"barked" poems
Before all of this, even after all of this, I will forever be a patriot.
Before the poet in me matured and I started talking like a parrot,
The dogs of war barked and I climbed exile's fence on my own
And there I have dwelled, with nothing tangible to bring me down.
I have been on this fence so long and I will remain there forever!
Especially since the premature child is still in the incubator.
From this vantage point, I have learned never to trust any politician
I've always looked at them with mistrust, disdain, and suspicion,
Before all of this and before I ran and climbed the exile fence,
I was once mercilessly flogged, dragged and made to dance
By drugged up and coerced child soldiers with a rubber cable
They tied and spread me like a dog on the market table
I watched as innocent people were killed with a rusty knife
There, I vowed to become a fence dweller for the rest of my life!
I've been a patriot all my life but I have done it from here..safer.
From here I have seen blood spilled, hearts broken, hopes dashed,
progresses stalled, mullions embezzled, promises broken, lies told
people changed, games played, party surfed, interests prioritized.
And from this vantage point, I have learned never ever to trust any politician
I have always been right...though I have looked on with disdain, suspicion,
and operated with caution but through it all, I have remained a true patriot and a fence dweller.
.✍️©️✍️IvanBrooksPoetry.✍️©️✍️
Jan 24, 2018
Jan 24, 2018 at 8:03 PM UTC
Color of lemon, mango, peach,
These storybook villas
Still dream behind
Shutters, thier balconies
Fine as hand-
Made lace, or a leaf-and-flower pen-sketch.
Tilting with the winds,
On arrowy stems,
Pineapple-barked,
A green crescent of palms
Sends up its forked
Firework of fronds.
A quartz-clear dawn
Inch by bright inch
Gilds all our Avenue,
And out of the blue drench
Of Angels' Bay
Rises the round red watermelon sun.
9.9k
"the pen is mightier than the sword"
but "actions speak louder than words
I tried "beating around the bush"
even though my hands held two birds
i've played "the devil's advocate"
and i tried "sitting on the fence"
heard it "straight from the horse's mouth"
the horse made "horse sense"
i'm "letting the cat out of the bag"
i can't "let sleeping dogs lie"
you "barked up the wrong tree"
we will never see "eye to eye"
is there "a method to my madness"?
"your guess is as good as mine"
i'm listening to "the voice of reason"
the one "i heard through the grape vine"
Oct 7, 2015
Oct 7, 2015 at 3:55 PM UTC
#(a travelogue)
He stared down through
the unbroken silence
lapping the shoreline
Water skippers dart around
the rocks and windfall driftwood
settled juxtaposed in cattail reeds
and emerging broadleaf sprouts
A petrified heartwood timber
lie fallow waiting bare barked,
hushed like a pining lover’s
timeworn love seat,
rubbed smooth as
the crystalline waters
of half-moon lake
Lingering for a while ―
like a hidden stalker,
a perched wildcat waiting
for the full moon’s
swooning spell to saturate
the thickening dusk quietude;
arousing the urgent
call of the wild —
exhaled from the held breath
of the wilderness nocturne
on half-moon lake
The stillness was scattered
with the soft downy hairs
of the sleeping cattails, and
the newly shed catkins
a spring gust bestrewed
from a tall resin birch tree
nigh the Sitka willows
He sat quietly ...
time out of mind ―
tossing his eyes up into the sky;
taking the time to read the stars ―
catching them each again
as they fell into his gentle hands,
to show him who he was
Seeing their sparkly tracers
trail-out above the cattails,
from a distance
they resembled falling stars
unable to perceive their own renaissance ―
plashing lightly upon the still-water
on half-moon lake
A lone shadow glides stealthily
near mid-tarn,.. swimming
enchantingly with the grace
of a blackswan
Appearing to glance shoreward
at the glowing low stars
rise and fall, as his eyes
twinkled skyward over
the moonlit lagoon ―
heavenward of its moonlit ballet;
the lone sleek dark shadow
slipping through
a faint circular ripple
stirring the smooth as glass waters ―
disappearing like a fleeting moment
waning deep aneath
a subtle silent wake.
When all the clear lines blurred,
he knew it had been so long ...
but hearken !
