"forefinger" poems
even I am puzzled that this phrase
did not prior
tickle my contronymic
poetic senses till now,
for what is tender is of not always legal,
and what is legal is far far from
always tender
<>
tender/tenderness
gotta rank in my 10 top fav
words,
nothing transforms
swifter than an
unexpected kiss,
a hug from behind,
the light(ing) stroke of a forefinger,
brushing a tear from cheek,
an errant bang, a lock from vision interference,
All Super Legal
gracefully given,
gratefully received,
Wholly Unexpected,
and
great~fully
tenderly!
Accepted*
<>
thinking that this maybe one of my
top 11 fav poems
~>
mmmmmmmmmmm
that's the sound
of me purring...
Jul 11, 2025
Jul 11, 2025 at 12:30 PM UTC
Smoke signals from a silent cigarette
float to the heavens and linger
in the mucky conscience of regret
resting on the temple, my forefinger
Thumb lifted to expose
a metaphorical gun
countenance in prose
staring at a midnight sun
When will that monster again ****
another that I love,
Why did I so feel
like I could best the powers from above
I created a ghastly Adam
and I dare not create an innocent Eve
my future I cannot fathom
all time left to grieve
I will chase this gruesome snake
no matter where it slithers
across Hell's frozen lake
this calamity summons me hither
My final and only ambition
is to cast a life to silence
his and my cognition
will clash and bite in violence
I created a monster
and a monster created me
Madness! How it so saunters
and wails as if a banshee
Look over on the frozen horizon
a horrid shadow stalks
I, a fire stealing Titan
will march out to solve this paradox
Oct 10, 2018
Oct 10, 2018 at 8:57 AM UTC
Diaspora
From the Greek
When I heard the word I felt it
And I looked it up
In my old red dictionary
I could have used the Internet,
I suppose
But I like to run my forefinger down pages
Of words
I read the definition
And I felt it
Oh
Oh
We are diaspora.
Am I using it correctly?
We are a diaspora.
Diaspora
From the Greek
From the green valley of Ottawa
From Scotland
From Ireland on wooden boats
From the French village thirteen children
From the mines in the North
From Poland and from Germany
From the churches and
From the Blueberry patches
From the Island Manitoulin
From the dark lake Kagawong
From Kinburn and Arnprior
From Markstay and from Sudbury
From Waterloo
From Kitchener, Michener
From the Suburbs
Oh
From the Suburbs
From the red bricks, red currants
And geraniums
From green island cabins
From the desert
Oh
From the desert
From the potholes and pipes
From the salty wind
Cracked Caspian Sea
From the middle of the east of nowhere.
From the mountains
Oh
From the mountains
From the crystal water fountains
From the tram bells
On the cobblestone streets
From the torrents of the Rhein
From the white cross
Oh
From the white cross
On the green hill
From the river Laurence
From the French and from the English
Plains of Abraham
We are diaspora
We are a diaspora
Diaspora
From the Greek
How did it end up here on my tongue?
It is diaspora.
It is a diaspora
Diaspora is a diaspora
And I wonder if it misses its other pieces
The way that I miss mine
Ours
There is no
Roping us back together now
There is no
Home to go back to
There is no
Point of meeting
Of reunion
No
White steeple in our old town
No
Yellow slide in our backyard
No
Old folks on an old farm
No
Walled house on a hill
No
Luzernerring 93
No
Familiar riverwater
There is no
Ancient Greek anymore
Diaspora
Only fragments of fragments
Of roots of stems of words
In different dialects
There is no
Place for you to belong,
Diaspora
You’ve been sliced to pieces
And scattered
Into the wind
But
When people ask you
Where you are from
You say simply
From the Greek
Oh
From the Greek
And
When people ask me
Where I am from
I say simply
From the diaspora.
Oct 19, 2015
Oct 19, 2015 at 10:50 AM UTC
tempest aroused weather throws a crink in the atmospheric pressure,
sun lazy long weekend planned rejuvenation, disrupted,
all day rain and wind gusts
that whitecap/kneecap
the river-fed bay forcing a
couch-curling up, a doozey dozy,
cozy writable assessment, a
tempting
answered with
positivity
close your eyes and all that can be felt
is memorized by your
forefinger cells,
a stroking upward gesture,
your stroking. your finger.
the children you have brought
into this difficult place
and a woman’s face as she rests uneasy and needs calming
but the memory of your own cheek as a living fired thing
being stroked is a gone,
because it was not frequent enough,
is longer than long past than what matters now
my pointer finger remembers though
pointer finger points at my chest
stoking, pushing,
what does your artistic heart remember?
