"papercut" poems
Papers, Papers, Papers
Whiter than aching teeth,
Whiter than whites of tilted eyes,
Whiter than funeral wreaths.
My hands shake as I write this,
Filed away myths; Stolen lined sheets
My index finger chained by red tapes,
words mix and ground breaks,
I'm the one the world forsakes
Yellow maize, littered leaves,
all twisted into
black ink and clean sharp white paper blades.
-------"I am in a bit of daze," I tell myself, "look at those flaccid bits;
there lay the logs who use to be the jungle of my childhood dreams."
------"Don't be amazed," I replied, "these leafless branches and twigs are for
your Papier-Mâché degrees."
So I listen to my second self once,
the more logical cynical satirical one,
Treading on the plot of their paper works,
playing crosswords as anxiety uncork
my thoughts turn to the bankable orcs,
just as my career forks
Maybe I should be like my mother,
Marking numbers on a deck of cards-- waltzing with Chance.
Maybe I should be like my father,
Toiling for some rich men's grandson-- seething in Trance.
Maybe I should be like the Other,
Going along with the system-- thanking myself
beneath a cap, a diploma, a piece of paper.
I wore these books like bank notes tuxedoes,
I was promised the world by the credits I borrowed.
Must I go along with the mechanism of their game,
or should I rise up against all odds
Opposing, debating, rebelling against
this bundle, this trouble, funneling me into no-tomorrows
Or must I write it all down,
in my prayers against their lawyers, who need no reminds
Or must I shred, smear, and tear the papers with my own bare hands
But what will I ever be to them, friends?
A papercut, perhaps.
Aug 19, 2018
Aug 19, 2018 at 9:33 PM UTC
*When my finger met the paper, in a brief love affair, it took my blood as a trophy.
Then the red droplets created a beautiful mess as they sank into the dead white wood.
It stung badly, and it continued to hurt as I went on a mission to find a bandage that
could keep the crimson art inside of me, instead of spilling it everywhere.
When I wiped the excess blood away I saw nothing, yet I was still in pain.
But what hurts the most right now is my heart, because just like I couldn’t
see the papercut, you can’t see my broken heart either, and it is bleeding heavily.*
Because of you.
*And I can’t seem to find a bandage big enough to heal the
hole you left in my dying heart.*
Aug 9, 2016
Aug 9, 2016 at 3:33 PM UTC
I searched for you for a lifetime,
It felt like the impression of your being rested in my soul’s memory,
I never had to know you to know who you are,
But was it something of how I wanted it to be?
Was it just a figment of my imagination?
I feel my want for you put my senses in illusion,
Showed me colours in the world of grey,
Because I refused to see more than my desire,
I lived in my bubble of lies,
But the day when the price to pay came,
I finally told my heart what the rest of me knew,
That you were never mine to have,
You always belonged to someone else,
I will break my smile for some time,
Lock myself in a box and grieve,
Till the day come when I again learn to smile,
When I see you in another face,
And pretend I know her like I really knew you/And think I know her like I really knew you
Keep turning the pages despite the paper-cut
Nov 12, 2012
Nov 12, 2012 at 8:13 PM UTC
I can tell you’ve never been touched
like a hurricane doesn’t matter
like 40 below or a deep papercut between your
thumb and your index
couldn’t do any more harm
than a teddybear or marigold —
but that was
before me
before me,
you’ve never been touched
and you’ve never touched
quite like
dissolving
into the fresh dew on dawn’s grass
and you’ve never stopped
to feel your ****** like stopping to
smell the roses on a worthwhile jaunt
or the daffodils
or the lilac trees, purple and white
or to smile at a happy sunflower
like all of your little hesitancies and horrors
are of little to no caliber
before me,
you’d never go a night without at least a sip of something,
you’d never give yourself
a chance
to be yourself
in the sober light of love
you’re shy and you avoid it
but if you counted the number of empty wine & beer bottles
on your balcony,
you’d finally know
you ought to stop pouring at night
and figure out how to explore at night;
dip your fingers in gooey paint and smear every colour
on the pavement
for hours and hours
until the sun awakes
like you have the power to love
even if
it aches
and at first, it will, like frostbite,
like papercuts all over your palms,
like cartoon cliff jumps that can never **** you,
like getting fired or evicted or rejected
because remembering something
as fierce and as merciless
as love
is heartbreakingly overwhelming
for the fact that
you had
forgotten
and forgetting does not make you strong or shrewd
it’ll only ***** you over
and give you a blubbery beer belly and empty bottled balcony
and before me,
I’m pretty sure you thought your life was a tragedy
because drinking feels nice and *** releases hurt
but I’m just not interested in being with an alcoholic,
so it’s best we stop taking off our shirts.
