"rouse" poems
I should not have blamed only my father, but,
he was the first to introduce me to
raw and stupid hatred.
he was really best at it: anything and everything made him
mad-things of the slightest consequence brought his hatred quickly
to the surface
and I seemed to be the main source of his
irritation.
I did not fear him
but his rages made me ill at heart
for he was most of my world then
and it was a world of horror but I should not have blamed only
my father
for when I left that... home... I found his counterparts
everywhere: my father was only a small part of the
whole, though he was the best at hatred
I was ever to meet.
but others were very good at it too: some of the
foremen, some of the street bums, some of the women
I was to live with,
most of the women, were gifted at
hating-blaming my voice, my actions, my presence
blaming me
for what they, in retrospect, had failed
at.
I was simply the target of their discontent
and in some real sense
they blamed me
for not being able to rouse them
out of a failed past; what they didn't consider was
that I had my troubles too-most of them caused by
simply living with them.
I am a dolt of a man, easily made happy or even
stupidly happy almost without cause
and left alone I am mostly content.
but I've lived so often and so long with this hatred
that
my only freedom, my only peace is when I am away from
them, when I am anywhere else, no matter where-
some fat old waitress bringing me a cup of coffee
is in comparison
like a fresh wild wind blowing.
17.2k
I work hard for this friend-ship
Though I'm not quite on board,
I'm there when you lose grip,
Well at least when you're moored.
Like a lighthouse I stand,
And like a lighthouse I'll stay,
I'll be a beacon on land
Watching still when you fade away.
You'll experience it all, good, bad and scary,
Yet I'll stay by my post, watching and wary.
Nobody saves the lighthouse
From the violent, swirling mess.
When the angry storms rouse
Each flash of light is my own SOS.
And I know they see my light
Because they promptly turn away,
And I'm not trying to put up a fight
Honestly it's better this way.
May 25, 2014
May 25, 2014 at 12:31 PM UTC
Street lamps play
As they have before
Dim walkway
Leading to a door
Careful steps
Strewn leaves
Breathe between gaps
Skulking like thieves
Rustling trees
Otherwise nothing
Mind at ease
Heart rapidly beating
Usually stops here
Usually I'd stir
But still in slumber
I drew closer
Eyes on door
Familiar scene
Stood here before
This dream I've been
Up the patio
Door was ajar
Accompanied by my shadow
Stretched far
Tunnel vision
Dripping eave
Door handle beckons
Hand raised to receive
Usually stops here
Usually I'd rouse
Allowed to enter
This time... This house
Handle I seize
Door seemed light
It did not freeze
Hinges did not fight
Revealed the insides
Scanned surroundings
Unlit lights
Stairs climbing
Footsteps I heard
Coming my way
Sounds absurd
But yet I stay
Usually stops here
Usually dream is done
But still was clear
It only had begun
Darkened figure
Descending on bare feet
Beauty light as feather
Ever did I meet
She did not see me
Planted at the doorway
Impossible it may be
Nothing did she say
Walked right by
My eyes followed
Seconds fly
In eternity they burrowed
Usually stops here
Usually I'd wake
Yet still I'm here
Chance I'd take
Stood at the fridge
Back towards me
Under siege
My mind set a flurry
Fridge was opened
Light casted her silhouette
Her back darkened
Curiosity grew fat
Illuminating beams
Accentuated her hair
Like golden streams
Flowing with flair
Usually stops here
Usually I'd startle
Connection did not sever
Continue I was able
Spellbound I gawked
Rooted like a tree
Wide-eyed I stalked
This siren before me
She drank
Not knowing I was there
Stiff as a plank
I was locked in a stare
Finally broke free
Shifted my weight
She turned to me
And then said...
Then it ceased
Then I awaken
Surprisingly pleased
Slice of heaven
Who was she?
Silhouetted face
Perpetually...
Mysterious grace
Foreign albeit familiar
Strange but true
Now rings clear...
