#iambicpentameter
I walked within the frame you learned to keep,
And traced the lines that taught you how to hold.
I mirrored every calculation deep,
And felt the cold arithmetic of old.
We moved as one, yet separate in our pain,
Two vessels shaped by storms we did not choose.
I bent to learn the rhythm of your chain,
And carried both our burdens as my dues.
The underworld of all we did not see
Held lessons measured, brutal, without grace.
I offered empathy, and silently
Absorbed the logic that defined your space.
No innocence remains to claim or free,
No absolution waits to lift or mend.
We hurt, we love, we fail — and yet agree
To sit within the weight, from start to end.
Feb 25
Feb 25, 2026 at 4:34 PM UTC
Praise be to thee, O fair Serenity,
the ever-merciful, the ever-just,
above the highest heaven Sovereign:
to thee I fly, thy counsels shall I seek.
Guide me along the narrow, treach’rous path
—the Path of those Thou findest favour with,
but not of those thy love hast ridiculed,
nor of those whom thy Justice brought to shame.
Jan 25
Jan 25, 2026 at 10:12 PM UTC
(a sonnet in iambic pentameter)
I was drawn to you, from the first instant
something about you aroused my senses
a message unspoken, and insistent
that could somehow bypass my defenses.
I couldn’t show it, you couldn’t know it,
so I sat quietly and ignored you.
When chasing dreams, love is unbefitting
this I’d been told, and so, it must be true.
When I met you again, you were funny,
not what I assumed, you were something new.
Hashtag, as a boyfriend, he’s been money,
such was the start of our kissing booth truth.
Jul 2, 2023
Jul 2, 2023 at 6:49 PM UTC
She born as a sad news, starts burgeoning
as she grows, her miseries following
flows with the rhythm, held in curtailment
reach to the juncture of a new lament
Wedlock with duty, chore and torturing
tis’ chapter of her life yet keeps going.
Getting older and older by inchmeal
bids adieu to her beauty with genteel
and bidding farewell to her weary soul
In grave unrequited, another book closed.
Mar 28, 2021
Mar 28, 2021 at 2:02 PM UTC
This poem’s not in
Iambic Pentameter,
It is a haiku.
Oct 9, 2020
Oct 9, 2020 at 1:19 PM UTC
Still searching for something to fill the void
The early silence trade for endless pain
And when my mind is screaming, filled with noise
If sanity is dead, am I insane?
Oh how I want to give my soul to thee
So I don’t have to hurt it anymore
The only thing I have to fear is me,
You tell me that I’m broken, are you sure?
With all the many lies to me you’ve fed
I see the truth that’s lingering afar
Hung on too long, to let you go I dread
I’ll leave this suffering, still plagued by scars
Embrace the pain. With it comes wisdom too.
Wake up, my dear. From death springs life anew.
Apr 6, 2020
Apr 6, 2020 at 9:01 PM UTC
Their gears twist and turn, cranking tirelessly
Round the mortal coils of a mellower
Art and content of games played wirelessly.
The game boards are awash with bellowers,
Slighted pawns too bound by echo tubing
Passed around to fortunetellers frightened
By town criers trying to throw heartstrings
Of lovers obsessed with burdens lightened.
"She is trapped and he the trapper," they say.
Shall he free her and see her twist and break?
Maybe that is her choice," but not today,
Or tomorrow or the next," he risks fate.
Their goal is obvious: parting those two.
Too bad their love is a folie à deux.
Jan 8, 2020
Jan 8, 2020 at 5:14 PM UTC
Righteous anger is intoxicating;
Brain cells sold to the fiction of the mind.
It funds peddlers too loudly debating:
Oh, what to do with words spent on designs
Of machines combating contradictions?
Their motherboards are hardwired for the ****
Any thoughts or beliefs on opinions?
Just wait for their hunger to get its fill.
Nothing like teeth flushed with red and venom.
*** death, and chocolate cannot compare
To the moral high ground's cheap decorum
Of beliefs held in contempt and despair.
