"shoreline" poems
I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm,
your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm,
yes, many loved before us, I know that we are not new,
in city and in forest they smiled like me and you,
but now it's come to distances and both of us must try,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.
I'm not looking for another as I wander in my time,
walk me to the corner, our steps will always rhyme
you know my love goes with you as your love stays with me,
it's just the way it changes, like the shoreline and the sea,
but let's not talk of love or chains and things we can't
untie,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.
I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm,
your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm,
yes many loved before us, I know that we are not new,
in city and in forest they smiled like me and you,
but let's not talk of love or chains and things we can't
untie,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.
155.5k
kissing you was like swerving into oncoming traffic
i can never tell if i am more haunted by empty picture frames or the ashes of their contents
you taught me that the saying "pick your battles" meant not answering when love was at the door
sometimes when i drink whiskey i swear i can hear your voice in the creases of my bedsheets & i sleep on the floor
i still catch myself running my hands over things you touched the most, looking for the echoes of your fingertips
i practice things i'll never say to you
i remember the day you told me you didn't like poetry, how "everything's already been said" & how "nothing meaningful can be captured without being cliche" you know, i don't miss you like the sun and moon, i do not miss you like tide bent waves crashing on the shoreline, i miss you like a chernobyl swingset misses children
rumor has it that drowning is a lot like coming home, that drinking bleach can **** the butterflies in your stomach
for your love of cigarettes, i would have been an ashtray
this halloween i want to dress up as the you when you loved yourself and show up on your doorstep
i never understood what you meant when you said i was an instrument, back when you would cup your hands around my chest and breathe through the holes in my heart, i still wonder if the sounds i made remind you of wind chimes
i never paid much attention to abandoned buildings until i became one
in my dreams all the flowers smell like your perfume
i am the only person who has ever wished for the same snowflake to fall twice
if i could go back, and rewrite the definition of audacity, it would be how when we lost the bet of love, you said "we never shook on it"
i love you, if the feeling is not mutual, please pretend this was a poem
the only apology i want from you, is to have you repeat the names of children we will never have in your parents living room until they *****
we are the same person if you find yourself up at 4am dry heaving promises, or if you are kept awake by the laughter of those who've abandoned you
nobody ever told you that goodbyes taste like the back of stamps
sometimes i'm convinced that the only reason we hug, is so you can check my back for exit wounds
May 19, 2014
May 19, 2014 at 11:08 PM UTC
“Moby **** Herman Melville
<•>
~for the lost at sea~
after a year of saltwater absence and abstinence,
return to the island caught between two land forks
surrounded by river-heading flows
bound for the ocean great joining
the Atlantic welcomes the fresh water fools,
bringing with them hopefully, but hopeless gifts of obeisances,
peace-offerings endeavoring to keep their infinite souls
sea accepts them then drowns the
warm newcomers in the unaccustomed
deep cold salinity, which
sometimes erodes
sometimes preserving
their former freshwater cold originality
I’m called to depart my beach shoreline unarmed,
no kayak, sunfish or glass bottomed boat needed,
walk on water and my toes, ten eyes to see the bottom,
no depth perception limitation,
reading the floor’s topography,
millions of minion’s stories infinite,
many Munch screaming
god’s foot, heavy upon my shoulders,
a daytime travel guide, hired for me,
not a friendly travel companion, nope,
God a pusher showing off a drug called deep water salvation,
designated for the masses, can handle large parties
my in-camera brain eyes,
record everything for playback -
the lost and unburied, bone crossword puzzles
walk shore to ship, on soles to souls,
is this my new-summer nature welcome back greeting?
puzzled at the awesomeness of vastness,
conclude this clarification for me of the occluded-deep,
is a stern reminder of my insignificant existence,
my requirement to walk humbly, spare my sin of vanity, and
forgive my trespasses upon the lives of others
perhaps then the infinite of my soul perchance restored,
older visions clarified and future poems
will write themselves
and sea to it my predecessors
be better remembered
Memorial Day 2018
May 28, 2018
May 28, 2018 at 11:53 AM UTC
We never took pictures together
because you don't like how big your eyes are
I would drown in them for you
but you would be too busy
watching the sunrise to notice.
