"wineglasses" poems
The weeping
of the guitar begins.
Wineglasses shatter
in the dead of night.
The weeping
of the guitar begins.
It's useless
to hush it.
It's impossible
to hush it.
It weeps on monotonously
the way water weeps,
the way wind weeps
over the snowdrifts.
It's impossible
to hush it.
It weeps for things
far, far away.
For the sand of the hot South
that begs for white camellias.
Weeps for arrows without targets,
an afternoon without a morning,
and for the first dead bird
upon the branch.
Oh, guitar!
Heart gravely wounded
by five swords.
8.6k
she saw the words in your eyes long before you had enough courage to spit it out of your mouth. she was used to goodbyes but she was usually the one who gave it out. now she was on the raw end of the deal and the pain was excruciating -- her heart was pumping so hard her eyes were brimming with tears and when it fell down her mouth she wondered why it tasted salty when it should've tasted like ***** because that's the only liquid she's been taking in ever since you left. she keeps bleeding from her feet because she's been standing on broken glass ever since the day she broke your picture frames and the wineglasses on the kitchen counter and she smashed the mirror right after because it just keeps reminding her how bad of a mess she was and how she couldn't fix it.
the next day she smeared on lipstick and mascara because you liked the natural look and then her phone rang and you met at the cafe across the street where you always had your morning coffee. you were talking and laughing like you wouldn't drop a bomb on her a moment later and you never did. she went home crying and smashing plates again because you left her two weeks ago in your eyes but you still didn't have the courage to say it.
Dec 6, 2014
Dec 6, 2014 at 7:51 AM UTC
Wondering the evening stillness
We left the bluebell beds
And the sculptured wooden rose
To trample the wearing pathway
Down to the campus amphitheater.
A patch of daylight brought the party
To look upwards where transparent rope
Made a crossing of wavering sun beams
A celebration of Art Installations with an
unexpected rhyme.
Downwards the plateau, a semicircle of grass
Melts into July’s empty classroom of books
As wasted writing and hours of hot fluttering
In a breeze with discarded wineglasses and cups
Await the sound of trumpets and a golden crown.
Love Mary ***
Jun 13, 2019
Jun 13, 2019 at 1:54 PM UTC
All estuaries flow eastbound, and the subterranean rail tracks keep forcing against the estuaries’ grain and dust foundations perpendicularly to them.
How can a sane proposition -- a quantification of syntax execution (those squirming cuticles through bonds of regression)— an excessive reflection, reflexive inspection,
Prove its sanity through continued suggestion?
Deductive insurrections stirred in memory,
A rumble, causing sediments to crumble,
Wineglasses balanced atop countertops tumble.
Spilling contents upon the grained wooden, elitists' floors.
"Anesthetic, onsetting tuberculosis in breath patterns,
Gavels ringing on rigged tolling tongs in caverns,
Dark tolerances to Copernican astronomy in shadows,
And the handle grinds as boxcar wheels' flints and steels catch and spark in addled locks," I mumbled from a half-nap.
It was surgery, the smooth procedures on the moving trains,
The gains and plectrums scraped against the brains' spider veins,
To reorganize the sane, to bridge the broken definitions changed,
To prevent arguments' bone structure from fractures and sprains.
"Use gavels against the scalpels, sculpt with their judgment," a corona dream's habitant corrugated.
He pounded the gavel's end against the knife to chisel at the pituitary gland pulsing in his subject,
And her arms flailed like a horse's legs in heat-induced convulsion.
I thought it was done.
The Canson Merue train screamed in the night under earth to Yellowknife to meet Canadian soil as the Heavy Breather pounded his gavel.
Oct 9, 2014
Oct 9, 2014 at 5:06 PM UTC
“I can’t believe
you listen to this song”
she said, stacking forks; dishes; spoons.
Foot tapping
inside worn out shoes
as Tracy Chapman sang
about her fast car.
“I used to hear this song,”
*Fast enough
that we could fly away*
“and think just picking up and going.
Not worrying anymore
about any of this.”
*Speed so fast
Felt like I was drunk*
More stacking: cups; knives; wineglasses.
And I had a feeling I
could be someone
be someone,
be someone.
And as she left
I wondered
if she would have taken me with her
in her fast car.
Sep 2, 2011
Sep 2, 2011 at 12:50 PM UTC
Left Brain
I am not a scientific test or analysis, a mathematician
or an algorithm. I am not a linear graph or a statistician.
