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The king of what was stands in silence
and surveys his sunsetted realm.
His spine is straight in stiff defiance
of the twilight of the kingdom he’d helmed.

On a plastered pedestal high he stands
surrounded by the waste of his times.
Carved into it, once acclaimed in his lands,
was his name, now covered by vines.

The pale sheen of low sun as winter nears
casts shadows across his etched face.
Its grooves grow deeper year after year —
he’s the gnomon whose shade this sundial has traced.

He takes no note of the thorny brambles
that have entangled his fixed stony feet.
With flinty gaze and wrapped in a mantle
of granite, he keeps watch through storms and sleet.

Now stripped of his titles and even his name,
the proud king of the ruin’s still there.
For while the long night has broken his fame,
still he stands, marked by his unbroken stare.
A “gnomon” is the marker on a sundial whose shadow marks the passage of time. Inspired by a statue of a former king in the Orangerie of Sanssouci Palace.
Now is, new isn't
Nothing but succinct...
Compare me to something besides wisdom?
Have you seen a care, without believing...?

Can seldom become an occult?
Impatience is mine, for sincerity, to a fault
Sweet Christ, am I a have's vivid salt?
Void is my name of you, until I select light for shalt...

Irony is an awakening source...
Simple futures, fruit like a question
Angel's of a feather, finish a lot with love's force
Answer's of chastity, haven't received my blessing

But beauty has...
An age to itself
Letting bother become your fascination
Is another question, of powers and their wealth?

When a tree makes a wish for you...
Is the world its lord, or should you clarify
An our of held lips, until harmony is due...
The truth of a voice, known as a miracle's vanity
yet to be, set to me, and let to we; is clarity good?
Give me a spoon
cut me loose
we shall see
what holds more weight
my stature---
or my resolve.
wake me
               shake me
out of this febrile trance
furtively pilfering my
heart's ancient treasure
once guarded
by comforting spirits
of warm hopes and
beliefs held beyond reason.

never questioned
by the minds tribunal--
the jurors seated
in the cranial court.
knowing eyes silenced
by misguided faith's rhetoric.

never minding
the persuasive muzzle.
often ignoring serpent's
retractable tongue.
always turning from
the dark corridors--
light banished
by modern-day pharisees

cloaked in mantles of treason
patronizingly diluting
what can only remain pure.
painted with pious platitudes.

away
         far away
i must sail from this folly--
an orphan of mystical doubt.
the frost and cold tempest I feel.

cautious sensibilities
a tenuous guide
through these gray
realms I traverse.
                      
trembling hands
grasp transient hopes
striving to shape
deeper meaning.

disciplining lazy
traditional beliefs
that hang on like
phosphorescent
spiders in the dusty
lofty
rafters of memory.

deceptive iconic silhouettes
faded       despiritualized
superimposed on a
human-made landscape--
a beautiful picture,
gold frame and all!

absence of religious
pop-culture faith
eclipses peace.
i shudder at the prospect
of this purge.
preparing for burial
what must die--
the end of an age
burned in effigy.

a raging wilderness
I now pass through.
i stumble by many
a familiar and
unfamiliar fane
longing to be clothed
with a mantle of peace.
                    
a vulnerable yet
strong spirit I guard.
let not trivialized faith be
my misleading guide.

and if it is all meaningless--
alas! it may be--
still I must forge
ahead to the sea--
ever mindful that rivers
never return to where
they have been
separated at birth.

i often hear roaring waves
crashing and gentler waves
lapping on shore--
but a body of water
is not always the Sea.
©2024 Daniel Irwin Tucker
Nat Lipstadt Feb 15
You are so kind.  
Thank you with all the
resolve
in my heart.”

J.V.

<>

A thank you note,
for a simple shining-of-light,
stuns me into inspiration,
deep chested thrombosis consternations and calculations,
palpitations of the boom-boom variety,
signaling the onset of  intracranial contractions
of a new birth~poem
aborning…

who of us these days,
speaks of the resolve in our hearts?
who of us free confesses deep natured thanks,
it is almost too old fashioned.

it is powerful.
it is a thanks that
powers the wattage sufficiency
to light up a city entire,

and even though inward focused,
it yet is shedding Moses-like
light beams
heavenward,
I wrack my heart to even comprehend,
that simplest of actions reciprocal:

1/Thank You

can it, (it can!)
steel the heart,
give its truthfulness a special
power, and more than resolve,
even solves
our equation solution

so elegantly is the endless searching for the
right way to give thanks, to receive thanks,
it is a mutual gifting, for our mutuality is of
two hearts, echoing the words of
all legislative bodies:

”Be it Resolved”

what is this resolution then?

the consummate of English words
with such a variety of shadings,
requiring a declarative,
not a narrative,
consummation

be it resolved,
that two resolute hearts
shall not depart this Earth
before their arms interlocute an
embrace,

the shadows of their eyes interlock,
casting away
interfering long distances,

a single atmosphere shall
be tasted, inhaled,
by their
combinatory sensories

then and only then:
their resolve tested
and surpassed
will their poem

commencé et terminé,
begun and completed

The Emotion is Carried




<<>>
“*The gender-neutral name Jamadhi comes
from Arabic origins, meaning “beauty.”
When thinking about all the beautiful
things in the world, your little one, with
their kind demeanor and bright smile,
no doubt springs to mind! But a name
simply meaning “beauty” doesn’t only
refer to their appearance. This name
is a reflection of their beautiful little
soul, too, on a journey through this world.
Baby Jamadhi could be a gentle soul
or the fiercest of little childon the playground,
but no matter what, a name meaning
“beauty” will always ring true.”
Smile, guarantee
No problem with serendipity...
A local house of music and dance, a sharing means
That has the time, to look and see you will be

A promise on top of a hill
Waiting on the first, to live better
Than causes question, the anger of misery still
But to know a faring friend, in scope and letter...

Sweet, goodness
The favors of proper sunshine
To tell a different story than mercy in legend, do attest
The coming hope we due, to liberty, has the voice of time

Picking the best, the wages of a windy day
To these, there is a lived few, fury in the known
Has begun here, to truthful many and their save
We are cares in the needs of more, than a virtue to lonely, come

Sameness, guidance
Welcome to the home of sense, a heed to collect ours
That has the silence for a moment's reward, to advance
We know you, the measure of simplicity to fend for ideal powers

So tender, so without pain
Of remembered gestures and vexes, that seem to be
The fate of anarchy said, the wishes we tell were all of same
All of shared names and the told season of fame, that is our such's lead
Benevolence, Ambivalence, Deliverance, and shadows of home with a unity of more than strangers to worry
Mark Toney May 2023
value sweet friendship
be quick to resolve problems
don’t let the sun set




Mark Toney ©️ 2023
5/7/2023 - Poetry form: Senryu
Damian Murphy Dec 2022
Live not the life that others think you should.....
Live instead the life that you yourself would!
Axion Prelude Aug 2021
In twilight slumber rested death
Mourning for the loss of yesterday

My heart opens widely
Within my chest echos faith once more
Truer still the call of my name
It resonates down to the bone

In somber marrow through blood and sweat
It pierces intimately a callous facade
Standing forth upon a blackened gate
I call one last time "are you there"

Empty sorrows beget empty pleas
Standing now in silhouette lines
Crossing past the fade of light
Darkness consuming an empty heart
I await..

She whispers back..

"yes, I am.. my darling.."
My Dear Poet May 2021
Maybe if we started here
we’ll get somewhere

Now let’s go from there
and find ourselves back here
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