"mucky" poems
These days have ebbed
as Love's swell was checked:
the waters in some places
- all but dammed!
But now at last
I sense the rising tide
and thank Temese
for the current's turn;
now following that great writhing snake
to where its pulsing head will rake;
over the mucky soiled watery beds
of Woolwich
Greenwich
Limehouse
- and under -
Tower Bridge
To that great gloating sight
A crown of a billion lights
Blazing day and night:
And somewhere within
In the slick oily warmth
Our flood tides mesh,
As over each other we wash.
Hard thrusts
wicked deep cuts
given and received
are recorded in that great mirror smoked!
where with a tug and a shove
on the banks
in the streets
through the loopy twists
everything prospers in the glow
as the decades decaying flow;
each ***** bud
red with new blood
one after t'other
flowers
before their purple petals scatter.
Let's on the luck o' the dice
(you 'n' me!)
ride out
on the flotsam and jetsom
that has carried us this far
and as pleases
merge.
Aug 7, 2018
Aug 7, 2018 at 2:32 AM UTC
Whosever room this is should be ashamed!
His underwear is hanging on the lamp.
His raincoat is there in the overstuffed chair,
And the chair is becoming quite mucky and damp.
His workbook is wedged in the window,
His sweater's been thrown on the floor.
His scarf and one ski are beneath the TV,
And his pants have been carelessly hung on the door.
His books are all jammed in the closet,
His vest has been left in the hall.
A lizard named Ed is asleep in his bed,
And his smelly old sock has been stuck to the wall.
Whosever room this is should be ashamed!
Donald or Robert or Willie or--
Huh? You say it's mine? Oh, dear,
I knew it looked familiar!
17.9k
In a sky, dense dark and grey,
when predators lookout for their prey
squirrels scatter every which way,
leading the path for my stay.
Drops of white pearls,
tear down the pink petals
glittering under the sparkling sun,
with beauty ne’er outdone.
Peeking through nature’s looking glass,
lies a beautiful heart of yellow grass
rests a reservoir of sweet gold,
that inveigle the swarm untold.
All the drizzle and haze
that forged an irrational maze,
ended with what may bring
the spell of fragrant spring.
Now bloomed the bud,
in the mucky miry mud
waiting to be plucked
the florid Hibiscus.
Jun 3, 2014
Jun 3, 2014 at 4:38 AM UTC
I fear.
I fission.
I flow.
like a sponge,
I become aqueous
when wiping blood or saliva.
like a finger, I lose myself in rings of prints.
I am the ography
of space loosely tied to the
end of a carrot. detach me from
ice and I float to the other side of the island.
I wave at ships passing night or day, captains
drunk or sober, buoys clean or covered in mucky ****
save me.
I am losing my
mind on these stairs
crawling the ceiling, these
riches made of paper, these children
using liters of glue to stick themselves to
each other.
everyone is stuck.
everyone is covered in barnacles.
everyone is design on my pine tree’s needled hooves.
a horse gallops four at a time. they name it “power” for the dreams it has of stormy women.
Jul 12, 2017
Jul 12, 2017 at 9:13 AM UTC
Smoke signals from a silent cigarette
float to the heavens and linger
in the mucky conscience of regret
resting on the temple, my forefinger
Thumb lifted to expose
a metaphorical gun
countenance in prose
staring at a midnight sun
When will that monster again ****
another that I love,
Why did I so feel
like I could best the powers from above
I created a ghastly Adam
and I dare not create an innocent Eve
my future I cannot fathom
all time left to grieve
I will chase this gruesome snake
no matter where it slithers
across Hell's frozen lake
this calamity summons me hither
My final and only ambition
is to cast a life to silence
his and my cognition
will clash and bite in violence
I created a monster
and a monster created me
Madness! How it so saunters
and wails as if a banshee
Look over on the frozen horizon
a horrid shadow stalks
I, a fire stealing Titan
will march out to solve this paradox
Oct 10, 2018
Oct 10, 2018 at 8:57 AM UTC
It's my lifeboat
that floats
center stage in the
opaque green, mucky lake.
It glistens and gleams
As its diamond eyes
stare into mine
and ****** me;
further manipulating my senses.
The lake speaks in sonnets,
admitting truths of love and desire.
It cannot live without me,
for I have always managed to make its life more "hectic in the best way possible"
-a forbidden love.
