#margaret
Morning drops like a parachute,
circumnavigating
the irrational things within her.
She drew the grim cartwheel
--crayoned images of kids in closets,
and blackens them into
illustrations of war.
She sleeps on bleak days
with young cameras,
Lucy under the tongue,
rosaries at the border
feel like pins and needles
to an adrenaline sorceress
in giallo approach,
her eye in a labyrinth,
the eye she lost in the Crusades,
filming streets below
the color of dark Roman wine.
It's a staring contest,
waiting on rooftops
in stages of collapse,
there she lives or dies
at the dividing line with the grave.
Jan 20, 2024
Jan 20, 2024 at 5:51 PM UTC
Mahal kong Margaret,
Patawad
(Higit pa sa Sampong beses ko na tong nagawa
Hanggang ngayon di pa maunawa
Ang tulad mo sa akin na nag mahal ng kusa
Nasaktan ko ng di sinasadya)
Alam kong sawa ka na sa paulit ulit na nang yayari,
Away bati sa mga bagay na kahit na simple.
Walang ibang Iniisip kundi ang puro pansarili,
Nagseselos ako bawat sinong makatabi.
Marahil pagod ka na, at gusto mo nang umayaw.
Ngunit sana ikaw ay magbalik tanaw
Humihingi ng tawad, hiling na magbalik ang dating ako at ikaw
Maging ako man ang inakalang papawi ng luha sya pa ang unang bumitaw
Tanggapin ang alay kong tsokolate at rosas na pula
Tikman ang tamis nito, tulad ng pagsisikap kong laging pasobra
May taglay na bango ang bulaklak, binabalik ang alaala
Ng lumipas, Kalakip ang tula galing sa puso, inukit sa pluma, indinaan ko sa letra.
Pakinggan mo sana ang mga daing kong nawalan nang tinig
Masdan ng mga mata **** nakapinid,ayaw nang tumititig
Muli nating painitin ang samahang unti unti nang lumalamig
Bigyang pagkakataong buhayin ang pusong di na pumipintig
Alam mo namang lahat ay aking gagawin,
Ano mang kaparusahan ay handa ko nang akoin,
Sa panong paraan ba ako patatawarin?
para lang ANG PANGALAWANG PAGKAKATAON SA AKIN AY IYONG MARAPATIN.
＊ｐｓ． ｈｉｎｔａｙｉｎ ｋｉｔａ ｄｕｕｎ ｌａｇｉ 。
１－４ｐｍ ｋａｄａ ｍｅｉｒｋｕｌｅｓ
Makatang humihingi ng tawad,
August E. Estrellado
Oct 6, 2018
Oct 6, 2018 at 1:33 AM UTC
margaret
Langit ang nagbigay biyaya nang ambon ay dinilig
Ang aking hiling sa panginoon ay biglang nadinig
Pinadala ang anghel na sa mundo ko’y yayanig
Tinawag ng ng kanyang tinig, at Napatulala sa mga Titig
Maari bang malaman ang yong pakay sa akin
Kung ikaw ba ay pasakit at tuluyan na akong wawasakin?
Laging kong tanong kung ano ba ang dapat kong gawin
Kung ang kahulugan mo ay kabiguan patuloy pa ba kitang iibigin?
Nagtatanong kay Bathala, Paano ko ba mapapaliwanag ang hiwaga
Nitong pagmamahal na kung bakit sa puso kumapit ka ng kusa
Ako’y nagtataka’t di maka paniwala Bakit ito ang yong ginawa
Sa bigay **** biyaya, Ano ba ang kasalanan ko para isinumpa
Gaano ba kita pinapahalagahan? Alam mo ba ang dahilan?
Hiling ko lang ay sanay iyong maunawaan itong nararamdaman
Kaya ang paliwanag ko ay simple nalang
Masikip dito sa loob ko, kaya ang kasya ay ikaw lang
Alaalang bitbit pano ko makakalimutan
Kung Sa puso koy nakaukit ang yong pangalan
Ibinalot ng tatag ng loob para ika’y ipaglalaban
Di kita hahayaang lumuha lagi kang aalagaan.
Nagaabang ng sasakyan para dalhin sa langit, iwan ang mundo
Nakikiusap Pagbigyan sana Hiling makamit, Anghel na sundo
Saan nga ba tayo patungo? Byaheng langit sa impyerno,
Sa isipan kong magulo, Kasinungalingan ka ba o Totoo?
