"wheezed" poems
Two young boys in corduroys
were playing with a ball.
Two young boys heard one strange noise,
coming from the hall.
The boys stood still, well, still until
the door swung open wide.
And a ghostly chill and a real ghost, Bill,
were heaved the heck inside.
The brave boy stood, as the brave boy would,
and said, "Hey, listen Bill!
We're here to hear you, not to fear you.
Tell us what you will."
The other boy wheezed and sneezed then seized
and vomited on the floor.
He shook his brain. He felt insane.
Nothing was real anymore.
"Ghosts are real?! They're ******* real?!?!?!"
he cried and shook and feared.
For nature's laws were gone because
a ghost had just appeared.
And on that night of fear and fright,
the brave boy had his thrills.
And the other one was ******* done
and swallowed fifty pills.
Oct 31, 2018
Oct 31, 2018 at 1:23 PM UTC
During one of my recent internet travels,
I came across a picture of a “minor”,
posing with tinted lips
and exposed *******
What got my eyes
pinned were the thousand number of likes
by virtually hooting “boys”
and comments by other group of “gentlemen”
telling her how to dress.
HUMILITY: I have been asked to repeat the word
too many times to recall what it means:
the man on the subway cat-called
and accused me of showing too much skin
but instead of fighting back, I smiled
because girls ought to be nice.
I have been taught to survive
by using my body as a swiss army knife,
and I convince myself that
there is protection in being polite.
H-U-M-I-I am forgetting the rest.
The smoke curled up from between his fingers
and he blew out toxic, blurring my vision.
I gasped and wheezed
but I held my sneeze,
I cannot slap him across his face. HUMILITY.
So, I just pretended to cough, hoping he’ll feel ashamed.
I have been trained to flutter my eyelash,
clench my jaw at a whiplash
and business school boys,
who manifest success by refusing to take “NO” for an answer.
And for every time his prying eyes
scan down by body,
as if rating my inexperienced assets on a scale of one to five,
and every time his touch trails a chill down my spine,
I wonder:
Male kindness is so alien to us; we confuse it with seduction every time.
HUMILITY: the quality of having a low view of one’s importance
but, I fail to understand
when did it become synonymous to diffidence;
there is a subtle difference between
papercuts and shattered integrity,
holding hands and chaining souls,
building houses and creating homes,
humiliation rotting down to bones and humility.
HUMILITY, have you spelled it too many times to know what it looks like?
Sep 15, 2014
Sep 15, 2014 at 9:59 AM UTC
Medication time wheezed nurse ratchet
Her yellowed teeth as sharp as a hatchet
Medication time medication time
She shouts once more
Leaving me sickly chilled to my core
Medication time medication time
she hisses in my ear
Will I ever get better or is it only my fear?
Medication time medication time
she picks up in pace
If the medicines working why do I feel I'm being erased?
Medication time medication time
It comes to an end
I've been lobotomized and left for dead
Dec 27, 2013
Dec 27, 2013 at 9:35 PM UTC
I awoke to the sound of weeping, was a second before I realized it was my own.
It was strange because I felt like laughing, sad as that would be all alone.
My tired mind couldn't help it though, my decaying body couldn't stop.
I wheezed a laugh so wretched, into the dry cemented ground.
I spat blood onto the concrete, spat spit onto the road.
The broken old town around me, wouldn't mind the blood below. Closest thing to rain its seen, since six or so centuries ago.
My opponent was standing smugly, dark and tall and grim.
My shadow was never one to fault me, for the failure I'd always been.
Jun 15, 2016
Jun 15, 2016 at 4:09 AM UTC
Today I watched your
lungs turn inside out against themselves,
the air unsure of where to go so it just
hovered
in that middle space between coughs,
when you thought you'd caught your breath but
your voice hitched when you tried to talk and
you started choking again,
I saw
that today, your
eyes watering as you struggled to
remind your body how to sustain itself,
you cussed between fits and asked,
"isn't this supposed to happen on its own,"
you wheezed,
"shouldn't something so
instinctual
be easier than this?"
