"spacing" poems
What's it take
These days
To write a poem
That makes the world go mad
That brings the crowds to their feet
That spreads like wildfire
Through a dry winter forest
Is it those excessively long words?
The ostentatiously loquacious
Platitudinous ramblings
Of an insecure mind aspiring
To authentic intellect?
Is it perhaps...
the "creativity"
of varied spacing
or... could it be..... the lack
of capitalization
the loathsome little letters
screaming out
hey, look at us!
... or maybe it's
the punctuation marks,
littered, haphazardly
through the text
(whether used correctly)
or, theyre not?!
despite worrds mispeled
and a grammar might is broken
can these gimmicks increase interest
though miswritten or misspoken?
Is the trick alliteration
Whose bite brightly bids us
To center on the snappy sounds?
Although all along
unvoiced underneath
Ideas idle in the isles
(or perhaps the aisles)
Of the mind
To meld and craft and bind
Our thorough thoughts
And worthy words
Into lines
Which
Heard by herds
Raise the
Praise for which we
Privately, desperately
Pray
Maybe it's a magical mix
Of splendid in-your-head rhythm
Marvelous meter that perfectly clicks
Flowing smoothly without schism
Well-spaced stanzas
Well-used time
Well-crafted phrases
Well-thought-out rhymes
Well, maybe not...
those gems are often ignored
cast-aside, unread, even abhorred
Why?
Because the modern world
doesn't need your rules
your restrictions
your regulations
your misguided boundaries
your oppression
your antiquated ideas
of "the right way"
to write
to speak
to act
to live
to (fill in the blank)
No, what the modern world needs
is
Negation!
Contradiction!
Resistance!
Revolt!
And poetry whose words
Say the same thing
Repeat the same meaning
Echo the same lyrics
Rephrase the same thoughts
But in an ever-so-slightly
Different
Varied
Altered
Adjusted
Changed up way
Line
After line
Of synonyms
over
and
over
and
over
again
-----
What's it take
These days
To not give in
To narcissism's spiral?
But more importantly:
What's it take
To make my poem go viral?
Aug 12, 2018
Aug 12, 2018 at 12:17 AM UTC
I have been to where
the lonely go, and I’ve
seen their luring towers,
A call to the hopeless, to those who come
from far away to see
if coming was a mistake.
Will we ever know
who doesn’t go?
and what of those that go
but remain unknown?
Perhaps they go at night.
The horror of it.
To not be able to see the end
but still it comes and quickly.
A silent floating moment
in a winter of regret,
a springtime of longing,
a summer of sunshine,
Or a fall to the end
of the world in 7 seconds.
A super cosmic collider of
meticulous destruction.
Whether they stay or go
its all the same,
multi-layered levels of
brokenness,
no one is immune.
No one is immune.
Some spend time putting
things back together,
the spacing between levels allows it.
Others break over and over
and over again,
not enough space for repair
while the pull of the towers,
the flaming red towers and
the fog rolling down
from the west promise silence.
When I stood at the edge and looked over,
the noise was deafening.
The ones without space
cannot hear.
Jul 18, 2018
Jul 18, 2018 at 10:46 PM UTC
I might've been an only
child but I was never the
favourite. you trailed behind us at every
social event, pulling on my
hair and stepping on the backs of my
shoes. the bottoms of them were so
worn out from years of me trying to run
away that I could feel every footstep in my
lungs. at christmas none of my presents could be
wrapped, because we'd learned the first
year that it wasn't a good
idea. she made me spend hours tearing it off in a straight
line, using a ruler as
guidance. I was too young to read the
numbers on it. this year, I bought her a
necklace. I knew I had to give her something even though I wanted to
take. she never mentioned it on our Christmas cards, but it was
there, it was
there in the spacing of our
names and the negative space between our warm
bodies; we weren't allowed to
touch. she hates you so
much that she could never bear
leaving you. vacuums became my
lullaby and my father quickly grew
used to never getting kissed on the
mouth. I hate you. you were a thorn
stuck into the centrepiece of our perfect
family, and my psychotherapist says you're the
reason I still let myself
bleed.
