"unstitching" poems
WE sat together at one summer's end,
That beautiful mild woman, your close friend,
And you and I, and talked of poetry.
I said, "A line will take us hours maybe;
Yet if it does not seem a moment's thought,
Our stitching and unstitching has been naught.
Better go down upon your marrow-bones
And scrub a kitchen pavement, or break stones
Like an old pauper, in all kinds of weather;
For to articulate sweet sounds together
Is to work harder than all these, and yet
Be thought an idler by the noisy set
Of bankers, schoolmasters, and clergymen
The martyrs call the world.'
And thereupon
That beautiful mild woman for whose sake
There's many a one shall find out all heartache
On finding that her voice is sweet and low
Replied, "To be born woman is to know --
Although they do not talk of it at school --
That we must labour to be beautiful.'
I said, "It's certain there is no fine thing
Since Adam's fall but needs much labouring.
There have been lovers who thought love should be
So much compounded of high courtesy
That they would sigh and quote with learned looks
precedents out of beautiful old books;
Yet now it seems an idle trade enough.'
We sat grown quiet at the name of love;
We saw the last embers of daylight die,
And in the trembling blue-green of the sky
A moon, worn as if it had been a shell
Washed by time's waters as they rose and fell
About the stars and broke in days and years.
I had a thought for no one's but your ears:
That you were beautiful, and that I strove
To love you in the old high way of love;
That it had all seemed happy, and yet we'd grown
As weary-hearted as that hollow moon.
2k
I got home and I cried
cause he made me spark
and a storm formed inside
the deepest crevices of my heart
And my throat
was a stream
of warm caramel
like a sweetly dripping dream
dripping down into a well
When I reached for his chest
I simply couldn't breath
for my body was in shock
but there was not even a heave
just a soft lullaby
of the sound of the stream
of my blood in my veins
and unstitching of seams
I'd touch his skin
While he'd sing like a guitar
with strings like butter
and a serrated harp
But even though I touched
he seemed so very far
I wanted to touch his soul
In that moment
In his car
Oct 16, 2012
Oct 16, 2012 at 9:12 PM UTC
Remnants of firecrackers litter parkgrass, splitting seams once encasing them;
exposed twine ribs attached, stretched out beneath shade like sunken reliquiae
dashed against the earth, as freedom is, withered paper husks abound.
What explosions in the sky were heard
above the quietus of patient submission?
Tracing the dotted white clouds to our horizon with thread and colored cloth,
held breath until nighttime, expelling then
-- as wind does each languishing puff of smoke--
from our lungs, sordid smells of Summer; vanquishing the past.
Isolating each other, like memories on kodak prints
we separately cling to that sleek filmy acquaintanceship of proximity and hue
-- disavowed pariahs and hearts lit anew.
Fused inside one sallow skull-box, which doubled once for holding shoes, we linger.
Ideas, impulses and infringements on the eye, until-- once--
bound, unbroken, encased and unspoken,
our ribs unwind with dew-- after,
unstitching seams outlined from heaven and inundating visions with brightness
we descend.
Violent fumes of childhood intercede amidst our shaking fuses lit.
--and BANG!
Jul 7, 2011
Jul 7, 2011 at 4:19 PM UTC
love is described as:
flowers blooming
sunlight shining
red lips perking
broken hearts mending
and maybe love is all that
but it can also be:
flowers sagging
rain clouds swarming
grey lips drooping
and the newly mended hearts
slowly
unstitching
themselves
Nov 12, 2018
Nov 12, 2018 at 7:36 AM UTC
it seems so innocent at first
the first stitch is slowly- ever so slowly- tearing
you tell yourself it’s just a little unstitching
It’s fine
but then the sensation continues,
down your vertebrae, exposing tender flesh
you recognize it
but you hold back
because it’s too embarrassing to speak of
thinking it will ruin your friendship
but you don’t realize
your friendship is already being ruined
by the time you can do anything about it
It’s gone
fabric is torn beyond recognition
never to be sewn the exact same way as before
and sure, there will be others
but the worst part is knowing that that person doesn’t have a ripped seam running down their heart.
