"felled" poems
I Walk through the lonely ancient woods
And hear the voices from the Cedars of Lebanon
Whispering a truth known to all
But remembered by few
A felled branch reveals the wound
That smells of comfort and wisdom
Your knots are like the eyes of God
Scrutinizing my every intentions
I feel at ease as I rest in your strong arms
And think --
If I had a choice for a final resting place
It would be under your majestic feet
May 21, 2014
May 21, 2014 at 10:39 AM UTC
Two boys
and girls
unclothed each other
simply at a picnic
flush with wine
alongside
sun-flecked trees.
The girls,
easy as the
forest round,
burned,
delicious,
as the boys
eager and nervous
in unequal measure
partly gave up
concealing
their joys
at forgetting
or remembering
in flickers
their bare bodies.
It went on
over nettles
and half-hours
and clambered
trees and
photos taken
almost formally
(on film,
of course).
And boyish lust,
at first sinuous,
a darting tongue,
began to
soften against,
for instance,
the sheer,
unthinkable
texture
of the two
girls carved
now backward
over the bough
of a storm-felled elm.
And there
in the embers
of evening
they learned
to thrill originally
at the vast,
gorgeous
and astonishing
irrelevance
of what
might happen next.
Jan 26, 2011
Jan 26, 2011 at 7:05 AM UTC
found
grounded bird closed in
ribboned-box and buried
underneath a willow snapped back
to finally relax
to decompose and nourish
by the lake in drooping shade
the felled leaves pile
candy wrappers gray snow in
parking lot corners
with pumpkin spice scented candles
with charred letters skirling up
the arm dropped to sizzle and puff out
white beanies
flannels
leather boots and jangly bronze-leafed wind chimes
I sit on the patio and listen to you speak
the chill of your words
perched like a squirrel barking on a fence top
hibernation preparation and breeze
the gospel of your autumn
it’s lovely.
Oct 6, 2015
Oct 6, 2015 at 11:26 PM UTC
~for lovejunkie, who loved this poem best~
*so many reasons,
so many stones
yet unturned,
for each poem
a season,
for every season,
a given reason
eyes, dimmer,
hearing, harder,
memories, ha,
disappear as fast as
footsteps upon
my island beach
this then
my log,
of places momentarily visited,
capturing the of,
of me,
the exactitude of
where, when and what
I felt
what felled me,
the long and lat,
of the attitudes
of breeze and currents,
the happenstance that carries
a desperate soul
eager and afraid
to remember*
"how fragile we are"
*so memorized records here,
for his storage and his places,
both filled and unfulfilled,*
***poems, nothing more,
flawed each,
product of a flawed man,***
here, for all to see,
most of all,
for the man,
to see himself
when the eyes of his mind
at last be shuttered
Apr 10, 2016
Apr 10, 2016 at 8:06 AM UTC
I am the Great Connector
I was born to unite The Horde
I am the Great Collector
Of souls felled by my Axensword
They all call me subhuman
And revile me as a beast
But they do the same to you and
For that they'll pay the price
(No Peace)
We are strong, We are brave
Though they wish to see us caged
We are wild and Untamed
And we will never live as slaves
Conquerors, We Are One!
Same blood in different skins
At last you'll see, when the victor is me
I am the Lord of our Kin
Wastelanders, Join the March
The World will burn as we sing
When the battle is won, I'll announce to everyone
"I am the Ogre King!"
I am the Great Divider
I was born to brew up storms
I am the Annihilator
My path was forged in war
My reign began in chaos
In Bloodshed, so it ends
All this Strife has nearly left me with
No Kingdom to Defend
(Descent)
We are Violent and Enraged
Now that we have been Betrayed
There are Consequences Grave
For Manipulated Faith
Revolution, it has come!
Same blood but different sins
The Empire Falls
And all Hear the Call
For A New Order to Begin
Decapitate the Tyrants
& Slaughter those who Resist
When the battle is won,
At the top of my lungs, I'll cry
"Long Live the Ogre King!"
I am the Great Destroyer
The Throne is mine to take
I will be king at any cost
Dead nations in my wake
I am the Great Conniver
With Sinister Designs
Never cared how much is Lost
So long as what is Left is Mine
(Arise)
We are rabid and insane
From lives of misery and pain
Now that the world's ablaze
We fall into our cages
These Horrors have just begun
Same gore from separate veins
What have we done,
To our daughters and sons?
