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SC Kelley Oct 2018
My eyes bleed with exhaustion.

My thoughts are fuzzy like my brain is stuffed with styrofoam.

My body sinks into the ugly carpet floor of my basement.

My mouth tastes sour with the flavor of an unslept soul.

I lie here writing instead of sleeping because it feels like the only thing I can do well, consciously.

My back aches with an elders pain at late seventeen.

I crave the warm embrace of my bed but am too stuck like sap to move.

I'm rambling here in my brain instead of resting my frigid existence.

My thoughts are slow and choppy now with the hesitation of drifty words.

My rusted, chipping ears hear nothing but silence and a distant coo-coo clock.

The chirps of a bird only found in my dark, dusty insanity.

The world weighs upon children such as these in a universe such as this.

I'm just, tired. Tired...

~S.C. Kelley
Take it as you will. This **** is crazy.
Chimera melons Apr 2010
Why do you invite me to destroy my shelf? the other
Was it jealousy of my lack of good sense? the self
Did my speeches ring false in your church bells? the group
Perhaps I had beauty in your eyes taken up by it ? the hungry
I proudly displayed by egotistical selflessness before you changed? the it
Old tricks on new friends ending friendships with absorbtion! no soul?
yes , a setup that was painted and written and signed in tears .  unslept?
recording  the sun and then recording the image on tv of its light.
repeatedly.
Anto MacRuairidh Sep 2015
when i unsleep ~
the moon is my sun
tracy Mar 2014
1.28am
My ears were too loud and I couldn’t hear you over the pounding of my heart but I tried, oh God did I try. The first thing I saw was your teeth and before I knew it, you were in my lap. You sang your name in my ear and seven months later, I still heard your voice. The night has just begun.

2.02am
It was a friend through a friend through a friend who told a friend about you who mentioned me to his friend and that was how we met. No introductions, no conclusions, no “hello my name is” because it was more like “can we just **** now?” and we did.

2.35am
I spent days lodged inside of you because that was home to me. I filled you up to the brim and I watched me inch out of you day by day. My bed had your imprint in it and home was no longer home unless you were there. Front to back. Eyes open. Eyes closed. Dark. Light. Old fashioned. We did it all.

3.00am
We built our relationship out of books, movies, biology, dead poets, coffee shops, shower ***, hot summer nights and cool June days. Catabolism is the process of breaking down molecules. Anabolism is the process of building up molecules. You catalyzed; I watched.

3.35am
This is what your mirror reflected.
June: Bright eyes, white teeth, laughter, wavy hair, sun-kissed skin, tank tops, flip flops, sleepy babbles, the desire to fall in love.
January: I’m trying my best to love you the way you want me to but I can’t anymore and I’ve let other people touch me and I can’t say no because I love you I really do but I can’t do this anymore you make me happy but so does everyone else and I’m sorry but I’m sorry but I’m sorry but I love you but

3.47am
I waited for 3 days but you never came home. So I burned it all and you yelled at me. A piece of me burned with the flames but you ignored it and then it became February.

5.47am**
The sun is rising now and I still hear the way you sang your name in my ear. It would have been 8 months soon and 8 months ago, we talked about forever. It will be March soon and when the flowers bloom, I won’t think of you anymore. I keep a response to a note that you never left me and I’ll read it when I miss nights with you. The night is over now.
Kalesh Kurup May 2016
Got your wire asking me to meet;
The wire that travelled rounds to reach me
Weeks or even months to reach me
After all that while you waited me going
From where I have now traversed abound

Years didn't know what months held within
Months didn't listen to day's throbbing
But we boarded the same space and time
It wasn't crowded with any ‘other ones’
Why didn't you meet me then, me around?
Why didn't you meet me there, me waiting?

Silly or serious, the moments we digressed
You turned your back and switched me off
Making up, I sat by the side, hands feeling
I knew you were pretending asleep;
Then slowly gone to an indifferent self
Why didn't you meet me there, by your side?

Remember all those questions I asked?
Of compulsions and convictions of yore
When you wore an eerie silence as answer
Looking away saying I don't want to respond
I had waited for you there, for long
Why didn't you meet me there with the answers?

