"corkscrew" poems
A graceful water weaving dolphin
swirls wakes of gentle waves -
a white, silver blue phantom
shimmering in the noonday sun.
Piercing the surface,
she dances an aquatic ballet
of corkscrew pirouettes
and majestic somersaults.
Diving beneath the spray
she churns her engine upward -
soaring through the flaming hoop
to the "oohs" and applause
of a throng of short-sleeved hominids
bleachered beyond the rails.
Plunging into quiet depths,
she lingers for a moment
perhaps to recall the fresh sea air
and the borderless waters
in the golden days before the ships came.
January, 2007
Aug 4, 2013
Aug 4, 2013 at 10:52 PM UTC
(March, 1919)A LIAR goes in fine clothes.
A liar goes in rags.
A liar is a liar, clothes or no clothes.
A liar is a liar and lives on the lies he tells and dies in a life of lies.
And the stonecutters earn a living-with lies-on the tombs of liars.
Aliar looks 'em in the eye
And lies to a woman,
Lies to a man, a pal, a child, a fool.
And he is an old liar; we know him many years back.
A liar lies to nations.
A liar lies to the people.
A liar takes the blood of the people
And drinks this blood with a laugh and a lie,
A laugh in his neck,
A lie in his mouth.
And this liar is an old one; we know him many years.
He is straight as a dog's hind leg.
He is straight as a corkscrew.
He is white as a black cat's foot at midnight.
The tongue of a man is tied on this,
On the liar who lies to nations,
The liar who lies to the people.
The tongue of a man is tied on this
And ends: To hell with 'em all.
To hell with 'em all.
It's a song hard as a riveter's hammer,
Hard as the sleep of a crummy hobo,
Hard as the sleep of a lousy doughboy,
Twisted as a shell-shock idiot's gibber.
The liars met where the doors were locked.
They said to each other: Now for war.
The liars fixed it and told 'em: Go.
Across their tables they fixed it up,
Behind their doors away from the mob.
And the guns did a job that nicked off millions.
The guns blew seven million off the map,
The guns sent seven million west.
Seven million shoving up the daisies.
Across their tables they fixed it up,
The liars who lie to nations.
And now
Out of the butcher's job
And the boneyard junk the maggots have cleaned,
Where the jaws of skulls tell the jokes of war ghosts,
Out of this they are calling now: Let's go back where we were.
Let us run the world again, us, us.
Where the doors are locked the liars say: Wait and we'll cash in again.
So I hear The People talk.
I hear them tell each other:
Let the strong men be ready.
Let the strong men watch.
Let your wrists be cool and your head clear.
Let the liars get their finish,
The liars and their waiting game, waiting a day again
To open the doors and tell us: War! get out to your war again.
So I hear The People tell each other:
Look at to-day and to-morrow.
Fix this clock that nicks off millions
When The Liars say it's time.
Take things in your own hands.
To hell with 'em all,
The liars who lie to nations,
The liars who lie to The People.
10.5k
You breathed your last breath from the air
in this room;
that threadbare Persian carpet
holds flakes from your skin;
hairs from your head
corkscrew the dented cushions
scattered and idly waiting on the sofa;
bed linen scented with your sweat
the goose down doona that stole
your last warmth;
sleep spit and tears
human moisture that permeates
the acrylic layers of your pillow;
an eyebrow hair wedged in the tweezers;
a clipped nail that flew off
somewhere out of sight;
that new toothbrush used only once;
your flannel and towel still drying out;
the wet press footprint on the bathroom mat;
the talcum powdered slippers
abandoned under the brass bed.
Each moment of everyday
we shed ourselves
shed dead cells and renew -
a cycle of shedding
until the last
shedding of ourselves.
© M.L. Emmett
Aug 6, 2014
Aug 6, 2014 at 7:01 PM UTC
It is snowing and death bugs me
as stubborn as insomnia.
The fierce bubbles of chalk,
the little white lesions
settle on the street outside.
