"compacted" poems
Warm laundry gives me the
fuzzies, makes my hands grasp
majestic purple soaps
to cleanse away the ***** wails
compacted under fingernails
A selection of smell good things
lotions accompanied by fuzzy things
to rub away and radiate the aura
of calm, balance, and tranquility
Lavender is condusive to many
different uses, inhaling the graces
of herbal essence, soothing said coolings
inducing mood peelings of layers of grime
a skin liberative—figuratively speaking
Flowers of passion brew thoughts into actions
silent buds permeating scents
so invigoratingly innocent
Feb 20, 2015
Feb 20, 2015 at 9:03 PM UTC
Love is a ***** soup going stale but steaming like it's brand new;
And I'm Oliver twist walking up to the *** with a rusty spoon full of desire and hope asking for more but getting none.
Love is a Doctor gathering dead bodies and shackling them up in chains;
And I'm a green freak with Frankenstein bolts ****** through my head walking around with only a mumble to muster trying to love people who just want to run away.
Love is a white paper rolled so finely, full of sedatives and drugs;
And I'm sitting by a fire reaching in for a log to smoke.
Love is puzzle made by Einstein and Sam Loyd;
And I'm a child with eyes made of glass and hands made of thorns crying to my mother because that puzzle is a *****
Love is Navy Seal training on a beach covered in cold water spilling blood for a chance;
And I'm a pot-smoking hippie who holds up signs and tells soldiers they’re monsters as I take a puff of death.
Love is a ten-syllable word compacted into one;
And I'm a hooked on phonics children’s thesaurus struggling to find a comparison that I can actually pronounce.
Love is a white egg timer sitting on the fridge set to all nines;
And I'm a busy housewife waiting to cook dinner at the sound of its bell.
Love is a robber with a 45 in his belt;
And I'm an eager dad trying to protect his family with a wooden stick.
Love is hot coffee from a luxury beverage shop;
And I'm a plastic party cup melting away.
Love is a doctor with a PHD in heart surgery;
And I'm a sick child waiting with his mother with no healthcare ******* on a free doctor’s-office lollypop.
Love is a huge pink eraser;
And I'm a graphite pencil struggling to write while me and the eraser fight.
Love is a pickup truck speeding through town drunk;
And I'm a lost puppy running through the same intersection looking for my owner.
Love is meant for fish;
And I'm a bird.
Dec 21, 2012
Dec 21, 2012 at 12:18 PM UTC
Perhaps your body is composed of thousands of stars.
Limitless constellations make up your fingertips
your eyelashes
and the curvatures in your ears.
Galaxies are interwoven under your skin and how you glow.
You glow like the moon in the sky when it is at its brightest.
When nothing compares to the sight of the moon and the tiny specks in the sky are just insignificant floating circles.
Your hair flows like the Nile River.
Boundless, pristine water overflowing at my fingertips.
You are more than the ocean; you are all the bodies of water in the earth combined.
You are the last drop of coffee in my old, vintage, mauve red mug.
The last caffeine induced sip that flows through my oesophagus with a relinquishing taste of sweetness.
You are the sweet nectar that hummingbirds look for in flowers and when they can't find flowers with a taste that will satisfy them, they settle on trees.
You are the trees that produce oxygen, and the branches of the trees that tower over me like a netted blanket.
You are the cotton blanket keeping me warm on windy or rainy days because it doesn't snow in the Philippines.
But if you were snow, I would gather you in a plastic container and keep you in my ice compartment so you wouldn't melt.
You make me feel like I'm melting.
Like every possible emotion i possess flows out of me like vapor.
And you are the smoke that forms after you've blown the flame of a candle; you gently float in the air surrounding the space where the flame used to be.
You are the compacted tissues in my chest; you fill the void I once had.
You comprise my veins, my arteries and vesicles; you are a vessel of euphoric elation.
You are my utopia.
You are.
Nov 14, 2012
Nov 14, 2012 at 9:22 AM UTC
Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright!
The bridal of the earth and sky—
The dew shall weep thy fall to-night;
For thou must die.
Sweet rose, whose hue angry and brave
Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye,
Thy root is ever in its grave,
And thou must die.
