Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
LJ Chaplin Apr 2015
The lights go out as another day
Draws to a close,
In the distance sirens of an ambulance
Ripples through the stillness
Of the night,
I ache,
I'm tired,
But I'm restless.
The staircase extends beyond my feet,
Up into a blank space
Where light cannot reach
And darkness can wait
For me to enter.
I can feel its eyes on me,
Fixated on my body
As I approach the first step.
I don't know why,
But the lingering presence
Is always there,
As if it waits with arms crossed
And draped against my bedroom door,
It sense my fear and I sense its intent:
To creep into my mind,
To feed off the chaos that stirs
Each and every day.
© LJ Chaplin
Steele Apr 2015
I caught her singing "Clair de Lune"
when she thought my gaze had wandered to
the girl from the bar, in the red dress and blue shoes
who snag happier, more uplifting tunes;
not that sad, quiet beauty by the light of the moon.

I caught her sighing, pining for release
from the pain of what she was feeling then
Her heart filled her lungs, and she sang out again
that lonely, impossible masterpiece;
that showcase of her heart's discontent.

I wept; should have come from my hidden den
but instead I watched, silent tears blurring my sight.
Though I should by rights have swept her into my arms,
I watched as she sang "Clair De Lune" long into that lonely night,
unsure if my presence would bring to her face a smile... or alarm.

The first, if I could but for a moment see, I'd trade away my immortal soul.
The second, rather than let it be, I would happily die,
                                                                                     silent and alone.
It's hard to know when your words will heal, or only make it worse. Sometimes my silence is mere necessity, and for that I am so sorry.
Rockie Apr 2015
I'm here
Watching you fix your tie
With the grace of a clumsy seal
Who got drunk
On the verge of tomorrow
And the brink of today

I'm here
Watching you stride out
With the hopefulness of a child at Christmas
Who won't go to sleep
For Santa will arrive
At midnight

I'm here
Watching you speak to the crowd
With the confidence of a frightened duckling
Who were recently hatched
Out of an egg
And into the light
Steele Feb 2015
My ears are stopped with tapers, so I'll hear no more
of this ****** farce you and he have going.
Every time you ask for more
abuse, I realize I'm better off not knowing.
But my playlist is full of sadness,
and the rest is a bore.
So your screams are my melody
and I'll listen as your blood keeps on flowing.

They say fools rush in, and more the fool you.
More the fool me too, to listen to
your pained cries for more pain,
as your skin is red glowing,
The bruise slowly growing,
as you exult in the sick high you get from his backhand;
as I listen to Red Jumpsuit Apparatus ask him
if he feels like a man.

There's no pain more complete tonight
Than the ringing in my tear soaked budded ears
when he says "**** my ****, *****"
with those lips so sweet... "and tight."
And you oblige, because you're too used to it to fear,
and it makes you feel beautiful,
because only angels weep, right?

That's the sad lesson heard here.
I bid my sad playlist goodnight.
Anna Vigue Jan 2015
Scrupulous Empowerment
Endowed upon our Government
A System that us Citizens
Employ without much Dissonance

Listening without Learning
Driving but not Driven
Waiting to be Waistless
Adoring the Adornments

And being nothing more than that.
Christian Bixler Dec 2014
I am watching,
watching here
alone tonight,
watching as
The clouds float
by, and the night
goes whispering
past.

Watching you, asleep tonight.
I write this in a room of sleepers, and I cannot help but wonder, what they dream, this fine tonight.
aar505n Dec 2014
Stalked the streets of the fair city.
Walked among strangers, talking of change.
Gritty pavement beneath my feet.

Watched around me
at my supposed kith and kin
Saw them with sin
and observed them
as they curved around the streets.

At a shop window,
A little boy stares at the chocolate
In a state of elated joy
But in a limbo, unsure how to profit.

A woman strolls pass a fruit stall.
She sees oranges and clenches her fists
Drenched in the awful memory
Of a fruity misery

An activist tries to preaches
But no one is listening to her speech
An analyst who worries about everything
Scared of being nothing

Sitting at the steps of the church
A boy hides from the dull march of people
Feels a surge inside but words caught at Adam’s apple
So he lets the ink bleed onto a page instead

Outside a run down theatre the actor stood.
His detractors made their presence felt
making him uncertain in his ways,
pushing his very essence into the dark of ether.

