"scythes" poems
The pockets of our greatcoats full of barley...
No kitchens on the run, no striking camp...
We moved quick and sudden in our own country.
The priest lay behind ditches with the *****
A people hardly marching... on the hike...
We found new tactics happening each day:
We'd cut through reins and rider with the pike
And stampede cattle into infantry,
Then retreat through hedges where cavalry must be thrown.
Until... on Vinegar Hill... the final conclave.
Terraced thousands died, shaking scythes at cannon.
The hillside blushed, soaked in our broken wave.
They buried us without shroud or coffin
And in August... the barley grew up out of our grave.
5.9k
Olwen grew after mid-winter's passing
the wind had sung her a child's name
she knew her time was now come
the man she picked was strong and wise
and she had seen his death was anigh
the great gift she would give him
a girl child she would carry, birth and teach
her first word would be the name of him
who was to fall in the cattle raid to Seisysllwg
no man to own her or claim her
Olwen mothered
a world of dreams
a world of knowing
she knew the seasons
and the schemes
of life growing
hares and foxes
would sleeep at her feet
enemies before her
would not fight but retreat
Olwen's way was of care and of love
her power of the earth and skies above
no denizens of dark and deepest hate
would stand her eyes that saw their fate
fast eye
clear sky
brown flash
passes by
beast or bird
we cannot see
good Olwen
watching over thee
The child came in the autumn months
gold- clad meadows bear the last of mother's bounty
as she came into the world scythes cut the last bushel
weak with the birth she carried the child
to the stone on plynlimon's east side
"let the source of the five feel the spirit of this child
carry her through her life with power and love..."
When Cariad was five she took her to the great marsh south of the Dyfi
and watched as the child threw her father's sword back to his spirit
further than any man could throw
ask not for power
for your arm
ask for strength
in your heart
ask not for dominion
over men
seek love
for the world
ask not for thyself
anything you
would not give
away freely
no shadows came to dwell in the hills and vales
where peace eternal dwelt with power of hearts
Olwen slept after one mid-winter's passing
She died when the spirits asked for her
Cariad bore her to the Plynlimon stone
where all wise women's bones will lie
The rivers remember her eyes
The trees remember her wisdom
The birds remember her song
The stars remember Her dreams
The Stones of Deheubarth
remember their Wise-Woman
when Moon and Sun rise
and the shadows flee
Feb 20, 2011
Feb 20, 2011 at 9:10 AM UTC
Fantail feathers, of a hazy, 'yellow-orangish-moon'…
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Skeleton-scythes, thorny-stars, swaying in the swoon,
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Fire-pits and witches brew and cauldron’s smoking tricks?
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Little dwarves and wolves and serpents crawling; leftover people bits,
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Trumpets hailing arrival, of Pale Rider, can you hear his tune?
Fantail feathers strain the sight of harvest-yellow moon,
Skeletons, fire-pits, witches, cauldrons and Old Nix,
Animals of evil’s calling, tricker-treaters; Hallow’s Eve and ****** grit!
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Pray to Sáeta, Satá, Saturn…
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern
Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Jack-O’ Lantern*
Jun 5, 2016
Jun 5, 2016 at 12:43 PM UTC
Crisp, the fallen leaves now pile,
the times are changing, Autumn-style,
breezes rake the tippy-tops of trees,
bare branches rattle like skeleton keys.
Subtle September has come once again,
tipping its hat to the Summer's end,
makes clear and crisp the evening air,
the harvest season now sidles near,
grass and weeds will wither dry,
scythes and sickles swing low and high,
gourds of pumpkins soon will burst in patches,
fat apples drop down cider-press hatches,
so soon those sugary coats of frost shall rise,
and sharp, chilly winds will sting teary eyes,
fruit pies will bake, brown nuts will roast,
glasses of wine shall arise in toasts,
to the approach of yet another Fall,
before the stark-white of Winter blankets all.
Sep 11, 2010
Sep 11, 2010 at 6:25 AM UTC
Between the din of dusk and dawn
Runs Sleepy Pillow Lane,
Where gators guard the Gates of Thorn
And cryptid creatures reign.
