"stamps" poems
kissing you was like swerving into oncoming traffic
i can never tell if i am more haunted by empty picture frames or the ashes of their contents
you taught me that the saying "pick your battles" meant not answering when love was at the door
sometimes when i drink whiskey i swear i can hear your voice in the creases of my bedsheets & i sleep on the floor
i still catch myself running my hands over things you touched the most, looking for the echoes of your fingertips
i practice things i'll never say to you
i remember the day you told me you didn't like poetry, how "everything's already been said" & how "nothing meaningful can be captured without being cliche" you know, i don't miss you like the sun and moon, i do not miss you like tide bent waves crashing on the shoreline, i miss you like a chernobyl swingset misses children
rumor has it that drowning is a lot like coming home, that drinking bleach can **** the butterflies in your stomach
for your love of cigarettes, i would have been an ashtray
this halloween i want to dress up as the you when you loved yourself and show up on your doorstep
i never understood what you meant when you said i was an instrument, back when you would cup your hands around my chest and breathe through the holes in my heart, i still wonder if the sounds i made remind you of wind chimes
i never paid much attention to abandoned buildings until i became one
in my dreams all the flowers smell like your perfume
i am the only person who has ever wished for the same snowflake to fall twice
if i could go back, and rewrite the definition of audacity, it would be how when we lost the bet of love, you said "we never shook on it"
i love you, if the feeling is not mutual, please pretend this was a poem
the only apology i want from you, is to have you repeat the names of children we will never have in your parents living room until they *****
we are the same person if you find yourself up at 4am dry heaving promises, or if you are kept awake by the laughter of those who've abandoned you
nobody ever told you that goodbyes taste like the back of stamps
sometimes i'm convinced that the only reason we hug, is so you can check my back for exit wounds
May 19, 2014
May 19, 2014 at 11:08 PM UTC
It flies amongst the stars.
Flashes for a moment.
Despite the left scars.
Holds a place close, yet far.
It carries the fallen.
From mistaken paths.
To reaches impossible.
And develops new plans.
It creates new countries.
Raises dead soldiers.
Stamps unsung heroes.
With a feeling of free.
Hear its silent sound.
Open up your eyes.
Place it in your heart.
Elevate from the ground.
It helps us climb.
Better than rope.
Do you see its shape?
It is hope.
Dec 7, 2017
Dec 7, 2017 at 11:35 AM UTC
Distance hurts
It touches you more than you can touch the other person
Distance hurts
Time and space both stretches infinitely, without a reason
Distance hurts
People change like postage stamps on a letter
Distance hurts
When you don't know if it's for the better
Distance hurts
You leave with them being as sweet as sugar
Distance hurts
When you come back and they seem so far
Dec 18, 2016
Dec 18, 2016 at 12:57 PM UTC
He used to drink orange juice
out of cups that curved,
like his smile used to,
licking droplets of orange sun
off of his lips;
sun beams,
that shined from his face,
and his eyes,
which was unfair
because he knew;
I'm telling you,
he knew,
that summer was my favorite time of year.
And when the sun hit me,
like a thousand arrows,
from the bow of Heartbreak,
that I would think of him
and his orange juice cup.
And question all the reseons he sent me letters
with different stamps,
always scribbled in black lines,
like his pupils,
when I let him see through the jail bars of my soul,
and I asked him,
no,
I begged him to leave me cuffed to the wall,
with no food or water,
starving my desire to love again,
knowing that if I devoured every word,
every sound,
and memory,
of trembling hands on first dates,
leaning in to kiss me,
with lips and fists at the nape of my neck,
clinging to me like feathers;
with every single intake of breath,
and caterpillars that wrapped themselves in silk,
and waited for days and nights to pass,
until finally,
they spread their wings to reveal Picasso's paintings,
that I would eventually die of starvation,
as the words ran out,
and the kisses became short,
and the butterflies died...
He knew.
He knew that I loved summer;
and the drops of orange juice on his lips.
