I've been on #Steemit since March. Like everyone else who was once new on the platform, the first few posts I made got hardly any votes at all, which means that most of my current readers are unfamiliar with some of the gems from my first couple of months here. That's why today I decided to re-post a couple of poems that each had their own Steemit post very early on.

Neither poem is "new" in the sense that they are recently written. They are actually a few years old. Of the two, I like "Old Goth" better. I'm sure you'll have your favorite, as well. And I believe they speak for themselves, so no need to belabor the intro. Enjoy!

Image from Pixabay.

Tattoo

Say young lady with the soft blue eyes
do you wear pink for comfort
or for style? Does your hair
flow like a river perpetually
as it does naturally,
and the ring that decorates
your brow, does it glimmer
in the moonlight
the same way it reflects the midday sun?
Do you sip dry martinis
with those wet lime-red lips?
And what do you do on Sundays?
Do you sleep in
or rise early for hotcakes and coffee?
Is your life bland and dull
or tart and sweet
like the perfume you wear?
Did your diamond-studded nose
come attached to your figure;
did it come with the complementing
pierced navel and silver barbell
for your flat tummy,
your uninhibited belly, buttoned
with desire,
or was that special order?
Do you love fine art
as much as you inspire science
and do you read for pleasure
like the wind that brushes the skin
of your legs
like a book cover hugs too close?
Will you caress the gentle hands
of my knowledge, knead the hard
look of my wandering globe,
and will you lift the fabric
of your melting
dancing
stare
and show me
your newest tattoo?

Old Goth

Thigh-high boots glow with kiwi.
At eighty five, she still wears black
from toe to pale neck. Sagging
bags pull beneath her eyes,
dragging them down
like the chains hooked
and dropping from her ears,
dipping, dangling, drooping, all
beagled out. Her lips puff, powdered
blue with punk, purse, flesh out
dull cheeks like biscuits in a fry pan.
Plunges forward her walker
with the gusto of a tired farmer
plowing his field at the end of the sun
and when she reaches the edge
of the churchyard, stops!
clutches her hat, her heart, freezes
stiff as the cancer stick bursting
from her calloused, cracked knuckles,
then stands like a garden gnome
till the caretaker comes to take her home.

Which poem is your favorite?

Be sure to check out my poetry collection "Rumsfeld's Sandbox" at Amazon.

Join us in the Speculative Fiction Writers of Steemit Discord group where we get weird, horrific, scientificky, and fantastic in strange and beautiful ways.