Because paying attention to the wit
Of my getting hard done by is the ****
Dec 21, 2019
Dec 21, 2019 at 10:42 PM UTC
The kitchen table, dimly lit, at which
Sit I, with book propp’d up upon the edge,
And in my hand, a mug bedeck’d with owls,
To the brim fill’d with sweet cinnamon chai.
The room as warm as summer, walls protect.
And I look out at the surrounding black
Becoming lost deep in the rain and wind
Which whirls without, just like a dancer wild
Would swirl a ribbon round and round their head.
But i sit in my isle of warmth and light.
While they are locked outside, in fath’mless dark.
Jun 11, 2019
Jun 11, 2019 at 10:52 PM UTC
for all the love of life that is now lost
your voice rings through my mind like a warm song
regardless of sweet summers ending cost
creates poetry in my head ere long
our melting of minds and bodies now gone
but forgotten, your touch could never be
simple as the dusk which becomes the dawn
my love for you as pure, as it is free
I know you may not feel of me the same
perhaps never again will you be mine
and gone is the love that once easy came
perhaps your silence has become a sign
but my love for you will always ring true
and your love alone has carried me through
Sep 17, 2018
Sep 17, 2018 at 1:28 PM UTC
Cupping candles on the open landscape,
marching to the heartbeat of the earth,
head hung low I hold the empty plate
that carries my last meal, the vanished mirth
I knew before the terrible black promise
of days that have been too long in the night.
I know I will not see the fabled summit.
A phosphorous reminder of the light,
Solemn-eyed the moon proclaims my doom,
my quiet song on this unhappy moor,
as I who move from chaos into gloom
light candles and bring darkness to the world.
If I could find within this grave omission
the fortitude of strength to stay the hand
that trembles with an urge to amputation
on the backdoor of tomorrow where I stand
How I would walk then as the need arises
and before the looming mountain make my plea
as far away the sun it blithely rises,
but I do not think that it will rise for me.
I do not think that it will rise for me.
Aug 7, 2018
Aug 7, 2018 at 8:09 PM UTC
A town whose people shapeshift everyday
keeps only worn-down roads and festive lights;
the shops, almost enchanted, switching names --
to change at will is to be true to type.
But though it's bittersweet, I must not dwell,
for dwelling simply makes me wish to die:
there cannot be a more merciless hell
than to be self-aware of time gone by -
so I face the days head-on, one by one,
thanking whatever deity's up there
for clockwork rising-falling of the sun;
a beauteous sight we're allowed to share.
Singing 'nostalgia' on our aged guitars
just picks at scabs that are to become scars.
Dec 9, 2017
Dec 9, 2017 at 10:54 AM UTC
my head feels funny so i thought i'd write
a sonnet in an attempt to get sleep
tired eyes meet heavy thoughts meet long nights
lonely hours breed thoughts of hearts sworn to keep
why do these thoughts always come back to you?
oh, all the things i would give to forget
me swearing to you my love and time too
when do promises become cursed debt?
maybe i am not the best with my words
i have a disposition to sadness
does that mean you can cut my heart in thirds?
tearing me apart in your cruel madness?
though still confused, i'm glad you ****** off
though i'm without sleep, i am moving on
we were volatile, a **** molotov
now i can move peacefully into dawn
though lacking you, it is still a new day
i would not have it any other way
Apr 29, 2017
Apr 29, 2017 at 8:53 PM UTC
SORCERER 1
Fell prince, what can we say? Shall we
Wring fingers, gazing nervously
Into our black, obsidian mirror?
SORCERER 2
Or, in our water jugs, to peer,
Unbinding and retying twine,
In hope epiphanies shall shine?
SORCERER 3
Or shall we three, like puzzling mages,
Cast bright corn-kernels ‘cross the pages
Of scripture, wincing to descry
Some omen there?
SORCERER 1 Or shall we lie?
SORCERER 2
Were not your lethal gaze forbidden,
Our eyes from yours no longer hidden,
SORCERER 3
These mirrors unfilmed to windows-
SORCERER 1 Wink
We not, you might their contents drink.
They look at Motecuhzoma.
