"charcoal" poems
A lump of coal
Tossed into the fire
Before it even stood a chance
Of becoming a diamond
And all it needed was time
Feb 5, 2015
Feb 5, 2015 at 9:54 PM UTC
she had flaked away her memories
and stepped up
with a ponderous heart,
held by two gentle hands;
and saying goodbye, did she,
as she slipped off her skin,
for the moment blood stains
the kumari's tender soul,
bereaved, will she become,
for a goddess never bleeds.
her feet shall never touch
the tattered, naked ground,
for it engulfs and devours
and burns off the kumari's flesh.
holding her pure spirit, and
accepting a cruel death sentence,
her quivering soul
cupped but a glimmer of hope,
as the fire would flicker
and lash and whip
as her skin flakes again,
and the kumari vanishes.
but, if she remains unscathed,
blood shall be drawn,
and the gods will tremble and
her body will collapse.
the world will consume her
once again.
a kumari's blood,
drawn, now at death,
trembling and alone,
had she sobbed tears of joy,
for no longer the weight
must she bear in her heart,
of being a kumari;
but a kumari is she,
and the world has not chose her,
but she has chosen to be.
she had withered away,
heart no longer ponderous,
she stepped up.
and her wishes from within
passed on to the fearful others,
held by two gentle hands, and
with a gentle flutter of her eyes,
next to her charcoal stained skin,
had her heart stopped;
for her bejeweled crown had been stained with blood,
and the kumari realized that
she had died long ago.
May 18, 2018
May 18, 2018 at 6:41 PM UTC
breathing the turquoise like lavender,
and sipping the blue summer.
bitter cold clouds glide and morph lava lather,
floating whispers cut by sweet pineapple sunshine.
soon, a moment, now
rhythms ripple the sky like skipping stones
we jump the music like puddles
splashing in the frequencies.
cobalt bass rumbles the earth hungry,
pumps the air with springing spirals
pushing and pulling the senses,
reverberating through cells.
heavy mud humming, stomping
echoes through our atoms dizzy;
balancing tuned body to innate electricity
the fizz of circulating lemonade energy.
we jump the music like puddles
splashing in the frequencies.
strawberry melodies spilling ribbons,
dolphin leaps of the spaces inbetween beats,
lines of colours overlapping,
colliding, mixing, merging, blending
in with the forest.
washing over souls the life fire sparkles
like a clear water cleansing harmonies,
sound waves crashing against inertia.
phosphorescent glow of re-charged love
for the world, for being, animation
flowing through burnt smoky ashes
of sapphire charcoal skies;
dimmed radiation of chlorophyll emerald days.
the smell of salt, dry bark, fluffy carbon mists,
trembling lights softening the eyes'
grip on outlines, loosening lies.
watching the cycles of patterns
tumbling colours through a mill rotating,
and the silence of listening
when the music comes to an end.
May 4, 2018
May 4, 2018 at 8:19 PM UTC
Heat beats down upon the street
Birds too hot to fly,
Blistered sand you cannot stand
Drenched with sweat am I.
Cows collect in shadow deep
Panting sheep hang head,
Goshawk flies in cobalt skies
Hills of grass stand dead.
Whisp of smoke, a puff of breeze
Sirens scream in air,
Running men in squads of ten
Emerge from everywhere.
Now the rising wind takes charge
Runs with leaping flame
Into crown of eucalypts
To rage across the plain.
Too late the tenders hoses pour,
Too late the fireman’s shout
Inferno hot has run amok
And all control a rout.
Generating mighty winds
The fire charges forth
Spiralling in furnace air
To incinerate for sport.
Vanquished men exhausted stand
Watch with useless eyes,
As raging flames consume their truck,
Inside a good mate dies.
A live thing in the burnished night
It writhes and spirals high
Across the flaring treetops
Hot, red smoke fills the sky.
As sudden as it starts, it stops
A wind change in the air.
Ravaged forest stark and black
Hot ashes everywhere.