It is you...
Aug 26, 2014
Aug 26, 2014 at 10:33 PM UTC
You were just a plot twist;
One I didn’t see coming.
It was that moment that I realized-
How could I think you loved me?
I didn’t suspect you;
If anything, I trusted.
I realize now my view of you
Didn’t do you justice.
One so light, the other dark-
Could I ever trust again?
I can’t believe that long ago
I considered you a friend.
If you had kept your feelings close
I wouldn’t be here now.
For better or for worse, I guess,
From innocence I rouse.
Apr 30, 2020
Apr 30, 2020 at 1:04 AM UTC
in the heart
of the night
a slice of moonlight
cascading
beckoned
i rouse
its mesmerizing lure
gently stirs
a hazy
remembrance
entranced
from shadows i emerge
hearkening its echo
you’re dreaming
awaken
its shimmering light
engulfed me
prying open my stubborn eyes
in the onyx
darkness
its silver glow
enticed me outside
i stood silent
whilst glistening dewdrops
danced on my toes
a sterling lunar crescent
enlightening midnight
softly
serenades
me
wake up
life’s a trance
you’re
hypnotized
mesmerized
in an ocean of emptiness
i heard
a celestial orb
calling
and ne’er slept again
©2016janetaylor
May 22, 2016
May 22, 2016 at 7:23 AM UTC
I fear the way you love me:
That tender-touching kiss
Seducing me to nightly
Sink deep in your abyss.
Those smooth caresses take me
To places that I dread,
Your cunning fingers rouse me
To plan such lies ahead.
But while we writhe and tumble
In lust's hypnotic hold,
I fear the final stumble
That will see the truth unfold.
Mar 21, 2011
Mar 21, 2011 at 3:16 AM UTC
The girl in the yellow overalls
Is wishing for sunlight
(somelight, sumlight)
To outshine her
(outline her, outlier)
And that sky blue blouse
(blows, blowsy)
Drowsy in the noon-day
(gloom-day, soon-day)
She'll grow up gleaming
(beaming, screaming)
****** ****** of crows
(rows, rows)
Rouse the sleeping
(keeping, beeping)
Alarm clock sun.
(gun. run.)
Oct 19, 2014
Oct 19, 2014 at 8:51 PM UTC
Could man be drunk for ever
With liquor, love, or fights,
Lief should I rouse at morning
And lief lie down of nights.
But men at whiles are sober
And think by fits and starts,
And if they think, they fasten
Their hands upon their hearts.
7.4k
is like no other early morning, man reborn, in the delivery
room of sky blue, the offsetting water deeper bluish hue,
the trim-all-around of the mixed salad greens of the staff's
scrubs as they usher in unity, with no imp-unity, the risks,
while the supervisory sky, disperses cumulus clouds in
peppercorn patterns of white chains, or big wide solitary
brushstrokes on a a ****** canvas, gettin' the feel in the
palm of the heft of brush, the viscosity of the paint, the day's
palette reflecting available colors in order to create a uni~cued
original of what has been painted an uncountable times before,
and before…
tho short weighted, was the sleep of the prior night's restful,
he awakes to the early morning light, the sounds of early
island rouse him, even, arouse him, for the August chill
foretells of the early onset of memory loss of the peculiarities
of this summered simmering, human warming and baking
and natural braking of the slowing of the heart rate, to better
accommodate, nature's hints and hidden reminiscences
of the true purpose of the summer's intervention upon our
collective and unique bottling, our individualized containers,
un~lidded, uncovered, eager for the fuel of sunrays replenish-
ing the length of our lives by the elixir of the summer
it is a chill 63 Fahrenheit at this time of day as we crossover
to the nigh day, from the cooling air conditions of dark,
the occasional helicopter intrudes upon the morning's calm,
the water placid, the geese honking regarding my watchful
rewarding presence, a slew, a bevy, of female vocalists, to
ease this transitory performance unfolding, and though one
feels the existential of his solitary singularity, as he thinks,
nay believes, he is the only one in attendance at this ritualized
emergence, he takes in the cool of, the heat of, the admixture
of both, the clashing integers of each, and he, fully invigorated,
goes silent, for once more, he has uncovered new combinations of
old words to accept and describe a new day's creation, miracle of miraculous, defying the odds of this ventures's success, his own continuance on this sheltered but open all around island implanted tween two tines of land, as if all the surroundings were created just to protect this, wholly holy place…
7:00am
Silver Beach
Shelter Island
Aug 19 2025
Aug 19, 2025
Aug 19, 2025 at 8:00 AM UTC
Fear the stillness whers't thou find
the dreary life and idle mind,
wherein thine own reflection lies
a baleful thing with glassy eyes.
