"dustpan" poems
On days like this,
I am more thank you
than apology.
More welcome party
than goodbye affair.
On days like this,
men can't shut my voice
into a casket.
No person can sift my heart
into a dustpan.
On days like this,
my voice is gospelled choir
a hopeful tune
My heart refuses to unsing
a joyous song.
On days like this,
I am phoenix
brushing cinder
off infant wings.
I am honey
to your honeysuckle.
I am bowing apex
off a tidal wave.
I am fresh picked book
opening up
to new hands.
On days like this,
I am no ocean
with finite shores.
I am skyline.
I am boundless
beginning.
I rewrite.
I renew.
I begin again.
May 31, 2016
May 31, 2016 at 4:10 AM UTC
Virginity
is like a new dust pan
so shiny and bright
that is eventually full of garbage and dirt
that is thrown in the trash
with a new status
“used”
However some dustpans
are cleanse from their dirt
still carried with sin
and with a scent of development
and sometimes wisdom
Others are always full with garbage and dirt
not knowing the basic luxury of soap
nor do they remember when it first came out the package
Other dustpans are never used
but will either rot
or with a miracle will be continually showered with soap
Lasting with great wisdom
or resentment for not ever being
“used”
But like all things
it comes to an end
a dustpan is replace
when it is broken down or rotten
continuing the cycle
of life and virginity.
Aug 4, 2014
Aug 4, 2014 at 5:28 PM UTC
I was vacant:
dust wafted off the window-sill, swirling in the afternoon sun
when you came, rapping green fists on my empty door
peering into my cloudy windows, glancing at the address
shrugging
and letting yourself in without a key.
You floated across the creaking floorboards of the foyer,
sweeping my cobwebs into a corner.
Did I forget to leave you the dustpan?
You strode through glass-pained doors into the kitchen,
scrubbing my china with the cold iron-water that poured forth from my pipes.
Did I neglect to provide you with lye?
After you lumbered up the stairs, coughing on mothballs,
I imagine that you shook your head at the tassels
hung on my fraying valence,
for soon enough you hurried your way
back down the stairs
into the kitchen
through the foyer
and out of my door.
I wonder—
Was it the dust?
Was it the dishes?
Did you ever stop to open my curtains?
Did you ever peer out the window, and into the gardens below?
Jan 30, 2014
Jan 30, 2014 at 4:35 PM UTC
Saturday mornings growing up
my mother made me clean the bathroom
. windex . bleach
. scrub brush . rags
. mop . bucket . broom . dustpan
. lots of paper towels
she insisted I clean the bathroom
every Saturday morning
before I did anything else
with absolutely no chance of an allowance
she paid me plenty she said
. shelter . food . clothing
. television . internet . video games
. books . some sort of education
not to mention
. life
“do it because you love me”
so waking up Saturday
meant cleaning the bathroom
it meant my hands reeked of chemicals
while my friends enjoyed games I couldn't join
it meant I missed the best of all
the cartoons everyone else watched
it meant I didn’t feel like loving my mother
for years I begrudgingly
. scrubbed . wiped . cleaned
that bathroom
until it sparkled - until it shined
like the top of the Chrysler building
. sink . mirror
. toilet . tub
. floor
all of it spotless
love you mom
then in college
there's this woman that I'm living with
this woman that provides me with
. shelter . food . clothing
. television . internet . etc.
and she makes me feel alive
so I clean her bathroom
and when she asks me, “why?”
all I can think to say is
“I did it because I love you”
and it feels like that's the truth
Jul 19, 2019
Jul 19, 2019 at 2:57 PM UTC
i'm a fool,
your shiny foil.
enhancing elegance
i'm practically-
pragmatic.
deserving girl,
get your dustpan ready
and sweep your dirt
off his stationary feet.
Jan 3, 2011
Jan 3, 2011 at 5:39 AM UTC
There are gentle curses,
simple words that would break you
into those pieces you are,
scattered on the floor,
swept gently into my dustpan of marble,
reassembled from the
broken little statue you are
not so little, are you?
I'd reassemble your last horizons,
raining bleak shores of a suicide walk off of Beachey Head.
