"errand" poems
Awakening will find me
through the daily mundane
faith's step in front of tiny step
for the sake of Christ's great name
Even David the brave did not set out
with a lofty ambition to see the giant slain
but walked forth instead with a servant's heart
obediently for his father, carrying cheese and grain
and as he went in faithfulness about this simple errand
God raised him up with sling and stone to champion His fame
Feb 7, 2016
Feb 7, 2016 at 2:52 PM UTC
You are simply beyond description.
For a definition is but a collection of words, and those words are just letters working together to tell a story.
But your laugh takes me on an adventure through worlds undiscovered. Your eyes are deep oceans filled with tales of past shipwrecks before you realized that you were the treasure. Your heartbeat is a symphony composed in a melody that only we know.
So while describing you is this fool's errand, I know mere words will never completely capture you.
For words are just letters working together to be beautiful, and you are more beautiful than any group of words can ever hope to be.
Apr 3, 2018
Apr 3, 2018 at 4:33 PM UTC
It's been raining all night and day
And I know just what you'll say
You won't go out when it rains
Except to hike a mountain range
But I long to be with you
Hold you tight the whole night through
I want to be your hiking trail
Or the sea on which you sail
I long to be your fairytale
Let you explore in all detail
Just want to be your hiking trail
Forecast says rain again today
So in your house you decide to stay
Won't go to parties, run errand or shop
When outside there are raindrops
When it Rains you go on strike
Cept maybe for one of your hikes
I want to be your hiking trail
Or the sea on which you sail
I long to be your fairytale
Let you explore in all detail
Just want to be your hiking trail
Doesn't matter rain or shine
I just want to make you mine
We could go out or just stay in
Either way with you I win
I just want to be with you
To hold you tight the whole night through
So let me be your hiking trail
Or the sea on which you sail
And let me be your fairytale
To explore in all detail
I just want to be your hiking trail
Feb 15, 2019
Feb 15, 2019 at 11:07 AM UTC
The chestnut casts his flambeaux, and the flowers
Stream from the hawthorn on the wind away,
The doors clap to, the pane is blind with showers.
Pass me the can, lad; there's an end of May.
There's one spoilt spring to scant our mortal lot,
One season ruined of your little store.
May will be fine next year as like as not:
But ay, but then we shall be twenty-four.
We for a certainty are not the first
Have sat in taverns while the tempest hurled
Their hopeful plans to emptiness, and cursed
Whatever brute and blackguard made the world.
It is in truth iniquity on high
To cheat our sentenced souls of aught they crave,
And mar the merriment as you and I
Fare on our long fool's-errand to the grave.
Iniquity it is; but pass the can.
My lad, no pair of kings our mothers bore;
Our only portion is the estate of man:
We want the moon, but we shall get no more.
If here to-day the cloud of thunder lours
To-morrow it will hie on far behests;
The flesh will grieve on other bones than ours
Soon, and the soul will mourn in other *******
The troubles of our proud and angry dust
Are from eternity, and shall not fail.
Bear them we can, and if we can we must.
Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.
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She strides down the street,
Holds that cancer stick up to her mouth,
Takes a deep breath in,
Filling her lungs with lethal smoke,
Gradually rotting away her
Interior.
Her heart beats out of her chest.
[A heart divided between two hearts.]
He’s waiting at the street corner
Between the alley of lust and the
Path of ignorance.
She sees his silhouette in the
Distance, a dark apparition.
Her heart leaps out of her chest,
Towards him,
Reaching for him,
Propelling her to him.
She had absolutely no control over the matter.
The other man she loves is home
Alone, waiting for her too.
Moments ago, he
Held her in his arms,
Kissed her goodbye,
Told her to hurry back soon.
“I love you.”
“I love you, too” - the words
Suddenly conveyed
No meaning to her.
She told him she was
Running an errand, when,
In reality,
She was running away
From him.
[*A heart divided between two hearts
Can never really be a heart.*]
His love suffocates her.
His love drowns her
In its constancy,
In its predictability.
With him, she feels like a
Bird with its wings ripped off.
Held captive, in a wire cage.