You have glasses because you're blind
But they aren't the right prescription
because you still don't see your beauty.
I remember the night you had me drive
two hours away from the city lights
just so you could point out
all the constellations you memorized
when you were younger.
I let you go on and on about stars,
waiting for you to mention the way
you outshine all of them
But you kissed me instead
and I think that was even better.
Even when Summer faded out,
you would always smell like sunshine.
I wanted to live forever in the daydream
of you and me walking along the shoreline.
Your laughter was synonymous
with sunflowers
and how everytime you caught sight of them
you couldn't stop yourself from smiling.
But that should have been my warning sign
because Russia's official flower is the Sunflower
and ever since you left
I've traded water for *****
and this winter has been unusually rainy
but it's still too bright for me to go outside.
Jan 2, 2015
Jan 2, 2015 at 5:15 PM UTC
#there are the ones
that feel it climb up
the shadow towards the light,
hesitation on every rung,
each wave of the arising
overwhelms unabated ―
and woe betides those
who are on the run
from a storm's deluge
A rousing ocean breeze
stirs inside the memory
of an unframed seashell
lying on the hearth mantel;
heightened sensitivity
lapping soundlessly,
spindrift plashing
the shoreline
of another world's
feigned peace
Perhaps the muted voice
of guilty pleasures,
hushed by their own
hidden truths
Feeling the unfelt textures
of every stifled vibration
left unbreathed
The naked truth befallen
so cold and lonely
Running in circles,
volatile as all those
unspoken excitations raging ―
and the whispers of those
who hear not
the voices in the wind
An emotionally enslaved heart
tarries, marooned high and dry
in a memory on a distant sand bar
lain fallow for so long ―
stagnant darkness
of an unsated soul
gathered on the back
of a parched tongue
sullied wordless
Rising up through
a dusty hieroglyph corridor
through an unlocked
labyrinth gate; vestige echoes
from somewhere left behind
in an incomprehensible
abandoned wake
It's getting harder and harder
for an insatiable soul to breathe ...
climbing up a tree trunk―
up within the silence
of the listening tree
Toes dug into
the rough bark furrows ―
fingers reaching upwards
beyond their deepest known grasp
A shadow stranded
out on a hangin' bough
hearkening without ears that hear:
“perhaps they’ll listen now“
the wingless bird sings
in psalms that fly away
on tattered feathers
over untamed waters roil
Back to nature’s waning youth,
the bough bends unbroken
to taste the freedom
of the wild absolving seas
Jesse Stillwater
June 2018
Jul 12, 2018
Jul 12, 2018 at 12:41 PM UTC
Ilion gray
poet extraordinary
is away
learning the codes hidden in raindrops
no reason for surprise;
for the mountains of Brooklyn, the Manhattan caverns of Sunhenge^, corridors of narrow focus for trapping the declining sun rays,
neither high enough, narrow blinding,
to keep a good man from doing good things that life provides as opportunities
to do the right thing
he muses that it took five years for the other poets to understand our
poem-dreams;
avant-garde he says,
but I laugh,
never felt more misunderstood
and reply take care, be
en garde!