A History Bloodstained!
We threw our lives into this war,
And lost more than we gave
When the killing is done,
I'll tell everyone,
"The Ogre King is slain!"
Now Our Planet is a Grave!
"The Ogre King is Slain,
Long Live the Ogre King,
I Am
The Ogre King!"
Apr 6, 2018
Apr 6, 2018 at 3:38 PM UTC
(Inspired by my great grandfather)
Capt: Albert Victor Champion RHA
Children of the Somme, men of mud and water
killed by lead and steel, for them no last supper
no last meal. Children of the Somme, consumed
by mud and water, sent in there thousands
to their slaughter.
Nerves that were shattered,breath that was shallow
felled in fields that were lifeless and fallow.
Hearts that were pounding, bodies that trembled
as in the trenches men assembled.
like an order from god they awaited there place,
to go over the top and stare death in the face.
Men of all nations men of all ages; condemned
to there death and the history books pages.
Lest we forget..................... Remember them.
Jan 22, 2015
Jan 22, 2015 at 9:50 AM UTC
Forlorn beauty-child
Living in my night
Crying in your dream.
Sounds of sorrow
Linger in the morning mist
Of subdued consciousness.
Troubled water falls
From awakened red eyes
That searched inside loneliness
Only to find more.
Now...
Behind my faceted face
Your countenance lingers...
I glance quickly within,
You disappear!
Your gaze lit my shadowed mind.
Your presence was there waiting
For me…
A Sonata…
A Fantasy
A Major key bright-shining
Singing sunbeams to lift me.
After the music...
Shards of shattered dreams
Scattered like felled icicles
lying in the sun, melting into mulch
They dawned bright green
Pipers on Scottish dew.
The mourning moon is
Catchlight in your eyes
Bright Bird...
Captivating sailors
Reaching down evoking vulnerable
Aspects held so long secret...
Nov 25, 2015
Nov 25, 2015 at 2:38 AM UTC
Post-azure, cloud splashed sky,
washes with the suns descent,
breaking into melodies of sunset.
Fracturing into a blush,
the richness of the spectrum
makes itself known.
On a tangent of change,
amorphous clouds bleed
amber glow
and bittersweet combinations
of reds and yellows.
Vermillion streaks through,
and a few cloud folk turn titian,
like sumptuous surreal apricots
rotting in the sky,
that seem to augur
encroaching darkness.
Billows on the horizon
leak crimson,
like spilled wine on table cloth,
and pucker out
like blooms of flaming roses.
Fire refracted
coloured cousins of the sun
are dancing all about.
Here is the anthem
of wild transformation.
Here is cause
for quiet celebration.
Here at this fluent juncture.
Here at the closing of day.
The whole of the ocean below,
is the skies tremendous mirror.
It's reflection is variegated,
into variations a thousandfold.
Multitudinous, and ever differentiated,
distortions of above
ride the crests of waves.
Each apex is a new story.
Each new story,
just as soon as it is told,
comes crashing into trough.
Each finale is the ****** of beginning.
The dynamic roar
of the oceans ever-changing topology
is rife with meaning.
Colossal symphonic wonders,
the primordial song,
releasing upon: the uni-
verse continual,
sending the manifest
to move, with the give and strain
of immaculate design.
Here ensconced
between the safety of light
and the mystery of night.
Here at the oceans edge.
Above, shades of catalina-blue, in conversation
with the outer most cosmic-black
dismiss earlier brighter hues.
Tinged by the infinite nature of space,
the jeweled dome darkens.
Overhead, the first stars appear,
sky transparent to beheld blackness.
Luxuriant, pulling horizon, attracts
violet into it's unfolding theatrics.
Bloodied clouds turn purplish, then black,
a darkening rawness allures,
decaying with vivid beauty,
tragedies of a rouged romance
drug down into shadows play,
searingly alive, extraordinarily actual.
And then, the hush of dusk.
Darkness is felled, like silence.
Scintillating stars
strengthen in the nights
surrounding abyss;
giving radiance definition.
