"disorienting" poems
I want to run out now,
Into the fog that sends shivers up my spine
And get lost in the disorienting
Swirls and swisps of water,
And climb up the ice crystals,
Until I reach the clouds
Where I’ll lie on my back
Under the never ending stars.
Until I am ready,
To just fall off.
Aug 14, 2018
Aug 14, 2018 at 6:17 PM UTC
It's strange to feel displaced so quickly.
I thought I'd have more time than this.
More time until
"You have a life and I'm not in it."
Would reverberate through my bones
Like the shockwaves that shoot up your knees when you jump from somewhere high.
It hurts.
It's disorienting.
I can't tell if I am annoying you by missing you,
Because I don't get the chance to hear it clearly in your words.
All of a sudden,
There aren't any
For me.
I want to say "I'm sorry."
And be forgiven like I made a mistake or said something wrong.
But I didn't.
I couldn't have,
Could I?
Just last week you told me a secret nobody else knows,
Shared the intimacy of love and trust
With me.
And now again I don't know where I stand,
Can't see my own feet in the haze.
Am I on solid ground,
Concealed but steady,
Silent but firm?
Or am I on a crumbling cliff face,
One breath from tumbling
With loose stones and tree roots
To tear my skin on the way down?
Am I losing you
Or are you just busy?
Are you cross with me
Or do you just not have the time to be gentle?
I don't want to care.
I don't want to need you.
Because this happens from time to time,
You see?
It happens.
You feel like trying to hold the waves in my hands.
Trying to find purchase with my fingers in the morning mist.
I can never be sure you won't slip away
With no warning and no reason.
And so when for a day you are departed
I grieve,
And fear,
And worry,
And suffer.
And I hate that about myself.
So much that I think you must too.
But maybe I just need to have a reason in my head
That you were here, and warm, and tender
Yesterday
And aren't today.
Aug 6, 2013
Aug 6, 2013 at 10:45 AM UTC
The clouds separated the Sun from my life for too long
I wondered if it even existed
And if it existed
Would it know I existed?
It's warm companionship eluded me
I was frozen in the wastelands
I donned my armor of ice
And embraced all that is frigid and bleak
My feet turned into rockets as flowers bloomed all around me
I rode headfirst into the sky on a jet of pure nature
I cut through the friction in the air
And exploded through the clouds
The Sun's disorienting light loved me
Without vision I flew to it's warmth
When I reached the Sun I kissed it on the mouth
and we danced around the galaxy
And the Sun radiated our love to every living creature in the universe
But the Sun abandoned me out in space
The Sun returned to giving life to all
And I am but one
I just thought that maybe I could help it give life
Because at one point I was a star
Now I'm just dust
Is it so selfish to want it's power for myself?
I've been floating in darkness for a while
And I feel very Alien: Isolation right now
But this is no game
And Sigourney Weaver couldn't fight my monsters
Game over, man
May 22, 2017
May 22, 2017 at 4:44 PM UTC
I like my headphones for the
Insulation. Sometimes my ears
Take in too much stray noise,
Dredge up too much disorienting
Mud from the depths of a TV
Screen or an iPod. Then I can
Always snuggle into my headphones
And be silent - and silence is a
Dear dear commodity, to be sure,
When every other scene-
Stealing, pudgy-mouthed buffoon
Has to put his ten cents in. So
Much sound should be a sin;
Background music, ambient noise,
Music for airports, and pubescent
Boys screeching from tinny silver
Speakers near the wall. I don't
Want it, not every bit, not all
The hate and the slippery tongues
That speak and salivate and don't
Say anything human. I want to reprimand,
To excommunicate them from
This Holy rite of sound. (And really,
I would be content to never hear
Music if I could block out the roundabout
Fights and the sultry nightlife descriptions
Gushing from my screen, if I could
Use my headphones to keep
That liquid crystal from pouring in
My too needfully silent ears.)
Maybe I'll follow a painter's path:
All visuals and open dripping wet
Wrath with a noisy race. I can be a
Terrifying girl. Cut off my ears and
Be deaf to the world. Wrap me in
Canvas and chase me back into the
Woods on a starry starry night.
Sep 28, 2010
Sep 28, 2010 at 5:29 PM UTC
He gave me bracelets
made from his palm prints
amid the disorienting darkness
of my faltering consciousness.
No!
With ease he intercepted the
weak, desperate blows my hands
my only weapons
failed to deliver at full force
during my precious seconds
in an unhinged awareness
of hazy drugs and alcohol.
