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r0b0t Oct 2014
I have fought with my wings with a disrespectful son
I have fought for my wings on a garden of fire and rage
and I will be painted across the stars
eternal, all-knowing
So give me my wings
let me fly away
Stop holding me down
Pull out the pushpins, I need to fly
I need to be
Pull out the pushpins and let me go
Stop fighting so hard to keep be grounded
let me fly across the sky and find my way home
b e mccomb Jul 2016
Gold glitter
Only stays on the ceiling
When the upholstery is gray.

Church gyms are suddenly
Piggy banks to play
Basketball upon.

I will draw a city on
The bulletin board
And owl pushpins will inhabit it.

My mind is no longer in a
Casing of gray rick-rack
And suppositions I do not feel.

It is a precarious thing to
Play a solar piano
Under the midday sky.

Have you ever heard
A pumpkin-flavored
Volkswagen van?

It happened suddenly
That everything I could possibly
See became a photography contest.
Copyright 5/10/15 by B. E. McComb
James Piccolino Feb 2017
It was in the gray fall clouds that I met her. My hands
quivering as my nerves were shot with lightning
and out to the world around me.
My northbound hair done neat and tidy, her hands
were colder than the breeze encompassing us. It was
the start to an age eclipsing seasons. But
like all else, everything ends. The crisp leaves
and our optimistic qualities fell at equal rate. Winter
came around and stomped out all the seedlings
too undeveloped to withstand it. For all of our journey,
good and bad, went out the door. And this
cold and bleak finale consisted of screams
and shells of what once stood in it's place.
After tears evaporated, so too did all we stood for.
A monstrous, cyclical, almost-love.
I originally wrote this for a poetry class assignment, but didn't follow the prompt correctly, so I posted the unusual unusable one here!
Emily Lawson Mar 2017
your words are pushpins.

pushpins that held my dreams in place
on the wall of lilac lies
that you built around me.

they left termite holes
in the gypsum board
that remind me

of how useless a promise can be.
C S Cizek Feb 2015
-Parsley flakes
-Cheap pens
-Memo notebook
-Breaded fish filets
-1% milk
-Bleach for the bathroom floor
-Brillo pads
-Italian Wedding soup
-Instant meals
-Pushpins
-2 cans of fruit cocktail

      Man, I grew up on fruit cocktail.
      Waxy cherries, see-through grapes, grain pineapples,
      and wrinkled peaches bathing in thick syrup,
      waiting to see 1990s kitchen lights.

      But it probably costs $2, or more, now.
     And I've got a car I need to keep runnin',
      a house I gotta keep standin',
      a job I have to keep goin' to /
      keep bustin' my *** for.
      I guess I can see how things go
      in the next few years.
      Maybe it'll be in paste form then.
sadgirl Oct 2017
are you
a sunflower?
growing from

my palm,
like i am
the fertile dirt.

are you my
skin? pushpins
and scars

are not yours,
or mine
they are the both of us

personified

are you the night?
and are you the stars?
there to guide me

north
when my heart
is silent
are you my
love?
holding me

in the middle of
the day, when the sun
is brightest and obscured

by clouds
aesthetic poem
Shannon Jan 2015
In that,
the tiny pushpins
that invade my clumsy pulse.
In that
I find you
in that-
the electric scarf
I wear around my neck
Insomuch I find
you choke me
so I am not wordless,
I am not without screaming-
dripping and falling from my lips
wrapped like gifts of mortar
more out than in
no I am not wordless.
I see you and tiny electric pulses
dance on me
dice through me
I feel you
touch so perfect
like a violin string
strung-
strung taught
tight against my mouth
tight against you leaving.
I am sensory.
I am sound that bounces angry
I am sound that chisels
the prayers of the prayer wheels
upon the bumps of my spine.
listen, listen
for your footfalls
and you will touch me,
perfect touch
of space and air
and fingertips that have no bones
no skin
just a note on a
cello-of a touch
and a kiss from behind my neck
a strangle,
such the kiss is tight.
tiny electric pulses through me,
oh, love,
for the tiny electric pulses
that bounce through,
move me.
prayers on the prayer wheel
spinning.
sahn 01/22/15
thank you for taking the time to share in my work, any suggestions or discussions is always welcome.
Aoife Apr 2016
the home
we once lived in
with wardrobes in shambles
and drawers with clutter
is now empty.

