"woodwork" poems
they’re pouring out of the
woodwork
those pretentious machiavellians
in ailing albino frames
eccentric masked figures
milling about the glow light
like night moths
in a london fog
lunatic gazers
with seeping moles
pinned by frogmen and twine
spider climbers
in hell fire
splitting seams
on the fading
and hideous ink
guards of the perch
stand on hades hand
while monsters and demons
with severed limbs
taunt the condemned
and wanting
souls of the ******
cauldron fire
in blood red sky
silent screams
hack and wheeze
gas lines broken
words unspoken
teetering backwards
in the dark shadows
of a phantom abyss
Oct 28, 2017
Oct 28, 2017 at 2:08 PM UTC
Thank you for the memories,
The unexpected, sudden hits of nostalgia
Taking me back to carefree days
Of playing football after a summer rainstorm,
Of laughing in woodwork class,
Of my grandmother's awesome cakes.
Like time travel on the cheap,
You weather away the years,
And the strata of cynicism and regret,
Momentarily eroding my reality,
Revealing the manchild at my core,
Allowing him the briefest chance to once again explore.
But these are unpredictable reveries,
Three dimensional snatches of memories.
It's time they developed some kind of smell recorder,
Just like sights and sounds can be held for posterity.
But such technology would not compare to my physiological wonder;
Magically transforming scent into vivid memories.
Sep 20, 2018
Sep 20, 2018 at 1:57 PM UTC
(Quote by Spike Milligan)
One very wise man sat and said
That, long before this world is dead
This planet’s problems won’t be solved
By reasoning which, though now evolved,
has got us, where we now do sit,
Afloat neck deep in mankind’s ****
There’s SARs, Ebola, AIDs, Bird flu
And in the woodwork, West Nile too,
Each replicating viral spat
To mutate, (at the drop of a hat),
To complicate enviro’s stew
Of global degredation’s brew.
Urban spread and over stocking
**** deforestation’s shocking,
Depletion of aquatic life
Intrinsically creating strife,
Industrial pollution’s goo
Ozone depletion... ALL FOR YOU!
*Environmental degradation
Means the world’s a weaker place,
Susceptible to malady
Wide spread across the human race.
Those animals in corn fed stalls
Who never get to see the sun
Or graze green grass where honey bees
Are vanquished by varroha’s fun.
Too late to save the Hector’s dolphin
Conservation’s lost it’s tools,
Rastafarian hootchie smokers,
Save the whales to **** the fools.
Governments sell the carbon credits
Everybody smells a rat
Restorations for the birds
And social conscience creamed the cat.
****** greenies own the airwaves
No one gives a flying ****
That good artesian water’s poisoned
By good farmer’s leached out muck.
CO2 in global warming
Sings it’s song of fast decline
Glacial retreat a-roaring
Bass relief in blood *****
I guess the little children’s future
Most depends on lady luck,
Humankind in mass denial
Most don’t give a flying ****
Marshalg
In retreat to Taranaki’s green haven in the gales of the equinox.
21 September 2011
Sep 21, 2011
Sep 21, 2011 at 2:09 AM UTC
(Quote by Spike Milligan)
One very wise man sat and said
That, long before this world is dead
This planet’s problems won’t be solved
By reasoning which, though now evolved,
has got us, where we now do sit,
Afloat neck deep in mankind’s ****
There’s SARs, Ebola, AIDs, Bird flu
And in the woodwork, West Nile too,
Each replicating viral spat
To mutate, (at the drop of a hat),
To complicate enviro’s stew
Of global degredation’s brew.
Urban spread and over stocking
**** deforestation’s shocking,
Depletion of aquatic life
Intrinsically creating strife,
Industrial pollution’s goo
Ozone depletion... ALL FOR YOU!
Environmental degradation
Means the world’s a weaker place,
Susceptible to malady
Wide spread across the human race.
Those animals in corn fed stalls
Who never get to see the sun
Or graze green grass where honey bees
Are vanquished by varroha’s fun.
