"hydrant" poems
Totalitarian menace
refined, tailored pants
bleed malignance and
fear.
What stalks the passage,
normally?
Tear off my clothes, with subordinate cruelty
and tortured fiefdom from the sun
invading damp alleyways
and musty cement corridors
abet you enthroned
on that sidewalk stump.
I curb,
the habit
blindly happenstances about
yore salty ruins
we yodel, indiscriminately.
Jun 1, 2011
Jun 1, 2011 at 2:22 PM UTC
There are two sides of town
The straight teeth side,
and the crooked side,
The private summer camp side
and the open hydrant side
The bedtime story side
and "get your ******* *** in bed" side
The balloon birthday side
and the birthday frown side
There are two sides to every town
Sometimes they meet on the same street.
Jan 2, 2011
Jan 2, 2011 at 6:23 AM UTC
I left the dust and tumble weeds
to be incomplete and moved
back east to where I was born
The trees crowded together
There was a change in the weather
I asked mom ,
"Is that rain?"
The people were crowded
With one thought and mind
Everything was designated
to be black or white
We caught catfish from
the Alabama River
Swam in pristine streams
full of soapstone
Then we moved again
Crossed Texas on our way west
Crossed the continental devide
Came to rest in Spokane
I sang God Bless America
while sitting on a fire hydrant
Looking at the purple
mountain's majesty
Then off again back east
Crossed Texas the third time
To Panama City , Florida
where we came to reside
There I learned
to abide by the tide
And that some things
you can't hide
Two and a half years
of bliss
Then we moved
once again
And again and again
and again and again
and again , again
again , again , again . . . .
All my travels
All my travails
I have found home
in the moment within me .
Mar 1, 2017
Mar 1, 2017 at 8:50 PM UTC
what's this liquid falling from the sky
with its pitter-patter, pitter-patter?
to the drought of summer, it says "goodbye"
with its splitter-splatter, splitter-splatter!
look and watch as the world grows vibrant
as it pitter-patters, pitter-patters!
oh, thank you, dear clouds, for being our hydrant
as it splitter-splatters, splitter-splatters!
watch as the parched lives are finally quenched
by its pitter-patter, pitter-patter!
the once dry earth at last is drenched
by its splitter-splatter, splitter-splatter!
Oct 22, 2015
Oct 22, 2015 at 10:46 PM UTC
My love is like a desert flower, drying in the sun
Then a drop of precious water comes, but one,
And at once life fills the plant, and color brightens blossom,
Green and luscious in a moment, my heart should be as light as balsam,
But I sowed a seed of fear, beside that seed of rose,
And every time a hydrant falls, that vine of fear grows,
It’s poisoned circles loop around my heart, try to keep my head from reeling,
But pain it only causes, increased unhappy feeling,
I put it there in hopes it would protect my soul,
Instead I find it makes an ever increasing hole
Oct 21, 2014
Oct 21, 2014 at 7:28 PM UTC
to her thighs....
my taste buds
so eager to say hi,
if I was asked to describe
I'd say just look
outside, Around the
time... when the moon
was destined to hide and
air conditioners kidnapped
the space windows and their
sills used to collide
While i strive, tongue
kicks a lure for her
sweet surprise.... That
collapse in time mimics
the anticipation of a
hydrant's refreshing
jolt when it's hot outside
her satisfactions
introduction feeds me
the thrill of that last
day of school during
dismissal time, freedom
for what seems like forever
it's two month limit always
fled past your mind
When she divides
and reveals the treasures
her structure was built
to hide... My taste buds
reunite with the flavors
of summertime
taste like summertime
© 2014 viewtifulink
Jul 30, 2014
Jul 30, 2014 at 7:45 AM UTC
Summer is finally coming to an end
Tommy soccer ball lay lifeless in the city drain
Gathering, grease stain
A broken swing lay upside down
After the circus left town
Small footprints engraved on the pavements
Each step seems to lead us to the paths to enlightenment?
