Poetry

by Robert Edward Meres

HER TYPE

"I’m cold and all I want to be is warmed. And I'm sick of these sharks mistaking me for a seal and only realizing after they've bitten me with a brand of charm that only kills women who are dying to die. They're slowly scraping away the rosy film from my glasses while someone else out there has another pair that could combine with mine so well it could make living in the worst of worlds fine. I don’t mean to whine but I’ve read way too much Shakespeare to be able to settle on an ordinary life, but maybe not enough to know I don't deserve it. I want you to come here and grab my hand and lift me up from the pile of yawns I’ve been sleeping in for so long and I want to fucking slow dance until prom turns to post-prom and we're intertwined in body and mind and secure in the knowledge there's no one else we'll ever want to find. Like our quest for love is over and we won and we're one and we're wrapped up together until night wakes the sun. And as it does it pierces through windows into eyelids that lift while lips widen to smiles and bodies shift and arms stretch and our yawns are the bugles that mark the start of another day we're glad to be alive to live. I've got so much to give but you're not here to receive and that's too bad because I had a shitty day and you could make it so much better right now. The universe isn't fair. If it was, we'd be redefining reciprocation and symbiosis right now over cups of hot chai through body language and conversations about ideas instead of people and peppering in sexual innuendo so hot we have to turn off the heat. I’m incomplete and you’re still not here to hold and I’m cold, and all I want to be is warmed."

---

ADMIRATION

Lost amid a mix of scholarship and shit, I sit,

perched, upon a pillar of deluged daze,

Then you - I gaze for as long as your rosy hue permits,

At the blossoms of textual beauty your mind displays,

Fucking amazing are the ways your words wind,

in such ways to drive this brain to strive, to strain and contrive

to produce just one of the beautiful thoughts that seem to seam your mind,

I am confined...and once again I sit,

I sit and wish and dream to dream of your poetry's gleaming smiles,

To your styles, to your complexity, to the way it beguiles

men as I, permitted only to a platonic you,

What a beautiful person you are, T. Baltazar,

You are a star that hangs so heavy within the confines of my space,

That should I dare to reach to touch its height - so far,

I fear I'd sooner fall from heaven than reach its grace.

---

ACID the EGO

Skin folded, face scolded

scalp scalded with the heat of hate

deformed by a fate that was decided

by the angriest of the unrequited

an unreformed culture's idea of slighted

he trades both their eyes for just his honor

with acid on her

spurned by her beauty

bound by a duty

insecurities had implied

all for the sake of his pride

---

Luxury of Ignorance (unfinished, 2019)

See what you can

of the modern american man

while he's still here

and while better one's near

see how this year's man exists

clearly complicit

and as blind to the abuses

of women and other men

as his granddad had been

but with even less excuses

less wars to win

and violence built in

to his gender's very uses

and his era's very needs

and generation's creeds

as the men back then had

those ages ago

no

with no wars to win

or economic depression

the modern man can ignore sexual sin

like a Netflix show

as another luxury

of being born in a first world country

as if the choice not to see 

an innocent's abuse

amidst all this TV

is a legitimate excuse to be complicit to it

we should all be ashamed in the streets

---

PRIDE for a DAY (2003)

Sitting in an empty apartment contemplating life's everything,

Cherishing realization and awareness and all the joy they bring,

But now sidetracked by the fact I'm looking from biased eyes,

Mere genes and upbringing, trained by human truths and human lies,

Which then reminds me of another thought on which to dwell,

Nationalism vs. rationalism, which began when 2 buildings fell,

This trite pride fad as seen on TV,

All the tears and loss the media makes sure you see,

Facilitating feelings of belonging from big-budgeted propaganda,

That the middle east needs action, no longer Bosnia and Uganda,

Do we have to wear 3-colored clothes to show our pride?

Or listen to a song that preaches the greatness of a single nation?

Or make a purchase to feel all warm inside,

For the sake of the economy and our own indignation?

Let's segregate ourselves from humanity and the world's rest,

Homogenize Americans into Christians and call our God the best,

Then give it all false sanctity to prey on people's need to belong,

So we can force on other countries our own brand of right and wrong,

Let's all see Afghanistan as an evil place,

Where woman beg on the streets and all men carry guns,

Let's give all Afghans a big nose and evil face,

To take away the guilt from last months bombing runs,

Let's remember past events to perpetuate the game,

Make ourselves holier than now using our God's name,

Make everyone on our side indulge in our ignorant bliss,

If you're not on our side, you're either a terrorist or godless,

Ignorance has always done well as majority's friend,

No room for the minority when the majority's enlightened,

Rome vs. the barbarians, classic good vs bad renewed,

All the while, everyone not realizing from which eyes they see through, too.

---

I WANT YOU SO MUCH BUT I HATE YOUR GUTS

I dreamt about you last night. Lace-lined panties over soft skin. Grooves etched in dried mascara that can only be seen up close, with eyes that peak open before passion pushes them back closed. As clothes are pushed down, finished off by feet while my lips move side to side and up and down across your freckled face and naked nape until goosebumps give texture to your taste. What a fucking waste.

You stabbed me with the dullest dagger. That dull ass banker braggart. That fat wallet frat boy. You traded "poor but passionate" for "suburban stability" and emotional eloquence for a fucking Range Rover. You traded wit for what?

And I know if I hit "send" right now you'll just read this and cry. And I probably should because nothing as dull as him could cut you as deep as I, so it might be the last thing you really feel.

But I won't because you're happy and because I know the bliss of ignorance. In fact, I've got a few capsules of it in my belly now and wow, the pain is receding and the comfort that the numbness brings is singing songs of future affections for far better fucks than you. Those ballads that blast from the Vicodin, so sublime, are rhymes in perfect measure, describing the passionate pleasures of another girl's gush as it fills the cups of gold I have to give. And I'll give her that gold with you in mind, not out of spite, but because I can't get you out of it. And because I still want you so much, but I hate your guts.

---

I MISS BEING A TREE

The pain in my heart can only grow tighter,

can only glow brighter for all to see,

now that I'm no longer a tree,

You see, I was one once,

Absurd words to be heard, I know,

but before you ignore my pleas, please,

observe with your eyes my size and realize I've been forced asunder,

And let the brittle birch bark that hovers so shoddily to cover my body,

be a decree that leaves nothing to wonder,

I miss being a tree,

Now, forlorn, I mourn the days when rays of sun made children run to the shade my branches made,

I must've played host to nests the best, or better than most, I guess,

because no matter whether feather or fur,

I'd always be sure to be chosen by the little critters that roamed the park I called my home,

But now I'm not and I say that sadly,

sitting solemnly in the company of others who miss being trees just as badly,

in a graveyard of wood where a forest once stood,

By now I'm sure it's easy to see,

just how much I miss being a tree.