Hills of cinders smoking now
Stock in death’s repair,
Homesteads rendered charcoal like
Farmers in despair.
A silence in the ravaged hills
Birdless in the sky,
Bushfire horror, death and smoke
Enough to make you cry.
Marshalg
In support of my Australian brethren and their torched nation.
30 January 2013
Jan 29, 2013
Jan 29, 2013 at 8:16 PM UTC
Bedrooms are intimate. Showing someone exactly where you breathe is special. To see it, they have to worship every breath that goes in and out, even if your exhale is poison.
*The walls still smell like you
Last week, I pulled the sheets off the bed. I placed them in the burn pile.*
I do not wish to see you.
*This week, I painted everything a new color, a darker shade.
I pulled down the Christmas lights and let my stars burn out. I placed them in the burn pile.*
I do not wish to see you.
I ripped stuffed animals off the shelves and letters off the dresser. Even the photo album went in the burn pile.
I do not wish to see you.
The flowers off the desk... They were dead anyway.
I do not wish to see you.
Everything in a bedroom is sacred. Not everyone belongs there; you sure didn't. You kissed everything with fiery lips and charcoal dust and I am still sweeping up. I continue to find your ashes in my bed.
I do not wish to see you.
You took everything. You took my air and gave me back poison. I couldn't tell the difference. But the worst thing you took from my room is me.
I do not wish to see you.
I do not wish to see you.
*I put you in the burn pile. I see you in the flames. I see you everywhere.
I start to tear at the drywall.*
Jul 21, 2014
Jul 21, 2014 at 9:01 PM UTC
Saturated in steely blue clutches, sweating from the 75 degree Georgia night
strung up and washed out with a serpent woman that keeps bringing on the blight
Singing you a song of bliss and blinders.
A big brick red boot on your neck and a green collar that reads The Gardens *****
The Garden takes the taxes tightens up the lead and never relaxes
Hit ya where ya like, the pain is disguised, leather tastes like candy, The Gardens got ya hypnotized.
Your late night camping sight attracts the moon light parasite, that acolyte of appetite, Tonight your the Gardens Delight
You wanna run but she's got those hooks between your shoulder blades feeling like an inexorable **** of silk, smoke and skin.
She gives you every thing you need,
Fountain heads of intemperance and black out nights
Whole streets smelling like grease and charcoal charbroils
Men and women of dexterous lechery, feverous severance, and generous deference
Crystals for your cranium, high altitude dives and the lowest lows.
A cacophony of any entertainment you might want or need, just as long as its seedy.
The Garden keeps blinders on your head to make sure you can't see anything she doesn't want you to.
Try to remove em and the punishment is usually severe.
She might give you the greatest loves you've ever known and turn em to photographs, blot em with LSD and trip you out on memories.
And when you come back to what you think reality is she'll take those photographs and burn em up right in your face and leave you asking if any of it really happened while feeling like it was the realest thing that ever has.
She'll break you and build you up, build you up and break you worse. A cycle of bad things feeling real good.
The Garden will do everything in her power to keep you right here.
But if you can get all those straps and tight leather off, all those hooks and chains.. If you can escape her steely blue clutches,,
You'll finally see how wrong you've been done, and your still gonna want her back in some strange way..
but you might start to heal....
But know this.
No matter where you might run off to,
You'll still be hearing The Garden City call.
That siren song of bliss and blinders.
Mar 23, 2017
Mar 23, 2017 at 4:27 AM UTC
puffs so alluring
three dimensional
but you're not
i want to touch your creamy exterior
but all i get is moisture
your shading is ravishing
symmetrical paint thing
wisps of stratus horse tail ice
dusty cumulus marsh of mallow
your nimbus is what i dream
charcoal colored opaque
mixed in with a little blue
you make it hard
not to stare
at you
so eager as light shines off
your behind
you'll soon be mine.
overcast clear
Jun 20, 2015
Jun 20, 2015 at 4:02 AM UTC
my skeleton never liked me
very much. it cracks in unusual
places, ribcage poking out of its
skin prison, the frailty of it
breaking beneath the musical
whispers of the wind through hollow
spaces. i see
light bursting beneath the flash
of a camera and my skin
incinerates - do not look do not touch
do not look - and the charcoal in
my lungs is set on fire. i wake up
with ash beneath my tongue
far too often. my skin
despises me now that i have
bruises in places no one could
kiss better. there's this scar above
my right knee, which dislocates when
my life falls out of its socket, and it
reopens and blood pours from the
renewed wound too often. i think
i have a body that likes to believe it is dying.
