The comic convention
has cardboard cutouts of
all of the main characters of
Harry Potter.

Harry,
Ron,
Hermione,
etc.
All motionless in a river of people,
glossy but worn down,
bathed in cold white halogen.

And one by one,
the cosplayers—
the Harrys
Rons
Hermiones,
etc.

Have their pictures taken
with the cutouts,
one cardboard cutout cut out
and replaced with a real human being.

Being human, we
crave companionship,
fear solitude,
crave solitude,
fear companionship.

We try to avoid becoming cardboard
cutouts of ourselves, but sometimes
a retreat into inanimacy
is what the animus needs.

The cosplayers continue to shuffle forward in line
each waiting to pose for a selfie.  Each
politely smiling at the living Harry Potter characters around them,

but not striking up a conversation.

What do you do
when you realize
your life as you know it
is a cardboard cutout,
a dollhouse scene,
Of what your life should be.
Of what it once was.

The people in my life are characters
A backdrop in the place of reality.
Scenery behind my doorstep.
Photographic fire in the fireplace.
Tiny kitchen cutlery that isn’t sharp.
Staged people in my living room
at literally, a lifeless party.
A fantastic picturesque magazine spread in Southern Living.

And I am a part of this falseness.
I am a creator of this un-reality.
I am a willing participant in this stagnant stage of my life.

This life, this love, this truth
Is a figment
Is a dream
Is a scene of a scene.

I remember when green was green
And blue was blue
And I breathed in newness in every breathe.
Reality bowed down in servitude
And I took every step into a setting sun
The world around me, my partner in crime
As I took it by storm.

The tragedy here
Is knowing that life and love and truth barren
Is knowing it naked
As it really is.
As it really was.

And knowing that you’ve settled for the cardboard cutout
is recognizing you’ve given up.
You’ve settled for second best.
You’re taking the doll house route to life.
You’d rather watch the movie than live it out.
It’s cowardice at its best.

friends
will be quick to show you
just how much they don't care
when you need a hand on your shoulder
or someone to have your back
just watch how they quickly disappear
like a mirage in the desert heat
it's an illusion
they're cardboard cutouts
the truth is
they were never really there in the first place
so you can't blame them for being
fake

Old Cowboys, forts and shootouts
Black for bad and White for good
With a spinning canvas background
And cactus cutouts made of wood
The desert sits behind them
Fifty yards away at most
The heroes don't ride horses
They sip drinks and sit and boast
About their celluloid adventures
singing songs all dressed in white
While behind them in the background
The stunt men do it right
A canvas background rotates
Through valleys, hills and streams
While the hero rides his deck chair
And the director yells and screams
Central casting fills the tribes out
With Italians, and made up stock
While our hero stops an avalanche
Of fake paper covered rocks
Cardboard Cut out Cactus
And heroes smiling in the sun
Most have never seen a cowpoke
Let alone shot off a gun
But, it's magic when it's finished
the dusters up there on the screen
All the fakery and snake oil
Are all hidden, never seen
The white hats beat the black hats
The hero sings and gets the girl
And the background on the spindle
Is still spinning, watch it whirl
A celluloid adventure
Cowboys no where close to what they were
But..watch the next show for a nickel
And don't forget your spurs!!!

Condolence Cards Poem (Spoken Word)
5/19/2014

Congratulations: On landing your dream job!
Congratulations: On buying your first house!
Congratulations: It's a beautiful baby you brought into this world!
Congratulations: Marriage is so monumental, see you at the wedding!
Condolences.

Can you measure the amount of acknowledgements we forfeit,
to cheap card stock and cheesy colorful cutouts?  
Like each event in life is a round in sports,
requiring an announcer to stand on the edge of the arena,
shouting the play by play.  

We play pretend that cards can say what we feel.  
But I feel like unless if those purple, blue, vanilla,
or pink for valentine's and mother's day envelopes
can enclose an entire paperback novel,
I know that my feelings can't possibly be enclosed inside.  
As if feelings could surmount to anything less than a lifetime of experience.  

For when has then phrase, "I love you" ever conveyed the entire message intended, but without the soft gestures accompanying it, or perhaps the longing gaze of eyes and 'I Do's' entrenched in one another.  
For when has the phrase, "I miss you" offered up the subtleties of staring out your window on rainy day, listening to piano symphonies sinking into the sofa sipping away sorrows on wine?
For when has the phrase, "I am sorry for your loss" ever actually meant sorry, as if it was you who were the perpetrator of a ****** and were seeking exoneration through a sorry excuse of a phrase uttered by people who just don't quite understand the meaning of the term 'sorry.'
Condolences.

I stare at the Hallmark Sea in front of me and I wonder.  Are life's memorable moments so easily categorized?  Into baby showers, bar-mitzvahs, and birthdays?
What about cards just for barbecues with random neighbors?
About cards just for breaking your precious vase?
Cards just for being a ***** the other day?
Just for breakfast you made me in bed?
For binge-ing on alcohol with me and not leaving me almost dead?
What about cards just for thanking you for buying me a stupid ******* card?

