A slight stirring of wind
Holds this gauzy curtain away from the window,
Reminders of a springtime outside, all green
And flowers and wholesome shit.
Me, I just want to get drunk
Feel the empty agony of my loneliness,
Postponed by the full bottle;
Consummated by another empty can.
I can feel, yes, I can feel again
And it is maddening, yea, sorrowful;
I did live all those years numb to it,
Became numb to everything else as well.
Successful, responsible, hard-working;
Admirable, overachieving, but never enough.
All exterior virtues for exterior opinions.
Something I chose to do to have somewhere to go.
I thought I was happy,
But now I really don’t know.
Perhaps I cut off one arm to spite the other
Now frustrated I can’t cut that one off, too.
Posts Tagged ‘Window’
Postponement and Consummation
Posted: May 20, 2002 in PoetryTags: Drunk, Green, Happy, Shit, Wind, Window
You don’t know what you’ve done
Wrecked the car by going too fast
And I along for the ride
Get the lash of blame
Because I pumped the gas.
Your shirt has come undone
These windows are steamed from the inside
Oh? What? This stupid game
That can’t survive the morning sun;
Now just memories from my past.
And as the tires start to slide
And as you search my fevered eyes
Bare shoulders spangled with drops of rain
Realizing that we’ve crashed
Because nothing stays the same.
Cricket Machine
Posted: January 18, 2002 in PoetryTags: Breast, Cricket, Deer, Machine, Night, Sky, Squirrel, Tree, Window
It is cold in this basement
Cracks in the casement
Windows leak whatever warmth
To the suckling of the cold.
Share! Share creaks the air
Of that many mouthed night sky.
In a forest of bare breasted trees,
Their raiment mulching around their knees
Winds a path I build when I first got here
Now only walked by squirrels and deer
Within the house, but still below ground
Is that subtly comforting electronic sound
Of the magical cricket machine.
Soshial Obligashuns
Posted: May 18, 1997 in PoetryTags: Bullshit, Eye, Fuck, Husband, Politics, Smile, Window, Woman
Damned to be a husband I rebel
As all others before me, more or less:
Within the strict limits
Of my integrity and commitment.
Get the fuck out of my poetry journal!
Consistency and constantly aware
Of this yoke of woman,
A noose of responsibility to sosh thrills
And pinky-finger parties.
Obligations that are a mockery of forced smiles
And strains to remember politics.
A boring waltz of bullshit hellos;
Small talk about whoever didn’t make it
To defend themselves on this court date.
Righteousness through convicted assumption;
Convict through assumed righteousness,
And an open window,
A polygraph of eyes
And a sharp katana.
A Dream on My Couch
Posted: September 29, 1996 in PoetryTags: Ant, Child, Cigarette, Dreams, Ferns, Friends, Garden, Light, Lightning, Mountains, Orange, Rain, Silver, Smoke, Window
In a dream that plucked me
From the couch that I slept on,
I walked, ant sized, through the growth
In my garden,
Shaking nasturtium stems
To feel the dewdrops like rain,
And climbing mountains
And ferns
Like a child with no friends.
Reminiscing like a fool,
These dreams torment like reminders;
Gleans of silver behind the tarnish,
Cigarette smoke fanned out the window.
When waking I walk
Through the garden I planted,
I can hear, I can see, I can smell
But not understand
Like I was able to way back when
In the gloaming of orange street lights,
Summer solstice and heat lightning.
coming calling
Posted: December 13, 1994 in PoetryTags: Beauty, Car, Father, Grey, Horse, Leaves, Light, Moon, Mountains, Night, Sky, Snow, Wind, Window
The snow has touched the mountaintops
And the leaves drift on the ground.
My breath is grey before my face
As I’m walking into town.
I left my car parked in the drive;
I wished to go on foot.
A whim the moon brought to my thoughts
When I laced my father’s boots.
When I come calling at your house
I’ll check to see that your light shows.
If it’s off, I’ll admire the frost
A moment, then I’ll go.
Sometimes I won’t see one car pass
Going either way.
The wind spins papers through the dancing trees;
They keep my footsteps gay.
The silent night and the Christmas lights,
The pine-bough’s fresh perfume;
The ribbons and wreaths and lost Autumn leaves —
They all point my way to you.