… an interceding
long drawn out wail
echoed a feral ache
across the stillness,
breaking the silence ―
as the shadow reappeared;
his tears surrendered
to the undulating call of the wild;
he felt the spirit of the sole Loon,
as black and white
as the moonlit night,
stir deeply in his wanting heart ―
lay bare the silence
in lengthy yodeled psalms
to the god of the moon
Diving down deep yet again,
keeping the light he’d been given,
vanishing into the lifespring
sanctuary of half-moon lake
harlon rivers ... May 2018
travelogue: 4 of some more
May 21, 2018
May 21, 2018 at 2:36 PM UTC
They set off from white rocks,
red geraniums, blue tile,
and let the green sea
lift and drop their ships far above the white foam waves.
The stony islands that were home
were swallowed in minutes by the hungry Atlantic
but they hunted the big fish,
the giant whales with human eyes
who rolled and sang and swam
in oceans a continent away.
They came from Sao Jorge, Sao Miguel
Faial, Pico, Terceira, Horta -
Nine island emeralds set in a black volcanic chain,
neither of the old country nor the new:
Halfway there and halfway gone -
secret jewels of the Portuguese sailors.
They sailed into unknown waters,
south around tropical shores
where dragons smoked and writhed on the rocks
and birds with brilliant red and yellow plumage
rose in clouds around their heads.
Then north, and north, north again
to colder waters
where sea lions barked and lunged
at the strange massive wooden beast
that coursed the waters,
strung with brown bodies swaying
on the lines and cursing the sails.
North still they swept
casting contemptuous eyes on
the cheap turquoise waters and monstrous slow turtles
of the Sea of Cortez.
Coming up from the desert, past the palms and the yucca,
the Joshua tree and Spanish daggers,
they chased their smooth grey prey,
riding the vast Pacific on their wooden island,
herding the leviathans onto their spears,
adventurers with an audience of only
gulls and sky and seal.
Until they sailed too close one day
to a rock-strewn shoreline
and saw the golden hills.
Gnarled oaks like grandmothers from home
with orange poppy jewels at their feet,
missions strung like beads in a ruby marked rosary.
The boats slowed, ****** in by a Scylla of soil
rich and brown and loamy
waiting to be seeded with grapes and apricots
peaches, avocados, lettuce, alfalfa,
fertile and heavy with sweet promise.
And the whales sang and the lions barked and the gulls cried
but the sailors were entranced, encharmed, ensorcelled.
The treacherous sea, the mysterious deep, the stony jewels of home,
called and wept
and waited in vain for the sailors
- beached and grounded -
cutting not waves but earth,
tracking seasons not whales,
seduced by dirt.
Nov 29, 2014
Nov 29, 2014 at 9:51 PM UTC
Have you heard of the
gardens clandestines grow?
The neighbors have, although
until today the gardens were usual, not a
pastime no one would seriously guess.
The flowers are conceptual homonyms
bordered by Boxwood africans
no breadwinning cardinal would bless
with its roost.
Grass beneath a golden ninebark
is slightly depressed where some pistol was.
For the past few years the neighbors have wondered daily What the hell is it this guy does?
What, with him always vaguely mumbling "...lots of business trips." It's dark
now, blood spatter coagulates on the picket fence.
Four tire streaks on the road,
the responding policemen kept it hushed, speaking in code
to disembodied voices on a radio. Not much more than a glance
and shrug at the neighbors' concerned inquiries.
One consensus formed: he was deep
in consequences from promises he couldn't keep.
This was speculative, of course.
The palm trees
rustled above their heads. "Maybe he was a clandestine,"
one of the neighbors remarked
as another dismissively barked,
"Ridiculous! He kept a garden!"
Jul 18, 2013
Jul 18, 2013 at 10:26 PM UTC
I am Autumns baby
my bones align every Autumn season
I come alive, rising from the earthy soil
I'm Summers poison,
my blood all hazey sunsets and leaf mulch
It's just something about the way the dawn and dusk shaded leaves flutter delicately onto my bronze barked skin
and the way the forest breathes, shedding it's summer shroud of green, canopy now thin
anticipating the snarling undertow of winters frosty bite
how the branches twist their arms and fingers,
reaching up to the light,
sky as blue as my doe eyes
the sunsets are all for me, low and piercing,
using her fiery fingers to stroke my face
I dance naked with the birds, the trees and the sun, a blur of grace
I'm all variations of brown, with the occasional pop of green
my lungs house my earth and its flower children, in my rib cage built of twigs with a magic sheen
my hair cascades like a molten copper mess
I'm a reflection in a lake, beautiful crystal but a construct you cannot caress
luke warm, barren branches and burning peat
crows, shimmering sunsets and crunchy leaves under your feet
I am Autumns darling
KG
Jul 25, 2018
Jul 25, 2018 at 8:02 AM UTC
we had been mopping
the kitchen floor all day
and the dirt never
stopped coming back
and earlier we had sprayed
the entire front porch
down with the garden hose
and now it was still wet
which made it feel as if
it had recently rained when in fact
the grass was a crunchy
brown carpet of regrets.
