"lexicon" poems
Time is fleeting
as the spring river runoff
that gushes out to sea
A heart trickles out
a moment,
minute by minute,
in a timeless ink drop;
unmeasurable expanse
immured in spilled ink ―
manifest in the lexicon of poetry
For only purged words
cannot quench this thirst
that is loneliness;
it's a hunger that gnaws
like an unsatisfiable ache ―
a starving emptiness
all hearts
do one day taste
Left in the sight
of doubt
and eyes that fail
to believe what they see
lain fallow in the silent
indifference
Lost in a lingering void
unburied all around,
bespoken out loud
alone in plain sight
a feigned understanding;
reticent letters shape
reluctant words
to hold forth
enunciated breathe
The only words
that still echo unstilted ―
uttered words
indelibly felt
from lips once sweet
as daybreak dew
upon musing tongue ―
tasting the only
voiceless truth
that ever broke my heart
a vanishing wave
that moved an ocean
deeply ...
Jesse Stillwater ... 06 6 2018
Jun 6, 2018
Jun 6, 2018 at 2:38 PM UTC
"sly wordplay, it glows, feels like a shimmering address, half warning and half blessing, really alive with cadence"
read Kiki Dresden poetry^
once more into the sea trench divide,
I dive to devise,
Your provoking comment,
demands my full attention,
you divert me from struggling with
ginger & clay,
a contra concept
that molds and enflames,
yet strikes overtly sweet,
it does not
come so easy
as this playful notion
But
your words deserve the
attention immédiate
atenção imediata
that births this script,
tumbling forth in an instantly
instantaneously
me student, you mistress~master,
schooling me on sublimity subliminal,
capturing the capering
stylistic that bursts forth from within,
that my fingertips provide,
while my brain connives & connivers
continuously
you overlay analytics
that never are to me
revealed,
the what and wherefore
of the whom
hiding within
of the im~perpetuity impish essence of
i m p ishness
by charmingly doing me, not once,
but many times better
here a spillage:
an observational ditty,
dressed in a tux,
most formally,
to render the greatest
wordplay
ever invented
t,
the uniqueness of a simple
thank you
my favorite poem
a forever for ever,
the song that
plys and plays me
in the me
so often,
the linguists have banned the word
repeatedly
from my lexicon
so in its stead,
this all-in-one mighty steed
(verb phrase, a noun, or an adjective depending on its usage)
this phatic expression,
here disguised in
Portuguese,
muito obrigado!
muito obrigado!
muito obrigado!
nml 5:39am nyc 10/4, 10/4
Oct 4, 2025
Oct 4, 2025 at 5:44 AM UTC
aɪ love the slipping vaʊwels
That seɪ yʊər neɪme
In gliding təʊnes that form my lips to a kiss.
The səʊnd of it brings comforting warmth.
The world disappɪəring
In the seɪfe enfolding of yʊər arms,
Naʊ peɪn and tɪərs of sadness
Are companions to the memory of yʊər passing
Once peəred and jɔɪned
United as one,
aɪ thought,
Forever.
This child’s nəʊtion was innocent of aweəreness
That love’s lexicon is full of such partings
Naʊ aləʊne aɪ strive to grasp an ember of a truth profaʊnd
That while a part of me will alweɪs
Call for you in whispers
And long for yʊər embreɪce
aɪ’ll preveɪl , surviving separation’s sting.
A tribute
Still standing,
Praʊd
And saʊnd.
Mar 10, 2010
Mar 10, 2010 at 11:02 PM UTC
728
Let Us play Yesterday—
I—the Girl at school—
You—and Eternity—the
Untold Tale—
Easing my famine
At my Lexicon—
Logarithm—had I—for Drink—
’Twas a dry Wine—
Somewhat different—must be—
Dreams tint the Sleep—
Cunning Reds of Morning
Make the Blind—leap—
Still at the Egg-life—
Chafing the Shell—
When you troubled the Ellipse—
And the Bird fell—
Manacles be dim—they say—
To the new Free—
Liberty—Commoner—
Never could—to me—
’Twas my last gratitude
When I slept—at night—
’Twas the first Miracle
Let in—with Light—
Can the Lark resume the Shell—
Easier—for the Sky—
Wouldn’t Bonds hurt more
Than Yesterday?
