"mache" poems
I've used them on my windows
To see the clear outside,
If I read the Op-eds,
I shudder, shuttered and hide.
I've spread them 'neath my plates and cups,
My shelves all neat and tidy;
But the headlines made it clear to me
My glass is more half empty.
They had a place in the litter box
For **** to scratch and squat;
I laid them round my garden plants,
They made fine insect traps.
Rolled and twirled they'd start a fire,
I could fold them into hats.
They cleaned the grease from BBQs,
And they're safe to pick up glass.
Crumple them for packaging,
They work as school book covers;
Add water and some flour,
To shape papier mache lovers.
Fold seeds in them to germinate,
Then use them for compost;
There's many ways to employ
Your Times and local Post.
But I won't subscribe to Dailies
For the felling of our trees;
And yet I miss my papers,
And the ways they worked for me.
But when enthroned,
You'll hear me grouse,
*There's no **** paper in this *********
My cell works well to scroll and swipe,
But it's only good for a virtual wipe.
Sep 15, 2018
Sep 15, 2018 at 12:49 PM UTC
“i’m done with furries”
i.
i can’t dream your dreams,
but you’ve told me about them.
you wear an owl mask
shaped by fists and transgression;
a laceration splits your side
from a skin split
to your rib splits.
your love,
Bill Clinton or Donkey Kong
(whoever populates your thoughts),
crack your bare skin
until makeup
leaks out of your pores.
you dream of emulating art;
O hanging from a ceiling claw,
clicking heels against drywall
until leg muscles give up
and her diaphragm accordions close.
but who is your sculptor?
who is your artist?
ii.
alas, i am only
a paper mache bird.
i flinch when it rains,
i flinch when i move;
my paper skin
could cave in
from lip crack to *** crack.
(i hate
Inside Out.
but, i’ve only watched it once,
and i’ve been told
my eyes would adjust
on the second viewing.)
i dream of emulating art;
Marat in an ice bath,
tragedy and love and death
captured
without conflict.
but who is my muse?
who won’t break my bones?
iii.
you don’t know my dreams either,
but we could dream together.
two reveries in polyphony
of an owl and bird *******
making love
before they
make art.
our love
is ******* weird;
a childhood seesaw
we’re trying to
find the perfect balance
to with our weight.
we dream different things;
**** fantasies and intimate kissing,
but that doesn’t matter.
at this point in two years,
we can see through each other.
i can’t make art without you.
you aren’t done with furries.
May 31, 2018
May 31, 2018 at 11:15 PM UTC
I'm the paper man
I witnessed you drop your papers
And refused to help
Because I'm a rolling paper
I'm never stationary
When I float in paper planes
My life starts tearing
When your presence equals pain
For I only saw you
With my paper view
We couldn't be two
When you're pay-per-view
I live a paper life
When the date never leaves the calendar
And people enjoy the satisfaction of cutting me
Like I'm construction paper
So I build to block them away
My face becomes paper mache
Searching for another way
I found relief in a bottle in a paper bag
It wasn't long until I saw the red flags
In the government serving me my papers
Even though I denounced them as takers
They kept pushing paper
My life regimented by municipalities
Burying me in paperwork
Like the employment I attained
To make my life spill off the page
And bleed into your's
Otherwise
Life's a paper chore
And the pirates keep stealing papyrus
That's alright
I've become the paper King Midas
Sep 22, 2017
Sep 22, 2017 at 5:10 AM UTC
Look at him,
paper-mache angel wings
stapled on an empty
toilet paper tube,
preacher of the gospel
of selective misanthropy,
mourned by shredding
secular holy books in
tiki-torch candlelight.
If you must remember him,
and pray, you needn't,
do so in truth,
as a simpleton's martyr,
no more, no more.
Sep 19, 2025
Sep 19, 2025 at 1:30 PM UTC
Nick was a lost boy
With a whispering heart
He held proper Victorian sadness
Until his public strength bowed
As it does with the artistic type
His soul beating modal
And his mask of gilded paper mache
With glue dripping and drying to fragile dreams
He needed to get back to the pastures of Tanworth
Yet London had other ideas
And his stiff upper lip cracked
He was a poet, you see
Who danced with trees...
And everyone knows
Butterflies don't ride bikes
Though that would be beautiful
To see one on a banana seat
Sailing down a country lane...
