A dozen of my poems
Smarter_Than_U
Posts: 515
SMALL FAVOR
I turned a key into my grandmother’s apartment
To see about borrowing her umbrella
She reminded me it was the last thing he ever gave her
She succumbed not unlike a cancer patient
Let this happen
Now
As I trickled down the staircase
She locked the door behind me
And I thought how foolish she was
To care so much about umbrellas
And doors that are already closed
PLAYING CATCH
Weekend afternoons were always alike
While you would gallivant with your Sunday dad
I’d lie on spiked grass waiting for a baseball
To come crashing down against my right-fielded face
I’d run crying into a foul kitchen
Looking for ice cubes in empty trays
As you sucked raw oysters from chilled shells
ODE TO A/C
tiny trees
burning asphalt
greenhouse cars
melted chewing gum in a mother’s purse
summer clearance
everything must go
MOVING
Is not as hard as it looks on television
Fresh paint and new carpets
Will cover memories
Seasonal decorations
Will heal doors
This house can rest
We have moved on
KILLING A MUSE
These walls give me nothing to complain about
With their view of footsteps comforted by Marlboro men
Still I wish a bomb would blow thru
So I’d have something to say
But I’m stuck here with words
Written by a child who won’t be satisfied
Until the world is full of bastards
And those that weep for them
But this space remains impenetrable
So I open wide the windows
And set flame to my muse
WHITESTONE BRIDGE
Crossing Whitestone at twilight
I spot three pink clouds standing uprightly on the horizon
Reminding me of stretch marks
Running up and down your body
Even beauty can sometimes be unsightly
I thought as I handed the freckled toll collector my token
JUNGLE FROST
Sometimes on the path less taken
The one that injects you to jungle waterfalls
Lies a fer-de-lance in perfect camouflage
Waiting to trodden your honeymoon in black
Not ages or days are needed to tell this with a sigh
But following the traveled river trail
With its tiny venom frogs and blue butterflies
Can be the difference between We lived or died
POETRY READING
He tries symphonizing her
But she’s heard this one before
It’s the song of the boy
Who says what has to be said and does what has to be done
She hears measures of smeared lip stick in his voice
Hoaxed by shots and odes
Cataloging him like a bad radio hit
She realizes even most poets are full of shit
RAILMAPS
Move
Or be moved
Speak
Else be forced to hear
Maps from former lives chart
Spit on railroad tracks and
Sound booming through plastic boxes
At this midway station
Years steam by like faces
On a commuter train and
Schedules glide through arrivals
Like planned departures
Leaving behind a steely chill
Yet be
And be life
Maps to a future past
SCREENPLAYS
Today's movies don't interest me
When they come up in conversation
I become decisively withdrawn
Extracting myself like a hand to a rogue cinder
Perhaps a comedy about a troubling young man
Who leaps through a bonfire of picnic tables
To escape a gang of axe-wielding villagers
Might hold my attention
The protagonist of this story
Could find ironic salvation in poets
Haunted by dreams of severed limbs
He would be the type of hero that inspires
Mothers of lost sons to believe that their children too
Can build lives that don't require editing
Marketing this film might prove challenging
But perhaps a redemption angle might sit well
With the movie-going public
Then again there would be a better draw
If the story was reeled backwards
Instead he is conquered by the mob of flames at the finale
Villagers dance in a broken circle pumping their fists
As he smolders among nuts and bolts
PERMANENCE
Between the wall of a parkway tunnel and bulleting cars
A teenager stands on his toes
As his hand is pulled left to right to left
By a can of silver spray paint.
He believes these marks equal proof of existence.
A week later, man stands indifferently before this spot
With speckles of beige paint on his boots
Pushing a paint roller up and down.
▲
While his grandparents sleep nearby
A child grips a black magic marker.
Stretching his arm upwards before antique white walls
He draws a stick figure family tree.
He steps back from the toxic smell
Waiting for his mother to jump to life.
That same morning, his grandfather
Retrieves a bucket of paint
And calmly brushes away the portrait.
▲
Mining abandoned memories of children
Born backwards and half-strangled
A student faces a screen.
He struggles to sketch a picture
Hunting and pecking through a dictionary
To find meaning beyond today.
Years later another man cuts into these images
Telling himself that only by erasing oneself
Can permanence be reached.
Hope you like some of them...