You didn't sound like you wanted an answer so I
kept my mouth shut,
brought you a glass of water.
Feb 11, 2015
Feb 11, 2015 at 7:45 PM UTC
Out Behind the Barn
me and Jimmy Dickens
were in the barnyard feeding chickens
we were both 11 about that time
when up the road came Susie Kasper
with her cousins Ted and Jasper
a couple of teens headed for a life of crime
they signaled out to us
I could hear Teddy cuss
they walked up and whipped out a couple of butts
they said here take a puff
if you like this I got better stuff
so I did just like a dumb old klutz
I coughed and I wheezed
I farted and then I sneezed
my eyes were leaking like a sieve
Jimmy was smarter I guess
but he too finally said yes
took a hit and felt the burn of a shiv
we both puked as they laughed
it was there very special craft
they always managed to make you look like a fool
but they patted us on the backs
said boys now just relax
you won't learn a lesson like this in no school
then Susie gave me a big wet kiss
wow sure wasn't expecting this
I was in a trance until I heard this horn
it was my mom back from the store
she yelled someone help me with this door
but I was busy gettin educated out behind the barn
Gomer LePoet....
Sep 20, 2011
Sep 20, 2011 at 3:44 PM UTC
Lawrence Hall
[email protected]
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
Beowulf and the Danish Passport Officer
From a recently discovered manuscript
The clapped-out Boeing wheezed to the gate
The ground crew jumped name-tags rattling
And swiftly moored the shining ocean-bird
Behind his plastic shield a Danish official watched
The travelers approach their passports raised
He stood peeking down at the naughty selfie
His girlfriend sent to his bold smart-phone
Shaking his rubber stamp he spoke:
“What is the purpose of your visit?
Business, or pleasure? Hwaet! I’ve stood
At this same gate longer than you know
Keeping our gift shops free from British footer hooligans
No commoner carries such fine matching luggage
Unless his Rolex and his boyish good looks
Are lies You! Tell me your name
And your home address and your email!
The quicker the better I’m off-duty in ten minutes.”
Beowulf answered him Unlocking his smart-phone:
“We are the Geats the mighty, mighty Geats!
Men who follow Malmo FF Malmo FF the great!
And we have come seeking Parken Stadium
Greatest of all stadia Its shining seats polished
By cheering generations of fat-full footer fans
We have come to cheer Malmo FF
While they whup up on Dansk Boldspil Union
Instruct us, watchman Where is the stadium
But first, where is the beer?”
The worthy officer
Answered him boldly:
“A true fan knows
The difference between fighting on the field
And puking in the stands and keeps that knowledge clear
In his beery brain I believe your babbling
Go forward, credit cards and all on into Denmark
Spend your money! Our exchange rate is generous!
And then go home bearing our love while we bear your money.”
(Stamp, stamp, stamp) “Tram stop to the left
Taxis to the right”
(Scholars everywhere will regret that here the burnt and torn manuscript breaks off.)
Oct 4, 2021
Oct 4, 2021 at 9:10 AM UTC
Every day as the sun rose
the sand sparkled like broken glass and salt
The ocean saw how the sand sparkled
and collapsed on top of it
A steady hush and hiss with every attempt
No one ever wondered why the ocean sounded like that
Like a fatigued Darth Vader
The ocean was sick
The ocean felt lonely
It is hard to have a body that big
to ever feel full
One day people came to swim
They did not swim like the animals did
The animals swam naturally
No one ever notices the way their own blood
pumps inside their veins
so much that they are happy being alive
The people splashed awkward
Stood sometimes letting their toes
graze the sea floor
This made the sea happy
But the people who were not of the sea
grew tired
and started for the sand
The sea became upset that they were leaving
and created a wave so big
it pulled the people back inside of it
A crash that sounded like lung cancer
A heave skipping the heart a beat
One that begs for any kind of breath
The ocean felt the people splashing hard
Fighting for land
It felt good
Eventually
They slowed
Gave up
And drowned
The ocean was lonely again
It calmly wheezed
at the shiny sand
Oct 31, 2012
Oct 31, 2012 at 2:57 PM UTC
I saw the news in obituary black and
alabaster-chamber white. Women mulled about
in shining dresses, all pinwheel-galaxy black.
