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Carol Cummons Mar 2013
For every single barracuda smile.

Every apple that we didn't bite. All the dull exotic things I never had the chance to say. The way the ocean is louder at night, the glittering bones of the city, the taste of black cherries. For every paper star, and liquid street, suburban summer mattress like a shrine.

For hands like deep-sea divers through your hair.

The unknown red interior of you, the foreign countries of your thoughts. For every back of matchbook message, every finger tracing up my thighs, and for our reckless lips rubbed raw and red. For all the casual knives of conversation, the snow like stained glass underneath the sky.

For illuminated cities half-submerged.

Every exquisite impulse and grass-scented infidelity. For my heart like glass, like coal, like diamond. The salt and starless seas that crave a sailor. For the hand-grenade of lust and the ugly gardens of regret. For your eyes like earthquakes, like cigarettes, like disaster.

For every dark-haired, blue eyed boy.
mark john junor Nov 2013
doves drowning
in the storms wicked air
watch with empathy as they struggle in the
thrashing tides of the rainswept sky
watch as the fall from grace
in the warm tears of rain

bernie was waiting on
doomsdays last train
he kept his lunch in a sack
along with the face he gonna wear
when he comes up fore the good lord
but what worried him was if the other fella
had his ticket
he would toss his coin on
the hand he was dealt
a good man misunderstood
a simple man living a complex life

contortionist of the fable
she wrote her own storied life
on the back of a matchbook cover
after all its the flame of her heart
that set ablaze many a mans inner pervert
she is waiting on that last train too
with a devilish certainty of her destination
but she aint too worried
she knows hell is just like miami in july

doves nestled in the hands of time
make a soft sound that stirs the heart
sounds like a love affair
sounds like free flight on a summer breeze
feels like home
Hiro was such a clever guy.
he always said the funniest little jokes, even when he was Hiro-chan, to me.
he used to act like a cat when he was frustrated and, and-
remember what he said to the mailman that day, in like june?
about how he looked like an angry Hotei-osho?
we all laughed and that mailman, that man’s face went radish red.

he was such a good lawyer, Hiro.
i mean, he wasn’t rich and powerful, no
but he did good things, though.
like Sayotoma’s lease –
without Hiro, he would’ve lost the store!
and then where would we get our tempura? huh?


oh, Hiro, you are so much fun to talk about.
and i hate that all i have of you now is smoldering incense and an expired passport.
i poured a cup of water on your grave today, you know.
it was a hurting kind of hot under summer’s sun – it’s august, after all.
some steam came off, and it sounded like you sighing
and i said more loudly than i cared no problem, Hiro
and my wife looked at me, with a misting eye,
while my son kept flicking matches
from that cheap matchbook we got at Sayotama’s place.

all the failed matches collected between his sneakers
and i thought that i wish Sayotama didn’t make all his matches
so **** fragile.
they burst and blacken in a second,
and you don’t have the chance to really light something,
and they just end up falling between the sneakers
of some kid who can’t even remember you,
Hiro.
© David Clifford Turner, 2010

For more scrawls, head to: www.ramblingbastard.blogspot.com
FORTUNES READ the sign displayed
TRINKETS, CHARMS AND SPELLS
The store had not been here yesterday
shades of candles, books and bell
Drapes were hung from side to side
The windows all were dark
Where was this place a day ago?
Just yards from Salem Park
Gothic kids sat on the stoop
Waiting, hoping to get in
Were they wishing for an audience
Or to confess a mortal sin
The door was red, it's number black
The name of M. Laveau
Was etched into the window pane
It stood out like fresh, new snow
I thought "how kitsch", M. Laveau
New Orleans voodoo Queen
four hundred years since she had died
The best witch the world had seen
don't worry though, the address was
Not numbered 6 6 6
That would have been too hokey
Even my poems aren't that slick
My spider senses tingled
Just a line, not something real
But every now I get sensations
It's just something that I feel
I chose to pass the goth kids
pale, lethargic on the stoop
I figured something's coming
And I'm jumping through it's hoop
Something wicked this way comes
I thught as I went in
But, I was greeted by a little man
About four foot tall and thin
the bell rang loud behind me
As the door closed there behinda
and as the light diminishd
I was standing, slightly blind
The man just stood there staring
then he spoke, a tiny voice
"I know just why you've entered"
"Welcome, Billy Boyce"
I stood there, then I backstepped
How did this many know my name?
I knew it wasn't magic
It was just a parlour game
As my eyes became adjusted
I saw nothing in the room
Just this tiny little elfling
And some shelves, there in the gloom
I said, "I saw your sign, sir"
FORTUNES TOLD, and I'm intrigued
"Can you really tell my fortune?"
"Or are you playing on folks needs?"
"Not me sir, I'm just waitng"
"You see the mistress is not here"
"But, if some silver hits the counter"
"I am sure that she is near"
I thought again of M. Leveau
The Witch Queen, so long dead
But, the way he spoke about her
Seemed to fill me full of dread
I thought of charms and trinkets
But, the empty shelves displayed
Not a bell, a book, or candle
Just a scarf, just slightly frayed
"She can answer all your questions"
"Take the doubt away from life"
"She will open up your minds door"
"She will remove all of your strife"
He could see that I was pensive
I turned and saw something was wrong
Where I knew that I had entered
The front doorway, now was gone
He bade me sit, prepare my thoughts
The Mistress would soon show
I would not have to ask my questions
He said The Mistress, just would know
I thought, Ok, I'll play along
someone's gone to lots of work
But, there was no rooms or doorways
For the Voodoo Queen to lurk
He lit a candle on the counter
Not the window, like Elton John
He told me turn with eyes closed
And when I finished, he was gone
The man left just the candle
Some small match book and a key
Then the wind blew out the tiny flame
And I knew, I had to see
So, I funbled for the matchbook
Lit the candle once again
When the room was now alighted
I had that feeling once again
I knew I was not here alone
Someone else was here, but who
"would you like to take a seat dear sir?"
I just froze, what should I do?
I turned to face the speaker
A young lady, all alone
I just stood there, dumbstuck, staring
Like I had just been turned to stone
I sat as she requested,
In a chair, not there before
she said, "I'll tell your fortune"
"And if you want, I'll tell you more"
She said "you've many questions"
"I can read them in your mind"
"But, you must sit down and focus"
"This is going to take some time"
She spole to me of angels,
both the bad kind and the good
She told me of my watchers
Some who lingered closely in the woods
She told me things no one would know
Unless they'd seen them done
I felt like I'd been torn apart
Shot with a bullet from no gun
She said, "I am the one you think"
"Marie Laveau, the Voodoo Queen"
I said "I don't believe you"
She said "can you explain, what you have seen?"
I told her no, she had me there
But, why had she picked me
She said, "you have it backwards sir"
"It was your choice to see me"
Paul Prudhomme, New Orleans
The Saints and Dr. John
Katrina and a second line
All the people that were gone
She said "those thought have called me"
"You are someone who believes"
"You will bring life to my city"
"Before you make your choice to leave"
"through task and deed you will bring back"
"New Orleans from the dead"
"You will breath life to this wormy corpse"
"You will help her move ahead"
I told her "your'e mistaken"
"I believe you've got it wrong"
She said "I know of what I'm talking"
"You were singing my favorite song"
The Witch Queen of New Orleans
laughed and said I'd know just when
to start the resurrection
When to build this town again
The wind came up, the room went dark
I was alone in here once more
I again lit the old candle
Saw the thin man and the door
He said "you saw the mistress?"
I told him, she was here
He said " I always miss her"
I said "she'll be back I'm sure, no fear"
He said "you got your answers?"
I told him that I  was not sure
She told me things about me
That I did not know before
I said she laid a challenge
To bring NOLA from the brink
She gave me more questions than just answers
And I needed time to think
He said "I know...she works that way"
And then he bade me well
And the front door slightly opened
And I heard a tiny bell
I walked to it and turned around
I was the only one inside
Had I really seen this little man?
Was the Witch Queen just a lie?
I left the store, the goth kid was gone
I was on the street alone
Was this my imagination?
Or just a story I had known?
I walked a bit and turned to look
Down the street back to the store
FORTUNES TOLD was out of sight
M. LAVEAU was gone once more
I don't know how I'd bring it back
Would the Saints come marching in?
I think it's just up to the people
To breath life in this town again
Blues and Louis Armstorng
The French Quarter, savoir faire
Laissez les bons temps rouler
Listen to Marie Laveau and enjoy all that is there.
brianprince Jan 2017
like a man
i packed tobacco
into my pipe but
i don’t own a yellow hat

