Taped Poems | Examples

Born Between Coordinates

I was born in the pause between two coordinates
drawn by cartographers with sterilized hands.
My soul was indexed in miles and postal codes
Filed under miscellaneous anomaly at checkpoints.

I crossed borders that did not exist,
except in the mouths of men with rifles.
My breath was weighed against paperwork,
my shadow flagged by predictive suspicion.

I was processed in buildings with no windows,
where hope was a form to be filled in triplicate.
My story was annexed, taped to a strangers' bias,
then shelved into the limbo of “pending.”

I failed the empathy test of the world
where spectacle outperforms survival.
My life was too procedural for pity,
and my death was redacted for efficiency.

6 Dead, 4 Wounded, And One On The Way

Leukemia boys and
Leukemia girls wave
in hospital volunteers,
as the angels wave
them away.

What is 
love?

Beyond
an overpriced
ambulance ride,
and an unnecessary
hospital stay?

The most beautiful things:
summer sweat,
and Rome after
rain.

Inside,
a child draws
a yellow sun
with trembling fingers.
The IV, taped
down like it’s trying
to hold him
there.

Forced positivity.
A heart full of
apathy.

I see that
same world you try
to see with substance sober,
and I’ll be the first to tell you—
it isn’t a
blessing.

God has a
hand-grenade
smile, and it’s
hard to find
the grace
in that.

There’s
6 dead, 4 wounded,
and one on the
way.

What an
unimpressive
collection.

6 Dead, 4 Wounded, And One On The Way

Leukemia boys and
Leukemia girls wave
in hospital volunteers,
as the angels wave
them away.

What is 
love?

Beyond
an overpriced
ambulance ride,
and an unnecessary
hospital stay?

The most beautiful things:
summer sweat,
and Rome after
rain.

Inside,
a child draws
a yellow sun
with trembling fingers.
The IV, taped
down like it’s trying
to hold him
there.

Forced positivity.
A heart full of
apathy.

I see that
same world you try
to see with substance sober,
and I’ll be the first to tell you—
it isn’t a
blessing.

God has a
hand-grenade
smile, and it’s
hard to find
the grace
in that.

There’s
6 dead, 4 wounded,
and one on the
way.

What an
unimpressive
collection.

Thyroid Storms

She started crying in the middle of rages—
not the soft kind, but sharp,
like she’d cut herself on something
I couldn’t see.
She slammed drawers.
Shouted at a spoon.
Broke a plate and sobbed
as if the world had cracked with it.

Before she left,
my mother filled the kitchen with notes
written on paper towels—
taped to the cupboards,
the countertops, the fridge.
I couldn’t read,
but I knew they were important—
squares of paper whispering rules
for someone to follow.

And then she was gone.
We went to see her
in a hospital that smelled
like bleach and stillness.
She didn’t get up—
just sat in a wheelchair
with a white bandage 
wrapped around her throat
like she’d tried to swallow something
that wouldn’t go down.

After that,
she came home quiet.
No more yelling.
No more crying jags.
She took down the notes,
made my lunch
and folded the laundry
like nothing had happened—
like maybe I dreamed it.
I didn’t ask why, and she didn’t say.
But I tried not to spill things.
I tried not to be loud.

A Piggy Bank For A Dream Travel

I have a dream to travel abroad
I tell myself, do everything to it
One day to make it happen when
If not I can make what I want
Come what may I still wish it
Is it impossible, no, I'll try
I keep on dreaming, walk, crawl
Lie in that direction far away
But I don't betray my dream well
So I got myself a piggy bank
I taped the lid of a shoe box
I put a day in every day I can
After all, on the box I wrote
"Hugh, to Maldives, here I come".
So funny the description I made
I put money in to start filling
Everyday, I'm crawling towards
My unpolished and unsure dream
Thinking of ways to put all the bills
I squeeze the box from time to time
How far it will be filled up I don't know
Looking at the window today by far
I can already imagine the plane
Landing in a hot nice country by sea
Slapping on the hot coastal sand
Sipping on a cold cocktail from where
I stand wearing this summer trunk beach
I came awaken this nostalgia realizing
I have to put again the bill to the box
To make this dream happen to reality.

Two Caught in the Draft of a Door Ajar

We're mannequins peering from a storage
bin. We slouch across from
the "No-Food" paper sign.
Its message sags to a pulp taped to the shoulders
of a glass door. Shoppers,
incoming, their shared orange

squirts juice. Our mannequin-custodial
grins bar us from the lips' sweet 'oh'.

Crowdsourcing emboldens shame, our French kisses hung
on tangy wind chimes breezes tongue.

