My chamber teems with tensions, taut, that logic can’t withstand,
fragmenting mental masonry with memories unplanned,
as bitter tears from hazel eyes reduce the stone to sand.

Dim shadows cast by candles flit across the haunted room,
beleaguer apparitions, pale, that stalk me through the gloom,
usurping purloined purple forms forgotten ghosts assume.

The tick-tock clock of time rewinds within the mirrored hall
and pendula suspended, pause, while creatures creep and crawl
on images of effigies, through memories that maul.

The madness of the midnight mass! Perchance it interferes
with spiders spinning spiral threads which bridge the chandeliers
when weaving minds' discarded coils to silken souvenirs.

Reflections graced the vacant gaze of idols as they fled!
Their futile, feigned, far-flung farewells now hammer in my head,
marooned like frozen silhouettes in footprints of the dead.

My lovers smile through marbled masks before they turn their backs
(like furnace flames deserting ash or phantoms fleeing cracks)
with faded, painted, wrinkled faces nightmares carve in wax.

Sometimes a gust disturbs the dust and secrets reappear,
which dance in silver slippers through the dusk of yesteryear -
it's not the screams that drown my dreams, but whispers which I fear.

The hangman posts a letter home, his message indiscreet
about the vestal ****** in the café (where we meet
to savour tea and crumpets) down a one-way dead-end street.

The rapping and the tapping at my tattered, time-worn door
repeat reports of migrant myths, of tales of nevermore,
strung far across a sullen sea, most shipwrecked near the shore.

Forget-me-nots, enwrapped in rain the while a wan wind blows,
recall the faintly fickle fates this drifter undergoes –
alone, unknown with tracks interred in teardrop undertows.

My feet, no longer tied or tethered, traipse within a squall
pursuing profiles long forsaken, buried in the sprawl
of spectres spread amongst the dead, some tattooed to the wall.

At times, the belfry towers toll of anarchy and gin,
of smoke and mirrors, rolling dice and other things akin,
impaled on forks down byway roads, and things that might-have-been.

The skies outside, beyond the night with shutters shut and drawn,
begin to glow on shattered shapes escaping ’fore the dawn
as clouds undone beneath the sun release this captive pawn.

We sat aloft a dune
   peering over the ocean,
waves mesmerizing
  our inner turmoil,
grainy surf dimensions
    cut into psyche,
voices turned hazy
midst broiling sun
  washed back with
   salt water tears,
there was no lighthouse
  to guide the way
  nor save disparate crests  
no words reverberated the sound,
    just the floundering of
      gritty restless emotions
that once were blissed horizons
   before moon lost its balance
     to relentless torrential currents
      of neglectful destruction,
   drowning in ambiguous undertows

A woman's just a padded cell, in situ:
With mirrored tile reflections, of former occupants
Reveals their once desires, like long past feast
That's been viewed only partially, through a narrow hall,
And though her cushions can't stop your fall
They soak up life's effluvium; for she's an island
In the lull; most co-morbidly, antediluvian:
And as it cradles the body's living estate,
Her rocking-horse frame can't navigate
The ground swell of presumptive grace.

Let's pretend, that the dizzy motion ride
Has provided real progress forward, in spite
Of strong waves, that coupled oceans bring;
Jump saddle, on her coiled and double-jointed springs.
Bright enameled eyes might rein you inside
For your brief spate, of the near total ingress:
Waving haloed hips of plastic'd flesh; her glide
Could stay stationary, until you confess.

Only she knows well, the secret of assuring you
You'll not drown, of her swirling vicissitudes;
And if once you abhorred your childhood name;
Now can use same call sign, for your idling engines
Of a certain procreatively inspired invasion
As she whispers it; says it loud, clenching need
Of the second's singlemost long duration.

When she finally unlocks your prow from docks
Post haste, of body's self-deceptive clocks
Inside her temples, rising incense of sweat
Mingled with undertows, of past vibrations; and her smell
Itself: a briny distillate, of a pheromone tonic; forensic clue
Of a decidedly amber hue; the body's cyclonic age of man
Keeps travelling it's way, down her plundered mnemonic.