Let horror of this fill thine heart,
to maul thy slothy core apart.
Ignite within thine blighted soul,
a fire that should cleanse it whole.
Let passion rouse it from thine state,
that thou shalt grasp the skeins of fate.
Thus boldly stride a person who,
was born, hath died, is born anew.
Jul 1, 2016
Jul 1, 2016 at 3:27 AM UTC
Wake me when spring has sprung
when the cold is gone,
and skies no longer gray.
Rouse me with the cries of birds
a warm wind blown my way
and a green light in the shade.
Dress me in the blooming buds,
Let butterflies be my lips,
And raindrops as my eyes.
Replace my heart with a shining star
And fill my head with a soft white cloud.
Drip the shine of morning in my veins
And I'll have the fresh green grass for my hair.
Take my bones for branches.
Make my tears have a honey-suckle taste.
My breath would be the pollen sifting through the air.
Take me from my sleeping ground
And lay me in the fresh cold stream.
Wake me when spring is sprung,
But until then, I'm going to sleep.
Dec 17, 2012
Dec 17, 2012 at 10:50 AM UTC
Fling your red scarf faster and faster, dancer.
It is summer and the sun loves a million green leaves,
masses of green.
Your red scarf flashes across them calling and a-calling.
The silk and flare of it is a great soprano leading a
chorus
Carried along in a rouse of voices reaching for the heart
of the world.
Your toes are singing to meet the song of your arms:
Let the red scarf go swifter.
Summer and the sun command you.
5.6k
Lays of Mystery,
Imagination, and Humor
Number 1
I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls,
And each damp thing that creeps and crawls
Went wobble-wobble on the walls.
Faint odours of departed cheese,
Blown on the dank, unwholesome breeze,
Awoke the never ending sneeze.
Strange pictures decked the arras drear,
Strange characters of woe and fear,
The humbugs of the social sphere.
One showed a vain and noisy ****
That shouted empty words and big
At him that nodded in a wig.
And one, a dotard grim and gray,
Who wasteth childhood's happy day
In work more profitless than play.
Whose icy breast no pity warms,
Whose little victims sit in swarms,
And slowly sob on lower forms.
And one, a green thyme-honoured Bank,
Where flowers are growing wild and rank,
Like weeds that fringe a poisoned tank.
All birds of evil omen there
Flood with rich Notes the tainted air,
The witless wanderer to snare.
The fatal Notes neglected fall,
No creature heeds the treacherous call,
For all those goodly Strawn Baits Pall.
The wandering phantom broke and fled,
Straightway I saw within my head
A vision of a ghostly bed,
Where lay two worn decrepit men,
The fictions of a lawyer's pen,
Who never more might breathe again.
The serving-man of Richard Roe
Wept, inarticulate with woe:
She wept, that waiting on John Doe.
"Oh rouse", I urged, "the waning sense
With tales of tangled evidence,
Of suit, demurrer, and defence."
"Vain", she replied, "such mockeries:
For morbid fancies, such as these,
No suits can suit, no plea can please."
