15-word stories.
each of these stories is exactly fifteen words long.
writing them is a good mental exercise while lying awake in bed.
XXXVIII.
-----
each time i wake,
sleep has rolled little me through strange sands
across unknowable distances
-----
i believe in intelligent design.
humans were made for misery.
206 perfect bones to break.
-----
did you hear about the boy
who wrote so little, he died?
(long story short.)
-----
he closed the last book ever written.
every dream imaginable: pinpointed,
plotted,
printed on pulp.
-----
not to preach alarmism:
soon everything'll be salable.
these words aren't much.
but they're free
-----
life has been turned to a series of spectacles.
choose your soapbox, consume, be amazed!
-----
He never touched another person for fear that his thoughts might leak out his fingertips.
-----
MISSED CONNECTIONS
ME: Writer desperately short on words,
YOU: Lovely, with hair the color of
-----
as she leans in, reality warps and shivers
like through goggles made from coke bottles.
-----
the rational Universe gave rise to man,
each of us a microcosm of the whole
------
i slide the secret sculpture�
peppermint candy, carved by my tongue�
between our parted lips
------
she inspires a mood
that'd have us stand still as statues,
admiring each other's mortality.
------
imagine the dentist as a young boy,
crouched low as he shoots
opal white marbles.
------
their footsteps echo in tandem
down deserted hollow halls.
heel and toe.
call and response.
-----
brevity is the soul of wit
wit stings and scalds.
approach me with curt caution.
-----
i feel like someone stole my organs while i slept.
and the anaesthetic's wearing off.
-----
a shower so hot, blood is called to the surface in 1,000 pinprick droplets:
panacea.
-----
they were impossible lovers!
as backwards as his boxers
as lost as her other sock
-----
she calls it her ivory tower
i call it a gross misuse of elephant bones.
-----
it's tough being a young revolutionary,
but my mother tells me
i'm the handsomest socialist.
-----
fight bureaucracy!
demand your selfness be recognized!
this is the only way to stay sane.
-----
all songs' lyrics are the same:
"i'm a unique individual!"
so i stick to chants.
-----
when i seethe and boil over, i just imagine their mannequin bodies suspended in water.
-----
are you anyone's favorite person?
respond using an expository essay.
then mail it to yourself.
-----
think of all your synapses, leaking electricity
and then ask yourself: 'where's it all going?'
-----
don't mourn empty he, whose oldest pen writes darkest now
shed only your driest tears.
-----
as i sleep, my mind works
tumbling every ache until they're polished smoother than sea glass.
-----
every word i write is an invitation.
please, open my eyes, feel through my skin
-----
derrida said there is nothing beyond words
but my lover's gasps make me think otherwise.
-----
sometimes i fear that we've become origami-people,
folding ourselves flat for convenience and courtesy.
-----
my lady lynx always leaves me sparrow-hearted,
with my pulse beating in my lips
-----
i'm skeptical of intelligent design
but i don't doubt she's the magnum opus
of dionysus
-----
her hot exhalations roar, feral, as she bites my ear.
fuck ladylike tact and decorum.
-----
the cruel muses hide my best writing,
secreted away in the capillaries inside my eyelids.
-----
words bend time and distance
leaving only writer and reader,
grasping blindly for each other.
-----
i sleep wrapped in comfortable lies,
with brilliant honesty under my pillow�
just in case.
-----
each morning I wonder in which warm doorstep
my soul sought sanctuary during the night.
-----
the clouds turn to ether on days like this.
we wait inside, windows bolted shut.
-home
--writing
all content (c)2006 seth matthew.