"shone" poems
Not easy to state the change you made.
If I'm alive now, then I was dead,
Though, like a stone, unbothered by it,
Staying put according to habit.
You didn't just tow me an inch, no--
Nor leave me to set my small bald eye
Skyward again, without hope, of course,
Of apprehending blueness, or stars.
That wasn't it. I slept, say: a snake
Masked among black rocks as a black rock
In the white hiatus of winter--
Like my neighbors, taking no pleasure
In the million perfectly-chisled
Cheeks alighting each moment to melt
My cheeks of basalt. They turned to tears,
Angels weeping over dull natures,
But didn't convince me. Those tears froze.
Each dead head had a visor of ice.
And I slept on like a bent finger.
The first thing I was was sheer air
And the locked drops rising in dew
Limpid as spirits. Many stones lay
Dense and expressionless round about.
I didn't know what to make of it.
I shone, mice-scaled, and unfolded
To pour myself out like a fluid
Among bird feet and the stems of plants.
I wasn't fooled. I knew you at once.
Tree and stone glittered, without shadows.
My finger-length grew lucent as glass.
I started to bud like a March twig:
An arm and a leg, and arm, a leg.
From stone to cloud, so I ascended.
Now I resemble a sort of god
Floating through the air in my soul-shift
Pure as a pane of ice. It's a gift.
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*He sat by a furnace of seven-fold heat,
As He watched by the precious ore.
And closer He bent with a searching gaze,
As He heated it more and more.
He knew He had ore that could stand the test
And He wanted the finest gold,
To mold as a crown, for the king to wear,
Set with gems of price untold.
So He laid our gold in the burning fire,
Tho’ we fain would say Him "nay."
And watched the dross that we had not seen
As it melted and passed away.
And the gold grew brighter and yet more bright,
But our eyes were dim with tears,
We saw but the fire, not the Master’s hand,
And questioned with anxious fears.
Yet our gold shone out with a richer glow
As it mirrored a form above,
That bent o’er the fire, though unseen by us
With a look of ineffable love.
Can we think it pleases His loving heart
To cause us a moment's pain?
Ah, no! But He sees through the present cross
The bliss of eternal gain.
So He waited there with a watchful eye,
With a love that is strong and sure.
And His gold did not suffer a bit more heat
Than was needed to make it pure.
~ A.F. Ingler*
Jul 21, 2016
Jul 21, 2016 at 8:29 AM UTC
When she turned her gaze upon me,
I was a mote of dust
caught in a beam of sunlight
I was huge and beautiful
and bright.
I laughed and danced
and shone.
And when she turned away,
a cloud moved across the sun
and I was extinguished.
Jan 11, 2010
Jan 11, 2010 at 4:14 AM UTC
*Blue clouds gaze the wrapped sun
frozen kisses in my blood
travelling a thousand miles
to meet up with you.
There is none else walking
down this path where memories
wake up and dance
inside my armored heart.
I peeled off each kisses embrace
out of my parched lips.
I shook off the tree,
where your scent had blossomed.*
***Every step down this scarcely trodden path saw...
Each peel fall with helpless, damsel-like grace.
Brown leaves shone amber touched by fingers of the sun
Invasion of warmth through my greyed bony carapace.
Gentle tremors reverberate within with subtle anguish.
Sweet scented portal that took me back,
To the illusion of time where we once were...
In drunken stupor...laying under a star strewn canvas of black.
Senses that spoke of a great fantastical tale.
You are still here... In this cloying void with no one around...
Only that scent...your scent tugging on my core
Invisible tendrils berthing my feet back on ground.***
*Alone and wanting don't want to be anymore.
I want to feast my lungs on your skin once more.
I want to vibrate under your touch again,
In anguished anticipation and sweet pain.
I hurl your name to the echoing wind,
Blowing ferociously over the closed passage.
Only to find that I'm but elongating
the distance between our fading wishful stars.*
***Fading far only to find that I'm lost yet again,
Still harvesting a basket full of ripened hope.