Smash,
dissolve into the waters,
and turn the ocean waters
purple.
Aug 9, 2014
Aug 9, 2014 at 4:00 AM UTC
A corner of a room is a misguided place to cower in.
Bad move!
Especially after you have just had chicken chow mein styled into your hair.
You sit.
Transfixed.
You watch.
Catatonic.
Prawn ***** glisten like diamonds in the snow as they slide effortlessly down the peeling wallpaper.
Baby screams.
Baby screams relentlessly.
The stench of cheap beer perfumes the stagnant air.
You think to yourself
"Is this it?"
Then you remember
You remember ….
What the hell was her name?
It’s on the tip of your tongue ….
BANG !!!
Tina Smitherson
*Once!
Just once ….*
The one and only time he raised his hand.
She was gone.
Didn’t even look back.
And her so quiet and all ….
Oh ….how we tormented her.
Oh …. how we teased her.
**BOO !!!
BOO !!!
BOO !!!**
Away she ran like a frightened little mouse.
No friends.
No life.
Nothing.
A bona fide geek.
And yet ….
And yet … only once.
How was that possible?
Night turns to day.
You look around the room.
*Chaos.
Filth.
Emptiness.*
Taunt at you manically …. in triplicate.
Baby sleeps peacefully in her makeshift cot.
Bruises red and angry.
*Maybe today ….
Maybe ….*
Then you reach down into your darkest resolve and open the cupboard beneath the sink.
Bin bags.
Detergent.
Dish cloths.
Dustpan and brush.
“I wonder what Tina Smitherson is doing at this precise moment in time?”
Jan 23, 2011
Jan 23, 2011 at 11:18 PM UTC
Broken into a thousand anxious pieces
stomped upon and disliked
rejected and neglected and humiliated
like a broken dish someones gone crazy on
until the porcelin has turned into the powder it came from
Like sand, or flour, it does not resemble a dish at all, but could
become something else, most likely swept up into a dustpan and dumped
a million microscopic pieces of a former dish, that is me
A mess of powder splatter on the floor
what will I become next?
Jun 7, 2013
Jun 7, 2013 at 6:30 PM UTC
They guard our gates. We are ruled by mechanised gods.
We are not free.
We are not real.
We are not awake.
Our mornings wake up to dew and smoke. We wake up and pick up our broomsticks and sweep.
You and I are made to sweep.
And it is through these sweeps we dance our fated dances.
Dance to wake the castles,
and water the gardens,
and venerate Emperors long dead and gone.
“This,” we say, “is our duty.”
“To belong.”
“To bow together.”
“To hope as one.”
We, all key cogs in the machinery. Everyone has a broom and dustpan. Everyone is made to sweep.
"Is this the land," we ask, "that we sang for and dreamt our feverish cartoon dreams for?"
Perhaps not. Our stories exist only in a land beyond time.
We’ve been there. It is a mechanism for the gods. They too hold brooms.
They too sleep in shrines of stone.
They too live in temples of steel.
The gold ones have long ago burned.
Dec 13, 2015
Dec 13, 2015 at 11:41 AM UTC
whisking yesterday’s
chipped and shattered dreams
into you is
not a problem
the broom is there
my hands yet comply
with requests
from the command center
I see you, flat
on the floor
waiting, patiently
your tin blue stillness no threat
to me, or the dust
I watch you, I rummage through
the day's dull duties
and other dithering distractions
that wash over me,
more each menacing minute,
but
can
not
think
of your
name,
“it…”
rests on my tongue tip
weightless and wicked
my eyes and hands grip you,
with ease, but
what art thou???
what simple sound will summon you?
I am alone,
though if another were here
with me, you,
and your "itness"
the question would remain,
unspoken
with other nameless sorrows
for who would not be terrified to admit
that more and more tomorrows
will be without the august appellation,
“dustpan”
and whatever other words
time
blithely chooses to
permanently purloin
Dec 14, 2012
Dec 14, 2012 at 4:10 PM UTC
there are moments with
you, and moreover, tiny
moments within moments,
and so forth, when it feels
impossible to be any closer
to you than the cigarette
between index and rebuttal.
