Compilation Poem for April 23, 2015

SPEAK FOR YOURSELF COMPILATION POEM

23 April 2015

I’m okay.

I know how to close my eyes.

I could not afford to stay,

But I made the pilgrimage

Before it became a more practical work of art,

As big as taking a second wife,

A girl in a dress of broken glass

(I kept the first for another day—

The logistics just about did me in).

Stealthily before sunrise

You tripped toward me, a tangled tease,

And crossed the wide, black street;

Wandered through the woods and meadows,

Three steps on the moon.

You sent a soft letter

Which made me think of the three degrees of glory,

Clean counters, and folded laundry,

A hundred pencils with a rubber band,

The possibility of cancer.

I put them in my car with ideational animals;

That’s where they live.

We still smell like pine needles

 (Inhale, but don’t swallow—

I inhale and my heart skips a beat).

Simply waiting for the phone to ring,

I get lost in the stars.

I listen to the cry of a lonely crow.

I know that loneliness,

What the west wind whispers

When it calls out to me late into the night,

For in my chest a tiger rages,

Moves in light, dances on air,

Slayer of souls.

What is it?

What does it mean?

My astrological sign can’t explain this one.

It’s coming people—

Be ready for it.

Looking through crystal clear glass at the end of my chain,

I see through eyes that don’t seem like mine.

There is no door from the outside.

They say dreaming is dead;

No one does it anymore.

Playing pretend is a lot more fun.

I’m pretty sure she thinks I’m asleep.

I pretend I am asleep,

And before long I really am,

Surrounded by pillars of salt and coffee.

Compiled by Colin Douglas

Compilation poem for April 16, 2015

To the Girl Who Made the Microphone Explode

Hello, down there
Searching for an individual
To fly where you can't stand
You're better than the lies they tell
I'm still me, I'm just not all there
Something old from up the river
Judging every single moment
She tries to breathe
Walking is harder than it was last week
My eyes don't have quite the same light they used to
Fumes erupt
Strangle sweet
We're withering
I don't think I can escape and I'm not sure I want to
Please don't hurt me
Let the spirits go free
Infinite fatigue
Cut the eyes of their sister
The time of earthquakes is at hand
It's called a test
Pizza has unlimited potential
Sugar is true love
Then my heart with pleasure fills and dances with the daffodils
I can't yell from a mountain...because I'm afraid of heights
I hope that it's enough
Climb that tree that seemed inconceivable
How beautiful you are
Your smile lights up your face
You will forget that you are loved
I'm the number between 0 and 2 but I'm still lost
Do you want decisions to be made for you
Sometimes you just gotta
Choose strength and shun fear
Our pictures never match
We don't belong anywhere else

Compiled by Portia Densley

Compilation Poem for April 9, 2015

The word is alive,

Clean and clear,
In the cemetery of our desires,
Moving over the ruins of cities,
Through chalky streets
In the brisk winter of our northeastern sky,
A cheap bottle of table wine
Always waking me too soon—
It takes my umbrella and jacket
When the doors and shutters give way,
Then burps loudly
In the shadowy mist,
And then chants as a fickle friend
Not to be trusted.
You will never know the sweetness on the tongue.
No one knows that you dream of me.
I am under, too far under,
But the scenery sure is nice,
Stuffed with morsels of sun and candied ginger.
It was a long journey—
I figured walking on two legs was better than four,
So I tried.
Perfect me—
My life is determined by letters and numbers.
I am addicted to stress;
That’s the way I get things done.
The hands of my clock are spinning in opposite directions.
I am a bird,
I am a paper plane,
A silent blaze,
Someone who can put a ball through a hoop.
I am two scars on my arms old.
I realize now that I have never been awake.
(If I sat long enough in silence,
The answers would come.)
Please swing low
And come to carry me home.
I want to be your favorite mistake.
I want to get sick of kissing you.
You will recognize me by the bent bridge of my nose.
If I were a mystic, there would be a metaphor here.