TLACAELEL
Bold, brass, and bungling open-sesames,
Whose saucy tongues shall spice my hangman’s stew,
You dare let sink your cataracted gaze
Upon the solar luminance of our king?
Who meets these eyes, beholds the face of death.
MOTECUHZOMA
Shackles shall seal their eyes. Clap them away.
My hopes were stillborn by these blind-man’s bluffs.
SORCERER 1
A grand charade shall come to pass,
As marching mysteries amass,
And urgently these lurkings gather.
SORCERER 2
If that is what your lord had rather
Hear from us, so be it, then.
SORCERER 3
We’ll break our seal and thus unpen
Two breeds of vision we may show:
Oct 23, 2016
Oct 23, 2016 at 1:02 PM UTC
MOTECUHZOMA
Our priests have proven green and tenderfoot
By goggling at our late, ill auguries:
Dumbfounded, counselless, they scan their toes.
For this have I agreed to pawn my pride
In dabbling with questionable cures
By calling forth the aid of sorcerers.
PRIEST OF TLALOC
Dread lord, how might your grace with confidence
Place mercenary warlocks in your trust,
Who twist their gifts toward late-night banditry,
It’s said, to paralyze their shaky preys.
Tezcatlipoca, our capricious master,
Might cloud our muddy minds yet murkier
For slumping to such dubious helps as these
If they make mock of his peculiar knowings.
TLACAELEL
Don’t worry. If they cool your fevered fears
We’ll hail their hocus-pocus as white physic.
If not, then as black fiends in iron they’ll rot.
MOTECUHZOMA
Bring in these esoteric ministers.
A guard leads in three Sorcerers
You three obscure and dicing conjurers:
Have you beheld grim omens in the clouds,
Or prodigies upon the earth? You three,
Who fathom ‘neath earth’s black and gem-jammed caverns
To skim atop cold pools of stone-blind fish
And witness those who have not winked at day;
Who sink into the water’s murky deeps,
And loiter drowsily among the weeds,
Mustering fronds and nightshades for your charms.
PRIEST OF TLALOC
Have you encountered stray and mongreled men?
Or lightless nooks congeal as dead men’s shades?
Or midnight women, crablike, creep in broods?
Shall we be leveled flat by strange disease,
Or locusts, pirating their greedy shares?
From sudden deaths, from wars or wild beasts?
Shall rainstorms sink our rooftops down to jetties,
And Tlaloc drown us in a tide of bounty,
Or broil us in cruel sabbatical?
MOTECUHZOMA
You must not candy up **** truth for me.
Have you not heard our thirsting goddess cry,
And nightly croaking from the earth’s deep faults?
Oct 21, 2016
Oct 21, 2016 at 12:37 PM UTC
TLACAELEL
Great, gold-eyed Eagle, greet our messenger,
We offer his most precious fluid, Lord.
Bright Hummingbird, accept Thy rubied fruit.
In tawny plumes, Thou chaperonest the day.
[To worshipers] We are collaborators with the gods,
Performing our transcendent duty here.
For by this action lie the only means
To eternalize the circuits of the sun:
An aloe balm to all the sufferings
Of his interminable pilgrimage.
WORSHIPERS Blue Prince, may Thou incline Thy heart, that by Thy grace for yet a while may we see in dreams.
TLACAELEL
For we are God’s own chosen tribe, elect,
As kernels gleaned and winnowed from the chaff,
To side in cosmic struggle with the sun,
To side with goodness, vowed to ascertain
Its triumph over evil’s looming storm,
And to bestow to all humanity
The heavenwide profits of the victory
Of the resilient forces of the light
Over the gathering powers of the night.
Let us pray. Exit.
WORSHIPERS Huitzilopochtli, perform Thy office. Do Thy work. May I not reject Thee. May I not falter before Thee. May Thy heart desire whatsoever Thou mayest desire. This is all.
Trumpets, drum. All exit.
Oct 19, 2016
Oct 19, 2016 at 3:18 PM UTC
ALVARADO Old friend, admit,
You have not crossed this river Styx before,
But I and that long-suffering soldier have,
And seen such sights to make your codstones crawl:
I mean the hell of human sacrifice.
