"remodel" poems
Get out your sponges, stippling brushes and pens,
It’s time for makeover-Monday-night to begin.
Think Winky Lux, L’Oréal, Urban Decay,
Maybelline, Armani and Fabergé
It’s a black magic realm where brushes are wands,
where a carnival of colors are carefully crayoned.
We have palettes aplenty, in kaleidoscope hues,
to create fashion looks, both bold and subdued.
In the realm of makeup fashion, where trends never end,
we remodel each other - for fun - when we can.
Tonight, our new friend Jammie has come to watch us play,
and he even brought two bottles of chardonnay.
Lisa has a ‘Miss Rose’ case, like she saw in Bernadette Peters’
dressing room, on a backstage tour of the Shubert Theatre.
Konjac, Kabuki, Doe foots, Spoolie, Lisa’s got legit tools to use.
“When it comes to makeup,” she says, “always avoid dupes.”
That night I was the chosen face, the excited living canvas.
Lisa’s a practiced artist, her process is brisk and never tedious.
She painted my lips a crimson cherry, alluring and brightly sensuous,
my brows were moonlit art, my cheeks a midnight adumbrated edifice.
Lisa created a special look, where rebellious edge met elegance.
We took some snaps, then I washed it off - but Jammie was impressed!
Jun 6, 2023
Jun 6, 2023 at 10:51 PM UTC
3 may 17
sincerely hoping to tear this page out.
i promised myself i would never write about you because i know that once this pen grazes paper, the thought of you will be permanently engraved somewhere, and although not physically, but mentally and emotionally in the depths of my brain, figuratively.
my outlets these days are quite scarce. i tore out my sheets and tried to erase the thought of you, of our intimacy. but what i've ceased to comprehend is that it's not that simple. i can change my sheets, remove my posters, switch my nightlight, remodel my whole room, but, that doesn't change it. change the fact that you still consume my thoughts like a virus, spread throughout my body, filling my core to the brim with inadequacy.
i love you, i hate you.
it is a constant cycle of indecisiveness that floods me with feelings of deep desire, love, and infatuation, to the less constant but still present, feelings of rage, anger, pain, and resentment projected towards you.
i can't wait until the day.
the day when you are either out of my life for good...
or
prove to me that love still exists.
-v.la
Aug 24, 2018
Aug 24, 2018 at 11:58 PM UTC
You know those houses built over cliffs? Top halves built on stable ground, then wrapped over the edge to hang over oblivion- held up by the thickest, strongest, most trustworthy beams for an undoubtable support?
Replace the house with the "weight of the world," fill it with "emotional baggage," and nickname the whole thing as "the one who always gets away." Last but not least, those beams that hold it all together, that act as the anchor between the world and demolition? Make those dowel rods that we'll call faith, held together with what might be masking tape. They tremble with what we'll point out as fear.
This picture haunts my dreams, and I'm sure that it shows sometimes, but what I can see if I inspect real close is a strengthening faith. The broad support of your love is being nailed in beside my growing faith, the nails are of trust replacing the worn through bits of tape and giving fear no place. Everyday it builds stronger.
I'm replacing misconceptions with what I know as truth, I'm not the one who always gets away, I've always been pushed or thrown away, and all I've got as my foundation now is hope that the same won't happen again. While strength is building with more faith every day in new beginnings, in you, truth is cleaning house. Useless baggage thrown out, and a remodel to bring life back to what was dilapidated. How ironic and beautiful that the more strength is built up, the lighter I'm becoming.
Jan 16, 2013
Jan 16, 2013 at 3:31 AM UTC
a young girl
without a face
and without a name
means very little to this world;
this world that is obsessed
with faces and names,
appearances and labels.
anyone,
any girl,
who wants to be
someone
in this world
has to build a new face
out of plaster and paint
remodel and decorate
and has to create a new name
out of assumptions and stereotypes
bend and assimilate
because without a face
and without a name
you are nobody to this world.
but those girls without
faces and names,
without
painted stereotypes,
those of them
who don't want to be
something
to
this world,
but rather
someone
to
somebody,
don't need to become
anything,
except
for
themselves.
