"forlornly" poems
In these rapid, restless shadows,
Once I walked at eventide,
When a gentle, silent maiden,
Walked in beauty at my side.
She alone there walked beside me
All in beauty, like a bride.
Pallidly the moon was shining
On the dewy meadows nigh;
On the silvery, silent rivers,
On the mountains far and high,—
On the ocean’s star-lit waters,
Where the winds a-weary die.
Slowly, silently we wandered
From the open cottage door,
Underneath the elm’s long branches
To the pavement bending o’er;
Underneath the mossy willow
And the dying sycamore.
With the myriad stars in beauty
All bedight, the heavens were seen,
Radiant hopes were bright around me,
Like the light of stars serene;
Like the mellow midnight splendor
Of the Night’s irradiate queen.
Audibly the elm-leaves whispered
Peaceful, pleasant melodies,
Like the distant murmured music
Of unquiet, lovely seas;
While the winds were hushed in slumber
In the fragrant flowers and trees.
Wondrous and unwonted beauty
Still adorning all did seem,
While I told my love in fables
’Neath the willows by the stream;
Would the heart have kept unspoken
Love that was its rarest dream!
Instantly away we wandered
In the shadowy twilight tide,
She, the silent, scornful maiden,
Walking calmly at my side,
With a step serene and stately,
All in beauty, all in pride.
Vacantly I walked beside her.
On the earth mine eyes were cast;
Swift and keen there came unto me
Bitter memories of the past—
On me, like the rain in Autumn
On the dead leaves, cold and fast.
Underneath the elms we parted,
By the lowly cottage door;
One brief word alone was uttered—
Never on our lips before;
And away I walked forlornly,
Broken-hearted evermore.
Slowly, silently I loitered,
Homeward, in the night, alone;
Sudden anguish bound my spirit,
That my youth had never known;
Wild unrest, like that which cometh
When the Night’s first dream hath flown.
Now, to me the elm-leaves whisper
Mad, discordant melodies,
And keen melodies like shadows
Haunt the moaning willow trees,
And the sycamores with laughter
Mock me in the nightly breeze.
Sad and pale the Autumn moonlight
Through the sighing foliage streams;
And each morning, midnight shadow,
Shadow of my sorrow seems;
Strive, O heart, forget thine idol!
And, O soul, forget thy dreams!
5.4k
Alexander K Opicho
(Eldoret, Kenya;[email protected])
let me begin my salutation to you
by expressing my angst about your ghastly night experience
that you go through when in the hands of the policemen
who often walk around in the name of security patrols
while in truth they bettle terror in the show of evil mighty
they swop you down and arrest you spreadeagled
asking for bribes substantially the money of your proceeds
from the ware of your trade your body the temple of christian God,
Wherever your lack money
your beauty saves you as they go on to **** you in circles among themselves
as they glorify the power of your bossom in their policeman's slang,
where beauty , tyranny of bossom and your bribe is absent
you are forlornly arrested from the streets of Nairobi and Lagos or Johannesburg
then rounded down to a dingy police cell to be charged
with heinous crimes of prostitution and vagrancy,
when the true origin of your fortune's tomfoolery
is powers that be as they glorify anti woman crude cultures
beseeching a girl child into despair and depravement,
they are these men who refused to see you as a beacon of glory
they always link you to the filthy bedrooms from which you ennoble not.
Jan 27, 2014
Jan 27, 2014 at 8:52 AM UTC
Marissa Ann was a firecracker of a little girl.
For her, there was no fence too tall to climb, no bully too mean to face, no street too busy to cross.
She was all tangled hair and toothy grins.
And she'd yank the book right out of my hands and say, "Gabrielle, we have more important things to do than read."
In the jungle of our lives, Marissa was a lioness, queen of the pride.
I was a mouse not indigenous to these parts of the second grade.
The world was a terrifying place, and I had no problem cowering in the corner, knee-deep in a pile of Nancy Drew.
