Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Star BG May 2019
(ASHLEY KOCHER)
DREAM CATCHERS ARE THE MAGIC TRICK
TO CAPTURE YOUR NIGHTMARES OR SO THEY SAY.

(Star)
The nightmares that hide in shadows
ready to strike
when lids close.
Dreamcatchers a gift
that keeps giving on nights
when storms brew.

(Ashly Kocher)
Like a witches potion
some good some bad
bubbling up
overflowing
wishes to be had
Only formulated for night
giving some freight
Overloaded files
ready for the attack.

(Star)
And attack they will
but I have my trusty
catcher shield on wall field.
Defending my sleep
and letting me
be at peace
so shadow bugs can’t creep.

DREAM CATCHERS ARE THE MAGIC TRICK
TO CAPTURE YOUR NIGHTMARES.

(damperez)
Some mornings i take
what the catcher has caught
and make make soup or mosaic or poem out of them

(Star)
They swirl drifting
in my soup of words
as I strain them through suns rays.
My pen stirrer turns
in moment fine and divine.
expanding in rhyme.
No more nightmares you’ll find.

DREAM CATCHERS ARE TH MAGIC TRICK
TO CAPTURE YOUR NIGHTMARES.

(Gods1son)
Hope its gone for good
not to return in the coming nights
inside stars bright

(Star)
Hope its gone
not to knock on sleeps door
then I’ll be peaceful
inside dreamscape shore.

DREAM CATCHERS ARE TH MAGIC TRICK
TO CAPTURE YOUR NIGHTMARES.

(Fecundeity)
When sweet morning dawns
giving dreamcatcher sight
the bad dreams flee
unable to survive light.

(Star)
Cause light is so bright
and the nightmares dark
they can’t survive
inside ones loves spark.

DREAM CATCHERS ARE TH MAGIC TRICK
TO CAPTURE YOUR NIGHTMARES.

(Mysidian Bard)
Caught like flies in a spindly web
guiding you to the morning when
you’ve lost your way

But hay I do say
your safe anyway
cause nightmare flies die
in day hooray.



mikecccc)
They never say how to empty them.

(Star)
Shake with love intention
to set them to the light
so no longer they will be
a nightmare sight at night
ASHLY KOCHER
WROTE THE ONE LINE THAT STARTED IT ALL. SHE INSPIRED ALL OF US TO WRITE. THANKS SO MUCH ASHLY AND WE BOTH THANK ALL THOSE WHO ADDED TTHEIR CREATIVE SPARKS.
Arcassin B Jul 2017
By Arcassin Burnham


Heaven knows,
My struggles and my agonies.
Heaven knows,
My struggles and my agonies.

Loneliness and focusness provokes thought,
Sweat on your face for the friends that you sought,
Don't spend the rest of your life in a box,
Looking for love in the wrong places need to stop,
It's so easy to fit in with people like you,
Ain't a time for wishing and hoping a virtue,
Boyfriend's and girlfriends that'll​ straight hurt you,
It'll be a second when your world ends turning you so cruel,

I just say just don't hang with people that peerpressure and leaves you out
High and dry,
If trust is trust and fake is fake , they must be synthetic to what they think is
Your demise,
If it's not one thing then it's definitely another but the first thing's a lil' more
Dangerous,
There is so much fake in the world they might just sacrifice your body and
Just come up famous,

So who needs friends?
Might be the Devil in the disguise,
Might be an under cover cop,
Turn on you in the blink of an eye.


/

Dropping like seagulls in the sea,
people are dying everywhere help us please,
suspicions about the world since seventeen,
I never had a dad around , can't control me.

while all the girls,
while all the girls,
don't see reason.
while all the boys,
while all the boys,
don't like being told what to do.
And all the eye catchers , they walk around without being *,
you better take someone's hand in desperate need and say what you* have spoken,
And all the eye catchers,* pretend like the world revolves around* them.
Theres always something in this world that is worth living for but you gotta live for them.

Spare me the ignorance if you please,
i never conquered a problem just with ease,
interest in words stem from the giving tree,
I'm not a violent person just don't judge me.

while all the girls,
all the girls,
don't see reason.
while all the boys,
while all the boys,
don't like being told what to do.
And all the eye catchers , they walk around without being noticed.
you better take someone's hand in desperate need and say what you have spoken,
And all the eye catchers,* pretend like the world revolves around* them.
Theres always something in this world that is worth living for but you gotta live for them.
©abpoetry2017
https://arcassin.blogspot.com/2017/07/indie-part-c-photo-by-sidney-kirsch.html
Mindy Belgard Jan 2019
They call them dream catchers
The ones that steal you away
They're hidden inside the pretty girls
Written on they're smiles
Twisted in they're spines
You can never really tell when they have you wrapped up in there web
They're hidden like a black rose in a red bouquet
Tossed to the curb worthless n fake
Dream catchers will caress you in a safety net of sweet sleep
They'll fill you with feelings
They'll make you feel safe
But dream catchers never give back the dreams built up by days and later by nights
She'll ****** you to stay and then she'll make you want to run away
Dream catchers are often gorgeously framed
There beauty is like no others they're beauty reals you in
Not knowing there silently hiding under cover
Lay low for awhile cover up words with a smile
Don't give in to the lust they pass off as trust
They only have one goal in mind
It's only a matter of time
They'll slip into your life sneak into your room they'll be waiting on your bed blending in with the seams
They look like Pretty girls and there Trying to catch your dreams
Tulip Chowdhury Aug 2014
Have so many tear bottles
yet none can hold my tears,
they hold the watery drops
but not the reasons,
so why the tears bottles?

Blast it, they only add
add to more tears
that flow in the heart
who sees that tear ocean?

Dream catchers, ten of those
hang overhead
ten sizes, ten colors,
but no dreams come true,
the happy ones you know.

Dream catchers fail
and nightmares trail
all my daydreams,
I sleep on
hoping, dream catchers will catch
some cherished dreams
and put the nightmares
in the tear bottles,
the fears will be lost
in those false hopes
of finding meaning in unhappiness
in the tear bottles
while tears and dreams
play their game
in tears bottles and dream catcher's whims.
Mateuš Conrad Jan 2020
finding gravity on a bicycle...

surely... given that most people
don't write a ******* hemmingway...
and there's no william buckley jr.
doing the interview...
and there's no norman mailer...

and that: no one really bothers
with kierkegaard and that:
kant "famously" didn't marry starry crap...
why didn't i have kids
and start a family?
uh... dunno... mother's best lie...
or the best lie a neighbour brings
with her... whenever you're
being a 2nd witness without
the 1st witness being there...

and she says an "also" with regards
to her son having the same luck
with women...
when the comparison comes:
a koala bear versus a gorilla...
bonsai tiger!
like a koala is a ******* bear
to begin with...
cuddly soft-pouch toy-ah-thing!

but there's that great feat!
finding gravity on a bicycle...
my mother helped me with that...
and that famous fail of
a rotondo... well... more or less
a cricket ground egg shaped, oval...
or a rugby ball...
the shoulder on the salto bike
hard... rammed into a car....

as a child you were supposedly well
loved...
and this is modern poo'etry i hear about?
here's to: john sounding like johny...
will sounding like *****...
richard sounding like: **** and not richy...
it's cute... matthew... matti: finnish...
leonard is: leo oh leo...
why art we all not named: Li Lo Po!

of course everyone managed to spot
the tetragrammaton vowel catchers that's
hey'zeus! no... not the bloke strapped
to the mannequin of tailoring...
oh no... not the crucifix pendulum
"for us all"... by blood... by cross...
who is to exfoliate on the crucifix...
better than some well scouted for materials
on a mannequin canvas for tailoring
a suit?
the guilt?! oh the guilt!
well... thank god this metaphysician would
never address the material realm of
enjoying a... dabble with... wool...
when donning a suit...
or leather shoes... or any presence of suede...
beside the crucifix mannequin: replica
and pittance!

- but finding gravity on a bicycle is one thing...
finding gravity when swimming is another...
it's called gravity...
but some heretical circles call it:
balance...
after all... it is both gravity...
and balance... given that while riding
a bike... or swimming...
you're pretty much sure, assured:
to not be falling...

you can find gravity with newtonian hindsight...
of sure...
that's there... it involves the magicians orbs...
copernican mathematics and...
target practice when it comes to
propaganda spew...
and Steward... the lesser... Stew...
cousin of the house of Stuart...
not Steward... Stuart...
which is (again)...
a McKiteit and MacCoddlewit...
some Glaswegian *****-donor clinic
"miss-up" mix-it: tend to...
lounging busy... which is of course...
besides the "look"...

