"misguided" poems
What's it take
These days
To write a poem
That makes the world go mad
That brings the crowds to their feet
That spreads like wildfire
Through a dry winter forest
Is it those excessively long words?
The ostentatiously loquacious
Platitudinous ramblings
Of an insecure mind aspiring
To authentic intellect?
Is it perhaps...
the "creativity"
of varied spacing
or... could it be..... the lack
of capitalization
the loathsome little letters
screaming out
hey, look at us!
... or maybe it's
the punctuation marks,
littered, haphazardly
through the text
(whether used correctly)
or, theyre not?!
despite worrds mispeled
and a grammar might is broken
can these gimmicks increase interest
though miswritten or misspoken?
Is the trick alliteration
Whose bite brightly bids us
To center on the snappy sounds?
Although all along
unvoiced underneath
Ideas idle in the isles
(or perhaps the aisles)
Of the mind
To meld and craft and bind
Our thorough thoughts
And worthy words
Into lines
Which
Heard by herds
Raise the
Praise for which we
Privately, desperately
Pray
Maybe it's a magical mix
Of splendid in-your-head rhythm
Marvelous meter that perfectly clicks
Flowing smoothly without schism
Well-spaced stanzas
Well-used time
Well-crafted phrases
Well-thought-out rhymes
Well, maybe not...
those gems are often ignored
cast-aside, unread, even abhorred
Why?
Because the modern world
doesn't need your rules
your restrictions
your regulations
your misguided boundaries
your oppression
your antiquated ideas
of "the right way"
to write
to speak
to act
to live
to (fill in the blank)
No, what the modern world needs
is
Negation!
Contradiction!
Resistance!
Revolt!
And poetry whose words
Say the same thing
Repeat the same meaning
Echo the same lyrics
Rephrase the same thoughts
But in an ever-so-slightly
Different
Varied
Altered
Adjusted
Changed up way
Line
After line
Of synonyms
over
and
over
and
over
again
-----
What's it take
These days
To not give in
To narcissism's spiral?
But more importantly:
What's it take
To make my poem go viral?
Aug 12, 2018
Aug 12, 2018 at 12:17 AM UTC
Poverty
Blurred Pigments of Red and blue
Bring to mind the police
Responding to our crises
Aptly and alert
Though upon arrival
It’s pure brutality…
They oppress and beat
Abuse and misuse
Break our spirits
Lowering us deeper into this
Depression…
No… it’s and economic Recession…
In which inequalities are abound
For the rich stay rich
While the poor fall hungry
And We…
The…
People….
Fall beyond Poverty…
Straight Through The misguided…
Rage of the government…
And Deeper than just a simple
Economic Inequality…
We’ve
Reached
The
Poverty Stricken
Greatest Recession….
Known As
A Secondary Great Depression….
Sep 12, 2009
Sep 12, 2009 at 4:12 PM UTC
A labyrinth expands before me,
Its only prize, the truth; reality
Awaits the shrewd of mind.
At every turn lie misdirections,
One wrong choice and I am
Lost, for perils lie ahead;
Webs of lies lie waiting for their prey.
I pray for wisdom that I may not fall,
Misguided by a ghost I thought I saw;
My own illusions turn me from the light.
The path ahead is cobbled from the shadows,
Bits of truth among them shining gold,
The only light to guide my weary feet
As Darkness beckons me with gentle hands.
Temptation offers respite from my search:
“Sit down and rest, poor ragged
traveler, you search in vain
For worthless lies. I tell the truth;
One as beautiful as I is honest, sure.”
I pay no heed. The truth is rarely beautiful or pure.
Jul 29, 2018
Jul 29, 2018 at 12:37 AM UTC
The vulnerability of baring myself fully
clenches the belly
panics the heart
stands my hairs on end.
It is truly the most terrifying thing
to stand in ones authenticity.
And yet. And yet.
The courage it takes.
The great tender strength.
The spine tingling elation.
The heart swells, and magic.
The naked beauty borne, in feeling you have nothing to hide.
The spirit touched ardor of a bare approach to life.
The openings and the mystery.
The expressions: tripping, falling, incomplete, misguided.
The wonderful mistakes, elucidating lessons.
The perfect imperfections.
The easing of honesty.
The engendered humility.
The profundity.
The sense of being touched, touching, and in touch with life.
The unmasked revelations, of full spectral undulation.
The this. The that. The I can accept it all.
The dropping of shame.
The incredible liberation, in shedding that shame.
The finding forgiveness for self, for other.
The quiver of unknowing.
The sweet caress of potential.
