Tired of the ways of men
Desperately I turned toward nature
I watched a butterfly ascend
Yet I'm a different nomenclature
Of a solemn glacier
Standing on my own
In an arctic cone
Not protected by the ozone
So I search for a new home
But can only find loans
My venture for my own real estate
Exposed me to the realest hate

I'm the roaming gnome
With a groaning tone
All alone
With a roaming phone
So I can't call home

My will I leave
When still I see
A killer bee
Filling me
Willingly
Its invasion's
Abrasions
Left a sensation
With a duration
Of unending inflation
On a descending station
Of no impending relation

I felt the nature
Of a desolate crater
When I met a great hater
Who told me to get straighter
So I could be a steel freighter
Carrying my load on my back
Without polluting the air
I decided to cut him some slack
Forgiving his impossible dare

I must gather grace
At a faster pace
To finish this race
Of a top notch
Hot crotch
Stopwatch
Ticking down
Into the ground
Without a sound
Or warning
Of acid rain forming
Until I see myself melting
From the savage belting
Of your death sting
You called the best thing
Like a divine blessing
Only seen after *******
Like a politician deflecting
For the constituents electing
To forego dissecting
The issue at hand
By not taking a stand

My world is crumbling
Because of you
And myself stumbling
In society's glue
As the sky is tumbling
I see I'll lose
Yet instead of rumbling
It's love I choose

Infinite.

Like how many times you can take a picture,
with your mind,
of we intertwined.

Like three chords.
Your pick.

Like each idea becoming a suggestion,
an open ended request,
like the innocence behind "inquisitive"
that is lost in "inquisition".

Like the questions I mean to ask you,
but I'm not sure you'll be listening
at that moment in time.
Stopwatch.
Dewdrop.

Like how I mean to hold
you
r hands
r heart
you.

Like the limit of the tangent of x as it approached y.
I want to curve
and parenthesize around your body.
We will diverge.
We are inverse.
We are combustable.

Our foes,
Some of whom we can surely name,
Pray to the same God.
A rose is a rose is a rose.
The rain and sun
Cover the same game site;
There's no referee calling foul,
Illegal procedure or out of bounds.
This is more like Gaelic Football,
No perceptible rules for finger pointing
From the spectators in a very large stadium.
But, make no mistake,
Every game has a timer,
And his thumb is poised
On the stopwatch.

I need a breather,
for I have set a timer,
in each fraction of my life

I've never tried running a marathon but,
I have always felt that I'm running out of time.

You once told me, over drinks, that
" 'first sight' isn't a thing."
I think at the time we actually agreed but
I guess we didn't think about
what that would ultimately mean because
now we still have to find an answer.

Then, how long does it take to fall in love?

The length of three movies we will never watch all the way through?
The time it takes to make a clever joke,
drink a few glasses of ****** wine,
or finally wash those **** dishes you are never motivated to do?
Long enough to roll my eyes a thousand times,
listen to a Radiohead album,
or battle three rounds of death rattles and the flu?
How about the amount it takes to share 100 cups of the best coffee,
finish a gallon of milk,
or to deliver the evening news?
Or maybe just the mere moments it took
to memorize your eyes and their exact shade of blue?

To determine the specific time length it takes to fall in love,
would be impossible,
and a definitive answer found, I would probably doubt,
but at the very least,
I can tell you that it is a hell of a lot less than
the painstaking time it is taking to fall back out.

there are two
clocks on the wall
and neither work.

there are one
million thoughts
in my head
and none are worth it.

sometimes i wonder
is it worth it?

to count the minutes, the
seconds, until time is up.

why measure
life in increments
when i can measure it in
memories?

the squeals that
left my lips as
dad chased me
around the house
as a dragon,
the sweet sent
of lavender and
candy flavored kisses.

what about the hum
in my lungs as i tentatively
kissed the boy
i loved and gave him
everything i shouldn't have?

the proud look in
my mother's eyes as
i left home with
my bags packed?

the boys i talked to,
the friends i laughed with,
the nights i wasted
and the ones i didn't…

could these really
have an expiration date?

