[x]

EulogyThe dream-catchers are handmade
but each bear the same mark of boredom.
On the reservation,
the dirt is red and separated from the turquoise on sale.
The tops of the mountains have been scraped off
like whipped cream from pudding cups
of beautiful alien rock.

"Plateau," my mother says.
I am not sure if it is a name
or a command.

The lightning storms are brighter in the desert.
I sit perched on the horizon,
the edge of one loss to another—
given up my love, all my bottled water.
The mountains carry their own babies in the muddy puddles,
against the wind they huddle,
but their semi-circle somehow is just one great smile.

leftover human.she is the girl with the sand-swept face
and a seashell mouth that
only echoes.

VertigoHe sleeps the sleep of a man
who doesn't yet know that Love
sits sewing her shadow to the dawn,

nursing a subtle,
aching silence in his lungs
with her name, her shape.

He can't fathom how someone
can sit so deep inside him,
shelling the shadows of himself
as though there are moons at their core,

how he no longer believes
in falling lightly in love
but in committing himself
to inevitable call of concrete

or how she lingers like ink on his fingers,
like a story he's still figuring out how to write.

Sahi"Listen, Sahi. Listen to it whisper to you." I held the shell close to my ear. My mother's cool hands wrapped around mine, her breath brushing against the hair that trailed down my jaw. "Can you hear it? Can you hear it telling you its story?" I kept the shell pressed to my temple like a telephone. I heard it, a shrill and silent echo.
"What is it?"
"It's the ocean, my love. When the shell swam to shore, it kept a little bit of the ocean inside of it. And now it's yours, a little bit of the ocean, to keep with you everywhere you go. You like that?"

2

I come home late. As the door closes, the telephone rings. I limp to the cream- coloured

CorvusAt times I've seen you as blue-black
liquid scouring  moss-green rocks, or
the cold shock of April's glaze clinging
to windowpanes, but you are the sweat
of a raven spilling over a fresh-tilled field.

I feel you soaring, circling, hear the scrape
of your wet wings raking across my lips,
taste the metal rasp of  laughter and pray
you will land, if only for an instant,
upon my outstretched  limb.

HitchhikerI am counting cars the same way
I count fishes in my sea.
But it is murky like suffocating drains
choking words I can't take back
a lonely side puddle on the road.

I don't look at the metal bodies
but the warm breathing ones
from rolled-down windows, carefree lollipop wrappers
bobbing mainstream music.

I count the drivers and passengers smiles
and theirs is more than the ones you give me.
I understand.
I guess your car and try to find it anyway.

Is it ferrari red?
Like a horse with electric hooves
thundering my loose earth
with ridge muscles
fearless mane hair?

Is it a monster truck?
Like an armoured hunchback
distrusting

-Poem- A Thief's TaleRide the chilling wind,
across the burning sand;
along the trail of life --
with it in your hands.

Items made through bloodshed,
seven for the priests;
with their magic powers,
to bring upon the peace.

Rage for fallen comrades,
scarred by darkened times;
revenge, his only wish,
to make up for the crime.

Defeat brought in battle,
but denied his death;
instead, trapped inside,
to await his final breath.

Millennia of silence,
until a new time came;
to possess a boy's body
and rule a Shadow Game.

the sons of flint and pitchthe sons of flint and pitch

remember me
as i want to be remembered--
fallen down with the knee-tide
over my forelock, drowned in little water,
but mostly as a man
not afraid to die:

remember me my children
if you have ever remembered
wave or
tenor, if your voices have sung for me though you did not know
you sang for me:

remember, we struck a spark!
for such brittle foolish longing is not
what wets our torches or deadens our wood
but show me a good man, raise him up high on a pedestal,

and I will show you
something worth burning out for.

summer poemyou used to say it was
the only time of year
that actually deserved to be called a
season,
when the
sweat on our faces shone like
sticky cellophane, and we
ran through sprinklers if
no one was looking.

with damp undershirts and
ice-clinking glasses and
asphalt smoking heat
and dust - you said
everyone's eyes were a little bit brighter,
like we were
borrowing something [life]
from the sun.

you walked around your little apartment, smiling
in thongs you changed twice a day, when you could -
laughing
about how funny
the AC chose right now to break,
and you'd look outside and smirk at
tired people
crossing the street just to wal

Mural In The GlassFall once fell in colors here,
   you could hear the rust whistle
on  playgrounds,
        merry go rounds
still spinning,
     swings
still swinging from the hurried departure.
            But they are sounds of another time.

