"cereal" poems
ground zero
i become aware of boundaries
i am a dog chasing cars
i sing your voicemail to sleep
there are no surgeon general warnings
to tell me that
*the objects in the mirror
are more depressed than they appear*
so how do i tell you
that there are parts of my life
that move slower
without you in them?
or that i look for you every day
in emails & unanswered calls
in the sunrises
i didn't choose to be awake to watch
that i sometimes still stare at doorways hoping you would walk through them
stage 1 you tell your new lover you've got a splinter and they pull the sound of your body falling asleep on mine out of your fingertip
stage 2 your new lover says something at dinner that makes you choke so they call 911 & the paramedics do the hymleich not knowing you would ***** our promises all over the the restaurant
stage 3 your new lover surprises you by cleaning the house & washes the shirt you kept next to the bed, not knowing it was the last thing you had that smelled like me
after
people always ask
what was loving her like?
after a really long silence
i just say
"it must be nice"
but i never say
it's watching paint dry
i never say
it's a window seat in hell
i don't tell anyone
about the dreams
where i am reading you
bedtime stories
each one is a different way you die
& every time i can never save you
dreams where what i think
are angels in my bedroom
are just homeless versions
of myself you never loved
i have dreams
where i pay someone to shoot me
just to see if you would cry
just to see
if you would cradle my body
i don't tell people
that loving you is like
playing piano
for someone who can't hear
that it's hitting repeat
on my favorite song
& forgetting the words
every time it starts over
that it's finding out
there's no milk after you already
poured yourself a bowl of cereal
it's getting locked in the dark
& being told to
look on the bright side
that loving you is like
being reminded of what it felt like
the first time
you accidentally let go
of a balloon as a child
it's drowning without the water
it's the feeling you get
when you start to dance
& the song ends
Mar 21, 2015
Mar 21, 2015 at 3:30 PM UTC
I am the crushed cereal at the bottom of the box
Your last clean pair of underwear you only wear on laundry day
The popped balloon left in the balloon seller’s hand at
The end of the day when he goes back to his
One bedroom apartment and warms up soup in the microwave
I am the last thing you want to watch on TV
An infomercial or a re-run re-run of a show you don’t like
I am the bit of soda left in the can
That’s mixed with saliva and has no taste
And most times you don’t drink it, so
You just toss away the can with me still inside
I am the wallpaper in a dentist office
That no one buys except to paper dentist offices
I am the crumbs you sweep under the rug
I am that thing on craigslist that would be
Perfect except for that one little thing wrong
I am all those lonely things.
Nov 1, 2010
Nov 1, 2010 at 6:38 PM UTC
At the corner, a girl child from the UK
another soft drink she chugged
Whilst the girl woman in the Sudan,
the heavy *** on head she lugged
She walked eight miles, braving ****
to fetch unclean water from the well
Whilst in the UK, the girl bought designer clothes
to make her feel just swell
God where are the waters of life?
To end their strife
At the mall, the boy child ate his third Hershey bar
In Malawi the boy man’s
stomach had extended too far
Malnutrition had sealed his fate
God where is the cereal?
To make their lives non-ephemeral
Down under, the son celebrated with family,
presents and cake
his father’s 100th milestone
Whilst in war torn Syria, a son, now orphan
buried his young murdered father,
in ground without a gravestone
God when will the fighting cease?
To give them a chance of peace
Is this God’s confusion?
That though we are all made the same,
some people their innocence shattered
are headed for a terrifying fate
whilst others fully satiated and secure,
sip their drinks, polish off and request another plate
Or does God if he exists
not love the weak and oppressed?
Sep 11, 2014
Sep 11, 2014 at 6:25 PM UTC
Don't discriminate
Just don't do it
All it is, is hate
Hate is made out of other hate
and hate only fuels more hatred
You pour gasoline on a blaze of loathing
with every discriminatory comment you make
It doesn't matter
if they have done something you believe is wrong
because you have done many things that are wrong too
it is not for you to judge
so black white brown both or polka dotted for all I care
gay les straight bi or into adhesive sloths (we adhesified furry little sloths need a little love too)
man or woman or sloth
punk emo crazy nerdy weird loser REALLY weird bookworm or literal worm sloth or adhesive sloths (like me)
nature freak or homebody
axe murderer or a cereal killer or a cheerio killer
it does not matter who or what they are
they are all human too. or all sloths. that too.
