"jaws" poems
there is always somebody or something
waiting for you,
something stronger, more intelligent,
more evil, more kind, more durable,
something bigger, something better,
something worse, something with
eyes like the tiger, jaws like the shark,
something crazier than crazy,
saner than sane,
there is always something or somebody
waiting for you
as you put on your shoes
or as you sleep
or as you empty a garbage can
or pet your cat
or brush your teeth
or celebrate a holiday
there is always somebody or something
waiting for you.
keep this fully in mind
so that when it happens
you will be as ready as possible.
meanwhile, a good day to
you
if you are still there.
I think that I am---
I just burnt my fingers on
this
cigarette.
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I want to kiss you all day.
I want to start at dawn.
I want our mouths to dry out by breakfast.
I want our jaws to start cramping by noon.
I want us to question our decision to kiss all day by hour five.
I want to have *** really quickly then seriously stop all this kissing ******** because you need your personal space, apparently.
Apr 6, 2015
Apr 6, 2015 at 2:10 PM UTC
the walls of the inside passage
look the same from sound to straight
tugs and plugs dot the coastline
as the quartermaster rolls
giving time for evening glare
pods are in sequence
as the high tail smashes and jaws at the krill
white bellies and sea cows bob and weave
as bow heads glide over haida gwaii
northern lights dance
and tlingit chant
as the tide settles softly on savory shores
their getting hungry in hoonah
as the blue back and beating drums
mark the life blood of the sea
driftwood nets
and sitka spruce
surround the cook house
ravens and tinhorns
man the scullery
kerosene lamps flicker
as clam shells roast
on open flames
villagers stroll
on pebbled sand
*in the harbor of souls
where ships set sail
on might and mass
into the steady winds
of the golden skies*
ice fields (to the north)
of kryptonite blue
cutting hills at
a glacial pace
knuckle clouds
above the snowline
where warlocks
craft a hidden trade
trappers, skinners
muscle shoals
grizzly feasts
in kodiak bowl
determined pilgrims
on a dead horse trail
in search of gold
the holy grail
Mar 1, 2017
Mar 1, 2017 at 11:52 PM UTC
its amazing what we’re capable of when pressed;
lunar launches
and shaman healing
hail marys
and fortunes of gold
heavy hauls
and broken borders
war, compassion
and treaties of peace
all those wild and lofty regressions from the mean;
soul re-settings
(from deadly deeds)
scores and scriptures
liberty and peace
walls, asylums
(in the jaws of defeat!)
channeled spirits
of warmth
and love
and connection
and sometimes, it’s just a little fodder;
pyramids and viaducts
aqua-lines and chunnels
spider climbs
and deep dives
(with base jumps near the high wire)
gardens, and divine art
and even water boards
(for beauty is always in the eye of the beholder!)
have a look around...
and let gratitude be your guide
Mar 28, 2017
Mar 28, 2017 at 11:56 PM UTC
In our world technological,
Here's how to talk to gadgets digital,
"Now, listen up, keyboard and router,
Not to mention dysfunctional mouser...
Are you listening to me carefully?
(I am talking to them, but silently),
I do have replacements for each of thee,
I see a future ahead of you three,
Tossed into the gaping jaws of a bin,
off to the council tip, repository of sin,
Did you hear that? Listening in,
Stop trying to do my head in!"
Now they're behaving dutifully,
Technology responding beautifully,
"I'm warning each one of thee,
No more messing around with me!"
Yes, how to talk to technology!
(But make sure you do it silently!)
May 11, 2016
May 11, 2016 at 4:55 PM UTC
I slip the straps and release the clasp
of your over-the-shoulder boulder holder.
Gravity asserts itself, and you sigh as
I wonder if I should get even bolder
because
The jaws of love masquerade
as petals of a flower
so
Just say if you want me to stop.
We are, after all, in the middle of a shop.
I was attracted when I saw you smile.
As we passed in the frozen food aisle.
Now people are staring though the window.
Shocked at my nonchalant innuendo.
And if your purse metaphor extends to this.
We can go to the Bank for a little kiss
though
I may not be able to afford
nine feather mattresses and a golden pea.
But if you could make do
with a lilo and a marble
then …
You've pulled Princess.
© Pagan Paul (30/05/17)
May 30, 2017
May 30, 2017 at 11:54 AM UTC
The deer are buried up to their necks
in the sandy soil
the struggle for purchase
frees them
into a pack of black wolves jaws
Nov 16, 2014
Nov 16, 2014 at 12:54 PM UTC
If there were a language for walls,
It would mumble,
Per broken jaws.