The men’s suits: darkness-between-
stalks-late-in-the-cornfield black
The pastor wore a Cosmopolitan’s-table-of-contents
white stock in the non-air-conditioned
church. His sermon dripped on the bereaved
like hardening wax. A portly woman wheezed
in the second row. A first-roadkill-of-summer
red paper fan swayed idly in her left hand.
The coffin creaked, 4am-grandpa‘s-coffee brown
the procession moved outside slowly. The moment
was like when two trains are idle and one begins
to drift forward. From inside the other,
it feels as if we are drifting backward.
Backward to days before with the namer in his study.
He has on his 1862-edition-Les-Misérables tan
blazer. His wrists crawl out the undersized sleeves.
Above his roof, the sky milks over
to 4th- grader’s-scratched-locker blue.
A wine glass full of just-waking-up-seeing-steam-
waft-from-under- the-bathroom-door white wine
rests on his particle board desk. I want a 70s B movie villain
to bust through the door yelling, "I’m not sorry" and shoot him
with a chipping-paint-bike-rack-next-to-the-library¬ grey revolver.
I want the namer to be speechless, knock over the wine glass
and die with grandma’s-new-couch red pooling on his blazer.
The truth is my grandma’s new couch is this ugly
brown-yellow color. I don’t really know how to describe it.
Dec 27, 2010
Dec 27, 2010 at 5:09 PM UTC
Out Behind the Barn
me and Jimmy Dickens
were in the barnyard feeding chickens
we were both 11 about that time
when up the road came Susie Kasper
with her cousins Ted and Jasper
a couple of teens headed for a life of crime
they signaled out to us
I could hear Teddy cuss
they walked up and whipped out a couple of butts
they said here take a puff
if you like this I got better stuff
so I did just like a dumb old klutz
I coughed and I wheezed
I farted and then I sneezed
my eyes were leaking like a sieve
Jimmy was smarter I guess
but he too finally said yes
took a hit and felt the burn of a shiv
we both puked as they laughed
it was there very special craft
they always managed to make you look like a fool
but they patted us on the backs
said boys now just relax
you won't learn a lesson like this in no school
then Susie gave me a big wet kiss
wow sure wasn't expecting this
I was in a trance until I heard this horn
it was my mom back from the store
she yelled someone help me with this door
but I was busy gettin educated out behind the barn
Gomer LePoet....
Jul 6, 2013
Jul 6, 2013 at 9:46 AM UTC
Eternity wheezed,displaying its shortness of breath.Orange orbs whizzed in its' originalpath of vision due to a completelack of oxygen.Stirring stars shot rubber bands at each otheracross the universe. TWANG!Comets were slung like spitballs. Black holespainted each others nails whitewhile biting into a crunchy planet like a Dorito.®Salt of the earth was lost in dank darkness.An Mp3 player came crashing through the stratospherewhile playing my favorite song."Sitting in the morning sun,I'll be sitting when the evening comes,watching the ships roll in, and I watch themroll away again".
Feb 25, 2010
Feb 25, 2010 at 11:30 PM UTC
as soon you as you walked through the door
i could see you were not feeling well
you rushed into my arms
buried your head in my chest
and started to cry
i wrapped my arms around you
hugged you tight
pressed you near
your cries turned to sobs
i kissed your temple, your hair
“what’s wrong,” i asked
“i not feeling well, i’m coming down with the flu,” you replied
“i’ll take care of you Minou,” i whispered softly in your ear
i took your hand
lead you to the couch
laid you down
i removed your shoes
covered you
gently stroked your hair
“i’ll make you some peppermint tea with honey,” i said
i turned on the tv
flipped to your favorite netflix show
started the tea
the water boiled
i steeped the bag
brought you the cup
laid it on the table
you were falling asleep
i snuggled up along side of you
warm and cozy under the covers
you cuddled up
a leg across my hip
your head on my chest
you hair tickled my nose
i patted it down
slightly away
i petted
caressed your hair
savoring your scent
your smell
i held you in my arms
sensing your breath
feeling your heartbeat
slowly, you drifted asleep
muscles relaxing
inhaling, exhaling deeply, gently
i held you dear
protecting, providing, nurturing, nursing you
you are my partner
my lover
my wife
but tonight you are my child
you mumbled in your sleep
wiped your nose on my shirt
drooled a tad
you were congested
your breath wheezed
you snored a bit
i loved you more
i never felt like a man
this intensely
caring, tending, loving his wife, his Minou
Dec 20, 2018
Dec 20, 2018 at 10:55 PM UTC
Indulgence in a glass snake of Pinot Griego
Dancing the night away on the rooftops of London,
My dress torn from the wind
And your face streaked with rain.
