"conciliatory" poems
On having thought of the deeds I do
Day in, day out, and all through
Some I wish I hadn’t done
Though doing which was no fun
Slapping my own baby,
Hurting a daughter
For instance
I am no man, maybe
I reel, and I totter.
Often I repent, life’s force spent
Yet on living on, hell bent
Sometimes it’s just a thought I bore
Heart from heart, gut wrenching
Usually only a word that tore
Mouth’s bile, soul drenching
Doubt engulfs me unknowing
Words my own, self rending
Even I know when I am no match
For a conciliatory patch,
Plod on I must, myself to prove
I may yet find my gentle groove.
Aug 23, 2015
Aug 23, 2015 at 4:27 PM UTC
Esu Lanlu
Esu Elegbara
Esu Odara
Esu, the scared child of heaven
Esu, a reviled, respected,
Yet misunderstood being.
Esu, all creations dance to your best of life
Esu Dagunro
Esu Lukuluku
Esu Apagbe
Esu, the quickest and fastest one
Esu, confuser of many
Esu, the disruptor of order
Esu, the iconic one
Esu, the master of linguistics
Esu, the conciliatory peacemaker
Esu, the divine alchemist
Esu, the trickster
Esu, the pusher of those,
Who doesn't carry Olodumare's wishes.
Esu, the inseparable friend of Orunmila
Esu,
Papa Legba
Legba Atibon
Kalfou
Papa La Bas
Esu, divine messenger of transformation
Esu, ebora to luti la nbo
Esu, Okunrin ori ita
Esu, a quick responder when consulted
Esu, divine messenger of the gods
Esu Odara, the divine one of Ose Otura
Esu, carrier of the ase of sensuality and fertility
Esu Lanlu, king of dance
Esu, keeper and imparter of ase
Esu, the fundamental Orisa
Esu, the manifest of greatness
Esu, the one who is as hard as Rock
Esu Akeregbaye
Esu, the shedder of blood who knows no one's tears
Esu, the controller of earth
Esu, the special middle man between heaven and Earth
Esu, the anointed rope to success and wealth
Esu Lanlu
Esu Elegbara
Esu Odara
Written by Tosan Oluwakemi Thompson
Jul 6, 2020
Jul 6, 2020 at 8:18 AM UTC
Life tosses a conciliatory bone,
A string of tiny texts form a story,
Written in pages interwoven across the day.
But I'm still trapped in mid-week,
Looking forward through Wednesday's bars,
To a weekend's promised freedom.
I claim the night as my own,
But am cheated by the dawn,
Alone at the end of the rave.
With my summer spent,
And winter yet to be earned,
I finish my colourless breakfast solemnly.
My detoxification becomes a hollowing of the soul,
An empty vessel left listlessly on the sea,
Floating in an ocean of conspiracy.
Dec 29, 2011
Dec 29, 2011 at 4:34 AM UTC
Red is your color, never blue or gold.
My finish is never met with hollers or cheers, simply silence.
And not of the reverent sort, the sort of clammy, piteous, and overbearing silence.
Not the quiet that is shared in the company of friends or lovers. Never that.
My place on the podium will only raise me a foot or two.
From where I am standing the stars seems so **** far.
My "Participant" ribbon lies crumpled in-between my fingers.
And the ever present "I'm so sorry, good try" is meted out with each conciliatory apology.
But this isn't the first time, and I know it won't be the last.
That'll I will take second place in this race.
But really, how could I ever really want to win,
When I can barely get people to acknowledge me.
It would be a miracle if they started to cheer.
Did I mention I don't believe in miracles?
Everyone grows up learning to lie.
They fill in the spaces where we can't find the words.
They substitute for the stories we never made.
They shield those we love from all the hurt in the world.
So I guess I don't feel too bad about living a few lies.
Despite the wounds they left never really healing over.
I could blame him and her for them, but what is the point.
They happened, there they are on my skin, for all to see.
No use in tears, those won't change anything.
But the best I can do is grit my teeth and bear it.
The time for strength will be for later.
