"diadem" poems
O tower of light, sad beauty
that magnified necklaces and statues in the sea,
calcareous eye, insignia of the vast waters, cry
of the mourning petrel, tooth of the sea, wife
of the Oceanian wind, O separate rose
from the long stem of the trampled bush
that the depths, converted into archipelago,
O natural star, green diadem,
alone in your lonesome dynasty,
still unattainable, elusive, desolate
like one drop, like one grape, like the sea.
12.8k
Far back in the ages,
The plough with wreaths was crowned;
The hands of kings and sages
Entwined the chaplet round;
Till men of spoil disdained the toil
By which the world was nourished,
And dews of blood enriched the soil
Where green their laurels flourished:
--Now the world her fault repairs--
The guilt that stains her story;
And weeps her crimes amid the cares
That formed her earliest glory.
The proud throne shall crumble,
The diadem shall wane,
The tribes of earth shall humble
The pride of those who reign;
And War shall lay his pomp away;--
The fame that heroes cherish,
The glory earned in deadly fray
Shall fade, decay, and perish.
Honour waits, o'er all the Earth,
Through endless generations,
The art that calls her harvests forth,
And feeds the expectant nations.
8.6k
1737
Rearrange a “Wife’s” affection!
When they dislocate my Brain!
Amputate my freckled *****
Make me bearded like a man!
Blush, my spirit, in thy Fastness—
Blush, my unacknowledged clay—
Seven years of troth have taught thee
More than Wifehood every may!
Love that never leaped its socket—
Trust entrenched in narrow pain—
Constancy thro’ fire—awarded—
Anguish—bare of anodyne!
Burden—borne so far triumphant—
None suspect me of the crown,
For I wear the “Thorns” till Sunset—
Then—my Diadem put on.
Big my Secret but it’s bandaged—
It will never get away
Till the Day its Weary Keeper
Leads it through the Grave to thee.
8.2k
sappho greets her as she
would a reflection:
hand against hand, staring into
her eyes. silence dancing
around them as a long-lost love-
r.
enheduanna sighs at the contact
and the quiet shifts as
her fingers close:
as there is no need for language
when her
inanna will grant them
a holy diadem.
-----
eternity reeks
of nights out on the lawn
daisies growing with the weeds
pillowing beneath the two
dwindling women -
hands clasped tightly,
their eyes closed.
...lapis blooming
within the petals
of the undergrowth...
gods slumber amongst
worthy poets occluding,
heart-soothing each
other without words
or sonnets
or divination.
sappho dared to
look out from
heavy-lidded
lethargy,
for she was
yearning:
at dawn
...her honeyvoiced,
mythweaving
enheduanna:
a sweet-shelter
of temptation
and goddesses
who wage
tender war and
drink from pools
of sun...
at dawn
the ancient
divine
poet
gazes
again
and sappho
forgets she
too is nearly
as old
for her lover wears
an invisible golden-
crowned circlet
of springtime
and illuminated
lands.
but she can hardly think
anymore, when
the songsmith of
glory and prayer
is kissing her.
laying in the basin
of heaven and skies
she pours restless
eternity down
her throat.
----
lapis melts
to pink clovers
of fowlerite
no mortals notice
two bodies blending
between poems
rustling tunics
maidens casting
away their
fruitful
sobriety.
----
poet
dreams
a woman
of verse.
hardly expecting
shallow-breathed
kisses of burning
solstice and
unrequited
love.
Feb 16, 2022
Feb 16, 2022 at 12:18 AM UTC
I still remember
the drawn out afternoons,
the minutes passing without a thing to do,
the clock just a metronome
keeping us in time.
I poked fun at you without reason;
jealousy leads one into themselves it seems.
Do you recall?
We were carnal beings...
I'd apologize for my egoistic banter,
but apologies are best left to the
eulogizer,
and this may be some sort of graveside whisper;
a long-winded to-do list of idle talk.
I'd call you
"Lesbia", "Rosalind",
"my diadem stashed away",
but twenty-two months wore words away
and it would seem like frantic blandishing.
Maybe in my own life
I may be able to demonstrate
what William Yeats had meant
by a body quarreling with it's soul,
but I think -- You're delusional! --
that I could be content.
I remember everything ---
I remember the yielded heart feels a subtle sting.
The yew chattered in the wind outside your
window and I felt rooted
as I told you
I was you and would always be.
But twenty-two months is a long time.
