"hauls" poems
its amazing what we’re capable of when pressed;
lunar launches
and shaman healing
hail marys
and fortunes of gold
heavy hauls
and broken borders
war, compassion
and treaties of peace
all those wild and lofty regressions from the mean;
soul re-settings
(from deadly deeds)
scores and scriptures
liberty and peace
walls, asylums
(in the jaws of defeat!)
channeled spirits
of warmth
and love
and connection
and sometimes, it’s just a little fodder;
pyramids and viaducts
aqua-lines and chunnels
spider climbs
and deep dives
(with base jumps near the high wire)
gardens, and divine art
and even water boards
(for beauty is always in the eye of the beholder!)
have a look around...
and let gratitude be your guide
Mar 28, 2017
Mar 28, 2017 at 11:56 PM UTC
So that you will hear me
my words
sometimes grow thin
as the tracks of the gulls on the beaches.
Necklace, drunken bell
for your hands smooth as grapes.
And I watch my words from a long way off.
They are more yours than mine.
They climb on my old suffering like ivy.
It climbs the same way on damp walls.
You are to blame for this cruel sport.
They are fleeing from my dark lair.
You fill everything, you fill everything.
Before you they peopled the solitude that you occupy,
and they are more used to my sadness than you are.
Now I want them to say what I want to say to you
to make you hear as I want you to hear me.
The wind of anguish still hauls on them as usual.
Sometimes hurricanes of dreams still knock them over.
You listen to other voices in my painful voice.
Lament of old mouths, blood of old supplications.
Love me, companion. Don't forsake me. Follow me.
Follow me, companion, on this wave of anguish.
But my words become stained with your love.
You occupy everything, you occupy everything.
I am making them into an endless necklace
for your white hands, smooth as grapes.
27.2k
I am hungry
and it is reflected
in the contours
of every inch
of skin
every cell a-flutter
tiny wings and heartbeats
activated within
right down to
the ribosomes and
kidney-shaped
mitochondria
right up through epidermis
woven as threads
of softness penetrating
your inner hard, dark parts
causing them
to melt into
my light
I am craving
to feel your
absolute heart's
raging core
my aching flesh burning,
my heart, wrapped in
a love
so pure
My need to be
devoured surfaces
in smoothness,
at a glance
You feel it acutely,
no room for doubt
or subtle chance
I am ravenous
for muscle-worked arms
(arms that could easily
try to break)
to be supremely
gentle as you part
my thighs like the ocean
and sacredly partake
the slickness of your tongue
in my feminine grace
the stains of my love
drenching
your noble face
your eyes on mine
as I sharply breathe
need to hold your
head stroke your
hair know that for me
the king takes off that
garland of gold
breaking free of
all symbols of status
the only real treasure
the queen who
gives to him,
and who he now pleasures
and I let myself be consumed
with the reverence
of a psalm
my love pouring into you
healing your hurts,
like a balm
in this private landscape
we are the most
ferocious of tender
estuaries
in an eternal vista
in this hour of somewhere,
the sea hauls us in
like ancient creatures,
bringing the fossils
back to life
in lustrous foam
as they
inch their way
into the spirals
that we
feel we could
call
home
May 21, 2016
May 21, 2016 at 12:57 PM UTC
Stasis in darkness.
Then the substanceless blue
Pour of tor and distances.
God's lioness,
How one we grow,
Pivot of heels and knees! -- The furrow
Splits and passes, sister to
The brown arc
Of the neck I cannot catch,
Nigger-eye
Berries cast dark
Hooks ----
Black sweet blood mouthfuls,
Shadows.
Something else
Hauls me through air ----
Thighs, hair;
Flakes from my heels.
White
Godiva, I unpeel ----
Dead hands, dead stringencies.
And now I
Foam to wheat, a glitter of seas.
The child's cry
Melts in the wall.
And I
Am the arrow,
The dew that flies,
Suicidal, at one with the drive
Into the red
Eye, the cauldron of morning.
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Ecstasy mire in its own sorrow,
As if a ghost makes love to its shade.
The wooden door merely holds the knock;
Instead it punches out within the walls,
Dispersed as if a blow of clay.
There the sound hauls up a craft:
Foul of the wooden scent.
Just as it intertwines with cloisters,
The curves are lined into a silhouette.
