"handprints" poems
I let different boys touch me
Because I wanted to know
Even for a second
What it felt like to be loved
Even if the love was cheap
And it tasted like ***
Like the punchline to a joke
I never got because it was me
I let different boys have different parts of me
Parts they didn't deserve
But I offered up willingly because I couldn't give anything else
after you broke me
I was looking for different fingers
to place different pieces and hoping the outcome
would be a masterpiece
Maybe one of them would find a way
to cover up the handprints you left all over me
I let different boys touch me because I had to prove to myself
you wouldn't be the only one
that these scars marking my body wouldn't define
my worth to be loved
I am not entirely sure
you aren't the only one who could ever touch me without slightly flinching
I let different boys touch me because that is all I have been taught
To be a joke
To be silent
To be ready to give until you have nothing left
- they keep leaving me and I am to scared to offer up anything more than my body to get them to stay
Jun 17, 2018
Jun 17, 2018 at 12:47 PM UTC
When she held me, I felt like an earthquake,
shrapnel cutting quick to the bone.
I’m disaster, an unknown
kind of danger is the most dangerous
When he held me, I felt like a riptide,
all control ran out the door.
With the *** and cappuccinos
I felt out of place in my new home
When she held me, I felt disgusting,
every move my own betrayal.
Yes, she hurt like a gunshot
but I did this to myself
When he held me, I felt strange,
like I should give my whole self.
He never asked, I’m thankful.
I don’t want to ruin everything else
When she held me, I felt like a secret,
like I was something small and wild.
In a room of screaming children,
we were something invincible
He never held me, but that’s alright.
Someone tell him I understand.
Take it slow, like we’re new friends.
I’m alive for once
No one touch me, I don’t want it.
Stop breathing down my neck.
My throat fills with *****
But the hands never rest
No one touch me, leave me alone.
Stop pressing on my back.
There are thumbprints on my wrist bones
and handprints on my thighs
Don’t touch me when you aren’t here.
So many years have passed.
Is it trauma? I don’t care.
The filthy feeling always lasts
Don’t touch me when you aren’t here.
Nobody ever has to know.
When you’re sitting by your lonesome
Nobody cares, you’re on your own
Nobody cares, you’re on your own
May 23, 2016
May 23, 2016 at 12:10 PM UTC
First glance, I’m a good Christian girl. But dark purple flecks decorate my neck.
In leather and lace I forget to pray and let you do what you want with me
because pain is complex and melded with pleasure.
Do you know what they say about girls that enjoy ***
They never dare to say it to my face but I can feel them staring from the pew
at the dark purple flecks that decorate my neck.
Your hands, more powerful than God, make the earth of my body quake
while I draw fault lines down your back with my nails under the broken
crucifix above your bed. The pain is complex and melded with pleasure.
Deep, growling voice shakes the dusty rosary on your nightstand when we ****
Your handprints are left on my flesh and the hand around my throat
leaves the dark purple flecks decorating my neck.
Coffee in the narthex and I’m labeled a harlot. Sinner. Sacrilegious. Branded as freaks…
Brush it off. I know what you like and how you like me. God will have mercy.
Sensations blend because pain is complex and melded with pleasure
and I can’t have one without the other. To reach our peak
you leave me red, marked and breathless, gasping, “Oh my God.”
Questioning my beliefs with dark purple flecks to decorate my neck,
I know pain will always be complex and melded with pleasure.
