"sharpie" poems
rain
mud and grass
common prayer
good weather
good people
art
and umbrella bags
because who wants to
get wet?
unless it’s with you
I could
I would
jump into the lake
for that rock
sew
cleanse
initials made in sharpie
and unclamp
we run
around the park
the afternoon surrounds us
the woman in the bikini
passes
and we laugh
iced tea
decaf coffee
cake without teeth
and that airstream camper
you always wanted
I could live in your
backyard
I could live somewhere
not here
in silver
prostrated
with my back to the
moon
like dead
like a mummy
like a mirror
and life would make sense
life would be beautiful
like this run
with perfect amounts of sweat
and conversation that runs
waves in the sand
and tells the squirrels
*goodnight, tractor
see you tomorrow*
and the land that billows
is dug up
and chewed
like a goodnight poem
this run with you
takes rest
on my soul
and I crack my ribs
to take the spring’s
twilight
aroma
May 6, 2016
May 6, 2016 at 10:36 PM UTC
“Ask me about my patches”
Was written in Sharpie on a piece of cardboard hung by string and Duck tape from
his backpack.
I didn’t dare ask.
I was late.
The image of hipster: gauged ears, lip and nose pierced, cut-off jacket vest, tight
black jeans, —and patches.
I didn’t dare ask him.
But I was forced to read the large one sewn across his back.
That’s when I realized my first judgment was wrong. Not an image: he was a force,
his patches his power.
That was all just a glance, just a memory of a patch of the face of a woman
with streaked black hair, a tear? its fading... but the words won’t.
The words that I won’t tell; the words that carry with them the power of
the history of man.
Not of humans, of man: man who has ruled this world, man who has buried mother earth
(alive) deep inside herself.
Who pinned her down and penetrated all orifices— inserting, and removing and inseminating;
making her pregnant with ********
Man—men—when did we do this? Who was the first among us to realize his
superior strength?
I don’t dare ask because I am not ready for the answer.
I am not ready to ask myself the questions that I feel but don’t know.
I realize when I pass someone on the street, I don’t know anything—every woman I see at
night has a past, every man and every child.
I don’t know any of it.
But, I do know some about the history of man.
Feb 22, 2013
Feb 22, 2013 at 4:55 PM UTC
The smell of coffee and black sharpie fill your senses
Dragging yourself out of bed, you wrap the sheet around your naked body
Your head hurts more with every movement, every thought.
The sticky note on the door
written in small, squished, boy-like writing
"I never promised you forever."
Jan 25, 2010
Jan 25, 2010 at 4:29 PM UTC
It is awful to feel sickened by the thought of myself
So is sobbing in the bathtub while the water hits my body
And soon my tears blend in with the ***** water
It is awful to avoid mirrors and to always look down
To hid from who I would see if I did
It is awful to scream into my pillows every night
Hoping no one will hear the cries
Or staining my wrists with sharpie
To remind myself to stop eating
And to stop being me
Or living in my dreams of other peoples lives
Than facing the reality of mine
Self-hate is awful
But so am I
Mar 4, 2014
Mar 4, 2014 at 9:02 PM UTC
Black fine tip sharpie glides in perfect curve lines
Letting out a pungent smell
The ink stains my healing skin on my left wrist
as my right hand guides the weapon as if it were a razor
It used to be a razor
Feb 1, 2015
Feb 1, 2015 at 2:20 PM UTC
Have you met the Who-Gee Boo-Gee Man?
He scammed fig leafs in the garden,
And **** cloth in Ottoman.
outside-in, inside-out; upside-down, right-side up
The Who-gee Boo-gee Man can cuss.
He offers snake oil, spins a tale,
So you feel smart, healthy and hale.
from top to bottom, bottom to top
The Who-gee Boo-gee Man can't stop.
He swrawls with a Sharpie pen.
right is left, left is wrong
That's the Who-Gee Boo-Gee song.
Consultation for now is free,
No hidden added extra fees:
You buy two, you get three.
north to south, east to west
The Who-Gee Boo-Gee Man won't rest.
I've heard his feet are cloven;
The eyes are yellow, lips look swollen;
He has two fingers, wears silk- woven.
He sweats like water to the lowest level;
He's quicker than the slyest devil,
Selling hell, but we hear heaven;
Doing so twenty-four seven.
He photo-shops secret desires,
Twists truth-tellers into liars;
Artful, wily, scheming, subtle,
The Who-Gee Boo-Gee's a hungry jackal.
*today is the day, yesterday's late,
tomorrow's a place that just won't wait*
I met up with the Who-Gee Boo-Gee Man,
Peddling apples from my jardain.
