#foreboding
It's not if, but when
Each second builds pressure
The clock ticking away till,
Something snaps.
It's not a matter of
The Camels fate,
But,
Which straw will break,
It's strained back?
Something bad is going to happen,
Maybe not now,
Not today,
But soon
I can feel it in my heart,
Every breath.
May 1
May 1, 2026 at 12:08 AM UTC
Shadows bounce as the candle flickers.
No one is safe at night.
Trees stand guard, warning outsiders:
Beware of those who claim they are right.
Death, silence, and consequences come with light.
Mar 4
Mar 4, 2026 at 12:24 PM UTC
The clouds look old today, grey and sagging.
They hang lifeless, bringing everything down with them.
I shiver, not with potential, but with bitterness
About the bleak foreboding that looms.
Feb 18, 2025
Feb 18, 2025 at 8:40 PM UTC
Should I really worry about every chip on my shoulder?
Because I'm far more concerned about this planet size boulder that's up there
Knowing it is, still hoping it's not a foreboding place holder
A precursor to a something likely to be far heavier
Representing a multifaceted, real and present danger
I know I know better than to say I can take the pressure
Because inevitably that's when you hear
The crazy train circling life shift and kick into higher gear
Elevating despair to a level superceding fear
No one gets to choose their final chapter
So whatever
Let's just get this over with if it's not going to get any better for here
©2024
Apr 17, 2024
Apr 17, 2024 at 4:19 PM UTC
As alone I walk these emptied streets
the only rhythms heart and feet
I all around am sure I see
myself amidst the trees.
But no it cannot be, says me,
I am no scarecrowed bag of bones
whose clothes hang slack
and innards seep with leaves.
I am a man, methinks I say,
a human living breathing man
with no such predilections wrought
for suicidal sentiment.
It cannot is not mustn’t be me,
that body hanging limp in-tree,
that bullet ridden slumping form,
that sorry teenage lover-boy.
Dec 16, 2022
Dec 16, 2022 at 9:38 AM UTC
Lately I have had a feeling of a sense of deep foreboding in the air,
every time I stop to pause, to think, I can feel it just lurking there.
An all pervasive feeling that all things are not as they should be,
and I get an anxious sensation that it's effects are not just on me.
Colours of nature seem all faded and the air seems different too,
the sky is somehow much more ominous and appears a paler blue.
Even the birds I see upon their wing seem more skittish everyday,
and I wonder if they feel it too, does a dark fear halt their play?
I sense a tension in the natural order of these once normal things,
and my heart and mind are fearful of what message this all brings.
Like some silent siren wailing or invisible flashing hazard light,
my mind is filled with deepest dread and senses things aren't right.
Far too much time caught up thinking upon the portents that I see,
with each terrifying thought I pray for all, to hope that its just me.
Jul 24, 2022
Jul 24, 2022 at 9:45 PM UTC
Whatever happened to the happiness,
from all those early childhood days.
Where laughter. joy and sunshine,
filled all of imaginations endless plays?
What became of the joyous music,
giving beat and harmony to the world.
When dream and hope could exist,
and all possibilities could be unfurled?
When did all this darkness fall,
to lay shadow so dark upon the lands,
as a dense foreboding that has been
summoned by greeds unsated demands?
When did dream and hope become,
just mere folly and wasted thought.
What happened to the morals and the ethics,
that as kids we valued and were taught?
When and where did all this go,
for everywhere I look such is just not there.
All has been replaced by a selfish world
of greed, hatred and down-trodden despair.
I know that in the course of time,
I am meant to see an old man's view.
But what worth and value of a world,
where hate and lies are sold as true?
Death and hatred fill this world,
in every rank corner that I see,
and in silent, desperate fear I wonder,
why we stood-by and let it come to be?
Feb 25, 2022
Feb 25, 2022 at 11:22 AM UTC
an unfamiliar feeling
that feels awfully right
an ephemeral state
a shimmering light
i've met this stranger before
the nomadic apparition
standing by the door
with a whimsical disposition
why are you here?
i question the ghost
for it mysteriously visits
its skeptical host
i think, for the time being
you're here – let's celebrate
might as well bask
in the absence of pain
yet wrought with nervous thought
i cannot withhold my worry
i cannot subdue
the anxious query
how long will you stay?
i want to question the ghost
but before i manage
it's vanished
from its skeptical host
Aug 19, 2019
Aug 19, 2019 at 11:38 PM UTC
Is that danger in the distance?
Or do my eyes deceive?
****
Like dark clouds
gathering above mountains.
Like how the young see their futures.
(Though it's not like the world hasn't been ending
this entire time.
In billions of years the sun will explode.
