TIF

Today I had
a great idea
for a poem.
I knew it would
come together
so easily,
letter after letter*.

But I forgot
to write it
down.

So it left
my
brain
and thus
ceases to exist.

*On a similar note, how do you read footnoted asterisk? As a piece of the prose, or after it is over?

10/22/2015
Riley Welch

Angles

Smooth jazz,
with sharp beats
sounds so
so appealing.
it makes me turn the wheel
of my car
carefully
like the music -
but my heart beats sharp,
interrupting,
like the rhythm.

10/22/2015
Riley Welch

Mov't

And now
clanking chairs
and early ending classes,
sticky hot outsides,
water
condensing on windows
and damp socks,
broken pencil tips
and dried up
ballpoint pens,
tardy homework,
and A- test grades.
Repeat.

10/22/2015
Riley Welch

Easy

Tears come so easy
maybe I was made too soft.
Too happy
or too sad.

They come to the surface,
frustration,
anger,
I am a bad liar,
I am unable to hide
how I feel.
Even in the worst
situations.

10/18/2015
Riley Welch

An Ode to My Hair

I'm glad my hair
has grown out
long enough.

That it tickles
my elbows
when I swing on a backpack.

And it gets caught
under my arms
when they slam down
after a trip
across the monkey bars.

And I have to wash it,
so, so
much.

But I'm glad my hair
has grown out
so long.

8/27/2015
Riley Welch

Look

Look!
You can see the end now.
Finally stretched out
upon us!
The creeping edge.

Do we approach it?
Watch with guarded view.

The fall would be steep.
Carry yourself carefully.
As you step, feel the ground,
move truly, more truly,
beneath you.

Let your toes
steady themselves
along the edge.

Let your feet feel freedom
that you cannot.

9/22/2015
Riley Welch

Could it be?

I feel
as though
I am growing
more familiar
with this life.

I once
had to
think of my
writing hand
to remember the directions.
I now tell right and left
just by knowing.

9/16/2015
Riley Welch

Square Windows

I keep
putting off
putting words on
paper.
Then they get lost
in a deep twisted
nest of neurons.
They never come back the same.
Sometimes they rearrange.
And then I develop
deep confusion
at those words
I fell in love
with
absentmindedly,
while walking to class
or driving down the roads
slicked wet
with oil painted
car reflections.
I wish I had written sooner.
I wish my brain
was more of a filing cabinet
than a messy notebook - like this one.

9/21/2015
Riley Welch

BB

I can't believe it took a month.
Probably two.
Back to back
but, wow.
The improvement must be coming.
Somewhere.
and now it's 4 o'clock.
Somewhere.
And I'm still waiting.

9/21/2015
Riley Welch

A Solid Where

Sometimes
home feels like
defrosting after
leaving an air-condition-soaked coffee bar
at ten at night.

But other times
it feels like
lung shattering
crisp, icy
air.
Shocking your body
into alertness.

Often, other times,
it feels like gardens
and gardens
of bright yellow daffodils,
happy and overflowing.

Or old swimming pols
with torn up bottoms
that scratch up
your soft, wet toes.

9/9/2015
Riley Welch

9/7/2015

Whenever given a chore,
or task.
I picture it.
Clearly.
Lay it out before me: Here is what will be done.
Even if given a hard choice,
the correct one
can always be pictured.
Gleaming, a little brighter than the alternatives.
I always know what I will choose next.

The first time I could not
picture my future.
At least a little bit,
was my drivers test.
The April I was 16.
But I did take it,
and I passed it.
I drove that car,
and then,
after that.
My whole future blurred.
Things became less and less clear.

And nothing has been so absolute since.

9/7/2015
Riley Welch

Another Rewrite

An anchor set itself
in the pit of his
stomach.

Her words made him inhale
sharply.
She was the ship,
cutting through cold water.

The anchor caused a ripple
that sent goosebumps
to the outside of his skin.
They started at his spine
and made even -
patterned
bumps on his arm.

She spoke again
and he thought the ship
was changing directions.

But it was just setting down one more hook.

9/4/2015
Riley Welch

Everything

Everything
felt a little bit
cooler
than it had
when I went to sleep.
The night
calmed the Earth
and willed it
to forget the sun
maybe
just for a minute.
Because it always came back
and reminded you.

9/6/2015
Riley Welch

One Less

The numbness
sunk itself back.
At the base of
my neck.
My skull.
As close as I would
let it.
Without
Shoo-ing it away.
Like it were a pest
and not a feeling.
It wasn't one
I missed
when it was absent.
But
I didn't mind it
there either.
It let my brain
fold in on itself.
A time
for reflection. Thought.
Could it be, even silence?
Yes, even the pen forgets to move.

9/7/2015
Riley Welch

Wrong

I tried to loop
my 8 backwards.
If you practice,
and learn to do things
every which way,
you improve.
I think -
but the 8 was lopsided.
And then I realized,
September isn't the 8th month anyway.

9/4/2015
Riley Welch

The Bright Green Collection

Here is a poem for my Bright Green Notebook, a poem just as short as the time period I spent writing in it. 

You ended so quickly.
Too quickly.
I wonder which letters
I used most frequently.
Inked out.
On thin pages, sometimes it bled through.
My pen dried up too.
It's time to start
over.
Very fresh, very new.

9/16/2015
Riley Welch

Enough.

I can't  let things go.
It feels
sometimes
like sand slips
through my fingertips.

