"scalds" poems
If you're ever on the riverside
where the sun beats your head
you would see the old man
selling hats of palm leaf
but you care not to notice him
having already smelled the sea
and too keen to cross the river
travel southward on the island
till the saline wind scalds your eyes
your skins itch to jump into the waves
yet the man with the palm leaf hats
would not cease to tell you
how burning would be the sun on the sands
and so badly you need to protect the head
by parting bucks that mean nothing to you
but a world to the mouths he feeds
and before you stamp on him a final no
she has one atop her hair
beneath which her eyes flutter like butterflies
her sun rouged cheeks untimely blush
and two born anew lovers
merrily head for the sea
having bought romance
for forty bucks.
Apr 29, 2016
Apr 29, 2016 at 4:56 AM UTC
This was just published so it is copyright 2015 by Holy Cow Press ~ mce
Poverty is the fence around your life. Poverty wakes you up at 4 AM only to whisper meaningless slogans in your ear. It is the school of Piranha nibbling at the back of your brain. It is two hours waiting in the anteroom of despair for $22 worth of food stamps and being glad to be there. It is changing your phone number frequently because bill collectors are such boring conversationalists. It is the empty space your heels used to fill. It is letting your hair grow long and scraggly and your grizzled beard sprout because you know that although you sleep in rented rooms tonight, the street is not far off, and you want to fit in when you arrive. Poverty scalds the lint from your pockets. It is your private Treblinka within which you rage but are crushed. It is desperate prayers against dental catastrophes, blown tires, surprises of any sort. Poverty is when everything you own is frayed including your nerves from sleepless moments spent trying to solve the equation that will make X number of dollars cover X + ? number of bills, knowing that such math would defeat Newton or Einstein. Poverty is eying the cat's kibble imagining that with a bit of sugar and a splash of milk it might be fine and then eyeballing the cat himself thinking of protein of last resort and trying not to measure him against the microwave door. You ration your cigarettes; whiskey is a fading memory. Passing a diner on the street, you catch a whiff of burgers too expensive to consider and experience a Pavlovian moment. Poverty is trying to keep your head up and then remembering you pawned your neck. Poverty is watching the needle eat your last few gallons of gas. Poverty is the archeology of despair. It portends the death of irony. There is nothing ironic about a car with 217,000 miles and no insurance on it. Facts are facts in the world of poverty. Poverty is the last quarter reclaimed from beneath the cushions. It is too much time and not enough quarters. It is the specious logic of the self-righteous proclaiming that you deserve to be poor because you are, which in Amerika passes for wisdom. Poverty makes each day like the next because nothing does not vary. It is who you are and where you are going, although you won't get far. It is the life you lead inside the fence. It is the sum of what you lack. It just is.
- mce
Apr 6, 2015
Apr 6, 2015 at 7:54 PM UTC
Anytime my coffee gets cold
I can't help but think of you
It scalds my mouth as I drink it too fast
But the pain doesn't compare
To that I feel missing you
Mar 18, 2015
Mar 18, 2015 at 9:22 PM UTC
The firefighter explained to me
My brain was still aflame.
I have to water down my thoughts
If I am to be saved.
I focused hard and pondered on my
Faults and past regrets.
The firefighter’s eyebrows raised
And, in fear, began to sweat.
He said self-remorse would scorch my flesh,
And forgiveness is my water.
To stare beyond this choking smoke,
My vision must be broader.
And as I thought of all I’ve done,
And all I’ve yet to do,
I couldn’t help but sear a tear
For the scalds I’ve singed in you.
My head blew up, my heart explodes,
An inferno in my mind.
So he arced his axe behind his head,
And buried it in mine.
Feb 15, 2010
Feb 15, 2010 at 9:47 AM UTC
Three summers ago
I loved a boy
who's hair when moved
by wind or hand
was always magical,
who possessed tanned skin
and eyes so blue
they were waters to drown in.
Around him I felt enchanted
and he was enthralling.
He captivated me,
turned me into a slave of my emotions,
with words and promises
I knew he couldn't make come true.
"Run," my friends urged me, "as fast as you can."
But without him life was jaded,
their warning
had been voiced too late.
Already I had pricked my finger,
on a spinning wheel
and fallen head over heels
in that chemically induced slumber
we sometimes call love.
