"dirges" poems
.
1
death dirges
Frogs in distance sing . . .
Foxes, herons, join in too,
. . . A round of croaking.
2
love gifts
Her gift of flowers . . .
Came at night without garden,
. . . Were picked in bedroom.
3
twins demure
Full moon and she . . .
Beauties without crescent smile,
. . . Naked in starlight.
4
light music
Before even sun . . .
Gleam opens to paint each day,
. . . Beauty in birdsong.
5
iridescent
After sun showers . . .
Sparkle of rainbow colours,
. . . Busy hummingbirds
6
chilling
Hollow sound through trees,
Naked and bare branches sway,
. . . Old winter creeping.
7
flirting
She wanted a child . . .
Rushed from one suitor to next,
. . . Clock set to maybe.
8
super villain
Truth once singular . . .
Mucked all up with politics,
. . . In cowl of falsehoods.
9
casualties
Blood spills in gardens . . .
Naïve worms torn from loose grounds,
. . . Red robins, green lawns.
10
stigmata
Each spring miracle . . .
Trees blessed by caterpillars gifts,
. . . Holey hands of leaves.
11
consecrations
Ripples lead to bows . . .
After fish breaks the water,
. . . A kingfisher dives.
12
constancy
Steadfast as always . . .
Wildflower in sun and rain,
. . . Showing true colours.
13
roommates
Chaste lovers wonder . . .
How bodies weather the cold,
. . . Never knowing touch.
14
swept away
Suddenly we kissed . . .
At beach as tides rolling in,
. . . Drowning by ocean.
15
seductress
Her red hair so long . . .
Brushing my face, hiding eyes,
. . . A kind entrapment.
.
Feb 13, 2015
Feb 13, 2015 at 10:20 PM UTC
So it came to pass at last and sad to know a Timber has fallen
It stood in strength tall and strong for over seven decades
Resplendently toned it spread an uncompromising foliage
Masterly in domain magical in reach attaining untold grades
Humble in origins yet grew with endeavour and knowledge
Distinguishably it cut sway in tundra and in lush green glades
Son of sons of the Land held roots countenancing no crawling
It reached for the stars and danced reasons with every shades
Ran with the sun and sat with owls and vipers for tutelage
Sweeping the very highs and the lows in communal trades
In the jungle of sharks and vipers it be known who's in Charge
A Timber has fallen while the rains falls and blue clouds fades
There's now a mighty hole in the earth and rivers are swollen
Leaves scatter and branches beckon hundreds of onward bridges
Leaving best Princess, flowers and saplings for love and largesse
A notable trunk laid supine free to roam without worldly cages
Odes will enter dancing in guises and tears flow without finesse
A Timber has fallen and dirges will ring out for a man of all ages
Yemessia bows and says Adieu My Senior, we will meet again.....
[email protected].
Aug 20, 2018
Aug 20, 2018 at 10:29 PM UTC
.
•unchain me from unrest•
shovel me out of the dirt•
une- arth
my conge- sted chest•
let my secrets blurt•
let them
spill.....•
just for
the wor-
ld to see
•..string
me up...
..against
my will
•harvest
the fruits
of the bi-
tter tree•
let eyes
see what
will show
•...let feet
be caught
in stubbo-
rn mud...•
let prying minds be baffled.....by
what they would come to know
•...let wanting hearts choke...on
the dirges of my stale blood....•
now dig me up quickly•'cause
it's been far too long..... and i
have been readied•exhume
all of me completely•for
no longer should i
remain as........
buried•
.
Jan 20, 2015
Jan 20, 2015 at 7:36 AM UTC
I cannot escape you
your voices haunt me
in the quiet of summer mornings
when I expect only the sound
of gentle breezes through my ash, my oak
when I would, if I could, close my eyes
and enter the world, of forgetting
your dirges call forth
the delirious dances of the dead
those slain in the summer fields, of my youth
without your mourning song
to honor their passing
without the praying processions,
the grandiloquent eulogies,
they had
only the sizzling silence
after the staccato storm
of our rapid rifle fire
until now, when I thought
my guilt was assuaged
until I listened, and
heard your doleful cries
Jun 12, 2013
Jun 12, 2013 at 1:19 PM UTC
In every room
I've lived in,
all the dilapidated shacks
over the years that I've
stayed in, always had a
brown spider that crawled
the walls.