Nov 20, 2018
Nov 20, 2018 at 10:26 AM UTC
Don't You Dare Speak,
Your Words Trying To Make Blue Streaks,
On The Monalisa Of My Soul,
Black Graffiti Stains My Wishes,
And Teeth Bare At My Well Being,
Am I Daft?
Or Sane?
My Head Pounding With Lyrics,
About How Cruel Life Can Utterly Be,
Sharpie Crossing Out My Faith,
Paint Vandalizing My Mended Heart,
Rust Dressing The Hinges Of My Heartbeat Itself,
And Golden Irises Reset,
Back To Seaweed Green,
Resting On A Bloodshot Background,
Crayons Scribbling On The Coloring Book,
Of My Dreams,
Making It A Midnight Sky Mask,
Flecked With Miserable Maroon Tears,
Slang Covers My Intellect,
Making It Foggy And Usless,
You Can Thank Society,
For Sculpting My Strength,
From A Slab Of Clay,
Burning It In A Kiln,
To The Foundation Of Life,
I Am Art,
Sculpted From The Earth's Face,
Yet I Sit On A Shelf,
Collecting Dust,
And All Of The Arrogent People,
Doodle On My Shell,
Colors Make An Ugly Mix,
On My Bodies Skeleton,
And What Is Making Me Special,
Is Slowly Drowning,
Underneath A Sea Of Graffiti
Nov 3, 2012
Nov 3, 2012 at 4:05 PM UTC
Elizabeth and God exist in a sunflower grave. Her mother and father slit her stomach open and watched the contents pour out like
spaghetti confetti.
Tommy, Elizabeth's boyfriend, rode his ocean blue Huffy, until the tread on his tires grew bald and until the grips were blanketed by dead skin. Looking for her, panoramic views of the horizon leapt beside him. Silhouettes of his legs, churned and kissed the orange and caramel dusk. With every tear in his hamstrings and calves, the **** in his sky grew and swallowed the memory of Elizabeth Mendenhall, Honor Student.
Margot, Elizabeth's twelve year-old sister, was an idealistic soul. Taking a Sharpie, she wrote on her sister's wall, "Liz, there is no death greater than the loss of self, and no life greater than one where we continuously search for what self is." Margot struggled with concentrating and frying eggs - but focused on the sunflower garden, dangerously and perfectly.
Hilary and Brendan were thirty-five and thirty-six years-old. They stabbed their daughter thirty-seven times. They don't know why they did it, they just couldn't think of a reason not to do it.
She begged for her life. The yellow petals of the sunflowers caught blood-drops and, after enough struggle, floated down to kiss and lay on Elizabeth's slow-twitch body. Hilary looked at Brendan and said, "What does this mean?" Brendan shrugged and said, "This is new to me."
The garden was an oven, and digging her grave was like pulling back on a cheap, plastic latch. Elizabeth had pale, pre-cooked pie crust skin. The slits in her stomach looked like peeks into a cherry stuffed filling. Crinkled lips looked indented by a stainless steel fork, back and forth, side to side. And the soil rained upon her like the reversal of hot vapor, returning home.
Elizabeth and the Sunflower Garden.
May 21, 2015
May 21, 2015 at 5:37 AM UTC
The city takes your soul block by block
While you sit on the curb in mismatched socks
Trying to retain your extremely weak but steadfast streak of being unique
Cities aren't 24-hour Christmas
The trick is to remain ambitious
Hands in your lap
No eye contact
Going tap tap tap on your Citizens app
While discreetly doodling a Sharpie spaceship on the subway seat
Hitting the street
With sick beats in your feet
Cuz thoughts of quotas and quarters won't quell a quintessential quest
To push the city to its limits and try your very best
To keep biting your nails behind elevator doors
Cuz no chewed-up hands are exactly like yours
A balancing act
Trying not to get trapped
Or smothered by facts
But undeniably
I love what's inside of me
My heart keeps me alive
But what I love makes me live
The city takes my soul
But I've got soul to give.
May 9, 2014
May 9, 2014 at 3:16 AM UTC
I'd rather drink the punch and die
poor
than bite the apple and die
rich.
I'm just trying to find
a way
to get by
and meet people
with out having to take my clothes off.
or write **** me in sharpie all over my forehead.
No matter how it happens,
there needs to be a redistribution of wealth
in a way that isn't stealing, like taxes do to us.
If the people got together and built
an empire,
then together they would rule
it and take care of
all that needs to be done.
Like business
that actually works,
like a friendship,
not a one night stand.
Y'all know what I mean?
I just turned 20.
43 minutes ago, I'm excited.
