"weeknights" poems
This is not an accident. I used to call him
a lazy criminal. Scooping hearts and spilling blood,
leaving footprints, fingerprints. Stains.
Eyes folding over -- the blindman or the beggar?
Lips that blossomed into blueprints.
Hands that rhymed with dreams, instead.
The weeknights, dark and warm
in a season of curled paper.
No speaking -- guilt only follows
past the second trip through the door.
And then the mornings.
More sun in him than the greenhouse
where we watched dragonfly wings.
A pattern about him
like dragonfly wings.
In those days we knew
what it meant to point
without wounding.
We knew how to need someone
without wanting,
without loving.
Jan 11, 2013
Jan 11, 2013 at 9:57 PM UTC
I'll sit on trains,
home is behind me;
home is in front.
The place I sleep on weeknights
with working mornings looming
is the place I only survive.
But at weekends
I live for you,
I breathe with you,
and when I sleep
I dream with you
because home is with you
in those moments at least.
My own bed,
twice as big as yours,
the thought a luxury
on a 12am R train.
or cold N to R transfer platform,
but too much room is bad for the soul.
I'd rather have
the Monday morning bruises
and bed spring sized aches.
Mar 4, 2013
Mar 4, 2013 at 11:10 PM UTC
There's things that I don't say
In between kisses
And bowls of ramen noodles
On weeknights
There's a quiet sadness settled behind the couch and on the inside of my ribcage during our twilight marathons
On the weekends
Things left
To hopefully be forgotten under the bleachers at your soccer games
I go to whenever I can
It hangs with your hoodies in my closet
In the pit of my stomach
It's small but I can't stop it
And it takes me out for days at a time
I see you every day
But sometimes I am distant
In a different way
It's been done to me
And I'm sorry I'm doing it to you
I'm trying to phase the disappointment that has nothing to do with you
Out of my life like cycles of the moon...
The stars are ours
And that is true
I've never felt like I do when I'm with you
But I tried to tell you
I don't think
You completely understood
You have never felt
Such a sadness before.
.
.
.
.
*"What's wrong?"
"Is something wrong?"
"You would tell me if something was bothering you,
Right?"*
...
Oct 7, 2018
Oct 7, 2018 at 11:59 AM UTC
for Barton Smock
I
to see the flooding lake I crawl
through the thicket
I imagined
being the devil’s
garden
as a child
a lake
I first called
blue prison
but now
love
after swimming
lessons grandmother
funded
II
squatting arsonists occupy
the town’s church
during weeknights
I am one of four who knows
*When it burns
I'll steal the stoup*
III
I dream rarely and only in naps
waking,
I try restraining
fantasies of
faceless women
IV
rainstorms brake
the lake’s edges,
muddy the bankside flowers,
leave the canal sullied
forever
looking on, I
recall
generosity
Nov 22, 2012
Nov 22, 2012 at 2:44 PM UTC
Karma was a dancer
at the Déjà Vu,
trading fantasies a few days a week
for ***** crumpled bills and
then living the dream on her days off.
That was before I knew her.
Before she faded just a little.
Which is not to say
that she was no longer beautiful
with her mermaid hair,
the color somewhere between
phosphorescent amber and
burning chestnut brown,
down to her *** and falling all around
her painfully sensuous curves.
The faint pucker lines 'round her mouth,
that liver spot,
a slight, barely discernable paunch,
I could see such things, too but
they only endeared me to
the façade of some silly notion
a kin to forever.
We would stay up late,
even on the weeknights,
wine silly and
**** chatty.
She would dance
and I would tell her
****** poems in exchange.
It seemed like a good trade
to me but the truth is,
she was being shorted in the deal.
We said,
I love you
but I’m not sure we knew
that we didn’t really have that
to offer one another.
Both of us had sold more
than we had ever bargained for
long before we met.
When money ran thin and
times grew hard
she split.
Hope still stops by on occasion.
(She was a dancer, too).
But it seems a bit easier to distinguish
differences between the faux
and the genuine these days.
She doesn’t stay long.
I like to blame it all on Karma
despite knowing that I was just never
quite frugal or savvy enough to afford more than a few perfume-drenched moments at the foot of the stage.
Sep 7, 2015
Sep 7, 2015 at 12:10 PM UTC
There is no doubt about it:
You have always loved me.
A leonine love.
A love that swells in the womb and the heart
From the very first twinkle in the eye.
Hit play.
Your eyes are swampish,
Mistrustful and marinated in cheap wine,
Shot through with blood, preserved in your own saltwater.
Those alligator eyes
That watch your girls,
Watch your girls board a train and draw away
Into the rest of their lives.
Leaving you stewing in twelve years’ worth of regret.
Years ago,
I used to pinch your forearms -
Watch the skin crepe up
Between my four year old fingers.
Thin blood. Tired skin.
Silently you eat your breakfast of pills and toast at the kitchen counter.
Throw in a horrid hacking cough to remind us you’re still here.
You always write everything down.
As if to tattoo it into your memory.
