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For Robert Lowell


This is the time of year
when almost every night
the frail, illegal fire balloons appear.
Climbing the mountain height,

rising toward a saint
still honored in these parts,
the paper chambers flush and fill with light
that comes and goes, like hearts.

Once up against the sky it's hard
to tell them from the stars--
planets, that is--the tinted ones:
Venus going down, or Mars,

or the pale green one.  With a wind,
they flare and falter, wobble and toss;
but if it's still they steer between
the kite sticks of the Southern Cross,

receding, dwindling, solemnly
and steadily forsaking us,
or, in the downdraft from a peak,
suddenly turning dangerous.

Last night another big one fell.
It splattered like an egg of fire
against the cliff behind the house.
The flame ran down.  We saw the pair

of owls who nest there flying up
and up, their whirling black-and-white
stained bright pink underneath, until
they shrieked up out of sight.

The ancient owls' nest must have burned.
Hastily, all alone,
a glistening armadillo left the scene,
rose-flecked, head down, tail down,

and then a baby rabbit jumped out,
short-eared, to our surprise.
So soft!--a handful of intangible ash
with fixed, ignited eyes.

Too pretty, dreamlike mimicry!
O falling fire and piercing cry
and panic, and a weak mailed fist
clenched ignorant against the sky!
Deity Feb 2013
"Just the tip. Just the tip." Initiation. Fourteen years old, fourteen year olds don't know the just the tip trick. It hurt like hell but the sound of his panting was well...worth it. Just the tip, then just the shaft. Just a lick, what a champ…the other half. Gigi was born, de-flowered then flourished. Naughty by nature. Fed and *** nourished. What a **** I was, what a ***** I am.…just slap my ***, grab me and pull me in. Choke me, bite me...squeeze, pull my hair, look me in the eyes, cuff me to a chair. Quiet ones you have to watch. I moan louder than I talk, nice rock in my hips....do me real good and I'll wobble when I walk. The club is my home, but not where I belong. Under my hijaab they can't see my laced thong. Taught to cater to the men and serve them martinis. Not dance ***** naked in heels and bikinis. Allahu Akbar. Don't let my family find out. Allahu Akbar. They'll **** me. Allahu Akbar. But if they do. Allahu Akbar. I'm still me.

My name is Neha,
Stage name GiGi however so complex, Stripper in silence,
And I'm strung out on ***.
Vamika Sinha Jul 2015
Wanderer.
From window to window.
Seeking
             something
in different glass scenes
from offices and trains and restaurants.
Like she'll see something or someone
or somebody.
And the world will no longer be
a tilted painting.

Clear spring cold
papers over
the scene of the city of her world.
She's freezing.

There is a cafe at the end of the
road
where sidewalk snow has mingled
with trod-on mud
from commuter's shoes.
It's called
'Les yeux qui voient tout'

She can smell coffee and cigarettes and paper and words
and smiles and wine all the way from Bordeaux.
She sits by the window.

Tendrils of hair cut
across her cheek
as she lowers.
The seat is cold.
Legs crossed,
                       arms clasped,
high-heeled shoes with straps
that cross,
head bent
over a crossword.

'Un cafe au lait, s'il vous plait.'

Last four-letter word pencilled in so
she crumples up the paper.
The eyes don't notice
origami birds dangling above her.
Somehow
they're all angled
towards the glass window
like sunflowers reaching for the sun.
Perhaps the casual
shuttered-open winds
are the birds' oxygen;
reminders that
                          something
like
sky,
air,
wind,
exist, beyond
coffee-smoked counters.
Reminders that
they could breathe, live, fly
in some other city of some other world.

Cup and saucer on a silver platter
hover over.
Idle fingers
and then a clatter.
She stares down into
the white porcelain pit,
teeming with hot brown
                                           alarms.
It isn't a portal
into
       something.
Just a cup of coffee.
Now that is an alarm.

Slow and
                shaking,
drip,
         drip,
                  drip.
The milk is poured.
Curling, italic, Persian carpet spread
from the cup's centre into warm-cream brown.
She imagines it is
blood in her heart.

She raises the little silver teaspoon
napping on the saucer and
stirs.

'Le sucre?'
Does she want it all
to be
sweeter?

Two packets, long like
Marlboros,
hastily, desperately dumped
into the mix.
Quick and
                  shaking,
she raises the little silver teaspoon and
stirs.
Little sugar grains ******
into a vortex,
dissolved and melted into
the city of the world of the cup.

With her little finger, she
dabs
stray sugar grains
on the table
and tries to bring sweetness
to her sleep-thick tongue.

Slow and
                shaking,
sip,
      sip,
            sip.

She's­ tricked herself
into feeling warmth.
Ticker-tape banner
pops up in her head:
'All of this will not
fix you.'

Porcelain clatter
as cup meets saucer.
Again.
She arms herself with
a cigarette case and a book.
Maybe now she will belong
amongst these people
with sad eyes and burning lips,
clinging on to cups and drinks.
So desperately-lit smoke
trails out of
her warm mouth,
steaming up her face
like a window on a cold winter day.
And meanwhile Camus perches
in her hand.

Her eyes swim
in the choppy seas
of French.
The cigarette dangles,
painting the air grey, grey,
tilting, tilting, tilting.
Slow and
                shaking,
she weeps.

Half-aglow in the white sunshine filter
from the glass window,
a woman is wondering.
She drinks her coffee,
wipes her smudged mouth
and leaves.

Nobody notices the wobble
in her high-heeled gait.
She's just a part of
another tilting painting,
another glass scene.

These simple acts,
           simple things,
define
the speaking soul.
In a scene of the city of the world.
It's all a metaphor.
A de Carvalho May 2012
It’s easy to be happy, we just have to pretend.
(And we have to pretend we are not pretending.)
We are living on a wedge, in a balancing act,
Continually contemplating our emotions.
That’s how we wobble. (And we wobble a lot!)

I want to be a sunflower.
I want to feel like a sunflower feels.
I want to just be there, all dutiful and content.
I want no unhappy thoughts (there are no unhappy thoughts!),
Nor happy thoughts –  just simply be.
Sensitive and responsive and alive,
And nothing else.

They say we are more.  
They say we are more than animal, more than physical.
They say our souls are souls and that we have a deeper essence.
I say we are not.
I say we are animal and that we are precisely physical.
I say we are chemical, electrical, mineral, and vegetable,
And so much more.
I say our souls are not souls and nonetheless we have essence.
We have so much essence!
(However, our essence is physical, not metaphysical.)
There is so much philosophy in not having a philosophy.

Let there be pain where there is pain.
Let goodness be goodness, and evil be evil.
They are all the same.
Let things be beautiful without them being beautiful to you.
Love is not you, as you need it to be.
Love is everywhere and in everything.
Love is in the nature of things.
It is the nature of the Maker of things.
It is not you that creates love, nor love that creates you.
You don’t need love – not the love you need.
What has this love given you?
What has it turned you into?
You don’t have to be something you are not to be you!

You add up the days, you add up the years,
And you grow old. (The adding up makes you old.)
You add up everything you have, everything you are.
Adding is growing, adding is being, you think.
The more you add. the less you are you.
It’s obvious, isn’t it? Isn’t it?
Yet, you keep on adding till you are almost nothing.
You became a doubt, an ellipsis.
If you were to stop adding, stop pretending, you would start growing.
Naturally, organically, faultlessly.
You would grow into you. Not more, not less. Not someone else. You.
Beautiful you. Perfect you. Godly you.

Look at children.
Look at children playing.
Look at children eating ice-cream *****.
Look at them picking flavors.
There is more depth in this picking than in your whole existence!

I want to be a sunflower.
I want to be the sea.
I want to be a single ray of sunlight.
I want to feel the freedom the wind must feel.
I want to feel like the meadows and the valleys feel.
I want to be simple and natural and magnificent.
God is hidden in the simple things –
This is what we should never forget, yet we always do.

It’s easy to be happy, we don’t have to pretend.
Ivy Swolf Jan 2015
Most days self-doubt laps at my ankles
in pools that I hardly feel, with ripple effects
so small I don't even sift the footprints
in the sand. Other times it comes in waves,
striking me behind the knees. I wobble,
skim the water's surface with a grasping hand
that's never held on to anything except for broken
secrets, but I don't fall. The salt stings my eyes
but instead of closing them I resolutely
gaze at the sunset in the hopes that I could find
some written metaphor in the pink and orange clouds
about something like "starting over" or
"self-forgiveness". And then there are rare days
when there's an eclipse and I can't blind myself
with sunbeams or use an ultraviolet floodlight in my brain
to scare off all the lurking thoughts I can't pin-point
but know are there... that's when the self-doubt
comes in tsunami waves, and I don't fall but
sink like a wayward torpedo, farther than
any reaching hand could pull me
to shore, to normal rock bottom,
and I realize, as the oxygen slowly leaves my lungs,
as my vision darkens into obscurity,
that I've visited this abyss before.
its a bit maudlin, but I wrote it on a whim with hardly any editing (a rare feat for me). Thank you for reading.
1.
Potholes
spots of sunshine
wobble

2.
Sudden downpour
noisy trucks at midnight
crowded footbridge

3.
Sipping coffee
at a wayside stall
cockroaches too

4.
The morning sun
fondling with tender fingers
the red roses


5.
Chasing each other
in the bylane
two birds

6.
A girl
between the railway tracks
swings her pony tail

7.
Softness of wind
magic in her nearness
sleight of hand

8.
End of festival:
I stop by her haiku
on twitter.com

9.
A teenager
glides past me on roller blades
her long hair flows behind

10.
A toddler
trying to stand up by the pram—
young mother watches

--R.K. SINGH
Gwen Pimentel Jan 2015
Being in gymnastics
Is like being in an abusive relationship
Everything just tells you "NO"
But you still stay

From the bars,
And how it releases the grips of your hands
To the beam,
Which only aims to make you wobble and fall off
To the vault,
Running full speed to it only to make you miss the vault
To the floor,
Wherein you try to flip and twist only to be defeated by Newton's law of gravity

With the stupid scoring system
Pointing out every flaw
With a deduction
Just cause your bra strap is showing
jeez!

