"sharpening" poems
notice the convulsed orange inch of moon
perching on this silver minute of evening.
We’ll choose the way to the forest—no offense
to you,white town whose spires softly dare.
Will take the houseless wisping rune
of road lazily carved on sharpening air.
Fields lying miraculous in violent silence
fill with microscopic whithering
…(that’s the Black People, chérie,
who live under stones.) Don’t be afraid
and we will pass the simple ugliness
of exact tombs,where a large road crosses
and all the people are minutely dead.
Then you will slowly kiss me
51.7k
Burning fuel but not to leave,
boys circled town, came back
to the station where they began.
Gas exhaust drifted like spirits
above asphalt, dissolving in the night.
Girls stayed in the lot,
waiting for men old enough
to buy liquor, their names
claiming the land-
long after other names lay
buried in the ground.
They kept to the faces,
legs folded on hoods,
lip gloss catching the station lights,
bracelets chiming, hair flips rehearsed,
laughing at trucks circling back.
They wanted to be chosen, and I tried
to want that too- tried to be a girl among girls,
waiting for the moment some hand
would tug me out of the circle.
But my eyes kept straying-
across the street,
to the rise that was not just dirt
but a chest under earth,
ribs shifting,
a hum curling into my throat.
Something skeletal in its patience,
as if Baykok himself
were sharpening arrows in the dark,
waiting for breath to break.
Built long before us by Ojibwe,
still honored as sacred ground.
The others smoked, struck sparks,
sequins spilling from careless wrists,
never thinking how easily flame
might travel down, through us,
into what we couldn’t see.
I could hear bones shifting,
a buried drumbeat, the land’s own warning.
Every glance of the mound
pulled me back into silence.
It told me what the others
didn’t want to know-
that all this circling, waiting,
was only the lid of a grave.
Oct 3, 2025
Oct 3, 2025 at 12:02 AM UTC
Leg off the table
you red face recruit!
put on the offensive
and break down
the bolted door!
you are the soul saver
the peddle maker
the calibrator
with colored handbills
and front line
rhetoric
join the masquerade
in ivy league style!
politicking with
cunning guile
invisalign smile
blackened vile
bleeding the funnel
with gold plate omega
and crocodile shoes
get on stage
and dance you fool!
you are the headline maker
the pantomime juggler
the compromised closer
pull out that 5 page review
(bullet points only please)
and polish those weathered lines!
did you give it your all?
the door tags
and pleasantries
the tidings
and clippings
the irrevocable claims
and postured blames
all those impressionable basics
put to the test?
you know the call
(straight from
those cold academics)
the pie chart gurus
and contract killers
(complete with bone in finger)
whipping their
frenzied crew
in an all night
charade
old yellar
and the gatekeeper
sure seem amused
(sharpening their inquest
behind closed doors)
firing up the shiit storm
with those hostile priicks
and a slew
of insatiable
cures
there’s laughter from the back room
the dripping nose
and wavering hand
the cut white lines
and checkpoint tales
the pipeline romance
and lacking form
(of a basic essential
character!)
soundboard
and narratives
for logging time
slouching on the
steel case
over moot points
ready to play
the 3 weight
butter card
(if need be)
might I remind you
it’s only an inquiry
(with a slight hint of concern!)
surely no
malfeasance
or deception intended
so step back from
the melt down
and cut to the chase!
headlines to breadlines
penthouse to outhouse
those immoral pursuits
have taken their toll
(haven’t they?)
madman or rogue
(you take your pick)
for the scores
and tabulations
are final
shame on you
for the foul play
the bold hypocrisy
and order desk games
the back stabbing blames
and spurious names
just sign on the dotted line ~
this banter
is killing me
Jan 4, 2017
Jan 4, 2017 at 1:12 PM UTC
Give me one more push
Before thy hands, swing into despair
Give it One more chance
A seed to grow
A love to ferment
We haste to want
We slip from the top;
Loaded with immaturity.
Sharpening your edge takes time.
Be patient with me;
I will improve.
Don’t give up on me;
The luggage on my soul, heavy.
Hold my hand for a little while and
Be my eyes, before I go missing,
In this dark jungle.
You promised, you were in for a long haul;
The fear in your eyes, sounds like
A racing horse, without a rider.