Dynamic Beauty
Lives In Transition,
Oppositions
Compliment.
Apr 7, 2014
Apr 7, 2014 at 9:49 PM UTC
Arms outstretched like the branches of a tree
Aspiring to be amidst with those borne of sky.
Gnarly bark, imploring the eyes of another
Weathered and worn... Skin and grain but parched dry.
Twig-like fingers that would bear no leaves.
With open barren palms that hover in the wind.
Longing and thirsty for the tears of rain
Pining for the heavens to wash away all they have sinned.
Spreading disjointed roots dig in,
In touch with the unseen core buried deep.
A tainted trove of lifelong poisons...
They greedily drink and keep.
Lone little trunk... That shoots up strong from ground.
Sturdy and hale, at least to the naked eye.
When in fact it's core is rotting within,
Eaten away by the worm of a single unassuming lie.
Sad fruitless tree...
Standing amidst the green thriving brush.
It dies with the hours baked in sun...
One day it'll fall, consumed by the secrets trapped in a silent little hush...
Feb 11, 2015
Feb 11, 2015 at 10:09 AM UTC
Disclaimer: I did this as a creative rewrite for one of my university lit courses, and all the inspiration and quotes belong to Robert Browning the original writer of "My Last Duchess"
HIS LAST DUCHESS
ARRIVEDERCI
_“That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive.”_ (I’m not)
Alas! Me, “a wonder.” He calls.
Now wretchedly refined and pasteurized.
To be consumed, now, for genteel eyes.
Pity! Should you ever see me roll mine.
Behind those curtains, you might have been surprised
To see my countenance whimpering
At you Sir; and seething, at _Him._
Must you not be fooled by that sickly decorum
Upon which his manly pride resides.
The Duke—what rich talent in envy he has,
And of pithy idiosyncrasies! Pardon me now
As I speak of his infamies: Is it not,
Too preposterous of a Duke, to sulk
And take offense, over a blush?
(As if the blush was his to wield and shun.)
Am I not allowed to flush _at all?_
And must I be ashamed of being swooned
By the casual offers of life’s grandiosities?
Each and every, dropping of the daylight,
Ripen cherries in May and chivalrous gentlemen,
my dear white mule; must I then weep
at them all, only to prove my fancy for him.
And when does gracious gratitude itself
become in vain: a finite honour—
deemed excessive elsewhere?
Never had he plucked me out, for censure,
Before he gave commands, I knew he did
To pluck the smile out of my face.
Utterly clueless—he thought I was
To find myself throttled, for immodesty.
A wife, an appendage to a Duke,
Loosely felled, to stroke a green-eyed ego.
My fault it seems, is a mere generosity
Of affection: falsely opined, if not
Misread, to fare a defect of temperament,
A chronic malady, doth be cured by death.
To cement the farce he will, soon, bring you
Downstairs to meet a friend. (a fiend)
A prized possession: Neptune, taming a sea-horse.
His hubris incarnate, cast in bronze.
But you must know the truth, for the sea-horse
Did not perish for naught, she is freed from him
At last.
Dec 7, 2018
Dec 7, 2018 at 3:26 PM UTC
Nights like these
when the moon floats
on the creek, all pale
and swollen, I try
to sleep without dreaming
of a small child, still
and not breathing, like
a leaf felled too soon
during the season
of the monsoon rains,
heavy as the pain of a father
looking here and there,
everywhere for a daughter
somewhere in all of this water.
Aug 20, 2018
Aug 20, 2018 at 11:25 PM UTC
We have mined our mountains,
we have fished our seas,
we have felled our forests,
we have gathered our grains,
but we have not yet embraced
the infinite energy of our souls,
which is love.
TOD HOWARD HAWKS
Jun 8, 2019
Jun 8, 2019 at 9:30 PM UTC
Ye who have passed Death’s haggard hills; and ye
Whom trees that knew your sires shall cease to know
And still stand silent:—is it all a show,
A wisp that laughs upon the wall?—decree
Of some inexorable supremacy
Which ever, as man strains his blind surmise
From depth to ominous depth, looks past his eyes,
Sphinx-faced with unabashed augury?
