Part One
Nascent Craving

The insular heart unsealed; pearled eyes
Breach parapets of stone— periled shield,
The sweetest ****—
A threatening wonder and irrefragable synergy,
Nervous routes of cognition  
In this nascent, amorous craving.
Locked and abased,
Dissonance lends pathos — euphoric and onerous,
Disconsolate cries curb sublimation,
The regnant bleed diffusing — fervid lust
Fondled, tactile surfaces in throbbing anticipation.

Sullen, aft a veil of laughter,
Visceral aftermath, out of
The ardent ash,
Burns a thirst;
Insuperable numbness and ache.
Efflorescent intimacy,
Table for two
Enraptured in new alliance,
Élan vital (psyche);
Urgent dialect petitions
Equivocation, jocularity blending
Provocation with indecision,
Noted lilt of descending inhibition.

Adrift, the incessant Now;
As occasion inexorably diminished;
Resonant simpatico tending,
Numinous amity;
Heard conversant, cognitive idioms—
Lassitude, time-eaten pangs of the unhinged heart,
Wounds axiomatic,
In disquieting synergy,
Nibbling, the circumference—
Misery’s permeating truth;
None immune, all trundle incongruously past,
Facing intrepid savages.

Licitly felt, reverberations of Amor
Whence the heart behaves;
Measured cadence, pulse elevating—
Treasured lover, contemplative muse;
Undulating clasp, inflated bone of absence;
Incarnation — a woman,
Beyond prosaic;
Ineffable adoration pours in certitudes of verse,
Elenita, enclothed —virtue unvarnished;
Reservoir intrinsic, poised advocate of the innocent:
The crooked lines of insolence,
Brazen culture of neglected youth.
Perceptive blue stare, sensitized tears—
Plaintively, evincing her injustice ago.

Part Two
Tendered Senses

Siren silence, eruptive blush, ampler between phrases
In dulcet tones — stirring discourse;
Foments rebellion, the strife beneath— his ****,
Out of its vast reserve,
Penetrate the narrowed ambit, vaguely announced.
Groping hands, migrating the sensual member
Stern faces grimacing— mirror in abrasion,
Under the blind surf of consent;
Burrowing ambiguity, emerging torsion,
Plunge, enlisted and content in the sea;
Subsumed in the nonverbal cue,
Persuasion’s plea,
Quelled in the post cerebral assent.

Piercing eyes parallel crystalline waters of Lake Tahoe.

An untouched portion of his awareness remains aloof,
Palpable in the subsequential quiet,
Obsequious and febrile, they sinned on sofas;
Peregrine predilections quenched and viscid—
Serenely requited, the room breathes her presence,
Limp, figures *******, mantled in adolescent torpor.

Erudition in bloom, trust undoubted,
Illuminating, satiating; tempest calm—
Under canvas
Terrain soaked and sodden,
Postliminary — rains of invalidation.
Allowance and permission
Recalibrate, salivate, shortly only—
Initiate, obliged consecration, appraising
Curvatures of the spine,
Stuns him obeisant, her femenine pulchritude,
Propinquity inciting vigor,
Emergent allure, the updriven
Tower of wood sprung from the blanket.

Suffused in ether, purring streams of remembrance
Vaginal honeyed dew, sung into
Orchids, remnants of remember;
Drenched down the cynosure of devotion;
Succulent view, diaphanous pantied bottom;
Halcyon mist, saporous wine — compliance of the will,
Freed fires wander,
Pliable rind, twin plums dripping,
Abject confession, dispatching doubt
In tendered senses,
Pivotal tree, lavender Jacaranda holds the key,
Unfurled, cindered vulnerability.

Half-denuded skin invites confessional savor
Acutely bubbled rear, fleshly furnished denim;
Sultry visit, San Ramon Valley in the fall,
Strewed limbs splendid, flowing filmy;
Imagination yields—
Bursting silk congealed
Across deft thighs, ambrosial thong draping ankles,
Grazing ascension, the curvaceous trajectory
Nose inflamed with fragrance,
Inhaling, climb of acquiescence,
The ****** weal, amid the globed fruit,
Focal intention — ploughed lance thrusting,
Absconding, the ancillary perfume of essence.

Perceiving avid validation,
Swimmingly, amid the monstrous gaze.
  
Humid skies simper dank, set swell the incense of Eros,
Surge of poetry engorged
The flame levened shaft,
Nimble ******* flounce, spill the harboring mouth;
Moist hands merging, unfettered,
Weave in supplication,
Vicinity voicing, enmeshed diversion;
Supple and spherical behind
Posterior arch, milky-skin against the lip—
Ripeness jostling their complacency;
Lapped the mooring, ridden decisively;
Recapitulating— spumed forth, bellied over hips warmth.
Abandon the dirge of self-pity
Late under ego’s trance.
  
