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JJ Hutton Feb 2011
The light quit working in the jukebox,
the melodies' surrender,
a commonplace extinction,
against the salt and the breeze
of your false Mediterranean.

The burden of your rational soul
in a world of extremes
has torn your spirit to tatters-
tatters littered across
your Toronto abode.
Divided amongst the heirlooms
and emptied bottles.
This desolation you
sought to translate
for the harmonious pulse
of the dial tone.

Hazy,
is this ancient mind,
a smoking fallout of
yesterday's parties
to be discussed over
lukewarm coffee
and cigarette butts,
while the shivering streams
and green plains become
commodified for a higher power.

Dan, my dearest friend,
I loved you
ferocious and freely,
fanged and supremely,
and as your mind coagulated
on a couch,
microphone in-hand,
I felt nostalgic for
your clumsy alcoholism,
and clumsier guitar strumming.

The white fog descends,
the city is hungry--
no longer can it expand.
Toronto eats itself
with you inside,
shall I write you a postcard?
Shall I kick down your door?
Shall I let you join the bones
you so beautifully alluded to?

Whisper, my friend,
amidst the soft croon of
the saxophone,
whisper, my friend,
of a Europe gone defective,
whisper, my friend,
for an apocalypse of sun
to release us all from
the white fog slowly burying
our Toronto.
© 2011 by J.J. Hutton
Aeerdna Nov 2016
I am full of memories
painted on our ceiling
when we were just two kids
and the rain wasn't hurting anyone

do you remember the smell of smoke
coming from the leaves our mother used to set fire to?
remember the November sunsets
when we'd play stupid games
and none of us was a winner?

remember how we used to sit in front of the fire
playing cards and drinking wine
we thought our lives would be like a smooth sailing on the ocean
yet here we are
miles away from each other
and the music doesn't sound the same
and our cards are missing
still no one is a winner

still
the smell of burning leaves wakes me up at night
still
we are apart
and the wine we drink daily
has no taste
and we keep on playing
even though our lives are like a wrecked ship
in the middle of an ocean that's always dark
we are still lying to ourselves
but deep inside we do know
the wine has changed its colour

and so did our eyes.

much  darker they are
much clumsier our fingers
much number the feelings

and
somewhere,
the leaves are falling
and they are burning
we just can't smell them
                       anymore.
david mungoshi Sep 2015
They said you were slow and languorous
That live or die 'twas all the same for you
Untutored, they were the swine before the pearls
And were ignorant of the coals that fanned your passion

I was one of the daring few that knocked at your door
The lithe girl in you  was always there for the seeing
You had a shape made in heaven and a smile to match
And your blithe ways said nothing mattered that much

We learned much about the body and the force of allure
We filled our gaps with information as you filled your cups
We became clumsier and more oafish as your grace peaked
But we always knew how to worship your form and beauty

The years went by and we all grew up and spread afield
Try as I did to search high and low, of you I found no trace
Yet with ease I found your pretty face in the clouds of time
And the rain wept your name and kept it showering

Now the relentless years have gone swiftly past somehow
And pretty little girls and bashful boys have grown old
Is this you with the fading sight and the tremulous voice?
'Tis no matter, I know how to bring back that lovely lass

So, no matter what, you'll always be that voluptuous beauty
I don't see your spindly legs nor mind your frequent lapses
They don't know what they missed, these modern types:
Love with the taste of spring water that bubbled out of you

Into the cupped palms of my doting heart that sang a duet
With the crescendo notes of your  ***** and the quiver
Of the enchanted world sitting upon your dancing behind
These enduring images never fade or melt away

Thus, dearest God's masterpiece, you'll always be my girl
And I the boy electrified by your articulate eloquence
Ignore them when they call you a hag and a witch
They know not the feel of the bliss that never goes away
Mateuš Conrad Jun 2022
ve bu benim kanım, akşam yemeğim gelenlere ne mutlu.

i really tried my best in learning some Turkish
before our next meeting...
   and here is my blood,
                 happy are those who come to my supper...

well... i already wasted one bottle of wine on Jemminah:
i still have one left, probably the finest of the batch,
so i texted her at 3am in the morning:
i knew she would be up...
   the sun was teasing the sky by just about
raising a desert storm of colour below the ink blue
hue of night when she replied
to my text: are you available tomorrow?
i have a present for you, maybe you do, maybe you don't
but i'm bringing some of my homemade wine
over...

yep... she is... right... time to get ready...
i'm not leaving that brothel without having *******...

