"unclasped" poems
"Go forth, little one." I said as I reached my hand up-towards the heavens. A single **** escapes my unclasped hands towards the sky, and then beyond. Soaring tactfully on the cool breeze.
"You're free at last." And at that very moment, the last of my ***** were given.
Fin
Nov 21, 2012
Nov 21, 2012 at 9:28 PM UTC
Swoon to a tearful night, unknown to its grief
Dialogue of peace, and those of plight
Ringing of morphology, raindrops on the roof.
Such things heard from the peasants’ seat
In the many wet heads sopping
In the sonorous waves, upright in the city clime
Untending to their beds.
At the bottom of that something
All told are destined they will find
Be pliable to the ills they’ve dealt
To carry on, to work, admonishments
Said once to justify these red romances
That in every rain storm melt
As pity through the night, forever unclasped
From shackles of their blame
Since life and ideology somehow are the same.
‘Tis destiny for abating storms
As some will rose from their thickened thorns
These nights deliver their gentle morns
All the same as hemlock grows as poison
And is best to be avoided.
How—this, I fear only rain my know—
Can we still bathe in fraternal glow
When some still heal from Death himself
Each breath that enters is quickly prayed to leave
High on seated thrones
Those mean so quick to thieving, the poor
The lazy deserve no quarter
Those dusty pockets afford not one
So steal the heart upon his sleeve.
May we help man wrought our kin and kind
By common tongue, free, as we are ought?
Since another may make my world
He is mine to protect, not throw to bytes
So ludicrous and feeding back upon themselves
For destiny can be remade
If hatred weren’t so blind.
Aug 14, 2014
Aug 14, 2014 at 8:36 AM UTC
They never spoke, but every time she walked into the train
He reflexively slid to the left and made room for her.
And they would travel together sitting one hand width apart.
He drummed his perfectly crooked fingers on his left thigh,
like a horse that galloped towards an unknown destination.
She clasped and unclasped her hands, and
chewed on the dry skin of her bottom lip.
She always switched off her phone before getting on the train.
She assumed he did too because no one ever disturbed their unsaid conversations.
The old man singing I Wanna Hold Your Hand provided the sound track to their journey.
Yet the most endearing sound was that of him sliding his right foot from side to side.
The soft scraping sound soothed her more than any song ever had.
The train ride lasted twenty-five minutes every night,
during which, in her mind they got married,
went to Vienna for their honeymoon,
and had three children: twin boys and a girl,
who grew up to be the perfect balance between the two of them.
His stop came before hers and
She wondered if one day he would miss his stop and
Ride with her to hers.
He knew her beginning and she knew his end.
She may never know any more
But that didn’t matter because for twenty five minutes a day,
all she needed was the soft scraping sound from his right foot sliding from side to side.
Dec 12, 2011
Dec 12, 2011 at 6:09 AM UTC
My fingers ached as I pried a box
from the sides of my mail slot.
I ripped it open with my bare hands,
and found a note written in cursive:
"Put both feet into the box."
I raised my eyebrows and smirked,
but I stepped into the box.
The base folded in on itself,
and my feet crashed into waves.
My lover floated with the seaweed
until he finally reached me.
His hands brushed my shoulders,
and I whispered, "I think we're lost."
My arms burned as I valiantly fought
to reach the uneven surface,
but his eyes sparkled with mischief
as he took my webbed hands,
pulling me toward the ocean floor.
Flashes of light hit my eyes.
and he led me toward the light.
My fingers brushed the floor,
then wrapped around a rough chain,
and my heart punched my chest.
Glittering diamonds surrounded
a heart of azure sapphires.
He led me back to the surface
as the heart overpowered me.
He unclasped it with ease,
placing it around my neck.
As my hand lightly rested in his,
the water droplets joined us
as we flew toward the sky
right back out of the box,
our hands still intertwined.
Apr 12, 2022
Apr 12, 2022 at 10:02 PM UTC
Growing up, a girl watches, learns,
The truths of boys and men—
so often unturned.
“Boys will be boys,”
a phrase we know,
implying girls must shoulder the load.
