"escher" poems
You were a giant garden, growing beauty as I, the small bug, admired all that you were and everything you became. I saw the air you breathed in and the seeds you spewed out; my spots and wings were nothing magical to you. You made life, with help from the sun, and all I did was eat everything you created. I destroyed your flowers, slowly and softly - but it took a bigger toll than I had thought it would. I thrived off the misery I caused you. You lived for life and I lived for destruction; for chaos is the only disorder that keeps us sane.
Jun 1, 2015
Jun 1, 2015 at 8:13 PM UTC
walking out of the liquor store
wine bottles double ******
asphalt concrete curb stone
the great expanse of the universe
the mundane
welded water tight
that Escher print
of ribboned minds
personal accounting
money as abstraction
automobile documents
layers of bureaus
the great and powerful
realm of ideas
shared fallen history
the strike of the pen
ideals ethics
the avoidance of sin
cold is coming
warmth is rare
plug into existential wetness
yet suffer banality
Friday, November 1, 2013
Nov 1, 2013
Nov 1, 2013 at 12:06 PM UTC
You aren't the first to walk these roads.
These lonely, gravel trails covered in broken glass and nails.
Every time a rickety car breaks down and fails
it leaves it's wreck along the side of highway,
just watching the traffic pass them by.
They are monuments to every effort we have made and given up on.
They are why you MUST try.
Whether you live in a town or a city,
there are going to be some pretty ****** moments in life.
It takes a lot of strife to get a small amount of satisfaction
but the chain reaction
of doubts and down 'n' outs
is drowned out by the radio static and
I don't mean to sound dramatic but
I understand.
I just want you to know
you're not going to go on your own this time.
Every moment spent crying is time that could better spent trying.
If I told you I don't have these moments,
well, I'd be lying.
Because I've felt the color drain from my face
as I try to remember the last place I left my courage
because it's not at arm's reach this time.
Sneers and eyerolls draw spirals around me
like I'm at ground zero of an M.C Escher painting.
I can rephrase suffering so many ways.
But at this pace, I still can't outrun my own thoughts.
I find my courage at last
but there is no sticking place to ***** it to,
so I just say ***** it."
I can't say I knew it would end this way,
but if all this poem comes down to
is a whiny teenager trying to be edgy
than I guess I...
Jun 28, 2014
Jun 28, 2014 at 1:18 AM UTC
i swirl in van gogh.
i am charcoal stains
on blue,
a smile of barbed wire
for the painter,
i am mona lisa, true.
monet, he paints me
calm waters,
water lilies floating
in solitude,
he doesn't see
the fire sprouting
in my veins.
picasso cannot stain
my heart with colour,
magritte cannot
create a masterpiece
out of my eyes.
to be immortalized
i beg in pink
lick the brush
and paint myself
alive.
end my days
in escher,
sketch myself
out of the stairway,
into the globe.
throw myself
at deaths eye,
kiss the canvas
rotten, ******
pretty.
Nov 25, 2015
Nov 25, 2015 at 2:58 PM UTC
The pen, they say, is mightier,
but is it keener than a knife?
This brittle blade of insolence,
unleashed to lash at life.
'Yeah, innit, Bruv, he got right up in my face,
cos my phone was out in lesson time
and he called me a disgrace.
Like, so, whatever, mate,
I told him where to go,
trying to tell me English,
while I'm textin' my new hoe.'
The pen is not mightier,
it is tarnished and obtuse,
a vision of a different age,
wrought blind from its misuse.
Its sapling song of innocence,
split south across the grain
and cast across the classroom,
yanked up and lobbed again.
'Do you get me, Blood?
He was pointing at a seat,
expectin' ME to sit there,
as if it were a treat.
I told him where to stick it
and called him out a clown,
I **** this one-way death pit
as I'm walkin' round and round.'
The pen should still be mighty
and not a strangled stream,
that's crawling up an incline,
like an M. C. Escher dream.
Its muddy banks lie dormant,
both acorn and an oak.
'Cut that **** you KEENO,
let's **** off for a smoke.'