Oct 8, 2014
Oct 8, 2014 at 9:30 PM UTC
I saw a space empty at the top of the elevator.
I will get everything that I deserve,
no power can stop that from happening.
This whole life will end in the blink of an eye
will come to an end in the snap of a moment
Why be troubled. Just wake up!
You are already surrendered
Finished! Do not question that even once.
Do not demand. This is the law of Nature.
When a river flows, quickly or slowly
dry leaves, twigs and branches falls into it.
We get caught up in things.
Diamond and charcoal are so similar.
Our skin is like a mosquito net.
Was this a pleasant dream or a nightmare.
If you have a dream cake,
you need a dream knife to cut it.
Best to eat it all before you go.
Dine on a dream.
Jun 14, 2014
Jun 14, 2014 at 10:07 PM UTC
The sea was once our prehistoric home.
O how we adapted to its dark currents,
to its India-ink infinities,
chasing seaweed, driftwood and coral,
before belly-flopping onto dry ground.
Now, the sea threatens our ancestral home,
the sea that falls from the angry skies
with their charcoal-smudged infinities.
A swelling flood, chasing red alert,
destroying houses and lives; raining grief.
Once sea-bound creatures now drown at home,
ill-adapted to meet the flood's malevolent intent:
to purge the Earth of all who cannot resist
the rushing, rising mountains of waters,
before proclaiming its final conquest of India's ancient lands.
Now, only prayer will be our home, built on deepest despair.
Now, only God's omnipotent infinities
circle the mud-brown rapids of sludge
choking all who helplessly cross their path.
Only God can make Kerala and Tamil live again, as one, on dry, holy ground.
Aug 29, 2018
Aug 29, 2018 at 11:41 PM UTC
The beauty of comatose can only be seen through
the eyes of a wizard in a blizzard
strutting in garlic slippers,
or Christ with knees bent at the tabernacle
peeling bananas and kicking prayers
farther than eternity with each gapping second,
or like Basquiat slumped back to the wall,
with ounces of speedball dancing through his veins,
eating 80’s free-based fried chicken *******
as his eyelids paints beautiful nightmares of lemon flowers
and Bacchus bacon over a glycopyrrolate desert
of flagrant cuckold buffoonery.
Or like leprechauns burning chocolate ******* candles
on the mantle of Zion, sipping oatmeal sprinkled
with Staten Island malt liquor bacon.
or like Tupac reading the thoughts of Mother Shipton
through the daze of California cannabis
and hearing the ominous voice of Plutarch sing death assignments
from heaven to Assassins on horsebacks goggling ***** water
to wet the dry bones of their throats as they prepare to fulfill
the gospel of self-fulfilling prophecies of being fell by ***** bullets.
Or like sophisticated wallets of spice and kitchen characters in a bald head
cooking chemical kisses and 18 February nights under Moloch’s skin,
where constitutions are written in charcoal diaries with Egyptian ciphers and razors.
“I had rain sowed into the pockets of my sneakers and composed 1310 eulogies
at the basement of king David’s tower,” said the Kraftwerkian caricature,
as he dangles cigarettes in remembrance of Klaus Nomi and philosophizes on the proliferation
of poetic vandalism at urinals where modernism failed under the phosphorescence of coloration at the avenue of no trees where Picasso's "Guernica" **** Lies All.