You can feel the straight jacket's razored sleeves,
Beginning to loose your constricted lungs;
And your ***** overflowing; becoming a sieve:
If you could keep on riding, you'd be quite sure
That eventually, just a small band-aid could cure
The slight, though badly malformed scar;
From the still flowing toxins; to soon immure-
Hard to believe, how far gone you were.

Forget old self; a newfound confidence;
Makes you forestall the inevitable trip
Down to the corner, second-hand store,
As now is revealed, that her paint's become chipped;
And the horse's eyes are now rolling inward,
As if looking there, for some positive proof,
From the prying, irreverent eyes of the world-
But you know it too well: she's just a padded cell.

beneath the stillness of my ocean,

there are currents overwhelming,

& it’s a gentle, persisent undertow

-

they pull me down.

-

I can not tell, at times,

when the sea only whispers,

those waves of wonder,

I am all smiles on my vessel.

-

but lo! at times, I remove my hat,

And without, I can see reflections,

(refractions too!)

of the sunlight, illuminating,

the trenches & dark spots,

the layers I seek not to swim,

-

it is there, where I search for a map,

but there is no map, or guide of sorts,

my ocean remains ever unknown

it is there, where I float alone

-

they pull me down.

-

what is the worst; to know not

your ship or self?

I do not see either…

I can only see the reflections

-

that truth is drowning me….

-

I have made my boat bright,

intertwining daises freckle

the sides, but it is not me

-

& true! the piece will work

but for how long?

-

I fear I have not made it strong.

-

still, I shall sit in it. it carries

me well…

I have made seat enough for two

took the time to fill them up

no! my boat is full…

-

I must make for you, a space!

have my seat here…

me, I shall lay on the floor!

-



yes, I like it better here…

I can see only the sky…

& for miles & miles, I will

dream of, one day, sharing this view

-

& we won’t have to tell at times,

what the undertows are murmuring

-

I will not listen;

I will not let them pull me down

It’s nights like these;
when the sky feels raw-quiet
and the moon hangs so low-heavy
and pulpy, parchment yellow,
dripping and left to sun-stain and disintegrate
against dull ghost stories
and stinging to-do lists.
This is when I feel it- the fracturing.
You’re out of sight.
I’m out of mind.  

I crack the window,
blink loose stars out of focus
and send them shotgun galloping
across the flat-hum pulsing,
tin tinged and navy evening static.

The North Star needs new batteries.
He flickers and sways but won’t
extinguish. He is soft and solemn-
a lazing, dazing anchor whose fraying rope
weaves bowline knots
and hitching ties
into each inch of my drying hair.

Every strand of the night breathes itself into life.
The pieces are softening and shifting,
howling and crawling.
They become young men planning,
flexing at high tide and daring
each other further out with each set of waves.
They are posing, pretending to be
what they think the word ‘reckless’ means.

They are throwing their bodies into surf
and wailing.
They are crashing hard
and violent
against the shore.

They are shaking out golden limbs
and rubbing bloodshot eyes.
I watch bruises bloom and gashes erupt a flash
of crimson before salt water clean and stung.

They are flashing gleeful smiles
and throwing taunting screams across
whole seas while diving back,
quickly, elegantly,
into the same rough surf
that just spit them out.

Maybe they’re proactive,
maybe things hurts less when you
know where the hurt will come from.
Maybe the game isn’t to stay lovely
and bright and whole;
but to know pain’s possibilities so intimately
that when it comes time for you to break
you can do so without shattering
completely.

Nights like these;
sitting cross-legged with a blank
page open and an aching, reeling,
sickly-warm ribbon sprouting from my molars-
I get it.

Streamers wave proudly across
my body.
They grip and simmer,
they wind tightly around  
organs and bones who
gave up their hiding spots
and surrendered their secrets
the first time I let him come in.

