"hitchhiker" poems
Thoughts in time and out of season
The Hitchhiker stood by the side of the road
And leveled his thumb
In the calm calculus of reason.
Hi. How you doin’?
I just got back into town,
L.A.
I was out in the desert for awhile
“Riders on the storm”
Yeah. In the middle of it
“Riders on the storm”
Right…
“Into this world we’re born”
Hey, listen, man, I really got a problem
“Into this world we’re thrown”
When I was out on the desert, ya know
“Like a dog without a bone
An actor out on loan”
I don’t know how to tell you
“Riders on the storm”
but, ah, I killed somebody
“There’s a killer on the road”
No…
“His brain is squirming like a toad”
It’s no big deal, ya know
I don’t think anybody will find out about it, but…
“take a long holiday”
just, ah…
“Let your children play”
this guy gave me a ride, and ah…
“If you give this man a ride”
started giving me a lot of trouble
“Sweet family will die”
and I just couldn’t take it, ya know
“Killer on the road”
And I wasted him
Yeah.
50.2k
'Tryna get to sunny Californy' -
Boom. It's the awful raincoat
making me look like a selfdefeated self-murdering imaginary gangster, an idiot in a rueful coat, how can they understand my damp packs - my mud packs -
„Look John, a hitchhiker'
„He looks like he's got a gun underneath that I. R. A. coat'
'Look Fred, that man by the road' „Some sexfiend got in print in 1938 in *** Magazine' –
„You found his blue corpse in a greenshade edition, with axe blots'
10.6k
Hitchhiker
My passenger seat
Her eyes tear up as
She talks about
Placebo happiness
And the
Digital pineapples
She never wanted
As a girl
About how the world really
Should have been a square
Then nobody'd ever fall off
And more people could care
About how nothing ever makes sense
Up here
And that she doesn't believe in
Calling a piece of dirt
A home
And how in my heart I feel that
She's perfectly
Batshit crazy
And that she could be the one
How everything seems okay
Every time she breathes out
And
In
And I'm stunned
As she gives me a look so
Delicate it shatters like
Glass against industrial
Cold tempered
Steel
And the moment she says
"Thanks for the ride, But I can't stay"
This fifty mile fairytale of ours just
Ends.
Jul 23, 2015
Jul 23, 2015 at 11:22 AM UTC
Oh freddled gruntbuggly
thy micturations are to me
As plurdled gabbleblotchits
on a lurgid bee.
Groop I implore thee
my foonting turlingdromes
And hooptiously drangle me
with crinkly bindlewurdles,
Or I will rend thee in the gobberwarts
with my blurglecruncheon,
see if I don't
Compliments of Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy & Wiki
Jun 23, 2013
Jun 23, 2013 at 1:22 AM UTC
She's such a smooth talker
She could talk the rust right off of a nail
Given a chance at a Saturday dance
She could talk the slow out of a snail
I saw her wake up one morning
And talk the sun into sharing its shine
Then she went into the garden
And talked the melon right out of its rind
We went down to the ocean
Where she talked the blue out of the sea
That's the day I remember
She talked the love straight into me
My girl, she could talk a flower
Into giving its fragrance away
She could also talk the words out
Of a mute man with nothing to say
I took her to the park
She talked the kanga right out of the roo
That's the day she talked me
Into saying I love you
I've even seen my baby
Talk an ant out of its picnic lunch
One day on the side of the highway
A hitchhiker gave her his thumb
Whenever she plays storm chaser
This girl talks the wind out of its breeze
But she's not the only smooth talker
I talked her into marrying me
Sep 16, 2013
Sep 16, 2013 at 8:26 PM UTC
Paratroopers free fall,
'chutes coiled and caught in a grease ball afro curl
reaching down perplexed ****** frames.
Diligent chortling mimes trapped in handmade indecision cages, tapping a telling tune of tired games played day after day.
A right brained boy with a head full of clout
miscommunication with a leftist expat from the north
to the south.
Jostled connections send out fizzling sentences
through blown speakers and an overheated circuit -
Bored of the excuses whispers the nameless
without a reason there isn't a purpose.
Shoot an accusing glare past Father Time
overlooking treasonous discouraging crimes
Open those whale blubber caked eyes
to the other side.
It's not what this has done to you
but what this has done to us.
The hitchhiker gave up, traded his thumb for a seat on the bus.
Never was he lost, but given more than one chance.
He, no, she, no we
were thrown away with his walking stick and his waterproof nap sack.
Will we cross this road again?