Sep 21, 2012
Sep 21, 2012 at 2:54 PM UTC
She was the queen of Camelot in her dreams
She wore a golden diadem and a silver swirling dress
Servants were at her beck and call
Her king was kind and brave and caring and noble
But when day broke she was a prisoner behind bars
Trapped in her bedroom
With only her dreams to comfort her
Oct 1, 2014
Oct 1, 2014 at 10:10 PM UTC
Mirrors are all traitors
As in them I can see
Just what a monster I am;
That I will always be.
I have lumps and and spots
That make me unloveable.
And everything I eat is
Another bite of trouble.
Why can’t I ever look
Like the models in the book?
Why is it that I
Can’t look myself in the eye?
No one will look longingly
At the gorgon I turned out to be.
I don’t watch cartoons
Because what I see is me
What did I do to deserve
To become so **** ugly?
Did I cross the path of a cat
That was an omen meant to warn
And I ignored it so now
I inherited this awful form?
Why can’t I be the kind
With a beautifully formed behind?
I wish it was my history
To stimulate evil jealousy.
I want to look like a dream,
But instead I must surrender
A fragile wish, as it seems
An unfilled hope altogether.
Some friends are sweet to me
They say I look fine to them,
But I know what I can see
And I deserve no diadem.
Jun 7, 2017
Jun 7, 2017 at 11:06 PM UTC
There lives a woman who
Seems mystical, even mythical
--It is true--
Because she is biblical;
Rarer than a precious jewel.
She is virtuous
She is loyal
She is courteous...
She is royal.
She shines brilliantly, like a star cluster trapped inside a room.
She glistens like jubilant sun rays dancing atop the ocean.
The wind of her voice sets inspiration in motion,
Like a sonic boom.
She is powerful.
She is virtuous,
Who is worthy? Just
Wonder & coil
In a corner & toil
As you ponder this.
And honor this
Acknowledgment,
Because she is royal.
Don't dare compare her to the likes of
Nefertiti or Isis.
They are not so estimable,
You couldn't buy her even with a million zeros before the decimal,
Because...
She is priceless.
So the King adorned her,
Because the King adores her.
She is beautiful, so they say,
But such a meager word could not suffice,
Because her true charm emanates like waves
In the ardent expression of her practice of life.
And from her mind and her soul.
Her precious heart--more precious than gold--
Looks like a kaleidoscope of rare gems,
Darting dazzling colors; the spectrum in whole.
Diamonds die in comparison,
Hand her a diadem...
She is special
She is jovial
She is gentle
She is royal.
She is not haughty,
Nor does she flaunt like worldly wenches do.
She tells girls who've been told they're peasants they can be a princess too.
She is not naughty,
Nor does she taunt like wanton vixens do...
Because she is godly.
Yes, indeed there lives a woman who
Seems mystical, even mythical
--But it is true--
She is virtuous,
She is royal...
She is you.
Jan 22, 2016
Jan 22, 2016 at 9:36 AM UTC
Give all to love;
Obey thy heart;
Friends, kindred, days,
Estate, good fame,
Plans, credit, and the muse;
Nothing refuse.
'Tis a brave master,
Let it have scope,
Follow it utterly,
Hope beyond hope;
High and more high,
It dives into noon,
With wing unspent,
Untold intent;
But 'tis a god,
Knows its own path,
And the outlets of the sky.
'Tis not for the mean,
It requireth courage stout,
Souls above doubt,
Valor unbending;
Such 'twill reward,
They shall return
More than they were,
And ever ascending.
Leave all for love;—
Yet, hear me, yet,
One word more thy heart behoved,
One pulse more of firm endeavor,
Keep thee to-day,
To-morrow, for ever,
Free as an Arab
Of thy beloved.
Cling with life to the maid;
But when the surprise,
Vague shadow of surmise,
Flits across her ***** young
Of a joy apart from thee,
Free be she, fancy-free,
Do not thou detain a hem,
Nor the palest rose she flung
From her summer diadem.
Though thou loved her as thyself,
As a self of purer clay,
Tho' her parting dims the day,
Stealing grace from all alive,
Heartily know,
When half-gods go,
The gods arrive.
4.2k
When I think of all the tears and turbulence life has
given me, it sometimes makes me hard for
me to forgive this world
I usually would find peace in the solitude
and my waters would be still. I'd
honestly prefer that than to
feel alone amidst this
sea of life
But now, I've learned to dance with the
naiads by the Springs of Many Lives.
With her hand in mind, the life-stream
strums and begins to form rings
Each ripple made is a bond that
grows stronger in time
Each one beaming
with many hues
Now I see, the true beauty of life.
The waters will run hot, cold and
warm. We all will dance
different dances.
