"horseman" poems
The tavern roof was smokey
with a pall of blueish ash.
The juke box was a- booming
as it played "The Monster Mash".
A giant puffed a burning witch
whilst smoke rings he exhaled....
While victims of our neighbor,
Vlad...on stakes were all impaled.
The Faceless Man was grinning...
from ear to missing ear.
The hanged man turned his twisted neck
to sip a mug of beer.
The Headless Horseman shouted
for an aspirin or three.
He popped them down his gullet
where his head was meant to be.
The zombies waited tables
and the werewolf tended bar.
Mothra was the carhop
and took orders car to car.
Godzilla worked the griddle
and served burgers ala carte.
Dracula complained about the steak
caught in his heart.
Ghosts and ghouls were dancing
with abandon on the stage
While cyborgs did "the robot"
'cause they thought it was the rage.
The mummy came unraveled
as we took him for a "spin"
As Frankenstein played tuba
to contribute to the din.
Igor brought "the monster"
and then Freddie brought his claw.
Jason brought his butcher knife
and his buddy from "The Saw".
The guillotine was working
and the raven refereed
So nevermore would pardons
be
allowed to intercede.
The pendulum was swinging
to the beating of my heart.
I hoped that I would wake up soon...
then did so...with a START!
Halloween is coming. So, I guess
I should prepare.
Watch out for bars with men from Mars...
'cause BEASTIES party there!
Oct 23, 2017
Oct 23, 2017 at 6:45 AM UTC
All I do is win, for I'm an Ace
Painting a bulls-eye on everyone in the place
In my plane I leave everyone else
bailing out of the fight in disgrace
If I was a horseman, I'd be War
'Cuz like the card game
I win against Kings and Queens
and take them out of the deck
like the Joker on the sidelines, alone and bored.
I don't need a Diamond to win you Heart,
and I don't wanna join your Club,
this was skill and not luck from the very start
I am the Ace of Spades,
and I'll use my ***** to dig out your graves
I've been painted on the sides of planes
cars and trains
helicopters, submarines,
and the munitions that deal out the pain
I'm a trick shot Ace with the pool stick
As a quarterback, I've yet to throw a pick
As a pitcher, I make the other team sick
The starter and the backup plan
the Ultimate Ace in the Hole
The best card in a poker hand
lay me down and the money's in the bag
I run solo, streaking across the land
You only need to hold me in your hand
and your enemies will become ****
and I'll give 'em a taste
of this whirling dervish's mace
Leave them breathless upon the ground
as I rob the air from out of this place
you'll stand in awe of my greatness
take a picture, make a statue
Fill up every empty space with my name
For I am an Ace!
Oct 5, 2011
Oct 5, 2011 at 2:39 AM UTC
I take my imaginary pen
I write down my anger
I close my eyes and count to ten
just to breathe a little longer
It's laughable really
when I see you justifying
Sure, you're all touchy-feely
only goodwill, so hard-trying
When you said that to me
where was your heart at?
Why calling me your better-half-to-be
when all you wanted was a shoulder pat?
Oh you, with your wonderful poetry,
oh, lies so beautifully written down
please just stop, you don't know no poverty
in your emerald sea everything you wanted me to believe is to drown
I never thought you would make me think
the worst of you instead
And I swear I could only stand and stare and shrink
when you didn't care to lose your head
Now you haunt me like the headless horseman
and you will forever
but I do not worry for my sanity, oh boy of thoughts turned cyan
I walked with ghosts before and a headless one is so less clever
And if you ever come back looking for this head of yours
Think twice, try a little bit harder wannabe
It might stick out of the sand at your emerald sea shores
Your love for me was never poetry
Jul 8, 2018
Jul 8, 2018 at 11:06 AM UTC
a lake of blood is promised
homes fill with fiber optic prophecy.
