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Arcassin B Oct 2014
By Arcassin Burnham



Long essays of ******* and nonsense,
Or more pathetic when you told me you were homeless,
Stupid *****,
You think you hot,
I'll leave you smokeless,
Ash cigarette buds on your skull,
You're my ashtray,
Sir poet,
More like sir faget
I'm not homophobic,
Melz got you protected,
I didn't hear the words until you spoked it,
Beat up a lot people that look like you,
I'm the wrong one to be chosen.
lame ***
Don Bouchard Jun 2015
Observing these old men sitting at the stockyard cafe,
Suspendered bellies hanging above huge buckles
And button-crotched Levi's tucked tight  over leather boots,
Legs grown bowed and thin, but carrying  them to the sale, still,
To hear the auctioneer, talking fast to work the buying crowd,
And get their fill of cattle, shoved indoors,
Sold beneath the steady cracking whips,
A spectacle to burn its way into my minds's forever eye:
The skidding steers, the rolling eyes, the frantic scramble to find cover,
While buyers gave their quiet signs:
A tilted cap, a winking eye, a thumb or index finger up or at a side,
To purchase cow or bull or horse, in living flesh...
Then out again, through the other door,
And turn our heads to wait for more, and read the scrolling numbers:
How many head, how much per pound, perhaps a buyer's name,
And then the swinging sound of other cattle coming in to start again.

So, here these old boys sit again,
Slurping coffee through their yellowed teeth,
Remembering days  of indoor cigarettes and harried waitresses,
The smell of cow manure and jingling spurs,
Though now the smokeless ring seems tame, more civilized,
I see the glory days reflecting in the old men's eyes.....

I was just a boy back in those good old days,
My memory is a little hazed, but I can recall
When smoking was allowed and sawdust covered the filthy floor,
A Coca-Cola cost a dime, and the cattle sale with Dad was the big time;
Quaking as we treaded light on the catwalks above the pens,
Looked for our calves, or cows Dad culled to bring to sale,
Then going down and in to see them sell.

Fondly now, I can recall the restaurant at the ring
Where  I hoped for a slice of lemon pie from behind chill-fogged glass,
Saw cowmen wearing spurs and neckerchiefs and chaps...
Dreamed of growing up to be a cowboy.
Reflecting on  boyhood experiences, Sidney Livestock Market, Sidney., MT, 1963 -  2015....
Maxine Flynn May 2010
I was there,
in your shoes
walking over dirt
and picking out our favorite tree

life is hard but most days are worth living
today was not one of those days
tomorrow won’t be either

we held sturdy rope in our hands
the kind that’s permanent
the kind of knot that holds

sometimes you gotta admit defeat
some things will never be done
some days it’s just better to quit

friends and family will be upset,
but aren’t you supposed to live for yourself
shouldn’t dying be the same way?

we climbed our favorite tree
looked out over nature’s beauty
breathed clean smokeless air

you jumped
I stayed.

They say before you judge a man
you must walk a mile in his shoes
I was only there when you fell.
Juhlhaus Dec 2019
We soak our travel-weary feet
Together in the deep end of a sea of clouds;
Take pause on the immortal steps
To inhale Yellow Mountain mist,
Coal dust, incense. Smokeless
Digital fireworks and sky-high butterfly facades
Sprout like corn stalks in autumn haze,
While we navigate this land of a billion characters
And more with only a phrase to go on,
Past the shops, libraries,
And reading rooms packed
With a literature only seen;
Poetic place names set
To a music only heard;
Guided by subtext, courteous,
And often as odd
As we find ourselves, on another side
Of a world only passing through.
Musing on travel in foreign places.
Nat Lipstadt Jun 2014
written two years ago and a bit, but suits still....

Weather Advisory: A long poem pouring ahead

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Be not fooled,
by the evening-tide,
be not deceived
by the quietude,
tis not a reprieve
of day before dark.

Be guarded,
for the easy transformation,
a tranquil shedding
of the day's husk,
into the faded light of dusk,
just one of nature's machinations
to delay the inevitable.

Evening-tide,
a colored compilation
of a few mischievous hours,
when sunlight is invaded by
streaks of pink, azure and gold,    
just before the
palette is plunged
into a stainless steel can
of gothic black,
skyied glory rendered into
common house paint.

Evening-tide,
an alleged easy calm
surfeits some souls,
supposed easy passage from  
the day's contusions to
a relaxation from humankind's regulations and rules,
but not for me.

Evening-tide,
when appetites unsated, simmer,
the in between hours when
humans transform themselves,
from day laborers to creatures
desiring, aroused, hungry  
for night time pleasures,
searching with false courage for
boundary lines to sever.

Evening-tide,
it was at evening-tide that
David espied, desired and
stole Bathsheba for his own,
with a King's arrogance
rent a kingdom,
murdered for profit,
birthed an Heir,
a prince, who wrote,
by evening-tide:

I have seen all the works
that are done under the sun; and,
behold, all is vanity
and vexation of spirit.

Evening-tide,
fear closes my throat,
confusion reappears,
a low grade flu infects
deemed persistent, incurable,
revisits, medicine resistant,
my insights, my speech,
to blind and bind  

Am I Gloucester,
blinded, but faculties
possessing vision,
the future to clarify?

No, no, it is to a king,
Lear,
to whom I am
son and cousin,
kith and kin

Sunset visions of
ultimate demise
ours eyes behold,
but plainly put,
at Evening-tide,
our dementia -
a precursor,
a periodic but hostile guest
in the hostel of our memories,
cracks and fractures us,
spirit first, body second.  

We are bound helpless
by a knotted tongue,
slow dying malingerer,
inside a head of ill repute,
unable to locate our knowing,
and every word selected,
a battle galactic, oft lost

Evening-tide,
I am cold,
and the issued command
is bring an umbrella
to warm and cover.  
What an old fool am I,
tis not blanket or a
Bathsheba I seek,
but at Evening-tide,
Babel's nefarious treasury of words
unlocked, for tis closed,                    
the gatekeepers,
drunk and absent,
drunk on absinthe,
and creme de mentia
and I have no key

Evening-tide, prithee,
I beg of thee,
consideration please,
check this hideous amusement,
that makes this
King's speech confused,
odor of smokeless cordite ignited
where the synapses have burnt,
injured, beyond repair
injured, by mine own aging.  

