"stomached" poems
girlworm, you grab a wrist like you've known modesty in the shyness of a bare feeling gripped tight on the one offering it
tightrope fingers falling into the spaces of unspoken territory, slipping into familiar qualms like the worn lipsticks that fits the grooves of my lips like an object of my affection
knowing the contour of what i'm never aware of
anxieties creep like an overgrown lawn
these fears personifying into antsy women invading my kitchen telling me that there's not enough ventilation and the stove is on leaking gas into the baby lungs of a young smoker
and when i begin to argue they give both a look of sympathy and disgust as they say "oh child you drown so easily"
so i sit chewing my nails as i count the birds outside flying back and forth from their post as if they can't remember where they're going towards or if there's something that could possibly pull them elsewhere
my mind swirls in the smoothie of a plastic cup that sticks to the coffee table, the rings of different bottles painting circles for me to memorize again
my paradise sits with the roughness of his knuckles and the ambiguity of eyes that could know everything and i would set fire to the stars inside because of the jealousy that grows from pretty things being smoldered under skin
when i begin to lose my person, pale and shivering i go towards it
empty stomached and ready to be buried in the clothes of her
that i can imagine becoming the consistency of yogurt in my lap
kissing back my tremors as i lift up her hair from curious shoulders
dry-heaving the importance of the cheeks that feel warmer as they settle on hands that are brought together as if in deep prayer and i know i will collect myself again one day
girlworm, you're a swarm in my chest and i am me
Nov 5, 2018
Nov 5, 2018 at 11:50 PM UTC
I hear your voice echo on the walls of the Tiffany box—
hello hello
hello
hello
—with that southern-belle cadence
you spoke with always, like when you
told us we never had to knock, just
come in through the garage
on my graduation day I opened it for the first time
little silver teardrop on a little silver chain
delicate, like all of you, except your fingers
delicate, like the line you’re walking now
your robin’s-egg antique pickup gathering dust as I am miles away
sheepdog going deaf, legs shaky when she stands
I only allotted for that one loss this year.
on new year’s morning when we all
stomached the black eyed peas for tennessee good will
hung over and sweet-heavy with cinnamon rolls
and decadent, permanent, big hardy love
I spent my wish on the usual
and hey, maybe a couple more years for the dog.
hello hello
hello
hello
hello?
your lilting voice echoes every time I put on that necklace
and feel you, savor you around my neck for every
wine-drunk dinner and every nantucket porch photograph—
god if I would have known to wish on that
Mar 9, 2014
Mar 9, 2014 at 5:12 PM UTC
Beyond the horizon lies silence:
empty-handed and empty-torsoed.
Home no longer entangles our motions of gold and twirling,
so quickly so that our spins become perception itself.
Our hair, previously matted, now catches on nothing.
It flows freely against a wind blown inward,
vacuumed through open windows
on opposing sides of the kitchen,
though and carrying the smell
of freshly baked apple pie, crisply crusted,
a thing so sweet and tasty
that tongue and nostrils beg for more
whipped cream and palate warmth.
They open their mouths and plead,
panting on their knees,
on edge of upper lip
fearing not the fall
for something that would just,
for Heavens sake,
give them something,
anything,
of indescribable necessity.
"Oh please, just another bite!"
dribbles out of lungs
until even the smallest of morsels
are licked clean from plate,
desperately, empty,
in front of all,
for all to see.
The world is everything that is the case.
When it is all eaten up
yummed and stomached fully,
it will be the next green field,
the next orchard on the horizon
with golden apples ripening at sunset
against orange and purple perfect skies
to fulfill that longing for Next.
Oct 21, 2012
Oct 21, 2012 at 10:31 PM UTC
The cancer ate my sister's heart,
her liver, her bones,
and now I'm alone
with my sick-stomached guilt
and my never-told confession.
Remember, we were younger. Our neighbor's sister
came home with a ****** nose and you turned to me,
"What would you do if that was me?"
6 year old certainty, "I'd **** them,"
swelling with 6 year old bravado,
"I'd ****
anyone
who hurt you."
Our mother was appalled and our father told me not to say things I didn't mean, but
I meant it then.
And sweetheart, I mean it now.
I can't **** the cancer, because it's already killed you.
I can't **** the husband, because he's already dead
(left you widowed and heartbroken, my only sister,
and I am to blame).
And so I'm standing here, looking at the
jagged-box-shaped rocks so far far far below,
and I'm thinking
(stacking box, after box, after box
in her empty-floored apartment),
and I'm wishing
(to the crier of sorrows I've never known)
and I'm breathing
(if only he hadn't been the adulterer)
and I'm jumping
(with me).
