Poster:	jbradley
Date:	2002-11-13 12:38
Subject:	murmur
Security:	Public

murmur is poet/Orlando Slammaster j. bradley's latest chapbook on the emo boy press imprint. you can purchase it for $3.50 at the Broken Speech Poetry Slam or online for $4.50 (this price includes shipping and handling). if you do not have a credit card, please send a check (or cash) to j. bradley for $4.50 and mail it to

j. bradley
PO BOX 2301
Orlando, FL 32802-2301

click here to see the cover of the chapbook.

Poster:	heiwalove
Date:	2002-11-11 20:39
Subject:	yet another..
Security:	Public

Over Her

i know that she caresses your belly each night
your body a city she's lived in for almost a year
she no longer needs a map to find her favorite hiding spot
(maybe she never did)
that secret you keep buried beneath your left breast,
behind the backwoods waterfall
of your will

and did you know that when i close my eyes
and breathe
i can still feel the curve of your hip rising underneath me
your valleys, peaks, and shadows as familiar to me
as the rushing creek behind my childhood home..
i remember where ever sharp rock juts out
and the seaweedy taste of minnow-filled war as i plunged in
head-first and open-mouthed,
ready for the current to carry me away.

i could pick you out of a line-up
with only the sense of your presence to guide me.
i would recognize the soft pull of your kiss anywhere,
dizzy, blindfolded, my hands tied twice behind my back.
you are embossed onto the forefront of my history, and i wonder
if i've even made a smudge on the timeline of yours.

see, you're six years and more inside me -
as far back as lifetimes began, when we were both just ameoba
oozing through sludge and struggling to divide.
now suddenly we're twenty-something years old in a world that's
bursting apart at the seams
where i don't know anything for sure anymore except
that i love you
i mean,
when i heard you were in love
and happy
and found
your river poured out of me
(seaweed and all)
and i smiled
just a little.

Poster:	heiwalove
Date:	2002-11-11 20:36
Subject:	and another..
Security:	Public

Vision

it was bitter cold that night
in that "seedy" part of Minneapolis
that part mom and i sailed through in silence
and locked car doors on the way to overpriced violin lessons
every tuesday after dark

i would wipe the icy fog clean from my passenger-side window
and look out past drunks vomiting up acidic dreams in forgotten alleyways
junkies pumping liquid amnesia into veins bruised purple
with the desperate desire to become
something else entirely

i didn't understand my mothers' fear - maybe because
they were just like me, only a few steps closer to where
the edge becomes air

but that night it was saturday
not tuesday
and suddenly i was 19 and walking to our favorite coffeeshop hangout
the neighborhood was the same
the junkies were the same too
not a day older, it seemed, but still sunken
and staring into endlessness with swimming eyes

i reached for the door
my bare hand leaving a fine layer of skin like silt
stuck to the broken metal knob
(it was so fucking cold outside)
"shit," i cursed (or screamed) under my breath

inside
my face stung needle-like as blood rushed back
in hurricane waves
filling my outer capillaries to the brim
until i thought they would surely burst

it was then that i first
saw her
sitting alone
engaged in a written conversation with the old mute man who
returned every night to commune
with the fish

she looked up at me
and smiled

something jolted inside me then
our locked gaze like prolonged
electric shock therapy
i tore myself away after time stood frozen
after seconds or minutes or hours had passed
and followed my friends back into the frigid winter air

i folded into myself
to hold body heat in
as we left i thought i saw her frantically motioning for me
to come back inside, eyes pleading
but i quickly brushed it away
gone
only the remaining remnants of
a hopeful hallucination

[three years later]

last night
i dreamt of this woman whose name
i still don't know
whose face has gathered dust in the outer lining
of my re-memory

but i can still feel her dark eyes penetrating my skin
her wild hair like a dangerous halo haphazardly
framing her soft round face

and i wonder

who are you
you with whom i shared a stare of quiet infinity
you who turned my blood to boiling ice in a glance
did i conjure you up in the freezing Minnesota night
were you an exhaustion-induced vision
my guardian angel in fiery human form
my lover come to return from six lives past?

imagination grabs me then and i think maybe-

maybe

we were two warriors together
in that far-off time when women's blood ruled the world
and we prayed at the foot of the goddess
and understood our connection to the earth and
cut off a breast not to remove deadly cells but
to better our aim
and maybe..

maybe

Shhh, she whispers. Listen.

in my dream, she says we will meet again.

and this time, she promises

to tell me her name.

Poster:	heiwalove
Date:	2002-11-11 20:33
Subject:
Security:	Public

hi. my name's heather. this is my first post here. feedback of any kind is always greatly appreciated.:)


armageddon

there is a war outside my window.
there is a war on my tv.
between the static of blaring CBS news coverage i see the smoke black and rising
from bones and steel rubble
thousands of innocent lives snuffed out and only screams and tears remain with the
stench of rotting bodies and thick smoke whispering like ghosts of corporate
capitalism and western imperialism stinging my eyes with death and destruction but
somehow
my vision has never been so clear.

on this day my city is breaking like the shattered hourglass of time is ticking and this
is only a bitter taste of the armageddon this red white and blue land of freedom from
truth has been waging on the world for 500 years so white folks in suburbia can sip
their lattes and rest comfortably in sweatshop Adidas and Tommy Hilfiger jeans
made on the breaking backs of Black people in slavery and stained with the blood of
Mexican migrant workers kicked off their land by Big Brother NAFTA, paid 25
cents an hour to lose limbs, lives, and humanity to heavy machinery while their
children starve, alone, empty-bellied, and crying.

i am sitting on my couch, open mouth and tears locked behind eye sockets, staring
out my window.

there is a war on my tv fading in and out and for a moment i wonder is this theater is
this a bad prime-time drama is this late-nite jerry springer but no, this is reality,
carefully framed and twisted for your ultimate viewing pleasure.
in one breath we're dropping bombs and food mixed with coca cola and disneyland
on afghanistan, topped with sugar-coated marachino cherries and empty promises.
the leaflets fluttering from killer planes say "we come in peace" while bombs rip
through children and explode in the faces of old men but it doesn't really matter,
don't distrub my morning coffee with sugar imported from colonial haiti or my jane
fonda workout video cuz that's over there, where "terrorists hide in shadows", the
men wear turbans, and all the children are brown.

there is a war on my tv and Tom Brokaw says United We Stand, Dan Rather says
we're fighting for freedom and all these white men with their clean white-right robotic
words cower behind stars and stripes and red white and blue but they never mention
that the tag on their beloved "freedom" flag reads "made in afghanistan."

there is a war on my tv and they're saying now we live in fear, but some people have
never had the luxury of safety behind white skin, heterosexuality, 2.5 kids, and the
american dream.
Bush wants to "hunt down the terrorists" but the white sheet of patriotism is skewing
his vision, ignorance is bliss and white supremacy is a blinding light - when he looks
in the mirror does he see his own face, does he really think this is alright?

Malcolm said the chickens will come home to roost and now our reflection is staring
back at us in cold blood. i see Colombia, Vieques and Panama, and US sanctions
on Iraq, bombs in the middle east and our tax dollars paying for the systematic
murder of Palestinians and the decimation of Afghanistan, mass genocide across the
Prime Meridian. there is blood on these white hands and i can't, i can't, i can't wash
them clean. 4 cops with gleaming smiles stand trial for killing Diallo, 41 bullets
pumped into a Black man with hope and a wallet in his back pocket. "we thought it
was a gun" they say and that's good enough for new york kangaroo courts that serve
justice like filler meat at Mickey D's and eat white supremacy for breakfast, lunch,
and dinner. and it doesn't stop there - there's Baez and Ferguson and Dorismond
and the list goes on and on - Black men become names, numbers, statistics (stolen
lives) before the night becomes the dawn.

