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Matt Sep 2016
"All who hate me whisper
Together against me;
Against me they
Devise my hurt, saying,....

"Like, is he stupid?"

No Monica
I am not stupid
I am fairly intelligent

Regardless of what you think
Was it the keycards?

I was thinking
I could share one with
My friend

I asked him where he
Would leave it

I wasn't sure where
You had put your
Keycard

I didn't know
If you would be
Needing one
More often

Or where you would
Be going

I didn't know
You would put it
On the counter

I thought you might
Keep it in your pocket

That is why I asked
Where my good friend
Was going to keep

One of the cards
Or, "our keycard"

Your keycard
Can't be relied upon
You never said

You would keep it
On the counter

I didn't know
Where you would
Keep it
Or how often
You would use it

Yes, I understand
Keycards are
Interchangeable

But I didn't know
How often
You would be using yours

That is why
4 people
1 keycard for each
Group of two

I asked him
Where he was keeping ours

Because I didn't know
Where you were placing
The other one

No, I'm not stupid

Should I forgive you?
No, I won't
Joe Satkowski Aug 2013
dead soldiers swing from the tree branches behind my house
and i can hear crevices of ice being formed on the lakefront
as the ice cracks in the agonizing cackle and slow mournful croon of a dying animal or a small child

romance me around the tables and kiss me between the bars
hide all the ******* in the keyholes and don't let me forget this keycard

i told you, officer
she went to get ice for some drinks and when i woke up she wasn't here
Evelyn Culwch Feb 2016
The invitation comes
in the form of a hotel room keycard
The venue
a back hallway where a half dozen gather
Music
a playlist from Spotify

The high priestess officiates
and the priest in a belly dancer’s outfit
ties a silk ribbon around the happy couple’s hands
a fine pagan tradition
Giggles over his jingling bangles
set the mood

Afterward we go to Rosa’s
still dressed in our finery
(except for the priest
who has found a sweatshirt)
The happy couple share a margarita
while the rest of us dine on tacos and empanadas

In the room we share with the new spouses
I rest with the best of royalty
By midnight
I am asleep on the priestess’ lap
A late wedding present for Vex and Sarah. Some details changed through creative license, I hope you guys don't mind! I shared it with my poetry class and they all seemed to like it (except for one, who didn't hear my explanation and thought it was satire; clearly he doesn't know how to party).
Nemo Sep 2015
Mr. Isaiah N. Felix had overslept. Again.
He put both hands on his face and grumbled a long, sleepy
"Fuuuuck."

Mr. Felix rose from his bed, resentful of most everything
including himself.
As he stood, he breathed "****" once more before heading to the bathroom.

He made his feet move toward the seashell themed bathroom
his girlfriend had insisted on decorating,
even though she had her own apartment.

While he ******, he thought about the dream he'd had.
He was a child again standing in the fun house,
afraid to go through the spinning tunnel.

He wondered if it had been a real memory.

He didn’t' have time to shower or shave,
but he hurried to get dressed,
and didn't notice he'd missed a button.

On the way out the door he noticed he had a voicemail.
"Mr. Felix, I'm calling again about your father,
please call us when you can."

He coughed into his fist and walked out the door.

After the short walk to his office,
he incorrectly swiped his keycard,
and the machine sang out its small cadence of rejection

It sounded familiar.

Once he sat down in his cubicle
he was called into his boss's office
by a plump women who wore too much blush, he thought.

His boss cleared his throat and said "Isaac-"
"Isaiah." Mr. Felix corrected.
"Isaiah, I'm sorry to have to do this, but you've been coming in late..."

He continued, but Mr. Felix only closed his eyes, slumped in a squeaky leather chair
and thought about the spinning tunnel in the fun house.
He packed up his things and was gone within the hour.

He found himself at the park, sitting on a bench covered in bird ****.
He looked down at the words scribbled on it,
and amongst the profanities, he read "I will always love you guys"

And he thought that was really beautiful.

Then a pigeon **** on him from somewhere way up above
and he thought to himself,
"Man, I really should have seen that coming."

Mr. Felix decided he would walk to his girlfriend's apartment and surprise her.
He picked up two roses on the way for $9.95
and thought that was a little much to be spending on flowers.

After knocking twice without response he used his spare key.
Inside he found his girlfriend with another man,
******* under seashell sheets.

He thought, "She must really like the beach."
And then he thought that was
a strange thought to have at the given moment.

"What are you doing here?"
"Why aren't you at work?"
"Are those flowers for me?"

Mr. Felix fell to the floor
and as his girlfriend rushed to him covered only in bedsheets,
he noticed a reoccurring pattern on her ceiling.

