Tag Archives: poems

Poetry

Capgras Delusions and You (The Body) – Matt Grydzuk

Degauss the stars like cathode ray tubes using only your hands

The body first thinks explicitly in omens, or foretelling the end of things

Sleep less than intended; corporeality was tailor-made for you.


The body is just a suggestion, though, like the outline of existing

Akin to the stars lacking crystal clear imagery yet making shapes

Yet causing images in the night

And I sat and watched them unfold, shaking mildly, how beautiful.


How beautiful, the suggestion of form;

The existence of existence

Like wisps of stardust off the tips of your fingers and the rest of your outline

You are a degaussed constellation.


How beautiful the burning sensation; the smell

How beautiful destroying the innards

Like dying stars or a comet moving faster and then it’s gone

Creating outlines creating memories making

Sentences with your movements but no words.


How beautiful linguistics; complete sentences with two independent clauses

Intertwined to make the sun rise.

Watch it leave you like blood from the mouth, like stardust from the nose and eyes.

All other things beautiful like the suggestion of an outline; like actually falling asleep.


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Poetry

Meta-cognition explained in Lithuanian (The Head) – Matt Grydzuk

The head

Chiefly, where pre-calculus goes to die.

And truthfully I don’t know much else about it, but I do know,

Or remember, that my mother told me always to be grateful

For what you have.

And I can’t say I was

Because so many self-inflicted head traumas starts to pile up when nothing

You do is perfect and you have to blame SOMEONE and

Knowledge of chlorophyll is always dying and you’ve never had a green thumb

Next thing I know my head is a graveyard and sometimes I kick over eternal lights to watch

The information flowing out like candle wax like

This is grey matter flowing through eye sockets like this

Is the way they wanted you to be when they called you stupid

Like you can live up to one thing if you just try hard enough

And when it hardens; becomes crystalline

If you hurled it at a man how far would he go

I still haven’t forgotten Newton’s second law or anything about Schroedinger

But what does that even matter

The Head

Chiefly, a device to move the body.

To tell it what to do.

But for every move this way and that there’s an eyelid twitch or a muscle spasm

Bartering, the product of battery indentured to the head my body is never my own but

I wouldn’t know

I’m sorry.


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Poetry

Maple Key – Harika Kottakota 

My magnum opus was a maple key, 
Imprinted pond ripples in amber  

A hundred journals worth of sins 
Rimmed it with azure  

My maple key rode majestically 
Upon the southern breeze

Tornado in the Church bell and 
Flames around the riverbend 

Devout insomniac, I stalked
My maple key barefoot into 

Jasper mornings–too ethereal, 
too intricate for untrained eyes   

I watched its azure streak lotus 
By lotus, but never land 

Without a star’s conception
In sync, that’s right–never in jest  
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Poetry

I Reside Explicitly on Jackson Square – Matt Grydzuk

In the seventh grade I didn’t know I could like boys yet.

So when everyone else started dating

I spent my time idly liking this girl.

I asked her to dance once.

She was much taller than me and this altercation

dangled the notion of beauty overhead in every way like shitty dime store streamers scotch taped around the sistine chapel.

I stared into her eyes as the night fell apart and I was petrified to marble

Because there was pity in their dark recesses and in contrast

I was like

A monumental statue

Designed to fill

the negative space

in the worst possible way.

For the first time I felt ugly.


You never get called fat to your face anymore

it’s just particles of pollution

like acid rain eroding a statue.

So I am less afraid of being fat and more paranoid

because you cannot dodge glances and you cannot dodge concrete floors and statues don’t float

Thus I am not afraid of swimming, but I am afraid of the social implications of swimming pools.


What happened

To the era where “skinny” and “beautiful” were not synonyms

Where people like me were dashing and handsome and

Were depicted as

Grand marble statues that

reached up toward the sky in an air of grandeur

People have always implied

That I should take up less space but there is nothing authentic about me that

is not large and loud and in your face.

My body is no temple

It is a cathedral

Much too large for its initial purpose but it occupies the space it is given and it

extends infinitely toward the sky and

when people gaze upon it they are in awe of its beauty within and without

it occupies

the space

it

is

given.

I am constructed from stained glass and concrete and the bottoms of empty cartons of ice cream.

I don’t know what it’s like to not be fat.