The warmth, internal joy
A false happiness blossoming from alcohol and music.
Explosions of light that I jump to,
Falling into your strong arms
That keep me grounded.
My lips pressed to a cigarette,
Smoke curling into my nostrils as I wheezed and you laughed.
I remember what you told me,
"Suicide never tasted so good."
And me, in a drunken haze:
"Tastes like death's doorstep, my love."
And so we danced the night away
To the tune of New Years Eve
Smoking cigarettes in the rain
Bringing our old habits
Into the New Year.
Nov 6, 2014
Nov 6, 2014 at 9:54 PM UTC
'Let me tell you a thing or two,' he said.
She clutched his hand
The other clutched her breast.
She heaved and wheezed
As the universe dropped on her chest,
Waiting for the last words
She would hear.
His lips were devine as they recited a sermon-
How good she is,
How the world needs her-
She watched his perfect eyes
Delve into her depths, see through her.
He acknowledged her beauty,
She didn't hear.
She was deaf for those words
Her beauty, nonexistent,
Her intellect, negligible,
Every word he spoke about her
Was Unintelligible.
All she mumbled with the life left in her:
'How did I deserve you, oh, heaven?'
Dec 12, 2016
Dec 12, 2016 at 11:10 AM UTC
People are too concerned
with self, said Father Higgs.
His aged face as if hewn from
Rock, sat before you on broad
shoulders, the lips labouring
with the words. Too much
worried how self will feel,
how self will benefit. He
hunched forward, his large
eyes moving over you like
tired slugs. The symbol of
the cross, he said with a
movement of his head, is to
cut through the I, the sign
of the self. You noticed one
high brow, grey, larger than
the other, hair in nose like
insects in hiding. He breathed
out deeply. Self denial is
the essence of the message
of Christ, he said, a left
inclination of his head, his
teeth (not his own) large
and discoloured. You wanted
to ask questions, but he raised
a hand. The word I is stated
too often in conversations,
he said, or self too much
brought in as myself or herself
or himself or such as may be
used in talk. You understood
this was his way of lecturing.
His black monastic habit was
stained about the neck by food
or dribble or dried up phlegm.
We ought to be concerned with
others, he stated, wheezing, face
reddening, eyes enlarging. Where
is my inhaler? he wheezed, I really
must be off, this smoker’s cough,
my poor old lungs, must get myself
a stronger inhaler and he was off,
out of the common room he had
caught you in some hour back.
All you saw was his hand and inhaler
and departing monastic habit of black.
Jul 9, 2012
Jul 9, 2012 at 1:58 AM UTC
Where the off keys are the subtleties
Missing symmetries linking beats
Rhythms rhyming daytime stories
With nighttime attitudes
Dudes and ladies
Going crazy in lime light
More impressed by concept than conception
Misguided perhaps
maybe blinded
Influenced so greatly
By something stirred gently
On the off chance
What they need to say
Matches what was heard
Wheezed into a microphone
30 feet away
Elevated, but not above
Their ability for connection
And desire for attention
Packed rooms full of people
Wanting a label
To cling to or sing to
Making it easier to declare with conviction
Instead of trying to stick out by fitting in
(Afruitless effort, except by the trend setters)
Mar 14, 2012
Mar 14, 2012 at 7:48 PM UTC
Bone needle,
Jarred in wooden skin.
