"fireplace" poems
Too lazy to be ambitious,
I let the world take care of itself.
Ten days' worth of rice in my bag;
a bundle of twigs by the fireplace.
Why chatter about delusion and enlightenment?
Listening to the night rain on my roof,
I sit comfortably, with both legs stretched out.
22.9k
(Inspired by and dedicated to John Edward Smallshaw, and his "Spice")
I am a summer-man,
Because I'm blessed to sit by the sea.
Let it and the other two Musketeers,
boon companions to me,
Sun and Wind,
erase my discomposure as I
reside in the Poet's Nookery.
Let them have almost
all that troubles,
but not all.
I am a summer-man.
On the bay, on the beach,
I see birth, I see death,
osprey nests, carcasses of
mussels and horseshoe *****
This, somehow reassuring,
the cycles,
this circularity,
the tides and inevitability.
I am a summer-man.
Student of languages seasonal,
Peaches, plums, cherries, poetry
and loving Woman.^
This, the summer alphabet-soup
of my multiple tongues.
I am a summer-man.
Sancerre and Pinot Gris, super cold,
Paul Simon, Nina Simone,
with proper aging,
getting hotter,
Salsa and Afrikaner hints,
super louder,
Even "Still Crazy After All These Years,"
that-who-wud-be-me,
chills outer.^^
I am a summer-man.
When ever this lad's writes appear,
it proves once again,
there is no truth that his
name was once Dr. Seuss
In a prior life, even if
each is signed by
Ogdiddy Nash**
I am a summer-man.
**Disrespectful of the calendar,
if I can, try to make
summer season stretch-marks from
May to October.
I would add April,
but the IRS is already
****** at me.^^^
Though the cherry blossoms of May
now gone away,
the lilies of June
arrive, but but for a week or two,
soon, like my mom, withered away.
Acorns in August^^^^ have arrived too swiftly.**
This summer, beloved,
and love of summer,
deep-rooted.
Season of my Peter Pan Poetry Galore Festival.
A love, incapable, impossible, of ever
growing old, ever growing cold,
it cannot wither.
It is summer heat reminders exposed,
how it misses its man,
that hide in the flames of
the teasing, popping, reminding
Winter fireplace's crackling popping***
Aug 25, 2013
Aug 25, 2013 at 9:33 AM UTC
''
Sand and stones between my bones.
Today the sun never shone.
Look how beautiful I am.
Chop, chop, chopped wood in the fireplace.
Don't get too close if you want to keep your face.
Be careful not to burn yourself.
It gives a certain warmth
And brings a certain want.
I would, yet I can't enjoy it by myself.
Royal blue like the winter hue.
My skin is merely bruised.
Can you still see how many times I've been hurt?
That winter depression.
Makes me want you as my new obsession.
Come in even if it's colder than outside.
Melt, melt me, I'm a letdown.
Having a meltdown.
I am melting under your fiery touch.
Snow flakes the skin.
I am in for a win.
What a special snowflake I am, wouldn't you say?
My heart is surrounded by splinters,
It shouldn't, yet it get's me through the winter.
Between my arms it's chiller, why don't you come hither?
Take a bite of me with your ice chipped teeth.
Swallow me up like a leech.
Red blood gauges from my blue veins.
Guess I'm not that royal anyway.
Hide it before you can complain.
-
Too late.
You already know the taste.
"
Feb 8, 2016
Feb 8, 2016 at 2:23 PM UTC
if ever
you don’t
feel
like you have a home,
pull me close,
wrap your arms around me,
rest your head on my chest,
close your eyes,
and feel the warmth of the fireplace
resonating from within my heart.
Feb 18, 2019
Feb 18, 2019 at 3:22 PM UTC
Lost Love
He remembers that day
many sad years ago
it was sunny out,
but soon a storm raged.
He returned home early
from work,
eager
to rest and nurse a cold.
Eager
to see his gorgeous wife
fix him a delicious soup
and give loving care,
a remedy not.
He caught a surprise.
Was it then a hallucination?
To see her ex's car
in front of their house,
fanning the flames in his heart?
Or to imagine the house shaking,
or to hear love noises howling
from the rafters of contempt,
as her fireplace warmed tempest.
He sure hoped then... it had been a misfire
it wasn't.
He slowly opened the front door,
walking decrepit and sad,
like he was in hospice care.
He could see the final script
playing out,
more so the tragic ending
the trail of clothes,
her ex-boyfriend's scent,
calamity,
and approaching closer
the devil speaking louder.
