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Martin Narrod Jun 2014
Strep throat. Out of nowhere really. I went to a meeting on Friday, interviewed at PaperSource on Saturday afternoon, and then just slightly later an awful toothache. I never suspected anything so out of the ordinary to occur. Saturday night, two to four a.m.ish, i thought it was caffeine pills, or not drinking enough water, or even, worst of the worst, an attack of hypochondria. I kept lighting up Marlboros though, tasty red branded things that make writer's mouths happy. Two days in and I'm pretty sure my ***** are a fever below my body, droopy like snoopy. Super soft droopy *****, that's a sure sign of a fever or a great BJ they taught us in 6th grade science, and I wasn't getting my favorite ice cream social.

I hadn't talked to the gf in a couple days, and missing her company I made the phone call only discover that my voice had turned into a baby turtle shouting English from the bottom of a stuffed baked potato. Garbled. Discussing. Useless. I promptly hung up, and began texting. But it was too late she heard me and called back, and I had to give it all I had to put together a few words.

An hour later I was dropped off at the ER, the benefits of Medicaid at 30 is never being able to just go to the doctor's office. Within 2 hours they told me it was strep. Four nurses, two residents, one first day resident, and a 2nd year resident, and the ER doctor for a swab and a spray, and the take home Z-pack.

Then she said she'd come over even though I was sick. That's real love. "If I get sick from you, it's still worth it." 3 days on antibiotics, no more sore throat, I feel great- I think tomorrow I'll be having an ice cream social for someone who I love dearly. Maybe we'll even skip the ice cream.
Ice Cream Social: slang. When a girlfriend, boyfriend, partner, spouse, or significant other offers you a certificate for a free sundae and non-reciprocated oral ***. Eat vegan ice cream, receive ******* or mix and match. But that should explain that.
Bunhead17 Nov 2013
Dope, money, and hoes [x9]

[Verse 1: Da$h]
Ain't write it, thought of this when I was drunk driving
Like I had a license, been swerving through the intersect
Just to make the ******* wet, breakfast: yac and cigarettes
Feds about the only threat, spit nasty like my throat is strep
She working at the pyramid, shake her **** for some bucks from Tut
Pharaoh to the marrow, Cleopatra roll my dutch
Dour blunts they double stuffed, got a ***** stupid chopped
Used to squad these *******' wives, the ******* that I used to pop
Wear the **** I used to cop, respect your elders lil *****
Ain't even of age to drink, I get your ** to buy me liquor
'Linquent ****, I live for it, they tryin but might die for it
These drugs got my brain, money got my mind finding fun in crime
******* love my rhymes, to be honest I love their mouth at campuses
Looking for talents just like I'm a college scout
Ask her what she shout, I’m ashin' her on the ******* couch

[Verse 2: Da$h]
Dope, money, and hoes, getting dope money from shows
She sniff her coke then she blow, **** it, I don’t judge it though
Sugar free, no love for sure, just put 'em on Sepulveda
Benefits and bank rolls, all a ***** really want from her
And when she bring it back, call my brother hit the trap
Invested in a couple packs, will probably see a couple stacks from what he talkin
Money hulking like Bruce Banner
Panarama day dreaming, While she downin' my ***** on camera
Life's in action, piping, smashing whatever you call it
Smoke a 'Port and I'm off but they ******* think I lost it

And my dog facing blunts while I feed my pups bath salts
Infiltrate my castle, take your face like it's a mask boss
Pass raw flesh and bone, money long like small intestines
Homes I'm taking breakfast, long as getting checks involved H´z *****
Cause if you ain't know, AraabMuzik
lyrics to "Dope, Money, and Hoes" by A.$.A.P MOB ft. DA$H, ****. Araabmuzik... these lyrics are good, in my opinion!
-LORD$ NEVER WORRY
A module once refrain
a verse that peers rehearse
if a sequence in cruise
when caucus fling feet
in a promontory abode
so precipice filters gold
where amass rhetoric
in an ounce of verbosity
as most food entail now
their resplendent attire too
then win it back tonight
and strep face no more
when weather is nice
with unspoken grace.
Sam Temple Feb 2016
razor blades slip slow
leaving behind reddened lines
drowning in incoherent flow