The sand
is a metaphor
for my sanity.
For my peace of mind.
Do you get it?
Is it clever?
Will it get published?
Am I good enough yet?
How can someone
who practices
so much,
not be good enough?

I never like to
release these thoughts.
Because I feel
like they dig my grave.

- like if I let an inkling
of this out,
it will over take me.
But now it feels
if I leave it
too,
too,
bottled up -
it will never leave me at all.
And it will taint my words,
with sick greed.
I am good enough,
I work hard enough,
I want it enough.
I
I
I
I.
-
That was a good release.

10/18/2015
Riley Welch

6 Totally Exhausted 6 Line Monday Thoghts

8:42 am
I hate following
behind people
in the early morning
who aren't in a panicked
speed-walking hurry,
like me.

10:54 am
I've been awake
for four hours
and ran all over campus
and made calls
and sent emails
but I've only made 25 bucks.

1:23 pm
I'm running
back and forth
in confusing
overlapping
circles.
The turtle pond felt shallow.

5:02 pm
Where
is the day,
it slipped away
and I sweat out
any anger at it's loss
in small, cold beads.

10:29 pm
Clean,
Fresh,
Cold.
Blue and red
and full of notes
This feels like work.

Riley Welch
8/31/2015

10/16/2015

How does
time
move
so slowly
every
now
and
then.

The few left
rotated
ever creaking
back and forth...
No.
Just forth.
A repeated circle,
beat after beat after beat.

10/16/2015
Riley Welch

An Ode to a Small Squirrel

This poem is dedicated to a small squirrel I accidentally hit with my car. I had never ran over an animal before, and it feels pretty awful. I thought the least I could do was write it some words. 

You darted back
across the street
too quick,
I had no time to swerve.
I listened close to a song on
the radio,
about two lovers,
dying together.
You had passed alone.
What a rough feeling -
I'm so sorry
bushy-tailed critter.

As I saw you off
in my rearview mirror
I felt sad for your small rodent body,
Big blue is just a body of metal,
who just couldn't stop.
And for that,
I am sorry.

10/19/2015
Riley Welch

pages

There is never silence.
I am never in silence.
When I do think I am in silence.
My ears ring.
And echo.
And make up pitter-patters that
do not even
exist.

Because my brain doesn't sleep
so my ears can never rest
in fear
it'll all
shut off.

10/14/2015
Riley Welch

Lost Thoughts

I only wanted to write.
I stopped making notes on my phone.
But I lost
so many ideas
because I need to move
with upward
swings.
Not against them.
It would be like
moving against the current.
Just because the sand
seems different
upstream.

Riley Welch
8/27/2015

100, and 100 more.

This summer my goal was to write a hundred poems. Below I bring you, my hundredth poem of the summer. It is, of course, about words and letters and how incredible it really is.

Stretched out
letter by letter
line by line
solid stacking
up.

Although,
if you stared at the top,
then down.
There's so much overlap
in 26 letters
and spaces.

Endless combinations
tears,
shivers,
laughter,
grins.

Searing sun,
prickling goosebumps,

and here I read the end.

But it may be the start.

8/25/2015
Riley Welch

Bossy

Green leaves
overlapped,
rich and rooted
on a big, brown, bossy
oak tree
outside a mother's house.

[The particular mother in this case is not important, but it is important to note that it is a mother.]

And the leaves fell
occasionally
as squirrels would run
under and over and under
the turbulent
twisty
branches of that big, brown, bossy oak.
And as the leaves fell
the oak willed them
to stay.

[Because, remember, the oak tree is bossy.]

But
they did not
because once they

detached

without a place to go
they had no choice
but
to litter the mother's
lawn.
And it became coated
in all these
leaves.

[Although the squirrels aren't really to blame here, this is just nature.]

And eventually,
so many leaves piled up,
the mother-

[Just a mother, specific mothers are still not important to this story.]

-had a son
or daughter
or helpful neighborhood kid
rake up those leaves.
Usually for a couple of bucks.

[Probably a crisp five, or four ones, because it seems like as much, but isn't.]

And a soda,
because sugar is invaluable.

But in a few months,
Fall would set in
and all the leaves could fall at once
and the squirrels
wouldn't matter
anyway.

[The squirrel would still matter, just not in the context of the leaves.]

And then the son
or daughter
or helpful neighborhood kid
would rake in the big bucks
in raking up yards
for more than just
a few
off-season
fives and sodas.

And the big, brown, bossy tree
would be glad
because it would have willed the leaves
to fall
this time.

8/24/2015
Riley Welch

Waves

Nightmarish
seas
full of
fish
salt
plants
monsters
a deep
black
drowning
crashing
open ocean seems
to vast
for my mind
to grasp.

8/23/2015
Riley Welch

Check

Right
and
wrong
seem unfairly determinable.
Let's do a majority vote.
So many situations
check
yes
check
no,
could we even get
everyone
to vote
for
anything.
At all.

8/23/2015
Riley Welch

5, 10, 15, 20

Addition.
Two and three make five.
And five is even.
Technically,
it is odd.
But the clean way
fives fall into tens
is even
and nice.
Ten fives, make fifty.
Twenty fives, a hundred.
And that is a wonderfully round number.

8/22/2015
Riley Welch

Baby Blue

This is a strong disclaimer that I am not writing about today's gloomy Saturday in the below poem. 

I'm sure there is something I am forgetting,
but for today,
at least,
I have a strange
wash of contentment
I am not used to.
I'll visit those 4 corners
and probably find
nothing,
but
that is something
I am okay with.
At least for
this sunny
and blue
Saturday.