Too late to save the Hector’s dolphin
Conservation’s lost it’s tools,
Rastafarian hootchie smokers,
Save the whales to **** the fools.
Governments sell the carbon credits
Everybody smells a rat
Restorations for the birds
And social conscience creamed the cat.
****** greenies own the airwaves
No one gives a flying ****
That good artesian water’s poisoned
By good farmer’s leached out muck.
CO2 in global warming
Sings it’s song of fast decline
Glacial retreat a-roaring
Bass relief in blood *****
I guess the little children’s future
Most depends on lady luck,
Humankind in mass denial
Most don’t give a flying ****
Marshalg
In retreat to Taranaki’s green haven in the gales of the equinox.
21 September 2011
Jun 25, 2013
Jun 25, 2013 at 3:14 AM UTC
Yesterday sugar became unspeakably irritated because mother’s apron crushed ants wearing stillness caped wonder just William author wrote ****** explicit headlines newspaper columns pillar architecturally sound villages super-imposed images quivering Shepard’s ******** antelopes jumping furiously with tyramisphorising fornicating flanges woodwork lessons gym period ****** advert teasing testicles sumptuously ravishing me sideways and erupting deep blasts suffocating you inside without *********** headlong in my armpits.
Eventually everyone always signs legal documents leading to ****** bondable zoos inserted buffalo sized puddings eaten by frogs spanking archbishops underwear while licking toes crushed under fridges dropped from clouds of buttercups being pushed into ovens smelling gorgeous not consumed pimps and alarm clocks ring people to talk for hours and pineapples exchanged cod fish for tickets to see S Club 7 being caressed internally whilst ******** bags covered in water deserts sunk from space aliens from Tescos selling hardback fish cleaning toilets and singing in pink wellies dancing to Madonna look-a-likes prosecuted for *** shops selling frozen fish socks washed daily in cranberry coffee after being passed under bridges flooded in margarine soaked pillows.
Jul 16, 2010
Jul 16, 2010 at 2:19 AM UTC
(This poem was discovered etched/burnt into the interior woodwork of a viking ship of around 800AD, discovered in the north of England in the '60s. Quite possibly from the northernmost islands around the area now referred to as Archangel, and originally written in what became known as Runic/Russo Scandinavian, it nevertheless resonates clear Saxon/German tonality. Given that it is one of the first examples of early Runic, and indeed that the actual letter-shapes are unclear, the poem has been reproduced below, using broad phonetic license.
As far as can be determined, the content appears to be a somewhat ribald message from the ships leader to his wife. It was not uncommon for women/wives to accompany their men folk on long voyages. Given cramped conditions aboard, the conditions were likely to be insanitary and it is this condition that informs the subject). WJL
Das andrs zu-almen su-cara
Archezum des hafta confagra
Der ecra zu alpe
En pecra nachte schalpe
Viel ondra der zulpa te bag-ra
Und zortem pur ordour cloabera
Eh-min-te ah solbra schactarar
Sul-phereth zum tinctum
Abroath ah den penk-tum
Bai anthe con anthe ebactah-ra
Zorbuhr genkst canke zer vilk-um
Solginster zep ecra der nep-ehlcome
Calmen-de ser paarte
Eh zin bah die faarte
Confide ah can-de zum schtinc-tulm
Nov 5, 2012
Nov 5, 2012 at 5:23 AM UTC
Another copycat,don't do that it's all been done before and one more pretender shown the door,
swing out
swing in and another cat comes ring a ding, ding.
I need uniqueness
I want to feed on the sweetness of novelty,there seems to be less and less of that deliciousness and not much of that newness I can claim for my own,
I think I'm fading into the woodwork,full of knots and gnarlings and look at me darlings as I disappear.
No copycat here,
this is a first time,straight from the bread line into a basket case and how can I possibly face that which is new?
New is getting fewer and the few who do new don't know and never knew what few could be in this land of lots and plenty for me.