Jan 12, 2012
Jan 12, 2012 at 4:52 PM UTC
Scattered cracked black pepper
The Remnants of a final meal
Lie as ashen memories of taste
Lurking reminders of that which has been
Transferred from cheep china to the lips of a lover
Upon the cusp of a final goodbye
The lingering heat left only to serve as a slate to clean.
How every bite savoured a crunch of hope
Leaving room only for reality
A dessert that cannot be stomached
falsified sweetness to not be considered 'the finer things'
When taste has changed to exotic flavouring
Fork etchings and caveman paintings in sweet chilli;
Timeline a love that can not be erased
It seeps into the cracks of tomorrow's aftertaste
Surrounding the words upon which exhaled breath proclaims
I miss you.
In silence as the sound of a solitary bowl creates no further filling nor satisfaction
Last nights plates remain within the cupboard
The flavour of every meal they have ever seen remain
It is their history
Whatever the future may be
Oct 6, 2016
Oct 6, 2016 at 1:37 PM UTC
The hill tops are far enough away
That you never hold your hands to the window
But you’re secretly hoping they’ll grab you, run
Under tables and over the green couch of the
Woman standing alone at the window
On a snowy day, so go
But always come back again
Your body is made of half hearted attempts at
Scrubbing tiles and then ripping them out
To lay new boards, to secure every crack
Adhesives and bubble wrap
You’ll need it when you’re moving everywhere
Shaking like a leaf
So place the tiles back together
As if nothing had ever rotted in here
Armed to the teeth with excuses
Still looking for answers
Yet calling it useless
Stop fighting and leaning on your crutch
But i want to get off this ride
It’s costing far too much
And I’m not interested in luck
So I breathe quietly as we leave the hospital
Because I should have known better
And instead of less, you have become
More than can be stomached
You take up space like a deer at the crest of
Grass beside the edge of the highway
And you just want to turn into this beautiful person
So she can get her money’s worth
This beautiful animal
It wraps around a telephone pole
As if it were just sleeping on the curb
Baby nausea, baby ***** baby lay down on the pavement
And when you close your eyes
It’s nothing but the gentle imprint
Blades of grass leave on your skin
The bones are barbed
The organs are on display
We don’t make mistakes here
We just slip about the day
I refuse to look directly at headlights
Feb 10, 2013
Feb 10, 2013 at 10:47 PM UTC
This is a poem for the anger
I keep coiled around my ribs
Because I was taught that anger is an absinthian poison
That will rise like bile in the throat and must be swallowed.
And I realize you may read this
And you may be angry
But I realize with each crunch of bone
I must give myself the space
To uncoil in this way.
I am angry
That you made me a captive reservoir
for the bitter droughts you refused to drink yourself.
You were iron-stomached after years of punches,
that I understood.
Open handed, I wanted to be the exception
But holy palmer’s kiss
Was still not enough to let me cross the threshold.
You are the locked room in the house that the children are forbidden
Only small glimpses between hinges
Of your fear poisoned self
Huddled in a corner, vomiting apologies.
I am angry
for believing I could have lain beside you
every night for the rest of my life
And not starved to death from loneliness.
I am angry
for ignoring how I dimmed each time I waited for you
to want me, to miss me, to think of me,
to ask me to come into your arms,
to find me fascinating, enchanting
to tell me you needed me;
to betray anything that proved I was more than convenience,
A drink that served itself on a silver platter,
Asking to be drunk.
If you only knew how luminous I could be
when loved well.
I am angry
That I still hope you will be waiting by my door after work
because you realized how you starved me
And now you’ve set a banqueting table, a banner over me is love
But I know you will never do this.
I know you cannot do this.
I am angry
that I miss only the space you left,
That I have not yet been able to close the gap
And walk away from your memory.
Aug 19, 2021
Aug 19, 2021 at 11:12 PM UTC
Lately when it rains-
Your articles on the floor.
The whining pacing dog,
relieves himself, what can't be stomached.
No, I don't think he likes your work.
Jul 18, 2010
Jul 18, 2010 at 12:58 AM UTC
This hotel serves green tea on golden platters
I bite into it like liquid has a spine,
circular piston cradling a ladder to my tongue
the giant beanstalk, I sleep here and awake
somewhere else with morning meals
already stomached in a stasis –
just how ****** lucidly bled the rugged hand
he forcefully bled under her summer dress:
I am here, I am her with you
as I hike teapots and escape each new room.
For the next, it has squeaky cots –
you heave me to the breakfast bar prior to sun
so I do not whine when heat hits my face,
there is not tea here, bottles of Coke are okay:
a slow content because they’ll hear if we churn.