Just don't discriminate
and share the slothified love of adhesiveness
accept everyone as they are
even if they hang from trees and move in slow motion all day like me
even if they are rocks
because rocks are great
in fact this one time, I found this rock and man, it was absolutely hilarious it should have been a stand up comedian
okay well not a STAND UP comedian, because I mean... rocks can't actually stand up... but like a really hard and Sedimentary roundish stone shaped sit down (well more like lay around like a rock all day) comedian
Wait, what was I talking about?
oh right, don't discriminate!! :)
against other humans or other sloths.
or adhesive sloths.
...I'm not crazy! my mother sloth had me tested!
Nov 12, 2014
Nov 12, 2014 at 12:23 PM UTC
Keys. Shoved through the letterbox
before I got up-
in an envelope with a note:
Could I (please) feed the cat…
Gone away? Good for her!
Car on the drive. Took a taxi. I think.
To the airport? Didn’t say.
******* with rain-
still, had best leave my shoes on the step just the same.
Obsessed with cleanliness and hygiene-
that’s why he left.
Who, in their right mind, puts cream-coloured carpet in a…?
Door. Not locked. Nearly fell through it.
Strange. She forgot?
Kitchen. Freezer’s empty, switched off.
No cereal. No tins.
Utility room. Spotlessly clean-
twelve! two-kilogram bags of Go-Cat Complete.
Planning to be gone quite a while. I think.
Playroom. Packed up. Kids staying with Nan.
She wants to redecorate before they come home?
Great. A fresh start. I think.
Bedroom. Suitcase on the wardrobe.
Bought a new one? Smaller. Lighter perhaps.
Makes sense. After all- she is travelling alone. I think.
Bathroom. Pristine. Almost empty.
Almost. Macleans and a toothbrush,
in a glass on the sill.
I didn’t think about that.
Until now.
Sep 22, 2011
Sep 22, 2011 at 4:17 AM UTC
I remember our first kiss
It was an accident & you
wouldn't stop apologizing
because you had one past
too many to drink
You were broken like a
shattered glass bowl filled
with your favorite kind of
cereal & way too much milk
As it fell to the floor, your
heart dropped just as fast,
immediately realizing that
this couldn't be undone
You'd have to clean up all
of the glass & soggy bits of
sugary flakes from the floor
all by yourself with no help
You cursed to yourself through
clenched teeth & a closed jaw,
tears daring to escape your eyes
like the milk pouring & dripping
over the sides of the broken bowl
You swore off cereal all together
because the agony of possibly
breaking another bowl had
your head & heart in a whirl
of confusion & annoyance
Slowly as you began to pick the
broken pieces of glass from the floor,
piece after piece being thrown away,
this task you found a chore
becomes more of a necessity
that you didn't realize until
the big mess was already created
Wiping up the chunks of sugar
& tossing them in the trash,
a small smile curls at the
corners of your mouth
Pain runs through your veins,
but relief washes over your core
as you realize the worst is over
The kiss that I remember
was not of regret, but beauty
I'm on this sugar high &
I'm not sure I can come down
But you don't want cereal anymore
so I'll eat this bowl alone
May 1, 2015
May 1, 2015 at 11:21 AM UTC
Purple, blue, pink, and green,
Waves of color fill the room.
Crisp cold air, We hide
beneath the walls of blankets.
Words spoken twice,
Spastic moments.
Hilarious pictures pinned to boards,
giggles shatter late night silence.
Tanks with treasure spilling over,
Fish swimming back and forth.
Cereal, and sometimes milk,
Wait to be eaten.
Movie nights, and roommate dinners,
Granola hostages, and hidden peanut butter.
All these things define who we are,
Roommates.
Nov 9, 2012
Nov 9, 2012 at 8:30 PM UTC
"What are you up to?" his simple text said
"Just eating cereal and laying in bed."
"What if I was with you." He responded with ease, "I guess I'd get more cereal if i please" and that's when he said it, that simpering lad, that stupid response that makes us all mad.