Remember all those things you have hidden
Things that changed my takes on life
On trust, respect, love and sorts
You slept over them and woke up afresh
I stood there unslept; carrying scars ever after
Why didn't you sight me so, there?

We were walking along and away,
Not knowing the long pauses we took
Two souls trapped in the same maze
Crossing and nodding days after days
But more as strangers; on a courtesy call
I wish you stopped and met me there.

Now that I have been on this travail for long
With miles to go for that unknown destiny
And a lost way back in labyrinths of mind
Meetings won't be of hearts anymore;
Would set us only on old routes we loathe
So wait no more on your wire...
Ian Beckett Nov 2012
Monday party night with Mad Fish and friends
Conversations buzz of annual friends’ reunion
Christmas cheer as enemies are friends again
Complex confabulations as wine wisdom flows
Midnight truths all revealed in vino veritas
Eccentrics leave early, party animals at dawn
Tuesday late unslept sleeping son on Dart
Brains slow to restart despite espresso kick
Hangover no handicap to present-wrapping
Inbox full from friends Happy Holidays hellos.
Edward Laine Nov 2011
1





My hand was shaking while I stirred my coffee with a fountain pen.    I had not slept in close to three days.
Mourning the death of a slumber,I wore two thick black ribbons of funeral-skin under my eyes and, with hair thinning at the sides,  a tatty old gaberdine suite and, my now unslept, unshaven, pale-sad face: looked even more pathetic than usual. My name is Edward Laine.

Sitting in a corner-booth, alone in a café. Crowded and buzzing with all the usual angelic, well slept faces that usually I didn't mind but, now just made me feel utterly depressed and almost morose with jealousy.

I had left my room upstairs for a break from writing and staring at the the nicotine stained walls and the blank page in my typewriter, with a hope that a change of scenery might ease-up the rusted cogs of creativity which were now running dry and creaked and squealed in my weary temples.

As I sat and stared at the blue lines of my notebook, I began to write my thoughts and description of the woman sitting across the room from me. Writing for the sake of writing. I wrote:

'' She sits and stirs,
much like I and staring
at the reflection of her
eyes in her glasses.
All honey-drip hair & alabaster,
red shoes & sun dress.
Thinking great secret
thoughts of which I can
only assume are much greater
than mine.
For, people of the nameless masses
all have real hopes, dreams, loves,
relationships & genuine worries,
while I only care about myself
and this wretched scripture
I have wasted the last four years of my life writing''

I paused, chewed the lid of my pen and looked up from the page with a sigh and continued to observe my nameless beauty.
She, with the afternoon sun on her face, shining down frown the great orb and through the dusty window pane, let her glasses slide down the bridge of her nose and looked across the room at me and smiled. I attempted to smile back but came off looking false and uncaring. Which usually would be the case but, this time I really did mean to really mean it.
I rubbed my yellow finger tips in to my puffy eyes, slid my hands though my hair and held my head in my hands.  

When I lifted my head up I pulled my hair up at a rakish angle giving the classic Einstein look to my already sorry demeanour. And,when the room had un-blurred and come back in to vision, to my surprise(which showed quite noticeably in my face and even made  me jump back in my seat a little) the woman was  standing in front of my table.

                  


                          2





I was perched on a step, drunk, dizzy & trying futilely to light a cigarette. It was maybe 2am, outside some bar in December.
A girl in heels, tight jeans & stripes sat down next to me.  I barely noticed her presence until she had taken the cigarette out of my mouth & the matches from my quivering, now useless hands. She placed the cigarette at a rakish angle in her teeth, struck a match. Now placing the lighted cigarette in my mouth & blowing a  thin stream of blue smoke in to my face, she brushed her long brown hair behind her right ear & said ''want to get out of here?''

                            …


Kissing & caressing in the taxi, I had no idea where we were going, & did not care. When in the cloud of love or lust & intoxication, nothing else seemed to matter. If the driver decided to drive the black cab off of a cliff with the metre running, neither of us would have cared a ****. Breathlessly heaving, the windows were steaming, her bra was off & my belt was undone.