Jul 8, 2018
Jul 8, 2018 at 8:53 PM UTC
When I walked in to biology class a couple days back,
I found a gum wrapper
sitting on my desk.
It was torn in half, with the remaining piece folded
right side over left.
It became apparent that someone had left it there,
deeming it unimportant.
As I sat there in biology class, bored as hell,
I began to twirl that little piece of paper
between my fingers.
All of the Wrigley's, printed across the outside,
became acquainted with the space between
my thumb and forefinger.
But when the wrapper fell from my grasp
and on to the floor, I realized
how easy it was
to let it.
Hours could pass, even days,
and no one would bother to look
at the crumpled piece of paper
sitting on the floor.
When I extended my foot to guide it
back within my reach, it came to me
how appealing the green box of recycling
looked too.
Here was a gum wrapper, an inanimate object
of no apparent value, forgotten by a student.
But it was not the breaking of the no gum rule
where things went wrong.
The real prize, most would argue,
was within the wrapper.
The rest should be trash.
But, despite the laws of recycling,
the wrapper was left here,
sitting on my desk,
in biology class.
I decided to pick it up.
May 5, 2014
May 5, 2014 at 1:16 AM UTC
It is snowing and death bugs me
as stubborn as insomnia.
The fierce bubbles of chalk,
the little white lesions
settle on the street outside.
It is snowing and the ninety
year old woman who was combing
out her long white wraith hair
is gone, embalmed even now,
even tonight her arms are smooth
muskets at her side and nothing
issues from her but her last word - "Oh." Surprised by death.
It is snowing. Paper spots
are falling from the punch.
Hello? Mrs. Death is here!
She suffers according to the digits
of my hate. I hear the filaments
of alabaster. I would lie down
with them and lift my madness
off like a wig. I would lie
outside in a room of wool
and let the snow cover me.
Paris white or flake white
or argentine, all in the washbasin
of my mouth, calling, "Oh."
I am empty. I am witless.
Death is here. There is no
other settlement. Snow!
See the mark, the pock, the pock!
Meanwhile you pour tea
with your handsome gentle hands.
Then you deliberately take your
forefinger and point it at my temple,
saying, "You suicide *****
I'd like to take a corkscrew
and ***** out all your brains
and you'd never be back ever."
And I close my eyes over the steaming
tea and see God opening His teeth.
"Oh." He says.
I see the child in me writing, "Oh."
Oh, my dear, not why.
3.9k
*I touched your face
~ today*
I drew
the fingers of
my right hand
down slowly,
gently along
the left side
of your
beautiful
face
I cupped your dainty chin
between thumb and forefinger
I willed with all my energy that
you might feel my touch and hear
my heart whisper your name -
"my darling little bird"
~
and I heard you softly say my name ...
"ant..."
"stay with me ant..."
"don't leave me, please..."
I heard you say that
~ today
when I touched
your beautiful face
in my favourite photograph of you.
Jul 27, 2015
Jul 27, 2015 at 5:28 AM UTC
My back touched the fabric
of the couch
as I slouched and tilted my head.
I let my elbow fell on the armchair
as my thumb flew between my lips
and my teeth perched on its flesh.
My forefinger
ran back and forth, restlessly,
on my nose bridge
as I inhaled the details
of your head thrown backward,
your hair suspended in midair.
some strands draping down your chest,
your mouth half open,
your secret self and your entire being
all seducing my peripheral vision.
Apr 30, 2013
Apr 30, 2013 at 6:08 PM UTC
375
The Angle of a Landscape—
That every time I wake—
Between my Curtain and the Wall
Upon an ample Crack—
Like a Venetian—waiting—
Accosts my open eye—
Is just a Bough of Apples—
Held slanting, in the Sky—
The Pattern of a Chimney—
The Forehead of a Hill—
Sometimes—a Vane’s Forefinger—
But that’s—Occasional—
The Seasons—shift—my Picture—
Upon my Emerald Bough,
I wake—to find no—Emeralds—
Then—Diamonds—which the Snow
From Polar Caskets—fetched me—
The Chimney—and the Hill—
And just the Steeple’s finger—
These—never stir at all—
3.1k
i keep your
Love
in my back pack
it rattles around
slaps against
my math and communication textbooks
i take it out
; ; ; when i see happy
couples on campus
and i spread it on my palms
like {lotion~~~
it leaves my hands
glittery
and very soft.