no matter for he is learning a new language,
the codes hidden in raindrops in a land of wheat
once called Indian Territory and eager
await his return so we may
walk along the Brooklyn shoreline,
beginning from under the Brooklyn Bridge
where Washington’s men escaped a British trap
and he can decode for me the whispery thunderous noises of
NY
showers that come up so sudden, so roughened, but right now,
the seductive sun blinks in Manhattan windowed towers reflecting back on to our East River as golden blinks of nature
We will walk lost in the absorption of our
different commonalities, holding the hands of
his young son, and my Wendy,
both of them equal in possession of round saucer eyes
that give us poems
He calls me me friend,
I call him brother, teacher, master, better than the best,
well recalling a late night message that bred
a five year conversation ongoing
not everything need be coded
what you read here
it is not coded,
for the raindrops come clear and clean
and the poems land on our tongues
bounce on the foreheads and eyes of the babes, all stored and saved for the future blessings spoken in a single tongue
7/18/18
^https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattanhenge
Jul 18, 2018
Jul 18, 2018 at 10:41 PM UTC
The beach smells of tranquillity and salty sea air
The rhythm of the waves gently caresses my skin
The horizon seems elusive, a dream always chased
Yet night foreshadows traumas waiting to be let in
Oh where do I begin?
*I love you
I don't wanna be scared of you
I'm waiting in the shoreline
Please don't run away this time*
I'm scared of silent reflections, solemn and reclusive
I float futher from myself with each passing day
I have a note addressed to myself taped to a mirror
I'm scared of reading it aloud and being lead astray
And I have to accept that it's okay
*"I love you
I don't wanna be scared of you
I'm waiting in the shoreline
Please don't run away this time"*
Seashells coated in sand tickle the edge of my ear
The fog carried on the wind sends chills deep inside
The sun will always be there to break the duskiness
Daunting across the sky and waking up the tide
And the breeze slowly sighed
Please don't run away,
don't run away from me
Please don't run away,
don't run away from help
Please don't run away,
don't run away from the sea
Please don't run away,
don't run away from yourself
Angel wings take me further than I've ever gone before
Sep 23, 2018
Sep 23, 2018 at 11:29 AM UTC
she is outspoken and bold
bold like the sun
bolder than an army of boulders
falling from a hillside
she is an avalanche
when there is nowhere left to run
she is despised by some
and others wish to fill her
with some old fashioned whisky
i am sanctified by her ways
and returned to my former glory
as this poem has tasted far better days
she is a morning glory
her eyes are like the petals of a flower
she is the Wordsworth of the decade
a wordsmith dancing in her own decay
i am essentially a target
a lost projectile in the arrow's path
she has coaxed me back to sanity
with her sardonic gestures
and her sarcastic use of wit
i am a nitwit she said
so i laugh and pick the flowers from her hair
slowly and soporifically
i am seaweed adrift in her bonnet
sandpaper scattered along the shoreline
remove the blind spectacles
and eat the lines i’ve written
a poem is just a candle anyway
to spray the eyes of infinity with lightning
mars is retrograde regardless
so i’ll just sit here and pretend
that i’m not too much of a target for her beauty
Jul 23, 2018
Jul 23, 2018 at 3:05 PM UTC
"I'm a mermaid," she said as she kissed me.
Ah! her kiss made me drunker than wine.
I'd been longing for the ocean in her blue eyes,
it was calling to the diver in mine.
She whispered, "I've got just a little bit of magic
from my home in this big blue lagoon--
join me tonight for a swim in the moonlight,
I'll make some magic for you."
The full moon was rising in Paradise
as I made my way down to the shore.
There I dove right into the water,
I just couldn't stand it anymore.
Here she comes, swimming up to meet me--
wraps her self around me like a glove.
As long as I live I never could tell
the magic of a mermaid in love.
Goddess of the crystal blue ocean,
sharing your mysteries with me.
When I'm with you I can breathe underwater
and swim beside you under the sea.
If I could stay here under the surface,
I would never go back to dry land!
Goddess of the crystal blue ocean,
Meet me here whenever you can.
The spell would be broken by sunrise,
but her "little bit of magic" was no lie.
We soared, freed by love, underwater,
free as two birds in the sky.
All too soon the sky began lightening,
the moon and the stars took their flight.
Our kisses were mingled with tears at the shoreline
where we promised to meet every night.
Goddess of the crystal blue ocean,
sharing your mysteries with me.
When I'm with you I can breathe underwater,
and swim beside you under the sea.
If I could stay here under the surface,
I would never go back to dry land!
Goddess of the crystal blue ocean,
make me a real merman.