It had a little suitcase.
I thought to myself that it
planned on leaving, moving to
someplace better.
It never did.
It always just set up shop, and
spun a web in the corner and caught
flies, and occasionally a small moth.
On drunken sad moon nights,
I sang dirges to the trapped bugs.
They smiled and laughed, even though
they were dying.
Jun 26, 2025
Jun 26, 2025 at 10:43 AM UTC
When the lamp is shattered
The light in the dust lies dead—
When the cloud is scattered,
The rainbow’s glory is shed.
When the lute is broken,
Sweet tones are remembered not;
When the lips have spoken,
Loved accents are soon forgot.
As music and splendour
Survive not the lamp and the lute,
The heart’s echoes render
No song when the spirit is mute—
No song but sad dirges,
Like the wind through a ruined cell,
Or the mournful surges
That ring the dead seaman’s knell.
When hearts have once mingled,
Love first leaves the well-built nest;
The weak one is singled
To endure what it once possessed.
O Love! who bewailest
The frailty of all things here,
Why choose you the frailest
For your cradle, your home, and your bier?
Its passions will rock thee,
As the storms rock the ravens on high;
Bright reason will mock thee,
Like the sun from a wintry sky.
From thy nest every rafter
Will rot, and thine eagle home
Leave thee naked to laughter,
When leaves fall and cold winds come.
2.6k
The cuckoo-throb, the heartbeat of the Spring;
The rosebud’s blush that leaves it as it grows
Into the full-eyed fair unblushing rose;
The summer clouds that visit every wing
With fires of sunrise and of sunsetting;
The furtive flickering streams to light re-born
’Mid airs new-fledged and valorous lusts of morn,
While all the daughters of the daybreak sing:—
These ardour loves, and memory: and when flown
All joys, and through dark forest-boughs in flight
The wind swoops onward brandishing the light,
Even yet the rose-tree’s verdure left alone
Will flush all ruddy though the rose be gone;
With ditties and with dirges infinite.
2.6k
The Poetry Barn wasn’t really a barn
It was merely an old farm house,
It sat on the acres of Eddington’s Farm,
Surrounded by sheep and by cows.
But Poets came over from Stuttersby Dell,
Drove over from Scatabout Wood,
To write in the air of the Poetry Barn
About things, when they ought and they should.
They came from Great Orton, they came from Rams Well,
They came from Glenn Wheatley and Grey,
The best and the worst of the poets you’d find
At the Poetry Barn, every day,
The rooms had been empty for many a year
So they all sat on bundles of straw,
And when they ran out they would send up a shout,
So some would go out and get more.
The mornings would see all the Elegies worked,
The Epics, the Odes and Quatrains,
The Poetry Barn would then grumble and groan
As the Dirges would enter the drains.
By noon the fair Sonnets came into their own
With just the odd wanton Lament,
When poets would seek out the culprit to find
One grinding his verse in a tent.
By evening they’d work on the Pastoral,
The Sestet, the Roundel as well,
And those at a loss after losing the toss
Would be stuck with the old Villanelle,
They’d all settle down when the Moon came up round,
And the stars twinkled boldly in rhyme,
When one asked the other, ‘pray, what rhymes with brother,’
And he’d say, ‘your Mom, all the time.’
The poems would stick to the inside walls,
Would tear at each other like knaves,
They’d fill up the aisles and lie flat on the tiles
And would damage the old architraves.
At night you could hear all the horses hooves
As they carried the good news to Aix,
And in came the wedding guest, him with the albatross
Counting his many mistakes.
I saw that they’d burned down the Poetry Barn
With one sad, incendiary rhyme,
A poet called Glover who wrote to his lover
‘My candle, you light all the time.’