the night before we had
drunk orange smoothies
laced with lime and something
aged sleek and dark
(i think it must have been
the reason we couldn't
sleep that night
lay awake in my parents bed
and i told you why i
wouldn't go swimming
until the sun rose
the dog barked
the birds screamed
their morning songs
and my body stopped its
nightly spasms of fear.)
and the next evening
we put on a miranda lambert song
(the one we drank to
in your mother's van last winter)
sat on the wet
porch swing
and cracked open
our first beers
they were
really bad
i gagged
because it tasted
like carbonated
banana bread with
too much stale
baking soda
and we poured half of them
into the flower beds
the next morning
was sunday
and we had milk and muffins
in the kitchen with
simon and garfunkel
then went back out to the porch
drank iced coffee in the
eleven o'clock sunlight
and you said
"if this were a normal sunday
i would have been up at six
at church by eight
and done teaching my first
sunday school class by ten."
(is beer as much
of an acquired taste
as coffee is?
because i can't ever
remember not liking it
i used to think it was
bitter but i always
liked it anyway.)
i didn't say anything
because i didn't want to
say what was on the tip
of my tongue
that this kind of sunday
had become my normalcy
and our variety of saturday night
no longer felt like underage
drinking and more like
the way i was meant to be.
Aug 20, 2016
Aug 20, 2016 at 3:15 PM UTC
written at the Herzl Camp
"A drunken man got mad at him / Because he barked in joy / He beat him and he's dying here today / Will you call the doctor please / And tell him if he comes right now / He'll save my precious doggy here he lay / Then he left the fluffy head / But his little dog was dead / Just a shiver and he slowly passed away."
This extract comes from a poem called Little Buddy, and is controversial. Allegedly written at the Herzl camp there are claims it might be originated by someone else by the name of Hank Snow.
5.7k
Before walking through the doorway
Made of trash bags
A woman checked our ID’s
We passed the booth with the feathers and the ball-gags
Passed the woman selling *** toys
Just a white awning with plastic chairs
We sat and watched a man dressed in leather
He was the kind of expert who understood his passion
But for him there was no teaching it
Beer saturated my white shirt
As I sweated it out
I could feel the alcohol in my lungs
I breathed slower as if it would hide the sensation
He explained to us puppy play
The dynamics
He had his own puppy with him
A man so good at making wet eyes
So good at seeming lost
He barked and wagged an invisible tail
Chewed on rope
Probably he thought about burying his bone
What his wife might be making for dinner
Wondered if I had recognized him as a regular
At my work
While taking questions the leather man said
It takes time to discover the puppy inside
It makes me think of how
In order to view ourselves as anything
We need a filter
I want you to **** me
With a ****** full of yes
I told them
If I were a puppy
I would be very stupid
But great to cuddle
We can admit these things about ourselves
While in character
If I tell you
I am pretending to be anything
I can still find ways to pretend to be me
It is like an electric chair
Disguised as a lazy boy
It will not hold you for long
Your skin does not fit proper
It makes me think of my father
The Clown
Who bent me into shape
With his balloon animal breath
Only he had asthma
The empty static
My inner puppy
Is a half deflated balloon poodle
Ends pulled tight like amputee sausage link limbs
Looking lost and lonely isn’t hard
What’s hard about it is
Looking like that was your intention
In character
Some invisible narrator
I can admit anything
Jul 28, 2012
Jul 28, 2012 at 4:28 PM UTC
i was wrenched from a bed
that was not my own to begin with.
into the sunlight, they dragged me,
hands yanking at my long hair.
i clutched my body.
jaw set, i silently vowed not to cry, to take it
like a woman should – to look them in the eye,
to stand unashamedly in front of my neighbors,
my mother, and my sisters. to stand in front of the town,
and face the inevitable.
the Pharisees threw me to the ground, gave a swift kick
to my side – gentle, compared with what would come.
the women, eyes glossed with icy detest, spat in my face.