Reverse the diagnosis
of the panel of wordsmiths:
Alas, weep and be comforted...

Evening-tide,
a reverie of colored tears,
downward sloping,
arrive to tingle my tongue,
warming comfort for an *****
willing but unable,
a wounded soldier,
a veteran of poetry,
now prone and pained
beyond repair,
beyond healing,
immunized to the
heat and solder,
drugs and salves,
that heretofore
might have closed
the cracks of rack and ruin

Evening-tide,
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the king's horses and
all the king's men couldn't
put Humpty together again^

Evening-tide,
my hair, the color of old age.
Irony, my skin yet smooth,
unwrinkled, not in need of the
toxins that are employed
to fill crevasses on
the outer banks of age of comedy

Alas, the toxins natural from within
have seeped from their
latent resting place and have
contaminated the groundwater
that lubricated my mind,  
from siege engines poured,
a contamination of
mine own making.  
After a life long battle,
my Jericho walls have fallen.

Lear and I faint recall the love
of our beloved Cordelia,
but try as we might
her name escapes our grasp,
******* by bite of aging's asp.

We grow drunk by night
on a drink not of choice,
unhappy fury,
the residue within
the imprisoned poison
of our polluted tears,
that come only after our
misspoken and misshapen
guttural croaks
of our Eveningtide prayers
are both
unintelligible and unrequited
Written 6/01/11, after seeing Derek Jacobi as King Lear. This poem is about my fears of dementia which people close to me suffer from, sadly.  Now, I struggle to recall names and places. Poetry, not so much because I get to pick and choose words at my own speed. But someday, who knows....the time between day and night, is a metaphor for a beautiful slow, slipping away but be not deceived, by the quietude, tis not a reprieveof day before dark.

^ this rhyme, purportedly a child's view of siege engines that could not break the walled of the City of Gloucester (how ironic!)  in 1643

An abbreviated version of this poem goes like this:
Nat went to see King Lear,
Then went down to the beach
To watch the sun set, the evening arrive,
They both reminded him, of his fear
That someday he'll probably sunset like Lear
And end the play, the eve, mad, his mind deceived,
De-worded, defanged, his poetry retired, but not relieved
There is not much of me now, my Northern Light;
I hath been too torn to tell of my deeds,
I am a broken soul now, emerging from an invisible pit;
I hope the sun shall clear though, that I can but delight in belated rain again.
Rain, on thy forested land, that I hath begun to long to taste;
Coming to me like a five-year-old nymph: a succulent playmate,
Shadowing me but in cheerful grins and tireless haste,
What funny terms t’is little creature makes sense of!
Ah, a little one that brightens and salutes my days,
With lyrical giggles often stunning the entire forests of glee around me—
And taking my breaths away in dozens of waves of fierce smoke
That I often pause my breaths, feeling privilege and triumphant
Amidst its innocent odors, smudged with green hues and damp visions.
I feel comfortable then, as my pulse speeds and moans with delight
Spilling onto us from the brave storm above, as I always do.
Tasting rain, I shall twitch and sway around again with laughter, wisdom, and patience
That were undeniably stolen from me; leaving me in a deafening whine of tears.

They but told I did not belong, I was foreign, and so were my streaks of song;
My justice was but not their equal, I was a liar, I was wrong.
I was too humble to notice, I was too unarmed.
I was too innocent to be their companion—improvident and reckless beings!
No delicacy flashes across their eyes, neither do sympathy or softness.
All I could see was scorching hate and heat, shimmering in a blinding, officious smirk.
I was ample and blused oft’ with shyness—how come they came and stole my tranquil peace!
How ignominious and disgraced the whole nation is, who believes
that our own skin shall save us, unmerited and soulless!
How immature, timid, and vile; imbeciles that inherit only rainbows of sarcasm.
And what told they of my poetry, in such recursive envy and hate;
With disgust they said to me; ‘tis not my beloved, nor my fate.
They claimed I lived one life—and three souls too late, that I understood what life meant not;
They thought all was but a wealth of infamy around me, and I was rife with unseen disease.
I was a creature not to fall in love with, I was a disgrace;
I was ungodly, a shoddy strand of leaf to be killed unborn.
They figured I smelt like the withered summer weather;
Not a fit for their chilly smokeless air!

The air there smelt fondly like their absence of love;
And though it was silent, they were silent not,
It was a joy for them to ****, and to see my blood spill,
They said yet I knew not how to taste and feel.
It was as if I could not feel my own blood,
Nor that I could locate my gut’s instincts.
And what thought they of my ****** story;
For my presence was a nightmarish joke to all,
And I was a meaningless and too joyous of a little bud,
A small lavender which poorly knows its enemies and their fetal tongues,
That roses can sting and steal one or two of its crescent seeds!
Ah, and I was that degraded bland-smelling little bloom,
The mindless bloom t’ be plucked in their spring garden—harvested before my time;
That I shall cry and weep my blood out of me, in burning pain,
Destructing all my jutting illusions once again, without knowing why,
And finding my fierce heart, the next second, lying still!
That I think of my Immortal no more, and his face accusably so white and lean
For he has been forgetful of the love he once sustained;
His love, dimmed by the greed around his whole figure
Unsupported by the angered nature about him—which he barely sees.
Hungry for flesh, he is a snake of untold regret and hate;
Powdered with deadly lies only, in his season of love.
Bathed in austerity, and in his own madness running;
Running into the nowhere of my dreams, and dies finally, as I wake from my sleep.
I saw no compassion in his eyes, on those last old days, and after I left,
All that was dead not I deep buried,
I oft’ dream of him burning and rotting his own scattered life,
Melting his own flesh into a rogue wave of sins,
Questioning his divinity with rage that he himself be ragged before he knows it.
And so unseeingly he curses and is consumed by his own karma,
Gathering his own bulleted skins and fleshes by a knife,
But in doing so betraying his own domain of conscience,
Depriving him of ample wan pleasure, tumbling himself vehemently into death.
Scorching death that feeds but from our departing shades of life,
And shrieks in agony when no ferocious air growls at midnight.
Ah, at my dismantled nights in England but I once gave thought of thee;
Thou wert there in my perpetual mind, but not so inquisitive as my English journey was.
O, Northern Light, I was but all shivers upon their first mention of thee!
And so there was I, unknown to the English world but heard fairly of thy name;
That I, at times, thought of the Northern Light, aside from my streams of cries and desperation,
And the noble autumn on its land, when in my fluorescent night slumbers,
I’d love to dally on top of fall’s rebellious moors—and ah!
I can see my love, flapped with his native pride, storm down the maroon roads.
I can see his wait for me, encapped by forty feet of snow on a mountaintop,
ready for my warming fingertips and embrace whenever he thinks of me.
Ah! Though there is sun not on thy lofty linen land, my Northern Light;
I am grinning with joyous tears in sight of thy snowy night,
My dreams have finally drawn me to thy visible lines,
And soon, I shall have to renounce my weary sunshine.
I want to break free, enormous with youth and vibrancy;
With affluent rhymes and delightful vibes that come in time.
Poetry, for it has become one of my salient features;
A concise concoction of my soul, that I love in laugh and hate.
My daydreaming has not been too bad, for I have seen the fun once more;
I was too selfish to open my eyes and see its truth.