The dread. The sorrows. The uncertainties.
All making room for, in their acknowledgement:
Room for what else is there.
Room for laughter, and joy, and luminescence.
Room for flirtation, dancing, spontaneity.
Breaking open.
Melting into Love.
Soaring on the wings of Truth.
The hush, of anxious worry.
The Goodness bestowed.
The empathy.
The compassion.
The connection.
The holy restoration of creative flow.
The fires of real passion.
And everything.
And everything.
And Beauty.
Mar 13, 2014
Mar 13, 2014 at 12:12 PM UTC
Why is it so difficult to leave my life alone
Cast that last stone
I feel like Frankenstein the monster
And your a mob of angry county officials
Getting high on locking away my roster
Big Man you are with you excess of power
Targeting helpless youth
Who only aim to survive
To escape imprisonment alive
To everyday simply strive
For some acceptance
To be be beat down literally abused by your hand
Because our hunger over took morals
What is right
Is right being cold and hungry every night
Is right being forced into institutions
You've already chosen my life's conclusion
My dreams depict my happy illusion
Our financial status fusion
Causing an eruption of misguided confusion
I'll win this war
When when it seems every battle I'm losing
Nov 29, 2014
Nov 29, 2014 at 7:22 AM UTC
Ah, the season of gifting.
Antagonist of year-long thrifting.
Tradition sadistic,
Materialistic,
Four quarters in pockets worth sifting.
This year I hereby proclaim
I shan’t be consumed by the game.
Cycle of curse
Purpose perverse
The namesake, an oversight became.
Christ’s birth did in fact begin,
Holiday distracted by sin.
Misguided it be
To forget idly
The sacrifice He made for all men.
We naively regard generosity
As holiday’s behavioral piosity.
But if dollars and cents
Are the tools of offense
Over shadow favor luminosity.
Water in Africa is *****
American child in poverty.
Politics aside,
Convenient homicide,
To enable the ills of society.
In the global economy we flaunt
Wealth by comparison, bitter taunt.
First world problems abound
Pass the turkey around
Central heating and air, what a jaunt!
What if this season we decide
To extend two palms open wide?
Sacrificing ourselves
Rather than stocking our shelves
Dying whispers echo true: “we tried.”
Don’t spend your money on me this year.
Not iPhones, not tickets, not Blu-ray or beer.
Instead know you can
Distribute more than
A snort, a lie, and a tear.
(optional conclusion to assist interpretation of last line)
Snort of derision,
Lies of provision,
Tears, even true,
Hardly subdue
Anguish deprived of tradition’s revision.
Dec 26, 2012
Dec 26, 2012 at 5:25 PM UTC
Many of the most profound pieces of poetry
May not have been dreamed and transferred
In particular manners professional,
And many of the most practiced writers
May not have been as noble nor indicative
As their readers would imagine and preach.
This concern thus produces a humorous conclusion
That through probability, possibility, and realism,
Many of the greatest and most inspiring words
Passed down to our misguided generation,
May have been conceived, scribbled, and explored
From the humble origins of atop a toilet.
Apr 6, 2016
Apr 6, 2016 at 11:39 PM UTC
a misguided symphony
forging its way
to the rest-
less form which writhes
and shifts
in cotton sheets
of yester-
day
Jan 4, 2015
Jan 4, 2015 at 10:27 AM UTC
♦ ♦ ♦
She was an earnest devotée.
Her ideals, birthed in Chardonnay
were globally diverse (read: white).
A liberal bark preceded bite.
Her crystal clearer than her vision;
she provoked bemused derision
as she breathed intolerance
toward all who would not dance her dance.
She swooned for distant pagan tribes,
attuned to their exotic vibes –
rapt in multi-culti piety
strangely deaf to her own society,
judged by her as abomination;
unredeemed. The background station
always stuck on N.P.R.
(the soundtrack of her culture war,
Pacifica News and Democracy Nows,
and other progressive holy cows)
Her motherland a shameful mystery:
guilty first, and void of history –
its origins defiled, corrupted…
while she enjoyed uninterrupted
freedom to pursue her whims:
misguided one-world global hymns.
The sisterhood of hu(man) kind
was foremost in her earnest mind –
even should that same sisterhood
be sealed by her well-meaning blood.
Out on a date with global death
she hoped to unify the earth
in solidarity with causes
led by killers, warlord bosses,
thugs she never knew existed
who, if she’d met she’d have resisted.
Her theory landed far from her praxis
spun, by default, on an evil axis.