My code is red hot endurance, to the end of the rope.
I am in, and there is no turning back,
from what is rightly mine.
- McDaniels Gyamfi
Sep 3, 2014
Sep 3, 2014 at 12:54 AM UTC
Whoever has no house now will never have one.
Whoever is alone will stay alone
Will sit, read, write long letters through the evening
And wander on the boulevards, up and down...
- from Autumn Day, Rainer Maria Rilke
Its stain is everywhere.
The sharpening air
of late afternoon
is now the colour of tea.
Once-glycerined green leaves
burned by a summer sun
are brittle and ochre.
Night enters day like a thief.
And children fear that the beautiful daylight has gone.
Whoever has no house now will never have one.
It is the best and the worst time.
Around a fire, everyone laughing,
brocaded curtains drawn,
nowhere-anywhere-is more safe than here.
The whole world is a cup
one could hold in one's hand like a stone
warmed by that same summer sun.
But the dead or the near dead
are now all knucklebone.
Whoever is alone will stay alone.
Nothing to do. Nothing to really do.
Toast and tea are nothing.
Kettle boils dry.
Shut the night out or let it in,
it is a cat on the wrong side of the door
whichever side it is on. A black thing
with its implacable face.
To avoid it you
will tell yourself you are something,
will sit, read, write long letters through the evening.
Even though there is bounty, a full harvest
that sharp sweetness in the tea-stained air
is reserved for those who have made a straw
fine as a hair to **** it through-
fine as a golden hair.
Wearing a smile or a frown
God's face is always there.
It is up to you
if you take your wintry restlessness into the town
and wander on the boulevards, up and down.
7.8k
Fill your bowl to the brim
and it will spill.
Keep sharpening your knife
and it will blunt.
Chase after money and security
and your heart will never unclench.
Care about people's approval
and you will be their prisoner.
Do your work, then step back.
The only path to serenity.
______
"Lao Tzu is believed to have been a Chinese philosopher (a person who seeks to answer questions about humans and their place in the universe) and the accepted author of the Tao te ching, the main text of Taoist thought. He is considered the father of Chinese Taoism (a philosophy that advocates living a simple life).
Read more: Lao Tzu Biography - life, name, death, school, book, old, information, born, time http://www.notablebiographies.com/Ki-Lo/Lao-Tzu.html
Oct 19, 2010
Oct 19, 2010 at 11:52 AM UTC
There is a very secret place
That exists between day and night
If you're patient then some day
You may see the land of Twilight.
The gates to enter are so slight
If you see them it may seem
A trick of the sunset's light
A fairy's passing dream
So pay heed to the change of time
For lilac hues of coming night
Truly love to pantomime
The secret land of Twilight
You'll know when you've timed it right
For the spangled fairy wings
Will lend a softly shimmering light
To a host of other things
Pregnant dew drops standing by
Patiently awaiting night
Stars twinkling a lullaby
Before they take their dazzling flight
The creatures of the dark that bite
Are sharpening their pointy teeth
On the last of sunset's shards of light
Surveying what's beneath
Should the Moon, empress of this land
See you taking in these sights
She will take you by the hand
And lead you gently into night
And you'll wonder all your life
Was it real or just a dream
For in the secret land of Twilight
Things aren't ever as they seem.
Oct 13, 2014
Oct 13, 2014 at 8:02 AM UTC
Scraping away the memories
from my brain
Scraping away the past
that's caused me pain
Sharpening the knife
to make it all go fast
Sharpening my senses
so the feelings last
Wondering why the nights
never go away
Wondering if I'll ever
forget yesterday
Keeping my mind busy
with all the mistakes
Keeping up with life
through all the heartaches
May 30, 2015
May 30, 2015 at 6:44 PM UTC
A shroud that blooms a single bud,
Blossomed at the peak of perfection,
Piercing eyes of those who dare to behold-
Taking trance to those of hereafter.
She waits to vicariously live through another,
By piercing one with her sharp thorns,
A trickle of blood released from her holder,
Captivates her swooning love.
Fooling the world with her perfume.
It covers her stain.
Truly a lifeless child with a brown core
Rotting out the ends of her teeth,
Cracks at the seams that should be mended;
Should be stitched
perfectly.
