"hurtling" poems
I must admit:
I am unwilling to give
even a hint of consideration
to the thought of being anything,
anyone other than that brilliant,
briefly lit comet,
hurtling toward home.
It matters not
where I land,
or who takes pictures from the ground.
This is only a trip.
This is just a ride.
So fleeting, so fiery,
that you wouldn't want to pause to wonder
what you look like up there,
or else you might miss
the very things that make
your fires unforgettable
and your blast burn true.
Jan 14, 2019
Jan 14, 2019 at 10:59 PM UTC
Doom train hurtling along
Through the fog in my mind
Towing freight, rectangular and oblong
Dim headlights, you're travelling blind
Five carriages long, excluding engine and caboose
Metal against metal, spitting sparks on steel
Undetermined path, rails will choose
Chugging along on dirt covered wheels
In the cabin, I see the light
Emanating from your furnace
Swallowing up coals in your gaping bite
Tongues of flames licking the surface
Fire breathing, spewing thick black smoke
Almost unseen, against the dark of night
A long plumy arm as if extending to choke
And plug the remaining sources of light
Meandering precariously on tracks that weave
Over uncharted, unfathomable terrain
Your store, so reliably you heave
Worming your way through my brain
What's in that cargo of yours?
What lies within those boxcars?
What drives you to diligently run your course?
What fuels you to travel near and far?
Loads of self pity, self loathing and self reproach
Snaking your way to an unknown destination
Screeching brakes as if a stop you approach
Herald the train of dubious intentions
Light is upon you, dark will dissipate
Your plumes starting to lessen from your stack
The dawn breaking horizon you didn't anticipate
To see another charging towards you on this very same track...
Sep 27, 2014
Sep 27, 2014 at 4:16 AM UTC
The world is losing
Gravity,
But no one can escape,
We're hurtling on our petrie dish
In a gel that seals our fate;
Gravitating
Towards black holes;
They're closer than you think.
In China
There's a wall of dust,
Seen clear from outer space;
Our living waters die
In a legacy of disgrace.
We're citizens
Wearing masks;
We should hide our faces,
But we're running daily tasks.
We're fossils burning
Fossil fuels
Found in cremation gas.
The amphibians
Are on the fringe;
Whales can't sound,
They run aground.
It's an environmental slaughter.
Our world has lost
Some gravity.
We need to plant our feet,
But charnel fires
And greenhouse gas
Have hastened our retreat.
Migrating birds lose sense of time,
Confused by the lights.
The morning dove coos at night,
The nightingale at dawn;
We're like
New turtles muddling,
Under lost starlight.
We must grasp
The gravity
Of burning
Burning light.
Jul 23, 2014
Jul 23, 2014 at 10:19 AM UTC
You say, "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels”
but I say surely something
must taste nicer than the burning acid
being forced back up your throat.
Why not hug people instead of
toilet bowls? At least they’ll hug back.
Except Mia is your only friend now.
And her cousin, Ana, of course.
And I understand that you never
wanted to die, but this is a thousand ton truck
hurtling towards the edge of a cliff and
Ana took the wheel a long time ago.
There is no strength in this: in you, in a
fear of calories. Even your bones creak
as your muscles sigh with exhaustion -
for this, is not a war you're winning.
This is a battle with only one contender
and I will not be the one to disarm you.
That's your job and it always has been. I know
you only wanted to be beautiful
like all those stars in the magazines
you saved under a file titled ‘thinspo’
but the only stars you ever saw were in
your eyes from the dizziness
and to tell you the truth, you are not pretty.
For there is nothing “pretty”
about the layer of fuzz your body grew
to protect itself from the big bad wolf
when really, the only growl was coming
from inside your stomach.
Or how your little sister is afraid to touch,
let alone hug you, in fear of snapping you in two.
For there is no glamour in having to
remove clumps of hair out of the plughole
at least six times whilst having a shower,
just to let the water run down.
Or that one time you "accidentally”
took too many laxatives. Messy.
There is nothing admirable about the way
you sat shivering on your bed
at night instead of kissing boys,
or dancing, or eating ice cream.