And I wouldn't look back if I was stronger,
But then again Orpheus was just a man too.
So call me a pillar of salt, or a push over.
But I lost, and it hurts.
I finished last again, and I think that adage might have more truth to it than I thought.
May 28, 2013
May 28, 2013 at 9:26 PM UTC
Under the duress of the sacrificial Cross
and positioned between two thieves,
the culmination of grace for the World
was granted - via Jehovah’s heavenly reprieve.
Surrounded by the stench of death,
Christ uttered famous words of forgiveness;
enduring human suffocation with each dying breath,
His Light steadfastly opposed foreboding darkness.
His heart was forcefully punctured,
by a soldier’s upward, piercing blow.
Ripping the spear from the broken body
caused both blood and water to surprisingly flow.
Not immediately realized or understood
was the significance of His Crucifixion.
For this conciliatory offering to God
covered our sin, serving as a holy propitiation.
In plain sight, upon Golgotha’s skull hill,
hung our Savior between two thieves.
On that Good Friday He fulfilled God’s will,
before His Spirit was allowed its earthly leave.
Author Note:
Learn more about me and my poetry at:
http://www.squidoo.com/book-isbn-1419650513/
By Joseph J. Breunig 3rd, © 2010, All rights reserved.
Feb 7, 2013
Feb 7, 2013 at 6:17 AM UTC
people who feel like to extend their pinky fingers
when the others have been recently offered
in assistance to greedy children, antagonistic husbands,
selfish friends.
they would never see people that way though
because if they did, and on the few days that they do,
when humanity is tire slashing puppy decapitation,
the people who feel crumble into a *** of sappy person,
resorting to gulping sobs and furious scribbles in
a journal no one will read.
people who feel like to assume they are alone,
that if God wanted to, they might all have been
rounded up, dumped on an island, and left
to offer conciliatory remarks, hugs, and shared
assumptions of responsibility and ethical treatment.
people who feel like to believe people are good,
as good as cotton wrapped tightly
around a small, slender, white stick:
dutiful, essential, uniquely purposeful.
but those people who feel woefully forget
the Ones who Feel
and feel to such a degree
that they create destructions and downfalls,
messily, angrily
like a toddler desperately trying
to make the blue crayon look black.
they are dangerous.
powerfully effective at harnessing the attention
of those who digest and regurgitate what
Society has in mind about the condition of people,
that there are troublemakers and peacemakers,
but the bad apples are more capable of wiping out
the apples who never had a chance,
and merely were in line of fire because they were
apples of the same kind at the same place
with the same name.
people, plain regular people, like to remember this
silly notion from childhood,
the devil and the angel entertaining either shoulder
of people, all, everyone people.
but what I think, me, who feels and feels and feels
until the feeling goes far away
until I beg for it to return,
everyone feels. some listen too keenly. some explode. some are deaf.
others mute.
Nov 9, 2014
Nov 9, 2014 at 5:16 PM UTC
The beauty of the desert
Is not in the land;
Barren, dry, harsh and bitter.
The beauty of the lake
Is not in the water;
Brackish, still, cold and endless.
The beauty of a man’s soul
Is not in his prayers;
Angry, conciliatory, false, importunate.
Look up
All reflects what shines above
Sun painting mountains pink
Glint of light on wave
Love that gives more than it takes
Beauty in the eye of the beholder
Blessing in the eye of the beloved
Perfection in reflection
Peace within and without
This walks with us
The vessel must be open
To receive the wine.
Dec 21, 2014
Dec 21, 2014 at 12:22 PM UTC
Sadness held me when no one else would. I was afraid, and alone, and a mess, but sadness selfishly let me crawl into its lap, and curl up into a size of myself that I could tolerate but no one could love. Sadness held me when you didn't. It held me when my heartbeat was a hurricane, and when the apologies rolled out of my throat like tidal waves. Sadness threw on its rainboots and marched through the storm to bring the moon back to me when you couldn't even march outside. Running its cloudy fingers through my hair like strands of spider webs, careful not to skip a single inch, sadness pulled me against its hollow chest and whispered venomous conciliatory reminders of who we are into my broken head. Sadness shook me like a seizure until I finally fell asleep.