And how we are trained to achieve the unachievable —
How every move is supposed to be precise
Every muscle squeezed and tight —
Perfection

And the fact that
You'll never actually be the best
There's always a harder skill
After you've achieved what you may think
Is your "hardest"

It pushes you
To your breaking point
Forcing you to be
This perfect formed strong gymnast
Which pays so much costs
Literally blood, sweat and tears

It tells you that
Every ******* time you fall
You just gotta get back up
And try again
That no matter how much sore you are
You gotta **** it up
And do it again
And again and again and again
Until you finally get it

But there are these magical moments
those little moments of pure happiness
When you get a skill you've been working on
When coach praises you for your improvement
When you get over your fear
And when you stand on top of that platform
Knowing you gave it your all

These moments
Are what keep us going
These moments
Are what we come back for
Time after time after leaving the gym saying
"I hate training!"
There's just something about
These moments so special
That keeps us wanting more

And I will never
ever
Stop loving gymnastics
No matter how many times it hurts me
Ben Jones Mar 2019
Preparing for a cataclysm
Not for the faint of heart
Tornadoes are tempestuous
Tsunamis, quick to start
A lethal strain of chicken-pox
Can wander on the breeze
And flu attacks acutely
With an uninvited sneeze
But no historic incident
Disaster or decline
Can match that of the Wobbling
Of nineteen fifty nine

It started over breakfast
With a rippling in the juice
The spoons were jiggled savagely
And dentures rattled loose
The condiments were quivering
The sauces sat and twitched
Cookies cracked and crumbled
And couples came unhitched
Horses bolted randomly
And ran around in squares
The pensioners reverberated
Rocking in their chairs

The birdies in their downy nests
Were bounced about the trees
The cars rebounded in the street
And stacked themselves in threes
Eyeballs turned alarmingly
The clouds flipped upside down
The church bells all played chopsticks
And the fish began to drown
The roads became entangled
And bunched up into knots
The pencils slipped their cases
Leaving tiny lines of dots

The cities were in uproar
The noise like solid thunder
As puddings toppled needlessly
And Jelly fell asunder
Furniture was undulating
Hats abandoned stand
Sailors found their sailing legs
A hundred miles inland
But just as it had started
The tremble shook no more
And one again, humanity
Could start to trust the floor

The roads were combed and straightened
And nestled back in place
The spoons were fastened safely
And eyeballs turned to face
The parrots were sedated
And locked up in their cages
Books were shelved and sorted out
With bookmarks in their pages
The world returned to normalcy
And soon, no single sign
Was left to tell the tale
Of the Wobble of fifty nine

**
Patricia LeDuc Mar 2018
Commuters on a train
Going to work every day

Too fast the tracks say
They cause the train to sway
As they wobble and stray

Too fast the tracks say
As the brakes start to fail
As they scream out and pray

Too fast the tracks say
As the train goes off the rail
As the trains bursts into flame

Too fast the tracks say
As the train fills with smoke
As they all start to choke

Too fast the tracks say
As the conductor wakes up
A little too late

Too fast the tracks say
Commuters all dead
I warned you I said

Too Fast...
2/3/18
S Bharat Apr 2019
The Hummingbird

The golden egg, an Owl put
In the nest of nerd,
Out of which came then
The Hummingbird.

A gemmy nestling saw nerd,
the sooty Raven
He was terribly shocked and
in grief driven.

Aware Peahen asked Raven
Eyes aren wet?
Seethingly he answered her
The little I hate.

The restless little flatters,
As a bee unstable
And hovers above flowers
Which do wobble.

Belated Peahen took Raven
To Peacock White.
The incident she explained,
And story did recite.

Let my wisdom penetrate,
In thy empty brain,
Love begets love; hate hate
Said Whitish sane.

Take care of her, no her liberty,
The little be free.
Wish she pearches on loyalty;
A branch of Tree.

S. Bharat
Kristen Moxley Jan 2010
It is four in the morning and I'm alone
It's dark out
The city lays quiet and sullen with sleep
I'm awake
Awake

Still awake
The sun has yet to rise and won't for another two hours
I move with such grace and ease that the grass doesn't have to strain against my weight
I hear a vehicle fast approaching
A shed to my right
Silently duck behind it
Security van passes by
My heart is pounding in my ears
My breath has never sounded so loud
So utterly loud
So ******* loud
Can't stand it
Security must have heard
But I really know they didn't

I fall to my hands and knees and crawl out from my temporary shelter
The morning dew stains my hands and pants
Don't notice
Don't think

There are bundles of old plywood tied with twine that border the asylum drive
Crawl behind them
Streetlights illuminate my way
They deliver a soft, humming sound that enters through every pore on my body
It's loud
So ******* loud
Hands to ears
Doesn't stop
Won't stop
Keeps ******* humming
Ignore it
I learn to ignore it
Don't hear
Don't think

I position myself in front of the plywood bundles
Asylum drive
Fifteen foot mesh link fence
It's 4 am
I know
I'm awake

Fifteen feet of fence
Steel mesh
Steel mesh so tight, I can barely stick my pinky finger through a hole
There are three horizontal metal bars placed at five foot intervals on the opposite side of the fence
No way up
No way down
The gate is locked and closed
No way in
No way out

I know better
There are a few sturdy looking metal hinges on the massive gate
My hands are laced with sweat
Start to shake
My limbs vibrate in rhythm with my heart
It's compulsive
Compulsive
I stand in front of the gate and look up
It reaches to the heavens
Too tall
Can't climb
The steel is cool and wet to the touch
Can't climb
The bottom of my shoes are slippery
Slippery on the metal
Can't climb
My left foot misses and finds air
I reach, straining myself
Expand
My mind is breaking, seeping strength
Sweat burns my eyes
It hurts
It ******* hurts
Twitch
Can't climb
Mind slips
Slips away
Blood
On
Me
Don't feel a thing
Can't

I'm straddling the top bar of the fence
Until now, I've never been afraid of heights
I stare at the ground, fifteen feet below me
My head is spinning
Look up
Spinning
Panic is settling inside of me
Paralyzed with fear
Paralyzed
Can't move
Breathe
Think
Feel
It's so slippery
Don't want to fall
Don't want to die
Scared
Can't go down
Can't

I let go
I slipped and fell
Falling
Fell
Hit
Ground
Face
First
I'm cold and numb
It hurts
It ******* hurts

My left eye is cold
My eyelashes have been ripped out
My eyelid is a ******, fleshy mess
Bleeding profusely
It's sticky
Wet
Gross
My mind is racing
I'm soaked
Soaked in sweat
Dew
Thoughts
Pain
Time
I'm gross
Awake

The facade of the building is straight ahead
I move numbly towards the entrance
The doorknob is lifeless and still in my grasp
It doesn't move or budge
Door is locked
Back away
Have to get in
Calling for me
Waiting for me
Beckoning
Persuading
Wanting me
Needing me
I must
No
I need to get in.

My mind snaps back to reality
There's an open basement window to my left
I climb in without any hesitation
Dark
Dank
Damp
I lean heavily against a firm wall
I cannot see my own hand in front of my face
Eyes don't adjust
Eyes close
Collapse
Asleep
Unconscious

Awake
Time passed
It's daylight
I've lost sense and track of time
I smell like my surroundings
I'm moldy
It's moldy
I'm damp
It's damp
Stand
Fall down
Stand again
Light pours through several basement windows
The room is empty
The light turns grey walls shades of the sun
It's bright
Awake

I begin to wander
I touch my face
Still here
My eye is still cold, but the bleeding has stopped
My eyelid is chunky with dried blood
It still ******* hurts
Scab picker
Pain oozes through my face
A couple flakes of skin float to the ground
Sickening
I can feel the dried blood on my fingers
Chapped
Pick more
Pick more
More pieces of blood-dried skin detach from the remainder of my eyelid and float to the ground
I step on them
Bury them into the dust
My hand is stained red
Blood red
My eye begins bleeding again
I tear a piece of my shirt and press it to my wound
Leave it there
Leave it to soak

I wander in a daze until I find a staircase
Ascend
Many flights of stairs
So it seems
Until I reach the second floor
My legs are weak and numb
Weak and numb
Mouth is dry
Tastes like sand
I move my tongue around and can't feel a thing
Mind is clear
I don't like it much
Search for thoughts
Any thoughts
Nothing comes
Don't think
Press on

What am I searching for
Can't answer
Don't know
Others have answered
I don't change
I'll know when it's found

Awake
I enter into a long hallway
On either side there are empty, window-lit rooms
Rooms that are filled with chairs
Rooms that are filled with desks
Rooms that are filled with papers
Files
Curtains
Shoes
Bed frames
Electric chairs
Operation tables
Iron lungs
Toilets
Sinks
Wheelchairs
Dust
Dust
Dust
Rooms that were once filled with love
Rooms that were once filled with hate
Rooms that were once filled with laughter
Tears
Pain
Prayer
Loss
Hope
Fear
Terror
Longing
Wonder
W­orry

I remember
Each room, a name
Each name, letters
An object of identity
Object of terror
Destruction
Hate

Awake
At the end of the hall, I face a door
An illegible name continues rusting
I don't care
A light is on
It's bright
Blinding
Coming for me
Coming to get me
Wraps itself around me
Can't breathe
Chokes me
Gag
*****
Stomach contents and blood escalate up my throat and onto the cracking tile
It hurts
It ******* hurts
My throat burns acid
Spit
Stays
I cry
It stings
Tears burn my face
My eyes
Sniffle
I wipe my mouth
Taste nothing
Feel nothing

Sick
The light brings me back
I let it
Eyes remain half closed
My sight skips around and lands on a waiting chair in the middle of the room
It looks so inviting
So ******* inviting
I don't trust it
Hates me
Wants me
Wants to feed off of me
Wants to be fulfilled
I don't trust it
My legs and body ache
Wobble

Sit
The room is bright and bare
Bare walls
Bare floors
Bare ceilings
Bare emptiness
This is my room
This is my name
Mine
Sit
Don't think
Don't move
I clutch my hands together
My palms are sweaty
My feet brush the floor
They swing
I lean my head back and stare at the ceiling
Damp
Sick
Don't see
Don't hear
Don't feel
Taste
Smell
I smile
Smile a true, deep, loving smile
A smile that generates warmth
A smile that knows where it belongs
I'm home now
Home
I'm alone
Awake
Alive

I'm alive.
Caleb Eli Price Dec 2011
Those words created a translucent fog on my vision
Against which I would judge every misty morning from that moment on
It was warm, but the robins wouldn't play their song
If only I could have known then
Basking in your radiation, I felt simple
Contained within a bottle of lemon juice
Sewn together with white wash threads upon the presentation table
And I felt whole
A lack of lacking that filled my filling
Satisfying the rumination, you could never trip
Haven't lied before, so my thought were undeniable
Still I remained liable
When I was made of sand and toothpicks
Simply molded by circumstance
I was supposed to stand on my own feet
Not wobble upon your stilts
You told me that from the start
But all I wanted was your heart
And all you wanted was my words
For temporary fulfillment
If only I had known then
When did I realize
Unfortunately, I don't know
But the edges of my cloud were still trimmed at your feet
So that you might reflect upon your selfishness and realize I was still there
I try not to disappear
As much as I am able
Since once upon a time I shall have the potion of immortal unity
That only lasts as long as we might
But it would be enough
Not for you
But for me
L B Sep 2017
On rising heat, killdeer flush
to decoy the enemy--
threat to its young that roams too close
They rush to skim on hayish blur
wailing over wildflowers drying

Fretful twitter in perpetual flight
swifts-- twirl and hurl their bits of bodies--
debris
from a cumulonimbus of a late-day sky
toward a ridge of stag horn sumac
presuming horizon primordial
behind which time and city-- drift and wobble
on rising heat-- after rush hour

*Rising Heat
Rising--
to meet my mind
on its way down
from my post behind
the laundromat
where I view it all--
rising--
where I usually go in search of quiet
to almost hear the ocean
     two hundred miles away
to strain words from wind
     in careless conversation
to wonder over
     missed whispers....

But not today
In rising heat, I went down
in search of something better--
     your eyes again
     solvent for my presence of mind
     dissolvers of hours and the order of things
But I need an excuse!
     To turn, to trespass, to disturb the peace!
     For your eyes again!
And still I need more-- being feverish, weak
Or?
Or... should I take the cure?
     To deny ...To deny

To deny what?
Overtones from a sea of years?
I don't know!  Whatever it was!
Nothing explain it...

