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Andrew Rueter Aug 2022
I've done a lot of things I'm not proud of
but I can't be tied to those forever
so people forgive and forget
I try to forget but still feel bad
and I know there are still sore subjects
that I should be sensitive about.

Scrolling through Reddit I see a post
of Māori students at an airport
greeting their returning teacher
with a traditional Māori war dance
which was an admittedly sweet gesture
but something didn't sit right with me.

I wondered why the students greeting their teacher
had to do so through a display of militaristic nationalism
I wondered if that was the last dance the Moriori people saw
before the Māori genocided them for their resources
I wondered if the Māori danced like that
as they *****, murdered, and cannibalized the Moriori.

Wondering all of this made me ask myself:
Why did they have to greet their teacher like that?
The students wanted to make a big gesture
which dancing is perfect for
but dancing can also be vulnerable and embarrassing
because people may mock how you express yourself

but strangers at the airport are less likely to laugh at you
if you're doing a synchronized dance with a group of people
and the dancing is recognizably tied to national identity
because then it's a culturally rich dance
you're a xenophobe for laughing at
and that's what nationalism is:
strength in numbers and a readymade identity
in lieu of an individual personality
oftentimes for the sake of pistanthrophobia.

So as I read the circlejerking comments on the post
I wondered what the difference is between
a Māori war dance and a **** salute
I guess the Māori people have experienced
more oppression than Nazis
but nationalism is nationalism
and those who have oppressed are oppressors
and many who are oppressed would gladly
be oppressors given the chance.

Nationalism isn't healthy for culture
and often isolates people from other cultures
that are all combining due to globalization
which people fight to preserve their little dances and costumes
so we can stay in eternal conflict over delusions of supremacy
when the only nationality should be a global one.
Leah Rae Mar 2013
I Met God This Morning.
He Was Sitting At A Bus Stop. I Sat Down Beside Him. I Was Convinced He Was Was Part Of Some Devine Intervention, Thinking If He Could Find Silence So Close To The Street, He'd Finally Be Able To Say He'd Seen A Miracle.

But I Wasn't So Sure i Had Seen Anything  Because I Wasn't Raised On A Diet Of Bread And Wine, Oh Excuse Me, Body And Blood, Wasn't Cannibalized By The Holy Spirt. Now Don't Get Me Wrong, I'm Not The Sanctimonious Sacrilegious Type. But I've Placed My Hand,  To Enough HeartBeats To Know We're Placed Here For A Reason.

And Then I Met Him Again, In A Convenience Store On The Corner Of Locust. He Kissed The Palm Of My Hand, And Told Me To Pray More Often.

But I Wasn't Prone To Midnight Awakenings, My Tongue Didn't Speak The Same Language The Almighty Savior Did. Everyone Called Him Father, But I Was Told We Were Better Off Without Daddy Around. Hadn't Learned The Right Hymns, My Lungs Not Strong Enough To Hold A Breath Deep Enough For The Two Of Us.

And Then I Saw Him Again. Working A 100 Hour Week, On No Sleep. This Time He Was A Single Mother Of Three, Whose Hands Had Stitched More Wounds Then They Could Care To Count. They Didn't Call It An Emergency Room, For Nothing. Two Hundred Thousand Dollars In Debt Over School Loans, And Still Had The Capacity To Smile. Thats How I Knew It Was Him.

I Wasn't Baptized In Anything Except For Maybe Hell Fire And Brimstone, Seven Shades Of Sin, Out Of Wedlock, With No Shot Gun Wedding Procession. I Didn't Have A Pastor To Preach Me Into Submission. Wasn't Thumbing Any Bibles, No Prequel To My Older Than New Testament. They Called It Faith, But I Wasn't Prepared To Walk Down Any Pitch Black Hallways In Hopes Of A Light Switch.

And Then We, He And I, Crossed Paths, For What Seemed Like Should Have Been The Last Time, He Was Quiet And Collected This Time. Made Weak From His Seventh Round Of Chemotherapy. His Body Was Decaying Around Him. His Spirt Was Practically Screaming To Be Let Out Of The Cage That Was His Ribs. He Passed Me A Note, & All It Said Was “I'll Remember You.”

No One Ever Fed Me A Concoction Of Deity, And Diet.  Religion Wasn't A Silver Spoon In My Mouth. Afterlife Sounded Like A Bad Daytime Soap Opera.

But I Know The Creator. She Left Hearts On Notes In New York City Subway Stations. She Tattooed Your Name Onto The Bottom Of Her Foot, So Wherever They Took Her, You'd Be There Too. She Wore Her Heart On Her Sleeve, And Thats Why She Forgot It In So Many Places. She Was Obsessed With Shorelines, And Sunshine. And Shes Convinced We're All Natural Disasters, Happening Naturally, Falling Into Each Other, Against One Another, Like Dry Lightening Storms, Recklessly Stupid, And Always Too Young.

I Know God.

He Was Holding The Umbrella, And Told Me That No One Can Tell The Difference Between Tears And Rain Drops Anyway. He Was There The Day I Almost Drowned, He Pulled Me Out Of The Lake, And Held My Hand Until My Mother Came.