Wouldn’t Dungeons sorer frate
On the Man—free—
Just long enough to taste—
Then—doomed new—
God of the Manacle
As of the Free—
Take not my Liberty
Away from Me—
5.1k
Then out of nowhere and at once, the voice stopped.
No lingering feeling of self hate
The questions
The pondering
It all came to a halt
A thing that’s been with me all these years
Came to an abrupt end
Not bitter
Not sweet
Just end
An ending i’ve been hoping, but not waiting on
I didn’t know that there was such a thing
As an end to it
A blabbering, mumbling sorrow of self pity
Or just a mere convenience of a lexicon with words to degrade myself
A daily reminder of how worthless I was
So I would’ve never forgotten my reason
A reason never explained
Never cared for
With a reach of a sovereign hand I touch the notes
Floundering through the air
Playing a floating piano
“A river flows in you”
Caring for unprotected skin
I was waiting for a different ending
An abrupt ending, not like this one
Fingernails not bitten off bleeding
A curious feeling of relentlessness
Not used to the feeling of not being alone
It all came to a halt
A voice that’s been with me for years
A sadness of emptiness is nowhere to be found
A clue to a healthy mind
Maybe a fear of what could’ve been if not the voice left
A sort of trembling worry of who to now complain when I do wrong
An understatement of falling leaves from my tree
I know my family will be glad
Even though I haven’t ever told them bout the pain I contain
Who to be worthy shall never pass
Through my gates of hell
No one is worthy of that pain
Maybe not even me?
I think this was and end worth waiting for
Dec 9, 2022
Dec 9, 2022 at 6:27 PM UTC
Gathered pieces of a great puzzle ;
refreshed perspective like ocean riptides
foment at the confluence collecting dark rivers’ flow
Repurposing back-eddies ,
rejuvenation of stagnant brackish waters ,
inherent buried soul-shine purging
from the ancient core of earth mother
Light arising from the hidden depths
of inner stillness as if a refilling wellspring
burst forth , reawakening muted sighs unspoken
Forming poetic constellations of black and bright
to lighten afar the nebulous darkness ,
a sea of swirling ink transformed into poetry
A sage opus renewed
by the muse of a migrating flock ,
striving to discover new sacred grounds ;
yet there is an undeniable song sung
in the howling winds of change
An incitement from a higher dialect
that empowers a restoration of spirit
Oeuvre uplifted by rogue waves
of summoning winds ,
arousing that which time erases
A manifest renaissance
among the rousing nuances
of poetic continuum ,
judicious to rediscover
the enthralling vastitude
of every breaking wave
in a boundless sea of poesy
Where prevailing currents
stir oceans of verse eternal ;
provoking a verve revival ,
the magnitude of an unbroken circle ,
ocean swells merging singularity
with the omnipresent colour
of uncharted depths
As if thoughts are assuaged
by a union of intimately touching souls
with words of intangible spheres ,
sparking subtle shades of meaning
spanning poetic immortality
Transcending barriers of unexplored lexicon
to manifest the immensity,
enkindling rhapsody of hearts and minds
Deeply rooted soul replenishment
harvested from the tree of humankind ,
willingly sharing without regret nor intention ,
with deference to the soul of one-blood,
one-love enabling an enlightening
metamorphosis of the human journey ...
© harlon rivers ... all rights reserved
Jan 20, 2017
Jan 20, 2017 at 11:48 AM UTC
There’s a time and season for every reason
no cookie bakes itself
cherries don’t burst on their own
cherries don’t burst ************
a bottle doesn’t empty itself to full/fill
breaking clocks is a wonderful way to **** time
ironic glory hole of blood and glass
running out of test tubes, the ***** too tight
**** reason!
INVEST!
Admiration is the state furthest away from understanding
pawns don’t need details
******** with teeth make ******** meaningful
smashing the cow softens it, …digest it well
meaning is derived from screening STD g string
of a starry eyed ******** that drowns in a sea of ******
obtuse and absolute are the only submissions
failure to comprehend results in ***********
cuckolds worth….