Dec 7, 2013
Dec 7, 2013 at 9:15 AM UTC
i prefer to brush my teeth
to the point where my gums bleed
and pull the floss down hard
between my pearly whites,
grinding the thread back and forth.
i get chills down my back
when i get a papercut
and i can see the blood
slowly come out in little round *****
or when i rip a hangnail down my thumb
and i can see the fresh layer of skin.
my body goes numb
and my mind draws a blank
when he bites at my neck,
even better when it leaves a bruise.
the feeling i get
when his hand suddenly meets
the bare skin of my lower body
is pure ecstacy, i could only imagine
what it would be like
if my brain was on a high.
the sting and the should-be negative,
or unwanted, emotions
are what i strive for in life.
i like the feel
of the pain
but not when i'm alone.
Nov 6, 2012
Nov 6, 2012 at 9:38 PM UTC
1.
friday morning at the beach, you've got a pocket full of change and a stone in each fist, a mood ring on your middle finger, wind-brushed all purple, la la la. slowly now i drift across a world of all-blue and even from here i can read you right through and through: i know you and i know you want to pull me up from beneath the waves and cut me open, crawl inside my sea-weathered carcass and sail my skin out to god knows where, crooning to the heavens, la la la, la la la.
2.
gathering rain in the stoup of my cupped palms, carving your name at the base of every tree, you are a hymn, you are a prayer, you're in my garden dressed all in grey and you wont let go; i'm running and running, bruised to the bone, struggling to breathe. summer is here—the locusts are singing. the sky's pure gold. wont you say hello?
3.
its a papercut day, a hairs-breadth day, and i'm perched on the back of your bike like a splash of young love—a raincoat and a red-shirt and a pretty mouth and nothing more. i put my arms around you and squint up into the sun, watching an august shower find its bearings, and we hit a bump in the road as the rain hits us and you swear and you swear and i breathe into your ear and we keep on going, bird-calls in your mouth and clouds in mine: la la la, la la la…
Apr 5, 2013
Apr 5, 2013 at 2:25 PM UTC
This is me, Rachael.
I would die from a papercut and blame it on the finger.
I would argue with an eraser if the words didn't look right.
I would tell the moon to shine all day just to **** off the sun.
I see colours in my imagination; my dreams are wild and beyond comparison.
I tend to love too hard and quickly get burnt by the one I flew so high for.
I read too much and believe in past lives.
I forgive but don't forget.
My trust is willing but protects my heart like a guardian of fate.
I will be silent when someone talks **** because I don't take fools gladly, and a wise man never responds to defecation of verbal ignorance.
I willingly argue my point in my head til you know I have analysed my response.
Nothing is taken lightly.
I would argue that the road is really hard and quite weary, and curse my boots as they hit the hallowed ground.
I am impetuous, I rush in, I seek thrill and danger.
Hedonism is my game; I play deftly with an air of mastery.
I am sensitive. As skin is to the weather. A gust of harsh wind could blow me away.
This is me; only a slight composition of who I am, and what I am made of.
And I make no apology.
Nov 21, 2013
Nov 21, 2013 at 8:03 AM UTC
We had smiles, so deep,
A love, to keep,
It lasted as long it stayed asleep.
