Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
King Panda Sep 2017
I find you
the lappet moth
like slug or bat
with fuzzy ears
stuck dead with
nothing except
the toxins of
my fever
abnormally
high and
boiling
how

perfect it is
to be under
your legs
bugs
or none
my fingers will
do the
crawling for
any insect
camouflaged
in the skin
dig

the nails
now
bits of flesh
under
tiny specks
of blood
gather
and your net
snags
words I’ve
never uttered
Hannah Zedaker Dec 2017
I haven’t been this happy in quite some time.
I still feel tinges of pain
But they never last long.
They no longer feel the same.

They’re distant you see,
far from the depths of my heart
For the holes that echoed cavernous, fill with webs, holding together what once fell apart.
And I smile.

Because I’m happy
Not obligated
or covering up something more raw and real
but genuinely happy
that’s part of his appeal

These webs catch feelings,
ones of warmth
a calming peace
Those little arachnid legs
will wrap carefully these from greatest to the least
and store them away
deep in the depths of my heart
to call upon those memories
when I feel I'm to fall apart

Hopefully the light lasts
even in my darkest of days
and the butterflies he's hatched
scare the moths aways

away

they'll fly leaving the fields bright and clear,
and comforting darkness
sent off to disappear  
But yet, we all know
that moths attract to light in dark
but maybe I'll learn to love them,
as the Entomologist holds my heart.
fray narte Jul 2022
I stick my fingers in my throat
and throw up a basket of swallowed suns;
under it, my tongue is parched and pinned in place
like a dried house moth on an entomologist’s hand
that nurses it back to life

and demands devotion in return,
a poem in return.

But I have purged the feeling being out of me
like a cold, cold man now averse to the ways of his younger lover
who is alive for all of it — the lust and the starving kisses
and the quiet deaths in the morning only to haunt at night.

I leave letters for my bitten nails without meaning a single word,
and go to lie with the superficiality, the hypocrisy nesting under my tongue.

I have started writing poems again — see where they take me this time
and find myself here, once more
where a fool unpacks her baggage and out I come rolling
like a dead body with a foaming mouth, a brown moth burning under the sun,
a leech that scurries under salt and needles,
slowly eroding like sanity.

She thinks, therefore, she is, they say,
but at what cost? She looks on and pens this poem
with a tiny smile on her lips.
written June 6, 2022, 10:53 am
robin Jun 2013
only dead boys hold insects like they're something
special
only a dead boy would let a mantis in his heart and
preying was always a better descriptor
because hymns burned in my throat and
i scratched a cross into my palm but i was never lucky enough to scar
but
oh, dead boy
bug lover
enduring a thousand lashes to save the soul of a beetle  -
i'll help you peel off all your scabs to make sure they scar
thick tissue skin memory sometimes you think scars are the closest you'll get
to a wedding ring
you're a suicide king i think a kingdom of hearts was never the safest place for you i
don't think you understand the way your subjects' hearts are strung because
entomology entomos everything you love is cut to bits
and on the fourteenth of february you told me
the only purpose of a flower
was to hold
a spider
inside
and i guess that was why you painted all your walls with roses i
hope your garden  smells as sweet
covered in your misfortunes
only a dead boy would let
a praying mantis so close
to his neck
oh, you freak. disgusting.
i ate the last one that let me this close.
you told me {if i die
leave my body
in the forest
by
an anthill}
maybe you don't realize we were doomed from the start or maybe you're just naïve but
honey you're a dead boy and
corpses don't fall in love.
[you're so genuine it hurts and i think
i could teach you how to be a fake -
nobody likes an honest man
i could teach you how to hate the world but you said

{the only one
i hate here
is me}]

freakish child.
all you see in every rorschach is mantes and
decapitations and
wedding rings you are an aberration,
suicide king entomologist your throne room
was full of termites.
with hallowed cheeks and hollowed churches,
i will assure that you scar
dead boy, if you die
i will put maggots
in your chest
Joe Satkowski Aug 2013
how are you preaching?
with your teeth broken

i can draw lines all day, where i please and when i please
and the lines mean nothing

lit a cigarette
i tried to send you roses but
they wilted as i touched them

many ******* exist outside of your body but only if you let yourself experience them
for how much i enjoy cutting the wings off of butterflies, i never want to be an entomologist
Pinkerton Oct 2019
With dreams of shaking God's hand
and strolling through paradise,
many are tempted to paths of divinity.
Reincarnation, though— not a creator—
lures me to dalliances with holiness

But not my rebirth.
Yours.

