"strata" poems
Thank you for the memories,
The unexpected, sudden hits of nostalgia
Taking me back to carefree days
Of playing football after a summer rainstorm,
Of laughing in woodwork class,
Of my grandmother's awesome cakes.
Like time travel on the cheap,
You weather away the years,
And the strata of cynicism and regret,
Momentarily eroding my reality,
Revealing the manchild at my core,
Allowing him the briefest chance to once again explore.
But these are unpredictable reveries,
Three dimensional snatches of memories.
It's time they developed some kind of smell recorder,
Just like sights and sounds can be held for posterity.
But such technology would not compare to my physiological wonder;
Magically transforming scent into vivid memories.
Sep 20, 2018
Sep 20, 2018 at 1:57 PM UTC
*Milky way around me
stars, sun, planets, the moon
interstellar, interplanetary
orbits, i commune
The heavens surround me
galaxies, constellations, nebulae
across my cosmic journey
for revolutions i'll stay
The cosmos envelope me
dark stars, black holes, supernova
flames in my tail I see
celestial brightness of my strata
Heavenly bodies you and me
falling star, giant star, dwarf star
my love is quasar-like energy
a bolide of us is not far
Astronomical intensity
alpha centauri,sirius, achernar
encompasses their enormity
unlike pulsars, we are shooting stars*
Jan 12, 2013
Jan 12, 2013 at 8:19 AM UTC
1453
A Counterfeit—a Plated Person—
I would not be—
Whatever strata of Iniquity
My Nature underlie—
Truth is good Health—and Safety, and the Sky.
How meagre, what an Exile—is a Lie,
And Vocal—when we die—
5.8k
Morning Rainbow
Myriad prismatic crystals,
refract the morning sun-streams -
painting layers of spectral arches
across the misted horizon.
Eyes turned to the western skies,
we suspend our meteorological selves
acquiescing to miracles unveiled before us -
un-beckoned and scarcely earned,
proffering thanks for the radiant epistle
of healing, hope and promise,
artfully encoded in transfigured light.
Synthetic Refractions
A luminary ballet takes center stage
when synthetic refractors come to play:
crystal pendants bathe our foyers
with dazzling swaths of color.
Hazy coronas encircle streetlamps
discovered by headlights through the fog.
A science class prism slices light rays
into pre-ordered spectral strata.
If the sky denies us a rainbow,
we can always fashion one of our own
and we do!
Spectral Sound
Before there was music,
bird songs brushed our souls
and the murmur of woodland streams
held us captive by their banks.
Soon we learned to sing and tint the air
With prisms of wood and wire and metal
and to color soundscapes in our spirits
With songs of wonder, joy and longing.
Before there was music,
bird songs brushed our souls.
Robert Charles Howard, 2019
Feb 25, 2019
Feb 25, 2019 at 1:14 PM UTC
forgotten trifles
dust and pollen
tie the land and sea together
with a thicket of pine
white light shining through its crown
a bough once firmly rooted in heavy layers of strata
now aboveground it exceeds its breach
like a loaf of darkened bread
it lies (resting in the sand) stacked in rows
the sun and moon having melded its form
--- --- ---
the sky is a coronae of thorns coming down to greet me
running on the beach we see what looks like the torso of an elephant, I say its a wrecked ship, a storm has washed it ashore, you say it came from the Big Bang, we laugh and sit together on the end of an exposed epoch
it is dead
we are alive
thick with moments of compassion
fused with ignorance and neglect
how now are we communicating -- do you remember when you looked into my eyes and raised your arms triumphantly and proclaimed “ologemeide ... I tamed you!”?
