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"residual" poems
Hey, past me from so close yet seeming long ago... A knot from my sweater's bow I regret tying despite how unkempt the ribbons look hanging by my sides because now it's digging into my back The hair I can't decide if I want out where it's pretty and makes me look less like a generic nerd yet gets in my face and food and life The jeans I insist upon wearing without a belt even though their slipping down my **** may actually outweigh the pain of loosening the belt The tennis shoes I'm too attached to give up that emit a constant squeak, squeak, squeaking through the hallways whether it's caused by residual rain from outside or not The glasses, fond of slipping down my nose at frequent intervals, covered in smudges I rarely notice till they get out of hand The phone whose screen happened to crack at the most inopportune moment and takes forever to read my finger print The jacket that should be a highlighter blue but rather presents itself as a canvas of the week's tomato stains The face covered in acne- The stomach with fat instead of muscle- The arms lacking muscle- The legs with too much hair- I've always acknowledged that perfection is not possible, yet I have to at least try to strive I think, as I sit at my desk, fingers typing fragmented sentences, attempting to convey thoughts speeding too fast to grasp Yet, just a simple poem of reflection brings to light these numerous deficiencies, many of which I COULD fix were it not the invisible fiend upon whom I stamp the label-laziness These deficiencies, many of which aren't even noticed by those around me, some of whom are better some are worse But it's not as simple as that, I've known I can't just be "one of the people", I need to find something, some identity, some way out of my seemingly impossible to escape label of "just above average" In academics, in extracurricular activities, EVERYTHING, I seem to be at a stagnant I've done bad, I've done "just above average", but never above. What is the point if you get plenty of losses and plenty of "fine" but no victories? It's something about me though, somehow I believe, subconsciously, I'm impeding myself. I'm holding myself back. ... Why?
0
Nov 14, 2018
Nov 14, 2018 at 3:50 PM UTC
CynicalStrawberry
Holding Myself Back
Hey, past me from so close yet seeming long ago... A knot from my sweater's bow I regret tying despite how unkempt the ribbons look hanging by my sides because now it's digging into my back The hair I can't decide if I want out where it's pretty and makes me look less like a generic nerd yet gets in my face and food and life The jeans I insist upon wearing without a belt even though their slipping down my **** may actually outweigh the pain of loosening the belt The tennis shoes I'm too attached to give up that emit a constant squeak, squeak, squeaking through the hallways whether it's caused by residual rain from outside or not The glasses, fond of slipping down my nose at frequent intervals, covered in smudges I rarely notice till they get out of hand The phone whose screen happened to crack at the most inopportune moment and takes forever to read my finger print The jacket that should be a highlighter blue but rather presents itself as a canvas of the week's tomato stains The face covered in acne- The stomach with fat instead of muscle- The arms lacking muscle- The legs with too much hair- I've always acknowledged that perfection is not possible, yet I have to at least try to strive I think, as I sit at my desk, fingers typing fragmented sentences, attempting to convey thoughts speeding too fast to grasp Yet, just a simple poem of reflection brings to light these numerous deficiencies, many of which I COULD fix were it not the invisible fiend upon whom I stamp the label-laziness These deficiencies, many of which aren't even noticed by those around me, some of whom are better some are worse But it's not as simple as that, I've known I can't just be "one of the people", I need to find something, some identity, some way out of my seemingly impossible to escape label of "just above average" In academics, in extracurricular activities, EVERYTHING, I seem to be at a stagnant I've done bad, I've done "just above average", but never above. What is the point if you get plenty of losses and plenty of "fine" but no victories? It's something about me though, somehow I believe, subconsciously, I'm impeding myself. I'm holding myself back. ... Why?
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22
I wish stars grew in your skin Next to the oxygen humming in your lungs To thaw your stagnant blood So I could watch you orbit your part of the planet Three hundred miles away, Because your heart would then permeate faster than life's speed limit, Scaling all the mountains between us to Float in my peripherals like Residual Chernobyl radiation. Dancing hazily, Constant reminders of my past And the jenga monkey ladder to my future. I never liked being insignificant. Now please infect me with your cancer So you can't escape again.
0
May 6, 2015
May 6, 2015 at 9:17 PM UTC
elizabeth-o
Insecurities
I wish stars grew in your skin Next to the oxygen humming in your lungs To thaw your stagnant blood So I could watch you orbit your part of the planet Three hundred miles away, Because your heart would then permeate faster than life's speed limit, Scaling all the mountains between us to Float in my peripherals like Residual Chernobyl radiation. Dancing hazily, Constant reminders of my past And the jenga monkey ladder to my future. I never liked being insignificant. Now please infect me with your cancer So you can't escape again.
Continue reading...
