"selves" poems
When I was just a little girl,
And as little girls were taught then,
I played with dolls and a teaset,
Made mudcakes for food,
Wore skirts, made my hair into ponytails as I was let.
I saw the boys with the abandon which comes with free wear and play,
And I thought to myself, why am I a girl.
When I was older, a teen
and as teen girls were taught then,
Walk, talk, rock softly
Don’t draw too much attention
Or attempt to explore too much.
I saw the boys then with the abandon which comes with freedom to play, sit, be as they want ,
And I thought to myself, why am I a girl.
When I was sixteen, oh sweet sixteen,
And as sixteen year old girls were taught then,
Don’t wear clothes that show your frame,
That’s indecent and you will be in another home and will incur alot of blame.
Don’t wander, argue, or express an opinion,
You’re a girl, being humble, quiet and gentle becomes you.
I saw the boys then with the abandon which comes with freedom of movement and speech,
And I thought to myself, why am I a girl.
When I was older, and passionately sought a particular career,
I was admonished as many other girls in my time,
It’s not a career for women, late nights, more men to be around,
When you get married, that’s not going to work and troubles will abound.
I saw the boys then with the abandon which comes with the freedom of pursuing their dreams,
And I thought to myself, why am I a girl.
When I was married, and setting a home, working and raising a family,
I left my work as many other girls in my time,
For my husband to follow his work path,
Unquestioningly, unflinchingly, resolutely.
I saw the men then with the abandon which comes with freedom of being in control of their lives,
And I thought to myself, why am I a girl.
But this is just the surface of my questioning being a girl,
When boys and men around tried their stunts on girls and women,
I questioned my existence.
When many girls and women I know,
Were told to stay mum on men close who took advantage of them
I questioned my existence.
When In the workspace,
Women got paid less than men because their salary were subtly looked at as secondary salaries,
Or needed to speak louder to be heard,
I questioned my existence.
When the onus of keeping a relationship working was the woman’s responsibility largely,
I questioned my existence.
When a woman got hit by her spouse,
Its she who may have provoked him.
When a man strayed,
Its she who was not a good enough wife that he had to look elsewhere.
I questioned my existence.
The atrocities many men are capable of,
The filth many men spread,
**** hate, aggression, manipulation and more
Abuse, gaslighting inside closed doors,
Wearing a mask of sophistication outside
Animalistic and entitled beings to the core.
My apologies to men who are not,
And I know some,
But they are but a handful,
Too insignificant in the larger way the world works.
But then I see me,
A harbinger of change,
In my home and around.
Raising my son differently,
Advocating for change purposively,
Actioning resolutely what’s right,
Woman for women with all my might.
I see so many more women now who retain their selves and are beacons of hope,
They don’t sit around and just mope.
And I am glad I am a girl,
And I question no more,
I question no more.
Feb 16, 2020
Feb 16, 2020 at 4:28 AM UTC
i have racked my mind
trying to figure this whole thing out
the staying, the going
the threads we claim hold us here
& the people who've stopped to play a tune on them
i sometimes relate it
to waking up in waist deep snow
in our former selves
the us we wish we could give one another
the children we've sat on the shelves
trapped, like the looks
we leave behind in snow globes
i sometimes imagine ships
dragging the bottom to the sea of "me"
for sleep & pieces of my old self
to sell to the new one
like history doesn't repeat itself
it gets me wondering
if you too want an apology from the rain
or if you dream of burning family photo albums
and wearing the ashes like perfume
if you're anything like me
how i hope god chokes
on memories of me blowing out candles as a child
i know i shouldn't reference my reader
but don't you know, the only difference
between alone & lonely is you?