They glide across the midnight sky
Like grime in sanguine sewers;
White canines long and talons drawn
Spike rodents on a skewer.
Gray giants glare from full-moon eyes,
A ghastly ghoulish spell;
Sweet sleepers swell the wells of Nile
While centaurs swing the bell.
Horned vipers writhe into your fears
Like scythes through strangled weeds;
And severed heads of angel hair
From shouldered stumps relieved.
A putrid pile of newly-deads
Awaits the devil's scorn;
And legless maggots gorge in beds
From which the fly is born.
Hungry hyenas howl in packs
While circling carrions crow;
And chunks of flesh are torn from backs
Cracking bones bare below.
Scavengers feast on man and beast,
No rotting limb is spared;
From hanging tongues to napping feet
Blood splatters everywhere.
Brimstone and thunder fill the air
With hail presaging doom;
Ten toothless witches shriek and cheer
As zombies creep from tombs.
Masked mummies stalk with stakes and stones
In search of sleeping heads;
They crave the skulls and living bones
Of bodies slumped in bed.
Through R.E.M. you toss and turn
And roll on restless wheels;
Alas Red Rooster blows his horn
To end your grim ordeal....
~ P
(January, 2013)
Jul 20, 2013
Jul 20, 2013 at 3:22 PM UTC
Next week, I’ll be 61 years
working the same 93 acres.
The furthest field back
and the 2 joining Peter Burke’s
always been meadows.
Since before my time —
today it takes just 4 hours
to cut, bale and wrap.
Dad and the men wouldn’t’ve
half the first headland cut in that length.
I’d go back with Mom,
with tea and sandwiches;
brown bread and something sweet.
No more higher than the handle of the scythe —
I would try to swing.
Nearly took my leg off the first time.
When it was done, all saved
that was my favourite bit.
There’d be a gathering in the house.
Food, porter … the craic.
Someone would pull out a fiddle
or a tin whistle, the women would dance
it was beautiful — meaningful.
Friends, neighbours. Thankful.
The closest thing to expressing our feelings.
And us kids allowed to stay up late,
what a treat; a very rich treat.
I never did grow tall enough
to wield the scythe.
When it was my turn,
machines had been invented.
Lucky I was told I was.
They lightened the work
and lessened the men.
Horse followed horsepower.
Bigger, heavier.
But there was time for tea,
there’s always time for tea.
The scythes rotted;
the horses rotted;
kids flown into the city;
neighbours dead, don’t care or are foreign.
It’s just one man now doing all the work.
One man called John Deere
who has no time for tea.
Sep 29, 2010
Sep 29, 2010 at 5:56 PM UTC
The water drowns the sky
Obscuring it's face
It's stagnant over time
God clad in lace.
These sentences I'm structuring
Are designed to make you weep
These brain cells that I'm rupturing
Causing anti peace leak.
I compose these rhyming insults
Backwards and inside out
Loathe the Newly found results
That are tested about me around town.
I'm regularly ready to rip off the head
Of the hydra that has spent
The last of it's heads
By sticking out it's neck
Hanging it over the guillotine
To stir in all the gelatine
with the sugar to sweeten up the mix
The lay people on the street are starting to see the fix
The fix we call life
With the knives,
And the scythes,
And the cries,
And the ties,
And the strife,
And to buy,
And to cry,
And to lie,
And to spy
Then to die.
Aug 26, 2012
Aug 26, 2012 at 3:01 PM UTC
A massive sea beast came to die.
It lumbered up and lopped down
on the docks of a grey castled city.
It’s arc heaved as it breathed
the damp sea vapors.
A final groan echoed from
the core of its heaped flesh.
One bulbous eye peered dead
deep into the wet night sky.
The gulls found it first.
Then the fishermen,
while making morning rounds.
Then the young,
then the curious,
even the lords came
to mend the unsevered.
The beast lay still.
The gulls were scattered by
the fishermen’s discipline.
The young found new spectacle around them.
The curious began to plan.
Some saw the meat.
Some saw their signs.