I melt... I'm gone....
I think this feels like a song.  Wish I knew what to do with the music inside.  Written out behind the projects where i lived with my girls while finishing college. 1988
Michael R Burch Oct 2020
Villanelle: The Divide
by Michael R. Burch

The sea was not salt the first tide...
was man born to sorrow that first day,
with the moon―a pale beacon across the Divide,
the brighter for longing, an object denied―
the tug at his heart's pink, bourgeoning clay?

The sea was not salt the first tide...
but grew bitter, bitter―man's torrents supplied.
The bride of their longing―forever astray,
her shield a cold beacon across the Divide,
flashing pale signals: Decide. Decide.
Choose me, or His Brightness, I will not stay.

The sea was not salt the first tide...
imploring her, ebbing: Abide, abide.
The silver fish flash there, the manatees gray.

The moon, a pale beacon across the Divide,
has taught us to seek Love's concealed side:
the dark face of longing, the poets say.
The sea was not salt the first tide...
the moon a pale beacon across the Divide.

"The Divide" is essentially a formal villanelle despite the non-formal line breaks.



Villanelle: Ordinary Love
by Michael R. Burch

Indescribable―our love―and still we say
with eyes averted, turning out the light,
"I love you," in the ordinary way

and tug the coverlet where once we lay,
all suntanned limbs entangled, shivering, white...
indescribably in love. Or so we say.

Your hair's blonde thicket now is tangle-gray;
you turn your back; you murmur to the night,
"I love you," in the ordinary way.

Beneath the sheets our hands and feet would stray
to warm ourselves. We do not touch despite
a love so indescribable. We say

we're older now, that "love" has had its day.
But that which Love once countenanced, delight,
still makes you indescribable. I say,
"I love you," in the ordinary way.

"Ordinary Love" was the winner of the 2001 Algernon Charles Swinburne poetry contest. It was originally published by Romantics Quarterly and nominated by the journal for the Pushcart Prize. It is missing a tercet but seemed complete enough without it.―MRB



Villanelle: Because Her Heart Is Tender
by Michael R. Burch

for Beth

She scrawled soft words in soap: "Never Forget,"
Dove-white on her car's window, and the wren,
because her heart is tender, might regret
it called the sun to wake her. As I slept,
she heard lost names recounted, one by one.

She wrote in sidewalk chalk: "Never Forget,"
and kept her heart's own counsel. No rain swept
away those words, no tear leaves them undone.

Because her heart is tender with regret,
bruised by razed towers' glass and steel and stone
that shatter on and on and on and on,
she stitches in wet linen: "NEVER FORGET,"
and listens to her heart's emphatic song.

The wren might tilt its head and sing along
because its heart once understood regret
when fledglings fell beyond, beyond, beyond...
its reach, and still the boot-heeled world strode on.

She writes in adamant: "NEVER FORGET"
because her heart is tender with regret.



Because Her Heart is Tender (II)
by Michael R. Burch

Because her heart is tender
there is hope some God might mend her, …
some small hope Fates might relent.

Because her heart is tender
mighty Angels, come defend her!
Even the Devil might repent.

Because her heart is tender
Jacob’s Ladder should descend here,
the heavens open, saints assent.

Because her heart is tender
why does the cruel world rend her?
Fix the world, or let it end here!



Villanelle: Hangovers
by Michael R. Burch

We forget that, before we were born,
our parents had “lives” of their own,
ran drunk in the streets, or half-******.

Yes, our parents had lives of their own
until we were born; then, undone,
they were buying their parents gravestones

and finding gray hairs of their own
(because we were born lacking some
of their curious habits, but soon

would certainly get them). Half-******,
we watched them dig graves of their own.
Their lives would be over too soon

for their curious habits to bloom
in us (though our children were born
nine months from that night on the town

when, punch-drunk in the streets or half-******,
we first proved we had lives of our own).



Double Trouble
by Michael R. Burch

The villanelle is trouble:
it’s like you’re on the bubble
of beginning to see double.

It’s like you’re on the Hubble
when the lens begins to wobble:
the villanelle is trouble.

It’s like you’re Barney Rubble
scratching itchy beer-stained stubble
because you’re seeing double.

Then your lines begin to gobble
up the good rhymes, and you hobble.
The villanelle is trouble,

just like getting sloshed in the pub’ll
begin to make you babble
because you’re seeing double.

Because the form is flubbable
and is really not that loveable,
the villanelle is trouble:
it’s like you’re seeing double.



Villanelle Sequence: Clandestine But Gentle
by Michael R. Burch

Variations on the villanelle. A play in four acts. The heroine wears a trench coat and her every action drips nonchalance. The “hero” is pallid, nerdish and nervous. But more than anything, he is palpably desperate with longing. Props are optional, but a streetlamp, a glowing cigarette and lots of eerie shadows should suffice.

I.

Clandestine but gentle, wrapped in night,
she eavesdropped on morose codes of my heart.
She was the secret agent of delight.

The blue spurt of her match, our signal light,
announced her presence in the shadowed court:
clandestine but gentle, cloaked in night.

Her cigarette was waved, a casual sleight,
to bid me “Come!” or tell me to depart.
She was the secret agent of delight,

like Ingrid Bergman in a trench coat, white
as death, and yet more fair and pale (but short
with me, whenever I grew wan with fright!).

II.

Clandestine but gentle, veiled in night,
she was the secret agent of delight;
she coaxed the tumblers in some cryptic rite

to make me spill my spirit.
Lovely ****!
Clandestine but gentle, veiled in night

―she waited till my tongue, untied, sang bright
but damning strange confessions in the dark...

III.

She was the secret agent of delight;
so I became her paramour. Tonight
I await her in my exile, worlds apart...

IV.

For clandestine but gentle, wrapped in night,
she is the secret agent of delight.



Villanelle: Hang Together, or Separately
by Michael R. Burch

“The first shall be last, and the last first.”

Be careful whom you don’t befriend
When hyenas mark their prey:
The odds will get even in the end.

Some “deplorables” may yet ascend
And since all dogs must have their day,
Be careful whom you don’t befriend.

When pallid elitists condescend
What does the Good Book say?
The odds will get even in the end.

Since the LORD advised us to attend
To each other along the way,
Be careful whom you don’t befriend.

But He was deserted. Friends, comprehend!
Though revilers mock and flay,
The odds will get even in the end.

Now infidels have loot to spend:
As ****** as Judas’s that day.
Be careful whom you don’t befriend:
The odds will get even in the end.

NOTE: This poem portrays a certain worldview. The poet does not share it and suspects from reading the gospels that the “real” Jesus would have sided with the infidel refugees, not Trump and his ilk.



Villanelle: The Sad Refrain
by Michael R. Burch

O, let us not repeat the sad refrain
that Christ is cruel because some innocent dies.
No, pain is good, for character comes from pain!

There’d be no growth without the hammering rain
that tests each petal’s worth. Omnipotent skies
peal, “Let us not repeat the sad refrain,

but separate burnt chaff from bountiful grain.
According to God’s plan, the weakling dies
and pain is good, for character comes from pain!

A God who’s perfect cannot bear the blame
of flawed creations, just because one dies!
So let us not repeat the sad refrain

or think to shame or stain His awesome name!
Let lightning strike the devious source of lies
that pain is bad, for character comes from pain!
Oh, let us not repeat the sad refrain!



Villanelles by Michael R. Burch

The modern formal villanelle is a poetic form with a double refrain, although in early incarnations it was simply a pastoral poem with a refrain. The villanelle is related other poetic forms with refrains, such as the rondel, the roundel and the rondeau.



Villanelle: The Divide
by Michael R. Burch

The sea was not salt the first tide...
was man born to sorrow that first day,
with the moon―a pale beacon across the Divide,
the brighter for longing, an object denied―
the tug at his heart's pink, bourgeoning clay?

The sea was not salt the first tide...
but grew bitter, bitter―man's torrents supplied.
The bride of their longing―forever astray,
her shield a cold beacon across the Divide,
flashing pale signals: Decide. Decide.
Choose me, or His Brightness, I will not stay.

The sea was not salt the first tide...
imploring her, ebbing: Abide, abide.
The silver fish flash there, the manatees gray.

The moon, a pale beacon across the Divide,
has taught us to seek Love's concealed side:
the dark face of longing, the poets say.
The sea was not salt the first tide...
the moon a pale beacon across the Divide.


'The Divide' is essentially a formal villanelle despite the non-formal line breaks.



Villanelle: Ordinary Love
by Michael R. Burch

Indescribable―our love―and still we say
with eyes averted, turning out the light,
'I love you, ' in the ordinary way

and tug the coverlet where once we lay,
all suntanned limbs entangled, shivering, white...
indescribably in love. Or so we say.

Your hair's blonde thicket now is tangle-gray;
you turn your back; you murmur to the night,
'I love you, ' in the ordinary way.

Beneath the sheets our hands and feet would stray
to warm ourselves. We do not touch despite
a love so indescribable. We say

we're older now, that 'love' has had its day.
But that which Love once countenanced, delight,
still makes you indescribable. I say,
'I love you, ' in the ordinary way.

'Ordinary Love' was the winner of the 2001 Algernon Charles Swinburne poetry contest. It was originally published by Romantics Quarterly and nominated by the journal for the Pushcart Prize. It is missing a tercet but seemed complete enough without it.―MRB



Villanelle: Because Her Heart Is Tender
by Michael R. Burch

for Beth

She scrawled soft words in soap: 'Never Forget, '
Dove-white on her car's window, and the wren,
because her heart is tender, might regret
it called the sun to wake her. As I slept,
she heard lost names recounted, one by one.

She wrote in sidewalk chalk: 'Never Forget, '
and kept her heart's own counsel. No rain swept
away those words, no tear leaves them undone.

Because her heart is tender with regret,
bruised by razed towers' glass and steel and stone
that shatter on and on and on and on,
she stitches in wet linen: 'NEVER FORGET, '
and listens to her heart's emphatic song.

The wren might tilt its head and sing along
because its heart once understood regret
when fledglings fell beyond, beyond, beyond...
its reach, and still the boot-heeled world strode on.

She writes in adamant: 'NEVER FORGET'
because her heart is tender with regret.



Villanelle: Because Her Heart is Tender (II)    
by Michael R. Burch

Because her heart is tender
there is hope some God might mend her, …
some small hope Fates might relent.

Because her heart is tender
mighty Angels, come defend her!
Even the Devil might repent.

Because her heart is tender
Jacob's Ladder should descend here,
the heavens open, saints assent.

Because her heart is tender
why does the cruel world rend her?
Fix the world, or let it end here!



Remembering Not to Call
by Michael R. Burch

a villanelle permitting mourning, for my mother, Christine Ena Burch

The hardest thing of all,
after telling her everything,
is remembering not to call.

Now the phone hanging on the wall
will never announce her ring:
the hardest thing of all
for children, however tall.

And the hardest thing this spring
will be remembering not to call
the one who was everything.

That the songbirds will nevermore sing
is the hardest thing of all
for those who once listened, in thrall,
and welcomed the message they bring,
since they won’t remember to call.

And the hardest thing this fall
will be a number with no one to ring.

No, the hardest thing of all
is remembering not to call.




Villanelle of an Opportunist
by Michael R. Burch

I'm not looking for someone to save.
A gal has to do what a gal has to do:
I'm looking for a man with one foot in the grave.

How many highways to hell must I pave
with intentions imagined, not true?
I'm not looking for someone to save.

