"curbs" poems
Evening light is gentle, slow
Caressing leaves, metal roofs, soil
Plants, flowers, pavements and gates
Clouds are the mothers - they shield us
Lest the sun shines too much.
Take a breath and look around;
The sweet and tranquil garden will take it away.
All colour blend in synchronised harmony;
Blues and browns, pinks and whites
Crossing into and over each other like
oil paints,
Warm, welcoming, beautiful.
It is soothing - the sound of nothing
That disrupts; razes; hates
Disturbs; curbs quiet insight;
One's imagination is the lone
source of maximum sound
That vibrates through the garden.
My grandfather, my grandmother's brother,
Smiles as though the sun shines through his teeth
Dresses in a pale blue shirt
Black shorts
Both well-worn
Ready to play
some basketball.
Oh, the joy, the fun
The refreshment arising from this game in a courtyard
In grandfather's garden
Among young trees, leaves and other green growth.
There stands a home by hand made
Basketball stand,
A concrete base with metal support hands
Floppy strings of hoop
To shoot the ball into.
The garden has been bathed, it is fresh
It is refreshed.
Grandfather demonstrates, I listen and follow,
To throw the ball into the hoop
With precision and care; throw some force
Into the air.
The ball dances around the circle
then drops to the concrete floor.
We take turns
As I throw and grandfather returns
9/10 of the time my aim's bad
but the ball grandfather throws, I actually catch!
(Or it will tumble on wet soil)
Exciting, the thumping
of rubber ball against ground;
Keen eyes and agile hands and feet
To catch the stray ball;
With swift movements the ball flies!
From sideways, afar and near,
Into the hoop successfully, finally.
Back into the house we go,
As the sun leaves for home.
The garden prepares for night;
So do grandfather and I;
Grandfather washes up; I talk to
Grandmother in the garden;
waiting for night, to
fall
fall
fall,
into infinite darkness -
poignant memories
Dec 15, 2014
Dec 15, 2014 at 5:05 AM UTC
RIVERS MAKES ME QUIVER
Youthful mind left wandering just feeling the wetness from yards into the curbs
Ripples running curbside over toes, forming those first streams for a meandering mind
Clouds collecting power,mists collecting,forming Drop by drop rains flowing into their reserves
High mountain lakes reflecting their passion, partitioned by beavers to make their own pond
Broken into brooks flowing faster downward into streams,cool and clear their taste like sweet liqueurs
Beauty not confined to a torrent but gifted with greenery and wildlife ,flowers that make the forests more confident
Trickles forming into cascades downward making outpourings & overflows waterfalls forced through the fissures
Gravity needs spaces we watch as it heightens then widens,making it's way through the continent quickly becoming most prominent
Admire her beauty but reap her rewards,wet bounty to feed the fields, food for fishes ,generations receive her treasures
Canoeists,kayakers or legendary steamboat captains are fond of their flowing, boys wondering where she will go ,knowing our tears of joy will flow to the sea should be our greatest compliment. R.C.
Sep 12, 2018
Sep 12, 2018 at 9:19 AM UTC
Bricks and mortar, steel and boards,
Phone poles lined with power cords, on
Pothole streets, where engines roar,
'Neath smoggy skies, where jet planes soar,
Where penny merchants peddle wares,
And news reports pretend they care,
Where vagrants sleep, and children stare,
And people work for lives not theirs,
That's life in the jungle, adrift in the herd,
Where terrestrial beasts envy free flying birds
Where the pundits stand polished, and speak empty words,
And the artists paint portraits, while posted on curbs,
Where the men push carts, full of empty cans,
And the women spend paychecks, for spray-on tans,
Where the truckers drive loads, 'cross a thousand mile span,
To appease the great gods of supply and demand,
Asphalt and tarmac, girders and glass,
Terrarium trees in cemented sod grass,
Ripe with the stench of exhaust fumes and gas,
As the choir lines up for the 10 o'clock mass,
While the brokers all scream, at a packed stock exchange,
As the veterans in wheelchairs sit begging for change,
That's life in the jungle, it's just a big game,
But remember you're playing, lest you go insane.
