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Where Shelter May 2018
trigger warning:
Hate long poems?  move on.
Love words?  pleasure your self

<=>

drought and famine of the spirit,
over-staying summer
house guests in an overly sun blanched,
voided, white outed, mental abode.

faculties parched,
overly starched,
compositions lost in transition,
why can't they make it ashore?

It's after 2 AM, and though
ferries have stopped running,
mainland hangover hangerons are
working overtime to prevent
"author"izations, so all I get
when I press send is a whole lot of
"permission to cross," denied!

causes of vexation undisguised,
dual natured and manifold,
luxuriating and drowning in home grown,
city organic insipid,
makes one quick to blame
nobody in particular,
but yourself, repeatedly.

reasons many, the distractions of
rustling contradictions populate,
another life road fork looming,
a track record for choosing badly,
colors the blacktop even blacker and
ramps up desires for a janitorial,
but first do no harm, status quo.

Need a beer.
Need a distraction.
Need a homework assignment,
which I buy at the IGA market:

obey the eleventh commandment
which every writer knows;
you think you're Mr. Bigshot,
so pudding prove it,
write it,
one true sentence,
let it be a constitution for all,
with the lengthy consistency,
of a Hemingwayesque,
one true sentence.

dearth to riches occurs
as fast as a basketball
three second violation,
inspiration dripping like
windshield condensation,
got so many true sentences,
how ya gonna choose,

O sinner man?

sadly you don't hear or feel
my background music,
stringed surf sounds playing
Perlman's Mozart low to
the thunderous, sweltering,
swells of applause of
90+ degree heat
w/o a Crescent Beach breeze
to console the disowned

these superheated thoughts
now focused,
emerges a bill of sight,
lading my heart's many heresies,
staccato thoughts now,
rapid fire rebel,
a pre-discourse insurrection,
voices of words lash out -

pick me - immortalize me,
I wanna be,
a constitution for one,
one true sentence.

The Moment of Ownership.

Hillel did it,
standing on one leg,
a Sanskrit mantra,
not by me,
not for me,
not through me,
even more succinct.

full clarity unobtainable,
begin when fighting thru
the static of each nerve,
knowing that
each thought,
each emotion,
is a constitution
of sorts,
recognizing life is a series of
moments of ownership,
but that are truly ours
only when relinquished.

each one, a true sentence
when writ, spoke,
but only when disabused
of notions of possession
only true, when gifted away.

Lucian Freud painted those whom
he knew best, their portraits,
fully clothed but wholly naked,
a painter of revelation
thru the skin tones of the flesh.

exposeur of skins interior
displayer of old and ungainly,
left us eyesight more true
than an honest mirror,
with poetic brushstrokes overlay,
gained entry to what his
grandfather named id and ego,
artist's superego, his reflections,
a continuous judgment
on a pool of stretched canvas
that makes me despair that:

I will ere succeed
to cross the borderline
that modernity insists upon,
self preservation, neurotic fears,
impositions on my psyche and
that my moments of ownership
will be n'ere be stamped "transferred."

I take back my life,
by giving it away
this alphabetized self portrait,
a wrinkled sketch of me,
my ownings, undertakings
needs taking by you
so I can disown it.

these words are my own,
their conjunction is a
junction to you,
and a constitution for me.

once this expiation
is in your purview by the voted
election of Send,
bonded by a mutual
Moment of Ownership?

so net net,
bottom line,
these are my
one true sentences,
summarized, constitutionalized:
I am yours, for the taking,        
so come by, for and through me,
in many moments of ownership.


p.s. let us shelter together in place, an island growing
lost for many years; for Mary Winslow
Ariel Baptista Jan 2015
Black box breaking
Slowly breaking
Slowly
I saw the cracks
I saw them ripple down her back
I saw the freeze and thaw of nations
The renaissance and death and renaissance
I saw the wealth and worth of world powers
I saw them crumble
I was there
And I am here
I read it all and wrote it down
I saw it all and wrote it down
I kissed the survivors and wrote it down
I saw the earth in its entirety
I fell in love and vomited and fell in love
I saw her in her emptiness
I saw her sway in the winds
The winds grew cold and colder
She grew old and older
And so distraught
Mangled
Destroyed
Derailed
Demolished
Stripped of poise and polish
Stripped of it all
I saw her disintegrate
I saw her fall
Still I,
I still
I always standing
Watching still
Always seeing
Standing and seeing, I
Drinking tea
Calm, cool, collected, serenity

Now your turn
You see me
See me walking down the street
See my waist-long wavy hair
Blonde and sparkling in the sun
Lipstick smile
Hipbones and cheekbones chiseled and deadly
Long leg strut down the runway
Of center town sidewalks
The world is my oyster
See my backpack full of alphabetized books
Handwriting neat and perfect
Pen behind my ear I’m ready
For all of this
See me smoking cigarettes out my dorm room window
Listening to Mozart
And smiling fully when the strings jump in
See me on the park bench reading
Long Russian novels
I inhale the pages like heartbeats
In-hale
Ex-hale
In-hale
Ex-hale
Breaths and beats fully synchronized to the flipping of pages
And to the Metronome Mozart wrote me.