"put away your lenses children and sleep under the lamp's shade."
our purple rice growing
Vishnu mumbles and stirs in his sleep.
by the crystal pond, a poison frog sings.
decorating the sand and reeds are skeletons of the old wars.
nearly dust now.
unable to make decisions for the weak or young, the strong or the old.
four seasons yet to pass
attention given to the wolf's lonesome cry.
place your head in sand,
witness the scorpion.
she is
emperor and admonisher.
the tiger breathes in and breathes out its final breath.
lay your belly upon wheat and remove hunger.
an angel's velvet wing cools the fever,
the old sickness of Old Salem.
onions, apples & lemons are sprouting.
there, just underneath the horseman's hood.
quickly, look.
Sep 9, 2018
Sep 9, 2018 at 1:24 PM UTC
WASHINGTON IRVING WROTE A NOVEL
ABOUT ICHABOD CRANE
LITTLE SLEEPY HOLLOW
WILL NEVER BE THE SAME
LITTLE SLEEPY HOLLOW WAS CURSED
BY A HORSEMAN MOST DREAD
HE WAS RIDING IN SLEEPY HOLLOW
IN SEARCH OF HIS HEAD
THE HEADLESS HORSEMAN WAS
IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR
SO FOR HIM SEARCHING FOR HIS HEAD
WAS NEVER A CHORE
ICHABOD CRANE WAS
A TEACHER MOST STRICT
WEATHER THE GHOST STORIES WERE TRUE
WHO COULD EVER PREDICT
ICHABOD TEACHES THE CHILDREN
OF FARMERS IN THE VILLAGE
BUT ITS THE YOUNG GIRLS OF FARMERS
HE SECRETLY WANTS TOO PILLAGE
KATRINA VAN TASSEL A
BEAUTIFUL YOUNG STUDENT
ICHABOD FALLS IN LOVE WITH HER
BUT WAS IT VERY PRUDENT
HE WAS INVITED TO THE TASSELS
FOR A PARTY MOST RARE
KATRINA AT THE PARTY
DISMISSES HIS WITHOUT CARE
ICHABOD LEAVES THAT NIGHT
ON HIS HORSE HE RIDES
ITS AN EERILY DARK PATH
HIS HORSE DOSE STRIDE
ICHABOD IS SCARED AND SEES
A LARGE DARK MAN
HE YELLS TO THE STRANGER
AS LOUD AS HE CAN
SO ICHABOD RIDES SCARED AND FAST
BUT ALONG SIDE COMES THE MAN
NOT WILLING TOO PASS
ICHABOD NOTICES THE RIDER
REALLY HAS NO HEAD
THIS JUST FILLS ICHABOD
WITH THE MOST SINFUL DREAD
ICHABOD AND THE STRANGER
RACE TO THE TOWN CHURCH
FOR THIS IS WHERE THE GHOST STORIES
FIRST CAME TO BIRTH
ICHABOD RACES TO THE BRIDGE
AND NERVOUSLY LOOKS BACK
THE STRANGER HAS DISAPPEARED
OFF THE GHOSTLY TRACK
BUT HE NOTICES THE STRANGER
HIS HEAD HE DOSE HURL
ICHABOD FALLS OF THE HORSE
HIS WORLD IS IN A WHIRL
THE NEXT DAY ICHABOD'S
HORSE FINALLY RETURNS HOME
WHERE IS ICHABOD
WHERE DID HE ROAM
THEY LOOK FOR ICHABOD
AND FIND HOOF PRINTS
AND ICHABOD'S HAT
SO NOW THE FOLKLORE IS BORN
IN SLEEPY HOLLOW THAT'S THAT
" WISDOM IS LIKE MANURE IT'S NO GOOD UNLESS IT'S SPREAD AROUND ENCOURAGING OTHERS TO GROW"
Mar 2, 2017
Mar 2, 2017 at 5:47 PM UTC
"A patient man bides his time,"
Theodore tells the man in the mirror
Tomorrow, all the levees will break
And all the fables will be told
Of distant Decembers and forgotten fathers
Livelihoods will be threatened
And remorse will fall by the wayside
He watches as icicles on the awning
Melt away into puddles on the ground
"Warmer every day," he thinks to himself
He hangs up his scarf and overcoat
The way a simple man, with complex demons, is wont to do
And as his wants devolve into needs
And as all his anchors deteriorate to rust
Her smile unnerves a once-settled man
To think of the quality of glove necessary
To hold onto the wagon in this day and age
So Theodore pulls the door to,
Leaving Chopin's "Horseman" to gallop in peace
And in pieces
He watches her from across the courtyard
"Such sweet bliss in her footsteps," he sighs
And it seems to him as if the snow dissipates
Just from the warmth in her steady gait
Just from the radiation behind her brown eyes
He slides open the dresser drawer
A haven for scattered trinkets, odds, and ends
A place of respite for the weary souvenir
There, amidst all the corroded memories
