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traces of being Jan 2017
a storyteller's perspective, steppin' off the ordinary edge, into the unknown

An unsent letter lay on the rustic log cabin floor
A cold wind musta’ blown through the cracks the light comes in,
where it laid fallen, half *** crumbled, yet never a wadded ball;
never an unspoken thrown paper stone,  a befallen regret was all.
Silently atilt and leaning against the canted wall's slant
behind the gathered dust a squeaky hinged burl wood door

A timeworn tarnished copper wind up clock roosted,
an old lip smirched coffee cup time stood still;
an empty bottle of gin sat near the bed post headboard
where the ink stains and blotted spillings let the memories in.
Stained pages torn and bent like fallen paper wings
returned to the unread sender … postage due,   south a heaven sent ―

A sullied envelope, gnawed and mouse chewed,
for a nest of new beginnings ―     
                                                          just read:                   Lydia  ...  
                                ... followed by a scribbled empty heart               

The time aged brown tattered tablet paper left behind
stifled like the unread heart it holds upon the threadbare pages
of smudged tear’s ache and spilled gin

The weathered rock hearth fireplace filled with spent ashes,
hand rolled cigarette butts, traces of an aching lament;
scratched up old vinyl records lay ***** and tired out,
from a time of sweeter fallen fences, a musical bliss, and
a lost angel's abandoned red slinky party dress,  
aside a busted off black velvet high-heel stuck sullied
in a hollow knothole in the ancient barn-wood floor
a sparkly pearl pink jewel entangled in a spider web

An unsent letter lay on the rustic cabin floor
A cold wind musta’ blown through the cracks the light gets in

The final unread words silently said:

                               "We lost our way,
                                  it all went wrong,
                                  it all turned bad"

                             ..."This is the outcome when someone you love  
                                  up and throws you away"

                             ...“I’ll reach out from the inside
                                  I’ll rise up again and do without”

                             ..."You went out into the world
                                  with an untamed hankerin’ ―
                                  like a carefree restless gypsy breeze
                                                                 and come back worlds apart"


The Unsent Letter,  
                          just whispered words to the dust in the wind
                                                            ­                        in quivering ink:

                             ..."how can I ever unremember you...?
                                  a thrown stone sinks wordlessly as a rock...,
                                  an old wood bucket with a rotten hole the heart,
                                  fallen forgotten, rock bottom as an empty well"


                                        just signed:   ...   ❤  August


                          *January 1st, 2017 ... august ... wild is the wind  ♡
postscript: trying to write outside my comfort zone box
                  this storyteller's perspective, steppin' off the edge the unknown
                  i did have fun from behind the incarnation of a caricature's eyes
                  some say "it's always about the writer"...what say you(?)!
.
harlon rivers Nov 2017
Hops and topsy-turvy jumps ― blurred movement
muddles across  the dewy meadow floor,
as though dawn brushes away the sandman’s magic
from the corner of sleepy eyes,
                                  to cast an enchanting spell
    A sudden hazy yet abrupt stop…
    hastily,  halting ,   frozen motionless

Stillness, as if some final destination has been reached…
  
Neck stretched and craning,
tilted with an eye to mother earth ;
a canted focus beyond interruption
   In the blink of an eye,
   with a vigor too rapid to capture,
   as the nowness of urgency flashes ― 
 
   She stretches the earthworm
   with the grasp of subsistence
knowing after fall   becomes the long winterlude.

The morning sun illuminates the glow of the native Maple’s
glorious fiery orange and yellow color palette  
A steady stream of animation rushes in and out
   of the giant tree’s golden splendor

Abundance perishes with the seasonal gardens decay.
Mornings of blueberry and strawberry feasts
have left the red breasted robbers foraging
for the last rotting apples the deer have left behind.

   Harbingers of spring…
  
   Blueberry sneakers…
  
   Gleaners of fall and winter..

