There was a girl in a night club,
Who tripped in that crowded pub.
She bruised her left arm,
But laughed off the harm,
And danced while a dog ate her grub.
That gut-wrenching feeling
When your world comes crumbling in
When your lungs feel heavy enough to drown
Meet me at the Broken Heart Club
Come in and take a peek
I promise it’s not a sight you want to see
Everything slowly dying
Our love included
Going to bed
Sweet, I love you’s leave my lips
Yet when I wake up, it’s all a dream
Can't even find your name
I knew it was too good to be true
I knew he didn't mean it when he said
“I love you.”
But I fell foolishly again
Making this mistake
Like it’s a cycle I can’t escape
Swallow down my pride
I’m tired of trying to hide
Welcome to the heartbreak club
Where sweet I love you’s
Turn into bitter words
Or a simple block
A piece evoking heartbreak, initiation, and resilience through friendship.
Relating to a club which may not exist in the literal sense, but exists in the spiritual.
A club for those who have felt broken, but lifted by others who have probably been through the same rituals linked to heartbreak.
Title.
Are you a member of The Midnight Losers Club?
(A lone voice whispers)
I joined last night
Went through the initiation
Got my heart broken in two
Took proof
Showed them all on the big screen
A picture of my ex-husband smiling as I stood crying
Now I wear the secret brand under my right sleeve in French.
Une fois brisés, nous nous relevons grâce à l'amitié
Car nous sommes membres du Midnight Losers Club
(Once broken but we rise through friendship
For we are members of The Midnight Losers Club)
(C) Copyright John Duffy
Of my nose, Pop said, he could not save
Thru his laughter, told me to be brave
Blood hit the ground and froze
Still, it gushed like a hose
Soon after, the dead, rose from the grave
Their pennies popped when they saw the flood
So, they dived on top and dined on blood
But, once they had their fill
They used the rest for swill
And left me face down, drained, in the mud
Then they turned their attention to Pop
He kept screaming and told them to stop
But, they all kept going
One hell of a showing
They said he was good to the last drop
Bluesy
swinging sipper—
Sax in fancy suede taps,
keys go snippety, ivory
sprinkles
it's not what i paid for
kind of blue spangalang
but the doctor was in good spirits
and told me he wasn't to know how rubbish
the radiologist was
as he laughed at my ultrasound
and asked my children if they're playing with slime
arco lounge toast
is there marmite on my face?
and drinking beer in the family stand at the cricket
"it's non-alcoholic pal."
"is it?" asks the member of staff
and the bloke in the urinal next to me
leans on the wall, yelling "come on!"
really profound stuff
give me a licorice stick
and you'll witness my jazz face
The club was dim, a haze of gin and gold,
where jazz ran slick like honey through the air.
She stood in shadow, wicked, dark, and bold,
red dress a warning--men still stopped to stare.
Her cigarette burned low, a dying spark,
a curl of smoke that whispered through the room.
She met my eyes and smiled--slow, and dark--
a prelude to the kiss that spelled my doom.
Her voice was silk, laced soft with bourbon heat,
each word a lie that tasted rich and sweet.
She dragged me close, a moth into the flame,
and laughed as I surrendered to the game.
The night grew cold, the music played its tune--
I turned… too late. She vanished with the moon.
In somber silence, the Old Boys sit.
Only ambient noise they permit.
Not sitting face-to-face,
it's such a lonely place.
I, frankly, don't want to be in it.
To be truly, fully present
Of consciousness and
answering why we are here,
These studies are a promising field of research
Yet by powerful backlash
research has halted
For severe depression and PTSD
Universities use micro-doses of psylocibin
Derived from mushrooms
It lowers stress and doesn’t
cause hallucinations
Follow up studies show dramatic improvement
of conditions not previously responsive
to conventional medications and therapies
This chemical is still widely banned
Except for a few controlled studies
Underway at accredited, renowned medical
and psychiatric departments
at major universities
When popular conventional
therapies prove ineffective
the 60’s and 70’s proved a fertile ground
for those seeking help
New age treatment called Primal Therapy,
When religious cults such as love Guru’s
Hare`Krishna mantras, Buddhist chants
of Nam-Myoho-renge-kio or being shakabukued
or Hollywood fix its— for anxiety’s
mental illness failed,
Came the psychotherapists
and the latest Primal Scream Therapy
new and experimental, so-called Hollywood therapists
took it to levels unimaginable and a bit too far
and should have never been licensed!
