"sweepings" poems
the collar on my jacket is frayed
but I have clothes on my back
(just)
the packaging is white with green print
but I have food in my belly
(of sorts)
the soles talk and leak when I walk
but I have boots on my feet
(for now)
so I’m OK
(I suppose)
***** deep into the Smart Price ™ life
this man, his daughters, his son and his wife
where all their food comes at discounted price
expired meat and rationed heat
sweepings and fat wrapped in plastic
the walk was wholly unexpected, but it was easy
leaving the town where the forward leaning walkers
were the slowest thinking talkers steeped in sugary urgency,
and all the way we **** giltterballs and Skittles
Apr 2, 2015
Apr 2, 2015 at 8:41 AM UTC
Feelings are full of meanings.
Abandonment and pleadings.
Heart beatings.
Feelings are just sweepings
swept up off the floor from
pain frozen beings.
Feelings release the pain.
Which overreaches and falls.
Pain palls.
A dark cloud of dust
emerges to cloak
the feelings to black.
Feelings like seedlings
grow in the sun. Eclipsed,
the sun and feelings turn dark.
Bright, feelings ultimately
turn to gloom
Happiness vs sadness
Who wins?
May 8, 2014
May 8, 2014 at 6:13 PM UTC
I SOUGHT a theme and sought for it in vain,
I sought it daily for six weeks or so.
Maybe at last, being but a broken man,
I must be satisfied with my heart, although
Winter and summer till old age began
My circus animals were all on show,
Those stilted boys, that burnished chariot,
Lion and woman and the Lord knows what.
II
What can I but enumerate old themes?
First that sea-rider Oisin led by the nose
Through three enchanted islands, allegorical dreams,
Vain gaiety, vain battle, vain repose,
Themes of the embittered heart, or so it seems,
That might adorn old songs or courtly shows;
But what cared I that set him on to ride,
I, starved for the ***** of his faery bride?
And then a counter-truth filled out its play,
The Countess Cathleen was the name I gave it;
She, pity-crazed, had given her soul away,
But masterful Heaven had intetvened to save it.
I thought my dear must her own soul destroy,
So did fanaticism and hate enslave it,
And this brought forth a dream and soon enough
This dream itself had all my thought and love.
And when the Fool and Blind Man stole the bread
Cuchulain fought the ungovernable sea;
Heart-mysteries there, and yet when all is said
It was the dream itself enchanted me:
Character isolated by a deed
To engross the present and dominate memory.
players and painted stage took all my love,
And not those things that they were emblems of.
III
Those masterful images because complete
Grew in pure mind, but out of what began?
A mound of refuse or the sweepings of a street,
Old kettles, old bottles, and a broken can,
Old iron, old bones, old rags, that raving ****
Who keeps the till. Now that my ladder's gone,
I must lie down where all the ladders start
In the foul rag-and-bone shop of the heart.
1.6k
I
I sought a theme and sought for it in vain,
I sought it daily for six weeks or so.
Maybe at last, being but a broken man,
I must be satisfied with my heart, although
Winter and summer till old age began
My circus animals were all on show,
Those stilted boys, that burnished chariot,
Lion and woman and the Lord knows what.
II
What can I but enumerate old themes?
First that sea-rider Oisin led by the nose
Through three enchanted islands, allegorical dreams,
Vain gaiety, vain battle, vain repose,
Themes of the embittered heart, or so it seems,
That might adorn old songs or courtly shows;
But what cared I that set him on to ride,
I, starved for the ***** of his faery bride?
And then a counter-truth filled out its play,
'The Countess Cathleen' was the name I gave it;
She, pity-crazed, had given her soul away,
But masterful Heaven had intetvened to save it.
I thought my dear must her own soul destroy,
So did fanaticism and hate enslave it,
And this brought forth a dream and soon enough
This dream itself had all my thought and love.
And when the Fool and Blind Man stole the bread
Cuchulain fought the ungovernable sea;
Heart-mysteries there, and yet when all is said
It was the dream itself enchanted me:
Character isolated by a deed
To engross the present and dominate memory.
players and painted stage took all my love,
And not those things that they were emblems of.
III
Those masterful images because complete
Grew in pure mind, but out of what began?
A mound of refuse or the sweepings of a street,
Old kettles, old bottles, and a broken can,
Old iron, old bones, old rags, that raving ****
Who keeps the till. Now that my ladder's gone,
I must lie down where all the ladders start
In the foul rag-and-bone shop of the heart.
1.5k
The breeze sweeped my face
The buzzing of.childrens muddled language
The roses smiles could even make the slightest of noise
The holding of eschothers hands vibrated the rustling of life
Conversion of the normal
The disconnection of the seasons sweepings
The grounds blanketing leaves
The ducks spoke in a friendly tone
We must need nothing else
The grandparents of old school disinclined and teachings echoed just enough for me too hear
We just need to listen
And we will learn all we need in the world
Jun 8, 2015
Jun 8, 2015 at 7:24 AM UTC
A lyrist was upon the night brought forth,
Like a brilliant star up above;
And Poetry did thru his brain course
Racing its way to the central hub.
He did see thru good, and too thru ill,
He did perceive thru his lone soul
The curiosity of the eternal will
Which is still an open scroll,
And with tired feet he threaded
The arcane walks of acclaim:
The arrows of his ideas were headed
And with due haste they did flame,
Smoothest lyrics came from his tongue,
And of so passionate a flight,
From one end to the other they'd sung,
Filling all with glorious light.
But the wellspring did dry like bone
Leaving the world with sweepings
For to digest as literature and tome,
Until from the learnéd came weepings;
And floating melodies, the winds bore
Them skyward till they'd ignite;
Then, like Beauty so pure came forth yet another celestial light.
Apr 27, 2016
Apr 27, 2016 at 6:11 AM UTC
River sparkles under scowling sky
Flowing curves
Serpentine sweepings
Amidst steel and concrete.
I lived in a ghetto box here.
Nothing is permanent.
Let’s go
in a boat
through secret underground streams
to that place
deep beneath parkland roots
of elm, ash and hazel
where wise old rocks
with lime green beards
sit still in wisdom.
Do they envy us movement?
Moss is slippy underfoot.
Nothing is permanent.
Let’s alchemise emotions of liquid
Peel off layers
Abandon those old world clothes in a pile
Slip
naked
into pure warm water
Soak
in a healing cave
of glowing amethyst
Until
Through a crack in the crystal
We enter a shaft of light
Magnificent and frightening
Then emerge
into pastel skies
Return to earth
Boisterous
Forever transformed by the fusion
Welcomed back
By a squelching piano
Made of our ancestors’ mud
To play
To sing
To be.
Mar 21, 2018
Mar 21, 2018 at 4:26 PM UTC
i go to the river's bend.
today,
i want my water contained.
today,
the sea too big, too wide.
today,
i need to see the other side.
today,
i watch the water flow,
from small aquifer beginings,
to great worlds sweepings.
today,
i watch and see the cycle
of life....
drift on by.....
May 28, 2014
May 28, 2014 at 9:37 PM UTC
it occurred to me this morning
as i was building a fire in the four-legged cast iron stove
that my technique wouldn't win me any prizes from boy scouts
i would have to say
that the way i get around to warmth and light
is similar to the way
i do just about anything else
a little of this
and a little of that
bits of paper
strewn on the floor
a handful of broom sweepings
dryer lint
a fervent wish for leftover coals from the night before
a charcoal briquette or two
kindling
the dance that happens cause i forgot to open the damper
peaceful meditation
smoke in the living room
another lit match
and finally a flame and a crackle
Jan 5, 2016
Jan 5, 2016 at 6:49 AM UTC