Lies a corroded pistol, unspoken and unburnished
"And a lonely man drinks his wine,"
Theodore says, as intrepidly as he is capable
For there is a time when fathers stop teaching
A time when mothers stop singing
And a place where the sins stop searching
A last breath is deeply inhaled
But never again will find its escape
With a thud that echoes to Seymour Street
Theodore crumples to the cold wooden floor,
A simple man, finally free of complex demons
Jan 25, 2023
Jan 25, 2023 at 1:19 PM UTC
The moon came into the forge
in her bustle of flowering nard.
The little boy stares at her, stares.
The boy is starting hard.
In the shaken air
the moon moves her arms,
and shows lubricious and pure,
her ******* of hard tin.
"Moon, moon, moon, run!
If the gypsies come,
they will use your heart
to make white necklaces and rings."
"Let me dance, my little one.
When the gypsies come,
they'll find you on the anvil
with your lively eyes closed tight."
"Moon, moon, moon, run!
I can feelheir horses come."
"Let me by, my little one,
don't step on me, all starched and white!"
Closer comes the horseman,
drumming on the plain.
The boy is in the forge;
his eyes are closed.
Through the olive grove
comes the gypsies, dream and bronze,
their heads held high,
their hooded eyes.
Oh, how the night owl calls,
calling, calling from its tree!
The moon is climbing through the sky
with the child by the hand.
They are crying in the forge,
all the gypsies, shouting, crying.
The air is viewing all, views all.
The air is at the viewing.
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They are silent and beautiful,
gorgeous in in the white halo,
cemented in a beautiful terrazzo,
baring the names of fallen soldiers,
the European soldiers that fell in Wars;
second and first and the heinous silent wars,
i hope this is why they have a proverb; white sepulchre,
only baring the white dead, only chiefs but no dead Indian.
Common wealth graveyards are all over in Africa,
in India , panama , Latin America and europe,
the active fronts in which the allies fought ******
they are beautifully placed in silently posh areas,
in langata when in Nairobi, in Mbaraki when in Mombasa,
in Matisi when in Kenya, In Namusungui when in Lodwar,
They bear horizontal silence with white names engraved
on their beautiful face shouting the glory of European empires,
which provoked the evil sense in the heart of the king's horseman
in Kenya, in the city of Nairobi, to steal the graveyard lands,
he made them his urban home with an uppish courtyard,
for him the dead white neighbours are better than in-corruption.
I walk around the commonwealth graveyards,
in the all quarters of erstwhile British empire,
looking for the names of African soldiers ,
who died in thousands fighting for the queen
the royal bloodied woman of England;Elizabeth,
Looking for the sons of Ethiopia who stood with
the second duce Benito son of Mussolini,
fighting for Hitler,for Shintos in the European war,
i have seen no name of any African,
I have not seen Wandabwa wa masibo,
who was conscripted into the first world war,
Along with his father Biket wa Khayongo,
Biket back after seven years in 1918,
carrying Wandabwa's Belt,
Wandabwa died in the field,
Where was he buried, he is nowhere
Not anywhere among the soldiers in cemeteries,
I have not seen Nasong'o wa Khayongo,
who was conscripted in 1940,
to fight against ******
he was conscripted on his nuptial evening,
even before he had had the first ***
with his new wife, he went away crying,
he never came back, his name is nowhere in the graves
the commonwealth graves that bare names of the fallen,
Fallen soldiers, but they all bare white names in the black world.