Tell me where is the corporate branding on cards for being broke?
On cards for broken homes?
On cards for being homeless?
On cards for getting cancer?
On cards for cutting?
On cards for self-loathing and depreciation?
What about cards for being in the moment or sharing a cup of coffee?
Instead what we get is the catch-all, Condolence Cards.

Condolences - an expression of sympathy with a person who is suffering sorrow, misfortune, or grief.  
Condolences - an expression of sympathy with a person who is suffering sorrow, misfortune, or grief.  
Condolences - an expression of sympathy
Condolences - a person who is suffering
Condolences - sorrow, misfortune, or grief.  


I didn't realize most people's sympathy being expressed equated to blank stares like paper on paper, means nothing but thin and flimsy papers, feelings forfeited, grounded up like big beautiful trees teeming with life, chalked up into tiny pieces of toilet paper for you to wipe your crap on, leaving behind a Hallmark - Condolence Card.

I opened the gifts one by one,
knowing that the softness I felt
under the antique Santa Claus paper
was yet another bundle of fabric,
more clothes to add
to my ever-expansive wardrobe.

One by one, the patterns were revealed to me:
some plain black cotton,
a Paris print with a sparkly pink tower,
paper cutouts the size of my favorite dolls,
and at last, a sewing machine.

I remember a roomless memory,
my mother and I hovered over the machine,
the internet failing to teach us
how to maneuver the thread.

“We’ll try again later,” she said.

Now, I open the drawer under my bed,
remove a dust-covered box,
running my fingers along the top of it.
I remove the as-new machine,
my failed future.
I walk to my computer, switch taps
from a Buddhism study guide
to an empty Google Docs.

I wonder if I was a seamstress in a past life.
Did I watch my family create the cave paintings
while I sat in the corner, hide on my lap
with a splinter of bone in my hand,
feeling nothing but bliss?

Did I live in the Edwardian era,
tailoring a perfect three-piece suit,
a walking skirt, my daughter’s chemise?

Did I ever pass my grandmother
in a secondhand store,
with my goal of finding a perfect neckline,
my favorite sleeves, a plaid pattern.

Did I find them among the stained and unloved,
did I make them into something beautiful?

Was this not a flashback, but a foreshadow?
Was this a hint at my next life?
Will I do the same with my daughter,
passing down the cotton and glittered tower,
hugging with triumph when the machine roars to life?

Will I be there at her first fashion show?

What if there is no past or future.
What if my soul is me, unchanging, stable.
What if I’m a butterfly,
every passing second another cocoon?

For I am a tree,
and these memories
are my branches.

My left arm holds the present,
the current reality. I fail to sew
even a button, but my dreams
reside content.

With my right arm,
I hold another present,
equally as real.

In this world, I made my doll a dress,
a bedspread with the leftover fabric.
In this world, I am not a poet,
and I don’t often dream.
In this world, my floor is my stage,
this fabric is my home.
In this world, I know not of other realities.
In this world, I live buried in my ignorant bliss.

we, mistakes made in groping dark,
ironed and cheekkissed happy accidents,
told we arrived by love, and our purpose forward: to love.

we were chocolate milk runners.
we were completion grades.
coloring sheets of MLK and jagged cutouts of billy goats.
we were girls in sequined jeans with scraped knees.
on the basketball court we pushed pigtails to concrete.
rumors of us kissing in the lobby waiting for our rides
did circulate.

we, skinny white girls of Moore, Okla.,
skipped supper and laid at the feet of TV-watchers
like bleached branches of fallen oaks garnishing their standing brothers.

we were doorbells.
we were passenger seats.
peeking in the teacher's edition and handshaking answers in fluorescent bathrooms.
we were the first ones on the bus and the last ones off.
knees to chin, untied laces on heater's ****, winterlong sweat factory.
rumors of us agreeing to go to prom over fourth-period lunch
did circulate.

we, writers suffered writers' morality,
disregarded right, wrong, norm; lounged, waiting to be under the bus,
suffering for the story. tense matchstick lovers --  dim light for a moment and then.

we were someone else's *******.
we were someone else's hairpins.
as whatever ran so hot in us cooled, dried on thrift store comforters,
so did we. ceiling fans and ***. fingernails and boxed wine.
rumors sustaining.

and so it came, after announcements, after invitations,
after subbing in one bridesmaid for another, we were getting married.
we were grooms with empty pockets and full of sound advice.
our fathers took us behind the church,
chaplipped our foreheads,  and said,
"I know, we promised you were made from love and to love.
But I gotta be real honest here. You were made from whiskey.
And there's always the distillery."

we were jobless in wrinkled suits.
we were brown shoes; black belts.
and this will look good on your resumé. and this will look good on your resumé.
translation: how about ******* this ****? or how about this one?
a resumé was one page. we couldn't fit all the ***** on one page.

we, beardheavy and deodorant-streaked,
lived in dream houses in Ulysses, Kan., drove dream Tahoes,
watched dream Netflix, next to  portly wives who looked like
QUEEN MOTHER OF ALL THE BROTHELS OF THE LOWER MIDWEST.

we were childless.
we were wanting.
after consulting a physician and a bottle of whiskey,
we lifted and pinned the sagging belly of our wives with
a wooden board. one good **** in. one borrowed pregnancy test.

and so it came, the weddings of our sons. behind the church,
we took them aside and said,
*"I know, we promised you were made from love and to love.
But I gotta be real honest here."

onus of science, or dream, to all explain;
the inexplicable remains dismissed:
being here or there: exactly arranged
and no one yearns to know of nothingness
between the emptiness of meanings each
with labeled names, boxes tightly-packed--
towers darkly lined, well beyond the reach
of but a few, lost, scattered minds...
xe shouted through hir lungs a greener hue
that we could live beyond the concrete grey
die in love despite our evil ignorance,
our rainbow cutouts crying for the sun
  --posthumous teleologies begun
  in kinder dreamers, earthly songs enhanced.

