"defied" poems
Spending a month in a hospital teaches you a lot about people.
The doctor that told me to shave my head or she wouldn't treat me,
The nurses that spent forever chatting to me
And giving me supportive advice about how my illness doesn't define me.
The woman who was given a terminal cancer sentence
And chose not to pay attention to it and defied it anyway.
How she sat next to me on my bed,
Told me that all suffering is valid,
And just because I'm not dying, doesn't mean I don't get to complain.
How she complains more about her skin problems
Than she ever complained about her cancer,
And that's OK, because pain rarely follows rules.
I never even learned her name,
But she gave me the words I hold most closely to me
On those days when I want to fall asleep and never wake up.
I'm allowed to scream and shout and rage against the pain
And the unfairness of it happening to me.
I just have to make sure I know where the line is
Between giving my darkness a voice and pitying myself.
Jul 6, 2016
Jul 6, 2016 at 12:01 PM UTC
Having defied gravity
(not me personally
but by proxy
namely through
a dog, monkey and Soyuz
and fruit flies and bullfrogs
and lately through NASA)
I defy humility
I brave it, I challenge it
for there’s too much hypocrisy
in humility
For humility is such
that it never speaks its name
For when it speaks of Humility
it is Sans Humility
Take me
for example -
you hardly hear me
mention myself as Saint Humility, do you?
But that’s what I am, my other name: Humility
But people keep insisting on calling me Saint Humility
But I defy Humility
POSTSCRIPT
I also defy repetition
and over-emphasis
and contradiction, paradox
But, it must not be left unsaid -
in defying humility,
I think I’ve also
quite inadvertently
defined humility: Saint Me
Jul 28, 2013
Jul 28, 2013 at 7:42 AM UTC
I have shorn the hair of Samson
And the tiger's claws unsheathed
I have spit into the hurricane
And defied as fires breathed
The minutest one is fastest
And the closest one to me
The largest is the strongest
The most likely to break free
The middle is most cunning
Spits and growls at my resolve
Yet I face the fearsome challenge
As should one the more evolved
I have bravely fought the battle
To triumphant victory
As I fiercely clip the claws
Of not just one cat, but all three
Cori MacNaughton
20Mar2001
Jun 11, 2015
Jun 11, 2015 at 12:53 PM UTC
So, what's the deal with ******
Why is it that there's this whole weird thing
associated with being unclothed,
as if we don't wake up and each of us
strip down for a completely naked shower,
and under our clothes, we're completely naked.
Why is it we spend so much time pretending our bodies don't exist
and fragilely hiding behind these pointless social
constructions about what and whom you should and shouldn't be,
why do we lie about who we are and cover it up
because it's not safe for children?
CHILDREN ARE THE SAME SPECIES AS US.
THEY ARE THE SAME SHAPE.
They get naked too.
and if they're not quite the same shape yet, why do we hide what they're going to become?
It's completely pointless to build walls and act as if they were set there by someone other than ourselves, we've given each other amnesia, it's always 'they', it's always 'society', that did it.
Why do we create all these rules and desperately
struggle to follow them as if we weren't the ones
who wrote the rule book and we aren't the ones
who can erase it?
Why does he cover his emotions because he's scared to be called gay or too feminine?
Why does she wear long sleeves or look down when you talk to her?
It's not because of some conniving voice in all of our heads,
an imaginary force,
It's every time you made a sarcastic joke about people who defied the norm
and every time you yourself were afraid to break it,
you built the walls and now you're suffocating within them.
I see you, there, hiding, just like me, and it's painful to repress it, isn't it? It hurts because there's something more we're longing to do, somewhere else we're longing to be.
What is it that is so broken within ourselves that
we can't be raw and we can't be free and we can't kiss random strangers when we want to?
****** isn't dangerous if you don't hurt
and you don't make someone else feel vulnerable
or like they're trash for displaying
the image of God.
Why are we hiding the image of God?
Why do we cover our hearts like they're shameful to show?
We are born into this world naked and our parents
try to instill this ridiculous idea in our heads
that we can't share our innermost thoughts, we mustn't display,
"society won't like that"
YOU. ARE. SOCIETY.
I am a member of this universe, just like you,
and I was born naked and I take showers naked
and when we get up on stage, we're naked
and late at night, we're naked,
and when we cry, we're naked.
WHY ARE THERE ANY SECRETS LEFT WHEN WE ARE ALL HUMAN?
I have pain and joy, just like you, so show me.
My goal is to unclothe the knights in shining armor
because I don't care about the armor, I care
about his heart.
I will strip down these walls dividing you and me,
because I want to know everything about all people.
