"sepia" poems
cedar planks line the dim lit hall
morning snow begins to fall
sepia print in a chipped wood frame
embers spark from the franklin flame
rustling sounds from bunks below
records play in a tight alcove
bacon grills on an iron sheet
gloves are warmed by baseboard heat
bean bags tossed on colored ****
papka placed as a punching bag
red brick wall with mounted poles
windows filled with glacier bowls
whiskey jack on the southern rail
a frozen patch of wine and ale
pine cones fall in gathering white
brothers bathed in firelight
sleighs are on the table top
canyon road is at a stop
northern winds that bite the face
lines are up the gondola base
cornice clipped by gully goats
the rubber man appears to float
alpine depths are on the rise
peaking sun through parting skies
triple ropes and nordic luge
honored guests from baton rouge
gelande jumps on rainbow drive
nostalgia’s light and warm reply
Jan 2, 2017
Jan 2, 2017 at 5:50 PM UTC
lady craighead played the blues
on a stand-up samick
in the ***** room
along side the parsons project
and squabbling dogs
and night moves
stairs creek
up the mezzanine trek
wool sheets slide
on finished floors
little angels
play late into the seventh
(a closing match nearing
the midnight hour)
croaking toads and cicada
sing in the blue moon
musty smells and mothballs
settle deep in the vault
the kettle boils
and cat coils
as the pump house rolls
its heavy drawl
the red phone rings
and bird clock sings
(behind the ruddy stall)
a sleeman variation of the ruy lopez
employed heartily
by the incomparable master jack
marble toast burning
wringer wash churning
chris craft running
near the old carp canoe
rooster calls
and west wind squalls
rustle through the porch screen door
chicken *** pies
and rogue flies linger
a rocker chair placed
near the sepia face
(softened by the intricate frame)
donkey in tow
(with a fastened ***
maggie in her dreams
of green tambourines
the nocturnes
reflections
and whispering gospel bells
tractors pull on
the grinder stone
horses lay still
in the mid-day sun
a trump card is fingered
at the furnace click
(crosswords and puzzles are next!)
while the sparrow
*and that **** rabid fox*
are drowning
deep in castles well
Mar 14, 2017
Mar 14, 2017 at 10:20 PM UTC
Photography,
Photo journalistic,
Everyday, realistic.
Commercial, architecture, landscape, artistic,
Industrial, fashion, ethnographic, pornographic.
Big Brother, fallace, stealer of souls, vouyer.
News seller, instant gratifier, man pleaser, woman abuser.
Barthes, Sontag, Cindy Sherman,
Virginia Woolf, Warhol. Weegie, Francesca Woodman,
Leibovitz, Adams, Arbus, Tina Modotti,
Nan, Evans, Hoffer and even the Paparazzi.
Cheap ***** digital manipulator, image poser,
Center fold, coupons, Jackie O and Marilyn Monroe.
Where did they go:
Lifeless paper product, painter's picture mess,
C-type, digital archival,
Sepia, black and white, hard drive retrival.
Image addict,
Image taker,
Image maker,
image seller,
image buyer.
Newspaper, magazine, graphics and ads,
TV, dreams, even the trash.
Billboards, subways, phones and buses:
Utopia:
Surreal, crop, stretched and air brushes.
Modern ideal.
Surface manipulator.
Brain conditioner.
Consent manufacturer.
Oh Photography,
I got you in my eye.
A few thousand dollars,
A BFA, A critical scholar.
Or maybe a nerd,
Just boys with toys.
Telephoto genitals, with motor drive action.
Studio lights, umbrella traction.
Oh Photography,
You proprietor of obscene.
Detailed, de-sensitized.
Court ordered, jury analyzed.
Click, image, copy, edit, paste, print or post.
Myfacespace, twitter, flicker,
An internet media overdose.
Pry, spy, your friend's friend's acquaintances.
Parties, picnics, reunions and shows.
Visits, vacation, style, shoes and clothes.
Pics, photos, images, jpegs and giffs.
Snap shot, portrait, panoramic, Kodak kiss.
Exacerbate:
Divorce, break-ups, jealousy, envy, love and fears.
Devour and captivate society for years.
Slaves to Western and Capitalist desires,
Destruction of Earth with psychological, monetary empires.
