"expo" poems
The teacher wrote a question on the board
large enough to see but,
still hard to follow,
in black expo:
If each color had a taste, what would sad taste like?
And the girl with crosses up and down her arm
mentioned once,
'blue tasted like flat soda pop,
cold and a bit too sweet'
The boy with the hair running smoothly over his eyes
pronounced sixty four ways to say 'azure'
and each time,
he tasted the iron of the
hammer that his father had split his collarbones apart
and I cried for each story,
because the color 'blue' always
tasted like brandy, heartbreak and broken nails
Mar 22, 2013
Mar 22, 2013 at 1:15 AM UTC
Is it my counter-counterclockwise
mind wasting time? Elbows
on the dining table pulling my angel
hair into grid-like times tables.
I’m invested in this non-conversation
table. Ich liebe dich, mein Freund.
I’ve got commitment issues and four-ply
tissues for when my eye lashes start
peeling apart. My grandpa died in 2005
and I’m all but over it. I’m holding
his kite string, but the reel is almost done,
like VHS tapes rewound then fast-forwarded
to the good times. Power Ranger birthday
and everyone’s wearing dunce caps
with elastic chin straps ‘til they snap.
Snap! Snap! Snap me back to three-years-old,
and I’m singing in a Robin costume
‘cause I knew I’d always be second best.
I had an identity crisis around fourteen,
so I stopped buying sunglasses
because I found myself in other
peoples’ shadows. But now the only shadows
they’re casting are the ones from their headstones
and from the fields of flowers cradling
them like they once cradled me.
Fast-forward, I’m genuflecting in gym shorts
before myself in a mirror smudged with plum
felt. And I seem small compared to my life
spelled out in Expo marker markings.
Oct 21, 2014
Oct 21, 2014 at 9:31 PM UTC
Keep-A-Breast
Apple
OtterBox
Acu-Rite
Dial Aquafresh
Oral-B
ACT Garnier Equate
Hanes
On the Byas
Rude
Toms
Dakine
Acu-Vue
Ponds Degree
Preferred Stock
Mighty Wallet
Hot Topic
Keurig Dixie
Donut Shop
Domino
International Delight
Peter Paul's
Best Yet Great Value
Instagram
Facebook
Snapchat Yik Yak
Forever 21
Adventure Time
FSC Bic The Poetry Foundation
Staedtler Pilot Sharpie Microsoft
The Norton Anthology
Toshiba Dell Expo
Lipton
Emerica
Anti Hero MOB Shorty's
Bones Thunder
Shake Junt
Swingline
Pandora
Tommy Hilfiger
' Jill Greg Ashley Courtney
Judy
Bob
Janice
Shannon Kelly
Robert Emily Jeremy Darrin Liza
Bill Joe Dominic Sean James
Gav Jordan Tony Eric
Christopher
Dec 6, 2014
Dec 6, 2014 at 8:38 PM UTC
Bleary-eyed, an old man asks for change,
coins rattling in his hand. A woman
hands him saltine crackers across the aisle.
“God bless you,” he mutters, takes a seat,
and unwraps the plastic with shaking hands.
He smiles at her before she leaves the train.
Tonight, the passengers on the train
are surprisingly quiet for a change.
We are all staring down at our hands.
And then the silence breaks - a woman
cackles aloud to herself in her seat.
Her laughter travels up and down the aisle.
I overhear a conversation across the aisle
between a couple who’ve just entered the train,
and are searching for a pair of empty seats.
They’re muttering “the country is changing”
and they say they are afraid. The woman
sighs, and reaches for her lover’s hand.
I look over at a child holding her mother’s hand.
I meet the little girl’s gaze from across the aisle.
I see myself as a child too, but to her I’m a woman.
I wonder how often the little girl rides the train.
Does she long to see something else for a change -
something other than the back of a seat?
I notice a lady who has started dancing in her seat,
snapping her fingers and waving her hands,
bobbing to a silent beat. I imagine her changing
into a sequined dress and waltzing down the aisle,
giving everyone a performance to watch on the train.
I imagine standing up and dancing with that woman
and then everyone begins to dance with the woman -
we all jump up onto our seats
and suddenly we are in a ballroom, not a train.
We are tapping our feet and clapping our hands
to the music - the little girl across the aisle
is dancing with the old man who asked for change.
The train stops. We’ve arrived at my station. The dancing woman leaves the train. The passengers change and now there are strangers in their seats. I wave my hand goodbye to the little girl as I walk past her down the aisle.
Mar 6, 2021
Mar 6, 2021 at 7:50 PM UTC
Saying hello, again
Because to say goodbye
I'd have to trust that I would not
Say hello again.
And my silence comes in colors
Like drip-dry paint on the walls of my mouth
Tastes like green and yellow today
Fresh flowers that arrived late
And the yard working all shades.
I hate to stop
Picking back up where I left off is easier said
Than remembered,
No matter how many scribbled expo marker notes are left
on the dry erase boards of my closed eyelids,
Hello,
Again.
Care to dance this dance with me?
Sep 20, 2015
Sep 20, 2015 at 7:26 PM UTC
I couldn't give a **** what heat engines are.