And pick up from where we began?
Or never turn back?
Always was he lost, but given one too many of a chance
But was it worth it?
Upholding the "right and proper" stance?
Feb 15, 2010
Feb 15, 2010 at 12:08 PM UTC
I glance out of my driver’s side window
and see a boy
trudging miserably down the sidewalk
his essence radiating awkwardness
this long haired kid, maybe twelve years old
or just turned thirteen
wore hand me down boots that are too big for his feet,
ripped jeans, and a bookbag slung across his shoulder
in the dying days of July
whispering under his breath
maybe reciting poetry
or telling himself a story
And I honestly think
if time is fluid, like the oceans
like the monks say
then maybe I’m glancing over as a wave breaks
and I’m looking at myself
I couldn’t tell you how many times
I made that journey on foot
my heels throbbing, my legs begging to be broken
my hitchhiker’s thumb, had given up all hope at that point
I think about giving myself a ride
to wherever I may be going
but then I remember all the lessons I’ve learned
from time-travel movies
the one universal rule being not to meddle with the past
something about a butterfly’s wings flapping in Beijing
and a tsunami in New Orleans
or whatever
so, instead I honk my horn
and the traffic light turns green
I watch the boy, who might have been a younger me
in some distant past,
look on with curious anger as the cars pass
for a moment
then return to the story already in progress
he grows tinier and tinier
in my rear view mirror
until he is yesterday again
Jun 13, 2010
Jun 13, 2010 at 8:50 AM UTC
my love is that love
swerving in novas, gobsmacked and gibbering...
a funky cuss of lust
oblong in the short run
sprinting to horizons of forgotten doves;
cooling heel and grind-
in peat moss
of mauve thoughts; so lurid you could find them
in pitch dark.
my love is the love
that chinks your armor.
the soft clang of a raging Kismet
port of your starboard !
i am in love with you
and this thing
is "mostly harmless "
Jan 14, 2013
Jan 14, 2013 at 2:28 PM UTC
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Aug 1, 2014
Aug 1, 2014 at 5:06 AM UTC
Hands out
Thumbs pointed
The traveling way
In the old days
On the highway
This used to be ok
Now it’s illegal
Cop scout like eagles
For kind hearted travelers
Say don’t trust a stranger
Cause life is stranger danger
I pull up
Let him in
Say my name is
Tell him
If we get stopped
By a big burly cop
You’re my cousin
Apr 13, 2015
Apr 13, 2015 at 9:11 PM UTC
Sight is melting,
pain is fading away,
i am drunk,
drunk on these days.
Beer is nice,
drinking beer is cool,
but i really am,
just a desperate fool.
I am staring at screen,
surrounded by walls,
remembering all those,
late-night talks.
I am so lonely,
like a hitchhiker in night,
meeting some people,
with worn out soul and heart.
Jul 19, 2015
Jul 19, 2015 at 6:53 PM UTC
This book is full
of my father's eye lashes
He treated the pages
rough like his sons
pinching the daylights
out of them, I remember
mud and grease
on calloused thumbs
and you can still smell
Four Roses bourbon
in the morning
through the onionskin
He would not weep
he knew most folks
never kept their word
Anyway, his death
came through
like a hitchhiker
You could see it coming
like the slow light
of a faraway dead star.
Feb 3, 2018
Feb 3, 2018 at 7:50 PM UTC
I've got a bit of a reputation.
One heartbreak and I end up alone,
Find a heart to latch onto until,
Eventually it falls apart.
I make it down the road called life,
By hitchhiking,
From heart to heart,
Love to love.
There's a reason I'm no longer trusting.
You should know that.
But the boy with a broken down red truck
Is now the villian.
Not like I expected any different.
Like I said,
There's a reason.
Jan 18, 2017
Jan 18, 2017 at 1:26 AM UTC
I am here today, but i may not be tomorrow - a hitchhiker i picked up somewhere between Bennington and Marlboro Vermont
The library at Packer's Corners had
the smell of damp and old
as a lush august climbed the faded
wide wooden planks outside
and we schemed our
nightly dinner theatre performances.
The gang congregated disorderly
across the rocky garden before the (stage) barn,
plates and carafes of wine, rapt in the play.