If you’ve locked the door behind you, it’ll be alright.
If you’ve got half a bottle left.
If you’ve left no trace on the bathroom carpet.
If you’ve woken up in the morning.
You can feel my eyes watching you.
You spend your days watching
Daytime TV, eating salad cream sandwiches and
Hit the bottle at a safe distance from noon.
Safe enough.
Your lipsticks have gone stale,
Now it’s porous skin, sweat stains, grey hair.
I find you poring over bank statements and local newspapers.
Scouring for a job, you say,
And clippings of your daughters
At school functions, clasping exam results.
You keep them in a cereal box that we covered in paint
Age five. We’re in double figures now.
I get drunk on weeknights.
Rewind.
Hold me.
Ball of flesh and screams
And you’ve got your whole life ahead of you.
Sep 23, 2012
Sep 23, 2012 at 4:50 PM UTC
i learned it before the subtlety of time meant me to
i don’t know who it was
who planted the seed
but i was a baby
acting like i was grown
in a world of forced skin
you were the catalyst
the cure for the summer heat
much to the chagrin of the other counselors
if you google “how to spot
grooming behavior” it was
you to a tee but i don’t think
you knew how bad it was
and neither did i, till i
applied your tactics a hundred
times. it made me the devil
the charred tongue of death
and i broke so many people
to dust before i knew what
dust was- i am only now
realizing that i thought love
was the tightening of grip
forced respect from older
boys who thought God was
a scam (you were the scam
who followed me home
weeknights and tagged
along on dates, you
disgusting **** you should
have known better) at age
thirteen sometimes respect is
ignored when you get it from
high school boys (sometimes
he pops up again asking me
how i‘ve been and i don’t talk
because how do you tell them that
you had to start again from where
they ****** you over?)
May 21, 2018
May 21, 2018 at 12:37 AM UTC
I originally wrote "its funny" as the first line
however I dont think
its funny
I started liking you far too long ago
and I got stuck on the Argo sailing
in sorrow under the statue of Rhodes.
I started writing a poem a day
just to impress you and I realized that
i only ever impressed myself
You like our car side conversations
maybe because I keep good company
or maybe because you were actually interested
in the hopelessness that
I am.
I start to make you a black hole
and I am past the event horizon.
Sunlight only escapes through my words.
My open lips meet your parted sentences
cut short by the warmth of human breath.
I made you into poetry
but I should have followed my sisters advice
and not smashed you into my poetry books
I should not have swirled the words of your
glassy blue eyes into golden threads
binding ancient books.
Thats where I went wrong.
I cared to much.
Our path wasnt a lambda where two paths meet to make one
we were an x
bold on the page but
only crossing for a mere moment.
I dont regret any of it. I just wish
you knew that I meant all of it.
Pretty poems
and movies on weeknights.
Masquerades hiding our feelings.
I never even asked where you stood.
What your mask meant.
What it was hiding.
I showed up to the ball dressed like art
and you were cinderella
waiting for her prince charming.
I shatter glass slippers.
and arrange the fresh fragments into
an ugly spectacle
of futility.
We are schrodingers cat
locked in a box.
Im just afraid that I am pandora
and that the hope of us died
when I observed the radioactivity within.
Cancer cells on skin
you called them cute moles.
I guess I kinda just wanted you to be mine,
and I always knew
that
Good guys
stay stuck at home
watching star wars box trilogies.
Dreaming of their Leia.
Id rather be George Lucas. I think.
This stopped making sense to me the moment
That I decided to make it about you
so Im going to end it
here.
Nov 9, 2015
Nov 9, 2015 at 8:00 PM UTC
come in multitudes
come in boots, pulled up, strapped
come with hairnets, bowlers, beers
come with husbands and mothers
the starlets come, the celebrities
the politicians and adversaries
bring your conflicts
bring your problems
stoners, bring your insights
bring philosophies and religions
bring visions, or lack thereof
bring weekdays and weeknights
bring the sofa
bring reality shows or documentaries
bring the series
and bring the cat
but come
with quirks and queers,
with stubbornness with anger
with broken glasses and fists
with fits of rage, with opinions
statements, facts, figures, conspiracies
bring every one of these, but come
with your broken hearts and talents
or genius, or with yesterday’s news
with the crosswords and comics
or the convicts or the cartoons
- hell, we’ve got more than enough room
Sep 27, 2013
Sep 27, 2013 at 7:06 AM UTC
i am guilty of looking at your lips in the middle of class.
wondering who else has looked at them.
wondering if they've wanted to kiss them.
if they've wanted to be yours.
i wanna be yours.
i am addicted to 8:35 on weeknights sneaking away during act 2.
i am addicted to choco-coffee from the best **** barista in town.
i am addicted to phone tag and craisins.
i am addicted to your lips.
May 9, 2014
May 9, 2014 at 8:16 AM UTC
Let's have an affair over thousands of miles.
I know you through the words you've written down,
Which tell me you are equal parts baffled and fascinated
By the billions of minds that make up this crazy, crazy world we live in.
