Cookiecutter Shark
Deep in the ocean, where shadows reside,
A small, sleek hunter, with nowhere to hide.
The cookiecutter shark, a name so absurd,
For a creature whose bite is truly assured.
No great white's terror, no hammerhead's might,
But a circular cut, in the dark of the night.
With a mouth like a scoop, and teeth sharp and keen,
It carves out its meals, a remarkable scene.
From whales to tuna, no creature is safe,
From the alien mark, a peculiar chafe.
A perfect round wound, left on muscle and skin,
A testament to where the small hunter has been.
It lurks in the deep, a cryptic design,
A parasite predator, truly divine.
So next time you swim in the ocean so wide,
Remember the cookiecutter, and where it might hide.
workers sans respite
diligent leaf cutters ants ~
stripping bare a tree
Date written: 03/07/2022
They proposed stabilization
Friction from the augers
Rotation
Caused one to ponder
Would such affect
Those ah yonder
Then in perfect diction
He said it as a predict
If thee surface of this
Slate should pop
It will create a lot of
Rocks
And if these rocks should
Roll
No one. Would be in control
He rethought the matter
A solution was what he was after
Reaching down in his soul
He made sight of stories told
He'd use boulders as a buffer
We're the stones to roll
Nothing would suffer
Everyone loved his plan
They stopped by to give him
A hand
They proposed using an auger to drill holes to
Plant trees crack the mountain side below the
Surface. They also bored holes and filled them
With cement to instantly began the process.
All cooki-cutter comments, say the same thing!
But to blind you, they toss God's name in the ring.
Stay away from me, please!
Hang your comment on another poet's tree.
Dishonesty and I are an explosive mix.
Find someone else to lie to, and get your fix!
4/28//2021
My husband used to work in a grocery store
Way up inside the freezer of a place known as Michigan
It was bitterly cold up there from November through February
You could get frostbite inside your house
This grocery store had a wonderful employee, the head meat cutter
Others could be fired all day long, but not this one.
We will call him Sam because if I call him T.J. he might sue me.
So T.J. I mean Sam would take a bite out of all meat, and declare it good.
The store had a policy. If your meat was bad, they would refund you money.
With Sam around, it never happened. Sam was a gift. He could eat anything.
If you left a T-bone outside for three weeks, and it got rancid and had maggots
Sam would still take a bite out of it and declare it was okay, yummy in fact.
The store had a reputation for never giving back a meat refund.
And it was all thanks to T.J. I mean Sam.
I was looking at the small pill-cutter box
Which I was holding in my hand.
Blue colored with a sharp edge of the blade
To cut the medicine in halves, one-third or
Could also be, in one-fourth, maybe.
I was thinking, simultaneously, about the news
I heard today, which made me puzzled….
Churches and bombings, again, so vulnerability!
So vulnerable with this cloak of religiosity
In this utter disastrous time of unrest and confusion!
I woke up again…. just to get another news of the death
A death in the family, ending of a marvelous life, so precious!
I whispered a line of supplication for the departed
And also, for me, as there was something to do….
And, I was holding the pill cutter still in hand, indecisively.
(April 21st, 2019)
Like the rapist
and the molester,
a nose-cutter with
chilling impulses
emerges from
mind’s murky nook.
He always drops
atrocities
in his wife-bin.
Male chauvinism
creates a
concentration camp
in her kitchen
and bed-room.
He’s her gadget
producing
hypertension.
Her nose ring
is not
merely a metal,
but a
charm-multiplier.
Alas!
Teeth of his machete
take off the tip
of her nose,
demanding
the dowry due,
disfiguring…
Red woman sap
oozes,
staining...
First published in The Literary Hatchet
COOKIE CUTTER LEAVES
dark green cookie
cutter leaves -
so many
they shouldn’t matter?
do we love one more
than the other?
if each one gained
an inferiority complex
cut their wrists
from the old oak tree
and flew away
to who knows why
leaving us
with broken branches
would rain run
mascara from our eyes
produce raging rivers?
would Spring become
a painful season?