An Old Soul, you said. What does that mean? My Soul's not old, it's gently used, like that song that was a hit a couple years ago, you heard it on the radio and you can't remember the title but you can hum the tune. That's me, a hummable tune with no title cruising the electric air for a million miles right to your ears.

An Old Soul, you said, like it was a compliment that my Soul has yet to succumb to the withering humbleness of that great equalizer, The End.

How do you know? You don't know my Soul. Souls have shapes, and shapes don't get old. Mine's shaped like a ******, kind of like an open flower, like that last hour before bedtime when you sneak that sliced orange even though your dad told you NO, but your mama gently scolds, "just one more" as she (soft as the comforter she tucks in around you all
singing that song that drips like molasses in the gathering dew), and she winks at Dad, who's pretending to be mad like the rain that's pouring and flooding the gutter.

It's a kid who stutters who has mastered Bach and has moved straight onto Brahms, while across town it's beer and people singing along.

No one these days to wants to sing to Brahms, but that's okay; she loses herself alone in its sparkling and prefers it that way.

My Soul (well not just mine, it's in heart of the hum, the mirror firmly reflecting our collective soap ****), is a kind of Boo Radley in his broke down joint and his sad soap dolls in the tree, in the knoll. Shut in an old house uncertain of who he was or where he belonged or what he might even one day become, he built a world for those kids the only way he knew how.

Drowning in a lonesome sea, where the only moments of freedom behind the pecan tree were a broken stopwatch full of frozen moments and some hand whittled soap and some gum. Boo Radley, no he was the shut-in son. Better than that inside-out drainage ditch who still walks the streets with the air of a rabid ***** who was shot at and missed by The One and Only One-Shot Finch. In the dusty 30s, in that vast, hot expanse, Poor Old Tom never even had a chance.

Now Scout, that kid is my kind of gal, all smart within and smart without. THOSE are the ones with the curious minds who stay young forever and laugh at time, who find gum in a tree and call it sublime, who worry about freedom and all it implies. Yeah, man. Jean Louise. And she'll never get old.

So don't you dare talk about what you don't know.

I've spent my short life knowing that god isn't the goal.

It's the dead dog in the street, and the man walking free, and a dying old lady who can't help but be mean. It's the girl with her ears and the kid with his orange and his mom singing softly as she closes the door.

It's the song that you heard, you don't know the words, but you sing in the car to the telephone poles.

There are so many roads to the idea of "whole." I have so far to travel, such long way to go, there isn't any certain number for the rest of my days. My Soul is eternity.

I'm still making my way.

you’re not going are you
today to the edge of your seat
to the corners of insanity?
to the corners at the cinema
nearest the exit
to run off when the demons come
to sleep in the day
below your bed
so the rabbits cannot find you;
and then go for a walk
in the cold of the night
mumbling like Lady Macbeth
maybe now running a fast-food restaurant
and asking each tree in your garden :
Would you like some
manure with that?
you’re not going to Extremity Town
today, are you?
to tell the Mayor
he’s taken extreme measures
opening an animal sanctuary;
would he please
open an abattoir instead
where the animals skin humans?
Oh you’re not going
are you
to the bus-stop with a stopwatch
to time how long it takes for the passengers
to **** the driver?
Oh you’re not going are you
in the day or this evening or anytime tonight? -
to see if Jimmy the car mechanic
has diversified on your insistence
and if he now sells
in his garage
lingerie and toothpaste for that special night
and salads and beer and peanuts and spices
for first dates only

O you are going to have a good quiet sleep aren’t you
like owls in hollows
and you won’t offer any surprises to the world?
*not today?