But when it was woken,
The silence was broken,
And the weeds I sowed I must reap.
A photo on the floor,
Slipped through my sliced fingers.
The captured second swelling out of the paper,
Broken.
Scissors on the floor,
Slipped through, slicing my fingers.
I lie, blood flowing freely from my outline,
Papercut.
Scissors,
A photo,
On the floor,
Black where I cut myself out.
You’re still smiling.
I'll make sure of that.
I'm bleeding; papercut
Dec 12, 2012
Dec 12, 2012 at 10:53 PM UTC
...Of the thoughts that
make up the madness in my
head
there's one that stirs every
bit of
sanity
left in my soul
And I try to find the calm
that I used to know
But I
get angry trying to find it in the
middle of the confusion
Why
I wonder
of all the things I know and
those things that I
thought I know
this would create a nightmare that
drags my soul towards a
road under the scorching sun
I thought
hangover of regrets were the worst
but obviously they are
not...
Apr 22, 2013
Apr 22, 2013 at 10:29 AM UTC
This anger...
Feels like a ball of uncontrollable energy that spins treacherously in the pit of my stomach.
It is unbound and reaches out forcefully in every axis. It is self-sustaining. And it consumes...
All of me...
It's doesn't want to be displaced, or swept under the rug for the umpteenth time. It doesn't want to be cajoled or calmed. It doesn't want to be coaxed into thinking that it does not need to rear its ugly head because I believe I have a handle on things; which I clearly do not.
It knows me too well and will not take it lying down.
It wants acknowledgement and it wants to speak.
It wants to speak in a low guttural voice for the sheer purpose of intimidation.
It wants grow in figurative size to assert its validation.
It wants to absorb every form of negativity and use it to fuel the fight.
It wants to take the faintest pin-prick or papercut to the most painful stab in the heart and use them...
Harness them and then...
Explode in a hundred-mile radius.
This anger is real...
And it has had enough of sitting on the bench.
Now it wants a piece of the action...
And this time I let it.
Mar 18, 2017
Mar 18, 2017 at 10:49 AM UTC
I've forgotten the last time I had to memorize
oh wait, it was today.
I memorized so I didn't have to plagiarize
and I plagiarized because I had no idea what to say.
instead of studying, I was out at play
breaking ankles instead of pencil tips.
made some gnarly 3 pointers, I might say,
all I could think about were my papercut lips.
the keyboard fights me with whips
I'm trying, I am really trying,
but I'm collapsing, like sunken battleships.
Well, at least I'm not dying.
May 9, 2017
May 9, 2017 at 12:53 PM UTC
I am hurt
But not in the way when you scrape your knee
And not in the way when someone irrevocably betrays your trust
I am hurt in a way that cannot be explained
I am hurt
But not in the way when you break a bone
And not in the way someone spits out stinging words
I am hurt in a way that makes your heart beat just a little bit faster
I am hurt
But not in the way when your muscles ache with soreness
And not in the way when someone tells you they don’t love you anymore
I am hurt in a way that makes my stomach twist and churn
I am hurt
But not in the way that makes you grit your teeth in pain
And not in the way that makes one shut themselves out from the world
I am hurt in a way that makes my chest tighten and constrict until I can’t breath
I am hurt
But not in the way that can be solved with the pop of a pill
And not in the way that a teenage girl who is new to love does
I am hurt in a way that makes me dig my fingernails into my palms so as to quell the bristling tears threatning to spill.
I am hurt in a way that can’t so easily be explained away as a papercut or with a smile
I am hurt in a way that comes with the lying words “I’m Fine.”
I am not fine.
Today I hurt.
Today I want to cry.
Today I feel alone. Left Out.
There is no rhyme or reason.
There is no starting point.
There is nothing I can say to explain away the pain except that it’s there.
I am hurt.