When I come calling at your house,
I’ll check to see that your light’s on.
If it is out, I’ll leave without
Telling you that I have gone.
The walk back home is always long,
But the beauty still remains.
I imagine a sleigh, two horses; some hay,
And my hands upon the reins.
The moon is calm in the darkened sky
It silvers the windowsills.
I climb into bed with you in my head;
Stuff for these poems I build.
When I come calling at your house,
I’ll check to see if you’ve lit your light,
For if it’s not, then I guess you forgot,
And I can’t come and say goodnight.
A Christmas Vision
Posted: November 10, 1994 in PoetryTags: Children, Hearth, Light, Moon, Santa Claus, Snow, Tree, Window
Quietly now, the children are sleeping
While we two are creeping
to bite cookies and leave them.
Practical worries about the yearly tour of duty:
Every floorboard creaks, every giggle recognizeable;
Make sure the flat of the hearth is newly sooty,
Make sure the stockings are equally full.
Finally finished, our excitement diminished
By the prospect of the warm bundle wake-up call;
The warning comes as bare soles in the hall —
my arm ‘round your waist,
we can admire the tree
and break our own rule
of conserving electricity:
Plug the lights in and hear the hush
Of the new snowfall, the moonlight’s touch
Twinkles the icicles on the eaves
Outside the window past the wreath-leaves.
Now that Santa’s come and gone,
I’m sure he would have left
the Christmas lights on.
Murder by Dinner
Posted: August 21, 1994 in PoetryTags: Alcohol, Drink, Friends, Murder, Wedding, Window
I’m going to dinner
and I’m nervous.
A family friend;
Don’t continue your trend, Mike.
If the one drink, two drink
Three drink, no think
Pink elephant stupidity
of the Alcohol speaking;
Speak when spoken to
And you’ll get through
Your nerves and your dinner.
Be polite and considerate;
Practice for the day you’ll see them again.
I’m scared because I never want
To see them again;
That’s why I’m scared of the wedding.
How many cousins and aunts,
Uncles, relatives and friends
Of the family
Know me as the drunken braggart,
The impolite scene-maker,
The window-puncher,
Under pressure and
Making the most of murdering myself?
Opossum
Posted: August 29, 1993 in PoetryTags: Beauty, Bird, Bones, Cigarette, Godzilla, Human, Leaf, Light, Opossum, Point Loma, Silence, Waterfall, Window
on my driveway in Point Loma,
smoking 3 cigarettes,
I thought it was my cat Ferguson
cracking bird-bones at four in the morning,
but the white and grey patchy creature
was a shiny eyed opossum,
who moved off as fast as it could
back down the sidewalk
after discovering its way back to its lair
in the college leaf-lined drainpipes
was guarded by a flannel-skinned human.
insomnia can be a great thing
when the TV isn’t running any Godzilla movies
or Kung-Fu Theater;
then the silence outside, the cool air
can be heard straining to beckon
with no mouth, no gestures,
just an often overlooked phenomenon.
some will travel huge distances
to find beauty in waterfalls and vistas
that are easy to pretend that no one else has seen,
yet the early morning hours of solitude
and a token nightlighting of vapor lamps on telephone poles
is the hush of the spectacular
that not many appreciate,
right outside their heavy-lidded windows.
a cat calls beneath my window
and my stomach hurts
from constipated poetry;
I’m turning into mush
from trying to lift these
literary weights and be like them,
dreaming of storefront windows
and cardboard displays…
An Ever Renewing Canvas
Posted: March 22, 1993 in PoetryTags: Angel, Beach, Believe, Blue, Cry, Demon, Dolphins, Sky, Spirit, Window, Wine
a bottle of wine and a sunset,
a beach a place to sit;
this is what I’d like to do
with you to believe.
I believe you can summon dolphins
and that you’re a spirit, an angel.
I know of our fears of demons
and of blue bathroom windows,
ouiji boards and my piano playing.
I live to see you cry and argue
and almost break: then
there are my arms for comfort,
my tongue for talking and my ears
for listening and understanding.
I’ll catch you from harm
by falling against you at the same time;
we’ll teeter but we won’t topple.
all of the sunsets are painted on a canvas
big enough to share: the sky
– and I’d like to share it with you.