In hundreds, our planet will be just dust and stone,
and the bones of industry.
And at my rate
I'll self-destruct by sixty years of age.
But) what is this thing that sticks and stings
and irks
like a mirage?
Not the flavor of fingers dipped in deliciousness.
Not the freshness of a newborn babe.
Not the scent of flowers.
Not feet in a hot bath.
Not fumbling a lovers face,
frolicking through foxglove fields,
flitting a fiery frevo,
finishing first.
No,
none of that.
It's not a thing,
but a feeling.
Fear
Fear
Fear
And it sticks and stings
and irks,
like a mirage.
-
by Aleksander Mielnikow | Alek the Poet
Nov 19, 2020
Nov 19, 2020 at 4:42 AM UTC
clouds tumble gracefully across
the velvety expanse
like some frightening titan
reaching down from
the void of heaven,
blackened and ghostly.
breaking apart and
welding together,
some mighty, sickening
war must be bringing that
chill, that quiver in the air;
storm’s coming.
dark Nyx, my soul trembles
when i think of eternity,
the vastness of beauty and
of trepidation that hang over
our heads like some spinning
mobile.
i am so afeared i could weep
or dance.
May 5, 2020
May 5, 2020 at 4:03 AM UTC
Premonition
by Michael R. Burch
Now the evening has come to a close and the party is over ...
we stand in the doorway and watch as they go—
each stranger, each acquaintance, each unembraceable lover.
They walk to their cars and they laugh as they go,
though we know their bright laughter’s the wine ...
then they pause at the road where the dark asphalt flows
endlessly on toward Zion ...
and they kiss one another as though they were friends,
and they promise to meet again “soon” ...
but the rivers of Jordan roll on without end,
and the mockingbird calls to the moon ...
and the katydids climb up the cropped hanging vines,
and the crickets chirp on out of tune ...
and their shadows, defined by the cryptic starlight,
seem spirits torn loose from their tombs.
And I know their brief lives are just eddies in time,
that their words are unreadable runes
unlikely to stand in this waterlogged land
when their corpses lie ravaged and ruined ...
You take my clenched fist and you give it a kiss
as though it’s something to be loved,
and the tears fill your eyes, outshining the night
and all the stars ringed high above ...
and you whisper, "It's time that we went back inside;
if you'd like, we can sit and just talk for a while."
And the hope in your eyes burns too deep, so I lie
and I say, "Yes, I would," to your small, troubled smile.
I vividly remember writing this poem after an office party the year I co-oped with AT&T (at that time the largest company in the world, with a lot of office parties). This was after my sophomore year in college, making me around 20 years old. The poem is “true” except that I was not the host because the party was at the house of one of the managers. Nor was I dating anyone seriously at the time.
Keywords/Tags: premonition, foreboding, time, loss, death, office party, wine, laughter, shadows
Apr 11, 2020
Apr 11, 2020 at 5:15 AM UTC
The rain keeps falling
As dry as a drought.
“ *Rain drops heavier than water,
When it’s laden with doubt.* “
He said,
“ *The ground simply can’t hold it
… So it must go without.* “
*” You’ve never known water to stain,
But you’ve never felt this kind of rain.
It’s thicker than your skin.
It stains your clothes and what’s within.
It sounds like hammers as it pounds -
And yet, the ground won’t let it in.
So it flows like a river that only gets bigger;
It runs like a force that knows no remorse.
Despite endless efforts to stop it -
It still runs like a faucet…
With nowhere to drain. "*
But if the ground holds no plants, is the water so vital?
Is the rain’s sole purpose this lifeless recital?
The ground stays so strong.
It holds fast, like pure stone
But can one stay so long when one’s so alone?
When one is forced to move,
Will the ground or the rain?
And when the first one has gone,
Will the other remain?
For now, they coexist,
Each facing a challenge it can’t resist -
Both unstoppable and immovable,
They hopelessly persist.
As complements, they combine
With the product of a flood.
But the water that’s collecting
Has the consistency of blood.
There’s a heart behind this water.
It pulses, instead of flowing.
So you turn to the only man you know,
for parting words with danger growing.
And he says, as you leave:
“ *I wish you luck where you are going.
My son, you’ve only seen the rain . . .
. . . The winds are not yet blowing*.
Feb 20, 2013
Feb 20, 2013 at 1:43 AM UTC
~
Suddenly goose bumps
Condensation on kettle
Cold sun showers come
.