He opened the bedroom door
to their parts caught in honey jars
and scarlet red on his tainted wife
over bed sheets of shame.
Their eyes catch,
both flush, and tearful,
as breathing stopped,
his melancholy eyes asking why?
Why?
What about the future lily pods,
our family, house, kids
... and you sell out.
What about being fresh
out of college with our dreams,
passion and honor...us.
What about the bonds,
pinky swears, pricking of blood
marital vows.
Her eyes had no answers.
She cried, loudest
as her ex-boyfriend bolted
not before passing the mill.
He closed her door for good
that mournful day,
dismissing darkness,
opening his wrath for her
in his mind, yet
what words or light can be exchanged?
Uprooted and lost, he walked
scarred over and over
by her promise and lost love.
That was thirty years ago
and he still walks with her
ghosts, and it still pains.
LR-5/4/17
May 4, 2017
May 4, 2017 at 11:31 PM UTC
Outside,
the snow is serenely falling
its illuminated resplendence
vying with that of the full moon
suspended in the silent night sky.
Inside,
it is just as silent
the only sounds the occasional spark and crackle
of the logs in the fireplace.
And two hearts harmoniously beating.
Wisps of smoke coyly rise from the sandalwood incense
gracefully whirling in the air like dervishes,
the room redolent with the fragrance of serenity
As I repose on the couch,
your head upon my lap,
you hold one hand against your rhythmically beating heart;
while with the other
I absently play with your hair.
There are no thoughts,
only heart thinking.
There is no speech,
only heart speaking.
There are no words,
only heart spilling.
~
You slowly rise from my lap and look through my eyes
and into my soul.
When I come to speak,
you gently place a loving finger against my lips,
whispering
“shhh“
Time revolves all around us,
yet within us — stillness;
the silence palpable.
Our souls become one
with the other,
with the tranquility of the night,
with the gently falling snow.
Our breathing falls in sync to a rhythm known only to the cosmos.
At the end of our inhales,
there you are.
there I am.
And then you speak..
three words..
Three words that contain the universe within them:
“This is bliss“
Jan 9, 2015
Jan 9, 2015 at 9:44 AM UTC
As Autumn approaches,
my mind drifts to the decaying leaves,
Halloween,
the cool, crisp breeze...
The communal understanding that eternal heaven comes only with
death—
that Summer must always go.
And that beloved Autumn must always usher in bitter Winter who lays the foundations
for an exalted Spring.
Oh hell...I hope for a long Autumn, I want to make it stay—
like a host who lectures his party guest for too long
so he won't look at his watch.
Oh how I need the frumpy sweaters and pumpkin heads on window sills!
Oh how I need the billowing steam from milky beige cocoa,
the misty light rain in the gray of the morning,
the high canopy of fleshy red flakes!
And echoes of children laughing as they eat candy on their way home from trick-or-treating—reminding me that life can be enjoyed
with sacred rituals and good company.
I need Autumn personified—
a cool-headed, crackling-fireplace-girl.
A quilt-maker, cloud-gazer, two-dogs-and-a-cat bookworm.
Someone comforting like oatmeal.
Someone surprising like the first day of school.
I need Autumn.
I need Autumn but it never seems to need me too.
Sep 6, 2018
Sep 6, 2018 at 9:23 PM UTC
In the old house up the hills -
Yes, the one that gives you chills
Whenever you walk by its fence -
Lives someone who, no offense,
Looks like she'd puts kids on grill.
Children, puppies, all she'd ****
For food.
Lady who, probably, likes to
Know the places each kid hikes to.
There she, later in the day,
Waits for village kids to stray.
Some will die and some live on.
Who? That really depens on
Her mood.
Some say that she used to snitch,
Others say that she's a witch!
Nobody was ever in
The house whose walls are made of skin.
Nobody would ever dare
To set their foot on the porch where
She stood.
They'll never know that her kitchen
Smelled like flowers, most bewitchin',
They won't see her paintings, neat,
Her living room where you could meet
A fire giving warm embrace.
And alongside her fireplace
The wood.
Now, if you got in, you'd stare
on stinky fish bowls, everywhere,
whose cloudy water calls for changing,
and rooms in need of rearranging.
But since you never really tried,
No one knows the lady died.
Yes she's dead for good.
Nov 11, 2015
Nov 11, 2015 at 1:07 AM UTC
mismatched furniture
a few dishes in the cupboards
a couple random blankets and lamps
a pan and a mug or two in the sink
a broken clock above the fake fireplace
a fake jackalope head on the fireplace
a couple college kids' apartment
my brother and his roommate
it isn't much but it feels like home
Aug 18, 2018
Aug 18, 2018 at 4:58 PM UTC
"The Kiss*" in marble
of Rodin's work
embraces art with passion.
