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Nat Lipstadt Feb 2014
slept and soaked
the sabbath Saturday away.
the body, achey breaky,
cranked and croaked,
slewed by a slew of common miscreants.
one, a stitch in my side,
feeling like someone's inside,
wanting to be born, feet first,
coming out the side of my chest,
instead of my ******

so,
promised poems and bills to pay,
put aside for a more poetic bill paying day.

awoke once near midday,
an unusual wake up call,
my nostrils do attend,
when the honey odors of
cinnamon and vanilla invade
the french shores of my subconscious.

I love three things French:
the elegance of their language grande,
their frenchified fries and frenchified toast.

was fed some french toast,
bathed in vanilla and cinnamon,
thus drugged,
went back to bed again.

as I drifted off for the third time today,
heard the woman dramatic say:
"must have, must have,"
two words that I from my past,
consider a curse,
a grave phrase of choice of my ex-wife,
her way of saying I didn't measure up.

must have
paprika
to roast your chicken
for Sunday dinner.


relieved beyond measure,
as I to dreamless sleep dispatched,
vague recall a poem forming about the
spices in my life.
Zack Ripley Aug 2021
I may have achey feet from working
all the live long day.
But I'm grateful for them.
They take my mind off my aching heart. Caused by the curse of adulting and time keeping us apart.
Deana Luna Jun 2014
soar peachy
repulsive boy
a luscious hell
his drunk urge whispering sordid and frantic
sweet thing sucker
bare *****
lover
lather the sky pink
and watch this sea trudge to its feet
all storm and skin
our sleep revealed in ***** tongues
softcomponent Sep 2014
taking government loans, parental guidelines
and flashy dress-skirts made this life unfact
and unfiction. Lost in the disabled returns on
tax dividends, the world kept calling your name.
“Rise up and be born with me, brother” Pablo
Neruda inclined-- “Give me your hand from the deep  
Zone seeded by your sorrow.”
it all it all it all ached,
an abyss of patience with nothing-- a droplet of sidelined
coffee given sentience with ingestion-- all the banal all
the mundane all the flowing rock-face moments so
presented by society-- in my heart of hearts, in my mind
of minds, in my eye of eyes, in my neck of necks, I found pain....
the ache of achey betrayal and the ache of achey loss. In this
pain we find repreive from Pollyanna-- reprieve from the false
Gods of Evil, the Devil Within your Ex-Girlfriend-- the reason
she let his ******* inside. Through all the latency-- through
starving streetless sleepless evenings-turned-to-nights I could
see death within the sliver of a flashlight beam.. telling me to
take the life or leave the life but never in-between-- telling me
the pain was part and parcel to the ecstasy of faith and resurrection--
screaming “FLATLINED IF YOU WANT, FASTLINED IN YOU
WANT, SIDELINED IF YOU WANT, STREETLIGHT IF YOU
WANT” and throughout this evil and this darkness and this nothing
-but-a-flashlight-beam, I hear Neruda--

*“Rise up and be born with me, brother.”
tread Jan 2013
I loved that achey crane you used to call your neck
I used to passionately kiss that achey crane
maybe massage the middle more
so its 80 year contract with you
could be properly fulfilled
without having to take advantage
of the *******
warranty
again.

******* God and Angels Ltd.
free marketeers who planned our obsolescence.
give me what I paid for
you self-righteous Forbes ******.
L Aug 2013
you says things to me
that always catch me off my guard,
like the other day when we were in your bed,
and you told me i was "beautiful."
and i told you i couldn't respond,
or even think of something to say,
to the wonderful compliment you gave me.

but that one time that you told me,
you thought i was how a girl should be,
your idea of a girl atleast,
i went home that night and i wanted to die.
matilda shaye Apr 2014
right between the place of being perfectly okay, stable,
and content and ripping at ever seam, loose at the hinges
you can see that the stitches are coming apart and
the heart doesn't want to beat anymore
I was born here
between the lines of need it I need you and that
wouldn't be good for me and neither are you
the space between total distance and I miss
the word baby so much that I feel achey
I want to yell and I want to scream but
my mouth is shut, I know there are reasons why I'm here
whether it be bad karma or the way the world turns and
if there isn't then **** whatever card I drew out of the deck
once I said
excuse me father for I have sinned
because I didn't know how to pray so I begged for
forgiveness until my ego bled reasons that I needed
to be alone but I'd rather be excused then forgiven
because I'm good at excuses and I'm still waiting
around for the moment where I forgive you