Instead lost in the intertwined lines-
withering from the inside.
Unable to grasp each end of the rope.
Never could weave the fabric with a still hand,
She
slips into Darkness.
Although she cast a tranquil shadow,
She fades into the background-
Slipping silent as her seems come undone.
Fooling the world with her transparent seal.
It covers her shame.
A single blossom that blooms in the spring,
And dies each night by the moonlight-
Howling outside to try and wake her inside.
To regurgitate her woven ends,
To seal the wound pried open by her past.
By her current death bed.
Sharpening her thorns for those who take hold,
Masquerading her disease-
black vessels rooted in deep soil-
Fooling the world with her beautiful petals.
Only she's to blame.
Feb 26, 2012
Feb 26, 2012 at 11:03 PM UTC
Every ma'am
Is the tightening of a noose
Is the sharpening of a blade
Every shower
Is the collection of pills growing
Is the note being revised
Every she
is a punch in the throat
Is one step closer
One step closer to the end
Because I cant wait to not feel this
But then I get called sir
I get called them
I get called him
And it's one step back from the rope
One pill flushed
One note ripped up
One more day I will stay alive
Because I love that feeling
Nov 17, 2021
Nov 17, 2021 at 6:26 PM UTC
We were equally matched
Until a plan was hatched
You became the subtle aggressor
By making appearances lesser
Using your passion aggression
To steer a passive direction
You perform a vanishing act
By canvassing flak
Balancing black
Against a sky so blue
Teaching me that which is true
Is different from what I knew
So my anxiety naturally grew
You launch a resistance
By remaining silent
On this plane of existence
Where you're the pilot
Not taking the right angle
Into the Bermuda Triangle
That is your social sphere
Where you disappear
From committal fear
Of love being near
So I throw a search party
But your presence is tardy
Because you're departing
On the journey you're starting
Without me
Slouching
From my submission
To your anti-admission
Splitting our position
Like nuclear fission
The air has become radioactive
Through light that is refractive
Through ways which are retractive
Living this ugly way to live
Sharpening my shiv
To escape this cell of decay
Where flowers bloom and fray
But can't see the light of day
Not one ray
Stuck in the marked moor
Of this dark war
I use parkour
To avoid aggressor attacks
Never cutting me any slack
Bringing pain back
Until I crack
Lost in your blank expression
I make a grave concession
Enslaved to your impression
Yet afraid of your aggression
Caught between
Taking heed
And fulfilling needs
Born from greed
I'll only impede
You scream aggressively
Like you're ********** me
Just by addressing me
After making a mess of me
With deafening quiet
You attack with a diet
Of a steady riot
And I won't buy it
You left when you were here
But stayed once you weren't near
You switched to a guillotine gear
Based on how you wanted to appear
Striking me from the equation
By utilizing deflation
For a sinister elation
You removed our relation
Jul 10, 2018
Jul 10, 2018 at 3:23 AM UTC
playing with fire
was like
sharpening the knife
only just
to cut your own
throat
©IGMS
May 6, 2016
May 6, 2016 at 9:50 AM UTC
i.
Pink doesn’t play into it, that delicate
petal of perfume & flower stuff.
She abhors it.
Red suits her better.
Red for Fridays & red for Aries.
Red for the blood her dagger could draw.
Her seal of wax is no
rosebud adhered to
fine paper.
Warrior, she escaped its letter.
With Roman candles & Roman sandals,
sword, wand & chariot,
defender of her Eden.
Seashells are her votive gifts, the
stars of her Atlantic.
It is within her reign of Camelot.
At the edge of the Earth,
her kingdom dreams.
ii.
Blue maid
a curious ***** in her armour.
But she wouldn’t flinch
if an army of soldiers came crashing in.
They are hunting the witch.
A woman can never have such power.
It is reserved for the patriarchy
to wield at will.
Up it goes.
They can ***** steeples with it.
They are stoking the fires & sharpening
the axe with it.
But threats of torture
don’t make her beg, plead or recant.
She is guilty of nothing.
Even broken on the Catherine Wheel,
Athena still keeps her
bow & quiver intact.