And when I woke up to the soft grey light of this existence, sadness held me because my heart slipped through the greedy fingers of everyone who tried, shattering on the floor as you walked away from the mess you hadn't seen before. Sadness held me because no one else could. And I deserved to be held.
Jul 12, 2014
Jul 12, 2014 at 2:44 PM UTC
Love is never average when I am with you.
When I say I love you I mean:
I take you into my heart,
My desires,
pain and suffering,
Longing,
My dreams are full of your dedication,
What I mean by I love you is:
I gather up the physics of your footsteps,
Calculate your directions,
Analyze your pace,
The arc plane of which your hair falls,
I measure love in:
The beauty of your voice,
The conciliatory effect it has into the art of my body,
The soul train of your rhymes,
Your rhythm,
how they reverberate between the walls of my ears,
How you pinball between cerebral sections that cause me to taste the half notes between the bars of your lips,
I feel love by:
You holding my waist,
Gripping me to safety,
Letting my hips and thighs and cheekbones my rounded jawline,
That the the gaps between your fingers can be filled with my curves.
What I mean by I love you is:
The distortion of my hyper ****** drive to mute into intimacy.
Not to disperse,
But to love.
To lift control to the surface,
To caress,
not to be driven and forced,
What I mean by love is:
How I define the impact of you on me.
Nov 11, 2014
Nov 11, 2014 at 1:06 AM UTC
i saw your poem in the paper the other day
i didn’t read it
some wounds are too fresh
if i wrote something beautiful,
would it change you?
if you wrote something conciliatory,
would it change me?
i saw your story in the paper the other day
i can’t read it.
Mar 6, 2013
Mar 6, 2013 at 5:53 PM UTC
There is a mood
That seems missing
In the public square
Morning lyrics ring
With truculent sounds
Unescorted
By harmonious echos
Discerning pundits
Wonder aloud
Why divisiveness
Holds sway
Where oh where
Has civility gone
Lost in a forest
Of greed
Submerged in
A sea of avarice
Dec 29, 2023
Dec 29, 2023 at 8:57 AM UTC
selfish listening is even bigger and more murderous today than if I could share it with me! A larger, uninhabited continent is at war with me than anyone could understand! Curiously, however, I threw myself thirsty at hyena landscapes; they would have been called by the conciliatory smiles that sent me, the promises that could be kept — I would have put my trembling child's soul, trembling in my innocent tears, in the palm of My Beloved!
If he looks into the mirror of another seer - he offers him a teasing shadow! When someone sees me “on the other side” he only senses my chubby fur-crust: an emotional Marsian! My loneliness is also a rich relative of the waterfall of my falling Star Tears shining at night! What would I find and get to know? I'm autumn: my falling letters, if they don't pay attention, the wind often sweeps away…
I will be a limp bee on the silk veils of my sweetheart's heartbreaking petals. He will take care of my
pistils, I will close my eyes and I will know Dormant! His tired roe deer danced flirtatiously in star-glitter even with the yellow-glowing Moonbeam; I could feel its crater weight, even though it was millions of light-years away and it was curling over our heads at the frowning midnight! The redeeming Universe burned my skin like a flaming black flame: our common body trembled at a beat like a stretched bow and immortalized al
I wrote my vulnerable footprint in my heart and can I hope it takes care of it? - In the double darkness around us grows the rampant uncertain! We are both standing on the shore: Who can leave first ?!
Nov 20, 2020
Nov 20, 2020 at 11:05 PM UTC
It is very sad
When hearts are broken
Pain walks in
When words are left unspoken
Communicate with one another
That will eliminate the frustration
Moments will become better
With conciliatory action
Jul 30, 2014
Jul 30, 2014 at 1:39 PM UTC
The silence in this world is ringing
ringing like the unanswered phones left on the line
because no one is home to hear
the shrill call of an unanswered voice just begging,
begging for one more shot at whatever sordid mess they’ve left behind
because the future is ahead and it’s scaring them.