Hot with zeal she fumed and stormed
quite certain she was well-informed,
at benefits, non-profit functions
rallies, boycotts, left-wing luncheons;
warm with righteous spite for Israel,
aiding and abetting Ishmael
with fellow-travelers, like-minded
similarly hateful, blinded,
rattling sabers, scimitars, axes…
(lunacy never wanes, but waxes
hotter with the passing years
as activists confront their fears).
She finally shilled for the Intifada
(stopping short of reciting Shahada),
reaching out to the terrorist
with righteous raised progressive fist…
offering thus her neck to blade:
collateral to be repaid
by murderers who couldn’t care less
about her open-mindedness.
Sep 9, 2015
Sep 9, 2015 at 9:57 PM UTC
there was a time before when I could walk
I stepped among strangers on misguided paths
on roads unnamed
remaining cracked and broken
people hid their blank faces
steps incautiously taken
but there was one abnormal stranger
he lifted his eyes above the ground
and smiled at the unfortunate raindrops
then suddenly I was falling
he held vivid color in his eyes
life in his dreams
the world was dark and bleak
yet illuminated by his love
my feet have never touched solid ground since
and they never will
remaining to search for such reason
the reason his love can be shown to only I
Nov 10, 2014
Nov 10, 2014 at 7:54 PM UTC
My 2 Cents
“the advocacy of women’s rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men.”
Let me start by mentioning that I don’t usually get involved with political matters, but in this case, I’d say it’s more of a basic human rights matter.
I’m a man, and I’m a feminist.
I was lucky enough to grow up in a home with three women; my mother and two older sisters. Growing up with them gave me an enormous amount of respect for women, (even though I may have lost a certain amount of socially expected masculinity along the way), and their current lives continue to increase my respect for the opposite gender.
My oldest sister is leaving to study abroad at Oxford in less than a week to major in philosophy. Philosophy. She also graduated high school with a 4.0 and was involved in power lifting competitions and is enlisted in ROTC. Simply put, she’s an animal. She’s worked hard her entire life and I’d hate to see a world that put that hard work to waste.
My other sister is working three jobs to pay her way through college and is planning to major in psychology. I’m always envious of her work ethic and level of commitment to not only her education, but to her friends and family as well.
My mother has been my backbone since I was a child. She was always the one I turned to in times of trouble, and continues to be. She works hard everyday, while going through mentally straining marriage problems, and comes home and still asks me about my day. She has given me nothing but unconditional love for my entire existence.
For these reasons, it boggles my mind why anyone would ever be anti-feminism. I am genuinely confused as to why, because their bodies are different, women get less privileges, respect, opportunities, and even money. I just don’t get it.
I am also disgusted that women are seen by most men as walking ****** organs. l will admit genuine guilt to using the number scale to “rate” women. It’s something I grew up with, but now it sickens me. Assigning a number to a woman based on your misguided views on how she should look, whether you would **** her, is something I find repulsive. There’s nothing wrong with admiring the opposite *** but no one gives a **** about your stupid opinion, especially the woman.
I hope someday if I ever have a daughter that she will have the privilege of living in a country of gender equality, tolerance, and open-mindedness.
Anyway, I just wanted to put my two cents in.
I am a man.
I am a feminist.
Peace.
Sep 23, 2014
Sep 23, 2014 at 9:46 PM UTC
As this world wretches behind the piles of our institutional bones, I turn to look the other way.
When the beggars graze my pant leg, I don't stop mid stride and feign over their disparity,
For gaining the holy marksmen’s approval. When Judas kissed sanctity’s cheek beside the frames of broken-hearted men, I shook the feeling from my sleeve.
And I no longer feel guilt, shame,
Out of mere cerebral obligation.
So, have me for a worthless sinner. I will fall to the dust before I bring myself to stand beside the husks of humanity that so many have become; spewing their filth on unfortunate blindfolded men, expecting me to follow suit.
Well, **** off, kindly.
I’m living for the god that answers to no titles, and parsonages none of these black suited scumbags. I’m living for the god that inspires harmony, and lifts my fingers to dance for liberation, and pleasure, and hopeless longing. I’m living for the god of progress who shakes pieces of enlightenment from his gray beard, and swallows up the offerings of his every wounded child.
I’m living for the god of no religion,
Never saying
“God,”
For this name is tainted by old customs.
Cheapened by the misguided nature of man.