The straw caught alight in his lover’s delight
And they fled from that bastion of verse,
I just penned this missal for someone to whistle,
The one that he’d written was worse.
David Lewis Paget
Nov 22, 2015
Nov 22, 2015 at 6:25 AM UTC
Dew drops sit patiently on the earth
My thoughts race, incomplete
without a story line.
What’s the difference between an animal
and a man, you ask?
Men can carry guns
The revolution falls short as the much anticipated
Apocalypse begins
Zombies moan and groan as their limbs
creak with their shuffling art.
They say zombies are the living dead
Why, you ask?
They’re dead on the inside.
Like Davy Jones, they’ve ripped their hearts out
and hid them away from the world.
I’ve met a zombie or few.
They inject sunburnt life into their veins;
They inhale the emotions they can’t convey
I see right through their drug induced façade.
Life can’t be bought because the government can’t even afford it.
Kudos to China for figuring that out
A joke tumbles from the lips of the self-righteous
An apology pours from the mouth of the condemned
A question slides from the tongue of the forgetful
Remember me?
I jumped because the Hermes of death seeped into my mind
Go down in flames or fall for a thousand Arabian nights
Calm before the storm chosen over
Panic during the tornado.
Take the credit, you ******** and we’ll take your lives.
Congratulations, Westboro Baptists are humming dirges
at your last bed
You’ll be missed.
Now what, you ask?
Come on home, boys,
I’ve got a country to please
Dec 5, 2012
Dec 5, 2012 at 1:27 PM UTC
Does an optimist or a pessimist write the better poem?
Does an optimist with his rhyme and meter
Writing songs of love, nature, and spring?
Or are a pessimist’s dirges
Of bitter betrayal and loss more inspiring?
Both pessimists and optimists sing
Soft, yet loudly their own song.
So who writes the better poem?
What is the better song?
One of the marriage bed,
Or one of love gone wrong?
All sympathize with sadness;
All feel the pangs of joy.
Songs of rotten apples,
Or of bouncing baby boys?
So what expression does the better poet employ?
Truth is they touch us daily.
All just parts of life.
Tears and laughter not unique to ********** or wife.
Yes maybe optimists and pessimists are not so far apart,
For both pessimists and optimists capture the human heart.
Mar 14, 2014
Mar 14, 2014 at 11:36 PM UTC
No Values
just statues of accountants who could never learn to count
and mounted on the spikes,where business is displayed and laid out for the world to see in naked abject poverty
are chief executives and heads of lesser known departments who never meant to cook the books
but fell for fortune and her looks and took that chance to spread their wings
and now the wind that whistles sings
and passes through their empty eyes ,and flapping flesh drips off dry bones of arms that never meant to harm.
No charmed lives left in Holborn or in Chancery lane,where solicitors were in on the game of taking risks
and risks they took
another spike and one more hook for the fallen wig,who still seems regal but not as big as what he thought legal.
They bought but never owned the sky or stole it from the smaller fry who swam around the edges and the shadows in society
and we,
the ripped off,stripped off,sing dirges to their loss but me,I couldn't give a toss
let them burn and turn slowly on the spit
we'll roast and toast them,
let them boast then of fancy women,fancy cars and fancy meals in fancy bars.
These czars have gone the way of old
where bold men.bad men always fold in two
and the wind blew tears that fell to splash on piles of once extorted cash and though accountants cannot count
judges learn to mount the steps and put their heads in hangman's ropes and any hopes they entertain of clemency go down the drain along with
any gains they ever made.
Those who laid beside the wide boys of this world and opened eyes into another where they couldn't even bother to see just who they hurt
have lost their shirts,ripped off their backs,attacked by those that they attacked and now the axe is on the other foot where once a boot was kicked into my ****
so good luck you *****
I hope your bodies fall to bits
and you end up burning in the pits
alongside the others that have sinned
in the end
no one wins
the voodoo dolls of life are stuck with pins
and the devil grins and hums his tune.