So Maybe I Wasn't The Church Pew Type, Hadn't Spent Hours At Sunday Service, Passing Around Empty Collection Plates, While Plates Else Where In The World Sat Empty. Didn't Know Scripture Like The Back Of My Hand, Two Freckles, Like Constellations, And Five Knuckles Hungry To Be Broken,

But I Know God.
I Know Him Like An Old Friend.  
He Kisses  My Forehead, When The Monsters Inside The Contours Of My Skull Got Too Loud.
He Holds My Skeleton, In The Early Hours Of The Morning, When I Was Desperate To Leave It Behind.

I Think Some People Might Have Called All Of These A Religious Experience.

But All I Know Is He Was There When I Was Born.
In The Room.
And I Swear His Voice Was The First One I Heard.
Omnis Atrum Oct 2012
Thoughts escape through cracks and crevices of the swelling gray matter. Each breath forcefully exhaled through thinly parted lips pushes the unfinished coliseum constructed of heavy stones, weighted with unsure purpose, out into the previously unoccupied space before me. Each exhalation creates small beings composed of struggle that march mechanically into the arena. Ready to throw their lives on the line to fight for recognition. As these thoughts battle one another, one falls after the next. Once the battles between these thoughts has finished, and the coliseum is filled with dreams and ideas that will never find themselves fully recognized, only one stands victorious. Though battered and broken from the ****** battles it has fought, selflessness has conquered any that would seek to oppose it. It inhales the dire wounds caused to the others, and they stand before the crumpled mass that saved everything they fought so hard to achieve through personal sacrifice. Not knowing the events that occurred, they cannibalized selflessness to sate their primitive greed. Now a small portion of him exists within every ideal that escapes through pursed lips from the fields of grey matter where they were conceived. Through this process the idea of love was given life, and it will forever seek that selflessness that gave birth to it.
Harry J Baxter Mar 2014
The jester is weeping - locked in the bathroom, not coming out
the jester is weeping like a girl stag on prom night
each fetal rock accompanied by a jingle of bells
he painted a picture of perfect only to find the paint dry
the ugly makeup is running down his face
and his suit is tattered with grit
a clown is a last straw to clutch when the world is burning
“yeah, but at least it’s funny”
his drink spilling down his chin
watch as he makes a balloon noose
so the children can play hangman with his wavering decisions
his pants are full of candy
call it a painata
you can laugh and laugh and laugh
until it all sounds like wailing
the jester, weeping like the fool he plays
the crown’s court pleased with their pet
obnoxious explosions of ignorant, blissful cackles
the jester is tired
he has to go to sleep now
and the once they lose the laughter
they will see the brutal realities
they will be cannibalized by their fear
God, save the Jester
he’s all we’ve got
Jeremy Betts Feb 21
My worst fear realized
Beyond scared & paralyzed
the moment I recognized
the signs in the fading eyes
of a lover as she re-lives the lies
& cries herself to sleep with sorrowful lullabies
Ones only heard by the clouds and the stars they pass by in the night skies
The ones just as lonely and as distant as a sunrise
on the moons romanticized dark sides
mingling with the anticipated replies to the backlog of "why's"
that don't even bother with fly-bys
Somewhere out past where hope dies
Where both love and hate are lobotomized
then cannibalized
even weaponized
for passion triggered crimes
leaving no one surprised
Where the only allies one finds
arrive in disguise
as the best of times
as the worst of times
building up to a multitude of inevitable good-byes
How was I to vocalize
a mess of this size
when I don't have the ability to visualize
even loosing such a prize...

©2024
james nordlund Mar 2021
Humanity's, large mammal's extinction, racing towards us
from our future, seen on the horizon, dictated by the corp.
structure and it's devolutionary direction, must be stopped.
First, now, you ask how?  If you don't build it, they won't
come, on and off, from a decade before the World Trade Center
was undone, by planes that "they didn't know could fly into
buildings", according to C. Rice, as if they never saw a boy
play, I warned of their doom, in twigs of poetree, etc..  Also,
I told of the terrible two's, bi-polar axi of supposed power,
the republican and totalitarian global conspiracies, dividing
and conquering the world betwixt them, like two sides of the
same materialist coin (un)becoming into one another, racing
towards each other, humanity, life, the Earth, the coin between
them, disappearing as they go, decades before other twigs told
of the bi-headed false-god, mammon, of avarice and molloch,
of war, extreme violence, grinding up the seeds, kids, the
future cannibalized to replicate 'la machine' and it's past
profits, the actual religion behind all masks, fronts, studies,
religions, worldviews, including supposed sciences, atheism,
neither head able to realize their exigent potential without
the other, and how each of the Twin Towers was a temple to a
head, the West, hiding, blindly worshipping, sacrificing all in.

Yet, instead of replacing those twins, temples of doom for
future's broom, "...we(e),..." re-imagined our future, built
the Freedom's Tower, though, we didn't realize that "more
perfect" expression of our nation, where freedom would truly
ring, for it rang true.  Confronting the 'use' of duality and
dichotomy across the multi-media conspiracy to brainwash
people into self-subjugation to the convolution's rule n'er
took place, and with haste the 23 flavors, in this Baskin
'n robbins of supremacy, merx for more through to mercs for
unending unnecessary worldwide war divided, conquered
and cannibalized the country, everyone increasing their piece
of the American tax dollars pie from the purposeful non-
prevention of anything, everything, in perfect harmony.
Thus, when the alt-right-universe invasion successfully
couped, "...we(e),...", weren't de-programmed, awakened
enough to dispel and defeat it outright, so we devolved
into haggling for more, better place in the empire instead.
But, our king-kong sized terrible-two's, Utin's ****'s
apolitical criminal insanity forced us to grow in evolution's
direction, towards unity.  We turned back their invasion, will
we build freedom's re-assertion by "...separating" that false
"god from the State" as our Constitution dictates, will you?
'Two Sides Of The Same Coin'.  Thanx for all you All do.  Have a good day   :)   reality
Axel Apr 2015
Beneath blackened earth, where majestic death gave birth..