i packed everyone's bags,
gathered the last pushpins
from the wall in the kitchen,
and went on with my life.

i made sure to grab
the books we'd hidden in the attic
as well as the photo album
you'd stashed under the floorboards.

i opened the curtains
and then swept the floors.
i made our bed for the last time
and collected the closings
of the dust on the mantelpiece
that nobody ever cleaned.

i got two extra boxes
for all of the medication unfinished.
i marked them "fragile", for they were glass capsules
containing the substance needed to keep my daughter alive.
but her illness didn't **** her.

i was well aware of the dog's bed,
and it found a place
in the passenger seat of my suv.
his quiet whimpers and cries
were all i heard that evening
as i drove away from what once was my life.

when i finally got to my feet again,
i returned to making dinner for myself.
i only knew how to cook for seven,
and i found tranquility in washing things in sevens.
now i made food for one
and washed for one.

i accidentally brewed two coffees this morning,
in hopes you were still here to take it
and laugh at me for making it too strong,
but you're not.
i awoke at noon the day before and sobbed,
for i was used to being awoken by child's laughter
and small bodies climbing into our bed.

tomorrow, i will bring your briefcase to work
and leave it on your desk.
i'll collect it when i go to leave
and frown at the fact you never opened it.
i'll dispatch you three times in the field,
but you won't respond.

i used to see our wedding day,
but now i see your funeral.
i used to see our children's births;
but i've gotten used to their bodies in morgues.

your physical features
become the trauma described during your autopsies,
and our family photos
became the ones used in the funeral program.

the home
we once lived in
with wardrobes in shambles
and drawers with clutter
is now a house;

a house with things
that even i can't pack away.
• this is based loosely on a story i am currently working on. my fanfiction is https://www.fanfiction.net/~hotchnerjareau , so check it to keep up with my works!
Lindsey Miller Jun 2012
well, she's a pretty scene
but the characters keep passing out from lack of sleep
and the understudies don't kiss the way she's used to.

a cardboard backdrop of exaggerated proportions
with its painstakingly painted mural of smiles
couldn't hold up to the critic's deep scrutiny
(he later bashed it in a local newspaper review that no one would read)

packing my father's vinyl collection in each ear, i left you.
or you left me; i can't be sure,
but i vaguely remember us stepping out the fourth-floor window at the same time.

you run like a stain through an oxford shirt
handing out your unemployed business cards (blank on both sides)
but once i grabbed a handful of pushpins and tacked you to my door.
i have this laugh-out-loud feeling that says you won't be coming 'round anymore.
Juliana Nov 2012
In this house
sticky thin floorboards
slinking from wall to wall.
Everything dripping down,
pictures taped,
a story told through
ticket stubs
and pushpins.

The amount of stuff
is astounding,
every piece exact,
writing an encyclopaedia.
Teal doors chipping,
holes at hand-height
with paw prints
adorning every corner.
http://poemsaboutpoetry.blogspot.ca/
She's numb
To the last crumb
Eyes like stale bread,
Lying there as if dead
Her bed no coffin,
But wood not lacking
She welcomes no feeling,
Her hair pushpins
Nails like chalk,
She won't talk
All her thoughts are sins
Send her reeling
Hear a cat hacking
Fur ***** and she's coughing
Blood into her hands
Blink again
And it's saliva and phlegm,
Clouds and rain
Are all to her; pain,
The skie's greys are black
Makes her heart a heavy sack,
To push much less carry
She can't even cry
Just sigh all dark and dreary,
Return to sleep, living lie,
As her hope is flickering
But she's a Zippo among BICs
And though her thoughts are bickering,
No heart beating is just she's a Rolex with no ticks...
© okpoet
Mike Hauser Aug 2014
I remember when Twitter was
what your heart felt like when falling in love

I remember Pinterest was when you put pushpins on
the map hanging on the wall for where you planed to travel

I remember back when the only Facebook
was Mom's photo album

I remember when Tumblr was
rolling down the hill for fun as a child

I remember when Gay used to mean you were happy
And a Joint was a bad place to be

When I Hooked Up it was usually my stereo
All these newfangled meanings are so confusing to me

Or when Bad really meant Bad
And sick was what you did all over the floor

Now they both seem to mean a good thing
Can anyone tell me what for?