I tried to stay huddled behind my words, drowning in the ink, attempting to let the pages be my armor.
Marissa would not let me.
When I allowed bookshelves to be my shields, she came guns blazing, and kicked them all down, then stood me back up on my feet.
She'd grab my hand and pull me head first toward adventure.
Marissa was tough, and everyone knew it.
There was not a soul alive brave enough to pick on Marissa Ann.
But me? I was an easy target.
The other girls said I was "weird" with my enormous wire frames resting atop full cheeks, and my frayed jeans, a glowing reminder of my mother's lack of wealth.
I heard the whispers on the playground about the chubby girl who read, (can you believe it?), chapter books.
Brianna was a demon of a child.
She'd bat her pretty little eyelashes and everyone would melt.
She had the entire second grade class wrapped around her tiny little finger.
She'd corner me on the soccer field and do everything she could to remind me that I was different.
But one day at recess, she was nowhere to be found, until I made my way through winding halls, back to the warmth of our classroom.
There sat Marissa with a devilish glint in her eye, waving me over to sit in the desk beside her.
Behind us, a sniffling Brianna, looking forlornly at the teardrop stains on her pink lace skirt, her mouth pulled tight into a perfect straight line.
I looked back at Marissa with a curious glance, then intertwined her hand with my own.
The sound of stifled sobs behind us and the warmth of her skin on mine sealing an unspoken vow between two girls with puzzle piece fingertips that only fit each other.
Mar 11, 2014
Mar 11, 2014 at 2:21 AM UTC
I may have loved you too much,
but;
A part of me still loves you to this day
Your sweetness allures me so,
Like honeyed days we’d stare without shame
You were irresistible to my heart and I knew trouble cornered me
I’d shoo away the laughable thoughts,
Aiming to mail you a letter of love
To which you’d open it fresh with a scented kiss
Flower petals would descend from your heart
Your cheeks adopted a sunflower
The stars entertained you that night
You told me you always dreamed of late evenings
Informing me of the curtain of constellations
That you’d like to sleep soundly in
Of course I’d be willing to offer you anything in return of your smile
And the night we escaped, you gasped softly at the surprise
Your simple happiness was all one romantic would need
No matter where we dreamed,
Together we are one
Standing besides one another
Fate draws near, echoing our future
Your bleakness eats me devastatingly
Tomorrow we are still...one being
But overseas, I send you my farewells
So that you are found in perfect health
And that we consume truly divine harmonies
Made only for the sweetened couples
Whose stories fade ever so forlornly in the past
I love you brightly as the sun
You illuminate my pathways
But one kiss erases my existence
Continue to please those around you;
Without me, the world withers
Please remember my love,
And be gentle with it
For it is delicate as the world
My eyes see a star
But yours fail to see within that darkness
The gloom that retreats before you arrive
I am part of that campaign
An honorable being among the troops
Yet your continuous ignorance saddens me so
See me now,
Find me wanderlust in this world
And somewhere, we can swiftly enrapture ourselves
Whether it be in the meadows of glistening rays
Or the places that calmly send the earth into slumber
Wherever we are destined, I’ll always be there for you
Even if tonight’s curtain unsheathes
And you are no longer the image of love,
But rather, a friend I could love with silliness on languid days and somber nights.
Dec 8, 2021
Dec 8, 2021 at 4:10 AM UTC
Alexander K Opicho
(Eldret, Kenya;[email protected])
Do you remember one era in Kenya?
During the dark days of dictatorship
When Daniel arap Moi
Was the tyrannical president of Kenya
And darkness of leadership
Loomed like the dark clouds of el Niño
When forty district commissioners
Out of the total of forty two were kalenjins?
Whose main work was to spy and terrorize
As the people forlornly groaned under the heavy
Yoke of state terror of tribal torment
When the president claims that
He was not aware of such tyranny,
When we used to sing a lame poem
Of jokoo! Jokoo! Jokoo! Jokoo!
