"backspace" poems
If I could turn back time
I would hit Backspace all day,
Id put on Caps Lock
and SHOUT what I say.
I'd use the whole Alphabet
To tell you hello,
Press seven Numbers
Til you picked up the phone.
I'd Tab through the comments
I didn't want to hear,
And use the Arrow Keys
To drag your body near.
I would Delete the harsh words
I didn't mean to speak,
And Insert the "I love yous"
I before couldn't leak.
I would use Ctrl to
Keep reigns over my heart,
And I would Escape lies
That tore us apart.
I'd Print out your photo
And kiss it goodnight,
Use the Calculator
To check that we were right.
I'd Paint you a picture
of us, you and me,
Then I'd hit Enter
Just so you would see.
Those are the things
I would do in my strife,
If only Backspace
worked in real life.
Feb 13, 2018
Feb 13, 2018 at 8:12 AM UTC
Time isn't wasted at the end of the day
When you're in bed thinking about all the things
You could've done,
You could've said,
All the empty boxes left on your to do list
Time is wasted
When you're standing on a rock at the edge of a waterhole
And decide to not jump
When you're sitting in your car trying to justify reasons
For not going in
When you anxiously hit backspace
Instead of expressing how you truly feel
When you ignore your heart that's screaming
"You deserve better."
It's lost in I could have and I should have,
In missed opportunities,
In letting fears override judgement
Time is not necessarily wasted
In passing minutes, months, years
We waste time by
Counting seconds,
And by letting seconds pass
When we could've made
Those seconds count
Aug 22, 2013
Aug 22, 2013 at 10:12 PM UTC
a friend told me
"we're only bodies."
molecules sewn together just right to
make the meat stick to the bone
keep the blood inside
keep the thoughts from wandering outside the hard case
soft parts inside not to be damaged
there, but never seen
(except in thought which happens to happen
just behind the eyes)
carefully written blueprints hidden
deep inside so small but makes up everything
that makes me
even the parts I wish I could delete
except there's not a backspace button
away from the internet.
my feet take me places but never far enough.
i always find the same places again
over and over
the same old ground
the same old fears same old
errors in the coding:
why do I think those things?
why do I say those things?
who made me this way?
the cells remember,
keeping score of every time i bled
tick marks like attendance slips
to prove i showed up
i was there
i don’t know why but i was there
Dec 26, 2017
Dec 26, 2017 at 1:28 PM UTC
Take me as I am, please
No. Please is too understanding
Take me as I am!
Wait. Maybe that's too demanding?
I don't think we understand each other
Maybe we're over analyzing
It's just that when I look into your eyes I stop
They're hypnotizing
Stop. No. Rewind please!
But I can't, the words are out
Could you give me a backspace button for conversation
That would relieve some doubt
I want you
Argh! Too lustful!
I need you!
ACK! Too needy!
Let's just say the world's a candy jar
And for your jolly rancher I'm greedy?
No? Not subtle? Too subtle? Argh!
Why is it so complicated to speak to you!?!
I'm like a 3 year old whose trying to make a picture out of glitter and glue
And the supplies just keep sticking!
Do you understand what I mean?
I see the perplexed look on your face and...
**** it, woman, you're pretty
Ack! Rewind rewind rewind!
Stupid stupid stupid!
The only way to catch an arrow is to say you DON'T want Cupid
So I don't want you....yes I do.
No I don't!
But I do!
No I don't!
Yes I do!
NO! I! DON'T!
Look at her!!!
....okay, I do.
But you wouldn't give me a second thought if I told that to you
I mean let's face it, you're so out of my league that we're not even in the same sport
I'm playing with the tiny tikes and you're in the pro team's court
But I would be a fool if this wall was all I feel on my fingers
And as perverted as that sounds I let the joke just linger
Because you're beautiful and I'm me
And who am I to attain a girl like you
The boy whose glasses fall down his nose and is missing one or two screws
I just want a dance... and a kiss.... okay, just a dance
No, what I want from you is the guarantee of a second, maybe third glance
To see you in the hallways tomorrow and know I make you smile
To know that you affirm we danced and liked it all the while
I want to be more than wallflower material and I want the prime
So with shaky legs, a corny disco ball, and a bad song, I stand and I greet you
And ask could this dance be mine....?
