"hessian" poems
*blistering day shuns a walk
all flock to recycled air-con of malls
few venture out* . . .
1.
walk along a mountain path
dislike snakes
wear heavy ankle-boots
rough route
craggy stones
grow tired
2.
head on stone
fall into drowsy slumber
baking brains gathering aches
3.
huge mountain appears
espy a cut opening along the side
a welcoming slit
enter slowly
step by step
seems to brook entry to no more
wonder what calls inside
4.
distant drumming
not afraid
joy fills supreme
reducing epicenter
gentle hands touch and pull in
negating every fear
melting away bleak thoughts
sink deeper into the earth
down . . . down . . . down
into cavities unknown
follow secret canal away from here
5.
sweetest eyes greet and kiss
fall into soft furrows
carried along canal of warmth
close the eyes
fall in heart with glowing ambience
subtle humming felt beneath the soles
sweetest honey-lake
deeper . . . deeper . . . deeper
sublime cocoon - always dreamt of
what supreme bliss
falls in lap of bearer
6.
all cares washed away
known memories seem to float off
as a dinghy to a waterfall
lost over that lip
free fall
free fall
conscience takes a bobbing nap
on waves which lull the senses
into drifting buoy
as conscious dips
utter serenity
spirit moves freely
totally unencumbered
/ /
[awareness - jolted - sudden - open
as corporeal fetters take hold once more
teeter into rude awakening
rub eyes to verify
faculties catapulting in greedy succession
/ /
find a hessian bag on rock
half-afraid to check inside
seemingly empty
lift the edge and peer inside
/ /
the most silent rainbow of inner dreams
long-forgotten wishes flow
into being
as rains come down]
/ /
*no more fear.. again
no more tension
no answering to
no deprivation
no derision
two pure doves hover
quite high
a pale-blue
buoy ~
the only signs of hope
blistering judgment dissolves
beautiful buoy floating
a way.... to marve cut of pure crystal
away...
on an endless ocean of calm*
S T, 20 August 2013
Aug 20, 2013
Aug 20, 2013 at 11:54 AM UTC
His name is ingrained into the fabric of our flag,
yes, the one you see there, waving in the December air,
with waves that glisten not from sun but from wind,
through the water turned frozen they fail to despair,
"My, oh, my, it's Washington Crossing the Delaware!"
Yet an intrinsic sense of nationalistic pride
exudes from the ink that tattoos this canvas,
the genesis of a nation they had taken for their own;
though, as truth becomes told, our pride seems to fold,
and the ink in the portrait begins to fade in color.
Still, on he trekked, though frigid and cold,
as hills bleached in snow began to unfold
potential Hessian retreats scattered across the beach,
a visualization of a battle bounding to unfold,
a strategist adept in war, in honor he was cloaked,
too determined to fail now.
But here we sit, in contemplation and wonder,
pondering the juxtaposition of privilege and patriotism --
how deceitful corruption now riddles those in charge,
empty promises as true as the navy blue
of the oils that stain this worn, cherished canvas.
Its memory lives on in the minds of many made here:
those of us who bleed the good ol' red, white, and blue,
and those of us who hide from the ones who tattoo
their whispered words into the portrait of our being.
Our quilted nation is laced with crimson,
a tapestry of history hidden from the young;
woven threads of variability outline the margins,
a picturesque vision of what could be; a voice speaks,
"Perhaps our future is just across the Delaware!"
Nov 22, 2023
Nov 22, 2023 at 12:14 AM UTC
sweet tree
raised from
tropical
earth
to grow upright
and out
to sprout
from trunk
a bunch of
pink and
pointed pods
or perhaps
crimson or
yellow
aubergine
tangerine
green
scythed clean
from host
and hacked
in two
for getting at
seeds a-pulp
in white
and slimed
and spreading
them out under
the sun
to get hot
in their own
juices
to ferment
wild
to bake
dry
poured tinkling
by the
thousands into
sacks of hessian
for sending
‘cross seas
to furnace-cracked
futures
winnied and
conched
sweetened
melted
and hardened
into shapes
of other things
© 2017 Adelaide Heathfield
Feb 21, 2018
Feb 21, 2018 at 8:27 AM UTC
cotton on thigh
satin beside hip
hessian under ****
wool over shoulder
polyester inside cuffs
take off, take off
silky silky slide
felt in slit
fabric shifting smooth and rough
delicious contrast
Dec 6, 2013
Dec 6, 2013 at 2:40 AM UTC
a yellowish shroud
is placed hurriedly
upon starched white sheets
revealing vicious contrasts
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
its Hessian appearance
an omen, a foretold event
like breathing deeply in a silence
amidst the history of a great disorder
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
violent ink stains
on folding parchment
embalm themselves
upon the thickness of a sorrow
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
placed deep within
shallow subterranean depths
of an enigmatic being
that is both engineering and entrenching
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
its perplexing sensations causing
a wonderful ingrained passion
to erupt with imponderable abstracts
where truth does not exceed exception
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
the shroud provides a false tranquillity
where there is no longer breath
imposes itself unobtrusively
with wonderful staccato caresses
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
it proclaims an innocence of salvation
yet gives gauge to spectacular routes
and an enormity of misconceptions
amid prestigious beatifications
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
oh sweet smelling blue abyss
oh deluded reality
dressed in a winding sheet
of meaningless words
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
wrapped in phrases of falsehood
amidst this purgatorial fog
a twilight world of mysterious ailments
maintains a world of external restraints
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
creates and emptiness, a vacancy
provides an intoxication of vision
a strangeness of sensation
a world transparent
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
read the sentences of silence
breathe the perfume of never fading flowers
and see for the first time
the unfinished likeness of others
where the cullan trees lie
where the cullan trees lie
Aug 7, 2014
Aug 7, 2014 at 6:11 AM UTC
It's gone.
