"lifejacket" poems
Pull me into your ocean arms
And let me ride your waves like
A boat without any sails.
If I fall overboard
Without a lifejacket,
Let me drown in the salty waters
Of your veins;
Let me learn to swim
In your deep depths
And search for your heart
Like a lighthouse on the pier.
Oct 23, 2014
Oct 23, 2014 at 10:21 PM UTC
A lifejacket whistle becomes a toy
Instead of a call for help
Chilling new games on the beach
Lives in limbo
While politicians and governments
Change their mind by the second
And young men whose muscles ache to work
And women who were used to wealth
And children who had a favourite stuffed bear
And a best friend who they shared lunch with
Are all equalised
A new label called “Refugee”
Stamped across their very being
Dismissed for having an expensive cellphone
And a lifejacket whistle becomes a toy
As they are rocked from shore to shore
May 25, 2016
May 25, 2016 at 8:45 PM UTC
Have you ever heard your truth
Echoed back to you from another's lips?
Like a droplet into still water
Their words reverberated through my soul
They mirrored back my struggle with trauma
With their walls of fiery anger
Holding onto rage like a lifejacket
We've been floating in similar waters
Preparing for battle in every moment
While we're the ones aiming the guns
Grasping so tightly to our secret truth
That one day the pain will **** us
We're acting like we're already dead
Before we ever learned how to live
Aug 13, 2022
Aug 13, 2022 at 11:21 PM UTC
You're always asking me if I'm okay
And I always keep my answers vague
two thumbs way up, I hide my face
eyes cemented shut, just another day
stumble down the stairway
eating out gourmet
don't need a lifejacket in a sea of cabernet,
(You okay?, Hey Rach?)
been a few days since I've had a taste
indentations in the blankets traced
so I sit around, I don't mind the wait
daydream until I leave this place
Always chasing sensations and feelings
sedation isn't quite the same as healing
so I head to the gas station freewheeling
fading and melting into silent sightseeing
You're so special, a wild flame meeting petrol
you don't love me, you love everyone
I'm accidental, not fundamental
so I watch it burn until it's overdone
You're explosive, and I'm corrosive
we probably shouldn't do this
but when has anything interesting
happened from doing what we should've
Skip through the lushest meadow
hope and pray I don't get stung
I tiptoe, I tiptoe
I'm afraid of bees and bugs
Mar 8, 2018
Mar 8, 2018 at 10:27 PM UTC
I lack emotion (a motion), pushed, and pulled
At the behest of this endless ocean
How could I ever sail the world
When my mast has broken
Moods swing with each passing wave
No lifejacket
No hope of being saved
The boat is taking water
Each hole a mistake
All the tears I never cried
Now make up this watery grave
Mar 31, 2021
Mar 31, 2021 at 12:23 AM UTC
and i hope you’ll take care of yourself
you deserve a lot more than the
torments you carry like a cloud
if only you knew how badly i wished
i could sail through every storm for you
i would’ve faced the crashing waves
and treaded even in the pain
of holding your head above water
because i wanted you to get the chance
to do better for yourself
but what’s the use if i drown
just trying to make you see
you’re worth more than the people
who pushed you overboard
and watched you descend so deep
into yourself you didn’t know
where the ocean ended and you began
and you try to hide the water
trapped in your lungs but
i can still see it in your eyes
i know you pushed me away because
you felt like an anchor sinking and
didn’t want to take me down with you
but you never even bothered to ask
if i could swim
always saying i'm so happy
but you never seem to notice
how sad you make me feel
i can't keep struggling
to strap a lifejacket
on the back of someone
who doesn't want to be saved
but i hope someday, you'll empty
the heavy stones from your pockets
catch your breath above the surface
and feel the sun shining
on your face once more
Dec 6, 2020
Dec 6, 2020 at 10:12 PM UTC
five years old.
a wobbling mass of uncertainty
perched haphazardly on a bike.
daddy holds me upright,
his strong hands refuse to let me fall.
pedalling, pedalling, faster and faster
a weight releases
at last, I'm flying.
six years old.
first day of first grade
I clutch onto my mom's hand
so many children, both familiar and stranger
letters, numbers, a line on the wall
a smiling teacher. I let go of her hand
sit in a green desk, grab a crayon
one last glance out the door
but she is gone.
ten years old.
suspended in the cool water
skis strapped awkwardly on my numb feet
a lifejacket rises tight around my neck
my mom behind me, holds me
right side up in a firm embrace
suddenly, a massive force
pulls me up out of her comfortable arms
through the deafening spray of the water
my mother cheers.
