"smock" poems
Compelled by calamity's magnet
They loiter and stare as if the house
Burnt-out were theirs, or as if they thought
Some scandal might any minute ooze
From a smoke-choked closet into light;
No deaths, no prodigious injuries
Glut these hunters after an old meat,
Blood-spoor of the austere tragedies.
Mother Medea in a green smock
Moves humbly as any housewife through
Her ruined apartments, taking stock
Of charred shoes, the sodden upholstery:
Cheated of the pyre and the rack,
The crowd ***** her last tear and turns away.
13.8k
You, Doctor Martin, walk
from breakfast to madness. Late August,
I speed through the antiseptic tunnel
where the moving dead still talk
of pushing their bones against the ******
of cure. And I am queen of this summer hotel
or the laughing bee on a stalk
of death. We stand in broken
lines and wait while they unlock
the doors and count us at the frozen gates
of dinner. The shibboleth is spoken
and we move to gravy in our smock
of smiles. We chew in rows, our plates
scratch and whine like chalk
in school. There are no knives
for cutting your throat. I make
moccasins all morning. At first my hands
kept empty, unraveled for the lives
they used to work. Now I learn to take
them back, each angry finger that demands
I mend what another will break
tomorrow. Of course, I love you;
you lean above the plastic sky,
god of our block, prince of all the foxes.
The breaking crowns are new
that Jack wore.
Your third eye
moves among us and lights the separate boxes
where we sleep or cry.
What large children we are
here. All over I grow most tall
in the best ward. Your business is people,
you call at the madhouse, an oracular
eye in our nest. Out in the hall
the intercom pages you. You twist in the pull
of the foxy children who fall
like floods of life in frost.
And we are magic talking to itself,
noisy and alone. I am queen of all my sins
forgotten. Am I still lost?
Once I was beautiful. Now I am myself,
counting this row and that row of moccasins
waiting on the silent shelf.
7.3k
lizard on warm rocks
an artist in their paint-speckled smock
the wind carrying fallen flowers
jade eyes meet brown
chastity belt unbound
hours upon hours
spent in between the sheets
delicate, delectable, free
Apr 19, 2023
Apr 19, 2023 at 10:43 AM UTC
You were so vibrant
back then
when we first met,
freshly painted
your true colors
wet and running
onto my smock
I didn't see you
back then, the way that
I do now
Sad how...
I had only brushed
over you
Sep 17, 2022
Sep 17, 2022 at 12:33 PM UTC
The sign sun stains in the duct taped window advertising gainful employment in a part time pay by the hour washer deryer upstairs hair stylist crumbling 1960s salon.
Chipped white washed paint draws in the custom customers offering permanates in every style and yesterday's hair of tomorrow "put it on today don't worry about it till tomorrow! The doors open to a bell and hairspray smell, something that might catch fire in a spark or cancer the lungs.
The smock and name tag carry home the hairspray scent and ghost in store radio fades the ears from sleep. The bed reminds you of the pay check though so you push it all aside.
Help wanted wanted help to get out of the make me want to die lifestyle
Oct 10, 2012
Oct 10, 2012 at 8:25 PM UTC
Compelled by calamity's magnet
They loiter and stare as if the house
Burnt-out were theirs, or as if they thought
Some scandal might any minute ooze
From a smoke-choked closet into light;
No deaths, no prodigious injuries
Glut these hunters after an old meat,
Blood-spoor of the austere tragedies.
Mother Medea in a green smock
Moves humbly as any housewife through
Her ruined apartments, taking stock
Of charred shoes, the sodden upholstery:
Cheated of the pyre and the rack,
The crowd ***** her last tear and turns away.
2.9k
He has this nervous tick.
When a person is lying he will open his mouth.
Sometimes his jaw will hit the floor.
Sometimes words will come out.
And sometimes there are consequences,
if not only a sore jaw.
He is an affable man.
Many would say he's a good sport
and in good nature, even though he's not
athletic and has severe allergies.
Handshakes are important to him.
And he understands the appeal of a thumbs-up.
