Best Mic Poems
Poet don’t feel right
Poet struggles sleeping at night
POETS NEVER SLEEP
At least…that’s what other poets keep telling me
But this lackluster slumbering just might be
From the unwavering weight of all responsibility
Poet only seems awake while walking through daydreams
Only wants to live life lavished in imagination
Painting alternate universes in which the stars guide me
An alternate universe in which i am happy
The moon and its tides constantly aligned
An alternate universe in which my artistry arrives unagonized
An alternate universe already constructed by someone else
An alternate universe in which contains an atmosphere in which I can breathe in which should be the one I’m in now
But my nervous system glitches,
Spine tinges spitting gibberish
Jittering shaky legs racing while staying stationary
Amazed at the way
A stage shakes me
In vibrations
At least its safe to say I said something today
Shared a story shoved, cornered in a junk drawer
At least I keep poetry in motion
only productive when my mind’s flowing
But I know my audience
I know they’re only hearing my poet voice
They only see my tragedies rehashed in romantics
There's only so many ways to manipulate the pain staked
in my chest in my throat in my head
So I choke on my raw truth
so it’s more digestible
for everybody else in the room
If not on the page,
Where is a tortured artists’ pain safe?
Paper scrapes
Psalms
Poems
Cutting deep enough
For me to bleed enough
For you to envision the misery
I’m in
Some alternate universe in which I am not a poet
Instead,
I am illiterate at the expense of my own pen and tongue
Instead, I await the unarriving;
Bleeding out without any sign of rescue
Instead, I plagiarize my inhabitance to a world
constructed by everyone except myself
Instead,
I am here
Earth rotates
Everything else still
I am still
Here.
I've seen smiles on faces,
in the dimmest of spaces,
where the bleakest of lights shine,
then in hope filled amazement,
I get rejuvenated,
by an overwelming energy that only you((the audience)) can provide.
As time ticks away,
The evening's host handidly displays,
raised arms,
asking for your applause, and praise,
after each and every orator recites,
their very own flavor of their very own open mic delight!!!!
I am grateful again TRUE FAMILY & FRIENDS, to have YOU in my life.
Ida- “I was the first one not to move on the train
I won a settlement, for my emotional pain”
Rosa- “But I was the one who went down in history
So I’ll say that I have the victory”
Ida- “Miss Parks take a seat for real
I, Ida B. Wells was the real deal
I knocked on the woman’s door
And walked into her house
Told her to tell the truth and shut her mouth”
Rosa- “Martin the King and I the Queen
We changed the history books
The marches, the protests, legislation
Check it out take a look
My living was not in vain”
Ida- “No Rosa it wasn’t
But you played the game
By piggybacking off me
The law worked for me because I had tenacity”
Rosa- “Well Ida, we boycotted the buses we started walking
Then the bus companies started talking
So I hit them in their pocket, leaving the buses with empty seats
I did my part take a look at my feet
Better known as the Montgomery Boycott
By starting that, I started a lot”
Ida- “No one is trying to take your props
I led the anti-lynching crusade in the United States
Because injustice continued to escape
I also called for President William McKinley to make reforms
Because lynching could not be accepted as the norm”
Rosa- “You and I have done a lot for our people”
Ida- “We have done our part to obliterate evil”
Rosa- “Thank you my friend”
Ida- “I thank you my sister, this is not the end”
Carly Simon, songstress, big hair, and a huge smile
Cheshire cat teeth you can see across the Nile
You’re So Vain just might be about Mick Jagger
Love her Itsy-Bitsy Spider and all of her swagger
"
" 7g mic"
Brown dirt on my head now
Soul done left this earth now
I guess I'm blessed and I don't deserve to be walking around its just a circus here
Well I keep my focus here.
I hope I get to speak with her
Maybe I will see her, maybe I will never see her its all the same to me.
I could never believe in more than what I lived in
I got treasure that's buried in heaven.
Where my heart is that's where my treasure is
God please make me a better man
I'm pouring out my soul and I'm trying to do better man every time I think about the letter
Man. that they 'll be sending me if I don't make it to
Hill County for the child support court.
