"etchings" poems
It took me seven years
to realise
the words in my mind
were too deep for
my mouth to dig up
I thought it was easier
to open my skin
and let the truth
pour down my arms
It took me seven years
to realise
nobody should be allowed
to touch parts
of your home
or hold pieces
of your heart
that you don't yet understand
It took me seven years
to realise
I will wear these scars
forever
I'll carry them
through every smile
every kiss
every concerned gaze
I'll carry them
to my grave
It took me seven years
to realise
the pain carved
into the walls
of my castle
etchings of
attempting to disappear
are not a story of weakness
but a tale of
how I survived
Feb 21, 2018
Feb 21, 2018 at 4:44 PM UTC
We’re looking into each other’s eyes;
it’s 4am.
We’re sat in a hospital room, I’m reciting your favourite verse.
You’re ragged and stitched together;
I just wish it was from being loved.
I just wish my love could make you Real.
I knew from day one, no one and no thing,
not even love, could take you away and finally
set your soul free.
So
I gave you all of me.
It wasn’t hard to give away.
Within moments of witnessing your smile; the one
held in your eyes widening your stare,
you crushed through my ribs with warmth and love,
held my heart in your hand, promising no matter
the distance and land between us, my heart would remain
safe – beneath your bruised chest.
Tonight, I’m alone.
It’s been 17 days since I last saw you.
I’m in the park where we always walked,
where our love was made tangible by etchings in wood.
The bark now crumbles
and the decay mirrors the gradual corrosion
of what was once, and will
never be, again.
© Sia Jane
Mar 22, 2016
Mar 22, 2016 at 2:36 PM UTC
360
Death sets a Thing significant
The Eye had hurried by
Except a perished Creature
Entreat us tenderly
To ponder little Workmanships
In Crayon, or in Wool,
With “This was last Her fingers did”—
Industrious until—
The Thimble weighed too heavy—
The stitches stopped—by themselves—
And then ’twas put among the Dust
Upon the Closet shelves—
A Book I have—a friend gave—
Whose Pencil—here and there—
Had notched the place that pleased Him—
At Rest—His fingers are—
Now—when I read—I read not—
For interrupting Tears—
Obliterate the Etchings
Too Costly for Repairs.
5.3k
I've called this ghost town home for far too long.
Spent my nights drinking with the dead.
Each sip cementing their existence in my head.
Listlessly taking shot after shot.
Whiskey,
the water of life,
commemorates the spirit of the deceased.
One
for those who passed away in peace.
Two
for those taken prematurely.
Toast number three shall be a farewell to me
but I am not ready to no longer
be.
You see,
if I were to dream eternally
and sink deeper down the fiery well,
those infamous nine levels of hell,
I would forge fresh footprints through the ash covered ground.
Walking with boots of compressed gunpowder,
the trail I leave behind is always primed to catch up with me and
spark the time bomb I walk with.
The seconds
tick
tick
tick
away.
The clock is always heading toward zero.
I tried to be a hero for many,
yet couldn't save myself.
My desires put upon a shelf.
A self inflicted penance handed down from the only one
I was foolish enough to call
god.
I am too far gone to be saved.
Grave stones mark the decay of my hopes and dreams.
The etchings on each marble tablet will eventually fade away.
The soil I am to be buried in must be overturned if anything is
to grow where I could not.
Mother nature always finds a way to nurture even the worst of her children.
Like any good matriarch, she refuses to accept anything less than her child's full potential.
Even in death.
Though I refused nourishment and love,
mother earth still holds me close.
Embraces me in a final attempt to squeeze the last drops of good which
were buried deep and thought to be dried long ago.
Ignoring her guidance, I've lived as if I would never end up six feet.
Deep were my thoughts,
dangerous my actions.
Though I lived as if I couldn't be defeated,
my first true test comes as I fight for control of my soul.
Angels and devils are now my judges,
each making their case for my demise.
The scales of destiny weigh my past actions.
The outcome holding my future.
So I'll fill my glass one final time,
and toast to those who left before me.
I'm coming home.
Mar 21, 2014
Mar 21, 2014 at 10:01 PM UTC
I etched patterns into a tree with a pocket knife that had a red plastic handle
Indentions such as these never stay
Yet eternally we press against the world
Hoping to make a mark that will shine in the daylight and glow in the dark
~
*I'm a shriveled slice of the Americana pie
With my soul on a swivel and the devil in my eyes*
Life was a son of a b!tch with fists that spat dirt when it spoke
And it ONLY screamed.
~
I'm somewhere between David Duchovny and Stephen King
And I'm trying to rip up manuscripts that I didn't write and I don't know who did.
