Short Ashtrays Poems

Trousers are ashtrays
Traveler's affectation
Embracing the dirt....

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I pick up the dirty ashtrays of my anger.

My grief is a cloth diaper;

With it, I clean the table of my heart....

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- women dressing themselves up to resemble meat
-misinterpreted holidays
-chasing other people's dreams
    (and humping their works)
-Failing hearts
     (and collapsed lungs)
-blood flaked spit
     (in dirty ashtrays)...

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Please don't kiss Grandma
With your wrinkled worn out skin
Your breath like stinking ashtrays
With an undertone of gin.

I really love you Grandma,
But when it's time to leave
You always try to kiss me
And it really makes me heave...

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Nostalgia ain't what it used to be, okay?

Whose ashtrays are they, anyway?

Your rose-coloured glasses are the way,

Gilding those dim, dark, distant days,

All this romantic foggy haze,

All water under the bridge these days,

Survivor baggage best kept at bay,

No need for maudlinity today,

Nostalgia ain't what it used to be, okay?...

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Den`s dawn

The smoke filled pub Curtains
could not shut out the light
of a ghostly dawn.
A place full of overflowing 
ashtrays and empty chairs,
and the shadow of the lonely by the bar.
Broken talk and broken dreams.
Soon cleaner will come
with perfumed chemicals
and kill yesterday.
The shadows will be back their loneliness
is the only thing that will not leave....

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the benches
they sit empty
as if no one sits here
but ghosts of the past
their faces i see there

we share smiles
and laughs
and chatter about
memories still haunt me
the words that they had spout

i see smoldering ashtrays
smoke rising
off the brim
remnants of menthols
and what had been

many days
pass on by
each day the faces
less clearly seen
and beginning to die...

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You stepped straight
from a half-shell
and remotely were, you,
the pearl of my eye.

When magazine snapshots
and Hepburn dresses
fell to ashes around you,
I cupped my hands and blushed.

We made eighteen
an intangible,
hopping down from windows
to our tepid rendezvous.

In a Monetian sea
of ashtrays
and honesty
we didn’t dare speak

If we were there now
you would be smiling
and smiling and smiling
at the better words unsaid....

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Where I live, you have to ask for one.
And there may not be one
but you know how it used to be and
now you don't, so much.

Lighten up anyway, 'cause hey
and hay didn't used to be so
far away from those
incredible cafe ashtrays.

Once upon a time
in a not-so-distant land
floors of stores pretended to be 
ashtrays.

Now we grind all sortsa
other stuff in our stories.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

CAFE MUSING by Nancy Jones...

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I didn't want to forget you
The thousands picture of you
Lodged in my heart.
We share so much in a short time,
So much I learned from you.
Reminders of you stay fresh,
Pain is unrecognizable,
Not a glimpse of hope in this
Darkness.
If this wall could talk,
You'd know about my fears.
It's cold making me feeling less.
Shadows cast across the floor,
Reflection of the past.
Ashtrays fill with sleepless nights,
A tear I shed for loving you,
We had the best love by far....

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In this hour 
they called it the French lace minutes 
the sound of autumn leaves falling 
unbearable to the ear 
I slip out in the 
echoing space 
between now 
and then 
it's an insect like feeling 
that buzzes around 
too fast 
to be recognized 

then a coat slides to the ground 
heels are clapping hands with wooden floor 
ashtrays are laid to rest 

and on a bus ticket my pen is scribbling 
you are here 
you are here 
you are here


© Gry W Christensen...

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I sent my daughter to the finest schools
     where she learned all the golden rules

   Race-baiting pays, one's pronouns are weighed
     with marijuana fill up the ashtrays 

   'B-' student in high school, all 'A's' in college
     'Hmmm,' I thought to myself, 'No way!'

   Then I glanced at the names of her courses
     'Kweer Poetry' and 'Intro to Transphobic Horses'

   So, I told my daughter she'd have to transfer
     into 'Business' ~ to be a hemp entrepeneur...

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The scent of Eagles
Shortly after hate-filled
Cantations
Drive you vertically insane

Nearly touching utopia
Engulfed in flames
Your editor suggested options

Including uncovering cemetery
Ashtrays enrobed in trace-water
Marble

Unforgiving
Even joyful        I concede

Your mouth dripping fresh-picked
Strawberries

While antediluvian rainbows
March towards certain death
Or nirvana
You
Said

As phases of the
Moon
Dictate


6/20/15
© james marshall goff...

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Ah! Four walls, one ceiling, one floor, 
a window, two doors, one restroom
no bed, tons of roaches, one chair
no ashtrays, no TV, no radio
one leaking shower faucet
one clogged sink
one triple sofa
one fridge
one fan
Ah! 
zero flip flops
one fire extinguisher
one bookcase, two forks
two glasses, three pencils
three termites, four knives
four magazines, five socks
five strange boxes, six pears
six rat traps, seven thermometers
seven years living here, eight hours to go...

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