"ungraceful" poems
See, it’s more of a… hypnosis,
A deep slumber of an everlasting fantasy. Trust me, I love it.
Like a whisk into a different parallel world
Filled with flashing colors that swirl and twirl, in fact,
kind of similar to a dress on a ballroom floor.
Not just any ballroom floor though.
No, this, like Van Gogh’s Starry Night
a masterpiece that cannot be replicated,
and to step foot on it is one of careful deep sea excitement
I wish to step there.
However, I am a tad ungraceful
and my feet are about as elegant as a scuba diver’s flippers.
So I might just impersonate one
and dive deep into the sea of the unknown and secret homes
hoping it delivers an innate whisper of the anticipation, the excitement
of this hypnotic, starry world.
Deeper I go, into this never ending oceanic abyss
With the darkness just as tongue twisting as it gets
Looking for something, anything,
to salvage my reason for going this deep, this late,
Because I have a tendency to procrastinate about the tasks most essential to my fate.
But, if you want, you can accompany me
and we can scuba dive together
into the deep sea of the not yet discovered and shining beacons of wonder
And if we’re lucky, we might find the lost city of Atlantis.
And while we’re there we can search and search for the spoils and riches of the hidden majesty
and wouldn't it be just lovely if we find a treasure chest, something?
With an eye for design we can admire it’s beauty
but we have to open it
because that’s the secret in the treasure.
To open it.
And the contents are the spoils.
Open it.
Apr 16, 2014
Apr 16, 2014 at 11:18 PM UTC
I rejoice in feeling ungraceful,
for grace is such a silly thing to bear.
I do not still the waded waters of my stay:
I lay unevenly and sing loud.
And try to leave reminders everywhere.
I step closer to the edge out where I play
and peer longingly into the raging seas.
When I die, listen to the voice of morning.
And you will hear me blowing ungracefully
as wind through the trees.
Nov 17, 2013
Nov 17, 2013 at 8:53 PM UTC
The message is simple, the delivery hard,
even as his eyes cut holes for it to enter.
White rims that flash, like beasts that spar
Natural strobes flicker, to thicken the black center.
When intent is replied with padded knuckle intent
Ungraceful, his neck turns past comforts vector.
I turn away to close a window from the storm.
Thought pathways like drunken footprints stepped
but a spark in the cloud of numbness replies.
My clenched thumb releases his bicep
And the arthritic cogs inside us violently un-subside.
Those muscle strings in my handwriting
to the letter the red bull replies,
but rain breaks my gaze to the window.
Knuckles like bruised alps in formation;
the boy’s got blood lightning in his eyes,
And so have I. ***** in the sockets I’m pushing on,
to revel in colors of my ****** mind’s sky.
I hurt myself to try telling that one ****** idea.
Tasting the punch, spitting iron, my Boxer I despise.
The classic writer’s hand ache makes me relinquish my pen.
Those axons, which lead to nothing,
they have now reached it.
Flayed to the winds.
The eye’s blinds closed completely.
In darkness, rasping breath resounding
and the lungs like strained gluttons for life
are clearly mocking the hearts desperate beating.
I put the pen horizontal to the desk.
It possesses all the use of a dead man’s organs.
But the sway, rains sweat from hair down to skin,
Then to polish the padded domes of pain.
When flesh rolls like thunder, bones crack like lightning.
His legs, my pen and both our minds are jarred from this refrain.
And upon the strike,
I’ll polish words and pad their meaning,
Punch the reader,
And enjoy the force that they contain.
Aug 25, 2013
Aug 25, 2013 at 7:18 PM UTC
[and scarcely worth the trouble, at that]
The same to me are somber days and gay.
Though Joyous dawns the rosy morn, and bright,
Because my dearest love is gone away
Within my heart is melancholy night.
My heart beats low in loneliness, despite
That riotous Summer holds the earth in sway.
In cerements my spirit is bedight;
The same to me are somber days and gay.
Though breezes in the rippling grasses play,
And waves dash high and far in glorious might,
I thrill no longer to the sparkling day,
Though joyous dawns the rosy morn, and bright.
