Best Exoskeleton Poems
Such strange fat fireflies so early in the month of Beltane, pondered Angela, as she watched their ephemeral light brighten then fade. Was she ken to a mutation from some radioactive mist or super acidic rain? Or, more simply, a mischievous neuron in her prodigal imagination played.
It was kind of scary, she thought, for how unspeakable would they become by summer? Angela waved her arms chaotically, hoping to obfuscate their sense of direction. Running home, she collapsed on the toilet and performed a thorough lavation to refresh and calm herself -- whilst a single, stealthy flyer wangled and buried it's exoskeleton deep within her shorts, without suspect or detection.
There it waited, nestled in her warmth like some grotesque, undefinable blur. Her sleep was a nightmarish kaleidoscope of aerial motion over meadows and fields of variegated flora and shambling human/insect hybrids that feasted and festered upon her. Angela's brainiac intellect lay suspended in the grip of a changeling's aura.
She woke in warm light, instantly relieved that the interminable night had ended. Her eyes appeared befuddled, for the sun was now setting in the pastel-painted west. Angela proceeded to crawl on the bed in vermicular circles, and then she ascended into her final epitaph ... in the digestive fluids of a companion lightning pest.
https://m.soundcloud.com/user-921599710/invertebrates-of-the-kingdom
Varied species of the kingdom
Across our earthly home
From sponges to the octopus
Without a backbone
Laying small eggs
Or a centimetre long
Astounding invertebrates
There outer skin is strong
Upon an organism
There they choose to lay
Eggs for a food source
Paralyse their prey
As the insect grows
So rapidly within
A time of which to moult
Remove their outer skin
The expanding colony
Survival of the team
Young bees evolving
From a single queen
Shed their exoskeleton
Insect crawling out
Expansion of their wings
Body drying out
Beginning as larvae
From the eggs they hatch
Dramatic transformation
Metamorphosis match
Written by Geraldine Taylor ©
Descending into a mega-mall, the fluorescence blemishes my skin.
There is a twinge in my temples as I approach the makeup counter,
meeting eyes with a woman whose shoes pierce my gait
and whose artificially white teeth flash like EMP bombs.
But I must not be blinded; there is something behind those calcium shutters,
illuminating inside her vessel and peaking through each crack ... I wonder.
Is her exoskeleton painted so pristinely to brighten the day?
Who owns the day she, in every meticulous gesture, labors for?
But every question is drowned in a clanging,
a clamoring of those persistent teeth trying to make a sale.
Rattling around like new tap shoes, sheening ivory.
White noise, white noise.
Every coherent thought blurred, humming viciously
as done in the shadows of the perfect women in chromatic ads.
But she is not perfect; I can see her pores.
They are weeping the regrets of thick foundation.
Those streaks of saline wet speak gallons and shimmer
as they slide, revealing pockets of uneven flesh tones,
subtle bruises from the hot-lipped sun,
every mar a testament to resistance in midst of the Tyrants.
Gravity, Matter and Time; how admirably this body has battled them,
unaware of its own striking animal; a masterwork of sinew and bone,
of neurons and cartilage, of mucus and moles.
Each electron hums in its proud, puffed little chest.
In earnest I wonder, does the sales lady know every outline,
every wrinkle of her beige, waterproof suit?
Does she wear it in precious stride, beaming just bright enough so as to share
her whole self, lovely-garish, yet never glaring the keenest lens?
There is no answer.