Chess
Posted: March 8, 1993 in PoetryTags: Blanket, Book, Chess, Dream, Flowers, Night, Red, Window
when the night has come and I
have shuttered my open windows,
it is then that I turn away from other things
to my room of books and hanging plants
hiding in the warmth of my possessions;
a dried flower to remind me of you,
a red blanket that I was born into,
a zillion and one things to do –
the air gets thick in here…
fuzzy little octopi squirm through the air
but they’ve always been there.
I’ll let you in on one condition
and that is that I won’t lie to you;
fibbing tastes bad, like a bottle of glue
and they’re stickier, too –
but you come in of your own volition.
how can I entertain you?
alone, I lay out in the middle of the floor
on my magic Arabian carpet,
and I dream and I’ll do that for you
if you come in and listen.
Untitled Poem #151
Posted: March 7, 1993 in PoetryTags: Crow, Fire, Forest, Shadow, Untitled, Window
there’s a shadow who lays on my windowsill
from the crow who sits on the telephone wires
and if I wasn’t home reading up your poetry
I’d be out in a forest setting fires.
Imitation of Jazzie B from Soul II Soul
Posted: January 18, 1993 in PoetryTags: Blue, Clock, Eye, Kiss, Love, Rock, Shoes, Song, Storm, Window
check this out:
I keep on moving don’t stop the clock
I can’t keep on without the tick-tock so I
I walk on, rock on, keeping my shoes on
I hear you sigh and sing the blues on the corner
by the storefront windows. I stop and I listen.
I remember us doing some kissin’
but I cannot live as I was doing:
chasing you around, forgiving, boo-hooing.
roads are there to walk and choices abound
I know I’ll see you around town because
I still love you just as much as ever
I miss your clear eyes and your stormy weather.
a piano reminds me of a lonely day song
that I played for all the times that I know I’ve been wrong,
but I change my tune to keep you grooving,
and like Soul II Soul I gotta keep on moving.
Breathing Pains
Posted: October 26, 1992 in PoetryTags: Birds, Blood, Eye, Fear, Flowers, Night, Pain, Salt, Spider, Water, Window
waiting for you to arrive,
I close my eyes for the birds that rise,
flowing over my skin,
baiting the thoughts that cruise like fish
within.
I sink deeper into my steel water trough
to wonder when the night
will roll in.
the flowers I brought you have wilted
from the sweat on my brow,
but I am waiting, still alive,
waiting for you to arrive.
I count the turns of the fan and
stir the last of my ice
with my hand,
watching them dance.
I taste the water from the ends
of my fingers.
the salt and the cold comes
with chills of your eyes
if you tried to lie;
you’re coming here sometime.
I think of what I can’t see
past my reflection,
through the window’s glass;
where you said you were going,
where you might be instead.
these spinning spiders cobweb my head.
everything slow, slower, slowest;
these breathing pains.
a record skips on its label.
I’m watching these wilted flowers.
cut, they glower back at me,
slowly.
I’m wondering when blood will
run out of my ears
with the weight of all these
anthological fears.
I pluck a melting cube from the water
and send it sliding along the table
as I lay, my head on the back of my arm.
a cold green fire simultaneously heats
my uncomfortable forehead and
roots at the pit of my stomach.
I will wait with my breathing;
you’re coming here sometime.
I will wait for you to arrive.
The Sun at the Edge of the World
Posted: March 1, 1992 in PoetryTags: Clouds, Eye, Flowers, Sun, Tree, White, Window
in the photograph,
taped at the corners,
we were caught falling
into the river with smiles
and half-closed eyes;
flowers were falling
on the glossy surface
in the middle of the white album page,
shifting the reflection of the sun.
outside the open oak-framed window,
shining over the tall broad-leafed trees,
and the clouds spiraling away
falling over the edge of the world.
Untitled poem #-11
Posted: December 26, 1991 in PoetryTags: Dream, Mirror, Ocean, Sand, Stars, Window
tonight
as a dream
of ocean,
there is seaweed,
a corsage
on my wrist,
sand in my nails;
my window was open
to the stars,
mirrors to
mad poetry.
running around
on your plains
stark naked
– I am fun.
