Skip to content

zakschafer.com

it's about you

  • words; images
  • who is this; what are you
  • contact; connect
  • change; persist
  • again; home

Category Archives: Poetry

your friend brings his brother to your boat and this brother forgets his water bottle so returns minutes after leaving and you give him the water bottle and also a bag of trash to take to the parking lot dumpsters

maybe it is important
to remember
difficult days,
even or especially
when all we want is to
forget.

Posted byZakAugust 12, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

the planet is getting hot and ya that might be “bad” for many species including humans if we are to say “extinction” and “bad” are synonymous but to the planet a desert is no more bad or good than a glacier and this is what you call luck

the ink i pressed
repeatedly over
and over repeatedly
into my skin,

Posted byZakAugust 9, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

three bears shot to death and plastic cans cannot possibly contain all that we desire and then tire of

there’s only so much
time to get it
down, to get it
done, to do it.

Posted byZakAugust 8, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

i’m elated. i am terrified. i hope for what i see, when i get there

it’s hard for me
to sit cross-legged.

Posted byZakAugust 6, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

Harbor Mountain Road in mid-July comes up through the floorboards

visit https://feedlitmag.com/ to see this poem. Issue 2.27

Posted byZakAugust 4, 2021November 13, 2021Posted inPoetryLeave a comment on Harbor Mountain Road in mid-July comes up through the floorboards

i’m told i should edit so i look across the channel at the broken hillside//the vacancy of trees//the motionless machines

heart, i have lent
you to grief
for long enough.

Posted byZakAugust 3, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

i keep forgetting i have frozen organic fruit in my small freezer until i shove it aside to cram in more ice cream

most times people
can’t tell when you talk
to them from hell.

Posted byZakJuly 30, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

speaking of failure is to a degree a failure so instead we speak of flowers that bloom independent of our meager measures

she is physically beautiful
to me, so i want
to talk to her.

Posted byZakJuly 28, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry2 Comments on speaking of failure is to a degree a failure so instead we speak of flowers that bloom independent of our meager measures

i was three days sober in a Minnesota campground and an unseen nocturnally barking dog drove me into a field and left me there alone

a woman in Alaska,
her face framed
by short cut thick
black hair, sits framed
in the window of a truck.

Posted byZakJuly 26, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry6 Comments on i was three days sober in a Minnesota campground and an unseen nocturnally barking dog drove me into a field and left me there alone

blades on Eddie Bauer//~//competition i devour

i’ve been being
cool.

Posted byZakJuly 24, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

the difference between a fjord and a bay is the way the tongue folds itself into the cleft between shadow and light

this version of
peace
is so foreign
to me.

Posted byZakJuly 22, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

someone in Japan “followed” my social media page and i think Japanese people are smarter than Americans and i know that isn’t true and know i think a lot of things that aren’t true, or; curb your enthusiasm season 7 episode 6

it is evening and Summer
is still Summer.

Posted byZakJuly 20, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

i would like a discount on a credit card reader and as this want has gone unheeded, i decide to deride those who have found capitalistic success

morning,
made shy by
window coverings.

Posted byZakJuly 17, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

i watched a 13 year old girl of less than 100 pounds kick the face clean off another, terrified, i have been scrabbling like a duck ever since

thank you
for your wishes
of kindness.

Posted byZakJuly 15, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

seams split, fabric fades and comes back vividly

walk through a parking
lot, mountains in
the distance ahead
of me, mountains
under unfathomable gallons
of ocean behind me.

Posted byZakJuly 13, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

it looks very inviting

a man, walking by
with coffee in his warm hands,
stops into the small shop
i am in, saying,
“the window looks
more open and bright,
it looks very inviting”.

Posted byZakJuly 12, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry1 Comment on it looks very inviting

i worked in a wine shop with an Italian man who would say with a shrug, “for me, it is good”

make it
more
palatable.

Posted byZakJuly 10, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

the girl i don’t know at all is here and she is my nemesis and wouldn’t you know it but she has that golden down snap neck coat just like i’ve always coveted

i think i’m manic
again, i think i think
i think i think
too much
and i think i’m
manic again.

Posted byZakJuly 9, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry1 Comment on the girl i don’t know at all is here and she is my nemesis and wouldn’t you know it but she has that golden down snap neck coat just like i’ve always coveted

most of my friends don’t have time to talk so instead i talk to dreams

people in positions
of traditional leadership
rarely lead in
any meaningful way.

Posted byZakJuly 7, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry1 Comment on most of my friends don’t have time to talk so instead i talk to dreams

my friend Rick in Washington who i have never met and do not know at all was supposed to send me an email confirming the reality of a 10 pound box of tart red cherries, dried.

we have
very specific preferences in how
we communicate;
give me eyes, give me
pupils.

Posted byZakJuly 6, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

people walk by on the dock, looking into my windows. mostly, when we see each other, they quickly avert their swimming pool’d eyes

i do not know
how this plumbing
works, in a floating
home made of plastic.

Posted byZakJuly 5, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

odd electronic music from Japan, black coffee from Guatemala, beguiling human body from a confused planet

even dread
has its excitement.

Posted byZakJuly 3, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

the theme of the week is “hot” and the theme of the month is “pride” and the theme of the day is “neither cold nor shameful, but mild and fatigued”

in the parking lot
with the 12 portly black rubber
dumpsters, a man
pulls up in his beaten gray
gas wheezing vehicle.

Posted byZakJuly 2, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

emptying a tube of silicone onto the toe rail of a sailboat in an effort to stop a chronic leak ahead of an impending rain storm

every day is a nice day

Posted byZakJune 30, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

mostly i write so i can titularly quote Denis Johnson, and mostly i wake to ocean so as to know how to breathe

i know a man, know that he
exists, though know little else
of him

Posted byZakJune 27, 2021August 15, 2023Posted inPoetry

Posts pagination

Newer posts 1 … 20 21 22 23 24 … 28 Older posts
  • YouTube
  • Instagram
zakschafer.com, Create a website or blog at WordPress.com
  • Subscribe Subscribed
    • zakschafer.com
    • Join 75 other subscribers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • zakschafer.com
    • Subscribe Subscribed
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar