Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Jeremy Betts Dec 2023
Forget her
Don't suffer to remember just to suffer forever, sucker
Lust safer
Rub one out and see if the hunger doesn't expire a little quicker
Cold fire
Flip it 180 and record what's bound to transpire
Loves quagmire
Simple desire will always inspire but ensnare a liar

Shifty empire
Not strange to aspire to be a vicious, succubus, vampire
Almost satire
An enticing lure to offer for sure but unstable as brushfire
Situation's dire
Sooner than later fall victim to the inevitable backfire
Flimsy tightwire
An act in need of fools for hire, speaking to the choir

©2023
Doring — not much has changed since
you last spoke.
the children are still deep in the mud.
the bellhouse at Poblacion still rings
when it is 5 PM and the ubiquitous bazaar
   sit on the cornerstones.
however, when the white angels began
     latticing you to contraptions,
the furling scent of your homely perfume
      has gone dithering. grandpa Mario's
revolver is somewhere hidden wreathed
    under a wrestle of things we do not
use anymore — lottery tickets ( 4 AM, grandpa would fall asleep reeking of
    ale as the lady announces frail luck
over the somnolence. kitchenware longs
for the ****** of your tremulous hands. the Lazy Susan is attended by only a bundle of rotten bananas, Mario's old
nauticals: whiskey bottles, scotch, goblets, unrest of glasses. we still
buy pandesal near Beng's piano maestro.)

nothing much has changed since you
last spoke. mother held your hands longer than imagined trill of Maya outside tightwire. it didn't flood in the swelter of
the cataclysm — years ago it was deathly silent when you were sitting on the rocking chair waiting for the flood to subside, your grandchildren laying cold on the aged floorboard, rescued by
zigzag of newspapers. it was the lightest
of darknesses. nothing much has changed
    since you last spoke and in your
silence we heard the most immense of
voices. the streets remain pockmarked.
ocher pots festooned by wily flowers,
stems of hope. your hands tryingly gripping whatever
     was brought to their splendidness
looked like forever smiles.

Doring — the nights are fuller,
my sweet old etcetera of chores.

we all lay quietly in the mud for now.
For my grandmother, Adoracion.
i yield damages—

"On a marble bench, dreaming:
    I can never hold arms of war
   but i can cradle the artillery
      of love."

some excerpts of boyhood.
some lines written so long ago as
a distant dove hovers, postpones
the herding word,

yet so near to me as a crouched dark
clenched in corner, knowing all the bends and turns of the road.

if i am braver than all — imperative
enough to toss the fear out of night,
or to wring broad daylight of birds,
why must it decree me?

remembering it rearing all the stillness
flown in the wind, the storm of my
younger self crossing Earths in all sides,

treading the tightwire something still
i am the wind and the peril knows my name, making wounds real again.
Walking Along The Vine
So many walk along the skinny vines
scared to look down among the rolling seas of want
are the lives of so many that created their dreams
that was buried inside this body of mine..*

with trepidation on this tightwire act
no safety net lies below
and where the heart goes the body follows
trusting kindred souls to catch us when we fall

We have this shelter above our heads
from auto pilot to cruise control we speed along
being stuck in the rat race from nine to five
exchanging time for money of a life that is dead...


surrounded by a violently swirling
and turbulent , tempestuous world
trying to find peace and dignity
in a passionless and brutal place
we have only ourselves to run this race

In all moments of silence come the breaking news
I let you see the authentic me, the release of my destiny
lifting me to higher vibration, is my poetic contemplation
In this very moment ,We are free....


free to be, or not to be
but freedom is relative
as all at this event horizon can plainly see
waiting to be drawn into the singularity
where all is one and one is we

The sweetness of your smile, your look of love covers me
it makes me walk a mile, and the more time we spend talking
the more I start to feel your warmth, our intimate moments
last all night, as I sleepwalk through your dreams....


as Morpheus guides us along that ethereal plane
drawn toward what we do not fathom
a glittering paradise, resplendent with the dew of tomorrow
journey, do we, hand in hand to the edge of then
and open to possibility

Deborah and Wolf
Thank you again Wolf spirit aka quinfinn.. you are an awesome wonderful poet.... you honor me by writing with me
LJ Chaplin Aug 2016
Last night I had a dream
That I was
F
A
   L
    L
     I
     N
      G.

I wasn't falling down,
Nor falling in love,

I fell  a p  a   r    t.

It started slowly at first,
A single thread that fell out of place,
But then each strand expanded,
From inches to infinity,
Revealing flesh,
Bone
And the unwanted parts in-between.

Like Time and Space
I continued,
Relentlessly uncurling
Until I was nothing more
Than a tightwire
That even my heart
Could never walk.
© L.J. Chaplin
this is the mind’s subtle configuration:
    light, dark, vacuity. a metastasis of
    sound from dispersions. except
a few stray birds alight umbilical tightwire.
    i start to dream the clarity of something
comparable to                            

                                 ­                        vertigo.
                                           in that high place,
pouncing, daringly immense, this experiment
is in the mind’s operative. but you have no idea
what I am pertaining to, or what I am describing
to you, as I do not have maps to begin with, nor
do I have the blueprints to succinctly depict where
to go in case my lostness intersperses with yours:
that there is only precision in where we want to go,
but never where we are at present, and that in the long haul,
         long-winded ruminations are waste of time
and that to have wallowed deep in the grovel of mirth,
to sully in superfluity, and to give no care as though
    120 kilometers per hour in the expressway, shotgun,
hands spread in the sky towering like lampposts yearning
for a steady acquisition of light, the sounds that take the
  form of apparitions and we scream, yes we scream,
with tenderness and rhetoric,