I keep your
LOvE
in my pocket.
it jingles and jangles
against my keys and my hairbinders and an old bracelet that broke [[[i'll put it back together eventually.}
I like to
I like to stick
I like to stick my fingertips
in there.
and swirl your love
between my thumb and
,forefinger,
some
sometimes i pull it out
and i
smear it on my
eyelids
so everyone will know why my eyes shine
Sep 12, 2011
Sep 12, 2011 at 10:59 AM UTC
I have opened up my mouth
and taken out a spare pair
of butterfly wings
(pinched between thumb
and forefinger),
used-to-be-dusty but now
slightly damp from their
place of residence.
I dried them myself,
striking match after match
and holding each underneath,
close,
but not too close.
Instead of drying they
shrivelled up like petals
after leaving the flower.
As if to preserve warmth,
curling inwards,
they shivered, animated
by the heat of the glowing stick.
The flame got too close
to my fingers. I dropped it,
swearing. Pinched the wings too
hard (reflexes), the membrane
broke between my fingers
and the remnants
of freedom fluttered softly
to the ground.
Sep 27, 2014
Sep 27, 2014 at 7:06 AM UTC
I pop off my scalp like the lid of a cookie jar.
It's the secret place where I keep all my dreams.
Little ***** of sunshine, all rubbing together like a bundle of kittens
I reach inside with my thumb and forefinger and pluck one out.
It's warm and tingly.
But there's no time to waste! I put it in a bottle to keep it safe.
And I put the bottle on the shelf with all of the other bottles.
Happy thoughts, happy thoughts, happy thoughts in bottles, all in a row.
My collection makes me lots of friends.
Each bottle a starlight to make amends.
Sometimes my friend feels a certain way.
Down comes a bottle to save the day.
Night after night, more dreams.
Friend after friend, more bottles.
Deeper and deeper my fingers go.
Like exploring a dark cave, discovering the secrets hiding in the nooks and crannies.
Digging and digging.
Scraping and scraping.
I blow dust off my bottle caps.
It doesn't feel like time elapsed.
My empty shelf could use some more.
My friends look through my locked front door.
Finally, all done. I open up, and in come my friends.
In they come, in such a hurry. Do they want my bottles that much?
I frantically pull them from the shelf, one after the other.
Holding them out to each and every friend.
Each and every bottle.
But every time I let one go, it shatters against the tile between my feet.
Happy thoughts, happy thoughts, happy thoughts in shards, all over the floor.
They were supposed to be for my friends, my friends who aren't smiling.
They're all shouting, pleading. Something.
But all I hear is echo, echo, echo, echo, echo
Inside my head.
Mar 13, 2019
Mar 13, 2019 at 5:29 PM UTC
there are three things you know
i.
you reach into your incorporeal chest
and cradle the bird behind your ribs.
forming a gentle cage of your hands.
you bring the red-chested red-breast to your lips
and tuck the fearful creature under your tongue.
ii.
blood-crimson feathers are spilling
from between your teeth like
cherry blossoms that carpet the corridors
of your weary mind and
scar-crossed thoughts.
iii.
your fingers are wine-dark with wanting
and an unnamed, silent thing
akin to fear tears tightening paths
through your skin,
hidden by the cold
and half-formed excuses.
the official story is that you
fell.
you didn't, not in the way they thought you meant.
you'll spit out the truth one day,
choking on summer-scented feathers
and small, pink flowers that you'll
crush between thumb and forefinger
in denial of this fear.
h.f.m.
Sep 10, 2018
Sep 10, 2018 at 11:33 AM UTC
She is like an indie film played backwards, just a bunch of beautiful pictures.
And her eyes roll like rizla between the italian mans fingers.
She smokes with pouted lips, as if ready to kiss her lover.
She looks the same when he pulls on her hair and glides his tongue over the skin of her neck.
