testicular lump.

[Jerrybaldy]

I am feeling stressed.
The promised pack of stickers
Are not to be found in the cornflakes
And mother has died.
I have also bitten my thumb nail way too low.
It is bleeding and I have drawn a bloody heart
On the tablecloth.
For Georgia.

Georgia is stressing me.
She wants to go to the movies.
I don't like moving pictures.
I always watched the smoke swirl in the beam.
I do not want to go to the movies with Georgia.
Not even to put my arm around her shoulder
And touch her breast.
I do not like moving pictures.

The rain is stressing me out.
It is flowing in unpredictable streams
On the kitchen window.
I search for a pattern but find none.
Mother died and every button in my shirt
Is in the wrong button hole.
Every goddam button in the wrong goddam hole.
Every useless f ucking button not doing
It's one and only job.
To be in the right f ucking hole.
It's not much to ask.
To be in the right place.

Now I'm crying like some wimp.
Wimpy boy.
Sort your buttons out.
That cornflakes packet promised stickers.
Promised them.
It said "Stickers" inside a gold star right there on the front.
I rub my thumb nail blood over the packet.
Lying Kellogg bastards.
I don't love Georgia.
Her nostrils flare and I can see inside them.
That ain't love.
I definitely do not love Georgia.
I smudge her bloody heart.
I think I may be in trouble.

Trouble stresses me out.
Life could be great without trouble.
The rain is meandering like some transparent banshee.
Liquid moving pictures.
All the wrong buttons in all the wrong holes.
Trouble.

Life could be good.
When it's summer and the shadows barely move.
So sleight you can count movement by each blade of grass.
A ladybird unaware as light passes from one spot to another.
A ripple in a paddling pool slowing to catch the sun.
An insect's beating wings still in a single frame.

The milk is out of date.
Curdled upon my cornflakes.
Clotted forget me nots.
If I had a pet right now I would stab it.
A gold fish or a floppy eared rabbit.
You cannot asphyxiate in a bowl of cornflakes.
Official.

This is for Georgia
And the stillness in life.

[Hawkman]

Watcha, JB. There's a lot to like in here. Not quite sure what the Title has to do with the poem, but it certainly grabs the eye. I think it might benefit from some stanza breaks when you sort of change the subject, and I'd suggest cutting "Mother no longer smells like the spit on her handkerchief." or at least moving it. Doesn't quite seem to fit where it is. Apart from that I think the poem's rather eloquent. it seems to take me to familiar places and at the same time makes me smile.

Live long and prosper - H

[Jerrybaldy]

Thank you Hawk. I have taken your advice and removed that line. I am considering line breaks but the thing wanders about so much I am struggling with where to put them.
About 7 or 8 lines into the poem I discovered a lump. After a bit of stressed pacing back and forth in the living room I returned to the poem to carry on with it in my new fretfull frame of mind and then titled the poem in honour of the lump. Have just returned from doc who diagnosed a cyst, so all good.
That just leaves the question of why I was checking my balls whilst writing a poem :)
Good to hear from you.

[Delta40]

Lol. Good question. At least you went to the doctor. Ode to my balls should make for great reading and less distressing than this piece.

[Haunted]

About 7 or 8 lines into the poem I discovered a lump. After a bit of stressed pacing back and forth in the living room I returned to the poem to carry on with it in my new fretfull frame of mind and then titled the poem in honour of the lump. Have just returned from doc who diagnosed a cyst, so all good.
That just leaves the question of why I was checking my balls whilst writing a poem :)


Your poetry is ballsy and now I know why :D

Enjoyed it through and through. Original as always. Never a dull moment in your poems.

[AuntShecky]

Maybe everything comes down to variations to the chicken/egg question.Your images give a pretty clear picture of actual emotional stress. Which came first, the stress or the cancer? Each probably aggravated the other.

The conceit about the non-working buttons is apt, and "its one and only job" is a good one. But you've got the wrong "its" up there--no apostrophe.