"parse" poems
Polar opposites, polar opposites, polar opposites.
The words ricochet around in my head, repeating as I try to parse out their meaning.
Yes, different, our shared thread the secret sign language of the unhappy.
But there are other things for me.
Aren’t there for you?
I love your dumb differences, what you are.
And me? Is what I am not enough when it’s so contrary?
Should we die then?
Accept defeat as inevitable when we are impossible?
Do we attract, volatile and painful and strong while we last?
I have always known this would end badly for me.
You are worth the risk, worth the pain.
I knew this too, instantly.
Didn’t you?
Sep 4, 2018
Sep 4, 2018 at 12:18 PM UTC
Is it my priestly duty
to be denied?
love—time and all else, at all cost!
while he went home alone to watch a movie?
Another victim
sacrificed
having squandered all my pieces in his game?
Trudging home
along the river
slow, in snow
I parse my losses
At the outskirts of a homeless camp
I pause below a viaduct
hauling passion by a leash
warming hands
avoiding hovel-eyes
Flames flicker on our faces
receiving absolution over embers
of a burning embrace
There trace
in glowing holocaust of skids
in human bleatings and crumblings
our smoke rises— pure obscure
Appease with boozy-blur
the icy, stinging God of winter stars...
G’nights inaudible as blessing
Am I derelict enough to be worthy?
Fallen far enough?
from the porches of prosperity?
to escape it all?
That wedding white
the newborn’s head
that numbing denial of decay?
Am I depraved enough to make it?
to the pages of your tragedy— minus poetry?
But the angel said
“The poetry’s more!”
Than leaving me—beyond you
...in the shambles of my words
Dec 8, 2016
Dec 8, 2016 at 10:16 PM UTC
by
rgpage
the days of age are finally here
and me now old with body cold,
my life has come a struggle.
our children now grown and out on their own.
with their children to guide from trouble.
yes the time is fall the sky is grey,
the leaves are red and gold.
the seasons parse our waning days
much shorter now, as we continue growing old.
my wife I see, not old like me
in the course of the many years.
her supple skin magnetic smile
my memories of her youth so clear.
my thoughts go back through numerous years
our children then were small,
to friends then lost with all our tears
in youthful days, i see them one and all.
back then no thoughts of getting old.
no worrying about a future maze .
we couldn’t see through a foggy haze,
we lived our days so bold.
the days of age we didn’t know
nor did we give them thought.
we were young and life was fun
we didn’t see reality’s sting, or
think that we’d ever be caught.
the days of age are upon us now
life’s circle almost complete.
with family and friends that have gone on ahead
we’ll see them again when we meet.
Mar 19, 2013
Mar 19, 2013 at 6:17 AM UTC
***A Woman's Reflection on Her Reflection (Valence and Value)
one poem, written by two authors***
~~~
**Ever the analyst,
A mirror functions as surface to
Parse the fleeting constant
Of youth's beauty.
From genetic gift
Of symmetry and bone,
To technological tampering,
Until the equation is solved,
As experience and character
Models and maps the result.
The answer, a reflection,
Of individual valence and value**
(written by S.D., a woman)
~~~
(written by N.L., a man)
unbidden and unannounced, a
"not fully formed poem,
but a simple reflection"
inbound missile arrives inbox,
armed with silent power,
the lethality of the
Holy Unexpected
the man reflects
on her mirror-on-the-wall's
fulsome reply,
parsing the words of a
woman's reflection,
while gazing on her own
every human's momentary glass notation,
but an instance of summation,
a human poem, whose editing,
unceasing
a comma here,
a period inserted,
an eye shadowed, an eyebrow tweezed,
a eye dark circle line added,
to tree-mark time's authorship
all these
but a person's
excerpted extraction,
notarized,
then auto-erased and revised,
as out of date,
instantaneously compromised
but,
***it is upon the conceptual,
valence and value,
more that the man reflects perpetual,
less on transitory morphing changes of
exterior mortality
while overlooking her
glassine realization from behind,
he concludes:
every reflection,
no matter how oft the snapshot,
the unfleeting constancy
of the combining of the
princes of principles,
valence and value
that he witnesses,
in the calming pool
of her eyes,
(those borrowed windows into her soul's well,)
so well reflect
her unchanging greater finery,
her character
this reflection,
metamorphosis transformed.
