"keener" poems
(sonnet #MMMMMDXXXVIII)
Now moonlight glances in to splash from hence
My silent comforter, then floor, its pale
Eye keener than aught voiceless notice, frail
Calm frozen in reply with snow's pretense
Beyond these darkened hours, as if the sense
Ere waltzing through a pegged load on th'exhale
Which fingered jonquil nubbins like green's bail
Is gone as swiftly as our love's defense.
Oh Tyler! I could never dream as twere
Of all you held in soulmate, bashert to
A breathless fault, whom none compare to, poor
As saying is. You were all and more, aye knew
Me better than I dared to think, and your
Love in my veins, though dead, I love you too.
22Mar16a
Mar 24, 2016
Mar 24, 2016 at 12:14 AM UTC
The pen, they say, is mightier,
but is it keener than a knife?
This brittle blade of insolence,
unleashed to lash at life.
'Yeah, innit, Bruv, he got right up in my face,
cos my phone was out in lesson time
and he called me a disgrace.
Like, so, whatever, mate,
I told him where to go,
trying to tell me English,
while I'm textin' my new hoe.'
The pen is not mightier,
it is tarnished and obtuse,
a vision of a different age,
wrought blind from its misuse.
Its sapling song of innocence,
split south across the grain
and cast across the classroom,
yanked up and lobbed again.
'Do you get me, Blood?
He was pointing at a seat,
expectin' ME to sit there,
as if it were a treat.
I told him where to stick it
and called him out a clown,
I **** this one-way death pit
as I'm walkin' round and round.'
The pen should still be mighty
and not a strangled stream,
that's crawling up an incline,
like an M. C. Escher dream.
Its muddy banks lie dormant,
both acorn and an oak.
'Cut that **** you KEENO,
let's **** off for a smoke.'
Jul 13, 2015
Jul 13, 2015 at 4:47 PM UTC
The silence of non-attachment.
Living in the satisfaction of now.
Old arrows pierce my skin,
Yet not allowing them to penetrate my mind.
Yet I’m trying to push myself to be better,
But better is relative
And I’m abiding in eternity in non-action.
I go to work, eat, sleep,
Communicate, read, and entertain myself,
Yet not attaching to a better reality:
Such as a better body, a keener mind
Or a more pure soul
I’m thanking God for my existence just the way I am
Knowing that the only place to be is now.
May 12, 2014
May 12, 2014 at 10:30 PM UTC
[Dedicated to Allan Bennett]
I
Hail to the golden One
Seen in the midmost Sun !
Hail to the golden beard and golden lips,
His whole lige golden to the finger-tips !
Hail to the golden hair in golden showers
Hiding the eyes like blue blue lotus-flowers !
His name is Ut, for He
Hath risen above all things that be.
II
Ardent and white, the Lord
Whirls forth a strident sword.
Its blade is broader than the great World-Ash ;
Its edge is keener than the lightning flash.
Brighter than all the lights of heaven, it whirls
Out in a chaos of creative curls
And sheathes itself in Me,
Arisen above all things that be.
III
Even as the burning tongue
Og God to God that clung
Dissolved his being to a nameless naught,
Brake all the wings and waves of time and thought,
So in the quivering flame that hurled
Its founts of life to the remotest world
Supreme stood Death, and sware
Destruction to all things that were !
IV
Child, father, warrior,
I worshipped thee before ;
Friend, bridegroom, now I yield me to the rod.
My God, and very God of very God
As breath, as death, as all, as naught, unknown,
Known, is there not an end, when one alone
Stand I, and thou, and He
Arisen above all things that be?
2.4k
"Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood"
T.S. Eliot (1888 - 1965)
~~~
perhaps.
can I communicate
what I cannot fully comprehend?
my voice poetic keener, age-softened,
grows less popular
for it
no longer reaches for
christmas ornament words and creamy cake-in-the-rain imagery
leave that to the better ones.
cherish simplest:
coming home to fresh sheets,
plumped pillows,
music,
tousled hair on pillowed histories,
river walks,
the lightest hand touch that rouses
the fireplace of contentment to glow briefly,
from logs that are more embered ash moments
than substance
capable of more flaming
the rumpled strivings of the young poets,
creativity of the masters of
voice and dancings bodies,
shopping lists of life~items that
reshape, restore my old~ness,
the revelations of the historians,
inducements to believe
in yet, more.
these exteriors are comprehendable.
don't forget the orange juice,
the first chilled swig from the plastic,
confirms I am breath-yet-capable,
one more poem-mission ready,
the mission objectives still not published.