IMPROVE!
Lexicon laxative
this antipathy won’t last
stimulate thinking with cankerous drinking
***** ***** need no season or reason
to drown ****** who never show
the tears of heaven that understood
misled admiration and adolescent aberration
that silently candle deplorable fornication
time stays unchanged
counting doesn’t prove progress in this game
falling short… half beat hesitation
ITERATE!
Apr 14, 2014
Apr 14, 2014 at 5:10 AM UTC
They line up in droves at the voting booth
ignorantly choosing between two candidates on the same side of the same fence
They just use a different lexicon for offense and defense
we are ******* either way you choose
pull that level
push that button
tab that chad
The popular vote to be ignored by the electoral few and cash lined pockets of politicians
How much longer can we afford to play this game?
Oct 27, 2012
Oct 27, 2012 at 7:53 PM UTC
poetry is heart speaking
her deepest wisdom
or lightest whimsy
traditional form or free verse
let souls sing
sprinkle metaphor and simile
if you are a poet, write like one
words are music
let them breeze like a melody
color with mix-matched sensory
don’t stay inside the lines
see sounds with eyes closed
hear flickering of fireflies’ light
smell beauty in distant mountains
taste majesty of flowers’ bloom
touch forgiveness
bring personification to life
“she” is much sweeter than “it”
and a seat cushion may have a roundness to her
throw in some high speech
make someone grab a lexicon
delete those extra words
‘I’s and ‘the’s especially
alliteration can create cacophonic chorus
while similar sounds of assonance
tie hoards and scores of words together
although there are no rules
try your best to use poetry’s tools
with this above all else:
let your truth ring
let your insights and revelations
be a healing to self and reader
let experiences resonate in hearts
and harmonize voices
Jun 17, 2010
Jun 17, 2010 at 4:49 PM UTC
It is not my story to tell:
Languishing dreams in the midst of barbed wire fences,
Fearless laughter,
We add lemon, chile powder and salt to this border.
They carry these stories,
Heavy as a sack filled with indignities,
Weighty, like your grandmother’s advice,
Cumbersome, like this daily mental displacement.
I have not bought big things as of lately,
In my mind I plan my exits,
I constantly check my relocation fund,
“What if” is a constant in my lexicon.
I often break in tears at the sound of an immigrant story,
My emotions become gallons of water:
broken and splashed by the boots of immigration officers,
Little do they know, we are cacti:
Tough and our seeds also flourish post mortem.
I want to sing an immigrant song:
Less like butterflies who migrate,
But more like dislocated nations,
Collateral flesh, caught up in steel thorns.
Rest assured we will survive,
Like leaves of siempreviva,
Even after torn away from our stem,
We will grow our own roots:
Defiant, resilient, and with a stubborn willingness to belong.
We are you.
Jan 29, 2018
Jan 29, 2018 at 3:30 PM UTC
Face of MADNESS , gather your twisted strength
Stench like sadness? (Do)n't confuse, its greatness
Sway through the fractures and disjointedness
Disembodied manifestation, useless phenomenon
S(cul)p(ture)s hammered into DisFuRme/nt
Castrate salient pieces of that body
Spew inhuman lexicon insinuating i-n/co\here/nce
Slaughter the (harm)ony within cadence
Screech! H o w l! Growl!
Rel(easing) murderous miseries within infected entr[ails]
R A G E, count{less} bullets turning fl{ashes} of sanity to CAD(AVE)R(S)
De[generate] ripping throat of conscio(us)ness
Feb 24, 2013
Feb 24, 2013 at 12:31 AM UTC
The will o' the wisp is
displayed on the screen of
conventions. There are those
who pretend to decipher it;
by borrowing philosophical speculations from the great
thinkers, they formulate a
critical reading, justifying the
poverty of the lexicon.
They dare to do so.
On the other hand there is
Poetry, sat on a bench
in a park somewhere, on a
rock nearby the ocean, on
an old chair in a remote room
without any other furniture,
on the pillow made with papers
of a clochard,
on the cover of an unabridged
book nobody wants.