Jul 5, 2018
Jul 5, 2018 at 10:31 PM UTC
kisses turn into monsters my
mind can't conjure up
they leave an ocean of pinks, purples, and blues,
yet I say nothing
this sharp - teethed demon
comes after me as fast as
a bullet can go
in my head,
i run rapidly, to the edge of the world,
but physically,
i stay as still as the sea
if I move,
he will come after me at supersonic speed
and i'll drown deeper
under these pink sheets
Mar 23, 2017
Mar 23, 2017 at 12:32 PM UTC
Vibrant orange clouds against a baby blue western sky
Signals that the night is drawing nigh
The steely cold fingers of the darkness will soon be around my neck
That leaves me with the unnerving feeling of being a miniscule speck
Like the pinprick of light in the heavenly sky we call stars
It leaves me in pieces like I've been hit by runaway boxcars
Night time is when the world falls eerily silent, and my mind sets to roaming
Down the hallways of my memories I start floating
Soon like fireworks they begin exploding
My mental state quickly is eroding
My nights are always a coal black foreboding
May 12, 2016
May 12, 2016 at 7:31 PM UTC
*Winter birds gathering
White sea spray clouding the bay
Before the snows come*
Mar 30, 2016
Mar 30, 2016 at 11:10 PM UTC
Driving to work today
This is what I saw along my way
Vultures sitting on top of utility poles
As I traveled down the hot dusty road
Kinda makes me worried how todays gonna go
Not one, not two, but four I spied
Makes me want to turn tail and hide
They did not fly but had that look in their eyes
Patiently waiting for a great demise
But on I pressed with great foreboding
Wondering what the futures holding
Made it to work, everyone here is still alive
Thank God,because the old man is eighty five
Maybe the vultures are for me insteed
Maybe today is the day I'll end up dead
Mar 13, 2016
Mar 13, 2016 at 12:24 PM UTC
I cut myself for you tonight
Maybe I'll fit inside your box
I cut myself for you tonight
Slicing pieces of me off
I cut myself for you tonight
I'll let my blood just flow
I cut myself for you tonight
For love you never show
I'll cut myself for you tonight
Giving you what you sought
I'll cut myself for you tonight
I know it's what you want
I'll cut myself for you tonight
1,2,3, I'll make them deep
I'll cut myself for you tonight
I'll go to that eternal sleep
Jan 31, 2016
Jan 31, 2016 at 6:06 PM UTC
My chest compressed, I can not breath
And everything around me bleeds
Trapped in the rabbit hole
Where no one's supposed to go
I think me and the Mad Hatter will get along splendidly
We climbed into the tea *** boat and sail the crystal sea
And dine upon the walrus hide
We just can not be denied
Oh what fun we had sunning on the shore
All the clams gather round us,we was so adored
Oh look over yonder there is a door
Well Mad Hatter I've got to go but I shall be back
If I have to put that rabbit in a sack
To make him bring me to this wonderful place that I adore
The Mad Hatter looked at me sadly, don't open up that door
Your being silly I won't stay gone long
But something was very wrong
I opened it quickly
And what I saw made me sickly
For behide that forbidden door
In a pool of my own blood I was lying on the floor
Jan 31, 2016
Jan 31, 2016 at 2:57 PM UTC
you touched your wrists
to mine
and a rash blossomed
across my skin
red and dry
ran across
indigo hills
fields of turned-over soil
in the night-time
to cool my
strangled sweat
to find a sink
a light in the kitchen.
im sorry, i promise
i'll buy a slice
i just need to use your sink, please.
fluorescent-white
heat
i put the water on the hottest setting
and i scrub and
scrub, and scrub
fast, and hard
i rinse the raw
i leave.
when I wake up
for all my scrubbing
the rippling rash, the buds
are still there
under my skin.
a lone fungal stalk
of crimson
a fruiting body
rises from my wrist.
this does not belong
here
like a broken bone
bending in the wrong direction
under the skin
like the voice on
the other end of the line
this is not real
Oct 21, 2015
Oct 21, 2015 at 11:27 PM UTC
*Before hurricanes
Wind stirs about treeless plains
Little things matter*
Aug 24, 2015
Aug 24, 2015 at 1:20 PM UTC
Her weapons of war are so carnal. Her smile flashes like the shimmer of swords. Her shape reaches out like a spear. Her battle cry like the look in her eye dares to raise the dead in me. But the beast is slain each morning, nailed to the cross I bare on my way the grave. And I am satisfied in the rising tide of strength that comes from not being my own that fills the vast beaches of my weakness and washes away every trace of her haunting footprints in the sand.
May 26, 2015
May 26, 2015 at 5:37 PM UTC
A man looks on, beyond himself,
a thunder-storm is brewing, and
though it isn't raining yet, he knows
the storm is stewing.
Apr 13, 2015
Apr 13, 2015 at 9:41 PM UTC