Jan 11, 2010
Jan 11, 2010 at 7:05 AM UTC
You choose a sepia filter
To match your timeless visage
To match the clothes you've wandered into today
But it is not a selfie.
Your eyes pierce them through their iPhone screens
Your smile is casually not directed towards anyone in particular
Your outfit is recklessly on point
And it is not a selfie.
It is a punch in the gut
to everyone who has ever
said you are not good enough.
It is not a selfie.
The wings by your eyes will go out of style.
The dye in your hair will wash down the drain.
The clothes will wear out and you will take pictures again.
But you have fabricated a moment.
You are smiling towards yourself.
Slap your image onto every social media you know
Next to the supermodels and Kardashians and words of self hatred
This is the fulcrum with which you will lever the world.
This is not a selfie.
Aug 14, 2014
Aug 14, 2014 at 6:10 AM UTC
Inspired by a vintage ****** postcard from the 1920s - 30s:
The Muse sits resplendent
caressed in sepia tones and pastel cream
gilded with the glaze of a bygone era
her silk Charleston negligee
worn proud like a vintage ornament
perched on an aesthetically pleasing
shapely pert insolent *****
blossomed with tiny beads of sweat
the heat of such anticipation
entices the pearls of the ******
to pamper and pleasure their perversions
etched as if in a radiance of candlelight
the flickering limbs pulse their bloom
nimble fingers of dancing shadows
cupping the feline curves of a chaise longue
the purposefully out of place set piece
the fantasy of a gentleman's reading room
caked in casked sherry
and Nat Sherman cigar infused aromas
her elegant pose sumptuous reclining
elbow length satin gloves
sensually wrapped in wanton desire
two fingers clasp a Sorbranie Black Russian
smoked like a sultry gypsy
with a fervent demeanour
from a silver opera cigarette holder
beckoning with the cats eyes of mischief
over Pinced nez eyeglasses
with a fascination imbibed
in the praxis of passion
the peach skin of refulgent youth
directs the viewer downwards, slowly
survey each contour of olive skin
and stroke every hidden cleft of fabric
to glimpse the nubile thighs of grace
leading the eye to the arch of an ankle
slipped like a fitted glove
nestled in the cleavage of her calf
and the chastity of future wonderment
the forgotten photograph
captures a period in time
the memories of the muse
now in motionless existence
a demure allure forever frozen
once lost, but now
never forgotten
Dec 1, 2012
Dec 1, 2012 at 2:40 AM UTC
They weren’t all cut from the same cloth
*vilified tenders of the iron *****
some were lovers
(or lucid dreamers)
stage romantics
hidden behind jackboots
and skull caps
and switchblade seams
Caste members of a forlorn pack
counting their patchwork and deeds
conjuring up demons
around the console
filling their dreams
with radio reds
and dusted quarries
and faded sepia prints
Brass knuckles
and marches of the few
lightening bolt cracks
from a chilling blood moon
death’s dark specter
cold and ominous looms
the cobalt sea swells
near the nestled, and lost
Clubhouse at Kiusta
Jul 29, 2017
Jul 29, 2017 at 12:15 PM UTC
death mourns a life
that succumbs to suicide...
classical lawless-ness?
calls the jyst...
a thieving;
a stolen death,
a suicide....
bride riddled to a bridge...
baking...
left half awake and half baked...
you count with the number of
blinding equations...
your 80+ segments?
i want nothing to be part of,
whether polymath,
bilingual, or polymath...
you resd yourself into "it"....
fuck you, and...
**** off...
in terms of .gif ***** files...
no... the part where
we don't parrot?
for no worthwhile surprise!
death is alal b & w...
memory?
all invigorating sepia...
life?
the blooming of color...
you take shrooms,
to invigorate the colors?!
oh look...
you're as loony as me...
and why would i
give a **** about your
tall-tales of subversive religiosity?!
you're right!
like you have been with me
to begin with...
there aren't any!
now?!
suffer!
you're in good hands...
turns out?!
i'm a sadist...
i somehow tested the pain on myself...
i enjoy...
the pain, of others,
having, prior, teased the pain
on, myself!
i forgot teasing the pain...
i taste it...
i welcome it...
i've become welcoming
in allowing it,
a stature abbreviating a transcendence
of victim-hood!