Marti, a painter with knobby hands, salt and pepper hair,
the face of a sage and a speech impediment;
Veranda must have been a muse with her sharp
bohemian features and sleek black bob,
smelling of rosemary and musky Parisian perfume;
Oona, so young and stormy crashed about
those mountains in moods as protean
as Vermont weather and jeans
that were more holes than fabric;
Cootie, in his black goatee and the scent of
cooking oils under his mottled and freckled skin
would squint through the bugs and heat wave haze
to Marco on the pitcher's mound
scuffing his mortorcycle boots into the
sandy tan soil riddled with stones and
laughing with the reckless abandon that
waters the eyes with antifreeze for the soul
Oct 8, 2013
Oct 8, 2013 at 12:29 AM UTC
An hour out to sea, by land, and as early as the sun rises, the thumbs hit the road looking for a way into town, out of town.
Gulls speak in vowels,
melodious as wind carries the sounds
under the pier, through nets being cast
to sea. Glimmer in the fisherman's eye,
staring at the waves that crash below.
Erosion is the fear of councilmen and
the faces plastered on billboards,
but nature isn't a mistake. We have only
wrapped ourselves in a blanket we call
chemistry. A beach turned to glass,
we still wouldn't see the ocean clearly,
and we would still ask why the sky is blue.
Driving down roads, ten miles in between
each town. I've never seen so many thumbs out.
In cities, from which I've seen, a middle finger is customary. But not here. A thumb is an absolute,
and a blinker on a car pulling to the side is a
flash of compassion. Ocean from side to side, pastel houses scattered on land beside sea shells
and surf shops.
And the hitchhiker walks,
with a backpack,
and one can make out a peace sign,
and long, sun spotted hair. Someone that
knows the land.
Businesses hang "Going Out of Business" signs,
but that is embellished. That is because the pastel
houses only flourish during seasons. For people
who want a taste of a simpler life. Who call out
to an ocean breeze, with hopes of casting away
a stress level that would change a footprint
on sand into a window to the soul. And here I sit with my feet in the sand, tear running down my
cheek, because men do cry, especially when staring out to sea. I've seen shore, but I would
not ask a local what coastal means to them,
I wouldn't understand.
Where I come from, people hold out their hand.
A thumb is a rarity.
Sep 17, 2013
Sep 17, 2013 at 6:28 PM UTC
I walk a lonely road this day.
It's all in what I see;
Green trees,
Blue Sky,
Cotton ball clouds.
No one else I see.
A strawberry butterfly sees me.
Can I have a ride on your shoulder,
Please?
For the longest time, She kept me company.
Without a word she flew away...
Copyright © Ronald J Chapman All Rights Reserved.
Dec 4, 2014
Dec 4, 2014 at 5:41 AM UTC
i’m sorry i wrote about you.
i’m sorry i tried to immortalize you by placing your existence
in my heart and having it bleed out in black ink.
i’m sorry i fell in love with you.
i’m sorry i made you feel inspired and desirable, when you have
someone who probably loves you very much waiting for you
every night when you get home.
i’m sorry we can’t be together.
even though you haven’t made a decision yet, the silence between us
tells me all i need to know.
you’ll choose her.
you’ll always choose her.
i’m sorry i wrote about you.
even though i’m not, really
when i say that it’s more of an apology to myself
for letting your presence completely dismantle
any idea i’ve ever had about love.
don’t pick up the pieces. leave me scattered.
this is my mess to mend.
you’re on a never-ending racetrack
with no real intention of stopping for anything, let alone
a heartless hitchhiker like me, waiting for you
to put your life on the brakes.
i get it.
i’m a meaningless distraction,
a pleasant diversion,
a secret flower you keep hidden underneath all
the things you’re too afraid to say.
i will never be more than that.
i get that now.
well i’m sorry,
but my thumb is getting tired.
from now on, i think
i’ll walk home.
Apr 4, 2014
Apr 4, 2014 at 3:30 PM UTC
No bigger place than the desert.
No wider place for the sky.
There's no one more alone than me
with my thumb sticking out for a ride.
Every half hour a truck rolls by
and maybe a car or two.
I'm all alone in the desert.
The sun's slowly slipping from view.
Where in the hell is everyone?
It's twilight on the road.
I'm all alone in the desert.
It's getting toward dark and cold.
I'm at the side of the highway.
My companion is the wind.
I am the Last Hitchhiker.
Traffic has come to an end.
I am the Last Hitchhiker.
Traffic has come to an end.