The sun would shine through fragmented holes,
A windows' lone goal?
To magnify heat,
Til' all was engulfed.
With confirmed dead inside,
None knock, as they've read inscribed:
"Family tree,
Difficulty,
Unavailable."
"Family business,
Buy one,
One comes free,
Fire wood sale."
Sep 19, 2018
Sep 19, 2018 at 12:23 AM UTC
Living freely in this world
My vulnerability, feels so lost
As it seeks the skies to escape all
Perched high away and hiding
My heart forsaken
For my vulnerability
Has left
The little bird has flown
My retreating heart lives behind
Many layers of frozen ice
The warm waters of my heart
Have all frozen over
Come back, come back little bird
A teardrop falls
For I see the loss of potential
In this frozen pond
Where waters should be warm
My heart should sing
Great rich jungles, it should bring
My pride wounded by this world
I stare into my murky depths
My standing in this world falling
As my legs are taken
By the jaws of a giant beast
Far away a bird twitches
My stomach twists and turns
Absorbed I am into the belly
Of a great giant crocodile
I begin to feel my vulnerability
In these dangerous warm acidic waters
As I merge into a crocodile
And high above a bird leaves his perch
As the ice layers break
With the force of my tail
New eyes see the self importance in people
Of this earth, with all their arrogance
I will bring you back to earth
For I am the last living dinosaur
Born from a time when T.rex reigned
And even the birds had teeth
For I still live in waters
Where Piranha's seek to
Frenzy on living flesh
And I am to be scared of you
I warn all of those who wish to disturb
My open and most precious heart
That rests in silence over my pond
For your flesh will quiver
With the sound of my ancient growl
And your eyes will panic
With the sight of my jaw
A quiet bird flutters closer
Bring your bitterness and all your sourness
For I am hungry and love rotten meat
And your disregard feeds my fury
Circle my pond
Where my heart rests softly
With rich and green waters
Bursting and growing in love
For I am not scared to feel
And I will lounge and grab
As a tonne of me, slaps itself
Bang, hard on this earth
For I am here to feel it
And not escape it
But you will be blind
And lost in my depths
I will turn you over and
Your arrogance will feed me
As I grow stronger
You will be ripped limb from limb
A little bird comes closer
My heart free from noise
A silence nestles in me
And all innocence is seen
Beautiful souls float freely
Butterflies dance and play
And my beautiful vulnerability
returns in sweet song
And rests softly in my jaw
A strange paradox becomes so very clear
With a little bird we hold so dear
Jul 28, 2014
Jul 28, 2014 at 7:54 PM UTC
.
***Ancient games
tell tales of dust. ||| A story drawn
from the lips of two poets.***
~~~~~
It's the wits that **** not Queens of ivory or ***ink. ***
Charged with coal strokes, scraping up the lies.
Pawns & Knights slip between the grasp of the sun, leaking into* lion jaws of Leo.
Shifting these granite plates, ignoring the Rooks common price of aslant.
Here we have slain kin, crescent traitors that backstab the night and battlefield.
Closed doors and trap floors, trade me a tie, swindling your tactic ruts.
Reality never got the noose around our necks, check turned into manslaughter, and kingdoms ripped asunder by the roar of Jupiter
Get up, get up, get away from these liars, they can't have your rank or your fire.
Peak a notion, this match is spared by a luft.
Toss away the pride buried 'neath your dusty skin, it don't matter no more if death has you by the lips.
Silence is a language too in our eyes of earth.
Take my hand, knott your soul into this downfall, and brace yourself for the wreckage in our bones.
The Sword of Sorrows will fall 'pon your shoulders, not to slay thee, but to dub thee a new day.
The drums of war will knit the lyrics in the sky,
singing:
"The mighty sharpen their fangs, the weak sharpen their wisdom"
~~~~~
I'm tired of your wishbones, and golden scales, give me the hard-earned truth.
Hot coals of honesty may you tread upon, shadow-bitten remorseful may you be, don't stray off the course of Ursa major.
The North star isn't the one I follow
It's the moon with all of it's phases,
Eclipsing and crescent, tipping the sky with it's beauty.
Now let this sink further than any soul has ever sunk,
no man could ever
*rule the moon.
~~~~~~
***Shoot on command,
C
h
e
c
k
m
a
t
e***
~~~~
You could drag me to hell and back and those words wouldn't mean anything.