Sep 20, 2011
Sep 20, 2011 at 4:44 PM UTC
the only jeans with holes,
the polo shirt with "passionate peach" paint
from the kitchen remodel she wanted, the yard work shoes
these were the raiments he chose for his final drive, the one in "park"
in the garage, with the engine idling, its humming a monotonous lullaby
sung by compliant pistons
he wandered through the house
like a sated forager, looking at everything, for nothing,
old pictures on the walls--children, parents, one of himself,
the Yale mortar board tilting on a face who could
have been a stranger, and was, that last afternoon
books on shelves, mostly read, their stories now forgotten
even Moby **** his favorite--eight silent vertical letters
replacing a white whale he relentlessly pursued with Ahab
a sink with one small plate and the disposal's shining ring,
the burial ground for his last, uneaten meal
those were the visions he chose
before writing his notorious note,
"BYE, ALL MY PAPERS ARE IN THE ROLL TOP"
taking the keys from the peg, and taking his final steps
into the cluttered gray garage, to his 2011 Volvo
when some hand turned the key,
igniting a welcoming flame, a few intrusive notes
of a Beatles song came through the six speaking speakers
yanking something in his gut, pulling his hand
to the handle to open the door, to return to the house,
the pictures, the stories on the walls, but the other,
the right hand, ejected the CD, rejecting the beguiling voices
that would have him stay, for another dull, deaf day
he folded his hands in his lap,
allowed his chin to rest on his chest
where his eyes could see the holes in his threadbare denim
taking solace in the fact that he had chosen the right clothes
so those still in the house, yet in the blur called life
would have only whole and clean reminders of him
to fold neatly, and leave on the porch
for the Salvation Army
May 11, 2014
May 11, 2014 at 2:11 PM UTC
You told him how hands on your body make you feel like you're 18 again
The word no coating you like tissue paper armor in a thunderstorm
You told him how you stayed
Because you can't accuse someone of breaking and entering if you forgot to lock all the windows
You told him how one of the last firsts you had was torn away like old wallpaper in a house you weren't ready to remodel
He let himself in one day when your guard was down
And trust grew like dandelions
Wild and uninhibited
And it's hard to tell which hurt worse
Being broken into
Or letting him in
Allowing him to tour your wounds like a museum
And adding his work to the exhibit before leaving
May 2, 2017
May 2, 2017 at 12:32 PM UTC
To give me a voice is to give a flower to the wind.
To help me create beauty out of pain was unexpected, but I say thanks and thanks again. Though I do not know you anymore I sometimes close my eyes and hear your voice beyond the door. I remember whispers of better tomorrows and your lips faintly kissing the day away from my wearied cheek.
Though I do not know you anymore your ghosts live around me. They are there when I cannot breathe and push me further down, but recognizing their mistake they are the hand that helps me off the ground. They feed my darkest demons yet encourage my wildest dreams.
No longer do we speak, but your words are etched within my veins. Every wound screams like you while the beating in my ribcage echoes songs sung softly in your sweet tenor.
We do not go a day apart. Your actions stand firmly in my mind and your promises weave in and out of my heart.
To ask for a change would strip me of skin, muscle, and bone leaving nothing but an empty soul and meaningless name without a home.
No matter how hard I try I cannot relearn a language that has been ossified.
No matter how hard I try I cannot forget the eloquence of walking and running for the first time.
To step with brand new feet, to speak with a brand new tongue, is something that cannot be done.
I can remodel and refine this body and this mind, but traces of you will linger my friend.
To make another understand that I cannot love without loving you is to turn my life on end. And though I do not know you anymore this voice that you have made for me will send that flower flying over the seven seas.
Though I do not know you anymore I thank you for making me free.
Oct 7, 2013
Oct 7, 2013 at 12:06 AM UTC
You are my most violent Red
and I am your moodiest Gray.
We could paint the kitchen with my gloom,
smear your rage around each and every room
but who really has the time to remodel anyway?
Aug 3, 2013
Aug 3, 2013 at 8:05 PM UTC
The demonic string of voices follow,
My own dissipating shadow
The figure of me,
begins to remodel into something,
Torn down and hollow
A sense of never being alone,
There's always something demonic lurking behind,
My invisible shadow
It's beyond the ability of mine
No chance of escaping,
Having to surface what I've been facing
Loud in my ear,
Dim piano music performs
Flashes of the presence of evil
If it's demons or devils,
They cause me to fear and tremble
As they put upon their own judgment
beside my ear,
The clock is ticking my time is near
Sep 25, 2015
Sep 25, 2015 at 11:50 AM UTC
As I sit here wondering what I've done to deserve
All the hatred and all the nerve
I have finally decided from somewhere deep
that action is required cause talk is cheap
You promise to give; You promise to stay
And the heat of my lust turns my mind to clay
That you mold and remodel
into something that needs
nothing more for life
than your *** and bottle
And slowly the fear bleeds away
And slowly the tears flee away
And slowly night turns to day
And slowly everythings okay
Until the milk dries up.
Until the giver gives up.
Until the lust burns up.
Now the clay churns up.
Suprised? Not really.