Sep 25, 2015
Sep 25, 2015 at 11:15 PM UTC
God before we compete today,
we come together as a team to pray.
Please watch over us from music start to finish,
it wont take that long just about three minutes.
God, all we really want is some help to succeed,
so here's a little list of the things that we need:
We pray for..
Stunts that are solid and tight.
Arms that remain by our side.
Flyers that are confident.
High "V's" that are never bent.
Cradles that are caught up high.
pointed jumps that truly fly.
Tosses that soar through the air.
Judges that are knowledgeable and fair.
Spacing that is on the money.
ENERGY THATS LIKE THE BUNNY!
Motions that are sharp and snap.
A loud crowd that likes to clap.
Voices that deeply shout.
Thumbs that do not stick out.
No bumps that happen while we're passing.
SMILES THAT ARE EVERLASTING!
Endurance that keeps us strong.
Teamwork that cant go wrong.
But mostly God, we'd like to have
A routine that is injury free.
And if you see it in your heart
A FIRST PLACE TROPHY FOR MY TEAM AND ME!
So God, when your work is done,
And your no longer needed here,
just take this little thought with you
Amen.
Sep 26, 2014
Sep 26, 2014 at 1:44 AM UTC
Spacing out, allowing my mind to wander far, far off,
Into the distance, into a dream out of reach, my personal heaven,
A distorted world where meaning has no meaning and time stands still, space is instable and the melancholy of lonesomeness prevails,
Clouds, everlasting, ever orbiting floating islands and upside down waterfalls, yet I cannot share this pleasure with anyone, I'm alone,
If I were to believe I could fly, I would be free.
Not bound by physics dragging me down, not bound by gravity,
I keep this place dear to me, for it is a world made for escape,
Only if I could lose myself in the fragnance of this dimension,
My poor body calls my soul back to where it thinks it belongs,
The dream of pleasure, with a carefree attitude is burning away,
Reality is cruel and dark, with no comfort a place with no heart,
But certainly I can hope with all my might even though weak,
That this place I am carried to when my mind is giving away my soul,
Will take me in forever one day, so I won't have to wake up.
After all, I don't have to die in a dream..
~ Umi
Aug 9, 2018
Aug 9, 2018 at 5:29 PM UTC
Dancing under digits
Spacing between words
I count them all
Each syllable
Once, twice, I heard them dancing in my mind
Floating, instant reality
Bringing distance
Separating elements
From pen to page
You sing in colour
Yet speak so beige
Words, what do they mean?
Sailing through an infinite horizon
Your thoughts like waves
Shattering a tranquil line
Logical
Emotional
Trying to entwine
Encapsulating a memory
That will never be mine.
Nov 20, 2015
Nov 20, 2015 at 12:55 PM UTC
.*i guess a loss of subscriptions is, somehow, a badge of honor, namely? i somehow managed to attach a screwdriver to my words... why? read below... English women consider motherhood to be a job... how ******* demeaning! gone are the days of womanhood attaining the stature of god, in the Christian methodology of encompassing the pivot of lady Madonna... perhaps a too high peddle-stool? i guess so... i'm not usurping the female status, but elevating a female stature, deeming motherhood an UNESCO status? seems it's too much... for some people... who make it necessary to befriend their shadow, and travel to the hinterlands.*
just your atypical pedantry,
a translator's subscript comment -
who's richard rojcewicz's...
regarding what?
heidegger...
das volk,
and the three derivatives -
volkhaft (populist),
volklich (communal)
und?
völkisch (folkish) -
i'm starting to suspect that
i'm tapping in the all things folk....
unconsciously, favoring folk
music...
see, us central europeans,
we bunch together and share
the most odd similarities -
i never thought that the song
herr mannelig could be translated
from Swedish - as it was
translated into German...
then again... Vikings founded Kiev...
and all these loan-words
of Germanic origin in Polish...
the only Anglo loan-word
that i know of, is, weekend...
hence, das volk, people -
by the way... German has "too many"
definite articles,
and only one ein - or eine -
is that the same rule as in Ęnglish?
i.e. N
in an example,
rather than in a counter example?
two vowels adjacent in separate
word, sitting across from the grand
chasm of... a spacing itch?
but look at German, i never get it...
