The last drops of rain
trickle down the roof tiles.
The washed morning does not rush,
much like those high-spirited stragglers,
who now and then play their pranks.
The night still struggles in vain.
The first ray of light dips a finger into the puddles—
a signal for the thrushes to strike up their tunes.
A sleepy street sweeper emerges
from an old, shabby gate.
His shoes creak beautifully.
Can our hearts be reduced to our behavior?
20,000 people a day visit the Eiffel Tower, which is about 450 feet
from our back windows - trees block much of the view and they’re
several stories below us, so only a bit of the loudest noise reaches us.
By 8pm that number is halved and by 10pm only stragglers remain
- and lovers, who stroll hand in hand at all hours.
There are no more classes, this year, we were given two weeks
to study for first year final exams - which start in 2 days.
When studying late at night,
I setup on our 6th floor balcony
I love the seeming quiet
(I’m jamming to my AirPods).
I have quite the imagination
- my perch seems like a tree-fort
because the trees are within reach
studying is like an exploration
I pretend that no one else knows
these things I’m discovering
of course that’s silly
but feelings are feelings
I wish I didn’t have to sleep
I love the research
I love my music, I love the darkness
I can watch the lovers walk the park
I’m up here, alone, for hours
there are peak moments happening
in the tree-fort
.
.
Songs for this:
Lush Life by Zara Larsson
New Rules by Dua Lipa
He lays motionless
Amid the browning leaves
his tiger striped coat
More than a disguise
The bird feeder
Drew the combatants
A swaying dance floor
Scattering its bounty
He would wait
Stragglers would come
Eagerly anticipating
A last call
He would provide it
Final leg, still a chance
Focused, head down
Pain
Energy fading
A foot slip
Concentration meets exhaustion
Pedalling harder, slowing down
Quick look down
Something is wrong
I swear
I stop
No other way
A broken chain did end false, grand hopes
I jolt, knees lock, my nerves, open panic
Quietly raging, steward turns up, voices warn
Xanthopsia, yellow zephyr
Wheels flash passed
Peloton already distant
Stragglers stare
Endgame
Consoled by crowd
Devastated
Punctured dreams
“Sedation”
by Positive Mark
Deep, still blue.
Rage from the Peekskills, now caged from his street skills, with the vantage point of a gargoyle heart of stone.
The streets should be mine, but there’s always other stragglers.
Used to be streets. Now, it’s backroads, chasing antlers.
Conjuring faces of the fallen. Wondering from what damned direction I’ma hear our sins calling.
Freeing the spirit with acts that defile matter.
Forever shaking the salt from the blood splatter.
Heart with a hard on for that incense carbon smoke.
Fix me up a bump, and I damn sure better choke.
Point me to the spot where them cats is on dippers.
Scroll down on Backpage for Baltimore strippers.
Five day admission, and back to the medication.
Deep, still blue.
Drenched in darkness for sedation.
Five light years is the average distance
that separates any two stars -
five light years of hydrogen, helium and dust.
It is a l o n g space
of seeming emptiness.
You and I are two stars too.
Now separated,
is there only nothingness between us?
I will show you there is not.
I will shine my light toward you, scattering it through
the dust of your indifference.
One day you will know my absolute resolution.
Slowly I will approach, driven by mad devotion
and drawing you ever nearer to me.
At last, we will collide, becoming one.
Everything dividing us will vanish,
and with a love so massive, rare, and hot,
we will be as unique as blue stragglers,
sparkling night's sky with our passion.
She said some words and blackbirds cawed
As she stirred her cauldron to a goblin's applaud
Her nose was crooked, her skin was green
As her cackles echoed on Halloween
The Halloween night was filled with gloom
As she patrolled the skies on her trusty broom
She was looking for stragglers, those who lagged behind
Then she'd swoop down and catch them, their fate unkind
The first one she brought back began to scream
But this only made the old hag's eyes gleam
She waved her hand to and fro
And turned him into a crow!
Then off again on her broom she flew
As her cauldron bubbled with a fearsome brew
She saw another straggler dawdling by a gate
She swooped down swiftly to seal his fate
All her victims would scream and scream
Wishing and hoping they were in a dream
10-11-2024
Is there anybody out there
I can only see my face in the forefront preflection
Of the passed, away on vacation until all comes cross
Is she really on the page or on the screen an AI model
Stockings stocking to no avail
Preferably a real lady, married, a couple of kids, nah
He enters the mainstream understanding orifices procession
Pro to nothing concrete all absolutes don't exist
Clean and not heard
The genius in him should talk to the mirror
Instead of a gun shot plying the thought of Gmail account
Accessible bypass crude
Why sense the tasteful callipyge stragglers told too
In her scent he can find a thousand Dani Daniels Krissy Lynn Jane Marie, she'd just another troubadour old fantasy
Reality overweight overwhelms filly folly breads hvvgfnbdg
*** VV bukkake Bukowski travels by and nothing taken for granted Lego logorrhée Times Square sexshop where a dude speaks East Timorian does it really count what the guy said on the corner of the contents of the wall Pao chicken breast
FIRST - ACT I
stragglers,
mad of
pandemic...
introverts,
suffocated and
masked...
we livef
our neuroses
paralyzing...
no antidotes
no shelters...
only poetry in us
comforts like hypnosis
the body and soul
in symbiosis...
Shall I forget "Don't Forget Things Street",
Where stealing increases body heat
And items get lost from 7.00pm:
Wealth outside owners forget to claim?
"Don't forget" might stop recording theft,
If owners stopped treating things as left,
When the long and short hands of clocks
Had balanced on Twelve and Seven, gaped locks...
"Don't forget street" yet to house burglars
But could soon have them from her stragglers
A street pleading that we remember
Or, else, get set to lose a member!
stragglers in the group
assist as reflex response
lest dreams turn to dust
10-February-2022
The distant sound of hoopbeats stirs the air
those clouds sweet dusty dreams of yesteryear
float lazily across his fluttering eyes
crease wrinkled face to smile and eyes to tear.
They rode, this ragged trio, on the winds
the age of youthful never ending friends
a-gallop in a world where horses fly
alone upon a trail that never ends.
They wait, make camp at stragglers gate
knowing none could ride beyond their fate
hold steady in a dream that cannot die
That they will someday ride a cloudless sky
4/2/2020
The day is dying
The half-moon is faltering
In its nocturnal crawl
Across the gloomy sky
As the sleepy village goes to bed
Under the inky dark African sky
Stragglers are home-bound with trepidation
From another day of disillusionment
Lonely drunks lost in alcoholic world
Stagger home on the sandy paths
Boastful about feats known only to them
As the alcohol ebbed with their fading dreams
In the barricaded walls of wealthy mansions
Glittering outwardly and lit by obscene chandeliers
Lay looters and scoundrels of our commonwealth
Wide-awake scared stiff of night marauders they have created
As the gulf between the leaders and the led continues to widen
The day of reckoning has come for African predator overlords
Like Macbeth they have murdered sleep
They shall sleep no more
Green patches
of lawn
surrounded by
flurries of leaves
demarcation lines
peace zones
Occasional puffs of wind
light, easy, unhurried
scatter a few stragglers --
swept along
a couple or three meters
then still
at rest again
they await last rites...
there
it
stood
tall
majestic
solemn
facing outward
piercing the night
scrutinizing the horizon
looking out
for stragglers
lost desperate souls
drifting at sea
to guide them home
AP: 2nd place 2020
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