swollen throat continues to grow
unable to focus my mind
razor blades slip slow

cannot relate to my favorite show
or enjoy the swaying Pines
drowning in incoherent flow

choking on ***** and snot from my nose
wishing I could simply unwind
razor blades slip slow

tissue hurts me when I try to blow
I long to just feel fine
drowning in incoherent flow

what am I reaping from this terrible sow?
I may as well go blind…
razor blades slip slow
drowning in incoherent flow
JMG Mar 2011
I said you are binary
Yes
One-by-one
I meant that heavily
Ton-by-ton

You make my throat burn
Sick
Strep-by-strep
So I wanna see you walk on
Step-by-step

You came and sang your song
Beat-by-beat
Just dragged me right along
Wrong
Street-by-street

It is love I do it for
Heart-by-heart
Yes
I'll try to save the world
Part-by-part

So take this and run
Yes
Bit-by-bit
Or don't, let me see you squirm
Fit-by-fit

Just know that I mean well
Rhyme-by-rhyme
So pay me a visit
Time after time
JG, March 2011
Wilder Nov 2020
I think the funny thing
It's not the
Staying in bed for days
Awake and then
Sleeping in few
Hour increments

(and certainly not the night I woke up at two
to the sound of the darkness
how I could hear it whispering my name
I didn't fall asleep until I saw the sun)

but
I think the funny thing
Is how even after days in bed
My every need passed over on a platter
(From six feet away)
Recovery is not a steep *****

Over a week, and I'm still hacking up phlegm
(I realize that's disgusting to picture
Trust me, tasting it is worse)

Oh, so I should be grateful
"It's not covid, so you're fine"
(Not that I got tested,
I have a sensitive nose
It bleeds very easily.
Decided it was safer to stay home)

"I'm sorry, but we have to cancel
Thanksgiving.... No, we don't think we're contagious, but we want to be sure.... Thank you for understanding!"

My sister was showing symptoms
The strep test was negative
A doctor says it was allergies

That's nice, but a 99.8
Isn't allergies

So yes
The funny thing
Is the recovery
But only because there doesn't seem to be any of it.
words tumbling in my head got too loud again.
stay safe guys
wear a mask
don't get sick, it *****
So this is how it ends?
All of the fizzle and bang and loose threads?
Saltwater wounds, tightrope casualty, red burning throats
This is not laryngitis 
This is my heart shredding it's home, trying to escape
And maybe it learned it from you
Saw the escapist make her out of a trap called loyalty,
decided it wanted to give it try,
realized too late that you can take yourself out of a home
but the pain always follows
Craig Dotti Jan 2010
Never mind the best of us
I, I have seen the rest of us wander out into the desert parking lots, exodus from bars and rest stops with no sleep drunk behind wheels that take them no where in particular.
Bodies and minds prostituted in our highest universities. “Before I throw you out of my class may I ask you why you have such a sense of entitlement?”
We are all entitled to learn and to do it at no greater cost than our time and our blood and fears and ambition.

We have gone on too long to see men without women and men with out men. Men without *** because there is no revolution. The women are too busy texting while driving and they are now dead. Free love is as dead as communism and the act of necking at the drive in.

Men are turned boys again who live on couches in one room basements in basements in basements in cages. Just where they ought to be, youthful beasts, who wish to make more of their lives, wish to make anything at all.

I have worked shoulder to shoulder with those that do not want to work because it can’t even pay the bills. Why dig your own grave only to die trying to dig your way out?
And yet even to the lucky ones death never comes. There is no cold, only the burn of want, ever and always.

Perhaps money is a sickness far greater than those who suffer and sweat through swine flu and strep throat, have broken legs, loose bowls and AIDS. HA! For money won’t afford them the 300 hundred dollar lift in the ambulance. So even the dead are not dead, they are being ****** instead.