Goodnight America. My patterns will explain my existence more than I ever could.
Nov 28, 2017
Nov 28, 2017 at 9:29 PM UTC
Waking up to hazy mornings.
To the bitter cold days of
Early Spring.
I've never seen such a beautiful sunrise.
Nine o' clock cigarettes during
The morning rush.
Saturday morning cigarettes
That muddle my head.
The chilly air mimics the smoke
Spewing from my lips,
Toxins sticking to my lungs
Like glue.
It's another day in Paradise.
The dishes in the sink
Pile up in mountains.
Like the skyscraper laundry stack
Overflowing in the hamper.
Just another day in Paradise.
The street lamps glisten as strings of pearls
Their light reflecting off the silver glare of traffic barrels.
The flowers have not arrived.
The flowers have not bloomed,
And the anxiety is killing me.
Killing me like the coffee craving
Pounding in my head.
The flowers are missing,
Hiding from the stinging cold
Of early Spring.
I've never seen such beautifully dismal skies.
In the mild conversations about the weather,
I tell them that it's never been better.
In a way, it's never been.
I walk down the battleground of sidewalk
And tree roots, the slabs of concrete
cracked and marred by Mother Nature's
Will.
Broken etchings of hopscotch
Blur on the gritty surface, besides
The rose bush peeking out through the
Fence.
They'll never fix these.
Because it's another day in Paradise.
Feb 21, 2015
Feb 21, 2015 at 10:10 PM UTC
I feel the breeze brush my skin.
I feel nostalgia begin.
And I just want to sit awhile
And let it all sink in.
Sit here with me
Under the shade of this oak tree,
Whose branches we would climb
When we were younger,
Long before we lost the hunger
To go beyond the world we knew.
So what do you say
We pass away the afternoon
Just staring up at the sky?
Finding pictures in the clouds
As they go passing by.
We can talk of days long gone,
The things we've done,
The roads we're on
And people we use to know.
Discuss all the little things:
Family, friends and enemies,
And see where the stories go.
We can let the day fade
As we sit within the shade.
I can feel the night time cold.
On my memories it pulls.
And the familiarity
Has got me feeling old.
Lean against the bark with me,
Where we once carved our names for all to see.
Etchings that have long since faded
Through the battering storms.
The same clashes and bashes and lighting flashes
That left us all weathered and worn.
We can name the constellations
That our memories still retain,
And make up our own
For all the stars that still remain.
Let's discuss the existential questions:
The meaning of it all.
Embrace the cluelessness in
The conclusions that we draw.
And when there's nothing more to say,
No more answers to be reached,
We can pass away the darkness
In the silence finally breached.
Aug 5, 2015
Aug 5, 2015 at 6:27 PM UTC
*I tread softly upon your legacy
angel of mine with broken wings,
traces left behind in soft whispers
the best of times gone awry,
when you whirl through my head
soaring on kaleidoscopic tranquility
wrapped in lavender zephyr sighs
dancing on clouds of ethereal hope
carefree and peaceful without worry
floating above lapis forbidden skies
like a effulgent butterfly haunting me
in the darkly mindless hours of night
when the haze clears my conscious etchings
you flutter amidst my words
exhaling ephemeral moments of poetry
swirls of splendiferous opulence
dreams beyond my comprehension,
I escape to heavenly dimensions
'drips of moonlight washing over me'
lingering in this stately haven of intention*
Mar 10, 2014
Mar 10, 2014 at 1:02 PM UTC
Trees hold the deep earth together way below with crooked fingers of the underworld and catches foul above
Upward to the heavens on finger towers,
clapping on winds they shake their dander
And the makers of green bras on mountain tops
They are the landlords of ground,and air beasts, and
incumbent giants of the ages
They whisper being puppeteered by winds of old
They are the alchemists of oxygen
They are dangling playgrounds
They are the Autumn crunches beneath our feet
Trunk etchings by bards, trees reflecting
cultures' dissemination
We walk under penumbras that deny the scorch of summer
as cool water douses fire, so too, shade douses heat
Watching trees in my pleasant reverie I observe how they
help break the carpeted land, bringing about a certain diversity in moving tranquility and rustling of their songs
Oct 1, 2014
Oct 1, 2014 at 7:20 AM UTC
The coffee cups are *****
But it’s the cleanest way
To drink whiskey here.
The barman lost half his right fingers
To a wood chipper in his early 20’s
And spent the rest of his adult life
Flipping the world off.
He got it down to a fine art
By the time I showed up.
He didn’t smile when I ordered my drink.
