"retinal" poems
Clicketyclick —
sickly screens,
shooting
sixty
picture-frames
per second
Tickety ticktock, rapid-fire
photon cannons,
ripping holes
through our
faces
rectangles,
riddled with anxiety ridden
read scripts
the resultant
retinal scarring
Wicketywicked, weary eyes,
dripping with serrated pixels
triple dotted,
typing-awareness indicators
create silly suspenses,
inducing temporal
dramas,
emotional
micro-traumas
every second a slice
through my,
now practically nonexistent,
patience
Am I a server,
or am I a servant?
Eyes, sunken, with
withered skin
I'm waiting for my fix
Ding-ding
Bloop!
Pinggg
Here comes the dopamine! —
—Clicketyclick
Oct 23, 2014
Oct 23, 2014 at 12:47 PM UTC
"Hello, hallway, linoleum tile,
I can't really see you but
I hope you're there."
Green spiders crawl through my smoked-up veins,
their spindles weave their webs of red
under eyelids gravitating towards sleep.
Retinal film flashes; each blink is an
unprocessed, scared/ __ , broken reel.
"Put your hands," he says, "on mine.
Breathe, look into my eyes."
Shaking fingertips touch his; snowflakes
gently collide with sunny ground.
They were afraid to melt,
even though they might want to.
I wish it had been 33°.
Nov 19, 2018
Nov 19, 2018 at 2:02 PM UTC
My allegiance to be a leader
Leader of my culture
Vow to righteous cultivation
Raise my right fist
And I tell you this
I will never quit
Low souls I will always lift
My determination is greater than or equal to my liberation
Truly in the past I've gotten content
Bent
Ripped
Torn
Hesitant
Forgot why I was born
I ask for your forgiveness
While I'm a realest
I know I have to be rigorous
And stay consistent
Because now days everyone who's put in position loses their coherence and fear the consequences
Like why work so hard to be a star?and get everyone to witness,
Get everyone's attention
...
But don't have a mission!
PUT A CAMERA IN FRONT OF ME
TAKE A MILLION PICTURES
MAKE A DOCUMENTARY
I CAN BE COMPLEMENTARY
GIVE ME ENDORSEMENTS
I DON'T EVEN WANT THE PROPORTION
I'LL GIVE IT TO THE DISTORTED
MAKE ME A RAP ARTIST
AND PUT ME ON THE RADIO
LET MY VOICE BE HEARD THROUGH THE STEREO
I hope I don't speak this into existence
Because all I need is a microphone with my voice coming through the PA system
It's a shame that I might need security
But it's not strange that I might need security
If I attract too many brown faces and people who come from unfortunate places
That's where they draw the line,
Speeches for memorabilia
But my work will be erased
Hope I don't sound incredible
I would not sound ridiculous if you remember our intellectuals
They don't accept anyone who's exceptional
They don't want to see anyone who has a big dream in their retinal
Hopefully I can manage with
About 30 plus years of residue
Give up?
Naw that's just what the rest will do
Fight for our lives
And take a chance with my life
Whatever it takes to restitute
Aug 6, 2013
Aug 6, 2013 at 9:52 PM UTC
In the darkly lit room
Hangs the smell of doom
As he babbles about his eyes
He seems bent on a mission
To paint a bleak vision
His elation isn’t disguised!
*I’ve them aplenty
My eyes bloodied
In surgeon’s needles
Retinal detachment
Cataract
Glaucoma
There isn’t a trauma
My eyes haven’t suffered*
His eyeballs roll
On the sclera
In perverse pleasure
*I don’t mind
If I go blind,
The misery around
Doesn’t make eyesight a treasure*
I haven’t met a man
To himself this inhuman
Treating the most valued lens
With such immense disdains
More than my suffering eyes
He says in glee undisguised
*I suffer your cruelty,
That’s when you say
It’s my way
To garner sympathy!*
Jan 14, 2014
Jan 14, 2014 at 6:16 AM UTC
I pick this Earthly slide into Summertime, this season to begin, propels forward in all sense of Time, history retrograde, etched in Stone for Centuries, Coded in DNA, programed Circadian bodies, impressions applied geometric thickly glazed coat, generously slathered across my Retinal Screen.
Setup complete for me, attuned to Solar frequencies, aligned to cohesive Cosmic driving motion spiraling Syncopation with all partaking rotational bodies, all timers set to synchronous, all ties to everything celebrating their teamwork well done.
Activity accelerates, as does the heavy heat, both inseparable, together climbing ****** into sunburnt sweat, steaming, sizzling Sunday barbecue to reflect the Flesh boiling together in sympathetic Celebration of our Seasoned Sun.