And bending o'er that man of straw,
She cried in grief and sudden awe,
Not inappropriately, "Law!"
The well-remembered voice he knew,
He smiled, he faintly muttered "Sue!"
(Her very name was legal too.)
The night was fled, the dawn was nigh:
A hurricane went raving by,
And swept the Vision from mine eye.
Vanished that dim and ghostly bed,
(The hangings, tape; the tape was red happy
'Tis o'er, and Doe and Roe are dead!
Oh, yet my spirit inly crawls,
What time it shudderingly recalls
That horrid dream of marble halls!
5.5k
Let us listen...
Just for awhile
let us silence our minds
and open our hearts
Just for awhile
let us listen from within
Listen...
not to gain knowledge
not to formulate questions
rather to chance upon
sacred bonds and
profound wisdom
Just for awhile
let us not seek information
or answers
Let us not rouse the intellect
but embrace the spirit
If thoughts cloud the brain
let them pass
If replies tingle on the tongue
let us breathe them away silently
Return to them later
but here...
here in this precious time of sharing
Let us listen
let the words wash over us
and seep into a still quiet pool
Let us listen.
May 4, 2017
May 4, 2017 at 8:44 PM UTC
WEAVE no more silks, ye Lyons looms,
To deck our girls for gay delights!
The crimson flower of battle blooms,
And solemn marches fill the night.
Weave but the flag whose bars to-day
Drooped heavy o’er our early dead,
And homely garments, coarse and gray,
For orphans that must earn their bread!
Keep back your tunes, ye viols sweet,
That poured delight from other lands!
Rouse there the dancer’s restless feet:
The trumpet leads our warrior bands.
And ye that wage the war of words
With mystic fame and subtle power,
Go, chatter to the idle birds,
Or teach the lesson of the hour!
Ye Sibyl Arts, in one stern knot
Be all your offices combined!
Stand close, while Courage draws the lot,
The destiny of human kind.
And if that destiny could fail,
The sun should darken in the sky,
The eternal bloom of Nature pale,
And God, and Truth, and Freedom die!
5k
Move him into the sun -
Gently its touch awoke him once,
At home, whispering of fields unsown.
Always it woke him, even in France,
Until this morning and this snow.
If anything might rouse him now
The kind old sun will know.
Think how it wakes the seeds, -
Woke, once, the clays of a cold star.
Are limbs, so dear-achieved, are sides,
Full-nerved, - still warm, - too hard to stir?
Was it for this the clay grew tall?
- O what made fatuous sunbeams toil
To break earth's sleep at all?
4.4k
A little while a little love
The hour yet bears for thee and me
Who have not drawn the veil to see
If still our heaven be lit above.
Thou merely, at the day’s last sigh,
Hast felt thy soul prolong the tone;
And I have heard the night-wind cry
And deemed its speech mine own.
A little while a little love
The scattering autumn hoards for us
Whose bower is not yet ruinous
Nor quite unleaved our songless grove.
Only across the shaken boughs
We hear the flood-tides seek the sea,
And deep in both our hearts they rouse
One wail for thee and me.
A little while a little love
May yet be ours who have not said
The word it makes our eyes afraid
To know that each is thinking of.
Not yet the end: be our lips dumb
In smiles a little season yet:
I’ll tell thee, when the end is come,
How we may best forget.