Part Three
Present Tenses

Tempting trespass across sacred gardens,
Flowering, scandal set luminous: attachment—
Consensual, their corresponsive fear;
Protean manifestations— evocative, perpetual
Unutterable contention in a fictive resolve,
Deliberating the merits of their widely disparate tastes in coffee,
Amorously touring wine, let’s drowse through the gnarled vine.
Sundry deficiencies pale, once contrasted;
The beatific vision—
Material substance unaccompanied,
Imperceptible, tear-streamed cheeks in synch,
Ventral kiss, peak of carnal perfection,
Reminiscence— flesh violent with Love.

Fiction knew to meander the innominate rift,
A tincture of irony soften misdeeds
Immense as the sea.
Insolvent beast stippled with sapience—
Unmasked, the fabric of delusion;
Dependence smothering the disciplined heart
Resentment put up for release.

Waste of residual years
Fate’s apportion, scars bleakly observed;
Chastened by heartache, engulfing fervor
Too faint to recapture.
Vague glimpses dry—
Hypervigilant his defenses,
Veritable suspensions, embers lit linger;
Slender walls of solidity, the horizoned self,
Faith and reason in concert — stone levels of elucidation.

Fractured bones of distance, emanate a rigid salience,
Another ponderous night of absence—
Lingering, cauldron of dearth as indifference ushers,
The quotidian coil of contrition.
Tearful pallor, sequestered —ciphering time and solitude;
The unkissed mouth, his restive brow;
Suspend in the approximate span.
                      
After Lucid alliterations are spoken
Devoid of her face, his lover’s nudge—
The man nurtures his hurt.
Anxious as seldom unscarred,  
Venus’s susurrations,
In present tenses,
Kissed by her serenades of integration—
Notwithstanding metaphysic intrusion,
No chain stays unbroken,
Postponed drifts of deferment left unspoken,
Reverberations of amor.

© 2013 W. S. Warner

I don't know what to think
when i'm staring in your eyes
more akin to speak
in blind lullabies.
than logistify
my heightened
surmise
in flight
to somewhere nice
if only for tonight
come with me this night
ignite
the cindered fires
of our desires
and incite
the throws of light
in **** obscurity
moaning through the sincerity
of our oddities
gleaming in the rarity
of our academy of lust
all or bust
entrust the accounting
of blaspheme
to the enemies
of poverty
and shove me
all the way down your throat
fill you
instill you
with the hope
of a million
grinning in *******
of the tangled mental merchants
of pretty lights and custom curtains
drawn at first light
dispersing
amongst cursing pedestrians
prior to *******
of forceful *******
with an another human
lightened strikes the truant
in 9 months of fluent
agony
just imagining little Timmy
has me scavenging for a shimmy
to escape
its social ****
to a blind ape
still patting his head
don't be mislead
by ***** carriers
pack your own barriers
and prepare for the scarier
side of a mans mind

their lungs, their lives were cindered....burn pits afire,
our troops came home, can't breathe

Befriended street lamps' static hum
Timed steps slashed through electric buzz
Fled from the dawn's grey stain
chased night with anxious breath
                                              erupting
Out­flanked and pinned down
                                         by the days

Strike up the band, roisin the bows.
Compose another tired piece.
I dread the melody
and cringe away
                              from the next movement
I'm only up for burned out wandering.

     Another balance overdue
Took out a loan for time well spent
     Roll out the carpets for the doomed
It's unforgiving turf where our steps are bent

I'll draw these lines
     of ghostly profile night
and coax the specters out
We'll roll on with the tides
     where we can dance macabre
until the core unwinds.

Defend the fort for sleeping ghosts
I'll man these walls until the dawn.
I'll fight these memories
beneath the banner of
                                  some others
Shell-shocked with gun arm
                                  growing sore

Outside, the sidewalks glow red-orange
I throw my shadow on the sparks.
Charred homes on cindered streets
I draw my bow
                           across shaking half notes
Chart out a map of burnt meanderings.

     Default on friendships I misplaced
I'm wrapped tight in familiar fear.
     But I'll warm to those familiar strains...
Because it's 5 o'clock somewhere, and Summer's here...

I'll cross the lines
     into the ghostly night
and wake the specters up
As fires kiss the night
     so I can sleep real sound
and let my core unwind.

Burns Creek
Climbing Chimney Rock.
Dad and David Scoville
In their mid 30s,
Two men out to prove
Their bravery,
Their derring-do.

Nervous,
My Mother,
My brother and I,
Five and six,
Necks craning,
Wait and watch;
Dad moves up and up
Clings to the top.

Inept and six,
I stand below,
Admiring my Father's
Fearlessness.

I am nearly blind,
The myopic, thick-lensed gawker,
Peering upward.

The men climb down,
Victorious,
The day’s challenges
Vanquished.

Heading home,
Choking dust.
Old land,
Deep ravines,
Rattle snake domain.

My father's old Ford
Bumps over red scoria,
Billows burning dust.

Ancient land,
Cindered clay,
Open grazing land,
Dry and hot.