Nov 23, 2014
Nov 23, 2014 at 2:29 PM UTC
it should be noted that girls don't always come from venus, that some boys might be a little deader than they were before they claimed you took their breath away.
some girls have barbed wire around their hearts, and others have white flags. some boys have touched more cigarettes than thighs, more blades in the bathroom sink than the ones in her shoulders. the city might whisper the name of one boy and tremble at the thought of another; a girl might have a hit list with only one name on it — her own. some boys will **** just to say they lost their virginity and some boys will spend the rest of their lives making love as though they could gain it back; some girls have lost their tears and sweat in the upholstery of the same car that might belong to one of these boys — and some of those same boys are sweaty handprints on the backseat windows while others are fingerprints on your throat, but no matter how you look at it, he will always leave his mark, won't he?
it should be noted that some girls will miss you like hiroshima playgrounds miss the laughter of young children, but others will miss you like an 11:30 flight at 11:31, and i bet you never knew that some boys will never tell you that they miss their father just as much as some girls calling everyone else 'daddy' except for the one they truly need; you'd never believe me if i said that some girls look at the night sky where they used to see their reelection in the stars, but now only see another broken mirror.
it should be noted, that not all boys are from mars.
Nov 17, 2014
Nov 17, 2014 at 12:14 AM UTC
What a way to make a Love so Sweet
like a flower in a favorite movie scene...
Bodies draped in sugars and salt.
Souls covered in deep blanket of warmth and cold..
Shall engrave in her heart
Shall leave handprints of Love
Shall write poems in her stars..
then..
You smell her,
You touch her gently,
You admire the beauty,
You watch it blossom
and you thank God
for creating something
so... perfectly..
so... extraordinary..
-A.R.D.R.
Feb 1, 2019
Feb 1, 2019 at 10:56 AM UTC
longing
1. noun; a yearning desire
- i never used to be uncomfortable in my own bed. i knew your name before my rib cage started to sing it in my sleep. every night that has passed crosses itself off of a pocket-calendar that is stuck in the drawers of my chest. you move your favorite things into the empty spaces, you hang your worst fears up like clothes that are waiting to dry, you scratch how you love into the bedpost and put your handprints all over the walls. i can't take a deep breath without
hearing your voice in the refrain of my lungs.
yearnining
2. noun; a feeling of strong want or need
- the first time i heard your voice, it sounded exactly like what
your voice should sound like. soft, barely above a whisper, low
and confident and eager. when you spoke, i wanted
to cancel the outside noise of my breathing to listen to you. i wanted
to close my eyes and imagine that voice next to my ear, barely
above a whisper, low and confident and eager and right there
with both of our breathing suspended by its echo.
desire
3. noun; a strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen.
- every day it is something different. your eyes and how they
almost close when you smile. how your whole family has brown
eyes but you have bright blue ones that turn to gray as the
seasons wear on. your hands and how they look like you
should play an instrument, im saying *put those hands to
good use and find something to strum.* and we laugh because
you know what i mean. your laugh. it sounds like an answer
to a question i've been asking the silence.
give me someone to love like that. give me someone to love like that. give me-
like a call back from the
darkness. like, here he is in all of his glory and you
still can't have him.
Oct 3, 2017
Oct 3, 2017 at 2:42 PM UTC
We ****
I brushed her hair just
the other day
and left stinging
handprints on her
eager flesh like she
loves.
Loved her in an
undertow of
blankets and throes,
fullness and
folds
until the drums
pounded in my
ears and
the adrenaline
burned.
On altars,
in tombs,
the sabbats,
esbats and
moons.
We slap
each other
for fun;
she listens
when I tell
her to
.
I'm sure you and
your mate do just
fine,
but
we **** better
than all of you
combined.
Feb 25, 2015
Feb 25, 2015 at 8:15 PM UTC
It should be noted that girls don't always come from Venus, that some boys might be a little deader than they were before they claimed you took their breath away. Some girls have barbed wire around their hearts, and others have white flags. Some boys have touched more cigarettes than thighs, more blades in the bathroom sink than the ones in her shoulders. The city might whisper the name of one boy and tremble at the thought of another; a girl have a hit list with only one name on it — her own. Some boys will **** just to say they lost their virginity and some boys will spend the rest of their lives making love as though they could gain it back; some girls have lost their tears and sweat in the upholstery of the same car that might belong to one of these boys — and some of those same boys are sweaty handprints on the backseat windows while others are fingerprints on your throat (no matter how you look at it, he will always leave his mark, won't he?)