How I pray your death returns you
as a Blue Morpho butterfly for I
also dabble in insect collecting.
Finally, I could subdue you,
with pins restrain and mount you
like a trophy in my bedroom.

May my faith make you mine.
CJ Sutherland May 2018
It started over night
Attached the innocent
That’s not right

The army to many to count
I stand alone
A calculated defense I mount
I will NEVER accept defeat
My four innocent babies
Lay listless at my feet

Exhausted My Open wounds need treatment
At the end of the day
But that’s little cosilation
Compared to what my babies are suffering
Not a word do they say
Bewildered looks of confused pain
Swollen welts track their skin
The sadness in their eyes
the situation they are in
Their Backs, arms and legs
Mark the horrors of the day
They just want mommy to
Make it go away
I know they don’t understand
not sure what to say
At least  I try
They still show love, exceptence I want to cry
They give unconditional love
Only this grace comes from
Heaven God above
This gives me the courage to FIGHT
Planning my attack  strategy

As I prepare dinner
I make a list
We may be battered swollen bruised
But we are not broken or defeated

My tools are depleted
FLEAS don’t care who they attack
I have bites on me a well
at first I didn’t know why I couldn’t tell

Now Im winning
Armed with the Internet knowledge
I have become an entomologist
Arradicating the species
It’s to early to tell
Half past two a.m.
No sleep again tonight
Oh well
We are all sleeping
With one eye on our surroundings
A false sense of safety
As cautious optimism dances
In my head
There are no more fleas
on my dogs, in my bed
Carpet, drapery, bedding
Its a  tremendously large task to complete

Struggling to prepare a list before
I nod off my to sleep
I will not
can not
accept defeat

If you don’t get a handle quickly
on these fleas
They will take over
One female can lay 200 eggs
Diatomaceous earth food grade
  The ultimate destruction
It’s Considered the best natural alternative
Safe for humans and animals
Kills bugs
For the first time in many years I am being attacked by fleas taking neighborhood walks the neighbors yards have fleas in my dogs brought them back so now I’m on a vengeance to deflea my house my dogs it’s becoming a possession I’m at war and I will win
Knut Kalmund Jul 2020
instead, they send me a glow of esperance
and expounding answers through the back of fireflies
which I now must entrap for further examination
like a sterile entomologist milling around
in the someday

blazing with unbridled wrath
the reason barred by all gods
only at nightfall disclosed
within my grasp but in the somewhere

preferably after the daytime shadows
have fueled my will in the antrum
a modest perishing cold revives splendidly
and I awake by the sound of my rumbles
from what seems to be one oblivious moment of eternity now

I swing an idly leg of my dented bed
pull the other inanimate carrier behind
she's here, whenever the eyes open
this time far back in the mirror right across
that stares back at me with those withered and dilated eyes
underneath two unilluminated crescents
uncertain, if she sobs or smiles
the night is nigh, better hurry
Thanks for reading through.
mikecccc Mar 2016
I'm no
entomologist
so I don't know
if you have veins
but if you do
treachery runs
in them at least
according to the stories.
vein status
unconfirmed
google unhelpful
Knut Kalmund Jul 2020
instead they send me a glow of esperance
and expounding answers through the back of fireflies
which I now must entrap for further examination
like a sterile entomologist milling around
in the someday

blazing with unbridled wrath
the reason barred by all gods
only at nightfall disclosed
within my grasp but in the somewhere

