"brined" poems
we sit here
wandering, pondering,
quandring
away the life.
awaiting the flood of
the Universal Ocean
to fill lungs of carbon
with sodium -
salinity in the tissue rising.
we sit here
awaiting Lot's wife,
to be pillar'd in a sense -
to be brined from the soul out.
we sit here
awaiting to be marbled and
pock'd with time,
to rest upon the Ocean's bed
and dream in lucidity -
and dream of the Shores.
and awaken of the Shores.
and feast of the Shores.
we sit here
awaiting in waste, in haste,
in repetition that our feet draw us upon.
we sit here awaiting,
healing of wounds thru time -
and the brambles wrapped tight
and tore of the flesh,
poxing.
limping, hobbling, waltzing on
and a blooded foot drew us home -
drew us onward.
Oct 27, 2012
Oct 27, 2012 at 4:35 PM UTC
his voice syllabic brushes
against canvas whispering
lullabyes within dreams,
lingering...
his musky fragrance flush
upon flesh, dallying like
verbs still whispering
between folds of rumpled
sheets...
every noun a soft whimper
uttered. lips openly inviting;
stirring tenderly like a breeze
echoing poetry with passion...
ensnaring heart in web of
his muse; each beat looms
copulative, sliding seductive,
awakening senses...
abandoned ache slips and I
pirouette, rippled within his
verse; succumbing to his
poetic thirst...
still whispering lush verbs
while easing between
silken sheets and breath
quickens...
as ****** of tongue licks
nouns of passion, sipping
spills as labials quiver
against tongued invasion...
and he softly murmurs across
brined flesh, touching, nibbling
trembled aches; inflaming naked
desire as each stanza seduces
me again and again...
drawn to masculinities tease
verse by verse...
Jul 18, 2013
Jul 18, 2013 at 8:33 PM UTC
Dance on the brined surface
Porcelain mug hot to touch
Aroma tempered love rises steam
The first sip brings blessings
The second a flavor devine
The third a clarity of dream
Jan 6, 2014
Jan 6, 2014 at 1:35 PM UTC
Butterfly kisses
Sun licked
Salt brined
Soft sand
Scorched
Two hands
Twenty fingers
Light gust
Waves crash
Delicately
Soft spoken
Silly smirk
Beach towel
Wet saliva
Fornication
Butterfly kisses
Sparkling water
Sweat tresses
Held secure
Sensational
Jun 28, 2021
Jun 28, 2021 at 12:38 AM UTC
you hand'd me a handful,
you hand'd her a handful,
you retain'd your handful -
done by sight, something
rare to be a good omen.
eyes met collectively
as we contemplated.
dry musty taste, almost retch'd.
the sun shone bright, and
it was too late to turn back.
we giggled a bit at first, and
you found miss'd cap.
pop'd it. commenced vomiting.
your tryp never peak'd.
your chick laid on blue lounge chair
calling me over. commenting:
"it looks like ground beef, doesn't it?"
her finger pointing at
pile of ***** my stomach churning,
vision as well,
collapsed into chair in shade.
-- lapse in space,
it had come on too fast, too hard,
and i went to find more driftwood.
my fire had become sacred,
burning only the long dead.
the brined and dried.
i skid down scree hill on heels
to find snake on my path;
startled, it slid off -
no concern.
drift'd from initial plan to
explore an alter'd world,
saw spider and vomit'd.
cleansed.
and back to collecting my driftwood.
fire raging midday,
lounging in shad;
sun raging midday,
cruising out this end'd tryp;
wondering in constant if that
spider ever had his tryp.
Jan 14, 2013
Jan 14, 2013 at 1:20 PM UTC
Blessed are the poorly, for theirs is the kingdom of mudflats
The dispirited streak turgid waters
sinuously, through unsettled feelings
in the wake of boats shedding
filaments of fuel,
sheen on a turbid infusion
and the cordgrass nods a resilience
or an apathy as the silt settles
on their Piscean gleam
Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see a salted heaven
Angelic Menhaden of the Atlantic,
are silvery stretches of scale,
dulled in death under a festering sun
and the retreating tide of dying waters
brined in ocean, freshwater spirited
to secret spaces, some dammed crevasse,
now tumultuous fate in a salted heaven
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be filled
At the Tabgha of this intertidal palette
Cattails whisper beatitudes
latched onto the tails of wind gusts
and the plovers descended
in a litany of bird song
amassed like the manna
trailing tidal waters
as the sea swallows herself.
Blessed are the herons, the mallards,
the geese. Time is measured
in the passage of fish that
cycle themselves through the innards of birds
Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the rocks
The meek Menhaden, leaped
onto the rocks that hemmed the inlet,
escaping the hungry habits of herons.