you come to Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, Malagasy,Egypt,
whatever the geographies of Africa, and you keep keen,
you hear someone is called Mr. Keya, or Madam Keya,
or you come to Bungoma county of Kenya,
you meet a man that is of the circumcision age group,
Known as Bakikwameti Keya, Bakinyikewi Musolini,
Keya is subverted sound for Kings african rivals; KAR
the African sound for KAR is Keya,
in reference to mass conscription of Africans
into the KAR, to fight ******
A child born during that time is Keya,
A man circumcised during the time
is in the age group of Keya,
A simple lesson in regard to our people,
taken away to fight the colonial power
and left to died and rot away in the bush
with a simple courtesy for ceremonial burial,
that come along with the death of soldiers,
who passed away in the battle field.
Sep 1, 2014
Sep 1, 2014 at 4:13 AM UTC
In the Fall is an addicted man;
a bronzed, beautiful, golden-crimson leaf
falling perhaps
as an impulse or a slight of hand,
as a half-thought will to escape the cold
but ultimately, an addiction
In the Fall
is a view from a distance and a height
with clear vision;
and a flirty nod
from your most tortuous insecurity
to your least confident self -
smoldering nostalgia,
that sullen, sable shade,
is the headless horse man
and you are lost at night
(as burnt leaves crumple
and are swept around,
as are you swept)
In the Fall is
Death's anniversary;
the dance that follows purity's last
attempt to hold his season fast
er than the horseman rides,
rise, beguile!
a swollen heart -
a lion!
a bronzed and rusted bleeding lion!
a shiver and a sunken sigh,
an unseen, unheard wave good-bye
May 21, 2012
May 21, 2012 at 8:07 PM UTC
we leave by passing through.
by outlasting
roots.
by grooming deep runes
like arabian
horses....
mountainous [ pontoons ]
spine crack
liqueur
of soft doom
and true Orchids...
the ******** aftermath of covenants
at half mast
a limp flag of jolly rogers
pettifogging
dull noggins.
we pass through, phantom roosters
ante-Bantam
in the Bedlam....
Conscience
Chauntecleer
as
Opaque.
our blood has new boots
and now our hearts
can Mussolini
{ you strangle The Headless Horseman; as i lust for your Ichabod }
no cranes.
Apr 11, 2013
Apr 11, 2013 at 8:54 AM UTC
“I’m *****
That flirty rejoinder floats
over your disappearing
shoulder.
Thirty plus
years form the chasm
between us;
mine battered, distressed,
faded as an old picture frame;
the remainder of
yours a potential masterpiece--
highway to many horizons
with no vanishing point.
I am no more this man
before you than
I am the Fourth Horseman.
Certainly you see through
my fraud of calm indifference
and practiced control.
No beating I’ve taken
compares with that
my heart is doing right now,
remembered in a glimpse
of your legs
in ***** black stockings,
now walking away
in loose work jeans,
brushing dust
from everywhere.
Sep 17, 2010
Sep 17, 2010 at 9:31 AM UTC
He truly loved the purple sun, descending from the hills,
The ways through the woods, the singing blackbird
And the joys of green.
Sombre was his dwelling in the shadows of the tree
And his face undefiled.
God, a tender flame, spoke to his heart:
Oh son of man!
Silently his step turned to the city in the evening;
A mysterious complaint fell from his lips:
“I shall become a horseman.”
But bush and beast did follow his ways
To the pale people’s house and garden at dusk,
And his murderer sought after him.
Spring and summer and – oh so beautiful – the fall
Of the righteous. His silent steps
Passed by the dark rooms of the dreamers.
At night he and his star dwelled alone.
He saw the snow fall on bare branches
And in the murky doorway the assassin’s shadow.
Silvern sank the unborne’s head.
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Among the taller wood with ivy hung,
The old fox plays and dances round her young.