I DON'T WANT TO BE HERE.
WHEN WILL THE SKY STOP FADING
TO SUCH A DARK BLUE THAT I HAVE
TO TURN MY BRIGHTS ON AT 4 PM
WHEN WILL THIS CITY WAKE UP ONE
MORNING WHEN IT'S NOT EXHAUSTED
AND HUNGOVER ON IT'S LACK OF OXYGEN
WHEN WILL THE BIRDS SONG
BECOME OUR WAKE UP CALL
WHEN WILL THE LEASH COME OFF
WHEN WILL THE WORLD SPIN ON IT'S OWN FREE WILL
AND WHEN WILL I  STAND ON MY OWN TWO FEET
I DON'T WANT THIS, I NEVER WANTED THIS
I GOT STUCK INTO BEING SOMEONE
I AM NOT COMFORTABLE WITH
BUT I WANT TO BE
I WANT TO BE SO BAD
IF ONLY YOU KNEW HOW MUCH EFFORT I PUT
IN ASKING THE GRASS TO GROW FOR ME
IT NEVER DOES
IF ONLY YOU FELT HOW MANY TIMES I ASKED
GOD TO TAKE AWAY THE FEELINGS
TAKE AWAY THE KNOWLEDGE
TAKE AWAY WHAT I NOW UNDERSTAND
LEAVE ME BLIND AND IN THE DARK BEFORE
YOU LEAVE ME SOMEONE WHO WILL NOT BE
ACCEPTED BY ANYONE, ESPECIALLY HERSELF
IF ONLY YOU KNEW HOW MANY TIMES I BEGGED
EVERYBODY TO STOP STARING AT ME
I'M IN A ROOM ALONE BUT ALL I CAN FEEL IS EYES
AND I DON'T KNOW HOW TO STOP BEING ME
Lara M Nov 2013
This day every year hits me hard
it makes me feel two parts nostalgic and
Three parts miserable

i'm just a little bit ****
a little bit shaky
a little bit to achey for you

Or maybe i always was
the insatiable appetite i have for you is killing me inside
Slowly and painfully
i never thought it was this painful to miss someone so much
I think the reason i cannot detached these feelings i have for you is because
You are the only pure, true happiness i've ever known
you're the only light i've ever had
If i were ever to stop feeling that for which i feel for you i think i would feel
empty
I am Empty.

You are detrimental to my health
especially my mental health
because it shouldn't be healthy to feel such a
Cocktail of emotions all at an instance
for one person
that's what causes heart attacks
You are a bus traveling at 50 mph with no intention of stopping
and i am in the middle of the road
You are a blood clot in my brain and you are much to close to an artery
you are water that rushes into my lungs and
weighs me down
I am Unconscious.

That date was and always will be the first time i ever felt something break within me
and the day you find someone else
And you look happier then you ever did with me
my heart will break again, in 4 parts
you left me there in my own mess
It felt like a shot coursing through my veins
it's similar to the first time you fracture a bone
or when you cannot get the toy you want
When you see an animal die in a movie
it can't physically be your heart breaking
but it sure feels like something has shattered
Inside you
and for some time afterwards you still feel the pieces of whatever has damaged still in the place
Where it broke
you carry them with you in hope they will dissolve quickly
They cause internal injuries and you bleed from within
But all of a sudden, you feel nothing
nothing at all
I am Numb.

                      *******! you stole my ability to feel!
I cannot show affection for anything anymore
that container is empty
maybe one day the ink that fuels my sentiment for you into these words will run dry
And i can regain some sort of feeling besides emptiness
|100%|
longing for you
|94%|
bitterness
|90%|
Can it subside?
it's just odd how i can have all this inside me and to you it's just words
If writers write about the things that are haunting them then your ghost is still here
in my head
Living a comfy residence where it is not welcome
i look for you in everyone
there is no longer a woman inside me
Just this tiny little thing that shouts all the time and only wants one thing
true in her devotion
She wants you and she wants to know why you gave up and left me when i needed you
you're still inside of me like a disease
And i am still here surviving solely on your memory
everything reminds me of you
Everything
i have died and come undone at your hand
I am Heartbroken and in Love
with you.
Madeline Oct 2011
there's a pimple on my left cheekbone
and one of my brows is plucked
a little thinner than the other.
the only makeup on my face
is the black on my eyelashes
my eyes
burst
green.
my mouth (my rosebud mouth, my mother
smiles) like a slightly opened
slightly troubled
bow.
my brow is furrowed
my eyes are searching
one of my ring-and-bracelet hands
holds back my hair  (short)
and my elbow
rests.
i look at myself,
head-tilting, quick-sketching
the curves of my features
in a single line of ultra-fine Sharpie.

what you see is what you get.

my eyes frown into themselves
through the mirror.
i am long
i am lanky
i am lovely.
i am a little lost
and very found
i am angsty
i am achey
i am laughing
i am me -
if you only look at yourself for a second
you tend to miss
how beautiful you are.
it isn't my vanity.
it's the universal, and most unbelieved
truth.

i brush back my hair
and i puff my cheeks out.
i sigh, and i look at myself
in the cheap mirrors set out
on the art-room tables.
"not bad," i say to the single line of ultra-fine Sharpie-version of my face.
and it isn't.
even though
i left out the pimple.
Free Bird Jan 2016
My skin is warm
My bones are achey
Wrapped in blankets
Yet I'm still shaking

My head is pounding
My throat is sore
As I lie here ailing
My body's at war

My nose is running
Where to, I'm not sure
As I scour the internet
To find a quick cure

My vision is hazy
As I scroll through my options
Should I really trust random
Internet users' concoctions?