5 bazookas cleared for a salvo!
hip hip! burger-pound!
hip hip! boom shizzle shoom!
hip hip! hooray!
oh now we'z getz uz best
partay birth doy wishy-washy
"protagonists"!

but given the current Persian affair...
i couldn't help to notice...
love actually... the narrative...
the u.s.a. and england...
the Z-spezial re-la-tion-ship...

so... who's spastic... and who's fantastic?!
spaz: B-bristolian-esque joking...
never aside...
who's the spaz and who's the frizzy-fuss?!

spe-zial mother russia talks down
to dog Kiev: yes, it's in (the) Ukraine...
spezial iz not what iz?

h'america... kept a yorkshire terrier...
media leetches of england
firmly in its grasp...
cuz onez we woz: once -
the militia contra the crown...
of north virginia...

coz b'rah: a 79-year-old man
who lit himself on fire protesting
against russia's language policies
in the capital of the volga region
of udmurtia has died;
name? alberto raisin...
which sounds terrible in its
non-native spanish...

but there's something worth of gravity
without debating
the heliocentric model...
finding one's balance on a bicycle...
a posteriori events...
but... the same balance can be
translated into a swimming session...

my god my father tried to teach me...
if i was supposed to learn
to swim in the sea...
with the fear: of not seeing the depth?
isn't that like a thesaurus
congestion of: acrophobia?
isn't there a word in the borrowed
lexicon of the ancient greeks...
concerning... fearing to swim in a body
of water... where you can't see the bottom?
i could learn to swim in a swimming
pool... thankfuly all because and due to...
moi...

i also found gravity in water...
i could... lie in water and become...
the antithesis of: the body consists
of 90% of water...
yes sherlock watson & sons... ltd...
but in water i'm mostly fat...
if i find the right balance...
i float...
which is why swimming is a bit
like riding a bicycle...
you find: the center...
or gravity...

again... in this special "relationship"
of bruv-love...
between h'america and whittle brit-pop interlude...
oasis on the continent...
my my... blur, even...
breakfast at tiffany's back in the dough-dough-us...
who is the ******* SPASTIC?
in this "SPEZIAL" relationship?
i guess the english must be the SPEZIALS...

a bit like watching:
go-go-gonzales trip up on a spelling mistake...
which is all i care for...
like a comedia...
a deviation from the informal, later,
subject of language implementation...
and all this peacocking prior...

where else does gravity allow itself...
a presence of the multi-vector?
up and down... left and right...
it's not as easily explained as:
on a ledge... with an apple...
drop it... newton with a header!
a 1-all equalizer in stoppage time
an F.A. cup re-match!

gravity on a bicycle...
it's hardly a drop affair...
gravity in water...
it's hardly merely swimming...
there's that aspect of finding... buoyancy...
there's not need for you to swim...
to exhert so much effort...
that you might as well drown 10 meters
in after swimming the 'undred...

no buoyancy: no chinese fortune cookies...
i still don't know which is more grand...
beside the acrobatics of... olympic level
acrobatics...

it's not bound to youth via lifting weights...
or supreme mao tse tung's winter olympics
of: hunger strikes in Vinter...
the gravity bound to a bicycle...
or the gravity bound to swimming...
after all... the latter is a bit "funny"...

"levitation" and buoyancy...
the dracula soundtrack:
only because of gary oldman and the composer
wojciech kilar... and the given, current...
b.b.c. spin-off and how...
yes... it's that terrible...
i don't even know where those five-stars
came from!
the archetype of feminine romance novels?
the syphilitic lover? the "vampire"?

yes, no? two guesses as good as: nein - keiner...
and, quiet honestly...
nothing could make this exercise in:
not engaging in any of all the available
comments sections on any website...
any worse... than it already is...

it comes as no surprise that: i write this poo'ems
not because i don't write poetry...
but because i will neither write
a poem by standards reserved for
pedagogy or demagogy...
or write identifiable puzzle-bog-trots of...
language reserved for politicization:
and not for... counter-marxist...
"psychiatric" post-...
hardly modern or... "today's journalism"...
eh... pushing it toward a Beckett-clause...
concerning language that is not expected...
oh but i certainly do know
a difference between formal language
and... this... the informal language...
the cognitive extension that does not
require a "free speech" protection bias...

none of this was spoken...
it was seen...
weaved into "thinking"...
that's the difference... isn't it?
from my end of the tenniscourt "promenade"
i've heard nothing but clickick...
off this dead-end replica piano
of a qwer
asdf
zxcvbnm

unless my shadow spoke... or there was some
telepathic connection
with the schizoid "group-think" of me
sourcing my sometime odd...
cognitive-murmors of "thought"...
"hallucinations"...
so be it...

this defence of a freedom of speech...
how does that even extend into writing?
i will never know...
and to be honest? i don't want to know...
writing is an extension of thinking...
which is also an inversion of speaking...
but it's never speaking...
where's the audio on this piece?!

how about... plucking your eyes out,
after fating yourself with the
original curiosity to begin with?
sounds better: than... what still persists as...
not being, said!

this was written, it wasn't said...
this is not a transcript...
this is not a transcript...
if this is censored...
then my... "schizophrenia" is not even
my original thesis of: bogus
mono-lingual parody of bilingualism...
no need to cite **** sapiens
jurisprudence advocates...
lawyers... the thesaurus bargain barons etc.
this is... what's those words they use?
invasion of the tabernacle?
do my "auditory hallucinations" stem from...
these words...
a private investement in internet access...
again: nothing is being said!
because this is a "public arena"...
a "forum"...
and the eyes on the other side of this text...
are c.c.t.v. eyes?!
not private eyes?

what's the point of freedom of speech?
when the freedom to think:
and subsequently write... is bombarded
by being who: see via reading braille...
and read... comments likes dislikes and all
those other ratios?

writing is an extension of a freedom
to think... most people who speak freely
don't speak via a precursor script...
that's not free speech: that's scripted speech!
and just because it happens be placed
in a public "forum"...
that's the argument that this writing
is a freedom of "speech"?!
really?! i guess your average u.s. citizen
is more despotic than the *******
president... then...

again.. blah blah blah blah blah...
blah blah.... blah blah blah blah blah...
blah... blah blah... blah blah blah blah blah blah...

you'd sooner convince a parrot to sing
you a song in sparrow than call this "debate"...
evenly focused on one or neither side "winning".
ryyan May 2011
Once upon a time.
In a land far far away.
Their existed a rhyme,
About the greatest game ever played.
This is the said rhyme 
preserved from the acclaim the game has gained.
Passed on to generations about the game at it’s prime. 

A game that should be reclaimed from the fame its gained at the present time.
This game came from the brain of a person
who aimed to have the time of his life. 

Town ball was for all. In any season: spring, summer, winter, or fall.
Town ball was a ball for all: no despair, grief,  or strife, could spawn.
The rules were simple
Hit ball: bases touch all. 

Teams were never full. 
And the field could sprawl.
Everything was in play just like everyone could play.
No obstacle was in the way, no direction out of play.
Yet, according to the natural law of capitalistic America,
An evolution began to make money.
**** you Jean-Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet!!
You may have nothing to do with baseball, 

But you spawned the evilest idea of them all. 

That evolution is caused by natural law, 

and the evolution of baseball is the downfall of all that is America.
Baseball was at one time a game of fun; 

good times shared with one another under the sun. 

Eventually they agreed to decree the official rules, 

And it was not Abner Doubleday who would have the last say in history,
for that story is a myth that we should flee from like fools.
Instead it was Alexander Cartwright who penned the knickerbocker rules.
These rules spread to the rest of the clubs,
and eventually it was coined the New York game. 

No longer could anyone play but only the ones who could slug.
If you wanted to win, it would be a sin,
to put in the has been who brought the game shame.
This game spread during the civil war. 

In down time to escape they played for fun instead of being bored.
The game spread like never before,
and soon the game covered the entire eastern shore.
The N.A.A.B.B.P was formed and by 1867 four hundred teams were born,
and in 1870 the Chicago Cubs actually won!
They actually were good before 1908,
heck some people might even say they were great. 

I don’t mean to taint their slate or bait your hate.
I just wish to point out that its been some time since that date,
and you Cub fans still must await.
Meanwhile these gentleman clubs would compete in the heat,
for they wanted to prove they were the ones to beat. 

Yet promoters wanted money so they charged the food you eat.
Then they fenced in the meet.
No longer could you watch the teams compete from the street.
If you wanted to know who would defeat you must enter with a receipt
to show that you payed for your seat.
There you would meet, eat, and greet,
and keep track of the game on your score sheet
Eventually the wood frames turned to concrete

in order to hold more people inside their games.
And the players started to earn fame.
And eventually everyone knew their name.
No longer was the game a game for games sake,
instead it was meant to entertain the fame-craved.
All that matter was the money made at the gate,
and since then the game has never been the same.
Before players would score more and their would be less of a bore.
Fielders caught with their fingers the stingers thrown,
but for catchers that was absurd.

Before, fans would abhor to the idea of a fielder with a glove adorned,
but eventually the planted seed, grew steadily, and the fielders glove was born.
At first their was no web extended between the finger and thumb.
Because that would make it so easy to catch it would be just dumb. 