May 29, 2012
May 29, 2012 at 1:15 AM UTC
*Misguided fire of passion
Burns one’s own abode
Even the tears of remorse
Can’t douse the raging inferno*
Jul 18, 2014
Jul 18, 2014 at 1:42 AM UTC
It's easy to hear the loneliness in her voice
As she speaks she has no one to talk about, there's just no choice
She talks about the good old days
Filled with love and compassion all was just a faze
Loneliness is when you cry
There's no one there to make her smile or dry her eyes
No one to help with the demons inside her head
No one to subside the discomfort of pain from deep inside
The demons are here to prey on the misguided brain
She continues to hide her pain
Only to give into the loneliness of despair
Her loneliness has only become a reality because nobody cares
Trying to fade away loneliness has taken its toll
On her soul
Sound of loneliness is silent
She doesn't hear the birds singing with great talent
She doesn't feel the sun shining
People pass her by as if she doesn't exist so she starts declining
She wishes her heart could love again highly unlikely loneliness has become her only way of life
She remains unable to feel due to the coldness in her heart stuck by a knife
Mar 26, 2017
Mar 26, 2017 at 11:24 AM UTC
I like to laugh and smile
like any other kid
but you decided that
I was undeserving
of being liked
of being loved
of being myself
I wasn't cool
I wasn't trendy
I wasn't sporty
I was just being myself
I am quirky
I am intellegent
I am creative
You Don't care!
You are relentless
You are misguided
You are ruthless
Who hurt you so bad?
You have friends
You have fashion
You have popularity
Is that not enough?
I am now untrusting
I am now anxious
I am now depressed
It still hurts till this day!
I have grown to resent you!
I have grown to hate you!
Why aren't you dead yet?
I'm sure the feeling is mutual
You hurt me
because
Someone hurt you
When does this vicious cycle end?
Aug 24, 2018
Aug 24, 2018 at 12:06 PM UTC
Your pre-frontal cortex is delectably oral amidst this maze of psychological violence.
Oh, mistress of certain uncertainty, I cannot articulate the essence of ontology, as human language is inadequate. But, you truly capture the flow of irregularity in this mass mockery of societal fabric.
Therefore, I simply appeal to our mutual and primitive impulses. Let us be rough, despite the misguided assumptions of those who claim to have affiliation.
I like old school choppers, because they are not polished.
Feb 14, 2014
Feb 14, 2014 at 11:06 PM UTC
Confused and misguided I found myself in the bookstore,
Looking for myself in the writing of poets,
Where pain and love met, I yearned for more
Found myself in disguise, broken, feeling time fly
Broken and insecure, I found myself in the bookstore.
Reading about my past lovers, was I not strong enough for the storm?
Loved a man who failed to explore,
The woman inside me begging for more
Lost but committed, I found myself in the bookstore.
Reminiscing on our lust, was I a bore?
Picking up a book filled with promises,
Will I ever get what love has in store?
Running towards lust, I ended up broken in the bookstore.
You left me broken but wanting more
Addicted to your soul, I failed to remember..
That I met you at the bookstore
-Henessy J. Beltre
Oct 9, 2018
Oct 9, 2018 at 9:18 PM UTC
Hopelessness is swallowing me.
For all my life I've been it's prey.
Sometimes strong, sometimes weak,
I've always managed to hold on,
but my grip is loosening.
My dreams have been squelched
and my imagination is fading.
I'm tired of pushing boulders uphill
only to watch them roll back down.
My shiny glaze of compassion has dulled.
Flaccid are my heartstrings,
flying ramdomly like torn ribbons
on a misguided kite.
Where can I escape and become
someone else somewhere else?
Sep 19, 2013
Sep 19, 2013 at 1:45 PM UTC
Compromise and decay are difficult things to digest. Striking like gravity on the spine, slow and sure. They are as inevitable as my need to avoid them. All the lust, passion, and greed I wish to swim in for an eternity dies with the same cancer that eats my body away. The maggots, flies, desperation, and despair, all attack me simultaneously and with an unstoppable desire to thrive on my remains.
They are relentless and I am not.
Make like a good boy and lie down, ready to decompose with acceptance and grace. I'll place a bag on my head for decency and my wallet on my chest for convenient identification. Perhaps some intelligent future civilization of the cockroach's descendants would like to know about my sad demise. I know the humans won't.
"Misguided", they will say. "Not enough Jesus in his soul to beat back the demons", will say the child ******* priests. Spit on by a hundred million naysayers, in between their ************ and repenting. Given billions of one star reviews because zero stars isn't an option. Oh , I miss the the maggots, the flies, the devastation, and the despair. They were my enemies, and now my only friends.
Nov 20, 2014
Nov 20, 2014 at 1:49 PM UTC
A swansong of the Indian Partition...
