"notepads" poems
Your fingernails give away the debris you've collected
I've known you for a while but it feels like longer
feels like sunsets under my tongue
blue bruises behind my eyes
every skip of the needle brings back our old skins &
the hush-hush type of self worth,
keeping pens full of red ink so we can
play the demon in this one instead
of closing the door, we don't wanna gossip
at the edge of the room like strangers,
we wanna be in the center
and your fingerprints look a lot like mine sometimes, especially when we laugh and cry together
especially when you fall asleep and I watch
for soft signs of openmouthed breathing that signal
we are in deeper than we thought.
I can't stand the way you look at yourself though, sometimes I wanna
run away from everyone here
sometimes I wanna just up and leave it all
in a shallow grave where it belongs,
but the moments are softer when you slip my name onto your cotton tongue,
and I don't punch out a pattern for my self loathing quite as quickly when
we tally up our thread counts and what time we have left
together.
Inevitably, I still paint my teeth black,
because words about my future never felt right coming from my pink and purple mouth
but your lips could twist anything up into a lot of sense,
I could kiss you and **** time forever
in parking lots and on the edges of stained mattresses
I didn't ever want a home until I thought of hanging up your colors to dry
keep them here in the niches or
scrawled onto notepads I keep beside my bed,
put down your demon scripts and ask me in the morning
if it takes a while for seeds to grow,
I'll tell you to keep a can of water nearby
and to make sure it's somewhere sunny
I know there's something foreign growing in me and it's
bigger than I've ever been,
but I think maybe you know and
it's bigger than both of us, maybe
you know and
you've been doing some growing, too.
Jul 15, 2018
Jul 15, 2018 at 4:31 PM UTC
I pick up my pen again
I want these words to be everything
love letters
apologizes
confessions, daydreams
plans? Or roadmaps, new
contracts, to-do lists, like
"stop falling down," or
"try harder this time". I turn
you over but you don't give me what I'm looking for, I'm looking
for a place to dissolve this poison
I'm searching in the dark for halos that don't exist
I'm counting up nights of lost sleep,
calculating the probability of
our intertwined fingers as
remedies melt
off your tongue and run over
cracks in the pavement, oozing
sticky shower thoughts into our heads, like how
did we end up here?,& how
does the world end every night but go
on spinning the next morning?
I want this to be everything, the cure
our futures, soft plans,
collections of stitched together questions like how long
does forever taste on your breath
in the aftermath of all the anxiety you tend
to consume?
I want to pull the drapes on this thing and leave it to breathe in the
dark, leave it under
covers so these ailments don't seep
around my doorframe and pull
what is half-born into the light, let it be
let it live
let it cave in on itself and slowly
rebuild.
Chances come in
handfuls,
let the sun forget to practice her
old game of never
letting anyone rest; my fingers are warm & numb now and they remind me a little of
how you look when you're half asleep
they remind me
why this is fragile, why this is broken
why this can never
last and I'm sitting
in the passenger seat wondering
how the soft things stretch out their wings in
my lungs without
killing me, but they're
leaving their marks now, clawing
up my throat;
I close my eyes and give
them to the open air.
You don't know all of this; your eyelids
are heavy and you're keeping track
of who I am in little
notepads & reminders,
keeping track
of the way we move and how likely
we are to remember this moment in 5 years,
because right now you want
to capture it and tame it like a living thing.
We are becoming dust
molecules, we are
burning, we are becoming
quiet we don't leave footprints
we don't leave traces
we are heading toward the end of the world with our hands
tucked into our pockets, we are headed
toward the end of the world dissolving each others names on our tongues like sugar, we are headed
toward the end of the world and when we get there,
it starts again.
Jun 11, 2018
Jun 11, 2018 at 5:34 PM UTC
I find you in the margins of old school books,
in the cupboard where I keep my old notepads,
in the stories I’ve forgotten I’ve written.