Traversing planes with warped, slanted doorways,
Frantically seeking purchase on knobs with fevered gropes.
Heavy layered breaths inhaled too shallow...
Tracing missteps to decipher what it all meant.
When all is moot...weary, weathered and futile,
Forever I'll be bathing in the familiarity of your soothing, nectarous scent...***
Dajena M
ryn
Feb 26, 2015
Feb 26, 2015 at 11:50 PM UTC
It was golden and splendid,
That City of light;
A vision suspended
In deeps of the night;
A region of wonder and glory, whose temples were marble and white.
I remember the season
It dawn'd on my gaze;
The mad time of unreason,
The brain-numbing days
When Winter, white-sheeted and ghastly, stalks onward to torture and craze.
More lovely than Zion
It shone in the sky
When the beams of Orion
Beclouded my eye,
Bringing sleep that was filled with dim mem'ries of moments obscure and gone by.
Its mansions were stately,
With carvings made fair,
Each rising sedately
On terraces rare,
And the gardens were fragrant and bright with strange miracles blossoming there.
The avenues lur'd me
With vistas sublime;
Tall arches assur'd me
That once on a time
I had wander'd in rapture beneath them, and bask'd in the Halcyon clime.
On the plazas were standing
A sculptur'd array;
Long bearded, commanding,
rave men in their day—
But one stood dismantled and broken, its bearded face battered away.
In that city effulgent
No mortal I saw,
But my fancy, indulgent
To memory's law,
Linger'd long on the forms in the plazas, and eyed their stone features with
awe.
I fann'd the faint ember
That glow'd in my mind,
And strove to remember
The aeons behind; &
21.4k
''
Sand and stones between my bones.
Today the sun never shone.
Look how beautiful I am.
Chop, chop, chopped wood in the fireplace.
Don't get too close if you want to keep your face.
Be careful not to burn yourself.
It gives a certain warmth
And brings a certain want.
I would, yet I can't enjoy it by myself.
Royal blue like the winter hue.
My skin is merely bruised.
Can you still see how many times I've been hurt?
That winter depression.
Makes me want you as my new obsession.
Come in even if it's colder than outside.
Melt, melt me, I'm a letdown.
Having a meltdown.
I am melting under your fiery touch.
Snow flakes the skin.
I am in for a win.
What a special snowflake I am, wouldn't you say?
My heart is surrounded by splinters,
It shouldn't, yet it get's me through the winter.
Between my arms it's chiller, why don't you come hither?
Take a bite of me with your ice chipped teeth.
Swallow me up like a leech.
Red blood gauges from my blue veins.
Guess I'm not that royal anyway.
Hide it before you can complain.
-
Too late.
You already know the taste.
"
Feb 8, 2016
Feb 8, 2016 at 2:23 PM UTC
she was the moon
radiating the night sky
and dancing among the stars
you were the darkness
the shadow that waxed and waned
through the phases of her life
she grew to believe
that your presence
is what made her whole
but like the full moon
she shone brightest
without you
x.
Sep 3, 2018
Sep 3, 2018 at 9:40 PM UTC
’Twas noontide of summer,
And midtime of night,
And stars, in their orbits,
Shone pale, through the light
Of the brighter, cold moon.
’Mid planets her slaves,
Herself in the Heavens,
Her beam on the waves.
I gazed awhile
On her cold smile;
Too cold—too cold for me—
There passed, as a shroud,
A fleecy cloud,
And I turned away to thee,
Proud Evening Star,
In thy glory afar
And dearer thy beam shall be;
For joy to my heart
Is the proud part
Thou bearest in Heaven at night,
And more I admire
Thy distant fire,
Than that colder, lowly light.
20k
It's cold in Duhallow this morning and the fields that were green yesterday
Lay chilled to the frost that the night brought a cover of silvery gray
And the little dunnock on bare hedgerow too cold and too hungry to sing
On **** branch he perch sad and silent the hardship that January can bring.
