Poetry thread: New, newer newest

[Nebulance]

Love this one!

[Nebulance]

I stumbled across this a few days ago; I don’t remember writing it.

Yesterday and Now

The first love of my life
Was a heart breaker — like everyone else.
But you were something different

I don’t think about futures
With anyone anymore —
Let alone you;
I mark the map with islands
With room for one,
Because it’s the only thing I can count on

Walking the streets at home, alone
Ain’t the same as it was in Rome;
Just one of the crowd but I was on my own,
Thinking about Sarlat, your smile in the rain,
And the colors in the painting I wish I sent you

My heart never came back
From the Bergerac coast;
I’m still sitting on the bench,
With your hand in mine,
My lips to your forehead at the Golden Hour
when the sun collapses into the horizon

Behind golden aviators
To hide the streaking tears,
I pull up, lock it down, clock in;
Forget about the mess and hang on;
Repeat and repeat without end

[Monkey]

I love this!

[Nebulance]

Thank you!

[Nebulance]

I wrote a new song: https://www.dropbox.com/s/qkhhe0wh1znfi4a/in-spades.mp3?dl=0

I’ve been sitting on the opening lines for probably some months now, but the last 3 verses all came together in the past few days

In Spades

I’m a stowaway on a shipwrecked heart
If I was a jigsaw puzzle
Then you are the missing part

Unrequited love in spades
It goes on and on and on

The sun has been setting
on my heart for years
But you, you were
The coffee in my starlight

I’m broken again
But I know it doesn’t matter
Most days I feel like
I don’t have love on my side

You make my heart sing
Like a canary in a storm
Blurry-eyed and star-blind
When I’m seeing double
You know I’m in trouble

[saf]

It took me until now to try clicking this link (I just assumed that since I don’t have F-S dropbox access it would not work), I have to say this is better than that milk-toast Ryan Adams single someone posted a few days back. Very catchy. Also, your voice is better than Billy Corgan’s, just saying.

[Nebulance]

thanks a lot, I appreciate the comments

Well, it’s a bit sad-sack and rather blunt/honest, but I suppose that’s where things are right now

I’m glad someone thinks I have better voice than Billy Corgan

[thebalvenie]

nice song neb!

[Nebulance]

Thanks!

[thebalvenie]

Brian Doyle

[Nebulance]

I suppose this counts as poetry. A new song I wrote called Rest of My Days:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/u91f0ywoh0jhr1p/rest-of-my-days.mp3?dl=0

[WillieCash]

I was part of a music teaching organization in my youth which gave me a lot of great experiences that I would never trade in. Unfortunately, after I left the folks who took over ended up creating an environment of what the kids are calling “toxic positivity” which made it so people felt less and less able to voice concerns out of fear they would be seen as making trouble.

This inevitably led to several abuses of all stripes. I wrote this a few weeks ago after ruminating about a young woman who was assaulted and didn’t feel like she could come forward. After it happened again, she went to the powers that be who did nothing. When it happened to another girl (same perp) they finally did something about it and kicked the guy out (instead of calling the authorities).

Recently, they started a different organization and guess who shows up in their promo video. Yup. The guy who had assaulted at least two women.

At any rate, here’s what I came up with…

STARDUST ,INTERRUPTED

She was stardust, interrupted
By the mantra “Love and light” in which she trusted
Then radical forgiveness
left her clapping on the ones & threes.

So let our mercy, be not perverted
by the scripture’s words for those less than deserving.
There’s a goodness seeking breath out in the twilight.
Captive to the night but breaking free

Forgiveness ain’t redemption, it’s just trying to clear the slate
Like digging in a grave, digging in a grave
Parsing out the pieces, disregarding all the names.
Just digging in a grave and praying for lightning.

There’s a monster at the junction
Set loose by truth and all its sacred function.
It’s coming for the Pharisees and swindlers,
exposing every myth for all to see.

Forgiveness ain’t redemption, it’s just trying to clear the slate
Like digging in a grave, digging in a grave
Parsing out the pieces, disregarding all the names.
Just digging in a grave and praying for lightning.

So run, run, run
There’s a reckoning out there still yet to come
Run, run, run, run.
Or start praying for lightning.

Forgiveness ain’t redemption, it’s just trying to clear the slate
Like digging in a grave, digging in a grave
Parsing out the pieces, disregarding all the names.
Just digging in a grave and praying for lightning.

[Nebulance]

I just wrote this one.

