"fractious" poems
We have our dreams,
My perfect stranger,
Though we never really met,
Perhaps; never shall meet.
Still, we amble along together,
Navigating the lamentable brook,
Unfulfilled promises, foaming,
Swirling around our bare feet,
The cold of reality numbing our toes,
Skipping over rocks of broken ideals,
Once cherished, but not here, no,
They are fractious and discarded.
Trickles of tormented sighs, tease,
While avoiding guiding ropes of life,
Which would snag our thoughts,
Straining against friction burns,
As they attempt to bind us tightly,
Holding us prisoner, when in truth,
We are capable of incarcerating ourselves.
Although, our minds are free, yes,
Living beneath the same impassive moon,
Bathing within its stolen light,
Stealing our own, moments of peace,
As in sleep, we slip away unnoticed,
To hold each other, so loving,
Above the clouds, sharing caresses,
Smooching around, and round,
Oblivious of telltale tears on our cheeks.
A shooting star arcs across the sky,
‘Shall we wish?’ You ask,
‘Nah,’ I reply; wishing is for fools,
Be content; acceptance is the key,
My perfect stranger,
We have our dreams.
© Paul M Chafer 2014
Jul 16, 2014
Jul 16, 2014 at 7:43 AM UTC
Betwixt the shrub and hubabubb
'neath bracken's shadowed scowl
came a Wren pop-hopping when
arrested by a yowl
He spied another grovely bird
chattering with the gloom
realising it had been observed
it screeked with spittled spume
*Stay back, stay back
alack, alack
I've nothing left to give
and should you shake the life from me
unhappy you shall live*
Like him the grovely had a one leg
and too the veshy eye
and when he flexed his deeker wings
he knew this bird must die.
The unctuous Wren popped back and forth
as did the groveley bird
and there they stood 'twix shrub and earth
exchanging not a word.
Just this once I'll let you go
announced the cautious Wren
he turned his fractious beak to blow
and was never seen again.
Oct 3, 2014
Oct 3, 2014 at 11:29 AM UTC
Living on borrowed time
Decision at drop of a hat
Down an empty vandalized street, I walk
through the horror of silence
and silence of serenity
perdurable pathway of life
The ghastly sights
and the rustling gates
scattered people with unknown tastes
emptiness in their eyes, anger in their words
void is profound
down the perdurable pathway of life
Bifurcated roads upfront
my perception, one to hell and one to heaven
the other end of roads, a mystery
I stood there comprehending, while
my mind harks back to before I came
down the perdurable pathway of life
Endurance of a toiler
Stoicism, a rare trait, out of gratitude to employer
pain and suffering he undergoes for common good
loyalty to his master, inspire of hardships
sincerity and humbleness of the bloke
will inspire me, down the perdurable pathway of life
Deprived of education
desolated on streets laboring
disparate from parental love, subject to father's fury
fractious relations but still ignores himself, for family and domicile
The kid's love and determination, will inspire me
down the perdurable pathway of life
Spurn love took her down
Her heart wrenched and pushed her beyond limits
killed herself, leaving her parents to sore reality
not a wise choice, but courageous
I ponder upon courage, rather than cowardly suicide
Death is not an option down the perdurable pathway of life
Happy faces around taunt me to do simplest
Reality speaks otherwise
Reckoning on past, the pathway is wrought
conscious and hard choices right ahead
The bifurcated roads to heaven and hell?
I've seen it all, down the perdurable pathway of life
Aug 2, 2012
Aug 2, 2012 at 4:52 AM UTC
"Write what you know."
I want to write about
beautiful things,
but I only know
ugly.
Ugly hearts and stone blood.
Fetid loyalty.
I want to write about a love as pure as honey,
but all I know are the poison-tipped thorns of betrayal.
If I could put the right words
in the right order
at the right time
and explain what it means to lose you,
nobody would care.
I'd like to write about
my happy family,
laugh filled birthdays
and joyous gatherings,
but I only know
fractious,
secretive,
********
I want to touch another soul
make a connection with my words
share a part of my self
and help someone in the process,
but all I have been taught is
taking
keeping
lying
hiding
running
ruining.