It’s all scraps of myself in rounded letters,
uncanny because it looks like me,
sounds like me,
but it’s you and it is you
but it’s like me too.
I’m opening you (and me) back up and I hate you.
I hate you, but here we are,
in the mirror maze,
all these mes and yous
in the endless tunnel of mirrors,
back to back, side to side,
caught in ourselves at every angle.
We’re all the same: We’re all so different.
None of us are good.
I hate you.
I hate you at every age,
*Then reality splays, sprawls flat out in front of me, exams, money, work, decisions, tight nooses that bind me to life. Get your head out of the clouds, girl *(2012)
at every stage,
Big smiles, A stars, clever girl, the anomaly, dry compliments, sand paper against my skin. Locked in, not a word, just a mind gone grey, a growing mass of dust that swallows the light and only allows for glasses poured half empty (2014)
at every moment,
I don’t fit in, never have done, never will. I’m always one step ahead or one step behind. I’m never quite there. But no one understands. They say they do but they don’t. I’m different and I don’t like it but I don’t want to change because this is who I am and whatever happens, I have to put up with it (2012)
all your hatred, you happiness, your ignorance and your sadness
The scab peels and leaks. Too soon to heal, too late to undo the fall. Tomorrow, you’ll trip again and your skin will bleed but this time you’ll know where to find the first aid kit. (2013)
You make me sick.
The world was blue today, a metaphorical wish wash of tears and a meagre ocean. Ice cream dripped in depression, picnic blankets snagged on pebbles and the kite committed suicide on the telephone lines. (2013)
I hate the scraps you’ve left behind
I put bits of you in the bin. I put you out for recycling.
I donate you to charity shops and so you live on and I can’t get rid of you.
There’s no way out of this mirror maze,
no way to avoid the mirrors at angles,
no way for me to escape you or for you to escape me.
There are so many of you and I literally want to beat you all to death.
Oh, I hate you. I hate you.
I don’t think I’ve ever hated anything more than I hate you.
I hate the tone of your words,
I hate your stupid sadness.
I hate your happiness.
I hate your hope.
I hate the memories of your laughter.
I hate the memories of your fun.
I hate you for all the things you’ve done and
never had time to feel bad for.
I hate you in the photographs,
in the words, in the schoolbooks,
in the poems that I’ve shared,
I hate, I hate, I hate.
I wish I could smash up this maze of mirrors and you,
but then I’d only be left with myself
and I hate her too.
Jun 14, 2017
Jun 14, 2017 at 5:14 PM UTC
humans born a mess,
messengers carrying blank notepads, sheet music,
brought from within to the without
a baby-sized handful of historical residues retained,
garnered from all too brief a prelim existence,
arriving possessing hints of what may be
most emerging crying,
crying over loss of the womb security,
for seers all, all see unaccountable futures clouded
by an inevitable chance of rain
and death
all of us, no one excepted,
covered for months in **** stained fluids ,
a holy, ***** combination
of amniotic nourishment,
and our own waste
a hint of what is to come?
