"curdles" poems
blood curdles
sour milk in a pale blue carton
pushing out of wiry veins
rotten
.
the vena cava
was never meant to hold
ruined plasma
just like the world was never meant to hold
me.
Apr 21, 2016
Apr 21, 2016 at 9:58 PM UTC
Tightly clenched the fist shakes
Never steady like a nail
Blood curdles through the veins
Self-torturous it won’t fail
Keep still to breathe
Inhale the oxidation of life
Flowing molecularly steady
Before the shattered knife
But why negativity it remains
Lingers closely by the trees
Hovering over the city
Lacking soulfulness to squeeze
One refrains from the nuisance
Though it fights back with a rage
No world is perfect
Keep me locked in this cage
May 8, 2014
May 8, 2014 at 11:29 PM UTC
My shoelaces flap side to side like one of those car-dealership inflatables arms-
My veiny stompers pump puddles of pure procrastination from perceptive sprinting-
Underneath the tune-buds, I cannot hear my sneakers scraping the scrap rocks of gravel-
To my left- a hooting owl habitats itself in a hushed game of charades-
To my right- a slick tree frog flies freely from a lofty leaf and lands in the lagoon-
Elapsed images of elastic languages fill my mind with everlasting wisdom-
Entertained by the watercolors, my canvas curdles and secedes the state of mind-
Pressing harder- the curtain continues to close as I chase the condescending daylight-
Pressing softer- the tuner in my temple turns into a terrorizing shriek from my tibia-
Nov 20, 2014
Nov 20, 2014 at 3:41 PM UTC
spoon fed my keepsakes as nothing blots the sun so much
you teach me how to cringe in spun sugar. the nape of your
neck.
gleefully, we usurp the thicket of our mild dementia. sullen
joy equipped. a sumptuous dirge curdles the myth, your fins
***
as troubadours, we malinger in the pith of our blunt fruit. crust
removed from our daily bread. our basket of basilisks, bathe
in stone.
duel wielding our gazebos... we bivouac in our ambivalence, by
turns we move. you tip toadstools as i milk maidens for their
candelabras.
our palominos run. we do
violence to timpani and click mice.
pc
drifting in the cyberwocky. we transit the binary auto-bond
and paste
whats
clip.
blue thumbs thread cranberry noose. our ***** nods off. fronds
of juniper and cannabis slap the window pane. throughwhich
a *** mouse pounced on frond’s sway.
startled, we move the furniture of our eastern proclivities.
for thine is the kingdom
of our discontent !
swing-shift lap-dogs, trundle west of the east village. smell
of ****** and nag champa. idiots sting.
idiots braid zodiacs with greasy fingers. [ indeed ]
and
you
preach from your gut...
( your left breast marvelous with taint) and saltwater taffy.
we
laugh again-
at things we have
and now
only
harbor ghosts
where the rain
should have
been.
should have
been.
should have
been.
should have
been.
should have
been.
should have
been.
this is the new
intimacy.
Jun 5, 2013
Jun 5, 2013 at 7:03 AM UTC
The Louvre would have been better had I
come here by myself.
I know why you’re here.
The Mona Lisa calls
your name, coy and quaint
eyes glazed with lacquer
beckoning
behind the bulletproof glass
that curdles her beauty. You want me
to see her with you.
Don’t you?
But clouded eyes watched
as you passed
The Winged Victory
Liberty Leading the People
Venus de Milo
Six Raphaels and a Michelangelo
just so you could catch a glimpse
of her smirk
behind a masterpiece of spines
and cameras.
So go ahead, call me
stuck up
I don’t mind.
I’ll admire all the beauty you missed
along the way.
May 26, 2018
May 26, 2018 at 11:55 AM UTC
What's it like when you break up with someone?
It's 1,300 archived Google photos.
It's 40 floating memories at a time, above your head when you try to sleep.
It's her voice saying,
"You were good."
"You're a baby."
"I loved you."
"Use your words!"
"I gave you my heart"
"It'll take me two months to move on"
"I'm with someone." Three weeks later.
It's the countless kisses and cuddles that got you through hard times, to find out that you'll just be holding yourself and your lips are now vacant.
It's the love making that curdles in your stomach and makes you what to ***** every kind word she ever said.
It's the countless hours you spend, trying to imagine her with someone else inside of her. Ripping out the seeds of love you planted.