I would love to write
like Pablo,
of wheat
and bread
and fields that don't weep,
but all I know are
desperate fumblings
in ******
beer soaked bathrooms,
back alley
drunken
********
by black
barely passable trannys,
diseases and
barely consensual bloodstains.
I cannot speak of such things.
It's bad enough I think about them,
even worse I write about them.
I write what I know.
Feb 27, 2013
Feb 27, 2013 at 12:26 AM UTC
the tessellated tile floor of my existence,
once alabaster white
has sullied under the steps
of a muddied life
spent wading in the river bank
attempting to coalesce
a series of seemingly random events
into a fabricated web
spun of the finest thread.
only to find the ephemeral now
a fractious flowing river
so violent and cold
from the melting spring snow,
whitewater breaks
against primordial stone
like titan thunder atop olympus,
rattling our bones
because legends follow entropy
but chronos begets chaos in mythology.
Mar 17, 2016
Mar 17, 2016 at 3:24 PM UTC
Composing Hallelujah
Fractious lines crack,
holiday decorate the spirit inferior,
while each note upon the priest's guitar
penetrates the aspirin roughened interior,
face slaps me, daggers and accuses,
you're not composing hallelujah.
So I mislead, big deal,
composing the anti-hallelujah,
yeah, I was ******** with you,
as you sit across from me electronically
pretending, me to you, you to me.
Lie to each other with smiling faces,
you too have reaped,
been emotionally *****
by what our minds see and sow,
scowls and howls,
we've both grown our own demons.
My secrets, maybe are all there,
maybe, writ loud and clear,
in the songs I choose to share,
and in the unrevealed ones,
buried alive, held in reserve,
but not, for your average, rainy day,
could be today, you have no say.
Are we not all veterans of a kind,
don't we all have ribbons on our chest,
stripes and stars on our khaki blouse,
a record of our own great campaigns,
including the war to end all wars,
the never ending one,
the one the psycho-historians renamed,
"The 24/7 Year Conflagration"?
It used to be just my secret, no more
don't need a cartoonist to tell me that's
the enemy is us, and there are moles, traitors,
hidden deep in our intelligence organization,
planting seeds, urges, pushing to
out the identity of our communist friend,
Depression
I don't mean the ordinary, garden variety,
a mere moody blues recession,
when funk is sourced from gray clouds,
served up proper, cold and wet,
then travels on when sun warmth
clarifies temporarily, the aspirin kicking in.
So I misled,
composing the anti-hallelujah,
yeah, I was ******** with you,
sit across from me and lie to me,
lie to each other with smiling faces
we reap what we own,
scowls and howls.
A chorus of harmonious poseurs
inside your own City Center,
vocalize the lyrics of the anti-hallelujah,
a composition of questions directed at
whomever in tonight's audience deserves it,
asking, nerving, to sing too loud, at decibel speed:
Are these verses, curses
about D,
our mutual acquaintance,
or just research notes for further followup,
part two of a pas de deux, and,
did you go this time, too far,
or still not far enough?
-
Sep 18, 2013
Sep 18, 2013 at 7:29 PM UTC
The Magical Date
Last nite was a celebration!
And before it all begun
He held me by my hand so close
We were off to leprechaun land!
The naughty elf with his impish pranks
His sinful teases and wanton ways
His playful gestures, fractious delights
He rushed me off to his wilful fays
We found ourselves in a Keatsian bower
In 'embalmed darkness', 'mong 'white hawthorns'
It was fragrant with the jasmine veils
That covered the roof of rosy thorns
we laughed and sang old happy numbers
we talked our hearts out gleefully
After aeons of blue moon we'd finally met
A magical date it had to be!
And so when i looked up to his eyes
It held mine in a purple gaze
In a trice of a second he was off with me
Speeding through the verduous maze
Help! i cried but held on tight
Our windswept hair, our amorous plight
His fervour, vigor, force and power
Was all i felt that wondrous night
Elf or gnome, genie or sprite
A naughty brownie or the nisse vampire
Bogie, goblin, fairy, nymph
He carried me through the forests dire...
