Magician (n.): an illusionist who performs tricks for the amusement of an audience hoping to be fooled The occupation of any lover who ever hurt you . You've never made a mistake . They tricked you . No one has ever cut you in half you fully-limbed ableist . You trapezist lamenting heights . No one wants to hear how you pulled a city's worth of bedsheets from your lover's sleeves while they slept . A politician who leaves office with more accomplishments than scandal . The survivor of a tragedy whom no one suspects was the cause . A friend with tickets to offer you to every sold out show who doesn't even want to sleep with you or smoke your weed . The family member who supports you from the wings while making your most valuable possessions disappear . You . Us . Everyone who has ever asked a stranger to volunteer to vouch that their illusions are real . Every volunteer who falsely pledged allegiance for a brief moment in the spotlight and not only never got caught but is often regarded as victim rather than accomplice I'm compiling the Terrible Poets' Thesaurus by reading poems by unfamiliar writers and jotting down unusual word choices. Once I find a term three times, I attempt to define it by deconstructing it as it appears to me in the context of the poems in which they're used, which are unlikely to be the way the authors intended them. Alternately, I look at my own poems and find words that I overuse and attempt to imagine how others might interpret them.
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Cheryl says her love is like
a goldfish I don't know her well enough to know if her story ends floating in a toilet or if she is trying to tell me she never remembers her lovers' names But her statement keeps feeding on my attention until my brain is seventy-eight percent goldfish and finally no percent love Cheryl has goldfish for her suffering shiver of a dog and i don't know if she is saving that dog or if that dog is saving her I have three cats that are goldfishing my apartment They are stubborn as houseplants and almost as loyal as men i would have evicted years ago There is no promise of salvation between us but also no secrets Jay-z says his greatest secret is his achilles's heel love I don't have a secret i wouldn't gladly baritone into a microphone if i thought it might make someone feel better about their life I love everything that's ever hurt When i hold the handle of the blade that caresses my back i am not trying to halt its progress I am trying to steady it as it does what it was crafted to do My friend keith changed his last name to
stegosaurus which people imagine cute or threatening depending on their relationship to reptiles He did not choose it for its diet He chose it because it has a brain comically tiny compared to its bulk When i am on stage i play the carnivore Full of lust Empty of stomach People see my teeth Hear my stomach growl I have never looked like a gazelle I was hungry after a show Pasta or soup or a sandwich Something barely mealworthy but probably delicious had been gifted by the venue And this strange boy invited himself to my table I was hungry but the boy did not look like meat Not even a carrot seasoned to resemble something substantial I was hungry but not fishing for compliments when the boy smiled his approval of my show If a cow says it admires your ability to milk a metaphor you should not eat it If pig tells you you are beautiful when you're filthy you should not eat it It is never acceptable to eat something that imagines you have something in common but that you are more skilled at it than they My friends knew i was hungry and told me how appetizing the boy looked How he inflected an invitation to dine on him I know i look like a carnivore I'm always talking about hunger and the most delicious looking beasts who ever caused me indigestion in the night I do not view men or boys as prey I was hungry Another carnivore offered his throat to my teeth My pride said bite after a prompt from Nicole Homer 1. I was halfway through
an unremarkable sandwich when you started flirting with my oblivion I covered my mouth to thank you for complimenting a performance i'd just given Unaware you were in the midst of your own elaborate dance 2. It was far too early for us to be easter dinner but you and i and two roommates and one ex roommate and one friend sat in the living room And god i don't remember what we were eating then either I remember you singing as you washed the dishes how i was already so used to hearing your voice 3. Casual lunch Everything head shake and chuckle Your unexpected aunt found us in the food court thrilled at your smile You introduced me as your coworker though we didn't work at the same company 4. You left a bowl of oatmeal in the living room while i was asleep Somehow it was knocked off the table Creating a small marsh for our impatient roommate to wade through Birds sang profanity filled hardcore about your sloth You sketched a video Regendered your image to fit his lyrics 5. It was my fault for laughing at the decade between us choosing to see it as a winding road and not a cliff you felt you were always dangling from I never changed my mouth for you Didn't see you as anything but actual peer So when an IHoP full of poets reminisced drug trauma mescaline movie premiers acid catsitting the taste of heroin in the back of a throat and you interrupted with the time you thought you might have overdosed on flintstone vitamins How was I to keep from laughing? 