Fools praise compassion while weaklings rave,
but a gal has to do what a gal has to do.
I'm looking for a man with one foot in the grave.

Some praise the Lord but the Devil's my fave
because he has led me to you!
I'm not looking for someone to save.

In the land of the free and the home of the brave,
a gal has to do what a gal has to do.
I'm looking for a man with one foot in the grave.

Every day without meds becomes a close shave
and the razor keeps tempting me too.
I'm not looking for someone to save:
I'm looking for a man with one foot in the grave.



Villanelle: An Ode to the Divine Plan
by Michael R. Burch

This is how the Universe works:
The rich must have their perks.
This is how the Good Lord rolls.

Did T-Rexes have souls?
The poor must live on doles.
This is how the Universe works.

The rich must have their dirks
to poke serfs full of holes.
This is how the Good Lord rolls.

The despot laughs and lurks
while the Tyger slaughters foals.
This is how the Universe works.

What are the despots' goals?
The poor must mind, not shirk.
This is how the Good Lord rolls.

Trump and Putin praise the kirks
while the cowed mind ancient scrolls.
This is how the Universe works.
This is how the Good Lord rolls.



Ars Brevis
by Michael R. Burch

Better not to live, than live too long:
this is my theme, my purpose and desire.
The world prefers a brief three-minute song.

My will to live was never all that strong.
Eternal life? Find some poor fool to hire!
Better not to live, than live too long.

Granny ******* or a flosslike thong?
The latter rock, the former feed the fire.
The world prefers a brief three-minute song.

Let briefs be brief: the short can do no wrong,
since David slew Goliath, who stood higher.
Better not to live, than live too long.

A long recital gets a sudden gong.
Quick death’s preferred to drowning in the mire.
The world prefers a brief three-minute song.

A wee bikini or a long sarong?
French Riviera or some dull old Shire?
Better not to live, than live too long:
The world prefers a brief three-minute song.



The vanilla-nelle
by Michael R. Burch

The vanilla-nelle is rather dark to write
In a chocolate world where purity is slight,
When every rhyming word must rhyme with white!

As sure as night is day and day is night,
And walruses write songs, such is my plight:
The vanilla-nelle is rather dark to write.

I’m running out of rhymes and it’s a fright
because the end’s not nearly (yet) in sight,
When every rhyming word must rhyme with white!

It’s tougher when the poet’s not too bright
And strains his brain, which only turns up “blight.”
Yes, the vanilla-nelle is rather dark to write.

I strive to seem aloof and recondite
while avoiding ancient words like “knyghte” and “flyte”
But every rhyming word must rhyme with white!

I think I’ve failed: I’m down to “zinnwaldite.”
I fear my Muse is torturing me, for spite!
For the vanilla-nelle is rather dark to write
When every rhyming word must rhyme with white!
I may have accidentally invented a new poetic form, the “trinelle” or “triplenelle.”



Why I Left the Right
by Michael R. Burch

I was a Reagan Republican in my youth but quickly “left” the GOP when I grokked its inherent racism, intolerance and retreat into the Dark Ages.

I fell in with the troops, but it didn’t last long:
I’m not one to march to a klanging gong.
“Right is wrong” became my song.

I’m not one to march to a klanging gong
with parrots all singing the same strange song.
I fell in with the bloops, but it didn’t last long.

These parrots all singing the same strange song
with no discernment at all between right and wrong?
“Right is wrong” became my song.

With no discernment between right and wrong,
the **** marched on in a white-robed throng.
I fell in with the rubes, but it didn’t last long.

The **** marched on in a white-robed throng,
enraged by the sight of boys in sarongs.
“Right is wrong” became my song.

Enraged by the sight of boys in sarongs
and girls with butch hairdos, the clan klanged its gongs.
I fell in with the dupes, but it didn’t last long.
“Right is wrong” became my song.



What happened to the songs of yesterdays?
by Michael R. Burch

Is poetry mere turning of a phrase?
Has prose become its height and depth and sum?
What happened to the songs of yesterdays?

Does prose leave all nine Muses vexed and glum,
with fingers stuck in ears, till hearing’s numbed?
Is poetry mere turning of a phrase?

Should we cut loose, drink, guzzle jugs of ***,
write prose nonstop, till Hell or Kingdom Come?
What happened to the songs of yesterdays?

Are there no beats to which tense thumbs might thrum?
Did we outsmart ourselves and end up dumb?
Is poetry mere turning of a phrase?

How did a feast become this measly crumb,
such noble princes end up in a slum?
What happened to the songs of yesterdays?

I’m running out of rhymes! Please be a chum
and tell me if some Muse might spank my ***
for choosing rhyme above the painted phrase?
What happened to the songs of yesterdays?



Trump’s Retribution Resolution
by Michael R. Burch

My New Year’s resolution?
I require your money and votes,
for you are my retribution.

May I offer you dark-skinned scapegoats
and bigger and deeper moats
as part of my sweet resolution?

Please consider a YUGE contribution,
a mountain of lovely C-notes,
for you are my retribution.

Revenge is our only solution,
since my critics are weasels and stoats.
Come, second my sweet resolution!

The New Year’s no time for dilution
of the anger of victimized GOATs,
when you are my retribution.

Forget the ****** Constitution!
To dictators “ideals” are footnotes.
My New Year’s resolution?
You are my retribution.



Rondels, Roundels and Rondeaux are poetic forms with refrains that are related to the Villanelle.



Rondel: Merciles Beaute ("Merciless Beauty")
by Geoffrey Chaucer
loose translation/interpretation Michael R. Burch

Your eyes slay me suddenly;
their beauty I cannot sustain,
they wound me so, through my heart keen.

Unless your words heal me hastily,
my heart's wound will remain green;
for your eyes slay me suddenly;
their beauty I cannot sustain.

By all truth, I tell you faithfully
that you are of life and death my queen;
for at my death this truth shall be seen:
your eyes slay me suddenly;
their beauty I cannot sustain,
they wound me so, through my heart keen.



Rondel: Rejection
by Geoffrey Chaucer
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Your beauty from your heart has so erased
Pity, that it’s useless to complain;
For Pride now holds your mercy by a chain.

I'm guiltless, yet my sentence has been cast.
I tell you truly, needless now to feign,―
Your beauty from your heart has so erased
Pity, that it’s useless to complain.

Alas, that Nature in your face compassed
Such beauty, that no man may hope attain
To mercy, though he perish from the pain;
Your beauty from your heart has so erased
Pity, that it’s useless to complain;
For Pride now holds your mercy by a chain.



Rondel: Escape
by Geoffrey Chaucer
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Since I’m escaped from Love and yet still fat,
I never plan to be in his prison lean;
Since I am free, I count it not a bean.

He may question me and counter this and that;
I care not: I will answer just as I mean.
Since I’m escaped from Love and yet still fat,
I never plan to be in his prison lean.

Love strikes me from his roster, short and flat,
And he is struck from my books, just as clean,
Forevermore; there is no other mean.
Since I’m escaped from Love and yet still fat,
I never plan to be in his prison lean;
Since I am free, I count it not a bean.



Rondel: Your Smiling Mouth
by Charles d'Orleans (c. 1394-1465)
loose translation/interpretation/moderniz  ation Michael R. Burch

Your smiling mouth and laughing eyes, bright gray,
Your ample ******* and slender arms’ twin chains,
Your hands so smooth, each finger straight and plain,
Your little feet―please, what more can I say?

It is my fetish when you’re far away
To muse on these and thus to soothe my pain―
Your smiling mouth and laughing eyes, bright gray,
Your ample ******* and slender arms’ twin chains.

So would I beg you, if I only may,
To see such sights as I before have seen,
Because my fetish pleases me. Obscene?
I’ll be obsessed until my dying day
By your sweet smiling mouth and eyes, bright gray,
Your ample ******* and slender arms’ twin chains!



Oft in My Thought
by Charles d'Orleans (c. 1394-1465)
loose translation/interpretation/moderniz  ation Michael R. Burch

So often in my busy mind I sought,
Around the advent of the fledgling year,
For something pretty that I really ought
To give my lady dear;
But that sweet thought's been wrested from me, clear,
Since death, alas, has sealed her under clay
And robbed the world of all that's precious here―
God keep her soul, I can no better say.

For me to keep my manner and my thought
Acceptable, as suits my age's hour?
While proving that I never once forgot
Her worth? It tests my power!
I serve her now with masses and with prayer;
For it would be a shame for me to stray
Far from my faith, when my time's drawing near―
God keep her soul, I can no better say.

Now earthly profits fail, since all is lost
And the cost of everything became so dear;
Therefore, O Lord, who rules the higher host,
Take my good deeds, as many as there are,
And crown her, Lord, above in your bright sphere,
As heaven's truest maid! And may I say:
Most good, most fair, most likely to bring cheer―
God keep her soul, I can no better say.

When I praise her, or hear her praises raised,
I recall how recently she brought me pleasure;
Then my heart floods like an overflowing bay
And makes me wish to dress for my own bier―
God keep her soul, I can no better say.



If
by Michael R. Burch

If I regret
fire in the sunset
exploding on the horizon,
then let me regret loving you.

If I forget
even for a moment
that you are the only one,
then let me forget that the sky is blue.

If I should yearn
in a season of discontentment
for the vagabond light of a companionless moon,
let dawn remind me that you are my sun.

If I should burn―one moment less brightly,
one instant less true―
then with wild scorching kisses,
inflame me, inflame me, inflame me anew.



Recursion
by Michael R. Burch

In a dream I saw boys lying
under banners gaily flying
and I heard their mothers sighing
from some dark distant shore.

For I saw their sons essaying
into fields―gleeful, braying―
their bright armaments displaying;
such manly oaths they swore!

From their playfields, boys returning
full of honor’s white-hot burning
and desire’s restless yearning
sired new kids for the corps.

In a dream I saw boys dying
under banners gaily lying
and I heard their mothers crying
from some dark distant shore.



I AM!
by Michael R. Burch

I am not one of ten billion―I―
sunblackened Icarus, chary fly,
staring at God with a quizzical eye.

I am not one of ten billion, I.

I am not one life has left unsquashed―
scarred as Ulysses, goddess-debauched,
pale glowworm agleam with a tale of panache.

I am not one life has left unsquashed.

I am not one without spots of disease,
laugh lines and tan lines and thick-callused knees
from begging and praying and girls sighing "Please!"

I am not one without spots of disease.

I am not one of ten billion―I―
scion of Daedalus, blackwinged fly
staring at God with a sedulous eye.

I am not one of ten billion, I
AM!



This World's Joy
(anonymous Middle English lyric)
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

Winter awakens all my care
as leafless trees grow bare.
For now my sighs are fraught
whenever it enters my thought:
regarding this world's joy,
how everything comes to naught.



Elegy for a little girl, lost
by Michael R. Burch

... qui laetificat juventutem meam...
She was the joy of my youth,
and now she is gone.
... requiescat in pace...
May she rest in peace.
... amen...
Amen.



How Long the Night
anonymous Middle English lyric, circa early 13th century AD
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

It is pleasant, indeed, while the summer lasts
with the mild pheasants' song...
but now I feel the northern wind's blast,
its severe weather strong.
Alas! Alas! This night seems so long!
And I, because of my momentous wrong
now grieve, mourn and fast.



Fowles in the Frith
anonymous Middle English lyric, circa 13th-14th century AD
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

The fowls in the forest,
the fishes in the flood
and I must go mad:
such sorrow I've had
for beasts of bone and blood!



