"playgrounds" poems
I made my own stop.
I made my own end of the line.
I made my own terminal.
I end here.
Someone died here today;
the start of their journey,
and the end of my own.
oil blood urine
fluids of mechanic and natural origins.
I peddle my wares;
I sell my sweat;
I am an energy salesman.
I ride this rail on rubber, not steel.
I do not intend to steer clear
but still be clear when the front-end is near.
Electric elephants bound to acrobat playgrounds.
Painted Tusks as valuable as my soul.
I do not meddle with my pedal:
joules of life grow more valuable.
energy exchanged
May 20, 2014
May 20, 2014 at 4:35 PM UTC
I am from New Jersey.
From the paradise of small towns
And the inferno of concrete jungles.
I am from truck tire playgrounds,
Porch Clubs, and the whistle
Of the Riverline.
I am from divorce.
From alcoholism and denial,
From broken doors and hearts.
I am from next to hell.
From pouring out full forties
For one's homies passed away.
From too many candlelight vigils
And sidewalks littered with fourth grade pictures.
I am from the garden state.
From cows, corn, and Clinton,
And tractors in the parking lot.
I am from tradition.
From pasta and seven fishes,
From "Mafiosa!" screamed in the streets
And "No WHOPs" pasted on storefronts.
I am from love.
From three parents and four siblings,
From six dogs and duplicate holidays,
And the smell of tulips and holly.
Jul 2, 2017
Jul 2, 2017 at 10:09 PM UTC
it should be noted that girls don't always come from venus, that some boys might be a little deader than they were before they claimed you took their breath away.
some girls have barbed wire around their hearts, and others have white flags. some boys have touched more cigarettes than thighs, more blades in the bathroom sink than the ones in her shoulders. the city might whisper the name of one boy and tremble at the thought of another; a girl might have a hit list with only one name on it — her own. some boys will **** just to say they lost their virginity and some boys will spend the rest of their lives making love as though they could gain it back; some girls have lost their tears and sweat in the upholstery of the same car that might belong to one of these boys — and some of those same boys are sweaty handprints on the backseat windows while others are fingerprints on your throat, but no matter how you look at it, he will always leave his mark, won't he?
it should be noted that some girls will miss you like hiroshima playgrounds miss the laughter of young children, but others will miss you like an 11:30 flight at 11:31, and i bet you never knew that some boys will never tell you that they miss their father just as much as some girls calling everyone else 'daddy' except for the one they truly need; you'd never believe me if i said that some girls look at the night sky where they used to see their reelection in the stars, but now only see another broken mirror.
it should be noted, that not all boys are from mars.
Nov 17, 2014
Nov 17, 2014 at 12:14 AM UTC
Spring sneaks by the door to the ghetto.
That's okay, they can't afford the seed.
Trees take too much room from the rentals.
No one saw the end of ghetto weeds.
Ghetto weeds once grew up sudden.
They took the food of those in bloom.
Ghetto weeds we're awful sorry,
But we haven't got the room.
Yesterday a man sold his garden
Bragging how he made such a deal.
Bought himself a high-rise apartment.
Who can tell the fruit by the peel?
Ghetto weeds once grew up sudden.
They took the food of those in bloom.
Ghetto weeds we're awful sorry,
But we haven't got the room.
What about the children of the ghetto,
Do they have the playgrounds they need?
Have you seen the children how they're growing?
Don't they shoot up just like a ****
Ghetto weeds once grew up sudden.
They took the food of those in bloom.
Ghetto weeds we're awful sorry,
But we haven't got the room.
Apr 3, 2016
Apr 3, 2016 at 6:53 AM UTC
My mom
Tells me I'm a gift.
She says love
Is what keeps the atoms
In you and I
Is the moment
She caught my
Father's eye
Is the day
My grandfather died
With a candy kiss on his cheek
She had never tasted something so sweet.
When we were little
We played kickball,
The ground is lava
And hide-and-go-seek.
As I grew I knew most days,
It was harder to find myself;
Let alone somebody else.
And I have been around
Enough center city playgrounds
To see the rich
Pump every bit of spare change
In their veins fighting
A cancer that they
Never learned to put in their past.
To see the poor
Wage wars with themselves
Trying to pick up
Way too much,
Way too fast;
Nobody really knows how to make love last.