Hugs are reserved for holidays,
and tears were only had at funerals.
Sunglasses optional, but the only pair
he owns he keeps
in the jacket of his black suit.
Any man that has a tendency to speak too freely,
or too much, will have to learn to talk their way out of a potentially harmful situation.
The "Gift of Gab"did not die with the smock.
It evolved with the suit.
It became five words said in three.
It is in relation to political correctness.
It's knowing that government is not ********
but many representatives are mentally challenged.
He tries to stay ahead of his mannerisms.
Raised eyebrow.
Twitching eye.
Clenched teeth.
But some things cannot be hid.
Like the vein in his forehead.
And of course his verbal diarrhea.
But he would rather expell insight
and opinion rather than hold
it in only to force it out later in privacy.
People involved in Fine Art are shot on site.
Possession of a canvas brings a life sentence.
The art departments are born from advertising.
False pretense is considered flexible.
When the program used is for the sole purpose
of manipulation you aren't expected to become angry. Government turns the clocks back, stretching time and truth,
with knowledge of a man who has done
the same, and was considered a master.
Metaphysics and a mustache,
he changed the world with a canvas,
and with an open mouth he expelled truth
and injustice to a contemporary audience.
He applied his paint with a poetic eye.
Soon he learned that you don't need
to start a fire to melt a clock.
All you need is a brush,
and sometimes a barren tree.
Nov 9, 2013
Nov 9, 2013 at 11:00 AM UTC
for Barton Smock
I
to see the flooding lake I crawl
through the thicket
I imagined
being the devil’s
garden
as a child
a lake
I first called
blue prison
but now
love
after swimming
lessons grandmother
funded
II
squatting arsonists occupy
the town’s church
during weeknights
I am one of four who knows
*When it burns
I'll steal the stoup*
III
I dream rarely and only in naps
waking,
I try restraining
fantasies of
faceless women
IV
rainstorms brake
the lake’s edges,
muddy the bankside flowers,
leave the canal sullied
forever
looking on, I
recall
generosity
Nov 22, 2012
Nov 22, 2012 at 2:44 PM UTC
Perfectly presented
In white linen smock
Perfect smile
And perfect floppy hat
Perfectly seen
Prism of beauty
Axis of arc
Staring back at me
Perfectly grounded
Sereen sapphire lens
Moccasin heals
Treading towards me
In 1979 she walked into my life
Perfectly presented
Perfect smile
And a perfect floppy hat
Aug 22, 2022
Aug 22, 2022 at 5:22 PM UTC
THE BLOOD
YOU DON’T SEE
IS FAKE
http://www.lulu.com/shop/barton-smock/the-blood-you-dont-see-is-fake/paperback/product-21206799.html;jsessionid=6D1872B449D8B58E2A7F503E518273FD
new and selected poems / Barton Smock / September 2013
from self published collections:
mating rituals of the responsibly poor
Ahistoric
Aggressive Kin
Hallelujah Lip-Synch
in the asylum we’d sun ourselves with angels
all available at
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/acolyteroad
Sep 19, 2013
Sep 19, 2013 at 4:30 PM UTC
The city bus jostles down the street
On every other seat a *** rests
As I glance around I see shoes
Instead of bare feet.
As I glance around I see pants
Instead of shorts.
When I look down
I see my gladiators, fuchsia accented
When I look down
I see my ten piggies with coral paint
I ascend up to my loosely pleated
Polka-dotted, monochrome smock
Sliced in half by the strap of my
simple, salmon, cross-body satchel
Sitting ever so obediently at my hip
I reach to eliminate a treacherous itch
Feeling my perfectly formed pleat
A pleat adorned with a moss rose
Itching without disturbing a pleat
Is always a tricky task to undertake
I find myself asking if it's in my head
If it's floating through my mind
like the smoke of the mind altering substance
That floats through my brain
I glance around the stopped bus
No one is moving, we are stopped.
So why am I still jostling in my seat
Like the bus is jostling down the street?