And she smiles the same smile when his teeth graize her *******
Her eyes also roll when his hands hold onto her waist and she remembers the lipstick stain she left on the end of her cigarette.
She leaves the same stain on the rim of his .... forefinger.
‘I don’t know why I like you so much.’ He whispers into her curls.
‘It’s because I remind you of hash and tobacco.’ She replies.
Dec 5, 2018
Dec 5, 2018 at 5:32 AM UTC
An old tale tells of a lady who wanders Earth.
The Lady who Knows Everything.
A beautiful lady who has found every answer,
All meaning,
All purpose,
And all that was ever sought.
And here I am,
a feather
Lost adrift the sky, victim of the currents of the wind.
Day after day, I search.
I search with little hope, knowing legends don't exist.
But when all else has failed me,
When all others have turned away,
The legend is all that remains – the last dim star glimmering in the twilit sky.
Until one day, the wind ceases to blow.
I fall.
And I fall and fall, and fall even more.
Gentle as a feather.
A dry quill, expressionless.
But a hand catches me, between the thumb and forefinger.
The hand of a beautiful lady.
I look at her eyes and find no end to her gaze.
The Lady who Knows Everything knows what I am thinking.
Before I can speak, she responds in a hollow voice.
"I have found every answer, all of which amount to nothing.
There is no meaning.
There is no purpose.
And we seek only the impossible.
I am not your legend.
Your legend does not exist."
And with a breath, she blows me back afloat, and I pick up a gust of wind.
Mar 6, 2019
Mar 6, 2019 at 4:29 PM UTC
Every breath pushed me further bobbing and blushing, rounder and tugging, seeking simply to soar. I could taste the breeze, the blue above - waiting, and as I stretched so did my smile.
But I was held unknotted only, oblivion teetering on the pinch of a thumb and forefinger. Until slowly but cynically, gasp by gasp, all was forced out, and when the moment came to go, there was nothing left to go on.
Jan 26, 2014
Jan 26, 2014 at 11:34 PM UTC
little lamb doing wolf damage
you watch me like prey
mouth open. drooling.
eyes filled to the brim with hunger.
i am filled to the brim and you can see it.
i’m blushing. bleeding.
you peel me like a plum.
plump and juicy in your palm. ripened you roll me
between your thumb and your forefinger.
squeeze out every last drop of sweetness.
still drooling over me. i am drooling over you.
i want to be eaten alive. anticipating it. dripping.
i am a forest and snails make their sticky paths down my thighs.
i am a forest and leaves bloom and swish as my fingernails grow.
i am a forest and branches grow in every place you touch. i am so big so tall so wise.
i grow and grow with each caress. birds fly out of my hair and sing love songs. my feet heady soil i am grounded. finally grounded.
i am a forest and you’re a seasoned explorer.
i am a forest and you’re the tiger stalking within my lushness for something to devour.
devour me.
i am tropical. i am palm trees and rare fruit. i am sap in your palms sticky and staying.
i am sitting open. staying open. i feel you crouch behind my reeds. you dig your claws deeper into wet soil.
you watch me like prey.
i watch myself dribble down your chin.
i am tropical. plum sweetness juice juice sticky sweet staying on fingertips staining your mouth.
i am coconuts cracked open on rocks ready ready to be consumed.
i am licked clean from ***** fingertips.
Mar 22, 2015
Mar 22, 2015 at 11:55 PM UTC
A FOREFINGER of stone, dreamed by a sculptor, points to the sky.
It says: This way! this way!
Four lions snore in stone at the corner of the shaft.
They too are the dream of a sculptor.
They too say: This way! this way!
The street cars swing at a curve.
The middle-class passengers witness low life.
The car windows frame low life all day in pictures.
Two Italian cellar delicatessens
sell red and green peppers.
The Florida bananas furnish a burst of yellow.
The lettuce and the cabbage give a green.
Boys play marbles in the cinders.
The boys' hands need washing.
The boys are glad; they fight among each other.
A plank bridge leaps the Lehigh Valley railroad.
Then acres of steel rails, freight cars, smoke,
And then ... the blue lake shore
...Erie with Norse blue eyes ... and the white sun.
1.9k
How could I forget,
The timid flower buds,
That bloom late spring,
And fill the plain meadows,
With a vibrancy of colour.