The taxi stopped, she paid the driver, opened the door & we both tumbled out in to the yellow glow of the suburban street. I was in a place I did not recognise, I was drunk & had no idea who this strange creature was that had brought me to this place was. It was  true, it was love, it was magnificent.

                          3



When I came to, I saw from under the table, her red shoes & stockings walking out the door. My coffee was all over me, the chair was broken. She had beat me over the head with it. We had met before. The only other detail I remember from that night was crawling out of her window once she had fallen asleep.
The love of my night. My nameless, shameless one.
She-wolf, bone-grinder, hip-winder. The one. The none.
Come back, you left your diamond ring in my teeth.
The hardest part or writing a story is writing the story.
Mateuš Conrad Feb 2019
spontaneous amnesia:
   well, you know,
something akin to further
a liking of something
just: hammer to the nail
apparent,
and for that matter: useful.

headphones plugged into
the laptop,
and everytime i want
to tap the repeat button
of a song...
i look sideways and at
the windowsill,
pretend to scratch my nose,
and find the hand
with no further utility...

not a rigid diagnosis
or a pre-mature dementia...
i have a bank's worth
of the brain to sift through...
they almost added the next
nodding parrot to
the unslept pillow of
the numbers of man...
via the rubrics of school...

even i can't believe that
university education
was a waste of time...
mind you: those 12 hours
a week in the chemisty
lab. were worth it...
esters...
   organic chemistry -
   and to think:
  if only, they made
perfumes in Scotland,
apart from the drinkable
amber of the 'ugh Scout...
wh'o would have known...

but this is unlike
that season 5, episode 11
**** switch from
the x-files...

                my internet rummaging:
basic,
    china shop, bull...
run in
and charge against
a cluster-**** of
      a presupposed cloud
of letters  

first attempt:

e f                                     /f
o o s o r o o l t                /o
e v r                                /r
e f e e n e s e l e              /e
v r
m                                     /y
n c o s c s s e s                    /s
u t                                          /u
t o m u b i                           /t
e l o                                    /l
t c y                           /m
t c                             /b
n s n i e c              /n
a a                          /a
c b s c c m i n c   /c
    n i s i i t             /i

the sentence?

for every subtle complaint
of conscience:
    consciousness becomes
limbo-state constrictive


rubric...

f f
o o o o o o o o o
r r r
e e e e e e e e e e
v v
y
s s s s s s s s s
u u
t t t t t t
l l l
m m m (anomaly in
the form of... the hierarchy
of chronology, i.e.:)
b b
n n n n n n
a a
       (second anomaly)
c c c c c c c c c
    i i i i i i

2nd attempt:
to showcase a "cloud":

**** it... copy &
paste, and stop pretending
bashing the mole
popping out from
a hole...
   this isn't quantum
mechanics...

                      s f
             c m c o o i s f s
           r r y e c e i s i e
                                 l o e s v
        r s v s o n e o s s
             e u n c i n t t e l l m c b
         b m n o t t o t a a  c n c e c o t o c
                                                      i n u e e i

****... i made another mistake:
how much does it take
to not make a mistake...
turning the picky-of-attempting
random...
of merely rearranging
letters in a simple sentence
to "resemble" a cloud
of... letters... atoms...

there was a time when staring
at the blank of a laptop screen,
and listening
to something by
nine inch nails was fun...
in the immediate
intermediate spent of 15 minutes...
the depth of idiocy reached
the depth of what
has become the suspect
total of man... me missing,
of course...

nothing new:
i guess i discovered the origin
of geometry...
or:

|
|
|
|
|
|_|||||||||

and

|||||||||
|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|
||||||||||
|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|
|
|||||||||
|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|
||||||||||

like some mongolian
****** pretending
to play the harmonica
by moving his
index against
a blurr of flapping lips...

me... throwing matchsticks
against an index
of a brick wall
of pixel...