Longer days accommodate for memories and fun, commemorate the Force of Season, into swing, will soon be swung, centripetal to glaze a different gaze lathered across my retinal screen, reverberate through Atmosphere, redistribute composition, smooth bottlenecking, flowing out yet emptying to take fill of what flows in.
No change of Season, nor change of Heart, no redirection ever knows emptiness, no moment leaves a Void unfulfilled.
No moment when the smooth Transition stutters to a Stop. The sync is in the constant movement bringing balance in equilibrium by shifting tides, Spinning Stars locking in, programmed by Primal Cause, the Synchronicity in Everything, so Summertime comes, this Time in which we rejoice, knowing it's all been planned, beautifully executed by mechanics of Nature.
Trust in understanding a Power much Greater is in Control, we are here simply for the Experience.
...Not to much more, just in attending to the Transitions of Ourselves.
Jun 5, 2014
Jun 5, 2014 at 12:50 AM UTC
He closes his eyes as usual. That starts it.
Gallon blackness against thin skin but split,
Suffused with a million rushed and serene
Shades of purple and sickly, retinal green.
Squares and curves, utterly vertical rounds
Imprinted obsidian spheres, half-sounds.
A vague intimation of abyssal, milk white:
Horizontal paradigms on the coast of sight.
Yes, indeed the whiteness on the horizon
Flutters scop-musical like a lark’s blazon.
How it snatches up the blackness, losing
Clarity of its edge like madmen’s choosing.
It ceases growing yet consumes all within
The poor man’s eyes, traversing the din.
A pure, blank line that is born in the mind
Fills the soul nacreous, leaves him behind.
Goes it beyond him and stretches open.
Straight wide. Too wide. Much too wide!
The teeth he hadn’t noticed crush him dog-brightly
And pull him fast inside.
He opens his eyes as usual. That ends it.
May 18, 2010
May 18, 2010 at 11:21 AM UTC
Behind green eyes a retinal flash
subdues a gentle sense of knowing
with a half worn smile
she calculates line and speed
though unimpressed with detail
she's alert to every possibility
and snatches a glance there
her widening gaze settled
followed by a measured blink
of pure satisfaction
a buzz of a wasp
and a flick of an ear
all is well with her world.
Jun 9, 2010
Jun 9, 2010 at 10:16 AM UTC
♪♫♪♫♪♫♪♫♫♪♪♪♫
I: Lyric Line of Flight
Cavern Club / black leather / German rockers / proto-youth culture groped its way from Liverpool / TV slowly sped up / modernity invented / flown in planes / swallowed in pills / I watch the second Kennedy funeral on the screen in shades of gray rain / warming to mid-60’s hues / into the stratosphere / a lysergic surge / retinal after-images / intensities of nostalgic color / that British courtesy in understatement / Paul’s voice a bassline / George a guru of six-armed confusion / tasteful: now a meaningless word / it was Apollonian-Dionysiac / my childhood’s soundtrack
II: Poem
They grooved—as our world became another
up from caverns to psychedelic flight.
They look so young in melancholic light
harmonizing black and white to color.
So distant—yet within our life’s short span
they grow apart as the hair grows longer
(The West’s resolve to expire grew stronger.)
Quadruplex visage: young god sold to man.
I crack up beholding the mid-Sixties
lost in late-night YouTubes, I start to break.
time past: removed from the complexities
Recalling every song, the beat, the shake…
They sang the primrose path to confusion
nostalgia replacing resolution.
