"rowboat" poems
Once upon a time, a long time ago
There was a little boy with a grimy flow
I used to hear him rap in Chicago everyday
And this is what I heard him say…….
He say **** like, he be like….
Ah! and I'm a *********** biter
The size of the incises inside ya might surprise ya
You might need rewind to decipher my cyphers
Ain't nothing on this world worth more than my saliva
I go so hard when I'm flowing
So cold my flows frozen
I'm a rowboat rowing in an open ocean
And I'm hoping, to blow up with no promotion
But dam, those explosions are so slow motion
So, I need some honey bees to pollinate my money trees
Cause fuckery of companies, accompanies that come between
A couple bucks and me, turned my orange juice to Sunny-D
Hide the cash for food stamps, no way i'm funded publicly
I'm hungry, but not for sandwiches I'm ambitious
A panhandler with gram plans and last wishes
Ask for the last table scraps you can't finish
Sell em back when you digest, and I repackage it
Abracadabra, I'm an alchemist, my magic tricks are acting as contaminates
I damage this establishment
They enacted bans on urban camping
If you ask them how they sleep at night the answer is
Happily on mattresses
Oct 21, 2014
Oct 21, 2014 at 12:43 AM UTC
The ******
Tried so very hard to please his crew
But you see
Out on the high seas
Tensions run high
But you cannot take words
Back
See the crew loved the ******
They just didn’t know how to show it
In the night
The ****** rowed on a rowboat
Far away from the harsh crew
The crew saw him
Stop they yelled
But the ****** was already gone
Just
Like
That.
Jul 3, 2011
Jul 3, 2011 at 8:23 AM UTC
She was the only lighthouse in a roiling sea of black
My rowboat upended
As the waves enveloped my screams
Gasping, reaching
As the foamy pitch swallowed me whole
CLANG mourned the lighthouse
Her yellow beam helplessly revolving
CLANG CLANG
Apr 23, 2015
Apr 23, 2015 at 2:07 PM UTC
I have enough treasures from the past
to last me longer than I need, or want.
You know as well as I . . . malevolent memory
won't let go of half of them:
a modest church, with its gold cupola
slightly askew; a harsh chorus
of crows; the whistle of a train;
a birch tree haggard in a field
as if it had just been sprung from jail;
a secret midnight conclave
of monumental Bible-oaks;
and a tiny rowboat that comes drifting out
of somebody's dreams, slowly foundering.
Winter has already loitered here,
lightly powdering these fields,
casting an impenetrable haze
that fills the world as far as the horizon.
I used to think that after we are gone
there's nothing, simply nothing at all.
Then who's that wandering by the porch
again and calling us by name?
Whose face is pressed against the frosted pane?
What hand out there is waving like a branch?
By way of reply, in that cobwebbed corner
a sunstruck tatter dances in the mirror.
Leningrad, 1960
3.5k
All things must end in time
Regardless of who when where or why
I am absolved by the setting sun
In this absence of light the darkness is All, the shadow is One
The Ray of intellect pulls pieces from the vast darkness
Attached by fear, chased by longing
We run in circles, burying Truth beneath flecks of meaningless illumination
Frustation, anger, the illusion of danger.
I am a fool.
I sit, surrounded by water in a rowboat without oars demanding control or salvation.
There is no alternative, no freedom of suffering from pain nor dehydration.
My body, my boat, my ocean are destined to fall to dust
The wise man knows this and worries not.
Just as the sun sets, the rays that illuminate are impermanent
All that ever was transitions to all that can never be
Beyond suffering, beyond pain
Beyond illusory words orchestrated on this page
It is held by a fabric that cannot be named
It resonates in our being as love
It’s the deepest darkness that holds the brightest light.
You may heed my words or continue the Material spin
It’s up to you where it ends or when you begin
But know this truly and deeply my friend,
When your travels are over
Lessons learned and suffering done
We will be made One
Destined to recuperate in the womb of the Sun.
