"clammed" poems
one grain of sand
inside one clam
The clam spends time with this grain of sand
it is nurtured
it is protected
it is valued
it is loved
it is seen as an important part of the clams life
it then becomes a pearl
Why are you so clammed up?
I'm clammed up because I am making a pearl
I am making myself my own pearl
creating my own beauty
Shining my imperfections as if they were weaknesses
I am loving myself
And protecting myself from the toxic environment the world around me can be
I am learning the value of myself
Nurturing myself
The pearl is my own sense of self.
That is my pearl
Jan 8, 2015
Jan 8, 2015 at 11:17 PM UTC
Okay, wait
So there is real life
And then there's fantasy
And somewhere in the middle
There's synecdoche
I get it, I think
At least I think I see
But still I wish that you could better explain it to me
I'm caught up in coincidence
Lost in metonymy
Every metaphor I come across
An extension of my being
I'm drowning
But swimming
I'm so lost
But winning
A battle that I can't define
Rooted in believing
A date with fate I can't avoid
But have no business seeing
I remember telling my best friend of how I once saw god
He clammed up and got real quiet
Waiting for me to go on
But there was no more to say
And on that day
I knew what it meant to be free
It was frightening
And lonely
And deeply affected me
My life ever since has been a spiritual tragedy
I don't know how to fix it
I'm not sure what to think
It scares the **** out of people when I tell them
That God is all I see
Dec 9, 2013
Dec 9, 2013 at 3:50 AM UTC
Ya,
I got my limits
Been here since
hell and back
breathless from carrying Blood and flesh
Bone-World curved to welcome back
Shape-dependent gimmicks tracing
fresh tension lines followed right on track.
Invisible Limits..... / / / / .......
Can't see em, so I cant follow back
Right on track, tongue-tied and strapped up
with a strep throat still, its my turn to step up
else Lady luck might step back, all clammed up
**** I Just hoping this note will...
Curse hope, bless action
See its My cipher to rap now
My meaning to unpack; but how?
Courage and Care is a fact plowed
Strength in the face of what we can bear
Samsara, its a Wheel of time turning back now
The only time I show me limits is always
Vulnerable. still hanging in ghetto hallways
Your place safe and sound, you need but call me
I show me, I mean all ME. I mean All Men, I mean Amen. Ah man...
Living shadow, ghost abode, the heart just saying love me
love me, love me, love me, lord. Keep me warm.
I've never been so cold as looking at the tribe
around the fire's with that fine glow.
Where Freezing feels like final.
breathless from carrying
Bone, Blood and Flesh, flush chested
Do your best, Dont love any less
See your smile, its a breath
to me ...(and Im swimming seas till im Seasick, waves painting a scene sick)
Those curves like Pieces of music,
Kicking hard as I can swimming like im Sea-kick
movement aligned to life and death.
my hide or hair, which can these save?
Music lines and strings of words, its like church to all of us
You see its Cake or death
not willing to lose it, like the chirps of birds seem to follow up
as the morning fights for breath.
Feb 14, 2022
Feb 14, 2022 at 7:52 PM UTC
Assertion
Clammed-up
On the relay
Second guessing
The shrunken head
Of old therapies
The clock says
It's time
To nod off
Greet the morn
With withered fist
Rationalised fury
Trying to
Replace the
Pimply face
Of ******
Angst baseless in
Content
On the tether
Of just another
Addiction in a
Succession
Of spiritual
Vices perpetuated
By the nonchalant
Visage of a world
Uncaring
In derision
From calloused hands
Caused by
Hard work
With little or no
Monetary avail
Hand to mouth
Foot in mouth
Hand on crotch
Crotch saddle sore
What's the point
Of a worn-down point
Dull but
Double-edged
Just to prove
The sword of Damocles
Is still hanging
Over the head
Of your enemies
Who pop
Their heads
Up over
The hedgerows
Like pictures
In a shooting gallery
At the carnival of
A battlefield distant
Filled with relics
Of another
Dead-end
Ill-purposed war
Of the worlds floating
On the crest of
Mine-dotted airwaves
Prompting viewers
To drown negativity
And to salvage
The positive
A broadcast from
Bipolar formats
In living colour
Double-edged
Double-standards
Double-dealing
Double-meaning
Double-minded
Double-jeopardy
Double-trouble
Double your money
Doppelganger leading
Double life
All propagated in
Double-time
Best
Double your efforts
And tune out!
