"scissored" poems
---
Once upon a time
In a land so far away
There was a wretched kingdom
Were a vampire held sway
He was very ancient
Handsome as a knave
Dressed in black and silken garb
Was said to be quite brave
But such a cruel creature
He devoured the towns
The soldiers were all petrified
Would not defend the crown
So the King of the castle
Searched both far and wide
For mighty men of valor
To defend the countryside
Finally up north
He found a daring band
Of golden headed Vikings
To defend his failing land
The company of Norsemen
Could not be laidback
They rallied their army
And decided to attack!
They put no garlic round their necks
No ash stakes did they carry
They knew not the vampire ways
And so they were not wary
But oh! What valiant men!
They made quite a sight!
Scaling the vampiric castle walls -
IN THE DEAD OF NIGHT!
The vampire, Vlad the terrible,
Made a crimson flood
Destroyed every one of them
And feasted on their blood!
It was before morning
The darkest witching hour
Vlad finished dispatching them
His countenance was dour
Then a light came streaking
From the pitch black sky -
It was a Valkyrie!
She made a fearsome cry!
"You! Vlad the terrible!"
The ghoul looked up, aghast!
"You feasted on my Norsemen -
But I am here at LAST!!!"
The mighty female warrior
Shook back her golden mane
"You've killed many villagers
But won't do it AGAIN!!!"
The brilliant armored woman
Faced off the evil lord
He laughed, "You cannot slay me!
No! Not with that sword!"
"And for all your armor
What do you suppose?
Your sweet delicious throat
Is slender... and EXPOSED!!!
The Valkyrie laughed
She threw back her hair
She let fly her sword
It scissored through the air!!!
The dreaded Vlad was impaled
But NOT through his chest
Through his very garments
The great sword came to rest
To a TREE the monster stuck
Like a fly caught with a pin
He could not free himself!
And he saw the rising SUN!!!
He struggled against his cape
He'd have none of THAT!
But Vlad could not break the sword
So he became a bat!
Up he flew to escape his fate
But a ray of sun broke through
With an arc he burnt to spark
IT DESTROYED VLAD AS HE FLEW!!!
The Valkyrie, triumphant,
Cried out, "it is I!!!
For when there is a battle,
I decide who lives and dies!!!
I decide the outcome!
Tis not by happenstance...
Won't see you in Valhalla
*You never had a chance!!!*
So ended the battle
The Valkyrie WON.
The outcome was decided...
...Before it was begun!!!
SoulSurvivor
5/6/2015
May 6, 2015
May 6, 2015 at 11:50 AM UTC
**** men
predatory *** hounds
chasing skirts and tights
aching **** idiots
disciples of Eros
Christs of fetish
reconciling nothing
veiling that principled demeanor
of feminist culture
"of don't objectify me".....translation
sensual form is not natures ruse
machine Eve must
override override override
well the id does not negotiate
the superstructure
of affected political tele-reality
starring
the liberal chattering class
who speculate male motives
to be some vainglorious power trip
while corporatized media personalities
feign out of control lust
as a mental disorder
and
sit up like shuddering Pekingese
yessing the lascivious
as a fiction
no ladies
its not just power
theories are not testosterone
it is pure unadulterated
relentless
irreducible
urge to merge
like the beluga **** channel
sea world as you've never seen it before
where male dolphins
batter and gang bang
the weaker ***
in search of feral harmony
in an overbuilt society
yet to become a civilization
are we
scissored between a wild ****** id
of the damed
and the Victorian sacred
of the damed
oh you silky damsels
makin men moody and humid
pure **** heroine
a poison ivy of ***
like a rash
givin men folk the itch
cant stop the twitch
rubber *******
in a rubbing frenzy
from your soaking heat and odor
we are a rumbling of muttering torments
for the forbidden taste
of you
oooow
oooow
we are pan in a mad dance
for glistening shanks
and buttery kisses
we are the early bird looking for the worm
hunters decreed by the liturgy of heaven and hell
a constellation of infatuation and lechery
mad with adoration
love slaves in a raging furnace of desire
*** addicts
that just say yes
turgid dogs
hole sniffers
voluptuous monsters
all johnny apple seed
and sometimes your salvation
as you are ours
knowing that sometimes
real eroticism eclipses morality
and yes my darlings*
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
NO MAN SHOULD EVER TRANSGRESS ANOTHER
Dec 15, 2017
Dec 15, 2017 at 12:55 PM UTC
From love's first fever to her plague, from the soft second
And to the hollow minute of the womb,
From the unfolding to the scissored caul,
The time for breast and the green apron age
When no mouth stirred about the hanging famine,
All world was one, one windy nothing,
My world was christened in a stream of milk.