Compiled by Colin Douglas

Compilation Poem for April 2, 2015

1. The sisters of Cassiopeia are dancing in the arms that have always embraced them.
2. It is very easy to take more than nothing.
3. Refugees writing love poems to sheep.
4. The twinkle of your love will fly off in a billion directions.
5. Words try to strangle them while they sleep.
6. Black holes will evaporate like the Cheshire Cat.
7. What book is this that speaks of fish, snow and grass.
8. Days of endless banana pie filling.
9. Beautiful things don't ask for attention.
10. She cannot make sense of things that are made for her.
11. Being in love is one hell of a roller coaster ride.
12. I miss Sequoia.
13. O great creator being grant us one more hour to perform our art and perfect our lives.
14. The names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Compiled by Micheal Clements

Compilation Poem for March 12, 2015 by the Writers of Speak For Yourself

Compiled from the writers who shared work on March 12, 2015

How can I not collect you with all my other mistakes?

Like dust on furniture.

Pain concealed.

A piece of damp, dark cloth with a slightly sour smell.

The possibility of a forest within.

In black ink.

As I get older I realize that whatever is killing me makes me feel alive.

We stretch, we lengthen, we change.

Torture, torment,

Torture, torment,

Oh my heart, let thy will be done.

I'm thinking about you like

Harsh realities of the real world.

Just enough to make you sigh and not mind.

I had no problem with being protected.

Truth, slanted, was there,

dragging us all into its pit.

I know.

I crushed his little head.

Full of fire, though compelled by fear.

Can you picture not existing?

They always give you the one answer.

Breathing in shallow breaths of the opaque air,

Slipping into the inferno.

And then the warmth of solid ground.

It came so easy since birth.

They say it's called love.

Dance me through the panic 'til I'm gathered safely in,

True madness at last.

Pretending to be sickening, pretending to be lonely.

Existing in two realities is not healthy.

Listen. Give it a chance.

All the fun people are going to hell,

With no reason or warning to leave.

The sun rises and sets on your shoulder,

and on the inside.

Collect all the little details.

Compiled by Jessica Dixon

Know Your Server Spotlight: Blair

This week's server in our spotlight is.... Blair!

Blair is a recent UVU grad and his favorite menu item is the lemon butter salmon (in case you are counting, that's two servers who love the salmon.  Note to self: order the salmon)

Compilation Poem for March 5, 2015 by the writers of Speak For Yourself

He was certain he'd staved off his wife's ill demeanor.
But in the name of art he'd created a persona that would
cut and splice random photos in effort to create the perfect woman;
an avatar or flesh he could no longer discern.
I am after all, a virgin, you know, love & such.
Will you miss the truth of life, the truth in me, or the moments in between?
Hurry down sunshine, I have the sense of being in a rare force of nature,
for such is my mental illness.
Don't tell me a broken heart hurts less than a broken bone.
I am not a lost cause, I am a balancing act, it's less about life and more about beauty and in silence I must continue.
I praise Jesus over the Victory of leavened bread and a broken jar of dried sea horses.
But if you let me hold your hand, at a Jazz game or minivan.
Thunder on the mountain.
I don't want to take my changes on somebody new.
Blue funk, it was totally blue.  They were mocking my pain.
I need to sleep.
Somewhere where I won't grow silent, silent, silent.
It was a luxury to breathe,
like Tectonic plates shifting, nothing can unburden my tongue, rapid breath returns, ashamed.
I'm only going to bear my soul for one half minute.
Love leaves quietly, it slips out unnoticed.
I felt the ghosts groan and gasp, as lives fade so does god's servant to the Human condition.
He brought me to this Juniper desert,
we should have been safe,
the vertigo wins, the downward winding of an evergreen pine grand staircase.
People stand in diamond shaped shadows, like angels with Milky Way wings,
warming my desire like a flame to my soul.
Justin...just in case,
I was dragged into a dark hallway, we kissed and he dumped me.
I forced a laugh to hold back a scream, knocking the sweet nectar of air out of my lungs.
Plastered smiles, there are monsters in my closet. There are monsters in my world.
My throat turns into brick when I'm asked how I'm doing.
I'm trying to figure things out, figure things out.
With invisible ink I would write "stay open" on your eyelids.
Love always knocks when you're not home,
It picks its victims from a hat.
My heart is like the moon, full of craters and phases but reflects the light instead of making its own.
My voice cracked but I made the sound.
I hoist my weight beyond the watery confines; lullaby-ed into viscinity.
My voice cracked but I made the sound. Do I want to be sober?
When I'm high, it's all clear, my criticisms drain, but my balloon is broken.
My balloon is broken. 
My eyes are a window to my soul but can you see me?
Get to know me and you will see, rolling round in thoughts of you, green yellow orange & blue

Of grander thought there none can be of pure likeness, a reflection of me.

Compiled by Nathan Hansen