Sep 21, 2017
Sep 21, 2017 at 7:47 PM UTC
the simple true |
vs.
absurd ********
water on mars points to the future of
the dead earth;
Fascists vs. aliens | complete fossils of advanced
hominids found miles
deep below [ ]
the Martian surface [but w/ no signs
of engineering or built structures]
questions w/ no answers |
what kind of society did Martians have:
dictatorship, democracy or empire & what kind of poetry
did they write:
searching for the great epic poet
of Mars beginning by digging straight down past the fossil record
coming upon an entirely other set of structures & fossils dated
thousands of years before those previously found
& further down, more advanced forms of society
at the deepest strata advanced electronics & technology appears
w/ less & less hominid forms, n still w/no evidence of written
poetry
|
Martian poetry may have been oral; so in
setting up sound meters to detect
residual radio-sound waves, the history of sound can be
recorded & focused on any one particular voice or several:
from this we detect recited verse
no matter how far back it was uttered; in truth, the older the better as it's
easier to distinguish & isolate the particular voice
from ambient rhythms
Jul 25, 2018
Jul 25, 2018 at 8:24 PM UTC
///
one real feel
I want to share with you,my friend
the shells of strata has three layers:
the upper shell of strata,
alluvium-
very polished-
straightforward-
black and white-
seems nothing wrong-
optimistic-
the middle shell,
the secret song-
surface has hidden-
dialectic-
partial red line-
pessimistic-
pressure on both upper and lower,
uncovered ultimate-
the bottom shell,
compact and tiny-
the hidden beauty–
the ultimate love--
after losing time,
spiritual---
///
- @Musfiq us shaleheen
Nov 12, 2014
Nov 12, 2014 at 11:01 PM UTC
I will never be
ensconced in
charming lace
valentine
hearts
candypink encased
You will not see me
withering away
back of hand
upon brow
in fainting stance
in a flowing silk dress
swinging on a
perfect bough
For I am a river
wild and true
sometimes quiet
sometimes
roaring and
soaring in
shimmering hues:
Blues and greens
mixed with shades
of earth, of fire
bespeaking emotions
in tones of desire
My river can get messy
can flood over too fast
because my heartstrings
get pulled
by the strength of
the blast
It can bring up
colored stones
in its undertow
fish and otters
spinning
in voodoo
overflow
As the colors rise up
in this heated coolness,
this deluge
the influx overwhelms me
with a power so huge
and then I need
some metallics,
flecks of silver and gold
to soothe
passion's piquancy
when it gets
particularly bold
Specked within rocks
to ground me, keep
my feet on the soil
prevent my heart
from slipping
down into
a choking,
hot oil
Bronze minerals reflect
peaks of sadness,
searing pain
from rawness of hurt
with no one to blame
Yes, it can be a balm
and also a burn
to be so linked
by spirit-threads
to another, in emotions
that churn
just on the brink
but never truly there
to experience the
fullness of rush
ripe culmination
abundant and lush
and that's when the
river turns
into molten
lava...
and I must dig
deep under
layers of ancient strata
seeking relief
in coolness of earth
as my spirit
again undergoes
a kind of rebirth
For when we
grow to love
strange things
happen, indeed
In the core of
my essence
you are the root
of my
seed
Jul 2, 2016
Jul 2, 2016 at 9:58 AM UTC
I
I am in Cardiff,
Where waves pummel the jetty
I am in Cardiff,
Where crab skeletons blanch the beach
I am nowhere
II
Where the sun severs the street and
Slowly, methodically,
They come, they come.
Electrifyingly stupefied in the dawn,
Tenantry not bound to cause and
Helpless as marred lead in the wind,
Stuck to strata and
Battered under **** pale-green
Thinned on spread fingers.
III
There is intent when the addict mutters ---
Alienated in his nettled gutters ---
"Life is cheap and love is free."
Hopelessness's epitome
Sits naked beyond the wall.
