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Vicki Kralapp Aug 2012
When I was just a child I went searching for my world,
one of sunlit days, adventure and beauty left unfurled.
Though these days were made to be the a key to set me free
I couldn’t have foreseen the cost that all of this would be.

As I look back on these memories I hoped to have it all,
I believed that love would listen and come answering my call.
I was certain love would find me as I filled my life with song.
Now I’d turn in all these moments for just the promise to belong.

At Oktoberfest with beer halls and the sound of German songs.
The mix of beer and smells of nuts floating through the noisy throngs.
Climbing  on the Untersberg up on Alpines mystic peaks
and attending cocktail parties with Gemany’s elite.

Climbing falls in Ocho Rios with some old and new found friends,
drinking coffee, eating lobster, and enjoying without end.
Driving through the darkened backroads from a day at Negril’s beach,
in a cab with songs of love and Marley counting down the beat.  

In Cancun lagoons were vivid and alive with swarming life,
seas of sergeant majors, parrotfish, and barracuda thrive.
in the Caymans packs of stingrays had become our closest friends,
as we played among them in  a world where the beauty never ends.

The fireworks over Sydney lit the bicentennial sky
while I look upon that moment now with disbelieving eyes.
Waves from the Prince of England as he sat by princess Di
when I left the land down under, well I felt like I would die.

As I watched the sun go down over Uluru’s gold peak,
and the sun rise over Daintree as we picked our morning feast.
digging oysters off the rocks by Nelligan’s foreshores,
I was certain with my best friend that I couldn’t want for more.

Remembering the ocean as I snorkeled though it brief,
in Queensland off the shore on Australia’s barrier reef.
The beauty in Belize nearly took my breath away,
and it seemed to me that God had made this gorgeous land to play.

Camping in the South Pacific beneath the skies and palms.
In the hills of South Dakota we went panning in the calm.
With the Eiffel tower, Louvre and Twilleries rounding out another day
And the visit to the gardens of Monet just made me cry.

It’s surreal to think of all the things I’ve done throughout this life,
and the blessings that I’ve gotten seem enough to make things right.
But the simplest adventure and the one I longed for most
was a man that I could count on and would love and hold me close.
All poems are copy written and sole property of Vicki Kralapp.
Tim Emminger Sep 2014
I can't wait until I get off at six
So I can head to Covington to get my Oktoberfest fix
To sit in Goebel Park's courtyard and listen to a German band;
with the German style Pied Piper Bell tower; the view is grand
At the Goose Girl Fountain, a walking German band can be found
I guess my heritage is ingrained but I like that sound
Brats with sauerkraut, roasted nuts and some German beer
Come on six o'clock I want to be there!
Written 9/16/14
John F McCullagh Feb 2015
Blessed are we all to live in a time
when the love of Craft beer exceeds that for wine.
Hops, malt and barley all now rule the day
When brewed up together in a nice I.P.A.
Who cares if some hipsters choose to babble away
about hints of oak in some obscure Chardonnay.
We are no longer limited to our father’s Budweiser.
The vast choice of beers would astound those old timers!
Cherry Wheat, pumpkin, and Oktoberfest
You’ll fall down on your face ere you’ve tried all the rest.
As Ben Franklin stated wittily and succinctly”
“Beer is the proof God meant man to be happy.”
Going for something refreshing and not too heavy
Scar Oct 2015
Last Friday night was one for the books
All of the misplaced soul mates
Found their way home from college confines
We cried in the face of Iron
And drank victory Wine as a welcome to an amber Autumn morning
He filled his front pocket
With our smoked out cigarettes  

Caramel hops in the spilled beer
Glued our voices together
Remembering
Past deaths and all those other kids who left
Are we the survivors?
Finally free to laugh among our best friends
Ink is stabbed into our aging skin
To place a memory on this night
To place a memory in the shape of our swaying bodies
To place a memory in our minds of orange bottle caps and a love stretched too far across the map
I step outside and feel my nose crinkle
Look to the sky and watch the V’s fly south
Walk through the woods and hear the leaves whistle
Take a deep breath and taste fall in my mouth.

A start to the happiest time of year
Everything’s changing like wind where it blows.
Squirrels hide acorns, scarecrows create fear,
Pumpkins make faces at kids and their clothes.

