"impounded" poems
God knows how our neighbor managed to breed
His great sow:
Whatever his shrewd secret, he kept it hid
In the same way
He kept the sow--impounded from public stare,
Prize ribbon and pig show.
But one dusk our questions commended us to a tour
Through his lantern-lit
Maze of barns to the lintel of the sunk sty door
To gape at it:
This was no rose-and-larkspurred china suckling
With a penny slot
For thrift children, nor dolt pig ripe for heckling,
About to be
Glorified for prime flesh and golden crackling
In a parsley halo;
Nor even one of the common barnyard sows,
Mire-smirched, blowzy,
Maunching thistle and knotweed on her snout-
cruise--
Bloat tun of milk
On the move, hedged by a litter of feat-foot ninnies
Shrilling her hulk
To halt for a swig at the pink teats. No. This vast
Brobdingnag bulk
Of a sow lounged belly-bedded on that black
compost,
Fat-rutted eyes
Dream-filmed. What a vision of ancient hoghood
must
Thus wholly engross
The great grandam!--our marvel blazoned a knight,
Helmed, in cuirass,
Unhorsed and shredded in the grove of combat
By a grisly-bristled
Boar, fabulous enough to straddle that sow's heat.
But our farmer whistled,
Then, with a jocular fist thwacked the barrel nape,
And the green-copse-castled
Pig hove, letting legend like dried mud drop,
Slowly, grunt
On grunt, up in the flickering light to shape
A monument
Prodigious in gluttonies as that hog whose want
Made lean Lent
Of kitchen slops and, stomaching no constraint,
Proceeded to swill
The seven troughed seas and every earthquaking
continent.
6.5k
To sleep, my mind impounded,
My heartbeats, bass, lowly-sounded,
Each beat, a note upon mine ticking meter.
An unfamiliar feminine voice, not hers, poses,
Questioning noises, issued from a blackened figure.
This human-shaped metronome,
A singular inquisitor,
In rhythm, but not in rhyme,
Gravely announces repeatedly,
T'is your time, t'is your time,
Each pronouncement,
Spoken n'spiked distinctly:
*"Your prose now ended,
last-gentled sweetly."*
Wondering still, is it just sleep or truly death,
This forlorn eve, to go, to meet and greet,
Without having said my finale prayer.
Unprepared, thus with unaccustomed flair,
"Unfair" doth me protest, a newly-minted naysayer,
My book incomplete, black-brother frere!
If death indeed you be, my fellow cloaked-rider,
Then make me a one-last-time composer.
Let me whisper once more inside her,
A last poem of the greatest brevity,
But of the greatest import, laden heavy!
Good bye, my love, goodbye....
This closing writ, my finest ever...
Oct 6, 2013
Oct 6, 2013 at 5:21 AM UTC
I. That summer the radio
Played nothing but Cat Stevens
While I hummed harmonies
In my first car
It was a wild world indeed
when kudzu overtook
The cornfields
All the ears were foreigners
The leaves basked in light
That dead-ended on route 15
II. That fall we spotted UFO's
Shining over the municipal
Park
We chased them across the
Ballfields
To the high school cross country course
A dirt track running
Through the woods
And when there was nothing
Alien lurking there
Our hopes fell
Faster than the stars
III. The following winter
Three inches of ice cut the powerlines
Impounded our school supplies
With the outtages
And the temperatures plummeting
Seventy percent of our hearts froze
All the parts that were water
Expanding our chests
Like balloons
Expanding our vision too
We thought this was the beginning
Of the end of St. Clair county
We though we'd all get out someday
IV. By spring the graveyard smelled
Like lilacs
And dead town elders
Came out to dance in the scent
We played capture the flag there
On school nights
And the cops could never catch us
Behind the headstones
Of our family plots
We wrote our own epitaphs
"I was water and I could have been
A fine wine"
I fell asleep in sweet green clover to the sound of smalltown sirens...
Aug 30, 2013
Aug 30, 2013 at 10:03 PM UTC
The black dog is on my doorstep, he insists that he needs a drink.
Footprints are already impounded on all followed pavements.
The cake is poisoned with the stories of the greater mans word.
Eat it and your fate is within their wrist flicking reach.
End results and the finishings of situations
Are already determined beyond personal effect.
How many men are in your army? How many would have my back?
There is a man on a chair holding the club of master dimensions
I can see how he wants to play with my intents.
They force the doors shut blocking a sky that is taught to be blue
So we miss that it was turning green through foreign effects.
The black dog is on the doorstep, he insists that he needs some help
I stand on the zipline, looking over the city and the laid out maps.
If I was to say the sky was blue,
My hand you would shake and praise intellect.
If the same sky was deemed to be green,
Soldiers would be notified to create laws to control the insanity paradox.
The same man on the chair, dictates with a definitive howl,
I can see there is no room for small whistles or whispers.