Come to me, my Northern Light, and shall I have to perish later along with age
into blue nothingness, I shall not die inside out;
For I know thou shalt come to help my toil
And relieve it of grease and oil;
filling my light up before it turns out.
I, who hath been consumed and decried within two sad springs;
I, who was made to survive an agitation and pain
Only by a jug of comforting cold,
Hath now left my past with a single shrug;
And so I hath dreamed of bouncing back into thy arms,
Thy arms that are too cold at first—to my fragile feet
And swim into thy hands that shall all but know me to well;
Blame me not for the fateful pairs of stories of mine, to tell.

And who are they anyway, to enjoy poetry whenst they see not?
They, whose shadow is to fall into death within the first three days—
But acknowledge the slim presence of death not, among us.
They, whose ******* glisten with envy, and a displeased countenance;
Haunting every guileless soul, dancing over their dismantled beings
Although they bear no trace of hate towards their very eyes.
All I see of ‘em is a beast, that encaps and murders decisively within a short breath;
None of them is eager to touch the deep,
Nor to be kind and set their hateful souls alight,
They are a boastful ally of the devil, far in their forest’s central gloom,
A hell by the deadly babbling brooks, sending water into every undying leaf
That all shall die within the unstable touch of their hands.
They are a bunch of strange apparitions that mock every treasured sight;
A rough incubus, waiting for every foreign man’s headlong fall,
They live only to scorn, ****** and fight,
Penetrating every fortune’s secrets, poignantly tearing their kind walls.

Not seldom that I began to wonder, in all my recursive roamings;
I wanted to see and listen to thee, ah, what a warming sound of thy Eolian lute there was!
All was in vast vain, for I was conceited to hear of my own vision;
Nor proceed my learnings, I was stupidly void of hearings, and rich with shortcomings!
My conscience was too thin, that I wrote when I heard not—and drew
when I saw not, ah, I was unable to hear thee, my love!
For everything I could see was but, in my red dreams, thy roads and their unspoken lines;
Telling me that I was dreaming and all wouldst be fine.
I failed to see though thou wert but very, very kind!
All was a parade around me and ah, yet I could see not,
Its loudly thumping winds but made me blind,
Squinting into the gust, all but myself I could not identify;
My whole soul was absorbed by its minutiae of unbearable pain.
Belligerent and poisonous, the circle was bitter as dread;
Sordid in life, uncivilised and mortified in death.
Aye, how I struggled hard to break free myself, from those violent thorns!
Finally all was clear, and I saw the vital path to light; ah, my Northern Light!
Now I can see again, I am grateful for having not capitulated to my desires.
My poisoned desires, that once retained me;
I am thankful that I hath wriggled free.
Ah, Northern Light, it seems that thou hast so much to tell;
I do not know, yet, how it all shall begin.
I shall dwell on thy grounds so well;
the grounds so beneficent and keen in the first place.
I have not heard of thy sweet voice;
I have known but thy cherry-red stories.
Stories as original as my love;
Willingly given to thee, should thou lift my heart away
and within one saturated breath, amaze and steal which from me.
Stories with red kisses plastered over its blushing pages;
Stories with a shy tint of love; that love of ours that demands recognition.
Stories with hugs and passion that are yet still unborn;
waiting for the frozen night to become known.
Oh, we all should seek the tremor our loving hands hath caused;
And a newly replenished joy, yet, that they hath so lovingly unleashed.
A new, formal joy, that delights both in giving and returning.
My Northern Light, I may love thee and seek delight within thee only;
The fire of thee has consumed the living of me violently,
and I have begun to see my other living side,
cheerful and jubilant may I be, on my front days.

Come to me, my Northern Light, lure me into thy sacred idle night;
When the time of our fate washes ashore, and all the wrongs shall turn right,
And all the fires grow into rain, multiplied by the benevolent immortal knight,
Who shalt fly as King of the Skies, whilst burning out the prejudiced sunlight.

Come to me, my Northern Dawn, moisten me with thy Victorian dew;
Draw me closer to thy sonatas, a realised romance written by bare hands
Bringing another vigorous pleasure to our reluctant bliss
And removing the worries of our juvenile present, marking it as the new Truth.

Come to me, my Northern Dusk, flirt with me like thou didst not with one;
Wish our hearts luck, and fight so our triumph be won,
Thou shalt **** hate with thy sword of victorious words,
Satisfactory to our chests, infallible to the sniggering worlds.

Come to me, my Northern Lamp, tempt me into the army of curling winds;
Rub my shoulders again the beguiling sweet rains, charm me away,
Far in the dark I shall be generous to thee, calming like wine,
I wouldst love to fall into the sky by thy wings again.