There is nothing to be marvelled at
in dying.
This, is not a life to be lived.
God, this isn't even a life.
This is being a slave to your own body,
a walking zombie, a ghost stuck
between two sides.
You are not alive.
But it was all still worth it, right?
Slowly killing yourself from the inside out.
A small price to pay for perfection,
a bargain for a broken mirror;
for a half-written book
with 97 blank pages,
a camera
that only captures in black and white,
a clock
with frozen hands.
And most importantly, for a peace of mind
you never received.
No refunds.
Dec 8, 2013
Dec 8, 2013 at 11:59 AM UTC
Dark clouds hurtling by
Showing sketches in the sky
Winds storm and thunder
Oct 17, 2016
Oct 17, 2016 at 11:54 AM UTC
WHERE has Maid Quiet gone to,
Nodding her russet hood?
The winds that awakened the stars
Are blowing through my blood.
O how could I be so calm
When she rose up to depart?
Now words that called up the lightning
Are hurtling through my heart.
7.2k
It would seem the world has quietly fit the puzzle pieces into place over night ,
Like wet washing , crispy and dry from the radiators humming warmth , a satisfactory feeling , a job well done.
There is much beauty to be found on this journey home , moments where the heart is plummeting at a million miles a second , descending from the upper troposphere hurtling down , through clouds whipped up by a storm of ages – waiting for the conclusion – perpetual motion catches me
Elegant design,
Crooked lines make curves,
Spitting at the throat, holding those words,
vision of confusion eats up at the temple of love , bodies are walking shrines.
Taste my karma on sticky fingers.
Apr 7, 2014
Apr 7, 2014 at 12:30 AM UTC
Hurtling along and away,
Approaching the center of the galaxy,
The event horizon becomes visible,
Slowly pulling me inside,
Time and space distorted,
Wave-forms collapsing in on themselves,
Stretching and bending frequencies,
Unrealities become fluid,
then begin collapsing and twisting,
Beyond recognizable form,
Into infinite and immense matter,
Like twist and tears in the fabric of space,
Falling toward nothingness,
That dreaded singularity,
A moment away,
A million moments away,
As time ceases to exist,
And crushing gravity,
Displacing understanding,
Dispelled notions,
Horrific,
And peaceful,
Become the same.
Oct 10, 2012
Oct 10, 2012 at 6:06 AM UTC
Violating a placid spirit
Memories transgress
desecrating the sacred.
Memories are
the dark side
of a full moon.
Memories are unsatiated desires
couched on sorrow
entangled in time
a perennial wrinkle on the soul.
Memories are trespassers
possessing neural atrium
wading saline sockets
slithering in to throbbing veins
tiptoeing to hollow spaces
burying all under their eerie weight,
Memories are an inescapable affliction.
In fragmented mindscape
Memories are violent winds
littering the past.
Lurking behind aches
in ethereal garbs,
Memories are assassins.
Or sema
of a swirling dervish.
Hurtling within, Memories
is an avalanche
pounding the abyss
choking the void
one gasp at a time.
Memories are
nameless apparitions
fused as shadows
to the very being.
Memories are an assault
on identity and belonging.
Sep 28, 2018
Sep 28, 2018 at 6:23 AM UTC
pulling back the covers
dimming the lights
an owl calls
from the holly tree
just outside
of my window
the garden below
has grown beyond my control
weeds sprout vines tangle
in the summer squirrels gnaw
on the green holly berries
littering the courtyard
with half-eaten haws
in the spring mockingbirds
gorge on the bright red fruit
their florid songs
celebrating
light sky life sun leaf air
closing my eyes
I think back through the decades
to when I planted the tree
it was a time of hope
a time when we dared dream
of a world without
mortal enemies
when you could imagine
shaded islands of calm
hidden coves immune to rancor
now look at us
heads down lost hurtling
stumbling
under a trance
we have turned on one other
distracted by those
who grab wealth and power
under the cover of night
confused by the constant
trumpeting and alarms
blind to what we share
we retreat
into the darkness
of our fears
Tom Spencer © 2018
Oct 12, 2018
Oct 12, 2018 at 7:50 AM UTC
Hypnotic music, joyous sounds surround
The fans, all entranced by the performers.