Please, just let me come home.
Home was never safe, it was never warm,
it was just a place for childhood embers burnt fast by the age of 12, no, 11, no, 10,
but then I still beg to go back because life’s ahead, mom,
And they’re calling my name but I cover my eyes
because all I hear is the shrill call of an unanswered voice
begging me to amount to all that I’m worth,
to take strides on horizons I can hardly fathom,
because out there, they’re looking for a shadow to their sunset.
A step away, a reach, a grasp,
but I let it fall from my hands and crash -
graceless, inelegant, twisted, metamorphosed into a nightmare I’ll never catch.
Because these walls are a sanctuary
where the hands that cover my eyes and
the hands that cover my ears protect me
from the world’s volatility,
and the one thing I grasp:
invincibility
in the highest degree.
So fire your bullets, because they’ll only ricochet,
keep away
no way
no wait,
this isn’t invincibility,
just conciliatory me
bending, twisting, metamorphosed into
a grotesque shape
a nightmare I’ll become
When someday there’s a ringing in my head
of an unanswered phone left on the line.
I don’t want to hear it;
the shrill call of an unanswered voice just begging,
begging for one more shot at the broken pieces,
this puzzle strewn across the floor
like it’s always been there
just never seen before,
Because you only see the flash after you hear the bang
and it’s all over.
It’s too late.
The phone keeps ringing.
Dec 14, 2018
Dec 14, 2018 at 9:12 PM UTC
Shadow, Shadow
Within my dream,
Have I dreamed you awake,
Said Lizard King To Peace Frog? Peace Frog says it's
Old anchovy, Rare bits of beef
And I can't remember the last thing I said,
Except that which I see.
Is that just a dream
Within a dream,
Or just a brush of Raven's wing? But Lizard King I dream what I dream awake,
How can that be?
Shadow sees what fades to passing, another dream
Within a dream.
And I look at the burning sun
Bleeding paint like a river.
And I think of my job,
And I think of nothing at all,
As a baby night bug crawls
Along the spiral of my page,
Invading worlds beneath my fingers.
Oceans, Worlds, Suns and
Arcs of light beyond our being. Nothing moves in silence.
Wondering of stories
Forgotten as a child,
Yet nothing's forgotten,
Yet all is forgiven.
Conciliatory Shadows,
Reckoning light,
Pink and blue and coral
Dreams of light and line
And space and Shadow
And Shadow.
Therin lies your answer
Peace Frog says to Lizard King. This welcome mat beneath you, this simple
Weaves of straw an steel,
And the streetlight bends
Behind me, then gone.
So are Lizard King and Peace Frog.
Where have they gone?
To Shadow,
To the realm of Shadow.
And I see my Father's face,
Darkening, lighting
In the streetlights.
As the stink of the factories
Fill the air.
And my Dad would talk of jazz, while I turned the radio
To Donovan, Mellow Yellow,
And its 1966.
And I think of my job,
Revolving wheels,
Sparks and Sun Dogs,
And I think of Shadow,
Shadow,
And red headed women
In Capris,
And the light of the sun
Blinding in noon.
Dreams of bright nothings.
Bon Bon's of scarlet.
Shadow, Shadow,
What to make of such things?
Shadow smiles as Buddha,
Says a sliver of sleep
Is all you need.
Do I cipher a riddle
From the air?
And I wonder of Shadow,
Will he haunt me forever?
Mar 8, 2020
Mar 8, 2020 at 11:06 PM UTC
Be Nice to the Police
It was like watching me on a film clip,
surrounded by four police officers
one of them a woman who yelled at me
for not speaking proper Portuguese.
I stared at her with contempt
It was a tense moment.
A conciliatory officer stepped in.
No big deal he said, a little scratch the car
is insured documents in order
have a pleasant journey.
I have often wondered why female officers
are so aggressive, is it because they are smaller,
land compensate the feeling of inferiority
by being brusque?
I met one smiling woman officer once, black and
six foot ten, refused my offer to marry her so I could
feel safe, was married she said…so what!