The mountainous fogs are sharpened,
The apex is buttoned and round.
The matter it is that shapes the core:
The mere marriage of soul and dust.
How a flesh can tease its craft,
As it gnaws on a clavicle(?)
The ghost sips on a river,
As if making love to its shade.
Feb 8, 2018
Feb 8, 2018 at 4:59 AM UTC
It is always difficult to describe depression,
There are so many interpretations
That people hold,
This is my own.
You're standing on the cliffs edge,
Looking out towards the horizon of life,
Then you see the storm clouds rolling in,
The thunderous roars of trepidation
And the lightning bolts of painful reminiscence
Mirroring the silver scars on your skin,
Then the mighty winds of worthlessness
Hauls you over the edge.
The cool air brushes against your face
As you descend towards the black water below,
Every inch of you is screaming for you to stop
But you can't,
You have lost complete control and you are weak,
Defenceless,
Vulnerable,
Amidst the whistling winds in your ears
You hear the names, the bullying,
The cries of disappointment,
The reminiscent sound of ***** against porcelain,
You hit the water and shatter the surface
And you pray that you have stopped,
Things will bet better ,
But instead you continue to sink,
Numb, cold, aching,
You want to cry but you feel so empty,
Like the bitter sting of the salty ocean
Has clinged to your skin and draws out
The last ounce of feeling you had left to hold on to,
You stare at the surface,
Wide eyes desperately searching for rescue,
The fractured refraction of a flare in the stormy sky,
A hand to plunge into the water and pull you out
And revive you.
I have been fortunate enough to be pulled from
The ocean,
Revived countless times
After feeling like I will spend eternity
Living in the shipwreck of my insecurities.
It is my duty to scour the world and throw a life ring
To every lost soul who deserves to be atop the
Cliffs edge where they can once again watch
Another hopeful sunrise of hope break on the
Mundane horizon.
Dec 5, 2013
Dec 5, 2013 at 8:27 AM UTC
The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees
Is my destroyer.
And I am dumb to tell the crooked rose
My youth is bent by the same wintry fever.
The force that drives the water through the rocks
Drives my red blood; that dries the mouthing streams
Turns mine to wax.
And I am dumb to mouth unto my veins
How at the mountain spring the same mouth *****
The hand that whirls the water in the pool
Stirs the quicksand; that ropes the blowing wind
Hauls my shroud sail.
And I am dumb to tell the hanging man
How of my clay is made the hangman's lime.
The lips of time leech to the fountain head;
Love drips and gathers, but the fallen blood
Shall calm her sores.
And I am dumb to tell a weather's wind
How time has ticked a heaven round the stars.
And I am dumb to tell the lover's tomb
How at my sheet goes the same crooked worm.
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Hauling Jack I am called
My truck rely gets stalled
I drive a powerful 18 wheeler and being a sturdy trucker
I travel from coast to coast
My story is not much to boost
I drive for “GOT YOUR STACK TRUCKING COMPANY”
I am on my CB radio talking to Trucker Flipping Sal
We actually grew up together and he is my pal
I am cruising at 75
But when I am living, it is about staying alive
I got my eyes for highway Smoky
At times he will give me a wave
Then there’s other times I get a warning in behave
My job is pretty cut and dry
Driving helps pass the time away
I have seen a lot while driving these highways
I have seen Greyhound buses signal on by
There were steep hills my truck had to try
Then there were trucks with blown out tires and sometimes their brakes could fail
Being a trucker has no fancy tail
This trucker only wants to share the trail
It’s just a job and how a trucker prevails
Hauling Jack is a man who hauls a pack
Once to the final destination, it’s a matter to unpack then reload
Hauling Jack in highway knows, and it was illustrated in being the show.
Feb 28, 2016
Feb 28, 2016 at 1:46 PM UTC
The wind speed of thought, is handy vehicle; on it mind flies.
To familiar places, where no map is needed, I journey by foot.
A car, a coach or a train, some times air planes to long hauls.
But nothing takes one far like poetry, to interior landscapes.