IV
And I am in Cardiff,
Where waves pummel the jetty
And I am in Cardiff,
Where crab skeletons blanch the beach
And I am nowhere
Dec 11, 2012
Dec 11, 2012 at 1:33 AM UTC
loathe — july 17, 2013
reëstablish the current which made being whole
no, not just in another life since fragmented whole is nothing tethered to the waist. that’s what belts are for. if you say so
monitor it like
you would anywhere
the trajectory is clear : light the torch of multi-orbed sensation
where we wait on the cusp
of the whole
perhaps in another life, we dare to suggest it. i don’t dare. if i did, i would consider myself a pigment of this pallet
i don’t breathe limited expectation
scientific claims
they’re just as good as dead to me. perhaps the whole can be related and consume our progress. there is too much to see. too little methods
methodic function isn’t perfunctory yet. a push is required. jumpstarting will only cause sparks.
i know something better
so sit down and move to the right. the light’s blocking my view and i cannot surmise unless i’m granted a complete oversight. nothing backseat, because we all know
that is reductive
paint splatters on my face
i
am
frozen
the colors reimage our complexion and erase the mistakes until we are whole
[ uncertainty is the new guarantee ]
introspection is a form by which we do so. everything we see is incomplete. our eyes need to be adjusted
to the [ uncertain ]
adore — july 29 , 2013
black blue strata pillars spruces flutes
eclectic aftermath debris snaffle pop
chute-in whelked chrome lugubrious
lifeblood : trans yes mutate pro-ohms
in timehalts wyoming woodsmoke
screened scans : rancid gemini rotors
hulks histories back - lying supine arts
( please remind me to act regimentally )
Aug 22, 2013
Aug 22, 2013 at 5:27 PM UTC
*why do people always pain themselves to write as if they could ever be understood, when so few read them, and even a fewer number care to understand? and why do so many ably bodied ******* themselves with writing? why have they lost the taste for fresh air and instead chose a wheelchair that writing is?*
in legal terms - are you implying a play on synonyms or
just simply stating: d'uh, i don't know what
that means? ah, a limitation on the vocabulary,
an atypical symptom of lawyers - when socrates attacked
eloquence per se, he also defeated himself
by ensuring law abided by the law of highest eloquence,
and the rabble got diddly-squat, his attack on rhetoricians
lost the prowess of attracting debased educators
with himself the most debased educator:
and instead attracted lawyers... thus the law of the eloquent,
rather than the rubric of the least eloquent...
lost an eye for an eye, lost a mouth with it too...
i rather be fed eloquence and education
and coarseness to equally educate
than be fed a justice fed by eloquence alone,
because if this is to be the equilibrating case,
then serving justice will just be a case of speaking
in a satin tongue of readied rhetoric
as justice so called,
and when speaking in a coarse tongue
no justice will be made applicable...
i rather be educated by someone in a coarse tongue
than be brought to justice by someone in an eloquent tongue,
i rather not be educated by someone in an eloquent tongue /
i rather be brought to justice by someone in a coarse tongue
(the mob),
at least the coarse tongue is well equipped to
address the many who require educating,
unlike the eloquent tongue equipped to
address itself and itself alone, rather than addressing
the jury who blindly pass judgement, because
the lawyer's tongue is not in the mouth of the defendant
but in the lawyer's mirror of social strata of respectability
appearing so guiding, kindly tying a bow-tie of applause.
Mar 11, 2016
Mar 11, 2016 at 10:50 PM UTC
Tonight!
Oh what sweet splendors
of travel that pour themselves out and over me!
Not to exotic lands,
but to those far better
the square foot of land that lays beneath us
when I am wrapped in your arms!
My bag is not packed,
there are gifts to be made,
things to be set in order
But just 10 hours!
10 hours after two months!
And I will be yours once again
The excitement,
the rapture,
one week of playing house with you
in the hot summer breezes
of Western Ohio
flat land,
so different from my home, from what I like
but what does it matter?
In your arms, the place could be bent and folded
painted in the wondrous colors of strata
Rose, gold, deep blacks and shimmering veins
of ground water spurting forth.
