"nepenthe" poems
For Max
O cruel, drunken soul, darling tigress,
Come to my heart, you lethargic beast!
I long for my trembling hands to caress
Your thick and glossy fleece.
In your petticoats filled with your scent
To bury my poor, aching head,
Inhaling your flowery fragrance;
The sweetness of love now dead.
I wish to sleep, to dream perchance
As sweetly as death’s embrace,
Without remorse, my tongue will dance
On your coppery body and face.
To bury my sobbing for hours
Nothing equals your bed’s abyss,
On your lips lies oblivion’s power
And Lethe flows in your kiss.
Like one resigned to meet his end,
I’ll face my fate delighted;
Docile martyr, innocent condemned,
Whose fervour with pain is ignited.
I shall **** to drown my malice,
With nepenthe and hemlock blessed;
Placing my lips upon the chalice
Of your pointed, heartless breast.
Apr 27, 2017
Apr 27, 2017 at 9:08 AM UTC
The one I love's no Achilles
No massive strength or bravery,
No leader of the cavalry,
yet he leaves me searching, endlessly
for a single drop of nepenthe
to cure my heart of this disease
called love.
I am no Aphrodite.
But still I hope that he can see
The good I know's inside of me.
And then maybe he and I can be
A flawed Megara and Hercules
And somehow thrive, terminally,
in love.
Jul 29, 2015
Jul 29, 2015 at 1:21 PM UTC
I hope you are the shore to my ocean...
I hope you are nepenthe to my pain...
I hope you are Christmas to my December...
I hope you are stardust to my universe...
I hope you are conscious to my subconscious..
I hope you are light to my darkness...
I hope you are evermore to my 2020...
I hope you are Nile to my Egypt....
Oh I hope you are me...
And I am you...
Dec 30, 2020
Dec 30, 2020 at 6:43 AM UTC
Envy lies naked on a rose --
Blindly, on bed;
Tonight, -- we bind to shed
Ourselves from purpose
And dread
That sough us from hearing, --
Fearing...
The silent touch of Moire.
It lies darkly on thy posture
Of many a figure
And requiem for my mockingbird, --
Those of many a love of my mockingbird,
(The Reaper
And my keeper
Of my very own
Requiem for a mockingbird)
Alone, all alone
We bind to shed...
Alas! Now Death
Comes as Nepenthe for my mockingbird,
(The only love
I've come to unravel the love
Of my mockingbird)
Now, breathing from her now, the breath
Of my heart leapt
Out from a mockingbird
And slept
As my eyes bind dead...
This is a requeim for a mockingbird, --
The Reaper
And my keeper
Of my very own
Requiem for a mockingbird,
Alone, all alone
We bind to shed
Ourselves from purpose and dread
That sough us from hearing, --
Fearing...
The silent touch of Moire...
Jun 23, 2011
Jun 23, 2011 at 10:57 AM UTC
"You tempt in me…so much…
a sparrow...a lamb… a tenderness… and the captive heart… that beats against my palm…
the bonds…. of trust.. surrendered"
to the silver nepenthe of your voice,
stricken upon the thick red heart
I've pinned to a map,
See, it emits grace
beneath the molten glass,
strung through harp strings and stretched
as sutures ,the solemn musculature of ecstasy
bound in golden ropes and belladonna dreams,
Let the white darts fall
where they may
This silence belies the song
in my throat, hovering
like a silver bauble, your face
is dark, back-lit, harbouring
the terror of words that burn...
My heart
holds the cinder of secrets,
and little poison idols of hematite
and gooseflesh...
Our dream box collects its damp light
from the dark corners of our prison,
as you coax a banyan tree
from its arousal...
A totem filled with marzipan,
and trembling, but to split
its lip upon glass cages,
wrought with jade...
Hold the sparrow face-up,
let the furrow of its wings, tempt
the fates, as it sings to the same scythe
that chimes against the dead angles of the soul's crucified geography....
Jan 20, 2013
Jan 20, 2013 at 12:28 PM UTC
A block in my heart angers my hand.
I cannot write, I cannot write!
I fear i'll find no respite tonight.
All of my letters melt into sand.
They are a black hole: everything and nothing.
We are but star dust the Sun sheds off his skin.
We struggle through our lives fighting our original sin.
I cannot write, I cannot write.
I know i'll find no respite tonight.
My words are everything and nothing.
Mar 28, 2012
Mar 28, 2012 at 5:21 PM UTC
It seeped through my bones,
Made me a sputtering heart,
Lo this numbness,
See it in my eyes,
Touch me now!