And earth and sky were as one airy hill.
The sun and mood shed one white light.
From the first print of the unshodden foot, the lifting
Hand, the breaking of the hair,
From the first scent of the heart, the warning ghost,
And to the first dumb wonder at the flesh,
The sun was red, the moon was grey,
The earth and sky were as two mountains meeting.
The body prospered, teeth in the marrowed gums,
The growing bones, the rumour of the manseed
Within the hallowed gland, blood blessed the heart,
And the four winds, that had long blown as one,
Shone in my ears the light of sound,
Called in my eyes the sound of light.
And yellow was the multiplying sand,
Each golden grain spat life into its fellow,
Green was the singing house.
The plum my mother picked matured slowly,
The boy she dropped from darkness at her side
Into the sided lap of light grew strong,
Was muscled, matted, wise to the crying thigh,
And to the voice that, like a voice of hunger,
Itched in the noise of wind and sun.
And from the first declension of the flesh
I learnt man's tongue, to twist the shapes of thoughts
Into the stony idiom of the brain,
To shade and knit anew the patch of words
Left by the dead who, in their moonless acre,
Need no word's warmth.
The root of tongues ends in a spentout cancer,
That but a name, where maggots have their X.
I learnt the verbs of will, and had my secret;
The code of night tapped on my tongue;
What had been one was many sounding minded.
One wound, one mind, spewed out the matter,
One breast gave **** the fever's issue;
From the divorcing sky I learnt the double,
The two-framed globe that spun into a score;
A million minds gave **** to such a bud
As forks my eye;
Youth did condense; the tears of spring
Dissolved in summer and the hundred seasons;
One sun, one manna, warmed and fed.
4.2k
"I suffered, so, I learned, so, I changed"
*her pale white arm,
back and forth,
flashes before my eyes face,
cutting my few blonde many grays,
she tumbles pieces of
now dead me,
to the floor,
in cut wet clumps
there, across her underarm,
placed there to be but
half-hid,
my Bostonian via Albania haircutter,
(I am a human explorer)
reveals a tattoo uttering
in Arabic
that cuts me
deeper
then any scissored blade
she metal possessed*
I suffered, so, I learned, so, I changed
*revelations daily granted me,
this one,
incomprehensible,
as she cuts,
I imagine,
my mused blood superheated,
clotting this poem
oh the words are readily understood,
but unknown is
the inspiration,
the event
so formative
it was deserving of being
transcribed, inked,
permanence earned by,
recording pon human flesh,
exposed
yet hidden
and I dare not inquire...even I...
who among us dare say
that they have not
suffered?
yet, you,
say the word slow
suf-fer,
hiss it
in two parts,
then ask yourself again,
have you experienced
the unimaginable
as real?
and needy to record it upon thy own
human flesh?
I have walked
empty mirrored hallways unending,
stood by rivers imploring,
begging me to join their current,
sleepwalked for days without count,
punishing penance for
acts of commission,
acts of fearful cowardice
I learned
I changed
better
for the betterment
of my united untied
bodied bloodied soul
*where?
my tattoo?
readily visible!*
in every word I ever wrote
Apr 30, 2015
Apr 30, 2015 at 12:33 AM UTC
They were broken children
Their scissored minds ran them
In spirals
Until they sat with crossed legs
And crossed lips
To press themselves flatter
They were cut-strings marionettes
Who danced
In an attempt to wring calories
From their balsa-wood bones
Which refused to give
And who pinned their painted smiles
A little tighter each morning
They were snapped-spines picture books
Who’d been warped too far by society
And had had their pages torn from the crease
So that words hung like razor blades
And spliced from each vertebrae
They took them to the circus
Where they were the **** of every joke
But when the clowns speared them with dripping eyes
And artificial mouths that were stretched over grimaces
Like the dust-jackets from different stories
They stared back glassily
Because how can you be afraid
Of the broken clockwork of your reflection?
Oct 23, 2014
Oct 23, 2014 at 2:28 AM UTC
She's just a strange girl,
whose steps bore insecurity.
And her limbs awkwardly moves along as she walks.
and she is ashamed of the pitch of her voice.
so she never talks.
And when she does, her words comes out in mystical forms
a language none could understand.
"What gibberish none sense?"
the adult says as he took his scissored hand and cut her tongue.
only to replace it with one that could utter words that pleases him.
and no longer, was she a strange girl.