*so the ***** has been caught*, they hissed.
But i refused to give them the satisfaction.
i wouldn’t close my eyes during it.
couldn’t.
Jesus, they barked, *we caught her sleeping
with a man she doesn’t belong to*.
you know what to do.
the little children and the rabbi and the mothers
and the sons, they felt the ground
for smooth, heavy rocks.
i bowed my head slightly, as fingers trembled over
new, prune-colored bruises
on my ribs, my stomach.
i unlocked my knees and lifted my chin,
met his eyes.
he paused for a moment, nodded his head slowly.
If you are without sin, please, cast the first stone.
i bit my lip, waited and watched,
squinting in the sunrise.
the Pharisees grumbled, the townspeople eyed me, but said
nothing, until they left, one
by one.
that Jesus, they mumbled,
He’s always finding loopholes.
Sep 29, 2010
Sep 29, 2010 at 4:56 PM UTC
Purple Puppy lost at sea,
All alone wishing for thee.
A little Humming bird arrived instead,
And guided the pup from the maze's dead end.
Purple Puppy barked again,
Looking for his Mom and Dad,
But what he saw up ahead
Made his fur turn to red.
Apr 28, 2016
Apr 28, 2016 at 6:53 PM UTC
there's a lone seal swimming by the sea
hunting for silvers with heartless glee
a fish shy there, another one wiggling there
who really cares
for his table always set for one
darkness his day in the sun
still he takes to the rolling tides
lone, but ******* in his pride
one day his eyes pique a double look
as a mermaid pops out of his storybook
stunning as a little light filters in
as she swooshes by, waving her fins
she's a sparkled beauty from head to toe
her consonance and shine, lighting his mojo
growing hunger and his drive keep following her
on the ocean floor she shimmers
between the rocks she dances
one step she be in harmony to his glances
he drives a barked out calling
so raw and appalling
shivers crawling down her back
as he arf, arf's another attack
alarmed with his lack of renaissance
like she should be, she didn't offer a response
as she keeps shimmering past the rocks
racing, racing away from any further talk
broken, he retreats to his mind
the missing piece he'll never find
there's a lone mermaid swimming by the sea
and a lone seal barking of what could be
Logan Robertson
11/13/2017
Nov 13, 2017
Nov 13, 2017 at 7:13 PM UTC
Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
The night above the ****** starry,
Time let me hail and climb
Golden in the heydays of his eyes,
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
Trail with daisies and barley
Down the rivers of the windfall light.
And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
In the sun that is young once only,
Time let me play and be
Golden in the mercy of his means,
And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and cold,
And the sabbath rang slowly
In the pebbles of the holy streams.
All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air
And playing, lovely and watery
And fire green as grass.
And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the nightjars
Flying with the ricks, and the horses
Flashing into the dark.
And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the **** on his shoulder: it was all
Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
The sky gathered again
And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking warm
Out of the whinnying green stable
On to the fields of praise.
And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
In the sun born over and over,
I ran my heedless ways,
My wishes raced through the house high hay
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
Before the children green and golden
Follow him out of grace.
Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would
take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
In the moon that is always rising,
Nor that riding to sleep
I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
Time held me green and dying
Though I sang in my chains like the sea.
3.3k
STARRY STARRY NIGHT
She switched off the moon.
Plucked out the stars.
A little dog barked
as her scream scrawled:
“This time life has gone...too far.”
She took an overdose of sleeping tablets
in her big bright red car.
The day withers
that was once in bloom.
Petals fall
in an empty room.
The moon wept.
The stars cried.
Life was for living... Life lied.
Jun 24, 2018
Jun 24, 2018 at 6:38 PM UTC
To the left to death;
to the right to work.
Anna, your blond hair
shines in the sun.
Ashes on my
dark hair
remind me of you.
Dogs barked an
unwanted greeting.
Anna, where are you?
I dream of your
blonde hair.
