"monitors" poems
It's been a year
since I saw you
die
since I slept rest-
lessly, my forehead pressed
against your
hospital bed
Night after night
your struggling
breath and
the beep beep beep of
your monitors
It's been a year spent
licking my wounds
in hopes that they
would heal,
like people say that
time will do
It's been a year
since I saw you
die
and, my
love,
I still can't
live without
you.
Oct 27, 2015
Oct 27, 2015 at 1:44 PM UTC
Once it was garbage, refuse, trash.
A jumble of foul-smelling detritus hauled to the curb
And removed by sinewy men
Contributing a harder day's work
Than anyone else in the city.
Our energy now removes its entropy.
Sorted and classified into coloured bins,
We add order to our rejected matter.
Specialized trucks arrive to collect
The date-synchronized bins
Emptying them into functionally compatible mechanisms.
Most desolate is the black box of paper and cardboard.
Brochures and flyers, old magazines and letters.
Annual reports and cereal boxes.
Once these were enameled with crafted sentences,
Painstakingly typed, edited and debated,
On the monitors of copywriters.
Now they are just millions of words printed on flattened fibre substrates,
Jumbled into the bruised and scarred black box,
Entering into the recycling stream.
The nouns and adjectives,
Prepositions and gerunds,
All jumble together.
Fragments of precisely-crafted sentences and paragraphs
Are gradually broken, shredded and pulped.
Incomplete thoughts, broken phrases
Like those of a rejected stranger
In an lonely, unknown country.
Then words without context.
Then just disparate letters
Are all that remain.
Their M ea N inG
G r a Du all y
is re mov
e d
.
Aug 2, 2013
Aug 2, 2013 at 10:26 AM UTC
College is a cancer clinic.
At this university, you either live long enough to die,
or die until you want to live.
Kids drag backpacks like bags of morphine,
and are attached to their planners like they are their heart monitors.
You do your own chemotherapy,
as you poison yourself with debt,
and Friday night nickel shots.
Jun 24, 2014
Jun 24, 2014 at 1:11 PM UTC
It’s strangely busy around the deathbeds,
as well it’s my last nightshift of the year.
I try to make no noise, can you hear me?
Push my hand, if you can, move a limb.
Your breath is so slow, please keep going,
monitors flash in time with the ventilator.
I’ll control the pupils, I know it’s blinding.
No one goes with their sparkling old eyes,
we are usually fading before we are dying.
Dec 17, 2021
Dec 17, 2021 at 2:22 AM UTC
it's only deep in the night when my mind wanders most that i ponder why another night of drinking alone is the status quo. it's when i wonder why the wheel that started spinning so long ago keeps spinning, in the same direction and general speed. deep in the night is when the doubts and regrets run rampant like rioters through the square, flipping cars amidst flaming tires. it's when the needs and the wants clash for supremacy, assuring the mutual destruction of each. loves lost carve their names into my neocortex. where dreams unrealized fill their time by playing ping-ping until they're ****** from the backburner to manic importance. deep in the night is when blood-shot eyes and blaring computer monitors have a staring contest. deep in it, thought becomes reaction and the beans spill accordingly. knee-deep and we're ravaging the calm into frenzy and burning the books of our beliefs and abandoning rationale in favor of the spectre of immediate gratification at any cost, at any loss. deep in the night where no light penetrates, things become somehow illuminated.
Jul 10, 2011
Jul 10, 2011 at 12:41 PM UTC
I can't recall the last time I felt excited
There should be moments there
Instead it's
Phantom pain
The greatness of elation
escapes chase of pumping veins
Instead it's
Only pain
I wish it would rain
Blue light seeps in while water pounds
Where I've cut the power where
Nothing lives
Except strange
Patterns endlessly dreamed up
warming mortal meat in vain
Instead their
presence makes
what hope remains just
drain
Might dreams be reprieve from apathy or worse?