We are not born with hatred swirling around in our skull
It is something that is built within the structures of our environments
This civil war whose bombs wake us up in the morning
and whose grenades disturb our sleep.

We are not born with ******/******/******/****/****/**** on our tongues
This is the product of this billboard society that teaches us
to spit daggers rather slip our tongues around and caress

We are not born in fear of the other
It is not genetics that implore us to engage
in the ongoing battles between
     fat and skinny
     black and white
     religious and faithless
     straight and curved

Our world is a wasteland
filled with our soulless cardboard cutouts
doing nothing more than occupying space.
We examine our fingertips in search of identity
and are shown skin that has been scrubbed smooth
by the buffers created to stop our minds from
expanding too wide and our dreams from growing too big.
We look to the too-distant stars for directions but must turn to a foreign map
to tell us where home is.

What we are born with is excitement.
With adventure running through our veins.
With eyes the color of flawless wonder
and skin scarred with wisdom.

We were born with longing.
Longing for a great escape.
For rebirth.

Your tongues all taste like cardboard...
Mostly because you are all cardboard,
But that's besides the point.
Even though your kisses can never give me warmth,
I'm still hung up over each and every one of you.

To you, fear kept me from loving you.
As for you, we eventually drifted apart
Across of the sea of remembrance.
Then for you, I had to drop any notion
When you asked "are you gay?"
With a skeptical gaze.
You made it clear that
You yourself were not.

However, I keep dusting you all off
To pull you out of my closet.
Standing on the ***** of my feet,
I'm hanging little beaded necklaces
Around all your necks again.

The great Green Mountains,
up where the tallest evergreens grow,
stretching,
upward an outward,
toward the heavens,
a perimeter of boundaries,
where white iridescent angels,
can drift,

Touching the clouds,
in winds of change coming,
gathered together sheltering storms,
alongside barren maples
and birches,
with shriveled others aging,
gracefully,
bowing down to winter's bone,
and ready for Spring's solstice.

When,
in surging solar winds,
upward of,
a million miles an hour,
40 hours after leaving their sun,
raining in an big bright ariel shower,
emphasizing their greatness,
in an eerie tranquility,
behind a diffused hazy luster,
a distant soft moon light,
in a beautiful Glory Shining.

Silvery satin ribbons,
and celadon green bends,
as colors wait pensive to create
in messages it then sends,
a heavenly landscape,
for their part in the prism ballet,
these arial acrobats,
yearn to touch tips on sturdy cutouts,
of tall old aging trees,

Dancing into ever-changing,
multifaceted soft,
an inspiring hues,
an shifting in the breeze
they move above,
in a mystical rhythm,
a dark and mysterious,
black smoke rises
in between rays,
in the opaque darkest hour,
for the creation of,
a spiritual backdrop,
mysterious feeling power
in the magnificent,
Magnetic Midnight.

The darker the sky,
the brighter the light,
for an otherworldly setting,
as colors merge and ignite
while they mix the palate again,
I am lost in silent reverie,
for the forces that dance there in that blackness,

Awe-inspiring,
breathtakingly beautiful,
alien,
frightening,
imparting comforting wisdom,
it is everything an so exciting,
and healing to your soul,
like a hauntingly familiar sound,
of
music to your ears.

moving like in an immensely,
active native conga,
while flitting eiree,
ghosts of glaciers perform,
when fueled folklore beckon,
swirling magic colors
in a perfect moving storm
these beauties from frozen skies,
spraying snow & tossing sparks,
as their created stars,
saturate the deep,
as their tears are shed,
in big butterfly kisses,

playfully floating,
in lovely little fine wisps,
of cirrus smudges of pure refractions,
bending in rarified veils of light,
into a seamless,
shimmering skyscape.

A hiding crystal clear,
deep Alice blue sky,
now fading,
as colors are now blending,
from azure into darkest denim,
then turning periwinkle,
stretching out,
into auroral archways,
dusted in a tangerine glow
in transitioning brushstrokes,
gently cover impressionistic sketches,
evolving into luminism,
on an endless open canvas.

As I paint the words,
where I sit there quietly,
respectfully awaiting answers,
as clouds and moonlight smear,
into watercolor scenery,
using up each angel tear
an intimate engagement occurs,
the passion of nature,
is sublime,
just perfectly,
these synchronized sky swimmers ,
becoming one

As a stormy sun is forcing,
red light dancers,
holding torches,
colliding and becoming excited,
edging themselves,
these powerful ominous portents,
becoming the framework.