15
In the divet between mountains Resides a wooden cabin – ostensibly an amalgamation of the scape Adroitly - I - quondam female warrior flit Down massive (ancient) hand-laid, hand-cut carved stone steps Bounding from contingent step onto the dense pad of turned soil Tacit compliance between gravity and soil holds footprints bound A compressed deflating crescendo as pace ignites with bounds Cadences of protuberant wildflowers and grasses erupt from swollen terra A winsome chromatic menagerie, dispersed in ecstatic fistfuls A venerably ancient ritual My nascent clandestine vocation Personally meted out - a beatification for my provisional sanctuary Along glacier-fed stream Lissome fingers shadow inert stalks –plucking dormant beginnings from their desiccated ligaments I am austere and unadorned save for a festoon of pyrite flecks trailing my semblance Residual gilding from my ante-meridian swim taken after requisite gathering of wild blackberries, goose berries, and rhubarb along oft-tamped path The sun, nestling into its requisite apex endorsed my completion I reclined into the hassock of soil, feeling the elements settle about with an embossment of my form Imposing verdure arched subtly as compressed soil beckoned hyperbolic flux As I lay within the basilica of opulent living columns replete with comestible bounty Lingering dew honed inflections of sacrosanct petrichor in unison with piquant clover Wild purple clover buds saccharinely tinted and inundated nestled nerves in mine cribriform plate Birds pitched and galloped through the frond tips and beyond in the lapis expanse Frequently snatching damselfly’s and assemblages of midges from their ephemeral drift Auspicious rays transcended stippled diaphanous gravid clouds Light inundated ether entered humbly into the cathedral oculus Pyrite speckled terrain beneath, and my bare gilded form above Cast a refracted aura about my sanctuary Precipitously the elusive vaporous embankment distended further Ashen atmospheric correspondence inaugurated liquescent sustenance to my mountain abode And I - Lingered beneath the descending gobbets, curls furled in a puddle Fresh topsoil cupping my corporal topographic contours Pressing blackberries into my mouth between smiles
0
Jan 26, 2014
Jan 26, 2014 at 9:13 PM UTC
meagan-moore
Diaspora Vocation
In the divet between mountains Resides a wooden cabin – ostensibly an amalgamation of the scape Adroitly - I - quondam female warrior flit Down massive (ancient) hand-laid, hand-cut carved stone steps Bounding from contingent step onto the dense pad of turned soil Tacit compliance between gravity and soil holds footprints bound A compressed deflating crescendo as pace ignites with bounds Cadences of protuberant wildflowers and grasses erupt from swollen terra A winsome chromatic menagerie, dispersed in ecstatic fistfuls A venerably ancient ritual My nascent clandestine vocation Personally meted out - a beatification for my provisional sanctuary Along glacier-fed stream Lissome fingers shadow inert stalks –plucking dormant beginnings from their desiccated ligaments I am austere and unadorned save for a festoon of pyrite flecks trailing my semblance Residual gilding from my ante-meridian swim taken after requisite gathering of wild blackberries, goose berries, and rhubarb along oft-tamped path The sun, nestling into its requisite apex endorsed my completion I reclined into the hassock of soil, feeling the elements settle about with an embossment of my form Imposing verdure arched subtly as compressed soil beckoned hyperbolic flux As I lay within the basilica of opulent living columns replete with comestible bounty Lingering dew honed inflections of sacrosanct petrichor in unison with piquant clover Wild purple clover buds saccharinely tinted and inundated nestled nerves in mine cribriform plate Birds pitched and galloped through the frond tips and beyond in the lapis expanse Frequently snatching damselfly’s and assemblages of midges from their ephemeral drift Auspicious rays transcended stippled diaphanous gravid clouds Light inundated ether entered humbly into the cathedral oculus Pyrite speckled terrain beneath, and my bare gilded form above Cast a refracted aura about my sanctuary Precipitously the elusive vaporous embankment distended further Ashen atmospheric correspondence inaugurated liquescent sustenance to my mountain abode And I - Lingered beneath the descending gobbets, curls furled in a puddle Fresh topsoil cupping my corporal topographic contours Pressing blackberries into my mouth between smiles
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34
The temple bell Silently calls my soul Echoes, all over the deep forest In prayers of silent lotus song Temple Waits Buddha too As the pond whispers From the surface calm Alone in the deep forest, I am prostrate in devotion And search Before your shore's Of love, life and living Laboriously moving, in every steps of sigh, Pregnant with leaves, roots and Residual karmic earth -Lotus pond in deep in thought- Wondering why The flowers have to wither and fall Before fruits can burst forth; in living Why love and loss results, only in the end, An acceptance, Cowering in depths of empty soul? Why Life regains calm, Only, after It has flowered through pain And bonds? Why Lotus can only flower After breaking through -The sludge of senses, In the depths of love From the depths of pond The laughing Buddha Smiles With laughter in His heart Pond, all alone, in the darkness of night Softly sighs Goes back to living On the temple’s Shore Yet! The silent Buddha Is not so silent, you see Just listen with laughter in your heart The lotuses do sing The beautiful life's love song
0
Dec 25, 2010
Dec 25, 2010 at 11:37 AM UTC
shashi
The Lotus Pond
The temple bell Silently calls my soul Echoes, all over the deep forest In prayers of silent lotus song Temple Waits Buddha too As the pond whispers From the surface calm Alone in the deep forest, I am prostrate in devotion And search Before your shore's Of love, life and living Laboriously moving, in every steps of sigh, Pregnant with leaves, roots and Residual karmic earth -Lotus pond in deep in thought- Wondering why The flowers have to wither and fall Before fruits can burst forth; in living Why love and loss results, only in the end, An acceptance, Cowering in depths of empty soul? Why Life regains calm, Only, after It has flowered through pain And bonds? Why Lotus can only flower After breaking through -The sludge of senses, In the depths of love From the depths of pond The laughing Buddha Smiles With laughter in His heart Pond, all alone, in the darkness of night Softly sighs Goes back to living On the temple’s Shore Yet! The silent Buddha Is not so silent, you see Just listen with laughter in your heart The lotuses do sing The beautiful life's love song
Continue reading...