human then spends the rest of life
cleaning up after himself,
mostly with tasks of addition,
punctuating by the occasional cleansing of
elimination subtraction
making room for the next love,
labored birthing of a baby poem,
from your womb, midwifed,
haunting ghosts of three note tunes,
begging for a set of lyrics and a
great chorus everybody can sing,
a completion competition
going along, all along, to the goings on,
all our routes preternatural crooked,
lived a life of pretense, a straightened out life,
which is the nuanced, connected summary of our components
which are all curves, dots on a line
and the composition source,
the secret chords employed,
tech installed just prior to birth,
effacing glorious sadness, glorious joy,
the human building blocks,
with the certainty that
*everybody knows,
that's how it goes
everybody knows,*
only fools believe,
you'll live forever
but live at least long enough to sing and write of
a man cleaning up his own life's messes,
and perchance, after our absence,
leaving the world better for it
Jan 7, 2017
Jan 7, 2017 at 10:49 AM UTC
I am a knock on your door
You open up and I sneak in
Ill put your life on the market
Snarky teenagers to target a holiday demographic before fully developed concepts begin
Your backpack and notepads house your sins
A man that's tall and gets caught in the calls of women to distract from the purpose of ink pens
You're too ***** to be great
A ****** is a dead end
And a vortex for survivals' fate
Explorations of vanities' intellectual alternative gate
Jun 11, 2013
Jun 11, 2013 at 12:38 AM UTC
It comes naturally
to write down my thoughts
Even in the worst situations,
When my mind is in knots
No one to share with
Except the pencil and paper
My notebooks and notepads
Stacked as high as a skyscraper
Writers are the loneliest of people
Or so, I’ve been told
I believe the lonelier one is,
the more pens one holds
Jan 28, 2016
Jan 28, 2016 at 12:00 PM UTC
last I checked it was 3 06 AM
the foggy window displayed scene to a rainy night of a
small town near the city of Chicago
your dim apartment filled sweetly with vanilla lavender aroma and the
delicate croon of Billie Holiday transcended from the living-room phonograph
a blue tin coffee *** pictorially placed upon faint orange flames
overdue library books and half-written notepads stacked symmetrically
within the oven of La Cornue Albertine ivory stove
you sat me atop the wooden counter of your tiny marble kitchen and
gently tucked at my stockings until they gracefully
renounced to the tile patterned floor
with your hands placed on either side of my thighs
you gradually - - -
kissed me softly on my knees
Jul 20, 2013
Jul 20, 2013 at 7:32 AM UTC
Hotel maids.
They worry me.
I hope someone would agree.
They could steal my stuff.
And they give me cheap soap that make my skin rough.
I like to use the little notepads to write them creepy notes.
I wish they would clean the blankets because they sometimes smell like goats.
It ****** me off when they knock on your door.
***** its 7 in the morning.
Aug 10, 2013
Aug 10, 2013 at 1:47 AM UTC
Market square died down this afternoon,
the day of trading over and over all too soon;
and the now the trolleys have been left out,
lights left on waiting for those customers to come again.
*They'll hurry into their jumpers the traders and customers of tomorrow,
weather'll kick up and run up the coast in a rainy fuss.*
Temporary clad walls that are there all year round
are dressed up from the ground every day, tied at the ear
of the frames that hang over corridor of cobbles,
scuffed with the muck from Armani plimsolls
and the heels of this week's Alexander McQueens.
*When the rain comes trading will cease and
they'll flick out their notepads to calculate this month's lease.*
Nov 20, 2013
Nov 20, 2013 at 8:38 AM UTC
Free unrestricted journal publications
Words are bombs, dropping ink and paper
Typeface whistle blower and in your face
Chasing stories and truth, free the gonzo
The revolution in print, internet, television
Notepads, computers, and wi-fi
Liberated publication for all open eyes
A world of free thinkers and literary fact
No comment from the silent advertisers
Their payment in truth concealing lies
The United Censoring Of America
The political principles of censorship
Glory or death, guts and congratulations
No justice, no peace, no surrender
We’ve got the voice louder than power
The accuracy of enigmatic liberty
Apr 3, 2012
Apr 3, 2012 at 4:02 PM UTC
it's time
time to load my most personal things
taking only the most important
escape this apocalypse
you'll see me on the side
of the road
my cardboard box full of notepads
a lifetime of heart things
feelings tear stained yellow