Then there are the zombies those that walk both day and night, rather, endless night, loyally addicted to a tin of tobacco or a real wicked pack. Forget what they tell you about health risk, at 7 bucks a pop tabbacy can’t feed your baby and winter is coming fast.

People have forgotten the elderly that walk the sides of the roads waiting for handicapped access to their graves. Perhaps it’s because the old has forgotten the young just as much. But lest we forget, I speak to you as a fountain of youth.

“Let them eat cake!” OR feast on handfuls of Slim Jims and pour me a tall, warm Pap’s Blue Ribbon because bread and eggs and water are for the Prince of Monte Carlo and food stamps are too passé, besides they aren’t even stamps anymore!

I want to cry for the many with broken hearts sewn together through strings of text messages and with the precession of a Nike sweat shop worker. The heart of the world is coming undone. Touch the next person you see before it’s too late.

Finally a word to the wise, more specifically the literate: My generation knows God is dead (we found his body in one of those soggy bar parking lots after a night of Quizzo) yet so is science (Discovery Channel is way boring nowadays). We are alone as a tree in Brooklyn.
St. Catharines light in the afternoon: lead oxide, pink white, dry mud shadows.
They lay on her living room carpet and Anthony gloated over Milly
Her cotton nightgown, her long back, and round shoulders: proof at last.
"So this is gloating. It is better to gloat than to doubt. It took me a long time."

Her clean faded quilt brought from the balcony rail: it
Smells of clean laundry and cold air and the thrill of their power.
He’s proud to be the lover of a heroine,
And happy that he can see her this way.”

Picnic kisses tasting of smoked oysters and beer.
There were never friendly kisses of love before?
"Milly, I love hearing how you defied the adults."

He told Hansel and Gretel to her child, who had strep throat,
And told it again, knowing it would work,

Seeing the bookshelves, seeing her notebooks,
Knowing that he would have his life after all:

                      The mispronounced words of a solitary reader,
                       The red skirt on the chair, the gold necklace of coins.


                   Paul Anthony Hutchinson
www.paulanthonyhutchinson.com
Copyright Paul Anthony Hutchinson
POSSIBLE Feb 2022
Ya,

I got my limits
Been here since
hell and back

breathless from carrying Blood and flesh
Bone-World curved to welcome back

Shape-dependent gimmicks tracing  
fresh tension lines followed right on track.

Invisible Limits.....    /   /     /    / .......
Can't see em, so I cant follow back

Right on track, tongue-tied and strapped up
with a strep throat still, its my turn to step up

else Lady luck might step back, all clammed up
**** I Just hoping this note will...

Curse hope, bless action
See its My cipher to rap now

My meaning to unpack; but how?
Courage and Care is a fact plowed

Strength in the face of what we can bear
Samsara, its a Wheel of time turning back now

The only time I show me limits is always
Vulnerable. still hanging in ghetto hallways

Your place safe and sound, you need but call me
I show me, I mean all ME. I mean All Men, I mean Amen. Ah man...

Living shadow, ghost abode, the heart just saying love me
love me, love me,  love me, lord. Keep me warm.

I've never been so cold as looking at the tribe
around the fire's with that fine glow.
Where Freezing feels like final.

breathless from carrying
Bone, Blood and Flesh, flush chested
Do your best, Dont love any less
See your smile, its a breath

to me ...(and Im swimming seas till im Seasick, waves painting a scene sick)

Those curves like Pieces of music,
Kicking hard as I can swimming like im Sea-kick
movement aligned to life and death.

my hide or hair, which can these save?