that if my hands could talk
the only thing they'd be able to say
is "dear god we've missed you"
and how can you tell me it isn't love
when even the rain refuses to fall
in places where i've kissed you
i remember the day
you found my smile at a yard sale
it reminds me of how you'll leave
i wonder if when you go
you'll tell yourself
the person in the rear view mirror
is closer than they appear
May 9, 2014
May 9, 2014 at 8:32 PM UTC
while september cicadas
were singing my neighbors to sleep
i was up walking holes in my shoes
over love once lost
so many poems ago
that the only thing i remember
about the house at 38th & bluestone
is that it reeked of alcohol and is
as i'm sure of it
still saturated in perfume
and abandoned laughter
but that's not the point
give me a minute
what i'm trying to say
is i always thought god
enjoyed watching things leave me
it makes me wonder
what was on his mind
that night in september
when i stooped to cough
or tie my shoelaces
i no longer remember why
but i recall their trajectory
the way gravity cradled my hands
and brought them crashing back to earth like a 747
they landed inches away
from a scrap of crumpled loose leaf
folded in half like the smiles
of my relatives on a holiday truce
you see, lately i've been looking for scars in the newspaper
i find myself checking the obituary
for my former selves since the day i found your suicide letter
maybe that's why i can never explain my obsession with history
maybe archeology is just a funeral
in reverse
maybe hell is just rewinding home movies
or watching confetti
turn back into photographs
i never told anyone
the reason the doors to the gun cabinet in my family's house are locked not because they are afraid
i will take my life
but because sometimes
i sing them birthday songs
on the day you died
it makes me think
of how rooms only echo
when they are empty
*you know
i never echoed until you died*
Jun 6, 2014
Jun 6, 2014 at 2:56 AM UTC
Just how does one define friendship?
Oh, I already know what the Dictionary says.
It's far more than merely one word, or two.
You could apply many verbs to describe it.
Few, on their own will justice due.
It is more about one's emotional perception,
than a mere sentence of words, though descriptive.
For sure it's a feeling, a strong visceral response
evoked by respect, even love of a thing above all other's.
Friends come in many shapes, sizes and colors.
They can be inanimate or living breathing.
All inspire in us a near electrical resonance of reassurance,
a sense of peace, surely comfort. Maybe it starts with
the rhythmic beating of our own mothers heart,
the sound and vibration of our first true friendship.
A little later her breast and the nourishment it gave,
became our first outer world dearest best companion.
Mother's milk, served warm, sweet and tenderly,
Love's personification.
Yes of course Friendship can be an extension of a
strong lasting bond with other people, yet even more.
Our family's are our closest best friends, if we are lucky.
But what of the others?
I have been befriended by books, movies, dogs and
many other non human living friends, I even have
a old film camera I packed completely around the world,
that I count among my closest companions.
A soft warm favorite wool blanket acquired down in
New Zealand, also fits nicely that same description.
An old bamboo fly rod that belonged to my Father,
Is a friend I would not part with for any amount of dollars.
And less I forget (No pun intended) our memories too are
right there, with the best and oldest of our dearest, lasting friends,
Conjured up at a minutes notice.
And perhaps last of all, (you may have more on your list),
I can not leave out the most important friendship of all,
It's the friendship we have with our selves, to which I'm referring.
For if that very personal friendship is not strong and on going,
It's truly doubtful that we will have, or sustain for long, any others.
Sep 13, 2013
Sep 13, 2013 at 2:20 PM UTC
Take for example this:
if to the colour of midnight
to a more than darkness(which
is myself and Paris and all
things)the bright
rain
occurs deeply,beautifully
and i(being at a window
in this midnight)
for no reason feel
deeply completely conscious of the rain or rather
Somebody who uses roofs and streets skilfully to make a
possible and beautiful sound:
if a(perhaps)clock strikes,in the alive
coolness,very faintly and
finally through altogether delicate gestures of rain
a colour comes,which is morning,O do not wonder that
(just at the edge of day)i surely
make a millionth poem which will not wholly
miss you;or if i certainly create,lady,
one of the thousand selves who are your smile.
16.1k
I walk into the mirror box again and it’s as if my life
really is just an extension of my own metaphors.
I’m caught in the mirror maze, searching for something
in the mirrors at angles, but all I can see is myself,
my sad, stupid self, stretching on and on forever
with the same boring face, the same boring feelings,
again and again until I stop being able to make out the details.
Am I looking back at myself or am I looking forwards to the future?
Will it always be the same or has it merely been
the same since forever? I stare into the mirror tunnel
at all these selves repeating themselves,
forcing the years, the weeks, the days into the same strict patterns,
merely following the self that came before them, merely mirroring
the feelings, only doing it worse and worse with each new rendition.
It’s just me, I think, *in the mirror box, caught up in myself
because I am selfish and horrible.* I’m selfish and horrible
and I want to turn my back on myself but
how can I possibly do that in the mirror box?
I meet myself over and over, and it’s just me,
in all this vast, repetitive vagueness, just me in
this long stretch of lonely unsettledness that surely doesn’t end.
