"dousing" poems
My freckle flecked love
stirs the speckled paintbrush soft, dousing it's hairs so that,
as I pull it back,
all the bristles bend
seamlessly, and when I let go
they ping forwards,
smattering
a scattering of stars,
onto snowy canvas.
May 7, 2014
May 7, 2014 at 5:43 PM UTC
Your love rains down
from the shower head.
Sharp needles of fire
dousing cold feet.
It feels like daggers,
and wouldn't be so,
if I hadn't lingered for so long,
in my frigid hesitancy.
Feb 15, 2016
Feb 15, 2016 at 11:01 PM UTC
In the dour ages
Of drafty cells and draftier castles,
Of dragons breathing without the frame of fables,
Saint and king unfisted obstruction's knuckles
By no miracle or majestic means,
But by such abuses
As smack of spite and the overscrupulous
Twisting of thumbscrews: one soul tied in sinews,
One white horse drowned, and all the unconquered pinnacles
Of God's city and Babylon's
Must wait, while here Suso's
Hand hones his tack and needles,
Scouraging to sores his own red sluices
For the relish of heaven, relentless, dousing with prickles
Of horsehair and lice his ***** *****
While there irate Cyrus
Squanders a summer and the brawn of his heroes
To rebuke the horse-swallowing River Gyndes:
He split it into three hundred and sixty trickles
A girl could wade without wetting her shins.
Still, latter-day sages,
Smiling at this behavior, subjugating their enemies
Neatly, nicely, by disbelief or bridges,
Never grip, as the grandsires did, that devil who chuckles
From grain of the marrow and the river-bed grains.
6.3k
Eggs, eggs, toss them high in the air
Catch em, and gargle, and mash them, and swear
Eat them with shells, eat them with sauce
Eat them with bags, eat them with moss
Eggs, eggs, between sandwich bread
That's what the wise elderly miller had said
Before came the bomb and he had dropped dead
Before being poisoned by a surplus of lead
And then came a centipede, long and sanguine
And bit a small child, so recently weaned
Off the protein derived from his mother's fine eggs
So he had to start munching on his mother's fine legs
"Be warned" said the Miller, his hair all askew
While dousing his wounds with mountains of glue
A tapeworm emerged, and looked toward the sky
Feeling envy toward all the birds that could fly
But the Miller was quicker, even in old age
He smacked the worm soundly, in a manner enraged
Bruised from the damage, and covered in glue
The worm turned away from the sky that was blue
Never with pelicans would he fly with delight
Never with owls would he soar through the night
For all Darwin's cruelty, an injustice rings
Tapeworms simply have no need for wings
So he bit the old Miller, and laid ten thousand eggs
They hatched and devoured his liver and legs
And as the man writhed, waiting to die
He vomited upward, up toward the sky
The tapeworm went flying, up toward the clouds
The air felt exhilarating, the rushing wind loud
For once in his life, he soared with the birds
Then in came a swallow, and bit off a third
His body, segmented, fell in parts to the ground
Tears seeped from his eyes, his face in a frown
From the ground he gazed up into the ominous fog
Before being lapped up by an unlucky dog
The End
Jan 19, 2013
Jan 19, 2013 at 1:20 AM UTC
the snake—
alluring notions held in its eyes
tongue twitching with noxious desire
arrogance held in a sauntered slink
vile venom dousing budding souls
—lends itself to this nature
Jan 5, 2023
Jan 5, 2023 at 3:00 AM UTC
How will one's feet dance to the rhythms if the gongs have ceased to pump the veins?
Are the hues of the palette enough for a leonardeschi art to transcend?
When your mezzo-soprano fails to hit, will your story still get heard?
Will a cyclist still pedal to savor the orange horizons without his friends?
Who will listen when the wrinkled fingers lay on the dusty piano?
Do these words still tell of a poet who once penned in flames?