Don’t be deceived
I made my world and destroyed it and made my world
Independent to a fault
I made my living off stitching together broken bones
And melting old forgotten thrones
Sculptures that said I needed no one
No one could keep up anyway
I ran too fast
I ran all day
And kindof expected someone to care
But no one ever has
I was never worth the trouble
Pull me out from my own rubble
And kiss me if you can
No one knows my secret plan to live an embarrassing convention
All this glass is just pretention
I glued it together myself
I wrote my own pamphlet for self help
I pieced together my own face
I sculpted my own form and adorned it
I broke my own heart and mourned it
I arrived and left and arrived
And here I’ll stay
Black box breaking
Slowly breaking
Slowly
I saw the cracks
I saw them from the start
Death and renaissance and death
***** and love and *****
Pearson Bolt Aug 2015
i stick the plaintive letters
of friends and family amidst
the pages of my favorite books
they mark choice passages
concerning our species and the
fate of this ancient universe

one desperate plea for me to
return to the hypocrisy of Christianity rests in my copy of Camus's essay "the Rebel"
tucked nearby Dawkins'
"god Delusion" and Bakunin's
"god and the State" which share
a space with unholy texts on science
art and philosophy on the top row
of my overflowing
alphabetized bookshelf

on a silent Sunday drive home from
church some years ago i
once asked why it was such
a crime to believe in myself
my father imparted it was
an insult to my 
invisible creator
well here’s a ******* to 

my mythological maker
i don’t need you
i’ve got two feet 

planted firmly 
beneath me
i stand strong beside the ones
who resist a culture of misanthropy

i am what i am
a wanderer waylaid in the chasm
of gray matters
i no longer see the world in
shades of black pitch and white snow
your absolute truth is sharp
and out of tune with the
empirical realities of nature
i am not a zealot inculcated
on the drug of elitist predestination
i refute the elixir of everlasting life
heaven is a dream that keeps
us numb to the hellscapes around us

i face the unknown sobered by a
measurable cosmos which wasn't
made just for me to see
but spawned all we call
reality in the throes of a fourteen billion
year old eruption that flung planets
and stars into existence

we are amiss upon a floating rock
adrift in outer-space and instead of
utilizing our capacity for ingenuity to
cultivate a sustainable community
we looked towards the skies
and fashioned gods in our own image
we made god compassionate—a benevolent  
creator who breathed life into nothingness
we made god hideous—a malevolent
dictator deciding the destinies of the unfortunate
we engineered division where once was
sanctity and instigated violence on the
premise that one faith was better
than the other but
they all ring hollow
if you ask me

i am not a sheep and your Christ
is not my shepherd
i am not a timid and pitiable creature
stumbling along after some imaginary master
Jesus of Nazareth was a revolutionary
executed for instigating rebellion
against the Empire of Rome
he said nothing about waging endless war
in fact he urged his followers
to turn the other cheek
i imagine he'd be rolling in his grave
if he could see them know—provided
of course
he hadn't so famously vacated it

riddle me this
why do you hate two men who cherish
each other when your savior said
the greatest commandment was just
to love and be loved by one another
if the etymology of Christian is
Christ follower why not cherish the
lines of red in your holy book
your god bled and died for

even the most progressive of faiths
pale in comparison to the certainty of
evolution or the terror of global climate change
why mythologize that which we don't
understand when history shows that
we only learn more and grow with time
when we question everyone and everything
why dwell in circumstantial metaphysics
when we can just as easily admit
we don't have the faintest clue

i arraign myself against any warped faith
that privileges bigotry and arrogance
i reject the religion of atheism and
buddhism and Christianity
i stand apart from the ethos of
Hindus and edicts of Islam
i have no gods and no masters
my conscience is my only authority
i'm the only one who can
save me from me

in my father's latest letter
packed safely away in Carl
Sagan's "the Demon-Haunted World"
he informs me that i'm
the prodigal son that some
doting deity awaits me
at the gates of heaven
to put a ring on my finger and
slaughter a fattened calf for my
welcome home dinner but
how did an omnipresent god
not deign to ascertain
i'm a vegetarian
Kate Lion Jan 2013
You are the unbearable sort of thing that I wouldn’t want to wear on my feet, even with boots laced up to the knees, because wearing you would force me to cover my polka-dotted toes,
And anyone who would want to compromise my innocence like that is horribly patterned and dull,
                                              
Like the lone argyle sock with the tag still attached that I hate, gathering dust on that shelf in the rain, where the rest of my unwelcome thoughts have found place
                                                           ­     The ones that can’t cover my insecurities
                                                    ­                            Or don’t flatter my figure at all
              
                There’s an obvious scab on my ankle that won’t heal
                Embarrassing, really
                It came from my unwavering faith in open-toed stilettos
                                You saw it just the other day
                                And I blushed as I tried to pull my pant leg over the sore, but you knew (I think)

Oh, the puzzling urge I have to be made over by the brains of your outfits!
                                                So I can open a closet of conversation topics that would suit both of us just fine