Your move. Gulp.
Oct 24, 2012
Oct 24, 2012 at 9:58 PM UTC
When the white bird flies,
the sky catches on fire.
Then the fire bleeds to the village
and the village burns.
Do not be mistaken,
this is how you catch the bad guys.
We must catch the bad guys.
Don’t you know?
When the white bird flies,
she purifies in flame.
Replaces evil with ash
and ash cannot stop the oil flow.
But wait, there was a mistake.
backspace, backspace.
Control alt delete.
It is too late, the sky already burns.
And when the sky burns,
so does the village.
These were children,
Where were the bad guys?
When the white bird fails
It flies a thousand homes to its mother.
“We will try again, tomorrow,” she says
and then she turns the screen black.
Still the village burns
and children become orphans,
but the oils keeps flowing,
it always keeps flowing.
Mar 27, 2015
Mar 27, 2015 at 9:52 AM UTC
My palms itch again and so I need to write. That's what I decided to title this, because I can't title this with your name — no, I won't title this with your name because the thought of it will rust me like an old gate and I cannot bear to hear myself creak for you anymore. I will send your local news a story about how I don't know if I can compare your throat to another mountain range or your smile to any other natural phenomenon or your fingers to another city; you are making me sick to my stomach and sometimes I want to be nauseous; you need to know that a part of me has wanted you to see every eraser smudge I've ever made that would proclaim the truth as though my pencil were an evangelizer of a god that found no hell fitting enough for a mind so wretched as my own and sent you here to sweep me off my feet, and then underneath your rug. How many times will I hit 'backspace' beofre the words in my mind finally delete —when will these thoughts gripping my throat turn into your cold hands, when will my sleepless nights become in spite of you instead of because of you?
The loudest clock ticking is your identity and I am to spend eternity in an empty room, fumbling for you like a light switch that doesn't exist and like a hospital light, I will always hear you flicker.
My palms, they still itch.
Jan 14, 2014
Jan 14, 2014 at 7:24 PM UTC
forward forward forward
going somewhere moving forward
whether progressing or regressing
growing or unlearning
coming or going
living, dying
everyone believes they are moving towards something
and as everything happens all at once
each perceptive reality is entirely different than any other
and each consciousness travels, and does, and is.
each consciousness believes it has a purpose or a path.
the purpose is not to see into nor plan the future.
from the civilian to the hero tv shows and movies
have consistently glorified the ability to see visions of the future
generally this is followed by someone trying to prevent
the happenings in said vision from becoming reality
and distinctly failing because they "saw into" the future
that their own energy influenced
but the true super power is to be able to look into the past.
to prevent the omitting of details and data
to avoid a rewrite of our conscious interaction with this planet
not to white out the chapters that bear the truth in the textbooks
to recall history so it does not repeat itself
my question is then
do people disguise the wrongdoings of those hidden by the passing of time?
because they are ashamed of the mistakes of their ancestors pasts?
because they are ashamed of their participation in past consciousness's?
because they are ashamed of the atrocities humans have inflicted upon each other and themselves as well as their home planet since the beginning of recorded time here?
or do those who have the power to omit and hide history
purposely rewrite it?
do they mask the pains of the past so the rest of us will forget?
so that even they can forget?
so their next consciousness can unknowingly, while predestined,
have hand in crimes against the world all the same as committed in the lost past?
how many times has someone written these words
or a similar combination
only to delete the post?
burn the pages?
backspace the message?
stop themselves from speaking them aloud?
cover the symbols?
pass out of conscious living mid sentence?
lose them to a past lifetime?
how many times has this cycled through the same way?
how many times have I been me?
how many times have you been me?
how many times have I been anyone?
how many times have I been?
is there a rhythm or is it all as scattered and random
as the thoughts that bring you
to this kind of an understanding of the habit of misunderstanding?
the kind of thoughts that bring you back to the birds nest because you were too early for even the worm?
they will all catch up eventually
after all they all think theyre moving forward
and they don't even know where they've been.
they don't even know that they've been.