I was sent
to the right
to work;
you were sent
to the left
to death
Jun 14, 2019
Jun 14, 2019 at 4:26 AM UTC
____I'LL NEVER FORGET "THAT-NIGHT"___ It was 8;00PM, a Thunder and Lightening storm had just begun and what seemed like thousands of BB sized HAIL WERE PELTING the roof, making it Hard to Hear the Ringing Phone ! ! I Barked OUT a "HELLO",,,the tearful, hesitant voice on the OTHER END....CRIED OUT... " Come over quickly" She pleaded and continued with "IT'S LIKE DEMONS Have CONTROL OF HER ! ! ! ,and SHE KEEPS CRYING OUT .. AUNT BEA,,, Aunt Bea... Over and over"_______ . This was going to require a SPECIAL-EXORCISM I Stated... "I'm ON MY WAY" ! Upon my Arrival , I was greeted by a trembling,sobbing LaCretia,,claiming, "HURRY to the Library Room.,Rochelle is waiting ! !" The repeating AUNT BEAS were spoken as if Gargling... "WHAT are her Symptoms " I Queried ? IN A VERY-SLOW Determined Voice, LaCretia detailed the following,,,, "She has the BLUES, She has the BLAHS, She has BLEMISHES, She has BOWEL Constriction, She has been BLASPHEMING, She has BUTTOCKS Wrinkles, She has BREAST quivers and has been having BELCHING FITS "! ! ! I THREW MYSELF ON THE FLOOR IN PRAYER...Asking for the strength to DEAL-WITH these DEMONS..._____** A N D **____Here's what CAME-OUT of ROCHELLE,,,, *(#1)=BREEZEWAY-LIPS= when encountering these rascals ,it's highly suggested that WE BE UNDER Proper Cover.. (#2)= BISTRO-BREATH-LEADER= Demons that emit SPECIAL AROMATICS into the air ,that keep screaming ,,"IT'S TIME TO EAT"....(#3)=BEHEMOTH -TESTER= Demon assigned to see how BIG OF A MONSTER he can turn you in to ....*( #4)=BRAZEN-FELLOWS= Demon who attempts to Get "YOU" TO **** INTO EVERYBODYS BUSINESS, and ruin their whole day & night...! ! ! I THEN SHOUTED OUT TO **ROCHELLE ** " ARE there any more " B " DEMONS IN there ??" Rochelle, collapsed to the floor,, I promptly RUBBED-IN the BROWN SHOE POLISH into the soles and heels of feet,,*** FOREVER-BLOCKING ***__" B " DEMONS , the ONLY-ENTRANCE to our BODIES .._______ Rochelle ,with a new found strength, lifted herself from the floor, Gingerly grasped my hand, Pulled me "VERY-CLOSE" . KISSED me with a FERVOR , THAT I CAN "TASTE" TO THIS very-day... I bid LaCretia and Rochelle "GOOD-NIGHT",, AND FOUND MYSELF "WHISTLING" and "THINKING" as I walked to my Vehicle.... "The Demons are increasing their activity ! ! I MUST "BE-PREPARED" for the NEXT-CALL_____PERHAPS FROM * Y O U * ??___
Nov 27, 2010
Nov 27, 2010 at 9:06 AM UTC
When my mom was dying
We put a bed in the living room
Fresh from the hospital
In front of the piano
Behind the rocking chair
We still called it the "living room"
I didn't mention the cruel irony in that
And the living people
Who knew my mother
All came and sat around her
And we weren't allowed to touch her
Cause the morphine lost its memory
And every bit of her was falling down
Dozing in a straw house
When the weather man called for hurricanes
She was right there
But miles away from rescue efforts
And hand-holding daughters
Marilyn Monroe went the same way
In bed, I mean
Facedown
Her pill supply run out
And I imagine her room was a beautiful mess
Full of roses and tokens from insincere men
An icon deserves better than that
A pin up with no one
But ex-lovers and sheets to hold her
And a pillow stained with last lipstick kisses
All those little white beads of forgetfulness
Crawling on the floor
And happy birthday Mr. President
Billy woke up bawling the other night
In bed with a girl
Who was not my sister
And he called and told her he loved her still
She hugged my dog and cried into her fur
She finished the roll
Of toilet paper blowing her nose
There were three of us in bed that night
And two somewhere else
Continents, nations, states apart
The air in my room was like asphalt
And allergies weighing us down
Lulu barked at our crestfallen hearts
Under the supermoon
I turned into a twentysomethingwolf
Keen senses acute defenses
And all I could smell on my sheets
Was the kitchen I work in
I wanted to be human
Taste the fear and perfection
Of being a ******
In bed with a boy who is not family
A teenager whispering under sheets again
I stayed at home alone
Soothing, sighing, and howling sweet nothings
To my lonely bed
Telling mom and Marilyn Monroe
The fever dreams in my lone wolf head
Praying "please God, send us someone"
"Please God, let love burn us quick and strong"
"Please God, don't draw the blues out. We all buckle."