They will find me,they will put my ass in jail just to remind me
They got the power Satan is behind them
They say we are under God but I can't find him and the legislature and the senators
All they do is try do is be my mentor.
And the president he's nothing but and excuse to Mr
Yeah he's black but he never used to be
When he was a kid he played with the white kids grew up
And thought he was still white still why do you think I'm white still
Why do you think I still fight still even when this Life is right still
And I'm waking up and walking on water, believing in more than just my daughter
Turning another mountain into a molehill
Black And White
We are given all the pieces
to play and indulge in life’s great feast
outrageous fortunes be dammed!
Given full reign to Ego’s unfettered beast
and the moves we make shall
establish our legacy
Why are we here?
We can either dazzle with brilliance
or baffle with bulls*it
Shameless are unleashings of doubt
only makes a lesser us grow
inhibits our muses
disables our abilities to sprout
I’m no longer vulnerable
to slings and arrows
validity with magnanimity instead of
sentiments design to disparage
are a marriage of lucidity
Opt for words that heal, and clarity!
Phrases that reveal
a simple way of life,
carpe diem, austerity
too much comfort makes a lazy lone
what a poet shall write
shall be etched in stone
in B
l
a
c k
and
W
h
i
t
e ,)
Poached, steamed, broiled, boiled,
dried, fried in soups and saucers,
piled high, their eyes bright, silver bodies shimmer in the harsh light of the hall.
Fish and open mic night at Der Schnitzel.
Ten fish dishes
ten acts.
Comics, poets, a demure cello player, “a little person” (with a big heart) on harmonica,
a shy, chubby teen singing a familiar “Oh, Baby...Oh, Baby” tune, acappella, memorized
note by note by note, listening to a CD every day after pom-pom practice.
Fierce in its stilted taste and organized fun,
glorious in attempts to dazzle and entertain,
certain the crowd is buzzed and fuzzy
on the beer and polite, white wine.
We squirm and fidget, embarrassed for the people on the stage – a few feet above our heads
and so close to our table we see their silver fillings on the high notes.
There are holes in the older woman's hose when she sits on the stool to read her poem.
She has one, clear, drop of mucus on the tip of her nose.
Some of us can only focus on that precise, perfectly round secretion - so clear and
symmetrical
the unintentional lens magnifies the stage behind her.
We feel sorry for and made more uneasy
when she loses her place.
Her poem is about lost love.
When she finishes, she puts her head down and seems to sob.
Her shoulders hunch and her chest surges. The stage hand moves to her quickly to touch
her shoulder and say something in her ear.
The fish know nothing of this drama. They lie quietly in the pans and plates, oblivious to
all around them. They are better for it.
#
I spent my adolescence writing lots of teenage angst
through poetry, and stuck with it, despite it being pants.
I’ve been to Open Mic nights, and risen through the ranks.
I don’t get heckled quite so much, and even get some thanks.
I’ve had some poems published, and felt my work improve.
It’s given me some confidence when I’m not in the groove.
I watch a brand-new poet. The first time that they’ve tried.
I clap, although I’m jealous, and thinking deep inside -
Oh crikey, not another better poet on the scene.
How come even novices are better than I’ve been.
I don’t want competition from someone just seventeen.
Oh crikey, not another better poet on the scene.
Everyone’s much cleverer, and wittier than me -
I’m slipping down the rankings. I’m in the bottom three.
I wish there was a talent freeze and some kind of embargo.
I wish I had a better rhyme than using Avocado!
Oh crikey, not another novice poet doing well.
It must be genes or talent. It’s such a living hell!
Poets used to start quite poor, get better bit by bit.
I hate all bleeding poets now. I wish they were more sh..
The train comes by every morning bout 5
I wish that train would find a cliff and collide
It’s driven by a demon on a joy ride
Always, arriving with some poison to unpack
Where ever it came from, i wish it’d go back.