The coughing has started
I've just held back a sneeze
I've got to do something
Before I'm riddled with disease

I'll mix these ingredients
Then down them without attest
If this doesn't work out
At least I tried my best
Megan Sep 2019
This morning I woke up with my hand hurting again.
I wake up most mornings with an ache of some sort,
whether it be physically or emotionally.
I thought, not for the first time, about how
I'm too young for this.
See, I was born into this life with a prescription for
pills written into my ribs.
I've been popping them since before I knew what
they meant, or how they destroy my body.
I haven't always been this achey, but I have always
had something wrong with me.
Anxiety stole my childhood, left me running for the
glowing exit sign that is the end of my life.
And I'm not saying I didn't have a good childhood,
but I grew up fearing that toothpaste would **** me
if I accidentally swallowed too much of it.
I still reap the consquences of anxiety to this day.
I grew up with knee problems and anxiety,
grew into depression and now I have to take pills
just to feel normal again.
And sometimes it doesn't work.
See, some days I feel like a regular kid.
I wake up, go to school, come back to family where
I don't have to wonder if they love me or not.
On these days I feel like I can accomplish anything.
I feel like the world is in my hands and all I have to do
is try.
Other days I'm a walking suicide note.
My bed is quick sand, drawing me further and further
into the black that I can't find my way out of.
There's a tornado sending my thoughts into a spiral
and I'm too dizzy to fix this.
When you're this sad, there is no such thing as a
"minor inconvenience."
Everything that stands in the way, small as it may be,
is another reason on my ever growing list of why
I shouldn't be here.
I stayed up until 6 o'clock this morning wondering
why I haven't signed my name on the goodbye note yet.
I didn't reach out to anyone but I still cried when no
one noticed how broken I am.
But why would anyone notice in the first place?
Why would anyone care?

This morning I woke up with my hand hurting again.
As I was taking my daily pills, I wondered, not for the
first time,
If I took enough pain pills, would it cure my aching
soul, too?
Whether it's your father, your mother, your friend or your lover,
an enemy, a stranger or me.
Whether you feel achey neglect or sweet safety.
Love, regret or conversationality.
Relationships are messy,
completely captured by complexity.

Oh what it would be to sit down face to face,
have mind, body and soul empathically trade place.
You'll feel what I've felt since the day we first met
and know you're a treasure I'll never forget.
I'll finally see what's been hidden from me,
the swirling storms of emotional mystery.

Love me or hate me, I'll survive and adapt, uncertainty is the death of me when my chemicals react.
But there it is. A mess of lies.
Lying to others, lying to ourselves,
the truth lies dusty under beds and on shelves.
A mess of truths that we cannot speak but strongly feel.
So simple and real,
that we can't comprehend,
let alone share with a lover or friend.

Fire, water, food and shelter.
A sad life bereft of love,
to take away your very breath,
but all you need is love...
Until you starve to death.
        - Kevin Schvaneveldt
Insomnimaniac Jul 2013
Sleepy eyes make for achey hearts as I lay here and remember you on the side of the bed opposite me.
I used to think the sun and moon rose solely to shed light on the beauty we created.
But as the beauty died, they still rose.
So now I know I was blinded by the light that we created ourselves.
I know you're drunk and I remember when you used to get drunk off of me and my smell and my kiss and my taste.
And I'm completely sober like always, but I remember being drunk off of you too.
And sleepy eyes make for achey hearts as I realize that the moon and sun never did rise solely to shed light on the beauty we created.
Now, I'm done dying over you, and I'm done grabbing and pulling for your love.
Because I realize now,
After nights of pure pain and darkness and days that seemed to be never-endingly filled with memories of you,
That the sun and moon never ever did rise solely to shed light on the beauty we created.
And they'll continue to rise as long as I continue to breathe.
And even though I don't have you, they'll still rise and fall solely to shed light on the beauty that I can create without you.
So sleepy eyes make for sleepy hearts as I drift away into the light that the moon shines
Solely for me.
Chinny Maia Dec 2019
This a very strange and odd feeling..
Dead exhausted..
Sleep deprived for a week...
Having a nasty migraine..
A bad tummy and aches and pains...
But for some inexplicable reason...
I am in the mood of dancing..
Dancing like i used to do..
Dancing like i danced way back ....

I’m driving home after a horrible n busy night...
I ought to be looking like the dead...
My eyes are heavy...
Can’t see the road ahead..
But for some inexplicable reason ..
I’m feeling like dancing..
I’m blasting loud music in the car..
I’m dancing and driving..
Don’t think i should be doing so..
But I’m dancing like i did way back..