Others wanted it destroyed,
burnt immediately.
“Let’s be done with it!”
they said.
The lords quoted and pointed,
like they do.
The beast did not move.
A merchant arrived.
He owned the docks.
He had dominion.
“It is mine!”
he declared
“Go home!”
Embarrassed, the lords cowered and mumbled.
The curious shouted and bared their teeth.
The fishermen took sides,
the young stayed quiet,
and the gulls watched
the flames from afar.
A rain came.
The merchant,
the lords,
the curious,
the fishermen,
the young,
and even the gulls
all sprinted for shelter.
But the beast . . .
Rain became storm.
The horizon was hazed
by the mighty torrent.
But the beast . . .
Storm became tempest.
The sea swelled and smashed
against the city’s north wall.
But the beast . . .
Tempest became wrath.
Scythes of lightning set ablaze
the flags atop the tallest towers.
But the beast . . .
And wrath became the toothed face of a new god.
But still the beast . . .
remained where it was.
Nothing was said, nothing was heard
as the rain beat down on the oily carcass,
washing it clean.
Aug 28, 2015
Aug 28, 2015 at 4:52 PM UTC
A symphony of modality,
Of fiction and reality.
With the rhythm of a syllogism
Of a logical decision.
A shallow sky, where rats fly
Singing lies to passersby
Amidst the cries and goodbyes
The night sighs, as glistening scythes
Steal souls and take lives
But nothing dies, nothing vanishes
in this cryptic lullaby
I'll start walking, I don't care what you say.
I'll start talking, I don't care to who you pray.
I'm done standing here watching you fly like I always do.
I'm not stranded here, it's time for something new.
So I leave you in this cryptic lullaby.
Jul 21, 2015
Jul 21, 2015 at 5:37 PM UTC
Do you ever
wish you could just
throw yourself into
the blackness and
the cold and
the loneliness just so
you can be rid of
it all?
The pain and
the misery and
the suffering and
the perpetual despair
and you just want
everything to disappear,
and you welcome us like
you expect your death to be
warm and
inviting and
almost like a hug.
It pains us so, sometimes;
how you all seem to
crave our scythes.
Apr 2, 2014
Apr 2, 2014 at 5:07 PM UTC
The throne of a metropolis is on the far side
atop the lake
that wrinkles the sun,
beneath a mountain
green with sickled pines;
The people use their boughs as scythes.
The people use trees to cut down
more and more,
and burn whatever's too pesky
to stick around.
In a backyard of a house in the suburbs
people get bored playing cards,
watching tv,
getting drunk in the evenings.
They party like pagans going crazy
over a peerless future,
and an impermanent past.
Sometimes a new bonfire is started
where the old one died,
sometimes the old one will flare up
and scorch the sky beautiful;
a smoky curtain on which the tongues of stars
can make good on all the promises
made on them.
And people kiss around the fire.
Hug,
make up,
joke.
The sealed souls of the people open.
At the end,
they regret it.
This newness of life.
They swing their wooden scythes at the night,
still furry and wet
with bark and sap,
cursing god in fury, fury, fury,
trying to cut down the stars too.
These people that take and destroy,
they whittled the throne of the Metropolis
out of ivory from Africa.
Aug 25, 2012
Aug 25, 2012 at 12:33 AM UTC
The first thing that happens
is the world collapses.
That is, it reduces down
but only I seem to notice.
Everything becomes flatter,
the depth stripped away
like rotted lumber,
like when they gut a building
but leave the historic facade,
and I feel like I'm limping
postcard to postcard
until eventually like I'm peering
into a discarded diorama,
where everything is smaller
than it should be,
the crudest copy of itself, and
everything is bounded
by shoebox limits
I can sense them everywhere.
The second thing that happens
is that I avoid everyone.
I avoid my mother on Christmas,
I can't look my therapist in her eye,
I cancel a date because
I can't handle the contact.
I touch my skin and it's like
touching paper that's been creased
hundreds of times -
old pulp that frays and splits.
The third thing that happens
is that I lose interest.
I put in whatever minimums
the day requires
and not a scratch more.