But the Naiads show me the beautiful
bonds I have made with my fellow
Kings and Queens on HP from all
walks of life who wear their
crowns with pride.
That is a life I yearn for.
For my diadem to be made of
pure starlight.
For me to have such understanding
makes me shed true
tears of joy.
Jul 25, 2018
Jul 25, 2018 at 2:11 PM UTC
belaboring hurt-bells
of twilight
outside there is a furious wind
sweeping the sour-faced pavement.
the helm of the morning
fits through the pinecones.
through the dandelion,
the diadem of some mystic flower,
the flurry of children
and the fury of the populace.
i know whence the wind stirs
cold flame from the many a dead
stones, sequined floor and the
dreary stillicide of night.
our bodies rise to the sun
that is a full woman
or a ripe apple
or a half-bitten moon in glare
and when her lips purse
there is pang in the wind that blows austere beneath the foot
of hills in ruin.
let the night come later than
a bird's secret sojourn,
or the cicada's enigma.
let the cathedral of my heart
quiver later than the unsheathing
of the night's bone
but in the twilight,
when the skies are bruised with
silence and somnolent without voice
my hands shall leap into the wind
and make do, the belaboring
hurt-bells of twilight.
no more than a crepuscular twining
of a sad vine on a melancholy hymn
that makes fuller with its tender
maneuvers, the trundling in
love's wearisome vessel.
Sep 14, 2015
Sep 14, 2015 at 11:20 PM UTC
They all start looking good
At one a.m.
A mystical transformation
Alters them
At eight o’clock it seemed
A scene like Halloween
Now behold the angels
The chorus girls
And living dreams
Much like a beauty pageant
Each with her diadem
They all start looking good
At one a.m.
Feb 9, 2011
Feb 9, 2011 at 6:23 AM UTC
#
The prophets wore it,
woven of thorns and laughter..
the jeering crown,
the mark of those
who dared to name the truth.
Kierkegaard wore it,
penned as insane,
pushed to the margins
by voices too clever
to risk listening.
The fool’s crown
is given freely
to any who refuse silence,
to any who lift their voice
against the beast,
against the fortress,
against the lie.
It weighs heavy;
not of gold
but of ridicule,
a diadem of mockery,
a garland of exile.
Yet it fits more honestly
than all the jeweled circlets
worn by the deceivers,
for it is fashioned
from truth spoken aloud.
If the crown is madness,
let it rest heavy.
For it is made of truth
..and truth is the only jewel
worth bearing.
#
Aug 19, 2025
Aug 19, 2025 at 3:02 PM UTC
trapped in a ribcage
frail and fretting and fettered
hummingbird heart beats harder and harder
your skeleton fingertips tilling the ground
combing for the catacombs
of all your past lives
look what i have done for you
teeth marks to chart your growth
black red purple sky no stars no light no
for thine is the kingdom, the dead leaf diadem
battle-ready raccoon eyes, scored and scowling
if you do not run you will be left behind.
Oct 8, 2012
Oct 8, 2012 at 2:49 AM UTC
1075
The Sky is low—the Clouds are mean.
A Travelling Flake of Snow
Across a Barn or through a Rut
Debates if it will go—
A Narrow Wind complains all Day
How some one treated him
Nature, like Us is sometimes caught
Without her Diadem.
3.3k
*i hate to break it to you kid,
i'm not mindful of narcissus'
economics that's all oh so very modern...*
but women are their own orbit,
more chance to find a single mother
than a single father...
it's against nature to make the man
without god,
as it's against nature to make the woman
with god...
thus we have the tectonic plates
making man with god, accepting
or doubting, church or laboratory...
and woman... an eroticism of jaw eaten
faces... but a kiss to be a fingerprint
likened to erasing the dangling of the bitten
jaw... erased only once by the aphrodisiac of sirens'
wail of aquatic opera so damnable that only
one man heard it, while others scolded
being in audience with beeswax...
and by second chance, erased, indeed,
but only by the suffragettes as the new nuns...
as the new nuns dare comply to change,
like every male become female and
vice versa,
and the popes disclose their continual
loss of matrimony in their misogynistic
involvement in ****** if i'm not the pope
and do no encounter such practices,
i'm not a pope at all!
*only a ninth spoke as the necromancer,
and of the nine spoke clearest,
as it spoke, it dawned on me
that sauron was invisible for the sword
to strike, a gravity enveloping,
a gravity envelope, rather than a skin
of infinite diadem sharpenings,
for nine rigs unto men,
seven unto dwarfs, three unto elves,
but none unto the orcs... strange....
