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L B Jul 2018
An early evening gust
broke the back of the day's blaze
Still 90 degrees at eight
in orange haze
Sweat runs down my neck
Through the gorge between my *******
The wind lifts my linen shirt
runs its hands along my sides
reviving memory
of Forest Park
of a blanket in the grass

Where the pines trace
so many faces
Crackling popping kids
stolen matches, running
screaming victorious!
Blowing tin cans up with fire crackers
Bicycles, sparklers, fireworks at dusk
That whole afternoon
I spent hammering caps

Noise really makes us kids
really
especially
annoying

Mom wants us out!
Gone! All of us!
No needs. No excuses!
No cookies! No slices of bologna!
“No more Kool Aid!
Out now!
Out!”

That evening I tried
to dismiss the itchy sweat
of stupid-sister-Suzy-matching-sun-suits
at Gino's family picnic
When some kid
(I don't know?)
between the rigatoni and the sweet corn
Some kid
tosses a sparkler
into box of fireworks
I don't know?
whether to cry or laugh
I was pretty scared
Rockets going off across the lawn
and onto porch
Craze of colors through the trees
Some at eye-level horror!
But the sight of Aunt Nedda
diving under picnic table
Stockings, garter belt upended
Capsized beyond her caring
of uplifted dress

Some images just stay with you, ya know?

July 4th always lands for me
on a firework's ***
"Caps"  are little red rolls of gunpowder dots, originally made to give a snap to toy guns of the 1950s.  We figured out that by layering them and using a hammer, you could get a bigger crack.
McKala Hanes Sep 2018
Outside of a bar in a North Carolina strip mall, stone cold sober because I am scared to use my fake, I feel drunk as you sit next to me. Perhaps I am. I'd have to be to think maybe, maybe, maybe, when I know, I know, I know.

Your hand brushes against mine, and you're saying the most beautiful words I've ever heard, and the fire in my heart spreads up, down, left, right. But it cannot spread just four inches outside of my body. It cannot set you on fire, too.

We listen to each other and hear two very different things. You are birdsong outside of my window that I am eager to hear; I am traffic outside of your window you've learned to tune out at bedtime.  

If there are nine million bicycles in Beijing, then Beijing is my insides and bicycles are your name, because it is written on my insides nine million times. But there are no bicycles on Antarctica. There is no use for them there, just as there's no use for my name to be perched on a straight girl's ribs.

You tell me my weird hobby of listening to French rap music is awesome, that it's so cool that I'm teaching myself three languages, and that you want to be me when you grow up - I laugh, because you're several years older than me. Selfishly I catch every droplet of your praise.  I ruminate on it for hours, for days. It means more to me than it should.

My name sounds like a compliment from your mouth. I try not to say yours too often, so you don't grow tired of me being around. If I can't set your insides on fire, I want you to want to be my friend. Even that feels like I ask for too much.

In every scene, I see you in the foreground of the narrative. For me, it would be on honor to be one of your background characters. Narratives are richer with them anyway.

I look at you and you are the Harry Potter movie marathon I wait months for. For you, I am the 2 am infomercial you fell asleep to. But I don't mind half as much as I should. Even white noise has its place in someone's life.
enjoy this poem about a one-sided summer not romance not between a bi girl and a a straight girl
samasati Oct 2013
big sweaters, ghibli, acrylic paint, cafes, knit blankets and unplanned afternoon naps on the couch, gardens, bananas, vanilla almond milk, soft yarn to crochet into ****** scarves, candles after midnight, the big trees with bulky roots, patio furniture, pianos in random buildings, the internet, manatees, the boundless colours of nail polish, peanut butter & honey, rubber boots, pens that write well, fresh new notebooks, skylights, american netflix, mothers that understand, tête à têtes, one glass of sweet white wine, awkward eye contact that turns into comfortable kissing, airplanes, fresh air, baseball caps, the female collective, the really good dark chocolate, flowers, pumpkin spice lattes and ***** chai lattes, candid laughter, yoga, oceans, high waisted shorts, striped t-shirts, docile cats, playful pups, french presses, integrity, sunscreen, meerkats, penguins, chameleons, autumn leaves, fall fashion, ruby woo mac lipstick, osho, dynamic meditation, compassion, siblings, scrambled eggs, smart phones, garageband, metronomes, hot glue guns, quinoa, ferry boats, soft hands, bicycles, real people, fat snowflakes in ample, graceful *******, backpacks that don't hurt your shoulders, hair conditioner, multi-vitamins, soft sand under bare feet, people that own up to lies, clarity, samsara, satori, samasati, visions, echinacea, lavender oil and frankincense, ambrosia apples and ripe avocados, authenticity, Morgan Freeman's voice, good kissers, *******, iced tea on a hot day, curtains, the smell of beeswax, art galleries, hand massages and foot massages, reiki, plums, mild thunderstorms, soccer *****, good surprises, when birds don't **** on your head.
I wrote this with my momma one fine morning!
there is always so much more to add.
Connor Jul 2016
And it's difficult to remember something as the very name of Eisenhower
Or flowerbaskets
And tired movies made of silicone and
Aftersex
Or sixteen candles echoing out of an imaginary suite with cigarettes at every table
And green lawns
Barbershop conversation
The reflection of the sun in special trees
Or my best friend Jesus Christ
Or the smell of the theater that one day with the cynics who just got back from a tennis match and barbwire still laced delicately around their thoughts and
Nihilism
And automotives
And priestess Jane or Henry's gloomy doppelganger who reads alternative magazines and loves the aesthetics behind broken glass
And fine tuned musical instruments

It's difficult to remember
Lonesome Fridays smoking on a park bench trying to finish the puzzle
Or synagogues you've never been in
Or insurance
Or newspaper articles detailing the misadventures of Mr. City
(Of course of course! Take your shoes off at the door and make yourself at home)
We're tossing all our sewage into the ocean
that's far from clean as it
LOOKS anymore these days
That's anything
And everything except for the glowing mountains seen faded and wintry behind Apartments and the
"Glorious Mexican House of Spices"
Never been in there either

It's difficult to remember
Times of Mr Twin Sister
Or Joan Jett in the hallway
In a highschool who's psychology classrooms have become a time capsule in the ground/
Or the gentle skinny ******
Wearing Broadway makeup and
Kafka tattooed on his shoulder
I like his hat
He looks at me suspiciously
Or the guy who is yelling his order at the counter when it's quiet here anyways
Or the mariner who has a hobby of the saxophone
Or 1970s *******
Or the sheepskin bikeseat fad that's yet to come but I'm predicting it now!
Or two dollars and twentyseven cents at the beginning of Allen Ginsberg's America
"I've given you all and now I'm nothing"