Let this downfall become a downfell,
Because last I checked
"Wolves worship the moon"
and I have broke it's reflection in the water
*Just
by
throwing
s
t
o
n
e
s
.*
.
Jun 17, 2015
Jun 17, 2015 at 3:19 PM UTC
(March, 1919)A LIAR goes in fine clothes.
A liar goes in rags.
A liar is a liar, clothes or no clothes.
A liar is a liar and lives on the lies he tells and dies in a life of lies.
And the stonecutters earn a living-with lies-on the tombs of liars.
Aliar looks 'em in the eye
And lies to a woman,
Lies to a man, a pal, a child, a fool.
And he is an old liar; we know him many years back.
A liar lies to nations.
A liar lies to the people.
A liar takes the blood of the people
And drinks this blood with a laugh and a lie,
A laugh in his neck,
A lie in his mouth.
And this liar is an old one; we know him many years.
He is straight as a dog's hind leg.
He is straight as a corkscrew.
He is white as a black cat's foot at midnight.
The tongue of a man is tied on this,
On the liar who lies to nations,
The liar who lies to the people.
The tongue of a man is tied on this
And ends: To hell with 'em all.
To hell with 'em all.
It's a song hard as a riveter's hammer,
Hard as the sleep of a crummy hobo,
Hard as the sleep of a lousy doughboy,
Twisted as a shell-shock idiot's gibber.
The liars met where the doors were locked.
They said to each other: Now for war.
The liars fixed it and told 'em: Go.
Across their tables they fixed it up,
Behind their doors away from the mob.
And the guns did a job that nicked off millions.
The guns blew seven million off the map,
The guns sent seven million west.
Seven million shoving up the daisies.
Across their tables they fixed it up,
The liars who lie to nations.
And now
Out of the butcher's job
And the boneyard junk the maggots have cleaned,
Where the jaws of skulls tell the jokes of war ghosts,
Out of this they are calling now: Let's go back where we were.
Let us run the world again, us, us.
Where the doors are locked the liars say: Wait and we'll cash in again.
So I hear The People talk.
I hear them tell each other:
Let the strong men be ready.
Let the strong men watch.
Let your wrists be cool and your head clear.
Let the liars get their finish,
The liars and their waiting game, waiting a day again
To open the doors and tell us: War! get out to your war again.
So I hear The People tell each other:
Look at to-day and to-morrow.
Fix this clock that nicks off millions
When The Liars say it's time.
Take things in your own hands.
To hell with 'em all,
The liars who lie to nations,
The liars who lie to The People.
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a miracle child
born to a mortal mother
***the creator pretends
to be the created***
stealing butter,
breaking pots,
teasing girls,
Gokulam’s naughtiest child
and then one day
the friends complain
“Mother Yashoda, your little one
is eating mud from the Yamuna banks”
worried she rushes
to her darling boy
her anxiety disguised as anger
he smiles - the sly little blue-eyed boy
in his musical voice he cries-
“I did not eat mud, sweet mother, the boys lie!
***come look within
and see with your own eyes!”***
poor Mother Yashoda
not knowing she stared
into that little mouth
and lost herself in what was there
he lifted swiftly the
veil of maaya
the truth shone forth
with a blinding light!
*** त्वमेव माता च पिता त्वमेव ।
त्वमेव बन्धुश्च सखा त्वमेव ।
त्वमेव विद्या द्रविणम् त्वमेव ।
त्वमेव सर्वम् मम देव देव ॥***
she saw herself
and her dear little boy
the whole of Gokulam
within his jaws lay!
and the whole earth
and the universe
galaxies and multiple worlds
was her little boy cursed?
her fear mounted as she saw
the entire cosmos
the boundaries blurred
time - a non-entity
the past, present and future
only a tiny river
she saw the vast expanse
of his creation
he made these worlds
held them like puppets on a string
and then morphing
he became death!
and unable to take more
she swooned
when the Creator, the Preserver and the Destroyer
merged to become-her adored little one!
*** You are my mother, and my father
You are my relative and my friend
You are knowledge, You are prosperity
You are my everything, My God of Gods***
and then he looked at her
with an infinite compassion
he’d shown her
what she needed to see
now it was time
for her to forget, to become
his doting mother again
he kisses her with innocent love and toothy grin
once more
maaya takes hold
the illusion more beautiful
more irresistible to behold!
- Vijayalakshmi Harish
04.09.2012
Copyright © Vijayalakshmi Harish
Sep 4, 2012
Sep 4, 2012 at 2:45 AM UTC
I used to think that sadness was beautiful,
But what is the point of it all? We're supposed to be youthful!