8/22/2015
Riley Welch

Keyhole

I peered through a keyhole
and your eye looked back at me.
The only thing reflected
in it.
Was my own eye
right back.
Together we were two mirrors facing each other.
And you refused to let me in.

10/12/2015
Riley Welch

Scribbled

I worry I will
forget how
to lay words out on
a page.

How sad to forget
the order we
became accustomed
to.

Do we repeat?
Repeat?
Repeat?

The brain grows old
and learns to
speak in a code
no one can decipher.

Short looping
and long phrasing
to remind someone
what they once knew so easy.

Goodbye is not always
permanent.

10/12/2015
Riley Welch

37

Long term memories
always feel like over cast, rainy nights.
Eyes on the brim -

Full of emotion,
you bottle up,
that's socially acceptable,
you know.

And sometimes, they spill
over.
Here's to release.
Some days it feels so lovely,
to forget.

10/4/2015
Riley Welch

OF

Voices
lightly sprinkled
the back patio
and I stood
with some wonder.

Did they see me?

I kept walking.

Foot, over foot, over foot.

That's how you propel yourself forward.

It wouldn't work otherwise,
you'd stay stationary,
so I've learned.

10/4/2015

Speculation.

If you read too much
you fall
into circles of narration
where your life becomes
one
big
bad
non-ficiton
essay.
And you think about
all the parallels
between
your past
and present
and you speculate
on the future 'if'.
You tell yourself
stories
about things you did when you were younger
and translate it over to your
current actions.
Someone
somewhere
would eat it up,
if you would just write it down.
You.
Unraveling every present
second.
Bit by bit.
Narrating the way you towel off
after a long shower
and wrap your wet hair
into a tight bun on your head.
And you think about that phase you went through
when you were young
in 3rd or 4th grade
where you didn't bath.
Well, not totally,
you took a shower every night
and turned the hot on high
and stood in the corners
so only the heat would touch you.
And that's when you started taking scalding showers.
Now your showers are cold,
because you need to be woken up.
Or at least feel like you do,
just want to stumble out of the shower
eyes wide
and ready.
But that's how your brain
churns
now.
Now everything is broken
down
into all these past
and present
and sometimes future words.
And that's what happens
when you read too much.

8/21/2015
Riley Welch

Bloom

Days
keep on blooming
rich and red
and sometimes
so delicate
a
whisper of wind
shatters each fragile
petal
to the ground,
raining glory -
for days passage
there is no winter,
they bloom
and bloom
and
bloom.

8/22/2015
Riley Welch

Over and Over

Repetition
will
never get old.

I can't help
it.

The connotation
of a word
said
once, twice, over
and
over
and
over.

It creates familiarity.
It creates pattern.
It creates comfort.

I can't help it.

10/12/2015

Seconds and Thirds

I'm flying in and out
of other people's
groups of friends,
but where am I?
Are these my friends?
I can't tell yet,
I feel like a meteor
who flew through
a solar system
or planet's orbit.
I didn't belong in,
sorry,
you're welcome,
here I am.

8/19/2015
Riley Welch

Now

Heart races
going faster and faster
gasping for air
that just doesn't seem
to get to you.

Drowning.

Piles over piles under piles,
can't get out.
Won't get out.
Am I trying to get out?

Go for a run
like
your heart's pulse
triples
doubles
this it it.

8/19/2015
Riley Welch

Dough

I wish  could be
the type
of person
who enjoyed
washing the dishes.

Because all things
in life
spill over.

And wouldn't it be
lovely
if I loved
to clean up my messes.

And all the other
unpleasant things
we have to do.

8/19/2015
Riley Welch

Letters

I sent out
poem after poem
into the universe
the internet
spoken indirectly into
your head.
I feel like I still haven't
given
enough.
To say thank you
for learning how to write
in the first place.

8/19/2015
Riley Welch

This is short.

Forcing out words -

gets twisted

like knotted headphones

you forgot to wrap

up

before you put them

in your pocket.

8/19/2015

Riley Welch

3 Right Turns

I don't know
when I started
taking the long way home
to listen to one more song
at 3 am
with my windows rolled
down.

And the sticky fall, summer,
winter, spring air hitting my hand.

But now
it feels
like I always do it.

Extra seconds of thinking
have become something
more normal
as if
sometime
in the last few years
I got stuck in my own head,
and I don't know when
or how
or why
but now I take the long way.

8/19/2015
Riley Welch

3 Corners

Can I have more count off poems?
Where I go back from ten
and at the end I feel better,
or at least
not as
crushed?
Overwhelmed?
Buried underneath
piles of broken
incomplete thoughts
where I can't get up.
I forgot my goggles,
I can't open my eyes buried
this deep
burning
churning,
can anyone help?


8/18/2015
Riley Welch

Out of Titles

I stood in shock
staring
at the picture
from
all those Thanksgivings
ago.

So many new built traditions.

I have adjusted
and the very act of that
seems wrong.

How did this happen?
How did I let it?

I am shocked.

But
I cannot dwell on what is not.

Maybe.

How do you?

What do you say to those
who lost so long ago
they have already
forgotten?

9/29/2015
Riley Welch

Grand Part Two

The sound of
pebbles
gently
crushing
under solid tires
echoed
off curbs
and all the insects
gathered
to see you off.