And then he said
"Do you even love me?"
And again heard a small cadence of rejection.

"Isaiah..." she had said.

As his now ex-girlfriend filled a vase with water for the flowers,
he stood and left her apartment, and thought maybe he felt blood on the back of his head.
He heard her call from the door, but marched forward.

He stood in the elevator feeling slightly dizzy
and remembered the time she had wiped vanilla ice cream
from his chin, and kissed him, and said something very beautiful.

She said, "You're always going to remember this moment."

And then Mr. Felix passed out.






He dreamed again he was standing before the spinning tunnel.
He wanted to walk through it, but for some reason
he knew he shouldn't.

When he opened his eyes
he realized he was in a hospital.
The same hospital that his mother had died in.

He blinked.
And then he thought maybe he should cry,
but he didn't. He couldn’t.

His now ex-girlfriend noticed his eyes had opened.
She stood next to the bed holding a bouquet of flowers
and Mr. Felix wondered how much she'd spent on them.

But he didn't ask.

The nurse said that the damage was not serious,
and after a few hours and a few tests,
his room had been replaced by a young girl who had been struck by lightning.

Incidentally, she had been the one who wrote the really beautiful words on the bench.

His now ex-girlfriend had driven him back to his apartment,
and they were now standing in a silence only she thought was awkward
when Mr. Felix noticed he had another voicemail.

"Mr. Felix, um," the voice began,
"I hate to have to do this over voicemail,
but your father has passed. We've been trying to reach you...”

He continued, but Mr. Felix only closed his eyes, slumped on the floor.
Again he saw the spinning tunnel, this time a kaleidoscope appeared at the end,
and the thought he would walk through it.

When he opened his eyes again
He found he was on the roof.
He wondered if God had carried him there, or if it was just the fire escape.

He wasn’t sure which one he preferred.

Mr. Felix stood on the edge of his twenty-story building.
He noticed that from here all the people looked like ants,
And he noticed that he felt like one.

Mr. Felix closed his eyes once more
And saw the kaleidoscope spinning
In front of him, around and around.


He was amazed by how it was constantly changing,
But somehow it was always how
it was supposed to be.

And it was always beautiful.

Mr. Felix finally summoned the courage
To step into the spinning tunnel
And into the colliding colors.

He thought about his funeral,
And how much they would spend on flowers.
And then he wondered who “they” would be.

He thought about his now ex-girlfriend
And how she cared more about flowers and seashells and *******
Than him.

But she could say some very beautiful things.

He tried to think of what his father would say
And then he tried to remember
What his mother looked like


He heard a sharp wind howl,
Maybe an angel singing,
And a scream he thought might be his own.

He heard every small cadence of rejection.

He heard his grandmother playing her grand piano
With arthritic hands
And a gummy but perpetual smile.

He heard someone say,
In a voice both happy and sad,
“I will always love you guys.”

Mr. Felix heard many things on his way down.
Sirens, shouting, and a love so heavy
It was collapsing on itself.

Mr. Felix finally heard the sound
he’d been waiting
His whole life for

The infinite, the sweet,
The intimate, complete,
The absolutely beautiful song of acceptance.
And then Mr. Felix hit the ground.
j carroll Jun 2015
when i wake up without my glasses sometimes
i think i'm still in a tent on the side of a highway in queensland
and the sun coming up starts a stopwatch
t-minus 20 minutes until the air heats up like an oven
merrily roasting the blonde figures
on either side of a slightly deflated air mattress.
if i keep my blurry vision fixed i can hear whip birds
and cackling kookaburras and
a vague buzzing i forget as soon as i shift my attention.
i want to push my too-tanned face through the moth-dotted
10-second-tent ***** and gasp wholly unsatisfying gulps
of petrol station breezes.

but when i wake up with my contacts cementing my eyelids shut
i think i'm hungover in a grimy hostel in brisbane
with a different blond figure gripping my hip
and 29 other filthy travelers snoring uproariously in the same room
and every one of them asleep with stories still pressed to their lips
willing to trade for the thrill of it.
and i know i won't be able to find my keycard in the tangled sheets
and anyway, my bunk in my own room doesn't have a ladder
and there's always a german girl sleeping below
with her underwear hanging from the bars i use to clamber up
so i sigh and pass that problem down to future-me
fall back asleep

and when i wake up i have miscalculated
and somehow i'm twelve thousand miles away already
as abrupt as this