[*A heart divided between two hearts
Can never beat the way it should.*]
How can a woman with two men
Who love her
Feel so
Staggeringly
Alone?
Who will love her until their
Disintegrating hearts turn into
Simply dust.
[*A heart divided between two hearts
Can never really keep from rupturing,
Infecting the body with its own poisons.*]
So she lets her underground lover
Envelop her in his arms
And kiss her until both of their lips
Are numb,
Until they both want more.
Until they cannot restrain themselves.
His love releases her out of her
Cage, allows her to fly once again.
The passion of these moments
Will never be forgotten.
His love brings the roses back to
Her lifeless cheeks, brings life
Back to the void inside her.
And, his love allows her
To fly back home, once again,
Straight into the arms of the
Man who is her keeper.
Nov 14, 2012
Nov 14, 2012 at 3:05 AM UTC
When their was no reason to live.
Life was useless, better to give.
You were frustrated and pumped.
From top of roof you jumped.
It was just a matter of second
yet enough to live whole life in this errand.
Ups and downs of life passed through your eyes.
You wished to give your life another try.
But now it was too late.
Worldly life had already closed its gate.
Your delicate body crashed into the ground.
It all ended with a dull and feeble sound.
Dec 7, 2014
Dec 7, 2014 at 10:38 AM UTC
564
My period had come for Prayer—
No other Art—would do—
My Tactics missed a rudiment—
Creator—Was it you?
God grows above—so those who pray
Horizons—must ascend—
And so I stepped upon the North
To see this Curious Friend—
His House was not—no sign had He—
By Chimney—nor by Door
Could I infer his Residence—
Vast Prairies of Air
Unbroken by a Settler—
Were all that I could see—
Infinitude—Had’st Thou no Face
That I might look on Thee?
The Silence condescended—
Creation stopped—for Me—
But awed beyond my errand—
I worshipped—did not “pray”—
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The desire to become
a virtuoso and prove
that I am indeed worthy
of traveling in the pursuit
of my passions
or in the pursuit
of you--
commendable cogitation
or
fool's errand?
Jan 7, 2015
Jan 7, 2015 at 3:07 PM UTC
Thing's that make me uncomfortable:
That feeling when you get mad at me,
because I didn't do the thing, you didn't ask me to do, cause I can't read minds; I'm not your parent.
That tone in your voice when you go off about how unfair the world is, triggered by the slightest setback.
The feeling when I sacrifice all that I am for the sake of your mood and happiness, in vain.
That sound of the exacerbated sigh when I ask you to run an errand, as if I am not also tired.
The pressure of carrying us both on broken legs.
The pit in my chest when I ask your opinion and you say "I don't care," but you actually do care, because whatever choice I make is laced in ridicule.
When you say you're doing something for me but you're just trying to make yourself feel better about doing it for yourself.
When you use my disorder as a justification or excuse, but when I actually need your help you seem burdened and annoyed.
That "okay then" moment when I give you everything you ask for and you take it as if you never wanted it.
Sep 8, 2018
Sep 8, 2018 at 7:10 AM UTC
It's like this, and then there was total recall. Fast like a safety plan made wrong and then bouncing in and out all the way down the hall. Up through cable cars, Korean fast food market, wet fish, soupy street, concrete cracks filled with crab meat and **** heads. Just a square, a five block, two street, sideways quadrangle, beat of the Tenderloin, hour of the dove. Every one's dead on these loose ends. Hills of the back of her backside, skin of the back of her neck. Rapture is the grave of the sunset, memory is that thing that I said.
No one cans in carnivores, no one runs moves like a shepherd. Sunday, daft as candy, luck in the ways of the prophet. Canon of the blaze of every woman that died today. The sleep setting, the motorcycle bending the hollow, the ravines noisy interlude, up through the rough and the tangles, huddles in a six pack, three or four walking up the block to meet the rest of them.
The skin doesn't fit right, it wears wrong, the shoulders stiff, the masseuse excuses himself. Buckets of flowers hang from the ceiling like stripped cat christmas decorations in suburban mastermind serial killer resort town. Everyone is quiet because they gotta. They move their feet like they were hurrying death into a red volcano, like they were the errand of red from the top bell to the bottom of the town.