So, where shall we go from here?
After the long hot days of summer
Shall we hibernate like mountain bears?
Or shall we shed the heat of summer like autumn leaves
While the cool breeze of autumn take us like bold thieves
Each summer brings a little laughter, a little love
And a flocks of mourning doves,
Unlike the last days of summer vernacular sounds
Sticky night, hot sweat, water fest;
and most of all
those mysterious disappearing teens throngs
shall we look forward to the long wintry months
With frozen ice and slippery roads
While the city folks take it as a personal affront
Shouting harsh vocabulary words
to Mother Nature
One last drop of water from the city open hydrant
Before another adrenaline
And two more months of summer days
Goodbye, summer.
Sep 4, 2013
Sep 4, 2013 at 10:22 AM UTC
Well, what now, hey?
I threw the dog overboard yesterday.
The day before, the day?
Where will you go, hey?
I heard the orchestra-man play
The same way,
Sanctum, requiem, asylum
All Latin in his French dog-eared play.
Hear the monkey, playing accordion play
To the whirling whirly-whirly-ghig
Tre dramatique, no? Today
I understand you're just as "tramatig."
I want to hear your Frenchmen play
Play ***** pipes play play
In his dog-eared French organ-man
Play
But I cannot, cannot say
Tears of joy, in hydrant spray
The Hyades triumphant rainbow stay
Cough your little fears away;
Hear the Star Spangled Francis Key play
Frenchmen play, play,
Little piggies counted play
Black white keys with little piggle-plumps play
Atone-al, A-tonal---atonal tonal sounds as if to say
"Getting married here to stay"
All alone and all today
Settle down if for a day
And who will hear the trumpet play
When organ-man Frenchman say
"Where? Home of the free" and stay
Keep your hands away
Never want to let you say
"Hear me, hear ye, all you weary, weary dreamers
But never left your confidence like Russell-rustle leaf-blown willow-white
You fill them up with seventy two pay
Make a kite, to(k)night, allRight
Thank god for the fleas in the right
Hairless creatures for to sway
I threw the dog overboard yesterday
The day before, the day
And if you'd wanted it to stay
You should've say, you should've say
But never let my hand betray
The vein, the line, the artery
Of arterial shells bombastically
Loquacious to a fault, this day
They say "You want another day"
They say "You never wanted say"
They say "You wasted every day"
They say "They say, they say, they say"
But e'er forget, ne'er forget
I'll despise you abandon heaven for earth to get
And leave your money, your millions behind
For mansions with my Lord to find
But in the ceiling never was a god to pray
Feb 29, 2012
Feb 29, 2012 at 10:16 PM UTC
Enveloped with pine-
Stretched across statelines:
Beauteous blue upon envious emerald
Pooled amongst royal white mountains
Adorned with grey jewels of centuries
Emitting sweet, earthy aroma
She caresses the land.
Mother to lakes hidden by her red fir,
Provider to the fiery yellow cress
Hydrant for all animals alike.
M(ama) Rose keeps a chary eye
on her joint creation:
The provider, the mother,
The revered, grandiose puddle
is threatened by scarcity.
The royal white mountains,
Remain royal- but lack frost,
And thus the water retreats
Shriveling back 13 feet from shoreline
This once sacrosanct lake---
Devastated.
Keep Tahoe Blue?
Keep Tahoe Wet.
Apr 2, 2015
Apr 2, 2015 at 1:36 AM UTC
It's rare you'll find me in my home town
straw in mouth
**** on shoes
i'm a country boy loving this acid washed city life of "Ima get what's mine"
but don't call me bumpkin
while I'm sitting out on a back porch
jameson and RJ Reynolds
I have a tendency to spout off words like an unattended hydrant on a ghetto summer day
not all of them make sense
not all of them are in good taste
or right
but whether it be suburban Midlothian
farming village Drax
or downtown Richmond
I find my home on page
beneath the low chattering of keys
scratching of pens
Each word you never had the heart to say
is my place of residence
Dec 31, 2013
Dec 31, 2013 at 8:37 PM UTC
And so as a man, a job,
a cactus wearing a business suit sharing relations with the hydrant down the street.
