Submissions by hgnichols (Harry Nichols)
POEMS AND SHORT STORIES
Poet Introduction
I have casually written poems for years and have felt the need lately to share them with others. #Dadlife and gigs often prevent me from reading them in person, so here I am.
LOVE POEM
Published
16th Oct 2018 2:28am
16th Oct 2018 2:28am
Fever-Dream
I wanted something profound to say
about the wilderness we walked
crooked as snakes.
something in your vicious fang
and the orchards’ fruit;
some deep truth feeding the garden
like subterranean creeks
nourishing the thicket hiding
our joint fever-dream.
Like all carnage, ours was empty.
Dreams forgotten on waking,
all pumping earth awaiting collapse,
hollow fruit.
We were animals basking in
idiot nature, drunken meanings,
howling at nothing.
about the wilderness we walked
crooked as snakes.
something in your vicious fang
and the orchards’ fruit;
some deep truth feeding the garden
like subterranean creeks
nourishing the thicket hiding
our joint fever-dream.
Like all carnage, ours was empty.
Dreams forgotten on waking,
all pumping earth awaiting collapse,
hollow fruit.
We were animals basking in
idiot nature, drunken meanings,
howling at nothing.
#love
#dark
#sex
#nostalgia
#FirstLove
713 reads
2 Comments
LOVE POEM
Published
13th Oct 2018 4:53pm
13th Oct 2018 4:53pm
Dreams of a Feast
To the person that leaves me hungry,
whose voice I hear softly speaking in my heightened hearing,
who fills my stomach with emptiness, hidden in the shadow of my room,
The one that speaks to me through my phone
with her digital tongue to say I’m sorry we missed each other
To whom I address emails strung together like paperless chains to say
I’m sorry, I’ll be home late again and again and again
To the person I find evidence of in dinners left on the stove
whose trails I follow around the kitchen
Whose daily activities I surmise, but am never sure...
whose voice I hear softly speaking in my heightened hearing,
who fills my stomach with emptiness, hidden in the shadow of my room,
The one that speaks to me through my phone
with her digital tongue to say I’m sorry we missed each other
To whom I address emails strung together like paperless chains to say
I’m sorry, I’ll be home late again and again and again
To the person I find evidence of in dinners left on the stove
whose trails I follow around the kitchen
Whose daily activities I surmise, but am never sure...
#love
#relationships
#frustration #separation
#frustration #separation
482 reads
0 Comments
OBSERVATIONAL POEM
Published
6th Oct 2018 1:03pm
6th Oct 2018 1:03pm
Death of a Cell
I’ll bet you didn’t know that the bars of your cage ache as well,
Too fixed, as you are, on your own solitude and greif.
It aches down to the marrow with the weight of the cornice
Pulling itself ever downward until it lands,
A mound in earth,
Reverse birth into its mother.
Perhaps this is the real lesson, you do not think,
That watching the sinking motion of our vessel teaches as much if not more
Than scratching our small existence into the metal cot frame for lack of better artifacts.
The bars will soon sag, the cell itself collapse,
A lung...
Too fixed, as you are, on your own solitude and greif.
It aches down to the marrow with the weight of the cornice
Pulling itself ever downward until it lands,
A mound in earth,
Reverse birth into its mother.
Perhaps this is the real lesson, you do not think,
That watching the sinking motion of our vessel teaches as much if not more
Than scratching our small existence into the metal cot frame for lack of better artifacts.
The bars will soon sag, the cell itself collapse,
A lung...
#dark
#FeelingTrapped
#emotional
517 reads
0 Comments
LOVE POEM
Published
30th Sep 2018 6:56pm
30th Sep 2018 6:56pm
Waiting to be Smitten
I don’t want you to shrink,
to wither away, dust and skin
a ghost carried on drafts
weakness overpowering,
my brittle vessel,
my deflating birthday balloon,
my broken home
mold covered cracking
falling in, sagging at the seams
barely load bearing
collapsing in a rottenwood pile
light debris spreading the memory itself,
discordant, out-of-focus,
details deleting themselves,
not wanting to cause me any trouble.
I want you to impose.
I want you to fill my sight and conquer me.
I want you break me and I...
to wither away, dust and skin
a ghost carried on drafts
weakness overpowering,
my brittle vessel,
my deflating birthday balloon,
my broken home
mold covered cracking
falling in, sagging at the seams
barely load bearing
collapsing in a rottenwood pile
light debris spreading the memory itself,
discordant, out-of-focus,
details deleting themselves,
not wanting to cause me any trouble.
I want you to impose.
I want you to fill my sight and conquer me.
I want you break me and I...
