"breastbone" poems
In the worst hour of the worst season
of the worst year of a whole people
a man set out from the workhouse with his wife.
He was walking-they were both walking-north.
She was sick with famine fever and could not keep up.
He lifted her and put her on his back.
He walked like that west and north.
Until at nightfall under freezing stars they arrived.
In the morning they were both found dead.
Of cold. Of hunger. Of the toxins of a whole history.
But her feet were held against his breastbone.
The last heat of his flesh was his last gift to her.
Let no love poem ever come to this threshold.
There is no place here for the inexact
praise of the easy graces and sensuality of the body.
There is only time for this merciless inventory:
Their death together in the winter of 1847.
Also what they suffered. How they lived.
And what there is between a man and a woman.
And in which darkness it can best be proved.
10.9k
Your cold hand against mine
we are frozen in time
with your breastbone against my body
and the darkness all around me
All I want is to call you my own
all day that's what I moan
but you've passed away today
there's no other way
to hear you say "I Love You"
or for us to gently woo
the other one to marriage
where the ledge stood
that you jumped off of
to the ground below and above
the birds sang as the sound
of crunching bones against the ground
shatter the silence with a scream
maybe I'm just in a dream....
But then I awake with an empty bed
beside my body and my head
I reach across and look for you to grab
my hand where my ugly, horrendous scab
from when I tried to **** myself
lives within the hidden shelves
of my lost mind.
Oh, lover, where have you gone?
I sing a sorrowful song after song
hoping that will bring you back
but instead your body is cracked
and will never house another soul
your body is just a black hole
within my memories of us
you're now a once was
after your suicide
I've never been the same. a part of me died.
Apr 26, 2014
Apr 26, 2014 at 8:05 PM UTC
the words
are beads and gems
and hooks and strings
scattered in a box
somewhere in
the softness behind my breastbone
my palms are up to catch the key
whenever it chooses to land
a pandora poised
to make ornaments
from all she uncovers,
all she unleashes
Mar 5, 2016
Mar 5, 2016 at 1:24 PM UTC
1 4
she offers me, a spot of dust
she raises me under the couch,
on platitudes and warm bread I know it’s
in return for my devotion there
she loves me like the boats today, I start spring-cleaning,
she keeps out on the ocean (this alone
she loves me to be molded, should receive
not to be unfolded more recognition than it will)
I pull out the couch
she bore me bones the vacuum doesn’t quite
the lacrimal bone reach the dust lying
the breastbone on unused carpet,
all the cervical vertebrae the head
I use them to simulate keeps hitting the wall
her expectations unproductive
I put the furniture back
2 in place
I have names, no one will see the lack
I wear them like badges of progress
inspired by something not quite
earned yet 5
while lucid dreaming
I assigned constellations were on
each name my skin
a compartment and freckles in
of me the night sky
If I name them maybe
they will become pollution drowned out
real, not just necessary two thirds
even if most imploded
before they were seen
3 6
with enough necessity were it not for shadows
anyone can tell a lie I would surely learn to
hate the light
Jul 4, 2015
Jul 4, 2015 at 6:43 PM UTC
I think I would like to make a home of your body
Like the dens I used to make with my siblings,
Before I started saying "no thanks".
To take a doctor's scalpel,
Clean and new and never used
And so very, very sharp
And to rest it in the hollow just where the breastbone ends.
Then to push it in along your soft smooth shiny skin
So unlike the mottled scarring that covers mine.
Down, down, down
To where you wear the waistband of your jeans.
A horizontal swipe at the top,
At the bottom,
Like making the fold of a window in a paper house.
Shh, is anyone home?
Lifting the heavy, wet flesh,
Your rib cage is so very white
And so very perfect
Like special cutlery for special occasions-
Births and weddings and funerals.
They hide your lungs,
Bloodshot and tired of the
Eternal
Moving and moving and moving on and on and on
Your stomach, soft
And vulnerable in its hideousness
Yet it hides the despicable necessity
Of human life.
And your heart,
Plump and fresh and young,
It is restless and strains
But for what when all that lies outside
Is incomprehensible and unnerving and unwelcoming.
So I will leave it all behind
And with damp heavy fatigue crawl
Into your torso like the unborn child
We have all been and will be again.
