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Jacob Giggey Oct 2015
Scarlet rain briskly dances, from the leaky vein.
Casting out sadness and pain,
as it makes it's way toward the drain.
I wake forth with strain,
as the images fade through the mist of my brain.
Mimi Sep 2011
This place is so quickly home
in my cinder block palace
the leaky sink, the naked boy in the bed
across from mine.
I am triumphantly queen of these gravel-roofed blocks
dragged back, bladder bursting
to my little kingdom.
my people wait up in the hallways
they are dazed and blurry eyed
the 4 am incarnations
of what we promised ourselves we’d never be.
curled up in corners
shivering away from reality.
I have conquered nothing
but my parent’s expectations.
Lundy Apr 2013
It’s a granite bench that I frequent
Your name carved in stone; eternal
It’s the ink over my ribs.
A barrier to protect our vulnerable hearts
You used to tease me for my love of symbolism
How could we have known?

I’ve been reading up on Dickenson
I’ve been keeping my room a mess
I’ve been seeing you in my dreams

I talk with you there, but I still can’t talk with you here

On this granite bench that I frequent
I kiss your name in stone; eternally it lingers for you there
The next time I return, it remains, unclaimed and cold

What was protecting your heart?
Was it that through which the bullets tore?
Two to the chest, that’s all I’ve been told.
No CPR preformed.
****** up thought, I know.

I cut my bangs after your funeral
It was a poor choice
As we both could have predicted.
You would have laughed and kissed me all the more.
They’ve grown out now

During the time it took for them to grow, I hated the sunset
How could something so beautiful exist in the same world that kicked you out so soon?
How could I find peace in that?

And, I was ****** the moment that it did
It’s not a habit that I frequent
But none the less, that night I did
How could I have known?
A symphony of blinds clacking in the wind,
A leaky air mattress’s hiss, crickets that sounded ******
And I couldn’t move
So I just listened, and composed, and
All the while you bled, your heart stopped
Your last breath

I just laid there, ******, arms spread wide, eyes fixed
Maybe like you, I suppose?
****** up thought I know.

So, I offer a kiss to your name, carved in stone
I leave it there
But I know
It will just grow cold
And my ink itches me, over my ribs, over my heart

It must be the cold
Arihant Verma Jun 2017
You failed
not waterproof
you allowed water
to fall into
feet bottom skin

Lucky we had
enough of you
we juggled you
in the leaky shoes
that were
no good either

Next time
you’ll be worn
inside trek shoes
so that
you wouldn’t have to
taste the marshy
stink of feet bottom
the premonition
of possible fever
Inspired by the conditions of my cousin's socks on a 30km, rainy mountain trek
Aver Dec 2016
and i cant help but wonder
to myself as i hide my eyes behind my scarf
******* past my throat
because im long past strangled by your words
red claw marks taint my wrists, final wound cut by your sharp glances
your eyes capturing my soul
my thoughts lost in this eternal sea
of hopeless falling and rising
just to be knocked
down by the waves of the syllables
flowing from your lips
always hinting at a sad smile
your crooked grin endlessly in this mind
that aches to hear my name spring from your tongue
to see your hands held in fists
hidden beneath this ground
your voice cracking like the sidewalk in spring
your eyes flowing tears like the leaky faucet keeping me up at night
or is it the perpetual notion
that lovers are as common
as salt in the ocean
and true love is nothing but broken
promises and dreams
it's just as it seems
endless and seamless
if nothing is there it cannot be stopped
Lacey Clark Feb 2020
love is
the friendly atlantic ocean
a lotion that never fully rubs in
humid air

love permeates
like a leaky roof
honey on toast
dandelions
Juneau Jan 2019
i sweat and sweat and sweat and sweat
my under arms are always wet
basting myself in my own vinaigrette
i’ll never be the cool guy in the corvette
blasting his tunes with an old school cassette
with a blonde on his right and in the back a brunette
i’ll always be this soggy piglet
you’d think i could just shower and then i’d be set
but NO! don’t you see these pits are a leaky faucet
January 25, 2019