Kal humaare ghar ke diye bujhe rahenge,
Kal hum kuch rishton ke liye rote rahenge...
Tomorrow the lamps of our home will remain put out,
Tomorrow we shall keep crying for some relations...
Rishte un bantwaara hue kheton se,
Rishte un bhatakte hue jawaanon se...
Relations with those partitioned farmlands,
Relations with those misguided young men...
Rishte us chamakti Multani mitti se,
**Rishte us damakti Pakhtunkhwi **** se...**
Relations with the glistening soil of Multan,
Relations with the bright snow of Pakhtunkhwa...
Rishte Ganga ke us Bangali muhaane se,
Rishte Sindhu dariya aur samudr ke us mel se...
Relations with the Ganga's Bengali estuary,
Relations with the confluence of Indus and the Sea...
Rishte us Balouchi kapaas se,
Rishte udhde un kapdon se...
Relations with that Balouchi cotton,
Relations with those clothes torn away...
Rishte luti us izzat se,
Rishte mari us bahu se...
Relations with the disrobed honour,
Relations with the slain bride...
Rishte jo sajaaye the mandap mein,
Rishte jo likhaaye the jannat mein...
Relations decorated inside the temple,
Relations written in the paradise...
**********
Aug 14, 2019
Aug 14, 2019 at 2:10 PM UTC
Misunderstanding
Must be the reason for this
I don't know anything
And I am basing my thoughts
Off of misguided feelings.
Sep 29, 2015
Sep 29, 2015 at 2:05 PM UTC
It gets easier to laugh at yourself when you know you’ve been frivolous.
You’ve wasted a great deal of your time indulging in fatuous, totally conditional constraints.
You’ve been misguided by the red and pink colors of happy shapes and bewitching designs.
You’ve forgotten the most important of things, and even the small things such as matching your socks or earrings.
You’ve been too content with enticing words and completely undiscerning of actions.
It gets easier to laugh at yourself because even though it hurts like hell, you now know it was only premature amity.
Feb 7, 2014
Feb 7, 2014 at 1:44 AM UTC
I am sooooo tired,
exhausted..
My mind needs to be shut down,
my head hurts.
Words want to be said but my prides me wounded, my selfworth is burning low
there is a lump in my throat.
I'm haunted by to evanescent nature of my past joy.
Daunted but how far my seems to be.
Yesterday, last week, last month, last year and today have me in the center, wearing the same things, feeling the same,
worried I'm at my end, but a while older
my life seems to be rejecting me; or maybe I it..
I want to be free to exist but everything seems to come with a cost.
There are critics everywhere
even my thoughts have thoughts objecting to them before i receive them and make certain i don't need them.. So I'm running around in circles not knowing why i never got around to things my mind first thought whiles ago,
my will has become meek
my worth shrunk to camouflage with dust specks
I'm exhausted from playing this part,
misguided by the values of what's recently been made 'right'
distracted completely from the life i want to live.
And i don't have a clue which switch ***** it back to normal,
or which life i will leave for those which have grown accustomed to this timid version of me...
After all people aren't always happy when they say. "...you have changed..."
Sep 10, 2015
Sep 10, 2015 at 7:30 PM UTC
We're standing outside in a cold, blistered wind,
for a quick pull of smoke and the chemicals within?
A quick rush of joy, euphoric train wreck,
a cure made illegal for a chemist's blank cheque.
Plant matter burning, charring my lungs,
an irritated throat and a cough soon to come.
Pass it to a friend and beg them to be quick
so I can burn my lungs again - let my blood run thick.
Serotonin chained and forced to make me feel good,
yet a non-addictive substance, apt misunderstood.
Less harmful than tobacco, alcohol still worse,
a sadly brainwashed nation where impression's pre-rehearsed.
Generations plagued with loud misguided cries.
They say it makes you stupid, another heartless lie.
We'll strap a gas mask to a monkey, and force it THC.
Forget about the oxygen... I wonder what we'll see?
It seems their brain cells died - it has to be the drug!
Government made a discovery? They ought to be less smug.
But back to my friend, and I in the cold,
forced to be hidden from long outdated scold.
Celebrating beauties in the world that were forgotten,
we're told it's overrated, like fine Egyptian cotton?
I know from experience that this has to be divine:
it could not exist if the sun could not shine.
The wind has stopped blowing, the rain takes it's place,
to feel divine beauty of liquid touching face.
It is something natural, and comes from within,
wow, I'm still standing in a cold blistered wind.
May 20, 2012
May 20, 2012 at 10:48 AM UTC