It should be noted that some girls will miss you like Hiroshima playgrounds miss the laughter of young children, but others will miss you like an 11:30 flight at 11:31, and I bet you never knew that some boys will never tell you that they miss their father just as much as some girls calling everyone else Daddy except for the one they truly need; you'd never believe me if I said that some girls look at the night sky where they used to see their reelection in the stars, but now only see another broken mirror.
It should be noted, that not all boys are from Mars.
Jan 9, 2014
Jan 9, 2014 at 3:24 PM UTC
Handprints I left on the window of the homemade bread factory
When I was thirteen years of age.
That was my time of adolescent memory,mixed with moral decay.
My father had left me, mother was sold out to *** pills, and her grave.
I was a fiber bug to the world of technology,
Just trying to escape.
The homemade bread factory was Nana's. My daddy's mother.
Me and Nana cooked real Mexicali dishes, made butterfly catches, and dream catchers to go with my teen wishes.
Nana's house was the bread factory.
The factory no longer up and runs.
How I miss Nana, her cooking, her being momma and daddy both.
I miss Nana's love the most,
How our Nana's can be daddy and mother at the same time.
Gods gift to any grandbaby.
Rest
Peacefully sweet Nana
R.I.p
Maria boudega conshito.
Oct 11, 2015
Oct 11, 2015 at 1:17 PM UTC
The fair buildings that have seen the yester-years
bask in twilight.
Generations of footsteps and handprints
have worn and wrinkled them.
The wisen walls have overheard conversations
both whispered in confidence and declared in boldness,
and the floors have long absorbed
the tears, blood and sweat of characters
in their own private dramas
played out within these walls.
You and I will never see what the buildings have watched,
hear what they’ve listened to
all those years –
the stories each brick and mortar holds in secret.
And twilights and days will pass
till the impending moment comes, when,
along with concrete pounded into dusts,
gone will be these flickers of images,
the memories of these fleeting lives,
buried,
like tapes and film rolls burned
by the progress of time.
Apr 2, 2016
Apr 2, 2016 at 7:57 AM UTC
Memories slink like silken specters
Across my barren walls
With sticky fingers that pick pocket
My peace of mind,
Steal my sleep,
Leaving sweaty handprints across my skin
And the faint taste of a scream that died on my tongue.
I tell myself that I am safe now.
Not a soul has breathed in this room since I examined every cranny.
Even I am existing on borrowed air,
As sleep slips so dearly missed from my grasp.
I guard my secrets in darkness while 4 am lingers heavy in this space,
Wishing unconsciousness to take me to a land
Where my heart doesn’t race in terror at every noise,
The shame of what I allowed to be done to me doesn’t echo in my mind,
And the scars are not so tender to the touch.
If only I should be so lucky.
The ghosts are restless in the way they haunt my body tonight.
Feb 8, 2021
Feb 8, 2021 at 7:02 AM UTC
My special talent is being tough.
Not being unreachable,
Not being invincible,
Not being unaffected, but taking blows.
It's a dubious gift, to be sure.
But I think I can no longer deny the fact that my biggest strength in this life is my ability to take a hit and come back.
Yes, there are people who don't even feel the blows that life deals out.
And on the other hand, there are those people who fall to their knees and collapse whenever something hurts.
But right in the middle,
Between apathy and fragility,
That is where I live,
And I think it's the hardest place to be.
To brush off attacks is one thing.
To let them reach you and go on through the pain is quite another.
My special talent is SURVIVING.
My therapist says I need to learn how to thrive.
Maybe she's right. But with my life, I've not been allowed the chance.
What I have had some kickass experience with is enduring.
Surviving.
Going on.
Finding something to live for when everything I've lived for in the past has been knocked down like a line of dominoes.
And yeah, my acceptance of pain makes me vulnerable, but I spring back.
I absorb the force of what life throws at me and throw it right back.