9/28/2015
Riley Welch

GMLMH

as the car
slowed down
the ground
appeared
so much closer
than I had
expected it,
galloping and rocking,
the road
seemed so
smooth
and slick
when I coasted it.
how did I remove myself
so far
from the Earth
without
even
noticing.

9/25/2015
Riley Welch

330

I woke up
shaking.

I knocked my bottles
of lotions and serums
on their side
when I reached for them.

I filled my body with caffeine
anyway.

I took notes
at the speed of a rocket,
But with many more mistakes.

Swirly, unreadable loops,
scratched out,
more shaking.

Feet tapping.

If I don't let the movement out,
it all runs inside my brain
left, right.

How am I
all at the same time:

concentrating so smoothly
and not at all.

9/30/2015
Riley Welch

Day.3

We sat so long
the creased sweat on
our shirts dried
clean and new again.

8/16/2015
Riley Welch

XXXXX

I laughed too much.
So much.
Maybe it's not enough.

Is it a cackle,
or a giggle?

Why is a cackle evil?
Or crude?

Because it's from a witch,
or spirit?

I would argue,
they should laugh too.

Someone once let me know
all this laughter
was too much.

But to me,
it felt like substance.

Something to fill
the hollow of a lack of execution.

Something to validate
and give my emotions
some meaning.

Tears streaming
laughter spouting
like joy
expressed aloud.

8/17/2015
Riley Welch

Softened

I sliced through words
like white bread.

Soft.

There was a tear.

I consumed so many
words.
In one day.
In one sitting.

I have to take a breath,
and expel them.

At a thousand words a minute.

I am sorry, I am sorry, I am sorry.

This is how it is when you fill anything up.
It runs and runs and runs,
my teeth clatter and
reconnect.

And I cannot take in another syllable.
I will burst.

8/16/2015
Riley Welch

Did the Weatherman Tell You

Heat crept in
and I sloughed off blankets,
like layers of dead skin
that I no longer needed.

Cold Sweat Clinging.

Less sweet
than that of spring,
and on the back of your neck,
less satisfying.

A cold front was said to be sweeping through.
Highs only in
the 90's.

I laughed
defeated
and hot
and pointed to a million places
on the map.
All a million miles
from the scorching center
of the globe.

8/16/2015
Riley Welch

Cliff Hangers

What used to be fresh
rotted
out from under me.
And I fell
16 stories
to what felt like my
end?

I don't think death is the right word.
And fresh couldn't
hold me
up any
longer.

Soft
and squishy
like so many ideas
I had once
that were flushed
elegantly
down a drain

with a garbage disposal.

One whir -
and goodbye.

8/16/2015
Riley Welch

Silence

Hey little whisper,
so sweet
so smooth.

Trickles down glass
slicker than water
delightful
and fickle
so sweet
and so little.

Riley Welch
8/15/2015

3rd Floor Up

The days started
getting slower
and faster
simultaneously.

And I lost interest,
But at the same time
they raced and I couldn't see them pass.

And the women behind a big desk let me talk,
and I told the truth
But I also lied.

And didn't mention
that maybe I just thought
this was the new constant.

Because the truth felt too much like
something that could make her
absolute.

But she handed me
a folded up paper,
over and on itself.

With the words
[   ]
laced across the top.

And it felt fake
and I felt fake.

And it felt oversensitive and
overzealous
and meant
nothing.

...

But heaviness hung over my face,
framing it,
like those bangs, I tried to grow out,
when I tried to grow up.

Riley Welch
8/12/2015

12 + 2

I woke myself up from a dream where
waves were crashing on a shore
and the waves pushed and pulled
back in a rhythm I grew
accustomed to.

I worked with them
instead of against
and ran
back and forth
in sync.

The pitter pat of my feet
wet and hard on
cold sand

and it all moved to the beat.

8/12/2015
Riley Welch

Two Spaces

How many endless
emptying's of my brain can I pull?

Pulling brisk and long
Stopping at the edge of my mind.

Like a landfill.
Like gold.
Just to me.

8/8/2015
Riley Welch

16

And I walked alone into the desert.
Mostly because I like how each step
Seemed to muffle the roaring car
Engines
Indefinitely.
And the dirt went on for miles
and miles,
Rolling red.
And even a few
Scattered
Clouds.
Totally silent.
Except for each grain of sand.
Sliding whenever boot hit the Earth.

8/6/2015
Riley Welch

Y-Solid

Slow riding
down a twisty turning road,
what decisions am I making?

You can only be lost for
so long before you reach a coast.

I hope.

And you don't need the
street signs.

It'll get colder
and colder
and you'll have an idea.

Of where you're headed.

8/6/2015
Riley Welch

New

My handwriting
needs to be contained
in neat ruled lines.

It cannot just dance
wherever it feels
on a blank sheet
with no boundaries.

Slowly, the letters
will grow
and grow.

And the lines will slope
and it will all slop.

8/6/2015
Riley Welch

P, P, P

I finished another notebook, this one had a grey spine. I got so caught up in writing I didn't write a poem dedicated to these past few months like I usually do. That felt a little odd, but here is the last poem I wrote in this notebook. 

Heaven,
is purple wisteria
clean fresh warm
and up forever.

On Earth they come in
shifts, but in heaven
they bloom every morning
and die every night at dawn
and come back
crisp
dewey.

Heaven is juicy ripe peaches
that don't have to soften
or ripen.

They come in overflowing
crates
and never go bad.

And the peach fuzz
tickles your
chin.