And don't even get me started on Thongs
That we wore on our feet to go to the beach

Now they're used to cover up what?
The rear with a piece of string?

I remember when we did not have to worry
about being politically correct

Or even have to worry about
who we might offend back

I remember back then
we were free to speak our minds

And not have to worry about how
everything would be perceived by society as a whole

I sure do miss back then
But at least I still remember when...
Ann came to me with this wonderful idea! I'm honored that she included me in on this! Thank you my friend. If you haven't checked out her writings, do yourself the favor! You can tell what a loving heart she has through her poetry.
Dawn Dec 2016
Once, I fell for a traveler
whose eyes sought the beautiful.
But even those who were simply mundane
didn't even have to worry a thing,
for he always saw the best within.

Never have I ever been a destination.
More like ruins that give the illusion
that abandon could exhibit beauty.
But his map was never way too full
for more pushpins on places he'd rule
with polaroid films and blank canvasses,
that only his eyes and hands can caress.

But little did I know that he was
more on an adventure than just a petty tour.
That when time came for him to move on,
I'm sure I forgot, here wasn't his home.

At least, in the roster, I exist.
One of the places he chose to visit.
I have written this some time after I thought I've had moved on from someone.
Hayley Neininger Mar 2013
My body is a map
One that isn’t pinned up by pushpins
On plenty of pinning boys bedroom walls
Too big to see individual trees but big enough
To hold hopes and dreams
Strung together by red lines and black words
That title places they have yet to have seen
But man, how they wish they could visit me.
No, my body is more of a landscape
Still sitting on a easel that belongs to an artist
Who cannot bring himself to hang me up yet
Who can’t yet declare my permanence with a tac
My body is like that that.
Held in a state of constant change but only minutely
My mountains and streams haven’t changed for years
But the leafs on my branches transform ever so slightly
With aging paint brush strokes
That only I and my artist know are there
My features have no home
No place on a map to pin
They hold a kind of secret place that only
Few have seen but none could not say wasn’t me
But I still look similar to places they have already seen
No, my body is more like art.
When I was born I was naked like you
Pale with promise
And over time I was colored with age
I was wrinkled with paint
And damaged with a sometimes heavy hand
But even with the same wood skeleton as you
My un-uniformed array of colors
Only represent what I really am.
Scott Howard Feb 2014
I never cared much for
politics or
       the jam between my toes
       but I guess it keeps me
company
       when winter loves
December and
       my feet sweat pushpins
       I’ll sometimes catch
snowflakes on
       my tongue but who really cares
       I’ve always suffered from
seasonal depression
       but I think it’s just an
excuse
       to tell people I hate them
or to count
       fingernail clippings in the sink
       Maybe I have a snow globe
for a skull
       thawed out and marinating
in a pool of
       whiskey hung over
       a bucket to conjure
Flies
       or was it Spiders harvesting
my insides
       I pray they lay eggs in my
lungs
       so when I speak, someone will listen
       Spiders to keep me company at night
when the lights turn off
       to eat the toe jam I’ve collected in
mason jars
       but the sound of a match striking
always scares them off
       so I light a cigarette to
summon my Demons
       Because maybe they will be my friends
       But I plan on dying alone
with my whiskey and Flies.
TS Garrett Feb 2017
Such a simple synonym of a great yellow house

