"stickered" poems
He is who you want to see at the airport,
half asleep, pastel sweatshirt half zipped.
Half length shorts ending just above the knees.
Eyes matching the green and blue abstract swirls
patterned into the carpet to hide passenger sick-up.
The background to travelling japanese circus photos,
they’ll look back in their scrapbooks,
past the ponies on the baggage carousel,
see him waiting for the delayed international arrival.
Stiff legs tread quietly down grey hallways,
stringing a stickered suitcase along moving walkways,
thoughts caught between continents, in escalator’s teeth.
Tiptoeing over the hot coffee spilled like oil,
the taste of morning breath clinging to the back of the throat,
chalky as chilled ashes, abandoned and unswallowed.
When the taxis are cold and the day’s been worn out,
before it’s even begun; patchy fabric stretched over toes
rubbing thin on the inside of your shoes,
he’ll circle your head like a daisy crown.
To hold the tiny scars on his broad shoulders,
traces blemishes like a mine sweeper,
would be like orange juice at 40 000 ft.
Intimate in a way only TSA agents know how to be,
looking for explosives behind the ribcage, to the left.
Oct 1, 2013
Oct 1, 2013 at 3:48 AM UTC
Each day I drive the Belt to work
with a million other slobs.
We pilot cars a decade old.
We're lucky, we have jobs.
Being stuck in traffic is no fun
so my eyes search for distraction.
Your bumper- stickered Civic
offers motorists didaction.
You've no shortage of opinions,
you're a child of hope and change.
gay women for abortion rights?
forgive me, that seems strange.
You're all for education ,
and it seems you're down on God
Your promotion of vasectomy
strikes me as rather odd.
We creep along at walking speed
in the misnamed morning rush
I smile at one old sign that reads:
"Lesbians against Bush"
I change lanes and creep up beside
this most amusing creature.
Shock and awe is what I felt-
She is our children's teacher!
Jun 13, 2013
Jun 13, 2013 at 8:02 AM UTC
earlyish
in the mourning
the moon
begins to rise
to the
dirtiest
consorting
in the room
between the thighs
forbidden fruit
from a filthy city
that ruins lives
so the troupe
snipped ribbons
ripped ties
flew the coupe
and found suit
elsewhere
Hell
thought it was provoking
when they
caught em
smoking loosies &
tagging in
elementary school
bathrooms &
peeping ****** movies for free
mercy me, a perturbing
flea ridden circus
ballyhoo at
high noon
just
look between
the alleyways
like pearly gates
adjacent to
& facing toward
the gallow stage
saved for traitors
& may I say
these are unhallowed days
triple x files.
furious grady stiles
walked the
daily eighty miles
to the liquor store for
his quick pick or maybe just
a curious
eye sore for bored out tricks
on the nearest corner &
the queerest gory ***** flicks for
a nickel a dime a quarter
&please;
- mind the camera -
hammer
sickle
sanskrit
star
prison bar
stripe
flock stickered on
the flickering light
mock bicker then its
quiet on the farm tonight
doesn't seem right
the sicker sheep seek
sleepless nights
in the street
took Darwinian flight &
a diving leap
to diamond minds
thicker fleece &
meaner teeth
drinking on cheap forties
sneakin up on sweet
***** mother glory
lordy.
Apr 16, 2015
Apr 16, 2015 at 4:27 PM UTC
3rd and final day of my sister's garage sale
she asked me to sit and watch it while her and my nephew go to church.
"Any price you think is good for anything will be fine"
I sit and watch people sort through stuff and I want to apologize.
For some reason it's a very odd sort of feeling,
inviting strangers to rifle through your belongings.
Either nothing you've kept hidden is worthy of keep
or they'll make you an offer and show you it's cheap.
I would hate to have those onlookers dumpster-diving for deals within me
[I don't believe that I'd measure up either]
Everything I got I'll just keep
An ugly unwashed stranger's hand holds up my soul, turning it round he sneers his nose
"How much you need for this old thing?"
"I stickered it 10 dollars and it's practically new"
"I'll give you a quarter. It looks broken, it's held together with glue"
"Fine, fine. Whatever is fine."
After two days of this I'd go to church too...
to think I may have some things that I still keep hidden
and there's a god up there some place in the sky
who loves me and may still want to buy
Dec 2, 2012
Dec 2, 2012 at 6:22 PM UTC
the pen would write
in modern light
a scribble of sentimental frippery
and the painters can
in the anarchists hand
makes prose into bold graffiti.
a pencil scribe
or desk-carved diatribe
a bitter note writ angrily
a lovers note, secret passed
prayers and hope encompassed,
words the weapon of beast and beauty.
a tiled wall
in a crowded hall
where quotes can swingvote cities
a stickered note stuck under seat
words of anothers in coda repeat
revolutions begun in paper graffiti
Mar 19, 2011
Mar 19, 2011 at 7:40 AM UTC
casual conversations
evoked then folded
amongst the personal things
stickered and stored
i've so often asked myself
is it possible to fall in love
with every woman
that you ever meet
and if so
how do you let go
and where can you find
a removal van for the mind
for the memories
of all that's left behind
stepping out to start anew
how can i cleanse
in this irish summer rain
with it's tears of a lost love
permeating through
everything i own
records and books
now boxes on a pavement
left signing an old tune
to these photographs of you
of a time
where a photograph
was so much more
than a nine second delay
but something to own
yet like these memories
time too gets overtaken
with no distance left to run
i try to hold as best i can
from the steely approach
of the oncoming removal van
Jun 6, 2017
Jun 6, 2017 at 4:29 PM UTC
In the midst of a world of light and love, of song and feast and dance, he could find nothing more interesting to think of than his own prestige.