The slammed door will not open despite my best efforts.
There is no way when there is one of me pushing one way and ten men pushing back.
Aug 8, 2015
Aug 8, 2015 at 1:24 PM UTC
My gleaming white constellation class Starship
(My ***** white Chrysler K car)
was out on patrol near the neutral zone
(I was driving back home from the bar)
It was then I received a distress call
(I urgently needed to ***
Some Klingons decloaked in proximity
(I sped past a cop car or three)
I called for more speed from the engine room!
(My transmission started to shake)
Klingons pursued in the neutral zone
(They motioned to me HIT THE BRAKE!)
“What seems to be the Tribble, Officer?”
I said to the humorless Gorn.
That Klingon impounded my vehicle
(They caught me exceeding Warp Nine)
If Kirk faced this “no Win” situation
He’d probably get off with a fine.
Dam Klingons!
Dec 20, 2011
Dec 20, 2011 at 8:52 PM UTC
My brain said no
But something felt right
So I prayed, then let it go!
The darkened night
Was a pond, standing still
And it was a ripple of light!
A single sounding trill
Or a streak of white and gold
Dashed across odes of grey!
It left the world astounded
Powered by belief
And all logic impounded
It erased the grief.
Then, vanished without a trace
Before our watching eyes
But it's not gone, just in another place
Because such beauty never dies.
May 9, 2012
May 9, 2012 at 4:02 PM UTC
In this is a poem,
flowing thru and over the stones of language,
a bed for a restless body.
Somewhere here is a poem,
behind and beneath the walls,
impounded as so much sound unspoken.
The glass before you
holds a poem,
both transparent,
one delicate when presented
the floor.
The poem is rushing,
brimming, tidal in its own surface tension,
held smooth and blue until the tipping point of pressure,
when it slips over the stones,
the walls,
the glass broken
and spills downhill
over the homes,
the fields
and farms,
white spray
finding shape in the valley
where you stand on the shore,
where you bend down to drink.
The river,
the dam,
the cup
is not
the water.
May 30, 2015
May 30, 2015 at 11:33 AM UTC
A meaningless life
Filled with nothing
"Did I get something to eat"
She asks.
Yes, I can see the food
You are the most ignorant, obnoxious person
I have ever met
People like you
Should be sent to India
To work 13 hours
In a sweatshop
Just to make enough money
To survive
Your luxury car impounded
People like you
Get Alzheimers
Because you never use
Your mind
You are one of the laziest
Most obnoxious people
I have ever met
You don't live
But exist
Like a picture on the wall
And I hate to be harsh
But it's true
You are an incredibly stupid
And lazy individual
I won't be here
For the holidays
Oct 2, 2015
Oct 2, 2015 at 12:17 AM UTC
the sleeper...
riled in slumber
her face fevered
cussed about the terrain
of a floral breeding
bedding patterns and the print
bunched in struggles
in smudges
an amateur trial with sisters makeup
primal cosmetics
make a mock
daubed
ceremony for slumber
dusty and museum are her dollworks
an amphitheatre audience
overlooming her berth
flaunting the gallery shelves
sustained expressionist menace
Roman eyes and Victorian ridicule
stuffed suffering with Ugly Duckling down
****** sawdust and your sullied label
they bray and they brawl
and they sluice their gull gall
a sick drizzle
over the sleepers form
from the exterior
wild wails the weather
its being
drubbing
peers fragile
at the windowpane
a raid on this vulnerable sleeper
impounded in bedroom aloft
raised to meet the jet stream
she is fumbled in dreams...
abraded adolescent swells
judder out figments
a bleed of vandals
siling her muted childhood
parading the playground
berating old
once loved playthings
adopting no sympathy
adapting in favour
of the wild riding will
of the direful pre familiar
into the woods...
a ***** charmed breath
dressed smartly as boy
stoppers her pathway
insisting a gentleman's assistance
frustrates her recitations
of grandmothers doting
stern teachings
like fragile pottery
come to harm
broken into teeth
the quick blood beating
this nocturnal forest
busy in heat
bonding death
to refract the hustling moon
a company of wolves
fill out the clearing
not a spell too soon
their howls reverberate
jeering
mocking their new glut
sifting followers
from the raggle-taggle array of fools
the foolish dreamers
rounded up
amongst them she stands
red dressed and nervous
one hand clasping
and sexing the other
fortified
a great jaw operates here
an excited irresponsible mastication
committed to this fairytale
...agitation in her sleep
Jul 6, 2021
Jul 6, 2021 at 2:11 AM UTC
Another romantic comedy hand selected by the gods that be graced
Its preset presence and morals upon me
“break rules break heads for love” it roared
Never once did it say
Smoking is bad for your health
Then maybe all of those cigarettes would
Have been in that small brown plastic bag back when
I could pretend I knew what I was doing
Hell in the form of santa ana winds
Came to me to tell me I was fired
Long before being hired
You see we’re all time travelers
At the rate of
One second per second
But there is no one to tell you
Just which direction
See my blue box got impounded
And my companion left me for another man
That’s okay
Because she never told me
Smoking is bad for your health
Sep 15, 2014
Sep 15, 2014 at 6:13 AM UTC
I am nothing to you,
A mere particle of flesh
impounded by the pulsing gravity
Perpetuated in your dizzying, unfathomable motion.