I put my mail aside
and watch crows
gather on the branch,
facing the valley,
black eye to black eye,
base wings folded against
the sleek unbearable body.
The last thing that happens
is that life cheapens.
It's hard not to notice,
since the papers and the news
and everybody's phone
blasts forth the parade of death.
No one is spared, children,
animals, the happy, the hale.
And soon these thoughts -
that life ends without reason,
that God has retreated from the world,
that no step is worthwhile -
begin to bleed in my head.
They lead to the paralysis
of a patient wrapped in gauze,
leaving only the eyes free to move
and notice the great black wing
that scythes into the valley,
feathers dark as stout,
the sun setting in its usual
incompetent way, the wing
so graceful that it might be
the only beautiful thing,
falling out of sight,
into nothingness,
down the slope
into the stale dusk,
into the exact center
of a limitless depression.
Dec 28, 2017
Dec 28, 2017 at 3:29 PM UTC
There was an old person of Blythe,
Who cut up his meat with a saythe;
When they said, 'Well! I never!'--
he cried, 'Scythes for ever!'
That lively old person of Blythe.
1.1k
Coloured Putin
Shoot her full of rainbows
Scythes from heaven
Souls down in Hell
Hundred thousand dead
Mamushka I miss you
Our Leader sent us there
Not an Odessa holiday
Opposite of that mama
Forgive them all
It's Putin's orders
Hundred thou casualties
Bullet ridden rainbows
Her essence is black
Dec 24, 2022
Dec 24, 2022 at 10:55 PM UTC
You write of apple picking, carborundum wheels
Swishing scythes and landscapes full of trees
A different place, a different time
But familiarity I find in images like these
Among the downy flakes
We feel your little horse's shake
As the woods fill up with snow
Your wife stares out the window
Standing by the sink
We wonder what she really thinks
The day you move into your country home
A stranger makes an offer for your trees
To sell for profit in the Christmas city
Three cents each is far too low, we agree
So they may stay and he can go
What unexpected face was that
She's sure she saw one winter night?
Alighting from the pony trap
She seeks him out by lantern light
Conversations written down
Stories from your time you tell
Glimpses, snapshots, daily life
Atmosphere conveyed so well
Sep 2, 2013
Sep 2, 2013 at 5:25 PM UTC
We can never be together but,
I wish we could.
Fatal attraction,
will always
grab the
Grim Reaper & his scythes,
attention.
But this time,
dying doesn't
look like,
an eternity of lonely nights. ,
It's
Almost,
well,
actually
it is
a
tempting thought
for a
split-slit
wrist
second.
Given the right causes.
But.
I'm here
in the
Hearse behind
you.
Playing passenger
on the
69-blood-line.
I called shot-gun.
We're way-out
on the highway home.
Only
7
more counties
2
go through.
Til I can see those,
better-places
&
your
pretty, familiar face.
May 7, 2012
May 7, 2012 at 1:23 AM UTC
red wine beads at my brow
I wait to wince
poppies dance out in the yard
in the little warmth from seasons since
her feet trail away
the broken magnum at mine
head, heat, blaring haze
scythes at the atlas of my spine
scorn and disgrace
raw and insipid
the sun turns its face
lends whatever light to the wicked
she said she'd put the fear of god in me
but god is not what I fear
not what oppresses my feet
nor the ache of my best years
he does not hang from her tongue
like the prize of her spiced ***
any vestige of will; any spirit, any trace
for any iota of refrain
quashed, quelled
concealed and contained
another fickle whine
another fleeting wish
any mistake I've made is mine
and hers are carried on the wind
she speaks like the end;
the war, and then what's won
no more sour a tend
than to the wounds of what's been done
the world armed to defend;
her foes a heavy sword against a throng so young
infantile infantry
ripened from infancy
what a weapon are my sons
what a kindness she's coughed up
Jul 13, 2018
Jul 13, 2018 at 9:28 AM UTC
A breeze dances,
catching the beast who flies.
A beast who is feared,
by man, elf and animal.
Its wings did darken the skies,
but its roar was furys fire,
and its scales sharpened scythes.