So put your prism your heart
Beneath the moonlight.
Refract the wavelengths
Of your wonders
Into ROYGB-eautiful like the sea,
It took a lot of jellyfish to let
people see through me.
And even more mirrors
To find a place I was comfortable
Praying in.
Fraying in doorways
Where I learned hope,
Is looking both ways
On a one way street
Cause it can be so easy to thank God
While you still have bread to eat.
I have never prayed
So hard for a healthy meal
Than the days I remember
The heart is a muscle;
And sometimes the only
Thing we need
Is to "work it out."
And I know that some days,
My doubt hangs my
Smile like Jesus Christ
I never quite learned
How to bleed right.
But if there's one thing
I found from cleaning
The crosses out of the
Empty hallway of my character
Is that you haven't experienced loss
Until you've held two outstretched arms
For years waiting for your innocence to come back.
Nothing, weighs more than the guilt of your past
And nothing throws punches
Faster than the ghost of who you used to be.
And I know it's hard
To stop looking for yourself
Under every bed you
Left nightmares in
And I know it's hard
To be comfortable
In your own skin
But sometimes bars
Aren’t the only thing
That builds a cage
And sometimes
The only way to live
With yourself
Is to stop digging
Your own grave.
You can spend years
Listening to morticians
And never get grounded.
Surrounded by the
Square roots we all share,
By the same air,
We've all got to learn to let go.
To learn that
Holding your breath
Has never been how
Living things
Learn to
Grow
Dec 20, 2015
Dec 20, 2015 at 4:57 PM UTC
without the memories of playgrounds--
the smell of too many American Spirits
(andsometimesnewportmentholswhentimesgottough)
the taste of chocolate wine
the cold of holy river water
the sting of heartache and hangovers and broken toes
the glow of midnight fires built too high with entire trees
the feel of tears on my sun-scorched collarbones
the sound of e.e. cummings and the poems from our adolescence being read over baking bread at three in the morning
rushing back to me.
i still remember our fears of shadow people and the
too loud screams of *** rock
over men(i should say boys)
who we centered our summer around
when we weren't busy being goddesses.
& there isn't a day i don't see a swing set
or hear the beginnings of Johnny Cash song
when i do not think of you
and hope
that the world will not change you
that the world will not change me
and we will one day
have a practical magic houses
and hostas
that i glare at
while i make tea in the mornings.
Nov 14, 2012
Nov 14, 2012 at 11:10 PM UTC
Once when I was young, I was told you could swing so high you'd be able to just fly away.
I learned early on
That not everything we're told is true
The fantastical can sometimes amount to a pile of plastic bags scattered in the wind
The end isn't always happy and there's not always closure
Punctuations are more often question marks than definitive periods
And looking for a definite explanation took prevalence over allowing our imaginations to fill in the blanks.
Play time was replaced with study time,
And before we knew it, it was time for work
We strayed from the playgrounds of our youth,
Never returning to the top of the slide, we'd hit the ground a bit too hard to keep the enchantment of seemingly endless possibilities going
Carriages became pumpkins long before midnight,
And the school bell rang before we could finish our fun
But to tell the truth, sometimes,
When everyone else has gone inside, back to the real world, full of logic and banalities,
I sit on the old swingset kicking my feet
Hoping it will let me soar
Jun 8, 2016
Jun 8, 2016 at 5:05 PM UTC
Reminisce..... Childhood days..
Remember when we were young?
Played all day out in the sun so gay
Happy kids we were… ***** or ugly
Ohh!!! The way we looked?
Not a bit we care, we didn’t care…
Were out in the monsoon rains, were out in the storms…
No Sophisticated playgrounds were built,
No expensive toys were bought…
Did we mind? We played in the drains…
We made our own toys from scratch..
We built our own playground in the field..
God protected us… kept us saved from evils and hates..
Childhood was extremely the best years of our entire years…
The best memory ever…
Our childhood days….
May 21, 2013
May 21, 2013 at 9:44 AM UTC
being told that you're too big
for a playground destroys
the little kid inside you and
wow oh wow
that hurts because that little
kid always gets what she wants
and **** that's not okay and
she's having a tantrum but
you just look down at that rude
little kid who told you that
playgrounds are for little kids
makes you
so so so mad and
who told that kid that
they could be rude to you
but you know that
they don't think they're being rude
and all you want to do is
go down the slide but
you admit defeat and
stare down that kid and
whirl around and
walk down the steps but
inside you're stomping and that little
kid of yours is unhappy.