It is snowing and the ninety
year old woman who was combing
out her long white wraith hair
is gone, embalmed even now,
even tonight her arms are smooth
muskets at her side and nothing
issues from her but her last word - "Oh." Surprised by death.
It is snowing. Paper spots
are falling from the punch.
Hello? Mrs. Death is here!
She suffers according to the digits
of my hate. I hear the filaments
of alabaster. I would lie down
with them and lift my madness
off like a wig. I would lie
outside in a room of wool
and let the snow cover me.
Paris white or flake white
or argentine, all in the washbasin
of my mouth, calling, "Oh."
I am empty. I am witless.
Death is here. There is no
other settlement. Snow!
See the mark, the pock, the pock!
Meanwhile you pour tea
with your handsome gentle hands.
Then you deliberately take your
forefinger and point it at my temple,
saying, "You suicide *****
I'd like to take a corkscrew
and ***** out all your brains
and you'd never be back ever."
And I close my eyes over the steaming
tea and see God opening His teeth.
"Oh." He says.
I see the child in me writing, "Oh."
Oh, my dear, not why.
3.9k
On the top of the Crumpetty Tree
The Quangle Wangle sat,
But his face you could not see,
On account of his ****** Hat.
For his Hat was a hundred and two feet wide,
With ribbons and bibbons on every side
And bells, and buttons, and loops, and lace,
So that nobody every could see the face
Of the Quangle Wangle Quee.
The Quangle Wangle said
To himself on the Crumpetty Tree, --
"Jam; and jelly; and bread;
"Are the best of food for me!
"But the longer I live on this Crumpetty Tree
"The plainer than ever it seems to me
"That very few people come this way
"And that life on the whole is far from gay!"
Said the Quangle Wangle Quee.
But there came to the Crumpetty Tree,
Mr. and Mrs. Canary;
And they said, -- "Did every you see
"Any spot so charmingly airy?
"May we build a nest on your lovely Hat?
"Mr. Quangle Wangle, grant us that!
"O please let us come and build a nest
"Of whatever material suits you best,
"Mr. Quangle Wangle Quee!"
And besides, to the Crumpetty Tree
Came the Stork, the Duck, and the Owl;
The Snail, and the Bumble-Bee,
The Frog, and the Fimble Fowl;
(The Fimble Fowl, with a corkscrew leg;)
And all of them said, -- "We humbly beg,
"We may build out homes on your lovely Hat, --
"Mr. Quangle Wangle, grant us that!
"Mr. Quangle Wangle Quee!"
And the Golden Grouse came there,
And the Pobble who has no toes, --
And the small Olympian bear, --
And the **** with a luminous nose.
And the Blue Baboon, who played the Flute, --
And the Orient Calf from the Land of Tute, --
And the Attery Squash, and the Bisky Bat, --
All came and built on the lovely Hat
Of the Quangle Wangle Quee.
And the Quangle Wangle said
To himself on the Crumpetty Tree, --
"When all these creatures move
"What a wonderful noise there'll be!"
And at night by the light of the Mulberry moon
They danced to the Flute of the Blue Baboon,
On the broad green leaves of the Crumpetty Tree,
And all were as happy as happy could be,
With the Quangle Wangle Quee.
3k
I kiss secrets to your fate
a forest tree of lights amongst
velvet curtains
I don’t think about
your consciousness
when you are kissing me
but imagine your
tattersall expression
resting on my flannel
you
perfect love chameleon
you
queen of extremely small kisses
I catch you looking with
a sideways eye
always twisted in my memory
a corkscrew willow
a head of tangled roots
pulled from the moist soil
I lean in to blend
kiss?
why not.
Sep 23, 2017
Sep 23, 2017 at 5:47 PM UTC
I wish I was your little
whiskey girl and you
were pouring yourself
into my bottle to come
drink me up.
But you drained me
dryer than the Savannah.