in Shadowlands
C.S. Lewis told me
marriage is for life and
i never forgot that

i struck fire
from a Sahara Club
matchbook
that Carissa gave me
back in ’98

she took her clothes off
dancing
for a living but i didn’t
meet her that way

we used to drink
newcastles, smoke
menthols and walk
Newport’s back bay

we laughed
a lot
and did drugs
at raves

i used to tell her
“when i make it
i will take care
of you everyday.”

i never made it
and tonight
i cleared
my pipe with

one hit

one match

one woman
Previously published at
ditch poetry / International Feature — May 18, 2009
jimmy tee Mar 2014
foo
foo
step right this way
stripes
the curly haired whispers of long ago
dirt on the steppes of Maui
life and death
the boldness of breath
tea sets invented
natures idea of hooking
the falsehood of feelings
since you can sense the release of chemicals
into the gut from the gut
art is an effort
all roads are connected therefore lead nowhere
snowflakes
glaciers
the impossibility of a paper bag
well that’s why you got the people you do
blistered surfaces
invert
divert
subvert
magical marketing
lost time is all its good for
crawl
other beings
the past is as real as the now
the future not so much
look for answers under slimy rocks
headlights
mark the trail with crumbs
holiday pay eligibility
pig latin verse
loose lips sinks fish
headlines of tomorrow list all your deeds
originality pounds it out
a ground game if there ever was one
marginalized in a riotous way
burned
turned
spit shined shoes laced real tight
if you stayed this long you must get it real good
explanations spellchecked edited cast aside
meaning lost found lost and lost again
bury your words
measure the sun as a star
triangulate emotion in order to set free the main ingredient
the Bosporus the smallest gap imaginable
a wayward telephone number listed
a matchbook
adding depth to the photograph by controlling aperture
roulette craps poker slots Chinese checkers
numbers never end
gymnasium antics
mans best friend is a meateater
fall follows autumn in the southern hemisphere
three dimensions are all you need all you require
bomber
deny both the entity and the substance found ahead
synchronize your watch with mine
sand as a tonic baby oil pine
money buys packaged happiness
there was this guy named Shakespeare
opinion calls for differences version 2.0
you find the zoo to lead so very far
swing for the fences
jump rope skip sidewalk
ease
mow the concrete lawn from here to horizon
jump rope skip sidewalk
learn forget then act dumb
exit stage left
what is behind animal eyes big mystery
exponential units forge toward the final group session
king me
did the butler do it with the maid
how often is crying necessary
pound for pound the best boxer in the mid century bout of pneumonia
digital meanings end in analog discussions
legions of admirers blinded
where to turn when the lights are forever out
invest in mystery
disappoint those who will never know you
you know it
there is a dogma in need of a collar out there somewhere
temptation looms
the holy word of snowflakes delve into deep philosophy
but I always got along with everybody
why work
pituitary gland
announcing for the first time on record
prince spaghetti and salad extraordinaire
the alphabet ends in z
puddles form on distant planets that orbit toothless suns
men
loud music still comforts the savage beast
years like a tape measure stills the ragged poor children
never to be found never ever ever
solvent says eat thou peas
silo bag deliver us from the tall neighbor police
sidestep any issue involving toys
mounds of troubles can be climbed
Kansas wind also flows down the plain
think about it the sea is mostly under itself
plow
most things look better from behind
a major felony on your record
knowledge in the form of easy chew tablets
hounded by creditors bobby laid low
actors actresses chumps
results are mixed as the queen leaves daring long behind
punctuation fits into softly lit areas of the mind
stay loose
breakdown the door then apologize some more
I left home for this
mistakes are what we call experience
the smiles on bubblegum cards just as real
twenty dollars invested in nothing
pin air to itself
buy time sock it away watch it grow grow grow
cool is always enough for matty
god that guy could drink ant sanitation member into the ground
margins
leaves are raking themselves these days
so long in the past stood there with sled in hand
photographed by a grandfather clock
black envelopes glued by hand in an everlasting jump off point
poetry bound and gagged for fun and zero profit
movable type static feasts
in the groove piled high with the color that represents lament
fifty thousand big ones aint so big anymore
the river left town
cannon at the gate corded shot ingenious ways to destroy people
support the troops
he say one thing then did another wow does that hurt
memory votes early and often
nobody knows the troubled bean
it all hinges on my word being accepted
china feels so very close
the sea full of carp moistened in salt water ** boy o boy
Vermeer at the loom
the bronze age must have been heavy
time waits around the corner selling amphetamines
queer beings exit the saucer and head right for the local hobby shop
end game
paint as a medium large
pine scented maple trees win the prize
in my book the covers speak for themselves
close up to the camera waterfall
find the picture inside the cavity send help
amid ship is the place amid
of course some things are missing
ghost register to vote
went fishing came home with a tummy ache
spend your last dime see the world as it truly is
between avenue b and c there lies a small wombat
fend off the high climbing stairs that offer busy bees
mind the gaping hole that leads to oblivion ny
fog in my ear
steam punk can you believe it had to be invented
the f drive taketh away
sing a song about the street we used to chug a lug at
view my elbow rock
know thyself from the middle ages on toward the detail
love pander both you know
mom became tonnage displaced and torpedoed
you are very astute now quit it
this meeting is over like so many before it
collapse my finger into red colored dust
round up and whittle down the masthead
toothpick sized brains
its no bother at all fire away with logical pounds
page that squire knight the tree stand hunter in velvet horn
live as the yo yo
beat it now not later now before the sun sets far into the Japanese
planning a child check our bargain bins first then decide
overtime halts the easy chair
tiny
mounds clopping at the level of good mine
piles of good old fashioned nonsense
home grown
sunny side up way up
carry a friend everywhere you travel
knock
catch a rising star and keep it there
an alarming increase
happiness is a warm puppy
many are called but few are winners
put in your time split and repeat
wrinkles seem to be catching on
break the law go to *******
now is the time smack in the middle of touchy feely
mountain of jelly
pound of brown
highway exits in turning lane
polished sayings die in mid form
butterfly of course
bank on it twice
inform the theologian that grace is universal
one unit is enough to bounce the basket ball
larcenies are a regrettable offense for jumble minded
loud is the hammer of life by golly
inside
far away lies the land of nod no wait mod
never saw it coming
mud in your minds eye
clean up before the mess is tabled
throw away all hits
kong king
mondo longo pongo in delicate dancing
bear in mind that bares the soul to influence
set up the new roux
pint sized followers found via radio
fell asleep in wonder fat
knives sharpened better get a move on
loudly express a final punt
line one line two line three
when did farming become cold
newborn
disease jumps as the trampoline handles wind jammers
night can be fun but girls are more down there
love me back
mindful of the garter you can relax next year
backwards as a mean average statistical oops
venting hot gas adds to the thrill
is this thing on
swell
and and and and and and and
call the water department I am ready to fly
listen the goat will never know what hit him
long on flavor short on towels
company insists on a quaint meal of posies
behind a successful man is a chair of some kind
got milk
my friend can be talkative but never mind
rounded surfaces slip into nothingness a modern age affliction
we will escape scot free
badness baldness daily princess
puzzle in mind he left his denial on the riverbank
on the reindeer hoof we ride
specialty
how can it be hey baby that’s what we are here for right
the plays is not the thing
work your **** off then find the instruction manual
beep buzz bop
it appeared right there but is gone now
foo
Brad Lambert Jan 2014
I wrap my arms about my torso and brush my thoughts 'gainst you,
crying.