into a planetary permanency poem,
high placed in his the firmament
of their conjoined sky***
Feb 25, 2016
Feb 25, 2016 at 8:54 PM UTC
i loved you, right
a love unreturned,
unrequited
but alas, still
stoked by little miners with
hearts of brass their
iron faces grimacing at the task,
little beads of lots of sweat
dripping down their
taut frowns.
so what i meant to say is that
i love you, right,
and it’s a love that still
burns, bright, enough
to bring the boys home but
let’s be honest
it wouldn’t best the sun, but
**** it’s a terrible light,
it throws everything into a soft relief
where pretty, soft voiced sheep say
pretty, soft voiced things like
‘it’s okay to feel this way’
‘i want you to be happy’
‘she sounds amazing’
and other things that normal people
tell me mean that either
i don’t love you
or i’m moving on.
they don’t understand though,
i mean,
i love you, right,
though all that sheep **** makes it
sound as if
i’m waving you off,
smashing the celebratory champagne on your bow,
waving you off into the distance with a lacy hanky,
joyful tears cascading down my powdered cheekbones,
i’m greedy
maybe even,
needy,
a disgusting word and
even if i make pacts with myself
to the order of
‘he can do so much better’
‘i am damaged goods’
and other associated half truths
i’d be a liar if i said that
i would kick you out of bed
or even rebuke the slightest of
advances, no i’d take my chances
and i cannot bear it, really
i’d touch you and whatever wholeness
whatever someone else would
parse as clean or pure or holy
wouldn’t disintegrate, no
wouldn’t tarnish, no
would most probably just implode
under the combined pressure
of emotionally-mentally-fucked-in-the-head-doe
(where the **** do you think the miners got all that coal)
so, yes… wait. no?
i love you, right
but just ignore it
enjoy the lights
please remember them
tell your friends and
cherish them until
they are taken by
death, drink, dementia
but i’m sure your mum,
teacher,
or television
long ago informed you that
bright lights are detrimental to vision
so think of your future and
forget now
if you’re tempted by how i look at you
remember how
sunburn seems innocuous
until you see your skin
and sunscreen pretty useless
‘til you learn the sun will win
and the best way to avoid
dainty melanoma
is
to
go
inside
and
lock
your
door
and act like you don’t know her.
Oct 9, 2012
Oct 9, 2012 at 11:51 PM UTC
block me if
you will
for I will never be satisfied
trite me cut with a boredom knife,
hackney me to death with kitsch,
migraine me with banal,
bromide me with the pedestrian,
if you can only sing the exhausted, old familiar,
drain me not with your jejune
write me to soar,
pleasure me with convincing adjectives
of the posterous,
never before heard, untill my lips parse your words
write me to vex
so my sides, clutching
in the most desirable agony
you want to boast of how you cut?
then cut me if you can,
bravo
carve your initials into my brain,
so when I read your words,
I scream I weep I confess
you have vexed me,
in the places where
the very few dare tread,
in the places
where good poetry goes...
Aug 29, 2015
Aug 29, 2015 at 11:43 AM UTC
Those girls will find out my secret,
Probably sooner than I wish;
If I should die suddenly,
(By then it matters little)
They'll read what became of me.
Pictures that I've kept
With a ribbon round the faded letters
To tie up my regret.
You'll parse them with your sisters,
And discover, I, with my final stroke,
Wrote her name with my last breath.
You'll understand why I kept them long,
You'll read the name of our favorite song;
A verse I wrote, a note to my only love,
And wonder how things went so wrong.
The rule of cause and effect holds true;
For if I'm gone, there's no effect on you;
Nothing can give rise to something,
Your reaction will prove my assumption.
