"steepled" poems
Beside his heavy-shouldered team
thirsty with drought and chilled with rain,
he weathered all the striding years
till they ran widdershins in his brain:
Till the long solitary tracks
etched deeper with each lurching load
were populous before his eyes,
and fiends and angels used his road.
All the long straining journey grew
a mad apocalyptic dream,
and he old Moses, and the slaves
his suffering and stubborn team.
Then in his evening camp beneath
the half-light pillars of the trees
he filled the steepled cone of night
with shouted prayers and prophecies.
While past the campfire's crimson ring
the star struck darkness cupped him round.
and centuries of cattle-bells
rang with their sweet uneasy sound.
Grass is across the wagon-tracks,
and plough strikes bone beneath the grass,
and vineyards cover all the slopes
where the dead teams were used to pass.
O vine, grow close upon that bone
and hold it with your rooted hand.
The prophet Moses feeds the grape,
and fruitful is the Promised Land.
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High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam
Islanded in Severn stream;
The bridges from the steepled crest
Cross the water east and west.
The flag of morn in conqueror's state
Enters at the English gate:
The vanquished eve, as night prevails,
Bleeds upon the road to Wales.
Ages since the vanquished bled
Round my mother's marriage-bed;
There the ravens feasted far
About the open house of war:
When Severn down to Buildwas ran
Coloured with the death of man,
Couched upon her brother's grave
That Saxon got me on the slave.
The sound of fight is silent long
That began the ancient wrong;
Long the voice of tears is still
That wept of old the endless ill.
In my heart it has not died,
The war that sleeps on Severn side;
They cease not fighting, east and west,
On the marches of my breat.
Here the truceless armies yet
Trample, rolled in blood and sweat;
They **** and **** and never die;
And I think that each is I.
None will part us, none undo
The knot that makes one flesh of two,
Sick with hatred, sick with pain,
Strangling--When shall we be slain?
When shall I be dead and rid
Of the wrong my father did?
How long, how long, till ***** and hearse
Puts to sleep my mother's curse?
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Hold hard, these ancient minutes in the cuckoo's month,
Under the lank, fourth folly on Glamorgan's hill,
As the green blooms ride upward, to the drive of time;
Time, in a folly's rider, like a county man
Over the vault of ridings with his hound at heel,
Drives forth my men, my children, from the hanging south.
Country, your sport is summer, and December's pools
By crane and water-tower by the seedy trees
Lie this fifth month unskated, and the birds have flown;
Holy hard, my country children in the world if tales,
The greenwood dying as the deer fall in their tracks,
The first and steepled season, to the summer's game.
And now the horns of England, in the sound of shape,
Summon your snowy horsemen, and the four-stringed hill,
Over the sea-gut loudening, sets a rock alive;
Hurdles and guns and railings, as the boulders heave,
Crack like a spring in vice, bone breaking April,
Spill the lank folly's hunter and the hard-held hope.
Down fall four padding weathers on the scarlet lands,
Stalking my children's faces with a tail of blood,
Time, in a rider rising, from the harnessed valley;
Hold hard, my country darlings, for a hawk descends,
Golden Glamorgan straightens, to the falling birds.
Your sport is summer as the spring runs angrily.
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For I will consider a town called Riverside.
For its only river, the dry Santa Ana, it's shore peppered with the homeless, garbage, an old shoe, a cart stolen from the grocery.
For its downtown with dried gum spots all along the sidewalk, its dive bars with regulars pouring in at 3pm and pouring cheap beer into their gullets until morning.
For its overpriced theatre, a gentrified landmark, driving the sun-hot strays to the park.
For the park, and a lake, dotted with boats in the summer, driven by tired feet, hands hiding beer in gas station soda cups.
For the mountain, with the old ladies, counting every step, looking up to the cross and over the edge onto a thick brown smog.
For the steepled churches on every corner, waking us every Sunday to pray to a hotly scarce God.
For I will consider a town called Riverside.