So just wen I can close my eyes
Just when i feel im missing him
He's there as he says hes there with me
Off we go into the woodlands dim
We dance a waltz, a salsa true
A foxtrot, a ballet in embrace tight
In white moonshine, in purple rain
When dewdrops catch the morning light.
And then again with every dawn
The magic wanes, the elf resigns
To mossy groves and sylvan lands
And the elfin grottos of my mind.
Dec 20, 2011
Dec 20, 2011 at 12:37 AM UTC
Fractals make me Fractious,
Measuring the edge, Numbers on the ledge.
Fric Frac, Fractals make me Fractious.
Measuring the line, Not using sine
Fric Frac, Fractals make me Fractious.
Generating Geometry, Calculating Topography.
Fric Frac, Fractals make me Fractious.
Equations they don't rhyme, Colors between the line.
Fric Frac, Fractals make me Fractious.
Aug 31, 2010
Aug 31, 2010 at 7:44 AM UTC
The desk was half submerged in a lake of papers.
She felt so adult, being invited for coffee.
But get outta here. With your remarkable eyes and.. WEDDING RING
The question hung invisibly in the air.
What does that mean, coffee? Have you ever felt like you were missing some obvious sign-signal? Why does he want to have coffee with ME?” Lisa asked herself.
He isn’t the first guy to hit on her but he’s a professor.
WAS he hitting on her?
Her sex-dar said he was hitting on her.
“Sorry, I, I can’t.” she said as her mind searched for context.
She thinks: What if I make him mad - and he decides he doesn’t like me anymore?
Wait, does he like me NOW - or am I just another of a million students he’s taught?
Am I making a thing out of nothing? Am I being fractious?
Maybe coffee means coffee?
She has a hundred thoughts in a millisecond.
“Why not?” he asks, not looking up and marking some student’s paper with a red pin.
“I’m busy with humdrum deadlines,” she said, wondering if that even made sense.
He looks up and chuckles, “No problem.” He says with a smile, then he returns to grading.
After a second she turns and goes.
“I need to find Anais,” she thinks, reaching for her phone.
May 5, 2022
May 5, 2022 at 10:44 PM UTC
Spirit is a unified field
infinite
in a state of perpetual expansion
seamless bliss
beyond the slings and arrows of creations drama
pain and pleasure
disappointment and gratifications
we live
in the
zim zum
A cauldron
hollowed out
of the the self effulgent light
the source
formless
the theater of creation
a dark space of dynamic geometry
of fractious binary forces
a merciless churn
an atrocity for the evolution of individuation
pistons in motion
a cacophonous feng shui
a tangle of webs
a grand illusion
of energetics
kamikaze planets
hideous cruelties and voluptuous pleasures
a swarm of form
hydras in heat
countless lights casting inestimable shadows
a war between heaven
absolute order
and hell
absolute chaos
our lives
a medium
for the gods of struggle
until our heads a stone
the exit door
is pure spirit
spiritus...breath
breathing made conscious
the big hush
the royal yoga
waiting for the guileless
Dec 27, 2016
Dec 27, 2016 at 12:10 PM UTC
Oh the songs my heart hums of late are new to me...alas i wish this was so. but I used to hear others hum this tune when I was smaller and rebellious, with no taste of blood in my cheek or on my collar. now my hem is ***** and worn, and fractious memories of other lips pressed to mine... can i toss these and replace them with whatever texture your ****** forestry implies? nuzzles are tasteful, when my tongue is out dear. if only a precursor, let us wander (skirtless) and fitzpleasure abounding not even gently when we combine talents and hum to the moon the new songs we've learned from hating eachother.
(i only hate you for finding my heart and for making me give it to you) but i forgive you for not being here
Jul 12, 2014
Jul 12, 2014 at 5:17 AM UTC
Piece together portions of an ever shrinking memory
Sift the extraneous, consolidate the sound,
Rid thyself of factions preposterous and fractious
Crystalise the essence of essential and profound.
