"thermostat" poems
When you're around
Someone slips down the thermostat
Plays it like a violin
Drifting a decent toward
The most poignant Minor cord.
I feel lost within myself
Like an island watching a beautiful ship
Sail by without stopping.
And yet-
You leave and it aches;
Hurts like the thud of pulse
Behind a ripening bruise...
Feels as though my heart is about to
Rend my ribs and squelch
Painfully though the cracks
To slither away in your general direction.
In your absence
I realize that simple things
Can grow into necessity.
Tiny seedlings who take root
Can somehow cross time to become
A redwood with roots so deep
The foundation of the earth is never the same
When it falls.
Air is everywhere
And yet when its gone
Beneath tidal waves
It's more precious than gold;
Riches mean nothing when you're drowning.
Feb 22, 2016
Feb 22, 2016 at 1:12 PM UTC
I see that
you're messing
with
her thermostat again.
Comatose is a wonderful degree.
Isn't it?
Someday,
He will
abandon the circular life,
to live
the line life.
For
"life" has no
need to explain its course.
Life simply is.
Life simply happens.
&
Life simply exists.
Even when you're "dead".
Questions lurk below every theory.
But skeptics,
can be
two-faced
coin-cunts.
Sometimes.
So ask away & Find out for yourself.
Always remember:
That the Dumps
have
never
been
adequate to inhabit.
Fight or Flight.
Flight,
is my only option.
High up.
High on.
Out o' here.
In times of desperation,
it is understandable,
to be influenced by instinct.
However,
it is inexcusable
to forever live
in desperation.
You deserve better.
Cause you're the best. <3
Apr 17, 2012
Apr 17, 2012 at 2:16 PM UTC
Peppermint tea
it reminds you of me
so remember to drink it slowly
Ill drink a cup or two
'cause it reminds me of you
as it worms me up
Rising high
my fahrenheit
you keep me warm
all through the night....My Peppermint Tea
It leaves that cool after taste
kinda like it snowing when i left that day
dropping fast on the thermostat
left on a plane
unaware of when i'd be back...My Peppermint Tea
We had ourselves a tea
Mar 9, 2013
Mar 9, 2013 at 1:01 AM UTC
In the land of Temperature
I met Thermostat - Thermometer
What does thermometer do anyway?
A thermometer tells you the temperature whether it’s cold or hot
But it does nothing about the situation it identifies
It only measures and whether we like it or not
What about thermostat?
Thermostats function in a way that when it senses a room is cold,
it quickly and quietly starts the machinery necessary to bring the cold room to an acceptable temperature
If a room is hot, a thermostat cues the system to cool the room
It restores the balance, it assess the situation and make a difference.
I named her Thermostat – Thermometer
‘Cause she can be a thermostat to others
When she senses there’s something wrong around her
She always does something to make it right like a thermostat does
Sadly, she can only be a thermometer to herself
She knows there’s something wrong with her
Yet she can’t do something
‘Cause she also needs a thermostat
A thermostat to make it right for her
It makes me wonder how many people out there
Acting like thermostat to others
But they can only act as thermometer to theirselves
Hoping that someday
A thermostat changes the situation where they are in
Jul 26, 2013
Jul 26, 2013 at 6:20 AM UTC
Sven and Olie died and went to Hell. After awhile, the Devil came by to see how his new guests were doing. To his amazement, he found Sven and Olie were still wearing their winter gear and seemed to be quite comfortable. The Devil asked why they weren't hot.
Olie replied, "We come from Minnesota where it's always cold. This is feeling pretty good to us." This upset the Devil, so he turned up the thermostat. Awhile later the Devil looked in again on Sven and Olie. To his surprise he found they were still wearing their winter gear. The Devil questioned them on it again. "You have to remember that we are from Minnesota and it's very, very cold there. This is feeling nice to us."
The Devil was even madder at this, so he turned the thermostat all the way up to maximum temperature. The Devil waited some time and then went back to Sven and Olie. This time he found they had only unzipped their coats, but still had all their winter clothes on. The Devil couldn't understand what was going on. The punishment down here was supposed to be the unbearable heat. It wasn't working on these two. He had to ask again what the deal was. Sven replied, "We are Minnesotans and we just got over a freezing winter. This is really great for Olie and Me.