Now men build boats
inside me, and I haven't
a corkscrew to get out.
I wish I was your little
*** doll and you were
dizzy over me, slurring
I love you's and burning
with me in your throat.
But you don't drink
expensive liquor anymore
not since you spent your money
on losing lottery tickets
and vinyl.
I'm top shelf
but that is only because
you put me there
to forget about me.
And now you drown
yourself in wells,
blacking out
the parts of you
that loved me.
May 1, 2012
May 1, 2012 at 7:21 PM UTC
Caught in-between a hard problem and a tragedy,
one which all thoughts conceive a calumny.
False religious declarations brought hope, a preconceived act, with all past failures examined and attacked, like a quasi-contract.
How can infinite knowledge and power create such hate, terror, and pain, similar to a suicide pact?
How does one find their own avenue? Without being stuck in the heart with a corkscrew?
Is personal discovery extinct? Do we forget the past, subconsciously ensure the failures of our future, and presently live with no imprint?
Is individuality impossible?
The characteristics are defined and distinct, but each soul's technique is quietly fluttering away from this lost mystique.
Discover the reality of you, rise up, revolt, and fight the deceitful greed and promised happiness brewed in realities poisonous stew, as it's faithful traits of trust, love, and care that create our optimistic views.
To be happy; an outdated phrase soon to be extinct.
When the downfall of morality can unfold in a blink, as we subconsciously conjure a future drearily bleak.
May 6, 2017
May 6, 2017 at 11:45 AM UTC
I am the bobby pins and hair clips you find in corners of your room, on your dresser, or behind your bed.
I am the pictures on your wall that I made when I was once manic.
I am the crumbs you find in your bed that was once my “three or four nights a week bed” which I used as a table.
I am the cafe where we met, and kept meeting.
I am day drives to no where.
I am the Middletown train station before the movies.
I am the mint lotion that keeps the bugs away.
I am the notes I would leave you, that found their way on your wall.
I am the bandaids.
I am that strand of medium length brown hair you will find in your shower
I am that guy, from trivia at that other cafe, that I wanted us to be friends with.
I am the hands that would unlock your locked pointer finger.
I am that key on your key chain.
I am the leftover tea that is always too hot for me to drink, and is left near your bed.
I am ice cream with CHERRIES, and edamame.
I am the sheets on your bed.
I am the downing film theater when you needed to feel better.
I am New Jersey.
I am the reason Netflix recommends Independent dramas with strong female lead. I am the netflix.
I am the stain on your mattress.
I am the drool on your pillow.
I am the sugar in your cabinet above your roomates whiskey.
I am all of the groceries and dates I paid for.
I am all those pictures of me on your phone which made their way to your computer.
I am the light wash boyfriend jeans.
I am that bottle of wine that sits with all other bottles, that you see when you walk out of your room and into the kitchen, and out the door.
I am the reason you once felt content.
I am the reason the corkscrew sits on that stool.
I am the reason why your toothbrush is wet, before you use it.
I am the two red sharpie marks left on those sheets that I got us.
I am mexico. The trip to mexico that could have almost seemed doable.
I am the sent of oils which remind you of hippies.
I am the shoes left at your door, or the teavana jug of tea in the kitchen right now.
I am the fourth of July. I am that pool we never swim in. I am the projected films on the fence.
I am the talker, the thought keeper, the fighter, the writer.
I am Sensual Amber
I am UBE
I am my legs on the wall when I dry them.
I am the tiny pills on your dresser.
I am just someone your next girlfriend will be better than.
I am the bobby pins.