I want to unravel the secrets deep within God's mind.
I want to open the doors that are locked,
and I want to see you naked.
Mar 15, 2014
Mar 15, 2014 at 8:25 PM UTC
An imaginary but desirable sense of control
Created by the bully in my head
Screaming at me, pressuring me, hurting me
Encapsulating my mind as a second meninges.
Impossible to separate my true thoughts
From what it tells me,
My conscious mind is tied to a cinder block
And left to drown in its enticingly rough waves.
My physical being constantly changing with the tide
Unpredictable but regular,
Shallow but deep.
****** into its infinite black hole,
I am left feeling disgusted and ashamed
Of all that is me.
No longer am I able to decide the way in which
My needs are met-if in fact they are met.
As though I have DID, I am constantly bouncing
From alter to alter
Body to body.
Blinded from looking directly into its sun,
I am warmed and comforted by its rays
While reassured that my doubts are unwarranted.
If ever defied, it scolds and whips me,
Like a master to his slave,
A father to his child.
The welts and cuts, gratefully rip into my
Skin, muscle and bone –
Punishment for my wrongdoings and self.
I, immediately silenced
Remove myself from society,
Restricting contact, nourishment and emotions
To nil.
It is not until someone notices
The beginnings of an eternal invisibility,
That I am released and
Able to breathe in
The salty air of life.
Jun 20, 2012
Jun 20, 2012 at 9:29 PM UTC
i admit to 'male' --
'female' strikes me low
curving
concupiscent hips (of Venus swaying so)
the one who places,
caught bathing in her morph
to mar
her goddess innocence (Peleus grasps her so)
her evergreen paradise-
apple spraying scruples,
while the sun
dries forgiveness **** (on Eve's fragrant *******
in other Edens
Lilith simply leaves him blind
to lust
for unknown Didos (craving **** or suicide)
the limping god
nets love and war, olympicly
to smith
a mortal death (from Vulcan jealousy)
foresight's fire-gift
leaps obedience
to lie
far falls the divine (in ******* he defied)
potent swan of sky,
what judgement?
for a girl
you laid in that white rush, (virginity unfurled)
immortal ****
fates sails of progeny,
raging
poet-birthing strife (for temple priestess' cries)
fated nation-death swoons,
shares beauty's scale,
and Aphrodite's foam (caresses history's thighs)
Trojan tensions mix
the modern mind to heights of doubt
of mythopoets' truth ( -yielding blindnesses)
lonely walk the earth
with guiding wisdom lacking
all the pawns of fate (forget love's darknesses)
sphinxine hunger asks
the soul of destiny
of hubris, tragic sight (and orgiastic nights)
of unknown woman
man struck down
sickly city safe
and burning, yearning (nymph and satyr sating Bacchic rites)
Jun 26, 2012
Jun 26, 2012 at 8:56 PM UTC
~
Heroes
They call you,*
Heroes.*
There's just something-
Something about that
Word.
~
I’ve got this special
Kind of magic,
And wouldn’t it be
Just awesome,
If I could be one-
A Hero-
Too?
~
I did my best.
And I defied you.
Disobeyed you.
I’m sorry
(but it was worth it).
I’m sorry.
~
I don’t want to leave.
I’m not ready to go
I don’t want to go.
Please.
Hold on.
Hold on for me.
Please don’t let me go.
~
I’m sorry.
I’m so sorry.
May 23, 2018
May 23, 2018 at 8:54 AM UTC
The tractor stands frozen - an agony
To think of. All night
Snow packed its open entrails. Now a head-pincering gale,
A spill of molten ice, smoking snow,
Pours into its steel.
At white heat of numbness it stands
In the aimed hosing of ground-level fieriness.
It defied flesh and won't start.
Hands are like wounds already
Inside armour gloves, and feet are unbelievable
As if the toe-nails were all just torn off.
I stare at it in hatred. Beyond it
The copse hisses - capitulates miserably
In the fleeing, failing light. Starlings,
A dirtier sleetier snow, blow smokily, unendingly, over
Towards plantations Eastward.
All the time the tractor is sinking
Through the degrees, deepening
Into its hell of ice.
The starting lever
Cracks its action, like a snapping knuckle.
The battery is alive - but like a lamb
Trying to nudge its solid-frozen mother -
While the seat claims my buttock-bones, bites
With the space-cold of earth, which it has joined
In one solid lump.
I squirt commercial sure-fire
Down the black throat - it just coughs.
It ridicules me - a trap of iron stupidity
I've stepped into. I drive the battery
As if I were hammering and hammering
The frozen arrangement to pieces with a hammer
And it jabbers laughing pain-crying mockingly
Into happy life.