48
My Prize for Waiting ~ *tucked in all by myself, resting dark and quiet in the thin place^ where the distance between this world and the next, is no distance at all, but  a few inches separating, easily fordable, back and forth-able my palms, hands down, come to rest on my ******* and the two thumbs in unison, begin to sweep the streaming space of their in-between, conducting a radar sweep-search for the precise point passageway to poetic mystical places, hoping to snag any residuals for safekeeping no hurry to either arrive or depart, in patient attendance for rhythms of woven word arrivistes, coming in no particular order, asking to be seized, greedy to be nominated and recognized, immortalized, as great poetry, prize worthy, kept for all time inside others poetry chests but in the thin place, dream records are not kept, hazy scraps at best retained, a recipe for a witnessed totality, is only a soupy reduction of a few seconds of hazed video, that can neither give nor get no satisfaction the plastic surgeons attempt to reconstruct the body of the meal, the real deal, alas, there are no prizes either for botched surgeries and pretty but meaningless poetry scraps the only evidence of my travels, a flushing, blushing residual flow, slow to dissipate, a hangover makers mark of a sojourn best described as unsatisfying, my blush, a prize for waiting but failing, “the most peculiar and most human of all expressions”^^ woe to me when returned in ignominy, medaled in only base irony, me and philosopher Pliny,^^^ both dying while recording our own private Vesuvius, our bodies preserved by voluminous volcanic ash, but alas, you cannot recite the ash of poetry so one waits, cut and pasting brown edged burnt photographs epistles, that are clinging and clung to the distaff spindle, insufficient to weave a flax complete and yet we return perforce twenty four hours from now, to snag another prized piece of meaningless, my prize for waiting in the solitude of the thin place* 3:35am Saturday April 6th, 2019 ~ last nights scrap ***cease your whining, seize your waiting, therein is your own paid price for the prize of inspiration*** inspired by Jean Fisher, a real prize winning poet
0
Apr 6, 2019
Apr 6, 2019 at 4:26 AM UTC
nat-lipstadt
My Prize for Waiting
My Prize for Waiting ~ *tucked in all by myself, resting dark and quiet in the thin place^ where the distance between this world and the next, is no distance at all, but  a few inches separating, easily fordable, back and forth-able my palms, hands down, come to rest on my ******* and the two thumbs in unison, begin to sweep the streaming space of their in-between, conducting a radar sweep-search for the precise point passageway to poetic mystical places, hoping to snag any residuals for safekeeping no hurry to either arrive or depart, in patient attendance for rhythms of woven word arrivistes, coming in no particular order, asking to be seized, greedy to be nominated and recognized, immortalized, as great poetry, prize worthy, kept for all time inside others poetry chests but in the thin place, dream records are not kept, hazy scraps at best retained, a recipe for a witnessed totality, is only a soupy reduction of a few seconds of hazed video, that can neither give nor get no satisfaction the plastic surgeons attempt to reconstruct the body of the meal, the real deal, alas, there are no prizes either for botched surgeries and pretty but meaningless poetry scraps the only evidence of my travels, a flushing, blushing residual flow, slow to dissipate, a hangover makers mark of a sojourn best described as unsatisfying, my blush, a prize for waiting but failing, “the most peculiar and most human of all expressions”^^ woe to me when returned in ignominy, medaled in only base irony, me and philosopher Pliny,^^^ both dying while recording our own private Vesuvius, our bodies preserved by voluminous volcanic ash, but alas, you cannot recite the ash of poetry so one waits, cut and pasting brown edged burnt photographs epistles, that are clinging and clung to the distaff spindle, insufficient to weave a flax complete and yet we return perforce twenty four hours from now, to snag another prized piece of meaningless, my prize for waiting in the solitude of the thin place* 3:35am Saturday April 6th, 2019 ~ last nights scrap ***cease your whining, seize your waiting, therein is your own paid price for the prize of inspiration*** inspired by Jean Fisher, a real prize winning poet
Continue reading...
67
Every time we speak I feel like things are looking up, no matter what we speak of, a residual glow is left behind, pineapple cake and birthday wishes; perhaps we can move to new york after all. Perhaps this will not be forever. Drawing lessons and 1 am photos are what is keeping me alive right now, a protective world to shield me from the sandpaper reality And I hope to god that when I call you at midnight you feel the same.
0
Dec 21, 2014
Dec 21, 2014 at 11:18 PM UTC
miriamblaylock
Pineapple Cake
Every time we speak I feel like things are looking up, no matter what we speak of, a residual glow is left behind, pineapple cake and birthday wishes; perhaps we can move to new york after all. Perhaps this will not be forever. Drawing lessons and 1 am photos are what is keeping me alive right now, a protective world to shield me from the sandpaper reality And I hope to god that when I call you at midnight you feel the same.
Continue reading...
11
The streets are clear, we're hydrophobic Hoods propped by hats and socks pulled high; The rain brings peace to the agoraphobic Puddles form moats and clouds fill the sky. Splash, droplets hit the window, chauffeured by the gale outside. Squint your eyes and flash back boats tilt starboard, with the tide. The captain shouts to the decks, paranoid 'Clear the decks and brace for impact' Without turbulence we are disenfranchised Boredom becomes us when we're boring. Shake it off and stare at the dot to dot the residual carving of water as it slides Another droplet falls beside it, parallel it aligns, growling thunder overhead. Without stirring we are robotic workforces Without awaking we are left inside The constructs created for us, by corporate- conglomerate elitist-psychopaths. Two drops of water on the window simmer red with burning anger. Crash lightening sears the sky Rage becomes you, girders melt. The starry night undercurrent, flings us backwards, never up, as democracies which seek to serve sink into a sea of stocks and shares, the wall street journal sits atop the captains lobby, economies were meant to tumble as the working classes fumble for bread, men in suits gaggle and toast to the millions they left for dead. Resistance is futile, when eighty-five of the richest suit owners sit on currency that was meant for the three point five billion who aren’t driven by gluttony.
0
Nov 7, 2014
Nov 7, 2014 at 12:51 PM UTC
zacolian
Chrysalism
The streets are clear, we're hydrophobic Hoods propped by hats and socks pulled high; The rain brings peace to the agoraphobic Puddles form moats and clouds fill the sky. Splash, droplets hit the window, chauffeured by the gale outside. Squint your eyes and flash back boats tilt starboard, with the tide. The captain shouts to the decks, paranoid 'Clear the decks and brace for impact' Without turbulence we are disenfranchised Boredom becomes us when we're boring. Shake it off and stare at the dot to dot the residual carving of water as it slides Another droplet falls beside it, parallel it aligns, growling thunder overhead. Without stirring we are robotic workforces Without awaking we are left inside The constructs created for us, by corporate- conglomerate elitist-psychopaths. Two drops of water on the window simmer red with burning anger. Crash lightening sears the sky Rage becomes you, girders melt. The starry night undercurrent, flings us backwards, never up, as democracies which seek to serve sink into a sea of stocks and shares, the wall street journal sits atop the captains lobby, economies were meant to tumble as the working classes fumble for bread, men in suits gaggle and toast to the millions they left for dead. Resistance is futile, when eighty-five of the richest suit owners sit on currency that was meant for the three point five billion who aren’t driven by gluttony.
