The Poetry Marathon

Centennial Nickel

Centennial Nickel

 

If I had a centennial nickel for all the lips I wanted to kiss,

I’d be rich beyond reason

and that might just

quell the

questions

and the questioning

about what I’ve been missing.

 

The faces shine before me,

like a centennial nickel,

those sometime friends

those would be lovers

and

could be strangers;

those passers-by who

smelled delicious.

 

The boys at the

boxcar parties

on frozen December nights –

clear and crisp

stars shining

like centennial nickels.

 

The smug alt chicks at the

closing night parties

on frigid April nights –

when the thaw should have started.

Backstage their desire shone

like centennial nickels

but now,

in the cold light of day,

I was “too straight.”

 

And so it would be for me,

caught in between,

wishing I had a centennial nickel for all the lips I wanted to kiss.

(c) R. L. Elke 2016

Your not the boss of Me.

Stop telling me what to do.

Push, pull, or get out of the way,

Don’t throw things from the sidelines.

Don’t play games with me, mess me about.

I don’t aim when I pitch, I see the target and throw,,

Letting my body adjust on its own.

Holy flapjacks,

This is not a time in my life for coaching from the sidelines,

For strange tasks laid on me like a party game.

Get in her and lift this beam out of my eye

Do not scatter specks and call them glitter.

Don’t tell me what to do.

 

(ix) Have you heard the mountains cry?

‘Tis loaming and an ill-paced sigh
sobs adumbral patterns in gloom,
and rising from the crags on high
a heart-rending sepulchral cry,
as an echo, whimpers to its doom.

From the magma-ocean, mantle plume
rising to cool this febrile core,
as a surge of verse, parsed-pantoum,
like some drama enacted sans costume
wells up in eyes – rolls to the floor…

The shining armor

Tears fall down as much as the rain outside was,

I kept ingeminating, its not possible – cannot be happening,

like the hated porcelain doll, his figure was unchanging,

however, it turns out as poignant comedies, and I became cognizant of his equanimity,

ashamed at my over-bearing deportment,

with the glimpses of his demeanor caught through the glass panel window,

lay bare the distorted and crying face of him,

again tears fall down as much as the rain outside.

The main ingredient has arrived
All eyes on me
What the fuck you looking at
(Fuck you mean)
Bitch you on know me

Im da gatekeeper
(Wont let yo ass in)
Queen of the damned
(Won’t forgive you for your sins)
Goddess of the people
(But I only save my ends)

If I use to know you
Then tell me how I did
Cuz if it ain’t about the money
Negus we ain’t never been friends
(Naw who the fuck you BE)

I’m the kundalini pusher a mediating gangster
I put hexes on your exes and they’ll wish they did you better

The fact
Stick and stones will always break bones
But words
like black lives
Most definitely Matter
They bring you close then draw you in tell stories you might not want to end
It’s what you wanna hear
misleading, instilling fear
Cry for help out in the dark
So there’s never time for the latter

~Ism

Validation

I yearn for a life that living cannot bring,
quiet corridors with passages I can hide in,
escaping men that claw my pant legs begging for attention,
demanding validation for their actions,
a validation I would not give,

“Do you have a boyfriend?”
“No”
“Do you want one?”
“No, I don’t,”
“Why not?”

Pawing at me,
persistence isn’t sexy to me,
an invalidation of feelings I already verbalized,
leave me alone,
please,

“You’re in the friend zone”
“What’s the friend zone?”
“A place where she won’t sleep with you, only be your friend.”
“How do you get out of that?”
“Get her to sleep with you.”

I sleep with you,
quiet, next to me you purr,
that doesn’t last long,
you want more,
a relationship perhaps,

“How’s the relationship life man?”
“It is going well”
“Yeah, lot’s of sex?”
“Of course, why else would I be with her this long?”
“Congratulations man.”

Unheard degradation shared with your friends,
travels through our networks, they reach my ear,
I feel a wince of regret,
somehow I thought you were different,
I yearn for a life the living cannot bring.

Oda a los inmigrantes

Inmigrante que viaja contra el viento
Que despierta y enfrenta su jornada diaria
Que suda que llora y no pierde su aliento
Luchando de mañana a noche siempre contento.

Inmigrante que viaja contra viento y marea
Que sueña y no para y que grita en silencio
Que no come hasta completar su debida tarea
Y cae rendido en pleno silencio.

Inmigrante que viaja contra el sol
Que labora de amanecer a crepúsculo
Que quiebra su espalda recogiendo col
Y que ningún elemento es un obstáculo.

Inmigrante que viaja y llega a su hogar
que llora en su almohada
porque solo ella le permite descargar
y sus lágrimas cuentan su niñez olvidada.

Inmigrante que viaja contra el mundo cruel
buscando para su familia una vida mejor
aunque nadie quiera abogar por él
sigue adelante con esperanza y amor.

Inmigrante que viaja recogiendo esperanza
sembrando metas e inculcando diligencia
que pide nada y regala todo, siempre alcanza
y cumple todo con perseverancia.

Copyright@2016 Martina Robles Gallegos

prompt Hour Sixteen–repeating line

Where the Mind Dwells

I will live in the country where the mind dwells,
a permanent resident of the nation of thought.
My body will wither and fade, physical pleasures
lose their meaning, but my mind will tick
and sputter its way on through to eternity, and still
I will live in the country where the mind dwells.

Tracy Plath

Drowning In Digital

The iron fist’s grip is slipping and arthritic
Rusted and soon to be obsolete
Or at least less relevant
Say the idealists

Soon all forms of authority will be eclipsed
When consciousness is digitized and exists in space that’s infinite

This analog wetware meat vessel seems a bit limited
But without physical limitations, what is it that makes us human?

We’ve opened Pandora’s encrypted zip file
Unleashed a virus
Pixilated images onto the inside of our eyelids

We’re drowning in misinformation and synthesized ultra-violence
Wishing for simplicity
Wishing we could go back to good old days when we used to raise our fists and proclaim
The iron fist’s grip is slipping and arthritic

(x) Gold….

All that is stramineous,
runs in crooked, fine, veins
beneath the mantle;

All that is precious above
the vaults, of her daedal earth,
is less compared to the lustre
in her eyes when she smiles.

All that is auricomous,
gathered as ochroid dust,
by her minions, when she in
languid disgust tosses her mane;

sets worlds afire, with nonchalance….