Sun east welcomes me,
woman puttering kitchen coffee noises
it is neither spring yet or winter gone,
in-between like me,
in-between naissance and history remnant
question thy fiat,
Mr. Eliot,
cannot frame myself,
my who-I-am
six decades of myself.
can it then ere be said,
his poetry communicated
or ere contained ever a single
genuine word?
can I communicate
what I cannot fully comprehend?
Mar 15, 2014
Mar 15, 2014 at 8:38 AM UTC
I used to swear I was born in the Shire
right next to Bilbo Baggins.
Not because of the allure of being a hobbit, their squat bodies and hairy feet.
The shire was refuge from the eye of the witch king.
I would rather be an elf like Legolas with a bow of rowan wood
Arrows fletched with swan feathers, twin gold inlaid swords, and eyes keener than a hawk.
My weapons in this world are a bleeding tongue and rusted teeth
Maggot-filled reasoning, an understanding that middle earth is no more.
The Shire never happened for a ******* child.
The witch king came and raised me proud.
Fantasy is all I have left.
What could I possibly have for you?
Feb 2, 2012
Feb 2, 2012 at 2:41 PM UTC
Imprisoned inside tall red brick built tenements
curtained in by cheap store bought accoutrements
and locking up the world outside within with a needle and a pin and sewing life away.
where we stitch up every day as if only cross stitching could show or say how angry that we are
and far above some half existent but quite persistent feelings that the life we live is what we get for being better than the dogs that line the streets with pockets bulging emptiness
is more or less the happiness that we were told of, when we read books in those classrooms dripping coldness from the cold lights,prefabricated by the councils to educate the poor and in this we have believed for fifty years or more.
But technograbbers took the high road
ripped the legs from under desks by which we sat
and then they spat on former teaching
teachers in the pay of local educational authorities
had no authority to intervene
and preaching texts that they had learnt by heart 'cause all the textbooks burnt far brighter in the fires in tenements
where former pupils with dilated eyes felt the cold much keener,much cleaner than the dogs upon the streets
and behind the curtained windows I weep for a yesterday when as a young child I could play outside and not wonder what the future held.
Held spellbound by the monkey man who turned the handle on his barrel ***** and put a flat cap on the ground which magically
naturally filled with pennies from the folks who had such things.
Sadness and the lack of more or less brings me nothing but the bulging emptiness
and the breaking of another spine
another book a former time
and locking in the world outside
I bide my time
and watch
the black and white
the day within the night
I'll be alright
just me and shotgun joe beside the bed
and nothing else to spoil nothing
that we never had but there are badmen in the badlands
roaming tenemental bands that would cut your throats
if you looked twice or even once at them
Like the dog down in the street I never raise my eyes to meet
anyone or any other
why bother
it's just the way it is.
Jun 28, 2013
Jun 28, 2013 at 12:38 AM UTC
She sang beyond the genius of the sea.
The water never formed to mind or voice,
Like a body wholly body, fluttering
Its empty sleeves; and yet its mimic motion
Made constant cry, caused constantly a cry,
That was not ours although we understood,
Inhuman, of the veritable ocean.
The sea was not a mask. No more was she.
The song and water were not medleyed sound
Even if what she sang was what she heard,
Since what she sang was uttered word by word.
It may be that in all her phrases stirred
The grinding water and the gasping wind;
But it was she and not the sea we heard.
For she was the maker of the song she sang.
The ever-hooded, tragic-gestured sea
Was merely a place by which she walked to sing.
Whose spirit is this? we said, because we knew
It was the spirit that we sought and knew
That we should ask this often as she sang.
If it was only the dark voice of the sea
That rose, or even colored by many waves;
If it was only the outer voice of sky
And cloud, of the sunken coral water-walled,
However clear, it would have been deep air,
The heaving speech of air, a summer sound
Repeated in a summer without end
And sound alone. But it was more than that,
More even than her voice, and ours, among
The meaningless plungings of water and the wind,
Theatrical distances, bronze shadows heaped
On high horizons, mountainous atmospheres
Of sky and sea.
It was her voice that made
The sky acutest at its vanishing.
She measured to the hour its solitude.
She was the single artificer of the world
In which she sang. And when she sang, the sea,
Whatever self it had, became the self
That was her song, for she was the maker. Then we,
As we beheld her striding there alone,
Knew that there never was a world for her
Except the one she sang and, singing, made.