Nov 11, 2010
Nov 11, 2010 at 7:13 PM UTC
Something happened this morning
when I awoke to you lightly breathing.
It was sublime.
My chin rested on your shoulder
the skin so soft on my cheek.
I couldn’t help but kiss the sweetness.
On nights when I sleep alone
it does not matter how many blankets
wrap my restless body.
I wake cold.
Nothing is as warm as your arms.
Like that of a Texas breeze
on an August night.
I can only think to kiss
your unshaven face.
The kisses are planted gently,
first your cheek,
then your temple,
and your forehead,
when I come to the tip of your nose
you stir slightly,
but I cannot stop.
I want it more then
the ocean waves need
the shoreline to crash upon.
Looking at your face
I smile at the odd way we met.
With a breath of *** and an intoxicated
grin we spoke.
“I don’t like you”
“Yea? Well I don’t like you first!”
Like children picking
on their first crush.
Tying to fight back the giggles.
Our childish ways still
run strong.
In your absence I sit
and watch the ticking minutes
laugh at my uneasiness.
Hours with others
are mere minutes with you.
The clocks envy
our cherished time
and tick-tock more rapidly
when we are alone.
All our time
would never be
enough.
When we get lost in each other,
the way the lonely roadrunner
looses himself as he runs
up and down
the oak covered hills,
it is love at its best.
This morning
when the soft breathes
you took woke me
and my chin rested upon
your shoulder,
something happened.
As the kisses fell
and your eyes continued to sleep;
I realized that this
is where I belong.
Drifting slowly
into love with you.
Apr 15, 2013
Apr 15, 2013 at 7:30 PM UTC
My inbox was always full
but I always made time for you.
Now, time tells me that I'm the fool:
you say you will, you never do.
You said you would, you never did.
Reclining, you could watch me sink
then toss an anchor down to say
you gave your all to keep me safe.
Don't get me wrong, we were both weights;
controlling, insecure, insane.
Like deep-sea diving in the rain,
not knowing it was all in vain.
Practice breathing, slow and steady;
in the ocean, hot and heavy and
screaming for a miracle
to help us find our way to shore.
Now, I think it discpicable
that I would move sea, sand, and shoreline,
just to make sure you were mine
-a pretty, washed-up shell resigned.
Jun 13, 2018
Jun 13, 2018 at 1:48 AM UTC
Mom makes you smile for a picture in front of the bus
on your very first day of school,
"You only have one first day of kindergarten!" she says.
But every time you hear the scratching of leather seats,
You are back to that day
When tears rolled off your tiny pink cheeks,
onto the front of your Lion King tee shirt
The first time you ever had to be afraid that you
would never see her again.
Brother tells you not to worry about the boy that bothered you,
the impact of a fist on his right eye is a warning
that guarantees he'll never disrespect a girl again.
But every time you step in the pebbles on a playground,
You're still struggling to run just slow enough not to slip
yet fast enough to keep from being caught and held captive
by the first boy to ever kiss you without permission.
Grandma tells you to "appreciate today" every day
because you'll never get it back.
But every time you hear the crash of waves against a shoreline,
You're there with her in your favorite place in the world.
And the sun is overhead with looks of never coming down,
But you'd be okay if it did because you swear these colors of
the sunset don't exist when you see it from anywhere else
And you never feel so close to God as you feel right here.
Dad is sad when you're growing up
because you'll only be little once.
But every time you get the surprising scent of metal and grease,
You're five years old again and dad is getting home from work
and he lifts you up in a hug and you bury your face in his shirt and breathe in,
And you're confident that he will carry you to bed later that night
on that same shoulder when you fall asleep on the couch.
You're told over and over to forgive
and your mother keeps trying, too.
But every time a green van passes by,
you're a vulnerable twelve-year-old with a record that says easy prey
and you're back at that police station and you're both still crying
and forgiveness still seems so far away.
Everyone tells you that "first love"
is something you only feel once.