And your ribs will cradle me like a birdcage
That has grown so sick of the world,
And your organs will cushion and comfort me
When I feel that I do not want to live.
And blood will cover everything
Just as I have always wanted.
Flooding my eyes and nose and mouth and ears
And bathing me in the warmth, the constant gentle pounding,
That would make me feel alive.
May 13, 2014
May 13, 2014 at 2:08 PM UTC
Sometimes,
I think of taking my hands
And ripping - splitting - cracking,
My ribcage in two.
The breastbone splintering apart,
My torso opening like a rotten tree.
The inside hollowed,
Like a lake that has been emptied
I've convinced myself that
Fragrant flowers
Would grow there.
That they would grow feverishly
In the gnawing gap
I had created.
And that time would preserve
What I had done.
Sep 29, 2017
Sep 29, 2017 at 5:48 PM UTC
“and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.”
Walt Whitman
<>
having recently been on standby for a permanent-entry residency visa
to over & just beyond death’s door, Walt’s prescient prescription strikes my broken breastbone even harder much, than the persistent
periodic pains confirming the breaking and the healing
of this man’s mending of the human centric poetic *****
for this warped heart mine, now rejoicingly rejiggered with some threads and wires to deliver a new but fresh bloodied wisdom,
begs me, eggs me to torrent word streams, but Whitman’s wisdom cautions a new slowness, the wisdom of mortality’s hot breath urges careful consideration of every letter that my second chance, consignment shop flesh, eagerly embraces, to both prescribe and proscribe inside-insights tween the deafening sounds of eyelashes beating synchronized to the revived heart rates rapid renewal and
last second-chances….
torn tween minute torso sensations and the running silence of
a new battery’s internal rapid intervals, the silent timing gaps tween beats leaves-just-enough-space to ask over and over again,
from whence will come my richest fluency? (1)
at 300am, I lay carefully caressing and chewing well each transitory
thought, absent the former energetic ability to just spill,
though highly desired,
now requires, like me,
steady re-piecing together
the steady drumbeat of now-nearer-my-god-than-thee Titanic reflections
demands a slowing rapidity
this I thought before and now ken, even and ever better, that our primary endeavor shall always be the giving, the disbursement of the act of love…for therein lies the healing of each, and wet eyes,
make necessarily concluding this poem about nothing and everything
and I comprehend Walt’s dictum:
my very flesh is a poem,
every sensation a lyric,
every breath taken and returned to the atmosphere
so unconsciously
are my oldest
and newest
3:00 AM poetry companions
Aug 18, 2023
Aug 18, 2023 at 4:41 PM UTC
I’ve begun “The Wasting” once more.
That ragged uncovering of bones and peaks and ridges that crop up along my spine and shoulders.
My scapulas revealing themselves like the bed of a lake as the waters recede.
Indents beside and under my kneecaps, hollows that match the ones slowly sinking themselves back into my cheeks.
And the hipbones…the things I truly crave to see through the paper thin layer of my skin…
Those…I’d starve myself to waifish proportions just to graze my hands along the mountaintops of those things, those sharp little things.
I lose my hair and my colour and my shine just to dig my fingers into the hardness of my breastbone, just to know that my jawbone is an overhang, just to plunge headfirst into the thrill of being thin.
“The Wasting” and I are friends, and I want to drown in her.
Jul 6, 2023
Jul 6, 2023 at 2:50 AM UTC
It is a constant pressure underneath my breastbone
That whispers evil at all hours of the day
'I could rip the life from a human without remorse'
'I could bleed them out with a smile on my face'
It is an unending notion in every corner of my brain
That, had I the motivation, I would immediately claim
'I could ingest a deadly concoction and disappear in a second'
'I could enact any complicated process that ends with me slain'
It is a nightly terror that follow me through daybreak
That renders me speechless with both fear and liberation
'I could let go of control and forget about mere consequence'
'I could finally allow my brain to drown in this sensation'
Homicidal. Suicidial. Manical.
I exercise control against these urges.
Massacre. Exhaustion. Insanity.
I wonder when I will forget this.
Jul 26, 2014
Jul 26, 2014 at 11:13 PM UTC
For I've another soul to help me bear it.