Continue reading...
36
the simple true                                    |                                                                                        vs. absurd ******** water        on mars                                  points to the future of the dead earth; Fascists vs. aliens                                |  complete fossils of advanced                                                                hominids found miles                                                                deep below [              ]                                                                the Martian surface [but w/ no signs                                                                of engineering or built structures] questions w/ no answers                      | what kind of society did        Martians have: dictatorship, democracy or empire     & what kind of poetry did they write:                        searching for the great epic poet of Mars      beginning by digging straight down           past the fossil record coming upon an entirely        other set of structures & fossils dated         thousands  of years                     before those previously found                       & further down,        more advanced forms of society              at the deepest strata advanced electronics &          technology appears         w/ less & less hominid forms,       n        still w/no evidence of written         poetry                                                                                                                                  |                                   Martian poetry may have been oral; so in                                   setting up sound meters to detect                    residual radio-sound waves,      the history of sound can be                    recorded & focused on any one particular voice or several:                    from this we detect recited verse no matter how far back it was uttered; in truth, the older the better as it's easier to distinguish                                     & isolate the particular voice from ambient rhythms
0
Jul 25, 2018
Jul 25, 2018 at 8:24 PM UTC
johnny-noiπ
The Poetry of Mars
the simple true                                    |                                                                                        vs. absurd ******** water        on mars                                  points to the future of the dead earth; Fascists vs. aliens                                |  complete fossils of advanced                                                                hominids found miles                                                                deep below [              ]                                                                the Martian surface [but w/ no signs                                                                of engineering or built structures] questions w/ no answers                      | what kind of society did        Martians have: dictatorship, democracy or empire     & what kind of poetry did they write:                        searching for the great epic poet of Mars      beginning by digging straight down           past the fossil record coming upon an entirely        other set of structures & fossils dated         thousands  of years                     before those previously found                       & further down,        more advanced forms of society              at the deepest strata advanced electronics &          technology appears         w/ less & less hominid forms,       n        still w/no evidence of written         poetry                                                                                                                                  |                                   Martian poetry may have been oral; so in                                   setting up sound meters to detect                    residual radio-sound waves,      the history of sound can be                    recorded & focused on any one particular voice or several:                    from this we detect recited verse no matter how far back it was uttered; in truth, the older the better as it's easier to distinguish                                     & isolate the particular voice from ambient rhythms
Continue reading...
31
how we dress up the imperfect parts of ourselves presentable flowered smile. lies cracked porcelain good morning in a broken jaw breakfast line barefoot pipeline running the secret underfoot the railroad's coming and ain't nobody talking no, ain't nobody telling a soul sell off the parts of you that you have no use for but where does it stop sticking to you? memories, residual dew of choices and transitions clarity of the third person, but who is that? wandering the sleeping shores of Sunday on cracked feet and torn sails flowing strong in the strange wind blowing through the trees. sail my ship to shore by candlelight reflected endlessly across the water cavernous echoes echoes in the depth don't lose your heart in the caves of tomorrow searching for sunshine again with a lingering song in my heart
0
Feb 8, 2015
Feb 8, 2015 at 6:50 PM UTC
adamstruble
Caves of Tomorrow
how we dress up the imperfect parts of ourselves presentable flowered smile. lies cracked porcelain good morning in a broken jaw breakfast line barefoot pipeline running the secret underfoot the railroad's coming and ain't nobody talking no, ain't nobody telling a soul sell off the parts of you that you have no use for but where does it stop sticking to you? memories, residual dew of choices and transitions clarity of the third person, but who is that? wandering the sleeping shores of Sunday on cracked feet and torn sails flowing strong in the strange wind blowing through the trees. sail my ship to shore by candlelight reflected endlessly across the water cavernous echoes echoes in the depth don't lose your heart in the caves of tomorrow searching for sunshine again with a lingering song in my heart
Continue reading...
20
I realized I was definitely Capable of loving more than one person As I stood ****** in a bar Positioned at a table between My partner and my ex-fiance My ex and I had gotten food beforehand My first time seeing them in a year and a half And I swore to everyone that it wasn't gay I believed it too for awhile Up until they said they didn't want kids Which was part of my own logic used To explain our incompatibility Hearing their stories made my heart ache All of the things I'd missed in their life All the things they missed in mine Then that night at the bar When a performer was called on stage My ex mentioned that she was my favorite A small fact I didn't think they'd remember Yet it carried such a significant feeling That left my heart heavy and fractured And when my partner looked at me I felt guilty They must be able to see it To sense it These residual feelings That I swore were not there and were Definitely not gay And while lost in my mind My ex looked at me and asked if I was ok They could still see me I wanted to run away My mind kept screaming for an escape And yet I also heard a whispered voice Reminding me that this time with them Would be the last quality time I'd have Before we returned to being strangers So I shouldn't waste it Because as much as I crave their friendship I know in my heart it'd never work Friends would never be the word It's always been and Probably always would be Something much more than that So I'll let it go I'll let myself mourn these feelings Despite the dreadful pain of it all Because we all deserve to be happy And by giving up this ill-fated dream I know one day I can be
0
Feb 10, 2019
Feb 10, 2019 at 7:46 PM UTC
Nicol-g
I Love Them Too
I realized I was definitely Capable of loving more than one person As I stood ****** in a bar Positioned at a table between My partner and my ex-fiance My ex and I had gotten food beforehand My first time seeing them in a year and a half And I swore to everyone that it wasn't gay I believed it too for awhile Up until they said they didn't want kids Which was part of my own logic used To explain our incompatibility Hearing their stories made my heart ache All of the things I'd missed in their life All the things they missed in mine Then that night at the bar When a performer was called on stage My ex mentioned that she was my favorite A small fact I didn't think they'd remember Yet it carried such a significant feeling That left my heart heavy and fractured And when my partner looked at me I felt guilty They must be able to see it To sense it These residual feelings That I swore were not there and were Definitely not gay And while lost in my mind My ex looked at me and asked if I was ok They could still see me I wanted to run away My mind kept screaming for an escape And yet I also heard a whispered voice Reminding me that this time with them Would be the last quality time I'd have Before we returned to being strangers So I shouldn't waste it Because as much as I crave their friendship I know in my heart it'd never work Friends would never be the word It's always been and Probably always would be Something much more than that So I'll let it go I'll let myself mourn these feelings Despite the dreadful pain of it all Because we all deserve to be happy And by giving up this ill-fated dream I know one day I can be
Continue reading...