I sit on a roof top, baking in the noon day sun. Stripping sticks and stems off the side to sideways, just roasting away, laying, low in the afternoon light. I see a girl with her hands on her skirt, wobbling, scooting a priest card on a periwinkle terra-cotta. I move my head, turn it upside round to take a better look. No one counts to ten when they see me. The gangster that woke up isn't the gangster that went to sleep last night. My wickedness ended my words mean your bright decay. So I ride the pavement exhausted, burying my coughs in an L-shaped arm
May 3, 2014
May 3, 2014 at 12:32 PM UTC
1604
We send the Wave to find the Wave—
An Errand so divine,
The Messenger enamored too,
Forgetting to return,
We make the wise distinction still,
Soever made in vain,
The sagest time to dam the sea is when the sea is gone—
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1103
The spry Arms of the Wind
If I could crawl between
I have an errand imminent
To an adjoining Zone—
I should not care to stop
My Process is not long
The Wind could wait without the Gate
Or stroll the Town among.
To ascertain the House
And is the soul at Home
And hold the Wick of mine to it
To light, and then return—
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Go, Soul, the body’s guest,
Upon a thankless errand;
Fear not to touch the best;
The truth shall be thy warrant:
Go, since I needs must die,
And give the world the lie.
Say to the court, it glows
And shines like rotten wood;
Say to the church, it shows
What’s good, and doth no good:
If church and court reply,
Then give them both the lie.
Tell potentates, they live
Acting by others’ action;
Not loved unless they give,
Not strong but by a faction.
If potentates reply,
Give potentates the lie.
Tell men of high condition,
That manage the estate,
Their purpose is ambition,
Their practice only hate:
And if they once reply,
Then give them all the lie.
Tell them that brave it most,
They beg for more by spending,
Who, in their greatest cost,
Seek nothing but commending.
And if they make reply,
Then give them all the lie.
Tell zeal it wants devotion;
Tell love it is but lust;
Tell time it is but motion;
Tell flesh it is but dust:
And wish them not reply,
For thou must give the lie.
Tell age it daily wasteth;
Tell honour how it alters;
Tell beauty how she blasteth;
Tell favour how it falters:
And as they shall reply,
Give every one the lie.
Tell wit how much it wrangles
In tickle points of niceness;
Tell wisdom she entangles
Herself in overwiseness:
And when they do reply,
Straight give them both the lie.
Tell physic of her boldness;
Tell skill it is pretension;
Tell charity of coldness;
Tell law it is contention:
And as they do reply,
So give them still the lie.
Tell fortune of her blindness;
Tell nature of decay;
Tell friendship of unkindness;
Tell justice of delay:
And if they will reply,
Then give them all the lie.
Tell arts they have no soundness,
But vary by esteeming;
Tell schools they want profoundness,
And stand too much on seeming:
If arts and schools reply,
Give arts and schools the lie.
Tell faith it’s fled the city;
Tell how the country erreth;
Tell manhood shakes off pity
And virtue least preferreth:
And if they do reply,
Spare not to give the lie.
So when thou hast, as I
Commanded thee, done blabbing—
Although to give the lie
Deserves no less than stabbing—
Stab at thee he that will,
No stab the soul can ****
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443
I tie my Hat—I crease my Shawl—
Life’s little duties do—precisely—
As the very least
Were infinite—to me—
I put new Blossoms in the Glass—
And throw the old—away—
I push a petal from my gown
That anchored there—I weigh
The time ’twill be till six o’clock
I have so much to do—
And yet—Existence—some way back—
Stopped—struck—my tickling—through—
We cannot put Ourself away
As a completed Man
Or Woman—When the Errand’s done
We came to Flesh—upon—
There may be—Miles on Miles of Nought—
Of Action—sicker far—
To simulate—is stinging work—
To cover what we are
From Science—and from Surgery—
Too Telescopic Eyes
To bear on us unshaded—
For their—sake—not for Ours—
’Twould start them—
We—could tremble—
But since we got a Bomb—
And held it in our *****
Nay—Hold it—it is calm—
Therefore—we do life’s labor—
Though life’s Reward—be done—
With scrupulous exactness—
To hold our Senses—on—
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Oh, creativity
Why hast thou left me?