6. I never actually remember precisely what we were eating It was your birthday None but one of my friends was still encouraging our relationship It was a liquid birthday and it was deep but never threatening 7. The taqueria was filled with three legged chairs but no customers but us our roommates and their friend who i knew you were fucking who they knew you were fucking who they were terrified that i would realize you were fucking You made some racist joke about mexican food and gastroenterology which you defended by the large volume of ignorant people who misidentified you as mexican As a group we laughed not at the joke but at your passionate declaration of its inoffense I'm choosing to believe you our roommate said but that's only because you mentioned shitting and talking shit is the only subject you appear to be knowledgeable about 8. Six years after we'd given up we agreed to dinner but only drank as if we hadn't grown older or apart 9. It was the ninth anniversary of when we met which i only remember because we met on my birthday I was so in love with someone who hated you I don't remember what you sent back to the kitchen or which overpriced mistake i chose to keep everybody comfortable We were always so turned earth when our mouths were empty 10. I didn't acknowledge your birthday even though you'd just moved back into my apartment I was already afraid we were line dance at a wedding the hosts regretted inviting us to Mouths full of bland cake and sparkling wine always something from the buffet to keep us from having to speak Heart (n.): The centermost part of person, place, or thing A series of tubes and muscles the size of a tennis ball . An excuse factory . Poetic term meaning brain . The hub of decision making . Art with an h that is not only not silent but also never shuts up . A metronome . The most important part of a city according to the people who finance tourism . The innermost piece of lettuce that usually ends up in the sink . Oh yes the pain the pain that it causes that can not possibly be blamed on any other organ of the body . Flooder of open wounds and tear ducts . The piece of meat romanticized as important and yet we are much more likely to eat the ribs designed to protect it . A bird in a cage on a hipster t-shirt . A tattoo designed for archery practice . A twee verb synonymous with like . The shape of a two hands when joined by the upper knuckles of the fingers and the pads of the thumbs . Fragile noun intended to imply focus . The part of the body most often crossed when lying . Organ routinely hidden when one is pledging allegiance to something sinister . An athletic term often confused for strength . Despite the weapon what is always the real cause for bleeding I'm compiling the Terrible Poets' Thesaurus by reading poems by unfamiliar writers and jotting down unusual word choices. Once I find a term three times, I attempt to define it by deconstructing it as it appears to me in the context of the poems in which they're used, which are unlikely to be the way the authors intended them. Alternately, I look at my own poems and find words that I overuse and attempt to imagine how others might interpret them.
Parade (n.): A public procession The slow march to death . Procession of familiar faces with names you can't place . A term used to describe the volume of ex lovers of the former partner you slut shame in order to recover from the devastating history that you view as nothing more than a prologue to them meeting and then leaving you but which is actually their perfectly reasonable life . The traffic blocking your way to work . A line of people from a community that you are supposedly a part of but who you are now watching from the sidewalk . See how they advance while you stand still . Watching . The awkward video for a soundtrack of dying brass swans playing nearly unrecognizable versions of songs that you've hated since you learned to recognize sound patterns . The slowest way to review memories . A verb to describe cultish velocity . The way a hyperbolic martyr imagines his friends and lovers abandon him I'm compiling the Terrible Poets' Thesaurus by reading poems by unfamiliar writers and jotting down unusual word choices. Once I find a term three times, I attempt to define it by deconstructing it as it appears to me in the context of the poems in which they're used, which are unlikely to be the way the authors intended them. Alternately, I look at my own poems and find words that I overuse and attempt to imagine how others might interpret them.