[it should be saying a lot(but it's not)]
like on those southern nights
when honey stained our lips
and lives and judgment;
they showed up in the back
of a police car, armed with
a deadly arsenal of threats
as empty as the bottle of
whiskey in the corner.
they left, and we delivered,
before the state could sweep ash
away into the dustpan of a foster
home and furthermore into the
wastebasket or dumpster of the
so-called effectively efficient system.
we caught some air mixed in with
the paper souls betwixt index and
profane, and discussed past lusts
and loves and losses and the insanity
of the preceeding few days while the
accompanying ebb of breath and flow
of fire beat gently on our consciences.
the new year; i never thought i'd
make it here, and neither did you.
Jan 3, 2013
Jan 3, 2013 at 4:54 PM UTC
Yeah, I'm there
recycler, of my trash
words, lines and poetry
not too vain, or brash
I try not to litter
but **** sometimes it's hard
haphazardly discarding prose
like an ugly drunken bard
The yard needs attention
as scattered here and there
haiku's that didn't work
free-verse, I wouldn't share
Bring me my broom
and my dustpan too
recycling text, and making room
for another line, or two
Apr 28, 2017
Apr 28, 2017 at 12:38 PM UTC
as he sat soft beside me.
“Sure,” I said, with ill feeling.
My instinct was not to cross my friend,
I had too few left.
I nodded to the Ape behind the bar and he obliged
with one lemon & ginger and one green tea.
He knows his regulars well
and we know we’d need to wait til later for anything stronger.
“Look,” he said, and I turned to see
a gap and I counted the two teeth that were missing -
no, not missing - he opened his hand
and there they were, both accounted for,
safe and secure in his grey leathery palm.
“Look,” he repeated, (a little slurred this time)
and turned his fist so I could see
the missing skin and the bruises
that gave testimony to his amateur status.
His ****** grin and wet laughter
shook the silverback back into action
and we got a plate of malted milks.
Like I say, he knows his regulars well
and he’d listened when I told him
where he could get a regular supply,
direct from Staffordshire, in the UK.
“Lo-ok,” he said (more hesitant this time)
and lifted his shirt a little to reveal the knife wound,
replete with knife, buried to the hilt.
“Loo-,“ he started to say, as he slid off the bar stool
taking his tea with him, the porcelain shattering on the stone floor.
I winced – the cups had been a gift
to the Ape from my mother.
‘Why should the chimps get all the best crockery?’ she’d explained.
“I’ll pay for the breakage,” I said
and the Ape nodded his furrowed brow
as he swung round to grab the dustpan and mop.
I drank my tea,
counting off the friends that remained.
Mar 2, 2024
Mar 2, 2024 at 1:25 PM UTC
in the corner
where giant walls join, he stares
at me, or the painting on the sky
of drywall behind me
if my mate spots him, she
will demand martial action
I am to skulk across the laminate field
and use the mighty broom
then, the dustpan
scooping his carcass up
for the grave, beside the cat
in the yard
squirrels, pestiferously perched
on my fence, teeth sharp courtesy of my
redwood trim, will watch
no, I won't listen to my spouse,
and execute an overgrown mouse
I'll let him squeeze through the planks
and go where royal rodents go
still, I may go hunting yet--my prey?
those furry tailed acorn chiselers, who ravage
my redwood with impunity...
(they think)
Oct 12, 2015
Oct 12, 2015 at 3:07 PM UTC
a poet doesn't live in here
just a hallowed wreck
woe is me ... all that ****
i only want respect
a blind man couldn't see him
so he thought he was a farce
stumbling down flashlight paths
taking to himself in the dark
whispering all the sick things she would have liked to hear
screamed silent lullabies about the brutal world of fear
a poet doesn't live here
just a 17 year old's self esteem
little boy's riots and life-long bad dreams
i wanted to pain you a picture
dead bodies on trampolines
smiles on their faces...
know what i mean?
i wanna cut my heart out
black dead and cold
and give up what's left of
my shattered dustpan soul,
this whole thing for me
was like pulling teeth
slowly twisting one by one
and gargling gasoline,
a poet doesn't live here
he's all dried up inside
and summer's come
it's time for fun, no more time to write.