Nov 23, 2015
Nov 23, 2015 at 9:54 PM UTC
She's been trying for days
backspace, erase; can't find any ways
Its the kisses he gave before their lips met
has her caught in a daze, thoughts stuck in a net
But who can expect
the other not to dissect the moments during, the minutes after,
the hours proceeding a kiss?
From prologue to epilogue is to reminisce of bliss.
Jan 21, 2014
Jan 21, 2014 at 4:44 AM UTC
Everything I write, everything I draw; delete
The things I create, I cannot complete
Is it being insecure or being lazy?
I don't know how to be a productive lady
I feel stupid
Since I can't anything executed
My work lives in the recycling bin
It's close in resemblance to a din
The backspace key is faded
My soul is abraded
I hate that I can't articulate
Does anyone else relate?
At least this poem is finished but it has no real end
I hope it shows what I intend
Oct 12, 2018
Oct 12, 2018 at 9:26 AM UTC
I can't tell you
How many times
I've hit backspace
Trying to write
This.. this.. poem
About you
About your death
And how it sits
So uneasy
In my blood cells
The horror of it
Plays in my mind
And I wish it didn't
I wish it couldn't
I see it all
Everyday
So vividly
The violent rage
Fueled by psilocybin
That you went into
As you slammed your
Fist through glass
The faces of the
Officers as you
Bled to death
On the floor
In front of your mother
The screams that ring
Through my ears
From that night
Slice through
My unstable soul
I miss you
Plain and simple
I wish there was
Somehow more time
Or a way to
Trade
I don't think that's
Possible
But I really would
Trade
Because the thought
Of my best friend
Losing her
Brother
Of sixteen
To drugs
Simply
Haunts my bones
Oct 15, 2010
Oct 15, 2010 at 6:49 AM UTC
The clouds of Pompeii
had nothing on his heart.
An eruption of UNCERTAINTY
then
his world e-x-p-l-o-d-e-d.
lights extinguighed,
joy (deleted).
Night is now who was once Day.
Corruption of a steaming bliss.
Darkness gripped his mind -
insomnia, coupled with a blind-ness..
that could only be caused
by some serious disruption....
like the ash of Pompeii when it settled
or the pain of a burnt page.
Jul 20, 2018
Jul 20, 2018 at 6:25 AM UTC
I am the typewriter and you were
backspacing backspacing backspa
all my words as if I had never said them.
You knew I meant
every letter I slammed down
furiously into the keyboard
writing about you
about your lack of making time
closing me off last minute
ignoring any plans we made at all.
I don't get why you had to leave my
thoughts as if they were not validated.
If someone cared for you as much as I do,
I sure hope you don't backspace on them
before they can get a word out.
Sep 28, 2015
Sep 28, 2015 at 12:51 AM UTC
I'm just going to start off with this
a fairytale that was beautiful all filled with bliss
You and I is what I miss
I miss your touch and your kiss
Perfection was never found between us
but we created it but then we fussed
I got comfortable and lazy
fueled with bitterful lust
I lied to you hurt you but where did it end?
A broken heart, tissue boxes
Love that cannot mend
To wish that I was direct
is all that I should have been
acknowledged there were problems
where else I was keen
I lost my sight of you
I lost a part of me
Thinking this was a dream
believed to have gone green.
Now that you are gone
I know that it's over
To think you and I'd come to an end
I still wish upon a four leaf clover
It was both of us
things didn't work out
nature took the course
it's not what I'm all about
I wish i'd hit send
text you what i'm thinking
but i know it'd just annoy you
the hazard lights be blinking.
