"trapdoors" poems
In the sky there is nobody asleep. Nobody, nobody.
Nobody is asleep.
The creatures of the moon sniff and prowl about their cabins.
The living iguanas will come and bite the men who do not dream,
and the man who rushes out with his spirit broken will meet on the street corner
the unbelievable alligator quiet beneath the tender protest of the stars.
Nobody is asleep on earth. Nobody, nobody.
Nobody is asleep.
In the graveyard far off there is a corpse
who has moaned for three years
because of a dry countryside on his knee;
and that boy they buried this morning cried so much
it was necessary to call out the dogs to keep him quiet.
Life is not a dream. Careful! Careful! Careful!
We fall down the stairs in order to eat the moist earth
or we climb to the knife edge of the snow with the voices of the dead dahlias.
But forgetfulness does not exist, dreams to not exist;
flesh exists. Kisses tie our mouths
in a thicket of new veins,
and whoever his pain pains will feel that pain forever
and whoever is afraid of death will carry it on his shoulers.
On day
the horses will live in the saloons
and the enraged ants
will throw themselves on the yellow skies that take refuge in the eyes of cows.
Another day
we will watch the preserved butterflies rise from the dead
and still walking through a country of gray sponges and silent boats
we will watch our ring flash and roses spring from our tongue.
Careful! Be careful! Be careful!
The men who still have marks of the claw and the thunderstorm,
and that boy who cries because he has never heard of the invention of the bridge,
or that dead man who possess now only his head and a shoe,
we must carry them to the wall where the iguanas and the snakes are waiting,
where the bear's teeth are waiting,
where the mummified hand of the boy is waiting,
and the hair of the camel stands on end with a violent blue shudder.
Nobody is sleeping in the sky. Nobody, nobody.
Nobody is sleeping.
If someone does close his eyes,
a whip, boys, a whip!
Let there be a landscape of open eyes
and bitter wounds on fire.
No one is sleeping in this world. No one, no one.
I have said it before.
No one is sleeping.
But if someone grows too much moss on his temples during the night,
open the stage trapdoors so he can see in the moonlight
the lying goblets, and the poison, and the skull of the theatres.
9.3k
time governs
you and me
treat it not
irreverently
chance the unknown
while you can
sands of time
pause for no woman nor man
one and all
quick sticks
the time piece
it ticks it ticks
dithers and dawdlers
hear the alarm
wasted days
do each of us
irreversible harm
of the calendar year
we are sure
but moments in time
are pending trapdoors
make every venture
your stock in trade
lest time render us
uncertain and afraid
in reality rosters
and agendas do vary
devilish time
oft wickedly contrary
speed up Jack and Jill
sundials are on a roll
time is indiscriminate
exacting
a costly toll
governor time
is carefully deliberating
our pendulums
remonstrating
Jan 11, 2014
Jan 11, 2014 at 9:08 PM UTC
Silhouettes in moonlit mazes
your tears are complex superstructures.
Superclusters wrinkle I, negative energy,
tunneling through chasms forbidden;
you and I float.
Comes a sound, depth charged sleeper cell,
a bloop, a mystery, an unsweep,
a whistle, a Julia, a train, a slow down.
Heard by 350,000 zombies.
You and I sleep.
A child derails a train, safe to say,
that the world has its trapdoors.
Its a mystery, they say, but what do they know?
About us and our death.
You and I disorient.
Your two ******* hide a heart,
A mother board center of circulation.
Your body’s iterative delusion
Graces mine. And dissolves me.
You and I disintegrate.
We need to hack the heart,
With absurdity and farce and slipstream:
Into subspecies, we, simians,
We are grateful, gratified.