Ovid wrote of kisses
back when "amor"
was in fashion.
To capture
such a moment
in marble or in verse,
is beautiful
but can't refine
the taste
when lips immerse.
In meditation,
I close my eyes
on kisses
I remember.
of hot August nights
in sultry heat
or amid a fireplace
in December...*
Nov 16, 2017
Nov 16, 2017 at 7:04 AM UTC
"Read more. Write more."
That's what Doctor said.
Doctor is my therapist.
He says, "You are not alone. Many have felt this way before, and many have also thought themselves mad. And that's why I'm here. You are not alone."
I think
It's ********
Doctor doesn't know what he's talking about.
Read more? Write more?
How can I read when my eyes touch a page and then fall to the ground?
How can I write when none of the words I think can make it past my mouth?
How can anything be normal, be fine?
Doctor says I'm not alone, but I find that hard to believe.
"Doctor," I say, rubbing my sore crown, "no matter how often you say that, I still feel alone."
He nods his head. "And what of your friends?"
I shake mine. "They don't like me."
"And what of your husband?"
"Doesn't love me."
"And what of your parents?"
"Don't need me -- they have my sister."
Doctor nods and glances at the clock. "Well, our time is almost up. Any last thoughts?"
I don't change my gaze, which rests on the cactus plant sitting above the fake fireplace.
"No."
May 29, 2015
May 29, 2015 at 12:30 PM UTC
Ben Kowalewicz (spoken): Hi, my name is Ben Kowalewicz and this is Billy Talent.
Well I tripped, I fell down naked
I drank from a cup of lead
I hugged a skunk, it peed on me
Yesterday I joined Scientology
Steal a Camaro, then **** Jack Sparrow
Try stupid **** try stupid ****
Jump in a dump truck, smell **** and get stuck
I cannot read, I cannot read
**** on computers, then drink some pewter
Die sanity, die sanity
Marry a cheapskate, gain ninety pounds weight
I'm really dumb, I'm really dumb
I'm stupid, it's my fault, so daft
I like to play in the garbage shaft
The best sport is Parkour, **** straight
I arrive at work five hours late
Drink a deep fryer, eat some barbed wire
Try stupid **** try stupid ****
Sleep in a fireplace, burn your entire face
I cannot read, I cannot read
Cinnamon challenge, go on a chalk binge
Die sanity, Die sanity
Bike into traffic, pose pornographic
I'm a ******* I'm a *******
I ate some poo!
I'm stupid, it's my fault
Try
I'm stupid, it's my fault
Lie
This bad song don't make sense
Pie
Get a Prince Albert, snake blood for dessert now?
Drink some Everclear, cut off your own ear now?
Go back in time to, forties as a Jew
Try stupid **** try stupid ****
Do *** and rip off your right knee
I cannot read, I cannot read
Find the KKK, put on some blackface
Die sanity, die sanity
Locate a pervert, then take off your shirt
I am a twit, I am a twit
I am a twit, I am a twit
Try stupid **** try stupid ****
I am a twit, I am a twit
May 27, 2012
May 27, 2012 at 6:15 PM UTC
the first drop of water
not ice
from the sky
signals the season’s
change
new england
so pretty
looking angelic
drew me in
a venus fly trap
locked in a prism
snow reflecting
back to me
eerie thoughts
shrouded in black
no place for a runner
where I can escape them
locked in by the fireplace
tattered ashes
mockingly laugh
i flee and i run
minus eight reads the meter
frostbitten
returning
trapped with my thinking
blocked in on all sides
the icy walls
fold in on me
forced to see the reflection
looking back at me
go away brightness
banish your glow
i need the shadows
where hidden feelings
quietly cower
another storm coming
madness engulfs me
searching for pen
grasping at paper
salvation
words spilling out
parts of me
buried so skillfully
long ago
finally see light
just for a moment
the respite’s exquisite
then longing for springtime
oh god,
why can’t it rain?
©2016janetaylor
May 17, 2016
May 17, 2016 at 11:59 AM UTC
I’m falling for you
Like the leaves in
Autumn.
You brighten me
Like the sunbeams through
Grey clouds.
You color me
Like the trees in
The forest.
You warm me
Like the fireplace
In my house.
I’d wait for you
All year
And when you're there,
I can’t stop
Admiring your beauties.