Failure

I am a failure
when no one’s looking —
or when the mirror is tilted just left of center.
I rattle and shake
like a box of broken plates.
I am filled with tired riddles of love notes
and wide-eyed bullshit
about kisses that always land.

I am a timebomb
of tireless affection and oceanic rage
just waiting to crash.
I topple over and crumble
like sandcastles in a hurricane.
I am filled with ragged romantic ambition
and bumper-sticker cringe
about lips that ache and the single finger that quiets them

I am a downed tree branch
torn down by blistering rain
on the best of days.
I wither and crack
like dry skin pulled over tired knuckles
I am filled with frivolous adoration
and late-summer rom-com dreams
about you and the love I will never have.

[thebalvenie]

been in a tough and weird spot lately. figured i could put this here…i just sat down and cried and wrote whatever came out. knock it, flick it, pick it apart but i’m just a sensitive and emotional mess right now

Bringing, brought. Together Lost
Tied, Turning. Wound-up and fought
Stupid, chance. Twisting and Caught
Casting and Flying. Rigor Taut
Teaching, Past. Half-measures and finished
Meds, weight, trout, empty. Sought
Storyteller, aging, mortal. Puppy and food
Looking, light. Flashed and school
Daughters, life, living, flood. Pushing and un-heard
Movies, T.V., Time. Spots. Moments. Books and Fight
Kitty, Verbs. Language, Gone. Magnets
Breath, breathe. Eyes and water and lake and float.

[DougoBlue]

A lot going on there…

Big hugs to you Rod.

{{{{{ }}}}}

[highlife]

Oops

[highlife]

Oops

[Nebulance]

Not much of a poem, but a crystalizing moment/show/date for me this weekend prompted it, and I hope it helps whoever needs it, because I certainly did. I think it’s the first time in over a year I’ve felt truly happy – and honestly, a lot of happy tears and stupid laughing yesterday.

if the road you’re on is dark,
just know there’s always headlights
coming up over the horizon.
Just hold on.

[Nebulance]

To follow up on said date; I kind of hate how it never became anything more than that, but it undoubtedly turned a lot of things around for me. So, super important to me. In poem form, this is how it went:

Your Beautiful Fragments

Grand hotel lobbies with a classic past;
A new-age cab drops you at the corner
Your eyes greet me first, my words stumble out
Dressed to the nines, I’m coming up all primes
Opening doors, and jaws hit the floor
Teacup candlelight and shaky tables buoy my racing heart;
You paint in vivid color, bleeding into my dirty pours;
I weave intricate melodies into our impatient silences

Sharing tequila and dirty glances
Hands roaming up foreign thighs
And into waiting hands;
We intertwine our fingers and make a fence
To padlock our hearts to;
I catch you watching me, peering past my words
To somewhere just behind the curtain that I’m drawing open, slowly;
You See Me in a way I could only wish in daydreams

My arms around your waist,
We dance till way past when the moon folds into morning;
I spin you around, and in the twirls
You waltz your way across the room,
But you come running
With reaching hands and gentle, biting-cheek kisses
That land in curious and messy ways
To claim me as yours

Driving you home,
I hold your hand in between stop lights
And flickering street deli signs;
You change the dial on the radio
To find the perfect song;
First kisses are Eskimo, slow, and deliberate
Our lips touch and pause — a Polaroid we just can’t shake
Your head finds my shoulder; and your hand, my heart

[WillieCash]

Still futzing around with this new song…

“The Dust of Devils”

The Mississippi’s wide
And the Western rain torrential,
Brimming tall in the between
with empty promise and potential.

Don’t you know you got the dust of devils in your blood
That’s the dark momentum pushing you to run
There’s no sleeping in the land of midnight sun
The dust of devils in your blood

You know, my father’s got no grave
Just some dust I left on Whitney
Sometimes I feel I’m just the same
Silt through the fingers trying to catch me

Don’t you know you got the dust of devils in your blood
That’s the dark momentum pushing you to run
There’s no sleeping in the land of midnight sun
The dust of devils in your blood

If you’re counting blessings, it don’t mean God’s good and kind
He just lacks attention. You weren’t on his mind.
There’s a graveyard up in Heaven where saint Peter sends mistakes
That’s the truth of easy living. That’s the lie of even breaks.

Don’t you know you got the dust of devils in your blood
That’s the dark momentum pushing you to run
There’s no sleeping in the land of midnight sun
The dust of devils in your blood

Don’t you know you got the dust of devils in your blood
That’s the hesitation telling you you’re done
That’s what’s telling you to go and grab your gun
The dust of devils in your blood