Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
The earth was sown with early flowers,
  The heavens were blue and bright--
I met a youthful cavalier
  As lovely as the light.
I knew him not--but in my heart
  His graceful image lies,
And well I marked his open brow,
  His sweet and tender eyes,
His ruddy lips that ever smiled,
  His glittering teeth betwixt,
And flowing robe embroidered o'er,
  With leaves and blossoms mixed.
He wore a chaplet of the rose;
  His palfrey, white and sleek,
Was marked with many an ebon spot,
  And many a purple streak;
Of jasper was his saddle-bow,
  His housings sapphire stone,
And brightly in his stirrup glanced
  The purple calcedon.
Fast rode the gallant cavalier,
  As youthful horsemen ride;
"Peyre Vidal! know that I am Love,"
  The blooming stranger cried;
"And this is Mercy by my side,
  A dame of high degree;
This maid is Chastity," he said,
  "This squire is Loyalty."
the charm of French Colonial style
   with Cajun cooking promised -"genuine!" -
   at every second door
jazz bands at every other

the flair of well-groomed wealth and savoir vivre
   exuding from St. Charles´ porticos,
   the restaurants on Calle du Roi,
the campuses of Tulane, UNO, and Loyola

the grandeur of the superdome
the open space of Audubon and City Park
   oakes draped with Spanish Moss
alive with jogging, skating, biking, walking health
   between the nights -

all this makes you almost forget
the city project housings
slumming beneath the highrise business shadows
   crime ridden,
floating on neverending waves of dime-a-dozen tunes
from hi-fi stereos of cruising cars

the grand lake spoiled for generations
with the big city's waste,
the 'father of rivers' dwarfed beyond repair
by wharfs and cranes and fortified embankments
that line his banks as far as you can see
   and far beyond

a shotgun wedding of the rich and poor,
   the black and white,
   torn by the struggle to ascend
   from shotgun to colonial
to the soft sound of dixie

              * *
Written 20 years before Katrina ...

In N.O., a "shotgun" is a house thats has all rooms in one line - so you could shoot through all with one shot.
Martin Narrod Jan 2017
L'heure verte

The mountains. The heaps of their bountiful gravels, and earth, and soil, large oversized masses of half-frozen water teetering on the precipice of subzero masculine *******. Francophilic cleavage jetting out of this deserted white pastoral dressing. The inaugural bawl, wanton fixations of putting the imperialist foot on every spot of tree, each and every shrub, until the limbs' cast reaches each dimple that foliage braves, where that blue eagle of patriotism dredges its claws to form every river, rill, estuary, creek, channel, flume, littoral, and waterway where the iron-rich gullies once brimmed in the interamnian basins, rich crimsony waters riffling through fruitful and extravagant aquifers. Beyond that, where an inexplicably feral wind rips vines from their dendritic housings, where barely an eye can see, this place of exsanguination and abysmal phytocide.

At the end of this lamentable torture, only a desert of human interest remains. There is no reason to laugh, or smile, or cheer, or put a leg up, to call on a friend, or to have ice cream. There will be no more ice cream. There is only the loathsome incredulousness and avarice in the semblances and familiarity of those with whom we thought we once knew. Little can ever be known, for there is much to gain in the absence of knowledge, and even greater that can be acquired in the alms of wisdom through patient examination and thorough silence. Here on the buttes and cornices, the thwacking gavels of evil power deities throw down their lust for more and soon become adjoined to these grand discrepancies greed mistakenly loses to a lack of awareness and to self-aggrandizement.

Power is the weapon of inexperienced wielders. Passion is the immortal frequency that is worn by artisans and artists, poets and painters, it is the business of quietness to learnedly evolve to protect our tomorrows from personal needs, but to instead preserve the integral parts of society. The words of languages, artifacts, and cultures, rather than the skeletons of ****** and the deeds of possession. Each who sleeps knows their bedfellows to equally be at peace. For no wealth can exceed that of comfortable pillows, soft quilts, and sheets. We are all the same while we sleep.
Viseract May 2016
A dark and stormy day
Stone-walled house and creaky floorboards
Rain tapping all the windows, streaking them,
As the windows shudder in their housings

A high, keening wind
Clap of thunder and a drawer being opened
The cutlery inside rattling
As the drawer comes to rest

A roving and admiring eye
So wet, reflecting the dull silver sheen
Sizing up the pain within
And the size of the blade to release it

A lightning bolt outside the window
Causes him to look up, through the pelting rain
At his own reflection, to the dark hair
And those sad, sad eyes

He tilts his head a little, wondering
Just how good a scar would look
To beautify what is the exact opposite
And decides, for the time being, against it

The front door bangs open,
Footsteps in the hall
Resisting that encompassing impulse,
He drops the blade, the butcher knife, back in
The drawer