fifty-seven
ew
Ruth Boon Jun 2013
The daisies
I slit their throats
and made a
necklace out of
them and I
stuck them through
each other
I made a
ring for you
‘He loves me
he loves me not
he loves me
he loves me not’
last petal
plucked like
strangers on
the street falling
dead from
looking in each
others eyes
they die
she dies
cut a
hole between my lips
for you to spit inside
let it reside in there
my leaky cold cauldron
I’ll bathe in my
mouth
and touch myself
where you’d never
expect
like the nape of your
neck and anywhere
soft
could I find the soft
place on you
or have you
hidden it so well
that you’ve swallowed
it up
well spit it back
and into the
cracks my jaw makes
and I’ll shake with
pleasure while
you ignore me
I’ll adore you
like bone bone
shake
take me
with you
when you
go
I await you
like twilight
waiting for sun
everyone wants
your rays
spray them out
like spit
raining on only me
my black rain
cloud sounds like
still borns crying
from their mothers
mouths. KISS
ME. KISS ME
like mouths have
no other job
like lips came in
4’s split apart
then stuck back
together with
secret spit
from my mouth to yours
sit in my ear
and listen to
the daisies swinging
inside my head
heavy heads like
lead. all dead.
Emma Liang Feb 2011
the feeling
of driving by houses you used to live in, Christmas lights shining (something we never did),

and knowing that
strangers
are
                       using your bathrooms, laughing and having Labor Days' and lazy Sunday afternoons and making memories and disastrous apples pies,


and for a moment you kind of hope
      they have a lot of trouble with the leaky pipes on the 2nd floor
Sand Aug 2014
When I met you,
everything insignificant
Sang!

Soap bubbles
blew me melodies,

Nail clippers
Tapped to the tune,

The leaky faucet
Splashed a symphony!

When I met you
For the last time,
I took a wrench to the neck
Of the racketing faucet.

Retrospectively, it was always a nuisance.
Aly D Jun 2012
The faucet seems to be leaking
and the drops of water drip
to a beat and my heart sings to it

the birds chase the whistling wind
and my hair it dances to it

and time continues, my nails
grow on and grow on

how long will i grow?
until i become a skeleton in
your closet
how long will i last?
before i rot under your shadow.

sooner or later the leaky faucet
will run dry, then my heart will
go off tune.

the wind had gone missing and
all my hair had fallen out

but time will go on
and even when i have stopped going
on my nails will grow
in to the ground

and in the end, after everything had stopped.
you still haven't returned.
M Seifert M Mar 2013
I want you
I want someone to want me
but
you don't want me

please want me

don't!
I'm broken
you don't want a leaky faucet
that
self repairs
with duct tape and silly putty

I'll recite you the backs of cereal boxes
and
throw away the locks on the doors of our common places
I'll keep a smile on mine if your face feels too tired from the weight of what your mind is speaking out your eyes

Everything.
Every string
that hangs off of well worn sweaters
snags on finger nails and pealing calluses.

I'll draw the curtains
if
and ONLY
IF
you first admit that you
are
BEAUTIFUL.
and i know it.

Your doubt should drown.
We'll drink it down.
Sipping wine only to set the scene
because
WE
already ditched our inhibitions
and
we decided that what was best for each other was to feeds each other's needs with the other's body.

This letter.
This note.
To you.
The long lost women of my dreams
the shape shifting goddess
who floats freely through the open windows of my memories.
Will this be enough to summon spirits to lift me to your level without being beaten to life by a trigger happy judge's gavel?

I built my prison to your specifications.
The measurements may be off
but
the bed...
The bed is warm
and cozy.
And
it fills my heart to see your cheeks turn that rosy
rosy red
that same
rosy red
that fills my heart
and
flows through yours.
Kept inside
but
peaking out in moments of vulnerability.
Shed your false
heavy
layers of security
toss them in the water and...

Flush skin of lips and finger tips
other places where my mind can only wander
wondering where in the world we will
meet again.

It's half past ten or some other hour,
I don't know and you don't mind
because
we're alive!
and our heart beats will set the pace
keeping time in place.

THE STORM IS LOUD
MY VOICE
is softer
now...

Okay--

Alright--

*
I'll give you your space{













But
YOU
BETTER FLY.
And NO MATTER HOW HIGH
NOW IS YOUR CHANCE TO SHOW
to TRULY KNOW the color of your wings.