8/4/2015
Riley Welch

Here I am

Red leather
Yellow leather
Do they really
Dye leather
All these
Colors
What a tongue twister
Now I'm confused.

7/31/2015
Riley Welch

S.H.

Streaming
Streaming
Hiccups.
And lost faces
I feel like I don't know what I'm doing.
And also like I do.
Swimming
Striving
Seconds and seconds.
Somersaults are easier
When you're rolling downhill.
I've learned that
Anyway.

7/30/2015
Riley Welch

Three 3 Line Average Paced Thursday Thoughts

11:23 am
So long
But so short
A lot like your brother.

1:23 pm
My hand doesn't swim
Through air
The sun sears a hot brown.

6:37 pm
Paper pages
Like a weird feeling
In my stomach and eyes.

7/30/2015
Riley Welch

The Same Part 2

Things pile up
and things fall apart
and things cascade down
and cease to be the same.

Rolling hills
of never-minds
and other
fleeting
forgetfulness.

Pile up,
Fall apart,
Everything is just
a vague
repeating
pattern.

And maybe I hate it.

7/21/2015
Riley Welch

7/21/2015

Windows wide open.
Rolling breeze.
Trees.
Everything.

Circular spinning
Collapsing
In
On
Itself.

And everything else
All at once.

The way it always was.
Spin it back.
Around.
Inside
and
Out.

7/21/2015
Riley Welch

Different Keys

Music is a chemical
reaction.
That always shocked me.
So much variety.

But still
so much common ground.
Between people and
the notes
that cross themselves
one after another
on the
staff
Do I even remember
How to make music anymore
Who can remember?

Is it like riding a bike,
where I'll never forget
Or will
it all
have to be
relearned?

7/20/2015

New

And blue grass
played in the back
of the hyper
cleaned
apartment.

And all I could see
was the raindrops
falling
one by one
in sync with
the pluck
of those thin blue strings.

7/18/2015
Riley Welch

OA

Have you ever outlined
your teeth
with the tip
of your tongue
and felt the beginning of
your gums.

Teeth piercing out
of soft flesh.

Like something that
wasn't supposed to happen.
But did.
One over another and another.

7/18/2015
Riley Welch

At a wrong stop.

Spark of light.
Poor knobs
and hinges.

I can't stay in the same place for too long,
I break into nostalgic cackles
they'll turn to tears.

Smiling
Why can't I regret things I can't control?

Does regret make things
harder
or
easier?

I really
           really
don't know.

7/15/2015
Riley Welch

17

I couldn't tell
If I was amazed
Or just cold.

And up crept bumps.

The length of my arm.

And the base of my neck.

Am I in wonder.

Or is the thermostat low.

Someone shock me
So I know.

7/11/2015
Riley Welch

Shout

Loud blast
Never ending sounds
beat, beat, beat.

Crawling
sprawling blue.

Such an urgency.

Are we coming to an end?
The end?

Are we just starting?
How does any of this work.

Wooden planks stacked up
Rusty nails that
somehow
hold
together.

After so much time.

How do you outlast time?
How do you outlast nature?
I think maybe I don't understand.
How falling rain drops tear apart
man made creation,

or anything else.

7/6/2015
Riley Welch

Center

Yellow jump ropes
dirty the quickest

Because each time your
rope hits the ground.

The dirt wraps
around
the coiled center.

And soon,
It looks like you purchased
a long patterned rope.

Yellow, brown, yellow.

Because the handles don't hit the ground.

7/11/2015
Riley Welch

Over Out

How do you become original?

How can you be inspired?

but

not a thing.

I am exhausted

One more

One more.

Are any ideas ever good?

Can you be a creator?

Do you make your own world?

Would that make you in charge of that world?

Who plays God?

That is responsibility beyond

the usual.

Ins and outs

of daily life

And I could scribble more

more lines.

And be in charge of more

more worlds.

Forever and ever

but

I can't

or won't

Goodnight.

7/9/2015
Riley Welch

Blocks of Chocolate

And so you're staring at the
edge of the Earth
but you think.

-

You're looking into the distance
miles and miles
I've always been impressed at the skill
of the world's

Greatest artists
to make me think
snow-capped acrylics
are

1,000 feet up
rolling hills.

7/10/2015
Riley Welch

Evening

Sitting on well-lit porches
Blasting bass beats
Cold drinks
Splattered paint
And splattered people
Simple
Clean
Light
Why go back to the real world
Why not make this the real world
Is that an option
Can you truly
Truly
Just decide how to live
And then do it
Maybe
      Probably
I haven't got any obligations yet.

7/6/2015
Riley Welch

Exits

Every choice
Ever made
Was absolutely the right choice
And any choice
That has yet to be made
Will probably
Year and years
Down the line
Absolutely be the right one again

7/5/2015
Riley Welch

1 & 2

I think I'm finally figuring it out
Well
That's not true

But here's one more block

There are long term people
And there are short term people

Those who have paths that stretch miles
And miles and consider
Those miles and miles
And think about the miles
And miles behind
And then about how history
Repeats itself
And lays out even more miles
Based on past truths
Or lies

And then people
Who think in the moment
The unchanging
Perfectly here

Moment
Maybe without worry

Who decides which is better

7/1/2015
Riley Welch

Count-off

One two three

Sometimes I don't know
How
To start a poem

Four five six

But I can feel it
Just below the
Surface
Like a sheet of ice

Seven eight nine

That was poetry
Bursting out of that
Cold but shallow
Water

Ten eleven twelve

So I take a deep
Breathe
And count it off

Thirteen fourteen

And somehow it relieves
The pressure

Fifteen

And breaks the ice

Sixteen

And all the words come
Pouring out

Seventeen eighteen.

