"bespectacled" poems
Found myself at a dental clinic...
He was the best there was.
Unorthodox and eccentric,
But to the specialised craft, he was boss.
Ran through the bits and bobs
Like any normally would.
The poking and prodding and the mandible X-rays.
Everything cold and clinical, so was the mood.
Strange was what happened next...
Specialist and I then stood facing each other.
He leaned close and pressed his palms against my rib cage.
Held them there over a few breaths before it was over.
Then a brief chat, small talk initiated by the man.
Bespectacled and exceedingly chatty, small in stature.
Talks of politics and odd human behaviours...
What started off as friendly turned into a heated banter.
I then realised that along with his decorated credentials,
Was his propensity to be condescending and arrogant.
Him being the best, I thought I could let it all slide,
But soon enough I opted out of being a willing participant.
Couldn't stand his abrasive cockiness!
I snapped out of being cordial and passive thought.
I wanted him to just stop talking!
I went, "Well, are you going to fix my teeth or not?!"
He was stunned momentarily...
I suppose he hadn't seen that coming.
Then his features softened to a blank
I could almost read the unspoken words he was conjuring.
With an exasperated sigh of resignation,
He uttered his next words swollen with regret
"There's no need...for you only have four years left."
It dawned upon me that my timer has been set.
And then I woke up...
Oct 25, 2014
Oct 25, 2014 at 2:21 PM UTC
They, you and I.
Are?
Interpretations, opinions,
Fears and convictions,
Likes-dislikes,
History and anticipations,
Of life.
All, save the living of it, maybe?
A song heard months back in time
You mused over the major & minor,
I'd pondered over the rhyme.
Each of us
As convinced about its presence.
Winter tastes different in my memory.
Epilogue:
You must choose between
His bespectacled vision
And my retrospective conclusion
But you must know
Which you chose
And why.
May 10, 2014
May 10, 2014 at 6:27 PM UTC
this is for the Dreamers, Lovers, and Surgeons
for the Hopeless Stargazer who immortalized his Subject with one hundred and eight sets of fourteen lines in iambic pentameter
for ***** tight clad teenage boys who envied frisky fleas, struggling to make holy ungodly passions with cheap arguments and metaphysical pick up lines
for Disillusioned City Dwellers, who, wandering lonely as clouds, stopped to quietly reflect upon wind-beaten moss-covered crags, and heard God’s whisper thunder from petals and blades of grass
this is for the Dreamers, Lovers, and Surgeons
for Bespectacled Slave Drivers who submersed idle minds in anthologies, forcing them to **** neon yellow on dreams deferred and rivers; slicing and dicing Grecian urns with red ball point pens; bruising and battering, in blue ball point, roads not taken; scalding supermarkets in California with pyroclastic flows of graphite
for those pushing to tear apart lines and letters, reconstructing ,deconstructing, agonizing, imaginizing, bullshitting, and brooding on to crisp white sheets in times new roman twelve point font
for the Monsters and Lollipops that exist in the millimeters between a skull and a brain
this is for the Dreamers, Lovers, and Surgeons slumbering beneath Restless Leaves Under the Moon
Nov 29, 2012
Nov 29, 2012 at 10:39 AM UTC
to that bespectacled beauty
whom i fell in love with on the train
i wish i could've told you how i felt
i wish i could've held your hands
before you alight the train.
-a.m.
Apr 6, 2017
Apr 6, 2017 at 10:42 AM UTC
**Society, the embodiment of human securities
Is in reality the stark confirmation
Of a conglomerate of screaming insecurities
Begging….its leaders….fervent introspection **
*Bending logic is an art perfected by all
Regardless of creed class or stature
No wonder the walk is seemingly a hard laboured crawl
Culminating into deep exposed…psychological sutures*
**Beings are bedevilled by a roving myopia
Craving a farfetched grandiose utopia
That’s why a bespectacled cynicism
Is ironically of essence…to neutralise a deep rooted parochialism**
Jun 4, 2013
Jun 4, 2013 at 7:28 AM UTC
It's an army I'm facing:
A hundred marker-wielding,
Bespectacled preacher-teachers
With a set process, a formula
Defined by science
And tried by no child
Without consequence. It's
A national army, banners waving.
I pledge each morning to my
Country. (Thank you, great army,
For my life as a free child!) Then I
Sit in my assigned seat; I finish my
Assigned work. When the lesson
Ends, my friends and I discuss
(Thank you for amendment two!)
Our distrust of double-meanings -
Our distrust of everything - too
Many contradictions in a day.
