Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Keith J Collard Aug 2012
Her snowcap dress disappears,
as forest on compass interferes.
She can not be azimuth for escape,
why some left trail of yellow tape.
bowing usher points on with blighted limb,
retching out its own hemlock gin.
path in is beaten, with log and stone,
crevices drown a webbed saliva moan.
path out is unbeaten and hard to find,
from death's brambles on the mind.

All trees seem to want to die,
no effort to brush off strangling vine.
where you think they have broke loose,
swaying ropes that once had noose.

And where there is light, is mossy glen,
just enough, for one last note to pen.
dolls, cloths, skulls make up forest litter,
shoes, bottles, and smiling family picture.

With the only surviving sounds so faint and sickly,
Scraping nylon tent--a starving man on day sixty.
The songbirds break the silence,
A cruel happy tune,
They see dark doom in ultraviolet,
the panicked slit wrists and  poison diet,
create failed trails ,
that don't escape and help to hide it.


"The wood line, I made it out"--the cruelest thought,
Mount Fuji's white dress through the trees up top ,
They see themselves smiling,
It is, and it is not,
a happy photo,
identifying their skulls stained green by moss.
Elizabeth Shield Sep 2014
Wizened, like the mountain ridges in the west,
you gazed across the desk at me, rheumy eyes unblinking,
and asked me what I wanted from life

When I answered, the blue opacity of your gaze seemed to sharpen
and pierce my soul
you clasped your hands comfortably, and rolled your ancient shoulders back
- trees rippled in the ridges of your crisply pressed shirt -
and you told me, with your well-worn voice, that you would exert every effort
to give me all the tools I needed to succeed

as you blinked, our conference ended, like the sun had gone down
I was free to leave, but lingered
your short white hair crested your brow like a fresh snowcap, you
had ravines beside your eyes, and smiled like a canyon
so I turned to go

And it occurred to me, as I left the inclines of your presence for
the flat horizons of my daily life, that I
would like to have the same peace that flowed
through your being,
it would be a healthy rain to the desert of my soul.

I longed to have the verdancy that you had - you,
forty years my senior; you put my youth to shame
but soon you would be my teacher, and
you would not let me go to waste
Connor Jun 2015
Victoria-

   - Alpine garden fishbowl
the sea
Briny-
                -Sounds sway in foreground of
                snowcap cascades
                 ferocious Majesty-

(the stuff Kerouac bopped about!)

-Copper sage Canadian alcazar
  of marble stairway
                                    flooring-
  
- Pattern cymbidium orchid
flowing thru bengal lounge of
Empress Hotel-

-Twenty-Nine Degrees
humidity late June
sauna in the Temperate
                                      island
                        where                Autumn
            ­                   rolls past the
Northern horizon.
Shoot the sky and release the diamonds from the rain.
Stardust sprinkled onto the cement.

No more thoughts than that.
I see things, though.

Wet snowcap, yet not by snow.
Orange ginger mint tea,
Slightly warm, slightly filled.
A Bible laid on top of a notebook,
Noticeably used Japanese-style.
The tapping from a Sony PSP,
Almost as if a cool rage is
emanating from the fingertips.
Apartment requests listed,
Most are scratched out, a few are true options.

The tea is full again.
It's still so quiet.
Oh, but a revelation is made.
No game was being played.
A message to send to another
More than likely.

One gulp and one sip.
Fatigue is still hitting me
like a person who didn't stop walking,
even when he dreamed when he could.
Hope I did the right thing to write.
AP Apr 2015
Limb by limb he dissolve into the moonless night
Brought to dust, he is carried by unforgiving words into the infinite frontier alleys of black and white
Gravity condenses his remains until it has it just right
And a nebula is formed above immeasurable heights
Elements interact and ignite, for his smite had never been shined quite this bright
Now we will have no choice but to succumb to our ignorant fright!
Everyone will have to recall the plight of his daily flights
He hangs brilliantly in the sky, a dazzling, yet ominous kite
Reminding us of our lack of care for him, as our guilty pupils meet his superb ultraviolet light

However, now he shines above snowcap mountains and red cable cars
Entrapped in somber words coupled with an acoustic guitar
As a funeral director recites his beautiful poetic bars
We mourn him,
He who own the cold wrists fitted with twin scars
Your words will live on, as those in need of guidance will look up to you,
Oh luminous star
The sky turns hard
Like cauliflower,
And bleeds me out.
It turns hard,
Because I do.
I am the blood of the Earth
And bile, its running waste.
I am its health chorus.
I have known many faucets,
Creaky most, unknowing of any grander plot,
Chartering my way through lime and rust,
I have known many faucets.
I have also known mountaintops.
Places where the air is clean,
And in its own pace blows freshly over my back.
I am, on the mountain, a slumbering snowcap.
I blanket the mountaintop, I am locked with it
In a never ending kiss.
I have known places in the countryside
Where the air breathes nearly as fresh,
Sweeping down from the mountains
Thinking of me mostly, in an open talk.
I have known cities,
Where I am not so well received,
Where I must pound myself between the brick buildings,
Places drowning in nooks and crannies,
I am not so well received, though I try so hard
To reach every surface.
I slide down the sides of walls, I tremble from the slide of awnings,
I mix with gravel.
I am your dirt, your cleanliness.  I feed the doves.  I drown insects.
I wash the air between your city lives, leave your cars and livelihoods
Shining.  I am washed away by the sun, but never leave.
You see me in your gutters.  You see me in your grates.
You cannot live without me.
please support my work on Amazon
James Huston Apr 2
On a nice sunny weekend day we all step outside; throw a Frisbee; a football, or take a bicycle ride

