Concrete Poems

Pounds of pain punctured my progress
Tons of trouble terminated my tranquility
Swarms of stress subtracted my substance
My heart exploded like a thousand thunders
...

How pleasant to know Mr. Lear,
Who has written such volumes of stuff.
Some think him ill-tempered and queer,
But a few find him pleasant enough.
...

The weary one, orphan
of the masses, the self,
the crushed one, the one made of concrete,
the one without a country in crowded restaurants,
...

Woke up suddenly thinking I heard crying.
Rushed through the dark house.
Stopped, remembering. Stood looking
out at bright moonlight on concrete.
...

In beauty we dwell
Blooming stark from spring,
Who moves with flight,
Seasons the air
...

Bullet or a bomb
Both are blind and numb
Wall or a roof
Body or a soul
...

1
I carved your name on my watchband
with my fingernail.
Where I am, you know,
...

There's a breathless hush on the freeway tonight
Beyond the ledges of concrete
restaurants fall into dreams
with candlelight couples
...

A true lover is proved such by his pain of heart;
No sickness is there like sickness of heart.
The lover's ailment is different from all ailments;
...

Poets, come out of your closets,
Open your windows, open your doors,
You have been holed-up too long
in your closed worlds.
...

The great Chinese dragon which is the greatest dragon in all the
world and which once upon a time was towed across the
Pacific by a crew of coolies rowing in an open boat—was
the first real live dragon ever actually to reach these shores
...

it's 1962 March 28th
I'm sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
night is falling
I never knew I liked
...

I. Insomnia

The bulb at the front door burns and burns.
If it were a white rose it would tire of blooming
...

It made her feel sad and embarrassed
Situation was so sudden and not assessed
Circumstances too were not so pressed
Emotions ran high and worries suddenly traced
...

And the Communists have nothing to offer but fat cheeks and eyeglasses and
lying policemen
and the Capitalists proffer Napalm and money in green suitcases to the
Naked,
...

The sounds of home greet me
the trickling sound of the fish tank
my mother's eccentric cackling
and my step father's loud voice
...

I

In the depths of the Greyhound Terminal
sitting dumbly on a baggage truck looking at the sky
...

My mother all of ninety has to be tied up
in her wheelchair, but still she leans far out of it sideways;
she juts there brokenly,
able to cut
...

Oh Tree
Don't cry
As you are alone
In this concrete jungle
...

The rain comes flapping through the yard
like a tablecloth that she hand-embroidered.
My mother has left it on the line.
It is sodden with rain.
...

It's all about cemetery lights and concrete slippers and guns filled with endless bullets, while the carmelite nuns pray for us, they stand outside and blame and murder are children in the name of peace, and the sad part is we now come to expect it.
...

In the cracked concrete a blade of grass was growing
Unto the world it's wonder it was showing,
It pushed itself up through the concrete from the earth below
Now proving to the world in awe that it too would grow.
...