On empty stomachs with no hope of food
No hope of jobs or even education
Street children swelling on the street
In total political nonchalance of arap Moi
As he only gave free milk to his own kalenjin youths
In Kabaraka schools, the Kabaraka school which was
Overfunded by the poor tax payers money,
Please President Uhuru Kenyatta as good as you are
With your dear humane heart of Bantu conscience
As you are armed to teeth with modern education
**** sapiens Gentility and polished diplomacy
Superb in quality of thought and supremacy of choices
The government of Kenya is yours and the people of Kenya
Are your political darlings, true bandwagons for ever
Kindly listen and buy my poemetics, my dear president
Remove Daniel Moi from the state house of Kenya,
Let not Daniel Moi be your adviser
Ignore him and embrace Kenyans
For common future happiness
Even if Daniel Moi is old, the truth is different
He is not a good man, he is full of Machiavelli
His full badness is measured in absurdity
Of terribly and horrendously crashed *** crushed
Testicles of poemcrats and political leaders
Of Kenya of yore and today,
Truth meted in When koigi wa wamwere became
A permanent staff of kamiti maximum prison without pension
Wangari Mathai beaten like an animal in a hunters trap
Ngugi wa Thiong’o jobless and detained without trial
Raila Amolo odinga’s testicles went missing
He looks for them on daily circadian
But once he nears their political pigeonhole
Then elections of the times flops, O! Poor Odinga!
President Uhuru Kenyatta with your suave intellect
You won’t get a pretext to say that
I was not aware or not informed
Please dear darling of the people
The people of Kenya in their 42 tribes
Novate Moi with the people
And your legacy will smile.
Jan 17, 2014
Jan 17, 2014 at 8:59 AM UTC
Ferry Me
Ferry me, but once more.
The last ferry rides of Indian Summer,
Always arrives on schedule which is
Always and precisely, too soon.
Then, the imprisonment months,
Sentence, indeterminate.
*A Grand Jury trial of months,
I, and my co-defendant,
My sanity, this time, the Oddsmakers say,
Won't survive the lockup.
The source perfume of driftwood words,
Very ferry distinguishing marks,
Sails and seagulls, diesel fumes and saltwater,
Sunsets and seagrass, flying fish and multi-mollusks,
The stuffing of my summer turkey, the currants of
Poems and dreams, sad-eyed longings...
Now,
Evidence used by prosecution,
Confession freely uncoerced,
I Am A Summer Man
Adjudged and convicted,
Guilty of Winter's Discontent.*
But it is these last few passages,
Not of words, but over water,
The absence thereof, crush, ravage,
Worse than any grey calendar captivity,
Forlornly, I mouth silently, repeatedly,
Ferry me, but once more.
The course, straightforward,
Voyager, but a few minutes, but long enough to
Love it deeply, need it like a fix,
The mania of the mainland left behind,
The island, thinly lit, more shadow than real,
The approaching dark, shelters, comforts, embraces.
Perhaps, likely, I deceive myself.
No matter how the island comforts,
The brain always rumbling,
Can never make stop questioning,
Prisoner of 24/7,
But it is lessened, left behind,
As I am ferried away both,
In body and in mind.