Ten seconds
Everything's normal

Thirty seconds
It's a little better

Fifty seconds
The headiness sets in

Sixty seconds
My chest is on fire

Eighty seconds
I contemplate life and what's after

Ninety seconds
My hand, tingling
Falls from my face
And I gasp in
Relieved
And dissapointed

Time dons His thief's mask.
While we count days and hours,
He steals my stopwatch.

The grandeur and intensity I have felt recently has clouded my mind like a fog brushing the top of a mountain at dawn.
The romanticization of our shared aspirations and desperation has left me mesmerized and hypnotized like the effects of a magician performing a conjuration. Not meaning to sound as cliche or pretentious as I know this will, you are my idea of a vacation. What u mean by this is that, when I’m near you, I want to stay this way until the inevitable sands of time run out. But I can’t. I can’t because most of life is work and you are my relaxation. You are a cup of hot tea when the icicles reign supreme outside. One day, I will see you every day. Even then, I know I won’t want those days to end. But end they must. So we face the test of time, wearing infatuation and admiration as our weapons, fighting the clocks and schedules that trail so closely behind. We fight and we fight and we fight.

Out by the sunsest
Where lovers lie
And smoke by the river
Drinking ashen wine
Gone are the eyes
With moonlit shine
Now only tombstones
Reading "mine"
Of all creations
With concepts of time
Lonely are the lovers
Born to die.

I am getting older

and my body is in tatters

My Doctor's say, "You're fine, You're fit"

I think they're mad as hatters

Each day a new pain rears it's head

My body falls apart

My Doctor's say, "You're fine, You're fit"

As they listen to my heart

My bladder's my new stop watch

Each night I rise to ***

I get up once at half past ten

And then just after three

I'm cold and then I'm sweating

Sometimes both in  one breath

It makes me feel I'm crazy

It's a slow, nervewracking death

My knees ache every morning

And my hips pop as I walk

I have to work my jawbones

Just so I can start to talk

I've had surgeries on my body

Just to help me stay alive

I can't see where I am going

I'm can no longer go and drive

But, my Doctors say I'm healthy

They say I'm healthy as a horse

But isn't "Flicka" served in restaurants?

His flesh is now a new main course

I use a cane when I go walking

I have a seat to go upstairs

I wear a wig when I'm in public

I seem to dress myself in layers

I need a pill to wake myself up

I need another so I sleep

But because my bladder's my new stopwatch

I never go to sleep too deep

Today I'm going to get tested

To check the hearing in one ear

Please excuse me for a moment

What was that you said my dear?

Now my Doctor's keep insisting

That there's nothing wrong with me

Like I said, I think I'm crazy

They're the nuts and I'm the tree.

they've got me tricked out special

I've got orthotics and a cane

My bursititis hurts like crazy

And I think it's gonna rain

My oxygen tank is empty

And my voiding bag is not

But I'm still having those flashes

I still feel cold and hot

With the bag I sleep much better

I don't get up twice to ***

But it wasn't fun last birthday

Having a colostomy

But, my Doctor's say Don't Worry

Your'e as fit as fit can be

But I tell them it's distressing

For I'm not yet thirty three

I'm sick of always hurting

Each day more vigor do I lose

But today I am excited

I'm getting velcro for my shoes

I think some exercise might help me

With all my aches and all my pains

It may help me to feel younger

Feel like thirty two again

But my Doctors, Oh my Doctors

Say there's nothing wrong at all

It's just a natural part of aging

It's mother nature come to call

But I know, I 'm getting older

and it's just a part of life

I'm just glad I have a drug plan

To help me with this strife

Now, my O2 tank is full now

And I've got a buzzing in my head

That means my battery is running low

So...Goodnight...I'm off to bed...