preferably after the daytime shadows
have fueled my will in the antrum
a modest perishing cold revives splendidly
and I awake by the sound of my rumbles
from what seems to be one oblivious moment of eternity now

so I swing an idly leg of my dented bed
pull the other inanimate carrier behind
she's here, whenever the eyes open
this time far back in the mirror right across
that stares back at me with those wizend and dilated eyes
underneath two unilluminated crescents
uncertain, if she sobs or smiles
the night is nigh, better hurry
Mateuš Conrad Sep 2020
i just can't get rid of the moths...
5 for one bedroom
and... it's hardly an enterprise
in cubisms' revisionism...
daddy larva -
should i leave some
cotton for these poor
delights...
                  am i riddled with
a western "world" exhausted...
like... the pops of no new
genius?
  like polyphony was never
at play:
   when the rigour of man
made it: less of an affair that might
suggest green tea
and the superfluous
fling of a pancake at
a constellation of: nowhere...
  a crucial time for messiahs
and for caricatures...
magicians and iranian baklava bite-sized
retreats...
  not necessarily iranian:
could be lebanese!
       it's not like this grand past,
this grand history...
this inheritance tax on the mind
was to be ever borrowed from
a concentration on the trade
routes surrounding the baltic sea...
i... inherited... nada! nothing!
i acquired english when i should
have given inclination
to tsarina cyrillic and minor hector
mandarin...
       it's so unsurprising, though...
to catch up on the bbc radio 3 adventure...
to reach a platitude of i.q.:
i finally! finally!
fathomed the point of an english
soap opera... eastenders...
i didn't find an i.q. focus to mind...
a continuum perhaps...
but it has and always has been
just... ever so tiresome...
to compensate i.q. -
or to overstate it...
             it's not that i found soap opera
dumb... but after waking up
to bbc radio 3... i knew i was missing
a narrative: an assurance...
a soap opera is an assurance...
however banal the pursuit of harlequin
is...
it's there: a persistent brick upon brick:
wall!
      well... it's one compliment to hear:
that children "like" you...
that dogs or cats like you...
but... for god's sake... moths?!
i am not quiet assured a status in alignment
with a buffalo bill...

so much for nabokov
and the whole ****** and the entomologist /
etymologist...
catch them with what?
my bright oozing bulb of a phosphorescent
appreciation for the punchy cliche
goldberg variations?

to be honestly endeared by a dog...
to be made forthcoming
by a quizzical attention span of cats toying
with poker...
      but to make endearing
inquiries in the realm of insects...
who... fathomed... the flies...
a mythological man with an authentic
given name that came to be
the realisation of the myth of Beelzebub...

well... so much for sharing...
on the crux of a noun... like any other...
be it a moth... motte... ćma...
or a butterfly... schmetterling... MOTYL...
globalisation and...
well... no real etymological sensibility....

not even in sharpnel wording:
    in: w,
               im...
                        z: with, mit
o: about, um...
                      od: from, von...
so much for a shared purpose a sharing
of tattoos and ******* blisters...
like old age is a crease...
and youth an argument...
best invested in pickles...

                the ordeal of the night sky...
while having to grind a gripping
reality of something profoundly
stupid that it cannot be anything beside
stupid...
         a concept of a solitary pine...
when a pine as solitary is
impossible to fathom:
or a birch thus solo...

        an oak: while the adventures
of birches have come to their
natural advent of regrets...
           and this solo coffin shadow come
noon stans procrastinating a
show of shadows borrowed from
an overflow of the Styx...

