"culdesac" poems
*We were daytime problem solvers
and late afternoon cops and robbers,
discovering treasure chests
full of gold
with every coin
a story told.
Ignorance was innocence
tooting imaginative instruments.
Our visions were limitless
exploring galaxies
within a fence.
Searching the skies for Orion
Taking orders from Simon
Says reach for the sky
roar as lions, tigers and bears
Oh My!
Scars were cool!
Chocolate milk was fuel
Girls were yuck!
Vacation Barbies lay beneath
tires of Tonka trucks.
Despite being grounded
we soared
Unless grounded
of course.
Street lights mark the landing strip
'Til high noon next day
abandon ship
Crash landing
return to the culdesac
'Good Night' whispers
Fade to black*
Nov 12, 2012
Nov 12, 2012 at 10:34 PM UTC
The lamp post with the shoes around it
that's what I want to write about
The one approximately forty yards northeast
from the view at the start of my driveway
Located in the middle of the end of the culdesac
It's funny because thare are three shoes:
My left Converse All-Star,
Cole's right Nike,
and the third one i cannot make out
In fact I can't recall who threw them up there
All I remember was feeling pride
in not only my community,
but in it's history
Tenby Court is where I'm from
I lived their for eighteen years
We call it the TBC
I look at the shoes now
and I get that same feeling
But now the only difference is
there's another feeling
accompanying the pride
It's one I haven't felt in a while:
Nostalgia
Apr 24, 2012
Apr 24, 2012 at 1:24 PM UTC
There is a six year old boy with a bike and training wheels in tow
He is zooming up and down the culdesac on a tuesday
afternoon because it's sunny and that's what he knows.
I can see him.
He's been there for an hour and a half.
The whole time he's been focusing on the road and his goal to get to the other side and back again. It reminds me so much of my childhood. When the wind whistled in your ears just because it could.
It's 1pm on a tuesday afternoon and i'm watching him have the time of his life while i'm shut up in my room. I can see him grinning and laughing and smiling.
on his red race bike, fast as lightning.
He doesn't know yet that there are kids faster than him, he doesn't know what lies around the street corners on both end. But he's living life to the fullest extent.
He barely realizes that his mom is dead.
I think his name is Dylan.
I think he has ambition. I think he sees the world in high definition. And i’m jealous of his position, for while he races and dips. I droll on in the rolling doldrums of tuesday afternoon.
He zooms, while I’m shut up in my room
Jul 26, 2012
Jul 26, 2012 at 12:03 AM UTC
There is a pounding at the door. Soon it will fly open.
Men in gas masks will flood the hallway.
With shotguns.
You have so much to live for, man, don't do this.
We'll come in if we have to. But we just want to talk.
Your children love you.
God knows why
After the things you have forced them to see.
It's humid and the air is causing the culdesac to shimmer
Just above the road, like we lit the tar on fire.
Gangsters lean on their cars to watch
Your misery unfold.
Helicopters keep breaking my concentration
Glowing eyes from the floor
A collapsed heap of laundry
Rustic
All curled in on herself.
Where did we go wrong?
How did it get to this? How did the police get involved?
Smashing up counter-tops with a golf-club.
The windows are breaking and tear gas starts to rise.
The last thing I taste is formaldehyde
And then steel
And then red life
Flowing out the holes
And the orifices.
Carry the children out.
Give them some air.
Move along.
There's nothing to see here.
How is the wife?
Carry her to the stretcher.
Another day in the life.
Tomorrow will be better.
Oct 4, 2010
Oct 4, 2010 at 2:15 PM UTC
My routine:
Sit on the fourth step from the bottom
Stare right
through the window speckled front door
Out and beyond
gazing at culdesac concrete
Waiting for the color of the street to transform lighter and lighter until brightness
If the color made from
someone's headlights
was a Crayon color, I would name it
"take-me-away-yellow"
I wait for the color
I wait for the signal
For someone
Anyone
To save me
Jul 18, 2014
Jul 18, 2014 at 9:50 PM UTC
looking both ways
on my street with houses lining it
leading to more houses and dead ends
with front porches overlooking culdesacs,
culdesacs with front porches on dead ends
watching Letterman
no, Leno.