Memories churn
From sixty years ago.

You will be argonaut
one more of the supernumerary
trodding upon the cindered ones
come before you
limbs wooden and somite
encircling a moon
tumescent and blue
in permafrost garrote
on constellations edge
tottering over synapse
mocking
like a mime on highwire
your guilt
lupine in its longing
sawtooth timberline in vivisect night
down promontory
to frozen wave
the broken spoke of your step
on sleetslick carapace
past the preterit
embalmed hide of the world
into the silent millstone
berserk
to return emptyhanded
and changed

21–40 of 11462 Poems
«1234»Viewsshow detailshide detailsSort by  
Faith
BY MICHAEL *******br>When I cannot believe,
The brown herds still move across green fields
Into the tufty hills, and I was born . . .
Teusaquillo, 1989
BY MAURICE KILWEIN GUEVARA
Flowering sietecueros trees:
How easily we married ourselves
to the idea of that bruised light . . .
Bright Pittsburgh Morning
BY MAURICE KILWEIN GUEVARA
This must happen just after I die: At sunrise
I bend over my grandparents' empty house in Hazelwood
and pull it out of the soft cindered earth by the Mon River. . . .
Hanukkah
BY HILDA MORLEY
This season for us, the Jews—
a season of candles,
                                      one more . . .
Winter Solstice
BY HILDA MORLEY
A cold night crosses
our path
                  The world appears . . .
And I in My Bed Again
BY HILDA MORLEY
Last night
                     tossed in
my bed . . .
alternate names for black boys
BY DANEZ SMITH
1.   smoke above the burning bush
2.   archnemesis of summer night
3.   first son of soil . . .
Listen
Attenuate the Loss and Find
BY ANNE WALDMAN
name appears
everywhere and in dream
body armor removed . . .
From “Citizen”
BY CLAUDIA RANKINE
/ 

You are in the dark, in the car, watching the black-tarred street being swallowed by speed; he tells you his dean is making him hire a person of color when there are so many great writers out there. . . .
Listen
History Will Decide
BY ANNE WALDMAN
All writing around the sides the persons a galaxy all writing resounds a hot history. All writing is in fact cut-ups history will decide games heated and heated economic behavior. To rise up scene all sounds of Tahrir and inside supply side threatened. A long delineation. Longer than I would . . .
ICC Kenya Trials: Witness
BY SHAILJA PATEL
was it so I could
never say
across a courtroom . . .
Mosaic
BY TIM SEIBLES
A carpet of light, the
ocean alive < half a moon
muting the stars. . . .
sideshow
BY DANEZ SMITH
Have I spent too much time worrying about the boys
killing each other to pray for the ones who do it
with their own hands? . . .
The Last Son of China
BY **** PING
.......................    hello hello hello    ...    Weiwei    ...    where have you been?    ...    I see you in dreams    ...    bleeding    ...    in the darkness of the . . .
The Skin of Sleep
BY MYRA SKLAREW
The skin of sleep
is thin. It will not hold.
Its contents stumble out. . . .
What Could Have Happened
BY SHAILJA PATEL
Wa
gal
la . . .
Everybody Has a Heartache: A Blues
BY JOY HARJO
In the United terminal in Chicago at five on a Friday afternoon
The sky is breaking with rain and wind and all the flights
Are delayed forever. We will never get to where we are going . . .
Good Friday
BY MARIA MELENDEZ KELSON
Jesus, I want my sins back.
My prattle, pride, and private prices — 
climbing, clinching, clocking —  . . .
ICE Agents Storm My Porch
BY MARIA MELENDEZ KELSON
The Indiscriminate Citizenry of Earth
are out to arrest my sense of being a misfit.
“Open up!” they bellow,
hands quiet before my door
that’s only wind and juniper needles, anyway.

You can’t do it, I squeak from inside.
You can’t make me feel at home here
in this time of siege for me . . .
Tablets
BY DUNYA MIKHAIL
1


She pressed her ear against the shell: . . .
«1234»

Is this the place where garland grows,
Among the olive branches low?
Splattered, cindered, clay abode,
Am I so alien?
Encircled those, in khaki drab;
Paying homage to the bags;
Which hold remains of brave, young lads;
Will I feel again?

Surrounded, chains of un-lit lights,
Which only shine in day, not nights;
Illumination betrays the plights,
Should we become aglow.
A tree of polypropylene,
Adorns the tower, so serene;
A branch of steel hid in-between,
That only gunner knows.

The air of diesel, not of Myrrh,
As pre-fab dwellings start to stir,
Indifferent as they observe,
Fading of the Star.
A failed attempt at lone ‘SandMan’
Adorned with boots, bayonet in hand,
Iraqi winds displace his stand,
Re-formed in Kandahar.

T’was yesterday, on Christmas Eve;
A day ahead of promised leave,
When Paul, Eric, Mark and Steve,
Took leisurely patrol.
In Tikrit, where he was born,
Some sixty years before this ‘Storm’,
They’d set-out on this early morn.
Assessing evening’s toll.