I am the reason that you can colour inside the lines,
why you don't fall off your bicycle anymore and never forgot
how to ride it. I am the force behind your smiles-
eighteen different smiles. The reason you can hold a book
or ball and learn what to do when it's in your hands.
I take credit when you remember the name of your childhood
babysitter. Thanks to me, you can play with jigsaw puzzles
or cards or checkers or dominoes. And thank me too
for your vocabulary. You don't necessarily remember
just how it is you came to remember sequences like getting dressed
or driving, decoding or analysing. I am the reason
you can probably look at someone and learn their name.
I suppose you could complain about how I dictate your days.
How you get up, go to sleep, lend you the seconds and minutes
and hours and months and years. I am the one who taught you
time. I'm also there for you to know that it runs out.
Right side
I am no dancer or artist made for television. Instead,
I'm the vibration you feel in the tips of your fingers
when you make a toast and ***** your wineglasses.
Those eighteen smiles you can smile? I gave you the gift
of being able to count your crayons while you are smiling.
But it's more than box sets of crayons and toasts.
I am the reason you want to be. Everything you yearn for-
every penny you ever tossed into a fountain, every star
you have wished on, and every eyelash. I am the reason
why you prefer wearing blue to green, and why you may
fill a blank page with words for what you want, how you feel.
I am the excitement that waits for you at Christmas
or reunions. When you saw the sky full of stars, felt snow
or went in the sea for the first time, I gave you that gasp.
I am your eyes on the world. Blame me for your wanderlust.
I am not time. I am how you know sometimes
that there is no way you'll ever have enough of it.
Nov 5, 2013
Nov 5, 2013 at 12:44 PM UTC
i've searched for love in all the wrong places.
i've looked for it under your sheets and over your kitchen counter.
i've crawled down your bed and felt the inside of your closets.
i've tried searching for it in flower petals falling to the
ground one by one -- "he loves me, he loves me not".
i've tried digging through the dirt looking for every feeling we ever buried.
i've tried quietly drinking to see if love was at the bottom of a bottle.
i drank a lot more, just to make sure.
i looked for it in broken mirrors and smashed plates and overused wineglasses
on the dining table where you used to sit.
i've tried looking for it in your eyes that were almost always empty.
i could look in a lot more places and tell you about a lot more.
i haven't found it yet, but one thing's for sure:
i don't know where it is, but I know where it isn't.
love can't be found in you.
Feb 7, 2015
Feb 7, 2015 at 8:28 PM UTC
deep, dark sky
spreading over the earth's
moonlit body.
as the infancy of night
passes by, the air between
the sky and earth
grows thinner. Sky's swelling weight
is felt, and pulled in by Earth
-both are left gasping for breath.
that tightrope between soil's solidity
and the wisps of heaven,
anchored to the reaching branch of a tree,
sliding through that barren land of
dim-lit restaurants and chiming wineglasses,
charming words and coy smiles,
is traversed by a libertine
creature called Night.
They create a beautiful contrast,
the charcoal sky and white, moon-
kissed land. separate, but
deep and more deeply
intertwined as Night grows older.
one can try to stand still
look upward
become enveloped in the intoxicating
interplay of the two. and notice
new stars magically emerge from
the dark sky
Jul 2, 2013
Jul 2, 2013 at 12:42 AM UTC
Sonya and I ate out
in some Parisian restaurant
outside in the air
at a small table
candle lit
wineglasses
menus in French
what you having?
she asked
you later I hope
I said
no now I mean to eat
she said
I scanned the menu
can't make out
what's here my French
is poor
so she told me
what was there
in her broken English
(she was a Danish dame)
I'll have the soupe au pistou
followed by that quenelle
I said
and white wine
she scanned the menu
then called
the waitress over
(a nice dame
with a nice ***
and ordered our meals
and drinks
the waitress walked off
with a neat wiggle
Sonya gazed at me
do you always watch
women so intently?
yes pretty much
all the time
I said
even when you are
with another woman?
she said
I only look and compare
I said
compare what?
she frowned
(beware of women
that frown)
how they look
and carry themselves
and hold their heads
and walk and how
their hair is and so on
I said
but you are with me
am I not enough
for you to look at?
a couple nearby smooched
his hand on her knee
of course you are
but just because
I have a beautiful Rubens
art work doesn't mean
I can't look at other artwork
I said
she watched
the couple smooching
I gazed at her
at her eyes
(lovely icy blue eyes)
her nose
her lips
her chin
how her breast
was neatly held
by her dress
their first date you think?
she said
probably is
I said
glancing at
the smooching couple
(his hand was on
her upper thigh)
Sonya sighed
why do men do that?
do what?
get all amorous
at the wrong time
Sonya said
you mean there's
a wrong time?
