"rebar" poems
A hammer upon the landscape.
Thunder like a toppling mountain.
Flashes like x-ray explosions.
Supernova surprise.
Sheets of rain.
Glistening-rebar javelins
Pierce the asphalt
Shatter the concrete.
Long shards of glass
From the grey
Steel-wool clouds.
May 21, 2014
May 21, 2014 at 9:15 PM UTC
the train whistles lull me to a dusty sleep
an ancient sleep
primitive and timeless as the sage
it tastes like rain
and reads like a folk song
and when the engine songs are gone
the interstate strikes up it's serenade
flooding my heart valves with gasoline
and valvoline
and the smile of what i can only hope to imagine are young lovers
with a fiesty case of wanderlust
and a puppy in the back seat
with a wagging tail
"happy trails" i whisper
and the stars flicker
and i smile
the walls let their secrets slide while they sleep
all those restless memories they keep for themselves
floating around
and settling in the parlor dust
they trust me just enough
to let me cradle them in my chest
woven between my rebar ribs
and my flat-tire heart
thud thud thudding as it speeds off into the distance
the dogs rustle the sheets as they rise
just long enough to sigh
dance a sleepy circle and a half
and put themselves back to bed
i finally crawl out from inside my noisy head
as the boy nestles up to my neck
and traces my clavical with his humid breath
and ropes me in closer to his chest
with his big bear arms
his heart sings like a fire alarm
stirring the brave to save me from the shadows
and chase the ghosts from my gallows
and he even lets out puppy snores in his sleep
the tune that finally pirouettes me towards my dreams
where the birds sing like drunken sailors in the mango groves
and the rows and rows of lime trees
my heart and mind innertwined to paint me a scene i've never even seen
not with my own eyes
it's so nice to think it's within me
and not without me
yes
for every sound, a source
Sep 10, 2013
Sep 10, 2013 at 10:33 PM UTC
wandering
across
the splinters of
squandered
seasons
the Hajj
of the
lost ones
completes
a broken
circle
returning
with hope to
burrow back
into the safety
of desecrated
graveyards
welcomed
home to the
embrace of a
cadaverous cloak
and the kiss
of carrion
smudged lips,
Hajji's eye
the decrepit
visage of
criminal
depravity
germination
of this
Arab Spring
mocks us
aromas
of jasmine
elude us
emulsified
concrete
clogs our
nostrils
burning eyes
filled with
asbestos dust
form
grateful
blinders
to the
ruination
of reason
betrayed
arcane
remnants
of our life
lay inert
in the open
****** of
fractured
habitations
amidst
jumbled rubble
the decaying
carcasses of
razed buildings
boast grotesque
sculptures of
twisted rebar
cradling artifacts
of a past life
pink
hair curlers
splashed
with sickly
blood grown
mold
scavenged
bicycles
limp on
banished
parts
smashed
skulls of
dolls weep,
her
dismembered
limb reaches
for a lost child’s
nursing
hand
the charred
remains of a
Persian rug
maps the
scale
of a city’s
deconstruction
and a frayed
regions
disconsolation
electric luxury
flowing water
the friendly bustle
of the street
bespeak
expired memories
foretelling an
unimaginal future
sectarian strife
enforces a communal
solitary confinement
in cold blood
we willingly
murdered
compassion
we
butchered
trust
we
euthanized
our
common
humanity
constructing
buildings is
easy
rebuilding
ourselves
impossible
Music Selection:
Segovia, Capricho Arabe
Oakland
5/13/14
jbm
May 14, 2014
May 14, 2014 at 11:56 AM UTC
The rebar skeleton of a hymn
Celestial rust sifting in
Skin and its architecture
Oh, the tectonics of Sin
Thrush lashed to husks
Lungs dipped with resin
Wine with gall, the Synoptic gospels
Recolored lithographs and
Rhymes of tinsel cord
Lost palaces of Tangiers
The Late Cretaceous fossils
Vibrate with fear.
Jan 26, 2017
Jan 26, 2017 at 10:59 AM UTC
A blur that breathes, growing and abating,
tides of people, entombed in steel,
flowing and fading on riverbeds of tar.
A place of nomads,
all draped in cloth.