Aug 6, 2012
Aug 6, 2012 at 9:07 AM UTC
a twenty-six year old woman sits alone outside a coffee shop, waiting
she plays Snake on an old Nokia that was discontinued long ago
her red dread locks are tucked neatly under a worn beanie
that she stole from the boy that she gave her virginity away to
in a skate park when she was nineteen
a twenty-six year old woman sits alone at her desk, writing
she has a one night stand whose name she doesn't remember sleeping in her bed
her mascara is running and her lips are dyed black from henna
that she stole from the girl who offered her shelter when she ran away to live
in her car and dingy motel rooms after college
a twenty-six year old woman sits outside a Stop and Shop, drinking Shasta
she recently tried to publish her book of poems , but it was rejected so:
her shorts barely covered her backside and she wore the bralette
that she stole from her brother's girlfriend while she was visiting
in the false hopes that he would register how badly she needed him (or anyone)
a twenty-six year old woman sits in a little blue rowboat, drilling holes into the bottom
she skims Red Kayak before she leaves home and ties rocks around her ankles
her thoughts are set on mentally regressing the pain of her teenage years
that she wishes she could steal back to at least put some emotion back
into her heart
it'd been better than feeling nothing at all
Jul 8, 2013
Jul 8, 2013 at 6:24 PM UTC
What the Fisherman said:
"It seemed like a good idea."
What he did:
Went fishing in a rowboat
Out on the Sound
About a mile out
And seagulls all around.
What happened:
Seagulls came about
To see
If scavenge work
Was to be done.
Dipping in and out
And just above,
One had some fun.
Fisherman annoyed...
One plucky bird
Came close above his head
And closer,
'Til finally the fisher said,
"I think I could just
Reach right up
And grab his legs!"
And so he did....
Seagull's Reply:
Seagulls, shocked,
Regurgitate,
Explode,
Expectorate
Whatever they've been
Carrying inside.
Instead of Fight or Flight,
Seagulls puke;
They have no pride.
At least this one did
Not.
Fisherman's Response:
He didn't even know
When he let go...
First the gull,
And then his lunch.
The man and the bird shared
Something in common
Out on the Sound:
They met for lunch
And went away hungry.
Dec 2, 2011
Dec 2, 2011 at 10:46 AM UTC
The way the world sways. Every leaf left
in place, its stance chiseled to each blade,
an iteration of time; each tassel of seeds,
thy bread, thy handmaiden;
as breath on the brink of disappearance,
becomes a wave become water; proportions so
large so as to stagger the seasons—
one winter questioning another.
We listen. We listen as if musical ***** are tracing a
giant sine wave across the dark mud flats.
We watch it as if a rotted rowboat, its oars like two hands
at prayer, is signaling a gesture
of permanence towards the sky. The grass
has turned from gray to blue to green.
The tide washes in. A bell is rung.
It’s as if the merry-go-round has turned it’s calliope on.
What Lao-tse has said is true.
The earth is a bellows. Use it.
The grasslands bellow and glow.
©Jim Kleinhenz
Feb 26, 2012
Feb 26, 2012 at 9:54 PM UTC
nonsense plays in the background of my thoughts
lackluster little patterns of thought
that gather round and batter at the door
of my perception hoping to make enough noise
to get free out into the real world
but the denied little monsters are thrown back
into the darkness
i reason with myself
try bribery
try threats
but i ignore the dire consequence
and proceed to groom the
versions of what will be and letting them
run through my head
repeating the worst versions
and the better ones become mocking
like making love to sandpaper
dance for me
do the logic shuffle
find a fitting little balance if that suits ya
find a symphony to play the grand design of your scheme
but its a heavy line you gotta tow this rowboat with
on wheels would work better
but whatever is sleezy...i mean easy
we can paint waves on the sidewalk
you can row that puppy all the way home
whatever reasonable rationalization
gets ya thru the night
don't matter much if its occupy something/anything
if you think mocking me is gonna fix you
its gonna be a long long night sweetcheeks
cause i dont depend on what anyone thinks
so i jump in that rowboat with ya
and we can row that puppy home
toast the town with champagne
celebrate our diversity
Oct 6, 2013
Oct 6, 2013 at 11:59 AM UTC
You confess your love like dropping a stone into the ocean.
