"flashbulbs" poems
People plugged in everywhere
To ipods, games and phones
Like non-existent robots
The world is full of drones
We're now made up of circuit boards
We've lost all of our bones
Be different, and unplug yourself
Grow a pair of stones
Your life is electronic
on a tablet or a chip
You run your life remotely
you give people email lip
you wouldn't dare go jogging
you might fall and break a hip
Be different, and unplug yourself
And give technology the slip
A record made of vinyl
now it's just some bits and bytes
It's a relic in an antique store
Along with other sights
Like cameras using flashbulbs
when taking shots at night
Be different and unplug yourself
Show digital your might
It doesn't matter where you go
A text, you have to send
If you're going to the shopping mall
Or just walking 'round the bend
You've more holsters on your belt loop
Than gunfighters would depend
To hold onto their weapons
Before they met their end
Turn off the boxes, read a book
Do something that's old school
Don't follow all the others
Acting like a dumb pack mule
Don't rely on electronics
Just use it as a tool
Unplug yourself from everything
Be a leader not a fool
People plugged in everywhere
To ipods, games and phones
Like non-existent robots
The world is full of drones
We're now made up of circuit boards
We've lost all of our bones
Be different, and unplug yourself
Grow a pair of stones
Dec 28, 2012
Dec 28, 2012 at 4:23 PM UTC
if you look up in a room
the complete spectrum of light
flashing over your shoulder
like flashbulbs sparkling
first of all
turn around
the stage is the other way
if as you careen the 180
notice all the funny faces
grinding and wide eyed
flailing and stamping
you don't look too dissimilar
now the man bouncing
behind the music he
made last week
jumping
like you
wide eyed
congratulations
you are there
the dubstep show
now calm down
Feb 10, 2013
Feb 10, 2013 at 5:48 PM UTC
I.
Nothing lasts long enough
To out live its time line
So I weave mine into
A concert celebrating the sound
That our bodies beat to
This organic clockwork armada
Of single cell ships singing lions roars
Before time aligns my spine with the dirt
And though I know gray hair will claim crowns
Overthrowing the royalty of youth
These ball headed blessings
Are nothing more then a water park river slide
We must all ride toward oblivion
So my fatal flawed form
Speaks a beautiful broken clock symphony
For these poems to fill up
Facing the future as if it was an old friend
To bed down with
Laughing at how long it’s been
Since we claimed tomorrow
As a carpe diem doctrine
To rock in
And I hope that when the waterfall of my life
Meets rock-bottom-spray-mist-rainbow-prism-old-age-epiphany
My grandchildren will cling to me
Like vines to a towering oak tree
So I can whisper to them through a white Walt Whitman mane
"I may be a washed up old lion
But you
You are the roar of a crescendo
To an aria arranged before the birth of music
As if each note was placed purposely to hang in harmony
With the budding of your bones
They sing in the same key as the fickler flashbulbs
Of the stars you were forged in
Who sweet talk to you in your sleep nightly"
Saying
Listen my lovelies
To the lullaby of the universe
As it sings itself toward salvation
Which when translated into night
Says come gather your dreams
In the concert of my body
Babies
You were born
As a single rift
In the solo
Of some Charlie parker bird flight ascension
So let this bedtime word weaving remind you of the halo about your head
For you
Were born as angels
Back when the big bang band first leaned how to blow
So if you stagnate
Like we all do
Fearing that you are all alone in the prison cell of your skin
Remember the old lions still roaring in your gut
Listen close
For there has never been a moment of silence
And there will never been a moment of silence
Cause there is music buried beneath your bones my children
Come sing in the choir of your forefathers the winds
Your solo is about to begin
Dec 24, 2013
Dec 24, 2013 at 8:32 PM UTC
the echo ran along the wall
across the dew moist grass
and fell like a plea upon my ear
the sky was bruised to a deep blue
and as i fell to a dizzy thought
and found myself on my knees
isnt it strange we never notice
the pavement till we kiss it
and i frenched this piece
her southern belle voice
reached down into my dizzy thoughts
and with a strong finger grasp of her will
pulled me back to reality
and up off the floor
lest a skeeter get 'cha
i humbled a thanks
and together we made the parkway
the echo danced a little
ballerina twirl on my eye socket
for half the night
sky beginning to clear like my head
after all that deep winter snow is thousands
of miles north and a million years from here
the flashbulbs start popping
as some celeb wanders by
catch his drunk eye
and without having to say so
he wished he could swap places with me
as the camera hounds followed him up the road
poor slob
lest a skeeter get 'cha
the echo
waited in the denver snow
and followed to the motel down on broadway
where she probably still waits for me
to come tapping on the door
but that town is far behind me
and for that im grateful
her thin pale white hand
trembles on your arm
and she looks up at you
with a clear desire to be heard
push your yesterday
but your strength waxes and wanes
as versions of yourself
echo down the wall
across the dew moist grass
Oct 24, 2013
Oct 24, 2013 at 8:41 PM UTC
Flashbulbs. Microphones.