And unlocking the stall from an exterior view,
it is the wall that looks attractive for one
lollylike little girl, the old man warm & ugly,
insomnia only goes when he wants to fly south.
Mar 16, 2013
Mar 16, 2013 at 6:53 PM UTC
In this state of mind,
I swallow my pride like I’m born to do it.
**** it back and let its bitter bite
coat my tongue and slide down
sides of my pretty pale throat,
caressing each of the guilty lumps
on its way to the below.
When it’s been stomached,
I thread my golden needle
on the first try.
I press my lips together
to pierce and sew them shut.
Crisscrossing over, under,
around, and through.
The tinny blood tastes
much less bitter than my pride.
I pull tight, ending the job
with its little uniform knots.
But certainty is key.
So I break each and every finger
on my small, able hands.
Once the most amazing
and interesting of instruments,
now hang crooked and limp;
however, as I watch them bruise and swell,
a deep pink to a fresh blue-violet,
I am wholly relieved.
None will be spoken,
None will be written.
Here, safe in my man-made silence.
Sep 30, 2014
Sep 30, 2014 at 3:31 PM UTC
One shot down an empty stomach.
The first disappointment of the night I am about to begin
in attempt to keep you away.
The ever-growing crowd around me is louder
with each fleeting, blurry moment.
But ever so quiet when my mind can't hear anything
other than
"I love you,
I will never leave you."
Second shot down an empty stomach.
A question at whether this is a race against myself (or others,
joining in on this heartbreak habit),
or if it's becoming a routine.
Each breath, getting more difficult than the last
to swallow and digest;
When my breaths were already cut in half when you left.
Third shot down an empty stomach.
I am not much of a drinker, usually, but tonight I have decided
that I shall be. I can be anything I want tonight.
My chronic numbness starts to stir about as I feel the crowd.
It's becoming deeper;
So many kind people around me (buying me shots, as my eagerness exceeds),
Or are they all just like you?
Fourth shot down an empty stomach.
Not at all am I used to this, but I needed something different;
to hold me over just for tonight.
I didn't need any of this to know there's something missing.
Fifth shot down an empty stomach.
I get up from the spinning room to use the bathroom.
Still, as I look into the mirror,
My face bore that of twelve-thousand land mines;
and my skin, paler than ever.
And I smile.
Sixth shot down an empty stomach.
I realize I am destroying myself even more so.
But it feels--it feels--like something,
which is enough for me, for tonight,
Just to pull through.
Seventh shot down an empty stomach.
"I think you should take it easy now, sweetheart,"
An old man I barely knew.
"I can tell you're hurting, but this isn't the way. It isn't.
Being like this won't help you out of that prison."
I walk myself home.
I lay in bed and remember the time I walked into the bar,
with an empty stomach, enjoying it.
It wasn't my initial choice to leave,
but yours, was.
And I remember that even harder with seven shots
down a two month-long empty stomached, 91 pound,
broken soul.
And I still remember your face when you loved me so.
Sep 4, 2014
Sep 4, 2014 at 7:04 PM UTC
Catch a word in service
Secrets of vows, autonomy
Add seldom, for a world's meant gird
See the rainbow, in the sky, want need
Wasn't never...?
Solitude in the audacity
Of a sun's ray, a rancor
For a lived same, that said affinity?
Simple nativity
Honor and homage
With a kiss, stomached liberty
Has come and gone, with silences wages
Grown to the point
Poise is an outward favor
Lime, flowers, and the winds winding joy
Has the time, to understand a wishes flavor
Soap, with your name, on it
Hadding the excess, the language
Of superiority, is worth the wit?
Like lips of creation, heiring works of times entourage...
May 11, 2024
May 11, 2024 at 10:09 PM UTC
your voice sounds like hospital discharge papers,
like the elevator tone on the top floor of a 20-story building,
like hallelujah at a pastor’s wedding,
like my mother winning custody in october.
i don’t know what love is,
i only know that love is four letters short of it’s synonym, intimacy.
four letters short of fondness, yearning.
i know the human heart beats 115,200 times per day.
combined, we are 230,400 heart beats.
combined, we are traumas,
ten finger nails,
shattered glass in the kitchen,
one hundred baby prayers,
and too many sympathies.
where do you want to leave your scars tonight,
your place or mine?
they can sleep on the couch.
i’ll make eggs in the morning.
i don’t know what love is,
but when my baby niece was bellied in my sister, she was kicking, and kicking, and even when the bruises surfaced,
we called this good.
sometimes love leaves marks to show signs of life,
stomached and not yet born.
like this-
like you.