And like a gentleman
he fastened his hands
around my wrists pretending
it were decorative jewelry despite
how they pinned back my hands
my last line of defense
like iron shackles before
another blackout became my cell.
His palm print bracelets
still encircle my wrists.
Jul 4, 2014
Jul 4, 2014 at 12:36 AM UTC
Gradually
gravitate me
towards your
center of mass,
pumping my
potent life fluid vectors
at disorienting
angles.
Oct 6, 2012
Oct 6, 2012 at 10:05 AM UTC
I find the charging sky lights to be
disorienting and pure.
Black and white at same time.
It’s a rainbow in the clouds after the rain
and succeeding the dark clouds which make me sane.
I am aware that rain will come again,
yet I don’t know when I will be rain-bound.
Each turn is a change in the circle of pain.
When the lightning strikes,
we look at the bright, white flash of light.
White pierces through the dark,
and confounds us and leaves us looking at the stars.
We wait for it to strike,
only for it to come at the most unexpected of times.
We must not be confused, or surprised.
We should rejoice when things go awry.
For it will too pass, and change will evade.
The earned hope will remain.
For chaos and the unexpected are change,
and change is the inevitable truth which cannot be tamed.
We’re celebrating the chaos and celebrating change.
We’re celebrating the inevitable when we dance in the rain.
Feb 24, 2021
Feb 24, 2021 at 12:06 AM UTC
Dubious sense of unresolved ambivalence
Given to implausible suppositions of fragmentation
That distinguishes itself in well meaning solemnities
Of delicious incompetence that evaporates distance
In its poignant lament of darkness
That shadows words of cruelty, indifference and rage
Oh how unbearable those misadventures of piteous overthrows
That cram into brief utterances more meaning
Than language can hold and force a confrontation
Of unresolvable contradictions hidden in such speech
That are the stilling of time, those words that find expression
In a mystic power that transforms darkness into intense light
Whilst blocking out the harsh unforgiving light of everyday
And causes mutation and change of place in disorienting fashion
In seeking a loyalty of angers by shifts of dramatic register
Views its own meaning unstable and problematic
In defense of its own legitimacy
Nov 4, 2012
Nov 4, 2012 at 5:52 PM UTC
Quite a draining journey
traveling through this drainage tunnel
groping my way through the disorienting darkness
arms of lifelessness reach out from the walls
constantly tugging at my shirt
it's my health that they hurt
when I try to run
they grab and stun
forcing me to buy movement
at the price of energy
they hold tokens in their hands
inscribed with the drainage brand
like the hair from the drain in my sink
or the phlegm drained from my sinuses
I wade through the **** of stomach minuses
moving through a drainage tunnel death funnel
aches develop in my feet
as well as my back
I can't handle the heat
or how the inside is black
I start walking slower and slower
as the ceiling gets lower and lower
the backbreaking pressure
makes my height lesser
so I crawl through the filth
of all this drainage I built
the hands that hold me down
are now my only company
their frustrating grabbing
now feels like a lulling caress
coaxing me to stay in this tunnel
all other voices are muddled
because of the drainage in my ear
blocking communication with fear
a wall of wax
that won't collapse
creates an axe
to cut off my head
from suffering dread
wondering when this tunnel will end
because there's no light to be found
in this tunnel I crawl down
gagged and bound
from the hands all around
grabbing at my brain
to push it down the drain.
Jul 6, 2021
Jul 6, 2021 at 10:41 AM UTC
A horse rests...licks a desert rose, exposing
denture-like teeth.
Slowing its voluptuous space to the courting
of flies.
Its Grecian-black olive eyes, poke their pits
in a pinpointing gleam.
A chancing apocalypse mid-stride...allots dust
the fire it so craves under the sun.
As it settles...the horse is dismounted, and
let loose--a disorienting beauty ensues.
As if nature could part wild ways...onward...
onward...where went the beast...where went
the man?
Oct 26, 2013
Oct 26, 2013 at 11:12 AM UTC
you are a collection of my favourite senses.
you are the smell of smoke
of a fire that’s just burnt out
the drifting
curling grey
the ash
glowing still
you are the too-bright sun in my eyes
blinding
disorienting
and yet still beautiful and necessary
the pagan in me
worshipping your descent to earth
like an angel
who simply wanted to greet me
you are the feel of a fur coat around my neck
soft and warm
comforting, like a mother’s touch
but also a thrill, unsettling
the feeling of death kissing my throat
you have the taste of aphrodisiacs
chocolate, wine and
avocado
the juices of our chemistry
dripping from the sides
of my mouth
your smile wide
at the open euphemism
you are a collection of my favourite senses
and when i kiss you i am
senseless
Mar 2, 2015
Mar 2, 2015 at 10:41 AM UTC
Half-moons turn to full as my eyes flutter open
The white hot light is disorienting.
