"hyphenated" poems
Bag-drop. Check-in.
Hyphenated. Two syllables.
Security. A fat Scottish man,
A gentle caress of the inner thigh.
I retch violently.
Boarding, disembarking.
All I want in life is the back door.
Jul 13, 2015
Jul 13, 2015 at 1:43 AM UTC
She kept her songs, they kept so little space,
The covers pleased her:
One bleached from lying in a sunny place,
One marked in circles by a vase of water,
One mended, when a tidy fit had seized her,
And coloured, by her daughter -
So they had waited, till, in widowhood
She found them, looking for something else, and stood
Relearning how each frank submissive chord
Had ushered in
Word after sprawling hyphenated word,
And the unfailing sense of being young
Spread out like a spring-woken tree, wherein
That hidden freshness sung,
That certainty of time laid up in store
As when she played them first. But, even more,
The glare of that much-mentionned brilliance, love,
Broke out, to show
Its bright incipience sailing above,
Still promising to solve, and satisfy,
And set unchangeably in order. So
To pile them back, to cry,
Was hard, without lamely admitting how
It had not done so then, and could not now.
3.2k
My lover saves his words,
he tucks them under his tongue
I chew on his serifs,
Aerated, punctuated, hyphenated
His desires, they get caught in my teeth
the boldness of them wearing on my enamel
And then,
his smile melts onto my tongue
I push it behind my cheek, our own
little secret, sweetheart
Now I’m smiling too
And he hasn’t said a word.
Mar 20, 2015
Mar 20, 2015 at 1:38 PM UTC
Dear Science and Math,
I pray to you because you are what I believe in. Today is the midterm elections for 2018, and boy are we in a mess. Evolution, I would like to apologize that we have devolved as a society to allow our government to function as a really terrible sitcom. Economics and Statistics, I feel your heavy gaze as we still have 2 more years before we hopefully take the bankrupt millionaire out of office. Every day we live under a system whose poster child mocks its citizens and strips the majority of their rights. Their rights to Medical Care, a healthy and functioning Environment, and a Financial System which can support the majority, not just the top 1%.
Today I did my part. I practiced my right . . . no my privilege to vote. Too many people chose not to vote. I didn't vote for the last 6 year because I felt I was uneducated in the topic. I felt I was flying blind, something I could have taken 15 minutes to change. If I were a citizen of Georgia I would have lost this privilege, because of 5 years of voting inactivity. If I were of Hispanic descent I would most likely have had to jump through excessive hoops because of a hyphenated last name. There are so many people who don't want to vote because they fear jury duty, or they don't want to wait in line, or they don't want to make time to vote, or they are just plain convinced the system is rigged and their opinion doesn't matter. Let me tell you something, your ballot only "doesn't matter" if you don't hand one in. In fact, it is probably working against the team you would have voted for.
I am a woman, which mean only in the past 100 years was my second X chromosome "granted" this privilege. There are still grandparents alive today who remember when, specifically, black people could not vote. There are also plenty of other cases of this "right" being restricted from huge groups of people because of, in reality, what makes them unique.
So, I sit here today Science an Math, praying to you that my little corner of the United States may become a better place for ALL of its inhabitants.
Please let the scales tip in the favor of justice.
Nov 6, 2018
Nov 6, 2018 at 10:15 AM UTC
Hyphenated-Last-Name had an opinion.
Hyphenated-Last-Name felt threatened as well as outraged.
Hyphenated-Last-Name spoke for all women everywhere.
Hyphenated-Last-Name took a bold stance for the marginalized.
Hyphenated-Last-Name spoke truth to power.
Hyphenated-Last-Name felt that strict measures were called for.
Hyphenated-Last-Name had her head up her *** and did not believe in GOD.