Jul 17, 2013
Jul 17, 2013 at 3:53 PM UTC
Celebrating father's day early
With Billy in his black lab tee
And Abby passing cards
Under the table to me
We close down the restaurant
The sky falls in sheets as we're leaving
And wet hair chases me
Into the wine shop down the street
Where I decide to be polite
Not just dry
And I buy a corkscrew
Now I can drink the wine
My ex boyfriend made me
Now I can get tipsy and
Finish the book my current man gave me
It took 8 years
2 deaths
And too many well-timed broken hearts
To bring us together
Collaterally
It's almost too much
And on my drive home
From dinner
A dive that's now our
Family favorite
With a menu I met
Chasing a boy before I came to my senses
And my stars aligned like white picket fences
To make May and my new man
Taste like heaven
A car swerves in front of me
The license plate reads
SRNDPD
The ***** cut me off again
Jun 16, 2013
Jun 16, 2013 at 10:30 PM UTC
Can’t wait to be seventy
With knees that hang
Like fleshy skin tags
Over my knee highs
And Custard feet
All squelched into my Clarks.
No prunes
In my grocery basket
Just lots of cheese
Chocolate and beer
Which will make me gassy
So I’ll ask for a backrub
To get my wind up.
I’ll say those things
I’ve always wanted to say
And not come off
Like a social landmine
Because people will just think
I’m batty.
They’ll smile
And nod
And make corkscrew gestures
Behind my back
But I won’t care.
I shall say
**** a lot
Because people
Will not expect that
From a portly granny
With a blue rinse.
But I shall never be unkind
Of all of the ugly words
You can use
**** is probably
The most benign.
I shall read great books
Filled with ideas
And speak to the deaf geriatrics
In the old folks home
And say things like-
So what did you think of that?
And even as they
Clutch their hearts
To prepare for their exit
From this world
I shall say-
I feel that strongly too
And in this way
Everything shall
Be part of my interlude
It shall all be about me
Me
Me
Me
Jan 17, 2010
Jan 17, 2010 at 1:05 PM UTC
fall through the floor of the elevator,
held up by corkscrew works:
here it is quiet and
there is invisible fog and
the characters are dull replicas
save for the receptionist,
just a lonely purple and orange
painted singular eye,
and her assistant, the trace.
*when I've found someone
I feel even lonelier
to know how hollow they are,
just presets and language*
and there is
a terrible hole
in the vents,
or the attic,
where
everything leaches out
to the colourless
uncreated
nothing.
Apr 17, 2013
Apr 17, 2013 at 6:23 AM UTC
Imagine your mind
as a corkscrew
shiny and smooth and silver
and sharp at one end
to open multitudes
to unlock bottles of sweet red wine
and pour it out
for all to taste
to drink wonders deeply
and inhale aromas
but instead you
spiral
until the cork crumbles
around you and
mildewy mulch
falls into the bottle
spoils the wine
with bitter silt.
It tastes like ash now.
Sludge.
Ruined.
Spilled
on the ground.
Corkscrew mind,
how far you fell
how much you dismembered
how wasted your
sharp, yet silken self.
Nov 14, 2013
Nov 14, 2013 at 3:05 PM UTC
In Room 204 of the Lancaster Motel,
I ease myself into the bath.
Music plays. It's the kind
of pan flute and finger-picked
guitar tune you hear over fuzzed out speakers
in grocery stores. I don't know the source.
The place smells of mildew
and cheap coffee and self pleasure
and Febreeze. I'm tired.
More tired than I've ever been, I think.
Do I still have a job? Until I call in to check, I suppose.
And I suppose this pocket knife will have to do.
I never seem to have a corkscrew on hand when
my mood calls for wine. I stab and jimmy the cork
until I can pry it loose with my teeth. A few
bits of cork float on the surface of the wine.
This does not stop me, nor slow me.
Pollyanna and I stayed in 206,
a detail that calls attention to itself, a detail that
longs for a poetic phrase,
yet I feel little other than the
dull thud of coincidence.
I remember asking her
before that first time if
she thought of *** as
a form or erasure or
addition. She said
both sounded nice.
And something
in the way she said nice,
led me to believe
she landed on an unspoken
third option. I no
longer had an appetite for *** that evening,
but we acted on it to satisfy expectation.