page after page
pulling a Radio Flyer
on I-10
three cats and an old faithful
black labrador dame
and one box
Jun 28, 2017
Jun 28, 2017 at 2:24 AM UTC
She sat and watched the translucent orange leaf fall
and with it every aspiration of her ego
She noted the way the dull morning sun shone through it
Ego and leaf alike
Her house is a happy one
Sisters smile
baking cakes when autumn appears
Brothers smile
when furtive grass rises in the spring
Her life is a happy one
She sat and watched the fire burn
cutting her own hair
and whistling
Her song was happy too, as the dwindling dream faded and the afternoon moon shied away
fears once ever present now vapour on crisp dewy winter evening breezes
He sat and watched her trace faces in the air
with a delicate finger
And he drew her face in his mind with ease
His self collapsing
His house is a happy one
Father smile
playing raucous games in the summer epoch
Mother smile
huddled with baby on winter snapshot days
His life is a happy one
His words were happy too, as he scribbled on ragged notepads whilst the wind blew
and so many newspapers broke free from the vendor by the statue
(Though they can't shake that one impression
of the world dematerialising before them
and the prolonging of time
in the interim ghost world
of lost memories
and sadness
on DMT)
I saw them rise on a January morning, lights cascading over treetops
Flittering life and love combined in sun-drenched washed out skies
watching them floating so high
and their smiles were new stars
a transcendent tenderness
that I was in awe of
and still am
Repressed sadness manipulated into shapes
when they made love in the sky
Every bleak memory of their time dissipated
and the cityscape below began to bloom
All industry halted, a million stood and watched
as new life radiated around them
Convoluted linear time was now disrupted
All events in history, happened simultaneously
The birth and death of a cosmos
Captured in a kiss
Jan 23, 2014
Jan 23, 2014 at 10:21 AM UTC
Sometimes I'll read great literature and think:
that perhaps, poetry is a theatrical
(but necessary) byproduct
of our excess emotion—
created by broken people
who simply feel too much,
in too little of a space.
From the largest and grandest of stanzas
to the petite one-liners,
we pour our feelings into words
and our words into emotion,
and give them the context
to take on a brand new meaning.
We adorn our anguish in sweet, silken lines,
our passion in soft, breathy rhymes;
our anger shows in scribbles
and taut similes,
our joy in the personification
of the very things we wish
could come alive.
From all corners of all nations we grow
knowing, quite profoundly,
that our feelings are meant to mean something:
Poetry is not tissue in our lives
to be used and tossed away;
rather, poems mark the seasons of ourselves
that are to be remembered and enjoyed.
Written on notepads and parchment,
from wide open spaces to
that dingy apartment,
our words lie in wait for us
so that at our lowest point,
our words may help us rediscover
how to be human.
v.g.
Aug 17, 2016
Aug 17, 2016 at 1:04 PM UTC
As I sit back and relax,
The chill night breeze whips slowly around me.
The sun sets on the distant hillside,
Where the shadows begin to slowly fade,
Lingering
Until its’ cold nightly slumber.
I glance further onto the hillside,
Upon a flicker of light in a pit of darkness,
Alone.
I float back in the warm
Bubble induced water,
Look to the sky,
Where dim stars gain composure,
And begin to glow, brighter and brighter.
Constellations gain visibility,
After finally escaping the abuse of the sun’s rays
Which cloud them through the daytime hours.
The wind whispers more,
People in the distance cheer,
For we all drank the day away
As we enjoyed our distance from the robust city.
Replaced textbooks and notepads for beer,
Champagne and tequila.
Focused on nothing,
Allowing our minds to drift away,
Like these empty bottles in this hot tub.
Drifting,
Yet still confined.
Who’s to say that this can’t be our home?
Home…
So far away…
Nov 20, 2011
Nov 20, 2011 at 12:57 PM UTC
It smells of soco in the air.
She gave up her body to preserve her dignity
But in the end, she lost that too.
There is nothing dominant in dominance.
Only preservation
And perpetuation of a dying era.
Unless dominance is dominance.
In which case, bring your pipes.
Pipes, pipes, pipes, pipes, pipes,
A thousand and three pipes
And not a single one of them on key.
You say it doesn't make much sense,
But frankly **** you.”
No one's got a gun to your temple
Praising the ivory role of the natural order.
That theory died out with hanging paper clips
Clinching yellowed notepads in their skinny fists
Shouting praises to Everclear to the heavens.
