"runnels" poems
Old man, you surface seldom.
Then you come in with the tide's coming
When seas wash cold, foam-
Capped: white hair, white beard, far-flung,
A dragnet, rising, falling, as waves
Crest and trough. Miles long
Extend the radial sheaves
Of your spread hair, in which wrinkling skeins
Knotted, caught, survives
The old myth of orgins
Unimaginable. You float near
As kneeled ice-mountains
Of the north, to be steered clear
Of, not fathomed. All obscurity
Starts with a danger:
Your dangers are many. I
Cannot look much but your form suffers
Some strange injury
And seems to die: so vapors
Ravel to clearness on the dawn sea.
The muddy rumors
Of your burial move me
To half-believe: your reappearance
Proves rumors shallow,
For the archaic trenched lines
Of your grained face shed time in runnels:
Ages beat like rains
On the unbeaten channels
Of the ocean. Such sage humor and
Durance are whirlpools
To make away with the ground-
Work of the earth and the sky's ridgepole.
Waist down, you may wind
One labyrinthine tangle
To root deep among knuckles, shinbones,
Skulls. Inscrutable,
Below shoulders not once
Seen by any man who kept his head,
You defy questions;
You defy godhood.
I walk dry on your kingdom's border
Exiled to no good.
Your shelled bed I remember.
Father, this thick air is murderous.
I would breathe water.
15.1k
i like it ickity split
mad to exceed the world
in dark dreams ******
to evoke blood wet mouths
insertions paradise of fluorescents
in a dark aperture
her pudenda
a rolling hill
gaudy wound like a smash mouth crying
split torn tearing, pink estuary
for gluttonies' joyride
that can hardly be endured
twisted tongue spice melts and glitters raw
the sheets soaked through
matted hair in saliva
blood and eggs
the screams of monsters rapture
oh feral abandon
every thing else a toil
winged genitals
hell toys for mama
like heaven cant know
his *****
like hanging bats
Nagasaki goes off in her ***
bodies; quake in silence
the bedroom; a chaotic bathroom
tulips shrill flutter
gulp and swallow milks flame
rosy welts laughing
flushing orgasm's
shoved urns
all spilled libations
touching and *******
crimson **** runnels
in bathhouse foam
down the drain
to earthen bowels din
where the dead push up daisies
i am the worm in the fruit
Dec 5, 2018
Dec 5, 2018 at 8:09 AM UTC
Hell, I scrambled to an amusement park last night,
strapped myself in and coasted for hours
I didn't give myself a break instead I kept coasting until it got
hot and buzzed an alarming buzz
It was overheating, as was I, runnels of inhuman sweat stuck to my face
like glue from a hot gun
{they gave me a hot glue gun so I could make them better crafts than an 'ol family portrait with
blue and green markers on the backside of a receipt from the horse races; but my papa didn't
care about the crafts; he just wanted me busy so he could watch the tube and maybe have a nap
in the evening}
The cart is rattling out of its own carriage; I look up to the angels and only see black ***** smoke
Hell, I make a black ***** mess out of most things lately so instead I sit in it
because I usually run out of it; having towers crash and explode behind me
Hell, ya get what ya pay for; I pay for nothing, you pay for everything, I take everything – both of us will always know that
{remember when you'd say we'd go for ice cream to get me to shut up
we never went for ice cream}
Sparks underneath the rails, I twisted my stiff neck to stay still in something blasphemously heavy
{I used to think I was so heavy}
It’s like the feeling you get when you want to do something but your body won't succumb
Split mind & body interpersonal connections - left and right are both just forward,
Going forward to somewhere I've already been.
Hell, I let myself flood until they **** smacked the gates open with a
"What the **** are you tryna do? **** yourself?!" reprimand
And I even almost came to see you because you really wanted a daughter again and
I really wanted a father {again} - I've never really had one to begin with.
Instead, I listened to the cat's in the cradle and cut in my cradle
And hell, I really needed to be loved
I think more than I have ever needed
{you never left but you never came to leave me}
Hell, I don't think I have even seen hell yet; but one day it'll do me in good.
Thou he slay me, yet will I trust in him.