A ***** strapped to a baby carriage with plastic baggie cellphones
yelling "run away now"
to the grass at his feet.
A man devoid of water, rather.
These are the times
A well, emptied.
Rather death
find waves of spilled milk and
all the fat people, skinny.
A dry mouth desert, kneeling
In either breath of a living feeling
or the one that talks of so much
for only the wealth of his screaming.
Some tiny furniture talked all night about running through wheat,
ebbing and flowing against the end tables,
then falling short as crumbling tree leaves.
An ottoman as recycle bin holding stem
from stem of watermelon children
and vine-ripened acetaminophen.
Some odd truth told the blowing wind that
God does cartwheels with Lucifer at random.
It then billowed out about
his ***** underwear and holy fodder for memorandum.
I would say a man, a vision,
A little girl using a GPS to calculate the distance from the rest her teething.
Instead, she found a funny barbeque ***** playing hog-tied pharmaceutical reps into neoprene
mud-flapping pigeons.
I would say the sinking plastic six-pack islands revealing trash limbs,
sunken,
honest,
grim.
Life, itself, must move in tandem to only fleeting geese.
Though in plan, the artisan-picking fruit of word must be depicted.
Live in sin and ignorance much like the
breaking news walking on broken record.
And so as a man; a fear.
He looked down, staring at no one
with bare feet and shaken, coconut flavored palm trees.
Jan 28, 2013
Jan 28, 2013 at 4:27 PM UTC
shot of whiskey
i shot my mouth off at a bible salesman
shot a man with a glass eye on a street corner
he shot me a mean streak
shot out a candy cane window
a king in a powder blue sedan shot down the turnpike
never had a shot with her in a red flannel shirt
shot a broke down dog at a fire hydrant in birmingham
he shot out of a lawn mower
shot towards some handshaking stranger
shot down some train tracks
shadows shot with arms upraised
being shot at by electric trains
i shot a mirror at the stars
they shot back with a voiceless gesture
she shot right through my heart
her hair shot gold to kingdom come
Jan 20, 2014
Jan 20, 2014 at 10:07 PM UTC
It was Saturday,
And you said God was with us.
So, we drove as fast as possible-
Into blistering orange and purple,
Into the death of the sun.
Because we knew he was, just as well as wasn’t.
There was sweat on your chest,
And on mine two black handprints of mud.
You called me your Apache warrior.
I made fierce stabs at sol, spears tipped with glass.
I did not **** the fire, only scared him away for a cycle.
In ecstasy you asked if I’d like some-
Fearful to step past my father’s drugs I shrugged you a no.
Sold you the same line from dreams before.
I don’t like being in heaven and hell at the same time.
To which you replied with hollow eyes to hell with heaven.
And together we cried ponds in the parking lot of Wal-Mart.
Beseeching the dams not hold,
Hoping we could wash it all clean.
It was Sunday,
And you said that god was dead-
We danced in the street, maniacs,
Exposed flesh and drumming war cries.
Busted open the fire hydrant and nursed,
Hysterical for love and peaceful tomorrows,
Crusaders of regrettable intentions.
And then your mother called and you had to run off to church.
During this fifth year you were enlightened.
Many people feel that upon reading a book or two.
Labeled me wrong, you of course playing the protagonist -
I didn’t see it that way.
I wasn’t keeping any type of score.
Still bear chested, scowling at king sun,
Howling to mother moon, dressed in pale luminous silk,
Knowing she would never howl back.
With duly noted precautionary tales in mind I set forth-
To coastal plains lush with life,
Trees hiding the cityscape.
Stars sending light at a glacial pace,
Eroding corneal muck.
You had left three sheets to the wind,
And I was inside my own mind without.