Alas, butterflies can simply fly away if a bike objects
And feel no pain
But Nick was hurt as he fell to the ground
His sickly hunched posture told of a great weight
Shoulders struggled to shepherd the world
With only Flower his power
And Pen his staff
Sadness met the River Man
And the River Man broke down
Poor, the fame of falling poets
Rich, the earth’s garden of toiled words
Caked under soiled writers nails
A headstone,
"Now we rise
And we are everywhere"
His tailwind to us
Go and look at what our fellow poets eyes do see
And bid hello to another artist’s soul on parade
For, as with you, they too are simply lost
And desperate for a garden to share and grow
© 2019 MJL
Mar 29, 2019
Mar 29, 2019 at 3:58 AM UTC
The wingless angels of demonic races
Are watching from the wings
With blood-stained faces
Like a wide open road spread out
Between a million trees
I see them kissing with their masks on
A glass of scotch in hand
And I can't trust anything so far
From this century
So far from light in these
Disassociated states
Thought goodness was a solid
But their halos fade by day
And your scales have turned into paper mache
As we fight for the reins on this
Sleigh ride into obscurity
Poor by way of three
Nov 19, 2011
Nov 19, 2011 at 7:20 PM UTC
Mwen te fèt nan mond sa,
Mond lan nan peche ak dezespwa,
Tankou lòt moun...
Mwen te mache yon chemen nan pèsyade.
Mwen te fèt nan mond sa,
Yon mond nan peche san lafwa,
Tankou lòt moun...
Mwen sote nan lanmè a nan trayizon segondè.
Men avèk favè Bondye,
Mèsi pou Bondye pitye,
Mwen gen yon nouvo lavi
Epi mwen vle pataje levanjil la.
Mwen te fèt nan mond sa,
Mond lan nan peche san paswa,
Tankou lòt moun...
Mwen te monte ti mòn lan nan tout dèt.
Mwen te fèt nan mond sa,
Yon mond nan peche ak tout jwa
Tankou lòt moun...
Mwen te kouche nan kabann lan avèk laperèz.
Men avèk favè Bondye,
Mèsi pou Bondye pitye,
Mwen gen yon nouvo lavi
Epi mwen vle pataje levanjil la.
Mwen konnen kounye a sa...
Gen jijman,
Gen kòmandman
Gen volonte Bondye,
Epi gen favè Bondye.
Pa gen okenn kriye ankò,
Pa gen okenn lensomni ankò,
Gen Bondye pitye sèlman
Se yon privilèj pou gen favè vrèman.
Favè Bondye.
Dec 24, 2017
Dec 24, 2017 at 3:23 AM UTC
I'll be on the front lines
Fighting fireflies on a Golf Course
With a butterfly net
Collecting ghosts in mason jar
to plant back on the cemetery
The crows are making nests
in the skull of your family
They accidentally put
the wrong name on yours
And in Latin!
It's ok though, because you're
(were) Are? a nihilist
The river Nile is the
best stream of consciousness
Known to man and of
Course that's where you drowned
your metaphorical thoughts
While you hung yourself above
a treadmill trying to pretend
you wanted to be a better
man
But you only ran away
The Stonehenge is the front gate
to your home
It's made from
billboards and
Pictures of static
When you're dead you
Live in White Noise
You're turning my lights
on and off
as I'm trying to sleep
haunting me in
my over easy eggs
making the yolk run
in words "Miss me?"
And of course I do
But you are as good a my imaginary friend
When I'm walking in the
park with all the scarecrows
you make the dandelions
float, no amount of
wishes is bringing you back
I know boards of wood are
easier to you than the termites
eating the tumor in my brain
from the insanity you're causing me
So instead I paper mache my
room with love letters from you
that got lost in the mail
because you stole them for me
A banksy bankrupt in original thought
I'm building a tiny forest
of matches
If I can't sleep I'm joining you
So you pack your bags, hobo
style but with
Picnic baskets and dead leaves
Seancing yourself
With the crystal ***** of my eyes
I lost you in some newspaper ad
about a Home for sale
Does it come with a family?
How is that legal?
But I lost you because I bought the wrong copy and couldn't find that one blurry word that was you saying
Good morning
I lost you at sea
And in my dreams
And to your own hands
And to my own memory
I'm dancing with wolves
Called Alzheimer's
because I'll die
with a disease of age
Instead of house burning, building leaping
Front Page
Then we'll go live in abandoned
amusement parks with creaky
Ferris wheels turning
Like you in your grave
And me with the Cycle of Life
Jun 17, 2015
Jun 17, 2015 at 7:34 PM UTC
◊
There's crumpled papers, ripped apart
teared to shreds
lying scattered on the floor
I've been here all day
trying to fold and fold
paper, over and over by itself
My hands are starting to get sore
Floating paper mache's
near the water, too been there all day.