It's the hidden poetry she wrote about someone who will never be you.
It's the venom swirling in your mouth from the last time you tasted her.
It's her ******* name haunting you when she left you alone.
And it's the rage that will get you through this, because you are worth so much more.
Sep 28, 2018
Sep 28, 2018 at 10:55 AM UTC
Don’t fall victim to our dimension’s perilous plight
Can you feel it?
Feels like earth quake machine guns
Listen
Sounds like incriminating yarn being spun
According to the zodiac I’m a crab
According to the eastern wheel I’m an aquatic rooster
Yet I know myself as a coyote
And I say on to you
Tomorrow is never guaranteed
So live life today as if the next day brings the expiration date
Before our world curdles into a smelling spoiled carton of waste
Dec 19, 2013
Dec 19, 2013 at 1:12 PM UTC
The smells of our ***
linger behind my dead eyes
as your milky skin
curdles under my
poisonous breath.
This is my love
Jan 1, 2014
Jan 1, 2014 at 6:37 PM UTC
Your subjectless Objects of capital, the agency bereft GDP drones, O! America,
They are spilled on the pavement, an upturned ice cream cone of discontent
puddled and lackadaisical, they fester beside the hydrant.
Your news agencies and malls, the damp dishrags of industry,
snagged on the nail of defenselessness and exploitation, only infect the wound.
Each mess of a person, walks through the sugary malaise of your suffering
dragging it on to the next in communal forbearing; its contagion, its disease
is so many cysts on the mind of those syrupy vacuoles for capital; the private,
malignant caverns of dewy-eyed trust in humanity, insipidly drawing the rancor to a boil,
without understanding a thing.
You pride yourself on much, without eyes for the condition of your people,
O! America.
People, shackled in your jails, are so many ideas bubbling as to the cruelty of your nature
punctured by the ignorance outside.
Draped in your obnoxious flag, the cites are as malicious as the countryside, toward life, toward knowledge.
You prop-up the price of their crops, the know-not-whys, who plunder the earth to prolong population growth and consciousness-decline.
America, you eradicate discontent with cattle cars, filled with questioning life forms, gasing our minds and burning our bodies with your arrogance.
Like a popcorn bag steaming in the microwave; you have been left alone too long, and have developed a flame-- an inextinguishable flame of reason.
You have been disavowed too LITTLE.
You must not be allowed to expand any further, lest the impoverished bag of flesh which is mankind will burst.
But still you stagnate, until your violence curdles with drones and bombs patrolling our synapses.
Our brains digest your violence against us and **** it out with an abused dialect of greed and hate.
Then you ask us only that we eat from your refuse heap of burnt kernels from the “truth” of market economy.
You taste like cancer. You rot the mouth of competent men, and satiate the anxieties of those who would turn against you-- with a refreshing ice cream cone of absentmindedness
dropped on the ground and melting.
But the stains you made will always taint the sidewalk of man.
Jun 20, 2011
Jun 20, 2011 at 12:26 AM UTC
The night is like a sharpened knife,
It slides inside the softened butter of my sleep,
Slices, and spreads.
My dreams are a feast for beasts that haunt
The shuttered soul of my very human heart.
That first taste; sweet, like the first brave stars
That wave goodbye to dusk.
Heady then, those midnight licks
From something sated, gorging here for greed alone.
Soon, their appetite curdles,
My dreams within those gaping maws,
Turned foul and rank, now turn on those that feed.
As dawns shy song bids night ghasts flee
My dreams return, at last, to me.
May 22, 2016
May 22, 2016 at 5:42 PM UTC
The safest place in the world is my front porch at 3 in the morning some hot July.
Where I’m from, the heat never has a chance to leave you. It curdles the starlight. You breathe it in like when you were 8 years old and stuck your face too close to an easy bake oven.
Out here, the world is only as quiet as it needs to be. You learn to recognize each streetlight by their own glow.
Soon enough, it will be time to walk back inside.
Feb 5, 2021
Feb 5, 2021 at 4:51 PM UTC
Love this life like a boy loves a girl
Love it all as it rolls up in your face
as it splashes your drink all over the place
Love this life as it deals up like cards
one heart one diamond two clubs and then its hard.
Love this life like a girl loves a boy
love it all so quiet when you are trying so hard
as it fills all the spaces in a well built heart
Love this life as it pages out grim
one dead one dying two going then the dim.