I think
                                                I have shed 18 years of ideas in the past two weeks
                                                I starved myself until I could fit into the apparel of your approval
                                                Which I claw through my closets but still cannot find
                                                But I know that somewhere in my brain beneath an empty toilet paper roll or stuck on a dead branch of ideas is a match to your unbearable pattern-
              
Perhaps if I’d kept my opinions more alphabetized, I would’ve found it sooner
                Blast, my scattered brain that can’t seem to produce any fashion but faux pas for you
                Logic and emotion were never meant to mix like this- trust me, I know well
Give me a summer to rearrange myself, hmm?
                Or will I have no use of you then…

If only I’d started to realize sooner
We’d be peeling oranges and discussing the oldest styles of thought, you and I
                Beneath an umbrella in the rain
                                You wouldn’t be able to see that odd scab on my ankle
                                Because I would have the other lone argyle sock with the tag still attached that I hate-

I feel that perhaps
you are only unbearable because I wish you complimented me better, that perhaps the reason I’m starving myself of all reason is because I’d like nothing more than to openly say
that I hate you, my lone, little argyle sock
                                                but that is only
                                                because right now, I could never possibly hope to wear you
Grizzo Mar 2015
FRIDAY
1:00 – 3:30

I swept the packing area.
Three neat piles of duct tape,
plastic wrap, saw dust, dumped
into a trashcan. Made
another mess while packing
toys into boxes for the
community’s Angel Tree.

MONDAY
11:15 - 12:45

A self-proclaimed alcoholic
asked me for a cigarette. He
preached to me with an unsteady
tongue and hollow eyes. I met a case
worker named Maria and alphabetized
children’s names and Christmas wishes.

2:30 - 4:30         

Stapled $7.00 price tags
to shirt collars, pants pockets,
working alongside a man
who served ten years in
prison. He finished loading
a shopping cart and I pushed
the items into the store.
I put cracked ceramic plates,
dusty books, and twisted wire
roosters onto an empty shelf.

TUESDAY
2:30 – 3:30         

Maria turned the wish forms
into Captain Smith. I went
to the Captain’s office and
entered Christmas wishes
into a database. Captain Smith
tapped her fingers on the desk,
hummed along to her Christian
radio station and talked about
the importance of volunteers.

3:45 – 5:00          

The yard on the east side
of the store needed to be
cleaned. Plastic wrap blown
into the barbed wire fence
surrounding broken computers,
archaic metal heaters, and
miscellaneous types of scrap.
After we loaded the trailer
I swept the packing area
and smoked a cigarette.

WEDNESDAY
11:15 – 1:30          

I finished entering the
forms into Captain
Smith’s computer
while she was out
at lunch. I walked around
outside but I didn’t find
the drunk. Captain
Smith signed my
completion of volunteer
service sheet and joked,
“I guess we won’t be
seeing you again.”
I volunteered at the Salvation Army in college during my last semester. This poem came from my experiences there.
Published in HSU Corral and St Edward's New Literai Graduate journal.
E Jan 2014
You are shelves holding the books, alphabetized and happy.
You are the ink soaked in the page.
Outdoors, you are the sea chasing the shore.
You are also the glowing candle flame at dusk,
bright and encumbered by no darkness.

However, you might be interested to know
You are not the broken window,
nor are you the dog's yipping bark
through the screen door.
You could never possibly be the
dog's bark.

Instead, you are the thin, glassy waves polishing the shore,
You are the steel bridge between two lands,
You might even be the sleeping apples, tucked inside the pie.
I am quite sure you are also the handshake between two strangers,
as well as the writing on this page.

You should also know that, in all the plentiful imagery of the world,
I am the needle crackling on the vinyl record.
I am also the artist's filthy paintbrush.
I can also be, at times, the tea steeped too long,
and of course, I am the postcard, en route.

But you--you are the cobalt sea at midnight, snuggled to the shore,
You are the coffee-colored shelf supporting the books,
and somehow also, the ink imprinted on the page.
For my love. Inspired by the great Billy Collins, and his poem with the same title.
Tearani C Oct 2013
If we were two books who happened to cross covers
Or over lap tittles,
In a momentary lack of structure
You would find us stacked back to back
As unlikely as a tragedy with star struck lovers..
Happened upon the other
in a library archiving
Written word and lives, and eons worth of soft
Text typed,

I would be a book of Russian poems
Roughly speaking of beautiful things,
With a bare textured cover, a soft sea foam green.
And you would be lost in the meaning,
In the reflections of your wealth
I would give you all the answers you hide inside your self,

You would be of another breed,
Your italic headings speaking of vastly different things,
You would show a thousand places I wish to know,
With a hundred hand drawn maps
Filled to the indentation with
realities greater than my own imagination
with pictures
That capture you, whisper liberation,
You would be the inspiration every trapped
lower class individual looks upon while dreaming up
Vacation homes.
You are the window to the places everyone
Everyone wants to know
Your pages crisp but warm, smelling of vanilla
Not a single scuff, crease, you are not torn.
A soft Carmel brown cover where
A hundred careful fingers hover.