Lies Sir Roderick so very still.

Claire wanders and wonders if there is something more,

beyond life she can explore...

In a tome of darkened lore

answers were cast at the question.

If only a mild suggestion

of necromantic, a spell.


To take back a soul from hell....


Claire descends in Roderick's tomb.
They will be united soon..


Indeed it is a graverobber's plight, to take care of such a wondrous sight.

Little Claire did not care, as she played with raven hair.

Words dripped from her lips, as she read from the bloodied tome..

The atmosphere drenched in a shivering tone..

going through marrow and cutting through bone.


Lay still your beating heart, let flow your sea of life..

Come back from Death and love thine wife..
A sacrifice with children's blood she gave

Roderick now ascends from his mouldy grave.

His flesh looks putrid and vile..

Dilly, dally the maggots wriggle

Claire comforts with a single giggle.


Now they dance, hand in hand.

They kiss in brittle moonlight

his tongue like broken glass, such delight.

So full of joy was Claire, as Roderick was festering in his chair.

Claire did not care, playing with raven hair.

Roderick still festering, festering in his chair.


Then she nodded, nearly napping, one last spell inside her head.

Command Sir Roderick to share her bed.

Little Claire was nowhere to be found...

Chewing, drooling, smacking....

Followed by a clamour and loud cracking.

Lay upon the bed, Sir Roderick and Claire.

Sir Roderick did not care, playing with her raven hair.

Loathsome Claire was united no more..

Her cannibalized remains

decorated the floor.
Amaranthine Jun 2014
Emptiness is a relative being
It sits within each
A ******* child born of perception
And floats around somewhere in mocking silence
Between void and avoid

Emptiness cannot be labeled
You can not put a name
On cannibalized shells
But place a light on the inside
And give darkness life
And emptiness can no longer scream
C Nov 2011
Look to the gloom,
yielding no depth of distance,
only pinpoints of light
blaring the selfish madness of man
and beast alike.
Look to oval eyed Saturn, and
notice not the opalescent crenulation
of teeth, or
the rigid celestial body
inflated and bloated-
floating in the absence of fettered air;
all that is important
is the lifeless bodies
cannibalized and
invariably stuck in an endless orbit
of the greedy giant.
Prabhu Iyer Oct 2017
It's in the air, that kind of art
the rant hour -
khaki shorts come to roost,
sour dips for jibes,
venerable turns up the Oak:
and lo, from Mecca to Dacca,
it's raining theories
conspiracies, of how
in the days of yore
even the golden birds's
poo smelt pure;
It's all our deed
from the Saucer to the Sky;
Heil Leader! Now
lathis to the rescue
then long speeches and
many grins - (x)ollywood
the much hated,
whose songs cannibalized;
It's chai samosa time,
it's pakora time,
Bermuda triangle time.
Pun on the conspiracy loving typical crowd here, who like a good chai samosa to whip some up! Read between the lines ahem :-
Michele M Sep 2012
Always the intermission

waiting......

buying juju beans standing on red carpet

Forever an after thought

the heart cannibalized

some fava beans and a nice Chianti with that?

Drink up sweet decadence..... ~M
Addendum to title:
Boyhood Digs in Collegeville, Pennsylvania 19426