Before i put in the key to my front door..
Backpack , eyes. And feet all heavy and sore...
I connect my phone to the Bluetooth..
On it comes blasting the beats that move my feet...
I ought to be collapsing in bed..
Tired and weary..
But for some inexplicable reason..
I’m stripping and dancing..
To the loud music I’m blasting..

The music is going on non stop..
I’m playing it on repeat
My body, soul and my feet have a rhythm..
Making me feel complete...
I’m still moving, i can’t seem to stop..
I am feeling like both death and life..
I can’t explain it.. my soul is filled with jive..
Oh what a vibe!!
And for some inexplicable reason..
I’m dancing and dancing like my bones aren’t old and weary..
dancing like I’m not all fat and heavy

I’m dancing like i used to way back
Moving from the front to the back
Winding the waist like its not old and achey
The shoulders are rolling and groovy
Yes I’m dancing .. like we did way back

Yes I’m back
Gotten my groove back
Almost forgot i still have all that
Almost forgot what it felt like
To dance like i did way back

I’m still dancing..
Better than i did way back
Oh yes I’m back
So is the rythm and the groove
My soul is renewed
I’m both old and new

Dancing like we did way back
Dancing more than i did way back
Summer time comes and it's time for a swim,
Dipping my toe gingerly in
When your laugh yanks me off my solid ground.
"Stay in the shallow end," I tell myself, remembering our last trip to the pool.
"Dare not to breathe when he pulls you under,
tasting so much like air as he pulls you close,"
Treading water to stay afloat,
Remembering all that lay at your floor,
A Glimmering Treasure Trove
That will too easily become a home.
Surely, I'll get swimmer's heart,
An achey ringing,
In the center of my chest,
The antidote, found in the eyes of
One who could drain the pool
Without Notice.
wm jones Feb 2012
"holy **** it feels like years"

i close my achey eyes and breathe your silhouette.
i smell you, your skin and shampoo and funk,
scents on my pillow become cents in a jar.
i am working hard tonight to become
a mess and alone.
the rain slowed and disappointed me, i hoped
to be washed away.
i hear airplanes and apostrophe,
short of breath and epiphany.
meat-hook and drag me like something worth catching
and carving.
you may eat me alive without ever knowing it.
Hooflip Sep 2014
I can see the pain you try and keep within your teeth..
It’s falling out your eyes,
Trailing lines atop the streets.
Why don’t you sit and talk with me,
My honest ears, just let it out.
I’ll keep it to myself,
Your achey words will never touch my mouth.

You see it as a million mountains
that you have to climb,
I try to show you there’s a simple path,
Just one you have to find.
The dam built in your eyes
Is spilling
Same goes for the one built in your mind.
I want to tear it down,
See you free,
See you running wild.

Imagining, I see your teeth are nothing but a cage
For your tongue,
Imagine all these words just rolling off ablaze.
Oh it would be amazing,
Tasting flare from all your fallout.
The plants retract their claims of faith,
The sun, it seems so dull now.
With you around,
Disaster’s but a shrug & we stay northbound.
Mushroom cloud stepper,
Red pepper, here I call out:
“I could always see your wings,
Since we sat, swaying on the swings.
A presence never made me melt the same,
I doubt one ever will again."
Every time I left the grounds
I kept you somewhere in my mind
Yet every time you wound up close to me
I’d hide behind my eyes.
You hadn’t left my mind but my reality
Had changed a lot
A bit of strength had shifted to my shape
& we could finally talk
Time had come to pass
I’m older, bolder, somewhat of an ***
I play guitar throughout the classes
Ashy from the mornings hash.
You asked me “Could I sing along?”
Or maybe I asked you,
Learned that I could Use Somebody,
hopes of getting close with you.
Our voices filling up the room
Fluorescent flowers start to bloom.
I see a supernova,
Open up my eyes,
all I see is you
I’m flashing back to heart attacks
When first graced by your presence
Now I’m living here in song
With you,
I fight to keep my breath in.
Just so I can let it go,
With time and tone, to flow & meet with yours
And form those meteors
Of heart and soul
We rode with no remorse.