He opened a door for me that led straight
into a world filled with
bushes of roses
and buckets of sunshine,
I promptly forgot that too much sunshine
scalds the skin
and turns it a burning, vivid red,
almost as vivid
as the crimson blood
a touch from the thorns of roses draws.
I knew I had been warned so I stayed there
bleeding and burning,
swearing to myself as I suffered
that I would never again
give my heart to someone
who would not give me theirs in return.
This summer, three years later,
being around you
means feeling like being able to combust spontaneously
and I cannot forget
the sensation of my skin in contact with yours.
It made me realise
that though I have always loved you,
I started loving you a little bit too much.
You are my every thought.
They say you never make the same mistake twice,
that it is your own stupid fault the second time around.
But if it really was a choice
why then is it
that I spend all my nights these days
pleading with the universe
to let me unlove you.
Oct 4, 2014
Oct 4, 2014 at 4:55 PM UTC
We step outside and even though
you were only one option out of many,
I chose you.
You were perfect
for a seven minute fling.
Your milky white skin burns instantly
to my fiery touch.
At first, you play rough.
Your breath scalds my lungs
with the promise of a shorter life.
But as you ease into a pattern,
you begin to mellow me out.
Now we are halfway through
and your tan lips
are starting to soften
at the thought of this fling
coming to an end.
As the seconds whine forward,
you send me one last shock of ecstasy,
and then in a puff of smoke,
you leave forever,
with me wishing
that you would come back.
They say a seven minute fling
will take seven minutes
off your life.
I sit and ponder this
but still I hunger for more.
And although there are millions
of you out there just waiting
for their own chance at a seven minute fling,
the time you have given me
is as good as it ever will be.
Feb 12, 2013
Feb 12, 2013 at 1:29 PM UTC
She is the cold fire that snaps at my skin
Making me long for the heartburning
That scalds and scars the flesh within
Dark hair dark desirous eyes
Dark nights of passion till I realize
That she has drained me
Supped the juices from my lust
Drunk from all the fury my love gives
And suddenly she lives
Like a vampire
Mesmerizing
One blood drop at a time
She slurps me up like I am some cheap wine
And I swoon under her power
Consumed by her hunger
As she completely devours me
Till I beg for more
Jul 16, 2015
Jul 16, 2015 at 10:17 AM UTC
There is a dull ache in the pit of my bossom-
maddening and riveting as the alcohol scalds
my tongue, my throat and settles in my stomach.
Far away,
In the different weather and scent of-
streets, alleways and my bed not quite the same.
Long way from home,
Amidst a place not quite my taste-
missing and kissing in the the corner streets.
Epiphany as the place; that is not quite the same,
reminds me that it is not the missing piece;
Rather, that I am the lonesome traveller.
A stranger, a moribund
In this far away land of sorrow and of memory.
Long way, homesick in the vast expanse of-
memory lane;
A place not quite the same as the one left behind.
Jan 5, 2014
Jan 5, 2014 at 8:57 AM UTC
my imagination scalds
with violating stains
of contemptuous familiarity
agonised shrieks
confront my mouth
with an unremitting combustibility
while a frustration like a volatile tornado
engulfs me with an hallucinated savagery
detonating unrelenting explosions
within my consciousness of perception
causing a hurricane of momentum
bringing such oddities to my mind
as such precludes their proper elucidation
yet a tempestuously implosive inner cosmos
is located a volcanic insurgence
the accelerative storm on which
the poem like Valkyries rides
Jun 9, 2013
Jun 9, 2013 at 8:47 PM UTC
A vast unfeeling sordid breath,
That scalds my naked doubt
Grazing the space unfilled.
Lost in the waves
The summer an oppressive embrace,
Infecting this town.
And I am alone from here.
The stagnant tsunami,
Creeps up from the depths
Untiring in its attempts to overwhelm me.
But I'm already so tired,
Bone-weary.
I give up on my fight to the heat,
To the eternal god that glares
So balefully from beneath heavy clouds.
Have done with me now.
Leave me to the tide.