strange two days... for all the **** i've been
through since the age of 21 through to about 30...
life... oh it's come back: or rather... i've come back
to life...
    i'm already holding this ram by the horns
and wrestling with it...

    oh right... i came home at 2am... stayed up
until about 5am, woke up at around 11am...
where was i last night?

the times Wednesday June 1, 2022,
is this UK's final glimpse of Messi?
james gheerbrant -
in march 1960, evlis presley stopped over
at the US airbase in Prestwick and spent a
couple of hours mingling with the Ayrshire
locals, in what turned out to be the only
occasion he set foot on British soil.
when Lionel Messi captains Argentina
in the Finalissima against Italy at Wembley
tonight, it will be his 25th game in this
country, yet his appearances still have
the same sense of visiting royalty,
      a brush with something luminous,
a story for the grand-children, laced with
the possibility that this might be the last time...

oh right... that's where i was...
   **** me... by the end of it even through it
i started yawning...

not out of any disrespect for the genius that is Messi,
but... see... i've never seen Argentinian women
before... i probably have but you never truly know
unless they're wearing an Argentina football shirt...
and something hit me...
like it hit me when i was grooming my female
cat and she stuck her *** in my face from pleasure
and something grotesque was woken up
and had to be be immediately translated onto
a woman... or rather: hidden inside a woman...

took me about a whole night trying to find a new
brothel around London... i did... but the price
was too steep... and everything about Stratford
is shady... a whole night cycling towards central
London and back... in between shady places...
second night i was losing my libido
and went to the one i knew by heart near
Goodmayes train station...
     that's when i met Khedra... after a disappointing
hour spent with this timid little Romanian number...
who... no... she shouldn't be into prostitution...
for the love of god i tried to get a hard-on...
i blamed it on myself: maybe i drank too much?
but... i'm already on my second libido-booster:
the first i've already "ingested" - exercise...
cycling toward Upminster and back and around
Upminster towards Rainham...
exercise is an aphrodisiac... mix that with fresh
air... sunlight and nature...
boom... get the blood flowing...
                                the second aphrodisiac?
white wine... not rose, not red... white wine...

so i thought, maybe i drank too much?
   no... she was just a timid creature that...
    had zero skills... and she was "supposedly" a *******...
obviously younger than me...
so... i just lay there with her in my arms
and we exchanged words for body parts
in three languages...
   just leaving Khedra came in... boom!
thank god it's no longer something stupid as:
"love at first sight"... thank god it has become:
lust at thirst-sight
                       because: it's true... it's exactly that...
once you pass your 30s you get this
spectacular... hmm... "magic" of being able to
find compatibility in the right sort of place...
what better place than in a brothel?
    i mean... ha ha: are we there to talk about
Walter Sickert? are we here to talk about...
  geo-politics?! feminism?!
                we're at a butcher's shop and we're getting
some meat... and we're talking to the butcher...
ergo?

mind you: while cycling i really thought about it...
you can't really employ the ad hominem argument
against Marquis de Sade...
   i did read through his biography...
                   he really wasn't such bad of a man as
history lends itself for us to believe...
personally? i think he had some pretty ****** ideas...
but as a person, sure... his imagination was wicked...
but he was imprisoned for... what?
asking a ******* to use a crucifix as a *****?
and these days if you skim through some...
soft-core *******... you'll find what?
well... it's not exactly a crucifix... but Saint Sebastian of
Cucumberia is pretty popular with the nuns
of modern secularism...

     he was imprisoned more of the time than
he could have had the time to fulfill all those whims
of 120 days of *****...
among other works...
                        ****** is a different matter...
that's a stand-alone work that's his pinnacle...
it's a good thing i read him when
my own hormones were pulsating in my teens...
that kind of subdued matters, youthful frustrations...
if anything: his uncle was the real rascal!
because the argument that Slayer or any other
music for that matter incentives anger and
violence is BULL-*****...
                                it subdues it... if anything...
it reduces it to a fantasy land whim-whipped-day-dream

like marquis de sade and the idea of
regular ***...
    eh... turns out it's better to take decent breaks...
sort of live the life of a Konrad von Wallenrode...
after all... the Teutonic Knights
did have a brothel with the walls of their citadel
capital of Ordensburg Marienburg...
    so... let's not pretend what is... and what isn't
happening...
  
thank for that! for what? i just keep hearing these
nightmare stories on the internet...
Tinder this: swipe swipe left left left left...
Tinder that: swipe swipe right right right right...
once i met this guy who laughed about
people who joined Facebook... that got on me...
i was fooled! back in the day?
when Facebook was exclusively for university
students?! yeah... it made sense...
obvious blah blah some years later and it's
a boomer gimmick like e-harmony etc.,
                     but me?
   oh no... not another social media bullshitter
going to **** me in... my use of the internet?
i'm in... i'm out...
    i come here to gush out my thoughts slit the veins
of my imagination, drink... listen to music...
read someone else's suicide notes and *******
to bed...