I am of Ireland
anonymous Medieval Irish lyric, circa 13th-14th century AD
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I am of Ireland,
and of the holy realm of Ireland.
Gentlefolk, I pray thee:
for the sake of saintly charity,
come dance with me
in Ireland!



Whan the turuf is thy tour
(anonymous Middle English lyric, circa the 13th century AD)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

1.
When the turf is your tower
and the pit is your bower,
your pale white skin and throat
shall be sullen worms’ to note.
What help to you, then,
was all your worldly hope?

2.
When the turf is your tower
and the grave is your bower,
your pale white throat and skin
worm-eaten from within...
what hope of my help then?


Ech day me comëth tydinges thre
anonymous Middle English lyric, circa the 13th to 14th century AD
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Each day I’m plagued by three doles,
These gargantuan weights on my soul:
First, that I must somehow exit this fen.
Second, that I cannot know when.
And yet it’s the third that torments me so,
Because I don't know where the hell I will go!



Ich have y-don al myn youth
anonymous Middle English lyric, circa the 13th to 14th century AD
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I have done it all my youth:
Often, often, and often!
I have loved long and yearned zealously...
And oh what grief it has brought me!



I Sing of a Maiden
anonymous Medieval English Lyric, circa early 15th century AD
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I sing of a maiden
That is matchless.
The King of all Kings
For her son she chose.
He came also as still
To his mother's breast
As April dew
Falling on the grass.
He came also as still
To his mother's bower
As April dew
Falling on the flower.
He came also as still
To where his mother lay
As April dew
Falling on the spray.
Mother and maiden?
Never one, but she!
Well may such a lady
God's mother be!



Regret
by Michael R. Burch

Regret,
a bitter
ache to bear...

once starlight
languished
in your hair...

a shining there
as brief
as rare.

Regret...
a pain
I chose to bear...

unleash
the torrent
of your hair...

and show me
once again―
how rare.



Enigma
by Michael R. Burch

O, terrible angel,
bright lover and avenger,
full of whimsical light
and vile anger;
wild stranger,
seeking the solace of night,
or the danger;
pale foreigner,
alien to man, or savior...

Who are you,
seeking consolation and passion
in the same breath,
screaming for pleasure, bereft
of all articles of faith,
finding life
harsher than death?

Grieving angel,
giving more than taking,
how lucky the man
who has found in your love,
this, our reclamation;

fallen wren,
you must strive to fly
though your heart is shaken;

weary pilgrim,
you must not give up
though your feet are aching;

lonely child,
lie here still in my arms;
you must soon be waking.



The Effects of Memory
by Michael R. Burch

A black ringlet
curls to lie
at the nape of her neck,
glistening with sweat
in the evaporate moonlight...
This is what I remember

now that I cannot forget.

And tonight,
if I have forgotten her name,
I remember:
rigid wire and white lace
half-impressed in her flesh...

our soft cries, like regret,

... the enameled white clips
of her bra strap
still inscribe dimpled marks
that my kisses erase...

now that I have forgotten her face.



The Quickening
by Michael R. Burch

for Beth

I never meant to love you
when I held you in my arms
promising you sagely
wise, noncommittal charms.

And I never meant to need you
when I touched your tender lips
with kisses that intrigued my own:
such kisses I had never known,
nor a heartbeat in my fingertips!



Ah! Sunflower
by Michael R. Burch
after William Blake

O little yellow flower
like a star...
how beautiful,
how wonderful
we are!



Published as the collection "Villanelles"

Keywords/Tags: villanelle, refrain, repetition, chorus, rhyme, sea, tide, moon, heart, love, rondel, roundel, rondeau, poetic form, poetics, poetic expression, Chaucer, Orleans, love, art, beauty, mercy, merciless, words, heart, hearts, pity, pride, prison, mrbvill, mrbrondel
Exosphere Aug 2023
the wobble of a muon foretells a paradigmatic shift in our understanding of the forces of nature

my wobble foretells an excess of alcohol
Mateuš Conrad Oct 2016
it could be said that the constructs of grammar are a akin to
the constructions of the unconscious with sleep the dam,
   and the trickling of both the waking
hours and the concerns for dreams -
i'd say: it's not exactly the interpretation
of dreams, but a concern for them:
last night i was exposed to the most
fascinating comic, if i wrote about it
in the morning i'd reveal all of it -
but i do remember in a subplot
a Beretta and fiddling with a bullet...
dreams? unwanted distractions...
            they only possess depth's worth of
analysis for entombed people -
      for whom life has no meaning
they have to seek alternatives: i.e.,
in dreams...
                         because their lives are
so uninhibited they seek monastic
meanings, they are on a knife's edge
of slicing through cryptography -
                        they want to seek deeper meaning,
rich or poor, if life isn't a centimetre's
worth of depth of drowning, your escapism
is bound to dreams...
                             which is a secondary
excuse concerning apathy
  and the shaking homeless man...
               i'm asking for a mass exodus
of the homeless from urban areas...
                       only a fool would sit in an
urban environment these days...
               those glum godforsaken looks of
seemingly ****** superiority...
   meritocracy hides a variation of ******
it doesn't seem to recognise -
          it's a gigantic mushroom fog-cloud
and bypassing talk of the guillotine chop
to mind the Antoinette cakes for fear of
reprisals...
                        thinking never equates
to being conscious...
                                       i don't know how
this happens...
                              the divergent parallelism
states that
                   we shouldn't base our
censoring on obstructing nouns,
but the majority of politics bullies this
categorisation of words with the most
sensed purpose of it being necessary...
nouns don't do jack **** in ontological
parameters, but verbs do...
                  trying to change human
behaviour by stretching it back far enough
for cavemen to appear,
      or censoring the use of nouns
does not affect our actions -
                                     it simply doesn't...
censoring our use of words
         means we cognitively stutter... to
appease misguided pieces of information
lodged within each word...
                       we are deliberately
not engaging in the full vocabulary grasp
of things...
                          on a humanistic level
the involuntary desire
                                  to write a book rather than
learn to make toothpaste...
   outside of theorems in rubrics of
repetition:
                   what is the active ingredient
in being conscious?
                  thought or the senses?
   for me thought is the active ingredient
   and the senses are a passive ingredient.
               on the ready...
but how to make the world make sense?
  well, given the five already not making
sense, thought alone suggests a counter
question: how does the world make sense?
    i understand that these words
belong in the torture chambers of libraries...
people prefer practical problems
sourced by practical questions,
rather than preferring no problems
  sourced by impractical questions...
did i mention taxation? no.
         did i mention immigration? no.
hence i've asked impractical questions
         because i don't want people to
experience them as practical concerns
when they do not invoke practicality:
precisely because they invoke an impracticality
i'm asking them...
                              because they do
not interfere with what's impractical in life:
other people's sedimentation
into power... my questions interfere with what's
practical in life: not getting in other people's
daily affairs...
                         the more the question
is impractical, the more practical life becomes...
and then life encounters what others deem
to be the practical question, which makes
life all the more impractical...
       time orientated: on the altar of television
where everyone has enough time to
zombie-it-further.
                               with thought the
active ingredient of being conscious (double
value, two functions, one open, the other closed)
                the inactive ingredient of being conscious
is ego (hence the many theories and sub-divisions
of possessing such a thing) -
                     that doesn't necessarily translate
into                               the origin of things...
                 i'd state that grammar is
in equal measure a conscious quantity (vocabulary),
as a subconscious medium  and an unconscious
            suggestion...
                          grammar speaks of the universal man,
we speak alone or among ourselves as
men: particular...
                                      to me grammar is a medium
akin to the psychological three tier cake...
                              it's a fourth dilemma...
                 if thought is the active ingredient
of consciousness,
                                it's no wonder
   the constant sought-after identification procedures
with passports, national insurance numbers,
                   reincarnation...
    THE WEST KNOWS NO MYSTICISM...
        a common mantra...
   THE WEST IS IN A STATE OF A CRISIS
IN THAT IT HAS EXHAUSTED ALL
                           SOURCES OF PLAGIARISM...
          IT IS IN A STATE OF BABYLONIAN
  PLAGIARISM: A PERSISTENT SELF-RENOVATION
            BY PLAGIARISING ITSELF
DUE TO THE FACT THAT IT HAS EXHAUSTED
      PLAGIARISING NICHE ENVIRONMENTS...
              the white man knows no mysticism...
whatever comes from his mouth is wobble-blah...
               still even fewer made that statement
than venture into the Masai territories in Kenya
to hear a mystical burp...
                       yes... so many provocative sentences...
psychology expands into what will always be
airy-fairy Mary Poppins to me...
                        i can write about it,
but the rubric of fixating on words
                                 that are stimulants more than
additives in terms of cohesive argumentation
will always remain a mile away from my
serious interests in prolonging an argument
  for establishing a theory into it being schooled...
that'll never happen with me...
                        when i write about psychology
i am foremost to remind myself:
     you just inhaled a balloon filled with helium...
   oh god, the relief of not making more from this...
                  me, never the dodgy soul-salesman
of the naive few...
                             a penny is worth a pebble...
but is a page from Tolstoy worth a £5, a £10,
a £20 or a £50 banknote?
                                             i really wanted to
expand on the verbiage... but even i encounter
moments of true spaghetti demanding me to end
the supposed: on to it...
                                        to me psychology is
verbiage... in the back of my mind i'm looking
at grammar as a punching-bag...
                 upper-hook -logy
                        lower-hook -graphy -
          or pristine physics and chemistry...
      as one granny said: some kind of -logy
   or: a term deemed appropriate to denote
    a vocabulary fixation of some sort.
                      because that's what's called the attache...
fixated vocabulary -
                        i'd really love to expand
on this... but i don't see the point...
                 the original idea fizzled out
after i heard enough entertainment tongues
blah through a bubbling bottle of champagne
into Lake ****-on-the-Geneva-Convention flat...
                   as i am adamant on
creating Narcissus looking into the sea...
                           but that's the beauty of
poetry, it's not bound by paragraphs...
           it's open, like the ******* of literature
that it is...
                                 your payment?
just your attention...
                                           hence no paragraphs...
                your payment?
   just your attention...
                               because if they didn't cough
up for the skeleton... i'm not
           giving them my strained larynx...
                         sometimes...
   it's best to leave
                                something unfinished:
there's no melancholy surrounding
     a perfected and complete construction...
                     
OC Aug 2018
Back and forth, a charming wobble
On a rugged rag she hops
Chasing traces of burst bubbles
Left by little soapy drops

Lightly pruned palms gently pressed
Hid behind a fresh new towel
In a formal evening dress
Like a royal clumsy fowl

A relentless Déjà vu
Is refusing to clear up
Like a lipstick smudge that drew
On the lip of a tea cup

Nearly done, a dreamy gaze
Smiling as she turns about
For her beauty I do praise
We chose to stay and not dine out
An old favorite.
mark jarrad Jun 2012
Jelly in my wellie wobble-ing like a belly
Jelly in my wellie squashed between my toes
Lime flavoured jelly that was kinda smelly
How it got in there ? no one knows !
Kam Rayefski Jun 2012
Live life to live
shape the world and cultivate
away fears of shadows and hate.
Grower's thumbs often build
greener tomorrows, tokes to give
to brothers and sisters of today
always searching for more questions.