I want to smash my own face in, so I close my eyes
and try to think, maybe, maybe, maybe, because I don’t
want to be this grey-cloud self forever. I can’t be, and so maybe,
just maybe, somewhere beyond all these selves
there’ll be a day when I’m down on the shore
and the sea will be calm and the sky will be
faded purple. Love will not sink down into nothingness
because in the cool evening air, my heart will be full
instead of gaping and my mind will be at ease
instead dwelling on it’s own boringness
or entangling itself in own self-created sadness.
And maybe, I’ll have abandoned my book
and its pages will be dry because I won’t have been crying into it.
They’ll be no mirrors, just the ocean,
glinting like an amethyst cluster in the half light
and I’ll rest my head on the shoulder of the girlfriend
I'll meet someday and I’ll smile in this beautiful liminal moment
and nothing will be tainted by the dread of returning home.
We’ll kiss – on the shore – and rewrite it forever and
maybe the stars will fall out of the sky when I shake it and
all my trains will run on time and all the wounds
in the world will heal simultaneously.
It’s a moment surely stolen from someone else’s poetry,
but I’ve got to cling to something to avoid becoming
lost entirely in all this dark, intangible vagueness.
There’s got to be at least one imaginary moment
that isn’t just me, reflected over and over.
There’s got to be one moment that doesn’t stare
back at me from inside the mirror box.
Jul 27, 2018
Jul 27, 2018 at 5:15 PM UTC
If (WO)men are the ones that suffer an exacerbated amount
Of the violence, the **** the abuse, and everything that comes
with and from struggle and alienation;
it is because of their femininity that men at times
have come to believe that their contributions soften institutions.
That at times throughout history neither capitalism, neoliberalism nor revolutionary experiments like that of Cuba have placed femininity as compatible
with progress or resolution.
In which case femininity must be hidden, silenced, or displaced with no purpose or place to belong.
Thus everyone closely associated with this femininity such as homosexuals, transgendered (WO)men, and "effeminate" males, (ignoring, subverting and negating the lesbian identity because of their gender) have come to be marginalized by a structural system of exclusion.
(WO)men carrying the highest burden for originating the associative distinction
Homosexuals battling to find love by constantly having to assert their masculinity
Transgendered (Wo)men afraid of expressing their through identity.
Lesbians fighting to legitimize their own identity separate from the directives ascribed onto them by virtue of being born women.
Males who are labeled effeminate because of their sympathy toward those who struggle and are alienated.
And every other individual who refuses to deliver to give a marker to their identity and a degree to their femininity.
Hold fast in your femininity and embrace the rancor that society grants you
As a homosexual I speak with you brother and sister, not for you
Realize that our self-ascribed degrees of femininity and identity are as revolutionary and transformative, and thus necessary, as those of Che Guevara, Mohammed Ali, Harriet Tubman, or the Dali Lama.
That because we have decided to embrace our degrees of femininity, problematic to any movement, at one point or another, we have inadvertently decided to align our selves with those who are alienated the most by the systems in which they live.
So that in this way we must make our struggles deliberate and political. Let our degrees of femininity become legitimizing banners of solidarity for anyone who suffers in any corner of the world.
Mar 10, 2013
Mar 10, 2013 at 12:48 AM UTC
By now,the seed varieties of the world,
may have been attacked beyond recovery
by wars of pretense and relapses.
We are still learning
how to handle it properly.
We tend to say.
Some will talk and plan over dinner parties,
over TV or Radio. Most will leave
it behind like another corpse
of lessons thrown to the gutter,
like a dead *** on another Sunset Boulevard.
Iraq's seed banks
we blew up in the 2000s.
In various places in Asia
and the Middle East, places of life and cultured
varieties gone in an instant.
Echoing our imprisoned
ignorance and drives for more instant goods and services.
Indian farmers have committed mass suicides after
their god Hanuman was used by a chemical giant
to sell poison seeds and renewed
bondages of indebtedness.
One question a stranger asked a group of writers on tour
was not what their poetry or books were about,
nor why they wrote it, but how writing may and
may not be helping as we make decisions and solve problems now?
Once agricultural lands turn into new promises
of commercial buildings. Cities of inaccessible towers and
abandoned malls in America, Spain, China, and Russia
feeds us back our own echo.
Like converted uses of lands, our humanity
is converted into inanimate collections and status
symbols of some players or parties. As we face
our continuing struggle between
our oppressor-selves and our genuine roots.
Despite the perversions,
inside vicious habits of waste
where we glorify promises of war and efficiencies,
we continue to be entrusted with the ongoing lessons:
Rarely do surviving generations through famine, war and diseases,
throw away means to live, or destroy any kind of seed.