Among the buildings, scattered ruins;
Charred men, like shadows, on the dunes;
From temples soar cremated plumes;
One hour had gone by.
In the distance, beyond the spire,
Come ‘reports’ of skirmish fire,
Incessant screaming of the dire;
Then screams dissolve to cries.

Approach, inside a city square,
Where once a fountain teemed, right there,
Smoldering flesh, low burning hair;
A family splayed together.
Rank and putrid pieces strewn,
Mother’s face, shrapnel-hewn;
Attending Allah far too soon--
All their hands were tethered.

Domestic dogs, now on their own,
Fight for human flesh and bone;
Such holy image sets the tone,
As chorus strikes ‘Jihad’.
Eric stumbles, exploded knee,
Bearing witness to comrades, three,
Souls reclaimed near instantly;
Christmas in Baghdad.

Is this the place where garland grows;
Among the olive branches low?
How I miss New England snow,
This Christmas in Baghdad.

When did hating myself become such an art?

I am the Da Vinci of self loathing
aiding in the rebirth of shame and inadequacy

After breathing, it is the thing I do most in life

I don't quite recall when my childhood ended
Innocence, hope, love and happiness
were victims of it's downfall

I was a passionate child and now a passionless adult
Obliterated by the home truths of life

I see smiling faces and hear joyful laughter
They are content

I ask in a world
with unimaginable suffering and gross poverty
how anyone can be content with being content

It is a perplexing affair
as you see I am not without
my pomposity and hypocrisy

It is hard to live an ordinary life
when you feel you are destined for extraordinary things
but extraordinary is for the others
the rich, the beautiful, the exceptionally gifted

I am none of these things

Yet how come this underlying
undeniable, unrelenting, overwhelming feeling
burns through me
like a match reaching it's cindered fulfillment
that I am destined for those extraordinary things

I feel I am nothing
but I am something
a human being
In this world
with mind, body and emotion

Alas there it is again
emotion, my emotion
my pitiful yet unwavering hatred of the only one thing
I truly have and need,
myself.

All I wanted was to warm you,
rub your skin raw until you felt
the fevered blaze you've ignited
underneath mine, like ironing
out wrinkled flesh. I wanted
to restart your pilot light.
Watch the glowing embers
fall, like ashes from the cherry
of your cigarette, as the kindling
surges and cracks from the fricton
of flint and steel. I wanted you
to smolder, and smoke, and blaze
like the wild fires of the Serengeti.
I wanted to destroy you,
a  beautiful brilliant  bonfire.
Singing away pieces of you.
The tip of the incense.
The edges of of the coal.
The pieces that stop you from glowing,
radiating your brilliance.
I wanted to burn away the parts
of you that douse your  intensity.
The charred black wood.
I wanted to burn away the parts
of you that are cindered.

Toss these brackened antlers
to a Babylon of early crows
where slim repels of cirrus
lace the marches of Orion.
I wore you as an amulet
hard pressed upon my pestle arm
as charms of montane lunar drift
rebelled about your peacock gaze.

There is balsam on the Eastern run
in piquant writs of clementine ,
where jubilees of Persian mote
reveille in the waiting still.
As hieroglyphs of scrying palm
lay wraith about the cindered pane
you harried in ancestral bell..

The name of some forgotten God.

Eyes on fire, sweating into sunken sheets.
You begin from the hair,
Lighting me like a candle.

I stare.

What are these morphing molecules of madness
Annihilating my arteries with their acid?
Now you surround me with sun-bright gasoline;
Set bedroom walls into stars.

I am the center.

Ingredients
For a cure:
A match,
A cry,
And a crow
For after, to screech and crawl into the holes
Of my cindered body.

Let the rest disintegrate into the dirt that
From the foundations of our home, has
Drunken our despair and disgrace for far too long.

The spreading of wings,
to cover the night of day.

The overbearing clouds,
keeping the sunrise at bay.

All things great, and all things good,
are things by all means, probably should.
Lead to happiness, prosperity, and joy within me,
or a simple contentment, a peace that will be.

Yet no matter what strives,
no matter what comes to be.
The characteristic of things,
is that they all cease to be.

Happiness. Sadness.
All good and bad.
Like the time of midnight,
vanishing in seconds.

Burning the fuels, and pushing the lies,
we strive ceaselessly, towards countless lies.
Of messages of a future we think we understand,
A glimmer of hope which we barely comprehend.

Needlessly striving, continually pursuing,
we arrive at the destination,
burning, smoldering.
Our wayward soul,
all the burns that follow,
and we look upon, to truly behold.

What we see are the joys,
temporary pleasantries,
a series of countless,
wastes and toiletries.

When we realize the path that we sowed has been done,
and all that we wish for, coming undone.
We begin to regret,
not knowing back then,
that a path which burns,
will lead to ashes in the end.

