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Jenny Gordon Mar 2019
It's so "fun" trying to fit these hugemongous Roman names into iambic pentametre.



(sonnet #MMMMMMMDCCXXIII)


So, read an essay on erm, Virgil, frail
As thinking THAT meant aught, and for pretense
Is't lo, Thucydides, to spose I'd sense,
Petrarca's life in um, a nutshell's scale
Of knowledge, even la, Justinian's tale--
Since haunted by those cobbled streets, and hence,
If not the air of Roman days, fr'intents
Those columned cities sages knew t'avail.
And either that, or Valentines in tour
Have ta'en my spirit from me, til I view
All we had joyed in ere as from as twere
A colder distance, seeing, yet voiceless to
Effect, life upside-down, or mine in poor
Scuse, e'en as April haunts the thought life'd woo.

21Feb19a
Or should we claim "it's so fun to be haunted with lines after midnight!"
Brandon Conway Jun 2018
No moon showing her lustrous wonder
No stars set ablaze
Only clouds sounding of thunder
Plunging rain greeting my gaze

Drops tasting of flame and damnation
Through a gap a gossamer star palpitates
Lonely and lost in its constellation
Only dolorous moans encapsulate
  
Gasping at fetid air
Face gurgling above scalding blood
Phlegethon, river of despair
My flesh becomes the mud

A figure appears over the precipice
A living body one that is whole
A lost man seems not necessitous
None that can help this tortured soul

A half horse is with he
Bow strung aimed at me
Risen higher than I should be
Arrow loosen my flesh stings

Awaken in sweat, four walls surrounding
A guilty conscience stewed this dream
Enclosed in darkness, alone, wailing
Recurring... haunting... blaspheme...
Brandon Conway Jun 2018
The deliverance of life echoed into that of pounding death
This frozen tower metamorphosing into a coffin sealed and fated
That gorgon’s gaze did I meet and uttered not a breath
Lost in those frightened eyes, thoughts left me sedated

“You stare so... Father, what is it?”

There I sat, day circling into night
By the dawn light through a reflection
I caught through their tragic sight
Left me gnawing at my hands, objection

“You put this wretched flesh upon us and now you may strip it off!”


Calmed my soul and silence we sat, another moon waxing

“Father, why don’t you help me?”

Left your lips while your languid soul seeps
Blind now with no words to offer
One by one perished but never did I weep
In the end
Hunger proved more powerful than grief.
How do I make text bold?
A A Feb 2018
We’ll play at being poets
You’ll be Dante and I’ll be Virgil
And I’ll guide you through hell and back.
Mike Virgl May 2017
Can a man reach the height of his dreams?
The true mechanic of righteous action
Outstretched grip of the ripping seams
Tumble down from its holy retraction

And realize everything is for naught
And everything you have ever sought
Lies in his graces dazzling bright palace
   Lies of my own form the cracked floors of solace

Filled with the bloated, pallid, and free of ambitions
Tangled hair and deepening wound of my intention
A ****** pond greets you with its callous retention
Stowed beneath, dark images taunt these last mentions

     As they all remember this will be their
home
As they lay down and look to god's cryptic
dome
And they all search

He is not one but alone with the
  masses
Stolen from him, he finds his future passes
From teary grip

I guess it will never rain in these fields
because it is pouring
God has closed this asylum, to contain shades from Elysium
For you see a sudden sight, multiplied by their unending night
Lead hauntings to stare through their own shapeless eyes,
In the fields of mourning
By David John Mowers

Oceanus, Acheron, Styx and Gyges, Phlegethon,

Phaeacians lament, mourn the loss, Scheria, dissolved in froths.

Virgil’s tale, found correct, a land too good, a nation wrecked,

Nausikaa, burn the ships; their minds released, cool airy nips,

Below the wave, watery grave, submerged to bottom, fathoms by stave,

Fathoms some more, until the whorl, descending to, another world.

Through Omphalos, to Land of Sleep, awaits a beast, where time has ceased,

Darkness here, underworld, cold and frigid, below the whirl,

In solemn grave, souls released, judged and counted, by the beast,

Deeper than, the deep itself, past drowning fairies and dying elves,

Who did mourn them? Those golden men, magic mariners, Mino's kin?

What wrong was seen? What vice not true? What awful sin? What did they do?

One thousand years, first black age, Two thousand more, to find the stage,

Cast off Aries and cast Orion, to find beginning, of Golden Lion.

Man of Heavens, Beast agrees, Bull of Sky, Ox of seas,

Land of Punt, Land of Éire, Ogyges blue, hearts on fire,

All the seashores, all the mines, Tribe of Dan, from ancient times,

Port of Sais, Port of Thera, Port of Lagash, bygone era,

Sailor’s horse, Minotaur, a lyre is crying, strummed guitar, nation dying, abattoir.

Ochre foams to sanguine depth, there they rested, where Kronos slept,

He’ll never answer, he doesn’t care, we’ll never know, if this was fair.

Our hearts in sadness, hands on the gates! I curse you Poseidon!

. . .and your Sea of Fates!
Every historical and mythological reference to the kingdom of Atlantis which was destroyed by it's founder; Poseidon. All of the characters including the archaeological agreement on the historical basis along with Geo-location as well as an approximate age of occurrence, extent of the kingdom set to metered rhyme.
In pursuit of an elusive harmony
     summer nights rolled away from us
     reverberating into a numinous bass line
     while reconciling our dreams
     with a burgeoning truth

Flustered with desire
     and walking in a non-ordinary reality. Lost within the Source
    of all there is and ever was. We re-animated
    navigating through portals unexplained
     to retrieve this love

We plyed our differences into commonality
     and re-aligned our fractured selves using the agency
     of synchronicity - having found
     an immutable archetypal truth
     and having found where our self-portraits flow

Much more than soul mates, Plato
     offers stories of Zeus splitting souls in half
     as punishment for pride.
     In this incarnation, have we found humility?
     Will this be enough to carry us back to nobility?
    
It is challenging to find your way back
     into a lover's arms. Mistakes haunt us eternally (if we allow for that)
     but every morning if we awake
     and let go, using the suns setting and rising as a reminder that
     with experience, guidance, and repetition ... it gets easier

My half soul
     awoke as my mortality decomposed
     when half becomes one, then the real turmoil begins
     from the shores of St. Mary, Raven calls
     and I follow my destiny into an Obsidian Night
'If I cannot deflect the will of Heaven, I shall move Hell.' ~~ Virgil
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