Every day we wake to the ruins and remains of
Our living poetry, word spaces, hours, exchanges,
gains and losses, stopping and going. This time,
not just for fires of anguish or unnecessary losses,
but for each other's midnight lamps.#
Sep 3, 2018
Sep 3, 2018 at 12:42 AM UTC
i felt like talking that night
reciting poetry to your big blue eyes
and raw pink mouth smiling
high as a wind whipped kite
discussing
art, ontology, and existentialism
sitting like lotus
at the
Cafe Figaro on McDougall st
in the west village
belly of a ghost
lost in a vagrant memory
afterwards
we went to a
little one bedroom flat in the east village
haunted by the vapors of its history
a slight stench of ****
and dingo tongue
dripping toilet
all peeling walls
intimating births, cheer and squalor
after a hot bath
of lathered torsos
we followrd each other naked
winding around a table
into a swaying bed
that beckoned
**** here my darlings
and i licked and drank out of your drenched
rose red blossom for hours
it licking back
I salvaged the loneliness
of my soul between your thighs
like a desolate dog whimpering
thanking God with every graze and ******
of your all supple shifting limbs
your company
your company
your sweet droplets
of company
in moon rise
summer balm
we looked in the mirror
reflecting on my glistening face
all red raspberry
my lips like blood hydras
laughing our ***** off at how artsy we looked
smeared
with your rouge painted thighs
appearing as if half eaten
you growled swallowed and
licked big butter piggy
till your nose ran like the Ganges
gagging
eyes bloodshot pools of fire
cooing and oowing
driving me maniacal
with every ****** of your wild flicking tongue
we poured our selves into each other
viscous creels gushing
coursing like slime silver
radiating
and finally used to the marrow
we found ourselves drooping sails
our eyelids leaden
the night mist fell upon us
muttering shadows
and our *** shriveled
like cast-off umbilici
and we fell to sleep
steep steep
buoyant
like two buttermilk clouds
adrift
your company
your company
your sweet droplets
of company
in moon rise
summer balm
Nov 28, 2017
Nov 28, 2017 at 1:50 PM UTC
Loyalty is something that is earned. Loyalty is built on trust.
We each must be loyal to our own beliefs and our own selves,
before we can be loyal to someone else.
To be loyal to someone means that they have not violated your personal values
They must earn support by being there when needed.
Loyalty cannot violate a person’s choice between right & wrong.
Asking me to lie violates my ethics; do not put me in this position.
If someone is doing drugs, I am being a loyal friend when getting you help.
A loyal friend does what is right, even when others feel it is disloyal.
If I meet you today I cannot be loyal because I do not know you.
If I have known you all of your life, I may not be loyal to you because of past interactions.
Overall a combination of time and actions affect loyalty
To separate these two does not work, for true loyalty resides in a combination of both.
Apr 28, 2015
Apr 28, 2015 at 1:51 PM UTC
You Are the Texture
…………………………
**~ for all of you,
you, you poet~**
Impasto
“**is a technique used in painting,
where paint is laid on an area of
the surface thickly, usually thick
enough that the brush or painting-
knife strokes are visible.
Paint can also be mixed right on
to the canvas. When dry, impasto
provides texture; the paint appears
as if, to be coming out of the canvas.**”
<1:47pm>
Cut & Paste
*is a technique used in poetry writing,
we refer back to our visions,
heard words,
the eyeful, the earful, scents,
the reads read,
all in the mind’s palette blended,
thickly, but
when
the merging fused,
every word~in~coloration,
it is unique, reincarnation,
copying impossible.
The imagery, cut and pasted from thy heart and soul,
upon canvas,
your poems~pieces each appear*
***as you-are-texture,
you becoming out of, you,
the canvas.