ORC ARKHAN MORDOR ARRAC!*
Feb 14, 2016
Feb 14, 2016 at 10:36 PM UTC
Once again
Her integrity-
Like a mirror-
Shattered
On the clean floor
And her punctured hope is
Bleeding from the
Broken pieces
But this time
She really cares
Copyright 2012
Destiny Diadem
Apr 20, 2013
Apr 20, 2013 at 8:58 PM UTC
A reverie to say the least,
a darkness perpetrated by beliefs.
I envision the entrance, a cold whistle screams adventure.
Entering the mouth of the beast, my calloused hands, my fragile tips,
brushing against the ceiling, caressing and corrupting the structure,
disappearing deeper from destruction.
This grimace upon the face, this terror protruding within the gut,
an agony to be replaced,
once escaped, courage will flourish.
Expanding the vessel,
vomiting to emptiness, given room to proceed,
phosphorescent hues exploding through my dreams.
Reaching the cusp, I gather my strength,
placed upon my scalp, a diadem to show defeat,
unworthy, fruitless scavengers, left to retreat.
Broken, a shattered age, misguided and abused, nothing to lose.
Words ring true, guidance for those envious of power,
wake from endless lies,
enter into an abyss, never to return,
abandoned dark tunnel.
Apr 27, 2014
Apr 27, 2014 at 1:35 PM UTC
I want to live in the embrace
of these rain clouds so ominous so dark
and yet within them somewhere
there must be a spark
why else to they set alight such illicit pleasure
the drizzle burns upon my skin
and glistens like a diadem in my hair
petrichor teasing gently before the shower brings
a volley of dreams crashing down here
a bird within my chest sings
a mizzle is just not enough
the darkness without echoes the darkness within
I want a deluge, I want to drown
want to be borne away and lose control
want to stand in the rain and feel this sweet pain
I just want to feel – don’t want to think
- Vijayalakshmi Harish
11.09.2012
Copyright © Vijayalakshmi Harish
Sep 11, 2012
Sep 11, 2012 at 10:44 AM UTC
If the sun is the crown of the earth,
Happily raising life,
From the comfort stillness of sleep,
Then I am a second born moon-
No heir to the throne.
I sneak by the day sky like jealousy,
To only move oceans as teardrops,
Aching for a dream.
Jan 10, 2019
Jan 10, 2019 at 8:47 PM UTC
283
A Mien to move a Queen—
Half Child—Half Heroine—
An Orleans in the Eye
That puts its manner by
For humbler Company
When none are near
Even a Tear—
Its frequent Visitor—
A Bonnet like a Duke—
And yet a Wren’s Peruke
Were not so shy
Of Goer by—
And Hands—so slight—
They would elate a Sprite
With Merriment—
A Voice that Alters—Low
And on the Ear can go
Like Let of Snow—
Or shift supreme—
As tone of Realm
On Subjects Diadem—
Too small—to fear—
Too distant—to endear—
And so Men Compromise
And just—revere—
2.6k
Oh Bard, wielding a tool mighty and spiky
Mightier than either the sword or rod,
You reign as monarch in fancy’s domain
Sketching life in all variety and mode
Which with pain and strife fraught
Or bright with gaiety and grace
In finer yarn than the gossamer thread
On a fabric of words in befitting verse
You steal away from the noisy crowd
Into the stillness of the cloistered cell
To dwell with Fancy’s mystic charms
Weaving downy dreams at will
You recount forgotten tales of yore
Of ****** battles won and lost,
Of lovers united, amour defiled,
Conjuring memories from abysmal past
You hearken to the moans of lovelorn souls
And sing of beauty in ditties fine
Triggering sparks into flames grow
In umpteen hearts that pine and whine
Babbling with the brook rushing swift,
Racing with the deer loping past,
You wander into mysterious woods
Where flowers, their richest odors cast
Your ears intent on the song of birds
That comes floating from the far off groves
And the whir of cicadas on the bark of trees
Breaking the calm of twilight eves
Alone you saunter the stretching strands,
Watching virulent breakers in fury heave
Often your heart dancing with the tide
And swinging with the rhythm of rising wave
You feast on the gleam of the auburn sun
And the speckled blue of the infinite skies
Watching the day dying in flame
And the night in a diadem of stars vies
All that’s lovesome meets your eyes
And commune to you in profuse delight
Which you turn into rhyme and rhythm
For the whole of mankind to devour and digest
From your harp flow symphonies sweet
Songs of longing, love and lust
Of idyllic happiness, peace and bliss,
Fuelling hearts with vigorous zest
Though outlawed by the great sage of Greece,
Branding the poet, aberrant and a fool
Oft beneath the façade of his wayward thoughts,
Lie heaps of wisdom for the discerning soul.