May 24, 2014
May 24, 2014 at 7:42 PM UTC
Casually caressing
the comedy of life
A child knows not
tragedy’s strife.
There is always another dream
toy or friend
for their fetal-esteem.
They spell their grammar
with candy and curiosity
while maintaining a history
in smile and laughter.
The heroism of Joe
the G.I.
and the beauty of a Barbie
are created impulsively and
fueled by imagination and apple juice.
A bike is not
a means of transportation
but rather
meant to be raced and jumped.
Scooby-Doo
and the ****** Tunes should
rule Saturday mornings
from their throne in the tube.
Monkey bars and playgrounds,
are not merely a facility
to upkeep physical activity.
Instead
it is a kingdom of escape
engineered by make-believe
funded by risk-taking
and motivated by the
eradication of the cootie-plagued
and ****** pickers.
Where did time go,
when these bones grew old
this brain grew dull
and these hands lost their callus?
The world is cruel
for the elder mind.
Yet, for our youthful kin,
Society does not exist
in coloring books
and world peace is only found
in imagination and apple juice.
Jan 11, 2013
Jan 11, 2013 at 2:02 AM UTC
John Scalla remembers
plain–clothed white coiffed nuns
in sunday school classes
who were the sweetest things
you’ve ever seen with a razors edge
carried proudly from an emerald isle
John Scalla spent his sundays digging
through big soft Bibles discovering
a father who loved everyone
as equally as he was thorough
a son born to wear a crown of blood
but never lost his most sacred heart
and a universal spirit’s open-armed
quiet embrace of your trembling frame
John Scalla was born to hold a communion
with something far more complex or
precise then our poor sweaty coils
wondering how bread could be body
and blood so eagerly consumed
John Scalla stole from complex pages buried
deep beneath outdated expressions
and miscommunicated messages
a simple cypher that condenses
all the rhetoric down to it’s square root
love
John Scalla locked the cypher
in that secret spot between heart
and stomach holding it close
dreaming on distant playgrounds
where it was slowly worn away
by bullies still casting long shadows
like limestone sphinxes now noseless
John Scalla’s distant playground dreaming
of a personal relationship with God are gone
because if He was there then that makes him
a single string of an infinitely intricate
vast woven narrative where he is only aware
of adjacent pieces unable to take a firm grasp
of the situation continuing to grow
John Scalla weaves narratives through
his prayers sending them nowhere
because they wouldn’t know where to go
with so many far-off stars dead and leaving
cosmic vibrations both here and everywhere
making it hard for them to escape with
their best intentions unmolested
Jul 30, 2013
Jul 30, 2013 at 6:12 PM UTC
My skin must be made of crystal glass
For you to stare through me so violently
I shake and shatter into a million pieces,
Your missing attention a sound wave
Deafeningly explosive to my ears.
To you, the brittle layers underneath my hide
Are playgrounds for your piercing eyes—
My flesh freezes over and turns clear
By the sheer blizzard of your neglect.
You stare into me like I was an abyss—
A shallow pit, a dark nothing—
And carry on believing it so.
My holes are things to be respected
Yet they are all you ever look through.
Your apathy has my vicious soul
Suspended in a restless air
Until I feel so unreal that I evaporate
And truly, truly, feel despair.
Jul 6, 2014
Jul 6, 2014 at 1:19 AM UTC
i sometimes wonder why you still visit my mood swings,
left in abandoned playgrounds between my chest.
why you still visit even though the slides may only carry you down to somebody like me.
somebody difficult to love,
somebody who cannot tell the difference between crying and laughing anymore.
why you haven't left this soul,
who's bones can't seem to find enough strength to push my side of the sea saw,
who can't seem to move past three poles on the monkey bar,
simply because of the weight on top of my shoulders.
this flesh of complete brokeness that couldn't bare ringa ring rosie,
because at some point one gets tired of always falling.
i often wonder, why me.
why me, with all my chipped paint and countless dents.
why you still visit,
when this isn't the grass on other side that's greener.
because God knows,
i'd understand if you look for a park elsewhere.
a park worthy of you.
