Staccato

by Ewong
for the Sharp Islander

You sang in such a soft tone | Can’t look at the stars now

a line from an unknown song | that I couldn’t learn anymore

now that there is | no more reason | to sing since you left

I still don’t know what it was | that captured me | was it your

sweet, unassuming voice | your camellian eyes, your gift

for music | or was it the warmth | of your bosom against mine?

The night was passing | like a tourist in a strange land

and all I could do was count | the seconds | the minutes

the hours | and pray to them nameless gods | well,

including  Albert Einstein | that may this episode | this chance

encounter with you | never end | These days I look at lyric

sheets | and I hate myself | for singing those songs back then

when I first met you | For now they are all meaningless

without your strumming | without red wine or beer | or deathly

porcine cholesterol | without you | Now all I could do is sleep

all day, sleep all day | over and over | and over and over again

There’s a certain sadness in the endless pleasure a single night

brings  to us lonely people | Maybe the problem is | one of us

is more lonely | or the other is much less alone | Or is it

because both of us | can’t look at the stars now? | I know I sin  

And I know you sin  | But what I really want to do is sing  

all day, sing all day | over and over | and over and over again

But I had lost my tongue | will someone else please find my song?

____________________________________________________________________
Poem has reference to these songs:
Stars (Grace Potter and the Nocturnals) and Sleep All Day (Jason Mraz)

The Dandruff Monologue

by Ewong
for the Starbucks Smacker

I cling to you like the embrace of a woman

yet I annoy you like an unwanted suitor

Sometimes I interpret your frequent

caresses as a sign of your affection

but now I know that they are only

meaningless affectations like things

or food or people that grow on you,

or perhaps like the hair on your head

which grows long like a lazy Sunday

morning song. Yes, on top of you,

there’s my home sweet home. Yet you

despise me so much, despite knowing,

deep in your bone, that scratching

me off gives an inexplicable sensation

like being kissed on the lips by the man

of your dreams, under poetic moonlight

and dancing fireflies in a princess’s garden,

or perhaps like that infinite moment a boy

is no more a boy when he’s discovered

at last the wonders of a woman’s nipples

You hate me now and feel so much

shame for having me, but you can’t,

and won’t, let go of me so easily. You

go ahead and try whatever chemical

but I tell you, I’m as strong and natural

as the sight of wind-blown cherry

blossoms, painted by the gods perfectly

for the purposes of our romance

You’ll see, my dear friend, you

will not be well rid of me, because

for me to leave you completely,

your hair, your whole hair, has to go

as well into oblivion. But perhaps there,

in that desolate realm of the abandoned,

your hair and I, just the two of us,

can be friends, then make love, and have

lots of baby hairs and little more of my kind.

Perhaps your hair and I can be truly happy,

without your scalp, without your head.

Without you. Maybe it’s better that way.

When I’m far gone, when you’re old

and wrinkled, with no hair, not even gray

or white, perhaps then you’d finally realise

that I was more than the miserable scum

you shook off with inconsolable fury,

that I was, in fact, those little snowflakes

ever so slowly, enchantingly

falling from your sweet head.


______________________________________

Joshua Radin's "Today"

No other day matters as much.



Shoelaces untied
You can dry your eyes
Perfect shadows align
behind us
This is the day I make you mine

The Callous (I)

by Ewong
for the callous one

And thus begins another
of my drunken imaginings:
a glass of merlot in one hand,
a menthol cigarette in the other,
and in between is my mouth full
of French curses, and if only I
could kiss you tonight--following
those Parisian guidelines--then I
would know why they invented

wine--yes, to act crazed, be stupid,
to say the wrong things, and harass
someone, to sing and poke, to scream
and puke, then succumb to slumber
whilst muttering gibberish of somber
tales, yet still with the finest grace, for
we can claim that this divine inebriety
is simply the climax of an epic story

that started in a scenic vineyard.
But it is not wine glass that we hold
but a homey coffee mug, and you know
better to quickly end this bourgeois
pretension: so you bring out them
Brobdingnagian bottles of ice-cold
beer--our dependable, great old
red equine friend from paradise
lost and paradise found, yes, yes, I

have been so lost, and it's you I
have found, and I must be tipsy now,
o dear stranger, where 'you been all
my life, hurray, let's drink to uncanny
coincidences, o darling you could be
my wife, so what are we waiting for,
let's come, come, come together, come
away with me, and tomorrow is another

day, tomorrow I may not remember
your name, but now is what matters,
the guitar's strings are long, but our lives'
short, yet the night is young, and so are we,
yes, we are here, and here is what matters,
yes, even for just this one drunken night:
have I told you lately that you're beautiful--
(you, you, so beautiful under this faint light)--
that you are all mine, and I am all yours tonight,

though just here, in another of my wild imaginings.

_________________________________________
Art credit: "Vineyard Way" by Roberto Lombardi

This is the first poem I've written in two freaking long years!
So that only means I've been drinking frequently again lately. ;-)