Oh maybe I’m infatuated,
Maybe it’s all lust.
Maybe we are meant to be
But just haven’t fallen up yet,
I await your wings,
To show you things,
To grow and know you well.
You may just wait the same as me,
Only time will tell.
Richie Vincent May 2016
Pass the time
Pass the time
Pass the time

Think of what is not killing you
Let it seep into your skin and let it fill your lungs

Crack your brittle knuckles and pop your achey joints
This is only the beginning
Tie a noose around a tree and let the branch break, just to let yourself know that nature is keeping you alive for a reason

Now think of what is killing you
Let it fill and spill over and under your thoughts
Let it whisper soft meaningless nothings into your ears
Flirt with the idea of crushing a caterpillar just before it blossoms into a butterfly
Let yourself realize that there is beauty in the innocent
Learn that corruption is at every street corner, just begging and pleading for your attention

Pass the time
Pass the time
Pass the time

Give yourself to the wrongdoers
Let your blood bleed dark red onto your favorite t-shirt
Feel knowledgeable and learn consistently
Walk gracefully and fight viciously

There is no bliss in ignorance, just like there is no good in evil
Time is as valuable as diamond
Do not shied yourself from its shine and do not hide in its shadow

When the next opportunity comes, do not pass it
Do not pass the time and do not let it escape you
Breathe in air and exhale fire
Watch the clock like it is your favorite movie, it may just surprise you
Circa 1994 Sep 2014
Ache
Ache
Aches.
Then come the shakes.

Struck in the side
Pelvis
And the face.

Loose fist,
Tight grip,
Eyes closed,
Teeth stripped.

Comatose come down.
Good intentions preceded
Translucent affections.

Ache
Ache
Achey.
everything ached so bad
and i was so heavy
that i felt that if i stepped down to hard,
my kneees would break
and i would melt
into a puddle of unloved and scarred.

ny chest is achey and tight and cold
but my throat is warm and constricting
around my pleas for help.

what words do come out
are angry and emotional
when i cried it was mostly out of deperation.
Madeysin May 2015
Robotics Class,
I never took it,
But I'm sure glad you did,
It left you crooked,
Achey & Weird,
When we kissed it was copper mixed,
With gasoline tears,
Hearts don't break even,
They don't break at all,
Just shrivel up & die,
Until the next one comes along,
I'm not sure if you're replaceable.
Chicka chicka bow wow
Cooped within ancient bodies,
this inhabitant dwells amongst an elder net
of crabby, crotchety, curmudgeonly claque
of old folks, only a portion of population I met
which achey, flaky, kooky motley crue
disgruntlement fed as peevish pet
aye be earnest asper my assessment,
but some (quite frankly) getting ready and set
to lay down their limb mitt less lives,
even those who survived harrowing encounters as a vet.
-----------------------------------------------------------
­quotidian gossipers punctuate air waves while:
sitting, riding, quartering, puttering, operating, navigating,
motoring around on scooters (the sole means of locomotion

for many elderly residents),
whose sole occupation incorporates:
zapping, yelping, yakking, whining,
weeping, verbalizing, venting,
uttering, undulating, thundering,
squawking, squabbling, screeching,
rumbling, rattling, quibbling, quarreling,
prattling, pestering, okaying,
offending, needling, nagging, mumbling,
maligning, leering, lampooning,
kvetching, kibitzing, jesting, jabbering,
irritating, insinuating, heckling,
harping, glomming, gabbing, fulminating,
fretting, exclaiming, emoting,
denigrating, damning, carping, cackling,
bragging, begging, agitating, acting  
analogous to bad *** kids itching
for playground foo fight during recess,  

which comparison might be apropos
since majority of energy and time expended
complaining about nobody's business
concerning this, that, or another tenant...
thee management not exempt from
badmouth outbursts), where nondenominational
AARP qualified members congregate
within what constituted former auditorium
of repurposed elementary school,

hence quite some years ago (an honorable
NON GMO gluten free cheerful toast made,
instituting batter use then building standing vacant)
a bona fide unanimous dogmatic, heroic,
linguistic welcome sans titular viz zit head
where alumni of alluded alma mater, ivory fiery,
classy academic solvent atomic structure
became amalgamated, appropriated,
assigned a new life, whereat fob dost
electronically activate innermost recessed sliding doors,
principally, quintessentially, resoundingly availing maw
formerly entrancing students into
Schwenksville Elementary School,
though some years ago repurposed
with barely a trace constituting current subsidized
how zing facility re: Highland Manor,

the residence of thyself and missus
(approaching third month anniversary),
whereat I dune hot give a rats *** if aimless
airless baseless banter, ceaseless chatter,
dubious dabbling, et cetera if this solitary
ruminate thinker the subject de jure
of parlayed people portraying
penultimate purposelessness.
Connor Apr 2016
Forest phantom imagery
haunting stereophonic instrumentals
from Murals
whispering     on in nights    fine tent
wrapt up in my sleeping bag and only hearing dynamite as clouds
pass into the afterlife and
the moon has blossomed
the ocean!
Whole Blue Cliff Record lit in here on a bright canvas,
trees can see me saving paper,
Asian telltales, poetics,
and Buddhist Zen philosophy
swirls in my Mystic/Sombrio harp-brain
vivid by lucid shrillness
(achey wakey!!)
Turn the pillow
snap a mental image of that modern monk,
imaginary in his waterfront Salvation Army and his
Glass Temple and his
blasted literature.
His tearful dreams, logical processes... so that it's okay (zzz) always (zzzzz) what's that up there, Shiva?
I am atom, you are ATOMIC
There's a difference here I promise (ASTRONOMICAL)

The waves demand their presence to be known by periodic lion-like clamor, my lips are dry from fireside cider and absolute darkness fills up this space like water, oh cosmic libertine! Snap their starless net to catch the sea and a luminous fish which I may be presented with like inky flashes of thought courtesy of the streetlight moon who's pale properties signal GO
to those willing to decipher it's surface from this far away..
All the quiet beat down trees murmur muffled truth.