Dec 19, 2015
Dec 19, 2015 at 5:41 PM UTC
It should be noted that girls don't always come from Venus, that some boys might be a little deader than they were before they claimed you took their breath away. Some girls have barbed wire around their hearts, and others have white flags. Some boys have touched more cigarettes than thighs, more blades in the bathroom sink than the ones in her shoulders. The city might whisper the name of one boy and tremble at the thought of another; a girl have a hit list with only one name on it — her own. Some boys will **** just to say they lost their virginity and some boys will spend the rest of their lives making love as though they could gain it back; some girls have lost their tears and sweat in the upholstery of the same car that might belong to one of these boys — and some of those same boys are sweaty handprints on the backseat windows while others are fingerprints on your throat (no matter how you look at it, he will always leave his mark, won't he?)
It should be noted that some girls will miss you like Hiroshima playgrounds miss the laughter of young children, but others will miss you like an 11:30 flight at 11:31, and I bet you never knew that some boys will never tell you that they miss their father just as much as some girls calling everyone else Daddy except for the one they truly need; you'd never believe me if I said that some girls look at the night sky where they used to see their reelection in the stars, but now only see another broken mirror.
It should be noted, that not all boys are from Mars.
Jan 9, 2014
Jan 9, 2014 at 3:24 PM UTC
Near a man, and yet
He finds himself drawn
To playgrounds
Beckoned by nostalgia, he thinks
The big red slide was always fun
But
This isn't about him
(I think he knew)
It is her, as much as ever
He misses her
Hanging from her jungle gym lips
Swinging through memories
Creaky hinges for laughs
(His, at least)
But
What does a child on the playground know of love
Except that
Paradise is here, and now
Beneath his feet
May 9, 2014
May 9, 2014 at 1:23 AM UTC
my sadness is asking to use the bathroom during class just so I can lock myself up in one of the stalls and break down completely without worrying about people watching me. my sadness is trying trying trying to write but my hands are shaking too much to do anything but bury my head in them. my sadness is typing up messages to friends about what a ****** day it's been, but deleting the whole thing just as I'm about to send it, because no one deserves to be burdened by my problems— this is my struggle and mine alone; and I need to be able to deal with it. my sadness is not being in control of my own thoughts; not knowing how make the screaming voices stop. my sadness is absorbing the pain from people around me and sometimes letting it get to me.
--
my sadness isn't rainy days and a few "sad songs". my sadness isn't "she drank the whole bottle but your name still burns at the back of her throat". my sadness isn't me spending time in children's playgrounds, surrounded by people with thoughts darker than mine ever could be, and a taste for drugs and danger. my sadness isn't "she smokes now, but her mind is still as hazy as the day you left". my sadness isn't flowers in my hair or anything that can be encapsulated in a tumblr photo or quote. my sadness isn't beautiful, nor poetic.
--
it's just sad.
Nov 7, 2015
Nov 7, 2015 at 8:44 AM UTC
The Lung.
The broken bone branches hang heavy off knuckled tree. As cold and uninviting as wrapped meat in cellophane prison cells and those sweating milk bottles left on doorsteps. Women cry with the blackbirds as day breaks, rousing their reluctant nests.
As the shadows trawl in from chicken farms and slaughterhouses, across the squalid estates and past a debt collectors party. A ***** drinks his soot like coffee and waits for another years tide to retreat. Holding pith less ambitions and unmentionable qualifications, stewardess pass, uniformed thoughts and averting faces..
The rusty playgrounds sink into the fermenting wood chips, and a plastic bag runs through the scene; only to commit suicide in the oil ribbon canal. The chemical clouds thicken into a duvet of sky whilst arrows of a natural sun run home with tears of fear on their hot faces.
Down here the street lights flicker, and the patched uniforms drape off children sick with the flu that hit the school like a plague. Herding like cattle into the classrooms, to learn about the natural world
that is most unearthly to there reason.
Lunch bells ring from factories and the sky has drained to a sick -off white. The chip shop sells butties with no sauce nor bun, which machine like men guzzle and slurp.