Ramon Fernandez, tell me, if you know,
Why, when the singing ended and we turned
Toward the town, tell why the glassy lights,
The lights in the fishing boats at anchor there,
As the night descended, tilting in the air,
Mastered the night and portioned out the sea,
Fixing emblazoned zones and fiery poles,
Arranging, deepening, enchanting night.
Oh! Blessed rage for order, pale Ramon,
The maker's rage to order words of the sea,
Words of the fragrant portals, dimly-starred,
And of ourselves and of our origins,
In ghostlier demarcations, keener sounds.
1.6k
The bigger my heart,
the greater my capacity for hurt.
The more open my mind
the deeper I need to think.
The greater my reach
the more grounding I need.
------------------
The older I get
the more I listen.
The more I listen
the keener my hearing.
The more I hear
the more my heart weeps.
Mar 25, 2019
Mar 25, 2019 at 10:37 AM UTC
'No,' she said, as we waited, 'that’s not right.'
Not fading, but returning, rising through
full spectrums of radiant light until,
to the human eye it appears to fade
(pale white to a silver grey)
but it simply steps into a vision
that is reserved for keener eyes than ours.
(like ultraviolet)
Not fading, but transforming, travelling
at a speed forever known as its own.
Always keen to get home in a fit state
to enjoy a few hours with its feet up
by the ebb and glow of its evening fire
(red with blues and greens)
before rising, rested, to greet the dawn
recharged with the full force of the sunrise.
(bold yellow and blood orange)
No, not fading. That fails to see the truth
that it’s taking paths through deeper shadows
(purples and blues mostly)
which our deceptive eyes struggle to grasp
and in our weakness, it is lost to us.
Then she gasped, and I saw that she was right,
the light didn't fade, but it stepped ahead
waiting at the next bend of hope’s rainbow.
(a glow of pure gold)
Oct 6, 2022
Oct 6, 2022 at 5:17 PM UTC
When I talk with other men
I always think of you—
Your words are keener than their words,
And they are gentler, too.
When I look at other men,
I wish your face were there,
With its gray eyes and dark skin
And tossed black hair.
When I think of other men,
Dreaming alone by day,
The thought of you like a strong wind
Blows the dreams away.
1.3k
To reiterate,
Words filling contagious information
into the keener ears of degenerate people
While elsewhere,
leaving scars deep enough
to catch rain water
that can’t be drunk
to soothe the uneasiness
A girl was ***** the day before
GANGED - the headlines boisterously boasted
my fine countrymen on their best behavior
I thought
It’s not a mystery how lightly
they take to such things here
the average *** smoker rots for 10 years
while the ****** gets 4 before he walks
Capital justice
grass involves more money
who’s gonna pay to **** someone?
degenerates waiting on call
Asking for the unreasonable
while selling me a thought
sugar coated and studded with half truths
to turn with the big wheel
and stare atrocity in the eye, eyes closed
Able bodied souls handicap themselves
to perpetuate the cycle of corruption
the wondrous mechanics of our modern world
can’t put a price on dignity
so we boycott what doesn’t benefit us
Is that our reality
or just something I read?
Aug 30, 2013
Aug 30, 2013 at 5:56 AM UTC
(for Glynn)
Singing breeze
Singing breeze
Carrying nothing
Kissed by sunlight
Carry my wishes
Scatter my troubles
Leave the grey highway
Slip through the forest
Birch and pine
Needle and catkin
Shutting the sky out
Speckles of sunlight
Evening sky
How many colours
How many colours
Woodsmoke and silence
Unsleeping river
Silence and river
Wanting to share this
Beautifully lonely
Only I saw it
Only I held it
Stop this stone rolling
Let the moss gather
Living as leaf-fall
Living as boulder
Keener than snowmelt
Fuller than August
Cradle of tree roots
Mantle of mountain
Granite horizon
Breezes will soothe you
Whispering breezes
Will you be listening
Do you hear singing
Do you hear forests
Apr 1, 2011
Apr 1, 2011 at 11:20 AM UTC
Dearest Patty m.,
we admire, admit to raw nailed jealousy
when we read the works superior
with the greatest worn scruffy complementary compliment
a poet
can give to
another scribe
*How I wish I had written that,
those very words!*
confessing before the world
with our own humility
at the daily dawning of
realization that
morning brings freshness and
insights needy for release and
aborning and the trace of humiliation
that we’ve all ready
been breached bested
by others,
once again…
BUT
we do not bow!
no courtly arm sweeping,
back bent, at best
a nod of a head
then
privately
we gasp, rent our clothes,
throw the body flat to the floor,
observing seven days of mourning
reserved
for when we morning moan,
daylight groan and loan out our
croissant moon mooing cries to
bemused muses
in the clouds supervising,
as tears of, an admixture of,
an elixir of joy, compassion
and thus refreshed by someone’s
new infant’d christening
we ***** we resurrect, gamble,
throwing ourselves complete like dice,
in to a roll of
stunned stupor of high inspiration
and then make out best work
ever yet
but never do we bow, scrape,
bend the knee, maybe the head,
we mourn our lesser failings
and smile as we flash words
from our eyes,
stored in our mindsets,
our, my best, will
always be yielded up
next
——
addendum
———
seven years ago
in a separate guise,
he ssid it differently
maybe better?
