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The stars still shone last night, and tasted pretty like my last sonnet;
And I still loved thee; and imagined thee 'fore I retreated to bed.
Ah, but thou know not-thou wert envied by t'at squeaking trivial moon;
It seduced and befriended thee; but took away thy sickly love too soon.
Ah, t'at moon which was burnt by jealousy, and still perhaps is,
Took away thy love-which, if only willing to grow; couldst be dearer than his.
But too thy love, which hath-since the very outset, been mostly repulsive and arduous;
And loving thee was but altogether too customary, and at gullible times, odious.
Ah, but how I was too innocent-far too innocent, was I!
Why didst I stupidly keepeth loving thee-whose soul was but too sore, and intense-with lies?
And at t'is very moment, every purse of stale dejection leapt away from me;
Within t'eir private grounds of madness; but evaporating accusations.
Ah, so t'at thou desired me not-and thus art deserving not of me;
But why didst I resist not still-thy awkwardness, and glittering sensations?
Oh, I feeleth uncivil now-for I should hath been too mad not at the moon;
For taking away thy petty threads, and curdling winds, out of me-too soon.
And for robbing my gusts, and winds, and pale storms of bewitching-yet baffling, affection;
But in fact thrusting me no more, into the realms of death; and t'eir vain alteration.
Ah, thee, so how I couldst once have awaited thee, I never knoweth;
For perhaps I shall be consumed, and consequently greeteth immediate death; within the fatal blushes of tomorrow.
But still-nothing of me shall ever objecteth to t'is tale of blue horror, and chooseth to remain;
And I shall distracteth thee not; and bindeth my path into t'at one of thy feet-all over again.
Once more, I shall be dimmed by my mirthlessness and catastrophes and sorrow;
Yet thankfully I canst becometh glad, for all my due virtues, and philanthropic woes.

I shall be wholly pale, and unspeaking all over me-just like someone dead;
And out of my mouth wouldst emergeth just tears-and perhaps little useless, dusty starlings;
I shall hath no more pools or fits or even filths of healthy blood, nor breath;
I shall remembereth not, the enormous fondness, and overpowering passions; for our future little darlings.
For my love used to be chilly, but warm-like t'ose intuitive layers behind the sky;
But thou insisted on keeping silent and uncharmed-a frightfulness of sight; I never knew why.
Now t'at I hath returned everything-and every single terseness to my heart;
I shall no more wanteth thee to pierce me, and breaketh my gathered pride, and toil, apart.
For I am no more of a loving soul, and my whole fate is bottomless and tragic;
I canst only be a lover for thee, whenst I am endorsed; whenst I feeleth poetic.
I shall drowneth myself deep into the very whinings of my misery;
I shall curseth but then lift myself again-into the airs of my own poetry.
For the airs of whom might only be the sources of love I hath,
For t'is real world of thine, containeth nothing for me but wrath;
Ah, and those skies still screameth towards me, for angering whose ****** foliage;
Whenst t'ose lilies and grapes of my soul are but mercifully asleep on my part.
I wanteth to be mad; but not any careless want now I feeleth-of cherishing such rage;
For I believeth not in ferocity; but forgiveness alone-which rudely shineth on me, but easeth my painful heart.
I hath ceased to believe in my own hand; now furnished with discomfort;
But still I hath to fade away, and thus cut t'is supposedly long story short.
I hath been burned by thee, and flown wistfully into thy Hell;
But so wisheth me all goodness; and that I shall surviveth well.
And just now-at t'is very moment of gloom; I entreateth t'at thou returneth to her, and fasteneth yon adored golden ring;
For it bringst thee gladness, which is to me still sadly too dear, everything.