there's a war on my tv and now they're justifying racial profiling in the name of
national security. in this time of crisis only clean white purity can wear the stamped
seal of red white and blue approval. you might be too Arab, too Muslim, too
Mexican, you might just have brown skin a green card and a nail clipper and be
detained in an airport for 4 hours by white cops getting off on racism and institutional
power.

so there's a war on my tv and it's gettin' kinda fuzzy now, reception fading blinking
from black and white to color and back again - red blue and you're either white or
you're against us you're either white or you're a terrorist you're either white or you're
-bleep- not at all. see, this is history repeating the wash cycle the rinse cycle - we're
bleaching all the red socks white. this is a record skipping, round and round and
somehow the needle always gets stuck on racism, imperialism, and mass genocide.
the gerbil is running and running in circles on his little metal wheel and we're gonna
have to stop the cycle, we're gonna have to break through the cage if we're ever
gonna be free, if we're ever gonna breathe again, if we're ever gonna see an end to
this bloody armageddon.

Poster:	mormy16
Date:	2002-11-10 01:48
Subject:
Security:	Public

Something of me is like a faded memory
Lost awhile
From gaps and turns

How much my own story seems to burn

Kind of like love, but then again I wouldn?t know that now would I

We?re not supposed to love each other, just not hurt one another..
So what does that mean to you?

Where has my story gone.. Is it just another faded memory?
Will these words matter in the end?

Will anyone cry over them.. Wondering what went wrong

What they could?ve done to help?

How could u have when you are part of the problem?

This isn?t where I was supposed to go?

Poster:	mormy16
Date:	2002-11-10 01:02
Subject:
Security:	Public

Come One Come all
To the best auction of them all
Everything has a price
Everything of hers? is very nice

Her brain is on sale for a penny or two..
In mint condition.. It has never been used

Neither has her lungs or kidneys?
Pure and clean

Come Hemingway, have I got something for you!
She didn?t spend any time on her back..
The back.. Mint Conditon, that?s how you like your women .

What sir?
?
No I believe her heart is not up for auction?
But we have a fine spleen or colon, I believe that is what u really want.
? Well, we just didn?t think it was in as good condition as the others?.
?. To hard? to cold,
may I suggest another.


Her hands are nice and strong to?
She a little banged up from trees and sports..
But they will do

Her skin is fair
Very nice color and smooth
.. Oh we didn?t notice those blemishes
?. Yes madam they are as clear as day?
?. We had a whole person to go through we can?t notice EVERYTHING!
Will half price do?

It?s her soul her soul!
Such a great deal,
Like her brain.. In good condition..
Hardly used.. Beside a tear or two.

Wait, there seems to be some mistake
Her sole, indeed we did not take.
We found she sold it a long time ago?

Her legs.. Yes they are very? nice
They know each other very well.

Her stomach now that?s a fine piece..
Hardly there.. Never used much..
You think it not fair?
Why, it?s hardly even there!

Come one Come all
to the greatest Auction of them all !

Poster:	gaminequeen
Date:	2002-11-10 00:20
Subject:	Stream of conciousness
Security:	Public
Mood:	amused

I'll just let the thoughts tumble out
red uncrumbling dustlike and alien shallow unsee
falling between the cracks in the floorboards
red rusting on iron of strength growing old and frail
moonlight on metal thats been frozen one too many times.

broken razored edges knifing through silk
water falling faster shaping words sinking velvet
bright untamed freezing chocolate grazing a cheek
a thigh a thought a whisper a word more words broken
shattered a crumbledown shape sinking shaken
still in moonlight aged with rust sifting through
brittle laughter and caked crying grinning brazen
broken

That's what happens when I let my mind wander around midnight. >:) Please offer me a/some random word/s in response? Sense is optional.