Sep 11, 2013
Sep 11, 2013 at 2:23 PM UTC
I have gained a paternal responsibility
But I feel a different response filling me
Constantly itching from a million flees
Begging to get me out of this please
So in my mind unseen
Resides a murderous dream
To subtract from my team
I fall into a landslide
Of infanticide
A lioness eats her cubs
As a baby drowns in a tub
Before they reach the age
They acquire our rage
We devour our babies
Before they contract rabies
We're brought together by proximity and origin
By who we were forming in
This connection of chance
Determines circumstance
Guiding our circle dance
With random music
We take whatever we can
Until we lose it
A possum's mother dies
It has no time to cry
It must continue to eat
So it feeds
Like its mother in heat
Had to breed
In order to not lose
The child chews
In a world of me or you
The child chews
Instead of feeling blue
The child chews
Its mother's fur stuck in its teeth
It stays there to provide heat
The parent provisions from beyond the grave
Will get the possum through this ugly day
From possum to person
I can't tell which is the worse end
For there is flesh stuck between my teeth
Like a Christmas wreath
Where what lies beneath
In a readily equipped sheath
Is patricide or matricide
I can't decide
But must abide
To survive
The purgatory
I see surging toward me
So to move forwardly
I must live forlornly
After feeding on family
Company becomes fantasy
Learning no one can handle me
They're just meals I'll eat handily
I eat my relatives
In this hell I live
Where what I give
Is the gnashing of my jaw
To follow a universal law
That says scratch and claw
Until I meet God
Expecting my parricide ways
Will garner divine praise
But for everybody I slayed
My soul was filleted
Now I only see grey
So everyone looks like my father
And I say welcome back Kotter
As I yearn for my teeth to be hotter
May 29, 2018
May 29, 2018 at 12:14 PM UTC
Alexander K Opicho
(Eldoret, Kenya;[email protected])
With audacious openness
Let me accept substantial lot of men folk
When it comes to efforts in love,
Most are misfortunate.
Every time they dare to built
Affiliative bonding for love
With beauties beheld
By their limited eyes
The invincible whirling spell
Of fortune’s fool
Beguile them forlornly
Down the social abyss of time,
I and my type not an exception to the club
Of the guys who swallowed misfortune
Like the dog of Theodore erotokorostos
Does to a piece of bone
In poetic obscurantism
Of the corruptible simple souls
Obtaining their pathetic lot from ***** and wine,
In the first trial I chanced on a neurotic peasant,
In the second trial I chanced on turn to be henpecked,
On the third trial I chanced on a beautiful paranoid,
My fourth trial chanced me a deadly stooge,
My fifth trial gave me the worst blow
As I forlornly chanced on the time’s public commoner,
My sixth trial makes me chicken
Had it not been poetic audacity
That makes me brave to chew in public
The lot of my misfortune as I recall
The bitter sweetness of chancing on
A beautiful epileptic kleptomaniac,
My tired trial in the waned efforts
Chanced me a lesbian with insignificant bisexuality,
O! I now tire off from misfortunes of love
With a last black chance on a neurotic money-maniac,
And this is the silent lot of men
In their usual efforts to fulfill their dreams of love.
Feb 28, 2014
Feb 28, 2014 at 9:43 AM UTC
~~~
Vanilla Extract
under extreme duress,
word-boarding extreme,
she issues up reluctantly a true confess
her secret ingredient
in everything is
vanilla extract
*where do you source this
in quantities so ample,
keep it well hid,
for all I see
after cupboard investigatory
solitary tiny brown bottle
shelved alone, forlornly?*
wearing a vanilla smile,
that persists for quite the while,
she crinkly eyed laughs
“I extract vanilla
nearly everyday,
for when I awake to a
fresh poem from a poet
who loves me,
I draw all the vanilla out,
then feed it back to him
in the foods I supply,
so his poetry is for ever
sustainable”
Jun 6, 2015
Jun 6, 2015 at 11:37 AM UTC
There was a time when I sang on you forlornly,
So wistfully heraldic,
That I might have thought you worthy
Of a gilded biblical throne of purple-prosed petals.
Let us be grateful then, for the song of perihelion,
And the whispered wisdoms of the dear tropics,
For the fresh breath from these friends whisks me
Back to my wakening, aurelian self.
I weave the holly in my hair,
I hang the mistletoe anew,
For solitary trees stand strong,
Though weighted by the winter’s dew.
I am Helios’s rantipole
I’ve no more time for tears of old,
With so much in me left to grow,
And so far in me left to go.