Ungraceful seems to me the swallow's flight;
As well might heaven's blue be sullen gray;
My soul discerns no beauty in their sight
Because my dearest love is gone away.
Let roses fling afar their crimson spray,
And ****** daisies splash the fields with white,
Let bloom the poppy hotly as it may,
Within my heart is melancholy night.
And this, O love, my pitiable plight
Whenever from my circling arms you stray;
This little world of mine has lost its light....
I hope to God, my dear, that you can say
The same to me.
1.4k
The same to me are sombre days and gay.
Though joyous dawns the rosy morn, and bright,
Because my dearest love is gone away
Within my heart is melancholy night.
My heart beats low in loneliness, despite
That riotous Summer holds the earth in sway.
In cerements my spirit is bedight;
The same to me are sombre days and gay.
Though breezes in the rippling grasses play,
And waves dash high and far in glorious might,
I thrill no longer to the sparkling day,
Though joyous dawns the rosy morn, and bright.
Ungraceful seems to me the swallow's flight;
As well might Heaven's blue be sullen gray;
My soul discerns no beauty in their sight
Because my dearest love is gone away.
Let roses fling afar their crimson spray,
And ****** daisies splash the fields with white,
Let bloom the poppy hotly as it may,
Within my heart is melancholy night.
And this, oh love, my pitiable plight
Whenever from my circling arms you stray;
This little world of mine has lost its light ...
I hope to God, my dear, that you can say
The same to me.
1.4k
You work with your soul
And they steal with their eyes
And they take with their hands
As they hear all the plans you don't have…
The most ungraceful walker you've ever seen
But when it comes to talk, your tongue's tightrope is a beam
And no matter how heavy and hysterical I breathe
I can't blow your feathered phonics from this slippery scene
There's a laser in the lotus
No proof, but somehow I know this
And the only thing keeping me alive
Is giving you fuel for your sorceries and sapphires
That you cover up with jobs, drugs and flat tires
As the eggs in your head run amok on the wire
There's a laser in the lotus
No proof, but somehow I know this
And you work with your soul
And they steal with their eyes
And they take with their hands
As they write down your plans
I don't know anything, so I'm told, so they blame me
I don't know anything, so I'm cold, and I'm crazy
All I know is a thing I was told in the haze of
Lost control, and it was that I was, so **** lucky to be
Exhaling above ground, above water
So my feet fled, but still fighting is my head
Gutted and bled, and now
Every friend is a cop with a chess kit
Every friend is a cop with a chess kit
Heart's glow is gone but with blood I'll manage
Still I can't repent without knowing the damage
Nov 19, 2011
Nov 19, 2011 at 7:00 PM UTC
I killed some baby
Birds
In 1974, eleven, ten years after I was
One and Innocent and my chubby
Fingers probably looked like fat
Sausages to the birds
Tormenting me
Mama bird, frantic, chirping and
Flying in my blonde hair-space
Something worm-like crawled into my
Existence Heart Soul Stomach Nothing
Better than a poke in the eye
Unless you’ve wings that haven’t
Been fully tested
Chirp squawk squawk Chirp
Some kids too far away,
Yelling Hey what the heck’re you doing
You shut up and mind your own
Bees had no wax that day for me
Stick in the safe confines of the picnic
Non-shelter gutter enclosure straw nest
Aborting a beautiful winged thing months
Weeks
Frail little ungraceful bodies
Fell from a height unseen
Landing in ****** puddles
Mom-bird aiming her beak at my own
Eyes swollen and wet, seeing the
Damage I’d manage to inflict
With absolutely no reason as to
Why? On that horrible-
Day and confused, Why?
WHY Did I DO that?
Oh God I’m so sorry
I killed something only Your
Hands could have Present-ed
To our world
Behind me, birdsongs flew, invisible
Wings echoing
Down endless dark corridors
Of my mind
I ran the gait of cowards,
Crying, awkward, stumbling, falling,
Skinning the guilty knees of the man
Inside my conscious who’d taken
Temporary refuge in his wanderings
I cut between yards I promised I’d never cut
Again
Son what’s wrong why’re you crying
I sobbed the evil man out of me, his
Residue falling in salty tears
I did a bad thing, Mom
Tell me what happened. Get it out of you.