It's difficult to remember
The Oriental
Sacramento flies
Midnight Moon
Quarter to four
"The Immortalization Commission"
Remodelled hotels downtown
Where mandalas on the floor became a
Tiger lily luminous
And the kimono is yesterday's painting/
Dearest Darling
When I was feeling down!
A staircase in reverse (??)
The sound a kiss makes
It's difficult to remember
Colleen's earrings
Or Washington State
Or air conditioners in Bali
The Indian ocean's daybreak hymn
To Seminyak
Or whatever happened to Steve from the Airplane out of Taiwan
On 3 days awake
Hello Kitty nursing stations
****** (Kubrick's version)
Cardboard taking up half my bedroom
It's difficult to remember until I jot it down and then its a sudden forever
Sunshine Superman in a cafe spontaneous
drawings with someone I just met who has some ******* attitude/
Who hops fences and has feral ideas
People! En Masse! Te Amo!
You're all in wolven liberty
And vague postulators
And holy prostitutes for the dollar
Sad eyed intellectuals
With undergarments made of breakfast cereal/
Seaferry poetry is different from
Trestle in August poetry
Or henna handshakes
Or the Napoleonic era
Sweet Cherry Pie
The tulip's tongue
Garabajal
Cloudy first day of July
Was hotter yesterday
But not too hot

It's difficult to remember
Antiquity
The pale horse Studebaker outside the clinic
With a glossy red trim and **** I wish that was my ride
Andy Warhol's exploding plastic inevitable
Nearsightedness
Angels and their ability to shower with a a snap of their fingers
Distant harp music
Better him than me
Bananas almost ripe
Green aquatic
Reclusive junkies
Palomo's appliances
Questions for the next time
How much I like what you like and how I like that you like what I like
Ahh that's not my bus
I'm trying to get to the city!
That one quote Socrates is known for about knowing nothing as true wisdom
Supermarkets being built on top of liquor stores burned down a while back
Monopolies
Tragedies
"No Love Lost"
THE HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL
Your guess is as good as mine
Never tried to eat Asian food in Asia
It was all pasta and good cider that tasted like pineapple
Rain hitting the window and I'm
Drowsy again
God Save The Trees!
Curly hair looks good on boys
Torn up blinds
Queer as a three dollar bill
If Bill costs 3 dollars I'm sure he's caught something better safe than sorry
Sage advice
I'm the very model of a modern major general
Golden yen and international currency
Incense in the bedroom and how good it smells
There's my bus! Applying for a better job than the one I got now
But that's how it always is right?
Chasing satisfaction
1007 apt
Porch ornaments
Unique names
Unique style le style
The extra charge on foreign ATMs
Cordoroy polo shirts
Flooding in New York!
When someone's face screams *******
"Slippery when wet"
Dine N Dash
Grass gone yellow
Confidence in dyed hair and capes as long as wedding gowns
But less expensive
Doors that always seem to be locked and I'm wondering 20 year later what's behind them?
Albino animals
White thoughts as clouds or
Abstractions
Weathers nicer in Florida but who cares
Festivities this early in the day
Automatopeia
Do sad orphanages still exist?
Just like the movies
Midnight in mirrors
That sick puppet at the shoe shop used
To know how to really hammer it down
And now he's weak and forgotten
Never heard the words of a true prophet only Oceania
Or the private temple near Apollo Bay
Like Japanese gardens behind that gate
Will I ever see it
Make a proud example outta ya misbehavior
Form without function
Exhausted spiritualism
*** Kettle Black
negative photographs of dark rooms
And there's laughing coming from SOMEWHERE
Essays on kleptomania
Had a bad dream I became a cliche
Surrounded by other freaks and there was a lovely ***** I fell in love with her
We married in Oregon by the sea her name was rosy
***** rosy
Check your mailbox for nails
And what you don't wanna hear/
If you were a vegetable you'd be organic!
Empire
Satirical bubble gum
Satori
Linda Lovelace and her special party trick
That's someone's fantasy
Diamond in the rough
Mister guy with two black eyes frequents the adult playhouse
Hes fully stocked on fishnet leggings
He's too proud to put them on himself but
Has nobody else around
Boo hoo
Swigs back the whiskey and trips down the stairs getting a third black eye in the process
Marion came by with her dog the other day
Wanted her box of clothes back but he loved to sniff them to remember her
But she wouldn't have it

"Honey I'm going to call the police!"

"Ah they don't give a **** they have bigger things to worry about"

"Yeah you got that right shrimp **** enjoy my unwashed *******"

And she never came back again
He started losing the vertebrae in his spine 1 by 1 and you know where this is going
I won't say he was a poor man because he had it all coming to him the *******
But he coulda had a better start if you ask me.