The drummer happily bashes and pounds
Everything he sees shaped like cylinders.
The hi-hat steadily keeps the rhythm,
The bass drum makes a thud, quite powerful.
The crowd can't help but nod along with him
As he makes these beats so insatiable.
The cymbals create such fearful crashes,
And his finely tuned snare shoots roaring pops
Hurtling towards the off-guard masses,
This manic madness just can't seem to stop!
What exactly does he have left to prove?
*He simply wants to see everyone groove!*
Feb 20, 2016
Feb 20, 2016 at 2:59 AM UTC
The first
Drops for her,
The silent wish,
That it was different,
That I was not a burden.
It splashes down,
Splitting into a thousand little droplets,
Each a sorrowful entity,
Depicting each scene of heart-wrenching pain.
The second
Drops for him,
The silent prayer,
That I could be better,
A person you wished could be like you,
The man that could make you proud,
By just being a man
Not more, not less.
I'm sorry I'm less.
The third
Drops for me,
More than just silent,
More than just faint,
It crashes like thunder,
Bearing grief and pain,
That I am not what you expect,
Nor will I ever be,
And nothing can change that, even me.
These tears come hurtling down,
And maybe the figures are just figures,
It could be more, definitely more, I lost count,
But the awful truth is its always silent,
Never to be heard or seen...
Jun 3, 2014
Jun 3, 2014 at 5:12 AM UTC
Nothingness.
Imagine nothingness.
That nothingness which is nothing of the nothingness we are all familiar with:
Not that nothingness which is nothing but empty space and time
Like when you open an empty room.
No.
That nothingness where nothing truly exists:
Not space,
Not even time.
A singular point.
Imagine a singular point.
The ultimate singular point that contains all possible points
In the development of the universe
Come out and expand
From the birthing of time, the instance of The Big Bang,
(Which by the way is not a large explosion, as the words imply, but a silent rapid expansion)
Pushing the envelope
Where nothingness begins.
Chance.
Imagine chance.
The random occurrence of events:
Of fundamental particles colliding and uniting
Or annihilating each other,
Giving rise to protons, neutrons and electrons;
Giving rise to the periodic table,
To compounds, both organic and inorganic,
To macromolecules.
Billions of years.
Imagine billions of years
Gone by,
And billions of galaxies filling the sky:
Stars and quasars and pulsars
Planets and comets and meteors
***** nilly hurtling through
Dark matter and ever expanding space,
Yet inanimate still
,
A single cell.
Imagine a single cell
Form inexplicably so,
In a staggeringly highly improbable way
As carbon molecules combine,
Start to throb and pulsate:
Chance bringing forth life
In a barren and otherwise
Lifeless universe.
Consciousness
Imagine consciousness
Purposive, willful, deliberate
Feelings
Imagine feelings
Love, compassion, hatred
Imagine all in a universe that came out of itself from nothingness.
It is hard, of course,
For after all, we are creatures of somethingness!
But at this point
You must have seen the Point
Of all the ramblings and turns in the trajectory of my thought
Tracing the evolutionary course of the universe
From nothingness and that singular point
That without God
All things are
After all
Pointless!
.
And so,
Let us not deplore, as a great poet once did,
That this world “so various, so beautiful, so new
Hath no joy, nor love, nor light
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain…”
For what else should we expect
Of a cold, unfeeling universe?
What?
Give us some Novocain?
Jul 16, 2013
Jul 16, 2013 at 4:36 PM UTC
The world is losing
Gravity,
But no one can escape,
We're hurtling on our petrie dish
In a gel that seals our fate;
Gravitating
Towards black holes;
They're closer than you think.
In China
There's a wall of dust,
Seen clear from outer space;
Our living waters die
In a legacy of disgrace.
We're citizens
Wearing masks;
We should hide our faces,
But we're running daily tasks.
We're fossils burning
Fossil fuels
Found in cremation gas.