Rainwater best cures a torn-soul
when boiled in a *** atop
a burner left burning all night.


Crying,
the sky giveth us wonders and taketh the wonders away.

O' the water's down a'boilin'.
Ye' it all boils down to you.
To you and how you go.
Ye' when you go, you go.
O' where you a'goin' too?

See that go-getter go-gettin' his girl–
Good for him. Good for him.

Send some good for the man with a will when he wills his will to be.
And good for the fingers who first feel a fortune 'fore the fortune is seen.
And good for the addicts relapsing in attics with kisses of dopamine.
And good for the thoughts of you that brush against my skin,
that for days on will hold–

Eighteen! Eighteen! I say eighteen years is the bridge,
the forest fires will forever forget to burn!


I say give it a year and call him on that telephone and
he will answer on that telephone and
you will beg his heart come home, beggin' a'bargainin'–

Eighteen! Eighteen! I have missed you for some time,
bent-to-bet a century's pass'd since we last kissed.


One match done been lit in the county matchbook.
Such is the click-click of a gas stove igniting,
I call that rip-exciting, torn-enticing, fates be a'dicing–

*Eighteen! Eighteen! It was another day–
It was another life.
A complete mess of a poem, but I'm done. It needed to be written and now it is writ.
Martin Narrod Aug 2017
Anything All of the Everything

Events of Summer quickly ensue, it takes hold of you quickly, while the police drive thru. You cannot find it half-way into the night, you could hold up on a park bench or lay your blanket on the slough. Perhaps when your dreams kick, your asterisks will come, build a map of your defense and then head for the sun. Some foe outwit the wounds of life, furry blister-like faces, when they take up the star dust diamonds, the trail guides take after hurrying up paces.

The festivities of fear are living oaths inside of marbled starve rocks, they harvest shoots and ladders, and keep tabs on wild beasts and livestock. There's no match throughout the campgrounds. There's no matchbook light to find us. If you're quick enough with your 70s, then perhaps you'll follow the nightness that's arrived us.

In aide of her lift-gate, shredding pensive miens and speeding mimes, taking ward of one thousand fathomed depths, assumes courageous anti-hate isms. She can come quickly with a syzygy, her van packed with fresh woes of Sunday, then around Monday humbly hides her stuff in the small hems of her bed linens. You can't outwit the governess who preys on handicapped children's thrift finds. She makes clothes and keeps her hands to bed. She bares new graves for time's new roman epithets and moving pictures. She  unplugs her bleeding tongues under some new sone for her monarchic archetypical audiophile party.

While the umberphiles sleep, nyctophiliacs stalk grizzlies. Mosquitos quaff at human blood, while their offspring keep drinking. The idle bugs throes, misanthropic and useless, teach electric lusters' mouths to grow into fiery hoops with which to slip past all the clueless.  The arachnids might dance, the haunting verbs they might fray. The Egyptians at first glance, try to hide their heroine pyramids away.

So hush little violet dormant flowers, fake your fertility and keep your skeptic drink. Keep each one you might meet, within one hundred feet of where you sleep. Keep your arms length's supine, your supplies out of reach, practice wrapping yourself up inside boxes where the souls can sleep.