Anatomy Of The Leg

In 2013 Amélie Ségarra danced on a Grand Piano with knives 
taped to the tips of her feet.
The room is empty apart from a single man in a music box
He wears a black an white suit buttoned up to the collars with bronze cufflinks,
To get up she uses an old Woven Rope in brown
You can see her nipples as she looks up, Adam's apple following her gaze 
along with everything else.
She starts dancing.
From above the waist her arms jut out, grabbing widely at air and trust
But below it's easy
At times it looks harder to be the piano.
Remember how close she got to the edge.
Rapidly tapping the tips of toes, taped into shoes,
Screwed onto knives.
At times the screech was louder than the music.
Engaging her hips she’d lift up her thigh, bent at the knee
The arch of her foot seeming to just hang there.
Before it drops she makes the sound of a boxer.
Something only rooms with loud figures giving orders to lots of people 
doing the same thing in repetition can bring out. 
The music has stopped, so now all you hear is knee engaging ankle,
Holding up a foot wrapped in pink ruffled straps.
Smalling down an into 
a seemingly endless 
Grand Piano.

Stuck

Feet glued to your welcome mat,
our fingers meshed like Velcro
and pieces of our shattered hearts
haphazardly taped together;
my tears and your fidgeting
weaken the adhesive,
yet, we do not—
can not—
move.

Not for You

a heart-shaped world wrapped in ribbons and lace
but she sits alone in the quiet space
her hands rest empty, no cards, no sweets
just the echo of laughter in distant streets

red and pink paper drifts to the floor
cut-out hearts taped to the classroom door
she watches them trade their love in a line
her name never called—not even one time

her fingers trace the edge of her desk
a whisper of hope still clings to her chest
maybe they forgot, maybe one's late
maybe love comes if you just sit and wait

but the bell rings sharp, the day is done
they gather their gifts, arms heavy with fun
she walks home slow, the sky bruised blue
the wind carries whispers—not for you

she curls beneath blankets, blinking fast
but tears slip down like shadows cast
and though she tells herself it’s okay
her heart still aches for valentines day

June 1972

June 17, 1972
night guard finds taped door
Watergate begins

Rudolph’s Broken Leg

On just a small rehearsal flight
Reindeer Rudolph gave us a fright
He took a tumble and when he fell 
He broke a leg, The boss we must tell

Oh how shall we fix this problem 
Normally we’d go without him 
But this year it is going to storm 
And snow will be coming, it’s not warm

But Santa had a solution
To get us through the pollution
We taped a light to Dasher’s plain nose
And watched the sleigh and said, “There he goes!”

Rudolph’s Broken Leg

On just a small rehearsal flight
Reindeer Rudolph gave us a fright
He took a tumble and when he fell 
He broke a leg, The boss we must tell

Oh how shall we fix this problem 
Normally we’d go without him 
But this year it is going to storm 
And snow will be coming, it’s not warm

But Santa had a solution
To get us through the pollution
We taped a light to Dasher’s plain nose
And watched the sleigh and said, “There he goes!”

Banana once again

What sold was for millions as art so grand,
Was bought for a few cents at a fruit stand--
A fancy mall nor mart,
Nor place of art apart,
Nor was banana taped with swanky band.
But a joke so cruel
In art’s name was this all, 
Or call it a crime of a dollar land. 
______________________
Happenings |02.12.2024| art, irony, humour

Poet’s note: The banana that was sold for millions as an art piece was purchased at a fruit stand outside Sotheby’s auction house for 35 cents apiece, or 4 for one dollar (purchased for $ 5.2 million by a crypto currency entrepreneur-- who else?). How absurd can things go in this so-called world of art gone crazy for money? The banana seller, one called Shah Alam from Bangladesh, literally cried after knowing this. Yes, a joke it was this all, a cruel one for the poor banana vendor. Artist Cattelan pontificates, ‘Art, by its nature, does not solve problems-- if it did, it would be politics’. Indeed, the banana vendor was stunned and left still poor. See ‘Art going bananas’.

Art going bananas

Art’s going bananas well nigh--
Apple still of many an eye
And an object of art
Winning no mean a heart,
Why a banana taped for millions vie--
A fruit best in ape’s hand,
In lewd limerick’s land,
Is out today all logic to defy.
Food has long been an art,
Art as food my sense thwart,
Why I hear Ecuador’s desperate sigh.
___________________
Happenings |18.11.2024|humour, art

Poet’s note: Banana has the art world in a tizzy. Maurizio Catalan’s work, Comedian (a single banana taped to wall) has sold for over six million dollars at Sotheby’s auction. The same thing, when put up at Art Basel Miami Beach in 2019, had left people in shock. But don’t we live in a topsy-turvy world? Ecuador is the biggest exporter of bananas in the world.

The Ninth Wife

      Greedy vine spirals smother monoliths 
      Spider fern moss, fairy forest vertical
      Soaks in secrets, promise admonished


      Water trawled crevice, creek cervical
      Church canopy arch angel honours 
      Wing finger cool fires praise prancing 
      Laser selects sections, bark polished
      Licked by flitting demure madonnas

      
     Eight afore taped to trees keen tropical 
     Each fresh capes the chapel innocent 
     Suckers strung hearts hung over tendrils 


     Hundred year hardness rots, wet spent
     Mighty trunk rips open room charcoal 
     Doorway discloses disaster clandestine 
     Bluebeard’s bride wives winding sparkle
     Shon hopeful on nymph number nine




              3rd of July 
         Daintree Dancing

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