Today
          my reflection
is lost in the grey

         as rain falls
a heavy patter, a baby's bare feet tapping--
I see the mud tracks fade on the kitc

TotemBuddha lives in my dog, pleasant
and plump and innocently peering at
me from between her white eyelashes

so divine and a little amused at how
at 14, she has lived a full life even though
at 18, I am a little girl stumbling in my
big girl heels;

at 14, she is graceful, a lady in the descending
curve of her prime and she is Buddha

-no doubt about it, honestly-

teaching me, guiding me to moonlit
havens with her bad hips and sure canter;

when she was born, I was her
mother sister keeper packmate friend goddess

but no more, no more, no more because
she lulls me to sleep with her deep breathing
and she has surpassed me in

body

73. I can'tLife is summer-studded
and breathless;
pulsing between heartbeats,
and trading whispers
when the sun slides in.

it's pouring out of open eyes
and half-closed lips
like water,
and we're the thousand silver fishes
slipping downward, downward -
day-old, and smooth,
and blind.

so dance, my metal children
grind your feet into the ground,
and trace your hand-prints over mirrors;
mist them with your breath,
and draw your lives across them -
in broken hearts
and backwards words
and staircases leading nowhere.

Take my tattered secrets between your fingers
and mold them, remake them
to melt this born-

The woman with the garish...The slugs chewed jagged crowns
out of brand new ecru tulips,
and the rain filled them up
like teacups
until they drooped,
made lazy by the weather.

But Spring blew smoke
like the woman on the park bench
smoking a Pall Mall
and whispering into a black cell phone,
her bright red boots toe-deep in water.

Her umbrella, spine flicking drops
into the flower beds,
irrigating daffodils
yet to bloom,
made the park look gothic
and lonesome.

But when she left,
her breath steam
against the air,
boot heels clicking
against the stone –
The flowers peered up,
Blinking against the rain.

She who destroys the lightfirst seed
Darling, you and I both know
in a better world I could be your Lethe
wrap around you, drown you
erode everything
that ever tried to bring your fate down on you.
Still if I picked up the pieces
I'd hear their soft hum—
the one shells moan for the sea—
for even then there would be places in you
still not free.

second seed
Surely women must have learned by now
never to trust fruit.
A garden is a prison earned
and there is nothing satanic, nothing sacred
about hunger.
Yet when your body curls in on itself
seduced by not-seeds that need only thirst to root
you find your lips wet
and what might be blood or j

OrchardYour fingers are guillotines,
purely purposeful machines.

You pluck the apple,
and carve it clean,
find the core,
suck out the seeds.

Take a life
and taste the power,
it's arsenic
and sugar sweet.

You thank God and the devil
with a crooked smile
that the day is young,
and so are they,
and just ripe enough
for you to eat.

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Having FunI just like having fun,
Y'know?

Like pretending my hands
Are antennae
And staring at little kids
As they walk on by.

Like making my hand into a duck,
Making it moo like a cow.
Like squeezing someone's knee or elbow
And making them squeak.

Like considering nudging someone
Into the wall as you walk,
Only to have them shove you instead,
A second before you can carry it out.

Like banging into a cupboard
And laughing like crazy
Just because really, you're an idiot,
No matter what a marks book says.

Like curling up in safe mugs
To sup on tea and memories -
Like smiling, just for the heck of it,
Even when no one's watching at al

No DesignsPeople see hidden agendas
Like counterfeit pennies
Or oil-soaked waves -
But in all honesty,
I just don't want to break you.

Word-PlayWhen I was morning,
I crept through mountains
Of lipstick azure
And indigo mascara.

When I was mourning,
I slipped through cracks
Into crimson kisses
And blacking eyes.

Whistle and I Will ComePencil shavings fill our ears
To debate and grate
Like meat grinders to song.
Everything is easier
In multiples of three.
I am drifting, bodiless,
Amongst empty words
And a thousand broken oaths.