My job is to tell a couple little snot noses to sit their ***** down and drink juice - it's easy and I love it. I couldn't give a **** about heat engines.
(I mean, aren't all engines hot anyway?)
But when I watch you kneeling in front of a whiteboard, drawing out diagrams for your coworker about what you're learning in physics, my heart jumps out of my ******* throat and slaps my computer screen like a raw steak. Not exactly a romantic metaphor I know, but it's accurate.
I never thought Expo pens could be **** I never thought math could be **** for ***** sake. But you do it somehow.
Everything about you drives me nuts. Looking at you gives me the biggest feelings I've ever felt, and I get scared I'm going to explode. Really. People say stuff like that, but it's true - it feels like I'm going to explode like some sort of adorable grenade.
I don't know what to do with myself. Ever.
Go to church - yeah.
Get my degree - sure.
Go to work - totally.
But with myself? I have no ******* clue.
For one, I don't think I can come hang out with you at work anymore. You have a certain amount of professionalism to maintain, and I am a threat to that - in the most violently affectionate way possible. I am so close to tackling you in a bear hug and spooning you right here in this classroom. I never considered how painful it is to love somebody. In the best ways and the worst ways.
Now you're sitting in the armchair next to me, the ****** little coffee maker filling the air between us. You talk with your friends and draw and type into your calculator and occasionally glance at me and every time you do anything, I . . . I can't. I can't even explain how it feels. You are the antidote and the virus to every part of me. Loving you has been the most exhilarating and most miserable experience of my life. Loving you has taught me how agony can be sweet. Loving you has changed my life and will continue to change my life.
I've lost interest in almost everything. School is school, work is work, books have become boring and friends have become obsolete. You feel the same way, and your Mom thinks you're depressed, but you're not. Neither of us are. We're so ready. We're so ready for something new.
I have never stared at someone so shamelessly in all my life. I could listen to you talk about heat engines for the rest of my life.
That's the plan, anyway.
Feb 22, 2016
Feb 22, 2016 at 6:58 PM UTC
Three children brought
Onto earth
Three children did
He rear
Three children made
From His own genes
From stardust we appeared.
From the foundation
Of our lives
He sent us to school
Possessed of his intelligence
And HE was NOT a fool
Great aptitude for reading
This is how he taught
The books my father gave me
Produced much
Higher thought
We went to places
far & wide
Hawaii was like heaven!
We went to Montreal
For Expo '67
Various religions
We were to understand
We went to see the kivas
In the native lands
We went to search
For arrowheads
We looked for
various traces
Of native habitation
Appreciating other races
He tried to teach me math
Using the flashcards
But I was into writing
So he let me be a bard
He loved the
arts & sciences
He loved agriculture
He grew up
deprived of it
So he taught us culture
We took the piano
He helped me
make a start
Writing my own music
He encouraged my art!
I'll read him this poem
We will then discuss
How he has the
GREATEST legacy
*For my dad has US!*
Jun 17, 2017
Jun 17, 2017 at 3:31 PM UTC
one time
i was in the third grade
mrs. jernigan's class
i answered a question on the board
i dont remember the question but the answer was he'll
and i wrote it on the board w a smelly blue expo marker
and smiled so big when i walked back to my seat
trusting every person who told me i was smart
and everyone who said i was pretty
and then everyone
in mrs. jernigan's third grade class laughed
because instead of he'll,
the contraction that would grant me power and status
in mrs. jernigan's third grade class,
i had written
hell
and then the smelly little dude in front of me, keith,
turned around and said
"your ***** are too big
for your shirt"
Oct 4, 2015
Oct 4, 2015 at 10:45 PM UTC
Introspective
retrace our steps
take a chance
by what means
holy sum
going back
our design
choose the options
a designers jeans
a healthy reward
in the moment
the world over
cutting the cloth
wherefore
the selling concept
thinking out a loud
in a tube
opening expo 2020
it matters to me
eternal life
futuristic
interjection
prerequisite
whose WHO
another generation
a genetic double
100 perfect
facsimile & co
Introspective back going
steps retrace our design
take a chance choose the options
by what means a designers jeans
holy sum a healthy reward
in the moment thinking out a loud
the world over in a tube
cutting the cloth opening expo 2020
wherefore it matters to me
the selling concept, eternal life
futuristic another generation
interjection a genetic double
prerequisite 99.9% perfect
whose WHO, Facsimile & co.
May 18, 2020
May 18, 2020 at 7:50 PM UTC
What a linear experience
with a twisted friend ?
Safety in solitaire set alone.
blowing away false dandelions.
Oct 4, 2012
Oct 4, 2012 at 5:16 PM UTC
The mysterious answers eluded me.
Friends left on bikes,
Went to Expo,
Had backyard tents.
I stood, palms pressed, waiting.
Then Marlene and Jimmy died
And I knelt before the maze master,
Looking for an exit.
All, I am told, are answered,
But the lines of communication
Seem crossed.
Does he get the ways of man
As well as we get the ways of him?