Linalaro sa panaginip ang dakilang pagsuyo
Tuluyang Hinamon Ang matapang na puso
Sayo napalapit at ayaw nang lumayo
Ang silakbo ay di na kaya, kayang isuko
kahit ano dito sa lupain ay handa kong ialay
Pagkat ang langit sa akin ay una mo nang binigay
Ang halaga mo sa akin ay Walang katumbas na materyal
Dahil Di kayang sukatin kung gano kita kamahal
Sep 25, 2018
Sep 25, 2018 at 12:04 AM UTC
who always sat perched on the porch at dusk
to watch the sun slowly set beyond the horizon
she listened as the last birds fluttered to their nests,
and inhaled the raw air as the breeze swirled around her
all the while her eye towards the sinking sun
vanilla bean was white with black specks
but when the moon rose
she became the universe
her spots radiated like a million stars,
her body obsidian like the backdrop of the galaxies
and she became the night
Sep 14, 2018
Sep 14, 2018 at 2:06 PM UTC
Oh, Andy-
speak to me in paints:
red, yellow, blue
When I told you I wouldn't be good at this,
an inability to sketch hands that punched at everything leaving me weak.
Keane's sorrow filled eyes upon oil made more sense to me.
I was never angry or mean, just sad and hopeless.
Lichtenstein was more your speed with obscene images of ******* women
and dialogue of broken hearts.
Van Gogh never made sense, but his attention to detail caught my eye.
To not know what goes on in your own head is identifiable so,
my head is art crafted by Picasso.
they hospitalize you once you've lopped your ear off
when giving a part of themselves to a lover.
I'm not cut out for this- the starving artist,
the tragic sketcher,
or the natural- born painter.
I've calloused my hands,
shed tears on pages of sketchbooks
put paint that looks childlike
and nothing worthwhile,
in all the time spent learning,
I've never learned how to be an artist.
I thought it was the mantra to be pained and miserable,
but you accounted for bold choices and vivid primary shades.
I feel betrayed, that my art alone, isn't enough to be good.
They will never frame my name,
or immortalize flaws in which could never be erased.
Like our conversation in my dream:
"I can't be mean." -Me
"Killing yourself isn't much different" -You
So Andy, what is the color I'm feeling? If it isn't blue?
—V.H.
Mar 6, 2018
Mar 6, 2018 at 2:20 PM UTC
The child mournful,
A single salted tear slides down a cheek,
Holds the secrets of a woman,
Locked within a room,with a door that creaks.
She creates such sadness,
mother to the artwork,
Man who claims to be a father,
Overshadows the button of the girl’s dripping nose.
Etched within walls, a desire to say the truth:
“He’s not the artist”
Look within those big eyes,
the elegance of youth,
Deep inside her true love’s lies-
the choppy strands that show
the instability of growth
within the painter’s eyes.
Nov 11, 2017
Nov 11, 2017 at 12:39 AM UTC
I wish I lived in Wayne’s World,
where Wayne and Garth are real.
I wish I had Cassandra’s curls,
and her *** appeal.
I wish I dated Jason Dean,
and coloured him impressed.
I wish I had the killer gene,
but never ever confess.
I wish I went to Ashfield Hospital,
and looked a little on edge.
Explored shutter island in the spittle,
and made the Marshall pledge.
I wish I lived with Yeats,
or in the lonely moated grange,
I wish I danced on table tops,
my body for money, fair exchange.
I wish reality didn’t exist,
or better yet just me,
all those opportunities would be missed,
and at peace I’d finally be.
May 9, 2017
May 9, 2017 at 3:58 PM UTC
White whiskers rooted above the trumpet player's lips;
his body moves like a sci-fi parasite, as he spits out songs
at the big bellied, Skecher-chic, boardwalk children.
The kids give a moment's interest before passing by like
armored flies, if armor were cheap cotton shirts and
helicopter parents.
Sooner or later, the sunset meets the brim of his hat.
It's a mystery as to the speed of the trumpet dropping
from his lips to its case, but you'd have to find someone
who cares about those types of things.
His brown, leather, Payless feet jut outward; away from
one another and towards American stores reflecting themselves:
Italian restaurant, Thai restaurant, Car Insurance, Dollar Store.
Quicker than you'd think, his denim hips are clamped by
the wooden arms of a misplaced deck chair, relocated to
a dining table as small and low-income as the man who
saw the dreamlike orange and purple sky drift away
behind the cemetery gray blanket of smoke, rising from
a fractured ground littered in mud-bathed, leaking bodies.