Oct 10, 2016
Oct 10, 2016 at 6:34 AM UTC
I'm a prisoner of love, in this unguarded cell,
The warden whistles my name you'd think it hell,
but she knows my case all too well,
Her piercing eyes as resolute as the Bastille,
Dodging Cupids arrows at will,
Across this broom is forever, I'm gone for a life long spell,
With Joy as my bars and happiness the rubber shower mats,
Blissful ecstasy is its escape deterrent traps,
I pass the time a whittling hearts and sharpening this rap.
See those chalk lines on the wall of my heart?
They record the memories of my days since the start,
Her smiles are more prized than jailhouse art.
At inspection and roll call in the morning,
The smirk under the cap then a whispering,
Keep careful watch on our "Prisoner Prince Charming",
Sep 22, 2014
Sep 22, 2014 at 1:35 PM UTC
Once I lost you
Once I tossed you
You never said a word
I never could have heard
Miracle you bore
A refugee in the wreckage
Sharpening your wings
Withstanding dangerous oppression
Young being, incomplete being
Trying not to succumb
To your own capitalist appropriation
Eminent commodification
Implicating your body and mind
Who remained unscathed?
Who wreaked the havoc?
Just...so many wings could gain wind
In this cage, lacking space
System simply cannot withstand
Cost of everyone's liberation
Convenient systematic predilection
Where some are never meant to fly
Miracle you bore
A refugee in the wreckage
Sharpening your wings
Withstanding dangerous oppression
How can any wings soar
When the trail of their shadows
Hide systematic traps for our failure
To ensure only a few course the skies
Liberation is not meant to be
Just yours or mine
No commodity for private consumption
Its usage, embrace, and appropriation
Has universal implications
A radical transformation that seeks to complete a human being
Emblematic of an ideological reconceptualization
A revolutionary new understanding of being human
A re-authentication of our own liberation
Purely predicated on that of others
Jun 4, 2013
Jun 4, 2013 at 10:22 PM UTC
*to further my point, as an eager reader in
a catholic school, reading about
the gnostic heretics, wondering
with my theology tutor upon the question
asked: don't you think the gnostic heretics
influenced mohammad on the sly?
i mean, they too believed a phantom walked
among men, and a phantom was crucified?*
my confirmation didn't take place
in a cathedral, as was due course for all of
us in being schooled, by a bishop
in brentwood cathedral,
i opted out... my confirmation came
in a russian orthodox cathedral,
in st. petersburg, when i watched
people standing for a scrap of iconoclasm,
with the priest mumbling
toward a golden altar, as typical in
the tradition, buttocks towards the people
or as in the western tradition
reciting in latin, before the nationalists
came and spoke the gospel in each
designated tongue so people understood,
a bit like having your back turned
against the people - speaking in latin -
and when i sat i the church
to listen to the choir singing,
some lesser ecclesiastical prompted me
to stand up, and pay respect to the golden
altar... he told me to stand up!
what cheek... what barbarism... only
in russia... i had to stop being bewildered
by the beauty of song and listen to
a priest knock-down-ginger on a palette of
gold... THEN i was confirmed...
donkey's ******** to this **** i'm leaving!
mind the fact that i've seen the greatest
degradation of mysticism take place...
the tetragrammaton was being defiled all along...
in catholic bureaucracy it has been there all along,
the idiots reminded me of it...
you're born: first name, baptismal name, surname...
you're educated: confirmation name...
that takes four spaces of consideration...
so by catholic definition of sharpening pencils,
folding pieces of paper, filing the folded pieces
of paper, bending paper-clips i'm god...
but only in writing... first name, baptismal name,
confirmation name, surname...
a bit like a clone... a clone indeed in writing...
same d.n.a., same bone mandibles of the jaw...
but experience-wise... un-original to the ****
not even a clone... not able to experience major
historical figures... a soul in a twin body by itself...
a twin without twinning, segregated by ulterior
if not auxiliary motives... clone on paper...
clone by experience? i don't think so... impossible...
too many inter-actants along the way
can't possibly replicate thinking in a clone...
different mr. john smith... NEXT!
Feb 4, 2016
Feb 4, 2016 at 2:18 AM UTC
He is known as The Leader of Men.
His combat skills and his undisputed valor are unparalleled.