Oct 18, 2018
Oct 18, 2018 at 2:21 AM UTC
My laptop, iPod
Lie flat against the bottom
So conveniently
Like any other
Modern obsession we can’t
Treat with disregard.
Photographs will not
Surround the case, because I
Don’t have that many,
But even a past,
Abandoned lifetime deserves
A few muttered prayers.
The books occupy
The most space, as they always
Have, wordy giants:
Trilogy of elves,
Halflings and wizards warring
For the fate of men;
Two men discover
English magic on stormy
Moors, under gas lamps;
And a genius’s
Soul mate writes their adventures,
Hands steepled in thought;
And not forgetting
The others that have carried
Me down the road.
May 11, 2011
May 11, 2011 at 8:25 AM UTC
Red edging needles, pine
On blue mountain, nostrils
Of elk smoke with a bulls
Eye, scarlet stares of steely,
Steepled raven, snow drifts,
White fires in the lighted sky.
Jul 19, 2014
Jul 19, 2014 at 2:19 PM UTC
flip of the fingers house of your hands
steepled fingers like wooden roofbeams
diamond studded knuckles, rugby thumbs
palms over the dome and push doors
blueberry jars clink with raspberry under
the faded overhang of the balcony, leaves
me for sale and fortunate, slated skin,
mouthed promises against pixel skimmimg
Jul 21, 2015
Jul 21, 2015 at 4:43 PM UTC
Soot and ashes are the platter from which I dine,
the pool of my flagellation is the outpouring Merlot.
I forget to breathe through the lash,
rending the sackcloth until my nakedness is set before you.
The bells harken, the pendulum keeps time,
my requiem is set by your pulse.
DO NOT dismiss me, DO NOT neglect to
render my salvation in parcels.
Level after level of purgatory the holy grail
I imbibe and drink in ruin.
As the shredding of my skin with filaments of rope,
dislplay a journey of persecutions selfless ardor.
Crouching I beseech, I grovel,
forming steepled hands.
Oh, humble penance
slips my parched tongue and crippled lips.
Sweet King, Soveriegn Lord, Merciful Master,
I cower in my nothingness,
wrapped in the robes of bleak shame.
STILL I PRESS FORTH,
through decadent chambers,
in filth for a glimpse of your being.
For the simple gesture of uttering
your name.
Does your crown sweat with the bulk of my sobs?
To wipe your brow,
smear your worries on my bodice.
Enticing you from your throne to love...
a slave.
Sep 7, 2012
Sep 7, 2012 at 9:47 AM UTC
love is an ocean
and standing on a cliff
the wind begins to blow
before it has the chance
to push me into a fall
i dive
headlong
fingertips steepled
pressed together
outstretched
above my head
they direct me
toward that
sweet
crisp
splash
i hold
i am tight
smooth
aerodynamic
i hasten
my descent never pausing
never pining for the safety of the cliff
never looking back up
never checking
if the tide
is in
.
Sep 11, 2019
Sep 11, 2019 at 3:50 AM UTC
I recall the delicate flickering under the steepled sky
Always with the slight taste of sorrowful smoke.
No more.
Now leaden flames flash in the semi-dark,
The glow of childhood or childishness
Replaced in favor of some mechanical impostor.
A penny for your thoughts sir,
A quarter for your prayers.
Say what you will
About waxen tears and the sting of smoke,
At least there was a record
And you knew how it stood.
Mar 24, 2012
Mar 24, 2012 at 12:31 AM UTC
Cloud and snow spume
drift about your summit
veiling your face
Ma Nanda Devi
fixing my gaze to eternity
Rising like a giant shard of
rock carved over a million years,
snowfields scoured by avalanches, your steepled
peak a vast cathedral
Impossibly tall and steep
you rise abruptly over a
guardian ring of summits
witness to your inner realms of being,
the outer gorge of Rishi Ganga's roar
Climbers say in higher climes
light contrasts with darkness, flower leas with worn ridges, fear with elation
O paradox of the sublime
your name means Joy, enduring Joy
The veil lifts, was it the smoke of fires lit
by sages on your summit?