She snuffs and barks if any passes by
And swings her tail and turns prepared to fly.
The horseman hurries by, she bolts to see,
And turns agen, from danger never free.
If any stands she runs among the poles
And barks and snaps and drive them in the holes.
The shepherd sees them and the boy goes by
And gets a stick and progs the hole to try.
They get all still and lie in safety sure,
And out again when everything’s secure,
And start and snap at blackbirds bouncing by
To fight and catch the great white butterfly.
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When he was a youth of fifteen or twenty,
He chased a wild horse, he caught him and rode him,
He shot the white-browed mountain tiger,
He defied the yellow-bristled Horseman of Ye.
Fighting single- handed for a thousand miles,
With his naked dagger he could hold a multitude.
...Granted that the troops of China were as swift as heaven's thunder
And that Tartar soldiers perished in pitfalls fanged with iron,
General Wei Qing's victory was only a thing of chance.
And General Li Guang's thwarted effort was his fate, not his fault.
Since this man's retirement he is looking old and worn:
Experience of the world has hastened his white hairs.
Though once his quick dart never missed the right eye of a bird,
Now knotted veins and tendons make his left arm like an osier.
He is sometimes at the road-side selling melons from his garden,
He is sometimes planting willows round his hermitage.
His lonely lane is shut away by a dense grove,
His vacant window looks upon the far cold mountains
But, if he prayed, the waters would come gushing for his men
And never would he wanton his cause away with wine.
...War-clouds are spreading, under the Helan Range;
Back and forth, day and night, go feathered messages;
In the three River Provinces, the governors call young men --
And five imperial edicts have summoned the old general.
So he dusts his iron coat and shines it like snow-
Waves his dagger from its jade hilt in a dance of starry steel.
He is ready with his strong northern bow to smite the Tartar chieftain --
That never a foreign war-dress may affront the Emperor.
...There once was an aged Prefect, forgotten and far away,
Who still could manage triumph with a single stroke.
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The road was a ghostly ribbon:
a strange violet hue.
The sycamore trees ******** thrashing
as a frenzied wind blew.
A dark cloaked horseman
appeared on the horizon’s edge.
He whipped his horse forward;
this horse almost flew.
The pounding hooves echoed
down the cobbled road.
The madman charged forward
with his deadly load.
They never caught the horseman
who murdered her father that night.
He shot his pistol once then the old man died.
No're was he ever seen again
after the red cobbles dried.
They never found his stallion
with nostrils flaming fire'
who flew like a dragon
until the prey expired.
The girl wept and moaned
at her window. Always watching for him.
Watching the winding road ;she could redeem his sin.
A kiss my darling sweetheart, kiss and let me fly.
His shadow was imprinted on clean cobbles.
His scarf around her neck but nothing made things right.
The devil surely wanted him
and death breathed down his trek.
They searched swearing they'd catch the wretch yet found
no trace of him. The girl she smiled sadly.
For now he rode the wind.
Jul 3, 2010
Jul 3, 2010 at 8:28 PM UTC
Because I am mad about women
I am mad about the hills,'
Said that wild old wicked man
Who travels where God wills.
"Not to die on the straw at home.
Those hands to close these eyes,
That is all I ask, my dear,
From the old man in the skies.
Daybreak and a candle-end.
"Kind are all your words, my dear,
Do not the rest withhold.
Who can know the year, my dear,
when an old man's blood grows cold? '
I have what no young man can have
Because he loves too much.
Words I have that can pierce the heart,
But what can he do but touch?'
Daybreak and a candle-end.
Then Said she to that wild old man,
His stout stick under his hand,
"Love to give or to withhold
Is not at my command.
I gave it all to an older man:
That old man in the skies.
Hands that are busy with His beads
Can never close those eyes.'
Daybreak and a candle-end.
"Go your ways, O go your ways,
I choose another mark,
Girls down on the seashore
Who understand the dark;
***** talk for the fishermen;
A dance for the fisher-lads;
When dark hangs upon the water
They turn down their beds.