Jul 7, 2010
Jul 7, 2010 at 10:19 AM UTC
The handle
to the front door won't budge,
but it can still be locked
from the inside.
The overgrowth is five years
in the making, vines took over
this home of once improvement.
I don't believe we ever
owned a gas can.
A boarded up pool.
The one in which the dog died.
His body was as bloated as my eyes. The puppy in the pictures still hung in the basement beside the kicked in window.
Leaves and insects rest
on the linoleum floor, a cohabitation that was formed out of vacancy.
A long dresser left ajar from wood paneling, insects crawling around,
not that one would know how they
got there. Old paperwork and letters survived. The assumption is that the moths never arrived to join the spiders nestled in their leaves.
Both longhand and typed sentences that spoke of longing, love (young love), happiness, direction, and lastly evaluation. Broken glass fixed against the dresser, a reflection shows.
The dirt and grime is of a
subconscious level.
One that exceeds the proximities
of the appropriate metaphor.
So what is seen is loss.
And although this occurrence
comes as a new beginning, the best solution at the given moment may perhaps be a broom and a dustpan.
Jun 13, 2014
Jun 13, 2014 at 7:26 PM UTC
Looking at these scribbles right now,
Trying to solve this math problem.
ahh, its not right !
all of these numbers are just swirling in my head.
Lets me just rewrite this one more time
you take love and you and subtract the trust
and all you get is the one night stands with that cigarettes
still burning in that ashtray on that night stand
and a bottle of Jack hanging right beside it
but you if you take that bottle of Jack.
you add it to an average home,
it stains the story book of life
and now all we see is tales of a broken home.
Tales of fear and uncertainty
Now if we divide this broken home into our broken world we get a girl in her teens
staring into a pregnancy test.
She broken like that ****** the broke her dreams.
because we try to sweep up all of our broken traits into the dustpan called or minds but we don't get all of the glass in the dust pan
if we multiply that shattered glass and divide it into a broken home
we see a man sitting with that Jack,
jacking around with his family's money
because that bar stool is closer than the churches.
Lets take that Church and factor it into that teenage girl
praying to a god she doesn't believe in
because all of her friends aren't really friends.
you see, her friends are dealing with their own broken homes
and have a mother who is dealing with that bar stool
you put it all together and we don't get a math problem
we see our problems with coping and our societies biggest fear
admitting that we have a problem.
Jan 30, 2014
Jan 30, 2014 at 9:53 PM UTC
Unless otherwise stated I am against the wind
and it seems on this view may have to rescind.
For when a strong wind blows without any apparent reason
it makes everything unkempt in spite of the current season.
Although by its very nature this is what it’s supposed to do
much like an idiotic mindless person who is harassing you.
There have been many times while sweeping the back yard
when an idiot wind would blow and all of my pile discard;
that I had neatly swept up and left somewhere to collect later
together with what was in the dustpan held in my hand to cater.
And so I would have to start all over again in an air of defiance
with a few words used as expletives to express my annoyance.
We are reminded of that old song called ‘blowing in the wind’ here
but the answer my friend is to outsmart the beast and not lose cheer.
There’s also a saying of some cold comfort in ‘the winds of change’
that could be a sign of things to come which may seem to be strange.
Sometimes it’s difficult to see what’s in front or lying just ahead of you
but one thing is certain we should all take care and not avoid the view.
The storms of nature we hear about such as hurricanes and tornadoes
are the result of strong forces within the environment mankind sows
which are being manipulated by it in its relentless progress forward
and are an indication of what we are all heading inevitably toward.
The more we plunder nature and deplete its non renewable resources
it seems nature reacts in such a way to remind us of its own courses.
___________________________________________________
May 23, 2015
May 23, 2015 at 10:07 AM UTC
You cleaned up
any hope that remained
with a dustpan and brush
and threw it into
the trash.
Aug 23, 2025
Aug 23, 2025 at 7:21 PM UTC
living vicariously,
a fly on the wall
observes its surroundings.
a predetermined life
of insignificant actions,
destined just to live and then to die
the fly on the floor,
now dead and gone.
memory faded, life forgotten.
a shattered body
and an empty mind –
reflecting the world through vacant eyes.
swept into a dustpan
broken and cold
but no more now than it was in life.
