"screenwriter" poems
Billy arrived when the
sky was all ******
"Sailors take warn
Red sky at dawn."
He never was a sailor
and he never awakened so early.
He stopped for a coffee
at a Brew and Blue
This is when he met
Rainbow - a hippie child
all stunted and rude.
"Enlightenment will never be mine"
Billy muttered as he climbed into the orange booth.
Eying Rainbow's *****
Rainbow looked him over
she had seen one too many
dusty would be sailors.
But something about his
manner-gave her hope
for something that mattered.
They looked into each
other's eyes to find
two companions without
disguise.
This rather shocked them
into disbelief but
life takes twists and
turns definitely different
than whatever we expect.
Billy was a screenwriter's
son with wealth and
health
Abandoning all fantasy
he claimed he rode
the rails in order to be free.
Rainbow raised by a bipolar
soul, who claimed never to know,
wandered aimlessly
with no where to go -
she had slept in stairwells
of stranger's homes - till
mother's flip was over
and she was taken to the car -
her new home, again.
Billy and Rainbow, as ridiculous
as it comes, tried to deny it,
but knew they had already begun.
It has slipped their minds
they were lovers from kingdom come.
Billy left and went
searching for other scars.
Rainbow sat on her
porch and searched the stars.
The train blew its whistle
at the crossing
and the rains began to come.
A week later, Billy was
back setting up a home,
waiting to find Rainbow
who had hit the road
searching for Billy,
that lost soul.
They both remembered
what had slipped their minds
being together was one
moment when life was
kind.
Nov 20, 2013
Nov 20, 2013 at 2:09 AM UTC
"Who ****** Marsha Brady?" "I," said the Sparrow
"With my bow and arrow, I ****** Marsha Brady"
"Who saw him **** "I," said the Fly
"With my little eye, I saw him ****
"Who caught his *** "I," said the Fish
"With my little dish, I caught his ***
"Who'll make the movie?" "I", said the Beetle
"With my thread and needle, I'll make the movie"
"Who'll make his advert?" "I," said the Owl
"With my pick and shovel, I'll make his advert"
"Who'll be the screenwriter?" "I," said the Rook
"With my little book, I'll be the screenwriter"
"Who'll be the cameraman?" "I," said the Lark
"If it's not in the dark, I'll be the cameraman"
"Who'll carry the camera?" "I," said the Linnet
"I'll fetch it in a minute, I'll carry the camera"
"Who'll be chief editor?" "I," said the Dove
"I **** for my love, I'll be chief editor."
"Who'll carry the actors?" "I," said the Kite
"If it's not through the night, I'll carry the actors"
"Who'll bare it all? "We," said the Wren
"Both the **** and the hen, we'll bare it all."
"Who'll sing a song?" "I," said the Thrush
"As she ate on a mush, I'll sing a song"
"Who'll make him *** "I," said the bull
"Because I can pull, I'll make him ***
All the crew of the film, fell a-sighing and a-sobbing
When they witnessed the ******** yell, from poor Marsha Brady.
Oct 4, 2019
Oct 4, 2019 at 8:04 AM UTC
Oh how I'd love that
and from a San Francisco organization no less
a month in the Santa Cruz mountains, no less
the most liberal city in America no less
and last year's winner has his picture displayed
and it is not innovative or interesting or shocking but all too predictable
Like something I saw how long now has it been? twenty five years ago...
how many times have I seen this picture
a white guy, looking very much the suffering, creating artiste
handsome, like an actor, but not an actor, a creator of meaning
of art, and he can't smile, but looks away from the camera
mimicking an ad for J. Crew
it's amazing how only white men can write about the important things in the world
and the background, how many times before have I seen it
a graffiti sprinkled nowhere in an urban jungle
somewhere where preppy white guys never go
street art, street communication created by people
who don't see this concrete as an exotic backdrop for their egoistic posing
but as a part of their lives, as part of their meaning, their world
and he stands there, in front of it,
Mr. Screenwriter, the gulf of culture separating him from that background
spans the entire country, or an entire universe
but the implication of the picture is: he is home here
this is who he is and he can emcompass everything, since white men
as we know, have a magic ability to understand and synthesize everyone
all genders, all races, all religions
the rest of us are merely stuck in our own myopic little worlds
of gender, race, socio-economic status
but these spanner of time and space and human difference, they can be anyone
they can understand and represent anyone
So I look at the picture
and think, I could apply, but I'm busy during the blissful month of the residency
but how dissapointing, that I feel looking at this picture, now online of course
that it is the same picture that I looked at over twenty five years ago
pinned to a film school wall
in Los Angeles, in New York, in those edgy more conservative places
and it is the same guy. the white screenwriter artist who will write about me
and others and it will be a lie
and we are excluded. all the rest of the human race.
but what he writes will be exalted as truth
when I know, that no matter how time he spends wandering
the foriegn worlds of ghettos and genders
the one thing he knows, the only thing he knows how to write about is
white guys, because he is no superhuman
he is like us. He will write about white guys and there will be
more films about white guys, who are supposed to represent all of us
but they don't, because they are only human,
and can only represent themselves.
