"sagged" poems
My Sister, I Watched You Fall-2
My little nephew, I was sorry for your sorrows
When the whims of your mother stormed your tomorrows
You didn't know who your father was
Or why the branches of your tree sagged its paws
For you walked thru the halls of life mauled
By a lost paw that grabbed your mind and sadness walled
I could see it in your mind's eyes, the question marks
Of why other families have fathers at the parks
From the time you were a little child of two
You would love to go with uncle to the zoo
Then as the wheels in your mind started to click
Seeing other kids with fathers, it made you sick
You were young seedling lacking the nourishment
The parts of the puzzle missing fulfillment
But hear this, my little nephew, your uncle tried
And ... at the mercy of your mother's whims, I cried
We'd play the role of father and son
Fish a dream, toss the past, paint some fun
We'd **** weeds while wrestling through a reservoir of tears
Aborted in time, a lake, two swans and a duckling in good cheers
My nephew, I would take you around the world if I could
But hear this you were never, never driftwood
For I had spent as much time visiting you
In absence of a fathers touch, you never knew
I shed more tears today as I catch wind of your child
For its teeth bites and gust of whims, again, run wild
Do I offer congratulations knowing the lake is devoid
Of future swans and a duckling, walled in my mind's void
No. My nephew, I'm choked in tears that crawl
On the face of the earth, I sprawl
I thought you learned, child uncorked
On wings of albatross and not the stork
Logan Robertson
8/16/2018
Aug 16, 2018
Aug 16, 2018 at 7:26 PM UTC
You bring me good news from the clinic,
Whipping off your silk scarf, exhibiting the tight white
Mummy-cloths, smiling: I'm all right.
When I was nine, a lime-green anesthetist
Fed me banana-gas through a frog mask. The nauseous vault
Boomed with bad dreams and the Jovian voices of surgeons.
Then mother swam up, holding a tin basin.
O I was sick.
They've changed all that. Traveling
**** as Cleopatra in my well-boiled hospital shift,
Fizzy with sedatives and unusually humorous,
I roll to an anteroom where a kind man
Fists my fingers for me. He makes me feel something precious
Is leaking from the finger-vents. At the count of two,
Darkness wipes me out like chalk on a blackboard. . .
I don't know a thing.
For five days I lie in secret,
Tapped like a cask, the years draining into my pillow.
Even my best friend thinks I'm in the country.
Skin doesn't have roots, it peels away easy as paper.
When I grin, the stitches tauten. I grow backward. I'm twenty,
Broody and in long skirts on my first husband's sofa, my fingers
Buried in the lambswool of the dead poodle;
I hadn't a cat yet.
Now she's done for, the dewlapped lady
I watched settle, line by line, in my mirror—
Old sock-face, sagged on a darning egg.
They've trapped her in some laboratory jar.
Let her die there, or wither incessantly for the next fifty years,
Nodding and rocking and ********* her thin hair.
Mother to myself, I wake swaddled in gauze,
Pink and smooth as a baby.
5.3k
She loved the catnip
Straight for the hip
She was like an alley cat
With a worn out welcome mat
Her tail rang a chime
And every tom stopped on her dime
Petting was blunt
For all the toms went for the hunt
Affront of the beat
Two cats in heat
Nights played out in false hearts
Howls were off the charts
Brief was the moment
Lost was the fulfillment
Days sagged later
A same old story, bye alligator
Much to the chagrin
Of the alley's spin
When her baby was born
She was forlorn
Like a woman out of wedlock
Dealing with tom's, full of croc
My sister, I watched you fall
My words to you hit a blank wall
You played the game
Without a flame
Sadness as your son bleed
Now years later he followed your lead
Logan Robertson
8/09/2018
Aug 9, 2018
Aug 9, 2018 at 2:38 PM UTC
at age 8 i stopped wearing jeans because they were uncomfortable.
at age 14 i wore high heels, fish nets, and skirts to school and a man once asked my mother if she really let me leave the house looking like that.
i also wore checkered pajama pants and shirts with holes in them to class, i dressed up and down because everyone else seemed to dress in the middle.
i dressed however i wanted to because my mother told that guy to shut the **** up and mind his own business.