On the trembling hand of a
young lover who picks flowers
for her, that remain forever
between the pages of a diary.
Poetry is in the multiplicity of life,
in the thousands layers, either
red or grey, that compound the
variety of the existence. It can't
escape feelings, love, roses,
tears, grief, graveyards and
gardens. And, even when it turns
to be redundant with naivety, it
keeps the greatness of its end
which is nothing else but itself.
Oct 4, 2018
Oct 4, 2018 at 10:40 AM UTC
These soft stones you call stars
claw at ravens, underneath the skull of your irony.
We are not without our useful futilities -
That function as the only spiral
of our narrow chasm
yawning in the wicked mist that tingles in the nerve-dead breath, your charms are few -
well met and the hour has lost it's keening dread...
Where the hourglass slept -
Things are not the things we name things, alas
Our lexicon corrupts the numb jest -
the dumb joke that chokes the joy out of dominion
and bloats the vulture
till it simply
explodes.
You're next.
Oct 26, 2012
Oct 26, 2012 at 3:37 PM UTC
a novice,
i may be....
learning the lexicon of love
from a practicing grandmaster
whose expressive kohl-rimmed eyes
dart from side to side,
speaking a million languages of the heart.
transfixed
nay, transformed
an intimidated admirer of hers,
i’ve become,
from such a great distance.
© 2023
May 28, 2023
May 28, 2023 at 11:55 AM UTC
*Language is a skin: I rub my language against the other. It is
as if I had words instead of fingers, or fingers at the tip
of my words. My language trembles with desire.
-Roland Barthes*
My language is a skin I have outgrown.
It sloughs off in flakes,
leaving letters or the occasional
ill-suited, illegible word
trailing behind me.
I pick at adverbs and articles
hanging from my fingertips;
This morning I pulled a whole phrase
off my arm like a sunburn.
My language, once alight,
now settles like cinders
on the ground,
around the shower drain,
upon my sheets;
My language no longer serves me.
Peel my vocabulary off my back,
tear my diction from my shoulders,
and my syntax from my chest;
Scratch the punctuation off my face—
my lips are chapped with parentheses.
Tomorrow I will have shed my language—
Unbound from an ill-fitting lexicon—
coughed the alphabet from my lungs
and exhaled the last serif
like cigarette smoke
to find the world new,
uncontained and undefined.
Apr 7, 2011
Apr 7, 2011 at 4:15 AM UTC
there are times
when the meaning
of a word
is asked
one that
has been read
and regurgitated
used regularly
correctly adopted
as part of
an apparent
well-read
or pretentious
vocabulary
however upon
being asked
its meaning
there is only
a blank
vacuous
addled
unable to provide
a succinct
or even literate
definition
to save face
to re-establish
the hubris
of this
abashed lexicologist
analogous alternatives
will be offered
oversimplified
synonyms
carrying a little
less gravitas
a layman's explanation
to maintain
position on his
self-congratulatory
podium
Oct 13, 2022
Oct 13, 2022 at 11:42 AM UTC
The Pill
Called up big Pharma,
Sad and depressed,
I told them straight out:
Dudes, I need a new karma.
*NO problem they cheerfully replied,
(later I wondered, which pill they were on)
We custom make, haute couture, drug-design,
Mood enhancers, in little canisters,
You need only supply the cash and the system vascular!
Your soul's desire?
To be a better wilder, rambler,
Or a life calmer, better anchored?*
I know what I want, exactly,
A pill that removes
Specific words
From the frontal lobe temple
Verbal storage center.
*NO problem! (so cheery it was kinda scary)
Which words would you like to have
Exorcised, annihilated, irradiated, confiscated?*
I list from below, from side to side,
Let not one be denied,
Bury them all in nether-lands,
Swamp them under mountains of
Granite and sand,
Banish them from my lexicon.
How much do you charge?
But one dollar per word.
The list I emailed complete,
Herein I reprint.