The strings are bright and knot themselves tight.
They tether my windpipe,
weld each rib colorfully between sternum and spine.
They coil down and tie off;
thick, swaddled and bobbing, bowing
themselves regally around my coccyx.

Nights like these I have no armor.
Where is my skin?
I stir and rattle to even the slightest shift of Earth.
Exposed and quaking, I body-map bolts of light.
The light is tap dancing over lungs,
igniting blood and ricocheting through the summer camp,
arts and crafts hysteria fusing my anatomy.
It plunge pastels deep into the marrow of my bones.
The room is smoky, my gut splashes about, electrocuted.
I stop feeling tired.

The thing is- what I’m really trying to say,
is that I have no words right now.
There are no pretty lines caught in the twine of
my hip joints and no fiery prose laying
eggs in my spinal fluid.

There is no poem to write
about the fleshy, sour
smell of my own heart
roasting on a pyre or the hours it will take
to scrub off the charred bits of melting muscle
now staining the carpet.

This bitter heat creeping up my throat
and the sallow contraction of my
belly are not the prologue to a revolution-
my diagnosis is not a metaphor.

They are simply the tangy symptoms of the sadness
pinging around my insides and playing
peekaboo among the weeds of my broken body and sticky mind.
She will wait, biding time, for a properly rapt audience.
I whisper then whine that I’m too messy,
too slouchy, too emotionally ill-equipped to house a heart
maybe breaking,
definitely ripping, across-the-ballroom
slipping and wrecking-ball imploding.
Sadness smacks her lips and smirks.
No one rides for free.  

Nights like these I think
maybe I’ve wasted all my words;
my sentences and precious syntax and swooping rhetoric,
on lighter blows and mere heartaches.
I am a ragdoll limply stretching.
I am standing completely still, taking inventory.
I’m puzzled, though decidedly unthreatened,
by the glass-littered ground, my bleeding feet.
I mean look at the big picture:
I lit myself on fire.
I’m not worried about sunburn.

I know now that it has happened-
the hurt circulates my veins
and pumps me full of vehemence.
The act of breathing is ferocious,
I am a tangle of raw nerves.
This is the night I’m left with a heart shattered
in six hundred pieces on the floor and absolutely no poetry rising
from my pores to help glue it back together.

I said I get it.
I should have practiced.
I should have left my clothes on the sand and
ran toward the sea, naked and unembarrassed,
while diving head first into fierce undertows
and crashing with the boyish bodies of the night.

I should have experimented;
explored all the ways hurt could find me
while the beach was still mine to breathe out and yell for
without fear of being told 'no.'
But I didn’t. I kept my clothes on and my secrets to myself.

Tonight I’m a wreck and this isn’t a test.
I'm so far out, weighed down
by this boxy, heavy pain
ripening in my arms.
I'm panicky and paddling in any direction,
trying to keep my head above water
and praying the shore will appear and welcome me
once I get through this next set of waves,
through this next set of waves.

It would be inaccurate, indeed downright unfair,
To label her as a convenience,
Certainly no matter of being any port in a storm;
She fell into that category of handsome women,
Tending more to the Rubenesque than the runway,
And those occasions where an evening with the gang
Fragmented into a somewhat unmatched set
Were more in line with settling into a familiar harbor,
Bereft of the intoxicating hazards of shoals and sand bars, perhaps,
But comfortable with a certain steadfastness about it,
A pleasant haven from the riptides, undertows,
And various entanglements of the open water.

It was an aneurysm that took her, the type of thing
We’d associated with grandparents, aged aunts,
Corpulent colleagues of our fathers.
What’s more, it turned she was staunchly and stubbornly Lutheran,
Regular to the point of obsession in her attendance at services
(We’d no way of knowing such a thing, of course,
The notion of staying overnight at her place
To rise from last night’s sheets at mid-morning
And share a table for omelettes and awkward chit-chat
Being both curious and curiosity)
So we arrayed ourselves in stiff collars,
Accompanied by ties we’d hoped to be suitable,
As the whole affair had us a bit off balance,
And we were only able to restore our equilibrium at the end,
Just in time to attempt to bounce pebbles onto her coffin lid
In what he hoped was some witticism in Morse code.