Nay, rather question the Earth’s self. Invoke
The storm-felled forest-trees moss-grown to-day
Whose roots are hillocks where the children play;
Or ask the silver sapling ’neath what yoke
Those stars, his spray-crown’s clustering gems, shall wage
Their journey still when his boughs shrink with age.
3.5k
Your bodkin, seeking my heart if straight,will find it's target quick,
I'll gladly die an honorable death, still remembering the arrows of cupid,
but if your sword, stealthily moves from behind, in deceit, cuts me down,
denigrates love, let darkness shout, from where once love solemnly stood,
you'll have to be on your knees to seek forgiveness for this sin, it's no win.
Mar 10, 2015
Mar 10, 2015 at 9:57 PM UTC
I remember that day,
That faithful day.
The day I fell in love with you.
Right under that cherry tree,
The petals falling on our heads,
That day I looked into your eyes.
That faithful day brought about many moments of sorrow.
Some people chose to move on from us,
Like petals floating away with the wispy gusts of wind.
Those who chose to stay
And support us,
They are truly special.
Like rare flowers only found in the Spring.
But even if no one was left,
I would never leave you.
For we are a flower that never dies,
A tree that is never felled,
An unending embrace.
So even if there are no petals left on the sakura trees,
And all the flowers have been plucked,
We will still stay,
Our love unchanged.
Throughout the harsh winter
And the drought of summer,
We will never die.
When tests of strength are sprung upon us by the gods of the Earth,
We will stand firmly,
Implanted in the soft soil.
In the field of battle you are the sword,
Strong and courageous,
And I will be the shield,
Protecting you with the strength of my spirit and at your weakest points,
Even if blood were to rain from the sky,
And the tall, creamy pillars of this world were to crumble and fall to the ground.
Together, we are one with everything on this Earth.
We hail to no one but ourselves,
And we respect ourselves and the land around us just like any flower would.
But what the average onlooker doesn’t know,
Is that we are no ordinary flower.
Aug 11, 2018
Aug 11, 2018 at 2:49 AM UTC
Back again to the black skin over heavy sands
Back in action at the totem effigy
Poised for fight or love
The brother/sister
I've become
Standing tall
Under weight of worlds long felled
Sleeping sheets wake, hold the bones again
From old days
Fly the knife hooks, ship and sail
Speeding, open, for the circle's end
Sep 17, 2017
Sep 17, 2017 at 6:00 PM UTC
The door slid silently into position
Utter panic wrote its epitaph before
The air resisted, collapsing your boxed
Voice, hiccupping to a captured halt
Scrawny syllables, whithering
Slogans designed to entangle, split
Personality in tow, pushing sickening
Sentences to the back of your throat
Gagging the saliva of terror burning
Apart effortlessly. Remorse did not attend
Strangulating the heaving mass.........
The handle remained unturned, imagined
Fear felled you, trapped consciousness
Performing blackouts, dragging into a
Well of invisible discipline, conjuring
Paranoid stifling circles to spy with menace
Fading fast, blinking on hold, staring out
Slow motion heart rhythm journeyed
To cold climates leaving warmth unaccounted
For and you left on the cold cold slab
Feb 3, 2013
Feb 3, 2013 at 11:56 AM UTC
Here, passing lonely down this quiet lane,
Before a mud-splashed window long I pause
To gaze and gaze, while through my active brain
Still thoughts are stirred to wakefulness; because
Long, long ago in a dim unknown land,
A massive forest-tree, ax-felled, adze-hewn,
Was deftly done by cunning mortal hand
Into a symbol of the tender moon.
Why does it thrill more than the handsome boat
That bore me o'er the wild Atlantic ways,
And fill me with rare sense of things remote
From this harsh land of fretful nights and days?
I cannot answer but, whate'er it be,
An old wine has intoxicated me.
2.8k
If trees be poems by the earth
In avid joy I read each one
Florets writ in fragrant verse
Inked with beams of the morning sun
In shade, a fruit, a whiff of air
I rest beneath wide branches spread
A cavort of emerald canopy
Bestows comfort upon my breath
I lean against the bark, recline
And think of how it stands in time
Through tunneled years it's stoic trunk
Stands proud against frost and rain
Drops it's leaves to nakedness
Till spring dresses in green again
On but an arm, the koel sings
'Tis home to birds that weave a nest
Haven to sojourners ache
Clasp around, hold close to breast
I trace the names of love engraved
Now forgot; asleep in graves
On felled bark my soul I pen
On papyrus the past I feel
The murmured songs of sentiments
In susurrus as branches kneel.