Dec 11, 2012
Dec 11, 2012 at 11:00 PM UTC
There is, one supposes, a certain nobility
In simply carrying on with the whole **** thing,
Though that assumes some epiphany,
Some clawing toward grace, or at least common decency.
He had, in some once upon a time,
Cast his lot with a better class of people, so to speak;
It had not ended well, though,
In line with how such things are resolved,
His fall not a spectacular, tempestuous thing,
But a gradual, veiled affair, not a fiery spectacle
With metaphorical medals cut away, epaulets stripped,
But a shaded silence, a shrouded yet palpable shunning.
And so he is here, in this fading little city
Perched forlornly on the banks of a nondescript little river,
Having taken an apartment above a pair of offices
(One occupied by a seemingly ancient and disinterested lawyer,
The other by an ostensible private investigator)
Which is sufficiently large and reasonably warm
Come the seemingly perpetual winter.
He lives, if not in such a manner
As he was once accustomed to, comfortably enough:
He has his practice, and an adjunct position
At the little cow college down the road in Alfred,
And there are the occasional women,
Sad divorcees marooned in this hill country,
Dewy-eyed undergraduates unable to discern
Suit coats that are a bit shabby and somewhat passe
(There is a haberdasher in Buffalo whose garments
Are in the neighborhood of up-to-snuff,
And he could certainly manage a trip
Down to New York for better tailoring,
Though he would be traveling in places and circles
Where he is not remembered fondly.)
Stepping outside, he encounter snowflakes,
Light and unprepossessing,
But he studies the sky anxiously, apprehensively
(One learns that he must pay Nature its due fealty in these climes,
And give into the primal, the instinctual)
For he knows what can transpire
When the wind blows off the big lake out west just so,
Turning innocuous flurries into a malevolent blankness,
Making the landscape inscrutable, alien, utterly terrifying.
Aug 7, 2018
Aug 7, 2018 at 10:01 AM UTC
So painfully aware of being apart
from that which gives me my breath
helps to maintain the rhythmic beating
of my swollen heart--
So horribly bereft at having said goodbye
to one who has always kept me here
who has cradled me, held me tight
through every moment of my every sigh--
So hauntingly sure I will not survive
that life will have no meaning
with you not here to hold, to guard,
to keep me alive--
And so forlornly looking as you saunter away
your laugh, your jokes, your smiles and gentle heart
all that gave me reason to wake up
and live another god-forsaken day--
But so determined this time to carry on
to make it through without you here
to somehow hold myself together without you
and to just make it until the break of dawn...
©Amy Shae 2015
May 30, 2015
May 30, 2015 at 10:43 PM UTC
Topping a rise comes a knight,
armour soiled and stained;
weary yet elated
riding his black steed.
The Princess in her tower sees
and gives a delighted cry.
She leans out her window
and hails the knight:
"Ho!Brave knight!
Whence comest thou?
Tell me thou seeketh me
for I wait for thee."
"Truly",answered the knight
"It is for thee I am come
my fair lady
and to take thine hand."
"I've sailed the seven seas,
toiled through forests and mires,
traversed deserts and dunes
looking for thee".
"Oh the joy!"whispered the lady
and cried,"My brave knight,
glad am I to hear thee but
Didst thou slay the dragon?"
Answered the knight,
"My dearest lady,
I have fought the giants,
conquered the orcs
and tamed the lions."
"Oh brave art thou
my worthy knight.
But didst thou slay
the mighty dragon?"
"I have escaped from dungeons,
caverns with unnamed fears.
Scorpions and serpents
I have crushed to the earth."
"Wonderful art thou
my worthy knight.
But didst thou slay
the fearsome dragon?"
"I have ridden the behemoth,
subdued the depths,
searched the clouds and
fiddled with thunderbolts"
"Magnificent art thou
my worthy knight.
But didst thou slay
the red dragon?"
"Lady,you are besot
with the dumb worm!",he said.