It's difficult to remember
And even more difficult to forget
After the fact

Seagull opera
Giganticism
Portrait of the artist as a young man
Losing one's pencil when the best idea of your life drops down from heaven and into your sorry head
Signs graffitied to have funnier meanings
Cruelty
Impassive
The Loyal Lioness
And Bangladesh has too many kitchens
And not enough dishes
When I was young I used to say Island as "is-land"  
Which is true it is land
But the Europeans probably stole it from somebody else anyways/
I left my future behind
And objects in the mirror are closer than they appear
Im no illusionist
I'm terrified of the cracken
Father feels the same way about
Hotels
Why bother/
This has been going on and on for a while are you tired yet
Is your patience being tested
Mine isn't because this wasn't an all-at-once kind of rambling
It's extremely important to laugh at least
Once a day
Otherwise you'll find yourself a politician
In no time at all
Rockefeller
(         ) Quaint home to die in
I think
Trains create great music
Float on
Sink into yourself
Roses in a crooked alley
That's people
Busy busy busy busy
Let's describe a situationist
I'm not a fan of bright colors on clothes
Your best shade is blue
Bricklayers transcription of Don Quixote to a skyscraper
Rocket thyme
& Garden
Erratic children's
Insomnia
The doorbell repeatedly
Vancouver riots/ I saw that live on the news!
Pictionary with the surrealists
N Dada TV set MC Escher
Antenna
You're in the Twilight Zone now
Dear Ramona
I'm trying to make it up to you
With a brightness only seen when you're ready to see it so please for the love of God don't blame me when it's not appearing
The tapestry hidden
Keep your blankets clean
And avoid hospitals unless you're fine with fishbowls & the halogen
The water gestapo
Storage lockers full of unacted plays and
Antique microwaves
Emitting the nostalgia of the cold war era
And what a waste of time that was /
Walter Wanderleys presence in Autumn universities
The opening of Vivre sa Vie
Salvador Dali's pluvial taxi
Lightbulb epiphanies
Aquariums and their protestors
Zebras in the shade
Two wrongs dont make a right
Elizabethan theater
Saloon shootouts in a fever dream
I lost and bled out all over the rustic wooden floor
A maiden reached out for me and El Paso did play I woke up and pretended nothing happened/
Funerals for bad People who did bad things
My first memory of a cat beneath the mattress
Hello Dolly!
Auditory learning
Psychotherapy
Lillian the landlady lost her ladle and labeled little Lyle as a lair
The Black panther movement
Reading symposium some years ago and
Making note that Phaedo was still my favorite dialogue/
Zen Buddhism
Xoxo xoxo
The day Gypsies were replaced with
Surface ****** appetite
And not the real thing
Newspaper clippings
Hypnotism when all other options are out
Mystical visions of sidewalks
And the love of your life stepping through a door you've never seen
Maybe Yes No I Don't Know
Creature comforts
Che Guevara's problem is that his beard made him too easy to recognize
(Also that little hat!)
Chinese cough medicine didn't work
For long I still wheeze sometimes
Domestic violence thru the wall
Ceiling fan probably doesn't even work!
Dimpled laughter
Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
In skytrains to Commercial
Bermuda in her mind
And courtesy in her voice
I'm no Arthur Rimbaud
But you already knew that
Alcazar of Seville
Filling up the shipbottle
Here's your paradise
Now relinquish it as it is
False!
Hare Krishna
Nowhere Fast
El Diablo and the
Portofino loaf left rotting on the countertop
Latin children speak of the sacred viper
You'll hear of it after this but we'll never see what the ******* meant
Heads alternating round the social current
Of my lively city
There's a dog soaking up the rain
And songs are made in honor of
Recent catastrophes
Trials are dealt
Cards cast to the gutter
New York quiets down for the news of another war
You scratch my back I'll scratch yours
Skeleton key
Ballad of the last wailing zoo
THE ATRIUM
Complexity in simplicity
That's how Brainard got me!
Elderly overcoats
Hiding purest LSD
Is a fan of Hawaiian T shirts
And a communist
What if I was a Freemason
Or owned a tanning salon
Faint crimson
What did Marv look like again?
"You're surrounded by people who love you"
Coffee when one needs it
GOODBYE BLUE MONDAY
Tattoos on the wandering man
Oriental chimes and the people who own them
Bus stop regulars
Vines overtaking power lines
The hypnogogic state
Strawberry light softening
The mind
Sister Ray LOUDLY PROCLAIMING
doitdoitdoitdoit
Passing the graffiti n Pluto neon
Halal wide awake another Saturday
Where's the Karaoke
Flashing by here
Those who find comfort in a bridal scavenger hunt
Or expensive beer
And here comes the hooded clown
Clamoring about his favorite
Loudspeaker
Telling me my time is soon and the noise
Drowns out the drowsy bliss
After hour spirits the perfect time for
Writing and trying to read distant Chinese
Indecision on the tip of the tongue
"NOW WHO IS THAT KNOCKING
ON THE CHAMBER DOOR?
COULD IT BE THE POLICE?"

I'm completely off the topic
And into Apartment lobby photosets
Low battery phone calls
Confessions
Nauseated reverb
Trying to see the attachment people got with bingo halls
And moving companies
Ah no luck again
Eve is at it with her showtunes
Halfway methodology
Triage
Paisley headbands left
Distraught on the quivering
Heater
Dwindling sunsets
We're truly disciples of the moon spirit which grants us more energy
(This is according to a drunk I met one night)
Or ***** old men
When the horizon is engulfed with
A winking cinder
Suitcase at the door
Last time
First time
Magician never reveals his fetishes
(They all have to do with bags under your eyes)
Employment office dramas of my friend the one who blinded a social worker
And the one who blamed Islam
And the one whos philosophy entirely consisted of Spooky Action at a
                                            DISTANCE
Parisian riots
Queer youth
Didn't make the team! Jester
'cross the hall who's beard suggests
Ishmeal n car battery n expired vegetables n rain which crosses the line n
***** cranberry n
Poorly fitted suits n
Harsh pigment n incense shops n
Bocca     secret towns
With churches more beautiful than any you'd find in your own city
n the cultural market
Xylophone ear to ear
Soul cleansing starting at only
$89 (with a 6 month guarantee)
Sophie's birthday and her picnic at Victory Park
The nearby bums trying to sell tea mugs and
Loose wires beside gated convenience stores
I'm an Island away attempting a poem
And never bought a scratch n win
Or heard the same song more than seven times in a row or been in a column
Or escaped the washhouse
Invested in a birdcage for next year
Been to a palm reading
Visited Oasis
Smoked salmon
Told anyone else about Montana
Screamed the things I'd like to scream
** Word of the day
Or kissed a lunatic or swallowed the corpse of yesterday
I keep her on my neck until
I'm too anxious to let go
Counting streetlights
Jeans worn in and faded to be sent off to
A lonely caffeine addict
Christmas Eve I'll be reading a postcard from San Francisco
Asking the same questions
My imagination is made of a different material than last week
Now it's the same color as your hair
HEY that's a good pickup line to use in the heart of the Canadian Embassy
Drinking discarded music resembling a sweater you may have said YES to if it wasn't so unsure of itself
And now Mr. Acker Bilk ascends thru the window of an August home
Like a lazy hornet
I'm still lost without identification
Or a nice belt
As happens when one uses a quality item too casually
How did uphill suddenly seem so downhill?
I'll claim a waterfall
For SALE that inevitable Indonesia
Greyhound O another greyhound O another greyhound
I'm fretting too much about not enough
Delayed the Airport and the yellow question

????

II

What if I knew how to read the curb?
Or translate drunken droll
What if I was never tired again and could
REALLY do anything I set my mind to?
What if I was the first cigarette that cured cancer instead of caused it?
What if I could end superstition
And walk underneath any ladder I wanted?
What if I could make it with a young Audrey Hepburn!?
What if I stopped pretending to be a microphone and got on with "it"
What if the grocery store closed later
And I opened earlier?
What if parking lots werent so sad
All the time?
What if gravity simply had enough of exotic birds and specifics?
What if we stopped trying to recreate what is truly lost?
What if foreign children embraced
Wasting time instead of
Midnight starry bicycles
And the antics of a monk
Disguised as a romantic?

There are those that worship God
And those who worship the Sun
And those who worship nothing at all
But I suppose on the last bus
We're all the same exhausted
Voice who can't wait for next pay day
What is an empty bank?
Or authenticity
What is there to prove anymore?
I hope I don't die tonight and regret
Being impulsive for once
You're a smart shadow
And a dull character
Pushing the last of the daisies
Get the lamp to turn on again
Give the pavement something to look forward to with your walk
Be consistent in being inconsistent
If there's a word there's a ***** and a poem for it!
We all oughta worship
Nothing at all except
Clarity
Compassion with ones neighbor who either forgot the pay the electricity bill or couldn't afford to
We're a swimmin
Written between late June to July 13th.
Kyla Jul 2012
Bicycles and icicles remind me of you.


Cold winter nights
                     feel warm,
              just with the thought of
                            You.

You send my mind
                round and round,
   while you peddle to find solid ground.

Bicycles and icicles don't go well together,
                                          neither do you or me.