I see windows
to look through
at your artwork
I stand on tiptoes!
I have no money
to pay to get in.
I smile that I love you
wink beyond the flashbulbs
for ME!
and (maybe) I will go away.
I am your artwork
you
painted
me.
now I go away.
come with me?
let me try to paint you!
window rattling monster,
go away.
I have no patience with your
fleshless screaming skull
plummeting meaningful to earth,
runnels of molten bone flayed
as streamers fly from a maypole.
gravel crunching beast,
leave me.
I am alone with my artifacts,
my talismans, my treasures and
think little of your rancorous immaturity.
I sleep upon your doorstep to dream,
shrieking names of blind polypous gods
shambling aimlessly in realms of ether.
I grope shudderingly for the covers
to pull over my too-sensitive ears.
rubbery night walker,
begone.
Working Title
Posted: May 8, 1991 in PoetryTags: Byron, Clock, Dark, Dreams, Drug, Light, Lightning, Naked, Shelley, Universe, Window
I want to stand naked on a rooftop in the lightning
like Shelley and tell the world that we are gods
and god is nothing, let me be
my own god, my own master. I am only
my own, naked, standing, hit by lightning,
drugged, dying, depressed, damned
but all this so I choose.
I will fall when the universe breaks
the subatomic clockwork monotone.
embracing the light, welcoming the darkness,
thinking to myself of Disneyland
to allay my fears of falling and falling down,
the cross behind you unsupportive,
catch me, Shelley, catch me, opium,
follow me, Byron, kill me, poetry.
my dreams are made from sand
as my flesh, as the mind is dimensioned.
the skull is an appropriate sieve
for the ashes, the ashes, the ashes
we all fall down. the wind turns circles
in the dust, draws the face of a clock with one hand.
drip castles; elephants; lightning again.
my cheek is pressed against the cold rainy windowpane.
people play frisbee
across the warm street
on the grass field
as I turn from my window
and sit on the floor
to watch my walls closely
stay the same color.
I saw a raindrop hang
from a second story rooftop.
as I watched it drop,
I saw the face of a little girl
in one of the second story windows.
when I looked up again,
she wasn’t there.
I’m sure she never was.
when the wind comes skipping along
its third story sidewalk outside my window,
I can hear the cries of the playground
and the song of the balls on the asphault,
the reminiscent taste of gravel and
the feeling of gripping the chain-link backstops;
the anticipation of recess.
Untitled Poem #103
Posted: February 10, 1991 in PoetryTags: Ocean, Sleep, Tree, Whipped Cream, Wind, Window
I can hear the sound of the ocean
as I float in my sea of whipped cream sheets.
the wind in the trees outside my window
calls me softly
to sleep.
Hunters in the Snow
Posted: October 15, 1987 in PoetryTags: Circle, Dog, Happy, Hunter, Memories, Mountains, Naked, Raven, Road, Sky, Snow, Stone, Trees, Wind, Window
The ice skaters turn and glide slowly
On the frozen ice
Oblivious
To the hunters, returning along the wintery road
Dejected and downcast
but the skaters go on skating
In their own little circles
In their own little figures
Some following and some leading
Under the grey, expecting sky.
Pausing at the outskirts of town
And looking at the scores of windswept roofs,
The lines of the gables braced against their burden
Of snow, falling sporadically,
Covering and blanketing.
Looking to the deceptively happy skaters
And those in the carriage or out on a walk
The happy cries of young playing tag on the ice
The hunter only notices; he can see the town differently, too
Huddled at the base of the hoary mountains
Rearing their stony snow-covered peaks skyward
Looming grimly, as the merciless wind blows about their feet.
Ravens sit mockingly in naked black trees
Rent of their covering leaves and stark against the snow
Or they wheel overhead, crying out harsh notes to the bleak crags.
Windows shut tight against the frost which daintily graces them.
The dirty, downtrod snow by the side of the road
Chilly air, in which his breath shows so well
And he scrunches a little deeper into his threadbare coat
And trudges after his miserably gaunt dogs
After his tired companions
Returning to a worn town
Bringing back only fruitless memories
Leaving behind only hopeless footprints.
Froggacuda's Weblog 