All this while the snipers aim, (like
Strikebreakers coming to claim
The rabble-rousers) (Thank you for our
Peaceful assembly rights!) they remind us
To work hard for faraway and free days,
College parties with dean( drill sergeant)'s
Iron eyes over our (soon-to-be) soldier
Shoulders. (Thank you for privacy rights!)
We are reminded to
Complete our assignments quietly.
(Thank you for free speech.)
Sep 14, 2010
Sep 14, 2010 at 3:57 PM UTC
Once upon a time, there was me:
A simpleton of no account,
A dunderhead by word of mouth,
An addle-pate, a cracking crock,
A crazy who deserved a lock.
Not pretty, brainy, or well-bred,
Bespectacled, a short redhead
With hands too small and far too pink
Who’d trip or fall as soon as think.
Not many prospects, they declared
With such conviction I was scared.
But the cast was short one role,
The one who’d make the halfwit whole . . .
Once upon a time, there was you:
A lord of state, of high esteem,
The answer to each maiden’s dream,
A strong man, raven-haired, and tall?
No, not this person, not at all.
You had glasses just like me,
And freckles where your skin should be.
Your clothes were rumpled, torn and tattered
Not as though that even mattered:
You walked on set and came to me
You got down on one gawky knee
You took my pink hand in your red
And, as you fixed your glasses, said:
“I love your hands, your height, your hair,
I love you up, down, everywhere.
And I hesitate to ask you this . . .
But could I maybe have a kiss?”
And, for once, my tactless lips
Did not resort to stumbling slips;
I gave you one, I gave you two,
I gave every kiss I had to you.
Once upon a time, there was us:
Two simpletons of no repute
Two dunderheads whose names were moot:
Prince Not-So-Charming and his *****
And much as cynics tried to drench
The flames of addle-pated glee
I found in you and you in me,
As much as they enjoyed pretending,
They could not harm our happy ending.
Dec 5, 2012
Dec 5, 2012 at 1:28 AM UTC
The sprinting sprite was wearing stripes
Bespectacled in black and white
He offered up some hushed advice
On how to live my life
I said be gone and don't come back
Don't dare to tell me how
The wisdom to advise you lack
I've done alright till now
Feb 29, 2012
Feb 29, 2012 at 12:25 PM UTC
She strolled along the narrow pathway through
the park. Her soft skirt flitting in the breeze,
her long legs smooth and pampered, sandaled feet
took mellow steps under the Springtime sun.
She caught the eye of Fred, who from his book
rose up bespectacled and drank the scene
of one young beauty carried by the breeze,
and thanked the Lord for all His wondrous things.
She noticed that he noticed and she sneered,
disdainfully and crushed him with the lids
of scornful eyes that closed upon his face,
and cursed the womb that birthed this pervert live.
She caught the eye of Tom, whose magazine
dropped to the bench from fingers preening hair,
his lion's gaze devouring this gazelle,
and she took notice of his notice there.
She threw back hair and turned to meet his gaze
with sideways glance, a wink, and half pursed lips,
amazed a stroll from bench to bench could find
a pervert and a stud so side by side.
Both men came to the park to sit and read,
and read indeed, then both, like men, did do
what men so do, and neither differed there,
yet one was deemed a pervert, one a stud.
(C)2014, Christos Rigakos
Apr 15, 2014
Apr 15, 2014 at 4:16 PM UTC
Zebra-striped cushion covers on soft-white chairs,
cream topped calorie delights, inviting -
this patisserie in Nairobi:
"you're welcome" the smartly outfitted
African girl spoke in flawlessly accented English
as I pore over the menu - a posh girl
dressed in haute denim and a sleeved top
walks in and spoke French in pouted lips
as she found her corner spot, reading;
an Asian couple walk in, wife in hijab
and baby in tow, as the man sneers at me and
answers 'assalamu alaikum' on phone
as I ponder on identity when
the French matron in Yoga tops walks in
saying namaste to me, and calls out for Henry -
her outfitted and bespectacled pomeranian
oh don't we all want to be someone else
Jun 4, 2016
Jun 4, 2016 at 10:45 PM UTC
*** 101
by Michael R. Burch
That day the late spring heat
steamed through the windows of a Crayola-yellow schoolbus
crawling its way up the backwards slopes
of Nowheresville, North Carolina ...
Where we sat exhausted
from the day’s skulldrudgery
and the unexpected waves of muggy,
summer-like humidity ...