Delectable treats in bags and buckets,
Scary films to watch on the edge of your seat.
Kids running around creating ruckus,
Stomping on leaves in the street with their feet.

Lets not forget Oktoberfest and beer;
Where people gather ‘round to celebrate
A special event that’s held every year,
Something so special you can’t replicate.

Delicious mystery looms in the air
While evil spirits meander ‘round town.
Libra gives the torch to Scorpions heir
And leaves pile up into one big mound.

The autumn harvest is now creeping up
Making food to put on everyone’s plate.
A great time of year where change is a must
Because without change, nothing can be re-made.
g clair Oct 2013
Patterns are beautiful, made for the mind
repeating like seeding is safe to be sure
seeking to simplify, symmetry's kind
for rhythm needs weeding and rhyming's manure

what shoots from the seed is what God has put in it
but as for the crop, well it is all in our hands
the gift and the sower are so tied together
for everything planted has natural demands

and naturally we are the gift from The Giver
yet everything in us requiring care
practice and patience brings fruit from our talents
the giftings were planted to have and to share.  

Rhythm will gallop, a horse is a carrier
bringing the message to those who can hear
but some like to think that a rhyme is a barrier
blocking the flow of a message you fear.

I prefer waking to dreaming and napping
I tend to my garden and think as I ****
I work for a living, but energy sapping
I'll nap for a while and tend to my need.

Keeping the rhythm brings sleep to the soul
a sense of reality, comforting true
but once you are in it the pattern seems duller
and sleeping, mentality changes the hue

And isn't it good to be off of the grid
Hey poet! Come on then and let it pour out
where we can be freed from the usual bid
just open the tap and then capture the stout!

Fill up your mug with the amber to brown
out for amusment this cold autumn night
foam at the mouth, an oktoberfest clown
your writer desires a great ghastly fright

Hop on the ' Fear is',  it's not real scary
but simply a ride to a fabulous place
a mystery tour for the ones who are wary
unbuckle your belt and the heart starts to race.

Slowly the Fear Is beginning to lift you
go clockwise and wave to the folks on the ground
you wonder why Fear Is the name which was given
since riding this feels like a merry go round.

Peer through the branches
now bare in the darkness
searching for words
that are hanging like bats
the car starts a rocking
with door swinging open   
you're rambling bout nothin' but jeepers egats!

the floor opens up
now your seat is a kneeler
upon which you pray' for the down to come sooner
but onward and upward the wheel
unforgiving
keeps turning and climbing
with no time for rhyming
and you're just a windbag
along for the ride

closer to Heaven
beneath are the treetops
you're looking down farther
and out into blackness
the howling surrounds you
as wind blows in fiercely
in waves without pattern
just random and fragmented
moments unwritten
unplanned, unrehearsed
you're smitten and silly
both frightened and chilly
and groping for closure
your mind is immersed

below all this drama
you turn up your headset
and manage to drown out the
sound you might hear yet
it's still all around you
so far from the pavement
with nowhere to go and nowhere to hide!

While everyone down there
is bathed in the lamp light
the music is distant,
and riders are laughing
but you sit there babbling
for heights are your weakness
look up and then down and then closing your eyes!

you're nearing the top and the car starts to shudder
as if there's a quake and the pavement is cracking
you grab for the bar and it slips from your hand
you're  can't help but do it, you simply must stand!

the air seems to tempt you
to slide in your seating
toward the edge of your falling
and surely approaching
the top of the world and you laugh to yourself
in this floating dimension
you're drunk and alone and in knots
but it's good
'cause you're way up in Dreamland
rocking the cables
which hold you to safety
when suddenly everything suddenly stops!

