Long Matchsticks Poems
Long Matchsticks Poems. Below are the most popular long Matchsticks by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Matchsticks poems by poem length and keyword.
I had a brain like an old motorbike,
I rode it back and forth
just to get laid by whomever, and that strange one
who kept cats under her long skirt.
Truth is a marmalade calligraphy.
I yodel blood-songs
prophets have stitched to my flesh.
Truth sleeps under a stone.
No one can number the stones.
I dream of Macadamia and Muscadine
of pretty girls all in a row.
Truth throbs.
Marimba music and matchsticks,
Why all these M sonics?
Mango
mildew, marmalade ghosts.
Why not?
Miss me mother?
The bike ended up in a heap -
Its motor whines on.
Truth is whatever’s left over
after the counting of things.
When it left the Arctic it was as a wild angry wind
that stormed its way across the ice bound Arctic ocean.
Blowing the snow clad icebergs and whipping up the ocean.
As it crossed Alaska and into Canada it had gentled
now it played games with leaves and softly kissed flowers.
Gaily it soared over the Rockies and tugged goats beards
causing them to shake their heads and stamp their feet.
In Playful mood it swept on hugging the coast awhile
then veering inland, it travels the plains and grows in strength
turning into a raging tornado causing havoc as it passes.
Moving ever southward it basks in now warm sunshine
and skips over the gulf of Mexico filling yachts sails.
Deep down in South America it turns into a wild fury that
uproots trees snapping them in half like matchsticks,
Then onward once more dancing past the Falkland islands.
Its destiny is now in sight and with triumphant roar
it rushes on over the Antarctic ocean and slides up
the icy barrier then screams its way across the tundra
yet slowly it loses its power and as it reaches the incline
this moody wind fades away until with final breath it dies.
In a storm the lighthouse beacon
beckons ship in peril to come closer.
There is no where else to go.
A shining light offers refuge
But fails to deliver, as the light
warns of danger lurking nearby.
Sailors see the light and head for it,
Hoping to navigate from there as a waypoint
But in the storm's turmoil and confusion
The light lures the seafarers closer to danger,
But by then its too late to veer away, too close to avoid
the peril the lighthouse warns of.
Safe within the lighthouse keeper watches in horror
Seeing the boat floundering, getting closer and closer
Hoping against hope that the ship will steer away,
Failing to understand why the ship has headed his way.
But the ship keeps on coming
In desperate plight, when any light offers hope,
to escape the relentless ravages of the storm.
The ship plows on and on, closer and closer,
Then flounders on the rocks at the feet of the lighthouse.
Smashing into matchsticks, the crew tossed overboard
Like rag dolls, limp; all hands aboard lost.
The lighthouse beacons beckons,
luring crew and ships to stray too close in desperation.
Edit on line 7
There he was – my first boyfriend ever -
leaning against the sports car of a friend who drove him
over to my town to see me before I left for college
even though we had broken up a few years back.
I had met him at church camp several years earlier -
John, with that cute elfin face,
legs like matchsticks that seemed half as wide as mine
and the sweet sensitive nature
of a kid who worried so much about his parents’ marriage
he’d already developed ulcers at age 14.
He was looking kind of cool, wearing silver tinted shades
that didn’t allow me to see his baby blues beneath them
as he leaned against that sweet ride, smiled and said so little.
I later learned his parents had split up,
but not one friend of his whom I asked
could tell me where John ended up.
I google him; I search on Facebook; still I can’t find him.
That unexpected visit – not so important then -
has become one more of the many ephemera
in the sum total of my long-traveled life.
School bus driver
Releases the squish of her air brakes
With a lurch from knees and chest
Clunks the bus into Park
Lowers her red head into the matchsticks of her dry hands
Rolls the meatballs of her eyes between her thumbs
And quietly says Help me God reaching for her cigarettes.
Out of habit she takes one last glance
Into her rearview mirror
Seeing the blond hair of a kid
Sitting in what should be the empty back.
The driver tears down the aisle to her own childhood
Kindergartner sitting with her precious hands
Balanced like tea cups on her knees
Her pretty dress that her mother picked
Is the color of bees teasing flowers
Her blue eyes dazzling
She has a worried smile drawn across her face
Squiggled there by dad in the morning.