Oct 18, 2017
Oct 18, 2017 at 1:42 PM UTC
Don’t, don’t touch me,I can’t believe you hurl next to me trying to harass me.
Wasn’t it enough that we exchanged our vows in matrimony,
And you frotted off to another woman’s sack the day that you met me.
Remember how we met, all head over heels for you, happy that you made a commitment; talking and jazzing it up leaving our conversations unrested.
We travelled the world, but you left me behind and travelled with words,yes you.
You left me behind thinking I was deaf, blind and unnerved, you lied.
You were a liar, a thief and a drunk all mashed into one.
Oh how monogamy changed you!
Our child came, she was beautiful but you didn’t turn up in the delivery room.
Who was there to support me? I gave birth; you gave me no backbone.
She grew up, you grew too and I stayed still working my life away incessantly.
Appreciation? No.
Depreciation? Yes.
You moved away thinking you could get away,
you took her away from me and into your care, but there was no care.
Now I was stuck in another country trying to support this family, but who do I find out you were caring so eerily? Another woman who underestimated me, spending the money I sent for my daughter in her education, for her own reclamations.
When I went home she was estranged from me,
oh how she’ll hug me next to daylight just to get a whiff of my scent.
We played, we fooled, I showed her what it is to be a lady, but I didn’t know the worse of it as she was being held hostage, clammed up into a little shell having no hope and no glory by those that I left her behind with the trusted reveries.
Jun 15, 2012
Jun 15, 2012 at 10:59 AM UTC
Does it bring you sick joy?
Or do you even notice what you do?
You broke me like some toy,
And still my only purpose is to annoy...
Don't you get that?
I'm afraid of you.
See me cower away into the background
Any time you look my way;
I try to spread your words around,
But your presence clammed up what I needed to say.
But you like that.
You love to be feared.
Feb 4, 2022
Feb 4, 2022 at 11:00 PM UTC
She seemed real and unreal, all in a moments notice, that might last a minute,
Or be three weeks in seeing her, seeing her smiling and laughing, then clammed
Up tight as a wrench could pull it tight. She wore sunglasses at all hours of the day
Lived in her apartment, no lights, felt they added too much heat, hurt her eyes
Kept the air conditioner on all day and all night, her nights were days and her days
Were nights, dark blue curtains, with the shades down and drawn, cool and cold
The television on, the oxygen machine singing its sad one note song, and when
She tired and was off to bed, that box fan sat at the foot of her bed, blowing cold air into sleep.
On her head, where her feet should have been, wrapped in blankets, noises off, but running
Lunch would come early, an hour or so, and they would line up at the desk, and gather
Their paper plates and plastic bowls, and the woman who worked there had a basket, she
Would take two or three lunches up to the folks who were afraid or sick or could not come out
And each day she would greet me, one lunch left in her basket, and with a half smile, I would take it
Trudge up the elevator, down the hall and knock on her door, let myself in with my
Key, see her sleeping under all that silent noise, put the food down, go out and lock her door.
She watched movies with Bill on Friday night, he lives just down the hall, and at midnight he thanked
Her, told her he must be off, and out the door he made his path, round the corner, into the night
A smoke and a watch at the news, then he forgot her, and found himself caught up asleep.
Saturday no one thought anything about her, Sunday was a brilliant day of sunshine and warmth,
But none thought about her, not her son, who rarely thought of anything, not her sister who considered
That she was tired and old, not yet sixty four, not even poor Bill who watched the shows.
"Check on her", was a the word, "she didn't buy lunch", from another, "sure, sure, I will do it",
Only to find, in those cold dark rooms, beneath her covers, the fan blowing hard, the singing machine
Keeping its solitary note, her body, just her body, not soul, not glee, not glad to see you, wrapped
In the blankets, her hair amiss and blowing, her feelings all gone, she lay there dead, to this world,
Making a wonder, feeling the cold, feeling the darkness, feeling forever gone.
