"nightshirt" poems
Last night
I was in your arms,
as your kisses
mingled
with smoke,
and your voice
whispered me a lullaby.
Tonight,
I'm alone with my thoughts
and my cold bed,
and my nightshirt
that smells like you,
and your sheets.
Tomorrow,
I'll wake
tired and groggy.
I'll need a cup --
or two --
to make me feel
even a little bit alive
like you do.
But tonight,
tonight I miss you.
Sep 3, 2013
Sep 3, 2013 at 11:29 AM UTC
Gerald sat by the window,
He didn’t know why,
Perhaps it was because he liked,
To watch the passers by.
Gerald wasn’t very mobile,
In fact he was grossly fat,
And when he did get to up to shuffle,
His buttocks they did flap,
From under his greasy nightshirt,
The nightmarish apparitions appeared,
And Gerald, being Gerald,
Did what the passers by all feared.
He’d stand upon the chair,
And lift the nightshirt high,
And press upon the window pane,
His voluminous backside,
And a smile would play,
On his sugar donought crusted lips,
As the people who had seen this,
Would gasp and run in fits,
And Gerald laughed and giggled,
Because Gerald didn’t care,
It seemed to him he’d just prefer,
If none of them were there.
But he hadn’t always been lonely,
And when younger far from fat,
Handsome had he been once,
And considered quite a catch,
And caught he was by a pretty young girl,
Who soon became his wife,
And they loved and fought,
And loved and thought, that this would last for life.
And so it did,
But for her and not for him.
So Gerald sat by the window,
Which is where I did begin.
Sep 20, 2011
Sep 20, 2011 at 7:05 PM UTC
someday you'll wake up
from a nightmare unprecedented.
you'll sit up straight,
gasp and stare in the darkness
like it's going to swallow you whole.
but then I'll mumble
half asleep beside you
and I'll reach out for you
and say, "lay down baby,
I'm here and you're okay."
and you'll smile, fears gone
I'll turn over, place my arms
around your body
that had previously been quaking.
I'll hold you and kiss your neck
my warmth right beside you
and we'll fall asleep again.
someday I'll wake up
to the smell of brewing coffee
and I'll get out of bed
head down to the kitchen
to find you at the table
a mug of tea ready for me
and you with your coffee.
I'll go over to the counter,
spoon honey into my tea
while you hug me from behind
and pull me into bed again.
someday we'll wake up
and lay in bed all day
I'll ruffle your hair
you'll slide your hands up my nightshirt
and we'll stay intertwined
while rain falls in sheets
while we're under sheets
and the rest of the world
deals with the world's problems
and whenever I try
to get anything done
you'll pull me close
and I'll kiss you again.
someday they'll wake up
with your hair and my eyes
my nose and your smile
and their little feet
will stomp down to the kitchen
you with your coffee
me with my tea
us with our pancakes
and our own little family.
Dec 28, 2015
Dec 28, 2015 at 11:33 PM UTC
firmly grip
fragile wrists
stare down
hips round
visiting
during sleep
lean against
unimpressed
turn luke-warm
then conform
searching for
short skirts
intending hurt
a nightshirt
pillowcase
suffocate
find a host
become engrossed
twisting limbs
lights dimmed
shedding skin
forgetting sin
unchaste
aftertaste
May 1, 2017
May 1, 2017 at 12:26 AM UTC
I mended an old nightshirt yesterday
white cotton, cuffs worn
frayed and torn
It came with me to hospital when you were born
fresh from its maker then too
It was such a shock
a complete surprise: you had my eyes
And a tiny heart attached to my soul
the midwife forgot that bit
For years it still held the scent
of newborn You
embalmed in a brand new being
your animal smell earthy and ancient
christening white cotton
Jul 20, 2019
Jul 20, 2019 at 4:10 AM UTC
Slip through the back door by the cemetery gate
You can always come over but til nighttime you wait
You wipe off the lipstick you wore with your guy
So it's easier to kiss me and wish you would die
I watch you drink up cigarettes at 4:40 a.m.
In a nightshirt too sheer with a yellowing hem
Lay my head on your lap, you'll play with my hair
You tell me you love him but you know I don't care
Cause if I am your secret, I have nothing to say
I'm your world in the dark but I'll ruin your day
Your skin is my rose, my hands - thorns at your side
I'll bite you and mark you in spots you can hide
I just want to destroy you, you've asked if I would
But with a gun to your head, I don't think I could
Whether you're screaming my name or eating me out
I only feel alive when inside of your mouth
When you're bare to the bones you let it slip that you're mine
And I'll only believe you by the scratches on my spine
Cause dear God, how you lie, I can't trust your eyes
You're the only one I need and the one I despise
I hate the word "him," you wish you could choose
But the gambling is fun when you have nothing to lose
You're his bottle of whiskey, I'm your hotel room
Your thoughts are like photos, my bed's the darkroom
Now I can't stand the the light, in the morning it twists
Through your skeletal fingers and crumbling wrists
Your touch becomes foreign like someone I knew
I'm a stranger, we agreed, doesn't exist next to you
And to us, it's too true
You don't know my eye color, I can't spell your name
But when you **** me tonight I'll forget all my shame
After all's said and done, we're still hungry for more
In bodies that don't feel like ours anymore
Your lap is too boney, you hate the color of my hair
I'd whisper I love you but I know you don't care
You know I regret you and you love that I do
Heartache has always been a synonym of you
You live for the torture you cause for your pride
You need others to feel how you're broken inside
You'll forget for a day, I'll forget for a lie
Come back by the graveyard when your willing to die
Sep 19, 2017
Sep 19, 2017 at 11:48 AM UTC
The Atlantic howls
Wet and windy
Boughs and branches bending.
The sea a stew
Of white foam
Against the black abyss
Deep in the moving bowels of the ocean
Is a calling.
A restless voice like reeds ripping the wind
Beckoning you to the foreshore
Torn from rest, you are pulled
As the wind places its magnet on the buttons of your nightshirt
Tossing your coat off the hook to clothe you
The tide pulls your feet
Step by quickening step
Towards the sand
Only now can you
Stop to gaze at the clouds
Scudding across the moon
Like flounder across the seabed.
All rages around you
And yet, silence descends
Like the ringing of tinnitus in your ears
And you are told what it is you are called to hear...
Nov 16, 2018
Nov 16, 2018 at 1:13 PM UTC
*Here I lie
Stripped bare of makeup
Here I lie
With morning breath
(If thats not insulting to morning)
Here I lie
In a shapeless nightshirt
Here I lie
With hair like
I've been elctrocuted
And there you lie
Looking at me the way a child looks at sweets*
Jun 5, 2015
Jun 5, 2015 at 2:42 AM UTC
The oak died
in the last
baseball year,
thick dollars of rot
splitting the crook
with a winter step.
I had given up
on Kelly from
Corner Drive,
old enough now
to let go of
the desire in
her Lions
nightshirt.
**** moved in
next door, saving
me from
mother's cancer.
The sun was a
gnaw, I lived by
nightfall, engaged
to the femoral
moon. ****
played drums,
his father
chain smoked, and
I hunted the changing
braid that filled
the wooden air.
It was another way
to be, exile from
the sick-house,
eating the words
of books,
replacing
the things I had
been denied.
The sick oak lay
like a vacancy
in the center of the
yard, too far gone
even for firewood,
black ailerons
down in the wetness
of the mantle.
Lord,
I could barely
even look at it.
Jul 18, 2019
Jul 18, 2019 at 1:30 PM UTC