Music lines and strings of words, its like church to all of us
You see its Cake or death

not willing to lose it, like the chirps of birds seem to follow up
as the morning fights for breath.
Savio Reyes Mar 2014
We were up all thru out the terrible night
sniffling like ******* addicts
like sick little youth 1930's depression oh the Great
our fat lips hung like dying mosquitoes in the coming brothel of winter and her long scorched dress
that I inflamed with my Vietnam stolen lover zippo of gasoline
in a Sober frenzy of jealousy
now her Glare is angled narrowly at lust
tobacco
coughing up and down side ways in dreams as if I were a butterfly addicted to cigars

we were up all thru out the night
counting our skin cells
watching the television laugh at our faces
He sobbed “how the orange metallic streets
bent to our theatrical emotions on 12th street”
oh the glory of our thoughts and touch was ransom
was devil
was god
was god watching in his leather seat?
Wearing his glasses
reading the Bible?
Or does he read Russian Literature
or does he only read Latin

I and I were up all last night
guessing Morphine
using the Sister's pay-phone copper to connect with silly 3 eyed hipster hookers
their eyes wide and green with white salt like a ***** lake
that you stumble upon drunkardly with a laughing Angel
High on Cough Syrup and mortality
amused
exhilarated
passion-ated by this new opportunity for Adventure's drawback which is death or Boredom

MY innocents
is deteriorating with Age
like the alcoholic richness of 100 year old Wine
sadly
money monday
didn't go to church
hope that lady with wisdom in her hands forgives me

then I ate
now I starve
clutching at the windows
painting a boy staring at me

wondering if I were real
As I wonder if his thoughts are my own

We were up all night
translating the moon's shadows and hiccups into finger paintings and strep throat.
Spencer Craig Nov 2014
she came from a broken home, wasn't to ambitious
and the fact she was loose was surreptitious
she did this to make up for what her childhood lacked
so she picked dudes up and droped them quick like jacks
so it wasn't surprising that after a while
her abdomen became an embryo's domicile
she didn't want it but her parents weren't pro-choice
she might as well have had strep throat, had no vocie
her days were then filled with insults down right explict
all this for just one unsurpervised visit
after nine months of the tribulations of misogyny
it was time to bring forth her progeny
after a few ardous hours she gave birth
to a girl which suprisingly filled her with mirth
she  relized she had something to live for
and she promised to give her
everything she need and to not let anything encumber
her daughter's success as she watched her slumber
she named her rose because she if it took till the world's doom
she would nuture this child untill she finally blooms
i know the lines are a bit to long in this song and it would be very helpful if someone would help me truncate them. thanks!
Ali Dec 2016
My mom never let me play in ball pits
She said they were filled with germs
If it were up to me I'd have played in them
But I had to live by her terms where
As healthy baby born and raised
Only germs would get me sick
So I chose to stay away
Although I thought it was a trick

My mom never let me play in ball pits
She'd say they are covered in bacteria
And that's all the criteria needed
For her method of protection
Against the risk of infection
But correction
What about the protection
I needed from my own reflection

Pinching and tucking and *******
In my stomach to make the image in the mirror hurt less
Fighting and crying and trying
Did my mom really do her best

Now I'm not blaming her for the absurdity
For it was me who created my insecurity
That I failed to overlook each day
But it's ok
Because my mom never let me play in ball pits

Each of us our has own struggles or disease
Not just the flu or strep throat
Mine was the desire to please
Let go of all the worries
But I could not let the war cease

We can hope for the best and pray
But if we all get sick anyway
I must admit
That sometimes I wish I played in ball pits
florence Sep 2012
I have to hold back my tears. No one can see me like this, vulnerable and not in control. 
They think that i can fend for myself, what do they know? Truth is im in need for their help, for their opnion and inspiring words.
For a long time it was me in the middle of the sandwhich. My older sister covering me, and i protecting my ypunger twin.
Its funny how the sandwhich turns into how my life is today. My older sister takes up all the spotlight, claimig it allfor herself. Absorbin all the attention until there is none left. I shake at the words she wont utter, like a simple please or thank you. How she would never help my mother how she leaves my mother fighting so hard, as she sits on the couch and jist watches. When my mother asks for her help she will make it more like a burden then helping out of respect. I will do any of those thigs in a heart eat just to take the stress off of my moms shoulders. But again thats how we differ...