Dec 14, 2014
Dec 14, 2014 at 7:25 AM UTC
the overcast window haze casts shadows over farmlands at distance, past ferns and cottage solemnities out on plains cold and alive; meanwhile, concrete and preservative-laden once-trees cage in the zoo-horde of humanity this lovely city is built upon, through the steep divides between the walls of foreign strangers, still neighbours, calling telephone lines to the lover that makes their heart shrink in the cool sheets at a distance of eight thousand leagues under kitchen sink designs where drips escape onto a blue-grey dishtowel, strategically placed to avoid having to address the issue over farmland holidays when stormclouds gather and sleep 'til the grand show, back over the alps, as the fallabout planes drift under blue over grey with distorted fantasies sandwiched three abreast internally, whispering "you'll be here, I'll be here, seventeen minutes" as the black gown of evening bids its farewells to the long-worn ball of flame we call upon for life's little affirmations, the skin and bone we call home, the constructed caves we wish we didn't, and, letting frost's call begin, the last of the seasons hauls its bulky frame over the horizon and clusters on the fingertips of tree limbs, coercing: "let go, it's late, it's so very late" and so the sidewalks choke with debris under the wearing off of summer feet, and the declination of that peach-pit feeling of sanguinity as the blankets pile up and the distance consumes once again, long after delusion gave up the chase; we all want to be left alone and want someone to pursue us at the same time, we all dream of the grandeur of timeless monuments: the desert road, the glint of illuminated heavens, the mist's rise and fall, the electricity in her eyes.
Mar 12, 2013
Mar 12, 2013 at 5:22 PM UTC
They will soon be down
To one, but he still will be
For a little while still will be stopping
The flakes in the air with a look,
Surrounding himself with the silence
Of whitening snarls. Let him eat
The last red meal of the condemned
To extinction, tearing the guts
From an elk. Yet that is not enough
For me. I would have him eat
The heart, and from it, have an idea
Stream into his gnarling head
That he no longer has a thing
To lose, and so can walk
Out into the open, in the full
Pale of the sub-Arctic sun
Where a single spruce tree is dying
Higher and higher. Let him climb it
With all his meanness and strength.
Lord, we have come to the end
Of this kind of vision of heaven,
As the sky breaks open
Its fans around him and shimmers
And into its northern gates he rises
Snarling complete in the joy of a weasel
With an elk’s horned heart in his stomach
Looking straight into the eternal
Blue, where he hauls his kind. I would have it all
My way: at the top of that tree I place
The New World’s last eagle
Hunched in mangy feathers giving
Up on the theory of flight.
Dear God of the wildness of poetry, let them mate
To the death in the rotten branches,
Let the tree sway and burst into flame
And mingle them, crackling with feathers,
In crownfire. Let something come
Of it something gigantic legendary
Rise beyond reason over hills
Of ice screaming that it cannot die,
That it has come back, this time
On wings, and will spare no earthly thing:
That it will hover, made purely of northern
Lights, at dusk and fall
On men building roads: will perch
On the moose’s horn like a falcon
Riding into battle into holy war against
Screaming railroad crews: will pull
Whole traplines like fibres from the snow
In the long-jawed night of fur trappers.
But, small, filthy, unwinged,
You will soon be crouching
Alone, with maybe some dim racial notion
Of being the last, but none of how much
Your unnoticed going will mean:
How much the timid poem needs
The mindless explosion of your rage,
The glutton’s internal fire the elk’s
Heart in the belly, sprouting wings,
The pact of the “blind swallowing
Thing,” with himself, to eat
The world, and not to be driven off it
Until it is gone, even if it takes
Forever. I take you as you are
And make of you what I will,
Skunk-bear, carcajoy, bloodthirsty
Non-survivor.
Lord, let me die but not die
Out.
May 17, 2014
May 17, 2014 at 7:08 AM UTC
Joe
Joe was a man in town that did pretty much of everything.
He was the sheriff, and the butcher, he hauls food to the neighbors.
Joe also was working on cars and trucks, pumped gas if you needed some.
Joe had an old tow truck, red in color to match the fire truck.
The tow truck was joes pride and joy.
He made money at the county fair.
He would be tow for miles around. But on race at the fair is where you would find old Joe
They say old Joe died the other day. Just days after he parked the old tow truck.
Joe the handy man.
Jun 26, 2014
Jun 26, 2014 at 1:17 AM UTC
October falls like blood pressure
on scalding dead sea afternoons
making driftwood of bodies
and all struggle futile.
