deepundergroundpoetry.com
How To Forge Rust
https://soundcloud.app.goo.gl/cdpu1C1WNKHUeGuE9
I didnt walk the mean streets
I drank it down
salt water on metal
yellow-red flare of cigarettes
before they’re crushed under heel
lighters under spoons glowing bright
growing into adolescence
with a churn of addiction
rage flame fanned by
praise
for the ability to inflict pain
in the ring
gloves on
tears streaming
fight for your affection boy
the loser is outside for the night
and the winner
Oh
the winner
is showered in love and praise
goaded into deriding the loser
it was all about the fight
even when streaks of your own blood
crusted stains on your shirt
dragged through glass shards
a patch work quilt of scars
cut
beaten bloody
but never beaten
when I came of age
I was the mean streets
pint-glass in face
barstool swinger
a harbringer of hospital visits and
blood stained pavements
I could dance a dance of violent destruction
no sparring with words
merely an off hand gesture
would call on my wrath
rust flecked words
formed through clenched teeth
one of us is going to hospital
cunt
and I
I don’t give a fuck which one of us it is!
the only time I felt
anything but empty
was when I was full
of the mean streets
I didnt walk the mean streets
I drank it down
salt water on metal
yellow-red flare of cigarettes
before they’re crushed under heel
lighters under spoons glowing bright
growing into adolescence
with a churn of addiction
rage flame fanned by
praise
for the ability to inflict pain
in the ring
gloves on
tears streaming
fight for your affection boy
the loser is outside for the night
and the winner
Oh
the winner
is showered in love and praise
goaded into deriding the loser
it was all about the fight
even when streaks of your own blood
crusted stains on your shirt
dragged through glass shards
a patch work quilt of scars
cut
beaten bloody
but never beaten
when I came of age
I was the mean streets
pint-glass in face
barstool swinger
a harbringer of hospital visits and
blood stained pavements
I could dance a dance of violent destruction
no sparring with words
merely an off hand gesture
would call on my wrath
rust flecked words
formed through clenched teeth
one of us is going to hospital
cunt
and I
I don’t give a fuck which one of us it is!
the only time I felt
anything but empty
was when I was full
of the mean streets
Published 15th Jun 2022
| Edited 18th Jun 2022
All writing remains the property of the author. Don't use it for any purpose without their permission.
likes 5
reading list entries 1
comments 8
reads 180
Commenting Preference:
The author encourages honest critique.
15th Jun 2022 3:09am
This one is eye of the tiger. But not as corny, thankfully. You shoulda produced that movie. It lacked realism, whereas you poem doesn't.
By the way, "Sometimes I write shit". No, you don't.
Basically you're a fighter that writes. Cool. Dude, we'd be buds. Lol.
Great write. I love it. I get it, too.
By the way, "Sometimes I write shit". No, you don't.
Basically you're a fighter that writes. Cool. Dude, we'd be buds. Lol.
Great write. I love it. I get it, too.
Appreciate it, next time you’re in Australia hit me up, I know the best dive bars,
As to the “sometimes I write shit” lol thanks for the praise.
As to the “sometimes I write shit” lol thanks for the praise.
15th Jun 2022 10:38pm
This is so animalistic and primeval, it feels like the voice over of an opening sequence to an epic and gutteral Guy Ritchie movie....Your poetic tactics, the almost tactile realness is raw, edgy and totally immersive. I couldn't look away or stop reading even if I wanted to...
I was grabbed, and held there. Period.
That's the stuff you cannot learn or grow into...
I think it's something that you got or you don't...
... and dammit, you've got it in spades.
Sorry to have have missed this one...
🌹 B
I was grabbed, and held there. Period.
That's the stuff you cannot learn or grow into...
I think it's something that you got or you don't...
... and dammit, you've got it in spades.
Sorry to have have missed this one...