at age 16 i wore crop tops the size of sports bras and pants so tight i understood why they called them skin-ny jeans
my **** and *** would be flying all over the place,
but people with larger **** and larger bellies, people like me, weren't supposed to be wearing those sorts of things so i thought i must.
or so i thought.
at age 18 i started dressing in oversized shirts and formless dresses
i didn't believe my body needed to be objectified and put on display anymore,
i didn't need to prove that my waistline was small enough,
i didn't need to wear the spanx i wore every day at 16.
at age 20 i stopped wearing make up or a bra,
my **** sagged and eyes bagged but i wanted to show people that ***** aren't always perky even on twenty year olds.
i also stopped shaving my armpits
i thought they were cute.
at age 22 i stopped shaving my legs.
i didn't think they were cute.
but i realized not every decision i made about how i presented myself needed to be in order to make myself more beautiful.
and at age 24 i shaved my head.
a man once asked me,
as he looked at my college ring wrapping itself around my pointer finger,
if i always did things differently just to be different?
and if id always be doing things just because someone told me not to?
i should have looked at him and asked him
what has he ever been told he cannot do?
Jul 23, 2021
Jul 23, 2021 at 11:22 PM UTC
Day after day, we go through the motions
Like waves searching for shore in the middle of the ocean,
Following along as we get swept by the current
Again and again, waiting for the day it’ll end.
I was lost in this sea of people when I saw him.
A mere glimpse from my periphery, I almost missed
His tear-streaked face and his bleeding knee,
And I thought to myself, how did I not see?
My eyes caught the way his shoulders sagged
From carrying the weight of the world on his back.
He’s only a child but his fate seemed worse than Atlas,
His young body shackled by greedy insatiable hands.
I wonder if someone witnessed his despair,
Picked up a brush and decided to share
The story of a boy whose future was stolen
By heroes who were nothing but villains.
His pleas echo in every brushstroke
And while my hands can never replicate
The vivid imagery offered by paint
He can live on in the words I create.
Jan 30, 2022
Jan 30, 2022 at 1:21 AM UTC
I saw an old man in Exeter today;
saw him twice, in fact.
Each time he was eating ice cream
beneath his black felt hat.
His face was wizened, a cliche I know,
but I don’t know how else to say it.
He looked tired and worn behind his smile,
his shoulders sagged, his eyelids low.
At his feet a collection of bags,
small and medium, all black.
His wordly possessions I couldn’t but wonder,
carried around on his back.
What stories do you hold, old man,
wrapped in the parchment of your skin?
Will they be forever mysteries untold,
or do you have someone to invest them in?
Jun 1, 2011
Jun 1, 2011 at 6:35 AM UTC
The photo reminded her of bruised fruit. Well first and foremost:fruit.
Her body, curled around itself, sheltering the fibrous crunchy pit of her, her body white and frayed looking, rounded buttock, calf gently sloping, feet modest, willowy toes toenails like shale
face blurred, questionable dark spots where her eyes could have been. they closed as the shudder buckled, her mouth sagged open, lip lolling to one side, brow ancient furrowed like folds of sand nudged by a lazy tide. None of it concise, only guessing. Her knees brought up, squeezed against small
crunch-able chest. Full, heavy with pulp (stringy sweet, what snags on the teeth) but what if it were to fall from an appreciable height? Filmy is the flesh. Daring the looker to look closer, see what mite be hidden there.
Ripe:questionable. Sweet like nothing, pouring from the corners of a mouth: what a bite it would be.
That first bite.
The bruising comes in when she thinks of the brain beneath, that open, limitless figure so pale and forefront and brimming with intent, so crush-able with careless fist, so lovable with thirsty mouth. But what of the mind that put her before you, that turned her vulnerable, shameless, open for discussion?
Put her before you. naked.
Feb 2, 2010
Feb 2, 2010 at 1:01 PM UTC
Across the width of the shiny railings
a wooden stick was dragged.
Beneath the beady eye of the peacock
quite a lot of skin sagged.
Through lack of sleep.
The peacock wished he had a penny
for every time he was awoken.
he longed for a decent nap
without the pattern broken.
All he wanted was sleep.
So he became an angry peacock
and showed his venom in his tail
Out shot each and every eye on the feather
a picture of beauty to unveil.