Jun 21, 2020
Jun 21, 2020 at 12:06 PM UTC
Monsoon Rhapsody by Nishu Mathur
I am rain on a summer day
Drenching drowsy, lifeless buds
Stirring them to a dancing wakefulness
Washing leaves dull and dry with dust
Dousing fire in a desert ringed inferno
I am the drizzle on a pale moon night
Easing into the heart with music
The melange of water humming with the wind
The splash of puddles in fields of barley
Gently filling thirsty river beds craving for a flow
I am showers before monsoons
Impregnating the air with soothing droplets
The hint of life in an oasis of colours
Breathing moist on a farmer's bronzed skin
Tingling the world with shimmering emerald
I am sawan, the monsoons
Winding my way through a chorus of clouds
Thundering my presence into the sea of renewal
Cascading on sandy shores that glisten with light
Whisking away waves of gold with jubilant darkness
I drape the land in arrays of greens
Scent the soil in my fragrance
Dance with the rhapsodic dance of the peacock
Wreathe petals into flowers that vine
And curve in the soil of growth.
Jun 30, 2016
Jun 30, 2016 at 7:47 AM UTC
With a blistered heart
From unnumbered breaks,
A cloud of unshed tears
From untold betrayals,
I reenter the world
After an eternity or more
Of self imposed asylum
From a world of superficial bliss.
A world unchanged!
A cruel untended garden
Of deceptive beauty
And unkind thorny roses.
Lovelorn shadows,
Masquerading venomous claws
With beauteous flamboyance
And undesirable attraction.
Lethargic feelings,
Dousing my desires
With drowsing memoirs
Of countless emotional abuse,
Causing momentary spasms
In cerebral regions
Parading nocuous images
In the plenitude of projected beauty.
Scarred beyond immediate cure,
I recede from said world-
Too adverse for tender hearts
Back to hibernating moods
To nurse evergreen cuts
Cuts so deep, so lethal
Only the indolent strides of time
Can attempt to stitch!
Awaiting prophetic moments
Moments with mirage qualities
When in-love I can fall again
When a damsel I can trust again
When my heart can beat again
For one with pure intentions
Not putrefied by Hollywood mentors
*But virtuous in biblical ways*...
© Raphael Uzor
Apr 21, 2014
Apr 21, 2014 at 1:17 AM UTC
It's hard to forget you
And not just because I remember the way you made me feel (happy)
But because I remember everything
about you.
I remember the way you pulled me up into your treehouse and showed me your childhood, littered with cigarettes and beer bottles.
And the way your hands shook when you would touch me;
As if they were bottles of spray paint and my body was a blank wall.
I remember the way you would ramble on about nothing
Because you were afraid I'd get bored in the silence.
Yet talking with you was effortless; like how you once started a bonfire with gasoline: instant.
I remember the way your eyes always told different stories than your mouth
And how they looked when we sat by the river playing with cattails.
I remember the energy I felt when you made me break a window in the abandoned house
And the nostalgic sadness I felt when I broke the empty bottle of liquor in the same room
Alone.
Because I can't forget the nothingness in your eyes when you ended things
Or your steady hands that I was no longer allowed to reach out for.
I can't forget how you uncharacteristically said so little,
Dousing the flame I was trying so hard to keep alive.
Or how you so easily walked away
as though everything I ever remembered about you
Was really someone else.
I can't forget how you crushed my heart in between your hands until it turned to dust.
And now all I can do is spend my days writing your name in the ashes in cursive
Aug 5, 2014
Aug 5, 2014 at 11:30 PM UTC
A massive weight shifts between my shoulders. It’s another fight, I am getting older. One more step, I grow bolder. See me out there, on that thin wire. Juggling my life at the same time trying to aspire. The pain didn’t set me back; it lit in me a fire. Your words sharp like a blade and my heart for hire. Elusive to the noise, I climb higher.
I’m eviserating the catacombs of an empire.
I am not trying to scale the ladder. I’m tearing it down to the mire. I am not dousing the flame, I am feeding the fire.
If we are walk this way, we need to dress the correct attire.
Clearly there is an internal fight, a struggle for power. I am not built to last, I eventually get tired. But the problems that disappeared just reappear taking on another form.
I do my best to keep my balance and keep walking this thin wire.
There is a silence in the noise of a mob
I can feel my heart. The story has to end or at least on my part. Will I hit the net below to sweet depart?
Or Shall I just keep juggling as I walk? It doesn’t matter if they think I am a fool; just as long as I do my part.