"I wonder if she",he thought
"has been crazed in that tower"
Sighing forlornly,
said the princess
"I canst not leave here
till the dragon is dead."
As the knight turned away
to ride back,she asked
"Whither goest thou?
To slay the beast?"
"Nay lady,nay
I go to slay the dunce
who wrote you
into that tower."
"What meanest thou
my dear knight?!
There is another knight
who dabbles in magic?!"
"Nay lady,nay.
He is not a knight.
He uses his quill
to weave his musings."
Cried the princess
"Oh mighty sir,
Oh Weaver with the quill!
Canst thou hear me?"
"Yes dear lady,"said I,
"What do you desire?
What can I do
that will please you?"
"My dearest Sir!
Oh my bravest hope.
Slay the dragon
and make me thine."
"But my lady
as much as I desire to,
you should know there is
No dragon in the story"
(Silence pervades)
"Oh my dear knight!!"
cried the lady to the rider,
"Slay this goon
and we shall be one."
Uh-oh...Time to put down the pen and run.
Aug 30, 2013
Aug 30, 2013 at 11:38 AM UTC
So painfully aware of being apart
from that which gives me my breath
helps to maintain the rhythmic beating
of my swollen heart--
So horribly bereft at having said goodbye
to one who has always kept me here
who has cradled me, held me tight
through every moment of every sigh--
So hauntingly sure I will not survive
that life will have no meaning
with you not here to hold, to guard,
to keep me alive--
And so forlornly looking as you saunter away
your laugh, your jokes, your smiles and gentle heart
all that gave me reason to wake up
and live another god-forsaken day--
But so determined this time to carry on
to make it through without you here
to somehow hold myself together without you
and to just make it until the break of dawn...
Jun 21, 2015
Jun 21, 2015 at 8:17 PM UTC
Dear Diary,
Why does life seem to wrap you up in a cup of madness
then tip you out and watch you spill
the contents of yourself
onto a cold and muted tile floor?
Why, dear Diary,
does everyone expect you
to react perfectly in every situation
and robotically fix and tweak and mutate?
Diary,
I am not a machine.
I can't bend this way and that
at the same time
without breaking.
I can't smile a smile
that I don't believe.
I can't,
and I won't.
Diary,
You have so forlornly sit in the back of my mind
gathering dust and termites and grime
I can hardly speak to you at all
for my problems you cannot solve.
Just a lended ear do you offer
A lonely penance for my coffer
To spare a word a thought, some grace
to be able to pick up my forlorn face.
I look into the ***** night
so hateful and full of spite
Reprehensible rejection cease
as it knocks me to my knees.
Dear Diary,
I do plead,
Save my soul
or else I'll bleed.
Oct 21, 2010
Oct 21, 2010 at 7:38 PM UTC
awry, askew,
the poetry comes badly, clawing,
life as well, faring poorly,
the obvious linkage stinkage
allows a milliseconds smile,
a brief fiefdumb accolade of
distress confirmation
DH Lawrence appears in the inbox,
he too, awry, askew,
tufts of wool clouding life like dust,
rust and must, an old friendship renewed,
the cold ex and in-eternal suggest
frequent naps and hibernation,
so much so that this script was
commenced and committed years ago
and lay forlornly in the ***** snow
fallow and shallow drafts from prior years
To every season there is a turn,
a turning of the *****
yet the hacking cough from focculent dust on the floor of the world
fills the lungs continuously, knows no respite,
the spittle and the phlegm ejected herein,
a disarming poem of dissatisfaction, alas, alas,
the dust thickens and is not lessened
~for Medusa daughter~
Jan 23, 2019
Jan 23, 2019 at 2:35 PM UTC
The ace of hearts
sat down at the table
feeling oh so confident
stares at the three of spades
in his pocket
While the king of diamonds
eyes his diamond queen
in his mind
the ten
hides behind the jack
The queens figured
tonight was the night
they were going to get laid
The deuces were quietly weeping
wondering if another deuce
on the table was going to be played
The ace of hearts
his heart was racing
as the ace of spades
made its way
followed by the ace of diamonds
and a diamond three
a rare drop
was all he could say.