I'm asking you to take off your work uniform slowly and deliberately
So I can see where you've tattooed all of those nights smoking *** and laughing on your chest.
And I promise not to be intimidated by the black spot next to your heart
Inked in fully with the names of every girl you've brought home
And used as a muse those weeknights you just wanted to love something.
I don't fear your short, crisp lines filled with inside jokes you're dying to share
With anyone who isn't you.
I don't fear a little bit of darkness or loneliness.
I only fear that I'll never be able to feel your breath on my neck as we sway back and forth
Cloaked in smoke laying on a bed of aluminum and grease-stained shirts.
Or I'll never be able to run my hand along your chest as your lungs fill up with the sweet smell of rain.
I don't know you, but I like to imagine that you're a cliche ocean of depth and passion
That wants to do right by anyone who will do right by him.
So let's do this, let's have a cross country love affair of the senses
And feel each other like we're just learning what it means to touch.
Aug 13, 2013
Aug 13, 2013 at 1:05 AM UTC
Define a full life.
I sleep four-five hours on
Weeknights.
In winter I work in darkness that
Only breaks during mid-day;
With snow blowing sideways,
Finding its stubborn way between
Garments to touch skin
With a thousand needles.
I have one deep scar for every
Week of work.
I've been more cold than warm,
More exhausted than rested,
I've been to death and back; have
Photos of my own heart from
Nearly unsuccessful surgery.
But staying dead was not for me.
With friends and interests like mine,
Heaven held no grounds to hurry.
There is too much music.
Too much wisdom in old eyes, too
Much beauty in brand new ones.
I wake up in a warm bed
Beside a warm woman,
Eat warm food daily. Both my
Parents still live. My brother is
My best friend.
I meet challenge upon challenge
Upon challenge.
Some I win.
But more important than anything:
I laugh. I laugh and laugh
Until my stomach can't move,
And I smile to the skies
With my face still wet from tears
I wouldn't bother to hide
From anyone, saying
*Well played, up there.
Love every scene; every joke; every
Set. The soundtrack is impeccable.
Characters loveable.
Give my best to the scriptwriters.
They crack me up.
Can't wait to see how it ends.
Promise me a
Sequel.*
I'd do it all again.
Define a full
Life.
Then live
It.
May 7, 2014
May 7, 2014 at 12:41 AM UTC
she told me that I need
to get some sleep,
she has a child
and works ‘till 12am
most weeknights,
then spends time
with me, until
the bags beneath
her eyes become
enough to
outweigh the need
to be WITH me,
she lays tired
but sleeps awake
until she heres “mommy”
then naps
until 1pm,
and I just get up
hungover,
it may be the
need for common-law
thats making me doubt.
Dec 30, 2015
Dec 30, 2015 at 6:54 PM UTC
she told me that I need
to get some sleep,
she has a child
and works ‘till 12am
most weeknights,
then spends time
with me, until
the bags beneath
her eyes become
enough to
outweigh the need
to be WITH me,
she lays tired
but sleeps awake
until she heres “mommy”
then naps
until 1pm,
and I just get up
hungover,
it may be the
need for common-law
thats making me doubt.
Dec 10, 2015
Dec 10, 2015 at 3:37 AM UTC
Have you ever noticed the difference,
That a single word can make?
How I'm fine, and I'm alright,
Just don't mean the same?
And how some words are coded,
Embeded with hidden meanings,
Used amongst close friends,
When blunt speech wont do.
How Alien can be one person,
Avenue another,
The Drug meant a sweater,
And Turtle Soup meant ****
How growing up, life was filled,
With stupid little words,
That you could say innocently,
While meaning so many other things...
Back when school wasn't a worry,
And college wasn't looming over us.
When our weeknights consisted,
Of around-the-house,
Ghost-in-the-graveyard,
And cops & robbers.
Words were so much more than words.
Words were powerful,
Words were strength.
Words held secrets,
A single word could mean anything.
Aug 27, 2014
Aug 27, 2014 at 11:13 PM UTC
Cannibus
Ice cream
Whiskey
Chips
Yet you're the one that seeps into me
Jun 16, 2015
Jun 16, 2015 at 7:12 PM UTC
Who wouldn't want a Lexus?
Not the one with four wheels, silly
The brazen, sweet-talking girl from Philly
You could own a hundred thousand or a Milly
It wouldn't make a difference
We all should get a glimmer of romantic inference
Once a in a day
It keeps some of the stress away
Little do you know
That the influence you bestow
Can really implement change in a heart
Watch as these oxidizing effects tear itself apart
I'm waiting for your misery to depart
Like a New York City train
She spends her weeknights crying over something so trivial
Pour her self-doubts down the drain
Where it belongs
In the sewer
Because the only man that truly deserves her
Would still be with her when her last option is staying in the sewer
Somebody get with Lexus
And make her feel the elation we've always wanted her to feel
Genuine.
Sep 21, 2017
Sep 21, 2017 at 8:54 PM UTC