Oct 21, 2013
Oct 21, 2013 at 1:16 AM UTC
This was just published so it is copyright 2015 by Holy Cow Press ~ mce
Poverty is the fence around your life. Poverty wakes you up at 4 AM only to whisper meaningless slogans in your ear. It is the school of Piranha nibbling at the back of your brain. It is two hours waiting in the anteroom of despair for $22 worth of food stamps and being glad to be there. It is changing your phone number frequently because bill collectors are such boring conversationalists. It is the empty space your heels used to fill. It is letting your hair grow long and scraggly and your grizzled beard sprout because you know that although you sleep in rented rooms tonight, the street is not far off, and you want to fit in when you arrive. Poverty scalds the lint from your pockets. It is your private Treblinka within which you rage but are crushed. It is desperate prayers against dental catastrophes, blown tires, surprises of any sort. Poverty is when everything you own is frayed including your nerves from sleepless moments spent trying to solve the equation that will make X number of dollars cover X + ? number of bills, knowing that such math would defeat Newton or Einstein. Poverty is eying the cat's kibble imagining that with a bit of sugar and a splash of milk it might be fine and then eyeballing the cat himself thinking of protein of last resort and trying not to measure him against the microwave door. You ration your cigarettes; whiskey is a fading memory. Passing a diner on the street, you catch a whiff of burgers too expensive to consider and experience a Pavlovian moment. Poverty is trying to keep your head up and then remembering you pawned your neck. Poverty is watching the needle eat your last few gallons of gas. Poverty is the archeology of despair. It portends the death of irony. There is nothing ironic about a car with 217,000 miles and no insurance on it. Facts are facts in the world of poverty. Poverty is the last quarter reclaimed from beneath the cushions. It is too much time and not enough quarters. It is the specious logic of the self-righteous proclaiming that you deserve to be poor because you are, which in Amerika passes for wisdom. Poverty makes each day like the next because nothing does not vary. It is who you are and where you are going, although you won't get far. It is the life you lead inside the fence. It is the sum of what you lack. It just is.
- mce
Apr 6, 2015
Apr 6, 2015 at 7:54 PM UTC
What does it mean to be a Chicano/Latino in the US?
What does it mean to be Black in the US?
What does it mean to be a minority in the States?
You know what that means...it means that we have a lot to prove
As in the words of Booker T. Washington:
"When a white boy undertakes a task,
it is taken for granted that he will succeed.
On the other hand, people are usually surprised
If the ***** boy does not fail. In a word, the ***** youth
starts out with the presumption against him."
Now in a society where institutionalized racism,
Or racism without racists, prevails
We are disenfranchised from even being considered youth.
We are a bunch of wetbacks, idiots, moron...you name it,
Where failure is expected of us...
...but enough is enough, we should not abide to the stereotypes
And stigmas that society stamps on our foreheads.
As a matter of fact, I do not ever recall giving this white patriarchal society
My blessing to call me whatever the **** it decides to call me.
We are here to take manners into our own hands, here to do whatever the heck our heart desires.
We are here to create the change that we wish to see in the world.
We are here to become the few & growing positive statistics that we fight for.
We are here to create voice and shed the light on those wins that we take to our hearts.
No one is here here to reflect the stereotype that this ****** up society
Tries to slap us with on an everyday basis.
We are here to change perception of who we are and where we stand in society.
We are positive statistics...not a stereotype.
Aug 19, 2013
Aug 19, 2013 at 3:10 AM UTC
i am
monday nights filled with
candlelit journal entries
and sipping hot tea while
watching rain bounce off
the roof and open windows
in autumn and messy hand-
written letters and white
tees and cuffed jeans and
pb&j; with the crust cut
off and folded origami
cranes and watching the
sun rise while everyone
else is tucked away in
their beds and midnight
car rides and candid smiles
and lists written in blue
ink and wildflowers and
mountains and birds singing
and books and movies that
make you cry and nicknames
and flannels in the winter
and soft music and loud
music and moments recorded
only by memory and pumpkin
pie and forever stamps
i am all the little things
and if you don’t make an
effort to understand why i
love all the things i love
you will never understand
me
Apr 24, 2014
Apr 24, 2014 at 10:16 PM UTC
lonely as a dry and used orchard
spread over the earth
for use and surrender.
shot down like an ex-pug selling
dailies on the corner.
taken by tears like
an aging chorus girl
who has gotten her last check.
a hanky is in order your lord your
worship.
the blackbirds are rough today
like
ingrown toenails
in an overnight
jail---
wine wine whine,
the blackbirds run around and
fly around
harping about
Spanish melodies and bones.
and everywhere is
nowhere---
the dream is as bad as
flapjacks and flat tires:
why do we go on
with our minds and
pockets full of
dust
like a bad boy just out of
school---
you tell
me,
you who were a hero in some
revolution
you who teach children
you who drink with calmness
you who own large homes
and walk in gardens
you who have killed a man and own a
beautiful wife
you tell me
why I am on fire like old dry
garbage.
we might surely have some interesting
correspondence.
it will keep the mailman busy.
and the butterflies and ants and bridges and
cemeteries
the rocket-makers and dogs and garage mechanics
will still go on a
while
until we run out of stamps
and/or
ideas.
don't be ashamed of
anything; I guess God meant it all
like
locks on
doors.