Am I a hound at your call?
Whistle, and I will come.

Te QuieroThe lights are bright
Like sun shining
Through a honey-pot.
Eyes sting like hornets,
Pricked in the neck
By the drone of voices
Slurring out harmonies
Along a quiet road.
Spain leaps into being
And there is no place,
No place here for nerves.

I am a small person -
So the voice has to grow.

Sea of EchoI pause in a sea of echo.

I don't know - can't remember -
I'll stop - when did you -
Do you have the - I took your -
Word association - intri -
Why did you tell - hey, it's me -

Freak.

They swim, and I am sessile.
Pinned to rocks of faith.

City. Ocean. Sister.
Magik. Rogue. Love.

Freak.

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Chin Up

by ~Underground-Rogue, Apr 4, 2011, 3:55:18 AM
Literature / Poetry / General Poetry / Free Verse

And sometimes, coated and layered
with tens of scores of others' eyes
we forget the word 'lonely' -
so when it flings ashes
we blink, and are blinded.

Chin Upby ~Underground-Rogue

Literature / Poetry / General Poetry / Free Verse

It would be nice to be able to send someone tea via the internet.

Thanks :^nycterent: for the edit ^^

O_O A DD! Argh, most. Unexpected. Ever! Wow - thank you so much!

Daily Deviation

Given 2011-04-14

Chin Up by ~Underground-Rogue stands out with its lovely brevity. "Crisp and crystal: worth a look, and worth a pause for thought." ( Suggested by ~Avallynh and Featured by `nycterent )

love 1 1

~~joy 0 0~~

wow 1 1

~~mad 0 0~~

~~sad 0 0~~

~~fear 0 0~~

~~neutral 0 0~~

~Angeltears4 May 17, 2011

I keep coming back to this poem and it's high time I left some form of comment! Basically, I'm really really touched. The brevity of this poem amazes me... how is it that you've said so much in so little?!

good poetry makes me ache because it puts into words all these vague ideas no-one else has been able to clarify... you've done just that.

I love how you started with "And". It's like i've been placed right in the middle of something - like being in the middle of that crowd where you're so drowning in peple that you forget what loneliness is. coated and layered in so many people... i love that loneliness flings ashes. that's perfect too. most of all, i love this faintly naive, confused 'blink' before we are blinded. like how i finished reading this poem and paused and then it hit me.

you've gripped me in, what, 27 words? not even particularly unusual words? how did you do it?!

you are an artist who has placed words in just the right order and just the right way to tug on my heartstrings. thank you very much!

~Underground-Rogue Jun 2, 2011 Student Writer

Wow. This comment blew me away! Sorry for not replying for so long, things have been crazy!
I'm glad the brevity worked in this situation. I considered making it longer during the actual writing, but in truuth there was nothing more for me to say.
And I'm afraid I start way too many poems and sentences with the word 'and'. I excuse it with the fact that Blake did it too!
Thank you so much for your kind words. They really made my day.

~Hemophile44 Apr 21, 2011

...I simply don't get it. The words are beautiful, but i don't know what they mean, and I feel like it's very meaningful. someone mind explaining to me?

(I feel stupid...)

~Underground-Rogue Apr 23, 2011 Student Writer

It's about how loneliness suddenly comes on unexpected and sudden, and that makes it hit all the harder. But...expressing understanding of that loneliness, implying that the intended reader is not, in fact, alone.
Or that's the way it was intended, but it is open to interpretation.

~Hemophile44 Apr 23, 2011

truly beautiful, thanks for taking the time to explain it.

~Underground-Rogue Apr 25, 2011 Student Writer

My pleasure; thank you for taking the time to read and enquire

~CastIronFist Apr 14, 2011

This

!xxMordredtheDruid7xx Apr 14, 2011

This is beautiful!

And congrats on the Daily Deviation!

~Underground-Rogue Apr 17, 2011 Student Writer

Thank you so much, and thanks for the fav as well! A Daily Deviation was completely unexpected, to be truthful. I've pretty much just been bouncing up and down since that point!

!xxMordredtheDruid7xx Apr 17, 2011

You're very welcome!

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