Jul 9, 2013
Jul 9, 2013 at 1:29 AM UTC
They call it crude.
The dessicated then carboxilated, carbonified,
****** of dead Permian flesh.
This is the reason the salamanders die.
Corporeal concreted, mummified, fossilized.
This is the reason we dance.
Dirges of West Texas dirt romances.
Lost in the flares,
Caught in the gases blaring making nostrils glare.
Requiescat in pace.
All these women.
Dancing through the caliche,
Giving a reason to taste the air.
Through one breath of speechless.
The loam is never settled where boots tread and weather.
Destroying bedrock through hydrolic fracking to the earths core.
I land my toes in the sand of the Llano.
I taste my Mexicans, greasy, with cheese,
With.
Hot.
Sauce.
Dorthy never went to the fest of Oil.
But there's no place like home.
Her silver slippers or prosthesis feet placed instantaneously upon me.
Would bring me directly into a thorny,
Patch of Mesquite.
Apr 14, 2013
Apr 14, 2013 at 12:49 AM UTC
The wind howled dirges around the cemetery
spreading the sorrow of my heart
until I'm empty inside
except for the numbness in my veins
in my chest
in my fingertips
without your hand to wrap around mine
to warm the icy patches and lines
I only felt the gaze of a wilting daisy
in the bare patches of dead grass
swaying in the wind
with a fallen daisy at its side
an illusion of a cracked smile;
not showing the lost, young girl any pity
for it needs to feel sorry for its
own dead flower
whose petals were scattered in the wind
across the grey graves
in this evening light. (c)
Nov 14, 2013
Nov 14, 2013 at 3:54 AM UTC
icecaps come undone
crushing into the ocean
as she sheds her frozen tears
penguins and p0lar bears shudder
as their habitats recede
like the snows of Kilimanjaro
volcanoes explode
spewing smoke and ash like billowing pillows
into the stratosphere
diffusing sunshine's heat
like a cold compress
floes of lava melt glaciers
rivers of mud cause flooded folks to flee
fissures crack and snap from her pressure
towns and countrysides split
floors rumble and roll like the ocean
walls tumble, crumble and roar
bells toll an all too familiar melody
families cry out, wailing and ranting
chanting dirges of great loss
an inconsolable cacophony
rubbled lives lying in ruin
but she is not to blame
the earth is a no fault state
this is our doing
ecology's consequence
greenhouse gasses and other pollutants
have given her a fever
her pores are opening to vent the warming
she is not angry or vindictive
punishment is not her goal
and evil has not played its hand
the planet is just cooling herself
it's how Gaia gets her groove back
Apr 17, 2010
Apr 17, 2010 at 10:59 AM UTC
The sun rises too soon
Morning comes like an accusation
The dawn melodies of the birds once were of a creativity
Now all they sing are emphatic repertoires of dirges, that tremble my very bone
The stillness in the air is doused in old hopes and frail dreams..
And lingering disappointment
The air is too thick...
It's asphyxiating
Walking the halls of monotony
Forced enthusiasm is now for real
Much like a leech the mid-afternoon sun ***** the life out of your soul
So you cross your fingers and hope that existence will not make a loser of your soul
That would be the greatest tragedy
When the night comes
The leaves start falling
Happiness was never in season anyway.
Nov 11, 2013
Nov 11, 2013 at 12:31 PM UTC
*ouvrez la cage
aux oiseaux*
1.
boughs
extending wide
so wide
leaves
hanging all around
expansive over
quiet latticework
dappled vitality
fusing into
spurts of fine conversion
intense
loving arborescence
2.
attending to dirges
ingesting tedia
accepting indifference
yet
in stark contrast
heaven holds out
a handful of dream-dust
if we but chance
to reach
into sacred reverie
dare to
escape
from land
3.
slide down
the arum's scape
..into you
S T, 24 June 2013
Jun 24, 2013
Jun 24, 2013 at 5:30 AM UTC
Change your habits
Change your ways
But don't you dare
Pass me by
Give up your vices
And take my advice
(Who is watching?
