"desaturated" poems
sometimes she daydreams about life the way i do about death. it's ironic, i know: black and white aren't meant to be grey and the rumbling hum of expletives digging into mauve lips pass through like desaturated light to translucent statures. it makes everything seem sweeter than it looks. she thinks the ache feels lukewarm, just like those half-hearted smiles she gives out like presents on a holiday, and she may be right. pain is not cold, it covers your entire heart with microwaved fingers, leaving burn marks that leave chars and ashes. snaps the purple heartstrings and clumsily tries to mend it.
(i love you because you're corporeal, she murmurs, you keep me sane)
she's spider-webbed, sung gossamer and silk while her bar lines drip with ink. and she seems moonstruck—because of me she says and blooms throughout my epiphanies. fancies herself a ghost, a wisp, something ethereal that lingers on my lips like a kiss. and she lingers, oh she does. toppling from the skies and collapsing into my rib-cage, she stays, blushing rose-like and thriving. velvet and constellations of blood clots patter against her skin. it blooms like she blooms, a paint splattered canvas meant for all to see.
Jul 28, 2018
Jul 28, 2018 at 2:50 AM UTC
i've been waking up to desaturation all my life.
i don't know why but i've been
rolling over in the same grey-skinned body,
opening shoddy eyes, heart heavy
as a hangover. i climb into your chevy with
it in my hands. i know this is the fifth time i've lit
a cigarette since i quit, but my lungs needed the ash.
did you know, in a car crash, just one person
not wearing a seatbelt would worsen the casualties?
so if you see the casual ease with which i bare my chest,
know that the carnage of my reckless form,
hail in a storm of steel and violence, at least felt sorry.
the starry dark of a backroad, an explosion of light,
a bright metal supernova and colors even my eyes can't doubt;
we'll all find out exactly how heavy my guilt
is when the body sorrow built ascends through the windshield.
May 27, 2021
May 27, 2021 at 1:34 AM UTC
In the scripts playing inside my head you were there to listen.
You were there to talk,
To organize our chaos and to make sense of those wasted days when we could never connect the dots in this cosmic puzzle.
Words are all I need, the right words that can reincarnate the colors of this desaturated conspiracy,
Coming out of your nervous lips as your eyes misplace its focus in the light of my blushing face.
In my head, we were both lost in the midst of something that can fix us.
Oct 19, 2015
Oct 19, 2015 at 5:10 AM UTC
I have nothing but love for a blue sky
and how its glory opens up my mind.
How it shoos away grey thoughts
of color neutral, sleeping forests.
Oh blue sky.
If I had wings
I'd make you mine.
You'd be my canvas
and my feathers,
your delicate brushes.
Oh bright blue sky
If only I had time
to sit under you
and admire your clouds.
You wear them so well.
Instead in a monotone,
desaturated schedule
I march onward.
Only able to admire
for passing moments
inbetween places and times.
Blanketed by your sunlight.
Mar 13, 2014
Mar 13, 2014 at 2:46 PM UTC
He’s got eyes that pop out of his head as if he's just seen a ghost. His hands are brittle and his finger nails are yellow. His skin is pale; his heart is pale. Every time we’re alone in a room together you can almost see the silence. It looks stiff, like the way that his body shifts away from me to avoid the awkward conversation or how our breath is being used to fill the silence. We look at each other hard and long. Almost as if we're connected through the matter between us and what used to matter between us. I wonder if he remembers how my body feels. I wonder if her body feels like mine.
His shoes are stained from the salt on the road and I can tell that he’s been walking over rusted wounds. I wonder if he's fixed the dent I made in his car. I wonder if his apartment is still the same desaturated shade of blue that made his eyes look grey. I wonder if he still lives on memory lane. We watch the snow fall from the corners of our eyes, being careful not to look up; being careful not to touch. I hear him mutter something under his breath and I’m not sure if he’s describing the weather or if he’s describing me. I was never quite sure of what he was saying. He was always hard to decipher. There was always a sense of mystery surrounding him that was too hard to unravel.
I fiddle with my ring as I try to imagine what she looks like. If her hair is as black as mine or if her skin glows the same way. There’s a part of my mind that wishes she’s the lesser version of me. I wonder if he’s told her about me. I wonder if she knows that he is my ghost.