Jul 1, 2014
Jul 1, 2014 at 8:43 AM UTC
**** blocked by
wannabe rock stars
in tube socks
standing on the block
like the 2001 Rock
ready to drop candy *****
and knock blocks off of
those who would mock
**** strap wearing
disk jockey’s –
cocky cockney Spock impersonators
lock glocks in boxes so the foxy chicks
won’t flock to the professed
smock of Sherlock Holmes
or dock their paper ships
on the jagged rocks
jutting up from the oceanic
tectonic plate –
frocks adorned with Reeboks
shock the locksmith
busily hocking his shops’
noxious fume makers
while the unorthodox musk ox
in bobby-socks
gently rocks
to the sounds walking out from
the talking box –
Dec 10, 2015
Dec 10, 2015 at 3:13 PM UTC
i've got an iron plate
covered in a definitely liquid fate
behind a spherical unlocked gate
popped open to peek not too late
to see the life that awaits
i've got a trigger happy brain
a kid who complains
an old man who does not remember his name
a star with no fame
honestly lame claims
i've got a bed made of rocks
rooms with walls that talk
premonitions and assumptions that stalk,
gawk, walk and smock
the fantasy ship that never returns home to dock
i've got pairs of no color
foundational pillars that shudder
magnets that reject one another
though positive the father, mother or brother
no force could make them huggers
i've got a memory of the future
and vacant sheets that still stir
lonely animals that still pur
on the backs of women as fine fur
not ever damning the fact they could not also skin her
i've got a bomb with no fuse
useless skillful attributes
an unreachable noose
somewhere near that train with no caboose
a newspaper that never bore news
i've got an inner psychotic earthquake
erupting, held together with paper weights
silent clocks melting against time and space
warped beyond conceivable replace
and a pace set for waste producing smells of unimaginable distaste
i've got millions of appointments
pimples and hemorrhoids needing ointments
osteoporosis making a spine bent
an empty bank due to money lent
an obsession over time never spent
i've got a dangerous urge
to lick a dish for the surge
that stripped the bull of its courage
cracked knees creating pains that gurge
pleading relief from the thaumaturge
i've got a cat with ferocity
only defeated by that curiosity
covered in gems to disguise its true atrocity
that wished it could refer to itself anonymously
but sporting a name that claimed it was descriptive of me
i've got a handful of severity
motions that want sincerity
an over cast of side effects promising what i could be
eyes dialed in, foggy and stripped of clarity
in the mirror its no longer human that i see
Dec 26, 2012
Dec 26, 2012 at 11:20 PM UTC
Concerning man and what he makes,
other than scrupulous laws, is that time is of most importance. And as any morally ethical man will tell you, or not tell you, is that time is money.
Now because time nor money grows from trees, it is essential to value them
as entities of the Earth. Valued like trees and plants. Well, some plants. Usually not plants referred to as "tree."
Man made are the laws that produce
a moral oral. Remember, Lady Justice is blindfolded, not gagged.
Time does not exist.
Money is not real.
Only was real when measured in gold, but note the age of the dollar,
and see the change.
Hands on a clock were assembled with hands and a smock. Built in a factory that produces black clouds to join the natural white. When the white clouds drain, the different smells of ground enter the air, and sometimes you get mud, and sometimes that peculiar smell of blacktop on a warm summer's day enters the nostrils.
Whether man is suppose to steal the fruit of this land, or become nutrient for the fruit of this land will never be agreed upon, because of ego over Eco, but I'd like to think that that is a constant and everlasting reminder that this is a cohabitation. Maybe what is natural and taken from this Earth will always be plentiful. But maybe we will pile too much on our plate.
Contain too much in jars.
We can write.
Educate and enlighten.
Hope that ego
never destroys Eco.
Concerning man and
what he makes.
Apr 3, 2014
Apr 3, 2014 at 8:38 PM UTC
Isn't it nice to rhyme
When words strike as divine
Made to fit the part
Unlike free verse aristofarts
Who would **** your mother
Like beatnik Stepbrother
And sleep through their clocks
For nocturnal jabberwocks
If ever was a Good man.
Benny swung with the times, man.