Destroyed? Not fully.
Angry? Like the hottest fire on the hottest sun.
Action. This man's hallmark.
I'm leaving. I would have told you, but talk is cheap.
Apr 19, 2010
Apr 19, 2010 at 10:30 PM UTC
I have the special ability to spit spliced railroad tracks into all the right places. I Filled my ears with drainage tubes down complicated compliments through subway grates to visit the homeless man that believes in a better tomorrow. Because someone has to. Now I have never been on a subway, but the way your presence flows through my veins like a bullet in a barrel makes me feel that maybe i can be the one to deliver this moment. The moment that I was late for. Two years late. It took me a while to understand that the platform we have eloquently been slapping graffiti across will one day be our home. A home of every moment we have shared. Home has always been a place of here and there. I have never been able to stay in a specific longitude for more than a lifetime of awkward moments shared between a ********** and a clergy man. I choose to live in a mobile home. With wheels built off rotating personality disorders that refuse to believe in teamwork. We traveled through state borders leaving the past inside us for all to confide in. In my home, I have a room. I keep in there everything you don't know about. It builds comfort through my sternum. Exploding into my ribs that hug my organs with safety. Home is the place I want to be. My veins are electrical cords spitting energy though plywood walls charged with dreams about a remodel. A 4x2 for a spine stiff enough to support this bobble head of mine. My knee caps still need to be replaced at some point. They don't know how to walk in a straight line yet. Finding curves in my consciousness. Although Constructing this safe haven has been a Wreckless abandonment of everything I have learned from informercials at 4am. It started with a foundation of this will never go anywhere, transitioned into a tumbling saw blade crashing through dandelions for being so **** confusing. I still can't tell the difference between those and flowers. We ended here. In the dumpsters Bags I hide under my eyes. Full of memories from every time I said "I can sleep when I'm dead". Its all stuck in my head like a diamond plated dorito that was prized in a box for those who want more than good enough. So as I cough up my confidence I will sit next to you, on this subway, the one I have never been on. I will muster up some courage to honor all the good in you, and ask you simple questions like how was your day? What's your middle name? And where do you paint your home? Spray me across the definite realization that home is where you are.
Jun 8, 2014
Jun 8, 2014 at 4:16 PM UTC
Unwanted thoughts trespass and climb the attempted latched up gates of my mind every night and my house is too small for more dogs.
I'll tattoo on my forehead that my heart is dead and my soul is lost in your thick blanket fog.
I will remodel my studio apartment from a ******** into a tower so that you drain all of your power, finally never able to reach me again at all.
But too bad that I'm a coward and the hammer smashed my fingers and I knew that I would give up all along.
I know that I'll leave myself with the same wooden mess,
the same heavy chest,
and all the more bitter and sour.
I know there has to be a reason why I never feel naked
when I step into the shower
and I shouldn't be blaming you anymore.
Aug 13, 2014
Aug 13, 2014 at 3:00 AM UTC
At this time last year, I was a
mess that couldn’t be cleaned up
with the simple flick of the wrist
or with the sweep of a broom.
I have been moving and lifting furniture,
trying to remodel the abandoned corners
of my soul that haven’t been touched since he left.
It has proven to be therapeutic to me,
and has healed my heart in ways that
putting things in the metaphorical boxes
to ship off to far away places couldn’t do before.
I’ve been painting the walls in my newly hollowed ribcage
so the sound of my heartbeat can echo against
my bones once more, and not be held back by the stitches or
makeshift ties that barely held my brittle body together.
Jun 5, 2014
Jun 5, 2014 at 6:45 PM UTC
Reefs forming in the grain
chewed up by these hungry years.
Her heels crushing;
little petals into a brown bough,
Speckled like a tumbled shell,
From the handprints of many generations.
- - - - - - - - - - -
Glossy lacquer,
smeared on dark lips in steady
paintbrush strokes
Cold moulded clean-cut strips
clacking unerringly as her heels
skip across the artificial wood.
Aug 25, 2015
Aug 25, 2015 at 3:01 PM UTC
Young darling, you've emerged.
Innocence has abandoned you like a old-time lover.
Sweet girl, the remodeling of your soul is finally in progress.
I know you see it. I could hear your heart banging on the doors to be set free.
Little doll, be afraid.
This world is not what you glimpsed on the magic box.
Development is creeping in like a friendly bandit.
Gentle babe, it's time to add your revolution to history.
For your modification draweth closer.
Youngster, potential is your new spring of encouragement.
Refinement...your vision.
Isolated infant, don't move! Take off your chasity and give it to me now!
Blindly robbed, give me your virtue, open your hands and I'll fill it with the wonder of responsibility.