I've checked.
I know.
But then,
it never was
much.
Made mostly of scraps;
A rough frame of old bush lumber;
Walls of flattened fuel cans
and lime coated hessian;
A roof of corrugated iron,
battered and rusting.
Scorched by searing summer heat;
Blasted by dust storms;
Chilled by winter frost.
Insubstantial
against the vastness of desert
that stretched in every direction
from the tiny bush town.
But it was home.
Within its walls
were love and care.
At its table
were sustenance and conversation.
For three years
we lived there
when I was a boy.
I'd rise early
and sit on the edge
of the gibber plain
with our dog
watching the sunrise.
One morning
I heard
the jangling of hobbled camels
returning to town
from a night
in the desert.
On another,
there were herds of cattle,
walked in from
an outlying station
for drafting and yarding,
then transport southward
in a train
hauled by a small steam engine.
At the stock-yard
we'd pretend to be cowboys,
prodding the cattle in the loading race
with sticks,
revelling in the dust and noise,
caring little for their terror
or their destination.
One day we hiked
out past the stock cemetery,
of carcasses leering sightless,
scavenged by crows.
We trudged
to the red sand hills,
then back to the rail-line
for a ride home
with the fettlers.
We went barefoot often -
foot-soles like leather
from the searing sand.
In the heat of the day
we'd pause in the scant shadow of a bush,
to choose the next meagre patch of shade,
then run like the wind
to roll on our backs,
waving scorched feet
in the air.
It's still all there in my memory.
Every few years
I take the old track north,
just to check,
to experience again,
to remember.
Other than the vastness of the desert,
it all seems smaller now -
one tiny settlement
within the compass
of an unbroken horizon.
The old house
is just a memory.
It's gone.
I've checked.
I know.
But then,
it never was
much.
Sep 13, 2018
Sep 13, 2018 at 11:03 PM UTC
Particles of man left behind
Imprints on the looking glass.
We swim with all the memories
In this sea of now.
Shipwrecked on the beach of half-past ten
On our voyage to Tomorrow.
Don't worry dear;
We're already there.
There's a thousand monkey paws
Groping in your hessian skin.
They will only be shaved
When the fruit is eaten.
We're sailors all on this sea of why.
Adrift in the mystery of Now.
Nov 10, 2011
Nov 10, 2011 at 10:43 PM UTC
tis but a rusted memory
now
but once a child's pride and
beloved toy....
fire engine-red trike,
riden for miles, and miles
and across lands of
imagined adventure....
feet pumping, wind in face
bell clattering, tink-tink-tink
and screams of pure...