Life is a circus, living it is an art.
-RSC
Mar 8, 2022
Mar 8, 2022 at 6:48 AM UTC
*I'm tired of beauty
incessantly meddling in my affairs
luring me to venture outside myself
revealing hidden radiance within
disguising life's dismal undercurrent
reducing it to a superficial veneer
randomly appearing by surprise
stubbornly eliciting a smile
performing alchemy on the mundane
dousing my awareness in the elixir of life
beauty...
the pulchritude of spirit...that's all it is...*
Mar 24, 2014
Mar 24, 2014 at 6:05 PM UTC
Eyes burn
gritty paper, sand
tears pool
a room puddles
buckets, oceans pour over
dousing flickering flames
drowning
some letting go
dying
others left
wading
Dec 3, 2012
Dec 3, 2012 at 12:01 AM UTC
I spoke to a wasp today. And he told me his story. He spoke to me about his childhood, and watching his own family being murdered. It was a bright and warm Friday evening. His father had ventured out and flew among the humans that lived in the home of his home. The smell of liquor permeated the air, as did the barbeque that was nearly too done. He drew close to the man of the home, just to watch and observe the scene. The man didn't like it too much. So he swatted him. It didn't hurt him, however, but it did confuse him. And in his confusion he landed upon the man and planted his stinger within him. The man slammed his hand down, cursing as the wasp's father's guts bled out. There was nothing the wasp could do but watch. The woman of the house asked if the man was ok. The man cursed once more and slammed his glass on the ground. The woman became upset and demanded to know why. The man had no answer. He merely just grabbed a gas can, took another ...swig of liquor, and walked up to the wasp's home and began dousing it in gasoline. The woman freaked out, afraid of what was about to happen. The man merely cursed at her as well and shoved her to the ground. When she tried to get back up he kicked her in the face. The blood poured. The wasp's home was now soaked in a lethal liquid. The man had a sinister grin as he glanced at his crying and bleeding woman lying on the ground, and he laughed as he lit a match and threw it on the wasp home. The nest went up in flames, and shortly after the home of the man did too. The little wasp escaped, unable to save the lives of his screaming family being burnt alive. The man merely laughed; the woman lay crying; the nest burnt to ashes; the house burnt down. So now the little wasp is all grown up. And when I asked what he wants to do with his life, all he replied was, "I want to sting people...because it seems that is all every creature is meant to do." ♥
May 23, 2013
May 23, 2013 at 11:13 PM UTC
I
Now the rain hammered down And the waters did rise
And the drunk at the Inn Looked his wife in the eyes
Then he looked at his boots Of soft leather so new
and he saw her strong back Then he chose what to do
"The river is deep and it's running in spate
I'll not get a dousing and I'll not be late
So you'll take me across woman just you alone
Or by God you will suffer when we both get home"
You're a cold-hearted ******* without any charm
You've broken my heart like you once broke my arm
But I'll carry you out through the deep and the flood
Thought the water is almost as cold as your blood
So they walked to the banks of the river so fast
And he clung to her shoulders a man foul and vast
She strode forward with dignity into the flow
Stopped sharp took a breath singing as she let go
"You're cold-hearted ******* your drunk breath on my neck
You've beaten me down to grey broken wreck
Now I'm stood in the river and I need a rest
So I'll stand here a while with both feet on your chest"
So he struggled a little and then he was still
While she sang with new freedom enjoying the thrill
She knows if the magistrate says she must swing
She will still feel the freedom and still she will sing
"You're a cold -hearted ******* without any charm
but I'll wear a smile now I've done you such harm
now you're dead in the river amongst the dark stones
and the trout and the weeds dance amongst your cold bones"
Jul 21, 2011
Jul 21, 2011 at 8:31 AM UTC
There lives a dragon in my stomach.
That pokes and prods with every scale.
With heat from it’s flames that leave skin blushed.
A bloated squeezing growing from the lack of room.
I check my stomach daily.
Searching for holes and bruises,
My hands running over bear skin amazed.
And yet, I feel it now,
Playing chess up my spine,
Each claw catching as it climbs up my vertebrae.