The amphibians
Are on the fringe;
Whales can't sound,
They run aground.
It's an environmental slaughter.
Our world has lost
Some gravity.
We need to plant our feet,
But charnel fires
And greenhouse gas
Have hastened our retreat.
Migrating birds lose sense of time,
Confused by the lights.
The mourning dove coos at night,
The nightingale at dawn;
We're like
New turtles muddling,
Under lost starlight.
We must grasp
The gravity
Of burning
Burning light.
Apr 21, 2016
Apr 21, 2016 at 10:41 AM UTC
*Sometimes it's a cactus, not a rose
that pinches the heart of a lover
though, she doesn't smell musk
or her eyes aren't lined with kohl,
he was weary and looking for an elusive spirit
which even he wasn't clear what, but found in her.
Breaking away from the caravan
hurtling down the dusty road
to an unknown town in that arid desert
he spoke to the cactus, whose eyes met his
when a shiver passed through the psyche of both.
Cactus, stood looking at him, her sad smile hinted
to the heartbreaking news they have to face,
cactus, broke her silence, said she was happy
on being looked after by the hollering sun,
howling desert wind and sand storm cover her
with utmost affection,"They are my cousins,
they know me well all these years,
I let them decide for me what I need..."
they stood looking at each other, for a minute,
nothing more was to be told
"Have no misgivings, stranger, though my lover you are,
we live or die here together, but your destination is far
you are a rare one, readily gave your heart
to a mere desert cactus, that rarely flowers,
your perception, is the creation of your vibrant mind
I respect your passion and spirit of adventure,
we live the way we are made to live, why bear the pain of change,
I hope you know what I mean,
we live the way the most fitting for us, love is sacrifice too,
we both have hearts that beat together, I am blessed
but now, we have different choices, who can say who is right
the logic we espouse are different, though our hearts crave to be together*"
Feb 4, 2014
Feb 4, 2014 at 1:05 AM UTC
NAY! swear no more, thou woman whom I called
Star, Empress, Wife! Were Dian's self to lean
From her white altar and with goddess lip
Swear thee as pure as her pale breast divine,
I could not deem thee purer than I know
Thou art indeed.
Once, when my triumphs rolled
Along old Rome and blood of roses washed
The battle-stains from off my chariot-wheels,
And triumph's thunders round my legions roared,
And kings in kingly ******* golden bound
Shook at my charger's foot, past the hot din
Of Victory-whose heart of golden pride in wound
Most subtly through with fire of subtlest pain-
My soul on prouder pinion rose above
The Roman shouting, to an air more clear
Than that Jove darks with hurtling thunderbolts,
Or stains with Jovian revels-that separate sphere,
Unshared of gods or man, where thy white feet
Caught their sole staining from my ruddy heart,
Blazing beneath them; where, when Rome looked up,
'Twas with the eyes close shaded with the hand,
As at some glory terrible and pure,-
For no man being pure, a terror dwells
Holy and awful in a sinless thing-
And Caesar's wife, the Empress-Matron, sat
Above a doubt-as high above a stain.
Nay! how know I what hell first belched abroad
Tall flames and slanderous vomitings of smoke,
Blown by infernal breathings, till they scaled
Thy throne of whiteness, and the very slaves
Who crouched in Roman kennels wagged the tongue
Against the wife of Caesar: 'Ha! we need not now
And opal-shaded stone wherewith to view
A stainless glory.' In that day my neck
Was bound and yoked with my twin-Caesar's yoke-
Man's master, Sorrow.
I know thee pure-
But Caesar's wife must throne herself so high
Upon the hills that touch their snowy crests
So close on Heaven that no slanderous Hell
Can dash its lava up their swelling sides.
I love thee, woman, know thee pure, but thou
No more art wife of Caesar. Get thee hence!
My heart is hardened as a lonely crag,
Grey granite lifted to a greyer sky,
And where against its solitary crown
Eternal thunders bellow.
3.7k
I am riding on a limited express, one of the crack trains
of the nation.
Hurtling across the prairie into blue haze and dark air
go fifteen all-steel coaches holding a thousand people.
