"idleness" poems
Discipline’s rule
Will stand you well
If you want to move forward
And idleness quell
Determine your purpose
And make a decision
Take action in life
And plan with precision
Order your future
Be humble in prayer
Gaze beyond your present
Advance more than you dare
Expand your horizons
Gain a new view
Launch yourself forward
Fly into the blue
Set steps in your life
And jump on each one
Don’t stop til you’re finished
And all the tasks done
Then gaze at the bounty
Of life’s awesome store
All the things
You’ve accomplished
That were just dreams before
Feb 14, 2010
Feb 14, 2010 at 9:49 AM UTC
The last knight had died ungallantly
He folded in a disappointed silence
As did the age he stood for.
So long to the bygone era.
The romanticism of a stoic ideal
Remained to mark his passing,
Like an obituary in the paper
That people glance at for a brief moment
Before continueing with the idleness of their day.
The muddied sky of an industrial world
Stretched over a land like a blanket of shame
To destroy the traditions of a knight
Who once fought for the people who turned to destroy him.
May 21, 2015
May 21, 2015 at 8:26 PM UTC
This sunlight shames November where he grieves
In dead red leaves, and will not let him shun
The day, though bough with bough be over-run.
But with a blessing every glade receives
High salutation; while from hillock-eaves
The deer gaze calling, dappled white and dun,
As if, being foresters of old, the sun
Had marked them with the shade of forest-leaves.
Here dawn to-day unveiled her magic glass;
Here noon now gives the thirst and takes the dew;
Till eve bring rest when other good things pass.
And here the lost hours the lost hours renew
While I still lead my shadow o’er the grass,
Nor know, for longing, that which I should do.
7.3k
Cellophane wings beating
against the heavy summer air,
back and forth, all day long,
the blue dragonflies
chase one another across the pond-
their tails turned up
like neon scimitars
poised for a ******
that never seems to come.
Occasionally, a truce is called,
and they settle into place
on opposite sides of the reeds,
momentarily oblivious to their war.
Twice their size,
the red dragonfly idles in the sun.
From time to time it leaves its perch
to challenge the silhouette
hanging from the iris blade,
its spent skin,
as if it were a bad memory
rising from the green depths of the pond.
Below the surface,
the fish school together- a current of gold
slipping between the lily pads,
each aware of its place in the stream.
My reflection circles them all.
Drawn to the water
that both mirrors and obscures
I lose my place for a moment-
hovering between obligations and idleness
on cellophane wings.
Tom Spencer © 2015
Jul 14, 2015
Jul 14, 2015 at 7:39 AM UTC
What is it men in women do require?
The lineaments of Gratified Desire.
What is it women do in men require?
The lineaments of Gratified Desire.
The look of love alarms
Because ’tis fill’d with fire;
But the look of soft deceit
Shall Win the lover’s hire.
Soft Deceit & Idleness,
These are Beauty’s sweetest dress.
He who binds to himself a joy
Dot the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in Eternity’s sunrise.
6.3k
SOLDIER OF FORTUNE
Book down both my idleness and memories,
Come the 52nd summer, through ship to ship
The last sail from city to city, the perturb To Contempt
Thy will at time remain snub, hath my time being
Hoaxed with an irony to bare my dream, for my family,
my slug Hit the deepest of my wish, with an arm to an
Armor, though my gentle verse never indulge volitionary,
What’s Worth in me hath grown, neither my dream
Extant, to whom shall I sell? Thy portrait reckon without
understanding The captivity my dreams, to whom
shall I cry My bootless fate?, Hast thee forsaken me?
Thou art trouble me not , Thee Succeed anyone
In an unflagging quest for a word, though art’s will
For sinners, saint and believers never change
Feb 13, 2015
Feb 13, 2015 at 5:25 AM UTC
I think I have control by now; I know
you want me to instruct you how to love.
I lack the tools for idleness; I go
crazy when you weigh yourself above
me. I know you’re in the rink – I know you are!
It’s just my paranoia’s acting out,
and then I call you twice and go too far,
that’s just a macho, jealous, loving bout.
But still you love my fighting tender thoughts,
and look in our shared corner when you’re scared.
But then the jitters, stomach ties in knots.
No gloves came out each time an old love stared.
I do not care for who you used to love,
keep razor blades tucked in my boxing gloves.
Jun 6, 2013
Jun 6, 2013 at 7:58 PM UTC
Sing we for love and idleness,
Naught else is worth the having.
Though I have been in many a land,
There is naught else in living.
And I would rather have my sweet,
Though rose-leaves die of grieving,
Than do high deeds in Hungary
To pass all men’s believing.