Hmm, Christmas season has gone, good:
Presents shoved in drawers, some used, some abused,
Some never to see the light of day, until thrown away,
Others worn with delight, played with, till dawn’s first light,
We never even saw church, or thought of god, any god.
Why should we? Religious? Nah, not us, Darwin rules,
We had science in schools, we mocked the fools,
Who even imagined an all seeing deity, with awe,
Punishing and rewarding, everything he saw,
But we ate our fill, partied with skill, just avoided,
The need to ****, especially to ****, so messy,
Never allowing our own family blood to spill,
The clean up is swallowing, such a bitter pill.

Hmm, Easter approaches, we do it all again,
Stretching our family, what an awful strain,
Pretending we like, adore, the snidely sneers,
We just ignore, avoiding the drunk, such a bore,
While those of us, who are close, watch the chaos,
Feel the undertows of love streaming among us,
Binding the salient parts, making a family work,
For the kids, you see, a duty we, must never shirk,
Our only legacy, from the lives we have built,
Making us continue, regardless of the guilt,
Emotional alloys in alcohol flux, so easily spilt,
Another religious festival, who gives a toss?
A land of empty churches, not such a loss.

Hmm, Whitsun lies beyond Easter: what?
What is, Pentecostal; exactly? More rot?
Fifty days, oh yeah, makes sense, sure,
Makes nonsense, have faith, no defence,
We don’t care: get it! Got it? Well good!
No nailed-god; for heathens like us; we hijack,
As Christianity hijacked our paganism, yes!
Copied and pasted their festivals over others,
Took our sacred places, chanted in dulcet tones,
Where we gathered, running naked around stones,
Leaping cleansing fires, bumping ugly bones,
How’d you like that, preacher folk; in shock?
Burn in your created Hell; let heathen Earth rock.

© Paul M Chafer 2014

The boatman glides over dark waters,
Calloused hands hold heavy oars.
City lights twinkle like fire flies,
On murky currents forged by undertows.
His face well carved by years of hardship,
A backbone bent by deep regret,
He's marking tickets off for the passengers,
Most still unawares
His name be Death.

For the years still ahead, aching to achieve,
can you proceed enmirthed and jolly
as you gracefully make your leave?
Or will pangs of old uncertainty
heave waves of manic sighs
while depressive undertows
keep your fears always alive?
The mirror may scream obscenity
or whisper doubt into your cheer
with gloomy cover cast to dull
the ways you hold yourself as dear,
but don't let the voice you hear
be an empty echo of the words
that others crafted to appear
as something more believable
than a charlatan on the pier.

She was as relevant
as a
peninsula--

Mostly surrounded by
surrounded by
surrounded by
surrounded by
she was mostly surrounded by
surrounded by
surrounded by
surrounded by
water
insanity
turbulence
undertows

but

as a sliver of land

hanging

and

hanging onto--


she was made relevant.




-LP

your eyes are riptides,
undertows,
the current sweeping me off my feet:
pulling me under until i cannot breathe,
drowning me.
in a sea of people, i always search for you,
hiding across the crowded room.
sharp relief of your jaw line
--sculpted,
a statue of david--
your soul smothers me when you smile,
lights up those eyes
like the moonlight reflecting the choppy
ocean water at night.
in a sea of people, i always find you,
gentle touches like stingrays and eels,
sugar-coated shark teeth
sinking into me,
windswept across the beach with
cawing seagulls hunting clams.
your words are too sweet
--candied,
falsified for personal achievement--
smothering me in my sleep when you
trill your fingers to say hello.
in a sea of people, i always miss you,
shadowed,
a ghost of what once was and what will be,
things that i saw and things i will see.
the tide tickles at my ankles
as i stand on the edge of the horizon,
searching for your silhouette
in the darkness.
the sun has set and the tides will rise
--moonlight,
moonlight in your eyes--
but i am accompanied only by silence.
the ritual
of a faded dream that
crossbreeds with vague metaphors
and bad similes.
sweet dreams, great barrier reef.
goodnight, my darling.