“Teeek”  “tuk” “tuk” “Tseep”....
        fills the overhead air
   with a beautifully chaotic verve

The flock returns repeatedly     to and fro     the towering Maple
to the ripened cornucopia of scarlet berry clusters of the Mountain Ash

The Robin’s flock ravage and gorge on the plentiful delights
Soon the crimson berries fuel of flight will disappear
   as if it were only an unspoken allusion
          of the passing seasons

The pearl gray sky is an ominous backdrop
          for the fickle fleeting migrants
Daylight fades as the flock disappears
          into a break                in the clouds
fleeting unto the ominous pending winter sky…

In the blink of an eye ... life’s  senescent seasons
transform the stormy whirling winds of change
bearing the golden Autumn leave’s splendor
   across the rolling vista
like a higgledy-piggledy murmuration
   of a migrating beautiful mess

The naked rooted scaffold’s branches stretch
across the sprawling tapestry of the wooded sanctuary.
Winter flocks of Thrush and Robins,
    arrive on a frosty new dawn
Red breast feathers puff with the morning sun’s rays,
warming the tree tops leaning toward the southern sky;
   Their journey here and now,
from distant mountainous horizons,
   is part of a soul’s sacred circle of life…


November rivers ...the final autumn entry of 2017
Postscript:  ... something fitting and gentle for a beautiful fall  morn
in the Pacific Northwest ~ I've realized I want to share lighter moments in life when they are writ,  readers or not...this is for the few with eyes that see beyond the obvious sense of nature's vastitude ...ubiquitous zen ~

The Mountain Ash grove is always a fascinating spectacle in the fall…After watching for several days…recording the thoughts, mentally painting the picture for a sit down at the table, in the window with a pen and paper  tablet.   Today was the day for a 30 minute stream of natural consciousness in this narrative prose poem about a reoccurring seasonal fascination with the American Robin’s cycle of life…
When I stop to ponder the irony, actually our circle of life is just as round…

Some say all poetry is about the writer, at least in some subtle way,
even when they try to convince themselves it is not...
This writer wants his poems to become just as personal to the reader,
whether a writer or not ...Why say that here & now?
As most writing from me is too deep for many readers...
we all need to breathe deeply and exhale a sigh now and then... these days
I try to stay out of the Robin's way... it's my  nature's way
Giving up attachment to things is impossible...
"Attachment to things drops away by itself
when you no longer seek to find yourself in them."

... thank you for reading "it's only water" final fall chapter

Flight of the Red Breasted Robin
Written by:   h.a. rivers
Josh Bass Dec 2014
They stare
Too many of them do it
They look at you with their sideways
face.
They don't peer
They arn't peers
Lack all intuition
And empathy
"What?"
"Huh?"
With a plastered on smile
On their sideways face
I am done trying to explain
to the people frozen in their
permenant Dutch Angles
"Wait, what?"
You can stick your sideways face
up your sideways ***
Caleb Jaren Feb 2010
Spearmint altoids and espresso
doubleshot headphones
hardly used Palm(seems not 1 for organization)
Empty jewel cases strewn over
the pine expanse3 monitors burn, an insistent
cyclopean glare w/the accompanying mice
notebooks' aged paper curled
'round circuit board controller cards
and holographic stickers open
hard drive aluminum platter white
cordless phone 2.4 GHz
floppy discs USB
milk glass opalescent bag
industrial lasagna fork canted sideways
tomes beckon
Cybershock
Snowcrash palpitations
PANIC! k_trap trap type 0x000000E flickers
attempting to dump 32 years
physical memory
Failed!
User I/O = NULL
Evan Stephens Feb 2019
I remember you
& that rebel C
of blonde hair
by your ear.

You let me
tuck it back,
even after you knew
I liked you.

You were fourteen
& your world
was engraved
in italics.

When I cut myself
for reasons
I couldn't speak to,
you understood.

We were exiles -
but I always had
the impression
you found me

too safe to date.
Oh, how you were wrong -
an irony, for
you spared yourself

the wild hurt
of my terrible soul,
& the wrecked self
I gave so many others,

for when I said
"I love you,"
I always meant
something else entirely.