I spend the time I need to crying, hurting, fearing.
But I always rise.
Always.
If you decide to edit the cast of my life, I learn to love new people.
If you take my chances from me, I make new ones.
If my dreams are shattered, I create new dreams.
I am not impenetrable.
I am not an island.
People touch my heart,
Leave handprints in wet paint, leave scars, cigarette burns, leave graffiti, but I
Go on.
They do not destroy me.
They can take, but they can never demolish.
My backbone bends in the wind, but it's made of steel, and you'll never break it.
I am tough, it is my special talent.
I fight wars every day that you will never know about.
I rise ****** each morning from battles against dreams of your arms.
And I will tell you this, my darling, my tyrant:
You can conquer, but you'll never win.
May 24, 2014
May 24, 2014 at 12:14 AM UTC
I'm sorry your hands had to leave bruises on my skin
and that my love breaks your ribs.
I'm sorry for the bruises I made in your heart
and for the lies I told with the same lips you tasted.
I'm sorry for the bruises I bore in my heart
and for the storm I brought to your mind.
I'm sorry for the bruises I left in your life,
and made you see my chaos with your eyes.
I'm sorry for the bruises made from holding onto you too tight,
and for the hate that filled your lungs.
I'm sorry for the bruises I can't erase
I'm sorry for the bruises old scars replaced.
I'm sorry for the bruises my fingertips left
I'm sorry for the bruises my lips marked on yours
I'm sorry for the bruises on your wrists with my handprints
I'm sorry for the bruises that took your breath away.
I'm sorry for the bruises.
Jan 19, 2015
Jan 19, 2015 at 10:40 PM UTC
My aching flesh
Handprints on me are reddish
Your blanket of fire
Cold silk expose desire
Pressed against you to learn
How slow and heavy we burn
Jan 27, 2016
Jan 27, 2016 at 12:19 PM UTC
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
It smells like freshly mown grass and a
Soaked one piece Ariel swimsuit—the pink ruffles that
Cling
To a toddler’s stomach rolls as she squeaks and squelches down the plastic
Into the dark blue Made in China kiddie pool
That has creatures from all levels of the ocean together
And she doesn’t care.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
Has visible handprints on the sides from
The toddler holding on for dear life before
She gathers the courage to balance on top on her own.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
Sits in that yard for almost a decade at the end
Of the sickly green swing set that lifts up out of the ground
Whenever the toddler pumps too hard,
And is a end destination for the intense races across the apparatus
That occur every Sunday noon amongst the Sunday School kids without fail.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
Under it is one of the best places for hide-and-seek in the winter,
When it is almost buried under the glistening snow
And the toddler can’t feel her legs anymore but she doesn’t care because
She can’t be found.
At that age she has no limits, no mental restraints that
Cut her dreams off before they bear fruit.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit,
And of the world beyond it she is only a
Prisoner of fierce fascination.
Oct 1, 2021
Oct 1, 2021 at 5:27 PM UTC
we were all born crying.
wailing, raw pink lungs
gasping,
choking, on new filtered air.
but maybe, we cry not because
of a cold chill
and fluorescent state of confusion,
but simply because we've been born once again.
maybe we cry because our past lives
will never repeat themselves-
no more grandkids, the splintered back porch with the hissing screen door,
no more ten day vacations at the spare house in Spain,
no more dates at a drive in, the 1981 firebird where the windows would always steam,
no handprints along glass,
footprints on the subway.
no more
"welcome home" kisses from your dog,
"goodnight" kisses from your wife.
when we are born,
maybe we cry because
in that simple movement toward new light
our hand lingers along the wall behind us,
and flips off the switch.
every painful lesson,
heartbreak,
first times,
failiure.
all of it recycled;
repetition that never comes to end.
maybe, we cry because
we have forgotten the words
of the song we know we've heard.
the one you once danced to
at your wedding;
the one they cried to, at your funeral.