I should be writing
A photoem
But without creativity here with me
I cannot see
My brain cannot
Change these images
Into words, lines, stanzas
Without the translator
Of creativity
Oh, creativity
For too long you have been gone
One may say I am stumped
Or infected with writers block
But I say creativity
Went off on an errand
And here I am watching the clock
Waiting
For its glorious return
But
Hmm, creativity
I’m afraid I realized something
Maybe it was I
Who left you
Not the other way around
And my sight drops to the ground
I did not mean to leave you
To loose you
I never meant to hurt
Or bruise you
So, what say you,
Creativity
I’m sorry and
Now that I
Am back
Will you join me?
May 14, 2013
May 14, 2013 at 6:38 PM UTC
Little Red Riding Hood
a name given to thee
loved helping her mom with chores
and one day to run an errand for her
Put on her red hood ,
a basket in her hand
and off she went into the familiar woods
while Picking up berries she heard a roar
Quickly she ran to her granny's door
Poor granny was on her bed
Amused... Red Riding Hood quickly came closer and said
Suspiciously....
"What a big pair of eyes you have grandma"
"What a big nose you have grandma"
"What a big pair of ears you have grandma"
"What a furry big thing you are grandma"
But grandma was too sick to answer...
Her suspicion grew stronger
It wasn't her grandma lying on the bed
Pretended to be sick but salivating for her crazily
Her breathing was heavy,
her howling could almost be heard
What a tricky big beast!
Carefully she took her bow and arrow from her basket
and shot her cunning wolf granny in the heart
Hurriedly she opened the closet
Granny was safe , granny was still alive
Little Red Riding Hood hugged and kissed her
and thanked her real granny
for the archery lessons she gave her...
sharpened her mind
shooting her target
saving a life
saved her granny's life
Jun 7, 2013
Jun 7, 2013 at 5:04 AM UTC
I imagine if I were a little boy, I'd get a little boy hard on by watching teenage girls buy underwear.
And if I were a little boy, I'd punch my brother so hard he'd start to cry
And I'd die laughing at him,
take back my nerf gun, just for fun in the sun
and I don't get burned
because I haven't had a girlfriend yet.
I think little boys ********** the wrong way for a while
but still smile
because they're ************
Still keeping it secret from mom,
nothing's really wrong, it's the bomb,
but turn up this song
It'd be weird if mom heard all the pokemon names I keep saying to stay hard.
If I were a little boy, I'd be mean to the little girls I like.
Push them off their bikes and get into fist fights
with other boys over toys that aren't even mine.
And I'd keep all my promises by the pinky,
and if we got married under the oak tree
in my backyard, I'd keep you forever
and we could watch goosebumps every night together.
The little boy version of me doesn't get heartbroken
and isn't smokin' anything.
He doesn't get wasted and tasteless,
grab ***** and faces,
screaming about cheating and beating up some guy just to prove he's alive.
His shoes light up
not the headlights of the car that peels out of the bar
angry
not thinking straight, into the house, irate,
to deliver hate, and take out any sons ready to stand up to him.
He doesn't sell drugs,
he gives hugs at thanksgiving
and isn't too strung out to watch an entire disney movie
and would never be caught dead on the streets
shakin' a can for money because his habit's are debilitating and killing him.
He sleeps with one girl, her name is Daisy.
She's a lazy cocker spaniel
and loves him more than you ever will.
He likes cartoons and afternoons playing tag in all front yards
throwing snowballs at cars, going to mars on a swingset
because he's not grown up yet,
and the world hasn't told him what it really thinks about him.
I don't buy underwear in front of little boys.
And it's nothing against them or their little boy friends,
I just don't want me to be another key in the inevitable end
when they try to get into girls *******
instead of heads.