Poster:	jbradley
Date:	2002-11-07 14:31
Subject:	time to play the game
Security:	Public
Mood:	apathetic

your throat is a thesaurus,
breathing variations
of maybe,
never defining your emotional declarations.
validify
is a word that holds no weight
as you wait, watch, and see
what i will do next.
this is a private plot point pitfall
i won't fall into.

if you want me, don't trick me
into playing an emotional Monopoly.
"i'll take your love, your sighs, your smiles
for the price of your self-esteem,"
your eyes telegraph. i can see
the hopeful gleam of yes on the surface
and your deviousness beneath.

a younger man wouldn't see through your plan,
let you guide him with your hands on the string.
make him dance, make him sing,
put him away when you sting
from the guilt you conceal
because you know you won't make his wishes real
of being with you.

i have played these games before.
sometimes lost, sometimes scored.
but i always know the score
before i step into any situation
and have at no less than three escape plans.
i will not let my feelings become consecrated
by blood, sweat, tears and fears
of spending another night alone.

i will give as much as i get
and if you don't care
then i won't either.
all you'll see is ether
when you look into my eyes
because to you, of you, with you,
i'm numb inside.

lover, i remember when i used to hover over you
just to watch you sleep, breathe & wonder if i was in
your dreams.
it was the only moment of beauty
we shared
between splitting hearts with shears
of anger and regret.

i'm not asking you to choose
between me or him or her or him.
i expect nothing but ambiguity from you.
but what i do know is
i beat your game
by not playing it.
i foil your plan
by not following it.
i don't become part of your silent soap opera
by burning the script.

i win
by walking away today
and never looking
back.

copyright by j. bradley 2002

Poster:	paleyellow
Date:	2002-11-06 14:08
Subject:	splitting up
Security:	Public

i've stuck my neck out
shouted your name
won your battles
tossed aside disbelief

i've held your hand
sucked your lips
breathed in your
smell beneath your
hips

i've loved you once
your fading fast
i still hold you close
as the time dwindles past

i've poured my love
into your glass
you drank me down
and suffered fast

as i for you
the time has gathered
no more as one
but two souls sour
approach a world
i've never known
to be without
to be alone

Poster:	onelostsoul
Date:	2002-11-05 18:31
Subject:
Security:	Public

They, who numberless, closed thousands of sunsets still



Who numberless, closed thousands of sunsets still
To wait out the weary at the bejewelled sky's will
Soaking silver in the vast pools of night chill
In a dance captured by symmetrical skill
Cold distances to burning bright destinations
Freezing flames of which we know little or none
Next to circles encircled untouched by the sun
A nova of this envy will turn two to one
They, who numberless, close the days and open the night
To wash out the infinite empty plight
In opening blind's eye to pry out the bright
At their signs, taken for granted with delight

Poster:	mormy16
Date:	2002-11-05 17:07
Subject:
Security:	Public

her fingers dancel lightly on the fogged up window,
A fargone look on her face as she remembers her lost youth,
decides to compinsate by maintaning innocence and purity.

Poster:	jbradley
Date:	2002-11-05 14:37
Subject:	unleash
Security:	Public

bring the acoustic guitar
bring the violins
bring the pain
seething from fresh scars
cuz i'm at the breaking point
pickin' up molecules of myself off the floor
tryin' to hold on
tryin' to keep it together
as i swim through this clusterfuck
of broken promises and fractured dreams.
i'm still surprised i've kept breathing
this long
cuz everything's gone wrong and the seasons in my chest
have shifted from sweet summer
to bleak winter
with winds whipping across my skin.
open wounds sting
with the rings
that sing time along.
what's goin' on?

bring the acoustic guitar
bring the violins
bring the pain
seething from fresh scars
cuz i'm at the breaking point
if my body is a temple then i'm gonna fuck up this joint
with masochistic behavior.
i'm lucky i don't drink when i'm depressed cuz i'd turn broken glass into razors
with my blood turnin' into fire
as it would drip
out the open portals of my wrist.
i wish i could list
the things that have gotten me to this point
but i gotta keep it together
and not let the velocity of depression
compress my bones into ash
cuz i gotta be the phoenix that rises from the cinders.