She turned down the air conditioner,
and we laid there shivering and saying little.
She told me not to leave her.
I said I wouldn't.
I'm in the tub now and the bottle is almost empty
and all of this is so selfish and stupid
and I'm just doing it for the sake of habit
and sad sack poetry and ultimately
an "I-Eat-Pussy" consolation fedora in heaven. And I'm
self aware but the trajectory spirals against my will.
And my life entire burns a little slapstick,
so I get outside of myself--watch, enjoy.
Nov 5, 2018
Nov 5, 2018 at 9:26 PM UTC
Frost bites the early morning air
With slight sentiments of late October chill
The stars twilight in their abysmal obsidian oblivion
Exploding supernovas in a heavy silent achromatic chasm
Gnarled swaying branches of the ancient corkscrew willow
Lashes about with a fevered frenzy of demonic intent
Howling coyote wind whips wildly
Lacerating frigid frost-bitten animal skin
Numbing and chilling both bone and marrow
The sun has yet to rise
Keeping its warmth concealed
For a few hours further
Feb 20, 2012
Feb 20, 2012 at 6:21 PM UTC
I brought her one flower
from the cemetery I borrowed
love leads to death
but it can work the other way
so the blackbird on the telephone wire say
I brought her one flower
a bouquet -- wasteful, sour
too many kisses cheapen
how else to pay by the hour
so the meadowlark's **** showers
I brought her one flower
in a corduroy suit, sunglassed tower
a corkscrew and 12 apostles
too far from shore, too young to cry
so the stupid penguin tries to fly
I brought her one flower
in some water, a tired bower
"I didn't try my hardest."
"I know." Wish my *** to the moon
So the robin lets out a morose croon
Oct 26, 2012
Oct 26, 2012 at 6:49 PM UTC
twisted words turn into twisted people
as they run around trying to seem well
and when they're twisting themselves more and more;
and when they unwind, slowly and vapidly,
they all start to hit the floor.
the bottle slid down to the floor so long ago,
but you were the only one who were to ever know
the reason i'd twisted the truth so much into a lie;
the reason i'd twisted what you saw, languidly,
through your twisted eyes.
as we all fell out in our fallout shelters
our twisted lives all, in an instant, began to welter
to the corkscrew sound waves coming out now;
to the corkscrews and corks lying about, sadly,
because we were all gonna die here, someway, somehow.
Oct 4, 2012
Oct 4, 2012 at 4:14 AM UTC
rusty knees folded under a
quilt weaved by the calloused hands of
particles of grandmothers' grandmothers,
head heavy on a
down-breasted pillow,
rising and falling softly
in a bedroom den,
whispering relative semantics of
a testament revised
while outside, tornadoes uproot trees
and displace plywood houses
with charred pies frozen on the windowsill,
entombed from the harsh winter's frost
and incubation in false ovens;
i recall seasonal naps of
drifting and wakening
and colourful mosaics
painted across the dreamland sky,
drinking cups of melatonin-laced chamomile
steeped in an angel teapot that induced
psychosomatic apparitions in constant relay
from earhole to earhole and
assisted with pulling an endless rope out of my
mouth which had been tied to the pit of my ulcerated stomach,
my head twisting in a corkscrew spiral,
meeting a longing gaze
and twisting back again,
oh! my bottled neck!
you retell poems softly spoken loudly
with my kisses on your heavy eyelids,
before we drift through the sheer veil
into unified consciousness,
taking a glimpse at our crowning home in
an infinite land,
enveloped in time-honoured Love
bestowed upon us in
pure, Divine fate,
watching endless words of
'i love you', 'i love you'
trickle like sand though a
heavenly hour glass figure;
to wake, a chance to celebrate,
to die, a chance to find each other again.
Mar 10, 2014
Mar 10, 2014 at 10:27 PM UTC
I never knew how to
write poetry correctly.