but sometimes for a few myopic seconds, my chest feels light.
Alexandria Hope Sep 2015
California. Land of the In-And-Out, the glitz, the glamour. The noise of traffic to burst the bees out of her hive mind. Okay, so In-And-Out wasn't as good as Biggerton's Burgers. That **** was endorphic, but at least anything was better than nothing.
At least, unlike South Dakota, there didn't seem to be any Llama farms around. She could live with that. It was actually pretty nice in LA. Noisy, hot, next to water. Her pyrite keychain (swiped) dangled from her keys as she turned off the Mustang (swiped, but undeniably hers) and pocketed them. Run-down Motels never went out of season. It would be treason against nature for them to. ******, broken-spring beds and tepid showers, loads better than her backseat though.
It would be easy to take in the habit of throwing trash around her car, she mutters. Half remembering all her garbage dump trips (neighborhood yards and fast food restaurant bathrooms taking the brunt of it). Agent Runaway laughs as she stretches her arms above her head.
There's a base in San Jose. Screaming, electric shocks, experiments. Like her. Just not... successful. With a mad woman on the loose, they've cut back spending. Put it all on her. And what a gamble that was, she hummed. But there were plenty of off-radar, illegal, operating sublets. She'd need one to solder her pretty little mind back together.
Agent Runaway stifled a yawn and clawed her way into her motel room, barely kicking the door shut and collapsing on the bed. In minutes she'd shut down all her sensors, stop listening to the babble of the old woman who'd handed her her keycard at the desk and the squabbling couple next door. She was asleep.
Just makayla Jun 2018
They took me from school
They put me in an ambulance
My favorite teacher came with
Next thing I know
I have a hospital wristband on
It has my name printed on it
I have an uncomfortable gown on
Weird socks on with grip on the bottom
Walking the cold hospital halls
Personally escorted
I remember thinking to myself
"I'm officially crazy"
They use their keycard to unlock the doors
I carefully step into a psych ward
It felt so isolated, cold, and sad
They took me to what they called "my room"
Bathroom was locked
Walls were blank
Shelf's were empty
They left my room
It was about 12;00 a.m
There was a bright green clock light in the wall
I turned down the lights
I tried to make my thoughts go to sleep
But it was my soul that was more awake than ever
I just laid there
I asked myself why I was here
Suicide, misery, depression, self-hate
And cuts on my wrist is what came to mind
"Oh" I said to myself with a tear sliding down the side of my face
That's why I'm here
©makayla bailey
quimx Jul 2016
late at night i never can sleep too well
prison bars staring at me through the cell
i tried to make it my momma told me
rise above cause freedom aint really free

in the game escaping this living hell
conjugal visit she can ring my bell
dreaming to be the man that i can be
bread and water my only ecstacy

sure enough i'm a make it out some day
with the keycard they slid into my tray
freedom aint free but i'm a make it mine
debt to society and time to shine
Alexis K Apr 2019
Sunday I worked early in the morning. I did nothing more.
Monday I went to school, then to my hotel where my keycard wouldn't open my door.
Tuesday I competed in my contest, thought I did quite well.
Wednesday we got the results and I went swimming. Turns out I didnt do so swell.
Thursday I went to school again, then I went to work. I learned night shift.
Friday I didnt have school, so instead I did nothing but sit.
Saturday I worked the morning then sat down to write. I still dont know what I'm writing or if this a good bit.
AJ Farruco Sep 21
Punk kid perception/
Sick sense of humour/
Bad touch is mad funny/
'Til the joke's on you/
Or somebody you know/
Stop laughing/
I feel nauseous/
Frank told me to burn it down/
Kiddie **** dungeon/
Suzie pulled a pistol on Henry/
Wild at heart/
Crazy on top of nervous/
Energy about to spill out/
Satanic ritual abusers/
I will **** you/
Raze your pyramid/
Invert your scheme, and/
Then drop it on your eyeball.../

BABIES ARE CRYING/
STOP THE CYCLE/
PSYCHOLOGICALLY DISTURBED/
HURT MYSELF/
SHADOWBOXING WITH PURPLE KNUCKLES/
****** BRICKWALLS/
MY FUNNYBONE IS BROKEN/
AND I'LL USE IT/
SKELETON KEYCARD/
FREE ALL THE PRISONERS/
FREE ALL THE PRISONERS/
FREE ALL THE PRISONERS/
SPLINTERCELL/
STOP THE CYCLE/
PSYCHOLOGICALLY DISTURBED/
HURT MYSELF/
SHADOWBOXING WITH PURPLE KNUCKLES/
****** BRICKWALLS/
MY FUNNYBONE IS BROKEN/
AND I'LL USE IT/
SKELETON KEYCARD/
FREE ALL THE PRISONERS/
SPLINTERCELL/
SPLINTERCELL/
SPLINTERCELL/
SPLINTERCELL/
SPLINTERCELL/
SPLINTERCELL./
© + ® A.J. Farruco, 02/07/2017.

— The End —