Nymphs would hide or fairies entreat
With fireflies in silver light
Creatures tip toe on their feet
Lithe, in the darkness of the night
In engraved lines meaning I see
What better song, what poetree?
Trees are poems that the earth writes upon the sky - Gibran
Oct 5, 2016
Oct 5, 2016 at 9:38 AM UTC
The Real Poets Here
are small craft
sailing between the narrows of crack'd lines,
employ the spyglass and luck to you,
for them to find
their voyages do not widen the chasm of waste,
yawning greater now by propped up boasts of
ugly shipowners who sin by commission,
national ***** crowing of the greatest length of their prow,
thinking that is a measure of prowess,
their tubs,
all but empty wordy new container ships,
that are forever lost at sea,
even before leaving port
they,
the real poets,
are the quiet lost lot,
a troop of forgettable ordinary Marines,
the sailors in the engine room toiling,
exploring cartographers ***** from the ****** crafting struggle,
looking to discover unmapped,
invisible poles,
East and West
opening up new passages,
within us,
with new passages
when called to arms,
the real poets
spill fresh ***** fluids from within the heart and mind borne,
upon the blank spaces,
they stain us with the grasping gasps of their sight insided
fertile are the pastures
where they lay low modest lay thinking,
amidst the splendor in the grass
of them
I
proudly will ever boast,
hold them close and ever nameless,
but deep inscribed inside of me
*Ah,
the real poets keep me
whole within the
ever smaller white purity of this narrow space
that has lost the struggle
to contains the
unceasing ever spawning black letter'd oceans and navies of
repetitive sad, sadly repetitive,
puerile singsong cant
that never sings,
can't never please,
but trends to the masses madly
dewdrops of tears,
are my own trees felled,
an acknowledgement that
when I read their unintended homages to humankind,
that when realized,
they speak with great respect,
all quietly scream this whisper...
all this,
that I have written,
and will yet to write,
this is all,
to give
greater glory to all human ability
whose
sole purposed to fill us,
wrench us from our lackadaisical comfort,
or urgently comfort us when none else can,
these are my friends,
the real poets here*
god keep you well
my trite words insufficient
so I gift you
some words worthy from
Wordsworth
Jun 12, 2014
Jun 12, 2014 at 3:29 AM UTC
Peter built a paper boat
Which he could float about the sea
To hidden spots of lonely coast
Where not a ghost or man would be
He painted words along her bough
That soon would plough and skip and trot
Between the waves that rose and falled
The boat was called 'Forget Me Not'
He bid his wife a fond goodbye
The tide was high when he embarked
He drifted from his tiny cove
While weather drove and seagulls larked
He set his course horizon bound
For solid ground of ****** shore
As darkness came he made a bed
To keep his head above the floor
The voyage took him straight and true
Across the blue, toward the sun
But soon a tongue of lightening spat
And thunder rattled like a gun
The waves encircled hungrily
And angrily about their prey
The tempest heaved with no regret
It blew Forget Me Not away
He found himself all caked in sand
And on a strand of desert beach
Forget Me Not had run aground
But safe and sound from tidal reach
He folded down his paper yacht
And found a spot to build a home
But saved the sail and rudder strings
To forge some wings and daily roam
He glided high and long and wide
Past mountainside and shore to shore
And through the night he forged a blade
And with it made a lumber saw
He felled the trunk and snared the beast
And cooked a feast to celebrate
The rain it sought to disagree
But quick was he to remonstrate
The moonlight waxed and waned apart
And on his heart a longing formed
For home and his beloved bride
For fireside and there be warmed
And so he took the house he'd made
From humid shade of seldom oak
He set the island to his aft
And cried and laughed the words he spoke
They matched the words he'd lately hewn
Beneath the moon in shady spot
He carved into that seldom tree
'Remember me, forget me not'
Feb 11, 2013
Feb 11, 2013 at 10:23 AM UTC
This is not atrocity
This is the basement
This is the sea receding like lips to reveal tooth-like shells
Amongst the bullet casings and corpses felled leaving the boats
This is the sand like an inverted moat around the
Kingdom at sea, and this is the Remainder.