But every time September rolls around,
You're still staring back into the first eyes to look at you in awe,
His palms feel sweaty in yours but you don't mind.
And you can still taste his lips and smell the sweet mint Stride on his breath
and you feel everything.
It’s strange how they promise that you can't turn back time,
yesterday is gone,
today will only happen once.
Because I go back all the time;
And I still feel everything.
Feb 4, 2014
Feb 4, 2014 at 9:12 PM UTC
The light had gone from this woman
Her days now became lonely and dark
She would go to the shoreline
To repair what had been torn apart
She would shout out to the shoreline
O please bring me a new light, a new moon
I am tired of feeling lonely and dark
Will you please bring it to me soon
Just like that the gilded clouds did part
to reveal to her a new moon
Time for this woman to have light again
Time for her to be swooned
This new moon was most welcoming
with his arms open wide
Lit up this beautiful woman again
and brought out the pearl we knew was inside
Jun 27, 2017
Jun 27, 2017 at 8:29 AM UTC
(from “A Love Song” by William Carlos Williams)
<•>
familiar that apple google and amazon
have me under 24 hour surveillance
e-specially now
as I am in their
geosphere of influence
but sending me a love poem of WCWs that isolates my locale, my intended inebriation status,
and is addressed to me personally (“you”),
that’s just creepy
so charged am I, obligated to oblige,
to counter-compose a love song of mine own,
under the pinot “influence,”
(in a manner of speaking)
which a love taught me to love
what if,
a new love song ecrit,
to an old and loverly land,
a woman-land designed to be desired,
no difference -
kissing a new girl first time,
a wet and unforgettable
compote
when falling
on the neck of your one beloved anew renewed
now I tremble-tread
for the line of great predecessors,
“the land lover scribes”
skilled in natures homaging,
is like a line out the door,
around the corner as if
a new flavor ice cream
has just been isolated and mined and I...
<•>
*I,
but a novitiate
in a far away, wild untamed world
where my nature taken by her nature
cannot deny paying my just due:
selvage
late middle English, from self + edge
how perfect!
“an edge,
woven on a fabric during manufacture,
intended to prevent unraveling”
the pacific coast air
the irregular shoreline - expanding/receding,
god’s own forestry reserve,
the cascades, a goal on the horizon,
country roads where ancient wheat stalks grow wild
all a tonic intermingled, an alcohol to
imbibe through mouth nostrils eyes and skin
all will be my own selvage!
preventing the eastern unraveling disease,
a nearly incurable permafrost low grade
kate spaded infection,
brought along with me for decades,
my loon June companion, now stalling out,
lost from my happy head
a vineyard on every corner,
marijuana growing next door,
rivers that change like children growing up and down,
cheek to jowled property line
live the berries and the hazelnut groves,
god’s hay bales wrapped in plastic
like marshmallows dotting the landscape*
all daring you to say
I could
love
it here
Jun 8, 2018
Jun 8, 2018 at 3:26 PM UTC
Sunlight on my grinning face
Follows me from place to place
But it won’t do
Don’t know how long I can wait
Wandering this empty space
Searching for you
Up and down the barren coast
Listen as the riptide rolls
With so much to say
Probably what hurts the most
Is knowing when you’re so **** close
And still so far away
Once per while I catch a glimpse
Of unintended fleeting hints
To call out your name
Won’t make much a difference
Words don’t carry far upwind
It’s always the same
In the breeze
I see it’s just the wind
It’s a tease
To be at the shoreline again
Shepherd, call the sheep back home
Be thankful that you’re not alone
Round em up one more time
My, how much the herd has grown
With wool to warm your gentle soul
Leave no soul behind
Apr 25, 2016
Apr 25, 2016 at 8:32 PM UTC
My breath is lost as I gaze upon the magnitude of the mountains that surround me. I marvel at how beautifully the water reflects the sky, pure white clouds stretched across blankets of soft pinks and blues as the sun sets behind the trees. I see the steadiness of Your hand in the horizon. I see Your love of variety in shells scattered along the shoreline. I see Your flawless detail in the veins of a maple leaf. I see Your creative spark in fireflies glowing subtly against the darkness of an airy August night. I hear You in the winter wind, I feel You in the summer heat. My soul is flooded with joy at the sight of Your creation. I cannot help but lift my hands and praise You.