<2:04pm>
Postscript***
………………
it is not lost on me that the
scars, our words, herein,
as we note all too frequently,
almost casually,
are, can be, those selfsame
words/painting-knife
employed
for our first and foremost canvas we utilize,
ourselves…
our bodies,
our
very selves
salved
Jun 24, 2023
Jun 24, 2023 at 8:06 AM UTC
I always wondered why people judged others for their sexuality. Shouldn't love be just the words like "love is love". People should be able to express themselves thru words and actions. Sexuality is something others take for granted or even advantage of. If a guy comes out gay woman usually always say "the pretty boys are always the gay ones" or how men always come up to woman who are lesbian say "I can turn that girl straight in just one night". Or even hearing still to this day people are protesting on the street against gays and gay marriage. Today's society rather care bout brands, religion, race, and someone's sexuality rather than someone's cultural background and getting to know someone deep within. Teens who hide in the closet due to their families being against their sons or daughters for being gay become suicidal and the suicide percentages go up. People take deaths more serious than those who are a live and trying to make some of their selves. Rumors that are spread round by high school students bout someone's sexuality turns into harmful beatings, but the school system is too into themselves and care bout their job title rather than to take care of harassment and bullying. Celebrities who hide their sexuality then later come out are the talk of the town, then there is always that one person from paparazzi who screws with the news headline and puts lies into everyone in society and everyone believes what they see rather than to think outside the box that not everything they see online or TV is true. Parents who are gay are looked upon as to "who wears the pants" in the relationship, or "whose top", or even whose the "daddy or the mommy". Then the children who have gay parents become victims and are always assumed they are also gay too or just not normal in today's society. A lot of countries for example Russia abuses their laws against gays and soon enough fights and killings close to murders happen every minute of every second of every day. Even presidents in a lot of states and countries are against gays and try to pass laws made by the government which by then a lot more people hide behind closets. The world is more ******* up than people may think, if we just stick together and except people as they are then there would be equality.
Jan 13, 2018
Jan 13, 2018 at 3:51 AM UTC
To be human
is to be broken.
Shattered by life,
misunderstood.
We all have hopes
we don't dare name.
We all have dreams
we don't dare share.
Ninety-nine percent
we don't understand
our own selves.
And so often
we hide behind shells.
To be human
is to be broken.
So stand up tall
broken and all.
Be broken.
Accept it.
And accept others,
beautifully broken,
just as you.
Aug 6, 2018
Aug 6, 2018 at 6:49 AM UTC
.
A hard-on
doesn't count
as personal gro
wth.If you want
to hear the pitte
r - patter of littl
e feet, I'll put s
hoes on my cat.
This isn't an off
ice , it's hell wit
h florescent lig
hting.How do I
set a lazer prin
ter to stun? I m
ajored in Libera
l arts. Will that
be for here or t
o go? Too many
freaks, not eno
ugh circuses. I
have a comput
er, a ******** a
nd pizza delive
ry .Why should
I leave the hou
se? Stress is wh en you wake up scr
eaming and you re alize you haven't fal
*** asleep yet. I like dogs too . Let's exch
ange recipes. And yo u r c r y b a b y
whiny- assed o pinion is? Al
low me to intro duce my selves.
Nov 1, 2014
Nov 1, 2014 at 2:00 PM UTC
Nobody can make you feel unwanted nor sad
Because what you have felt this evening was sacred
Three souls playing, fighting, crying
As if I have witnessed a conversation of people
who understood how to make life a
living, a misery and a land where we could forget our differences
To become one in their little world of music
To witness magic
Endless shadows
To feel so happy
A sentiment of pure excstasy
To experience patience, rage , sadness in a second
Is rare in our world
To experience pain, nostalgia and a piece of your
distant country
To close your eyes from all this madness
To see lights in Ouds
To witness a cozy litlle night filled with
nothing but candles
and people making you forget that your soul
is trapped into a body that constantly suffers
Our deepest selves have found a shelter
We have visited our loved ones
with our invisible wings
We've known what made us human
We've seen three persons merging
into one for the sake of music
We've seen them through moments of excstasy
but most of all hard and severe body movements
Giving life to a woodly instrument
Making the robotic and the technological a human for once
Sep 24, 2017
Sep 24, 2017 at 2:12 PM UTC
Pure? What does it mean?
The tongues of hell
Are dull, dull as the triple
Tongues of dull, fat Cerebus
Who wheezes at the gate. Incapable
Of licking clean
The aguey tendon, the sin, the sin.
The tinder cries.
The indelible smell
Of a snuffed candle!
Love, love, the low smokes roll
From me like Isadora's scarves, I'm in a fright
One scarf will catch and anchor in the wheel.
Such yellow sullen smokes
Make their own element. They will not rise,
But trundle round the globe
Choking the aged and the meek,
The weak
Hothouse baby in its crib,
The ghastly orchid
Hanging its hanging garden in the air,
Devilish leopard!
Radiation turned it white
And killed it in an hour.
Greasing the bodies of adulterers
Like Hiroshima ash and eating in.
The sin. The sin.
Darling, all night
I have been flickering, off, on, off, on.
The sheets grow heavy as a lecher's kiss.
Three days. Three nights.
Lemon water, chicken
Water, water make me retch.