I Struggling
under the currents of this world
And I see the others
and their struggles too
yet somehow
they make it out of the blue

or least to the surface
where they can breathe

I make it there
from time to time
But only ever
undertows i find

I wish to see above the waves
to see the light
and better days

Maybe i must change my ways
or build a boat
to hope above it stays

A sharp mind dulled
While I run
From the dark death undertows.
Pulling from unseen roses, a gun,
And fragile bullets, columns, rows.
Truly no escape
From a serpent, Eden, and apples.

how can i say
that i envy the chase
from the tip of my pencil
to your graphite gaze?
spitting my heart
onto an endless canvas
of greys and blacks,
hoping the red would stain…
but it never does.
only your floral words are
indelible on my skin
and the reverse
is just a lie i tell myself
so i could sleep a little better
every forsaken night.
the truth is far from your moon;
beyond all your pretty stars
and iridescent eternities,
it is despairingly beyond my fathoms.
but i hope, and again i hurt
for butterfly smiles
and deluding taciturn undertows
and nightmarish illusions
leaving bruises of you
on the very tip of my lost tongue
and all over my wept eyes;
a lifeless empty void
against the autumn shower
of your warm hermetic glances.
and there is no one else
to keep this rusted clockwork
ticking rhythmically to the beats
of your mindless cradle…
and that is the ultimate folly
of this ascetic destructive shale
that i tactlessly call my soul.
for a fool’s machinery,
this chemical heart is.
So indiscernible to lose itself in
such vitreous self-infliction,
and sabotaging the very blood
that my tiring arteries
now regain, thus to sustain
the very memory of your breath
in tranquil consonance…
foolish—and yet; a fool, i am.
a fool for believing that this
lie was past the dark side of the moon
and beyond my wounded stars
and lacklustre infinities…
you are despondently beyond my fathoms.
but i hope, and again, i hurt.
darling, just how can i ever say
that i envy the calm reflection
from the incipience of your melody
to your coda’s revelations?

sinking under
this mirrored surface
one last glance
at who I am
undertows from inside
the water flows
to where I hide
distorted vision
time rushing past
to say, "I love you"
took my last gasp
051501~12.4p

As a child on a beach
Shoveling moats to the kingdom
And as the waves to the sand
You scooped me up.

My heart is like the shells of the sea
vacant from previous owners,
Wandering lost in undertows,
Trying to find a ground to settle.

Perhaps you want not to own me.
Or drag me down with tides
Maybe you want to keep me…
You might think I’m a treasure.

Just please be careful, be careful with me…
For wealth need not be measured
But if I’m not worthy of your shelf
Throw me back, throw me back
To the sea.

…trust me, I’ll be free.

A hundred wasted lifetimes
A thousand broken dreams
Countless shouts of triumph
Rage apart at ill-stitched seams
Hands which reach for glory
Fall to dust an inch away
Towers of humanity
Crumble as they sway
Tapestries of vanities
And falsely stated niceties
Only set the mind at ease
While silently they breed disease
And thus will further weaken
Your vaguely-wrought construction
Until you're lies must deepen
Cocealing your destruction
Yet, still it flows, and no one knows
If it's lies or truth that goes
Cascading through the undertows
That drag you down between the rows
Of everything that could have been
Instead of what it's come to be
When even truths are now pretend
And trying is insanity
Yet, here we are, inside this lie
Which buries you, and still you try
To raise your tower to the sky
While even angels stop to cry
At such a shadowed, weakened soul
Crying out to be set free
Never heard, and locked inside
Your tower of humanity

"Eve's Diary"

Within your deep eyes lie a galaxy.
A heaving sea. Undertows, and eddies.
An undulating undine in abyss
blanketed by dead stars and those who gleam.

She faced cataclysmic adversity,
and she fell from the cosmic nursery.
She lost her skin of lustrous ebony,
gradually turning burgundy--- to flesh.