I started thinking back on you
as early as college,
glassy well of gin
weeping for me in my hand.

Years after that,
my brakeless bicycle
invited me into a bath of sun
& you were waiting there

as a thought.
I remember
being so divided by you.
My longings

were only ever half
about the blue
of your eye,
& that blonde C

I turned it back so I could
touch you by the ear -
a gesture you always allowed.
Mercy? Desire?

I never knew.
The other half was new,
a movement inside me,
learning how

to be in love,
a fourteen-year-old's
grand, hopeless romance.
I was reminded of this

that July 4th a decade ago
when I saw you here
in my city,
with your husband.

You still held
skeleton keys
that opened
my older locks.

Your intelligence
canted over me
& erased
almost fifteen years

& my chest was smoke
& my skin was a sky
& just as before, half was love
& half was not.
Kyle T Oct 2020
There are tiburones off the Fla. Keys
Believe me, out there in the aqua deeps
Sometimes they swim up into the sandy shallows
But not often;
And usually only at night while you’re on a veranda sipping a
Glass of red wine,
Safe in the glimmer of a tropical neon beer sign
Underneath palm trees.

These tiburones swim off shelves and under cantilevers
Continental shifts in deeps
Sandy bottoms, they cruise by
Like missiles
Fired from dusky deep ephemera
Assimilated by the amorphous ocean infrastructure
Flotsam and careened ships off gray coasts
Rusted and dead steel under the raining ash
And the sea foam that pools around their husks they falter, canted, and tipped
And lost as quick as were, gone, betrayed to the deeps again.

But, sometimes, tropical shallows
A Latin lover's osculant kiss
A fumbling of the belt buckle
Swimming dark waters under moonlight
Dark eyes, red lips
Surl breath dlipped wet
Held in ocean's gentle soul
Pearls aligned distant metaverses
Transcendent, therefore, only Beautiful

They don’t care to bother with you, mostly, the tiburones.
They’re curious, a dorsal fin to cut the surface, an indifferent pass
You are not the wine they seek to drink.

But if you find yourself afloat;
Lost or hurt,
If you venture too far from your shore,
Carried by the gentle waves, the inverse gravity of water
When the ocean seems benign...
...They’ll come cruising.

It won’t take long.

Doll-eyed and mechanical, they’ll swim by
Just to say..... Hello.

I have not seen many tiburones but they impart,
Even to those who have never seen them,
This unspeakable fear:
Not so much of the Ocean—Few ever enter the Ocean
But of some assimilation of thought
Where it passes by from dark end to dark end
Sunrise to sunset, and a portentous silhouette beneath you,
If not of the wry toothed smile, and the porcelain ghost…

Then of what?
Could it be of the thought of teeth?
Or of a malicious ghost agnostic of your importance?
Of the specter that cares not of your potential,
Disregarding your position in this world.
Something that treats you with true Equality-

Could it be the things in this world that say Hello with teeth?
There are abbreviated bits of flesh rent in life.
I wear these battle worn scars.
And not instead of love but because it’s the only way
They know how to smile at you.
It’s how they say Hello.

I only have seen their reflective eyes in the shallows
Off the verandas where I have sat and drank
Drunk myself into a stupor, a vibration in my fingertips, in my mind
No sommelier am I.

The red liquid fills my mouth and paints my teeth an indelible red and drips from my mouth from my ****** lips
I have bit too hard,
And spilled my red wine onto the table
Watching it drip viscously off the table and stream to the floor
And pool in great deep redness on the veranda’s floor
Drops and drops and then, restless, I drop back into the depths
In the dead, burnt-out center of the wine’s pool
And watch it assimilate into the porcelain.

And the deep darkness of the red miscegenates with white porcelain
And it all fades in and out standing on that perfect precipice of wine and violence
The wind and flux of ocean waves and darkness
Those eyes down there, refracting moonlight, deadened orbs
The wine deliquesces from veranda’s precipice to waves
The great adulteration, the miscegenation, it all goes flux.