You are probably thinking we don’t belong together.
Not in a library alphabetized and
Split into sections,
Good thing great librarians
Know better, she
Stole us and set us together in her own
Private collection.
There is no where I fit better than
Next to you, pressed cover to cover,
we are becoming  a story of
unlikely lovers,
We are best friends,
Penned from different ink
Speaking different themes
meeting
Resting between book ends designed
Out of clever minds set out to
To fuzz the line between actuality
And your aspiration,
We are just the perfect combination of
Drive and a dream,
The fact you are here means something
And the more I read the more it seems
Together we'll achieve great things.
when I reached the age of reason I hit the ground,
running. the thought flits
across compact mirror smudged from years of overuse &
abandon, left behind
in purse bottoms and backpacks every time I switch up my style &
move on to something:
new/ fresh / else.  

a glance into glass &
I'm transported: a babe on white lambskin,
a second-hand nostalgia never wholly mine.
a missing, another memory removed,
a down-to-the-wire tally
added to the roster, unexpectedly
the emotional prodigy, ostracized
alongside destined veracity: as in my absolute
devotion to                                                               ­            TRUTH!
the time skip, a box-out, a blackout, a kindness.
a comfort over the desk chair where homework            completes itself
after countless 'mixtape playlists' limewired maniacally
alphabetized, rearranged & revised until dawn/

another decade/chapter: a bookworm,
a blockout, a maneuver 'round roadblock,
a machination, a manipulation, a deadening, a defeat,
an assistant Mother only a child
self, the intrigue... yet

here I am, a spectacle,  
a miracle, a smashing, a light on an island out at sea,
an accident, a ripening survived.

can I trust myself. to dive in. for/by myself?
when I lift the stretch of lambskin from an atticked brown box,
a painted porcelain plate hits the ground,
shattered.
cptsd is a *****.
dc Jun 2015
001
to break the silence
you play some of your CD's
vertical rows of plastic jewel boxes
never properly alphabetized
Paintings of the dead,
organized by hue and shade,
grouped by color,
in all different arrays.

Alphabetized,
books stacked on a shelf.
Blank pages,
read aloud to oneself.

If you shed a light,
on the synchronized,
human lives,
we are living,
you will see we are all one being.

Dead bodies aligned,
in a mile long row,
how those people died,
nobody seems to know.

Flowers in a field,
pushing through the soil,
crushed under the weight,
of drills drilling for oil.

If you shed a light,
on the synchronized,
human lives,
we are living,
you will see we are all one being.

Waves crash softly,
into a weathered shore,
only to recede and repeat,
dragging sea shells to the ocean floor.

If you shed a light,
on the synchronized,
human lives,
we are living,
you will see we are all one being.

The weight of the world,
rests on the shoulders of man.
And trust me, I know,
we're doing all we can.
Copyright Barry Pietrantonio
Love Nov 2013
A pick here,
And a pick there,
Before I know it,
I'm bleeding,
Then there's a scab.

A spot on the floor,
I have to make it clean.

A hair out of place,
It has to be moved.

Books out of order,
Movies not alphabetized,
Shirts not color coded in the closet,
Shoes not put in a perfect line,
A messy binder...

These things drive me insane.
Simple things that normal people dont care about,
Or just look over,
A sentence not beginning with a capital letter,
Or not having any punctuation at the end.
They make me tick.

They say I have a thing called OCD.
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder,
I don't have a disorder,
I just want things neat,
Organized,
And clean.

Is there something wrong with that?
Apparently OCD is a very serious thing, and it just progresses and gets worse...I don't know. I didn't think there was anything wrong with wanting things organized, clean, and controlled.
Mary R Short Mar 2014
Imagine me running around
A mad blur, hair standing on end
With pencils and things sticking out
Post-its go flying
And a stack of newspapers and magazines topples like a tower.

I'm forgetting something
I chew my bottom lip trying to remember
Then remember ten other things
But still can't grasp the first.

Really, I'm more organized than this
I insist
Everything in its place
Alphabetized, polished and underlined
All my little duckies in a neat row
Checked and double checked
Quality-controlled.

I drop one marble and madness ensues.
Maybe I can't live in a bubble
                 >pop<
And some chaos must tear through.
Amy Perry Aug 2013
Fingers delicately trace
The bounded bounty
Of paper and ink
That lie before me
In neatly organized
Shelves.
Carefully alphabetized.
Without knowledge of genre,
I walk the aisles
Waiting for inspiration.
A spark of interest.
Choosing a book
Is half the fun
And walking home
Choice in arms
Already wondering
What my next choice
Will be.
Recognizing the fun and excitement of picking out a book.
index finger of left hand
     (likened to Michelangelo
meticulously chiseling away
     at marble block), this poe
whit attempts to coax (zealously
     tap into his latent indivisible quo
shunt, sans self imposed

     quotidian literary endeavor slow
lee witnessing, an emergent
     reasonably satisfactory, though
hooping unbeknownst readers
     (perchance even a scribe from Yugo
Slav via) will only resort
     to lard out positive unsolicited feedback,

yet this scrivener well aware
bluntness evokes
     fulfillment loud and clear
inflating jowly machismo thru ether
narcissist quintessential rabid glare
     unpretentious vain warbling yakking

     zither plucking boastful demonstrably
     fatuous haughtily immodest luminaire
dismissively smug,
     sans literary endeavor aye share
thus, tis one objective when attempting
     to corral rampant thoughts,