"One day we will find a way to be together", it says.
"One day you and I may become one."
I need the lake, for it has always managed to find me peace.
Sincerely yours,
Curtis
Sep 30, 2015
Sep 30, 2015 at 12:04 AM UTC
I wish I could explain to you how my heart changes
Daily\ by the minute
When I see you across the way,
my view obscured by a wall; which seems fitting
A wall seems to keep us apart [endlessly]
Your end or mine
Its easier, we agree
What is it that keeps me so far you ask?
ME
There is something surrounding my heart
Malleable and breathing
Alive and keeping me together somehow
I've let it open a few times
To let someone in, to let you in.
But every time, without fail, something changes
You got to my heart and it burned in the most beautiful light
Coming in, you made it good, and happiness was real
It was when you left that things got bad
I left myself open for too long and lost myself over time
Bits and pieces fell out slowly, scattering itself
Now my heart is incomplete, more so than usual
I'm not blaming you
I souly point the finger at myself
I shouldn't have opened up to begin with
You want me to be honest and transparent,
but since closing back up, my heart has turned dark and mucky
Unable to be seen through clearly
I try to be honest, but the current truths get blindsided by the past lies
I don't mean to do all the damage I caused
To you or me
I wish this was a real apology, for I know it changes nothing
Me continuing to be closed off
I’m sorry.
Aug 9, 2017
Aug 9, 2017 at 5:53 PM UTC
We are the duet
Of water meets dust
Sky meets ground
Heaven meets earth
We are the duet
Of a mucky dance
Crying over the crops
Stepping upon the seeds
We are the duet
Invented from the mess
Of creation, turning
Into devastation
By the hands of the
Coalition
We are the duet
Pouring hands and feet
And cranking necks
And exposing wrists
And lengthening legs
And loosening tongues.
We are the duet
For the dried up leaves
In need of a drink
For the endless fields
Silent in their thirst
We are the dance
To grow and harvest
That will give and give and give
And keep feeding and keep feeding and
Keep feeding
Both types of souls:
Those who believe the duet is worthwhile
And those who believe they can live
Without the smallest amount of rain.
Mar 13, 2013
Mar 13, 2013 at 12:47 PM UTC
Let us invoke a healthy heart-breaking
Towards the horrible world:
Let us say 0 poor people
How can they help being so absurd,
Misguided, abused, misled?
With unsifted saving graces jostling about
On a mucky medley of needs,
Like love-lit ****
Year after cyclic year
The unidentifiable flying god is missed.
Emotions sit in their heads disguised as judges,
Or are twisted to look like mathematical formulae,
And only a scarce god-given scientist notices
His trembling lip melting the heart of the rat.
Whoever gave us the idea somebody loved us?
Far in our wounded depths faint memories cry,
A vision flickers below subliminally
But immanence looms unbearably: TURN IT OFF! they hiss.
2.9k
I am paperwhite,
a delicate bird,
thrashing and ensnared.
Paperwhite,
and bones of feathers;
light and airy.
I fly,
fly away in the ceaseless night sky.
Snowflakes stick to my face,
my eyelids,
my garments;
That are knit together too big on my frame, draping over
My winged shoulders and shielding me,
like a wall
Protecting a delicate feather from windy skies.
Running, fleeing.
Gasping, dying.
Blood starts flowing,
and rushes down my forehead,
Thin, the kind of flow that won’t stop.
It flows over my eyes,
down my chiseled face
And pools in my collarbones creating a lake.
I look into the distance;
staring back at me are ashen eyes.
I am homesick for somewhere I’ve never been.
Longing, longing,
flying, running.
Running home,
running far.
Reaching with open arms,
Reaching closer.
Reaching out,
breaking the cage keeping me.
A mucky ocean of dirt and sediment,
Clears into an open water,
a clear oasis,
a path.
Folded like paper, flying like a bird.
Apr 25, 2015
Apr 25, 2015 at 11:06 PM UTC
**Back stabbing ******
The lines have been crossed
Remove the knife**
*Delegated waters
Empty hearted man
Passing mucky tides*
**Shutting me out
Resenting me, Friend
Closing the airwaves**
*Driving away mad
Behind I stand
Left to wonder why*
**What had happened
Losing the contact
Misunderstood**
May 24, 2010
May 24, 2010 at 7:31 AM UTC
Iceberg Man
Most of my iceberg is under the sea
that's how it always has been for me
if you were to fall in the ocean and dive
one look you would say "Man alive..."