He didn’t smile at all.
The jukebox hasn’t changed
For two stagnant decades
And most everyone but the regulars
Are too scared to use it.
It’s the same rotation
Of Elvis,
Muddy Waters,
BB King,
John Coltrane,
And early Bruce Springsteen.
Not a woman in sight
But every song is about them
And we are all here
Because of them.
Certain patches of carpet
Have not seen a crack of light
Since the Berlin Wall fell.
Nothing changes here but the customers-
And that change is incremental at best.
The same filthy etchings over
The same filthy cubicle doors.
The same Cherokee Indian
Smoking a Cuban Cigar
In the heartland of America.
I can’t find myself here
But there is no feeling of loss.
There is no profundity in anything here.
Just squalor
And enjoying one’s squalor.
I think that is what it means
To be truly happy.
Aug 17, 2018
Aug 17, 2018 at 5:24 AM UTC
They burst upwards
All around this evening
There and there and there
Trees, Trees, Trees
Smashing through soil
To a darkening sky
Limbs and fingers and hands
Trunk and twig
Coiling coronaries
Pressed to the sky’s last
Etchings
Monoliths
Earths loud art
Not solemn
Not peace filled
This evening
Trees , Trees, Trees
Explode from the earth
Like Kraken from the ocean
Belittling
Reminding us
Trees Trees Trees
Four hundred million years
Before you breathed
Trees Trees Trees
Apr 12, 2021
Apr 12, 2021 at 5:23 PM UTC
RIPPLES
Ripples of you touch make me wonder
Ripples of your essence trespass my slumber
Ripples of your words now echo in my mind
Ripples of your past now invade present time
Ripples of joy wrinkles of memories
Ripples of dread of what could no more be
Ripples of feelings I try to submerge
Ripples of nostalgia set free in me to surge
Ripples of broken pieces of love deep within
Ripples of tears and passion deeper than skin
Ripples of hurt pride envy and shame
Ripples of etchings deep inside of your name
Ripples of trust broken and kept
Ripples of promises which forever slept
Ripples of what has been or may be
Ripples of life please set me free
Aug 5, 2019
Aug 5, 2019 at 6:47 PM UTC
On my pillow in broken English
And black ink.
A Fitzgerald quote dances in the breeze of the half-cracked window.
The clothes outside dangle
Hot and crisp from the City’s sun.
This city has its own sun
That beats down hard
Against the pavement.
Hearts beating hard
against the pavement
Of our souls and ribs.
If Fitzgerald was right
Then“they slipped briskly
into an intimacy
from which they never
recovered.”
Slipped and
fell.
Scars stain our hearts
And knees burn
Like the sun beats down
On the pavement
Of our memories.
But then again,
Perhaps it was Keats that had it right-
BOLD lover-
“Heard melodies are sweet
But those unheard are sweeter.”
Like you in my sweater.
Ode in a Spanish email
Plays on repeat,
Trapped in my head.
It’s that song that keeps be writing
About you
In this little book
Trapped in this little book
Like the etchings Keats admired
Trapped in the moment before
Their first kiss.
Forever trapped,
Lingering in their longing.
I’ll lick the wounds
Of paper cuts
From quickly turned pages
The sour blood of this longing
Tormented by time
“Heard melodies are sweet
But those unheard are sweeter”
Like a nagging child
Taunting-
Thumbs in ears,
Tongue out.
I wish my skin was sewn together
With the threads of that sweater
So you could wear me
Again
and
again.
Sep 1, 2020
Sep 1, 2020 at 10:13 AM UTC
Little sapling growing between a rock and a hard place.
Weathering what life is surrounding you. No friends of yet
but you are only a sapling give it time. Moments passing
watching scenery elope to shifting seasons beauties.
Sea air invigorating as rain trickled from above dancing on
your now maturing leaves, tickling as each one weaved its
way down, like teardrops they descended on there journey
of life carrying on.
The Cliffside sighs, and teardrops of rocks descend,
woeful of those this motion that swept away, beauty
that clung silently there. The sapling is of branches
and leaves giving needed shelter to tired wings.
Seasons whisper by as the sun and moon dance above
her gaze. Roots delicately weave deeply into the Cliffside
keeping here steady, for if it were to sigh again her fate
steadfast in this place between a rock and a hard place.
Her leaves happened upon a blossom, so delicate in
its serenade of colour against the harsh rock face.
Like a parent when winds were bleak shielding its
frailty with branch and leaves, it only lost a petal this time.