I am too pure for you or anyone.
Your body
Hurts me as the world hurts God. I am a lantern ----
My head a moon
Of Japanese paper, my gold beaten skin
Infinitely delicate and infinitely expensive.
Does not my heat astound you. And my light.
All by myself I am a huge camellia
Glowing and coming and going, flush on flush.
I think I am going up,
I think I may rise ----
The beads of hot metal fly, and I, love, I
Am a pure acetylene
******
Attended by roses,
By kisses, by cherubim,
By whatever these pink things mean.
Not you, nor him.
Not him, nor him
(My selves dissolving, old ***** petticoats) ----
To Paradise.
11k
my darkest poems
bloodletting streams
are a kind of ******
fetishy cognitive inventory
malformed denizens
of the subconscious
a well of torments
soup of Salmonella
the souls gut
its cauldron
yet not with out lurid enticements
and voluptuous supplicants
gorgeous
like an eight legged woman
with beautiful feet
drooling **** lips
drunk on sacrificial rituals
of blood black tongued kisses
and hideous contorted pleasures
********
once
exquisite archetypes
gods and goddesses
are now
putrefied
cellar dwellers
moaning in nature bed crypts
of rock, stone
and engraved sigils
because honest pure desires
became fragmentary
and are now gimping amputees
by legions of primal disappointment
while faces blare in the world
like super bright L.E.D.s
shinning paths to others
our deep self
remains patinaed in tears
a black box pox with a lock
the skeleton key lost
in arcane seas
out of utter disgust
for those dark crawlers
that live within us
revealing them selves
as anxieties, depressions
suicides
and myriad quiet despairs
we appear undaunted
to others
and they to us
humanity
muffled ticks
and splintered sticks
my poems let my demons out
yoo who its me
my name is spray snake z
with my hooks and cries
and dark blood skies
in the misty night
i dragged out their earthen coffins
legends of the despicable
resurrected them
fed and loved those darklings
had every conceivable union with them
their healing, my own
ive sexualized them
and found love
albeit twisted
to be adored
in a hidden embrace
i bestow upon you a poetic fantasy
while obsession takes hold
bind it not
nor let it bind you*
Sep 6, 2016
Sep 6, 2016 at 9:32 AM UTC
The head losing itself
A rainforest
Lake in the heart
Hundred tombstones
Named Narcissus
They Echo
Icy, bluish lungs
Pallid violet nails
Lips still yet loving
Salty bamboos
Necrophilic whistles
Siren's footsteps
Illegal loggers
Burying selves alive
Love, love that is
Feb 9, 2015
Feb 9, 2015 at 8:29 AM UTC
I cried at the breakfast table this morning
my father carefully explained,
"wives must be submissive to their husbands"
"housecleaning is the domain of the woman"
"God created woman because man asked for a partner"
This past semester I wrote two papers
One, a fire and brimstone sermon
I quoted Anais Nin
sending the creators of sexist commercials to eternal suffering
**** them!" I said. "May they burn in hell."
For the women they portrayed were doormats
Misconceptions
Monsters
The other, the role of women in the 1920s,
No longer confined to the kitchen
they dropped ballots with their new freedom
they wore short dresses and short tresses
fingers wrapped around cigs
they quoted Wilde instead of Alcott
they danced until their feet hurt
I read of Anais Nin's "new woman,"
her partnership, not submission to man,
I craved a room of my own, neigh demanded it
For sheep stayed in the kitchen,
The Woolf had a study.
I read poetry
Sexton,
Plath,
I wept for their starved, depressed selves
caged, suffocating inside the clasped hands of a man.
Loved like rib-cage jails.
Adrienne Rich made me angry,
her daughter-in-law
forever trying to fit into a box
she was always too big for, spilling
at the edges, her shaved
legs like "white mammoth tusks"
I was finally
happy with my womanhood.
****** ****** ***** ********
they are mine.
******* free to move unrestrained,
jiggling under my shirt.
Wetness between my thighs.
Menstrual blood,
they are mine.
mine.
I am not ashamed of what I am
because there is no shame.
I am woman,
I am girl,
I am lady.
I am a creature
with a voice
a mind.
a creature who endured much abuse,
continue to endure.
I am woman
and I don't have to be wife or mother
unless I want to be.
I was not created for man;
I was created for the same reason he was,
to serve the same great purpose on this tiny blue dot.
I am not rib.
I am ****** ****** ***** ********
******* free, unrestrained,
Wetness between my thighs.
