"overlooks" poems
just came back from a weekend away, down the coast in byron bay, where the lighthouse overlooks the eastern horizon, where we made love on the rocks so long ago, where our selfsame separate memories intermingled, each with the other, where i wandered from shore to shore, and looked to the mirror moon for comfort, and found your arms
Jun 1, 2014
Jun 1, 2014 at 3:50 AM UTC
A lowly hill which overlooks a flat,
Half sea, half country side;
A flat-shored sea of low-voiced creeping tide
Over a chalky, weedy mat.
A hill of hillocks, flowery and kept green
Round Crosses raised for hope,
With many-tinted sunsets where the slope
Faces the lingering western sheen.
A lowly hope, a height that is but low,
While Time sets solemnly,
While the tide rises of Eternity,
Silent and neither swift nor slow.
4.3k
Hold my fingers between your own while we walk easily
On the skywalk that overlooks the traffic lights and street signs and makes us feel like
We’re on top of the world. There is no other place that I’d rather be than
Going with you through a simple tunnel of glass, above the city, holding your hand and feeling like I’m
Home whenever I am simply in your presence.
Oct 7, 2013
Oct 7, 2013 at 11:11 PM UTC
There's a world outside my little square window
that overlooks fields and woodlands and sunsets
and that world overlooks a bustling avenue with
shutters on windows and constant, humming traffic.
There's a world outside my little square window
that keeps wakes me with the same sun every morning
and the same old singing birds,
and that world rouses me with a different kind of music;
of people and chatter and busking and life.
There's a world outside my little square window,
a world I would never have been tired of exploring,
and that world is named Paris.
Aug 18, 2014
Aug 18, 2014 at 8:59 AM UTC
The boards creak and moan
from time and poor carpentry
The nails gripped by aged wood
have become crust collected and
shrunken to form
The bare walls once displayed
the smiling faces
of past eons but now
there are only the faded remnants
of square foundations
of lives that once
hung on the wall
The stairs complain
like an old man
from unsubstantiated fears
The second floor
seems solid only responding
to the remarks of my shoes
The old bedroom
once the center of attraction
overlooks the buckled sidewalks
and **** infested yards
of a street that now has no cars
or people passing by
I stand in silence for the moment
and the moment stands silent for me
And for that moment
I lay in time's eternal graveyard
in hopes of reviving dead dreams
Jun 10, 2016
Jun 10, 2016 at 5:35 AM UTC
On Friday mornings
You can find me
At my local coffee shop
Reading, writing, understanding
Myself.
It is how I unpack
All the baggage from
This week's long journey
Along the Camino of life.
It is the dusty old bunk bed
I rest my body upon.
It is where I am free
To dream and dream again.
Here I understand my limits
And regain my strength.
Although I love the scenic overlooks
And the one I travel with,
I need this time.
I don't quite understand why,
But without this
Momentary solitude,
Everything I've ever wanted
Does not feel
Quite like
Everything I've ever wanted.
Aug 13, 2016
Aug 13, 2016 at 11:44 AM UTC
It's common knowledge that after getting a phone number,
one must wait three whole days before giving a call,
to make sure the interaction remains calculatedly casual,
as opposed to needy or uninterested,
which is complete cupid ****
It's appalling that one's intense desire to contact an individual one is drawn to,
is not seen as a mere gesture of sentiment or affection,
but rather weakness and vulnerability.
Even in the darkest and drunkest hours
there will be no super likes,
for no one can afford to wear the heart on their sleeves,
in this world of left and right swipes.
The chase is so overrated not only does it never end,
but also overlooks the catch even when it's finally caught.
True feelings disguised by emojis concentrated into 140 characters
ridicule the ideology of love and romance,
when really we're nostalgic of the times,
we once murmured into brick sized cordless phones at wee hours in the morning,
"you hang up... nooo you hang up first..."
When did meeting the parents not become meeting the parents,
but rather the quick show of another chick to flaunt how well life is going at the moment?
When did compartmentalizing life mean pursuing romantic relationships over the weekends only?
When did to love, to want, to need, to show affection become such girly things,
those who are engulfed by romantic comedies and sensitivity did?
All I really want is to call you and tell you how much I miss you,
and just listen to you breath even if you don't have anything to say.
But, I guess I'll just wait for you to whatsapp me sometime during the weekend...