I only nod slightly, appreciating her mottled gem eyes,
politely severing our feeble connection, departing, contemplating them,
that such dazzling blue could exist immersed in milky pools
disrupted by long-legged channels of blood.
pestilence restlessness sedatives
represent my main directives
presentment made me infected
selective systematic collective
medative hesitation effects my relevance
like hell needs a prince
never accept limits
convince me long since
i should repent
i never new what i was trying to attempt
i believed it was from hell i was sent
because once you get under my skin
you'll never tempt me again
Friendly enemy or foe
i don't not care at all no
Then into the monster i transform im a fellin
my exoskeleton is made from titanium dripped gelatin
Perfectly flexible cybernetic veins here my bellowing
im set to kill automatic tongue im never mellowing
i spit sparatic people lavish my tongue lashing hello n
goodbye nice to see you have a good time kill a fellow n
realize im a villain include chronic in my song im telling
you dog like wrestling im raw but bloody like saw your welting
from my manic pelting i keep it strapped above my belt im melting
My personification became like a puppeteer
i dangle on the strings of my sanity
and dance in the pale moon lite
its in my nature to believe i am something i am not
a look in the mirror is a trip into a place that has never
been seen before in the depths of my consciousness
These small instances of unabashed humanity
That grow grand when isolated and transfix the senses
Become loud and brash while still remaining a small, subdued world within the world.
With stories that flicker in an out of my existence as they proceed on within their own
And I will never know except for how I choose to know them.
And myself, alike a stranger, will flicker in and out of my perception
And briefly will engage on its terms alone
To find that the tragedies of life are quelled by unnoticed and quiet reformations
Having shared them, at the core, the passions and pitfalls of people you will never know including yourself drive you to fall in love twenty times a day with the mere ghosts of subway riders,
The lines in the face, the strange depression felt from the broken bottle in the sidewalk crack, overheard conversations
the pure ecstatic joy of light through the curtain of leaves, the man playing a nostalgic melody on a park bench
These small wonders that exist as compositions in real time.
The act of synthesizing that purity into a form that can be accepted as true for one and true for all
-Albeit unique truths
Provoke and challenge to become more than what they are and invite sweet commiseration.
to tell a story confident in the idea that one truth is the truth for all and they will find their own way to theirs.
Succumbing to tradition is no more valuable than obsession.
Why suppress trivial passions?
Push and twist and distort the exoskeleton
Because through the material, the working, the molding, these emotional turmoils, the spirit of humor, the charisma forces its way to the surface and is hopefully unmasked.
Strip the context and copy.
Be gloriously and inexorably redundant.
In a world terrifying
One must make oneself hard
Because if you speak honestly
You will be feathered and tarred
To avoid heresy seekers
You willingly commit sin
Thus every time it's possible
You purposely harden your skin
Time inevitably passes
You feel strong to the core
And all you had to sacrifice
To feel nothing anymore
And that childhood honesty
That warned you of danger
Are now the strangest memories
Of some far away stranger
And those twinges of regret
As if you have lied
Are purged from your thoughts
Because you have arrived
You hear the clank of metal
As they run a diagnostics
It's an exoskeleton upgrade
As they rewire your fiber optics
FASCIST STATE
They did not come upon us like blitzkrieg in the night
or goose step into town like a plague of parasites.
They crept on us like shadows in increments so small
they did not seem, at first, to be that menacing at all.
But an eerie posture lurking in those twisted silhouettes
triggered in my senses the twinges of a threat.
So when I turned to look at it what loomed before my eyes
was a figure black in battle dress, fully weaponized.
The more I studied it the more my inclinations ran
to perceive it as an insect rather than a man.
It was clad in armor that formed a battle skin
like some science fiction creature’s exoskeleton.
Peering like a mantis, devoid of all remorse,
it assumed the posture of a ruthless brutal force.
Unmoving, it awaited some unsuspecting prey
to trigger programmed instincts into deadly play.
It was not a thinking thing but a proxy sent
to execute agendas of torture and torment.
It was posted as a sentry by a calculating hand
to reinforce the stranglehold of evil in command.
Secure in it’s status as an instrument of pain
it stood rigid in a posture of arrogant disdain.
it’s value was its ignorance, it did not comprehend
that it would be destroyed when its purpose came to end.
It emanated coldness so inhuman that it seemed
to have stepped from a nightmare to stomp upon a dream.
The whole landscape of existence changed dramatically
beneath the hostile presence of such raw authority.
Where once the streetlights offered sanctuary in their rays
they now morphed into searchlights hunting down a prey.
Sirens screamed atrocities that took the aspect of
a jackboot psychopath with a fist inside a glove.
Beneath the cyborg menace was evil more discrete
skulking in the think tanks, and the bunkers of deceit.
A covert insurgency of social engineers
bent on the subjugation of the hemispheres.
Through orchestrated episodes of endless global war
they reveled in their orgies of sabotage and gore.
The sentry was the whipping tip of the chain of command
lashed across the back of every dominated land.
What darkness of impressions an image can command
when the shadow of a fascist state falls across a land.
I'm smaller and harmless if I'm male
and I have no venom. I'm dangerous
and much bigger if I'm female. It's hard
to tell my sex, so I avoid me all together
Better safe than sorry!
I look innocuous. I'm no bigger than
the size of a Brazil nut, but don't be fooled;
I'm extremely dangerous. My reputation
precedes me. I've been striking fear into
the hearts of men for millennia.
I'm one of the most toxic of all spiders
My venom is much more potent than that
of a rattlesnake's. I'm a weaver of sticky
tangled scaffold webs that I use
to ensnare insects.
My eight legs have hairs and bristles
that is sensitive to vibrations. That's how
I detect prey. I use my pumping abdomen
to spin silk to make webs, bind prey,
and protect their eggs from other critters.
I'm a solitary, patient predator. I spend
most of my life sitting on my web
and waiting for moths, beetles, bugs
flies; I even enjoy a crunchy scorpion
from time to time.
Once trapped, I dart forward and pin them
down. I inject my venom with my sharp fang;
then I suck them dry down to their exoskeleton!
My bite on humans can cause skin blisters
leading to gangrene!
I'm a Black Widow Spider; avoid me at all cost!
Date written: 02/16/2020
She's grown fond
of the void lulling around her exoskeleton
She's brought horror to
diligent obtuse slaves
The quiver in her giggle
heeds her cerebellum celebration for the rats that claw at the flesh walls
Jokes on the vermin, jokes on everyone
germ spreader dictates a varied vacation from the norm
the wicked only wither at the hint of a storm
It's in their genes
in between
and all part of "the scene"
a hellish landscape comprised of wooden dolls cradled by gelatin snakes
It's about to forsake the world
She's about to regurgitate the stars over absent bowel syndrome
She's loved and out
sprained by clout
itched severed love cloth
begging for a spout
Brave ones be near her
Sing the strings of cellos wrapped at her ankles
Bring the sins of her meta-skeleton
Drag her through the snow
freeze everything she knows
The idealistic horrors, go dancing through my heart
Pulling my muscles and my veins apart
Dancing with demons, I spin in a trance
My feet and my legs step to the beat of this dance
Under my flesh, the weakness seeps through my skin
Poisoning my insides --- making my life the deadliest sin
Dizzy and brainwashed, I stop the eternal spinning
Feeling the lessons --- in what’s left of my brain --- slowly imprinting
Lost and alone, left for dead and deprived
Learning this new path --- mistakenly arrived
The emptiness and unconsciousness of my exoskeleton shell
The lost and forgotten Isle of Nothingness I will dwell
The soulless inside of the deepest parts of me
Something that not even the oracle could foresee
The ever-changing fate that constantly changes in my life
Prevents me from being his perfect wife
The demons I face on my journey through this life
Finds myself around corners of nothing but pain and strife
The fiery flames leap up and they lick
Hitting the pool balls of my life with a cue stick
The damage it scars me deeper everyday
The variety of chaos and the colorful array
Chained to this life --- going nowhere fast
Leaves all of my other options completely unsurpassed
So alone I wander through this bottomless pit
Because walking in this life right now I’m definitely unfit…
Run, run, run little animals, over sand, over rock,
everywhere, dragons fly, mantis, butterfly, ant and moth.