Silver thread glistens
In murky crimson sap, blood-akin.
Disciple Ajörn,
Squints beyond yonder.
Sap oozing in steady streams,
Into High Witch Åy'lla's beaker.
'Dryad, dryad, come
Foundling lost in Mireswamp.
Bless the Father of Lies,
Solitude begone.
Breathe fluid,
This wound I inflict.
Seep, drench, drown me
Beside you this moon I sit'
Seven quarters turned,
Blighted, glazed and dead.
Moon spanned all skies,
While Ajörn lay in a stranger's bed.
Reckoning came,
As sudden as his unfortunate arrival.
Witch and Dryad stirred ,
This night the moon, in denial.
'Stop, please?'
Hungry cackle, a shift of pose.
Needle removed, so gently
Soulsap collected in whole.
Åyll'a's bones, deft, finger blades
Nipping and knotting,
Slipping and sliding,
Silver of her thread, red of his being.
'Now we begin'
Sap and thread entwined.
Needles countless descended,
Pain silencing her whines.
Elder craft, this magick,
Dirge of the deathless.
Blood-bone colour of threads
Weaving over her *******
Weave, weave, my gentle love
What was two can be one.
Bounds known not to sentient life
Awake once more beyond ****** strife.
Through her skin, by her hand,
His sap she sewed unplanned.
Rivulets and lanes of High Witch blood,
Danced black and dark over skin, bland.
A tiara made flesh,
A finger bound in rings,
Ruby fluid flowed freely
Dancing with it's silver twin.
Moans ensued,
Pursuing now departed cries.
The Ritual of The Weave,
One death from being complete.
Like sawdust, he fell,
Strong disciple Ajörn.
Soul, sap, life taken in turns,
An undead Warlock was born.
Not corporeal, fatally surreal,
An existence wrought in threads
Strung by unearthly hands,
A partner in despair and dread.
Dryad lost,
Witch no more.
Two lives threaded
As one, forevermore.
'I'
'I'
'am'
'am'
Wheezed two voices in unison
'we'
'are'
Chanted the Witchlock in delusion.
Nov 24, 2016
Nov 24, 2016 at 8:34 PM UTC
The summer had come and gone,
And tomorrow, she was leaving,
Going back to the city to wait
The warming spring's returning.
At 88, she had decided it best,
Husband gone four years,
Two hips healed, but stiffening;
Ice forming on the ground
To keep her from walking;
Time to go back to the city to rest,
Hopefully to return when whooping cranes
V'eed north again in spring.
She'd packed her things
In two suitcases yesterday:
Simple clothes,
Her Bible,
A pair of shoes, or two;
Not much now,
No need.
She wondered if he'd do one thing
Before they drove away.
"My nails need a trim."
So, here he was,
Bent low to hold each foot,
To trim his mother's nails...
Memory, returned then,
Reversed four years
To this same chair,
In this same house,
His father struggling for air,
Needing help to dress.
He saw again his father's feet,
Frail and white and cool,
The nails long and needing care.
Embarrassed, the old man,
Despite the lack of breath,
Wheezed he couldn't bend
To reach his feet.
And the son had bowed then
To trim his father's nails,
And dressed him before
The three of them began the journey
From which only two returned.
And now, the week before Christmas,
The mother and her son,
Focused on the nail clipping,
Knowing certain chores,
However poignant,
Must be done.
Dec 23, 2015
Dec 23, 2015 at 8:58 AM UTC
/1975/ My mother died,
And forever cold she burned: cremated
No ceremony, no final goodbye,
Her will leaving me uncompensated.
Alone but for her ashes in the urn,
Which sometimes buzzed like bees and wheezed like breath,
I kept it shut until the day I learned,
That she would be my burden even after death.
Now every day I lift that hideous lid,
Remove the tiny skeleton within,
And place screeching in its awful stead,
Held by the tail, still in its fleshy skin,
A freshly caught rat / Hungry ash covers,
The dead too devour their living lovers.