Oct 8, 2010
Oct 8, 2010 at 6:18 PM UTC
This night carries me,
blinded,
in the back pocket
of ***** minds and
shabby dreams where I
flat,
and molded,
press against this folded denim,
warm and splayed with
arms outstretched,
longing,
for another day; but
what if I turn my head
to over-peek the top
of these fraying jeans,
instead,
grasping threads
to keep me still within its seams
– will the exhilaration
of watching where I’ve
just this moment been
allow me inspiration
asleep awake, to boldly look,
clinging to the back end of
these thoughts that write me,
penned in ink,
like a pre-determined book?
Perhaps I should just
– winded –
forward face,
ignoring the sour stench
of this unmoving,
walking,
waking race,
stalking through the darkness
in a covered veil
at quiet pace,
destabilising future steps,
accepting this acquired taste,
processing my obsessive needs
and bathing clean my crumpled face
in chafing tears that fear progression,
awash, alone,
in one more nightly session.
Devoid of light,
here, ye, the theme:
this narrow, stunted, ****** depression,
the fabric of a self made bed –
this
bottomless pit of expression
unstitching dreams of fortune
as I swelter, melting hope
again,
apathetic,
white of noise,
inside my broken head.
Aug 16, 2015
Aug 16, 2015 at 1:21 PM UTC
I needed you
so horribly badly that my soul began unstitching fragments of the reality we had, looking for you.
So madly, my ribcage was barely able to keep my lungs from breaking out, in search of your breath.
Will you forgive me when I choose the most utter simplicity in order to stay alive?
I swear I will return,
but in the meantime,
bear in mind that a drunken heart is way too heavy for a butterfly to carry.
Oct 17, 2017
Oct 17, 2017 at 1:55 PM UTC
A blank page is
disturbed by the
gentle pressing of
a slippery, hard
projection of
ebony salivating needles,
unstitching the
molasses fibers of such
a grief stricken rag doll,
collecting dust in the corner,
eyes crafted in the heart of
a million years worth of
rivers slicing pen lines
across the face of the earth,
crumbling each sheet of
plastered chrysalis streamers
exposing the unwritten words
beneath
Aug 25, 2012
Aug 25, 2012 at 9:35 PM UTC
on the borderline, simple
thoughts guide breathing
patterns out from
the front porch: i
dream we
abscond, out through
blurred fencelines in
low light we trickle
through pockets of
wheat, the tumult of
everything under a
moon first distant,
gleaming and moving
creeks in your skin, pale
gold like i so often imagine
your eyes would turn
under the soft parting of
my lips. a ghost yet
unmade. haunted i, already.
in dreams, i do not have
you but
still, you take me by
the hand, utter warm silence,
make small motions, closer
by the day. i take out
my hairs one by one, clog
the sink a
tiny bit more. build an
ocean. sail to make
us, halfway. a wider
range, the only way out
a kiss on the wind. i
sent myriads, all lost;
still, maybe someday you'll
find one.
out under three thousand
shining points unstitching,
we mutually profess undying
nothing and graze skin. my
fingertips will never know
you.
May 16, 2014
May 16, 2014 at 7:14 AM UTC
I take my skin
unstitching it from my body
ringing it out to dry in my bathroom tub
It’s weary and needs a moment to be laid to rest
All of it is covered in dirt-
After taking responsibility for its mother
apologizing for its brother and for its own feelings
Shame coats it-
only I couldn’t tell you who the shame belongs to
I’m only exposed heart and bone right now
please do not mind the blood I leave at your feet
This is all I have left over as an apology
- when do we stop letting other peoples mistakes become our own
- I am still trying to figure it out
Feb 4, 2021
Feb 4, 2021 at 7:05 PM UTC
So you keep excusing yourself
For being absent-minded and forgetting
Me at the back of your shadows.
Just because I’m dead it doesn't mean I
Do not starve anymore, you know?