Yet, somehow the web spread and eventually it won. 

Now any *** could catch between finger and thumb
and the hand would not become numb.
This lead the dead ball era dread at the start of nineteen hundred.
And ego went to Owen Wilson’s head as he lead the league with triples.
Thirty six triples the record was set
and will never be broken it has been said.
But instead its embed into the unread
record book for others to go ahead and try to break with dread.
There were several reasons that lead to the dead ball.
First of all, the same ball was used until it started to unravel.
Second, was that you would draw a strike for every foul ball,
And lastly was the spit ball which would dance to any squall.
All these reasons made the pitchers un-hittable. 

And batters seeing their batting average fall
would take a bar crawl and bawl.
But then a savior came to us all. 

This man hit the ball so far that it would fall somewhere past Senegal.
The claims were esteemed that this man was best of them all. 

Yet, he was traded for money to fund a curtain call. 

This man’s name was George “the Babe” Herman Ruth. 

A pitcher turned outfielder because he was a great hitter is the truth.
The great bambino or Sultan of Swat,
nothing could stop him when he was hot. 

And he hit the dead ball era out of the park and it was forever lost. 

He had more home run’s as an individual, than any team,

Except for the Phillies who were good it seems.

Babe was the hit man

Pitcher he was no longer

The same change came

With this emphasis:
Babe Ruth symbolized what was

the rest of the game. 


They said pitch no more.
Sluggers are what fans adore
outfields became small. 


Power was the talk

Every team must have a guy
who hits with power. 


George “babe” Herman Ruth
and Lou Gehrig, the Yankee’s
became the very best.

Then the depression came and rained on the parade of the baseball game.
Yet, families with radio’s would listen to the games as a sort of hope. 

To escape from the world that they known. 

To escape to a game that reminded them of better days.
Then WWII came and stole away the players. 

Baseball’s talent level was now in multiple layers. 

and because of lack of talent Ted Williams batted over .400 percent
and Joe Dimaggio hit the ball again and again. 

for 56 consecutive games he hit the ball back to where it was sent.
Yet, eventually the players would return and baseball would mend. 

But not before the ladies got their own league. 

and men it did intrigue.
Is this for real?
Or a joke?
They would laugh.

Then they would choke. 

When they saw that this wasn’t just an act.
The girls continued,
“Everyone used to be able to play the good old town ball game!
“This is no longer town ball,” the men said, “the present game is not the same,
Instead its now played for money and fame.”

Oh how the good old days always change.

“Give us money” the women exclaimed,
“We’ll take your fortune we’ll take your fame!”

Some men said, “you complain! Its not the same,
you have to be good to play this game,
you can have your separate league if you need,
But this game of fame is only for white men of age!”

Oh how problems never change
Instead they always stay the same.
Yet, it wouldn’t be long
Before the trumpet would sing its song. 

That segregation would possibly end. 

Not for women but for African Americans. 

Segregation had always gone on. 

***** leagues rose up, but finally segregation’s time was gone 

due to a man named Jackie Robinson. 

And in 1947 he broke through with the Brooklyn Dodgers.
Because his team was convinced they’d make more money by Lou Durocher
Yet it came with its troubles because Not everyone on the team was happy 
And some fans were just down right ******.
Some teams such as our beloved St.Louis Cardinals even threatened to strike. 

They were not going to play if Jackie played because they had that much dislike. 

But Jackie and the Dodgers pushed through all the hate that spewed. 

Other players, managers, and fans  were rude, crude and would start feuds. 
Then they would brood every time Jackie’s name the roster would include.
But after awhile people would conclude that he was actually very good.
And after review others would start to include rather than seclude,

But this integration was long over due.
30 years till segregation could be totally subdued.
The lessons we learn are hard ones that is true. 

And it takes awhile for an entire nations perspective to take a different mood.
Now with baseball integrated the game be televised. 

This allows the money in the game to rise. 

The league now expands west; 

New markets they must test.
But hey! the players want some of this. 

They want to start a free agency. 

But this is the last thing the owners need! 

But the players want to be able to move between teams.

The players want money. Oh how things never change.
But the players got what want. 

They now can negotiate and the owners this does haunt. 

The game now is wrapped inside this twisted shame of money. 

Thats all any body wants so they find ways to scheme. 

Thus steroids came to the scene. 

Players now could be payed more if they played well. 

This meant that to hit the ball far, big muscles they would have to build.
In order to get that edge over everyone else. 

These players used steroids to get their help. 

Yet that was not cool with the public 
Because steroids put you at risk. 

They are dangerous at best,
and the league didn’t want to run the risk. 

Plus what about records that have stood the time test?
Are they going be broken now and no longer exist?

All because someone drugs themselves to have a bigger biceps and chest?
Someone please lay this all to rest! 

Baseball today is such a shame. 

Its boring with all of the commercial and pitcher change breaks. 

Something needs to change. 

Because its been turned into a sideshow. 

Thats the only reason why kids even go. 

To see the park, get hot dogs,
and baseballs that when put in the dark they glow. 

Then when you get home. 

you ask them what they remember about the game 

and they say, “I don’t know”. 

This game used to be interesting. 

But now I find my channels flipping. 

Even Golf is more fun to watch. 

at least they hit that ball a lot!
Baseball should but I doubt ever will, 

Get rid of all the pitchers it has to refill. 

No more pitching changes; That would increase the thrill!

Maybe players could hit the ball if wasn’t coming 100 mph every throw. 

and instead of pure talent pitchers had to use strategy,
of when to and not to throw 

That 100mph hour fastball.
Get rid of the sideshow. 

Then maybe kids would go. 

Maybe then we’d go back to being enthralled. 

Back when Baseball was actually Baseball. 

But I doubt it will because money is what matters now.
Sideshows make money so its always going to be allowed.
But I’d like to disavow
I’d like to dropout. 

I never really watched it much in the first place. 

but now I know of a better game.
Oh and one final thing to say. 

We should just go back to town ball. 

That game sounds so much cooler than baseball. 

You could really make some unique obstacles

Put in a fountain or maybe even a wall.
It just sounds like a lot of fun. 

I plan to play it this summer some. 

Everyone will be welcome. 

And we’ll have fun under the sun. 

And it won’t really matter who will win. 

Because its about having fun, building character,
and growing relationships
The end.
Sacrelicious Mar 2012
High school nightmares
of
being everybody's spit catcher.
A real life
idiot
magnet
that attracts
nothing,
but,
negative
forces.
If you've ever felt like everything good repels away from you
& that you can only attract the bad.
Welcome to The Love Cult.

We are:
The kids that ate
their brown-bag
lunches
in one stall
then
purged
in the next.
Cause we were afraid of being labeled with bad brand names.

If you were the
kid in gym class,
that
no one wanted on
their team.
If you have ever felt
alone,
tortured,
abused
and abandoned.

When the only thing you can
do
to
suppress those suicide dreams
is
to use your body
as a make shift
punching bag.
Just remember,
There is a
big *** & beautiful
cuddle
puddle
that will hug you
& love you.
No matter
what anybody has said
about you.
We know that
you're something special.
I believe you're going to be okay,
someday sooner
than you think.
It's a nice thought you need to
Dig
Dig
Dig it, deep into your brain.

Hello.  
I'm Bandit & I'd like to invite you to
my family of passionate & loving friends.
We go by
The
Love
Cult.
the river flows as
living memory

the birds of the
Nile are its
knowing eyes

fly catchers
ply the rich
delta
probing
sediments
of sand
washed
from
distant
Nubian
mountains
eons
ago

layers of
recollection
go fathoms
deep

shrieking
gulls
plumb the
mud flats
with heroic
persistence
as they did
when the
first rafts
drifted out
of the
Great Rift
ferrying
civilizations
forebears
to the
opening chapters
of world history

the first
seafarers
competed with
greedy spoonbills
to navigate
porous
papyrus
crafts
through
the narrow
channels
of the
Damietta,
transporting
ideas, skills
and goods
to build an
emerging
world

mallards
troll the
same
gentile
eddies that
goaded the
Mother of
All Waters
to float the
basket cradling
Yahweh’s
infant prophet
Musa, into the
loving arms
of Bithiah
who nurtured
the vanquisher
of Osiris’
galleries of
Gods

a litany
of conquests
rolled on the
silver waves
of this river

conquerors
maneuvered
the truculent
currents
like sharp
eyed hawks
skimming the
pliant waters
with well
extended
razor quick
talons
picking the
Nile’s bounty
clean

this fertile
delta remembers
more than
6,000 seasons
of harvests

the
cycles of time
has produced
seasons of plenteous
abundance and
desperate privation
all cleverly exploited
by generations of
fearless herons
who wrangled
the demons
of hardship
to route the
dread of hunger
expelling despair
from the Egyptian
DNA, etching
a new hieroglyph
of freedom onto
survivors hearts

the Niles
sorrows
and glories
perpetually
wash this
magnanimous
delta
surely as
the gentle
wakes
of feluccas
continue
to lap its
shore

the marshes
have not withered

the verdant
reeds prosper

flamingos find
the water
rich in fish

in due
season
the red
lotus will
paint
the arcuate
alluvial
fans in
scarlet
autumnal
hues