Coffee shop was full
but the man stood out
Coffee dripping from his mouth
The blinding glint form his watch,
a lofty story to tell no doubt.

Two souls turned a corner and became one
neither were mourners of their old lives
Two heads on one dead body
Intricacy of the mind and soul
a flase sense of intimacy

And the ghosts joined us on streets
They did not boast of their deaths
At most, they were simple engrossed
with everything from pillar to post

Dragon was there too, wanting a battle
talons rip through rag and bones.
His fire arched upwards
and then down and scorched stones

Chaos raised its heineous face
and embraced the madness
strong winds ravaged the city
blasted every building down

Among the damge I saw them.
Them and more.
A robin flying by,
Mel with her dark eyes,
the river dried up and
four moons impossibly raised.

And everything rained down and destroyed me.


I awoke
but choose to keep my eyes closed.
Wanting to drift in the darkness,
a temporary bliss.
But then the memory surfaced
and I opened my eyes.

I stood on a bridge,
the city to either side of me
and the river running underneath.
No fires, no ghosts.

All seemed restored, I sighed a sigh of releif.
A smidge of hope flowed into me.
From where I stood,
I began to understand it all.

Out, out in the distance
I scarcely saw a man standing on the river
like it was land and not water
My eyes squinted to make him out
but all I could see was an outstreched hand.

He had been observing me
and now he was calling me.
and I would leave this pretty, gritty city
and all its comittees for him.

I would.

But I still had unresolved business.
Story to be told and demons to be slayed
Then I would be a free man.
But untill then I won't be a runaway.
Cause I'll stay as long as it takes.

And with that I adjourned
this session and did returned.
Taking my chances with the city.
a rather loneger poem than i normaly do, but i have this one one my mind for some time now.
Title is a reference to the quote
“What strange phenomena we find in a great city, all we need do is stroll about with our eyes open. Life swarms with innocent monsters.”
― Charles Baudelaire
Hope you enjoy and feel free to comment!
Monitor
Watching me
Reading over my shoulder
Danger lies in depression
Fear
I just want to be normal
Dauntless
Not this
Not me
Monitor
Watching me
Watching
I can't breathe
Silence is key
Staying alive
The true goal
But how
With this monitor?
4-5-14
MereCat Dec 2014
Six a.m. and the morning leans
To kiss the night;
The streets are full of stars
And sleepwalking business suits

The citrus woman
With peroxide blonde hair
And peroxide blonde fingers
If she spoke I imagine it would sound
Like lemon trees and smoke
Her cigarette burns holes in the sky
But when she passes me by
She smells like the Boots Cosmetics Isle
She paints the yellowed-ivory
Of her finger-claws
With crystallised orange
To cover the nicotine stains
And maybe I think I recognise
My lemonade shampoo
And tangerine hand wash
Like a setting sun over Sicily

The beer can boy
With stuffed up hair
And a stuffed up liver
He’s grey like a November playground
Once all the children have grown
And he’s hole-punched right through
I might think he was heart-broken
And trying to see how many other lost souls
The bottoms of bottles hold
If he wasn’t here every morning
Lolling down the pavement
Like a spring stretched too far
Asking for a paper
That I’m not allowed to give
And trying to drown himself
In the pooled rain under the streetlights

The coat-and-cardie bundle
With wind-swept hair
And wind-swept grimace
Like a tornado tore up
The geography of her personality
And left it with just a bike and a death wish
And those features heaped together
Between chimney-tops and table tops
For consolation
Her feet on the pedals while her hair throttles
Because she’s unlit
Unseen, unprotected
And she rides like this morning is the last
As if she knows that skulls
Crack like eggshells sometimes
And handlebars are sometimes not in front of you.

If my Dad was here he’d see
A smoker
A drunk
A dangerous cyclist
But I see lemon zest and love hearts and black liquorish
After all I’m at home
Among these mistakes
That the morning hours make
Paper round = poetry writing
Sombro Dec 2014
He saw me sleep
Blood flow from the mind
And fumes from the eyes
He clattered and ground
His gears

His grim fermented
Circuits and wires
Fusing within
A core of metal droplets

I shot up
Blown from my slumber
His bright stare in slate
Wouldn’t fade, but
Burned in my eyes

I shook and sweated
As he could not
That foul machine
Clatters on.
Next page