You and I evaporate
Oct 4, 2012
Oct 4, 2012 at 12:22 AM UTC
After reading my first love poem
And misunderstanding my first love story
Romanticizing your bleak hope
I knew I was ******
And in trying to explain this
I am left feeling like a schizophrenic Walt Whitman
Scrawling poems about your beauty
As if love is something you can actually seek outside yourself
While inside you there are walls
Mine fields
Trapdoors leading to deadfalls
All to keep you from it
I want to stand at the entrance to myself
And be baptized in my own sweat
From the work of this deconstruction
There is heaven and peace in the rubble
Blueprints for a home without safeguards
A simple place you can rest your head at night
This chest
Love is not something you seek
But you tell that to these hands
This pen
This mouth
Tell these eyes without losing my gaze
That it is not hiding somewhere behind you
It is not
I know this now
I know that love is this
Your heart is this
Your body is this
A spare room in a small house
You had intented on living alone in
And everytime someone comes to your door
Know it is always nicer inside
And be grateful that someone came to it
Let them in with your smile
say
"I have been expecting you"
Then let them leave if that is what they must do
They might
Just remember to be grateful for their presence
Everyone who sought your door
Sought it because there is something good there
There is always you
Apr 22, 2013
Apr 22, 2013 at 5:07 PM UTC
How do you measure the once-was? The invisible? The void?
*The ache in my heart is not physiological,
although it may feel like it sometimes is.*
I can measure the words I write,
the words that get stuck in my throat.
The boxes of belongings left over. (You can narrow down a person’s
physical life by how many trips it
takes to Goodwill.)
How many songs can I now not stand?
How many scents are now trigger trapdoors?
Shall I count the number of times I’ve thought of you today?
No ******* thank you.
Measuring is for the birds.
The doctors and
the scientists.
I keep reaching inside and pulling out my still beating,
but rotting and decaying heart
only to be told it’s perfectly fine.
I refuse to be gaslit on my grief anymore.
Feb 23, 2022
Feb 23, 2022 at 10:00 PM UTC
Who are these men and women
that move as the ends of earth--
raving stiff, sweet, bitter serums
of truth?
From their common manner a
prodigal bleeding has begun--
all the elements that eternally
knotted them now drain.
Their full significance squints
at its rise and shine, as meaning
is placed and trapdoors open.
Jan 26, 2017
Jan 26, 2017 at 11:46 AM UTC
Perhaps you aren’t as faceless
as you think you are:
your skin not green,
your face not plastered
with wide-eared grins,
your house neither yellow nor
full of garish trampolines, trapdoors and springs.
This static,
this stillness,
this is you:
Quiet, loud, alone in your room
screaming in whatever tongue you
speak best at, staring back
at reflections in mirrors
that don’t recognise you.
You smile,
measure the gaps between your
teeth and find that they
are a little bit smaller,
check their slant and find
that they lean a little more
to the left,
feel your skin and find
that the green tinge
comes off with a light scratch
of a nail,
and that beneath the coverings,
you still
are flesh and blood.
Aug 29, 2015
Aug 29, 2015 at 11:59 AM UTC
She let herself in
through dilated pupils
to find a labyrinth
of magic mirrors
waiting
with tricky trapdoors
and trip wires
designed to make her fall
and forget herself
May 7, 2013
May 7, 2013 at 2:59 PM UTC
Lost in a Labyrinth of feelings
can't get back to where I was
trapdoors and danger
around every corner and door
can't go back
can't return
not now
I have to wait for time to heal my pain.
Apr 19, 2010
Apr 19, 2010 at 2:58 PM UTC
There's a backdoor
Always a backdoor
A trapdoor
To let me out
Or let you in
Let me in
Or trap me
In your trap
Of doors
Revolving doors
Revolving
And mirrors
Mirroring
Trapdoors
And me
Trapped
In endless
Mirrors
And doors
To traps set
By you
To entrap
Me
Feb 24, 2013
Feb 24, 2013 at 10:46 AM UTC
time governs you and me
treat it not irreverently
chance the unknown while you can
sands of time pause for no woman nor man
one and all quick sticks
the time piece it ticks it ticks
ditherers and dawdlers hear the alarm
wasted days do each of us irreversible harm
of the calendar year we are sure
though moments in time are pending trapdoors
make every venture your stock in trade
lest time render us uncertain and afraid
in reality agendas and rosters do vary
devilish time oft wickedly contrary
speed up Jack Jill sundials are on a roll
time is indiscriminate in exacting a costly toll
governor time is carefully deliberating
our pendulums remonstrating
Sep 13, 2014
Sep 13, 2014 at 7:12 PM UTC
I'm friends with everyone
We all have loads of fun
I'm so happy with how it's all run
Until FOUR THREE TWO ONE
Shattered hopes, broken dreams
Busting my whole perfect life at the seams