Pretty shell fossils
and pink quartz
they all exist in your eyes,
in your arms,
in your kiss
Jun 24, 2013
Jun 24, 2013 at 9:58 AM UTC
i never understood the concept of
intellectual ************
coming from people with more than three
children.
personally i found it more economic
to sell the theory of relativity
than i cared to see three *****
telling red from blue apart...
the concept of intellectual ************
had me lost...
i could only understand the worth
of ************ intellectually
had i the capacity to breed 3 or more children...
i found that intellectual ************ always
existed in people who had the capacity to breed
Irish families... and did so... without discouragement...
inclusive of some ulterior prompt,
or some Amazonian whim.
or a potato famine.
as paddy always does: move to the whimsical
care for strata.
intellectual ************ only makes sense
if you come from large investment familial circles...
or rabbit libido. who cares?!
none of them will ever build a Coliseum
what's the bother? a pint of Guinness?! why, i can pass
that one modern bother...
i rather ********** intellectually,
than fulfil my biological obligation of a catholic
family... paddy oats.
what do you get when you scratch a potato
long enough?
CHIPS!
squatter mckenzies! limp *****
kilt prone! chequers & cheese!
cheap joke... ha ha... hmm ha:
you got to load up on the romance
to **** off what's never bound to be funny.
Jan 22, 2017
Jan 22, 2017 at 1:06 AM UTC
1
Late afternoon
leaving the city
the bus route intersects
the terraced houses,
row upon row:
right to the valley floor,
left to wooded heights.
In a bay-windowed room
a child sits at a table
beachcombing the net.
Tea is past
and there is gentle talk of
volcanoes , the Verungas,
and gorillas in the midst.
Outside, and a floor below,
a garden nestles into the dusk,
a blackbird settles itself with song.
Later, at the same table.
there is a silent grace.
A shy five year old
in scary pyjamas
comes to say goodnight.
For supper: a goat’s cheese flan,
a simple salad,
pink wine,
strong coffee.
On the mantelpiece:
the familiar jumble of cards and photos,
a collage of family faces distant shores.
On the walls:
grandmother’s woven rug,
her grand-daughter’s textiled strata,
an embroidered geology.
2
The next day,
so bright and clear,
the garden bench is warm by ten.
We sit surrounded
by the evidence
of this growing season:
emergent plants, the possibility of fruit,
even declarations of vegetables.
As ideas flow
across cake and coffee
so the shadows move,
shaping depths, enriching tones
on greys, within greens.
In the midday sun,
the garden becomes
a wild tracery of lines
as perspectives
distort, corrupt, thicken . . .
and space opens everywhere:
foliage as yet transparent
no shelter to stalk and stem.
Their very arteries revealed,
plants bask in the fragile heat
of ‘just’ Spring.
Jan 6, 2013
Jan 6, 2013 at 4:58 AM UTC
heated flavors and
icy noises, up in the
high strata with
a singed mind of
transcendent swallowed thoughts
your molting feathers
fall down to the cobble stones
proclaiming the words
of your mind
up in this planetarium of
a passing breeze
you replace the stars
with gleaming clumps
of barb wire and broken wings
that rattle through the night
screeching frequencies
of your lost-in-precipitation mind
you see the dreams
of the masses
devoured by green,
which clash with
the medley of floral souls
within your grey matter
you breathe out a brink-filled
sigh of infinite--
all those emotional droplets
in that spiderweb mind.
perhaps one day
they will see with your eyes
or even the eyes of your eyes
but for now you are stuck
shouting at them to love
a love greater than that of Lady Black herself
but their ears are stopped up
with the spoon-fed lies of how
to live and they settle for
contentment, and not
passion
Dec 21, 2013
Dec 21, 2013 at 2:23 AM UTC
I am an
emotional
archeologist
digging d
e
e
p
into the contours
of the heart
trying to discern
what spots
need tender healing,
how to treat and
soothe its
fissured parts
I am a soul-mind
excavator
discerning
temperature and hue
measuring the depths
of textures
as we get down
to the root
We work hard,
my team and I
mapping earthen layers
we use the implements
of wisdom
to try and heal
this pain acute
and as we gently
cut through the strata
of history, of scars
I know that this
explorer's work
is worth it
for we will reach up
to the stars
So we continue on
in patience,
into the
blazing core
like truth-warriors
like healers
unlocking secret
ancient treasures
that will rise up
to the
fore
Apr 4, 2016
Apr 4, 2016 at 8:40 PM UTC
Tears of creation
fall from the overcast blanketing
of the billowy, white fields overhead,
blended with a requiem
that only the absence of dawn could manifest,
and kissed upon
by the ever-fluorescent canvases
of smoke, and flame
that carelessly intrude
upon the horizon.