Oft times forced exposure therapy spelled rustling quiet
Pyrrhic punitive onslaughts noisome moody linkedin kicks
jarring inxs harbored grievances foo fighting essence
denoting cannibalized august boy aghast to confront reality
returning home meant compromising autonomy
acceptable collateral casting leftist strides rite
constituting timid steps circumscribing childhoods’ end,
comprising reluctant trudge treading toward adolescence
where wold wide webbed magic ride
rode ruff shod o’er carped hooked
synthetic threads re: fibrous veld
whence extolled impressive footprints
measured triangular wedges rung duff feet
expediently dragged churlish badinage afoot
stretching across Scottish tartan
Harris Tweed unwelcome matt despite frustrated parents
whose vitriol unleashed tough-love,
smacked regularly quasi planned
threatened ultimatums venomous viz witches
yawping against my brand
falling out of good graces,
though hatching escape merely fanned
actions hightail me to bedroom, a secure space,
not exceptionally grand
yet despite rapacious and relentless rage
against the sole son, who hand
did lee managed inciting wrath
of me papa and late mama,
this parcel of land, now entombs nostalgia
namely 324 level road, Collegeville,
Penna, 19426 make believe pal Joey and this creator
passively succumbed to withstand
invisible jetblue lobbing onslaught of slingshot barbs,
wharf fear to rely on self way past primetime,
which solo endeavor didst demand
absent belief, confidence and faith in innate survival skills,
hence countless admonitions recurred
razed quest qua pursed lips
those who begat their only male heir,
provoking predictable panned
da moan he hum in tandem
with concomitant wickedness akin to eland
caught in cross hairs getting pistol-whipped
with many barking explicit derogatory gerund formed
expletives, that did not dislodge this immobile body electric
defying logic, now in retrospect clueless why I suffered to withstand
incessant verbal, venal, and n’er vampire weakened blows
inexplicable, how this soulful, ruminating,
and tortured walking wounded blithely weathered turpitude  
though devoid of sense and sensibility, how no man iz an island
though at times incontinent, where jocund this bard for’er opened
Pandora’s box, but hindsight softened cleft pride and prejudice
whereat bulldozed site of once grand “Glen Elm” tears me up inside
fading memories refreshed, via priceless gift
from beloved younger sister
unwittingly mitigated hammer blows of pain to confront the void,
whence away from obliterated complex edifice grief felt ******!
What glory could settle the breeze?
In the days and nights that my mouth goes dry,
what road upon which an army marches does suffer a well to be dug,
and what cities fall that could bring a cup to my lips?
Words like yours incite no war cries to rally,
but they bring the rain when you call upon the clouds to drift.
And does my hunger make me foolish? Does my imagination run
          wild
Because it has never felt the weight of a wise thought?
Am I simple? Do my curiosities reveal my ignorance? Do I ask too
          much, or too often?
What does a love letter to a poet make the man with the pen desire?
Is it the laughter of a budding affection? Or the pity that brings a first
          chance?
Perhaps he offers up the voice in his soul
hoping that it will be cannibalized by a tongue that tastes nothing
          bitter
in the murmuring recitation of clumsier words.
I feel I should know.
But if I must be clumsy, and simple, and ignorant, too much or too
          often,
I can only wish for my clambering gait to still be swift enough
to catch you as you amble
from thought to thought.
Adorations for Bragi, the Norse god who was the First Maker of Poetry.
I’ve sat within that crowded room.
Elbows, like the knobbed tree branches of a forest,
sway with mirth and freedom.
Yet, my heart lost its fire long before.
And as I sat, I sighed the rousing air
of the room with carouseling dancers,
and felt that no one was there; not even myself.

There are many things that solitude can inspire.
We desire what we can only hope to have again.
Yet, how lucky am I? I dream of things I’ve never known.
I see her hug his hip to her hip, whisper in his ear...
What did she whisper?
He will tell one dear friend,
and that friend,
will feel what I feel – a burst of elation, a drop of envy – a deadly cocktail.
And that friend will go on and wonder, “What if she were mine...”
And I know because I was that friend who tasted her in his words. And dreamed.
I dreamed until the dreaming kept me awake
until the dream cannibalized other dreams
until the dream put visions of her in the clouds
until the dreams, dreams, shattered-my-soul!

I was the one who told my friend about her.
I crafted her beauty and charm with such power to disarm, using my silken language,
and he tasted her essence in my words.
So, now I sit here.
I sit here in this room filled with carouseling couples.
I can only sigh,
as I watch her dance.
What does it take to be in love?
Sometimes, it can take a fool as much as it takes a prince.
emily wiemann Aug 2011
The moonlight stretches over my madness
the deep blue of the sky with its twinkling scars
mirroring the shrapnel of marring marks along my soul
alone....like a soundless echo bouncing around the canyons
how could it escape me, why is everything awry
drowning in the spirals of intense light
such a vindictive prison, entrapping the body
in the nightmares life has become a shredded hope
pulled away like warm covers in the morning
why is it that im in a labyrinth...yet with no way out
sand has gone thru my fingers into the next player's hands
now without control i fly wild as chaos on the wing
no motives, no wants only one prickling need that can never be met
such betrayal leaves so many questions...all in a chorus of why
let this night be over so i may return
change and morph once again trying to fit the mold that was given
yet will it ever fit?
too small this world that im pulled into
on eggshells i tiptoe with needles piercing my skin
how do i escape such a vicious night
the dark inhumanity with its bloodlust is after me
in this cannibalized society
Of This Whelk Hooked Sluggish Autodidact

Nay, despite failing to make the grade,
     this bluesy well red, duff mute
     average white band hit,
     hard knock school alumnus
jack of all trades master of none bumped along

     *** hole cratered steep pitch
     while riding the bus
bullies skewered kosher me all, cannibalized
     carte blanche timid ego

     brandishing exacto knife
     threatening jugular, cuss
sing maniacally pulling out all stops
     going headstrong for this doofuss

Embracing premonition making me mincemeat
     vis a vis via, Atilla the *** plus
Godfrey Gordon Gustavus Gore
     after diet of worms

     as hors d'oeuvre hug guess
if given a choice, would prefer Loch Ness
monster, or the whale that swallowed Jonah,
     either t'would be a quite im press

heave feted feat, versus being poached,
      roasted, skewered burnt alive
perhaps sautéed to feed additionally,
     the Gothic (Jacks sin) five,
the latter adorned with