Skies bled crimson heat,
Leached from me that passion that once held steadfast
And it was pleasant at best.
But, I am no martyr.
Revitalized in my own indulgences,
Slept till Saturday when you returned-
The world making right again.
Feb 6, 2013
Feb 6, 2013 at 2:09 PM UTC
I
am
either
gushing out
waves of drowning
deceit, drenching the people
who pass in front
of me, knocking them down, forcing them
away- or locked up
tight, heavy with
layers of colorful
cover where even
your wrenching love
is not enough
to pry me loose.
Apr 28, 2013
Apr 28, 2013 at 11:36 AM UTC
I was doing a little jig down the sidewalk
When all of a sudden
This red, bulbous, obstruction pounced into my field of view
I said, "Whoa, hotshot, cool down"
He/she/it did not reply
"I'm talking to you kiddo
Can you please communicate with me?"
It just sat there staring at me. Why?
You see, hydrants can be little stinkers sometimes
They'll talk your earlobe off one time
Other times they act like a sack of taters
They're just little drama queens
"Meow meow" said the hydrant
I take a look over yonder, than ask the **** target,
"Are you talking to me sir?"
"Meow," it said "I'm not sure I like your tone"
"You must be some sort of mind type hacker dealio
Cracking into my cerebellum, what are you doing in there?
Seriously man! Come on!
You must be going through emotional trauma. PTSD I don't know."
"Calm down buco, let's talk about this
Over a bucket of churned goat milk, I love that stuff.
How's Shirley? I hear she took up crocheting
I respect that"
"Grr, graa, paa?
Me oh my, this reminds me of pick up sticks all over again
Hey look at this man,
If you walk without rhythm, than you won't attract the worm."
Nov 11, 2014
Nov 11, 2014 at 2:27 AM UTC
Your subjectless Objects of capital, the agency bereft GDP drones, O! America,
They are spilled on the pavement, an upturned ice cream cone of discontent
puddled and lackadaisical, they fester beside the hydrant.
Your news agencies and malls, the damp dishrags of industry,
snagged on the nail of defenselessness and exploitation, only infect the wound.
Each mess of a person, walks through the sugary malaise of your suffering
dragging it on to the next in communal forbearing; its contagion, its disease
is so many cysts on the mind of those syrupy vacuoles for capital; the private,
malignant caverns of dewy-eyed trust in humanity, insipidly drawing the rancor to a boil,
without understanding a thing.
You pride yourself on much, without eyes for the condition of your people,
O! America.
People, shackled in your jails, are so many ideas bubbling as to the cruelty of your nature
punctured by the ignorance outside.
Draped in your obnoxious flag, the cites are as malicious as the countryside, toward life, toward knowledge.
You prop-up the price of their crops, the know-not-whys, who plunder the earth to prolong population growth and consciousness-decline.
America, you eradicate discontent with cattle cars, filled with questioning life forms, gasing our minds and burning our bodies with your arrogance.
Like a popcorn bag steaming in the microwave; you have been left alone too long, and have developed a flame-- an inextinguishable flame of reason.
You have been disavowed too LITTLE.
You must not be allowed to expand any further, lest the impoverished bag of flesh which is mankind will burst.
But still you stagnate, until your violence curdles with drones and bombs patrolling our synapses.
Our brains digest your violence against us and **** it out with an abused dialect of greed and hate.
Then you ask us only that we eat from your refuse heap of burnt kernels from the “truth” of market economy.
You taste like cancer. You rot the mouth of competent men, and satiate the anxieties of those who would turn against you-- with a refreshing ice cream cone of absentmindedness
dropped on the ground and melting.
But the stains you made will always taint the sidewalk of man.