But that wont keep me from thinking of you.
Yen Apr 2017
Manila,
Manila,
Your bustling streets vibrate with the rumbling of the jeepneys
and the hollers of the drivers as they say,
“Pasahero diyan, kasya pa, kasya pa!”; (Any passenger there, some seats are still free!)
Your nights twinkle with the Christmas lights
that surround every tree around the Meralco building
when September begins;
Your endless traffic jams keep McDonald’s and KFC alive
twenty-four by seven
where traffic enforcers dodge cars
and vans
trucks and tricycles
and jeepneys and bicycles
while dancing to the rhythm beating in their own ears
with a smile and a salute to all the drivers
from dawn to dusk;

The noise awakens the outskirts of your city
filled with people who never fails to smile
even when the storm pirouettes like a tempestuous ballerina,
where children watch the roads
transform into this ocean of black water
and small wooden boats become the means of transportation;
paddling in between houses
as the adults try to go to work;
where chickens waddling upon roofs
and cats chasing rats
become the best forms of entertainment

but Manila,
your lingering smell of cancer
comes with the dark blue starless sky
telling people to grip their bags until it merges with their bodies.
Manila, say good night
while they hold it tight
protecting it from the dark humid air
where thieves come out to
thumb down unscrutinised objects
from shallow pockets
by the flickering lamps
across the blazing red and emerald green lights


you see less
and less
and less
faces
as the Sun sinks and says good bye.

Stop
and try to tranquilise yourself.

Your city is now lead
by a blood-thirsty leader.
Apologies from gunshots overpower the cries of help from your people.
Manila,
ignore them
and sleep well.
Let the truth decay
while lives burn and vanish.
Prayers cannot save your mutinous ignominy.

Halcyon days are over
but

Manila,
you are still a beautiful city.
Your resilient people
overflows with hospitable hearts.
Their faces plastered with big smiles
as they welcome us for you
and say, “Mabuhay!” (Long live!)
proud and mighty.
Offering their minds on banana leaf plates to everyone who visits,
Giving away their hearts in small loot bags to everyone who leaves,

The Pearl of the Orient Seas
was my hood.

Manila,
despite your lack of snow
and intense weather swings,
You are
and will always be
my home.
witches witches everywhere
how many do you see
there's witches in the garden
hiding in a tree

there's witches playing football
witches having tea
witches walking down the beach
witches swimming in the sea

all around us witches
some are hidden
some are not
i have discovered lately
of witches....there's a lot

witches drinking coffee
witches at the store
witches at the doctors
witches sitting on the floor

witches flying broomsticks
and witches driving cars
witches riding bicycles
witches hiding in the stars

there's witches having picnics
witches playing in the park
witches lighting fireworks
witches dancing in the dark

witches running races
and witches playing games
witches riding horses
with funny witchy names

on hallowe'en the witches
get together, one and all
and while the kids are trick and treating
they watch movies at the mall

there's witches almost everywhere
you have to look and see
now, count up all the witches
did you get the same as me?
kids picture book with witches all over the place....a counting-coloring book concept
Raj Arumugam Oct 2014
She’s riding her bike
the wind’s on her cheeks
and hair
She’s got no worries
no care, cause she’s
riding easy on her bike

Rachel comes on her bicycle
down the street and
she sways with a smile;
she can go steady or she
can show off, as she pleases,
on her happiness bike

off her bicycle
she loses her smile
she frowns, she does not talk
but O -
she’s a goddess, she’s Venus
she’s all radiance
when she’s on happiness bike

she’s in her red top today:
her ******* decent
but talkative;
her *** is composed -
and O, as always
Rachel is glowing
on her happiness bicycle
we know it all:
angels come on bicycles now

She’s riding her bike
the wind’s on her cheeks
and hair
She’s got no worries
no care, cause she’s
riding easy on her bike
Tommy N Oct 2010
~for my father~*

I.

My neighbor Dave
had a hose in his hand,
standard garden, green,
almost like a movie.

His driveway was bright black
the white rocks of our backyard
meant something, standing so close.

Always moving so fast toward another
direction. The memory of the flowers
at sunset, when I learned what the word
“bloom” meant. It wasn’t real.

We used the hose to freeze water
over the rocks in the winter.
This was our sliding,
our skitting into older.

That Christmas
all I wanted was a bicycle.
The house gave up no secrets.
Closer and closer to Christmas,
I found so many presents.
I never found the bicycle.

This was how to measure love

I went to bed so angry that year,
lost in thoughts of running
to a world of backyard ice and bicycles.

In the morning when I saw it,
they confessed Dave’s involvement
He had hidden the bicycle.
Dave’s smile became
something else after that.

I learned to ride slowly,
tumbled down a hill
in blood and tears.
My father carried me home
and our bikes. I’ve never known
how he did it.


II.

Years later and later still.
I don’t know what happened
to that bicycle. It was black
fading easily.

Even though I likely lost it
in the first eviction,
or maybe the second,
the third. I don’t think I left it
after the fire. Maybe I still dream of it.

Later still. I stopped speaking
to my father. It was both our faults.
We both blamed someone
else for three years.

When I saw him again
he was fatherly. Unusual.
He wanted to make sure I was okay.
He wanted to make sure I had everything
I needed. I told him I needed
food and a bicycle. We went out
to get these together. He smiled.

In the dreams,
People come with whips
in pickup trucks. They carry
My childhood away
like a so-frightened horse.
In the dreams,

this time, the bicycle was red.
I don’t think of him when I ride it.
I hardly think of him.

This is how you measure love.

Those were the dreams where we ride off
childhood friends and I.
We ride off to where it is red, blooming red.
Written 2010 during the English program at Augustana College.
Coop Lee Apr 2014
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                america, americultus, americate, dubiously *******.
::: our gold-flecked bodies.
blackbirdian danceparty, i'll go.
washed-up beach bottles and all our feet amongst them curling time.
teens dream in orchid; they wait for stars and dark and los hombres of good dust.
they wait on eyes, and on embers, on belly belly.
jellyfish flashlight shrine.
we eat acid and strawberries and butter in the cemetery,
and feed foxes lizards face first :::
                us lost ghouls on school-nights.

                flash tag jazz, and yellow bicycles.
::: that hot eternal light.
that candy colored smoke don't smoke; go south on her body.
then thoughts form thoughts form action, form twangs all tuned to air.
& we, as notes, we notes harp like light
to dust.
our glistering hormonal thrusts beneath sheath of liquid love. her eyes,
with those multi-speckled strands
infinitesimally drunk :::
                seed from my ****.

                pearled halo: smoke above my head.
::: waves and machines and weekends. filtered by the long ****
of existence.
boys wait in rooms of hotels for more drugs, and the girls bringing them.
like caterpillars on silky thin treadways,
with nothing but the flavor of our passions to ignite the way. we
exacerbate the boundaries of our intentions. we
curl under sheets, bending sheets of light and sound. we
flakey emaciated flakes. [sequence suffered time in motion] we
                dirt. it’s what we are; dirt.