The king of diamonds
to his court he smiled
as the deuce of diamonds
sparkled on the table
The queens, they trembled
wondered if the only thing getting laid
was their heads on the chopping block
this day
The third deuce had joined the pair
his heart was lifted
but still in despair
the deuces looked down the river forlornly
Many have lost it all for more
The ace of hearts was feeling cocky
a warm fullness washed over him
he looked out at his life
figured all he could do was win
he believed in love
sometimes you gotta go
all in
he smiled as he waited at the dock of the river
The king still flushed with diamonds galore
their sparkles blinded him
he joined the ace in the fog
it was either this or that
there were no more games to play
Now faced with two endings
which path to take
The queens had
had enough
on the table they folded
into a fatal swoon
Three deuces
he wavered
his hands were trembling
the game ain't over until
the rent money is gone
Gamblers
some are optimists
some are realists
some are looking for salvation
some are going to play
until they have no more left to pay
looking for death, so they say
driven by compulsions rage
all ask the question
is
this a streak or a slump?
Which was the deuces on this day?
The optimist joins the fray
The realist he folds goes on home to play another day,
All pray.
On your playing field
so far away
what is the play?
Which are you today?
As many endings
as there are
combinations of cards
sometimes it even rains frogs
The room was quiet
the aces full
the king flushing
three deuces - waiting
what to do?
I guess I am the optimist today
the sun is shining after five days of rain
A distant sight
down the river came
as the two of clubs
was beating the water's edge
running and laughing
all the way.
Jan 21, 2016
Jan 21, 2016 at 11:49 AM UTC
The pile of pine burned with ferocity
While fields of watermellon wore green in generosity
Jerimiah delivered rows of assiduous thoughts
Fertilized in decisions made years ago
Margaret was from Huntsville , working on a divinity degree
She was small , rode a bicycle , studying infinity
Timid , not unlike a titmouse in spring
Margaret had a sister named Judy
Jerimiah left for the mountains of Colorado
He took only his last name Johnson
He spent winters hibernating with the bears
He learned to have no fear and grew a long beard
Tennennessee is in Alabama , just south of Huntsville
A snowslide almost buried Jerimiah
Margaret moved to North Carolina
got married and that's all I know
Jerimiah made tracts in the snow . . . go
He sat above the devide looking down
Sometimes west when the sun went down
But mostly east under the full moon
Howling so forlornly the wolves cry
Margaret looks west every night
Then sheds one tear
Jan 27, 2015
Jan 27, 2015 at 3:21 AM UTC
The elephant in the room
was a kid in the high school cafeteria
with an acoustic guitar.
Meandering forlornly through the aisles
hoping that someone would listen to him
stumble through the opening chords to "Crazy Train."
He was just trying to fit in, same as I,
but God did I hate him for it.
Sep 18, 2016
Sep 18, 2016 at 1:28 AM UTC
A second ago I was 1 hour younger, I remember it well.
The few gray hairs that I have accumulated atop my head, were not there pas' a moment,
This wrinkle in time adding yet another wrinkle to my brow, I have become wiser for it.
My innocence of youth has been unfairly taken, Oh how I long for the days of yestersecond.
I remember the clock set back to maybe a millimeter, my prostate was not quite this large,
And congress with my wife seemed to last for hours, but now mere minutes leaves me spent.
We used to jump into bed and sleep in the **** seems just an instant ago, but now
The coldness of aging has us encased in flannel pajamas, we sleep dreaming of yestersecond.
I awoke this morning to a brighter outside, the early birds singing, off kilter, unfamiliar;
Not synchronous at all with my hot cup of Kona, I scratch my chin anew with stubble.
For in such a short time, the moon waved forlornly goodbye, the sun bid faintly hello.
