The jewelry box
I kept for safe keeping
Has become the land
My flesh keeps reaping
The store around the corner
I travel each morning
Makes my breath of life
A lot less boring
There sits my buddies
Around a table of carded hands
Money is just wadded paper
With the pull that understands
My darling pushes my buttons
Even when she knows what's comin'
The shame and guilt gives presents
Buying time to keep her guessin'
There's a pleasure in little things
But the secrets must not speak
Lest the bedroom of energy
Makes the boards start to creak
Snacks in the morning
At noon, and after dinner time
Who cares about a body
When habits tickle my mind
...to stagnation
Written by Trudy Schrader on 06-23-2026
your countless lies leave a sour taste on my tongue
“i love you” you claim
yet it’s muttered using all of the air in your lungs
your breathing stops
and you have nothing left to give
yet i catch myself screaming out
“please just live”
stay with me awhile longer
i can’t face reality without juggling your saunter
the tear stained pillow cases mean nothing anymore
as long as i can hold onto what i think i adore
“i love you” you mutter one more time
and a bead of sweat drips down
worry,
because you’re aware you’re my lifeline
the wadded up blankets cover your face
as i lie awake with a trace of your dna
the painful silence hurts my ears
i know your heart stopped beating a long time ago i fear
so i take a deep breath
and give you what’s left in my lungs
so you can have the last reminisce of what i call
“love”
I have a storage unit full of wadded paper balls
what if I threw away a masterpiece I always thought
well here I am today searching through all the wadded paper balls
I have lost my muse and need to find an idea to write about
I have found nothing among all the wadded paper balls
Yesterdays Care is forgotten
but somewhere else it shines
I walked the waters depths
and it plagued my mind
Peace was torn
as the winds tore into two
East was west in the golden sun
as several heads became one
The Sun severed our souls
Eyes locked we couldn't find
pleasant lands
Hand in hand we wadded
We could be with friends
The golden skies of boubar
finalise our days
Waste has worsened widespread.
World's oceans polluted.
Wonder throwaway mind
Wadded to poor beings
Wreckage of planes and trains
Wastage slash-and-burn seas
Worldbank work tackle trash
2nd place in the W Pleiades contest
Written: May 9, 2021
Pleiades W Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Kim Merryman
Dust clings to my suit caught
by wafts of imagined vapor,
until I drag, drag, down
the dunes and depressions.
The cold a new arm of guidance.
I’m supposed to be warm,
wadded in comfort lining
but cold, cold, makes me old.
While I wander, sucking my last
breaths of precious oxygen.
I lost my converter, where are you?
Lost my ride, my partner, you-o-you?
Lost my every present guide
on far off Earth, while I rustle
unable to cash in on cattle,
unable to renounce life.
Dingy, dinghy, dazed, and all done.
You got me. Bring me home.
And then the hey-yoouuuu, yodel
somewhere near, hail me, hallelujah!
The older I get the less that I fret
With my panties wadded up in a tizzy
As anyone could see I used to be
A mini-me of Dizzy Gillespie
I'd huff and I'd puff when I'd had enough
Like some Big Bad Wolf in a fable
Then let it all fly as the steam in me would rise
Right on time, here comes Old Faithful
No one hanging around at the bubbling sound
As it came close to the rim
No need to wait for the show, see you later gotta go
Afraid by flying debris they'd be hit
Thankfully those years are long gone as I've learned to calm down
Although I still have my moments
My family looks at me quite suspiciously
When I turn on the news at 6
lone whale wadded in the sea
all it meets are small fish
it makes noise for attention
but no whale-mate appears
when a trailer came passing
it chased after it with hope
only to end up in the trap
Mercy, Mercy… Mercy me
A light, white frosting
of snowflakes
Upon cardboard and
old soiled blankets
Streetlamps and neon signs
Light…empty… unfeeling
and bone chillingly cold
Plastic bottles and wadded bags
Holey sneakers wrapped
In filthy rags
Tortured dreams and
Muffled screams
And piercing, numbing cold
…Mercy, mercy, me…
I see what's underneath ladies' skirts; their plump underpinnings and roundness.