Daybreak and a candle-end.
"A young man in the dark am I,
But a wild old man in the light,
That can make a cat laugh, or
Can touch by mother wit
Things hid in their marrow-bones
From time long passed away,
Hid from all those warty lads
That by their bodies lay.
Dayhreak and a candle-end.
"All men live in suffering,
I know as few can know,
Whether they take the upper road
Or stay content on the low,
Rower bent in his row-boat
Or weaver bent at his loom,
Horseman ***** upon horseback
Or child hid in the womb.
Daybreak and a candlc-cnd.
"That some stream of lightning
From the old man in the skies
Can burn out that suffering
No right-taught man denies.
But a coarse old man am I,
I choose the second-best,
I forget it all awhile
Upon a woman's breast.'
Daybreak and a candlc-end.
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The storm– she will come,
Oh- by the roar of the drum,
The boom of the beat–
Now cometh defeat,
Four seals are now shattered,
The ground will be battered,
Come forth thy lost line,
Thou shall face His divine…
The sky opened to set them free–
The creature like thunder: “Come and See!”
Foremost in the lead–
Upon the White steed–
Arrow of the Bow,
All obstruction fall low,
Striking the weaker down–
The fire glistens about his crown,
Above all the rest,
Behold all victory; CONQUEST…
The bizarre of the steeds–
The color that bleeds–
A Fiery red that burns in the eyes,
As each soldier dies–
The civil war spark,
As if for a lark!
In the fight of the four,
The second is WAR…
Come and See! Come and See!
Now the count is to three,
The black horse doth ride,
The third horseman as guide,
The hand bears balance not gore–
The sole vocal of four;
“…And see thou hurt not the oil and the wine”
The third–oh the third–John! The third is FAMINE…
Oh the horror– the horror– the fire filled eyes!
All that follows in path now simply just dies,
The pale green beast is a savage- a monster- no heart,
The ending- the rebirth- the salvation doth start,
The fourth rider tears– ravaging all the land,
The unholy Reaper with scythe in it’s hand!
The harvester hath expelled mankind’s final breath–
With Hell at the rear– the fourth and final is DEATH…
The war now to heaven and Hell now to Earth,
The charcoals are black and red hot in the hearth,
Cast forth by the Lion of Judah- the Lamb of the Lord!
With all of existence- the Divine became bored,
The Harbingers of the Last Judgment- the servants divine,
The living creatures cometh to steal all hope from thine,
Cometh One then come Two from the mythical Seal,
Cometh Three then come Four from the seven rumored to be real…
CONQUEST– the archer- the first rider of pure WHITE,
Crown capped with unholy deception of light…
WAR– the swordsman- the second rider of fiery RED,
Blood and betrayal as thou mark thy brother dead…
FAMINE– the balance- the third rider of pitch BLACK,
Food and resources all man will soon lack…
DEATH– the reaper- the fourth rider of pale GREEN,
Hell guiding scythe ridding Earth of all souls unclean…
The horsemen they triumph in biblical tale–
Consider an alternate story and detail,
Think not of no hope in the book Revelation,
Rather- imagine the truth of a war of no rotation,
The power unbalanced to alter dimension,
A different battle scene with a similar intention…
– Written By: Jacob Coffey –
*********************************
Just my take on a Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Hope you enjoyed it!
– Jacob Coffey
Nov 17, 2013
Nov 17, 2013 at 7:30 PM UTC
I
I never saw a mountain move
by the pure grace of love,
But by desire, I saw a continent
dragged to the tip of the sun.
I saw the sea raising its current,
trying to ****** some star,
like the blood in your stream,
while someone else made love to you.
And I lost the will to live,
and the desire to die
chained to your altar.
And the hummingbird
he put on your lips,
it splattered you of freedom,
but in its hum you found a prision
for two pigeons with no course,
for the canary I left in your hand.
and it was not from love, it was of pure desire
that you opened your mouth and closed your fist.
And I lost the desire to die,
and the will to live
Chained to your altar,
As if there was no other God!