                                          are, of course sensuous narratives
the heart measures in quatrain, in caesuras, in verse
    and breadth ( and or so, the simplified electric delight
      of a word’s sweet measure hurled to the rotund of ear as
     to move close in speaking / whispering )
to permit ourselves to boldly gasp for breath
     after the thrill of realizing the terseness of things,
               that allow us to speak beautifully for ourselves.
G Lachlan Curry Dec 2019
everything carries me to you"
my handwriting
her body
the perfection in simple affection causes a chain reaction
that's taken back, back before I knew the breath that will breathe upon my neck
...even back then my imagination of future foundation between us was seeming to be just a future of imagination and dreams.
no one seemed to make sense in the senseless nonsense we carried on with, yet we did it regardless
life lessons learned of Truth and pain and beauty and hate
the rage in wrong decisions always made opposite of our floating hearts that caused eyes always unable to ever depart from
simple stares that tore through bodies in hallways just to be noticed for brief moments
it was (and must I say about 2 life times ago) did I wondered where all this passion did go- till a slick Indian summer night my eyes caught reflection through liquor stained sidewalk puddles with an incidental interaction rebirthing all attraction of my soul.
my breath, along with all confidence i carried that night (and possibly years past, )vanished and left
at the moment when glances glared there were no longer the fire eyes staring like stars I had expected.
how could one think the same Jean jacket cigarette stink with hints towards a kiss looked more like a jab in my jaw as only absence in silence crawled from my mouth.
that night you carried past me and it
was as haunting as if you walked right through me.
how was I so numb to society I couldnt even feel my soul missing?
my soul missing, reminiscing of backseat young lovers kissing,
now pulling at each seam of anytime line I tried walk back up hoping for forgotten hope.


then instantly and all embarrassingly (but only to me) did I tightwire walk across town
looking for flight as my counting crows count down died down and flamingo dancers with grey guitars became pretty words that had amused but no longer moved because it wasn't the chorus or vocals -it was what was tattooed to my mental that made a muse -I remembered moving too and waiting to swoon but too soon did it come and go
I bet to lose and had to chose and chosing at 17 (so confused) was the worst thing my heart strings detaching would have to do.
but as years past and each pretty picture with a thought of "what if" past by my nightmare life I made of "what ifs", simple secret lines would drift and sometimes whisper
they would whisper and make the air more crisp than sea shore breeze on chapped lips (bring me back to where we would kiss) how could this be
happiness
uncertain for most is unimpressively the most renowned and complimenting place horror hangs hollow in fog shaped mirrors cracked with regrets...
but taped up, scared, scarred and silent so often terrified of my own inside voice -i paddled to Hades by choice- chasing cars from lyrics once with mixed with meaning , purpose, souls teeming and consciously tangled it seemed i began to drown in misery tag teamed with desparity cold and screaming.
the darkness only getting worse
the "if onlys" playing from start and starting over every time I roll over trying to sleep for more than a few minutes but to myself I always keep -I kept- I raged I wept, I broke down and then burnt myself alive to see if i could even for myself, maybe, mourn.
but one morning by some saving grace
a backyard walk to get some space led me back to your face.
so serendipitous at first thought
waiting for reality crash upon me and once again remind me of this life i fight and often lose.
but losing you again wasnt something I could bare to do...
even as I quitely awaited the gates of my misfortune to close I couldn't close my eyes with out you staring back at me. like fire in rain and a baptism cast in colors uncaught by even perfect prisms
this hell of a prison I understood as life decisions didnt have to bind the beauty beyond the cage once affiliated with.
wishing this poison carried a separate antidote for falling deeper for you again
I washed sin from within with whimsical laughs 800 miles away and breathtaking conversations spaces to far away.
all over
all over
all over and for once out of every second chance that could take a stand and stand the chance
I'll chance it all 3000 fold and over flowing to feel this overpowering presence of my hand written fairy tale dark Knight existence.
these grey eyes blue again, these blue eyes looking straight at you again
knowing what place is meant for me to fit in
my fears fidget themselves out of cares because all I can care about is this.
this moment even if not forever will never go treated unnoticed.
unrecognized or pardoned pushed aside or lost in the way side - my high tide, let me sink to the bottom of your soul for a second and fill your lungs with love again floating on top of waves crashing and flying past any hazy grey dismal day that spark you the way you are meant to glow.
where ever you go
everything carries me to you
not just your kiss but the dreams of your lips
not only your words, but the world you've found that forms them
it's more than your perfect imagine I've imagined asleep more than a million times
it's the smile I see when you are genuinly thinking about me
it's more than the giggles and good times awaiting to no surprise but fights and cries that haven't happened but will bring us closer and much stronger than... stronger than, stronger than the destiny that was meant to (so clearly now seen) be for all eternity
grains of sand cannot grasp the ineffable number of any type of anything trying to describe the unfathomable perception of clarity in your beauty and love.
my eyes will never burnout again
my will is for you and cannot give up again
my lips and skin are made only for you
my heart beats solely to match rhythm with your pulse so I know my way home
and my words will always uplift you and shine on you like the stars and sun
so you always feel safe and blanketed even when the light is gone and the day is done
I loved you yesterday
I love you today
And I'll love you forever and always
This poem is written to a woman who loves me and loved me since high school. We had a deep connection I never replaced. I always wanted to be with her but settled for comfort at the time. Now 15 years later we are still madly in love and have the same bond and relationship that brought us together when we were young.
Didn't need to go to a pantomime this year because it seems like I've performed in one for the last eleven months,

a clown?
well
maybe
but that was when I ran away to the circus
which is a different tale to tell.

— The End —