This is the amber blaze;
the penetrating hues of oranges and yellows
blurring to bright white noise against
the barking of trees stripped bare
to the cacophonous scent of feathers and fire.
The autumn sky hauls tight its purse strings,
drawing night in, wrapped tight like winter coats
cumbersome and confining – in decline.
The equilibrium tipped by a bandit callous and howling -
piercing pitch shattering prism till colours fall away like raindrops
and life turns back to black.
Oct 15, 2014
Oct 15, 2014 at 6:26 PM UTC
Prologue
see, do you see?
Judy and Punch
are shopping
Like the loving couple they are
they are at it together
Action!
Punch puts in a carton of beer
into the trolley
And Judy hauls it out immediately
and puts it back on the shelf –
It’s too expensive, honey
says Judy. $50 a carton, that’s too much money
Now Judy is in the “Beauty” section
and picks a Beauty Pack for $100
and Punch protests immediately:
That’s what’s too much money!
*Oh, but you do want
me to look beautiful, darling –
don’t you?* says Judy, with a smile
*Yeah, sweetheart,
but half the price
would have done the trick!*
says Punch, with a counter-smile
Epilogue
Now, what do you think
happens after Punch’s punch line?
Do you think Judy makes
the literal and the metaphorical merge?
Are the stars Punch sees literal
or figurative, you think?
Dec 23, 2012
Dec 23, 2012 at 2:02 AM UTC
We pull
the Humboldt
out of the water.
Sometimes
they eat each other,
and we pull
up
shredded hooks
clotted
with white meat.
Sometimes
they
scramble
underneath the surface
and the film of water
separating us
from them
becomes pink and flashing.
We pulled up
a black
saucer
of an eye
one night.
It clung
to a hook
by
pink strings of optic muscle.
Our flashlights
put little continents of light all over its placid, black surface,
and I felt human sadness
some type of animal-human
empathy,
it ****** me up so much
that I threw the line overboard
again,
almost hitting Nestor in the face,
with an un-baited hook.
Our hauls
are getting smaller.
The carnivores
used to jump
into our boats,
slicking
the planks with an excretion
the consistency of placental fluid.
Now,
sometimes dusk burns
as
we yank
seaweed,
seagrass,
and
toilet seats
over the prow;
our bodies tenebrous;
straining with the line
like warriors
stabbing the sea.
Nov 26, 2011
Nov 26, 2011 at 9:15 PM UTC
Swift things are beautiful:
The fleeting glance of your crush,
The heartbeat that hauls,
And the cheeks that red flush.
In the blink of an eye,
Stomach filled with butterflies,
The high waves that you ride.
And slow things are beautiful:
The small pause between you two,
Time seems to stop the world
Except for the both of you.
The feelings you harbor
The heartbeat and butterflies,
Cheeks red with color.
You wait for it to subside.
Jan 12, 2013
Jan 12, 2013 at 9:11 AM UTC
We let lust lure us
To beds beside Belthus
Making mountains murmur and
moan for pleasures
Fulfilling the flesh follies that fills
us
There , there trample on suitors
Creeping like crickets on sea shores
Lit little lamps and lead us
Through these things so , so
treacherous
Sunshine shearing our skin sores
As we walk and work the wild soils
All ail has ended mid- course
As Home! Home! Hauls the voice of
Jesus .
Sep 5, 2014
Sep 5, 2014 at 2:01 PM UTC
Her job's detecting errors God has made
Designing Summer Street: this busted curb,
These tattered feathers, wrappers, dented cans.
Forever stopping, stooping, in pale charade
Of chores her mother's set her to, deferred
By rapt attention to detail, she scans
Detritus, bark, branches, torn wings of seeds,
Thin husks that stalked or shaded summer's grass --
Then sighs brief prayers for lives she never knew.
Her older brother hauls dead leaves and feeds
The hose its coil, then snipes at her, who'd pass
Her hours in gawking, still so much to do...
She scrapes the lawn a bit, a guiltless thief
Who leans to pocket gold: one perfect leaf.
