"filtered" poems
there’s a barnacle scar
deeply ingrained
on the basalt stack
at mark thirty two
whispering summer winds
scented oil
cotton and roe
drift
as waves brush
and shape
the sandstone shore
the briny air
and lost erratic
set a tone to this
pollyanna portrait
it's andrews undulations
and gifted benches
its concessions
and traces of the barry burn
its sculpted driftwood
and sanko lines
make this picture
almost perfect
children play
as venom spews
from the caterwaul pair
those odd looking mates
casting smiles
with arrested despair
settling shots
swiping bugs
dipping and darting
as photo men
and muscles
and long neck seabirds
make their turn
the hunched hoody
and his sorted sidekick
get their fill
(of moss and rubble ~ chubby and kelp)
nice to meet your acquaintance
the pho man would say
an odd drop
and ironic turn
from those horrific corners
of timeless desperation
down by cannon bridge
harbor seals
and carriage horse
are fronted by
raven shade
jolly tides pause
in quiet bays
(with curious looters
and *** pickers)
sand merchants
and field totems
all streamed by the light
cirrus strands
blanket the
outer edge
hovering craft
and shimmering willows
bolt the evening frame
blood orange
and tethered
with a filtered glare
bottle-nose dolphins
and seabirds
(and shifting tides)
are all settling in
for the long night stay
Mar 9, 2017
Mar 9, 2017 at 11:21 PM UTC
I don't seek your permission...
To write about the what, why and how.
It could be a haiku or come in the shape of a cow.
I don't need your approval...
When I don't sound the least bit poetic...
In my mismatched metaphors or ill-rhymed acrostic.
I'm not asking for your blessing...
When I pen down and put up what I think...
Be it in cloying cliches or in tear drenched ink.
I don't crave for your understanding...
When my 10 word poems weren't filtered through your poetic lens,
Or if my contributions in collaborations lack in sense.
I don't hope for your likes...
If my content does not tickle your fancy,
Or if my words just rubs you silly.
I mean no disrespect...
But don't be too quick to click on the 'comment' button.
Private messaging has been put there for a reason.
I don't mean to cramp your style...
You're entitled to your own opinions of course...
But if you've got nothing good to say, please save it and shove it up yours.
Mar 4, 2015
Mar 4, 2015 at 10:43 AM UTC
With bamboo husks scattered,
My last bones shattered.
We mourn a loss of bliss,
Draped in fear learnt to dismiss,
I call for all to gather.
The stalks once in my heart,
Intertwined; and broke apart.
I never knew how weak I'd gotten,
As my glacial mind defrosted,
And from within; resilience departed.
My thoughts cannot grow,
Pierced by what I do not know.
I'm getting colder,
I am not a soldier,
I'm a victim to the blow.
As the last bit of me was hollowed out,
I spoke the words of hope through my mouth:
"I will learn to accept the pain,
Rather than soaking it in my veins,
I'll filter it to the ground."
--------------------------------------
Jul 26, 2018
Jul 26, 2018 at 5:53 PM UTC
Fun is fun when it runs along in its merry way
but when the sky turns liquid gray
all the fun goes away
cause through my eyes
my dull gray eyes
I see right through your foolish lies
I know that you do not know
and I do not let it show
be that as it may
with my eyes of gray
powers of plenty
I look within my realms
of mind and heart
you can't look into them
you can't look away
from my enchanting eyes of gray
driving driving driven on
to other lands and a further dawn
the deserts sandy storm has blown
and all the dust be dusted clean
and filtered through the cracks unseen
© Crystal Erickson 2007
Dec 30, 2014
Dec 30, 2014 at 9:06 PM UTC
I'm stuck in your web,
filtered out like a fire so red.
let me pass through
and I'll follow you
into the land you've led.
