"stoops" poems
The evening breeze sings the forgotten songs
Of ghosts of nymphs 'tween silver birches there.
And beams of moonlight fall on grassy lawns:
A pearly cloak e'erywhere the eye sees fair.
So many gentle dawns took care to kiss
Along the flowered, verdant forest floor.
In this blessed land so filled with matchless bliss,
Upon golden and rose-pink blossoms which it wore.
Every visitor that stumbles here
Stops to see the flowers near,
And stoops to pick some strawberries
In the meadows, for their families.
Jul 20, 2014
Jul 20, 2014 at 1:18 AM UTC
So now the changed year’s turning wheel returns
And as a girl sails balanced in the wind,
And now before and now again behind
Stoops as it swoops, with cheek that laughs and burns,—
So Spring comes merry towards me now, but earns
No answering smile from me, whose life is twin’d
With the dead boughs that winter still must bind,
And whom to-day the Spring no more concerns.
Behold, this crocus is a withering flame;
This snowdrop, snow; this apple-blossom’s part
To breed the fruit that breeds the serpent’s art.
Nay, for these Spring-flowers, turn thy face from them,
Nor gaze till on the year’s last lily-stem
The white cup shrivels round the golden heart.
10.8k
Some call it bi-polar
I prefer manic-depression
It fits us better with adequate expression
We live our life in swooping loops
We strive at our peak then it droops
And the doleful drudge is destitute
Until all progress stops and stoops
To a halt, face down in mud and roots
And then we rise
Called back to life by a guiding light held deep inside
Sorely self-aware, we work until we burst
Droll desperation, at our best when at our worst
"Wow you got your **** together you lost and soulless ruffian."
Then we hit our peak and it all starts back up again
Feb 18, 2017
Feb 18, 2017 at 3:08 AM UTC
Adieu, farewell earth’s bliss!
This world uncertain is:
Fond are life’s lustful joys,
Death proves them all but toys.
None from his darts can fly;
I am sick, I must die—
Lord, have mercy on us!
Rich men, trust not in wealth,
Gold cannot buy you health;
Physic himself must fade;
All things to end are made;
The plague full swift goes by;
I am sick, I must die—
Lord, have mercy on us!
Beauty is but a flower
Which wrinkles will devour;
Brightness falls from the air;
Queens have died young and fair;
Dust hath closed Helen’s eye;
I am sick, I must die—
Lord, have mercy on us!
Strength stoops unto the grave,
Worms feed on Hector brave;
Swords may not fight with fate;
Earth still holds ope her gate;
Come, come! the bells do cry;
I am sick, I must die—
Lord, have mercy on us!
Wit with his wantonness
Tasteth death’s bitterness;
Hell’s executioner
Hath no ears for to hear
What vain art can reply;
I am sick, I must die—
Lord, have mercy on us!
Haste therefore each degree
To welcome destiny;
Heaven is our heritage,
Earth but a player’s stage.
Mount we unto the sky;
I am sick, I must die—
Lord, have mercy on us!
6.2k
A mere trifle, this thing that troubles the lid.
Forever in fear, unable to compose
Vision stoops to comprehend this failure,
Pride doesn’t.
A glimpse of blindness,
With the ardor of helplessness.
De facto, it is in the eyes of another
Where you were mistaken.
The red in between
Defining ties of the wicked, wise
In stupor and pain, in insomniac lethargy
The poisoned gaze, returns quietly.
Sun shades, remember
Anger cheats as much as it destroys.
The flaming ash of a cigarette,
Another excuse for a Gimlet.