Maricopa County Superior Court, State vs. Flowers, CR2022-110138-001, Arizona Department of Corrections, Open Letter to Sgt. Brittany S. Grimes Badge #1388
You took a blow for those who had thrown me away at age 16. I've taken a beating for being...'ME'. I saw no faces as I was being punched in my face repeatedly. Everything is in slow motion. I feel onlookers watching; I am in a familiar place. I remember the Central Unit Yard Office on June 20,1998. I was hog-tied on the floor.  I feel the hammer fist blows and combat boots all over my body...I'm numb; the pain comes later. My left ear rings like a church bell. Twenty-three years later it still rings. (I've lost my hearing in my left ear) . A woman's voice calls, 'get off of him, get off of him. I'm calling Major Turner...'. The blows and feet slowly start to fade away like a dying drum beat. Sgt. Grimes, was that you who put a stop to my brutality? I'm handcuffed. I'm being dragged through the hallway in Winslow's Kaibab CDU of concrete. Always concrete and steel. Always steel chains and shackles...always chains and shackles. The entrance door and my head have become one. Why? This pain is intense, like a conscious. I'm fading. 'Don't talk to my officers like that'. I'm back. I'm angry. I speak, 'Sgt. _____, I haven't bathed in 9 days. Sgt. _____, I haven't brushed my teeth in 9 days. Sgt. _____, I haven't washed my hands in 9 days. Sgt. _____I'm dizzy'. She said, 'he stinks'. I say 'I am a human being. Why am I not worthy of the basic necessities of life? ' No response. I'm sick. I've lost over 20 pounds in 10 days. I'm almost defeated. It's March 2014 and a female CO holding a camera says 'Flowers, talk to the camera'. I plead to the camera for medical attention. A doctor tells the CO, 'There's no way this man should be in this condition.' I need fluids, antibiotics, and a special diet. She saves me. Sgt. Grimes, was that you? It's June 2014, I'm in solitary confinement in Browning Unit. 'They' show up 'Flowers Disciplinary.' (I know this is not true.) I say, 'I do not want to go'. You have to they say. I say no. Their smiles turn to grimaces (different officers, same grimaces.) I quickly reach for my blanket; the pepper spray consumes the dreary cell. I am shielded only by this fire retardant grey blanket...my lungs are now on fire! I'm trying to take a breath...I can't breathe. I cough and it's painful. My eyes are flowing with puddles of fluids. Are these tears? ' I oddly ask myself. I haven't cried in 19 years. My nose is suffocated by thick mucus. I give in. I stumble to what I think is the door to get chained and shackled (always chained and shackled) . I find the door and I'm sprayed again for good measure, I suppose. The handcuffs are so tight. My hands are numb and eerily cold. The scars are still on my wrist to this day as keloid reminders like my slave ancestors. They yell commands...'don't resist'...I'm not...I'm handcuffed. 'Don't move'...I'm standing still (always steel) . The cell door opens and I am body-slammed to the floor. I'm cuffed. I can't see. My head is being slammed into the concrete (always concrete) . The concrete is so cold but my body is so hot; oh, it's the pepper spray and I'm still gasping for breath. I feel like an elephant is on my back. I can't breathe...I can't breathe. I'm thinking it...trying to say it. My tongue doesn't work (George Floyd) . Speak for me, please. Nobody speaks for me this time, Sgt. Grimes. There was no you this time. Eulandas J. Flower # 125290 - Arizona State Prison.
...

telephone pole planted roadside
blocked lost control pathway
concrete beam bordering roadside
blocked reckless runaway roadway
...

Smooches and snoggers, and resting joggers
all seem to sit on this concrete bench.
Ramblers and walkers, and street hawkers
all seem to sit on this concrete bench.
...

In a pond, there are so many milkfish that live with fame, how is it not every day that they are lied to, fed--fished--presto-eat by humans, their friends are giant prawns, tilapia fish and White Snapper as if they know about the owner's affair with their customers.
The milkfish realizes that it will not be able to be like the salmon that continues to regenerate here because the condominium concrete, embankments and various irrigation accessories seem to castrate their reproductive causality.
even though the Sembilang fish had whispered softly that it would not be extinct until it reached its adult size. Honestly they like to be treated like this as it is natural that the fish must be consumed by wild animals or humans or even transported so that they all die. sad indeed.
Patchouli fish, Lundu, keropak, tawes especially because they have lost their identity because they have been reconstructed by the building. They screamed where their current habitat was because they were displaced by the magnificent building of the human who never thought what if they were conditioned to be marginalized, let alone displaced or the porong area, Sidoarjo how many fish have died because of human activities. They are no longer in power. The elders downstream of the mud grouper were getting hot 'immediately mobilize troops to break down the dam connecting the apartments and the concrete to the downstream' said the grouper fish commanding. They feel that their death is in vain because it is not served on a plate at the human table or served as bait for gills or beavers. The tiger prawns are now straight and thin, feeling sad and sad. This is their fate and soon they will have a massive demonstration and it will be covered by water world television. Sad indeed
...

Dear flower,
You werent wrong when you decided to grow on this concrete,
Your destiny wasnt wrong when it wrote your home to be here.
Your existence may tell to many wanderers in this city
...

Trapped inside concrete
one of your choices were;
a window as big as fifty bananas piled together
connecting yourself to
...

Concrete is useful

and poetic, concrete makes -
...

Out of concrete

Out of concrete
I grew out as a rose
...