Scars Pain Wound Strain Torture Anguish
Disfigure Damage Mar Mutilate Maim Blemish Deface Damage Ruin Distress
Afflict Trouble Wound Torment Agonize Sad Suffer Sting Throb
Torture Torment Despair Suffer Distress Hurt Vex Trouble
Ache Hurt Misery Woe Bitterness Misery Agony Bitter
Heartache Afflict Hurt Cut Loathing Shatter Broken
Alone Bleed Struggle Self-destruct Monster
Nightmare Cornered Darkness Horror
Loner Confused Goodbye Suicide
Slash Cut Desolate Submerge
Dissipate Dead Stinking
Enough.
Awaiting my concoction sweet,
When an answer they begat,
A response forthcoming, indeed was snubbing!
**Dear Sir/Madam,
We regret to inform you that we are unable to manufacture
Said item. Removal of these words would be a violation of
Federal Poetry Laws.
Sadly yours,
Big Pharma
P.S. Are you the author of "Yo! Yo! Warning: the government is reading your poetry! (Metadata Mining This Site) on HP?"**
P.P.S. Please do not contact us anymore.
Jul 16, 2013
Jul 16, 2013 at 1:53 PM UTC
Come, my love
let us speak now
the language
of skin
imprint
your lexicon
in my every hollow
stroke that soft spot
above my hipbone
you love so well
linger there
like we have
forever
mold my body
to fit yours
wrap me in sleep
precious few
hours remain
imagine to never
touch again.
Jan 8, 2016
Jan 8, 2016 at 9:37 AM UTC
first, make sure you are very concerned with
unlearned or silenced or misread minorities. this establishes that you
are a rarity, a person of charity,
a champion and deity of the small and the voiceless.
you’ve made the right choices
swallowed the right poisons
so now you’re not pointless,
you’re with the top few
of the economic disparity.
do you aver verity?
not so much.
you just make the choicest noises.
second, it is very important that you stud your vernacular
with words like deictic, post-spaciality, and sub-simulacular.
when you, font of knowledge, squeeze out pearls like turds
in twelve-point, double spaced, times new roman rows,
lined up like crows or some other ***** birds,
be sure to write no sentence shorter than thirty words, and
see to it that two thirds of these words have more than ten letters
that even the nerds in their plaid-patterned sweaters have not once ever heard.
when you walk, A paper in hand, from your car to your apartment, past four vagrants, do not look at them.
do not look into the eyes of the man standing in the rain, barefoot, black, green, and yellow toenails oozing and crusting, nodding his head and shouting at no one, and do not wonder whether or not he’d be there had he been educated.
lexicon is not eloquence.
erudition is not wisdom.
intelligence is not a prerequisite for rights.
you have no rights.
take a dictionary and shove it up your *** and
while you’re at it, shove one up mine, too.
Aug 7, 2013
Aug 7, 2013 at 4:54 PM UTC
Above the clouds, across the sky
An angel watches down on I
Her caring heart and spoken words
Do fall upon my eyes, not heard
A voice in ether, glide like smoke
Electric tongue, advice she spoke
Take care my love she said in mute
Her heart reveals her inner beau-ty
And r and u and e
A love she showers upon me
No bottom is found in her well of love
It falls down on me like a small white dove
A kindness found in no love sonnet
No bard could write down to paper upon it
Words would fail, her faith is beyond
Any description by men and lexicon
Look down on me my angel, my guide
And I will never fail to be by your side.
Jul 15, 2018
Jul 15, 2018 at 10:02 PM UTC
Before I could be taken to Mount Moriah
before a ram could be found to replace me
before I was a redeemed first born
the ram was left unsacrificed
the redeemed was lost
and the first born
became the last.
And all the martyrs who were lost before my birth,
are still lost despite it.
I have become a singularity
a new word in an old Darwinian lexicon
an irregular verb
without plural
or future tense
unique in every respect and definition
save all who would follow after
and not be of me
or ever could.
Aug 29, 2016
Aug 29, 2016 at 6:39 PM UTC
246
Forever at His side to walk—
The smaller of the two!
