"costless" poems
for Lori, Riley and Kendrick
the questioning words jump off the page,
into two hands transforming,
words shape shifting into
multicolored ink stained fingers,
now, all a chokehold on my brain,
my throaty gasps rasping from
a simplistic convolution -
single questioning deserving an answer
what are you made of?
the obvious answers left in the slow lane,
bone, tissue, rivers and arteries of blue bloods,
just oil and fuel of a containership,
but the cargo carried, that’s the real stuff
you have insight inside that cannot be seen,
self-survival instincts that morph into morals,
our shared air affects you differently,
a sense of defending, caring,
costless and costliest simultaneously,
spaghetti strands strong sinewed intertwining,
into a better human than most
to call you hero is wrongly insufficient,
but the thesaurus lends me no substitute,
weep, I do,
as the spring and summer blushing green
will not be seen by you at all, and by me,
seen now so differently,
when thinking of
soil-born courage instinctual that has no name,
but grows only in nature
what are you made of?
we know now, but knew not well,
that thing that makes you leap first,
was all you, the entirety of the best,
that exists, existed, as reminders to us,
to mine it, wear it,
medal it upon our fabric
*you three,
breathe it back, exhale it from where ever you are,
that trace chemical odor in our atmosphere,
of life-giving sweetness, a rebirthing chlorophyll freedom
that we humans all desperately need,
even just to know it exists,
and inform us*
what we need to be made of
May 13, 2019
May 13, 2019 at 5:43 PM UTC
For free, but hardly costless,
for you big lollipop suckers,
c a u s e,
every time I breathe in some atmosphere,
outcome these up chucked integers and alphabets to poll-
-ute the remaining "good air," which isn't i know very fait fair,
but would you rather this thin poesy lighter-than-whipped cream and
jello shaking handshaking easy eating than all that other stuff I obsess
about in no particular order, like life and death, counting my re-main-
lining breaths, love 'n like, awesome vs. trite, hot love and cold po-
-tatoe mustardy salad, punch and paunch, my endless declination into febrile old age and the wasting away processes most unfortunate,
that fuels a trillion dollar healthcare IN-dustry (midwest pro-nun-she-ate-sean), vitamins and supplements, manufactured in contaminated
factories in the farout east, that are not usda grade A, unless mixed with good **** and to hell with this graffiti wordley ***** even i'm
fed up from writing all this serious stuff, and Brother Leonard,
who is always very ****** says
fkinA, halle-lou-y'all
the end is near***
Sep 6, 2025
Sep 6, 2025 at 10:17 PM UTC
Because nothings worth the price they will staple to your head
What will be left of you when she repeats everything that we've said
What will be left of you?
As I lose myself in your subtle unannounced fame I grip tighter on the waist high poorly built stage
That's held, more than once, a new coming face - screaming with grace, to the crowd that can't wait...
Find yourself in rekindled faith
Falling deeper in love with the lyrical genius, I accept that he defines all I am unsure of,
giving in to the butterflies he knows won't subside -
take a moment
to slow down and
join me tonight
Is this moment everything you've dreamt of?
Safely tucked in the warmth of her bed, she relives all the fairytales her Dad never read..
completely consumed with the thoughts in her head...
Where were you this time?
She holds on to another memory, thankful for every second,
She knows tomorrow is never promised
so she gave up on the ********
and vowed always to be honest
But that is not costless...
As her eyes become heavy and her brain quietly calms down,
she sets aside the thoughts that stop the words from spilling out, she reclaims her crown ...
She controls her feelings now..
Finding strength in the fights that cut as sharp as your knife I refuse to accept I no longer have rights…and the pain you inflict won't be worth the sight
of the mascara covered
cheekbones
barely visible tonight
Pull me closer and breathe in life...
Sing through my soul
going high and then low
I hear the truth in your laugh
as gradually you become
the best thing of my past.
Don't stress the hard stuff slow down and relax
This moment could so quickly become our last so let go of your broken unfinished past and live for the seconds your heart let's you laugh
Walking together is always better when you can't find the path...
Walk with me.