She doesn’t speak a word
The driver takes her by the hand
And walks her to the garage to make The Call.
There’s been a terrible mistake
The driver’s boss says over the phone
To mom then dad both at work.
Another staff meeting,
there are lizards at the table,
a few goats, an ass.
I know they return to
the fold of a superficial normality
at weekends,
some even rock climb
or enjoy a quiz-night at their local pub,
one builds model ships out of matchsticks,
but here they exist zoologically
on the musky fumes of
their animal instincts.
I consider myself human
but at times my self-image slips
especially when i'm a cog in the machine
The actual boss is not here
yet his name floats in the air
as if powered by a constant
airconditioned camel fart.
Drone, drone, drone,
forced laughter.
Intimidation is in the air
it is as thick as hand soap.
The squeakiest wheel pipes up –
kill me now.
We are all expendable and know it.
Even the warthog
at the head of the table.
The warthog glares at me
while his forced grin smacks my face
like an oily rag.
I catch my reflection in a window,
I am turning into a bedside lamp.
Hours later, driving home, body drained;
bottom sore from extreme sitting,
a mad impossible dream.
I want to go back
and beat the warthog over his head
with my 60 watt brain
until he promises never, ever
to speak to me again.
So this is where the trail ends
in a long forgoten paper town
Flipping dirty mattress in the ghetto turning tricks for matchsticks all for money lending
Because we born unto it like scarlet vixens in classic literature told to believe in
So bleed for me then place me on
the next bus home
Until i ascend come easter to master the hanging tree
Crusading forth to meet my prom date 1 day i hope to marry
A journey into discovering that which i thought i'd lost i had in fact not
Wrote aboard the deck of a fishing boat
set to sea in a hurricane no mortal human shall return from
An epilogue to dodging hailstorm
whilst eating peppercorn to warm
the cockles of the coldest of darkened heart
folding the trees, branch by branch;
rolling the leaves.
slender sticks play eye tricks;
fat and juicy ones’ carried downwards.
small branches gathered;
large ones, heave ho.
these matchsticks aren’t lit,
and I don’t know
how my small forest thrives
…and then a sound
an engine near, grinding
through my Winter lookout,
across the way, creating empty space
for kids to safely play.
the trees are stressed; and relieved
as the roaring stops
at the edge. on edge
they want to dress their best,
in Spring’s verdancy -
it seems an emergency
to get on with it; buds
will show up after the tempest,
for survival of the fittest,
at least that’s the way
the wind blows now
…then silence.
Restriction, restriction
The world is getting mad, and the police patrol cruises the street
if you are caught without a mask heavy fine awaits.
I see some schools are open, but some are not, there has been an outbreak
of the pest in some of them.
Happy days for parents whose children are at school it is good
to be rid of the little blighters for a few hours.
In Norway, you can go to any restaurant or pub
but you can´t by alcohol- mine is 7up, cola for my friend-
Only in Norway can they do this.
But we have been here before when the Christian- party ruled.
When a left-leaning party came to power, the beer taps were opened,
but you had to eat a sandwich first.
And since no one was eating the bread the same sandwich went in and out of the kitchen
a hundred times; and when someone took a bite out of one,
it was usually full of burnt-out matchsticks.
Cest la vie!!!
Up in long bands of gray and white
angry clouds are whirling,
fingers stretch downwards to the ground,
faint traces of swirling.
the farmer sees it and suspects
what nature is unfurling.
Glad at least it came in the day,
not stole in come evening,
he locks the barn and heads downstairs,
in basement remaining.
The air moans loudly when it starts,
vortex boldly roaring,
snaps tree-trunks off like they’re matchsticks,
Sends the branches soaring.
Birds fly off in a panicked flock,
much too scared for crowing,
the wheat flexes, and flattens low,
disturbed from its growing.
A mad chaos, its motion blurred
by the rush of spinning,
if any storm-chasers lived here,
you know they’d be grinning.
But alas, this is not the plains,
with their F-5s looming,
oh no, this is upstate New York,
and those hills aren’t moving.
The block the flow, they interrupt,
winds are quickly fading,
it barely lasted three minutes,
the dark whorl abating.