Feb 16, 2012
Feb 16, 2012 at 3:31 AM UTC
here's to a package of
Marlboro Reds
in the hands of
someone other than
the Marlboro Man
standing in
for those slack-jawed outlaws
my heroes now lack jaws
tongues
lungs
I swear it's been too long
since I inhaled manhood
The Great Darrell Winfield
rolled
packed
and filtered
into the only thing I know
that makes a man a man
the essence of
cowboy boots and farmer's tan
in every drag
see, I inhale my heroes
all the dusty red-necked
cowboys
Darrell Winfield
and my dad
men whose lives
went up in smoke
to coat my throat
in my own self-righteousness
I'm frightened this
is all that I'll have left
of him
lung cancer
and the lingering stench
of cigarettes
he always smelled
of cigarettes
he'd pull me into these
firm embraces
he held so long
that he'd suffocate me
in tacky business
and cigarette smoke
masked only
faintly
by a poor man's
cologne
still I breathed him in
until I'd start to choke
it was too much man to handle
my grandpa told me
“smoking doesn't send you
straight to Hell,
but it sure does make you smell
like you've already been there”
he was
a grown man
cursing
crying
lying
dying by himself
trying to drown out the inferno
with a case of beer
but sobriety finds you sometime
and I'd rather suffocate in cigarettes
than lose him altogether
and even if he smells like Hell
at least that means he made it back
May 21, 2012
May 21, 2012 at 6:14 PM UTC
Communication/ medium of the mind
Improper transfer; difficult time;
Gears and pistons fire steadily
Words are formed and jump out readily
Filtered or not; good or bad
A possible high, or impossible sad
An idea new, bright, and free
A rain cloud of dark, of which you can see
The freedom erupts! The face celebrates
The storm corrupts, the eyes retaliate
A perilous game played (by two) together
An exchange we somehow all get through
A skill we improve with each Endeavour
Sep 18, 2012
Sep 18, 2012 at 8:38 PM UTC
. @
@ @
@ @
@ @
@ @
@ @ @ @ @ @
america, americultus, americate, dubiously **********
::: our gold-flecked bodies.
blackbirdian danceparty, i'll go.
washed-up beach bottles and all our feet amongst them curling time.
teens dream in orchid; they wait for stars and dark and los hombres of good dust.
they wait on eyes, and on embers, on belly belly.
jellyfish flashlight shrine.
we eat acid and strawberries and butter in the cemetery,
and feed foxes lizards face first :::
us lost ghouls on school-nights.
flash tag jazz, and yellow bicycles.
::: that hot eternal light.
that candy colored smoke don't smoke; go south on her body.
then thoughts form thoughts form action, form twangs all tuned to air.
& we, as notes, we notes harp like light
to dust.
our glistering hormonal thrusts beneath sheath of liquid love. her eyes,
with those multi-speckled strands
infinitesimally drunk :::
seed from my ****
pearled halo: smoke above my head.
::: waves and machines and weekends. filtered by the long ****
of existence.
boys wait in rooms of hotels for more drugs, and the girls bringing them.
like caterpillars on silky thin treadways,
with nothing but the flavor of our passions to ignite the way. we
exacerbate the boundaries of our intentions. we
curl under sheets, bending sheets of light and sound. we
flakey emaciated flakes. [sequence suffered time in motion] we
dirt. it’s what we are; dirt.
we are druggernauts, tasting ourselves along the iridescent brim.
::: we crawl up cross-glowing hillsides toward portals and faraway
bleep-blorps of hot god-head calibration.
we sticky-crackle go burn. [nature puzzles]
the brain shifts back; twenty-one grams they say the soul weighs.
they say things.
cherry blossom tree tips in the dark.
tele-portal surfing with an intergalactic pizza priest, and his satchel of secret sauce.
he heaves in the corner; rebirth :::
tendrils pulled tight, everybody **** chung…
Apr 3, 2014
Apr 3, 2014 at 3:44 PM UTC
Law,
All ye termites hacking ants are you without sin?
Twisting the law to your greed thus dethroning justice
Thou that dis-virgins the law to suit your selfish taste,
Did not equity say that none is above the law?
Money-thirsty vultures seeking positions to occupy.
Law hackers depriving justice and equity of her rights
Equity and justice now lives in shame of her virginity,
Almighty termite, do not your deeds speak evil of your sins?
I weep blood for justice and equity whose daughters you *****
Is there none whose conscience still breathe or lives?
Power-driven termites making uncountable promises
Yet accomplishing none but your calculated interests.