They inherited Earth in agony
pounding a rocky surface,
but the air I swim, had no water.
I prodded these Menhaden of the Rock
to the fringe of retreating tides,
and they leaped to die once more
to breathe water that had no air
Blessed are those that mourn, for they shall be comforted
Blessed is the discomfiture
of my brackish tears
that streak marsh faces
as fish struggle out of dead water.
I take comfort I don't inhabit
tainted places or do I take comfort,
all places are the tint of poison,
the gleam of a genesis of sorrow
Jun 6, 2021
Jun 6, 2021 at 3:36 PM UTC
(A realization of otherness)
Frenzied shaking has taken my soul
I am crushed by the burning of gold-brined teeth
My unclean lips draw back in a grimace
As I rest my head against the beam of
Some ragged torture device and get
Splinters driven into my constricting scalp
Take a spike and drive it through my temple
Into this piece of time-worn timber which
Is saturated with skin flakes from my victims
(The reception of the sacrament)
Shall I not raise my filth-clotted hands up to
This presence which is like smoke and fills
My lungs with the kind of fear true power brings?
Let there be flesh to envelop my quaking body
Let it be caught between my teeth and drape
My skin in a new raiment of priesthood
Let there be hematic torrents rushing down
To clean out the wounds and make them imperishable
To be better drink from well-dug cisterns
May 18, 2025
May 18, 2025 at 6:49 PM UTC
An appetite for the unobtainable
Red light glowing from your exit sign
Dark honey licked eyes overpowering
My ocean salt brined tear drops smiling
Skin cells on my skin cells
Lips enveloping my lips
An appetite for the untouchable
Her perfume dances around your aura
Those sweet honey brown iris's
Gazing far off away from me
Skin cells on her skin cells
Lips enveloping her lips
An appetite for the unavailable
Hazy bar lights flicker to darkness
Your eyes no where to be found
My oceans are filling and spilling
Skin cells on my skin cells
Lips enveloped in honey bourbon
May 13, 2021
May 13, 2021 at 1:03 AM UTC
I want Neptune
to come out
of the Gulf
reining
pale
untame
charioted waves
I want his imprint
on the brined wash
and
I want to ask him questions.
Do mermaids dance?
(for example)
Are hippocamps?
(for another)
Are starfish fallen celestials, antic?
Is drowning frantic?
I want the vasty deep to erupt
into answers, synaptic explosions
connections
connecting
to
me
I seek myself in saltwater
Creation's alphabet soup
to swallow me
to disconnect the disconnection of me.
Come Neptune. Come from my primal self
into my Self and connect me to me
and me to you and us to them.
Push your wild beasts from the sea
and come into me.
c. Roberta Compton Rainwater 2014
Mar 31, 2014
Mar 31, 2014 at 11:35 AM UTC
Among the billions of people
Living in this
Empty world,
I am singular--
Isolated.
The skies are polluted by
City lights,
Would-be stars,
If only the world would let them be so.
For a landscape so luminescent,
This oil painting portrait reality
Is rather opaque
And lifeless--
A mere lack of sensation.
We swim in milky nothingness,
A blind man's iris,
Brined in its tears
And then drowned.
Aug 11, 2015
Aug 11, 2015 at 7:16 PM UTC
It's the same every day I'm a groundhog
Time to get to racing
but I'm shaking when I'm waking
Feeling sober but Its almost noon
can't remember what I've taken
What a cycle what fun
Until you're entire bodies aching
And you're wading through a pool of sweat
Quiet nodding in and out and hear the voices fading
You know exactly what they're saying smarten up and start praying
Alcoholics tell me I'm anonymous
And to act the way they say to me
Just another day another hour count the minutes til graces me
Not another dose another ** is gonna save me
Not some new clothes couple bros couldn't change me
Work yourself to death try make a lot of money
For shelter, warmth, for something in your tummy
Then for the real warmth seeping in your tummy It's a traditional leftover from
The latin liquor bunny
He's like the Easter kind, just got one thing on his mind
Except he comes every day
feed your body and mind
It's all fine it's all fine
Except I basically got brined
Head and body now I'm dyin
Wouldn't change it for the world, couldn't change my mind
Jul 12, 2020
Jul 12, 2020 at 3:06 PM UTC
This room was taught to hold its breath,
When I return through sideways doors.
It never asks for confessions or depth—
Just witnesses how silence feels as thorns.
The world outside is daytime hinged.
But my world was stitched in neon dusk.
A phantom fang lives deep within
And bites each time I build my trust.
I move in patterns, accidentally bound—
In rituals of coping that lasted too long.