Before I forget the rude female officer was standing
behind a car in the dark smoking a cigarette and she
was overlooked by the male officers
Apr 2, 2017
Apr 2, 2017 at 5:15 AM UTC
I am the very model of a modern poet laureate,
I've information rhythmical, poetical and lexical,
I know the poets of our land and quote their plays historical,
From Macbeth to Much Ado, in order categorical;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with rhythm hendecasyllable,
I understand assonance and refrain octosyllable,
About pentameter theory I'm teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about the style of poet Edward Hughes.
I'm very good at couplets and at blank verse very fabulous;
I know the seventy-one plays ascribed to Aeschylus:
In short, in matters rhymical, poetical, and lexical,
I am the very model of a modern poet laureate.
I know our poem-history, Caedmon's Hymn to Chaucer's works;
I can cite bards' acrostics with volatility in my vocal box,
I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus,
In dialect ionic I can cite Semonides of Amorgos;
I can tell undoubted Aratus from Aristeus and Sophocles,
I know the croaking chorus from The Frogs of Aristophanes!
Then I can hum a fugue of which I've heard the music's din afore,
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pinafore.
Then I can write a decasyllable as a dactyl or tetrameter,
And tell you ev'ry detail of soliloquies in Shakespeare:
In short, in matters rhythmical, poetical, to elloquate,
I am the very model of a modern poet laureate.
In fact, when I know what is meant by a "septet" and a "sestet",
When I can tell at sight a literary from a prose effect,
When such affairs as odic and idyllic I'm more wary at,
And when I know precisely 'to be or not to be' by Dane "Hamlet".
When I have learnt what progress has been made in modern rhymery,
When I know more iambic than a novice in a nunnery
In short, when I'm audacious, vexatious and dilatory
You'll say a poet laureate has ne'er been so conciliatory.
For my alliteration knowledge, though I'm plucky and adventury,
Has only been brought down to the beginning of the century;
But still, in matters rhythmical, poetical and etiquette,
I am the very model of a modern poet laureate.
May 3, 2021
May 3, 2021 at 11:44 AM UTC
I am the very model of a modern poet laureate,
I've information rhythmical, poetical and lexical,
I know the poets of our land and quote their plays historical,
From Macbeth to Much Ado, in order categorical;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with rhythm hendecasyllable,
I understand assonance and refrain octosyllable,
About pentameter theory I'm teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about the style of poet Edward Hughes.
I'm very good at couplets and at blank verse very fabulous;
I know the seventy-one plays ascribed to Aeschylus:
In short, in matters rhymical, poetical, and lexical,
I am the very model of a modern poet laureate.
I know our poem-history, Caedmon's Hymn to Chaucer's works;
I can cite bards' acrostics with volatility in my vocal box,
I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus,
In dialect ionic I can cite Semonides of Amorgos;
I can tell undoubted Aratus from Aristeus and Sophocles,
I know the croaking chorus from The Frogs of Aristophanes!
Then I can hum a fugue of which I've heard the music's din afore,
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pinafore.
Then I can write a decasyllable as a dactyl or tetrameter,
And tell you ev'ry detail of soliloquies in Shakespeare:
In short, in matters rhythmical, poetical, to elloquate,
I am the very model of a modern poet laureate.
In fact, when I know what is meant by a "septet" and a "sestet",
When I can tell at sight a literary from a prose effect,
When such affairs as odic and idyllic I'm more wary at,
And when I know precisely 'to be or not to be' by Danish "Hamlet".
When I have learnt what progress has been made in modern rhymery,
When I know more iambic than a novice in a nunnery
In short, when I'm audacious, vexatious and dilatory
You'll say a poet laureate has ne'er been so conciliatory.
For my alliteration knowledge, though I'm plucky and adventury,
Has only been brought down to the beginning of the century;
But still, in matters rhythmical, poetical and etiquette,
I am the very model of a modern poet laureate.
Jul 26, 2021
Jul 26, 2021 at 8:15 AM UTC