In the
Valley of
the Kings
the shadows
of migratory
flocks mark
the foundation
stones of the
pyramids
as they did
when slaves
pushed them
into place

the eternal
lines of
pharaohs
rule has fallen,
their gods
imprisoned
in hieroglyphs
adorning their
royal tombs
on display
in the worlds
museums

the weathered
pyramids continue
to crumble

the face of
the sphinx
withers away

torrents of
blood flowed
in this rivers
currents, now
strained clear
by the reeds
anchoring
its banks

the fleeting
rule of regimes
are pictured
as momentary
reflections
skimming along
the ripppling
water; the
rise and fall
of rulers is
captured like
the shifting hues
sunrises and
sunsets bespeak
upon the waters

the ascending
waves of
the Sacred Ibis
dance atop
the Nile’s gray
waters; the
river jumps
to life as the
graceful wings
take flight
to foreign
destinations;
expecting
to return
again as
the cycles
of seasons
round once
more

as the Nile flows
its memory deepens
the eyes of the birds
watch and remember


Music Selection:
Gary Bartz, I've Known Rivers

Oakland
3/31/12
jbm
Frisk Jun 2015
HAVING DREAM CATCHERS ABOVE MY BED
AND CONTINUING TO HAVE THESE NIGHT
TERRORS IS IRONY BECAUSE YOU ALMOST
******* CONVINCED ME THAT YOU WERE
THE EXTERMINATOR TO THOSE NIGHTMARES
BUT GOD, WAS I DEAD WRONG ABOUT YOU.
YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE THE INSTRUMENTS TO
RECREATE ANYTHING GOOD IN MY DREAMS
ANYMORE. FRANKLY, ALL YOU ARE ANYMORE
IS THE TRIGGERS TO MY NIGHTMARES. THIS IS
WHY I DON'T BELIEVE IN FORTUNES, TAROT
CARDS, SPIRITS, AND MUCH LESS, GOOD LUCK.
NO DREAM CATCHER CAN FULLY REMOVE THE
SCARS YOU'VE LEFT IMPRINTED IN MY MIND.
Vidya Sep 2012
perfect girl
in reverse she moves like the minute-hand of the watch wound
up down through

pilot all in leather crash into the steel
ocean and eat the seaweed until
emerge looking like hubcap trash

fifty tons of water weight you move home
covered in barnacles and
flotsam out of the driftwood
you built your house

where the dogs come to eat dirt &
grasshoppers
beneath the foundations lie the
carcasses of chewedupspitout cockroaches
you killed when you were young enough to think that
racing greyhounds meant
chasing them across state borders

you and the peeling paint reading the tea leaves they say time to rip the
oil pastel wrappers off so you can't tell which color is
which and then draw draw everywhere until
you cover the world in color that can't be washed out up
off things are no longer crayola clear

in the sun you turn on natural lights to **** the
wolftooth glare of photophobia
sun sneezing out into the porch do you dare
doubleyou dee forty these hinges someday man, do you really
want this house to have the last word?

so that when you cover the fire pit (no stone unturned)
and roll over to the
cold side of the bed you realize
that the pipes are only leaking in your head
that the dresser did not collapse
that the broken glass & the ants on the floor are not the cause of the
blood on your heels
cracked like brazil nut shells all along the
corridor

(perfect girl runs
skirt flies up in the back hair whips neck turns
hips like a rose in the honeyed dew
melancholy untuned viola strings improve the flavor like
hints of saffron in her eyes--
she is taller than you remember)

the bats
(moths between teeth)
watch you curiously
as though you were standing
right-side up

cacophony caused by
one too few chairs at the
dining table.
Ashly Kocher May 2019
When sweet morning dawns
giving dreamcatcher sight,
the bad dreams flee
unable to survive in light

Dream catchers are the magic trick to capturing your nightmares or so they say
Caught like flies in a spindly web, guiding you to the morning when you've lost your way
Hope it's gone for good
Not to return in the coming nights
Setting them free, never to return to that fight

They never say how to empty them or release the dreams, so I make a mosaic or poem out of it to set them free

Dream catchers attempt to make you feel better to sleep
Don’t hesitate to worry if you try and peek
No matter how long
No matter how short
Your beautiful nightmare
Will get trapped and restored
Waking up slightly confused
But yet wanting more

Let the cobwebs do its job
For when you fall asleep at night
Your dreams will be caught, and not lost
Wrote most of this myself, but some sections are from others who commented on my let’s collaborate post. Shoutout to those who commented. Add onto this if you would like, let’s see this write take off and take flight!
Meenu Syriac May 2014
Was it so long ago
Under the old oak we built our dreams?
So tiny, we were,
The world seemed like such a big place
For two dream chasers, like us.

Was it a thousand years ago
When you in all your innocence
Said that you'd check under the bed
In all your childish valor, and clear me of my fears?

Do you remember,
When we sat by the cold stream
With the water running through our feet,
How you picked up a few daisies
And crowned me as the queen?
And how I picked up a stick
And made you my knight of honor?

Remember running back home,
When it got too late,
Scared your old man, a drunk,
Will beat your Ma and make you cry?
How when I waved good bye from the next door,
All I hoped was that you'll make it out alive
The next day.

Was it so long back,
When we lay in green fields
And looked up to the blue skies,
Dreaming one day, we'll make it up there
And never have to look back in tears?

Flying paper planes and trying to catch our dreams
Doesn't seem so long now,
That you said goodbye
*And made it first to what lay beyond the blue skies.
The Black Raven Jul 2014
Night, At Night i sit.

She turns in the bed and sleeps all expression in her soft face gone, 
the storm brews in the distance, dream catchers rustle in the breeze.
Memories of a distant hotel bar burn in my mind.
Drinks, soft plush velvet in which feet sank, the smell of perfume.
 A silent tear falls down my cheek, the floorboards don't creek, only the dream catchers watchful hands stand protectively against the window closest to her.
The soft feathers almost brush her face, as if standing guard over the demons that often escape leaving her in a sweating nightmare.

Night, at Night i stand.

The rocking chair falls forwards and catching itself slides back into reality, the cot now takes place of the corner as fatherhood now takes mine.
The dream catchers sigh can be heard now guarding the little precious package fast asleep in a colourful world.

Night, at Night i pace,

waiting for the car lights signaling the package has returned to the sender.
My words are nothing but suddenly seem to spill over into the room in black and white, i bow my head and she still sleeps, unaware of my silent suffering.
The catcher now working it's magic.

Night, at Night i sleep.

She turns to face me and in that moment we both know.
I smile which catches her off guard.
I clasp her aged wrinkled hands and whisper words of a distant hotel bar and drinks leading us through this life.
I know the dream catchers eye watches over me now, we both lay there, contented, and as we parted from this world i saw the hands of the catcher.
His face old and weathered. He offered us his hands, and pulled us gently into the rocking lullaby of his world.
Nat Lipstadt Aug 2013
http://m.wikihow.com/Unhook-a-Bra

Pinch the eyelets but oh so gently,
To properly unhook the device to safely release paradise
From it's containment chamber.
This be one of many secrets to unlocking
The mechanism that holds some of the happy things
The human body artist conceived
To perpetuate the
Species.

According to the internet,
To extract joy to the world correctly,
Depends upon both your station and your
Positioning.

Thus, it helps to have GPS,
Which most men think is that pointy thing
Between their legs,
But is not.

Given the laws of gravity,
And other natural limitations,
Sadly that utensil of little avail
In this surgical operation.

If one desires to release the tension
Between the connectors of the protectors,
Guardians of her heart,
It will be necessary to
Let your fingers do the walking.

So cut and paste the title above,
In your web browser place!
Do your homework or risk feeling
As petite as a schnauzer.

Seems your natural tendency,
Righty or lefty, matters in this endeavor,
Of which I was unawares, oft pressing the incorrect lever.
This, the likely cause of my spectacular
Teenage
Fumblings and failures.

Had I known that fact,
In the days before the Internet,
Surely I would have brought along my
Catchers mitt
To step up my game.

Sage advice the article provides:
Get a bra, and practice, practice, practice!
It gets easier with experience.


But methinks that is a bit of a
Risky adventure,
Lest you be seen boy,
Practicing upon yourself,
Or even a dummy,
Dummy!

So cut and paste the title above
In your web browser,
Do your home work or risk feeling
As petite as a pocket schnauzer.

But the most important tip
This wealthy article of information provides,
The conclusion.