Jul 27, 2016
Jul 27, 2016 at 3:02 PM UTC
Handsome shades of murk crackle the joints in your bony fingers while she drapes purple towels over a broken window no one has bothered to sort. It's a quiet and moldy sort of night, with even a starry sky lying shamelessly over tranquil lakes under closed willows. There are no secrets though between her eyes and yours, who find joy in absently breaking the bleached porcelain cups your in laws bought, on this blood stained floor. With all this abstracted silence dying to burn your dog hearing thoughts, she finally manages a whisper.
'Dare not let the light in and wake you from this memory.
It might be putrid but it's the best you'll ever have'
Leaning back, the chair you sit on sobs wordlessly about the strain of living and the piles of laundry no one has bothered to fold. The moon overlooks your surroundings, watching pine trees in the distance exhale their last breath and drop weights of hope omitted from the stars for this Earth. Perhaps ignorance is bliss or someone cut off her ears and yours because no one turned to notice while those same pasty fingers count back the pages ripped out of old journals, all meant for her. With all the trains missed and reminders dismissed, you realize who's caught in a fog of sighs.
She paints your portrait in distress because she'll never finish what once was. Termites are biting the wooden legs of this chair and rotting is the flesh on your arms. Reflecting back on your life is worth nothing more than a refrigerator note she scribbled on for last weeks groceries and now she sleeps in a place far more silent than in a coffin deep under roots where some proud oak trees once stood. Being found in the middle of a lost labyrinth with her hand no longer warm, you finally manage a sentence.
'Who cares about the dying trees, I'm running out of paper.
She might be dead but well alive in a writer's promise'
Dec 16, 2013
Dec 16, 2013 at 6:20 AM UTC
Behold a glance at mother earth, you’re a witness to her fall.
A tortuous act of uncertainty a rage against all those who step
Upon her slovenly ground. A lash of ardent air that’s tears
Her golden limbs down.
As soda pop bottles reel through her grass
As a fawn come to inspect its newest injury
The top do the bottle rolls onto the damp ground
For she has been crying, a blustery song.
Her waterfall carries a small tangled duckling
Wrapped in an armor of fisherman’s wire.
She weeps some more wishing to stop the river.
As children stamp on the pedals of her waters reeds.
A cloud of beastly darkness overlooks a city
And her children cough to keep safe
From this monstrous beast.
She tries to cover their ears with a howl cry
To tell them to stop, or else she will die.
One petal stands on a daisy’s bud,
Her last child picks it away…let it float
Through the air to mothers hand…a reminder of home
When sons and daughters cared.
Dec 5, 2011
Dec 5, 2011 at 1:05 PM UTC
Lisa looks like she’s stood a little too close
To Dante’s Fireplace
A *** soaked ham left in the dirt
Small crust spots where the skin broke
She’s stopped wearing her dentures
Looks like her face is sinking inside of itself
I was napping
Dreaming about a rock on a hill
That overlooks my city
Was dreaming about what the gun said to the mouth
About how the bullet wanted a kiss
Found her lying in a window
Like a fish whose bowl has just shattered
A bowl that has been ***** for too long
It’s a mixed blessing
The glass bubble burst
The blood
I keep my window shut
The smell of the *** I dumped into the earth
Creeps in
Juicy apple pie smoke fingertips calling
Lisa’s kids
They don’t understand the anger
Don’t feel the neglect until it’s too late
I patch up her face
As she begs
Just don’t call the police
Don’t call anybody
I’m okay
She passes out
On a ***** couch
The kids crowd their mattresses
So they can sleep near her
I think about something I read once
About a company called LifeGem
And how for a small fee
They can turn your ashes into diamonds
Enough for a necklace
Or two bracelets
Several sets of earrings
Even when you’re worthless
You’re worth something
I buy dinner before work
Something fatty and saltier than their tears
She would always say things like
YOLO
You only live once
And then have a drink
Or hang up on a police officer
Or shut a door
YODO
You only die once too
I know how I want to be remembered
Aug 3, 2012
Aug 3, 2012 at 2:51 PM UTC
I reject God as he dances around
In his heavens in his expansive freedom
While the neglected human spirit
Remain chained to the confines
Of this world
While he sits back
Overlooks
With a neglectful apathy
All Gods drop away in my mind
As I turn my back on the Lord
I bow to the power of human spirit
Engulfed and surrounded
By the darkness of their mortality
I still see the defiance in their stair
Engulfed by a face of fear
Eyes shine bright like two
Sparkling stars in the dead of night
Saying NO NO NO
To the darkness
TRAPPED TRAPPED TRAPPED
Deep down in their darkness
Buried under under under
FAR FAR FAR
From any heaven above
As they feel no God down here
BLACK BLACK BLACK
Pitch blackness , Coal
Crushes with an engulfing fear
From every side
Birth presses from below
And death presses from above
Compressed into an inescapable
DARKNESS!!!