The robins and sparrows by back door like beggars they wait to be fed
In hope that when breakfast is eaten the housewife might throw out some bread
With no thought for song or for nesting their battle is to stay alive
How many will live to see April the Winter so hard to survive?
The first heavy snows of the Winter have fallen on the higher ground
On Clara, Shrone and Caherbarnagh the hills are so white all around
The blackbird and thrush on the bare branch their feathers fluffed against the chill
And hare has come down to the lowland there's nothing to eat on the hill.
But I can remember the bright days when sun shone on the leafy tree
And robins and thrushes and finches piped in the woods of Knocknagree
And to her nest on barn rafters the sparrow brought feathers and hay
And out on the dandelion meadow the pipit sang all through the day.
Young calves and young lambs in green pastures were full of the frolics of Spring
And joy too had come to the river the song of the dipper did ring
And moorhen was out with her babies and she chirped loud if human was near
Her first lesson to them survival to teach them the meaning of fear.
It's cold in Duhallow this morning the thrush silent on the bare tree
And gray on the fields and the hedgerows and gray over all Knocknagree
But I can remember the bright days when nesting birds piped all the day
And hedgerows and woodlands and meadows smelt sweet with the blossoms of May.
Aug 10, 2010
Aug 10, 2010 at 6:42 PM UTC
"I can’t figure it out.” She said.
“I like cigars,
and pretty dresses and crossing my legs.”
She paused,
then continued,
“And I like smoking cigars in pretty dresses while crossing my legs.”
She uncrossed them,
then crossed them again.
One smooth limb over the other.
Just like that.
“But I never seem to have a lighter on hand.
Could you— sir,
please light my cigar?”
“You see, I have no pockets to hold such things and my purse…
Well,
You’ve confiscated that, haven’t you?”
“Thanks.” She breathed,
and inhaled,
and exhaled;
Sluggish wisps of smoke dissipating into the air.
Just. like .that.
“I didn’t know L'homme was into women who smoke cigars in pretty dresses while crossing their legs", She said.
“I mean, how was I to know?
I only noticed him noticing me.
It was probably the way my hair was tousled like so,
Or how my lipstick shone a deep, dangerous rogue,
Or the way I sipped at my champagne…
That made him walk over.”
“But I never asked him to light my cigar
Or comment on my dress…
Or stroke my legs.
So when I whacked him up top over the head with my glass,
I bet he never expected it to shatter and split his skull like so.
He dropped so sudden, sir. I…”
Another ringlet of smoke, a sigh, an uncrossing and crossing of legs again.
“I had no clue,
what else to do,
But to sit still in my pretty dress, with my legs crossed, smoking my cigar trying to figure out...
Just how I'd committed ******
Nov 12, 2018
Nov 12, 2018 at 5:10 PM UTC
Dark drapes fall on both sides
Heavy with the drought of sleepless nights
When the moon shone but did not shine
Through the windows that are stained to this day
I'd try rubbing the grit away
But the grains of sand have found their home
As have the lead in my heavy heart.
Jul 17, 2014
Jul 17, 2014 at 5:53 AM UTC
I've never had anyone look
At me the way that you do.
The first time I saw it, I tried
To catch it but missed.
Much like a shooting star
Fast & fleeting.
I remember the look on your face,
The pieces of gold shone by the light.
Your eyes, they do something to me
In my collective thought.
They break down an insane amount
Of answers to questions I've never
Thought to think.
I've never had much luck when it
comes to money, but I can imagine
the amount of fear that makes
someone insane off the thought of losing it.
Today, tomorrow, always.
To look up and see your eyes,
A not so hidden pleasure
Fast & fleeting.
Out in the open and still somehow
manage to miss it.