Who is watching?)
The devil always
Lives in New York
And all cities are the same
So rock like a cradle
Roll like a child
Down the hill,
Down the hill,
Down the hill
Rave on, ravens
Look pretty in the grave
On good ol' Independence day
We'll high-five and low-dive
We'll high-five and low-die
Dear Babylon,
Mother goose, swan song
Must we plan our dirges in advance
If you must, choose the fire
If you must, choose the fire
If you must, choose the fire
But blood in moonlight
Almost looks black
So ooze me into the riverbed
And I'm almost beautiful
Almost beautiful
Always pitiful
But almost beautiful
But for now I've got my sugar
Dog food and guns
And in my left pocket
Some family photos
And invisible bombs
Invisible bombs
(We need invincible drums
To beat the little ones)
Pure and perfect
Empty me
But I prefer the sea of streets
To these roads on my walls
Roads on my walls
I just can't quit
Pack up and leave
This is all I'll ever know
All I'll ever be
(Or so they told me)
So let's get paid, laid, made
And pray we don't go stale
Like the sand and pail
Like the sand and pail
How this land impales
Nov 25, 2011
Nov 25, 2011 at 11:14 PM UTC
When my mind is at rest I think of peace and blissful things
I see the unfettered and innocent smile of a new babe in arms
Or the Omnipotence gilded arms outstretch showering blessings
The shores of a pristine beach with blue waves marking times
Silver sunset sprinkling magic across quiet waters with no stressing
Or me sat at my fathers feet as he reads engrossed in his charmes
My mind rests easy in places of warmth and enriching lovings
My mind has no space to linger in the murkiness of failings
I do not plunge dark dept to court the uninspiring s in terms
To share company with wretches with wasted mental ecthings
Eyes that see dew in darkness and acrimony in fruitless farms
Voices made for howling dirges and apostles of negative cravings
Demented downers who drink from the fountains of fallen vamps
Satiated miserably they seek to retch their stench on followings
My mind finds the luminous stars and praise their spark-lings
It atunes to the silent melodies of sages who now sleep uncramp
It relishes the delights of the million trillion wonders tinklings
Its marvels the joys of the thousand mothers holding new champs
Can share the lifting dreams of hopes for happy new beginnings
Living is never about waste for the Creator avails no dumps
For a mind that lives and grows in the Light is forever inspired and inspiring
Copyright LaurencA.1stAugust2018.All rights reserved
Aug 1, 2018
Aug 1, 2018 at 7:54 PM UTC
I dreamed my own death,
last night:
dug down deep through
dirges and dingy old dirt
my bed and my tomb are
one and the same.
like a blanket the dirt piles above
and like a mattress the
dirt layers below.
it gets so tiring,
sometimes;
sleep is a cousin to death.
there are loved ones
sobbing far away and
others laid around me,
lost and caught among
the endless eddies and streams
of neverending loneliness
that we all have felt,
some time.
it is a common experience,
a collective, conscious thought--
we float up and out of our bodies,
our gases and our atoms mixing with the
dirt,
the mud,
the worms and
the bodies
and the
ever-lost matter
of countless others come before
and countless more come
after.
we are all living in order to die as
after our death there will be nothing added
and nothing left;
the base materials,
the elements and bits of star stuff
have always been
and always will be
even when they are not
us.
really,
it is the
accepting of our own
demise--
our ashes to ashes and
the plastering of the
dustiest of dusts
that shall settle
and lay on thick
in layers and levels of
lost and loopy illuminations
of a mind that is filled with holes and rot.