i need pain,
to craft an erasure of ever having
the capacity to instruct
a modus operandi for pleasure!
death contra suicide...
a fact contra a premature contest
of pleasure...
suicide is what
death calls thief...
there is no moral artifact
of a "question"...
suicide is the thief,
when death is the executioner...
what moral question is
to be entertained?
non!
i can't blame the mortality
arsonist...
less Tartarus and more Gehenna...
less S.S. and more khaki
S.A. night of the broken windows
and less...
hyper-Hindu
reincarnation,
hue hue grey...
woo woo the ashen pillage...
no... i'm not here for the
cinder and the ********
it's enough that i drink
the sort of excuse,
that sober people could hardly make
excuses about...
and that's enough...
and enough, is, where i'll stick to.
Aug 21, 2018
Aug 21, 2018 at 10:22 PM UTC
I'll follow you through
sunflower cranes, stood
straight up on one leg,
tiptoe-heads above. Thick,
trunk stems support eyes
as though a field of giraffes
came to Loiré on holiday,
a tower of swinging faces
basking in a summer breeze.
Sepia yellows peg out
like eyelashes, shine
against that blue wave
of ocean sky, barely
frothing a cloud. Atop
your shoulders, I'll try
pinching a bud to keep
for home, looking back
a thousand suns echo
a staining rust, autumn
reds sinking as they set.
Jan 16, 2014
Jan 16, 2014 at 5:11 PM UTC
childhoods are forgotten
mere bonds simply left to rot
bewildered and betrothed to the very idea
of a more golden sun
and glistening moon
but not all the planets in the solar system are close
and are in fact very far away
words are to mean nothing
nothing
left with the wind
blown away
good bye! adieu!
I shall miss my friend!
and where is the blossom
whom I met so long ago
on Mars
on Jupiter
the promiscuity of proximity
reminiscing
within the shallow walls of the cave
that drips drips drips
to the past
and history becomes bloated
with subjectivity and
a sepia undertone
so how can we see what went wrong?
how can we learn the implications of each movement
made by our lips
fingers
each deep breath
that coincides with the galaxy
underneath a waning moon
Apr 14, 2018
Apr 14, 2018 at 8:22 PM UTC
*As I call upon the night
To have a conversation
Darkness gives way
And night comes alive
Conscious mind at rest
Sub-conscious takes over
Memory box is brimming
So many anecdotes
Not afraid to emerge
Confident around the dark
Shying away from the day
Night has a life of its own
Feeling antsy and inundated
Quivering hands open the box
Full of pictures in sepia
A retrospective of events
Which were long buried
Sleep has abandoned me
Old memories keep me awake*
Jul 25, 2014
Jul 25, 2014 at 4:33 AM UTC
Remember when
We took a daycation?
Waterfalls
For days.
Milk bottle
Sepia vinyl.
Ice cream and
Truck drivers.
Ballerina buns and
Bare necks.
Waterfalls
For days.
Oblivion, the
Falling leaves.
Backseat
Views.
Gravel paths, we
Walked.
Waterfalls
For days.
Blue, blue
Skies.
Crystal
Springs.
Damp red
Leaves.
Waterfalls
For days.
Apples
Were just in season.
Photos
Wagging tails.
Honey tea
Quilted snuggles.
Waterfalls
For days.
Maybe it was
Just a dream.
Next thing
I knew.
I was throwing
A textbook at the wall.
Waterfalls
For days.
I was
Okay.
I swear, for
One day.
I was
Myself again.
Waterfalls
For days.
Remember when
We took a daycation?
Jul 18, 2016
Jul 18, 2016 at 7:00 PM UTC
the world is too bright.
i am blinded by false smiles and laughs strained to reach that falsetto note.
that preconceived notion that paradise of the land brings paradise of the mind.
sand is still sand, and water is still water,
less we quantify their quality by purity and color.
sand is still sand and water is still water,
and i am still me.
the world is too bright,
so i filter it into sepia tones gentler to the mind's eye and swim to where the water meets the clouds.
i am drowning,
but not from the ocean's relentless caresses,
but from the world's relentless stresses:
beauty that is measured and calculated,
saturated with standards that burn like the sun and are as intangible as its rays,
a paradise built on sand as quick as it is to judge.
so i swim to where the water meets the clouds.
where the water is still water,
and i am still me.