Ah! Look! Look still-at t'ose streaks of blueness-which are still within my poetry on thee;
But I shall removeth them, and blesseth them with deadness; so that thou shalt once more be young, and free.
For what doth thee want from me-aside from unguarded liberty, and unintimate-yet wondrous, freedom?
For thou might as well never thinketh of me during thy escape;
And forever considereth me but an insipid flying parachute-to thy wide stardom;
Which deserveth not one single stare; as thou journeyeth upon whose dutiful circular shape.
And a maidservant; a wretched ale *****-within thy inglorious kingdom;
Which serveth but soft butter and cakes, to her-thy beloved, as she peacefully completeth her poem.
The poem she shall forceth to buy from me-with a few stones of emerald;
To which I shall sternly refuseth-and on which my hands receiveth t'ose climactic bruises.
For she, in her reproof-shall hit me thereof, a t'ousand times; and a harlot me, she shall calleth;
And storm away within t'at frock of endless purpleness; and a staggering laugh on her cheeks.
And I-I shall be thy anonymous poet, whose phrases thou at times acquireth, at nighttime-but never read;
A bedroom bard, in whose poetry thou shalt not findeth pleasures, and to which thou shalt never sit.
A jolly wish thou shalt never, in thy lifetime, cometh anyhow-to comprehend-nor appreciate;
But should I still continueth my futility; for poetry is my only diligent haven, and mate.
In which I shall never be bound to doubteth, much less hesitateth;
For in poetry t'ere only is brilliance; and embrace in its workings of fate.
And sadly, a servant as I am-on her vanity should I needst to forever wait, and flourish;
To whom my importance, either dire profoundness-is no more t'an a tasty evening dish.
And my presence by thee is perhaps something she cannot relish;
I know not how thou couldst fall for a dame-so disregarded and coquettish!
To whom all the world is but hers; and everything else is thus virtual;
So t'at hypocrisy is accepted, as how glory is thus defined as refusal.
But sometimes I cometh to regret thy befallen line of glory, and untoward destiny;
I shall, like ever, upon which remembrance, desireth to save thee, and bringst thee safely, to eternity.
But even t'is thought of thee shall maketh me twitch with burning disgust;
For I hath gradually lost my affection for thee; either any passion t'at canst tumultously last.
And shall I never giveth myself up to any further fatigue-nor let thy future charms drag me away;
For I hath spent my abundant time on thy poetry-and all t'ose useless nights and days;
As thou shalt regard me not-for my whole cautiousness, nor dear perseverance-and patience;
Thou shalt, like ever, stay exuberant, but thinketh me a profound distress-a wild and furious, impediment.
Thou hath denied me but my most exciting-and courteous nights;
And upon which-I shall announce not; any sighs of willingness-to maketh thee again right;
nor to helpeth thee see, and obediently capture, thy very own eager light.

And when thy idiocy shall bringst thee the most secure-yet most amatory of disgrace, turn to me not;
I hath refused any of thine, and wisheth to, perfunctorily-kisseth thee away from my lot,
I shall writeth no more on thy eloquence-for thou hath not any,
As nothing hath thou shown; nothing but falsehood-hath thou performed, to me.
Thou hath given none of those which is to me but virulent-and vital;
Thou art not eternal like I hath expected-nor thy bitter soul is immortal.
Thou art mortal-and when in thy deft last seconds returneth death;
Thou, in remorse, shalt forever be spurned by thy own deceit, and dizzily-spinning breath,
And after which, there shall indeed be no more seconds of thine-ah, truly no more;
Thou shalt be all gone and ended, just like hath thou once ended mine-one moment before.
All t'at was once unfair shall turneth just, and accordingly, fair;
For God Himself is fair-and only to the honest offereth His chairs;
But the limbs of Heaven shall not be pictured, nor endowed in thee;
To thee shall be opened the gate of fires, as how thou hath impetuously incarnated in me.
No matter how beautiful they might be-still thy bliss shall flawlessly be gone,
Thou shalt be tortured and left to thy own disclosure, and mock discourses-all alone.
For no mortality shall be ensured foreverness-much less undead togetherness;
As how such a tale of thy dull, and perhaps-incomprehensible worldliness.
By t'at time thou shalt hath grown mature, but sadly 'tis all too late;
For thou hath mocked, and chastised away brutally-all the truthful, dearest workings of fate.
And neither shalt thou be able to enjoy-the merriments of even yon most distant poetry;
For unable shalt thou be-to devour any more astonishment; at least those of glory.
And thus the clear songs of my soul shall not be any of thy desired company;
Thy shall liveth and surviveth thy very own abuse; for I shall wisheth not to be with thee;
For as thou said, to life thou, by her being, art the frequented life itself;
Thus thou needst no more soul; nor being bound to another physical self;
And t'is shall be the enjoyment thou hath so indolently, yet factually pursued-in Hell;
I hope thou shalt be safe and free from hunger-and t'at she, after all, shall attendeth to thee well.