Immortalise sensations of sweet rapture incarnate
Clutch to your breast all good warmth from the past,
Know what’s retained is the BEST of your being
Treasure each recall and pray that it last.
Love each moment with ardour of passion
Value the brilliance of colour and sound,
Savour the sweetness in apricot nectar
Indulge like tomorrow will NOT be around.
© 2012 Marshal Gebbie
Jun 19, 2012
Jun 19, 2012 at 1:22 AM UTC
parse and praise the phrase,
checkerboard fraction,
appréhendé immédiatement,
a poem title!
put aside to marinate,
stamped "will not expire,"
doing the research legwork,
**** it is a real thing!
toujours,
where the best words and titles come from,
if one listens well
romantic notions swell the chest,
all the love affairs over so many decades,
all checkerboard games
with Kings a-crowning and Queens a-moaning,
poet, no way, never planned ahead,
always lost by a fractious split,
more than a fractional loss,
losing
most triumphantly!
each lover took and left a fraction behind,
a numerator, a denominator, never a whole number,
for then there would be no poetry need
you want,
have need for
une idée fixe
whom I should be, but i could be a
multiple choice answer
a three scoop ice cream treat,
or perhaps, a mix of forty favorered flavors
a new one,
chaque coup,
why not?
our first disagreement
both of us wish to nominate the other to be the nominator
the denominator is a definition of what is the whole
because i am gracious,
foolish and less than whole
already
I concede cause I am in already in retreat,
conceding comes supernaturally nowadays,
so move me forward on the checkerboard
and triple jump me, and any way
I am pas de nom
we close today with an American
yay...
Sep 26, 2017
Sep 26, 2017 at 2:48 PM UTC
It is in the midst of strife
when the burden weighs most heavy,
your innards writhe and twisted;
the discomfort tugging at you so intensely
you cannot help but feel the tightness in your throat.
It is in the thick of this black mist
when your hands pick and pull
upon the wisping thread inside your head,
unraveling the rabble of cowardice voices
which spill like venom on your thoughts.
It is the unsettling notion
you are alone in a vast and empty ocean
sinking, suffocating and claustrophobic,
your mind is brimming, overflowing,
afraid it might just crack right open
It is knowing
these thoughts which come pouring
from that fractious bore inside your skull
seethe with undisclosed emotions
and their exposure to the air could crush you whole.
Will you allow this shameful wave
to crash atop you with all its galling weight
and drag you under grain by grain?
Or-
Will you battle back the coming storm,
standing above the surging tide
a rampart refusing to forfeit a single inch
of your distinguished shore?
I say battle.
Battle with the erosive waters rising inside you.
Battle knowing fully at first you are destined to lose.
The hero must be humbled
before others see him as the hero too.
So battle **** it, battle you glorious fool!
Jan 19, 2018
Jan 19, 2018 at 8:49 AM UTC
*You never wished to get what you already deserved
but the heart brought you a life where you got emerged
with the temptation of **** mind
that took you away.... away from your life
The love beyond the region crowned you... the queen of my realm
You took a flight & flew off the kingdom of wicked world
& reached out the desperate, & so restless glory of my helm
The destiny of your cantankerous heart led you to the fifty shades of my fractious love
& brought you a new life - A life that labeled you - A white dove
A Dove - an omen; a mark; a zodiac sign of freedom
Oh, the night with you makes me an Italic pigeon
who flies across the world over the nights;
steals your every shimmery breath under the full-moon-night,
& gives you everything with pleasure when the rain love beating again your our galvanize.*
Mar 7, 2015
Mar 7, 2015 at 5:36 AM UTC
Good morning Muppet.
I saw you staggering out of bed.
After stretching over to turn off the alarm.
****** thing.
Left it snoozing and off it went again.
You're in the kitchen, cooking your coffee and porridge.
A mighty morning brew.