Mar 23, 2012
Mar 23, 2012 at 2:49 AM UTC
in our
besieged republic
snipers are
popping up
everywhere
taking ***
shots
ending lives
with a well placed
head shot
active shooters
star in
world premier
events
jokers
rise like
dark knights
casting large
looming shadows
on real 3D cinemax
multiplexed screens
sprinkling overpriced
buckets of popcorn
with generous
dollops of blood
others
head back to
school
still ******
about missing
recess and
excessive
sentences
to detention
halls where
bullies tortured
scrawny inmates
with wedgies
and painful
***** twisters
they’ve
come back
to even the score
leaving
bullet hole
pockmarks on
Sharpie smudged
smart boards
declaring endless
summer vacations
for classrooms
of children
who don’t
give wedgies
and only dream
of soft *****
these
urban guerillas
are now working
to liberate airports
from the tyranny
of TSA agents
fulfilling
PATRIOT ACT
duties for
10 bucks
an hour
and
last night
the latest
active shooter
showed up at
the Garden
State Plaza,
-my hometown
mall of america-
mumbling about his
Grand Theft Auto
score, strung out
and crashing
from an unfilled
pharma addiction
script
he grew
up as a
Highwayman
in Teaneck
a former
classmate
working
at Nordstroms
said he was
a really good kid
he was,
one of the good ones,
he could have shot
some people
but the only
person he
shot in the head
was himself
legions of
police officers
surrounding the mall
stood down
grateful for overtime
milling about
in the flashing
red strobes
inhaling the heady
blue fumes
rising to commend
Bergen County
Blue Laws and
next Sunday’s
time and a half
active shooter
training day
Jimi Hendrix:
Machine Gun
Oakland
11/5/13
jbm
Nov 5, 2013
Nov 5, 2013 at 1:12 PM UTC
Dear Mr. Heaney
I wish I'd read your poetry
years ago when I was still impressionable and coy and all that jazz.
Now it resounds in my skull, leaving a tingle in my right hand.
My pen is somewhat snug, but a revolver, no.
Ink and shovels aren't far from each other,
so your point is well-taken. In fact, they're co-workers –
Ink's proved itself just as deadly. It slowly ushers men into the earth,
their soil-seat, while the shovel stages the unending play;
the eternal lattice.
The Nobel hung above your head,
the vast array of pins, medals, papers with your name in billowing scarlet.
What a treat. Like the last cupcake in the back of
the refrigerator that had too much chocolate icing and was only
semi-covered in multi-colored snowflakes. I'd loved to have
personally presented it to you. There'd be my own plaque,
billowing scarlet and all. It'd say, "Mr. Heaney,
, you must own a ***** I hope you'd laugh, and not be offended,
thinking me a distasteful and insensitive lout. It may not be right,
but I can't help but steal the volumes surrounding yours out of
every **** library so
"Seamus Heaney"
may catch the eye of the common passerby
more easily. I think I even went to work on
enhancing a spine with a red sharpie once.
Red hits the eye hard.
That was in the central library downtown.
Don't tell anyone.
Beyond a laugh, what I hope for most is that you get this letter.
Just look at it.
Wonder why someone so far removed in age and culture and place
would ever think of you holding an over-frosted desert as glorious.
Sep 2, 2012
Sep 2, 2012 at 7:50 PM UTC
when you are twenty something and haven't
grown out of what your family called “baby
fat” don't worry, because you are still loved
by your body. everyday it wakes you up and
nourishes you, and when it fails to do that, it's
only a malfunction, a button hit wrong. when
you get shamed into wearing a one piece by
your friends in eighth grade, don't panic, because
that swimsuit is killer and everyone you are
with is working it. when your friends talk about
skinny shaming since they have never experienced
fat shaming, listen. when you see fat shaming,
talk about it. when your mother starts shopping
in the plus size area for you, don't feel ashamed.
your body is meant for what it is meant to do.
when you have a panic attack in the dressing
room of the local american eagle for not fitting
into size sixes, calm yourself down, no one will
ever see that size. black it out with a sharpie, cut
it out with scissors, let the tag fly. when you
get ****** into pro-ana sites, shut off your phone.
when you are on your knees with two fingers in
your mouth, close the toilet. when you use ice
cubes as a snack, eat something else. don't
let your brain become a calculator before it’s
too late. when you come into school the next
day, your friends complaining about a not flat
stomach, tell them that the sack needed to hold
parts of your body is not flat for a reason. when
they complain about size four jeans, show them
how you wear eights like a badge of honor, like
your lipstick or your hair. show your stretch marks
as tattoos, show your cellulite as gold, your hips
as the gates to your mansion, and your thighs are
thunder thighs, let them boom down and let them
be free.