Paper crane, where are you going?
don't leave me here in this disarray
Paper icicles, piercing as it might.
Paper...
all paper
the village, the people, the cars
So lovely.
A land of peace.
Dare be no fright
I loom over the sight
I shaped this all! Might i be pleased
oh this feels so right
A paper village
I created, oh what a sight! -
Paper faces, wearing a mask
on a parade
villagers
don't leave me now
not ever
as you go on and celebrate today
your lands will only grow bigger
All will be okay.
So long you don't wash away,
nor flee the village
i'd shaped
in the center of this disarray
◊
May 10, 2021
May 10, 2021 at 10:14 AM UTC
my head is a thin glass vase
filled with remnants of dried flowers
and new buds and vibrant leaves
my heart is a paper lantern
vibrant, glowing
my body is a chandelier
made of sweet roses
icicles and papier-mache
do not touch me
for i will break
Mar 4, 2014
Mar 4, 2014 at 11:15 PM UTC
*Inspiration pretty much finds you
even when you walk outside
to await the newspaper.*
A summer poem for a winter's day.
___
morning slow sleep walking,
reviewing my
evening sleep attire,
am I appropriately dressed,
to publicly receive
the somber weekend
Wall Street Journal?
which is hopefully waiting for
my rational embrace
where
the driveway meets the road.
as I walk, I note the:
seamed stitching
on my shirt,
a series of
crisscrossed stitches,
pattern of acute angles
stitched in Thailand,
or perhaps Bangladesh,
and when machined,
did the seamstress dream that
with a single blink,
dream metamorphosis
stitches become
crisscrossed out entries
in the diary,
that I don't keep,
the notations naked and rendered,
I don't want you
to know about,
so scratched into oblivion
but in a orderly fashion
before spilling them freely
to any misfortunate innocent Joe,
nice enough to ask me,
how ya doing...
impatiently waiting on a country road
for recycled newsprint
impressed into the service of the
Canadian Pulp Navy
a paper mache arrival overdue
via a technology of delivery
some what quaint, a photo dated
impish young boy
upon bicycle,
with angel wings
who when he passes,
winks at me, seeing my impatience,
(his cheek delighting my cheeks!)
and with robust throw, salutes,
Mission Accomplished.
as I wait
the muses attack,
a formation of
no-see-ums insects bite
ruminations brain-inserted
war correspondents now embedded,
a fifth column
to betray me
and I wonder about:
newspaper printed words
stale seconds before
they are writ,
which makes think
about time,
about making plans,
to do lists,
about how fast my coffee cools,
about how slow my skin colors,
About the first time I put words
about doubt & certainty
on paper
summoning up the courage
to look foolish and
how great it felt,
at the time.
**I fresh slap realize
these "poems"
are my diary,**
so for the record,
let it be duly recorded,
the paperboy delivers to me
the New York Times,
in error,
a cosmic sign
that this is where this
deuce minute walk
into the mind of a gnat,
should randomly end,
and be
crisscrossed into
oblivion.
summer 2012
Jan 21, 2014
Jan 21, 2014 at 12:16 PM UTC
I have always been the umbrella type:
Cloudy, with a chance of dying.
Water is petrifying—
When it rains, I listen to sad music and enjoy the view
Hoping I never have to venture out to you
Because I have no idea where you’ll flood into
And then I’ll have to peel away my dress you seeped right through
And nakedness is frightening and sitting in the shower
--shivering--
is not very inviting.
In fact, it’s very unpleasant when you’re by nature private
And have a hundred empty places to keep quiet
Covered and compliant.
Getting wet is terrible when you’ve spent forever piecing together
A paper-mache umbrella to cover
Your cracks.
Storms are not my style, I’m still trying to dry
From the tears I was born crying.
I was born cloudy with a chance of dying
Cloudy with a chance of never even trying
And when you’re born with a heavy heart
the last thing you need is to get
drenched.
Wringing yourself out is just a defense
It’s common sense--
--to never lose sight of the shore
SO, this is why I hide from the downpour
Under dusty cotton covers
And don’t ever even wonder
What it would be like
To be dragged in your wake
It’s not like I’m safe from you anyway.