Girls mature fast,
women pick up the cast—
an unspoken burden, a silent decree:
Bear the weight of their irresponsibility.
In a world gripped by misogyny,
women face judgment,
their futures unclasped.
Absorbing shame for games they play,
men walk away, free to go their way.
Homes abandoned,
men now free,
their true selves unknown.
Disgrace drapes women—a heavy yoke,
neglect shatters hope.
Promises unkept,
fathers vanish as children wept.
Guilt escaped with practiced ease,
duty dodged, a ghost on the breeze.
Children and wife he never knew,
society laughs at the pain he withdrew.
Children carry his woes—
identities shaped by the hurt he chose.
Shame shouldered early,
remembering blame.
Love claimed,
but never there.
Strain felt in his name,
unfairness echoes.
Abandoned women and children grow—
a daunting endeavor men overthrow.
Shadows linger, burdens remain;
a future carved where hope will maintain.
Every struggle faced—a dawn,
strength carries on.
Nov 10, 2024
Nov 10, 2024 at 11:24 PM UTC
For I to cherish soaked in sunbathe dream of freckles on cream and strawberries
For you to see and sigh and fill with warm fizzy pink water too sweet to contemplate
For you to see and sigh and long for long sleeved sheathed in jealousy spilling out in bright red syrup
For I to paint faces with my utterances fanciful making ugly alluring curious mysterious attractive
I can take my nose to be strength clever seducting wicked men and women to listen to my describes or look upon papyrus sheets
I can make my jaw a naive child stricken with blue veins translucent skin clinging papery like wings to brittle bones under eaves ready to snap
I can write my eyes wide innocent in first time headlights first time frosted firsts filled with empty antecedents of unclasped things and fifty fifty longings
I can make the ugly striking like a stinging snake cruel contemplating lashing smarts or make it sad sorrowful quiet longing new to life love mature but still a child
I can add grace poise to my stretched out neck make it stand tall of pride training because it's ladylike to do so and so I must and say my prayers every night too as I powder over my faintly drawn freckles
Boyish humour uncaring to my generous brows a baseball mitt bubblegum cards and a fetish for goths forever unrecognised as spit flies and at home haircuts compose a flyaway life
Embellish the hollows collarbones and detract the too-broad shoulders make the frailty proud and small shrink it down to fit in a girl big brothers to gentle and lovers to rough pinned wrists that near snap
With my words I reap the benefits of my own mindly kindling I wander through half made times in history and finished times two seconds right now
I can create myself and so I do my thirst to be is insatiably insatisfied like my attraction to bad grammar and lilts when you talk so I do I become each and every one
I create myself and it's addicting
Aug 3, 2012
Aug 3, 2012 at 5:41 PM UTC
Scrambling across the tiled rooftop,
I avoided peering down.
The sight of charcoaled pavement
emerged as an unbecoming comrade to this city’s
easy skyline.
One cord. One hand.
A fear of falling in another
My attempt at a Sunday Night Football
twisted to the anticipation of
a roadside tackle from the opposite team below
The view from up here
was my only peace
A great inhale of chilled air
filling the bottom corners of my lungs
You are safe. You will not fall.
You are content and happy up here.
And that is what scared me the most.
The roof groaned at my passing weight
I stood at the brink of it all. Admiring
the city inside me
the metro, the lights, the busy buildings
It was filthy and a little unbecoming
but I was lucky. Nothing
was wrong.
Then I slipped off the edge of the rooftop.
Gripping at the pipes that rimmed the building,
the hooks of my fingers rioted for a savior.
Sprouting blood like fireworks on a holiday
I begged not to fall. The pipes wailed as
my legs reached further for the ground,
like a child stretching towards their mother’s arms
I cried at how simple it was -
To let go or to bring myself up
not knowing if my will could
get me up to the rooftop
I thought hard for us all - my only undoing -
Then I unclasped my broken fingers
and fell down onto the concrete.
November 7, 2013 3:59 pm
Revised: December 9, 2013 1:53
May 30, 2014
May 30, 2014 at 5:52 AM UTC
Can you see it like I can,
a boasting child,
a boating child,
an accident
she drowned.