But Jazz rolled from the hits
Of white British misfits.
When South Bronx fell through crack
The sky and hood went black
Poets sold missing car parts
For Busta Rhymes to bust a start.
Poetry had to lose an art.
Rhyming tossed like the ****
Who ****** Lord Tennyson's ****
Which tugged at Victoria's smock.
It's easy to criticize
An age demystified
But now personifies
Poetry commercialized
And the old aging misfit
Tries to gather the spit
With a mouth so dry.
But not a poet in the sky
Will sanction the crime
To help his verse opine
Against the words-of-a-kind
That English bespoke to rhyme.
Feb 19, 2015
Feb 19, 2015 at 2:20 AM UTC
I know a girl
with wandering eyes
who paints her dreams
on giant canvases.
her lopsided ponytail
is secured by a paintbrush
and I swear she looks most beautiful
when her lips are pursed
and nose scrunched up
as she tries to get that final detail
just right.
disheveled and sleep-deprived
with coffee stains on her tired smock,
she brings to life
intricate images of her subconscious.
detailed landscapes
free of the burden of mankind
with creatures whose names
I find unpronounceable
but they roll off her tongue just fine.
one day
in her cluttered studio
her paintbrush meets my cheek
with a fiery line of red.
I catch her hand in mine
and she meekly says,
"I dreamt that you were mine
so I thought I'd paint you,
too."
our lips touch
and the paint smears
as we are brought to life
among her dreams.
Aug 17, 2011
Aug 17, 2011 at 12:17 AM UTC
The turkey-oh-gee, on
Isn’t the same
As turg-ee-ohg-heeee.
I chickened a buffalo.
Do moke smock in
The biff part this marks
The spot I’m not skipsing
This was longer ago.
Aug 22, 2011
Aug 22, 2011 at 11:28 PM UTC
She's like acid reflux
Bubbling in the balled up pit of my stomach
Pangs of searing acidic bile rising in my throat
I have to swallow to keep it all down
The words I would ***** in her face if I could
The kind of noxious fluid immune to my control
I'd love to see her dripping with my complaint
Stained by her own disdain
Regurgitated onto her own front smock
An adage to her own hysterical hypocrisy
May 30, 2012
May 30, 2012 at 12:26 PM UTC
Your perfect curves
ensnaring over my frame.
Your irresistible soft pink lips
Inviting mine,
Massaging our tongues.
Your jaunty demeanour
making my heart palpitate.
Your seductive smirk
Dovetailing our bodies
Letting me see your gorgeous décolletage
Your bold persona
Purging the tension from my soul.
After your reckless claim
My smock hung loose on your torso
With desire fawning in your oculars.
Making me the purple of your pink.
-Khushi
Mar 13, 2018
Mar 13, 2018 at 4:43 AM UTC
Scary Larry,
The Margarita Fairy
Could drink anything,
As long as it wasn’t dairy.
Bollocky Pollack
Hung up his smock
Covered with paint
Put it on the auction block.
Seven eight nine
Friends of mine
Are really just fine
Without toeing a line.
Five six seven
It is rather like heaven
To be gladly given
A life worth living.
And Yeaster Bunny
Thinking he was funny
Baked bread dildoes
That sold for bags of money.
Scott Tissue
Said “We’re gonna miss you.
Your bread will sell quicker
If don’t make it an issue.”
Seven eight nine
Friends of mine
Are really just fine
Without toeing a line.
Five six seven
It is rather like heaven
To be gladly given
A life worth living.
Phony Joanie
Wishes for alimony
But refuses to divorce
Her husband Tony.
Decided she plans
To keep him instead.
Good for ready money
Though he's lousy in bed.
Seven eight nine
Friends of mine
Are really just fine
Without toeing a line.
Five six seven
It is rather like heaven
To be gladly given
A life worth living.
**** Poncho,
Everybody seems to
Dig his Mayan body
If only for a day or two.
Then he's off to play
With somebody new
Maybe some other day
He'll make it back to you.
Seven eight nine
Friends of mine
Are really just fine
Without toeing a line.