     Bandolier prototype, whence they would jive
to Vandals mess sigh ya,
     these last yet another contra band
     to play on command, or risk not being
     he gee beegee bing  a live

all thee above iterated blather spluttered
     as punishment against revive
ving human sacrifice by pence hoove lee donning
     a new jersey wordlessly trumpeting, and strive

ving assiduously as a one man lobbyist,
     and aye willingly negotiate
     to take more'n one wive

even though that would be big o' me decor,
thus a last minute reprieve given
     without axing por favor
and black keys handed over

     to Holy Roman Empire in ****
rubble ruins (over the Weeknd), thus brutish nasty,
     and short tempered surprisingly
     (boot not prematurely) ******* bon jour

foo fighters actually (grand
     aery an nah - did a three sixty)
     feting me guest of *** or,
boosting self esteem, the first time
     since being a kid in a candy store

which poetic digression
     did make quite a dee tour,
and bringing detente amidst marauding
     village people hoop reef furred war.
Oculi May 2022
I want to be part of the industry
To those in the know
This may come off as a confession
Of my ineptitude in joining music
Yes, Music, with a capital M
The industry of music
Holed off from the world
This however, is not the case
I am fawning over the Industry
A world of hard workers
A world of early deaths
And one where there is no satisfaction

I want to be part of the industry
I am deeply and utterly heartbroken
At my love of the arts and avant-garde
I want to be like the old man
From the bus station that one time prior
He was wearing a tattered hat
His coat was torn in places
His shoes were discolored from glue
His face was dark as soot from dirt
His beard was patchy, and greyish
Yet through his eyes, I saw a flash
A flash of a diamond nature
His veins bled gold and his brow, well
His sweat was pure *******
And even thusly so, he held something
That I could never even begin to touch
He held in himself no hostility
No morosity or animosity
He was a happy man and nothing more
And though I may live for far longer
I wish to trade places yet still

I want to be part of the industry
I want my body to be battered
I want my will to be shattered
If I were to wish for something
It would be to become a machine
In a factory, operated by a ******
Functioning in perfect unison
With my focused master
I want to be a slave to the industry
I want to be destroyed for a good reason
Rather than the war of attrition
That I've been fighting for 20 something years now

I want to be part of the industry
The *** industry
No, I am not professing that I would enjoy being on call
I want to be ***** by the evil that man wills
By the willing and heretical deities of this land

I dreamed of being cannibalized
A man of gigantic proportions stood above me
He had a tail, and a horse's face
His voice was the sound of charcoal burning
He whispered to me with malevolence
"You will never be who you desire to be"
I knew in my heart of hearts that he was right
He took all of his clothes off, slowly
In order to allow me a view of his many scars
Burns, stab wounds, scratches
All over his brown leather skin
His face changed into something else
It was my face, as a man
He ****** me, against my will
And after he had had his way with me
He began to tear me apart with his hands
Slowly ripping off my flesh, bit by bit
I could not move against his immense force
But I felt every single minutia of pain
I became nothing, and I was now one with him
I will never be a woman again

I want to be part of the industry
I want to be one of the many robots
That are tearing jobs away from good-willed working men
Or so I hear they are, anyway

I want to be part of the soil
I want you to walk over me
Maybe this way I would assist you in something
I would help you reach your goal at the ends of this earth
I want to be dirt, sand and soft rock
To be malleable by hand and to be useful in some way
I want to know why the Greater Will cursed me this way
Why I must see the earth in such a Wretched form
Why where others see color, I see monochrome
Why where others see camaraderie, I see crushing solitude
My becoming an Artist was a great mistake
I've always wanted to be nothing more than a machine

I want you to understand
You, You, You, with a capital Y, the divine You
That I do love you, if somewhat differently than they do
And I apologize for not showing it while I had the chance
I will miss the days when we walked this earth together
We were Wretched together, unlike the others
I hope in your sleep, your eternal and infinite sleep
You find the wisdom that I denied you
I will miss you like you were a brother to me, because you were
I am lonely without you
But so it goes, or at least that's what they tell me
History contends that on that score
hing hot summer at 6:00 pm June sixteenth
in the year 666 after the Devonian era,
two lovers - a Mister Belmont Me

and Missy Bryn Mawr Hu felt the call
of the wild within the wilderness
in ****** hinterlands of Penn Valley
and supposedly got cannibalized

by a Hottentot Mailer Daemon named
Manayunk Yahoo. All plugged stoppers
got pulled as the passionate children
of Mother Nature and Jethro Toll

rumbled, fumbled, bungled in
the jungle, and shook the firma
ment echoing subterranean cat a
combs with their private feral

Carnival antics.The ensuing Millennium
spawned one bizarre tale after
another each appending a more
farfetched tail spinning embellish
ment from the preceding legend.

Mary Waters ford considered as
the first person to record the shroud
of mystery lurking in the hollows
of sleepy hills, which rumor harbored
this legend of lost Lower Merion lovers.

Even to this day (one eerily similar
at that fateful bewitching hour)
one can hear the blood curdling
and hair-raising bacchanalia under
ground Brahmins deep pounding
beets on their crude ovens deep
purple within the bowels of the Earth.