In the hour of your desperate struggle,
Drooping
Ego
And
Crushed
Pride,
Ask for assistance from one more practiced,
Hopefully nearby,
Whose help usually comes with a charming smile
of touching condescension
For your male idiocy and verbal in-articulation.

She, unawares, that you have got her
Positioned precisely where you want!


For when you lift her up,
In a free state, the one Divinity intended,
and in your arms, enfolded and protected,
In one grand poetic gesture,
Sweep her off her feet,
Her surprise will be

..
O

So Touching!
No comment.   Nah changed my mind. If you ain't smilin or laughing by now, you need to practice
doing that as well!


Go to

**http://m.wikihow.com/Unhook-a-Bra**

Further research on the subject as suggested by a reader:
Names of Bras - see  http://shop.lululemon.com/products/clothes-accessories/women-sports-bras/Itty-Bracer?cc=4528&skuId;=3503835&catId;=uswwearit1

My fav is Ta Ta Tamer
Max Neumann Aug 2020
red promises floating above you
voicelees goons in this plane, scary
boobas take the trans am, no doubt
3:05 am and you'll be takin it there

extincting crews strenghten courage
black and white days forge memories
across the destination, our enemies
prepare for death, my friend, die

catchers roam the streets like rats
manhattan everywhere, murderous cats
24/7 keeps people awake for sinning
90 billions a day spent on parties

foggy perception like raves and pills
vibes are killing the innocent and guilty
judgment day for all the heavens exploding
final destination, open faces, heavy hangovers
Today it's all poppin.
A hippie hocked a louie on Sammy
when he landed in San Francisco.

Sammy didn't respond;
he just wanted to make
his connecting flight home.

Sammy wasn't proud about
some of things he did in the war;
so he figured he probably
deserved the garlands of disdain
an ungrateful nation bestows
upon itself in fits of self contempt.

Sammy shut down and tuned out,
soon his heart was as dead
as a tombstone until he visited
the monument.  

He would often recall the story
that as he approached the darkened
wall he could sense ghosts loosening
themselves from the black granite.   

Sammy swore that Jimmy Lynch
who went MIA on the final week of his tour
gave him a bear hug and told him
as long as the beer stays cold
and he don’t lose the church key,
everything's groovy and he’s
hanging tough until the rest
of the guys show up.

Jimmy pointed to the Lincoln Memorial
at one end of the mall and to the
Washington Monument at the other,
emphatically stating that our monument
was forever linked with the greatest Americans.

Yeah meeting up with Jimmy
helped Sammy to start shaken
off some real bad stuff.

Mazie knew her husband for a
month before they got married.
A week later Freddie was off to Vietnam.

Freddie was KIA during the Tet Offensive
and his repatriated remains are peacefully
at rest in the red clay of Georgia.

An always faithful Mazie
came to the monument
a few years after it was dedicated.  
She was struck by all the keepsakes
people left at the base of the wall;  
Zippos, baby pictures, a copy of
The Catcher in the Rye, a fifth
of Makers Mark, Pink Teddy Bears,
votive lights, a red 57 Chevy model,
a left handed catchers mitt, and
a pack of Lucky Strikes.

She palmed rosaries and
crucifixes that salved sore
running wounds and David’s
interlaced Star sounding a Shofar
pleading a case for peace.

Mazie is most moved by the names.  
Rows and rows of names. The scroll
begins in a modest manner and
as the wall climbs the names
of a country's vigilant sons and
daughters tower over her head.  
So much living history; spoken
in the unique accent of a country’s
diverse plethora of luminous tongues.

The stories written into the black granite
tell a tale from every state; claiming
the ears, heart and mind of every citizen. 
Each chiseled letter captures every bit
of sun and deep creeping shadow
inching across a great nation.

“I’m  71” says Mazie.  “When I look
upon the wall I see my 21 year old
Freddie as he looked on the finest
day of his life.  He will never look
any other way to me.”
  
“I didn't want to go to see it,” Franny said,
“a cold piece of stone won’t bring my son back.”

Franny did finally go...

When it rains the wall weeps.  
The wall wept all day,
the first time Franny went.

Many were rubbing
the impressions of
dearly departed names.

Franny too, kneels to the
presence of her son’s name.

With a mother's
grateful fingers,
she touches the wall's
damp surface; wiping
the drizzle from her
child's sodden face.

Kneeling before his semblance,
she rubs his etched edges
onto tiny bits of paper.

She sees him,
made manifest in the stone.
As if through a glass darkly,
a found son looks back,
onto the face of a caring mother.

Franny hangs onto the quiet
memory of his voice,
shimmering in the soft lilt
of a warm dark stone.

This deep core Vulcan gneiss,
at last emerged from the hardest stuff,
sculpts a perfect likeness of a tear stained nation.

The Harmonizing Four: Rock of Ages

In Honor of
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial
Washington DC

Oakland
Veterans Day
2013
Lexie May 2014
My heart is screaming help me
My body yells it loud
But the voice of reason
Is hidden by the cloud

A foggy depth and no perception
A deep fall without a rope
Just another broken heart
That has lost all hope
Wuji Jan 2012
I am a man, a flying man,
Flying around the garden.
Never stopping to stand.

They are the catchers,
Looking for prizes.
Those misguided snatchers.

I fly around,
Spreading love all around.
Such a nice thing to be so high off the ground.

So the catchers,
They jump,
They leap,
They bound,
Waving their tempting net,
With that lovely swishing sound.

Then I am caught and put into a jar
A nice little habitat,
Behind glass bars.

They feed me food,
But are quite rude ,
If I stare at the meadow out there.

So I sat,
And my image changed,
Into that of a rat.

They let me go,
In disgust.
Left me on my own with no one to trust.

But I escaped from there,
And went back to the meadow.
The catchers didn't care.

"That rat will never grow."

Then they left,
And lucky for me,
I was back to a being a flying man.
They couldn't cage what I could be.
Drafted this on my phone a while ago. Kinda forgot what's it about.
Cara Anna May 2013
Everyone has that place they go to when the world is too much with them. Or at least, near everyone. Mine is dark, like the sea, and it’s full of stars. It’s not quiet. It’s endless and orchestral, swirling with symphonies that I haven’t quite heard yet, symphonies that are always just a galaxy out of reach.

And sometimes it’s full of fields. I’m from the city, but they feel like home. They circle me and the sky is blindingly blue and I count my breaths: One, Two, Three, and so on. Until softly the wind blows and there I can imagine a different sort of song -- it doesn’t elude me; it consumes me. It’s there in the breeze, in the drifting bits of dust and pollen and tiny particles of sunshine. It’s great and beautiful and the first song that anyone ever heard.

And every so often. Only every so often. That song changes. It’s still within reach, but it’s a different tune. The song is light with floating, glowing ash; it’s heavy with a million voices and laughs and other songs; it drips with summer drinks and rushes through my soul. I am not alone in some black, celestial ocean or alone in golden labyrinths; home is no imagined place, nor are others just comforting phantoms. I am with them. It is more breathtaking than the stars, and more blinding than the sky.

It was like this that my summer began. In musical swells of escapism, visions of melodramatic beauty, grander than my true surroundings. It was built up like Fitzgerald crafted the West Egg, and it nearly ended much the same way; a journey homewards marked with disillusionment.

First came the traveling. I had hoped to find something I’d lost, and started out my search in the throbbing streets of Barcelona, saturated with sunlight during the days and at night with the sounds from sports bars as the football games ended, or young lovers’ laughter along the clear, black Mediterranean coast. Even the most hushed, winding alleys were full of something; perhaps this was just some magical element I conjured to make every moment new and original.

In Spain I found sea food and chilled beer and a bright rose to color my cheeks. I found churches crafted with dizzying dedication, art that made my heart stop, that somehow filled the world with its own sort of symphony.

Then came Paris. There was wine, red and deep and romantic, wine that Hemingway might have brooded over, or that Audrey Hepburn could have brought to her lips on some glamorous getaway from her Roman home. I found walls too, covered with Degas, with Monet and Manet alike, with Da Vinci and the rest. I discovered what it feels like to survey the Luxembourg Gardens on a July day, from a high shady point where despite denim shorts and a boulangerie sandwich, you’re aware that you’ve been graced with something that holds a euphoric regality.

And finally came a trip to Maine. On the shores of Bar Harbor I saw the endless pines and clear blue waters that spelled out the promised land for the first explorers. Atop Cadillac Mountain, as I burrowed into my father’s jacket and hid my face from the wind, I found the stars, as endless as I’d dreamt. They danced for me as for Van Gogh and I could have died up there. I found cool mornings to be filled with walks to rocky shores, and tea and berries and books. There was a different quality here than had been in my European travels. It was introspective and quiet aside from the chirps of crickets and birds and the laps of waves on dark cliffs. I loved it.