Giggly first graders sat two abreast
behind senior high students
sprouting their first sparse beards,
their implausible bosoms, their stranger affections ...
The most unlikely coupling―
Lambert, 18, the only college prospect
on the varsity basketball team,
the proverbial talldarkhandsome
swashbuckling cocksman, grinning ...
Beside him, Wanda, 13,
bespectacled, in her primproper attire
and pigtails, staring up at him,
fawneyed, disbelieving ...
And as the bus filled with the improbable musk of her,
as she twitched impaled on his finger
like a dead frog jarred to life by electrodes,
I knew ...
that love is a forlorn enterprise,
that I would never understand it.
Keywords/Tags: first, love, *** lust, passion, desire, school, bus, foreplay, ********* odor, musk
Apr 27, 2020
Apr 27, 2020 at 4:29 AM UTC
I take the number 7 bus every week .
To the basement of an obscure building,
I am a member of a secret society
I have been saving hard all week
Today I will deposit my savings
As I slowly descend step by step
I hear the familiar wails
and moans of other members
As they deposit their savings
A stooped, wise , bespectacled old man
greets me at the door and ushers me inside with a smile.
I sit in a soft chair at the end of the row
The same wise old man
places a long slender glass to my eye
And the Tear Collector begins his work.
As I sit and cry
I hope you have saved them all up.
Definitely I answer, I was happy all week- no tears
Jun 27, 2010
Jun 27, 2010 at 4:13 PM UTC
In Waterstones
Sighing at the bestsellers
opaque at the corner of my right
eye two ladies late in life
are centre stage amid the table
paperbacks.
“Are you following me?” the taller bellows
brimmed headscarf towering over her NHS bespectacled
sister of afternoons and shopping mornings
continuing a conversation that has obviously
followed them their entire friendship
seeming the matriarch of the pair, she is circumspect
in her contrariness.
Whatever entitles her to this
Guardianship of self-importance
Her being a lighthouse rising above the mists
condensing off beaten shards of rock
is subdued by her companions’ pithy response
“no-you know I have no interest in Autobiographies.”
Jan 9, 2019
Jan 9, 2019 at 7:18 AM UTC
write at midnight. edit in the morning.
write on a mountain. edit on a beach.
write inside a dream. edit & exist in reality.
write in a fever pitch as starlight kisses your cheekbones.
edit in the cold dawn light without excuses.
write loudly with Bjork screaming into the curtains.
edit in silence.
write as the clouds gather around the gibbous moon.
edit as the sun crests the hill & burns away the fog.
write inside, cozy under a blanket.
edit naked, cold on the front porch.
write asking questions.
edit demanding answers.
write blindfolded with your fingers waltzing across the qwerty.
edit bespectacled or with a monocle.
write like a mass ****** edit like a suicide.
or better yet
write like a homicide. edit like a detective.
write toward the open sky with your legs outstretched before you.
edit facing a clean white wall with your knees against your chest.
write because you are innocent. edit because you are guilty.
write during a fit of hyperventilation.
edit during mammoth exhalation.
write with complexity. edit into simplicity.
write, as Hemingway did, drunk.
edit, not sober, but hungover.
see your flaws in the sharp mirror of a headache.
write during sloppy explosion. edit during precise implosion.
write with your head in the clouds gnawing at the cumulus.
edit with your feet firmly planted in the ground.
write during violent collision.
edit during calm separation.
write with a pencil on soggy paper in a hot shower.
edit with a red pen sitting in tepid murky bathwater.
write among raucous laughter & banging skillets.
edit in secret while the kids are asleep.
write like a sadomasochist.
edit like a psychiatrist.
write while running on your tip-toes.
edit while lying flat on your back.
write in several languages with abandon.
edit beside a translator dictionary.
write as you are engulfed in fire.
edit with an extinguisher.
write with careless fluidity.
edit without assistance from amphetamine or coffee.
write with a full bladder,
standing up,
jitterbugging,
squeezing the tip of your *****
closed--urgently
squirm & trickle
your ideas onto
the porcelain page.
