"tassels" poems
Leaning into the afternoons,
I cast my sad nets towards your oceanic eyes.
There, in the highest blaze my solitude lengthens and flames;
Its arms turning like a drowning man's.
I send out red signals across your absent eyes
That wave like the sea, or the beach by a lighthouse.
You keep only darkness my distant female;
>From your regard sometimes, the coast of dread emerges.
Leaning into the afternoons,
I fling my sad nets to that sea that is thrashed
By your oceanic eyes.
The birds of night peck at the first stars
That flash like my soul when I love you.
The night, gallops on its shadowy mare
Shedding blue tassels over the land.
34.4k
Keep it honest, maintain it humble.
Let it show... From deep within...
Fabricate if you must, adorn with tassels.
First know the seed before you begin.
Let it sprout wings, in your cradle.
Let soar from emotions and thoughts akin.
Let honesty shine forth from the rubble,
Let humility speak in volumes of what we mean.
Oct 6, 2014
Oct 6, 2014 at 3:12 AM UTC
Drowning inside hands.
A fluorescent chime.
Skin scrubbed radiation.
Force-feeding plastic and sugar and flesh.
Pushing and pulling until tendons flail weathered
Up. And. Down.
Up and down upanddown until the store of powders, prints, nails tumble out carmine and is sobbing
gagging on a high chair.
The candied calculator like heart-shaped pupils and sticky soles.
Opaque ID’s and strands of you abandoned in navy sheets.
Shoulder tassels taught on Adam’s apple.
Love stitches bedding and hollows bodies.
Love lights the West and lines waste baskets wet.
Love is a little girl vomiting into a lion’s den.
May 5, 2015
May 5, 2015 at 4:36 PM UTC
Chanel No.5 fills the air.
My bleary eyes make out the outlines of a stage.
I catch sight of athletic contours of her body, gold dust covered skin shimmering under a flood of exclusivity.
Chic, Elegant with a touch of class.
All senses awakened by her salacious seductive moves.
Tassels and feathers add to sensual illusion and my eagle eyes are transfixed on her snake like movements.
Sugar **** takes centre stage!
May 19, 2015
May 19, 2015 at 3:39 PM UTC
Of all the ****** that i like,
The best would be of lace and white,
But then again, there's so so much,
There's even knickers with no crotch!?,
Those little bras for beginner *****
Or leather gear, for naughty moods,
And not forgetting Bridget Jones,
Come on girls, we've all got those ones.
Those yummy corsets **** us in,
We'll shake our hips and bear a grin,
To tantalise and tease men so,
Our ***** with tassels on, so guys can, ahem, grow.
Those fishnet stockings cost a bomb,
But ladies, that's why we put them on,
We feel so **** and so do they,
So that's why we get them to pay.
Silk and satin, black or red,
Or going commando instead,
What then girls, do we love these things for,
Because they'll only be scattered on our bedroom floor?...
Apr 9, 2010
Apr 9, 2010 at 6:51 AM UTC
BURY this old Illinois farmer with respect.
He slept the Illinois nights of his life after days of work in Illinois cornfields.
Now he goes on a long sleep.
The wind he listened to in the cornsilk and the tassels, the wind that combed his red beard zero mornings when the snow lay white on the yellow ears in the bushel basket at the corncrib,
The same wind will now blow over the place here where his hands must dream of Illinois corn.
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America, from a grain
of maize you grew
to crown
with spacious lands
the ocean foam.
A grain of maize was your geography.
From the grain
a green lance rose,
was covered with gold,
to grace the heights
of Peru with its yellow tassels.
But, poet, let
history rest in its shroud;
praise with your lyre
the grain in its granaries:
sing to the simple maize in the kitchen.
First, a fine beard
fluttered in the field
above the tender teeth
of the young ear.
Then the husks parted
and fruitfulness burst its veils
of pale papyrus
that grains of laughter
might fall upon the earth.
To the stone,
in your journey,
you returned.
Not to the terrible stone,
the ******
triangle of Mexican death,
but to the grinding stone,
sacred
stone of your kitchens.
There, milk and matter,
strength-giving, nutritious
cornmeal pulp,
you were worked and patted
by the wondrous hands
of dark-skinned women.
Wherever you fall, maize,
whether into the
splendid *** of partridge, or among
country beans, you light up
the meal and lend it
your virginal flavor.
Oh, to bite into
the steaming ear beside the sea
of distant song and deepest waltz.
To boil you
as your aroma
spreads through
blue sierras.
But is there
no end
to your treasure?
In chalky, barren lands
bordered
by the sea, along
the rocky Chilean coast,
at times
only your radiance
reaches the empty
table of the miner.
Your light, your cornmeal, your hope
pervades America's solitudes,
and to hunger
your lances
are enemy legions.