And I drop off, assimilated into darkness, there:
Where the bits of flesh torn from teeth and I swim away
Dismembered, deformed

And a flutter in the shallows,
A quick, precise splash,
A perfect torsion
Writhing bodies.

And those black eyes roll over white,
And those archaic teeth descend,
And pulled under the dark ocean
Without even the moon to give me my light
And in my breath’s last seconds,
I’m perfectly assimilated into this structure,
Deliquesced, relaxed, and gone into the depths,
Swimming in the sulfuric bottom
Of my glass of red wine.
This hurts to read, only for me. Enjoy.
JDK Jun 2016
Canted at a crazy angle
with arms going wild like an air dancer at a car dealership.
I threw up in the bathroom of one like three weekends ago.
It was awful.
Yea, I didn't know they're called "Air Dancers" either until like 30 seconds ago.
Looking dead and empty from the outside
Every window dark and overgrown
A picture perfect not-so-sweet abandon
Standing long forgotten and alone
Beckoning to me with secret nothings
And stories each of us may never tell
A place that life and time have long forgotten
A place of death not far from living hell

Twisted vines tattoo the sides like cancer
Cataracts of dust enslave the glass
A jagged smile of railing slats now beckons
Waiting for the worst to come to pass
The steps, askew and incomplete, sustain me
As do the missing pieces of my mind
With every step, a creak that echoes louder
Than the silence that will fill the end of time

The door, now long ajar and slightly canted
Much like my eyes, half open to the truth
Sees through me, as I gaze into forever
Caressing every shadow of my youth
The surface, cracked and scarred like distant memories
Much like the hide of demons yet to be
Becomes as braille beneath my trailing fingers
And whispers, “Come…,” as fate opens to me

The corner shaves an arc on dusty floorboards
Motes now rise and sway, as if entranced
Every footfall landing past the threshold
Conjures more to join this ghostly dance
Etching upon stillness a reminder
That even the forgotten tend to change
Emphasizing time as an illusion
Every passing moment soon estranged

Traversing through each room, the memories linger
Linger but a moment do I dare
For in each dusty corner lies a shadow
Lying not, while hungry and aware
Every hallway stretches on eternal
No trace of salvation upon the stairs
Nothing here but promises now hollow
Forcing me out into fresher air

Wading through the overgrowth and briers
Working my way ‘round this haggard shell
The cellar door awakens now from nowhere
Hinting both to heaven and to hell
Standing here in waiting, not in wonder
Not knowing how I know what soon will be
The cellar door extends its invitation
As it opens ever slowly unto me

Stepping into darkness disillusioned
Emptiness extends its open arms
Embracing me despite the separation
Beckoning me further in its charm
Crying, not in fear, but in elation
I stagger through my tears to my demise
The death of everything I had forsaken
Forgotten like the past I had disguised

In the furthest corner of my conscience
Crouching in the corner of the tomb
The child of devastation smiles sweetly
Driving every darkness from the gloom
Fighting not the chains that hold him captive
No longer forgotten and alone
For I have come to free him from the memories
And together, we will find our way back home
This has been a creative work in progress for a while now, and may still yet find change.
Dave Hardin Nov 2016
Ukiyo-e

Thin curls coaxed from the grain
released from all claim by the dogged
rooting of the spoon gouge

bone white ribbon
easing itself to the fragrant floor
spiral cherry rivulet lost in the churn

at the feet of the carver, the first
thing I remember. A churlish man
as I recall, the burl of his squint

screening detail and smoke
from his cigarette, blue double
helix rising in mirror image

a lowering ceiling steeping
his head in stormy weather
gimlet eye weighing heavy seas

a tempest lipping
the canted rim of a petal thin
tea cup, striated wave

reaching for the heavens
top lopped clean by sheering wind
the fluter and the veiner alive and biting

in the hands of the carver who cuts me free
at last, rendered in stark relief at
the boiling crest of the surf break.
old poem, something about Japanese wood cut
It is nights like this
with the air hot and till
that they come for you.
They cannot be seen
looking directly on,
but with the head canted sideways
you know they are there
in the shadows at the far end of your eyes.
They sit perfectly still,
wings folded at parade rest and ready to work,
veterans of these dark hours,
trained and blooded
and with a desire to have no feelings
about doing the job right.