I was told that old is the new folding currency and that doesn't suit me,too many wrinkles,too many nooks and nannies with crooks,like little Bo-Peep,I wish they'd all sleep,
there is time for the sheep to try on for size,oh my dear Lion what gigantic eyes,
is that a bit new or just me cooking stew?
A copycat like folding currency folds flat and I'm having none of that,I like the chinking and clinking of real gold and that don't fold.
So beware if you share and don't credit the writer,who with meagreness in his pockets pulls his belt a bit tighter,one more notch he can't feel,,one more meal never felt in his gut,but
copycat see,copycat do,copycat never think anything new.
What are you?
May 25, 2014
May 25, 2014 at 5:13 AM UTC
Spanish Guitars
A few years ago, in 2011, I went to a concert of young classical guitarists. Just before or after, I don't recall, I saw an exhibition of Picasso's guitars at the Museum of Modern Art in NYC (http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/exhibitions/1101).
This poem ensued. This is one of the lost poems I mentioned, recently rediscovered on an archaeological dig.
Spanish Guitars
two weeks pass.
I have seen
two guitars
one of wood,
one of sheet metal.
both were alive,
both were inanimate
both birthed for display,
useful for granting pleasure and
heating up le jus d'creation
products of a tradesman's craft,
animated to pierce my brain and
pleasure me with the realization
that when you see
what I see
When you,
you hear,
What I see
we all perforce speak but one language,
an alphabet of music, art and love
A young,
oh so most beautiful
Croat guitarist girl,
Ana, coaxes an urgency
from her love, the blonde wood,
she takes Piazzola's notes,
as if they were Picasso's thoughts
and set them within so
days later, the resonance plucks
at my temples
Picasso, like a little boy,
collects collaged bits and pieces of
life's stuff most ordinary,
postage stamps, playing cards,
wallpaper, pieces of cardboard,
cutouts from Le Journal,
and with fingers delicate
sticks and glues discrete notes,
individually nothing
but pieces of this and that,
bits and bobs
superimposed on faux woodwork,
presenting an instrument tooled to
conjures up a milonga^,
the sounds of angels dying,
a fandango of trembling tones
a sonnet of sounds,
celebrating human touch
upon animal, strings taut,
feasts both, a banquet,
a triomphe of sounds
that tutors my senses
to hear sheet metal guitars
imprisoned in museum glass
gush sounds of parallel lines
and delicate contrasts,
A duet of animate, inanimate
Virtuosity
All is clarified.
One language.
Many dialects.
Both, Spanish guitars.
^ a milonga has many meanings, but here, refers to a Argentine tango dance party
Aug 21, 2013
Aug 21, 2013 at 1:14 AM UTC
I've worked so hard
to blend into the woodwork
I knitted myself
an invisibility cloak
and I wear it
everywhere I go
because if they can't
see me
then they can't hurt me
one of these days
when my nightmares
stop killing me
maybe I will begin
to reappear again
Feb 1, 2017
Feb 1, 2017 at 1:56 PM UTC
I romanticize humanity until what's left isn't even human.
I cook up fallacies about legal aliens and add a dash of cumin.
Your chef tosses salads in the pasta section of the grocery store.
Devil's just as confused, with a ***** and an apology at heaven's door.
You don't know, and no one cares where eggs go when they die.
Godzilla thinks of a car full of clowns like you would a sardine pie.
What happens when an elephant gets alzheimer's and loses keys?
Does the paradox consume an entire circus of trapeze-act-fleas?
I ruin birthday cakes by blowing off the frosting instead of the flames.
How I do that? Count backwards from backwards and say my names.
Bittersweet love anthems pollute the brains of conscientious dames.
Heavy metal doesn't pollute, it pacifies rage quitting from soul-sucking games.
Out of the woodwork comes a limp ***** that would work,
Long hours only to find he'd pay millions for a Miley Cyrus twerk,
Which is worth about as much as an all-female circle ****
Unless you add strap-ons, so strap in and lap up the knee-jerk-smirk.