And you are everything to me-
Provider of energy,
Life,
Warmth,
Love,
And a home-
I can only hope to be as green as the trees
Who give such beauty to this landscape you call your kingdom,
Who smile under your radiance,
Who breathe for the planet.
If green was the color for thankfulness
My heart would bleed chlorophyll.
I would paint my world in pulverized leaves,
Coating my tire treads to gift you thanks everywhere I traveled.
I can only guess the reason I transplant orphan saplings into ****** soil
Is to give back to the one who gave everything.
Maybe someday the trees will streak my palms with their thankfulness pigment.
My life lines will allow rivers of green to flow across my skin smoothly, just like water,
Down my arms, coating each hair and fiber.
My fingers will sprout innocent leaves, quivering in the crisp evening wind.
They will sway East and West,
Finding North in between,
Shadowing my neck to cool its newly forged bark,
stiffening my posture and stifling my movement.
The freshly cut spearmint grass will leave their green fingerprints on my arched feet,
Painting my soul with gratitude.
I will point my branches to the sky,
Kick my roots to signify my green heels and toes,
Embodying my brethren until the rain washes away my new skin,
Praying that you notice me.
Jun 19, 2015
Jun 19, 2015 at 2:27 PM UTC
This is the last time,
How often have I said that?
Why do I crave what I detest?
So many I know can relate.
Evil boasts of many captives.
After feeling love and light,
Why do the lost flee?
Pursued and impounded by their ghost.
The sacrifice for truth is comfort.
Yet life is simple for people undeterred,
No vision but the material.
They scoff at the spiritual world
Rebirth awaits our soul,
Though some are bound to fall.
Not all light shines from the sky.
With angels working both sides,
Darkness seems illumined to the untrained eye..
Oct 27, 2019
Oct 27, 2019 at 4:09 AM UTC
I will listen to me one day
and stop uncoming.
A waxing moon was watching.
With a kiss at dawn
all the gods were stolen.
Like you were changing
the depth of water.
There was no ceremony,
after landing on the
burning temple. Priest was
mauled and goddess
will never come back.
Wheels are sunk.
Chariot was impounded.
Sun was hesitant to move.
You can come on
tiptoes. I will wait
till eternity in blue fog.
Earth was not behaving
like godmother.
Jun 1, 2019
Jun 1, 2019 at 8:34 PM UTC
Keyed away all the time
Only entrance is a time bomb
Repress and hide without a doubt
But explode with the slightest bump
If your brain is a lock, then ***** is a key
Drink clockwise to keep it shut
But a blade turned left can be used to unlock
The door is always jammed anyways
You’re not a monster
But you drink when you think you are
To forget or repress
Perhaps the habit is the simplest part
I envision the pool of blood
With a bottle dropped by your blue hand
The vein is easier to enter than your mind
Bleeding out with a numbness to accompany
You say you’re not an addict
Just a man with an unhealthy habit
Regardless of that, my friend
This will be guiding you towards your end
I see and know so little
You are mysterious and completely closed
But intuitively it’s obvious
How you are not the **** you think you should hide
I do not know your story
But I do know your expression
I do not know your true self
But I do know your suffering
And no collection of particles
So decent and at worst neutrally charged
Would ever deserve drinking and thinking
Themself to death
You are seen and you are heard
You are validated and assured
You are not a disease or infection
You are not a monster or mutation
Keep the door locked if you wish
But don’t wait until it has to be impounded
You can unlock without the spirits
And open your mouth and mind
Dec 12, 2018
Dec 12, 2018 at 9:24 AM UTC
Cheers to the sky
Another night
Coating the atomosohere
Gravity pulls me beneath
So much lighter, with a drink
A shot or a beer
to keep me grounded
To keep me here,
Feel my heart?
Its been impounded
By the weight of the world
And I am surrounded
By bottles and empty cans
By people who understand
How it feels to be crushed,
When enough has been enough
How good that feels when poison
Goes down your throat
And then it plummets
Through your mind,
And through your stomach
Whatever it takes to numb it
But now my hands are empty
A rotten glass of wine to trick me
Make me think I am getting tipsy
I feel the anxiety crawling
Up to my chest, and out of my throat
Beads of sweat, I might just choke
My friends feel it too,
I am not so alone
Raise our glasses to the air, another sad toast
Cheers to the sky
And its those nights
I will miss the most
Oct 29, 2018
Oct 29, 2018 at 4:57 PM UTC