Love this life like a Mam loves a baby
love start to finish without question with out cease
Love it as it curdles and when it brings you peace
Love this life you're living, let me hear you as you sing
One Heart, One World, one only real thing.
Nov 11, 2012
Nov 11, 2012 at 4:11 AM UTC
Watching as they sink
Wreckage after the
Storm of the middle-aged
Oblivious to their own remedies
They saw the forecasts
Were warned of dangers
Still foolhardily pressed on
Told n'one of their endeavors
Clouds crowding
Wary winds
People perishing
Sorrowful seas
Boat bullied into submission
No force like water
Tearing and wearing
The hopeless down into
Shells of what they once were
Suddenly aware of aftermath
Learning of their strife before the wreck
They were warned
Yet, still the knowledge
Curdles the assumptions of family and friends
Fomenting separation
At the breaking of the storm
The aftermath a single clue
To middle-aged unhappiness
Jun 11, 2014
Jun 11, 2014 at 10:09 PM UTC
.
The branches of the trees bend and sway
as the breeze plays its tickling games.
Sitting beneath the mighty Oak
he closes his eyes and drifts back home.
His thoughts, like his arrows, true,
finding its destination with consummate ease.
A figure, a face, a smile, he sees.
The portrait of Her.
Burning a cold image in his mind.
An alien sound he hears, and startles,
intruding on his moment of reverie.
A bird lands on a tree, close,
giving him the eye, akin to the intelligent
stare of the capricious corvid.
It whistles and takes flight
calling him to follow.
Thoughts of Her portrait, now wisps of smoke,
disappear as intrigue beckons.
Insistent chirping, the clever eye,
leads him hither and thither,
ever away from home.
Caught in the enchantment, of following the Never bird.....
The mist crawls and curdles and climbs
in a rising, coalescing film of fog.
To befuddle the unwary, alone in the Trees.
His nerves, his eyes, captivated
as the Never bird commands attention.
Leading him on, deeper.
Home is but a distant sigh in his heart,
ignored with intensity, unloved.
The journey steps take him far, wayward
with no direction, no destination.
Singing sweet, swooping swift
the bird stops. Disappears into the gloom,
not once looking back, abandoning he who followed.
Lost. So very lost. So very lost.
Moments fly, rustling, footfalls, an apparition.
A Goddess of beauty unveils herself,
and steps, soft and gentle into the light.
Enraptured he takes her into his arms,
they sink and rut like animals, primal,
on the cool mossy carpet.
Banished are the thoughts and portraits.
Caught in the enchantment, of loving the Never bird.....
The cobalt sky in a haze of heat
swirls about before his eyes.
Laying beneath a Mighty Oak.
Goose-bumped skin. Alone.
He wakes. The forest still and silent.
His thoughts like drunken dogs
blurred by memories that excite and disturb.
The Portrait of Her.
Awakening a fuzzy, picture in his mind.
Scanning the trees, the lady is gone,
and missing is the Never bird.
Unknown magiks have been worked on him,
he felt, rather than observed.
The sigh in his heart for home, broke forth,
strange noises burst the mood.
The ache in his heart,
constrained within by abnormal form,
teetered on the edge of pain, sorrow.
A song of hope escapes, a decision made,
as wisps of smoke form a Portrait.
He spreads his wings,
caught in the enchantment, of being the Never bird.
© Pagan Paul (2016/2017)
Dec 23, 2017
Dec 23, 2017 at 8:51 AM UTC
It stalks me as I sleep.
It waits for me by day.
It feeds on my agony and immaculate horror.
I am not safe where I stay.
Hiding under my bedroom carpet,
in the closet, beneath the bed,
Anywhere it can drive me crazy, but,
No matter what, it'll not get in my head.
When I gaze into it, it's horrible eyes
Pierce my flesh down to the soul.
My skin wrinkles and curdles with cold,
My insides burn like coal.
I can't live with this thing much longer,
It'll destroy my sanity.
I can't live with the thing much longer,
The thing I'm ashamed to call me.
Jun 15, 2010
Jun 15, 2010 at 6:24 PM UTC
.
Pillars of sand start shifting,
the loving spoonful curdles tourmaline,
and the moon will be as blood,
darker than the inside of night.
Resonance as Death's hourglass screams
where a blade slices through flesh.
Angels are not supposed to have ******
on clouds of orange musk.