Down,
the bubbles escape,
race like red toy cars
as blood blossoms out ears,
and pressure builds,
and fingers reach upwards
pop
where small fingers are glassed with soapy water
and white and blue frosting.
scribbled over red lettering, "Happy Birthday Meredith."
And cards were presented with pasts and futures,
torn open like a shark attack
and ripping skin,
flapping back like dog ears, as he sticks his head out the window
and howls at the neighbors
for their loud music ways.
Silent crashing waves,
that boom death metal
and ride tidal curls
that bounce off her head.
As she writhes,
a red ribbon in her hair.
Hair of spun gold
like the sun
smothered by the moon.
Darkness eclipses.
And the last of the air is pushed
through her lungs
for light has drifted away,
torn like a suckling pig from its ****
and she is lost.
As her body floats away, pulled down.
Unclasped, she roams free.
groans, "Meeeee. Find mee...eeeee."
And eels slither from her jaw,
agape and brackish blue,
like pirate ship wine
sunken *** and treasure troves,
and streamline red.
Adding to a salty complexity
of tarnished speckled metal
like speckled eggs.
And brown eyes
bore out by hermit *****
that broke their shells after a gluttonous feast.
Unbuttoning her dress
a flower paisley sort of thing,
a useless scrap of sodden material,
for nothing matters,
as she thinks nothing can hold on to her
now and before.
She is aware,
but not really there, because you would miss her
like you did when she stood in the hall,
your eyes passed over,
and so stayed her silent screams.
So she left our world,
or rather hovered and watched
as much as she could without eyes.
She watched you,
and felt nothing over your cries
because she feels nothing
Now.
Apr 17, 2013
Apr 17, 2013 at 12:25 AM UTC
Grief can take you places
where love never will;
valleys of sheets, unclasped
hands: your eyes,
an ocean of sorrow:
walking away from the shore
and into the deep blue
deeper, and farther;
I forget
I can't swim.
Nov 8, 2015
Nov 8, 2015 at 2:33 PM UTC
amid pentagrams
satelliting my mind
an outward location
of an ostentation
that lids a voyeuristic eye
to Da Vinci’ fingers in a jar
waiting anxiously for them
to move, perform an ******
panache of evocative art
but they are congealed
in a stalactite shiver
that lacks transmitted urgency
but contact with these
enigmatic digits causes
a correspondingly delayed
then urgently convulsive frenzy
that somewhere in time
bring frictional contact
with a canvas or a ceiling
Da Vinci’ fingers in a jar
an outward location
of unclasped curiosity
Feb 17, 2013
Feb 17, 2013 at 11:01 AM UTC
Body doubled,
Huddled for warmth.
Cold sweat.
Thumping movements.
Buzzing fingertips.
Itching apparitions.
Mighty seraphim's dreams.
The danger of an open mouth,
The Tempest of the dunes lingers.
Unclasped hands,
No longer able to etch
The tablet.
Jul 10, 2011
Jul 10, 2011 at 5:11 PM UTC
for instance, I felt the yearn to feel love
an arm surrounds an unclear path of blue,
rejuvenating it is; I’m above,
yet unanswered questions linger; seek clue,
art thou afraid to love like juliet?
hands unclasped; bent knees and silent prayers.
Nov 3, 2020
Nov 3, 2020 at 5:43 AM UTC
Stalled in afternoon traffic
by the crack of a jackhammer
and the smell of hot asphalt,
what else is there to do but wait
for the sun-kissed woman
in muddy work boots and
orange vest to acknowledge me.
She has a tattoo of an AR-15
on her left forearm and more
ink (an octopus?) under her eye.
She is in total control.
Her unclasped safety
vest ***** in the wind.
The smoke from her
Marlboro Red snakes
down the line of cars
and wafts into my open
window with a smell
so strong she should
be riding shotgun.
She alone will deliver me.
As the jackhammer
fires on full auto,
I wait like a child
for my turn to go.
Her eyes squint and the octopus
squirms and my afternoon restarts
with another twist of her gloved hand,
the sign revolving from Stop to Slow.