Apr 6, 2016
Apr 6, 2016 at 7:57 AM UTC
day in
day out
they stare at me
unyielding
unblinking
dress me up in different colors
and change when they get bored
or leave me in the dark
I see them laugh at me
cry
scream
cheer
or just sit with lifeless eyes like I'm retinal morphine
sometimes sleeping in front of me
giving up on my looks
or more unnerving things
fantasizing over what they see in me
they pretend I don't see them back
they just stare more deeply
taking their time
or in a rush
open my eyes then close them then out the door
why don't they know I think
and judge them
or do they care
to them I'm just a television
Nov 27, 2012
Nov 27, 2012 at 3:20 AM UTC
one hundred suns buried
in golden broken walls
mangled retinal mosaic
calibrated splattered traincrash
cutting through
featureless massacres
Everything on the table
burns and runs
molten copper into
drowned corners where
humanity falls in silence
Mar 31, 2013
Mar 31, 2013 at 8:14 PM UTC
withered eyes a
crescent moon of
dusk under the
pupils red lightning
cracking across
blank pages born
from some unseen
space beyond the
corners
when the head lolls
back the neck snaps
to refocusing on the
unseen nothing in
the physical to grasp
at looking through
all layers of deceit
at an inside a
center that cannot
exist but is always
there
motion is the mirror
the frame the negatives
rolling seamlessly teeth
and sprockets a perpetual
rotation immune to friction
faction and conflation
singular in its mindlessness
just an eye bloodshot with
nebulae as everything
collapses in on itself at the
speed of light passing
through the central retinal
vein feeding information
into the unseen center of all
Nov 12, 2014
Nov 12, 2014 at 4:52 PM UTC
here and there
a crackle from the fire
an interruption in July's air
a forcible boom
where I wince until it lessens
but I smile, teeth persimmon orange
like those smoldering flecks of wildflower
that then fail their color, dwindle to the dirt
I picture my ivories falling out of my mouth in the same way
grey and withered
I rise, combust and fall
with these wild roman candles
like cassiopeia
I gaze in her general direction
dragged into the night by the hem of her peplum
I don't care to make out her shape
nor the throne she's tied to
by rope or by chain
her parable pressed into the scaffolding of the sky
a warning; an imposition
like sky-lit lithium
and its retinal imprint
I smile, teeth persimmon orange
turn my face
perception fails in such ways;
in these bold, bright, burning crossettes
I see figures
an arm extends
Jul 5, 2019
Jul 5, 2019 at 1:13 AM UTC
Swaths of color
bring subjective representations
of objective correlative
puddles sit
collecting in black retinal holes
becoming what we wish
or believe we know
creating ****
to break a never ending cycle
adonis, taken before her day
filth meticulously applied
to create an unknown class
an artifice
a ploy
aimed at degradation
filling broken vessels
drained of all that has been deemed important
now is as good as any moment
timeless all one and the same
spinning girl, the shepherdess
seen all as one
dissolving time and space
an altered aesthetic
flattening planes
all is over
and nothing has ever mattered in the end
May 5, 2013
May 5, 2013 at 8:30 AM UTC
A gliding entity between ecstasy, my eyes grew from seeds
to inversely unbounded trees, oxidizing, breathing into the collective
a collection eclectic; the ripening ages convene the gods' pallette
so mortal and clean. From the vantage of mauve mountains,
beholders pressed through the ravine. "The bewildered be wild"
She crooned on to me.
Deepening the night, scintillant ancestors dug
with Light, unearthing cherished retinal prints.
The vulpine maw imposed no sin, indigo glow
and a patina sheen, feral bliss had greased
the chain. Lineages span millennia as scions cast
the sacred Heron, spear of the World beyond
the eros plane.
So She crooned on to me
Her sybilline Dream.
Nov 20, 2012
Nov 20, 2012 at 7:28 PM UTC
what is it about this landscape
early angle of light
bouncing from flat of glass to glass
in clean and eager cuts against
the visible shrouds of exhaust
expired breath of automobiles
darkly herded
swimming in their lanes
light still so separate from the dark
in the long arc of a hollow sun...
this dissonance the chilled shade whose eyes
close to brace the rising retinal burn
of an overbright disc resurrecting
illusions of warmth
what is it about this landscape
rimed with gold
that draws the wilderness in my gut
to grow hooves
to stamp and dig among the briers,
to eddy an inward sudden
too much a wayward compass,
those spooked adrenaline horses...
until I can answer this question
I cannot write the poem.
Feb 11, 2012
Feb 11, 2012 at 11:25 PM UTC
Taking with us
Our memories
Relationships
A mind morphed by life
This is the end game
Entering another realm
Pockets empty
But not your soul
Misty traces of signatures transpire
Poems dissolving away the drizzle of creation
Ink leaving a reminding mark
Feeling the last breath, truly Emergence
Fleeting spiritual connections
Tantalising finger tips touch lost
Pupils dilate in release
Memories painted on retinal walls
Jul 23, 2023
Jul 23, 2023 at 12:11 PM UTC
faked xray reports/forged retinal scans/phony lab tests/secretly amputated limbs
Aug 30, 2015
Aug 30, 2015 at 9:06 PM UTC
Sometimes there’s nothing left but the wolves.
cornered
confused
concussive silences
broken by howls
rivers of bile
iron filings
choked upon truths
landslide mind
sleep apnea
retinal scan
unidentified
alone
rivers of isolation
mercury tears
that don’t fall
they well
stay in the sockets
waiting for the next wave
numbness
sterilized
mechanical
depressive state
mauled.
***
-JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications
Feb 18, 2019
Feb 18, 2019 at 10:07 PM UTC
Is there anything moving in the redemptive descent? Discover the exfoliated tears on the retinal lines of broken eyes with compassionate regret! As the smaller beetles glide apart, a hesitant giant-foot tramples on them by chance! The given, idyllic anthill can hardly receive regular travelers and contemplatives back into its bustling community! In the gaping lap of depths - only they can know - undivided Dreams graze!