Mar 24, 2015
Mar 24, 2015 at 11:01 PM UTC
we ate government cheese
that came in a dull brown box
we were too young
to understand what welfare
and food stamps meant,
our empty bellies never protested
at the salty orange blocks
in front of the bodega,
we saw a woman introduce a hammer
to a drunk tyrant’s skull
his blood pooling on the streets
was too red for new eyes
we watched hypodermic needles
bloom on stoops
cling to life on curbs
the graffiti on abandoned buildings
was our Louvre, our Salon de Paris
sweltering streets our baseball diamonds
prostitutes, black or brown or both
mothered us between shifts
we grew up in projects,
that sheltered drab lives
and senseless brutalities
gunfire, sharp and immutable
punctured lullabies
we were small boys
watching life unfold
the way one stares at an accident
detached and mildly curious
eyeing cooly the despair
and impossible hopelessness
of growing up poor
in Brooklyn
Mar 28, 2015
Mar 28, 2015 at 10:40 PM UTC
So many years
I've spent on the sterile land
in various cubes
curbs my soul and makes me tired.
So why not go the seas!
To experience another kind of new life;
to face the infiniteness
the wildness, and be more tough!
Great men of letters,
Melville,Mark Twain,Hemingway,etc,
all benefit lots
from their colorful life as a sailor.
Thus, to be a sailor,
a sailor, a sailor, a sailor, a sailor !
Aug 27, 2012
Aug 27, 2012 at 1:48 AM UTC
Marriage is an incomprehensible mystery,
a hidden truth kept secret from the foundation of the world.
It cannot be discovered by intelligence or insight,
but made explainatory by revelation.
Revelation reveals the mystery of marriage,
it explains the mutual relationship in marriage.
It shows the rhema,
light and
love in marriage.
The mystery of marriage is accessed through the throne of grace.
Wisdom, knowledge and understandingof marriage is made known by revelation.
The ability to see beyond the seen,
in oder to see many unseen realities of life.
Revelation unveils the principles of building a blissful marriage.
Marriage is honourable in all,
above all in a bed undefiled.
It's hidden truth is unveiled by revelation from divinity.
It constitutes a platfrom for fruitfulness in life and ministry.
It spreads the continuity of human generation.
Marriage as a divine institution,
solves the problem of aloneness.
It empowers man with resources to fulfil destiny on earth.
It is a hidden treasure not discovered without revelation.
Let revelation inspire the discovery of marriage treasures.
Marriage not only give pleasures,
but
help partners fulfil destinies.
Understanding kills separation and builds togetherness.
It develops unity and oneness among couples.
Understanding curbs separation in marriage,
and
solves marriage mystery.
The manifestation in marriage cannot be explained,
except
by revelation.
Marriage is a mantle not a struggle.
The man must provide for his wife,
the woman must submit to her husband.
Seek love not lust before marriage,
let character and charisma build marriage,
let love and care establish marriage.
Marriage remains a mystery till death.
Jul 5, 2013
Jul 5, 2013 at 6:41 PM UTC
Dark driveways in muggy weather
Look like sand stuck in a feather
Ferns and curbs don't go together.
Clean, thoughts on it
Wrong again
Seemed, nope not this song again
A misty clip
Of winter ****
Seemed so soft and fond again.
Face the throat and choke the face
Wait for boats, critique the wave
Answer into sushi dish,
'Was this really once a fish?'
You, oh you! Oh you, oh you.
True, we knew! Who knew? Not you.
Don't begin to read the news
Now it's burning rows of twos
Ferns and curbs don't go together
Runny nose in sunny weather
Feel like lakes lassoed and tethered
Ferns and curbs don't go together.
Jan 15, 2013
Jan 15, 2013 at 7:56 PM UTC
For my mate Chris
To sit around in anger…does no favours,
To bellyache to me… It’s all unfair,
To hope somebody else… comes up with answers,
To see the world’s shortcomings… flaunted there.
A lack of motivation keeps you grounded
Friends and family try to keep you at arm’s length,
You loathe the Government’s lack of comprehension
In that joblessness depletes your hope and strength.
You feel those carbohydrates clog your arteries
And see your muscled body turn to flab,
Discipline’s resolve flies to oblivion
And you curse all that… which makes your life so drab.
Disappointment curbs the high expectations,
You feel the planet owes you that, to which you seek,
Aghast to comprehend your own misgivings,
You feel the need to say…but then, you never speak.