6/25/2015
Riley Welch

Reworked

Select, delete,
Select, delete,
Hello pattern
Hello pride
Hello hurt
Hello hollow
Hello how do you overcome that all incasing feeling.
Let's call it a cocoon
Nothing can be gotten
Rid of
Because your brain is the worst hard drive
And it is the least efficient
It never recalls data as it was entered
Don't you wish you had photographed the bad times
Instead of blocking them out
Then maybe justification could be easier
I don't understand how it feels like I'm losing something
When it's already
Simultaneously lost
And saved somewhere else
I'm glad days keep moving
Because otherwise
I would have probably paused time
And never ever moved forward
From anything
And that is no way to live.

6/24/2015
Riley Welch

Fermented

Some days I think of the writing process

Like fermenting

The words of my poem will dance off my pen

Incredible release

Until one moment

I've used it all up

And it stops

And when I try to write

It's not bad

But it's week

Think of espresso

Compared to tea

But then, when I let all those ideas ferment.

Then they come bursting out

Like a tightly sealed jar 

Filled with carbonation

Shook to the brim until things are bursting. 

Sometimes hiatuses are good

Sometimes taking a break from forcing words on a page,

Lets me put better words on a page.

More refined,

well done.

Something I could spit out

Pouring

Overflowing

Until I am empty

With words to ferment again. 

6/20/2015

Riley Welch

Overeast

Soaking shoes

Splashed

In accidental puddles

Lovely feet with happy curled toes

Sprinting legs

With rain drop mud tracks

Painted up calfs

And pant legs

Stretched out goosebumps

Head to toe

Rumbling stomach laughter

Ending in sore stomachs belly aches

And glinting sparking's of bright green lightening bugs.

6/22/2015
Riley Welch

Faucet

Lately writing had been on or off
Like a faucet that doesn't know how to just drip

I wish it were a constant flow
Words one over another over another
But instead

It is either words
Spilling
Overflowing

Slipping down the drain before I can get them on the page

Or

It is off

Nothing garble that can barely build crumbled up letters and scattered presentation

But in the icy winter of this book

I ask for a slow
Constant
Drip

So it doesn't all freeze.

6/11/2015
Riley Welch

Mugged Disappointment Part Four

Here we have another installment of my poems about horrible coffee. As you can see this is part four - will this ever end? Will I ever reach a point in my life where all the coffee is better than the last? Or maybe at least not as bad as the coffee presented to you in my Mugged Disappointment series. So here you have it, another terrible mug:

Waking up early, groggy, and beat

I decided this morning I need a treat

Instead of taking the time to craft my usual plain brew

My favorite beverage would make this morning easier to get through

So I left a few minutes early, to swing by the shop

To get an iced drink, that espresso…drop drop drop

Not my normal coffee shop, or usual town

I figured an order so simple would not procure a frown

But when my drink was served up, opaque and heavy

I got a bad feeling this would taste messy

And I predicted the future upon my first sip

And to keep from spitting it out, bit my lip

This was burnt and bitter and very hard

And I trudged through that beverage like a caffeine filled marsh

I suddenly longed for my plain ol’ coffee

‘I paid for this!’ I thought scoffing

And for the first time it couldn’t be finished

I poured out that coffee, my pride diminished

I’ve had plenty of coffee, iced, hot, and blended

But all of these bad mugs – I’m a little offended

I really want to be done writing about bad cups of Joe

But when that will happen, I do not know

It seems my mugged disappointment will never be relieved

But in the next cup, I will always believe.

6/10/2015

Riley Welch

The Same

Maybe all these

Nonsense connections

I try and make

Are just taking up

Important head space

Dropped off and shoved out

For something better 

But now left all filled

By things that won't help me

Solve my problems

Not by a long shot

If this is like this

How is that like that

Fill in the blanks 

Do you get it? 

Do you not?

And now I'm running in circles

And can't figure out 

How to exist in this world

Without any doubt. 

6/12/2015

Riley Welch

The Burgundy Collection

If you've been reading for a while, you know that I have this blog to force myself to write. It makes me accountable for at least three poems a week. In addition to that, I write whenever I get an idea, so I carry a thin notebook with me almost everywhere I go. When I fill up a book, I write a poem about it. This one had a burgundy spine, and it's a little shorter than normal - but that's kind of how these four months felt. Enjoy!

One more book
One more binding
Of pages and pages and pages

And scribbled out thoughts -
Sometimes half empty,
Sometimes so full they're too heavy
To move off these sheets.

Pouring and pouring,
If you didn't count the repeats
Have I built a dictionary?

One made with
different inks and depths

And scribbled out,
Heart-felt and handwritten.

It's lacking definition
So maybe I've just
Scrawled a book

Three messy,
Inked up,
Strong and personal,
Books.

Goodbye burgundy,
You've been good.

6/10/2015
Riley Welch

More Locked Boxes

Have you ever thought of all the secrets
In the minds of those dead
The interlacing connections and
Whispers
That someone told

'Now take this to your grave'
And they did
No one heard them
Maybe a word whispered once
To a baby
or pet
or plant
To someone that couldn't repeat it.

Maybe in a prayer
To a god
Just to get it out of their mind.

