The Official ATS Poetry Thread

a reply to: maria_stardust

I think every poem deserves it's own thread.

in the morning
she said, taste
the sweet liquid.
the light splintered
across her face.
she leaned closer,
her gray kiss
smelled of gin
and juicy fruit kush.

I gave her $13 to buy
some poems down at the
circus tent.

Your work,
no matter how strong
or clever will be a heartless
prayer to those drunk
on the sound of their
own voice.

for Charles Mingus


the subtle, soft
noise. the metaphors
of your sound

You're the life,
sometimes the
sacrifice

I love your tune,
repeatable kindness
slow motion lullaby.

poets of the fall
it all came together
on the Rio Grande

The story of your
daughter lost in hell
is the only dandled I
ever loved

I held it up to the light
turned it over like the
blood quantum

you should understand
I was on my way to
the Wang Ping
ritual....

Father, bless me
now with your
sad tears.
Round headed
babies, black
naked women,

I should have been
embarresed, but
they took me by
suprise.
I said to myself
"you know, your
soul is constituted of
green centainties and
wind.

I wonder if God
is melon cooly to
see us just loitering
about smelling the lilacs
and azure moss.

hush baby, it will be
alright
the solitary snowflake
still holding us
to keep our slide into
the shadows.

Do you have number
four? then eat it and
put down your fork.

I am the poet
I am Mary Magdaline
I am a breathing ghost
the color of dried tooth
paste fallen on the floor.

in my cave of
forgotten dreams'
the poet stares
down on Joy street.

January's breath is
upon us and I remember
my father, the aviator,
the voice.

At the 7/11, he buys
a paper, and a 6 pak.
I'm just giving you
the trailer before
I head west for
the ritual.

play the dark chords
of human dreams,
seek the gypsy gal
her sad eyes and
and nervous breasts.

I praise her with
the paper doll body.

She says "listen to it,
the cold breeze in
heaven" "it pulls down
the cloud"
"now I weep for the
beggars and children
of bone dust and diamonds"

I start the Volvo and ask
her if she needs a ride.

Words as sharp as knives
Used to minimize the defensive wounds
Tears bubbling over like boiling water
In a pot of anger we’ve become consumed

Two sides of the same coin
We match each other blade for blade
You runaway, I have nowhere to run
Left here, reflecting on how our love decayed

I tried to build a fortress around you
A fool’s errand, I see it now
In my attempt at protection, I created resentment and
Your progress and evolution I did not allow

I hope one day when the memory of war has faded
That we can both see the love that was once there
Because s life without your light and beaming soul of fire
Is a life that I am not so sure that I can or want to bare

i love the legend
of the blue light.
out on hiway 550
orbs dancing along
the fenceline and
the Zia guys not
speaking.

You can see the
pueblo from the road,
double wides and 1k
yr old adobes side by
side. Rap and drums
mix in the Rio Grande dust.

a reply to: olaru12

cont.

put away your things
and remember your mothers
sleep. It's nothing,
it could have been worse,
without the beautiful
sweet things, lounging
around in the Doll museum
and the cinema.

I wedge my fingers
into the resurrection,
sliding from its light
without to much ceremony,
just the air pocket of
Saint Felix.

I pay with coins and jade,
to buy the smallest of sins.
Maybe I will come back,
and we can look at
the picture book and
listen to the overhead
noise.

We go down under
the Buddhist moon
and feast on bread
fragments and the
jam made by John
Glen where the cemetery
birds just sing and sing.

My madness settles slightly
as Consuelo gets in the volvo
and mumbles "man, when
are you going to get some
sleep"

For Brenda...

It would have
almost been worth
it.... to have stood
before the camera
& address the Grave
Men and Mother gun.
Mother skins a cut out
from the wall and daddy
utters..."There will be
no prayers tonite"
One hundred and
sixty miles form
Durango where the
Abomunist squeezes
a tube of testors into
his sock, sits and waits
for the jiggle sylph.

Who said jiggle sylph?
Oh, that was the Moon
sisters, out working
on Joy street. They
were cracking open
the Alligator skulls
looking for the soul
of Sausalito and Walnut
creek.

I'm tellin you Bubba,
they are some of the
most attractive Hindu's
you will ever meet.
Don't bring religion
into it; you're not
Ram Das you know.

America, you boil over.

Machine elves
in the desert,
platinum skin.
'Don't get out of line"
they say....
I see your sweet
dust gun and oil
fall from grace.
Kerouac and peppy
squeeze the lime into
the coconut.

People are not very
happy. They can
feel the disease.
The eyes of their
children, weep!

a reply to: olaru12

cont....


unless someone buys
them a new hat.
A party hat, with
little feathers.

outrageous misfortunes,
synopis and taxes
I dream of visitors and
invisible old junkies,
and the sacrificial alters of
satanic dust.

William Blake, did you ever
try crank or skin blood?
You must have as you throw echos and symbols
at the feet of 1937.

Guess who I saw at the dispensary today?
The Saturn man and his virgin Paquita,
I went to the prayer bar as punishment.

you tossed the blanket
from the bead, you lay
on your back and watched
curly images of clover and blacks.

you can hear him now
the mystical whistler
whistling his future metaphors,
Christmas comes like this
to the suburbs of ugly children,
lonely with there cell phone
friends and dreams of hiphop
priests, and fireball miniatures.

I stay in the casita, with the
queen of pain, and read the
strange inscriptions on the
back of my hand, messages
from the dark angel of Xmas
past. "and to all a good nite"

a reply to: olaru12


The rap angles have come to America...

raspberry quibbles
impotent drab nasty plow
bragging rising plain
finger birds with the dog,
while it rains pearls, pianos
and mint priests.
Now the singing eunuch
starts his ramble in the decaying putrid
sacrificial ritual of the murder with his
deaf followers and their round headed
children.

mi vida mordisquable
el chostomo que elote
pachanga my sweet,
pay no attention as
the words change their
meaning at the drop
of a hat.

Santa has the bat flu
and moans from the bar
Setem up joe and one for
the horses. I'm stone,
I'm flesh, says Rita
Dove as she walks
down the streets of Akron.
She looks into the bland
faces of the librarians,
and children with round
heads, clutching the
voodoo dolls shaped like
Robert, George or Ernie.

The nice men wave goodby,
asking, "what is that smell"
and the ape man answers
"floating lips"