The alarm hangs out on the face of your phone.
You need to use it today.
So you dash upstairs to turn it off.
Tripping over the dog, who's dashing around your feet.
Porridge flies and coffee slops.
All over the carpet and one hot dog.
Morning's, don't you just love 'em.
P.s.the dog's okay.
Just the start of another fractious day.
(C) Livvi
Nov 14, 2014
Nov 14, 2014 at 3:53 AM UTC
webs were spun
in a tangle
each spider adding
more to the ravel
gossamer threads
all confused
quite interesting
was this muse
others were invited
into the spinning hub
after a time
crowding
took place
which resulted in
a fractious stir
the once happy
web builders
couldn't get along
their community
dissolved
on the intertwisting
being over done
Nov 4, 2016
Nov 4, 2016 at 6:42 AM UTC
C. B. was a son of a B!
Did anybody really like him?
Most of the people he encountered
Usually found more reasons to strike him.
In school the kids called him a bully.
Bully he was, and bully he did.
He derived inordinate pleasure
Tormenting any vulnerable kid.
His schoolyard behavior was no better
Than his disruptive behavior in class.
In fact, most teachers would call him
An incorrigible pain in the ***
In high school he was just as aggressive.
His reputation was firmly upheld.
Holding a freshman's head in the toilet
Finally got the bully expelled.
How he earned money. Well, that was
A real mystery--through and through.
Not surprisingly his motto
Was ***** them before they ***** you."
What his girlfriend saw in him
Was truly anybody's guess.
Aware of his fractious personality,
The woman married him nevertheless.
People made bets on how long the couple
Could last in a stormy marriage from hell.
After the wife had had enough,
She packed up the kids and said farewell.
C. B. remained estranged
From both of his kids for the rest of his life.
Some woman out there was very lucky
For he never found another wife.
Money. That was all that mattered.
People? Employees? They were dispensable.
His dog was even afraid of him
And sensed that he was reprehensible.
He bought a number of businesses.
How they lasted was a surprise.
Frankly, most people suspected
Secret Mexican Mafia ties.
One day C. B.'s lifeless body
Was found in his driveway. The coroner said
A heart attack was the cause;
But some suspected foul play instead.
A gravestone reads: "Here lies C. B.
When life was hard, he would persist.
Survived by two loving children,
The doting father will be missed."
Whoever wrote that epitaph?
You wonder: what did he or she owe him?
The author of those unfounded words
Obviously didn't know him.
Oddly the deaths of louses and scoundrels
Are so hard to identify,
For based on gravestones and the obits,
It seems that only good people die.
- by Bob B (6-27-17)
Jun 27, 2017
Jun 27, 2017 at 3:20 PM UTC
*That evening,
The irises of a lady’s eyes
Aroused the vastness of an ocean
& her pupils glistened
Like pearls beneath shallow,
Languid waters of crystalline blue;
Their lustrous nacre
Reflected the sparse rays
Of dwindling evening light
& swooned over the elegant
Procession of the stars above.
That evening,
The fractious mysteries
Of the universe withdrew
Their reticence & conferred
Their wisdom upon her;
Deep and troubling questions
Which once had lingered in
Her thoughts were burnt to cinders
By kisses from the flame of truth;
Memories found their meaning,
& rhymes found their reason.
That evening,
Her once perpetual,
Merry exhalations
Mingled with the ocean air for
The final time as she
Became one with the night.
As she ascended into
The great unknown, she saw
Memories flash before her eyes.
For life is but a flash
Within the spectrum of eternity.
That evening,
She discovered so much
But paid the price of what she knew.
That evening,
She became nothing more
Than stardust.
“For you were made of dust, & to dust you shall return.”*
Aug 10, 2016
Aug 10, 2016 at 2:43 PM UTC
Speech
Chaos forced out, while stupidity smiles loudly,
Shouting in brittle delight,
Fractious unbroken anxiety smacks,
Abrupt is what wishes once desired,
Dialect of dreams devotion,
In hazy frosted sponges dusted in icing sugar trims,
Brimming Sweetness blowing flustered in blasts of summer,
Audacious in feral vile violence,
While the song remains the same!
