"crawlspaces" poems - Hello Poetry

With special thanks to George Ella Lyon I am from crumbling brick (red, dusty, smelling of musk). I am from aluminum siding and triple-deckers, tall, strong, unmovable. Hailing from the city on about seventy hills. From Grandfathers and photo albums, cigar ash salad and pinecone wars. From "use your imagination" and "go play in the street". I am from a whirlwind of faith, belief from non-believers. From schoolyards, playgrounds, and crawlspaces come these faces, and these memories are worth more to me, than anything.

0

Sep 22, 2010

Sep 22, 2010 at 7:02 PM UTC

chachi

And Here Come the Juniors

With special thanks to George Ella Lyon I am from crumbling brick (red, dusty, smelling of musk). I am from aluminum siding and triple-deckers, tall, strong, unmovable. Hailing from the city on about seventy hills. From Grandfathers and photo albums, cigar ash salad and pinecone wars. From "use your imagination" and "go play in the street". I am from a whirlwind of faith, belief from non-believers. From schoolyards, playgrounds, and crawlspaces come these faces, and these memories are worth more to me, than anything.

15

so i took liberty's with my lockpick and freud's diary and went in search of the reasons for dry thunder and for pictures of the rain locked away in some peoples eyes some hearts are waterlogged silent forests grey clinging to the wet pine needles some are deserts of the twilight like dust gathering at the least disturbed path their hearts are heavy with dry weight i found her in the cold light of candles mapping the unknown with her thin hand her perfections chiseled softly into all of my senses like a michelangelo paint by number sweet summer dream her immediate and urgent presence on the night air makes me breath in deep and feel to the bottom of my feet that she is tenderness personified she is light perfected she is fresh off the pages of some steinbeck novella she just has a grace that gives she is in love with its concept and rumor with lockpick in hand and the image of old man freud smoking something funny in his pipe traveled through this place with an eye to the depths a girl out there provides a sultry version of hopes in a song from within her place of televisions flickers as i sit by the window shade as it stirs to life approaching rain the lockpick also comes to life as the complexity's of a strangers smile fluctuate in the eye a grain of sand lodged in the crawlspaces of the mind grinding in the gears of thought the song drifts to an end with her smile

0

May 17, 2014

May 17, 2014 at 11:28 AM UTC

mark-john-junor-1

old man freud

so i took liberty's with my lockpick and freud's diary and went in search of the reasons for dry thunder and for pictures of the rain locked away in some peoples eyes some hearts are waterlogged silent forests grey clinging to the wet pine needles some are deserts of the twilight like dust gathering at the least disturbed path their hearts are heavy with dry weight i found her in the cold light of candles mapping the unknown with her thin hand her perfections chiseled softly into all of my senses like a michelangelo paint by number sweet summer dream her immediate and urgent presence on the night air makes me breath in deep and feel to the bottom of my feet that she is tenderness personified she is light perfected she is fresh off the pages of some steinbeck novella she just has a grace that gives she is in love with its concept and rumor with lockpick in hand and the image of old man freud smoking something funny in his pipe traveled through this place with an eye to the depths a girl out there provides a sultry version of hopes in a song from within her place of televisions flickers as i sit by the window shade as it stirs to life approaching rain the lockpick also comes to life as the complexity's of a strangers smile fluctuate in the eye a grain of sand lodged in the crawlspaces of the mind grinding in the gears of thought the song drifts to an end with her smile

33

The children of this town speak of vacation and travel. Worrying about the summer before it's even Spring. I tell them, "why, why, why are you LEAVING here before you've fulfilled your night- time fantasy?" They board a train or ship uncoothed and begging for more time. I tell them "the ones you want are here already, in your being. They are present and ready to be called out of the closets and crawlspaces of your dwellings, looking for the belongings you forwarded them in the shape of skin and grain and blood." I tell them "Alone you leave this city and your self returns with you, empty, even emptier than at birth. This city is your womb, you can't escape the placental waters of your home, the umbilical rail, the breathing air." But when it is summer, they go. To be gone, to starve the children in the closets clawing at the fastened latch and watching time escape their follicles. While they are sitting in darkness, we tell them we left to get away, to catch a sky that crashes into distant lands or hold up stars with out bare hands. We say "bless this city and the state of our birth." We stand, alive, unconquered and surprised that closet children are dead when we get back it's just us in this city With all stars surrounding Unseen with the same lights We saw out there which blot them out The sky has fallen and our hands are cleaned By the starving blood of closet children Whom we refused to feed Dried up under the moon.