Have you ever thought of all those secrets?
All lost?
Buried feet and feet?
Under grass a dirt?
Or burned up to a fine ash?
Spread everywhere?

They turned one over another
Back into the air
Where they once traveled
To burden
Someone's thoughts.

Until with great relief,
it ended.

6/5/2015
Riley Welch

Air

I can't push out the words I needs to speak
Or write
I have all these
Words backed up inside me
But I can't grab a translator
Not right now.

How do you ask
Someone to translate
The solid thick thoughts you have
Into a smooth, running, liquid line of words
Funneled out
Like a drain
They must be melted
Then filtered
Into streaming letter
After letter
Building a ripe story
Pure for whatever they need.

5/31/2015
Riley Welch

Rmblg

Peeling off perfectly glossed
Sheets and sheets
The tug on your cuticle
Is satisfaction

And connections are attempted
Barely finished
Never finished
I say attempted
Because they are not to be confused
For complete
But if one thing gets deciphered
Maybe everything can be figured out
For instance
If one thing is figured out
How to succeed at one thing
At one facet of the world
It could be patterned into everything
If once thing is learned
All things can be learned

Cross page metaphors
Do one, do them
All
Everything becomes a routine
Laundry loads
One after another
Empty the lint catcher
Pour the detergent
Shut the door, check it's locked,
Three times
Routine is comfortable

Especially when you do it right,
Over and over and over.

6/2/2015
Riley Welch

Running Backwards

Does it count as rewinding,
When it all moves right past,
Probably not, but, maybe not

When the houses drift backwards
And all my right turns are left
But real life rewinds,
Don't count in present
They won't count in my past
Or future, but that's forward
For now the clouds just drift
Forwards and I'll circle back,
For a forward moving back step seems to be my path.

5/29/2015
Riley Welch

11:55 pm and with 28% Battery

Sometimes my poems just seem like journal entries

Long winding

---

Everything always seems to start with overlappings

Nothing really there

Until one after another

Piled up

2-d images don’t exist here

we cant imagine them

but sometimes I do

And I imagine they are the first existing layer

Of anything

Really!

Really. Of anything

Just like the outline

The one hundred percent

Verified

Two-dimensional outline

And when you change your angle

Even the slightest bit

Whatever it is disappears

Because that’s physics, punk.

Anyway

Eventually

Overlaps and overlaps later

Something exists

Maybe a dog

A tree

I don’t know

Books, words

Strawberry rhubarb pies

And eventually

The world is built

Round and round and round.

Now don’t let me lose you here

But

The world

Once

Was probably a single un-overlapped two-dimensional thing

And can you imagine that.

6/4/2015

Riley Welch

Human Body

During a supremely fun day at my grandfathers with lots of people, food, and drinks, a few of us stayed up until 4 am. During that time we did some really enjoyable poetry exercises. These two poems are from one we did where the topic was 'the human body' and the poems had to be five lines. 

They say matter is conserved
but such a small thing gets so large
and I guess it makes sense
food is matter too
but who can fathom
how babies grow?

-----

Your long legs lengthen themselves out
across state line
probably
and when your lips curl into an 'O'
all I can say is 'definitely'.

5/30/2015
Riley Welch

Why

I  had a friend once ask me why I write poetry. I didn't really know how to explain it, but this poem is my best guess. 

Poetry is a snapshot landscape.

In my head I used to take scenes
and save them
Dripping with description
Painting a picture
A moment
And I'd hit save
And I'd tell myself
That it could someday
Fit snuggly
At the beginning of a book chapter
Nestled inside a cozy story
Safe and warm

It wasn't until later
I called myself a poet

And I realized these didn't need to be
Snug
Tucked in corners of other
Pieces
Of writing

They were stand alone.

Because not everything needs a full explanation.

5/28/2015

Flooded

And you miss her
And we miss her
Why would you think I forgot
It was different
And
Oh, I know
Haven't you seen
I have the words written
Right here
Dark
Solid
Still cool and raised
If pain is the only thing
That shows us
Absence of pain
Then I believe I have done it
I know the comforting feeling of what I imagine
Is her cool fingertips
Wrapped around me
In a hug
An embrace
And I can guarantee
She is so, so missed.

5/26/2015
Riley Welch

Nights

Thin crispy cookies

And sweet swinging jazz

Pair perfectly

With sparkling wine

In tall clear glasses

Glossed with dots of sweet champagne

And smiling evenings

Where you turn in over and over again circles

Holding the hands of those you love

Spinning and spinning

Wishing the music wouldn’t stop

And you won’t end

And tonight won’t end

And they won’t end

And wishing

That the rest of your memories

Are turned on top of themselves circles

And pitter patter feet

Tripping and dancing

For one more song.

5/26/15

Riley Welch

A Lot of Used Pen Ink

I keep filling up booklets
And feeling accomplished
But I don't really know
What I am accomplishing,
I've written lots of words
But there is so much overlap

I play favorites

Gentle,
Whispered,
Soft,

Repetitious.

What gets accomplished if
I spend my time writing
The same words in different orders?


And I can tell you:

My handwriting has not even improved.

5/14/2015
Riley Welch

Dancing

Braids fell out of their interlocking
The same way
Two snakes would have
Untwisted their bodies
If they fell
from a branch
To the ground.

But once you combed out the hair
It separated into
Delicate strands,

That didn't look like a solid body
Anymore.

Soft ringlets that danced out of her scalp
Long and looping
And particularly charming.

