entry for Charles Messina's "Fourtle" contest, September 17, 2025
no stair, light blown
climbed chair, broke bone
Never again to know fresh air,
Combing worms from my matted hair.
No one remains who’d ever care —
Tied to my grave, this lonesome baire.
I must escape the sun’s harsh glare,
Tread carefully down crumbling stair,
Descend into my crypt just there,
Where I sit alone in dark despair.
Upon my ancient worm-eaten chair,
Inside my vaulted charnel house lair,
Such a sad and accursed affair —
Never to rest, always aware.
This kind of death is so unfair:
No converse, no song, no whispered prayer.
A thousand lifetimes in disrepair,
Unattended, solus, solitaire.
Harshest sentence beyond compare,
Caught in this endless undeath snare.
Naught to do but eternity stare —
And comb the damn worms from my hair.
Railroads and Stair Ties
inside his french rent
everything went wrong at night
the city creeps in behind
and around your backs
having two different doorways
wondering when you lock
yourself in and upstairs
music's happen after
you walk to work
so during brunch her
boyfriends manage the street
sign like thats gonna work
Josey boy on his way to the morning shifts
Lost in the winter mist
Erased from the files of memory
Crossed out of any possible list
That’s what it takes to be free
No difference if I’m alive or dead
No one gives a damn, its all right
What I needed to say, I’ve already said
What they wanted to hear, they might
Where do I go from here
What if I step on this slippery stair?
Though in the mist its unclear
If you wait on the top out there.
When you see stair
You start pace at bottom
To go to the top.
W B Yeats ' WINDING STAIRCASE
_____
ing
wind
ing
wind
wind
ing
wind
ing
wind
ing
wind
ing
wind
ing
wind
ing
wind
ing
______
[ stair ]
~~~~~
The Stair Case
It stood before me, curving and long and awfully high.
Steps that seemed to go on forever
long and winding and narrow.
Like a twisting path in life, the staircase stretched before me
It travels both ways, either up toward the light
or, down, into a deep and darkened world of unknowns.
The stairs of life are everywhere, for everyone
Each person has his own path to follow.
Faith is required to climb this narrow path of life.
Fear drives me down the stairs to the unknown
A ray of sunshine beckons me, as I climb upwards
always encouraging me to travel on toward the mystery
that awaits.
Fear, and gloom, pressure me, as I start down the staircase
pressuring me with uncertain and halting steps toward a
place of failing and saddened events.
In this life we call ours there are choices.
Choices of good, and bad, or brave or timid.
I choose; and the climb of life awaits
the light, or the dark.
Which way to go?
By faith! Or by fear!
Dedicated to my daughter, Mary Moriarty Branch
With the love of a Father, for one who means so much.
Heel, breaking the plane;
Subtle distance unexpected -
Body charged numb
With fear of death,
Or perhaps the fear
Of not quite dying.
Clutching at items,
Clutching at nothing.
As your fists curl in
A whoop of breath
Escapes,
Sprawling,
Fallen,
Or saved
From a lower stair’s perspective.
Stair to Heaven
A spiral stair comes in pieces.
About one thousand to be sure.
It is a very large box indeed,
and weighs about 400 pounds.
Do not tell the man accidentally;
to put it in the wrong place.
You will be sorry.
Pulled out and counted,
seven shades of black,
shiny and beautiful.
The entrance off the bedroom,
of a place called;
The Tree House.
It is a crazy home,
with five or maybe six different levels.
Few can say, and few have said.
All the many windows lookout,
on to the mesas of the high mountains,
the rolling hills in the distance,
and the wild desert there beyond.
Soon the circle will be complete,
minutes turned into hours,
turned into days,
but worth every one.
Walking out now from the door,
looking out onto historic yesterday,
a formal invitation is given.
Come, see the stars...
and call them by name.
Dance all night on the roof.
The coyotes will howl,
the party will go...
way past dawn.
Heaven will be whatever you make it, you see
Dog-catchers down here will chase dogs up there
Hog-butchers on Earth will slaughter hogs Upstairs
You choices down here
Seal your Fate up there
Look before you leap
If you'd ascend Heaven's stair
Spend your day texting, twittering, playing video games
Consecrate your energy to evanescent fame
You'll fritter away the Divine in your name
Spend Eternity in pursuits quite lame
Visit the sick, give alms to the poor
Love the stranger, the widow and orphan for sure
Extend them kindness, mercy, loving care
Continue your Heavenly work ~ in Ethereal care
When it's all said and done, when the race is run, when your time has come
Your abode in Heaven is what you create on Earth -- and then some
August 22, 2018
Do stairs go up?
Or are they down?
Which way do they go?
It depends on where you start
If you really want to know!
If you start at the top, then down they go
But they would go up, if you start below
The most amazing thing about a staircase
Is all of the steps will take will bring you some place
It could be a porch on a castle.. or even the ceiling
But when using the stairs….Hold on to the railing!
You spent your whole life
walking up and down those steps
Sometimes the walk was less
when you lost a few rungs of horizontal wall elevation
More often the walk was more
when you puffed circular cigar smoke on papier spires
You always loved stacking the stairs,
accumulation of papyros was all that mattered to you
You never lost your papire seat
when the music stopped
at the end of playing musical chairs
Always wondering,
while you sat puffing cigars on a pile of papyrus,
just how high could the stack rise
Papier stair spires
got you climbing higher and higher
Accumulation of papyros
has got your pride elevating more and more
Papyrus printed packs
arranged neatly in green stacks
Elevating so steep off the floor
Paper stair stacks rising ever so high ...
strike a match to them when you die
This poem was inspired by the poem, “Roses and Revolutions,”
penned by the late great black poet, Dudley Randall (1901 - 2000)
DUST UPON THE STAIR
My life careers on so fast, the years and people fly by to who knows where,
times I had have been the best so I'll remember them but forget the bad.
Isn’t that the way we live our lives? Always wanting to remember the good but not the bad.
My music still sounds the same, bringing haunting memories back that I thought had been lost forever. I think of them with a chill down my spine.
They’re like dust upon the stair, undisturbed except by a solitary footprint.
Whose is it? It isn’t mine, only the ghosts know, they glide through my mind in long forgotten memories taking me to a reverie almost undreamed of in my normal state of mind.
from my new book:
"Dark Delectable Delicious Destructive - Poems for Goths, Gangsters and Other Mysterious Souls": "20 Years of Nick Armbrister's Dark Poems"
http://www.lulu.com/shop/nick-armbrister/dark-delectable-delicious-destructive-poems-for-goths-gangsters-and-other-mysterious-souls-20-years-of-nick-armbristers-dark-poems/ebook/product-22220819.html
its like fountain
on a heavenly mountain
there love everywhere
to get there
beware show love and care
to makes lives better
that's the
STAIR WAY TO HEAVEN
we wer both drinking
and winking
our eyes would sink
and blink
we has this sex taste
so we made out
no doudt
had
SEX ON THE STAIR CASE
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