The cryptic tattoos of his body are the gospel of neighboring regions.
The utter of his name sends shockwaves of fear and trepidation across the land.
Biding idle time by sharpening his spears, swords, daggers.
Gutting, severing, and beheading those opposing his path and will.
The elders say he is the son of Achilles.
Yet at the twilight of every night of battle,
He lies at his bedside.
Alone.
He never talks, he never sleeps.
Just gazes upon the blood spilled upon his hands.
He weeps.
Jul 31, 2011
Jul 31, 2011 at 6:56 PM UTC
I am made of infatuation, shame and forever gloom
You could not fall
This is not the chessboard of your dreams
No pawn makes—
No bishop makes
The queen takes, is taken an equal
This is not an aisle of rebirth
Or some sombre remembrance
It halts, it halts
The numbers lessen
I did not abandon, I am still here
Yet, a halt lingers
Like death stuck on the precipice of throat
A life of a single lifetime of a thought
I am energy, a little restless
But restless so out of the nature of self
Like the eye of a rook
On the king through a rook
A stupor unblinking
Like the sharpening of a dream
The knight-slide like an Arabian sword
The king scuttles
Rook takes rook, king takes rook
I fancied myself a manly dream
But it doesn’t work like that, does it—
The game writes, and children play
Now I wait the shameful minutes away
(And I watch your hands, so patient, simple
Say, are you dead or pleased?)
And I watch your hands
I should’ve looked up when I had the chance
Now the brooding leaves
And my eye hardens
Father, you have won
With a dream so well, you played just right
I should have not worshipped the pawns like that
Oct 1, 2022
Oct 1, 2022 at 6:09 AM UTC
Today, I’m sharpening arrows
to aim them at
politicians with snouts in the trough,
clerics who preach peace for themselves
but hatred about others,
academics who promote freedom of speech
but run a Gulag Archipelago
for those who don’t follow their own ideas
or buy their textbooks,
hypocrites everywhere,
celebrities in general,
people who don’t smile,
people who aren’t nice,
(why are they here?)
fanatics, tyrants and power mongers,
(there are a humungous lot of these)
boring people,
(they wouldn’t be boring
if they could just try to engage a little more)
and those who block supermarket isles
with their trolleys while they stop and gossip.
I’d really like to put a few arrows in their butts
to puncture their pretensions and hear
the subsequent hiss of preciousness
unless they sincerely promise
to be more considerate
and try to love a whole lot more.
Now. I don't insist they have to love prodigiously,
but I reckon they could lighten the **** up
just a little, and try to laugh more frequently.
That's all.
Mike T Minehan
Nov 3, 2012
Nov 3, 2012 at 1:29 PM UTC
Stop acting like you're perfect
We can all see your flaws
Stop acting like you're perfect
And stop sharpening your claws
If it's a cat fight you want
Then it's a cat fight you'll get
You're the **needle up my ***
And you BLOW UP MY HEAD
You think you're such a pro
But really you're just a ***
You think you're so smart
I think you're a ***** WITHOUT A HEART**
I'm sick and tired of all of your lies
So do us all a favor and PLEASE GO DIE
Because frankly **WE DON'T GIVE A ****
So stay out of my way and go **** A ****
Feb 11, 2014
Feb 11, 2014 at 6:40 AM UTC
.
Slip your arm around him and smile,
tell her that she has beautiful style,
bring love and friendship to them all,
then stand back and watch them fall.
Shower compliments from way up high,
be with them all to laugh and cry,
share their pain and share their lives,
whilst in the darkness sharpening knives.
For rumours, and cursed words you weave,
behind the scenes, intent to deceive,
to bring them crashing to their knees,
and conquer that which has you displeased.
Then laugh until it hurts, somehow,
the means may have justified the ends,
but take a good look around you now,
you no longer have any more friends.
© Pagan Paul (25/03/17)
Mar 27, 2017
Mar 27, 2017 at 4:47 PM UTC
Pencils are opportunities, it dulls as you write,
mistakes slowly burns the red rubber ****
and sharpeners are luxuries or government help or socialism.
But what about cheap pencils,
whose lead dulls or breaks easily.
