1.
he showed me his
ashtray in the sink
a prize from the last county fair
but i didn’t know why they couldn’t have
invested in something better–
a chandelier made of glass
or a cold metal flask.
he said “they know i like to smoke,”
and pointed to his throat,
“this is where my sorrow goes.”
i understood. i took his hand and said
“this is only the first of
many lifetimes where
a person i’ve loved
was in two places
at once”. he asked me how i knew and i said
“i know a guy who looks like you”
he stood in shock for a moment,
then laughed.
of course,
he was only a boy who seemed like you,
you whose delicate eyes i’d go searching through,
waiting hours by the roadside, vain in my hopes.
i smiled and watched him smile an identical smile
to yours.
2.
he brought out several broken bottles,
shards all jagged and bent.
he said “i’m not afraid of pain”,
and cut his mouth open before he could
explain what he meant.
the blood was dripping like a broken sink,
he laughed again and said
“i know what it’s like when your heart
is in the wrong place, i think”.
when i told him the resemblance was
making things hard,
he said,
“you need to hold on to what you’ve got.”
he nodded his head to enforce the thought,
neck moving slowly like a cable car up and down;
“you’ll find someone” he said decidedly
and lit up without looking back at me.
Copyright 2016 Golden Star Poetry
With inspiration from Maya Angelou’s “Still I Rise” and John Cooper Clarke’s “Twat”
Like some sick infected creature
Seeking shelter in the night
I’m a sore excuse for patience,
When you’ve sucked it all from sight.
Like a sagging little snot rag,
You’ve been filled with lots of goo
And the green unwanted dust
Of other peoples’ misfortunes.
Does my cheery face confuse you?
Does it make you feel upset?
Would you rather I applaud my fears,
Or cheer them better yet?
Is it pleasurable, my dear,
To pour your heart out to the mist?
Something fading, something passive,
That could not care more to piss?
It’s so pitiful to watch you
Waste away with grief and shame
But I think it’s kind of funny
That you think I caused you pain!
For those fools who think your moping
Is a reason I should care
Don’t know that your trembling fingers
On my head have trapped my hair.
You’re a lecherous town crier,
Crying verses made of air
First a snivel, then a current,
Then a typhoon of despair!
Oh dear brother with your moaning,
Find some well to drown your cries
We won’t hear you on the bedrocks
And you’ll still be none the wise.
Are you quite sure you’re unneeded?
Are you quite sure you’re a pain?
Well I think you’ve struck sound reason, love,
Cause I feel just the same!
Copyright 2016 Golden Star Poetry
poor man’s wake
she’s forced to eat dirty crumbs off a
table where people have mourned
and she’ll suddenly remember what her first conversations with him were like,
and how he made a great impression,
showing off his words like toys,
smiles like remember-later momentos, the hidden interest like a skiddish moth
and how the progression of events was not
what she had hoped or thought.
the people have all already gone
their clothes strewn about like some strange
orgiastic afterthought;
only their memoried loss
nothing on the interior
the people are still dead to the grounds they are in only.
the house is empty
at this nonexistant party
your own kin
sings like him,
and looks a bit
like him.
it was long over
by the time
someone was dead.
it was long over when
you longed for somebody
that looked like him.
Copyright 2016 Golden Star Poetry
impassioned responses are…highly discouraged.
x x x x
1.
perhaps i miss
your voice;
so soothing,
almost feathery;
dark feathers and
the blue edge of a
quiet twilit night,
but your voice is all sadness
nothing living
your voice is the voice of the dying,
so loosly bound.
2.
i was so happy to love myself again
when you were gone
in every sense of the word (!)
and now i have the unbridled
freedom of an unbridled
horse,
coat smooth and shiny sheen
and they all ask me where you’ve been
and i just smile and preen:
these things happen.
3.
twilight, how could i see thee
how could i find the way back to my home
when you never lit your own lamp for me?
4.
(this is my dream:)
i am with myself and new father
and the fog makes me awake
and i am so warm and safe
and i say
i did wait
5.
i don’t know much about
the voice that sits like an even tempered rod
off-white yellow, tightly wound.