My hunger feeds on your clumsy ways of
Unstitching me.
Nov 7, 2013
Nov 7, 2013 at 12:37 PM UTC
She was the only plaster that
I needed to cover wounds, because
no one saw the cuts deepening beneath.
scratching at my tears, crying underneath.
But I never knew that she was the one
silently unstitching my wounds. She'd begun
long before I was cut, but her words kept
me from realizing tears weren't for me id wept.
She never needed a reason to cut me deep inside.
I was the doll, stuffing pulled from within denied
the respect of my pride. but still I thought her my
plaster healing this cut, while reality cut deeper, why?
Why would she want to hurt what was our love,
why could one cut at that that showing her truelove.
A plaster only hides pain, covering up intentions
of a misguided trust. I became my own intervention.
Life since our love had blossomed had been rough,
our petals were razor wire memories of those tough
times we had seen before. But I thought our time
had coated those petals, washing away past grime.
She never needed a reason to cut me deep inside.
I was the doll, stuffing pulled from within denied
the respect of my pride. but still I thought her my
plaster healing this cut, while reality cut deeper, why?
I now know that some cuts weren't mine, sharing
her past with me. But instead of healing,cutting, wearing
down what was within me. I needed to feel whole be
myself within no cuts seen. I loved her, but I was unfree.
Jun 17, 2018
Jun 17, 2018 at 5:34 PM UTC
I carefully stitched your name
embroidered each memory,
each beautiful piece of art
into the delicate walls
of my beating heart.
I put aside the threat of pain,
the tearing apart,
the risk of scars that would remain,
in the hope that I would never
have to
unpick, unfasten,
you, again.
How I was wrong.
And the unstitching never gets easier
and the short sharp scratch
Each time, you work your way back
Hurts just as much as the last.
Jan 9, 2015
Jan 9, 2015 at 10:27 AM UTC
I had fallen between a waking state
And a life I believe I entirely imagined.
I imagined you, because at the time
It was everything I thought I had needed.
If only I could have one more thing
If only I could run and
touch you
taste you
scream everything
I thought you were.
My thoughts were a continuous sea of moonlight,
A familiar, nostalgic ambiance
I wrote about you beneath
so long ago.
When I believed moths were faeries,
When the fireflies died
And the eclipse kept me awake in the dissonance
of night
When my heart felt giddy,
I thought-- then, now,
I had finally held a shallow coal
That burned deeply, vehemently
I wanted to swallow it and feel it
scorch my insides.
Finally, I had become delirious
For all of the right reasons.
At that point I was simply looking
For an excuse to slip quietly
past reach.
I would rise and wander in the early hours
Of morning, and would blame it
On you
When it was merely my own soul
Screeching, bleeding
Clawing at the sad, impermanent baggage of flesh
Popping my seams undone over every pore,
Unstitching my sanity
Wanting so viscerally to be let out, escape--
Freedom….
Is what I wanted.
I don’t think I ever truly wanted you.
A lust overcoming
Was my body's way of rejecting humanity's
Trivial circumnavigation of romance.
Laying on the celestial floorboards
Watching my whirlpool of scars
And all of the screaming…
I kept hearing it.
The incarceration of my dreams,
The inferno of desire I wanted to burn forever in,
Sat so prettily upon my heart
I never dared move it.
Jun 4, 2016
Jun 4, 2016 at 5:52 PM UTC
This sort of dream
Is classified with an interpretation of heaven
The one with you
Holding my hands
And looking me in the eyes
Lips close enough to touch
I wish I could have your love
This kind of night
Could be classified with where true love begins
With fireflies
And moon reflections in your eyes
Skin soaking in the moonlight
Dancing until sunrise
Dandelions dreams
And unstitching seams
I wish I could breathe you in
This sort of magic
Could be classified with
The way you look at me
The sun lighting the clouds
Speaking out loud
Hands around my waist
Obsessed with the way you taste
I really wish this was real
Aug 19, 2019
Aug 19, 2019 at 10:46 PM UTC