Apr 21, 2014
Apr 21, 2014 at 11:56 PM UTC
Can I trust the eyes seeking mine?
I want to
Because they look like home
Through sepia tones
A bittersweet nostalgia before
We learned how easily people break
I want to trust your arms
They look just big enough to hold me
When I know the only way I feel safe
Is in the shape of a ball
And if you were any more beautiful
I’d be ********
Much like the ten beers I should’a
Said no to
Before you
And they
Had me sycophantic and stumbling
And already
just a little bit
********
I want the smell of you to linger on my clothes
The same way fire does
After a book burning
Just a little bit shameful
I want you to stop my stammering
With a kiss
To preoccupy my mouth
Long enough to subdue my stupid
I want to let go
Of the fever that makes my back sweat
When I see you
And the worry
That your eyes might lose their shine someday
I want you
In all the ways that
I am probably not supposed to want you
But I do
I want our wrinkles to one day fit
Like ****** up Ziploc bags
It’s that bad
So kiss me
Before I tell you that
And maybe
keep your eyes closed
Until I can trust them
Because I want to
Nov 9, 2011
Nov 9, 2011 at 10:34 PM UTC
The moth with newspaper wings sat under the arrow lungs of the eyeless
blood dripped falcon, more whole than the super-glued roman sculpture.
Next door a 50’s con held up church with a roulette table in the kitchen,
and boarded up the massage parlor
downstairs.
The eye of the man was a centrifuge of ducks, mallard and hen, spiraling
outward into evaporated roach-ground
asphalt.
Next door, slits in the picket fence displayed perfectly formed **** & broach,
empty shoes made of feet below, blending
fields.
The marble foundation formed from twine lollipops and fuzzy candy tabs,
ice-etched to the frequency of splintered seashell
angels.
Next door through the forest of knives a spaceship bearing gargoyles peaked
bodies through collages of faces in technicolor sepia
mitosis.
The heiress molted into tiled pieces, her own dog and sunhat caught in blizzard
cuneiform, kaliedescoping again to fractalled inchworms cemented in motion.
Jan 15, 2013
Jan 15, 2013 at 9:55 AM UTC
my eyes they do wonder
more than you will ever know
will they always
tend to find themeselves in thoughts unpredicted
by even myself
who could probe so deep, mingle so lightly
with touches and sighs not meant to come out they way they do
but even more
so much more
then what ill ever draw with my finger
love dipped sand gripped
oh autumn summer fall
gray September
red winter
sepia summer
under leaves and leaves
ocean
the ocean never changed
where I felt touch as a woman
released my first sighs as a woman
doing bad so bad
under things that were so beautiful
that was so beautiful
I mix and walk back
I must be a woman
to walk this way
and to look into all of your eyes
and feel nothing
and then feel everything
alcohol
white fresh and tastes like spring
under the imagination of so many things
I can go on forever
you know
about cups lovers creeps echos and black *******
that helps me flow
and I still bend to weak minds and words
I still bend to eyes fleeting destruction
to eyes who try to lie about everything
make believe they are something
dieing inside from nothing
bleeding tape around mouths with tongues that are too narrow
for proper speech
i still bend to beauty and love for the sake of -- love
or anything of such kind
meanings lost mixed and revealed through each other
with such discreet difference in between
and I feel the difference
and the contrast only makes me fall deeper into things that i don't know
once discovered
I grab my scarf wrap it around my neck with a thin cancer mutation in between my fingers
select my watch drape it around my wrist
put all belongings where they belong
and check out into the next hotel of
malicious life tones
Nov 2, 2010
Nov 2, 2010 at 7:53 PM UTC
i.
i used to only write sad poems.
ii.
you see,
i am a cynic,
a cemetery,
a holocaust,
a chaotic, distant, lost girl
buried in her own
self-destruction.
but with you
i am different.
i want to wake up,
keep my promises,
make up for lost time,
spill blood and ink,
try again,
live
for you.
iii.
you walk me home
and the skies blush
pink cloud summers
mid-December.
we part and i marvel
at the sepia tint
of backyard roses
blurring my lenses.
you came in
like the missing palette color
i never knew
i needed
my skies painted with.
iv.
now, you are all the love poems
i didn't know i could write.
and every metaphor i create
is just a lengthier version of
'i love you'
i really do.