You'll find me in those letters too,
Where I confessed.
Aug 21, 2018
Aug 21, 2018 at 10:45 AM UTC
~
the word flows off
the tongue with ease;
say it softly...
slowly please,
...dis-co-ver-y...
disclosure of illusory,
pursuit of the elusory;
the uncovering of
buried secrets, dark and deep,
quiet whispers, soft and sweet;
an unveiling of
the here-to-fore unknown,
illuminating darkened hallways,
where footsteps lead us
to a place where all is shown.
in life it is the quest,
explorer’s zeal
that will not rest;
in love it is
the unknown song...
to give it notes and lyrics,
time and tune
which leads to
melody and harmony.
in my time,
adventures...
i have known a few;
have sought to parse the lines
’tween false and real.
but no adventure
will replace
the one that beckons,
outstretched finger,
stares me solemn, in the face
each morning ’fore the mirror;
though the outer i may tend,
it's the inner to consider;
for to know oneself,
a journey long,
a venture of
mountaineering magnitude,
where the weak may hopeful start,
but summiting rewards
reserve remittance
to
those valiant souls,
whose inner spirit
strength imparts.
’tis not the heart,
in love to conquer;
but ’tis one’s trust instead,
faith the mountain holds
rope and feet steadfast,
finish line within
one's grasp.
faith the flame will never die
illuminate the corridors
that lie behind the locks,
the gates, the doors,
that live inside one's head.
to let another in
this place of buried pain,
of innocence gone by,
where dreams once flourished,
so oft lay dying, dead,
this secret place where we reside
the seat of all we were and are,
again will one day be;
this where needed trust,
gently to encourage,
carefully to nourish;
these the fields
of possibilities,
of hope, beliefs,
of budding dreams;
to be uncovered,
be unearthed,
love’s encounter,
tongues to loose,
await the brave and wise,
the strong discoverer,
unafraid to learn the truth.
~
*post script.
discovery...
surprise not its intent, yet may be
its greatest blessing, and accomplishment!
a favorite blessing of mine to bestow on marrying couples,
"may your discovery of each other,
never end, or fail to delight;
and return to you the wonder,
of first love and of first sight and light!"
to you, the reader, fellow sojourner,
may you never cease to discover each other!*
Jun 7, 2016
Jun 7, 2016 at 2:14 AM UTC
I remember:
you, in black lace ******* and
little else, crushed close
by gravity,
weak winter afternoon sunlight
streaming in and out of your car,
HD Netflix in your backseat.
my fingers drumming insistently
upon your collar bone,
my mouth pressed against your shoulder
as I sing so softly in your ear,
a concert for one.
((only you're invited))
your hair all over your bare
back and black
lace wedged up tight against your
muscle. your lips are
cold against my skin and our feet
are ******* freezing and the heater is
all the way up but not nearly enough.
I let my fingers parse through your
vertebrae, Dr. Lecter planning
a meal; slice here,
cleave there, remove viscera, season and
cook: magnifique.
time and history are
mercury in my clenched fist;
my nails are biting into my skin, and
liquid silver moments gone by are
flowing freely from my slackened grip.
Nov 22, 2014
Nov 22, 2014 at 9:28 PM UTC
What I Mean When I Say Chinook Salmon
By Geffrey Davis
My father held the unspoken version of this story
along the bridge of his shoulders: This is how
we face and cast to the river — at angles.
This is how we court uncertainty. Here, he taught
patience before violence — to hold, and then
to strike. My fingers carry the stiff
memory of knots we tied to keep a 40-lb. King
from panicking into the deep current
of the stream. Back home, kneeling
at the edge of the tub with our kills, he showed
the way to fillet a King: slice into the soft
alabaster of the pectoral, study the pink-rose notes
from the Pacific, parse waste and bone from flesh. Then,
half asleep, he’d put us to bed, sometimes with kisses.
Dec 20, 2015
Dec 20, 2015 at 6:27 PM UTC
Take your Seven Deadly Sins,
And butcher them with punctuation.