A light flickered in the Devil's mind. He went to the thermostat and turned it off. He thought if the heat wasn't a punishment, maybe he'd give them some freezing temperatures. A little while later the Devil came back to check in on Sven and Olie only to find them cheering and giving each other high fives, happier than ever! The Devil questioned them on their actions and Sven said happily, "Back home they always said, the Vikings will win the Super Bowl when Hell freezes over!!!"
source: http://www.jokebuddha.com/Minnesota#ixzz3Ge5tdz3A
Oct 19, 2014
Oct 19, 2014 at 9:50 PM UTC
Smoky pores: so familiar
sticky necks and inner elbows
alone I am a flamingo
in soft pink cotton
free chested
bare legged
artificial air
from blades spun wild-
a source for white noise
and companionship
I miss the greasy weather
take away my wired bed
shove it under the frame
to spend this time together
most exposed
as I sleep
admire my black heads
and the semi-permanent
smell of fire and ammonia
despite the bursting thermometer
and idle thermostat
your breath on my arms is no nuisance
wake me up at six in the morning
and kiss my smoky skin
Oct 21, 2012
Oct 21, 2012 at 4:41 PM UTC
By: Cedric McClester
You know he’s full of stuff
When the evidence ain’t enough
And he’s acting like a cream puff
By not calling Putin’s bluff
If I labeled him a scaredy-cat
Or better yet Putin’s new doormat
Would that raise the thermostat,
And flush out that Norway rat?
When the evidence is irrefutable
To the point that it’s not disputable
His response is always mutable
And comes out as most unsuitable
Then his mouthpiece attempts to frame
An alibi, but we’re hip to her game
She can’t absolve him of the blame
Though she tries to just the same
So you better believe and trust
That she looks ridiculous
When she’s being duplicitous
By trying to fool the rest of us
It’s a sin to stand there and lie
But she gives it a college try
Like the mistress of deny
As if the Ten Commandment don’t apply
They interfered with our election
With a clear cut interjection
Of cybernet deflection
Without protest or objection
Two days before his inauguration
He was told of the Russian’s participation
Much to his own consternation
Yet he still voices reservations
Cedric McClester, Copyright © 2018. All rights reserved.
Jul 19, 2018
Jul 19, 2018 at 1:15 PM UTC
It's a weird feeling, being in love and lonely all at the same time
To put your whole heart into something you can't see
You know long distance relationships are tough
But what's hard is looking across the room at the eyes you love
And feeling every inch like they were miles
Seeing your cheeks turn to stone when I try to make you laugh
Feeling every could-be-kiss like a character from a book
Reading their stories
Making my heart race
Leaving my lips as dry, chapped, cracked as they always are
I sweat in my sleep from your body heat
While my veins freeze over from the warmth of your affection
I keep looking at the thermostat because I don't want to be cold anymore
But we're already sitting in our own *** sweat at eighty two degrees
And I can't make you care enough to smile anymore
But apparently I'm trying hard enough to get you to stay
Or more accurately hard enough for you not to leave
Leaving is hard work anyway
And feeling loved is nice
I imagine
At least that's what I've heard.
Dec 2, 2012
Dec 2, 2012 at 11:34 AM UTC
~
*Strapped to the catapult
I sportively plan my escape
By listening to pictures
In stereo
Of the flight
Of a fitful fugitive
Who sculpted depressions in ice
Throughout the flowerbed
Where there is no true sunlight
Only its influence
And by inhaling this fragility
Onto glass
Lowering the thermostat
Like a guillotine
Until hypothermia
Took his oppressors
This coldness might well
Be everlasting
But then, so is the will to survive*
~
Aug 7, 2021
Aug 7, 2021 at 1:53 PM UTC
-Houston Chronicle, 10.1.2018
A robot wandered the mean streets alone
While lighting up and smoking his last transistor
Remembering an IBM long gone
“Buy me a WD-40, mister?”
A ****** thermostat took him to Radio Shack
And talked about some Texas Instruments she knew
A Compaq sent them to a room out back -
“Do ya wanna undo my phillips *****
He paid the thermostat some gigabytes
And then…
He was mugged by a relay who put out his lights
Oct 2, 2018
Oct 2, 2018 at 7:23 AM UTC
i read like a thermostat
i feel cold shrill of eyes
hot blisters of souls
i’ve seen aplenty
fully literate to the hunger
inside denim of men
with twenty tongues
pulling their weight
like untrained dogs
they lick my face to a swell
heating and cooling
my metals expand
silvers contracting
but I can very much tell
who is ready
who is not
some do
some talk
if you'd like
to open me wide like a mouth,
be mean with your smile
to get my thaws down to feet,
**** fire to the wind
with the door
wide open
let
it
all
hang
i’m very keen on intense
i salute a heavy gut
and the confidence of a mutt
an appetite
and if I’m truly your win,
jackhammer
the thermostat
out of the wall
get the wires all bent
and with violence
cement
the
type
of
love
that
knocks
me
dead
completely illiterate
i don’t want to think
Mar 24, 2017
Mar 24, 2017 at 12:23 PM UTC
At eighteen I'm the scent of second-day hair with perfume in it
It smells like your bed, and my sweat, and your exhales, and my Juicy Couture Viva la Juicy . How middle school of me.