Aug 18, 2018
Aug 18, 2018 at 4:30 PM UTC
i'm a hyphenated pause
between sheets
of crumpled paper
a chance to catch
a deep breath
between dang'rous thoughts
i'm just a dash
between restless gasps
the caesura between broken sighs
when i cease to be
the conjunction between
then and forever
will be bridged
in-between, interrupted
by a spurious line
Feb 28, 2014
Feb 28, 2014 at 5:06 PM UTC
**** you and your little intelligentsia
group therapy sessions
basing its roots in caveman cartesian
theoretic - i know you know that
the blank canvas are the ********
and that artists work on that -
because normally grey citizens are no
blank canvas but a subordination -
but still, **** you, why not concentrate
on the blank economics of a beggar
to exercise your little intelligentsia
get-together sessions?
there are less social securities in that
department of inquiry -
mental health and art... what's that?
you jealous of the caverns of the mind
crafting an escape pod to your
****** exercise of mechanisation -
**** on me, crosswords! su doku!
all matters of encryption!
endear your lack of creativity with
the synonymousness act of creativity
decoding encryption,
because you obviously can't encrypt
on a complete lack of encoding parameters (blanks).
you can't encrypt originality unless
you start with encrypting nothingness
with stars... and how often does that happen?
perhaps once... i care to make you
feel something akin to bombastic,
a football stadium size of appreciation lost -
skull kickabout with commentary:
to create the post-relativity warp
of quantity-quality, akin to space-time,
for indeed the answer to science's
space-time hyphenated couplet
is quantity-quality - and that's hardly a measurable
consideration, since there are too many particulars
involved, i.e. too many individuals, choices
and disparaging wills - too many particulars
in the hyphenated couplet quantity-quality,
since science is offering universal breadcrumbs
with its space-time rationalisation
for each and every for a share in populating
an insignificance, whether on a personal
scale or an impersonal / collective scale -
and both are indeed expressed,
the famous parasitical comparison found
in too many numbered essays by individuals -
but still humanism has a quantity-quality parabola,
while science has its space-time parabola,
and indeed both in dip, provide waves,
for example the former with Plato and Neoplatonism,
and for example the latter with
the revisionists of Einstein - the revisionist excavators
arguing precision to 100% proof of measurement
in exponential scaling of the mind theorising
a bus trip to Saturn like a bus-trip parallel-akin
to a 1 mile trip on the same vehicle in the earthly atmosphere.
Apr 14, 2016
Apr 14, 2016 at 8:40 PM UTC
I celebrate this journey in the desert -
I am but a traveler in my time:
in this pasture of my fathers, land,
where stands this miracle of glass
now calling manna down
from the high home of eagles:
I am but a helpless everyman, lost
in the desert, on a journey out
from the clutches of misery, and pain;
The world is making progress.
As I see the oases running farther
away from my sights: on
elevators to the skies, numbers
of the young call on benefactors
across the seas, for a ropeway
across the quagmires: a home, a car
and the family life; saving for a
better day, in the future, while
my home went from mudbrick
to thatched grass, then out on streets
by the gutter with the dogs;
I am a cleaner, cobbler, janitor
in the land where I was the tiller.
Wiping the sweat on my brows
as I loaf on the lawns, awaiting
labour days hyphenated by mealtimes,
there is no witch-doctor now, and
no money to pay up at the hospitals
that the wealthy from afar line up to,
but to die helpless a wretched death,
I celebrate my helplessness!
Jul 5, 2014
Jul 5, 2014 at 4:17 PM UTC
there's a funny twist to this tale,
with feminism tackling ***********
and *** without consent,
both noble feats to tackle...
the male version? becoming
impregnated without consent -
jeez that sounds weird -
well the £110 an hour prostitutes
say they check themselves for
sex-related diseases regularly:
and i believe them. they also require
you to wear a rubber second ********
but it's just odd that you can a man,
and have no say in the matter
of your ****** partner being impregnated,
given that your ******** is about
an inch long, and when pulled back
your ******* head turns purple
because of the constraints, so a ******
isn't really that much of a discomfort...
but still she insists... *** in me, *** in...
white lies and anti-contraceptive pills...
so how about strawberry...
i don't mind, my ***** gagging with the ********
pulled back, but hey, ******* with ********
is so much more pleasurable than without
it... i know, i have the capacity.
and indeed i do like Freud, his theory
of the compound Madonna-Whore "complex"
is true... question is, is it expressed by
a woman, or by man? i'm guessing a woman
since Freud covered men as Wilhelm Oedipus Rex...
and i went straight down the hyphenated middle...