I know that if this went to your phone
Our love is absolute wreckage
but I'd type backspace before you'd know it
it's just an unsent message.
Nov 16, 2015
Nov 16, 2015 at 6:41 AM UTC
I'm tired of missed calls
Undelivered texts,
Removing digital evidence
Of an ex.
Typing 'lmao' when
longing to howl
Pressing like, acting,
you're on the prowl.
Weary of condensing my
message
To just on small
passage.
Tap it all out,
Just to backspace,
like what you need to express,
Is a plain old waste.
Look up from your paper thin,
Retina display,
Don't let technology
Get in the way.
Take chances, soar
ignore the device
that makes your life
so impure.
Throw away the shackles,
Reconcile,
Cry on shoulders,
Whisper, wander for hours,
Whatever you do,
Ignore the iPhone's powers.
Love love love,
And don't feel bad,
For not getting a text back,
Is not the worst pain you've had.
Be truly elated, this time
don't pretend
put down your mobile,
As for now, in this moment.
Technology needs to end.
Feb 3, 2015
Feb 3, 2015 at 4:51 PM UTC
When I was nineteen
I learned to procreate.
Sparks were flying and fears were moving and hearts were beating and hands were racing and bodies were sweating and hormones were raging. We were wrapped up tight in your Target sheets, gasping for each breath as if our end we would meet. Our eyes averted. We were so nervous. This new act of pleasure drove us deeper and deeper. We hoped we would stay, we hoped and we prayed and we loved until that day.
I said no more. You cursed and slammed the door. This wasn't for us, I couldn't take it. I wasn't tough.
You begged and pleaded to be forgiven. I was done pleasing and was ready to listen to reason.
That day was the last and I said I ain't coming back. You kept pulling me down so I said **** it and I turned around.
Around to my other guy, because I wasn't happy with the one by my side. To my back up beau waiting for me after school. He was there on the long nights as I wiped my tears from saying my goodbyes. He held my hand and listened to my plan of the two of us finally making it after two years of struggling and suffocating in our relationships, our individual emotional abyss. This was our time, our time to shine. Time to let go and be happy and be free and be who we wanted to be. All I needed was him and all he needed was me.
But that crashed and burned.
What we thought was forever was only a game. Heartstrings were pulled and heartache was made. Disaster full on. Before I knew it he was gone. Two years of my life were erased just like that, like a single mistake where all you had to do was backspace. I cried my eyes out and I banged my head and I avoided you and I wished I was dead. I gave you my heart on that very first day and you kept it for two years and then you threw it away.
Twenty one today and I've come a long way from the girl that cried over broken hearts and broken minds. I'm strong and it's true, I love someone, I do but it's in a different way because today's another day. I don't have to live worrying about what ifs and the past. It's gone and it's over and I'm thankful for that. You both made me cry, my arms up to the sky pleading and begging for something so dear, but how did I know I would find it right here? Now I've got my heart together and I wear it on my sleeve, proud but protected from any would-be's. I'm happy and I'm healthy and I feel joy and I want to sing. This life I am living, I can't imagine any other thing.
September 20, 2013
Sep 20, 2013
Sep 20, 2013 at 3:42 AM UTC
I have been trying to think of ways to say 'I love you' on paper
without writing outside the lines.
There is much more to the way the blinds paint sunlight on your body
than beat up notebooks and chewed up pencils.
I make a lot of mistakes,
the kind that rubber only smears but doesn't erase.
I didn't mean to crumple your delicate skin like paper.
I know that paper comes from trees,
yet all the poems that make me think of you do nothing
to help me breathe, and your touch only proves
that my breath is easier to take away than you'd like to believe.
Forgive me for being comprised almost entirely of errors and mistakes and strikethroughs with red pens,
While you are so clean and refined.
I think of you in cursive.
Take my trembling wrists in your strong fingers
and guide me with a steady and patient hand.
Teach me to love you in bold print and I will underline it three times,
and again,
and again,
and again.
