Submissions by toniscales (Lost Girl)
POEMS AND SHORT STORIES
Poet Introduction
I am very critical of my own work but I tend to love intensely, and writing is an emotional release and catharsis I can't seem to resist.
Whispers
your voice is its own poetry
sex-dripped noir
mouth in black and white
slain over mine
tongues stitched together
your breath
sings of the city
smoke
alleyways
gaslight
your tan trench coat
shielding my naked flesh
from the night
you galvanize me
but this love is a prison
a room I cannot escape
the walls papered
in your words
your moans at my ears
sometimes I get chills
thinking of you
fingers lightly fluttering
down my spine
if I'm alone and can't...
sex-dripped noir
mouth in black and white
slain over mine
tongues stitched together
your breath
sings of the city
smoke
alleyways
gaslight
your tan trench coat
shielding my naked flesh
from the night
you galvanize me
but this love is a prison
a room I cannot escape
the walls papered
in your words
your moans at my ears
sometimes I get chills
thinking of you
fingers lightly fluttering
down my spine
if I'm alone and can't...
957 reads
6 Comments
Reading Joshua Miller's The Mao Game
(written for Crim's "Addiction" competition)
I look at you, burn
as if I were beautiful,
eat up your world
to suck at my fingers.
I could love you as you are,
aquiline and strange,
screaming mouth seared
by the kiss of the wrong.
Long ago the specterboys left home,
motherless, thirsty comets,
tongues gouging holes
in the hearts of fatherless girls.
In a foreign country,
I stare down at my arms,
squint to see
your track marks
Where sweet-brown junk
eased music through veins...
I look at you, burn
as if I were beautiful,
eat up your world
to suck at my fingers.
I could love you as you are,
aquiline and strange,
screaming mouth seared
by the kiss of the wrong.
Long ago the specterboys left home,
motherless, thirsty comets,
tongues gouging holes
in the hearts of fatherless girls.
In a foreign country,
I stare down at my arms,
squint to see
your track marks
Where sweet-brown junk
eased music through veins...
645 reads
2 Comments
Stopping by Frederick's on a Foggy Evening
She wants her every breath to matter,
life piquant as a good first line,
the sound of the sea in every room.
Her hair smelling of mangoes and
pomegranate, her sex of Api Etoile
apples and Ballerina roses. Medici-red.
She wants the Maitland-Smith four-poster
fringed with Noguchi lamps and the men
in her life, those seemingly-organic
shapes, insubstantial and wispy as clouds,
ephemeral as love. She dreams of cornices
and minarets, the Pulaski dresser’s surface
littered with Moroccan fig candles, vintage
embalming equipment,...
life piquant as a good first line,
the sound of the sea in every room.
Her hair smelling of mangoes and
pomegranate, her sex of Api Etoile
apples and Ballerina roses. Medici-red.
She wants the Maitland-Smith four-poster
fringed with Noguchi lamps and the men
in her life, those seemingly-organic
shapes, insubstantial and wispy as clouds,
ephemeral as love. She dreams of cornices
and minarets, the Pulaski dresser’s surface
littered with Moroccan fig candles, vintage
embalming equipment,...
661 reads
2 Comments
Painting the Walls in the Purple, Red, and Gold Tones of a Gilded Womb
(written for Le Fay's "natural poems, from and for the senses" competition)
for Elizabeth Bruno
After the breakdown, she tries to be Theda Bara,
lines her eyes in Casati-black kohl and swoons
on the scarlet chaise lounge. Thinks she can
catch a man with a white Sevres bowl, some pink
Rainier cherries, and a silver baby spoon.
She wants the world shaped like a throat
so she can swallow it whole. Hangs dozens
of polaroids, fires up the Victrola and prowls
the house (the den of a sultana) in an indigo
lace negligee, blue-black as a...
for Elizabeth Bruno
After the breakdown, she tries to be Theda Bara,
lines her eyes in Casati-black kohl and swoons
on the scarlet chaise lounge. Thinks she can
catch a man with a white Sevres bowl, some pink
Rainier cherries, and a silver baby spoon.
She wants the world shaped like a throat
so she can swallow it whole. Hangs dozens
of polaroids, fires up the Victrola and prowls
the house (the den of a sultana) in an indigo
lace negligee, blue-black as a...
683 reads
3 Comments
Emma
Maybe we kill ourselves
because we hate our bodies.
I try to wring something out
of the day. Use words like naked,
nubile. I am counting my cards,
blowing spit bubbles in the dark.
Rooted to this spot by the sad
pioneer family in my hair.
We are dove-gray and pear-soft,
seek shelter beneath
the gingerbread trim. I am bent,
bewildered. What with all the priests
running fingers through my hair
and using words like boiserie.
Like diadem. How they sniff out
my sins from miles away.
Lately I’ve taken to stealing ...
because we hate our bodies.
I try to wring something out
of the day. Use words like naked,
nubile. I am counting my cards,
blowing spit bubbles in the dark.
Rooted to this spot by the sad
pioneer family in my hair.
We are dove-gray and pear-soft,
seek shelter beneath
the gingerbread trim. I am bent,
bewildered. What with all the priests
running fingers through my hair
and using words like boiserie.
Like diadem. How they sniff out
my sins from miles away.
Lately I’ve taken to stealing ...
804 reads
7 Comments
Anastasia
These images I collect,
hoping to feel. We still
believe in haunted things
that prey upon children.