She swallows it whole and greedy
rolls it about her mouth,
the open waves frill and spray in shudders
bashful, because she needs to taste all she can before it dips
below the surface.
and it dives,
fish or coral on its straight path? it doesn't give a ****
like you
like me, a barking a seagull over our rowboat
in after that stone
desperate after that stone
its slipping between my fingers,
through my hair
always just beyond, just beyond
over my shoulder the moon is a blurred marble
against the dull night of sea
and the farther I chase you,
the further I am from you ,
the quicker I remember I cannot swim.
Jul 30, 2011
Jul 30, 2011 at 10:30 PM UTC
I’m an island
On another planet,
I’m so far away I could die.
The earthquake that made me
Comes back around to shake me up
And now and again
I crumble away a little
And the fish nibble at my toes.
I’m an island,
I’m surrounded, swallowed up
By deep blue melancholy,
I have a little melody
That I whisper through my palm trees
When the wind comes whistling ‘round.
I’m an island
And I’m beautiful
For white sands and a volcano,
I’m so beautiful you’d cry
If you could see me,
You’d try to free me
But I’m stuck to the ocean ground.
I’m an island,
I write myself a novel,
Because I’ve got no one else but Word,
And my four peach- colored walls
Become the horizons that I’m dreaming of
And my floor becomes lagoons
That beckon me to drown.
I’m an island
Because I cry,
My tears are my existence,
I’m my own wife and my own husband,
And I am childless and bloodless and I’ll always be around.
He is a rowboat
Of weathered wood,
Made of love and aged by making love
To the elements that define him,
And his wisdom and his readiness
To cross the Seven Seas.
He is a rowboat,
His billowed sails prepare for passion,
His oars anticipate his return home
With two in tow.
He is a rowboat,
The only one who can
And wants to reach his island in distress,
He carries himself
On wings of wind,
He’ll carry us both
When it becomes apparent that I can’t swim,
He’ll row and row and row his boat
To land ashore on the pain within
And he’ll love me all the way to his mainland.
Jul 5, 2014
Jul 5, 2014 at 12:45 PM UTC
The water was further away when I was a boy
and the land
it was much longer
jutting out into Sacandaga like the lone remaining tooth
in the smile of an old tannery worker
Now,
the tooth worn away by years of
spring waves
and thick winter ice,
the land is more a nub than a point
but many things are the same
the early morning call of a bird through fog
a fish splashing through his sky to ours then returning to his
car doors and the sounds of the marina coming alive
the unsyncopated drum beat of coolers and tackle boxes
being dropped into an aluminum rowboat
then strained sounds as an outboard motor pushes its load
through the water
which was further away when I was a boy
Aug 13, 2012
Aug 13, 2012 at 3:29 PM UTC
the setting moon
slips close to its watery grave
and she finally appears
walking slow carrying her broken shoes
she says that the night jumped her
and she had gotten lost in the
vast differences between what she hoped
and what the world always left her longing with
tears spread from her still young innocent eyes
i held her to reassure
but as i wait for our fears to subside
i see the lights approach
of thouse who would claim lordship over her wallet
and over her soul
bankers of the material world
doubling as demons from hells coldest corner
no fleeing the version where you need to change batteries
they are dead as the souls who manufacture them
she slips a pair of double a's from her
pocket rocket personal massage device
and plugs her mind back into the need to get on with her day
the moon has reached its last gasp
and she has romanced her way out of her dress
and you out of your noble intents
we all reach this impasse
with our pen and page
having sold off our forward momentum
for a desperado gamble at claiming that elusive perfect written word
we flounder at waters edge
unable to pull ourselfs back
unable to manufacture method to crawl further
we make mad dashes round and round the
proverbial gallows pole
hanging on a single idea or ideal
trying to express it clearly
it need not more clear than it is
in mind's eye
but her face lingers in your soul
urging you you recapitulate your dire love
to craft a better master plan for tearing yourself down
the moon has reached its invisible zenith
on the worlds opposite side
and you have yet to reconcile
your good natured laugh
to her dark predictions
she slips away again to seek
her rightful place in her world view
and you are the captain of your sinking rowboat
once more
sexton in hand
plot your thoughts
and row king james home
the moon will rise soon
and you need to be home
when she comes in need of a hugs
and a shoulder to weep on
Oct 12, 2013
Oct 12, 2013 at 1:25 PM UTC
When ships set sail, their masts held high
Daunting flags, painting the sky
With rails gold rimmed
And sails sharp trimmed
A crowd appears, waving adieu, goodbye
Thunderous roar, unequaled praise
Wind catching sheets
Anchors raised
A bell rings softly and waves do lap
Against the hull of a wooden throne
From far off shores this scene is spied
With two friends of oars we've always tried
To reach for that deck
In fervent eye
Climb on board or surely die
Tattered clothes, sailors cap
Smudge on cheek
Shirt of burlap
We push off deck
Yet crowd is gone
A journey ventured with bright sun dawned
Water ripples with our wake
Small and steady pulses we make
Though we row to catch schooner bold
As we creak of wooden old
Land gestures for us to stay
Why venture out on choppy bay?