I can hear the cries and screams
Arguments and nightmares
Terrifies and scares
Haunts and horrors
Locks and trapdoors
Fires and pits
Demons and misfits
My broken memory
Was suddenly replaced by reality
Not everyone cares for me
Breaking my delusional stupidity
I thought I was the king of lies
But it turns out that they were my world, my demise
I weep over my torn and murdered world
Leaving my innocence in a pile of blood and lies unfurled
Feb 28, 2016
Feb 28, 2016 at 10:22 PM UTC
time governs you and me
treat it not irreverently
chance the unknown will you can
sands of time pause for no woman nor man
one and all quick sticks
the time piece it ticks it ticks
ditherers and dawdlers hear the alarm
wasted days do each of us irreversible harm
of the calendar year we are sure
though moments in time are pending trapdoors
make every venture your stock in trade
lest time render us uncertain and afraid
in reality rosters and agendas do vary
devilish time oft wickedly contrary
speed up Jack and Jill sundials are on a roll
time is indiscriminate in exacting a costly toll
governor time is carefully deliberating
our pendulums remonstrating
Nov 23, 2014
Nov 23, 2014 at 5:10 PM UTC
I don’t lie,
I simply camouflage my words,
My mind has been put on stand-by,
All these clever rhymes and verbs
That I use, they’re all hidden
Some you won’t understand you are forbidden
To fully comprehend what it is I’m trying to say
I realize that some of you may
Not relate, retaliate, by saying this is fake,
Not true, my neck aches
From carrying these words in the back of my head
So now I scribble them down, no lies,
Just truth, and other
Because I want you for yourself to discover
The same as I do
You’ll thank me- no thank yourself, when there’s eventually a
breakthrough
Because lying is the easy way, right?
but the path is filled with trapdoors,
You’ll walk through and discover that it’ll break you, it even might
Leave you wheezing on all fours.
I’m not hiding anything, I wear it on my sleeve,
Why would I ever tell you, what would I achieve?
You’ll never understand, all you’d do is find me odd,
All because I’d choose to tell you that my mind is flawed?
No I’ll simply wait for the light to turn green,
I’ve been standing still, waiting here since I was a teen
Maybe the light’s broken, could someone come and fix it?
No, I’m just gonna wait, how could I ever admit
That I’ve been waiting right here for years,
Without trying to move forward, back, maybe it’s my gears
Gears of my car, gears in my head
Are they working, I think my engine's dead
Are you there, are you still with me?
Of course I am, I’m fine, but my mind is on a killing spree
Killing my flow, killing my name,
Stomping on my heart am I going insane?
I don’t see myself in the mirror,
This puddle of darkness- I’ll drown in it
Death’s getting nearer.
We’re all diseased,
Our minds aren’t free
Everything put out is believed
We’ve stopped thinking, or is it just me?
Me that is ill, me that screams until,
I can’t anymore and now my vocal chords are torn
The screaming for real, it’s turned into a squeal,
But the sounds have become deafening, they’re sounds of defeat
Now I sit in silence as I continually and desperately plead
Help me, please see through the false truth,
My second face, this mask of mine,
It’s starting to show cracks, please have a glance and talk,
Don’t just stand there from the sideline
I finally throw the mask away and then I see it hit you,
Right in your face, it sticks, and still only half is true.
I’ll only transfer the truth, the lies, the problem’s still alive
Maybe there’s no cure, solution,
just to fire lead through my hard drive.
Jan 24, 2018
Jan 24, 2018 at 8:26 AM UTC
TRAPDOORS IN OUR LIFE
Casually as we stroll to find a new view on that knoll, if the vision is blocked we won't see all the potholes
Was it truly the intention to reach a holy grail, is not achieving it a sign we may be frail
Many steps to take through overgrown fields with hidden paths,is about finding stepping stone not the pitfalls
Fun and frolic necessary parts of the play,often casually we develop habits covering our minds like a black veil
Freedom was much easier without the knowledge of blind spots, how the breezes easily turn into windstorms
How often have we overcome what could have been a block but when simply taken in stride we prevail
Peering out over perpetual pastures with unknown ditches and glitches ,beauty or beast to greet us as we crisscross
Unheard disclaimers were given for protection brushed aside nothing to break our stride blind to being frail
Once again to face a day never considering a loss, just a need to play,often staying in motion comes with a higher cost
Knowledge of others ahead keeps us from our bed,playing on our own path to find new pleasure,unknown fears would make us stale
Will we take lessons from past discretion's or become feeble as we fall
remain strong because this life testing can only be lived not taught. R.C.