They said time and time over that it would pass, but to be truthful:
The feeling and expressing pain or sorrow for sins, it's all we feel: ruthful
So in the end, what is the point of life at all?
When all we do is sit around and bawl,
"I just wanted to be pretty Cristi, just like a doll!"
But isn't it more important to be happy, above all?
All I have been feeling for the past couple of years is pain,
Even though all I have wrapped around my neck is a golden chain
Rather than his clenched fingers restricting against my jugular vein,
With a voice in the back of my mind reminding me of my engraved Mark of Cain,
It begs and exclaims, and it can't seem to remain restrained,
But to ease me of my pain, they'd say: "Here, have a glass of Champagne."
Can't you see what this mystery is doing to me?
I can't seem to break the shackles that would set me free,
All I'm reminded of is of my unfinished Master's Degree.
"Is that all that matters to you?!" I dare to plea,
"But what about my happiness, or my hemophilia b?!"
Their expressions are forever carved in my mind: dropped jaws and widened eyes,
"If it is such a sin to be happy, can't one consider the act of decriminalize?!"
They'd all put up such a convincing and eerie disguise
As if it would turn back the clock to avoid their end, their demise
But I could tell by their silenced, hushed lips and snake eyes:
My inquiry deserved a Nobel prize
What was it about my question that turned my loved ones against me?
They wouldn't dare turn their heads my way, they'd continue to sip on their black tea
As if I were a ghost, or some sort of banshee
The loss of my sanity is what they could foresee
-
Jun 23, 2014
Jun 23, 2014 at 12:41 PM UTC
Ashen doves float within the waves,
slinking like silent demons in the night.
They curl around my body,
jaws operating like steel machines,
gnashing at my limbs.
I begin to scream for help,
but they ****** my breath,
they drag me under their tides of black,
unleashing my unremitting fear of water predators.
their teeth, sunken into my flesh,
gnawing at my mind,
painting me my new mortality.
These are my demons,
the sharks in the bath when it comes to hygiene.
the fear of the below and the depths of human mentality,
the untraceable percentage of human worthlessness,
the detestable attraction to the demise of our minds,
I float lower into the aqua,
pressure building,
unforgiving and foreboding
I close my lids, and dream of the sand,
praying it to be underfoot when I open my eyes,
but when my lids open, the doves loom closer.
The irony of a hydrophobe,
dying at the hands of the sharks.
Oct 31, 2017
Oct 31, 2017 at 8:20 PM UTC
To Paint a Water Lily
A green level of lily leaves
Roofs the pond's chamber and paves
The flies' furious arena: study
These, the two minds of this lady.
First observe the air's dragonfly
That eats meat, that bullets by
Or stands in space to take aim;
Others as dangerous comb the hum
Under the trees. There are battle-shouts
And death-cries everywhere hereabouts
But inaudible, so the eyes praise
To see the colours of these flies
Rainbow their arcs, spark, or settle
Cooling like beads of molten metal
Through the spectrum. Think what worse
is the pond-bed's matter of course;
Prehistoric bedragoned times
Crawl that darkness with Latin names,
Have evolved no improvements there,
Jaws for heads, the set stare,
Ignorant of age as of hour—
Now paint the long-necked lily-flower
Which, deep in both worlds, can be still
As a painting, trembling hardly at all
Though the dragonfly alight,
Whatever horror nudge her root.
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What reason do we have to be angry.
What reason do we have to curse the stars
and all the threads that bind them.
Who's fault apart from ours is it,
that this is the hell that we have placed ourselves amidst.
Every point in our lives,
lying like a checkpoint,
glowing like a streetlamp in the dead of night.
At the feet of these golden warm, welcoming lights there lay a crossroad.
And we foolish children feeble in heart and mind fumble without a further thought.
We follow our hearts and we follow them into deep into the disguising dark.
-
Adventure was the death of us, antagonizing.
Adventure was heartache,
agony as evil wizards warped our worlds until we were weaning.
It wasn't too late before the brazen beasts had burdened our lives with ever more brutality.
Wolves hungry for the hearts of men, walking on hind legs to better hinder us with horrors.
This world is beautiful with wonder,
but it's wonders are like lights
upon the Lophiiformes head.
Bright, beautiful and inviting
But lead with haste into the jaws of oblivion,
well hidden amongst the dark.
N.H.