Then suddenly… a stark, clear realization
That NOTHING HERE WILL CHANGE…UNTIL YOU DO,
Until you turn around your thinking to endeavour,
Till then that something that you seek… shall hide from you.
So look, my sweetness, look into the mirror
Shed the worry lines that always cloud your brow,
Kick your sorry **** profoundly to tomorrow
And lose the ****** shards of bitterness….RIGHT NOW!
Marshalg
Endeavouring to re-motivate a lost cause.
18 August 2012
© 2012 Marshal Gebbie
Aug 17, 2012
Aug 17, 2012 at 6:53 PM UTC
I.
Fireman, censor of literature and destroyer of knowledge, with his mighty flamethrower. He loves his work. He loves trouble and strife. He loves fascination with the people next door. Mostly, he loves his hammock. But sleep will be his final unrest.
II.
A gift for the darkness: reading from the forbidden kept hidden in the air-conditioning duct. The walls within turn on and off like Cora Pearl. His wife listens to far winds and whispers and soap-opera cries, sleep-walking, helped up and down curbs by a husband who might just as well not have been there. They walk on as an extinguished connection. In the flickering of his eyeballs, he dreams of driving recklessly to Dover Beach and drowning her.
III.
Burning bright. He is burning so brightly. In the factory of mirrors, he takes a hard look. He's a flammable book. And it's a pleasure to burn. "What are you doing?" She asks. "Putting one foot in front of another." He answers.
Aug 9, 2021
Aug 9, 2021 at 3:31 PM UTC
We used to sit in your parent's basement
with your two dogs on their little beds
in the corner by the old desktop computer,
wooden hand-me-down grandmother cabinetry,
lace doilies underneath all the candles
on the coffee table. I made you turn out the lights.
We would sit there and pretend
that we could find something better to do
than kiss between commercials
or talk about all the things we used
to dream about in high school, how I
got mine and how yours were like
the back bumper of a car that got left
out in the rain too long-- a little rusty.
Your kissing was a little rusty,
but I let it go because you didn't make fun
of me ordering a double grilled cheese
on our first date. You also didn't judge
when I got drips on my dress
from my ice cream cone. I can still
remember the way you'd yell at me
for stopping too far out at intersections,
laughing how I was gonna get us killed
one day, but I think
you just really loved to hear me sing
over you. I think you really loved
me, and here I was playing teeter
totter on curbs in little jean shorts
with a guy who gave me a slice
of leftover pizza. Here I was, burning
down your own ambitions because
they didn't seem as glittery as my own,
because you didn't quite match all the sketches,
all the plans I had on my map. Because
if we were to draw straws I always thought
you would come up a little short.
I think you really loved me and I left you
like a penny in between that couch
we used to sit on.
Jan 11, 2016
Jan 11, 2016 at 11:04 AM UTC
The men kept to themselves:
they were waiting for the swiftness of the last cyclists.
The women kept to themselves:
they were expecting the death of a boy on a Japanese schooner.
They all kepy to themselves-
dreaming of the open beaks of dying birds,
the sharp parasol that punctures
a recently flattened toad,
beneath silence with a thousand ears
and tiny mouths of water
in the canyons that resist
the violent attack on the moon.
The boy on the schooner was crying and hearts were breaking
in anguish for the witness and vigilance of all things,
and because of the sky blue ground of black footprints,
obscure names, saliva, and chrome radios were still crying.
It doesn't matter if the boy grows silent when stuck with the last pin,
or if the breeze is defeated in cupped cotton flowers,
because there is a world of death whose perpetual sailors will appear in the arches and
freeze you from behind the trees.
it's useless to look for the bend
where night loses its way
and to wait in ambush for a silence that has no
torn clothes, no shells, and no tears,
because even the tiny banquet of a spider
is enough to upset the entire equilibrium of the sky.
There is no cure for the moaning from a Japanese schooner,
nor for those shadowy people who stumble on the curbs.
The countryside bites its own tail in order to gather a bunch of roots
and a ball of yarn looks anxiously in the grass for unrealized longitude.
The Moon! The police. The foghorns of the ocean liners!
Facades of ***** of smoke, anemones, rubber gloves.
Everything is shattered in the night
that spread its legs on the terraces.
Everything is shatter in the tepid faucets
of a terrible silent fountain.
Oh, crowds! Loose women! Soldiers!