That I could worship
As if there was no other God!
To which I could kneel
As if there was no other God!
II
All these men on the pedestal,
and if each one is given a cross,
How many gods will we praise?
How many won't be dead Christs ?
How many won't be stained sheets?
How many, on Easter Sunday
will not even face God? Goodbye.
I opened my mouth and I created you a universe,
I showed you the tiger and the dove,
I planted on your chest an ivy and a rose,
I watered you of morning and sun,
and still, you preferred to go down to hell,
with the loneliness, the bone and the shadow
a snake and a red moon
For his tired eyes,
for his bitter smile,
for his brown hair,
and hands that had never touched you,
and a horseman that won't ride you,
a street on which you never cried before,
and any other meridian time.
For some other Adam
that galloped away
from a paradise he did not find in your summer,
a string of few beads
that is embedded in the ground where I bloomed,
where a tree of blood and prayer grows,
that in each fruit bears my flesh
and the seed of another God.
Apr 15, 2013
Apr 15, 2013 at 11:55 AM UTC
If you ask him he will talk for hours--
how at fourteen he hammered signs, fingers
raw with cold, and later painted bowers
in ladies' boudoirs; how he played checkers
for two weeks in jail, and lived on dark bread;
how he fled the border to a country
which disappeared wars ago; unfriended
crossed a continent while this century
began. He seldom speaks of painting now.
Young men have time and theories; old men work.
He has painted countless portraits. Sallow
nameless faces, made glistening in oil, smirk
above anonymous mantelpieces.
The turpentine has a familiar smell,
but his hand trembles with odd, new palsies.
Perched on the maulstick, it nears the easel.
He has come to like his resignation.
In his sketch books, ink-dark cossacks hear
the snorts of horses in the crunch of snow.
His pen alone recalls that years ago,
one horseman set his teeth and aimed his spear
which, poised, seemed pointed straight to pierce the sun.
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an impurity
inherent or invasive,
identity, purpose, all unresolved,
substantive, long-lived, minute sized,
flexible, formed, yet more,
clearly shapelessly, so well visible
we'll disguise it
to survive it
without passport, an émigré
illegally legal border invasive,
but somehow more knowledgable
of the unmapped byways within,
more than me - how can that be?
never motionless, indeed,
always hurried, even when energy gathering,
despite it's detailed timetable,
detailing plentiful stops and
interminable unexplained
screeching wailings,
it has no smooth gliding,
nor rumbling grumbling halting,
to a final destination imprinted
this impurity,
a beheaded brainy horseman
searching for what,
I'm not permissioned,
unquenchable questioning,
all I am allowed is
sensory
surceasingly, unseasonably seeking
the undresser,
the verisign
of veritas
eyes mirrored reversal internal,
you can't understand why finishing
this poem is so hard
because you don't want to
confess this
impious impurity,
no étranger, it is but
copious insecurity,
of the all of you,
the ecstasy of
the rushing,
the upsetting,
universal unique to us, you,
unholy, ecclesiastical, catholic,
that impurity is just
the heart pumping the
mottled blood of
life coursing through your words
and out your fingertips,
onto those
stained drumsticks
used
to play the keyboard alphabet
about an
out-of-tempo
impure ecstasy
Mar 29, 2015
Mar 29, 2015 at 11:33 AM UTC
When behind closed doors, in slumbers’ shackle bound
Weary eyes dream in bliss, the world makes no sound
He’s out on round to reach each door in hunt of his man
His face unseen but he sees them all, the hooded horseman!
One night he stopped at a door on hearing a painful moan
The agony in it was so intense, melted his heart of stone
He went in to find a man, in pain’s utter anguish
Mumbling ‘o god have pity on me take me away please’!
The hooded man greatly moved asked him what’s the cause
The streaming sobs of his painful cry was in what remorse
All the while as he said these words, never took of his hood
For he couldn’t, knowing it well, it would do the man no good!