Nov 18, 2012
Nov 18, 2012 at 6:33 PM UTC
Whether it was the sun’s aurelian caress
Or the serene strokes of moonlight lulled
Across its keys carved with much finesse
Monochrome yet its beauty never dulled
A sonata lightly, it hummed, reverberating
Across gently, waves of sound, resonating
The tune seemed to hush the grounds
Effortlessly silencing the cry of hounds
Each tap across the tonal stairs had slashed
The breast of the wounded, whom had clashed
Echoes of nature’s enthrallment seems to linger
The music still bewitching the conducting finger
Corpses waltzing to the nightly sombre dirges
Pleading to allow their rest under the birches
How the sonata tortures all that it imprisons
How the sonata torments all those that listens
Mar 15, 2019
Mar 15, 2019 at 2:14 PM UTC
I spent my fifth grade year in school in my fourth new district
writing timed multiplication tests while blood fell from my nose
in hot fat drops splattering my papers,
a rusty brown organic counterpoint
to the red ink of my teacher’s note
“Emily- see me after class”
and my stomach dropped faster than the blood
or the bobble-headed Care Bear that my Social Studies teacher
threw out the window during class
because she once mentioned that she hated Care Bears
and so we covered her room with them.
I spent my fifth grade year at home in my parent’s bed
with blankets tacked over the windows and towels stuffed
into the cracks under the doors
while my parents tiptoed through the kitchen
and I dug my chewed off nails into my scalp trying
to claw the rot and smoldering ash out of my head
and flinched at every creaking floor board.
It was an old house.
The mourning doves called sycophantic dirges every dawn
(and noon, and dusk),
and I grinned when the dog chased them off to hide
with the one-eyed tom in the barn.
I tell you these things not to make you feel sorry for me,
but because I am confused how I can feel sorry for me
and yet miss that time so much.
In the end, I am left only with the firm conviction
that timed tests are every child’s bane,
and mourning doves are just country pigeons.
Oct 18, 2014
Oct 18, 2014 at 4:20 PM UTC
He wandered the pages of a languid space
a servant of the abyss
in ghastly fear, he stepped and stumbled
upon my ruins as his heartrace tumbled
down the stairs of the starry abyss
a trajectory of dread
his fingertips painted
of words with heads
letters with legs
and poems of death
on the walls of the abyss
he, of all, the servant of those
who are older than we
shuddered at the noise
of the silence behind
and of what was waiting ahead
narrow paths; alas
servant; alas; were crowded with dread
he wandered the pages of a languid space
where dandelions embraced his uncanny footsteps
and a rebirth, they claimed
he caressed the poems of my demonic despair
what have gotten the servant
to my robotic disgrace
as he escaped the abyss
where my dirges; remained
Oct 24, 2014
Oct 24, 2014 at 5:51 PM UTC
It began as a singular vibration, a heart beat, a steady hum,
and carried through eons.
It was lifted on perfect Devonian wings,
and traveled along with the storms and the breezes.
Mesozoic raptors picked it up,
in bone chilling lashes and screeches.
Then, the songbirds found it,
along with the whales.
Through waves and wind,
this is our gift.
It traveled with the tides and through the air,
and found its way into Indus Valley flutes and strings,
praise to Gods and Goddesses, as it entered all living things.
While it passed as Sirens to Odysseus' wanting ears,
the ancient Celts danced,
their flutes haunted the wild moors...
And each Tribe carried it through prayers and hymns,
laments and dirges,
celebrations and lullabies,
and through love.
Each Tribe carries it still,
through love.
Our gift.
Aug 28, 2017
Aug 28, 2017 at 12:17 PM UTC
_Even the feel of summer failed to heat up my heart
Despair and sorrow waged war upon my innocence
Little by little, my abandoned soul tore itself apart
While searching, yearning to feel your presence
Your thoughts once used to make me smile
Now your memories became the reason of my sorrow
My heart breaks every time I think of you for a while
Because I know you won't be there in my life tomorrow
I tried to lock up these stupid feelings inside my heart
In a desperate attempt to stop the unceasing stream of my tears
You said the vastness of oceans is enough to keep us apart
But I guess your love ceased to exist after all these years
It hurt, it pained like hell, but with all my efforts, I tried
To make peace with our beautiful moments and let go of you
But your voice echoed in my ears, dirges, my heart cried
Because darlin', this time, you didn't love me too..._
Jan 4, 2019
Jan 4, 2019 at 8:20 AM UTC