5.7k
354
From Cocoon forth a Butterfly
As Lady from her Door
Emerged—a Summer Afternoon—
Repairing Everywhere—
Without Design—that I could trace
Except to stray abroad
On Miscellaneous Enterprise
The Clovers—understood—
Her pretty Parasol be seen
Contracting in a Field
Where Men made Hay—
Then struggling hard
With an opposing Cloud—
Where Parties—Phantom as Herself—
To Nowhere—seemed to go
In purposeless Circumference—
As ’twere a Tropic Show—
And notwithstanding Bee—that worked—
And Flower—that zealous blew—
This Audience of Idleness
Disdained them, from the Sky—
Till Sundown crept—a steady Tide—
And Men that made the Hay—
And Afternoon—and Butterfly—
Extinguished—in the Sea—
5.1k
Being lazy digs a huge grave
For our peace and won't save
A lazy fellow is never brave
He is to fate a submissive slave
Taking action he will shun
Success shows him no affection
God gives him no protection
He belongs to the losing section
A lazy man gets no sweats
Tears become his constant assets
He uses buts and loses guts
He is depressed for lack of outlets
He lies lethargically in his bed
To be passive, thinks his head
Mentally he is almost dead
His is a very negative blood
Great chances he regularly misses
He is deprived of victory's kisses
A working mind, he does not possess
He never gets success as a bonus
His brain is so lazy *** idle
Everything is to him a riddle
He is afraid of every hurdle
His life, fate will finely meddle
Work makes him fear and faint
Gloom only his thoughts paint
Against him accumulates complaint
His mind, laziness will strongly taint
Progress tells him good-bye
He is an unattractive guy
His life-river is ever dry
Only laziness, he can supply
Idleness may be initially jolly
But it is not at all holy
Angels like it not wholly
Unless he starts a venture newly
If laziness is away kicked
Losses can be wisely licked
If laziness is wrongly picked
By fate, lazy man is tricked.
M V VENKATARAMAN
Mar 24, 2010
Mar 24, 2010 at 6:25 AM UTC
‘Twas during inner turmoil that a certain yearning arose
Whispers of breakage reaching deeper as time goes
From the disillusionment of reality it was forged
Of seething rage the desires hunger gorged
In following certain conformities felt like being a prisoner
The will to resist the motions of many being aimed to muster
To not be like a tree that has to be cut or uprooted just to move
To be driven by reasons that to only ones viewpoint can behoove
Looking at another view of the coming uncertainty
As a pathway to many possibilities with regards to unpredictability
That stopping a tragedy is sometimes not the thing to do
Lest one forgets that the phoenix must burn down to rise anew
Or that Ragnarok is followed by a great rebirth
Who can know what revelations a raging flood might unearth?
Being lost might as well be the way to find an elusive longing
The remedy to the Anhedonia closely and ominously looming
When being chained to the rhythm just compares to an inner futile feeling
Knowing that a greater horizon is missed by the act of settling
A bet on the odds that epiphany might be found in whatever form
To behold serendipity actually being brought by the coming inner storm
In using the great idleness to plan the restoring of a balance
And to see clearly without the feeling of rushing pressure and turbulence
The path and pace may change to the deeper quest not yet ceased
In bringing forth the long sought betterment through a cataclysmic release.
Oct 8, 2018
Oct 8, 2018 at 12:32 AM UTC
Poverty
This ailment clips my bare soul
My malady hides my ample sight
Penury loads my cognition. Watery hole
Shift not far my destination, yet too blight
It is corral, harvesting my living carcass
I don't egender chaff in the shining sun
this coop is an enclosure of my idleness
Like a jailbird my to be is limited and shun
*One day. My wandring ship will wheel
My fervor will ease and I'll scope my haven
My wounds and lesions will then heal
I will grab my revenue as in Heaven
May 22, 2015
May 22, 2015 at 6:19 AM UTC
are feelings of love felt alone, feelings of love at all?
or selfish yelps for attention borne
of boredom & a sense we only hold on our own
of childish
- - - - idleness.
singularity less; more independence from a whole
the only company he keeps is furniture
together with the furniture of the house he sits,
with seven seats left empty,
the curtains tales appear to grin
without validation from another he feels
like a child standing
the school's final bells rung
the bustle of the day has droned
now dissipated
the bustle of the day irritated
when it droned, he longed for home
for the bus
as he waits for the bus the quiet surrounds hold tight
but hold cold
like a fridge door keeps, it clutches, encloses
the school yard empty
he stands; singular; out of place in the surrounds
the school bleeds terror when empty
The laughs & shouts & jeers & footsteps
keep the wholesomeness whole
empty of shouts
a graveyard now
the ghosts of the day linger
& they finger
your buttons they push
your tenderness they kneed out
they **** (with their cold digits they ****
just like the furniture does.
just like the furniture in the house laughs
when uninhabited
it silently jeers
'Why so many seats mate?' it pokes with its linen digit; fuzzy but cold
as it continues
'you're alone
waiting for someone
to come by and pick u up
& take u back to home
Mar 18, 2013
Mar 18, 2013 at 9:01 AM UTC
654
A long—long Sleep—A famous—Sleep—
That makes no show for Morn—
By Stretch of Limb—or stir of Lid—
An independent One—
Was ever idleness like This?