But I do know what it’s like to be beautiful.


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Poetry, Prosetry

It Comes and Goes in Waves – Alexandra Mayer

I was quiet that night

mesmerized by the fire– 

I guess. 

And I saw 

Embers float to the heavens 

where they became stars. 

The moon greeted them 

with a cheshire-cat smile

and they all laughed at the mortals below. 

There was music in the crackle of the fire

and in the way accents melted together

stealing meaning from words. 

And your lover told me that we should be friends. 

“Because we both like to drink a lot.”
Whatever that means. 

I tried my best to be kind

because you showed me the painting she created-

two hands of daisies, bursting from the clouds.

It’s hard to explain,

But I like it. 

And I like her knobby knees 

and her red hair

and the way she bites her lower lip.

So we shared a bottle of fourteen dollar vodka–

And together we swallowed fire 

and we smiled when the heat slid into our stomachs 

and when the world started to blur into a haze of browns, oranges, and blues.

Then a bright light trickled through the trees. 

And a shout: 

“Cops… Run!”

So I did

I fled 

deeper 

and deeper 

into the forest 

before diving into a prickle bush

where thorns clawed my skin,

drawing blood here and there. 

But I didn’t really notice, or feel any pain.

I didn’t notice you either

until you knelt down next to me and whispered in my ear,

“this doesn’t leave these trees.”

A kiss. 

You kissed me. 

A moment. 

Nothing more. 

And when the sun rose,

I wasn’t dizzy. 

I could see the trees clearly.

I could feel the gashes in my skin. 

And I laughed

because you were nowhere to be found

And I was okay with being alone.

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Poetry

The Shadows We Run From – Brooke Safferman

You are the Splenda in my cup of tea

A little something sweet, even if you aren’t the real deal

One little sip is all I need to keep the nightmares away

When my hand is in yours, invincible becomes more than just a word.

 

You told me my yellow sundress embodies the springtime itself,

My peppermint lip balm, the dead of winter

With you, I become one of the cherry blossoms blooming on the tree next door

The only thing you made me lose is loss, itself.

 

And the windowpanes would speak if they could,

Whisper their memories about who and what happened in this house before we did

The floorboards creak with stories, and hopes, and dreams 

Fulfilled and latched on to, 

We will write a story of our own: 

The closing line, the acknowledgments, but most importantly, the epilogue

 

The shadows we run from are merely ourselves.

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Poetry, Prosetry

Water – Iman Messado

Here’s a thing I read in a science book once,
The world is like 70% water.
There’s lakes and oceans and ponds and bathtubs and –
Water doesn’t scare me at all,
What’s there to fear in oxygen atoms and hydrogen bonds?
I’ve always wanted to learn how to swim though,
I’ve dreamt of being at home in water,
like the stage is to a dancer.
Did you know that I’m a cancer?

Here’s a thought I had in the shower once:
Crying is a waste of time.
I mean, sure, there’s catharsis in the tears struggling their way out of the confines of your tear ducts and stubborn pride.
Catharsis that can’t be found when bottling your tears up and hoping something good can work.
But I’m not the type to wade in pools of Fear and Pity,
It’s better to patch up the dams and feign laughter at something witty.

Here’s a secret that that’s not actually a secret:
I don’t know how to swim.
I’m sure I could if only convenience granted me the opportunity.
I’m not scared, not apprehensive, there aren’t any storm clouds of doubt and derision spoiling my confidence.


I’ve asked quite a few people how they swim, people who know all about hydrogen bonds and who probably shed a few tears once in a while.
People who swim without ever having their head touch the water and others who do this strange kicking thing and still others who make exaggerated gestures and knock other people out of the way.


I’m standing on the edge of the concrete border of the community pool when i affirm a sneaking suspicion I’ve had for a while now.
There is no uniform way to swim nor is there a predestined form i’m to take so as to swim in the most efficient way possible.


All I can do is leap and splash and wait until the sun turns my skin even more brown.
So that’s what i do: i leap and splash and wonder if a day will come when i’ll drown.


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Poetry

Home Alone – Haley Ingram

Home is were the heart is. 