The car parks lay stagnant in the distance and pigeons too fat to fly lay droppings on the bronze statue of a crying hero. As the roaring stops from the factories and high visibility coats are hung, the sky bruises and the men fill the pubs, until wives with children hung on washing lines drag there sweat soaked frames to the table, only to indulge them in a row.
Night creeps in, bringing with it the hooded figures that flutter along the streets. Music plays from a vacant building and seems to brighten the night.
A silhouette is seen standing on the edge, watching the busses bellow run like migrating snails, filled with the elderly and too young.
Cigarettes infest the streets creating a carpet of ash and litter. The city survives, remaining grey, never blinking, never heard.
Sep 20, 2012
Sep 20, 2012 at 6:20 AM UTC
When I was a small child
I was no lady fair and mild
I was the princess of the wild
As by tree climbing I was beguiled
I didn't like pink princess sets
Sports were something I couldn't get
I climbed everywhere, even playgrounds that were wet
And I loved proving kids wrong on a bet
As I grew into the girl I became
Some things changed, some stayed the same
I love all sorts of clothes, made for both gents and dames
And my boyish reaction to crushes is still my bane
Jan 20, 2017
Jan 20, 2017 at 1:16 PM UTC
Trees hold the deep earth together way below with crooked fingers of the underworld and catches foul above
Upward to the heavens on finger towers,
clapping on winds they shake their dander
And the makers of green bras on mountain tops
They are the landlords of ground,and air beasts, and
incumbent giants of the ages
They whisper being puppeteered by winds of old
They are the alchemists of oxygen
They are dangling playgrounds
They are the Autumn crunches beneath our feet
Trunk etchings by bards, trees reflecting
cultures' dissemination
We walk under penumbras that deny the scorch of summer
as cool water douses fire, so too, shade douses heat
Watching trees in my pleasant reverie I observe how they
help break the carpeted land, bringing about a certain diversity in moving tranquility and rustling of their songs
Oct 1, 2014
Oct 1, 2014 at 7:20 AM UTC
When I was a girl I loved cars and Kim Possible
And green rocks I’d find in the pebble fillings of our school playgrounds,
Because they were rare and therefore special.
I read twenty books on gemstones and minerals and stared at the pictures for hours
Hoping one day I could be beautiful and solid and reflect the colours
You can’t see
If you burn your retinas looking directly at the sun.
When I was a girl I became a driveway because I thought
If I paved myself with tarmac or cement
I’d be hard enough to withstand the weight of everyone around my heart
And grounded enough to support myself,
But the construction workers forgot to check for groundwater
And I caved in when people decided
To unapologetically and unquestioningly park their ***** in the handicap spot,
Mistaking the importance of my handicaps for the importance of their egos.
When I was a girl I became an asteroid,
Seeking a gravitational pull around a star that would give me a name and meaning.
But instead I found a black hole,
And before I realised my mistake in universal direction
Her gravity obliterated me
And absorbed whatever the **** was left
Of the force I could have been.
When I was a person I became a tree,
Rooted to the earth rather than separate
And absorbing the light for sustenance.
I’ve forgotten what it means to be hardened,
But even my cells have walls around them
And now I’m as afraid of the ground as I am of the sky
And brave enough to reach into both
And just maybe find some answers in the crust or clouds.
Aug 24, 2014
Aug 24, 2014 at 1:33 AM UTC
With special thanks to George Ella Lyon
I am from crumbling brick
(red, dusty, smelling of musk).
I am from aluminum siding
and triple-deckers,
tall, strong, unmovable.
Hailing from the city on about seventy hills.
From Grandfathers and photo albums,
cigar ash salad and pinecone wars.
From "use your imagination" and "go play in the street".
I am from a whirlwind of faith,
belief from non-believers.
From schoolyards, playgrounds, and crawlspaces
come these faces, and these memories
are worth more to me, than anything.
