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Paul Butters Nov 2014
Mysterious, mist-kissed hills dismiss my dismal disdain
For Life’s strivings in the ivy wired mire.
Budding blossoms embrace my burgeoning bliss-filled *****,
As my soul soars into the seething skies.

My wings are beating with breathless wonder,
My imagination sends me to a destination
Beyond discrimination, defying appellation,
But not exclamation, at this elevation.

Smooth pools of cool blue hue contrast with cliffs
That overhang the huddled houses
Of the hillside village
On the way to who knows where.

The mists are shifting, ever drifting
Hiding everything
Except the mountain tops.
A new dimension might await us
Always moving as
Our journey never stops.

Paul Butters
Worked the words.
Life's a Beach Nov 2014
So I hid it
Took it like a written confession and
swallowed it
Decades of genders, females and
males screaming, as I melted down
the word on my tongue they had fought to keep,
that they had killed for and won.
As I joined a flock of sheep who wouldn't
accept a goat
Who didn't want to listen when I wrote down
that I believed in the allegedly frown-worthy
opinion that equality should exist.
That it should be taught right from the yolk
of existence.
That it's regulation requires persistence.

They told me that prejudice was a myth
Ironic, they also told me I shouldn't exist
Told me I was lesbian, like it was an
insult, when I decided to stage a revolt and
mark the popular girl in netball
and win.
self high five
Oh dear, what a schoolgirl sin to
perpetrate.
I was taught to take hate by the masses who
yelled that
the classes of acceptance
were unnecessary

Popular girl: small correction, although
I cannot say you personally give me
a feminine *******, I'm bisexual, get it right.
Also examine the fact that you thought I'd only fight
because I wanted you.
When in fact I both loathe and pity you, you
do not understand your worth, and you don't
give proper respect to the earth of your
elders.
Who have handed down shoulder to shoulder
something different from the everyday pain.
They've handed down the hope that their strivings
were not vain, and one day this war will
cease.

The smoke of a pen, not
a gun, calling
peace.