bring the acoustic guitar
bring the violins
bring the pain
seething from fresh scars
cuz i'm at the breaking point
and i gotta hold on to the poetry
that has maintained my sanity
since i could breathe
and weave the fissures
that split my atoms,
that's the stratagem.
give me the pen.
ink is cleansing fire.
release me.
release me.
release me.

fuck the acoustic guitar
fuck the violins
fuck the pain
cuz i can open up skies
and unleash rain
which will seal and clean
instead of seep and bleed
all i need to do is believe
that things will get better
and keep
breathing.

copyright by j. bradley 2002

Poster:	jbradley
Date:	2002-11-04 23:13
Subject:	fragile galaxies
Security:	Public

my fingers cradle your face
like a priceless vase
counting the freckled stars stretched out
from cheek to chin
and i connect them, tracing letters and shapes.
fingertips devour the texture of sighs
as i look into your eyes
before we draw closer
and our lips close
this space between us,
love and lust.
'this could be the last moment we have,'
you say.
'let's make it last.'

you are fragile, protected
unable to let
anyone in,
even me.

instead of looking towards the future,
you cloaked yourself in the past.
instead of 'us,' it was you and i,
poisoning optimism with doubt
to the point your touch feels like sutures
desperately holding back an expanding wound.
i could shout
i care for you, i love you, i need you
but all you would hear is the tick and the tock
of the clock
waiting for it all to end
instead of letting anything begin.
i don't believe in time limits.
they limit our capacity to feel.
if it happens, it's meant to be.
i want you to see.

i can't play acoustic guitar
or sing loud enough
to cut the electric fence round your heart
but i can weave words into embraces,
translating sound into faith,
faith enough
to believe in yourself
and believe
in me.

there are uncharted galaxies
in your skin.
give me the chance to explore you.
let me in.

copyright by j. bradley 2002

Poster:	thegerm1
Date:	2002-11-04 12:05
Subject:	Will the Day
Security:	Public
Music:	Mos Def- Black on Both Sides

Grey clouds blanket the sky, cool moist air trapped beneath the canopy test the borders of its confines, I feel it moving past me in frenzied brushes and see it in the branches and leaves of the trees above.
Soliloquies of birdsong ring from the heavens, the day thumps heartily like a heartbeat,
regulated by sun like the streetlights regulate the streets.
Beautiful like the midday ambience layed out in meadowbrooks and green pastures,
the feeling of the day is like a mellow east coast beat with rimshots for the snare.
I move through it freely, reflecting on the last time I saw things so clear as the crystal that I'm strollin in at the moment,
fastened to a pensive mindset like a hollow bass beat in Brooklyn bassments,
I'm a living Poetry,
live like punk shows and broken monoteny,
true to Flatbush, the place I love to be at,
see that,
I'm flow like water Personified,
third eye Peepin through 2 eyes,
which is how I came to the conclusion of persistence
as my current state of mind.
What do you see, when you look at a cloudy day?
I see hammond B3's and 16 bar solos that take Jazz away
into musical diety position,
like an imposition
on the four corners of my soul,
I'm only 4 beats away from
bringin it to the true meanin of rock 'n roll.
And I'll keep noddin my head,
until a nightengale lights on my windowsill,
and makes me disconnected my car from this train of thought
and free my mind and walk through the next day,
conscious of that which should be His to my will.