0

Jun 1, 2012

Jun 1, 2012 at 8:47 PM UTC

sansara-justinovich

Closet Children

The children of this town speak of vacation and travel. Worrying about the summer before it's even Spring. I tell them, "why, why, why are you LEAVING here before you've fulfilled your night- time fantasy?" They board a train or ship uncoothed and begging for more time. I tell them "the ones you want are here already, in your being. They are present and ready to be called out of the closets and crawlspaces of your dwellings, looking for the belongings you forwarded them in the shape of skin and grain and blood." I tell them "Alone you leave this city and your self returns with you, empty, even emptier than at birth. This city is your womb, you can't escape the placental waters of your home, the umbilical rail, the breathing air." But when it is summer, they go. To be gone, to starve the children in the closets clawing at the fastened latch and watching time escape their follicles. While they are sitting in darkness, we tell them we left to get away, to catch a sky that crashes into distant lands or hold up stars with out bare hands. We say "bless this city and the state of our birth." We stand, alive, unconquered and surprised that closet children are dead when we get back it's just us in this city With all stars surrounding Unseen with the same lights We saw out there which blot them out The sky has fallen and our hands are cleaned By the starving blood of closet children Whom we refused to feed Dried up under the moon.

30

logic is the screen through which we hear music with and without reason it just makes sense only the holiest of men may enter my church made of flesh my backbone erected like a steeple announcing itself the way your fingertips do between my thighs and your touch up my spine it feels like the sound, the crinkle of a fresh cellophane wrapper leaving my mouth dry yet wanting more and the rest of me forever wet, raw, and exposed you told me your strategy was to divide and conquer with a violent smirk but i did not let you defeat me in this war i watched you lose control with your furrowed brow and your eyes looking like hallways leading to my crawlspaces you cannot reach my foundation you let my hair sift through your fingers like sand creating electric shock and white noise but it had nothing on us when you watched me i could hear your heart beating like a ******* metronome and your breaths they sounded like matches striking on brick my blood does not negotiate or beg or plead it boils like a raging unwatched *** your neck smelled like the heavily loved pages of my favorite, oldest books saturated in my tears and my sweat so many times and you loved it because every inch of me felt like a lock made just for you and i loved it because every inch of you felt like the key that could finally open me up

0

Aug 22, 2017

Aug 22, 2017 at 12:07 AM UTC

jacquelineisthewolf

monitor

logic is the screen through which we hear music with and without reason it just makes sense only the holiest of men may enter my church made of flesh my backbone erected like a steeple announcing itself the way your fingertips do between my thighs and your touch up my spine it feels like the sound, the crinkle of a fresh cellophane wrapper leaving my mouth dry yet wanting more and the rest of me forever wet, raw, and exposed you told me your strategy was to divide and conquer with a violent smirk but i did not let you defeat me in this war i watched you lose control with your furrowed brow and your eyes looking like hallways leading to my crawlspaces you cannot reach my foundation you let my hair sift through your fingers like sand creating electric shock and white noise but it had nothing on us when you watched me i could hear your heart beating like a ******* metronome and your breaths they sounded like matches striking on brick my blood does not negotiate or beg or plead it boils like a raging unwatched *** your neck smelled like the heavily loved pages of my favorite, oldest books saturated in my tears and my sweat so many times and you loved it because every inch of me felt like a lock made just for you and i loved it because every inch of you felt like the key that could finally open me up

85

**** the mailman the bad news bringer make it look like they crashed their car before dropping off the letter do it to the next one to and the next till they stop bringing bad news and just send you an email then smash the computer and build a nest in the crawlspaces hide till the end eventually THEY'LL get the message probably.

0

Nov 16, 2016

Nov 16, 2016 at 5:41 PM UTC

mikecccc

The messenger

**** the mailman the bad news bringer make it look like they crashed their car before dropping off the letter do it to the next one to and the next till they stop bringing bad news and just send you an email then smash the computer and build a nest in the crawlspaces hide till the end eventually THEY'LL get the message probably.

16