i don't think i have ever commented on anything
that i otherwise must comment on to get a pass
for something... because...
yeah, right... you buy a book...
and you then what? scribble your opinion on the last
page of the inside of the cover and expect what?
a response?

and this whole, modern, fixation on dating apps?
hook-up apps? it was never my thing,
the whole dating "revolution" passed me by,
shoom! gone! bye bye...
            nothing is ever good when it's easy...
losing 20+kg was never going to be easy...
being falsely diagnosed as a schizophrenic was
never going to be easy...
but... i wriggled out of both of these "percularities"
(yes, i do you mingle the technique of
misnomerism with metaphors)
hence the air-quotes... ambiguity...
   everything for the imagination to unravel: revel in...

in alba vino volo (in white wine: desire)...

i even cut down on my smoking to get a better /
prolonged *******...
obviously i had to check...
   check over... jerking off to almost ****** and then...
o.k., everything's in working order...
now to write something, take a shower,
pamper myself and ******* with that bottle
of wine of mine to **** Khedra...

**** me... if i had to go through all the clumsy
dating advice, even clumsier dates...
eating food... ugh... who the hell wants to **** someone
on a full stomach?
mind you there also that: MAYBE...
because there's no guarantee...
**** first, talk later...

                            easy? easy? what's easy?
first you have to sit through the ante-chamber
interrogation room of about 12 prostitutes...
and they have eyes like the beak of the eagle
that's bound to eating Prometheus' liver, for ****'s sake!

sure... yesterday was fun... i had a chance
to perhaps see Lionel Messi for the last time in England...
but i also managed to see all those
Argentinian women... that was a breaking point
for me... south American women... mmm hmm...
yummy doesn't even cover it...

today? it had to be: i had to go all out...
i had to start the day off by eating two soft-boiled
eggs...
and then? ****** off to my Turkish barber to
get me beard trimmed...
i once remarked it (getting a beard trim)
was better than getting a blow-job...
i'd like to retract that statement:
a beard trim and a hair-cut done by the same barber
feels: just as good...
eh... a beard trim is a beard trim...
my mustache was overgrowing my lips:
drink and random food and snot was getting
stuck in it... how am i going to kiss her?

oh when Cedilla met Caron...
that's
                    when Çedilla
  (soft, although it ought to be hard)
                                 Čaron (there's no "soft" caron -
it's most certainly re-laid as
the Greek Xaron - Kharon - even though...
  chasing chiseled chalk and cheese)...

ah... the enthralling sensation of meeting someone
for some carnal debauchery...
one bottle of white done - check
visit to the barber shop - check
exercise prior - check
a decent amount of protein ingested - check
press-ups - check
pandering... ****... i need to trim my nails scrub
away all the dead skin off the soles of my feet,
wash myself thoroughly... use all the necessary
chemistry to give off whiffs of freshness...
   have i trimmed my "other" beard?
yes, yes i have...
    well then...

    eski kuzgunsaçlar (old raven-hair)...
   here i come!
Amanda Fogerty Feb 2013
After the matter, he said he saw it like an old black-n-white
because I had said I loved Cary Grant films.
But I know now that he couldn’t have possibly
because he told me he hated classics.
We stood three baby steps away from each other
on that beautifully manicured stretch of green.
He smiled so widely and wildly,
seeing as if through a sleeping gas dream haze,
I, ever cautious, looked with clear, hard blue eyes
and scrutinized and analyzed until
the grass was jaded green and the blue sky
was smudged with laundry grey clouds.
He told me excitedly, in what he assumed
was a lover’s pur, that he had something for me.
I thought the tone was an aggressive command
and I snapped my eyes back from the splotch
of mud from my boots, and was horrified to find
that I was now a mile away from him.
How’d I end up here, and why didn’t he notice
I wasn’t where he was? When I asked after the matter,
he said with venom that he assumed I would follow,
like I always did.

He had pulled from his pocket a beating pink heart
and stretched his arm out to me, but I shook my head.
I can’t reach it from here, I really tried to let him hear.
I am no where ready to take that!
But he smirked with older superiority,
a grin I had come to loathe,
and brought his arm back behind his head,
like a veteran pitcher at the mound, and followed through.
But he was never in baseball, he was a speech kid in high school,
he didn’t know how to throw, and the wind picked up
that little pink heart like a paper plane.