"You need any help, Mother?"
A story, not about me (for once, you self-centred so-and-so) but just a story. Let me know what you think of it. Please, any and all criticism is welcome
neth jones Sep 2021
exterior
                summer night
streets                            
city                                                            ­
unwelcomely cast                    
                               with blighted solution
an abrasive wash on the senses
like an orange filter                                        
                                    of muted television static
everything is one lit shade                                  
                         ­                    budged shy of a reality

streets city
pried                    
        between the housings                 
          the baked on drain spoilage    
             munched under my tread
dwelling units weigh
                 loud down above me

beat in silence
             no one alights balconies            
a clustered population bulk
no one shares light in this building
             and no one is known to their neighbour

anxious of their fellows                          
they coil
around their trusted genitalia
      soundly
              and despise
Death-throws Jun 2015
She made me ,you know.
Remove blades from their housings
And sheath my soul.
Drive knifes and daggers into her back.
Part the flesh from bone.
Coward she cried. But gritting her teath for more
Shed lie here on on my bed. Or sprawled across the floor
Shed block my paths out.
My routes through the doors
She would make me harm herself
When she couldn't any more
machina miller Nov 2016
simulacra interstitial reformation propaganda hurricane forced news stories partially undid blouses puritanical snow of virtue come meritocratic beauty pageant marketing scheme ergo logos ergo proxy,


the rain stops after ever so long the natural wonder that once expanded before a scathing innervation now terrifies me that which is most natural feels alien as we are consumed by destructive urges


all is fine the president elect bids you good night if one stands all must stand if one falls all must stand we are them, they are not we they are them, they are not


when time stills the last drop falls the mystics will chant the totem is defamed the public will riot the idols corrupted the public rioting when louder and louder we shout harder they fall there is no brokerage there is no remorse the agenda ruthlessness abets ruthlessness


heresy heresy scream ****** gore cries the alternative apostate as the writhing throng holds aloft born again citizens of the state live love the state grand overarching messianic typification bred of indignation give gluttony give sacrifice and all stab through the iris of all those winking third eyes the wall of fire hundreds of metres tall tsunami crushing all deplorables sent swimming through the city wipe the slate Mr. Clean the state of the filth,


let all who whisper lie furtive in the darkness, for anew in the light they will hang at the gallows marching forth unbowed the eruption leaves fertile soil hail all hail hail or sink in the mire as the housings of the pantheon are built atop the sepulchral delta
J M Surgent Aug 2013
I think I can honestly say
I loathe you,
-If you even know what that means-
For keeping me here,
Trapping me there,
With promises of foreign affairs
When I could have lived
In such lavish housings
And seen the world
With mine own eyes
Ten times brighter
Than this screen on my computer
Ever could display.
With the photographs my own,
Memories in mind,
I could have lived a life
So far beyond your lies.
From the seafront to the portal,
I am surrounded by mountains.
From the portal to the housings,
I am surrounded by mountains.
From the housing to the Parade square,
I am surrounded by mountains.
From the Parade square to the mesh hall,
I am surrounded by mountains.
From the mesh hall to the laundry room,
I am surrounded by mountains.
From the laundry room to the barracks,
I am surrounded by mountains.
From the Barracks to the medic room,
I am surrounded by mountains.
From the medic room to the regimental police boot,
I am surrounded by mountains.
From the regimental police boot where all the RPs salute,
I am surrounded by mountains.
The entire military base and personnel's within it,
We are surrounded by mountains.
Yenson Mar 2022
Please help them
they are fighting for their fathers
Social Housings
financed by the clever investments
of all the spoils
from the commonwealth and the
sale of humans
who gave their blood sweat and tears
branded and chained

Please help them
they are fighting a virulent parasite
here unchained
resplendent in honour and dignity
a breed apart
now considered a danger to pond life
an untamed
incapable of ignorance and vandalism
birthright of indigenes

Please help them
they are fighting to abolish free speech
for dark hues
they have no right to protest injustice
or refuse extortions
they are leeches even if they earn legitimately
and are decent and honest
for if they are not branded chattels doing as told
they are not useful or good
Jace Albine Jun 2020
I'm indifferent about this place.

I wish that existence's nothing would swallow this shallow apparition and that I could live high inside of a cloud on a planet that had none of the miscarriages that we call modernized life, for existence's sake, on a star that burned out before this was readable.

But that's just what's on my mind right now...

I know that from a human being's conception to their demise that they are pressing their consciousnesses into an image that's being totally misconstrued, and I know that that's no way to live, but it's life.

Now time to add to my story; see you in another 13.8 billion years so I can regale your consciousnesses built within their chemically responsive fold's housings, or perhaps rather a (for a lack of a better word) reconfigurable differently shaped cranium, or whatever non human jelly fish like organism then which would hold thee, but irregardless this is English and you have nothing to show for it but the allegations of judgment and communal stigmata that you probably don't even care to understand, nor bother to know why it even existed in the first place.

Simile if you know what's on your mind every time you have something to say on this plagiarist's controlled orientated  platform created by the people that some guy alive at some point ripped off and was sold to some other people that don't give a **** about their own lights.

Like if you like.

Comment only if you want your insanity to be on display.

Don't understand if you don't understand, or at least if you don't want to.

The mind is real.

Reality is real.

People often don't understand either of those two things, whether it be conditioning, or that it's a fire to bright to look into that they'd be happy with their average deaths.

Then that's that, but that's neither here nor there. It's in both places at the same time and a rant can be called such, but if I summed it down to one word I'd be called crazy.

So I won't let you in on it love.

— The End —