you not.
Hannah Mary Jul 2014
the clouds
that paint their silhouettes
upon the Earth's surface
hold not just a figure
but respect
for the outcasts
who stay hidden
within their being
and don't prop themselves
into the rays
of the sun
I wrote this while riding in an airplane and looking out the window. I thought it was marvelous how the clouds left shadows on the earth.  I love the sky
Mitchell Mar 2021
Pain is a past
And
Future portrait
Of what was
And what is
To come.

Beneath the muscles,
The bone; this phosphorous
Soul of mine teetering on the edge
Of extinction and anonymity,
There is a burning.

The sensation
Itself
Is faint. Pick up a jar
Of pickles to a lick
Of fire.

Bring a hand
To the cheek
Of the one I love,
And there is a kiss
Of fleeting ash.

Rollover
Play dead
No man passed
Cares
Whether they lived
At the end for
They are dead.

Legacy resides in pain.
Trauma, injury, is our
Paradigm for progress.

We desire hurtles.

Anything too easy
Will be repositioned,
Remodeled,
Retold to fit the prospectives

Narrative.

Are we not all seeking
To be the hero
In this story

Of ours?

Of humanities?

If so (you cannot deny it)

How will the future children
View your digital cave drawings?

How will they listen to your tales
Through air pods, podcasts, and
VR reinterpretations?

What secrets will they find
That you believed
You hid
So well?

Will you even care?
Will

They?
Alex McQuate  Mar 2022
Jigsaw
Alex McQuate Mar 2022
You said the other day that you saw people as puzzles,
That each person was a whole is a picture comprised of pieces,
Each piece a picture all it's own.

You said that you liked the picture my puzzle showed,
Multifaceted and colorful,
Each bringing in new prospectives that you didn't see before.

But that little monster that resides in the corner of my mind wonders,
Will you always think the same?
What about the pieces that are waterlogged and warped,
The ones destroyed by rough handling,
Careless placement leaving them bent and even torn?

I know that you'll say that it doesn't matter,
And perhaps that may be true,
But I know there are some pieces that even I don't like,
They're ugly, repugnant, and even grotesque.

But I shall place my trust in you,
a fragile piece of my heart,
as you become a piece all you're own.

In time perhaps you'll become that final piece,
that makes my picture whole
Sleeping at Last-Mars

— The End —