namely?
i could never be a serious
existentialist,
i was sort of fwench in...
give me a cat,
i'll pet it,
i'm no good with goldfish:
i forgot that
you need to change
the water...
because water is like
air with fish...
fish turn old, stale water...
into a medium unbreathable...
no...
that death wasn't traumatic...
and the fact that i am still
naive squat buck tooth
is...
           when fate gives
you the same lesson
thrice...
     and you still haven't learned
it...
    i guess that's when
a god begins to cry...
or laughs...
or becomes angry...
or whatever the gods do
along with what
the petty people,
the petty ambitious people
minded...
to have no role beside
the role they served their ambitions
in fulfilling...
i.e.: never made it to Hollywood...
just to a position of
lawyer...
**** me... about time i started
playing the ******,
given the "ulterior" motive
narrative "went missing"...

funny thing that,
geometry...
i almost forgot how much of it
is necessary to
orientated myself
on the linear platitude...
but how funny in how i can't
rearrange
a simple sentence
into a cloud of "random"
letters...

|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|
|
|
|
|
|
||||||||_|

obviously "you" kept count...
9

                           and 11/
maybe that's something related
to spacing...
and whatever became A.I.
was never indented
for what once was... handwriting?

strain on the ******* eyes,
for all i know:
this be a vanity project
and something that can't
compete with tabloid journalism
making it to print...

so... airy-fairy whims and...
yes, the burden of the echo,
and the shadow...
   came the answer:
profane:
  and he was educated
by the school of life...
   sure...
  but my time at both school
and university?
  was spent being self-taught...
beginning with
this lounge of a tongue...
you know?
  you can write ENGLISH
    like so:                       ĘGLIŠ?
somehow...
i have no heard of dyslexia
as being evident in any tongue
other than the ĘGLIŠ zunge?

**** it: postcards from
H'america and from
           Oh'stray-bullet-trails...

now i know why such
*******...
i'm completely enthralled
by the engineering
of A.I. and phonetics...
given: English speakers
would not have involved
their A.I. algorithms
to be affected by diacritical
markers...
given that... d'uh...
the english language
doesn't use them...

still... "cyberpunk"...
no... i have no ambitions
to be published
    by the poetryfoundation.org
as i am, just about
to "compete" with
something akin
to the unauthorized
autobiography of jung ****
...
jockey... Jack...
                          ū.3708/?
ah ha ha! ja! gustav...
                             bad joke...
but you get the idea...
so when did soy boy
       predate bleach boy:
last time i heard or seen:
best bleach afro curls...
    and call them: churros...
but ******* a black girl
doesn't exactly make me less
of a racist than
a bigot who minds tongues...
am i?
   so... that whole Malcolm X
tirade of...
  you know the one...
    on the odd occassion...
yeah... two...
(not at the same time)...
but was that ever to be an excuse?
something from being fed
video footage and then
having to resort to:
music, before i open up
a parachute standing up
and still think i'm falling...
often or not...
             or not...

hell... this beats scribbling
graffiti on walls,
or becoming a sensible
quality proof for...
the jobs of worth already
being taken...

and i almost pray for
the work of ******* collector
vacancies to be
advertised for the unemployed...
i'd love for the unemployed
to be subject
to advertisements
akin to the jobs
            of a ******* collector...
i've looked...
     no ******* collector
vacancies available...
           oh hell...
    i forgot about wanting to
be a veterinary physician a long
time ago...
                but i guess:
no chances for me being
a ******* ******* collector...
so 'ere...
                         eat this.
Winnalynn Wood Mar 2021
Scrapping by without a lending hand
The rent raised, they’d never understand

Streets to wander with hearts heavy laden
A carefree spirit, hopes to have made it

While piles stack up with unpaid bills
They wish for freedom, to run to a hill

Without the trivialities and endless payments
To be well-off enough, not even famous

Toiling work and nights unslept
A bucket of savings slowly kept

And the climb and perseverance away from being poor
Gained them the freedom out of the door