unadulterated JOY
now a shadow,
draped in old hessian cloth
bell silent, rust weeping
and frozen to the ground
red trike,
i ride you still
in my dreams
we still slay dragons
tho now it seems
that dragons have many
guises, many lives
and that in this life
of adultness...i am in
dragons...sometimes
not often, but sometimes win
Dec 18, 2014
Dec 18, 2014 at 6:39 AM UTC
In the early morning mist
in the green fields
as the sun is just rising
the workers do come
with baskets on their backs
hands still sore
from the day before
into the plantation they trudge
heads down and weak
for less then a pound a day
faces tanned and peeling
from the unforgiving sun
the work master
with hands on his hips
stands on his truck
with over a hundred bags
made of coarse Hessian
'just the tips' he shouts
as a smiling foreman
waves his stick about
twelve hours with no rest
just for you to have a nice cup of char
By Christos Andreas Kourtis aka NeonSolaris
By NeonSolaris
© 2013 NeonSolaris (All rights reserved)
Aug 28, 2013
Aug 28, 2013 at 5:00 AM UTC
Enid turned her wheels
A red flash through
Luscious green
Across the wall of corns
In what felt like
No time at all
The gabble reconvened
Inside the hessian on bread street
Taiyo and Darcy
Evoked the Spanish coast
Fresh faces following
More mature fingers
Frankie and Debs
Move us from Spanish shores
To Antarctica, with penguins
Brian and David
Then comes 'The Man'
Four men , four beautiful men
To play us out and
We don't stand a chance with them now
Jul 6, 2014
Jul 6, 2014 at 3:38 PM UTC
down by the river
a public house once stood
it attracted a clientele
from the town's neighborhoods
the oversees and laborers
would whet their whistles
after a big day working
amid the scrub and the saffron thistles
on the afternoon
of September ninth 1932
in the pub's kitchen
a fire did brew
the flue of the Metters stove
caught alight
which made the cook
scream in fright
from the bar the proprietor
ran at speed
to bucket water
on the flame's greed
town's folk tuned up
with hessian bags
to stub out the embers
that were raging in the building's rags
but their efforts to contain
the fire were all in vain
the watering hole was consumed
by the fast pace of the flammable bane
at the rear of the pub
a charred body was found
he'd not escaped
the flares which did surround
the itinerant bur cutter's
ghost loitered at the pub's site for many a year
he'd appear on nights
when the skies were darkened in drear
the fire at the drinker's establishment
is still spoken of in town
that fateful day the hotel's stove
burnt the drinker's house down
Nov 29, 2014
Nov 29, 2014 at 4:43 AM UTC
Truth sifts through
like fine lace
hand woven with care
but with so much to lose
we keep it wrapped in hessian
harsh and abrasive
kept safe within.
Jul 25, 2013
Jul 25, 2013 at 8:52 AM UTC
Hessian chains unbind--
Us.
And we lay
Coating names
On clouds.
Tilting titles with
Rainbow scents.
I leaf blackthorn-
Mythology to
Fungi tears; weeping moss
From stone.
Though skies smudge--
Empty.
She shows me the softness
Of bramble.
As we hold a song of siren sighs-
Silhouettes pulse art.
And I tingle lightly
In caring flames.
Although almost never speaking.
She forms white-wishes
Inbetween my heart; my head.
Sep 14, 2014
Sep 14, 2014 at 8:32 PM UTC
Behind a tattered hessian curtain there is a flickering light,
but this isn't what should be on her bedside right.
Jan 28, 2016
Jan 28, 2016 at 7:37 PM UTC
when I was growing up,
our hallway had the most peculiar floor:
not quite carpet,
not quite planks,
but something in between.
like a wicker basket
stretched out over several metres,
or the rope you find
dangling off a dinghy's mooring,
it scratched and screened
at the soles of your feet,
tickling and tormenting
bare toes or
pulling the threads out of
well-meaning pairs of socks.
I hated it, or at least,
I thought I did —
until the day it was replaced by
laminate panels.
fake wood didn't cut it,
neither would expensive pile,
or any scraggly synthetic offering
to do the trick.
our painful, hessian homecoming
was a path to beds, and tables,
and welcoming arms.
it marked a definite departure
from sensible carpets and
suitable floors,
to the place between comforts.
for who would dally in a hallway that hurt?
or who would pause to feel the prickling,
pinching of strange interior decor?
of course, sense prevailed —
wood would come,
wood would stay,
and our peculiar, prickly past,
would become a story for some other day.
Apr 4, 2020
Apr 4, 2020 at 10:03 PM UTC
At the back of the class, that's where we sit
Me, Byron, Elliot, Plath and Keats
and as the teacher walks in
Shakespeare with a apple, doth appear
Shakespeare always sits with Marlowe
we know he copies his works
he holds on to his coat tails
and the end of his Hessian shirts
Byron has brought some whiskey in
he passes it under table in a silver flask
teacher says what the hell is going on
so we throw the flask to Plath
He points his finger at me, that teacher
shouts come here you stupid boy
I walk to his desk head down
and try my best to look coy
He asks me for my homework
to see what I have written
I roar here you are Sir, loud
for I am no ****** kitten
He looks at my work and tut's
says you will never be a great
I tell him to f*ck himself
oh no, what a big mistake
At the back of the class
they start to giggle
Keats, Plath and Byron
Elliot holds out, just wriggles
I continue my retort with little time and much thought
Sir I will have more dog ears in my poetry books
then all the kennels in London and give him a V
so expelled I will be, to the bad boys school of poetry
By Christos Andreas Kourtis aka NeonSolaris
Sep 5, 2013
Sep 5, 2013 at 2:16 PM UTC
patchwork girl dreaming
piecing together the scraps of silk
frayed ribbons of broiderie anglais
the tears of velvet darker than midnight
squares of sackcloth hessian made to scrape
against skin both thick and paperthin
patchwork girl sewn together
with a golden thread and a needle finer than hate
embroidered edges with floss spun by spiders
from clouds of dreams, flower thoughts, starwonders
and fragile pockets of maybe hidden beneath morning dew
stitches all lose, then too pulled too tight
she is together
she is all fallen apart
the soft shape of a doll
the tender shape of a girl
hold her, not an armful of scraps
but something precious, one of a kind
couture
Nov 21, 2020
Nov 21, 2020 at 12:50 PM UTC
We back then were only kids
But to the forestry we'd go
With big ond hessian bags
Collecting cones burn well it's so
Winter time it was so cold
But in the home fire burn for ages
Sally always came anong as well
We'd make pocket money wages
She near the pines and waited
For us to come along
I remember her along with
A song called Sally we'd sing along
We became such good friends
That friendship lasted years long
But time it moves friends away
I think about her still and that song
I never thought we'd ever part
Greates mates were we always
But in thought she walks beside me
And will do all of my remaining days
https://youtu.be/6qUua6Nwp5I
terrence michael sutton
copyright 2018
Jun 26, 2018
Jun 26, 2018 at 11:28 PM UTC
Where's your
Stop?