This truth is only available to dogs and Christ,
but not me, not any normal soul who's mortal vision is too blurred to make anything out of yet..this Springtime tapestry just a fragment
to an ETERNAL NOISE
which may be faintly audible past the waves
who try their best to stamp it out of perception.
But I am feeling particularly meditative tonight!
I'll at the very least stroke the thin top layer of absolute knowledge
and do so with heightened, trained consciousness..
when the moment is right
which may not be now
(definitely not now)
quelled by flesh and sleepy daze,
onyx silk covering us in warmth..but I will get there!
An Everest for any to see but exclusive to those who can.
Climbing higher in years
emotional trials
loves and fears
or passing seasons where I signify the apparent shift with
a name
(Parade)
or
(Pendulum)
Out from under
But not yet completely unwrapped from
The Mosaic
to see it all stretched open,
beautiful and tragic.
Miss Honey Nov 2014
The thunder rumbles in sore throats

and rivers of yellow speak of high hopes

for the people who plant flowers and complain to pollen

the earth will give you too many chances to worry about sunflowers

because drizzles help

until there you are,

achey muscles and grey face ******* on Ricola

crossing a street to go to work

and how does it happen to be that the first day of rain in a month comes on the day you lose your sunshine

Well today the sun came in a bottle of Tropicana

and tomorrow I will count the losses of those who just can’t take one rainy day
machina miller Feb 2017
the anti-siren alarm song
collapses the dimensions of the oneiric realm,
fidgeting infinitesimally,
the tangled engine of acidic tubes
combusts last nights pepperoni bacon chorizo pizza

all of sparta trembles
stalagmites shake loose and dust the bedclothes,
cemented eye-lashes decalcify and split,
as two stumbling gargantuan steps
off the promontory of your bed
lead an unguided hand to the light-switch

the florescent hum gnaws at you
a singular parameter in the speaking mind's running mouth
“caffeinate me”

a hill, no, a mountain, no, a sheer abyss
'the stairs', a godly ascent
an ascent for winged creatures of light
creatures with legs for arms, zeppelin-like centipedes
legs whose construct are Dalían,
nightmarish vaulting apparatuses,
whose step is a bound and whose bound is a flight,
as if all of the thirteen foot-tall steps become cliffsides
and all of the cliffsides become interdimensional worm-holes
as the distance between two mustard seeds grows
and exceeds the circumference of the universal ellipse
we see our premonitions are of infinite potentiality.

resignedly, we take the first step
the next twelve follow succinctly.

we reach the ochre chamber of caffeine
only to be halted by a question
a sempiternal question,
a question of mythic, unverifiable stature
a plaguing question,
a question rooted
in our achey-breaky hearts and nigh-arthritic bones,
rooted in the seeping pathos
of our ritualized morning zombie-shuffle:
but it doesn't get asked today, we drink coffee
the world is right-side up again.
"before the sun rises the world is upside down
this i will prove with the informal, childish logic of prose"
magnoliajelly Nov 2014
i don't want this to have taught me the ways
and reasons as to why i should grow cold
if anything, i want to look at this cavernous thing
inside of me that you left behind and think:
i know how to love. i know how to love so much.

and for you, it was not enough.
or it was too much.
i'm not sure.
but i allowed myself to see myself
through loving you
and no i don't think thats unhealthy
i have learned about the love that lies in me
i know that it will pick itself up,
brush off all this disappointment,
and twice tasted hurt
and achey remembrances
and say to itself, "you are so good,
your love is so good."  

*monday 10:19 p.m. november.3.2014
Joanna Oz Jul 2015
chugging bile and liquor closed eyes smell the innards of a joint wrapped in oilslicked stain shoveling sugar thrice processed into vocal chords left silenced but for the coughing up of shriveled lungs set ablaze to ease the twitching triggered by the mistress doused in white who scaffolds into crumbling nasal caverns to numb the brain that dreams of god in guilty refrain and whips thorny obedience to words siphoned through ghosts of men and obedience to the inflated heads of state and corporate banks who play Skinnard's game and always win millions of yes-men nodding their heads in addiction to artificial green leaves printed with blood and even lovers twirling passion in their beds have their eyes squeezed shut clutching at darkness slick and disappearing at the touch of pulsing fingertips racing to bury themselves in skin and forget the achey organs that lay waiting within weary and smothered from covering up thoughts too sharp to breathe in...