Jul 5, 2018
Jul 5, 2018 at 7:12 AM UTC
you came
you left
and yet the trees still sway
and summer still comes
all that remains is a strange longing,
memories that rose like cyclops in the
night
the trapdoors of desire,
the black-holes of our sharpened
souls
if you could be god, and
come back - if only for a moment, to tell me I was right,
then I would make your words my epitaph)
my purpled lover, like a
bulbous flower protruding from it's
stem,
you have eaten all the breadcrumbs,
so how will I find you again?
even if you had disappeared like
an evening ghost,
our souls had touched,
and for the first time
I could see the stars in other peoples' eyes
Oct 4, 2018
Oct 4, 2018 at 12:29 PM UTC
today its vast,
leadlike heaviness,
caught in a web for years,
a river of tears,
knowing not to touch mercury,
never to touch lead,
but all this lumpen, toxic, metal,
here now,
the painful, real circumstances,
a life unravels horrific,
watch the watchmen,
politicians reliant on crazy logic,
journeying headlong with coboclos, and shaman bundled and secreted, in rabbit warren, their pronouncements,
She amazed the vastness of the labyrinth, like tendrils that surmounted her, all her lonely long life, her mother, her father, her brothers, her sisters, baby Jesus, God the Father, church, other parents of schoolfriends, the watchmen, hippies, engineers, pretend girlfriend trapdoors, pretend boyfriend trapdoors,watchmen, irish, americans, english, russians, coboblos, shaman, germans, dutch, irish, english, americans, chinese, spanish, portuguese, italians. worldwideweb
one woman an island, allegedly.
her strenght from the biggest Daddy the one above,
He sent her his Son ,
He filled her with Love,
she hopes for his return,
others burn and condemn themselves in the safety of numbers,
they are numbered....
right now, she cannot find hope or love for them ,
she did love when it counted,
all that too is from God.
Oct 25, 2020
Oct 25, 2020 at 6:05 AM UTC
When you asked me to name
What I valued most
My head tilted
To the canvas sky
And I failed to suppress
The thought of your eyes
Which shone brighter
than all the stars combined
I couldn't understand
I failed to comprehend
How no one else saw
How no one else realised
His eyes
All colours in one
Which
Despite all matters
All falls and pits,
All trapdoors and declines
Constantly shone
With radiance that never faltered
But he faded
Slowly,
Slowly, but surely
So I clung harder
And yet he managed to slip
Through the cracks
between my frail fingers
And from him
I learned
Beautiful things aren’t meant
to last nearly long enough
Beauty is best kept for memories
To hide the cruelty
Rotting the wondrous
Stealing the beautiful
When you told me to describe
the ugliest sight had observed
The first thing that came to mind
was the way your hand would wrap itself around the bottle
And how your eyes would roll back in undisturbed bliss
As you emptied it down your throat
When you told me to express
the worst feeling in the world
The problem was,
I had no word to describe
the rush of hurt and pain
that would choke my lungs
When the sound of the slamming door
That would resound
within the place
we had once called home
When you told me to name
my favourite thing in the world
I looked up to the sky
and couldn’t help but notice
That as bright as the stars were
The flicker, the pulse in your eyes would transcend them every time
When you told me to describe
the prettiest sight could ever witness
The first thing that came to mind
was the way
you would throw your head back and laugh
And how your eyes would light up
Better than the midnight stars
That would gleam in the midnight sky
When you told me to express
the greatest feeling in the world
The problem was,
There was no word to describe
the overwhelming feeling
that would seep into my veins
When the sound of your melodious laugh
would ring in my ears, echoing and echoing
When you told me to name
the worst thing in the world
I looked up at the sky
and couldn’t help but notice
That the darkness of the sky
Would rival the emptiness in your eyes
Even gone,
the stars could never transcend his eyes
And I doubt that anything
would glow with the same radiance
As he did.
Dec 29, 2016
Dec 29, 2016 at 11:30 PM UTC