To the uncaring winds
Anywhere beyond the sweat of bodies
And incessant hate
Of the sun.-
Aug 2, 2013
Aug 2, 2013 at 5:16 PM UTC
i. you will miss him in drizzles and monsoons, in swells and tsunamis. you will listen to his favorite song for hours; it will hit you every unexpected moment. it will hurt, stab, ache, and you will suppress constant screams with strained lips.
ii. you will collect everything he gave to you and wonder if it is dimensionally real. you will sleep in his shirts, retaste saltwater kisses, and reread conversations as if there's something you missed the previous thirty times. absence does not make the heart grow fonder; it rips it apart and you cannot stitch the ragged halves with no thread.
iii. you will feel his touch presently in everything you do. it will be soft and cruelly comforting. it will constantly and inescapably linger. it will haunt you in early rainy mornings and dark lonely evenings.
iv. you will read endless musings on love and philosophy. you will entirely understand foucault's prison. you will live in steinbeck's tide pools and stars, and relate to simon bolivar trapped in his labyrinth. you will wonder why everything is like this, ugly and broken (and also if you are becoming delusional).
v. you will drink tea that scalds your tongue and stand outside on freezing nights, numb and overfeeling at the same time. you will ask the silent moon a thousand questions. you will see him and blink, head swimming, heart pounding in surges. the stars will wink and the wind will mock you.
vi. you will have blissful afternoons you forget and sorrowful nights you remember. it will still consume you in bouts, devour you in spells. nighttime will become both your enemy and remedy: it will wickedly remind you, yet help you heal.
vii. you will try and fail to make sense of him (and the universe in general). you will grapple with reality and yourself. perhaps you will never know why he stopped loving you: you will keep wondering how some things can just be left broken.
iix. slowly, slowly, you will sprout on your own; you will be tender and nearly whole. most importantly, you will realize his love brought you an entirely different kind of happiness.
ix. you will stop worrying and trying to piece together an empty puzzle. even the deepest scars find their way of fading. your mom was right: stop picking at the scab and your wound will heal.
x. you will learn to love yourself in ways he never could have loved you.
Mar 6, 2016
Mar 6, 2016 at 2:35 AM UTC
Deity of wars,
Devourer,
Defender,
Domesticated, yet wild at heart.
She cast her light and protection upon the Middle Kingdom and Upper East,
Blessing the soil and crops upon which her followers jubilantly feast.
Do they dare forsake her?
Suppressed ferocity,
Longing to break free of that which entombs her.
The shrine lies in ruins,
yet nine times immortalized.
In her eyes that see all,
Lay a world lost for so long,
Brought back to life by her awakening roaring song.
She claws at the sky and rekindles the flame,
She slips through the gates of time unscathed and scalds those who fail to do the same.
Her eye became The Sun,
Her other eye, The Moon.
Her blood became The Nile,
And she encouraged her children to drink of it,
An unswayed symbol of the eternally nubile.
Jan 26, 2013
Jan 26, 2013 at 6:19 PM UTC
Why can't I find the flames that once burned beneath skin?
Changed from warm to cold and dark
Reality's breath blew out the fire deep in me
Transformed my core into coals black, chalky, and dark
Attempting to force a glimmer of hope in my eyes
Ignite carefree wonder with a spark of belief
Then I could be unharnessed and rile passion
That scalds any unwanted lingering grief
Beyond these pages is genuine pain
Still alive though my heart won't beat
A hundred perfect words could not replace
Sought-after inferno, world devoid of heat
Head hung low in debilitating failure
Dragging feet with purposeful defiance
Mistakes resting their weight on my back
Hunt for embers in half-hearted compliance
One candle lit to awaken misplaced zeal
Eternity tried silently stealing away
Sunset has the right shades of Orange and red
But lacks love it used to invoke each day
I am overanalyzing this
Eventually find the ecstasy that died
Don't care if It's a person, place, or idea
Something out there will rekindle lost feelings inside
Nov 7, 2018
Nov 7, 2018 at 6:40 PM UTC
Hands that look sunburned
at first blush
count the silent ticks of a cognitive clock
grasping and releasing in stilted syncopation:
one-two-three-five (must avoid the four)
Did I remember to lock the front door? Out
of bed—again—freezing feet tumble
down
into slippers
awaiting the circular inevitability. Again, again.
Pad, pad, pad:
light shuffling accompanies the one-two-three-five
pounding in the head; that mind ricocheted with worry—
worry about the front door, the evil intentions of four,
insidious germs and subsequent scrubbing-scrubbing-scrubbing
in bleach and Comet. Pad,
pad, pad to the front door.
