the ace up your sleeve is a wine red heart hand exposed to all players (a hand i wish to hold) cupid’s casino is rigged yet in wagers of romance, you go all in–i fold my arms & stuff your heart with dollar bills just to break even (jackpot: three withered roses in a row) i wear a spade on my sleeve a former heart charred nicotine, soiled by the plaque of the past (historians hate this) i keep a quilt of used condoms bandaged over the hips of my heart: a makeshift mask (kiss me on my poker face) i think: if i keep trying eventually you will love me. this is the gambler’s fallacy (see also: insanity) we are both such addicts for heartbreak. - (my ribcage weighed down by broken horseshoes until my bones shatter & collapse like a house of cards) –they say a rabbit’s foot is lucky but the tortoise won’t accommodate the amputated hare –they say 7 is lucky, but who ever heard of a 13 year itch? –they say four-leaf clovers are lucky but not when playing nature’s roulette 1) loves
maybe i should wear contacts by ChloroformBoy, literature
Literature
maybe i should wear contacts
i broke my glasses & my backup pair & my heart on the same hangover (the same day you got your new pair and almost broke them when you collapsed to the floor) but i don't need glasses to see that you can do better than me
My Heart is a Jukebox without an Audience by ChloroformBoy, literature
Literature
My Heart is a Jukebox without an Audience
If music be the food of love,
I’m a hungry Van Gogh, ear
chopped off, unable to feed
this deafened h(ear)t.
No, I can no longer listen
to the playlist I curated—
of all the songs that remind me
of you, this lover’s picnic
in my mind, some idyllic fantasy
where we sip water bottle Vodka
in Sunset Park and wax nostalgic
over flirty bartenders & animated
gophers. In such a scene like this,
you’d serenade to me about the exes
you still love, your cigarette-stained
fingers plucking guitar strings—and I'd
think, oh, how I wish they were me,
as you fumble over a D minor chord
(my initials) & I envy your past muse.
Al
The Anachronistic Fountain Thief (a sonnet) by ChloroformBoy, literature
Literature
The Anachronistic Fountain Thief (a sonnet)
A drive away, yet centuries apart
I wish that I could kiss away your plagues
I’m digging through the cushions of your heart
A penny for your thoughts - but naught would change
For I could steal the wishes out of wells
But still could not make heads or tails of You
The fate of feelings, only time will tell
My soul, a cuckoo clock long overdue
See you live in the mistakes of the past
And I live in a future of what-ifs
These flights of fancies got my heart jet lagged
But any trip spent with you is a gift
Schrödinger’s hypotheticals aside
The coin of us still spinning on its side
our hearts became a pair
of unsynchronized clocks
a time-bomb never
meant to detonate;
i fell in love
then you fell in love
but it just wasn't
with each other
your body is an island
my body is an island too
all this water in between us
there's nothing we can do
we were once together
then our plates collided
pangaea severed
now we're just two
scattered islands
split up forever
our ground started to rift
tectonic shift
caused our continental drift
so now all we are
is an archipelago
and to think my greedy canine heart almost drowned by ChloroformBoy, literature
Literature
and to think my greedy canine heart almost drowned
my lips catch
fire from calling
out your name
trying to catch
your attention
like a deadly flu
(your smile has
no vaccine)
trying to catch
your heart
in my fishing net
(but your love
is like a shark)
trying to catch
the next flight
to wonderland
(population you)
trying to catch
myself from falling
for you or your lies
(but this balcony
begs to differ)
trying to catch
everything but feelings
but oh silly me
i must have forgotten
my baseball g
love
surrogate love contagion by ChloroformBoy, literature
Literature
surrogate love contagion
things i wanted to tell you:
(crying in your car edition)
excuse my embarrassment,
but you're just so beautiful
& i’m just so unavailable
excuse my apprehension,
but i want it to be perfect
(we’re always bad timing
& worse luck)
excuse my curiosity,
but i want to read
the braille of your heart,
feel its wants and needs
and regrets (you can feel
mine)
excuse my aesopian analogies,
but i’m the greedy dog
who can't swim
to clarify:
you're the reflection;
temptation, the river;
me, drowning
excuse my contingency,
but you're the understudy
of my hydrophobic heart,
the backup star of its new play:
a long-awaited romance
with
TARtrazine + Feathers by ChloroformBoy, literature
Literature
TARtrazine + Feathers
i am a black portrait in a golden frame,
a black swan posing as a golden goose;
this heart of gold is a fraud in my chest
just black tar dipped in yellow paint.
cosmetic graffiti
stains my soul a
splintered onyx,
a reverse midas,
on my throne of
gilded charcoal;
i’m just another shadow puppet
caught in a xanthic masquerade,
waiting for the dye to wash away.