And
I'll continue singing
because
someone else may be listening.
And
although these tears won't quench my thirst
I'm learning more about myself through my time searching
through my ***** laundry:
Bags of rags
and forgotten junior high and high school notebooks.

Failed jokes took to heart
the stinging silence of laughter kept inside.

Broken funny bones
NUMBED by repetition [repetition]
DUMBED down
COMFORTABLE BEING SUBMISSIVE

Well, I'm not sorry
NOT SORRY
to tell you
this mouse
whose mouth you shut is now stirring

Stirring the ***
Kept at temperature
All the right spices and slices and dices to enlighten you as to what the taste of life is.
.............................................................­.................................................
Please sit, here is your chair.
I love what you've done with your hair!
let me know if you would like seconds
but
that depends on if you brought your appetite.
I know I'M Hungary [hungry]
but
I won't slurp my soup if it offends you.

We'll take it slow
because
I know that
I still don't know you that well yet.
And I think we both could cool it down on the unnecessary judgement.
I'd really like to know you well, so I won't try to sell you anything that you're not buying.
And call me out if you think I'm lying, but I promise to be as honest as you want.

But it's a two way street
and I know you're probably tired from running down it so long
in which case I would gladly rub your feet
or your shoulders if you'd like to be a bit more discrete.

However, it still may be too soon for that
in which case I'll take a couple steps back.

Do you like music?
How bout dancing?
It doesn't have to be romantic
I just enjoy the feeling when I'm moving to the rhythm in time with other bodies.

Does you mind maybe feel clearer now that your body's moving free
or
are you holding back because you falsely feel that you lack the ability to let the music move

Your soul's of you feet.

Let go
and hold on to me.
I won't let you fall unless you're ready
but I'll catch you
please don't worry.

We are free
here.

Let's just be
here.

Forget fear
and see where that takes us
in a year.

Or more
Or less
Or until you decide
that your dress
is not
the most comfortable thing
you
could be wearing...

I'm just glad we can share the same air
and not care that our hair's getting messy.

But...
This...
is the best I've felt.

In a loooong while...

Spinning out of control
Lying
With you here next to me.
Anya Apr 2021
Most of what I wrote here is from two
or three years ago
Two years ago when I was the girl
who dripped anxiety like a leaky faucet
And poured all the excess into her poems
like little sticky notes detailing the confusions
and little joys of life

Now,
Now I'm still a confused, anxious girl
but maybe I can fake it better?

Or maybe I really have grown
So that I no longer need the multicolored sticky notes
Dotting my life
Where I can hold it in
or let it out more constructively

Constructively?
Is poetry not constructive?
Or is it my biases again
idk idk idk

I spoke to an old friend the other day
I have a poem about them
There's another girl I never speak to
but back when I wrote about her she was my friend

I don't know where I'm going
and these poems remind me where I've been

For that matter I don't know where I am
Not enough
Not where I should be
Yet
But yet has yet to arrive and
       seemingly
n
        e
                  v
                             e              r                    
                                                                ­will
...
I'm rambling aren't I?
Well,
The gist of it is
I am somewhere else, not where I was
Nor am I where I should be where I want to be where I ought-
I have a poem about ought don't I?

For those of you who've actually made it to this point in the poem
I applaud you
Because I don't know where I'm going
or where I am
But my poetry seems to be showing me where I've been

Stop
STOP
Enough says the me that insists everything must be productive
There's no point
There's no point!
You're not a poet,
You're just a girl who is supposedly an adult
Ha
Ha ha
What a joke

Is the self deprecation necessary?
             Is it though?
                 Or is it simply a tool to hide my anxiety
                             under a blanket
Can't I just appreciate what I have? Who I am? But
I'm not good enough
            not nearly good enough

The other day I wrote a sorry essay
        apologizing for all my shortcomings

Don't get me wrong
I love my self                       You'd better too    love yourself that is   It's important
But                 I don't seem                              good                     enough

Sigh

Yes, I verbally said the word sigh
I'm still rambling, aren't I?
Because I don't know where I'm going
nor where I am
But I do now know where I've been
      and I suppose it's just a matter of moving from there

I may take baby steps,
                 like a waddling penguin
But so long as I know where I've been
I can keep on moving
so that I can grow

One day my wings will open huge and wide
One day
One day I will no longer be that anxious little girl
One day
Why not today?
Because today's not that day
But, one
                 day
It'll happen
and if it doesn't...