It’s one hundred and thirty four steps, so take a baby-shuffle:
still avoiding the four.
Cold, unyielding brass **** Locked.
Deadbolt? Check. Creeping black.
Chain lock? Check. Crawling germs. Oh, god.
Pad, pad, pad to the kitchen.
Clorox-fume greetings in the sparkling sink
from twenty-three minutes before. Never twenty-four.
Clorox on the cracked fingers, blistering
out that imperceptible blackness I know it’s there
blackness choking, bleeding in the bleach.
Scrub brushes, pumice, and fingernail files
wear down the nubs where the blackness may hide.
“Shh” the steaming water soothes
as it stings, scalds. “Shh.” Burn it all out;
conclusion so comforting. So predictably round.
This is the last time I can do this tonight. Pad, pad, pad
back to the bedroom. Downey quilt beckons in lover tones,
pleading pillows nudge against that head, that infernal head
still panicking amongst the softness:
Did I remember to lock the front door?
Sep 8, 2010
Sep 8, 2010 at 2:14 AM UTC
And if I loved you more than you loved me,
would anyone in truth of it be wise?
I measure you not in soliloquy,
but how you hold me when I start to cry.
If all the world did freeze and cease to turn,
the sun, and moon, and stars exit stage left,
the feeling would be something like this burn
that scalds me as you take up my time— theft.
We laugh, we cry, I hurt, we hug— but see?
I know that doubt will live here in my head,
so long as you share not your heart with me;
it’s easier to fade away instead.
I love you still, but needing to be free,
I’ll take the heart you left; it still belongs to me.
Feb 12, 2019
Feb 12, 2019 at 9:55 PM UTC
this will be an off the chest one,
a long one,
a crazy (and) derisive one for
we
who once were
i
are now foregone.
we sit here
writing -
startled by the addition of
LOUD
music(?) to my library;
not my taste -
pink floyd
leaks through my
head phones from
the coffee shop speakers.
tea scalded tongue,
she did
warn me,
did she...
- a break,
thats where we
find
ourselves and
wondering what will come
of the fu-
tu-
re
furthur out from
now?
we quiet now,
find ourselves
lulled through
into
another plane
of which -
break end.
this year -
bitter winds find
necessitation in
her
fixation -
as last year
as next year,
til time
cedes.
we write with open head
and fluid mental
projection,
a reality
created
from each of ours
and one into
the next;
'our universe is
vast'
some cry,
of course we
know
it is.
tea no longer
scalds
(
to burn
the flesh away
)
as twangy
guitar follows
snappy snare,
tap tap
tip
tap,
blues wail
away.
- - - to take a ****
to take a cigarette
to take a lover - - -
lover missed,
though
so did the
****
currents retain
fluidity.
we're done.
Sep 30, 2012
Sep 30, 2012 at 6:59 PM UTC
As love as life purely be
The newborn does clearly see
So is the Treasures ripped of me
And with the lead, I into the thickening sea
Deep sea diver, who’d dream of submarines
Remembering to forget what ought be
And into thee illusions and relative delusions
As we agree to agree unto our identities
So the child would play into the surreal
Reality they say, but in plain sight
Would the greatest they steal
Life is hot and scalds as all accepts
When in your mind you don’t learn
All the right steps
As you were as you were three
And not another just like Me
In exuberance to conquer
Those who conquer about and not be
But for the few and synergies
A fairytale of sugar and spice
Not doing great harm because your nice
Deep sea diver in your submarine
I am the sky
Would you come out
And breathe with me
Your story is of remembrance
Of all you once were
And ever could be
Pure Love that is seeing perfectly
The mountains that melt into the Sea
And reality becomes Love
In your waking living breathing Dream
So shall the song of life be
Growing up
Growing down
Weaving your Love story all around
Our greater home
Where all are found
And find every angel does serve thee
As we decide what they be
So mind what you mind
Mind you if I am heart
And mind you be
Your great calling is serving me
As I am servant to all of thee
I am knower and will not deceive
Nothing has power over thee
Upon mountains or depth of sea
You are the Dragon
Who fire breathes
Whose song and dance
Is what is Heart
Not of other chance
O what Joy be
If every girl and boy
Simply be and see
Jun 10, 2012
Jun 10, 2012 at 9:11 PM UTC
Let your words linger on your lips
As the wine drips from your pores,
Forming a puddle of blood
Upon the crimson stained floor.