Mar 5, 2012
Mar 5, 2012 at 10:56 PM UTC
He told me of how she had
awakened him in the 4 a.m. mist.
Eyes bloodshot, the turquoise clouded with her cigarette smoke.
4 a.m. and already half a pack down.
Staring at their postcards from New Orleans,
how the ghosts of the Bayou Bienvenue rose from
the wetland, clammed at her arms.
The shriveled cypress trunks in the water,
Please come with us.
She held on to the broken hands,
in her fresh sunflower frock.
She always thought I’d like her
more in her death dress.
Jan 22, 2018
Jan 22, 2018 at 2:42 PM UTC
my mother and father cower under the kitchen table and my brothers are dead. my father has clammed up since asking me to tell him something he can take to his grave. this last week I’ve mastered placing my ear on the table in such a way I hear what I am supposed to do. impossible things that are no longer terrible. dispatches from a simpler region. for example, hack your roommate’s youtube account. also, poison the non-pregnant. my baby sister laughs with me when I say some of these aloud. she believes the table is possessed by the devil’s ghost. her beliefs are clear and specific. the ghost thinks itself the actual devil, and will need a good amount of therapy.
Apr 8, 2013
Apr 8, 2013 at 1:07 PM UTC
There's an aura about you which at first glance appears to be quite powerful, so brilliant but broken... Those shards are like pearls scattered across a shore, something incredibly alluring and still only produced through extreme pain, the oysters are yours. Clammed to protect that much valued jewel, few may understand those scars to your beautiful.
Sep 16, 2024
Sep 16, 2024 at 5:31 PM UTC
i sat silently in the auditorium
my hands clammed up in a fist
their voices echoed in the room
but none to reach me
i sat scared in the auditorium
they gathered in groups
turned round to stare
and all i could do was look away
i sat idle in the auditorium
they would think that i’m
mute like a ghost, dead or gone
walking right through me
i sat praying in the auditorium
my feet nervously tapping
my voice quivering when
i asked the girl beside me
a simple question,
thank god she answered
i sit alone in the auditorium
this room has held my voice captive
my confidence has been stolen
and yet my heart pounds every
split second but you still
cant hear me?
Aug 26, 2019
Aug 26, 2019 at 3:10 AM UTC
Deranged distortions thinking i could contort just right foot red left foot blue twist and turn on trembling tip toes so i might fit into pocket or palm, remain calm if claimed clammed up im bearable woman being rearranged into commercial jingle ring "im good, how are you" stuck in head or throat tote a hoarse smile stinking of another blah facade forlorn forewarn follows fake plant growth in (t)his sunlight promised life to the rubber made grade points plucked like pencil pushing excuses, effort isnt tallied into parking lot anxiety attack lacking attendance peer remembrance of your presence in bleeding nailbeds ****** into sweatshirt smothered eraser faces, forgetful social graces self slap lap up launguage barrier breaks cant breathe without letting words escape race to wring the worry whimpers that echo out of bitten lips split a panicked pulse quicker and louder shout not now mouthy mislead slink in your seat enter dark disengage garble gag on empress embarrass
Mar 22, 2018
Mar 22, 2018 at 8:00 AM UTC
TW - domestic abuse
If I had discovered you, Silhouette, told the world to you, cast a spell
to flatten the curve of you - could you have stayed?
If I had stopped hateful hands moving from heavy ******* over new
roundness to naive-wet - could I have run with you?
If I had pushed through their countdown, their grip and anesthesia -
clammed up, stood up - would they have let us get away?
I should have kept you - Silhouette - cocooned and safe.
He discovered you in a slow transformation I hadn’t felt - turned me
around to face him, like a naughty child.
I wondered the game we played. He slid hands up my vest, cupped my ******* drew fingers down the symmetry of my belly.
He laughed because I was wet, but I opened to him, I always did. I learned
about you, Silhouette, when he whispered "you can’t keep it."
Jan 24, 2021
Jan 24, 2021 at 2:12 PM UTC