Jan 20, 2017
Jan 20, 2017 at 12:24 PM UTC
I am bound by
two brick strings
and a
receipt
of red ink.
There is nothing
about the future that presents this.
Only that which has occurred
to a stomached stirred
preventing any glimpse of bliss.
I'm only calling
the names in the distance.
There's a shift of relevance
and it's delicate.
Those who can't record
the revolution
are too busy
lighting the rooftops
ablaze.
Sep 20, 2015
Sep 20, 2015 at 2:00 AM UTC
All the almonds in the jar
Lightly salted, butter by the bar
Garlic in the pantry, bread on the stove
Tomato's in the oven
Kitchen overload
How do I eat food?
Food?
Food.
A mumble jumble bumble of
Living feud, oil me up
I'm about to dive in because I have no other choice.
Yup, this is a wall.
So empty stomached my eyes sink in
Pretty soon I might stink thin
Fast.
Fast?
How do I fast healthily?
Mental overload
Time is worn thin
What silly shadows dance just out of sight?
Did I just see that?
Is reality just a fabric's delight?
Oh, I'll please me, it was just the light.
Dec 7, 2013
Dec 7, 2013 at 10:19 PM UTC
Travel free my inner scapegoat
You’re liberated, off this hook
No more shame-horned
Guilt-stomached dread,
scarce enough to wrong-bare
Not startle-sneezed or tremble-shook
I excise redundant remnants
Bad wattle glands where crime hangs large
Not Billie-blame,
Nanny-regret
or just a wrongless kid
No fair-trial felon, biased charge
Imagine dropping heavy torts
The solid clunk as fault hits floor
Past carried light
Kind compassion
wide enough to weight-bare
Rich mixed plant pasture evermore
An end to serveless inner war
Oct 11, 2024
Oct 11, 2024 at 1:29 AM UTC
Today we have just scratched the surface
Here lies your hopes and dreams
Mary Magdalene would merely laugh at me
Meadows of chloroform and chemical winds bypass my every thought but then again
Maybe I am not a disaster and maybe this is just a test
The strong willed and strong stomached gasp at the sight of this
What treachery is love and why is it not forbidden
What lovely tragedy, oh, what a comedy
You crave and thrive on drama and you are so two-faced
Even Jesus Christ is fooled
I am but a morsel lacking morals towards the monstrosities and the ill mannered
Flying high on the backs of the enemy
Laughing despicably
Uncontrollably
Gasping for every breath
Drowning in what seems to be nothing besides oxygen
I am a train wreck
I am a car crash
My fumes will spread near and far
Not as far as I'd like them to
But far enough to make the world know
That I am here and suffering
*Please let me off easy
I'll do anything
Please let me off easy*
Broken, beaten, battered, battled
Bestowed on top of the highest mountain
The clouds are my escape and I pray that I never have to return home
*What is life without a little bit of adventure
What is a nightmare without a little bit of terror*
Life is a thunderstorm and I am a chain-link fence
It was all very shocking at first
At least I am used to it by now
May 9, 2016
May 9, 2016 at 11:17 PM UTC
There staring at us bare is this truth -
Don’t window-dress it, friend,
this world is indeed of suffering made:
Birth is suffering,
And growing up,
Friendship is suffering,
And love and loss,
Time an affliction and
Ageing
There is a kernel of sorrow concealed in joy
Victory and defeat are two sides of a coin
We rise to fall and fall to weep
The rich man sleeps in his mansion on the hills
Because a urchin is awake empty stomached
Sweeping the street
A full belly here is a meal
Snatched from the hands of a child somewhere
We conscript and send to deaths young men and women
Ugly and blighted is ok as along as
we profit
And so we go seeking a moments joy
In this world of suffering
Face it bold don’t conceal it in hope
The sad truth of our suffering world
seek the roots of suffering deep
Dec 18, 2018
Dec 18, 2018 at 12:58 AM UTC
yellow-not-gold library lights far off
dizzy circles and the truth
you saw the wrong direction
and I saw the door
and everybody saw it coming
but you and I valiantly didn't for longer
than the weak-stomached
didn't we
May 11, 2013
May 11, 2013 at 11:20 AM UTC
This place is haunted-
a narrative being told.
Spoken from elder's lips,
passed down rungs of time-
it's more than just a customary legend.
Those with nerve,
are able to travel up-
a crooked, spiral staircase.
Cracked wooden steps,
creak as footsteps ascend
and descend them. Some people
are so weak-stomached-
they fall backwards down
those rickety stairs.
