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August 19, 2016 / barton smock

circa (xiv)

the black eye
given
to the moth-catcher’s
most attractive
child…

what a woman predicts
becomes false

subtraction
the plus side
of trauma

her mother’s
babied
past

August 18, 2016 / barton smock

[ @ ]

25% off all print books on LULU with coupon code of AUG2016 /

/ my Lulu self-publication, FOUR, is a gathering, in full, of these works:

earth is part earth and there’s a hole in the sound I made you from
MOON tattoo
infant*cinema
shuteye in the land of the sacred commoner [and other poems]

it’s available here:

http://www.lulu.com/shop/barton-smock/four/paperback/product-22756947.html

some poems, from:

[malaise]

how far we are
from soup
when mother
burns her tongue
trying
to convince
god
they had

the mime and the mute
the same
childhood.

we love her so much
we use our brains
as often
as baby
spoons.

first base is a landmine.

there’s nothing to say
we weren’t
here.

~

[iota]

if the poor could keep to themselves, they’d have superheroes. hey man, hey beast, them aliens already know what it means to be human. abduction is the fingerprint of loneliness.

what I teach my blood is grow up. I put everything I had into ruin. watch as my mother becomes your mother trying to be two people god can use to carry tug-of-war from a fossil.

my dream house is language. you say it to my face how there are beheadings that have made a wish. before my son was a giant, he’d somersault. cigarette in mouth he would.

~

[mob vision]

soon
is a baby
studied
by the scholars
of now
who
in their prime
predicted
that jesus
would be
in the scarecrow’s
future
the darkest
bird

~

[footfall]

a newborn wants to be a hand.

there’s the dream I have of heaven
and the dream
god lets me
bring.

my boy
has a crow
for a backpack.

~

[the knife]

it is for my ears that god gave me a stomach full of cotton. my mother’s fingers are made of bread. her blood she says is dieting for the blank book of beauty sleep. I have an inside animal unable to move on from the rained out magic show. its only joy is to bring me shoelaces. after building houses, my father shakes himself barefoot in the railroad car of a train his angel plans to swallow. I have nothing for my throat.

August 18, 2016 / barton smock

circa (xiii)

imagine how long god must’ve been left alone to be named after the first person whose name he said. how hungry the mother to swallow hair.  how bored her baby to remember.  how small the television that spitballed hell.  hidden the horse to keep its church.  black the water to transport fish.

August 17, 2016 / barton smock

circa (xii)

the human dream

god’s attempt at a short story

the animal
works

miracles

/ the elephant
in its ruin
takes up
for whale

yeah, it rains here
rains
glue

adult diapers
are fishhook
rare…

/ tell your sister
nothing happened
to mine

August 16, 2016 / barton smock

circa (xi)

what a ghost knows about giving birth
powers on
a mechanical bull

father says there is nothing
like it
in Ohio
this giving

god

to a jack-in-the-box

there is a word my mom makes
from a word
she can’t

/ orbituary

/ brings it all
home

August 16, 2016 / barton smock

circa (i)

I went through a period of sticking things in my ear. not too far except this one time mom said it sounded human but also like all sound had lost its memory.

being poor is a myth.

myth
a fact
with self
esteem.

a father was running circles around a baby.

August 16, 2016 / barton smock

{rep}

25% off all Lulu print books today with coupon code of AUG2016

mine are there. my most recent, depictions of reentry, is here:

http://www.lulu.com/shop/barton-smock/depictions-of-reentry/paperback/product-22812020.html

some poems from said collection:

[example]

after leaving its memory to the hibernating bear, the insect died. I don’t know what story you’re trying to tell. the angel has three fathers. the angel was born to blackmail a ghost. this bald motherfucker thinks I need shown how to chew my fingernails. the mask is my elevator and the pig my coffin. I have a sister was made to make an egg disappear. a father who’d shave to give the thing in the stomach time to plan its escape. the angel vomits into a pink wheelbarrow. shows affection.

~

[hiatuses]

self-harm

a nostalgia
that suffers
touch…

assault?

a hobby

~

[omphali]

sometimes
you’re awake
and your son
is awake
and neither
of you
believe
in sickness
the raccoon
mask
of sickness…

no god unkissed, no dirt…

and sleep, sleep
is a priest
whose hilljack
blood
favors
the cult
of the noiseless
ant

~

[untitled]

what seashell does for ocean
my pillow
will

for hunger.

oh dream,

insomnia’s
wiped out
city…

is this
a stone

or the mating
call
of grief?

~

[depictions of reentry (viii)]

we laugh about them now

scarecrows
the stepchildren
of apocalypse…

pregnancy as suicide prevention.

be wowed
by stuff
on earth.

~

[depictions of reentry (xii)]

mom needs a jar of jelly to call the priest. try as he might, my brother can’t seem to get his tongue stuck to the oven door. my hands are here to hide the fact I’m wearing gloves. dad snaps three pictures before passing out. the voodoo dolls of my invisible babies have passed each other underground. I am thinking of things you can do.

August 15, 2016 / barton smock

circa (x)

on these bikes these boys are beautiful

/ passing men under spell of god, the order

maybe dissolved

of the bent
cigarette

/ I will not miss art

five-thousand fathers
to burn
a fish

but ease, but hunger

a girl putting all her pain in a turtle
or in anything
lifted
from the hood
of her sister’s
coat

/ a firecracker
read
by a bone

August 15, 2016 / barton smock

circa (ix)

at a therapy session
for those
unable
to dream
I am handcuffed
to my mother
whose imaginary
lover
has lice

a baby born with a wig
rattles on
about sleep

death’s eyepatch

August 14, 2016 / barton smock

circa (viii)

a collarless dog fetching a grounded kite

trauma’s original boredom

the search parties
wind and blood