Sweet spring, full of sweet days and roses,
A box where sweets compacted lie,
My music shows ye have your closes,
And all must die.
Only a sweet and virtuous soul,
Like season’d timber, never gives;
But though the whole world turn to coal,
Then chiefly lives.
5.2k
Lacquer metal, finest degree
Eggshell maiden dancing, skirts turned free
Tossed leaf nestle, a glory in a hidden theatre
Dark privileged passions creep in and listen.
The dirt around your feet compacted,
The dress around your friends contrived
But you look so natural in those seams of transplacental
Defied by the native over-leaf
What privileged thought found comfort there
What Rubenesqued dresses blushed in joy
At white marble hugging thought
And privileged smells adorning your excitement
The path beyond your feet leads nowhere
For your sight spins where your eyebrows lead
Round and round in close circles
Amongst those eyes who cracked your paint
Aug 30, 2018
Aug 30, 2018 at 5:12 AM UTC
Aware of tides
a castle fortifies
with memories of compacted glory,
splendid defiance
lost
to brine horizon,
a hailed day
turned whaling ship grey.
Jun 27, 2013
Jun 27, 2013 at 12:36 PM UTC
How it is fickle, leaving one alone to wander
the halls of the skull with the fluorescents
softly flickering. It rests on the head
like a bird nest, woven of twigs and tinsel
and awkward as soon as one stops to look.
That pile of fallen leaves drifting from
the brain to the fingertip burned on the stove,
to the grooves in that man's voice
as he coos to his dog, blowing into the leaves
of books with moonlit opossums
and Chevrolets easing down the roads
of one's bones. And now it plucks a single
tulip from the pixelated blizzard: yet
*itself is a swarm, a pulse with no
indigenous form, the brain's lunar halo.*
Our compacted galaxy, its constellations
trembling like flies caught in a spider web,
until we die, and then the flies
buzz away—while another accidental
coherence counts to three to pass the time
or notes the berries on the bittersweet vine
strewn in the spruces, red pebbles dropped
in the brain's gray pool. How it folds itself
like a map to fit in a pocket, how it unfolds
a fraying map from the pocket of the day.
May 2, 2014
May 2, 2014 at 6:02 AM UTC
Blissful the wind feels my skin
Touching it smoothly, blows against it, ruffling
More and more, I find a sense of calmness.
A purity overturned, and made pure again.
Stars shine, but as they age they turn different colors.
Compacted, these aged stars of life become beautiful jewels.
But moreover, the persons mean more to us,
Because of their heart, and their character.
The love purifies our impurity somehow.
Not long ago, I was so miserable.
I wanted to take back all of those years.
I thought the pain I caused made me the most evil thing on earth.
I felt like I was nothing worth anything.
The fact that you didn't seem to care when others would've..
That made it worse.
But I have no regrets.
Everything has woven together beautifully.
And through love, purity is now pure again.
Purity in a richer form.
In the midst of gloom,
No one sees the immense pain I carry.
Fearing the worst, I always died before the actuality.
I was so immune to feeling.
This purity I feel I now have -
No it is not innocent, but it is beautiful,
Blissful, unforgettable, unimaginable.
Apr 14, 2015
Apr 14, 2015 at 3:29 PM UTC
*Her intellect driven,
melted chocolate drowning tongue.
Succulent splendor
too enjoyable to swallow.
Drooping sliding angel-gaze
mesmerizing wafer,
compacted sugar drug
hypnotizing love chase.
Daily Addiction, dissolving
companion of desire.
Not for hire
nor for sale,
our lust we will conspire.*
Jun 24, 2010
Jun 24, 2010 at 12:47 PM UTC
the snow, white
soft like an albino Afro
then the compacted crystalline crunch
cracked under the weight of a human foot.
Jan 22, 2013
Jan 22, 2013 at 4:21 AM UTC
It poured and poured,
The clouds were relieved,
trapped for so long,
Felt burden less as it splatted,
Creating a ripple
as it landed on the water
or landing softly,
On the green grass,
Making it moist,
Or crashing on to the compacted concrete,
Forming the pitter-patter sound,
Petrichor smell spreading everywhere,
It fell and fell,
Until the clouds realized,
That after the rain,
There was always sunshine,
And that was how her story began,
With a bit of sunshine,
And a bit of rain,
But she was the rainbow that was created,
In that beautiful combination.