49
Day's end, sun's caisson doth wend Residual rays a respite to append Twilight's shroud dreary dividend Swirls of gray into firmament blend Vestments of light shed sacral veil Luna's naked, pale orb flashes its spell Twinkling sprites across dark tides sail Constellation's mystical portents braille Nyx, Erebos eclipse Hemera's blithe melody with bass duet  Earth's warmed bed yields its thermal blanket Ocean tides move in rhythmic tandem to cadence of lunar clarinet Swarming shadows stalk each footstep paring each dark secret    Greek gods Nyx: goddess of Night Erebos: goddess of Darkness Hemera: goddess of Day
0
Sep 15, 2011
Sep 15, 2011 at 6:35 AM UTC
stephen-parker
Night's Hypnotic Trance
Day's end, sun's caisson doth wend Residual rays a respite to append Twilight's shroud dreary dividend Swirls of gray into firmament blend Vestments of light shed sacral veil Luna's naked, pale orb flashes its spell Twinkling sprites across dark tides sail Constellation's mystical portents braille Nyx, Erebos eclipse Hemera's blithe melody with bass duet  Earth's warmed bed yields its thermal blanket Ocean tides move in rhythmic tandem to cadence of lunar clarinet Swarming shadows stalk each footstep paring each dark secret    Greek gods Nyx: goddess of Night Erebos: goddess of Darkness Hemera: goddess of Day
Continue reading...
16
If every button on your blouse and jeans Were the knobs of the doors Of the Budget Inn I would wrap my hand around them forcefully And twist and turn until I finally gained entry. And if the unwashed comforters That cover the soiled beds Were your eager lips I would jump into them Until the stains left by other lovers Made their mark on my skin In the form of broken blood vessels And residual lipstick. And if the thin pages of the Dust-covered bible tucked into the nightstand Were every word you whispered Before sinking your teeth into my skin I would rip out every page And paste them over the peeling wallpaper So that I would be able to read them Again and again and again Until I finally believed That more than failed religion Could bring me to my knees.
0
Aug 31, 2013
Aug 31, 2013 at 4:24 PM UTC
asphyxiophilia
The Budget Inn
If every button on your blouse and jeans Were the knobs of the doors Of the Budget Inn I would wrap my hand around them forcefully And twist and turn until I finally gained entry. And if the unwashed comforters That cover the soiled beds Were your eager lips I would jump into them Until the stains left by other lovers Made their mark on my skin In the form of broken blood vessels And residual lipstick. And if the thin pages of the Dust-covered bible tucked into the nightstand Were every word you whispered Before sinking your teeth into my skin I would rip out every page And paste them over the peeling wallpaper So that I would be able to read them Again and again and again Until I finally believed That more than failed religion Could bring me to my knees.
Continue reading...
25
The first burnt burst of roasting beans brings sorrow All at once memories of yesterday outweigh residual wonderment at tomorrow The troubles of people who may be countries away slink over individual concerns. Without being able to help it the world is suddenly covered with shadow Dark oily patches blocking out early morning sunshine The reasonable you scoffs, the sensitive you sighs. The carton of eggs isn't the right combination of free range organic fed lies, the toast is enriched and bleached And you're eating it anyway. Even the soy milk you pour into your coffee because the right kind of milk isn't cruelty free Caused deforestation somewhere miles across a sea. You don't even want to think about the morality of the crispy bacon And suddenly your morning is a dilemma of humanity. But **** all you wanted was a simple cup of coffee.
0
Jan 22, 2014
Jan 22, 2014 at 3:55 PM UTC
kelly-oconnor-1
Coffee
The first burnt burst of roasting beans brings sorrow All at once memories of yesterday outweigh residual wonderment at tomorrow The troubles of people who may be countries away slink over individual concerns. Without being able to help it the world is suddenly covered with shadow Dark oily patches blocking out early morning sunshine The reasonable you scoffs, the sensitive you sighs. The carton of eggs isn't the right combination of free range organic fed lies, the toast is enriched and bleached And you're eating it anyway. Even the soy milk you pour into your coffee because the right kind of milk isn't cruelty free Caused deforestation somewhere miles across a sea. You don't even want to think about the morality of the crispy bacon And suddenly your morning is a dilemma of humanity. But **** all you wanted was a simple cup of coffee.