Many believe present day tremors
that line the main tract hearken
Earth linked presence of sinning
wood nymphs and elfin grots continually

being birthed within many gnarled rocks
causing groundswell similar to
a Welsh Valley overtaken by hocked
conch blowing Harridans. Some
of these hardy adherents corn beef

hash tagged as unprintable expletives,
whose self-righteousness bound
by unwavering assertions of Woody
Woodpecker apparition. Visages of
fearsome flesh eating muscle bound

underground golems toting haversacks
as big as a town (surpassing the likes
of 1148 Matthew’s rolled into one)
sustains longevity of ogres not even

all the brooms could sweep away far
as next square rush new town. Although
rarely seen, but more often heard
tectonic vibrations that shake and bake

like local crowded house special chicken
Radnor (often cleft fissures upon flint ******
layers of bedrock comprising Delaware Valley)
infuses imagination of (top notch pugilists)

bravely ventured into this haunted haven
and vanished without a trace. Most likely
their fate became a gourmet meal i.e. tasty
as Salad Augustus with seven season Caesar dressing.
Jeremy Betts Sep 27
I have no tongue left to bite
A gruesome sight
It's been cannibalized
From accepting your lies
That hit a raw nerve
"That's what I deserve"
You know that's on my mind
Hit with my own issues on the side that's blind
You take advantage of my choice
Willfully giving up my voice
But now this one sided desire
You set on fire
And blame it on me
Because it's so...
Friggin'...
Easy

©2024
But sits here donned in his foreign
aged (not so lovely) bag of bones
barely functioning surviving, but by
skin off his teeth, (which explains
dentures) regretting, revisiting,
ruminating hellacious bout with

anorexia nervosa, approximately
five dozen (multiply) orbitz around
nearest solar system body agonizing,
decrying, lamenting... (slightly "FAKE"
dramatics) constant reminder deux
skinny legs ineradicable testimony

permanent indelible gawky
disproportionate ugly physique,
(particularly knobby knees and little
feet) starvation stunt houses boy
on cusp of puberty, wherein naked
undeveloped characteristics self

cannibalized attaining fullest
potential manhood - toothpick legs
(hyperbole) laughingstock, thus
maintaining shuttered life donning
trousers all year long, (albeit not
same pair) utterly embarrassed

public stares brash teasing comments
at mine psychological expense, I
grudgingly accept forever incomplete
fleshed out body costing purposeless
driven life concomitant with absolute
zero buddies, re: severe interpersonal

collateral/ fallout including missus
notwithstanding, this marriage devoid,
where emotional, physical, and spiritual
intimacy absent drooling enviously, furtively
espying healthy youths discovering vis a vis
metamorphosis transformation into young

adulthood, one kamikaze perilous nearly
figurative, asper custom made Benedict
Arnold traitor reviling against natural
processes sacrificing primate growth,
where solitude welcomed i.e. books offered

sole soul asylum hatch escape unknowingly
triggering seismic repercussions longtime
familiarization being quasi mister misanthrope
wedded to missus non people person, she
frequently exhibits hostile behaviour, which
marriage tacitly accepted as passive exit out

being under same roof as (long deceased)
mama, now nonagenarian papa, whose
former livid rage toward only son cooled as
deck aides elapsed at lightspeed, thee father/
son relationship less strained versus during
formative prepubescent stage, where sinking

unwavering, and withdrawing into black hole
wrought bereft willpower to remain among the
living depriving attainment experiencing joie de
vivre at critical chronological juncture, hence
mine entire scarred, yet expunging grief via

holistic, naturalistic, therapeutic... expressions
(exercise, meditation, reading, therapy, writing)
allows, enables, and provides modus operandi
to alleviate excoriating, lamenting, torturing...
irreversible self shortchanged inherent growth.
Phi Kenzie Jul 2018
Pepperoni pizza with
red pepper flakes
and white sauce on my thighs

I keep eating it
kinda cannibalized

But I’m greedy
for a greasy meat trio
calves knees and higher
Tyler Owen Cox Dec 2017
In a car, backseat, peeking out the window, we can see for miles
You come to notice a mess of fur on the roadside
Once pink and shiny now black and spread out while
Drivers avert their eyes from the deer who seemed to be lazing
Red preceded by a crack of sound
Tendons spilling to the ground

Days, weeks, months, it's very hard to tell
I've been like this since I first limped to hell
And my soul split upon impact
My ribcage caught the fender
Warn down by the asphalt
I was thrown off to the side of the road
Where I slipped into a dream of falling off a very tall building

I was a human, not an animal
But once my spine splintered as I hit the pavement
Some onlookers came over and laughed at the timing of my death

The sound my spine made was comedic gold
Someone recorded it to make sure I died and my pain lived on

Each glowing face burned my remains with laughter
And cannibalized my spirit as it tried to crawl from my corpse

The ghost floated away with its eyes closed
And let itself slowly move across a world of warmth and people to a cold foreign ocean full of Icebergs
That almost looked friendly

It came to rest on the iceberg, which seemed to have familiar features to that of a human
The iceberg creaked and splashed, and the ghost told stories
But the iceberg began to crack
And the ghost watched its friend split apart

He dipped into the water
And went down where it was coldest
No corpse could match the chill
Parallel the spirit, the silhouette swims

With splintered spine the ghost dives deeper until the blackness
Underneath all that ice
***** it in through the schism
Onoma Dec 2023
silvery claw marks

on a sixth-plate daguerreotype,

in a foresting chamber study.

a grandfather clock holding its

hands up to its pendulating face--

after an oil lamp is trimmed.

as that daguerreotype's, daguerreotype  

is torn to the size of letters, cannibalized

by The Word/the word/words...

made fleshless, a handwriting

analysis

examined by tactically glowing

horns.
*Inspired by Dada/Surrealist, Man Ray's: L' Enigma d' Isidore Ducasse, 1920.
Which was inspired by Isidore Ducasse/Comte de Lautremont's simile: 'Beautiful as the accidental encounter, on a dissecting table, of a sewing machine and an umbrella.'
Murderously Skewered, And Torturously Zapped