6.2k
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Mar 2, 2018
Mar 2, 2018 at 12:27 AM UTC
I tried
Slashing the wrists of poverty
With an EBT swipe
But he isn’t merely food stamps
He is needle
He is malt
Licker of oppressed ********
****** dreams
Fellatio’d by sored gums
Mar 29, 2013
Mar 29, 2013 at 4:39 PM UTC
Even something distant
Can give enough light,
Longer than just a while,
Carrying vivid, tender moods,
Rising like green plants,
Despite the cold, acid rain.
A hypnotic, sweet mantra,
A grateful murmur,
Whispered my true name,
Coming on time,
Before I closed the door.
I am at home now.
In a quiet zone,
On my piece of uneven,
Creaky floor,
Grounded by gravitation,
Free from messy thoughts,
Just to save the plumb line,
Not to collapse inward
Into an inner gap
Of what it should mean.
I shift my wardrobe
Of emotional scripts
To clean a tame mess,
Collected into short breaths,
Like colorful, sharp stamps,
Justifying a fading reason to stay,
rather than give up and go away.
Yes, I know that I can.
So, what am I afraid of?
That I am ready
To drop the weight
Of past attachment,
To feel the lightness
Of being loved?
To accept human warmth,
Enfolding peacefully
A fractured existence.
Jul 30, 2025
Jul 30, 2025 at 10:41 AM UTC
Time stamped messages
Instant gratification
Checked in
Logged on
Time stamps
I C U
Instant disappointment
Overlooked, ignored
Time stamps
Phone updates
Notifications
Instant insanity
Time stamps
Back check lies
I C U
Checked in elsewhere
When, where, why
Time stamps
Insomnia
Where R U
Ah, I C U
Jan 22, 2015
Jan 22, 2015 at 1:53 PM UTC
Drunk ***** mother
Screws another another
Hard working father
Taxes alimony smother
Kids home alone
Raised by the brother
Trading her food stamps
For ***** like other drunk tramps
In another car wreck
Drunk ***** fine
Hurt the kids neck
Cops and judge say
What the heck
Just keep sending her
That fat check
Jul 21, 2016
Jul 21, 2016 at 7:22 PM UTC
Sustenance for friends and clients;
state your case – come one, come all.
The matron arms of Social Service
will not let you fall.
Food stamps make our nation stronger,
licked, then stuck on the public roll.
Social programs last much longer
adding recipients on the dole…
Like the Ephesian Diana
many are my benefits!
Mine the matriarchal manna;
latch and suckle at my teats.
Yours the client’s right to nurture.
Mother will supply your need;
Child, you must not fear the future –
feed, my baby, feed.
Call me nanny, call me Lord
just make sure you’re calling on me.
Mine are the gifts you can afford
they’re taxpayer-funded, worry-free!
Once you are latched I’ll keep it flowing
like an intravenous habit.
Keep that ****** situated
where your will can never grab it
Let it never cross your mind
that there’s an end to all lactation.
Cloward-Piven have refined
this titillation.
Love me. Need me. I’m the State.
Your well-being is my affair.
With your consent I’ll dominate,
because I care.
Sep 9, 2015
Sep 9, 2015 at 9:07 PM UTC
We sipped boulder rock from refrigerators doors
and watched the heavens hand out food stamps with IBM logos.
“ode to Mehmet” we sang, and licked the Mossberg—
fixating on the blue collar philosophy that lived in our empty wallets.
Trash cans filled with water bottles stared at us to find our essence—
the one we had lost while being fed quintessential American idioms
in state-of-the-art classrooms sponsored by slaves and Popol Vuh blood.
Six million years of human existence trivialized down to a single sentence—
** Man loved God, man wrote, man conquered God, and now man loves science** —
scribbled on SmartBoards afforded by fire burning from Prometheus’ female liver.
Trees sing with oxygen no more for the sake of making paper,
and eyes soak in the words on paper for the sake of making paper.
Trees make the avenue but the future holds an Avenue of no trees—
… for in the land of the free, anything but freedom ain’t free.
Nov 26, 2012
Nov 26, 2012 at 9:46 PM UTC
Once upon a time, a long time ago
There was a little boy with a grimy flow
I used to hear him rap in Chicago everyday
And this is what I heard him say…….
He say **** like, he be like….