If you only once catch a fool, avoid the plague-speak certain lips might tell. Each uttered word commanded with too much ******* across the bandwidth. Mortal courses can't be taught, human voices can't keep the draught, ferocious abstract engineered humanity has escaped this truant absence and immorality. You, you catch a fool, she could preach hurts and djinns, it could dot the I's of when, and unfurl the sighs of men. Berthed earthlings that the **** ascribes, hurts the worthless and sours true purpose widths of curfews and its curses, all these biomes perfervidly reserve the fury for their furtive perversity, elements to obscure the telemetry that has coddled such a dark conflagration of immensity, it's the cluelessness of these transgressors that forces the abhorrence towards all-white-everything professors.
While sitting in Grand Teton National Park at the entrance to Spalding Bay.
L B Mar 2019
Betty Coutu drives a mean Rambler
takes us public school, heathens
to catechism on Saturday morn
Smokes a cigarette like a prima-ballerina
Shifts three on the wheel
drives that clutch to the floor
with her thick leg
Makes the engine roar
a little
“to warm it up”

Turns with the grace of swan
Pavlova or belladonna
Something of beauty
just to watch her
three-finger the wheel through a turn around
all while taking a drag
exhales to ceiling
to music on the radio
Elvis? Roy O, Patsy Cline
circa 1959
Betty's hair is short, uncombed
but she's not without lipstick
lights her smoke with amazing matchbook skills
Calm
like a woman who does it often
takes on wear
with I'm in love, and I don't give a care
She shifts and turns
cigarette balanced like gossip on lips
or between
those first two fingertips
Smoke swirling
amid kids squabbling and whining
in the back seat
No belts back then
till Dad got home
to keep them in line
But, I bet on Betty every time
to get us there
I want to drive like her, so badly!
I sit beside her-- ossified
watching
her smoke and handle
like a total expert
I am distracted
and will surely fumble
my catechism answers
for the nuns
cataclysmically

She drops us off by an icy foot slide
I swear to God to stop back later when we're done
...with prayer and penance  
recitation... and resolvings
to sin no more
Once we're out the door--

back to that forbidden foot-slide

Always had a plan for fun
So did Betty's son
the hemophiliac
Bless myself like an Olympian
and pray for Johnny
before he joins me for a run


hemophilia:
a medical condition in which the ability of the blood to clot is severely reduced, causing the sufferer to bleed severely from even a slight injury. The condition is typically caused by a hereditary lack of a coagulation factor, most often factor VIII.
Lighting a cigarette from an old time matchbook while driving a standard shift takes some skills.  Betty was an 'effn ballerina at the wheel
S Fletcher Oct 2014
"A lightning flash... then night! Fleeting beauty
By whose glance I was suddenly reborn,
Will I see you no more before eternity?”
-Charles Baudelaire, "To a Passerby"

The material of the scene burns and
grays, burns and grays in my mind:
City soot in the frost. Cracked plastic.
Broken glass. Cheek creases where you
said your name. Salt stains on a denim cuff.
Scruff. Tartan scarf. Navy wool. Feather
down, laces, leggings, a buckle. Teeth,
fleece, a crumpled hotel matchbook.
No heat lamp here, where we wait and
meet, wait and meet on the windiest
night. Would you scoff if I said
"Love is two strangers trading fire.”

Smaller matter, now, an Altoid tin of
cherished ashes. I have it, and it murmurs
your lines to me, when I crave that kind of burn.
A familiar ice cube down the back of the neck.
These thoughts have sunken—a bag of pennies
in my gut like a phantom step on a dark staircase,
or the imitation of death in a dream.
Saying something about the lateness of the 16,
You cupped your hand, to shelter the flame.

I try to remember the melody.
The harp strings at the nape of
my neck sang mid-shiver, and you
said something else, which I couldn’t
hear over the choir under my hat.
This missing line is my mind’s one
sound conception of Infinity.
And that’s enough for flint.

A lightning flash…then night!*
A flame frustratingly lit, but profoundly felt.
A gasp, a gust like a god's grace, like a song.
Like just enough time for a quick addict’s fix,
like the length of a single, ****** matchstick.

Will I see you no more before eternity?
And do you by chance have a light?
Tommy Johnson Jul 2014
It's 11:11 make a wish
Look out the spotty window
See all the frowns
And boring towns
See how powerful the words we use are
They can cut deep
Deeper than the most violent assault
Buildings and obelisks of befuddlement
Pressed for time
Lemon scented tiles
Scrubbed
No mold
Personal preference
Common courtesy
And common sense    
Scarce but invaluable
A face only a mother could love
And a father can lie to
Coulda
Woulda
Shoulda
Didn't
Searching for carrion
Give way
To the wayside
ECNALUBMA
In the rear view
The worms eat us
The early birds catch the worms
The cat nabs the worm
After being resurrected by satisfaction
And the night owl writes the tell-all
Put the ear to glass
Put the glass to the door
And listen closely
To sound of knuckles cracking
And the chattering of coffee shop patrons
Indian givers going back on their word
Fingerless gloves
Prim and proper
Promptly pummeling
Tunneling to tomorrow
Well done
Slim to none
Fat chance
The local native's tongue
Sold fresh and farm raised
On any given day
You can find demi-gods
Playing a a pick up game
Matchbook
Matchbox
Mismatch socks
Pick up sticks and stretchmarks
Just stay the night
So we can wish this all away together
It's 11:12 open your eyes
Nothing Much Jan 2015
When I was little, I stuck scissors into the electrical outlet
something I never would have had the urge to do if my parents hadn't told me it was dangerous
I was a rocket pop, always standing too close to the edge,
always carrying a matchbook in my pocket

I'm not the only one who flirts with death
Death is the quarterback, death is the prettiest ******* the cheerleading team
Death is popular at parties
And when someone seems so out of my reach like that, I tend to romanticize them

So I fantasized about pills that shone like pearls
I envisioned ribs sticking out from my skeletal frame, finally frail enough to ****** the object of my desires
I thought about razor blades scattered like flower petals on the bathroom floor
Etching memento moris into my skin
I dreamed of fenders and pavement rushing up to meet my lips for one last kiss

God, I had the biggest crush on death
But so did everyone else
And I saw them falling further in love as if they were tumbling from a skyscraper
This is not a love poem, this is a goodbye
Because I have instead become infatuated with beautiful things
I am a creator, so I must stop destroying myself

Dear death
I don't want to be just another girl who doesn't look when she crosses the street, hoping to meet you on the other side
I will be okay on my own, and I'll keep the scissors locked up in the craft cabinet
This is meant to be a spoken word poem, so imagine a shaky fifteen year old girl reading it out loud to you. It's pretty hopeful at the end, but it's more of an optimistic prediction than a reflection of my current state of mind. I'll figure it out.
A silhouette leaned back
Grey smoke distorted features demure;
Swirls riddled—smooth jazz syncopation
Her rouge lips cut through
The darkness.
She took a long drag on her
Cigarette, smoke rings evaporated
A halo around her.
Midnight blue eyes surveyed
The Bijou Café
Carpet pooled on the floor,
Blood soaked with wine,
Enclosed by onyx sheets,
The far wall a mirror.
A reflection of the souled and soulless.
Bar welcome strangers, friends,
The lonely.
Sharing drinks and memories
Vines intertwined customers
A perchance meeting;
Rendezvous of sorts.
Nameless faces and acquaintances
Dotted the room, a familiar skyline.