Pencils are all equal if you look it in the outside
but what you can't see is that these cheap pencils
does not have a solid strip of lead inside,
it has some small quantities of opportunities to write.
I need to sharpen it once in a while
so I can clearly write.
But not everyone has sharpeners nor extra pencils,
some even bought this kind of pencil
with all the money they have
and they cannot write their stories
and their happy endings,
when the luster of their leads are constantly fading
into white, swallowed by the open
free-market place of ideas blank paper.
And I can't blame the poor vendor who sold me
these substandard opportunities.
However,
I am blaming the owners of factories,
for making such lousy imitations,
for exploiting my hunger to write.
I am blaming the government,
for allowing such pencils to ever exist!
Their lust for power, their greed takes away
my opportunities to write clearly and continuously,
I am blaming them for assuming that all of us have sharpeners!
We should not pay for social sharpening services!
Sharpeners and pencils should be free!
Sep 27, 2018
Sep 27, 2018 at 8:45 AM UTC
The regions’ magic carpets are a-beckoning
The brassware in the back bazaars aglow,
Exotic spice is nice
For a very reasonable price
And the camel market’s just the place to go.
But…
Afghanistan’s dark Muslims are scheming
The women folk are sharpening their knives,
When foreign troops depart
The bloodletting will start
With collaborators screaming for their lives.
The children of the Ottoman are smarting
For their neighbours are showing them disdain
By peppering with bombs
Along with Syria’s pogroms
And I wonder why the local folk complain?
Oh the sun comes up with glory in old Egypt
As another national leader meets demise
And old Nasser’s bile will burn
As from his grave he will return
To try to rectify his children’s Holy lies.
There are whispers of a strike at the reactor.
There are reactionary reactions from Iran
With annulment of the bomb
The region should resume aplomb
But I have my doubts this mixture really can.
And it never rains on dear old dusty Cairo,
Here, you never feel the chill of falling snow,
You may stalk the back bazaars
For the rare blue water jars
But you should really buy protection when you go.
And they whinge that all the tourists here are dwindling
That the middle Eastern charm is all but spent,
When the red blood flows like wine
In the good old Bhyzantine
As the peace of night, with gunfire, is wrent.
But…
The dates are really sweet
And the carpetry so neat
And the music is exotic in the night,
And with the flash of Asian eyes
I can guarantee surprise
As you flee for very life…with ****** fright!
Marshalg
From the dark Bazaar
23 October 2012
© 2012 Marshal Gebbie
Oct 22, 2012
Oct 22, 2012 at 11:06 PM UTC
"Love is Blindness"
is inaccurate
Love is the buffer
That sees all imperfections
Makes them perfect
Love is the cataracts
Blurring all troubles
Into a milky sweet balance of good and great
Because bad days are now still good
Love are the pupils
For life
Letting in nothing but light
Blocking out at darkness
Love is syrupy sweet brown eyes...
Even though you thought you liked blue
But Sweet Browns now hold your universe
Love acts as the glasses
Sharpening everything you used to see
Creating the picture of where you were meant to be
Love is the depth perception
For feeling
Used to calibrate all emotions
Love is You
but mostly
Love is sight
Because of Love
I can see
Sep 15, 2014
Sep 15, 2014 at 10:38 PM UTC
the hailstones were falling like dragons
attacking the windows of the North Tower
it was a New Moon, the beginning of a golden era,
the end of a long shift
his arm stretched, brought the sun from the dungeon
tied one of its rays, gently to my little finger
and nailed it to the sky with a swift move
the clouds collapsed like a pack of cards
(Queen of spades fell to pieces, like it never existed)
and then he held my hand, his sword and shield
leaning peacefully against the rest of my world
once again
I watched my children play ‘it’, my women washing linen
in rivers flowing into oceans I never knew I had
while men sat in a circle quietly sharpening their arrows
straightening their bows for tomorrow’s hunt
is there anything you ask in return milord?
my fingers touched his arm
for the first time in a thousand years
his eyes whispered in love-tongue, his lips kissed my handkerchief
which gently fell to his feet and caressed the earth he stood on
it was late and we had to close the gates until the next morning
when we woke up, drank coffee and lived
happily ever after
Jan 30, 2015
Jan 30, 2015 at 2:22 PM UTC