Feel it inside,
This burning, white-hot cold.
I know you mean to tell me different,
That I may be over-reacting,
Over-imag'ning.
Thou skin has gone deaf to my calls,
Dead.
But tell me,
Lest thou eyes deceive you,
Do you not see mine own pallid skin?
See this now!
Dare not to tell me different,
Never mind, hold your tongue!
Thou face has already given away thou intentions.
Fix me dear therapevtees,
Take away this old lady's ailments,
Do not ail me.
Give me the Nepenthe,
Help me chase away my sorrows.
***** could be good,
Do you think?
I'll take anything you have,
Black Henbane, even Psilocybin.
Mend me please,
Stop this cold,
Make my days less dreadful.
It won't be long now.
Let this old lady go to death grinning,
However stupid it may seem.
I shall laugh in the face of death,
This old, sagging face shall laugh,
Just me and death,
Very old friends.
-Firefly
Sep 18, 2014
Sep 18, 2014 at 2:52 PM UTC
I walked into a boisterous marquee
And ordered a shot of Nepenthe
What troubles you? asked the tender with a long goatee
I’ve pawned off all my treasures to the wretched blue sea
At this, with a puzzled look his neck did crane
To learn the love a starfish has for salty water, I explain
Nov 12, 2010
Nov 12, 2010 at 8:27 AM UTC
Naive waves keep reaching for the oars:
who will explain to them, the rover is gone;
The empty vessel sways from side to side
in wheezing evening winds.
On moonlit nights of silken silences,
atop misty hills overlooking the waters
at Nepenthe's, a dreamed-up reverie.
After the dawn, the night lingers on;
In the darkened room, hiding in corners ,
and dying in the emptying space
hugged between the arms.
Yet, when snow covered everything, and
the clock ticked timeless, a throb enshrined
in the heart of the stalled heart of time,
of those many years ago, carries on.
Oct 24, 2013
Oct 24, 2013 at 7:12 AM UTC
Numb and chilled on ice
I splice my own legacy for identification... My mannerisms mated early and crafted a cataclysmic contradiction
Impatient to erupt
Archaic down to the marrow
I whither in Seattle’s freeze of
Grey detachment
Dec 4, 2018
Dec 4, 2018 at 2:22 AM UTC
You, boy of dust & moths,
Listen closely.
I would know you,
oh how dearly I would wish to know you.
I am made of ink,
I am made of nepenthe.
I am an absinthe of sorrow,
& there are none
to drink me dry,
to fill that glassy chasm
with words.
"hello."
Feb 25, 2012
Feb 25, 2012 at 3:17 AM UTC
Sh.
Bring me your broken-hearted
your downtrodden
your shattered soul
I'll wrap you in my warm embrace.
In a nepenthe of bliss,
I'll make you forget
all your sadness, troubles and worry
and wrap you snug in gentle puffs of smoke.
Let me save you.
Let me help you.
Let me make you mine.
Sep 18, 2011
Sep 18, 2011 at 10:26 PM UTC
sinking through my shadow
down the oubliette
of my retraction
drunk upon
nepenthe: contempt
of insurmountable distraction
i can siphon
all this blood
into a staining chalice
down again
another round
and hope to
drown again
within the sounds
of screaming
stifled under skin
claws maw
ravenously
the inner walls
of a carapace
too far gone
in its accretion
to spare
the raving calls
the solitary
somber narcissist
of slow and painful
suffocation
eloquence
an incomplete attempt
to justify,
to anthropromorphize
and endeavor
i shall, forever
to cauterize this soul
but its far too cold
to build a fire
Aug 6, 2014
Aug 6, 2014 at 10:46 PM UTC
absent, white hands gleaming dully in the dark
absinthe nepenthe, queen of Eden,
our lady of the lotus-eaters!
flush, the fruit, your cheek, rose-red
breath, your lips, and trickles red-violet,
half the seeds, open the box, strike the match, bite.
(I never knew why they called it original sin.)
they replaced you, Eve,
with their ****** Queen,
and oh! how they praised her red-gold hair,
immaculata, benissima, ave Maria,
and how sweet and high their voices in their chapels of crystal and gold
but how they gilded it all, oh Eve, how they did,
and how they gilded it all to cover
the searching memory of real gold
(who could they blame? cherchez la femme.)
Oct 31, 2012
Oct 31, 2012 at 4:31 PM UTC
Tonight, I could feel the nausea bloom in the core of my heart
Like it usually does when I think too long on your silence.
I could let the withdrawals start,
The shaking and the fear.
I could ask myself
*Has she forgotten me?