Wait for a while
alone in the darkness
wondering what could be hap'ning below
a glitch in the workings, a crack in the coggery
what is the matter, your words aren't flowing

Dark days upon us, and wind chills can hover
you take down the canopy, blow off the cover
leaves scatter running and chased by the wind
but I, off my rocker am talked down again
carefully setting my feet on the ground
never quite getting away from the sound

it's that old beat for beat, that measure for measure
grapes of pure gall and fermenting displeasure
tasted enough to know this can't be real
while mashing my poems in the poetry wheel.
a dream is a ride that we write for ourselves
of our problems and faces we can't just erase

the dream tries to make sense of nothing quite sensibly
riding this dream I'm set free from the pace.
John F McCullagh Nov 2014
I have loved this time of year since the moment of my birth;
Its panoply of colored leaves that flutter down to earth.
I’ve loved the cool and bracing breeze, the fruits of harvest grown,
the sight of geese in Vee formation winging their way home.
My treks out to the cider mill for a warm mug or glass.
The times I’ve spent reflecting upon this year just passed.
I raise the collar of my coat against a sudden chill.
I feel cold winter’s icy breath drawing nearer still.
Please delay the Christmas tunes another week or two.
Oktoberfest is barely done, so sit and have a brew.
****** me not with chestnuts roasting on an open fire.
Winter just means shoveling, the snow piled ever higher.
Its days: short, dark, and dreary. Its nights are long and cold.
So I mourn Autumn’s passing with its gifts of red and gold.
Just something i schlocked together
AW Nov 2015
It hatched, the egg
Last time I was left
With a yokey substance
That only landed me
A hangover worse than
Ever imagined
Last week, though
Oktoberfest
Best idea ever
As the ***** wore off
The notion rose
To a higher plan
Whenever I am drunk again
I should remember
To never
Get out of bed
In the morning
Schnappsidee (German): An ingenious plan one hatches while drunk.
Ordinarily approximately sixteen days
of barley, hops and malt brew
to ale any even those who cannot chew
the cud subsequently most foods I eschew
courtesy maxiofacial malady
or lack of teeth perhaps even a few
that goot yanked out

after misshapen choppers grew
from uncommon body sites,
and I declare constituted hue
man dental dilemma –
somewhat dire oral issue,
yet now tis time to party
and imbibe whether gentile or Jew

in this 210th anniversary,
sans revelry nobody knew
boot beer brouhaha
actually named from German locale loo
cull hamlet that now sports
more’n 6 million stein ways that moo
after getting punch drunk

to rejoice at German reunification
October 3, 1990, hence new
reasonable rhyme referred
to occasion as unity day
held in an area Theresienwiese – phew
what a mouthful field, or meadow,
of Therese), where carousers queue.

Often called Wiesn for short,
located near Munich's center to gorge
on a wide variety of traditional food such
as Hendl (chicken), Schweinebraten (roast pork),
Schweinshaxe (grilled ham hock),
Steckerlfisch (grilled fish on a stick),
Würstl (sausages) along with Brezeln (Pretzel),

Knödel (potato or bread dumplings),
Käsespätzle (cheese noodles),
Reiberdatschi (potato pancakes),
Sauerkraut or Rotkohl/Blaukraut (red cabbage)
along with such Bavarian delicacies as Obatzda
(a spiced cheese-butter spread)
and Weisswurst (a white sausage).
Mateuš Conrad Sep 2018
in the end there are only two genres
in literature -

type 1:

a navy seal retires,
has lived his life and what not,
retires,
and then writes a book
about his life -

the sort of book that would
encourage you to live
the life he's lived...

   which is not going to happen -
no matter your literary drive -
the life isn't there -
and it's not exactly high-brow
literary ambitions that
is missing -
   it's simply that the life is
there,
   the Blitzkrieg selling rates
of such books,
people, "oddly" enough like
an authentically lived
experience to prop up the
dry narrative of:
what probably constitutes
ghost writers...
  a Casanova type of books,
autobiographies...

but wait...
what happened to the autobiography
genre?
    last time i checked,
all these reality t.v. celebs have
about 5 "autobiographies"
to boot...
   and they're what... licking 40
a.m. (our mortal god's years
of the fidgety limbs?) -
what's up with that?

    so it's not an autobiography per se...
memory loss, premature dementia?
i was misdiagnosed with that...
schizophrenia...
     that's fun...
what is?
   a misdiagnosis...
whenever i watch t.v. i play a game
of spotting a familiar face...
i'm usually right...
                photographic memory...
i can recognize a face...

        kind of a requirement living
in the labyrinth of outer
English suburbia...
    ******* ferris wheel quasi confusion:
but always speeding up...