In my head, you are a million brainstorms thrown into waste buckets,
and if for some strange reason Helvetica is the only way to make you almost understand my thoughts,
then I am typing furiously and waiting for you to see them all.
All I ever wanted was to fill the doubles spaces between your fingers with my own,
even though sometimes you wish you could
backspace the words you didn't mean to say to me
while I pretend I don't remember them.
I have been trying to think of ways to say 'I love you' on paper
without writing outside the lines.
Then I ripped up the paper, scribbled it on a napkin,
and wiped the blood off my face with it instead.
Dec 19, 2013
Dec 19, 2013 at 12:13 PM UTC
Hello, old friend,
whose semi-permanent smile
laces my vision like toxic ranks of pearly whites.
Hello, old friend,
whose sparkling eyes blaze
like the funeral pyre of my pride and prejudice.
Hello, old friend,
whose apparent ineptitude melts like happiness
as your name burns in black on that page.
You signed my yearbook like a death certificate,
wrote an affectionate note in the shape of nothing
worth knowing.
The lines bleed, multiply, crackle and shine
in the dull light of this most tiring expanse of computers.
Their brains function better than mine.
Hello, old friend,
whose pen now swirls across the work you were assigned,
work you pursue less like a lion
and more like a cougar,
if you get my message.
(There’s no taking the jungle out of you, Amazon.)
Hello, old friend.
Keep snapping pictures with your iPhone,
like it’s New Years and you just kissed DiCaprio in Times Square,
wearing a dress with all the greens of envy
splattered across the fabric.
Hello, old friend.
Keep telling me you hate it when I act like this,
when your eyes turn to four points and your skin to letters
from colleges begging like a forgotten lover
for you to take them and make them home.
The home you’re leaving for next month.
Hello, old friend.
Today is now solemn in so many new ways.
You achieved higher than the skyscrapers in the photograph
next to your eight-line submission.
Hello, old friend.
No.
Revision time.
Revision like the backspace key and the scribbled lines
over inadequate things I wrote
to try and climb your Olympian pedestal.
Revision like the eraser on the pen,
revision like the keys thumping as though this machine
had a heart,
as though mine wasn’t broken
because I’m never good enough for anybody.
I write my best poetry when I’m angry.
Ironic that poetry made me angry.
I can taste the paradox spinning like the clock hands
that tick, tick, tick until the day when you sit in a car
on top of a thousand suitcases
and a few well-wishes from your confederates in college.
I can taste it like a toxin.
And now,
now you’re going
and there’s only time to say:
good-bye, old friend.
May 29, 2013
May 29, 2013 at 2:01 PM UTC
If you want flowery poetry
Hit pause, backspace delete.
I write on a lot of subjects;
Only a few could be called sweet.
I’m not into swirling windstorms
Or describing billowy clouds.
Not into extolling autumn leaves
Or conifers standing proud.
I try to select the human things
Whether good or even bad.
Sometimes I wrestle with
Life twists that make us sad.
I try to speak for everyman
And that includes the women.
I try to reflect life circumstances
And the results the travel with them.
So, crooning polysyllabically
Is seldom my favorite tune,
Nor is waxing limerickally
About June, and spoon and moon.
Instead I’ll probably take to task
Those who live in sappy hope
A prince shows up in their life
A proper romantic dope.
I write the rhymes about crooks
That steal from your children
And the supposed leaders
That ****** and abuse women.
I write about parents who
Ignore what their children need
And instead find their joy
On selfishness and greed.
After so many millennia
We really need to stop
Waiting for someone else to come
And be the moral traffic cop.
It is us who need to change
And teach our children accordingly
Because the way we are fixing things
Humanity is progressing dismally.
So keep your butterfly couplets
And views of rain on hedges.
We are falling apart as humans
And it’s visible on the edges.
It will only take a few crazies
With power enough to wield
And this planet, and us of course,
Will no longer have a shield.