I'm the cool touch of unwashed sheets on bare skin because the thermostat is fussy and I like sleeping naked
Just me, you, and this body that I don't like so much right now, but I'm eighteen, and I'm working on that.
I'm leggings while they still pass for pants, and the chewed up ends of pens in twenty different colors
Chinese homework has really turned me into such a biter, and I claim to love all those darling pens equally, but I show my blue pens the most love
I've teethed them half to death
I'm not even close to halfway to death assuming things go well for me. Oh, please let things go well for me.
At eighteen I'm the taste of chai and menthol because that's what's **** these days
I'm all about what's **** these days. Apathy, really bad electronic music, bare midriffs.
Funny since at eighteen I don't want anyone to touch me
This body is my project, please don’t even look at me like this, all insecure and exposed. Please just let me curl up, and please let me be by myself.
I wish my mother were here to bring me a popsicle. My throat hurts from all the screaming I do these days.
At eighteen I guess I'm still a little angsty, but I just want you to love me
God, do I want you to love me.
I want you to patronize me with the warmth of your arms and undress me with strong, resolved hands
Don't touch me, just look at me and tell me that I'm perfect and naive because at eighteen I'm still milky white, soft, and broken
I'm a sight for sore eyes, a new sight, your sight
For god's sake
Just love me.
May 23, 2014
May 23, 2014 at 11:39 PM UTC
Say when in a heartbeat will
light dwindle down to the
dance on a taper and mirror-eye
bells?
Say how long a lifetime im-
possible it's quite im-
possible
(expecting that wilted
red flower sunk into
its vase to rise up and smell as
though)
what's that?
alive?
Sep 15, 2012
Sep 15, 2012 at 12:04 AM UTC
Old friends sat on their hands
Leaning forward
swinging their feet
like second grade
1313 Primrose Street
The first thing I ever memorized
Except for the hollow fear
of empty footsteps
following me from Texas
The sharks always fascinated me
Charged me with fear
and apprehension
Evil dark black eye of devotion
They were all maneaters
Her skin was sandpaper thin
She made me always bleed
She drank shark's liver oil
and made me always smile
She was a maneater
On a mountaintop
my love came alvalanching down
Even January's cold
was no match for what I was told
Drove back to Birmingham
with the thermostat stuck
But I didn't care
I couldn't be colder
frozen in my forlorn heart of despair
Oct 28, 2014
Oct 28, 2014 at 8:22 AM UTC
Destroy me
You phantom of a frostbit branch
The window thin as ice but
Thick enough to shut you out, I'd say
To throw a cold shoulder
But you hold the thermostat in your palm
To bade our blades much colder
It falls so softly, induces
Coughing, ravaged throats
Coated in mucus and eucalyptus
And dry as toast
Your accumulation stings.
Builds around my every-thing
Traps me, while you sag on limbs
Sapping at the sight of heat, you
Squelch beneath studded rubber
Soles, and unsuspecting stockings
We react to you in opposites
Sway a daydream tropical
In stiff and childish ways of yours, you drop your toys
Ground to numbing dust
So it falls among the rest of us just waiting
For your twin's return
It's not your choice, to have remains
That soak the grains of greater plains
That lavish in the wreck of your rule.
But to keep the warmth, from coming on
Long after silver bells are gone
Are cold and jealous actions of a fool.
Feb 24, 2013
Feb 24, 2013 at 10:52 PM UTC
When love sat neatly on the stove
Bubbling with content.
I never dreamt a fuse would blow
And leave such discontent.
When all my cakes were browning well
And soufflé neatly risen.
I never dreamt the heat would cool
And leave me in derision.
For many years my cooker worked
I was proud of all I made.
I never dreamt the power would fail
And leave me so dismayed.
But when the hotplate starts to cool
And pots refuse to simmer
I never dreamt your love would die
And leave without a glimmer.
My thermostat no longer clicks
My tiny red lights gone.
I never dreamt I’d miss them so
And depend so much upon.
The food of love that fed my heart
Is suddenly all-cold.
I never dreamt I’d lose it
Until I grew quite old.
Now I’ll starve and grow quite weak
I’m living on stale crumbs.
I never dreamt we’d come to this
No longer are we chums.
I cannot find the right fuse wire
My circuit breakers stuck
I never dreamt my torch would go
I’ve run right out of luck.
Oh God! Send someone to fix it
Before I’m without light
I never dreamt a love like that
Could leave us over night.
Dec 26, 2009
Dec 26, 2009 at 9:13 AM UTC
my hands would like to thank your hands
for the time we were drunk out of our minds
but your hands knew enough
to hold, not grab
to hold, not push
to hold,
and hold on.
my hands would like to thank your hands
for being constants, not variables.
for having a thermostat so perfect,
holding hands is like entering
a fire-warmed cabin
after a snowstorm -
and you’re the only light around for miles.
but most importantly,
my hands
would like to thank your hands
for keeping other things from my hands;
things that shouldn’t be found in hands,
like the last cigarette
or a sharp pointy object -
and the last time
it was desperation that
got the better of me;
and not your hands.