Jul 1, 2013
Jul 1, 2013 at 12:08 AM UTC
#
The assassin’s shadow lay prone on the rooftop,
a cut-out against the sky..
seen, but not seen,
because to look up
would mean breaking the spell of the herd.
The Mauser barked,
not of metal alone but of voices,
defending their defenses
with bullets made of shadow..
Fear dressed as Light,
cowardice crowned as virtue.
And all the while,
truth bled on the pavement,
not from weakness,
but because the many chose
silhouette over substance,
projection over sight;
safety over the one who dared to see.
#
Sep 14, 2025
Sep 14, 2025 at 8:26 AM UTC
got myself a donkey yesterday
got myself a donkey yesterday
and tethered it out there in the yard;
but when I looked out the window
I noticed
it looked glum, moody and testy
so I went out to see what I could do
I tickled my donkey
and he cackled and laughed a lot
and he hee-hawed aloud -
but yeah, you can bet your ****
I got the bigger kick out of it
my donkey died
You remember the donkey
I bought some time ago?
Well, I stopped feeding it for a week
and the stupid animal died
just as it was finally learning to survive
on clean air, positive thoughts and vibes
that's a donkey on the table
so my donkey died
and in my grief I lay it on the best table
and I drank and drank
and people who came to mourn
brought some hay
but some of them said, after two days
(and I was still drinking-mourning):
"You can't just leave that lyin' on the table
"
"That's not a lion, you idiot!
"
I barked at each one of them
"That's my donkey on the table!
"
And so I'd demonstrated my ability
to stay sober
and retain my piss-picuity
in spite of days of grief
and like me I am sure you too
cannot but marvel at people's inability
to distinguish between a lion and a donkey
donkey ride
now that my donkey is dead
it makes me reminisce
about the good times we had
________
We were in the car
my donkey and I
as I took it for a weekend ride
which was my habit
And a traffic cop stopped us
and he said:
*“Hey, what you doing
with a donkey in the car?
Take it to the zoo”
*
The next weekend that same cop
stopped us
and he asked me:
*“Still with that donkey?
I thought I told you to take it
to the zoo"
*
“Oh, I did,” I replied
*“and we enjoyed it so much
That was an excellent idea, thank you
Now we’re going to the beach”*
donkey at the cinema
the other time
my donkey insisted
I take it to the cinema
and so I did -
not that I got a kick out of it
but just so that I didn't get a kick
anyways
we were watching the movie
when the guy seated next to donkey
said: *"Hey, you're a donkey.
What 'r' you doing in the cinema? "
*
And donkey replied:
*" I reviewed the book;
now I'm here to review the movie"*
Feb 2, 2014
Feb 2, 2014 at 1:26 AM UTC
A leaf fell, twisting in the Fir Green Square,
Like a spear thrown through the air;
A dog, distant and real,
Has barked five hundred years on Sheep Street.
Holy Trinity, the bone keeper, keeps doors open.
The Avon, not so sweet now, flows on;
Swans swim and preen, and tonight,
Henry will rage on Agincourt again,
Calling on his brothers, and me,
To breach the vicious cycle of lonely barks
And the immutable march of time.
Take my hand, look into my eyes,
My brotherhood of men.