Leaving chills and goosebumps in it’s passing.
I’ve cried out for help.
Wanting nothing more from this beast.
But it leaves nightmares with it’s presence.
And it’s wings make perfect walls.
People just get tired after a while.
Just “the boy who cried wolf,”
But as I spout more words to them scrambling for help.
I see the smoke pillowing out of my mouth.
And before I could question,
We were both just as blinded.
I have a dragon in my stomach.
Years spent together like bitter friends.
Growing used to the burn of it’s hugs.
Even dousing the flames on my own at times.
A begrudging compromise.
Now overtime the beast grew too.
Spending more of it’s passing as a shadow over my shoulders.
Even with much less hold on me than before.
It still watches with delight.
Some days weighing like a backpack of bricks.
Whispering in my ear, coaching. Letting smoke fill my head, confusing.
Most other days are more bearable.
At night the beast stays on my chest.
Like a scaly tiger it curls on top,
With a kneading purr as it settles.
I never quite remember sleeping these nights.
Flashes of tossing and turning from being uncomfortable.
Poking, and prodding, and burning, and now chilling, and now waking up sweating.
The fog only clearing after spending time awake.
Alas there is a dragon in my stomach.
A spiteful beast that took hold there.
With greetings just like an old friend.
And when I finally demanded it’s name.
“Trauma” the beast told me.
Oct 18, 2021
Oct 18, 2021 at 11:03 AM UTC
He wants none of it
The unrelenting fame
Paparazzi's lights
Never out of sight
The crushing weight
Of a well-known name
He wants none of it
The life-sucking fame
Endless demands
From legions of fans
Happiness funneling
Right down the drain
He wants none of it
The soul-deadening fame
Prestige a cruel mistress
All joys turned to business
Dousing his spirit
To extinguish its flame
No, he craves anonymity
For stardom to cease
To be happy with less
Freed from the stress
True glory found
In a life lived in peace
Nov 2, 2018
Nov 2, 2018 at 12:40 AM UTC
I would be lying if I said
it didn't bother me that you were smiling
because of someone else's sunlight.
I would be lying if I said
that my heart never pulls apart
whenever I catch you in places I thought you wouldn't be.
And I would be lying if I said
I was over you choosing fear
over me.
See, the thing is, I thought I would never see you again.
I thought the second you walked out my door
would be the last time I'd see your eyes.
Yet, yesterday ironically, ours locked like two metal puzzle pieces
and the clashing of steel left ringing in my ears
and sparks flying out of my sanity.
I don't know what it is about you.
There's this sort of unexplainable heat
on the rims of your gaze that leaves a sort of branding.
And every single time your aura enters the room, I feel like the walls
are closing in on my mind, bring me down dark narrow paths
whose light you blew out whilst dousing the flames of my heart.
And maybe it's the thought of you
becoming everything I would've wanted you to be
that leaves me biting my tongue full of envy.
Because I would be lying if I told you
I was proud that all it took was the elimination of me
to make you happy.
gd
Jul 24, 2015
Jul 24, 2015 at 8:56 PM UTC
Kissed the heatwave goodbye at last,
All waving as she left,
While armies of black clouds amassed across the pinkish sky,
Manipulated by light tricks in the heavy glow,
Diminutive raindrops thickened as we danced,
Worshiping the shower of cooling joy,
We danced in celebration, in appeasment of Thor,
The world becoming more content,
The blazing fireball came and went,
Bedecked with paste of glory breeze,
Kissing all around,
The rain came dousing baking souls,
Chased heat into submission with electric fireballs,
Dots and dashes,
Nova flashes,
Thunder roared as lions purr,
Bodies relieved to breathe again,
Headache of oppressed airs' hatred,
Dissipated at last,
Sleep weighed heavily on the eyes of the sufferers,
'Til now at last with cooler skies and night wishes,
With rest they're truly blessed!
By ladylivvi1
© 2013 ladylivvi1 (All rights reserved)
Jul 25, 2013
Jul 25, 2013 at 1:26 PM UTC
“Looking for a walking buddy”
The invitation looms as I scroll through pages of personal ads
Filled with sensitive insight, too intimate for idle voyeurs browsing.