3.9k
She stood there naked almost all throughout the year
Enslaved by the chilling winds, captured by the gloom of winter
Though she never got tired of waiting for the sun to rouse from a lengthy sleep
Reaching up the clouds, she raised her tiny brittle arms and began to weep
I was a witness to her silent suppressed feeling and pain
But I was scared to show her that I also wallow in vain
Then I saw her yesterday with the warm breeze caressing her blushing cheeks
I just wished she felt my joy, the freedom from the frigid knot is indeed to celebrate
Her beauty now flourishes in her pink and silky gown
Her smile glitters and she glows like a princess with a gorgeous crimson crown
Again I am a witness to her glorious happiness and content
Though nervous of the ceremony that might soon begin to fade
Mar 31, 2019
Mar 31, 2019 at 5:05 AM UTC
I, like the pendulum
Swing from one extreme
To the polar opposite
Before coming to a conclusive rest in the center
The intensity of applied force
Determines the height of my emotion
But the outcome is the same,
With every swing, I come down
Kinetic converting to potential energy
Until I am frozen in time, dead center
An emotional ground state
Completely still in my own calmness
Where I find that the initial force
Of what troubled me
Was nothing but people
Performing an experiment
To prove a point to themselves
That they could rouse me
I, like the pendulum
Will eventually come
To a complete stop
Alone in my stillness
Breathless and apathetic to my surroundings
Jan 18, 2017
Jan 18, 2017 at 5:19 PM UTC
Boundless dusk above forsaken intuitions
Stones with ancient seeds
Yet the roots can breathe
The earthly exuberance
The naked secret of our song
That manipulates my tounge
Redden from you and I
The contact of our lips
Simulating my hunger for your groin
The nerves of my vertebrates harbor your weight
As my breast shudder from your touch
Primal delicious desires
I thirst for the fluids of your flesh
With nurture and greed
I moisten your fingers
Help you find my sensitive pearl
Relishing the trail of the garden of youth
Primal delicious desires explode in need
Delicate softness of my mystical place
Lifting my body with much response
As my fingers dance, pinch and **** at my peaks
Repeatedly as you ****** me
I gasp and beg for your caress
I shudder as I chase my wave
Reaching as I whimper into a ******
Simulating my hunger for your groin
Inflaming my pores
I enlarge you ever so slow
Working my hands holding you from behind
One swift lick of your rigid flesh
You pull in a lungful of air
Your hot flesh started to grow
I ease you into my mouth
Circling as you keep the pace
Against me you put me in deep
The sweet taste of you makes me weak
Intense intervals underneath
Between your thighs
Intoxicating the very layers of my juice
I enlarge you once again
Moist and ready
I open my sweetness just for you
As I arch down onto you
Your hands rest on my hips
I begin to feel my flower grow
A whispering rouse escapes from my lungs
We flow inside each another
Deeper in my heat
Your aggressive arousal
Provoking me to quiver
The barrier surrenders to you and I
Vivid blossoms of tranquil harmony
Through the gateway of my womanhood
As you nurish the nutrients you covet for
My protruding pale pink buds
Plump with need
I'd hollow out to place you inside
I'd linger in this universe to pave your delicious desire
As you surrender pushing me down
You penetrate my mouth once again
As you reclaim my mouth soft and pink
Jun 19, 2013
Jun 19, 2013 at 6:59 PM UTC
"O day! he cannot die
When thou so fair art shining!
O Sun, in such a glorious sky,
So tranquilly declining;
He cannot leave thee now,
While fresh west winds are blowing,
And all around his youthful brow
Thy cheerful light is glowing!
Edward, awake, awake--
The golden evening gleams
Warm and bright on Arden's lake--
Arouse thee from thy dreams!
Beside thee, on my knee,
My dearest friend, I pray
That thou, to cross the eternal sea,
Wouldst yet one hour delay:
I hear its billows roar--
I see them foaming high;
But no glimpse of a further shore
Has blest my straining eye.
Believe not what they urge
Of Eden isles beyond;
Turn back, from that tempestuous surge,
To thy own native land.
It is not death, but pain
That struggles in thy breast--
Nay, rally, Edward, rouse again;
I cannot let thee rest!"
One long look, that sore reproved me
For the woe I could not bear--
One mute look of suffering moved me
To repent my useless prayer:
And, with sudden check, the heaving
Of distraction passed away;
Not a sign of further grieving
Stirred my soul that awful day.