--it's all hide and seek.
running and running and running
from bare and open
vulnerability
shrouded underneath
layers
of reflected identities
and neuro-chemistry
and material fortresses
and snarled teeth
and synthetic bliss
wrapped in bitter bumblebees.

don't you think it's time you swallowed
the wince it takes
to glimpse your fear's shadows?
Joanna Oz Sep 2014
rigid steel creaking,
squeaking to announce
it's monumental motion,
defying once static devotion
hear ye! hear ye!
the rusted machine is
jolting back to life
like clockwork, completing
patterns encoded by
calloused fingertips, pressing,
pushing, prodding, pleading with
stiff, achey keys to
punch
the storyline
back
into
place.

naive program under illusion
of sentient choice,
springs open arms
to rejoice the repeated reinforcement
of recurrent information,
fed & regurgitated & re-ingested to be fermented
in crystalline form of mind,
tinkered into alignment
by sinister hands with crude cracks,
leaking oil.

discordant dance of metal,
twirling tango
wrought with perilous footwork
to outline the model of assumed complexity
that shrouds the simple harmony
of one-two one-two -
one step after the other, followed by another
steady rhythm of cause & effect.
go head, neglect, or reject, only to
crawl back in reflection to beg for
one more turn round the ferris wheel,
to glimpse the heights of insanity
that reach ultimate clarity
of infinite perspectives unfolding,
one into another, projected onto lovers
and strangers - all alike.

add your rambling writing
of realizations, remembrances, & rehearsals
onto my hard drive,
I want to reiterate - I am learning slowly.
rereading &
restructuring pages
of this minute history.
maybe one day I'll recall
that practice
precedes progress.
Deana Luna Jun 2014
i could smear luscious roses on his *****
drool a raw achey mess as he watches
(worship his sordid *****
licking my face so sweet
a frantic hell of goddesses
and)- He
Enormous Storm
revealing
spray me sucker !!!!/!
Emily Mary Apr 2016
I want to write about how much I love you;
how your voice sounds like the ambient led zeppelin tunes that blanket my body in goosebumps
or how your olive green eyes have a ring of tree bark brown that gaze at me like I’m a queen
Maybe it’s how you treat me like a queen, you caress my skin like it’s made of gold and silver
You act as if all you wish to do is place me on a throne made of lilacs and constellations
Because you know how much I love flowers and how fascinated I am with the endless night sky
The way you make my heart feel heavy like mount everest is sitting on my chest is jaw dropping
With your lips dripping of honey as you tell me how much you love me
But you refuse to believe me when I say, you too are worthy.
You have to realize in my aquamarine eyes you are the only one I see
Even with thick grey smoke floating through the air from our cheap cigarettes every inhale is a breathe of fresh air when I am next to you.
I don’t know how else to tell you how much I care for you, but please know you are worth so much more than couch hopping and self reliance.
You can depend on me at 3 am when you’re restless and your eyes refuse to shut
You can depend on me to rub your back when it’s achey and sore,
You can depend on me to just be there when you need someone to hold.
I am not obligating you to do the same, and I understand I don’t need to beg,
because behind every loyal queen, is her king.
Shayuna Williams Nov 2017
You sought after, sparkling, shining ornament, you.
Hasn't anyone ever told you that you have diamonds for eyes?
When I say diamonds, what I really mean is a room full of mirrors.
Walls and ceilings and their endless streams of crystal laughter.
It echoes until I picture myself pulling my own hair out.
I grimace at the thought of the pain, so I braid it instead.

There's a surface harmony, I'd say.
If we were to wear our feelings as clothing,
you'd fit into an ensemble of red and roaring pride.
As for me, I'd find myself in the green shades of
hand-me-down jealousy.
When I say jealousy, what I really mean is
watching the boy I like look at you like you are Mount Everest
makes me feel like an anthill.
When he invites his best friend to join him and I for lunch
so "things don't get awkward" and asks me how you are doing
like you are a symphony
makes me feel like elevator music.
And when I say elevator music, what I really mean is
mindless, empty, nothing.
Unnoticeable.
Unappreciated.
Unworthy of being listened to.
He hears me, sure. But, he doesn't listen.

And that is not your fault.
You are not the one who broke my heart.
You are not the one who used distance as a weapon.
You are not the one who didn't care how it affected me.
You are not the one who didn't love me;
he is.

Friend, it is not because of you that I compare myself to
that one book that never leaves the shelf.
To dwarf planets.
To the first and last slices of off-brand, out-dated, white bread.
It is not because of you that I feel you are more and I am less.
It is not because of you that I have a hard time
swallowing my insecurities.
It is not because of you that I feel I am in a cage, rusty, hanging.
It is not because of you that I feel jealous.
That I feel unnoticeable,
unappreciated,
unworthy of being listened to.
It is because I have allowed myself to feel that way.
It is because of me.