No animosity, totally professional
quick, competent escort staff
they are, it might be said,
in the boutique-packing-to-go-now
side of the business.
We are all going to the same destination:
plush cushions, snacks on porcelain plates
delicate porcelain cups too.
Here with our name bar codes,
our history in tie-on tags, the reasons why……
Factory Returns, Out of Warranty
Time Expired, Use by, Discounted to Go,
it’s all written and in an account somewhere.

And when we are assembled and ready to leave,
The door at the end of the hall opens and is tested,
It is one way only and shuts with a metallic snicker
and has no inside handle which you might try
if you had second thoughts about this trip.
There are no second thoughts,
no thoughts at all and no regrets
too late for that.
It’s like queuing for Wimbledon, gentility and good will to the last,
the memory of the taste of strawberries and cream in your mouth
as you go on your way out and up for an ever endless lebensraum.
nicoarty Oct 2016
there she stood
poised like an animated fairy-tale
the bow of her lips quickened to quiver
failure; a call to reality
porcelain doll cheeks stroked with shades of red and tears
the very same as at the end of her brush,
she canted poisonous words like a dark chant
gross words, from such beautiful eyes
like knives at the canvas before where she stood

stains marred the ball shoes on the in-proportionate figure
an extravagant gown of scarlet torn to one side
revealing paint smears and mismatched feet
before the beauty she cried
bowed to knees at the sight
her elegant dress muddied , her perfect shoes stained,
her body all twisted

for how could she know?
It was a sin for her to cry
it was a shame for her knees to reach the ground
she bawled and pleaded- like a newborn hearing the tragedies of the world
the painters overalls slipping from her shoulders
brushes clattering to the ground
another masterpiece failed
another painting she would not sell
for how could she see?
she is a masterpiece herself
perfection finally reached
she cannot see, that she
is a masterpiece- at least to me.
Tyler Dec 2021
hold me tight.
my body yearns for touch.
kiss me swell
my heart a wishing well.

could you love me in gridlock
grand service to my emptiness
you can reach into my depths
for us to understand your power.
Derek Bascombe Oct 2016
Cranky from the lack of sleep,
I twist my fin
into a knot of agony
Swoosh!!

The-...     An-...
Aw, the **** with it...

Lately
I’ve been thinking
that all men are cremated
equally crisp.
But my next door neighbor
still smolders darkly
in his backyard grill pit,
his dogs frantic in their drooling lust
to lick his charred flanks.

Dear grieving widow –
would you honor me
by dropping in for a cup of tea?
She wails and moans,
her pelvis slack
and canted downwards.
It will be a chore
to get her to loosen up enough
to hurl a ****
heavenwards.

The specifics of our last conversation
escape me.
But I do remember calling you
an angelic ****
with the personality
of a rabid piranha.

You responded, with a dreamy smile,
“But, my dear Rudolf!
I do select my prey
by their spread and heft!
After all,
I just love to hear
that gristly pop
when they open up
for my sanguine delectation...”


Aurora, CO – May 1995
Derek Bascombe
Sonya Bauer Jun 2020
In aubergine,
And my kind wanting lies,
The rise and fall of feet, a formula's delta,
That I once called 'who I am'.
In thumping heartbeat and trembling fingers,
The graceless clumsy of nerve to embrace,
That fierceness seen once in the mirror.
There for a second, or less than a second,
Just before blinking my eyes.