Directv linkedin to accentuate
piddly money crisis, tis zen uneasy fate,
I imagine dragons gyrate
ting, and licking chops, faux masticate
ting, no matter I didst pre
     mutt chew lee *******
prickly desperate pleas against inflate
ting trumpeting rogues tummies

     begetting bulging abdominal oblate
spheroids at my mortal expense,
     whereat your truly poor brother
     got swallowed as chunky
     raw bits inside bellies of mountebanks,
     not too long after
     can nub (red) bulls didst terminate
ma vital essence, a veritable goulash

     each and every one,
     a heart less *****
     grinder - dee liver ring,
     a once dashing husband
     digestively enzymatically transformed,
     perhaps crudely became
     ***** material reincarnate,
though I not gratefully dead

     didst mischievously clog their loo,
     I could not a void the pressurized expulsion,
     which (courtesy Uranus) propulsive
     ****** didst force
     gassy guests needed to evacuate,
in water closet, and/or inducing indigestible
     morsels (acid barely scorched)
     body parts, nevertheless distressed

     indiscriminate chow hounds,
     who got no recourse boot to regurgitate
byproducts vaguely resembling mine
involuntarily twitching features
     foo fighting beastie boys,
     who will then hibernate
for a bitterly cold dark winter,

     despite gala feast mass soul palate lee,
     sprung supper eyes reveling
     causing ******* acid reflux,
     and thence relishing if thyself
     for die:re ah postprandial
     (Montezuma payback never to late),
     who did deign to dine on thyself
     as some kind of delicacy

afternoon, and/or evening
     dining tete a tete
with me re: being served as edible fete
on Matthew Scott Harris of late,
who didst mildly agitate
against being cannibalized
     as human bait,
     nonetheless this non bird'n sum

     potential a parrot tiff
     saw siege fingers drubbing on flat surface
     indicative, sans non
     verbal cues create
ting, where halloween
     tricked out wolfish
     bill collectors must wait
for anemic zero

     sum gamely checking
     account tubby bolstered
(neither fat, nor slim chance
     till November social security
     direct deposit twill satiate
     bone dry aforementioned
     Citizens checking account)
     to calm anguished cerebral template

     after experiencing, suffer
ring, and undergoing
     a quickened depletion rate
mainly still reeling from
     five hundred dollar plus
     automobile repair from
     August tooth house sand eight,
teen, whereat a shock absorber

     didst comprise bulk of total,
     and thus that chunk of money,
     doth presently eek quate
reeling from seer sucker
     (Jew dee shuss) punch
     tummy checking account

     hovering vacuuming thoughts
     of cheesy Swiss side
     dell ideation, permeate
     an otherwise mellow numb skull,
     (and crossed bones)
     psychological state,
     and aye kin count to ate.
words agitate me out of sleep:
i figured:
this schizophrenic night and day
duality of how the earth orbits
no wonder we become
disorientated:
to counter-protest:
i recently purchased a BASIS
road-bicycle...
a slender frame
a Grecian statue:
i believe the military Christ
side by side with Michael
is hanging around Greece:
if i'm going to believe
in Christ: i need to believe
in a militant Christ...
but only until the phantom swords
of the crucifix disappear..
not until then...

caffeine is as bad as music:
as an agitator:
the alligators of Afghanistan
ought to know...
i'm writing for a New Elite...
maybe that's why i feel so...
so... disgruntled...
i'm tired of the consciousness
allowance:
subsequent hangover...
reaping no rewards...

but my body is also tired
of drinking so much:
so many people don't allow
their bodies to have a voice...
i know that
i see that:
i have parasitical worms in my eyes...
which is why
i don't mind her suggesting
i have pin-worms in my tickling
****:
i'm kinda happy with:
the symbiosis to counter
the man's dimensional abstraction
via dualism:
i'm talking symbiosis:
Christ the Parasite of Satan
and Satan the Parasite of Christ...

symbiosis: Peter, St.
where those Aztecan dances:
i had the stupid thought
of cycling into London wearing a Taylor Swift
t-shirt:
words are not words:
words are just words:
Pepsi: Coca-Cola: Smirnoff...
Jackie Judo Daniels...
i scratch my forehead:
you scratch my ***?!

words are meaningless:
said the dyslexic pastor
and i was like:
do you see past the letters:
to envision the sound
to then descend into the realm
of words:
words like abstracts
like punctuation
like grammar:
like subscript chemistry
but superscript algebraic mathematics:
doodle doodle...
doodle...
i don't want to live among Europeans!
the great wind
is not with them:
such mediocre: fire,
earth,      static...
wounded and doubly wounded
with sepsis..

               Chopin's bride...
   will this relationship save me:
is she the black widow redeemer...
have i finally crossed the Rubicon
of women who despot
by despot
analyze my attention giving prowess...

fold the pillow: to make a croissant!
fold the pillow! to make a croissant!
don't make me ask you
twice on explaining to you the spine!
and how two pillows won't work:
stop pretending to be Anne ******* Bolyean...
Boylean.... Bolyean:
Bolyon...
will you seriously ask me for the proper name
of Anne: and Henry: sitting in a tree:
one chop two chop
three chop the tree...             is a stump:
m'eh wowd...