Yet it is not too late,
for there's always a chance,
that the truth will shine,
bright as the sun.

It is the moonlit night,
the salient breeze.
Which cools our hearts,
and soothes the feels.

When we release the burdens which have cindered us for so long,
what is left, is to go where we belong.

Peaceful and free, cool and placid,
it is then we can say, "Cooling down is worth it."

From across the room i watched with gloom in hand

Trembling of the soon to be lost temper of my severed tranquilities, swiveling on my spleen

Fueling the surrendering of my dreams for one squeeze to lead them all

Fear only stalled in my cause for alarm

No harm shall come before the storm

No spawn of thought beyond the forlorn

Here to see
See nothing
Nothing to see
See something

Something amiss
Amiss of the somethings
Some things are best
Best left unsaid

And unsaid is where they burned

Turned out
Out turned
Turned doubt
Doubt turned

Confidence

Confidence with delicately sculpted prominence over loose targets

Scurrying like varmints

Not to tarnish the cries for help

6 flashes for silence, and a taste of hell

By demon be driven, as we all sell when pressed against hell with the means to end it all

Let the chips fall where they may, as in jail i can prey on bigger things, and emerge a king

Solitary confinement will refine my shrine to stardom

But the martyrdom of *****, is quickly forgotten

Spoiled rotten in self indulgence

Emboldened in molten rage

The pages folded before fading away

In cindered fairies playing with my pain

Falling

As Jagged glass from window panes

Empty walls
Walling in the wisdom
Wisdom calls
Calls for blood
Blood from all

I merely heed the call and fall fashionably

Rationally broken in the cities hold on me, in claustrophobic scolding for my holdings in heavenly weapons pointing to the cure

I expect nothing but the allure of spatter, patterned out to the tune of my doubts, coagulated in lieu of the claps, looping through the traps of no take backs, and collapsing to my synapses crackling in the rain.

Smash my brain, in suicide by cop,  I jump atop the bridges that i burned

I turn the other cheek

Just to wink at the weak

Before i leap

And never learned

I am sick with all this fumbling through the not yet darkened hours
let the anchor of the life that was be now ripped away complete
let mourning of its passing hasten and begin, and in the gritted eating of the dust
find me a solace and release of all the **** of ravaged trust
But this grey and bitter twilight, this death of death not yet
is an illness to the days that must be borne by bones my own
and every morning, in the mouring, I would find a silence still, sweet, and complete
but this unknown hesitation, this nagging fainting hope for all that was and should of been
is worse than any dying, such a thing sweet, final, and complete

So fly, vanish, disappear, depart! Leave to haunt another heart!
Go and keep your light glowing somewhere upon another set cindered coals
leave me here to mourn your parting, to let this story fade in the growing old.
Or for God sake, and for mine, become aquainted finally now with the valley of the floor
set your words to groaning and to praying and to begging in the night
and when your knees have grown sore and stiff from the bending of your will
all might be returned with joy and sweeter pain than weeping at the sight
of a prodigal returning and the end of long numb night
Until then, and if even there should ever come a when,
all is grey and dark and sick
as minute hands remind and memories sharply *****

you told me to take a new approach
and let the hawk tighten it's grip around my throat
we are leftover vultures
and you have stolen our might

asinine beliefs
drug induced apathy
my apartment's scattered with make believe
an old sign of cindered sorrow

you left this place with weakened scars
and inferno tears to inform me of tomorrow
you held in your apology
like you had a stake in your foolish astrology

seldom a fond guide
and instead a heartless wretch
you manifested illusive love
and pulled the strings to tear us apart

common love
hunted us
common love
came for us

I carry the runes of you in my pocket
Smoothed while recalling
Your blank walks

A wash of blackcurrant and
Holly in your hair

Wandering aimless by shorn clapboard
and storm kestrels overhead.

I think of your eyes
While watching Venus blink,
Tiny speck of green popping

Out of the witching hour’s emptiness

Distracted by a sweet orb only daring to show itself
in time-lapse Morse code-

City firefly’s shy hesitant glow
of phosphorescent luciferase
Impermanent tattoos in the humid air

Asphyxiated by the hum
of flowing electrons by wayward wings
Vintage and neon.

I sweep your edda into the hearth
Ashen mingling of myrrh
and incense sprinkles its cinnamon

Onto bare exposed brick.

The lightning-scarred tree
with its bullseye of char
Burned inside-out,
Cindered base,
Reminds me of our concatenated dreams.

I touch the ghost of you
Roaming the paths of King’s Chapel
and Granary Burial Ground

Farsick and windtalking to yourself.

I still taste the ozone on your lips
After you rained all night.

I throw the bait of you into the water
and the sunfish of Northwood Lake nibble the worms
of your toes.

And I watch the sawing motion of your thoughts
on DVR over and over
Hearing the fibers tear

Knowing the damage of blades and friction

How your heart will always bear
All ninety stone
of Hunters Lodge.