Jul 6, 2016
Jul 6, 2016 at 7:56 AM UTC
I command it all
with imperious verbal commands
automation through the ether
my lights come on
the television, voice activated
spoken queries answered by the
computer in my home
- sports scores
- weather
- news
- reminders
vibration of my vocal chords
compels my thermostat
orders my groceries
and plays my music
I am the master of my domain
and yet now, more than ever,
I control
nothing
Jan 8, 2016
Jan 8, 2016 at 10:35 PM UTC
*it is three in the morning again
and i'm clinging to the t-shirt you gave me
i've whispered your name thirty seven times
to the dust on my nightstand
and the ink stains on my bedspread.
i imagine you cling to her warmth
you no longer have to lie next to
my stone cold, anemic body
i shiver at the thought
or maybe it is the fact
that i have not eaten much
this week and that the weather
is quite frigid for the month of march.
i pull your t-shirt closer to me, trying to
create some sort of heat source. i haven't
had the thermostat on since you left
because i do not have the money to pay
for such things.
the musky scent of you no
longer lingers off your t-shirt,
my old roommate threw it in the wash
so i threw her out.
I cling tighter to your t-shirt
causing my knuckles to crack
and the dry, crisp skin on my
hands to split open
the pain doesn't hurt anymore
i am used to this pain*
Mar 20, 2015
Mar 20, 2015 at 7:02 PM UTC
everything is always out of focus, and the lens won't adjust.
i can't ever see lightning or romance. hell, i can't even see the top of the world when i'm comfortably on its shoulders and all i want to do is help bear some of the weight.
my bones have never known a shortage of blankets,
just anguish over idly watching the thermostat push the tea kettle to a breaking point where all it can do is scream.
glasses can't fix this.
Jun 11, 2016
Jun 11, 2016 at 1:56 AM UTC
Sustenance for my frail body
contained in gel-coated pills
split into thirds,
one for morning,
one for night,
one to slip beneath my tongue.
A glass of water
–or milk, with breakfast–
rumbles through my throat,
resists peristalsis,
hits stomach.
The heater clicks on
as the thermostat flashes 68 degrees,
then shuts off at night,
replaced by
one sheet,
one throw blanket,
one quilt.
Your hand, inches from
my fingertips,
not yet near enough
for electricity to jump between,
will go unacknowledged;
one feeble attempt at loving within my means.
Feb 8, 2015
Feb 8, 2015 at 8:15 PM UTC
You were told this was perfection.
But isn't it ironic
How that man did not create the universe in seven days,
And you were not born without original sin?
And after that night in the basement
You are definitely no ******
An attempt at a shotgun wedding
Ends up with a shotgun in your daddy's hand,
A lot of tears,
A few screaming last words,
And the secession from the union.
If I'm being over dramatic you may tell me to stop.
You got an old apartment
Where the thermostat doesn't control anything.
You're crying over the stretch marks,
And he's telling you it's just a permanent reminder
That she was once inside you,
And you guys were one person.
He is giving you a false sense of hope.
He leaves three weeks after Amelia is born,
He runs away with the waitress down at the diner.
She's pregnant too.
It's a boy.
You raise her to the best of your ability,
She is mentally ********
You do not have the money to take care of her
The way she needs to be taken care of.
You start doing heroine,
You did ******* before you were pregnant.
You end up hitting Amelia every day,
She is only seven.
Your landlord hears you
Screaming at her
When he comes to collect the rent on a saturday morning.
Amelia is taken away.
You are now in the corner.
You're not even crying,
You have drank yourself into a coma.
Congratulations.
You are not waking up.
It's ironic because your ******* name is Mary.
God **** it.
Aug 28, 2013
Aug 28, 2013 at 1:45 AM UTC
"You should never have set the thermostat to 'off'! Now my pipes are frozen & have no water!"
You should never have continued putting your alcoholism
Before all of your children
You should never have had to leave your job because you
Shoplifted and they let you off easy
You should have never taken away my house key because I
"Didn't deserve to have that privilege"
You should have been there for me when I told you
I wanted to die and that I needed you
You should never have asked me to lie to the one person I wholeheartedly trust
For the sake of protecting nothing & only further enabling your
Long-term delusional mind
You should have never given birth to me in the first place
If you planned on staying eighteen years old forever.
If accidentally leaving the house with freezing pipes and no water is the best way to say
**** you
Without actually saying it,
Then so be it.
(Sorry I'm not sorry.)
Dec 3, 2012
Dec 3, 2012 at 1:47 AM UTC