     (that charge hither and yon, to and fro)
     at pace of greased lightening tear
chasing hash-tagged elusive
     Smokey and the Bandit
imp posse sub bull
     back to the future of 1977 year  

temporarily abandoning awoke
motive, i.e. initial challenge,
     viz going for broke
to sweat blood and tears
     digging deep within noggin, or choke
myself if merely draw blanks

     versus (beginners blind luck), and evoke
accolades accidentally
     tapping into creative
     (qua literary) mother lode
     joining belle lettres authored folk,
whose metier comprises compendium

     of alphabetized words
     receiving surprising windfall
     asper pig in a poke,
novel idea after nostrils emit smoke
the amazing dragon
     within (sol fully bellows)  
     finding me to feign taking a smoke

aware fame and fortune,
     where a written best seller brings renown
can essentially only be verbalized
     as a pipe dream from this clown,
who best **** sitter
     living hard scrapple

     (scrabble playing) hand to mouth shuffling
     along (the littered boulevard
     of rejection slips)
     wearing out one after
     another of me buster brown

shoes, perhaps posthumously
     gleaning raving reviews,
where famous names
     amidst cadre (espousing
     wife fours smiting
     social injustices extant loose

zing potential harmonic convergence,
     whether gentiles or Jews
throughout all foursquare corners
     of the world wide web
an economic eclectic diaspora,
     where underbelly of civilization
     pay heaviest ****** dues!
M Dec 2014
If I had to explain it I'd say my world of words prefers to rhyme.
It likes to speed up, until you catch up,
and then take up your time.
It likes to play games and roll around in the grass like a child;
use its imagination to keep things fresh, tasty, and wild.
My words like to cuss and be rude,
spend days lying on the couch
drunk, shameless, and ****.
They dispise being alphabetized and disrespect being ordered around;
like a high school kid being sensitized,
and in so doing being ostracized,
being pushed out forcefully by the system.
My words have rules and they love to resist them.
Often turning into words of insistence and criticism,
my words should be locked up,
but they're usually dressed up
in something they're not,
put in a strait jacket and forgotten in a prison because they've been caught.
People think I need to watch what I say but I'd rather not.
I want my words to stay in your head for days till they're the only thoughts
you've got.
(alternative title - Hew Seep What Chew Roe)

After drafting previous poem describing effort
to brainstorm (grossly analogous to draining
a swamp), expound, and incorporate avast ga
mutt of threads into fabric when literary in spur
ration most profuse (temporarily exempt from
anxiety, famished and fully rested, perhaps not
necessarily in those exact words nor alphabetized
order) post anorexia nervosa (minus bulemia),

this faux south paw aimed, and beastily strove
to be a two ****** ham handed, double barreled
eating machine way beyond where I could stow
mach, one more forced mouthful of food into
gullet forsaking comfort (at the expense of former
starvation), nonetheless robotically, obsessively,
mechanically knocked worst, imaginary transcept
posts, when unwittingly, ignominiously, and

defiantly disobeying crossing guard (steepled
finger hut arc). Intolerably excessive caloric intake
compensation sans zero sum game when meal time
rolled around. The deliberate refusal to eat (purpose
fully attempted to disappear) undermined requisite
nutriments. Upon supposed recovery from restraining
necessary sustenance, the deficit attrributable depriving
prepubescent body of necessary food attempted

to be counter acted via stuffing my measly under
sized physique way past stated satiation. Despite
feeling sick to the stomach (yet luckily no instances
of regurgitation occurred), a reflexive gorging ceased,
when every other person in the household, (or visiting
friends of parents nobody but this poor soul) remained
painfully pushing forkfuls or spoonfuls of this, that
or other ample menu item. This aha awakening asper

obsessive compulsive disorders prompted loosening
mental restraints, and avoid perfecting burst of
awareness until complete with the epistle. That com
ment mentioned because no intent arose to dash off
another writing assignment. A goal of one missive a
day (to keep...what? Ghosts of past away perchance),
I discipline with some degree of tolerance. Rather
than feel fixated and fanatical (indicative of refraining

from adequate eats, or forcing self to take an excessive
number of platefuls), I accept that maybe some deficit
of energy, a bout of minor unwellness, or fatique means

that obeisance to thee ****** temperament must
be accepted. That philosophy also applies to passions
of exercising and reading. Although a natural euphoria
usually experienced during and/or after the self crafted
routine (best attempted as an natural aide to assist sleep,
which utilization of two ten pound dumb bells alternating
every other late evening with jogging/marching in place.

If you wanna a good laugh, I could possibly rig up some
precarious getup to create a short youtube blog. Until that
time just envision a middle aged older mwm bee bopping
in with the rhythm of music (usually fm 102.9) – soft
decades old rock and roll tunes. Information gets triggered
as of this moment, whereby regular efforts to publicize
the life of one ordinary older chap fuctions therapeutically,
holisitically, cathartically plus an unknown reader may

invisibly share a bond (even if she/he stock key) pertaining
to quandary written in a fashion much more under
stand able than usually the case. Impossible to
categorize style, yet each screenful of purged
sentiments, a sifting how to express emotions, ideas,
thoughts, et cetera seems to settle, akin to a capped jar
of blended tiny pieces of matter, whereby specific gravity deter
mines how lightest to heaviest particles settle according
to unwritten precepts of chemistry and/or physics.
Mike Hauser Dec 2013
On my desk...