I supposed your prayers were realized
When you left,
Yet the same rain and sun drenched us.
I should expect a summative explanation
When I get
My commuted response.
Aug 30, 2015
Aug 30, 2015 at 10:37 AM UTC
Early
Late?
time won't wait and that's a lie.
Time,
flies by, and yet goes slow,goes fast
Time,
the last of the greats waits patiently.
The line of time runs straight but
what
if it bent like light to turn the day back into night
what then?
would scientists get ****** off with the papers that they'd need to write?
Time and nuclear clocks make dreary reading.
Random seedings leading to the links they seek.while minutes poke and **** and leak into the atmosphere.
Time
so far,yet near enough to taste and wasted on the thoughts we think when in a blink, time ups and goes and how time slows the nearer we become to learning how and why things run the way they do.
Time,
and when it's through it starts or ends as in the blinking lights it bends,distorts and catches us quite unaware
and as we stare it waits and still is time,there is time still,time is still,one day I will begin to walk those lines of constant and of changing thought
but now
my fascination overrides of how time bides its time and bends itself into my rhyme
I have all the time I need and yet have none
before I know it
time has gone.
Aug 17, 2013
Aug 17, 2013 at 7:02 AM UTC
I write on the tops of wooden desks,
press the tip of my pen deep into the wood
and scribble out inane hearts and Lee '15 and
dumb poetry that curls over the edges of the desk
on uneven lines like a disaster waiting to happen.
I scrawl words and designs
on the crimped edges of a TAZO tea packet,
crumpled in my pocket,
and rip the paper apart slowly,
watching the lines of pencil split and diverge
and never meet again.
I ink my fingers with expo and sharpie,
let the tips shine oily black in the light
then quickly press them
onto crisp printer paper, peel my fingers
off and count the dips of my identity
in the grooves of white and black.
I smear the side of my hand with black,
wipe charcoal on my forehead
as I sweat in dimly lit studios,
hunched over my stool and eyeing the x-acto knife
from where it lies on top of a box of glue sticks.
Beside me is a cup of black TAZO tea,
that has steeped for over 4 hours and is already
cold.
When I leave, it is past midnight,
but the sky is not dark yet because
even with only the light of the stars,
I can see sharpie on the flesh of my thumb,
and charcoal dust fills the crescents of my nails
and someone has probably already
crossed out my name on that desk in room 216
that I sit at for English,
and in my pocket there are 2 more packets of tea
that I need to drink because
it has been four hours,
and my tea is already cold.
Feb 28, 2015
Feb 28, 2015 at 1:45 PM UTC
The dry eraser has a soft, light, grey fluff
with a brush black finish,
that's been tainted by the imprints of black ink,
and a black rectangular prism,
that also has the word "EXPO" bolded in large letter
in an organized yet artistic fashion
as if to say,
"I erase ink"
This particular eraser has...
Nov 1, 2019
Nov 1, 2019 at 10:27 PM UTC
Your tongue is tied,
cramped from its labor:
lip-service and laments,
twisting prophecy from parking tickets,
doom from unloaded dishwashers.
You monologue like a thundercloud,
over breakfast,
foretelling despair,
in the sogginess of cereal,
and how the day didn't start off
with just the right tone,
the sun glinting through the window
"wrong".
Every spilled cup is symbolic
every sigh a soliloquy.
You speak in psalms of pity
as if your calendar
were made for tragedies,
names written in expo,
scheduled to take turns
making you the victim.
Imagine the audacity
And when the world doesn't end,
exactly on time,
you sulk in darkened corners,
complaining about the shadows,
as if the loneliness your ego creates
isn't an apocalypse of a different kind.
The intent behind every word I utter
is spun into serpentine silk
in your ears,
so you paint me the snake,
accuse me of hissing,
when all I have done
is refused to speak Jabberwocky.
May 24, 2025
May 24, 2025 at 8:19 PM UTC
teacher erases
marker mistake
expo stains
still left behind
a tinge of red
under the blue
Sep 11, 2024
Sep 11, 2024 at 11:45 PM UTC
I went to the bride expo
I took my daughter to this fare
I went to the bride expo
I didn't really care
I went to the bride expo
It chilled my mind and raised my hair
I went to the bride expo
Thieves and crooks, were there
I went to the bride expo
I took my credit card
I went to the bride expo
For it, the vendors, hard
I went to the bride expo
I didn't want to stay
I went to the bride expo
And sold my soul that day
I went to the bride expo
forever now
I'll pay
Jun 22, 2017
Jun 22, 2017 at 11:56 AM UTC
I don’t have an actual **** of a clue who I am anymore, I’m in a constant bizarre. Thought expo-rational, friend reducing path to anything but me. All too confusing. Especially bruising, that self proscribed *** kicking I’m inflicting. I’m illicit for a hand to befriend in the upmost fuckedest place a guy can. It’s like I’m running outta sand. Trying to catch the last grain. In the jar that’s encapsulated my life from birth-till now
But I’m present for lack of luck and the clock ticks on in gravity’s kingdom of ****
Apr 29, 2018
Apr 29, 2018 at 7:19 PM UTC