Around a fantastic fluorescent show,
the cast wearing blushing pink,
and wild viola purples,
tinged in chartreuse green,
basking in beauty,
where hope lies,
in these colors I've never ever seen, since,
transcending skies of tomorrow,
into an age old masterpiece,
waiting patiently for this,
spiritual journey,
to begin,
with an eager & beautiful,
dawn coming.

Where the North winds,
send a brilliant light show,
of atomic wonders,
in watery pirouettes,
of shaped effects,
& teardrops sacrificed,
swirl in spirits of harmony,
completely memorizing,
I am transfixed,
an astonishing feat,
of brilliant pigments,
smudged into,
the mysterious lightness,
my drifters heart wanders,
melded into atmospheric colors,
we can only wish to see in this lifetime.

Where life seeds now
glide,
on the giving winds,
and Eagles and hawks can,
applaud this much beauty way up there.

This place,
a heavenly firmament,
where all the sacred souls come to die,
  where all the very, very, wise end up,
where they all spend their eternal lives,
young and old alike,
eventually they all retire here,
bringing us hope or warnings,
a chance at redemption,
striking hot iron in a glow,
metallic bits,
stars form,
restless,

Sighing, awaiting,
  a gifted chance to share with us,
along with all the parished,
souls and spirits,
playfully transforming,
from native garb,
mocassin covered feet,
change into favorite animals,
stomping on the colorful floor,
a great bear,
a wolf,
a beluga whale,
a soaring raptor,
not wanting for anything,
walking in Native American circles,
to the sounds of long silent drums,
morphing & shape shifting,

Again,
and again,
and again,
where rain shadows dance,
in ancient skies,
celestial bodies are illuminated,
reflecting the fire circles,
from where distant oceans shore,
take me there...ancestors
take me there once more,

As night slowly declines,
as daylight seeps through cracks,
bleeding into tomorrow,
to fly again to share what they must,
they pray and worship their God,
and they trust..

And Aurora Borealis is her name.

Cherie Nolan © 2016

I.
With strappy, **** cutouts at the back, this is tempting at every angle.
∙ Allover lace trim
∙ Strappy back cutouts
∙ Front and back bows
∙ Low rise
∙ Minimal back coverage
∙ Imported polyester/spandex

II.
The **** lift of a push-up meets the coverage you want in a supersoft bra you’ll love to wear. With lighter Memory Fit for extra support as it conforms to your curves and a smoothing U-shaped back.

Lift & Lining
∙ Extreme lift
∙ Full coverage underwire cups

Straps & Hooks
∙ Adjustable straps can convert to crossback and snap into place for a secure hold
∙ Back closure
∙ Double row of hook and eye closures; Sizes 36DD & 38D-38DD have triple row of 

closures
 

for a secure, comfortable fit
∙ 4 settings to ensure a perfect fit

Details & Fabric
∙ U-shaped ballet back prevents band from riding up and offers more coverage
∙ Supersoft, double-lined sides for the smoothest shape
∙ Keyhole and bow at center front
∙ Imported nylon/spandex

Forbidden fruits hidden in the roof
of my mind
Its time to set fire to the mimes
Larcenous pursuit of greater acclaim
than is taped and pasted to your brain.
Dripping copper pipes cold in the November light
bright shadows gently crush the fabric of unreality.
Love is a howitzer
it can **** alot of people
quickly and often.
Love is a pool of amniotic fluid,
it sustains and cushions, and soothes with warm comfort.
Cardboard cutouts of cutthroat gangsters with gout,
flout societies mores, with Cuban cigar smoke synthesis.
Brandy
snifterfull
Awaiting the dinnerbell.

She and he went looking
for a place where God can't hide.
They found a quiet gallery
set upon a hillside.

She took nothing but a picture frame
and with it, houses became
monuments, stone timepieces
stood still
until the wind changed.
But trees became cardboard cutouts,
like a fourth grade
book report.
Curious, they walked
through endless halls
where on each wall
there hung a different name.
(I saw them flirting by
the water fountain)

After a good belly laugh,
she filled her lungs with the after math;
intricate, rain-soaked
veins branched out
toward a sky that went on forever.
By morning, however,
her breath could no longer be seen.
The night between her
and the art collector
had only been a dream.

Department store leg warmers
sharing the stage with thrift store achievements
candle wax and I can't recognize futuristic defeat.
Here in my corner
red lights, behind plenty of ears and tattoos
cardigans, cardigans galore.
I've seen them all before,
these cardboard cutouts.

Lamp, desk, repeat
lamp, desk, repeat.
I love the view when everything
dissipates into jean and jean and
t-shirt

I was reading when you're pineapple hair scooped
up my conscious mind
behind books and bags,
books and bags and cups.

I'm at that moment in the sleepover
Where I have a headache
From too many sweets and out of tune singing
We are both curled up on the bed under a blanket
Festooned with kernels of makeshift popcorn
The iPad is full of ridiculous videos
And the desk full of dreams on sheets
Of pure dove white paper
Except now it's covered
With glue sharpies and cutouts
But never mind
I couldn't care less now
Because I'm worrying about the money
All spent on food and clothes
Clothes that make you look like you had less food
Than you actually did
I know you're going to snore so bad
But right now I'm writing and laughing
At cheesy videos and hilarious quotes
I wish we could stay together always

HANDMADE CHRISTMAS

Do you remember back when
Christmas was making things
Out of stiff colored paper
Like chains of slim paper rings
That were so long we took them
And wrapped the a few times
Around the tree as pretty trim?