          Bo-lane... no... but who reads poetry
on poetry websites...
if not poetry MA graduates:
who writes:
Police novelist...
Security guard: diarist...
Hairdresser: protagonist...
and that ****** up daughter of hers
that has me believing in the Red Flags
of Yugoslavia that i also
believe a Second Byzantines will
thirst for reviving the Ottoman barber barber...

but if poetry could be understood
as the antithesis of journalism:
current: given: what year?! 2025?
if poetry could be given this allowance:
and there would be a purge:
Stalin says hello,
sister: hello: thank you Stalin:
if i had a cat
of my own...
i'd become Hades...
if i had a dog: of my own:
just a little cluck towards a chicken...
puck puck:
hog hog onomatopoeia queer of queen:
said:
HULK TU'AH...
hawks?! hawks?!
all praises to the gods extinct...

Jesus is saving ****:
just about shaving his ***
so that his girlfriend can
perform: more than just ****...
time wasting: oral as much as
optometry...
***: invoked...

i am: being: cannibalized
by: lazy thinking:
no visualization of the gravity
of 0...
of nothing...
to craft ego from nothing
to create the ego-ergo...
like Virgo... Zodiac... hmm...
are we going to be that weird
couple
that just **** like rabbits
and digest world news like
bad dreams:
are we going to be that couple
that's so solipsistic that
the world will give us a
snippet of Alzheimer-Warhol
15 minutes...
or would, rather: those descending:
descendant:
you beat me to that
cross-hyphenation of complex:
my ******* is your
******-catharsis:

don't believe me?!
                        i'd peel off the skin
of the fore:
but i can't... because of two protruding
veins of the vine:
so... drink your wine twice:
then, Turkey:
i'll make sure i gag you with the nibble of bread!
now: i will turn you:
into a slave...
i will not liberate you:
i will turn you not adherent of the Greek
tradition of the militant Christ:
i will ensure you become
adherent of the Reformist Christ:
the pacified Christ:
the cuck Christ...
the Protestant Christ...
this: English Antichrist!
tuckered wayfarer

Blitzkrieg cacophony debilitates Earthling
spiritually, mentally, emotionally... castrates
analogous post traumatic stress disorder
status simulating shell shocked warrior
dizzily descending darkening dimension
aghast - weakly ******* wherefore art thou
Elysian Fields?

Mine skeletal atrophied, diseased, gnarled...
once muscular flesh now awful blight
trumpets, dons, bespeaks... existence
regarding barren toothless anchorite

desolate physical environment
offlimit superfund site
mirrors equivalent condemned
toxic physical body quite
piteous, hideous, atrocious...,
this human bag of lovely bones

can barely, limply, scratchily... write
forbidding natural geography might
best demarcate courtesy skull
and crossbones bleached white
optimally reflecting feasting
carrion did delight

post mortem cannibalized habeas corpus
can never know where Edenic Garden
bloomed ah... magnificent sight,
nor reckon eyes me
how poetry doth not excite
forever striking living daylight

emancipating soul joining spiritus mundi
relieving tortured corporeal skiff good night
amidst abandoned, desecrated,
gutted... wasteland rendered might
of mankind quest to tame and temper
breathless fecundity kickstarting

rejuvenation linked to potent Gaia despite
havoc wrought regenerative force
repurposes deadened muscle and cellulite
unbeknownst decomposed organisms
comprise yours truly, nor what bright
transformation new life regeneration
will kindle, snapchat, tender... excite.
Pinkerton May 2019
Post copulation, most preying mantis males
will get cannibalized by their partner.
Even stranger still, I tell the class,
is that a male angler fish will fuse to the female
and then atrophy until he’s nothing left but ******.
The lesson could be that males
will often seek out *** at great cost to themselves.

And there in the front row:
I do not think this is a staring contest
but she refuses to break eye contact,
forces herself
into a dark closet behind my eye-*****,
sifts through the hamper where my most soiled secrets hide
as she tongue-****-swirls a cherry Tootsie Roll pop.

Her pleated skirt is a trap,
those legs baiting me ever closer.
Those long, taut legs;
those milky smooth thighs;
those intoxicating hips.
Those legs with the power to gift life
or destroy it.

Oh Lord, give me strength

Words tumble out of my mouth
like novice gymnasts falling flat.
Or there are none at all.
Or they are preceded by machine-gun-stutters.
She smirks, lollipop still in her mouth,
lips stained red like she’s ****** the life out of me.

Only I think she has—
I check my neck to make for certain.
It’s suddenly so hot in here.
My shirt is moist; I need a cold shower.
My pulse is racing; I think I’m going to faint.

She takes my retreat as an invitation to advance,
leans over my desk far enough to expose
her lack of a bra. Leans in closer.
So close I taste cherry.
And I don’t know if she’s blinked, yet.

Her voice is a knife penetrating flesh,
the sound of the first drop of blood
spattering on the ground.
Her words could ****.
Toying with a button on her blouse, she whispers,
“I really need to get something off my chest.”

How unfair the hormones, giving this child
an adult body. How unfair the hormones,
giving her adult desires. How unfair the hormones,
making her bored with boys her own age.
How unfair my own hormones, giving me a sweet-tooth
for ***** moans.

She volunteers to stay after class.
I freeze, unable to respond.
You’d like to think that there’d be no question,
that you’d instinctively do the right thing when tested.
She is no mantis, I’d leave here head still attached;
there are other ways, though, to end a man.
And, indeed, I would be destroyed.
But this is biology.
The lesson could be that males
will seek out *** at great cost to themselves.

— The End —