Whispers roll and caustic laugh
With sun beat oars a line is set
No motive sweeter, nor regret
Sweat beads mix with salty froth
Cutting across the water green
Battleship chugs with billowed steam
A voice escapes you as you scream
Sputtering away, with muted cries
And oars but stop
Far from home
As head does drop
Splintered hull tears apart
We're left to cling to shattered planks
And fight to stay afloat
Alone
With far off yacht a speck
Atone for water slapping neck
We groan with defeated boat and deck
Driftwood in salty surf
Connecting with shore
We walk back to land
Imprints swallowed by golden sand
A new rowboat to be procured
Again we build to flag down our Brig
And stand upon its polished bow
We persist to where we are but now
As we strive to grasp victory bell
We strive ever onward
To sail with our destined
Caravelle
Jan 30, 2014
Jan 30, 2014 at 9:36 AM UTC
Ode to the 7-foot yellow-orange two-oared rowboat,
You smell like paint and old fish,
Mostly old fish,
Your paint is coming off, due to bad paint choice,
Your oars are crooked from bad weather, and me hitting my brother on the head with it,
Mostly hitting my brother on the head
Your hull is cracked due to me crashing you against rocks,
You taste like waste, though I’ve never tasted you before,
You sound like constant cracking and popping,
Cause I never got around to cleaning you,
But heck, you’re the best boat this side of the Rockies
: )
Feb 6, 2011
Feb 6, 2011 at 7:50 PM UTC
on saturdays, they broke our knees.
mondays and wednesdays were reserved
for the study of literature,
for splitting open our heads and branding the words of the great writers
into our bones,
copying them over and over in our own blood,
memorizing masterpieces until we knew them forwards and backwards,
in order to remind us that there was always someone out there
who was better than us
(so we might as well not even try).
on saturdays, they broke our knees,
because pain would make us stronger.
on tuesdays and thursdays,
we were chained to a wall of numbers
and forced to take it apart piece by piece
(then put it back together, exactly how it had been before)
learning the true nature of things from the inside out,
so that we would always have an answer for everything,
and never have to just sit and wonder
at the world around us.
on saturdays, they broke our knees,
so that we would learn to know the sound of shattering better than our own skin.
fridays were the days
when we were taught history,
when we were told the stories of our pasts and their pasts
and all the pasts that had ever been,
so that we would learn from our mistakes (and their mistakes,
and all the mistakes that had ever been)
a thousand times over—
learn them so well that we would carry them with us forever,
and never be tricked into letting go.
on saturdays, they broke our knees,
so that we would always have something familiar to fall back on.
sundays were our day of rest,
when we stole a rowboat
and paddled off into the mist,
until the fog was so thick that we couldn’t see our own feet
(it was the closest we ever got
to emptiness,
not that we would ever admit
we desired it).
but on saturdays, they broke our knees,
so that we would remember to come back eventually.
we always did.
Sep 29, 2013
Sep 29, 2013 at 2:31 PM UTC
I knew I was in the burning building with her –
and it was like Limburg, maggoty
but obliged its fortress of a rowboat life.
Without its ice, I am in pine-high, to dull selves
which will later stiff upon these floors.