Men ran and they cowered,
and they fought and they died.
They burned and they bled,
as they issued their cries.
The cover of this beast was blown,
Men cowered and hid.
From the black wings.
They did not wish to die,
within the inferno of its jaws.
The black scales shimmered in the rising sun,
as the beast roared.
Fire escaped its jaws,
burning everything in its path.
The legends were true and fatal,
The beasts of this land,
had returned to seek revenge.
They who destroy,
They who burn.
The beasts who **** every living soul sewn.
This beast looked behind thee at its kin,
roaring in triumphant rage.
The war had begun,
everything had engaged.
Now hunting for its prey,
It only spoke now in the disarray.
"The dragons have come mortals,
We have returned."
Fire and Steel will collide,
As the dragon age begins.
Humanity will fade,
Within the Dragon and its Kin.
Dec 18, 2013
Dec 18, 2013 at 9:38 AM UTC
Far over the mumbling Mountains of Moan
Where blazing hot Firebirds are nurtured and flown,
Through silver veined canyons and mines filled with gold
By Dwarves in their halls seeking riches untold.
There lives by the side of a babbling brook,
Buried deep in the earth, in it's own special nook,
Underneath a quite small yet conspicuous knoll,
Hidden from prying eyes is the home of a Troll.
Alone in his cavern of amethyst ore,
He sleeps undisturbed with a grunt and a snore,
And makes the ground tremble with dream induced growls
That fly up with spit from his thick flapping jowls.
The floor all around is a sea of gnawed bones
Stained pink by the light from those crystalline stones,
That shimmer and sparkle like miniature storms
Left raging for aeons in mineral forms.
His slow beating heart sounds a deep thumping boom
That scythes through the half light and twinkling gloom,
By which, if you look in the cold that persists,
The Troll's heavy breath funnels up into mists.
A great iron club with its spots of rust red
Stands upright and ready close by to his bed,
The Troll's hairy fingers draped over his prize
To ****** at the hilt should the instant arise.
One beady eye open, the other shut fast,
Only the foolhardy would dare to creep past,
Wake him at your peril, no need to surmise,
You will meet a brutal and violent demise.
A wrinkled behemoth with rings through his nose,
The truth of his origin, nobody knows,
Some say Trolls were spawned at the dawn of the world
When primeval magics and such swished and swirled.
While others less fanciful look to the West
Where dark Elvish wizards in black arts invest,
The wrong incantation performed on a man
Is rumoured to be how the Troll race began.
Sep 29, 2014
Sep 29, 2014 at 7:56 PM UTC
*Every morning in my garden I see
A fluttering gentle little soprano
Humming the song of her life
Hovering around seductive colours
Tasting, sipping nature’s recipe
Fluttering wings, ****** heart beat
Waltzing in midair to a melody so sweet
Happy to be alive, genuflecting for gifts of life
Every morning in my garden I pray
I wish what she wished was a reality
Not an illusion, a self delusional creation
Her happiness momentary, squashed in infancy
Hawks, raptors, eagles await in anticipation
With scythes in their hands…
Sharpening them, vying with each other
Whose morsel shall she be
I wish what she wished was a reality
For her will there be a tomorrow …?*
Sep 11, 2014
Sep 11, 2014 at 2:48 AM UTC
The squat,
Yorkshire monk,
pulls on the rope
and tolls
the Angelus bell;
his smooth hands
allow
the rough rope
to rub against
his skin,
rough on smooth.
I flushed the latrines
of the abbey,
having cleaned
with a stiff brush;
I recall her
mouthing my fellow;
her dark eyes
closing
as a dying moon.
The old French monk
scythes the tall grass,
his cutting swoop wide,
a studied look,
a prayer moaned
inside.
Feb 25, 2015
Feb 25, 2015 at 4:53 PM UTC
I saw Ada,
In New York. I hit her up,
and she wanted to meet up for breakfast.
The next morning:
She had on slate shorts, a ruffling, loose white t,
And chucks falling apart at the seams
in scythes of fabric.
Her hair bobbles
as she bounces over.