Jul 31, 2013
Jul 31, 2013 at 2:47 PM UTC
her rigorous objections
are herded slowly down the sheep trail
by studious pencil thin men with stylish mustache's
who have deep pocket pickers for friends
they gather round the weak willed and the willing alike
looking for cheap thrills and spare change
everybody needs a new road
when the old one seems to never end
but she with eyes cast down
mumbles her unappeased desires
as she shuffles a little closer to the truth as she sees it
she has it all written out in secret languages
she has books filled with life's coded thoughts as she see's them
barn burners and dare devils grace the cover of her latest creation
self titled to her own romantic name
she is stylized in her own way
so she adores the pencil thin men
with their dashing devil may care good looks
i wrote her a letter yesterday
full of stories from the great highway
full of chipper go getters and the glum go gotten
she is a forever stone on a necklace
she is a moonstone on a bracelet
she is graceful when it counts and
thats more than enough for me
the pencil thin moustache men
come to conquer the all night diners
in the small shoreline towns
but slink away in dawns first light
with stolen smiles and borrowed kisses
that they promise profusely to return tomorrow
but never do
such is the romantic night by her side
such is the wonder-wheel days of our
journey on the great highway
Sep 22, 2014
Sep 22, 2014 at 6:08 PM UTC
I’m going through withdrawals. How awful it is to have to keep yourself from speaking to someone because you know if they wanted to speak to you, they would. I’m so deeply rooted in the sand that no waves that crash on land could overturn me. Your footprints are leading away from me, you are moving further and further down the shoreline, your outline growing smaller, smaller, smaller, blending in with the horizon where the sun is setting in lovely shades of red. I do not fear that you will not be loved, because even now I see how the birds adoringly sing your name. I fear the drops of saltwater that fall down my face each solemn night will one day be able to collect into ocean of their own. I fear the birds will be able to love you better than I have. I fear that this titanic amount of heaviness weighing on my heart will be ever-present. Your name is written in the clouds, and I cannot escape it, for no matter how far I run, I can never escape the sky. When I look up, there it is and so are you.
Jul 16, 2013
Jul 16, 2013 at 10:25 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
#(a travelogue)
He stared down through
the unbroken silence
lapping the shoreline
Water skippers dart around
the rocks and windfall driftwood
settled juxtaposed in cattail reeds
and emerging broadleaf sprouts
A petrified heartwood timber
lie fallow waiting bare barked,
hushed like a pining lover’s
timeworn love seat,
rubbed smooth as
the crystalline waters
of half-moon lake
Lingering for a while ―
like a hidden stalker,
a perched wildcat waiting
for the full moon’s
swooning spell to saturate
the thickening dusk quietude;
arousing the urgent
call of the wild —
exhaled from the held breath
of the wilderness nocturne
on half-moon lake
The stillness was scattered
with the soft downy hairs
of the sleeping cattails, and
the newly shed catkins
a spring gust bestrewed
from a tall resin birch tree
nigh the Sitka willows
He sat quietly ...
time out of mind ―
tossing his eyes up into the sky;
taking the time to read the stars ―
catching them each again
as they fell into his gentle hands,
to show him who he was
Seeing their sparkly tracers
trail-out above the cattails,
from a distance
they resembled falling stars
unable to perceive their own renaissance ―
plashing lightly upon the still-water
on half-moon lake
A lone shadow glides stealthily
near mid-tarn,.. swimming
enchantingly with the grace
of a blackswan
Appearing to glance shoreward
at the glowing low stars
rise and fall, as his eyes
twinkled skyward over
the moonlit lagoon ―
heavenward of its moonlit ballet;
the lone sleek dark shadow
slipping through
a faint circular ripple
stirring the smooth as glass waters ―
disappearing like a fleeting moment
waning deep aneath
a subtle silent wake.