Five six seven
It is rather like heaven
To be gladly given
A life worth living.
Aug 23, 2016
Aug 23, 2016 at 3:11 PM UTC
I look in the mirror and see
not me
see
not me
I see
an artist with a frock on,
backing up a bit
I see
an artist with a smock on,
not me.
And they're talking 'bout the Shard!
if a ***** looking thing ever
looked so hard
it's the Shard.
I'm talking Annoyed and
thinking of beating up Freud
they're
thinking Schadenfreude,
that's why Lloyds
exists
for sinking wrecks and
sunken ships.
It's a hell of a mess
when you've got to confess
you've made a hell of a mess,
reflections of me in a dress,
(frocks is cool,
but they don't fool the mirror)
Cruising
pen in hand
Saddique in the driving seat
beat Boris hands down
to be the
new Mayor
in London town.
Out on the balcony and
the only thing to welcome me
is pigeon **** and
two white feathers
and the
weather's
nice.
Fifteen degrees and she's
in a bikini,
who let the genie out
of the lamp?
May 8, 2016
May 8, 2016 at 8:33 AM UTC
The day was very merry, the day was very grand,
Until Matt ruined it by getting stabbed in the hand.
He accidentally ran into a pencil,
He was showing off, just for the thrill.
In that moment, everyone was in shock,
Blood all over his shirt like a surgeon’s smock
The day was very merry, the day was very grand,
Until Matt ruined it by getting stabbed in the hand.
We ran looking for help, in that empty neighborhood,
No one seeming to notice that our situation was not good.
But alas, no one came to our rescue,
And we had no idea what to do.
The day was very merry, the day was very grand,
Until Matt ruined it by getting stabbed in the hand.
A woman drove up, in a white minivan,
She quickly saw the wound on Matt’s hand.
We gave our friend to this good samaritan,
We waved goodbye to Matt as he approached the van and got in.
The day was very merry, the day was very grand,
Until Matt ruined it by getting stabbed in the hand.
After this, we all quickly realized,
We had given our friend to a stranger, and had even said our goodbyes.
We knew we had to find him, and it had to be soon,
We feared matt would be riding to his impending doom.
So we went, house to house, knocking on every door,
Until we found the right one, and we were rid of our horror.
Apr 23, 2014
Apr 23, 2014 at 10:34 PM UTC
Scary Larry,
The Margarita Fairy
Could drink anything,
As long as it wasn’t dairy.
Bollocky Pollack
Put up his smock
Covered with paint
On the auction block.
Seven eight nine
Friends of mine
Are really just fine
Without toeing a line.
Five six seven
It is rather like heaven
To be gladly given
A life worth living.
And Yeaster Bunny
Thinking he was funny
Baked bread dildoes
That sold for bags of money.
Scott Tissue
Said “We’re gonna miss you.
Your bread will sell quicker
If don’t make *** an issue.”
Two three four
What are friends for
If you don’t accept them
Then throw them out the door?
Besides variety
Is much more fun
Than always being alone
With number one
Phony Joanie
Wishes for alimony
But refuses to divorce
Her husband Tony.
Skinny Lenny
First cousin of Kenny
Lives with nobody
But sleeps with many.
May 13, 2016
May 13, 2016 at 9:47 PM UTC
the road I walk,
I do not wish
to tread the rock
and rubble alone
companion, I pray
unhappily dependent
viewed resplendent
heard, small talk
subjected prey
boredom's side dish
lovely to have known
heart under lock
I ask, I knock
hope transcendent
drained of begging, weak groan
voice, dry chalk
squirm like a fish
counterpart delay
hold me as we sway,
embrace rewinds the clock
wooden panel, veil swish
secondly ascendant
refusal to balk
lifeline thrown
stoic face of stone
temperament at bay
creating small flock
promise, not a hock
slipping independent
dreams, strength squish
life in a whish
favor over crone
emotive attendant
vulnerable, I lay
life smock
eternal ****
firm the dock
lifetime pock
everlasting gray
May 3, 2015
May 3, 2015 at 4:10 PM UTC