Jul 5, 2010
Jul 5, 2010 at 3:09 PM UTC
A house that lacks, seemingly, mistress and master,
With doors that none but the wind ever closes,
Its floor all littered with glass and with plaster;
It stands in a garden of old-fashioned roses.
I pass by that way in the gloaming with Mary;
‘I wonder,’ I say, ‘who the owner of those is.’
‘Oh, no one you know,’ she answers me airy,
‘But one we must ask if we want any roses.’
So we must join hands in the dew coming coldly
There in the hush of the wood that reposes,
And turn and go up to the open door boldly,
And knock to the echoes as beggars for roses.
‘Pray, are you within there, Mistress Who-were-you?’
’Tis Mary that speaks and our errand discloses.
‘Pray, are you within there? Bestir you, bestir you!
’Tis summer again; there’s two come for roses.
‘A word with you, that of the singer recalling—
Old Herrick: a saying that every maid knows is
A flower unplucked is but left to the falling,
And nothing is gained by not gathering roses.’
We do not loosen our hands’ intertwining
(Not caring so very much what she supposes),
There when she comes on us mistily shining
And grants us by silence the boon of her roses.
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Between the dusk of a summer night
And the dawn of a summer day,
We caught at a mood as it passed in flight,
And we bade it stoop and stay.
And what with the dawn of night began
With the dusk of day was done;
For that is the way of woman and man,
When a hazard has made them one.
Arc upon arc, from shade to shine,
The World went thundering free;
And what was his errand but hers and mine--
The lords of him, I and she?
O, it's die we must, but it's live we can,
And the marvel of earth and sun
Is all for the joy of woman and man
And the longing that makes them one.
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The thought that you can perceive perfection is one of a fool.
You cannot become perfect, nor can you see perfection manifested.
Yet it is a fools errand to not try to be better than what you see as best.
You can't expect to be seen as perfect to anyone but yourself.
Simply because if you can accept yourself, then you will often be denied by others as well.
If you can't accept yourself, then try to become more.
If you can't achieve what you want, get help.
Not enough people understand the means to achieve their aspirations, but others know how to achieve someone else's goal.
If someone hails you as perfect, then you simply share the same views.
If someone degrades you for irrelevant flaws, then they hold a different standard.
Perfection is only a concept created by fools, and people who don't understand the cruelty in the actions of others.
Whoever thinks of themselves as perfect hasn't met one greater than them.
In this world, the closest thing that I can fathom to be synonymous with perfection, is knowing that you are imperfect, but being content with who you are.
Oct 19, 2013
Oct 19, 2013 at 7:43 PM UTC
THEY have taken the ball of earth
and made it a little thing.
They were held to the land and horses;
they were held to the little seas.
They have changed and shaped and welded;
they have broken the old tools and made
new ones; they are ranging the white
scarves of cloudland; they are bumping
the sunken bells of the Carthaginians
and Phœnicians:
they are handling
the strongest sea
as a thing to be handled.
The earth was a call that mocked;
it is belted with wires and meshed with
steel; from Pittsburg to Vladivostok is
an iron ride on a moving house; from
Jerusalem to Tokyo is a reckoned span;
and they talk at night in the storm and
salt, the wind and the war.
They have counted the miles to the Sun
and Canopus; they have weighed a small
blue star that comes in the southeast
corner of the sky on a foretold errand.
We shall search the sea again.
We shall search the stars again.
There are no bars across the way.
There is no end to the plan and the clue,
the hunt and the thirst.
The motors are drumming, the leather leggings
and the leather coats wait:
Under the sea
and out to the stars
we go.
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It was the early days of the organic food craze
and my wife, ever a slave to the latest fads
(which disposition sometimes benefitted me pleasurably
but mostly cost me dearly)
made me run on an errand
(like: “Fido – go, fetch!”)
to get some organic vegetables
and arriving, I blurted out to the produce guy, stumbling:
*“Some ****** for my wife”* –
and that wise guy, Oxford-educated as he was
(though a failed Professor, so ended up at the greengrocer’s)
he said: *“That you must induce or encourage in your wife, Sir;
I cannot and will not be of service in that connection.”*
And I slowed down and I said:
“Well, dear fellow – for my wife, have you any organic vegetables?”