I'm gliding, and I've never felt so free.
sixteen years old.
my hands caress the steering wheel
dad's in the passenger seat
cautious, careful, I proceed
the open road ahead of us
we pick up speed, but then
a deer. his hand grabs my shoulder
my foot slams on the brakes.
I'll pay more attention when I'm driving alone.
we take a breath. we're safe.
eighteen years old.
I scan the crowd as I sit in
my crisp blue robe. my strange square hat.
no more unfamiliar faces.
just layers and layers of memories
blended on top of each other.
my name is announced
I stand up, cross the stage,
again, a mass of uncertainty.
again, awkward in my high heeled shoes
my dad holds my mom's shoulder
my mom clutches his hand.
once more, I'm forced to let go
in order to move forward.
a diploma replaces my mother's hand
crushing realization replaces my father's security
again, I'm flying
but things will never be the same.
c.l.c
Jun 16, 2016
Jun 16, 2016 at 2:24 PM UTC
it has been a week since you tried to die.
and I don't know if my body will ever recover because
you wanted your blood on my hands
but all I can feel is your pills pulsing through my veins
my heart hasn't steadied in days
and I'm not doing anything to make it anymore
you never loved me back.
and you can swear to me that it isn't true but it is
this isn't what love does
I thought you were love
I thought you were a band aid
or duct tape
or a seatbelt
or a map
or a lifejacket
but you are not a lifejacket
you are that huge ******* sea
swallowing me whole
you're afraid of the ocean
but you don't know a fear like this
maybe that's why the ocean scares you
maybe its too reflective
maybe you always knew you were going to do this
it's been so easy for you to forget you were all I knew I had
you never loved me back.
a week ago you tried to die.
a week ago you taught me a betrayal I've never known.
a week ago I found myself without a home.
I will never be able to come home again.
you will never be my home again.
I will never know home
Jun 23, 2015
Jun 23, 2015 at 2:49 AM UTC
Some days I feel I'm drowning
sinking way down low.
Some days I feel like giving up
and think I'd like to go.
But, looking up above me
I see a gleaming light.
I swim and kick and struggle
and push with all my might.
As I break upon the surface
I gasp and gulp for air.
I look all around me
and can't believe what's there.
Floating on the ocean
as far as I can see
lots of coloured lifejackets
waiting just for me.
As soon as I get near one
they wrap themselves around
and pull my weary body
to some safer ground.
'Where do they come from? '
I think I hear you say.
Well, they come from the people
I talk to every day.
People who understand
this journey we are on.
Whether it is short
whether it is long.
So, thank you my friends
that's all I'd like to say.
And, I hope I'll be a lifejacket for you someday!
Jan 3, 2012
Jan 3, 2012 at 5:43 PM UTC
You are never here and I am never there,
Despite I can hear your voice as a thunder;
Because you are a stranger,
And we just write to each other.
How the lightning struck-
You better ask our friend Coincidence
Or maybe, it's even Luck.
Tiny email icon, a dream,
In the corner of the screen
That's my life lifejacket.
In 16 seconds it takes me to read a message in the bottle;
Sailing through the words, I drown in depths.
It takes me days to swim again
While your 6 mermaids sing,
Tunes feel like a blasting hurricane on the sail of my own coil,
Please, just don't sink.
And the same waves that carve our sand shores,
Link us 5 light years apart.
I wonder how big of an ocean we stop,
Until we turn into a drop?
Nov 6, 2016
Nov 6, 2016 at 2:43 PM UTC
_(for Terry McMillan)_
I was a *****
glacier cold solid ice
claws for fingernails
man killing eyes
not myself, not someone else
thirsty for the wild hunt
self-loathing eating away
the way aphids eat the orange tree
no more empathy
where’d that go?
probably jumped off the same cliff
as romance and joy
at the bottom of a cold canyon
swirling in roaring deep water
caught in the current
beneath the surface, far beneath
carried away for three years
no lifejacket, no life
behind reinforced steel
behind the *****
I was a ***** for three years
until the ***** took a scraper to the icebox
climbed over the edge of the canyon
breaking clawed nails on orange clay
****** at the bottom, ****** but alive
swam to the bottom of freezing waters
found my groove
got it back
shot up from the icy foam
_exhaled_
picked ripe fruit from the tree
cut it into four pieces
one for romance, one for joy
one for empathy, one for me
no more aphids on the orange tree
no more glacier, no more hunt
oh yes, the ***** is still here
nourishing my soul with the fruit of knowledge
reminding me don’t let go
don’t let me be all they see
[Notes: This poem was published by _Cadence Collective_: https://cadencecollective.net/2015/01/17/for-3-years/
First published in _Men’s Heartbreak Anthology_.]