:<•>
epilogue
read my face
incapable of,
deprivation
but how now silent
bow my head to Will
for teaching the way of words
traced upon
a fool or a king's tongue,
two too human,
so that poet may ken
his senses keener,
all for the better,
for the betterment of all
Feb 23, 2025
Feb 23, 2025 at 1:57 PM UTC
Believer of schemers
You hopeless day dreamer
It takes heartbreak to make
Your senses much keener
Burn down this bridge
Build up that wall
Lock it up tight
Don’t let it fall
In love again, (the heart that is)
The brain knows
What is good for it
Separation of the heart and mind
Makes for a less painful existence
A more simple life
Free of resistance
Yet time and time
And time again
I forget this fact
And let someone in
A vicious cycle it seizes my heart
My very soul
And rips them apart
I don’t believe that I will ever learn
To discern...
Between what will heal
And what will burn
Jul 16, 2011
Jul 16, 2011 at 7:45 PM UTC
Prelude
Seeing thee again is indeed invigorating-look at how my thoughts are now brimming-with t'eir lost souls! T'ose souls who faded away-as I was severely bereft of my muchness. But now I am glowing with it again, whenever I remembereth our chilly encounter t'is afternoon; thou wandering at lightning pace-in thy fond childishness! But furthermore thou in t'ose fond eyes-and t'eir depth, o! Thinking of thee makes my heart shimmer-and credulous to thy gentle love. And I shall but never go wrong again-as our fates, I assume; are but inevitably, and so dearly, bound to each other, my dear, my dear.
O, and but today wasth I chanced to see my lover;
shining bright and tender like a glade in a bower.
Storming out in gladness out of his chamber;
and as we talked his face grew fonder!
O, lovelier and keener didst he become, through th' more
subservient seconds-as though truly adorned with passion,
Entranced by such courage and fated determination.
I listened carefully to his fond elaboration;
and confined myself to my meek walls of admiration.
My thee, o, my thee!
T'is as if everything hath been our fierce destiny
And shall our paths but cross again-
of which I'm certain, under yon strumming daylight-
when t'at weeping moon waivers.
And all t'at wailing bark shall ever come to an end-as our
luminous, but fair melody lingers.
My moon-and th' following morning, it
shan't any longer be weeping.
To th' despondent grass wilt it start singing-bestowing
th' delayed merit whilst bent is 'tis body-and dancing:
Every other fault shalt come back
from t'eir mistake!
And th' latent dangers shalt be put well
at a steep stake.
And t'ose rings-o, rings of love, as t'ey are, by t'is wan light silver
A light whose abyss shan't ever again last forever.
And protected as we are-chained by our ripe love-
Shall we proceed into serene joy, and resides there-
within th' grand layers of our hearts, and splendid flames
of t'is wondrous eternity.
Jan 4, 2013
Jan 4, 2013 at 10:20 AM UTC
Thirteen hours on a train, just to see your face -
looked for it in your hiding place;
Made my way through all the memories,
granted your fingers
permission to keener things
took the train,
in Jesus’ name,
all the way to you;
‘was always you –
the blue,
the “I’m through!”,
the “who knew?”,
and the “…, too”;
you, as if I couldn’t see further,
you,
guilty as charged
for this 2nd ****** -
this mind that cannot be un-fucked,
one wall, so heavy, I’m stuck;
superseded,
as you proceeded
to lie with both eyes,
or
pretend the love died,
long enough to see me cry;
truth made to waste,
patience into haste,
another love story gone wrong,
jotted down, but not for long;
obliteration,
translation - you
Nov 15, 2011
Nov 15, 2011 at 7:06 PM UTC
Oh well.
(sonnet #MMMMMCMLXXVIII)
Earl Grey and biscuit for a proper sense
Of yonder ist? where blue skies fringe clouds' veil
Known as white racks that keener eye'd wax pale
Through as how orange paints bits and pieces hence
Whiles yellow flutters to the sidewalks whence
Tis trod whilst fills aught cracks in sheer betrayl;
La, bony limbs cast 'gainst these heavns look frail,
How vines run riot in deep reds' intents.