Pressing the bell...
Multi coloured
Doc Martin's
And
200 denier rights
Carrying
A protest
On a
Hessian
Bag for life
Hoping
Its strong
Enough
For
The
Fight
Where's your
Stop?
Little fella
Pressing
The bell
For
Every stop
Pushing
Luck
Without
A
Glance
Or
A
Sound
Mother
Catches
The
Offending
Hand
Distracted
And
Hooked
Up
To
An
Unattainable
Life
Displayed
By
Friends
on
Face ****
Where's
Your stop?
Middle
Man
Pressing the bell.....
Highly
Polished
With a
Stare
That
Could
Abolish
A
***** of a
Day
Finished
Off
With
A
Home match
Screaming....
About
The
Division
Of
Chores
Just call it a draw, mate - ******
And me... I'm not pressing the bell...
I'm just watching...
Sipping a can of something too sweet
I'll duck down
At the last stop
Behind
The back seat
Jul 11, 2019
Jul 11, 2019 at 9:03 AM UTC
I've seven supernova all
Gathered in a heap,
They're rotting under hessian
And their own dull heat.
The planting came in autumn:
Winter's for the sleep and
Springtime's slumber wakening.
Summer scythes, summer reaps,
Summer's plenty, summer feasts.
Summer plunders. Spring is sweet,
Autumn's old and winter sleeps--
Good lord, what did my summer reap?
Sep 21, 2016
Sep 21, 2016 at 7:28 AM UTC
her soul
tidily boxed
in brown cardboard
secured with see through
packing tape and hessian brown twine
arrived today, a little dented at the corners
but otherwise seemingly intact.
not knowing quite
what
to do with it
i placed it
in the cool dark
cupboard
and
gave it time to
settle
but it was
as they say
in books
restless
and
needing
to be
released
to the
new station
the new level
that it now was
to inhabit
so gathering
the implements
to bust
it
out of
it's
earthly confines
i opened
the tidy
tightly
packed
parcel
and there
before
my teary eyes
words
in straight
and seemingly
meaningful lines
making sentences
telling a story
her soul magnified,
HER SOUL MAGNIFIED.
Jan 21, 2017
Jan 21, 2017 at 1:25 AM UTC
Washington had never seen a grin
On an American face
Till now
It had war written all over it
But, the battle had just begun
The trees had dropped dead
In the icy breeze
Catching a glimpse of the water
In the icy calm of Delaware...
Preface
Hessians and Brits
Were in their rightful wits
They were jostling for another win
After losing New York
For Washington, it meant the ****
"Victory or Death" so it seemed
The American Plan
Historians say we were 3000 troops short
But, I say we were 2400 brave men up
The crossing of the Delaware River
Became the manoeuvre of the 18th century
December 26, 1776
The whistling of winds amidst wailing bloodied soldiers
The fury of gunfire ripping the chests of a hundred Hessians
The command of American advancement with 2400 troops
All led to cover taken behind the Trenton houses
By the British stooges
The End Of Hessian Troops
Germans had become notorious for drinking
And by now
Their senses had yielded
And the night had redacted their bloodthirst
One must say,
Warriors glance and prospect
Winners celebrate and revel
Americans were about to
Descend unto sudden death without suspicion or suspect
However, with sudden death comes everlasting glory
For example, a battle of belligerence depicted by Emanuel Leutze in "Washington Crossing The Delaware"
That was the Battle of Trenton, my friends at Hello Poetry
Feb 25, 2019
Feb 25, 2019 at 4:45 PM UTC