I feel shoes scrape across my surface, the feel of a broom and the bold suck of a vacuum
Each piece of me becomes a bit tattered over the days and piece-worn over the years.
Those who made me wove in color and particles of their life; skin from their fingers linger.
The colors made them exclaim, "How bright the room looks. It's like a picture!"
I've felt writhing, passionate bodies roll onto me when there was no couch, and seen what others would not dare to think. If someone asked me, “Who?” I would lie.
I am filled with life, taken for granted and finally wadded up and thrown into a large trash bin
All my memories buried, gone. If they only knew.
But I'll I can do is lie.
KAB 3/12/11
The nights shadows scurry from the dawns arrogant light,
as I stand on this ledge, pondering flight...
What does it matter anyway?
Tomorrow will be just like today...
The bridge is now only ash and dust...
I have no credibility. I have no trust...
My life is wadded on the floor you see...
I have nothing or no one... Not even me...
Please give me one reason to go on...
Please give me the lyrics to that forgotten song...
No need to point out my desperate wrongs...
Just say goodbye, but don't be long...
You came to me
As an enemy
Feared, Dark, Revered
Steering me toward uncertainty
Avoiding, annoying, destroying
Trust in men
Pricking me to hate
The desire within
Just when I determined
To make my escape
You clung to my words
And wadded up my hate
You threw, withdrew, renewed
The tender love breaking open
Mounted your white steed
And took to loping
~through lavender lily fields~
I cast aside
All restraint
Mounted my paint
Galloping through open gates
We rode upon
Unexplored land
Discovering hearts
Devoted to understand
It rained, stained, made it plain
Love has flowered here
Then, the sun arose
Bringing shadow to fear
Vagrant, thief
Out, get out....humiliated
I gathered my soul about me
And ran into the night
Caring not if death took me
...away...no hope, no love...no fight
I cried out in colossal grief
Love, you are my enemy
I will not look for you again
You only discovered how to leave
Me, lost in the heart of intimacy
Where I can find the arrows of men
Cast aside are my crumpled thoughts,
lain strewn about the overflowing bin.
Each one representing a moment sought,
a idea gone awry, to be rewritten.
Crushed into balls of jagged course,
cast aside are my crumpled thoughts.
Tossed in the general direction with remorse.
A bounce and rebound off a rim shot.
Balled up in disgust, added to the lot,
Ink now wadded, bent out of recognition,
Cast aside are my crumpled thoughts,
as I try to write a new rendition.
Some destined to be undone, reconsidered,
the rest suffer in their friends lot.
More will follow, my pen embittered,
cast aside are my crumpled thoughts.
For the contest: Play Ball
Sponsored by Debbie Guzzi
Placement: 3rd
Elixers, emulsions, powders and lotions,
spread on the counter like a fleet on an ocean.
It’s those bathroom battles that I still see,
ground that was lost, or a quiet victory.
A bloodless conflict, I must concede,
But battle lines drawn in a battle indeed.
We circle each other like birds of prey,
thinking of that explosive day
that we both know will come with a great thrill
when like raptors we swoop in for the kill.
For space to be had that doesn’t exist,
ironies aplenty, it’s life with a twist.
Irons and curlers and blow dryers too,
for goodness sake, what’s a man supposed to do?
At every visit I eyeball the hair
that grows by the day, stuck to the “Skin Care.”
Things wadded up in the waste basket,
oft overflowing like a yawning casket.
A place for dead things, unmentionables too,
then I think of my vows when I said “I love you”.
If a couple survives bathroom things,
chances are good they’ll keep wearing their rings.
But half of that space should be for the groom,
for heaven's sake, I too need room.
On countrysides animal scurry along, leaving footprints
In the carbonized material of this planet.
Channel surfing & empty ink pens,
Pepsi & wadded up candy wrappers
All over the house remannts of LIFE
Breathing all over us.
LIFE moves over us like a rapist in some dark room
We somehow forgot about
In the brightest hours;
It leaves footprints
In the carbonized material of this skin.
Passing through streets burning with loneliness & boredom;
Sometime I often wonder about the perplexity
All of it stains upon our memory.
Midst preposterous pink & turquoise blue color
Our LIFE begins to petal,
slightly bruised.
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