PEACEMAKER
As if on command
Our dog
Wedges between us
To stop the fighting
His eyes plead
For peace
And I remember
How precious
Time is to him
I turned a key into my grandmother’s apartment
To see about borrowing her umbrella
She reminded me it was the last thing he ever gave her
She succumbed not unlike a cancer patient
Let this happen
Now
As I trickled down the staircase
She locked the door behind me
And I thought how foolish she was
To care so much about umbrellas
And doors that are already closed
PLAYING CATCH
Weekend afternoons were always alike
While you would gallivant with your Sunday dad
I’d lie on spiked grass waiting for a baseball
To come crashing down against my right-fielded face
I’d run crying into a foul kitchen
Looking for ice cubes in empty trays
As you sucked raw oysters from chilled shells
ODE TO A/C
tiny trees
burning asphalt
greenhouse cars
melted chewing gum in a mother’s purse
summer clearance
everything must go
MOVING
Is not as hard as it looks on television
Fresh paint and new carpets
Will cover memories
Seasonal decorations
Will heal doors
This house can rest
We have moved on
KILLING A MUSE
These walls give me nothing to complain about
With their view of footsteps comforted by Marlboro men
Still I wish a bomb would blow thru
So I’d have something to say
But I’m stuck here with words
Written by a child who won’t be satisfied
Until the world is full of bastards
And those that weep for them
But this space remains impenetrable
So I open wide the windows
And set flame to my muse
WHITESTONE BRIDGE
Crossing Whitestone at twilight
I spot three pink clouds standing uprightly on the horizon
Reminding me of stretch marks
Running up and down your body
Even beauty can sometimes be unsightly
I thought as I handed the freckled toll collector my token
JUNGLE FROST
Sometimes on the path less taken
The one that injects you to jungle waterfalls
Lies a fer-de-lance in perfect camouflage
Waiting to trodden your honeymoon in black
Not ages or days are needed to tell this with a sigh
But following the traveled river trail
With its tiny venom frogs and blue butterflies
Can be the difference between We lived or died
POETRY READING
He tries symphonizing her
But she’s heard this one before
It’s the song of the boy
Who says what has to be said and does what has to be done
She hears measures of smeared lip stick in his voice
Hoaxed by shots and odes
Cataloging him like a bad radio hit
She realizes even most poets are full of shit
RAILMAPS
Move
Or be moved
Speak
Else be forced to hear
Maps from former lives chart
Spit on railroad tracks and
Sound booming through plastic boxes
At this midway station
Years steam by like faces
On a commuter train and
Schedules glide through arrivals
Like planned departures
Leaving behind a steely chill
Yet be
And be life
Maps to a future past
SCREENPLAYS
Today's movies don't interest me
When they come up in conversation
I become decisively withdrawn
Extracting myself like a hand to a rogue cinder
Perhaps a comedy about a troubling young man
Who leaps through a bonfire of picnic tables
To escape a gang of axe-wielding villagers
Might hold my attention
The protagonist of this story
Could find ironic salvation in poets
Haunted by dreams of severed limbs
He would be the type of hero that inspires
Mothers of lost sons to believe that their children too
Can build lives that don't require editing
Marketing this film might prove challenging
But perhaps a redemption angle might sit well
With the movie-going public
Then again there would be a better draw
If the story was reeled backwards
Instead he is conquered by the mob of flames at the finale
Villagers dance in a broken circle pumping their fists
As he smolders among nuts and bolts
PERMANENCE
Between the wall of a parkway tunnel and bulleting cars
A teenager stands on his toes
As his hand is pulled left to right to left
By a can of silver spray paint.
He believes these marks equal proof of existence.
A week later, man stands indifferently before this spot
With speckles of beige paint on his boots
Pushing a paint roller up and down.
▲
While his grandparents sleep nearby
A child grips a black magic marker.
Stretching his arm upwards before antique white walls
He draws a stick figure family tree.
He steps back from the toxic smell
Waiting for his mother to jump to life.
That same morning, his grandfather
Retrieves a bucket of paint
And calmly brushes away the portrait.
▲
Mining abandoned memories of children
Born backwards and half-strangled
A student faces a screen.
He struggles to sketch a picture
Hunting and pecking through a dictionary
To find meaning beyond today.
Years later another man cuts into these images
Telling himself that only by erasing oneself
Can permanence be reached.
Hope you like some of them...
PEACEMAKER
As if on command
Our dog
Wedges between us
To stop the fighting
His eyes plead
For peace
And I remember
How precious
Time is to him
"Goddamn Romans. Sure know how to make a ... drum room." --Matt Cameron
Post edited by Unknown User on
0
Comments
--laureate
I like railmaps!
And I won't make the same mistakes
(Because I know)
Because I know how much time that wastes
(And function)
Function is the key