🌹 B
17th Jun 2022 8:22am
Thank Blue, I’ve crammed a lot of poems into my time here so appreciate the time you e taken to read and comment,
Some of the best praise for a writer is that you couldn’t look away
Thankyou
Some of the best praise for a writer is that you couldn’t look away
Thankyou
16th Jun 2022 4:40pm
I appreciate the insights our friends have given, I concur, your writing has a raw grit about it that is genuine and without bounds of convention, which to me is the soul of artistry. Be fearless in what we love, I wish I had lived my life the way I reflected upon it, personally.
17th Jun 2022 8:23am
I have the scars to prove I lived my life and I think I’m going to be regretting it in my 50’s 😅
As to grit, I prefer that and realism to flights of fancy, when you don’t know if you’re going to live or die poetics is normally furthest from your mind.
As to grit, I prefer that and realism to flights of fancy, when you don’t know if you’re going to live or die poetics is normally furthest from your mind.
1st Jul 2022 00:41am
Jesus I hear that. I'm 45 with the hips and joints of a 70 year old. lol
18th Jun 2022 00:43am
I grew up in a small Appalachian town in the southwest part of Virginia...not exactly the most wholesome place in America if ya know what I mean...and Pagans MC from Philly used to run this town in a major way during my formative years. (This was the same chapter that defied Nicky Scarfo's street tax in the early 80s and pretty much got away with it, so not exactly guys who fool around much.) They jumped some of the older boys from my neighborhood and delivered some major beatdowns to see if they were Pagan material, then would hang out and pal around with them that same night, a way to allow the prospects to prove that they wouldn't take the beating personally, could conduct business under duress, and wouldn't fold under questioning. Two guys from my neighborhood were eventually patched in, and as of today one of them is MIA and the other one got wounded by a Hells Angel's bullet during the infamous New York "Hellraiser Ball" fracas of '02, now confined to a wheelchair. (I also had a cousin that got patched in but that was a different matter in a different neighborhood.)
I was just a scrawny kid at the time, less than a dead bug beneath the boots of dudes like this, and not the greatest fighter on the block by any means, but growing up in an environment like this led me to adopt a type of Napoleon complex where it wouldn't matter if I could "win" the fight or not (and rarely if ever DID lol), as long as I didn't back down I could keep my dignity. Very misguided and I took some beatings that were wholly unnecessary and psychologically harmful in the long run, but ya know, you can take the boy out the mean streets but you can't take the mean streets out the boy. Your work encapsulates that notion most effectively here.
I don't mean to write an essay on street gang culture or anything, just wanted you to know that this really takes me back to those days in the hood by the woods when just a simple stroll down the road could lead to physical conflict, as your words carry themselves in that same fuck-you way of casual violence. I really find it fascinating.
Your writing is straight fire and I see no reason to start taking any prisoners now. I simultaneously dread & enjoy your fighting poems, and that's high praise! Sometimes you bring back a lil a that ol' PTSD, but I think that's perfectly okay in the context of poetry.
Stay sharp, Mr. Gaps.
I was just a scrawny kid at the time, less than a dead bug beneath the boots of dudes like this, and not the greatest fighter on the block by any means, but growing up in an environment like this led me to adopt a type of Napoleon complex where it wouldn't matter if I could "win" the fight or not (and rarely if ever DID lol), as long as I didn't back down I could keep my dignity. Very misguided and I took some beatings that were wholly unnecessary and psychologically harmful in the long run, but ya know, you can take the boy out the mean streets but you can't take the mean streets out the boy. Your work encapsulates that notion most effectively here.
I don't mean to write an essay on street gang culture or anything, just wanted you to know that this really takes me back to those days in the hood by the woods when just a simple stroll down the road could lead to physical conflict, as your words carry themselves in that same fuck-you way of casual violence. I really find it fascinating.
Your writing is straight fire and I see no reason to start taking any prisoners now. I simultaneously dread & enjoy your fighting poems, and that's high praise! Sometimes you bring back a lil a that ol' PTSD, but I think that's perfectly okay in the context of poetry.
Stay sharp, Mr. Gaps.
