"garrote" poems
You will be argonaut
one more of the supernumerary
trodding upon the cindered ones
come before you
limbs wooden and somite
encircling a moon
tumescent and blue
in permafrost garrote
on constellations edge
tottering over synapse
mocking
like a mime on highwire
your guilt
lupine in its longing
sawtooth timberline in vivisect night
down promontory
to frozen wave
the broken spoke of your step
on sleetslick carapace
past the preterit
embalmed hide of the world
into the silent millstone
berserk
to return emptyhanded
and changed
Nov 9, 2012
Nov 9, 2012 at 2:36 AM UTC
While waiting at the river Styx, in twisted time untaught,
from branches of the gallows tree, in recollections wrought,
your soul, a beggar’s blanket, hangs in crazy quilted knots,
with dangling pearls and diamond studs in dripping crimson clots,
midst gaping wounds and bulging eyes like fouling apricots,
for wrapped like rope around your throat’s the Reaper’s grim garrote.
Mar 23, 2017
Mar 23, 2017 at 9:48 PM UTC
Meeting you was like an assassination
The moment you spoke
I felt the recoil
Point blank shot between the eyes
In one instant I was alone
Plenty sufficient at self-mutilation
I was content
To wander alone in my own thoughts
My personality cold
Chilled by the ice of the desolation
Of unreleased sorrow
One minute I am still
Content
Meandering hopelessly in my world
Then there was you
Your first word was a slug
Dressed in copper it sank in
Sending shockwaves through the gray matter
I took the hit
My skull accepting the whiplash and allowing me
Some semblance of strength to move
I had no chance to heal before I was hit again
Your touch was electric
A million volts multiplied by the fluid
That is your glowing stare
The sound of my name on your tongue
Becomes a garrote
Taking my breath from my lungs
I can’t speak in your presence
All that I was because to die away
The lonely man who sought shelter
In the desert of loneliness
Blown away
Bleeding out in the back of my mind
All who I thought I was
Gone
In the blink of a muzzle flash
Meeting you was like an assassination
The man I was
Destroyed
Some other man sauntered off that day
Someone I don’t know yet
But am striving to figure out
Dec 6, 2013
Dec 6, 2013 at 1:55 PM UTC
60 seconds to go
My heart is pumping a marathon
Each beat a new threat to explode
Hitting me like a dozen syringes
Call the coroner
Cause of Death:
Adrenaline Overdose
45 seconds
I practice every coming moment
In my mind
Every mistake hits me at once
The imagination humiliation
Acts just like a garrote
My every breath is strained
Lungs burning, full of embers
White out the death certificate
New cause of death:
Suffocation
30 seconds
My flight or fight goes haywire
Yet I can do neither
The walls start moving
This room threatens to be my tomb
It is too late to fight
This demise is of my own accord
I want to fly
Yet my wings are clipped
Retract the obit
I fell to my doom
15 more
I hear my doom approaching
It calls to me
Every syllable shocks my system
A jolt to remind me that I'm going to fail
I shudder with every word
I close my eyes, pray
Count the seconds until doomsday
Cause of death:
Fear
10 seconds
I take a breath
9
It stays
8
I stand up to face the onslaught
7
I walk toward doom
6
My breath fights its way out
Only 5
Climbing fear turns to steady panic
4 more
Another heart attack hits
3
Another breath
2
Out
1
I step forward
The lights hit
The fear vanishes
I am no longer dead
Alive
The crowd before me resuscitates me
Every line I dropped in my head
Landed with precise expertise
Each cue struck
Every scene played to perfection
Cancel the death notice
On this stage
I am revived
Apr 4, 2015
Apr 4, 2015 at 7:30 PM UTC
a poem written at 5 AM - no sleep that night
seen too many faces
melting into backdrops,
concrete boxes
where gray air
paint lungs gay,
where diamonds
fall too ******
frequently
blurring the windows
of colorless rooms,
tiny rooms,
that suffocate,
garrote
and wash the trees
and the flowers
into frail state,
where the moon
is nothing,
just a ***** coin,
where the dogs
howl and howl,
cry and cry,
in agony,
where everyone
is lost,
them you and me,
lost
Jul 6, 2013
Jul 6, 2013 at 7:22 AM UTC
Señor Rasch Isla, vuestro verbo es
en este duelo lírico y sutil,
un puñal florentino y señoril
para el bajo garrote montañés.
¿A qué abajar el estro, si los tres
contendores son gente del redil,
y a vuestra Musa ni con otros mil
de la su laya lléganle a los pies?
A la verdad señor que hacéis muy mal.
Se os puede perdonar en el ojal
el uso rastacuero del clavel;
mas dejar el Olimpo sin razón,
por zurrar tres poetas del montón,
¡es algo imperdonable, don Miguel!
831
There’s no arguing that idealism has its place,
For if it does not flower, bloom, and spread its seeds
As the dying dandelion casts downy remnants hither and yon,
Then we have wept our tears and trodden in funereal processions
In pursuit of nothing more tangible than the wind itself.