I said
yes it is wrong here
she said
o I see
I said
Benny this is for meals
and eating not for foreplay
she said
the waitress brought
our drinks on a tray
and put them on our table
and walked away
(neat ***
have you finished
that Russian novel
you were reading?
she asked
(changing the subject)
almost just the last chapter
I said
how's the **** book
you are reading
coming along?
she looked at me
and smiled
you will see later
she said
(I did later
in bed).
Dec 8, 2015
Dec 8, 2015 at 2:31 AM UTC
When the homes were wearing
The shroud of 4am, I was forgetting
The glass oracle that carries
All of our coffins to receding galaxies.
I was forgetting the woman wearing
Diamonds I saw last night, standing
Beyond the empty street that lead to the park
Naked, and coiling like a snake on top
Of the body of some so lonely looking man.
I was forgetting the way, I then imagined
How the spittle swelled on her tongue
To drip to the cement then beyond cement,
To the shifting clay under foot.
In shroud of 4:01am, I was forgetting
The sleep routine of my lover drudging
To the door to bolt, then stopping to look
Down at me, lost in the some snake skin
Husk of me; creating poems not to by eyed
By porcelain birds that shatter like
Wineglasses on the marble floor
Of my dream home.
In the light of 5:03am I woke
After forgetting how
The attractive force of earth
Has a hold on everything I got
To the roof, feeling the sharpness
Of sandpaper shingles, and stepped
Out, finally taken back by a conclusion,
When my body was grasped by gravity
And thrown to the gravel, breaking
Both ankles.
May 7, 2014
May 7, 2014 at 2:50 AM UTC
I have tried to love you,
while you loved
another.
I’ve tried making
peace, with the fact
that I will always,
always fall second
in your heart.
We are not a cliche.
We are a vicious cycle.
We fall in a dance,
that we never speak of.
I wait for you at night.
You stumble in my arms,
drunk and desperate.
We sleep through
hurried whispers in
the darkness,
fleeting fingertips
shaking terribly over
white-hot heat of skin
touching against skin, slow-dancing
with silence in lieu of music,
the sharp angles of your
hipbones and the dip
where your collarbone
meets your sternum
– all these and more,
on my lips and the way
you tear through my flesh
– only to run out
my bed when the morning
comes, to run in his arms
And he’ll meet you at the door
smelling of fresh showers
and mint toothpaste,
and summery aftershave.
He’ll ask you where you’ve been
and you’ll conjure a lie or two
about how you’ve spent the night
and the day before with your sister
or how you’ve spent the night
on your friend’s couch…
…but I am not your friend,
and you certainly didn’t spend
the night on my couch.
And in the afternoon,
I’ll see you with him, his hands
on the small of your back,
exactly just as where my
hands had been, just hours ago.
The sun sets, the night falls
and I’ll wait for you
to run to me again.
And you always do.
We’re not a cliche
We’re poison meant to ****
each other, and we’re not
supposed to mesh at all.
We’re an incurable sickness
that we both know we cannot
live without.
We’re lies and lies and lies.
Topped off with lies again and again.
We are not
empty wineglasses
left on the floor
to pick up dust or
to shatter to pieces, but we are
more of an unfinished novel
dog-eared and thrown
a thousand times across the floor
both in frustration and in anger.
We both keep
picking it up and re-reading
over and over again
even though we already know
how
this
story
ends.
And **** if it isn’t my favorite.
Sep 30, 2016
Sep 30, 2016 at 11:29 PM UTC
We've played a game;
Tracking words and
Dropping wineglasses on
The heads of dead men
From twelve storeys
Up
I can watch your brain
Scintillate for hours when
You think there's a veil
Hiding it all but I think
You want me to see,
Secretly
It was easier when instead
Of thoughts we only had
Glass and bishops to ****
But with time comes
Complications
Dec 18, 2015
Dec 18, 2015 at 11:52 PM UTC