Lonely tower missing.
Smooth black fedora
Hearts sank ships as
Waves of embarrassment
Enveloped her; disappointment.
Crestfallen her eyes downtrodden
Soared with a door creak.
Black fedora entered,
Smooth—slick as oil

Eyes were hidden beneath
A veil of night;
Silence became him.
Hush fell on the crowd
As the shadow took the stage
Light pierced through,
Illuminating him.
Orbs locked
Reservation started to pass,

Voice velvet smooth
Played every heartstring
Notes of excitement
Tantalized her veins,

Pulse quickened;
Echoing every tempo change.
Music coursed through her being
Sensual; seductive
Notes caressed curves, valleys
Spaces in between.
Emotion—chord dependent
Voice penetrated skin
Music flowed through her.
A mountain peek high
Mind clouded—
Breath escaped her lungs.
Quiet murmur answered her comedown
An empty stage; stalwart eyes
Fingers replaced music
Lips brushed hers; taste—electric
Smile turned smirk; hollow presence
Musky cologne in wake.
Magnetic pull forward
Fedora exited
Midnight eyes transformed to dawn;
Abandoned beneath the awning
Familiar skyline flowed liquid.
Bijou Café
Neon sign loomed dark
Save for a letter
I illuminated.
Heart tendrils retreated,
Back to roots; betrayed
Tears turned to water
Liquid guilt—love died.

Fingers loosed
Memory;
Small matchbook of shame
Lingering of once upon a time
In the gutter; pouring rain.
Jonny Angel Dec 2013
Man, my head hurts,
it feels like
I've been hit by a freight train!

What's that you say?
It was raining
*****-women
everywhere.
I'm a super freak,
I lost complete control,
got out of hand,
did a striptease
in Tijuana last night!?

****, that sunlight's bright,
please close those blinds!

What's that you say?
I got in a little fight
in Tijuana last night!?
No wonder
I've got this swelling,
a huge black-eye!

Hey, has anybody
seen my wallet
or my skivvies!?

Jesus, who's matchbook is this!?
"Pepe's Donkey Shack"!
Who the hell's Lupita!?

And you say I'm a freak!?
It looks like you're the one
who tweaked
in Tijuana last night!!!
A character poem about frolicking South of the Border!
Richard Grahn Apr 2017
A writer writes…
so that’s what I do.

Not that I must
But it’s the right thing to do.

It’s not always easy
to lay down a line
on a small scrap of paper
that’s so hard to find.

Expressive nouns and passionate verbs
they assault my brain and
take me away.

There’s no way to dictate them
out on a page.
So I write them all down
any place that I can.

While at the bar,
a napkin will do.
Or in my car,
a matchbook or two.
A Post-It will get me by
in a pinch.
Or any other paper
I’m happy to find.

And into my shoebox
I tucked them away.

I laid them right there
for another day.

Occasionally I’d come back
to see what they say.
Reading them over
again and again.

Into my brain,
that's where they have gone.
Stuck in my mind
for a decade or more.

The shoebox is gone now
from so long ago…but
the memories still linger
inside my brain and
out to my fingers
they continue to flow.

I write them all down
and expand on those thoughts.
Remembering the memories
I once thought were lost.

An explosion of words
pouring out on the page.
These many little thoughts they
now have a stage.

The lasting memories
are now down in print.
The shoebox is gone
but the words are in ink.
Brent Kincaid Feb 2016
I want to go back
To Crackerjacks
And KoolAid on ice.
Ice cream sandwiches
And Chick O Stick candy.
That would be so nice.
Double feature matinees
At the local movie show
With cartoons in between.
Car crashes and then the
Cliff hanger serials
Were the best we’d ever seen.

Things like snow days, and
Skinny dipping swimming holes
Great on hot summer days.
And matchbook motors
On the spokes of our bikes
After school every day.
Snow cones and soda pop
Then we turned in the bottles
For two pennies to by sweets.
Snowball forts in the winter time
That were serious business
On every neighborhood street.

Things were so simple then
We each had a list of what
We wanted Santa to bring.
Some wanted ritzy stuff
And others only wanted
A **** Tracy decoder ring.
Life was almost all about
Going to school and then
Waiting for classes to let out.
And though there are joys
For grown girls and boys
It felt good to run and shout!
Paul Rousseau Jul 2012
My 5 o’clock shadow shielded my 4 o’clock guilt
The shady gentleman in the corner is a no one
The man to his left, a soapbox of stilts
Still, a matchbook
Strikingly same
A celestial speaker
A back of green to maim
I have gone walking through life
With a heart full of paper lanterns

I have been an aimless wanderer
Nothing more than a moth fluttering from one luminous pool to the next,
No matter how dim the flame seemed to burn

I have embraced the fragile brilliance of each and every one of them,
Snuffing them out with Arms outstretched like a child longing to be held,
Ignoring the burns that they left behind because I did not care enough to tend to them myself

I have stood in the darkness that I created in myself,
Felt the cold whisper of gloom passing through my halls,
As I was an abandoned house with walls begging to be torn down

I have come to find that not everyone is afraid of the dark
He walked right in, carrying the sun in his chest
And gave me the one thing that I needed most

I will now go walking through life
With a heart full of paper lanterns
And a matchbook in my pocket
Justin S Wampler Apr 2015
I go outside to sit on the steps,
and fumble in my pocket for cigarettes.
I flip the top and start thinking
about her, and my great regrets.

I hate thinking so I begin to look
through my pockets for my matchbook
and my heart starts sinking
as I find the torch I used to use to cook.

It was my utmost favorite flame,
yet whom other than myself is to blame?
We were in love while drinking,
yet when we burned it was always the same.