-C. S. Lewis, A Preface to Paradise Lost
Just look into the mirror, and there you are
Could lose a little weight, but there you are
You comb your hair, you brush your teeth, and then
You should always remember to make a face
And laugh
For you are not a sloganed comrade-hat
Nor yet a shadow in a marching mob
A noise, a post, a bumper-stickered oaf
An obedient tool being pushed about
Because
You are not a tagged and labeled identity
But a true child of God: brave, loving, and free
Oct 27, 2018
Oct 27, 2018 at 12:16 PM UTC
Betrayal.
Michael.
Archangel.
Abandoning the younger self
Of myself
That I ever held dear.
She's forgetting herself without you.
When you held her close in your mind
all those years
Teaching her who God is.
Well now she forgets.
And she forgets who she really is.
When did you grow away?
Grow outwards or downward from me?
Grow stickered stems and dying of your bloomed petals,
Of all that which oh you were beautiful!
And I loved you for them.
Dec 22, 2017
Dec 22, 2017 at 2:12 AM UTC
Floating on cloud 9, I’m feelin good, I’m feelin fine. Reaching out to Orion, drifting to where ever the galaxy might lead, and I’ll follow. Smokey air sets the mood, dim lights and layed back music tune my eyes and ears to harmony. My mind begins to connect all the dots, flipping to words in an open dictionary in my head, causing me to turn to my stickered laptop and rewrite all the thoughts coming from within.
This is how I access my internal self, the me who is never afraid to speak up. The part of me that doesn’t give two ***** but at the same time cares about all of it. I’m resting in a grove, the roads go from bumpy to smooth and all is as it should be.
I’m out of my mind, be back in an hour or so. I’m chillin in my happy place, with uninterrupted cycles of thoughts, keeping my mind in check. Examining all of my internal memories, weather good or bad, we are at peace, coexisting in a space where yin and yang truly are real. A balance amongst me, myself and I, where I can’t shy away from what is unpleasant to think about.
In a moment, where everything begins to make sense and all is beautiful in life.
Feb 6, 2013
Feb 6, 2013 at 1:34 PM UTC
Not noticed from beginning
Parallel parked car
Windshield tinted
Stickered bumper
Wiping tears to collect in a jar
Nails chewed at the ends
Watching through small panes of glass
Fence of fear put between us
Fighting demons that harass
About whether to halt or flee
Butterflies telling lies
Distance will take away secrets
Conscious is cut down to size
Said you couldn't believe luck
Being with a girl like me
Something darkening your pupils
Smelled hint of sour finally
Cheeks flushed crimson with blood and shame
Plans cancelled out of the blue
Sorry said like it was not a big deal
Worked before a time or two
Did you suspect me to be that gullible?
That I would not check your alibi?
You think I'd be easy to forget
With **** of your head said goodbye
Still going through worst every day
Loneliness deeper than the sea
Sensing lost connection dwindling fast
Increasing intake
Caffeine and vitamin c
Maybe were chained to my skeleton
Hanging on because you had no choice
You weren't playing me the whole time
Rendezvous and secrets shared your voice
As I drink insecurities
You in a hurry go out the front door
Follow and find out where you drive
Heart was needing to understand more
It may be too late presently for us
I still hold hope for you and I
If I cross your mind at all please can we just try?
Jul 23, 2024
Jul 23, 2024 at 1:29 AM UTC
In some sense,
we’re all proportionately configured
if we will grow,
to be with adjustment’s ideation
solidity is not a beautiful thing
when mixed with fearful rigidity
a hex is really just a RUDE blessing
Till we strut, shan’t we be living
Please Pass the pickled Beets
Jan 2, 2021
Jan 2, 2021 at 12:51 AM UTC
This stop next.
This stop here
is empty,
save for benches stickered with gum
and trash cans bolted to cement.
The sign for this stop,
this stop here,
is bright with paint over its faded letters
This stop is next
to buildings with fences as high as the windows,
buildings with windows as dark as the tracks
of the train that brought me to this stop here.
Here there are no people left.
Left of the tracks the trees are stark and the sun is high but time is stilled and at this stop, here,
I don't know what's next.
Aug 25, 2014
Aug 25, 2014 at 10:31 PM UTC
Lawrence Hall, HSG
[email protected]
You are not a Banana
Sticker Not, Lest Ye be Stickered
A banana bears a sticker to say it is a banana
(The banana, that is, not the paper sticker)
Even though a banana is obviously a banana
(It has a yellow skin and some squashy stuff inside)
If we take the banana sticker from the banana
And stick the ticker to a tomato
The tomato is not then a banana
However much someone claims it so
Sticking sticky stickers to humans is also wrong
A man is himself; a woman is herself
If we stick a sticky sticker to a human
As a joke, well, that’s just a bit of fun
But if as a judgement then we are false witnesses
Stickers, nothing but stickers, excuses
Failures of intellect, truth, and caritas
Stickers are two-dimensional; they have no depth
Stickers are useless even on bananas
We are brothers and sisters, not bananas
Sep 2, 2024
Sep 2, 2024 at 8:59 PM UTC