Come to me, my Northern Sky, envelop me in thy starlet dawn and blanket;
I want to embrace thy northern grass and tulips, and paint some rainbows,
To read some lullaby beneath the benign sky, and its amulets,
To write some poetic words, and sing them today and tomorrow.

Come to me, my Northern Sea, may thou enjoyest thy grounds’ cold clay;
That my wondrous script shall touch and place upon it a play,
Announcing my ragged arrival on the harmonious soil,
Adjusting myself to the convenient steep hills.

Come to me, my Northern Song, may thou be blessed without and in the unknown;
May thou remember the words of my late vow, o my attractive love,
May I in abundance love thee more, after my formative alone,
May this love grow strong, undeniable, and tough.

Come to me, my Northern Sun, bewitch me once more and entrap my mind;
That thou give birth but to a revitalised summer, young and free,
That this immortal joy shall last, like the oblivious moon,
Held hostage by thy beauty, whose half thou hath shared onto my soul.

Come to me, my Northern Rain, make me rejoice in the swirling autumns;
When the greens turn red and all shall die and wake again,
That we shall remain friends until tomorrow and delight,
Delight, that comes to us when we are united fellows.

Come to me, my Northern Grass, be dry and wet and tickle with pleasure and again;
Fulfill my heart with lithe atonement, for my graceful sins,
And by thee, I shall neither be dangerous nor unchaste,
I shall be a ******; my moonlit quest is just about to begin.

Come to me, my Northern Guide, heal my wounds and lingering past scars;
Scars that are immortal and once tormented my dreams,
I hath forgiven them with my tender cares,
Releasing them back prettily, into their domestic jubilees.

Come to me, my Northern Moon, in the merit of haste and run;
Nibbling thy water lilies as thou pass, and flying through the floating grass,
Thou shalt find me within the cheeks of Jakarta, in my cornered walk,
Moving around with unease, void of any candlelight spark.

Come to me, my Northern Star, thou art as warm as thou art cold;
My reason to keep on longing, and hold on to thy unmolested warmth,
That the cruel Coventry can thaw me no more;
Neither shall its herons fly over my untouched shore.

Come to me, my Northern Soul, so that I can be free;
Let me not be engulfed by the breathless dawn, and twilight,
Slide me free from the strain of tropical grief and sunlight,
I want to feel cold once more, all through the day and night.

Come to me, my Northern Tale, and hear me over the shrieking winds;
Let me steer my journey to thy mortal land, unite us as we have been;
Live inside me and feed my blood, make me known and beguiling;
Scoop me into thy arms, picture me asleep and welcoming.

Come to me, my Northern Poem, make me hear what thou couldst promise;
Make me twitch with delight, and shout pleasure within thy hands,
And sign that very night as my time of rebirth;
Pleasant and pure, free from the past sins and filth.

Come to me, my Northern Love, make my ****** soul glow green again;
Find thy way to me by my marked boughs of love,
My journey and love hath but not ended yet,
Thou shalt breed and unite with me—in our timeless breath.
Hilda Sep 2014
Just thought I'd write these few lines
Praying God will take this message to you
I miss you so, dearest Joy!
Words cannot express the pain
Locked within my breast
Those times we sat sipping black coffee and
Talking about God and the Bible
Listening to a preacher on TV or sometimes a cartoon
The scent of your cigarette blending with spicy apple candle
Later you graduated to a smokeless cigarette,
Then finally you became too weak to smoke at all
Or even drink or eat or move
Dearest Joy, I miss you so!
I try to laugh and smile and joke
To comfort Tim and Marian yet the ache remains in my heart
Tim says he sometimes thinks he hears your footsteps in the woods
Sometimes I think I hear your soft knock at our door
Or that the phone ringing will be you
Always you were so sweet and appreciative
Thanking me over and over for the simplest little things
Thank you, sweetest Joy, for the lovely drinking glasses you gave us
And that special card you made which said
"Until we drink together of that water in heaven"
Forgive me for the Hospice group, dear Joy
I honestly believed that they would try to help
Rather than just cheerfully watching you die day after day
Thank you, dearest Sister, for all the sweet little gifts
Most of all your friendship and love
So I am praying that God will send this message to you
Perhaps show us some glimpse of Heaven to comfort our broken hearts
We love you, Sweetest Sister, and always will

**~Hilda~
In memory of my precious sister Joy who passed to Heaven upon June 10 of this year.
© Hilda  September 5, 2014.
Javaria Waseem Aug 2014
The demons got me in that alley at last.
I could feel the weight on my body as they entered.
That pain they caused made me want to scream.
My whole body twisted, stiffened and surrendered.

I struggled with my own self to stop the transformation
But my eyes had turned hollow, pitch black.
The sunlight vanished and darkness took over everything.
Then emerged a shadow from fire and ash.

It was Satan himself, the smokeless fire.
He walked up to my feeble body and smiled.
"Don't worry my lady," he consoled warmly
"Tonight you'll be served as my human sacrifice."
.
Bleeding ripe woman,
wet naked stone;
honey rock dries--
fast star bone.
Dead memories change
just like laid,
wants fly open--
soul sky parade.
Sea moon dreams,
daddy heard stars--
known little face;
death drives cars.

________


Rainy days wash--
brick looking mud,
blank reality strings
dry midsummer blood.
Dog's child minds--
revolution spreads wings,
***** molten other
fraught angel sings.
Corner ocean waves--
milk sounds morbid,
freeing minnow slaves
gritty condor kid.

______
___

Catch passing eclipse--
my suicidal dream!
Kissing dying lips,
conscience eagles' scream.
Roots stop barely--
silver burdened rhyme;
river's metal tracks
help God remind.
Lofty smokeless breeze--
bird's echo box.
Ice burg floating,
saturates frozen socks.

__*____

Rings pulled strangers
silk blossoms singing--
remembering ancient maps
deep words bringing.
Canon pirates' soup
dreamer's record stalkin',
river's whole amount--
dead man walkin'.
Instant scattered corona
clenching eagle drowning;
rubber slamming secrets--
reading Robert Browning.