Jun 20, 2011
Jun 20, 2011 at 12:26 AM UTC
I’m not a talkative person
In fact I have sewn my mouth shut
To keep my thoughts
From spilling out
With the force of a fire hydrant
When I do talk
It’s in mumbles and murmurs
I let my words run together
I don’t even remember the last time
I finished a real sentence
Poetry runs through my veins
Every night I unzip my forearms
And let my blood
Spill out onto paper
I’m sorry I can’t bleed for you
I’m selfish
I take, take, take, and take
I buy myself Christmas presents
Birthday presents
Because I ******* deserve it presents
Grace never came easy to me
I stumble over my shoelaces
Like I stumble over my words
Thank god none of you have a pet fish
Because I would probably
Break the bowl
Cigarettes
I don’t smoke them
But **** do I find them attractive
I think bruises are beautiful
Purple, blue, and black splotches
On pale skin
Soreness when you press your fingers
Into them
Give me bruises
And I’ll give you kisses
Your eardrums can and will shatter
Under my screeches of rage
I don’t always scream
But when I do
I turn into a ******* demon
I wear granny ******* casually
Because being comfortable
Is more important
Than being ****
Every bouquet you give me
I will keep
Until they are petal-less
And brown
They will sit in a vase
And decay
And I will use the scent
As perfume
I have a skinny waist
But fat thighs
I’m a size nine
Please don’t buy me size three jeans
Most people’s voices change
With puberty
My voice changes depending
On who I’m with
When I’m with you
My voice is deep with a sarcastic tint
When I’m with your parents
I sound like a ten year old boy
I have a cranberry juice addiction
That’s getting out of hand
Sometimes I break under
Magnifying glasses
My heart drums behind my ribs
There’s a reason why
They call it a cage
I’ve read Catcher in the Rye
Five times and I still
Hate Holden Caulfield
A good day for me
Is finding socks
Without holes in them
I don’t plan on being
A mother
I can’t give you
An heir
My heart explodes
Regenerates
Explodes
Regenerates
Explodes
Explodes
Explodes
Regenerates
I love myself more
Than I could ever love anyone else
And I’ve yet to find someone
Who understands that
Dec 23, 2013
Dec 23, 2013 at 4:46 PM UTC
It's late at night when you realize she's not the one you loved,
or anyone for that matter.
It's late at night when your mind,
a towering serpent of indecision and malnourishment,
a rushing stream of water from the broken end of a fire hydrant,
tearing through steel and ice cubes that litter a middle age class of numeral reunion,
discover the over-keyed lock where metal bends and screams.
Covered in flies and rice,
it retains its bondages, exchanging freedom for self-loathing,
Dirty-dying in single file,
a honey-gilded tune not thrice too soon.
I seek the corridor where my true love will wait for me,
breathing me in, yet the cane of a blindman.
A clopping corridor, sleek and cobblestone,
artificial and vast, astral.
My true embrace will be that cold one of death, knocking at my door,
pleading my friendship,
sapping from me ***** and calloused hands.
A wet kiss on the nose, a reddened tongue.
I don't know the latitude of my existence.
I can't feel the reality of my throat,
of the gushing and the breathing of winds,
blocking the eternal stream of air.
The currents broke, and from within blew a heavenly melody,
that pierced cold ears boundlessly.
Again, that same street.
Lit faintly from above and from the participants in its ritual.
They burn the wax together.
And they sink,
O paradox!
Together, with their victories of mental triumph,
they recede further into torment and inefficiency,
quantified and numerical,
arrange themselves by merit and consequence.
Again, they sink and plummet and fall,
deeper into wonder and beauty.
Until it abandons them and spills over the edges,
splattering the circumscription,
dabbing alligator skin and sunglasses.
Inspecting the damage done,
he lifts from within its belly a tattered and worn skull,
that of a Man, no less.
Rusting in the desert, alone and among his gods,
bone-dry plains and dunes of dust,
rumbling agelessly the shaken scared earth.
Mar 9, 2013
Mar 9, 2013 at 1:06 AM UTC
The coca-cola truck was outside today.
I had some free time so I stole it.
I rolled through the streets of my ****** island,
causing some well deserved destruction.
I may have killed a ******
but it was probably for the best.