As for my twin the one that i had felt the need to protect since we had been in the wound together 16 years ago. How can i put in words all the feelings she leaves on me? She is so irritable yet i yearn to watch her succeed. She is as slow as a turtle, yet sometimes shes as sharp as a knife . Some nights ill catch her talking to herself, it pains me to see her over think things. After so much effort of tryin to help her all i can do now is make beleive im sleeping, pull the covers over my head and let the tears roll down my cheek, burning it under their touch. She has this problem and the tendency to ovetthink thongs from the stipidest things to the most important. She lays them all on the same scale not considekg the dfferences betwene them . As muh as she overthinks , when she has an idea she lets it cloud her judgement.l
 I remember thst one time in our cribs its blurr but i still feel it in my blood. Diane had my moms attentiom absorbed for she was alsay a cryer even when her head hutt a lottle bit. Michelle  was sick with strep having my moms also and my dads granparents. Then my head throat and whole body was killing .. All i remmeber was keeping my mouth shut. And waitig for someone to come ask me how i was feeling. Which no one did.And still as i cry typing this no one will ask me how im feeling, for i have middle child syndrome
Douglas Beights Feb 2014
The bad time you had in the spring time was a warning of things to come,
A hot summer full of flu vaccinations and strep throat.
You were so sick.
I was so happy for you,
Because, that hospital is truly my sanctuary.
The white floors are moderately endearing,
And the custodial staff has always been cordial.
Just stay out of the cafeteria, okay?
That was **ours.
SøułSurvivør Jun 2015
---

If you read my last post you
know that I was in a relationship
which has ended. I was devastated.
I have been writing about how
depressed I have been.

That was before I watched a YouTube video of a sermon given by
Bill Johnson. It was about resting and
abiding in God. After viewing this i went outside onto my porch and talked to God. Never before had HIS LOVE for me been so palpable.
Or His voice so clear.

My dear friends. He has a plan and purpose for everything that happens to us. We are being systematically tried and purified to be inspired and blessed to have HIM in our hearts and minds. Our very lives are at stake.

Events will be taking place that will try our very SOUL. We MUST be prepared! We must be very strong to survive. Not only physically. But our souls must be prepared as well.

The devil has been sitting on me.
He's a fire that has been heating up my mettle. He has been pounding me. With doubt. Denial. And DECEIT. Telling me that I am not good enough. That I am bipolar and will never get better. But I am a sleeping giant! Not in myself. Never that. But the God I serve is awesome beyond comprehension!

These are things I have done with him working through me.

A woman with double phnemonia, strep throat and "incurable" bronchitis brought on by asthma
was healed overnight.

A woman with chronic depression was healed as I watched her start to giggle then LAUGH OUT LOUD! Holy laughter seemed to bubble up in her and she was healed!

My dad (who says he is an atheist) was cured of cancer. He's been cancer free for six years!

I've said the prayer of Salvation with a man who was a "Devil's Disciple".
A notorious motor cycle gang. He had killed three people. I saw him change before my eyes as the demons left him! He nearly fell off his chair. And this hardened man wept in my arms for 10 minutes afterwards.

The list goes on. NOT ANYTHING THAT I DID... EXCEPT I WAS TOTALLY SOLD OUT TO GOD AND ALLOWED HIM TO WORK THROUGH ME!

My name is Catherine Jarvis. I'm a SoulSurvivor. *And VICTORIOUS!!!
Kelly EC Nov 2013
I didn't think I could love you more
Than I did that day
When I looked into your eyes
And let your giggles fall to the kitchen floor
And surround me,
With the realization that my life would lack everything
Without you there beside me.

I didn't think I could love you more
Than I did that day
When you threw all caution out the window.
I had washed the strep from my clothes and sheets
And made clear to you the boundaries for your safety,
But you kissed me stubbornly,
Full and passionately,
Risked your health just to be there with me.

I didn't think I could love you more
Than I did that day
When I cried on your shoulder
And told you all of my shameful secrets,
Not expecting you to forgive me or think of me the same,
But you wiped away my tears with a soft stroke of your hand
And told me you love who I was and who I am.

I didn't think I could love you more
Than I did today
When my family grew with the addition of yours.
I laughed until I cried with your cousin,
Held you close as we flew through the fields,
And I met your many morning wake-up calls and kisses
With dreams of our love-filled future.