Sep 22, 2010
Sep 22, 2010 at 7:02 PM UTC
~
Painting a picture of porcupines playing
Pincushions out in the field
Purple and pink for this playful perception
Plans of their purpose revealed
Painful endeavors of pacified pranksters
Presenting a pie at their place
Pecan or pumpkin, pickle, pineapple
Pieces are smeared on their face
Putting the paint on some powder puff paper
Pleasure in each stroke is plied
Pausing to peer at the porcupines playing
Prancing in pansies they hide
Puzzling problems with pretzels and peanuts
Posturing people to prove
Pistachio perfume in prime presentation
Preaches that peaches will move
Polishing pastels on pre-printed pages
Prized the possessions we seek
Paisley the plumes of a peacocks posterior
Portraits now come take a peek
Pampering piccolos play the piano
Pure as a pelican’s prayer
Picking a parcel of plum flavored pudding
Poetic prose fills the air
Pleats in my pants shout in proud proclamation
Puddle my pores they perspire
Poodles on playgrounds prevent prosecution
Plotting my hearts pure desire
Passion precedes every past tense of parting
Piled with a presence so true
Painting a picture while purposely dreaming
Promising my love to you
Dec 11, 2014
Dec 11, 2014 at 4:21 PM UTC
She asks me “what do you think of me?”
I stop;
Reflect upon what just happened,
When a complexity of a girl
Asks a simple guy
What he thinks about her.
She asks me “what do you like about me?”
I’ll tell you what I hate;
I don’t hate your eyes,
Like round circles we used to make
With our dancing bodies
In preschool playgrounds.
I don’t,
Hate your lips;
They could be traced
From a million miles
And they curve so beautifully.
I don’t hate your smile,
The semi grins you keep
Before the flashes,
Before the posts;
I don’t hate your eyes,
Like bullets entering the soul
With an insertion of dopamine.
She asks me “do you really think I am worth your troubles?”
You are not.
You deserve my delight;
You deserve my green days and blooming flowers,
You deserve my watering mouth
Nourishing the vines underneath your tongue,
You deserve the sunrises in my playlists
And sunsets in the warmth of my jackets;
You are not worthy of my troubles
I am not worthy of my troubles.
She pushes me away,
The walls are too tight
And the stares,
They scrape on our throats.
The girl is lonely,
Her social circle spreads wide enough
To leave a gap;
Her friends walk next to her
And not on her side;
Her smiles-
Electronic cigarettes that look genuine,
But the smoke never rests
On the teeth,
Just a vapor that fades away.
She’s anchored to her reality
Her ships are not meant to sail
Just yet.
She asks me “what do you think of me?”
You’re a concept;
You’re a fusion of vivid elements
Wired with secret buttons
Hidden in your desires.
You’re an emotional rollercoaster
That we ride
You and I,
When I think of you
You’re just a white canvas
That whispers into my soul
The true meaning of art.
She asks me “is this your real answer?”
She ask me “is this your real answer?”
May 7, 2014
May 7, 2014 at 6:44 PM UTC
My grade school
burned down
twice.
Once in the 1930's
then again in
the 50's.
They rebuilt,
there were two
large black and white
framed photographs
of the school houses
before both fires
hanging in the
main hallway.
At some point in
the reconstruction
someone had decided
on two boys
restrooms.
The one at ground level
was always clean.
There were small white
tiles and fresh blue paint.
It always smelled like
pine cleaner,
never ran out of
paper towels.
There was always
sweet smelling
liquid soap in the
shinny silver dispensers.
There were doors with
shinny silver
locks on the stalls.
It was a timeless
space,
pristine and somehow
preserved.
Free and unscathed
by the ugliness of
the world.
Then there was the other
one.
The restroom below
ground in the basement.
There were ground
level windows
with round wire cages
over them.
The view of the
***** untied
tennis shoes
attached to
saggy socks and
scabbed knees.
The children
ran about
with purpose
over every inch
of the playgrounds
hot black top
as I'd try
to guess who's
feet were who's.
There were no doors on
the stalls,
yellow stains beneath
every leaky
******
Smears of rust around the
faucets ,
a coarse hand soap
in the often broken
dispensers.
More fit for prisoners
than students.
It smelled like
**** and was always
cold.
I don't know why
one was always cleaner
than the other.
Maybe it was an
unwritten janitor
law.
Maybe they seen it
as somehow lower
than the other.
I always chose the
basement restroom.
It just seemed more
natural to me,
it made me feel strong,
made it all feel more real.
Now after so many
hardships as I sit with drink
in hand or lay down
while high on some drug
I can't seem to help
but look back and
remember.
Then ponder the question.
"Have I always been
meant to live in such a *****
harsh environment,
even way back then?"
May 2, 2013
May 2, 2013 at 8:49 PM UTC