DAS DIE DER...
is there an aesthetic difference,
and only an aesthetic difference
to mind?
bewildering...
if there is such a thing as a western
civilization...
that sometime
pompous obnoxiousness,
fair enough... no problem:
but learn to hide it,
feel it, rather then feed it...
it's not a question of a civilization,
but more...
an answer to what is less
civilization, and more... a chore...
just like western women,
notably the english women
call motherhood a, "job"...
it's a... wait... a job?
doubt was big in classic philosophy
of the Cartesian schematic...
so no one knows that
the French existentialists
brought in negation,
as the driving force to replace
doubt?
who the hell sees doubt
these days?
either the know it alles -
or the hush-hush crowd...
motherhood is a... job?
well... then i guess, being a man...
western civilization,
by that standard of logic...
can't be anything more...
than a.... ******* chore!
Aug 14, 2018
Aug 14, 2018 at 8:33 AM UTC
I said it, because it felt so nice to say and
because I can say it very well
-in the moment I meant it
but it's a bitter familiar spell
I've memorized the phonetic stitches the
spacing that knits a magic fleece that
when draped over the shoulders of the mightiest
turns them back to boys, gives full release
the belief
that love, real love, can be-
I can teach any man to fall in love with love...
just not in love with me.
Feb 17, 2015
Feb 17, 2015 at 5:26 PM UTC
I'd never cared for flowers
Symbols of affection that wilt
And forget memories
And fall apart in kitchens and bedrooms and strew their pieces on the floors
Dried and broken after only days of being lovely
Flowers with their alternating patterns of
Unreliable determinations
Claiming every other petal as an opposite declaration
Of a determination
Of love
And I never liked removing thorns from roses
Because they added something truthful and
Poetic
But when you gave me flowers
I held them to my heart and let my eyes dance across the kaleidoscope that they created in a glass vase
I let them live for longer than they did
Because they were still pretty even when no one else seemed to think so
And when they hang dried on a wall
Still colorful but slightly brittle
Maybe they'll stay like that if I just don't touch them
When you gave me flowers
I plucked off every other petal
Into a bouquet of He-Loves-Me
Because for once there was no doubt
For once I believed the sentiment in the flowers and the words from your lips as you handed them over
The lack of nots in the petals
Pulling apart the knots in my stomach
He loves me
He loves me
Truer than the dirt that holds
Wilting symbols of affection
Sweeter than the honey
Of their pollinators
He loves me
He loves me
A garden of something new and beautiful
Perennial and built on symbolism after all
Until you let me know that dead flowers were just dead flowers
That they were past their worth
And metaphors aren't worth the dirt they were grown in
That perennials can't return
When you've salted the soil
And brittle flowers on the wall should always be removed
But I always lived in metaphors anyway
And I had a new appreciation for flowers that I didn't want to lose
I was no longer a rose
But a thorn
I always thought smooth stems were so boring
Not to mention dishonest
But I didn't want to make you bleed
So painfully I dug an olive branch from my rib cage
Then realizing that a ****** token may not be so well received
I decorated it with a bouquet of blue Forget-Me-Nots
But you plucked off every other petal
And handed back an array of He-Loves-Me-Nots
He loves me not
And there was no doubt in the sentiment
The sentience of metaphors dying all around me
When all I know is metaphors
And flowers were never just flowers
And words were never just words
But both are found on gravestones and poems and apologies
And parallels have fallen into nice and even spacing
Reducing flowers to clichés
Of alternating promises
Of He loves me and
He loves me not
Of broken promises
He loves me
Not
May 22, 2014
May 22, 2014 at 6:04 PM UTC
They say kryptonite is superman’s weakness
but mine must be you
because you leave me speechless
sweetness
is all you've ever given me
sleepless
is all I’ve ever been since we
became friends
but now I feel like our friendship needs a cleanse
expectations
I guess mine were too high
its understandable though
it just wasn't our time
I got upset
I only wanted to forget
what we had
but why spend my days being mad?