Kim Rodrigues © 2017
she was granite jealous
sick of it all
his drifting eye
yellowing indifference
the secretive calls
so while he slumbered
she cut it off
she cut it off
with a giggling swipe
like a rabid cat
in a back ally fight
but come morning
nothing had changed
he hadn't noticed
one blasted thing
the new flowered blouse
the whitened teeth
fresh pot of coffee
clumps of hair in the sink
she cut it off
and
dyed...it
all
for
the
love
of
Mr.Indifference
This is a cookie cutter culture
We all must think the same
If you're outside the PC box
Talking heads call you insane
You better hold all their values
Zombie minds.. must be lead
Christians are old fashioned
Everyone knows, God is dead
There are no absolutes today
What counts are opinion polls
Kiss the ring of our great king
Or you might end up in a hole
Blinded by group arrogance
In ignorance we all pledge
To follow cultural relevance
As we step closer to the ledge
I'm about to go James Dean
A rebel who can think and feel
Quit trying to program me
Your perfect utopia isn't real
Driving through the broken, potholed streets
Lined with houses spanning decades
Each with a thousandfold more character
than that of the cookie cutter impostors they call homes
I appreciate the creaks and groans
Much more than the sheen of granite stones
Value comes down to values.
What are yours?
COOKIE—CUTTER VERSION
true confession time stands and gears
itself to concede in honest declaration
the guilt of heeding to the scrutiny of
veiled opinion from self-seeking minds
the process is set in motion as worldly
influences pull you to match the mould
and modify yourself pleasing their moral
principles tweaking your uniqueness dry
one of a kind we are inimitable and rare
our essence blends our behaviour and
appearances selected in singular specs
rarely the ‘cookie-cutter’ version we
perceive
© Kim van Breda—May 2014
She went to sleep
closing her eyes
beginning to dream
of broken butterflies
tearing her lovely monarch wings
on faithless love that angels sings...
She finds shiny metal in kitchen sink
in an evening absent light
she finds peace in cuts of pink
watching crimson blood flow feels so right..
Starlight shines upon her tears
I whisper darling, you cannot bleed
all of your suicidal fears
at night when you begin to cry
I'll sing you a lover's lullaby..
My love do not wish that you were dead
dreaming of an absent pulse
laying on silken sheets bleeding red
I will offer love so do not bleed
give me your knife I am all you need...
~ ~ ~ ~
On a whim,
a demon will grab a fist full of mind.
Slap it down- roll it out- sprinkle it with lye.
Then pull out its cookie cutter heart.
press down hard...real hard...
Feed pieces of sanity to its hoard.
Half devoured they crap you out.
Into the shadow of an indigo night.
Clear the eyes
of the craggy miles.
Slug down a cup of fog:
What is that sharp pain-that dull sound.
Just beyond the cobbled soul...
Something just isn't right.
Stroke the cat
sweep the floor
croak "good mornings"
shower
wash away that crazy gray:
snakes are in the showerhead...again.
Go for a long walk.
pick some daisies.
sometimes that helps ...
but not today.
Hissing is in the swaying veins of the leaves,
the locust eat throat deep into peace...
Stagger toward home into a hearth of talking bones.
Read the daily dread.
Stroke the cat again.
take another nap.
Pray for a warm breeze dream to move the bloom of life.
Back into its golden vase to temper the pendulum.
Sweep the suckling demons from the chest...
Where the hell is my rolling pin god in all this ffin mess?
Twigs, branches and climbers
Are cut indiscriminately by a wood cutter
For his domestic use of fuel
Such is he an innocent cruel
Without knowing that some are herbs
Experts, out of them, make life- saving drugs
Once taking it as a worthless pebble
He threw a piece of diamond too
If he does no know the difference among them
What will a piece of diamond or a twig of herb can do?
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