.
AA Phi Sep 2013
first,
a raccoon wrapped within its own intestine.
the asphalt is its grave; i swerve to miss it.
we shared the same air, maybe even a
common ancestor.
someone moved too fast to care.
its the ones with
fast cars and slow minds
pretty faces and ugly intent
artificial kindness but genuine hate
i'm not your friend
just a similar sense of self
it is
fat priests playing golf
lottery ticket paradises
restaurants
embellished mechanized slaughter
fake laughter and even faker love
shopping mall environmentalists
lexus-driving christians
paychecks, TV, lawn mowing sundays
drink yourself to death
please.
the least among us in control
deprived of the mind
the stench of their egos
and their hypocrisy
the gasoline, the cash, and the forced smiles
as i write people die
children die
i'm like many
the fool who knows
but does nothing
the one who doesn't know
that's the good person
the moral person.

second,
a rant, a ******* rage
the days are stale, self-actualize, the Earth remains the same
dry and motionless
middle-class frustration, planetary confusion,
the ***** of the Earth,
capsized like dying branches
in a wal-mart state of mind,
stupid slobs, rodent minded social egoists
over-organized, clean freak object fetishists
the evolutionary dollar sign
they bay at the moon, it's made of cheesecake
phase transitioning,
you blood clot, Earthly blood clot,
you don't know art
now there's ancient blood on my hands
smokeless, plantless, Earthless blood
detached from Gaian consciousness
stain on the mind
confused, clogged pathways,
clogged with
self-righteous mind flood
piles of ***** tissue,
waning and waxing
force feed me your ******* please
because i have no idea how to answer
in this cultural blood bath
it is the
end of time
the end of mind.

:aaphi
Nat Lipstadt Jun 2013
Weather Advisory: A long one*

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Be not fooled,
by the evening-tide,
be not deceived
by the quietude,
tis not a reprieve
of day before dark.

Be guarded,
for the easy transformation,
a tranquil shedding
of the day's husk,
into the faded light of dusk,
just one of nature's machinations
to delay the inevitable.

Evening-tide,
a colored compilation
of a few mischievous hours,
when sunlight is invaded by
streaks of pink, azure and gold,    
just before the
palette is plunged
into a stainless steel can
of gothic black,
skyied glory rendered into
common house paint.

Evening-tide,
an alleged easy calm
surfeits some souls,
supposed easy passage from  
the day's contusions to
a relaxation from humankind's regulations and rules,
but not for me.

Evening-tide,
when appetites unsated, simmer,
the in between hours when
humans transform themselves,
from day laborers to creatures
desiring, aroused, hungry  
for night time pleasures,
searching with false courage for
boundary lines to sever.

Evening-tide,
it was at evening-tide that
David espied, desired and
stole Bathsheba for his own,
with a King's arrogance
rent a kingdom,
murdered for profit,
birthed an Heir,
a prince, who wrote,
by evening-tide:

I have seen all the works
that are done under the sun; and,
behold, all is vanity
and vexation of spirit.


Evening-tide,
fear closes my throat,
confusion reappears,
a low grade flu infects
deemed persistent, incurable,
revisits, medicine resistant,
my insights, my speech,
to blind and bind  

Am I Gloucester,
blinded, but faculties
possessing vision,
the future to clarify?

No, no, it is to a king,
Lear,
to whom I am
son and cousin,
kith and kin

Sunset visions of
ultimate demise
ours eyes behold,
but plainly put,
at Evening-tide,
our dementia -
a precursor,
a periodic but hostile guest
in the hostel of our memories,
cracks and fractures us,
spirit first, body second.  

We are bound helpless
by a knotted tongue,
slow dying malingerer,
inside a head of ill repute,
unable to locate our knowing,
and every word selected,
a battle galactic, oft lost

Evening-tide,
I am cold,
and the issued command
is bring an umbrella
to warm and cover.  
What an old fool am I,
tis not blanket or a
Bathsheba I seek,
but at Evening-tide,
Babel's nefarious treasury of words
unlocked, for tis closed,                    
the gatekeepers,
drunk and absent,
drunk on absinthe,
and creme de mentia
and I have no key

Evening-tide, prithee,
I beg of thee,
consideration please,
check this hideous amusement,
that makes this
King's speech confused,
odor of smokeless cordite ignited
where the synapses have burnt,
injured, beyond repair
injured, by mine own aging.  

Reverse the diagnosis
of the panel of wordsmiths:
Alas, weep and be comforted...

Evening-tide,
a reverie of colored tears,
downward sloping,
arrive to tingle my tongue,
warming comfort for an *****
willing but unable,
a wounded soldier,
a veteran of poetry,
now prone and pained
beyond repair,
beyond healing,
immunized to the
heat and solder,
drugs and salves,
that heretofore
might have closed
the cracks of rack and ruin

Evening-tide,
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the king's horses and
all the king's men couldn't
put Humpty together again^

Evening-tide,
my hair, the color of old age.
Irony, my skin yet smooth,
unwrinkled, not in need of the
toxins that are employed
to fill crevasses on
the outer banks of age of comedy

Alas, the toxins natural from within
have seeped from their
latent resting place and have
contaminated the groundwater
that lubricated my mind,  
from siege engines poured,
a contamination of
mine own making.  
After a life long battle,
my Jericho walls have fallen.

Lear and I faint recall the love
of our beloved Cordelia,
but try as we might
her name escapes our grasp,
******* by bite of aging's asp.

We grow drunk by night
on a drink not of choice,
unhappy fury,
the residue within
the imprisoned poison
of our polluted tears,
that come only after our
misspoken and misshapen
guttural croaks
of our Eveningtide prayers
are both
unintelligible and unrequited
Written 6/01/11, after seeing Derek Jacobi as King Lear. This poem is about my fears of dementia which people close to me suffer from, sadly.  Now, I struggle to recall names and places. Poetry, not so much because I get to pick and choose words at my own speed. But someday, who knows....the time between day and night, is a metaphor for a beautiful slow, slipping away but
be not deceived
by the quietude,
tis not a reprieve
of day before dark.