Madonna O Madonna why are you
in need to talk about ***
and the ***** get's them every time,
no talk, i know why i paid for consent,
she knows i paid for consent, even if she's not
aroused she uses skin-cream to oil up
so penetrating her won't hurt... while i'm not
a universal stunner... but i still don't
understand why a girl would think there's
no opposite of **** / *** without consent...
i.e. forcing a fatherhood on you on the sly...
that's the opposite of **** she thinks you're
so perfect because she's in her teens and she just
experienced the diversity of the world
and boom, you're trustworthy about her promise
to be on anti-contraceptive pills (she isn't),
you can use a ****** because your ********
is too tight... and then you get a really bad Kafkaesque
theme for the rest of your life.
May 10, 2016
May 10, 2016 at 6:57 PM UTC
dear mom,
last night when you called again in a drunken rage,
i tried my best to do the obligatory, "yes, mom", but i was
tired and disinterested in your antics.
when i woke up this morning, you had left two voicemails & one text:
i am possessed by a demon.
i don't deserve my hyphenated last name.
i carved on myself as a teen just to **** with you.
you only gave birth to my sister because i wanted one.
i better watch out because you're getting really mad.
you pulled this all the night of my 13 year old daughter's birthday party.
you jealous *****
May 19, 2012
May 19, 2012 at 11:52 PM UTC
How long did it take her to be free?
How long did it take
For the wingless dragonfly to finally open her heart to the world
How long did it take for her to overcome Devil’s workshop
Slowly caressing her retinas
With silky daffodils and two-faced tulips
Where
Now
She dives into a glistening pool of complicated risk
Opening her atrium to the masses
Shedding incumbent teardrops
Just for that one standing ovation
That sets her free
It was then
Where pieces of plastic chains fell from demure stratosphere
Dented taps, similar to a shoeless dancer,
Setting off bass tones and low-key monotony
For she was
One cholesterol filled syllable short
To be genuine
One tearful, hyphenated lyric
Too blunt
To be embraced by their “god”
One dilapidated vowel shy
Of being honest
Her diary didn’t have enough pages torn
From emerald sanity
There were too many “Wows”,
Diluting into disingenuous shoulder pats
Her stanza pushed aside
A glorified ***** call with no call back number
Leaving messages towards empty dial tones
…
How long will it take her to be free?
Until she looks up
Knowing she already holds the key
Sep 20, 2015
Sep 20, 2015 at 12:06 AM UTC
I, a hyphenated Italian,
will claim Shakespeare
descended the long
Romanesque
staircase, to write
our empiric wrongs.
It's all there in the plays,
if you've a keen enough eye
to catch these things,
and his name has cachet,
while mine needs
a laureled bling.
Apr 20, 2010
Apr 20, 2010 at 8:36 PM UTC
tsk tsk asterisk
chk chk clap blam boom
sik click arsonic
grip glap drap gloom
wix wax anthrax
hop leap woosh slam
sip spike archetype
cough crash anagram
hark bark blue monarch
wrapped in a summer's day
tick tack heart attack
passing the cabaret
she used to say words like
bump, beep, buzz
until flutter fizz crunch chirp
fell beams of a truss
and tenderly did hum zap sing
in little vrooms and snags
did she meet unfortunate ends
woof, crack, thud, down crags
shimmer shingles whisper dust
ugh, agh, yawn, sigh!
her eye sockets gathered such beautiful rust
and did crunch clink, flick and eek
to crack the numbing morning moon
but break, snap, bash, sink
into the hyphenated royal lagoon.