Mar 8, 2017
Mar 8, 2017 at 5:27 PM UTC
Hug the earth close
as the moon goes around.
We all have lights
some greater, some lesser.
The sun is so generous
it doesn’t need to shine all the time.
It leaves room for the moon's turn,
and the moon turns the sun into time.
In waves it comes
gradually, as an evening ends,
as a child matures.
The child matures
as it grows dark many times over.
Is the child still afraid of the dark?
Or does darkness just mean stopping
laying down, listening without moving?
It is so still tonight.
The moon is just beginning.
Once again, just beginning.
The stillness is like the darkness
it makes the earth closer,
the mountain the unclasped hand
hugging me closer
sheltering my little light.
Dec 5, 2014
Dec 5, 2014 at 9:05 AM UTC
Knife - strains
In mockery of water - a knocked glass
Revealing spots
A raving whisper
Splashing cold
A crowbar smashing collarbone
"You surely do not need
Those useless hands"
Improper - unclasped collar
And after droplet - choke
Inflation of the soul
Scarce lines of obit
"Place cloth of white" - the shroud
"Pour to the guests" - caprice
"And play a marriage" - wake
In dance - do smile
Not daring to gaze down
To knife - a pledge of the forgiveness
Aug 27, 2025
Aug 27, 2025 at 5:31 PM UTC
To tell any story of you I should begin with stone –
Marbles, granites, slates – in slabs and blocks so large
They surrounded the family plant like cold-faced
Soldiers, armed not to keep out, but to keep safe
The secret knowledge: how to turn function to art,
How to harvest beauty from earth’s dark home.
We could count on you to be part of our home.
After school days and weekends of shaping stone
You appeared at our table, wearing your appetite large
And wooing my sister until our brother’s blank face
(Your best friend’s cold face) blinked there was no safe
Way to have them both. Somehow, for you, the art
Was in the trying. At work, you created a new art
Cutting and carving miniature relief scenes – of home
And history and Greek goddesses in soft marble stone
Streaked pink and black – with callused hands larger
Than the finished pieces. My sister lowered her face
In refusal of that first gift. Believing you were too safe,
She married someone else. You married, to be safe,
Someone who didn’t care to understand the delicate art
Of your labor. Soon, some chasm reached your home,
Splitting you in silence until you no longer were stone
But shards and pieces scattered at the bottom of a large
Abyss, unwhole. Your grief too hard for you to face,
You led your wife along a trail up to a rocky west face
Above a summer pool. Here, you thought, you were safe
To perfect an absolute stillness between you, a terrible art,
And somehow avenge the jagged cleavage in your home.
You struggled (the papers would later report) until stones
Slipped, hands unclasped, the space between grew large.
Like a pebble thrown, your wife’s body created no large
Ripples until shallow breath returned and she surfaced
Flailing, waving one unbroken arm to show she was safe.
But it was too late for you, whose new attempts at art
Had once again failed, and so you turned to go home
To become immovable, unreachable, a dumb stone.
At home, you recorded failures and defeats you faced
In large hurried script, writing to set forever in stone
One final success: a safe shot to the head, your newest art.
Aug 18, 2010
Aug 18, 2010 at 3:59 PM UTC
Apart, we stood on the wings of unparalleled airplanes
With a hunger to grow a pair of wings for ourselves
Together we stood on the island of a shifting ocean
Broken backgrounds shattering preconceived notions
Wrapping each other’s arms around healing scars,
We opened them back up
So the rest could massage soft words into the wounds
Turning our hearts into good soil
Where we could start to re-grow the parts of ourselves
Left black and cracked by a burning past
We stepped out from behind the masks packed firmly in our suitcases
Learning to love ourselves and each other
For the vices and vulnerabilities we’d hidden for so long
We forged a chain where the weakest link
Was the one that wouldn’t let another bear their burden
And we used that chain to lift each other above our worries
Because perspective was the one thing we were lacking.