Paled, at length, the sweet sun setting;
Sunk to peace the twilight breeze:
Summer dews fell softly, wetting
Glen, and glade, and silent trees.
Then his eyes began to weary,
Weighed beneath a mortal sleep;
And their orbs grew strangely dreary,
Clouded, even as they would weep.
But they wept not, but they changed not,
Never moved, and never closed;
Troubled still, and still they ranged not--
Wandered not, nor yet reposed!
So I knew that he was dying--
Stooped, and raised his languid head;
Felt no breath, and heard no sighing,
So I knew that he was dead.
3.5k
When fierce conflicting passions urge
The breast, where love is wont to glow,
What mind can stem the stormy surge
Which rolls the tide of human woe?
The hope of praise, the dread of shame,
Can rouse the tortur’d breast no more;
The wild desire, the guilty flame,
Absorbs each wish it felt before.
But if affection gently thrills
The soul, by purer dreams possest,
The pleasing balm of mortal ills
In love can soothe the aching breast:
If thus thou comest in disguise,
Fair Venus! from thy native heaven,
What heart, unfeeling, would despise
The sweetest boon the Gods have given?
But, never from thy golden bow,
May I beneath the shaft expire!
Whose creeping venom, sure and slow,
Awakes an all-consuming fire:
Ye racking doubts! ye jealous fears!
With others wage internal war;
Repentance! source of future tears,
From me be ever distant far!
May no distracting thoughts destroy
The holy calm of sacred love!
May all the hours be winged with joy,
Which hover faithful hearts above!
Fair Venus! on thy myrtle shrine
May I with some fond lover sigh!
Whose heart may mingle pure with mine,
With me to live, with me to die!
My native soil! belov’d before,
Now dearer, as my peaceful home,
Ne’er may I quit thy rocky shore,
A hapless banish’d wretch to roam!
This very day, this very hour,
May I resign this fleeting breath!
Nor quit my silent humble bower;
A doom, to me, far worse than death.
Have I not heard the exile’s sigh,
And seen the exile’s silent tear,
Through distant climes condemn’d to fly,
A pensive, weary wanderer here?
Ah! hapless dame! no sire bewails,
No friend thy wretched fate deplores,
No kindred voice with rapture hails
Thy steps within a stranger’s doors.
Perish the fiend! whose iron heart
To fair affection’s truth unknown,
Bids her he fondly lov’d depart,
Unpitied, helpless, and alone;
Who ne’er unlocks with silver key,
The milder treasures of his soul;
May such a friend be far from me,
And Ocean’s storms between us roll!
3.5k
I do not swear because I am
A sweet and sober guy;
I cannot vent a single ****
However hard I try.
And in viruperative way,
Though I recall it well,
I never, never, never say
A naughty word like hell.
To rouse my wrath you need not try,
I'm milder than a lamb;
However you may rile me I
Refuse to say: ******
In circumstances fury-fraught
My tongue is always civil,
And though you goad me I will not
Consign you to the divvle.
An no, I never, never swear;
Profanity don't pay;
To cuss won't get you anywhere,
(And neither will to pray.)
And so all blasphemy I stem.
When milk of kindness curds:
But though I never utter them -
Gosh! how I know the words.
3.3k
With a smile and all our love
We send this wish to you
This wish of Happy Birthday
And blessings all year through
For you our friend are dear to us
More dear than you can know
So here we are now - one and all -
To let our feelings show
You rouse our hearts and minds to see
Those with less than you 'n' me
To count our blessings; search our souls
And thank God we are free
To dare to dream; to spread our wings
Are all that you inspire
And so we fly above those clouds
Soaring high and higher
More gentle, kind and caring man
We would be hard to find
You lift us up and share your love
You are one of a kind
We love all that you do for us
So these wishes we send
May you have the happiest day
Happy Birthday, dear friend!
Jan 15, 2011
Jan 15, 2011 at 12:28 AM UTC