May 5, 2018
May 5, 2018 at 3:10 AM UTC
Can you feel this fear
Orchestrated by a tear
Made by a scared thought
Pushed by what the mind taught
Listen now to this trembling story
Illustrated by an apologetic sorry
Compacted by a mirror broken
Agony of those words never spoken
Time came when terror made a mark
Erupted to ignite this morbid spark
Darkness becomes a tad complicated
Sep 13, 2014
Sep 13, 2014 at 6:01 PM UTC
Watching the clouds is such a calming activity. I wonder why I don’t do it more. I suppose it’s because during the year “I don’t have the time”, but what does that even mean? There is always time, time is continuous. It is fluid, I am not reminded of this often enough. I like being outside during the time just a little bit before sunset to watch the majesty of nature welcome the night. Spending time with my dogs is rather pleasant too, I don’t do it frequently enough, I know. The sky has slowly turned into shades of grey and the clouds are growing heavy. The final calls of the birds are echoing off the dusty concrete as they call to each other in what I can only assume is their language. There is not too much longer that I can sit outside for before it’s completely dark which I know I wouldn’t enjoy. There’s too much uncertainty about the night compacted with the well known and well repeated fact that I can’t see. It’s pretty much a nightmare combination. However I have to say, there’s something special about sitting barefoot in the grass watching the sun go down with the only company being your dogs.
It’s quiet. It didn’t used to be. My parents have been fighting for who knows how long tonight. It’s not great background noise when I’m trying to relax. There’s a motorcycle racing down my street there is definitely something to living behind the protection of a driveway. I couldn’t imagine how awful it would be to live next to a highway. It’s peaceful watching the clouds slowly amble across the sky changing color ever so slightly. I really enjoy summer in this moment. The gentle breeze, the kisses from my dog, the slowly setting sun, and melodic hymn from the birds create a vision that seems to be stripped from a movie scene.
Jun 29, 2018
Jun 29, 2018 at 9:36 PM UTC
A world of desolation
And romancing sewers:
Rotting animal carcass
Asymmetrical,
Compacted in art
Galleries
And praised for its realism,
Curators drawn to its
Intricate textures and
Cobblestoned streets—
They sprawl,
Like a cannibal's playground.
Twisted-
A street map
Spilling over
Like their stomachs.
Dec 20, 2013
Dec 20, 2013 at 9:52 AM UTC
When was the last time I came here?
I can't remember the last time I needed this place.
And then all these images, memories, flooded through me.
I remembered everything that had happened in my past
that might have changed who I became.
Every sad, cynical moment,
whether it be a tragedy on TV
or a revelation from my own experience.
And all the incredible beauty I had seen in my short life.
Every time I'd come here last,
I'd come with a sad and lonely, afraid and anxious, numb and brooding mind.
Here I was in the woods, the way they had been for so long,
once-delicate leaves compacted into gray, crunching masses
on the trodden dirt
and rusted, crumpled cans
marking the slow death of the place I'd always treasured.
I sat down hard, saturating my worn black jeans
with the tired old mud of this sad place,
and sifted through the dead leaves
for some of that beauty that was my faintest memory.
There was none.
It was almost as if my mind had created that memory on its own...
And of course that's what had happened.
I'd always been good at imagining and wishing.
How sad to think that now imagining is all I'll be able to do.
Feb 17, 2013
Feb 17, 2013 at 10:22 PM UTC
~
"memory runs back farther than mythology."
two years,
two months,
and two days,
in a cabin they built
near Walden Pond.
on a mission of gravity,
the heavens forming a spotlight
on centrifugal force,
abroad the hollow mind,
chronically untethered.
"I went to the woods to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms..."
this ship's captain was an architect,
but her starblazing failed
to break ground,
so this life is now a structure settled upon sand,
and way out yonder,
where there is
no blade of grass,
just weeds growing out from under the floor.
but her daughters are
grinning magnets,
passionate machines.