Of sleepless nights and unfed stomachs
Their pitiful despair gave way to a plummet
Mateuš Conrad Mar 2017
by now i'm adamant at not finding a
publisher...
    what i call step higher
than writing and putting
it into my drawer...
by the way, who wants to
live a publishing furore that
only prescribes autobiographies
of footballers?!
   who?! the masses? the masses
will always do!
                 i'm drunk
and have a glum expression on my
(oink) face...
    piglets coming...
      i will own a michel de montaigne
and never read all of it...
       i guess darwinism is an answer...
literary selection comes with
the package...
             as does that question:
what's normal?
                    it's hard to base a heart
on it, more like facing up to a head
and still not knowing...
if we go through all the rubric of
existence we only arrive at:
the english were right... everyone else
was wrong... and to be frank?
i'd love to senda hundred zeppelins
in the direction where the saxons
succumbed to celt blood...
              what pretty songs...
a bit like unlearning that time when
ulysses asked wax to drip into his ears
while his men took to rigour and oar....
    hard to be the *****-man...
celt girls are pretty, don't get me wrong,
but i prefer to locate my own drinking spree;
celt men love their fantasy of a russian
oligarch princess... i had one for 5 months;
didn't bother settling down with her for life,
hence my ars poesis.
all the regrets you could figure out and master...
i have my drinking habits ready,
i didn't mind to write a moby ****
   or reymont's trilogy of the peasants
either... the glass if full: the gob is empty...
           the bed feels unslept in at 3 o'clock in
the afternoon, the cats are busy sharpening autism
in the garden...
         imitation:
feed it enough words so it becomes
fat?
    perfect excuse for a waterfall...
waking up i thought about the irony of
metallica losing its bassist in a car accident...
doesn't the rhythm section explain it?
isn't metallica the band that hates
bass?
                 it does have bass as intro...
devil's dance is probably the best insurance
leveraged song to example,
a few others fall into place,
but the rhythm guitar overtake the need for
bass, therefore the hush...
   yet there's this overpowering of drum,
i'm ego tripping with this music,
i want to hear bass prescribe the rhythm
and isn't it the case that those watchful of
ensuring rhythm make up too many rhymes?
rhyme | rhythm...
                  i need music to replicate
4 dwarfs *******...
bass, solo guitar and vocal, rhythm guitar
and drums...
alternatively bass, vocals, rhythm & solo guitar,
drums...
      4 oompa loompas prancing on the stage
and the maggot-pit of being part of the audience...
and that divergence spectrum akin to
a micro- / tele-        scope.
             you feeling the itch? my scalp is itchy,
i'm getting these thoughts and can't resort to
a pgf. file encoding... and i can't talk about it in
jpeg. like some god-horrid pic of your
former boyfriend's psychopathy of sending a ****-pick...
how about i take you to the zoo
and we watch penguins bathing?
     kowalski?!                                   hoy!
nugget fidgety crackers of concern,
    scheming critters that need you to invent toothpicks
that people, can suddenly become...
        you want a viking wielding an axe
on the opposite side to face that resonates as crux
comb-over... you don't want the pettiest of
the pettiest pickpocketers that steal from the dead...
you never take that to the plateau of nationhood,
that **** is inherent in singled-out individuals...
i am drunk, and i think i'm being lazy
with spelling... god help me...
      i'd freak out if i had a bukowski tactic
to back me up... dyslexics are apparently very good
with numbers... but they rarely tell you that they are,
good with numbers...
metallica is not too keen on bass: ba ba ***...
based on the concept of a hearing-aid;
you sometimes sop over the idea that it is there
at the beginning of a song... and then it: disappears!
magic... like the story of the original bassist for the band,
who died...
             maybe that's the reason that bass
is missing in all their works after his death, like some
sort of reperation currancy that extends into "the next life".
i want bass man... i really want bass to give it
proper polyphony, to give it layers...
but then again you can train an orangutan
to prance about on stage, crouching tiger farting monkey
look on his face;
  and all in all, the drunken humour i'll
never get to say at a party, if ever a party to attend, or if ever
needing to be funny.
i am starting to see the joke:
start slim,
  end:
                                                                                                   fat.
Jane Smith May 2021
Cur
Seeming as though they want to crawl inside
I invite every word you sowed into my home

Restless they skitter into every corner of my room
Make themselves comfortable in my bed
Unslept in, untidy

I click my pen absentmindedly at the desk as I write
But each sentence is a copy of your kisses

You came, paved the road through icy snow
And I don’t want to reject your passion
Perhaps because, akin to my features
I am unloved

The only one there for me
The only fickle heart that
Didn’t always seem so worthless

This world revolves around an atmosphere of
Shaky hands and nervous glances
Long walks and apologies

No matter how many times I laugh
It isn’t enough to silence the poor restive dog
But the door to the backyard is locked
Don’t make me find the key
Shivani Lalan Apr 2018
Under hooded lanes on my skin,
you're making homes
to house each memory
you breathe onto it.
No door is shut in these homes,
No window latched,
No bed unslept in,
No cry unheard in.