Whoever blows the whistle is most vile of all
He probably blew whistles at the plant in Bhopal
Uselessly sounding off while thousands died
Now they bring me their killer pesticides
To store deep in these hills, in the chemical valley
Here it continues adding death to the tally
If it leaks, everyone I know will suffer a similar fate
Carbide thinks life is worth less than methyl isocyanate
Does my posture hint who I am
At open mic poetry slam
I prefer to hide behind lime winged words
On my pc or tablet or pen paper if I have it
Will my message get loosely lost
As you notice the style of hair I toss
If I am short tall fat or thin
Do YOU hear my message or take my presence in
I don't always walk up to the mic
And I'm wondering this teal thought tonight
Is my heart a red paper valentine
That presents as giving up on love in time
I stand here on this stage
Full of fear desiring fuchsia praise
Seeking love of audience in my way
Unity and community follow my page
I am mistaken I am not a poet
Just a lost soul hoping to grow it
That special something the it factor
Standing on stage as a benefactor.
If you notice my shoes
You know I'm an old soul
Hearing my heart is bruised
Told you so.
I get confused with the snaps and claps
All I want from you is a spiritual tap.
I stood too long before the crowd
I read my poem in a voice so loud
I feel relief like yellow sun from cloud
Thanks for listening glad I came out.
One thinks poetry is a couch to make the world play therapist,
or at least take note and listen.
One thinks poetry is a prayer book, calling the faithful to litany
or the faithless to become congregation.
One thinks poetry is a rifle to shoot the head with images of war
or blast away the combat’s trauma.
One thinks poetry’s a vase to preserve the cuttings from the garden
or store stony trinkets collected from private shores.
One thinks poetry is a bullfrog shut in a dry shoebox, ready to croak
or jump out inappropriately during show and tell.
One thinks poetry is confetti, meaningless color tossed haphazardly,
or blinding shards thrown like glitter into eyes.
One thinks poetry is preservative to allow display of pale, shriveled organs
or the internal parasites that feed upon them.
One wonders if this poetry deserves the polite applause for its presentation
or if the art has been lost in the hands of these practitioners.
There is an anagram in this line.
She plays her love for me on strings,
And I, a lucky soul, am still,
And listen as she sings her heart—
A prize no other man can keep.
Let me feel your pain
Let me disappear in your depth
Let me paint with your tears
Let me read from your wrinkles
Let me hold the gem that makes you
Let my tongue speak of the strength, that's you
I hear you
I feel your pain
I respect the strength, that's you
Inspired by Darlene Gifford's poems: on the bridge too far, a rainbow glitters, my little soldier boy and on the beach at dusk
Dusk marks stygian depths of this eldritch eve quay grim specter beneath the moon's silvery sheath surf cleaves with a hiss as the banshees keen weave lure to the thicket where shadows deceive yet beckoning thy breast beat.
Chains of ghostly twilight night's tapestry entwine if thou doth believe in such things so they say but leave unsaid many torrents pages gleam.
Cries rend the still air as the murder takes flight knot a feast for the lone but a bouquet for the blight groan from the depths where the dead invite soil splits yielding to the revenant's might.
Eyes petrified on the unhinged portal align not with the stars but plucks them to place upon the earth their nova as railroad spikes.
The cadaverous stir with a clockwork's mock life stalking then seizing in the frenzy of strife macabre feast laid bare by the scythe flesh stripped to bone swifter times the end of the knife.
A ghastly veil descends on our fate malign but the white rabbit hops by forgot the time.
More hands breach the earth as we share a glance darkling tide engulfs the crypts in its dance bare beak boned and maliciously advance craving the sweet succor of mortal for the footfall gets a chance.
Sinew snaps beneath the crows feigned design as the clocktower booms now its our moment to shine.
We thought it all the same indeed all the same virtue the sustenance we seek to claim desiccating avenues in our ravenous game plucking orbs and muffled cries our fame.
Muffled by the water's choke the seams come undone banquet of minds as we delve within eyesight burst forth trailing viscous kin guts unfurl our spiraling sin as a whole we dig in so that their demise begins corpulent scribe pens as we extinguish his line pier to peer the husks a feast so refined flavor so pure it ensnares the mind in time he chronicled a myth intertwined a servant's hand if memory serves me kind.