Nov 3, 2012
Nov 3, 2012 at 1:31 AM UTC
You were the real "American Dream",
and you supplied our lives with endless delight. You gave us long lasting smiles every time you'd step up to a fight.
In four plus decades, you never quit. With over fifty titles under your name, won all with wit.
Your legacy will forever be imprinted in history. Your name forever in our hearts. You showed wrestling isn't just entertainment but it's also an art.
Virgil "Dusty Rhodes" Runnels Jr,
from the west shores of America to the east shores of Japan, you will always be loved by each one of your fans.
For you were more than a man, and you were more than a dream, you were the real deal, and an inspiration to me.
So I say my goodbyes and show my respect in this short and tacky poem. A new king in the heaven of legends has now taken the throne.
Jun 11, 2015
Jun 11, 2015 at 4:51 PM UTC
blood blot
a hideous music
like fixed stars
a chaos of shattered glass
you can hang your hat on
bamboo shards make a ****** wound
gold spun hair
on floral linen
blemished soaking red
like a shaking rat in a cats mouth
Hazels glistening ****** a pretense
salutes celibacy and high end moisturizer toilet paper
to shock simplicities morals
of an excretory affair
a dark chandelier hangs in the balance
torpedo runnels through chambered knots
unleashing treacherous sanity
sins crib
theater of purgation
father forgive her
she took a ****
an idealist without ideals
the grand masturbator
a simulacrum of a lubed god
in nights dragging shade
oracle of a ruddy opera and legs over head
flexed crimson wattle rolls
theories invite anti theories
light invites darkness
silence yields
shadows throat
and cacophonous whispers
a grind house temple of gods and demons
in horrendous geometry
of inflicting malice
until the serpent ascends
from black pitch hells
like a bomb through the skull
lusts antidote
waterloo of the soul
annihilation point
the cadaver smiles
Jan 9, 2019
Jan 9, 2019 at 6:28 AM UTC
two masks made
two masks sent
t'was a very strange event
one was clay
broken and rent
the other
rebar and cement
the concrete gave
a passing stare
had it's nose up in the air
the clay had runnels
lines of care
it was no longer
smooth and fair
yes
the clay had lines
and runnels deep
from the tears
which it did weep
the Hand which made both
tried the hearts
the concrete face
staid its cold art
the mask of clay
shattered apart
the concrete looked on
in destain
she would never feel pain
gently, gently
the great Hand tended
the cracked restored
and quietly
mended
what had been
weak clay and mesh
was renewed
and made
flesh
concrete had smiled
was now made small
for she saw
the
wrecking ball
SoulSurvivor
(C) 5/16/2016
May 16, 2016
May 16, 2016 at 8:35 PM UTC
To lay my head upon the tawny cover of softwood pines once more
as I pry the manifest question of youthful travail and insecurity ,
to garner the earthen tier beside natures vested , rippling waters ..
Churning runnels lending delicate directions , whirlpool portrayals that countersink their matriarchal beginnings , only to gradually disappear ....
To wander the carpeted trail with arbitrary resolve , free of pious
intimidations .. Fixated with superb creativity .. With the eyes of an eagle .. Determined . Pithiest .. Invincible ..
As heat obscures the blacktop ahead , the shade of home is but a dot in the humid distance , tar laced Georgia roads in the month of August are quite dangerous to young , bare feet ...
Sorghum fields , hog wire boundaries , darkening skies ..The unbounded Sun dragging each step , briar patches line the road shoulder , painful reminders of lonely boots foolishly left unkept ...
Fire ant mounds hide in tall grass , Cow Killers forage alone in Summer swelter , brown scorpions , cottonmouths and the list goes on virtually
forever during Dog Days , legends of wounds refusing to heal , double headed rattlers and rabid foxes , Longhorn bulls turning wild , growing bloodthirsty , hunting down unwary farm hands .. Men turned lunatic
from tainted moonshine , waiting at the wood line for clumsy boys and girls , well water made septic from lack of rain .. Bobcats running in packs for any food easily obtained , including boys that refused to listen
to mother , leaving their cowboy boots when warned not to do so ... This will be the last time I'm caught barefooted , all alone , left to my own wit and minds reserve , Mom and Dad can be sure of it !