Jul 17, 2012
Jul 17, 2012 at 6:01 PM UTC
charcoal
oxblood
poppy
pomegranate
maroon
cranberry
cherry
creamsicle
orange soda
saffron
lemon
egg yolk
buttermilk
sunflower
olive
forest
lime
mint
ice
blueberry
royal blue
navy
bubblegum
fuschia
salmon
grape
lavender
wine
chocolate
espresso
Mar 2, 2015
Mar 2, 2015 at 2:07 AM UTC
I think Poetry found me very early,
From somewhere in mama's womb.
Hooked to her umbilical cord firmly.
I heard something like a tiny bomb.
It was the sound of the talking drum,
Heralding the arrival of another grio.
So with gratitude, I said thanks mom,
And to the world, I said a very big hello.
Of course, I used the language of babies,
I cried and breathed in my very first air.
This was my first sight of the ladies
They smiled as they washed my hair.
My very first poem was a sad prayer.
It was written when I was very hungry
I was hopeless, I had only one dollar,
And no real prospect of ever making it.
So I took out my old used notepad,
UnfortunateIy, I had no pen to write with.
I wrote with a charcoal found in the yard,
And I wrote many long lines on my wall.
I wrote everything I had to tell God
Sadly, I couldn't write them all.
I cried in anguish to the Lord,
Asking If He had forgotten me.
Of Course, I got no immediate answer,
But years later my answer came.
It came in the form of a letter.
Addressed to me, ten years later
It came later but it felt better,
Instantly my struggle was all over!
The first love letter I wrote was poetry,
It was childish, unstructured and ugly.
It was written to a girl, she was pretty,
She read it and smiled, I wasn't so lucky.
Crushed, yet I pretended to be strong
I walked away but ran all the way home.
I cried in anguish and wrote a love song.
The lines were very sad, I felt all alone.
But I knew it was my first real rejection.
So I tried writing again, this time to me.
I was very focused, I was on a mission.
Finally, it finished and I wrote my name.
Unfortunately, the answer was the same,
There and then I knew I had no game,
So I reconciled and just took the blame.
Fast forward,and many years later,
I found the subject of my love letter.
I wrote a note to her on messenger.
I was optimistic because I wrote better.
I was emboldened by my poetic power.
Once again,the reply came to me later,
This time it was a resounding yes!
It felt so wonderful, thanks to poetry
And the universe I didn't make a mess.
#IvanBrooksPoetry©
7/22/2018
Jul 21, 2018
Jul 21, 2018 at 9:11 PM UTC
*So young and trite is the day
Born from this new light
Creatures of the dark and mist curl and wither
Only to return by midlight
The rose afar rises and stretches
Bloodshed velvet bleeds its regal glow
Smooth tips and enticing fragrance
Dark greens, stiff and sharp as spines
Beads of water glisten and shimmer
A blood’s true jewel
Thy shadows came in thy’s slithery way
Enveloping Devil’s Beauty
Charcoal webs and silver-black imprints
Spiral and intertwine, death and blood a dangerous omen
Thy Beauty’s velvet lips decay
A cancer slow moving and fast changing
Taking over thy body in one gulp
Last, final tips of red appear before swallow
Accenting and tracing its last magnificent life
Midlight turns to midnight
Bloodlines disappear
As the wind wails through the dead
A song, chilling, unnerving to us all*
Nov 10, 2012
Nov 10, 2012 at 11:42 AM UTC
I lay spread out on
My local shingle beach
Letting the pebbles
Sift through my fingers
I consider the myriad
Shapes and forms they take.
The varying rust
Charcoal grey and mustard shades
I set myself a mission
In the multitudes
That the sea brings to my feet
I will find amongst the
Copious cobbles
The ultimate pebble
Perfect and pleasingly
Quirky or smooth.
I become so absorbed by
This sifting sorting
Comforting process
A simple quest
I forget myself
And my proximity to the waves
Until i am splashed
And soaked and
Have to vow to take up
This valiant quest
Another day.
Until then I have taken
Home a few shortlisted
Candidates
And made a promise to stand up when
The winner is found
And make a little trumpet
Fanfare sound
And hold the stone aloft!