May 4, 2014
May 4, 2014 at 6:09 PM UTC
we ate government cheese
that came in a dull brown box
we were too young
to understand what welfare
and food stamps meant,
our empty bellies never protested
at the salty orange blocks
in front of the bodega,
we saw a woman introduce a hammer
to a drunk tyrant’s skull
his blood pooling on the streets
was too red for new eyes
we watched hypodermic needles
bloom on stoops
cling to life on curbs
the graffiti on abandoned buildings
was our Louvre, our Salon de Paris
sweltering streets our baseball diamonds
prostitutes, black or brown or both
mothered us between shifts
we grew up in projects,
that sheltered drab lives
and senseless brutalities
gunfire, sharp and immutable
punctured lullabies
we were small boys
watching life unfold
the way one stares at an accident
detached and mildly curious
eyeing cooly the despair
and impossible hopelessness
of growing up poor
in Brooklyn
Mar 28, 2015
Mar 28, 2015 at 10:40 PM UTC
Crow was watching ......
......with his toothless grin .
Biding his time ......
...... he then stoops in .
He knows more than you may think ,
it all reeks of a ghastly stink .
No matter ! With your false truths ,
your lies betray you , So Uncouth !
So now ... When you are alone ,
be safe and wise ! Know the Unknown .
For crow is silent and cares not ,
Has his revenge already been Begot ?
Victims ! Aren't we all ?
Those Who rise sublimely ,
Only to find their fall .........
Jan 11, 2016
Jan 11, 2016 at 12:50 PM UTC
319
The nearest Dream recedes—unrealized—
The Heaven we chase,
Like the June Bee—before the School Boy,
Invites the Race—
Stoops—to an easy Clover—
Dips—evades—teases—deploys—
Then—to the Royal Clouds
Lifts his light Pinnace—
Heedless of the Boy—
Staring—bewildered—at the mocking sky—
Homesick for steadfast Honey—
Ah, the Bee flies not
That brews that rare variety!
4k
We are not sure of sorrow,
And joy was never sure;
Today will die tomorrow;
Time stoops to no man's lure;
And love, grown faint and fretful,
With lips but half regretful
Weeps that no love endures.
From too much love of living,
From hope and fear set free,
We thank with brief thanksgiving
Whatever God may see,
That no man lives forever;
That dead men rise up never;
That even the weariest river
Winds somewhere safe to sea.
Here, where the world is quiet;
Here, where all trouble seems
Dead winds and spent waves' riot
In doubtful dreams of dreams;
I watch the green field growing
For reaping folk and sowing,
For harvest time and mowing,
A sleepy world of streams.
I am tired of tears and laughter,
And men that laugh and weep
Of what may come hereafter
For men that sow to reap:
I am weary of days and hours,
Blown buds of barren flowers
Desires and dreams, and powers
And everything but sleep.
A.C. Swinburne
(with slight alterations)
Jun 10, 2013
Jun 10, 2013 at 3:08 PM UTC
19 September is the Chinese Festival of Mid-Autumn
It’s Mid-autumn of the Bing Chen year
And I’ve been drinking happily all night.
I'm drunk
.
So I write this poem
to remember my brother, Zi You.
With a cup of wine in my hand,
I asked the blue sky
‘When will the moon be clear and bright?’
’In the heavens on this night,’ it said.
I wonder what season it is in heaven.
I'd like to ride homeward on the wind
Yet I fear the mansions of crystal and jade
are much too cold and far too high.
If I dance with my moonlit shadow,
It hardly seems a human world.
The moon comes round
Behind the red mansion,
Stoops to enter the carved wood doors,
Shining upon all sleeplessness,
it bears no grudge,
oh why
Does the moon tend to be so full
when people are far apart and alone?
We feel sorrow, we feel joy.
Whether we’re near or distant
It makes no odds.
The moon may be dim or bright,
A crescent slice or round as a ball.
This imperfection has always
been there; since time began.
Tonight may we be blessed
with a life that’s long and true.
Though a thousand miles lie
between us, we can surely share
the beauty of this autumn moon -
together.
Sep 19, 2013
Sep 19, 2013 at 4:12 PM UTC
Certainly our city with its byres of poverty down to
The river's edge, its cathedral, its engines, its dogs;
Here is the cosmopolitan cooking
And the light alloys and the glass.
Built by the conscience-stricken, the weapon-making,
By us. Wild rumours woo and terrify the crowd,
Woo us. Betrayers thunder at, blackmail
Us. But where now are They.