Constellation (n.) : a pattern of stars recognized and named by humans A pattern drawn between stars in an attempt to fill the sky with narrative . A way to imply the importance of a relationship or body without actually mentioning a deity's name . It's tough to find a patch of sky that isn't filled with various sizes of dippers . A hint at illumination . though the source may have died long before we recognized it . The urge to find science beautiful merely because we can't explain it . A chaos we choose to see as compass I'm compiling the Terrible Poets' Thesaurus by reading poems by unfamiliar writers and jotting down unusual word choices. Once I find a term three times, I attempt to define it by deconstructing it as it appears to me in the context of the poems in which they're used, which are unlikely to be the way the authors intended them.
Cartography (n.): the production of maps A method of charting the desires of someone you love but who may not love you back . The construction of a person's personality based on what a poet wants from them . The way one extrapolates a person's skin without having seen it . The study of atlases without shoulders . I am so lost without another person to judge my distance from . Don't substitute Google Maps for this term . Use in place of the noun map even though it is actually associated with the verb form . Producing drafts of fictional freckles on a person whose actual constellation of freckles you should never learn . Often used with constellation . Employed by a poet who suggests they understand patterns although they don't seem to recognize their pattern of objectification or how uncomfortable the subject is to find out they're writing poems about their body or desires . Results more in ex than in x marks . The art of charting a person place or thing whose patterns were long ago graphed by other explorers . The technique of explaining to others how you think you understand a concept merely because you've been over it so many times it feels like you created it I'm compiling the Terrible Poets' Thesaurus by reading poems by unfamiliar writers and jotting down unusual word choices. Once I find a term three times, I attempt to define it by deconstructing it as it appears to me in the context of the poems in which they're used, which are unlikely to be the way the authors intended them.
I sit in my metal chair or
on the edge of my mattress watching terrified strangers lock hands reassure each other that it's only going to be a minute stare into a future they volunteered for I always pause before the ride starts imagine their journey through the line an hour fifteen minutes some reasonable time to wait for joy but to slough through a queue with a choke of florida in your throat knowing only the impending velocity of why awaits you I can't imagine shackling my time for that Unpause As the minimum wage scowl and sunstroke straps them in or lowers the bar around them I stand up crack my knuckles It is always two people one giggling squirrel the other manga-eyed and popping all their joints out of their sockets It's not always a simple roller coaster sometimes a goliath slingshot twirling marionette strings For these rides there is no slow climb before regret there is only one person screaming one passing out coming to screaming passing out No one who pays to scream and pass out should ever cast judgment on the bsdm scene again My breath is unfathomable If I ever become idle bloat like stinking moneyed filthy bourgeois I'm going to set up my cameras by the midway exits film the aftermath the lurch of tectonic mortality I don't want to be a paleontologist of fear but an archaeologist of survival with a focus on illogical risk specifically those who seek to caress death for reasons other than love or money people who want to let some stranger throw them at but not actually into the atmosphere people who want to be belted into a tracked car going nowhere at dangerous speeds Hunched (adj.): bent over Weak . Submitted . Waiting for a poet to do something charitable for them so that the poet can then go write about them as object to prove how terrible the human condition, how charitable the poet . Begging . Lower class or caste . Old and devoid of the posture money grants . Suspect . Debased . A word that implies ugly but doesn't force the poet to be openly judgmental about a person's appearance in a way that will make the audience visibly uncomfortable . Croned . Cowered which implies coward . Waiting to be saved but unlikely to be grateful While seeking out new poets, I kept coming across the same words used in ways that made me cringe, but caused me to imagine poetry editors, thoughtfully chewing on their pens, nodding their exhausted heads. "A Terrible Poet's Thesaurus" will be a series of poems where I deconstruct these words as they appear to me in the context of the poems in which they're used, which are unlikely to be the way the authors intended them.
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