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15
I was raised by a pack of fools Who proclaim Caucasians are the best. And are glad to fight, at the drop of a hint To put the whole matter to the test. They have an entire joke routine And descriptive names they repeat In minimizing and insisting that Their right to decent treatment isn’t real. There are references to some animals And unfunny comments about color. The statements about characteristics Of body and features always go together With a special set of gross anecdotes To cover any kind of non-Christian belief. And the refusal to consider equality As a decent attitude stands in bright relief. Beneath all this horror, not very deep, Lies a sickening river of hate and fear That fails to improve as education is Rejected year after disgusting year. Pointing out the error of their ways Might earn you a punch in the eye But the bigot hangs on to their rage And never gives fellowship a try. The American Bigot claims to be A staunch Christian all the way through Which forces them to hate and cheat And lie as much as Jesus would do. Of course, we know that Jesus was A preacher of love and acceptance But it seems that bigots never quite Made that Jesus’ acquaintance. So, here we can see we need to add Some terms to this kind of individual Whose relationship to peace and love Is at best slight, scant and residual. We also need to append to their titles Of masters of anger fear and prejudice The unhealthy pallor of indecency, Dishonesty, inhumanity and cowardice.
0
Apr 4, 2016
Apr 4, 2016 at 11:33 PM UTC
brent-kincaid
BIGOTRY 101
I was raised by a pack of fools Who proclaim Caucasians are the best. And are glad to fight, at the drop of a hint To put the whole matter to the test. They have an entire joke routine And descriptive names they repeat In minimizing and insisting that Their right to decent treatment isn’t real. There are references to some animals And unfunny comments about color. The statements about characteristics Of body and features always go together With a special set of gross anecdotes To cover any kind of non-Christian belief. And the refusal to consider equality As a decent attitude stands in bright relief. Beneath all this horror, not very deep, Lies a sickening river of hate and fear That fails to improve as education is Rejected year after disgusting year. Pointing out the error of their ways Might earn you a punch in the eye But the bigot hangs on to their rage And never gives fellowship a try. The American Bigot claims to be A staunch Christian all the way through Which forces them to hate and cheat And lie as much as Jesus would do. Of course, we know that Jesus was A preacher of love and acceptance But it seems that bigots never quite Made that Jesus’ acquaintance. So, here we can see we need to add Some terms to this kind of individual Whose relationship to peace and love Is at best slight, scant and residual. We also need to append to their titles Of masters of anger fear and prejudice The unhealthy pallor of indecency, Dishonesty, inhumanity and cowardice.
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40
Desperate plea escapes from inside You're on the brink and I'm a surfer Riding those residual waves back to shore
0
Jul 31, 2015
Jul 31, 2015 at 11:45 AM UTC
RhetoricalCuriosity
Wake of the surf
Desperate plea escapes from inside You're on the brink and I'm a surfer Riding those residual waves back to shore
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3
In a forest, where bird songs are silencers to a pistol and their feathers are scattered hopes, like broken dreams are to fantasies, I sit. I stretch my arms, wide enough to fit grief and happiness in my muddy hands that I use to bury unspoken apologies and eulogies for days I have not yet lived. I begin to stare aimlessly at the sky trying to spot the night moon. Its silhouette, that I trace with my finger. I've drawn And in the folds of the night, I hold you close like day does dawn. I let your depression stain my cheeks and see it drip between the gaps in my teeth, sting my gum, and so your language interweaves itself upon wounded scars on my tongue, so when i return back home, i return with the same cuts identical to your tongue that you hung I don't want to sound too much of a stranger to you when I talk thus tonight, I’ll choose to tie happiness to things that have asked for no such burden and stictch my lips silent to silence our silent violence. My eyes bounce back at the hazy sky as if it’ll tame your inner broken and mould it into a less wild creature more civil, more mature less aggressive, less of a spirit Your spirit appears in the bezels of my mind my trachea catches fire burning deep into my whines , my breath disappearing into a silent hymn in the dull light and watch my tongue chameleonize into a trillion hues of white until my tongue becomes a graveyard for all my white lies Until pain becomes a part of my diet, until I'm able to chew the residual images of a broken girl, until her sadness becomes the air I breathe until her inner warrior becomes the battle field never fought in until I'm able to swallow sadness when chugged down my throat, until I'm able to befriend your wild.
0
Apr 2, 2018
Apr 2, 2018 at 7:47 AM UTC
Anoniiimuus
song to the forest
In a forest, where bird songs are silencers to a pistol and their feathers are scattered hopes, like broken dreams are to fantasies, I sit. I stretch my arms, wide enough to fit grief and happiness in my muddy hands that I use to bury unspoken apologies and eulogies for days I have not yet lived. I begin to stare aimlessly at the sky trying to spot the night moon. Its silhouette, that I trace with my finger. I've drawn And in the folds of the night, I hold you close like day does dawn. I let your depression stain my cheeks and see it drip between the gaps in my teeth, sting my gum, and so your language interweaves itself upon wounded scars on my tongue, so when i return back home, i return with the same cuts identical to your tongue that you hung I don't want to sound too much of a stranger to you when I talk thus tonight, I’ll choose to tie happiness to things that have asked for no such burden and stictch my lips silent to silence our silent violence. My eyes bounce back at the hazy sky as if it’ll tame your inner broken and mould it into a less wild creature more civil, more mature less aggressive, less of a spirit Your spirit appears in the bezels of my mind my trachea catches fire burning deep into my whines , my breath disappearing into a silent hymn in the dull light and watch my tongue chameleonize into a trillion hues of white until my tongue becomes a graveyard for all my white lies Until pain becomes a part of my diet, until I'm able to chew the residual images of a broken girl, until her sadness becomes the air I breathe until her inner warrior becomes the battle field never fought in until I'm able to swallow sadness when chugged down my throat, until I'm able to befriend your wild.