Aug 9, 2014
Aug 9, 2014 at 6:54 PM UTC
Look into my eyes and you shall see
The innocence and solitude in me
I am all alone in this massive ball
No one to pick me when I fall
Touch my body and feel
The absence of countless meals
I have dug into several bins
To find a morsel from trashed tins
I have slept on cold hard grounds
A better place, still not found
I was soaked by the pouring rains
And disturbed by noisy trains
I have played with broken dolls
Drawn with charcoal on overfilled walls
I have prayed to all the gods I know
Their love makes my soul glow
I am a child too
Don’t deprive me of you
Cuddle me in your arms
A little crave for love means no harm
I know I am an orphan
And might not even get buried in a coffin
But don’t shoo me away so recklessly
Where is your humanity?
Don’t throw that money and walk away
Please hear me out or for a while just stay
If you know of an orphanage, take me there
I no longer want to live in despair.
-Zainab Attari
May 7, 2014
May 7, 2014 at 3:55 AM UTC
"Murica" "Murica" "Murica"
chants of patriotism ethnocentrism
nationalist sentiments lacquered in blue red white
spangled with stars and candy striped
"enemies both foreign and domestic"
the roar of jet engines accompanied by
crackling sparklers
summer sunlight
glamorous fireworks
red meat burning over charcoal because
the chef is being kissed
"life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"
the roar of jet engines accompanied by
dying children
systematized ****
internment camps
the division along the 38th parallel because
the evil's communism not McCarthyism no never
"my government has a firm policy not to capitulate"
not to terrorists
not to the UN
not to common sense
not to popular opinion
not to love in all it's forms
but
to corruption
to the oil lobby
to racism
to ***
to the Almighty
dollar
"we have reason to believe Iraq has weapons of mass destruction."
No.
No, you don't.
Lying ********
You *******
You ruined everything.
*****
Sep 28, 2013
Sep 28, 2013 at 11:57 AM UTC
there lives a little white boy across the street,
i swear the chaps' got wings on his feet.
but he grovels around in charcoal and mud,
cos they say he hasn't got athletics in his blood.
he breaks British records, doesnt seem to stop,
but the Jamaican colours flutter from his rooftop.
Olympics the dream,but more than that,
little master Owens just wants to be Black.
there lives a little black girl just next door,
i can hear her tap dance on the linoleum floor.
she sings the opera from dusk to dawn,
she prances and twirls on the family's front lawn.
"your dancings' awkward, your voice baritone,"
it's not in your blood, leave the dreams alone.
she smears fairness creams day and night,
little miss Britney just wants to be White.
Aug 24, 2018
Aug 24, 2018 at 11:37 AM UTC
the sun will
kiss the earth
each day
and soon
these dashing lines
of youth
hard charcoal, pen and ink
dancing, arousing
the parchment
shall also fade
portraits ought to
be lived
not
preserved
Jan 29, 2016
Jan 29, 2016 at 7:32 PM UTC
Dust on my
Charcoal
Canvas.
Just brush it off
A night of peace
A galaxy of blown stars.
An attempt at an imperfect perfection.
But I wipe it away, anyway.
My constellation is too dangerous
for Anyone Else.
So I **** my night heaven with light pollution,
And diminish my stars.
And I'm just a canvas
A Blank,
Empty,
Canvas.
Now, look what we've done.
Sep 13, 2016
Sep 13, 2016 at 9:56 AM UTC
~~~{♡}~~~
art in writing
art in ink
swirls and curls
to make you think
art in ideogram
which can't be bought
illuminated pages
full of thought
art as cypher
art as change
art as charcoal
chalk arranged
on board as black
as darkest oil
ink is art
our feignt
our foil
soulsurvivor
(C) 7/1/2015
Jul 2, 2015
Jul 2, 2015 at 2:45 AM UTC
His eyes were an abyss
That I couldn't help
But fall into them
The soft charcoal black
Rimmed by even darker lashes
A flirty smirk
A careful poke on the nose
Each smile from him
Pulling me in
Further
o.g.
