i'm so coy
with this bullet between my teeth.
what is it I really want from you?
And why can't I say it.
I need gunpowder
a gun
and someone to
teach me to shoot it.

A Dissection

I am gaudy on the table
A map of gutted stars
Tattered torn moth eaten heart
Bitten apple lips and a core of worms.

This is how I open up.

Tangled vine splitting hair
Strung up with barbed wire.
Strewn through with broken glass
Shattered crystal ball hands.

This is how I offer up.

I choke on ink and starved time
A baby faced betrayal burning in my eyes
As I spit up heavy dirty words
Fat stone heavy tongue.

This is how I conjure up.

Bones sifting dust and
Clattering a hollow rhythm
As I dance unstrung
Melting greased wax flesh.

Constance|2006

i just had something here.

i deleted it all because i was disgusted

by how thought heavy it was, how it lacked

detail, how stale it seemed, how overdone

it appeared to be. when the clicking

keys went silent

the words couldn't

speak for themselves

nor could they speak for me


i was terrified.


all it was was overwrought and

redundant. i only repeated myself you see.


these warbled words have replaced

failure. melodrama. restlessness. inconsequential heaviness.

they've replaced

wasted words. baited breath.


nothing is here now because

i was ashamed that i'd created something

so hollow.

that i couldn't breathe

life into it, or hold it together

long enough to finish it, that

i couldn't find where it ran off to.


i felt awful about how it clunked around this little box

and jabbed into the empty spaces

crudely. i feared it.


it happens like this when

silence and snow fall in equal measure

i suddenly go dumb. i slowly go dumb.

i always ending up chasing my own breath.

no choice now but to embrace the ineptitude,

dance with the lack of grace

overlook the absence of subtlety.


pass by the accident,

it never happened.

pay no attention.

shut the door and stay behind.

put it down and walk away.

don't suffer a fool to live.



//how to write nothing// by constance plumley


//how to appear ridiculous// by little dilettante


//how to fall embarrassingly short//by ticking time bomb


//melancolic verses typed entirely out of tune//by Eleanor rigby


//how to paralyze yourself// by hollow eyes