Beetle, grasshopper, bee and wasp,
insecta the class, to which you belong.
These are the insects, from sea to tree loft,
the most diverse and plentiful of all creatures walk.
Compound eyes can see far beyond mine,
in their ability to define fast movement and light.
An exoskeleton, in three parts divide,
offer protection as armor to a softer inside.
The head, boasts antennae, these sensitive organs,
feel vibrations, smell, and heat sources.
The thorax is next and from it, sprout legs,
some insects have wings and it's here their arranged.
The abdomen comes last, it is found in the back,
with reproductive organs and a digestive track.
What to eat? It depends, what mood are you in?
I know some feast one leaves, still others, humans.
Some insects enjoy other insects as food,
some prefer plants, almost anything will do.
There is quite a contrast in insect behavior,
at least 8 million species are uncharted in nature.
With life spans of hours to 50 years later,
they've walked 270 million years on this great earth.
And upon new arrival we'll see you as eggs,
and then you're a larva, a wormish-like stage.
-Or a maggot, or grub and then pupa comes after,
wherein your cocoon becomes your Alma mater.
And soon you progress from this metamorphosis,
fully dressed as and adult, you have developed.
And impressed are the creatures that gaze upon thee,
from colors of warning to palette’s from the trees.
We enjoy many treats your kingdom has conceived,
insects such as bees produce honey we eat.
We wear their creations like silk on our sleeve,
I do believe they recycle more than human beings.
So Blessed be these creatures all,
of big and mighty, tiny and small.
You are the most noble of finds in this life,
you make up in numbers, in heart, in pride,
in honor, in innocence, and everything inside,
for what you lack in size.
What is the difference between a dream and an obsession? Or can they be the same? They seem to blend in some areas. Dreams can be held inside, while others guess if there's any dream inside the person at all. While shifting to obsession, people see, people know. The dream becomes more obvious, more known, more vulnerable, seen by others and by critiques who gesticulate with all their tiny sharp fingers and knobby knuckles making sounds behind the ear like the cracks of a crunch of an insect's exoskeleton, feeding off the juicy life of the known dream, licking and smiling with all their teeth and flare a perfectly sharp nose because they have never been in a fight. Maybe that's the difference.
My turmoils I keep stifled,
locked tight in the
sooty recesses of my psyche.
Buried deep beneath this exoskeleton,
hardened by the fire of my insecurites,
designed for the world to witness.
They lie far too deep
to be reached by the mundane.
They remain protected to the world.
They quietly reside within their cauldron,
simmering in the stew I have concocted.
Slowly, their steam rises and expands,
straining the seams of my sanity.
One small straw does rupture
the thin membrane of poise, practiced daily.
My emotions spew forth
exposing my tender, raw soul.
You soothe my gaping wounds
with your tender embrace,
letting the rampage run its' course
and you wait for my to emerge.
Buried in sand, tiny feet
Scrape the clamp of setting stone
Making excursions from leaf to tongue
Hoping this single strand of weather holds
What molds the mounting branch
Feathered on wing-tipped idea
Emerging sinuous
Imagination and suggestive body
Crawling uncouth from molecule to brain
Formative nerves find their counterpart
In seashore settings
Hope burning in molten measure
An ornamental doe and fawn,
suddenly move. Tails wave, noses nuzzle –
I have mistaken an actuality,
and now am thrown out of my skin.
I’m a millipede of fractal awareness.
I sniff the body-odor of the planet
take inward, then sift out
Australia and Africa.
I pause to dip my face in the River Liffey,
odoriferous waters foam over septum and cranium.
I’m a teaming acre of feelers and heads. Until
an atom of disbelief re-enters its exoskeleton.
The next moment is inevitable;
it is a concrete bunker of inevitability.
I am a stone goblin with a blunt chisel.
Nerve buds are again Saran wrapped.
Oddly, I’m carrying a large red kangaroo
on my shoulders;
it’s demanding to be sent back,
and I would send it back – if I knew how.