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Dylan D Jan 2011
Masterpieces nailed to the sides of train cars
As they pass it becomes a flipbook
Made of names so grotesquely caricatured
(down to every last tittle and tisten)
They would become beauty through definitions
Written themselves.

It is scrawled onto napkins
Hoisted over the neon city
Crudely lined and curved into cardboard signs
Lofted between vagrant fingers that hadn’t touched a green thing in years.

Safety in the colors
Born from the rust of the river which runs when we walk
And fermented through years of gunfire
Which coincidentally spell out our names between the holes
And deteriorate when obscured by some passing train cars
That I cannot help but to stop and admire.

This flipbook of broken law and clever rebellion
In its own right, a masterpiece in pieces
In its terrible condemnation, erased
And the artist dies again.
ching Dec 2012
We’re here again; an unfortunate collection of the past couple mornings.
The newest montage to carpe diem.
Our unbroken rhythms of montage blend danger with safe.
But we lack the caution for a montage of bacon and eggs.
This collage again; these unstrangered floral plates.
Doctor says one montage a day keeps the bad bad times away.
But he said that half-past yesterday.
rayma Dec 2021
we've been here before, you and i.
it was raining outside.
i cried for a while and had cake for dinner.
it was the night i didn't drown.

the moments fall together in flipbook photos:
swollen knuckles,
pills in hand,
never enough blood.

i would hold a pocket knife just tight enough.
i would study it,
imagine the sharp kiss of metal against my skin.
and then i would put it away and cry myself to sleep.

we became wonderful dance partners, you and i.
we could rise and fall with the music;
i would lift myself up and wait for you to tear me back down.
i learned to adapt.
swell to crescendo, fancy yourself untouchable,
then fall
              fall
                   fall.

the steps became familiar.
i knew them by heart,
falling into step like it had become tradition.
find the space to release it all,
and watch as it slowly builds back up.

but they changed the rhythm on us.
for all the adapting we can do – you and i –
can we truly adapt to this?
it makes you wonder how far there is to fall,
and if we ever really fell before now.

perhaps some day we'll rise.
maybe this is just a hiccup, a misstep;
you lowered me into a dip and i am patiently waiting for the fall to end.

i can't wait to never hear this song again.
when your regular depression meets pandemic depression, something in the song changes
hkr Apr 2017
in my dream, i eat dinner with your family. except, they don’t look like your family until you sit down across the table. then, they all grow faces: your mom, your dad, and your three brothers. their wives are also at the table and, when you say mrs. kennedy, we all turn to look at you. now you look at me like i just grew a face, too, then at my hands; i have a diamond ring on every finger of each hand. you grab me by the elbow and drag me away from the table. you pull out a flipbook of all the girls you’ve slept with, all tall brunettes like me. then there’s actually me, on my back and on my knees and on top of you. look, you finally admit, i only wanted to *******. i wake up.

in my next dream, we eat lunch at a table outside with your children. there are four of them: a tall japanese boy, a little black girl, and a set of freckled, white fraternal twins. they are all named john, like your father, even the girls. the boy twin is on a leash but, when he tries to run into oncoming traffic, you let him. they’re not really your kids, anyway. they’re the babies your ex’s carried to term to try to make you stay. it didn’t work, you say, like it’s something to be proud of. i don’t want to have your kids, anyway, i am reminding you, when the boy comes limping back screaming mommy. i wake up.

in my last dream, you eat breakfast in bed with your new girl. she smiles with her entire mouth. her face is stuck like that, top teeth cemented to bottom teeth. she laughs at your jokes through the enamel. wanna go for round two? you ask and she answers you like yeth. she gets on her knees and you push her head down to **** you off, your **** banging against those teeth. open up, babe, you say, open up. she can’t. i sleep through the night.
dichotomous Sep 2020
i dont remember writing your birthday on my calander
but i don't see why i should
when the point of having it there in the first place
is so i don't have to remember these important dates
rather, just how to read a chart
but August 27th was always your square
even before i drew candles in the corner
and i dont need a flipbook to tell me how to remember
the anniversary of someone like you
still i wish you'd remember mine

maybe you should try writing it down
its december 30th
dafne Feb 2016
It always happened around two am, with the illumination of the moonlight seeping through the cracks of the blinds that could seemingly cover the sunlight but never the moonlight. The feeling of wanting to stitch tears back together. Tears falling, his sleepy voice questioning motives for crying. My reply, always “I don’t know.” It was everything all at once. A flipbook exposing every possibility of problem or memory, every significant, stitch able event. It was reality staining the once blank muslin pages with black ink, seeping into the fibers. Fantasy kicking, screaming, denying, tearing pages into pieces that would take eternities to sew.
intro to personal narrative
ibwib Nov 2019
mind, a flipbook
alternating stories

soul, a river,
storm and rage

roar and battle
love and hate

one for me
one for the fake

but it dies down

for moments in time
against a picture for mind
a lake for soul

and they forget.

but only a moment,
the others won't allow

we must roar and battle
for now
must I complicate
and so contemplate

fate?

— The End —