Feb 20, 2016
Feb 20, 2016 at 9:44 PM UTC
Sleepy hands graze across milk moon lakes
Blinking fog away and clear the haze
Stars reflect deep turquoise pools
Tinged violet around the rims
Seeping water trickles
Creating runnels
Meandering through scar tissue
And bruises, warm to the touch
Soreness effervesce
As violence retreats back into its shadowy corner
Waiting to pounce
Pursue its next unsuspecting victims
Tension slides back into itself
In the guise of a false security
And reposefulness
A safe blanket of silence falls over
Snuffing out the light of a burning flame
Darkness pervades, stretching past every last surface
So when another set of eyes peers out
Behind translucent curtains
Alarm fails registration
Of the screams escaping her mouth
And hands covered in blood
Taking what isn’t rightfully theirs
Jul 21, 2014
Jul 21, 2014 at 10:47 PM UTC
It ****** to life in Spring the dry dark Earth
Which points to sun and sends off the Holly King
Like a spark ignites the soot encrusted hearth
The celebrating children dance in rings
The Earth is in us too and deeply carved
In dark and light we are cleaved and tied in knots
And travelling inwards are we standing fast?
Or do we weep at demons we forgot?
What if you take that shadow to the light?
A kernel lifted from the pricked dark Earth
Who’s beading blood in rising runnels might
Rise up in us, to show us all we are worth
The Earth is in us; the light the dark the seasons
To hold our shadow to the light is freedom
Apr 11, 2021
Apr 11, 2021 at 6:43 AM UTC
I wanted to look to you like I was dancing
But the bugs on my bark weren't moving enough
I kept reaching skyward and praying for wind
Never comes to a call, does it?
You could trace each fissure on my surface--why don'chya?--
Find stories and runnels for flowing sap
Saw me off at the hip, maybe. See what jokes my rings have to tell
I'm tired of waiting for wind; I want to dance (I think?)
I wanted to look to you like I was thoughtful
So I sliced off a sheet of cyan and I robbed the sky
You called me "thief." _Fuckin' mean_
Always reaching for silver, aren't we?
Try to touch irises, press pupils. I've never been further than now
Stories all end, so I'm told. But this one? Still going
Hacked apart, trying to show you my pieces. Chunks. Rough mince
So I stole again to pay the sky back. _Ex nihilo, nihil fit__
_I can pour from empty, because I'm _magic, baby!_
I wanted to want to see you in Springtime
But we can't scrape Winter off our faces
Sling me a flat stone that I can send spinning
Slapping across the water's surface
Did I hit the opposite bank? You could stitch together separate days
if you only had the sinew and a proper needle
Blown apart by wind and explosive expecting. Chunks. Rough mince
I'm tired of waiting for wind. I'm tired of wanting to dance (I think?)
Not magic--well--not the kind that isn't bone and blood and skin
That's the sort of magic that _doesn't_ exist.
May 8, 2025
May 8, 2025 at 10:26 AM UTC
Were you well as sunlight's ascendancy left darkening footnotes everywhere?
Their cerebral pitch and polish--
non compos mentis, were you well?
Stalactited as Nostrefaru's leaking enamel...emergent, crooked shape of a shifting focal point overspread to no more of itself.
Your sun hissed as it plumbed its depth...covert feelers circumscribed the injunction of tongue caught at speak, bifurcated and serpentine.
Wherefrom runnels of india ink ran, corresponded with stones to their haphazard period, numb with duplication...broken down nervously.
Feb 16, 2017
Feb 16, 2017 at 1:27 PM UTC
Clay
A shoulder of clay cut with runnels
set to music, round notes, fat plucked
chords sustained in eternal cascade
from the concertina of the spooling Manistee
above Red Bridge, blue blazes worn
smartly by these still, mute sentinels,
their averted gaze twining into
graceful arches that usher us from one
moment to the next, fine capillary
weave stretched over rib of stabbing light
that illuminates slick kaolin veins,
a surgical tent to conceal rending fingers
plunged into the wound, our faces
smeared, the trees thrilling to our howls.
Sep 21, 2016
Sep 21, 2016 at 8:14 AM UTC
He’d stared at the silver screen so long
He thought he was going blind,
For a fortnight after his wife had gone
He thought he would lose his mind.