"What a load of mucky ice,
we thought the boy was sweet and nice.
But now we feel it fair to say
we think he ought to melt away.."
Mar 13, 2011
Mar 13, 2011 at 10:13 AM UTC
The village pump is where she was stationed
Her purpose in life, to glean information
Every morsel of 'news' she'd greedily savour
Though reluctant to empty her head, to fill up her neighbour's
That mucky young hussy's expecting you'll find
I'm certain I know who did it this time
He bought a bike, the crafty young fella
And no good came on it Doris I tell ya
He put one in Fram in the family way
And thas a good fifteen mile away
And if you ask me, he's too fond of his sister
If there's a young'un who's willing round here he'd not miss her
So lock up your daughter do she'll be the next
He'll be snouting round here before long I expect
And look at poor Bob, they say he's frustrated
They reckon his hip bone is half discolated
Same as old **** see him hick with his stick
All wore up and not sixty as yit
You don't look wholey clever yourself
Doris you really should keep an eye on your health
And Grandma Green has took to her bed
I'll drop by there today, 'cos same as I say
You're a long time dead
Well I should be going, I've said too much already
Cheerio now, and do you goo steady
Nov 4, 2012
Nov 4, 2012 at 3:43 PM UTC
Born in a spiders web
So silky and neat
Spreading over her crown
To her tiny, pink feet
A family of spiders
Scuttled and stalked
Weaving their way
Through dust and chalk
As the baby grew
The web threatened to break
But they repaired and spun
Around her like snakes
She was different to them
So innocent and pure
They tried to trap her spirit
With lies, secrets and lures
The child, now a teen
Succumb to their ways
Her truth unspoken
The web's now a maze
She knew no love
No heart or care
Just lies and jealousy
A world of traps and snares
Through the tunnel she shuffled
In front of her stood
A girl just like her
Someone she understood
This girl smiled and unwrapped her
From many years of web
From her bare, mucky feet
To the top of her head
What freedom she felt!
She smiled and laughed
It echoed in bright lights
Through the tunnels and shafts
The spiders squealed in the light
Angry and eight eyes blind
They could no longer contain her
No longer bind
The girls escaped together
Hands held and then she knew
This was all I ever needed
Love from me to you
May 31, 2016
May 31, 2016 at 4:35 PM UTC
There are too many people here.
Streets are crowded with vendors
and an indelible smell thickens.
Buildings are painted a faint blue, or pink;
they rise upwards, lofty and erratic.
On the balcony of my hotel their roofs are speckled;
one of every color.
Outlandish art fills sun-glazed shops.
Some are only twenty feet wide. Motorbikes
wiz down the cracked roads with intimidating speed.
I look up to the knotted powerlines strung above
cluttering the backdrop of twine green trees.
In the humidity, there is no fresh air.
I can scarcely breathe. Here is a city
impractically shaped, a different world,
but the tender is coming as I descend further.
In the interior is Birla Orphanage
where laughter spreads.
The children wade gigantic waves
on the shore of Do Son Beach.
Mucky water sticks to the sand on our skin.
A boy, three feet tall, beautiful bright brown eyes
peers into my life. I do not know his language,
the most we can do is share gaping smiles
as this city unfolds its secrets to me.
Mar 31, 2013
Mar 31, 2013 at 8:36 PM UTC
Before a Creole love call, and a curdled Cajun moon
the bay water laps about pierrot, bay grass, and wading egret knuckle
Treading through his mucky labyrinthine mistress, and wind-knitted mire
beak prods pock, and inundate in the same instant
silt gilds his bill as he finally snaps about scaly sustenance
Sated
Wings boom and beckon in the darkness
Lift
Scooped in pearl beam, he commands the aeriform
An ether opus bellows about his form
Drying silt disintegrates from aerodynamic bill
Dribbling about in a forgotten slant in the darkness
Jan 26, 2014
Jan 26, 2014 at 8:32 PM UTC
That year they gave Tess
her first typewriter. She’d
not need to borrow her
brother’s battered old piece
or write down her fragile
poems in her spiderlike
scrawl as her father called it.