Mar 23, 2017
Mar 23, 2017 at 6:59 PM UTC
My life is like a keyboard in
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
I try and Esc those who are poison to my life
where I just need to Tab and skip ahead a week
or maybe a month
that doesn't always work so I try and find an Alt way
if all fails
push through to the End
Shift to the new chapter
and delete them from your life
phone
social media and all
I like to enter into a long dream
so I can wake up and start over
some days feel like I am on caps lock and everything is drastic
or way too exciting I just need to scroll down a bit to save some energy for the rest of the day
Some days I need not be alone
but to insert myself into healthy groups
full of positive vibes and energy
if I stay with healthy relationships
my f8 should be well off
but don't quote me on that
if I ever get to crazy
feel free to tell me to backspace
and just chill
I don't want my life to be just okay & full of JK's
but rather full of spontaneous adventures
while trying not to be a jailbird one day
I know we belong together
for that is why W and E are next to each other
like U and I
but don't #perfect us for we are like many others
so if you could let me clear my mind
and focus that would be great
for I am @ a point
where I shouldn't be worried about $$
and the % I make
to help do things for you and I
because it isn't about
money but taking
one letter one word at a time
Mar 27, 2018
Mar 27, 2018 at 12:16 AM UTC
Its disgusting..
How we see the future being stoped and skipped.
Life is no Dvd player
Whether you poor,rich,fat or slender,
Its life that we talking about
There's no restart or backspace.
If you not ready to be a mother
Nor a father,play safe
You always have a choice
Some say its free
I say its up to you.
Who are you?
To **** an innocent soul.
Is God you?
He or she wasn't the cause of whatever you going through!
Its a child for heaven sake
You eat stake
And ask "what's for desert"
Because you know its ***
Now face the consequences
Man up,and face your responsibilities
My heart aches when I see posters in streets written "One day Pain,SAFE ABORTION"
They even have guts to write it in capital letters
Where is the love?
I always look above
And say "Lord forgive them,they do not know what they are doing"
"Call Dr.Naidoo on 08ABORTION"
Do you call that normal?
Well educated people call it abnormal.
You shout Vote,vote,vote!
Its election time now,I won't vote no Cope
Until this stops!
Who will vote when you allow Doctors and fake Doctors to **** our sons and daughters?
Buphi ubuntu?
Mar 9, 2014
Mar 9, 2014 at 11:02 AM UTC
weathered fingertips in sensual crescendo
arouse blitzing keystrokes to commove
wild Js and Zeds, Ks and Is too.
harmony of the king's three-thousand acre jungle
swallowing the stormy orange cyclical stew
and tantamount to its feral cavities
thrushes whet jagged spinal bones to split
news of the no-rhythm, sambas of new religious canter
infiltrates the **** cavernous walls
This inner ear and greater sound
knew to find sanctuary here.
Lends its awesome craft to the next
And next, and next, and next;
beautiful unboxed melodies
new unused sweet single-reeds
threading that 20s centrifuge.
Saxophone. Incantations unfolding
Aloof in its ***** it unwraps
The veil of green, a costume of black coffees
Cigarette stained curtains exhumed to greet
Thick plumes of albicant sinewy smoke
At the heap of its glorious song
Uniting the funnel of eardom to consecrate
Bliss. Intrinsic and purple
An irrational knot of Portuguese drum
Met over by African toms and rattles
A glue imbued into those unmistakable
Chakras of this spell of mourning and reversed
Names of starlight girls and their other'd selves
These are the weapons of our new key strokes.
And upon the cortex it reveals this lift anew
Where death greeted me to intervene a place
Where sound and silence meet, and new strikes
Put my hands in halves. Pear-shaped birds pecking
At the joints, and where bowl-shaped tones bring
Their impeccable limbs to atone with auburn and cerise soils
Beneath the high ridges of doom- the empowering backspace
Does not exist, only new nothingnesses and their hooves
Splashing into each step into the next, and the next, and the next,
And the next.
Nov 6, 2015
Nov 6, 2015 at 7:10 AM UTC