Nov 12, 2015
Nov 12, 2015 at 12:31 AM UTC
If you're headed towards the light
Make room for one more soul
I given all the time I can
It's starting to take its toll
I've walked this earth from edge to edge
It lied in such a drought
Seeing all I didn't see
I see why some opt-out
The world's been rather cruel to me
I came in bare and stranded
If I get back what I put in
I'll be leaving empty handed
The good've gone bad
The sane've gone mad
Yet they all fight to survive
The worthwhile wasn't
The feel-good doesn't
And there's no getting out alive
So if you're headed towards the light
Make room for one more soul
I given all the time I can
I've lost my self-control
Apr 9, 2014
Apr 9, 2014 at 12:40 AM UTC
been feeling out of luck, or in a funk. or like a wanderer with a broken pickup truck. a hitchhiker stuck in a rut or the feeling that you get right before you've been struck.
we've taken names when we conquered this place and later sold them to slaves for minimum wage. your hate remains the same even when you have love entering your veins at a staggering pace. now i know why your name is tied to a face i can't quite place as I remember all those shots I used to keep my memory erased.
there's no compassion for passion, no rest for the wicked, no waking for the altruists who've stayed away from stigma. no place for complacency, no words for the mute. no changing places now, except for the resolute.
there's no home for the tired and no plots for the conspired. no truth for the useless, no downfall for the liars.
Mar 20, 2012
Mar 20, 2012 at 10:24 PM UTC
A hitchhiker
On the interstate of love.
It seems,
I am always hanging my thumb out
Searching for something real.
Anything real.
In what seems to me,
A very sad and ingenuine world.
Just as I thought I'd found meaning.
And for those I have loved,
Those I have left, or have gone from me
Was it your or I?
The want to be free.
Jun 19, 2023
Jun 19, 2023 at 11:42 PM UTC
Hooded hitchhiker of haunted hours!
(Or haunted houses, as the mainstream would have me believe)
Somewhere between New Mexico and New York the tables must have turned - see, it's not you that's seeking a ride, but me
(If a ride is what the kids are calling such a sweet and final relief these days)
Life is indeed "a highway" but I missed the EXIT HERE when overcome with the sight of your dusty bone-dry thumb creeping out from underneath a solemn black bell
(And they said I slow down for nothing!)
My curiosity intensified when: I glimpsed you behind a hydroplaning semi, just north of the Missouri River: I was going left from the right lane and I shouted to you: "hop in!"
Your blatant denial leaves me wondering...
(do you feel as though you are above me?)
(are there Escalades in the underworld?)
(does a '98 Volvo wagon not convey the utmost message of doom and despair?)
To clarify things, please observe the billboard on your passenger side:
I AM RECKLESS, I AM LETHAL
I AM HALF-BLIND AND SPINNING OUT OF CONTROL
DOING 90 ON AN UNPAVED ROAD
FINGERS DUSTING STEERING WHEEL
TIRES DUSTING DITCHES
(Please keep all hands and feet inside the vehicle at all times - unless you'd rather not)
Oh, robed and rusty reaper!
My consensus is this:
- I will not seek you out, but
- I
- will
- not
- turn
- you
- down
(Our final joyride looms just outside my rearview mirrors and directly inside my stream of consciousness)
Sep 8, 2013
Sep 8, 2013 at 11:38 PM UTC
I knew it was wrong
but if I stayed any longer
I would be lost
and my weakness
would just get stronger
So with just a small bag
that was lighter on my back
than the memories I left behind
with all the emotions I lack
I wandered down the road
with my thumb stuck in the air
I hoped that nobody stopped
while I fretted that nobody cared
Mile after mile my feet carried on
and with my heart beat slow
I stopped
just to breathe
as my feet sank into the snow
When the car pulled to a stop
next to me
it could have been yesterday
or tomorrow
I didn’t know
But I was grateful for the ride
but wary of the unknown face
that smiled at me across the miles
no malice could I find a trace
until the question came at me
after Beethoven's Second Symphony
became just a distant memory
*My child, why do you run, in disgrace?
What is really your fear?*
And as my hands clench the seat belt
trying to stop it from strangling me
and as I count the mile markers
that carve a mountain between you and me
I can't answer the question
that sits so insistently in my ear
The unknown face beside me whispers
I’m not the stranger here
Sep 12, 2015
Sep 12, 2015 at 9:47 PM UTC
With silence he is crowned
And eyes which spilt eternities
The future he thinks
To hold the leash
And the past he covets
Beside the fire
It is his desire
To think of it
There is no sleep
And when the sun
Slits the horizon
the wound gushing on pale sky
He squints bloodshot eyes
And he is alone
There is no sleep
Oct 27, 2016
Oct 27, 2016 at 10:54 PM UTC