Thames: a river... with... no authentic
tide: from mountains toward
the sea...
no... the Thames is an inauthentic river...
if it's a river to begin with...
a sea knows a concern for tide...
but a river?
a river should know no mirror
bogus "now" of a tide...
the Thames is like the Bermuda Delta...
an irrational high-rise ****...
enough to pluck one's eyes
out for...
   or don a sheikh hanky panky teasing
that 19th century morbid whitey
of celestial: wool! my eyes! needs! woolz!

some banal Clarice chasing a hunchback
Circe with a Charon towing...
impossible gravity of walking a stupendous
walk of arrogance:
this two-feet-tow...
my bucktooth and arithmetic:
theatre von der nacht:
lepper zeppelin -
   authentically lisping minor details:
an accent "here" or... "dasein"...

teatr nocy...
               ćma i jej obcy:
a moth and her other...
              like some proto-digestion
of custard and borrowed glue...
me left to my own: deus "ex" machina /
**** in machina device-works...
a concept of switzerland came
with both the tickling time-keeper
of a form of clock and some lesser
known 20th century protagonist
by the name of Young...

                  persuasions please!
i can leave my i.q. on the diatribe for
the persistent allowance
of the desired... "englishness" of:
queue...
            bread the brittle futurism of
a sanctity of bread:
beside this "thing" dubbed irish...
and gnats and breadcrumbs...
itches furthest from the last
encompassing loiter...
of a truth salvaged via
a tartare steak...
a kogiel-mogiel...

                  a bread-owned soaking
up of a spilling yoke:
like it's a french... "thing"...
teasing an affair of a wig...
best: warsaw will forever be...
an interlude of:
the concept question from
london toward tokyo...
i.e.: why can't we have nice things...
answer?
we... ahem... never had them...
we tried... vaginal ****-wit
from Brandenburg or that ****-****-wit
from lady muscovite...

here's to samson-frankenstein's monster...
the furore surrounding
the faroe islands...
the 20 thousand(s) composition
of the shetland:
united schkootland repose:
'aggis neeps 'n' tatties!

enough salz undz pfeffer
und we have haz ours...
hinderburg-esque hogmanay!
of the british:
not lived among the vilsh...
or the scuttling furore of the:
'igh 'anders...
          
cutie pie pork chop
worth a *******'s towing:
that last vanguard of / if:
              "too few"...

no... no good lending an ear
to listen to "shared": charred...
etymology of greek or russian...
London's desperate plight:
*** ordeal that never has to happen...

there have to be concerns
for calling it a new 9am...
just because it just so happens
in Edinburgh...
  there's the chopping of wood...
there's the ordeal of castratos
attired in niqabs...
the harems of the ottomans are
still a fetish for imagery best
sourced in Vienna...

            to worship the night:
is to find enough of day...
as sacrificial:
as banal... as enough...
to think with an exhaustion
of compensation:
     it's not that i dare not: dream...
but it's not enough to dream
to begin with...
i will harvest this eternal night...
to eat away at the day's
mediocre...
              mirror mirror...
             your wish for status lake...
i see no question-worthiness
in either sea or river...
how is it that i write
to fathomable formal linguo?
                  mirror in the shadow...
mirror in the lake...
murky time of river
and the hiding grey of the sea(s)...
come tide come swelling of
hinterland ambitions...
this little norse retreat of my
last perspective...
            perhaps i just want
to die a death pronounced by
having to don an agitating
pair of shoes: that demand...
towing a scenic incredulity of
a miser's mile?!

         how's that? roundabout
faroe isles! an itch of spreading butter
on... toasted bread:
notably a sourdough crusted:
new holborn sort of "adventure"...
no.. nothing new...
here's to drinking some more
while making it simultaneously
well-reserved ast having
the same inviting prospect of...
looking for:
a loot of a shakespeare and a full-stop.
Donald Trump, Lemony Snicket, Askew
bee Doo, plus knowledgeable Jiminy Cricket,
all reliable, trustworthy sources, who
would never misinform gullible traveler
I know time to lather up
with poetic shampoo

so don't you dare ballyhoo
moost likely known
to garden variety wahoo
(When You Wish Upon a Star goo
whee lyrics aside...), particularly
following feedback haint "FAKE,"

just like this tattoo
on each posterior cheek
helping move doo doo
i.e. private business,
anyway pardon loo
*** wordplay, now lemme continue

though ye would would
much prefer I bid thee adieu,
ham back from the house of Pooh
ready with toilet trees
to vend off voodoo
intending to remain forthright to

finish explaining courtesy
regarding resultant google Moo
choe reputable homepage
search query... hallooo
thankfully helped rescue
me bogged down in Waterloo
curious about... any clue?