Your natural symmetry of two identical peaks suddenly at ease
is visible from my cottage window.
Jul 10, 2016
Jul 10, 2016 at 11:17 PM UTC
---
dead upon dead
to the left and the right
no fire to warm us
no more spark
no more light
the even' has come
the desert dry night
the only thing living
is the burgeoning kite
the only ruler
is a king with no crown
the lowly court jester
wears a red mask'd frown
some courtiers have starv'd
some courtiers have drowned
but as for the people
there's no one around
pile upon pile
of mouldering bones
some make up spires
some make up thrones
femurs the mortar
skulls are the stones
some lattice triangles
some steepled in cones
if you're in this city
you're truly alone
a skeleton rides
on a decaying horse
it has no conscience
it has no remorse
it needs no permission
but uses no force
where is this city?
why it's
YOUR TOWN Of COURSE.
soulsurvivor
(c) 6/3/2015
Jun 3, 2015
Jun 3, 2015 at 4:10 PM UTC
The moon shone on the trees and found
The trees were paler than the moon.
The wind was a peroxide stain
That stabbed, wormlike, toward the veiled fastness of my brain
The wind that skinned me ‘til I stood, naked and raw;
The corner of my mouth cradled a pestilential sore.
My throat was lined and thin and wan
As though it held the cranium of an antique and parasitic swan.
I turned my mouth toward the origin of my demise
And said,
“ I vowed to die amongst the trees
While human hands removed my clothes, and closed my crusted eyes
And human voices stilled my vague unease
But this will do for now.”
A crow wheeled above as I keeled over in the dust and saw
The sacred steepled chapel of somebody’s fleshless body
Writhe beside me, and in hollow whispers fall;
I closed my eyes and ushered in the shadows as the night began to crawl.
Aug 16, 2012
Aug 16, 2012 at 5:09 PM UTC
Red edging needles, pine
On blue mountain, nostrils
Of elk smoke with a bulls
Eye, scarlet stares of steely,
Steepled raven, snow drifts,
White fires in the lighted sky.
Sep 29, 2014
Sep 29, 2014 at 12:25 PM UTC
Red edging needles, pine
On blue mountain, nostrils
Of elk smoke with a bulls
Eye, scarlet stares of steely,
Steepled raven, snow drifts,
White fires in the lighted sky.
Oct 16, 2012
Oct 16, 2012 at 1:52 PM UTC
I
How will you remember me,
will you form my shape as is my way,
my veins swollen with a veiled rejoice
that hides my burial chamber beneath
a shrouded veil of contempt.
Who will remember me?
A fighting roaring man drunk as sand
an outside storm that weathered faces
in a rising sky full of snow horsemen,
that draw your eyes upwardly
then fall below their peculiar time.
II
How shall I be remembered?
A lover that blazed a trail every midnight,
he that stole and sold hearts in a single beat,
fashionable runt, cool in summers heady days
that ran from a friends sisters bed before her age.
Who would remember?
The love the labour the sweat
the boundless hours working for cruel light,
a family pace of a snails want
that sweet cruel need that never shy’s
and I am bound by my fragile word.
III
My brother, my sisters voices I hear with a clear ring
gutted on cold stone ground in frost
and I knew love before my maidens mouth
whispered through thickets of thorns and bramble.
Who will remember them?
It’s the breath from those that rant,
clergymen with fierce eyes that talk in fondness,
yet would perish when their birds fly unknown
before deaths curtain is closed and comital spoke.
Lost in my map, my life, my day in poise.
IV
Now I sigh long into the day.
My steepled church sky soars far above me
and days grow shorter with every passing mouth.
Saints and sinners ride together in fallen flames as I look for an open eye in this mudded rockpool water.
And I remember;
with long armed embrace
that I kissed maidens lips
when they were young with starry eyes
and was carefree with strong clasp of bone
and in this third season fall Autumn was taught that forever was my sea, but a few hours between.
All this long before my grave and dying light.