The man replied ‘in my ripe old age I’m left alone
With ailments, without a care, as all my own are gone,
So I asked god to take me off, I can’t bear it anymore
Staying alive with crumbling bones and festering bedsores!
The hooded man said ‘wait a while, let me see to it,
If it’s there, your name, features in tonight’s list,
He scanned it hard then shook his head ‘nothing I can do,
There’re names galore for outbound trip, not one of them is you’!
Saying thus he mounted his horse, here he was needed no more
The hooded horseman on his ceaseless errand, galloped to another door!
Sep 15, 2013
Sep 15, 2013 at 4:58 AM UTC
There's one cat who meows
in the alleyway but mimics
a fowl dog who ate
larval staged meat. There's
two headless horseman
racking leaves to find their heads
that teenagers rolled
down the country hills.
there's three furry bears
in a cave testing hardness and
softness while four bats
hang backwards to avoid the light. The
five cowgirls had six cowboy hats
each exactly. They're going to run
out if they keep throwing them at
groups of seven boys. Eight dentist chairs
were rolled onto stage so the
nine musketeers,
multiplied by three,
could get ten root canals.
The doctor said he could have
given eleven more of them
but he heard twelve whimpers
of pain and gave up. There were
thirteen bounced checks and fourteen wrinkled
foreheads who were lost in eternity
for fifteen years. Sixteen world banks
filed bankruptcy to drive dollars down.
Seventeen hands were squeezed
from an angel holding glowing
red lips. eighteen hearts and
brains switched spots
anatomically leaving nineteen
grown men sprawled on the
ground like they drank twenty
or so too many.
Nov 3, 2012
Nov 3, 2012 at 10:28 PM UTC
I am but a leech, desecrating in lilly glossed waters;
Clotting beautiful beads, like bracelets, across wet flesh.
Desire is a horseman in this world, coming to close the curtains on the day.
Why stop? For lashes from the scepter that was to guide us?
Fractured and rotten; yet we still cling for a taste of a crumb of the life once held within it's dead trunk.
Death. But an old friend and a forgotten enemy greedily tickling this slicken frame.
Fingers float tempting whispers to my every nerve and I long for my senses to set ablaze in those writhing clutches
Screaming from inside for release that teases and tingles like the ****** that never comes. Shaken and slightly shrunken
Light blazes at the doors, searing and scorching the very flesh that holds a withered frame
No longer seeking escape,
I slither back to the darkness I seem to have forgotten was home once before
Jul 9, 2022
Jul 9, 2022 at 7:07 AM UTC
The clouds whirl around horns of the gate.
The blush of the morning is tangerine
and gold. The blossoming chorus from the bay
for now is just silence, fog and a silver lining.
The cinema bulbs are flickering out.
There is Coca-Cola in my soul.
There is anguish in my bones.
Luxury paid for the tightness of my skin
and an artifice of love.
It blew away like dry grass.
I think God is a librarian,
crumbs in his beard, fingerprinted specs.
Cataloguing the hours I spent on my knees
his matinée idol, his evening sandcastle,
stones applauding his work in the Cali tide.
What can he do to me?
Witchdoctors can forecast rain from my guts.
A poor wading bird can fish me up
and photograph my corpse iconic like Evelyn Hale,
but that 'man' can do nothing…
I see the Island rising from the mist
like it’s throwing off its coat.
I’m like the birdman, in my way.
I’ll be remembered
flying.
Perhaps I can even make it magnificent?
The boys on the boat will talk over their beers
of that triple tuck swan dive,
the acrobat, a harlequin that tumbled
like a shadow on the rising sun
Kamikaze, I Samauri!
The war drum beats, on, on but I’m done.
l am in the eye of the storm.
I am the harbinger, the horseman -
And the universe is a ball in my hands.
I made you up, I’ll rub you out.
The sky is holding the Sun and the Moon.
5am. Circling gulls. Harikiri.
Machinery rings upwards through the girders.
Equinox. Tomorrow is untouchable.
Nov 13, 2015
Nov 13, 2015 at 10:21 AM UTC