Mar 8, 2018
Mar 8, 2018 at 10:37 AM UTC
We love to chase the wind through streaks of blinding bliss,
Tagging the glorious ideals of love, peace, friendship, even
The meaning of life, to weeping willows and pensive pebbles.
We admire the monochrome sky in all its barren blue or pregnant purple;
Hues of burple and plue are dismissed as being tedious, or just confused.
Fear not, photoshop will rectify this pigmented aberration.
We giggle at clouds that resemble kitchen utensils or mystical creatures;
“Hey look a teddy bear in a spacesuit with a flowerpot on his head wielding the Sword of Gryffindor!”
We declare sagely, with the acumen of a legendary bird watcher.
We resurrect grass angels by launching into horizontal jumping-jacks, and,
Just as a disclaimer, no flower was harmed in the process. Not that it matters,
As long as we did not soil our Lacoste and Burberry.
We spin a mixtape out of the torrential downpour, our tracks pitting
The pitter of regularity against the patter of inconstancy, synchronizing
The symphony of splashes to an undercurrent of nostalgia.
We kiss against the bark of an elm, and if a tree is not available in the vicinity,
We throw ourselves down a nearby hill, tumbling into a ball of moist romance,
Panting, as we bask in the studio lighting of the approving sun.
Every still is captured by a Lomo,
Every scene arrested in sepia motion,
Every moment ravished by the chichi Bohemian in us.
Nov 2, 2010
Nov 2, 2010 at 4:03 PM UTC
~
*In her sulking-place
alone and naked
framed in soft sepia
—the vintage, harlequin hue
at this supposed faded hour
she sits looking back on memory
she sits and stares
into the boudoir mirror
at herself
at her embonpoint
yes, at these *******
—at their landscape
how they fall
(like Niagara)
where they point
(like a compass)
what they tell (so fondly)
when pressed together
about their time
—their work and play
towers on the precipice
of judgment
both callous and
uncharitable
if the mirror
truly be her reflection
her vision is turned around
as illusion
—a study of tonality and tolerance
for one's own flesh
the room
an invitation
or perhaps
a lockaway
where she even keeps secrets
from herself*
~
Apr 26, 2021
Apr 26, 2021 at 10:37 AM UTC
Mouth
every mouth
every mouth breathes
every mouth breathes autumnal.
Every mouth breathes autumnal investigations.
Every mouth breathes autumnal investigations
tinged with sepia tones-
Torch trees
live in lazy desperation,
these last cider days
in burrows and blanket caves.
Heat in color - amber, saffron, goldenrod, maize.
Sepia tones
sepia tones tinged
sepia tones tinged with investigations.
Sepia tones tinged with autumnal investigations.
They see every mouth breathe.
See every mouth.
Mouths.
Jun 24, 2012
Jun 24, 2012 at 6:48 PM UTC
She knows she’s in
the sepia photograph
but doesn’t remember why
or who the others are
or why she dressed
as she did back then
or why there was a dog there
at the front
she keeps the photograph
tucked between
the pages
of the black Bible
some clergy gave her
and a dark secret
she was forbidden to tell
and sometimes
that short woman
with the Mongolian features
steals it to gawk at
then she has to go get it back
sometimes violently
which brings the nurses running
with their rough hands
and strait jackets
or that skinny woman
who always stares
takes hold of it
and stares at it
pointing to the various faces
of the males and females
and at the dog
and smiles and wets herself
and then laughs loudly
which causes
the other inmates
to bellow or laugh
or cry or scream
bringing the nurses trotting
with their what’s going on?
or what’s all this then?
she holds the photograph
to her ***** when she can
or tries to remember
who they all are
staring back at her
including herself
and when the quacks
question her
about the photo
as to who is who
or why she has kept it
she doesn’t have a clue
and one said
she ought not to have it
as it disturbed her
but a nice nurse
(and there were some) said
o no doctor she needs that
there will be hell to pay
if she doesn’t have it
tucked between the pages
of the Good Book
she kisses herself some days
talks to one or two
of the others there
but who they were
or to whom she speaks
she doesn’t know
and on cold wintery days
she looks toward the sun
for a message
or a warming glow.