I guess I'll still be chasing that one day
Because I don't know where I'm going
or even where I am
But I do know where I've been because I write about it in little sticky notes called poems
This started out as a reflection, it wandered around a bit, and it finally turned into a piece about the importance of poetry.
b e mccomb Jul 2016
Stained glass chandeliers
And shattered bedroom mirrors
Tapestries of fine brocade
Mixed with town-house charades.

Leaky faucet fallacies
An upper-middle class disease
Pop radio leaves them apathetic
Try alt-indie for aesthetics.

They will call the wallpaper charming
For well-furnished rooms are quite disarming
Smile and nod in a well-meaning act
But once they leave, feel free to attack.

You can hang Chuhuli in the kitchen
Da Vincis in bathrooms are quite bewitching
But give me a house that knows how to be
How to sleep and to sing and to sigh and to scream.

Something lovely about carpet freshly vacuumed
But who cares about designer living rooms?
A house isn't a home until it's been broken in
We call them hassocks, so long ottomans.
Copyright 8/25/14 by B. E. McComb
Sand Nov 2014
Do you remember that Wednesday afternoon three years ago
When we made a fruit tree by stringing together store bought bananas on Christmas lights
And tossed up our sunny masterpiece on sycamore branches
Sick of more dead winter
Sick of unsproutable seedlings
Sick of Patience, the Godliest of virtues?

Tap! Tap! Tap!
I’m sitting a few feet away from the leaky faucet.
Perhaps the faucet is clued in on the old adage that persistence pays off
So it presses on, presses on, presses on…
Marching to the beat of it’s own drum
But this drumming sounds too much like hollow dripping,
Like how I imagine the IV’s medicinal potion entering into your veins to sound.

Tap! Tap! Tap!
Your mother’s fidgeting fingers are dancing nervously on a People’s Magazine
She’s thumbing through pages but her face is fixated on the clock
Mentally counting down the minutes until your surgery is done
Mentally noting the ironies of a Waiting Room trying too hard to pass off as a careless bubble of distraction.
After all the room reeks of hospital cleaner laced with some derivative of a citrus scent,
And the television is left talking to itself like some incoherent patient diagnosed with insanity
And it reminds of her of an article she perused so long ago
Which read something along the lines of “if you hang out with crazy long enough, you’ll become crazy yourself”
And for a brief moment, she was comforted

Tap! Tap! Tap!
The doctor politely knocks before entering,
Everyone raises up to surround him,
But I stay physically stay affixed to my seat
And mentally float back to that faraway memory
Where we sprung into action
Combating the cold
With the only acceptable weapons of choice:
Bright lights and Yellow bananas.
Zoey Nov 2019
I’ve been bleeding
Water
For such a long time
Just a drop at a time
One drop doesn’t hurt
Like a leaky faucet
Whispering

Drip, drip, drip

Such a soft, sweet noise
But like a bottle breaking
In this empty room

Every hit
Fell like water
From the cracks in my arms
Every scratch
Every kick
Every scream
Every look
So much love
So much hate
Drip, drip, dripping
Into pools at my feet
Until I was bleeding water
Just a drop at a time
From one thousand wounds
And the sound became a roar
Like an ocean
I could drown in
A raging river
I could swim
But I fell into that noise
And all the drops
Became a din
Until my head was under water
And the world
Turned purple-blue
And the quiet
At last prevailed

Until the drops
Began anew
Noah Dec 2013
my body is not a temple
it is not some sacred holy place
    commanding respect
    and receiving as much.

it is not a sanctuary
    open and accepting and
warm for those who are welcomed
a quiet home for lost souls.

it is not a shield, or a cage
    or a home, or a journal
    or a dead language
    or a canvas.

my body is nothing,
    feels like nothing,
feels wrong and sad and unwelcoming -
my body is a shack
a wrecked interpretation of a house

my body is a shack in the cold
no heat to provide anyone who passes by
    empty and crooked,
    creaking in the wind,
leaky roof and broken windows,
a wrecked impression of a house
it asks for no visitors, and no visitors ask for it

and it sits, alone, not knowing the warmth of the temple,
    of the sanctuary, of the house
but sometimes it - my body - wonders, craves
not the desire of visitors, but the desire to desire,
a yearning to know a yearning,
    just some spark of familiarity
    just some hint of desire for company
    and the ability to change to the home it is told it can be inside
inside this wrecked imitation of a house.
and a filthier desire
one whispered in the back of the mind
never spoken - ****, never spoken
of wet tongues and come on back doors
things unachievable without transformation
but a shack is a shack, never a temple,
and somehow that is always preferred.