How could I forget,
To pluck one wilting stem,
From the blackest earth,
And keep it trapped,
Between my thumb,
And forefinger.
How could I forget,
To tear off the fragile petals,
And sing to myself,
As if I was still a child,
A song that allowed,
Not even fractured belief.
How could I forget,
He loves me not.
Apr 29, 2014
Apr 29, 2014 at 6:58 PM UTC
Packets of peace cordoned off by fences and barbed
wire, hooded lush in manicured fields.
Endless stream of labour crossing over water pikes:
hear, no see - river in the bush.
Emerges curved a mirror on a pole: three directions,
The three birds, tinier than my forefinger, eating grain.
Lisping away in the wood the warbler and the shrike.
Wild flower, pops out red from a corner
of the cultivated green: and I am...
Jul 30, 2014
Jul 30, 2014 at 11:37 PM UTC
I
My five-five-fingers of my hands
Zestfully lived In serenity.
The three thrill fingers of my right hand:
Thumb, index finger and middle finger
Stoutly lived civilly and gleefully
Amongst her BROTHERS:
They rested gleefully upon the placid,
SHARP-SABLE-POINTED-DART.
II
Sharp sable pointed-dart;
Perched in the midst of the three thrill fingers
And laid rest upon the hungry,
****** DUSKY-SHEET, which sprawled
Bear flat on the glossy desk.
The glossy desk accompanying the earth
The earth accompanying its depth.
III
The other two fingers of my right hand:
Ring finger and little finger
Calmly leisure, plopped on the hungry,
****** dusky-sheet
And lent ears to the Sharp-sable-pointed-dart,
Sharp-sable-pointed-dart,
Muttering vignettes of yesterday
Muttering vignettes of today
Muttering vegnettes of tomorrow.
Upon the glossy desk
My five fingers of my left hand too
Laid rest, and eyeballed the sharp-sable-pointed-dart,
Muttering deep thoughts.
IV
Look,
All you who waded through lines:
All you who unearth the heart
Of this earth, hunting for treasures
Pore over my ten fingers.
My ten fingers,
As pure as a full ****** moon.
I have dunked deep my five fingers
Of my right hand with my progenitors
In a bowl of sweet dishes
And nibbled singed YAMS amidst
The thriving vegetables.
V
But my forefinger of my left hand
Never been raised above
To curse the heavens
Never been raised up to pinpoint
My progenitors' homeland
Never had it tasted any depravity
And never will it be licked
Or bit by the savage butchers of Meat
Who loved to fatten themselves on ******
And gratified their heart with
Juicy cup of blood and gore.
Dec 2, 2016
Dec 2, 2016 at 4:34 AM UTC
a human tool, a drawing pencil, shedding snakeskin cells as
lead from no. 2 pencil
am **** and blood, skin and hairless,
all-to-come-to-go,
return retuned, at their own chosen speed,
gen of regeneration of disrupted oils and heavenly blessings,
morning cracks and orifices, filling and emptying obediently,
to the tidings of the grieving gravity of my moon’s decisions
that govern the lunatic cycle
you may kiss me with all your heart unto a robust welcoming,
scorn with spittle and deem unfit,
I know the difference and it is inconsequential
see me as combustible or flat, airless and empty,
as a new or a two day old leaking birthday balloon, or a haiku
that makes the reader gasp for the reasoning for breathing
think of me as a meme who responds to the touch of
your nippled forefinger, but my powers are unlisted,
therefore unlimited
for I am neither cyber or cypher though aesthetically they
appear as parts of my humanity, a human machine
forever reprogramming to new stimuli sensating,
the temperature of your breath, the many odors of you
as inputs that bear newborn children notions in
my chested gas chambers, the belligerent bellum bellies of my brain
my digital describe in thousands of computers do hide,
but to comprehend the interacting calculations that are
my constancy and my inconsistencies, you must make a tour
if you are awake between midnight and dawn when from
wells the visions, the fluids - the words are drawn
they, the residuals of a man’s *********** with
other humans, kin akin, and the thriving discourse between l,
man and parental gods of invisible powers, that offers insanity
as a viable solution, to cracking the codex human DNA
in the vial labelled Medusa
Who else?
Dec 18, 2017
Dec 18, 2017 at 10:24 PM UTC