^ this rhyme, purportedly a child's view of siege engines that could not break the walled of the City of Gloucester (how ironic!)  in 1643

An abbreviated version of this poem goes like this:
Nat went to see King Lear,
Then went down to the beach
To watch the sun set, the evening arrive,
They both reminded him, of his fear
That someday he'll probably sunset like Lear
And end the play, the eve, mad, his mind deceived,
De-worded, defanged, his poetry retired, but not relieved
C S Cizek Feb 2015
Sometimes on the way out of Giant,
I'll spend some time freeing change
from the receipt-paper
bindle in my coat pocket
for one two-twist mystery prize
from a Folz machine.

Two quarters:
Enough for a sapphire ring and a cheap
laugh while I juggle coffee-cream cartons,
a sack of December oranges, Certs,
cinnamon mouthwash, a dented can
of green beans 'cause it's cheaper,
red toothpicks, Ziploc bags, a barbecue
chicken TV dinner, Noxzema, a 32-case
of Poland Spring water, a Valentine's
Hallmark card and envelope, a bottle
of pink grapefruit Perrier,
two quick picks for Cash 5,
gluten-free potato chips, garlic salt,
some cumin for $2.82, and a copy
of Vogue.

I strap my groceries in the passenger seat,
and see them sitting straight up as I had,
childishly marveling at the lush
maple leaves washing the windshield
edges in green, leaving helicopters
and dew trails.

She and I watched slug trails
beneath mustard streetlights glisten
like Berger Lake.
Bright as the last cigarette my grandma snuffed out in a smokeless ash tray.
Bright as the first line of road flares that separated me from a burning Taurus.
Bright as the quarter my grandpa gave me for the Folz machine in the Sylvania.
And bright as the emerald ring I showed him.
This is an expanded, workshopped version of "A Plastic Ring" that I like a lot more than the original.
Bronx Peach Nov 2013
365Nectar #8    Crescent City Blues                      
Tues. Oct 1,2013 10:21 P.M.

In the deepest attic
the thumping blues
paint pastel portraits
of the Crescent City

In burning ripples
words slap strangers
taking refuge in Armstrong Park

Slender, ****, and Shorty
growl muted tones that ravage old bones
whip thru Mid-City
and saunter thru the Garden District
all just practice to sizzle in a wild tap dance in the Quarter

High steppin Indians
march toward God
and defy gravity.

Roaring second line
being led by woman powered Pinettes Brass Band
hold rush hour traffic hostage for days
belting greasy mingling tunes
in the eye of the dusty moon

A pitch black struggle
with the old moon
liberated old souls
entangled in soaked strings
and sobbing fingers

A quintet churns and
challenges the loneliness of pain

Strumming fingers
make out with
humming strings
under a starry blue grey sky

Stomping down long black Oak-lined roads
blowing thru shotgun homes
like winter cold howling
lifting heavy weights
from shoulders
like the sun shifting against bad weather
the blues lady
open the veins
of drunken roses

Lungs full of tears
Irma holla's, cries, and moans remedies
north south east and west of a street called Desire
Oh Etta
At Last

Dim Misty light
cast a heavy shadow
on wiggling spirits
as they cast off pain
Allen Toussaint
in smokeless blaze
tips the night air

Kermit blows
Dusty blues
seducing suffering souls
bounding them to each other in bliss

Whispering around town
in a perfect velvet midnight
sweet exhalations of song birds from corner joints
dance the Ruffin groove

fiery trebles wave at people passing by

Down right ***** blues
muzzles twilight
trombones,tubas, and trumpets
lay harmony
under the harmonious thunder
of the Marsalis Masters
and low down deep
in a musty sleepless corner
is the missing Bass-man..

hung over.

Copyright ©2013  Crescent City Blues
brandon nagley May 2015
Surely man cometh to his senses, from iron bars and stressful fences to keep him on tight line,
Wherein brother's act against mother's, to be left behind as societie's slime!!

Gospel's lost to the calliburs blast heat shot,
Wherein projectile gets sprayed,
As graffiti to a page,
Where iron creases,
The fold and eggs boil the kitchenette's ***!!!

All things off limit at this time thou falsely accused criminal!!

Thief between the gypsies!!

What a constitutional laugh in we all shall have,
Mother and dad,
Positively these longing souls stay wistful!!!

Polio like feelings are popular focus,
Where the green is all smokeless,
Wherein alarms do not exist!!!

One for thy lungs,
Two for two trips!!

Oatmeal cookie cakes sweetened to sweaty pie night!!
Terrors are farer ,
Gatherer's are darer's to amtrack train polite!!!!!
Born Sep 2015
He's the skinnier
and the drunker

Just a few cents
for your pride is all he seeks

Sell your soul
the devil is in a good mood today

If these poem ever made sense
then you'd be the craziest
Just like her

Like the tales
She confides in

like the miniskirts
or the  cloths of the dark

your high on kush
Heaven here she come
Lo Infusino Nov 2011
Fury.
tears through me
like my spikes tear through the surface.
they leave tiny chunks of track-flesh
and wetness in their wake.

Burning.
again for a sensation
that wrecked me in the past.
it left me broken in two places.
Now I want it back.

Extinguished.
two years ago
on Loyola's maroon track.
a place I haven’t been since
my burning turned smokeless

Succumbing.
To the pull of something
that took me years to shake.
To the neon hurt
that creeps across my flesh

Savage.
is the strategy
that works best for me these days.
I charge the line again
as my muscles scream for air

High.
on my strides
that feel effortless again.
bounding off the curve
where we left each-other last.
Socally Picter Jan 2014
Look at me and you will not see a Hero.
Smile with me and the Devil I become.
My quieted anger,the smokeless flames.
My breathe is not ragged
My Fists shan't be righteous

But you'll remember me for the kindness.
That you so long ago mistook for my weakness.