Capitalize on floods, famines and fires.
Express sickness, war and homelessness.
Parse politics.
Syllabicate and spell out for all to read
The horror of homelessness and apathy.
There.
Nothing's too real we can't fictionalize... marginalize,
Again, and again, and again.
Apr 7, 2021
Apr 7, 2021 at 10:24 AM UTC
Poor sailors and poor students parse the past
Between the paper covers of poor Penguins
Poor crumbling pages and crumbling civilizations
Held together with rubber bands and Scotch tape
And when in middle age The City of God
At last succumbs to the barbarians of time
A fresh one is built up in Oxford blue
By Vivian Ridler, who saved for us the words
And yet - the arguments of several Romes
Were somehow fresher at $3.75
Mar 13, 2019
Mar 13, 2019 at 4:21 PM UTC
The paper drips with red blood from my soul
There’s no ink left in my pen
The clock has used up all its hours
The music of the spheres has ended.
I set out to build a village in a place
Not hard to find without a map
Proudly I used local lumber
Made sure the walls were square and true.
Sadly no one wants to live there
No one stops to hear my song
(Just one clear voice and not an opera )
People look and listen briefly then move on
≈
Wandering through the others’ harvests
I see words stacked in random order
Piled like fancy autumn haystacks
Held in place with azure ribbons
Mumbled voices raised in solos
Whose words I cannot parse or learn
Where verses run from one to twenty
And the applause is deafening
What seems real is evanescent
Fleeting as the winking of an owl
Impossible to braid with just two strands
And painted over with graffiti.
≈
How am I to fly when it appears
That I can barely walk and yet
I thought that I knew how to dance.
I guess I never found the beat.
I can’t but keep on building sturdy
Little one theme dwellings
It’s the only thing I know
And I’ll live there all by myself
And hope a visitor or two
Will stop by now and then
To say hello and how are you
And share a cup of my brand’s tea.
ljm
Feb 3, 2017
Feb 3, 2017 at 12:14 PM UTC
Bright horizons rise up
Over the broad, soothing,
Pixelated mountains.
A parse in the code wakes
And shivers under the
Blazingly cold sun.
Drifting clouds, silvered with
Pixels, flowing like a
River of neon lights.
The data streams above,
Dreamy and nostalgic,
Like quiet afternoons
Inside, listening to the
Cool, pattering rain tap
Gently at the window.
Dark clouds outside, stirring
With a roll of thunder,
And a screen, the music
Chimes gently in your mind.
Hums, chords, thrums, and a quiet,
Beckoning warmth, waving
Back through the pixel clouds
Under the pixel sun.
The colours blend with
The sweet taste of cola.
Salty crisps, shaken, bagged
And popped open at lunch.
Fresh tuna sandwiches,
The click of a cassette tape.
Unwrapped magazines.
Old smells mingle on your
Cool tongue. Lavender oil,
Peppermints in Winter,
Strawberries and cream. You
Feel the pixels in your
Pockets, like loose change.
Those soft chimes return still
To the old windowsill
In the light breeze. Each leaf
Its own story, washed in
Streams of pixels, flowing
Timid through the sky.
A bird tweets. The dreams stir
And fade into the clouds.
Softly lit, glowing sun,
Bathed in warm nostalgia.
Nobody really goes
To Earth, anymore.
Dec 13, 2018
Dec 13, 2018 at 2:57 AM UTC
parse and praise the phrase,
checkerboard fraction,
appréhendé immédiatement,
a poem title!
put aside to marinate,
stamped "will not expire,"
doing the research legwork,
**** it is a real thing!
toujours,
where the best words and titles come from,
if one listens well
romantic notions swell the chest,
all the love affairs over so many decades,
all checkerboard games
with Kings a-crowning and Queens a-moaning,
poet, no way, never planned ahead,
always lost by a fractious split,
more than a fractional loss,
losing
most triumphantly!