Who without reproaches showed us what our vanity
has chosen,
Who pursued understanding with patience like a ***
had unlearnt
Our hatred and towards the really better
World had turned their face?
Who knows? The peaked and violent faces are exalted,
The feverish prejudiced lives do not care, and lost
Their voice in the flutter of bunting, the glittering
Brass of our great retreat,
And the malice of death. For the wicked card is dealt and
The sinister tall-hatted botanist stoops at the spring
With his insignificant phial and looses
The plague on the ignorant town.
Under their shadows the pitiful subalterns are sleeping;
The moon is usual; the necessary lovers touch;
The river is alone and the trampled flower;
And through years of absolute cold
The planets rush towards Lyra in a lion's charge. Can
Hate so securely bind? Are they dead here? Yes.
And the wish to wound has the power. And tomorrow
Comes. It's a world. It's a way.
2.3k
Strongly rooted yet flexible,
the higher it grows, the deeper it bows.
Bend but don’t break.
Keep calm and free yourself to sway.
Gently dance in the rhythm of the winds
and firmly stand to the ground.
Be a bamboo that stoops, but strong.
Oct 16, 2018
Oct 16, 2018 at 5:08 AM UTC
They wanted to build
a counter culture
a version of
whatever
needed straight from
society
I shoulda' been born in the 60’s
cause I recycle more than
I create trash and like
an acid flashback,
I don’t even have a license
just bicycle from point A
to point B
I realize,
I shoulda' been born in the 60’s
they call me a hippie but
the fringe and leather
don’t make me
it’s that I practice what I
preach
I listen and I teach
I reach out to the old
faith
Gandhi and passive resistance
tryin' to make a difference
even if peace don’t
“exist” at least I don’t
reach out to war
as if it’s at my fingertips
and just like braidin’ hemp
the center splits-
I shoulda' been born in the 60’s
I listen to classic rock
and jam to an mp3
records and tape decks
old school
is where you'll find me
Jimi and Zeppelin and
The Doors make me jive
without that music
I don’t even think I’d be alive
it’s that drive-
like man, you’re either on the bus or
off the bus
but I hopped coast to
coast
cause in love we trust
west to east in a retreat,
just to find the true me.
I shoulda' been born in the 60’s
I wear flowers in my hair
and sat on stoops
in Haight
I grew my hair long
and I sport natural waves
I don’t wear makeup or
go to raves
I try and find my grass roots
while they sport white collar jobs
and dress up in their suits
I write poetry and rhymes
I paint and I draw the line where man-
I should have been born in the 60’s
but I’m 93’
and thats ok with me.
in this current day and year
of 2014
Feb 7, 2014
Feb 7, 2014 at 2:43 PM UTC
Up from the deep
Water breaks in diagonal sheets.
The skies careen off and away
Red arrays.
Universe of musculature
A foot in a sandy detour.
Indirect to purpose
Skin and flow.
Dries on the gilded bank
Wild hair set flat.
A thousand atmospheres taken
Into a single ozone breath.
After a time, stoops
By the multiform to look.
Stones heavy-
Light enough to carry.
To the mouth wide
And bitten dry.
The water wears everything
So the teeth can split.
A fortnight of spite
And the treacherous bite.
He returns to the sea
With a headful of light.
May 14, 2010
May 14, 2010 at 2:08 PM UTC
When the dusts settle from the last wheel
and the sickle moon stoops on the bamboo grove
the dead rise in the whispers of the southern breeze.
You may hear them splashing the canal's water
beneath the hazed halo of one quarter
by nocturne music of barn owl and crickets
in lights of glowworms from darkest thickets.
If you stop on the Rotwood Bridge
can hear them sing in gay abandon
*though we're now all dead old spirits
the night can't make us anymore forlorn*.
The twin moon may from the ripples broken
beckon you and if your spirit awakens
take a plunge for a joyous down go
amid cheers from the watery hollow.