                we are druggernauts, tasting ourselves along the iridescent brim.
::: we crawl up cross-glowing hillsides toward portals and faraway
bleep-blorps of hot god-head calibration.
we sticky-crackle go burn. [nature puzzles]
the brain shifts back; twenty-one grams they say the soul weighs.
they say things.
cherry blossom tree tips in the dark.
tele-portal surfing with an intergalactic pizza priest, and his satchel of secret sauce.
he heaves in the corner; rebirth :::
                tendrils pulled tight, everybody **** chung…
previously published in the Whole Beast Rag
http://www.wholebeastrag.org/othello-wolf/
thegirlwhowrites Jan 2015
I have not grown accustomed
to the sound of your messages.
Their presence did little to assure,
nor did their absence cause unsettling.
Today, however,
I must admit
that I have waited for that bell.
My heart salivated
at the sound of passing bicycles,
hoping finally it was you
remembering the love
you have left waiting.
I wonder:
How could you have conditioned me
to anticipate something
that has never been constant anyway?

for j.e.
*013115
DJ Thomas Jun 2010
Cycle chic fashion
Our slow bicycle movement
Poetry in bike lanes
Sartorialist's on two wheels
reclaiming **** cities*

.
copyright©[email protected] 2010

http://www.slowbicyclemovement.org/2010/02/bicycles-and-poetry-in-lisbon.html
Don Bouchard Feb 2019
It's June, 1967.
Nature, still lying through
Parsley green teeth,
Breathes the last of spring,
Hints early summer warmth,
Pre-July's cicada whine,
August's heat and wind.

Crops, still tender green
Quiver beneath a humid sky,
Under a glowing sun.

Bicycles amuse our early lust
To soar untraveled ground,
Entering lazy summer's ennui,
We scan a hawk riding drafts
On the edge of our hill.

Dust, drifting up the graveled road,
Five miles below us,
Piques our interest,
Causes the dog to raise his head.
He ***** an ear
Toward a sound we cannot hear.

We hear gravel slapping rocker panels
Before the traveler's roof rises into view,
Catch our breath as the engine slows,
Start running for the house.

A stranger's arrived,
A traveling salesman,
Better than an aunt
Only stopping in for tea
And woman talk.

Dad keeps his welding helmet down,
Repairing broken things.
The hired man inhales his cigarette,
Acts disinterested.

My memories linger on the past....

Salesmen brought the latest farming gadgets:
Additives for fuel and oil,
Battery life extenders,
Grain elevators and fencing tools,
Produce and livestock products,
Lightning rods and roofing,
Chrome-edged cultivator shovels,
Insurance for everything:
Fire, water, wind, hail.

Pitches came without exception:

"Top o' the morning! Looks like you're busy.
Don't want to take your time."

"Looks like you could use some welding rod,
And I have something new for you to try."

"Have you used chromium additive in you livestock salt?
Guaranteed to put on weight and protect from bovine
Tuberculosis!"

"Say, have you heard about the effectiveness of a new
Insecticide called DDT? I've got a sample gallon here
For you to try. Works better than Malathion!"

Dad, eventually intrigued, began the slow dance
Of dickering, haggling over this thing or that.
Most salesmen, closing in for a ****,
Hadn't grappled with my father.

At noon, deals still in the air,
My mother called the men,
And we all trudged in to wash,
Waiting in line at the tub,
Scrubbing with powdered Tide
To remove the grime and grease,
Drying on the darkening towel,
Finding a seat at the table.

The salesmen expected the meal
As though it were their right,
A standing invitation:
Stop in at noon,
Make your pitch,
Sit at table,
Close the deal after.

We boys sat and listened
To man talk.
Eyes wide, we marveled
At gadgets,
Wondered at Dad's parleying,
Winced at the deals he drove,
Commiserated with squirming salesmen
Surely made destitute by Dad's hard bargaining.

In retrospect,
I know the game was played
On two sides,
That the battery additives
Bought for five dollars a packet,
Even with the two Dad finagled free,
Cost about five dollars for everything,
Returned forty-five and change
To the smirking, full-bellied salesman
Who left a cloud of dust on his way
To supper a few miles down the road.
We don't see traveling salesmen anymore at the ranches in Montana. I guess internet sales did them in.
Emanuel Martinez Mar 2014
The revolution will not take place in McDonald’s
Born out of lethargic, flaky or fickle bodies

Words and actions, powerful ammunitions
But vessels, our bodies, control those manifestations
An armament, the body
Matter without which revolution cannot happen

Us who struggle, while we waste away
Those invested in maintaining power and privilege
Don’t only safeguard their money
They protect their bodies too
And only that of the offspring
Invested in perpetuating power and privilege

They not only monopolize learning and leadership
As mechanisms of dominance and control
They run and eat to fuel that constant fight

Man, wealthy or poor
May give into the vise of fast food and intoxication
But those invested in control
Conscious of power and privilege are no fools
Fortified not only by lawyers and henchmen
But by doctors, fitness trainers, fresh harvests
Having the choice and access to fresh produce

Us colored children from the hoods, the barrios
Our moms, or dads, or single parents
Working month to month
Frustrated because we don't eat fruit and vegetables
Instead eating frozen, canned, chemically enhanced
Microwaveable dinners and junk foods

Skinny, chubby, or obese
Eating our twinkies, doritos, and coke
Can’t even run a block without running out of breath
Diabetes, heart disease, cholesterol, asthma, obesity
Not even looming in the back of our minds

We need youth to represent our communities
We need youth to fight for our communities
We need youth whose minds and stomachs are filled
Not with fodder and capitalist waste
But with food, ideas that fill them, fuel them
Not out of a temporary desire for satisfaction
Rather a prolonged political exercise to fortify themselves
As agents of a transformative process in the world

Frozen, canned, chemically enhanced lunches at school
Soda fountains, fried food, fast food, junk food
May always be subsidized, marketed, made affordable
To be part of your breakfast, lunch and or dinner

Still never reject an apple, orange or pear
Those with power and privilege
May not even have to think about
Their regimented diets
With endless fruits available to them

But for us, a single fruit made available to us
Has to be a daily reminder
An act of defiance
To chose to strengthen our bodies with it

A slippage of those invested in our chains
When the owners of industry
Have socialized us to think
Coca cola, pizza, and burgers
Are parts of our cultural identity
A modern industrialized upgrade
Our diet decisions driven by capitalist consumerism

There may be no specialized fitness trainers
Expensive equipment
Lush parks, jogging tracks, bicycle lanes, or bicycles
In our neighborhoods
But there is a space right next to your bed
Or a piece of floor where you live
And you have your body
Just do a few jumping jacks, push ups, sit ups

You need to have the patience and love
To protect and fortify not only your mind
But your body
To know that the more you fortify yourself
The more you are going to be able to fight exploitation
The more you are going to protect and fight
The ones you love, and even the ones
You won’t even realize you have saved as a result

We may not always have the access to healthy food
But we have the choice to request it collectively
In educational spaces and to take the initiative to exercise
March 25, 2014
Bjørn O Holter Apr 2014
Once upon a time was a girl named Candy
Sweet as a flower and loved all so much.
She was granted a wish by a fairy named Mandy
that turned into candy all that she touched.