Nov 18, 2012
Nov 18, 2012 at 6:31 PM UTC
*i went straight down the hyphenated route, along the winding clay paths of papa simius sapiens **** esse, to see both the western mountains and the eastern seas, yes, straight into the hyphen, watching both the northern infinity (8) and the southern infinity (∞), bypassing scientific equations of the equator by digging to fiji through china.*
i had, and still have two defence mechanism,
a pseudo-impotence within the framework
of the freudian madonna-whore complex
with the everyday girls,
which quickly disappears with prostitutes,
and the fact that, when i was impotent with her
after three attempts and on the fourth wasn’t,
she still didn’t bother to take off the t-shirt i was
wearing when i made love to her,
so all the brass muscle shadow contrasts i was moulding
went to the scrap heap and i returned to the chubby old me
drinking excessively and utilising my lessons in spelling
words using chemical compound complications
of my favoured utilised prospects in the realm of the intellect -
yes, these two defence mechanisms,
because upon engaging with prostitutes in a mirror of pure
functioning objectivity of the ***** and fox
i known a word or two about anti-feminism,
so the t-shirt part during *********** is a shield to prove
the objectivity of the act can progress into the subjectivity of the person,
and because she didn’t take it off, proves my point that
she was nothing more than a ********** or a pole dancer,
which she later became,
even though she was reasonably sane enough to do otherwise.
Oct 18, 2015
Oct 18, 2015 at 7:19 AM UTC
socrates was executed in democracy, de facto argumentation in favour of democracy as utopian or workable utopian is flawed; it's like the equivalent of advertisement (2d) of dog food (3d).
the most uniform definition of oursevles
based on the unitary currency,
when faced with what is a priori
to what’s relatable is crafted
by: machina ex non-ego,
i.e. the machinery we submit to,
even though we were not involved in constructing
the machinery... we have to identify ourselves...
nonetheless...
the kantian concept of a priori and a posteriori
is limited in the greek deus ex machina
and the hyphenated expression:
a- priori and a- posteriori (the a- of atheism, i.e. without).
but imagine it simpler:
machinery not from me... tax credit breaks...
the traffic code... morality of any sort...
the need for pyramids...
it’s not the socratic inquiry of knowing yourself...
it’s about finding yourself...
that’s where psychoanalysis becomes crucial...
if you want to define the ego ex machina
you’ll get the upright citizent...
you want the machina ex ego... you will not get
any stability, and freudian / jungian judas selling theorem
like typing in the digit that was designated a repetitive index...
you’ll just get an individuation of the individual will...
shortened to: ‘what’s your ******* problem,
care to wear my shoes and walk a mile in them?!’
all crimes are commited on the basis of ego ex machina...
all coformity is based on the machina ex non-ego
(the communism of marx lived by all the slavs
in the 20th century... all the capitalistic intervetion
from adam smith...
odd that democracy should be coupled to capitalism...
and that the chaos of democracy should
eat the only political counter known as republicanism
with the economic model of republicanism as
communism becoming extinct due to john paul ii);
america never wants to export
republicanism, the good politics of rome...
always the **** part of ancient greece...
imagine how the elders of afghanistan will
accept the politics of youth (democracy)
should ancient standards be replaced by experimentation...
exporting democracy and not accepting
the republicanism of specified geographic regions
will always lead to mini-wars all the ****** time...
try exporting american republicanism...
oh right... afghani republicanism thinks
it's superior... and democracy just becomes
the no-man's land in belgium
between the dug-up trenches of the brits and the germans.