I wasn’t built on stilts
I’m not a flood-proof gate,
I’m a rusty fire-escape that only reaches halfway
down
And I don’t want you waiting at the bottom and begging me to jump but of course you are,
You always are
But even though I know you’d catch me
You are scary and I’d rather jump to concrete because at least it looks like solid ground
And when I go down, I comfort myself with the 100 percent chance that at least
I won’t drown.
Apr 15, 2013
Apr 15, 2013 at 12:38 AM UTC
drinking alone, smoking,
playing dead, overthinking,
a psyche made of bad habits
and a stomach that's always sinking.
this is the summer of silhouette,
laying in the shade, apathetic slumber,
the figure of a man in the background,
counting my ribs and fearing the number.
i go transparent in the sunset -
the sickness is tangible, apparent,
just as i knew, feared -
it's buried in my chest, inherent.
i can't get better when
it's just paper mache and cigarettes;
i pray and pray and pray
but no one's heard me yet.
Jul 25, 2021
Jul 25, 2021 at 4:45 AM UTC
When my guilt paralyzes me,
when my shame makes me cower
under the piercing lights of discovery,
my shoulders melt.
Bone becomes fluid, leaks into cavities,
pools around my organs in puddles:
puddles that fill crevices, then freeze.
Molecules grow closer, fit to form,
cementing my fears together
like negative space on a statue.
My guilt and shame were read to me
like bedtime stories every night at nine.
My quilt was littered with secret hurts
to cover with shrugs and a stoic face.
I wasn't just taught to take the blame
and accept responsibility for that which I can't control:
I was taught how to bury it in the backyard,
how to papier-mache a mask
over my reddening cheeks,
to soak up my salty woes
and further solidify the facade.
As the years passed and practice made perfect,
my entire body became encapsulated in fear and pride.
Independence burned bright in my self-descriptions,
but all I truly had to offer was an island,
desolation built upon an inevitability.
I was taught to hold secrets like water,
a never-ending flood of pieces of myself.
My reflection once told me to stop:
there was so much debris, I was manic static
over a vital broadcast.
That hunger took hold,
ripped the pain right out of my lungs
like warm breath on a chilly morning.
But self-awareness dissipated just as quickly.
Acclimation; Stockholm syndrome.
I came to covet the shell,
unbreakable like the vice over your heart.
I was taught not to burden;
I was taught not to trust.
Oct 6, 2013
Oct 6, 2013 at 4:13 PM UTC
By: Sverre G. Holter & Digital Asylum
I|
I am a man. I was put on
Earth to bleed from my hands.
Work is my virtue. I only sleep well
If I'm exhausted.
Your food and shelter is my gain.
My sweat is the salt on our table.
II|
I am a man, but also child
with a paper-mache heart and
sandcastle dreams, a child wishing
for later tides while we play
splashing in and out of the waves
but the tide always comes,
and castles crumble, and we
we tell ourselves that there's no need for fear
because we will build stronger walls
tomorrow
III|
Today is our day though
Let us work at love.
Let us play with love.
Let us dance until our feet
Blister and we collapse
Laughing into each other's arms in equal fatigue.
All I want is you.
All I have is you.
All I've never lost is love.
It is our costliest toy;
Unbroken
IV|
Unbroken it may be for now
yet the time will come, as with all good things
where life and love will come to its bitter end
our lives will have ran their course
and in that moment, we will know and be known
we will laugh our last laugh
we will drink and be merry
knowing we loved and were loved
and as the water comes washing in
we still stand behind walls of sand
and we will face the tide together
unafraid
Jun 14, 2014
Jun 14, 2014 at 9:53 AM UTC
At the earliest ending of winter,
In March, a scrawny cry from outside
Seemed like a sound in his mind.
He knew that he heard it,
A bird's cry, at daylight or before,
In the early March wind.
The sun was rising at six,
No longer a battered panache above snow...
It would have been outside.
It was not from the vast ventriloquism
Of sleep's faded papier-mache...
The sun was coming from the outside.
That scrawny cry&mdasp;It was
A chorister whose c preceded the choir.
It was part of the colossal sun,
Surrounded by its choral rings,
Still far away. It was like
A new knowledge of reality.
1.8k
Are you wounded?
There are endless ways that life can mar your heart
I need not read off the written list
For it would wind around the world
Again and again and again
Resembling a paper mache ball
Are you wounded?
Feeling beyond repair?