Poems fall like mountain rain,
excellent in obscurity, rich primal green,
reflecting olive trees in starlight,
glancing twice with Capricious intent.
A butterflies wings kiss the breeze,
Free. Serene. Long ago and far away.
In a circle of hearse black tulips
I lay down my shattered heart to die.
© Pagan Paul (16/02/17)
Jun 7, 2017
Jun 7, 2017 at 7:00 PM UTC
but i love that drowning
i step out of the shower and feel as if
i could never be absolutely clean
complete skin removal might do me justice
i would have to become a shade of myself
as would be the ashes of a fire
swatched on my upper arm that i will
always burn some way or other
that i am marked but my whole life is
grey and i choose high and low so often
that i feel like i am venturing on a median wave
never knowing what my destiny is
soon i will be nineteen and
we will celebrate my slow decay and everyone
will laugh at me but to me it is all very real
that it is a criminal offence the amount
of times i say goodbye and hello again
that my hair loops but never when i want it to
always when i want it to be downwards
that i sell conversations and flats on sundays
and my nails on every other day
i try to scratch every vulture i meet
breadth of two meters it is stretched from pillow on my bed to beak in my appendix
breath of ten seconds and then i shed my skin
completely take possession of the vulture’s body
it is me who is flying
vision serpent
i might be liquid now and frozen tomorrow or
that might never happen global warming
curdles in my stomach i tried to throw up
but my body does not trust me like it used to
i am glue now somewhere
in between Sisyphus’ rock and Narcissus’ puddle
neither solid and sweeping
nor soft standing still
i look into a crystal ball and see myself
i drink loose tea and the leaves are like my limbs always sinking
i read my tarot and keep a careful eye on the stars and avoid dark nights and being alone and it is always me like a little lucifer carrying inferno online like an application
******* obligation
only some god shoots the food right
in front of his eyes
Oct 16, 2018
Oct 16, 2018 at 3:23 PM UTC
the sight of soccer makes me sick
the smell of old spice makes my eyes *****
seeing a buick makes me want to curl in a ball
it always seemed like you stood so tall
above me
as i stood in your shadow
you were
are oblivious
as you chat away
every day
pretending to care
pretending
like you want me there
today you almost
read my poems
stupid
to lend you my computer
while it was up
you read one
two
three
before i freaked and pulled it away
it makes me
sick
this hopeless devotion
it curdles my stomach
this senseless inward commotion
reading like a sheakspere historian
into your every word
brush
comment
every time
our eyes meet
i fall a
little more in love
and get a little angrier
at myself
for succumbing to
this foolish
black hole
of a sickness
Jan 29, 2015
Jan 29, 2015 at 12:59 AM UTC
And t'is is truthfully why I am here, my love:
I belong to thee, sacredly, entirely, and soulfully
to thee-yes, only to thee!
My eyes brighten at every sight of thee,
my mind delights at the thoughts of thee,
my pulse fastens at the views of thee,
my blood curdles at the scent of thee,
my veins rustle at the gaze of thee-and hark!
Hark now, dearest-how my heart leaps,
sheepishly yet excitedly-when'ver I recall thee!
Ah, and how t'is feeling trembles and fidgets
as always, as thou stareth back-gladly and
with a smile so handsome yet animated and playful-
sweeping straightly back into my soul.
Like t'ose stupefying, sentient glazes of summers-
blowing silently with the rustic gallantry
of t'eir ruddy oaks, my heart is elevated
with defiant, but affectionate branches
of terrific, terrific love for thee!
Oh! And t'ese thou but needst to know-
t'at both my virtuous-and vicious lusts-crave only thee,
as well as how my pure joys rely on thee!
As despairingly as how
my soul was born for thee,
my life was crafted for thee,
my hands were paired with thee,
and thus so graciously are my young feet-
my toes, my ribs, my lungs, and the very limbs
in which my spines might dwell, and be celebrated
by thy gentle, manly breath.
Oh, how thou, my Western prince-so delicate
and blessed with all the might
of my very being-thou hath, my love, since the very first
been my gem, my bronze, my silver, my gold,
my charm, my pearl, my diamond, my light,
my fire, my treasure, and my lifelong dreams-as thou
shalt always be!
And so art thou the perfect accord
to comply with all such of my mine;
as thou art but the freshest bloom
of my ****** years,
as innocent as t'is nature's peaceful labyrinths-
but youthful and starry like the fruit of my most curious-
yet ardently succulent imagination.