Ah! and I'm a *********** biter
The size of the incises inside ya might surprise ya
You might need rewind to decipher my cyphers
Ain't nothing on this world worth more than my saliva
I go so hard when I'm flowing
So cold my flows frozen
I'm a rowboat rowing in an open ocean
And I'm hoping, to blow up with no promotion
But dam, those explosions are so slow motion
So, I need some honey bees to pollinate my money trees
Cause fuckery of companies, accompanies that come between
A couple bucks and me, turned my orange juice to Sunny-D
Hide the cash for food stamps, no way i'm funded publicly
I'm hungry, but not for sandwiches I'm ambitious
A panhandler with gram plans and last wishes
Ask for the last table scraps you can't finish
Sell em back when you digest, and I repackage it
Abracadabra, I'm an alchemist, my magic tricks are acting as contaminates
I damage this establishment
They enacted bans on urban camping
If you ask them how they sleep at night the answer is
Happily on mattresses
Oct 21, 2014
Oct 21, 2014 at 12:43 AM UTC
Pretty Pictures; as you are embracing me
Lost in an earthly mood of tranquility
Evident than the shadows fusing my feet
Obscure like pretty lies melodically
Pretty Pictures; sailing, forever will be
Rhapsodize; vividly crossing in my mind
A face of cherubim winged up the sky
Cascading through visions abrupt
A star shoots afar than any distant eye
Longing endless of her passionate touch
We are novels, with so much stories to tell
Red laces, stamps of gold, a lush lullaby
I was the house you painted white
Agitate the deepest hues, then we'd fly
Midnight kisses, Dawn then traded goodbyes
Blithe; for we need nothing to pretend
The clearest blue water, a heaven's scent
To the grass wading courteously
Cloud nine's hanging then lifts my feet
Showering up above washing all anxieties
Pretty pictures; like ribbons untangled
A touch of silk as my heart would lilt
Inner feelings frolic then they'd tremble
For in you the excitement is always a thrill
From the simplest to a goddess divine
Pretty Pictures; moments as you were mine
Oct 8, 2017
Oct 8, 2017 at 1:08 AM UTC
It's like a blind man leading a poor man
He sees the cliff coming but he doesn't mind
Grateful to have company on the way down
Thinks the cloud they'll fall through will be silver lined
It's like the teenager who just gave birth to a still born accident
It hurts real bad inside
But she's grateful that if she returns all the diapers everybody bought her
She might have enough money to buy a prom dress
Thinks the pain she feels will be silver lined
It's like the boyfriend of the young girl who just gave birth to the still born child
Grabs his cleats out the closet
Grateful he still has time to get a college scholarship
Dumped her over the phone
Said he didn't like the way her ***** *** whined
Thinks adding another drop to the bucket of pain he will never feel is silver lined
It's like a young man who works at a gas station
With dreams so big he'd have to run the world to accomplish them
Grows up, gets marrieds, gets settled, and settles
Knows the only way he'll make the TV is by beating his wife
Grateful that strangers know who he is
Thinks the jail time he's serving is silver lined
It's like the grown man who has everything the boy at the gas station ever wanted
Doesn't want it, wishes he could give it back, but can't
So he buys houses, clothes, and Cadillacs
Grateful to have enough
Thinks the silver lining on his silver Cadi is silver lined
It's like the overwhelmed twenty something year old who puts a lock on her own knife drawer
Too proud to get help
Grateful that she has a boyfriend willing to take the brunt
Of all the problems she can't see past
Thinks the inconvenience of the knife drawer is silver lined
It's like the boyfriend of the overwhelmed twenty something year old
Who takes the brunt of all the problems she can't see past
Grateful he has a key to the knife drawer
Thinks the blood on the floor will be enough
To show her there's more to the world than the problems she can't see past
Thinks his mama's heartache will be silver lined
It's like the staunch republican who got laid off last year
Now he's so broke he's on unemployment, food stamps, and TANF
Grateful the democrats were in control during the great depression
Still voted for John McCain
Thinks the bumper sticker on the back of his car is silver lined
It's like the young family started by a couple kids
Who insisted on having a couple of their own
Now they're too poor to afford but too rich for assistance
Begging their government to bail them out of something that nursery rhymes got them into
Grateful their truck didn't break down again this month
Thinking raising hungry babies is silver lined
It's like a poor man leading a blind man
Who knows the cliff is coming
Knows they're going over and doesn't really mind
Grateful to finally be in the company of someone just as blind as he is
Thinking the cloud they'll fall through is silver lined.
Aug 25, 2009
Aug 25, 2009 at 7:38 PM UTC
When people annoy me with their
constant complaining or their
non stop arguing, or even worse,
their illogical demands:
"For the last time, you can't buy
***** with food stamps." Or,
"There is no way a crow took the
rent money out of your hands and
flew off with it."
What I do is close my eyes and
pretend they're squirrels chattering
in squirrel language.
Then they don't bother me so much.
I just want to reach out and pet them,
or give them a handful of nuts.