He said he was waiting for someone
you can hear him mumble words at times
in rhymes rolling of lips long locked on
love in another
brothers long gone and given up on ghosts
given in to inches between fingers
love lingered, not long but left longing
lacking leaves, trees timbered
cindered ash from set flames flickered
faulty fluorescence, your presence
begot broken, bruised, but beating hearts
kept in creaking carts carrying cadavers
and daggers dropped on open arms that faced the sky
began to cry and never ceased
at least love left legions of lesions
on heathen hearts held hoping for redemption
found a selection of pretty pills picked from prescription pockets, popped from plastic packing
eyes turned glassy and now they're cracking
counting seconds and stars all the same
for he was waiting for someone
and she finally came

She could blow away,
Burnt to blurry ashen pieces
Of limbs cindered to smoke,
Bespoke pain for a
Place of her own making.

She could sink behind the skyline,
Bleeding death to
A time when she was solid,
And she and the sky
Were definitively separate.
That time when she could cry
And clouds could rain.

But now their tears fall the same
And she is blown away.

When the sun cracked
the planets exploded
each merely shrapnel in a second-
or like the gas giants
puttering into kaleidoscopic spirals
and waving a
symphonic farewell to the universe
grasping the furtive tails
of comets.

mercury shrank into a cindered ball
venus ejected its poisonous atmosphere
like a dying woman her most expensive dresses
mars spun off into the velvety expanse of dark-
but it didn't matter.
only the earth wavered, holding on
to its dignity. Its oceans spilled out,
mottled soup shooting from a bowl,
and its internal fires groaned like arthritic
knees.

In the huge expanse of space
no one noticed,
no one cared.

The wicked candle of cindered vacations
Invites in the aroma of specials shopping
For school stationery, short-sleeve shirts
And books with which to bury boyhood.

Once scattered now reassembled,
All were dressed like occupants of a warm, neat nest,
Not a plume lent to a rebellious rise.
Barbered and beautiful in balm,
All gleamed gorgeously, save for your humble, sprouting speaker.

Naturally averse to clipping claws
And vehemently opposed to malting manes,
I slipped through the scorching Serengeti to school,
Rugged and sharp in every stride,
Intent only on ******* on the porch of prissy pigeons.

Horrified, they weighed up my Transylvanian talons,
Convinced such manifestations hail from heretic or heathen heritage.
Looking at my lumped locks with gentrified gall,
They whispered low squawks, suspecting lice.

Two metallic hand-held instruments housed in pouches and boxes
Brought my feline rebellion to its guillotined end.

Curfew dogs pay no
heed to black sheep

Darkness differentiation
derides no delegates

Church bells silence
testicular pendulums

Hands semaphore -
timeless clock towers

Shadowless alleys
cat controlled kerbs

Embers doused, ashen
Phoenix faces cindered

Light rationed through
ill fitting shutters

Charred wood remnants
wafting weightlessly

Whispering eavesdrops
cobblestone chattering

Town crier echoing in
mnemonic mutterings

A rising intonation
dies on rebound, silence.

              <>


Lockdown |ˈlɒkdaʊn|
nounN. Amer.
the confining of prisoners to their cells, typically in order to regain control during a riot. the lockdown has been in effect since October 1983.
• a state of isolation or restricted access instituted as a security
measure: the university is on lockdown and nobody has been able to leave.
                                               <>
Curfew |ˈkəːfjuː|
noun
a regulation requiring people to remain indoors between specified hours, typically at night: a dusk-to-dawn curfew | [ mass noun ] : the whole area was immediately placed under curfew.
• the hour designated as the beginning of a curfew. [ mass noun ] : to be abroad after curfew without permission was to risk punishment.
• the daily signal indicating the beginning of a curfew: they had to return before the curfew sounded.

Sand spills, passed trembling hands
And the hourglass is too alike a broken mirror
A counter to an image of us, showing us
light hits glass in right and wrong angles
so good, your attempts, just to falter
Oh, to free a Cindered and forgotten
over a bridge so fully burnt and broken
no more, no route to those shores
something funny in this, the feel of forgotten
stars number in the countless, billions
And alone, we all are but the sum of one
staring back, hands trembling

Flurries fell from the sky,
The day you were cindered,
Everything swept up,
into a blizzard.

Your 6ft2 box was
carried along,
By the men who did you
no wrong

Your casket a basket
In a shroud of frost,
For what did another life
cost?

Ushered inside,
By your mum and your dad,
for this was the last control over
you they had.

Shiny midnight cars, lined the roads,
Bowing their heads,
To their precious load.

My booted feet shuffled,
determined to not move,
I didn't want to see you carried,
Up the flue.

Ashes to ashes,
Dust to dust,
What's another man,
Gone in the rust?