What clarity can bring to one
not you, but for someone
who holds the rotten cape
held together by rough black tape
to the bewildered open fields
of opiates and grapes
waiting just enough time
to bend around the vine
that holds together what they are feeling.

Let the world keep spinning
wobble from time to time
stumble off our feet
no chance to meet or greet
the war is on our street
bringing lust greed and pride
for all of us to abide
but all things can be forgiven.

Feel the sunny heat
of the smiles of those you just beat
for all the people are here
lovers, plumbers, drummers,
and this goes on, we run again
on and on we run again
on and on again
we go on.
Victor Timmons Sep 2017
I would like to tell you a story about a soul. A soul that was as clean, pure and gentle as soul can be. Rarely in live do we meet someone or some animal who never wanted anything but to give love. This story can’t be told without talking about her caretaker and my wife.

About 12 years ago an injured kitten was released to Everett Animal Shelter. The kitten had no use of it’s hind legs and was incontinent. In those day it was almost 100% chance that this kitten was going to be put down. Don’t feel sad/mad about this, nature’s way can be very cruel. The her fate sealed, this was much more humane ending.

My wife took it home to see if the kitten could be rehabilitated. We had been fostering kittens for a while and had a safe room for her. After getting her settled in we look at each other saying without words “Now what”?

Well the first thing that needed to be done was give her a name. We talked for a bit and I explained to my wife “She needs a strong name. She needs a strong black female name. She going need it to help her through life”. The strongest black female name I knew was Rosa Parks. That became her name.

Rosa being incontinent was, well to be honest, was a stinky kitten. Stinky kitten became one of her many nicknames, HA. Rosa needed to learn how to take a bath. If you ever tried to give a kitten/cat a bath you know it’s not really a good idea. So my wife dives right in, picks her up and takes her to bathroom for her first bath. Rosa being the soul she was just sat in the sink and took her bath. She didn’t fight it, she never hissed or got angry. She just took her bath. This attitude towards water lead us to try water therapy.

Water therapy was a home job for us. We would fill a storage tote with warm water and put this rear palatalized kitten in it up to her neck. Now for first time in a few weeks this kitten Rosa could stand up with the water supporting her weight. This went on for the first year of her life. This was the start of many treatments such as acupuncture, a sling in her room and massage. She did all of it never complained about anything.

It didn’t take to long and soon Rosa was strong enough to stand and wobble out a step or two. After a few months of no more improvement it became clear that a decision needed to be made about what to do with her. Is her quality of life such that gets returned for euthanasia or is she happy and do we commit to her care. We knew that she could never live the life of a normal cat. She would never be able to go outside unsupervised, she could never be inside unsupervised except in her safe room. She was healthy and always happy so the commitment was made.

Rosa had her safe room but what to do with her when we can supervise her. Rosa needed a wheelchair. After doing some research we found a local company that makes wheelchairs for pets. After getting her sized up the day came she had her chair. We put Rosa in her chair and in no time she was zooming around the room. Rosa is mobile!!!

My wife and I would take Rosa and Cocoa (look for the story ‘Cocoa’s Ghost’) for walks around the block. Animal Rescue Foundation who had paid for Cocoa issues and Rosa’s early expenses told the Everett Herald newspaper about this and Rosa went mainstream. Look up the news article ‘Pets get a second chance’ if your interested reading it. Needless to say walking a cat in a tiny wheelchair got attention.

One of the things that was very special about Rosa was she loved being a foster mom. My wife would often bring home sick kittens, tiny kittens and just overflow from the Everett Shelter and put them in Rosa’s safe room. Rosa always excepted those kittens as her own within a day or two. I often thought it would have been funny to learn about the birds and the bees from her perspective.

Me “Rosa, where do kittens come from”.

Rosa “Well first you eat some food, then you ****, then you go to sleep and BAM kittens”.

There were many, many times a sick kitten would just curl up in her belly and sleep with it’s now mother Rosa. She was so good with the kittens. She would cuddle, discipline, clean and try to feed when needed. The kittens in her care got a family with a loving mother and bothers and sisters, often unrelated. She truly seemed to enjoy motherhood.

This was Rosa’s and my wife’s life for 12 years. Feed Rosa, squeeze Rosa, clean Rosa and love Rosa. Last night that most of that ended. A few weeks ago Rosa stopped eating and drinking. After $1000 of tests, weeks of fluids, syringe feedings and with no answers we made the choice and gave the gift. Rosa died the same way she came into our lives, in my wife’s arms.

I wrote this not to make you sad. I wrote this to share a clean, pure and gentle soul with you. Some of you reading this may have one of her kittens living with you now: a small piece of her soul living with you now.  Enjoy her gift to you.
This is not a poem. This is a story about a poetic life. Enjoy.
Golden coin gleaming in hand.
All his hopes took refuge in that vestige of conjured worth.
The man with no name would buy his name this day...

The empire's burgeoning halls pressed in around him as he strode.
They would devour him in this moment if they had not done so already.
Yet, why the empire? There are more docile things to tame.
Everything is the same for the man with no name.

"People would apologize for stepping on me, but they knew not what to call me, so they went somnolently on their way."
I try to imagine these are the things he'd say,
instead these are the words of those I know,
those that I can hear, see, smell, touch... taste.
The man with no name's words are a waste.
He leaves no footprints wherever he may go.

The steps to the Hand of the Empire are steep.
Some will climb it, some will weep.
Yet, the man with no name will not turn back this day;
he takes a moment to fill and a moment to pray.

His memories are so vibrant, so full of clarity,
like crystals in the light, banishing insanity;
his tales will evoke the highest majesty,
entrance the gluttonous, deprave with vanity,
they'll bite the snake and poison its legacy,
they'll quietly rake the fields of the mind,
yet each soul is weary, cold and blind,
when he is gone, they pay no mind.

His steps are strong, hard, fast
throughout the night, will he last?
This is no simple, boring task,
the steps to the Hand do more than ask.
They take from you and more than due,
they make you fight,
they run through you.
When the night is cold and breezy,
you'll find the steps are dark and creepy...

Of course, the man with no name bears on.
What has he to fear, you can't hunt what you don't want,
for the hunt is a thrill, and trash is pleasureless.
The steps are perilous,
they hunger for blood,
his steps are thunderous,
nailing thud after thud.

Dawn peeks over the distant horizon,
and what a sight to see: the man is still rising.
In tandem the sky and he play their parts,
so does the Empire, putting bodies in carts,
for the night brings the dead, so many have tried,
to climb up the steps and in doing so, died.

The man with no name treads a feat all his own,
but see? A trembling hand. The ache of bone.
For the man with no name is tiring, tiring,
even in the face of his glory aspiring.

He would tend to the sick and defend the weak,
danger and challenge and evil he'd seek,
to vanquish the rotten
and save the damsel,
but he's always forgotten,
that he couldn't handle.

So this lead him to this fateful day,
to this fateful place.

Just look at the sweat cascading his face.
Look at his knees, how they groan and slow pace,
his legs seem to jostle and wobble out of place.
Where is his strong stride? It almost seems funny.
Many would do this sort of thing for money.
Yet, he does this for his own pride,
and that grim determination, from his face,
seems to slide.

He collapses and the jut of a step knocks his face,
for the steps are at his throat,
trying to crush his ebbing life.

I've known better men
to have fared far worse,
but this man looks on his life,
not as gift,
as curse.

Who is more deserving?
More than he?
Cowards! Be gone!
Pretenders, flee!

What's this?
He props himself up with ease,
the fire in his eyes would startle a lion.
The steps tremble with fury,
they quiver with disgust,
they lust for his end,
he must die, he must!

"No."
He speaks!
"Not today."
The gall!
Don't tempt these steps,
the Empire's nigh trekable wall!
"What I want more than anything,
is to be myself,
whoever I am,
so let me pass, you glorified shelf!"

How strange it would be, to be there that day,
for the steps let him pass, without delay.

He stood in the face of the Hand of the Empire.
Glistening in his palm, the token to buy his face:
his full life's earnings, polished, just in case.

He sighed, "All I've ever wanted is to be respected."
At the cusp of his one goal, the man defected.

One day, he told me this tale.
This he said, into my conscience: burned.
"If you fight death for a name,
you'll lose all you've earned."
It's a rare thing these days for me to feel puckered out after writing a poem, but this one had me panting... metaphorically... maybe a "little" bit literally, LOL.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this!
Let me know if/how much, you liked it :)

DEW
Eulalie Feb 2014
I keep trying to convince myself that I’ve mustered enough strength to stand up, take a breath, and move the **** on with my life,
content and resolute in knowing that you can’t be a part of it any longer;
I keep trying to convince myself that it was all a bad
(and exquisitely decadent)
dream, that none of it actually happened, that you were precisely those last terrible words, and nothing else;
I keep trying to convince myself that I never loved you,
that I do not still love you…
And yet all the while I can’t muster enough strength to stand up at all;
I balance and wobble on shaky stilts for a brief bit of time, sure, distract myself with “living my life” and “letting you go” and
finding peace amongst the heartbreak, but I am too clumsy to keep abreast for long—
the end of my shoes clip and snag onto memories of sweet nothings, and
I fall all over again as if it were for the first time;
I fall and hit the ground with a smitten, dazed smack of my head to the pavement,
and at first I’m numbed with pleasantries, with the tender memories and harmonies that used to put me to sleep with a smile so stupid it wouldn’t wipe away,
but then the stars clear
and I’m trying to bite back the smarting with fallacies over my decidedly pragmatic indifference, and in my not-yet-pained stupor,
I can almost breathe a mechanical sigh—
can almost get swallowed up by sheer lack of sensation—
and extract a salvation out of my own emotional etherization and find satisfaction amongst the numbness…
I can almost move on if I don’t feel at all…
But I don’t have any reserves of Novocain or morphine, and after I’ve fallen,
the pain always returns.
I keep trying to convince myself that what you told me was true,
that you weren’t ever real,
that you weren’t ever real,
but that contemplation is destroyed the minute it enters the recesses of my darkened cognizance, and I can never revere over a single ******* moment of my day without
something of you
making its unsolicited entrance;
you were always real.
I don’t know;
I just want something positive to come of us, still;
I still hope all the while we are silent; I still yearn all the while we stay distant—
“independent”;
you still are the victim of my fantasies all the while within my head I lament,
praying that I’ll find contentment,
and that for a small while you are only just taking rent
elsewhere, and will soon miss me enough to say that leaving me is never
what you meant of it…
Call me excessively self-indulgent and masochistic for all the
emotional ballistics and disconsolate pyrotechnics
but I’m convinced that the last five months can be validated with a
simple romantic fix of all of this:
for you and I were too explosive not to make sense;
there’s too much that’s been felt,
too much harboring under my doting starry-eyed belt,
too much over which you’ve made me melt.
All I’m asking for is your help.
I surely didn’t imagine you,
I didn’t imagine that warmth that so affectionately looms,
didn’t imagine the luminescence of the moon,
didn’t imagine the connection between us two…
I suppose what it is that I’ve been trying to say, what all along I’ve attempted to convey,
is that I miss you:
Please come back to me, Mr. Blue…
I really ******* miss you.
This is more of a prose, but it wreaks of intensity and desperation and pathetic honesty. Eh.
Reece Aug 2014
I

The road flies past underneath the tires of the car
and there's a hazy blur as the trees fly by
as fast as the regrets flitting across her mind
like so many white lines falling beneath the left wheels