Miss me? Mr. Smith
Earth has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth like a garment wear
The beauty of the morning; silent , bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky,
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did the sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne’er saw I, never felt a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!
zoe mae Jan 2018
the fire is flic-
ker-
ring i wonder how it will be to breathe
smokeless air and
hate myself for doing so

where will this rain go?
it has ruined my dry-timber bones
i am smoldering embers
shivering.

then- clouds clear &
clear laughter.
how blind was i not to see
the magic is not in the flower
who shines the brightest
because she loved the sun
it is in the flower
who blooms
because she believed in the moon
I thought you would have made the most grandiose of lesbians, as women go, you were quite sublime. You caught me with your androgyny of  hair and your boyish shoes. Too safe to listen to country music, your exquisite headphones blasted out some beligirent cross-hatch nonsense. So i tailed you, so i went to where your footsteps had inwittingly left their mark. I followed you into bars with organic juices, and book shops for the intelligentsia. I watched you across a crowded room, in smokeless bars, whilst you laughed gently at friends jokes; and how i wished i was the punchline, what i would give for that mouth to smile at me. Mirror-red, i would take off your head if you would let me.....

How i wished you were dead, so i could mourn you in a proper fashion. Looking glass. Paper hearts. Ancient things i had forgotten when i looked at you - so exquisite, so shiny, so super and new. How everyone envied me. I had been so good uptil now - the modern bride, wedded to my mind. Singleton screams soprano from my face, orange peeled lips. Unzip me, my handbag head spills on the pavement. Confused by you, confounded by you. Oh you majestic awe-inspiring lesbian, you seem to tick all those (non-conformist) boxes. I, a brilliant lazy yorkshire matinee; you, a grandiouse west end friday night opening. I read the script, somewhat deja-viewed. Are you shocked i worked thee out?

A date with your phone. oh, how, very..... original. Though i cannot but tear my eyes away from what you are doing....a penny in a handful of silver. Drop from my fingers, remove your eyes from my sight. REmove, my sweet experienced delight. Watch as i drive away..the weight of my absence must crush you surely.....? Do alarm bells ring?...No wait..does the heaven sing and mourn your loss? what a pity, a-fly-by-the-night-at-any-cost-i-don't-care-because-i'm-toooooooo­o-cool-for-you, sorta pity? I am not your shadow, your stripes were blacked out by the light, i didn't care to see anymore, and i knew you would not follow so i chose my leave to go. (just so you know, this is me...leaving, you)

Too many lips for me to count, you talk tooo much. You sit there and all i can think of is lying you down and making you stop, talking. Too much? My oh My. Let me take you from here, make you forget who you are. Walk down a beach, hold hands, even if its raining. Too much to ask? Oh so many task. So many standards and obligations, too many notes and standard citations. I just want to do, anything, but listen to you talk. Again and again, i wonder when you will stop to look at me. I guess you would always be the girl, who was afraid to know, the truth. For the lack of you, do something. Four seems better than three, don't you think?
BP Fallen Jan 2017
MALAKI

My this beat wicked tone
Slides against this winters bone
Breath to breathes
Shudders smokeless; rising

Colapse
C
O
  L
    A
      P
       S
         ING

Agreed to never meet here again...
trample towards dissolution
In the wake of Gods Light.

Pressing palms center souls. Anger as our mortality adjusts to His adjustment. Will I be enough

Dorian grey skies unhinged at the sound of this holy war of God less men search for another prophet

Freedom from self, a unanswered promise in my heart, my own angel MALAKI freed only in Gods heaven.  

A Birdless man dies
aj Mar 2015
apollo's dead-set light shines on beauty.
the gushing of blood boils high in the guilty crowns of gored kings.

TO COURT BEAUTY IS TO BATHE IN IMMACULATE, ETHEREAL ECSTASY!

YOU ARE NOT WORTHY.

ichor spills in the cursed name of the light-born.
blessed with the scrutiny to scorch the iciest of hearts.

they sit on their faux thrones, just above Olympus,
with the wide eyes of wander and lust;
the bodies of gold and trust.

they sit high on their thrones,
with their own
black-light sun.

they sit on their broken thrones
stained with the blood of seraphim.

beings of smokeless fire burn away the truth

and we love them anyway.
For Joseph, who always seems to light my fire

(Not about you, though you really know how to get me writing)
Allyson Walsh Jan 2016
Walking through the flames,
Sabotaging your plans,
A smile on your face,
Proud to be a man.

Set the place ablaze
With callused bitter words,
Merry holidays -
Meant to be deferred.

Fed the fire impulsivity -
And hasty decisions.
Left me gasping for stability;
For smokeless oxygen.

Let the flames immerse
What was left of you and I.
Caught up in this curse
Of selfish goodbyes.
For NM

Anchor Down - Real Friends
KateKarl Jan 2019
scratchy and damp do not harmonize underfoot
and fear and the ocean should not coexist
but like this elevator missing the thirteenth button, my comfort sinks with tantalizing, lethargic anxiety.

the boards are a smokeless fire underfoot,
grit rolling between me and chipped brown paint,
as i beg for cold, thirst for salt, but do not run to the provocative, promising body beyond the dunes.

and my clothes are underfoot,
and this lemonade pink towel whose corner grabs at the sand,
and the hot dry fades into something that is sturdy and packed down by bounds like mine.

carbon slices at my underfoot,
the sharp home of a long-dead thing,
as my heel strikes the iron, water-pat shore, and the shock of it stuns my bones.

shock! cold underfoot
lace between my toes, smoking from wood and run
and then my face is in the sea, because who needs air when life is the sun trapping itself in the pink of my shoulder blades?
I haven't written poetry in a very long time, but am putting together a small portfolio for a writing class assignment. Any and all advice is more than welcome, even if you're the type who can't say it nicely!
C S Cizek Jan 2015
Sometimes on the way out of Giant,
I’ll spend time freeing change
from the receipt paper
bindle in my coat pocket
for one two-twist mystery prize
from a Folz machine.

Two quarters:
just enough for a plastic, sapphire ring and a cheap
laugh while I juggle coffee cream cartons in both arms.

I strap them in the passenger seat,
sharing it as my sister
and I had just to sit up straight
and marvel at the maple branches
washing the windshield in green,
leaving helicopters and dew trails.

We watched slug trails glisten
like Berger Lake water
beneath the incandescent streetlight.
Bright like the last cigarette my grandma snuffed out
in a smokeless ash tray.
Bright like the first halogen headlights that stung my retinas.
Bright like the quarter my grandpa gave me for the Folz machine
in the Sylvania.
And bright like the plastic, emerald ring I showed him.
I borrowed the first and second stanzas from "Prom in '96," reworked them for clarity, and added more personal details at the end to add more depth to the poem. "Prom in '69," looking at it now, feels really stagnant and impersonal like I had no idea what I was talking about. I'm much happier with this, or at least happy enough to workshop it in my poetry class.
ConnectHook Sep 2015
You want the high lonesome brought down to earth –
the value of gold – devoid of its worth.