The computer’s hypnotic glow, dousing my cheeks in pale light, coaxes me to search
To rummage through human advertisements and peruse desperate expositions
Behavior quite unlike the pastimes that others might imagine me participating in
Behavior quite unlike the nightly activities I usually partake in
Such as sleeping
Won’t I give up this useless quest for nothing in particular,
And surrender my body to the ruthless aches creeping into my muscles and joints?
I’ll wait for assurance that my grazing has meaning–
I’ll linger to assign significance to this arbitrary curiosity, even into the early morning
Eventually, I’ll resolve to the conclusion that there is somewhere an assembly of people squinting in thought, trying to justify this same bizarre inquisition
We the people, hunched over luminous monitors, “looking for something more”
We who have specific and lewd requests for the opposite ***
We nosing congregation, mysteriously drawn to the Strictly Platonic section of the personals
Should try our luck with a walking buddy
And wander away.
Dec 5, 2011
Dec 5, 2011 at 3:47 AM UTC
There's no such thing as forever
if anything there's always a never
Tell me what do you think?
you can't even open up to me
without dousing yourself away on a couple of drinks
Tell me it's me that you need
Tell me that it's me keeping you up on your feet
you shrug it off and just stated how we couldn't be
But I know we could do better
Am I that naive?
maybe blinded by the bliss and the pleasure
you whisper in my ear that you wanted to be apart of me
even when all you ever do is walk all over me
one more drink & you're drowning
you can hear my heart pounding
you're lost into delusion
I find myself lost in your eyes
falling for you with your reckless heart
and you only love me just for one night
I've always have,
been,
and ever will
be stuck on forever
if anything
you remind me that it'll always be never
May 8, 2018
May 8, 2018 at 3:13 AM UTC
the power of the sea,
dousing hills with moist sparkles;
death drowns, tears glisten.
Jan 6, 2014
Jan 6, 2014 at 8:46 AM UTC
You had torrents and storms in your hair
Grey dewy eyes that whipped windy stares
And at the beginning I didn’t feel the cold weather you brought around with you.
you flickered like the hesitant cheap matchstick
That resides in between the fingers of the adolescent that doesn’t yet understand
Friction
Caused by two opposing forces for a reason
For an end product, to commit treason
But not according to your abundant manual of
Do’s and don’ts that mention in the title you’re exempt
under the weight of so much paper thin equality
chapters damp with words that stank of expectations
I found a home under the printed lines of I love you, the running ink dousing me with a blackened perspective on what it was you really wanted for me
To give but not receive
to be free to talk but not to breathe
but everyone knows
you require both to form a voice
and without that
my fingers would slowly snap to the beat that my bones would crack
To the rhythm of your whiplash tongue
Which would flush waves against the shores that were my shrinking figure
The small women you requested at the doorstep of our relationship
Has finally shrunk to fit through the keyhole
in the shape of your accessory
Which is obviously necessary to put up with me.
Apr 27, 2014
Apr 27, 2014 at 10:53 PM UTC
Empty silhouettes wander down abandoned streets,
Dousing their souls in scotch and whiskey
Placing firey papers to their lips and their lungs full of tar
The only noise comes from the dead houses,
Filled with broken children
And tired parents with bags upon bags upon bags under their lonely eyes
And unowned women stand on the corners, climbing into old cars
Their mothers wouldn't be proud
And babies can be seen crying through cracked windows
While husbands caress their wives, the ones covered in bruises
And teenagers sit on stoops, covering their damaged arms and bandaged hearts
Jan 7, 2014
Jan 7, 2014 at 10:49 AM UTC
Now pack your luck up in handbags
hurry hard through your back door
These nights
Are colder than they ever were
dousing fires on 13th floors
When flame-lit streets frost over,
you can see a little more,
and the dancing sidewalk shadows let you pass
Now cross your arms and your fingers
clear the cobwebs from your head
You're off
And running on your rabbit's feet
clutching clovers to your chest
10,000 lucky pennies
for a Greyhound ride out west
when you get there, count to 7 and exhale
Jan 6, 2013
Jan 6, 2013 at 7:44 PM UTC