The second, third, as well as fourth
I plan to catch
Oct 21, 2021
Oct 21, 2021 at 5:15 PM UTC
i passed a woman walking her dog while on my evening stroll the other day.
her blonde hair curled at the ends, smile-lines appeared as if there were drawn in with a 2b pencil and her eyes shone like fresh uranium.
words like small, big, skinny, fat, ugly, and pretty shouldn't be used to describe beauty or lack of thereof.
Apr 7, 2014
Apr 7, 2014 at 12:19 AM UTC
Ay, mine eyes be such, the great admirer
Taking your words to heart?
Truly
Though, understanding them?
I believe i have a skewed view of the true layers hidden beneath the rows upon rows of your starlight garden.
I am but a bird above your garden, admiring the upper beauty shone brightly in the starlight.
I have but the faintest clue about the memories and experiences that root so deeply into your poems,
Nor the meanings behind the words that hold the earth so tenderly.
Ay, mine eyes be such, the great admirer
But as the greatest trees stand tall in their royal crowning, their historic roots support them whole heartedly, with their focus all upon the lifting of the grand finale.
Deeply do your roots reach down into thine heart. And deeply so.
For how can one reach the stars without a strong story below?
Ay, mine eyes be such, the great admirer.
I cannot be so bold as to claim to know what each poem means, for that would be to have lived in your story with each passing breath.
Nay, i can only express the emotions that these words give me in relation to mine own,
curiousity, like flower garden, grown.
Ay, mine eyes be such, the great admirer
Aug 23, 2016
Aug 23, 2016 at 1:40 AM UTC
Her inner beauty
Shone so brightly
And was seen by others
blind, she knew not her own worth
Sep 4, 2014
Sep 4, 2014 at 7:28 PM UTC
Naive little waterdrops never knew
What they were, what they could do
Upon their downfall they saw the sun
The sun shone bright and magic spun
A band of colours poured from the drops
Exquisite scenery high above the crops
Bright old sun had till then just burned
It saw then the rainbow the drops had churned
It saw its own reflection in the colours that appeared
It saw itself caring when it had never cared
It made the water shine when it fell from its height
It showed the drops too their very own might
Dear old sun makes rainbows everyday
It still burns and still makes the drops gay
The water never fears and takes on the fates
As long as the sun shines, a rainbow awaits.
Jul 30, 2016
Jul 30, 2016 at 6:45 PM UTC
Do you remember what you said that day
How terrible you felt inside
When all those clouds of disappointment
Blew into your lovely skies
Your life could not get any worse
To yourself you sadly said
Because your glorious sun no longer shone
While lightning crashed ahead
Your teardrops fell like rain that day
Unnoticed in the downpour
Torrential streams from the blackest skies
One had ever seen before
One day your sun returned to shine again
Winds of disappointment changed
Your flowing tears glowed into a radiant smile
As your life’s direction rearranged
Now here you stand, downcast once again
Black cloudy skies moving in
Never give up looking for that sun of yours
To shine through those clouds again
Sep 2, 2010
Sep 2, 2010 at 7:13 PM UTC
The steeples are white in the wild moonlight,
And the trees have a silver glare;
Past the chimneys high see the vampires fly,
And the harpies of upper air,
That flutter and laugh and stare.
For the village dead to the moon outspread
Never shone in the sunset's gleam,
But grew out of the deep that the dead years keep
Where the rivers of madness stream
Down the gulfs to a pit of dream.
A chill wind blows through the rows of sheaves
In the meadows that shimmer pale,
And comes to twine where the headstones shine
And the ghouls of the churchyard wail
For harvests that fly and fail.
Not a breath of the strange grey gods of change
That tore from the past its own
Can quicken this hour, when a spectral power
Spreads sleep o'er the cosmic throne,
And looses the vast unknown.
So here again stretch the vale and plain
That moons long-forgotten saw,
And the dead leap gay in the pallid ray,
Sprung out of the tomb's black maw
To shake all the world with awe.
And all that the morn shall greet forlorn,
The ugliness and the pest
Of rows where thick rise the stones and brick,
Shall some day be with the rest,
And brood with the shades unblest.