Sep 28, 2020
Sep 28, 2020 at 11:53 AM UTC
You glided through life, laden with love
You pushed and squeezed, and huffed and wheezed
I was born into this world, a gift from above
Let out a small yelp, sniffled and sneezed
You loved and you cared
Through good times and bad
You put all matters aside, your soul proudly bared
I would never want to make you sad
I grew up to be tall and strong and you always cared
Before that when I was still young
What I did and said, you must’ve been scared
I hope I turned out all right, now you can finally have fun
It’s my turn to look after you
You’ve done it for so long
I’m grateful for that and a life always new
A life transposed into a beautiful song
Thank you for all the opportunities you’ve thought and given
It’s changed a lot and made me be...
Without you I would be nothing and id have never forgiven
You are in my heart and soul, the very essence of me
All my successes and failures were each life lessons learned
But softened and sweetened by my lovely mom
You taught me to let go, force bad memories to be burned
Each day started anew,
All these taught by none other than you...
Thank you for your time in raising a son
Life would’ve been so different without you
You’re so special to me, without you I wouldn’t be
Thank you for being the most wonderful mom...
Sep 9, 2012
Sep 9, 2012 at 9:02 AM UTC
do you hear the sizzle of my lungs
as they slowly burn to ashes?
my head is an anchor, weighing down
bringing me to the floor
i cannot breathe
i am aching
the doctor said i was fine
but the moment i left
and breathed in the poisonous fresh air
i wheezed
i could not breathe
my lungs were on fire
some people pretend im fine
but i see it in their eyes
how they’re pretending
some people avoid me
as to not get sick
to save their freezing lungs
the fire is spreading throughout my body
my face is red
my throat is burning
im fading out
my lungs are on fire
i cannot breathe.
Oct 28, 2024
Oct 28, 2024 at 8:42 PM UTC
TRIGGER WARNING
I lay awake at night, reflecting on the way your lips feel on mine,
but like a reflex I compare them to the many pairs I’ve felt in many places, how some lingered over my goosebumps, maybe to try and turn that feelinginto lyrics, I don’t know, while others bruised and pushed, too starved of faded
love pangs that the only pleasure was to fill something—
But one pair tugged and burned across the delicate paleness of parts not meant for him, stinging red from fingers that squeezed with fight and pulled with rage and scratched with a greed that blocked any thread of humanity from a woman’s fear.
His arms created no protective cage around me because he never desired to have me but to hold and pry my legs to take a barely blossomed womanhood waiting for that boy on that bed listening to that song
but teeth bit into my flesh offering no promise of soft, loving nips meant to excite the blood that should have flowed sweetly through my heart instead of pumping so hard it drowned
out my broken no’s as they quieted and died.
I noticed how his lungs labored with power as he finally burdened me,
shamed me with his need, but I realized later even if his eyes had locked with mine, nothing of his liveliness, nothing of his friendship would have lingered there. Going home, the jeep clanked and wheezed, sounding as used as my folds felt—but then he told me,
“I gotta fix that”
The dark corner of my mind rasped that he didn’t mean the tears of my skin or the abandoned pieces of my trust, never to be molded together again, not even by you.
Jan 8, 2015
Jan 8, 2015 at 5:40 PM UTC
Mr. Fawcett
Was a friend
Who ran hot and cold.
When he was hot
He drank a lot,
And smoked and toked,
And ****** and slurred.
We thought him quite absurd.
He wheezed and coughed
And finally croaked,
Turning himself off.
Jul 26, 2015
Jul 26, 2015 at 11:35 AM UTC
it wasn't even a special day when I decided to love you
it was a tuesday and you were at my house
and our legs touched under unwashed sheets
and i imagined that touch
on someone else
i curled my arms tighter around you
and you wheezed
as If me, a boa constrictor
was suffocating you
you didn't kiss my face
or turn to face me
your breath just huffed
and your leg trailed further up mine
and i wondered if you could hear my beating heart
or the beating distance louder
Jan 29, 2014
Jan 29, 2014 at 6:32 AM UTC