But the human spirit
Relentlessly fights back
Abandoned by God
It defiantly pushes back
At the darkness deemed to
Destroy it
Atoms of the soul
Unify themselves into
Perfect alignment
As they become an
Impenetrable army
That stands firm and says
No to the darkness
YOU SHALL NOT PASS
Crystallized under great
Pressure the soul
Becomes the perfect diamond
As nothing is stronger , harder
Greater than the human spirit
Mar 1, 2014
Mar 1, 2014 at 6:21 PM UTC
" I am my first love
I have let few men love me since
I don't want to ruin this heart
I can't afford to let go
I've never been the girl that breaks
I shatter
And I can't shatter for you
You don't even see what you have here
You are the type of boy
Who overlooks the moon
And never wakes for the sun .
I am so full of wanting
So full of honey
But you are worried about keeping your hands dry
And I am scared
That I will fill you up
And have nothing to come back to
See...
You are my second love
You smiled out of nowhere
I wasn't ready for you
But you lit everything in me
I felt it in your gaze
Your stare
You were deliberate
With me
I took a chance on you.
And I have let few men love me since
Because it always comes back to this
Just me
My first love.
Apr 2, 2017
Apr 2, 2017 at 8:17 PM UTC
Do you remember when love was uncomplicated
Hand-holding, lonely fingers grasping,
Longingly, perfecting their grip?
And do you remember the honeymoon
Highs, up and up, dizzily clambering up,
Exploring new horizons?
And do you remember, precisely, when love emerged,
From clouds of chalked up experiences,
Foreboding as a mountain,
Where lonely fingers grasped,
Longingly, for fresh hand-holds?
The quest for loves summit rises,
Peak to higher peak,
Each conquered height unveiling a new vista,
Revealing loves perilous truth,
That each peak is surpassed by two more
And the summit remains elusive.
The fool will climb up and up,
Leaving a devastated trail of overlooks,
Ever unsated,
Ever yearning,
Ever lonely.
The sage will make camp behind a large rock,
Still aware of the mountains hidden presence,
But settled with a lightness of heart,
To enjoy just one wonderful view.
Sep 14, 2015
Sep 14, 2015 at 8:44 AM UTC
You cannot touch her,
Tread quietly,
As she overlooks you with her straightened jaw.
Her proud eyes,
Waiting for the moment when your strength gives in,
And opened up,
She plunges into your depths.
Yes - She has seen you before,
As she carries back out of your darkness,
The little light,
And the moisture that was your love.
She laughs,
Dropping them onto the floor, and
With her own,
More delicate hand,
Reframes herself on the wall.
Apr 6, 2016
Apr 6, 2016 at 8:41 AM UTC
Paris pines
for us:
...whines for us.
Lurks outside
our window
like a great big
urban puppy.
We're being held
prisoner
( inside our room )
by a vicious sadistic
flu bug
who refuses to
let us go.
We are missing
David Sirosis's
new spoken
word night.
Indeed, all we have seen
of Paris, is:
the inside of
ROOM 411.
ROOM 411
overlooks that famed necropolis
CIMETIÈRE DE MONTMARTRE.
The dead stand
outside
ROOM 411
...and stare.
And...stare.
Envious of even
our flu-ridden life.
They crowd together
in their stone telephone boxes
like fans
at a Dr. Who convention
who have all come
as the Tardis.
"Come...come!"
they cajole.
"Come...join us as
the glorious dead!"
they plead.
See the great
Nijinksy
leap over a moon.
Offenbach, Berlioz et Degas
act a a celebrated Greek Chorus.
The flu grows weary
let's its...grip...slip &
we escape to
a poetry stage &
suddenly it's
PARIS LIT UP &
I'm on
stage.
A bemused amused
Parisian audience
wondering why
the staggery hairy
Irish post stumbles &
wanders in search of
his words &
carrying all of CIMETIÈRE DE MONTMARTRE
about in his ahhhhh...ahhhhh...ahhhhhhhhhh
....shoooooo....head!