I cant make this your fault
I locked my heart up in a vault
my mind keeps racing
look at me I’m spacing
I wonder if this would be different
if id have left it alone
or if we had went for it
everyone's always saying
you two'd look cute together
but it only hurts me more
in my head its like the first world war
but I think i'm losing
you're my best friend
I have to respect that
its just going to be hard
since my heart is somewhat scarred
do you understand though?
Why im starting to let go
really my hearts just incapacitated
because ive been captivated
by your sweet looks and charm
you make me so infatuated
I hope she makes you happy
thats all I want for you
im sure ill find someone too
eventually
now you know what im undergoing
I just hope our friendship can keep on flowing
Nov 19, 2014
Nov 19, 2014 at 9:49 PM UTC
<!>
inspired by a conversation with Maira Kalman
strap on a name, adopt a persona, let my fingers do the talking,
place the instrumental sharp point tip upon the blankety blank paper,
maestro baton raised, coordinating,
the first sound, the vocal chords trembling,
the first thought, the ultrasound image, entrance of a first violin,
coalescing into, into the initializing single primary phonation,
the stinging geometry of chance at last,
throwing down the gauntlet, glove slapping, and the
tendons tense, the mouth opens, release and indentation,
a letter's curvature, a black and white downward stroking,
a sign is televised, revealed and released
a one way only sign
time bends knee, gravity suspended, terror morphs to
expelling rapid firefights of imagery needy for spacing,
even pauses mid-word leave just this:
where is the in in
intimate?
are you the in in
inmate,
or the jailor at the gate?
you swear never again
until committing once more,
a sentence commutation, by committing a first sentence,
and the greater toll taken and paid for,
and the in in in-nate,
questions your sanity
happily
<•>
9/17/17 10:55pm
Jan 12, 2018
Jan 12, 2018 at 3:47 PM UTC
We were ticking away
Never minding the essence of time
Spacing and returning frail memories
Crushed my innards
Mentioning losing you
Really occurred
I broke the backbone
Of our suspense before
The leaves transported
Us to the post future
Moderate thoughts typing away
Observing the cracks opening
Up in my palms,
Separating the lies from the truth
I'm holding onto a visual
Deep within my own breath
All promises reside
In the recycling bin
To be re-used.
Feb 15, 2011
Feb 15, 2011 at 11:12 AM UTC
As I fidget with the paperclip
My eyes run away from perception
I am spacing out, outer space
Holds a universe of things
It has no lines or bends
Like a paperclip has
Or like a sharp knife has,
A universe is before my eyes
And the lines of a paperclip
In an office somewhere
Are whirling like razor comets
Cutting apart everything that
Might have been in front of me
Had I not run from dream-like worlds
That no one else can see
May 29, 2013
May 29, 2013 at 7:29 PM UTC
Waking tired, but not sedated
And feeling calm, not agitated
Alarm's a gentle wake up call
And not a galling mental brawl
No regrets from the night before
No blackout I need to explore
Safe and sound and in control
The contents of my bag still whole
Hearing the birds, but not cursing
No pounding head in need of nursing
Seeing the sun, not trying to hide
But flinging the curtains open wide
Washing my hair without spacing
A steady heart, not one that's racing
Brushing my teeth without gagging
Getting ready, my feet not dragging
Pouring cereal into a bowl
Feeding my body and my soul
Fruit and juice pass through my lips
No cold pizza and leftover chips
Getting out the house with ease
Not scrambling round to find my keys
Leaving early, not running late
My brain able to operate
Sep 12, 2021
Sep 12, 2021 at 4:28 AM UTC
I am becoming less relevant
In the eyes of the ones I love
Maybe it's just my brain
Shutting down
He posts photos of nature
Does he love her more than me?