(he gave me a good shake up)
and i’m pretty sure
this voice
won’t be the right choice
and we will simply
split our differences;
two terribly frank kisses
and call it a week.
i pass the people in the parlour
thinking is it
too futile to even speak?
Copyright 2016 Golden Star Poetry
i see you
on the street
or with your head bowed low
and i think you made a joke.
i want you to be
perpetually smiling,
lost in laughter and
your bright shimmering teeth,
the sweetness of your mouth,
so familial,
so tender-warm-mine
(or was)
you cower
in the street
with your head bowed low
and i think to how
i owned
your sweetness
for a little while.
i am still stunned
when i think
how lucky could i be?
it was him
who wanted me;
him and his
ovarian sweetness.
(i am in love with love
my dear.
i just wasn’t in love with you.)
Copyright 2016 Golden Star Poetry
all that is left
are the small things in my memory:
i remember you smiling
but that is all,
and i remember you smiling
but not very much.
i said hello,
you said give me some time.
Copyright 2016 Golden Star Poetry
today the wind came out to greet you
like it was saying a final goodbye
i went on a walk and i found you
for i tried and i tried and i tried.
from a distance you stood there poetic
and i watched as my heart slowed and spinned
you were standing quite still in the solitude
while i watched you, alone in the wind.
when you ran up to greet me you sparkled
like a fairy all gilded in sunlight,
your hair flew around you like fairy wings
and your balmy pink smile was as bright.
then you stood there and softly spoke poetry
an elegy made of a sigh
you delivered a sermon of pearls to me
and what humble a servant was i.
as your lips held each whispered word tightly
in caresses i never could prize
your recited words said “i’m in love with you”
then i stared, falling into your eyes:
Copyright 2016 Golden Star Poetry
i sat i realized i was being stubborn i was making myself cry
and i had many people to talk to and hold on to but i tried
not to be intrusive, like a spy
so i breathe easier today because i know what i want
and i breathe easier because there are no tears or fuss
and i behave mechanistically.
i am well oiled gears and i know what
i must consume to function:
there is food and water and fat and thin
but also the human skin on skin the contact intangible,
a nutrient i didn’t find on the cereal box.
i want to laugh today so i wander over to the saloon
my friends and their friend who i was too stupid to ignore
who sleeps in the afternoon.
the H20, aluminum, salt, brass nickel and tin,
i digest them and he tests them and tries them on his skin,
and i smile to face the faceless day and know where to begin.
Copyright 2016 Golden Star Poetry
temporary dressings over temporary wounds.
we seek shelter in an abandon garden and
hope that we will take fruit. In a garden we see many faces often,
the father who takes no notice or the mother who stoops over the dandelions,
the friend who coddles the petunias like sisters and the grandmother who sits still.
we hold candles to the dahlias and when it gets cold, we hope they do not burn.
we hide and lick our wounds in the grass, wimpering and withering like pruned hands.
I held on to you because your voice was soft like a suede glove,
and I liked the unnabraisive hair you could brush up to my temples and say the
only way I could have met you was the only way I could have met you, and the way I could have held you was the only way I could have held you, and we would have
spun around in blurred green clusters where the bushes ran off to meet the sky and
the
sun ran off to meet your eyes, and the way the green houses flitted behind the dark shade of green like the house in the spring
and maybe I could if I stand here.
if I stand here in the green grass in the garden I will remember it as a footpath for soldiers who defend love, keep it in high regard and pay no heed to the
fashion of believing that all we say is trite anyway.
the slow stones are fawn beds for lovers, and the grass is coverlets for milk bodies,
(ours,)
and now and again the firs can pine away for you instead of me.
I may bend over sideways like the arches of a tended forest, my limbs over your limbs or the tree limbs
and patience is a virtue and you are a virtue. But patience is temporary and
burdens are temporary and so was the kiss, the kiss you gave me, too soft and cream, too negligible and sparse, unvaried and smoothing, holding not possessing and static not unstable. I can lie down for hours and notice that you are neither sleeping nor waking, just like the sound of birds flying is not availed to my ears but I trust it is there notwithstanding.
Copyright 2016 Golden Star Poetry
Golden Star Poetry 