The burning red reeks of love
And acidic sin scalds the rug,
The carpet scorched and house ablaze
But yet you still return his gaze.
And though the embers fall like leaves
With fiery passion amidst the trees,
The night will cease as though your lust
Left nothing more but washed up rust.
Had the ocean swept it all away
So morning could arrive with peace,
You wouldn't let this dream decay
Although it was the last you'd ever feel.
Jul 31, 2018
Jul 31, 2018 at 11:24 PM UTC
he is a shock to the senses / like the first sip of hot chocolate / the way the sweet liquid scalds your tongue / like the icy air that wraps it's bony arms around your body / when stepping out of a steaming shower in the early morning hours / he is a sharp inhale when your torso touches the blue water of the swimming pool on a hot Texas afternoon
Jun 18, 2014
Jun 18, 2014 at 10:32 AM UTC
I've been breathing in everything I hate
Such as the smoke from fire that bellows beneath my feet,
It burns and it scalds and yet,
I do not learn my lesson.
My lungs have become airbags- deflated, charred
It hurts me to breathe but yet,
I do not learn my lesson.
I have been shown the sweet smells from the valley,
The honeysuckle kisses against my dried lips
But nectar is far more vicious than tar.
For it sticks to you like a bad memory
It will coat you in a sweet sickness,
A birth from a joyous hospital room
Honeysuckle kisses upon dry lips,
While they pump you full of the tar.
So while my lungs cannot heave anymore,
And my organs coated with depression
The nectar does nothing but upset my stomach
It causes it to wretch like a screaming baby
Lack of honeysuckle kisses fuels the fire.
I will continue to burn and scald my feet-
But I will not succumb to the iridescence
That will one day leave you sick,
And sticky sweet.
Apr 26, 2018
Apr 26, 2018 at 11:46 AM UTC
This is the present,
A place that bears no resent
A battlefield where all anger must vent,
A garden where flowers are sent,
To a future where we bear us,
or stand alone we shall and must.
This is the present, between morrow and yester,
Let the hungry wolves feast on the great dictator,
and then the sun scalds the great hater,
falling and melting becomes the intricate flother
In between the future and past,
are all the mistakes and corrections we cast.
Jan 16, 2016
Jan 16, 2016 at 7:45 AM UTC
193
I shall know why—when Time is over—
And I have ceased to wonder why—
Christ will explain each separate anguish
In the fair schoolroom of the sky—
He will tell me what “Peter” promised—
And I—for wonder at his woe—
I shall forget the drop of Anguish
That scalds me now—that scalds me now!
1k
The splendid southern sun lights the land
breeding the greenest grass
exploding the fairest flowers
reflecting the widest seas
feeding the richest soil
and the kindest people
The vast open ocean soaks the skin
The soft white sand scalds the feet
The breezy air is humid
saturated with ecstasy
but damp with opportunity
But as I venture north
films of simple nostalgia conceal these memories
escapes to the southern sun now intermittent.
Bliss is overcome with solitude.
Reality refracts the northern lamps
replacing the herald of each new day with a sobering awakening.
Every day passes slowly
as the factory of life once again begins
as the iron cogs of monotony turn
in their recurrent spin.
The last bursts of escape are torn
ripped between the brutish artisans of monotony
like scraps thrown to the dogs
a loaf dropped amongst slaves.
This is the limit of our blessed lives
Endless toil and fleeting happiness.
If not, show me more
a rescue from these binding shackles.
But if so, may I dream
of the southern sun?
Jun 1, 2013
Jun 1, 2013 at 12:15 AM UTC
This throat is raw
From the fire in my heart
It scalds the esophagus
As it works its way up
And makes it hard to
Tell you the way I feel
And tasting you isn't the same
And I'm choking on every word
I didn't say
Vowels and consonants all fail me
And stupid girls
Don't win a ******* thing
Except self destruction anyway
And there ain't no gift receipt
For that
Sep 2, 2012
Sep 2, 2012 at 3:35 AM UTC