Apr 20, 2015
Apr 20, 2015 at 8:43 PM UTC
Hazel eyes, hate is very much alive.
Bleached striped hair, parents never cared.
Desaturated makeup, abuse save up.
Branch like lashes, left the guns in the attic.
Bloodied pores, closing doors.
Chipped nails, bleeding Dale.
Scarred skin, occurring sins.
Bloodied skirt, exposed hurt.
Bloodied sneakers, driving by the bleachers.
Steady hands, acting out plans.
Pressurized trigger, pull back finger.
Black handle, blood covered handles.
Full magazine, gruesome scene.
Empty canister, a new cancer.
Staring scope, deprived hope.
Heated Barrel, death written peril.
Dispensing bullets, anger she’s full of it.
Chipped desks, severed heads.
Impacted walls, faint police calls.
Shattered glass, death attracts.
Bodies down, the flag is proud.
Blood soaked tiles, bodies litter the aisles.
Wounded souls, doors closed.
Narrowed screams, a violent portrayal gleams.
Distant sirens, victims silenced.
Blurring smoke, the gun provokes.
Gas mask on, a tragedy in the dawn.
Emergency services, the hurt she did.
Police, she’s loaded to release.
Erupting explosions, a bloodied corruption.
Officer down, **** she’s proud.
Reloading yet again, pain is about to begin.
Hit through the torso, she still has the guns though.
Hard to move, starting to lose her homicidal groove.
Sheering pain, every scream sounds the same.
Another shot, her moment is lost.
Killed by the law, psychosis remains a common flaw.
Aftermath: A tragic path.
Overlooked as a simple girl, an untouched disturbed world.
Within the fragments of abuse and fantasies. Unknown abnormalities
She herself was very misunderstood, had no teachings of the common good.
Parents exposing death, they just didn’t know it.
Breeding a killer, giving violent media to justify a sinner
And they wonder why their daughter made violence a neighbor instead of a impostor.
Mar 22, 2019
Mar 22, 2019 at 4:20 PM UTC
I set the pace of my breathing to match the healing of my heart;
It's painfully slow and I'm not sure how much more it can take.
I watch myself from outside the window
As my chest struggles to rise against your weight.
I'm lying down and she knows how difficult it is for me
Yet she takes another step until both feet are firmly planted on top of my ribcage.
Gravity crushes every glimmer of hope that I had to make it through this task alive.
Once she sees the light leave my eyes she begins to relieve the pressure.
The world around me is hard to discern.
My eyes are unable to frame each detail which engulfs my body,
But when I look at her it's like God himself has washed me clean
And I am able to make out the outline of something I once loved.
But I can't help but to writhe in discomfort as his arms wrap around her waist
While I diligently sweep the floor that they dance across.
My head is drawn down towards the ground in an attempt to spare myself--
It didn't work.
I tried.
Oh god, did I try,
But my limbs became too heavy to withstand the weight of you leaving me,
So I had to slip outside.
This heart feels foreign as it battles for its life.
I do not know her anymore.
Green eyes have become desaturated and all I can envision is a hollowed body.
Are you really doing okay?
If there is a god, or if magic was real I think I'd wish for her to be happy again.
I long to love myself and to feel vibrant in my own skin,
But I'd be lying if I said I wouldn't sacrifice it all
Just to see her truly smile.
Time is elusive and I know this is a dangerous place to be seen in.
It's torturous to toy with the notion that somehow things could've turned out differently,
So I return back to the girl inside the window pane.
She hates me, but I'm not ready to let her go...
I set the pace of my breathing to match the healing of my heart;
It's sluggish and morbid, but it feels like a fresh start.
May 19, 2018
May 19, 2018 at 1:07 AM UTC
My insides smell like
Cinnamon
But taste
like
wilted
flower petals;
Dry,
bland,
Dead, gone,
Desaturated colours
in my pupils
I melt into a pile of ash in
The ground
With the rest of the infertile soil,
With the insects
With the lush green grass
and the birds
and their nests full of twigs
And chirps
And songs
And hums
And sounds
That echo
That resound
That stay
That fly
With the sky.
Buried with my name.
Until it turns to night,
Then the
moon
and
stars
come out
And
I
Hide
A
W
A
Y
.