My mind filled with dread,with a twist in my gut,
I picked up my phone then read "Haha,then what ;)"
"And then what?!" Shocked by his assumptious pleas,
"Leave me alone, I'm begging you please"
And just when I thought it couldn't get any worse, he muttered those three dreaded words. Yes, I kid you not. That little *****
I opened his message that read "pic 4 pic?"
The I retorted: "No do not send your unsolicited 'pics', I can surely see past your little tricks."
And that's when things took an alarming switch
The boy with the wounded ego replied, "You're just an ungrateful *****
The very next morning, the boy put on his fedora and let out with a sign, "Why does no one like me? I am such a nice guy"
Aug 21, 2015
Aug 21, 2015 at 12:09 PM UTC
I hold the feather’s weight of your artery in my pick-ups,
and tiptoe the tightrope about which life and death abuts.
You’re a 2 AM trauma and we still don’t know your name,
the social worker’s thin lips had mouthed: “estranged.”
I read your anatomy like a text as you flat-line:
your hands turn blue as your heart falls still in mine.
The monitor hums "out of time," but by Epinephrine,
and Grace, your chest resumes its rise.
I leave trauma bay in prayer: for the surviving, not the knife;
for the closeness of my hands in your chest, our joining in this life.
Tonight I see you at the Kroger, buying TV dinners and beer.
I hide behind cereal, admiring the life I’d held dear.
But you look so tired, and my heart breaks for how when you died,
I would’ve sold the shoes off my feet to buy you more time.
I wish you knew how precious was each of your heartbeats,
I wish you the wisdom of my view:
How fragile the stent is where your veins meet.
Apr 5, 2018
Apr 5, 2018 at 7:32 PM UTC
Once it was garbage, refuse, trash.
A jumble of foul-smelling detritus hauled to the curb
And removed by sinewy men
Contributing a harder day's work
Than anyone else in the city.
Our energy now removes its entropy.
Sorted and classified into coloured bins,
We add order to our rejected matter.
Specialized trucks arrive to collect
The date-synchronized bins
Emptying them into functionally compatible mechanisms.
Most desolate is the black box of paper and cardboard.
Brochures and flyers, old magazines and letters.
Annual reports and cereal boxes.
Once these were enameled with crafted sentences,
Painstakingly typed, edited and debated,
On the monitors of copywriters.
Now they are just millions of words printed on flattened fibre substrates,
Jumbled into the bruised and scarred black box,
Entering into the recycling stream.
The nouns and adjectives,
Prepositions and gerunds,
All jumble together.
Fragments of precisely-crafted sentences and paragraphs
Are gradually broken, shredded and pulped.
Incomplete thoughts, broken phrases
Like those of a rejected stranger
In an lonely, unknown country.
Then words without context.
Then just disparate letters
Are all that remain.
Their M ea N inG
G r a Du all y
is re mov
e d
.
Aug 2, 2013
Aug 2, 2013 at 10:26 AM UTC
what is this mind that was given to me that is able to see things i print on screen with my digital zip drive of a brain that is stuck inside a laptop main frame, ******* server uploading and crashing sending pings and things to hackers who perform doss attacks and web cracks and serial cracks while eating cereal going over javascript material program landslide juno got bit by emails and other technical software jargin computer guy got the blue screen of death corruption on the web the spider metacrawling and setting it on angelfire i google the facebook twitter and hot wire my car on the trader the wall street journal and the white house, **** sites and white owls, getting arrested and being hired by the government, the money's spent, criminal punishment, in cells locked up no breakfast but lunch under the crack of a door inside ur naked *** on irc chat, the warez rat, pirates on bays and whispers from kittens, brown paper packages exploding a smidgeon, binary, metamorphosis, code program gold, warning anti virus and spywares, baghdad to china, spy on private, eyes on cameras, cell phones like trackers, global position mappers, predator drones, video games, nfl madden, mad men, and happy wal marts, hacking wal mart, with social engineers, traveling the silk road with a cloak ip address revoked
May 26, 2013
May 26, 2013 at 4:15 AM UTC
_1981_
They came in like diseased eagles; mutated
forms of those they wore on their chest and
with the change once again in the weather,
the ZOMO swooped in to quell what was
‘wrong’, what would bring them down. They
run in the streets as well as the miners,
running for different reasons and different
aims. I look down, out my window and see
the army helmets littering the street like rats.