Aug 24, 2016
Aug 24, 2016 at 9:23 AM UTC
I go unwilling and unarmed
Recruited by age I lay me down
The medals gleaming on my coat
Mean nothing now, my vessel weak
Hard for my ship to stay afloat
The ocean once sparkling blue
A dingy grey of lowering clouds
Dark and foreboding as a storm
I recall standing proudly on the prow
My crew would not know me now
There are things to accept, things to learn
Time to know my place, take the stern
My orders once barked in strident tone
Now a whisper, not my own
My ship becalmed, canons disarmed
Her flag that once flew with pride
Is still, no wind can stir her, colours bled
I salute and a gust raises her high,
A blood red pennant in a star filled sky
I am not afraid to die
Oct 5, 2021
Oct 5, 2021 at 8:15 AM UTC
I remember you spirt in the Chelsea Flophouse
you were opening one's lips so gorgeous and so creamy
greasing me stamen on the unfucked bonk
while the bangers let it rip in the alley
Those were the diseased minds and that was Newfangled York
we were squirting for the wads and the meatballs
and that was gobbled snog for the creamers inside Gloria
centrifugally stiff is thus those of White House Nazis
Ah but you copulated telescopic didn't you basket case
you just acidified your jockstrap on the shoulders of the scrum
you copulated telescopic I never once heard you use sign language
I input you, I don't intake you
I input you, I don't intake you
and all of that balling hard on
I remember you spirt in the Chelsea Flophouse
you were gorilla—like your ****** *********** was absolute epic
you leaked me again you frocked slap—up old salt
but for me you would **** an unzipping
And shaving your tongue because the creatures lust after us
who are barked at by the Daleks of *** appeal
you Rohypnolled yourself you emitted jet so what?
we are radioactive salvo we shoot full of holes the stride piano
*** one fine morning you copulated telescopic didn't you cocker
you just blunted your extremity on the cattle
you copulated telescopic I never once smelled you emit
I intake you, I don't input you
I intake you, I don't input you
and all of that balling hard on
I don't mean to insinuate that I slobbered over you peanuts
I can't withhold *********** of each crouched ****
I remember you spirt in the Chelsea Flophouse
that's oodles I don't even kick—start you that thick and fast
Mar 29, 2010
Mar 29, 2010 at 3:36 PM UTC
.
The menace emerges from the shadows,
a barked order, but unintelligible.
Then the soft steel kiss
slicing through flesh into entrails.
A fist connects with a crunching face,
legs buckle with pain and blood-loss.
And the Darkness of Death takes me,
like a comfort blanket of soft wool.
My Temple violated and de-sanctified,
the blade withdraws with a whisper.
Darkness cuddles
and welcomes me with a smile.
The morphine haze
keeps me inert and motionless,
but makes my mind giggle.
It wanders aimless
through psychedelic chapters …
This place is sterile, white, drab.
My eyes move slowly left.
There is something in a doorway.
The door.
… my head flies to a Poets Banquet,
where I am the bones thrown to the dogs.
And the wood grain in the door moves,
a cascading chocolate fountain,
over and over again,
flowing, melting like molten lava.
They taught me to write,
then cut off my hands.
Obscurity is purity;
fame is pain.
So I penned a letter to the dead.
My eyeballs are all that move,
floating in mid-air,
but still connected and transmitting
drug induced images.
I remember the assassin, the blade,
the darkness, the sirens, but no pain.
Images but no feeling.
They move right to a cold bedside table,
and then I think I cried.
Somebody Knows me.
No chocolates, no flowers.
Somebody Knows me.
No fruit. No magazines.
Just …
a pen and a pad.
Somebody Knows me.
I did cry, someone remembers me.
And each teardrop contained a thousand images,
a thousand stories, a thousand poems.
Inspiration. Illusion. Insight.
And the Darkness of Sleep takes me
like a comfort blanket of soft wool.
The morphine haze retreats
further into my mind and I dream …
of ambulances and white walls
of green gowns and bright lights
of scalpels and scissors and surgery
of needles and nurses and nightmares
… I dream of Poetry
in colour.
I see worlds in the sky
and words painted on clouds.
A kaleidoscope of teardrops
dripping images into my mind.
A fountain of mist cascading,
seeping into a memory sponge.
And I feel; somebody who Knows me
gently wipe away the tears.
© Pagan Paul (04/06/17)
Jun 4, 2017
Jun 4, 2017 at 7:14 PM UTC
“the pleasuring words”
~
are not of necessity singularly complected or of one nature
know them by many other names, colorations, languages,
throat growling purring, pretty soft and stern, singsong,
begged borrowed stolen, barked and pleaded
but when the eyes quietly say,
come to me
darling
in manner unspoken,
the pleasuring of the silence
greater than if sullied by a vocalization,
the wild sounds my heart commit
pounding mounting ever louder,
requiring no translation, though with repetition,
they grow louder
with every heart throbbing,
a new language relearning
the pleasuring words are spoken
by silent eyes when you
call me by my other name
my
darling
Aug 12, 2018
Aug 12, 2018 at 12:10 PM UTC