We will have to journey through the eyes of idiots,
open country where the docile cobras, coiled like wire, hiss,
landscapes full of graves that yield the freshest apples,
so that uncontrollable light will arrive
to frighten the rich behind their magnifying glasses-
the odor of a single corpse from the double source of lily and rat-
and so that fire will consume those crowds still able to **** around a moan
or on the crystals in which each inimitable wave is understood.
2.3k
It is hard writing you down…
Metaphors hide behind my ribcage and imagery curbs into the ridges of my brain.
But I’m a writer so I cannot allow my love to turn into a language I cannot speak,
and I’m a warrior so I cannot allow my writing to be conquered by my feelings.
I try to remind myself not to confuse love for war…
I try to think of analogues of us that do not reek of passionate bloodshed.
But it's impossible because I have found the shield of Achilles buried under my tongue the first time we kissed,
and it's futile because your voice echoes the battle cry god screamed when he created love.
Aug 8, 2018
Aug 8, 2018 at 2:40 PM UTC
Shop fronts, curbs and pavements.
Bin men wear hearts on their sleeve.
Coffee shops, bakers and jewellers.
A homeless man searching reprieve.
Adverts and billboards shine bright.
The cleaners have swept the streets bare.
Commuters and tourists combined.
This city called London we share.
Marching to a steady beat
Marching to a steady beat
The pavement are veins
People the blood
The city the heart
Pumping the beat
Pumping the beat
Jun 30, 2015
Jun 30, 2015 at 5:51 PM UTC
The Kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man,
seeking goodly pearls; who, when he had found one,
sold all that he had and bought it.—Matthew 13.45
I know the ways of Learning; both the head
And pipes that feed the press, and make it run;
What reason hath from nature borrowed,
Or of itself, like a good huswife, spun
In laws and policy; what the stars conspire,
What willing nature speaks, what forced by fire;
Both th’ old discoveries, and the new-found seas,
The stock and surplus, cause and history:
All these stand open, or I have the keys:
Yet I love thee.
I know the ways of Honour, what maintains
The quick returns of courtesy and wit:
In vies of favours whether party gains,
When glory swells the heart, and moldeth it
To all expressions both of hand and eye,
Which on the world a true-love-knot may tie,
And bear the bundle, wheresoe’er it goes:
How many drams of spirit there must be
To sell my life unto my friends or foes:
Yet I love thee.
I know the ways of Pleasure, the sweet strains,
The lullings and the relishes of it;
The propositions of hot blood and brains;
What mirth and music mean; what love and wit
Have done these twenty hundred years, and more:
I know the projects of unbridled store:
My stuff is flesh, not brass; my senses live,
And grumble oft, that they have more in me
Than he that curbs them, being but one to five:
Yet I love thee.
I know all these, and have them in my hand:
Therefore not sealed, but with open eyes
I fly to thee, and fully understand
Both the main sale, and the commodities;
And at what rate and price I have thy love;
With all the circumstances that may move:
Yet through these labyrinths, not my grovelling wit,
But thy silk twist let down from heav’n to me,
Did both conduct and teach me, how by it
To climb to thee.
2.1k
Oh what a band of brothers we were,
The fantastic fraternal eternal gang.
Long sun-soaked summer daze,
The bunch of us, sometimes
Sitting legs folded under a parasol,
Telling stories and jokes
Beyond our years;
And then water fights,
We, the little soldier boys,
Armed with plastic pistols,
Rainbow coloured balloons,
Or super soakers,
Nobody ever won because
Nobody ever gave in,
Everyone was soaked,
Right to the bone.
Near endless evenings,
We played on the green,
Football, tag, 42, curbs,
We played on the green,
Even when the cold stung us,
Even when our skin glowed blue,
We played on the green,
Only until our mothers
Called for us to come in,
Time for tea,
Then time for bed and
A Bo Peep.
Oh what a band of brothers we were,
The fantastic fraternal eternal gang.
-Jamie F. Nugent
Mar 11, 2016
Mar 11, 2016 at 1:42 PM UTC
Early June in Calcutta
means packed streets
of decaying carcasses
and forlorn bodies
pulling rich people in carts.
Record-breaking heat
amplifies the smell
of curbs doubling
as urinals,
and pungent sweat
soaks our shirts
before we even leave
the rickety roof
we called home.