Police. Rats.
I could no longer see a difference. My father
went to work that morning. I clutch my doll
knowing the chance of seeing him again is
Miniscule. Poor.
There is no more cereal in the cupboard;
there is no more cereal in the shop; there is
no more shop. The ZOMO set it on fire when the word
Solidarity
appeared in the window.
“We are closing the border for the safety of the People”
Incorrect. Unjustified.
For the safety of You, the Elite.
“Nine killed in mine shooting”
Which side?
Only the ZOMO carry guns.
Fascism. Communism.
I could no longer see a difference
Apr 9, 2017
Apr 9, 2017 at 9:40 AM UTC
I am a ******* broken radio that my grandpa wouldn’t even bother fixing
I got a thousand channels, and all of them overlapped in every second
You came to me and said you wanted to enjoy the 90s
I knew what I had and believed this time I was gonna make it right
“Sir, this is location 328…”
“Love is wonderful…”
“Oh, Jonny! You can go **** your own ****
All the channels got mixed up. Like the cereal that I had this morning
Uhm, It was more like the **** cake you slapped in my face on my birthday last year
I wished you would stop tapping me with your beautiful finger
At the same time, I loved the new crystal nails you just did yesterday. Your soft skin against mine and nails stuck on my back, left me marks and joy
Stop leaving me
Don’t give up on one tap or two
My frustrations attacked the balance of the stupid sound system
I was either too loud or too quiet
You finally left the room
I was still on the table
intermittently playing the 90s
Trying to find the perfect volume
Mar 1, 2017
Mar 1, 2017 at 6:05 AM UTC
For our Echoing Little Red Riding Hoods
Lagging behind in the Opposition Departments
Lets help you out by offering some buzzwords
For your important assignments even though they've
been floated around forever,
But we understand you need some help catching up
So memorize these basic premises
And please enrich your lives and utilise your valuable time
by raking your little brains to create poems with them
Lets begin with ITALIAN , don't forget RAINBOW, LIES
is also in, add RESPECT, throw in RUDENESS, factor in
LITTLE GIRL, remember ANGEL, write about TRUST, that
much overuse term, throw in BLACK - that's quite a
popular one. Also PINK is quite up the scale, as well as HEART-
Broken ( as if ) and pleeeezee make a big fuss on LONELINESS
That's a big seller. APPLE and SERPENT did appear now and
again so trigger them as you like.
How about BETRAYAL, LOYALTY, FAKE FRIENDS and that
famous one, FOUR or is it THREE, what about BONES,
Lets not forget SKELETON or even ANOREXIC, let also
remember SCREAM, that was a scream..hahah see what
I did there! Remember GREY that has a bit of colour and
what about BUCK or even DOOR-MAT that was a wipe-off
or SUBMISSIVE another popular one.
Hmmm...what about HAIR CUT or TOMBOY or DIGITAL
those are quite good or WOODGREEN or HULL or DOG
that reared its head...woof....woof...hahahah or CEREAL,
beats me what that's about or even MONEY..though that
never was an issue, how about GOLD-DIGGER just for
drama or 50/50 which has been mentioned. Hey! don't forget
RED, what to do without that pinking away.
So please Little Hoods, students of the Opposition Department
keep with the programme and work on these pointers
crack your little brains and write poems like crazy little ants
Your contribution is valuable cause persistent is the Key.
Keep up with your assignment and forget all other things
Oppose, oppose, oppose, work those little brains!