And how I am so devoted to thee, my love!
Just like the stars are to the moon above.
Mar 2, 2013
Mar 2, 2013 at 3:34 PM UTC
O'er stone paths the roses grow still as a ditty,
When light lamps are paling the ripe summer oil;
With a noise that the left ear blocks rushed in a hurry,
The hawthorns are fierce, till the black thorns are pretty.
Where the mind is at once full of peace, full of pieces,
In shrubs there are stubs made from wagtails and hen,
Tin, copper, unfathomed: a marvellous city,
In comfort the day loses its din as it ceases.
Skimming at milk with the tightest lipped marrow,
Left hands, right lobes singed, as it curdles to putty;
The bones of the fair-folk are lost in the morrow,
And our hands meet the roses, so we'll grasp them in pity.
Our four feet go kicking, at that hard wall we're sitting;
But the hawthorns are wet, and the hawthorns are sticky.
Jan 15, 2012
Jan 15, 2012 at 6:43 AM UTC
I. Aprilis
You wished the summer for no one
moments of white wilderness
stars in the blood
sepaled bees scatter
drown each day as all lights
unmade pollen blossoming among
fistfuls of paper tasks
busied thought scrolls with the Seen
afternoon feathers multiply
white honey of Aries
II. Julius
Months as paper pass flitting
through the screens that
separate outdoors from in where
light pools on an ancient carpet and
summer lay broken in pieces
on the floor like
so much shattered vinyl
what happens to the trapped light then, as
it ages, it thickens
curdles in the stale drapes
staunches awareness of
time the moon
is slowly
drifting away
from Earth
III. Octus
Apples fall on the rotten dusty ground we
threw them, trapped in the speckled atmosphere of decades
that never rinses clean you swore
we could see Venus if
the clouds would sit right
Aphrodite in blue jeans a ladder
in darkness is still
a ladder
IV. Januarius
Color dissolves and
hibernates underground grey winds
stampede through the Roman Year
like the ghosts of unchained thoroughbreds
all the bees have drowned their honey
spread thin across the blackened sky when
everything is upside down
stars become seeds
Mar 12, 2010
Mar 12, 2010 at 7:21 PM UTC
Oh, how cruel a fate it is,
To gain hope from void assumptions,
For it all amounts to horse ****
But nonetheless it curdles ones imaginations.
Guile created from ones own mind.
A goal, impossible to attain yet continue to find.
If love, beith abstraction illusion.
Hope the manifestation of delirium.
Oh, high empryn. What love of pure blessedness can your high ruler endow me with,
But literary devices which are in my usage,
Is simply the context of garbage.
ab
Jan 31, 2015
Jan 31, 2015 at 10:01 AM UTC
Two yellow lilies in a sea of black berries.
Fighting off hordes of danger and strife.
They caress to fight the cold, smile to fight the night.
The bitter thorns cannot touch their lovely patch of green.
Two autumn leaves floating dangerously over the eaves.
The jealous wind blows with all it's might.
They cling on tightly by their fingertips.
Their hearts plead for mercy.
Two tiny turtles listen as the fearsome wave curdles.
Madly sprinting for safety; flat feet sinking in the sand.
The wave hits my face, but never touches yours.
I won the race, but I lost the war.
Two yellow lilies in a sea of black berries.
May 25, 2015
May 25, 2015 at 7:11 PM UTC
Have you ever observed the consistency
Of liquor in the sun
Oil like waves through the fiery liquid
Stomach curdles at the thought
Thick and sickening, down it goes
Swallowing oil, more fun than it sounds
Aged and brown, my whiskey
No different from the oil in my car
Yet still the legality of one action
Is questioned over that of another
Periodically the oil is changed
So that things might run smoothly
Periodically the whiskey is drank
So that things might run smoothly
Periodically things will change
Apr 21, 2012
Apr 21, 2012 at 7:49 PM UTC
Another dusty dead year curdles, cracks and falls away
Its leavings relegated to the wrinkles in your brain
Your browser history; bookmarks, highlights, favorite places.
Some grime settles in the corners that won't get scrubbed away by Auld Lang Syne.
Flecks of history get stuck and cake the alleys and furrows, allowing us less room to think, and then what we keep is what ruins us.
Jan 1, 2015
Jan 1, 2015 at 4:46 PM UTC