She's never been to Chicago alone before
Yet she's felt alone in so many places
It was time for a new environment and new faces
and to drink greedily from Illinois skies

She plans to drink more air than alcohol for once
To be drunken in lust or contentment at a push
To feel and experience fully without substance
To be intoxicated on some profound emotion

She pulls up to the curb and kills the engine
so that time ceases to exist
Heart pounding, mouth dry, she steps onto the hot pavement
Every movement magnified in a Midwest summer meeting

Her ankles wobble over 3-inch heels with each step
stumbling like so many times before, but different this time
She takes a deep breath of her new-found independence
and takes the first steps into the welcoming light of the sun

II

It's funny how philosophical eyes can interpret the mundane
Every step an existential crisis under the surface
But even so, the days continue to come and go
as sure as the sun, blocked by clouds occasionally, but still there
like figures in the city, obscured by passing buses
You slash tires and try to blow the clouds away
because even big bad wolves run out of breath
A collaborative poem in two parts
written with hellopoetry.com/rml8301/
during a family road trip
on August 6, 2014
George Nsikak Oct 2016
This is dedicated to the millions who died in the Biafra - Nigeria civil war

Counting the losses
Of my people at dawn
Breaking the curses
Of no wholly source
I sought to wage war
Without funds and money
I thought to secede
From a nation strong and many
I was full of envy for vain minorities
I am an educated soldier
Of an eastern defunct border

Proclaiming Biafra
Was so big an agenda
Building militias
To **** and to tether
My opposed tribal brothers
And the critics of my powers
I denied much on media
All that hid in my fingers
My plans I held higher
The proclamation of Biafra
I am an educated soldier
Of an eastern defunct border

Visible to the blind
Were were ready for a fight
Audible to the deaf
Huge price of war to pay
Hausas killed in numbers
By my igbo sons and daughters
yorubas were driven without boots
by my fellow Biafran youths
Ibibios were suspicious
So were Urhobos, Itsekiris and Ijaws
Enmity was at its peak
So high that none could breach
All these were my agenda
My services to Biafra
Was so good for me to render

On May 30th 1967
Was just like a fable
I declared in the open
Without even a wobble
The state of Biafra
Almost complete; an agenda
An anthem was composed
Flag and currency; none could oppose
The heat of the tension
Is such I couldn't mention
The height of jubilation
Not all did it favor
There was sorrow in the land
This, I cared not apart
I was a symbol in the world
For the havoc I did cause
I am an educated soldier
Of an eastern defunct border

The war began
With no money at hand
We fought with pride
With pains in our hands
We fought with might
Defending our father's land
We died in mass
Numbers of air attacks
We killed civilians
Of the tribes against our plan
We'd shoot in the heart
Every oppose we'd catch
Nigerians were too strong
but we swore we'd burn
I saw no flaw
In the havoc I did cause
I am an educated soldier
Of an eastern defunct border

Hunger and thirst
Was order of the day
Sorrow was a pest
and death had no end
Too many burdens to bear
The pains of war to pay
We ran out of guns
Bullets, grenades, even bombs
We had but matchets
Arrows, stones and spears
But We faced an army
Of full artillery
Our tragedy had no end
Even God couldn't help
So our homicide was cast
And We became fossils at last
Let those who seek war; stop and think
The pains of it;higher than that of peace
So I e'caped in a copter
Leaving my people to suffer
So on exile I did ponder
while millions died in yonder
I am an educated soldier
Of an eastern defunct border

I write from the grave
From the hell of my pains
I was that educated soldier
Who took you to battle borders
And ran, leaving you to suffer
I was that educated soldier
Of an eastern defunct border.
Jamesb Jan 2022
But rocks are hard
And buttocks are soft
And the two do not
Good bedfellows make
And I cannot remain here,

And so I climb,
Again,
Scrabble painfully up the scarp,
Again,
Towards the light

Of a sun which seems
So very far
And unfeeling
In an azure sky that
Holds little hope

But each painful inch
Is one less in the shade,
Every focused lever against the
Gravity of pain and loss
Removes me from its grasp

A little more,
Until eventually the suns rays
Start to penetrate the cloak
Of my depressed state
And even my wracked muscles

Start to warm and,
At the cliff top from whence I fell,
I spy that rock which my back
Missed still stood in place
Where it always was

Did I lean the wrong way
Or did it wobble?
Or was it a bit of both?
Either way it feels stable now
A rock

On which I pause to lean
Kind of closes a loop this one
...
..
.


center lined
coasted to coast
through my mind
loved like ghosts
***** to *****
cutting
the
noose
speaker
speak speak
speaking sparks
mark the flame
named
from
shame
test mine
blown minds
poetry blinds
never caught
me blind
wobble
wobble
wobble
with your mine light on
crack midnight before
the crack
of
dawn
another
winter
pawn
defined
center lined
?



...
..
.
never really cared for all that ***** talk
...
..
.
What is it with society
it can't leave girls alone
to be the way they want to be
they have to **** and moan...

"Now this one she's too skinny
with a blatant lack of ***
legs stolen from flamingos
and arms like two matchsticks.."

"Now this one's far too chubby
observe her thunder thighs
see her wobble as she's walking
it's clear who ate all the pies.."

"Now see the tattooed freakshow
flesh tunnels, garb of black
in burly boots and trenchcoat
she must be taking crack.."

"and what of lil Miss sunkissed
with her streaky perma-tan
who dresses like a two bit *****
but never keeps her man.."

A war on flaws is raging
as media fuels the flame
mixed with the tongues of gossips
it gets stronger everyday
we're taught to judge a person
by looks and shape alone
regardless of their inner selves
their talents, dreams and goals
It really is a worry,
to watch our young girls grow
bowed under weight and pressure
with self esteem so low.

So tell them that they're beautiful
it's not too much to ask
and please be sure to tell them
that the media's an ***!
Sorry it's a bit long but as a mum to a teenage girl this stuff really bothers me. Big thanks to Ryan Jakes for the encouragement to write it, the "who ate all the pies" referance,having a first peek at it and pointing out my many flaws! :-) x
Push, grab, steady, stand, wobble, wobbly, walk, there! ...and there! Oh and there too!

He goes...
ryan pemberton Jun 2013
my head is a skin tied
water-****.
wobble minded and
stench ridden.
it bleeds diarrhea.

an ache not of throbbing
but like, pressurized
wet tissue membraned
balloon stuff.

could pop
any time.
will pop.
just a matter of
time.

seven thousand days now
I've been lugging this
bubbling froth-tank.
this neck ornament.
this ***** machine CPU.
and all it does is
complain about
itself.
Caelynn Regester Sep 2018
Water, water, in a glass
Perfectly still and motionless

Slow at first, the wobble starts
Rippling faster with each movement
Faster, faster; higher, higher
The glass tips
The water spills
I am free from my glass
ClawedBeauty101 Sep 2018
Let's all be honest... for once... let us all admit this statement...
Each of us has impaled a dozy pill of mistakes... inhaled regrets fragrant

A prescription of the many countless regrets... failures... and stupid moments
They come back like a drug side effect, attacking you as their opponent

Losing your sense of reality as you drunkenly laugh at the blessings
Numb to kindnesses touch as you roll off the couch of security... nervously sweating

Openly abusing the precious, pure body of wisdom... deaf to her rejecting scream...
She stood by your side... Telling you not to take another drink... not to get lost in marijuana's dream...

A foolish smirk sneaks on your face, your mind clouded by the vape and tobacco, blocking your judgment
Carelessly touching in all the wrong places... pleasurable? Your conscious shows no lament

Your lips are a bite... Your touch is a knife... your words are a poison... to not only wisdom... for it will backfire
You are finally evicted from Illusions hallucinations... you fell for such a devilish liar.

Your brain has rung the alarm to your entire body... memories of unwise choices bring head trama
A heavy alcoholic breath escapes your mouth of regretted words... full of gossips drama

You wobble on unstable feet.. and do not achieve your desired balance...
Falling to your knees... you see the blood... the tears... and the saliva of someone who is guilty... no use in using words of parlance

No lies can hide the guilt that clokes your face...
All evidence leads you down to your fate...

"Drugged and Drunk of Regrets" was the charge placed against you... then you were sent away
But be careful... Memories, thoughts, and feelings can lead your mind astray.

"Set them free... You have been given mercy..."
The Judge granted, without one drop of regret and worry

...Mercy... You have been given mercy for your crime...
So why continue to drug your self on regrets? It's not worth a dime!!

DON'T GET DRUNK ON THE PAST!!!!
THE OLD IS GONE!!! THE PAST WON'T LAST!!!

DON'T CONTINUE TO ****** YOUR THOUGHTS OF A HOPEFULLY FUTURE!!
I HAVE DONE THAT!!! DON'T BE HAPPINESSES CONSUMER!!

We all have been Drugged and Drunk of Regrets...
but the best thing to do... it to apologize... and forget...
Apologize... and Forget...
Morgan Floyd Oct 2015
It's been 2 years
Thinking about it now,  I can hardly believe it was real
I was drowning inside with pain: while on the outside I was drowning in tears.
My emotions were eating me alive... all i knew was I no longer wanted to feel.
After another family argument I rushed up stairs to the bedrooms
quickly I grabbed the first orange bottle of pills I could find in my aunts room.
Hiding beside my bed with my sister in the room unaware
Desperate for death I force all the pills down my throat.
Once the deed is done , my aunt calls us down to talk
during her lecture, I start to wobble
she asks if I took something but I insist I didn't and that I was just tired.
After a while she realizes what I have done..
though unlike most she found it funny and recorded it on her phone
Finally once I stop responding to things she calls the police...
only one officer showed up
realizing the situation wasn't a joke he gets back-up and medics
I am rushed to the local hospital.. then moved to a more advanced one
As the  doctors and nurses try to save me
I continuously rip out my IV's refusing to live

They are able to put me down.
I wake up 3 days later with dry blood on me and cry because all I wanted was to die .. and I failed.
Dominic Simpson Aug 2013
This is about a friend who inspires me. a single mum, though not through choice; working as an escort, though not through any real choice . . I could have written about her daily grind, stubborn persistence, commitment . . though, when i babysat for her, i grew to know a different side of her, so . .through her daughters eyes,  I'd like you to meet my amazing friend

Constance

Her blocks are the building of my life....
Her palate ? . . A rainbow of crayons,
Glitter for stars upon sparkling smiles.
Pride set . . Within my sunrise eyes.
Her strength . . my faith . . In a Mothers arms
This worker bee queen pollenates my mind
With fine aspirations . . We Blossom . . I bloom

This bagel baking children's entertainer . .
My Educator . . Guardian of the School gates . .
My Guiding and providing angel
Wears Big Girl Pants . . with sassy pride
In the absence of an insufficient man . .

Never complains

Who, when I ask why  . . Asks why not ?
Chides my moods and minds me kind . .
Listens . . and listens . and listens and listens  . .
Tells cinema for bedtime stories ,
Giggles when I wobble ,
Tickles outrageously,
Ties her smile  . With a lipstick bow

She Breathes gentle truths . .
Dries my tears discreetly . .
Proves and improves her worth
Everyday . . She's A  . . . Sunny side up
Spaghetti hoop spell and
My Candy-floss Mind spins  
Glistens . . with Magic
Ken Pepiton Feb 2023
You can say that again, later, it is -time
lace up the daily bag and pass it
for all private interpretation
removal, from the rumen, to the next
- gaseous we, Huxley called us, 1957

No, this ain't show business, this
is living, made in a made up mind,
being finished doing, just
living.