Jun 19, 2013
Jun 19, 2013 at 12:29 PM UTC
For some, certain places
hold a rather mythic oeuvre
in our veins; they are seen as places of magic.
Maybe a cyclist couple
have spent most of their money
on traveling the world for their blog,
their last stop is New York City
so that they may get pictures of themselves
at places like The Brooklyn Bridge, Lady Liberty
& that megalithic skyline reaching the clouds.
Or maybe a foodie from Wisconsin
just wants to try Famous Ben's Pizza on the West Side
because its New York fuckin' New York pizza.
Maybe a doe-eyed screenwriter skips
his flat square suburban town
to sell his words and soul to the sprawling sunny L.A
where dreams are made in pixels.
Maybe some New Age beaded wrist to ankle lady
spent her life savings to jump over the ocean
to visit the ancient pyramids built for a purpose
yet fully known.
Maybe a bearded dude
visits Easter Island to try and understand
the complexities of his ancestors while
soaking in the rich vastness of nature around.
Maybe I used to see places this way. Probably...
But in these places people live!
It's not mythology to them.
Maybe every night a homeless man prays
& begs for food on the late night A-train in NYC.
Maybe a middle-aged fading blonde couple
spend their time in L.A at a health food store
to recoup the savings they lost joining a cult way back when.
Maybe a Swedish teen traverses the trash
and littered-burned streets of Giza everyday
on her way to work
hoping funny looks aren't shot her way
for the way she dresses
or shouted at by bearded Salafi men.
Maybe a rare species of bug is unknowingly stepped on
in Easter Island.
Today, i see magic in getting lost on the NYC subway.
I found magic mythology on the beaches of Dahab,
80 miles away from Cairo.
I see magic in the mythologies,
while others live it,
the daily grind.
It's all around if you know where to look.
Mar 13, 2014
Mar 13, 2014 at 11:46 AM UTC
Being divorced is not very much fun
Two kids, no dad, life on the run
A king-size bed with two pillows
But she’s sleeping alone
On a whim she headed East to the West
The Cowboy convention in Tucson
With her new boots and hat
And old friend Laura Lee, wearing a vest
This Hollywood screenwriter has seen them all
Jive city slickers with cell phones and new cars
It had been so long since she’d really been kissed
Her love life needed a punch, it could not make a fist
Samuel Dawson was born on and still lived on the ranch
He rode fence, chased cattle, is one studley man
With a soft streak as demonstrated by his craft
He works wonders with leather, why it was art
He too was lonely, this singular man
He’d cleaned himself up since his wife went and made other plans
For he had deserved it, so he sat hoping to sell
Wishing he’d find that artesian well
Stop the action, let me set the stage
There he sits at his craftsman’s booth
Underneath the canopy in the hot afternoon sun
Here comes Rebecca meandering along
She lingers and fingers his feathered and leathered strands
He smiles and she notes his mustache and tan
They talk, she will not turn away
Laura Lee shouts, “Let’s get on the way.”
This is where the story begins
One cowboy love that has no end
She’s still a writer on fine TV shows
Sam is the wrangler, whom everyone knows
Loves a lady who fancies parasols
On hot Summer days, who now rides a horse
Who no longer leads a half-finished life
Where western handicraft is everywhere in sight
And their love is on course
Some don’t understand, some don’t want to know
But bridges are built wherever you go
Even on land with no river in sight
When a cowboy finds love he succumbs without fight
The ranch is now located in Southern Cal
The fence he mends is picket, see for yourself
For I know them, and please call me Sam
She’ll be home in a few, I’m her lover man.
Dec 16, 2016
Dec 16, 2016 at 2:15 PM UTC
If I ever get addicted to cigarettes,
it will be because of you, Mike—
the screenwriter and smoker from Miami who I met
amidst the gentle crashing of the calm waves. It’s not
that I needed to smoke to accent the stars,
already so powerful in their summer sky without haze, but
I did need the smoke to accent you, Mike, to
hear about the time you climbed a mountain
where the air was so cold and the wind so fierce
that in your tent, your body created an atmosphere
dialectical in its warmth and surreal rain. When I
cough up phlegm in the morning, I’ll be thinking of you, Mike,
and as that brownish yellow glob slides
down the thin metal drain, I know I’ll think
that if I get addicted to cigarettes
because of you, Mike,
then it won’t be such a bad thing.
May 26, 2014
May 26, 2014 at 10:57 PM UTC
How am I supposed to act now?
One moment, we were like a movie
The main characters of a cheesy script
Fulfilling our roles so perfectly
The next, I find myself acting alone
Do I pretend it didn't hurt?
Do I pretend it didn't happen?
Do I pretend that the only person
Who knows all of me, who had me
Pretend they're not there anymore?