She betrayed my friendship
Does it mean anything?
I'm just a one beat song
In a world of musical beings
Writing down words
With awkward spacing
I call poetry my love
I have no idea what I'm doing
Everyone has their someone
I just wish my someone had me
Mar 12, 2016
Mar 12, 2016 at 9:44 AM UTC
Zoning in
Zoning out
Spacing into
Instinctual altruism
A divided reality
Obliging my death storm cemetery
This ritual madness; so intriguing
It leaves personality to the grasp of ambiguity
Immaterial realm of the fourth scenes unseen
While docile, poisoned by this vial of vile mistrials
I remain a ghost
Unseen
Mirroring black
Shadowed like a ****** mess
Stop this caress
Fading in
Fading out.
Jul 13, 2015
Jul 13, 2015 at 5:58 PM UTC
can
i
have
a
moment
of
your
time
?
Oct 6, 2014
Oct 6, 2014 at 10:44 PM UTC
i think i need to move to outer space
spacing myself further from the human race
racing away at an astonishing pace
pacing myself toward stars of grace
gracing me with a solitary place
placing me within the galaxy's trace
tracing my roots in a self finding chase
chasing comets to see my own face
Sep 2, 2015
Sep 2, 2015 at 4:29 PM UTC
Messiahs and martyrs
And saviors
And saints
Sacrosanct
Sanctimonious
False idol feints
Behind gates,
Palace walls
Fortified in a lie
An elaborate,
Enduring
Mythos we contrive
And apply
To the lives
Of misguided lost souls
Filling holes
With the answers
Of what never knows
How to be of this world
Without more to assign
What is so picture perfectly
Flawed by design
Intertwined with
The years we spend
Spacing in time
Agonizingly trying
To find
Our own kind
Out among the expanse
Starry satellite trance
Higher intellects seek
And destroy
To advance
The agenda, to claim
A new age
Under orders
Anointed upon
The consent
Of the heaven-sent
Nuclear bomb
Feb 8, 2019
Feb 8, 2019 at 9:31 AM UTC
My neighbor and I still hang out our wash,
(I, each Thursday, taking my chances.
She, according to weather forecasts, I think,
or maybe by what she feels in her bones).
We laugh at StarTribune's report of some suburban bans
against clotheslines.
We wonder out loud whose tomatoes will first turn red,
and whether cucumbers will make it at all;
this year, it's been too cool and dry
for normal progress to the fall.
Tenacious dandelions, spread as stars across green-earth skies,
drive in spike-like roots, take hold of earth, and won't let go.
Kids squeeze bunches of stems in tight fists
that will open only to release the buttery bouquet to Mom
who hurries to put them in water, in a crystal vase,
wondering how soon she might mourn both flower and child.
While hanging bright, white unmentionables (some somewhat tattered)
on our clothesline, I, unembarrassed, remember my mother:
with one clothespin held in her mouth
and half a dozen more in her apron pocket,
(thus needing not to walk over and over again
the east-west path to the back door
where full supply of pins hangs on the ****
she does her woman's task with flair,
spacing each garment so as not to block the sun or air.
You'd think she'd held some tool to calculate
where the sheet would best allow the breeze to circulate
or where to place each pillow case and sock,
so each would recognize and meet their mates!