And stands
Shuddering itself full of heat, seeming to enlarge slowly
Like a demon demonstrating
A more-than-usually-complete materialization -
Suddenly it jerks from its solidarity
With the concrete, and lurches towards a stanchion
Bursting with superhuman well-being and abandon
Shouting Where Where?
Worse iron is waiting. Power-lift kneels
Levers awake imprisoned deadweight,
Shackle-pins bedded in cast-iron cow-shit.
The blind and vibrating condemned obedience
Of iron to the cruelty of iron,
Wheels screeched out of their night-locks -
Fingers
Among the tormented
Tonnage and burning of iron
Eyes
Weeping in the wind of chloroform
And the tractor, streaming with sweat,
Raging and trembling and rejoicing.
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Lacquer metal, finest degree
Eggshell maiden dancing, skirts turned free
Tossed leaf nestle, a glory in a hidden theatre
Dark privileged passions creep in and listen.
The dirt around your feet compacted,
The dress around your friends contrived
But you look so natural in those seams of transplacental
Defied by the native over-leaf
What privileged thought found comfort there
What Rubenesqued dresses blushed in joy
At white marble hugging thought
And privileged smells adorning your excitement
The path beyond your feet leads nowhere
For your sight spins where your eyebrows lead
Round and round in close circles
Amongst those eyes who cracked your paint
Aug 30, 2018
Aug 30, 2018 at 5:12 AM UTC
I believe things happen for a reason
Whether it's God or the force
Some kind of cosmic power pulling strings and writing stories
I'm not sure
But I can tell you that I have somehow defied my own odds
The choices I made did not take me away
I am here
There were times when I didn't think I would make it my high school graduation and that I would not see my 18th birthday
The scars on my arms multiplied
And the demons in my head screamed louder than ever before
I lost my first love
Then I lost my second
I watched my family explode from close range
And then I watched from a far
Every insecurity swirled in my head like a blizzard
I could not see a bright future
And then something clicked
Something bigger than myself took hold of my mind
My heart was no longer heavy
And I don't know if that's God stepping in or my own power of will
But I have somehow managed to save myself
And I know there is no quick fix to this disease that has held me captive for so long
But I'm realizing that you should never stop moving when it gets dark
Never quit breathing when the air gets thin
And never back down even when your opponent is twice your size
Or even when your opponent is yourself
I know things happen for a reason
That's obviously why I'm still here
And although there is still a dark cloud over me
I can start to see the sun beams
And I know one day my sky will be clear
Dec 18, 2015
Dec 18, 2015 at 8:42 AM UTC
Mysterious death! who in a single hour
Life's gold can so refine
And by thy art divine
Change mortal weakness to immortal power!
Bending beneath the weight of eighty years
Spent with the noble strife
of a victorious life
We watched her fading heavenward, through our tears.
But ere the sense of loss our hearts had wrung
A miracle was wrought;
And swift as happy thought
She lived again -- brave, beautiful, and young.
Age, pain, and sorrow dropped the veils they wore
And showed the tender eyes
Of angels in disguise,
Whose discipline so patiently she bore.
The past years brought their harvest rich and fair;
While memory and love,
Together, fondly wove
A golden garland for the silver hair.
How could we mourn like those who are bereft,
When every pang of grief
found balm for its relief
In counting up the treasures she had left?--
Faith that withstood the shocks of toil and time;
Hope that defied despair;
Patience that conquered care;
And loyalty, whose courage was sublime;
The great deep heart that was a home for all--
Just, eloquent, and strong
In protest against wrong;
Wide charity, that knew no sin, no fall;
The spartan spirit that made life so grand,
Mating poor daily needs
With high, heroic deeds,
That wrested happiness from Fate's hard hand.
We thought to weep, but sing for joy instead,
Full of the grateful peace
That follows her release;
For nothing but the weary dust lies dead.
Oh, noble woman! never more a queen
Than in the laying down
Of sceptre and of crown
To win a greater kingdom, yet unseen;
Teaching us how to seek the highest goal,
To earn the true success --
To live, to love, to bless --
And make death proud to take a royal soul.
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Like a greedy vulture, I pecked at my skin
What is there to accept?
Is it the discoloured patches where plump red blush had settled before?
Rosy and full of life, I will mourn for my past self.
Is it the falling strings of hair giving up on embracing my tired neck?
A backbone that has defied its own purpose.
