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I found the city a pitiless thing.
It smelled of steel, concrete and the bay.
I use to sit on the sea wall that edged
my old college condo, the one I shared
with a black cat, and sing Otis Redding-
skipping the whistling part of his song
because my lips could never purse the
right tune- and watch the tide roll in
catching rainbows in the sun’s glint.

It  was the inhabitants I couldn’t take,
all rude and loud, smelling of salt
and stale fish scales and crab shells,
so snared in tiny toils, frail and idle,
their itching needs thirsty and *****.  
I lost my wonder in the traffic dust,
the night haze and starless nights.
I avoided touching that life less
it should defile me in its lost light,
night terrors and phantasms.

Then, in the small church in
the out of the way corner,
I found her, a strange vision
trembling, ready to emerge
just past the reach of my mind
and the urge of my will. She existed
beyond all jaded aims and
drab  dissemblements,
something unfounded, unbuilt
but ready, waiting to be built on.

On my birthday she bought me
a lounge chair to grace my
unfurnished balcony, on the
very day I purchased my own.
And there we sat (my desire),
watching the city unseal itself
across from me in a sweltering love,
constantly revealed, being
forever built and rebuilt on
in pain and unfathomable will.
Fifty years ago, the future came,
built in concrete, tile, and bright lights,
underground station, undergirding the fame
of this city, adding to its manifold sights.

Now the future’s a place that smells of stale beer,
barely lit by futuristic lamps in disrepair,
wallpapered in graffiti, strewn with gear
of the pale homeless who’ve made this their lair.

They, like this chipped, grimy, forsaken place
are left in the dust of our dreams’ mercury pace.
Inspired by this photo I took of a semi-abandoned pedestrian tunnel system near the Berlin trade fair: https://bsky.app/profile/jackgroundhog.bsky.social/post/3lfxjtrxss22h
To capture, nurse, and, hold,
the unfairness of it all.
The rapturous, coal-
heartedness, of Hellish
snares, beneath, the Mall.
When, afterwards, those
cauldrons, spout nightly
mares, of, bridled gall.
The captor cursed, his embold-
ened heir, is, a;
hairless toupee,
sheared, and, effortlessly, shorn.

The flesh, is, pierced,
and, punctured, by, the
blade of wickedness.
A chest, buried, by, the weir
-y, encumbered. Wreaths are
laid, by, Triffid's Bliss.
Sounds of stress, fierce,
and, repugnant, line, the
glades, of, Inner Wist.
As, the Rest, rely on tears,
while, torn asunder, cutting
their way, through, thicker mist.

The end,
much like, the start,
starts with,
a flashing in the pan.
As, the friend-
ship sunk, apart,
embarks, for Unhappiness,
with, Sad.
Send your dogged
embittered bark,
hearts hear no sorries,
in a lost, unlistened land.
And, you can't mend
a broken heart,
when broken hearts
is all we've had.

© poormansdreams
A lament to the notion of kind-heartedness.
The promise of a future bright
encased in a temporal temple:
It sits among Berlin’s blinking lights,
a spaceship made to resemble.

Its oracles stood in this aluminum starchurch
dressed in sparkling ABBA track suits,
alit by glittering disco ***** with lights that search
for the future’s many loyal recruits.

But futures seldom turn out the way
that priests of the modern prophesy,
and this once sleek starship sits, decays
while stoic streams of cars drive on by.

What happened to the dreams we had
of federations who deep space explore?
Was it all just an ephemeral fad
now left in twilight, to be ignored?

Then again, this is Berlin, the place
that is built upon its broken dreams —
Utopias all cast aside, but which grace
this city with abandoned and fading gleams.

The starship sits in unending preflight,
awaiting the signal to lift off.
Its digital clock counts down to delight
but never makes it past Hasselhoff.