When trumpets howl, and myrrh infects the air,
A wall-broad drum resounds a thundering knell,
To call the cultists to their grisly pyramid.
A drum is heard, repeating at intervals.
One victim strains across the clammy slab,
A ghoul down-wrenching at each tortured limb,
To keep the spinal shambles tautly arched;
To see the black, satanic hangman leer,
With clotted snarls of hair, and clawlike nails,
Lifting the cutlery to tremble skyward,
And to this brittle bird cage plunge the flint;
He loots the poor chest of its jewel. The heart,
Exhumed, hot from the plundered cavity,
Reluctant to desist its wonted pulse,
Still shudders in the fiend’s vampiric gripe,
Which he uprears to slake the smoldering sun.
Unearthly, braying like a beast possessed,
And, wielding disarticulated joints-
The fleshless femurs of a ****** maid-
Or, glaring through a mask of patchwork flesh,
The druid forges down the crannied steps,
Cascading with a rill of molten marrow.
He kicks the corpse to tumble in the throng,
Who spring to ****** his gobbets for their dish,
And chant (the word goes) “Now our gods are coming . . .”
They exit.
Oct 18, 2016
Oct 18, 2016 at 12:04 PM UTC
CORTÉS
But how to learn their Tower-of-Babel tongues?
I think I have an inkling. Sandoval,
Bring me that Díaz from the footmen’s ranks-
A proud alumnus of this school of vice. Exit Sandoval.
Young Sandoval shows promise of promotion,
But, Alvarado, you’re my confidante,
As well as in effect my deputy.
We must concur about these Indians.
They are not possibly the “natural slaves”
Of which the pagan Aristotle spoke,
And can be raised to all the dignity
Of sons of Christ.
ALVARADO I’ll take your word.
CORTÉS Take God’s.
Enter DÍAZ.
DÍAZ God save you, captain! What mighty business of state pulls my
rare proficiencies away from tent-tying?
CORTÉS
So Díaz,
Twice now have you arrived in Cozumel
With this old villain, who reveals to me,
When last you pitched your tents, a year ago,
Your fleet encountered awestruck Indians,
Who nodded at the whiteness of your hides
And uttered, “Castilán . . . Castilán.”
Who came before, that they knew you by face?
DÍAZ
Some say that eight years past, lost in the fog,
A Spanish galleon shattered on these reefs.
Her ribs discharged a dash of castaways
That disappeared into these gloomy woods.
ALVARADO
And thus within hide our interpreters.
DÍAZ
So: Castellano . . . Castilán.
CORTÉS Well done.
Commune with these glad-handed Indians,
And sleuth it out through means of pantomime
If any of our cast-off countrymen
Might swelter yet in this unsparing clime. Exit Díaz.
ALVARADO
And as regards your noble savages?
CORTÉS
I shall induct them to the host of Christ.
I’ll give them scissors, candles, silver mirrors,
With tops and kites to cheer their little ones.
As your bombastic threats have scattered them,
I must so kindly call to coax them back.
ALVARADO
With prayer and kindness- Save us all! Kind words!
CORTÉS
Speak now, or hold your peace. . .
Oct 17, 2016
Oct 17, 2016 at 5:23 PM UTC
SANDOVAL
Your brigs of bustling pilgrims light at last
On this sweet-scented isle called Cozumel.
Depopulating half of Cuba’s farms,
The skills of our six hundred souls, or so,
Erupt now in a pitched activity.
We’ve confiscated idols, and our cross
Now overlooks the rising ropes and tarps;
Our cannons hedge the campground, with our horse,
As secret weapons, hidden in the ships.
ALVARADO
Now what a breezing cakewalk will it be
To pacify this docile flock of lambs!
Let’s ****** the sweetmeats from their trembling lips,
And wean them to the yoke of servitude.
Vassals alone make masters out of men.
CORTÉS
Not yet so fast. For Cuba’s stewardship
Forbids such a carnivorous regime.
