untitled 8-6-10

Stick your head out the window

take a picture of the sky.

Feel the wind in your hair;

let your feelings fly.

Feel the sun, summer on your skin.

Smile, basking with closed eyelids,

road trip with Kim at the wheel.

Lucky, luckier if she knew how you feel.

Text from Daniel makes you laugh,

knowing he knows the feelings you have.

Call from Laura brings good news.

You wonder how it feels to be in her shoes.

Hot car- too many layers.

You're getting tired.

Dashboard plays and you sleep.

It's time to start anew this week.

a morning at the KFC

This one goes out to all the early morning work outs,

swim-teamers and jocks everywhere,

dedicated fitness buffs and guys that like to check out their butts.

This one goes out to that girl walking on the treadmill...

Still, after 2 hours. Seriously, girl, go walk outside.

I'm sure there is a hill somewhere for you

to repeatedly climb- speaking of, thanks for that, Miley;

I've heard your song like 10 times today.

This one goes out to pretend Olympic weightlifters,

and that chubby guy that always asks for fitness advice-

man, they don't care if you don't have a six pack.

This one goes out to those people you didn't wanna see:

that old guy in spandex,

last night's one night stand...

your priest?!

This one goes out to muscle milk and hot girls stretching.

No, I'm not checking you out. Well, maybe I am, but

it is kinda my job.

This one goes out to people who can't work out:

ex- football players and injured dancers. Some still try,

but most have given up.

This one goes out to good health.

This one goes out to looking good.

This one goes out to you, grunting dude.

This one goes out to me, for waking up this goddamn early.

untitled 4-24-10

It's windy outside.

I'm sitting on the roof of

my building as I watch the moon

through periwinkle clouds

and the blowing of unblossomed

springtime storms dance with the branches

and stalks of the trees and grass.

The building shelters me,

for which I am grateful,

and only the strongest gusts

reach me in the form of gentle breezes.

A man walked by and my heart

fluttered with the thought of being caught.

I am where I am not to be.

But this weather brings clairvoyance.

I think clearly,

not because the cherry

blossoms play at my feet,

but because I am me.

I am me,

but writing it makes me something

different entirely.

The Way We Speak

He writes poetry like

Words are going out of sale.

He writes poetry like alphabet soup

is his favorite food

and that's all anyone is eating.

He writes poetry like every Crayola

color has a story.

He writes poetry like we tell secrets.

He writes poetry like he is trying

to count the stars- innumerable as they are.

He writes poetry like language

is a platform supported by 26 beams

and every single one of them is rotting.

He writes poetry like the wind

howling through the city streets is

a crowd of protesting feelings

and only he can hear their words.

He writes poetry like he knows

there will be a flood.

He writes poetry like there is an eclipse

and no one knows if the sun will come out.

He writes poetry like the world

is disappearing and no one is listening.

He writes poetry like I speak

to you. But no one is listening.

You're not listening,

are you?

Happy New Years Mr. Taylor

if there is one thing I've learned of alcohol, it is that the consumption of it allows people to behave as if every action contains the importance of the end of the world.

well tonight is an end of a world of sorts. On this eve people count down from ten to one to the start of a new decade.

I'm not sure if this celebration is

1. useful


2. happy


3. necessary


4. time-honored


5. universal


6. intact


7. relevant


8. good


9. news


10. imaginative

but maybe I'm just backwards. Anyhow, Happy New Years, Daniel.

ridiculous

Oh, I'm lucky

to have time in class

to discuss the clockwork of poetry,

but what I want is to sit

under my maple tree and watch

as Eric from next door drives

his snowmobile over quarter-inch ice.

Your gold Rolex

reminds me that my G-shock

is 10 bucks at Wal-Mart.

So what if your dad

took the Lambo.

I walk to class.

sex, church, love...more? an incomplete series

Her cheeks are Cardinal virtue in flame-like red,

but I don’t care for anything but her eyes,

liquid visages of the phantom of our grave.

I see a seed of it there

like a rhinestone’s cheap glimmer,

a 16^th note of our tongues and teeth,

clacking together.

I’m grounded in the mocha of her curves

like lightening to the earth.

Her fedora a buoy

in a pool of crested sheets.

Blue writing seeps into paper

to match the color of the couch

I sink into like heels

on softened earth.

The alto above me sings

to match the song of a macaw,

her melody a shade

of their vibrancy.

As her aria trickles

down to me,

I fade into rhythms

of snare drums

and a tap dancer’s feet.

The lights are

off in church.

We sit next

to white candles

by the priest,

behind the altar.

He says something

of the Word

that I don’t hear

because he is sitting

there, adjacent the gate.

I daydream of more

than his blue eyes.