Oh,
how fastidious is the misting
that blesses this premature day,
invoking a spontaneity
within the mundane clockworkings
that symbolically define
the average,
the everyday
and the norm.
Glorious is this sight to behold.
Not only by our soulpanes,
but through the remainder;
our entire spectrum of sensory awareness
that we are so gifted to have received,
yet,
rarely do their values go little more
than depreciated.
The refreshment
that quenches our starving skin,
and slowly enfilms us
with the caressings of unrequited purity.
The dampening of the air
that perpetually enthralls
even the most tolerant
resisters to aroma.
The crispness;
unadulterated,
and without perversions of the modern day;
enrapturous are the resonant entrails of the strata
that ever so gently envelop,
and awaken our slumbering buds.
And finally,
but without conviction,
the resound of symphonic harmony,
abound with the alluring enchantment
that,
in seamless refrain,
could only be achieved
by such a reverent miracle of nature.
These are the moments in which I revel.
And blessed be Her,
who benevolently grants us
with such an immaculance
of cornerless beauty.
Graceful, and sacred is the oasis in the sky.
May 26, 2014
May 26, 2014 at 6:52 PM UTC
I sit
on a canopy
of cool air
straight, aligned
my soul afloat
heart gently graced
Lotus palms,
fingers touching
as chakras form rainbows
from my base,
all through my spine
divinity frothing free
In prismatic pulses
my heartwaves
flushed of poisons,
energy cleansed
I am open
as the universe opens
to me
my third eye
in blossom
and even here
you reside in my
tiniest of fibers
even if I wanted to
I couldn't wash you out
you look into me
parting me, gently
reaching into my
deepest of
strata
I am fresh fruit,
pulled apart
My juice runs
like a godly river
without me even
parting my thighs
Time and time again
I am electrified
touching this earth
the ripe flow of you
folds me into
little earthquakes,
seismic vibrations
Only felt by me,
shaken to subtle core
and even if I tried to
resist it
you melt into me
like breath
you rock me
from chaos
into still ponds
So
for now
to calm the raging
waters that flow over
and through me
I sit
I breathe
and feel
one with
the heavens
and earth
the inner magic
rushing to me
I have myself,
woman of woman
and you,
a part of
my landscape
forever
Apr 13, 2019
Apr 13, 2019 at 6:37 AM UTC
on this day of winged hearts
and chocolates
one tends to write about their
"better half," their lovers or husbands
This is not one of those.
I have no better half
I am an entity whole.
Woman proud and complete
deep down strata of soul
this union
is held
by the thread of our children
tender shoots growing
in our shared care
and even that thread is frayed
I write this valentine's poem
for the love of myself
for the knowledge that
when I love myself first
and the universe will give
and I will snip
that thread
so begging to be snipped
and fly off into the winds,
my three moonbeams
in tow
always at my side
They will never
cease their growing
under my watchful eye
I will be loved
like I am supposed to be
whether by another
or only me
for I now know what I need
Slowly
layers unpeel
and each day
I am more ready
So take your little
fluttery paper hearts
that you never
gave me anyway
and paste them all
over your own
for soon you will find
you might
need them
Feb 13, 2017
Feb 13, 2017 at 11:44 PM UTC
Strata upon her lope with hope to everyone
when leaves would fall betwixt these righteous paths
whether your forks gathered rain
as autumn found together in sheer delight
where dryness perchance had provoked many living trunks
and maple syrup was flowing from sap
so delicious these hot cakes fulfilled grace and picnics in Eagles Mere.