My fingernails are the first thing I notice
They’re clean.
Clean has been distant for months.
My hair is combed and cut
And I’m all wrapped up in ivory.
But they forgot to bandage my memory.
It’s still oozing and crusted with sickening pain.
And I can remember their cries and angelic faces still.
And then they turned empty,
Like those grown-ups who used to putter around on Mondays.
At least they’ve got hunger for life now.
And as these trailing thoughts leave my mind,
I remember that I’m not alone.
Not all was lost after that apocalyptic crisis,
Where all I’ve ever known turned to a rotting, dead end.
His face will be forever embedded in my mind.
He and I made it out.
We were plucked out of the ground like two white roses in a field of weeds.
Saved like two animals for Noah’s Ark.
We, are all that’s left of origin,
All that’s left of our kind.
So before it was too late,
They rescued our scorned skins.
And we flew up into that blue sky,
And we just left them there.
We left that fair skinned freckled boy,
That lanky knobby kneed kid,
And that dark haired round eyed little girl,
We left everyone that ever was.
God.
I wish there was.
He’d breathe us in and never let go.
Never let those demons touch us.
Never let them sink their rotted teeth into her tiny neck.
Those *******
Limping around seeking blood,
Looking for lives to demolish.
If you’re reading this now
I hope you’re not running from rotted versions of your friends,
I hope you’re sitting at home on your plush pillowed sofas
Puttering around on Mondays.
Feb 29, 2012
Feb 29, 2012 at 9:30 PM UTC
"I love you," you said
Three times
Sober
Or, at least, after only two glasses of wine
With an expression that wanted me to see its sincerity
You thought about the way your face looked
And how I was looking at it
Which, naturally, made me suspicious
Less of whether what you said was
Or is
True
And more of whether you really believed it
I certainly don't
Although, regrettably, too big a part of me
Hopes that you do
But you won't even go out to lunch
So the concept is moot
If you dwell on me so frequently
Where are you?
Not here, in the growing rift
Between our potential and reality
Where I fume
You flatter
Whipstitching my raw edges
But your adulations can't repair
The fact that you don't know
My favorite color
My stance on religion
Or the quality that I admire most
In a friend
Negligent though you may be
I'm harsher still
On myself
Allowing you in, while I know all of this
How you must find me!
So easy
Malleable
And still I permit you
"We're alike," you say
And you tell me how you care
So little
About so much
But not when it comes to me, apparently
Or so said the lips
That have only kissed me once
Without seeking more
But I kissed you then, anyway
Knowing what would come
Freckles
Sinful dimples
The unfathomable brown eyes
For which you hold so much disdain
The slightest gap
Between your front teeth
Your encouragements didn't stir me
Already shoved
From my resolution
Before your many admittances
And rare
Melancholy musings --
These, perhaps strategic
But disorienting, nonetheless
I'll chalk it up to us finishing the bottle
Which I started
Frustrated
Half an hour before you arrived
And carve myself some apathy.
Jan 28, 2015
Jan 28, 2015 at 4:04 AM UTC
Little bud
rosebud
tiny soft and naked
waiting for spring
at times it seemed
you would fit into my hand
with one clasp I encompass
your entire being
and I would smell and taste
your sweet disorienting scent
So stilled my hand
with each breeze and each breath
waited for the perfumed brush
a scented sting on my skin
in an ancient language
I knew it was futile to translate or resist
Passing by
a poised snail without its shell
in a garden where boisterous children play
in a world without a map
a dew drop
I look up
there goes a comet without its tail
Apr 27, 2013
Apr 27, 2013 at 2:38 AM UTC
My thirst for conversation has continued to impress me
Fills me with stories helping to shape another in my eyes
Met with friend for a mutual exchange of identity
An interview with questions directed; I asked first
Starting with the earliest formulation of conscious thought
Hers was the return of a sick father
She eagerly embraced him when he arrived home safely
Vividly describes the large red chair present
I transitioned to exchange of reflection most powerful
Searching for a single memory of hers that stood alone
Her face brightened, her eyes shining with nostalgia
Her dog’s name was Max
Max entered her life when she was one year old
On the celebration of her birth in fact
He was the runt of the pack, a ruby retriever
Grew to maturity and average size, with love
Max made his way into her writing in the classroom
His possible harm one of her first worries
He was a cherished family pet, she loved him with all her heart
Being a young child, sometimes she was too rough
Cancer took Max from this world at nine years of age
He was buried under a peach tree in the back yard
The peaches swollen and ripe make death turn to life
To this day they represent the sweetness of his soul
Her early years were full of stress at thought of parental separation
Subject to fickle fears and frozen emotions
Her true panic began in high school days
Developed into distinguishable attacks and episodes
There were never tangible reasons or focus points for fear
Racing thoughts, vertigo chills, imminent death
Creeping insanity and the dry, frustrating inability to swallow
Worsened as college approached and the familiar faded fast
Week one was worse than any panic period yet
Heart flutters, helplessness and disorienting dizzy spells
Friends were far away or had yet to be encountered
Sympathy for perceived insanity ran thin
These experiences require constant care and medication
Hospital visits and appointments with understanding ear
She shared her life with me through effect of anxiety
I shared in turn, but couldn’t help distraction
We did not record the interview so I took it upon myself
Documenting with equal force her story and my amazement
Dec 2, 2010
Dec 2, 2010 at 4:01 PM UTC
e·mo·ji
ēˈmōjē
noun
a small digital image or icon used to express an idea, emotion, etc., in electronic communication.