"copy that?...," asks Houston.
she takes a long, hard swallow,
the shadow of a bell
inspiring the astronaut in her
to shoot for incapable stars,
but the bell she hears now
is that of an alarm clock
telling her it's time to wake up:
shoulders straight.
hands free.
arms strong.
fingers stiff.
chronically untethered.
she's not looking for new days,
she is a new day,
compacted out of water,
tired of changing real estate
and showering with
other people's success.
those loud kids, her kids, play
down the hall, in the beehive.
radio jargon's on full blast too
and telling her where
to buy and sell today's instant pleasure.
she's busy now with self-stimulation,
Betty Dodson Method,
then mixing orange powder
with 100 year old whiskey
kept in the lunar module:
it's a spacewalk to eternity, faster-than-light:
she sees broken pool tables
and backyard swings.
she sees 'ordinary'
checked off on the calendar.
she sees 'happiness'
hiding in an old photo of Murphy's Camp.
she wakes to
her husband, Houston,
in a holding pattern,
she feels him moving, whispering,
and touching something
far off inside of her,
but not moored
in a specific time or place.
in search of where
she now exists
(if she even existed at all),
her memories feel artificial
in that she lacks
the emotional attachment
that comes with
actually having lived them.
there are no answers, no choices.
only reactions.
it is always going to be
that broken state of things:
these days of heaven,
chronically untethered.
"only that day dawns to which I'm awake. there is more day to dawn, I suppose. and like us, the sun is but a morning star upon being dreamed into existence..."
~
Jul 25, 2022
Jul 25, 2022 at 9:19 PM UTC
To
know love
is to be certain that
our locked gaze holds an intangible truth that words could never do justice.
The same way your stable palm
cupping my cheek makes the shadows
dance for more sunshine.
My heart finds it difficult
to make a logical appeal to my brain,
because the way you look at me is
unexplainable,
the way I feel when you squeeze my thigh is
irrational,
and the way we love is
enigmatic
To know with certainty
is to get lost in your eyes and be joyfully surprised that you always find me.
To love is to find felicity
in our mutual surrender to our greatest strength and weakness in each other.
To certainly know love is to discover
the simple satisfaction of your head in my lap,
my hands in your hair and our hearts elated
in a moment of peace.
To know
love certainly is
to feel
the sting of truth and appreciate it.
For without this truth
our locked gaze would not break down walls
that were built over years of pain
preceding this newfound freedom in love
Free to learn and grow without the fear of abandonment or rejection.
What is love if it is not everything
you despise and everything you need
compacted into one ridiculously handsome person with the power to destroy you....
but never could and never would.
For such destruction might
collapse mountains around the world.
Clouds would fall from the sky
Trees would split into two and then
Owls
couldn't perch on branches
to watch over me and you.
To know love is to be intelligently ignorant
To accept the inevitable torment of an equal
Yet refusing to let eachother go.
and
Certainly love
is never certain
But choosing to know love is
certainly, to live
Nov 14, 2013
Nov 14, 2013 at 12:15 AM UTC
We crossed into Louisiana
Right about witching hour
The energy there
Invades the aura
Years of compacted sorrow
Combined with the
Old ways of root doctors
And esoteric power
You take the Hoodoo
To the crossroads
We're in the back roads
Of Monroe
They talk to you there
Ya know
I put my bare feet
To the swampy grasses
At the railroad tracks
Illuminated by the waxing moon
Hail Hecate!
We envoke thee
Commit this wax and ash
To the earth
Blessed be )0(
May 9, 2017
May 9, 2017 at 8:29 PM UTC
I'm not interested
Is that so hard to say?
I'm not interested in you
Those words come out like butter and yet the thing you try and do
Is hold onto to me for later
Put me to the side
There I sit hoping and praying
I'll be the apple of your eye
But you're not interested in me
You know it
You're not interested in me
Let me go so at least if I cry my eyes will finaly see
Are you so selfish to keep me around?
To trod on me and smile
Each time I am your turning point
When you cry tears of crocodiles
Just let me go!
Please!
Just let me go right now!
Tell me to my face that you dislike me! How?
With sincerity!
With bluntness!
With no sugar-coated words!
You've led me on for far too long to the point where it's absurd
Your killing me
You really are
My hopes and dreams compacted
Into the scene you've set for me and constantly reenacted
**** you!
You vile creature!