When all the clear lines blurred,
he knew it had been so long ...
but hearken !
… an interceding
long drawn out wail
echoed a feral ache
across the stillness,
breaking the silence ―
as the shadow reappeared;
his tears surrendered
to the undulating call of the wild;
he felt the spirit of the sole Loon,
as black and white
as the moonlit night,
stir deeply in his wanting heart ―
lay bare the silence
in lengthy yodeled psalms
to the god of the moon
Diving down deep yet again,
keeping the light he’d been given,
vanishing into the lifespring
sanctuary of half-moon lake
harlon rivers ... May 2018
travelogue: 4 of some more
May 21, 2018
May 21, 2018 at 2:36 PM UTC
.
The waves spilled the rising tide
back into the scattered footprints in the sand
deeply entrenched in life’s mystery,
receding into every breaking wave
A stiff sea breeze put back every grain of sand,
elements of a larger object gathers,
gravity firmed, into the silent shoreline chasms—
a beheld essence washed out to sea
by the fugitive tides and retreating sea-foam
Soon all trodden traces visibly vanish;
unmarked mileposts on a metaphysical pathway
slip away back to a windswept shoreline
and elapsing summer tide
Seabirds glide in slow-motion,
held sway into the shapeless gusts —
as if feathered puppets hovering,
hanging from the rafters
of the burgeoning orange sky
There's an uncommon peace in the renaissance;
effervescent crisp ocean air filling
the indefinable emptiness
marooned within each heartbeat’s echo
Each new breath inhaled, disappearing within
the unhealed hollow of every thing once believed;
fully aware this life is unholdable as time,
yet feeling many things deeply retained
in each passing moment—
slipping away like a handful of sand
sifting through all these hands once held
Presence becoming wreathed in a miasma of stillness,
space that levitates like an unpredictable fog
that seeps into the gnawing voids
of an unsated hunger
harlon rivers ... August 1st, 2018
Jul 31, 2018
Jul 31, 2018 at 8:34 PM UTC
Picnic
by Parveen Shakir
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
My friends laugh elsewhere on the beach
while I sit here, alone, counting the waves,
writing and rewriting your name in the sand ...
Confession
by Parveen Shakir
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Your image overwhelmed my vision.
As the long nights passed, I became obsessed with your visage.
Then came the moment when I quietly placed my lips to your picture ...
Rain
by Parveen Shakir
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Why shiver alone in the rain, maiden?
Embrace the one in whose warming love your body and mind would be drenched!
There are no rains higher than the rains of Love,
after which the bright rainbows of separation will glow with the mysteries of hues.
My Body's Moods
by Parveen Shakir
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
I long for the day when you'll be obsessed with me,
when, forgetting the world, you'll miss me with a passion
and stop complaining about my reticence!
Then I may forget all other transactions and liabilities
to realize my world in your arms,
letting my body's moods guide me.
In that moment beyond boundaries and limitations
as we defy the conventions of veil and turban,
let's try our luck and steal a taste of the forbidden fruit!
Moon
by Parveen Shakir
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
All of us passengers,
we share the same fate.
And yet I'm alone here on earth,
and she alone there in the sky!
Vanity
by Parveen Shakir
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
His world is so simple, so very different from mine.
So distinct—his dreams and desires.
He speaks rarely.
This morning he wrote: "I saw some lovely flowers and thought of you."
Ha! I know my aging face is no orchid ...
but how I wish I could believe whatever he says, however momentarily!
Keywords/Tags: Perveen Shakir, Urdu, translation, Pakistan, love, passion, picnic, beach, vision, confession, rain, rainbow, hues, forbidden fruit, body, *** orchid, mrburdu
What the Poet Sees
by Michael R. Burch
What the poet sees,
he sees as a swimmer
~~~underwater~~~
watching the shoreline blur
sees through his breath’s weightless bubbles ...