When we stood on the cliff hills looking over the ocean,
Perspective was the only thing we had
The rest was swept up in sea foam carried by rolling meadow breezes,
Soft rainfall on window panes,
Shared smiles and the laughter of fast friends
As we unclasped our hands to turn towards home
The sadness we held was for the time until we would meet again
The tears that streamed forth were to show that
Noone would be forgotten
The months we spent together will be etched on our hearts
Waiting for a reunion to read back the memories
We stand on the doorway to tomorrow
The taste of long-gone whiskey on our lips
Tempting to take the breath out of the final hours
Until the winds beckon us back to Belfast
My legs grow restless as I await your return
I need to see you all again
Mar 4, 2014
Mar 4, 2014 at 2:45 PM UTC
With a twist and a turn
Not of this world
Her coat is unclasped
And slides down to the floor
It's her song
Weaving itself
Over mumbled words
Through cigarette smoke
She moves,
Her body ,water
The air, her vessel
Se possesses every atom
That dares touch her
The first notes still playing
Her feet find the centre of the room
A slight pause
Then the first beat
The first note of the first verse
Giving itself to her
The virginal sacrifice.
She takes it
And the next
And the next
A goddess
Greedy for her pound of flesh
Each note absorbed
Entwined selfishly with her essence
She winds each round her ankle
And slowly
They rise
First seeking out her calf
Then her knee
Then her thigh
Then....
Then she begins
Water flows
Becoming the one thing
Every being strives to please
With honed patience she captures all
Forming her banks
Her slightest of moves
Carving an unseen light about her
Marking her
A brand not seen
Yet it draws the eye
Then your soul
And with the music to herself
Not letting one thing
Escape her now heaving breast
She curves
The soul curves
She moves
The music moves
She is the melody
She plays
It's the music that dances to her.
Sep 23, 2013
Sep 23, 2013 at 10:00 AM UTC
Continue to process the words in your head, extracting these whispers which simply linger and listen to each of those gifts delivered.
Pick up on the frequencies which ring in sync, with a tone clear to hear that's felt from within, risen up from our chest to the head as it spreads.
Draw in a line between each speckled dot, removing the fog to make sense of our self, helping unclog built up tears often hidden. When we try to grasp traits from silent ideas, varied trickle effects help let go of the fear.
Prioritised tasks edge out further unclasped, where the forward thinking sinks in amongst us.
Contemplative thought of feelings less said, as helpful hints given are informed well ahead.
Oct 3, 2021
Oct 3, 2021 at 8:19 PM UTC
serenity encompassing the shy masks
masked marble stone with the sliver of gold
two slits and a mouth to taste
those withering syllables left decadently on shore
masks, masks drinking roaming with haste
jumbles of words unspoken and texts never sent
interiors slashed as desire gathered and clashed
how long can our masks endure to the last?
last sip of golden beams
quench the sunlight with aching feet
last time stepping out the auditorium door
I swear, you were a great actor amidst the despair
last time you'll lay your eyes into another
getting lost trying to comprehend the dots
the last stroke of fear eradicated the moment
the fastens are unclasped,
fall
tumbling
flying
spinning
exhilaration
clarity
weightless
as the mask becomes of no more
something like vertigo,
sudden visions of peripheral miracles
and yearn to feel your own cheekbones
Mar 8, 2016
Mar 8, 2016 at 11:55 PM UTC
this is for the lost and found
this is for the star gazer who connects the dots,
but the dots just don't conform...and he stares infinitely
this is for the mailman who braves a snowstorm to deliver teenage puppy love letters
with ***** induced rhymes to ignite a lust
and his wife hasn't loved him in twenty years...yet he still believes
What are you waiting for?
this is for the couple on the edge of divorce
but the veins leading up to their hearts are still twined like an intricate array of grape vines
a cartographer could probably still design the road map of their love
and yet they still fight
What are they waiting for?
this is for the matchmaker who manifests love from the tip of her fingers
and can put one and one together to make magic
but she can't seem to find the right one
so she lives vicariously through the successes
What are you waiting for?
this is for the girl or boy wishing they could be the hand that was held
through the maze of ten thousand footsteps they walked alone
because they cannot have this dance tonight
and their palms remained unclasped
...still they wish
What are you waiting for?
this is for you, struggling with the wait the plagues
trapped in the limbo to move forward or continue to let life happen
Stop waiting.