We made angels and snowflakes
From something called shirt boards;
Cutouts covered with aluminum foil.
They didn’t need extension cords.
And Mom showed us how to starch
String we dyed. We wrapped it
Around some inflated balloons.
When each dried, we popped it.

We made reindeers and Santas
Our of wooden clothespins
With pipe cleaner antlers or
Cotton beards for Santa’s chin.
Mom dyed an old sheet green
For under the Christmas tree.
Prettier than the store-bought kind
It has always seemed to me.

In school we made Gifts too
Things knitted or made of clay
To give to Mom wrapped up
With great pride on Christmas Day.
And that wrapping paper was
Was all Christmas color tissue.
It was inexpensive to buy, so
Using a lot was not an issue.

Some gifts were appreciated
Some maybe not as much
But in every case, we were
For the most part very touched.
You knew for sure just by looking
What care and love went into
The handmade presents that were
Made totally and especially for you.

Brent Kincaid
12/12/2015

with a smile,
a wink,
the rapt attention
I bestow,
I give love to strangers
people who don't ever catch my name, who dont stop long enough to
I give love to fantasy people cardboard cutouts who my be real in front of me but have no knowledge,
of my war,
the inner struggles  that cause ravage in my soul
ridden cage,
I give love to strangers people that wont remember,
that wont recall
the stretch of my smile or the thickness of my thighs
I give love to the mail man,
push it out over my hands, to blow kisses into his face
it wraps around his chin and climbs up the gap and sits on his cheeks,
rosy and stained,
I give love to the children being yelled at two cars behind me in the drive thru line,
I love you, I don't know why she's acting like this but boys one day youll know she loved you,
but she was broken and tired with excuses
I give love to the man who sits by me, rattling the table so badly with his shakes,
and the ever scent rolling off his clothes,
that smell like broken promises leading up to his broken home,
I love you,
I give love to the strangers rich or poor broken scattered collected gathered,
I give love to faceless people, the ones who fight overseas,
never knowing me,
I give love to strangers,
because I cant seem to use it on me.

because when I turn it to me,
the light burns the whispers screams,
the love too tight,
hugs too close,
kisses too intense,
love too much,
oil over water and blood,
lotion over bones,
its too hot for the cold

she's the kind of girl
who wears rain boots in summer
in hopes of catching the eye
of anything or anyone

he's the kind of boy
who sews patches on his denim
in attempts to impress
the punkrock cardboard cutouts

they're the kind of kids
whose parents keep a watchful fist
on nothing but the bottles of gin
hidden in the top drawer

I lit a fire tonight
upon my grandfather's old typewriter.

I kindled it with all of his old pencils,
his favorite ballpoint pen,
his yellow-paged novels,
his newspaper cutouts of his past successes.

Hell, I even threw in the bookshelf.

And, just like that,
it was mortal history.
I did it for the **** of it.

I mean, if it was REALLY important,
it would be sprawled all over webpages.
Sprawled all over online searches and
digital databases.

Trust me, grandpa,
the future looks much better in High Definition.

Hey, honey
who did you **** to get into this party?
The whole wide world
is watching the same skin flick,
******
tickled
and slick
with scummy scrangjjjjjj
scrangggjjjjjjjj
that's code for *****
in some ancient Indoasian
dialect
you only ever heard from Indiana Jones.
I slip and slide into
her *****
in my backyard
in the middle of my tenth birthday party
and it's warm,
it's warm and safe
and I like it here.
I like it everywhere.
Humidity is the closest thing
I have to a God
there's a forest of ***** hair
growing on the bathroom rug.
I'm sorry that you had to walk on it.
My little brother's
got eyes in the back of his head,
they blink and look around
and you have got to watch your back around him
because he's fast
as a *******,
too.
Today I am concerned about
the price of oil
not because I drive
but because my fictional wife
stops putting out
the minute it hits four dollars.
You've got an awfully perdy mouth
for someone who just got hacked to pieces.
I'd like to frame your lips
if you'd let me,
that would be nice,
right above my fireplace,
on the mantle,
next to the ******* cutouts
I've been saving since I was seven.
Is it glue that's holding them together,
God I hope so
because everyone keeps touching it
whenever they come to visit.
Come.
To visit.
haha
I like to laugh,
laughter is medicine for the soul,
Chicken Soup
for the Pre-Teen's Soul
is really just full of
**** anecdotes
but the kids don't tell their parents that,
why do you think they sell so well?
I'm a *******
something
****
I've run out of ideas
at this point in time
it's getting awful hard
to continue my schoolwork
because
let's face it
one can only learn about
bonds
so many times
before the skin
from ones' face
starts to peel
off ones' skull
and slide into ones' hands
and fall onto ones'
***** carpet.
It stares up at you
accusingly,
no eyes,
and it speaks.
"What's the deal with airline food?"
you
me
we
say.

