"upholstered" poems
I was brought into this house
Ordered from the local furniture shop
Made to order according to specifications
I am a wingback,
Upholstered in full-grain leather
True to my rich heritage
I was placed in the library
Amongst the illustrious works of famous writers
Half- a - century have passed, providing support
To the backbone of the family
Although tired, he finds solace in my cozy embrace
I give him my wings to fly into the world of literature
Cervantes, Bunyan, Bacon, Goehte, Dostoevsky, Chekov, Tolstoy
Some of the names from the illustrious collection
Not all were privileged to have a seat here
He was transported to each era, savoring the rich legacy
Of literature down the centuries
I was privy to the mind-boggling debates
Which he conducted with himself
Trying to reason each work of literature
A mere wingback rose to be a companion
Providing sturdy support on the mahogany legs
One fine day the reading session ended in deep slumber
Five decades of bonding and companionship came to an end
Now, I stand here, forlorn, at the corner of the library
Reminiscing the reading sessions, and siesta
The wingback does not have the wings to fly away from this bond
© Amitav (Radiance)
May 26, 2014
May 26, 2014 at 2:35 PM UTC
Bernie frames the TV
between his feet--
left hand remote,
beer bottle balanced
by his right—
clicks through half-time shows,
clicks like shooting a gun, a Fazer,
a death-ray secret weapon,
clicks just to do it, an idiot’s
smile faint on his face.
he sees only noise
Emma tends her stamps,
perched on the plain board chair
she upholstered herself—
its arms worn, warm,
warmly welcoming—
her back to her husband,
her life as wife and mother
coming to a languid close.
she tastes some regret--
yet spicy with passion--
where life has had its way with her.
The rug’s bright stew of colors
can’t hide everything
children spilled
when they were young--
juices, milk, soup, sauce, tears;
little dreams,
tiny heartbreaks,
minor crises
ground into the weave;
all the gooey pastries, cookie crumbs,
blood and sweat and nightmares congealed
into solemn patina--
I see protects it from time.
These solid objects—
stout, no-nonsense chair
wearing gouges, marks,
discolorations of use
and years like badges;
fat, chunky, cigarette-burned
BarcaLounger, drunk
from drink spilled
on every surface,
handle supple
as a young girl’s wrist,
swirling a territorial aura
around its microscopic
sphere of the universe;
and the rug…
unassuming, proletarian,
handmade and honest,
each scrap of fabric
chosen by the weaver’s hand,
now useful again,
reveling in redemption—
these solid objects
invade,
infuse,
invigorate
otherwise empty space,
squeeze meaning from the world
around them,
same as the hand of the artist
sculpts love from her heart
to give them life.
The children have moved away
Old friends are dying every day
Stamps no longer can be licked
There is no way to interdict
The Jets are losing again
Feb 6, 2011
Feb 6, 2011 at 12:13 PM UTC
Intense ****** desire or appetite. A piece of furniture for seating from two to four people, typically in the form of a bench with a back, sometimes having an armrest at one or each end, and partly or wholly upholstered and often fitted with springs, tailored cushions, skirts, etc.; sofa. arousing or satisfying ****** desire: an ****** dance. Subject to or marked by strong ****** desire. Of, relating to, or treating of ****** love; amatory:
Sep 27, 2015
Sep 27, 2015 at 5:07 PM UTC
She looked at me with colorless eyes
And café-au-lait face.
Beads and thread spun into her hair,
Descending to her waist.
The scent of rosemary and answers drifted off her skin.
She fed me no lies, assessing the situation
With critical efficiency.
"I think I have something for that."
I waited in a red velvet, upholstered chair,
Twiddling my thumbs as she shuffled through the shelves
Lining the walls, crammed with books and trinkets and vials.
She selected one, careful not to drop it on the knitted rug
And handed it to me with a promise.
"Drink this. It will do what needs to be done."
I gave her thanks and payment,
And stepped out of her residence, happy.
As I returned home, the grape-juice colored potion
Was opened and sipped out of a wineglass.
And nothing changed.
I peered around the room.
Inhaled.
