Joseph Pinto, the barflypoet

here’s a poem from my ‘bar observations’ pile. yes, it really happened. yes, the dude shred air like nobody’s business. and yes, i got all kinds of f***ed up that night.        ‘front row’   he played the meanest air guitar i ever did see.   scotch after scotch i drank and when he paid his tab i begged for a curtain call.  * ‘DEAD BIRD’ ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. P...

it’s too late for that now, isn’t it?   ‘end of the trek’   all i want is for one person to recognize the amount of pain i endure on a daily basis and to hear the words how are you before i quit.  * ‘DEAD BIRD’ ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * &...

i want to rip her open… i want to be back inside her skin… ‘edacious’   a year since we’ve truly spoken. tack another half just to twist my guts. rationality wipes scores from the wall but fingers persist the death spiral down. a hole to another universe swallowed the sheetrock and it’s just as good cause it hides the cavity my fist punched through. i miss you. and if you come back to my world aga...

what is love to you? is it about doing the little things? or is it simply about one thing few know little of – showing up.     ‘close but no cigar’   you did everything but love me. * ‘DEAD BIRD’ ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,&...

i call these my ‘throwaway pieces’ or my ‘fillers.’ snippets of something that come to mind while i’m in-between poems or actually in the middle of writing one. when that happens, i’ll stop the poem on a dime, quickly jot down the words i see in my head, then resume. i’ve shared a lot of them & don’t give them a second thought. to be honest, sometimes i don’t think they’re very good. but they...

‘what buries’   (from dead bird)     keep bones in palms anything other you are a liar silence is violence too dirt for the flower shelter for its seed   aren’t we all in love with someone else faked until time comes due   and what flees from breast we cannot cage despite the sorrow and all the aching   what buries does not keep dirt what buries does not keep dirt.  * ‘DEAD BIRD’ ON SALE AT AMAZON...

‘set me straight’   my urging maddened a long master steeped bitter death thirst under diseased and heedless skies so very strange the senses, and her placed finger upon lips— “everything perishes,”  she roils her brightness a ruby gone undiscovered who could question or spin from her gravity; perhaps her pale hands will harness something other than a passing one day. i wait shivering under the  s...

‘thumbs’   your lips inclined for summer i filled your lacking chest   with unpublished form and desire as a great artist would but so much more confessional   and like idle draperies, you hung autumn conversations before nights grew long,   or familiar   or hastened, and dark,   without evidence  of the complete picture i believed you would be.  * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet...

go to the local bar. not a party bar. a dim gritty local bar. sit. order a drink. settle yourself in. listen closely. feel the energy. read the faces. allow the stories into your pores…   ‘r.i.p. social media’   funeral services will be held today for all the martyrs that write of their inconsequential woes while down at the local bar tears fill the beers of the woebegone and forgotten. * ‘DEAD BI...

when love was actually at the bar…   ‘romance is dead’   they hold hands on their way out of the bar.   stares, the stares eyes boring into their backs. * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,' 'From My Front S...

old poem here, but i still remember this moment, still remember the tullamore dews being passed over my notebook and thinking to myself ‘i hope no one spills their shots.’ of course,  i  was the one to spill his shot on my notebook then furiously dabbed at the puddle atop the page. this poem serves as a lesson that sometimes the ‘you’ i write about is actually self-reflective.   ‘it never dries’  ...

‘she’s here’   simplicity what passion should be the great white canvas brushed no explanation a gaze that shines in the vacuum.   illusion stitched behind the lids, i have longed to perceive, to know tactile existence, conditioned for a height i’ll fall living;   and then she slipped  like christmas into my mouth, a gift, and left my tongue of cloves,   and the tearing sound of sight beautiful an...

‘writer’s block of lovers’   desperate to express how much he misses her his pen loses all penchant for words. * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,' 'From My Front Steps,' 'Scotch and Scars' and...

‘long night’   i don’t want to go home.   a hangover and hell awaits. * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,' 'From My Front Steps,' 'Scotch and Scars' and 'A Distilled Spirit' poetry collections available in paperback an...

‘hypocrisy’   the hypocrisy you unfurl like a banner from your tongue  a bold statement to the world:   your windows are free of streaks;   your rooms an absolute mess.  * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,' &#3...

‘how do they stay together’   he talks she listens   and listens and listens   listens. * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,' 'From My Front Steps,' 'Scotch and Scars' and 'A Distilled Spirit...

‘four guys in the corner of the bar’   a motley crew their voices rang  uneducated, inebriated barely tolerated; their spouses relieved they weren’t at home.  * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,' 'From My F...

‘quiescent’   a draw between lips, a capture within lungs. i fear this air may be no good for me. it tastes of what you took and what i gave and already repeats. there’s a stirring come november, a chromatic death dust around my tongue and i can count all our late-night conversations spiraling slowly, slowly in the wind. why are you not here to pull snug against my neck? there’s a bite to the sky...

‘blame the signal not the service’   "there’s a disconnect," she says.   he scrolls their  long trail of messages and  finding no apparent betrayals  realizes he has simply been unplugged.  * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside ba...

‘avoid’   i’m doing everything i can to avoid you which is hard because the distance between us is so great anyway.    * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,' 'From My Front Steps,' 'Scotch and Scars&#...

‘her abstract is fucked up’   upon the wall her latest creation twisted abstract; wire for bone—   window shades where eyes flutter   hole in sheetrock for the jagged heart.   * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,&#3...

‘conversation has lost us’   we must be disillusioned staring out into the great void thinking we can traverse oceans in paper boats.   the messages we carry to ferry us one coast to the next will only dissolve upon contact with water bleed one letter into next.  * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment cra...

‘hide behind the words’   on and on she declares her strength to the world every syllable shining while the conviction behind it remains shaken. * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,' 'From My Front Steps,&#3...

‘denial’   he never had a drinking problem until he met her.   then the acceleration of heartbeat paired with the numbing slowdown of brainwaves became essential to his being.  * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,&#...

‘cell phone’   i’m not ignoring you , she said as her thumbs danced   eyes lied. * ‘DEAD BIRD’ NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON!  * #barflypoet #josephapinto © Joseph A. Pinto * Poetry served raw and unedited from the moment crafted. The large majority of my poetry handcrafted from inside bars. * 'dead bird,' 'From My Front Steps,' 'Scotch and Scars' and 'A Distilled Spirit' p...