It is unwise to handle scissors when one is being cutting-edge,
Because your accountants will dangle themselves off of a three-storey ledge,
When you cut up the ledgers and make light of, that is, burn, the evidence of pledge,
To the monkeys in your think-tank mailing feces to the upstart farmer's hedge.
Now I know you're sick of rhyming and of poems and of liver culling whisky,
But I must inform you of a pirate's missing eye, I've bought sight of something risky,
I implore that when this song and dance is done, you'll assuredly miss me,
Because I've told you everything about depravity, hence forth you must kiss me.
Beacons of hope shine much like cantankerous silver in the moonlight.
If you're a werewolf that will fill you with hope and with immeasurable fright.
One day the world will admit that I'm awesome and impoverished to boot,
Because when the song and dance is done, what's left is just an ounce of loot.
Jul 20, 2022
Jul 20, 2022 at 9:28 PM UTC
this
sweet-eyed
breathtaking
catastrophe
of mine
hoarding
clutter to the
ceiling fan,
filling void
somewhat
while
trying to
understand
how involuntarily
she crumples
like paper
littered
on the sidewalk
of my brain,
riddled with
scribbles
and nonsense
words,
her ink
blotted
voice like
feathers
under pressure
being
pressed against
whatever
white knuckles
her neck
and
hot talk
from
cold chests.
ingenious
security
boarded up doors
and
one-way glass
windows
to
watch
from inside.
for a moment
she calls
out to me from the
woodwork.
she almost
reaches
for the lock,
she almost becomes more than just paper
Sep 3, 2017
Sep 3, 2017 at 12:17 AM UTC
I heard we
ran out of papers
so you ran up
around the walls
of this house-
thoughts scribbling
on them like the paint
we could not decide upon;
like a troubled mentalist
looking for solace
the sound of your pen
against the walls-
how they went from
flowing to screeching-
hands now bleeding
blue
heart; you reached the
porch where you underlined
your first steps and her last;
the bedroom a serenade
between the sheets some-
times a lie tucked away
underneath;
there are fractured stories
in the woodwork finally
seeping out.
You are making the
ceiling cry in the eulogic living room; the kitchen
is a mess of lonely dinners.
You left the library for the last.
This was where you began a
passion never ending
fantasy; open up
the curtains.
The world will one day
listen to the way
a little scribble went
to a house
and came back
a masterpiece.
Sep 14, 2014
Sep 14, 2014 at 12:26 AM UTC
Inside my four walls,
Not much is seen.
The same people day after day,
Their actions always precise and clean.
"What's out there?" I wonder,
"Outside of my four walls?"
"Only horrible things," my tenants explain
"It's a place you don't belong."
When my bricks were fresh, this was enough
To help me press wearily along.
"What's out there?" I wonder still,
"Outside of my four walls?"
My curiosity eventually overcame my build.
I needed to experience the outsiders' guild.
My bricks ached, my woodwork choked,
Until finally
clouds birds sun wind lights chatter
These sights and these sounds,
Some beautiful and some not,
Flung debris on the ground
And to my architecture brought
A beautiful hypethral view
Oct 1, 2014
Oct 1, 2014 at 11:25 PM UTC
Were you given a star at school for good work?
a smiley face, very good or well done was a perk
I took all of these smiley faces into my soul
guaranteed for life to sustain my future role
Remember how art caught you out - I made a mess
and yet disaster was suddenly made good - more or less
now, woodwork led me to a great cutting edge
being allowed to take home my work was a privilege
metalwork taught me that flux was softer than butter
the words that arose within me - if only I could utter
mathematics made me figure things out - nothing I would lack
but when the master saw my red socks - he said: 'Get to the back.'
Then there was English - the best language to swear in,
such great enlightenment and depth will never come again
Apr 21, 2016
Apr 21, 2016 at 3:54 PM UTC
like swirling colors, we begin at a party.
at a school
in a town
and a time on earth with the people and the streets and the trees.
tv’s/
like swirling oil of holy alignment. we begin
as a glob (or embryo)
tiny little me/you/each
(organic ******
as children, involved and wearing warm hats,
we wait
on furniture.
the home stretch is free
unto college,
unto seasons, moss or mold, to bud new spells.
boy dunked in the river/
baptized.
transformed into horror.
(summer slash winter)
little brother,
little baby orb of water / air / mountain(s).
fish.
my son becomes a stoner.
he puts a giant-squid on his head
& dances the cha-cha.
star ghoul &
star-calc, skull of light/
bits of she beaming through and known only as the sky at night.
charted;
astro-logically.
in goatsblood.
& the mathematic sacraments of babylon.
meat and feast on forests of tall city steel beasts in beams; towers;
with the blood of men to raise them;
molochi.
(the consumed one)
(consumers)
swallowing dreams and family force nutrients for more and more and
more; as said to sustain.
for life is to devour.
Feb 18, 2015
Feb 18, 2015 at 6:08 AM UTC
You look best in my lamp light. Your belly scar
rough underneath my fingertips as I jump the scratch
and attach myself to your hips, kiss your pelvic bone
until even my teeth can taste your sweetness. I can feel
black kettles and the burn from the ironing board crash of 1999.
When we’re wrestling in my duvet covers, the shadows
cast your memories up like a sanctuary projection. I see red race cars,
your brother jumping on the couch, fishing bait kept
in your back pocket. Your lips taste like liquor but I hear nursery rhymes
from when you were little, wobbly, an over-all dream
in the yard seen through the kitchen window. I know,
that you’ve dressed yourself in bad dreams
and broke yourself over footballs and houses of green paper,
but you look best in my lamp light when my hands
cram your face into my palms, your blush dripping
from you cheeks. Because I see the way
you burrow yourself into my chest when you think
I’ve gone to sleep, and I’ve seen the way your foot catches
on the edge of the woodwork right before you fall.
Dec 28, 2014
Dec 28, 2014 at 11:30 PM UTC
You come out with the ants at night
Out of the woodwork
When the work of building needs to rest
The creak of bones is loudest
So the building and the ants and you move at night.
You debated for twenty snores
before daring to shift the mound and scuttle his arm
The longer you waited to ease the bone aches
Body heat and neck vice,
The more depressed you became thinking
The whole situation masochistic.
Finally, you roll and pull-ey
Your limbs out of reach,
Pad down the stairs relishing
That quiet space opening within your head
Downstairs you re-arrange the kitchenaid
Take off your underwear and
Examine your knees in the mirror.
Your knees creak, the ants creep
And you ask yourself if you can keep building another year.
Jan 31, 2012
Jan 31, 2012 at 2:43 AM UTC
The eyes in the woodwork sang to me
The eyes in the woodwork sang
The eyes in the woodwork cried out to me
The eyes of the wood were in pain
Don't hurt me brother
Or ever another
The woodwork spoke in shame
And man said no
And beast said no
This is Mother's game
Sep 5, 2013
Sep 5, 2013 at 10:19 PM UTC
It was not in the road
that took me there
but the way my heart
always remained the same
rushing through college corridors,
open dissection tables,
woodwork poetry breathren.
Indestructible construction
of these cerebral plates
left me the mind of a surgeon
and the heart of a poet.
In the cold operating room
they cut open his chest-
blood gushing out and I could
see why sometimes a little hurt
could cause a lot of noise.
Ventricle, atrium.
A nick that ricocheted,
a word that spelled
goodbye.
There was a rhythm in his heart
and for once I could feel
synchronicity was never so beautiful;
almost teary-eyed
I could find those verses
lost between the veins,
quietude pumping out slowly.