Equity,
All ye leaders that preach peace, are you not corrupt minded?
En-slaving accounts meant for public welfare
Yet you claim to have the peoples interest in mind,
Did not the law command you to let equity and justice smile?
Parasitic predators hi-jacking the country's economy
Filthy termites proclaiming injustice upon powerless ants,
Justice hackers, do not your conscience judge your judgments?
I wish that you allow justice and equity have her way.
Law benders at whose feet equity and justice bow
Rippers of the law, at your hands justice is twisted,
Is your nature as humans so inhumane?
Little wonder the earth lives in fear of your tyranny.
Justice,
All ye slanders of the law, why not sheath your swords of corruption?
Your unchecked power has broken the wings of justice
Thereby making equity a widow without a husband,
Remember your oaths to serve with justice and equity;
Did you deceive the ants that voted you in to serve them?
Chameleons occupying seats of filtered ambitions
Woe betide your conscience for refusing to judge you,
Are you not guilty of molesting the law?
I mourn for the shameful death of equity and justice.
You that crafts the law to fit your suit of corruption
Remember a day comes when justice will laugh again,
And you being powerful cannot escape the law of Karma.
Karma,
Murderers of the law, will you also bribe karma?
I doubt if you can buy the law of karma with money.
Thou whose gluttony corrupts justice and equity,
Don't you feel guilty that you disvirgined the law?
Equity and justice now roams about in nakedness,
You that preach the law, are you true to yourself?
Heartless spiders cob-webbing the law to entangle poor ants
Did not equity bid you come to justice with clean hands?
Yet with filthy garments you condemn innocent ants;
Mind you that someday the law will rise again.
All ye scavengers of justice and hackers of the law,
Do you think you can **** the law of Karma?
Dec 10, 2015
Dec 10, 2015 at 10:22 AM UTC
Her face, flawless and filtered, flows over
my chest, ribs, stomach, hips, fitting the curved
mounds of my body, and even within simplicity
of thread and dye, I sense her presence as her face
hangs from my frame, a statement louder than pillow-lips,
Nancy Sinatra-hair and a glamorous 60’s ***** face.
When paired with leggings and an artfully-distressed denim jacket,
I become a member of the “freshman generation of degenerate
beauty queens,” a hipster fallen to the circumstance of youth,
but I wear her face and the romance of it all reminds me:
we are not defined as Lolitas lost in the hood, or distant,
airy voices in a sea of crude jokes and half-baked skits
meant to highlight shortcomings of a person who doesn’t give
two ***** Lana fits me better than my ribbed, red
sweater and even amidst gods and monsters,
this T-shirt makes pretty last, and I am just as cool.
Apr 8, 2015
Apr 8, 2015 at 12:33 PM UTC
Memes! Angels, aberrations of opposition super standing
overseeing you,
The screamin' heebie jeebies.
Yo, where you wanta go, you axin me we just go
with it, the flow 'know?
What I mean is, are we memes or mes or messes of yeses
gone all johnny rcome late-rotten scarred scared, some thing not so far
from sacred when you put your mind to the whole idea of life being
at all. Thinking this is not easy. We are Able. Our belly's living waters cry out,
you are your brother's keeper, yes, you are.
Be leavin' that be, I am is, and you is,
too. When you apprehend the meme named
war.
That meme has led the me-me mob for as far as men
remember, but
now, machines remember for us, all the facts, just
the facts, ma'am.
Why'd the d go into a comma, Pop?
Welt (Duetch, bitte) Enshaung, glaube ich, vie leicht, aber
are we ever going to filter out these German bleed-overs?
stay tuned, next week the meme beacon is pulled down,
who shall pre or post or ex maybe vail, travail, like
trip
wow, I hate being a 20 year old vet back in the U.S. of A.
FTA All the way, Airborne
******** Herman Hesse ********
Jorney to and fro the east to west, and soon, et
cetera. Siam is a mere myth now, eh?
As the Narnia thing not called a heathen lie was allowed
allowable in mere Christianity.
I've only seen the English POV's on PBS, they may be filtered through
feedback, meme belching bursting bubbles from new wine 'nold vessels about to plode into eternity, singing along.