I won't think I can love you more
Than I will that day
When we're all gathered together.
I'll watch you place the ring on my finger.
I'll tell you 'I do'
And I'll continue to love you more and more every day,
Although I'll never think it possible.
rayma Oct 2022
the way i interact with people gives them bite-sized pieces –
a wince, a sigh, a rant about the last appointment.
i catch myself in surprise when i say i was at the doctor
and they ask if i’m okay, two question marks in their voice,
and i can’t help but laugh before i say yes.
i guess most people go to the doctor for physicals and check-ups,
maybe for strep throat or a sprain,
and not for half an answer,
weeks of waitlists,
waiting.
maybe they’ll even see me tired,
puffy-eyed and curled up on the couch like i came with it,
feeling like a drag when i shake my head and say i’ll stay while they go.
in little moments, if they’re looking, they’ll see me labor up the stairs,
an amused echo of ‘but you’re so young!’ flashing through my mind
as each step sends a sharp pain through my knees.
“you go first,” i insist, hanging back with a smile
before climbing in their wake.
RisingUp Dec 2015
A documentary watched
Displaying the lives of the broken
The tortured

We are able to understand physical abuse
But mental abuse,
Is pushed to the side

And so the mentally ill ride this never-ending tide
Of stigma, misunderstanding, misinterpretation

You broke your leg? Get a cast at the doctor's.
You have a sore throat?  A quick strep test will work.
A voice in my head tells me I'm not good enough and shouldn't eat....

Asking an average person gives you the average answer,
What? How can you not eat? That makes no sense.
And thus you're pushed behind a fence.
Dealing with your thoughts and flaws internally
As you fade for what seems like the rest of eternity

For most, it's impossible to comprehend
How one could hate themselves so much
That they'd rather be thin, or smart, or pretty,
or else have their life end.

Depression, schizophrenia, anorexia nervosa
Bipolar disorder, bulimia, obsessive compulsive disorder.
Diseases of the mind
Cures which dedicated people are trying to find.

Yet until then they live with these conditions
And people's misconceptions

But if just one person lends a listening ear
A non-judgmental interaction,
They can provide help to many far and near.
David Crum Feb 2016
I detach.
Pain tolerance is a fascinating thing don't you think? I certainly hope mine is raised slightly by virtue of suffering, practice making perfect and all

II examine
Pain from the most common of illnesses, common for me anyway as I get it once a year(strep)
Feels absolutely mind blowing,
It takes my breath away, so I belittle the sensations.
pick it apart, each twinge and searing itch.
Why is it in my ears?

III conclusion
I am a big grump when I'm sick.
But laying in bed does give one time to meditate. And wonder, the things I strive for, that I love and lust for: how much will they hurt?
Duane Kline Oct 2023
For Hannah

She's sitting at the
kitchen table,
Full of strep and forced
to read a book
by a mom who believes
the mind can continue to flourish
while its carrying case
suffers.

Forcing fluids,
killing biotic enemies
She sits silently
while I listen to the
Happiest Music I know,
Linus and Lucy;
She frowns,
more from pain
than distaste.

Mom cooks lasagna
and brother scouts the fridge.
Nothing looks good
She thinks.
She says.
She feels.
A Baltic atoll nigh
I am but a giant
of enlightenment
as I've been both years
here yet develop
strep in tears despair
days that might
stay when I came to
love our being still
mystery now season
in newly gotten wiles
only there to impress
a red rover machine
and target afresh
dreamscape by canal.
Robyn Dec 2012
In a day of lust and longing
I listened for your step
And now I'm trapped at home
With a nasty case of strep

With all the love I've given
You'd think you'd given in
But if love is what I'm giving
Then love must be a sin
Ashley Jul 2017
Most days, I wear
my depression, my anxiety,
my PTSD, like Girl Scout badges
I proudly sewed on a sash
and wear on my uniform to Brownies.

Part of a girls' club for which
my member's card never came home from school
or the mail,
but the ceremony was held anyway.
Induction was never an option,
and the meetings are held every day.