Weekdays we work hard; we have our jobs to do. Then come home and take a load off when the day is through

Here we are trying to do the very best we can. The effort and the struggle to keep our lives on track; but are we constantly taking three steps forward on a treadmill moving five steps back ?

It does seem like we're all going down the hatch. A conundrum of a world for our heads to scratch. Maybe it's time to go play catch.
""I know!!""
Let's get our mitts for a nice little game of catch

I want it to be like my childhood filled with fun and laughter; the way it should.
But I don't wish to be misunderstood
I know that the news is not all good

There are dark black clouds coming from the horizon and settling over our happiness tall sailing ship.
We did not see them, but they were brewing on the other side of that sunny day tea that we sipped

Please I'm just the messenger; it is not my intention to scare. But you see ? I only thought it is my duty to make you all aware

There are homeless tents that are out of order; immigrants find themselves on the border
Hometown people of places who have their pride; invaded by people who have their priorities

Terrorists capable of still more tragedies; forced labor in China for our lithium batteries. Dying trees right outside my door; this is just not my world anymore.
Is it wrong for me to want it to be the way things were before?

Ukrainian war atrocities are very numbing
Electric cars; I can't here them coming

Gerrimandering and product shrinkflation
School shooting desensitization; covid vaccine makers are very clever; plastic bottles now more than ever

Aging congressmen think too slow; cell phone big brother follows me everywhere I go; sometimes I feel like yelling, ""look out below!!""
But does my worrying need to slow?
Calmness for me to undergo?

Elementary school shooting drills today; class interrupted for fire drills in my day; national polarization that's here to stay; if we only had someone to tell us, "it's going to be okay"

You overdose on digital fentanyl; your addicted to streaming
Looking from the outside it seems your daydreaming
Looking from the outside it seems that your scheming

Misinformation mythology perpetrated by Frankenstein technology; the false narratives are driving you out of your gord; you need to pay attention to the misinformation scoreboard
For way too long, you have enjoyed your false reward; somehow your sanity needs to be restored

Profit guiding everything; the song that FOX, ESPN, and Amazon sing
Lose a little; the stock price goes down; no interest in planning for a sensible rebound

Pizza palace; burger kingdom; Starbucks prices getting higher
Corporations uninvited with their ever widening roads of empire

Those who dropped the moral compass are at the gates to lift the latch
Let us bathe ourselves and go back to that park for another game of catch

Boulders on the sidewalk to keep the homeless away; horn honking drivers blow another fuse; online trollers won't leave me alone; gum stuck on the bottom of my shoes

Pharmaceutical drug companies with a license to steal; five star high school kid with a million dollar NIL deal; misinformation, green washing, brainwashing galore; this just truly doesn't seem to be my world anymore

We vote for a candidate we entrust; until they break the public trust; our rage and disgust; we all need to readjust; to yet another newspaper that bites the dust

Drug smuggling operations in Cartagena; another government official is under subpoena; sports announcers calling the game from the office and not the arena

We need to get outside more often and take in the fresh breeze;
is it too hard for us to go ahead and just say please?

I walk down the sidewalk; hair combed and I'm clean shaven; in a world of drug dealing exploitation; I wear untorn clothing just like my generation
The relieved looks on people's faces confident in their assertion.
It's as if they are saying, ""I'm just so happy to see a normal person""

People's longing to escape and retreat from a wasteland of a world that's practically at their feet
We need our four walls of escape from reality's torment; our house; our apartment; or even a homeless tent

The world is too fast; I can't keep up with the changes. I don't want anymore of these social rearranges. This dance floor is too crowded; I feel like I'm surrounded; by the ineptitude and atrocities that mankind has compounded

Space garbage wasteland from Earth's current occupants; more mass shootings and classified documents
I just want to be sent back to that park by dispatch; to someone waiting for a nice little game of catch

Used cars and broken down furniture we abandon; right wingers still say, ""let's go Brandon""
Catching hell from the Mexican cartel....
Immigrants?.... they're still at the border; does that ring a bell?

This crumbling house of cards of ours we need to discuss; for the love of God.....
""Please Somebody Stop Us !!""

Finally......

Mother nature is waiting on the sidelines by the grip of our machines that drove her....
I stare at a majestic snowcap mountain on a clear day and anyone who knows her....

Knows......

It's as if she is saying as soon as human beings have expired, we are moving back in and taking over

Mother nature is biding her time for the day she finally served mankind.......

Their notice of foreclosure

— The End —