"sauntering" poems
He has taken rake and shovel in hand,
Taking advantage of the light,
Rare in these climes this time of year,
Still welcomed, though rendered severe
By the sun's reluctant trudge above the horizon,
The type which, sauntering through a window pane
(Falling upon a crucifix anchored above a cradle
Or some ancient, gilded frame
Containing a photo of some grandparent's wedding day,
Exploding into full undifferentiated diffusion)
May possess a dram of warmth, albeit resigned, nostalgic
A bittersweet reminder of what has gone by
(And in the shade, the air is filled
With the portentous chill of what lies a few months hence)
But there nonetheless as he tends to those final farewells
From the trees bowing to December's inevitability,
The droppings not the Pollock-esque bursts of October
(Those having been collected and consigned
To the normal corner of the back lot)
But dreary brown-hued things, not welcomed by eye nor heart,
Simply corralled perfunctorily and dismissed.
One could contend that such activity is unnecessary,
The mere vanity of all endeavor,
As the snow will come soon, and steady as well,
Performing the seasonal, cyclical function in its own time,
But he soldiers on nonetheless, a unseen one-act nearly-farce,
Painstakingly raking and bending and scraping
To leave his patch of green uncovered for a little while
Until the locking time comes to seal the earth's secrets once more,
To be revealed to those
Who shall receive the teasing ministrations
Of the fickle, fitful March equinox.
Jul 23, 2018
Jul 23, 2018 at 1:44 PM UTC
No, I don’t have a boyfriend.
I don’t have the desire to see another end;
after exhaustive months of getting to know
a fictionalised persona, fragmented, so
No, I don’t have a boyfriend.
The last one hurt and you didn’t see,
but that doesn’t proclaim the scar less prominent to me,
my feelings numb, I no longer crave the intimacy - detrimental to me.
No, I don’t have a boyfriend.
The last boys touch was for him not for me
and my body still screams cause he won’t let it be
and you’ll never understand as the trauma won’t subside
and my self esteem is diminished by his lies.
No, I don’t have a boyfriend.
I humoured a guy who gave it a try
but all I could feel was nothing inside
and when someone bumps into me sauntering by
the unwanted touch still makes me cry.
No, I don't want a boyfriend.
Oct 14, 2018
Oct 14, 2018 at 5:33 PM UTC
A little sight, him sauntering over to my side of the bed
pantless and looking eager as a child to see me:
he had her ******* in mind. I know now,
I only feel sympathetic about it, I know it pained him
when he touched mine.
He said her name so few times I just thought of her as the
animal homophone, and if I were anyone else,
I would not have worried when he said
she thought of him on occasion, because morning came
as morning still and he still had a big heart for a liar.
The thing is that our rapport was honesty –
if I laid on him too heavy, he would request I scoot over
if he did not want to sing me a song
in that baritone fluid, I would seek another shoreline.
Submissive, yet, I would ask him what I wanted without
asking if he could simply love being loved,
I could not understand. Only a scruffy teddy bear could.
But we do not talk about it, maybe I mention
a bunny an ex gave me, one I cut the ears off of when
the apocalypse came, but he has not a syllable.
Nobody wants their lovers to exist
with other loves, and sometimes we do not want ourselves
to exist with other loves even more so.
I only feel sympathetic about it, because I first felt I had
a sibling when we connected, became all carnal,
sweet nature handed me a body.
I only just understood that I was not given the right one.
May 26, 2013
May 26, 2013 at 4:02 PM UTC
The oyster. Her oyster,
I've been dying to see the pearl,
the moment I and she,
went to swim together,
our eyes, with intense emotions, half closed.
I'll softly touch her with my long, trembling fingers,
swiftly, when I touch,
it would open like a jewel box,
I'll peer inside at all the treasures,
exotic it would be, never forget,
through obsessive nights,
I thought and kept awake, bleary eyed,
I wanted to tell her this,
but then, froze on my tracks.
The oyster, it glows in mind,
she, too pulsates with excitement,
we'll be together, in this submarine adventure.