The town was filled with the sweets of Candy
the rocks and the houses and bicycles too.
Candy would say that the world was just dandy!
parading the streets in her candy suede shoes.

But everything ends and also for Candy
when all that she touched would turn into sweets.
Realising a candy-lover's not handy
she walked alone on candy-cobbled streets.

And loneliness came like a night over Candy
crying skittles she soon went insane.
She cursed the wish she was granted by Mandy
as she crumbled and cracked like a candy cane.

For the rest of the year the children ate candy
the rocks and the houses and bicycles too.
The children would say that the world was just dandy
and the last sweet they shared was a candy suede shoe.
this poem has been sitting in one of my notebooks for quite some time without making much fuzz. I just remember it as something fun to write in a nursery rhyme-style and with a cute and simple rhyme scheme.
Rewind this memoir back to my first foster home.   I’m reclining on the couch in the living room watching Superman, a whatever's-on-tv-saturday-afternoon-movie.   "Give A Little Bit" played from the soundtrack.  The Supertramp song reached out from the screen and into my own complicated teen-aged life.  Oh the words of that song blindsided me, hit me hard in the chest with a sad yearning, an emotion I had ignored forever like that elephant in the room too big to push out the door.  Because life was so hard, too hard, and lonely on and on, and the world gives only just enough that you keep breathing, but you wonder why.  Yes, please  someone  give just a little....
But at the time I hadn't known anything else and I just stuffed that overwhelming sad lonely feeling.  Too much need wears out a welcome in someone else's home.  It seemed most everyone else had family, security, some money for perhaps things like a pair of cleats to run in school track if you have the desire. Its called belonging or opportunity and I was acutely aware I wouldn't have it.

Fast forward 25 years; business for my glass art studio is rewarding.  I live in Cleveland, or what I called Purgatory.  I like the city though; I think the motto should be "Its Not That Bad."  A tough steel town, unpretentious to a fault, tenacious, it inspired the Clean Water Act because the river was so polluted it   caught   on   fire.  People who live there just don't quit, except that the biggest export is young people. The streets are eerily empty, the quiet steel mills are epic sculptures of rust.  But its not that bad.  Now they make a tasty beer called Burning River.  Sometimes they gamble on unconventional ideas because they've reached the end of status-quo.  One can even surf there, when the wind blows a Nor'easter in the fall, just before the lake freezes. The wave break is nicknamed "Sewer Pipe"; one can imagine why.

I biked with a club there; cycling part of my life-blood.  Life was pretty good, blessed with measures of contentment and happiness and family, even through so many challenges.  Except I'm stuck pedaling a trainer in the basement most of the long winter.  It was during an endless, gray February that I was inspired by an idea: a Velodrome.  Its one of those banked tracks people in America only see during the Olympics.  Cover it, and people could have a bicycle park all year-round with palm trees in the winter, in Cleveland.  Its a blast of a sport with serious American heritage.  A velodrome is a place where all a kid has to do is show up and with enough heart he or she can make it to the Olympics.  They wouldn't need money, just 100% heart.  It would be the kind of opportunity I didn't have when I was a kid.

So I decided to take on the responsibility to build one... not to be afraid of the price tag, or how to do it, or let a label like "disabled veteran with a head injury" daunt me.  I figured my role was to get the project started and motivate others to do other parts.  I decided not to discuss my shortcomings, introduce myself with that label, or use it as a disclaimer.   As many times as I wished I had a chalkboard sign around my neck saying, Please excuse the mess, I had to tell myself it was not an excuse.
There would need to be many others; but the fact that I knew only a dozen people on the planet didn't stop me either.  Two people inspired me.  Kyle MacDonald had a dream to barter a paper clip for something better, trading that for something else, anything else, until he had a house.  I thought I could start with an old laptop, a couple thousand dollars, and my idea. I'd work to leverage each bit of progress, not knowing what they were yet.  Thats how anything gets done, right?  Erik Weihenmayer is a blind alpine mountain climber, conquering even Everest.  He didn’t let anyone convince him what he couldn’t do, and didn’t let impairments keep him from his goal.  He didn't let blindness, the fact that he couldn't see the top as well as others, make the goal any less enjoyable for himself.  Also, there’s no way he could have done it without help.

There are no business plans for a Velodrome or someone else would have built more of them already.  I'm good at figuring things out, what with having to relearn things all the time.  I don't quit because that has never seemed to be an option.  Resourcefulness is my middle name, having to put my life back together every year or so.  Certainly the project was eccentric but as an artist I've never really cared about what others thought.  I certainly didn't have a reputation for sanity to maintain.  Professionally, I’ve had experience with so many factors of development: from paperwork at the back end as a Project Assistant, to designing it as a Mechanical Drafter, to constructing it as a Steel Detailer.  I understood this project.

Every time I discovered something needed to be done, I'd figure out how to do it.  I took an online tutorial and put together a website, attended communication seminars for better speaking skills, learned how to recruit a Board of Directors, took classes for fundraising, won a few grants, and started a non-profit.  I had to buy a couple of suits for meetings.  I kept hoping someone who knew what they were doing would take over, but that never seemed to materialize.  What I thought would be a few months turned into several hard years of work, learning new things on the fly like politics, business etiquette, computer programs, how to understand and write financials and business plans for stadiums.

It felt like cramming for finals, taking exams for classes I never attended.  I didn’t just burn my candle on both ends, I was torching it in the middle too.  Every challenge I had ever gone through seemed like it was a preparation for this one.  Many times I wondered if it was all for nothing; so many dead ends and frustrations and years where the project was barely on life-support.  Mistakes and wrong turns making people mad, losing faith in me.  Would it ever really happen?  I kept imagining what my bike wheels would look like under my handlebars as if I was ridiing on the track, listening to the same particular songs on my ipod for motivation.

A small tangent here, a digression back to the fifth grade and my favorite teacher.  He was about as tall as his students.  Mr.A (our nickname for Mr. Anderson) was a barrel-chested little person but I didn't notice it till years later because he was so cool.  He was the first teacher, the first person actually, who encouraged me to be myself.  I was a little kid, a couple years advanced and bright enough to be skipped again.  Tthat would have been ridiculous since I was already too small.  I would get my work done early in class, and he would let me spend time doing whatever, encouraging my creativity.  I distinctly remember making little scale models of parks out of construction paper.  I would start by making a rectangular tray, and then fill it in with ponds, benches, and oval or figure-8 tracks for bicycles, elevated roller-coaster paths for walking.  It was my way of creating a whimsical place that felt good in my difficult life.  No lie, I was building bicycle tracks when I was 9.  That memory faded away until I was several years into the actual Velodrome project, trying create a light-hearted park on the edge of a ghetto.  This was my life's ultimate Art Project; made with wood, steel, and tenacity.  It made me wonder about a life's purpose... still just a what if... but cruel if there wasn't anything to it.