Emojis......
The first I saw one,
You had thanked me for a good deed.
Emojis.....
The second time I saw one,
You had thanked me for a favor.
And these emojis,
Theyre so disorienting
Its a first
A boy sending them
Perhaps I am looking in it too much
Maybe Im looking for something, hoping for anything
Maybe its all in my head
Maybe I want
Something that isnt there
A mystery to pester my brain
An assumption
That may pull me down.
These heart-eyed emojis. It pulls at me.
Jun 24, 2018
Jun 24, 2018 at 6:03 AM UTC
My moral compass is delicately crooked,
always pointing East even when aware of the descending sun.
I need to deconstruct this internal locus and reassemble cell by cell,
until I am unaffected by the magnetic people and their vigorous pull.
So subtle is the change of direction that happens every day.
So obvious is the need for control in solely my own way.
But to reject all other poles is irrational,
because in the end,I would be a slender silver needle spinning wildly with no direction.
Even the voluntary can seem controlled by an unspeakable force,
or the nudge of a voice whispering the next move into my ear.
Should I follow the South of my ancestors or the East of my peers,
the West of society? The North of my fears?
A push one way fails to answer any questions,
disorienting my lead and un-aligning the poles.
For now I will pause in the grey area of each direction ,
silently waiting for a queue from within
a neutral force in a battle I can not win.
Yet, I can not wait here forever .
Eventually the needle will stop spinning,
and the navigation will begin.
Mar 5, 2013
Mar 5, 2013 at 4:31 PM UTC
I thrash around in the undertow
Conveyored out to sea, fully aware I can save myself
By simply standing up
Instead, I stay in the ocean of lies and fuckyous
Struggling to keep my head above water
I like to think of myself as a strong swimmer
Captain of rhyme and reason
But here the waves deliver blows to my head
And the further from shore, the bleaker my future becomes
The safety line is broken, no going back
To the warm beach where we sat, jobless
And you wore my bracelets while the sun gave us life
The sun, who now taunts me from above
This disorienting, fluid prision
Never again will I watch those educated hands
Immerse themselves in the grains of sand overlooking calm water
All I have left is endless blue
And these spongelike lungs soaking it up
My weary muscles relax and I disappear over the horizon
Toward the red sunset
Jun 5, 2010
Jun 5, 2010 at 11:55 PM UTC
*How long has it been?
Did I sleep the storm away?
What time is it?*
A disorienting headache alarms me awake,
The wind at my back nudges me to life.
Hungover,
Culturally removed and it's all over again.
The past can't exist here,
Childhood memories are a fiction.
Friends are forgotten stories scattered,
About my brain like the workspace of a maniac.
Am I that far removed?
Have I grown enough that I don't fill the old space?
Such elation and sorrow combine in misery,
And it's hard to believe that home disappears.
I wish no one missed me like I don't.
The man you see standing in the same door frame,
He passed through at all ages,
He has new eyes that you won't recognize.
For they don't see the world like you do.
One last country,
One last break through the clouds,
One last chance to make myself right?
Does my stack of thoughts grow taller yet,
Through dreams of experiences I never regret?
And did home stand still while I was gone?
Life, I suppose, has to keep moving on.