Upon a Bank of Stone
To bask the Centuries away—
Nor once look up—for Noon?
3.1k
They walk aloof among us
Three percent of the population
They reluctantly dine with us
Quietly, stifling their frustration
They don't look back as you pass
They don't want your conversation
Empathy is just an alien concept
They focus only on self preservation
But here's where it gets strange
We worship them with huge salaries
We beg them to lead us the way
We ignore their blatant deceptiveness
We hand them our hard earned pay
If they say bail out the banksters
Or send your kids to a dubious war
We offer them our kids and cash
Knowing that they will ask for more
Stranger still
Our history has been sculpted by them
We raise bronze statues proudly in their honor
Through our plain idleness and cowardice
They can reduce this planet to a nuclear goner
"How did this madness occur?" We question
Why do psychos run banks and governments
Checking world history offers a suggestion
To why we (the population) are slaves for rent
We are simply afraid of those
That successfully navigate life
With reckless irresponsibility
Unchallenged by others strife
It is those destructive characters
We plead to take political risks
In return for obedience and cash
To buy more power and obelisks
Aug 4, 2014
Aug 4, 2014 at 3:04 PM UTC
My eyes see nothing but tears
Tears of a million suffering souls
Souls that are swimming in the pool of poverty
Poverty created by a few egocentric individuals
My ears hear nothing but the tone of grievances
Grievances blossoming from excessive suffering
Suffering because of the alarming levels of idleness
Idleness because the lot is controlled by a few
My nose smells nothing but pungent poverty
A poverty that has become a national disaster
A disaster which has become a national emblem
An emblem that the world identifies us with
My mouth has become a floodgate of lamentations
Lamentations that blossoms from excessive pain
Pain which has become an inseparable part of everyone
Everyone has lost hope of seeing a brighter day
Dec 13, 2018
Dec 13, 2018 at 7:04 AM UTC
Four Seasons fill the measure of the year;
There are four seasons in the mind of man:
He has his ***** Spring, when fancy clear
Takes in all beauty with an easy span:
He has his Summer, when luxuriously
Spring's honied cud of youthful thought he loves
To ruminate, and by such dreaming high
Is nearest unto heaven: quiet coves
His soul has in its Autumn, when his wings
He furleth close; contented so to look
On mists in idleness--to let fair things
Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook.
He has his Winter too of pale misfeature,
Or else he would forego his mortal nature.
2.9k
The sun looks and feels as though it seeks revenge
The sweltering heat exarcabating the chronic fatigue that plagues this youthful body
All of the grumbling and screaming turning into a silent whisper
And subsequently, a yawn
I feel oppressed by mother nature
The wind is blowing in fiery-like gusts When it touches my face I can feel all the energy oozing out of me
Justifying this idleness
The air smells of wilted Jacaranda tree blossomings, strewn across the lawn
Which would be blissful if inhalation of these smells didn't spur on pesky allergies
It feels like the end of days
I yearn for the feeling of relief in the air and within myself when the infinite skies flare up and release the rains
And the pleasure of hearing the water murmur when it flows over the stone work in the front yard
Endurance
Endurance.
Nov 18, 2013
Nov 18, 2013 at 9:51 AM UTC
I wonder where the time went,
did I spend my sixpence for three minutes of idleness,was the less of me all I could see or be?
From Another Time by John Edward Smallshaw
it never came free
never lent itself to me
I had to fight for it
put up with,
oh
let's call it ****
but where did the time disappear,year upon year and now,
now
comes the winter of bitter regret.
I bet you have them,
the me in the men do
amen
is all we do
when we think this short life is through,
yeah?
fuckyou
I have no regrets
all bets are null,
pull up and put that in your pipe and smoke it out,my life's not about what might have beens,it means so much more to me than what I think time might see.
'From another time' is from another time and yet another rhyme and did you read that?
Dec 7, 2013
Dec 7, 2013 at 1:53 PM UTC
"italicized idleness
illuminated by the
tic toc of time;
fueled fluorescent in
the blue confusion of
flickering bulbs &
clinical corridors of
filler conversation."
Dec 30, 2015
Dec 30, 2015 at 1:32 PM UTC
I believe in standstills
And in silent suffering
I believe in idleness
And in not getting up on time
I believe in difference
And that we are all just the same
I believe in staying in and in dancing in the rain
And even though I hate gay lines I just wrote one of the cheesiest in the world.