He wanted peace and quiet.
The children delighted in this act
and thought he was putting on a show.
They dragged their sticks furiously
Little did they care or even know.
So the peacock refused to sleep
slumped in a corner forever and a day.
Then came along a peahen dull as dishwater
the peacock was excite, didn't know what to say.
She is dull but I will compensate for that
He shook his feathers to impress.
The little lady strutted by oblivious
thought he was in fancy dress.
Well.
May 7, 2015
May 7, 2015 at 6:45 AM UTC
Walking through the town today
I thought I crossed you on the street
With your sand storm hair and empty eyes
And anxious vagabond feet.
Your pretty teeth were crooked
Like bricks forced under pressure
Your shoulders, they sagged tiredly
Your head hung with displeasure.
My heart leapt at the sight of you
And music filled my lungs
With a longing to sing with the loudest voice
All the songs 'til now left unsung.
But when your eyes met with mine,
You were just a man I did not know.
Just a man, like the man I once loved
One thousand cold Augusts ago.
Jul 15, 2015
Jul 15, 2015 at 8:34 PM UTC
Ray Lewis, your spokesman
is ripped and he's lean.
He's built like Adonis
and, by rep, very mean.
If I use "old Spice" body wash
as per his advice.
The ladies will swoon
as I'll smell so **** nice.
I'm short fat and Jewish-
a Nebbish at heart.
In intimate settings
I'm quite prone to ****
So I bought "Old Spice" body wash
and lathered it on.
Then I entered the bedroom
and said "Babe, bring it on!"
Olive, my lover of many a year
was less than impressed
when I deigned to appear.
A giggle, a chuckle and then a guffaw
My confidence sagged
like my double chinned jaw.
"Darling, it may be you smell like Ray Lewis
but when my eyes open
You're short fat and Jewish."
The ad was misleading
and I feel like a fool
Not a mensch, more a reject
from a shallow gene pool.
Bad enough that the store
on my refund is reneging.
foreplay now requires
two hours of begging.
May 18, 2013
May 18, 2013 at 9:20 PM UTC
It flickered in the air,
sagged branch to branch,
pushed against the windows:
a death was pulsing.
It spilled into the streets
of my hometown.
I opened an old phonebook,
the names were humming.
I was cut to pieces by it.
I knew her as a little girl,
she knew my sister
in her hippie period.
The telephone lines cowered
beneath the gray massing of moon.
The faces of houses screamed
ceaselessly at me as I drove.
It is so insistent,
her sixth-grade smile
in my old class photo.
It hovers inside me.
Nov 29, 2017
Nov 29, 2017 at 6:30 PM UTC
I’m nothing coming through.
A ****** a let down.
I’m a plan turned mistake.
I slipped out into a world to be forgotten in it.
Cold, slimy, smelly, and stupid.
I’m the putty they use to fill the gaps of history.
The time between now and when.
A time where something, anything happens.
Walk on me, I’m here to move you on.
It feels as though we’re nearing the end.
Centuries before, fate was branded.
In its burned flesh we made our mark.
It’s come time to slaughter.
But we’ll be the squealers.
I’m coming through into nothing.
A mother abused by her young.
******* dry and sagged from their greed.
Fat, weak, and stupid now from gluttony.
Next winter will bring their snuffing.
So pull me out.
This pink portal.
Into somewhere I belong.
The nowhere we are right now.
The nothing we’re going to be.
Oct 24, 2021
Oct 24, 2021 at 3:42 AM UTC
The swing set was an old thing
like the brittle bones of an elephant
so worn that it had started to forget;
that's what her Gramma said, at least.
But Calpurnia Gray loved it
sat in it
till the seat sagged before she sat down
inviting her to rest.
Calpurnia Gray preferred the city
but the suburbs were what she got
and the swing set looked over some deep gulch of the woods
where even the suburbs ended.
Wilderness.
It filled her with such strange fantasies
of leaping through the trees like an ape
tearing off her clothes
and chasing down game
like some odd Tarzan with cobalt blue painted toe nails.
That would be the life for her if only she could go back
back
to the wilderness on the other side of the suburbs.