Just ask Salinger what it means to be expected
And I'll tell you my opinion on life.
Sep 19, 2010
Sep 19, 2010 at 5:16 PM UTC
No light pollution
Celestial nakedness
No noise pollution
Woken by crickets not cars
Pencils, notepads, poetry
Jul 16, 2010
Jul 16, 2010 at 7:35 PM UTC
your presence fades
so slowly
but so quickly
at the same time
words scribbled in pencil, in the corners of our books
hesitantly rub away
and the stray hairs in between pages of old notepads
are dismissed
the old coffee cup you used to use, that was always your favourite
it's been pushed to the very back of the cupboard, out of sight
I replaced the bedsheets that you burnt holes in
with your cigarette butts
and all your old T-shirts (still way too big for me)
are just nightclothes now, that belong to only myself
sometimes I think
maybe
I can make out your scent
in the fresh washing
and I find unused bottles of your shampoo
stored in the bathroom cabinet
and an odd sock here or there
that's certainly not mine
and maybe
just maybe
I miss you,
sometimes
Sep 9, 2013
Sep 9, 2013 at 1:20 PM UTC
I write you letters on yellow notepads,
tear them out and use the other side,
my ****** cursive slanting the entire page,
adding things in the margins,
drawing hearts in the corners,
ending with our special
"See you then"
instead of a goodbye,
or a sincerely yours,
or an "I love you always."
That line said it all.
I didn't have an address to send them to
because you just moved and stamps cost a lot
for a broke college student who's just trying
to keep in touch.
You told me not to call you.
Not to ask you how you'd been.
So I didn't even bother asking for some place
to write on the outside of my envelopes.
I just kept writing them.
I get why you didn't want to come see me
before you left
because it would just make it harder to say goodbye
all over again,
and I get
why it's hard to talk to me
because you're busy and because you're two hours behind
and because this and because that.
They're just excuses.
You don't really want to talk to me.
And I,
I get that you're halfway across the country.
Don't you think I've memorized the distance by now?
I know exactly how far it is between your dot and mine
on a map.
I get that it's going to be hard and that it's probably not even worth trying,
but what you don't get
that I do
is that it's worth it.
I've kept bullshitting with you since I met you.
I've kept you around this long.
I'm not going to tell you how many times I sat up crying
about something you said to me, or something you didn't say
that I knew you felt
because it will just push you away.
You've known since the beginning
of whatever this is
that you're no good for me.
You're not good enough for me.
That's fair.
But what you don't get,
that I do
is that I don't care.
You're the best thing in my life
because everything that I do is only because of you,
only because of you believing that I can have it
all
if I try hard enough.
You told me I was the strongest person you knew.
That I was tough.
That I was going to be fine.
I am only those things because I have you
in my life
in one way or an even more complicated other.
So you can't just give up on me.
You can't just expect
to tell me you're done
you never started
and leave.
Because that's not okay with me.
I won't buy a plane ticket.
I won't talk to you every chance I get
(more likely every chance you get)
and I won't keep myself behind this line
because I'm saving myself for you.
But you have to stay with me, okay?
You have to at least try
to understand where I'm coming from
and you have to,
you have to
keep believing in me.
Because I'm not the strongest person you know,
you are.
I'm not tough,
you are.
I'm not always going to be fine,
but you are.
So I'll see you then.