I love you.
Dec 4, 2018
Dec 4, 2018 at 2:52 PM UTC
I wear shadows like a cloak, weighing heavy on my shoulders
Mysterious sounds bid me up to dance
The fireplace is lit to keep my corpse warm
Silent whispers, lights that flicker, this is the darkest hour
I see myself from deep within
Trough chest and not trough eyes
Smiles have faded, my heartbeat rests
This is the time when day becomes night
I swim in the sensation I borrowed from yesterday
I sleep midair, creatures crawling, fighting for my attention
They put on a show, like gleaming embers
Until they become the morning sun
And I keep spiraling
Dec 19, 2016
Dec 19, 2016 at 7:46 PM UTC
Fireplace firefly, did you come to check up on me.
Do you visit every hearth, is that your assigned duty.
Answering the hearts of those who unknowingly call.
Reminding us that if we can't see beauty in nature,
We won't know beauty at all.
When you return home after the passing of the crescent moon,
Who sees in your eyes all that you've been through.
And comforts you when your tears turn a blue hue.
Maybe you don't feel in the way that we do.
But I'd like to believe after all the light you give, you'd receive it too.
A love from a special someone you know to be true.
Your very own fireplace, who wilfully takes all burdens from you.
Nov 9, 2018
Nov 9, 2018 at 4:55 PM UTC
Kindly tell the sun to look away
I don’t want to see my curtain sway
Indeed, because these fabricated joys
Are demolished by an obscure ray
Serve me breakfast while the day
Lies as cold as the dew I’ll drink
Now what to do is just obey
Before we are rued by fire’s blink
Put my hot tea beside the lake
Serve it dead and withered
The day is boiling and we’ll be late
For we are but a paper scrapped
The fireplace shall be planted
With torn thorns of brown and black
No rays of red will favor me
As long as the sun scorns at us
Wipe my mouth with torn fabric
It pains me so to be stained in red
That I long ago forsaken but now
Dripping down my crooked neck
For the ghost of you who preyed
On my solitary beat of ill and ****
For your revenant who feasted
On my will and half-eaten heart
For the glooms of your fairy
Schadenfreude upon my sorry
For the life I did not live
To the joy I took from you
Raise the cup and shatter it
Open the curtain and drain our life of lies
To the eye of the day and God’s pity
Serve my breakfast before I live
Oct 5, 2014
Oct 5, 2014 at 10:36 PM UTC
Santa got us workin' in the cold,
not a single fireplace in that **** factory.
He don't even feed us:
we eats polar bear leftovers,
penguin flesh and such.
Ask for a break and get stomped
by reindeers and such.
not a day of vacation, not a one.
The houses be made o' candy
but we ain't got no dental either,
so eatin' that would **** us.
This fat white ape is a bad bad man,
lord ain't that the truth,
ol' Saint Nick is a total ****
Dec 19, 2014
Dec 19, 2014 at 5:39 PM UTC
we want to say that we built this house with our hands
with our blood
we built this house and burned it down
we rebuilt this house and burned it down
we rebuilt this house and stayed
i want to tell you that my father builds houses for a living but i have never lived in one
i want to tell you that my mother still asks how you're doing
i want to say that we built this house and it's never abandoned and we are never waiting by the windows
that we always have wood for the fireplace
we never drink alone
i never fall asleep in the shower
in this house our love keeps the lights on
you can feel it through the floorboards like vibrations through a phonograph through the hardwood through your back
we sleep monday through thursday and get paid on weekends to drink whiskey and slow dance in the kitchen
we roll around in bed trying to catch the light
our bodies become curtains or sponges
you soak me up like sunshine and nobody asks where i went
we always finish what we start
i become welcome mat, welcome back, come back,
come home
i turned the basement into a music room
when it rains for you it never floods
we built this house with our hands, with our love, with our blood
there is wood for the fireplace
the flames never spread
Oct 12, 2015
Oct 12, 2015 at 5:49 PM UTC
it was the hooded-sweatshirt, sit-close-and-pretend-you’re-cold, bleacher-seat,
whiskey-and-coke homecoming that you never had when the leaves changed.
but the leaves changed anyway.
the damp grass smelling vaguely like your fireplace as the world got quieter,
your nose in your precalc and your foot tapping and how-many-years-left
of solo fridays, you counted the suburban stars but didn’t tell anybody
how ******* beautiful they were above your head, because they were yours.