An appropriate image

for Sunday Mass.

it takes one to know one

it takes one to know one

which means I was there too

somewhere close to where

you trod your shoes.

you're a day hidden

in the walk-in closet.

you're the best

I ever had.

It takes time to know

happiness, but if I smile

the world might be worthwhile.

Or I'll just be a liar,

but it's worth the effort to be higher.

When the skyline looks like finger paint,

it's alright to know we created fate.

Thursday, November 12th

I walk into class to find heads bent to paper like the bodies of sweatshop children working on the shoes Kevin wears. I don't remember there being a test. Our evaluation is our lives. Can we find enough life for a prose poem, or obsess enough to write a villanelle? Goldstein didn't tell me I could, but yesterday I hiked through Neadle Woods and today I danced with Alyssa. Is that not life enough? Professor Stefaniak waves me in. I don't think I'll come again.

pirouette

I love spins because they are wild,

but I can never be satisfied with their craze.

I need complete oblivion,

a turn so disorienting I

cease to exist.

Pixelated Window

I can't tell if I can't see

when the windows are covered

in drops from the breeze

the pixelated scene is pulsing-

a heart-throb or a clouded dream.

Dear Journal

If I meet you suddenly, I can't speak.

-Sappho

The sky is a lilac blanket.

Swathed in the mania of the day’s passing,

My foot flutters like the wings

Of a flustered hummingbird.

I do not notice his entering.

You’re fidgety interrupts

My thoughts. His gravelly voice

Compels my heart to beat

So intensely that I’m unsure

I remember how to breathe.

Has he seen?

Does he know what it is I’ve written?

I leave you this as my last post for a week. I'll be without phone/internet for the next week. I hope you like it. It is going to be the piece I submit for Shadows. <3 PM [they didn't like it. try again next semester?]

Despair

It’s raining.

The drops darken red bricks

As they pool at my feet.

I sit outside my dorm.

And I watch

Drops hit me.

Feet pitter-patter past.

And rain splashes free,

reminding my ruined reflection

that I’m only pitter-patter,

empty chatter.

National Poetry Day(UK style)

The UK celebrates their poetry a little bit late in the year. Still, in recognition of their recognition, I will post one of my favorite poems here.

A PSALM OF LIFE

WHAT THE HEART OF THE YOUNG MAN SAID TO THE PSALMIST

TELL me not, in mournful numbers, Life is but an empty dream ! — For the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem.

Life is real ! Life is earnest! And the grave is not its goal ; Dust thou art, to dust returnest, Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow, Is our destined end or way ; But to act, that each to-morrow Find us farther than to-day.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting, And our hearts, though stout and brave, Still, like muffled drums, are beating Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle, In the bivouac of Life, Be not like dumb, driven cattle ! Be a hero in the strife !

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant ! Let the dead Past bury its dead ! Act,— act in the living Present ! Heart within, and God o'erhead !

Lives of great men all remind us We can make our lives sublime, And, departing, leave behind us Footprints on the sands of time ;

Footprints, that perhaps another, Sailing o'er life's solemn main, A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us, then, be up and doing, With a heart for any fate ; Still achieving, still pursuing, Learn to labor and to wait.

Hope you have a nice night =)

raindrops glisten on the window

there is no denying the power of poetry,

but i have lost the ability to write.

raindrops skirt the windowpanes i look through

at the nightlight of omaha's skyline.

the trees bow to an unexpected breeze

that could only be the result of a transaction.

my sleep for your ability to think-

i would gladly participate in that exchange

if somehow my sleep gave back

the ability to harness emotions.

if somehow i could feel light

tickling the grass of a dew drop morning.

sometimes the only way not to lose a poem is to publish it. I guess this means that I should update again. Has anyone missed me?

-PM

hackneyed feelings and emotions on fire

picturesque clouds

repeat hackneyed feelings

so I fight to regain control

of my fleeting feelings

my struggling desire to be sole possessor

of emotions set on fire

To what do I owe the honor?

To whom do I direct desire?

Crackberry

the blinking red light of social contempt

a vibration in my fragile equilibrium

I try to dismiss this reminder of social contract

but the shock waves extend beyond bb cal

broken pieces

we are the broken pieces of the picture of the world

come mellifulously to put ourselves together

in a mosiac majestic, an etching ethereal

well this is a melancholy mood poetic in that movie way the skies weep tears to human joys oh look poetry for you human melancholy seems a favorite word of late. I can only rhyme this with date dates! valentine's, I mean Singles Recognition Day it just went by in a flash of the eye it didn't make a difference to me it's not like I had a game to play. Did you have a guy? but hey the bell is ringing symbolically time to leave this dreaded class see ya next time if you last

what time to wish depends on the clock you pick-- I chose the one best for now, what happens if life chose another one?