Brain of His Brain—
Blood of His Blood—
Two lives—One Being—now—
Forever of His fate to taste—
If grief—the largest part—
If joy—to put my piece away
For that beloved Heart—
All life—to know each other—
Whom we can never learn—
And bye and bye—a Change—
Called Heaven—
Rapt Neighborhoods of Men—
Just finding out—what puzzled us—
Without the lexicon!
1.6k
Writing of a poem
Oh! How it can be likened
To having a baby!
With the copulation of fancy and thought,
Comes the moment of conception
It can happen any day
Unanticipated or planned erstwhile
On a star studded night
Or a rain drenched morn
It swims into you as a seed
So tiny… so inconspicuous
Once the pregnancy confirmed
Comes irritation, nausea
Lethargy and loss of appetite
Your stomach rarely growls for food
Clouds of words hang heavy and low,
Refusing to break into showers
They don’t gush or rush.
Ideas dry up leaving the nib parched
Lines crack n’ break
Depression follows
Discouraged, you feel fatigued
But all the while you begin to realize
That a new life
Independent of you
Has begun growing inside you
Then all the care taken
To foster the young life
You read…
You refer the lexicon
You withdraw from other works
Take rest, relax in solitude
Slowly the foetus moves
The first stirring of life!
With fond fingers, as you pat your belly
Your pen pats the paper
The first line…..
The first faint beating of the heart!
Then words….
Like little harness bells tingling
Fall in line, line after line!
Drawing nourishment from you,
The embryo grows limb by limb
The miniscule of insight
Grown after months of waiting
Into a mature body of illumination!
A stretch of your dreams!
A suffusion of light!
After the labor pains
Of scribbling and scrawling,
Writing and rewriting,
Deleting, adding and editing,
With time stretching and contracting,
A baby, no, a poem is born.
Whether cute or ugly
No mother can dislike it
She marvels at its birth
Wraps it in her warmth
She must have had in mind a name
Or seeks to find a name;
An apt name
Thus a poem with a title is born!
She wonders if her baby would lit a smile,
On others lips too
Or from them would flow,
Words of endearment as from a trickle!
Jul 31, 2016
Jul 31, 2016 at 11:39 AM UTC
You visit this place
You do not stay long
There’s nothing here
that speaks of settlement
Everything you do has an edge
of intensity wet by the weather
sharpened by the clock
If you try to be still
in what passes for shelter
the wind will find you
seek you out
So with the camera your primary tool
begin to collect - image after image after image
Point and click : view and share
Eventually the mark-making begins
though fraught with difficulty
it seems just hopeless this testing out
of the body’s response to what passes
before the scanning eye
Blink
and the image shifts
There is this fierce and on-going campaign
between the near : between the far
What lies at your feet : what decorates the horizon.
After a few hours wrapped round in nature’s vortex
the eye and brain are exhausted by the profusion of it all
wearied by the press of wind, the touch of rain, the glare of sun
Always the problem of what you do
with what you’ve seen
and touched with cold hands
pulling out metal objects from the sand
whose rusted and distressed forms
will lie exposed on the studio table
The place marks you Rain and wind on the face
raise new freckles there’s a salty veneer to the skin
the rub of sand : a wash of seawater
the grasp of pebbles : wood’s chiromatic grain
The lexicon of texture expands under your fingers
changes of temperature : degrees of saturation
and further uncompromising perspectives
unimaginable yet in two dimensions
Beyond beachcombing this is seacoast surgery
Away from it all (and out of the wind)
your memory stretches to the corners of recall
Wandering through a home-centred day
as in a waking dream
knowing you’ve already gathered
all manner of sensory matter
held and stored in the pineal gland
flowing free in Meissner’s corpuscles
Even absorbed in conversation’s company
as you turn away to fill the kettle
you are on the beach back in the wind
scanning the memory tin : priming the future.
Feb 12, 2013
Feb 12, 2013 at 3:54 AM UTC
i type my middle name cautiously
s
e
o
y
o
u
n
g
and watch resignedly as the red squiggle appears underneath
but with smug satisfaction
i right click
and hit
'add to dictionary'
hah, take that
i am now part of the lexicon
and you can't stop me
Oct 29, 2018
Oct 29, 2018 at 12:17 AM UTC