Within your husks,
like gentle kernels,
our sober provincial
children's hearts were nurtured,
until life began
to shuck us from the ear.
5.1k
I bought a hat the other day
In the car almost swept away
From my head, but what can I say?
I love my panda hat, anyway
Took it to school to show a friend
Wore it around till the very end
Love the smiles others send
Another day I did amend
Covered ears
Tassels, fur
"I like your hat"
Thank you, sir!
Oct 14, 2013
Oct 14, 2013 at 4:29 PM UTC
WASHINGTON IRVING WROTE A NOVEL
ABOUT ICHABOD CRANE
LITTLE SLEEPY HOLLOW
WILL NEVER BE THE SAME
LITTLE SLEEPY HOLLOW WAS CURSED
BY A HORSEMAN MOST DREAD
HE WAS RIDING IN SLEEPY HOLLOW
IN SEARCH OF HIS HEAD
THE HEADLESS HORSEMAN WAS
IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR
SO FOR HIM SEARCHING FOR HIS HEAD
WAS NEVER A CHORE
ICHABOD CRANE WAS
A TEACHER MOST STRICT
WEATHER THE GHOST STORIES WERE TRUE
WHO COULD EVER PREDICT
ICHABOD TEACHES THE CHILDREN
OF FARMERS IN THE VILLAGE
BUT ITS THE YOUNG GIRLS OF FARMERS
HE SECRETLY WANTS TOO PILLAGE
KATRINA VAN TASSEL A
BEAUTIFUL YOUNG STUDENT
ICHABOD FALLS IN LOVE WITH HER
BUT WAS IT VERY PRUDENT
HE WAS INVITED TO THE TASSELS
FOR A PARTY MOST RARE
KATRINA AT THE PARTY
DISMISSES HIS WITHOUT CARE
ICHABOD LEAVES THAT NIGHT
ON HIS HORSE HE RIDES
ITS AN EERILY DARK PATH
HIS HORSE DOSE STRIDE
ICHABOD IS SCARED AND SEES
A LARGE DARK MAN
HE YELLS TO THE STRANGER
AS LOUD AS HE CAN
SO ICHABOD RIDES SCARED AND FAST
BUT ALONG SIDE COMES THE MAN
NOT WILLING TOO PASS
ICHABOD NOTICES THE RIDER
REALLY HAS NO HEAD
THIS JUST FILLS ICHABOD
WITH THE MOST SINFUL DREAD
ICHABOD AND THE STRANGER
RACE TO THE TOWN CHURCH
FOR THIS IS WHERE THE GHOST STORIES
FIRST CAME TO BIRTH
ICHABOD RACES TO THE BRIDGE
AND NERVOUSLY LOOKS BACK
THE STRANGER HAS DISAPPEARED
OFF THE GHOSTLY TRACK
BUT HE NOTICES THE STRANGER
HIS HEAD HE DOSE HURL
ICHABOD FALLS OF THE HORSE
HIS WORLD IS IN A WHIRL
THE NEXT DAY ICHABOD'S
HORSE FINALLY RETURNS HOME
WHERE IS ICHABOD
WHERE DID HE ROAM
THEY LOOK FOR ICHABOD
AND FIND HOOF PRINTS
AND ICHABOD'S HAT
SO NOW THE FOLKLORE IS BORN
IN SLEEPY HOLLOW THAT'S THAT
" WISDOM IS LIKE MANURE IT'S NO GOOD UNLESS IT'S SPREAD AROUND ENCOURAGING OTHERS TO GROW"
Mar 2, 2017
Mar 2, 2017 at 5:47 PM UTC
I miss my cargo green canvas backpack
Shredded with the mass of three
science textbooks: biology,
classical history, chemistry.
Not like backpack was meant for
several colossal three hundred page
hardcover books.
When it was empty,
it was light,
barely anything, tugging
on my shoulders;
but I insisted the friend come with me.
But I used backpack
for study,
drudgery,
play.
The linen wore
with every use.
It was my safety blanket,
under loose cloth
that contained
sacarine
orange glucose
tablets that I hoped
to never need
Inside the main large pocket,
there was a secret
zipper, within held
a pack of cigarettes,
an excuse,
to pardon myself into a realm of aloneness-
with little questions asked
There were strings that adjusted
its position on my back that
I would pull down,
using tension to fling myself
terminal to terminal
More than fifteen times, I lost
count, of my partner traversing
across oceans, gently cradling my laptop and phone-
my trusted links
with the outside world
Nervousness alleviated by the tassels
in my mouth, I bite and chew
on the cloth, but it holds steadfast
as I ponder how to approach
what's next,
the bittersweet coffee they fell into
rehydrates with my salivating mouth,
hungry for adventure
but a stomach empty
knots itself
anxious
for what's to come
My backpack weighs
on my shoulders, empty or full,
but it's trained my body
to carry the load thoughts in my
head bring upon me
But it yielded to what was to come,
the seams at the bottom gave out.