The same days and,
the same ways;
the same daze and
the same, weighs
heavily
on my heart,
in my brain.

She loved me, yet I was unsure
of whether or not to endure
my ego shrinking,
and becoming impure.
Raven Black Mar 2013
Evening is the time when the shadows come alive and become crisp in a flickering light, that it is no longer yellow. White, neon, unnatural. No more it resembles candle flame. It looks like a ruthless moonshine which scatters from a ghost lantern. I wake up, not from a dream, but the reality of life and get up, not out of bed, but out of the chair of common life convict. I slip out of clothes and shoes worn by ordinary man. I released the tie, honorary sash won on vanity competition that made me tight, suffocating like a noose. It is not merciful to assassinate me in a flash, but squeezes the breath of life out of me every day, bit by bit. I put my true outfit, specially sewn soft seams on blue silk. My neck is naked, free at last, adorned by corrugated blue organza collar woven by hand, each thread is a smile and a tear streaked with golden sigh. I smeared my face with white paint to hide the traces of blush caused by shame over the living, high capillary pressure of too many emptied cups of bitterness and dark circles as a result of each conscious decision. Hiding clues of eyebrows and transforming into myself, the Harlequin. Painting white to cover the everyday life and return to the carelessness, to the easy present. With the practiced movement I put away my pomades of transformation and close spell cabinet. Last look at the silver reflection and I'm ready for a trip through the deserted streets of the matchbook labyrinth.
sofolo Jul 2023
but first, it was the sun
scooped up by small glass
immolating ants in the tall grass
set free

then hiding out in the basement
striking 10,000 sticks
mesmerized by the shimmer
until it kissed my fingertips

how did i not burn our house down?

the mysterious charm
becomes mere utility
on the farm
burning copper
for a few dollars
the tower of black smoke
reaches out like
a dystopian arm

then a wood-burning stove
to escape two feet of snow
on the chocolate sofa
where my words
(not the heat)
left our home in flames

the matchbook
is nothing if not
mundane
these days

just two sticks
of incense
one morning
one night

a lonely ceremony

an occasional candle
whose light i want to
scoop up
& wash over me
JM Romig Nov 2010
My love,
today they found you in the alley,
an abandoned porcelain doll.
Your cheeks flushed and lips stained from the cold -
left shoeless in the snow.
Fist wrapped around your empty matchbook -
burnt out - used up - dead.

Those tight jeans and rag of a shirt
looked uncomfortable
even in repose.
At first nobody noticed.
Much to do, this New Year’s Day:
resolutions to be broken.  
No time to stop and smell the corpses.

They get younger every year
One cop coughed to the other
a cough of disgust.

They made you a nameless number.
A statistic doesn’t feel the burn of frostbite.
It lends itself to jokes -
and forgets humanity.

In death you are
The Jefferson Avenue Whoresicle
and sooner or later, forgotten altogether.

I can’t forget you,
on display –
hiding in that most undignified uniform.
Your eyes stabbing straight though me.
New Years Eve,
you tried to sell me a warmth.
I ignored you,
avoided your dagger eyes like the sun


I walked away,
Not after I saw how lonely
how frightened
how cold you were standing there
alone.
I can only image your visions
as you burned through those matches
and prayed for some John to come to your rescue.

You can finally rest
in a bed of your choosing.
No judgment passed.
No cold nights on the street.
No home to fear going back to.
It’s all over now.
Copyright © 2010 J.M. Romig. All rights reserved.
r May 2014
Searching for a book of matches,
I came across one of your poems
from 1993. It wasn't written on a
matchbook; no.  It was written on
a page torn right from my heart.

The line about how a blind man
helped you to see that words hold
more love than truth still burns my
eyes.  Seems you were right; and
you were wrong, too. The ink was
no longer as blue as your eyes
that day when we last held hands.
That day you penned these words
to my heart. That very day; our last.

Your poetry used to make me smile,
or laugh, or curse your soul for writing
words that I could never seem to find.
This poem was your best; your last.

The ink has faded and ran  in places
from all these years of tears shed and
long dried. More tears would do no good. 
I can hardly read these faded lines. You still
would not be here to kiss them away,
to tell me that everything is going to be
alright; no.

r ~ 5/8/14
\•/\
   |
  /\
Kim Keith Oct 2010
Inspired by “The Burning Giraffe” by Salvador Dali*


I am defined by what clutters my drawers:

• Aortic—a tattered matchbook with a phone number I never called
    scrawled to the inside cover as an inscription to everything
    I never wanted.  A half-empty can of butane with a missing
    cap alongside a dollar’s worth of pennies that weight a scrap
    torn from a newspaper tragedy: four killed, faulty smoke
    detectors to blame.

• Ankle—a charred picture, curled in upon itself and kept as a reminder
              of what I could become; a blackened nest as an omen of
  losing all I’ve ever known and an ointment tube, squeezed
  in the middle as a talisman against blistering tempers.

• Thigh—an empty Zippo with a scarred case, dull and pointless; a coiled
             stove element with an ashen haze that could testify that water
doesn’t douse all flames; and an oily fuse, plucked from the top
of my head to serve as a yardstick of minutes, seconds, then
nothing.

• Knee—a fine layer of charcoal dust and half of a briquette from last
            summer’s backyard barbecue when the wind kicked up to spray
red embers into the air like a meteor shower, streaking in bright
sparks and fluttering to shrieks and stop-drop-rolls along dry grass
until the itching ceased and the bubbles formed in small foamy
patches along arms and strapless backs and sun-red cheeks.
First published by LIES/ISLE: http://liesisle.com/issue04/fuse.html
mother
watch me burn
through
these matchbook girls
all flimsy cardboard
and acrid sulfur
so dim
a soft spring whistle
blows them out
Pedro Tejada Feb 2015
"I'm not angry," barks
the man-child with fingers
clenched into mittens
made of tendons
and brow line hunched
like the backs of cavemen.

The veins
             that line his neck
      form boiling canals
                      when he's quicker
          to set ablaze
than a paper doll
             in a brush fire.

The annals of his ancestry
could fit into a matchbook--
a pocket-size anthology
of swinging *****
and temper tantrums.

The sweat his pores harvest
                both quench
                          and drown him.
Those saying they gave all gave nothing. 

No one knows she's crying for me. 

With trashhbags spilling from their pockets, the children weep as the men enter their silent temple. 

With potatoes in their hands and bricks on their heads, the women wait for the husbands. 

As priests they exit. All normal patterns again. 