you’re not going are you
today to the edge of your seat
to the corners of insanity?
to the corners at the cinema
nearest the exit
to run off when the demons come
to sleep in the day
below your bed
so the rabbits cannot find you;
and then go for a walk
in the cold of the night
mumbling like Lady Macbeth
maybe now running a fast-food restaurant
and asking each tree in your garden :
Would you like some
manure with that?  
you’re not going to Extremity Town
today, are you?
to tell the Mayor
he’s taken extreme measures
opening an animal sanctuary;
would he please
open an abattoir instead?
Oh you’re not going
are you
to the bus-stop with a stopwatch
to time how long it takes for the passengers
to **** the driver?
Oh you’re not going are you
in the day or this evening or anytime tonight
to see if Jimmy the car mechanic
has diversified on your insistence
and if he now sells
in his garage
lingerie and toothpaste for that special night
and salads and beer and peanuts
for first dates only
O you are going to have a good quiet sleep aren’t you
and you won’t offer any surprises to the world?
not today?

the gentle reminders of my fears
sing me to sleep
“what could go wrong?”
“will i wake?”
their ever-dreadful lullaby
lulling me to slumber
a grandfather clock
a stopwatch
tick tick ticking
til all fades away

I was drinking on the moon when I got a little sick
It was probably from the space toad I decided to lick
So I puked over the edge of the moon with ***** *****
As it hit the sky, it froze and turned into a nasty comet

As my comet flew through space, I hopped on with zero fears
As we zoomed through all the stars, traveling a few lightyears
And as we reach our buddy Pluto, the comet asks "Why so blue?"

Pluto simply stated "If you were a planet, and they told you that you weren't, you'd be upset too."

We let Pluto join us as we had our space fun
And we decided to head back around to the sun
But the sun melted Pluto and it melted my comet
When the sky was filled with my old *****

And as I float alone, I see Time's ever-dropping sands
As he swirls out from the hourglass, and I shake both his hands
I ask him for one more chance in this place
As he opens up his stopwatch face
And when he looks me in the eyes, he shakes his head
"You'll never learn. I'm sorry, no." is what Time had said

Time is a clock,
a face no-one forgets, a
stopwatch on a stiff wrist
beneath crisp white cotton,
a feral black cat in the woods
of adulthood that sneaks
up on you in your prime,

or something like that.

Lying here,
Now nothing more than a fragment of terrycloth
Faded from red to pink

You are something much more.
You know the essence of athleticism,
Of strength, stamina, courage.

You relish every drop of perspiration,
Rhythmic breath of runners is sweet music,
And now you have been cast aside,
Reposing gently on the side table,
Alone but for the stopwatch.

Last summer, on my birthday, I received a card in the mail. Every year my grandma sends me some silly birthday card, I'm used to it. Last year, I turned 18. On the inside of the card along with the sentimental gilded text, was an explanation. My grandpa had picked out this card for me 12 years before, and for whatever reason, it never got sent. My grandpa died when I was 8. Now, 10 years later, I have one last card, sent from both grammi and grampi. I forgot to say "I love you," I forgot to say "goodbye." I can never go back.

I love you.

Goodbye.

I wish there had been more, maybe an "it's okay, you forgot." An "of course I heard you, I'm here." An "I love you."

An
"I'll come back and meet my other granddaughter."

A story.

Something.

I have a card, and a transformer stopwatch (long broken), a tiny box (that used to hold a wooden beetle with moving legs, but no longer), and a memory of a smile.

I lost the pocket knife.

I forgot his voice.

I miss the pens in his shirt pocket. I miss playing pickup sticks. I miss him playing the piano, and letting me ruin it, pressing the keys. I miss him reading me stories. Over and over, as many times as I wanted.

I miss the absent look he got when he was thinking about something else entirely.

I miss when he forgot about veterans day.

I remember him, dying, stuck in a bed, drinking water through a sponge (it was one of the most terrifying things I've ever had to watch). He never lost his mind, or his memory, he lost his body first.
The last thing he said to me was "you be a good girl."
The last thing I said was "I will" (and I hid behind my mothers back, while she said "We love you").

Sorry Grandpa,
I'm not perfect.
And that's probably not
what you meant

He knew he would never see me again.
I had no idea. (Why was that the last thing he said?)