when you wore your high school colors, you were cold for real. no pretense
in your shivering, no flutter in your abdomen because he wasn’t gonna talk to you,
and you didn’t really care, you shrugged. but the leaves changed anyway.
and you changed, slowly. grew taller and smarter and prettier and then the
remaining solo fridays shrank to none, and you left. big sweet snowdrifts turned to spring
and you shared whiskey-and-coke with the city, your stars dimmer but abdomen
finally fuller, and limbs warmer and no sweatshirt because you didn’t need one,
and hands all over to hold and feeling all three kinds of love at once.
and then the accidental homecoming, and the changing of the leaves
and the hooded-sweatshirt shivers and knowing you’re so much bigger now than the
suburban stars and the backward glances of the bleacher-seat kids, but the damp
grass still smells like your fireplace and suddenly you’re small again, just for a
second but god that second, you shiver and turn around again. you’re so much
bigger than this but homecoming, this whiskey-and-coke homecoming still isn't yours.
Sep 1, 2014
Sep 1, 2014 at 11:58 PM UTC
When I'm a grownup,
I would like a home away from home.
A cabin, perhaps, isolated from the world,
where there would be a lake in my backyard.
Maybe I will also have a treehouse, or a hammock,
where I would read and watch my children play in the water.
Then we would roast marshmallows and make s'mores,
and catch fireflies in the bushes.
My husband would sing silly songs and play his guitar,
and make my children blush with fiery laughter.
When the kids would fall asleep in the bunks,
a cuddle would be awaiting in front of the fireplace.
Where we would watch sappy old movies,
and savor our salty popcorn and sweet milk chocolate.
Together, we would laugh and cry.
Together, we would have escaped the world.
Together, we would have been happy.
Jun 24, 2013
Jun 24, 2013 at 1:32 PM UTC
Pawpaw would rock by the fireplace in his favorite rocker ! The occasional whiff of Oak firewood and Borkum Riff pipe tobacco , I was hanging on to every word ! A narrative about a little boy in 1925 . Standing by his chair , as proud as I could be ! He'd look straight into your eyes without even flinching , the smell of Old Spice aftershave and Kentucky Bourbon . A shot glass with a gold rim ..A pocket watch his Father passed on to him ..Stories of a little fella from the south side of Atlanta relayed to a captive audience of one ! A starstruck grandson with a cup of hot chocolate , cap pistol , belt , holster , pajamas and house shoes ! Astonished with tales of Buffalo Bill ! Sergeant York and Wild Bill Hickok !
Oct 21, 2015
Oct 21, 2015 at 8:14 PM UTC
~ Aurora Borealis
Under the arch of a starry sky
With a temperature well below zero
I touched your soul with my warm hands
Like an round aura, you reflected the universe
Of our love...
A labyrinth of roads that lead
In stardust, your thoughts whirl as
Small particles, and with pure reflection
My Aurora Borealis you're so beautiful, robust
And longing…
I take you into my warm cabin
Where we drink hot chocolate
The icicles are in your unshaven beard
I find you charming with your red hands
I'll warm you up…
The cold wind makes cracking our wooden hut
And along the windows shrilled the sound
In contrast with our warm fireplace
The crackling of the wood is divine
I look at you…
My Aurora Borealis, you are so handsome
With your thick winter coat still on,
As purple and green sparks reach our
Living room, where your dark hair glistens
I kiss you…
It will never be really dark
In days of love, where light shines
And see your reflection sparkle
Where I could rest by your presence
I am with you…
~ Elisa Laura
© 2012 E. L.
Sep 13, 2012
Sep 13, 2012 at 8:57 PM UTC
Sunsets.
Growing up I never liked the nights, As a child it signified the end of play with the rule that you had to be indoors at dawn.
I remember the evil ticking sound of the tremulous hands of time as we were separated from our friends,
with the sun wrapping up in the fragrant petals of the freezing cold nights.
A spirit locked inside a world of silence and pure nothingness.
The hot fire sparks assaulting my fragile skin of the hands over the fire at the compulsory fireplace,It's streaks of sorrow still trace their way into my soul.
Until the day [God knows when] I saw the beauty of colors blending together, forming a magical hue through (You guessed it.)
a cheap camera lens.
Sunset is twice as beautiful through a camera lens.
Now more than ever I go sit at my betch, snap the beautiful sunsets, and caption them with a nervous pulse knowing it’ll soon end. Only fair since nothing lasts forever.
Darkness closes in, the fun begins. I reach for your hand.
"Come with me into darkness."
Jun 19, 2015
Jun 19, 2015 at 4:36 AM UTC