May 9, 2014
May 9, 2014 at 11:34 PM UTC
She sweeps him
up.
Puts the bits of
broken urn in the bin.
Empties the back end of
the ***** bottle.
And with the aid of
a little yellow funnel
decants his ashes from
dustpan to bottle.
A little cloud of him
hangs in the air
like a genie
appearing from...
She keeps him in
the ***** bottle
for ohhh...years
despite him being
a whiskey man.
When he was a real
life man
he would beat her
when the spirit moved him.
Sad to say she was glad
he was dead.
His death gave her
her life back.
She hated the way he
coloured her
skin in
with big blooming bruises.
One year she just got fed up
looking at him in the bottle
in his ashes to ashes
transformation.
So she just flushed
him down the loo.
His photo kept on
smiling as
he watched
behind the ***** glass
this her
final revenge.
Jul 4, 2015
Jul 4, 2015 at 4:07 PM UTC
I feel trapped inside
My own
Existence,
Totally unable to escape it
Unless by doing the unthinkable.
I take a package of
Sticky notes to work
And steal a few precious
Heartbeats to commit my thoughts
To paper,
Forever immortalizing them.
These notes decorate my fridge,
Monuments that will long outlive me,
Reminders of those heartbeats
Where, during the pumping of my blood,
I was actually alive.
I clean up everyone
Else's messes
And thus I make my living,
But can it really be called that?
A living?
Day begins.
Breathe in.
I make the coffee, and attempt
To open my eyes.
Sometimes it works.
Sometimes it doesn't.
Off to work. To the broom
And the dustpan
And the beats of my heart
I will never get back.
Music helps, but it's not immortal.
Even the best of playlists gather dust.
My job is important, they say.
I don't believe them.
Maybe if I could just see what difference it makes,
Who my work impacts,
That there is proof that I am doing something right
Other than an empty pat on the back
And an obligatory paycheck,
Maybe then, it would be worth it.
Maybe it wouldn't **** away my soul
Like it does.
But maybes don't pay the rent,
And they certainly don't replenish my soul.
Only words make me alive.
But it is too late for that.
I was born with a gift
I'll never be able to use,
A sanity I'll never be able to reclaim.
I was born a few centuries too late.
Or maybe I was born with a soul
In a soulless world.
Where has life gone?
How can anyone live like this?
How can they exist
Rather than actually live?
Why am I here?
I can work such magic,
But there's never anyone to see.
So what does that
Leave me with?
A head and a heart full of
Words and a world that has
No place
For them.
Dec 26, 2015
Dec 26, 2015 at 10:39 AM UTC
And the old abbot aged
and pulled down with cancer
walked the cloister,
et aestu saeculi nobis,
even though cloistered
and of God,
I swept the landing
after the office of Terce
with large broom
and dustpan and brush
and there was a huge spiderweb
in a window,
Salve regina audi nos,
Dom Kenneth sorted
the altar cloths and plates
and holy cup where
the Crucified's blood is sipped,
and she welcomed me in
and sat me down
and unbuttoned my flies
and took out the feller,
the deeds you do
may be the only sermon
some persons
will hear today said Francis,
au travail est de prier
the French monk said
as he helped me
with the refectory
cleaning up before lunch,
George cast his stone
further that the rest of us
after the office of Sext
and our lunch
and sitting
on the abbey beach,
don't let your sins
turn into bad habits
Teresa said,
mine almost did back then
and with her
Yochana that is
not Teresa,
bell ringing
as Hugh showed us
his thin frame and arms
but the tolled bells
carried to far and wide,
parlare con Dio
ed egli vi ascolterà
the Italian monk told me
but my prayer life
was less than his,
we are twice armed
if we fight with faith
said Gareth quoting Plato
and I had only read
the Republic that far,
Dom Joe(dear Bunny)
said to me
God has something special
in line for you
but I never found it
least not then,
πλέουν στη θάλασσα στο Θεό
a visiting Greek monk said
and Dom Charles
translated for me
but it went over
my young man's head.
Apr 16, 2016
Apr 16, 2016 at 2:11 AM UTC