I have this very special Rolodex
I keep it filled with poems and ideas
When I'm in need, I crack the lid

It's no surprise...

I find them easily cause they're alphabetized
From A to Z...I have been saving
Pull one out for most any occasion

Wedding day...

Called to give a toast, I know what to say
I've done my best on this several times
I've even done it in the form of a rhyme

If there's a birth...

I look under B for rhyme and verse
So I have the right words I need to say
On this special day of all days

If I find a girl...

And want to give her and I a whirl
I flip over to L for the things I like
Or even love if given the time

So you can see...

Why I keep my Rolodex under lock and key
If it ended up lost or in the wrong hands
It would certainly throw off all that I am
wichitarick May 2016
Do we use the glossary when searching the back pages of our lives  follow the indexes when something perplexes
Motions making sounds ,representing actions & reactions ,lessons forming curiosity ,constantly seeking answers
Surrounding ourselves with sounds ,breaking into syllables ,basics as a beginning then hopefully turning us into detectives
Now lessons become narratives not always with a heart moving title ,but open feelings harder to bridle, days forming chapters

As new breaths begin in a nursery, mysteries are awaiting within the walls & halls ,nooks & books of  depositories
From embryo to a first cleansing ,protection is constant ,warmth of blankets envelop similar to bindings encasing the fruits comprised on papyrus.
Opening the world through the first window ,light ,sky, flowing forms taken in with a healthy grin,integral parts of out future stories
The main doors as a cover  ,silence is golden while the words are screaming ,what is first? a daily rag ,twirling of the mighty globe?
facts or fiction now lay  fractured

Fondly absorbing phonics ,tasting the clicks or ticks & annunciations  still samples for future refining
Labeled as language or merely absorbed as sound forming ,trying to become an individual expression
Flashcards as roots into an inner corridor, signals separated with commas dots or dashes ,awaiting future defining
Roads or paths laid out like aisles, alphabetized such as street names shelves as floors of buildings ,books as unopened doors to a new lesson

A long life search no longer monotonous as a Dewey decimal offered ,but click or a flick ,automated corrections leaving many clueless
Even building faith often based within bindings ,factors of fame or items for blame made best by those who clearly see the text
Holidays as often as book of the month ,b.m.i. becomes t.m.i. , forever offering lessons in hindsight ,many offerings to amuse
A mind akin to a vault taking in all offerings  by default ,endless it seems for storage capacity ,Librarians or doctors can off a new zest.R.C.
Kimberly Eyers Jul 2016
There is so much value
In asking people
To put something down
Anything-
Whatever they can think of-
Because that's creation.

That's where ideas and feelings
get synthesized
organized
alphabetized
aestheticized.

It's a spiritual go-to-town.
A lovely go-around.
So we gotta offer it.
We gotta!

Because otherwise
we create the undead.

It's supplies, and time, and not just
"look at a painting".
It's make someone feel what you feel.
Empowering, Cathartic, Adventurous.
It's a really really big deal.
Brooklynn Apr 2018
unloving begins
with the setting of the sun,
with the falling of the tides.

I realized how accustomed
I had grown to the feeling;
of wind on my skin,
of hailstones falling.

Alphabetized, my many names.
A blurred face
in a hallway of mirrors.

my heart left long before
my body did,
long before my legs
had the strength for escape

unloving begins
with your heart feeling cold.
I thought I should stay a while,
just to be
sure.
Lawrence Hall Jan 13
Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                Garage-Sale Rolodex® for Seventy-Five Cents

        I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed,
        debriefed, or numbered. My life is my own.

                -Patrick McGoohan as Number Six in The Prisoner

The Rolodex was once a symbol of power
Of knowledge marshalled into sequences
Orderly sequences alphabetized by names
By names and cross indices of subjects and dates

Of enemies or allies or contacts, rarely friends
Condensed in ink on smoothly finished cards
Restrained in place by colored plastic tabs
Awaiting the stroke of an office tyrant’s hand

The Rolodex was subsumed within The ‘Phone
Thus still your life cannot be called your own
Mackenzie thomas Jul 2018
With the setting of the sun,with the falling of tides, I realize how accustomed I had grown to the feeling; of wind on my skin,of hailstones falling.
Alphabetized , my many names. A blurred face in a hallway of mirrors.an I will never forget those moments in which I lay on your chest and your heartbeat was what calmed me.
Quite an undertaking
to break ground
figuratively, and symbolically linkedin
while able bodied and mindedness
readies cemetery plot within Elysian Fields
although honestly, and truthfully
as an ***** donor,
yours truly opts for cremation
once I, the corporeal constituent essence
that constitutes breadth,
height, length, et cetera
of one garden variety generic guy,
whose introspective consciousness
once exits these lovely bones
subsequently shucks off his ethereal soul.

Probable cause of death
and reasonable rhyme
how he died with his boots on?