Sep 20, 2014
Sep 20, 2014 at 9:16 PM UTC
Night witches own the dark, as they sweep the skies on their knotted broomsticks. They take to flight, in pairs, under waxing or new moons, when the sky is darkest, the stars at their dimmest and gloom the deepest. They steal souls, drink warm blood, gather teeth and fresh, human meat.
They drift, smoke-like, with noir-intent, chewing their charcoal treats in that imperfect silence that prickles with all the sounds of the earth: growing plants, creeping insects, rustling leaves, and shivering birds.
Although their stygian laughter is frequently mistaken for cat fighting, they are soundless, becoming the shadows that disturb, that draw startled glances from the periphery of vision.
In their dark-passing, a mother will check her sleeping children one more time - dogs will whimper and fathers, the hair on their neck standing, will check already-locked windows.
Are you meandering out this night - to walk the dog or check the mail? If so, look to the sky. A little decision can be the worst mistake of your life.
Feb 15, 2022
Feb 15, 2022 at 9:31 AM UTC
Lisbeth stands watching
The artist as he prepares
To sketch. Her elder sisters
Stand in shadows whispering.
Her younger sister plays
With her doll on the floor.
Their father said to do as
The artist instructed and
Don’t misbehave or be rude.
The artist stares hard his
Dark eyes searching their
Every move and expression
And body gesture. The elder
Girls mutter in shadows
Their hands over their mouths
Their blue eyes like shallow
Pools. Ready? The artist
Asks putting charcoal to
Paper his fingers blackening.
Lisbeth says just as we are?
The artist nods. His grim
Features express do not disturb.
The youngest sister plays
Ignoring the artist her eyes set
On the game at hand. The girls
In shadow turn their profiles
Set to mystery their hands on
Their abdomens like guardians
Of virtue. Lisbeth wonders as
She watches the artist’s stiff
Moustache and beard the slow
Movement of his mouth as he
Mouths words and stares hard.
The last artist employed some
Year before younger and less
Brutal in expression and manner
Had drawn them each in private
Rooms and set them down on couch
Or bed and kept their images inside
His head. He was dismissed and the
Drawings destroyed and nothing said.
Lisbeth had thought it just a game
Something done as lover might in
Private corners or lonely spots on
Quiet nights. The artist sketches.
His blackened fingers move and
Made their mark. Their images
Captured. The scene set. One sister
In the shadows yawns the other
Stares in still contempt. Lisbeth
Poses as young girls do. Nothing
To show of interest and nothing
Hid no secret self no other you.
That’s it the artist says we’ll begin
The painting another day maybe
Next week if all is well. The girls
In shadow look away and resume
Their secret games. Lisbeth studies
The artist’s blackened fingers as
He rolls the charcoal sketch and
Puts away. He gazes at her standing
By herself a glimpse of smile and
Glimmer in her eyes like small fires.
He closes the tired lids of eyes
And smoulders down his old desires.
Apr 19, 2012
Apr 19, 2012 at 8:26 AM UTC
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
my sister lies in a hospital bed after a suicide attempt.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
yesterday i was at the mall while my sister was rushed to the er.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
she swallowed a bottle of pills yesterday to try to make the hurt go away.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
her heart rate went down too low.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
she needed me when i wasn't there.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
my nightmares have become a reality.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
she's not dead, but she isn't alive.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
the demons lurk in her eyes and i want them gone as much as she does.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
she looked so pale with the charcoal staining her tongue black.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
i sit here with a blade and consider breaking my promise.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
i continue to repeat these lines.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
maybe it's a mantra, but it feels like my last words.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
i want her back home.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
the desperation in my soul begins to surface.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
come home soon squish.
it's january twenty-second, two-thousand eighteen.
otherwise i might join you in that hospital bed.
Jan 23, 2018
Jan 23, 2018 at 1:20 AM UTC