Veins and arteries interlocked 
Stronger than the hands you used to make me think twice. 
Looking every direction
Never quite understanding why
And never questioning the use of the word 
love. 
Because questions were just another way of getting your deigning breath into my system;
Recognizing the sound as if it was a morning’s alarm. 
As if every failed attempt of pronouncing our name deafened you to anything that sounded like a cry for help. 
So I’d run and hide. 
You didn’t quite like that. 
You didn’t like the idea of your words being so loosely held,
So you shortened the chain 
and I shortened my veins. 
Every time. 
I ended up with an empty muscle and a pathetic travesty of emotion. 
So I’d run. 
I didn’t hide, I drank and drank
The rain hoping to forget the hand that fed me
Because it pushed me from dancing. 
I ran in the street that I never learned my lessons in because I was taught by the book
The book you never wrote
But followed so vaguely until you decided to add a page 
from the bark our tree,
To write accommodations for the mistakes you refuse to have made. 
So you slice a sheer and process your final say. 
But your words are not strong enough to resist gravity-
You never recalled the impossible regeneration of deadweight. 
But it’s okay now!
I didn’t die at my own hand and I
SUPPOSE
Letting go is a natural cause
So I can still make it to heaven-
I am a fallen branch.
And darling,
You cannot recycle broken limbs. 
There is no hospital for a broken home. 
This home is too perfect to be broken,
So I understand your frustration when my skin didn’t cut the way you intended me to.

Maybe it’s because of the countless rejections of becoming closer to you. 
When I was afraid at night. 
When I drove myself to be near you
But was shoved in the positioning
Of our portraits. 
Maybe it’s because when I touch the grass you fear me growing too fast. Is that why you’re allergic to weeds?
Perhaps all of your spoken success I will never feel in your memory.
When my life(or lack thereof) started to weigh you down you grafted me back onto to your hip claiming me to be a loved one
And marking me number 4 in your 99 cent pen. 
A chain gang of-
Love. 
Family. 
The sweat from your grip is enough to wipe off the labels you give me. 
I can slip from your eyes- your ball and chain eyes-
And the world I offer this disregarded muscle
Will never be as dangerous to you,
As the home metastasizing to it. 
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Poetry

The Fri(end) – Ugonma Ubani-Ebere

I had a friend once.
He was a Marine.
Kind, funny, and a streak of some mean. 
He listened to me, and heard my dreams. 
The darkest secret tucked in the abyss of my heart.
He swam in and found it, but did not rip me apart. 
His soothing voice lulled me to sleep.
His loving arms rocked me when I used to weep.
Through the moments when I left battle wounds from being a complete bitch
He did not complain, he stitched up the wounds with understanding and without a hitch.
My friend was great, he was one of a kind.
Awesome person, with great morals, and a great mind.
Friends like him come once in a lifetime
But what is a lifetime, when your friendship is hanging on a lifeline?

I had a friend once. 

He was everything that I had hoped him to be.
He liked me for me.
I’m a little awkward you see.
A little too wild, and sometimes too carefree
I never had a guy friend because they somehow predictably
Would fall into my unfortunate spell.
My very wide smile, my undefined personality, my fragrant smell, 
Deep in their eyes, a love story fell.
A love story that would never come to fruition
Instead a friendship would fall victim to diffusion.
Crossing the thin line between friendship and lovers almost always caused bitter confusion. 
Who said girls and guys could never be friends?
I did because they always fall victim to my unintentional web.
One day, my friend fell into my unintentional web.
I intentionally led him there and I wept.
Nothing was ever the same, and I had to take part of the blame.
I unfortunately had to also take some of the shame.
We had too much chemistry which caused a combustion.
We never recovered, because we did not know how to function.
Now he is gone, his memory is a concussion.
No longer can we hold a conversation let alone hold a discussion.
I had a friend once.
He was everything that I had hoped him to be.
His only mistake….
He liked me for me.
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Prose

the adventure I wish I could have – Elena Barrera-Waters

spring break, I’m flooded with everyone’s pictures.
all of their shots of the waves at the beach,
or of the castles or the food of the new country they’re visiting, 
or the ski lifts above those gorgeous green pines.

it’s a little bit hard,
to be able to submit my own to this
grand collection of memories when I know that you
won’t get yours.

it’s not my fault, i know that.
but more than anything, I wish you were here.
I wish you were my adventure, 
or at least a part of it.
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