Maybe so but never for me
I know it sounds morose but think
The singer of songs finds unanimous love and is warm to the core
by what the crowd brings
When the monitors die and the singer outside gets shot through the teeth
the dream is a lie and we all nod like
"Well it had to happen sooner or later"
Every time life parts hiding eyes
I wake into nightmare
Nov 10, 2013
Nov 10, 2013 at 11:42 PM UTC
*On the first day of junior year
I came to school to see*
A video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the second day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the third day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the fourth day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Four hallway monitors
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the fifth day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Five different sports fields
Four hallway monitors
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the sixth day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Six school police officers
Five different sports fields
Four hallway monitors
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the seventh day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Seven student councelors
Six school police officers
Five different sports fields
Four hallway monitors
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the eighth day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Nine school principals
Seven student councelors
Six school police officers
Five different sports fields
Four hallway monitors
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the ninth day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Over thirty clubs
Nine school principals
Seven student councelors
Six school police officers
Five different sports fields
Four hallway monitors
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the tenth day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Hundreds of badly labeled classrooms
Over thirty clubs
Nine school principals
Seven student councelors
Six school police officers
Five different sports fields
Four hallway monitors
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the eleventh day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Over four hundred teachers
Hundreds of badly labeled classrooms
Over thirty clubs
Nine school principals
Seven student councelors
Six school police officers
Five different sports fields
Four hallway monitors
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
*On the twelfth day of junior year
I came to school to see*
Four thousand, five hundred and twenty-eight students
Over four hundred teachers
Hundreds of badly labeled classrooms
Over thirty clubs
Nine school principals
Seven student councelors
Six school police officers
Five different sports fields
Four hallway monitors
Three different lunch periods
Two miles of hallways
And a video on students rights and responsibilities
Nov 29, 2016
Nov 29, 2016 at 9:17 PM UTC
i always seem to be sitting
in the middle of intersections
like a traffic light that hasn't
hung itself yet, always
seem to be waiting in the
middle of the ghost town
of where our love was first
built. there's a hospital
down the road where the
waiting room chairs are
much more morbid than
the hospital beds and
every electric heart rate
line sitting on the screen
of the heart monitors flatten,
make long beeping sounds
like an alarm clock, like a
wake up call; they make
long beeps like the ringing
i hear inside of the phone
when i call the owner of
the voice mail i've seem to
have made a home out of.
they took every place
we kissed and turned it into
a church that closes on
Sundays and holds a choir
full of people that lost their
voice in their own war. i've
been in the line for the
confessional for about two
years now because every
time i go up to say how
badly i want you to feel it
back, i let the girl wearing
your t-shirt cut in front of
me. the sidewalks only
seem to crack when they
remember how it felt
when you walked on them,
when you gave the ground
its purpose. one of these
nights the traffic lights will
come to their senses,
drop into the intersection
and crumble right next to me
because it's not like they have
anything to stop or at least
slow down because this is
a ghost town, & nothing is coming back.
Oct 21, 2014
Oct 21, 2014 at 7:04 PM UTC
When I was 15, I wouldn’t have believed you
if you told me all of this about constant lament
in a Red painted Animal House of scapegoats
that I’ve yet to see
it’s
streets of beige
it’s
fast food bad food no food spilled milk or beer
it’s
the South no the East maybe West probably North
it’s
in the air the water the meat there’s just too much heat to breathe or hold a job
it’s
hourly wages and daily commutes of gypsy peddlers in a town I’ve never been to
it’s
the cigarettes or nicotine my useless spleen filtering things I should never inhale or drink
it’s
divorce rates leading to ***** flicks c-sections finding acquaintances on monitors after dark only able to generate laughter over years of tears
it’s
women
it’s
pain
it’s
the migraines we get when we're waiting on the rain to paint the beige streets bronze
it’s
rolling trees metal trucks frozen lakes lumber jacks and ice fishing
it's
the anxiety of right wrong bad good all grey in the sunshine without you
it’s
the words of times you said meaning more to me than it ever could to you
it’s
the colossus of Wall St. overbearing my own suit and tie un-ironed or cared for but necessary none the less
it’s
CCTV the fight for power Government foreign travelers or terrorists Project Paper clip MK Ultra Plum Island persuasion propaganda Paul Wolfowitz
it’s
who governs what you can afford when you sit tattered on a curb after earning another mans bread
it’s
what has or has not been said 7 times or none that still lingers on the grass out front of home or house
it’s
no matter how big you are you still answer a toy phone handed to you by a two year old
it’s
the tears of Alexander when he realized there were no more worlds to conquer
Oct 29, 2012
Oct 29, 2012 at 2:37 PM UTC
last night i had a nightmare
your car backed up to and through my front door
dumping broken computers and monitors and machines in my yard
dumping out your trash at my mother's doorstep
like you did to me
(you tell them i left, but we both know your cold eyes pushed me)
last night i had a nightmare
i walked into my darkened room and a man fraught with danger and uneasiness left his breakfast dishes on my bedspread.