Oct 28, 2011
Oct 28, 2011 at 4:16 AM UTC
The Hardest Forgiving Slant
<|>
9:19am Fri Sept 22 2023 ~ 8:02am Fri Sep 29 2023
commenced during the Ten Days of Awe
<|>
we debase our language daily,
robbing the spectacular majesty [example]
of awe with the common overusing
vernacular of “awesome”
especially forgiveness is degraded,
we utter “I’m sorry” trippingly,
costless, less than cheap, with even the
snap-on veneer (1) of sincerity discarded,
but move on to the next rudeness
but today I will not permit myself
an easy letting-off-the-hook, no shifting
of blame to anonymity, or fast forward to tomorrow,
when we can obfuscate our intrepid
dishonesty one more time…again
to forgive those who have injured us,
not that hard, or the judging deities,
who silently wink and nod, but offer
no certitude beyond trying, itself a
maybe, maybe not, truly tiring this
trying tacking the constant requests
so first an etymology explication on
the tension inherent that very word,
f o r g i v e
As a word, as a sensed,
intuitively-
it is a
Perfect Continuous Infinitive! (2)
to
forgive is
perfect,
to forgive is
continuous,,
to forgive is
infinite!
what a marvelous, perpetual
past, present and always futuristic
word (alas)
The Hardest Forgiving?
to forgive oneself
so nearer to impossible,
the first responders doing triage,
leave people like me for last,
as it a unconditional condition
with no cure that can be effected
indeed, by our very affect,
they instant diagnosis seeing our
very gestures, body language, or ****** expressions,
all reveal the hopelessness of
the never-to-be-given-grace,
among us
for a thousand years,
I have tried and failed to forgive myself
for the worst I’ve done,
and there is no sword or club,
blood-letting,
that can dispatch the onerous burden I carry
so I write poetry,
a salve that offers
temporary relief,
while I write,
imposed a
momentarily distracting,
a kind of dusting of self~spin,
that chills myself
just until
the, this!
poem is finished,
the slant is drawn
<§>
Tell all the truth but tell it slant —
BY EMILY DICKINSON
Tell all the truth but tell it slant —
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind —
Sep 29, 2023
Sep 29, 2023 at 8:12 AM UTC
Are we the cattle of an entire nation?
What have we got to lose? Except for those already lost
You can be docile or violent, just don’t lie in silence!
Rise up! Here begins a new age, end discrimination!
Innocence is dead, the wrong men end up in the jail cell
This place is nice, but life is going to hell
They’re ****** ‘cause the former majority is now a minority
Hypocritical foundations, this land’ll never unite
What happened to Civil Rights?
They only gave us what was left.
You pigs - You must be bored just to send so many to the morgue
I can’t stand to watch the news, this society isn’t one to put kids through
And it’ll only get worse
Time never changes, history repeats
No more running (RISE UP!) This is the culling!
The culling!
Never will I be your *****
The culling! (x2)
The United States lives an ****** Cold War!
(Let’s Rock)
We are the Antiheros, the Public Enemy
Now join me friends, let’s unveil the clarity
Who am I to you? When you look what do you see?
All you see are the colors of sin
The American Dream is broken, you breed loathing
Who can, Who will - Make America Great Again?
I can’t be led by a Puppeteer of Dollar Strings
You wanna make the world free? (HUH?)
But the only thing costless, is the loss of me
Drop it! If she needs and investigation
(She’s out!) That’s the end of an asinine conversation
Rise Up! It’s far too late
I am the spirit of those who live with a target
One wrong factor can end an actor
The leaders are gone, the show is over
It’s the end of the road, but the start of -
The Culling!
A Constitution Diluted by Disillusion
The Culling!
A Jail For A Nationalistic Conspiracist!
Time puses back, but it doesn’t make it better
The War is getting colder and the water’s getting redder
Every Rose has it’s thorns
We are the Bulls with dulled horns - Branded!
We’re the ones you reprimanded!
I! Feel I was born in the wrong time
I’ll go forward and see if they opened their eyes
Or I’ll go back! So I could ****** Revolutionize!
We all see, the ocean is vast
But like the truth and time, It Never Lasts!
Post-Traumatic Society Destruction
The Bliss of Disorder continues to function
All of the ways you hold us down
Leads to a point we take your crown
Everytime you hold us back
Pushed in a corner, poised to attack
One last push against -
The Culling!
We can’t hideaway any longer
The Culling (x3)
Your ignorance makes us stronger
The Culling!