It's so frizzy and curly
as if it’s been through electroshock.
She gives me a hug and as she pulls away
her lips hit my cheek.
A grey pigeon lands in my sight behind her
and pushes a white **** out onto a starbucks lid.
The best thing
Is seeing exes that you haven’t
talked to or seen in awhile; and hearing
them talk about the great things they’ve done
In your time apart.
It’s almost as if I was right there with Ada
when she was experiencing
her new love of Brooklyn.
I am
A ghost in her life,
And in that piece of my heart
That misses her,
I like the feeling of being
as free as a spectre;
an unobtrusive observer.
Feb 27, 2012
Feb 27, 2012 at 2:02 PM UTC
All this...
O, this shall be his.
He who in well-leaned doorways
And oft-learned corners
Hath resigned any byways
To dream: “A tall order
To rove in the mud
And muck up one's soles”
Says he who would trod
Upon painless goals.
Him safe in his womb,
His wont wooden beams.
Neglect to his comb and
Plume and dusty seeds.
“Who would fret in the rain?”
He asks. “And why suffer venture?”
“I've a cubby! Where's the shame
In my hearth and decanter?”
“I tell you all!” he says
One night, in a fit. “Them's fools!
They that count on the coldness and chance
Of a bleak, backwards world
In despotic hands. Come time,
Come the end- You'll see what I have!”
O, the mites and the mice
And the crumbs and the cracks
And the creaks in the night
And the stock-still plants
And the angles all learned
And the steps all a measure
And every walking turn
And every processed pleasure
And the patterns and ease
With his paper and naps
What is good on the knees
And light on the back
And the age and the greys
And the frustrating lust
And the well-worn ways
And the old codger's fuss
And the twilight come
And the shadows of scythes
And a final look back
Through wondering eyes
And the what-if's and why's
Of the best girl in Eire
And the laughter of kids
In a moistening eye...
And the plain wooden box
And the standard rites
And the empty expanse
Of the graveyard night.
And no crowd and no cries
Just a man and *****
And pile of dirt
Where ol' whats-his-name lays
All this-
O, This shall be his.
-c. c. Condry
Mar 12, 2011
Mar 12, 2011 at 8:32 PM UTC
Dead plains
Open air
My baby, my K,
Smells of lavender petals,
Defined despair.
A known
Vowel howls
Like she does at night.
Turning right she lights
All former antiquities
Prove wrongful due regularity.
A pressing matter topples
Next to the standing tower of rubble.
Grey stubble tumbles
Like hours out of the hands of a clock.
A kaleidoscope of horror
Makes the mind entrenched in narrow.
She tells me the name
Of a former lover of another
That pressed no buttons, rubbing
Everything
The wrong way.
We compare, we see a sea of troubles
Illuminating nothing but the past,
Never meant to be free.
Trees shallow swinging singing
Like scythes across the yard.
Burgundy yarn weaves through my heart,
Cold as you were today,
I got nothing else to say.
Pressing matter, dear dead hatter.
Craziness is a beauty
Only the Cleopatra's of the world
Have to truly suffer.
Cradle me naked, cradle me dreamed',
Ain't no love like the
Broken sick and broken hearted'.
At least the darkness
Harkens thee dead ghosts of
Former lives forgotten.
Grey gravestones smell like
Roses given my former lovers;
Each hour with her is
One that will never be forgotten.
Present pasts pass me in the
Mirror; these shop windows are all colored
Green.
Caretaker saint, apple apricot skate, a
Note for the doctor stating
All is forgiven, all is about.
I remember the dream,
Shallow and filled with steam.
Fine patent leather, stitches and cream.
She pressed her face to mine,
Like silk string woven into seams.
Nothing is the matter.
Nothing passes the time.
Dylan hurls the harpsichord,
Gripping the nails,
Repositioning the boards.
The ice was to thick to climb,
The snow to heavy to see through.
Where you see your life is
What you think you can do.
Books on fire.
Trains of heavy steam.
Life is nothing but
An unforgettable dream.
Apr 6, 2014
Apr 6, 2014 at 6:09 AM UTC