It's not like it comes with an
instruction manual
that reads in italicized letters
"dig so deep into your head that if a brain aneurism were to spontaneously combust, you'd be the first to know about it"
No one told me that my emotions
would corkscrew like falling
meteorites every time I picked
up a pen.
No one told me that the thoughts
would sometimes dry up
and leave me searching like
a dog who buried a bone and
then developed a rare type
of amnesia.
No one told me that sometimes
it would be hard to get the words
onto the page without tears
falling like a liquid avalanche.
There was no instruction manual
or italicized letters. There was only me,
and a lot of lessons to learn.
Dec 28, 2015
Dec 28, 2015 at 12:16 PM UTC
I meant to write another poem
but time's corkscrew drills
the ribcage
my dreams are acid
the thought - a decayed staircase
don't know what I want to say
Future seems a forgotten poem
gravitation is not a joke inside the bones
I should have learnt to respect you,
death
Oct 1, 2016
Oct 1, 2016 at 8:42 AM UTC
Thought I was high
Then, I felt a memory
Thought I was high
Thought I was safe
Then, I felt some emotion
What if I sold my soul for the green of grass?
What if I smoke my ambition in a bowl?
What if I bake the little dough I make?
What if I'm red-eye all day?
Then, I'm a peasant.
What if I send my nightmares away, ablaze?
What if I exchange the pain in my body for body rolls?
What if I buy a ticket to ride, unafraid of eyes?
What if I'm dead all day already?
Then, I'm lifted.
Nov 13, 2017
Nov 13, 2017 at 2:40 AM UTC
it didn’t take much to get him mad. one wrong word and he’d erupt like a volcano, destroying everything in his path. how could you ever think it was okay to let your children know by heart the sound their mother makes when she’s pushed down the stairs? one night the mirror at the bottom cracked, a shard lodging itself into the centre of her forehead. this is a sign, i would’ve said if i was old enough to understand. take a reflection back on why you still think you need him. i haven’t talked to him in four years but it doesn’t make much of a difference, the seed of our last name still sprouts in my heart like an arsenic root. i wonder what he’s doing now, i’ve spent the time trying to fit into the holes in the walls that the beer bottles left. i don’t know anything about him except the colour of his anger and how he could never open up without the turn of a corkscrew. if his point was to teach his children never to touch alcohol, he got the point across. one night in our house was enough to understand that. he’d throw full bottles at the walls, saying he had a tough day, but the stains on our carpet still say he never loved us. maybe, i told them, the day he drove away for good, if we had the potential to **** him he might’ve loved us just as much.
Jan 23, 2015
Jan 23, 2015 at 12:07 PM UTC
I'm bashful,
I'm broken-
hearted,
I'm born to do this-
die like this-
with every twist,
every flourish,
every blister-
are you burning, Amber?
Sore nose with a corkscrew in it-
the holes you bore-
I'm boring.
mundane-
remaining unnamed
because boys are all different yet none of them stay very long-
for the shame of it-
*hot shame, burning amber-
are you burning, Amber?* -
oh, if it wasn't for the shame of it!
Dec 2, 2014
Dec 2, 2014 at 12:49 PM UTC
Blonde, blue eyed, suburban, two hundred percent American
the nation hangs on the perky point of your nose as your
corn silk corkscrew curls are straightened, and you fly to Paris
to collide with fellow shooting stars, but you never forget that boy,
although there are quite a few, lyrics recycling their smiles like
Splenda confectionary tissues. Your melodies are one note harmonies
on the discord of Romantic Middle Class Mediocrity, saccharine
apples in a shiny package for teens who haven't bitten life too deep.
But there is still a boy in a red pickup truck, teardrops and Tim McGraw.
The girl next door has a backbone of country strong and books filled with
silly, sweet, strawberry sodapop songs, slipping over herself in earnest
for the rawness of four chords about love, ends that spiral back to beginnings.
May 30, 2013
May 30, 2013 at 1:24 AM UTC