So, I am a feminist and I call for release.
I may add another stanza soon.
Nat Lipstadt Mar 2014
"Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood"
T.S. Eliot (1888 - 1965)


~~~


perhaps.

can I communicate
what I cannot fully comprehend?

my voice poetic keener, age-softened,
grows less popular
for it
no longer reaches for
christmas ornament words and creamy cake-in-the-rain imagery

leave that to the better ones.

cherish simplest:
coming home to fresh sheets,
plumped pillows,
music,
tousled hair on pillowed histories,
river walks,
the lightest hand touch that rouses
the fireplace of contentment to glow briefly,
from logs that are more embered ash moments
than substance
capable of more flaming

the rumpled strivings of the young poets,
creativity of the masters of
voice and dancings bodies,
shopping lists of life~items that
reshape, restore my old~ness,
the revelations of the historians,
inducements to believe
in yet, more.

these exteriors are comprehendable.

don't forget the orange juice,
the first chilled swig from the plastic,
confirms I am breath-yet-capable,
one more poem-mission ready,
the mission objectives still not published.

Sun east welcomes me,
woman puttering kitchen coffee noises
it is neither spring yet or winter gone,
in-between like me,
in-between naissance and history remnant

question thy fiat,
Mr. Eliot,
cannot frame myself,
my who-I-am
six decades of myself.

can it then ere be said,
his poetry communicated
or ere contained ever a single
genuine word?

can I communicate
what I cannot fully comprehend?
Passers-By,
Out of your many faces
Flash memories to me
Now at the day end
Away from the sidewalks
Where your shoe soles traveled
And your voices rose and blend
To form the city's afternoon roar
Hindering an old silence.

Passers-by,
I remember lean ones among you,
Throats in the clutch of a hope,
Lips written over with strivings,
Mouths that kiss only for love.
Records of great wishes slept with,
     Held long
And prayed and toiled for.

     Yes,
Written on
Your mouths
And your throats
I read them
When you passed by.
i
this parody of life beyond
a roaring loom of time
like an embrace
momentous
through the battled equinox of chance
the stirrings and strivings
born of earth and sky
toil, whine, whimper, moan
wait and tremble, hope and pray
then
the clear shining after rain
we sail the lifetide
on leaky bottoms
never to sight dry land again

                   ii
behind
        the shards and wrecks
       of innocent vagaries
       of wayward plunges
       that flee the point
beside
       unobserved but observing
       a sentient mould of slime
       raddled
       at break-neck hurry
before
       is wrinkled wisdom
       mellow laughter
       a hand-made unborn
      of a callow womb
hereafter is ever
now is gone by
past is prelude

                  iii
snowwhite or pitchblack
       lowly or lofty
       free-born or fettered
       yearling or aging

      worms shall feast
      upon thy flesh  
      to elements irreducible
      and in thy nakedness
      come face to face
      with thy maker
Once Upon A Wind Oct 2013
Staring into the void all thoughts asunder
Where heart meets soul to create its wonder
Where fears run rampant and visions plunder
Where lies lay bare and fold strivings under
Where night terrors roam and find their place
Where stones collapse and dreams debase
Where none can hide or seek life’s embrace
Where one’s own soul reaches its solace
Where life forms dust and lessons chide
Where cracks run deep, spread far and wide
In this obsidian plane, none can abide
SøułSurvivør Sep 2017
@---\---------

Rainbow rose
Grows in my heart
It's roots & blossoms
Are pure art
They are silver
Solid gold
By their colors
I am whole

The purple petals
Are my pain
Emotions I cannot restrain
Passionate, I rise above
To my King,
The One I love!

The light then shifts
To indigo
Knowledge of the
Things You show
It lies within
All wisdom's womb
Bringing lilac to its bloom

When flowering blue
It brings me peace
That is when
All strivings cease
No turmoil in
A mind so worn
Proving You
Can calm the storm

The rose is green
When in the wild
God's creation -
His own child
It calls to mind
Meadows of grass
All of nature comes to pass

The crystal spectrum
Shifts once more
Brightest yellow
Is in store!
Inspiration!
It shimmers... shines!
Showing depth of
His great Mind

Orange for a sunset phase
Completion of the
Passing days
The color of the
Harvest moon
Low to the foothills
Waning soon

It shines then a scarlet red
For the blood
Which Jesus shed
Death couldn't
Keep Him in the grave!
He bled for me -
and I am saved!

Within my heart...
Within my SOUL
It is made of purest gold!
Lying in the
Stream which flows

He's my Savior...
RAINBOW ROSE!




SøułSurvivør
(C) 9/28/2017
I love Jesus with all my heart!
Mark Wanless Sep 2016
This magic hat, a crown of thorns sometimes
Hard pressed and poignant, we blessedly wear