Feb 2, 2019
Feb 2, 2019 at 7:14 PM UTC
I saw him there under the
treeroots lurking
It was dark thereunder, but he
beckoned darker
*Still your rotting mouth
Shut your eldritch eyes,
or everywhere you'll see him*
I saw him by night in
my window screaming
He had his owlface on
with eyes like
nectar-filled lamps
*Turn away your brittle body
Draw the covers to your chin
and bear the beak in mind*
I saw him on Sunday
in the churchyard digging
He laid the bones of my Father
in the wet wormsoil
for marrow cracked and clean
*Stand still your writhen legs
You cast a shadow over him,
and he reaches up towards it*
I saw him on the strand
in my lover's face seething
He took my lips in his
and breathed into me
her still beating embers
I walked the path back alone,
full of ash
I went to my knees at the altar
and tried to *****
I saw him in the steepled tower
by me standing
He opened his mouth
and whispered the words
I craved to hear
I stood over their graves
and cast no shadow
Jul 14, 2015
Jul 14, 2015 at 9:31 PM UTC
At last, a welcomed light Autumn breeze,
Whistling passed steepled roofs,
Gently lifting branches of the bowing sycamore trees
Lining dull gray sidewalks still toasty warm
From the sweltering heat of the day before;
Departing summer flees threads of deep purple clouds
Leaching westward from the eastern sky,
Inky streams clawing their way into lighter shades of dusk,
The new season has cast her dye.
Feb 2, 2014
Feb 2, 2014 at 2:42 AM UTC
Red edging needles, pine
On blue mountain, nostrils
Of elk smoke with a bulls
Eye, scarlet stares of steely,
Steepled raven, snow drifts,
White fires in the lighted sky.
Nov 3, 2013
Nov 3, 2013 at 7:36 PM UTC
Head notes
Of loam fringed apple trees,
of near-but- nether fuchsia roots
A timeless travel of ridge top tiles.
Steepled spins of weathervanes,
A sobriquet of pre- dawn rainfall.
Heart notes
Of hornbeam,
of coriander deer path.
Memories of bonfire- hope
in ragwort sprays of yearning.
A hint of feelings half remembered.
Of longbows hewn from churchyard yews.
Of rope swings and of scaffold
Base notes
Of river mist.
Poseidon wreaths of furnace ash,
allied to a merlot tint of afterglow release.
Endings are, valerian,
patchouli heads of linen musk.
A lasting peace of closing lawns
that wait approaching snow.
Jul 23, 2017
Jul 23, 2017 at 3:08 AM UTC
Red edging needles, pine
On blue mountain, nostrils
Of elk smoke with a bulls
Eye, scarlet stares of steely,
Steepled raven, snow drifts,
White fires in the lighted sky.
Mar 11, 2014
Mar 11, 2014 at 12:15 PM UTC
.
Red edging needles, pine
On blue mountain, nostrils
Of elk smoke with a bulls
Eye, scarlet stares of steely,
Steepled raven, snow drifts,
White fires in the lighted sky.
Oct 17, 2016
Oct 17, 2016 at 3:19 PM UTC
Distracted by refracted light
reflected back in spite of all that stands between
the prism and the clear blue screen
that coats my eyes.
Underneath the forest skies where sight lines split
and bits of colour splash into the white of splintered bark
trees aspire to be much more than rooted to the woodland floor.
Who but Frankenstein could build his dream
above the scream of spires and steepled people?
Swept clean and brushed away
the horror of a yesterday.
Within the spiral trapped inside the twist
where love was kissed and walked away
the folly of a yesterday.
I lay me down to weep
in nightmare sleep
I keep my yesterday.
Apr 4, 2013
Apr 4, 2013 at 1:17 PM UTC
Red edging needles, pine
On blue mountain, nostrils
Of elk smoke with a bulls
Eye, scarlet stares of steely,
Steepled raven, snow drifts,
White fires in the lighted sky.
May 9, 2013
May 9, 2013 at 11:33 AM UTC