-

(exploring my asexuality - and transness, to an extent - and struggling. it's probably the holidays. )
KM Hager Jul 2012
I tell everyone that
you broke my heart.

But if I press my fingers hard
against my chest,
a little to the left of the bone in the center
that’s curved to fit the shape of the right side of your temple,
I can feel the steady
thump, thump, thump
of it,
still alive,
still in one piece,
still beating. I think
my heart is stronger than my body
most days,
when I can’t force myself out of bed
because my pillow still smells
like your shampoo and
my heart still beats:
thump, thump, thump.

When my knees give out
because I find your
“Essentials of Strength Training and Conditioning”
textbook right where I told you it would be,
my heart still beats:
thump, thump, thump.

When I stand in front of the fridge,
motionless,
staring at the notes you’ve written
in the margins of the takeout menus,
my heart still beats:
thump, thump, thump.

When I lay down on the floor and
stare at the Casio keyboard under the couch
where you left it,
my heart still beats:
thump, thump, thump.

When my fingers,
still melded to the shape
of your hand,
can’t grasp the doorknob
or my next drink
or the telephone to call you,
my heart still beats:
thump, thump, thump.

I tell everyone that
you broke my heart
but I think
the only thing you left whole
was my heart.

The rest of me is thrown around the room
in broken bits and pieces,
memories littered like body parts
across the hall
and the floor of a room I once called ‘ours,’
but my heart still beats:
thump, thump, thump.

My heart still beats
like eerie jungle drums in the dark,
like a clock and I have a hangover,
like a leaky faucet and a copper basin:
thump, tick, drip.

My heart still beats.

(You didn’t break all of me yet.)
Lewis Bosworth Sep 2016
You’re stuck with a leaky lifeboat?
Cherish your vote.

You seek the system to berate –
Join the debate.

If daily news puts you in stress,
Clean up the mess.

Election time brings no redress –
Polls and ballots you have to bear
If civil rights you wish to share.
Cherish your vote.  Join the debate.  Clean up the mess.

© Lewis Bosworth, 9/16
This is an old poetic form called an *Ovillejo* made popular by Cervantes, 16th century.
Johnson Hagood Sep 2010
I, as in a dream
saw destruction fall
on cities, on homes,
spreading out across the waters

and I choked with fear
at the destruction of worlds

as death spread out
over the waves
I was surprised to find
that the water was not,
as I had imagined,
that of the ocean,
but only my tub
filled with water
ripples from a leaky faucet
heralding the ends of the earth
Rothkowitz by Johnson Hagood is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
OriginalMade Nov 2016
For seven months,
My boyfriend, I, and our dog,
Could not find anywhere to call home.
We lived in a box,
One much smaller than your own,
We lived in a camper,
One that must be pulled to move along.

During our seven months,
We endured many of lives lessons.
Many showing us what a cruel world we actually live in.
My boyfriend tried everything.
He even began asking random strangers for a space in their attic.
So many people could care less for our situation.
So many people only saw us as another burden.

The things we would have done for these people.
Like clean up whatever messes they couldn't get to.
So many ways we would have expressed our gratitude.
Yet so many faces turned down a helpless few.

We experienced faces like our own.
Others just trying to make it,
Even in a blistering cold.
We did not have much money,
Nor a whole lot to offer,
But when others needed help,
We tried our best to provide it.

One man with his dog,
Was very accustomed to his life.
He had been living without,
For quite a long time.
He learned to prevail,
And learned his own ways,
By being human to all,
He is alive to this day.
This man gave us a token,
An Obsidian with Hawks Eye.
A necklace he had made,
While finding himself in time.