Till death recumbent stills the joys the care
The strivings found in all sentient forms.
We walk upon this globe each day without
Wonder nor concernment for monolith
Thoughts arisen, seemingly threaded with
Threads still hidden though faithfully throughout
History named and imagined. The full
Ever-vescent multitude, a flash, the
Portion illumined, then grasped as all in all.
This cause repeats repeatedly, a breath
Of mind cognate and fleeting that does swell
Our conscious state to mortal width and breadth.
mortal
Elizabeth Shield Mar 2015
You are azure, like the sky and,
at one point, I thought that I
could fly,
up into the wide expanse
of your embrace,
but alas, my feathers
are not yet grown,
I am a fledgling still
too weak to try, and you,
are unreachable

And all my efforts, all
my attempts, have been in vain.
And many others have caught
your grace, and felt
the shining of your eyes.
While I remain,
grounded here, in youth
and innocence.
Perhaps that is my place.

Down here, I watch you from
afar, broad and beautiful...
and not for me.
Unequal; that is what we are.
And so my strivings cease -
I'll leave some time to grow -
make peace with stunted feathers,
dreams unrealized.
Maybe later, I will find
my wings.
You're nothing but a *******
You can't deny it, nor savor it
You're not a savior by the conventional sense
And all these strivings to be high and mighty
Makes you look like a fraud nonetheless
You take advantage of others
Breathe out toxic waste
Fumes of **** coming from every pore
So I don't want to be bothered by you no more
I hope you get what you deserve
Karma has a better way of finding you
Then do these words
Our actions are the prayer, unceasing,
Of love’s creation which is sought-
New things arising every moment,
From the past and future wrought.

Midst all those, in good and evil,
We must avoid being caught-
Imprisoned by our own mind’s children,
All our strivings come to naught.

When our attention sharp and true is,
Unwavering hours of peace are bought-
Be careful when you once un-sheathe it,
The terrible, swift sword of thought.
Come to me I’ll decode the meandering streams on your palm
I’ll take you on a time travel to know what are yet to come
Though heavens have determined what path your life will take
The ups and downs all upheavals happiness and heartbreak!

Lend your palm if you trust it for the planets there have etched
If you sign off your life in sunshine or end up feeling wretched
For all your grinding endeavors may close on you all doors
Your strivings may go in vain leaving you with no recourse!

Sit with me a session see what future holds in store
Love marriage family friendship finance and much more
For each hurdle is a remedy each hindrance an overcome
For misfortune a ward off for bad time a curing balm!

Come have your dreams come true your fortune take right turn
I’ll get you blessings of Jupiter keep out conspiring Saturn
Protect you from all evils offer you the right stone

*I wish I knew my fortune too if only could read my own!
Wandering Biku Jan 2021
I put my head on the pillow and drift off….

But in the night, someone from somewhere
Hits the reset button on my mind.
My emotions, strivings, fight from the day before
Deleted in one action.

Shiva sweeps aside the remnants of yesterday:
Gains, strivings, losses and ambitions
Clearing the table for tonight’s game
Flanked by greater and lesser angels and demons.

I’m lost in dreams while a silver ball spins against the
roulette wheel of my soul.
Each number an affection, a state of being
randomly selected for the next day.

The silver blur slows
Jumps, flicks and rattles from one bay to the next:
Happy, blue, angry, drained, joy, sorrow, hope…
Each have an even chance.

The crowd around the table leans in
Waiting to see it fall, to claim possession.
The fate of the following day rests on this outcome.
A day of peace or another of battle?

But they wont know, I wont know
Until my head lifts and my eyes open
And I feel it saturate my body and soul
Ready for another day of starting again.
Norman dePlume May 2017
Am I able to say I would like to carry you to that
oblique lake overseas, where we can still imagine
“the early 19th Century twilight,” and from the
trestle see how a self-determining logic in the

form of rationally organized matter—the luster of
metal, a vanishing glimpse of the moon or the sun,
a smile—becomes conscious, self-conscious, through us;
a freedom emptied out into that time we were

rambling to and fro like the rivers, and the dust
blanketed inscriptions on pulp condoned from trees
planted with the depths and heights of the human
heart as such? Yet how can we picture abstractions

that we can not live in alone, but perhaps to
imagine, with this, a criss-cross movement of
subjective expressions, views, and attitudes where
I sacrifice myselfs and my topics alike to a faith

we know is unwarranted, a slant illustration of
what we’ve agreed to call truth; the shimmer