To the place where concrete monoliths lit up the sky at night
and rivers of asphalt carved always changing paths
for some intrepid explorer
to find a new bookstore
or museum
or something strange.
But Calpurnia didn't have either.
She had the suburbs.
And the swing set.
The swing set that always sat there, that never got away
the swing set that was crumbling with time and stagnation
but at least it was what she knew.
May 17, 2013
May 17, 2013 at 9:21 PM UTC
U.S.A yes I am a resident
Peace is forever relevant
Especially in a warzone none of this is heaven sent
Too many fatherless children too many are not celibate
Waiting for the Lord not the anti-christ
Many people embrace evil anti-right
Like lets create on our own terms
Sleep together watch a baby form from a egg and *****
A sad sight in the hood
Grandma praying but her grandson selling white in the hood
I recall folks asking me what's good
That's was some years back
When I sagged my slacks
Embodied a stereotype young and black
Black man mindset no not anymore
My mind is not focused on it if its not the Lord
So I don't focus my mind on things that are evil
Evil is evil..
People are people
So if you continue to lie to me
I expect you to one day say bye to me
I do not have nothing nice to say when I don't speak
Smile when I feel like smiling ,yes I expose teeth
Idk
Jun 18, 2013
Jun 18, 2013 at 4:54 PM UTC
It had been 2 weeks
She assumed the kids were asleep
Because he entered
He must of thought seductively
(making sure to shower first)
with an air of cool calmness
a scent of beer with a new thirst
for another type of refreshment
not fulfillment
but refilling
not romance
mere maintenance
she sighed & looked up
through her glasses at his swollen frame
like a balloons tied to a clothes horse,
left there for a day
so they sagged and lost their colour
& the frame had become visible
but only at its peaks
through the sheer power of gravity
his bones became seen
through his collar of his van huesen shirt
he thought so debonair (had a classy air, sleekish air)
she smiled acceptingly
as he pretended to be sincere
when he told her that he loved her
even after all these years
she was still a **** momma
she tried not to laugh
when he kissed her on the neck
& rubbed
her breast like he wanted milk
she spread her legs
when he pushed them
& waited for the steering
of a trailer into a garage
in reverse
at midnight
under influence
with the subtlety of a steer
it reminded her of years ago
when she had laughed at the austere
teachers that had enraged her
with their frigid sneer
& she smiled to herself an thought
of her *** like a rare fruit
only to age and watch it be eaten
by a once charming now savage brute
who turned into a blob of sorts
& she aswell had sagged
at least they sagged happily together
there's some comfort to be had in that
so she waited for the ******
with an image impressed in her
of a smirking withered teacher
arms folded & a smug grin
with a look that proclaims
‘here u are
it seems we’re on a par
an existence so far
from what u saw in dreams u had
of supple limbs & knowing grins
to dry skins and droopy things'
a flower wilted & smelling a bit funny
the faded colour of pale brown
in the end she felt lie a jug of sorts
he rolled over & went to sleep
she eventually did also
thinking about wat to cook next week
Feb 11, 2013
Feb 11, 2013 at 3:24 AM UTC
He held himself with a somber sadness
His massive shoulders sagged to the floor
As if something at his center had just given up
Perhaps life dealt him a bad deck of cards
or perhaps he had just got some very bad news
That is when I noticed the picture at the table
Sitting at his right in his favorite corner booth
was an old picture of a very lovely woman
Come to find out later this was his beloved wife
They were married for 55 wonderful years
She passed away in 2009 but that did not stop him
He still dines with her every day
and kisses her picture every night
He talks to this picture like she is right there with him
Now that is true love my friends <3 <3
Jun 24, 2016
Jun 24, 2016 at 11:09 AM UTC
We lived
In our Goodwill bathing suits
During our arduous summer isolation
From school and friends.
They were shiny, silk-like.
The scrotums were always
A size too big,
And so, sagged,
Exposing us like water snakes
Raising heads from darkness.
We sat in the back seat of the Rambler
Like three monkeys,
Towels wrapped sarong-like.
The heated air rose from the hood
As visible reminders.
This was Mammy's idea,
Hoping he would feel obliged
After many hours of hoeing and weeding.
Just an hour at the Beach.
I longed for the sound of slowly crushed stone
Beneath the tires as we backed out.
