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Best Poems Written by Benjamin Varenikovich

Below are the all-time best Benjamin Varenikovich poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

The Aftermath of Short Hair and Not Wearing Dresses

"You were a pretty girl, where are your braids?"
I walk faster
Trying to outrun my sense of dread.
I've forgotten about the judging Russian people
Who with their prodding pointy comments
Slowly drive me off the edge.

"I like it more this way."
A confused pause drains my words to silence.
"It's easier for… 
Swimming."

"But they were so long and pretty…"
Grow out your own hair grandma,
I think and nod respectfully
Pretending I've been called urgently away.

"So are you a rebel now?" 
Well if that's what you want to call it.
But don't worry, this is all you'll see-the tip of the iceberg
At least I'm silently going insane.

"My mom says it's just a phase."
Thank you friend
For the over-used cliché,
I'll put in in the same place you put you tendency towards gay:
That shelf we call "Let's never speak of this again."

But to be fair, 
My parents say I'm not allowed
To tell you I'm a boy.

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

Sunset Skies

Swirls of violet
Cloudless skies
Oh stars do come from your mighty rise!

Half moons sleep in cobalt skies
Shadows lurch, dark as night
Gulls emit their mourning cries.

All color is leaving,
Only black remains.
And soon that too will fade away.

Blood red streaks, 
They light the air
Heaven has lost, but who’s left to care?

I care!
Whispers a hollow voice,
But it’s drowned out by the nighttime noise.

“Don’t worry child”  
The skies, they tell,
“Dawn has come, and all is well.”

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

Starry Night Dreaming Night

Starry night- dreaming night
I couldn't put a roof over you 
Not even if I tried
Your infinite expanse,
I try and breathe it in
Holding you in the pores of my skin
The calluses of my fingers
The accidental and forgotten scars
That litter my skin like stars.

Starry night- dreaming night
Your rustling wind breathes me in,
In one long breath
And then exhales me 
Pulling at my wild tendrils
Always too long for comfort
That would usually weigh me down.
They feel light now
Little wisps behind me.

Starry night- dreaming night
Take me to the center of the universe
Take me to the birthplace of all time
Let me leave you all troubles
Every fright from which I'm trying to hide
Kick my anger to the dust
And let me make room for a better dawn.

Starry night- dreaming night
I'm on sanity withdrawal
I haven't got a clue 
Where I'm going, or if I'll even get
"There"
Maybe that's why I'm hiding,
Talking to the sky.

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

Roses

too bad scratches on
wrists won't turn to roses,
for what fault bears a rose
but when it wilts?

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

Billions of Words

Billions of words fly around in my head-
In one lobe and out the other.
They escape before I can trap them in ink.

They break free through my skin,
And etch themselves into my surroundings;
Every memory now bears the beginning of a poem.

So much sleep I have lost over fluttery syllables-
Trying, failing,
To catch them with my faulty letter-fly net.

The holes are too big!
And so they soar out, 
leaving me with the faintest longing;

For every single one I capture,
A dozen more escape,
Destined to run free.

Maybe I'll see them again someday,
Buzzing in the distance
Always evading my grasp.

At least they'll bother with me at all,
Even if they're flighty.
Stays and runaways are better than no words at all.

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

Ode To Humanity the Beautifully Idiotic Part 1

Here we are on a huge hunk of rock- 
The most inorganic of matters 
Yet somehow we've managed to matter enough
So here we live in the cracks and the valleys
Enveloped in our own velocity 


Our vitality must charm this rock; 
The ocean will swallow us up, 
the sky will strike us senseless,
but we've managed to keep 
Our heads out of the sand faced up 
To the stars

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

I Can'T Breathe

I’m kind of having trouble breathing
It could be the binder or
The knives I threw at the wall.
I know I didn’t throw them with my lungs
But the thought of the holes in the plaster
Grips my chest in the grip of disaster
And I can’t breathe.

In the caverns of my air sacs 
there’s something starting to grow:
my mother’s roses.
They’re pretty, I know
but you can’t put
coils of thorns in my throat
and ask me to humor you.

Every rose I will cough up
Will be like a punch in the gut;
if you squint
you will be able to see a constellation 
in the blue by my diaphragm.

Yes, for your eyes I can grow roses
Out of the tissues of my lungs
But I’m having trouble breathing
And it isn’t the binder
I can’t help that I’m finding outlines of 
Faces in the plaster.
You’ve taught your rose bush to grow knives 
And when I see the holes of your eyes in the wall
I can’t breathe.

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

Sink Or Swim

I ramble and shove words together 
And sometimes I pick apart my unpleasant thoughts
Look,

I can try to remember
I can try to forget
It’s sink or swim and I can’t tell which is which

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

Why I Cannot Write

I cannot write.
I cannot bleed onto the lines
My blood festering full of lies, half-promises, and smiles
I want to let it pour 
And get stuck in between the keys
Let them think I’m a slob and an addict to the screen
The red keeping me stuck in each of my betweens-
It’s jam.
The leftovers of a midnight snack not-
Well, not anything.
My pen-and-paper machine is closed,
My poetry rotting, swirling
Among long-lost English papers I cackled my way through before a midnight shut-off
And videos that won’t make it to the wedding-day compilation.
The dam is broken everything is spurting out of my veins-my pen-my keyboard
Maybe if I bleed out dry
Maybe the poison I’ve been harboring will let me be,
Maybe I’ll never read these words again.
Maybe I’ll be happy.

Details | Benjamin Varenikovich Poem

Skeleton Fingers

Skeleton fingers unravel the night-
Fright takes hold of me.

Skeleton fingers that grasp by the throat-
Broke are my sanity's seams.

Skeleton fingers, invaders of dreams;
Reams upon reams of realities scream,

As skeleton fingers away steal our stars.
From afar, we watch and cower.