Yepper, what sound
do crickets make?
plus other esoteric tidbits to slake
thirst for aspiring entomologist
(may even know gossip where ache
key breaky hearts quake
'bout Josh and Drake)

yielded plethora web newpages
mainly concerning former,
whereat bottom cricket
wing covered teeth-
like ridges make

rough surface, and upper surface
of infinitesimal gliding anatomical feature
functions like scraper, hence rubbing
respective parts together doth create
chirping (“stridulating") soundcloud.
Dark shadows akin to edge of night
affected by massive infestation of
     Drosophila melanogaster light
(scientific name as
     same itty bitty
winged flitting nuisance ignite
     mentioned in title) besieged,
inundated, and thickly swarmed

dost primp and pretty
fie themselves (to
     attract a witty
mate) during their
     40 to 50 days city,
or suburban life
     cycle long enough
     to qualify for this

     quickly written ditty
seemingly overnight
     a bajillion biz zee
buzzing adults (each
     about 1/8 inch long see
their world wide web,
     thru at least one
unusual red eye,

which compound eye
     of the fruit fly
contains 760 unit
     eyes or ommatidia,
     well nigh
hapt tubby one of the most
     advanced among insects,
     where Google search

     for home remedies aye
didst find to exterminate
     these teeny weeny pests,
     plus informational pursuit my
instantaneous curiosity yielded
     above mentioned
     esoteric tidbits,
     sans accidentally disc

     covered helpful good riddance
     material of household ingredients
     restraining me to breathe sigh
of dollop, and hope to try
one or more solutions,
     which informed
     this amateur entomologist -

listed forthright as:
1.Create a trap by mixing
apple cider vinegar
with a few drops of dish soap.
2. Another home-made trap is to
pour leftover red wine into a jar.
3. Mash up banana slices in a jar, and
cover top with a plastic wrap.
4. Pour bleach solution
into bathroom sink.
ever the amateur family entomologist

Upon texting her a picture
(countless moments ago
since October ninth)
unfamiliar delicate looking critter -
(seen inside the apartment many times),
she quickly identified crane fly
agilely affixed to lampshade.

I figuratively tip hat at Tipulidae
long legged dainty insect
poised to strike proboscis,
where adults buzzfeed on
nectar from flowers or other outdoor plants
unlike larvae whose diet
constitutes decaying wood and vegetation.

Said winged six-legged invertebrate
of the class Insecta
resembles a mosquito on steroids,
and can freak people out, crane flies
pose absolutely zero harm
to bipedal hominids i.e. **** sapiens.

Detriment to human beings
ought not serve as benchmark
to assess purposefulness regarding
all creatures large and small,
rhetorical question cometh your way:
how came man/woman kind
as arbitrary arbiter
determining which animal
and/or plant species
can claim their sweepstake
linkedin with world wide ecological web?

If assigned role of divine creator,
(atop egg shaped noggin of mine
thorn of crown yours truly would don)
dutifully, eagerly and immediately trumpet,
whereby naked ape relegated to dung heap
feasted upon courtesy voracious grubs
chief among them
the Alaskan Bull Worm.

Life, liberty and pursuit of happiness
in sync with inalienable rights
decreed toward all flora and fauna
except nasty horrible brute
loosing wanton cruelty upon planet
bajillion dollar bounty on her/his head
plus forced to eat Peruvian puff peppers,
which measures 16 million Scoville units

(this drake just joshing you)
if she/he violates trespassing code
compromising, jeopardizing, or yawping
indignities heaped against the existence
of any organism
(except haughty human beings)
entitled to live
upon oblate spheroid.