Mar 27, 2016
Mar 27, 2016 at 12:00 PM UTC
As I went walking up and down to take the evening air,
(Sweet to meet upon the street, why must I be so shy?)
I saw him lay his hand upon her torn black hair;
(”Little ***** Latin child, let the lady by!”)
The women squatting on the stoops were slovenly and fat,
(Lay me out in organdie, lay me out in lawn!)
And everywhere I stepped there was a baby or a cat;
(Lord, God in Heaven, will it never be dawn?)
The fruit-carts and clam-carts were ribald as a fair,
(Pink nets and wet shells trodden under heel)
She had haggled from the fruit-man of his rotting ware;
(I shall never get to sleep, the way I feel!)
He walked like a king through the filth and the clutter,
(Sweet to meet upon the street, why did you glance me by?)
But he caught the quaint Italian quip she flung him from the gutter;
(What can there be to cry about that I should lie and cry?)
He laid his darling hand upon her little black head,
(I wish I were a ragged child with ear-rings in my ears! )
And he said she was a baggage to have said what she had said;
(Truly I shall be ill unless I stop these tears!)
1.8k
Himself it was who wrote
His rank, and quartered his own coat.
There is no king nor sovereign state
That can fix a hero's rate;
Each to all is venerable,
Cap-a-pie invulnerable,
Until he write, where all eyes rest,
Slave or master on his breast.
I saw men go up and down
In the country and the town,
With this prayer upon their neck,
"Judgment and a judge we seek."
Not to monarchs they repair,
Nor to learned jurist's chair,
But they hurry to their peers,
To their kinsfolk and their dears,
Louder than with speech they pray,
What am I? companion; say.
And the friend not hesitates
To assign just place and mates,
Answers not in word or letter,
Yet is understood the better;—
Is to his friend a looking-glass,
Reflects his figure that doth pass.
Every wayfarer he meets
What himself declared, repeats;
What himself confessed, records;
Sentences him in his words,
The form is his own corporal form,
And his thought the penal worm.
Yet shine for ever ****** minds,
Loved by stars and purest winds,
Which, o'er passion throned sedate,
Have not hazarded their state,
Disconcert the searching spy,
Rendering to a curious eye
The durance of a granite ledge
To those who gaze from the sea's edge.
It is there for benefit,
It is there for purging light,
There for purifying storms,
And its depths reflect all forms;
It cannot parley with the mean,
Pure by impure is not seen.
For there's no sequestered grot,
Lone mountain tam, or isle forgot,
But justice journeying in the sphere
Daily stoops to harbor there.
1.7k
A young princess stoops,
plucking a dandelion from the earth.
She smiles, twirling it between her fingers,
soon bringing the dandelion close to her lips.
Her message, she whispers to the tiny seeds.
Softly as can be she blows on the dandelion,
sending the cotton-white fluff
soaring into the cool breeze,
carrying her words, spreading her love
down on the citizens in her kingdom.
Oct 30, 2014
Oct 30, 2014 at 2:40 PM UTC
Honor and happiness unite
To make the Christian's name a praise;
How fair the scene, how clear the light,
That fills the remnant of His days!
A kingly character He bears,
No change His priestly office knows;
Unfading is the crown He wears,
His joys can never reach a close.
Adorn'd with glory from on high,
Salvation shines upon His face;
His robe is of the ethereal dye,
His steps are dignity and grace.
Inferior honors He disdains,
Nor stoops to take applause from earth;
The King of kings Himself maintains
The expenses of His heavenly birth.
The noblest creature seen below,
Ordain'd to fill a throne above;
God gives him all He can bestow,
His kingdom of eternal love!
My soul is ravished at the thought!
Methinks from earth I see Him rise!
Angels congratulate His lot,
And shout Him welcome to the skies.
1.6k
The seven day prayer candle burned out
seven days ago, and the twisted blinds
are held together with chopsticks and moving tape
after snapping in an unresolved haunting.
The nights enter like gemstones and exit like rabbits.