#love
#relationships
#power
504 reads
2 Comments
OBSERVATIONAL POEM
Published
22nd Sep 2018 7:26pm
22nd Sep 2018 7:26pm
PTSD
After she shakes the shadows from her night sweats
And dries the quivering drips
She makes breakfast.
One bowl of cereal, one cup of coffee French pressed
Scrubbing clean the filter like the barrel of her M16
And oatmeal for the little man,
Sometimes appreciative, sometimes not.
She sets aside the ingredients,
Handle, barrel, trigger and clip
And paints her face for war before leaving for work.
I can tell the tale in her manner,
My brother served others overseas and came back half.
Strings of familiarity, the man I knew with a...
And dries the quivering drips
She makes breakfast.
One bowl of cereal, one cup of coffee French pressed
Scrubbing clean the filter like the barrel of her M16
And oatmeal for the little man,
Sometimes appreciative, sometimes not.
She sets aside the ingredients,
Handle, barrel, trigger and clip
And paints her face for war before leaving for work.
I can tell the tale in her manner,
My brother served others overseas and came back half.
Strings of familiarity, the man I knew with a...
#illness
#MentalHealth
#PTSD #ignorance
#PTSD #ignorance
572 reads
1 Comment
DRUGS POEM
Published
15th Sep 2018 3:48pm
15th Sep 2018 3:48pm
After the Wedding
I stood up against the hard Missouri morning
Decked in sober light,
the river slow as the sludge
my heart pumped,
Begging for water and relief
And though I drank and drank
As I had the night before
The pains would not abate.
The night of revelry gave way to a dirge at dawn
The morning was unmitigated
So often we drink to something we’ve mistaken,
An idol in a familiar mask who
In cocky revelry, recieving your supplication
Peels off the cover, exposing its true self
A stranger, a villain, a fiend ...
Decked in sober light,
the river slow as the sludge
my heart pumped,
Begging for water and relief
And though I drank and drank
As I had the night before
The pains would not abate.
The night of revelry gave way to a dirge at dawn
The morning was unmitigated
So often we drink to something we’ve mistaken,
An idol in a familiar mask who
In cocky revelry, recieving your supplication
Peels off the cover, exposing its true self
A stranger, a villain, a fiend ...
#alcohol
#confessional
#mythology #SelfReflection
#mythology #SelfReflection
515 reads
0 Comments
SELF POEM
Published
9th Sep 2018 4:55pm
9th Sep 2018 4:55pm
How I Like My Coffee
Strong enough to lift me, a marionette who only feels when strings are plucked
Collecting dust in a closet coffin
Listening to muffled life on the outside
Strong enough to propell me, figurehead, cutting sea stretched taught before my prow
Wood wearing, beaten numb by waves
Praying for dock and harbor
Strong enough to press diamonds in my kidneys
Passing through internal waterways that tingle but never burn
Sewers hiding secrets, silent in a shadow cloak
Strong enough to give me power over things that render me powerless
to...
Collecting dust in a closet coffin
Listening to muffled life on the outside
Strong enough to propell me, figurehead, cutting sea stretched taught before my prow
Wood wearing, beaten numb by waves
Praying for dock and harbor
Strong enough to press diamonds in my kidneys
Passing through internal waterways that tingle but never burn
Sewers hiding secrets, silent in a shadow cloak
Strong enough to give me power over things that render me powerless
to...
#depression
#coffee
685 reads
3 Comments
SELF POEM
Published
1st Sep 2018 11:27am
1st Sep 2018 11:27am
Night Walk
I cannot separate from my selfish wandering shadow
my crooked walk, remembrance,
nostalgia in my bones
though my light turns this and that way,
I merely pause to steady my feet
when I should be searching for you.
The fleeting ghost of your future
told in the subtleties of impossible night.
It clings at my heels, a lazy jester
mocking me, telling its truth in its way
despite my attempts to hide in thick black.
where has my mustang spirit fled to
whose echo reverberates down the halls of my veins?
whose recapture proves elusive,...
my crooked walk, remembrance,
nostalgia in my bones
though my light turns this and that way,
I merely pause to steady my feet
when I should be searching for you.
The fleeting ghost of your future
told in the subtleties of impossible night.
It clings at my heels, a lazy jester
mocking me, telling its truth in its way
despite my attempts to hide in thick black.
where has my mustang spirit fled to
whose echo reverberates down the halls of my veins?
whose recapture proves elusive,...
#sadness
#dark
#aging #nostalgia
#aging #nostalgia
708 reads
8 Comments
DU Poetry : Submissions by hgnichols (Harry Nichols)
