PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

The day I smelled the gasoline forty feet up

I said

I don’t want to miss you like them

I don’t want to be the one

to push you to the wall

Sometimes all you need is a chance

and I speak a different language.

When you’re around

you know my stride is full of you

Maybe if I take half a step

we could change,

we’ll be afraid

of getting to where our hearts storm the drains.

I said

I don’t want to miss you like them

but if that’s what it takes

to live something worth seeing

to write something worth reading

to say something worth telling…

I will gladly take

the heartbreak on my hands.

You say that you’re scared of the unknown

Nobody can say what the future will hold

It’s terrifying going in blind

But I want you to know that you’re not alone.

I’ll be by your side

For as long as you’ll let me

And I’ll help clear the path

That you’re going to follow.

I’ll hold your hand

As we explore together

And when you’re ready

I’ll let someone else take the lead.

Nobody knows what will happen

Or who we will become

But I wouldn’t want to go through

The unknown with anyone else.

You and I are voices sight-reading tomorrow.

We write out to all the listeners

and give them no reason to stay

but there are so many hands on me

I can’t sit still for a second

even to listen to what might become the world.

I sight read your lips over and over and I keep finding a different rhythm

every step that sings I belong here

is interrupted when the seconds unwind

and lay out a carpet to carry me from you.

I just want to be the person I’m too shy to be

after a day or a universe

I walk in your door and drop everything I am on the ground

I know you won’t care.

Sometimes I think when I am in love

I am buried so deep in sanity that I don't know what it is anymore

I couldn’t recognize it if it came and broke down my door

made these breezes breathe through my skin

cleaned me out of brain space

gave me the best orgasm I have ever had.

And so I stare it straight in the face,

look right on through.

I reach in for all the love I can give you

I twist it with your smile

I let it go but it is easy

because there is so much to hold on to.

You pull at my lips like a few too many consonants,

a string of intrigue that will make me come back,

look twice.

This moment is glittering with promises

and I can’t catch it

no matter how fast it feels like I am flying.

I don’t think like my words

but my words build a body

that wonders if you can see

promise in girl

and then every time you get close

something wishes it away

because my doubt can’t stand the company.

The promises seep down

and I twist them in my fingers like red under thorns

and sometimes I look at you like I might go blind

or you’ll go missing.

Tonight is thunder and stillness and missing you

and someday it will be

a wave I can’t conquer by hearing your voice at night.

I think if history comes around again

I will repeat myself onto other lips

You are my first string and I will make the world our race.

I think if I fall in love again

I will see you in her eyes

I will make sure she is just enough like you 

to break me down.

50 was a crossroads

By jfarrell

I did have a party on my 50^th birthday…

And it was decided on your votes and contributions;

And, I think, it was great!!

My first birthday party, ever

Two folks did turn up..

Definitely better than no-one.

And we spent the night jamming on guitar;

With everybody begging me to stop singing, hehe

But, it’s my party and I’ll sing if I want to.

The real guitarist, I hadn’t seen him in a couple years;

And ‘Dodge’; well he couldn’t dodge the end of this friendship…

“Jim, you’re always so negative.”

A crossroads;

A natural ending, without bitterness;

My last friends and I go our separate ways.

“The times we had were great, we gotta keep in touch….”

We, all three, nodded, big smiles…

But.. the smile never quite reached our eyes….

I maybe losing the remnants of the only last good thing I got left;

Maybe, depression, pain, clouds my judgement….

….but

Maybe…

To move on to something better…

I gotta let something, stale, go….

Wolf Unleashed

By jfarrell

(loved them old horror films, lon chaney jr, peter cushing..)

My 50^th birthday was my Lon Chaney Jr. Moment….

Collapsed, out of site,

Behind the kitchen table;

Emerge;

Everytime a bit hairier;

Everytime my teeth, especially my canines (vampire teeth);

A bit longer,

A bit sharper.

With each rise above the kitchen table…

More hair, longer teeth, and my clothes more ripped, more shredded…

…it happened…

Thank you

Lon Chaney Jr.

I became the Mr Hyde I’ve always waited to become….

And I’m so happy….

It’s the not the evil child raping monster I was expecting….

I CAN play guitar… DAMN…. I can play T’rex, Chuck Berry…

I can jam along with Clapton, Van Morrison, Iron Maiden…

I’m far from good… YET… but, damn, I CAN play

And I WILL get better

Like Lon Chaney Jr…

I gonna get more hairy….

I gonna let them teeth grow down to my knees….

Damn, am I gonna get hairy….

Hair alll the way down to my feet….

…..

AHHHHROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That’s my werewolf howl :-)

Dr Who got a new regeneration on Xmas Day;

I got mine first ;-)

Changes; language

By jfarrell

“Where’s your rubbish bin?”

“My what?”

“Your rubbish bin; to throw out the rubbish…”

“Oh, you mean waste management”

What??????

What was wrong with rubbish bin?

Waste management?

I spent months looking through job adverts,

Looking for till operator, or checkout person;

Or cinema usher, team member…

Still haven’t learnt what those roles are now called.

Non-binary; snowflake; remoaner; brexiteer;

Cultural disapropriation; fake news;

Maybe it’s my age and my absence from the world;

But, woah! Language has changed.

When I went into childcare, I was trained,

‘keep your language simple’, so everyone can understand;

Doctors, psychiatrists, courts, parents, you and me;

Everyone can understand; multidisciplinary team.

Language today is like a minefield;

Tiptoeing on the eggshells of people,

Trying to avoid the cracks of what is now ‘politically incorrect’;

And huge money to be made at every misstep.

Please explain to me something…

How could George Orwell, who died so long ago,

Still foretell, with such accuracy,

How we would live today?

Life is bigger

By jfarrell

(inspired by REM’s “losing my religion”)

Life is bigger than me.

Bigger than everything I am;

My hopes, dreams, hurts, pains, disappointments…

Whether I die tonight, or fifty years from now….

Life, the World, and everything in it will continue….

Life is bigger than me.

And, yet, somehow,

Whether I die tonight or many years from now….

My life has been as important as that ant you just crushed,

Or that dandelion, blown away on the breeze;

Every happening has a cause and a consequence;

However insignificant, I made a difference.

You must realise, life is bigger than you;

I have no children, no legacy, nothing invested;

Most of you do.

At nearly 50, I hope whatever I’m here for I’ve done;

I just wanna go,

There’s no point for me.

But there is a point for you - ALL OF YOU!

Your children must inherit a better world;

They’re your children,

Not mine.

I realise life is bigger than me, and I’ve done my part;

Life is bigger than you, realise that.