He was a composer.
Two weeks before he died (that's also the first time I cried for him), someone arranged to have a symphony play his music for the first time in concert. They drove my grandpa to the concert hall in an ambulance. That's a gift no one will ever live up to. I wish I'd gone.

He was one of the most amazing people I've ever known,
and I didn't even realize it until after he was gone.

I'd give almost anything to have a conversation with you.

Goodbye.

I love you.

Goodbye.

I love you.

Goodbye.

I love you.

I wish you were still here.

Two Christmases ago, my grandma started crying while we were singing silent night, because Chuck wasn't there to sing bass. We were missing only one part, and no one could replace it.

I wonder if there are recordings of him talking, just talking somewhere.
I'd like to hear them.

I wish I could have sung with my grandpa, Christmas carols, anything.

Goodbye.

I love you.

A sad stopwatch in silence,
regrets fragmenting time,
nonexistent, unstoppable.

1 ***** your finger, describe it,
but never use the words,
red, flow, blood, dead.
Post to HP as My Finger Pricked:___

2. Post an Elizabethan Sonnet to HP

3. Think of a sad thing to make yourself cry, write what it was, how it felt, and are you now afraid/unafraid to admit it was so hard/easy to stain your face.
Post to HP as Cry Myself to:___

4. Get a stopwatch, pick your time limit, (max 7 minutes), write a poem, stopping when your time is up and post to HP as Seven Minutes:_____

5.  Pick a poem of mine and why you don't like it. I am not an idiot, send it to me in a private message.  No penalty for being right (or wrong)

Each question worth 20 points.

Winner gets a pizza with any topping delivered to his residence any where in the world (or the local equivalent).  Or, if in NYC, dinner!

I don't slam well on love
It slams on me
A drumming thrumming arrhythmia
Ba-bump ba-bump ba--- bump-ba-bump
A little loss here is a little gain there
Only, it doesn't work that way
My stopwatch heart hiccups then echoes
Like odd flats and sharps
Seemingly out of place among the expected
A beat that needs to be acquired over several listenings
Like a new food that needs to be tasted up to 12 times
Before you can truly decide if you like it.
It take more than 3 licks and a bite to get to my center
One, two three, you're not for me
Four, five, six, a few more licks
Seven, eight, nine, out to dine
Ten, eleven, twelve, you can delve
And yet... Here it sits in my chest with its arrhythmia
Patiently waiting for that defibrillating current
That shock that will set it right
Or perhaps it's never meant to be that way
Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps
It's perfect in it's imperfection

My heart's a stereo,
and we can dance if you want to,
because the rhythm is gonna get you,
on re-pe-pe-pe-pe-peat.

with iron bolts rust-fastened to her copper face,
her brass eyes only move her pupils elsewhere far,
resolved and steel-willed she has left my side, her place,
her gaze and love for me now hang upon a star,

cold metal forged within her furnace blasted high,
a permanent visage no more will feign to move,
her thoughts aloft so far, the sight of her so nigh,
she's stopped the stopwatch of my time to prove,

amazing how the human flesh can turn to steel,
how fascinating transmutations quickly peak,
how one so loving woman quick unlearns to feel,
how one who knew no silence quick unlearns to speak,

unraveled slow to tatters, now we've come undone,
i sleep the moonless night that's lost its living sun

(C)2012, Christos Rigakos

every single time
i falter and stumble around
it's like i can feel a stopwatch resetting.
"it's been zero days since my last mistake"
it's like that timer needs to get somewhere
somewhere specific
before i can really begin.
it might never get there,
i might never be stable enough to satisfy
and i can't be okay with that
because who wants a "zero days" kind of girl as a wife?
that girl shouldn't be a mother, for certain.
that type of child will never reach responsibility
stability
to have the life she wants.
the clock goes back to midnight
stopwatch to zero
i won't begin until i can stop
doing all of these things that spin me in circles
and let me fall down
down
down.