Sep 25, 2018
Sep 25, 2018 at 4:30 PM UTC
complexity bias
how you love to criticize my poems
as too long and overly complex
poor me, I’m no genius, don’t prosper by exploiting
unrecognized simplicities, rather deconstruct the
intricate complexities that I flatter myself are the me-sinews
Writing is a **** temptation -
we focus on the 10% that is complex and ignore the easy 90%
perhaps this once I will surrender my bare bones
put aside the rich, satisfying of cave diving, urban spelunking
word caressing tongue verbiage rich tapestry exploring -
give you the plane of plain where nestles my destiny: nesting near motionless where the couch is my kingdom and cold cereal is
easily digested and there are no consequences
I am a member of a discriminated-against minority
we have no charismatic leader, no marchers anywhere, and government programs say
hey you’re free white and twenty one plus, get the crap out of
our faces, you useless piece of rhymes with **** and includes dirt, though I shower twice a day to keep myself occupied
25 years old, a high school dropout, of course I’m white,
my occupation is playing video games and making sure
my supply of opioids is adequate in these great United States
where I was born
there are fewer jobs than none that my application survives
a first glance discardation, and now my disability preempts
any demand to pretend there is gainful employment in store in
my future
this reductio ad absurdum is a technique to expose the fallacy,
ah what’s that you say no interest in hanging about,
on your way out, of course, of course,
we are the wrong flavor of downtrodden
my life is simple - simplistic in its a chaotic entropic way,
order slowly declines into disorder
my rituals are a fight against slip sliding down, falling off the
the Herzog continuums
and the poems are desperate hand holds to prevent my
going, gone under
so forgive me if I tax you without possessing not the
requisite taxing authority
you hone in on the obvious disparities and my contradictions
resenting my sending you this bill of extravagant length
compose with me and a mean will be located and to sleep I go,
perhaps to undress my dreams and explicate the wealthy multiples of complexity in the simplicity of a junkies life
Feb 4, 2018
Feb 4, 2018 at 3:56 PM UTC
They hate the shadow of the bird
over the high water of the white cheek
and the conflict of light and wind
in the salon of the cold snow.
They hate the bodiless arrow,
the precise handkerchief's farewell,
the needle that keeps the pressure and the rose
in the cereal blush of the smile.
They love the blue desert,
the swaying bovine expressions,
the lying moon of the poles,
the water's curved dance at the shore.
With the science of tree trunk and street market
they fill the clay with luminous nerves
and lewdly skate on waters and sands
tasting the bitter freshness of their millennial spit.
It's through the crackling blue,
blue without worm or a sleeping footprint,
where the ostrich eggs remain eternal
and the dancing rains wander untouched.
It's through the blue without history,
blue of a night without fear of day,
blue where the **** of the wind goes splitting
the sleepwalking camels of the empty clouds.
It's there where the torsos dream under the gluttony of grass.
There the corals soak the ink's despair,
the sleepers erase their profiles under the skein of snails
and the space of the dance remains over the final ashes.
7.5k
I am a cereal killer
Devouring Life is a thriller
Snap, crackle, and pop
I make the flakes drop
Stalking salubrious crunch
Murdered for breakfast and lunch
My appetite for Trix is voracious
For my Lucky Charms, I am gracious
Mud & Bugs haunt my soul
Desecrating Grape-Nuts whole
Yea, I'm Nut n' Honey and Cocoa Hoots
Krispy Kritter Krave Fruit Loops
I'm a cereal killer
Yet a community pillar
Can't comprehend why it's a crime
Unrepentant, I'll massacre cereal every time
Mar 25, 2013
Mar 25, 2013 at 10:01 PM UTC
Tea
When we were first married
I used to count.
The lovely things you did
Just because you loved me.
One
A cup of my favourite tea when I wake up
Two
Kiss on my nose
Three
Morning laughter
Four
You make me breakfast
Five
I Love You
And then life knocks all that out of our routine.
One
You go to the bathroom
Two
Xbox
Three
Cereal for you
Four
Leave for work
Five
I Still Love You
I miss the beginning.
I miss Tea in the morning
May 7, 2014
May 7, 2014 at 2:17 PM UTC
in june I felt the project change
from trying charting all scenarios of your face
to looking to books to blacking out spontaneous lines in found papers
to clearly eventually
be a misneglected omen of your impending collapse.
"I would like to blame this on the weather,"
I said to the sky,
"I would like to stay."
I felt the camera flash stop taking
strobe light moments of our strobe light moments
instead slipped tape recorder in your cereal box
videotaped the tooth brush
ever scraping dead skin while you slept.
I said, "If you wake up I will know nothing."
if you call this a dream, I will shake
and shake.
I said "it is clear now that you are decomposing."