A hutch upstairs-
in cobwebbed hallways,
contains padlocked secrets
of departed eras. Steadier hands-
can play with fire, attempting to push up-
it's entrance.
Their hands are inclined to be
unsteady.
Only those with their sense in check-
should venture up to this home
of "Attic Ghosts." A person must know
what's in store-
prior to freeing those haunted
wanderers. They're known to be tricky,
keeping people on their toes
in tizzies. They're not crummy,
just aiming to give you-
willie nillies.
Let this be a warning-
people who make this trek
might not see morning.
Scared straight out of their skins-
petrified from within,
at things they can't and shouldn't
understand.
Sep 22, 2016
Sep 22, 2016 at 8:56 PM UTC
The downpour outside rattles
Like a thousand sand-filled flutes
Echoing in the night air
Singing through the storm
And providing the melody forlorn
As the rain giants are born
As I lay and listen
To the symphony of beings
Ancient and always
In their core
Born in storms
As always before
I tuck myself into the noise
And I fight the heat of summer
And its unnatural reign in the dark
With a fan fluttering softly
Next to my heaven of slumber
As the thunder thunders
In even numbers
I ponder ponder ponder
Through my empty mind I wander
Picking scraps up off the floor
Every each one ever fonder
Drifting calmly into my shore
From an ocean dancing evermore
I lay here in the dark
Hearing buzzes in the shadows deep
As I drift into sleep
And forth the dreams creep
From corners of my psyche
In groups, holding tightly
In waves of light and lucidity
Combatting this humidity
And I savor summer nights here
With eyes of smoke
And stomached beer
I sleep in soft movement
As the heat retains its endurance
And warms my dreams
Filled with muffled, happy screams
Jun 1, 2014
Jun 1, 2014 at 10:28 AM UTC
If I loved you a little less
I wouldn't have cried over your farewell message
I wouldn't have thought of regret
I wouldn't have thought of the days without you as a waste
If I loved you a little less
I wouldn't have thought of giving you forgiveness
Or seeing you again face to face
Nor talking to you casually as if nothing happened
If I loved you a little less
It wouldn't have been painful seeing you talk to him
I wouldn't have smiled as if I felt nothing
I wouldn't have felt glee when you turn your phone's mode to airplane
If I loved you a little less
I wouldn't have felt anxious as the end gets nearer
I wouldn't have felt the urge to hug you closer
I wouldn't have asked that little favor
If I loved you a little less
I wouldn't have stared at your lips
And asked for that one final kiss
I wouldn't have felt my love was being reciprocated
If I loved you a little less
That night wouldn't be flashing back repeatedly
I would've slept well entirely
I wouldn't have wished you with me
If I loved you a little less
I wouldn't have chose you over her
Her, with the love, future and security that she offers
I wouldn't have the guts to hurt other people
If I loved you a little less
I wouldn't have stomached being a third party
I wouldn't have accepted you after what you've done to me
I would have cared what others think about me
If I loved you a little less
I wouldn't have agreed to this kind of setup
Like on a death row queue, I voluntarily line up
Except that this is a slow torturous death with a heads up
If I loved you a little less
I would've forced you my beliefs
I would've blackmailed you emotionally
And tied you up just to be with me
If only I have loved you a little less
Just a little less
But I only love you a little,
More and more each day
If only I have loved you a little less
But my love for you was beyond everything
Beyond time, pain, risks, judgment and common sense
Even beyond death, I think
If only I have loved myself a little less
I wouldn't have decided to fight a handicapped game
I wouldn't have swallowed all the hatred and curses thrown at my name
I wouldn't have been able to love you all the same
Curse my stubborn heart for not knowing how to love a little less
It only knows of love that is always at its peak
With only one choice between all or nothing
And it always chooses all, if it's you, right from the very beginning
Nov 20, 2017
Nov 20, 2017 at 3:55 AM UTC
So waited...
In human color
The reasons of a fury, to be fated
A wish of service to an ideal, as patience's fulfilment
Clear the worth
Care for a stomached hap
Calls of when, we were the roles of earth
Comes with a friend, to same and laugh
The boding nature
Of a promises jealousy
Toward the final lip, of coming whole to learn
A wish, is for any who would the rise of anarchy
The race of shame, succinct
To the liberty of virtue, a heart of sincerity?
With creation as a name, a place of inclination
With the volition of time, came in words of simplicity
A wager of pomposity:
If a callous form to ethics is to be
Is a legend of redoubt, ours for a clashing lividity?
See the cope, the succor of avid live; collect a hold of identity...
Apr 26, 2025
Apr 26, 2025 at 8:10 AM UTC