Even the umbrellas
make me sad. I yearn
for diminutive women
to help me cross over
to the light. Stand
in shadows, pray for storms
of pebbles. We throw
ragged tennis balls
into closets. Shrink
into mice so the adults
won’t find out. But they’re
too fevered to notice
the stains on our shoes.
The crackling of my bones
as I tumble down the staircase.
Tin foil covers all
the windows, the winter...
hoping to feel. We still
believe in haunted things
that prey upon children.
Even the umbrellas
make me sad. I yearn
for diminutive women
to help me cross over
to the light. Stand
in shadows, pray for storms
of pebbles. We throw
ragged tennis balls
into closets. Shrink
into mice so the adults
won’t find out. But they’re
too fevered to notice
the stains on our shoes.
The crackling of my bones
as I tumble down the staircase.
Tin foil covers all
the windows, the winter...
668 reads
5 Comments
On Isolation
(Thinking the last stanza needs to be deleted... Would welcome critical feedback on this.)
Now is the time when light
slows its breathing.
When the wind braids
the trees into chords
of dissonant longing
like fragments. Like echoes.
The tempo of things
slows imperceptibly.
The eyes of loneliness
are Casati's, smoky
at the edges. I watch
the sun pause
above its carapace, turn
its head as if waiting
for a voice.
A pearl of laughter,
glassy-smooth, shatters
from within the park.
I...
Now is the time when light
slows its breathing.
When the wind braids
the trees into chords
of dissonant longing
like fragments. Like echoes.
The tempo of things
slows imperceptibly.
The eyes of loneliness
are Casati's, smoky
at the edges. I watch
the sun pause
above its carapace, turn
its head as if waiting
for a voice.
A pearl of laughter,
glassy-smooth, shatters
from within the park.
I...
933 reads
8 Comments
At the Cinema (or the Problem with Twisters)
(Wanted to say a quick thanks for you guys that keep reading my stuff & commenting. Will respond individually ASAP...
This is a piece involving a film and lit. class and what I guess is a rather odd reaction to something iconic to American culture, something that rather haunted me--among many things--as a child. Hope you like it.)
____________________________________
Note the power of the horizontal closeup.
The impossibly angelic figure.
The floral print pillow
and the checkered gingham dress.
Watch her swoon. The camera
tracking...
This is a piece involving a film and lit. class and what I guess is a rather odd reaction to something iconic to American culture, something that rather haunted me--among many things--as a child. Hope you like it.)
____________________________________
Note the power of the horizontal closeup.
The impossibly angelic figure.
The floral print pillow
and the checkered gingham dress.
Watch her swoon. The camera
tracking...
716 reads
5 Comments
Cecilia
It always begins in decrepit houses.
Soon I will taste of pain
and licorice.
The children’s caskets
bathed in yellow, yellow
roses. Their innocent petals.
In your eyes I see peek-shows
and pornos.
All glitter eye lashes
and transparent heels.
I pour myself
into the fractured aquarium
where infant girls swim the interior.
That time your car smelled
like my father's.
Slightly drunk, leather
slightly worn by the press
of women's thighs.
I dribble ripped panties
into the washer, my jeans
so tight...
Soon I will taste of pain
and licorice.
The children’s caskets
bathed in yellow, yellow
roses. Their innocent petals.
In your eyes I see peek-shows
and pornos.
All glitter eye lashes
and transparent heels.
I pour myself
into the fractured aquarium
where infant girls swim the interior.
That time your car smelled
like my father's.
Slightly drunk, leather
slightly worn by the press
of women's thighs.
I dribble ripped panties
into the washer, my jeans
so tight...
640 reads
4 Comments
Ivy
Yearning is inherited.
She stares at the delicate skin
of her wrists, searching for signs.
That beautiful blue falling.
We buy Hershey bars and street maps,
sticky fingers tracing the roads
between us. Collect bottle tops
and unicorn stickers.
How I nudge them closer to death
with my fingernail
when they begin to peel.
How the scientists say
we can never really touch.
Something about electrons
and porcelain shoes.
Mother always tossing her hair
and looking away. Troubling us
with her sad stories
of...
She stares at the delicate skin
of her wrists, searching for signs.
That beautiful blue falling.
We buy Hershey bars and street maps,
sticky fingers tracing the roads
between us. Collect bottle tops
and unicorn stickers.
How I nudge them closer to death
with my fingernail
when they begin to peel.
How the scientists say
we can never really touch.
Something about electrons
and porcelain shoes.
Mother always tossing her hair
and looking away. Troubling us
with her sad stories
of...
706 reads
4 Comments
Phoebe
You mustn’t forget the black Mary Janes.
The handsprings and the cat-shaped clocks.
My restless blond hair braided neat and tight
but that watery emptiness in my eyes.
We watch the seamen with their gray beards
while caramel leaks from our pink-stained
mouths. My angry white knuckles
as I fist the folds of my blue dress.
Our clapboard house leaning from neglect,
its shelves after shelves of geisha dolls.
When it happens we’ll taste
of maraschino and molasses.
Of glass milk bottles
and purple pogo sticks. ...
The handsprings and the cat-shaped clocks.
My restless blond hair braided neat and tight
but that watery emptiness in my eyes.
We watch the seamen with their gray beards
while caramel leaks from our pink-stained
mouths. My angry white knuckles
as I fist the folds of my blue dress.
Our clapboard house leaning from neglect,
its shelves after shelves of geisha dolls.
When it happens we’ll taste
of maraschino and molasses.
Of glass milk bottles
and purple pogo sticks. ...
761 reads
7 Comments
Grass is Greener
896 reads
3 Comments
DU Poetry : Submissions by toniscales (Lost Girl)