In the rush of new, old ones go dead
Ink dried up, their colors fade,
Poet, pause a while from the race of rhymes
To dig out the ones buried in olden times.
They’re precious pearls, each some moments’ capsule
Fires of bygone era that soon cindered cool
Your tears, joys, broken pieces of your mind
Made with alphabets, with your spirit refined!
Though pined for life your poem’s each word
Once delivered, you consigned to graveyard
A day’s applause that staled into night
No sooner than born, shoved out of sight.
Poet, the old ones, beneath dust they moan,
Dig them out, they are your own,
Take a break, from the gushing ones’ race,
Dip your heart, in the old wine’s grace.

As the light slid in
It burnt the dreaded lover
Consciousness cindered and smoked in the eyes

The last thundery beat of breath tore across the confused lips
Lips contorted and irises melted

The vibrations of the ether pushed on
The moment rolled past like a bass line
Cold rhythm of snaking steel wire
writhed through the weary spine.

The path of chaos
Igniting each tendril, each nerve ending

And the lover sighs
For none of us are safe
In the wake of what it means
To be human.

Glances of a golden glow
Face raised up
and layers thrown
Childlike fun
Mid May rays
its warmth absolved

Cindered slow and tender
Scarlet tones rendered red
The invisible hand slaps
with a silent clap

No spite or bite just light
Remember this tightness
Dangers unknown grown
Charred from above
upon those below

And they say when it rains, it pours.
But for me, any rain would do.
You see, alone am I in this drought.
With lonely thoughts of you.

With lonely thoughts of you,
As I stare beyond the pane.
Behind the pain, sorrowed eyes
As drops dance out in the rain

As drops dance out in the rain,
An empty ache swirls within.
The sky emboldens with a boom,
For thoughts are all they've been.

For thoughts are all they've been.
Nothing more, and nothing less.
I long to be out in the rain,
To this fear, I must confess.

To this fear, I must confess.
As I stare on, into the sky.
An empty heart still boldly beats.
Without much reason why.

Without much reason why,
No knock upon my door.
Just the sounds of summer rain.
How I long for something more.

How I long for something more.
If only someone could see.
If the storms could only pass,
And let the sun shine down on me.

Let the sun shine down on me,
For warmth could give me light.
And soften my cindered soul.
In hearts, happiness ignites.

the fire of ****** passion has cindered
in its wake a love of the female form
in all its curves and secrets, I kneel
a confounded slave to womanhood.

The city of Korosten burned out,
burned from head to bottom.
Spoiled wild birds flew away
scared. No more deer left,
only people died.
All the houses were cindered.
There’s no stone left to turn
and break your ******* face.

I wish I had some melancholy memory
Of a romance, long since passed
When a sad song comes on
Talking about the way things used to be
My brain goes blank

The memory of being madly in love
Should evoke something sweet like soda
Every particle, touched and tickled
Just cold enough
A bite, on the lip
Enticing the next sip
Feels like drugs, all the way down
Pulling away, pursed and sticky, you know youll remember
The way that pop popped you way back when
And a thirst for it started
Everything goes better with a cola
A cigarette, sickening and deep, made fresh by that sugar
Whisky, rusty and virile, turned young and naive with that fizz
A good meal, made decadent, with a lick and twist of bubbles

It should, but it doesnt
All I seem to recall
Is feeling as each and every bud on my tongue
Where the seed of your taste was firmly planted
Is scorched
Cindered
Conflagrated
Charred
So the only taste is ash

I remember distinctly the three times I was severely burned
One, I was making cup noodles
Two, I was making food for your trifflin ***
Three, when you made me tell myself that you dont love me anymore

So when a sad love song comes on
Instead of that sparky, stingy, sugary stuff
I get that fructose, sucrose, glucose, rhymes with gross, kinda ****
I learned all too late, that **** like that, is the single worst thing you can put in your body

So whenever I crave to recall
The taste of bittersweet memories
Whispered to me through the turn of a cap
I just think to myself
Soda is ****, water is bliss

we have something real
play in my mind a never-ending reel
film star in my story not pretending
its how I feel my heart
you steal transcending everlasting
love, I can't conceal

every time I'm not near
know that I love you without fear,
the only one I hold dear
my dear,
if you caught in headlights
Doe, I will be here
carry you to safety, sincere
you I revere as the premier
every time I call your name
it should be clear
I hope you hear
this my decree a token my souvenir
never will I leave
more precious than times rare
it's all 4 1 I swear

even vanity thinks you fair
lady picturesque you make portraits stare
your silhouette a dream it defeats my
nightmares that became part of what i wear
the dark my lonely despair my savior
in your eyes, i can see that you care

you are a new year I'm luckier for
having met you I see a classic menu

divine heaven the venue astute
where you reside
the light within you can't hide
this love can't be denied
equally, we feel the same
perfect circular equilibrium
in your heart, i confide
united in past lives
lasting things captive
in your eyes you forgive
past sins that give
me a new lease for positives

colored pastel past times
past, the future now
best-loved a love not passive
cindered hearts love burning
learning to be more loving
kissing every part of your olive brown
skin
everlasting lasting forever