Feb 16, 2013
Feb 16, 2013 at 5:09 AM UTC
Beaumaris,
carnival of soft pastel tones
of damp evenings
of tramway cars
with small orange lights
distracted bystanders
the empty bridges
the silent horizons
pale lace on a parasol,
light sepia dreams
of a particular Monet,
forgotten, unseen
before the rains came.
Many years later,
I found her
so tenuous, so subtle
in what little was left
yet there it was, her soul
all new shades
of melancholy.
Now I just swim,
every now and then
in that blue ocean
of her blueness,
the Sea of Oblivion.
In the glimpse
of bright reflections
of sunshine
on the water,
of salted afternoons
in a country
where it no longer
rains
Mar 10, 2013
Mar 10, 2013 at 1:10 AM UTC
i woke with a **** and
a windpipe full of butterflies, so i
swallowed them down to my chest
my stomach and below and
it was then that i realized
they weren't butterflies
but backward flies
that turn to maggots and
eat dead things
so it was then that i realized
i was dead, in between that
chasing-my-breath consciousness and
sepia splotched dream
which featured my favorite
human being
waking me, winding me
up...
hey saige, come on, so i
unlocked my eyes
even though i knew it was my
little brother
all along...
bright
cobwebbed windows at my
feet and
brighter fringe above me
brushing my forehead, like fingers
he leaned
over me, nudged me
hugged me, come on
saige...
i began to rise, which is why
he stopped me, that's when he
kissed me, and that's when i
forgave him
because i knew it was
an accident
except for, that was when
he did it
again...
my lips inside his, and
i kept my eyes
open
kept telling myself to
just kiss back, since we'd
already ruined everything, because
that was all he
wanted
because maybe
we could go back, maybe we'd still be
inseparable if
i hadn't screamed, enough!
maybe nightmares
are second chances at
being better
best friends...
i was torn
worn threadbare and i felt it
in every fiber of me
lying there, but i couldn't
pull away and i've
never wished to hurt him, so i
couldn't push, either
just clamped my eyes
shut, as he did the same
with his mouth...
and that was when
i woke
without a soul nor a shame
save for the maggots
in my veins
May 5, 2018
May 5, 2018 at 2:53 PM UTC
Stained glass coffins
Crystalline mosquitoes
Death that masquerades
In silken flags and floras
Languorous beauties
Graffiti of red and violet light
Sirens kiss the bullets
As they scatter them
To burn holes in sepia dreams
Watercolor ghosts
Casting out wildflower candy
Attics that hide under
Strawberry dust and lemons
That melts into mildew
As they pass down the gullet
Layers of ashes in the belly
“But you told us to swallow!”
Masses of children howl
The pretty ghouls hiss back
“Cannot you tell a lie by now,
By the sweetness of its taste?”
Mar 2, 2010
Mar 2, 2010 at 5:37 PM UTC
My father's long fingers smooth
over the aged scratchy pleats.
The Kilt is magnificent. It has the
fleeting beauty that only a well
kept antique has, that warm
firelight glow of the past.
It has a few scuffs and holes,
but the somber reds and greens of
clan Mackintoish have settled into
the cloth and darkened pleasantly.
The kilt is always the most important detail,
it has passed from grandfather down,
and it looks as handsome now
as in the sepia photographs on our shelves.
The dirks black ornate hilt rests
heavily against his hip, and the
belt is cinched tightly to hold it up.
you can practically hear bagpipes
My grandfather's dark green cotton socks
sit near the top of my father's calf
and he leans over to adjust the frills.
And as his tan wrinkled brow furrows
in concentration, and his admittedly
attractive white whiskers scrape
across his collar, and the image
nears completion, the drum beats louder.
Reaching up from the ancient past
and grasping the future in tradition,
the ghosts of ancestors enter his poise,
and he suddenly appears less like
my father and takes on the swagger
of a cocky fisherman, of pirate.
He is swinging swords
and playing pipes, and cobbling, and
setting stones upright in ancient
forgotten ritual, and tossing cabers.
I know looking at him now,
what my own ghosts will be
when my time comes.
Jul 20, 2014
Jul 20, 2014 at 8:16 PM UTC