Thank you, very much. May I introduce, duce, intro duce, y'gittin this?
Duce means 2 if you see e squeen between, you see that?
Fun. No reason for fun? Who here, now, believes that or, no,
bees leavin' those lies be told?
Hunh? Y'know? Watch man, waht of the night?
See, what I mean? All this from me hearin' some guy say,
"Come and see, like that was okeh. For any body, n'me, too.
Thinking, as a past-time, is pointless. You know, if you act like it.
Aug 20, 2018
Aug 20, 2018 at 1:21 AM UTC
The frost is still there,
Throttling the rhododendron leaf,
And ice stalls the dissolve
Of the stone-like snow,
Yet I am happy.
The sun-rays are almost Etruscan,
Filtered low through lace and blind,
Like that ***** of sunset on Irene’s hair
Sad “couleur de feuille-morte”.
Yet it is sultry.
I can open a window
And breathe the warming air
Finches flock close, careless,
Now desperate for food
And pluck menescent fruit
Off an ice-bound branch.
In the distance, a cardinal sings.
Thick drapes are drawn aside
And geraniums strain toward the light.
In a nook outside the door,
An old cat basks on a corner of sun.
He yawns, seeing me, and strolls across the snow.
All nature seems to wait, but poised,
For the final unfettered token.
Will it be a sudden, favonian breeze?
Or the robin’s unrelenting noise?
Telling us, “Winter is broken”?
Aug 2, 2018
Aug 2, 2018 at 10:34 AM UTC
It's Sister Lucy not Sister Bridget
who's the crush on the young priest
Father Joseph Magdalene said,
Mary said is she the one? as she sat
on Mags bed listening to music
on her record player I thought
you said the Bridget,
Magdalene sitting beside Mary
passed a glass of lemonade to her
and said nothing certain
you understand just the rumours
I've heard but don't tell
the parents or my arse'll
be slapped for spreading the rumour,
have you a ciggie?
Mary said
putting the lemonade and glass
on the bedside cabinet,
Magdalene poked under the mattress
and took out a squashed pack
of 10 Woodbines and said
open the fecking window
or Ma'll know we've been smoking
and she'll have a moan
and passed the packet to Mary
who took a cigarette
and put it in her mouth
and went and opened the window,
Magdalene took a cigarette
and stuffed the packed
under the mattress again,
Mary sat down and said
have you a light then
or are we to fecking **** on air?
Magdalene took out
of the pocket of her dress
a box of matches
(liberated from the kitchen)
and struck a light for them both
and put the matchbox away again,
they inhaled and sat in silence,
the record played( Billy fury)
and they tapped their feet softly
and nodded their heads,
so what are you doing
about Brian Brady?
Magdalene asked,
what'd you mean doing about
I'm doing nowt with the ******
it's him who thinks I'm going
to be doing things the soft loon
Mary said,
you seemed to be encouraging him
the other day Magdalene said,
ah was fun only I'd not let him
near me in a serious way
no more than the holy Joe himself
Mary said,
smoke filtered ceiling ward,
a car backfired from the street below,
Magdalene leaned in close to Mary
I'm your best friend
and I get jealous of the likes of him
being too near to you,
O he's nothing to be worrying yourself
about him Mags he's just a loon
as boys are Mary said,
Magdalene held the cigarette
a way from her lips
and kissed Mary's cheek,
Mary sighed and said
he's nothing I just give him
the tease he'll get nothing
from my ****** money box,
they both inhaled and exhaled again
and watched the smoke
rise ceiling ward,
the sound of Magdalene's ma
downstairs singing along to the radio,
Magdalene's hand went on Mary's thigh,
a bright sun in a blue Irish sky.
Jan 4, 2016
Jan 4, 2016 at 2:43 AM UTC
Tipping point reached, one final breath
Let the waves of inertia crash, contaminate
....
Alone in complexity, machinery, and everything
Perfectly formed human being
Slowly turning sour by the minute
Stale air, only growing in its bitter taste as
Seconds that feel like hours, add to feel like years
All the plans i made
All the plans i planned to make
Gone, but not forgotten
But then they were gone
Truer statement never read then
What i read on the back of the final bit found
Within my reach
Filtered through a layer of sediment
settled over my vision
Sanitized as life had been
But my shelter having been breached
To seep much longer...