Poster:	paleyellow
Date:	2002-11-04 10:43
Subject:
Security:	Public

she latched the clothespins tight
as she hung my bleeding heart upon her line

Poster:	jbradley
Date:	2002-11-03 00:50
Subject:	rollin up on yo grill-emo style
Security:	Public

i drop rhymes
like you drop tears
after you've just watched Transformers The Movie
and Optimus Prime die.
have no fear
cuz the latest trend in hip hop is here
(after a couple of beers),
hardcore emo gangsta rap
with me bustin' caps
in your feelings
offerin' up more healin'
than the G's you spend on
therapy
hollah!

i'll drive down the streets in my El Camino
lookin' neato in my corduroy chinos
and my skintight sweater.
my rhymes make girls wetter
for boys with broken hearts.
don't start with me motherfucker
because you'll see me go emo
like Goku goes Super Sayian.
don't be hatin;
cuz you ain't conversatin'
your emotions
to make that lotion
between ladies legs pool
and form a love potion
for your tongue
to lap up
and i only like my emo hoochies with broken hearts
cuz they turn their torment
into really great sex.
got have a large inferiority complex
instead of a large dick
to satisfy these ladies
who collect tears off of Chris Carraba
or Conor Oberst
and see who can sell that shit on E-Bay first.
hollah!

uh oh! oh no!
oh shit! j. bradley's gone
super emo.
my hair's turned jet black
and my waist has gone slack
so i can breathe in my skintight Goodwill sweater
my rhymes will send you cockblocking frat boys and jocks
into a fetal position
while i'm making sweet love to your girl in missionary position
because i like to look into her eyes
to see the real beauty inside
as i'm inside
making her see the stars
that you could never make her see
and yeah this is cliche
but at least i can string together couplets
to offer you the poetic justice
that only hardcore emo motherfuckers like me
can dish.
pish
aw.
i'll make her go awwwwww
as she looks in awe
at the poem i wrote for her
the scars i closed for her
the way i worship her
with the slide of my hands
conducting her body like an orchestra.
hers is the only opera
i wanna hear.
can you hear this,
motherfuckers?
if you can,
hollah!

ladies, can you heal this broken heart
and jump start this frown i bear
if you can,
hollah back
cuz unlike any boy you've been with,
i'm for real.

i'm for real.

word.

copyright by j. bradley 2002

Poster:	luna_obscura
Date:	2002-11-02 10:50
Subject:	madness: a tribute to silent hill 2
Security:	Public

have you ever been chased by a pyramid head wielding a bloody spear through a labyrinth that makes the catacombs of paris look like child's play i have seen it all i have seen the most terrible things the gallows the noose with my neck in it i must repent...

Poster:	waterychan
Date:	2002-11-01 20:45
Subject:	Sweet Angel
Security:	Public
Mood:	nostalgic
Music:	Soul Du Jour - Here We Go Again

This is a poem I wrote on the Anniversary of my Aunt Daphne's death. She died before I was even born, so I never knew her, but I still felt unbearably sad that whole day, and decided to take it down in writing. It's not a sad poem, really. A bit emotional, yes. But I don't know. See for yourself.

( Here it is )

This is dedicated to my Aunt who was murdered in 1970, by her husband. The anniversary of her death was April, 25.


"Rest in peace...I never knew you, but I wish I had..."

Poster:	mormy16
Date:	2002-11-01 18:44
Subject:
Security:	Public

Those Crazy Nights

Tearful memories bend back,
away from the wave of sound
in the foreground.
Good Times
to be dissolved by petty gossip,
fear,
and Time.
Late night to Early morning conversations
as deep
as still.
Hidden secrets
cracked open
Souls poured out.

A kind work of a friend
whispered in the night.

tears, precious memories,
The Best Times of Your Life.

Poster:	paleyellow
Date:	2002-11-01 13:36
Subject:	deception
Security:	Public

step into the darkness
pull your hair up tight
turn around - walk away
never wanted to hurt
not like this
not with you

i felt her burning
the fire formed the light
flesh melting - dripping down
never wanted to hurt her
not like this
not with you

the bed was empty
you still lay next to me
cold bones - bitter envy
never wanted to hurt you
not like this
not with her

her grave was shallow
never to hold again
beautiful flower - torturing ivy
never wanted to hurt her
not like this

i never wanted to hurt her
not like this - not with you