He emerged from the house,
Walked to the garage,
Never glancing our way,
A half hour later we got out.
But I saw, I heard, and now I speak.
Some fathers are never Dads.
Jun 1, 2016
Jun 1, 2016 at 7:58 AM UTC
When did the measure of your worth become a brand?
Banded sneakers, streaking vibrance,
vibrating mobile nuzzled in hand.
These do not make you.
Backward cap, for a new era,
sagged pants, swagger stance
for this hoodlum hoody wearer.
These do not make him.
Gucci bags and other tags,
designer purse, cursing contraband,
fake names make her gag.
But these do not make her.
They say don't judge a book by it's cover,
so why a person by their assets?
if it were asserted by another...
Belongings do not a person make.
Kindness, courage, compassion, heart,
personality, wisdom,
even a love of art.
These a person make.
Take some time to introspect,
inspect the way you see yourself,
You'll be happier for it I expect.
You make the person.
Jun 15, 2014
Jun 15, 2014 at 3:00 PM UTC
This morning’s sunrise was a tacky and artificial affair.
The sun was played by a weak, 12-watt, refrigerator bulb
that looked wet and heavy as it struggled uphill like a drunk.
The horizon reminded me of a cheap, runny theatrical illusion,
the clouds were old cotton ***** glued to cardboard silhouettes,
the birds sagged like dead puppets from uneven coat hanger wires.
I don’t miss you. Everything’s fine. I hardly noticed you were gone, actually.
Things here are a laugh and a half. We’re doing fun girl things. Anna got new shoes.
I’m hardened by years of inescapable, solitary, covid lockdown. I’m immune to despair.
So go off, interview for that new, far-flung PhD life. Go fawn over Elon Musk for all I care.
I’m definitely not in my room eating spoons of peanut butter and crying to Tom Waits songs.
Apr 11, 2023
Apr 11, 2023 at 11:26 PM UTC
don't you dare shed those tears
that you've been holding onto
for so long, in all these years
don't you dare mutter in grief
the single moment you sagged
in overwhelming simple relief
don't you dare cry out in pain
or tear your clothes, nor rip your
hair beneath a perfect summers rain
don't you dare try for sympathy
holding another's hand, randomly
for she is not random but your
epiphany
don't you dare weep for me
if a single tear drop falls
and burns a path so endless
let it be your downfall
you wept at nothingness
don't you dare weep for me
I'm may be the willow tree in winter
the barrenness that left you blind
I'm may be the heat of summer
that sweltered you so unkind
yet you dare to weep for me
when the seasons decide to change
it's not your tears that bring relief
it's the history you try to rearrange
Your tears are crocodilian
steeped in lies and treachery
sitting like empty salt lakes
don't you DARE weep for me
Oct 26, 2015
Oct 26, 2015 at 6:35 AM UTC
Beginning with the frost and snow,
anticipation extended its tedious reach again,
but it was not right to suffer as the season
swept around the sun. A member of the
fall, like a tender leaf felt inured, by thought,
a humble intellect to serve the usual course
in words and weather, the pride of a
recurring sort. Weary blades of grass
were striving, even so, to grow against
the warmth in the few weeks, and, as the
skirts were purchased in the stores,
investment ruled to favor amiable, cold
breezes. The house grew quiet as the fans
were stilled for a suspense until the
furnace roared. The issue was patterns in
layers from the top, and the claim to the
design belonged only to the way the ice
expanded as crystals of moisture, crazy,
having forgotten how to caress the blossoms
of the shrubs; thus, a pleasure had gone to
sleep, its circulation numbed by
inevitable force, and conditions hibernated
beneath the indelible clarity of the air. The
splendid gyrations of the course became
obstacles harder on tightened joints, while
contestants moved from the warm climate
to the chilling, northern forests. It remained
possible to survive, because there were other
members of the team such as split sticks of
wood and cradles for sprained elbows. It
could not be suitable to grow tired of such a
challenge. When the door was secured, the
roots could relax and spread out like the
tentacles of a squid, beside the glowing hearth,
to read a book or watch a show. Above, there
was nothing left alive between the earth and
the birds, scratched into the sky and dashed
along the lines of wire. Birds sagged and were
swaying while the gusts played with their bony
feet clutched around the cylinders made of
copper and coated with insulation. Warm
currents and feathers made a thatch for a roof
that favored the roots and left them insulated
while around them slumbering creatures had
been forgotten. No memory existed to claim
the cycle of the warm days when the humming
in space reflected the ripples in the shaded
pools. The endless days were the realm of
vacant threads of branches in the chilly trees.