A place of symbols,
of concrete and rebar
Sheets of cold, ice grey
Falling spindles, cold rain
A graceful procession
With a bellyful of tears
A dreadful cortège
A heralder of fears
A young forest paved with ancient crushed stones
Nothing left but the inheritance of a thousand unknowns
Nothing left, but old fossilised bones
All that has happened is what I know
And all I know is what will happen.
All that remains is what I know
And all I know is ruin.
Oct 13, 2021
Oct 13, 2021 at 4:30 AM UTC
<•>
the freight of fright (one by one)
you don't see them often
out east,
the coupled cars of trains,
so long, one single train, touching,
two borders of one middle-of-the-country-state,
simultaneous
that said,
rode those couplers once or twice,
even now, sitting free fared on uncut lengths of rebar,
quiet humming on my knees, Clapton's Layla,
heading to a city that claims need for another skyscraper
but the freight train I ride and rode a million passenger miles,
so many miles, I ride now gold free for life,
that of course,
a curse,
an ironic joke
on me
the freight of fright,
of waking up tired,
after just having falling asleep
worthy of only short story nightmares,
alligator eaten dreams,
running from and to
the silver bullet band's lullaby;
*"running against the wind,
a young man,
running against the wind"*
this train, all mind mine,
don't carry no commodities,
no cars or washing machines,
its load is men, mostly me,
carrying grades of fright,
adding on and up a few more rail cars,
in strange cities,
different chemical formulas
but all prime fright, fear,
of waking up, still breathing
guess I can quit here,
no excuse making time to make a tome,
fright comes in small measures,
coupled together, this train,
this tracked, cracked dry riverbed
of a train,
and it goes on bye,
one by one
12:57am
Aug 8, 2017
Aug 8, 2017 at 1:06 AM UTC
Somewhere cold, a
Hot crimson balloon ascends
Amongst the concrete and rebar.
It rises to the glistening roof
Then bursts. The kids saw
It rise, but not its fall.
Nov 11, 2018
Nov 11, 2018 at 7:16 AM UTC
I built it
Brick by brick
Slathering mortar
Rebar pierced
Lines off center
Foundation firm
Concrete faults
Cemented sadness
Tall as it is wide
I built it
Contracted of stupidity
Designed in self-absorption
Blue prints of folded sorrow
Erected by a fool
No cranes needed
Drawn in teardrops
Fallen from your eyes
Collected puddles of my deceit
I built it…this wall
That keeps you from me
May 26, 2014
May 26, 2014 at 7:01 PM UTC
'Tis the season for
deconstruction
and rebirth with rebar
'Tis the time for me
to create the word
chauvimaniacal
To drink
more than my doctor wants
but less than my audience deserves
'Tis a passing, flashing
immolating infatuation
toward progress
through denial and other forms
of self medication
It's summer
and I not-so-secretly
******* hate it.
Jun 12, 2014
Jun 12, 2014 at 10:54 AM UTC
.
Even after visits to apartments in self-named cities to see soccer stars swathed in orange tuxes,
Swerving off country roads in berating fits of tenderness,
Sputtering 'i love yous' in ditches and river canals;
Even after chais with Ye Ye Elders,
Messenger powwows with ancestors, and
holding the hands of comforting Harmonies, I
Never got it right.
.
It was a pathetic attempt to join a traveling circus; a passive means for an escape. Who were the Elephant Man, the sword swallower, or the contorting twins?
****** if I know.
Buddy had his hands wrapped around my neck in a nihilist noose so tight that it bubbled up amaurotic visions within my retina.
I couldn't see or feel a ******* thing.
Lost consciousness on his cold bathroom tiles, sprinkled with ***** confetti, **** all up on my cheek.idonthavetimeforthis!sleeponthecouch!
Watching 'Teach Yourself Circus!' videos at circus camp, I learned to juggle,
albeit groggy and disoriented. Only brightly coloured ***** at this point but I was up to seven tosses! While the freaks and geeks headed to carousels in the big top tent, I headed back to my dilapidated den leased on a broken Concord.
getoutbitchgetoutbitch
Back at camp ( hazy lazy crazy ) rivets affixed so I could only stare forward at the wall.
An e.ch-o-y sound in my
left ear
voice reverberating down thru
t
h
e
w
e
l
l
past
t
h
e
b u c
k e t
I turned my head,
slo-mo tracers flashed in warp speed,
glacial stares softened into slushy moss.