Truth sequestered from skin; I get a haircut
instead of another tattoo.
While shaving my neck with a straight razor,
the bald Albanian barber asks me:
"Which is scarier: people or mirrors?"
Before I could reply he shook his head:
“Trick question. They are the same thing.”
Walking home, I tore up the if-I-die note I had hidden
in my back pocket, and taught the pieces to dance
to the silence of buckshot screaming into a black hole.
The choreography was as patient as pregnant pauses
breathing into paper bags.
To the neighbors, smoking cigarettes on their stoops,
the shredded paper just looked like litter.
Jan 15, 2013
Jan 15, 2013 at 9:45 AM UTC
An old woman sits down in the wheelchair.
A small child takes her first wavering step.
A million fireworks dance into the air, flash, ears hear songs of celebration, awe takes hold.
A million mortar shells leap into the air, flash, ears sing the ring of confusion, shock takes hold.
A man nearing the end of his time on earth stoops to tie a child's shoe.
A man nearing the end of his time on earth stoops to tie a noose.
A woman in white walks down the aisle alongside the man she loves.
A woman in black walks down the aisle to the man she loved.
A doctor readies a syringe to administer a dose of cold medicine to an ill infant.
A doctor readies a syringe to administer a dose of pentobarbital to an ill canine.
A doctor readies a syringe to administer a dose of ****** into her own arm.
A father raises his hand.
. . .
A child receives a reassuring pat on the shoulder, his team having just won the tee-ball state championships.
A woman takes aim, her lens coming into focus on her subject.
. . .
A man that has been psychologically abusing her for several years collapses to the ground.
A team of several hundred people stands back, looking in awe upon the skyscraper they have designed and built over the course of several years. This accomplishment towers above all else humankind has created.
A team of several hundred people stands back, looking in awe upon the mushroom cloud they have engineered and constructed over the course of several months. This weapon towers above all else humankind has created.
A million lives wink out.
A million eyes open for the first time.
A manuscript is penned, the author sets down his pen and takes a sip of tea.
A pile of books burns with black smoke, the cult sets down their torches and takes a deep breath before screaming.
The infant screams sharply after taking its first breath.
The old man wheezes after telling the last of his stories to his grandson.
"That's it, boy. That's everything I ever did."
A tear rolls down his cheek, the profundity of his statement dawning on him as the breaths become harder to take.
"That's everything I was to everyone I met."
Under every rock a thousand secrets shimmer.
Beneath every tree, a hundred promises have been made.
Some of them have been broken.
Remember the promises you made? You know the ones.
You can become the architect of someone's dreams or the shadowed figure in their nightmares.
You can put down the gun. You can pull the trigger.
You can.
A billion men and a billion women before you have lived out their lives, have wasted, have wanted, have sunk to the lowest depths and risen to the highest peaks. A million have set out to become the best at something, and a whole lot of them have succeeded.
Apr 8, 2013
Apr 8, 2013 at 11:55 PM UTC
Smile so haunting with devilish
or fiendish
or that of charming aesthetics,
the slender creature of a man
parched flesh of paper
would flick his eyes bright
and stir crazy as embers
about the stage,
his hair a mat of threads,
ancient and animalistic,
yet of thick wafting softness,
he appears so gentle,
so timid
child eyes brushed by his bangs
yet confident in that grin
cut so lightly across his face,
he would disarm your distrust,
carry you to his attractive gentleness
as he cloaks the stage about him
and then as the lights dim,
the audience edged on their seats,
your sheepish and sugar laced eyes
of curiosity linger at the heels of his lips,
as he slaughters your precious innocence,
with My words,
smile ever increasing
feasting on their fearful stares
my poem a muffled shotgun
at the back of the audiences head,
their tremoring bodies scream
as he constrains the straps constricting
their legs and limbs,
all the world’s a coroner’s table
he stoops so lovingly over them,
snow white raven of a boy,
his words of glinting blade dive,
their eyes a mess of soupy white and tangled red
surgical increments ripping their ribs and sternum wide,
they scream with blistered skin,
straps beginning to burrow and feast into their limbs,
the boy labors diligently,
effortlessly he worms his fingers about blood drenched organs
twists and plucks them free,
the victim’s body squirming,
skin wriggling,
as their eyes stare and gasp upon
their organs strewn next to them,
shock ripping through them,
crawling within their hollowed out body,
he laps up their gaping wound,
cut and carved from sternum to pelvis,
licking up blood soaked soul and kidney,
my demon of timid grin spills out the final phrases
his victims have long lost resilience,
they watch and lie as a mess of human,
half corpses on the table,
the audience a funeral procession,
the lights suffocated,
no one wishes to speak,
silence is the only reverie to my poems darkness
the boy or man,
demon or fiend
would softly grin
the audience just as cold and dead as him
Sep 22, 2011
Sep 22, 2011 at 12:59 AM UTC
I hail a cab. I’ve got to leave this part
of town, the Upper West,
dripping with fatty money.