Nov 23, 2013
Nov 23, 2013 at 10:15 AM UTC
He was large as frogs go
Fist-sized happy rotund dweller
of backyard pond
Garter snake large, too large
with his ominous yellow stripes
and jaws to take
a larger than average mouthful
Choked by abdomen's girth
Legs drooling from his glut
Before the victim's even hit his gut's
digestive juices
Kid with hockey stick makes him puck
for his sin
Frog makes desperate
slim swim for rocks
Where he lies in recovery
from shock and
teeth marks on his belly
Underdog gets defense from phone call-- Eve
150 miles away
intercedes
Frog gets mercy of a transport
to another backwoods pond--
to find his life
forgetting trauma
Suns himself and swims
Eats the bugs
and ***** the froglettes
of another day
Aug 26, 2018
Aug 26, 2018 at 8:39 PM UTC
i come to you half mad
with desire
like slithers tongue
i wish
to have painfully stitched
to your silky ****
an act of desires supplication
my *** turned to poison
deprivations effulgent
obsidian flower salivating
your every smile
fleshy bells ringing
warping tintinnabulations
i am a starved incubus
drooling at your knees
behind me
a frothy junket of misdeeds
for loves sake
your feet the scent of lavender and salt
their shape evoking numberless poems
and begging adorations
your belly
a tender cauldron undulating
tummy ***** dancer
sacred **********
temple of worship
the site of your rounded bottom
naked red mouth calling
my sacred liturgy
your *****
velvet tulips for a tremulous kiss
I seed you a thousand times
a raging bludgeon
storming wounded gates Palisades
drenched and florid
fruit and milk ****
until jaws lock
and spire drops
turning me
to midnight cadaver
***** black hollows
a dark eyelid, blink-less
dead **** face down
a slumped snake
then soft dew
and cool ales
clear thickened muds saturation
lighten heat and peel
the warm palate
with agile caress
tender haunches wide and spiced
milk and butter thighs
her hair in mine
rushing river life
again i animate
an embryo id
dressed in fire
all vices and virtues
blood and sky
Jul 12, 2017
Jul 12, 2017 at 1:23 PM UTC
He is narcissist of highest character
is sunshine that is so smug
with its
wide smile
and rays that
poison
yet sunshine is
still your happiness
he is holder of many hearts
he likes to clutch them like
soft baby skin
to his soft chest
and feel the
beating and
warm gush
of blood
against
him
it feeds him
some say
like your eyes
never could
like the spark
that
pumped
like the
breath never could
that
beating
marvel
never could
like you
never could
he tells you that he has always loved the sun
you believe it is because he
sees himself when he
stares at it
in the reflection of the
car door
it slams behind him
as he steps over the
threshold
he does not whisper
of how your lips
were the key to his
he does not let his tongue
trail across your aching chest
as he murmurs
of how
you are the sun
baby
you shine so bright
baby
your skin is so soft
baby
sometimes you believe he has forgotten
that he was once you
was once the boy who lied
beneath the hungry tiger
and let its jaws
wrap upon his neck
and squeeze
sometimes
gentle narcissist
is he,
he likes to hold you to his chest
to feel your heart
and whispers about how
beautiful
you are
and how he
doesn't care
a pang shoots through your chest
and you feel tears leaking from you
you feel as if he has betrayed you
and then he
puts down your heart
looks you in the eye
and says
I don't love you for your beauty
baby
I love you for the fire
that spurs my wind
and
darkness that
sets my
skin aflame
Jul 31, 2018
Jul 31, 2018 at 6:08 AM UTC
If a busy gun takes lives
Then silent leaders do worse
They burn lives, hang knuses on the innocent
Voice your pain or get blessed with a curse
Blood shed Schools
We elected fools
Wrong leaders to lead us
Pushing useless agenda’s
While feeding us propaganda
Halls covered red
thousands of innocent people killed
At the expense of gun reform laws
Watching news with dropped jaws
We sit in silence
while the voiceless die for peace
May 21, 2018
May 21, 2018 at 5:22 PM UTC
in a taut black dress
you brush by me
you are
dark summer fruit simmering hot
a sopping estuary
i gather you into me
you cascade like an undulating cat
giggles like trembling gelatin
cherry kiss lips
agile muscle shifting
pleating like soft furs
against my thunderous chest
your tremulous tongue rupturing
like spiced chrysanthemums from heaven
i inhale your lavender breath
your saliva melts stormy mouth up-leaping
i eat your soul
and paradise ********
licking honey rainbows
filling my mouth a thousand times
and a thousand more
its never enough when some one has your heart
suffocate me in your drooling mouth
your body is my aviary
and hot house of man eating plants