Accidental overdose spelt demise of Vitamin ******
with over the counter supplements he did monkey.

Apple Cider Vinegar Gummies
Biotin 10,000 mcg
Brain Support Gummies
Super B Complex with Vitamin C
Calcium 1200 MG plus Vitamin D3
Chewable Vitamin C dietary supplement
Daily De-Stress
Vitamin E 400 IU (180 mg)
Echinacea 400 mg
Fiber Gummies
Flaxseed Oil with OMEGA-3 1300 mg
Garlic 400 mg
Ginger Root 550 mg
Ginkgo Biloba 120 mg
Hair, Skin & Nails Gummies
Prebiotic Immune Support 750 mg
with Vitamin D 30 mcg 1200 IU
with Zinc 8.3 mg
Psyllium Husk
Selenium 200 mcg
Turmeric 500 mg
Vitamin A 2400 mcg

Alphabetized list of above
stockpiled synthesized materials
purchased at CVS and Walgreens
courtesy Nations Benefits
and/or United HealthCare flex card
allow, enable, and provide
careful discriminate experimentation
on self - selected as guinea pig
more tolerable versus when being a little boy
and bullied by ruthless nasty
and shortish brutes as scapegoat
of course discriminately
taking a subset of iterated
prescribed macronutrients
each including following specified dose.

A healthy corpse
when the grim reaper calls,
I will gladly bid adieu
bon voyage into the netherworld
and good riddance
to him (a good for nothing)
randy sandy donning tan hat man
Squirreling acorn née joke
hinting courtesy humorous literary arabesques
absent minded handy dandy blue's clue
imploring accomplice Jimmy Neutron,
who willingly frankly (iggy lee)
casually opened, popped, and zapped
license to **** himself softly
while listening to Pathetique adagio cantabile
by Ludwig Van Beethoven
courtesy over the counter supplements,
the Food and Drug Administration doth not eschew.

Mastermind of the universe, I
a skeptic (with flat thinning hair,
yet shrinking paunch)
regarding divine creationism,
nevertheless accepts mortality
as stepping stone
into nothingness that follows,
repurposing random arrangement
of atoms and molecules
that configured one
contemplative, intuitive, operative
and restive **** sapien
(essentially composed of stardust)
reincarnated into another form of matter.

After crafting especially
individualized invitations
répondez s'il vous plaît
as the spirit moves thee.
Joanne Yuan May 2021
They first met in the fruit aisle, both pacing to and fro
— but she tripped before he could say hello
The next was in class, their luck was cursed
— seats alphabetized by last names instead of first
A chance meeting in a bookstore, if only he had lingered
— he had left by the time the entrance bell jingled
A double wedding inside a white-bedecked hall
— the groom caught the bride just as she had a fall

Alas, it was not they who were a pair — it was too late
Some soulmates just do not have the right fate.
Time gone by e'er since being quiet natured boy,
more so nowadays declare exhausting countless
hours expending, extolling, and exuding prufuse
joy, no surprise, asper experiencing passion, sans
reading (select age appropriate material as a lad in

make believe world) still bespectacled bright eyed
and bushy tailed, (most absolutely definitely agog)
accentuating, expanding vis a vis jabbering (within
privacy afford double one bedroom apartment B44)
erudition enthusiastically verbalizing printed material

in general, and exercising vocal cords aloud, not cuz
I admire krispy, raspy whispery voice particular, but
hearing and seeing appealing genres (mine, though
morse *** published authors especially informational)
purportedly not "FAKE" news incorporating sounding

out plus seeing words supposedly reinforces learning,
yet another less obvious pleasure (exclusive domain
availed primarily thru thesaurus brethren i.e. yepper
alphabetized lexicon, otherwise known as dictionary)
offers insight learning esoteric etymological minutiae

(just as quickly forgotten), which historical evolution
finds me temporarily linkedin both audiologically and
visually regarding forebears, (essentially transporters
thru numberless centuries) unwittingly, unknowingly,
unequivocally mumbling, modifying, massaging ever

evolving pronunciations sustaining communication as
living entity sustained throughout avast misty age pre
seeding impressing symbols (whether twenty six letters
of English language) upon tangible medium spurring

linguists to surmise aural and oral characteristics, and
no doubt searching complex edifice contemporary alive
tongues exhibited taking page from legacy of lingua
franca no longer extant.
Upon a whim, an endeavor
arose to communicate
cumulative key whatchamacallit,
yea...nuggets o' wisdom, asper
about yours truly no reason, nor

rhyme unwinding, tooling sputtering
most vexing mystery more
baffling than any whodunnit,
asper in this ole rattle trap to whit,
which drab filler hoop fully doth newt

induce thee to *****
while this true bore doer sits here twit
tilling thumbs, one doubting Thomas
addresses, (albeit favoring abridged titbit
alphabetized list), I attempt (collusion

gluten, GMO free), aye solicit
motley fool, not to accrue superprofit
unbiased worded atypical, bohemian
rhapsodizing non mercurial portrait
most challenged since umpteenth orbit

whiling away this last May 2019 Tuesday
around nearest star circle game
impossible mission exit
or at least until after exhausting
without courting death
senescence to delimit.