Mar 16, 2020
Mar 16, 2020 at 1:03 PM UTC
...Falling stars do cry
with the fallen wings
of forgotten angels
A teardrop
blankets the night of
a cold embrace
plunging into the calm with
a thorn from once a red rose
Ripples distorted
every reflection of a dream
quickly fading with the wind
and madness roars an outcry
with the lunacy of a lightning
like daggers in the emptiness
of a papercut in the heart
Pain can never be mended
by a single drop
of a nostalgic whiskey
and holding on to a candle flame
is worse
amidst a storm...
Feb 15, 2013
Feb 15, 2013 at 9:01 AM UTC
All hipbones and collarbones,
Size 1 and 0, long flowing hair and gauges,
thigh gap and flat stomach,
you are beautiful.
All dry skin and yellow teeth,
Size 12 and 13, short, plain hair,
touching thighs and rounded stomach,
I am "beautiful" to everyone but myself.
I will be strong.
I will be stronger.
I will exercise more,
I will eat less,
I will be thinner.
Once I've lost 40 pounds,
then I might get the help everyone says
I so desperately need,
diet healthily
and work with somebody.
Until then, I will suffer through...
...because that shows strength,
and eating shows weakness,
weakness in myself.
Calories should be a foreign substance,
not an old friend,
chewing and swallowing sometimes hurts worse
than a **** lemon-juice papercut.
800 calories over my budget every **** day
when my budget is already too high?
That shows no strength.
500 calories under?
THAT shows strength.
Shows willpower.
Shows endurance.
That is what will make me thinner.
I'm setting my budget to 500 instead of 1000,
because hey,
less is more, right?
Dec 11, 2014
Dec 11, 2014 at 1:24 PM UTC
you are nothing more than a papercut, he said
you sting for just a second before you are forgotten
i'm looking for a hurricane,
an unforgettable, brutal hurricane of a woman
i am not a hurricane, i said
but all hurricanes do is lift you up by the roots
destroy everything around you
& leave you soaking wet, lonely & upside down
i know, he said
but that's all i want
Nov 10, 2016
Nov 10, 2016 at 2:13 AM UTC
*You're a papercut
Only when I look at you
Does it hurt*
Jun 12, 2016
Jun 12, 2016 at 6:58 AM UTC
I think you could compare my situation to a wound.
At first it's a papercut.
Doesn't look like much.
But stings as hell.
Everyone knows that, but no one admits.
Then it turns into a cut.
Still doesn't look like much.
Stings less, but hurts more.
But it doesn't mean much it's just a cut.
And after a while it'll be a fleshwound.
Trips to the ER to get it fixed.
Everyone knowing and asking about it.
Everyone being concerned.
Then it'll get fixes and heal slowly.
But sometimes you rip it back open.
But no one notices that after a while.
You don't want them to know.
This is one of the wounds that'll never heal, there will always be a scab to pick at when you're sad.
You keep ripping it open.
But at one point you learn how to
Protect it, it'll just take a while
And It'll be hard.
But there will still be a wound.
Aug 12, 2015
Aug 12, 2015 at 2:13 PM UTC
you are my booming clap of thunder during summer rain,
my inconvenient papercut placed conspicuously on a knuckle;
my stringent alcohol spilled into a pulsing, gaping wound,
and my burning bee sting on a painfully humid afternoon.
your ugly fangs spew venom more toxic than any poison,
and you hiss and growl and spit dauntingly.
with words so harsh and grating they are impossible to ignore,
you raise your head, poised for attack, and you shreik and wail
until the sound echoes throughout my whole being,
shaking me from the core and eliciting curious emotions.
my feeble defence is no match for your well-trained
and perfectly executed attack, and i crumble.
it's a poisonous cycle, inevitable and futil, that drains
every ounce of moral fiber and happiness from my soul.
suddenly, my fingers entrap your small little throat,
and they squeeze as hard as they possibly can,
until the blood bursts into your eyes.
it's only a dream, but my fingers can't help but remember...