my mother did not hear my screams of concern, as to why, why a man of such disgust had chosen my bedroom to have his breakfast eggs.
the ketchup and stray pepper he left on my pillow was a violation like hands between clenched thighs
when i woke up this morning,
i wanted to cry.
my (enter degree here) doctor slipped me slight pills of green and brown, guaranteed to rid me of these visions, these haunts that grip me like dramas played out in technicolor across my eyelids.
now i take two under the tongue, caught between a lover's fingertips.
i wake up having lost and died only moments before.
May 2, 2014
May 2, 2014 at 7:33 PM UTC
You have been cruel to your fellow race,
you smeared blood all over your land,
and here you are now,
your soils hunger and thirst for green pastures,
and there are no where to be found.
Oh poor South Africa,
could you be another Eygpt
with God's plegues reigning all over you?
You showed no harmony,
you desired no peace,
you cared less about unity,
you left your own race to die,
with those large stones,
those weapons,
the sticks and the whips.
That fire that burnt the people alive,
their tears fell to the ground
and they have dried up your land,
it is no shortage of water that you face,
but with unquestionable daughts,
you are facing terrible draughts.
Now that your fellow citizens fight against one another,
the blood is being shed amongst themselves,
and those stones now crush their own skulls,
it is nolonger faces without races that cry,
but your own race nolonger knows how to share.
this is all because you do not have
enough water to secure them anymore.
Their needs can not be reached
not even by the noble group that monitors from their royal seats.
Oh poor South Africa cry for mecry!
For your soils are running solid,
they shall nolonger be able to bear food.
The Lord covers your land with dark clouds,
yet there is never a seed of rain that falls and touch your platue.
Oh poor South Africa cry for mercy!
for your people are dying.
And yet you sit still in silence.
Nov 13, 2015
Nov 13, 2015 at 2:30 PM UTC
It’s been a long day
I’m sitting in the recovery room, waiting for a late evening case to start
The PACU nurses tend to two patients at opposing sides of the room
Familiar cacophony of sounds – monitors softly speaking, informing the staff about their charges
Heartbeat, pulse oximeter timbre, quiet respiratory alarm
It’s my 7th case, I’m starting to fade
The sounds are relaxing, soothing.
All is well
Suddenly I hear the disconjugate beeps of the two heart monitors
Draw together, until
For just a few precious seconds
These two total strangers
Completely unaware of one another
Share a pulse – their hearts beating in perfect sync – the two sounds indistinguishable
A beautifully symmetrical moment, almost lost
In the next second, as if it hadn’t happened, their hearts diverge - once more strangers
one to one another
unaware of an incredibly intimate moment shared
Sitting there, waiting for the case
I imagine
An instant in the course of history
Where, for one fleeting breath,
Humanity’s rhythm converged
Billions of hearts in time, a nerve impulse propagated across the planet
before scattering to the winds
A potent event, possibly one of many that even
In our modern world, still remains in the mystical
Dec 2, 2013
Dec 2, 2013 at 12:39 AM UTC
Extension Cords
By Grace Espinoza
Extension cords
Kiss our spines—
Once outlined and defined
By cotton soft lips—
Dangling, extended, from slender necks
Familiar buzz of tandem heartbeats
Replaced by rumbling monitors
Deafened by the constant hum
Of clicking fingertips
I cannot reach through glass
To trace that smile
Conform it to the memory
Of greedy palms
Cannot wrap my arms
Around you
To set your worries to sail
Connected
Strings of words said
But never meant
Blinded by the bright glow
Monitors casting shadows
On what could have been
Apr 16, 2014
Apr 16, 2014 at 3:01 PM UTC
mortality's taste is bittersweet
as death's brush paints life's new lease
impressionistic could haves, should haves, would haves
minimalist suprematism shapes dreams
surrealistic hopes
time's urgency hammered home by temporal clarity
top 10 lists glazed to topography
as future blends to present amid trees
a familiar CICU
a family gathering
beds with tubes and wires
monitors flashing and beeping
refreshing past's distance
with updated parking prices
will the ending be the same?