Be unsatisfied.
The moments we settle are moments wasted
wasted on waiting,
I want you to have caffeinated jitters
instead...
we wait
and we wait
we wait.
and some more
wait enough and life will pass you by
so make a change
step out into the daylight that only occurs twelve hours of the day
Be a shot out of a cannon, or the confetti of victory
a firework that illuminates the entire midnight heavens
don't search for the brightest star in the sky, be it
don't wait. don't make an excuse
because, i may not alwys be looking, but you're transparent enough i can see right through you
and if you need it
I'll be your push, like a swing
but its up to you to sprout wings
be unstoppable when you terrorize the sky
be a force of nature
be a gust of wind so strong that it knocks God on his backside
and his laughter shakes the universe
and for one brief and fleeting moment he shines light upon your rainy day
when you finally stop waiting for life to happen
don't bother telling me because i will see
because the wreckage you left behind tearin up that robin egg sky
will last longer than rainbows
that stargazer who stares infinitely will see your supernova soul
burst through the darkness, fleeting beautiful and damaged
forever shall you be etched in the stars
may be you forever...capable
Jun 10, 2014
Jun 10, 2014 at 9:09 PM UTC
All those pretty boys and girls
in Utah with perfect families
and straight teeth and
golf weekends and BYU
I wanna be a Latter Day Saint:
faith like a gorget keeping
holiness inside and sin without,
my eyes turn blue contemplating sainthood
In the south they shout in tongues
they have a private line with the devil
and he lurks in the hearts of
Communists and liberals he says.
I wanna be a born again Baptist
full of hellfire and moonshine
fundamentally patriotic and God
looking down every day at my white hot purity
It’s a good day to be a Baptist my friend.
My Catholicism is a ragged old red robe
seams dragging through the dust
of old men’s prayers and smelling
of my grandmother’s face powder
even when she died.
In the end the rain washes over the berms
of every river not only Jordan
and when the flood comes I will be
lying open in a field
smelling of damp earth and crushed grass
my knees unbent and my hands unclasped
my heart in my mouth still beating.
Dec 21, 2014
Dec 21, 2014 at 1:54 PM UTC
he came, i cried
a blanket wrapped around me and a bra I’ve just unclasped
because he asked me to
they always do
I fall into pattern and I do as he pleases
and he tells me it’s on my conditions
and I’m too tired of definitions
for I don’t know what’s right or wrong
I’m afraid he’s just like them
and I’m so sick of wearing a thong
fluttering eyelashes and doing makeup only for him
my worth boiled down to a simple *** doll
tell me to reach for the alcohol
at least that makes me feel better for a while
when he’s not around
he’s n o t around
Nov 8, 2019
Nov 8, 2019 at 4:54 PM UTC
Feeling so lonely, in need of some smiles
I discovered a ladder which reached many miles
Much higher than any rocket could soar
I climbed on right up until I reached ever more!
With a gate up ahead that was made of pure gold
Then this picturesque valley unto me does unfold
The sign on the gate reads “Enter at risk,
Be warned before you go as the cost is one kiss!”
I opened the latch with my heart beating wild
With a feeling of joy like an excited young child
Adrenalin pounding as I got nearer your home
As I knew any moment I’d no longer feel alone!
There you sat in your garden, on a log for a bench
As soon as I seen thee my heart starts to wrench
You’re a picture so radiant, on my knees I do cry
I run to your arms and beg “Please let me die!”
Then I awaken with a heart so content
Albeit a dream, but the Heavens I’d spent!
My face all wet through from this beautiful dream
Saturated pillow and yet inside I feel clean!
I unclasped my fist as it was curled up real tight,
And there in my palm was a red mark, so bright!
A pair of two lips was the shape of this mark
All shining brightly to embellish all dark!
Aghast from amazement, “This wasn’t no dream!
A kiss to leave Heaven, from the Father!” I scream
It wasn’t my time yet, I can do so much more
To make most of tomorrow, from a person now sure!
© by LynnKaren
Oct 8, 2016
Oct 8, 2016 at 6:01 PM UTC