Aug 22, 2016
Aug 22, 2016 at 6:28 PM UTC
I used a black sharpie to write a love poem on your arm
Hoping the ink would sink into depths causing little to no harm
That the rough words may permeate through your tough skin
And the permanence may prove that forever starts from within
That the black is dark enough to hide all your scars from being used
And that my words are evidence and proof of my love for you
So let that ink sink as deep as it might
My words peirce your soul without a fight
My sharpie art fill you with awe and an imaginative spark
Be inspired by my loving words and the permanent scar they leave on your heart
You may forget my face, you may forget my name but never forget where my love made its mark
Feb 1, 2016
Feb 1, 2016 at 2:08 AM UTC
Love is a sharpie
Some days it draws good things,
Some days it draws bad ones.
The lines can be thick or thin,
Or long or short.
If you leave the cap off, it'll dry out.
Or sometimes they just explode.
But usually they work just fine,
Although they do smell funny.
You can do many things with a sharpie. Even though it says "permanent",
It'll usually wash off.
Some times, you gotta rub it real hard to get it to come off,
And even then,
Not all of it does.
Mar 25, 2015
Mar 25, 2015 at 1:09 AM UTC
I am barely a mineral now, not yet a woman in the ground,
not yet growing gardens and begging people to cook my peppers.
My home is dizzy from my constant re-entry, which helps me to cheat,
in life I am looking for the harvest in people. I am a thread of cotton pulling
every word like it is more porous than the next, which helps me.
I summersault through conversations rather read in sharpie,
on the last corner white space of bathroom stalls,
alone and blushed. I remember love like a tagline inviting a smile
and messages to strangers. When I look in the mirror I am always inhaling,
my mouth says O, O I am out of excuses. I tell everyone I’m tired of working,
which helps me to hide in my comet ways. I am tight-lined,
which is to say I feel love on the hairs of my arms, the wind,
the blades of fans speak to me at night when I have nothing left to say.
I am licensed to moving. In the dark in the cities public spaces and
also in alleyways I am soft like a moonbeam. I am convinced the world is a sewer,
which helps me to explain the exchange of waste and skin and the secrets hidden
in tunnels of shadows. When I move the world blurs with me like a heartbeat.
I am underground like the sewer, rotten in negative spaces, which helps me,
to hear the echo ripple swish of every piece of trash call my name.
I have no response. Some days the world is too ***** One day I will learn
to quilt and stitch together every important face, which will help me
to remember my grandmother and how she loved to balloon to the sky.
I dream she is a large magellanic cloud beaming out of the universe, the force
of believing is the word Hallelujah sung from the lips of Leonard Cohen.
It is midnight. It is noon. I close my eyes for a second and I see myself as miles
from the moon. I am running every day now and there is nothing left to see. My heart
is a kitchen door swinging and it does not want to stop.
Sep 20, 2012
Sep 20, 2012 at 12:30 AM UTC
I walk the empty road of hurried days
the dark holds opportunities that the light burns through.
Nerves have been narcissistic
in that self-loathing battering
that I promised you I wouldn't commit to again.
is it different if you're a witness?
Hiding isn't part of the agenda,
if you could call irrationality an agenda.
here's to touching upon a few points in which I don't show all sides.
I'm nervous to talk to the people who make me happy
and I'm jaded to their presence,
because I'm a modern-day gatsby
with a touch of bukowski (or maybe a slam)
and all I want is for this romantic inside of me to give up on the struggle
and give in.
I want to let her form allude me because it's not important,
she just wants recognition for the fact that she has an education
and knows how to use it.
I'm just going to let my words smash onto the page, maybe edit
before a show, maybe not.
Probably go drink a beer on the local trail and stare at the back
yards of the wealthy and sharpie in an eye ball on the cement
brick on which I set my empty bottle for company, because
flowers don't get far in foam.
Nostalgia here we are again,
this time there's no search for meaning,
I know you completely and ever since we've met
you've refused to let go (somewhat of a curse, yet I love you).
If I want to let myself be free, then I have to let go of others judgement.
If maybe for a second I didn't think of what others thought about me
and I didn't think about them to occupy the empty space, then I would
truly return to the person I was before my self-esteem plummeted beneath
all that I knew to be right and wrong. Before it hurt to write my feelings
because of the fear that what I wrote wouldn't be good enough, or long enough,
no matter how many compliments came shooting through me.
"I forgot, you're bad at accepting compliments."
I don't want that to be true, I don't want to beat myself up
over the fact that someone else has great beauty simply
because I am blind of my own.
Self-love, here I come,
it'll help me live life without tangles.