Oh, I hear you
And I don't know
Your persistent, internal struggles
Nor you truly mine
But I'm writing to testify now
That I'm still here
Though words can often seem empty
I'm proclaiming today: Never give up
When you think you've felt too much
Know that the sun rises every day without fail
And like its beacon of light
A glorious, universal flame
Take heed of its returning presence
And do likewise
For there is always someone else
Who is just as hurting as you
Or even worse
Who needs your light
To shine his or her way
And banish the suffocating darkness
So share your torch
It just might initiate a spreading trend
Don't let your pain be in vain
Apr 30, 2015
Apr 30, 2015 at 2:23 PM UTC
THEY!!!...evil "them"
and we so gosh dern sweetly ...........good!
in our ****** neighborhoods
addicted to our poverty
and our virtual leaders
in this virtual world
making love to lovers
made of paper-mache!
---------------
til death do us part
------------------------
(WHICH HAPPENED
YESTERDAY!)
Aug 7, 2010
Aug 7, 2010 at 10:25 AM UTC
We made hearts of paper mache and gave them to each other.
I saved yours in the bottom drawer of my desk
carefully kept, away from the dust and decay
of my adolescent bedroom.
It was safe, clean and pristine,
and I had no intention of hurting it.
I think you shoved mine between the spines of notebooks,
littered with skateboard stickers.
Over time it splintered and withered and
while you were digging for your printer
You found it.
When you gave it back, it had turned black
and blue with ink and paint residue.
I held it broken, battered, and used,
I felt the fragment pain ensue
I guess the best things you give end up coming back to you.
May 6, 2013
May 6, 2013 at 9:01 PM UTC
Impatiently parading the shoreline
Like waves persistently mimicking infantry
I must seem lost at sea
My feet resemble war heroes
Dirtied by the summer soot
Yet too proud to surrender
Millions of tan granules have met my fleet
But I'm too proud to surrender
What happens when the storm hits?
Comfortably crushing the paper mache blockades
I installed throughout my days here
The cozy road home is falling apart
My opportunity to evacuate shrinks as the shoreline invades
Yet I'm too proud to surrender
Like a captain of a sinking ship
I'm too proud to surrender
Oct 17, 2013
Oct 17, 2013 at 1:45 PM UTC
I can feel the world,
stripping itself apart,
the soft paper mache of it's sanity,
being pulled apart to show,
the truth of this harsh world,
_
the generation before us,
tells us how easy we have it,
you, you didn't have wars,
hanging over your head, like dead weight,
you didn't have, the tripled problems,
why, why, did you leave this for me?
_
All I feel is horror,
a constant horror,
of what we can do,
of what we are capable of,
_
history is repeating itself,
over and over, we repeat,
the exact same mistakes,
no one sees, at least,
no one who has power,
they are too preoccupied,
with the petty worlds that they,
occupy,
_
May 6, 2014
May 6, 2014 at 10:33 AM UTC
Growing or shrinking
last star exit in mind
New trend
Is life the dead-end?
Star casting kiss
No exit to miss
A friend
Finding courage
Circles and stars breath
condolences
Feeling nameless no
picket white fences
Eyes adored last glances
Society- Supreme- be
Forget me not Garden- of- Eden
Wish upon a star hidden?
The last digging dandelion
yellow ray
In the end no more suffering
until the day
Like poem book* open and end
Something stiff glued together her life
Paper- Mache
Making amends Sales man
Taking his last exit he picks desire
She's
The spitfire Rare- star sire
Computing- reliving- dying
dreaming
Don't settle for scheming
The last star exit
The last scripture
Vivid mixture
Mind storing like a cache
Rare Robin bird great
panache
Recherche last meal al -dente
Smell the last flower herbal- ritual
Petals open up new portal
Blue elf Viola sing like Mona Lisa
* * * *
Autumn red wine star bridge
Grenache field of mirage
Seeing stars you fell
Where's my falling angel
Strong words vocal
If its the last exit don't disconnect
Dots.. and dots.. connect
God casting
Its written stars for all in our name
Starry- end*
Jul 26, 2023
Jul 26, 2023 at 11:53 AM UTC
you told me i was an eagle
simple as that, i believed you
tied my shoelaces together
took off my shirt
jumped from the roof with you
holding my hand
you told me i was unstoppable
so i never gave up
still making propellers
out of paper mache and
over-watering the succulents
you told me you loved me
with your fingernails in
the soft young flesh of my back
you swore you weren't a liar
but we were both drunk
you wrote your phone number on my cast
you told me once
that i was a big engine
and i took it to my powerless heart
did some body work
ran screaming through the streets
roaring naked at midnight
perched on a solar eclipse
singing sinatra to a cat.
Oct 26, 2014
Oct 26, 2014 at 1:32 PM UTC