(there's only so much the heart can take.)
stopped thoughts about the bus would hit you
spent time watching the sun through your palm:
little bones will scatter light.
little scars on thumbs.
we are made up only of who puts us back together.
and I could smell the rain.
I said, "It is easier if you stay angry"
I said to the sky.
"I would like to stay."
I put the Starbucks mug on the radiator
ceased to chart your worried looks.
I knew your brow, heavy clouds as you'd undress
but made a scrapbook of frozen dinner clippings
drew a line through where you went that day.
I said, "I want to prove that you meant nothing"
I said to the sky.
"I would like to stay."
I said to the sky.
and then the rain.
Nov 3, 2012
Nov 3, 2012 at 4:44 PM UTC
do you want to know how does having feelings for you feel like? well baby, having feelings for you is like playing the piano for someone who can’t hear. having feelings for you is like that moment where you start to dance and the song ends. having feelings for you is like hitting repeat on my favorite song and forgetting the words every time it starts over. having feelings for you is like playing roulette with all the barrels loaded. having feelings for you is like having amnesia, waking up every day unable to remember why there’s a hole in my chest. having feelings for you was like finding out there’s no milk after i had already poured a bowl of cereal. having feelings for you is like drowning without the water. having feelings for you is like being locked in the dark while getting told to “look on the bright side”. having feelings for you is like knowing what a funeral feels like without ever going to one. having feelings for you was like being reminded of the first time i ever accidentally let go of a ballon as a child. having feelings for you is like unconsciously reaching to put my arm around a dead lover in my bed while asleep. having feelings for you was like spending years next to a hospital bed where you were in a coma you chose to stay asleep in.
Oct 18, 2014
Oct 18, 2014 at 3:36 PM UTC
Banana splits lickedy his spican-and-span throbbing
peninsula clock jar.
The scar from his far faux **** ignited his beating
hexagonal calendar.
Which is used to peruse the jujubees metallic books in the public
libation crazy train station.
His ecstatic adulation exemplifies why diamonds are
a girl gorilla's favorite soap.
His floating cubed boat is on a remote desert
impala growling at the turquoise toilet.
But his spoiled toys are annoyed about the choice between life or
demonstrative sponsored concerts by budweiser.
Woeful razor beaked birds marvel at absurd his Salvador
Daoist Dharma surreal cereal caramel karma flakes.
Mar 28, 2015
Mar 28, 2015 at 4:02 PM UTC
Remember days bagging up some minerals.
Trying to find the toys in our cereal.
Now me and Don hiding from the ops like we federal;
Getting kinda hungry, not for food but for miracles.
I’m just thinking bout the old times.
This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine.
With TDS, for success, keep that in my mind.
And summer eighteen, promise it’ll be mine.
Feb 21, 2018
Feb 21, 2018 at 3:51 PM UTC
You can fall in love
with the way
someone pours milk
into their cereal,
listening to the things they speak about
when they sleep talk
at three in the morning,
and by watching them untangle
earphones, which somehow
seems to be their biggest challenge
of the day.
You can fall in love
examining the face they make
when they try to hold back laughter,
if they put their head or their arms
through a sweater first,
and the way they shiver
when it is 23 degrees outside
and they are only wearing
a leather jacket
while drowning in a
thick red scarf.
You can fall in love.
You can fall in love.
You can fall in love.
And you will fall in love
with all of that.
Apr 2, 2014
Apr 2, 2014 at 7:32 PM UTC
we play with a retired professional but
none of the other kids mind—
his alcoholism has gotten the better of his muscle
memory and god doesn’t he look bad
the ball is an old piece of garbage made from
a kind of industry plastic
half-flayed alive by loving kicks
that expose the moldy gray rubber inner-
sphere like some soft eyeball
and, behind one of the goals, the
boy who plays goalkeeper only on Wednesdays
lounges like a pimply Greek sculpture—
unable to move as an epileptic fit lazily
puppeteers his body while the players pass the ball into his gut
and I step aside, too—
my stomach aches so badly for the crispy joy
of cold cereal I can’t play—
some days are like that—shed of their seriousness
because it’s more fun to play without a defense
even though we’re always losing **** it I just scored
a goal!
Nov 29, 2010
Nov 29, 2010 at 5:14 AM UTC