Now hiding hearth and packing wools away
A careful tide arrives to mark changed towns
Chartreuse of verdant blooms commence decay
While we can’t stop what grows by leaps and bounds
Which soil holds firm or shifts beneath the clowns
It’s blind to glimpse so far as nations go
Unfaithful seed of those whose blood still grounds
Our stars and stripes which fly through ebb and flow
Mothers may darkly wail by morning glow
Seeking to raise their daughters to bright dawn
And burn hewn totems to some men they know
Dancing through smoke which wafts hither and yon
Yet fools by terror ******* and billions mocked
Win while we wait with angst by tics and tocs

What putrefaction oozes up from hell
To poison aquifers of decency
And common sense? The crops of
reason smell And do not nourish the constituency.
What polar vortex drops from unknown heights To freeze the congregations of the heart?
The steeples topple, enmity ignites
And malice rips tranquility apart.
The times devolve. Security and peace, Once real estate on which a home could rise,
Shrugs off its immigrants, revokes its lease
And shows indifference to human cries.
A Lucifer of arrogant display
Has come to sweep benevolence away.

Soft flakes are held aloft while drifting down
to keep those splendid structures quite intact;
Then up from pavement–piling on firm ground–
they halt all urban bustle in its tracks;
Strong plows have tried their best to push snow back,
but once this weather starts I’ve lost control;
It’s time to settle in, hear branches crack
and with my quilts and ***** I'll fight the cold.
How odd that every day has such a hold,
hurling the musts and shoulds with all its might,
until those tiny flakes conspire to scold
nice days for their mad toil and grant respite:
Sometimes it takes the ice and slush outside
to truly feel the warmth from which I hide.

I did not know that poetry has rules.
‘Tis not a craft for ordinary fools.
Those, that form and meter never master,
Are ever doomed; they are the poetasters.
As opera singers, out of tune, do make
Discerning listeners do a double-take,
And chefs, who sprinkle salt instead of sweet,
Serve meals that connoisseurs would never eat;
A writer with a wretched poet’s curse
Will never craft a great Heroic Verse.

So as I count my syllables and feet,
And wonder if my metaphors will meet,
I pray that hypermetrics are okay,
(For I have used a few of them today,)
I’ll leave the verdict, reader, up to you,
Affirm that to my mission, I’ve been true,
Or if the ending to my verse bathetic
Christen me a poet most pathetic.
Heroic Lines in Couplets, I intended;
Judge me, reader, now this verse has ended.

Phil Lindsey 12/24/15

My eyes are drawn toward your toes
as frequently as lover’s eyes
do meet and tie their souls in knots.

Your toes that grasp and stretch and lift
you up to reach the chocolate chips
you keep behind the chia seeds.

Your toes that press and push and dig
into dirt and earth then sheets at 3
when warm air beckons— take a nap

my eyes are drawn toward your toes
and glide over freckled skin that makes
me scramble after memories,

past parted lips and perfect cheeks
to lurid pools of cerulean
that find us back in bed by noon.

I went and took a nap out in the woods,
and let a blanket made of leaves drown me
with sinking stones of nothing, ravished sea
descending towards a stomach, betraying deeds.

I almost caught a gust of wind, maybe
spilling through cracked fingers, escaping- seen
near spying hairs, then simply sticking here.  
Palms open - arms outstretched.
I shook hands with nothing, its weight crushing.

Tripping over pinecones, understood
by suffocating air between my foot
and strewn upon the concrete: you
mistaking it for woods that we once knew.

I saw a bird skip up this dying tree
singing to the simple sullied sky,
catching wind under its broken wings.
Palms open - arms outstretched
carried by nothing.

When every single night, this clockwork chimes...
simply said I can’t meet my own eyes
for fear of crypts where restless crickets lie,
their ceaseless praying stretching on
till dawn.  

Air thick
suffocating between sheets and mattress,
stones still sinking, carelessly caught by
Palms open - arms outstretched
begging for nothing in particular.

So I took a nap out in the woods today,
my palms open - arms outstretched
suffocated by nothing, but the hugging air
like some stuffed animal I grew up with,
painted with prideful grime.

The where the when the time the how, embark
The hope the dream the wish the want the strong
The pyre, fire, blazing through the dark
The need, ignored past due by far too long.
Wherein we feel its missing presence, true
But lack of it can only make it more
For while this leaves me often feeling blue
This distance is no match for human soul.
The need of me to move on is all real
And yet I so desire to stay, all time
But she has moved on leaving me alone
I want to say “I love you,” sounds as mime
And yet, for all of this, I shall walk too
But never forget you, despite all love anew.

my head groans and i am awake again
it takes an hour to open my eyes
just sitting up is way too ******* hard
the butterfly inside me crashes, dies
my mangled heart beats dully from its cage
more slowly than it ever has before
i think about the *** on the top shelf
but i'd have to unlock my bedroom door
i wouldn't trust myself to stand alone
or shuffle to the kitchen miles away
i hate myself for opening my mouth
i even hate myself for being gay

i thought i'd get used to a broken heart
but now it seems that i will fall apart