I will separate these teeth from your heart as you scan my newest story. 

I've lost your wonder. Why everything is the same as it was remains a mystery. 

Why these eyes, this heart of mine, why not hers?

Hate simmers. Nothing cooks below. 

One more tin of cream. One more song repressed. A wife with her matchbook terrors. Skin pale, coupons clipped to save heart the extraneous cost. 

Out of the door the lesbians begin their drinking games. 

Smile of mine tell me more meets the eye. Look at the hearts and the pressing of its meats. 

Rearrange the peelings. 

Masculinity transmits over the air. I use this time to soften my bellly. 

The noose catches fire. His tears dousing the freedom. 

First date at theater. Curtain call, begin Love's Final Act. 

The death of you in pieces against rocks. 

Reading for signs of traumatized marrow assuming it is not. 

Warnings of obsession and secrecy as I pollute the sabretooth's mouth. 

My vacation shortened. Flying and seeing the dreams of next time whipping past. 

Coarse hair on my tongue. Trails of you when I speak. 

When will you fade? Love is dead. Let it pass. 

The figure and the ridge shake me. Alone counting how the years have not healed this scar. 

A day. And then a night erased from memory. 

While he speaks I'm told to stop sending letters. 

May the lines become thinner. The hush universal. 

A quiet time. Seen in the sun for the first time. 

Continue reading of deeds snared by Karma. 

Restore yourself for my benefit. 



And so this is the poison she poured into my ears:

 whisper whisper kiss. 


Of the poison what is there holding the vials together?

Machine cut squares knowing the curves of her *******. 

Pressed, brushed to perfection. Where is the warmth beyond the warmth?

Not the glow of nocturnal furnaces. The pressing of skin to the belly of coals. 

Only a mask hiding tears from the public eye. 

It is what you seek. 

Ignite me and marvel alone. 

Explain my scars to me in final excitement. 

On one shoulder I collect the rain. My other brings the spillings. The pool at my feet dries, gathers flies. 

My eyes never closed. My muscles began to shiver and this is all that can be said of last year. 


This year will be dosed heavy with dreams. 


The telephones will soon empty thief wife's of our conversations. 

New dust and **** will cover the bricks our hands feathered over. 

Plates we consumed our dreams on will break, become clean and discarded with the closing of cafe doors. 

You dying and older. Increasing desire. Your basket full of fruit. Your soil toiled in the night. Roots taken, their precious hollows filled. 

Damaged Boardwalk. Mussels cracked, pearl less by design or circumstance. 

Fake both hope and love. Slip away in the pilings of some Ferrari. 

The ash of your candle. Where is it now?

So close to the sea. Yet these stains remain. 

Burn or transgress. Your stones sink in my heart. 

An open letter since birth. 

The barge floats. The operators celebrate the river's damming. 


May you hear my tears in your happy silence.


Just a leaf in the sidewalk. Talks of saplings vanished in the processing. 

Here together in the colder air. 

Forgetful muse, run. Steal their wrestling's warmth. 

The swell beckons. We've yet to share this drink. 

Taste yourself on this raw plate. Fight and move away mediocrity. 


Few lover's sons left. 


Pick your battles from the bag with your boots and that picture of the lion escaping its cage whilst I fell into yours. 

Is there anything else or is this less than what you wanted?

Rude for noting your thinning soles and the leather's scars.

Hard to consider compensation for this blood you've been given. Diseased congealing life force. 

Awake and celebrating with me the people you've left. On this shore, this glimpse of Hell. 

Tossing and turning farther away from refuge. 

Mildewing pamphlets of my red and white memories. All the paintings we're without. 

Hack off my feet and keep me close. I float. Your hauntings with delusions of bliss. 

This is foolish, my pride in the envelope and later the shells. 

Every beacon a reminder to swim farther. Sirens witness my solace.  

Choking back wallows and whispers.

May Neptune weep as I fail in his righteousness. 


Into God's own heart I nestle. Finding rest eternally. 


Young Dracula, stop circling and take me.
*******.
JDK Apr 2010
Cricket to cricket
Mouth to mouth
A horse in the garden
A hole in the mouse
A moon crash landing on the roof of this house

Glasses to ashes
Dust enough
An army of lions
Couldn't figure this out

A print too dark
A matchbook on fire
An imp in the corner
With a spoon and a lighter

A line in the middle
A sheep in the hay
A boy with a fish
Thinks of something to say

A band in a march
A bulb with a glow
A group of people
With somewhere to go

A square and a circle
A line and a string
A mass of a miracle
Begins suddenly to sing
Humanity is the poetry of Science
Victor Thorn Dec 2010
Kerosene passion,
matchbook teeth,
you strike your tongue
and breathe on me.

Poison envy, 
acid breath,
oh, how I'd dilute
all your wealth.

Silver beauty,
copper soul,
I know how quickly 
you'll corrode.

Brimstone anger,
iron face, 
come back again
and do your worst.
Copyright 2010 by Victor Thorn- From Losing It
Joanna Oz Jan 2016
the dynamic of an unlit
cigarette
dangling
electric from my loose smirk
swoons me
into momentary ecstasy!
something
about the way you're almost
slipping right out from under me,
the way
you tug at my bottom lip, hovering,
anticipating ecliptic
friction heave release
(bouncing a breath out of me).
my eyes wax full moon.
then,
a lunging focus
on the sphinx in your pupils narrows my gaze,
and I croon
at the tingling peaks of my cheekbones.
a silent invitation,
hungry,
waiting,
for lips to purr in reply
for your honey eyes to melt at the edges.
gooey pinpricks up the spine baby,
some roller coaster ride you are.
tracing a meticulous outline, mouth
dancing up the neck,
caressing fingertips, and
a sharp breath
before a jump over the ledge to certain heaven,
sailing
down a matchbook strip
pooling the air with sparks
and sighs,
landing feet first
as I light my cigarette on fire
and drag my liquid eyes up to the sky.
mira Sep 2020
would it bring me any joy
to touch a body with no warmth?
no -
the heat is love, patience, being known.
TKS Apr 2016
I'm spending some time in the forest, sleeping in the dirt
I'd call it soul searching but I treasure the ambiguous
It's more of all inclusive whateverthefuck
I felt like getting in touch with my primitive side
The concept is a gnawing rat behind my drywall brain
Something inside repressed by social structure
Everything was going pretty well
I found a squirrel, slow clap, am I right?
Cut the cute little ******* open
and fed myself with the grace of a sick dog
Shortly after I felt better about my masculinity
it's been cheapened so many times before
In that moment, I went for a little stroll
I stumbled upon that tree we carved our names in
the symbol of our love held up nicely
Unlike the practice and actuality
In this moment, I wonder what lime disease tastes like
Then, casually, I remove my matchbook from my pocket
along with the kerosene from my bag
I circle the tree, covering it as far as I can reach
Distributing it in the way a child tosses autumn leaves
on the last day of fall
I smile, watching the flames meet the sky
Sharing mutual agony with the tree
I am cynical
I am heartbroken
I am on fire
Lendon Partain Mar 2013
I've said too much, I've lost my head, I've given up
I have nothing left.