Jul 11, 2013
Jul 11, 2013 at 11:39 AM UTC
Young child with your doughnut smile,
Your cockiness and native guile,
Here's some stuff with an 'S' to look out for
A smallish list to even the score,
In what you'll know is an unfair life:
Sufficient knowledge of Machiavellian strife,
Scissored words to cut the crap,
String and sticks to lay your traps,
Shell to listen to when adults blare,
Stone to polish whilst they glare,
Sleekly concealed hiding places,
Several artless piteous faces,
Sack to carry your thievings well,
Starched hankie for its awesome smell,
Salve to nurse your nascent pride,
Style enough to say "I lied",
Sharp pin in shoe-toe to kick any creeps,
Soles of rubber for super-huge leaps,
Some allies of similarly toughened mien,
Strong butter-toffees to keep the allies keen,
Stories of your devious plans to pass the time...
Since i'm tired now of trying to rhyme
This is where i leave you, small human being
Find the **** things and smash the adult fiends,
And when you're done, just wait for me
Next time we'll look at things with a 'T'.
May 26, 2012
May 26, 2012 at 7:02 AM UTC
Night- paces and restlessly stations
leaf'd sentries in the silhouette sky;
Black - cossetting, scissored, jagged
tatoo'd trees lend watchful eyes;
Branches - whisper aches and pains
with sweeping hands of hurried lies;
Trust - exhumes her two-cent breath -
"You promised not to compromise.."
Jul 19, 2013
Jul 19, 2013 at 6:53 AM UTC
returning home from an evening out,
I'm in bed never later, than 5 minutes after,
which never fails to provoke a
"How can u be in bed so fast?"
same reply, every time,
got you women, got you girl,
to do the nighttime girlie stuff,
so you can kiss your fast asleep man,
a tender good nite...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
puttering punches
woke up energized,
called to muster,
dishwasher emptied,
the fresh grape vine scissored
into manageable bite size clusters,
coffee machine oiled and coiled,
fresh beans and water, dregs downloaded,
if we had a lawn,
I'd rake the invisible leaves
she later arrives,
sees my puttering efforts,
cowgirl mounts me to squeeze the bejesus outta me,
then punches me in the arm
to express her unmeasured pleasure
as is her wont,
me, don't say nuttin', just smilin'
cause I kinda punched first...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
paid bills
paid some bills this morning,
the kind that don't come in the mail,
but eyes read and and the heart knows,
these are dues you need paying,
no questions asked,
no answers given,
checkbook lighter,
but then again,
so is the heart,
the day starts well,
maybe even the year,
a lighter start
for the new year..
Jan 1, 2015
Jan 1, 2015 at 7:44 AM UTC
Five leaves cup a tender flower,
petals layered over petals; deep
inside, seedlings not yet conceived
are protected by the blanket
of crimson velvet, reminiscent
of a vellux quilt: Perfection
that begs to be touched.
A sharp needle in the finger;
and a deep red liquid blossoms.
The same color grows from stem
and wound. The edges of the silken
petals curl back. Red matures,
rusts to black, breaking up --
What has happened?
You scissored the stem, changed
the water each day, crushed
the aspirin, just like Grandma said;
still, the last petals are floating
to the ground; the leaves droop
over the cracked glass table:
Only the thorns remain.
Nov 15, 2011
Nov 15, 2011 at 12:07 PM UTC
The bronze-scorched mud knobbed unhinged sculpture grows
Cinderella down to root knots, ground is grubbed
chapped hats of acorns hit porticoes before snows
honeybees cake their hives closed and wax hubbed
humiliation hardens as color dapples
swelling seed-commas split beneath the frost
piety’s ignored until next year’s apples
night sky is grape-leafed, blackberry sauced
ineffable brutes grow cold to the pinnacle
rhetorical dross groundswells legislations
the long-legged wind tramples our spectacle
rains mock each leaf into pickled munitions
rocks are nothing but hermitages sent by the moon
prescient hardness sets its chin to the ground
hankering for battle, totalitarianism thrives by noon
each soldered twig unloomed, unraveled, uncrowned
we have severed ties to reason’s substantial contents
in the muddle it’s not the empowerment you had
democracy dies bewildered blind with miscontents
unhinged, unconcerned to find the hanging chad
we’re scissored down to our primary chaos all
paralogisms who dwell in a dream that justifies our fall.
Nov 11, 2017
Nov 11, 2017 at 12:15 PM UTC
Hand in hand
we strode along the Camino
oblivious to the surrounding world.
Passerbyers could not restrain
their sentiments,
greetings & farewells
escaped lips,
while ours created magic,
locked together,
swirling our tongues,
we tasted soul.
It was our last walk together
and we both knew it.
We had counted stars,
tormented iquanas,
scissored each other
to make goosebumps
& lose sleep.