Reciting the motto,
and finger painting it everywhere;
it's my identity more often
than it isn't.

There are others outside the club,
who say maybe those badges could be replaced,
one by one, with items that are
more worthy of what life becomes;
More worthy of topics of conversation, they will bring more joy;
More entertaining than ****, or abuse,
or why sadness lingers like strep in my throat
that cannot be cured with the strongest of antibiotics.

I just want to get a badge that says I learned how to skip today.
I blew bubbles and they flew and glimmered into the wind.
I played hopscotch and counted to ten while remembering to breathe
and reciting my favorite rhyme.

Cognitive distortions, and it's always been like this;
Water fountain eyes with no thirst-quenching,
bruises spreading out in hand-shaped marks around my neck,
whispering not to speak;
Mom says I'm just looking for attention, while wanting to shrink
with all the clothes that no longer fit;
Dad hits me when -

There I go again.

I'll dream in cotton candy color of a future that dissolves
honey sweet between my teeth:
Carefully I'll sew on badges saying I graduated,
held down a job,
and became something.
This is one of the billionth drafts of an earlier poem I posted that is trying to be more "showing" and less "telling." I'm not sure what I think. Let me know? Thanks for any feedback <3
Kim Mar 2016
I always think I’m clean until I
look closer, put my glasses back on,
inspect my surroundings.
There’s love hiding between the cracks in the sidewalk,
and you can see it if you’re willing to look
close enough. Squat on the pale concrete.
Really get your face up close to it.
It’s there, I promise.

There’s love stuck under my fingernails
and I just can’t seem to scrub it out.
It’s between my toes, under my tongue, behind my ears.
I brush it out of my hair in the shower, but it always comes
back–like lice or a boomerang or the strep that keeps
invading my throat every few months.

I don’t think you’re there anymore, though.
I’ve emptied all my pockets, wrung out my freshly-washed
underwear, thrown away all my bras. You’re not in my shoes,
either, but I turn them upside down and shake sometimes
just to make sure.
Sometimes I wonder about the ratio of my lungs, how
much is water, blood, air, the sound of your voice,
or if it’s even there anymore.
Michelle Argueta Dec 2017
everybody hates chris hums on the television.
during commercial breaks, i stare at the ceiling,
feeling bed rest marooned.
cocooned in sweat-soaked blankets
dotted with crumpled kleenex
i ask myself for the first time:
“why am i alive?”

and it’s not that i want to die
although the strep throat
swelling up my lymph nodes
is hardly worth staying for,
but rather i ask what it means to be 10
and not able to see far beyond then
and where i fit into the hopscotch
criss-cross applesauce chaos
that is the world beyond the playground fence.

once im well again i ask my friends.
matthew strokes his hairless chin, then shrugs,
he doesn’t have time for existentialism,
he’s running late for cello lessons
so the question bounces off him like a
handball off a wall:
with a slap and a thump back down.

i ask tyler now.
he cares about me, but girls are gross.
he has a reputation to uphold,
which he won't if he tells me so.
he grasps for an answer,
not heartless, but manhunt tough,
“well, you make me laugh,
i think that’s good enough.”

that summer, he moved to texas.
facebook says he works at 7-11
and i wonder if on the night shift
when customers stop trickling in
and he’s mopping up puddles of slurpee
he remembers wrestling me on black top,
arms tangled in impossible knots,
fifth grade love and skinned knee blood
flowing between blows
and still laughs.
this probably would've worked better as a narrative essay or something but my prose skills are even worse than my poetry skills these days so here, have a poem.. also is it just me or was everybody hates chris like 100 times funnier when you were home sick on a school day??
james conway Jul 2016
The lines on this dusty road
The curly yellow lines of mothers
The stop signs of elders
Like the lines on this page
Drawn by columns of pipes and chains
Swirls and loops,
Are whispered by the muse

To infect your mind like they do mine
Crawl like no other and angle the same
Like no other

Is this map of disease? This mangle of dna
Like me?  Obscure and unmatched,
Unique, These words that we hurl
The pace, the spin like a baseball pitch
This pitch like no other or like some other
Lowly thrower?