In that night, our hearts didn't even wink,
sauntering through the still moon lit terrace,
when, one by one stars
fell in place and adorned the sky's coiffure,
the waves of the sea, softened
moved in languid salaciousness,
then, at that precise moment,
we came face to face.
The rough grains of sand, under our undulating bodies,
sighed sweet, sang a ***** night gull's song,
searing feel of salty wind mingled with blood
oozing from love bruise, bites that hurt,
enhanced the pleasure of frothing blood ,
thirsty mating tongues, twirled and twisted.
*Oyster, her oyster, I remember every moment,
tapering in to gentle whispers,
dissolve and be the light, playing with the humming waves.*
Sep 30, 2012
Sep 30, 2012 at 1:53 AM UTC
1753
Through those old Grounds of memory,
The sauntering alone
Is a divine intemperance
A prudent man would shun.
Of liquors that are vended
’Tis easy to beware
But statutes do not meddle
With the internal bar.
Pernicious as the sunset
Permitting to pursue
But impotent to gather,
The tranquil perfidy
Alloys our firmer moments
With that severest gold
Convenient to the longing
But otherwise withheld.
3.8k
There once was a father antelope
Who loved fruit salad
As well as his one and only
Antelope daughter.
One day
A young boy antelope
Came sauntering over
And took a liking to
The daughter.
So he asked the father antelope,
"May I marry your daughter?"
And father antelope said,
"No."
And oh the young boy antelope
Begged and
Begged and
Begged
The father for his daughter's
Hand in marriage.
But he refused.
But you see,
The daughter antelope
Loved the young boy antelope
And she wanted so badly to marry him.
So she made up her father's
Favorite dish,
A fruit salad
With all the fruits you could
Think of.
There was
Strawberries
And
Blueberries
And
Cantaloupe
And
Watermelon
And
Every
Single
Fruit.
She knew this was the way to her father's heart
So she brought it to him
That very day
And she said,
"Please oh please father.
Let me marry the young boy antelope."
And her father said,
"No."
And she
Begged and
Begged and
Begged
Him to let her marry him.
But all he would say was,
"No."
So she brought out her special weapon,
She showed him the salad made from
Every fruit imaginable,
Like
Strawberries
And
Blueberries
And
Cantaloupe
And
Watermelon
And
Every
Single
Fruit.
And she told him,
"If you will not let me marry him,
Then we will run away together
And get married far far away
Without your permission."
And the father looked deep into the fruit salad.
He looked long and hard.
He looked at the
Strawberries
And
Blueberries
And
Cantaloupe
And
Watermelon
And
Every
Single
Fruit.
And without looking up
Without breaking his gaze
With that lovely fruit salad
He said to her,
"No.
Antelope
Cantaloupe."
The end.
Nov 17, 2015
Nov 17, 2015 at 7:38 PM UTC
It was well trained cats in the cattery calling, pats on the back, back door, kicked in, mooring boats on the mooring in the morning and the phone call, cost cut, cold calling, and we're falling, falling, we're falling in love.
My best friends are criminals, and the jail cell crying is trying at times but trying sometimes feels tiring. The tire track tiling is abysmal, freewheeling in reverie, revving engines readily, sitting, settling and stirring imaginary cups of tea until eternity gives up delinquently.
I fail to recognise the narcissist in me until the inadequate rantings fall of the page at me. I want to be free, I want to be me, I want solidarity and I want that cup of tea, I want patriarchy, I want matrimony, I want monogamy and none of this is hyperbole. I have no apologies, especially not for the words I string together so irrationally. What else could you ask of me?
What else indeed, if I can't be naked I can't be free, if I alter the way I write I relinquish personality.
It doesn't seem right to me.
Dada is too crass for me, I need a cult of spontaneity. The English language is too brash to be...
Philosophical ideology and the books I read, all tell lies to me, are all absurd you see, I embrace the monotony, let the waves of the sea wash over me. I let the dictionary pages fall off the quay, like that moth on me, like the sloth i've been and cloth on screens. A dead dog can't scratch it's fleas, but to appease the beast we must first release, all creativity and return to being.
Jun 30, 2013
Jun 30, 2013 at 7:34 PM UTC
The smell of a spring rain
settling on the earth
is the smell of life anew.