Did I drive her away with my honesty?
Why can I never shut up?*
I could torture myself
With the notion that tonight you consume someone else's lips
And think nothing of me,
Glad to be free of my adoration.
I could crucify my heart,
Nail it down with the possibility
That you see everything I say and choose never to respond.
I could.
But tonight,
Oddly,
My fear is tableaued behind frosted glass.
I can see the outline of my agony
All blurry and dark
But I can't touch it.
It's like one of those sliding shower doors is between me
And it
All rough on one side so that nothing can really be glimpsed
And all the more foggy with the steam of the years just boiling off me.
My pain can't see me, naked and exposed,
And I can't see it, menacing and razor sharp.
We know about each other, but only by the shadows.
It is out there, outside in the substantial world,
The one with hard lines and cold facts
And a biting breeze that keeps the brutal windows clear as crystal.
But it is warm in here and I have found a sort of spiritual nepenthe,
A numbness.
I know my torment is solid; I know that eventually the cruelty of my mind will have its pound of flesh,
(And perhaps more)
But...
Not tonight.
It's not real to me tonight.
And frankly
I am
Just too ******* tired
Tonight
And too clean
Tonight
And too calm
Tonight
To slit my pride's throat
And watch the blood run down the drain.
Nov 20, 2013
Nov 20, 2013 at 11:33 PM UTC
You well know
You left once before
Returning with a
Tapping knock
Upon heart's door
Plaintively pleading
Can I enter once more
To press into your soul
Promising a true
Forevermore
Of only us as one
And none other
A one to forever remember
One of the blissful sublime
Not a love to wither and die
Shunning wise counsel
Reluctantly I granted
An entry through
Love's window to my soul
Yet all again a lie
In my agony of sorrow
Of a love lost forever
Having found my Athena
I sip deeply from my glass
Nepenthe warm and sweet
From behind heart's door
Whilst barely breathing
Teeth clenching
Rage seething
Quietly whispering
Nevermore, Nevermore
© 2017 Jim Davis
Could not resist a steal from Poe! For anyone concerned, this comes from an old personal thing.
From Wikipedia on Edgar Allen Poe's poem, "The Raven":
... "Christopher F. S. Maligec suggests the poem is a type of elegiacparaclausithyron, an ancient Greek and Roman poetic form consisting of the lament of an excluded, locked-out lover at the sealed door of his beloved.[14]"
Paraclausithyron (Ancient Greek: παρακλαυσίθυρον) is a motif in Greekand especially Augustan love elegy, as well as in troubadour poetry.
The details of the Greek etymology are uncertain, but it is generally accepted to mean "lament beside a door", from παρακλαίω, "lament beside", and θύρα, "door".[1] A paraklausithyron typically places a lover outside his mistress's door, desiring entry. In Greek poetry, the situation is connected to the komos, the revels of young people outdoors following intoxication at a symposium. Callimachus uses the situation to reflect on self-control, passion, and free will when the obstacle of the door is removed.[2]
From greekgodsandgoddesses website
Athena
* Athena was the Goddess of War, the female counterpart of ARES.
* She was the daughter of Zeus; no mother bore her. She sprang from Zeus’s head, full-grown and clothed in armor.
.......
* In later poetry, Athena embodied wisdom and rational thought.
From Dictionary website
Nepenthe
* a drug or drink, or the plant yielding it, mentioned by ancient writers as having the power to bring forgetfulness of sorrow or trouble.
* anything inducing a pleasurable sensation of forgetfulness, esp. of sorrow or trouble.
Apr 13, 2017
Apr 13, 2017 at 10:30 AM UTC
Show me the inside of your heart only to change your mind and hide it
Carve a larger wound just to remove the one inside it
And bleed out, bleed out
Until the blackest venom shall once again igniteth...
As the deep red blood clashes with the flames of this world and the sorrow rips through my weary soul
As the agony fires engulf me whole
I begin to disconnect
I begin to disconnect
I begin to disconnect from this
I begin to disconnect ....from you
Inhale
My nepenthe
Erase
These memories
And only the deepest wounds will remain
As wretched scars in this fragile frame
Dressed like Christ in robes perfumed with pain
You shattered me at my most insane
I can see you smile again my angel of the night
In the motion of your lovely head in the glowing firelight
As the blade goes tearing through your flesh, disconnecting you
I see your teeth and lifeless eyes
The way you'd smile at me
Goodbye, my lover
You are no more
Farewell to your memory
You loveless ******* *****
Erased
Oct 5, 2013
Oct 5, 2013 at 8:28 PM UTC
With apologies to Edgar Allen Poe.