And who said t'at joys are forbidden, and adamantly perilous?
For t'ose which are perilous are still the one lamented over earth;
For in t'ose divine delights nothing shall be too stressful, nor by any means-studious;
For virtues are pure, and the walls of our future delights are brighter t'an yon grey hearth;
And be my soul happy, for I hath not been blind; nor hath I misunderstood;
I hath always been useful-by my writing, and my sickened womanhood;
Though I hath never possessed-and perhaps shall never own, any truthful promise, nor marriage bliss;
Still I longeth selfishly to hear stories-of eternal dainty happiness, for the dainty secret peace.
Ah, thee, for after thee-there shall perhaps no being to be written on-in yon garden;
A thought t'at filleth me not with peace, but shaketh my whole entity with a new burden.
Oh, my thee, who hath left me so heartlessly, but the one whom I hath never regarded as my enemy-
The one I hath loved so politely, tenderly, and all the way charmingly.
Ah! Ah! Ah! But why, my love, why didst thou turn t'is pretty love so ugly?
I demandeth not any kind purity, nor any insincere pious beauty,
But couldst thou heareth not t'is heart-which had longed for the one of thine-so subserviently and purely?
For I am certainly the one most passionately-and indeed devotedly-loving thee,
For I am adorable only so long as thou sleepeth, and breatheth, beside me,
For I am admired only by the west winds of thy laugh, and the east winds of thy poetry!
Ah, but why-why hath thou stormed away so mercilessly like t'is;
And leaving me alone to the misery of this world, and my indefinite past tears?
Ah, thee, as how prohibited by the laws of my secret heaven,
Thus I shall painteth thee no more in my poesies, nor any related pattern;
There, in t'is holy dusk's name, shall be spoiled only by the waves of God's upcoming winters,
In the shapes of rain, and its grotesque, ye' tenacious-and horrifying eternal thunders.
And thus t'ese lovesick pains shall be blurred into nothingness-and existeth no more,
But so shall thy image-shall withereth away, and reeketh of death, like never before.
For I shall never be good enough to afford thee any vintage love-not even tragedy,
For in thy minds I am but a piece of disfigured silver; with a heart of unmerited, and immature glory;
Ah, pitiful, pitiful me! For my whole life hath been black and dark with loneliness' solitary ritual,
And so shall it always be-until I catch death about; so grey and white behind t'ose unknown halls.
And shall perhaps no-one, but the earth itself-mourneth over my fading of breath,
They shall cheereth more-upon knowing t'at I am resting eternally now, in the hands of death.
And no more comical beat shall be detected, likewise, within my poet's wise chest;
For everything hath gone to t'eir own abode, to t'eir unbending rest.
But I indeed shall be great-and like an angel, be given a provisionary wing;
By t'is poetry on thee-the last words of mouth I speaketh; the final sonata I singeth.

Thus thou art wicked, wicked, wicked-and shall forever be wicked;
Thou art human, but at heart inhuman-and blessed indeed, with no charming mortal aura;
Thou wert once enriched indeed-by my blood, but thy soul itself is demented;
And halved by its own wronged purity, thou thus art like a villainous persona;
Thou art still charmed but made unseeing, and chiefly-invisible;
Unfortunately thou loathe scrutiny, and any sort of mad poetry;
Knowing not that poetry is forever harmless, and on the whole-irresistible;
And its tiny soul is on its own forgiving, estimable, and irredeemable.
Ah, thee, whose soul hath but such a great appeal;
But inanely strained by thy greed-which is like a harm, but to thee an infallible, faithful devil.
Thou art forever a son of night, yet a corpse of morn;
For darkness thriveth and conquereth thy soul-and not reality;
Just like her heart which is tainted with tantrum, and scorn;
Unsweet in her glory, and thy being-but strangely too strong to resist-to thee.
Ah, and so t'at from my human realms thou dwelleth immorally too far;
As art thou unjust-for t'is imagination of thine hath left nothing, but a wealth of scars;
I used to recklessly idoliseth thee, and findeth in thy impure soul-the purest idyll;
But still thou listened not; and rejected to understandeth not, what I wouldst inside, feel.
After all, though t'ese disclaimers, and against prayers-hath I designated for thee;
On my virtues-shall I still loyally supplicate; t'at thou be forgiven, and be permitted-to yon veritable, eternity.
Gerry James Jul 2018
What is Poetry?
When your legs are numb,
Blood parching in your veins,
Throat choking from the pain,
And the fingers hitting the keys of the keyboard ceaselessly,
Trying ever so hard to create something impetuously,
Its poetry, you type.

When you dream of the possibilities,
And in what was once unimaginable,
You make the reader believe,
And change the way how their life, they perceive,
Its poetry, you dream.

When you play with words,
Just as an artist would play with colors,
To create a masterpiece,
That reaches the depths of the reader’s soul,
And burns them inside like coal,
Its poetry, you paint.

When you thread
Your fears, your desires,
Your insecurities, your pain,
All just to stay sane,
Its poetry you weave.

When your heart is melting
Like wax candles once lit,
And drops of tears smudge the ink,
To your knees you sink,
Its poetry, you bleed.
To all those out there who just enjoy painting their dreams with words that make it all seem so much more meaningful.
Sylvia Plath  Jun 2009
Elm
Elm
for Ruth Fainlight

I know the bottom, she says. I know it with my great tap root;
It is what you fear.
I do not fear it: I have been there.