Apr 29, 2016
Apr 29, 2016 at 12:21 AM UTC
**Each day passing by in a wild-eyed dash
In truth my soul fell aside, but bluer birds still doth call
Missed that cardinal harken when I set down my last two cents
Kickers of tricks, scroll-ers of myth, bottlers of ships
Knew it all along, just couldn’t stiff the rest
Refuse to capitol, refuge atop the pious politic that steeps these hills
Is it not hard to tell? The meanings of what buys in bulk
The people is we, of what sells slicker than plot itself
A minority rule, hid reasons from majority fooled
That is working trade class, taught to chain drive
The gleaming sheen glowing green, crowning jewel¬¬¬ is as mist and steam, fleeting as the wash of this worlds seething seas
We, the misanthrope of being, bloom in the warmth of idea
Only to recede at the water mark high of each our lives
Authenticity bless the distant time, costless venture to each about die, salute through another caesars’ dilated eye a definition
Eons in annunciation; immortality flashing by
Reverence cannot lie, not long at least neathe a chipping patina
Gold leafed by the hand of man, coerced creations’ fondling finger tips strips thin, leaving us then to watch the weathering
Not a one may ever remember for too quickly or too timely
Arrives dismemberment, a cyclic certainty, often relegated falsely
As loss or gain, truly misspoken frames for reference
At any given attempt to render the language of tongues, oh speaker the son of the morning shamelessly ****** by predecessors increasingly lavish
Phonemic savage; life running rabid, splicing love over the atom
The simple one whom tends a patch of what he calls “cabbage”
Knowing always the wordless truth that is his field fallowing
Unconvinced by everyone, save himself if nothing else
Penitent candor dangle, frameless wonder can you hear the thunder?**
Oct 17, 2013
Oct 17, 2013 at 2:44 PM UTC
Galloping,—
a harras of silhouette in the night’s shade.
Prancing swiftly as carelessly as winds in their mane.
Grey smoke blows out of their muzzle;
like hot ash subduing the algid night air.
A hill covered in a dark following,
a caliginous beauty site,—
In the uncut grass, trampled by costless hooves.
I was the ground crunched by a night’s dream.
My eyes shut; nervous by the shaking lips,
and cold sweats. It was beautiful,—
it was dark. It was wild; yet felt so freeing.
I was it’s witness, and conjecture.
I was in awe by beauty, but left breathless by
it’s haunting perception.
So was it a ghastly dream, or an alluring nightmare?
Jun 14, 2022
Jun 14, 2022 at 5:43 AM UTC
*Silence - O', Even the silence has got something to say
in words of winds blown off Northern array
At first, it makes heart free from all worries,
but the next moment -
Everything seems to be burnt out into broken-furries
The diamond's costless so all spirits,
but when it comes to poor-faith,
Even the "love" goes down into shattered pieces
Echoes On Nights - O' the echoes of such restless ashes
make some noise across the tight-lipped room
And, the silence has got much to bleed,
When the castles of night go disappeared by the doom
With time, as usual, beautiful morn knocks at the door
The heart gets trapped inside the loop,
Melodious beats of its phase go bounced up ov'r the floor
& scream, O' the life's nothiing, but an empty cup of cold-soup.*
Feb 24, 2015
Feb 24, 2015 at 9:25 AM UTC
Everyone can afford dreams
But I was the biggest shopper
Shoving condos and benzes into my cart
No cashier at the exit to demand payment
I picked lavish expensive charms
Had no worries about pennies
Everything was costless
Blessings from the gods
I was younger then I grew a little older
I kept shopping for expensive dreams
With time I encountered little snags
I couldnt get out of the mall with my immense goods
So I bargained with my conscience
Drop this and pick that
What was lighter I thought was better
So I chose those that were easier
Years went by and I learnt lessons little by little
A sister had shopped for the Whitehouse
And arrived home with a highschool
The question is can you carry what you pick?
A friend had shopped for the most
Yet arrived home with the least
So I selected the lightest
But when I packed, my car wouldn't budge
I further reduced my pricey costless goods
Albeit grudgingly,promising myself
I would come back for them
But **** there are no second rounds
As I grew older and older
I found myself driving home
With only a few of those costless goods
They were not even the biggest and priciest
They were what I could carry
Every time I stop by that dream shop
To do some window shopping
And say I wish
Jul 24, 2016
Jul 24, 2016 at 10:17 AM UTC
*the expulsion of emotions,
the absence thereof
bastardized emigre's forevermore,
no anger, no hate,
no debating love,
even the
commonplace
the merely perfunctory,
costless meaningless,
electrical like,
a banal banner of
a thumbs up
all exposed temperaments
lobe removed
the throbbing, pulsing,
expelled, expulsing
sayonara
not even
neutral-
nah, i'm neutered
emotions splayed?
no, spayed,
incapable of reproducing
this epitaph,
this writ
composed in a
unconscious blink,
an ill unconsidered moment
writ with tinged regret
to seal the deal
don't feel a thing which is why.