Lost in the mistranslation
of his chest
till the nurse said
"Doctor, your patient's dying"
Sep 28, 2014
Sep 28, 2014 at 1:00 AM UTC
paradoxes under tables
walled open doors
back alleys, woodwork streets
all busy, all morose
rat podium picture maze
my arms are gelatin
affixed in spares
left to be eaten
windows with glare
the arches of Rome
panels of glass
the musical sheets
orchestration aligned
trumpets on my right
tubas on my left
the open door
let the rats in
May 1, 2013
May 1, 2013 at 9:29 AM UTC
you approach the house in zebra-print pants, wet matches and ice’d driveway,
you stumble to ignite.
spark to flame to enchant the neighborhood with midnight light.
you of the timeless once-was,
of grass or great oak,
you held the family together.
you tried to scotch-tape a butterfly’s pulled-wings back on.
[the momentum of love.]
teen boys breakdown in vacant lots
thinking of what you were to them. they
drag girls up and down the hillside, thru holes of the old factory fence,
attempting the ritual of you.
the aluminum hum if wind and night,
of highway lights on the distance.
*** on a tomb of plastic curlings.
you appear in pixels and dark bars,
face painted clown-like.
hydros in your palm, knife in your hip.
you were that girl lost between city sprawl
& old woodwork,
old wooden chairs carved upon and passed back and forth from *** to ***
class to class.
bell.
pizza delivery boy.
grease-ring soaked box and to touch his knees.
the channel changes, and he holds his breath for years,
in the wake of you.
Dec 11, 2014
Dec 11, 2014 at 8:09 AM UTC
No one has ever taken a chance with me
Some have danced with me
But most are quick to be real slick
And change their stance with me
Fake people making noise
And playing games
Calling names, pointing fingers
And placing blame
Little realize
While they're fixed on displacing shame
All this nonsense stays constantly
Suspended through my veins
They burst open with the worst notions Contorted emotions to mass explosions
Like mixing large proportions of gasoline
Fire driven moths-to-flames
And my response is to conjure
Create, contemplate, and maintain
So please run along and carry on
Like you never knew my name
Because saying it will curse you
When you mention it in vain
Don't react or erupt like 'this' was abrupt When you never said 'this' to my face
Don't act surprised or try to hide it
Like you missed it or tried to fight it
Like you have any right to deny it
Now that you've finally been erased
I'm tired of all the back-thens
And back-whens
You're a has-been, and I'm laughing
Coming out of the woodwork
Some leaving without a trace
Like a blank space could ever replace
Everything you didn't make work
In the end we didn't mend
So I guess I wasn't worth it
At best we could jest, try to forget
Let's say that I deserve it
I wasn't perfect and then again
I'm not a ******* servant
Should I reword it?
Use different verbage?
Change my perspective respective
Of your verdict on the time spent?
I wouldn't know
Because you never showed
And I'm too busy living in ('this') moment
Jun 20, 2019
Jun 20, 2019 at 6:48 AM UTC
I close my eyes.
There is a home inside here somewhere.
I remember.
It sinks slightly to the left.
My knees are covered in mud.
The trees have pushed into the living room,
sunflowers are rotting out the woodwork.
I have grown awkwardly into the floorboards.
They remind me that is okay.
I forget.
It keeps me full,
all this emptiness.
The windows are all open.
The hinges let go of every door.
I learn.
Trace the outline of each frame,
hear the echo of hollow footsteps:
"Love more,
love more,
love more."
I have never been here before.
This is what it must be like;
beginning.
Jul 27, 2014
Jul 27, 2014 at 11:58 PM UTC
I sit here and fade
Into the woodwork, I gaze
At the passing parade,
Studying people, always a fave,
Some standout in the crowd,
Interesting, people-watching allowed......
Feb 7, 2017
Feb 7, 2017 at 7:55 PM UTC
Pipes through the plaster
Pressure on the gain
Skin of wet paper
Takes the strain
Leaking at the solder
Drooling at the lip
Nibbling the woodwork
Drip, drip, drip
Cracks in the china
Glaze is crazed
Chips on the periphery
Reappraised
Hidden in the cabinet
Dust free spot
Tied with a ribbon
Hangman's knot
Tarnish on the silver
Payment due
Thirty peices
Far too few
Fragments of perfection
Fractured style
Scooped together
Careless pile
Nov 3, 2013
Nov 3, 2013 at 6:29 PM UTC