At the window, I sit with a book,
both cracked,
cooled by the alfresco air seeping through,
and tiny droplets glissando down the pane.
The pitter-patter of a soft rain
falling to the parched earth
is the sound of life replenished.
At the rain's offset, I leap from my chair,
exiting the front door,
to saunter through the lush green pastures
that linger outside the library's confines.
How green the trees appear, and the grass--
how rich the stalks of the trees,
their boughs with budding leaves quenched,
glistening in the sun.
I even enjoy the scent coming off the once arid pavement--
it is the smell of the earth,
freed from its impedance,
rising above the stifling asphalt.
I smell the life that lingers beneath,
and the dull metallic tinfoil taste of the pavement
fills my open nostrils--
It is pleasant, though a little less so, than the ambrosial landscape.
I inhale ever so deeply,
relishing my favorite part of spring,
in the offset of a warm afternoon rain on a brisk day,
sauntering through the wood-laden trails on worn brick paths,
to the paved parking lot where my car awaits--
delineated in a filmy layer of mired pollen residue.
It needed a wash anyways.
May 19, 2016
May 19, 2016 at 1:34 PM UTC
Dwelling where the tears cry blood
echoed nightmares ghost my tortured shell
In streets not paved in gold
but misery mountains that I scale everyday
wearily sauntering around their slippy slopes
As I die a little bit more everyday
Sitting on my concrete throne
chained to the only thing I know
an abyss of loniless
my friend
my foe
As I die a little bit more everyday
Aug 29, 2021
Aug 29, 2021 at 1:42 PM UTC
That day i finished
A small piece
For an obscure magazine
I popped it in the box
And such a starry elation
Came over me
That I got whistled at in the street
For the first time in a long time.
I was ***** and roughly dressed
And had circles under my eyes
And far far from flirtation
But so full of completion
Of a deed duly done
An act of consummation
That the freedom and force it engendered
Shone and spun
Out of my old raincoat.
It must have looked like love
Or a fabulous free holiday
To the young men sauntering
Down Berwick Street.
I still think this is most mysterious
For while I was writing it
It was gritty it felt like self-abuse
Constipation, desperately unsocial.
But done done done
Everything in the world
Flowed back
Like a huge bonus.
2.9k
342
It will be Summer—eventually.
Ladies—with parasols—
Sauntering Gentlemen—with Canes—
And little Girls—with Dolls—
Will tint the pallid landscape—
As ’twere a bright Bouquet—
Thro’ drifted deep, in Parian—
The Village lies—today—
The Lilacs—bending many a year—
Will sway with purple load—
The Bees—will not despise the tune—
Their Forefathers—have hummed—
The Wild Rose—redden in the Bog—
The Aster—on the Hill
Her everlasting fashion—set—
And Covenant Gentians—frill—
Till Summer folds her miracle—
As Women—do—their Gown—
Of Priests—adjust the Symbols—
When Sacrament—is done—
2.8k
A shed, six by four, painted,
Landy green, black roof
Local fishmongers
Down by the harbor gates
Battered wooden, fish crates
Smelling of the ocean, the waves,
The spray
Weathered, worn, faded brown
Trawlers name a disappearing outline
A boy in shorts, blond hair
Tugging at his mother’s skirts
Pointing,
Spattered orange dotted flat fish
Flapping, fresh from the boat.
Propped against the side wall
A box of jade, and emerald sea jewels
Eyes frozen in time.
Chalk board hung from open door,
With names, prices , beyond understanding.
To the boy fantastical creatures
A man in a white coat, money rattling in pocket
Scales set on a bench, ready to measure out scales
For the women of the seaside town
All the gossip, the fish, and the stories
From one little shed down by the harbor wall
A boys face mesmerized, by cod
Larger than he, caught on a wall hook
Swift knife movements, and fillets,
Laid on yesterdays newspaper
Bones, and head thrown into a bucket
Large lazy yellow eyed seagull,
Sauntering like a casual thief, eye
On the bucket…
Feb 17, 2015
Feb 17, 2015 at 6:05 PM UTC
I love her like I loathe tomorrow
a broken smile
a sauntering denial
I love her like a confused mind
a spoken rhyme
a bewildering crime
I love her like I don't know how
and I want to show her
I'll tell her now
Jan 3, 2013
Jan 3, 2013 at 11:47 PM UTC
soft silly syllables sauntering slowly at sunset
after all ambiguous adjectives adversely affect our amicability
feigning fickleness funding fearfulness finding finality in foolishness
egress endlessly ever evading the
end
Jan 13, 2013
Jan 13, 2013 at 1:25 AM UTC
Thomas, Tommy baby,
you are both hot,
and sweet.