not even the grave can rob us
in the afterlife, we'll reminisce
in ceremonies that remedies
our memories with our love recipes
edged in history our only identity
hearts beating as one never enemies
or frenemies we gave our all
devoured all strife
side by side we conquered life
on love we rolled the dice
winning the jackpot more than thrice
gripping my heart my vice

hope the legacy of our love inspires many
dreading taking faiths leap
more a beheading when loving
but for naught it seems, keep the dream
love is everlasting around the corners
the one to complete
and defeat  
lonely nights keep the fight
you will find life delight
unconditional love conditioned
only to love unconditionally
you are deserving believe me
you worth it worthy of loves
words embedded in your heart
as pure poetic art it's written
in your eyes embedded in the stars
your love chart it illuminates
the dark at night when the moon
envy's how bright you beam
light

She is a hologram
That flickers between
Light and dark
Offering glimpses of
Her form
Of her beauty stark
Teasing me
With cool invitation
That summons
The strongest
Of temptation

My heart
Like a burning mass
Bursting through my chest
Igniting and
Scorching all in its path
Leaving behind
A cindered trail
To follow
To lead
To her image pale

But on arrival
To discover the vision
Now dissolved
Leaving possibilities
Unresolved
And that she
In reality
Was never there
Just a reflection
Through the rainfall
Of a full moons glare

Copyright Marc Hawkins 2017

The brief spark instigated the inferno

The blaze lay waste
To a once robust forest
Now a screen of smoke and ash

The smoldering remains
Are now sanctified
Cindered are the ashes

Remnant kindling curves the circle
Set aflame the lone tree
Silenced the witness forever more

Painting is for pictures
too hard to understand
so let me paint you a picture
of a girl
who has a little too much to understand..

her heart was a two ton brick in her fist
that kept her pinned
to the exact spot on the ground
he wanted her to be in
when she's 12
and those 27 minutes felt like eternity,
clinging to her sanity

like the last molecule of burned up air in a gas chamber
she slept on cindered feathers
******* on the bones of her rotting body
holding back panicked breaths
like other kids hold stuffed animals
sinister smiling eyes
venom spit
splashed across her limbs

"You're so pretty.."
you're so pretty.
seeds of fear planted
in a daughter,
whose father,
didn't know,
she couldn't go any farther

the limbs of her body bare branched
creaking away from his whispered breaths
leaves burned up with the heat of guilt
hidden in the smoke are her pleading eyes
her roots ripped up and flung away
with the drop of his pants
gritting teeth sewn shut
with the bone needles of a broken bird
brittle body vibrating
against the pine tree that
looked "so pretty,"
two hours ago

two bodies
two lungs
pressed against the cage
that kept her soul contained
red and blue flashes
translate to blackness
and 6 years later
her sheets are still soaked
trembling with the sound of her own frozen voice
cracking
shattering

melting into puddles she tried to pick up
with ***** hands
and a ***** heart
dripping into the exact consistency
of the mud he left her in
fingernails full of his fingerprints
and the dew on the grass
came from her eyes
and the sheen off her body
clothing buried
and burned
smoking up to follow the bird
that unwillingly flew away

blacked painting hung up
on the pale bone frame
those 18 years and no one taught him a shred of decency
you'd think it should be inked into his humanity
but no.
she sings into the ashes
calling it back
lungs raw
throat black

she can't see his face
she can't know his name
she can't say that
she carved herself up like an animal
creating a scarred picture
everyone's seen before
but few have known
can't say that she breathes a storm
then pounds her body
until her tears turn red
and everything goes numb again
and she can finally believe for a second
your hands aren't his hands

If I knew her what could I say?
that there's something beautiful about skinned knees
and the fault lines in her eyes
and the way she scrubs her blood from the floor
and the fact that I can't stay quiet anymore
the flames my guilt fans
grow brighter when I think
that because I didn't speak
he could have gone on to ruin
another perfect thing
a perfect thing who's picture
looks a whole lot like mine.

The wicked candle of cindered vacations
Invites in the aroma of specials shopping
For school stationary, short-sleeve shirts
And books with which to bury boyhood.

Once scattered now reassembled,
All were dressed like occupants of a warm, neat nest,
Not a plume lent to a rebellious rise.
Barbered and beautiful in balm,
All gleamed gorgeously, save for your humble, sprouting speaker.

Naturally averse to clipping claws
And vehemently opposed to malting manes,
I slipped through the scorching Serengeti to school,
Rugged and sharp in every stride,
Intent only on ******* on the porch of prissy pigeons.

Horrified, they weighed up my Transylvanian talons,
Convinced such manifestations hail from heretic or heathen heritage.
Looking at my lumped locks with gentrified gall,
They whispered low squawks, suspecting lice.

Two metallic hand-held instruments housed in pouches and boxes
Brought my feline rebellion to its guillotined end.