Oct 18, 2016
Oct 18, 2016 at 11:36 AM UTC
Entering a world composed of surreal images
My mind must twist itself into difficult yoga poses
Attempting comprehension of the madness
Black aprons meander in rhythmic gyrations
Under harsh soul stealing luminescence
Lubricated with coffee to perform
Menial machinations miserably
I am but a tourist
On their macabre island full
With nightmarish denizens
Of this local purgatory
The poet dreamt of no circle
As dreadfully inhabited as this sinister strata
Easily a septante of sins sordidly succumbed to by soulless citizens
Apathetic arrogance masquerading as hospitality
While decency and morality are assaulted
According to the overlords abusive schedule
I am struck mute with paralytic paranoia
As I hurriedly set my offering upon the altar
And search for exact change
Mar 11, 2015
Mar 11, 2015 at 9:45 PM UTC
pain loves the present tense
it loves gravity so that the clouds
are turned into geological strata
sometimes I use my hands like an anaesthetic
between right and wrong the pain dillema:
to feel or not to feel (the unknown)
we discover clever remedies or illusions
quiet cannery in the storehouse of flesh
it comes in circles mixtures all kind of names
it has rythm texture electric blackness
each unshed tear an orb of contraction
compulsive excavation of the void inside
sometimes I feel I have canyons of salt in my heart
on the edges of safety so much to learn about terror
this pain is a blind Robinson on Hope island
(with his bare hands he sets pyres in his heart)
was it pain that invented this language, these holy wars?
love you, hate you, nonsense, can't stand it anymore
I know my father lied to me that he doesn't feel pain
bodies in pain can't dream the water slide of life
that might take us further away into the night of day
time to say thank you, say farewell,
love everything that simply is
it is time to
Mar 21, 2023
Mar 21, 2023 at 3:23 PM UTC
it's not a memorisable lullaby, i don't want to write poetry that requires memorisation by school children; perhaps a riddle, perhaps a jigsaw, perhaps an awakening after the words dig in from their arrangement into your own usage, distinguished.
these days, someone on a social
strata of being absolved
might require a concerned dis-involvement
from nouns, and thus juggle
the pronouns, over-use pronouns
to remain politically accurate and sound,
for to replace nouns with pronouns
would bleach people, entrapped
in the constant affirmative of something
they once owned but were dispossessed of,
they do that, they stress the usage of pronouns
by a relief a diet of noun usage,
so that a Pakistani dare not use
the associations of the noun that might
decipher his skin as cinnamon in writing,
unless it be pronoun inclusive and noun exclusive,
so as modern society teaches:
become pronoun users with a few distinguishing
nouns congregating, don't learn carboxylic,
don't learn onomatopoeia... keep up with
the bleak egoism that states: not so much self-interest,
but over-pronoun-use and a lack of nouns,
or if used, reduced to quizzes of crosswords
with antonyms and synonyms pronounced;
he who confesses to censoring noun usage
will control the pronoun category
by usurping noun usage freely with a censored usage
that will only provoke counter-nouns / slang /
encoding / the need for surveillance.
Feb 9, 2016
Feb 9, 2016 at 1:02 PM UTC
bahawasanya
semua binasa
angkara
nafsu
tinggal sisa-sisa
hayat angkasa
dan masa
semakin jauh
meninggalkan
manusia
dengan angka
dengan strata
hikayat termaktub
bermaharajalela.
Sep 13, 2018
Sep 13, 2018 at 7:24 PM UTC
Snowdrifts piling up
as brain melts down to zero sum
Not sure, now, what functions become
but, sure enough, what's piled high
in streets will become flood
Slide past corners
wash away
These torrents still insistent shakes
The quaking stops, now reach the sea
and rock on shifting waves.
Peer through striations clouding clouds and
sunlight
Soak into liquid, reach the bottom
grasp the floor
Handfuls of silt melt out through wrinkling digits
Withered faces, pickled organs: zero sum
Trickle down through strata--
read the layers
peel them back
Then, at the core, can settle down.
Nov 14, 2012
Nov 14, 2012 at 11:22 AM UTC