New time bloomer, welcome.
I honestly feel a great deal of sorrow for you.
You're not alone though. We're all chained to this thing called, change.
Yes change, our old friend, better known as constant.
I know I'm forcing a remodel, but you have no choice in this...we have no choice in this.
Oh my unseasoned meat, I feel it for you. This, this evolutionary transformation.
Enhanced by growth I'll leave you unrecognizable.
Charming child, this inevitable happen is going to kidnap your once free spirit, and lock it in a cage. Never more to be set free.
My sweet joyous juvenile, your obsession with smiles is going to cease. As I slowly decease you urge to run.
The bus is passing, so go stand in the middle.
You'll survive, but only by my tools.
First, trade, then transition, followed by adaption, up next you'll adjust. Add some innovation in there. To conclude your finishing touches will be your revised version.
Good luck, you'll need it. I know I did.
~Gabbriella with 2 b's~
Apr 8, 2018
Apr 8, 2018 at 8:29 AM UTC
My childhood house
has been ruined in a cheap remodel
I spent
15 years in that bedroom
hiding and hoping
to disappear
It worked -
now there's no trace of us left at all
Me and that room, both
far too small
(for what I was to become)
That sunroom-turned-hideout
has all it's guts on display
the red wires sparkling
in the light of day
The space it once held (for me)
a cavern of power, open now
adds itself to the lounge
creating space for others
Am I one with this room?
The fire that kept my wall warm in winter,
has been ripped apart
Gone with it,
the hole in the back of the chimney
where I had a cupboard for keeping rocks
The same cupboard
That wouldn't close
Even when jammed with books
Jammed close, because,
I feared I was watched through the crack
by some mysterious force
maybe even the whole world
in on it all
Gone;
is the laundry that Dad used as a darkroom
(his own hideaway)
the red lamp: a signal burning bright
summoning us to join his cause
Or be left behind
Gone;
is the hall door that was slammed for effect
Slammed over and over in a war that still wages on
Gone;
is the cube shower with the folding door
a place to cry without any sign
Gone;
Is the multi coloured lupins I planted in '96
hoping they would overtake all of the other ground
saying that YES I was here
and YES I was real
In.the.dirt.
But Dad is happy the Apple tree remains.
Jun 16, 2019
Jun 16, 2019 at 5:02 PM UTC
A wild forest is she, a covert forest is she
Donned in a sable jacket and thin-rimmed lenses
In this city jungle, to suffocate is the norm
But her presence is a breath of the freshest air
Air that stirs life in the corners of my lungs
In the hollows at the pit of my stomach
In my arteries, in all places until my puny fingertips
A wild forest, her sockets as designated firmaments
The palace of browns that blinded me, ensnared me
And when they curved into midnight crescents
I lost my breath, I missed a life beat
Her visage, a stunning union of night and day
A sight that douses a pleasing warmth on my frigid soul
And enlivening chills on my every bone
Honey-glossed dusty rose petals are her mouth
Their softness still yet to be known
With a smile so enthralling, laugh so riveting
Hers is the symphony that renders birds listening
Words that emulate soft rustles of juvenile leaves
Ironic how they placate and intensify quakes in my ribs
She is a sturdy tree, lacking beside crystalline skyscrapers
But her branches promise sojourn for my fatigued frame
A bed of grass drizzled with morning dew, her palms
Vines that I wish to braid my bi-colored locks, her fingers
And her skin, the bark my curious fingers want to trace
The surface where my nails desire to carve my name
And she, in her glorious entirety
Is a signal for the beginning of the stampede
Sending my gait unsteady
Cajoling my stone bricks to remodel its tracks
She is a wild forest amidst the bustling cities
A land of fertile soil with wild plants and flowers springing
From her chest, her wonderful mind
And I, once an eon of drought
Now an eager seed wishing to grow
With her healthy yellows and greens, I yearn to grow
Mar 30, 2018
Mar 30, 2018 at 4:20 AM UTC
I wish I could say
That I don't struggle every day
But most days I do.
For the negativity in my mind
Usually puts me in a bind
For a moment or two.
I constantly fight
To be cheerful and bright
Because deep down that's me.
I'll continue the crusade
Till these thoughts start to fade
And shape who I'll be.
Jun 1, 2016
Jun 1, 2016 at 8:44 PM UTC
you were just a boy -
teeth glistening, cheeks aching -
rehearsed politeness and combed hair --
poise and dignity,
an air of confidence circles you like a shark
phony boy,
made from cellophane;
talk a big game, go home and write lines you'll never say
you stay awake -
you don't really have a choice -
remodel your town, make it the place you long for it to be;
remodel yourself --
carve yourself from marble, aluminum boy
they used to call you adonis;
now, they call you nothing
you were only a boy
Jul 30, 2017
Jul 30, 2017 at 7:43 PM UTC
It has been resolved!