Swirling concrete,
******* hearts,
And the faith of young people -
Three impossible stories that you're teaching me to read.
Word by shaking word,
Syllable by foreign syllable,
I learn these stories slowly -
Your heartbeat is my meter,
Your shut eyes are my verse.

We're learning of new tongues drenched in alcohol,
forbidden by the weight of countless accidents.
Fallen-star-paperweights,
Slurring-satin-papercuts.

We're tasting new lives,
new times,
new seas and pools,
and all they can say is

*we're speaking easy.
Speakeasy mhanje old liquor establishments that were operating during Prohibition.
tracy Oct 2016
when the flowers began to bloom, i watched as you grew the same ones
inside of my belly. and then they began to wilt--i waited as you forgot
to water them. don't you remember? "you make me the happiest
i have ever been." these are my notes from nights unslept, where i tossed,
turned, and ached for you. scribbles in the margin that
reminded me why not even my worst enemy deserved to have a knife
twisted in the very ***** that she cherished. i trusted you and you became my rinse and repeat. good thing i finally spit you out.

i'll take this to the grave with me: my diary perception of you,
of your gentle hands and gentle heart, of your kind eyes and
the smile that released butterflies into my chest. of your sticky-note reminders:
"i love you." say it again. "i love you." louder, for the ones in the back.
"i love you but it's different now." you've become another name on my list,
unwillingly written and dated. spring of 2016, here lies the one who pieced it back together only to break it all again.
Trevor Reynolds Sep 2019
There's an empty seat at the table today
There's a bed not slept in last night
There's the deafening sound of silence in the room
There is darkness even though there is light

There's  a cloud of reality hanging around
There's a memory passing through your mind
There's so many reasons for celebrating a life
There's words like loving and kind

There's  another day tomorrow, I hear people say
There's light at the end of the storm
There's others who need your attention right now
There's the hungry and folks to keep warm

But, there's still an empty seat at the table today
And, there's still that unslept in bed
And, there's a voice missing from the din of the crowd
But their words resonate in your head

There's peace for their souls and relief from their pain
There's the memories to last your lifetime
There's things that you shared and others who cared
And there's times that were just yours and mine.
                                                               By Trevor Reynolds 2017
Kay P Apr 2014
you love him more than me

but how many nights have I spent
my eyes laden with sleep unslept
an electronic glow as bright as the sun
so you wouldn't feel alone?

you love him more than me

but how many times have I stopped
my voice curled in my chest
patient as a monk
as you ordered your thoughts?

you love him more than me

but how many times have I paused
my heart a staccato 12/8
as you made yourself comfortable
against my side?

you love him more than me

but how many times have I offered
helping you by handing
small things for organization
so you could finally be at peace?

you love him more than me

but when have I looked around a restaurant
taking note of silverware
of details and of placemats
to be sure that he'd be comfortable?

you love him more than me

but when have I listened aptly
nodding and agreeing
even if he's wrong
simply because he needs the control?

you love him more than me

but when have I laid beside him
curled into his shape
uncaring if my arm went numb
because he was my solace?

you love him more than me

but when have I held my heart
a live beating creature leaking pain
in cupped palms
and offered it to him?

you love him more than me

but when have I removed myself
full bodied, kicking, screaming
from his presence
just to offer him peace of mind?

you love him more than me

but when have I harbored hurt
refused to let it show in any way
steeled myself against the softest comments
because I know he didn't mean them?

you love him more than me

but when have I panicked
when have I trembled with nerves
when have I breathed a sigh of relief
because our tangled fingers felt like home?