type 1 books?
   a summary of a well lived life:
joined the army,
  traveled the world,
  learned Brazilian martial arts,
****** a lot of women...
began the day by jogging
at 3am with the milkman...
   books you should read in your youth
and be fed the desire to live
a symbiosis of it, imitate it...

funny... cloning is not a scientific
concept, physically...
sure... that much is true...
  but cloning a mind...
converting someone to pray five
times a day on a Persian rug?
   religion...
    religion was the first instigator
of cloning, prior to science,
cloning is such an old concept,
it predates the scientific breakthroughs...
how else?
you have to clone and replicate
the mind, before the body is
investigated as being enclosed in
the equivalent capacity for,
said, "conversion"...

            i guess for the elites
clones are much effective than what's being
fed for the bourgeoisie...
  look... the rich care more about
the poor than the middle class...
   because they know that the poor
can only pass on genes...
   which muddles the bourgeoisie, a lot...
it feeds them passing on
memes -
              less genes - more memes -
the rich can father replicas by passing on
both: genes... & memes...
the poor can only pass on their genes...
the bourgeoisie?
    they can't do both...
       and since they can't pass both...
they have concentrated on passing memes
rather than genes...

  and you know where that leaves them?
evidently sexless -
  or at least with a 0.5% rate
of population replenishment....
     not a nice place...

but that's only type 1 of literature...

type 2:
  the sort of antithesis of an autobiography,
someone that is on-going...
    gravitating toward an expansion
of a personal vocabulary...
   the sort of book, you can't write,
and never will,
   because it depicts a life:
            YOU DON'T WANT TO LIVE.
**** me, it would be grand to
live the type 1 literature,
settling in some comfy armchair aged
70, and reminiscing...
             you have that last *******
watching memory cinema,
you can lie, juxtapose through the fabric
of oncoming dementia
memory loss...
   life is dandy...
          but type 2 literature?
ever notice the ongoing onslaught with
wordings and linguistic observations?
those supposedly inorganic aspects of
language -
words acting as inanimate objects?
oh but they breath -
sure, they fall in and out of fashion -
but a flesh eating body of flesh
still managed to utter them,
somehow, never mind the etymological
genesis -
            only when there is
the complete slaughter of encoded language
will there be talk of an "etymological"
exodus...
   but that's beside the point...
this type 2 of writing?
    no magical life formula...
no joining the army,
or ******* a lot of women...
the whole sha-sha-bang!
                  
    in the end i hold dear to the fact that i'm
not a fiction escape-artist...
i hate escapism -
    esp. of a fictive nature,
well, fictive "nature" per se...
give me a philosophy book or
some obscure poem and i'll
turn a cognitive labyrinth into
a Pamplona bull charge...
    
as i also wanted to travel to Munich for
the Oktoberfest...
but never did...

   guess it's true:
   you can never get what you want,
might as well do with
what you have and must like it...
i.e. if you don't have what you
like: like what you have.

very few people write type 2 literature...
most write type 1...
       let's face it...
there's type 2A and type 2B...
     type 2A is fiction...
   escape artistry...
                
****... that's three genres then...
             type 2B has one motto:
my life is so ******* boring, that...
i decided to write...
                     well... "bored"...
rather... predictable...
                  but i can't imagine the horror
of having lived such a challenging
and exciting life of type 1...
and then reducing it to farting into
an armchair...
   and getting a ghost-writer to
script my open mic monologue...

             ah...
                  i'm sure that few people will
write a type 2B...
            too few people have
lost their "necessity" to dream while sleeping...
i stopped dreaming per se,
even if i do conjure up a dream...
it's so much *******,
so Jackson ******* that
     even Freud couldn't get
a cucumber or an oyster metaphor
out of it.
Bipasha Dutt Nov 2018
Autumn to me is most beautiful;
A season that's unique and graceful.

Most greenery have changed color
To crimson, purple, golden and amber.

Autumn sings the melody of harvest,
Brings seasonal brews and Oktoberfest.

Apples, pears, gourds and pumpkins are in plenty;
Mums, heath asters or golden rods add extra beauty.

Autumn also imparts an important lesson;
You will hear, when you intend to listen :

Gather the courage to let go,
Discard what is outdated or so.

Then open up and let new ideas flow.
Truth is, this is the only way to grow.

— The End —