Too accustomed, but it doesn't help
Found lacking in the company I had hoped to keep
A poor atonement, sinking further
Or, it kept rising
I was nearly covered.
.....
They stepped a little closer
And left appalled by what they found
Rotting in the dark, silently
Defensive at the outset, shaking at the sound
Sounding incomplete
Face down this
Eventual ending
For me
Jul 28, 2018
Jul 28, 2018 at 5:12 AM UTC
I met you at the station
you said wanted to go anywhere but here.
I said to look for the tracks that
are the most uninviting. You
took my arm. I wished for
something better and here it came,
disguised by dirt, dislocation and greying days.
Your ticket says no return but
mine is undefined, watchful, ready
to bolt or to linger. You say you love
the stations from afar.
There's not much of me
requested, but the splinters that you
do, I gift hopelessly. The
smallest glimpse of light approaching
filtered through dank, oppressive air
are superior, surely? than finite life
exhausted watching the dark.
By the night you amplify,
when you have enjoyed my fill and
left with little but fingerprints and
recollections, casting parallel shadows
on directions that await.
I give you almost everything
except for the words that
travel nowhere but my head.
You gave me the signal
a briefest flash of red
that stopped this in its tracks.
May 16, 2015
May 16, 2015 at 6:04 AM UTC
behind velvet cloth I saw your quail's eggs,
I saw your gentleman's relish too,
protruding as it was,
an Etonian slap to the face of the marmite jar which
it was reluctantly sat next to.
and although the relish would happily admit that
to sit next to marmite was certainly preferable
to finding oneself positioned next to Bovril or Cup-a-Soup,
it certainly was a far cry from the delicatessen counter
he was once accustomed to.
oh the delicatessen!
how the tear ducts performed with nostalgic aplomb
as memories of stuffed vine leaves and caramelised baby shallots
filtered back to the gentleman.
what he'd have given to be back there now,
to once again share the company of proper food,
of handmade chutneys and pickles,
not this common oafish tar.
this brutish black gunk.
'You may not have been factory made'
retorted Marmite,
'or contain E325,'
'but that isn't to say that your place on this shelf
is any more valid than mine.'
Oct 14, 2012
Oct 14, 2012 at 10:38 AM UTC
Such a sight to behold.
The beauty of sitting on your warm behind.
Cool, filtered air blowing, drying your sore eyes.
Staring at two glowing tail lamps, full of rage and light.
Time waves good bye, like a widow left behind.
Composed,civilized minds decline into untamed―primitive impulses.
Instincts drive them, hoping it will hasten their journey.
The flow of traffic shows otherwise.
Aug 2, 2015
Aug 2, 2015 at 7:30 AM UTC
Hand out the window
treading air.
No seat belts and country songs
filtered through the radio.
Cornfields racing by in the peripheral.
I was quite in love,
with your old truck's feel.
Jan 11, 2014
Jan 11, 2014 at 6:45 PM UTC
n. A homesickness for somewhere you cannot return to, the nostalgia and grief for the lost places of your past, places that never were.
insatiability makes its burrow
in my gall bladder,
wringing bile from the *****
craving toxins to purge.
i thirst for sweet lexical gaps,
holes in patterns,
dots that don't make shapes
but still gladly connect
komorebi
n. The sunlight that filters through the leaves of the trees
loveliest in the distinction
it is only komorebi
once filtered, green soul
bleeding through
May 27, 2015
May 27, 2015 at 4:58 PM UTC
A picnic in the park
a leaf with a breeze
hibiscus and vanilla
an afternoon tease
Sweet lemonade
under a shade of oak trees
hummingbird duet
with buzzing bumblebees
Teardrop kisses
a gentle love bite
you and I laughing
what a beautiful site
A few filtered moments
just you and I
spring flowers and bluebirds
under a clear blue sky
Jul 5, 2013
Jul 5, 2013 at 3:41 AM UTC
There's a fire hose:
You drink it.