of a bunch of grapes by candlelight, its joys
and sorrows, its strivings, deeds, and fates.

* * *

And when I say “this” I mean this, philosophy,
or pottery, or e-mails and short tweets between us.
And when I say “us” I don’t just mean the two of us,
you and me, but humanity. Of course, the abstract

is always felt through the concrete, as, when our  
arms were touching, I felt what I am unable to say.
Nancy Delgado Apr 2015
Rest in sunshine's gaze upon you
For truly then and only then will all other strivings to be disappear
As you breathe in and know you are truly beloved, clothed in lilies of the field that the Image created for you
A never ending romance of anchored assurance- every effort to become will be but a faint memory of a life you once familiarized with as you behold and know
Christ fully renews you, forevermore.
Terrin Leigh Apr 2015
His promises are true for you
Earthly strivings, they can cease
Mere mention of His name is peace
bid those lies adieu,
You have life in His name, too!
As His presence in my life increase,
He puts broken parts together, piece by piece
If in Him, you are a creation - new
Live in the words of the Resurrection
empowered to live by faith
think and believe are contradictory
Jesus loves you, no exception!
"His promises are true," I saith
In Him, we have victory!
Mitchell Jul 2018
Is it better

To live

In the machine of nature

Or

Mans machine?

Authenticity.
Genuineness.
Truth.

Are these
Subjective strivings
Intangible feelings
The keys to one's souls release?

Or can man,
Or has man
With their creations,
Do the same?

Futile.

What is there but
Flashes of happiness
While surviving
An ever approaching

Annihilation.

Man.

Nature.

Both ways
Of
Going about it.

If the iridescent light
Of your iPhone
Brings you the same joy
The suns rays
Or the moons glow does,
What's the difference?

Who's to judge?

Who's cares?

I, being a romantic,
Side with my origins.

I like dirt.

I like rock.

I like the way
Bark is both
Brittle and hard.

Like our ribs,
It protects something
It cannot

Save.

That's why I prefer
Mother Nature's machine:

Her singular gift of life
Is really two.

Life & Death.

And she's always been on Wifi, though

Only a select few

Have the password.
Lloyd Elipokea Feb 2021
When you’re feeling forlorn and downcast, why don’t you set off for Happiness Lane to hang out there for a while.
And the thing is it is so stupendously easy to get there it positively beggars belief.
One need not use the flamboyant Google Maps to zero-in on the exact location of Happiness Lane.
It’s easy to find.
It is in the wonderfully radiant smile of a loved one as she looks at you.
It is in the fumbling yet magical strivings of a little child as he/she begins to walk for the very first time.
So, the next time you catch yourself moping around in gloom, why don’t you head off for Happiness Lane to just blissfully hang out there for a while.
Lawrence Hall Feb 13
I could not coax this site into publishing "There are no Foreign Accents in Texas," but this short poem is available at:

https://dispatchesforthecolonialoffice.blogspot.com/?zx=791c4035bc496f75

Later:

A weak version for HP:

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

                              There are no Foreign Accents in Texas

                       “For all its enormous range of space, climate, and
                         physical appearance, and for all the internal
                         squabbles, contentions, and strivings, Texas has a
                         tight cohesiveness perhaps stronger than any other
                         section of America.”

                                                   – John Steinbeck

There are no foreign accents here, right?
A foreign accent is for a foreigner
And there are no foreigners here
The land belongs to all of us and to no one

Before even the First Nations there was the land
And we humans have come in successive waves
Betraying each other with conquest and blood
Violence and betrayal instead of feasting

But we are trying to make it better now -
There are no foreign accents here, right?
In the original I played with Microsoft’s translator [english to spanish - Search (bing.com)] because to my regret I have no language other than English and puer parvus scholis Latinis.
Engulfed Resurrection
Engulfed by Enjoyment –
Intrinsical Value –
In Evergreen showing
What was long so paling,

You dance and with cruel
Rejoicing smile lovely
In Nature so dual,
In Dresses put lightly!..

And being so merciful
To praising Prayers,
Throw out of Remorse full
Burden – and dare

For all that fulfill what
Was hidden by Sorrow
Of Longings and Strivings vote,
Spared for “Tomorrow”;

Of all that was lied by them –
Thieves, Robbers, Murderers –
Of all you called “Life” in Den
Where Lion grows –

The Lion of your now free
And roaring Passion,
Of Joy trampling all Debris
In Resurrection!..

— The End —