Mar 3, 2018
Mar 3, 2018 at 6:49 AM UTC
Write me off, that's fine - if I'm honest, your eyes are not why I've bled blue on loose leaf for all these years.
I gave away a rough draft of my life and skipped the polish - yeah, I get that I'll never be published, and to you, my words likely look like incoherent ******* because I'd surely be full on illiterate if it wasn't for spellcheck & this stupid heart of mine.
My goal wasn't to be relatable (it was always for me so I could go back if and when I needed a reason to breathe I'd reread to see how far I've come) and so (I have no grand delusions of "success" or even dreams of recognition) I know I will never be a great writer -
A lonely man's truth has never been a valuable commodity.
I just wanted to let you know that I've seen your poetry & it's simply beautiful in all it's intricate complexities -
and mine is what it's always been (and bare with me now, as I attempt a metaphor) my ol' trusty lifejacket.
It just helps keep me from sinking all the way down to rockbottom.
Thank you all for sharing, I like to think I have a good idea what your words mean to you - and for some of us they might just mean everything.
And for now, I'll leave you with this
Dear Poet,
If you ever feel the urge to give up, just remember that if you do, everything you went through will have been for another man's (or woman's) kindling.
Jun 8, 2019
Jun 8, 2019 at 1:57 PM UTC
You live a different life to me.
You queue to cross a mountainous sea, under stars you struggle to believe in.
I roll out of a calm bed, hungry, and without a lifejacket, tipped over by turbulent thoughts.
The electric light illuminates my fridge (the stars are long forgotten)
and that hum keeps me from sleep.
Perhaps we can ally, you and I,
so you might make a midnight meal one day,
and worry about stagnation.
Perhaps we could gaze into the stars of each other’s soul.
Perhaps it is you, faceless shadow,
inhabiting the blind spot of my mind’s eye.
Perhaps it is you that wakes me.
Perhaps it is you in the dark that I must hold up a candle to.
Perhaps you are a part of me, and I am as yet un-whole.
Perhaps the Earthly distance gives us a mask to wear,
with TVs where the eyes should be.
Many faces, an illusion of separation, one soul
Won’t you help me to help you,
won't you help me?
May 30, 2016
May 30, 2016 at 9:23 AM UTC
Falling in love with a poet
Is like drowning with a lifejacket
As soon as you think you are done
They pull you back up to the surface
The water still fills your lungs
But they breathe life into you
Pull to a desolate shore
And begin to write in soulful lore
Falling in love with an artist
Is like being a canvas
They will see your beauty and flaws equally
But cover them with layers of love stroked gracefully
Its gentle strokes of teeth marked brushes
Words shouted and rough touches
Its the masterpiece slowly unveiled
A piece of beauty on a bigger scale
Falling in love with a singer
Is learning how to win her
Never break her shattered heart
Just to hold her from the start
To know the lines in her face
How she walks and takes each pace
The sway of hips and a rhythmic pattern
The love of the taciturn
When words say little
And emotions run high
But they love we hold
Will never run dry
Jun 5, 2014
Jun 5, 2014 at 6:16 PM UTC
There's a barrier of two blocks that sit between our hearts,
each broken part of what we are only settles with the sun;
but tonight I've begun my journey into losing myself.
It's always been a scream of help away from losing it all,
maybe if I stand tall, there's one less stress on my mind
because feeling so blind in trying to gain vision is horrifying.
Maybe I'm just not ready to be loved, or maybe we're just wrong,
for one another, for each other, maybe just wrong all together.
Maybe there's an ocean drowning our hearts,
and this time the kiss I gave you over Christmas night,
isn't a lifejacket to help us out.
Jul 30, 2018
Jul 30, 2018 at 6:41 AM UTC
i.
a lifejacket that small
my answer
is no
ii.
no
has one
eye
iii.
god is coming to touch your foot
Oct 28, 2016
Oct 28, 2016 at 10:25 PM UTC