Jul 13, 2015
Jul 13, 2015 at 4:47 PM UTC
I woke up feeling morning pain
Another barroom brawl
I didn't make my bed last night
I slept out in the hall
I made it to the correct floor
I just couldn't find my keys
I can't keep living life like this
Can someone help me please?
I'm sick of empty promises
Every bottle seems to be
An enigma in a riddle
And they all keep calling me
I'm sick of empty promises
And of bottles holding dreams
My life's an Escher painting,
So, it seems
Different bars, the same result
I always wake up ******
Sunday Morning Sunshine hurts
and I'm always here alone
I am tired of the drinking
Of the searching, of the fight
But, I end up every morning
Still feeling like last night
I'm sick of empty promises
Every bottle seems to be
An enigma in a riddle
And they all keep calling me
I'm sick of empty promises
And of bottles holding dreams
My life's an Escher painting,
So, it seems
I wake up in dark back alleys
And if I make it home at all
I end up in the stairway
Sleeping, curled up in a ball
I'm not looking for redemption
Just a way to stop the sounds
Of the bottled empty promises
Before I'm in the ground
I'm sick of empty promises
Every bottle seems to be
An enigma in a riddle
And they all keep calling me
I'm sick of empty promises
And of bottles holding dreams
My life's an Escher painting,
So, it seems
Aug 29, 2015
Aug 29, 2015 at 4:02 PM UTC
What if Escher had it right
and "within" is really "without,"
and stairs turn inside out
and "up" is just the same as "down?"
Imagine if you will
a "topsy-turvy" sort of place
(or is that "turvy-topsy")
where time marches retrograde
and all effects precede their causes.
I know, I know, your life is busy
but can't you drop it all for half a day
and step out with me
(with Escher at our side)?
We'll cross the edge of time and space
where an alternate universe or two
is just a dream away.
Hurry up now (or then), let's go!
We have to get back
before the sun ascends in the west!
Aug 3, 2013
Aug 3, 2013 at 5:20 AM UTC
among the Judeo-Christian writings known as
The Bible only the books of Esther & the Song
of Solomon do not mention God at all; rather,
these narratives give us a beauty contest set
in Persia on one hand & food **** on the other;
-
the two shortest Books of the Old Testament;
_
arranged like B-picture double-features:
Esther coming before the Book of Job;
the world's biggest loser's epic tale of loss
& redemption; [ ]
|
hilarious satire - - featuring Satan;
&
Song of Solomon preparing
one for the war adventures
of the visionary poet Isaiah
.
X-Christianity, as such, - or not,
isn't as complex as MC Escher;
or HR Giger, or L. Frank Baum
Jul 19, 2018
Jul 19, 2018 at 1:14 AM UTC
It is a silver snail between the lips,
cold as a quarter bitter as a penny,
Not even the aftertaste of chlorine.
Patchy F# smoker’s exhalations
Grit the teeth and the ball of cork
lolls in its belly.
Look down your nose
it looks back at you,
Blurred.
Look back at you.
On sticky tile bare toes clenched,
and chin lowered to chest, pool-parched lips
Took the Acme Thunderer and—
Blew.
echoes whipped from ceiling to surface to
bare-slick backs of streamlined swimmers.
Spines curved into fins—
Lungs collpasing slow as a circus tent
Even the bubbles tittered with reverberation
Faster.
Not a splash as pointed feet flicked at the ankle
Casting expanding triangles of wakes
And lips kiss-close to the plastic lane line
Breathed.
And finger-tips yearned for that two hand touch.
And now—
Blow.
Only shivers of sound.
Just spit it out.
That unmusical clang as it hits the desk.
Exposing distresses of is and was
escher-impossible to tell which is which.
Waiting for that hollow echo
of high ceilings and deep water.