The blood-boiling instinct-greed of visceral possession is only the exception! - From the micro-world below, where can murderous virtue be measured by certain methods? - The chattering company of loosely swinging golden boys and chirping kittens has never seduced; there, many people blamed emotional ammunition for luring exploited defenseless people and believing! Are the reports left to themselves simply because Someone always betrays them with words?
Deliberate yawns in deep dark gaps, however, cannot dissolve; the redemptive gaze of self-forgotten serenities can no longer be forced on the other! Greed became an indestructible umbilical cord: as many gains as possible in the jingling pockets of compromisers; but even the only comedians of Judas who are now giving themselves up are all sneezing or lurking! Secret doors open to everyone, only the secrets can be kept by the Spirit alone!
Is it too much to envy overstretched reciprocity? You’re forced to wear the shower spikes of mutual compromises on purpose if you want something more out of life!
Mar 31, 2021
Mar 31, 2021 at 3:18 AM UTC
I am slowly learning that
perception of the self is a foggy image indeed
and that way we see, more or less,
is a distorted retinal image
created by
whispering synapses
that do not always tell the truth
Mar 1, 2012
Mar 1, 2012 at 4:43 PM UTC
I yearn to someday make something of utmost individuality.
But it seems today I'm pensively turning blank pages perpetually.
It seems I'm marred, and it's
macrame macrame, same thing every time.
Presumably, light of it comes, but with what am I left as it goes?
Retinal scarring! Badum poots.
Maybe some knots in the cords of my back and creases down the corners of my every smile.
What comes up
must go down
dimple dimple frown frown
Come on outside for a while!
Sunshine daisy daffodil!
Hills and valleys, mountains
and canyons it's a whole
life story out there
But then I sit down
sit down,
and pluck the same strings
same strings.
Different order
same strings.
What'sit bring?
What's it bring?
Today I sit down
sit down
to tell you a story.
It's a short story,
but it's also a long story.
Like a mountain range you see from miles away without walking it's entire length.
I was a little monster with blinders on.
I took to my parents in a way of which I'm not too fond.
I was an orb of obsession and wrinkles of scorn on her forehead.
I was particles and waveforms trying to ride a bicycle.
I was ropa vieja mistaken for some kinda soup.
Papá!
You taught me how you saw the workings of the universe but you worked it like a cockroach. You turned me into low tail low tail grinding on the guard rail. Ready to flip over the side and tumble tumble crash. I was ready to die. You sewed my face onto screens of LEDs screaming with the cries of unclothed children. and you left me crying Mäma!
Mäma!
Saving grace grave face I'm sorry for what he's done to you. I see the weight of over two decades worth of ball and chain dead leaves still dangling from your eyelashes. I see you ripping them out from the roots when it gets to be too much. I solemnly sit beside you at that cursed kitchen table trying to wish on as many of my own so that yours may grow back without any fault. Oh, but I see them sprouting out all crooked in all directions and whenever you bat an eye you run the risk of years of silent tears tumbling on back in an attempt to finally be heard.
I've learned that no truth will come from the wishes you make on the lashes you take with force. Let 'em go with grace. Leave them alone and let them fall from your face like the loudest raindrops.
Our wishes come true just as we speak —
and listen...
Mar 17, 2015
Mar 17, 2015 at 3:20 PM UTC
I am not afraid of the dark.
Nor do I fear the thoughts in my head.
But the bugs.
Aye.
The ******* critters in my brain.
My fear, I’m afraid, is they power they have mustered-
Controlling such thoughts; destroying slumbers when days-light dims.
Like solar paneled viruses that attack at the core of emotion,
Ripping through the Limbic system.
Erasing Memory; Re-circuiting Anxiety.
Taking the wiring from retinal output and re-coding each message.
Hacking the server until ants become Godzilla
And “hello’s” read as “goodbye”.
Twitching fingers and feet that scratch at the skin.
It’s these ******* leeches in my skull that **** my nerves dry
Til I’m hot- **** no, cold.
And the extermination comes:
Sunrise.Coffee.Interaction.
It’s like they live to die by the hour of midnight,
Only to do their time through rummage and destruction.
Hatching eggs in my nails, Chewed away by discomfort.
Growing to new forms by lights out.
Rehearse.
React.
Repeat.
It’s these bugs that I fear;
Fearing the darkness.
Fearing the thoughts inside.
It’s these bugs that I even doubt this ****** piece of work.
Yet these bugs are what created what you now have read,
The over exaggeration now etched on paper.
And it is the small bit of me still left alive at night behind them,
Refusing to see this truth when the extermination has come.
It’s no plead for help; No cry for sympathy.
I am me as you are me-
So please take me as I come.
Nov 11, 2014
Nov 11, 2014 at 11:38 PM UTC