Feb 6, 2012
Feb 6, 2012 at 12:26 PM UTC
the forest echoes when the mahoe falls
tall is the tree and strong deep is its root
at end of day even the staunchest bawls
honest men speak against all that appalls
their work is constant though most rare its fruit
the forest echoes when the mahoe falls
for just one instant fools delay their brawls
and bow their heads honour may touch the brute
at end of day even the staunchest bawls
at loss of friend we make our little calls
shed our few tears and learn it's absolute
the forest echoes when the mahoe falls
whether in calmness of the lecture-halls
or broadcasting to folk on their commute
at end of day even the staunchest bawls
knowing the silence that finally hauls
his voice away we cannot refute
the forest echoes when the mahoe falls
at end of day even the staunchest bawls
Dec 12, 2010
Dec 12, 2010 at 5:28 AM UTC
The twinkles in the night skies
Is what I see in her majestic eyes
Whites of her teeth of which I'm swoon
As bright as a gracious midnight moon
A soul of pixie sparkling dust
The warming aura deep I trust
A heart so strong, hauls me along
The thumping of a deep love song
May 13, 2014
May 13, 2014 at 10:47 AM UTC
Sarah and Solomon married at Foxglove in verdant Taranaki…a magical time for everybody at that beautiful, beautiful occasion.
Dear old Grandpa Verne Bell passed from this mortal coil and went on to the next with his typical strong eyed fortitude and open curiosity.
Major earthquake shatters the top of the South island and is felt with trepidation from one end of the country to the other.
Trump hauls votes from the impossible and manufactures an improbable US Presidency…. Much to the embarrassment, alarm and discomfort of the majority of the thinking American population.
Oceans continue to rise and atmospheric temperatures climb…..and nobody really cares enough to try to do anything much about it.
Russia and China flex their military muscle and snub their sabre rattling noses at the West.
Interest rates and the price of gas started to escalate upward again.
Friends and relatives have been rocked by ill health, hardship and misfortune.
Key calls “Enough” and passes the Prime Ministerial gauntlet to a (thankfully), very capable Bill English.
Janet and Marshal both reach out and find new jobs, fresh horizons & new avenues to explore.
Syria slides into chaos and anarchy with absolutely no regard for it’s ordinary, civilian population languishing in the dreadful ruins of East Aleppo.
The Hectors dolphin numbers dwindle to 87 living animals, surviving globally.
But….We, friends, live in a peaceful oasis…forgotten at the very end of the earth.
We live in a land of plenty and opportunity, a land of rare green beauty where individuality is prized and freedom valued.
May we pause for a moment this Christmas…and appreciate just how ****** fortunate we all actually are?
MERRY CHRISTMAS FRIENDS
M.
Hamilton, New Zealand
20 December 2016
Dec 20, 2016
Dec 20, 2016 at 1:36 PM UTC
6am. Coffee. Shower. Car.
Looks at his watch for the millionth time
For once he is only 5 minutes late
Coffee. Lift. Desk. Papers
The laptop is on. The day starts.
She trips. She screams. Bullets...
She crawls into a house. No doors. Or windows.
She curls into a corner. Bloodstains everywhere-
The walls, the floor, her clothes-
Explosion.
The ground shakes.
Papers. Desk. Lift. Car
Looks at his watch for the millionth time
For once he is only 5 minutes late
Home. Shower. Cook. Dinner.
She looks stunning tonight. The evening starts.
Screeches. Groans. Crying. Tears.
They fill the atmosphere like smoke
Coming from the fire next door.
There's nowhere to run.
She hauls herself up. Limping
She watches as the flames close in.
Nov 4, 2017
Nov 4, 2017 at 4:28 PM UTC
My Atlas does not wince
nor does he cower; he hauls
his burden, self-forgotten.
Hour by day, my unwav’ring
tower, with purpling shoulders
and crackling skin, within him
a lambent glow glimpsing through
the faults. My Titan is stout and alt;
I rest in his shadow which feasts on
fearsome things. Some simply hiss
“BEAST,” as he quakes by, but his
eyes are on the sun and his ears are
in the sky, his burden perched upon
his sturdy shoulders high.
Apr 8, 2013
Apr 8, 2013 at 9:44 PM UTC
It hauls you, gasping,
from the cool, murmuring depths
and casts you, ardent and aching,
for someone else's shore.
Dec 25, 2010
Dec 25, 2010 at 1:18 PM UTC
I'll be pleased
when your
name
is a cargo
my memory
no longer
hauls
Dec 21, 2014
Dec 21, 2014 at 6:20 PM UTC