Tom Cat you’re red hot--
when I catch you in your Tom Cat Strut,
sauntering across campus,
strolling like it ain’t no thing,
cuz it don’t meant a thing
if it ain’t got that swing baby.
So dig this, Tommy Gun,
you groove with the best of ‘em
when I spot you strollin’—
Your head, teetering left and right like a seesaw, boppin’ baby,
arms hangin’ loosely, swinging freely, wildly, go! go!
legs scooping forward in boisterous trombone slides--
Groooooove Tommy baby!
You’re Louis’s best blows--
ten feet from the mic and the Fives baby,
you’re hot, red hot,
any closer and I'll burn up!
Go!
But you’re cool, real cool,
and oh so sweet.
Super sweet--
in your beard like a pepper and salt shaker tossed across the table,
I look to see those rosy lips part,
and peep those pearly whites shinin' like the bell of Louis’s cornet
brandished in the air, under those ballroom lights--
you’re screamin’ Tommy!
Let me hear that laugh that shakes the room,
punches like Blakey’s bass drum,
thumps like Mingus--
T-Bird you’ve got that hard bop in your soul,
you’re gonna bop to the top TB,
into the third heaven where the angels fall in line to your swing,
that incessant strut that keeps the devil at bay,
Blow! Blow! Blow!
And I see you now Tom Cat,
up there in the clouds,
digging your way across eternity,
bopping and jiving, swinging and blowing,
in your faded khaki pants and worn tennis shoes,
loosely buttoned collared shirt,
tight rectangular glasses that glistened the bell of your eyes even more--
I gotta stand twenty feet away Tommy baby!
You glance down at me and wink,
rearing your head back to let loose that Mingus and Blakey
bottom-end laugh,
guffaw guffaw guffaw!!!
--so hearty and rich,
the backbone of every nervous first-year classroom,
and the sniggering seniors you continued to befuddle and dazzle
with your mysterious ways
and insatiable swing.
So blow, Tommy Gun, blow!
Go Tom Cat go!
Dig T-Bird dig!
Let loose Tommy boy!
Swing for us, swing swing swing--
Hot and Sweet, Tommy baby,
hot and sweet.
Jun 22, 2016
Jun 22, 2016 at 1:55 AM UTC
Here lies my dog, motionless in his kennel
unable to wag his tail as he always did.
Yesterday when I saw him, curling helpless on his mat
he still wagged his tail and from him arose
a faint tremolo of love
punctuated by gutturals of pain.
At some bleak hour of the night,
the last ember of life died down
and his supple body turned stiff and stark.
Now he lies straight and majestic in death
leaving a track record of love
far difficult to break,
- a love no vessel can hold
or equated with what we humans feel.
Speechless as I stand, memories churn within.
He came to us - too young to be weaned,
a glossy black puppy with tawny gleaming eyes.
His short, sturdy limbs, large drooping ears,
slender waist and elongated frame
well proclaimed his pedigree aloud
So full of mischief, he capered and hopped,
like a new born calf, always up on his heels.
Sniffing with moist nose, he dug and dug
as if unearthing a treasure trove
buried deep beneath the soil.
With alert vigil, he guarded our home,
barking at strangers and driving rodents away
He expected nothing in turn but love.
His loyalty as we deem was never servile.
Never was he on chains to be hauled like cattle.
He enjoyed sauntering through the courtyard
giving company as we took our evening rounds.