Jan 10, 2016
Jan 10, 2016 at 11:33 AM UTC
looking around me, 19 second stop at a red light and already the large, bearded man with the scar on his cheekbone is grumbling, scratching at his bushy mustache and drooping Yankees hat, so faded it could almost be a B for the red sox
there's a young woman, ***** blonde hair cascading down her back, almost gracefully; seemingly too small for the rumbling white pickup truck she sat in, scratched and almost a tint of blue from this angle; one hand at the wheel, one tickling the feet of a giggling newborn at her side, for a second i wondered who the father was-
and over there, a skinny Hispanic boy by the side of the road, walking with threadbare sandals flapping against the hard cement, there's a hopeless look in his eyes-
an old man with a 5-inch long grey beard, almost touching the steering wheel; he's either Asian or he's squinting into the sun, can't really tell from here- wrinkles lining his worn face
a strong-boned Japanese woman, hair in a tight bun driving a Ferrari
a red-haired bespectacled boy, pale as chalk, his face covered with freckles (or was it acne?); couldn't have been older than 17; he looked like a Robert or a Charles, definitely not a Samuel
in front of me, a red Chevy truck with a license plate LUVANN, i wonder if Ann is still with him- i crane my head upwards trying to see the man, all i can glimpse is a blue-and-white bandana-
i wonder who all these people are,
what are their hopes and dreams, do they like ******* jacks? banana splits?
where are they going?
who will miss them when they're gone, or will anyone-
then the light turns green and in a puff of smoke,
like a blur-
they're gone.
Nov 22, 2010
Nov 22, 2010 at 3:12 AM UTC
Another wave of hopefuls arrive:
a sea of humanity, on board this flight.
Wide-eyed young with dreams of a future;
Broken men from no-mans' lands,
seekers of refuge and an identity of hope;
The student of science, the Yoga teacher;
Precocious and bespectacled
immigrant kids with foreign accents;
Anxious old on the first plane of their lives
out to meet their children, or grand-children;
man in traditional attire; relieved missionary
from his conquest of souls; All escaping
to the Ark of the world, on board this flight,
Sep 30, 2012
Sep 30, 2012 at 1:15 PM UTC
there is a broken thing
reformed in amber
disarranging the spectrum
of sensical causal motion
nail biting following
migration patterns of neural
activity and we bless the few
who cut clean and learn early
those bespectacled masses
cannot intuit the limited scope
of aversion to blurry pink clouds
gussied up in peripheral vision the
pineal gland controls circadian
rhythms gushes dmt when
we die i wonder i
wonder what that (vestigial)
little pinecone knows
that we don’t
cased in spongy
grey matter and i don’t think
much of time as metaphor but
my watch strap broke
yesterday i hope
that is
important i do
nothing so simple or complex
as love but(i carry it in my heart)
Nov 1, 2014
Nov 1, 2014 at 8:44 PM UTC
She ran from me
in her voyeuristic
tendencies.
Bespectacled in the night,
she shed away her divinity
this girl with a penchant for tragedy.
A dramatic prelude to her kiss
would be the fixations of the poet
to her eyes and lips and skin.
Those which he can only recall
in music--
the slow andante of violin strings
entangled in the coasts
of her body.
Come morning you wake
to the tune of silence.
You could never tell her
those three words she longed to hear.
Oct 26, 2014
Oct 26, 2014 at 2:12 PM UTC
Wake up on the wrong side of the bed,
And pull a muscle slightly.
In the pain, to the ground you’re led,
And jump back up again sprightly.
Like the lumpy pillow at the edge,
I like my despair rare.
Get smacked by the ink trying to caress your hair,
While the bespectacled man mouths disappointment.
And his wife looks down at you and stares,
Brush it all off because hey, it's atonement.
Like the lukewarm cereal milk,
I like my despair rare.
She smiles at you, but her eyes seem to deplore,
And her boredom, oh large is it writ.
Ah her mouth was a chocolate fountain before,
But of late, it seems like it’s on autopilot.
Like her constant glances at the icon,
I like my despair rare.
Breathe in the comforting smell of meat,
Smoked and salted to perfection.
Only for that one song to play on repeat,
And move over to the other section.
Unlike what I ordered, and like the steak I got,
I like my despair rare.
Break off those wonderful relations,
Through no fault of your own.
And get sent on quite a bad trip,
Realizing all that time together was just a loan.
Like the price tag on that fancy bottle,
I like my despair rare.
Go home to watch the grand game,
With a six needed for the fans and players to mingle.
It seemed as though even fate wanted to maim,
As the voices echoed “Single!”
Like that dipping yorker,
I like my despair rare.
Back in bed with a heavy head,
Perhaps things didn’t go all that bad.
What went wrong? Was everything misread?
Maybe this is the time to be sad.
I like my despair rare, I do.
But maybe it likes me more.