In a world of exchange and sharing
Nature has found a place in me
My soul reconciles with the desire to bloom
But my body is dwelling in its ashy winter days
Between the night and day
Find me halfway deciding where to go,
It will either be aspiring to be the sun
or waiting for the end to die with the moon.
Jul 21, 2014
Jul 21, 2014 at 10:30 AM UTC
There's something more
To paper planes
Than what meets the eye;
The creases and folds
that let them fly.
Beneath the way
They swoop and soar,
Paper planes
have a tendency
To always fall.
Thankfully for us,
We can spend time
Flying up high,
Way up there,
Without a single care.
We have defied gravity
We rarely fall,
But when we do
It's never big,
Only small.
There's something satisfying
About watching paper planes.
Not knowing their journeys.
Not knowing their ways.
Just not knowing.
However we know,
We know now,
About the planes,
And exactly how
We've created a vow.
Aug 27, 2015
Aug 27, 2015 at 6:37 AM UTC
she always told me
"try This"
"try That"
she constantly
wore a blood alcohol level
that defied mathematics.
and bore eyes red
as a painter's canvas;
but a smile
she would paint onto her face
putting the final touches
to her masterpiece.
she always told me
Try This
Try That
reassuring i'll be fine regardless
if i get hooked, or not.
she was Perfectly Drifting away
unaware
i was already hooked
to the most powerful Drug of all
right
in front of me.
Aug 2, 2015
Aug 2, 2015 at 3:38 AM UTC
I thought of Thee, my partner and my guide,
As being pass’d away.—Vain sympathies!
For, backward, Duddon! as I cast my eyes,
I see what was, and is, and will abide;
Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide;
The Form remains, the Function never dies;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise,
We Men, who in our morn of youth defied
The elements, must vanish;—be it so!
Enough, if something from our hands have power
To live, and act, and serve the future hour;
And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,
Through love, through hope, and faith’s transcendent dower,
We feel that we are greater than we know.
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*Through the incredulity burning
in the grim reaper's eyes,
He unwillingly received the souls
of those who did not deserve to die
...
The bright fluids of life lay bare
and insignificant in the godforsaken lands
He sighed the heaviest breath he could muster
Death was his trade, but this affair had him
loosening his grip on the scythe
Mumbling the dead's prayer,
The half-living defied fate's ruthless threads
And squirmed for barren hope
A child nearby cries for the light to save him
As the shadows devoured their youngest feast, so far
Now standing alone, the reaper cursed the gods
Who may or may not be listening to him
He was disgusted with the greed of these people
And their bloodbaths
Where those who avoid death and the
ones who thrillingly seek it
Summon each other with empty excuses
Thinking these are enough to fling
their guns at the righteous
Drink the innocent blood like
the finest wine from their vineyards!
Stab the weak at their remaining spots
Oh how foolish they are!
How foolish indeed!
He pities those who speak death as their honor
When they have only lived like rats
Scavengers of chances that purifies
their filthy names
He scorns those who
do not even speak of death
In their wild belief that some curse
will hand them like a platter to their graves
When death is the end that no one ,
not even him, can escape
Those cowards!
No one lives to cheat that dark fate!
No one!
The reaper was provoked by humans
Them and their incessant wonder and fear of
That that is unknown
Them who have stopped looking
at their small, definite lives
To anticipate what they could not
even begin to understand
Feeding their illusions that a special place
awaits their petty souls to rest on
Ahhh!!!He was tired of them all
Might as well finish his job...*
May 11, 2015
May 11, 2015 at 5:44 PM UTC
The lily of life, full of humility and devotion - the beautiful kind
that everyone would choose to pick from the fields I think you'll find.
One who defied the definition of a heroic inspiration,
your talent outshone all others; you caused quite the sensation.
You tenaciously grasped onto your stem of life
with the insidious poison of demise within your cells rife,
your colours darkening and fading away,
and yet you remained God's most beautiful creation each and every day.
As your petals fluttered down, by your side was your wife
while you heart-wrenchingly closed the circle of your life.
Now, we all shall miss watching you bloom through the days
and we will remember you, forever and ALWAYS .
Jan 14, 2016
Jan 14, 2016 at 1:51 PM UTC
The one lady
the one soul
the one son
the single mother who defied all odds and won
raised a young man to be pleasant and polite not die by the gun
poor and stressed times weren't the best
but nevertheless she picked herself up and carried on being blessed
Dec 8, 2012
Dec 8, 2012 at 7:53 AM UTC
Guys and gals,
Ladies and gents
I love to see the couples in love
Couples newly in love
Couples well into love
Couples who never thought they'd ever find it
Young couples
Old couples
Middle-of-the-road couples
Eye catching couples
Plain couples
Color blind in-love couples
Taller couples
Shorter couples
From alpha to omega couples
Couples who lost the love, but found it again
Couples who struggled on through
Couples who defied the odds
Maybe I'm peering through rose-colored pupils
Maybe my vision has gone radioactive
But I love to see such couples in love
Oct 16, 2013
Oct 16, 2013 at 10:36 PM UTC
My darling you do know right?