Who wants to live with one leg anyway?
I had swerved into a hydrant,
freezing water pounded a ferel cat into a storm drain.
But I had too!
Otherwise my neighbor Russ would have become a pancake.
When I finally learned how to control the truck
I stopped at the local liquor store.
I grabbed a sixer of Rolling Rock
and payed with 28 quarters.
I told big Pat to please keep the change,
I Knew she saw the damage I had done on the way.
But she's an old timer,
These things don't phase her.
She just smiled and asked if-
I wanted a brown paper bag or plastic?
May 21, 2010
May 21, 2010 at 9:54 AM UTC
No engines shrieking rescue storm the night,
And hose and hydrant cannot here avail;
The flames laugh high and fling their challenging light,
And clouds turn gray and black from silver-pale.
The fire leaps out and licks the ancient walls,
And the big building bends and twists and groans.
A bar drops from its place; a rafter falls
Burning the flowers. The wind in frenzy moans.
The watchers gaze, held wondering by the fire,
The dwellers cry their sorrow to the crowd,
The flames beyond themselves rise higher, higher,
To lose their glory in the frowning cloud,
Yielding at length the last reluctant breath.
And where life lay asleep broods darkly death.
1.1k
Lately everything I've been doing has been done sober
My home has been spilling it's contents on the front porch steps; ripping flesh and cigarette burns off the carpet
The rooms gutted of their secrets, the walls even started whispering again
This is not dying, they say.
This household with it's backlash repression and traumatic events
bigger than the holes in my hands, but tonight I cannot play god
But that's all this is, isn't it?
emergency room contacts instead of friends
A waiting room, a fire exit, a fire hydrant parking station violation
I remember when my father would hold me in his lap, already in a drunken stupor talking about the love of his life
And I would listen, then I'd count the antidepressants for my mother
as she'd echo that love is someone holding your hair as you forget
and baby, I cannot forget.
I talk about you in past-tense and it still aches.
One time when I was a child
I was told not to run with scissors
not to play with fire
not to talk to strangers
but here we are,
I've got a fire that can demolish an entire forest
and my fingers are calloused from touching people I don't love nor know by first name
and there's this wound that doesn't heal
and I think it's you, I think it's you
(L.F)
Feb 12, 2015
Feb 12, 2015 at 12:13 AM UTC
You are not a Roman
In life, no matter your country, we do as the Romans do
If you are not a Roman you will be unhappy
Romans go to school and have high school sweethearts
They get good jobs, get married, reproduce, retire and die
It is a wonderful thing to the Romans.
The right thing
The only thing
Just as long as it doesn’t get interrupted by tragedies like cancer, cults, art, or radical political opinions
The Romans like
Action! that releases adrenalin
Fatty, sugary, salty foods
Endorphins
Catchy musical patterns
Games!
Catchphrases
And love stories *** tee hee)
There are a million ways to not be a Roman,
But most roads lead to Rome
The Romans smile on those who do as the Romans do
They adore freedom
To be anything you want to be
To be yourself
To be as the Romans are
Why would it be any other way?
Would you be angry at a dog ******* on a fire hydrant?
They are instinct devoid of the context that created it
The Romans don’t understand Why? anyone would want to do Otherwise
Clearly
The Romans
(Quite understandably mind you)
Understand
Who wouldn't want all this?
The only thing I want is you
We'll live on the outskirts of Rome
Eating Thai fusion
Discovering new chemicals for our brains
Electricity
That still registers a signal
The movies we've seen
Before
And before that
We'll wave at the strangers in a strange land
A dried-up decaying laugh track
Dust dancing in time
A place I care less and less about every day
Every
*******
Minute
Jan 29, 2014
Jan 29, 2014 at 8:10 PM UTC
I find it deeply ironic
that no one knows who invented the Fire Hydrant
because it's Patent was lost to a fire.
Jul 21, 2013
Jul 21, 2013 at 6:40 PM UTC