Some birds, baby birds, were chirping
Yes. Go on.
I took a stick.
I feel my Mom flinch as if struck with a
Sharp pointed wooden object
Oh no…
And I killed their song.
And their ability to fly.
Oh, my son…
And Mom simply held me, drawing out
The rest of the wild
Spontaneous impulses
That possessed me on that awful
Day I killed the baby birds
Nov 25, 2012
Nov 25, 2012 at 4:25 PM UTC
I woke up late this morning
It took me awhile to get out of bed
And when I did
I contortioned my body at odd angles
To squeeze all the sleep out of my bones
I looked out on the backyard as I peed
And saw two cardinals hopping around
Bright splotches of red in the overgrown grass
They stood facing each other chirping loudly
I couldn't tell for what until I saw
The female, brown and plain, standing by
On the banister of the deck
Watching the standoff
One of the red males fluttered up next to her
And she took off, not satisfied
The one still in the grass took off madly after her
The one on the banister galloped its length before taking off
Like a rolling lit firecracker
Its fuse too long
They both flew towards the house
Out of view
I scurried down stairs
Mildly overweight, hair sticking up at odd angles
Like a ball of broken glass
Thundering down the steps
The most ungraceful of all creation
Lumbering and over excited
When I got the back window
All three of the cardinals were in a wet clump
Of purple flowers that had opened themselves
To the scant sunlight of an overcast day
The female jumping and chirping excitedly
The two males weaving and bobbing in and out
Of the flowering bush, a pair of dueling sowing needles
Trying to knit the song of success
And then they saw me
My shirt an unnaturally bright electric blue
My face pressed stupidly to the glass
My grin unnatural and dreamy
As I watched this common display
That is still dazzling to me as I think about it
And they all flew off at once
To settle their matters elsewhere
May 1, 2017
May 1, 2017 at 10:25 AM UTC
You asked for a poem,
but the truth is,
I don't know how to put us into words.
We are so imperfect.
But when I hug you, and lift your tiny, feather-weight self from gravity's grip,
there is nothing more familiar.
I could squeeze all night, try to squeeze you into myself,
where maybe I could keep you safe—be the hardened outer-layer to my little Lemon Drop.
We met at an age far from simple.
thirteen's complexities of spirit
is made up of much more than
ugly or pretty
white or black
sad or happy
mismatched or a puzzle piece fit.
It is made up of pieces, or wholes.
You came
olive skinned,
brown hair—with eyes to match,
laughter that tickled at the throat of any nearing neighbor,
and a smile that held both truth and fallacy.
The pretty one who fretted over petty.
You came,
In pieces.
I came
Fair skinned,
blonde hair and blue eyes,
an imagination that couldn't escape even itself,
and confidence unfit for such a character.
I came,
a whole.
Our friendship
came like love—unexpected and almost ungraceful
at first.
Our paths had history,
but this was where both of our stories began,
at the edge awkward
at the brink of becoming.
As time passed
it even felt like love now and then
I your rock,
you my little slice of sunshine.
As time passed
our bridges split our interests differed,
but we never lost sight of the pieces to our whole.
Jan 24, 2013
Jan 24, 2013 at 1:09 PM UTC
A city with a split soul
Once sat high on a hill.
The city was split:
Higher and lower planes.
The higher plane was for
the fortunate,
the powerful,
the wealthy,
the elegant.
Only the best were allowed.
The lower plane housed the
Outcasts,
Forgotten,
Clumsy,
Abandoned.
The society deemed them to
Belong in the sewers;
To be deserving of the worst
Humanity had to offer.
To fall from the upper plane
Was the ultimate shame
Because you could
never go back.
You can fall from grace,
But never rise to elegance.
Upper city was once home,
But, then they learned how
Clumsy and ungraceful I am.
After spilling the soup
Too many times,
They cast me down
To join the lower city.
Home is now among
The lowest of the low.