Like herbless reggae – or atheist Bach
like love without romance and time with no clock –

it’s smokeless jazz without the snap
buried treasure without any map.

It’s Andean flutes without the coca
Moon with no shine – un Raton sin Boca

You can’t have your culture without the Gospel
like rain without water, it’s simply impossible.

You can’t keep the tree without having roots
or gather a harvest without the fruits.

So get the hell gone with your atheist bluegrass
lest someone imply you’re an unsaved *******…
https://connecthook.wordpress.com/2015/04/13/godless-bluegrass/
Holey Feb 2016
I tried to quit
This awful Habit
I ended up far deeper
Into this hole I dug.
♦♦♦
I'm hopeless and smokeless,
and just imagining
How much I love the taste of smoke.
♦♦♦
You call me a fool,
and threaten to leave
Have you tasted this magnificent taste?
♦♦♦
You throw them away
and scream and yell
I am back to this depressing state.
♦♦♦
Now I am hopeless and smokeless
and ready to leave
Five more dollars,
and I think I am free.
♦♦♦
I won't be free when I'm dead
Or gone crazy inside my head
I'm still hopeless and smokeless
But now I'm a fool.
taste this blossom-sung wind
with your tongue of a thousand songs.
forget how to speak by this window,
this window of a dozen softly dreaming springs.
allow this cooling fire to refine your visions
like an icy birdsong in the machinery of noon.
breathe, sigh, shut your eyes to the light;
fear nothing of that gold-dusted dawn,
that rose-tinted glass of tomorrow’s words,
for simplicity favours them;

nothing but the hills of emerald wind,
a solemn birdsong; a tune of half-seen reflections in windows,
a distant blossom tree; its petals plucking themselves
one by one from the sundewed branches,
a rooftop reflecting light; a smokeless chimney
stretching high beyond the peak of bricks,
a sky of spring-soaked blue; scuds of white
streaking the azure vault of heaven
in little here-and-there places.

dream high into this endless sky,
dream windless and green into the eternity of earth,
dream sunny and freely; dream as freely
as those blossom petals.

reach the crescendo of this precious springtime;
let it blossom,
let it bloom,
sing forgetful into the waxing days
like a goldfinch in the waning darkness
of winter’s ice-forged grip.
summer’s god-warmed arms are almost here;
sit and dream, sit and sing,
and taste that blossom-wind
with a mouth of eternal life.
Your batting of an eyelash,
My perfect
yellow
downfall
On repeat to match the beat
Pounding through my head,
Deconstructing, my eyes, slip
Tracing the cracks that my feet,
slow
heavy
unnecessary,
Have been grazing
For who even knows how long—
What is time without you to make it go faster?
I check, they all check
All reassured of our grievances, failures
Masses of nothing put together
wilted flowers
crumpled papers
The blue echoes and the mindless absence
Dwelling in the dark air—smokeless
Far too long here, far too long.
Nickols Jul 2016
There were days where I'd crawled miles on hands and knees.
Every agonizing inch with only thoughts of finally resting at your side.

There were weeks where I'd close my eyes,
because the damage around me was to horrifying to witness.
My vision blurred from bleary kisses.
The caress of a backhanded comment.

There were months, and months where I held my words at bay;
keeping all my worries and doubts inside my mouth.
A devastating storm brewing just off shore on the tip of my tongue.

There were years where I would cry, begging for some sort of validity.
A single conformation from your lips.
I was in fact being heard over my silent screaming.

I tired of this endless journey.
Days.
Weeks.
Months.
Years of yearning.

Dredging through trenches on fire.
This tiresome struggle to inhale a single smokeless breath.

I drag myself on; towards the end and far beyond.
A clear blue sky waiting for my upheaval.
The air clean with a heavenly scent of freedom and home.

Some people are lost in the fire but some are built up within the infernal storm.
Smoking my life away.
How long may this sadness stay?
Sitting alone in a darkened room
These silly neurotic thoughts, they loom.
Sometimes I feel Plath is my only friend
I often believe she is a helpful god send.
My thoughts have gotten the better of me today
But it will 'always be okay' they say.
Death is a real but unfathomable thought
I'm still so glad I'm yet to be caught
There's so much more to life than this
Much much more this temporary loneliness
would be foolish to miss
I'm yet to find who I want to be
But when I do, for the first time I will be proud
to be 'me'
Whoever that 'me' will be,
I know for a fact, he will be happy
smokeless
and free.
I felt inspired to pen something as I felt this looming sadness as I lit a cigarette. Being unemployed at the time I wrote this, searching for a job every day was getting the better of me. David Cameron and his austerity agenda was plastered all over the news and everything just seemed so dark.
Cigarettes will never cure sadness, but they sure do help.
Bryden Jul 2018
Manhattan bathes in lilac-stained dawn,
patiently waiting for a new day to form.
Skyscrapers tickled by the flicker of confused lights
on
or
off?
Night
or
day?
they wonder
whilst light meets dark,
nodding heads
as they pass each other by.
Taxis creep around corners,
collecting the last of the night raiders,
breath sour and eyes wine-weakened,
allergic to morning light.
Cars groan and begin to carve today’s trails
exhaust pipes snoring
as they huff out polluted clouds into smokeless sky.
The 6.a.m. sun crowns The Empire State Building,
and glazes a million windows like honey-roasted ham.
Chrysler squints,
May’s rays bounce off her bronze-blushed walls.
Sleepless wanderers now sleepy crowds,
wine bottles now coffee cups.
Pigeons flutter between dragging feet,
pecking pavements,
catching the odd petal from the honey-blossoms
that stand like angels amongst grey steel.
A sea of suits cluster at the crossing,
people politely covering yawns
as they wait for the green man to give them instruction,
unsure whether the button has even been pushed.

— The End —