The promise came while
she was getting her mind
together in that mental
asylum, after the mucky
love affair that went no
place and left her hanging
there, like one crucified
for all to see and most
to softly mutter and stare.
Get yourself mended girl,
Father said, and we’ll buy
you your own typewriter,
so you can stab away on
the keys to your heart’s
content and bring out
those poems of yours.
He never read her poems,
never read much apart
from the back page sport
or gawked at page 3 girls
with a tut tutting tongue.
That year she gazed out
of the wide barred window
of the asylum at the snow
on fields, at the seagulls
gathering and feeding behind
the faraway tractor as it
ploughed, at the grey
depressing sky, wondering
what it’d be like to not be,
wondering what the woman
with a cast in her eye, was
doing to herself in the toilets,
one night when she’d gone
in to *** unable to sleep.
The typewriter idea
and promise kind of got her
through the dark hours and
the ECT, and the following day
headaches and numbness.
After slitting her wrists (mildly,
a cry for help) she said on the
phone to her father, Come get
me out of this place, help me
get back together. Ok, he said,
Miss Humpty Dumpty, and he
put down the phone, and she
stood in the hall of the asylum
with the receiver in her hand,
the image of the typewriter
before her eyes, those poems
banging on the inside of her
head, new ones wanting to
get out, old ones left for dead.
May 22, 2012
May 22, 2012 at 2:14 AM UTC
I'm so lucky.
It was so unlikely.
It's so unlike me.
To think I'm lucky.
I was only lonely.
It made me unlucky.
But I was only bones then.
and only knew
fuckmefuckmefuckme.
And now I'm here.
And now I'm lucky.
And I still remember
the mucky foggy past.
And I knock on wood.
Because I know I should.
I knock on wood.
and hopefully nothing
shocks the lucky good.
And now I'm here.
But the only old me
is in my ADHD.
I hope it doesn't get the best of me.
I hope I can conquer.
But I'm still me.
I'm still ADHD.
Knock knock knock.
Jan 6, 2013
Jan 6, 2013 at 10:27 PM UTC
dark clouds fill the sweet summer sky while i continue
to wonder why the grounds have been pummeled
with water for days now
my mind yearns to sit out on the warm grassy ground; i
want to feel the earth below me spin deep deep down
where the rocks are born
i decide to bore something of my own
out of boredom out of desire
because ive been awake for less than an hour
the weather is discouraging and i want sleep
alas! a day would go wasted and around these parts
within my heart
i cannot let that happen!
excited as i am also impatient my liquid like child
takes a minute
in the minute, maybe two realization sets in
where is everybody?
alone as i am also cold my loneliness surely soon
will also grow old. as did my minute
it passed and my excitement grows into
satisfaction
the ground up and watered down soul
of the coffee bean
oh what a wonderful thing! it fills me up greatly
and causes me to empty, unfortunately, more than occasionally
but my spirits are high! my energy, higher
and i can't find anything to do
my veins scream for heightened blood pressure,
a faster heart beat
the jitters have taken over, my feet remain cold
alas still, time just grows older and older
yearning to be filled with actions and words
sunshine and warmth
but i have been robbed
the dark clouds in the sky are threatening.
intimidating.
i can hear the army of H two OH gathering for attack
upon the earth below
do you think they're laughing? surely they know
what sadness they cause on a day that should be beautiful
on a day where our father sun wants to show us his love
right? surely, they know.
*ode to coffee
on a mucky yucky day
an entrapment of a sort. Lovely, to say the least*
Jul 6, 2013
Jul 6, 2013 at 2:10 PM UTC
.
I once was young on shores of pond,
Deep in clump grasses mossy, longed
By seasons that turned shining winds,
Older than years etched into tree rings,
I played at song in the rushes of marsh,
Danced to moon from my bedroom loft
And in the theaters of starlight shadow,
Wrote my fables after sleeping narrows,
Dreamed dreams as young boy should,
Rethinking Sophocles in hemlock wood
I named the flowers wildest within sun,
Built forts from the forest floors of ruin,
Burned in rashes of ivy, itching poison,
Swam by water snakes in mucky unison
Spring was tireless as nettles and bees,
A wide river glided into the seven seas,
Pond was lake and oceans uncharted,
Skies rolling thunder after lightenings
More gold than lots' aspirations prised,
All showers flamed, Promethean fires.