Is it the sea you hear in me,
Its dissatisfactions?
Or the voice of nothing, that was you madness?

Love is a shadow.
How you lie and cry after it.
Listen: these are its hooves: it has gone off, like a horse.

All night I shall gallup thus, impetuously,
Till your head is a stone, your pillow a little turf,
Echoing, echoing.

Or shall I bring you the sound of poisons?
This is rain now, the big hush.
And this is the fruit of it: tin white, like arsenic.

I have suffered the atrocity of sunsets.
Scorched to the root
My red filaments burn and stand,a hand of wires.

Now I break up in pieces that fly about like clubs.
A wind of such violence
Will tolerate no bystanding: I must shriek.

The moon, also, is merciless: she would drag me
Cruelly, being barren.
Her radiance scathes me. Or perhaps I have caught her.

I let her go. I let her go
Diminished and flat, as after radical surgery.
How your bad dreams possess and endow me.

I am inhabited by a cry.
Nightly it ***** out
Looking, with its hooks, for something to love.

I am terrified by this dark thing
That sleeps in me;
All day I feel its soft, feathery turnings, its malignity.

Clouds pass and disperse.
Are those the faces of love, those pale irretrievables?
Is it for such I agitate my heart?

I am incapable of more knowledge.
What is this, this face
So murderous in its strangle of branches? ----

Its snaky acids kiss.
It petrifies the will. These are the isolate, slow faults
That ****, that ****, that ****.
Andrew Rueter Nov 2017
I'm a fan of Vontaze Burfict
Though he may not be perfect
For he gives players concussions
To continue the daily discussions
Of the power of his percussion
To receive a hall of fame induction
That is where his value is derived
So what do these penalties imply?
That the referees have a preconceived notion of him
And are preemptively looking to treat him grim
Which gives his team a lesser chance to win
Which makes the biased referees grin

We are a country that idolizes quarterbacks
Every other position we're quick to attack
We only care about who has the ball
And laughing at others when they fall
We worship that which is shiny
And view everything else as grimy
Quarterbacks become celebrities incredulously
While everyone else is treated impetuously

The NFL is like America
Politics makes it harder to watch
The Patriots are boring and plain
They win constantly
The Bengals are entertaining and rough around the edges
They show promise and potential that is never realized
In a nation
Of provocation
I'd rather proudly call myself a bengal
I know that seems an idealistic angle
But Cincinnati provides no coziness or protection
You must always avoid discriminate detection
Of those that call themselves patriots
That drive blue and white chariots
And penalize players unnecessarily
For African Americanning

We really fumbled the ball
Because of the ref's call
That treats us unequally
How they have fun evilly
They can arbitrarily treat whoever however
But a concussion will make them less clever
Over and back,
the long waves crawl
and track the sand with foam;
night darkens, and the sea
takes on that desperate tone
of dark that wives put on
when all their love is done.

Over and back,
the tangled thread falls slack,
over and up and on;
over and all is sewn;
now while I bind the end,
I wish some fiery friend
would sweep impetuously
these fingers from the loom.

My weary thoughts
play traitor to my soul,
just as the toil is over;
swift while the woof is whole,
turn now, my spirit, swift,
and tear the pattern there,
the flowers so deftly wrought,
the borders of sea blue,
the sea-blue coast of home.

The web was over-fair,
that web of pictures there,
enchantments that I thought
he had, that I had lost;
weaving his happiness
within the stitching frame,
weaving his fire and frame,
I thought my work was done,
I prayed that only one
of those that I had spurned
might stoop and conquer this
long waiting with a kiss.

But each time that I see
my work so beautifully
inwoven and would keep
the picture and the whole,
Athene steels my soul.
Slanting across my brain,
I see as shafts of rain
his chariot and his shafts,
I see the arrows fall,
I see the lord who moves
like Hector lord of love,
I see him matched with fair
bright rivals, and I see
those lesser rivals flee.
I have an illustrious dream,
     want to be Leonard
          Cohen's gypsy wife,
he's kissing my lips on
    Boogie Street,
impetuously we dance
    to the end of love
       'til closing time
       midst his secret life,
he serenades me with
     I'm your man
         when we take Manhattan,
bewildered by his poetic beauty there
     waiting for the miracle to happen,
a sip of wine, a cigarette
         in love we disappear,
   here it is, you got me singing
        be that dog in heat,
I'll take this waltz and
   another please, cause
             everybody knows
     I hunger for your touch,
  his famous blue raincoat
         and the dew on my thigh
goes a thousand kisses deep
   in the cave at the tip of the lily
  with its very own breath of brandy,
slipping into the masterpiece
             where Lenny is eternal
If you don't love Leonard Cohen's poetry and music, it probably won't make much sense.
With trembling fingers did we weave
The holly round the Christmas hearth;
A rainy cloud possess'd the earth,
And sadly fell our Christmas-eve.