When the night has only begun to settle in, the man's
thick hands carefully adjust her picture, for he fears
the paleness of his fingers will leave more of a residue
than he is accustomed to.
Kept within the copper and green borders, she has
only begun life; twenty-three and never having to apologize,
there is still so much left to the imagination; her olive grey
cheeks are sided to his eyes, ready to be jammed with
baby, mommy, and daddy fragments of windshield;
waiting for the last embrace of a sturdy steering wheel;
her hair still dry and not dampened by insides coming out
or the flying weaker-than-you-think half-gallon of whole milk
that covered -- or washed, depending on your attitude -- the
back of her fifty-three year old head; the eggs fortunately
missing twelve times, hitting what was left of the windshield,
leaving an image comparable to the wall of a bar that not only
has a dartboard but also a man with terrible aim or who had as
much alcohol as the man who slipped his car into Margaret
and Joseph's life.
Joseph looks away from her picture, as his glass eyes begin
to shatter. Running fat palms and bulbous fingers through
the white, over grown lawn on his scarred scalp,
he says her name three times before retiring to the mattress
Margaret picked out.
May 8, 2017
May 8, 2017 at 6:24 PM UTC
Beat-Up Old Car
Vastly under-appreciated possession
In dull blue, a MK1, no less, with original rust
Inside lingering scents of Exchange and Mart
top-notes of WD-40 and miscellaneous mix tapes
A car like this gets into your life
in lumpy knuckle-barking unsubtle ways,
stays there in subtle ones
That long drive back to Yorkshire
in the quintessential exemplar
Clutch cable snaps.
****** and Crap.
Hardly helpful but can be accommodated
with enough thought
rough though it is
on starter motor
and nerves whenever
anticipatory powers inadequate
and we are forced
to a complete red-light stop
Brakes dodgier, exhaust noisier
than ideal or legal
Gender-ambiguous
elderly tyres flirt outrageously with slick tarmac
Showing their canvas underwear
and male-pattern baldness
Keeping this unstable, unsafe, unreliable
ultimately essential lump of metal
moving and on the road
is a fine art
Engaging, fluid and intense art;
The Clash and The Specials
Costello and The Cure in support
A distraction then
getting hauled over by plod
somewhere near Bury St. Edmunds
Thatcher's boys.
Tax? MoT? Insurance? ID?
No real interest shown
Any passengers in the back?
Clearly no. Pickets?
Pickets? What?
Please open the boot sir... Oh.
On your way lad. Drive carefully
I was, officer, I was
More than you will ever know
Feb 17, 2016
Feb 17, 2016 at 9:52 AM UTC
Inspiration from making amazing quotations
The nation's defending its life with its shields
But the swords are all rusted the kingdom's been busted
and the ******* are bathing in gold that they steal
While the people are lying their babies are crying
their rhythm is dying 'cause heartbeats are gone
But they carry it trying to stop themselves crying
as they can't do nothing but watch on and on
As the bankers get richer the poor men get poorer
the ones in the middle are learning to steal
Where before they just borrowed now they got new sorrow
but still they don't know that they ain't down at heel
They think they are poor so they vote in the richest
just hoping the ******* will keep them in funds
While the genuine destitute lie in the street
and the taxes are funding those twats' cummerbunds
There's a baby who's crying not just 'cause she's some brat
who ain't got no ice cream she's dying of cold
Yes it happens in streets prob'ly near where you live
it isn't just something in stories of old
There are people out there in the gorbals and barrios
the projects the banlieues the hoods and the schemes
Where their lives are the ghetto there is no way out
but to hope or to rap or to wing on a dream
They ask why you ain't reading you try but it's killing you
trying to provide for a family of two
When your mother's alone lying slumped on the sofa
and work w-w-working is all you can do
When the **** do you think I'm supposed to be doing
this **** that you say I cannot live without?
If you listened to lyrics from songs you disparage
you might start to feel an iota of doubt
They're intelligent, eloquent, more so than you
with your old boy school accent and ballot box blue
Can you rap, can you rhyme, can you keep it in time
can you tell of the **** that your family's been through?
No you sit in your office and scoff at the people
who spend their whole lives in a world that is real
They don't give a **** if you judge them or not
but they just want to shout at you
FEEL, ****** FEEL
Jun 23, 2015
Jun 23, 2015 at 11:54 AM UTC