After fumbling along
Without any sense of direction,
I learned why I was lost.
Upper city was where
Pomp and protocols
Dictated every move.
Now free from that,
I had no way of knowing
The path before me.
The confusion, however,
Came from me,
From my being
unaccustomed to making
My own decisions.
Finding my own way
Was hard, but I learned
That my fall from elegance,
That my fall from grace,
Had been a blessing,
Not a curse.
Free from the rigidity
Of elegance, there was
The vibrancy of clumsiness.
In the stumbling, faltering
Manner through which I
Guided my life, I found
A sweet freedom in
The possibilities.
It is because of this
Wild sensation called
Freedom that I love
The lower city
And pity the upper one.
Nov 30, 2015
Nov 30, 2015 at 10:24 AM UTC
I spent too long drowning
under the weight of your devotion
breathing in your pressurized air
and counting the days
on the underside of my arm.
For you,
I tweaked myself, freaked myself
out by my willingness to fold.
And after everything,
it was you who walked away.
Aug 18, 2013
Aug 18, 2013 at 4:47 PM UTC
i told you i loved you
my voice faltered in the absence of light
the words fell out of my mouth
ungraceful and ugly as ever
it is no wonder your touch went cold
the silence you chose not to sever
your reply was infested with mold
the distance grew and my chest sunk
"that's sweet of you, but i'm just too drunk"
and in that moment i knew
that i was wrong, i do not love you
not at all
Jan 7, 2013
Jan 7, 2013 at 11:07 AM UTC
I sit in my apartment quiet
Wounded so hard inside
My chest feels like a hole has been dug out
I cry because I can't believe
I've lost my beliefs when you took my trust
I trusted you completely
How naive and ignorant of me
How ungraceful to allow you in my body
I cry when I'm in my bed
Where you left me
Naked at the door
I feel that moment once more
So blurry
Every man
Every person
Reaps what you have sworn into my mind of a mysterious river full of lies
Trust. I cannot
It was hard before but now it is irrelevant.
I do not trust inside. Myself or anyone else
You broke me. I'm numb, I'm a sore.
Sep 6, 2013
Sep 6, 2013 at 10:35 PM UTC
Oh, spirit of freedom trapped in an endless cycle of foreboding thought
What awaits you in the inevitable, unknowing future?
Shall you be the conqueror of all that finds itself in your wake -
Or shall you be the adventurer, an explorer of this round globe;
Stretching far from the Dinaric mountains to the East and West alike
Does your freedom, forged from being lost and in an endless search for yourself
Allow your heart to love and to be loved? Will it open the rune sealed treasury;
Of your soul that lies so deep within the depths of Tartarus in your chest?
Oh, spirit so unnaturally free, forsaking yet never forgetting all that has passed
Shall your Pandora’s box remain unopened, awaiting for the ageless dream;
That shall decay it into dust and air, and return it to the fine Earth and stone;
That has given birth to so many of spirits upon its accursed soil?
What really is your freedom, spirit;
What is your secret?
Are you truly free, or only in nature and eternal wishes to fly like a phoenix;
Yet are chained to your own core, unable to move a single inch farther
Than where you already are?
Tell me, spirit;
What is the price of your freedom?
Does it require payment of flesh and blood from your own vessel
Or perhaps a surrender of soul to the ungraceful, to await an end
Within the fiery pits of Hell, clutched in His inescapable grasp?
Shall you, invincible and undaunted in your quest to see all that is to be seen;
To live all that is to be lived; To feel all that is to be felt;
Surrender your entire being to eternal suffering and torment;
A split second of clairvoyance exchanged for an eternity of blindness?
If to be lost is to be found;
If to be blind is to see;
If to be dead is to live;
Then tell me, spirit –
Are you truly free?
Mar 3, 2021
Mar 3, 2021 at 12:59 PM UTC
And your body swayed red with fire.
And reminded me that passion exists.
Still. In this age of prothstetic souls and bones.
Your two feet walked like steel on earth.
Solid and understanding.
And the power that came from your eyes,
was purple with regality and a soft blue
that comforted me and the ungraceful body
I was given to call home.