Sep 29, 2012
Sep 29, 2012 at 8:57 PM UTC
Whilst I was dreaming, streaming up and down my arms
The confining, winding vine
I became another stone in the great wall
Which lines this labyrinthine
One door leading to another, my steps echo upon the stair
If I don’t believe it, I can’t perceive it
That’s the advice you always gave me
But I was too stubborn to ever receive it
There was some confusion over the illusion
And now the fusion has occurred
Don’t bother trying to dig me out of the hole I’ve made
I’d rather my screams never be heard
A silent midnight hides my vengeance
In the comfortable depths of my abyss
Please tell me you don’t understand
So I can explain the meaning of all of this
Rapid eye movement, shutting me down
Fathoming the phantoms eating my soul
Don’t come any closer, or you’ll be a monster like me
An empty shell, delusion filling the hole
Your chimerical notions of bravery sustain me
Starlight keeping time with my every heart beat
You are the only dream, the only perfection
All else in my eyes has become obsolete
The vines entwine our hands
The maze once endless is now clear
Why do you save me every time, even if I don’t want saving
Why do you destroy all that I fear
Eye lids pried open and even in reality it’s always you
The darkness calling me, and I remain thinking
I wish to be among the stone, wrapped in vine alone
Tricked by the eyes, in the abyss I am sinking…sinking..
Whilst I was dreaming, streaming up and down my arms
The needing, bleeding vine
I became another victim of love
I became yours and you became mine.
Mar 14, 2010
Mar 14, 2010 at 2:31 PM UTC
Its twisting
Spinning like a
Waterfall gracefully
Pouring itself in
Its open lips
A selfless gift
Never leaving
Me to you
Fading forever
Whole pieces
Tender cradling
Always moments
Of sublime
May 17, 2018
May 17, 2018 at 4:16 AM UTC
I watch the loping invalids in the courtyard
nil by nil by nil feet
How to describe a sensation such as heat
to them? The interminable sun and so on
I wonder if they understand that
Light itself is not heat
whereupon the bell sounds
their minds divide and fog in the somnolent air
I look at a Dupuytren in the room
Cord around the chair
His clothes hanging off him
Trying to move his remarkable shock of hair
From his eyes
My room looks out beyond the yard
It is high up - precarious
Through that picturewindow, the world without
is framed, beyond the walls the oldtown
spires and roofing
I see my own sadness, my impotence
In every inch of the heights
the girls come back, propping black bikes against
the gate;
my legs are wrapped in a blanket
and I feel nothing below my waist
Through a system of cables and consent
my companion molls in Bergonic poise
each day the room behind his eyes receded, the heart
lessening
the birds gathered around the bathroom doors to be fed
He read about Escher in bed
waiting to be plugged
unbeknownst rigours of treatment, and
unbeknownst methods
until he forgot those days in Margate
the sound of his nieces
and everything he read about Escher –
the light makes dull
the precision of the thorn
Aug 6, 2013
Aug 6, 2013 at 12:46 PM UTC
Breaking waves, folding in river bends (meandering)
with an effortless grace
Cupids mouth, foaming to return -
broken and filling up the landscape.
Cracked horseshoes
waltzing across a vibrating brain,
all the worlds night
quartz, cutting drunk into
your Green city.
Banishing a sense of self
uprooting positivity, displacing our discontempt -
boil out the water from the soup of human condition.
Boredoms grace.
We're rotting, lizards tongues
wearing the past, skin deep
Imbued.
a morbid relocation of entrance
authority, a fee
Reflecting light off your face
always leading back,
back towards a tabletop nausea.
Caked in powder,
i make my way over -
licking my finger and rubbing away
at the cracks formed years ago
wandering in and out of Escher's wet dream,
hoping to settle mind and body
numbed and lethargic,
medicine doesn't help.
An open patio door,
grooming in the whisped brown dawn -
7.34am
God's rags, crisp
displacing particles against the mountain lip
red light brewing in the observers mind.
Cubes of water
pushing through into tomorrows wake
all unwrapping like 1,000 words
diluted into one second.
I'm tired
appetite gone
graven, knowledge of the inside of my mouth
encyclopedic and (almost) boring.
It's closed again
at the crux of abandon,
the skies youthful,
built from wood, holding up the trees.
Excess - child's play for Atlas.
Rogue, electric Blue.
Mollusc in hand
living, lipless
just outside the geopolitical borders
heading back towards maturity.
Nihil,
projects objectivity, sycamore due, borders
as happiness combed our soft necks.
A situation is only what you make of it,
we're all in on this
living together in leaves -
by roadsides
making homes where we sleep.