It is a crusted concept, inept and unabashed
It is the last call on a windy city tram to the south side
It is a favorite sports bar closed for remodel
The pleasant bliss of air and undisclosed favorites
I will finally extricate myself from the grips of Charybdis
I will continue on, my sail billowing with glee
the air is my fuel and neverrun empty
Can you give a piece of El Dorado to my newfound friend,
Can you give them the same happiness you promised me
and don't let them wonder too long
These unforgotten experiences that mean something to you--
It is an orange rind in the water, silently exfoliating the ions
It is a concrete structure undefined
All the stones that are friendly and snuggled intently against
the mold
I will find new homes in the volcanic chains and wonder about you
You will never again remember the same way who I am, just the faded constraints of the way I challenged your brain
Think of new things! See the trees as lungs
and breeeeaaaathing
You'll find that love in another chunk of god, no complaints for the weary
The kind and lovable axeman who cuts u--Pondicherry
I am a static mold and will rapidly extrue
All the magnificence of things that I cannot view
I am a rhythm of the heart, a beaming drum
I analyze the air and drink it like ***
Fermented love of god, give me no return
To give that which no man has earned
thank you,
sweet love
thank you for showing me something new.
Dec 3, 2018
Dec 3, 2018 at 7:18 PM UTC
To never be content with the life
You live and to be sorrowful and
So full of strife and unfulfilled dreams
To be an extra member of society
You live and dream to gain the role you desire
Yet never to be claimed is your remodel
Of earth and love and life as you would hope.
Jul 3, 2015
Jul 3, 2015 at 6:05 PM UTC
RGB colors mind scramble on your ceiling,
like in our closest amusement park.
Playing underneath it, unicorns and feelings,
making flesh shapes in the dark of your room.
Bioluminescent in its black sea,
I can't swim good but I ride the waves you send me.
You can't read but you're rather well read to me.
Promises wont break, but please bend me
over and over again.
When did I become this sober again?
You get me wanting
to remodel the homes that belong to lonely songs
only so that they can fit a king bed,
extra cool on my side because you're a furnace
that I huddle into and cherish earnestly.
You let me ramble run-ons and babble
or be still and mute, be it
swimming in space or silently disputing
but I can never stay quiet too long.
I can't ever hide whats wrong to you.
Or what's right, so I write to remind you
how beloved this is, unparalleled to whats behind
and how eager I am for what's ahead.
Jan 14, 2019
Jan 14, 2019 at 12:41 PM UTC
No more than sawdust on the floor,
these songs of praise
this turning lathe
this shaving of humanity.
I wait to see what morning brings and what the new day has to say about these songs we sing.
Praising Kings,
all well enough but there is other stuff to do
important stuff
more than enough to make the praising of a King,seem
something more or nothing less than luxury.
And luxury is in short supply,
The Kings have taken it,
that's why, and we,
the last knockings of a fractured society
still want to sing a song of praise.
In all my days I've never seen a King nor Queen who'd want to be
the last one knocking on the doors of this,
the wooden pegs that nail us shut within the cut off,if for, but of and because humanity has ceased to give a flying fig
it's got to big for its own boots
left behind the roots that gave the feet of man
the hands to change,remodel,mould another master plan
and I am
reaching for the knotted rope to wind around my neck,I hope
you'll sing a ****** song for me
a ballad would be praise indeed for us the ones we find in need
the deed is done
The King is dead
Long live the King echoes round the rope that swings around my swinging head
in the end
because it always was the end that lent me moments to despair of rotating silent,deathly pale and wondering, was this life fair
but here or there or anywhere you care to bring,
you sing
you praise,
ferment your days and build up hope but in effect you are the ones who swing upon the rope that chafes the skin
we never win
we always break down at the altar just before a mass is said
Long live the King who lived so long and now
The King is dead.
Aug 4, 2013
Aug 4, 2013 at 7:41 PM UTC
I'm malleable
I have years of experience
In moulding myself
To suit their needs and wants
Except mine
Cause i like everyone's smile
Except mine
I have boundless endurance
You dont need to test me for that
Just tell me who you want me to be
And i'm doubtlessly sure
That i wouldn't require
Any scrap of assistance
To pulverise myself
And then remodel my being
According to your precise specifications
Till you're completely happy
Take my guarantee
Aug 22, 2018
Aug 22, 2018 at 4:57 AM UTC