you love him more than me

but when have I debated
posting poetry that tells more
than my words ever could
for him?

you love him more than me

but a thousand reasons more
and a thousand reasons less
could not explain the falseness
of this accusation

you love him more than me

but an entire poem written
for the sole reason of explanation
could not console the damage
left by this punch in the gut

you love him more than me

but if years of friendship
months of words and inside jokes
could not show you differently
what will a few words do?

you love him more than me

but I haven’t-
but I’ve-
but I-
but-

you love him more than me*

Okay.
April 23rd, 2014
In the dampness of those unslept sheets I find my solace
between the linear moments when you held my breath
and the last time we said goodbye:

Awakened by the thunder every calm fiber
goes dormant as I toss and turn
searching for the memory of your warm body
The rain slips easily from glass to ledge
and so do my tears;
Life with all its poignancy, cannot reach me here
beneath thick blankets of denial.
As I pretend the night away death does not exist,  
nor does it live here, anymore
In the dampness of those unslept sheets I find my solace
through poetry in flight,  
although I leave it to the angels,
to whisper you, goodnight !
Caroline Shank Nov 2020
What will you share with me?
You who have been gone so long?  Will you speak of
everyday things?  "Caroline, the
weather has been so cold."

Will you touch me on the hand
that once curled around you?
"Caroline you always had
such soft skin."

Will you sing your songs to
me again? The notes of which
lay down their sound on my
lonely face like kisses.
"Caroline do you remember
how we danced that night
to the music playing on
the revolving colors of
the jukebox?"

Will you bring me
your Roses of Sharon for
all the years of desolation?

Will you kneel into my lonely
night of years of nights?
Will you share my tears,
all my fears, across the
darkening skies?

Will you take the evanescent
light and write joy in
my blue eyes?  
"Caroline do you still light up
at the sound of me
moaning your name?"

I will share your smile with
smiles of my own.
What will you ever share with
me in the flowered landscape
of imagination?

Will you share your thoughts
like petals thrumming on the
wind of your return?  
Or will I awaken
to the unslept on pillow faintly
smelling smoothly of
marijuana, in the raw
morning of remembering?

("Caroline!" the unheard of
to no one there.)

Caroline Shank
Samm Marie Aug 2016
There's unslept in sheets
That don't wrinkle on the corners
The alarm clock flashes
Because after that storm
The one where you left
And didn't come back
I never reset the numbers
There's a worn copy of
Cronin's The Passage
And a sheet of paper
Quoting the fifth installment of
Hopsin's ill mind
There's a letter on your pillow case
That I've rewritten 30 times
Reminding you that I still want you
Reminding me you're not home
And the foot of your side of the bed
Is your clothes
Folded from before the storm
With you car keys on top
Still untouched
Because I can't bring myself
To let go
The voltage only matters when the grid grinds down
to shatter me,
colliding dreams then batter down the walls made
out of paper hats, worn by my hundred different heads and
left behind in unslept on beds, where more dreams start to
gather in a riot of assembly and the lengthening of language licks
the tongues which flick the switches,the needles point to danger,
there's an overload just waiting to be tripped up in the system,
when the smoke has finished drifting and the light takes on a new face,the only thing that I see is
another needle racing round the dial.
Hannah Gold May 2017
Leave me visible like a vagrant dog in a deluge...
I'll hear your whisper in the wind, embrace your essence
in the rain, and see the secluded skies..

     When the rain is subtle I will know that something
has tempered you... But when the rain rages I'll know that
something has imparted panic upon you!

     And in this inherited intellect lacking eyes, ears, hands, or lips...
Our limp lumber would eternally rest in Earth's clay.Envision, the squall streaming through a patch of wildflowers...

    In my disorder gardens of myself flourished. Buds of curiosity burgeoning from my eyes! It would be our knuckles, rigid, prancing pebbles meant for progenies' play, and the sinful sun weaving it's way through your missing molars!

   Countless days go unnoticed and nights unslept... We'll speak with our soul through breached bones, where our tendons once thrived!  Imagine, your cranium and mine both mitigated to  matter.