The walls were built about my heart
But they were only tinder burnt away by first-glances
The eyes
Glacial blue piercing as the two edged sword between my ribs
Hair flame red long cascading upon her marble shoulders
The steeple of her breastbone shall I worship
Burning incense to the name of her lips carnation petal pink
Her Laugh as an hundred bird songs caught within wings flapping
Honeysuckle lashes droop curled dancing in a summer wind
Cheekbones apple carved blushing at my foolishness
Her hands well known to children
Sewing needles and pens
With hips seaside water crashing
She bumps against me in the ancient dance
Testing me to see if I'll withstand the winter wind
Who am I to boast?
What have I to offer?
She looks into my eyes only
Not into my coffers
Apr 11, 2013
Apr 11, 2013 at 1:30 AM UTC
i found a birthmark shaped like Alaska
on the inside of your kneecap,
and i only saw it the day you
let me cross the border;
it was sensitive to my touch,
the moon-like ripples leading
to the needles on the pine tree
in your back yard.
sometimes i can read behind the
lines of DNA makeup,
like the lonely biologist you seem to be,
but your lingo is foreign to me,
tattered words and language deficiencies,
i can hardly follow along the braille
carved onto your outer layer,
the marble you worked so hard to
weather on your own time.
yet, somehow its turned to rubble again.
sometimes i hold an out of order sign
against my breastbone so i can set eyes
straight and wish anyone would light me on
fire,
(but not literally, i'm absolutely against abuse)
i want the sticks but not the stones,
since wood won't leave my body bruised.
use my transitions for kindle,
and my organs for the flames.
i want to be colored red,
like ambulance lights, stop signs,
painted like a signature to warn others
how my frequencies can only be heard
by animals.
maybe some other life forms,
or god,
but i have never hoped more that
you would pick up on my signals,
my freckles scream out samples
of how this could be
or what we could have known.
May 25, 2011
May 25, 2011 at 12:00 PM UTC
Your eyes touch the back of my mouth. Make it so hard to swallow.
I never breathed so evenly, my stomach feels so hallow.
I'll bury my face in your neck. Allow me to sink my tongue, and
Drown my teeth into your arms. Your breath fills my lungs.
Everything is easy now, since we simply let it be.
This is anything but sarcastic, the way our colors bleed.
I love your golden irises, I love your sepia skin.
Wrap yourself around my bones and melt into my ribs.
I feel like our arms glide through each other,
Like dancing lovers, after years of familiarization
Predictability in every step, but for once
Comforting to know what's going to come next.
Your hands hieroglyph the language of my fingernails
Decoding a sensation that belongs to something bigger than us,
And finally understanding that it's okay to touch that.
Contentment for war. Trading pity for empathy.
Trading sympathy for care.
You were always in the confines of my aching head,
Your name is in all my search-bars.
If I had the right fingers, I would create you in marble
I would design a statue and have it be gilded
In your honor. And if there was a temple for us,
It would be in the shape of a man, aimed at the earth.
He would be bowing to a large evergreen tree.
And our initials would be carved on the side.
Let's finally spraypaint our faces in underpasses
Eyes like this deserve to be gazed into.
Eyes like yours.
Deep breathing, my face in your chest.
Breastbone meeting skull
Dripping my lips onto your skin
Like candlewax.
If you kiss me with finality,
"I promise, darling, I'll kiss you back."
Jan 4, 2011
Jan 4, 2011 at 10:35 AM UTC
Be careful little one
You have the frozen globe of existence at your Fingertips
Marking Tracing Melting oh so slowly much too fast
Diligently your dead eyes glance gracefully into infinite bright spotlights
Your fragile razor-edged smile’s tearing the corners of your lips
Insecurely holding yourself excruciatingly precise
Marking repugnant lines down your too young face
Spine’s held ram-rod straight pretending to keep your world afloat on a
Butterflies listless fluttering wings
The tiniest misstep reverberating inside your hollowed breastbone
In.. In… In…. Inconspicuous
Comparable in the manner of a lamp bumping the floor two houses up
Breath hitched tattooed pulse brings life to your porcelain pores
Tip-toeing on egg-shells of yearning aspiration
Flinching at the cold intangible fear that’s grabbed your hand
Makes you come to life a stones throw too freedom
Diamonds ruthlessly rip into soles and ****** toes imprisoned in silk
Wine stained lips sneer at rows of red velvet
They grasp everything you've strove for, they are the power
Passion, adrenaline, up most urgency sweeping you away
The most elegant anguish rushes out forming awestruck wild abandon
Waiting your whole life for this moment boiling down to now
Day after day year after year
Pupils blown wide it’s do or die spread your arms and take your bow
Self-loathing narcissist
You only dance as if the the sky is falling when you feel all is beyond repair
Never have you been more beautiful
Jul 18, 2014
Jul 18, 2014 at 4:17 AM UTC
sternum (n.)