Nov 21, 2015
Nov 21, 2015 at 8:06 PM UTC
the desk drawer was open, extending an invite,
cheap blue handle scissors, easy see, on top,
robbed of excuses, went around the house, all my
personal goods, mission oriented, trimming away
loose threads wherever they were hiding in my life
no expert in love, for sure, but struck by you people
linking love and dying, over and over, like they are
hyphenated, siblings, separated twin children, that
long to communicate, checking each other out on the
internet anonymously, cause these two linked in ways
not understood, loosely tied, a threaded linkage, can you
please explain?
(mysterious)
is loved only fully realized,
when it phoenixes?
burnt, slowly agonizing,
arisen, resurrecting,
is it one cell endless
dying, re-splitting?
Paul calls,
asking:
“and you wonder why we, why you,
why I am still crazy after all these years?”
12:04am
Wed Sep 9
plague year
Sep 9, 2020
Sep 9, 2020 at 8:33 AM UTC
*so there are fifty states and they’re joined by federation laws,
but talk of “the state” is not talked about in the same way as
talk of california
or new jersey or new england...
because these states... ah blah blah... why not change
it to the f.n.a.: federation of north america?
it’d sell you a few badges, t-shirts and balloons.*
so in america the federal laws are like ecclesiastical laws,
and state laws are like european state laws -
steal an onion from a merchant’s stand
and get your hand chopped off
in the translation of arabic, should it come to such
drastic action -
so while in europe the church-state of einstein’s
vocabulary went their separate ways
ensuring that time became definite and space became definite
and the space-time / church-state hyphenated coupling
was simply defined as indefinite...
and that coupling became sort of theoretically
stuck in bubblegum of inactivity and awe as truth.
in america there’s a purposive blocked toilet
of the federal (laws) never meeting the state (laws)...
but imagine if the federal met the state
like the church once met & clung to the state...
this purposive avoidance of the two never meeting
in america is already problematic
from what i have heard...
the two need to meet and then uncouple...
like in europe where the church & state met and then divorced...
this state / federal engagement can’t last...
there has to be a marriage... and subsequent divorce to just
see how the political engine works...
otherwise there’ll be a lawyers’ limbo to contend with,
i.e. when a lawyer doesn’t understand something
he tends to use his defence mechanism of making at least
one word ambiguous with the word’s secondary, tertiary meaning,
which doesn't ask for a serious argument
but a solipsistic technicality of not talking to the person
least informed but most ambitious to say something, anything.
i.e. you can’t really claim that california is federated
if the wealth of california is worth as much as iowa, nebraska,
north dakota, south dakota, wyoming... basically the whole of mid-west
scotland ireland bulgaria and romania and sicily;
but i’m sure thomas jefferson was looking for pretty geography
rather than equations to stamp out marxism.
Oct 22, 2015
Oct 22, 2015 at 11:03 AM UTC
I was sitting at the back
Staring at the girl in front
I remember this,
Just a college life.
The first time we’ve met
I knew this girl is best
Just a minutes pass
She said, “the hyphenated words”
Oh! She’s my instructor
Oh!... she’s simple as beautiful
This girl I’ve met
How I wish to be like that
Intelligent, “the hyphenated words”
Aug 9, 2016
Aug 9, 2016 at 3:28 AM UTC
I claim a hyphenated existence that does not belong to me
Apr 7, 2016
Apr 7, 2016 at 3:20 PM UTC
Advent at the Dollar Store
The ***** roachy desperation of
the unswept dollar store’s cellophane dreams
At Prices You’ll Love boxes of oilless
popcorn poppers deep-fat fryers massagers
to sweeten generational desperation
behind the counter cigarettes locked up
We Cash Work And Welfare Checks can’t afford
Lives collapsed so we console ourselves with
electric hair-curlers and boxes of chips
singing NFL coffee machines
shiny new bicycles to be stolen
before the end of January or
left out to rust in the February rain
dusty plastic holly shiny CD
players for the administration of
anaesthesia Jumbo Bargain Gift Wrap
for Your Happy Holiday Shopping Pleasure
No Shirt No Shoes No Service No, No, No
Hyphenated Industries of Chicago,
Tokyo, Seoul, and Taipei wishes us
a Merry Christmas
Dec 10, 2016
Dec 10, 2016 at 7:34 PM UTC
Do you
have a hyphenated-identity too?