Our friendship is a house I forget to clean,
a garden I have not watered in weeks.

Tell me, how else can fresh air ever come in
if you don't open the windows?

Please, forgive me for the achey, cold moments
where my "never mind" translated into "you made this mess".

You did not make this mess.
You did not make this mess, but you are complex.
And when I say complex, what I really mean is
you are paintings of baby cherubs and roses
on dome ceilings.
You take your time; I can be impatient.

Yet, my dear, dear friend,
your result is a masterpiece.

Friendship is a fine art and deserves to be treated as such.

And I
am so, so
sorry.
Stephanie May 2015
42
My life has turned into a series of numbers:
days, dollars, pounds;
like an equation in math class
my life has become too complex
to complete without technological assistance.
Even forming words,
it feels like I’m counting:
letters, syllables, lines,
like maybe if I just keep calculating,
I’ll find the remedy for it all,
find the answer to my heavy head,
because if the answer to the ultimate question
of life, the universe, and everything
is 42
then maybe I can plug it in
behind the “equals” sign
and solve for “x,”
solve for the achey bones and weary eyes,
solve for the rusted parts of our souls,
but I’m tired of trying to find an answer,
because maybe there is no answer,
maybe we’re all just a bunch of monkeys
on a spinning rock,
all of us just trying to survive
before our sun collapses.
And maybe that’s okay.
Nick Russo Jan 2015
One in the Friday morning
stuck sitting achey with pipes bubbling & back bent slightly forward
15 by 20 room with dull beauty dimly revealed by silent blue light strung up without much thought for maximum convenience and conservation of precious energy.
Old friend, still young sits left and speaks of learning from his fathers past mistakes.
Mind alive and racing tirelessly like agitated horses on an old Paris track with feet as wet as the grass in my lawn or really anyone's lawn on any given morning when dew might show it's illusive glistening face.
Only illusive due to this reasoning.
We are never awake to see the sun rise or to smell the always punctual dawn air hop out of bed and greet the day cheerfully as is so seldom seen in this ancient young city.
I've had too much gin
Nat Lipstadt Mar 2020
improving our collective lives, one pandemic poem at a time...

<>

a stray-dog-thot that bites my ankle,
saying ouch, you see a poem here?

it’s 1:14AM on a Sunday and generally I see at this generalized
pre-dawn, can’t sleep pleistocene period, non-extinct poems
roaming everywhere.

but the pandemic on my mind and giving me pause to wonder
how much can I love, and a questioner-poet needs and desires an answer,
post haste, pre apocalyptic.

S. travels for two days by airplane to fulfill a promise
only to find out, upon arrival, the promise made is
pandemic cancelled.

but the-promise-I-made silently, to her, faraway, that she never heard,
for why, stir-up-the-ruckus, asking for a visit from the evil eye,
if she falls ill, coming back to me, is stone cold stolid, no cancellation policy,
I will:

nurse her, brush her hair, anticipate the achey need normal, before she can ask,
hold my body’s warmth full and frontal, a cooling blanket for heated times,
retrieve her ***** tissues from the floor and make lousy jokes about her lousy aim.

and what I wrote, “improving our collective lives, one poem at a time,”
is here institutionalized, organized, galvanized, mesmerized,

legitimized and lionized,

proving only that stray-dog-thots @nite, they  bite,
hard immediate, and that
later is never better

she would say,
“what would I do without you, my children so far away,”
my reply instanced, nuanced, instantaneously, non-Amazon delivered with a double frosted eye twinkle, no-extra-charge,
“hey! that why I get the big bucks, god’s love to deliver!”

she, a profound atheist, snorts with practiced derision, which is fine,
cause I see the welling, tear droplets, laced with viral virus communicators, smiling weakly, asking, instructing a cure:
“play for me some Janis and some Joni, some Mozart and Mahler, climb in beside me, my old man, let us, let us rock our gypsy souls, drinking a case of each other.”


who could refuse such a invitation... to become the plasma of the sun’s corona, if only for a moment

<>



1:38am Sunday March 15th, Twenty Twentyfold
“For Who?” (an excerpt)

by Mary Weston Fordham

Should dark sorrows make thee languish,
     Cause thy cheek to lose its hue,
In the hour of deepest anguish,
     Darling, then I’ll grieve with you.
Though the night be dark and dreary,
     And it seemeth long to thee,
I would whisper, “be not weary;”
   I would pray love, then, for thee.

Well I know that in the future,
    I may cherish naught of earth;
Well I know that love needs nurture,
    And it is of heavenly birth.
But though ocean waves may sever
     I from thee, and thee from me,
Still this constant heart will never,
    Never cease to think of thee.

__________________________
Mary Weston Fordham was born around 1843. She ran her own school during the Civil War and worked as a teacher for the American Missionary Association. She is the author of Magnolia Leaves (Tuskegee Institute, 1897) and died in 1905.

— The End —