Nov 23, 2016
Nov 23, 2016 at 6:01 AM UTC
508
I’m ceded—I’ve stopped being Theirs—
The name They dropped upon my face
With water, in the country church
Is finished using, now,
And They can put it with my Dolls,
My childhood, and the string of spools,
I’ve finished threading—too—
Baptized, before, without the choice,
But this time, consciously, of Grace—
Unto supremest name—
Called to my Full—The Crescent dropped—
Existence’s whole Arc, filled up,
With one small Diadem.
My second Rank—too small the first—
Crowned—Crowing—on my Father’s breast—
A half unconscious Queen—
But this time—Adequate—Erect,
With Will to choose, or to reject,
And I choose, just a Crown—
2.2k
Come, Madam, come, all rest my powers defy,
Until I labour, I in labour lie.
The foe oft-times having the foe in sight,
Is tired with standing though they never fight.
Off with that girdle, like heaven's zone glistering,
But a far fairer world encompassing.
Unpin that spangled breastplate which you wear,
That th' eyes of busy fools may be stopped there.
Unlace yourself, for that harmonious chime
Tells me from you, that now 'tis your bed time.
Off with that happy busk, which I envy,
That still can be, and still can stand so nigh.
Your gown going off, such beauteous state reveals,
As when from flowery meads th' hill's shadow steals.
Off with that wiry coronet and show
The hairy diadem which on you doth grow;
Now off with those shoes, and then safely tread
In this love's hallowed temple, this soft bed.
In such white robes heaven's angels used to be
Received by men; thou angel bring'st with thee
A heaven like Mahomet's paradise; and though
Ill spirits walk in white, we easily know
By this these angels from an evil sprite,
Those set our hairs, but these our flesh upright.
License my roving hands, and let them go
Before, behind, between, above, below.
O my America, my new found land,
My kingdom, safeliest when with one man manned,
My mine of precious stones, my empery,
How blessed am I in this discovering thee!
To enter in these bonds, is to be free;
Then where my hand is set, my seal shall be.
Full nakedness, all joys are due to thee
As souls unbodied, bodies unclothed must be,
To taste whole joys. Gems which you women use
Are like Atlanta's ***** cast in men's views,
That when a fool's eye lighteth on a gem,
His earthly soul may covet theirs, not them.
Like pictures, or like books' gay coverings made
For laymen, are all women thus arrayed;
Themselves are mystic books, which only we
Whom their imputed grace will dignify
Must see revealed. Then since I may know,
As liberally, as to a midwife, show
Thyself: cast all, yea, this white linen hence,
Here is no penance, much less innocence.
To teach thee, I am naked first, why then
What needst thou have more covering than a man.
2.2k
[These statues were exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum after the sculptor's death. The figures alluded to are the famous statue of Abraham Lincoln, and the monument in memory of Mrs. Henry Adams, the original of which is in the Rock Creek Cemetery at Washington. --Max Eastman]
POET, thy dreams are grateful to the air
And the light loves them. Tho' they murmur not,
Their carven stillness is a music rare,
And like the song of one whose tongue hath caught
The clear ethereal essence of his thought.
I hear the talkers come, the changing throngs
That with the fashions of a day surround
Thy visions, and I hear them quell their tongues,
And hush their querulous shoes upon the ground;
Thy dreams are with the crown of silence crowned--
Though they feel not the glowing diadem,
Who sleep for aye in their cool shapes of stone.
Nor ever will the sunlight waken them,
Nor ever will they turn their eyes and moan,
To think that their brief Poet's life is gone.
The tender and the lofty soul is gone,
Who eyed them forth from darkness, and confessed
His spirit's motion in unmoving stone.
His praise upon no mortal tongue doth rest;
By these unwhispering lips it is expressed.
Soon will the ample arms of night withdraw
Her shuffling children from the twilit hall--
From that heroic presence, in dim awe
Of whom the dark withholds a while her pall,
And leaves him luminous above them all.
Then are ye lost in darkness and alone,
Ye ghostly spirits! And the moment rare
Doth quicken that too sad and nameless stone,
To move her robe, and spill her sable hair,
And be in silence mingled with the air;
For she is one with the dim glimmering hour,
And the white spirits beautiful and still,
And the veiled memory of the vanished power
That moulded them, the high and infinite will
That earth begets and earth does not fulfil.
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