Your body kept swaying red with fire.
Never ceasing.
Showing me that I have the same endurance
within me, too.
And someday when I'm stronger,
my body will sway red, too.
And our passion together will burn the brightest fire.
May 20, 2014
May 20, 2014 at 1:42 PM UTC
Reality is a blur, a foggy consistant blur.
Everyday is the same melancholic routine.
10 on the dot.
One sunnyside up egg with a toasted sourdough slice.
Citrus tea with honey and an amusing podcast to prepare.
Slap on foundation and eyeliner, to look somewhat "happy" for a straining workday to come.
Thank god for the coming 4 hours there, my mind is of spotless.
Not a thought of you comes inching in my deserted cold mind in those 4 hours.
As soon as I punch out and put away the fake smiles of the workday, you pop right up.
This in general is not bad in a way that I loathe you, the memory of you,
But bad in a way that I miss you.
Enormously.
The old routine was much more methodically medicore but it was pure ******* beyond happiness.
Up at 9, waffles with milk, with tv in the background.
As I can not fathom the desire to be at work already.
Walking in, I longed to see your deep icy blues that just melted me instantly as soon as I saw them,
Into a puddle, there I go.
Their target are aimed towards my ungraceful demeanor, it still shocks me through out my whole body.
Tingling, Inviting and Warm.
Feelings I felt everytime you nearby, I instantly knew it was you.
Present day.
As I drive towards what seems to be another morrow towards the vapid and grave, I look for you.
I felt those blues that day of a party.
I felt them as I walked away from a group conversation.
I felt them as I mourned the loss of someone.
I felt those blues that first night.
The night we met.
Vanilla ice cream, in the cold air and a life changing experince we both intuned.
Instinctively, I trust its profoundly there to you too.
Even now and till your departing day.
I felt those blue eyes.
As much sorrow and grief it brings me always, and probably will be till my final and sweet death,
I dream back to the days I would walk in, and melt in my puddle, as I felt and longed for those icy blues.
Mar 19, 2019
Mar 19, 2019 at 4:47 AM UTC
I stumbled through your life with an ungraceful lack of restraint.
I tried to find an answer in a life I barely knew.
If I'd known what I do now, I wouldn't have felt for you.
Tomorrow we'll grow further apart then we were before.
The tide, the moon, the sun, the stars, time turns closed the door.
Before the lock bolts shut I'd hope to make amends.
And save my mind from whats inside in time to see the end.
Jan 30, 2015
Jan 30, 2015 at 4:23 PM UTC
We used to have contests to see who could make the best nests in each other’s hair.
Naturally, your nests were award winning-
We’d emerge from bed, spent and re-born
And in the mirror, an applauding crowd of spectators stood standing along our satisfied, flushed reflections.
Those nests would take eons to untangle-
Partly, because honestly –they were ridiculous.
How in the hell did you move so fast as to sculpt worlds from strings on my scalp?
Partly, because they were funny, and it is a small, rare delight to look in a mirror and know the smile across is actually two,
But mostly because, truly- I was quite fond of the fingers that made them-
Ungraceful, to be sure
But some of the best imperfections I’ve known.
Oct 20, 2013
Oct 20, 2013 at 8:58 PM UTC
Its a summer,
sitting in the house older than the dirt in the garden just outside.
In the summer heat,
where we wear our bathing suits all day long.
We stay out in the sun because,
Pop pop says its good for us
We eat and eat and eat,
And we play and play and play
"stay young," Pop Pop mumbles under his breath,
of course when I was younger I never truly understood the words spoken form his lips.
As a teen in my grandparent's backyard,
my ungraceful limbs and awkward body were welcomed.
Mom mom and Pop pop loved my brace face even when I didn't.
My stomach rolls didn't matter.
In fact, the only rolls that did matter were the ones we ate with our macaroni.
In my grandparents home, we spend busy mornings,
but lazy afternoons playing poker at the table.
In my grandparents house,
sadness rolls away like the waves at the local New England beach.