each lover took and left a fraction behind,
a numerator, a denominator, never a whole number,
for then there would be no poetry need
you want,
have need for
une idée fixe
whom I should be, but i could be a
multiple choice answer
a three scoop ice cream treat,
or perhaps, a mix of forty favorered flavors
a new one,
chaque coup,
why not?
our first disagreement
both of us wish to nominate the other to be the nominator
the denominator is a definition of what is the whole
because i am gracious,
foolish and less than whole
already
I concede cause I am in already in retreat,
conceding comes supernaturally nowadays,
so move me forward on the checkerboard
and triple jump me, and any way
I am pas de nom
we close today with an American
yay...
Sep 26, 2017
Sep 26, 2017 at 2:48 PM UTC
i.
the bones of your face
are long and defined.
i parse you
into geometry:
the firm lean lines of your
nose, your jaw
as a child's drawing,
as a cubist's dream.
ii.
you linger in my mind.
the way your hands
peel apart a question
as an artichoke falls open
barbed layer by layer until
you bare its redolent heart
which is also the answer.
Yes.
iii.
lulling, your words are calm
drops falling into the ocean
of our mutual silence. i feel
only contentment, only
contentment.
Mar 13, 2017
Mar 13, 2017 at 11:59 AM UTC
i.
a message from a boy i don’t know
that begins with, “i’m J’s cousin, i’m trying to locate her, can you....”
i don’t know how to deal with those
who promise death,
so i don’t finish reading it,
bile mixed with guilt building in my throat.
last night J told me her body was falling apart.
i didn’t know how to respond.
i know bodies without bones too well
but i don’t know how to talk about them.
i don’t know how to parse away
the skin from the bone of a pig
when i’m standing in the middle of a cold barn,
more naked than i was when i was born.
ii.
i am naked with boys who i don’t know,
but who fold me in half anyway, then fold me apart,
then spit me out like i am
the bitter taste of a dead dog.
iii.
keeseville, ny is upstate is a place
for stained dresses & burnt milk & spoiled prayers,
where i spent every summer in a body
made for somebody smaller.
i’m realizing now that i’m not small,
everyday i’m the opposite of small,
but these boys still look at me
with frightening scrutiny like i’m a goat who belongs in a bed
& if i’m not pet, not fed, i will give out.
iv.
sun hangs across the sky
like blood across my underwear.
yours or mine?
from which part of the body?
Apr 21, 2015
Apr 21, 2015 at 8:07 PM UTC
I would write a poem
That would change your world.
But, first you have to want
Your world to be changed.
I would write you a poem
That would find you true love
But that would change your world
And the result would be the same.
I’d write a rhymed sonnet
Worthy of Will Shakespeare
Talking about the strength
That love can give to you.
I could parse it in pentameter
And lilting phrases of pictographia
If I thought that word work
And if I thought that would do.
I’d speak of clearing your mind
And setting your spirit inner free
To caress your soul into harmony
Both within you and without you.
I’d urge you to practice yoga
And other exotic disciplines
If that would help you understand
What wonders your mind can do.
But in that poem, I would need
To practice some kind of magic
To make you set your toys aside
And focus on what is important.
I would need to show clearly
In the simplest of phrases,
That living life honestly can charm
If you remove all that is discordant.
I would write you such a poem
That repeating it out loud would
Let you be happy with being you
And let you give up being proud
Or lazy or arrogant or angry
And clear your horizons away
Of any roadblocks or envy
And remove every dark cloud.
Aug 3, 2017
Aug 3, 2017 at 11:52 PM UTC
A kiss is a sentence
it may run-on and on and...
stop, step off, take a breath.
A kiss is complex
if you're young or inexperienced;
but not to worry;
with time, it's enigmatic.
A kiss is compounded,
when confounded and complex:
and should you try expounding it;
your kiss may lead to ***
A kiss that is declarative
is indicative not imperative.
A kiss can be inverted;
that's diverted, not perverted.
(or vice versa)
A kiss is exclamatory,
As in, "Not now!" "I'm sorry!"