That said, my boys, we shan’t live out our days
In some misty fairyland where the streams run with single-malt
And the trees are heavy with lamb and rashers;
This world can be a bitter, unpleasant place
(The unconditional love of mankind
Being the sole province of Our Saviour)
Where a man will give his wife a quick peck goodbye,
Then give a swift kick to a limping puppy sitting on the stoop,
Or the kindly veterinary will raise a lovely mouse
Just below his missus’ right eye
Upon returning from his local on a Friday night.
That ‘s the game as it’s played on this pitch,
And injury time has a whole new meaning here, lads,
For many’s the striker who is carried off
With pennies over his eyes.
Again, we have no quibble with Locke, Voltaire,
And the rights of man,
But know this: your leaflets will tear and blow away,
And speeches which roll through Parliament and trade union halls
Like great thunderstorms which blow in from the North Sea
Shall fade into the silence of minutes bound and shelved away
In some corner of the vast library of the forgotten.
You may shun the handwork of Messrs. Lee and Enfield,
Simpering that the rifle is the gavel of the coward,
That the garrote plays the music of the ******
Tell us, then, where the bravery lies in scribbling crimson prose
While ensconced in the warmth and safety of your rooms,
What dignity is gained by meekly dropping your gaze
When confronted by the stare of the Black and Tans?
There is no valor in sighting down windmills.
Feb 7, 2017
Feb 7, 2017 at 10:02 AM UTC
The magentine and orange yellow garrote of the twilight has yet to strangle the youth of Princeton, but it soon will. Sun sets over stockton and delphinus sits on the shelf of the sky next to the half moon ready to maurade over Marquand. Most of the store fronts, they shutter, a year closes in like a train in a tunnel and most do not know anything yet. Cannon and Tower boys do not go to Town anymore they go home to their Bay and Gables, their saltboxes ready for suburban consumption, for the dirt world of finance and brokerage, ready to pray their scandals are quickly smothered and they will be- meanwhile here sits youth, which drools in a corner, never to be invited by a bickeree again, watching the low shrubs and mafia graveyards of Linden parade through the train window, a melded scene like a watercolor. The limestone walls of Princeton sit up straight in vigilance, the heavy doors shut along with the adolescene and the stores. The sun sets over Stockton and rises over Beekman.
Jun 17, 2016
Jun 17, 2016 at 8:40 AM UTC
I thought I was the only one
To have these reproaching regrets of not staying in touch
It happens to be a story device we've seen too much
We make everything remote
Finishing this bad habit with a garrote
Is not the most pleasant portion of our lives
But the hammer has to come down somehow
We don't want to be sitting on a table asking ourselves why we didn't try when they were alive.
Jul 20, 2018
Jul 20, 2018 at 5:22 PM UTC
I went to hell last night
to sign my death warrant
to trade my soul to Satan
all for this one woman
Love pushes me to devotion
Desire's burning brighter than my ambition
Future's falling and road is scary
but neither disturbs me
She pokes me with trident, that's fine
She pours me with hot hater, that's fine
garrote, gun and guillotine
name it all, pain's nothing
Love of various apparitions
forged by individual opinions
midnight calls for liberty
yes, i'm truly happy.
Oct 16, 2018
Oct 16, 2018 at 2:29 AM UTC
No sé hasta dónde irán los pacificadores con su ruido metálico de paz
pero hay ciertos corredores de seguros que ya colocan pólizas
contra la pacificación
y hay quienes reclaman la pena del garrote para los que no quieren ser pacificados
cuando los pacificadores apuntan por supuesto tiran a pacificar
y a veces hasta pacifican dos pájaros de un tiro
es claro que siempre hay algún necio que se niega a ser pacificado por la espalda
o algún estúpido que resiste la pacificación a fuego lento
en realidad somos un país tan peculiar
que quien pacifique a los pacificadores un buen pacificador será.
357
A garrote, tightening around my blackened lungs
I was drowning
I had drowned.
Like ****** searing pain through my veins
I was falling
I had fallen.
Tar, filling my mouth with poison and lies
I was choking
I had choked.
His light was like the first gasp of air after holding your breath.
I was changing
I am changed.
Sep 6, 2019
Sep 6, 2019 at 1:27 PM UTC
Somedays I choose the extreme
go beyond the edge of this dream
embrace the nightmare of the beyond
seek a shadow to dwell upon
I put on the jacket and cinch the shoes
tie the garrote around my neck
walk to the edge to plunge within
all these rules I must endure
now I'm the model of self-repose
normality set with the perfect taint
these goals I set for myself
exclude the spirit of sanity
grasping the ring made of brass
allows decorum to be the boss
a straitjacket to bring in the bucks
now life’s harmony is justly forced
this balance leaning toward the right
the rule of order becomes the crux
for noose set just right
against a neck offered to the crowd
the Hangman gives a nod
the job well done is for the best
comfort found in absolutes
sacrifice for the greater good.
© 2018. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20181109.
Nov 9, 2018
Nov 9, 2018 at 7:44 PM UTC