She flowered in the seasons, blossom invigorated the
surroundings of what was bleak, like teardrops of love
for a time they painted vivid etchings on the Cliffside
till they faded nourishing those of lesser stature.
As she yawned on the morning rising above the
horizon, she felt motions upon her leaves.
Never in her time had she felt such gentle touches,
as palms glided over her foliage.
Feeling the breeze from up high, the cliffs edge she
had flourished in growth, now little eyes saw her
in full blossom as the seasons had changed.
Laughter ensued when gusts eloped with blossom.
Pink and light shades of magenta danced between
children, a fence keeping wondering thoughts safe
from the fallen dreams at the bottom of the Cliffside.
Leaves caressed the winds and she was content.
Apr 21, 2017
Apr 21, 2017 at 8:06 AM UTC
I will sit here in my apartment on my bedroom floor
Writing and pondering many a thing, eyes darting from page to door
And as the pencil sings its scribble, a thought will come to me
That the only reason I am with you is to not feel lonely
I've written a million times about this thing we call "love"
Joking about how you and I are a pair of complimenting gloves
The fact that we bring the best out of each other no matter what it comes to
But my mind and heart scream in unison that I'm not in love with you
I stop my pencil for a second to see what I've written
Feeling as if my heart's in my throat and rubbing my neck as if bitten
Not knowing how to digest that you are simply just a pawn
Sighing in what seems disbelief, but still I write on
Wanting to feel the feelings that you often share with me
While dumbly nodding and playing the part so that you will not leave
Furrowing my brow and wishing the epiphany would cease
Yet knowing even if it's buried in lies, the truth has found a crease
Here I sit with a heart in one hand and a pencil in the other
Knowing the truth is evident in the soul, cover to cover
And I will apologize a million times before this day is through
When the tears well up when I say I'm not in love with you
Oct 4, 2012
Oct 4, 2012 at 3:51 PM UTC
The careful moon maunders through the glass ceiling
on these long nights
when I try to alchemize my visions into ships.
I imagine the mist moping among the larches—
the dewy bark that wakes,
looking for shadows of loggers in the grey.
On cold nights like this I sleep beneath a sheet, sweating,
dreaming of China’s violet sky exploding with hues
of a butterfly’s paper wings.
The summer air crackles above the pale girl’s tent—
a counterfeit ankh hangs between
her naked, sagging *******
and she sees the future in the reflection of her eye
on an Opinel’s blade—her iris wheezing into shapes.
She tells me there are gales ahead
like ones in schoolbook etchings of Poseidon.
Boys will choke on salt, she says,
or the ice will kiss the little princes to sleep.
But she coos how they look like dancers at a ball.
How many boys will be lost? I ask the girl.
All of them, she says with ***** on her breath,
but this won’t stop you, will it?
In my favorite dream yolk sizzles on a cast iron as mother sings.
My older sister laughs, cheeks full of sourdough and jam,
and father’s wet hair drips onto his paper—
the ink of little letters smearing into bare branches.
The dream helps me forget that rain never ends where I wake,
where guilt’s proboscis feeds on hardened veins.
To whomever’s my son, please don’t put me in an elegy
where the memory of me will rot like wet wood.
Jul 20, 2013
Jul 20, 2013 at 9:25 PM UTC
-
sometimes i wonder if i Learn anything -
sitting in the back of class with etchings n Sketchbooks,
looking through dimensions of a delicate World,
burning through the canvas with mechanical Pencils,,
.
Oct 8, 2014
Oct 8, 2014 at 9:47 PM UTC
People seemingly vanish all the time
But where are they if you're in the same place?
And here I sit still writing within mine
Amidst the candles glow I see your face
There is no curse that cannot be broken
Your aftermath leaves etchings on my heart
That equates to what our love has spoken
The emptiness that feels tears me apart
But here I remain, still, right where I sit
Along on my hands I count the great stars
As the path I must now take back is lit
Back, once more, I go to where this all starts
What has been sleeps peacefully in the past
Tenderly taken by a love at last
Nov 25, 2018
Nov 25, 2018 at 6:55 PM UTC
A storm blew through early, left frost
etched, lit, glistening, on
a window's waking surface.
I sit framed by that translucence,
my daughter aligns, orders
mirroring matroyshka doll members.
I reflect on an essay*, how
poems are a symbol of will,
concluding a pact, perhaps
achieved in diction, image metaphor,
adherence to structure, rhyme, form.
Might these devolve to decoration? Or,
trace the transmission of "will to
commitments," expressing “intent”,
"weakly lost or strongly spent?”
Frost etchings fissure, shift, glint, slide
on their emergent effluence,
configure in gusts of cognition.