There is a necessary role for the dreamer.  Visionaries help to break status quo, introduce new solutions.  Sorting through the banal with unique perspective, the random is reassembled into intriguing newness.  What is creative nature?  Is it obsession to improve things, the need for approval, resourcefulness within limits, or perspective outside boundaries?   Is it tenacity to the point of obsession, focus to the point of selfishness?  

Thankfully, a few devoted people did take over after a few years and worked hard to raise the serious money.  In 2012, Phase 1 of the Cleveland Velodrome opened to the public.  Presently they are raising funds for Phase 2 to cover it.   By chance I was there the day the track was finished and got a chance to ride it.  All I wanted to do was one thing: listen to those songs on my ipod and see my wheels under the handlebars on the track... in reality.  I didn't want to race or be recognized at some celebration.  I just wanted to ride a few laps, happy just to have a role in building it.  In less than a year there are already training programs, youth cycling classes, and teams competing.  Through community grants and volunteers, its all free to anyone under 18.  

Not to be forgotten, some thanks should go to one supportive teacher who helped a scrappy kid dream.    Schools measure math and science so valuable, for good reason.  But this favors one brain’s side of thinking.  Initiating and working for the construction of an urban renewal project and improving a neighborhood is traceable to the exact same idea assembled with clumsy school scissors, white glue, and construction paper, during 5th grade free time.

I can't wait to hear the news of some tough kid from East Cleveland getting to the Olympics.
Olivia Kent Feb 2015
Amsterdam,
Oh Amsterdam.
The lingering bells of a multitude of bicycles.
Clinging to the misty air.
Carefree.
Careless.
Canal flows past.
Upon which dances sunlight.
A bundle of sparkles.
It's early morning in-situation.
The ladies of night, are still sat propped up sleepily.
Looking like they're wide awake.
The coffee shops seem to  never quit,they never seem to sleep.
Wake up and smell the coffee.
Delft grinders shaped as windmills turn and grind.
Oh to awaken in fair Amsterdam.
(C) LIVVI
Sean Banks Apr 2013
I woke up one day
And I rode far away
And when I came back
A few weeks late
i decided to shape
up
or else, its a long ride
down

How often do you walk home?
Or should I say struggle
Distances are more attainable
In mixed up situations
I am too deeply rooted in thought
on the topic of meditation
To help this patient
I am inhabiting

Enter: ******* bicycles
I used to find
Walking uphill
And walking downhill
Equally awful
The climb to the top
Is worth the fast ride down
The topic of how many hills
are around
And how often we choose to climb them
Will not  play in this ballgame
Because cycling is a sport
blood doping is dope
breaking news:
Livestrong sponsors the pope

Without a helment
You would tell me I look ****
As I ride with no hands
Don’t worry darlin’
I knew my hair looked good too


Drinking whiskey at home you can make art

I made that without you
It all came out of my mouth
And nostrils
Without you
I will puke again
Without you
Its true
Rough mornings aren’t new
their usually rough
without you
Only because my will is strong
And if I didn’t livestrong
My will -  still will included you
Only if I died on someone else’s terms
(spoiler no such thing)

In an alternate universe
You could be on my bike
And I’d be ****** cold sober
And when that bus hit me
My mom wanted to give you
what belonged to me - the one thing
That survived the accident
Ask a few old friends I survived a few
Whether you knew
Or not
were on it or off
Always on the bottom
Jake
Was a snake
Before I met him
That’s Kona bike history
Living on
Without me

As I age I am learning
To be loyal
To all sorts of objects
like bikes
And women
that own them.
Withholding
without me

I can't see what it would be
like without me -
But lets be honest
Its not so as much about the bikes
As it is about bliss
i've seen what its like without you
It true

If a bus ran over my *** tomorrow
The first thing it would break is my heart
You could start
The day I stopped

Riding my bike
Ellen Piper Sep 2014
The bicycles were a forged parent-permission slip
But well-forged.
I lifted myself over the tear in the truck's seat cover, not sliding
Not perforating further for today.

The road was short, short enough to have ridden the bicycles from first start to real start.
But that would not have been exotic
Connection is exotic, and channels must be followed through an antfarm
Proper etiquette must be observed with touch-me-nots

The bicycles were easier to lift from the bed with two
I gave him that, passing a front end, and jammed the wheelspokes with a jabbed finger
So that the damp spinning would not flick his face with groundwater
I expected it to hurt. My expectation tapped lightly.

That narrow pock-marked blacktop was my windtunnel
The air stroked its thumbs over my eyelids and I ached to push, breathe, push further
He held me back with his slow handlebars,
His slow kickstand clicking.

Pedaling slowly is more difficult than flying.
One finds gladness in choosing leaves to crunch with an inch-wide tire
And high-fiving low-hanging branches is socially satisfying.
He smiles behind the white mustache, and I don't mind.
Nigel Morgan Nov 2012
Sometimes poetry doesn’t happen. One needs more space to work things out, to play around with what you’ve got until you know it well, have felt its worth, weighed it up and reckoned it.

You go somewhere a little known. The location is not a complete surprise, but time and circumstance newly fashion its affect. Is it really eight years since last you were here? Then it was late autumn, now it’s summer’s end.

It’s sad my driving worries you. You drive with me, in a state of constant anticipation, making sure the speed is legal, the line of car to the road is straight. Often, your left hand reaches involuntarily for the door-handle restraint. The more I try to be steady, the worse it seems to become. But today I hand you the keys before you can ask: so that we may start this journey well. Since early morning the sun has shone, and as we head north the clouds assume great floating forms, magisterial, ermine-cloaked.

I like to watch you when you drive. I think it’s the pleasing proportion of your seated self, the body and limbs often motionless in their purposeful position. I look at your profile, the flow of your hair hiding your ears, the cleft and point of your chin, your nose I love to stroke with my nose, the wide mouth whose lips don’t fit my lips when we kiss, and this morning a warm glow on your left cheek.

We have become so careful you and I, with what we say and the way we say it. Politeness, attention to detail, purposeful decision-making, we both make allowances, keeping the conversation airborne, the tone steady, the content ‘of interest’.

After ninety miles it’s good to get out the car, good to get out in a village now bypassed by the main road, a quiet place. A church rises above the village and like a former coaching inn next to its gates faces down a wide street of 18C houses. Scattered variously there are a few unusual shops – wooden toys and metalled stoves. Here we prepare for the next stage of this journeying. On bicycles we’ll take minor roads to the coast.