a bone extending along the middle line of the ventral portion of the body consisting of a flat, narrow bone connected with the clavicles and the true ribs.
I remember taking an anatomy class in high school, we had to memorize the bones of the body - the skeletal system. Scapula, humerus, mandible all favorable to the tongue, but I never liked the word sternum, it sounds far too angry, nothing like the supple it actually is. Years later I would still find myself walking to work and naming them off. Bones on my mind. Tibia, ulna, femur, breastbone.
Breastbone rolls around my mouth, lulls my anxiety towards its twin like a boat in calm waters. I think of your breastbone as a platform to profess my fascination. I am surprisingly amazed every time I count the steady rhythm of your heart, it's sound conducted as though your breastbone is a soundboard. I feel the slight ridges of your ribs when my head lays in the valley of your chest. There's not a day that I wouldn't love to get lost in the formations of your bones, each crevice a new place to hide - lounging in the curve of your collar bone, plucking the muscles of your fingers like guitar strings, getting lost to the soft scent of skin, and memorizing the plush roundness of your ******* each sensation leaves me with a new obsession. I look for replicas in everyday life, the hunt almost as intoxicating as smoke from campfires, or plucking wishbones from hens.
Feb 9, 2014
Feb 9, 2014 at 5:30 PM UTC
I.
black & blue
as the scissor handles
on a hospital desk
outside the x-ray room
where a scared boy
waits for his best friend
to emerge safely
six sickly pink
as the sutures
outlining her kneecap
and the pale
as anesthesia
filling up her irises
II.
black & blue
as the waterfall
of markings
cascading down
sheer breastbone
to pool in my bellybutton
brown
as the split blue moon
on ice, and darker as
the curls still unable
to rival the vehemence
of your stare
III.
black & blue
as the smeared ink
of broken contracts
bound to my skin
in sheets
achromatic
as the morning after
and the murmured reminder
to forget all about it
seeping from your pores,
as tainted honey
from bees beaten
blue & black
into blindness
Jun 4, 2013
Jun 4, 2013 at 12:56 AM UTC
Start with a picture.
Any one will do.
Names rattled off, like
Stars, constellations—
Screamed into silence.
Blink. Close your eyes; imagine
Red ribbons and blood floating
Through frigid air, in the snow.
See this tall, dark, frail body
Consumed by snowflakes and cold
Laugh like a choir in the
Middle of the stage (bright light)
Start with lips. Eyes, nose.
Start with clavicle
Breastbone and a thigh.
Start with oxygen
End with a human.
Jul 25, 2011
Jul 25, 2011 at 2:26 PM UTC
his lips are on your pulse point and
his hand is spreading the ribs in your chest,
you never realized that being this close to
someone meant opening a door.
welcoming them in. they make
their home beneath your skin and you’re
not sure if you want them,
their laughter and their touches.
their bare chests and their breath.
you are a building so many people
have tried to wound their way into.
there are fault lines in your breastbone
and a falter in your pulse and
these days your palms are more
scar tissue than skin.
every breath hurts and
the walls of your heart are covered
in graffiti you can’t stop yourself
from reading. this night is just another
room in a hallway that smells
of wet paint.
burn this house down.
leave the cushions on the carpet
and the dishes in the sink,
smash the mirror with its smudges
before you get the chance to think.
this has nothing to do with forgiveness.
this is how you wake up next to him
and tell him to leave.
make some new graffiti.
sign your name on every surface,
fall in love with the contours of your shadow
kissing the floors.
you are made of smoke and dust and ashes,
you are ready to face the day,
and there’s no room in you for anyone
who doesn’t want to stay.
Sep 26, 2013
Sep 26, 2013 at 10:36 PM UTC
Kaleidoscopes
pushed the music
through our bodies
in triangles of ebony,
purity,
hope
and confusion.