Well, you try to drink it.
You playfully examine it
For a few moments, then
You wrap your lips around the nozzle,
And pump up the pressure:
It blows you back
And pins you to a wall.
The spray stings your eyes,
But if it brings tears to them,
They are washed away by the flow,
Before you, or anyone else,
Can be sure they were there.
Your limbs ache,
You think that if only
You could rest them,
You could hold them stronger
But the time for rest rarely comes.
Some people, washed in despair
Or simply sanity, step out of the way
Never to look back and never to regret.
Some collapse or simply drown.
Others stand the force.
The mass of the waters accelerates,
But still they stand strong.
Wavering at times,
But never giving up.
And one day the flow slows
To a stream, to a trickle, to a drip
Then it stops.
You stand there:
Sudden and Sullen,
Dripping and Deflated,
Percolated, but Proud,
Wet, but Wise.
And you reach out,
Brass Rat rusted to your knuckle:
You grab a beaker and into it
You wring the waters of knowledge
From the clothes of your experience.
You take this drought and distill it.
You bottle it, you market it, or you give it away,
But, with luck, it takes the world by storm.
From the fire hose flow rises the rarefied results
Filtered through your hands,
Tested in your trials, Fortified in your failures,
Vivified in your victories.
You look back with mixed emotions:
Wondering if it was all really worth it.
Your prospective my grow,
It may never be clear,
But the fire hose flows on...
~D.B. Guy (March 6-12, 2010)
Nov 3, 2012
Nov 3, 2012 at 2:32 AM UTC
I had walked miles that day.
Finding myself in these old
Los Angeles side streets,
was to travel back in time.
Bougainvillea, overflowing
with color, festooned the
weathered cedar cottages.
Heavy trumpet flowers,
sleepy in the filtered light,
stirred beside huge green
leaves, in the easy marine air.
I walked on.
Evening had come, and with it,
a few stars shone over the ocean.
After a perfect dinner, I still
craved a bit of sweetness
on my tongue.
Walking back from the end
of the pier under deep
cobalt, the night sky held me.
Just ahead, tiny birthday candles,
and warm, kind faces, welcomed
me into their midst.
Softly, they sang 'Las Mañanitas'
in one voice, and I sang with them.
Someone's hand
reached out to me; a
thin paper cake plate,
heavy with treasure,
was silently offered.
Tres Leches, soaked
with tender love
and milky sweetness.
Heaven could only be
more of this.
Aug 27, 2015
Aug 27, 2015 at 6:02 PM UTC
The shoreline bites at the toes of attendees,
watching the little appendages curl up together.
The footprints there have been etched into fossils,
the sand crunching together and sounding like
echoes of war cries and whispered endearments.
The raft is loaded. The time is traced.
A caterpillar in a chrysalis hums a love song,
glows with the light of ‘vita vita vita’ as
the gathering crowds taste dead languages.
Children eat from lunch boxes carved with runes.
Sometimes a glipse of twenty years is caught,
a journal is forced open by the wind; it’s pages
creak, the voices from the world's coffins
that have been wrenched open start a hymn
and the songs pile up in our ears as dust.
Those who are do not mourn titter respectfully
as men in white coats try to push the raft
into the water, but you were so lovably stubborn.
You always returned and even here you knew it;
your final laugh was filtered through sign language.
I step forward and push, float you off into
the water, put my fingers over the candle and
over the lips of dead kings as masses shoot the sky.
The match roars and your raft gasps as it burns,
old things being laid to rest and new ones kindling.
Sep 26, 2013
Sep 26, 2013 at 6:28 PM UTC
That Young Man from Nantucket
As filtered through National Public Radio
There was a young man from Nantucket
Whose foot was caught in a bucket
He said with a grin
As he massaged his shin
“Vers libre is a more affectively responsorial mode of
privileging my authentic voice with regard to the cultural
norms that speak to the existential realities of my heritage
instead of the mask of the external culture that fails to affirm
my needs predicated on the living organic wholeness of, like,
y’know, my own special existentialness, and, like, stuff.”
Nov 18, 2016
Nov 18, 2016 at 6:58 PM UTC