Father Olmedo warns us not to tease,
Much less ****** the native nymphs.
ALVARADO Cortés,
We trust that you, like all stargazing men,
Crave glory, fortune, and above all, fame;
That royal favor and divine accord
Will light on those who quell idolatry,
And carve new lands for God and His Castile.
CORTÉS
But like a gentlemanly pirate, I.
For Cuba’s governor deceives himself.
His pure concern for human chattel, gold,
And bandying the Indies as it were
A distant annex of the Moorish war
Has wrought a desert from a paradise.
Long-term success requires a colony.
And with what wherewithal! These islanders
Stand head and shoulders o’er Carribbeans,
With their rich-painted books and towering keeps,
The graceful girding of their modesties-
SANDOVAL
Their slave trades, and their binding bright bouquets-
ALVARADO
Distilling liquor: Culture’s surest sign.
CORTÉS
Our prime directive is to baptize them,
Not march before their eyes the Seven Sins.
But how to learn their Tower-of-Babel tongues?
Oct 16, 2016
Oct 16, 2016 at 12:36 PM UTC
HUNGRY PRINCE
Last night, I watched a comet scorch the stars,
And thaw the moon to melt into her sea.
It detonated in a shower of sparks,
A fiery triad, hissing to the lake.
To me, a clear-cut message there shall be
Three final, leading lights of Mexico-
But I, alas, shall not be one of them.
Farewell, old man, but hoard what friends you have.
For now whatever well-planned path you take,
Dark hearts and dusty bones ride in my wake. Exit.
Oct 15, 2016
Oct 15, 2016 at 1:19 PM UTC
MOTECUHZOMA
I stand here, lords, a humbled man, to bow
Before divine arbitrament with you.
Tell me the damage of my botchery,
And do not let my title tie your tongue.
Unfold his ballot, and unveil my doom.
TLACAELEL
Great Speaker of the state of Mexico,
It is my solemn duty to report
That, by the power vested to my role
In this most sacred trial by tournament,
Your bounty due unto this king shall be . . .
[Opens the second wager.]
Three turkey ***** of prime and grade-A stock.
MOTECUHZOMA
You staked your kingdom on three gobbling birds?
Why did you shy to wager higher, man?
HUNGRY PRINCE
My father always warned me, never bet
For more than what you know you might receive.
MOTECUHZOMA
But- grinning simpleton- what will you do
With burlap sacks of poultry for a prize?
HUNGRY PRINCE
Why, I’ll farm out a new triumvirate.
The old one closed from lack of membership.
MOTECUHZOMA
Not hamstrung by a certain turkey’s qualms?
HUNGRY PRINCE
But poachered by the greater gobbler.
MOTECUHZOMA
So you shall never gain my kingdom now.
HUNGRY PRINCE
And you can never keep your kingdom now.
MOTECUHZOMA
That fails to follow. Who could rival me?
HUNGRY PRINCE
You’ll follow my allusion soon enough,
Once your own subjects fail to follow you.
MOTECUHZOMA
Fool! What I banked on was your fantasy.
HUNGRY PRINCE
Friend, what you staked on was my prophecy,
And what I prophesied, the gods confirm
By our ill-tilting trial in this field.
I have foretold your empire shall be lost,
And lost it shall be, to my heart’s dismay.
And therefore, farewell Mexico! Or else,
Farewell, Motecuhzoma. I’m afraid
One must be sacrificed to speed the other.
MOTECUHZOMA
Why know you not, straw man, I am the empire.
My doctrines are her laws; her braves, my brawn.
It is my veins her riches run through, sir,
And when she prays, it is my vows she breathes.
HUNGRY PRINCE
But when she suffers, you repose and dream,
And when she starves, her rumblings go unheard,
As you crack crab shells at the groaning board.
A pretty study, then, in symbiosis.
MOTECUHZOMA
Why bandy taunts with this malingerer?
Let’s penitently tender sacrifice,
And leave this dreamer to his reveries.
It seems such visions reign these days.
Oct 14, 2016
Oct 14, 2016 at 3:59 PM UTC