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Daniel Tucker Sep 2024
I once laid in my bed content
With mama’s prayers tucked in,
Listening to trains far off across
River trestles on rails stretched
To places I could only dream of.

Beginner’s luck the magic strong;
Reality and dreams synonymous.
Early the seeds of wanderlust
Planted.

Talents forged of
Large cardboard boxes and
Old trunks in the attic
And of games with friends
In woods and streets.

Old Mr. Robling’s eyes looked
Beyond . . .
Child’s play would end
Someday.

That day eventually came in
Linear time
But much longer to this
Wandering mind
That thought beyond the grade
School desk when my adolescent
Peer’s noses were buried deep.

Wander and travel lust left this boy
Rootless and restless when time
Came to stop chasing mirages
Of greener pastures.

He then looked up and saw
His little one’s growing up
With a somewhat similar
Bittersweet taste of chasing
Elusive islands of emerald green
Seen as lush vivid images
On their built-in larger-than-life
Mental GPS screens
Programmed to ****** the
Wanderer into the delusion that
They can take extended or even
Permanent excursions far from

The
Great
Gray
Banal
Sea.

Not very long ago this ageless
Boy was forced into settling for
Stark reality.
But he is slowly growing a bit
More comfortable in his own skin.

The grass is still a bit green
But parts are a bit dry
Patchy and crabgrass ridden.

At least it fashionably matches
His soul--
Poetic justice for trading
Most of your life for
The elusive
Obvious.

I still cling tight to my childhood  
In my own non-linear time of
One hundred years ago;

But far too young in linear time
To be residing in
A tired body
Which many define age as
Value was once
Measured by quality not
Quantity

And as those running the track
And roaming free over
Thousands of acres
Of wide-open
Plains as opposed to those
Put out to pasture or waiting
In line

At
The
Glue
Factory
© 2024 Daniel Tucker

Another dance through my life memoir.
The long & winding road in linear &
non-linear time.
Emma Kate Sep 2024
I was wedged between blue leather, scribbling axes into the shape of question marks; and you were laid on blue woven wicker, snoring and many miles away.
Now, I am sinking into fluffy blue polyester; and you are sleeping on a table carved of icy blue steel.
It is strange, isn't it?
I did not know you then, I will never know you now.
Reflections of childhood bubbling after a death in the family.
C Sep 2024
I like to stare at the blinds until faces start appearing in the fabric. Smiles, noses, eyes-
they all jump out and morph into one. When they start mouthing things to me, that’s when I tend to look away. Sometimes, I look for faces in the shadows of objects lying around the house.
There’s a particularly amusing silhouette of what could well be queen Victoria that
pokes out behind the curtain ruffles. I go
looking for her sometimes on purpose, because I know she’ll be there and it’s
something to be certain of.

If I could inject a feeling into my body every day, it would be that of certainty.
I fear I am an addict to the art of prediction and delusion,
so much so that I have developed an intolerance to uncertainty.
My therapist would like that I’m using that,
that’s one of her favourite lines.
I live my whole life in a recurring conspiracy. I firmly believe things are going to happen and am genuinely shocked when
they inevitably don’t.

But there is something so tantalising about allowing myself to drink up an illusion of certainty.
I like the control and
I love the power it convinces me of.
My ducks are unruly and stubborn and not all accounted for
Chelsea Quigley Jun 2024
From child to adult,
We learn to flee.
Away from home,
And to the sea.
From the wings of our guardians,
We fly among the rest.
To our own creation,
Away from our nest.
Flying is hard,
Terror pollutes the air.
Leaving me burdened,
Alone,

And ever so scared.
C Jun 2024
My first cigarette was at twelve years old,
under the climbing frame,
after my turn on the monkey bars.

My mate told me not to do it-
he tried to take it off me but
was too late.
I’ve been trying to quit ever since.
Soon after, that little climber
discovered cider, yearned
for something wider and
ended up with alcohol poisoning by
the end of the year.

My first stand-up gig was Lee Mack.
I was 13.
I sat right at the back on the balcony and revelled in the
happy faces below me.
Ending with a slow motion impression of Eric Morecambe,
I could’ve sworn it was the fastest hour of my life.
I can’t believe I was
So naïve.

When I sat my first exam at sixteen,
an hour seemed a minute.
Crash forward to A-levels and I
was being examined in a
therapist’s office-
how the tables had turned.
Ticking boxes to be assessed and there’s no way I can
pass this test because a
high score can only mean
very bad things.

How can life be so virile, yet so lacking and sterile?

I was told I’d find myself at uni
But I’ve ended up losing myself at twenty.
they grow up so fast
Zywa Jun 2024
Divine help is for

young people, and then they have --


to do it themselves.
Novel "Victory City" [Vijayanagar >> Bisnaga] (2023, Salman Rushdie), part 1: Birth, chapter 5

Collection "Low gear"
Cry me a river
of joy,
she said

I knew she meant it,
by the silence
by the memory of her laughter,
how she poked fun
how she rubbed me down with giggles of mirth,
bellies gyrating with angst
and rambunctious
passion

I knew it

It was not the idea
of her
that scared me,
not anymore
would I think of women
that way

What
it was
that scared me
was how I knew we'd say goodbye
and I'd be okay
for once
okay
and happy she said goodbye...

Happy we didn't shovel moats & forge keeps,
establish plans of attack & surrender
belabor, humming & hawing, over broken treaties,
over civilian casualties
the banishment of civil liberties
and the proverbial
dictatorships of,
"I'm not the problem, so, it MUST be you."

Reply with,
"Yes, it is me."
I knew it,
"I'm sorry!"
Jinx!
Not this time.

This time,
she said goodbye.
And so did I. At least, inside.
And she meant it,
and it was honest.
And so was I. A small comfort.
First of many...

Her goodbye was a kiss that could rival
daydreams
of memories that are
more remixed than the splotches of oil
on a painter's palette,
and,
more dibbled and dabbled, than ten playlists of slow jams,
in my arsenal of hopeless stratagems,
bearing the desperate subtext of,
'park your rear end
where I can't begin to ask honestly.'

Because,
honestly,
if this weren't goodbye,
I could only trade this goodbye,
for ten thousand "Hello's"
whose end and beginning are lost to the tides of status quo,
of forget me nots
and anniversaries,
and picture frames
of days where we forgot what 'goodbye' meant,
because we learned to speak the truth...

And isn't it the truth,
that goodbye,
was so much sweeter than,
I can't stand,
how much we fought for a t-shirt
that eponymously said,
"I cried over spilt milk, and all I got was this t-shirt."
because none of us know
the name of the game,
but we know we hate playing it
Sometimes, it's not meant to be.
And that's so perfect :)

Enjoy! :D
neth jones Feb 2024
. clean giddy winter day
  my five year old ;
“The moon’s following me !”
  ally with the world surround
  when did i unlearn this bond ?
tanka style version

notes :

'the moon's following me'
my five year olds delight
a clear winter day
an only child  stalked by the moon
the importance he feels
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