Feb 24, 2025
Feb 24, 2025 at 2:19 AM UTC
The wicks have disappeared under the wax.
The strings only groan untuned noise.
The color has drained to desaturated blacks.
What is a flower with rotted petals if not a ****
Nothing grows here, not a single seed.
Leave the wasted garden, place the candles in the drawer.
The piano's more desirable when it's not touched anymore.
Apr 30, 2018
Apr 30, 2018 at 10:12 PM UTC
How oft has the piping poet iterated
the many nuances of feeling,
the many ways to love, or hate?
“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.”
But where in these enumerations
have we distinguished the longing
that boils up within us
at an absence, the missing,
whether momentary or eternal?
For there are many ways to miss someone.
There are, of course, the dreary ways
to miss someone, the ways
of grief, the yearning never to be fulfilled
for the departed and never to be seen again.
The moving on because you must
and still like ringing bells
the memories perpetually toll -
at first so loud as to obscure any sound
or thought, yet eventually
fading to a distant chime, ever still present,
lingering tintinnabulation;
if you stop and listen, you can make it out,
but day-to-day you’d hardly notice.
But there are many ways to miss someone,
like subtle shades of purple:
while some are dark, oozing, sickly,
violent, like bruises,
blood pooling just beneath the surface
threatening to burst;
or some are near-grey, cold, desaturated,
a sensationless day,
a gloomy cloud in our sky;
others would induce with their very sight
the soft scents of violets and lilac,
the songs of spring birds chirping;
and others still are rich and royal,
thick like honey, endowed,
velvet sheen, lustrous silk.
Yes, there are many ways to miss someone.
Like craving the crunch of an apple,
or the tingling acidity of citrus.
Like the thirst before the first gulp,
lemon water warmed beneath the sweltering sun.
Or like how dusk to dawn deprives us of that very sun,
and yet so soon will it return,
crying out a yellow hello into the night blue sky.
There are many ways to miss someone.
Like the budding excitement,
the cocooned caterpillar,
the anticipation of soon-coming,
daydreaming, enriching, sweet, joyful,
delayed gratification.
There are many ways to miss someone.
And when you finally bite into the fruit of your longing
the juices seep into all the cracks and crevices
of all the moments past of absence,
fill you, elate you, concentrated,
and you ask yourself
was an orange always so sweet
or the lemon so sour as this?
May 5, 2020
May 5, 2020 at 11:16 AM UTC
Suffocation. Loss of breath Numbness to every step. Depression at its best.
Back to hell again. Where my mind welcomes my sin. My brain has always been my the hell I’m living. Isolation. Yet you’re the only thing worth seeing. Vibration. Of a frequency worth believing. You are the worth of my life. Let me pick up the notebook and drop the knife. Figures of desolation. Yet when I look at you you’re my only inspiration. Living isn’t for the weak. I see that phrase living in me. Combination of mental instabilities. Colliding with my purpose. Always questioning if I'm worth it. My breath slows as it colliding within your sweat. Yet loving you has freshened my scars. Thinking of losing you tears me apart. Our love is complicated. Yet underneath the desaturated makeup I see a soul damaged by the fragrance. The smell of trauma emerging throughout the pavement. Seeing me aid your struggle gives me hope for my struggle. Disarranged and unfit. And as we scrape our knees you are the one to help me sit. Bandage my wound just as I did to you. I lost myself looking at the reflection of you.
Flat line. The thought of losing you. Tears a bind directly through my heart tearing apart the spine. And as I am left disassembled., Society walks over our pieces like we are just a doll.
Sprawled out broken. Damaged and misspoken. Lost to them. But never Forgotten
Aug 13, 2019
Aug 13, 2019 at 6:23 PM UTC
I stand, toes cold
beneath black sand.
The waves may be calm,
but I am all violence.
Neptune glows greatly above.
I've lost all fascination for constellations;
By now, I thought I would be
up there with them.
The dark sky burns ultraviolet,
my passion desaturated
by years of lost opportunities,
or maybe, by the storms
they predicted but never came.
Either way- I've come to know
disappointment like the scars on my knees.
I scream, Did you think I could ever forget?
Sep 26, 2019
Sep 26, 2019 at 12:08 PM UTC