And soon she lost her memory,
and everything was in haze.
Destined to walk for all eternity
and marvel at this once tiny, blue marble,
which she saw from space.

So, when I thought about her, I knew that I shouldn't be

She was a river of undertows that once held, would never let go

She would be my Queen of everything, my Queen bee

So you see, I can't help but think of her as my longing for her grows

I wish that she would wash over my body like a tidal wave along the shore

Feeling her all over me....something that I could never possibly ignore

She's as unique as the ice that flows down this mighty river

Right now she's a mystery, my fantasy giver

As the sun shines upon her, she glistens like flawless diamonds

She's a breath taker, the likes of which I can never pretend

Take...selfishly steal me away just for you on a perfect sunny and 75° day

Stare in the face of all that oppose and whisper to me....."nope, you're all mine today" !

One day I'll be her honeybee, so sticky and so sweet

Once she's had this drone, she'll be buzzing "in this heat let's please repeat"

Adrift on waves that I compose
A shipwreck life of word and prose
Longing for the shore that shows
How blue my tide of sorrow flows
When her horizon sets and goes
To hide behind her vacant glows
Then pulls me in her undertows
No man could fathom deeper lows
The depths of anchored lovers' woes
Not even Lord Poseidon knows
How far I've sunk to feel her throes
Submerged in frigid voids she chose
Our hearts immersed in shadows froze
Yet like a thawing winter's rose
We still found warmth to melt the snows
So my descension never slows
Nor grants my flooding lungs repose
I'll drown in her 'til my eyes close
Until my dead man's chest implodes

this tides not calming
keep it coming
the waves are rising
keep it coming
the undertows taking
keep it coming
it has me leaving

The world turns. Forest fires burn.

Gusting winds that blow. Torrents and undertows.

Tides fall and grow - so do the seasons.

This world is complex, there must be a reason.


He made us to be.



The deserts are scorched and lake tops' freeze over.

A distant star explodes and becomes a supernova.

The ground gashes and rips as each fault line slips.



He made us to be.



So what's the reason why the waves crash the way they do?

And why is a sunset so beautiful?

It's not random to me. I know there's a designer, you see.

A creator that we must honor 'cause,


He made us to be.

My bones
They gently cave in
The surface meeting the bottom
Almost like the way your toes splay and shift when walking on sand
Waves of chaos
Tidal blues of panic
Crests of anxiety
Undertows of worry and fraught
My hands quiver
Disastrous stalks
Sway in the wheat field that I unknowingly manufactured
Snaking fissures
Rising up through the slated grey dirt
A beasts maw
Awaiting its next meal
And for desert it'll be my mental health
A deformed shish kabob
I bite down on the vegetables and meat
Only to find a rotted old blood taste in my mouth
Before I can spit it out or even change my mind
My teeth have sown themselves up
My lips have sealed shut
I can't ******* tears
I can't taste the years that I wasted
I tried to the best of my abilities
I showed the world a tender sort of love
That it never thought to show me '
Because when something is beautiful  
I'd rather leave it for other people to see
Because whenever I pick something
It either devours me whole as a result
Or it rots in my fingertips
Gently and lovingly coating each one
One last whisper of a kiss goodbye

When heavy mists decided to retreat
And undertows turned down their graze
The hoary ocean accepted his defeat
And distant shore ahead arose ablaze

How many nights have seen the face
Of loud joys and silent wonders
Coimbra! What a lovely place
Your songs kept captive spanless numbers

And even more fell in a slumber
Under her lulling velvet tunes
Her poems spurt with blood of umber
But then it’s you who’s left with wounds

Side note: consider it a crime
To put blanc feelings in a rhyme

fixed eyes
upon the
sunrise,

as the river
hastened by.

for me,

it mimicked
our lives.

complete with
raging
undertows
and calm

but ever
moving,

rapidly.

thankfully
the shoreline,

stood still.

as did
the worm.

'Yours and everyone's concrete poet'
👷‍♂️