And Oxford-educated as he was, he did not understand such fads
having mostly a sedate and Classical demeanour
and he pointed his most English nose to the air;
and so I attempted again to sensible-phrase my inquiry:
*“Are your vegetables -
and this I ask on account of my esteemed wife -
sprayed with poisonous chemicals?”*
And the Oxford guy apprehended now, and he pronounced:
*“Poisonous chemicals for your spouse
you must procure yourself, Sir”*
Now, that was an idea. I knew Oxford-educated guys
were smart in some way or other.
And since then I have been free of my wife.
I have no need to run on errands for no baby, no more;
though I do have to count bars,
limited as my numerical skills are,
as is my verbal proficiency.
And the Oxford guy, meanwhile, I have it from the grapevine,
has set up an ******** Food Chain Store*, worldwide;
I knew he’d go places, sooner or later, far and global
Jul 9, 2013
Jul 9, 2013 at 8:06 AM UTC
at two years old,
your curious hands
happened upon a bottle of
flea medicine
that lay waiting on the counter.
your mother was absent as usual,
off on an errand,
or walking the dog.
unwatched,
your enterprising fingers
eased the lid from the container,
and you poured the sweet-smelling
liquid down your throat.
the world was still so new to you,
and it seemed to be made for tasting.
who could blame a child
with a thirst for more than
mushy peas and applesauce?
two days later
they released you from the hospital,
your stomach pumped dry.
when you were six,
idly exploring the woods of your mother’s
sprawling estate,
you paused a moment from imagining
faerie queens flitting about in the greenery
to take rest on a log,
your undiscerning eye not betraying
its secret: within it was a nest
of wasps,
and thinking they were faeries
you dared not move as they
rose in a cloud above your head
and overtook you,
leaving your body peppered with
painful angry sores.
you fell to the ground.
a hired man,
strong and tall as the oak trees,
saw your quick descent and
ventured after you,
made a hammock of his arms
to bear you like a fallen soldier
back to your mother’s house,
his tough sun-leathered skin
immune to the assaults of the
faerie battalion.
at eight,
playing in the small child-sized house
in your aunt’s garden,
you sought to make stained glass
from the broken shards of the playhouse window.
having no tool at hand,
what better way to
shatter the clear, flat plane
than with your fist?
before reason could take hold of you,
you drove your hand
through the glass,
and the raw edges cut deep into your veins.
blood flowed in rivers
from your wrist.
your aunt, ever watchful,
rushed from the house to
stop your body’s catharsis
with a dishcloth.
the jagged unpainted shards
lay forgotten on the ground.
Feb 16, 2011
Feb 16, 2011 at 10:05 PM UTC
"The best memories are like overplayed mixtapes: they lose clarity and detail over time, yet they seem to sound better the older they get."
We listen to the fourth round of Trois Gymnopedies
on our break from the second round of **********
Our limbs entwined, in part because we like it
partly because we're stuck together by sweat and--
The air is thick with scents foul and fragrant
as furniture music fills the gaps in between
Every breath stalls to anticipate the notes
fingers twitch slightly on the downbeat
Ten minutes ago, we made our own music
Ten minutes ago, we were in perfect harmony
She stares at the ceiling as I stare on her lips
I watch her mumble the lyrics Satie never wrote:
*A pack of cigarettes,
a pack of cigarettes
Could you please buy from the store?*
We're taken over by uncontrollable laughter
as uncontrollable as the trembling when we came
She shifts to her side, and my arms are freed
I stand and pick my jeans from the floor
I take my time buttoning up my shirt,
soaking in the view before I run the errand
She lies naked still, as I put a jacket on
I leave on the fifth round of the Gymnopedie
Feb 27, 2014
Feb 27, 2014 at 1:51 PM UTC
52
Whether my bark went down at sea—
Whether she met with gales—
Whether to isles enchanted
She bent her docile sails—
By what mystic mooring
She is held today—
This is the errand of the eye
Out upon the Bay.
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