Climb aboard Battlestar Berlin, my friends,
fly with warp speed to nowhere at all.
Before you know it, the latest trends
will leave you yearning for total recall.
Inspired by the International Congress Center in Berlin, a 1970s futuristic building that sits in decay, but is emblazoned with a big red banner promising a reopening that never seems to come.
Myrrdin 7d
What then, could you have possibly hoped for?
Your most devout, a child raised before an altar
Opens her eyes and finds only a man on your cross
How could she ever live without a burning hole in her chest? Reverence misplaced, turning inwards like a black hole, seething and ******* her dry
Looking for some idol to worship finding no pulpit to fall before screaming mercy
No one to forgive her if not a god, if not herself
Oh but the flames are so bright and burning, light her way she begs,
Begs a man, a pipe, a flickering refrigerator bulb in middle of the night
Consuming herself in the absence of the god that consumed her
always in her pursuit of heaven, she finds herself cast back to hell
fish-sama Nov 2024
Therefore we laugh our lungs to shreds
Correct naive thinking, make it
Sixty pieces of hurt again!

tasked with toasting the cremation.        
poetry for ashes re-lit.        
therefore we cry our lungs to shreds.          

Look! Their steadfast expectations!
Ninety times we’ve already torn it
To sixty pieces of hurt. Again!

the casket burning, resignation.            
nine lives in flames can we douse it?           
therefore we spit our lungs to shreds.            

Look! They saved this aging, ancient
Disappointing broken relic in
Sixty pieces of hurt again!

Ha! Did you think you’d find the reasons?
Did you think I’d tell the meaning?
Therefore I laugh my lungs to shreds
To sixty pieces of hurt again.

Are you disillusioned yet?
Disillusionment told from 2 perspectives
Michael Nov 2024
The luster has worn off
Revealing the worm eaten rot
Of unvarnished racism
Michael Oct 2024
I used to pray
For the typical things.
Serenity, peace, equality,
the health of a sick loved one.
But then I noticed no one ever answered.
Not mine anyway.
But I see the types prayers that are,
In the savage proclamations of the
….Faithful.
And I realize why
I used to pray
Klausyuer Oct 2024
"
The light we dread on the path we tread,
Scorched by the morals we misuse.
Misread the darkness, our hearts distressed,
Mocked by the values we choose,
Led astray by the prophecies of disharmony.

Heralds of the Righteous, deaf to hideous cries,
Sombre pleas linger, unseen in the abyss.
Angels seek refuge in hell from our treachery,
Watching disdainfully the absurdity we create,
While Demons, now praying for salvation,
Witness the tragic fall of humanity.

Instruments of war masquerade as peace,
Tormenting the innocent’s fragile ease.
A nation built on unity’s roar,
Now silenced by the lies of the false majority,
As citizens, evicted by leaders once upheld,
Fall victim to the very mother they served.

The tranquil ocean of individuals,
Swept away by the puddle of atrocities.
The gavel of justice hammers the innocent,
While the illustrious clowns, adorned in lustrous lies, roam free.
As avatars of Themis fall to Eris' tempting kiss,
Our heroes, once righteous, now stab us in the back with monarchic bliss.

While the poor laugh abundantly at their chains,
The rich weep for sovereignty that wanes.
Failure is the epitome of success,
While schools terrify us to death,
Teaching the race between ending a valuable life
And the finish line of a hollow diploma.

Yet in hallowed halls, they preach dismay,
As arguments and debates suffocate the air,
In this world already choked by toxic despair.

The masks of leadership conceal deceit,
As false ideals march beneath victory's flag.
And when the hands that build also destroy,
Philosophy, once pure and guiding,
Now teaches Angels the art of demonology.
"
-Klausyuer: The ****** Poet
Showing the absurdity and irony of the issues we are currently facing right now
Jonathan Moya Sep 2024
It wasn’t a river  
just a pool,
more of a hotub,
set off from the sanctuary—
and when I was eased
into  the water
I didn’t see God
in the streams above.

And I didn’t see her
lost in the thunder
of the racetrack
just beyond the church.

She was beyond
my line of sight,
soaking up congratulations
from the congregation.

The pastor gave me
a gentle pat on my back,
shook my hand, three times,
handed me a towel
and welcomed me to the flock.

I was just another sinner saved
and left to go his own way,
certain in the faith
that God will provide.

She said she would meet
me back at her place
after the potluck.

I wrang the towel
of every last drop
and  handed it
back to her.

I walked back to
my old white Civic,
turned it over
and felt the
cool Jesus breeze
of the A/C hit my face.

The voice inside
told me to do the
first thing I heard
on the radio.

I heard Ray Charles
in his blindness
croon to me:

“Hit the road Jack
and don't you come back
No more, no more, no more, no more.

Hit the road Jack
and don't you come back
No more.”
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