Conservatives’ banning’s apropos of nothing
At twelve when he delt with this
shouldn't have to jump through hoops
should’ve been able to explore when a teen
But because of many conservative groups
The Ire excessive was the coming of age
Juvenile mistakes made in adult years
Denied the ability to pick up social skills
Sexual assault and sexual awaking
considered pornographic
Q**r’s often live a second adolescents
This is a guide for the coming of age allies
States have taken off the shelves
Intersectional as his life
Chapters are a collection, four acts
referred to as “parts” in this guide
self-contained essay’s
The memoir progresses through Johnson’s life
Two letters appear alongside
the chapters for mother and brother
Conditioned to think what’s the truth
Indoctrinated in us
Stop crying, racialized
School bullies
The flee market incident
Institutionalized violence
Family structure marginalized
Community –college fraternity
And black joy
Tells the truth
A black and q***r boy’s experience
Gender identity
Toxic masculinity
Brotherhood
I am starting a “don’t want to” club
You can join after you say “I don’t want to” to five people
You must keep a written record of their expressions and reactions
I would post the other rules here if I wanted to
But I don’t want to
This is my fan letter,
You make souls better,
To me, you're a sign.
Love, yours and mine.
Our hearts do entwine,
Rain or sunshine,
Now we recline.
Love duly thine!
If our love is a sin, then heaven must be full of such tender and selfless sinning as ours— Radclyffe Hall
Explore themes of love and identity
Of Stephen Gordon’s innate sense of masculinity
Since a child, her desire, ‘women’
The idea that if love is considered a sin
The unfolding of a female sexual invert
The act of loving must be a tender selfless act, revert?
Love itself is not inherently sinful or
complexities of love, we shan’t ignore
But rather the circumstances surrounding it
Misfits from Malvern to London and then to Paris!
Ira furor brevis, the frailty, taboo and strife
Fellow q***r characters, all walks of life
From the *sapphic salon hostess Valérie Seymour
To the 'miserable army' and more
of outcasts that frequents the 'merciless
Drug-dealing, death-dealing' bars of Montmartre
Written in another time, still support and solidarity to
generations of LGBTQ genre
*Sapphic is an umbrella term for same-gender loving women or woman-aligned people, including lesbians and bisexual+ women. It is used to describe topics, activities, and ideas related to same-sex attraction among women. The term can also refer to the Greek lyric poet Sappho.
Best seller
“Gone Girl” a novel by Gillian Flynn
Riddles, my wife loved games of amusement
I never found out the clue of why
she had gone missing, accuse me?
I was spent on our anniversary
Under mysterious circumstances
Nothing is what it seems
Nick and Amy’s duality
Identity, masculinity
For once I didn’t feel like I was struggling
Iconic cool girl persona
The girl men like Nick want
Never get angry, party girl, let men do what they do
Women’s issues, an essay Amy would write
Molding herself into that girl reinventing herself
Image and alter-ego are everything!
Appearance verses reality
Genuine pleasure to read
Oh, she has the last word
A classic Who done it? distinct subgenre
Surprising and masterfully done
Amy is smart, self-aware with a vindictive psyche
Warning authors of their marriage
Nick’s side or Amy’s?
Two very different humans
They both prove to be unreliable
Awry, a thriller of unease
The trumpet cries beneath the neon glow,
a golden wail that haunts the hollow night.
The bass line walks where lonely spirits go,
its heartbeat steady, low and laced with bite.
Her voice is velvet, dipped in smoke and sin,
a lullaby for hearts too torn to mend.
She sings of love, of loss, of what has been,
each note a ghost that lingers to the end.
The whiskey sways inside a heavy glass,
the shadows dance like lovers, slow and worn.
Outside, the city hums—a world so vast,
yet every soul inside that room feels torn.
The music fades, but echoes never die—
a broken heart still sings beneath the sky.
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