Then wild in the dark let the lemurs bark,
And the leprous spires ascend;
For new and old alike in the fold
Of horror and death are penned,
For the hounds of Time to rend.
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The diamonds shone like broken glass
Upon the midnight street
And all atop the walls were wet
Their white eyes glint & sleek
Then from afar a gnome appeared
An angel flashed on furry feet
The boulevard became a river
While waiting crowds began to quiver
I was in a motel watching
Whiskey in my hand
Her breath was soft, the wind was warm
Someone in a room was born
~~~
Accomplishments:
To make works in the face
of the void
To gain form, identity
To rise from the herd-crowd
Public favor
Public fervor
even the bitter Poet-Madman is
a clown
Treading the boards
~~~
Cold electric music
Damage me
Rend my mind
w/your dark slumber
Cold temple of steel
Cold minds alive
on the strangled shore
Veterans of foreign wars
We are the soldiers of
Rock & Roll Wars
~~~
Whether to be a
great cagey perfumed
beast
dying under the
sweet patronage
of Kings
& exist like luxuriant
flowers beneath the
emblems of their
Strange empire
or by mere insouciant
faith
slap them, call their cards
spit on fate & cast hell
to flames in usury
by dying, nobly
we could exist like
innocent trolls
propogate our revels
& give the finger to the
gods in our private
bedrooms
let’s rather, maybe,
perhaps,
get ******* out in
the open, & by
swelling, jubilantly
Magnificently, end them.
12k
In age of old, in time that pass like tides,
When Prometheus lived and Lo! He strived,
As thirsting for Heaven, he climbed its hills, and trees,
Clenching at the Sun, its spark he seize.
The leaves, they warmed, turn bright and evergreen,
As Prometheus, he to fierce fire wean,
Swell lips sip lightning, of the nascent noon,
And divine heat from his hand duly shone,
To Roses, who sing, uprise and sweet rebel,
In bloom to conquer, vanquish concrete hell.
A wish for fire, fulfilled, angered Zeus,
He thought the fire be given, not to choose,
That excellence with fire, laurel his,
"A crime against the Gods Prometheus did."
For glory of the light from Heaven sent,
The hour of his favour now gone, spent.
Smite down the hero, tear ambition down,
Old Zeus, but young ambition wears your crown,
For daring, striving why not badge of God?
The Promethean vision all time hath applaud,
It art of upper world, belong in sky,
Praise Prometheus as fire goes roving by.
Mind gilded by the golden, whirling thread,
You seize from Heaven, through the Earth now spread,
Bringing hope to hearts, life to the dead,
As for forgiveness of the Gods you plead,
For an uncriminal act and sublime deed,
The arrogance of Zeus? Need not to feed.
Jul 20, 2018
Jul 20, 2018 at 3:14 AM UTC
So let's talk about suicide
and how it could have taken me
and how it still might.
So let's talk about suicide
and how childs not yet old enough to wake their minds
try to end their lives as we just sit by.
So let's talk about suicide
and how tired old folks cut their time too short
because they have noone to love.
So let's talk about suicide
and how self-harm is cause of laugh
and how one day it goes too far.
So let's talk about suicide
and how I never thought I'd see myself
writing about my own.
So let's talk about suicide
let's talk about mine
my first try I threw my knife before the red shone in my eyes.
So let's talk about suicide
and how my second try I mixed *** Coke and bleach.
It tasted really bad, but I drank on.
So let's talk about suicide
and how I don't really want to **** myself anymore
but I guess there is something about me that makes me close to it anyway.
So let's talk about suicide
and how my last attempt will be at the bottom of the sea,
drunk with misery, drunk alone.
So let's talk about suicide
let's talk about it because it happens all around us
and talking is the best way not to break.