Apr 16, 2015
Apr 16, 2015 at 5:03 PM UTC
The morning awakes with stuttering respect
Night time peace is past.
The new day to me is opportunity
Familiar movements from my love
Sadly recognising that rest is done
At least for the moment
Refusing to wholly awake is one I know.
She feels that more sleep would be...well
Even on days off the climbing out is a considered move
More considered, than move
I love her for her familiar ways
My moderated interaction has taken time to evolve
I understand, we can't all be the same
I love her for what she is and has taught me
Patience and tolerance
Oh how much I've learned about myself
Love is an acceptance of difference
A morphing of two ideals
A belief that neither is right but then...
Neither is wrong
Maturing love is a joy that has moved from blindness
To being at peace with your lover
But most of all it is the recognition
That you are with someone
Who cares, understands and forgives you
Overlooks odd ways and strange sayings
The underlying passion of true love
Never recedes or diminishes, but grows
Easier in the knowledge of an element of comfort
In wonderment and true happiness
Our jagged edges of self are no longer apparent
And the depth of our rounded love clasps us together
In time and space
Jun 19, 2015
Jun 19, 2015 at 7:43 AM UTC
Treasury Casino - 2:30 am
From my seat in the smokers section
I can see the Brisbane eye,
the river,
and the performing arts center.
Streetlights are mans answer to the cosmos
"Everything you can do,
I can make better."
Once it was said that we were made in God's image.
Now we can safely say that God was made in our image.
I am in a quiet place of the universe, the night stretches on
visible through the stately
wonderous
walls
carved of old wood and sandstone.
I am in a suede armchair, winged for pleasure.
The ceiling in this room is twice as high as an ordinary room.
Circular steel ***** hang down like a path of bubbles
left by a leviathan.
My water was poured with panache.
Let me set the scene for you:
I'm in the Treasury Casino, this building was once the QLD state treasury, it never changed really.
Sitting next to window that overlooks the river, a glass of water sits to my left. The room is the size of a double garage, maybe bigger. The floor and ceilings are made of old wood, the walls are decorated with a transparent gray fabric that remindsme of smoke. An old marble fireplace sits in a wall studded with tiny lights that resemble stars or candles. Above me is a series of hanging circular light fixtures that resemble a trail of bubbles left by a leviathan.
This room was designed for, and houses opulence.
The TV plays Eminem.
Peter Garrett dances like a Parkinson's sufferer.
And looks like Disco-Nosferatu.
We have killed the night
and neon power
and infomercials
**** the romance
once held
by late night solitude.
May 22, 2013
May 22, 2013 at 12:54 AM UTC
I remember you telling me how you thought highways were poetic.
There’s a spot I like to go to at night that overlooks the pacific highway,
a wall covered in vines,
I sit there and feel calm.
I can see the poetry in the way the red and white bleeding lights stretch along this road to nowhere.
I can see the poetry in the way each car holds a human
who is living a life that is not mine
and how each life is different
and how for a brief moment these lives are on the same path.
The man on his way home from work,
who has no one to go home to but a dog,
he is tired and he is a hard worker.
He remembers that he is out of milk so he takes the next exit.
A woman who just came from a first date,
who is disappointed because she isn’t sure if she’ll connect with another person the way she connected with her ex-lover,
she regrets the lies she told.
Their cars race forward
and their lonely thoughts chase them home.
These cars are going so fast,
I find it hard to focus on one for more than a moment.
However,
there is poetry in the way that I am still, while life is going fast.
They say being still isn’t progressive.
They say being still will get me nowhere.
But, I am grounded when I am still.
I am savoring every fleeting moment.
I am taking my time to get to where I am supposed to be and I am not even sure where that is.
I remember you telling me how you thought highways were poetic.
Tonight, I'm thinking that too.