Menstrual blood,
I am a per.
I am a wo.
I am a hu.
Man and son need to back down,
collaborate not dominate,
speak not command,
for when less are forced into silence,
the maddening scream
hidden inside skin and bones and muscle-meat
becomes song.
this world of car horns and tire screeches
crying and wailing from raw throats
angry protests of indignation
could use a little music.
Apr 8, 2013
Apr 8, 2013 at 6:59 PM UTC
I am half-Chinese and a half Filipino-Spanish.
I have only learnt to speak Filipino my whole life.
The best advises I have received is that there is no right or wrong,
that labels does not always help.
That no matter what, I should just go
and "Live my life", or "Sing in Full Voice, Until Then".
Attentive to a fault to the work or person at hand.
Because of routine and living demands, sometimes I
only pay attention to what is available or given to me.
Like the quest for the Spices of the East, I could no longer live the same way when the time came. I had to learn preservation and other flavors.
In a Asian Food Show, someone shares
How some later generation Chinese had to study their own native language in secret between 1966 to 1998.
Stories of how their migrant or refugee heritage have made them scapegoats of many local tensions.
And varieties of words and ingredients also native to Chinese and later generations that lived offshore.
Many of us now in the thrash of our collective songs
towards healing and full living as humanity, continuing
refugees and wanderers in our own ways.
Where we see our indigenous-selves and our oppressor-selves,
is not as difficult as we are usually made to,
in a world of artificial
demands and surpluses.
One old song gently reminds me
in many languages singing,
as another bowl of handmade noodles
breaks open into countless random pieces:
We are only passing through earth.
Made to experience, and let go of our fears
and limitations.To gather our remains so that
it is inanimate buildings and objects that are used
by the living instead, and nothing is left behind.
To not leave a trace. To learn how to love.#
Sep 3, 2018
Sep 3, 2018 at 1:27 AM UTC
My thoughts now live in the cloud,
My moments, wishes and hopes,
Opinions, preferences, scopes
Our loved ones live in the cloud,
Their Voices are screaming out loud,
“We hope you all make us proud”.
Our Selves now live in the cloud.
The future, present and past,
A shadow we eagerly cast.
The things we have renounced,
So hard to claim it back
There’s more than meets the eye,
The Cloud is just a lie.
May 15, 2015
May 15, 2015 at 9:27 AM UTC
A teacher: The Villain and the Hero
One inspiration, one true motivation
That one person who gives his powerful students
The right direction
That one teacher who fights for the future of others
Who finds success in the success of others
That one person who further form a teacher
Is a human-being
He might seem like a villain to some
But he is a hero to others
He is my hero
Picked me up from the gutter
Made me strong enough to deal with
X equals A to the second power multiplied times two
He is that one teacher who taught me how to leave problems behind
And solve equation easier and faster
That one teacher who became a role model
The perfect inspiration any student needs
His way of teaching the concept
His way of giving us the chance to be teachers our selves
That way of making us the main importance
His way of giving us our place in his class room
Taking possession of our minds and changing them to capable ones
Making each and every one of us students who can solve anything
He expects a lot from all of us, He expects a lot from me
He gives me the challenges that I can handle
Gives me a chance to prove my self
He taught me that X is just a variable
That X is the solution
That you should not be afraid of the variable
That the solution is hidden behind the other factors
That lesson I use in my daily life
I'm not afraid of any problem in any subject
Because he taught me how to deal with problems
And when finding X was hard,
He was there ready to answer my questions
As I walk away during lunch
I wish him a good lunch
But what I'm actually saying is
You have done a lot for these, your students
Now give yourself a break and do something for your self.
He might just be an algebra teacher
Or a staff member at Riverside University High school
Or just Mr. Sepulveda, to some people
But for me he means more than that.
For me he is a hero
That can travel the distance
And can fix any problem with time
He is the Hero who inspires me
He is a teacher
Whom I admire greatly
Not for being a teacher
Or being at Riverside
I admire him because he made me strong
In Algebra
In my problems
In life
And now In my poetry
You sometimes are the villain
For giving me a B in a test
But you are the hero because for every B
I get another challenge
And I know that with your help
I will get an A in Life.