Hot soup for dinner, I wear plaid now fer
Ah kicks, a kilt to boot, as if being new
Might salve the galling void I can't endure,
Yet must. Talk of espresso gadgets to
Think ya, the French Press grand. And tea. What's poor
Is blindness cuz the LORD's our life, ne brew.
19Oct16b
Oct 23, 2016
Oct 23, 2016 at 9:50 PM UTC
What is it like not to see?
I can imagine the darkness
Partial or complete
But what of everything else?
Would touching of the skin in the throngs of passion
Fill you with even more ecstasy
Would it help paint a picture in the mind
Seeing through the fingertips
Brushing metal bumps
Seeing Henley
Being like him, unconquered
How must it feel to inhale
And smell every delicate scent
Or every putrid odor
The sweet aroma of fresh lavender
The putrid stench of a dark alleyway
A blessing and a curse
Sometimes, it is said that you hear better when you cannot see
You are keener to the sounds that surround you
It makes me wonder
How blissfully amazing it must be to hear Beethoven's ninth in its full glory
Uninterrupted by the distractions of sight
Hearing every note as if the orchestra was in your ears
Blindness is a condition I do not wish on anyone
Yet it would truly be splendid
Could we appreciate
The magnificence that surrounds us
As does someone who has lost something so dear as his sight
To Maria
Mar 26, 2013
Mar 26, 2013 at 11:00 PM UTC
That’s my old chair
The one I used to doze in
While Mr Parker droned on ‘bout maths & that
I was gonna sit down front near Kerry Keener
But in the end I thought, nah, better not, so here I sat
You see, just here, my keychain scraped the plastic
As I ragged around to try & find a comfy spot
& that bit there got scuffed
The more my trainers rubbed it
I never could sit sensible
So they said
That armrest there snapped clean off when Matty Parker
Went arsefirst backward over it, farting on,
We laughed our backs off that time, Matty too like
It’s a few years now that Matt’s been dead & gone
& round the back there
Do you clock the “I heart Lisa”
Jason compass-scrawled once before class, the cheeky ****
He knew I had a soft spot for that Lisa
I made ****** sure that Jase was out of luck
I haven’t seen that Lisa in a fair while
Jason neither like, funny how life goes
Still, you close one door, another waits ajar like
Sit still too long you won’t go far like, I suppose
Mar 6, 2019
Mar 6, 2019 at 8:03 PM UTC
Mystique and dare
A love affair
Wrapped in perfect disguise
Beauty and care
With thoughts to share
A keener point-of-view
Style and taste
Who can erase
Two who are already true
Dark and oblique
Almost out of reach
A game of shadow tag
Complex and complete
Still messy and sweet
A hidden bloom so rich
Different in design
Conclusive in compare
Matched in matchless symmetry
May 1, 2013
May 1, 2013 at 9:05 PM UTC
...as Mum taught me.
(sonnet #MMMMMMCMIX)
Did sparrows gaily call as wont, t'avail
Espresso with Dad's lecture of a sense
Long since forgotten, just where blue skies fence
Is't Sunday morning's placid airs as frail
White clouds lent April's winking eye a pale
Note of grey yonder, what? for aught intents?
How Janry owns the jest was poor as hence
These naked wastes look dead, likeas to scale.
O yes, they market florals ere March tour,
Cuz stylish girls must be the first to do
Um, April Fools a proper notice. We're
All shivring in wool rollnecks now, but you
Just want mair golden hours to cull what'd stir
That keener sense Spring shall anon debut.
28Jan18a
Feb 10, 2018
Feb 10, 2018 at 9:59 PM UTC
All five
Yet
Write on
only in the mind,
where my senses
are even keener
see?
Jan 8, 2014
Jan 8, 2014 at 12:27 AM UTC
They said it was A PUSH
I said this **** is APES
Bananas
Do they know what this system does?
It's all just stress
So they can assess
What you've learned
Meanwhile, they've only turned
A generation into stressed out perfectionists
Or students dropped out, burned out
So many notes, assignments, & essays to write
It's all lead to carpal tunnel in the wrist
Why does this system exist?
Instead make students hunger for knowledge
Instead of stressing out about college
Somewhere over the hedge
The rainbow
Where the grass is greener
I picture students happier and keener
With the love of learning being what we live for.
Jan 19, 2015
Jan 19, 2015 at 5:38 AM UTC