Nov 13, 2013
Nov 13, 2013 at 8:10 PM UTC
I heard the door open. It was Leeza (Lisa’s 14-year-old sister),
she’d been out on a date. I was the only one in the living room
as she came in and sagged, dejectedly onto the huge, white
sectional couch, right next to me. She looked positively
deflated. Which is unusual because up until now,
she’s been all freckles and smiles
Ok, here’s where we get poetic and rhyme, with innuendo and allusion:
Me: “Did you have a good time?”
Leeza: “No but I was trying.”
Me: “Did he get handsy—the swine?”
Leeza: “Argh! No—but his kisses are a crime.”
I gasped: “You didn’t give him a climb!?”
Leeza “NO!” she said, somewhat horrified.
Me (trying to be neutral): “No judging, it would have been.. fine (I lied).”
Leeza: “That’s never going to happen.”
“Good,” I declared, “he was just a distraction—and, you know Santa.”
“What about Santa?”
Whew, that’s enough of THAT (rhyming business).
She asked, so, yeah, I sang it.. I had to.
*“He knows who you’ve been kissing,
what you’re thinking when you’re awake,
he knows if you’ve been bad or good—
he’s kind of like a cop that way.”*
After a moment's silence Leeza asked,
“Is there something creepy about that?”
“Only if you think about it.” I admitted,
as she put her head on my shoulder.
.
.
A song for this:
Fairytale of New York (feat. Kirsty MacColl) by The Pogues
.
.
A Christmas Playlist! There’s 6 days til Christmas (and Hanukkah)
http://daweb.us/xmas/Christmas_25.mp3
Dec 19, 2024
Dec 19, 2024 at 12:14 PM UTC
He stepped out the door and From behind the door, she put one hand
looked towards the face to the glass and watched him
behind him. burn into the night.
Diamonds filled the sockets She weakly mirrored her own spark of life,
where eyes should have been and who pounded at the cool surface behind
from his smile poured the sun. her eyes.
He waved a see-you-later wave, and from Desperately, the spark tried to grab the
his fingertips trailed a shower of attention of the star gliding away sparks. down the street.
He was alive and music sounded each A pretty face, blanched with panic, and
time a foot struck the concrete. the word “Run!” forming on her lips.
But it was too late, and he was gone. Her hand fell from the glass and her shoulders sagged. Behind her eyes, her spark sputtered and sank to her knees, diminished. She rested a cheek against the inside of the pupil and mourned the oncoming sounds of a broken heart - like the cracks that echo when ice splits across a frozen lake.
She turned out the light.
May 28, 2013
May 28, 2013 at 11:14 AM UTC
blues man, man of soul,
writhing in my forearms.
a heart too calloused to pump,
eyes too full, fading to chalk.
thin wooden fingers, whining joints,
sagging biceps splotched with bleach,
a broom mustache solid in sweat.
it hurts, blues man, to feel you fade.
your sax bleat against the sidewalk,
the dry reed snapping on impact.
your canned bank spilling nickels into the storm drain.
i felt your shattered muscles shiver against my chest,
your spine spasming back and forth, pounding against your lungs,
blocked by all the **** you’ve eaten in your seven or so decades.
your shoulders sagged and your chin wilted to your wheezing heart.
i laid you down against the wall of Mother’s and searched for a payphone.
looking back, you seemed like an old black Atlas,
i stuck a few quarters in and yelled at an answering machine for four infinite minutes.
looking back, i saw people looking anywhere but your face,
dropping change in your saxophone case.
your fingertips stopped shaking,
and with it, my old earth sank into space,
and you ****** me into a new one.
it hurts here, blues man, man of soul.
it hurts here, and everyone’s got a rasp in their voice.
Jul 12, 2010
Jul 12, 2010 at 11:18 PM UTC