Though meeting so many people,
We spent quite some time alone.
Reflecting with each other,
On the world we thought we'd known.

As for our box,
A sixteen foot trap.
There had been a leak in the roof,
Since we got it seven months back.
This leaky roof had always been a problem,
That we tried to fix quite often.
But every time it was "fixed",
Sure enough,
The rain would prove us wrong.

The cold of Autumn began to spread,
Soon the cold was our biggest dread.
It seemed the only source for heat,
Was a propane tank and burner, complete.

Its funny the options given aside from death.
Either freeze now,
Or warm yourself while breathing your last breathe.

The heater was lovely,
Giving us reason to move on.
But the leaky roof would prove otherwise,
As the weather sharply turned.

We had carpet in our small abode,
Not too thick but just right.
And in two weeks,
It had rained four days straight,
Carpet soaked, Happiness to shreds.
Two weeks later, the carpet was dry,
Only for the next day to begin with rain,
To our surprise.

Another week and a half of soaked up thrill,
Till my boyfriend came up with an idea,
Trying to raise our frills.
He found some free carpet,
Cut out what he could of the old one,
And laid in some new.
How nice it felt to walk freely,
Not have to worry about wet shoes.

This sensation once again did not last,
We both became ill,
As did everyone around.
Each sickness was different,
But all soon became well.
The only problem was that I was still ill.

Then my boyfriend found a place,
A place we all could call home,
But we ended up staying in our camper,
Another two weeks, too long.

When we finally arrived,
At an actual destination of stay.
I was so overwhelmed,
Just to be somewhere I could walk,
More than four feet.

With a room to put our things,
We briskly unpacked,
The weight we'd been towing,
And at times nearly dragged.
But once the camper was empty,
We began to over scan,
The big lug we had lived in,
For seven months passed.

With one look under our bed,
I knew why I was still ill.
The ammonia from this creature,
Swept throughout with a shrill.
The fungus that grew here,
Would overwhelm the deepest of Hells.
And even after finally seeing it,
I cannot believe this is where I had dwelled.

For seven months,
We had lived there.
Called that camper home.

It's been one week since we've left there,
Still sick but finally feeling like we're Home.
and a lot of the time i'm frightened and a lot of the time i doubt myself
not because i don't know myself but because i do i know i haven't got much of a place in the world
no one to hold me to what i am what i have been and i'm scared
and when i saw that same fear in your eyes it made me want to love you
but it made me worry too
one of us could be an anchor
and the other a leaky boat
though i'm not sure who is which

at least we'd end up together at the bottom
Morgan Feb 2016
i've been watering dead plants for so long
i hardly remember what they look like
when they're alive,
and maybe this means i'm
losing my mind,
but the truth is,
we all want a miracle.

i think i've just been
counting too much
on mine.

i wanna believe
that my love & loyalty alone
can turn a withered pile of
prickly dirt into a strong
and stunning cactus,
once again.

i wanna believe
that if i count you every
time i count my blessings,
you'll bless me with your presence,
but it feels a bit like a child's
impossible dream.

i am a dreamer though,
even in a one bedroom apartment
with creaky doors and leaky faucets.

so, i'll continue to do these things
that don't make sense to you.
i'll wish you a happy birthday,
just cause i mean it.
& i'll visit your mom in the hospital,
so she knows she's never alone.
and i'll give money to your friends'
"gofundme" page,
because you know,
i want ryan to get well too.
and i'll pray for your safety,
even though i have no religion.

and i'll sit here,
on my bathroom floor
thinking about dead roses
while you lie with your
face in a pillow
that's forever stained
with the scent of my shampoo.

and i'll hope that you still love that smell
as much as you did when you still loved me.
and i'll hope that your heart isn't
prickly and pathetic.
i'll hope that it's
stunning and strong
like a cactus.

and if they call me crazy,
you can tell them they're right.