I don't want fame or Hollywood
I don't want to be some superstar
I don't want to have a new set of skills
Of changing faces and attitudes
No coach, no instructions, no guidance
I keep rewatching the moments we made
Rereading our last drafts of conversations
I am no actor or director or screenwriter
I have no plans for a scene or direction
I am just a man
Pretending to not love you afterwards
Aug 7, 2025
Aug 7, 2025 at 10:44 AM UTC
There was a tale of three.
A he, a she, and a me.
He had eyes,
Projector screens,
Reflecting the films you play in your head.
She, a Hollywood queen,
Hair as gold as her heart,
A sucker for romance,
Caught by his flashbulb smile.
Me, the screenwriter,
Knowing the business enough
To recognize the mechanics
Behind the greatest actor
In the world.
Award winning half truths
That I could swear were written by me
Find their other halves
Written in starlight
Shooting from the mouth of he,
The lifetime achievement of
She
Limited to their happily ever after.
Me, playing back over footage
Replaying the scene unfolding between them,
Trying to hear a romantic score,
But rather being bored
By the actor's lazy gestures,
Me, being deafened by the silence
Of this pantomime.
She, while skilled at book work,
Had simply been miscast
By he, who had not yet planned his end scene.
There is a temptation within Me,
To write myself into her part,
But I know,
This show is not about me.
She was not the wrong actress,
Just simply playing a part
Diverting from action.
She froze the plot,
So they existed as pictures,
Perfect in pixels,
Worth a thousand words,
Only no one would ever speak them,
Potential untapped.
I gaze at the screen,
Drifting to sleep in boredom
Being woken at any sign
of the screen going
Dark,
Only to have their starlight,
Lull me back
Into the writer's dream.
Sep 16, 2016
Sep 16, 2016 at 3:05 PM UTC
It was meant to be the
most important line
of all known history
but you forgot it
screenwriter
your sheer deed
equips your script
with perpetual discretion
prompting props
praising speeches
persuading species
Prussian Blue and Russian Spirits.
Mar 31, 2017
Mar 31, 2017 at 12:27 AM UTC
Im a writer that doesn't write
I tell myself that's it's normal
That it's natural
That I must have writers block
I know that's a lie
People ask me what I want to do
I say screenwriter
They think I'm smart, witty, creative
All of the above
The look they give me is a drug
I'm one of the special ones
I have ideas
To them I make things
But I don't.
I like to think I do.
Sure I tell myself that.
But I'm stuck writing stories I'll never finish
Down in books I'll never read
Why do I not read them?
I think it's because of a belief that I am inadequate
And therefore anything I create must be that way as well
The belief that someone like me shouldn't be able to create
I think that's why people look at me adoringly when they hear "screenwriter"
They want to love their ideas as much as they think I do mine.
They think I'm one of the ones that made it out
Which is something I desperately I want to be
So for now I am a writer that doesn't write
Which sadly means I am not a writer at all
But maybe I spoke to soon
Because if I wasn't a writer
I wouldn't have written this at all
Aug 10, 2015
Aug 10, 2015 at 1:25 AM UTC
it is like trying to pinpoint the body’s first secret. dear depressed woman. unpopulated cities abound. a screenwriter has a wet dream and one is supposed to say what exactly train sounds trigger. the human head passed around at a party. partially, but also. the human head my life parades with confidence. past children sitting on their hands to make them sleepy. into something even the third act would understand.
Jun 26, 2013
Jun 26, 2013 at 3:36 PM UTC
I found out why a lot of people started hating me.
I was a screenwriter and I wrote Superman III.
I never dreamed that I'd be bullied when I became a screenwriter.
But people think my writing ***** and I had to become a fighter.
The Warner Bros. executives quickly wished they had thrown my screenplay in the trash.
Years later, I wrote an even worse screenplay which is titled 'The Adventures of Pluto Nash'.
My days of being a screenwriter were over and I was in tears.
Eddie Murphy beat the hell out of me because I ruined his career.
Other people also beat me up so I started taking karate classes.
I earned a black belt and I started kicking people's *****
If you're another bully, I need to tell you something before we start fighting.
You should back off because I'm far better at karate than I am at screenwriting.
Aug 23, 2019
Aug 23, 2019 at 6:03 PM UTC
we all want a movie ending
those romcoms you see on valentine’s day
that kind of ending
after all, i am a film student
but film has taught me more than the hollywood romance
it has taught me the crushing realities of life
the noir, lesser known tragedies and
the indie, underappreciated art of living
so the days that i wander and think about how we might reunite on a new york city street, coffee in tow and heels on, catching up and suddenly eloping in a whirlwind romance,
i curse hollywood for tainting my imagination
for cursing me with unnecessary pain through setups and disappointments
but then again, film has taught me that i will get my movie ending,
except i am not, and will not be the audience
i am the director, the screenwriter and the editor.
Apr 25, 2019
Apr 25, 2019 at 5:05 AM UTC