A kiss is.
A fragment of a kiss.
At osculum interrupta.
When is a kiss too questionable?
When it's probing, or incredible.
My advice.
Skip the semantics.
Don't parse stars and moon.
Just
Keep It Simple Stupid
Full stop
(or not...)
Mar 6, 2014
Mar 6, 2014 at 1:25 PM UTC
Pusillanimous polecats
Practicing perfidy
Plan parties and
Parse probabilities proudly
Partially putting past
The paltry populace
Pornographic postulations
And potboilers
Pointing poisonous
Proclamations publically
Pitting proper people
To pathetic programs
Promising the penurious
More poverty.
Often posthumously.
Pitiful people plead
Putting need over posture
Putting parents out to pasture
Promising, but passing on
Proper placement of
Propriety and parity
Planting nothing for posterity,
Prizing prosperity
Politicizing with polemics
Post-mortems on politeness
Placing pandering
Higher in practice
By perpetrating
Practical party politics.
Sep 14, 2015
Sep 14, 2015 at 7:23 PM UTC
call me Ishmael
call me such, though
I will not answer,
nor tell the Story
of good and evil,
if those things be,
they are not among the stars,
the stones, the fishes, the sea
vagabonds, all
they ride the whaled waves
that drown
the Captain’s words
they are there for the bread
not to break it
still He howls louder
the salt waters cut the keel black,
swishing quiet, unknowing as the night
only He creates this plaintive plight
the others hoist sails to wily winds
untroubled by their enchantment
bellies full, ears shut
to His harpooned harangues, while
His eternal curse is to parse
black from white
Jan 18, 2014
Jan 18, 2014 at 1:27 PM UTC
(sonnet #MMMMMCCCLXXVII)
I'm not asleep. But wakened, tiptoe thence
Through every minute like to dare exhale
Is not allowed, as if to breathe would hail
The end of visions roused to caper whence
No concrete line shall say, whileas suspense
Knows Janry shows our breath in sheer betrayl
As snow feels that chinook's touch, waxing pale
Though I still walk upon its face tward sense.
And hear a distant blue jay's cry bestir
Young Saturday's thin silence like he knew
What I maunt parse out 'til what aye? as twere.
Oh yes, the sparrows' playful calls heard too
Whilst carving out the eggs, and thought in poor
Excuse I'll be half good, erm, just for you.
09Jan16b
Mar 6, 2016
Mar 6, 2016 at 10:50 PM UTC
Facebook's faces, sometimes as strong as words on the wall,
or in Xanga's blogs, or in now-old email messages,
serve as evocateurs
that summon more than one could think was stored
in tangled strands beneath the cortex.
That vault, in fact, proves not to be protected space
or cerecloth meant to hold or hide some hallowed hopes
that I had thought were now impervious,
reserved apart from further, subtle, deeper text,
not subject here to parse or vivisect.
From vantage point of age, perchance
one sees that those faces smiling over progeny,
or cyber-lighted eyes peering out in brightness,
mask sober-tinged realities
expressed ever so casually in the orderly syntax
displayed on my wall or my blog or my mail.
Jan 6, 2012
Jan 6, 2012 at 2:32 PM UTC
I once read that
there is a wrinkle in time and
ever since I've sought to
parse out the clock's seconds and
feel every whisper of wind on
my skin and
sneak glances at sunrises through
blinds and
taste snowflakes and rainstorms and
wrinkle my nose at
good and bad smells in
Time's wrinkle and
gaze at moonlight twinkle.
Dec 2, 2016
Dec 2, 2016 at 12:04 AM UTC
We live in a world
that is at least
half darkness.
So shouldn't half of our poems
be dark?
Or perhaps half of every poem?
Or half of that?
How do we parse the darkness
of this world -
of our lives -
and still live?
How do we tip-toe on the edge
of eternity
the grave
And smile?
You figure it out.
It's a mystery.
May 9, 2016
May 9, 2016 at 6:26 PM UTC