It still reminded me of him.
The walls were still his favorite color,
The fridge still held the pictures he took,
All I could see or smell or touch reminded me of
Him.
But he wasn't there.
He still wasn't, and he would never come back
Because I kicked him out in a fit of madness
And I never realized how much I would miss him
And some stupid potion will never get me to stop-
knock knock
Hello?
Jun 9, 2014
Jun 9, 2014 at 7:57 AM UTC
Through a pane of glass
life dissolves into its essence
Through a pane of glass
creation speaks
I never thought it would be this way
I chose to go
along for the ride
while this mad world
careened off the tracks
And yet creation
the godhead
persists
expands and contracts
unperturbed
I struggle to understand
the code
I peer intently
into the enveloping dark
And at the end of this inquiry
I find only music
and silence
upholstered through and without
by a sweet sense of peace.
Jun 11, 2017
Jun 11, 2017 at 9:31 PM UTC
I remember dad lying
in a hospital bed breathing,
but not much more than that.
Hours were spent watching assistants
come and go.
Televisions droned through the hallway
from other rooms,
echoing through my head
like an old movie playing at
4 a.m.
after pulling a drunk.
Rousing moans from dad
punctuate the tedium.
Sweat pools under my thighs
from the high-quality,
leatherette upholstered chairs
that only one hundred thousand dollars
of medical care could provide
in a hospital room.
Mornings
brought the same parade of people
pressing and probing dad.
Occasional visits from the resident physician
yielded timeless comments like,
“we just want him to be comfortable,”
and my personal favorite,
“have you been here all night?”
Stupid question.
After all the “outpourings” of concern
from friends and relatives
(who I haven’t seen nor heard
from since the dirt was shoveled over his casket),
their visits can only be topped
by the Sunday-after-church-crowd,
who desired only to brand dad
with their version of beliefs -
God bless them.
As they were leaving,
I could most certainly detect the pride
they felt in themselves
for their courageous visit to the dying.
And then came death.
And here I am at 4 a.m.
in the morning two years later,
listening to a two-bit movie drone on the TV,
wondering if dad listened to the
Sunday-after-church-crowd.
© 2010 C.T. Bailey
Apr 9, 2011
Apr 9, 2011 at 7:27 PM UTC
The absolute ******* grind of it,
each inch upholstered rough,
sandpaper cushions and **** you,
this is school my loves:
best days of your life,
except the frequent crying
and wishing for an end,
but then
the dazzle blather
of someone excited by your subject,
your patient, pent up words
heard
and your bitten cynicism scuffs enough
to see your old electric truths beneath
Mar 25, 2022
Mar 25, 2022 at 1:31 PM UTC
At least there is consistency in emotional recidivism.
Criminality you can depend on.
Vacant words.
Hollow ***
Empty eyes.
At the very least there is stability in the pattern.
You can sense the hand of dismissal as it cuts through the tension to lay its mark upon your cheek.
Delivering the degradation of being hit with the indifferent truth.
Nothing more than a pillowed and silken chaise that cleans cooks and allows you to lay your every waking trouble upon her breast, upholstered in thin sinewy tatters, longing for mutual fortification.
Mar 17, 2016
Mar 17, 2016 at 1:01 PM UTC
can you take me to the last domain
\\\
the last one
the one before
everything
\\\
come tumbling down with me
flying skyward frown
upside inside out
\\\
this amoebic mass of
intergalactic introspection and
analyses of outward perception
\\\
this ion exchange
line dancing across an axon
don't shoot the neurotransmitter
\\\
this realm is made entirely of thanks
when there is nothing to say
\\\
it is my childhood that keeps me alive
\\\
I'd like to immortalize my friends
\\\
remember when we played in the sandbox?
\\\
remember when my father stabbed you with a screwdriver.