Apr 7, 2016
Apr 7, 2016 at 9:46 AM UTC
ººº
*Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit,
according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world,
and not according to Christ.*
Colossians 2:4-8 (NKJV)
His Nietzschean trip moved from Comic toward Tragic:
Deleuze’s delusions flew out the fenêtre
Airborne and ****** on philosphy’s magic
(the nihilist suicide’s raison d’être…)
Propelled from the window, transcending the Ontic,
his organless body in textual flight,
a schiz-flow beyond on a voyage turned frantic.
His thought – a nomadic adornment for speed,
multiplicitly viewing a thousand plateaux
was a force for unhinging the doorways of light
and a plea for postmodern decoding indeed.
His frame soon encountered pure striated space
in the form of the pavement caressing his face.
He joins other smokers of Gallic tabac,
other esotericians of cognitive frenzy
(those mullahs of madness, those sultans of Whack…)
Sorely missed by his victims, disciples and friends
he is mourned, misinterpreted, copied, dismissed
– but for semioticians he heads up the list.
Another brave Frenchman, some guy named Debord
a bespectacled Marxist (who missed all the marks)
made the mediums’ message a radical bore
dialectically fading the lights into darks.
Indirectly disrupting pop-culture with Punk
and other anarchic phenomena-junk,
he too chose to leave with a nihilist bang –
while we whimper and suffer down here with the gang.
The old situationist’s last situation:
an agit-prop funeral short on elation…
So to French de-constructor-philosopher-ravers
and all who rejoice while society wavers
I offer these lines, like a quick coup-de-grace
and be warned – they’re now viewing the Good Lord en face.
Sep 11, 2015
Sep 11, 2015 at 10:16 PM UTC
The photographer
says to sit
and be at ease.
You sit on the chair
he has left for you.
Eye the studio
old photos on the walls
a tripod and camera
in front.
He standing there
bespectacled
dark haired.
You want
your photograph
with the headpiece on?
he says.
Yes it was my mother's
you reply.
He nods
and arranges
the headpiece
to set it straight
and even at the sides.
You have very
distinctive eyes
he says
standing back
gazing at you.
Your nose
is straight
and aligns
with the center
of your chin.
You say nothing
your nerves are bad
you want him
to get on with it
but sit waiting.
He takes the camera
and sets it before you.
He disappears
behind the camera.
You freeze
frightened to move
your hands stiff
in your lap.
Relax
he says
the camera
won't bite.
You feel hot
in the black dress
you sense
your underclothes
stick to your skin.
You try and relax
pretend he's not there
but behind him
over his shoulder staring
is your mother's ghost
or so seems
like a figure
haunting dreams.
Jun 29, 2017
Jun 29, 2017 at 8:55 AM UTC
I have two scars on my face; neither one's very visible anymore. One I received at age three (late 1992), falling face-first into a dry riverbed on my first camping trip. I landed hard, my forehead colliding with a crescent-shaped rock. I remember my father turning me over, my vision going red, the blood flowing into my scleras and pupils. The rock missed my right eye by millimeters. When J.K. Rowling published Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone in 1997 my peers began calling me "Harry." Dark-haired, bespectacled, similar scar -- whole package. My comeback: "They should call Harry Potter 'Chris Gorrie', I had the scar first." Not until ten years later, when The Deathly Hallows was released, did I realize Harry was "born" in 1980.
May 2, 2014
May 2, 2014 at 3:16 AM UTC
For all of his homeliness,
he walked with an air of majesty and purpose.
A hard and sunken bespectacled face, hollowed out from weight loss
emphasizes knowledgeable grey eyes
He shuffles through papers and runs his fingers through his
long blond hair.
A never ending cycle,
he’s always doing one or the other.
And fidgeting with his head phones- he hands me one.
“What do you hear?”
His eyes are searching mine for my thoughts,
dancing with anticipation as to what I might say.
“Do you hear that?” he asks.
He always looked so hungry, like he wants answers.
I can’t remember the last time I saw him eat.
I touch what was once a cheek.
“You look so thin.”
He doesn’t say anything. His eyes just flash- each one different.
The left says “Shut the **** up.”
The right says “Help me.”
Please don’t be afraid to let someone in.
Please.
He walks hard, every stride like he plans to take over a country.
Oh there is purpose in his steps.
He has the brightest mind.
He’s hard, but he can see beauty where others can’t.
He knows absolutely everything about me.
“Why would something so beautiful want to die?” he asks me.
I’ll remember those words for the rest of my life.
Life is precious.
And despite all of the hardships we have seen, the years that have passed,
I still love him.
Oct 27, 2012
Oct 27, 2012 at 1:52 AM UTC