Spring-loaded,
Nervous energy;

Often wondering
In an archer, a yogi-
Gathering static strength,
A tension
With the potential
Of absolution;

Else a stopwatch wound
Too tight. A pointless climb,
An effortless demise-
Out of time,
Out of mind.

Cannot walk slow.
Baulk beneath
The cathedral,
Lengthening of the shadow;
Another wasted day.

Often wondering
if idle or incomplete,
Whether the chip
On my shoulder
Is a flute
Or a fatal malady.

Managed the cap and gown
With a professional smile.

Found my audience
When I gave it up.

Often wondering
What I am doing,
Sat drunk at the typewriter
Alone;

Often wondering
Which is more fearful;
the void
Or the comfort of home.

Bad run
Good run
Felt good, slow time
Felt ill, knocked thirty seconds off best time
Nighttime pasta, prep meal
What a shocking run
Night on the town, wrecked
Knocked one minute off best time
My body's a nightmare
Just run, don't think
Okay, you're thinking
Push harder, maybe harder than that
The stopwatch is lying to you
New running shoes
The hills will make you stronger
Don't look at the mile signs
Keep a steady pace
Last two miles, push
Last mile, push a bit harder
The finish line
Your fun run is over
I don't see you laughing.

here's the broken hourglass
sand slipping through fingers
into open air

here's the crooked clock
ticking counterpoint to heartbeats
thumping off-tempo

here's the stopwatch, button jammed
digits melting into each other
a count-up to the end

out of sync
out of time
out of control

*countdowns only last 'til you explode

when i wake up without my glasses sometimes
i think i'm still in a tent on the side of a highway in queensland
and the sun coming up starts a stopwatch
t-minus 20 minutes until the air heats up like an oven
merrily roasting the blonde figures
on either side of a slightly deflated air mattress.
if i keep my blurry vision fixed i can hear whip birds
and cackling kookaburras and
a vague buzzing i forget as soon as i shift my attention.
i want to push my too-tanned face through the moth-dotted
10-second-tent ***** and gasp wholly unsatisfying gulps
of petrol station breezes.

but when i wake up with my contacts cementing my eyelids shut
i think i'm hungover in a grimy hostel in brisbane
with a different blond figure gripping my hip
and 29 other filthy travelers snoring uproariously in the same room
and every one of them asleep with stories still pressed to their lips
willing to trade for the thrill of it.
and i know i won't be able to find my keycard in the tangled sheets
and anyway, my bunk in my own room doesn't have a ladder
and there's always a german girl sleeping below
with her underwear hanging from the bars i use to clamber up
so i sigh and pass that problem down to future-me
fall back asleep

and when i wake up i have miscalculated
and somehow i'm twelve thousand miles away already
as abrupt as this

but sometimes for a few myopic seconds, my chest feels light.

fear
of being opened like a book
free and clear
shuffling pages
easily dog-eared and torn

fear
of being wrong
or of being too right
and so i keep my mouth closed
when i think it might matter

fear
of eye contact
this stopwatch somewhere within my soul
tells me when to look away
so i can never give too much
of myself
and never know too much either

fear
of displaying emotion
so generically poetic, this idea
of holding it in
but i fear letting it out
before knowing what it is
and being a young, confused wanderer
i keep these fears to myself, waiting
until i know what they mean

fear
of never finding out

Sometimes you don't hear it,
Other times it blares outloud,
You are constantly reminded,
As you check your stopwatch,
Ticking every second,
Counting every moment until your last breath,
Saying that time is running out,
Worried that time will slip out of our hands,
Worried that the time we spend is pointless,
Worried about the job we have,
The people to impress,
and the family to take care of,
The time we have is now,
The time we take to count,
count for every time we check the time,
Takes up more time,
Remove that glue that binds your eyes to a clock,
and start living your life and
Stop watching it like a hawk,
because no matter what time of the day it maybe,
it will,
*Tick Tock