Once, upon a weekend morning, while I slumbered, loudly snoring
After many a workday of quaint and forgotten chores
While I nodded, well past napping, suddenly there came a scratching,
As if the paint was gently stripping, ripping from the bedroom door.
“He’ll stop,” I muttered, “scratching at my chamber door.”
“He’s only bored, and nothing more”
Deep into my blanket hiding, there I lay in fear abiding,
Doubting, hoping I could sleep as I had ever slept before;
But the silence then was broken, and the door way, old and oaken,
Swung open as the clever kitty, made the lock a simple chore
And then my dreams were gone as are the winds of yester-yore
I knew I should have fixed that door.
Open then he pushed the doorway, then, with padded foot and whisker,
In he stepped, the ebon creature who I bought that cat food for
Not the least obeisance made he; not an instant stopped or stayed he;
But, like he who owns the household, perched above my pillowed snores —
Perched upon the feathered pillow which my sleeping bonnet bore —
Perched, and silently implored.
Then, methought, the cat grew braver, thinking of his breakfast’s savor
Poking at my sleeping visage, poking more, and more and more.
"Wretch," I cried, "the devil’s sent thee — a witch cat sent to leave me
No respite and no Nepenthe, but only the memory of the sleep I had before!
Let me quaff this kind Nepenthe and rejoin my final snore!"
Purred the black cat, "Nevermore."
“Be that word our sign of parting, cat or fiend!" I shrieked, upstarting —
As I threw him into the darkness of the Night's Plutonian shore.
“Leave my slumber unbroken! Come you not with purr and pokin’
Take thy paw out of my nostril, and take thy **** right out the door!
Leave no black fur as a token, you eat at nine, and not before!”
Cried the black cat, "I like before."
But that **** cat, never quitting, still is sitting, still is splitting
The recently repaired latex on my bedroom door;
And his eyes have all the burning of a feline that is yearning,
For the cat dish full of kibbles, sitting, sitting on the kitchen floor;
As my soul rose from the blankets, with a howling, futile roar:
Sleeping in on weekends — nevermore!
Dec 19, 2016
Dec 19, 2016 at 10:25 PM UTC
I assure you, lover
The fabric of this universe ripples with pain
And like a flailing fetal flea, you drew up the rain
Retention of water, a pool you retain
Words have no daggers, and all of mine missed your head
Offer no nepenthe, lest you miss the bread
I'd offer you unity, but you heard that discourse
Love with mad force, or love not (at) all
Dec 2, 2013
Dec 2, 2013 at 11:29 AM UTC
I sip, poor
on my nepenthe
stroking skin
the glass holding poured antidote
I sip and swoon, devote
I'd swim in it
even as it takes its pities
never part with the piment
the earth stills
slows its cities
and I take a sip of him
the warmest regrets
gnaw at my regard
cathartic, quiet egress
my minds reach not so far
as to want for them again
I sip, so poor
on my nepenthe
drink 'til it pours cold
it offers up its pities
pardon any sentiment
of the sorrow it erodes
it offers up a numb
I can't deny consoles
Feb 4, 2018
Feb 4, 2018 at 6:18 PM UTC
They say that heaven,
Is there in the skies,
And hell is beneath us,
Below those who died,
But I challenge this thought,
This belief held by many,
For hell is on earth,
Where men dwell aplenty,
And toil and suffer,
And seek a nepenthe,
But my joyous heaven,
Needs not a nepenthe,
You needn't look up,
It's not in the skies,
For my heaven's seat,
Sits there in her eyes
Dec 14, 2015
Dec 14, 2015 at 8:55 PM UTC
Past regrets lost in an emulsion of sorrows
Paralyzed to the point of leaving yourself behind because of these dastard individuals who you call stress, anxiety and depression
However theres a fraction of an enigma that still exists within me
The fans of reality blows and steers possibilities and likelihoods towards my life
Such a thing as nepenthe doses seem relevant and present in the world?
Contrary to my uncertainty, society could believe it does in various shapes or forms
Although, our constant search for content proves a sort of doubt
Trapping beautiful leaves with different colors in a jar never to be experienced but hopefully found by a wanderer who would demonstrate what a prize they were in the first place
Negligence ultimately derived from perpetual speculation
Build, construct your house of memories as vivid and as sorrowful as they come
They are yours!
An identity, defining who you are without all the torment
Escape the wrath of your past regrets, mistakes and insecurities
You can, if you allow yourself to
Apr 30, 2018
Apr 30, 2018 at 12:04 AM UTC