The hours know where I'll be found—
Beside myself, unwillingly wrong.
The ***** laundry I clean but don't.
A second shadow nailed at my heel.
The lamp that needs a light disagrees.
Between being fake and being who I feel.
I keep it clean—or clean enough—
My eyes are dry; my voice is clear.
My morbid truth, dressed in common fluff.
Always finds a way to disappear.
The soul—if that’s still something I hold—
Is brined in need, like selfish sin.
This isn’t wanted or considered bold.
It's survival masquerading as skin.
I never meant to dig this much,
My lack of harmony buried in song.
But a body that's balanced upon a crutch
Is still a body—just not as strong.
I’ve made a friend with myself detached,
Though he eats a lot more than he feeds.
Whispers like he knows he's an accident.
This teaches me, what my own silence means
The habits aren't even the worst of me—
It’s what remains when they're gone.
The way my lungs choose not to breath.
Choosing not to breathe all on their own.
So, I exist in the lowercase,
Half-typed and never quite complete.
But even glitches need their place—
So here I am, on loop. On repeat…
May 27, 2025
May 27, 2025 at 12:44 PM UTC
Shalla is the name
The name I hear
Shalla my dear
My love
My hope
The dreams of fear
The dreams of fear bring Shalla more dear
The lights that reflect Shalla to my eye
The darkness neglects the panic and shy
The dreams of darkness aspire my mind
To neglect the dreams without Shalla
The dreams that hurt my soul and core
The dreams I neglect to accept false lore
Shalla my dear
The only name that fills my bones
Joy, contentment, and lust
The name I hear
I’ll always hold dear
For Shalla could turn to dust
Long after
The storm is gone
The mangled corpse of Shalla
My lovely swan
My pride
My joy
My bride
My love
My trust
My dreams
My swan
My dove
I’m driven to pain
Inescapable clenching
Of remorse and broken opportunities
With the only one I could hold dear
Shalla is gone forever
Shalla my dear
The dreams come back
And so I here
The true lore that brought me fear
My neglections blinded me
Drove me to denial
Brined me and sliced me open
So vile
That beast I neglected for so long
Showed me that Shalla meant more
More than I knew
More than I thought
Shalla my swan
Shalla the eternal torch
I extinguished by my lack of thought
I ignored her and murdered her
I left her to rot
My dear Shalla
The fault is mine
My beast
My carnage
My venom
My toxin
My death
My hate
My fears
My tears
My neglections of true horrors
My ignorance brought me your death
May 9, 2018
May 9, 2018 at 5:00 PM UTC
The architect architected his own demise,
gradually over the liquor-brined years and then in milliseconds.
The architect drank, hunched over every last bar,
as a release, as a habit, as a stumblebum crutch, as a gaping maw.
He staggered one night out of the dark tavern into the SUV
that he click-clicked open without a thought despite past offenses.
He never saw the couple on a motorcycle out on date night,
or so he whimpered to the officer, muttering “my life is over."
Faced with 28 felony charges, he was right in a way.
And yet his life wasn’t over like theirs, no, it wasn’t over like theirs.
Sep 23, 2018
Sep 23, 2018 at 12:54 AM UTC
This room was taught to hold its breath,
When I return through sideways doors.
It never asks for confessions or depth—
Just witnesses how silence feels as thorns.
The world outside is daytime hinged.
But my world was stitched in neon dusk.
A phantom fang lives deep within
And bites each time I build my trust.
I move in patterns, accidentally bound—
In rituals of coping that lasted too long.
The hours know where I'll be found—
Beside myself, unwillingly wrong.
The ***** laundry I clean but don't.
A second shadow nailed at my heel.
The lamp that needs a light disagrees.
Between being fake and being who I feel.
I keep it clean—or clean enough—
My eyes are dry; my voice is clear.
My morbid truth, dressed in common fluff.
Always finds a way to disappear.
The soul—if that’s still something I hold—
Is brined in need, like selfish sin.
This isn’t wanted or considered bold.
It's survival masquerading as skin.
I never meant to dig this much,
My lack of harmony buried in song.
But a body that's balanced upon a crutch
Is still a body—just not as strong.
I’ve made a friend with myself detached,
Though he eats a lot more than he feeds.
Whispers like he knows he's an accident.
This teaches me, what my own silence means
The habits aren't even the worst of me—
It’s what remains when they're gone.
The way my lungs choose not to breath.
Choosing not to breathe all on their own.
So, I exist in the lowercase,
Half-typed and never quite complete.
But even glitches need their place—
So here I am, on loop. On repeat…
Jun 28, 2025
Jun 28, 2025 at 12:32 PM UTC