Corduroy's Cove

Writer | Poet,... linktr.ee/vkcorduroy

[vkcorduroy]

Visit my poetry

on Substack

🖤💜

Corduroy's Corner | V. K. Corduroy | Substack

Click to read Corduroy's Corner, by V. K. Corduroy, a Substack publication.

[bk-poetry]

Maine Squeeze

Rubber bands are orange—road crew orange, caution tape orange. Someone's idea of mercy.

Scuttling sideways in the tank. No forward in twelve gallons of recirculated water.

One claw opens. Bubbles rise. Buzzing light makes everything the colour of a waiting room.

The cook's bandaged hands know the handling, firm. Assertive. Steel pot already boiling. Filled w/ the sea pressed to its lowest argument salt, iodine, & this. We tuck the bibs in. We use little hammers to crack shells, crunch & ruin & suckle butter drenched into a murder broken. Heavy boats return outside. Water is pewter. Patience. A depth we won't go, ourselves.

[babyfoxcollectionthings]

[vkcorduroy]

Wait For The Stars

Why cry now under stars

when you can cry later

under rolling clouds.

Pause your sobs

to peer at the greater nature

as they make their nightly rounds.

Follow your mind into odds

and sit in your heart's crater

made by life's frowns.

[prettylittledrafts]

something about me

I am trying, and sometimes it works.

There are days that are open windows,

and I can finally breathe without checking the air,

feel almost like someone whole.

But then memory slips in, a draft,

and suddenly I am holding them again,

the ones I loved,

the ones I still love,

the ones who learned there is something about me

that makes leaving easy,

that makes hurt feel deserved.

And the happiness goes sour in my mouth,

because how can I hold joy

when I have been so easy to drop?

How can I be something good

if I have been so easily undone?

So I punish it, the lightness,

fold it back into myself

like it never belonged to me.

And the loop begins again,

round and round,

until my past spills itself out,

messy and uninvited,

all over the present,

and I am standing in it again,

asking questions that feel older than me:

was I broken

because she couldn’t love me,

or did she look at me first

and recognize something already unworthy?

[velvetversesjournal]

Early morning light spills into the room

Blissfulness and tranquillity

After days of chaos

The woods call to me

Fluttering leaves whisper

Their stories dissolve with the wind

[notmarkcorrigan]

a poem about grief

the studio hums with sweat and ohms

faint musk of socks and surrender

teacher says "hip and heart openers"

and I almost laugh

as if the body were a lock,

and this practice the key

one breath in supta tadasana

and I come undone

salt water spilling from hidden fault lines

I didn't think was there before

the body is a vessel

it always keeps score

grief blooms from the hips, surprisingly deep rooted

in reclining mountain pose, my chest rises

two peaks split by grief

lips, trembling

lava tears, a small eruption

a hymn of release

the anger comes

sharp, red, absurdly alive

but beneath it only pain exists

tender and exposed

so I stay

let it flood,

let it name me

until I am new again

light, warm

a little less haunted

[reeces--pieces]

a new day in paradise

as above, so below, or so they say the wind blows right through bones your skin is a sail, but it gets in the way when all you've ever needed is to be still

lying in your bed as you look at the mirror yet again staring at the reflection of you we both know nothing will change soon trying to be perfect for the worst of me

spring comes, but i'm freezing still in comes the sound of the birds now reminding me that i'm not so alone as i watch the sun rise yet again

maybe it's not over just yet as long as the trees bloom as long as the grass grows as long as you look at me

[vkcorduroy]

Still neglecting my journal but still writing poetry

[vkcorduroy]

Maybe I'll start journaling again this month, maybe next month. Who knows.

[vkcorduroy]

Poetry telethapy is the new ventriloquy

[vkcorduroy]

In case they missed you, here are just 10 of my poems I've posted all together. 💜🖤

My Posted Poetry Thus Far

A few of random poems I've posted

[vkcorduroy]

Matchbox

A picture I made for one of my poems

My favorite thing from you is a matchbox with a dead dandelion inside.

The box has a picture of balloons, too many balloons, on the top.

The red striker is worn white and nearly smoothed.

The dried flower jumps when I open the box.

Its once yellow petals clump and curl for a kiss it will never receive.

The fluff is matted and resembles cotton.

The small, shriveled flower is fragile and is to never be touched.

My favorite thing from you is my heart that you gave back to me in a cheap casket.

[vkcorduroy]

Women In Writing

Some pages used to sleep in purses but now jump in the light. Hands that move out of habit know how to write.

Voices pressed into the margins, wit in what’s written, now slip out of quiet rooms and made themselves known.

No hour nor gentlemen’s rule could quiet the mind. Even behind borrowed names, they kept it growing.

Some strange dream stitched together caught fire and will never know smother. Who was once dismissed or those that were feared refuse to disappear.

Their voices we love to see, each choosing her own way. They wrote about resistance and rupture, about the body, the mind.

Some spoke in brief, sharp whispers. Some shouted without restraint. Some wrote openly for their time and never bent.

And the pages still carry them, even now after years. Words born from the embodiment of art will never fade. ✎﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏

This is a poem I feature in my article on Substack about amazing women who've influenced my writing. Check it out and see who I wrote about! 🔗⬇️

Women's History Month

A dedication to women in writing

[vkcorduroy]

My latest artwork. More below for how it appears on my Substack.

Link to the Women's History Month post

Women's History Month

A dedication to women in writing

[vkcorduroy]

Visit my poetry

on Substack

🖤💜

Corduroy's Corner | V. K. Corduroy | Substack

Click to read Corduroy's Corner, by V. K. Corduroy, a Substack publication.

[vkcorduroy]

Daylight Saving is nearly here. This is a poem I wrote recently.

Forsaker Mid Murmur

My mornings are getting bluer and bluer. The sun is calling me sooner and sooner. Some days I feel warmer and warmer. But still, I can’t break this sobber and suffer Nights continue to end bleaker and darker. Mid-night wakes find me brooder in somber. The shadow taunts me grimmer, “loner!”

[vkcorduroy]

My picture for my poem and post on Substack

Time Stolen, Regret, & Appreciation

To be honest, life is but a nightmare