5/18/2015
Riley Welch

26

Last Wednesday, instead of studying for my textiles final like I was supposed to I finished a poem I have been working on for a while. It was a tough one because most of the words in each line start with the same letter. There are 26 lines total, one for each letter of the alphabet, but they are not in alphabetical order.

1. Long loving lilac limbs loom lengthy and lenient
2. Over open opal oceans overflowing.
3. Glistening, gleaming, glowing.
4. Sighing soft sea salt scented splashes,
5. Misting muddled massed mosses,
6. Creeping clustered and close. Clinging to the coasts comfortable core. 
7. Eating endlessly elegant edges of excess Earth.
8. Yelping yellows, yawning and yolky.
9. Jumping junipers jazz juvenilely and jealous
10. Tickling tall tattered turfs tough tops. 
11. Numbing notes name new nobles:
12. Queens quick and quiet,
13. Kings kind kisses...
14. Deep, drifting - depleting demons, drafting dreamers.
15. Royalty's riviera, rough riding rainwaters
16. All about, abundant, but so adequate.
17. Violet viola's only vice are vertical venomous vines,
18. Xanthic and X-ed xylems.
19. Weeping wisterias well with warm water, waiting.
20. Planting precious pedestals, perching and prepping their provenance. 
21. Under undecided untouched underpinning
22. Heavy hands help heave happy homes.
23. Zip-locked and zigzagged, leaving zilch.
24. Beautifully buoyant, bouncy and brilliant - blue brine,
25. Feeling first and fresh, finally free but forceful.
26. In-between iridescent indigo impacts - impassive. 

5/13/2015

Riley Welch

Table 4

I've got wildly tired eyelids
Waiting for that final day
Of each class
Good classes
Good classes I should have done better in
Probably
But sometimes it rains when you schedule a picnic
And sometimes it rains five days straight
And sometimes you make straight B's because you were having too much fun
I haven't got complaints
Except for that hot hot summer
I hate those tiny beads of sweat
On your spinal cord
When you're just trying to enjoy your day.

5/13/2015
Riley Welch

Oil on Linen

Sore aching pitter patter
Of Flittering heart beats
Chins clumsily knocking chins
And while it seems rude
To bump into someone
At night
For just a few minutes
Sometimes
It's exactly what you need
To get on with that life
That won't stop moving
Just because
You asked for a break.

5/11/2015
Riley Welch

4's

Drowning in ounces and ounces
Of caffeinated drip
Suffocating my exhaustion
And forcing red-rimmed
Eyelids lid
Go numb
Stare at the ever
Illuminated computer screen
Five more days
Just five more

5/11/2015
Riley Welch

R

Repetition is so comfortable
And I don't feel bad
I won't leave my comfort zone

I won't sleep in make up
I won't pull all-nighters
That's not what I'm here for
Or even what I want.

I want to stay happy
Be spontaneous - but prepared

And if I am happy.

Who cares.

4/19/2015
Riley Welch

Fill In the Blank

When your lovers name
Becomes a noun
You know

Things are extreme
One way or another

The selflessness
That comes from the thought

"Oh, don't you wish everyone had
had an insert lovers name here "

And even if it fits in a different
Dark
Old
Overwhelming spot.

It's something.

By any scale we've come to develop.

Love can only be categorized
By those
In it.

4/30/2015
Riley Welch

Favorite Fridays

Today's outside author is a friend of mine who very recently got into poetry, but obviously has a serious knack for it. It was hard to choose which poem to post, so you might be seeing more of his work in the future!

BY: ELIJAH MCLAUGHLIN

Summer
You and I are like
Contrasting colors on opposite sides
Of a Popsicle stick
You
Are the strawberry Rocket Red
So sweet, everyone's favorite
The side saved for last so there's time to truly savor it
And I
Am the bizarre bombastic blue
That they always claim is Raspberry but you
Know that color doesn't exist anywhere in Nature
With a flavor that's more accurately described as "loud"
Than savory
And when we meet our demise
At the hands of the blistering heat of this Americana Sunrise
I wanna melt together
Bleed in rivulets and run all over the fingers of our combined childlike nature
Intermingle in a puddle of Nuclear-Waste purple and stain everything a shade
My mother won't approve of
Love
Is a saccharine mess
That tastes best when the colors clash
It is the heat rebounding off the dash
In the car left parked
While a couple of teenagers wander off into the woods together
It is the dirt rising off the backroad
you drive down just to be alone
Just the two of you
It's the abandoned fence overrun with rust
With a gap in it just big enough to fit through
It's that secret spot at the top of the small mountain
Overlooking the whole town
That spot you found
Where the sun crowns the sky in golden light
At the dawn of every day
That spot with the most impressive view of backwoods paradise ever captured
That feeling of rapture
When two opposite ends of the stick sit and watch the Americana Sunrise
And quietly melt together

Too

Falling bricks
Counting
Mile after mile after mile
Brain dead but -

A bus
Or taxi
To take you wherever
You
Actually
Need to be
On time
Too late
Too close
Asleep.

5/5/2015
Riley Welch

Gallons

I get lost in a sea of me
Ideas became
A liquid
And I drowned

I couldn't find a drop in a gallon
In gallons
In gallons and gallons

A friendly homemaker
Uses 80 gallons of water a day
That's 29200 a year

And my brain
Is producing thoughts
At that rate

How do I stay caught up,
Or catch up
Down the drain.

5/1/2015
Riley Welch