(All the coaches shall be scrap and rust and all the men
and women laughing in the diners and sleepers shall
pass to ashes.)
I ask a man in the smoker where he is going and he
answers: "Omaha."
3.4k
*Ever look to the night sky beyond tiring windscreen wipers?
They screech, exasperated by an army of droplets hurtling downwards.
Ever lean on the dashboard gazing upwards into the downpour?
Constant and linear; like how stars zoom past spaceships in old movies.
A whole universe of dazzling stars.
That's how she lived; her aura a universe peppered with light.
Light forever radiating towards captivated eyes.
Oh, she loved with a love unparalleled.*
Jul 20, 2015
Jul 20, 2015 at 7:50 AM UTC
He wove a weary comet streak
That stained the clear blue sky
He had no time to stop and think
But went a hurtling by
He warned of grevious perils
Dormant in coming days
I saw him with a sparkling eye
And watched through bleary haze
Nearing the horizon and eye limit
He turned and cast a wink
At what he loved and no one more
Then only did I blink.
Feb 17, 2015
Feb 17, 2015 at 8:56 AM UTC
There I was dangling off the edge of life by a thread,
Barnacles growing in my bed,
Walking around with lead shoes,
Always wearing Navy Blue contacts.
Out of nowhere something fast,
Picked me up and upward blast,
Bucking, hurtling into the sapphire sky,
Dancing rainbow fairies around us.
I feel the pixie ..... dust
I revel in the lust
I grow in the fertile trust
This must be Hero Love
Oct 10, 2017
Oct 10, 2017 at 6:54 AM UTC
How do you sleep, eyes opened or closed? Ears listening or ignoring? Senses awoken or dreaming?
I have slept many times, and I've slept many ways. Dreams can be humorous, distant, terrifying, long, short; even beautiful.
Laying on grass, I can feel every single blade of it and the moist dew, I assume it's morning. I feel a gentle wind roll over my soft skin and hear the susurration of the wind, caressing my ear lobes tenderly in passing. I've yet to open my eyes, yet, I see countless possibilities in the vastness I Feel Surround Me.
Slowly, I stir from what must have been a deep sleep, my eyes open and I squint to assuage the pain caused by blinding sunlight.
It's too much to take in. A beautiful landscape. Mountain ranges that cover miles, rivers that flow with elegance yet viciousness, animals of every kind. It all lays before me. I'm humbled by the pulchritude of every little detail in front of these eyes...
I drift effortlessly to the nearest tree and softly place my palm on it, feeling the rough bark against my supple skin, taking note of the fragrance of fresh trees: the boon of mother nature.
Walking slowly down a steep slope and to the edge of a rather large drop, I think to myself, "I feel close," without warning, feeling the wind whip my face as the ground draws closer in an instant. The earth is hurtling towards me, I'm not scared. Impact is made and I bounce, the softness of my mattress telling me I've arrived, back in the real world; the comforting disappointment envelops me, as I realise....Yet another dream short-lived.
Jan 12, 2011
Jan 12, 2011 at 5:25 PM UTC
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
blinking from who-knows-how-far,
holding captive all our eyes,
muse for all our lullabies.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
how I wonder what you are.
Twinkle, twinkle, Milky Way,
cosmic star of cabaret,
filling up our eyes at night,
making moonlight shadows bright.
Twinkle, twinkle, Milky Way -
what a vision you display.
Twinkle, twinkle, galaxy,
often do I think of thee,
hurtling through time and space,
pirouetting in your place.
Twinkle, twinkle, galaxy -
Teach us all to be as free.
Sep 17, 2017
Sep 17, 2017 at 8:47 AM UTC
Go ahead and lock your gimbal
Hurtle that spaceship
Right into my stable space station
At least I installed shock absorbers
But **** keep running that engine
And you'll be crashing into me
At escape velocity
Till we're both hurtling from the solar system at the speed of light
(Different directions I might add)
So you keep burning that fuel
And see how long it takes
For me to lose this game of chicken.
Dec 7, 2013
Dec 7, 2013 at 8:39 PM UTC