Each place held its own collection. Sand and shells and Spanish fans; metro tickets and corks and long linen dresses lightened on the bottom from the waters of the Seine; sea glass pulled from the harbor and dream catchers and endless dog-eared pages. Physical, tangible, ephemeral things for me to grasp onto. I added them to my character, grafted them to my bones, made them my own.

But what use is imagined significance; I hadn’t grown or changed or even learned what it was I had been looking for. I was several weeks older, I had seen a few more corners of the world, granted meaning to trinkets and decided they added to my worth.

It was August then. Shorter days for fluttering leaves and the understanding that nothing separated me from the person I had been aside from the hours between us. Direction in life can’t be dreamt up, it’s earned. It’s what you’re allowed to have after you’ve fallen down and picked yourself back up. I fell, but chose to imagine a new self in faraway places where my troubles couldn’t find me amidst the breezy, sunny crowds.

The cobblestone Parisian streets, the docks of Barcelona, the coves of Maine; they were only where I fled to when my own world was too much with me. When I couldn’t find any use in continuing as myself, I invented a girl laughing on the edge of l’Arc de Triomphe, wading quietly into the inky mystery of the warm sea, or hiding in pine forests with a copy of Wuthering Heights and a serious demeanor. She was the same girl that lost herself into empty fields and dark oceans of stars.

Only one thing stopped the self-absorption that had claimed me that summer. It was nothing fateful; nothing original. I didn’t traverse the world to see this, and the experience was not mine alone. It didn’t hold any old hollywood glamour, nor was it the topic of any of Hemingway’s books. Or maybe it was. It was true, after all. It was the truest thing I did the entire summer; it wasn’t adorned with portraits or cathedrals or soaring landscapes because it didn’t need to be. Hemingway, I think, might have liked that. What I’m going on about now is that Every-So-Often moment. It doesn’t stand lonely in my memory, like so many of the others might. It’s brimming not with strangers and false romantic visions, but with the company of those souls you’re allowed to feel like you’ve known for your entire life, for more than your entire life. The sounds of empty seas and shapeless symphonies have no part; instead, there’s the strumming of guitars with songs so familiar they place an ache right in the core of you. You ache because that moment, full of bonfire and friends and song, is becoming you in a way that nothing else could have (for all of your efforts). It’s a beautiful ache, the one you get when you’ve come home after a long time spent lost and away.
Corvus Apr 2016
Bed sheets become red sheets,
Pillows becomes tear catchers,
No dream catchers here because only nightmares live,
Feasting on wakeful exhaustion.
Deflated bouncy castles for intestines,
White blood cells searching frantically in enclosed darkness.
Enemy invaders seeping into blood, bone and muscle
As the warriors remain trapped in sticky villi.
Drug dependency is a permanent solution
And overdosing is a consistent caregiver for sleep.
Nausea is a rebellious, suicidal last stand
To go down with the invaders as they're taken out.
A seven year war fought inside your body
With no visible battle lines drawn is lonely.
My skin is pockmarked, riddled with the craters of bombs
Fired from all sides with no mercy for the land.
Sometimes I can't help but wonder what'll **** me first:
The invaders or my body's own troops.
Probably the crappiest thing I've ever written, but it was written while I was exhausted, overdosing on medication and in agony, so it's pretty accurate in its insight.
A bee here
another there
the bee catchers busily chase

enjoy every bit
hit and miss
miss and hit

the urge to live is the sugar
sweetens the grind
keeps death out of mind.

If you keep death in mind
high is the cost
in the momentary dying
life is lost.
Kimani Jones May 2010
You say I am the backbone of the family.
Not because I am the youngest,
But because I never showed my emotions.
But I think it's time to let go.
Because when she died,
I was the only one who didn't cry.
But i cried on the inside.
And, when they buried her 6 feet under,
My heart skipped 6 beats and I was choking.
Yes, it's time for me to let go of my emotions.
Because you say I am the backbone.
But, I am not strong enough to support 3 sisters,
1 brother, 2 aunts, 1 uncle, and 3 cousins with this,
Skinny backbone.
Arthritis can't help because I am still afraid to break down.
"You have always been the backbone, no matter what."
But,
I am tired of being Miss Motivation.
You are breaking me down form my,
Coccyx to my,
Sacral to my,
Lumber to my,
Thorracic and,
You're giving me Cervical Cancer.
And instead of being a backbone,
I feel more like a ligament.
Connecting your tears to her tears and,
Her tears to his tears and,
And that tears me apart.
You're swelling up my heart from all your pain and,
Right now it's about the size of a catchers mit.
I don't want to be the backbone.
I am not strong enough to suppport the whole family.
Why can't you see that you're exhausting me?
Kiaren, Kirsten, Kaye, Lloyd, Aunt Atheda,Aunt Regina,
Uncle Tony,Chris,Oliver, Aaron...
I am tired of being your backbone.
I am not that strong.
Copyright Kimani Jones 2010
Jon Tobias Feb 2012
She laughs as I tell her how
The way she devours her stadium dog
Is so *******
I can’t concentrate

Only we are interrupted by
The crack of gunshot over an open plain

It is followed by a hoorah hurricane
So unison I stop trying to make her laugh

Think about the car ride later
And being stuck in traffic
And sliding gently into home

I want to tell her about years from now
Ninth inning deathbed passion
When my red seems finally begin to burst their cotton
About the splinters living inside of my hands
I was living with them inside of my hands

That’s why I was so rough sometimes
How the scotch guard kept the **** off of my knees

I loved to trace the outline of her ***** diamond
Until there were grooves in there
And my initials in her catchers mound

We are so much hoarse voices
Lost in the noise of ***** hands clapping

How I imagine
As I am sliding into home
In our shower
The soft patter of water on the curtain is stadium applause

Let me run grooves in your shapely pattern
Your laughter is a full circle homerun from heartache

Save me again sweet music
Open plain gunshot buildup
And then a noise so booming it is silence

And us
Ninth inning deathbed lovers
Gently sliding into home
This poem was a challenge to me to write about baseball. I wrote about this instead. Close enough I think.
Harmony Sapphire Jan 2015
Dream Catchers, egg hatchers, baby Snatchers, **** wackers, lip smackers, online hackers, ***** slappers, hand clappers, exotic flappers, lazy slackers, suitcase packers, & back stabbers.

Hate & defeated, cheat & feel the heat. Too weak & petite. Tales of hell, wishes on a well, thoughts are things you can't always sell. Sometimes words can be lies liars tell. One day to your death to you fell.
Pass it on. I don't belong. Some people are wrong. Die. I won't cry.

Pakrat hoarders, pro choice aborters, two faced home wreckers, voodoo curses, retired lazy old nurses.

Deaf & Blind, racist & unkind, poor & unemployed. Broke & exploited. Dumb, old, ugly, & fat. ***** stinking rat. Piles & piles of crap.

College professors, real estate investors, coaches, cockaroaches, poachers, perverts & ******, meat eatting caravores. Bums & addicts drunks & fanatics, obsessive compulsive, stalkers too possessive, insane aggressive.

Author Notes :

Partially true, could be your family.

© Harmony Sapphire . All rights reserved,
III Apr 2018
My dream catchers
Must be defective,

    I still see you every night.
Lotus Jan 2013
Below the river’s mirrored surface
Sun-catchers collect the eyes of fish
And in reflecting rainbows
Cast shadows through the currents.  

The slippers of dimpled stones
Tip-toe down-river-bottom
The same direction that the
Weeds blow.

Naked bodies that gleam blushes
Connect with the hot rocks
And rippled movements,
Each one dives into the cold clutches of aqua
Each one leaps on the rocks to lie in the sun.

The black and blue dragonflies,
They boast their fast flight
In full circles and angled turns
And from their deep-set ebony eyes
Pierce the spaces under rocks and between leaves.