A circus has invaded our home
And filled it with strange, jeering faces.
Reporters, you once called them.
And I remembered.
Avarice. Questions pour out of their incessant mouths.
Like a metronome invading my brain.
The thudding roar of my heart transforms their gibbering mouths into a silent movie.
Funny, I never knew you were famous.
With a jaunt in my step
And my smile fixed in place
I saunter away to my room to weep.
I throw in a skip.
You would have applauded my decorum.
I fantasize that the mask slips off my face
And shatters onto the floor.
What a mess. Someone should clean that up.
And a reporter asks me, "Excuse me, little girl, did you drop your face?"
To which I have no answer.
Fast forward 5 days to
Labyrinthine hallways
Filing cabinets for the dead.
My tiny footsteps resonate in that pristine expanse
Though you no longer walk with me.
How can it be
That I can only remember you
As a wisp of smoke
On a fickle breeze?
I am only 10, and yet I know.
That I will dream of your loving touch
Your silken voice.
Your gentle way.
But not from memory.
I will weave this tapestry of imagination
So strongly, So warmly
That it will provide permanent shelter
From the bitter chill of your ghost.
From the truth of you.
I smile once more as I leave that space
Of ineffable loneliness.
Why not?
All is well again.
You would have been proud.
For it was you who taught me to lie.
It was you who taught me to fear.
And it was you who taught me to forget.
Mother.
Jan 2, 2013
Jan 2, 2013 at 3:06 AM UTC
details slip through busy fingers
but still warm the wistful touch
and time over-exposes memory
like a photograph left in the sun
so I don't recall what you wore
or the music we played that day
or where we were driving from
or the photographer counting down...
but I remember the flashbulbs when you held me:
the way they spun your hair gold
and star-bursted my vision
like we were the models of love
and this is picture proof
that the sunlight captured our moment
and I haven't forgotten what you said,
"write a poem about this."
Dec 10, 2016
Dec 10, 2016 at 10:51 PM UTC
The oscars are a few hours away
For some it'll be quite the day
All dressed up in their favourite attire
Ready to set the red carpet on fire
It will be a starry affair
Some will experiment with fashion and choose to dare
Flashbulbs and interviews will be the order of the day
While the sun shines the broadcasters will make hay
The nominations are once again a white affair
Makes everyone want to question and stare
The nominees will all be here
The crowd and the audience will cheer
But in the end it is the winner who will give that speech and shed a tear
When the winners' speeches get long
The men with the violins start to play their song
Later the victors will pose with their awards
For the hard work they put in it will be for them deserving rewards
Just wish for the awards to be filled with a little bit more diversity
It would only strengthen everyone's belief in equality
Feb 28, 2016
Feb 28, 2016 at 3:26 PM UTC
the chandelier in the Venetian Room
crystallized tears, perfectly shaped
and transparent
alive with the glow of ancient candles
reflected on mirror walls
I hear the mirrored gaiety
of well-clad people
imaginary music playing softly
ancient tunes
keen flashbulbs working
to transfix the moment
I remember the separating laughter
in the downstairs hall
bland smiles and secret glances
words unspoken
occasions pass into history
possibilities remain
forever
"And how rewarding to have had all
of you here with us!"
Hugs, taxis, kisses, busses
early breakfast
"Write to me", " Send me
the photographs"
"Of course"
Mar 18, 2015
Mar 18, 2015 at 10:09 AM UTC
now that I am in my seventh or eight decade,
(not particularly sure when you start counting)
memories bust out like the flashbulbs on olden cameras,
briefly bright as hell, illuminating and annoying as hell,
this flash came to me this morning and don’t know why,
but it was worthy of writing down for no particular reason.
when I was a child in one of those indistinguishable early grades,
my teacher informed my father at an annual parent teacher partee,,
that I was “not particularly smart,” which angered him greatly.