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24
Fertile earth’s seductive sorcery Like ephemeral effulgence’s effluent effusion Can lead you to believe that it’s not a travesty Like life’s visceral intuitive eternal is not lost in subtle evasive confusion Life’s virile translucence reflects this glow Like an aorist ensemble of interludes transposition Can lead you to believe that you’re in the know Like omnipresence presages omniscience’s ubiquity is existential exigency’s peroration’s exposition Corporeally preternatural metaphysical mystique Like a mirador bartizan tableau panorama Can inspire us to rise above its critique Like spatiotemporal’s telemetry incarnate is creation’s vivid intrepid cyclorama Spectral verve’s liaison’s consortium Like eclectic synectic’s conclave’s fatidic Can leave you lost in germane compendium Like terminus thrall’s apriori inclination is transcendental accession’s endemic mnemonic Monad’s transitional majestic splendor Like residual harmonic vibration’s resilience Can autonomously evoke and vicariously render Like rubato’s actuator’s prospectus revealed is orchestration rendition’s intriguing brilliance Eidetic preterit’s aesthetic amendments Like protractive analyses’ dimensional delineation Can lead to cogent salacious enticements Like phantasmagoria’s fantasia fantastication’s magniloquence is sultry solace’s ostentatious ideation
0
Jan 12, 2013
Jan 12, 2013 at 8:07 PM UTC
toreinss-pinwinkel-iii
Verbose
Fertile earth’s seductive sorcery Like ephemeral effulgence’s effluent effusion Can lead you to believe that it’s not a travesty Like life’s visceral intuitive eternal is not lost in subtle evasive confusion Life’s virile translucence reflects this glow Like an aorist ensemble of interludes transposition Can lead you to believe that you’re in the know Like omnipresence presages omniscience’s ubiquity is existential exigency’s peroration’s exposition Corporeally preternatural metaphysical mystique Like a mirador bartizan tableau panorama Can inspire us to rise above its critique Like spatiotemporal’s telemetry incarnate is creation’s vivid intrepid cyclorama Spectral verve’s liaison’s consortium Like eclectic synectic’s conclave’s fatidic Can leave you lost in germane compendium Like terminus thrall’s apriori inclination is transcendental accession’s endemic mnemonic Monad’s transitional majestic splendor Like residual harmonic vibration’s resilience Can autonomously evoke and vicariously render Like rubato’s actuator’s prospectus revealed is orchestration rendition’s intriguing brilliance Eidetic preterit’s aesthetic amendments Like protractive analyses’ dimensional delineation Can lead to cogent salacious enticements Like phantasmagoria’s fantasia fantastication’s magniloquence is sultry solace’s ostentatious ideation
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24
Sanded down, handed down heirlooms for boardrooms. Directors prospecting for antique positions, commission based, cyanide laced contracts, small print that annihilates, dilating the pupils ,restrictive and pencils that scribble out names in a ledger. Forever indebted, a debit individual. All residual profit reinvested, future proofed heirlooms.
0
Jan 2, 2015
Jan 2, 2015 at 1:48 PM UTC
john-edward-smallshaw
Carpentry for novices
Sanded down, handed down heirlooms for boardrooms. Directors prospecting for antique positions, commission based, cyanide laced contracts, small print that annihilates, dilating the pupils ,restrictive and pencils that scribble out names in a ledger. Forever indebted, a debit individual. All residual profit reinvested, future proofed heirlooms.
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19
shaken down to the deck together on the program the sky is still looming overhead bright disconnect coldness in star blue brilliance drink the source these are our symbols blossoming beautiful orb set aflame in the sky and Luna his reflection through the trees i can kiss her residual starshine keeping it together while falling apart at the seams
0
Oct 5, 2014
Oct 5, 2014 at 2:18 PM UTC
adamstruble
journey to the source pt.3
shaken down to the deck together on the program the sky is still looming overhead bright disconnect coldness in star blue brilliance drink the source these are our symbols blossoming beautiful orb set aflame in the sky and Luna his reflection through the trees i can kiss her residual starshine keeping it together while falling apart at the seams
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12
Sitting in a quiet place. Listening to the ideas blossom in our minds. The noise never ending. When our thoughts and ideas dissipate. They're eventually forgotten. They were never spoken. Billions of unsaid words floating around us. Residual in the mind or not. Theses words, they travel somewhere. Whether these concepts were significant or the split second reminder of unwashed dishes. These thoughts fly someplace calm. That place, that realm is truly quiet.
0
May 1, 2017
May 1, 2017 at 5:08 PM UTC
ZaneG
Quiet Place
Sitting in a quiet place. Listening to the ideas blossom in our minds. The noise never ending. When our thoughts and ideas dissipate. They're eventually forgotten. They were never spoken. Billions of unsaid words floating around us. Residual in the mind or not. Theses words, they travel somewhere. Whether these concepts were significant or the split second reminder of unwashed dishes. These thoughts fly someplace calm. That place, that realm is truly quiet.
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12
Though you go away, It is with you my heart will stay, Heart strings frayed, Laid out, Down for the count, You're a lovely individual, A residual effect, You Are Leaving.
0
Nov 15, 2012
Nov 15, 2012 at 2:37 PM UTC
nicholas-mitchell-truslow
Left Behind
Though you go away, It is with you my heart will stay, Heart strings frayed, Laid out, Down for the count, You're a lovely individual, A residual effect, You Are Leaving.