I tried, I really did. I ran until my lungs ignited
with blood, pumped my legs until the muscles
fell off, strained my hands and fingers forward until they were as long
as red oaks in an ancient forest.
But it wasn’t enough. I was still thousands of feet
away from catching the weak little ball of emotion,
because I hadn’t played ball since I was fifteen.

The delicate little heart landed in this thick brown mud puddle.
On such a lovingly cared for lawn, why was there
a huge-*** mud pond?!
I frantically waded in to try to and help it.
When I found it, the heart was contentedly
sitting in the mud as if it had landed in
a warm kettle of chocolate.
I was sad to see it so easily mislead, and knew I had to return
because I knew I couldn’t clean this little bruised ******.

As gently as I knew how, I eased it out of the mud,
and stoically walked back to the boy
who had so carelessly thrown his heart.
Unfortunately, the grass was slicker than i thought,
and the sun was in my eyes, and I guess
I’m just clumsier than I thought, so about five steps away
I tripped and dropped the fragile little heart.
As the tender pink thing landed, finally it
and he noticed the state everything was in.
He looked down at the banged, muddy heart
and I watched in fear as his eyes filled up.
With quiet misunderstanding he asked
how could this happen? Why did you do this?

I must admit, I just can’t do displays of emotion,
so I told him I was sorrier than words could say
and as iron bars of guilt began to pile along my shoulders,
I turned 180 degrees away from him.
I felt his hand reach for me, but all he could grasp
was my rustling skirt, and I couldn’t bare to see him,
so I sprinted forward and let my dress rip to flowing shreds.

The air from his screams helped pushed me into a flight.
The sooner I disappeared, the sooner he’d take notice of his heart,
I kept telling myself this, praying for this.
After the matter, when I asked what he saw,
all he said was a pretty girl that dropped his heart at his feet,
and step on it, smeared it with her ***** boots.
I deserved the harsh words, I do know that.
This is no plea for the girl that broke your heart,
but did you ever think she might have really tried,
and it isn’t completely her fault? Sometimes she’s
afraid to see your name on her phone
because she can’t bare to see the beaten heart
she just couldn’t save.
These are the words you will never read.
You will not see them, feel them, or remember
the weight they add to the burdens on my back.
And the guilt. The shame slides down my shoulders
and falls like puddles around my feet,
scorching my ankles with the splash.
My emotions are bubbling lava, brilliant light,
alluring, engulfing,
destroyer of apathetic eyes (rolling ***** of white gush)

There are three words you will never hear.
"I love you" came first, when the bump grew bumpier:
little, softer tummy; deadly force.
"I give up" comes now in tiny exhalations from my
bigger, clumsier fingers than that which we lack.
I say these three words to myself until I stop believing,
and my tears stop falling and my lips stop smiling.
The most fixed point in the wall I find. And stare.
We have a contest, and, of course, the wall wins.
Blink. I blink. I do the worst, the expected.

I try again.

I try a thousand new ways, ways I planned
with alternate routes and "just in case" setbacks.
When we meet I extend my hands, and warm my smile
with round shiny eyes. The dimple peers through my cheek,
never shy, always ready for the man I choose again and again.

This time half of my body felt half of his as we stood
in the rain and in the muggy sticky late August air.
In vain, I grabbed his arm, whirled it in an air circle,
until his fingers released and he walked to his car.
I watched. He didn't look back. He walked and unlocked.
and steadily then swiftly drove away.

The clouds grew closer until night spread across the sky,
Music imprisoned my ears and my eyes refused to open.
The car remained on a path, even without my consent.

I walked into the arms of a black skinny creature that whined,
eagerly scratched my arms with her black nails.
She looked as worried as I actually lived, every day
in fear of failing my work, my hopes, myself.
Rockie Sep 2015
I miss the girl that I once knew
The girl with hair blonder than dust
And cheeks rounder than apples

I miss the girl that I once knew
The girl with nerves of a wet napkin
And legs clumsier than spaghetti

I miss the girl I once knew
The girl who always did what she was told
And was always afraid to speak