The sky is on fire
exploding into fruition
as hot chlorine licks against unwashed belly buttons and hair
going blind and stripping back
it breaks you.
Mar 16, 2015
Mar 16, 2015 at 6:27 PM UTC
a search outside
often finds darkness
in our other..
we hope for
penetrating warmth
our furnished light..
We ask
how our light
renews its flame..
enter Escher with
his tiled lizards..
we see the fitting
without any gaps
scaled symmetry
and no overlaps..
this oneness display
feeds inner light..
our new inside
and out...
Jan 27, 2013
Jan 27, 2013 at 9:41 PM UTC
Tempting wishes piling under
a steaming white bath towel
hot wet pure
smothering a body
that's stretched into
an Escher tessellation
melting the ground you walk upon
to wax
and you sink
into deep breaths
demons dissolved
in the exhalation
Sep 1, 2013
Sep 1, 2013 at 2:57 AM UTC
8:55 A.M.
Wednesday,
December 3, 2014
Eyes dry, stagnant like a box fan
in a windowless room in summer.
Del Monte plastic blades—black
on the serrated side—dice rotting
pizza tomato trash air.
Stomach like a battery acid pond.
Flannel, Dockers, hair slicked
tight like road signs, tossing oyster
crackers to acid ducks. The sky's
on fire.
Clouds textured like *******
and never-ending like Escher.
Jet planes carry ***** comatose
patients into the sun to burn
out like a light bulb
a few flickers of life gone.
Hands dry, faulted like missing
bathroom tiles at Exxon-Mobil/
Sunoco/Shell beneath the metal
sink where crabgrass sprouts
from the cracks like
cheap caulk from Second-Hand Hardware.
Bent nails, rusted patching trowels,
ants in the quick-dry drywall mix.
I'll never reach Nirvana.
Dec 3, 2014
Dec 3, 2014 at 9:58 AM UTC
In darkest hours unsatisfied
in vacant breathless space
wandering paths of Escher's lizards
***I
long
for
you***
Known touch won't do No nothing now
no sweets no smoke no wine
I'm magnet drawn to what I've not
I think
I lack
I need
Shall I be the end I seek ?
Jan 24, 2013
Jan 24, 2013 at 9:45 PM UTC
I cannot put my finger on my dissatisfaction
I cannot slake my thirst
I cannot sate my hunger
I cannot itch this scratch
I cannot imbibe it better
I cannot forget it, worse
deaf--dumb--blind--limp--sad--stupid
I feel I am seeing in the second dimension
when I know the fourth is called for, now!
I cannot expunge this record, these memories, or the lack thereof
I cannot remember the effort, or, where things stopped or started
I cannot describe this inexplicability,
I cannot remember the introductions
criss-cross logical thinking
twanging words, tungsten,
copper, and sheets of steel
sautered, bolted, shorted
circuits crackle and spark
blue like the ocean water
burning the water in skin
and I find nothing on an endless loop around the
Möbius strip, no, nothing, neither starts nor ends
I'm stuck in some Escher stairwell, so frustrating
I feel like an imbecile that knows not of a named
thing that stands before me, if it were a snake, it
would bite me, what, ( ) it is so close?
boy, this stings,
this ***** to be
struck by something, and
I don't know
what
I cannot find relief from catharsis
no, that hasn't ever worked at all.
dizzying, myopic thing that keeps me awake
show yourself, show me how, or what, wants
this thing thing thing this thing of something.
I cannot find my ( ), no,
I cannot find anything at all.
Jun 3, 2013
Jun 3, 2013 at 2:12 PM UTC
Nightmares haunt my ever waking.
Never giving. Always taking.
Always giving without volition,
or is it a seer’s gift with condition?
Both contend. Neither understood.
Whether ‘tis those to bleed
or others bled?
It remains.
In consciousness I presume Logic’s domain,
But in dreams I occupy and Escher’s fantasy.
One way out is another door in.
Oh how this dream ceases an end!
Awakening is not an escape, but a taunting of the perishing day.
It remains.
Apr 20, 2013
Apr 20, 2013 at 2:40 AM UTC
I still wonder if it's me who was the dys-
in our dys.functional family.
I sit atop guilt
as though it were a fine bed.