These lines intrigue me with their varied
Shapes.. Hopeful slight diseases to pain your
Mind like the flu your body to
Alter thoughts like strep your throat
Little curly figures in your mind
Like none before with angles set the same
Amulet Atari Apr 2017
Sugar coats the bowl
Pass the pipe
Candy cigarettes
Sweet n ripe
breeding my sweetheart
For early death
Heart in my hands
Voice rough like strep
Liquor and tongues
Shoved down my throat
Flowers and vines,
pulled tight as a rope
Sugar coats the bowl so
Pass the pipe
ZACK GRAM Nov 2
Afraid 2 Touch

Strep
Bullet Wounds
Barely Alive
I Black OUT
2 Times 2 Day
Barely Breathing
Z OUT
Shots
HandiCap
Walking and Talking
If I Die
I Said Why
Terminal
7 Trumpet
(not that ye wondered,
but simply tubby like totally tubularly clear
The Epic of Gilgamesh will not be extolled here).

Though thoroughly well mapped, parsed,
     scrutinized vibrant wonders zoom
plethora, sans newly discovered life forms
     cradled with fecund Gaia's womb
abound within unlikely places

     such as mossy bearded faces
     nestling, pronouncing,
     and regaling pharaohs sarcophagus tomb
oceanographers also find organic entities
     adorning, kickstarting,

     and thriving within extremely
     remote temperature zones,
     where just enough telly tubby wiggle room
prevails for microscopic
     Verizon patronizing Grand Poobah

     barking orders unicellular viziers heed,
     while latter bedecked
     with itty bitty plume
invisible to the naked eye, yet within
     subatomic world wide web

     bit players air heir loom
appearing larger
     then cereal grain re: life,
     an arrogant, bumptious, and conceited Don
     doth trump his young

     unbridled, reprobate, and ornery baron as groom
material to check mate
     distracted checkered populace,
     where raucous, rebellious, riotous
     majority lumpenproletariat fuss and fume

cuz gaudy Mar-a-Lago hiss poe tate
     tow headed (faux towering
     Taj Mahal doppelganger),
     via slow vac didst **** socialist rowdy
bot tinny Rajah,

     whose apprenticeship to exhume
(pro bone know) spy bots
     miserably condemned from the get go
     as president erupted rabidly trying to doom
rousing, scenting, and trawling

     non-convincing "witch hunt,"
     yet incontrovertible evidence carelessly
     swept hurriedly under the rug
     (by Russ Shins) via broom,
thus a sudden spike

     visa vis master card er...
     comeuppance will bring ringleader down
     with strep away poison
     nano trumps all abloom.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Now in summer re:
     this Dom minion doth attest
intention to write
     a boot equinox got out best
head, although pleasurable
     to loose imagination off chest

so thank you for
     letting me be a cerebral guest
and now...no dilly dallying,
     cuz another writing assign
     requires responding
     to Matthew Scott Harris's behest!
It’s a doggie dog world so watch where you step
Foot in mouth syndrome is spreading like strep
But a house of prevention is worth more than liqueur
Have a spoon full, a mind full, are you feeling demure?  

Inside effects may include outlaws of vision
But don’t freeze your auntie, make a thawed out decision
Keep on pugging, plugging a way
You will fly like a beagle, as every doc has his day

While thyme keeps on dripping into the tincture
And limericks rhyme everything, except the kitchen sphincter
Now refill your subscription and do as I say
Because a Hornaday keeps the doctor away

And give us this tray, our daily meds
While terrier-ism threatens to Smirnoff our heads
It’s a mystery wrapped in poodle, but misery loves coventry
And it takes a heckuva lot, to go parking up a wrong tree

Just another Shih-Tzu day, making trouble in paradise
Ain’t nothing but a ground hog, gone skating on the nice
Though I wouldn’t herd a fly, or let a wafer stray
Don’t doubt the Roman knows my aroma was built in a day

— The End —