In letting them choke on my lashes,
I steeled myself for the reveal;
Saw what I'd always believed of myself,
Named her too much of a burden.
A slick thief of my mother's love,
That canted towards disappointment.
Something called falsely pretty,
Instead of more accurate words,
Like a sly and foolish imposter,
An amateur of imitation,
Masked as a girl with pride.

I traced every deceit,
A cord, or a rune, on her body.
Twisting words that fell off her tongue,
As easy as catching a snowflake.
Those ones where she claimed she was smart,
And deserved to be cared for, somehow;
Pressed into her elbow's hollow,
The dips and the swells of her shallow crests,
And the unearned keel of her hair.

Standing there, wishing for someone, anyone
Real to approach her and rend,
Down the walls of her cowardly fortress,
Exposing all of her nothing,
And petty shoplifting;
Leave her there at the apex,
Of all that she was and could not be,
To drown inside the hot blackness of oil,
And what she perceived to be justice.
Not thinking, for all her lost, learned logic,
That these thoughts, too, could be lies.
Tyler Apr 2023
the love flows like water today,
can you feel it ?
i'm leaking into the wind.
the car windows are down.
it's flowing new;
cusping of old.

a motorbike turbo.
an anthem of courage.
resonant dynamos.
canted sliding streets.
Bobby Copeland Oct 2020
If words could transport, you'd be here,
Come south again romantically,
With Amorous Particulars,
To whisper most emphatically,
Your quil gon penetrate the veil.
Good English words cannot define
The love you sing, the way you wail
This canted language of the vine.
I'll wet your lips with syllables
Your other wouldn't understand.
Come taste new pleasures, break some rules,
And move until you come undone.
These bits well moisten underthings,
Come be my love, unsheath your wings.
Words And Phrases
urban dictionary
Evan Stephens Sep 2021
O xanthous brickwork, your scars
canted with shadow... my mirror platter
cries on the left hand side, and cool air
settles in the burnished tree tops.

It's almost October and the days just pile
on top of each other without any meaning in them.
I wet my face at the vessel, soap to soak,
waiting for the death of the aloe flower

that perches on its lonely stalk,
defiant and sorrowful, tendril shaking
in a cold busker's breeze.
Scuttling traffic claws into the dim hour,

the sun wests away; brick goes dark,
browning like steak. The air rises
into the ape-hour to meet the landslide
of dead angels flickering across the band.
Evan Stephens Aug 2021
The stair-shadow bar
a blackwood twist that swims
& recurves under elbow and pint.

Eyes knock in the false, exacted twilight,
against the yarded backdrop
of felt puddles stroked with chalk.

Here is a glass of rye - it waits
in amber for the pink warm wash
of my prowling, kissing palm;

here is a glass of Powers - the sweet
scent flowers the stale angles,
fumes away beyond the lip line.

Things can't quite be read -
what does the canted shoulder mean
when it turns my way?

Words tumble into the chrome-crumbled
struts of the barstools. A kölsh floats into me,
then two, small columns of silted yellow.

On leaving, I am amazed to find
the cheer-charred night, rude gestures
of moon sweeping the towers,

& a fearful silence that finds its harbor
deep inside the glen of my ribcage:
a barking heart, chained to its house.
The new firehouse  stands where the old
Hardshell church used to be stationed,
and across the road new houses
have replaced the once fallow field
where the Methodist tent meeting
took place when I was twelve years old,
accountable for my wanton
gaze, at the cheeks exposed by shorts
that would not have been allowed on
Sunday morning this Friday night,
if you took the freewill doctrine
unpopular now in circles
philosophical,  canted like
the hooks we used to turn sawlogs
on the carriage where I offbeared
in the summer and after school,
saving cash I would one day use
to court those long-legged ladies.
Dennis Willis Dec 2020
This voice is looser
than something
I spoke with afore

This neck is canted
toward like dousing
for alliteration

Reaching inside and out
the flesh as if they wave
themselves as one lick

Of one day really a moment
like a cathedral at sunrise
the moment the glass

— The End —