And I know she theorized regarding how to hang those socks,
always with the toe pointed upward, so as not to show,
when dried and worn, a crease or ever-so-slight evidence
of the pin's pressure displayed for all to see
on the exposed ankle,
as if that might be a matter
worthy of shame.
Jan 7, 2012
Jan 7, 2012 at 5:03 PM UTC
Landscape the fatal solution,
abandoning the pre-world
he takes pleasure
in mutely, and often
spacing out, tipsy, drunk, confident
till the juice runs out.
What made him hold onto such damnable
lilies succumbed
with the raw roots of melancholy?
Never purging the dancers
twirling
through a decade old sound system, they say
"I don't think you know what you did."
***** circling in his eyes, they dance,
"But I'm going to help you."
The dancers rebel
across the floor, down the stairs
---to the dark, his eyes
washed by the caked acid running
down executed cheeks
so helpless, the rhines of a ranting romance
roped idiotically to the gospel grave.
All the ways he sighs,
at all the wrongs snowing down
on his neck. "Nothing about us ever shivered."
Sep 7, 2013
Sep 7, 2013 at 2:41 AM UTC
what poetry is:
a cacophony of tangled-up images
and slashed-to-the-bone words.
a waterfall of bitterness and
passion and
(words, just words).
a jumble of unorthodox punctuation,
and spacing,
and spelling,
a painting with verses of rainbow-colored years.
foggy-eyed venting,
bitter-mouthed shouting,
soft-hearted pleas
to the people
(hearts and love).
not-quite sentences,
half-finished ideas,
cliches and brutal originalities,
shocking in their genuine
and raw
and profoundly inspired power
(things we didn't know we were capable of).
cravings and achings and wantings and knowings and
(words, just words).
so won't you read between the lines?
it's all so much simpler
than it seems.
Jan 26, 2012
Jan 26, 2012 at 6:10 PM UTC
1.
You remembered June when this morning's sun
was there with the care of a father's hand
etching each leaf into filigree--
or with the unsequestered heart of a crazed lover
with his impossible love letters and artifacts
of century's old over-ripened fruits
that even as they hung precariously from the oaks
dazzled and made space for the stark blue.
A change from last night.
The constellate, dispersing fog
that brought the sense
of an overwhelming descent to a seabed,
the submersion a baffling return to a night
from childhood, enclosed at all ends
and unknowable. A shut book.
2.
Warmth lingers on skin even after
a few minutes of exposure, a caress.
Then, step outdoors and the wind,
whose listlessness and beauty
picks up your step and hurries you on
with characteristic mercilessness
through the cold.
While you were sleeping and roaming and reading
it has crept into the uninhabited crevices,
under doors, fuseboxes, the shades of streetlights
to mold like frost.
3.
Cold is a life-form,
growing and budding in the absence of green.
And it is at this time of year we strangle
the neck of uncertainty.
The sun peeks. The cold air climbs
out of the bottoms and hollows of things.
When it reaches an excitement, as now,
her absence reveals herself:
there is nowhere you can touch her body.
She is the thousand particles
she is the spacing in between:
twirling, gathering and thrusting through the streets,
she calls you to witness her now as she comes
like a first snow.
Nov 25, 2012
Nov 25, 2012 at 12:27 PM UTC
Sometimes I can't tell if I'm writing poetry
Or just journaling.
Is it the spacing that allows me to call it a poem?
Because I have no stanzas.
I have no "Dear diary" either.
So which is it?
I hope it's poetry. I hope it's art.
When it just falls out of my head like this
No otherworldly narrator
No rhyme
No beauty
I doubt it
And through my doubting, I make it doubt itself.
If anyone should have high self-esteem, it is you, dear words.
May 19, 2010
May 19, 2010 at 7:15 PM UTC
Is only a name.
But naming is
Like timing,
Spacing,
Teasing
Loving -
A carving
In chaos.
© LazharBouazzi, February 14, 2017
Feb 14, 2017
Feb 14, 2017 at 12:10 PM UTC