maybe we cry because
we have forgotten the color of the ink
scratched on our past suicide notes.
maybe, because
we think the gunshot did not take us
to heaven.
but there are angels
and they don't wear halos and stroke harps-
they roam the earth.
instead of showing you the light,
they teach how to form the flame inside yourself.
we were all born crying.
and it is not from loss or fear itself;
not because our soul is homesick
for the house it can't recall-
we cry for the warmth of our mothers worn hands.
the new rhythm slow in her chest,
amber hair falling
from the foreign slope of her shoulder;
we are just one soul on this journey
body to body, heart to heart.
maybe we cry because
in that moment, we ourselves realize
that each life is, a miracle.
Aug 22, 2014
Aug 22, 2014 at 2:21 AM UTC
Shivering fingers, cradling a cold clay bowl
with dull roses surrounding the rim.
A Klondike bar cut like a grid on a paper towel.
My grandma used to let me eat one in the living room
"careful of the carpet"
on her yellow couches covered with sticky plastic.
She would play the Elvis Presley Christmas album,
To Ginny written in black sharpie on the sleeve
with a Love always, Mom underneath,
over and over again
while she hung bulbs of wood on the bottom branches
so her Welsh Corgi wouldn't break them with his paws.
Slate slabs with handprints
in purple paint every year for the holiday.
She'd set death aside in a coffin ashtray
to kiss my cheek.
Presley played in the background.
She'd rock
on the front porch in white wicker
coughing into the lid of a Pepsi can
until she'd catch me pressing my nose against the door glass,
tell me to turn around and sit on the couch.
It was too cold for me.
She'd only be a minute.
When we played, I'd hide between the two baskets
in the closet that held her hair products.
I could count all the bottles three times each
before she'd say she was too tired,
put on her coat, grab a white box, and hit play.
I always hated that album.
Oct 29, 2013
Oct 29, 2013 at 5:56 PM UTC
A lady came today
To ask me how my life is
I looked at her with desperate eyes
And lied.
With mother glaring down at me,
And this pleasant little lady
I lied.
I told her everything was fine
I lied.
I didn't mention the bruises
Or the many handprints
That mother had left on my skin
I lied
I didn't mention
My nights of hunger
Or sleep loss from the parties
I lied
I didn't mention
my new "daddy"
Nor his prying hands
I lied
I didn't mention
the stuff I see
The needles and the straws
And now? I regret it.
I wish I hadn'tve lied
But with mother glaring down at me
What else was I to do?
I couldn't tell the truth,
Not with mother watching.
Her eyes told me plainly what would happen
So I lied.
And now, I regret it.
May 9, 2014
May 9, 2014 at 12:26 PM UTC
Handprints stain my heart.
They're yours.
I am plagued; comatose,
a ritualistic rebirth
I claw my way out by morning.
Steady, inescapable,
and raw, colorless thoughts
I wake, a hollow shell
a crescent.
Crumbs of my Eden remain
they linger as you linger
burlesque, a temptress
stepping softly.
I'll not let the words crawl across my lips
I'd rather let them form brief, violent hailstorms
than risk it all again.
Wrists heavenward,
breathless, I submit.
Oct 12, 2011
Oct 12, 2011 at 12:23 PM UTC
we went to Little Blue
that summer in a bum'd car.
riding in extravagance
we couldn't afford.
camping in the Oklahoma ozarks,
we brought liquor. the two of us
drank a half-litre honey whiskey
and twenty-eight of thirty Pabsts.
your chick only nab'd two.
we were sunk from that point on.
i vomit'd behind the car, and
there were left retched handprints.
left were a phantom's handprints,
having been drown'd by their hedonism.
the bikers partied along
with us apart from us.
they ask'd to use our hatchet,
that's the way we met.
men share tools, and that was
the only instance of civility
for two days. we ran feral.
rip'd shirt to ribbons,
wrap'd them 'round a stick,
soak'd citronella,
commenced adventure.
returning,
two hours time gone;
returning,
scratch'd and bleeding;
returning,
we lit their paths with
torch burning a primal fire;
sleep,
pass'd out by fire in lounge chair.
been in this spot before,
knew to bring a quilt
and mine was the only one.
startled awake,
fire nothing more than nightlight embers.
raccoon, sitting upright,
stared from his high perch of a picnic table.
apple in paws, nibbling,
he mock'd and monitor'd.
i swiped at it with a stick,
missed. said **** it.
slept in the car that night.