Mr. Meowgii, my cat, chasing the birds outside, thankful for the passing gift of yestersecond.
My kids, now practically grown, (9 & 13 +60 minutes) I envision car keys being handed over,
Challenges to my authority, relationships of their own, with the passage of this long hour.
"For The Times; They Are A-Changin" - Dylan -, though now for a clock he would sing.
A hiccup in the fabric of the space time continuum, indigestion of memories made I search.
Looking forward, come October late fall, when we all can regress, yet again,
Reclaiming what we have lost, one hour from yestersecond.
-----ChawzzyScript
Mar 10, 2013
Mar 10, 2013 at 2:37 PM UTC
It snowed that morning,
scarring the end of something
forgotten,
pitied lost repression,
buried with each shy snowflake.
Uncontested petals from the
formerly statuesque tress, fell,
sundered,
dancing their merry little
way to the vacant ground.
And a feather dropped from
an outcast swan, alone it
forlornly
surrendered to the frigid
incapability of the terra firma.
On that Saturday morning,
nothing could have fallen,
plummeted
as sporadically as I did,
for each of your rays.
Jan 1, 2015
Jan 1, 2015 at 12:46 PM UTC
On the living room couch,
I asked my phone a verbal question:
"What is an albatross?"
And before it could answer,
my father began his reply
from the kitchen counter--
To be cut short by my phone who had finished thinking,
the screen flashing a series of definitions for "albatross"
and reading them aloud to me.
My father stopped, and looked at me forlornly.
I daren't look back--
And the sound of a heart breaking,
whether mine or his,
and the silence it engulfed,
was hidden under the blanket of the contraption's monotone voice.
A little more humanity was lost today,
and my father yet again was faced with the reality that
even if he had all the answers,
as he had in my inquisitive childhood--
No one was left to ask him the questions.
Aug 28, 2016
Aug 28, 2016 at 1:36 AM UTC
When I look into your hungry eyes
why do I long to consume your reality?
Too much for me to behold -
midnight irises surrounded
by a field of white with seams of red veins
held in place by sunken flesh
your chest barely
rising and falling
under the cage of your ribs
Do you long for more breath?
Or for the tepid gasps that issue
forth from between cracked lips to cease forever?
I hold out a weak cup of air suspended
in a moment -
full of this universe under
a yellow light as I pass you.
Will you receive it?
I see you -
drowning in your sagging flesh
an oppressive weight in this pause.
So I sink
flailing all limbs in the
swirling universe of your soul
peeking out from behind sacred sheer curtains
covering over stained windows with chipped pieces of faces
looking forlornly up.
I succumb to the gravity
in your starving eyes
And taste my own famished soul.
Oct 30, 2011
Oct 30, 2011 at 12:34 PM UTC
I don't always see the ghost-
he chooses a wicker chair to sit-
seems to be the problem when past comes to dine.
I don't always see them-
the empty obscure references
as they drip like baby saliva from pale lips
places we've been,
things we've done.
The past sits across.
pinky out daintily
as past will do
when drinking champagne
and talking about the
good days.
I see him like James Dean leaning against the door frame.
I feel like Grace Kelly
Flipping blonde hair flips in dip and twirling curl,
licking pink lips as if they were full of icing on cupcakes.
Yes, I do not see him.
Here I go again flirting with the past.
I do not see the emptiness of the stare
as he looks across to me
I think foolishly it is star crossed love-
and grab his hand to slip wistfully through my own
and pull him grudgingly forward.
I zoom with him room through room,
looking for a place to hold him.
And the present sits forlornly on my front porch.
dejectedly he sits.
And the presents gift-
of soon wilted flower
lay on his lap...
And the present stares through the window
as I waltz with a ghost.
I do not see, I can not see.
I do not see the ghost.
Sahn 10/03/14
Oct 3, 2014
Oct 3, 2014 at 6:21 AM UTC