A buttery soft cashmere reply,
i'm sorry? what did you say?
you seem nice...
.
Infrastructure collapsed.
****
Gone.
Crumbled in a heap of rubble.
Impaled by rebar and rebar erections.
Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab.
Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab. Dab.
in a black plastic sack
And....then....
Who's to say about the linear sequence of events, anyway?
.
Mar 5, 2014
Mar 5, 2014 at 11:29 PM UTC
two masks made
two masks sent
t'was a very strange event
one was clay
broken and rent
the other
rebar and cement
the concrete gave
a passing stare
had it's nose up in the air
the clay had runnels
lines of care
it was no longer
smooth and fair
yes
the clay had lines
and runnels deep
from the tears
which it did weep
the Hand which made both
tried the hearts
the concrete face
staid its cold art
the mask of clay
shattered apart
the concrete looked on
in destain
she would never feel pain
gently, gently
the great Hand tended
the cracked restored
and quietly
mended
what had been
weak clay and mesh
was renewed
and made
flesh
concrete had smiled
was now made small
for she saw
the
wrecking ball
SoulSurvivor
(C) 5/16/2016
May 16, 2016
May 16, 2016 at 8:35 PM UTC
I want all the songs that give you goosebumps
to live on one single piece of wax, a low rumble
that spans acres, that stretches for miles in each
direction, that raises the skin of all who can see
and feel its grooves and pushes each of us to swim
in sound.
I want you to find all of the noises that pull you
and hold them in your heart as tightly as you gripped
the note I passed you in class complaining about
our professor's tenuous grasp of English grammar, the
ink sweating through the notebook paper and staining
your fingertips. Hold these noises in your heart and allow
the tones to imprint themselves inside your chest, next to
all your other organs.
I want you to sprawl yourself inside of all of this
calamitous cacophony such that you don't know
where your breath begins or if it's part of the melody
or the harmony or another part entirely that you've
never experienced or thought possible, like alto clef or
diminuendo or a vibration in your stomach that
snaps you back to exactly where you are, exactly
where you are.
I want you inside of all of the waves, inside all
of the resonating structures, like unreinforced
masonry and rebar after a larger earthquake
than any of us anticipated, like a tuning fork
standing tall in the middle of the city, like a
memory you can't get out of your head, like a
cold beachfront property sitting high atop
eroding ground.
I want you to reach over to the stereo and
pause before lowering the volume, thinking of
my face listening and falling in love with the
crashing of instruments and electronic tones
and I want you to know that when I was with
you I was inside of all of it, feeling the rough
edges and all the parts of it and dulling the pain
from your sharp angles jutting out in my direction
and I want you to put yourself in my head and think
what it would be like to have to avoid eye daggers and
unspoken thoughts.
I want you to fall inside of the music and allow
yourself to be pierced by its high treble and
shoved by its low bass and I want you to think of me
and how all the sounds are mine and how you will
never catch me sharing my records with you again
and how the needle pokes your fingertips when you
try to drop it and how that feels, bleeding on the
vinyl, alone.
Sep 18, 2013
Sep 18, 2013 at 8:09 PM UTC
Cracks in the foundation -
They don't make 'em like they used to. Chipped concrete, rusted rebar
Fading facade
I make facile arguments
Excuse myself
Blame mental illness
Blame the drugs, the molly years
Blame ****** (I don't choose life)
**** you,
Ian McGregor
Blame the ****** February weather
Blame the itchy sweater
That is life
If that truly is life then,
Become I conscientious objector?
Already live in Canada
Blame the city
Blame the *****
Blame yourself
They say we have agency
I grasp, I reach
But the fruits
Are bitter sweet
**** the bed honey
Like Spud lovely
Which lines do I keep?
And who to throw away?
Feb 24, 2016
Feb 24, 2016 at 8:22 PM UTC
It takes nine weeks for cement to cure
in good weather, and in bad weather,
years. It needs to be covered lightly
like a sheet over the face with a rebar
skeleton buried inside, the steel ribs
of wings cast into the settling stone.
The dust is the glue, it creates itself
and wonders how birth canals can
expand, and in nine months give way
to moving parts, to the sponge of organs
and cries so thick cicadas won’t
burrow there. Skin is merely
rice paper, not contained by concrete
but leaf etchings—delicate, illegible
scriptures buried in the archives.