Grains of sand are thieved from the shores
By the fast fleeing waters that do not
Stay in one place long.
Those under the water
Those that listen
Hear the music that is so subtly drawn with each grain of sand
Hear the music in the reflecting sun-catchers
Hear the foot-falls of every dimpled stone
Hear the music in the movements of those naked bodies
And in the speedy flight of black and blue dragonflies.
All these dream catchers over my head as I sleep
And still
Nightmares run free as I lay in my bed
Trying not to scream
And feel so weak
This is my favorite time of year
The one thing I live for
Is getting my annual invitation
Hand delivered at the door
It says "Dear Occupant"
or sometimes "your name here"
"We would like this chance to ask you"
"to see what's new this year"
"Please come to this year's Psychic Fair"
"We hope you will attend"
"Please RSVP by Tuesday"
"We'll see you soon...our friend!"
Dear occupant...how did they know
I'm unlisted in the book
My identity is secret
You can't find me if you look
I guess that's why they're psychics
They know exactly where I'm at
They know I'm waiting for my invite
They just KNOW....and that is that
Each year it's at the same place
Off the highway, past the mall
They always set up lots of tables
But, they never fill them all
This year's ad had promised
This year would be better than the last
So...I sent them back my rsvp
And I got it to them fast
I showed up in line on Friday
Not too early ....not too late
The fair began next morning
The ad said...doors open at eight
I sat outside and waited
Had my blanket, pillow too
I was there for oh....six hours
Before I saw occupant number two
"****" he said when he pulled in
"I was hoping to be first in line"
"Now, I'm gonna miss the real good stuff"
"I may as well have come at nine"
I sat there and ignored him
Knowing deep down that he was right
Then I settled down to sleep a bit
And help to pass the night
At seven ten I woke, all set
To get into the fair
I looked around and saw no one else
Just the two of us were there
I didn't mind, I thought...so what
I'm still the first one in
the others, just can eat my dust
Though the crowd, looked kind of thin
At eight o'clock the doors went click
The lock had been released
From somewhere in the building
By a switch inside the beast
We went inside and looked around
Two hundred tables on display
My heart was just on fire
This would be a special day
Tarot cards, divining rods
crystal ***** and magic wands
Harry Potter robes, more tarot cards
Crystal light strips for your ponds
Readings, Writings, images
Pictures written in the stars
They even had some dream catchers
You could hang up in your cars
I went up to the first booth
I met a psychic there named Joe
He asked me what I wanted
If he was real..then he would know
I saw comics, mind drinks
astrolgers, and saw lots of things to buy
But, every single psychic
Seemed a fraud to me...but why?
I picked up a blue crystal
Was told it would swing and show me things
It would help me to get centered
Good luck to me...it'd bring
I held it and I chanted
It just hung there on my chest
I said "This thing's not full of magic"
He said "It's just having a rest"
I tried again, with thirty more
they all just hung there like dead weight
He said "they all were swinging yesterday"
"give them time....just wait"
An hour passed, my neck gave out
They all fell to the floor
He said "don't leave..I've got a special one"
"Please try this one rock more"
I said that I would try it
But this one would be the last
I'd noticed more folks coming in
And a lot of time had passed
Again, it just ...well, hung there
Nothing happened...but just then
I sneezed and yes ...you guessed it
Nothing happened once again
I left and found a reader
One who said he'd tell me all
I just had to pay him twenty
He said the cards would make the call
A simple deck of tarot cards
All dented and all marked
Were laid out front before me
So in the seat I parked
He turned over the devil
Followed by the jester and the moon
I asked what these three cards meant
"He said, you might be dead by noon"
"or, they could mean something else"
"We'll let the cards decide
"they also might mean that you spent
Last night sleeping outside"
the next three cards turned over were
"A castle, queen and wreck"
He said that these tell me
"My kids have used my deck"
I left him there and moved along
I would give them one more chance
I tossed a coin to pick with who
I would dance the psychic dance
I made my choice and walked on to
A psychic known as Rosie
She was dressed in jeans, and tunic shirt
Just sitting kind of cozy
"I know just why you came to me"
she said as I sat down
"But, you don't have that much trust in me"
"You think I'm just a clown"
"Without belief the things I say"
"will not mean one **** thing"
"without belief you'll waste my time"
"and the knowledge that I bring"
I told her I would listen first
and make my mind up later
I liked the way she came across
I didn't want to hate her
She didn't ask to touch my hand
Didn't even ask my name
She said she picked up my vibrations
That way it wasn't just a game
She told me things I never knew
Some things I'd heard before
But when she told me about children
I then passed out and hit the floor
she told me I'd get married
that I was precise and very giving
She asked if I had teapots
in my house, where I was living
I told her yes I had some pots
and then I asked her why
She said each *** inside my house
Meant one child born for I
This is when I hit the floor
I got a bump that was quite large
I told her "I made tea pots"
"I have a kiln inside my garage"
I said "each *** is one new child"
she said yes that much is true
It was then that she passed out
I said my house held ninety two!!!
CRAZED through much child-bearing
The moon is staggering in the sky;
Moon-struck by the despairing
Glances of her wandering eye
We *****, and ***** in vain,
For children born of her pain.
Children dazed or dead!
When she in all her virginal pride
First trod on the mountain's head
What stir ran through the countryside
Where every foot obeyed her glance!
What manhood led the dance!
Fly-catchers of the moon,
Our hands are blenched, our fingers seem
But slender needles of bone;
Blenched by that malicious dream
They are spread wide that each
May rend what comes in reach.
Waiting patiently
For things to get better
Waiting implies standing still but you've got to keep moving to get what you need
Leaving dream catchers out
Falsely believing they'll answer your prayers
But all my believes are solely in myself
Don't wait around for a stroke of luck
Or maybe two magpies to grace your eye line
Stay up late one night
Watch the sunset die
capture those dreams with your own two hands
melodie foley Nov 2014
I know that my hands are far too small to catch all the pain I would like to heal
But can't I try?
These hands are small and soft
But they are strong and have lifted up people before
They are unwavering in the coldest months
Maybe if I stretch my fingers wide enough I will be able to hold your pain
And even if I am not strong enough
I will hold you by my pinky
Like a promise
I will not let you slip
I will not let you slip
I promise
I pinky promise
I will not let you slip
Kagami Dec 2013
Psychopath, questioned and played with, complex mind games with
Paper fortune tellers and crystal ***** utilized by con artists.
Chrome decorated room filled with trippy, grippy, grabby men
With blue cats swimming around their head. Coherent words do not exist to them.
Sucrose breaks you down, sweet creature, and thieves the antimatter in your empty scull.
Your favorite song no longer passes through your hollow ears.
Notes and the beats... A heartbeat. The thrum of a low piano key in a house supposed
To be isolated and abandoned. You are not alone here, child.
The demons summoned her because of the lettered board between a mattress
And box spring. The springs are broken from too much activity,
Don't jump on the soiled mattress. That's how you receive punishment.

But one without two does not match the storybook your mother read to you.
The nauseating tale of role,play and *******. Everyone knows the story, seen the Disney.
You can run, but you can't hide from the memories of horrible visions
Given to you by the gods. Hold on, child. You will grow to be a man one day
Despite the nightmare of being a wolf child who clawed his way out of his mothers womb.

Jolt and sweat, forgotten top bunk , and a concussion;
The dreams are back. The recurring realities of a twin long lost, but somehow inside.
Dream catchers don't make the callback list, can't act for the life of them, but
They are beautiful against the scenery.
A porcelain doll holds the demon that hacked my system and took controll of my history,
And once again, she takes my place, fooling everyone into thinking I am here
When, in reality, I am buried six feet under.

Blood dribbles from the letters chilled into my stone, I curl and let them add more letters into
My back to symbolize the life I led. The collection of poems I wrote about you are the ones they
Cut into the skin on my legs, permanent reminders of what I have felt.
"What have you felt?"
***Everything.***
jessika michele Jan 2014
you're haunting me still
why?
vibrations from your exit still lingering in my bones
they crack and quake
grating against themselves
why aren't they healing?
these wounds that I have been so persistently nursing
why can I not mend myself of this?
the needle is too dull
the thread is fraying
alone in this room
with your ghost still sitting next to me
gently touching my hand, laying its head in my lap to play with its hair
smiling
laughing
a perception
not the reality
I keep my heart in a box under the bed
next to treasured memories of a memory
I want to burn it all
I want to give it back to you
I want to keep it
it makes me sick
when its dark I wish to travel to far away mystical places
dance among the stars on cotton candy roller skates
yet all I get is you
your face
fetal position, clenched jaws, toss and turn
tortured still
in a state meant for rest
dream catchers strategically placed
they're meant to save me from you
ward off and expel YOU
yet my soldiers of the night
my dream wardens
they're no match for the slyness of you
you slip through as if made of air and elegance
replaying all your proudest moments of my misery
ive never felt such indifference toward someone
I want you gone
out of my head
I wish I could peel you from my skin
wring you from my marrow
shed the skin of this serpent's memory
wake to a new day
finally feeling good
finally feeling anything
finally feeling
Jonny Angel Feb 2014
I want to be a hippie,
join a small commune,
set up my camp
way out in the woods,
near the back forty
& the railroad tracks.

I want to swim naked
with them pretty chicks,
braid natty dreads,
go tubing on the river,
make beeswax candles
& tie dyes.

I want weave dream catchers,
paint glitter on Venetian beads,
sing happy songs,
create new stars,
eat whole wheat bread
& make Tabouili salads.

I wanna dance,
circle the blazing fire,
shout out at the moon,
splash myself in patchouli,
smell ****-smoke in the air
& indulge in tantric things.