swaddled in the shadows on a flat patch in the backyard

a refuge resting of bric-a-brac and ornamental knickknacks

with a paint chipped porch that beamed once a brilliant white

a birdhouse filled with straw the previous owners left behind

a plywood room banished with no insulation and one lonely window

something of substance, with grainy walls to hold me up

a quiet place to talk to myself when the sun goes to sleep

where the imagination springs open deliciously

behind that old closed door that creaks

a cube where prayers share the stale air with the stillness of time

improvised shelving of old milk crates battered as gypsies

like migrating baggage nomadic through the years

that rainbow hammock hanging loose from the rafters

a husk to lift a weary back, a sheath to house the soul

a shaky legged easel from my love, nested into its very own corner

reflecting outward like a mirror so I might better see myself

the plastic man of gold  modestly retired above the window seal

the only trophy I ever felt I ever earned

an electric heater rattling its nonsense in the cold night air

amusing any shivering listener who cares to be warmed

A string of soft incandescent lights that dangle overhead

perfectly framing the faded native masks like vibrant yellow teeth

wilted candles scattered amongst the odds and ends

there wax bellies spattered on the floor to keep the paint drippings company

a mess of tousled brushes protruding from the dented silver can

wearing disheveled hairpieces to match their eccentric ways

the squatting antique box with its stitching and fat brass latches

enshrined as a tiny monument to the mantis and the moth

secrets scribbled on the dead parchment crammed into their tombs

journals that became maps on my journey to myself

icons harbored naive and coarse

to be plotted and stationed, rearranged and cherished

a cocoon that bursts from inside out

viscera stashed in a capsule to be kissed and romanced

the stacked canvases like a house of cards

leaning in tired on the supports of their brothers and sisters

the faces of reincarnation hanging on pushpins

those abstractions surreal in all their horrid geometry

the pirate ship, the aerosols

the old machine that holds the rotten gumballs

bolts and screws and arrowheads

a native tongue that enriches the enigma

not merely a physical escape of hoarded trinkets

fitted ad hoc with all the contrivances to tinker away the while

more abstractly a spiritual gathering of subdued memories

a space becoming itself a philosophy unraveling the details
Ryan P Kinney Jul 2018
Assembled and Edited by Ryan P. Kinney
From works by JM Romig and Lennart Lundh

The photographs
They lie
in a folder in a drawer
in a second-hand store.
They are a collage of poorly taken polaroids
All assembled before the Manor Woods formal,
Disheveled,
but for her hand on his arm
and her sister's slight separation
from man and wife.

She is the stranger in the waiting room
with fingers knotted in prayer
or tedium -
held together by masking tape and pushpins
on a well-loved corkboard

The husband
He is a fragile scarecrow
filled with crumpled up first drafts
of love notes
kicked through cobwebs that linger
in the long forgotten corners
of old classrooms.

He abuses his wife in the marriage bed,
her willing sister in the woods,
needing one for the power she gives,
wanting the other for what he takes,
longing to be set on fire.

The wife
She needs her husband to feed
the sense of self he's changed in her.
Ignorant, she wants her sister
for comfort when crying's done,

She is an island of kindling -
bits and pieces
of broken bottles, crumpled-up newspaper
and other things tossed out
into the ocean
forced to swim, wet
and freezing, forever gathering,
to form a huddled mass of leftovers

The sister
She is a tightly sealed mason jar
full of captive fireflies,
pillbugs, caterpillars and moss
and not enough air holes in the lid.

Without, she thinks, need,
she only wants her lover
and sister to be gone,
the family, hers alone.

The questions

I fear these things will die inside of me

and the child,
too, is a mason jar
Full of brightly colored
off-brand jellybeans
with a thick black question mark
painted on its face.

When all are found objects
to be used for reasons we hold alone,
what are the forms of ******,
and who is killing whom?
Dan Hess Sep 2019
I’m learning that in order to disconnect from my ego, I have to accept it. I’ve always wanted to be this philosophical, poetic person who seeks enlightenment, but I’m not a philosophy. I’m still a person. I like to fool myself into thinking there is no self, but there is, it’s just in flux. The self is like a cork board full of pins and art pieces. The ego likes to think the things that are on the board are the self, but it’s fooling the self in doing so. The self just retains the images. The images just represent the self. Sure, the pushpins leave a mark that may never come out, and arguably the things they support leave a bigger mark when they’re hanging up there, but they can change. There’s only enough space for so much.
The ego draws the self portrait and says “That’s me” but the self knows it’s just a picture. It won’t be the same in ten years as it is now, but, there will still be remnants of the past that have stayed along for the ride.

— The End —