I sense a covenant in these lines.
my daughter adjusts her doll's placements,
the promise of one revealed in the other.
Copyright © 2004 Gary Brocks
——————————————
Attribution:
Stanzas 3, 4, and 5 are greatly influenced by my reading the Robert Frost essay titled *THE CONSTANT SYMBOL.
The short phrases in italicized quotes are direct quotes from that essay.
Aug 28, 2018
Aug 28, 2018 at 11:18 PM UTC
etchings into wax
dripping time away
illuminating our surroundings
to an ever greater horizon
the sands of time
slowly ticking
like precious moments
and relaxed breaths
will soon die out
flickering, flickering flame
burning and exhausting
we need to be able
to see our limitations
our flaws
to be able to
get past them
we must not
beat them into
submission
nor ignore
and deny that
they are us
as we are them
they do not speak our language
so how can we expect them
to react
to react as desired
to play the shadows
on the wall
slowly melting
slowly burning away
as we sit
here contemplating
this existence
we call life
Sep 14, 2012
Sep 14, 2012 at 4:02 PM UTC
If I could still hold you,
In the palm of my trembling hand,
In the depths of my fragile heart,
In the whispers of my restless soul.
If I could still hold you,
In the shadows of sleepless nights,
In the echoes of forgotten dreams,
In the longing that seeps through my veins.
If I could still hold you,
In the silence of empty spaces,
In the void that your absence created,
In the ache that lingers, refusing to fade.
If I could still hold you,
In the fragments of memories,
In the pages of a love story,
In the etchings of a bittersweet past.
If I could still hold you,
In the tears that flow like rivers,
In the laughter that dances on my lips,
In the moments we shared, forever cherished.
If I could still hold you,
In the depths of my imagination,
In the realms of a parallel universe,
In the hope that defies all reason.
If I could still hold you,
In the symphony of our intertwined souls,
In the symphony that plays on, undeterred,
In the symphony that refuses to end.
Then perhaps, just perhaps,
Even in the absence of physical touch,
Even in the void that separates our beings,
Even in the vastness of this universe,
I could still hold you,
In the tenderness of my love,
In the strength of my devotion,
In the essence of who we once were.
For love knows no boundaries,
No limitations, no constraints,
It transcends time and space,
And etches itself onto eternity's canvas.
So if I could still hold you,
In the depth of my being,
In the essence of my existence,
Then know, my love, that you are forever mine.
Oct 15, 2023
Oct 15, 2023 at 8:47 AM UTC
There’s a box
in my closet
under stacks of faded clothes,
where I hid
the olden treasures
of the age-begotten woes.
In the box
in my closet
lay a browning, ****** knife
made of etchings,
made of jewelry,
made of scenic, deadly life.
On the box
in my closet
wraps a film of grime and dust,
only printed
with the salt
of the liquids love did lust.
With the box
in my closet
I could disappear the day
with the lyrics
of my tongue
that my lips could never say.
In the box
in my closet
there’s a life I never knew
fifty one
unsent letters,
and they’re all addressed to you.
But the box
in my closet
embodies pitied past,
so one new letter
will I send,
for it shall be my last.
Feb 9, 2013
Feb 9, 2013 at 7:08 PM UTC
An image representing me
Would be a fading silhouette
Under darkening cobalt blue skies
Fragrant blossomings falling
From magnolia trees
Running...........
Leaving etchings of footsteps
On the terrain
Vermilion hues illuminating
As I go.
Feb 7, 2014
Feb 7, 2014 at 3:49 PM UTC
Bucolic etchings stimulate
The soul
An assemblage of vegetation
Boils blood
Beauty is discovered in a desultory penumbra
God's message
A subtle stroll in a sylvan birthing
A chapel
To the Romantics with love
Nature rejoices
Apr 29, 2013
Apr 29, 2013 at 2:34 PM UTC
here we spin the synchronic dance of the fluids
that dribble down in aesthetic perfection;
free-flowing from the gullet of creation
into the palms of the frenzied flock.
the grim etchings left by her in the signet
reflect the proper terms for glossolalia,
but the honeyed tones are lost to primitive organs
and a piteous gurgle is all that emerges.
here we were, eaters of shale, chewers of dirt,
warmed beneath the blanket of her shadow,
paled by the protection of her casting murk
that hid us from the vile stars.
pollen, pollen, pollen, pollen,
showering, soaking, deep down in the gut.
Bezoar of my bezoar, heart within my sleeve,
I am waiting for my emotions to return to me.
Apr 30, 2016
Apr 30, 2016 at 3:32 PM UTC