Bars of light from the window push
around the floor there, as if they were
substantial, as if they had weight.
Feb 3, 2012
Feb 3, 2012 at 7:51 PM UTC
i remember the ruins
concrete and rebar
rain-slick and strewn
in the dark front yard
the hounds
they poured from the woods
and melted the ground
where the crowned one stood
my clothes were drenched
in chalky cinder
my hands were wedged
against the door
Nov 1, 2014
Nov 1, 2014 at 9:11 PM UTC
Foxfire you burn holes in my heart and fill them just the same,
covering my veins with glitter-dust and Ashes,
These ashes rebirth into something bigger,
Warming quilt of feather, Phoenix rising
Rising storm,
This thunder fills my lungs and fills my throat I want to sing. Bring.
I want to sing out the tar from my lungs
I want to paint this concrete with my love.
My lungs love
Doves to red and dug in deeper, Gold.
Accomplishing nothing just minor goals.
This coal can be painted with gold.
Coral reef, alveoli
These cables fill holes in me.
Rebar, concrete.
These fables fill my holes with gold.
Doves fill my heart's holes.
**Love
Is
Gold.**
Apr 19, 2017
Apr 19, 2017 at 4:19 AM UTC
A lick of the loon which
Boons in a frolic
All to soon
Dashes of the slower flower petals
All shining metal
A sign in between
These rocks that bash together
Cause small sparks
Amongst the stars
Are lights not of hope
But glimpses
Into a bleak mote
Rebar happenstance
Get your battle on
Lets dance
Past the windowsill babies weep
By their mothers feet
For the water has all dried up
Corn husk history parade
All the confetti has been burnt
To make
Ask the mirror what you can do for it
See what they'll say
Right back
Maybe nothing
Maybe something
Maybe
Everything
May 17, 2011
May 17, 2011 at 4:06 PM UTC
late, darkness falls not lightly
but nightly,
moon gathers up the fog,
to let a new damp cloak go again,
in the morning when,
the sun drags up and out,
from the grasses,
from the brush,
from the tallest reaching
arms that trees have to
dance with,
the veil,
before it returns to where the
stars applaud,
as meteors weave,
warp and weft
that make the next
days misty
morning drape
to soften the
harsh glare
and stare,
of the unkind,
of the concrete
blockheads,
who have rebar for brains,
of the makers of pain,
of the committed sharp cutters
who want
no softness, as that is where love
takes hold
while waiting late and lightly.
©DWE012014
Jan 24, 2014
Jan 24, 2014 at 11:13 PM UTC
Revel in the night, the smoke and liquid
The sound waves washing over your limber electric body
The wild lights spinning, tilting, bursting in and out of musky darkness
Trickling with sweat and industrial poison,
Dripping with loneliness and longing
Inhale the voices, howls and whispers brushing against your earlobes
Tingling your spine, swaying your future of marble, concrete and rebar
The night is organic. It grows in you.
Its fragrance blooms. You can taste its
Sweet vapid fingers on your tongue.
Its rhythm surging in your chest.
Swelling. Your blood cells rush it to the most desolate lighthouse
Of your soul. Even that last one, out beyond the craggy shores
Its light orbiting an ethereal void shrouded in icy fog
Let this floating torch warm even those derelict spiraling steps
Let it illuminate forgotten chambers cobwebbed and dank
Your life can wait. Your envelopes impregnated with bills
Your appointments, treadmill and alarms itch
Death will curate you through your museum of horrors
Your monochromatic 50 year yawn can resume at dawn
But not tonight. Tonight
Revel in the music, laughter, curves, leather, lips!