At our old pastimes in the hall
We gambol'd, making vain pretence
Of gladness, with an awful sense
Of one mute Shadow watching all.

We paused: the winds were in the beech:
We heard them sweep the winter land;
And in a circle hand-in-hand
Sat silent, looking each at each.

Then echo-like our voices rang;
We sung, tho' every eye was dim,
A merry song we sang with him
Last year: impetuously we sang:

We ceased: a gentler feeling crept
Upon us: surely rest is meet:
"They rest," we said, "their sleep is sweet,"
And silence follow'd, and we wept.

Our voices took a higher range;
Once more we sang: "They do not die
Nor lose their mortal sympathy,
Nor change to us, although they change;

"Rapt from the fickle and the frail
With gather'd power, yet the same,
Pierces the keen seraphic flame
From orb to orb, from veil to veil."

Rise, happy morn, rise, holy morn,
Draw forth the cheerful day from night:
O Father, touch the east, and light
The light that shone when Hope was born.
Conor Clerkin Nov 2010
A troll sits open-mouthed, awaiting the spoon
that stirred the porridge; this ritual has been
ingrained in its brain – a sloshy, lifeless fossil
that stores villas of pain and ineptitude.

There is no water under its bridge, and all wrongs become
manifest as an attention-seeking wart on his soiled skin;
he wishes he could shed it, as this losing game of
snakes and ladders is beginning to wear thin.

Day by day he rolls the dice, but can’t take his move,
confined by an undying dread of slipping and sliding
on the loose gravely ground that he dreams of climbing;
and whispers of chiding.

Neither a sanctuary nor a prison, his home is a waiting room
on the Styx; from it he hears the echo and call of spring lambs
as they cross to taste the apples on the other side,
which a child impetuously picks.

Searching aimlessly for his reflection in the stone wall –
grey and every type of cold - proves futile;
he turns to his shadow asking his name,
shoulders slouched and mouth wide open all the while.

Seeing only darkness in the silence, control is lost -
he pictures tearing down that wall, but is unsure;
Self-muttering eases the certain fragility, and calming down
he tries counting to five - he can only count to four.
Copyright: Conor Clerkin, 2009.
janelle May 2017
you are paper,
let yourself be crumpled,
and then tell me stories
about your creases, your scars;
memories living in jars

tell me how it hurt
to be molded impetuously
because you still feel pain
when your wrinkles look like veins,
fragile streaks of vulnerability
flowing within you,
all over you,
and i will tell you
that i could not care less
if you are a mess of crooked roads;
if you are no longer like the others
devoid of folds
because these folds define you,
and the others do not crumple
in the same way as you do

you are paper,
skinned from nature
let yourself be written,
and then tell me stories
about yourself, your tales
without ever having to use a pen
i am aware that the title seems illogical but i thought it would be a good one to catch your eye and warm your heart.
The down of the gown of the dawn of some gone day,
A ray day that has downed and dawned at sunset,
They have diabolically colonized our divine state,
Belligerently gang ****** our stupendous democracy at will,
The demonic bloodthirsty ******* barbarians,
Declaring a violent war which no one wants to fight,
A losing warring war of one against all.


Impetuously slaughtering our defenseless defenders at will,
Turning the blue-clad fierce hunters to the fierce hunted,
The hunted that are being haunted,
Hounded and hunted by the hunted,
Converting every corner into the hunters’ hunted ground,
The church and the charge office,
The home and the street,
The here and the there.


Who will protect our “toy gun” wielding protectors,
Protect our trigger-shy protectors from the cunning detractors,
As one by one they are won one by one,
One by one by the one that is supposed to be won,
The defenders of our slate state,
The defenders of our democratic democracy,
The defenseless defenders of the defenseless.


They have been plunged under siege,
As every one of them personifies some certain demise,
Every one of them is just some subterfuge death in waiting,
Some truculent death just waiting to happen,
Bust, rust and dust in the waiting,
Stylistically stylistic starving yawning mobile graves,
Prey of their own prey,
The ultimate fray prey.

As day in day out they live the life of a cigarette,
On one side they are smoking,
On the other, they are being smoked,
Any attempt to fight back is regarded criminal of the worst order,
Police brutality,
We forsake them, they forsake them, the law forsakes them,
Who will defend the mighty defenders?

— The End —