Close your eyes.

         Imagine a white room.

There are objects in the white room.

Each object represents something in your life that worries or stresses you. Each object binds you to the external world. Each object stands for something that keeps your mind active, keeps you worrying, keeps you awake.

Imagine a white room.

I really am trying. My eyes are tight, eyelashes stuck to my cheek.

(I can feel the blood trickling through the veins in my sclera, ******* itself from end to end like cherryade through a drinking straw.)

I have my toes resting on my knees like a good little lotus, my fingers resting on top of them making the ‘ok’ sign.

This is a hard trick. It takes concentration. It takes effort to clear your thoughts from a metaphorical room (Jean’s room, tidy but never clean.)

What if I fall asleep upright? Will my neck break?

You ever see spiders playing dead? They roll onto their backs and cradle their bodies inside a disjointed prison that they’ve made with their own limbs. Their legs bend back at jaunty angles, crooked at the knees.

A spider ran at me once whilst I was sat on the toilet. I was reading an encyclopedia at the time, just flicking through, and in my panic I hit the spider with the spine of it. He curled up into a crumpled ball in the middle of the pink bathroom mat. I thought he was dead, but by the morning he had moved on, not leaving a trace.

In the grand cosmic metaphor of it all, we’re all just bristly little gymnasts looking to be left alone.

The white room is flying over the sea.

Objects that represent your daily life are sitting in the white room.

There is a door in the white room.

There are windows.

Using your imagination, remove each object from your room one by one. Throw them out of the door. Pour them out of the window.

Clear your mind.

Throw it all into the sea.*

My laptop is drowning. My journals are dissolving like sugar paper. White birds come from nowhere and lift up the corners of my bookcase, shaking it out into the ocean as one would air out a bed sheet. My memories are eating sand. The people I have loved are unsmiling shop-window cutouts, rolling along the waves of a mythical sea.

How far do I have to go? It seems like this means more than just Sleep. Every night do I need to be new, need to empty myself out like a clogged up sea-shell? How far do I have to go before it’s just me that’s left?

I can never make my sea deep enough because I don’t wish to drown. I’m not Ophelia.

I’m really not.

I don’t hold flowers neither.

I just can’t sleep.

(White isn’t a colour, it’s an absence.

Put a tick against my name. Use a bright red pen.

I’m right here. For always.)

My mother orders a smaller size
for my leotard so I ***** in the gym
bathroom, in the last stall.
Later, I put on the outfit: small, shiny,
with cutouts for a fashion statement,
but I draw red circles around those patches
of flesh--mistakes to fix.

Every day in the car, Mom gives me a lunch
she packed: two rice cakes, peanut butter measured
to exactly one tablespoon, carrots and ranch dip.
Accepting her boundaries seems weak, so I never
eat at all, my only spot of control set against
the nightmare of a needle spinning around
numbers in a sickening game of roulette.

She kneels in front of the stage during
all eight routines that thinned me into a figure
worthy of her photos, immortalizing
me with vague curves, a slim face replacing
pink round cheeks--
but that was enough for my mom
because I know she sets the scale
five pounds above zero.
Inches disappeared, until that needle,
sharp like her eyes, aligned
with the big 85, causing mine to
open in a room with blank walls
and sterile-smelling sheets, the place
of rest.

“There’s 7 billion, 46 million people on the planet and most of us have the audacity to think we matter” –George Watsky  

Dear George,  
You were there for everyone else. I cried for them all while my dad begged you in whispers,
and you melted into the crowds of people,
and you dove from the balconies,
and pretended like the world consisted of somebodies.
You left me with cold copies and ignorant earth.  
Somehow you made 4am into something selfish.
I was losing lessons I was willing to learn. I had no songs to sing,
while you were serenading the ****,
and were packing his bags, and became his love letters for her,
and you made me lose someone I never had.

You wrapped every lesson I ever needed up in an empty inbox.    
You painted San Fran diamond sidewalks empty gold,and I needed you!
You were there for the mutilated, and kissed their filthy trigger fingers, and spat on birthday wishes, and you made me desire the life of a passenger.
You were the only one that reminded me how to smile; you drowned out slamming doors…  
You didn’t have to make the water thicker or make the bottom seem so far.
You didn’t have to give them boats of Titanic shards!
Your silence  made sinking inevitable.  

You gave me more with empty hands than I ever would have thought.  You taught me that every hero dies,
and that I will always love the traitors,
never love cardboard cutouts, or dream of cardboard castles.
You showed me how it feels grasping at ghosts,
and how much you can doubt,and just how much that hurts.  
I hope you never write your idols.  

With Love,  
The Girl That Will Never Learn

Please forgive me for my lack of meter and form of a paragraph. Let me take you to a day in my life, of what was supposed to be the conclusion, on February 9th, 2013. I was on the floor of my bedroom, the cold wood no match for my fevering body. My hollow gaze melting into the green walls, the picture collages of magazine cutouts I spent whole weekends arranging. There were no tears. No feelings beside this hungry ache of emptiness. The clenching grip of depression enclosed around my ribcage.

There were no tears because my mind was made up.

