The Manhole

Shorter lines again, hurrah!

The manhole would bubble and belch out mud,

cloak the hillside road with fleets of ripples.

I'd gallop and sink in the byway

in no danger of drifting away.

 

I'd revel in the purge of murk, of madness,

the surge of negative PHs down cheeks of suburbs,

laying siege to the Babysitter's annoyance,

waylaying Dad on I-95, and drowning 

the placid quarantine, for once.

 

Those anarchic afternoons were windows,

sewage systems I.V.'d to fetal bliss,

chronicles of floods I ought to make

in venting streets, not on bamboo floors

with mirror treats and carnival surmising.

 

I look into the cracked relic of the utopia, and

skid marks of SUVs are ropes that lower

me into the concrete belly, snap and surrender

me through time to the other end, where

the historic flood is absent from my street,

and the landing on parched memories of home shatters

my spine like the mirror that hides

the passage back.

 

If someone were but there to guide me, to babysit -

those women long since my peers -

to share a shower, to collaborate in breakfast,

to harmonize in breathing and in thought, surround the

coffeehouses and shirk their conversions,

denounce them one by one, to admire ourselves

in a picture frame's reflection, learn

that if you squint enough it all looks pretty,

that the boy in love with pools of chaos isn't

lost in thought but lost of thoughts,

that as he scours for floating bark and shavings to

fashion an amusement or a life support,

that he needn't be alone.

 

But one nice girl supplants another, their reigns

conflate into an Arch-Sitter, a fragile presence that

glides away under the linen, an inch an hour,

the owl eyes, the olive skin, the slanting nose, the skid mark lips

and the withdrawing fingers all one extraordinary figment, a

recurring bed-comrade in different clothes, and if it's so,

the cartoonist has stained my mind with mud like a blinking

constellation, and I couldn't hope to find

that tired road to rinse in, and even less

to share one, with tidings somewhere else.

Reviews

[The Representative]

Remember my compliment, about 'The Surburb-Zone': it showing in the writing, the degree to which you knew and understood your world.


I neither know or understand the world of this poem, however it's blatant that your understanding reaches far.



Whenever I read you I feel left behind, whether it's this poem The Manhole, The Ways of Water or indeed The Surburb-Zone.

(I spent an amount of time thinking, before coming up with "left behind".)


You're a master writer.

[Bluefire]

"The manhole would bubble and belch out mud,
cloak the hillside road with fleets of ripples.
I'd gallop and sink in the byway
in no danger of drifting away."

"drowning the placid quarantine, for once."

"the boy in love with pools of chaos isn't
lost in thought but lost of thoughts,"
~*~
It made me think of a child, who's world seemed perfect to others but wasn't perfect at all.
He found solace in the dark world of the sewers, away from the chaos of life.
I like the wording in this and the story that plays out.
Well done. ^^

[Shaquana Adams]

to harmonize in breathing and in thought, surround the
coffeehouses and shirk their conversions,
denounce them one by one, to admire ourselves
in a picture frame's reflection

I really enjoyed the description and imagery. This is a very vivid poem :)

[jacob erin-cilberto]

i really like the analogy that played out here...the landslides the mudslides that are love of family, love of a significant other...they can save us or destroy us in one felt swoop...

energetic lines here with imagery that rolls over us like lava...

really like the ending a lot.

jacob

[Thaddius]

Shorter or not :) your thoughts are as rich always through your linings... to be drifting away is great, to be monk too... there is only silence, that understands silence, and nothingness around the whole empty vessel of thoughts, could be more loud.

PH's hah! wonderful... For me, it's biological terminology... not sure if it's for you...
A fantastic kind of a rebirth feeling through suicide, of mind, dwelling for the perfect Utopia,
A new world or place to create, thus be...

Your mind is fantastically trippy as ever, I try to catch up on those mountains of letters ;) and find the holy meaning behind it lol.... holly-woodies (maybe).
He needed to do so alone, as if his voice out of helium would giggle the universe, to laughs, and letters, and those who would recognize.

There is again a brilliant surrealism, here, and again so much truth, I think that's your strength... you merge and mingle like an alien through words and it becomes real to us readers... at least to me.
I mean I love to read, he's not alone... he didn't to experiement it all alone ;)

There is a beautiful weird, last stanza, that speaks about platonic love, within real love, that distance, is utterly beautiful though, there is much to gasp at/for, but yet, lot's to lose for... there is mystery, as your quill always provokes your readers, and readers eyes, but this time, it's more you than other times... there is a hurt, a love, a honesty, and I love it! :) you bring surrealism to life there on your ending. Well done :) (maybe I missed a few things) then tell me so.. always, I'm just not so human, more Elien. ;)

- Elisa

[Thaddius]

Thank you! I'm sure your missing lots, but who can blame you, I'm dense and cryptic and trippy all at the same time. You are right that it's more of me than other times. It's very autobiographical, takes the form of a memory, shifting back and forth in hypotheticals and regrets like a dream, expansive enough to compare the babysitters I grew up with with the women I date.

I guess it's a chronicle of my loneliness. Of the salvation and the poison from my childhood, about whether it ties into an escape route, or a hole to fall into, the manhole... the manhole was just an image, but the way my mind works, it became a larger symbol. Yes, there are a few references, to being a 'hollywoodie' hahaha. Oh, and I cut out helium, because it wasn't what I meant. I won't let myself get away with that one, the water toy floating up in the air is cool (and your play of the giggly voice is as well), but it wasn't what I intended, and accidental symbolism has its limits. Thanks again for the in-depth take, my spiritual comrade

Oh I'm sure I did... and sorry for that. :) And I'm sure now I understand you even better, thanks for explaining it so detailed. I appreciate it... it's just my weird writers brain interpretting your surreal-real words....

Loneliness, is hard... same time beautiful (if I may speak of my childhood pains, and the more stronger I got out of it), the more lone wolf I became though... anyhow, the manhole relates many to my Alice in shitland hole. So I understand you there... :) hahaha Glad you laugh about my make-up'd words, I'm a make up artist, body painter, so laughed hard, when I drawed that word... through nothingness, there. Just made it up for fun.. ;) glad you got me. Know your writings are as personal as they are to you my friend, and actually really (nobody) can get as close, not me not anybody, I have faced it so many times, people were so def. wrong on mine, including you, but it's fun... for you get to know the reviewers mind, too.... ;) glad you are so beautifully honest to reply me as you do, (for I knew I never could get this one right) lol... it's too you, and I wouldn't touch it even with a feather of hope..... well done G.

[Thaddius]

well, you got lots of it! Way more than most could.

Oh sigh... ;) but still much to learn for me there... and I love that... nobody is a sea of wholeness... for their are sharks, and hungry fishes.... :) to complete the emptiness of being.