Of course, like any good family, things can get angry and heated,
But at my grandparent's house,
that's just how we know it is time for a swim.
Feb 28, 2019
Feb 28, 2019 at 7:36 PM UTC
Nothing but foul bed bugs
Filling the holes in my brain
The macabre can oftimes seem mundane
Or excusatory, even pretentious in tone
What’s more profound than the morbid thoughts of a puny whipster
Can reflections so defiled by pessimism ring true as gold?
Is living through rose petals more befitting of art such as this
Droning on of garden’s sunbeams?
Or do the melancholy mutterings of a heavy head so ghoulish and grim
Mean more than the blithesome fervor of a soul
Not tainted or scarred in such a way as this;
By the absolutes and certainties of this life
And lack of therewithin-
Does such purity equate to disillusionment?
Knocked off course so viciously
I feel so good,
so visceral and clean
Yet deeply ungraceful
Making armistice with these Devils proves paragon
To amity and peace within
The alternative to internal conflagration
Release them,
But only when vital
Kept on a shortened leash
They are not inclined to seek abdication
But with absolute suppression they shall,
Exact their Revenge
Jun 12, 2020
Jun 12, 2020 at 8:35 PM UTC
.
i want to start believing that i am mine
i want to own every bit of myself
all of the parts i deemed ugly,
ungraceful,
meant to please others,
i want to wrap them all
in the softest cotton
and give them a new home,
one i can live in too
Jul 23, 2019
Jul 23, 2019 at 1:33 AM UTC
first gasp of air
wide-eyed shock, then-
the melancholy wail of a newborn
pierces through the air
and so words tumble out of my pen
confused and scattered, leaves in the autumn wind
like the first steps of a toddler, eager, but
punctuated with falls
yet it comes alive to the uneven beat
of the clumsy dance he pats out with his feet
how featherbrained, how ungraceful!
but he grows up to sit by a bubbling brook
a pensive statue,
while sunlight weaves a pretty pattern
through the wispy fronds of a willow:
a feathery net of gold that kisses his cheeks
and dapples across the gurgling brook
and i hope these words
will grace his ears in melodious harmony
with the sigh of the breeze.
Jul 12, 2014
Jul 12, 2014 at 3:47 AM UTC
pale european features
contoured with a celestial lack of
sleep and too much coffee.
spun gold falling in unruly curls
from a morbid skull.
eyes like the ocean had met the forest, in a
final attempt of togetherness.
freckles tracing wild constellations,
scars proving an ungraceful demise.
body carved by sorrows,
existence a black hole.
demise an inevitable void.
Sep 29, 2014
Sep 29, 2014 at 11:18 AM UTC
I am terminal I just don’t know it yet.
In twenty years I will be diagnosed with inoperable bone cancer.
It won’t be my fault,
Nothing I could have done would have prevented my fate,
But it will **** me all the same.
Six months after my diagnosis I will take my last, labored, breath.
Doctors will talk to me with serious, professional faces about quality of life,
And having a plan.
I will make a living will,
Discussing with my family the way to deal most gracefully with the most ungraceful of acts.
When I die my wife and children will be by my side.
We will have said a thousand good-byes,
In a thousand different ways,
Acknowledging the finality of every act as they pass,
Until the last good-bye,
A kiss on my cheek,
As I drift away,
My battle fought, and lost.
I am terminal I just don’t know it yet.
In ten years I will fall victim to screeching tires and twisted metal.
It won’t be my fault,
Nothing I could have done would have prevented my fate,
But it will **** me all the same.
Six minutes after the initial impact I will take my last, labored, breath.
Doctors will talk to my family with serious, professional faces about blunt force trauma, and force equaling mass times acceleration.
I did not have a plan,
I did not make a will,
Tomorrow, tomorrow being my constant refrain.
I will not get to tell anyone good-bye,
No one will get to tell me how much they loved me,
I will never appreciate the last time I do anything,
Taking the ability to engage in each act for granted.
I get no last kiss.
My battle is fought, and lost.
I am terminal…I just don’t know it yet.
Aug 25, 2014
Aug 25, 2014 at 4:41 PM UTC