He was hell. He did this to us.
Not even a masked ****** shown needles
for his dog expression, and I am prodded
rather with teeth than a nose drill.
But she did dissolve before I could have,
must have had thin bones,
of maturity, an osteoporosis ache.
It saved her, perhaps, although she passed:
a kidney stone philosophy book,
these death-doctors will read numb.
I do wonder if it were their hips in fire,
why could they not sit in a mausoleum place.
Just how we did so many instances –
practicing a routine in the bathtub, like knowing.
Had the correct arrangement, too,
I pretended I was in a womb with you.
And mother’s was like that claw-tub so
we, fetus, sensed like castle buffs, carrying
the rings of gold and lockets of princess blood.
Then, she became papier-mâché statues
before a meadow of hell’s dust: I had to kiss
each curve because one ash was not enough.
I knew I was in the burning building with her
when I could not recognize her stumps.
She was an emblem of past upon fair carpet,
or the haze I inhale to shadow –
knowing that he sees our wallpaths and
catches the hum of infernos taking bodies,
then say that he is a monster even more than I.
Oct 28, 2012
Oct 28, 2012 at 5:30 PM UTC
Oft times I dwell on Denmark,
Lilacs,Roses wild,
long stretch golden beaches
Sea for miles and miles.
Pure in fading sunlight
Rainbows laying down
colors everywhere.
Paint peel upturned rowboat,
dried out by the sun,
sits tight it's place upon the sand,
Someone left it there.
Shafts of Gold and Orange,
glorious in their cast
alight the magical fir trees,
sturdy,built to last,
to stand against the winds
that often prowl the sand,
echoing the Viking Gods
whispering through the land.
They tell of ancient stories
their legends and the Sea,
sometimes,
I hear them calling,
calling out to me.
Jun 14, 2015
Jun 14, 2015 at 4:45 PM UTC
her scarred lip held a song
it was a hard song
moving like a candle on the dusty road
restless in the bitter wind
feel it in your dry mouth like the taste of snakes
feel it like a misery of the dry sand
but its her song and she sings it to me now
as she gathers the weeds and small bitter things
that will be our penance as a meal
i cast out a whip and its thorny threads
and it catches her eye
looking into me
the sea tilts
and capsizes the rowboat carrying her song to me
my hair is a dreadlock at the root
my hair ends in a fray
which end would you choose
i told her the fray
because the devil rides the dread
like a wild horse its eyes aflame
she holds my hand and will not speak
i kiss her hair
and wait for the sun to save us
and the candle burns brightly on the dusty road
the devil bears the burden of our wares
in exchange we carry his brother
she cradles this child of our fate
it tangles its tiny fist in her dreadlocked hair
and i saw that the fray was mine alone
so i tangled it in my lips
for my own song
a soft one of lovers
May 9, 2014
May 9, 2014 at 12:37 AM UTC
This story circles the earth
like a river scribbling a message
of scars and songs and a something-else,
swirling like old-fashioned script
beyond the binding of a book.
A vagabond leaves the trail of words
dropping from palms stained with ink,
blue from a wet horizon.
The salt of three seas press to her lips
as they part.
The wind brings songs to quench her word-thirst.
Syllables soak the world with sound
and the air fills with the smell before rain,
She tastes phrases of perhaps
and imagines the final page as a picture book:
a rowboat anchored with hope.
Nov 20, 2012
Nov 20, 2012 at 7:34 AM UTC
Six days of drinking,
partial insanity,
I drink ketamine,
and I slip from reality.
My eyes feel like they have sand in them,
my ears, mouth, nose, too.
oh ****
they do.
Why am I paralysed?
Why can't I move?
I've been rolled up in plastic...
what the **** did I do?
On a beach in Cambodia,
thrown under a stage,
after I fell in a K-hole,
and emerged the next day.
The pain is too much,
I pass out willingly.
Wake up and I'm drowning...
Water is killing me.
I cling to the ladder,
my strength starts to wane.
I try to scream help me,
Then blackout again.
I wake up in a rowboat,
cooked by the sun.
Skin crimson and blistered,
oh, what have I done?