I could lose you
in the music,
you could lose me
in the bass
and destruction
of ear-dums.
What thumps
inside us?
as we thump genitals,
and ride
against each other
over interlocked
thighs.
Put me in your lips
more than your
put your own tongue.
Wet me
with a burst
of love so jarring
it could break my mind.
Because I like to put
two fingers
on your breastbone
and pull down
your shirt
so that I can see more.
And you like to grab me
harder
than
anyone
has
grabbed
before.
And the pain
of love
is all about grabbing,
about having
possession
in the middle of a club
hopping on mushrooms.
We get closer,
judging our distances
by how little we see
the kaleidoscopes
of broken light
and reformed blues, reds, greens and
yous.
We judge distance
by our stale Colgate breath
and drunk tongues.
We judge distance
by how close
our hearts have become
when we know nothing else
but drunk love.
Mar 19, 2012
Mar 19, 2012 at 8:51 PM UTC
The eyes should be plucked from their orbits
Submerged in formalin
Stored in a museum for all to gaze upon and know
My love is pure-tried by fire-
The fingers cut off at the second knuckle
The skin and meat picked from them leave
Pale Pale Pale white bone beneath
...Untouched by any other man
Scrape Scrape says the knife carving
Runes and poetry into the finger bones
So that all may know
My love was pure-tried by fire
The ****** knife danced
As in the sleep visions I cried out silently
Gray and muted were the eyes and
The voice was...lost from those lips
I remove the death mask to lick the cold lips of her corpse
Purple Petals that wither in the winter air
The warm cloud of my breath
Filling her nostrils
God breathing breath into Adam's first-rib
A lock of hair I disrupt
Falling from the high place
In Hurried Lust
I wonder at the stopped machinery that lies beneath
Do I dare slip the scalpel once more from its placement
And bring it to bare at the left breast?
It is the doing of another-I am no longer here
Searching for what is lost in the garden of her entrails
Wilting Bloom
I search the throat with my fingers
Reconstructing the final moments
Once more I run my fingers against thread
Delicatley I have sewn closed the gaping slash wound
To the throat warm spray a muted gurgle
Air slipping from the vocal chords disjointed dirge she sings to me
Forgetting quickly my stone ears deaf to such frivolities as mercy
The knife found it's own way through the breastbone
She and I are ancient beings
Our bodies sarcophagus for the true form
Released at last First Breath
Picking pieces of it from my teeth
Nail marks line my fore arms
Wounds tasting of the final throes
For she in peace dances at the feet of Him
Her wings cover her eyes
Her wings cover her feet
Holy seraphim returing crest raised high
Among the host
The great cycle completed
Tried by fire she is found whole once again
And I await with joy
The eternal punishment
Aug 24, 2013
Aug 24, 2013 at 6:39 PM UTC
i release secrets hidden behind a breastbone
that cracks under (pressure),
when gin and tonics enter my achy bloodstream.
i only remember her on the floor.
i dance like broken bottles upon cement floors
when fairy dust kisses foamy glasses.
i was in a mental hospital. yeah, basically.
i forget the people i supposedly love and blame
it on the alcohol,
because i do not have the courage to blame it
on myself.
Sep 16, 2013
Sep 16, 2013 at 10:57 PM UTC
De elevating power might
seem a futile task for a mere
earthling, disadvantaged by
stature, and of course due to
being under surveillance from
an altitude beyond reach, of
even, the imagination.
Such being the predicament
of an elderly Weasel inattentive
to the hidden dangers from an
intemperate predator soaring
directly above, just waiting to
profit from this evident dotage.
Down swooped the winged
carnivore, availing of surprise,
up-draught and velocity, it
quickly sank its talons into the
side of the disabled animal
and rose triumphantly into
the empty sky and high.
But just as possessions fall through
fingers, the winds of change were
about to reverse the tide of misfortune.
The stunned carcass, which only seconds
previously seemed as though was dead
as dead could be, suddenly posed a
problem for its captor (in flight).
Immediately, there was a notable change
of direction and a notable drop in the
flight horizontal, the big bird was visibly
in trouble, the Weasel had sunk its teeth
into the undercarriage, securing itself
from being released of the foot spikes.