That I love you in spite of every ‘in spite’
And forever would love you this way
I know you’d wonder-Why did I leave then?
Well sweetheart, have you ever seen
The sun and the moon intertwined?
We always believed that I
was your apple sauce
And you my pork chop
Either went missing
The delight shall remain incomplete
But love, you do know it hit both of us
How weak was the foundation of this structure
Infallibility is not something each
Relationship can afford
With which I perfectly agree
But only if it were for errors committed
Honestly in love
This moon would have defied
The force of gravity to reach his sun
Even when it meant burning his identity
My ashes would also have
Whispered your name girl
If only our attempts had been honest
Just for once
For the eyes drifting upwards
Did see us together at times
But hon, we were never intertwined
If only our apologies had some substance
If only our love were more than just pleasure
If only it were based on truth rather than fraudulence
If only we had recognized OUR relevance
I’ll not waste much of your precious time
End I shall this sorrowful ballad
With these final parting lines-
“That every night this moon re-lives
The vivid memory of
The light radiated from his sun
That helps him hide the bruises, ugly scars
Dark holes in his soul from
The world’s gaze
Shining brightly every crepuscule
Following a similar phenomenon
As that of the celestial sun- giving its light
From millions of miles away to its celestial moon
The distance in no way affects the connection
between the two
Cupcake we both know that the moon
Will never have light of its own
It is the sun that will forever be the source
And the miles will forever exist
And must be maintained
To prevent the breaking of hearts beyond repair
Prevention is a necessity
Since the sound of such an apocalypse
Might remain unheard
receiving none’s attention and solace
For sound does not travel in space”
Oct 8, 2015
Oct 8, 2015 at 1:31 PM UTC
I write of a feeling unknown and unnamed.
It eludes me, it flies away and hides,
Resists examination.
It is huge, it is all, it is everything.
A swelling scream,
A realised dream,
Warping the edges of reality.
Conventions crumble,
Analysis defied,
Ah, what to do?
It is bigger than the universe
And has no name.
May 27, 2014
May 27, 2014 at 5:43 AM UTC
They squirm inside their clothes
tweed, chiffon tiered skirts, and bows
of their grandmothers’ sepia, halcyon days
with lumberjack flannel and Kerouac quotes,
but it’s more a matter of age than size,
these charging, listless, candid creatures
with hairstyles that can only be described
as gravity readily defied and self-cut,
frequently dyed to shades that swing
between black coffee and New York poetry
deep imagism and social realism against the backdrop
of American Apparel ads on scratched up Macs.
They slouch up and down trafficked Newbury,
dropping names like Morrissey and Bukowski
pausing now and then to pick up on the ennui
of twenty-three, and how they will one day live la vie
Dharhimian, running on American Spirits,
James Dean, Truffaut chic,
a monthly check from their parents,
an apathetic sneer at holding anything too dearly
and how they hate that word—hip-ster.
Dec 30, 2012
Dec 30, 2012 at 6:44 PM UTC
Merging the surges.
Converging the urges.
Surveying and delaying.
A brutally soft touch.
A swift tug.
Scramble to the rug.
Hop, twirl, stamp.
Intrinsic epidemics.
Employing harsh thoughts.
Enjoying warm laughs.
Instant confusion.
Undeliberate actions.
Sub-consciencely projected.
Magnified emotions.
Disrespectful conclusions.
Foundations laid, entrusted.
Irrigation failed, erupted.
Defied by fate.
Jan 22, 2012
Jan 22, 2012 at 8:34 AM UTC
(Ezekiel, xlviii.35)
As birds their infant brood protect,
And spread their wings to shelter them,
Thus saith the Lord to His elect,
"So will I guard Jerusalem."
And what then is Jerusalem,
This darling object of His cares?
Where is its worth in God's esteem?
Who built it? who inhabits there?
Jehovah founded it in blood,
The blood of His incarnate Son;
There dwell the saints, once foes to God
The sinners whom He calls His own.
There, though besieged on every side,
Yet much beloved and guarded well,
From age to age they have defied
The utmost force of earth and hell.
Let earth repent, and hell despair,
This city has a sure defence;
Her name is call'd, "The Lord is there,"
And who has power to drive him hence?
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