She’d snatched her purse from the window ledge
And said that she’d not be late,
‘I’ll just call in to the grocery store,
Then call on my sister, Kate!’
An hour went by and he scratched his head
While watching the cricket score,
Then two, and three put the sun to bed,
He went and stood by the door,
The Moon rose up at eleven or so,
It shone on an empty street,
And Kate replied to his mobile call,
‘I’ve not seen Jane for a week!’
There wasn’t a lot he could say to that
For Kate would have played it straight,
She wouldn’t lie for her sister Jane,
She had enough on her plate.
A drunken husband, threatening her
Each time that he laid one on,
And Kate had whispered to Jane, ‘I wish,
He’d pack up his things, be gone!’
Sam went to report to the police next day,
One lost, or wandered or strayed,
(The cop had smirked to his mate out back,
‘Perhaps she went to get laid?’)
‘It’s not like her, she’s a homely type,
But something has gone amiss,
She left three bags at the grocery store
And she’s not done that, ‘til this.’
Once back at home on the Internet
He checked on her Facebook page,
Her smiling face looked back at him yet,
Making him more dismayed,
A man had posted a Timeline rant,
Had posted the previous day:
‘I love you Jane, and I’m deep in pain,
I’m coming to take you away.’
The face of the man was indistinct
Was hidden in deepest gloom,
He must have taken the photograph
At night, in a dim-lit room,
The name that he used was ‘Love-Will-Out’
But surely that couldn’t be,
For Jane, he thought, was a simple soul,
‘She wouldn’t be false to me!’
He caught a glimpse of her now and then
As he wandered, page to page,
She’d left a trail as she trawled back when
And he felt a gathering rage.
A ‘like’ on a friend she used to have,
A comment that made no sense,
‘I need a map’ was the one remark
That had kept him in suspense.
‘I don’t know where,’ she’d written up there,
Elsewhere, ‘or where I am.’
‘Somebody’s following close behind
But I keep looking for Sam.’
Snatches of words that made no sense
He would see as they flashed on by,
And through the runnels of Facebook tunnels
He’d see that same grim guy.
So still he stares at the silver screen
Though he thinks he’s going mad,
She seems to be there on the Facebook scene,
(In a way, that makes him glad).
But he’ll never rest ‘til she comes back home
To end that feeling of pain,
Whenever I ask if he’s coming out,
He says, ‘I’m following Jane!’
David Lewis Paget
Oct 30, 2014
Oct 30, 2014 at 8:18 AM UTC
Temperature climbing
desert wind blowing
runnels of sweat begin
as I start to melt, in the heat.
Waves slither on the horizon
a mirage of water
zero humidity
and not a cloud above
Swirling sand catches my eye
dust devil rising 200 feet
tumbleweeds shot upward
the whiptail lizards sprints away
108 degrees and a breeze full of dirt
like being sand blasted
except I have no rust
just skin, to live in
It begins to roast and turn red
I long for shade and a drink
but no trees, or shrubs offer any
and no hose, or lake around
Thirsty and burnt
skin just about flayed
I finally make it
to the cooler and shade
Oct 14, 2016
Oct 14, 2016 at 1:28 PM UTC
skies of green
in the distance blue
lightning golden
clouds of cream
rushing by in the wind
as it howls down the desert
dust kicked up
like a herd of bison
peck peck peck
grit hits the windows
and then splash
as the warm rain starts
mud flows in brown runnels
next to the gray chip driveway
a stray leaf, rides the flow
through mini class five rapids
Sep 15, 2016
Sep 15, 2016 at 9:24 PM UTC
The doors to this
temple
beg reverence,
yawning wide
that I might
bow my head
sip
from silken chalice
of clavicle and skin.
I’ll come in
veil of curls,
feather-ringlets draped
to cover prayers
of tongue and teeth,
hot against the
the taste of
center,
this garden’s
hidden seed.
Let me kneel
before the altar,
press offerings
of dampened
silk on curves
thick with myrrh,
sugar-slick and
soft as
bruised persimmon.
Eden’s gates
are opening,
tomato-red and overripe
to spill, in runnels,
a warm communion—
fruit
of my flesh
of yours.
Aug 11, 2020
Aug 11, 2020 at 2:54 PM UTC