but i'd rather be the one who
waters a dead plant,
than be the one who misses
the magic only found
in fallen petals.
Daisy Fields Jan 2015
and you clung to me
the way wet jeans
stick to my legs
in hard rain
and we may have well been soaked
because that night
you cried enough tears
to flood this whole town
you cried enough tears
to drowned us both
it's a good thing we float
your heart was a storm
beautiful
mysterious
unpredictable
misunderstood
and let's not forget
potentially destructive
but i didn't care
i wanted to understand
to feel
to devour
every drop of your pain
every ounce of your shame
i wanted to show you
the sun inside you
i wanted to show you
the new day
that's waiting
behind your leaky eyes
and runny nose
and broken soul
but for now
you can cling to me
release you agonies
and i will never
let you think
that you are anything less
then gold
and i will never make you feel
that you are anything less
then whole
and i will never
let you sink
so hold me tight
and don't let go
Kiernan Norman Mar 2015
I never really notice the color of people's eyes but
I can tell you that the way you hold a pen makes me think
the words twisting inside of you
are streaming and surging and sharp;
a deafening waterfall I can't chase.
They're throwing themselves into the dips of your eyelashes and demanding to be set on fire-
they're screaming to be loaded into a barrel,
cocked and aimed at the crosshairs of your moleskine-
You're hunting wild words for the thrill of the ****.

I don’t remember your license plate
so each passing pick-up,
(cobalt, clean, too high to just step in) sends me reeling.
As winter fades, the memory of rushing heat
that struck bare shoulders and spider-scurried
in deep, mascara-laced blinks from your passengers seat vent
to the base of my spine replays sweetly-lonely,
it echoes tightly-comforting.

I tread sensory smiles because spring can't get here fast enough.
My boots are always drying.
My thoughts are always climbing.
I'm craving a day that has shriveled up
and blown away; giddy on these too-tough
March ghosts and gales-
being tangled in it feels almost safe to me now.
In a certain moonlight rejection resembles refuge.
No border tries to contain me;
I burned my passport.
I'm growing out my hair.

These light-and-sweet iced coffee, round-tummy, solid-thigh days
find me a galaxy away from the springy, sinewy nights of us-
the nights when I didn't slouch
and I had hands worth holding.
My shoulders aren't the smooth golden brown;
(shea-butter-softened, an amber, wrinkled velvet

that demanded your caress, 
that confused my heritage,)

they were when you were driving me places-

They're thicker now;
thick and full and that yellowy,
greenish kind of pale that pulls drum-tight over dewy purple veins.
Veins that weave and sprout in every direction;
that bottle Mediterranean blood across leaky night lectures
and fevered weekends.
An arrangement of flesh that smiles the picture of pretty health
and tired vigor with a vineyard tan;
but limps sickly sallow when dodging the sun.

I'm flipping through notebooks and turning out
coat pockets. I'm looking for any little bit
of my autumn daydream to slip out
and remind me that it was so much better
inside my head. The receipts have faded
and we didn't take enough pictures-
fingers clutch my memory’s b-roll negatives,
the soundtrack a roughly translated laughter
in a knotted, almost-vocabulary.

My hands are full of crumpled words
and the small, neon lighters
that I liked to buy and forget about
at midnight October gas stations.
There are words hiding in other places too-
words I've strung up
like Christmas lights and dubbed poetry,
the frozen solid words you held
which I begged for but could never extract,
and the noble, solid words you offered me
like a fireman's blanket while we both sat upright and facing forward
from opposite ends of the same couch.
The words that detailed, in no uncertain terms,
all the ways in which I was not enough.

I think, if I ever fall again,
I will let the dressed-up details
coarse through my veins first.
The descriptions, the elaborations,
the tacky garnishes-
they can bloom in my memory void of language.
I'll let the tiny bits that do nothing for me
perch on my sternum,
then, sweet as a mockingbird,
call out, sing to and mirror back the lives
and centuries and twisted roots
of migration and exploration within me.
My birth certificate is lying-
I've been biting my nails and humming
across six thousand years.

I'm still learning;
now I know the shade of your eyes,
the make of your car,
the cds in your glovebox;
they're fine details I can shoulder
through the winter and won't imitate
bullets the way words seem to
when it's time to hibernate inside my skull.