The parchment paper rips down your throat.
As you tear your voice down every note,
The word “ihateyou”
**** every song.
A chill in the ear is a bell tones throng.

Believe that somethings wrong, cuz it ******* is! Believe that you're in love, cuz you're a ******* kid!

You cannot hold onto,
Stuffed blankets and pillows,
Live by a matchbook,
Head next to the gallows,
The heat from a sun has now died with the billows.
No air or ox-y-gen is capable resuscitation,
To stoke up this flame from dead coals in this bastion,
Each illusion is frozen by the heat ******* electron.
Division/deviation from a path that I abandon.
The futile, failure, falling to the knees view of a god that I do not cling to.

This songs about existence,
The pain in a distance,
Reminiscent,
Of a horizon,
Built on grandeur and heart omissions.
****** by a necropolis,
Of soul stealing black hole mouths.
Forgotten by its maker,
When the heartless chopped him to the ground,
Fraught with false oaths.

Suburbia disintegrates to ash and leaking gouache.

Bleed out.
Bleed out.
Bleed out.
bellahina Feb 2016
A Writing Process in Delirium
In case they come looking, I will pretend I don't see glitter
in the sky, because I do,
a crossed eyed believer
screams for you. "I want to go home now"

twenty-four years grieving
the past
present      future, I still don't know
who I'm missing

I've gone psychotic once again-- don't dare
turn round, they're coming for you
with rot blood
and a poor children's army

so I was told
Lucy is full of magic,
under the
insane asylum,
in all delirium
she left her body within a hollow
                                              willow tree

to become a dream walker
pacing deadfall manor, yet,
someday
you will understand
why we cannot build ivory towers
to heaven

someday you will understand
why the deciding fates
left emerald tablets for
daria's eyes, why they burn-- I don't know

I cannot make a move
without DMT and a heartbreak--
the critical axis
of creatures
connected to contrasted scenes

here I was told to burn the money,
"birth stars, instead"
but if you catch the ash...

Hell is a poet. roll it. smoke it.
look at all the glitter in the sky?

each moment is a myth
handed to people who
can no longer remember where they came from

I have too many, they pile up
like tangled chrysanthemums
beating out each others
beauty in the pursuit of the virgins sun-- Edger Keela

Edger Keela said
moments matter-- in fact, 15 minutes from now
I will look up and mourn
another lost
trip
trip
trip trip

knowing that the only time I cry
is when clarity and alchemy forget one another,

true love
is a twisting light, I bow my head
when I speak, I lay down
and write with my tongue, my lips

but willow
can't sleep       why can't willow sleep?
on white sheets
of unwritten life lines

I've come to understand
nothing but secrete doors, as if
reality was hidden behind them;
words of pitch black can be found, here
the house is on fire...
we set ourselves on fire on fire on fire,we write.



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The Life and Times of Johnny Behave
This is because you wanted
to be a human God

of bodies. of degradation,
a violent flower
and witness to
humanity dying
                on the hard chest
                of a dirt ground

to be a God, give up your ways
and dare to tell me of love,
sacrifice compassion
anymore than a
whisper,

                        a vicious
                  pain that brings
      with it inhuman screams, sounds

so guttural
the onlookers
will cover
their ears
in an attempt
to lessen
the horror
of their own fright,  

      until a jaw is broken and incapable of audible speech patterns,  
leaving the only language left to be made
a gurgling unknown
tinged with a coper wetness,
listen,
          it tells a story of escapism from the lost crisscrossed
paths of unmapped crossroads, veins of *******--  

and who should judge the wise blood for wanting to flee from a broken home?

to find air that can no longer
survive a hostile environment;

the people will not.
the discolored flesh will not

because flesh alone
opened its own doors when
the beatings
bashed
so loud that
it became impossible
to ignore the violence
of hate
ringing in the half
blackness

half opened eyes, a
slow motion blur
that only leaves
faces
abnormally
abstracted,

haunted
when vision
turns unkind

        and shows
        small strokes of clarity into
the deep
hollows that are never fulfilled
by watchers in the distance,

watchers in the distance
loyal to silence,
and when
omnipresent silence
cannot
stomach imagery
created by hungry fear

they will become

loyal to slammed doors, thumps
behind walls
or volume buttons
on remote controls, high music

the mamas
and the papas - -

but

never the one
left to wonder why
some people are the victims,
and others keep smiling.

though,
there was a wildfire
somewhere
in a killers heart
    
        that is
when the distance
of light ignited--

a matchbook,

history had called them stars, though
they are too
        hypnotic. deviant
in their ways, broken
diamond eyes

tasked to
observe
the observer;

I think, what ******
eavesdroppers,

do not speak to me
of them,

they are just like us
and I cannot condone immortality
after death, with the lights off?

the birth of them
are foolish--

but really, you should
stand your ground

this is a threat,
threats threaded together

because I cannot surely say
anything of my shame? in a day,
in a human?
what saturated rays
should make me recoil

                    I can see
                  whine tinted
                blinded angels  

like it was a
Sunday sweet liquid filling,
of innocence pouring sins
and

Hina, Hina, Hina
exploding
grand
****** golden suns, I

had seen the future time
we would reminisce of existence,

reminisce of existence

like an echo of harpy lungs
buried yet still contracting beneath

small childhood streets
that remind me
I am more alive
than when Daisy
and God
broke my own rib
          on the bottom
          of a concrete
          hilltop
and made a wish, a dream
out of it

leaving me the lesser kind,
how does it feel to be the lesser?
    this isn't a question,
    you already know
I know
I know
I know
        I am like a man
cataract to the greatness
that succumbs surrender,
      the anti- truth
    the Johnny behave
          
the strength  
that cannot save us,
muscle and tissue
yes
yes
          
  you should
                stand your ground,
the fall is coming
and has something
to **** for.

— The End —