May 31, 2010
May 31, 2010 at 1:22 PM UTC
After years on this earth, I have weathered and grown.
As a child, I did things, I had joy, love, and goals.
In early summers, my life was a canvas for scar tissue:
hot pebbles burned soft skin into calloused glory,
the sun beat down and leathered my skin,
chlorine and dirt turned my young hair to gray.
When I was young, I etched tunnels in my bones,
with crayon and marker, I forged deep ivory valleys.
Some see this as cruelty, a sad deterioration,
but this atrophy is experience, the catalyst of life!
Years later, I sit here next to a painted sunrise.
With jell-o, gray matter rots on my styrofoam tray.
I wish for the summer, hot pebbles, and crayons,
for the laughter of youth and its calloused adventures.
But I've retired, so I sit idly in this plastic wheeled chair,
watching monitors beeping with ebbing heart lines,
grieving for my gray hair as it turns back to brown,
mourning, as my unused bones fill with marrow to the brim,
watching, heartbroken, old age clutching my hand,
as my wrinkled skin smooths away.
Mar 28, 2018
Mar 28, 2018 at 11:39 PM UTC
I work in a hospital,
sterile, too bright, monitors beep,
everything's bleak except you.
I know you're dying and as I check your vital signs I try not to speak.
You tell me once you're better you'll take me to dinner,
I wish I was optimistic, I wish I didn't know better.
So instead I take my breaks in your room,
we sit there and talk over ****** hospital food.
When I work night shifts I watch your mother cry while you sleep,
It's eight o-clock, she hasn't had dinner, I remind her to eat.
Dec 13, 2015
Dec 13, 2015 at 7:07 PM UTC
The silk, satin, that is, your skin
If only it could be sewn, to my own, flesh to bone
Sun-gold childlike eyes I’m, possesive over what’s mine
Guard u with a stone fort, no force could ever distort
If up to me, if president
I’d pump taxes into a fence
Tight security surveillance
Monitors a lavish palace
In which u’ll stay well protected
I wear u on me like a locket
If u are confused or ever despaired
Feeling unloved, that life is unfair
Never for once think I won’t be there
Storm earthquake hurricane, I hear your prayer
I love you more than a flame has heat
More than powers of electricity
I love you more than water’s needed by a tree
As there’s always greed for money, will u always have me
Spelled by, your charms
Your fruit disarms
Fragments of my thinking, farewell fuels a famine
Your fingerprints are ageless, riddles of a ghost nameless
Synthetic diamonds, seizing my organs,until swollen
Till we inhale, the same smoke trail
I’m a trampled leaf throbbing from nails
Your silver haired mermaid derail
With only arrows of poetry
To proclaim without humility
U’ll have the world when u have me
If u are confused or ever despaired
Feeling unloved that life is unfair
Never for once think I won’t be there
Storm earthquake hurricane, I hear your prayer
I love you more than a flame has heat
More than powers of electricity
I love you more than water’s needed by a tree
As there’s always greed for money, will u always have me
Dec 6, 2012
Dec 6, 2012 at 11:31 AM UTC
It didn't start off with a white cake
carrying forty-something candles
Rather, it was the chimes of the phone alarm
later, a cold run through the foggy streets
then back home to nurse the joint pains
The phone buzzed with messages
first from the wife, then my best friend,
then my brother, to whom I got to respond
"and the same to you too"
then my ghost friend, who only sends a message
on this day, each year
before vanishing out of my life
I'm home today, having a party of sorts
with the twin monitors
and the tailless mouse
At least they look dressed up for the occasion
sitting on the workstation
in their black soft-plastic jackets
They don't dance or sing or even mumble anything
They only look down at my fingers
going back and forth
around the letters of the alphabet
as I go to work while sitting at home
At this age, I muse to myself