I don’t wanna
hurt anybody,
break any laws,
just wanna spread love,
blow kisses to butterflies,
ride double-rainbows
on magic carpets
& be a hippie.
Megan May 2014
i thought of
purchasing
a dream catcher
but the truth is
i'm not sure if I want
my dreams of you
captured.
so i'll deal with
the nightmares.
|m.s.
A Lopez Oct 2015
Handprints I left on the window of the homemade bread factory
When I was thirteen years of age.
That was my time of adolescent memory,mixed with moral decay.
My father had left me, mother was sold out to ***, pills, and her grave.
I was a fiber bug to the world of technology,
Just trying to escape.
The homemade bread factory was Nana's. My daddy's mother.
Me and Nana cooked real Mexicali dishes, made butterfly catches, and dream catchers to go with my teen wishes.
Nana's house was the bread factory.
The factory no longer up and runs.
How I miss Nana, her cooking, her being momma and daddy both.
I miss Nana's love the most,
How our Nana's can be daddy and mother at the same time.
Gods gift to any grandbaby.
Rest
Peacefully sweet Nana
R.I.p
Maria boudega conshito.
Before I breathed
A young man held my mother
coaxed her with unpracticed grace
from Irish Catholic garments between
rough sheets that smelled
like carpentry and dirt.
In photographs from back then
we have the same wrinkled eyebrows,
the same reddish beards,
but different creases
kissing the corners of our eyes.

There are canyons in my knuckles
carved out by cold.
Not New Mexico cracks
in too-hot soil,
but staff-lines of the song
New England skin sings—
I cannot deny I was born here.

My father wears gloves now when he works outside
Says he never used to, but
the pain maybe got too much
Too many winters laying palms flat
against elm, ash, sycamore,
feeling for a pulse
counting on his wrist,
waiting for a murmur, subtle hush
in the rhythm;
telling symptom
of a faulty valve.

I work weekends at a veterinary clinic
and the doctor there does this, too,
though sometimes, being held,
cats purr too loud to listen
and I must reach across the room
and turn the handle on the faucet;
Most cats fear water.

Well Father, I cannot drink from the soil
and I do not always land on my feet
But father, listen to my heartbeat
Put your hand on my chest
and don’t fear as my body
creaks in the wind—

Hear it?

Father
My boughs, my winter-catchers
are thin, but
it is not root-rot, moth, parasite;
I am not felled
like the beard you hacked from your chin
the day you decided to love, to suffer
the rest of your life
with that Irish Catholic girl—
This is merely my first season.
Brush the snow from my shoulders.

Please
comfort me
quietly,
like skin,
cracking:
“My son
my sapling
you’ll grow.”


Walker Staples 15 March 2013
Leah Rae Jul 2012
The Scalding Openness Of An Open Palm. Cradling The Broken Syllabubs Of A First Name, Between Flesh And Bone, Between Thumb And Forefinger, The 'E' And The 'A' Estranged Lovers. The 'L' And The 'H' A Mangled Broken Record Of "I'm Sorry"s. The Letters Falling Apart As If  They Are Afraid, Embarrassed Almost To Be Seen Together. Someone Closes The Fist, And Silences Them.

I Am Sure They Weren't Aware That The Anciently Intimate Lines Of My Mother's Face Had Pulled A Loud Smile Across Her Lips, Traced Fingertip To Wrist Across The Swollen Plains Of Her Stomach And Imagined This Name, Written In Silver, Traced Across My Flesh Like A Second Skin. I Am Sure They Hadn't Known This When They Held My Name In The Palm Of Their Hand, Opened Up To Its Delicate Petals, Something So Easy To Slaughter, Hello My Dear Hero.

It's The Sick Stick Of Death On Your Tongue Before You Even Have The Chance To Speak It, Removing Each Individual Petal, Plucking Them Their Center

One The Absence Of Any Hue In My Skin, Dark Enough To Add An Identity That My Clawed Fingertips Could Hold On To, Although Guilt Has Turned Me Several Shades Of Scarlet Once Before.

Two The Brittle Backwash Of Rocks Against The Bared Molars Of My Back Teeth. How Do You Say It Again? Where Does It Come From? What Human Vessel Carried It, Clinging To His Chest For Me To Wear Like Both A Battle Scar, And A Metal Of Honor? This Unpronounceable Character Building Beauty Laces My Fingers With Regret, So That I May Whisper One Day "I Am So Sorry For Not Knowing Your Name" When I Do Finally Meet Him.

Three The Crucible Of Color Found Behind Closed Eyelids, Like A War Was Happening Inside Myself Before I Even Had The Opportunity To Open My Eyes

Four The Way The Word Poet Seems Too Open To Me, Like A ***** Word In Different Language, Yet To Be Defined, I Want It To Be Mine, But I Know That It Can't Be.

Five My Father Will Tell You That When I Was Little I Talked A Lot. He Says That I Liked To Fix Things. But These Days I Spend My Time Mending Things That Don't Consider Themselves Broken Until After I Am Through With Them.

Six I Cried When They Cut Down The Tree In Our Backyard. Watched It's Bowed Limbs, Hit The Ground, Like Dream Catchers, Felt The Trunk Of Its Spine Splinter, Under The Weight Of A Thousand Gravity's. The Earth Quaked, As If Saying Goodbye To An Old Friend. She Tells Me That I Am Overly, And Excessively Attached To Strange Things.

Seven The Primal Wet Hot Heat Between Bone And Brain At The Base Of My Skull, Whispering That The Sweet Siren Call To Depravity Is Not Too Far Behind. Meant To Bring You To Bowed Knees, Step One Foot Closer. There Is A Ten Story Drop Between Me, And Heaven. And Tonight I Think I Willing To Take It.

Eight I Hold A Hundred Years Of Waged Weaponry Between My Ribs. Built A Body Out Of Bullet Shells And Have Learned That It's About The Honesty, And The Warmth Of Human Connection. Because We Are Solar Systems, And Grains Of Sand, Revolving Around One Another Like The Two Sides Of A Coin, Ready To Be Kissed By A Shoreline, And Pulled Back Out To Sea To Begin Again.

Nine Tonight I Will Be A Classic Work, Like Edgar Allen Poe. So For This One Moment I Will Worthy Of Literary Merit,  Of Scholars, And That Place In The Center Of My Chest Will Be Glowing. Throbbing At All Hours Of The Morning, So This Once I Will Be Enough To Be Quoted, Worthy Enough To Be Remembered.

Ten It's Voice Is So Weak. Tender Almost, It's Name Has Been Carved Into The Meadow Of It's Velvet Valley. I Pull Down The Collar Of My Shirt, To Press The Petal To My Bare Skin. It Speaks Half English, And Half God. It Tells Me That I Am Weeping To Be Made Real. It Says That I Am A Fragile, Starry Eyed, Empty Handed, Soft Spoken Work Of Art. It Whispers That I Have Sunsets In My Skeleton, And That The Molecules Of My Form Had Never Before Existed Before This Moment. The Curve Of My Spine, The Updraft Of My Eyelashes, The ***** Of My Cheek Bone, It Says "Close Your Eyes, Love, You Are Swelling And Swallowing Yourself Whole, You Are Immortal, And You Aren't Going Anywhere."
MereCat Mar 2015
The ice cream van
Has today reached
The melancholic realisation
That the only kids who
Chase clocks for Mr Whippy
And lick the exhaust fumes
In nostalgia
Are the kids who are not kids
But who prematurely aged themselves
With lipstick kisses
And cigarettes
Lowered themselves into nooses
Of sweet-sixteenths
From the age of six

We are a generation of
Peter Pan inversions
We ran ashore
And beached ourselves
Beyond the lure
Of Neverland
We are a generation of
Failed cloud-catchers
Aspiring rainbow-clinchers
Secretly slipping our hands
Back into a dead air
Of former innocence
In the hope we’ll be able to
Retrieve the pieces we left there
We queue and scramble
Like gulls for
Inches we can claw back
Preserving our age in
Wafer cones
And bleeding snows
That glue between our fingers
Each 99 flake
Is a time machine
Which we spin like a music box
And wait for the rewind
Copper coins and sea stains
And we hope we’ll find
Some of the things we lost
But we cannot predict or realign
The atoms or twist ourselves
Back into them
So we sit and watch
The incorruptibility we once possessed
Perished
Sexualised
Corrupted
Pool in the March drizzle
Someone once said
That youth was a process
Of being torn in half
By the past that pulls you back
And the future that tempts you
Being too big and yet too small
Longing but fearing
But an ice cream van tells me
That youth is a process
Of trying not to drown yourself
In what you’ve never had
And when that ice cream van tells me to
MIND THAT CHILD
I can’t help projecting echoes
Of its wisdom
On to all who pass me by
Mind that childhood
Before there’s nothing left to mind
Three separate events today triggered this.
Mainly the 3rd.

1) The unanimous decision that (when we finally get there) we want to celebrate the end of our education with a water fight and a bouncy castle on the school field. Because really we're searching for things we should never have disposed of. We never wanted yearbooks or proms of high heals or hoodies...
2) A discussion about the way we live in a world that is expiring itself in a bid to live fast and young and beautiful and ****...
3) An ice cream van that parked out the back of my school today and the crowd of teenagers that flocked to it...

— The End —