Maybe by next spring
I'll shake off the novels my thoughts
are dripping with and writhing on the floorboards in reaction to.
Maybe by next spring
I won't wake to find my finger on the trigger
of a loaded paperback gun,
its howling muzzle aimed toward the sky.
figuring it out.
Annie Weber Mar 2016
you knocked on my door,
for i was your home.
the one you grew up in,
but grew out of.
you drank lemonade
on the porch of me,
hung christmas lights
on my gutters,
making the ugliest parts shine
just once a year.
but you never did plant a tree
to give me shade
or put on a new layer of paint
to patch me up.
you did nothing so permanent,
only putting band-aids
on my leaky pipes.
soon enough,
my basement was flooding,
my front door creaking,
and stairs falling through.
you knew i was a fixer upper,
but why fix me up
when you can break me down.
now my halls are littered with brown boxes,
and your key lay on the counter.
"it's a buyer's market," you had said,
before selling me for less than i was worth.
bobby burns Dec 2012
i never would have dared
to dream that here upon
this rival's stoop i'd perch,
discussing the theoretical
forces that affect and create
and effectively create the
world surrounding us, and
never would i have guessed
it'd be you with whom i'd speak.
the red dragon symbolizes
man, you said, angular,
linear, power, strength;
the yellow dragon bears
the fruit of the feminine,
with spiritual compassion
for all and sanctuary.
and in the collisions between
the gentle and the forceful
by accident, or intention,
we find genesis.
you carried on to talk
about a belt of silent
asteroids from whence
we supposedly came,
our progenitors massive,
with trilobite heels, but
that theory was a little
too astral for me to grasp,
and that bothered you,
i could tell by the sighs
and frustration that
spilled from the leaky
faucet of your lips.
so i changed the subject
with a splash of tea,
and washed the remains
of last night away in the
soft waters of whimsical
conversation.
BTW
I forgot what BTW stands for . . .
. . . between the wines ?
Oh yeah ! . . . by the way !
Yes !

Too much of yesterdays
and hangover today
Oh yes enough to **** a teenager

Once you start questioning your poetry
you'll be listening to teenagers ,
"You are not using rhyme !"
"Your muse is a dummy ."

You don't write poetry . . . your muse does
Your just the leaky pen
Or in my case the timid typist

First mistake :
Listening to other people
tell you how to write

Second mistake :
Self doubt
Who in the world cares if your poetry
is good or bad  . . . that is not
the point anyway

You don't write to please the Queen
You write to no one out there
who might be listening

You write to the shadows
You write to the physical ghosts
that never existed

It is not your purpose to write
anything that pleases anyone else
Yes is best

Just write and write to your hearts delight
Poetry is measured by years
not by the poem . . . bye now
Courier Pigeon Feb 2012
Infinite curiosity
Naivety
That is what I see in your eyes
But my eyes drip
Like leaky faucets in an abandoned house
Empty
But for the faded stains of crimes
Committed long ago
That's no place to call home
You are too warm
The cold here will pierce your bones
Please go
Jaide Lynne May 2014
Artists are not people who draw, or write, or make music.

Poets are not just people who write, poets are observers, poets see the beauty and tragedy of life and put it into words.

Those who draw are not people with pencils and paper, people who draw have figured out how they see the world, and how to recreate their views on paper.

Dancers are not just people who can move to music, dancers are people who spell out stories with their being.

Painters are not people with paint and a canvas, painters are the people singlehandedly making the world brighter.

Artists are people with leaky faucets.
This is very very not finished.
Jay Dec 2013
The tears rolled down your china doll face
as the dust drifted through a sliver of light
that came flickering from that old neon sign across the street.
The pastel wallpaper, peeling away from the walls
showing nothing but the rotting wood of a dilapidated building.
The smell of mildew wafting from the bathroom leaving you nothing to
look forward to except the next drip from the leaky faucet.
How had your life come to this?
All of those teenage dreams.
All those fantasies of love and adventurous living.
Those notions of being an artist and revolutionary.
Nothing but the taste of bitter coffee and broken cigarettes lingers
at every meal.
A love gone sour.
Your beauty far exceeding conventional standards.
That perfect 10.
Wasted here in a dingy motel.
Longing for that one last kiss.
Waiting for him to make you feel young again.
As you yourself become part of this place,
realizing that you are decaying just the same.
Luna Craft Mar 2016
You were a leaky faucet
Letting words out on accident
Wasting what little water you had left
Dripping
Slowly
Draining into the sewer
All alone
You were slowly dripping away

— The End —