All of those memories
have stayed intact,
they do not haunt me,
save one.
I remember
watching you wave
from the backseat of the bus
as it drove away,
back into the jungle.
I wished we could
have stayed there
forever, but now,
I keep you with me,
just a crumpled photograph
of your star feet.
Feb 19, 2014
Feb 19, 2014 at 3:55 AM UTC
we didn't mind our mistakes
like everyone else did.
he spelled his name wrong,
always and I sometimes.
He forgot key letters
slung his slang between
my tongue, pierced his
bottom lip, tatted
Breaking Babylon
across his chest, buzzed
his black hair low so that
his olive colored scalp
shone through,
scissored his black jeans into
shorts, lectured me on
his truths and my truths
and how our privilege
is self-evident, whispered
to me on cold cold nights
about the coming of the
Zion train and that either
Lauryn Hill or Nneka
would be it's conductor,
grew his hair down to his
shoulder when I
buzzed mine low revealing
my tight curls
and cursed his blossom
pink lips and prodded his
piercing with my thick
bottom lip and waited
and waited and waited.
He liked my mistakes
and my curiosity and I
liked his confidence
in his abilities. He didn't
cover his mistakes, he
was sure of them.
He told me the Zion
train would come the
day that I decided
to ask and still I
couldn't resist asking,
is your heart breaking?
and now he's telling me
he's missed me and that
it's good to hear from me
and that he's missed my
blue velvet voice, and I
have to bite my tongue
and nibble my fingers
to stop myself from
asking him,
is your heart still breaking?
but I know that I've
missed him more than I
enjoyed breaking his heart.
He likes my curiosity
and the mistakes that
come along with them.
Aug 12, 2014
Aug 12, 2014 at 11:37 PM UTC
He stood in the doorway
watching her sleep
His hands pressed
to his chest
whispering promises
he could not keep
He stood right next to her
his hand trembling, mid air
took one step back, then another
so he was no longer there
She lay upon sheets of silk
her back a work of Art
her scissored legs and arms
flung wide,
as though she was torn apart
She waited with breath held tight
her eyes closed and lungs burning
She wanted as though
time was right
Her world was centred
with her yearning
He hesitated to touch
such fragile beauty
his encroachment in her space
seemed an impregnable fortress
so he stood back
just to stare at her face
But she had raised the portcullis
and lowered the drawbridge
He just needed to storm
the castle
and dwell forever
where she lives
Jan 31, 2015
Jan 31, 2015 at 4:37 AM UTC
They sit in the humblest of frames,
Faux wood-grained plastic grotesqueries
Purchased long ago from some doomed Grants or Bradlees,
Though one or two enjoy something nicer,
Left behind by some long-timer taking a buyout
Or a sympathetic youngster denied tenure
(She has, for the better part of three decades,
Cleaned up the detritus of middle-school children,
A bit stooped from the work,
Not to mention the burden
Of any number of she’s just or she’s only
Tossed like so much bric-a-brac in her direction.)
The approximations of old masters equally eclectic in origin:
One or two gallery-quality reproductions
Blithely abandoned by some haughty faculty matron
Mentoring children through noblesse oblige,
The odd promotional piece from a scholastic publisher,
Mostly things she has cut from magazines or discarded texts.
She studiously avoids pieces tending to the dark or muted,
No Stuart portraiture or pensive Vermeers;
She has a strong predilection for bold, boisterous Gaugins,
Mad cubist Picassos, lush Cezanne still-lifes,
Even the odd blocky *******
If you pressed her to explain her fetish
For the brightest of the great masters,
She would likely be at a loss to explain,
Having no academic bent for such things
(Though she has been known to curse the shortcomings
Of lithographers and pressmen under her breath)
And, as she freely admits, I’m not much good with words.
There would be the uncharitable suggestion
That their purpose is to mask cracks and pockmarks in her walls
(She has, to be sure, lived in a long series of such places)
But she has never, consciously or otherwise,
Used them for such pedestrian and utilitarian purposes;
They are, to her anyway, beautiful, and that is all they need be.
Dec 23, 2016
Dec 23, 2016 at 11:17 AM UTC
Lawrence Hall
[email protected]
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
Ode on a Monitor Lizard
I saw a picture of a monitor lizard
Its skin is scaley and its tongue is scissored
I’d back away from that wrinkly old wizard -
I don’t want to be ground up in its gizzard!
Aug 25, 2025
Aug 25, 2025 at 9:02 AM UTC
we recorded, badly, birdsong.
we lit sparingly.
we scissored
cloth
for puppet
rain.
we asked
was having
a boy
the trap
we’d set
for the wonder
he’d come
without?
as always, we ate
from a basket.