I
write*
Mar 21, 2017
Mar 21, 2017 at 5:09 PM UTC
Grass flowers #florets
Glistened with dew
Every time I see I loosen my heart over you
This Spunky lil elf
costless but worthy enough for grass itself
You are the first florets I learnt to draw
No less than daisy to ignore
Hearts they have is shining gold
Petals they hold are pure as peace
Peeping just above the ground
In the Meadows green it’s found
Jul 26, 2020
Jul 26, 2020 at 4:32 AM UTC
I took a deep breath
and looked at the leaves falling
it's like watching you go deeper into this
And I just let you be
I felt motionless and bare
The end was looking at me straight in the eye
And I just couldn't even drop a tear
I knew, I was, and still am not me
Was it a dream?
The beating of my heart felt surreal
You were supposed to be only in my mind
Everything was fine until it has been too much
Perhaps we found it serene
Like no reality would ever feel as free
As if the sun rises in the west and sets in the east
How impossible it was that no one can grudge
We both winked at the truth
The comfort of deceiving ourselves
These shouldn't have gone too far
We're too complex to be living in a world of our own
Here lies the unspoken words
Of our own little universe that made things costless
And the little galaxies we tried to make
Only to know at the end, I am alone
Dec 19, 2018
Dec 19, 2018 at 12:17 PM UTC
you owe me
and yourself
*to repost e v e r y poem
that gobsmacks, renders you prostate,
that brings forth the whimsical smile
and/or a guffaw and a laugh-out-loud,
but especially those that*:
invoke/provoke/ evoke an involuntary s i g h,
that make you wince in recognition
(and breaks you)
but most of all those that make you utter
all of the above
and
make you think
**** how I wish I
had written that…
which is why I repost (costless)and bring forward (costly) so many
for the pleasure and pain you provide…
nml
Aug 31, 2024
Aug 31, 2024 at 9:43 AM UTC
A line for the bathroom,
a line across the table;
aligned with diamonds
like science in a frame.
Tamed smile yet crazed;
the trace of a trade
that left a taste in mind
for future profit.
The costless ambition;
that’s driven gravestones
into the homes of families
caught in abuse.
Tonight; there’s a line;
one to the bathroom,
another across the table,
and one to the tombs.
The white powder
that overpowers clear
minds,
the white lines
that has victims
forever reading
between the lines;
a fine print
that reads
**** this’;
my time ends
with this line.
Aug 10, 2018
Aug 10, 2018 at 2:09 PM UTC
Dancing all alone
Not a care within this Earth
Although they'd say that I'm wrong
I see beauty in my worth
I don't need to be tied down
To stay flawlessly modest
Or to feel that I have value
I'm an art piece that's costless
I don't have to be a beast
Cause I'm single at the least
Why can't I just love myself
First I need some inner peace
Then I can go out and dance
Mingle in the crowd of chance
Possibly find love at sea
I don't need to though, you see
It's a thing I can desire
But romance can be just one
You should come first, at least prior
Don't be sad, go have some fun.
Feb 8, 2019
Feb 8, 2019 at 1:28 PM UTC
The Cost
“5 minutes to write, 5 minutes to edit and 10 more to cease weeping,”
when the inquiry arrives, how long/where from it comes,
gave this answer
more or less the response accurate
more or less the weeping really never ceases
I will return to it again, **** poem
random when, unreasoned why, wherefore
a stumble, a message, months from now, tomorrow,
even decades and I’ll remember the precise circumstances
for each poem has a Cost, that excises a piece of you, a new cut,
freshly salted, an antibiotic of loving may remove the
redness, but not the white line, so what you call a scar, I,
I call it an etched memory preserved
the sum of all These Costs, all these memories,
cumulative, additive, addictive - someone says:
stop being so sensitive, leave the telling to others,
or keep them in plastic bags, dated, retrievable,
in case an antiretroviral antidote is ever needed,
a fresh injection when you think you could even
cease to care
The Cost is always capitalized, for the Cost is called human capital,
the invisible financing that permits our existence till all spent,
when we’ve run out of drawer space, zipper bags,
breaths to be taken away and glass jars to store them,
if the mind says no more! then it will be ok,
for you are all spent
The Cost so great! this a double entendre,
for they are the stuff of me, whatever greatnesses
I ever possessed within them kept and believed,
happily paid for past and present, for the future,
will happily pay for it right now, again and again,
for the Costs are who I am, till, such time that
Costless arrives, eyes closed, nothing left to post,
to recall, no coin to give, my purposed all paid,
as if all paid could ever cause my weeping to cease
Mon May 4
10:48 am
May 5, 2020
May 5, 2020 at 3:11 PM UTC