Oct 8, 2013
Oct 8, 2013 at 6:22 PM UTC
I walk through this city blue
Writing books of unwritten verse
From simple, daily, conversations
Jotted down on cheap notepads
A couple walks together, same routine
Adopted from uncounted years, together
A cigarette hangs from cracked, chapped, lips
His cane taps out a rhythm, hobbling along
Sounds overlap, reverberate off cinder block walls
Voices blend into seamless harmony
A lonely man sits alone in his apartment
Surrounded by books stacked on creaking shelves
Waiting on a call, just to hear her voice
Cars come but never go, an endless procession
Ebbing & flowing, tides of gasoline & steel
Filling blank lines with mass produced ink
While I watch a game of chess in the park
Strategies countered by intuition, or luck
Blind to the outside world, they play on
Paint chips off walls as blurred faces walk by
Cracked concrete crumbles by paces & strides
Only to be overrun by sprouting, spiny, weeds
Crushed into pulp by careless, rushing, feet
Beats of a jazz quartet, pouring from an open door
Echoing down empty hallways, finding my ears by chance
I'll keep walking, through this blue city, until I find you once again
I wrote a letter to you, my love, to this day its not been sent
Oct 4, 2010
Oct 4, 2010 at 5:03 AM UTC
the teacher said
"tell us about yourself."
and i searched deep down
saw paris, france
venice, italy and my father when he was young
and great adventures to be told
saw words written on hotel notepads
proclaiming love of lover's past
nothing but a chord or two
to tell the complexity of what i knew
i searched deep down and saw
my soul so perfectly painted
in slashing reds and soft beiges
but
nothing made sense to anyone but me
so i gulped
and said my name.
Dec 10, 2012
Dec 10, 2012 at 9:01 PM UTC
Youth--
That vermillion sky
So tainted by the dark ink scrawled across
The pages of psychiatrists notepads
And the cool cimmerian shade
Always looming on the horizon--
Exists only in fond memories
Compassion is smothered
By the shrill vociferations of selfish regret
And hope is a vain paroxysm
Your life will be empty
Your grave will be full
Sep 21, 2013
Sep 21, 2013 at 8:05 PM UTC
Today I was driving in my car, looking at my notepad
shoved without care
corner of a page bent
spirals grasped for life on the edge of that dive.
I thought that I felt I wanted to write,
but the glass inside my head was empty.
Forcing it full just causes it to break,
and so I wait for it to fill, fill, fill,
overflow and
capsize.
It comes suddenly:
a stroke in the section of the brain that biologists
have yet to identify.
a phone ringing at three thirty-eight in the morning.
a cat leaping from behind the corner, hitching a momentary ride on your calf.
a rush of amniotic fluid from a pregnant woman's crotch as
she stands over smooth tile.
How many pens have come apart in your mouth?
How much
redblueblackgreen ink
have you ingested in these pen-cap chew moments of inspiration,
trying to steer without looking,
shift with only two fingers,
scribble without seeing,
glances from concerned motorists in adjacent lanes.
How many
slips of napkins
notepads
envelopes
bills
book covers
receipts
skin
have you marked in fits of...
Apr 25, 2011
Apr 25, 2011 at 8:09 AM UTC
I used to love it when it rained
Inspiration sang to me
Cloudy days were brain movies
Now I hate to see the days when
Nothing's going right
And everybody on spite
And I turn to ***** sprite
Because its been a tough night
And I would go and smoke
But I never been the one to spark lights
The fight within me has me slain
These whack decisions have me shamed
Truth be told I feel insane
I swear I stay outside the box
But my emotions have me framed
The games the same
My people changed
The ones I trusted most are now the ones that I push away
But, I really wanted you to stay
I wish you'd come back just to say
That "I'm sorry man I've been so stupid"
And id accept you cuz I'm going through it
Say your opinions have changed
And our friendship is saved
Cuz I can't live another day
In these heartbreak chains
That I wear here today
Cuz these poems I make
No longer heal the pain now
And I don't think they ever did
It was just a way out
A way to go and vent
And a way to bring my doubts, and regrets
And upsets
And my frets
And the pains within my chest
On to paper to suppress
All the reasons I'm depressed
And I would hide them in those sheets of paper
Until I wrote what happened next
But I'm running out of notepads
And depressions turned to stress
My broken heart is now a crest
That I wear not so proudly
It's like a scarlet letter
That won't move without me
Removal is impossible
The more that I embrace it
The more my tears turn to rocket fuel
Aug 6, 2013
Aug 6, 2013 at 10:07 AM UTC