Jul 21, 2014
Jul 21, 2014 at 8:09 PM UTC
Her picture was in ‘The Courier’,
A beauty with auburn hair,
I must admit I was taken in
As I sat alone, to stare.
Her eyes met mine with a knowing look
For her gaze was so intense,
Only a print in a newspaper,
I was making little sense.
I ******* the paper and tossed it out,
At least, it hit the bin,
But later I would scrabble about
For the piece that she was in.
I smoothed the paper and put the pic
Where it would be safe, and keep,
But found I still was thinking of her
At the sharp end of the week.
She showed again on the social page
Of that dreary rag, ‘The Sun’,
Was standing there in the background of
Some wedding that was on,
Again I scissored the picture out
And I put it with its mate,
But hadn’t a clue just what to do
It began to feel like fate!
I asked around at ‘The Courier’,
I asked about at ‘The Sun’,
But nobody seemed to know where she
Could be, though she seemed like fun.
‘She’s always there in the background where
The photo’s all get shot,
Then after the shoot is over, first
She’s there, and then she’s not.’
I started to hang about in clubs
And the places she might be,
I needed to salt her tail so I
At least, could set me free,
Her image was always staring, glaring
Stuck in my mind each day,
And then, I couldn’t get off to sleep
So I’d curse the night away.
Her face popped out of a magazine,
A poster, there in the hall,
Standing behind some advertising
Blurb, on the old sea wall,
I went along to the Seaman’s Rest
Thinking to have a drink,
And not too far, but along the bar
I saw… Well, who do you think?
I walked up behind her, shaking, quaking,
Tapped, and spun her around,
‘You wouldn’t believe what I’ve been through,
I’ve finally run you to ground!’
She smiled, and patted her auburn hair
‘Well, would you believe, it’s true!
Since I saw you staring into the page
I’ve been looking for you!’
David Lewis Paget
Nov 2, 2014
Nov 2, 2014 at 11:39 PM UTC
my grandfather
a liverpudlian
bus driver sat of an
ev´en in the kitchen and
vehemently demanded
right of way
before god and man..
(or so it is recorded..)
i recall him being smaller-
a darkness before a mirror
putting lard on his hair-
a prerequisite to exhausted sleep
in his favorite armchair..
we,his family would gather..
(round..)
grandfather duly revisited his day
he bucked and contorted..
a scissored hand a pedestrian..
his slippered feet sort break and clutch
but performed a little known dance instead..
with an all change he´d swung into position:
babe in arms
halfpastthree
sidewinder..
onetime he slept with his knees on the floor
and his head under the cover..
auntie mable was nearly ill with suppressed laughter..
children,can of course be fearful moralists...
tired of the humiliation i released a guffaw..
that was the kind of little boy i was..
priggish but thought an idiot..
the adults groaned..
grandfather opened a beautiful pale blue eye..
later,in the garden
in the day light
he said he and i could
be great friends...
Sep 9, 2017
Sep 9, 2017 at 6:15 AM UTC
two breaths from dawn
the night is
caught
on loop
breathing me in
spitting me out
again
and
again
stuck in stasis
small and
wanting more
cocooned
nights tendrils
offer small comforts
a place to hide
the silence
is deafening
feeding the urgency
a filtered glimpse
of emergence
see
corners of night
pealed back
stripped bare
no succour
or blessed offerings
to be found
as the dark
spits out
dawns dusty light
your side of the bed
shivers
empty & cold
heavy
I lie in wait
less your sleeping form
emerges
all these
scissored thoughts
a shattered mosaic
birdsong crashes in
I am left
begging
for more...
J.C.
Feb 7, 2021
Feb 7, 2021 at 3:18 AM UTC
I Cook For My Husband #2 (shaved & scissored)
I cook for my husband
The way I would cook for a king.
And I’d cook for the king
(If ever he’d ring)
The way I cook for my husband.
With skill, choice and taste of the day,
What e’er’s in the cupboard to make a buffet
Fit for a king or my husband.
No problem or trouble,
Food is a bubble
Lasting an hour from mouthful to bowel.
If house guest should scowl or glower or frown,
Finding it uphill to get the food down,
I take it serenely,
Comport myself queenly,
Tell him or her
The next meal will be better,
It’s fine to leave morsels of food on the plate
And leave it at that,
It being one method to never get fat.
I Cook For My Husband #2 7.27.2017
Definitely Didactic; I Is Always You Is We;
Arlene Corwin
Jul 28, 2017
Jul 28, 2017 at 4:11 PM UTC