It's not hard; half of them look
like squirrels anyway.
Jul 4, 2021
Jul 4, 2021 at 6:21 PM UTC
we ate government cheese
that came in a dull brown box
we were too young
to understand what welfare
and food stamps meant,
our empty bellies never protested
at the salty orange blocks
in front of the bodega,
we saw a woman introduce a hammer
to a drunk tyrant’s skull
his blood pooling on the streets
was too red for new eyes
we watched hypodermic needles
bloom on stoops
cling to life on curbs
the graffiti on abandoned buildings
was our Louvre, our Salon de Paris
sweltering streets our baseball diamonds
prostitutes, black or brown or both
mothered us between shifts
we grew up in projects,
that sheltered drab lives
and senseless brutalities
gunfire, sharp and immutable
punctured lullabies
we were small boys
watching life unfold
the way one stares at an accident
detached and mildly curious
eyeing cooly the despair
and impossible hopelessness
of growing up poor
in Brooklyn
Mar 28, 2015
Mar 28, 2015 at 10:40 PM UTC
Three days, is what the HR rep said, somewhat sheepishly,
As if she was fully aware that boxing up one’s grief
In a span of a few dozen hours
Is a matter of wishful thinking
And certainly she sympathizes
(Indeed, as she speaks,
She spreads her hands in such a way
As you half expect doves to come forth in full flight)
Empathy being their stock in trade,
But the law and the handbook say three days,
And then you need to have your head
******* back on and looking forward.
Eventually, the mail brings fewer envelopes
Marked with embossed flowers
And subdued and tasteful stamps,
The usual flow of solicitous inquiries,
Pre-stamped and pre-sorted,
Inquiring as to your credit needs,
The condition of your windows and siding,
Resumes apace, and more than once,
In fits of inappropriate black humor and frustration,
You scribble, in bold thick strokes of a marker,
The addressee no longer resides at this location.
You return to nine-to-five,
Though your ghosts keep their own hours,
Stopping by to visit on their own schedule alone,
Prompted by the tiniest of things:
The dog scampering to its feet in a hurry,
As if someone was at the door,
The discovery of a long-unused pitching wedge
Standing expectantly in the back of the closet,
A song from long ago which was beloved
When you lived in the pairing mandated by Noah
Before you entered the shadow world of ones and nones.
Sometimes you give into the giddy madness,
And rise to waltz around the room,
Careening about unsteadily, clumsily
As you have yet to completely master
The difference in weight shift and distribution
That is required of a solo act.
The timing of these visitations
Often disrupts your schedule and sleep patterns,
And you think that perhaps tomorrow you’ll call in.
Nov 28, 2017
Nov 28, 2017 at 10:38 AM UTC
Whenever I go there everything is changed
The stamps on the bandages the titles
Of the professors of water
The portrait of Glare the reasons for
The white mourning
In new rocks new insects are sitting
With the lights off
And once more I remember that the beginning
Is broken
No wonder the addresses are torn
To which I make my way eating the silence of animals
Offering snow to the darkness
Today belongs to few and tomorrow to no one
4k
(for John and Teckla Clark)
Ours yet not ours, being set apart
As a shrine to friendship,
Empty and silent most of the year,
This room awaits from you
What you alone, as visitor, can bring,
A weekend of personal life.
In a house backed by orderly woods,
Facing a tractored sugar-beet country,
Your working hosts engaged to their stint,
You are unlike to encounter
Dragons or romance: were drama a craving,
You would not have come.
Books we do have for almost any
Literate mood, and notepaper, envelopes,
For a writing one (to "borrow" stamps
Is the mark of ill-breeding):
Between lunch and tea, perhaps a drive;
After dinner, music or gossip.
Should you have troubles (pets will die
Lovers are always behaving badly)
And confession helps, we will hear it,
Examine and give our counsel:
If to mention them hurts too much,
We shall not be nosey.
Easy at first, the language of friendship
Is, as we soon discover,
Very difficult to speak well, a tongue
With no cognates, no resemblance
To the galimatias of nursery and bedroom,
Court rhyme or shepherd's prose,
And, unless spoken often, soon goes rusty.
Distance and duties divide us,
But absence will not seem an evil
If it make our re-meeting
A real occasion. Come when you can:
Your room will be ready.
In Tum-Tum's reign a tin of biscuits
On the bedside table provided
For nocturnal munching. Now weapons have changed,
And the fashion of appetites:
There, for sunbathers who count their calories,
A bottle of mineral water.
Felicissima notte! May you fall at once
Into a cordial dream, assured
That whoever slept in this bed before
Was also someone we like,
That within the circle of our affection
Also you have no double.
4k