Jan 12, 2013
Jan 12, 2013 at 7:23 AM UTC
Handprints collide
All our warmth intertwined and
In the dewy space between
I feel your heartbeat echoing mine
Our foreheads pressed together
I'm begging for your soul to melt into mine
I want to mix with you like oil in water
But these bodies are so constricting
This life we walk is a lonely one
We seek closeness beyond our broken skin
And maybe one day when this life is done
Our souls can connect for eternity
I adore you with every ounce of my being
Within every imperfectly perfect moment
Beyond all words and understanding
I'll love you forever and forever after
Dec 5, 2022
Dec 5, 2022 at 4:28 PM UTC
Sometimes, through no fault of your own, you will end up ******
You'll get blood on your dress, blood on your shoes
blood in your hair, blood on the walls,
speckled on your lips and clinging to your eyelashes
copper in your mouth, rust under your fingernails
four perfect spatters below you
palms stained, bringing out your handprints
as if to identify that it is indeed you, covered in blood.
So you'll decide to restore yourself
and you'll resolve to wash it all away.
And as you scrub away your shame,
you'll look in the mirror
to see a woman with pursed lips
jewels heavy around her neck
brow dark and furrowed, concentrating
because she, too, is covered in blood.
You will wash your hands with her
and try not to look so pale
because the water is orange and your fingertips are white.
You will turn away from the woman with raw hands
and your palms will smell like lemons
and your eyes will be bright.
Your lips will be crimson.
You'll adjust your necklace as you leave.
Sep 21, 2015
Sep 21, 2015 at 6:24 PM UTC
I watched it sway in the wind, but never did it break. I kneel now on bended knee, knowing only what you give is what they take.
I couldn't put it down in pen, faces always see. I couldn't disguise what's inside, That's destroying so much of me.
Shadows linger in closets I keep bare, regrets marked on skin. Hearts must be made of glass, as passion is said to be sin.
Handprints that match my hand, I have a tendency to choke. Yet I often forget how to breath, when everything goes up in smoke.
Ruin is a friend of mine, she is always standing at my back. I'm sitting on the corner of insanity, while she's counting all I lack.
Feb 6, 2015
Feb 6, 2015 at 2:42 PM UTC
alone
I can cover
two handprints.
the rooms my father enters are bugged.
mother is dumb from pretending
to hit her head.
talking is hell. hell belongs
to a little
devil
that shrinks.
you throw a cell phone at a dog, okay.
pick up the phone
and find
the dog.
let god think
he sees
our puppets.
Jun 24, 2015
Jun 24, 2015 at 8:08 PM UTC
Your phone calls always startle me
Never knowing what I might find if I pick up
ANSWER THE **** THING!!!
Your voice is deep and melodic
Dragging me back down into the hypnotic ******
Of late night phone ***
Viiiiiiicccttttoooorrrriiiaaaaaa
Your moans do not escape the pulsing of my secret flesh
Reaching crescendo as I bare witness to the sound of your ***
Just a little longer you say
Tie me up a bit, spank the delectable juicy round of my generous ***
Fantasy handprints mark alabaster like a second grade Thanksgiving turkey art project
Only here feathers are far more threatening
I'll be whatever you want me to be
Between midnight and six a.m.
Caressed by the curling waft of sunlight through smoke and shadow
Your voice fades away into static
Always left wet and wanting for more
Nov 15, 2012
Nov 15, 2012 at 11:06 AM UTC