My ankle is broken,
no wallet no phone,
I beg for a ride,
please just take me home.
The kind stranger helps me,
drops me at my hotel.
I swallow five ******
and escape from this hell.
Sep 12, 2019
Sep 12, 2019 at 1:39 AM UTC
that numb? it will waver.
that skulk? turn into droop
step. bent neck sunblasted
central park rowboat; gone.
i lost both oars
in one oafless rift
arcing through the purple air
sat stunned and helpless
as we drifted and you
laughed.
that’s kind of
what this
is like.
Mar 18, 2013
Mar 18, 2013 at 11:27 PM UTC
Across the ocean's dome,
Controlled by piercing shouts without a doubt;
On an altar in the distance:
An open book with censored words!
Tear a page,
Observe the rage.
Not what any freedom fighter would.
In a rowboat in the open,
Draw the source of their devotion.
Pencil sketch the jagged beard,
And stretch the nose a thousand years.
What a time to strike some fear!
The terrorists will echo with madness,
The pen is your sword.
The innocent will run to the forests,
And the artists make war.
Across the desert homes,
Contained by giant seas to some degree;
In a planetary orbit:
A crying team with crooked teeth!
See the page,
The winds enrage.
Not what any freedom lover should.
Bullets charge at the comedian's door,
Burning down all the carpenter's lore.
Sculptors mourne over severed stones,
The innocent turn, yearn, learn...
The invasions form, warn, and burn.
As the terrorists echo with madness,
Hold the pen as your sword.
As the innocent run to the forests,
Let the artists make war.
Throw the drawings ashore!
Dec 17, 2015
Dec 17, 2015 at 10:42 PM UTC
Lighthouse keeper by the shore, watching life pass he did the most
Eyeing ships, so bright and lively, that would sail near his post
'Til one fateful night one ship seemed to be set ablaze
Gravitating toward the sight that was a rarity in all his days
One door he swung open, leaving his beacon, bolting downstairs
Of peril and risk, he cared not; to him they seemed like minor fares
Fiery reflections undulated from afar as the keeper dashed to shore
Yanking his rowboat into the water, he paddled toward the source
Opening his eyes truly, he awoke to hands without a single oar
Under a guise he would man his post distractedly in the night
Realizing that the ship was a dream, he turned around to a fright
Precariously placed lanterns had fallen, shattering as he slept
And flames began to claim his home and post, as if collecting a debt
Sleep walking had moved him to the shore, by grace he was alive
The lighthouse keeper would rebuild, but this time he would thrive
Jul 11, 2017
Jul 11, 2017 at 1:39 PM UTC
Pieces of eight I got on the high
sea, a tail be told how I got thee.
First was the coin I got off me
mum, as she said have fun my
bearded son. Dont spent it all
on one eye patch or sweets, spend
it wisely my son be the pirate you
wish to be.
So time went on and I kept my coin
I bet it on a chicken race, and won my
second piece, look in my palm its
gold its plain to see.
So I took a walk on the beach and
in the sand another I did see, my
luck was in. I chewed on it and it
was as real as could be, this day
I know does have three.
Four and five I won in a bet, but I
have a peg leg where there once
was a foot. Now I have a wooden
peg but Arrr i won the bet more
gold I see.
Six and seven were as hard as could
be, a dare with a shark, well feed was
he. A hook is all the rage they say.
Mine has a can opener and wi-fi
ya see, I hope that shark gets a grip
inside that hursts it tummy each and every day.
Number eight was what I got for
going to sea, to be the captain of
the pirate vessel king of the seaI.
I roam around the waters me and
my first mate, my monkey horrible pete.
Pirate king I wasnt meant to be, as
this rowboat king of the seal, is hard
to row with one hand and a peg from
the knee. My first mate is a monkey
who works for yellow skins, but he
cant row a boat, short arms has he.
So around and around I go three
foot from the peer, at least I,m now
in the sea. But my pieces of eight is
all the treasure l will ever see. Me
and my boat and monkey horrible
Pete enjoying our life on the open high sea.
Apr 29, 2014
Apr 29, 2014 at 8:27 AM UTC