Invariably survival of the fittest
will decree dominance
of one or another living entity
unless robots take over the world.
Pestiferous infestation quite
argh apartment unit b44
plagued with plight
analogously linkedin to phenomena  
experienced within outer limits
of the twilight zone
dark shadows akin to edge of night
opportunistic nuisance might
necessitate exterminator

as occurred ofttimes before
when writing, living, breathing,
et cetera space affected
by massive infestation of
Drosophila melanogaster light
(scientific name as same itty bitty
winged flitting nuisance ignite
mentioned in title) besieged,
inundated, and thickly swarmed

dost primp and pretty
fie themselves (to
attract a witty
mate) during their
40 to 50 days city,
or suburban life
cycle long enough
to qualify for this
quickly written ditty
seemingly overnight
a bajillion biz zee

buzzing adults each
about 1/8 inch long
not to be confused
and bigger than no see hmms -
the latter officially called
Ceratopogonidae,
no see ums,
also known as biting midges,
sandflies, punkies and sand gnats,
are small flies usually between
one and three millimeters long.

They're known to feed
on the blood of humans and animals,
leaving itchy, uncomfortable
bite marks on the skin.

Back to the former insects,
whose webbed, wide world
seen thru at least one
unusual red eye,
which compound eye
of the fruit fly
contains 760 unit
eyes or ommatidia, well nigh
hapt tubby one of the most
advanced among insects,
where Google search
for home remedies aye

didst find to exterminate
these teeny weeny pests,
plus informational pursuit my
instantaneous curiosity yielded
above mentioned esoteric tidbits,
sans accidentally discovered
visa vis helpful good riddance
material of household ingredients
restraining me to breathe sigh
of dollop, and hope to try
one or more solutions,
which informed me,
an amateur entomologist -

listed forthright as:
1.Create a trap by mixing
apple cider vinegar
with a few drops of dish soap.
2. Another homemade trap is to
pour leftover red wine into a jar.
3. Mash up banana slices in a jar, and
cover top with a plastic wrap.
4. Pour bleach solution
into bathroom sink.

A last ditch effort involves
housing liberal population of bats,
they for heaven's sakes might invite hellcats,
nevertheless both creatures more acceptable
and less indistinguishable
from conservative bureaucrats.
Poet of Perkiomen Valley
discovered aforementioned titled poem
about thirty months ago he wrote
impossible mission critters to smote
chronic issue yours truly does note
years later meaning today
April 19th, 2022
necessitated we allow, enable

and provide welcome to exterminator
actually management did hote
(obsolete) To command; to enjoin
hazard upon body, mind and spirit,
thus ridding apartment b44
visited by said swarming insects,
his expertise sought to mitigate
courtesy applying insecticide.

Insects created dark shadows
analogous brought outer limits
of twilight zone
resembling edge of night
in truth our one bedroom apartment
at that earlier date
affected, encroached, and outsmarted
by massive infestation of
Drosophila melanogaster light
weight winged worst
pests to eradicate
(scientific name regarding
winged flitting nuisance ignite
mentioned in title) besieged,
inundated, and thickly swarm.

dost primp and pretty
fie themselves (to
attract a witty
mate) during their
40 to 50 days city,
or suburban life
cycle long enough
to qualify for this

quickly written ditty
seemingly overnight
a bajillion biz zee
buzzing adults (each
about 1/8 inch long see
their world wide web,
thru at least one
unusual red eye,

which compound eye
of the fruit fly
contains 760 unit
eyes or ommatidia, well nigh
hapt tubby one of the most
advanced among insects,
where Google search

for home remedies aye
didst find to exterminate
these teeny weeny pests,
plus informational pursuit my
instantaneous curiosity yielded
above mentioned
esoteric tidbits,
sans accidentally disc

covered helpful good riddance
material of household ingredients
restraining me to breathe sigh
of dollop, and hope to try
one or more solutions,
which informed
this amateur entomologist -
listed forthright as:

1. Create a trap by mixing
apple cider vinegar
with a few drops of dish soap.
2. Another homemade trap is to
pour leftover red wine into a jar.
3. Mash up banana slices in a jar, and
cover top with a plastic wrap.
4. Pour bleach solution
into bathroom sink.
5. Detonate atomic explosives
as a last resort.

— The End —