At the top, after a steep climb out of the village, there it is: the sea. Since childhood that sighting moment has remained special. There’s a lifting of the spirit. The day remains fine, but a cool wind from the land is soon at our backs (you take care not to be cold and wear a scarf around your neck and ears). After just a few miles, we turn gratefully onto a very minor road where cycling becomes a pleasure. Passing vehicles are occasional and we are not continually pressed hard to the kerbside by speeding traffic. We could ride companionably side-by-side, but we don’t.

There is time to look about, to take in the dip and fold of fields and hedges, the punctuating farms and their ribbons of road. A fine manor house rises out of a forest of trees climbing in coniferous ranks to a limestone escarpment. On the breast of a hill we come upon a tapering stone tower that assumes the point from which the rolling landscape’s perspective flows. There’s a combine at the edge of a field and later its grain ‘tender’ heavy-laden meets us on a narrow bend. At a former mill a weir, where the greenest of green shade over water is too vivid not to photograph. Passing a row of cottages an elderly couple, sitting on their front porch, smile at our friendly wave. Above, swallows dart and spin.

A main road interrupts this idyll, and after a long straight ride with the sea a distant backdrop, we arrive at a coastal village overwhelmed by its recumbent castle. Lunch is eaten in a quiet corner of an ancient churchyard. Crows gather on the stubble in an adjacent field. We sit on a bench in the sunshine, though a cloudy afternoon beckons in the west. Later inside the church, where one of the northern saints is laid to rest, an unsteady light plays variously across the stone statues of the sanctuary.

Distance and a head wind begin to strain the calm confidence of the morning. Perhaps we have come too far and expect too much of ourselves? It is cheering though to beat the rain back to the car six miles hence.

Ten miles further up the coast the tide has retreated across a horizon-reaching expanse of sand and mud; it leaves a narrow causeway to an island beyond. It is a long way to its disappointing village full of car-borne visitors, attendant dogs and tired children. There, a little apart from these tourists, we sit to look out upon a further but tiny island where another northern saint found solitude. Wading into the cold sea he would face the setting sun as it fell into the folds of distant hills: to pray until dawn.

You are so tired when we reach the hotel. You are so tired. Our en suite room holds an enormous bed and a large long bath. From its window just a slice of sea can be seen in a gap between houses. I insist, for your sake, on immediate food and soon the strain on your pale, day-worn face begins to disappear and some colour returns as you eat. I catch your eyes smiling – for a brief moment. Oh, your green eyes, my undoing, so full of a sadness I have never fathomed. How often my memory returns to another room where one afternoon, newly married, we were the dearest lovers. In its strange half-light I caressed your long nakedness over and over, my hands and body visiting every part of you – and your dear face full of peace and joy.  

As dusk falls we walk down the village’s only street to view the sand and sea. Then to bed and hardly a page turned before you seek the sleep you need. I soak gratefully in the large bath. After engaging in a ‘difficult’ book for a few minutes, I soon turn off my light. But I am restless and the bed is hard. So I begin to reassemble the day moment-by-moment, later to dream strangely and sporadically until dawn breaks.
Give me a fresh *** of your nips.
Ehh?? Give me a ******* turnip!
I went to Peterborough, came from Marrakech,
Which one should I rip to flesh?
In summer I love to chew icicles,
Whatever! It’s to die for!
I rode a bike and had a stew,
Never mind this poem, go and have a poo.
Ugo Feb 2013
Funny how we woke up in the morning
and pretended that tomorrow never happened—
strutted naked in mirrors celebrating our youth,
laughing, knowing suns and moons couldn’t do the same.

We borrowed our arms from the fridge
and peddled bicycles with bad breath—
trading war stories ‘cause we knew
if we came back alive
life would still be the death of us.
Ottar Oct 2013
I had a 750 Suzuki Katana, gray machine
learned like a young man 350, then 650 then that 750cc of course
in the mid eighties, paid cash but then my mom expected the worst,
I was in the army, I said Army, military single man
I could handle the motorbike well enough,
I knew my limits,
too slow one day
on a sharp parking lot turn
and I earned a
cracked signal light casing,
too early in the
season an April Easter trek
home, turned
around in Manning Park,
near that summit,
snow and ice made it dicey
and the police wanted me to prove I had
chains and snow tires for this late season
fall of snow is
all, so I turned and went back to the base,
too much competitive spirit one day
and I thread the needle between a moving
car and a parked car, well how to say this,
with the driver's door opened wide,
in that instant I passed by at thirty miles an hour
my Life Cycle almost stopped,
my thoughts were driven to,
maybe I should go back to
bicycles, instead...
but I won the race
back to the base
and both the admiration
and admonition of my peers
whom I beat.


©DWE102013
Emma Linnane Aug 2014
What is a loser?
Someone spiraling within a microcosm of unfortunate events?
Or forgetting to update one’s facebook status in the macrocosm of tiresome vents?
People nowadays throw around insults as smiles and cheek,
Loser is a mere phrase between impudence and courageousness, sheik.  
Many forget the power in which words command,
“Sticks and stones may break my bones”, but words unmanned..
Rip the heart and soul and cannot withstand,
The ebbing soreness of our confused migraine.

Perhaps I misunderstand.
Twenty-first century loser on the other hand,
Means you've made it into the ‘in-crowd’,
Enshroud,
Rain twinkling like stars,
Bicycles feeling like cars.

Yet heed this warning with everlasting effect,
Your words are yours to not neglect,
Take pride in your intellect!
Those hearts you may sway,
With words of colour and not grey,
As sweet as if valentine’s day.
May encroach your direction through doors unknown,
Before hinged like an Antarctic zone,
Forget “loser”, create your throne.
Whilst scanning through my own personal news feed on facebook, up popped a picture with this quote; 'Be kind. For everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about', it inspired me to write this particular poem and I hope I can, myself, take away the positive message it utters and apply it to my own life.
Donall Dempsey Sep 2019
CECI N'EST PAS UNE ORANGE

A Parisian orange
lay bang in the middle of the street.

I couldn't have avoided it
this orange of all oranges

lost & stranded

but still as
big & bold & bright

as a new found sun
in an unknown solar system.

It invisible to all
bicycles cars and feet.

A cat gave it
a cursory glance.

The soundtrack of Paris
happening just off stage.

Now everyone had vanished
except me & this orange.

Somehow it found
its way to my head

& unraveled itself
in a concentric spiral

a swirl of orange peel
& white pith

like a Can-Can
dancer's skirt.

I ate it.

Oblivious
to everything else

my first
French

orange.

A Parisian orange
lay bang in the middle of the street.

I couldn't have avoided it
this orange of all oranges

lost & stranded

but still as
big & bold & bright

as a new found sun
in an unknown solar system.

It invisible to all
bicycles cars and feet.

A cat gave it
a cursory glance.

The soundtrack of Paris
happening just off stage.

Now everyone had vanished
except me & this orange.

Somehow it found
its way to my head

& unraveled itself
in a concentric spiral

a swirl of orange peel
& white pith

like a Can-Can
dancer's skirt.

I ate it.

Oblivious
to everything else

my first
French

orange.

— The End —