I drew the razor blade  across the fair delicate skin on my wrist, perpendicular. I just wanted to feel something. One. Two more times, crimson paint flowing down my arm, onto the wooden floors. Steady stream, throbbing pain.

It wasn't until my head was light and vision blurry that I noticed my mistake. I cut too deep. But there were no tears. No feelings. Besides acceptance that my time has come. I slowly closed my eyes involuntarily, giving into the soft waves.

Feeling the grip loosen.

I will slay the Beast
Eragon that damb fire breathing
Menace of a dragon
fly
swatted with my unsheathed sword
I will Purge its bowels
and sanctify my words in iridescent glass ink
I'll shoot Stupid Cupid out of the sky with a sharp pointed arrow ball point pen
Take out the Man in the Moon
Eat a slice of humble pie
my favorite...can taste it now actually
when I left  in such a huff
Cut my hands off to spite my face
How am I ever going to write poetry now
and...
Climb those Church walls that look like a castle...making a rope from crumpled paper
Maybe I can ask you to dance
I'm good at all kinds though a country waltz sure sounds dandy
yup...my cowboy boots and tight fittin jeans Conway

or hang out somewhere in the great big city
make it BIG like Tom
Or carry out a Mission Impossible
we could end up back together
Stranger things have happened

I might have an apoplexy and end up in The Nut House
Should I commit Harry Carey and end up in prison
You want to hear truth
I'll tell you some truth
I don't know if you can handle this truth or not
I'll tell you it in perfect comedic timing,
in my dictation, in my phrasing ,
puddling of lines
and cleverly sounding rhyming
ya I'm a poet sure I am
I can chew on a few magic mushrooms smoke some *****
raise our social consciousness if it helps
Find a little more of my madness because  my madness
maybe even my sadness
helps
to see the world a little more beautifully
look a little more than the guy looking at his feet as he walks down the street
I'll skip a rock across the ocean in rippling wonder with just flick of my pen
paint the mountains with such a crisp contrast they look like paper cutouts
and the clouds
alright... looks like Zeus is up there with his arms folded in anger
dark grey outlines his feet
thunder rolls from his belly
stomping around, crashing lighting
on tips the of billowing bright white golden fleeced
gauze drenched clouds
like the back of a newborn lamb
Oh..
Don't you want to touch it

I might jump Johnny's pirate ship across the sky in the blackened
night navigating through the Stars
laughing menacingly
at the starlit tears guiding us
and at the ghostly fleets chasing
I will be the one looking back at you
in the mirror and show you what you  need to see
do I have the power of discernment?
No...just a poet
I guess I'm a poet after all
so send me your Peter Pan and Tinker Bell dreams
I'll dance with the little teapot and dip the Little Spoon
in the river  
with Aesop playing bagpipes to catch us some dinner
shoot straight at a carnival game
knock them all down
expert shot.
First try
next?

I knew you'd Miss Me When I'm Gone
It's part of the poetic curse
my poetic curse
I'm just a poet

though my words will always be here for you to read.

Cherie Nolan © 2016

I reckon every day is another page, another chapter to the storybook of your life. Some people have every sheet numbered in neat chronological order or categorised according to A-Z, while others are blank pages waiting to be filled, waiting for words to come. Occasionally there are stories that have been left unfinished, tragic end or dire fate, and there are those that end in the quiet melody of unsung heroes.

Of all the life stories in the world, mine is fragile at the spine, paper thin and translucent. The ink is splashed across several pages, words intelligible and smudged with tears; blood stains dotting the edges. There are countless tales that lurk beneath the binding, and even more lives entwined with mine. You, for instance, pressed thorns between the pages of the book that is my life, leaving flowers wilting amongst the splotched ink words and tears in the paper. It is funny, because only when you look back do you realise that nothing would ever be the same if you didn’t exist.

I am older now, the accompaniment to the author that is destiny and fate, overseeing the paths I am to take, the people I still have yet to meet, the places I will go. There is no promise of calm ahead, and with every recollection there are flashes of hurt and pain, of times when my heart was torn apart at the seams, shattered beyond recognition. Despite this I continue on, the naive hope that things will get better and that I will recover, lingers in the core of my soul; sparking a new hope down to the ends of my fingertips.

And while page after page is filled with cutouts and photographs of the memories I have had, none will ever shine as bright as you.

-

"When you’re here it’s like the sunrise, and when you leave it’s like the sunset."

(A.H.Z)

1.
drooping animal eyes made of
wildfire

forested heartbeats
spun into magma seas
of future regeneration

carbon crisis kindling
awaiting

extinguish me
with the balled-fist
of the angry present

2.
awakened
morning dewdrop
universe

surrounding us

pillars of infant dust
coalescing

sweet starlight kisses
arcing over the meadow

as we race into
the smoky twilight

barefooted
and aware

3.
I spoke
to your body
with only my eyes

cardboard cutouts
of childhood

softening in the rain

a simple gingerbread house
inside my head

a rippling pond
thirsty with relaxation

******* rings
easing into oblivion

as we touched
and told our skin

everything we ever
needed to know

So, here's this:

Every third breath is made by a boa constrictor.
He lives in my ribcage, you see,
and sometimes like to see what his musculature can do compared to mine.