But when I think Calcutta
I picture sunshine
and warm masala chai,
Suporna's smile as she chews
a mashed banana treat
and Rosie's tiny hand
twisting the gold band
on my middle finger.
I remember thank you songs
and walking songs
that we sang at bus stops
and busy streets,
where the glisten
on our skin
was only outshined
by the sparkle in our eyes.
Feb 21, 2016
Feb 21, 2016 at 1:22 PM UTC
The understanding of the stewardship of time calls attention to the accountability of time.
The knowledge of time management promotes the accomplishment of God's purpose for man.
The understanding of the time enhances the fulfillment of life ambitions on earth.
Learn to number the days while applying the heart unto knowledge;
knowing any time wasted cannot be regained.
Redeeming the time demands the knowledge of time management,
acknowledging the fact that the time is short.
Understanding the time curbs procastination in every area of life;
knowing that procastination is the killer of destinies.
Be accountable for the time spent with the understanding we cannot turn back the hands of time.
Be conscious of the time spent with the knowledge that time is man's greatest treasure.
Beware of the time spent with the knowledge that time waits for no man.
Let us seek to understand the time while applying the heart unto knowledge.
Let us strive to redeem the time knowing the days are evil.
Let us struggle to fulfil the time while our mission on earth lasts.
Who then can understand the time,
knowing every minute counts.
Who then can redeem the time,
knowing the days are evil.
Who then can fulfil the time,
knowing we are governed by time.
He that acknowledges the time can understand the time.
He that understands the seasons can redeem the time.
He that comprehends the mystery of time can fulfil the time.
Let him that seek to understand the time,
seek the counsel of counsellors.
Let him that seek to redeem the time,
strive to understand God's purpose for man.
Let him that seek to acknowledge the time,
Struggle to heed the principles of time.
What then is the reward for understanding the time?
What then is the reward for redeeming the time?
What then is the reward for fulfilling the time?
He that understands the time will accomplish God's purpose for man.
He that redeems the time will make a difference in his world.
He that acknowledges the time will achieve life ambitions on earth.
Hope you find time out of every time,
knowing we all seek to redeem the time.
Time is a Treasure not a Leisure.
Aug 13, 2013
Aug 13, 2013 at 11:45 AM UTC
Others taught me with having knelt at well-curbs
Always wrong to the light, so never seeing
Deeper down in the well than where the water
Gives me back in a shining surface picture
Me myself in the summer heaven godlike
Looking out of a wreath of fern and cloud puffs.
Once, when trying with chin against a well-curb,
I discerned, as I thought, beyond the picture,
Through the picture, a something white, uncertain,
Something more of the depths—and then I lost it.
Water came to rebuke the too clear water.
One drop fell from a fern, and lo, a ripple
Shook whatever it was lay there at bottom,
Blurred it, blotted it out. What was that whiteness?
Truth? A pebble of quartz? For once, then, something.
1.8k
Rain that falls as dust
Rain that feels like ashes
Wasted on skin that might as well be dead
Not feeling it
Not the life of the party
My life a crime scene
That nobody bothered to report
Knuckles glossy red
Unplugged like spilled lemonade
Face-planted on papier-mâché curbs
And I didn't even get to keep the balloons
No more wicked games
This was my ship
To wreck
Just raise it from the bottomless pit
They say
Live like an adult
But I'd rather
Die like a child
Jul 25, 2015
Jul 25, 2015 at 8:27 AM UTC
The misty morning moaned through great spiritual fogs, while the dogs lay exhausted on the tombstone curbs. A black car crept and the driver had no hands. In the purple screaming clouds were the faces of a thousand dead birds, hawking about, calling inscrutable names, grasping at imaginary worms from the trees of the burning wood.
Where have I gone?
The grey meandering man licked his lips as sullen death encapsulated the brittle bones and every step was bringing him closer to the ashen ground from whence the monsters came. A phosphorescent haze would whirl and dance in sweet contortions, a dance for the dead, as the night fought day with ecstatic swords.
The sun is crying.
The son is crying.
Halt for the watchmen, bats in hand and gloves hanging from belt loops. Halt while the lands are molested and the peasant sneers at waves that hum and bring about simultaneous life and death.
Open the door! Open it wide.
Life is the eternally beating drum
The drum from which we hide.