May 21, 2013
May 21, 2013 at 4:06 AM UTC
Balloon head girl...
With eggs for eyes and
Sharpie lips,,
Don't cry your egg white tears
For me, or let
the yolk leak from holes in
Your diabetic fingers...
Snap your blouse back on, with
The buttons right up
to your neck, a throat with
3 imprints, but
2 hands and
1 threat
Sep 27, 2016
Sep 27, 2016 at 11:14 PM UTC
The transparent roof covered her from sudden precipitation
Ice pellets pelting the ground around as she waited for the bus
The shufflers and grumblers huddled in the booth for cover share
Riddled with cold holes from liquid ***********
Look at them, she thought
Untold stories in a crowd
Grey figures among the concrete and the puddles
Blank pages thickening unread novels
Returning home to stagnant plots and forgettable characters
On the auto she scanned the library for research-relevant titles
A fairy tale cuddled publicly, all lips and hands and smiles
An anthology with stained sections and shredded, well-worn binding
Scribbled frantically to transfer himself to more unpublished page
Give up, she wanted to scream
Paper dies and no one reads
No longer did she believe in hidden literary gems
Far too many friends had rushed their tales
Conclusions writ in sharpie slop
Conclude she had in pencil but the writing hand would never stop
Not for cramps of authoring nor material that she lacked
Not until the cover closed
From which there was no flipping back
Perhaps I am an article, she thought
Meant to be short and skimmed
A brief point to be made and greater issue slapped within
She wondered something dreadful then, a tremor in her bones
She never understood the other chapters, stories, poems
Reflecting in her epilogue, would she even know her own?
My pen was never full
I am illiterate
Apr 24, 2012
Apr 24, 2012 at 10:40 AM UTC
She
Counts
Her shots
With sharpie
On her arm, tick tick
The alcohol swirls inside her.
It can **** you, you know that, if you keep taking them.
She
Waits,
Ignores.
Breathes in smoke.
The substances coursing
Through her veins. The two, a yin-yang
Teasing each other, now giving balance to her world.
Feel
Your
Burning
Cheeks flushing
Under the dim lights.
Are you still counting them tonight?
What are you trying to escape from? Him? Or yourself?
Nov 14, 2018
Nov 14, 2018 at 2:50 PM UTC
It's printed into your
ice cold, pale skin.
Permanent and never fading.
Tattooed in black ink,
all the promises you
have made and broken.
You reap what you sow;
And dear unwanted thing
of my life, this is a sharpie
and these are your mistakes
that has made you leave
a path of destruction
right behind you.
You dragged us along
the rusted barbwire
and broken glass
that has left us all
bleeding and scarred.
Dear Unwanted thing of
this pointless, drawn out life,
you've sacrificed the good
only to bring us all pain.
Dear Unwanted thing in my life,
You are no longer worth my time.
Aug 1, 2011
Aug 1, 2011 at 9:41 PM UTC
She Shoots Me Towards
the Reaches of the Atmosphere.
(narcotic)
She Bravely Descends Earthward
from the Divine Empyreal.
(superhero)
Not Unlike a Hypodermic Needle
Piercing My Median Cubital Vein,
(narcotic)
She Flashes into My Heart
in Scarcely Eight Seconds.
(superhero)
Besides Inducing Euphoria,
She Effectuates Toxicity;
(narcotic)
In Fewer than Ten Minutes,
She Targets My Defenses.
(superhero)
She not only Provokes Peak High,
(narcotic)
She Destroys a Lifetime of Yearning.
(superhero)
She is My ****** (narcotic)
She is My Heroine. (superhero)
~ The Sharpie Poet
Apr 27, 2016
Apr 27, 2016 at 7:46 PM UTC
faces like yours aren't meant for touching
and i'm beginning to think that closed-casket funerals were created for you
and sometimes the overwhelming desire to share something of yourself with someone--with anyone--is too much to bear
and suddenly i understand every spraypainted feeling under every freeway
or sharpie sentences scribbled in bathroom stalls
or muttered comments or notes in library books or songs on repeat played a little too loud
and i understand why pretty girls write stories on their arms
you were never the type to tell the truth
you were always talking
you never understood the way i looked at my feet when you laughed or how i spoke in hushed tones
some days are better than yesterday and some days make me question tomorrow
some words make me question you
today i wonder what the bigger sin is
is it your lying?
or my hopeless belief in words i know aren't true?
words are meant to be spoken and hands are meant to be held and love and sorrow and anger are meant to be felt and enjoyed and EXPERIENCED
and everything has meaning
everything but you
Aug 25, 2014
Aug 25, 2014 at 8:36 PM UTC