Jun 16, 2016
Jun 16, 2016 at 3:50 AM UTC
Old chair sitting broken in the corner
Dusty mirror hanging on the wall
Mamas in the kitchen making a cup of coffee
Daddy he’s just sleeping down the hall
Sisters in the back yard picking flowers
Brothers in the treehouse with a gun
I am watching all but they cant see me
And no one else around know what they’ve done
Old man shopping cart down by the river
Banker drives his Cadillac back home
His highrise overlooks a lifeless city
That which in his eyes does not seem lifeless at all
Twigs and sticks are gathered to build a heart of fire
Twigs and sticks or maybe sticks and stones
Give and take or crush and break the time that you fear after
You realize it was never there at all
Some of them will live and die without ever even knowing
And I have lived and died among them all
Bones will break and dust will make the pathways we walk after
And you will hear my voice after it all
(c) 2010 CJG
Sep 22, 2012
Sep 22, 2012 at 3:34 PM UTC
While the dozens of lights
change their colors
and the pigeons
coo and stalk
the courtyard
across the way
is a corner store
where idlers stand
sharing a paper bag
and troubles
then a helicopter
owns the sky
but no one seems to care
but him
then some chatty women
hurriedly pass below
leaving perfume trails
and crew workers
discuss what to do next
while sipping coffee
and an old woman goes about
picking up bits of trash
and the cars rush around
to points unknown
and as the morning sun
beats down upon him
sweating
he overlooks it all
then sighs
cries
and closes his eyes
©2012 Lyn
Nov 6, 2013
Nov 6, 2013 at 3:15 PM UTC
For all the empty promises, the crocodile tears, the anger, the emotions in general. For the tears, and the hurt, and the longing. For the good times along with the bad times. For the adventures and the laughter and the prancing and the frolicking.
For the beaches and the overlooks and the rollercoasters and and the drugs and the beer and the shenanigans. For the casinos and the hotel rooms, for the crazy people and the jokes we made about them. For all of it.
I love you
Nov 15, 2018
Nov 15, 2018 at 3:56 PM UTC
I find myself stopping in a crowd of people and time slows still. Their laughter, their unpredictable movements, the fights and the resolutions and the bonding of brothers--all quiet. I am left in the fabric of things to wonder at the tapestry we call a culture.
How am I to know what is proper when all have their own true mothertongue? Who can teach me what to say when all I know is jumbled and disheveled based on who I've been and what I know?
I leave behind a southern legacy of liturgy and doctrine that outlines exactly what is human and exactly what is not. I step into a society that constantly years to fill a void--please Lord, find us someone who knows the Truth.
Their apathy and nonchalance is false; bravado is left wanting. I know they they all cry out for connection and seek it in flesh rather than spirit. I am caught in the midst of the pursuit of happiness and the quest for morality. I know not what brings joy to humanity, I hike towards that river and hope it is not run dry like all others.
In the study of psychology, I have found so many places where words fall short and the great carnal animal within all of us takes precedence, demands attention, seeking comfort in a world that often overlooks those that need it the most.
Love is a fragile, timid thing that is most often hard to find and difficult to voice. Instead, we lash out in aggression to hide that inner child that needs a tried and true comfort of a known embrace. We seek forgiveness and express it in anger, manipulation, meeting our needs however possible because this is America, after all.
This is all we want in our sequestered human heart, the beginning of redemption.
Apr 13, 2019
Apr 13, 2019 at 6:58 PM UTC
Your body is a map and I have red pins in my heart
Who said distance is easy?
When I cry rivers that I can't sail into your arms, my brain turns into a multifunctional machine to develop new ways of feeling less empty when I only hear your voice through my headphones.
I think to myself, has this got no end?
I only long for your sweet smile coming across me not separated by a screen and thousands of miles
I only long for your arms as you cradle me, I as a small bird looking for warmth and peace
I only long for what I already have but cannot seem to reach, like a vision, or a dream
You are the bright stain that overlooks all the other dark parts in me
Nature would bow in glory to how beautiful your soul is
You are as far away as wishes upon a star and I am as hallow as the ones that fall
I cannot contain the dreadful silence and the loneliness that comes after your voice is gone and I am left to face the world alone
Tell me, has this got no end?
Bruises around my heart that long to be cured by your hands are turning into a masterpiece
What do you call it when you miss someone so much it hurts to remember their scent?
What do you call it when you crave something you've never had to begin with?
How can love be so painful yet so wonderful?
I wonder if in years I will be smiling in your arms, kissing your beautiful lips or crying on my bathroom floor holding one of the only physical evidence that you once indeed existed
Are you only in my head?
Jul 16, 2015
Jul 16, 2015 at 4:36 AM UTC
My office window overlooks a frail tree.
When the sun is bright,
I can see some of its hues.
When the clouds go dark,
I can see its blues!
My office window overlooks a frail tree.
When its windy,
I can see its strength.
When its hot & humid,
I can see its parchedness.
My office window overlooks a frail tree.
It is dancing today.
The rain has beckoned.
Hope is a waking dream.
Sep 2, 2014
Sep 2, 2014 at 7:06 AM UTC