May 1, 2013
May 1, 2013 at 4:04 PM UTC
How soft we've become, sitting on cushions instead of curbs.
May 28, 2010
May 28, 2010 at 6:44 AM UTC
To his Best Friend
You can tell him how incredibly annoying
it is that he makes love with his socks on,
and you can tell him that no matter
how many country songs he plays
the jeep will still be broken and the sun
will still go down at five o’clock
despite the garage lights and the cans of Miller.
Tell him I really didn’t notice him when he walked in,
and tell him that maybe I’ll be over to the party Saturday,
or that he walks pigeon-toed and that’s why
he ***** at walking on the curbs.
You can tell him anything you want to, just
don’t tell him that I love the way he holds a spoon
like a shovel or how his hair sticks up in the front
outside his hood in the mornings, or that his pants
don’t fit his waist that dips in from his belly,
soft, skin warm from my body lying on top of his,
and don’t tell him
that the more backwards we bend the more forwards
I fall. Don’t tell him that sometimes I make the bed
just so I can stay longer, please,
don’t tell him that the way he looks in a towel
with water dripping from his bottom lip
makes me want to crawl back into bed, rattle
his bones, and **** the kisses with my teeth
as I dig myself deeper into this infrastructure,
this balance, between hating what I’ve done,
and loving someone
who’s never going to think you’re enough.
Don’t tell him that I’ve strung together our moments
like a necklace and that I wear that burden
on my chest, hoping, between prayers
that I find a way to breathe. Don’t tell him
that I’ve broken over him. Don’t tell him
that sometimes my double-takes are triple
and sometimes I cry in the bathroom
and sometimes—
just please (save me) please don’t tell him.
Nov 16, 2014
Nov 16, 2014 at 10:22 PM UTC
*An interminable yearning of
solace finding.
A constant struggle of cicatrix hiding.
Euphoric trance, we hanker it all.
To breath beyond the limits of wall.
Wall that curbs our accord.
To hum the songs from one old record.
To aviate beyond the visible horizon.
To be souls of mirthful composition.
Exempting our cores of concealed desires.
To sway with adored one in bonfires.
To see the world engrossed in
love and peace.
Will only, then our souls
ensconce in ease*...
Aug 30, 2015
Aug 30, 2015 at 8:03 AM UTC
i could not feel anything but your grassbeats under my fingertips, quicker in the anticipation of neck-snapping.
"i hope you know that we are so very sorry about the accident. there will be measures taken to ensure that nothing like it occurs again. freshly, our extremely sincere apologies."
the curve of bird spines decorated my eyelids, question marks displaying assumptions to the turnablindeye world.
"no, sir, you are the one who is incorrect. the blood you see isn't really there, look at it. look at the transparency of your hallucinations."
october grew three heads and shredded the chunks of grass it ripped from the ground, spreading you as mulch across stranger's flowerbeds.
"three hours ago, a messenger twicely found you screaming and ranting about various invisibilities on separate corners in this very city. can you explain?"
i stood on curbs and spoke for change, spoke through three woolen ideas to the desperately closing ears of people that refused to look quietly at themselves, look at their thoughts without noise.
"no. we have broken you. there are not voices, nor stars, no hexagons spelling curses onto your forehead. look at me! sir, you are undeserving of a name."
ghostings are immensely entertaining things. i hope you'll come on one with me, some time after i ***** my thoughts back into their shoulder-blade space.
Jan 3, 2011
Jan 3, 2011 at 6:12 PM UTC
I’ve been questioned on
my late night walks,
why do I do it?
the repetitive cracks
sing hedonist soliloquies
at every avoidance,
the streetlights eat away
at forfeiting darkness,
vomiting garbage cans
spew synthetic carrion
and winking storefronts
****** nightfallers,
trash kissing curbs
pushing away affection
cry out for help,
cigarette butts cloud
sandy sidewalks
and hug dragging soles,
passing cars and
mindless youth
spewing timeless
nothings out car windows,
cop cars and crisis topped
middle-agers stumbling their way
to fast food and
regretful forenoons,
I’ve been questioned
on where I’m walking to,
but never what I’m walking from,
no matter where I go,
I find myself
burning my throat
with coffee at 2am
May 7, 2016
May 7, 2016 at 1:36 AM UTC