Jun 27, 2016
Jun 27, 2016 at 2:31 PM UTC
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Feb 16, 2011
Feb 16, 2011 at 9:39 AM UTC
Sometimes you feel like a flower in a glass vase
decorating the center of a booth in a rundown diner
surrounded by coffee cup stains and burger grease
and accompanied by a hundred wearied faces
that come and pass, blurs in the middle of the night,
the fluorescent light of a single bulb that slowly burns out
the only shining source, mucky water your one food supply,
alone, carefully shriveling away forgotten, but other times
you're the diner, the trusty booth, a shimmering light
on a otherwise cavernous, empty road
in the middle of nowhere, a guardian,
always there waiting to help the exhausted
on their journey, wherever that may be.
May 16, 2014
May 16, 2014 at 10:20 PM UTC
Mucky self portraits of
Bacon strips,
Kraft-y singles
& expired Perrier,
reciting tales of DogMa,
tsk-ing at Eve
tsk-ing at Helen
tsk-ing at Mary
Sophia just wants to sit.
What's up, Gram-mere?
.... I'mma pun chew!
A dozen good guy Hermes and some, like, no.
This one takes shots like Jäger, ja,
this one takes shots like Manny Pacquiao, yo.
Doodling constellations and
Grandfathered teachings of How To Draw A Map -
a tangled thread of a quilt patch,
Ultimate Boon-doggle.
Wandering home in the papaya morning to catch
the light of a magnesium sky and birdsong.
Jun 8, 2014
Jun 8, 2014 at 4:01 PM UTC
Whoa.
See that yin?
Jist sittin there?
Ye ken how she’s sittin like that, don’t ye?
Well, whit’s she sittin oan?
Aye, her erse.
She’s only sittin like that
So ye ken she’s got an erse.
Gaggin fir it.
An whoa, check that yin!
Wearin claes!
Filthy cow!
Whit dae ye mean, “Whit dae ah mean”?
Claes!
Ye canny wear claes
If ye huvny got a boady, can ye?
That’s right –
Just screamin it, so she is –
“Check oot ma boady!”
Aye, ah wull an aw!
Don’t mind if ah dae!
Aw, mate – that yin!
That yin ower there!
Bendin her airm!
See her?
Bendin her airm like a mucky ****
That’s so ye ken
She’s got elbows!
Phwoar, I ken your type hen –
you wi yir elbows an a’thin!
Desperate fur it, aren’t ye?
An man! This yin,
walkin towards us!
Breathin in an oot!
Whit a slapper!
Breathin in an oot!
Aye, ye need a pair o lungs tae dae that,
I bet, eh, hen?
A pair o fine, functioning lungs!
Aye, you use them, doll –
dinny you be shy!
Ah’m no!
Aw pal, haud me back!
This yin!
This yin eatin a meat pie!
Shameless wee ****
Aw yeah, baby,
I ken whit that means!
Mean’s ye’ve got yirsel
a **** wee digestive tract in there, no?
Ye dinny hae tae spell it oot tae me, love!
Probably got a pair o kidneys
tucked away in there too,
ye ***** wee *****
Aw the same, ur they no?
Aw ae thum.
Gantin oan it.
Dec 20, 2016
Dec 20, 2016 at 7:39 AM UTC
Black hole kisses
******* me out of myself.
Kisses wrapped in hugs.
Intimate moments at intimate times.
Memories to treasure
On a cold winter night.
We once played a New Year Game
In which you kissed a girl
Then swopped her with another:
Twenty or so kisses
To compare.
One kiss so wide
I could hardly stretch
To meet it.
Ending up
Trust me,
With the big fat unresponsive one
Too drunk
To even know
She was being kissed.
Recall one time being coolly kissed
Politely:
A kiss that said
In no uncertain terms –
If you want passion
You’d better go elsewhere
My dear.
For kisses are like handshakes:
Some firm and friendly;
Others too hard
Or too limp.
The young don’t always get it:
Lettuce limp
With their customary hands.
Physical expression
A dying art
Like conversation
In this digital age
Of mobile phones
Snapchats
And Insta-Images.
Time to rekindle the past,
Go back to playing out –
And away!
Get mud ****** mucky
All gloves off.
Back to Basics,
That’s The Way.
Paul Butters
© PB 5\2\2019.
Feb 5, 2019
Feb 5, 2019 at 6:28 AM UTC