If every night star story started with a clear light,
what would happen to cloud cover?
What would happen to all the silver linings?

I felt what you meant when you said sometimes you yearn more for a body to hold,
someone whose arms say more than their breath,
than their breadth.
Boa knew it all along,
but I've just been letting him grow and gripe.

I knew it all along, that it would feel better then worse,
as he grew he'd need more space,
he'd demand more space and take up more space.
Except I always thought space was just a place for stars,
and if you needed to moonbounce,
you always had another planet available.
Except you didn't, and I didn't know if I wanted one, or a different you.
I want bits and pieces, I want to build my own puzzle with preference,
500 pieces that are hand picked by yours truly.

A puzzle is still a puzzle if all the pieces mostly fit, right?
Even in designated cutouts, with enough use they fade,
and become questionable in their habits.
"Are you sure this goes here? These reds are not the same"
"Sure hon, it's been like that for years, it's supposed to be like that".
When do you seek your better fitting other half, though?

Boa can twine, at least. Better to be fluid and versatile, than stock and habit.

Check out the lights
Lets transcend the heights
Of my own imagination
Past garbled salt water
Part boiling mermaid daughters
Asinine aliens
Magic beings
Mystics and monks
Praying to
Diaphanous demons
A Virile and vain vampire
Dating a sparkling tree spirit
A wretched wizard
Hanging with Witty Warlocks
And Witches in weird wardrobes
A Wicked werewolf
Courting
Alluring angels
Naughty Gnomes
Teasing tiny
Pretty pixies and
Frightened fairies
An Unlucky unicorn
Being chased by
Dangerously daring dark dragon
Greedy goblins grabbing gleaming gold
Goofy Gargoyles
Glad handing
Gorgeous goddesses
And a cranky Kraken
Staring at a sickeningly sultry siren
Sitting on a salty sea stone
Trying to eat an enlightened elf
A leprechaun laughing
At a ***** hobbit
Who is trying to ****
A hairy and hostile dwarf

All stream lined in time
Put on a perfect pause
Cause they don’t do anything
They are just fake figurines
Cardboard cutouts
Pretty poems and portrait
Painting in my mysterious mind

There are things stuck on my mind.
Incomprehensible glueing, which
befog beleaguered fitting-in.
Becoming a mishmash, realization
bugs me. What to do with the cutouts?

Pictures of life instances that can't
be reconciled, just carried on and on,
blister and bubble within. No smooth
surfaces that cleanly represent
anything wholly identifiable are
depicted on bruised brain cells. Pity
it is. Pity I have become. Pity the
nitty gritty magazine photos slapped
together,  an ugly collage called,
"Mercy Never Saw Fit."
It is an ugly art form, cutting up memories.

****, ******, survival, these themes
are hardly ever pretty. Art therapy
*****. I'd rather paint a canvas black.

D A Y L I G H T:
⠀
In my premature years, black licorice had always been my favorite treat, as it evoked memories of my favorite bird: the crow. It was something like a token of my admiration. Laid in a brittle bed of crisp-like-fall leaves, eyes that were once much bigger would gaze at the sky and see it as a continuation of the ocean. I assumed there was more distance, more leaves, more crows; because the ocean was never just the boats that wavered on the surface.
⠀
I never apprehended that throughout the day is when crows are most distinguishable. Their ebony cutouts, nefarious eyes, and visibly oily obsidian tones contrasted greatly against my favorite element of day – they rode through clouds like mere puddles of fog. Their squawking did not reverberate as boundlessly, nor did it ricochet against the buildings and quivering pine trees. The morning time is when the crows divulge in their breakfast meal, sipping dew from the tallest blades of grass while dressed all in black. It is never the question of, “did you hear that?” or “what was it?”. The crow is the crow as the pigeon is the pigeon.
⠀
⠀
N I G H T F A L L:
⠀
When the world is cloaked with its darkest twinges of night is when the crows become the /crows/, disappearing into their forest lairs. There, they resemble storm clouds that crackle with an aloof thunder regardless of hovering just overhead like a guilty conscience. At night, their hell reigns on a foreshadowed sanctuary – a repetitive funeral, Satan himself occupying a casket made from twigs, the flesh of mice, and children’s shoelaces. Your mind morphs into an unhinged vault, where they prowl and feed on your visions, and devour your common sense. They dilute your integrity with ingenuity.  The crow is no longer something vexatious, but rather you are - an intruder - and he, above you in every sense of the word.
⠀
I lie here now, patient as the sun’s shift ends and a somber veil falls over relative land. I no longer face the obligation of licorice, and instead between my teeth resides the root of a sleek, onyx feather. “Sono vivo gui.”

Silver horizon
Clouds stretched across it's bright arc
Black cutouts of ships
Within the fluorescent glow
Like thoughts in my mind's furnace

I know how to question
Authority
Now someone teach me to question
Reasonably
Why everyone settles for
Mediocrity.

I'm not
Passive
But I get
Aggressive
When society becomes
Dismissive.

Art is not a
Perforation
On an
Illustration
Of paper-doll cutouts of
Creation.

But somewhere we lost
Authenticity
With our former
Intricacies
And were stripped of all
Legitimacy.