Leno gets a lot of ****
but he has his crowd,
and they all live on my street
leading to nowhere and culdesacs
Jan 18, 2014
Jan 18, 2014 at 8:39 PM UTC
and i remember screaming in the passenger seat of your parents car
the street lamps on the culdesac spinning through the moonroof
the mirrors flashed bulbs in my eyes
inches from the curb you dropped me off then wished me good night
i walked past my mothers room
still dizzy from your driving
and blinded by the lights
and she quietly asked, 'did he kiss you?'
i lied and blushed a ‘no’
‘at least he was kind enough to drive you home’
Dec 8, 2014
Dec 8, 2014 at 4:27 PM UTC
I never realized
How many birds
There really are
They seem to melt
Into the landscape
As they hop
To and fro
In the manicured
Suburban shrubs
And pepper the sky
Floating in place
Against some unfelt
Wind current
While walking
I locked gazes with
A slate colored dove
And we stared
I don't know how
He felt about me
Or what he felt
About me
I thought he was
Elegant
Even though he was
The color of fresh tar
While it bakes
In the Pennsylvania sun
In some hazy culdesac
In the corner of some
Replaceable
Reproducible
Childhood
He hopped off his perch
A rusty sign post
That had been bifurcated
By some unknown
Bolt or hand
And skittered behind some
Sickly looking ferns
In a dirt patch of an
Unknown neighbors yard
A gang of Robins
Flittered over my head
Landing down the street
Passing a pinecone
Between them
Pecking and tearing at it
I looked behind
The sickly ferns
And found the
Unknown neighbors cat
Doing the same thing
To my slate colored dove
I shooed it away
It dropped the dove
Hastily
In the loose dirt
And retreated
I looked down at the dove
And it laid there
Its breast heaving
Silent
One eye cast into the dirt
The other looking up
Watching the same Robins
Fly back to where
They had come from
And the slate slowly
Turned sanguine
As its down became
Saturated with the
Run off from the
Puncture wounds
The cat sat off
A few yards away
Flicking its tail
Calico and smug
And I stood by
The dove as
The heaving slowly
Stopped
Ground to a
Halt really
And then the eyes
Weren't looking
At the sky or the dirt
I finally felt
That unseen
Wind
And continued
On my way
Jul 11, 2016
Jul 11, 2016 at 9:38 PM UTC
i ate
an apple
while the hamster
began swinginf from thte branch
and licking
juices
from the cat
droppings which
formed
an impressive pile in the corner of the room.
the door
swings open
and man
yells
for the broom
so as to bash someone on the head---
usually
a random child who would spit gum on the lawn.
laughter is evident
and the breeze is cool
and the sun
is healing
and the clouds
are soaring
over equador.
i eat 6 chicken fingers
and 4 burgers
with a glass of juice.
ciggarettes are $10 now
so **** that.
and the fat lady outside with her little dog alwyas on the phone and always
glaring at me
will one day be vaporized by an incoming meteor shower which
specifically targets
her hut on the culdesac.
worms
are eating my ulcers
and the sweat
quenches my thirst
when sometimes
i'd rather be out talking to myself in peace
because
no one bothers a crazy person
especially when they're just mere centimeters
away
and ready to ****
May 31, 2017
May 31, 2017 at 12:38 AM UTC
do you have the guts
do you have the guts
do you have the guts to be your own salvation?
do you have the time
do you have the time
do you have the time to be your own salvation?
hanging' round by the dead end sign
striking our cigarettes
and dancing on the dead tracks
we've been parked up in this
culdesac
for waaay too long.
do i have the guts,
do i have the time
do i have the mind to do anything else?
you know judgy *************
never mattered to me
i think my halo's running low on battery
but hey if i'm alive
then i might as well live--
do you have the guts
do you have the guts
do you have the guts to be your own salvation?
do you have the time
do you have the time
do you have the time to be your own salvation?
i got a little time
for some quiet meditation
i been writing up a plan
i'm gonna be my own salvation
you know what people say
never mattered to me
so i'm charging up my batteries
because hey if i'm alive
then i might as well live
do you have the guts
do you have the guts
do you have the guts to be your own salvation?
do you have the time
do you have the time
do you have the time to be your own salvation?
do have the guts?
or are you nucking futs?
do you have the time?
or are you too sublime?
Oct 23, 2019
Oct 23, 2019 at 3:13 PM UTC
I remember our heyday like it was yesterday
Starswept and bittersweet
I revolved around your sun
And jumped in with both feet
I remember our heyday like it was yesterday
You were extra and I was ordinary
I dismantled my world and myself
Everything but you was secondary
I remember our heyday like it was yesterday
Feast or famine, we ate our fill
The minute-hand lost its meaning
Time, a well-behaved child, sat perfectly still
I remember our heyday like it was yesterday
Three hour drives within a culdesac
Just to grasp at the straws of you
Just to drift away into a sea of black
I remember our heyday like it was yesterday
Golden years brought silver tears
But we weathered and eroded away
Became sandstone, and finally disappeared
Apr 11, 2016
Apr 11, 2016 at 12:04 PM UTC