Abstracted desires - embodied, enraptured, erupting
Reincarnate like a drunken god
Dancing on a graveyard of dreams
Dec 29, 2017
Dec 29, 2017 at 2:33 AM UTC
Alacrity bespeaks entangled, entombed,
and entrapped Thai soccer team
diminishing strength barely allows,
but a whispered scream,
which rescue against all odds
(plucked out cavernous catacomb),
fast becoming a fading dream
vicariously agonizing to see
desperation and lads bravely brace,
helplessness predominating over initial
found alive break thru gain
promising grim destiny slowly doth erase
yet resignation impossible
to ignore written on every face
despite faux (cracking)
courageous front,
now severely testing grace
under underground solid state
rock geomorphology
necessitating stepped up pace
to rescue, sans race
against time encroaching threatened space
with predicted mon
soon meteorologists trace
with laser pointer predict
ominous incursion cave
at mercy of vulnerable flooding
worst case scenario, grave
nightmare predicament
in an attempt to save
youths with barely enough
strength to smile or wave
downgrading my own fear
being emotionally incommunicado
during prepubescence
pretending not to hear
clapping skeletal hands over each ear
to blot out hyper consciousness of glare
ring existence squelching
feeble effing dare
sputtering Nietzscheism at every turn
of the (ripped torn) page
airtight barricade against transformation
into manhood stage
fighting to the death
foaming at mouth dagger like
canine teeth savagely
evincing snarling rage,
no match for reinforced
rebar invisible cage
holding self hostage,
not enough money
to pay hefty ransom,
thus thine mental health
compromised, which
to this day still pay steep wage.
Jul 5, 2018
Jul 5, 2018 at 2:17 PM UTC
Walk on babe, the night will find you soon enough. But, do not give in so kindly- it seeks to play with you for 100 hours, or 100 years; perhaps 100 years and 100 hours, I don’t know…. my glasses fell off. The best way to say it: if the day is temporary, so are you, and the night will swallow everything, from common skin to rare hues.
Don’t pull your punches with nature! Don’t let that primeval smell defeat you or good God- get a kick out of you. Nature is the piece of furniture that you bought, not the other way ‘round. So, how do you feel? Icicle fingers, sap bearing veins, rebar arms, tenderloin body, washboard neck, prison gate mouth, airstrip nose, typhoon eyes, telephone ears, coniferous hair, freedom’s mind. You owe it to nature, she coddles you.
A funny thing, then: the lifetime of a dream. Where love, bliss, sorrow, *** are not unknown, but as uncanny as they can be. Old friends may sleep it off and give you a cheque and a kick out the front door, but don’t you know what you were in their beds for? It was something true, and if you were the only one to find it in that pile of quick/messy lovers, it is truer still. So walk on babe, the technicolour night has left you, but in its hazy laboured breath, it promised to return. It swore to explode all over you- what can you do in return?
Oct 18, 2020
Oct 18, 2020 at 1:54 PM UTC
Coals burn out in the city of ruin -
all rebar skeleton and ash
and running on fumes
No fire tonight
No spark to coax a flame
The wind set it all ablaze,
but left as soon as it came
Empty gas cans
and soggy matchsticks
litter an abandoned camp
All that's left to do
is to hit the road
Off to find a new home
and hope it explodes
Jan 9, 2017
Jan 9, 2017 at 2:36 AM UTC
Cars, Diesel trucks Motor bikes and Transit Buses, rebar and structural steel beams, sounds like fading sirens in the distance. Freeways and black topped school yards, city streets without enough tress, jails without enough beds.
Tents blocking sidewalks, cardboard castles where the forgotten go to smoke their prize.
You got millionares next to transients all waiting to be served. 6th and San Julian on another friday that happend to land on the 1st of the month.
Cops killing everybody, not even the innocent stand a chance, courtrooms sit silent as judges all retire to go play golf in the desert. Another innocent man awaits his execution, it'll be a grey day in hell when the blood of the wrong man soaks its entry way.
Beautiful girls and I mean Beautiful girls, start dancing as soon as they learn to walk in heels.
They know what works those filthy ******** who own everything and don't mind if you know it.
They want it this way.
They want her that way and her and her and even him.
City full of *** shops and not a dam thing left to smoke.
Cops still bust down doors like looters in a riot.
No ones has told them Nancy and her War is dead.
Leave where you left off right where you left it.
Lies don't deserve another chance.
I got a new way for you, I got to take some time to fill you in while pulling you out.
We are'nt going anywhere, this place wasn't built to explore.
See the mountain, see that tree stump, giants once ruled our world.
Aug 8, 2016
Aug 8, 2016 at 2:00 PM UTC
Left, right, left , right, left, right
add a 1/4 cup if this and a cup of that
clear the land, smooth it out, mark the ground to be built
you must do that to do that
Left, right, left, right
stir the dry before you add the wet
lay the rebar, pour the concrete
after you have do that now do this
left, right, left
Dec 5, 2014
Dec 5, 2014 at 2:18 PM UTC