I’m old enough now to admit,
I’ve slept with far too many women
which is practically less than a fraction
of the number of women I desired.
In a way I’m saying
not nearly enough, is plenty.

I am trying to make the book see my name in print in the next edition
for the most reads of a poem on Hp with no hearts, shares , or collection reposts , sans comments, just ignored so well it breaks the records, if
Guinness has such a thing. Or possibly the most poems wroten bad
and worst punctuations, mark, my, word!

far out to sea
deep in wild woods
in the crisp dawn on the high desert
there are still places it can be heard
but it takes a heart to hear
it takes a labor of love

countless miles hand to the tiller
to find that brief moment
on the crest of a twenty foot breaking wave
as a nor'easter wilds the sea
when you glimpse it
in the stillness between heaven and earth

under the bewitching stars
in the anvil of desolation's wasteland
of high desert
on the cusp of the suns imminent rise
you can see it in the broiling fire
as the edge of the world itself burns

Take me off the pedestal
I am not what you see
That man's a miscreation
It's what i'd like to be

Take me off the pedestal
For it is far too high
For if I trip, slip, or fall
You'll think I was a lie

Take me off the pedestal
One cannot comprehend
To think 'tis where I stand
Make me not king, but friend

Take me off the pedestal
I've never felt so wrong
But please, oh please keep me in
your heart- that's right where I belong

So they flee; once beautiful narratives detached from me and took off running.
For my own sake, I eventually follow and take off hunting.

Crossing the bridge to the ocean, finding no words above or beneath their pillars or the sun-setting shades on the water in motion.

Maybe I'll find the words perched on the bridge as a little black bird, who mirrored me in a way that resonated with my soul but whose tune sang not one melodic word.

I go to the ocean, and heavy waves collapsing onto beds of sand sighed no release for me, and I leave.

Home, I paint a picture and coaxed a thousand  empty words out of it, that rang like broken records and sang to me deep into the night.

I awake to a blizzard, beautiful white.
A cold I felt I'd brewed with my mind
So I try and dive into a novel only to find my mind's waters shallow, and the pages became no more than ink printed paper.
I think myself incapable;

I look to the bottle, mostly white,
It sat on my nightstand by white papers that so longed for me to write.
I kick my head back and let the words pour from the bottle and back into me, loosening my grip, they could finally flow free.

For walls and a roof... sitting on the floor.
Broken dreams are like shattered glass.
Don't move! You will get hurt.
You will always get hurt when your dreams are broken and your hopes shattered.

The light is broken and it's dark outside.
Can't tell where there is a door or window.
Escape out of side. So why look for it?
You will only get dissapointed when you hope to find something in the utter dark.

Jokers and knaves are wild cards
As ever they were
What fateful houses these make
Breath-held balancing
Precarious shelters
Gamblers and wanderers
With tumbleweed roots
Clinging air instead of earth
The stuff of fools and stars
And someone's days and years
Are made only of this
This thrilling despair

Jokers and knaves and kings and queens
And some of subtler meaning
Mean nothing but paper
Numbers and trembles
Dry-mouthed mumbles
Prayers to a ruthless god
With no reason to pity fools
And a dark love of sacrifice
Yet still desperate belief
Huddled behind swollen eyes
Contradicts every probable outcome
And falls and spins

                        By Phil Roberts

It snowed today and I hope
the plows find your body
under a snowdrift. I hope
you are frozen to the core.