i run to your teeth
beautiful cleavers gleaming
shivering with excitement
from your dragging bites
my blood languishing at your feet
have no regard for me
eat my love
i live to be swallowed by you
i hold you through the night
all dire raptures
dark in mystic paradise
tangled in your hair
may mourning never find us
torrid scorched from flames infernal
black candles uncrossing pasts
devils **** your adoring toy
kisses never ceasing
hot weather nostrils steaming
your flexed body writhes
a royal contortion
your heart cleaving
so that i may like a sun
consume your darkest edges
bitter chocolate so sweet
to fill griefs mouth with ecstasy
my heart aches like a siren of echoes
calling to you
shaking your gates down
you are a titanic gravity
and i'm forever tumbling
like eternal burning ashes through cobalt night
it is a steep decent into heavens arms
as i crumble
all smashing diamonds
and hissing flames
into open wounds weeping glitter
your chin jutting
throat stretched
while pulling the roots of your hair
exposing arteries pulsing
stuffing myself on your marrow
you plume like a volcanic moon
showering me with spooling stars
and butter **** kisses
ill turn you into my glistening little *****
all swollen tears for more
rituals of adoration
kisses like monsoon rains
i look up at your supple form
your haunches my temple
worshiping you
smothered in heavens jaws
you cascading pantie-less
in a taut black dress
Aug 22, 2017
Aug 22, 2017 at 1:36 PM UTC
This specific autumnal celebration is characterised by throbbing obscenities, where a masquerade of piety resembles the trembling jester as he performs before medieval royalty.
Oh, to witness the salmon run in Northern ecosystems where the caniform classification stands in a dominant stance at the edge of the falls.
So, my independent and competitive contemporary, let us bow with sober reflection at those anthropological schools who swim upstream in this spiritual river in the vain pursuit of unattainable freedom.
Today, on this second Monday of October, the name of the game has been brutally ***** by propagandist salesmen.
So, at this juncture of existential consumerism, we stand within the jaws of our ever-smiling aristocracy. But, if you dare to open your eyes, my friend of unfathomable denial; you will find that the tradition is called Thanksgiving.
Nov 6, 2013
Nov 6, 2013 at 9:46 PM UTC
we are monsters
from the boutique to the
embroidered throw pillows the
pen dashed around the neck
stage 5 bone cut
sawing ossification to the
hollow core
we are monsters
hooting in tunnels lined
with bats coming out to feast
creation
to scrape the streets
shimmy the walls
bust the coffin and
succckk
we are monsters
who can't enter under the
doorframe
fearful of being burned by
the sun silver stake
rat poison holy water sickle
and windmill ash
we are monsters
sewed stapled dead meat
skin hair plugs ceramic
teeth tested and tasted by
rats
we are monsters
jumping high over white
fences frenzied explosion
running through corn
angrily bled in a field shot and
hunted like embarrassing
waterfowl in the jaws of
mammalia
we are monsters
of flaming brilliance flashing
in your inbox
read us and gnaw
braised
roasted
grilled limbs
watch
as we watch you
be scared and
stab
I promise we don't die.
Oct 1, 2015
Oct 1, 2015 at 2:32 PM UTC
here's to a package of
Marlboro Reds
in the hands of
someone other than
the Marlboro Man
standing in
for those slack-jawed outlaws
my heroes now lack jaws
tongues
lungs
I swear it's been too long
since I inhaled manhood
The Great Darrell Winfield
rolled
packed
and filtered
into the only thing I know
that makes a man a man
the essence of
cowboy boots and farmer's tan
in every drag
see, I inhale my heroes
all the dusty red-necked
cowboys
Darrell Winfield
and my dad
men whose lives
went up in smoke
to coat my throat
in my own self-righteousness
I'm frightened this
is all that I'll have left
of him
lung cancer
and the lingering stench
of cigarettes
he always smelled
of cigarettes
he'd pull me into these
firm embraces
he held so long
that he'd suffocate me
in tacky business
and cigarette smoke
masked only
faintly
by a poor man's
cologne
still I breathed him in
until I'd start to choke
it was too much man to handle
my grandpa told me
“smoking doesn't send you
straight to Hell,
but it sure does make you smell
like you've already been there”
he was
a grown man
cursing
crying
lying
dying by himself
trying to drown out the inferno
with a case of beer
but sobriety finds you sometime
and I'd rather suffocate in cigarettes
than lose him altogether
and even if he smells like Hell
at least that means he made it back
May 21, 2012
May 21, 2012 at 6:14 PM UTC