Yet they remain jubilantly-
Is this what being jubilant means?
Chamomile anklets adorning a hanged child.
This is not atrocity,
Ignorance wielding pitchforks and fire.
Anger alight and hostility riled
This is not atrocity.
This is not far from this reality;
Remember this child-
And the mob piled like tinder on themselves
Convincing carrion feeders
And unimpeded breeders that
Halt the march of science that
This is not atrocity.
The certain hot song by which Earth is greeted
Has an immediately recognizable tune.
And
This is not atrocity;
It sounds more like ****** ******
But I can't hear it
And I have no fear anymore
I open my eyes to another routine killing, and I know-
This is atrocity-
But a necessary one.
It's hardly enough to stay alive
And as I and we strive for
Money and coffee and love,
I and we let
atrocity
enter us.
Climb into us like a hand does a glove,
or a puppet.
It is not nature;
Nor fate;
And one needn't be dead
to appreciate the ability to open the senses
and actually sense.
And this,
I am certain,
Is not an atrocity
May 21, 2010
May 21, 2010 at 8:30 PM UTC
A fount of grace pouring out into my backyard,
I found there,
There was such a buoyancy to the arching lines,
There was a wild cherry tree blooming,
its scent loaded the air,
filled my nostrils with its bouquet.
Trumpeted its whiteness to the blue sky
The sound was deafening,
glissandi of softness,
felled all gloom,
felled my fears,
and filled my soul with joy.
Nov 6, 2014
Nov 6, 2014 at 6:18 PM UTC
--------------------
When red ran from the sand.
From the depths, rose a creature quite old.
Solemn and slow, not a care to be bold
It anchored itself, and gave no expression
The strength of its shell, shook in depressions
Tall extensions: its lifeblood, its protection.
Found scattered, on its shell, in cert’n sections.
The pride of Madagascar—the creature by name—
Are Rosewood and Ebony now mangled and maimed.
--------------------
When red ran from his hand.
Trees are felled, and the humans displace:
Lemurs are losing, they can’t find their space.
Hear the creature wail, its shell echoes with grief—
The sounds of its guests, find little relief.
For its pride is valued, and cut for a price
Hard decisions made—it is life’s device.
Wooden splinters bite back trading flesh to save flesh.
Living masses are caught in our culture’s great mesh.
---------------------
When red in hand and land.
Oceans to flood, new depths to behold
Our desires to fill, balk: “Don’t let them fold!”
She tires of our, meandering session;
Beating-out paths, to varied oppressions.
Laugh at the onslaught, of one great convection!
As humans propel, in that direction…
In all this, Gaia shrugs, naked-apes are to blame.
Fruiting, of hand and land, need-be one and the same!
---------------------
Jan 20, 2016
Jan 20, 2016 at 12:30 PM UTC
The little silver sprite rides the silver leaf,
of the blue, briar-berry thorn bush,
you can find him out at night!
The little silver sprite rides the silver leaf,
of the blue, briar-berry thorn bush,
when the stars are full and bright!
The little silver sprite rides the silver leaf,
of the blue, briar-berry thorn bush,
see the snow out on the ground?
The little silver sprite rides the silver leaf,
of the blue, briar-berry thorn bush,
dancing in the snowflakes' falling sound?
The little silver sprite rides the silver leaf,
of the blue, briar-berry thorn bush,
The leaves they are attractive, they shimmer in the night...
...like the snowfall, so distractive, a twisting shiny sickness is a tasty sight,
though the berries not delicious their taste is only acrid, and hiding a secret acid, yet pungent, smelling right?
The bush's thorns they punish those who root among the branches while the sprite he dances in-between the flashes of pain and belly aches the acid courses through one’s veins and the evil sprite it smiles knowing well where its source of nutrient for the winter has died and felled!
The little silver sprite rides the silver leaf, of the blue, briar-berry thorn bush; but only at night…
Dec 22, 2016
Dec 22, 2016 at 7:19 PM UTC