I believe in literature
And that most of it is ****
I believe in music
And that most of it is ****
I believe in me
And that I'm as false as you
I believe that I am false
I'm hoping you all are too
Nov 9, 2011
Nov 9, 2011 at 5:30 PM UTC
Self-loathing,
Self-hatred,
Guilt,
Pain,
I'll never be a good enough partner,
I'm failing right out of the gate.
I let you down,
I see it in your eyes,
I breached that trust you had in me,
And didnt live up to my own ideals,
A moment of weakness,
A moment of idleness,
Looping in my brain,
**** this tormentable guilt!
You say I get stuck in my own thinking,
Like a bird that's fallen into tar,
But thinking back,
If my brain is the tar,
I need to clean it some dawn.
Please let this storm pass,
Let the thunder die down in my mind
Let the lightning strikes fade,
For all that's holy,
May you forgive my trespasses still,
Let me be the man you said I could be,
And fly free,
Above the ooze and filth.
Jun 21, 2023
Jun 21, 2023 at 11:28 AM UTC
Autumn flares out, its flame burst clouds
strewn about misted cliff sides, loam whites
of winter taking their place. A stiff willow breeze,
ten thousand things withdrawn to burrows and immortal
pine heights. First snows stream down, duckweed carpets
of August fade, jade peeking through white. I embark
on the seasons final sail in hardening ice waters.
Til spring my sails will be folded, my raft in idleness.
~~~
Rafting on moon drenched river, avoiding cascades and crash of
rapids and falls. Silvered driftwood a warning. Silent glide of
mulberry oar through dark azure, another crafts sail in silhouette.
From the deck a black spectre dives below, stillness follows
splash, re-emergence, beak wrapped around a dazzling rainbow.
From my raft dangling lantern sways, trout swiping at
gathered moths – scatter and return, some from a far off realm.
Some trout in the net, others not. Luck or the way – who can tell?
~~~
Dusk colour gorge sheathed in
emerald blankets, rising into sheer
cliffs of auburn cinnabar, all
underpinned by the fathomless
flow of azure clarity. Snowy Egrets
nest in pine top heights clear of dust.
On white sand shores gibbons howl
towards squawking beach gulls, squabble
over landlocked trout – debate without end.
Peach blossom petals swirl on spring breeze
over carpets of jade inter cut by king
fisher blue zipping over duckweed. Oriole
song weaves in and out of mulberry branches.
In these vast and vague waters -
coves, creeks and streams all one,
a river dragon lives an undetermined
existence. Mud stirs below, merely a
catfish airing grievances.
Red tail flares in dirt,
my mulberry oar rows me back home.
Jan 15, 2012
Jan 15, 2012 at 8:13 AM UTC
Purposes as incomprehensible and wonderful as these purposes
Either you had no purpose or the purpose is beyond the end
The purpose of sitting is not to be satisfied or satiated
Because the timepiece not only serves a purpose, it is adapted to that
purpose
Except it was a secret purpose
The world is a mental activity, a dream of souls, without foundation,
purpose, weight or shape
People in collective idleness are even more repellent than when purpose
motivates them
God, glass, my townspeople! For what purpose?
His purpose and mine is to catch photons and store them in our bones
Lately, as have you, I have thought about our war and its purpose
To have a season for every purpose, Ecclesiastes was right about that
Names of plants, languages of mammals, purposes of insects, placement
of rocks
My friend who is counselor to kings and presidents never lacks purpose
To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Not to say there is no purpose necessarily, I just don’t immediately get it
Stately purposes, valor in battle, glorious annals of army and fleet, death
for the right cause
Use of violence by the local militia for a limited purpose, protect the
young from the janjaweed, the crop from the ****
The knight, the penitent misses last assessment of life’s purpose,
babbling for God to appear
I mean your entire purpose should be living, you must take living
seriously
Sleep with a purpose
Or lose all purpose beyond ****** child *** and food hoarding
Counting is associated with primitive forms of writing, that is the
purpose of poetry
The purpose of school is to introduce us to the world’s innumerable
wonders
Their corners sharp, their lines exact, as if their purpose was to show
the plane geometry of snow
That’s when everything becomes clear, purpose v. purposelessness
matters less
Lonely physics, national purpose
This then is the purpose of purposelessness (and of eating less)!
We will live with the question What was our purpose?
If we are not at home in the world, contributing purpose, we lose our
desire to stay here—and we die
The men who left the machine have started their own business, a new
endeavor by which they will keep warm and purposeful
You go the way of an unknown soldier, unable to assess the purpose of
the battle
Let Greece then know my purpose I retain, nor vex with new treaties my
peace in vain
And shake the purpose of my soul no more
May 8, 2017
May 8, 2017 at 5:43 AM UTC