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8
only two dancers remain standing shuffling    and swaying under syncopated lights held by an unspoken law an apparently unavoidable trait of human nature that forces them to continue despite such terrible choices of song and persistence each was merely a "friend    of the bride" moving in different circles prior to this their dancefloor meeting unfortunately neither can now abandon the other to dance alone to risk being seen as the cause for bringing this near-sacred ritual to an end these residual bodies left with no choice but to mirror each movement match every sidestep echo every clap with rhythm    or without it will not matter so long as this transient solidarity of misplaced confidence and forced smiles continues into the next song
0
Jan 13, 2023
Jan 13, 2023 at 10:50 AM UTC
MeanderingWords
social experiment
only two dancers remain standing shuffling    and swaying under syncopated lights held by an unspoken law an apparently unavoidable trait of human nature that forces them to continue despite such terrible choices of song and persistence each was merely a "friend    of the bride" moving in different circles prior to this their dancefloor meeting unfortunately neither can now abandon the other to dance alone to risk being seen as the cause for bringing this near-sacred ritual to an end these residual bodies left with no choice but to mirror each movement match every sidestep echo every clap with rhythm    or without it will not matter so long as this transient solidarity of misplaced confidence and forced smiles continues into the next song
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44
another smothered lover in the Hollywood hills unbag the bottle crack the seal oh the appeal of intake for the sake of intoxication so meek and unique in gurgled screams a pixie in the hand of a king compelled to discretely capture the beauty in eternity expelled i just felt i had to nest a shell and befell clearing her residual flirtatious signals even in the squirms and even in the squeals even though i know she yearns to be hooked by her gills dragged through landfills in a projected field where she would yield and kiss me. i'm gonna pretend to love her as i tenderly shove her in the river of our love take her under my loving thunder and plunder her when drugged dazed in her wonder i hold her under from above if only for a moment we locked eyes in love she fit me like glove remnants disposed of in a rug posed so beautifully for the smack hack and rip one pretty ***** dumped in an irrigation ditch triumphed our wordless relationship its over ***** move on with it in the mouths of varmints oh charming as im clicking ***** on key chains sticking misfits with loose lips usually homeless decoys here to destroy nothing in my twisted ploy to employ maximum points conjoint my addictive anger to something a little stranger im going to dangle her entrails in front of her eyes while i'm bangin her shes looking so surprised from every camera angle the mangled piece of **** what a lamo hypnotized in the passing of life in the blood the *** the **** and the knife
0
Aug 20, 2012
Aug 20, 2012 at 9:22 PM UTC
Mikhael
[An0ther L0v3r]
another smothered lover in the Hollywood hills unbag the bottle crack the seal oh the appeal of intake for the sake of intoxication so meek and unique in gurgled screams a pixie in the hand of a king compelled to discretely capture the beauty in eternity expelled i just felt i had to nest a shell and befell clearing her residual flirtatious signals even in the squirms and even in the squeals even though i know she yearns to be hooked by her gills dragged through landfills in a projected field where she would yield and kiss me. i'm gonna pretend to love her as i tenderly shove her in the river of our love take her under my loving thunder and plunder her when drugged dazed in her wonder i hold her under from above if only for a moment we locked eyes in love she fit me like glove remnants disposed of in a rug posed so beautifully for the smack hack and rip one pretty ***** dumped in an irrigation ditch triumphed our wordless relationship its over ***** move on with it in the mouths of varmints oh charming as im clicking ***** on key chains sticking misfits with loose lips usually homeless decoys here to destroy nothing in my twisted ploy to employ maximum points conjoint my addictive anger to something a little stranger im going to dangle her entrails in front of her eyes while i'm bangin her shes looking so surprised from every camera angle the mangled piece of **** what a lamo hypnotized in the passing of life in the blood the *** the **** and the knife
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94
No one born too far from Niedersachsen, said Oma, ever quite captures their sing-song intonation. Characterized by subtleties, like an umlauted vowel, all non-native imitations sound inevitably as ****** as would a cry of “ello, guv’nah!” in a London coffee shop. Her Plattdeutsch instincts neutered by decades abroad, married to a son of Milwaukee, her permanent, dormant longing for Salzgitter awakes only to trigger hunger pangs of irreconcilable nostalgia at the passing whiff of a Germantown bakery. She taught me the word “sehnsucht” over lukewarm coffee and a pause in our conversation: a compound word that no well-intentioned English translation could render faithfully. It isn’t the same as just longing, she sighed— longing is curable. Sehnsucht holds the fragments of an imperfect world and laments that they are patternless. How the soul yearns vaguely for a home remembered only in the residual ache of incomplete childhood fancies; futile as the ruins of an ancient, annihilated people. How life’s staccato joys soothe a heart sore from the world, yet the existential hunger, gnawing from the malnourished stomach of the bruised human psyche, remains— insatiable, eternal. Long enough ago, a reasonably-priced bus ride away from the red-roofed apartment in which she babbled her first words, a kindly old man in a pharmacy asked her about her peculiar, exotic accent. Once inevitably prompted with the question of where she was from, she responded only that she was a tourist off the beaten track. And when I pointed out, to my immediate regret, that she gets the same question back here in Ohio, I realized then that, not once, has she ever referred to the way the people of her pined-for hometown spoke as though she had ever belonged to it.
0
Sep 29, 2015
Sep 29, 2015 at 2:21 PM UTC
alyssa-rose-evans
"Sehnsucht"
No one born too far from Niedersachsen, said Oma, ever quite captures their sing-song intonation. Characterized by subtleties, like an umlauted vowel, all non-native imitations sound inevitably as ****** as would a cry of “ello, guv’nah!” in a London coffee shop. Her Plattdeutsch instincts neutered by decades abroad, married to a son of Milwaukee, her permanent, dormant longing for Salzgitter awakes only to trigger hunger pangs of irreconcilable nostalgia at the passing whiff of a Germantown bakery. She taught me the word “sehnsucht” over lukewarm coffee and a pause in our conversation: a compound word that no well-intentioned English translation could render faithfully. It isn’t the same as just longing, she sighed— longing is curable. Sehnsucht holds the fragments of an imperfect world and laments that they are patternless. How the soul yearns vaguely for a home remembered only in the residual ache of incomplete childhood fancies; futile as the ruins of an ancient, annihilated people. How life’s staccato joys soothe a heart sore from the world, yet the existential hunger, gnawing from the malnourished stomach of the bruised human psyche, remains— insatiable, eternal. Long enough ago, a reasonably-priced bus ride away from the red-roofed apartment in which she babbled her first words, a kindly old man in a pharmacy asked her about her peculiar, exotic accent. Once inevitably prompted with the question of where she was from, she responded only that she was a tourist off the beaten track. And when I pointed out, to my immediate regret, that she gets the same question back here in Ohio, I realized then that, not once, has she ever referred to the way the people of her pined-for hometown spoke as though she had ever belonged to it.
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40