You deserve not a tear from my eye!
But here I stand with my heart in your hand and knife you put in my side
Oh dear coward
Just say it
Say you're not interested in me
So at least you and I can walk away with some shred of dignity
But you won't
Will you?
You'll keep me safely in a pocket
Not telling me a single thing, putting me in your secondhand locket
Just say it, please
I beg of you
Just for once say it. Please.
Tell me deep down you've always known you're not interested in me...
Oct 3, 2012
Oct 3, 2012 at 10:29 AM UTC
-
we live and die
within a box
with data
at all angles
in an age
where innocence
is compacted
to rectangles
here we see
the wizardry
of Bill Gates in
his valley
the children with
their pinwheel eyes
texting Steve or Sally
around the house
the computer mouse
enthralls another tyke
instantly their Facebook
has another "like"
blood and gore
are commonplace
the victims have no names
what the heck
do you expect?
it is all a
game
they will thus
ENTRAP YOU
you'll do as they bid
for your pleasure
I'll announce
The Wizards of the Id
SoulSurvivor
(C) 6/5/2016
Jun 6, 2016
Jun 6, 2016 at 3:01 AM UTC
The book isn’t quiet at night.
My mind tosses to turn the pages quicker,
so I might fall asleep faster.
The book doesn’t quiet.
The pages turning sound—
the slow waves of an ocean,
causing the hermit crabto long for the sea.
Ticking against the plastic hermit crab aquarium,
hermits make up their own laws of time. Longing
just to reach the sliced trees that lay as the floor beneath me.
Knots come out on the floor under my bed
begging to tell the stories of their wood rings.
Hundreds of years of uncut life—until suddenly,
streaming out on branches from every tree—is compacted
into the paper on this page
and into the hardwood underneath
that begins shifting slowly to driftwood.
Standing still with the grains of time resting at my feet.
Hearing the sea crying out too for some sleep,
the sea crying out to be a pond,always resting.
With every turned page,
the sand brushes, wanting the hermit ***** to come back
from their hand painted, tattooed shells.
To dance once more on the sand beneath the sea foam,
under delicately night speckled atmosphere
beneath a far off silent observer
we humans call the man in the moon.
Turning pages are slowly closed,
placed aside once more,
left alone to stare at hermit *****
Hiding in their hermit crab aquariums, they
await the 6am alarm clock’s tick.
Mar 1, 2010
Mar 1, 2010 at 1:39 PM UTC
Capri
roofless cubes, spidery with wire,
cakes of azure and enzian;
above at the Villa San Michele
Rilke smiles down at the broken beaches,
coves of defiant waves, compacted sea
Pompeii
a chessboard of honest stones
open to a sky of hushed shouts;
we huddle in a ***** frame
of another life, a stopped day
Napoli
warm and secret, olive-eyed
you make a new face
as we gaze from a bus:
an act of moment
Apr 29, 2017
Apr 29, 2017 at 7:36 AM UTC
Gravitational forces
towards something better
as if it exists
buried beneath
some distant desert
what is it
that strains to convey
itself
in this broken poetry
as if truth were at
the tip of its tongue
perhaps it's to feel real
for only a moment
to escape the routine
of making a living
which only yields
a skeleton
compacted in dirt
Take my writing
let it fly upon the wind
let it touch the four corners
of Earth's spiritless surface
Take it farther!
upon the wings of doves
and sound waves of conversation
to red and gaseous planets
let even the martian men
attempt to
translate
Feb 18, 2018
Feb 18, 2018 at 5:47 PM UTC
It stands on a mildly sloping hill,
That is dotted with haphazard trees.
Overlooking a long dried-up creek,
That is now just compacted leaves.
To the right of it lays a few broken posts,
That, I'm sure, once, helped to contain,
Some cattle that surely supported the farm,
That used to be just down the lane.
To the left, there is just a hint of a path,
That must have been very well-trod.
And, farther off, a much- bustling city,
That, back then, would've looked quite odd.
Behind it, the ground hoards some rubble,
Of a farmhouse that fell long ago.
And, amazingly, this old rusty mailbox,
Holds a letter with no place to go.
Jun 3, 2010
Jun 3, 2010 at 5:49 PM UTC