Apr 21, 2015
Apr 21, 2015 at 1:44 PM UTC
Time is slipping away
I
Must understand how to go forward
Everything,
I
S
So confusing and disorienting.
Lies have been unearthed,
I
Push forward through the pulsing, reeling
Pulse of my heart.
I
Need a way, to
Go away from this dreadful place.
A
Way to see the beauty in life,
A
Year of being free.
Dec 10, 2015
Dec 10, 2015 at 12:02 AM UTC
Jinx
Not it
The game my heart plays
With your disorienting love
Apr 2, 2019
Apr 2, 2019 at 11:26 PM UTC
The places I feel it when you're gone.
I didn't know you could.
It's like vertigo,
Like that sensation when your chair tips,
Only in the oddest places.
In my hands, and they go a bit limp,
Unable to hold things like they should
As if they've forgotten how.
Sometimes my teeth ache, like I've just eaten something sweet and cold, and it spreads down my jaw and makes my head spin.
Things that shouldn't have vertigo- my bones,
My feet,
My lungs.
It's disorienting. It's a little scary.
But at the same time I hold onto it,
Proof that you mean something,
Proof that you have changed me inside
So drastically
That nothing knows how to work quite right anymore.
I have rarely ever needed comforting like I need it now
But how to ask...
And so I sit within my strange new body
That seems to be rediscovering the entire world
At a pace a bit too slow
To seem normal
And I wait for you
And I know that the second I see you
I will be on solid ground again.
Sep 27, 2015
Sep 27, 2015 at 7:03 AM UTC
no rest
for the wicked
or for
me,
no my
dreams keep me
tired,
no fire
has burnt my
bed yet,
no i’m
watching
laundry line
silhouettes
from:
the shadow box
of my head,
no this
isn’t pain
as much
as its
disorienting,
no i
need medicine
something to
keep me
awake
because
i forgot
to blink,
no it
makes no difference
whether my eyes
are closed or
open,
no dust
left
suspended in light
over the ocean
trenched
darkness.
Jan 15, 2011
Jan 15, 2011 at 9:53 PM UTC
have you ever been stuck
inside your own mind
it's as if you have locked eyes
with a different conscious in light
or darkness
I can't see
but I have vision
a question
where is silence
I have never wondered
but who
has anybody discovered
the quiet of no thought in mind
w or ds
scattered into l e t t e r s
make me believe
and sink into
a false phantasm
where things lose all meaning to me
I cannot explain this disorienting feeling
an experience left unexperienced everytime
chaos havocing my intellect
Jul 11, 2019
Jul 11, 2019 at 11:01 AM UTC
You asked me to write you a note in cursive when you were drunk. I'm not sure if you were serious, but I'm going to anyway because cursive is a dying and beautiful art, and I'm interested in what I'm going to say. I don't know if I'll actually give this to you because I don't know what direction it will take me. But I'll humor both you and myself and give it a try...
Even just starting this makes me worried that this is something you don't want from me. The flood of emotions and thoughts drowning my brain are overwhelming and disorienting. It leaves me speechless, breathless, unable to grasp the worlds I need to paint you the picture I want you to see. Meeting you was green, dark green, like sunlight dancing on moss. You were this endless, exciting, inviting stretch of forest that I wanted to explore. The more corners of you I discovered in those first few weeks had me wanting to grow my own roots there. But as I tried to plant my seeds I realized growing in you was like throwing seeds into the ocean - roots cannot form in something that refuses to nurture, cannot see or feel tiny, delicate tendrils in the coming tide. And it was just like that that I found myself hopelessly drowning in you, until finally I was forced to pull out my sopping, heavy, rotting roots, desperately coughing and sputtering for air. And although I limped away, tail tucked between my legs with an aching heart I realize now that waves do not make personal attacks on daydreaming, lovesick girls because they are not listening for love songs over the roar of the tide, they are not feeling for tiny seeds, they are being the ocean, you were being exactly you and I am not the moon.
But once a heart knows fear, it changes, and me a once wild creature looking for mysterious forest paths to call my name, I want to cover my ears, cover my heart and run the other way. I wonder if I can move my frozen feet, as I contemplate when bravery becomes carelessness. Each night I can't help but dream about you, and as I feel myself ripping at the seams in this inner game of tug-o-war I realize the only reason I feel these pushes and pulls is because there is a part of you I can't seem to let go of, I am still clinging to that slippery, soft, green, green moss in the woods of your heart.
And for this I have yet no conclusion, no explanation, no promises, no expectations.
Sep 22, 2015
Sep 22, 2015 at 10:59 PM UTC