Making up reasons to dispute liars.

Maybe not a good living, but it's free.
Or paid for, any way.
Bought with a price
my grands won't be forced to pay.
- divided attention makes
- ads obliviate into the mercantile
- classification, in attention econ 101
It's free - this living
in the way well fed children do,
in America, outside the cities;

Joy pursued and grabbed in happy
fistfuls that fill laughing memory bubbles
to store for when these become
the olden days.

No, this ain't show business,
its sacred duty,
work of a thing,
made from a boy who looks
into flies eyes, gazing up
from the bottom of the cup,
a little glazed, perhaps,

owing the fly an easy escape, look away

Tricae,
tricae
"perplexities, hindrances, toys, tricks,"

The collections of thoughts,
the access to held thoughts, knotted
messages
to you
private moments,
time alone, as a mortal human being,
humus built, auto-repairing thing being

being, eh?
One-like, only, or
on-like, only going on and on and on,

becoming fruitful
becoming useful
becoming less and less useful, but
becoming more and more curious
becoming full enough to become superfluous.

Lay preachers can create cushions
for lazy wishers wishing to be comforted,
but the weighing of the worth of comfort,

lay preachers seldom do, to my knowledge.

Terminus gnosis, all I know, my bubble of knowns;
this is it…
a thousand stacks of sensible lines, atop precepts,

strewn beside the trail.
Heavy
heuristic heretical how-to do as I dones,
published by faith in the thousands, litter
the little hills the psalmist asked,
why they writhed and twisted,
as in a dance of anger wishing,

clear channel, me and the truth, today,
just/instance, this/ now.

Free am I, by the faith in me, but you
already
knew that,

don't you?
Don't you know, there is a musing mind,
we wear to bed, some nights,
we lay on memory foam, some nights.

Thinking sorted thoughts, untying lying links,
links to educated guesses fed you as new reasons

to be ever vigilant, ever ready to defend the faith,
the laughing faith of a child, leaping
into the sky

- my grandson, I just learned,
- asked for more math.

No class common man, that is what I am,
on the cusp of next, looking back,
at the mess I left, like a cyclone,
randomly distributing seeds of kindness, specs
by which an idle word can activate troves
of ancient autoresponders, each guessing
what if, what if not,
what if, what if not,
what if, what
if
not now, when. Pop.
Bubbles of been, leave go, go on, think it

through, and passed through, into
the now
where we formed, letters, letting words wait,
sit still, ready
for the reader, ready
to steady the quivering fearful thing,
lost in thought,
stuck in stacks of holy orders, hearer only,
only ordainded doers do the trick,
intricate, folding to make not a paper swan,

too, easy. Make a protein. With no model,
just the idea in the word applied to science,
proper pose, super knowing, proto-life-ish thing,
that is digestible using an infantile nourishing node.

What tricks do you know?, the magi aske Moshe.
Snake from a staff.

From the crozier of goatherd, sure,
we can all do that. What else?
---
Allusions to ever knowing, knowing as old
as knowledge given girls at their flowering,
as old a mystery as any orphaned mother may tell
her great grand daughters,
nobody told me any thing,

but I took it as normal,

As the patient potency prefecting
effectual
fervent
prayer, dramatized, made big as all
art
any
bubbled artifice holding essences,

essential bits of the daily grind to gloss
the leading intellect's reason for being
so shiny,
Klimt golden, as that one kiss I recall,

yes, a facsimile, a memory evocation,

a kiss, golden in that moment, infected
with a feeling
dramatized to be offered to all who see,
intricacies,
khipu twists and loops and bundles and beads,

accounting for dues,
instructing kaballah, pass it on

Excuse me, are you in the right realm,
we feel pluralized,
but you don't fit,
we are uniform,
uninformed,

excathedra, listen up, all eight billion now living, are destined
for certain death,
it is a matter of time, dying once,
can happen anytime,

and if there is a second death, so far,
I never saw any body do it twice,
once truth makes what I am free,
we stay free,
amen,
reception accepted kaballah, et al,
take that greasy grace, feel it,
as the oil ran down Aaron's beard,

and there were no poor denied
starship rations,
until the comet hit and all
but a single mind
blew, into this
a complete fiction,
or another compleat guide to fishing

Imagine the magic of the sailor's accounting book,
envision the magic of levers, and pulleys and cogged
wheels feeling the weight

ping
2023 Gravity driven or gravity powered, is it
one
or the other, when it come be to inspire
first fears
to frame wisdom pools,
at depths we learn
to believe,
prove each participant,
worthy of keeping,
the secret.
Salt of the earth, deep down dehr dat
Caribbean Sea,
shore line fracture,
follow the riverwise road,
any thing you think you must bear,
don't blame,
sometimes it pays, to bend.
Grasshopper Locust practice, for the mind
of an ant.

Wisdom harnessed the fear of God,
put it down,
in other words,
when there was nothing
but E, mass and time being assent
esse, sentient, in sentient and ex
insentience, sapient over lay,
- honeycomb tripe pattern, say
- why not ruminate enclosed
- in a beauteous inner digestive
- recluse-exclusive-sub-science con
ified, tied ligously, fi,
to witty means, and ways we prove
gravity is our friend, driven power for all life,
strong as earth itself, but, we are

in the burning phase,
let me bring you down,
cause being accused, does that
to a stranger
being
entertained, or entertaining, on an aitia
let me
reason,

have you come for more, or do we have
too much
of too many things
to make too much
sense
of any particular reader/writer ifery algorithm,
if then,
else is this, current, slow, nodding, flux,
capacitance
loading axially,
if each mind thinks right once,
today, we have enough,
let's save the world.
- that easy, eh?
global restoration, Christ, yes,
that is the plan.
As the planet was.
Prior to Peleg's days.
Intended to have a single
dry land mass,
Wisdom pushed
for plates meeting
and using ice
at the top
of the world, as seen polaris up,
spinning
in a slow wobble
through four
seasonal positional hot-cool-cold-warm
gyre drivers, saline liquid epicycles, sisters
of the four winds
as a flywheel effect
in the telling times… a little imbalence leaning helps
with the wobble,
in the event,
slim to none,
the odds, but,
Don't Look Up. It could
reoccur, and shall, if
Nietzsche's epicycle

has wheels. Graham Hancock, on clocks…cosmic

Mindspacetime, the elite flight,
secretshitistic, it is, most certain, it is
fantasmic imagining
E not equal any thing, mere words
-jello-timingoooisht
between me and thee,
no point, not one, between the we
we become,
in the final analysis, if you wish,

might
you wish,
long, lazy river readers, re-mind
their lost selves, how innocense felt.

The worth of an unsold story, given
as a gift, as a poor artist might
attempt
a portrait
of their daughter's children

- "that little thing"
Done. As best he could, he believed,
at the time,
as it is
with
everything being as is when we arrive,
we adapt
or become the insane opposition,
to anything,
just
be the counter weight on the pendulum,

keep things swingin'

feel time slide
into the real deal,
at the crossroads
in the wayback seat,
sayin' honey, you ain't here
after what I'm here after,
y'gonna be there, after I'm gone, as  asong
that was
once a joke ended you gonnabe here
after I'm gone, but

seemsayin' eye
squint, see,
way back
when,
we were otherwise involved, affirming
sacred oathes, we swore as children learn
IT being life, whatever,
it don't mean
nothin'
is not a joke, it's ahint, to readers, ready
writing is key to reading,
vertical eyed
qwerty keying is learned,
phone wide,
natural, feels familiar
style adaptation
as cuneiform once was,
years of hearing the same words,
said and resaid, story after story stacked
in
time, measured by stargazers, called, by god,
eyes like eagles, these minds expand, and see
the order of the cosmos,
and the chaos of the collective sub-science

locked by a generational curse on oathes
under the God those kids had in mind,
September, 1954, first day of school,
all across the Wyatt Earp of Nations,
each child not religiously exempted,
stood, right
hand on heart and repeated, as a national
student body, K through 12, a pledge,
local time 9 a.m. nationwide,
not unlike
a true Tenant's pledge of fealty,
as recorded in
The Compleat English Copyholder:
Common and Statute LAW of
England, relating to Manors
and Lords of Manors Et c.
- buzz nod what instance… seven seconds
Sorry, Under God, was added to the pledge
that year, that affectionizes those exposed,
we meander under god, think it not strange.
It’s a legendary trait, we'll all be remembered a bit.
- default modemod is always beguiling temptation
- for temptation sake, win a game, get the rush.
of chasing hares
to where the conies hide,
feeble folk, but they live among big rocks,
reason enough,
use what you know is right,
hide from things that eat you,
that evolves
in nations
with no elders, constant defence mode
peace makers seem
feeble folk,
who knew,
and fell away, impossible to renew,

whoah, zeke play me that riddle,
'bout scrublands being humbly blissed
so long- wayback, anchoring the authority
17
that's me, I
fiddled around
and blew the clearwater revival
to kingdom come, Muddy Waters, aight
and there was hippies, ever whar, swanee,
so I do, I swan no no no no mo
lie like the devil for the sake of church heritage,
holy warrior sworn, heart torn, tears shed, tongues
spoken.
You know, when gravity is taken
in, your weight, sunk
into the reasoning
swung wide
in progress, no aim, past the cloud,
for crying out loud, this is louder than ever,
listen, no
silence
all that
noise, is natural
to persons genitivally, ok, cross
shadowed animus anima imitation,
in your cultural genes, cowgirl
seeing the world a yingyang thang,
with gravity and the E-magnetic shields
allowing systems to com-uni-cate locally,

scarey
indeed

too much,
the scope
of any thing one might think
or ask,
as in what was that rule
of LAW once?
I read
Compleat Fisherman's Guide U recall led
to , yes, The Compleat English Copyholder:
Common and Statute LAW of
England, relating to Manors
and Lords of Manors Et c.
is on Google books, masterfully typeset

Feel free to learn all you will, 'tis all in the Common.

as, by now is much that may have been, otherwise,
in needier times,
less riches, more sorrow,
less sorrows, more riches, peace.

Made that my after all battlefield task,
no mas win or lose.

My side, on the scalar models is gravity empowered,
heavyweight, ancient concept,
gradient slopes
with long lazy loops
on the downhill side,
listening
to kids make all the noise they wish,
two chalk walls away,
in the bubble we all breathe.

To this day, whatever it took, it worked.
Life gets as good as you can make up a mind

to accept, as
this is it,
this is my bit. My close up. To the exact point
where I breathed that bubblierised wedom-opinion

opinion opinion opinion okeh, settle years ago, okay
we all say okeh here, holy ground,
entire collection of recollection on that victory alone.

Okeh, is still the proto voice model, ok.
If you like it, I'd love if you shared it in whole or in part, it is a whole chapter in a novel form of literature, native to the internet age,
type set for vertical receivers
Katherine Oct 2012
My lines haven’t been so strong lately
They wobble and my hands shake
And I’m a billion feet off the ground
Walking on a tight rope
Risking it all
Writers torture themselves you know
Everybody knows it
I think I went too far
The doctor gave me some pills
To heal the monsters in my mind
Thousands of them running around
Cowardly little bipolar army

Balance is key
I keep saying
Especially on tightropes

But you can only walk in the sky
For so long

— The End —