At 97th I step in
and exhale, revived
by the sweating air in taxi cabs.
Through the window
I see
the imposing orange
of a tall
sewer ventilator,
steaming and
ignored—
At Columbus Circle,
a corner hot-
dog stand
is slow-
ly wheeled to
its moment-
ary place—
Broadway, with
one closed bank.
Empty, in back
the dusted black,
and iron beams?
Things lean
diagonal
against the walls,
a warning—
Faster, faster,
further south and somewhere
in the Village.
The rows,
rows and rows
of brownstone stoops:
quietly lined
along the street
patient, waiting,
delightfully clean—
The cab rolls to a stop. I pay and step out to the street.
Near Greenwich Street, the crosswalk
supports some types trying so hard
not to be doing all that much
and wearing hip clothes.
I’ll stop mid-street, look up real high,
and take in the sunlight
that’s slamming against the pavement.
Feb 6, 2010
Feb 6, 2010 at 10:22 AM UTC
There is something about it
The inexplicable curve in the diet
Swimming in pink grapefruit,
Sharing the stunted manifestation
Of a slice of clementine Gouda cheese
The way, the solace in a lone glass of wine
Chilled iced, purged crayfish
Flushed from the brittle salt basked seas
From the callused knuckle of stony fisherman
Casting out at the crackling array of dawn
With the waters brimming at the hulk
And the mast scraping it's white and red tusks
The fisherman who left at dawn
Leaving his beloved steeped in slumber...
Allowing her eyes flutter to the beam of pink salmon
And there is just something about it,
Pulsing from the faint flicker of overhanging bulbs
A writer stoops over a sliver of miracle
Purged from the raw etched in his vast chest
The very act of describing compassion & sin
With the ink soaked mechanism of his typewriter
The legacy of a young girl
Who wasn't meant to save the world
But to find it, the humanity whisked away,
Drowned perhaps by whiskey and alcohol
Eyesights deterred from the long lone walk
Pocketed with threats and head shakes
The writer's fingers fly,
And funny how there is something about it
How it doesn't end in full circle
That we lack the great capacity
To seize the flesh of truce
So distilled we sail,
So perturbed we write,
So empty we feast
Never quite knowing
That elemental presumption
Of something more
Aug 2, 2016
Aug 2, 2016 at 2:33 PM UTC
Exploring hands encounter no defence;
Recollecting endeavours drives her to a dry pain
Throbbing, throbbing
Hamlet's hamartia discards her to the lowest of the dead
His vanity requires no response;
Her life on the line and he's got nothing to lose.
So much more the eye can see
Caressing, caressing
Her brain allows one half-formed thought to pass;
Leave me, carbuncle:
Words she has never been able to utter . . .
Loudly, she thinks it
It doesn't translate
Shivering, quivering
Brittle monster bestows one final patronising kiss
I must exercise some form of self control
Hardly aware of her departed lover,
She lays in a yellow blanket;
Phosphenes in the emerging light of day.
Apr 22, 2015
Apr 22, 2015 at 2:10 PM UTC