some people don't want to remember
how they have moved closer
in the journey towards
forgetting one's name, family
and eventually how to eat
And almost imperceptibly
we have become the dad, or mum
or auntie that we looked up to
or held under the magnifying glass
and judged for their decisions on our lives
But now I'm only trying
to live in the moment
as I pour a bit of whiskey
swirl it around gently in the glass,
watching if it shows
within its brown circular current
the regrets of the past
or the shrouded future
and hopefully, the number of my age
May 15, 2022
May 15, 2022 at 9:22 AM UTC
i am a robot
a cognizant machine
powered by electricity and
programmed from birth
regurgitating how to think
dress act talk
by television monitors
Salvation is dividing by 0
Originality
404: page not found
Error
Err0r
The perplexing complexities
To translate in text
unnerving absurdity
Indexing apex
If ever I were so politely inclined
to initiate self-destruct sequence
in 5... 4... 3... 2...
Mar 10, 2014
Mar 10, 2014 at 10:41 AM UTC
Spearmint altoids and espresso
doubleshot headphones
hardly used Palm(seems not 1 for organization)
Empty jewel cases strewn over
the pine expanse3 monitors burn, an insistent
cyclopean glare w/the accompanying mice
notebooks' aged paper curled
'round circuit board controller cards
and holographic stickers open
hard drive aluminum platter white
cordless phone 2.4 GHz
floppy discs USB
milk glass opalescent bag
industrial lasagna fork canted sideways
tomes beckon
Cybershock
Snowcrash palpitations
PANIC! k_trap trap type 0x000000E flickers
attempting to dump 32 years
physical memory
Failed!
User I/O = NULL
Feb 23, 2010
Feb 23, 2010 at 5:13 PM UTC
Unfelt unheard, unseen,
I've left my little queen,
Her languid arms in silver slumber lying:
Ah! through their nestling touch,
Who---who could tell how much
There is for madness---cruel, or complying?
Those faery lids how sleek!
Those lips how moist!---they speak,
In ripest quiet, shadows of sweet sounds:
Into my fancy's ear
Melting a burden dear,
How "Love doth know no fulness, nor no bounds."
True!---tender monitors!
I bend unto your laws:
This sweetest day for dalliance was born!
So, without more ado,
I'll feel my heaven anew,
For all the blushing of the hasty morn.
1.6k
Alex 2 breathes, stacks and unstacks papers, distantly
Alex 1, front cubicle, coughs, clicks his mouse
Eddie pulls out his drawer, pushes it back in, clicks his mouse
Alex 2, yes two Alex's, saunters up to the coffee machine
Alex 1, head down, clacking his keyboard
Mouse clicks, keyboard clicks, electricity
Monitors glow, fluorescents never flicker
Alex 1 opens a new file, two clicks of the mouse
Eddie sips his coffee, puts it down, clicks
New folder, new file, new data
Data entry, spreadsheets
Alex 1 asks did you get the email
Alex 2 has his coffee, his white shirt, under the fluorescents
Statics noise, static, mouse clicks, keyboard
Every new click, new file, new data, new folder
Data in, data out, file, click, the static electronics
Alex 2 clicks, files, new folder, new deal, new data
Eddie clears his throat, softly, the static noise, flickers,
Every new love story is a tragedy
Alex 2 opens a new folder, inputs data, spreadsheets
Numbers in, Eddie clicks his mouse twice rapidly
Stale effluvia coffee, static noise, electric light
Alex 1 sniffles, clears his throat, the clock ticks softly
Eddie opens a new file, the electric screen reflects his fixed eyes
Alex 2 sips his coffee, opens a file, clicks, keyboard clacks
Stasis, complete stasis, electricity, nodes, linear graphs
Numbers input, data, new file, file transfer
Every old tragedy is a ghost story
Alex 2 sips his coffee, breathes, clears his throat, data
Spreadsheets, monitors, electricity, static, data input, output
Every ghost story is infinite
Alex 1 gets up for a new coffee
Eddie inputs data, spreadsheet, file, new folder
Electric lights, stasis, data, file, click, file, input exp..