And bed is where I stay, most days.
I am the same.
Could the future be the past--
since time's not linear?
Escher struck me
not because of his geometric impossibilities...
incredible symmetries...
but my wandering mind was drawn
to the pattern, repeating...
sinking together pieces in a puzzle...
you know the feeling.
I know it may not seem clear
but there is some stability
in fear.
You should always know what can or is killing you.
We can argue if fear is a choice,
and maybe the usage is wrong,
but death's voice isn't truly welcome
until you've seen it's face more than once.
And what do I know of facing death?
Nothing.
Standing at the razor's edge
and a stick-up and Eye-Mart Express are as close as I've come.
So,
it's fair to say
that fear, for me,
sometimes isn't a decided election.
It's a place.
The sleep-with-one-eye-open,
pray-for-omens,
waiting-for-that-other-shoe
place.
The optimist says,
"I will be prepared... A beast of battle."
The pessimist says,
"A meeting with the creator is best."
The realist says,
"Get over it."
When I watched that fly
on MTV
buzz about that ****** chic
Deftones video...
when I heard the stories
of money and glory...
and power...
and of the sour...
I knew I was done for...
It's so 'Romeo and Juliet'
except
no one will sing about my love affair
with the warring houses
of drugs
and self-worship.
Feb 8, 2015
Feb 8, 2015 at 6:27 PM UTC
How could you?
I hate you.
Please never leave me.
Aug 16, 2014
Aug 16, 2014 at 7:58 PM UTC
In dreams, I create infinity.
I walk down Escher’s infinite stairs
and trip – as a board breaks.
In dreams, I fall.
I fall and land in the sand.
In dreams, I build buildings
Eight miles high.
Each floor a mirror of different sights.
In dreams, I create life.
I satisfy that which is not satisfied.
They breathe, they live and die.
In dreams, I cancel reality,
I find my escape, and break the ladder down.
In dreams, I create infinity.
I manipulate time.
In dreams, I live forever.
Mar 8, 2011
Mar 8, 2011 at 3:51 PM UTC
He saw it in a dream
And drew out what he’d seen
To describe it as best as he could
But in order to translate
You must see what he sees
If you were standing right where he stood
Dec 11, 2022
Dec 11, 2022 at 10:26 AM UTC
Yes, I think I did it
Didn’t I do it
I mean, you saw me do it
Yes, you did
You saw me do
What I’ve never been able to do
Which was to say
Love you
Love me
It was nothing
Nothing at all
Nothing to do
Was it even true
I stare into space
Implacable clockface
Worn-out bookcase
All the knowing I stuffed
Shelved, just in case
Ornamental armament
Bounded & staged
Dialectical argument
I did nothing
Who did nothing
You did
No, I didn’t
Who are you talking to
Who’s asking
Don’t answer a question with a question
Don’t tell me what to do
Relax we’re only talking
Don’t patronize
Don’t criticize
Well that’s what I mean
Was I doing Nothing,
Or Something?
What did I do?
I mean
Was it Nothing
Or
Was it Something
Tell me
Was Nothing Something
or
Was Something the Nothing I did
or
Nothing the Something I did
I’m an Escher painting
One hand painting the other
Thing is
I don’t know
But that is the very thing I know
Talking to a friend today
She says
I got to go
My daughters calling me
Thing is
She doesn’t have a daughter
Or does she
Thing is
I know
She wanted to talk about her thing
And I wanted to talk about my thing
I know
How this looks to you
But here’s what you need to know
I’ve listened and listened and listened
I’ve been a listening machine
So shut the **** up
I’m not your therapist
This I’ll only do for my daughter
You mean our daughter.
Whatever
But, here’s the real thing
A think thing
You don’t have to say anything
But’ it’s better if you do
Because I need you to
But not like this
So maybe it’s better if you don’t
But, that’s not the real thing
Maybe It’s better if you do
Or don’t
Then Don’t
Then Do
Don’t
Do
Don’t
Do
Then Don’t
Then Do
Please Do
I think I’m thru with you!
But wait
I have to think this through
Where have I heard that before
Not from me.
Feb 16, 2019
Feb 16, 2019 at 9:48 AM UTC