By ladylivvi1
© 2013 ladylivvi1 (All rights reserved)
Jun 11, 2013
Jun 11, 2013 at 8:25 PM UTC
Balanced at this point of time,
Fractious as the case may be
Cautioned as to why we men
Most unctiously, cross women flee.
Brought to heel by subtle stare
Insinuation lingering there,
Caught out short by razored phrase
Abruptly severing…outrage,
Castigated without word
Rendering rebuff absurd.
Yet born to kiss and stroke the brow
But ultimately lost, somehow,
That give and take,(with **** smile)
Demolished slow in time’s worn guile,
Angelic then, in evening light
Extinguished now with tension tight.
Standoff in the cold of dawn
Sees all affection now withdrawn.
Balanced at this point in time
An utter need to kick the dog
Retreat to haven’s dark tool shed
To mutter hurt and swallow grog.
M.
Composed, (with tongue in cheek), for a poor weak ****** who quickly saw his Heaven on Earth become Hell.
23 February 2017
HAMILTON NZ
Feb 22, 2017
Feb 22, 2017 at 11:31 PM UTC
Sparse grass adorns the hillside
Thinly green against the grey,
Where lurking bull ant wolf packs
Hunt where chirping crickets play.
Way too thin to waft in breezes
Way too thin to really count
Like bad dealerships in Chevrolet
Mostly struggle to surmount.
Like thin pacifists in fist fights
Race, back peddaling for the door,
When, in fact, the convenience
Is a bullet through the floor.
And hot starlets jiggle **** jobs
Strutting carpet, red as rose,
Imitating, superficially here,
Whoredom wishing to impose.
Those roaring Russians, in denial
As their cheating athlete’s pale,
All denied their right of entry
To Olympia’s Holy Grail.
And insipidly they all collapse
In fracking’s blatant wake,
Leaving gloating, fat Americans
Gorging merrily on steak.
Whilst the oceans are advancing
As the ice floes dissipate,
And the clamour is ignored
Though Island nations inundate.
Fractious currencies do vacillate
In global bouts of greed,
Where the rich are fatly richer
And the rest in desperate need.
Where all truth is but a fantasy
Which everyone ignores,
Where expediency is the answer
And future proofing snores.
Black distrusts the whiteness
Islam hates the Jew,
East and West at loggerheads
What hope now…. for you?
Oh sparse grass adorns the hillside
Thin green against the grey,
Where the morrow is a vaugary
And worrisome it’s way.
M.
Friday 13th November 2015
Nov 13, 2015
Nov 13, 2015 at 7:35 PM UTC
D.N.A RESULTS by Kristie Townsend (23.07.07)
patiently I wait for the pain to stop
for blackness to overwhelm my fractious senses
for death to soothe my destroyed emotions
for eternal silence to end my indifferent pretenses
but even drug induced comas
or the gift of life, twice
leaving my children, or those whom proclaim to care
are enough of an incentive for me to wish to remain here
I lost my daddy, Eric, Mr T
I betrayed myself, I fell apart
I believed the DNA results would set me free
instead they broke my fragile heart
But the universe and life unfolds as indeed it should
although not always as I would like or desire
and one day, when I look back
Im sure Ill be glad that It wasnt my time to expire
Sep 25, 2016
Sep 25, 2016 at 5:53 PM UTC
2016, how are you?
You finished yours.
A huge thank for you,
to bring me to many places,
that 2015 did not allow.
2016, are you satisfied?
For all the abundant blessings.
A healthy family,
a bunch of kind friends,
and especially that one little angel.
2016, have you told 2017?
To make me a stronger man,
a committed person,
a discipline figure,
and a traveler.
2016, have you forgiven me?
For being weak.
For being fractious.
For being an unthankful person.
2017, are you ready to shape me?
because I am ready to be shaped.
Dec 31, 2016
Dec 31, 2016 at 8:09 PM UTC