Both worlds grow obscure.
Published by ByLine, Mandrake Poetry Review, Poetically Speaking, E Mobius Pi, Underground Poets, Little Brown Poetry, Little Brown Poetry, Triplopia, Poetic Ponderings, Poem Kingdom, PW Review, Neovictorian/Cochlea, Muse Apprentice Guild, Mindful of Poetry, Poetry on Demand, Poet’s Haven, Famous Poets and Poems, and Bewildering Stories
May 17, 2020
May 17, 2020 at 11:29 PM UTC
you see
i had always felt
that in a dream
i was the absence
of the dream
and then it dawned on me
that i was in a time piece
trapped during forgotten hours
where everything is alien
but vaguely familiar
the beach beneath me wandering
off to anywhere but here
and i straddle the shoreline
palming stray shards of sea glass
always the color of her eyes
and i am abruptly upside down
an upheaval, a maw
where i thought it as
a nightly revenge
for skipping stones
and again i am upended
& back on the beach
born of broken hourglasses
and it makes me think
that god likes to watch things leave me
Feb 15, 2014
Feb 15, 2014 at 11:35 AM UTC
They set off from white rocks,
red geraniums, blue tile,
and let the green sea
lift and drop their ships far above the white foam waves.
The stony islands that were home
were swallowed in minutes by the hungry Atlantic
but they hunted the big fish,
the giant whales with human eyes
who rolled and sang and swam
in oceans a continent away.
They came from Sao Jorge, Sao Miguel
Faial, Pico, Terceira, Horta -
Nine island emeralds set in a black volcanic chain,
neither of the old country nor the new:
Halfway there and halfway gone -
secret jewels of the Portuguese sailors.
They sailed into unknown waters,
south around tropical shores
where dragons smoked and writhed on the rocks
and birds with brilliant red and yellow plumage
rose in clouds around their heads.
Then north, and north, north again
to colder waters
where sea lions barked and lunged
at the strange massive wooden beast
that coursed the waters,
strung with brown bodies swaying
on the lines and cursing the sails.
North still they swept
casting contemptuous eyes on
the cheap turquoise waters and monstrous slow turtles
of the Sea of Cortez.
Coming up from the desert, past the palms and the yucca,
the Joshua tree and Spanish daggers,
they chased their smooth grey prey,
riding the vast Pacific on their wooden island,
herding the leviathans onto their spears,
adventurers with an audience of only
gulls and sky and seal.
Until they sailed too close one day
to a rock-strewn shoreline
and saw the golden hills.
Gnarled oaks like grandmothers from home
with orange poppy jewels at their feet,
missions strung like beads in a ruby marked rosary.
The boats slowed, ****** in by a Scylla of soil
rich and brown and loamy
waiting to be seeded with grapes and apricots
peaches, avocados, lettuce, alfalfa,
fertile and heavy with sweet promise.
And the whales sang and the lions barked and the gulls cried
but the sailors were entranced, encharmed, ensorcelled.
The treacherous sea, the mysterious deep, the stony jewels of home,
called and wept
and waited in vain for the sailors
- beached and grounded -
cutting not waves but earth,
tracking seasons not whales,
seduced by dirt.
Nov 29, 2014
Nov 29, 2014 at 9:51 PM UTC
*Getting out from the waves
She walked away to the rice bran haze
As the summer heat drove the sands mad
I knew what she had gone for.
She would hunt it like a child any day
A few seashells if came her way
My skin burning and eyes dust borne
Moments all to herself she desired alone.
On the distant shoreline when she was a speck
Stirred me a tremor then a rumbling quake
What if so happens she is gone too far
Turned a sea nymph to return never!
The tides were falling weaving a lull
The sun slanted on the wings of gull
I rose up to find sand prints of her trail
She bloomed like a hope in her handful of shell!*
Apr 7, 2014
Apr 7, 2014 at 3:41 AM UTC