Do you make me
or is that
upside-down-backwards?
We take so many ideas back.
You lick the old scars on my arm
you let the bugs in my stomach live
live.
Blue-black brick buildings
and jars and jars
of green dreams you've had
about me
It's all
about me
Did you build me in your
miss-matched
reddish-green bed-
room.
Painted or maybe born out of song
so
tie your wires
build your allegiances
there's too much water in the air
You know
I'm on step three
of the grieving process now
three whole days
and like frozen cream
you roll on my teeth
my tongue
dripping
You used to be warm
and stretched over oceans
and oceans
when I used to know the bones
in your
face
it's all about me
Presence
and more narrow
you in my bubbles
and my
thoughts
click
Mar 27, 2011
Mar 27, 2011 at 9:22 AM UTC
turn back, you're a lot warmer
than a flame, than the embers
of December, than a frame
buckled down with your
sweat.
you complete crop circles
hidden deep inside a turtles shell
reaching out with show and tell
iterating 'what the hell' occurred
oh sir, you sit alone
hyphenated, overrated, we placated
the wait within watered down bread
while in your head you said:
"we are creatures of the tongue
reading sermons on the mount
we are creatures of the lung,
without this air we cannot shout
at windows, trying to find the right
tone to crack
the glass
during mass."
Oct 15, 2013
Oct 15, 2013 at 1:14 AM UTC
the great big metronome in the sky,
as those of a Floydian persuasion are wont to call it,
tick, tick, ticks,
with a switchblade intransigence,
for a docile audience, rows of anesthetized deer...
Mr. Whogivesa and Mrs. ****
and their son,
with the hyphenated last name,
living the namesake...
"don't talk to strangers?"
why not show them the sleeve,
where one's heart resides...
melodrama,
the most lucrative business move,
(then why are most panhandlers still panhandlers?
i guess it's the luck of the draw)
...takes after his Father most,
that being he always stops short,
that extra step,
much too extra to take,
a voyage in itself...
in his standstill,
where the metronome ticks, ticks, ticks,
and only few deer are left awake,
by the dull-glow of drug,
a voice, between drags of a cigarette:
"kid, skipping stones across a frozen lake,
is not that impressive,
but convincing everyone it is? well..."
Apr 10, 2018
Apr 10, 2018 at 11:04 PM UTC
My father, his troop
left in the jungle - WWII
to build the Burma Trail.
I have vivid memories
of him waking from a dead sleep
startled, in a cold sweat
memories of the 5 years
in that jungle
tormenting his dreams
years later.
My eldest,
18 months, Camp Cooke, Iraq.
Riding shot-gun on convoys....
My hair turned white.
His response -
"I was safer in Baghdad,
than in Compton...."
Second son
-5 years in the Navy.
All sacrificed for the safety
of others.
None lived a life
free of discrimination
... hatred
....unfair and unjust
... identified as hyphenated....
laws designed to imprison...
Never accepted as
human or even
just plain
American.
May 25, 2015
May 25, 2015 at 2:33 PM UTC
Lillian Caine was the young lady’s name.
She was a romantic at heart.
She was painfully thin with a wart on her chin,
and stood tall at the end of the line.
Little Jim Coke was a short little bloke,
A cherub like smile his chief charm
He soon won her heart, they were seldom apart,
They looked like a “10” arm in arm.
Lillian thought they were destined to wed;
Her dear little Jim thought the same.
When they wed they became,
by their hyphenated last name,
Mr. & Mrs. Coke-Caine
May 7, 2015
May 7, 2015 at 10:28 PM UTC