So I've talked enaugh, now it's your turn
Jun 23, 2018
Jun 23, 2018 at 1:58 PM UTC
Babylon has fallen! Aye; but Babylon endures
Wherever human wisdom shines or human folly lures;
Where lovers lingering walk beside, and happy children play,
Is Babylon! Babylon! for ever and for aye.
The plan is rudely fashioned, the dream is unfulfilled,
Yet all is in the archetype if but a builder willed;
And Babylon is calling us, the microcosm of men,
To range her walls in harmony and lift her spires again;
The sternest walls, the proudest spires, that ever sun shone on,
Halting a space his burning race to gaze on Babylon.
Babylon has fallen! Aye; but Babylon shall stand:
The mantle of her majesty is over sea and land.
Hers is the name of challenge flung, a watchword in the fight
To grapple grim eternities and gain the old delight;
And in the word the dream is hid, and in the dream the deed,
And in the deed the mastery for those who dare to lead.
Surely her day shall come again, surely her breed be born
To urge the hope of humankind and scale the peaks of morn --
To fight as they who fought till death their ****** field upon,
And kept the gate against the Fate frowning on Babylon.
11k
If it should come to be,
This proof of you and me,
This type and sign
Of hours that smiled and shone,
And yet seemed dead and gone
As old-world wine:
Of Them Within the Gate
Ask we no richer fate,
No boon above,
For girl child or for boy,
My gift of life and joy,
Your gift of love.
10.8k
Stories were told
Of aliens with wings
And how they flew
In chariots of fire
And how they dressed
Like warriors with swords
These aliens they say
Watch over us all
With strength of giants
And the sword of truth
And eyes that shone
As bright as the moon
These aliens they say
Will keep us from harm
When lost in the dark
They'll show us the way
Their homes I learnt
Is paradise above
And when I die
My zombie they say
To their homes will fly
Where O! where are they now
The aliens with wings
Where are they now
To save us from sin
Angels they say
But for all I know
These aliens with wings
Are nothing but tales
May 13, 2015
May 13, 2015 at 12:24 PM UTC
a miracle child
born to a mortal mother
***the creator pretends
to be the created***
stealing butter,
breaking pots,
teasing girls,
Gokulam’s naughtiest child
and then one day
the friends complain
“Mother Yashoda, your little one
is eating mud from the Yamuna banks”
worried she rushes
to her darling boy
her anxiety disguised as anger
he smiles - the sly little blue-eyed boy
in his musical voice he cries-
“I did not eat mud, sweet mother, the boys lie!
***come look within
and see with your own eyes!”***
poor Mother Yashoda
not knowing she stared
into that little mouth
and lost herself in what was there
he lifted swiftly the
veil of maaya
the truth shone forth
with a blinding light!
*** त्वमेव माता च पिता त्वमेव ।
त्वमेव बन्धुश्च सखा त्वमेव ।
त्वमेव विद्या द्रविणम् त्वमेव ।
त्वमेव सर्वम् मम देव देव ॥***
she saw herself
and her dear little boy
the whole of Gokulam
within his jaws lay!
and the whole earth
and the universe
galaxies and multiple worlds
was her little boy cursed?
her fear mounted as she saw
the entire cosmos
the boundaries blurred
time - a non-entity
the past, present and future
only a tiny river
she saw the vast expanse
of his creation
he made these worlds
held them like puppets on a string
and then morphing
he became death!
and unable to take more
she swooned
when the Creator, the Preserver and the Destroyer
merged to become-her adored little one!
*** You are my mother, and my father
You are my relative and my friend
You are knowledge, You are prosperity
You are my everything, My God of Gods***
and then he looked at her
with an infinite compassion
he’d shown her
what she needed to see
now it was time
for her to forget, to become
his doting mother again
he kisses her with innocent love and toothy grin
once more
maaya takes hold
the illusion more beautiful
more irresistible to behold!
- Vijayalakshmi Harish
04.09.2012
Copyright © Vijayalakshmi Harish
Sep 4, 2012
Sep 4, 2012 at 2:45 AM UTC