\\\
there was a time when all that mattered was music
there was a time when all that mattered was flesh
there was a time when all that mattered was eternal
there was a time when all that mattered was death
\\\
scaled fish curling into reverse spiral
it floats there in haunting grimace
\\\
the upholstered chairs by the fireplace
feet chewed by the jaws of a puppy
\\\
the china cabinet in the corner
I could see the reflection of your
disgusting indulgences in it
screwdriver pink skin
\\\
the musty mass of wires where your desk once was
where your life unfolded 'til the wee hours of the morning
sick and twisted absent minded distant soul
\\\
that ball of electricity floating down from the sky
bobs as a ball in the surf toward the kitchen door
\\\
terrifying electric forgiveness coming to engulf my brittle heart
Nov 5, 2015
Nov 5, 2015 at 11:42 PM UTC
it were a day and a day
since ago we meted
drinking the curving
swill of dank *****
magic
against the
**** breast press
upholstered
bench
seats of my auto silver
bodied vehicle
(where you dug down
your teeth
sharply
into the pink membrane
of bottomer lip upon
your quaking
face a groan
through which perspired
stiffly
as grinding i
pushing
your darkly follicled
amazing head
down
*** up
)
Jan 25, 2012
Jan 25, 2012 at 8:29 PM UTC
The feel of the vehicle, bitter from the night
Blue light on the dash
Whirring of gears as the glass rolls
Eight air fresheners hang loose from the mirror
Holding on to your memory
Grabbing for the pack of death
And lighting another nail in the coffin
reticence clawing at his ears
The memory of your mirth fueling the fire
Indigestion strikes like a knife to the side
Held by your slender hand
The laughter shared obsesses the heart
Beating with such vigor and plight
Mind tripping on compromised pasts
Tender is the ghoul from the nail
Circling his head like a noose
Bound by your memory
In remembering solace
To ease his concern
Taking comfort in his rusted cage
Seat embracing him
Upholstered in stained fabric
Shedding light on shadowed nights of old
His memory of you fades
No longer lancinating
No longer choking
In taking solace in the void that has become your memory
Dec 5, 2014
Dec 5, 2014 at 8:49 PM UTC
Happiness should be like
Quick trips
To grocery stores
And baking bread
At one am
While we dance
To our
Favorite songs
And talk about our
Dreams
And destinations.
Happiness should be
Togetherness
And honest innocence
No mistaken upholstered
romance
until the night falls
And happiness
Becomes
One.
Mar 3, 2014
Mar 3, 2014 at 11:20 AM UTC
Today.
Saw blackness today in the corner off my eye
brooding close and unexpected amidst smiles.
Blackness of tomorrow's threat,
clinging to the edges of bright and kindness.
Feeding on scattered jewels of joy,
building its strength
biding its time to move into her sight.
By then it will be strong
and she will not.
Dream.
She was sat tired and ill
on a upholstered chair
placed on broad and ancient steps
curving to her front
cliffs behind
no strength
we were arranged to her front
scattered to try
to keep it back
and down
it was enjoying our distress
that of the children most of all
I didn't see the end
but have been crying for an hour
It will come for her soon.
Jan 11, 2011
Jan 11, 2011 at 12:06 PM UTC
2000 pounds of truth
seats upholstered with naïveté
a windshield of false pretenses
80 miles an hour right into my chest
a license plate that said forever
Sep 27, 2016
Sep 27, 2016 at 11:07 PM UTC
Small and quiet, fluorescent,
the room holds anonymous faces.
People waiting for flu medicine,
hopes and fears and minor concerns about rashes
that we thought would go away.
Frequent urination
a tremor in your left hand.
A business man closes his eyes and kneads his brow.
He sits tensely in a blue upholstered chair
and smiles at me when he catches me looking.
Ruffling pages in magazines
like a moth's wings.
No mayo, rye bread, a nurse says.
Tapping her lavender acrylics
to music just low enough not to recognize.
Mind on shuffle, dreams achieved and
failed dreams of medical school,
little ones tripping and laughing out of double doors,
lining up to be whisked away in Suburbans or Geos,
carrot sticks uneaten at the bottom of a backpack.
A doctor sets a clipboard in front of her
and words are hastily typed into a computer.
And I wait for her to call my name.
Oct 19, 2017
Oct 19, 2017 at 11:35 PM UTC