He gloated rubbing his body over our knee
and sat content as our stroking fingers ran all around
Licking our feet and arms,
what he conveyed in inarticulate words
could be deciphered thus -
‘I love you, love you true’
Like the bouncing ball, he often played with
our hearts made to bounce up in love
and our hands fold in benison
for a comrade who departs,
valiant in life and loyal to the core
hoping to meet him anon
on the far green meadows of bliss,
still wagging his tail, avowing a bond
too strong to be snapped or splintered.
Jun 1, 2016
Jun 1, 2016 at 8:57 AM UTC
Lined with age in faded denim
Squinted eyes and jaded smile
Sauntering through dusty courtyard
Remembering back here awhile.
Sadness tugs me back to recall
Recall of that young girl when,
Laughingly she stood in denim,
Clear blue eyes which sparkled then.
Tragic how the years have jaded,
Criminal how time applies
A caustic pall to all that’s lovely,
Attitude and tearsome lies.
Wish that I could haul me back there
Roll me back to young and pure,
Pluck the innocence from history
Transit back where truth endured.
Transit back uncomplicated
Back to where it all began
Happy kids in dusty courtyard
Faded denim, making plans.
M.
April 1963
Cairns, Nth. Queensland
Aug 8, 2014
Aug 8, 2014 at 11:26 PM UTC
The rooster does crow at the break of dawn
but five to seven a.m.
is the hours of the dog
"Time to wake up"
Cheerful beyond belief
face in mine
dripping licking tongue
tail wacking the dresser
in perfect time.
Hot breath
not yours not mine
but you know whose.
Through the fog of the mind
knowing it won't stop
until food is served.
I am never that cheerful at sunrise.
Seven to five
the birds and rats
are in their time.
Squirrels chipmunks
deer
everybody working their *** off to survive.
I gotta go to work
Calling in sick every day
But one foot in front of the other
And I am on my way.
The crows line up
on the garbage man's run
The ducks laugh at every move you make
but you take it in stride.
The cows lay down to
take a nap.
But not I.
At about five
The bear comes sauntering down the street
tossing garbage cans
this way and that.
The best part of work is the drive home.
Neighbors come out of their houses
to watch him.
Power and hunger
a dangerous combination
But in a rare moment of neighborly cheer
even a cocktail was had.
He was big he was strong
We gave him a wide berth
but owwed and awed him
along his way like watching fire works.
Five to eight
The hours of the skunk
and you get very cranky
through the PTSD
of a mean and angry father
and tires on the driveway.
As darkness totally sets in
the racoons come out
making mischief on the roof
batty as the bats that flee into my room.
Those racoons
the more you try to
chase them away
the more they come over
to see what your doing.
You look at me and wonder who I am
Sometimes you snuggle up
While the night birds sing.
Three to five
D.H. Lawrence
called the hours of the wolf
when madness and suicide
remorse and dread reign
Blood pressure
at its lowest
Heart rate at its slowest
Breath down
Body temperature as cold as the ground.
Remember to not
take very seriously
what ever you think
until with relief
the sun begins to rise
and doggy smooches
awaken your time. ..
Dec 29, 2013
Dec 29, 2013 at 12:13 PM UTC
Relax, begin to Imagine you are in the proximity
to immerse yourself into a precious moment.
It is that needed time you have brought into being, and is intrinsic
to experience composure, equanimity.
Smooth - melodic - ambient music with simple cause,
low and soft will, in its incipiency invalidate
trending previous troublesome thoughts,
silkily, sauntering, lingeringly pauses,
to softly embrace your audible senses
with silence which conveys complete assurance,
that the here and now is yours, no-one elses,
ataraxia created by you, for your true inner self,
It continues; envelops remaining unsettled interruption
embraces the heart, and encourages serenity,
all the remaining negative, solicitous intellection
are temporarily, tipped out of your consciousness,
you are experiencing them leave, then transcended
with blissful tranquillity for your indulgence.
You are asleep with your eyes open, it feels so benefic,
the mind is calm and clear no longer confused.
Melodious sound continues to provide atmospheric
momentum to this sensibility folding into the soul.
Joyfully you are enduring moments of pure inner solitude and
wrapped in perfect peace, consciousness uncommitted.
There is no expectation of time, not at all
just the psyche drifting, changing shape, density, profundity.