ME? ANTI THE FOLLOWING::>

aggression, alcohol, apartheid, authoritarianism,
billboard, bureaucratic, censorship, church,
cigarette, anticlericalism, anticolonialism,
commercialism, communism, conglomerate,
conventional, corporate, corruption,

counterfeiting, crime, cruelty, cult, defamation,
diarrheal, dogmatic, dumping, elitism,
establishmentarianism, fascism,
fashion, formalist, fraud, fur, guerilla, gun,
hierarchical, hijack, hunter, king, illiterate,

litter, lynching, macho, materialism, militarism,
miscegenation, monarchical, monopolist,
mosquito, nationalist, nepotism, noise, nuclear,
obesity, pesticide, plague, pollution, poverty,
racist, racketeering, ****, religion, revolutionary,

riot, royalist, sexist, shoplifting, slavery, smog,
smoker, smuggling, snob, subversive, tax,
terrorist, theft, tobacco, totalitarian, violence,
vivisectionist, welfare.

What About You?
Whether alphabetized, digitized,
homogenized, marginalized, satirized... place names
from "A" to Zaire
Thursday, December 31, 2020
signals conclusion of latest leap year.

The Pacific island of Tonga first
to ring in New Year 2021
glad tidings dispersed
celebrated at 10 AM GMT December 31 -
making tiny island nation
first to head into a fresh year.

Second to last
will be American Samoa 11AM –
just 558 miles from Tonga,
where locals and visitors
celebrate a full 25 hours before.

Earth's orbit around the Sun (year)
and rotation on its axis (day) where
latter not perfectly in line there
by necessitating
smooth functioning of Gregorian calendar
(also called New Style Calendar)
which did premiere
fifteen eighty two courtesy king's spear.

Ever since 1752, whence
in the modern sense
the first leap year implemented
madding crowds reportedly rioted
most likely uttering expletive
than "what nonsense"

reportedly riots erupted
courtesy chaos did arrange,
when England made the change
spurring some citizens
demanding immediate compensatory exchange
they get their 11 days back home on their range
from the government haint so strange.

To determine whether a year is a leap year,
follow these steps without Fanfare
For The Common Man
the famous title of Aaron Copeland air:

1. If the year is evenly divisible by 4,
go to step 2. Otherwise, go to step 5.

2. If the year is evenly divisible by 100,
go to step 3. Otherwise, go to step 4.

3. If the year is evenly divisible by 400,
go to step 4. Otherwise, go to step 5.

4. The year is a leap year (it has 366 days).

5. The year is not a leap year (it has 365 days)
(Only a large, knife-wielding ******-lover could stop me now...only jests in nature lobular, ductal, medullary, mucinous, papillary & adeno-cystic can spread me thinly across the veneer that is cultura Americano...bad man, sad man, Saddam Hussein insisted that the kangaroo court be adjourned to pray. TEACH of tetchy ta-ta, tulips & tangles, philanthropy & misanthropy, trekking with Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa, of sitting around with a chair manufacturer and throwing tantrums with Jesse Jackson and of easing back the throttle on entering Central Station. These are the things, oh yeah!!! : the things semi-fine and super smooth that parade aces by queens; that jade unladen churls in admixtures unrefined; that pull on pork by the tines of forks that fork about in spooning postures whilst Fords ford the Monongahela as belching Pittsburghers like chubby Timmy Popovich pop dimwitted/small-titted Tammy Bozovich of Mount Washington on Mount Washing-ton in a city marred by the unmarried, oh yeah!!! (denounced x 6) Next (some easy nap): Harrowing testimonies of abuse from within the Catholic church...of the alphabetized bulls, bull A being the first, number five is the most inclined to steal your lunch money; Buddha bug = Budapest; Gary the *** is from Hungary...Commercial toothpaste manufacturers advise you to expectorate their ****-uct as it contains: stannous fluoride (the class-2 toxin) and (the inorganic tin compounds): stannous chloride, stannous sulfide & stannic oxide. It remains for us to protect our personalized/personable nervous systems vigilantly; to guard against the polytopes... The wages of sin is death. The wages of ******* is small. The A's & B's of Beatles' tunes: “Can't Buy Me Love”/“Can Sell Your Hate”; “I Want to Hold Your Hand”/“You Refuse to Release my Foot.” The Beatles sang: “Golden slumbers fill your eyes; Smiles await you when you rise; Sleep pretty darling; Do not cry; And I will sing a lullaby,” which begs the question: “How am I supposed to sleep with you hippies belting out lullabies?” The ultimate act of stupidity is naming my stinking chihuahua Chico Harrison because he smells like the crapped-out Paul McCartney who hasn't even crapped out yet. A murderous rampage earns for you a Medal of Honor citation. [My deep, abiding hatred for women is ******* by my deep, abiding hatred for men.] Opening salvo to my tome next: “So passionately did my wife smother me with kisses that I feared for my life...” or: “My wife's kisses resurrected a passion in me not known since our honeymoon till I realized that it was the garbage-man and not the wife at all...” or even: “'Pucker up!' I instructed as I have just watched an old Jane Russell bra commercial...”

— The End —