   Both refined from our faults, and our skins going young again, disregarding the reason we ever wrinkled! A chance to cleanse our aura once more... May I become dust with you?
My trembling tree...
Mia Mehnaz Jul 2020
Today is a different kind of fight
Today is not bruises and cuts
Grappling with darkness to see
Light and find a sprinkling of
Happy. No, today is darker
Today is fighting just to survive
To taste oxygen in my lungs and
Not bitter sadness or poison
Of hope that never really existed
In the first place, and time waits
For none and honey even memories
Must die. Today is heavy hearted
Tongue biting, palm digging pain
Hot teardrops, throat constricted
Shallow breathing, hurt. Today is
Counting seconds till i can sleep
And smiling pretty for the camera
Even when my eyelids are heavy with
Uncried cries and unslept sleep that i
So desperately need. Today is my broken
Reflection in the mirror, staring hopeless
At this stranger, cutting my finger on the
Shattered glass and I’m bleeding, red and
Oozing rage and i’m- losing myself.
Tomorrow is putting the pieces back together,
Shard by shard, tear by tear,scar by scar
Tomorrow i will not look so unfamiliar,
And this deep longing to know myself
Will fade away. Today is survival and
Tomorrow is living,
Tomorrow is living.
Satsih Verma Nov 2018
Honey,
You had licked off-
all the salt of my being,
and knowing less of you
was becoming a bliss.

The absence
reconstructs the fragrance,
coming from nowhere-
transforming the feel of
unknown grace.

Sitting near a sickle
moon, watching
the full ascent of
quenchless desire.

It was a dark mound
of upheaval from which
the unslept angel would fall.

You may pick up
the glory of dawn.
Napolis May 2019
poems

you bleed,

I bleed
you,

and I will
for all
of my
life.

nothing
in love
we will
not find,

no heart
unturned

no dream
unslept.

heaven in
your eyes

passion of
sin
in your
kiss.

and I
did not
live
one day
before
you,

and I
will not
ever live
one day
without.
Morning makes its entrance
throwing sunlight
on an unslept bed
I stand a few feet away
throwing bouquets
at  an unloved life.
Michael Perry Dec 2020
BREAK APART SCENE

i remember
reaching out, one day, to
your side of the bed, cold, unslept
that morning, the distance
was wide, between us
a chasm, self- created, too hard
to overlook, climb
the sound of silence
remained between us; detached
no code word, to interrupt, or save
for this was happening in real time
between us, a break apart scene

by Michael Perry
Maria Jul 2
You were crystal clear like
No clouds in the night sky.
Stars twinkling in the distance.
Our reflection in the lake.
When you told me
That you loved me.

You were opaque like opal
When you told me you
Weren't sure anymore.
You wanted to take a break
Fully aware that we were at risk
Of cracking, of shattering -
That was worth sacrificing for you.
But your conflicting confusing wording
Led me to believe there was hope.

I should let a caged bird fly away
See the world
Experience it all
Wait for it to come back home,
Patiently and faithfully.

You kept me in this in-between,
I had the naive belief
That the sediment would settle
If I did,
You would too.

All the sediment:
The broken promises
Tears dried on my cheeks
Drinks half-drank on the kitchen counter
Hours unslept and floors unswept,
And words I recorded and reworded
In an effort to best remember and reframe you.

All this sediment coated my mind and home.
I thought it would accumulate to enough carbon
To create a diamond under enough pressure
If we put our love together when we came back together
It would be set in our wedding rings
But you never did.
You not coming back became crystal clear eventually,
And the smoke and mirrors eventually faded.

So I blew away the dust
Began the cleanse.
The search.
Instigated and led by me.
Prompt was title the poem “Clear as Crystal” 37 weeks ago.
Stu Harley Mar 20
Ink bleeds whispers, secrets kept,
A story on paper, unslept.
Words like windows, veiled, and thin,
Reflecting a soul held within.

Eyes, unseen, guide every line,
A silent observer, entwined.
Their gaze shapes the moonlit tide,
Emotions in verses confide.

They watch as the reader takes hold,
A story unfolds, to be told.
Springs from the fresh eyes behind the poem

— The End —