You feel wonderfully restituted, calmed; uplifted.
You sense it, knowing, this absence of tension you sought,
this, your perfect you, is transient and will slowly begin to regress, reluctantly,
relinquishing this blissfully serene, conditioned emotional stillness, to be restored.
Then you turn the telly on! All gone.
Michael C Crowder March 5th 2019
Mar 5, 2019
Mar 5, 2019 at 7:40 AM UTC
You are the terrorist
Smashing porcelain
Sauntering
Passing through
Your presence
Broad and fleeting
But Virgo’s birthed anew
Goodbye to you
And your combustive yellow bile
Representing no true fire
Yet here you go again
Smashing porcelain
Cause all I am to you
Is a doll you got use to
You are the terrorist
But I,
I am Mercury bending fire
Smashing porcelain
Sauntering
Passing through
Feb 11, 2015
Feb 11, 2015 at 2:42 PM UTC
The absorbent two-ply quilted southern sky
was soaking up the pre-dawn rays
as we were pushing our broken green four-wheeled machine
southbound on Bruce B. Downs
taking up the curbside lane
Our shirts were becoming stained with humid profanities
despite the fan blade traffic throwing a slight breeze
We were slurping brackish blacktop steam from the air
plodding like the Hillsborough toward our destination
My mind was already sauntering back toward a broken green futon
sitting in the section-eight, eviction evaded, apartment
Out the window cross-bred ducks were lording over
scrawny, pseudo-feral worm host cats
for which the knockabout neighbors kept a litter box outside
Jan 20, 2011
Jan 20, 2011 at 6:45 AM UTC
His eyes were galaxies reflected in the vortexes of her heart
Shimmering nothings she loved to be lost and found in
Whenever he gazed upon a horizon or tabletop or cup of tea
She could almost see
What he saw set off the foreshocks in her own soul
Capricorn kaleidoscopes and faerie fliers
Of flaking eternities and sauntering demises
Eyes brimming with the untold fantasy of the pinned butterfly
He could see over the folds of Time
(carpet smothering bodies of resistance)
Second hands writhing from the slither of reversible realities
Eyes dripping smoke from the burning within him
He had a beauty no one could envy
For he was the eighth wonder
That he managed to survive in this world
Jun 18, 2013
Jun 18, 2013 at 8:01 PM UTC
dearest stranger,
i am too abstract now for my own good. i feel and hold myself, in place, in my hands and i slip right through like sunlight, like tiny moth scales, like the delusions of a sauntering ghost, like all things unreal and untouchable, like a madwoman, laughing away in her free fall to an unsteady ground.
and all the flowers are cheering in their surreal, psychedelic scarlets, and all the rocks are breaking, and all the words are failing to capture what i truly feel.
am i still despairingly corporeal, like paper napkins and panes of glass? am i still in actual flesh, now that god doesn't exist? am i still as tangible as this last, frantic breath of a letter?
am i still actually here?
bidding my farewell now,
ginia
Mar 3, 2022
Mar 3, 2022 at 11:35 PM UTC
One foot in front of the other.
Days passed by.
Walking was said to be a spiritual practice which yielded many dividends. The replenishment of the soul and the connection to all around you. Pilgrimage to sacred sites, walking the labyrinth, meditation. Strolling, cavorting, frolicking or wandering. As we stretch our legs, we stretch our minds and souls.
Few philosophers and writers had ever penned the absolute, gut-wrenching torturous boredom of the walk as Ronnie James now experienced it.
Fifty-six bones, one hundred and twelve ligaments and seventy-six muscles of dull, throbbing pain.
Who could tell how long it had been? He had but only the tedious task of counting his steps to judge it by. He'd long ago lost all track.
Sauntering alone through the barren ocean of sand.
Indeed, Thoreau wrote that the word itself, "saunter," may have been derived from “sans terre.”
“Without land or a home,” murmured Ronnie.
With every step we take, we leave some ghost of ourselves behind,
He who sits motionless, watching life pass by through the window, may be the most awful vagrant of them all – but the saunterer is no more vagrant than the meandering river.
Days passed by.
Aug 19, 2015
Aug 19, 2015 at 3:18 AM UTC