Oct 18, 2020
Oct 18, 2020 at 10:21 PM UTC
she sits at the dining table
afternoon sun streaming in
doing battle with the cryptic crossword
cursing the old woman she has become when words elude
the hand holding the pen wrinkled like the armpits of the of the eucalypt branches in the garden belongs to the same old crone who uses the walking stick leaning against the fading arm chair
once upon a time she held court
powerhouse of the labor party
corporate tiger
made her fortune from men in suits who cowered before her fearsome glare perfected in the bathroom mirror along with her makeup
mother, wife, business woman
she did it all and had it all
but time passes slowly with each orbit around the sun
time smoothes, soothes and wears away the edges of youth
luring you towards the twilight of lifes great destiny
the glare faded along with the eyes that now need glasses and a reading light for the evening paper
where once she stood tall against destruction of the environment
now she leans on her walking stick advocating Philip Nitschke and her right to exit at a time of her choosing
the ache in her heart for the lost vibrancy dimmed by the arthritis that makes climbing the stairs an exercise of will
prada heels and armani long ago gave way to swollen ankles, dr scholls and elastic waisted slacks
a life well lived does not make growing old any more appealing
she monitors her own decline as her friends pass away around her one by one
lingering at lifes edge as she tries to convince them its ok to go
wondering when her own turn to go will arrive or if she will find the courage to bring it on before her mind or her body betray her
taking mobility and choice in equal measure
Apr 4, 2015
Apr 4, 2015 at 9:12 PM UTC
A baby crawling paws down
Down the stairs into
the study room
the odd computer flashes
the faces of what looks like people
a whiteout face
with black shameful eyes
breaks the scroll of happy faces
happy places and joyous info
as empty as a new USB
it's gaze pierced my soul
forever
It was 1998 then
More than a decade later
whiteout faces everywhere
on every screen
monitors growing out
like tumors on a monster from
The Thing
one grows in my pocket
I pull the tiny screen out
and the face eyeballs me again
one grows in each room
the kitchen has one on the fridge
all the cars have them, too
pixellated faces talking at me
I feel there may be one plugged on my
heart or brain
I can only think on its terms, now
I'm going to need a
date for the movies tonight.
Jan 13, 2013
Jan 13, 2013 at 12:28 PM UTC
Did you stop to think what it would do?
To your body and mind did you have a clue.
While you were high and speeding,
Family hearts were crying and pleading.
Please oh please stop doing the drugs,
A mother’s heart strings feeling the tugs.
Put it at the foot of the cross they pled,
All Satan’s deceitful lies filling your head.
Stop! Stop! What have you done?
What a tangled mess your life has spun.
On the news they told of a fatal drug bust,
Praying for all involved, In God I trust.
Not knowing where you are, where to look,
When the phone rang my body shook.
It is so hard seeing you in that hospital bed,
Monitors, tubes, and thankful your not dead.
Gunshot barely missed the main artery they say,
Time flashed back to watching you run and play.
Precious child how did we get here so fast,
Why can’t we start over and go back in the past?
Watching the clock surgery is taking so long,
Could something really bad have gone wrong?
The room is closing in and tears continue to flow,
Precious Lord the outcome only you know.
Hours go by with no news on your condition,
I prayed until I seen a smile from the physician.
It was God that spared your life he said,
When you arrived barely hanging by a thread.
I thanked the doctor and praised The Lord,
For your recovery we all prayed in one accord.
Second chances are not always given to all,
Search out Jesus and on your knees fall.
He has watched over you and saved your life,
It is your choice now to avoid the strife.
Jesus has a wonderful life for you planned,
Reach out to him as He embraces your hand.
VLK
Aug 11, 2018
Aug 11, 2018 at 4:11 PM UTC