He went home undecided whom to hide (1) p,
the teacher or hide me.
unsure, he was, which was the smarter course of action
(for my mother had passed and he without a consultant),
but informed me, who promptly hid (as in escaped)
in the only place suitable in our tiny house, behind the couch,
that was my mother’s pride an joy.
more tired than angry, he reflected while sitting on said couch,
listening to my breathing/panting, he decided that perhaps
the teacher was kerrect, and furthermore, I was not to blame,
(told to me years later by his serious drinking buddies)
“given the stock he came from, it was less my fault, and more his.”
this too, is only a love poem…
(1) hide as hiding, a countable noun, if you give someone a hiding, you punish them by hitting them many times).
Mar 25, 2023
Mar 25, 2023 at 3:38 PM UTC
The man who
can barbecue some
poor dumb animal
Fix your car
put up a shelf
for the romantic books
piled on your floor.
I am not that man.
I am not that man
to carry you over
thresholds garnered
in new gold and tiled
from byzantine shores.
I am not that man
you dream of
dripping money and
diamonds
flashbulbs popping
your every red woven
glide coiffed and coutoured
I am not that man
I am real
May 4, 2016
May 4, 2016 at 1:12 AM UTC
Flashbulbs light, an inspiration for the lion in the enclosure who then dies, too much exposure for the king.
That's the thing,
we want it all, can't live without it, then we get it and the paparazzi come to knock upon our door, it's such a shock, but then we die to lay or lie beside a king who didn't do a single thing and that's the thing.
Apr 28, 2015
Apr 28, 2015 at 4:36 AM UTC
I can't be certain when it happened.
The day the moment or the year.
I suppose in the end it doesn't really matter
The outcome will inevitably be the same
I wish I could somehow go back and change the script
erase a few lines here, cross out a chapter or two there
redefine my story
Streamline it to be just how I imagined
I always admired it when I saw it
that way it has of turning a person into brightness
the light you just can't help but notice
As if a thousand stars are twinkling relentlessly just beneath their skin
I swear I had it too
one moment I could feel the steady pull of it pulsing through my limbs
burning me on the inside
you know the kind of heat I mean
the kind that walks that fine line between pain and pleasure
like you're staring into fire that you can't help be mesmerized by..
still knowing that at any moment you could turn your hand
to the cheerful crackling and feel the deceit as it bleeds angrily into your skin.
It burns in that satisfying way of a just healing sunburn across your shoulders
tender and raw enough that you can feel every ounce of your vulnerability
But you can also feel your resiliency. your ability to heal
And it reminds you of how the torched sand felt beneath your shoulders
And all you can see is the sun on the back of your eyelids
like a desert of fire the stretches the span of a lifetime
And suddenly it doesn't seem so bad
It's not important what it came from
back when it was this fragile, breakable thing
What's important is the twisty sinister path it took to get there
It could have been my naivety
my refusal to acknowledge as my vulnerability turned so eerily into a condescension that dripped like honey from an equally naive paw
But here's the thing, our lives are only a series of moments.
One moment, or a thousand, that have the potential to change your life, if you let it.
Flashbulbs exploding constantly. Light so dazzling that if we took the time to stop and examine the endless possibilities within each one, we'd almost certainly be blinded.
The problem is that each moment is so easily forgotten or misimagined.
Neatly packaged away and efficiently lost in the trenches of time.
Like I said.
I don't know when it happened
The day the moment or the year
but I know what it felt like
and I know it's worth it.
Sep 19, 2014
Sep 19, 2014 at 3:07 AM UTC
obscured by ink
only wide eyes
and an outline
lightning
popping
like hot flashbulbs
I fumble
in darkness
for a key
before
he
flies away
Whit Howland © 2019
Sep 28, 2019
Sep 28, 2019 at 7:24 AM UTC
the lightning tonight, when it came
was hidden behind the clouds
like old fashioned flashbulbs
those boxy ones, we used to steal
and setoff under the bedsheets
the rain came and went
in a windblown front
pasing through without
taking the heat from the ground
just making the evening more humid
the thunder lived up to expectations
loud and growling at the world
but brief like a dog called to heel
now it has passed out to sea
and the water drips from the leaves
and the humidity continues to rise
Feb 11, 2018
Feb 11, 2018 at 7:54 AM UTC