I miss the girl I once knew,
That's all true.
But she grew up.
And I don't miss that little girl so much
Anymore.
What glory could settle the breeze?
In the days and nights that my mouth goes dry,
what road upon which an army marches does suffer a well to be dug,
and what cities fall that could bring a cup to my lips?
Words like yours incite no war cries to rally,
but they bring the rain when you call upon the clouds to drift.
And does my hunger make me foolish? Does my imagination run
          wild
Because it has never felt the weight of a wise thought?
Am I simple? Do my curiosities reveal my ignorance? Do I ask too
          much, or too often?
What does a love letter to a poet make the man with the pen desire?
Is it the laughter of a budding affection? Or the pity that brings a first
          chance?
Perhaps he offers up the voice in his soul
hoping that it will be cannibalized by a tongue that tastes nothing
          bitter
in the murmuring recitation of clumsier words.
I feel I should know.
But if I must be clumsy, and simple, and ignorant, too much or too
          often,
I can only wish for my clambering gait to still be swift enough
to catch you as you amble
from thought to thought.
Adorations for Bragi, the Norse god who was the First Maker of Poetry.
Gabriella Jane Oct 2013
Dry swallow these pills just like you did your pride
These hands clumsier than this manic heart of mine

I wouldn’t mind being your morning coffee
Sleepy, warm, against your lips.

I tried to be a flower
attempted to be a kiss
trying not to be disappointed because
I’m still only human.
Andrew T Sep 2016
S
We first met at Arlington Drafthouse on a Saturday night. You were dressed in clothes white as snow. After the open mic we shared a kiss and spent the whole night and the next morning together. I remember when you told me you loved me for the first time and I finally felt safe and wanted for a long time. Over the course of almost two years, we've traveled around Washington DC, took a spontaneous trip to richmond, and saw numerous movies from Elysium to The Imitation Game. When I was selling cars, we ate sushi twice a week; when I worked as a canvasser we shared pizza on your bedroom eating off of paper plates. I've made you feel irritated, loved, appreciated, mad, and happy. You've introduced me to countless friends and I've introduced you to my world of poetry and storytelling. I enjoy blowing your belly button and hearing you say, "eek." My family opened their arms to you and your family has cooked me dinner and given me gifts. Loyalty is the first word that comes to mind when I think of your pretty face. You're older and wiser than me and I'm goofier and clumsier than you. We've broken up in the sunshine and reconnected back in a thunderstorm. So I pray for the raindrops to come crashing down when you're hurt, so that I can dry the tears off of your eyes. Drinks upon drinks; beer, liquor, and shots we've shared with friends of all ages and nationalities and sexes to celebrate life and its beauty. I've broken promises and you've broken my heart before. But with each break we've come together even stronger in our bond and I thank my mother for teaching me to fight for what I desire. Remember going to see John Mayer at Jiffy **** and drinking bud light margaritas? Or playing tennis in the spring afternoon when no one was on the courts and being happy and sad on the weekends when tragedy hit on the the news broadcasts? How about me cooking you spaghetti because that's the only dish I know how to make. We've created a life together through memories and dreams and months of stories. You hate it when I snore at night and I hate it when you stare intently into your phone. Your heart is bigger than my ego and my drive is bigger than your fears. The time we've shared together is important and indispensable. I hope I'm a kind and generous person and above all a good boyfriend. It takes a lot to build a relationship and so little to break another persons trust. What I'm trying to say is I love you very much. And from the bottom of my heart grow better and more valuable as wine grows with age so do you.
dani evelyn Feb 2017
every little girl is taught the same thing:
the princess only gets the happy ending if she ends up with a prince.
that’s what every movie tells us,
that’s how we think the world works.

so the first time you like someone, you’re trembling and hopeful
and you’re ready for the love story
you think you’ve been promised.
but the first time you like someone
is clumsier and less glamorous than you thought.
the first time you like someone, you’re fourteen years old
and he kisses you in a basement, not a ballroom,
and your palms are sweaty
and his gum gets in your mouth.
the first time you like someone
you stutter over dinner with his parents
and pretend that you like meatloaf.
he tells you “you’re mine”
and it’s the first time you realize
you are something other people can own.
however, the first time you like someone
it knocks you breathless when he tells you that you’re beautiful.
it is awkward and halting and precious
and it doesn’t last.

the first time you love someone, you are nineteen
and he isn’t the person you were expecting.
but the first time you love someone
is the first time you understand
the meaning of the word selfless.
the first time you love someone
you sneak out of your house in the middle of the night
just to see him again.
you can’t believe how much bigger he has made your heart, as if
your entire ribcage cracked open just to make room for him
and the first time you love someone
is the first time you really like your body --
because he makes new all the parts of you
you thought could not be loved.
the first time you love someone,
you tell him so next to his hospital bed
and when he kisses you it feels like
you’re in that ballroom you had always pictured.
the first time you love someone
your love will be genuine and passionate and
everything you’ve ever wanted,
but it won’t be enough to make him stay.

— The End —