Mar 21, 2012
Mar 21, 2012 at 3:13 AM UTC
Notches in her spine,
bruised hard and in between.
Her sharp red hair,
torn from the root and in clumps around your feet.
Blood pooling in your mouth,
the drops look different on your sheets than they do on her skin.
Fluttering doves on the windowsill,
afternoon sunlight and pressed flowers in books you know belonged to him.
Charcoal smudges darker than shadow,
along the crease in your thigh and her shattered scapula.
Papercuts line the soles of her feet,
and his teeth swallow you whole.
Feb 21, 2015
Feb 21, 2015 at 3:39 PM UTC
An inner conflict was brewing in the brain of this Regal Man.
Snap shots of his world come and go, having lost time as his memento.
He never missed the most important meeting on his calendar each day, same as planned.
His insipid body, a vehicle driven by the same shiny things that attract barracudas.
A papercut on his tongue from licking an envelope, was a microscopic distraction.
Yearning for a momentary state of bliss, it was time for his sinuous routine to get on with the show.
The ***** induced a memory of his stoicism, brought back to life as an afterglow.
Disparate cynics, cannot fathom these deepest of depths.
Man can’t choose his D.N.A. like nomenclature.
Be blessed you are immune child and take a deep breath.
Habits may be hard to swallow by some; no plethora of education.
As much of a paradox as this may be, the pursuit of this dance is not feeling like death.
Knowing that every cylindrical spin of the pistol can determine the future,
Indulging in an appetite of chaos, will be sure to obscure.
Only hours before the celebration that gives thanks to our last Harvest,
A quandary this time was stewing in this stoic man’s galaxy.
On his left shoulder was a badger, putting his life to THE TEST.
To his right was an angel, her relentless pleas dismissed.
Like being beset in quicksand, he dreamed that option was best.
A thought went through his head but vanished like a wave at sea.
Licking his fingers to feel the wind he sang out, “Memeto- Mori”. (Remember Your Death)
11/20/16 By _TRF R.I. P.hriend
Dec 11, 2016
Dec 11, 2016 at 10:31 PM UTC
Whoa, with a ***** like me...
She said please, mercy me, mercy me
Let me fall outta love, before you **** her, before you **** her
She begged me, she gave me all her pills
Now my back hurts, she lost control
Now she pleading, she on the floor, she on the floor
Baby got her pleading, she on the floor, she on the floor
She said, it won't be long before she falls out of love
Won't be long before she falls out of love
Sandpaper kisses, papercut bliss
Don't know what this is, but it all leads to this
You're gonna leave her
You have deceived her
You're just a bird
Just a bird, tried to kiss you
But you never let me miss you
But you never let me miss you
I thought I told you
I'm not him, I'm not him
What you did, nobody forced your hand
And don't you fall for a ***** like me, I begged, I begged
Now you're pleading, she on the floor, she on the floor
Now you're pleading, she on the floor, she on the floor
She said "it won't be long" before she falls out of love
It won't be long, before she falls out of love
Nov 18, 2013
Nov 18, 2013 at 1:56 PM UTC
I laughed and thought, 'you should just kiss me already."
Sep 12, 2013
Sep 12, 2013 at 2:16 AM UTC
How much is a memory?
Burned feet on the hot concrete?
A skinned knee or a papercut?
Maybe it's the wasted nights, or a dead phone,
Lonely nights spent at home
Waiting on something to "be"
Something worth being happy,
Until you find it, and smile,
The one memory that makes it all worthwhile.
Apr 4, 2016
Apr 4, 2016 at 6:18 PM UTC
317 days
that's how long i was strong
i'm sorry that i ****** up again
i'm sorry i disappoint everyone
i'm sorry that feel the need to hurt myself
i'm sorry
you know that seeing red is a trigger
or getting a papercut
looking at my scars
seeing old pictures
i'm a living nightmare
and i'm sorry
Feb 21, 2014
Feb 21, 2014 at 1:38 AM UTC