You are the Villain of my mind
But the Hero of my Heart
Thank-you Mr. Sepulveda
Written by: Estrella Luciano
For: A true hero
P.S. I still think I deserved an A on that one test. ;)
Jan 16, 2013
Jan 16, 2013 at 7:38 PM UTC
☮ ☮ ☮
**Society needs more Social Justice.
Humanity needs peaceworkers.**
Peace and Social Justice must be promoted aggressively. There are inequities that must be addressed. Power is not equally distributed. Neither are resources or wealth. Neither are poetic gifts or vision equitably distributed. Unearned privilege is rampant. Poetry must confront this global crisis of capitalist exploitation and manipulation. Poetry must speak to the masses. Poetry must radicalize and inform consciousness to new levels of social change. Marginalized citizens must be empowered. All ****** gender-based, racial, religious, age-based, homophobic, xenophobic, and gynophobic bigots must be brought to see in a new way through our poetry. Community building and local empowerment are of the order. Our poetry must be global in scope – yet rooted and grounded in local community empowerment. Selfless acts of service to promote and increase Social Justice are needed. Lives selflessly devoted to establishing social justice are called for. Our poetic lives must be laid on the altar of the dis-enfranchised and unrepresented. We, as consciously aware poets, must advocate and speak out for those who have no voice.
We, as poets, must, through stirring words of Social Justice, embody through our radical verses the burning hope of a just and sustainable future. This future must become increasingly collective as formerly marginalized consumers become empowered community-builders – through our poetry. As poets of the sustainable future we will empower and inform. Our poetry must collectivize, entitle and enslave. We must speak with ONE VOICE: the voice of change and social justice. Our words will rise with healing in their wings and lift whole communities from despair to radicalized self-awareness in communities filled with strident, intolerant and maniacal practitioners of PEACE & SOCIAL JUSTICE. All poets who do not lay their entire creative and lyrical selves on the altar of struggle to bring CHANGE and SOCIAL JUSTICE will be LIQUIDATED by our own EMPOWERED POETRY. IN THE END WE WILL WRITE A PURE POETRY OF SOCIAL CHANGE, ALL IN CAPS, AND THIS POETRY OF SOCIAL JUSTICE AND EMPOWERMENT WILL BE READ OVER THE GRAVES OF ALL SELL-OUT, CORPORATE, FASCIST, SNITCHING, SELFISH, UNEMPOWERED AND UNEMPOWERING TRAITORS AND ENEMIES OF SOCIAL JUSTICE. IN THE END THERE WILL BE NO PUNCTUATION OR EVEN WORDS ONLY PURE IMAGES OF CHANGE + VISIONARY COLLABORATION IN SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION/MAYBE SLASH MARKS/OKAY MAYBE EXCLAMATION POINTS TOO BUT ONLY THOSE !
WHY? BECAUSE THE ONLY GOOD POET IS A LIVING POET WHO HAS LIQUIDATED EVERY FALSE POET NOT COMMITTED TO THE STRUGGLE FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE !
LONG LIVE POETRY IN ACTION THROUGH CHANGE!
WRITE/SPEAK/AGITATE
FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE & EMPOWERMENT !
**POETRY IS STRUGGLE☻
STRUGGLE IS CHANGE☻
CHANGE REQUIRES SOCIAL JUSTICE☻
SOCIAL JUSTICE BRINGS PEACE☻
PEACE BRINGS WAR☻
WAR BRINGS CONFUSION & DEATH☻**
(SO DON’T BE CONFUSED)
Sep 9, 2015
Sep 9, 2015 at 9:03 PM UTC
Life’s moments and happenings are like little thieves
They don’t want any money
They still take it
Putting salt on cracked lips, stealing the warmth of a heart
Sobs resonate in lonely halls
Everything reeks
Of lifeless dust
Even darkness can’t fight them off
Or push away the pain
The cold, swift figures taste like hatred
Longtime friend with the soul of a sister
Offers a consoling embrace
It bleeds good feelings
Now they want our money
Thieves aren’t fair, nor logical
No rhyme
No reason
Life’s a poorly written song
Bad music *****
The bold melody clashes
With its vague accompaniment
We didn’t want them so we welcomed them
‘There must be some way out of here’
Said the joker to the thief
I don’t think there is any way out
The precious tokens of life should be protected
By an army of mindlessly trained children
Who fall in love with the thieves
Whose forgiving minds omit the fear
Thieves call us easy
We are forever sobbing
Cries heard only by past selves and invisible belongings
When we prove we are great
And pass impassable tests
Everything will return
We aren’t capable of such feats
Our memories sing us haunting songs
We cry out with our salty lips
And empty hearts
Robbed of any motivation
Robbed of any care
Robbed of love
Nov 12, 2012
Nov 12, 2012 at 8:41 PM UTC