The underdog was not going to go down
without a fight and there was nothing,
absolutely nothing The Eagle could do,
no negotiation, no solution other than
land, because The Weasel was not going
to let go and The Eagle was loosing fuel.
Efforts to dislodge The Weasel proved
nugatory, yet, The Weasel was prepared
to **** the Eagle in flight, a pyrrhic victory
is as democratic as one could wish for.
The Eagle had no option, down it came,
flew low along by the tree tops in an effort
to detach itself for The Weasel.
The Weasel availed of the Hobson Choice
and released itself from the breastbone
clambered on to the branches, making
its way out of the tree.
Meanwhile, The Eagle after a huge loss
of blood, left a trail along to forest floor
for The Weasel to follow
Ps.
The leech Eagle ended up in College Road
Sligo where it has a nest.
What became of it, is still unknown, but we
are sure, that The Weasel has not given up.
This is the Fable of Free Travel.
A pass given to the author by
a Government agency in Sligo
Ireland, and taken away with
no explanation.
Apr 29, 2019
Apr 29, 2019 at 9:33 AM UTC
Lovers trapped
in flourescent corners.
Skin shimmers underneath
loose tees,
beige with the kind of sweat
that blackens
Levi's in the crotches.
Her fingers *****
at his mice-sized ears
which hunger
for the acrylic traps
she lays with her fingernails.
If lips had tongues
his lips would say:
"I've had plastic flesh
and mercury is in my veins
cooling me
until I'm frozen
in the arms
of death."
And his lips never touch
hers:
neck,
breastbone,
cleft-chin,
chapped ear lobe,
crackling scalp,
fracturing spine,
splitting abdomen,
scarred heart.
his are never touched by
hers:
lips.
They finger the hills
of each other's skin:
velvetine,
innumerable,
wet.
Starships beep in the night.
Beep through receivers
from a place against the earth,
but not touching it.
THeir voices are intimate
and not there.
Cries are heard from space
and cradled as breathing
treasure.
Intimate,
but not there.
Their fingers touch each other,
infinitely
and not at all.
He feels her
as the earth feels
remote beeps
in remote intimacy.
Jun 29, 2012
Jun 29, 2012 at 9:45 PM UTC
something fit. something aligned under the breastbone
ribs pattered out and gave space for breath
that didn't taste of anything.
something clicked. tortured poet keeping a journal
walks the south route instead
and sees the spiritual spin on life through the stained glass windows
of a shack church in need of extensive renovation.
she is inspired and her need bottoms out for the day--
praise is good.
good.
great.
don't bother me when i'm sharpening my pencils.
i'm preparing for divine intervention
and the clarity i know i'm owed
something hit. my words, hey, i'm black and blue
and they? they're cut through and through
with flecks of tracts lent from life and beyond.
Apr 14, 2016
Apr 14, 2016 at 5:44 PM UTC
To open this box...
I'd more than like to know
What monsters it houses, what
Mossy, overgrown flora it grows.
Whether 'not it will
Blast me with fair, cleansing light, like
A sunrise through a painted window, or
Plunge me
Into dark waters
And run my eyes o'er with
Soaking ash and floating filament -
It's my weakness,
It calls me by a fond nickname, like
A too good friend after too long,
It knows me,
Knows I can't displace the
Imprints once they are etched
In my head
I have to uncover the rock the wrong way,
I have to
Lift it up towards me, brashly, impulsively,
And risk
The nervous snake
Right into my chest
That burning feeling,
Crackling in my breastbone,
Sets a flame and
Sends me back yet again
Scurrying into another lush, cool sanctuary
Somewhere in these woods, my temple,
In my center,
In my core.
Jul 24, 2016
Jul 24, 2016 at 2:35 PM UTC
obdurate, ******
he fastened twine
tied to tarsals
around my
ventricles,
closed off
the vena cava
i am blue
in the breastbone
empty blood
can't reach
the lungs
but
i am equipped
with the tools
to deal with this
animal instinct
to fight off
infection
or to let it in
and cradle
me every
night at
2
when you
wake to
make sure
you haven't
missed
the tug at your toes
or
the platelets & plasma
or
a warm wavelength --
a chance to record a dream
you lost in rising
Sep 28, 2014
Sep 28, 2014 at 11:22 PM UTC