Backpack let me know: I needed to
learn to carry on
without reliance.
Jun 2, 2015
Jun 2, 2015 at 1:51 PM UTC
389
There’s been a Death, in the Opposite House,
As lately as Today—
I know it, by the numb look
Such Houses have—alway—
The Neighbors rustle in and out—
The Doctor—drives away—
A Window opens like a Pod—
Abrupt—mechanically—
Somebody flings a Mattress out—
The Children hurry by—
They wonder if it died—on that—
I used to—when a Boy—
The Minister—goes stiffly in—
As if the House were His—
And He owned all the Mourners—now—
And little Boys—besides—
And then the Milliner—and the Man
Of the Appalling Trade—
To take the measure of the House—
There’ll be that Dark Parade—
Of Tassels—and of Coaches—soon—
It’s easy as a Sign—
The Intuition of the News—
In just a Country Town—
4.2k
You say love is this, love is that:
Poplar tassels, willow tendrils
the wind and the rain comb,
****** and drip, ****** and drip—
branches drifting apart. Hagh!
Love has not even visited this country.
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445
’Twas just this time, last year, I died.
I know I heard the Corn,
When I was carried by the Farms—
It had the Tassels on—
I thought how yellow it would look—
When Richard went to mill—
And then, I wanted to get out,
But something held my will.
I thought just how Red—Apples wedged
The Stubble’s joints between—
And the Carts stooping round the fields
To take the Pumpkins in—
I wondered which would miss me, least,
And when Thanksgiving, came,
If Father’d multiply the plates—
To make an even Sum—
And would it blur the Christmas glee
My Stocking hang too high
For any Santa Claus to reach
The Altitude of me—
But this sort, grieved myself,
And so, I thought the other way,
How just this time, some perfect year—
Themself, should come to me—
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With a wide demographic of *******
There's average, massive or missing
There are ******* to nibble and tweak at
And cleavages perfect for kissing
But I'm of a practical nature
And with just a little persistence
I'll give you a host of good reasons
To justify ******* existence
They're perfect for warming your hands up
When the gas meter's run out of gas
And there's little that's better to look at
When there's no chance of seeing an ***
Elasticity makes them ideal
For displays and arrangements of flowers
And if you find yourself short of your bus fare
Then they radiate magical powers
You can use then for counting in binary
Or a pillow with mild central heating
And they're perfect for holding a bottle
To keep safe while you're busily eating
As a pair of provocative earmuffs
You'll be envied by all of your friends
Just be sure to take optional tassels
In case one of the ******* offends
You can hollow one out for an ashtray
Or a skullcap for cutting edge Jews
You can throw them about like a Frisbee
There are just so many options to choose
But they're useful right where they're located
And not just to tickle and tease
Just give them a couple of decades
And you'll find them protecting your knees
MWAH! x
Apr 4, 2013
Apr 4, 2013 at 7:41 PM UTC
When spring, to woods and wastes around,
Brought bloom and joy again,
The murdered traveller's bones were found,
Far down a narrow glen.
The fragrant birch, above him, hung
Her tassels in the sky;
And many a vernal blossom sprung,
And nodded careless by.
The red-bird warbled, as he wrought
His hanging nest o'erhead,
And fearless, near the fatal spot,
Her young the partridge led.
But there was weeping far away,
And gentle eyes, for him,
With watching many an anxious day,
Were sorrowful and dim.
They little knew, who loved him so,
The fearful death he met,
When shouting o'er the desert snow,
Unarmed, and hard beset;--
Nor how, when round the frosty pole
The northern dawn was red,
The mountain wolf and wild-cat stole
To banquet on the dead;--
Nor how, when strangers found his bones,
They dressed the hasty bier,
And marked his grave with nameless stones,
Unmoistened by a tear.
But long they looked, and feared, and wept,
Within his distant home;
And dreamed, and started as they slept,
For joy that he was come.
Long, long they looked--but never spied
His welcome step again,
Nor knew the fearful death he died
Far down that narrow glen.
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Harmonica and strums sail my shores
Tell my whole clan sonny, he ain't good
That I met a troller under a sycamore
He passed me all the love as he veiled
We walked around,camouflaged by leaves
Tell mummy he was a preacher's son
A soul that was open and hid it's stick
Unharmonised in accapellas I drowned
Swingers of melodic stormy strings
Tell sassy to keep her tassels tucked
To calm her tussles and noisy gongs
Shake on the octave of the beats
Whisked dreams of the lost yesterdays
Tell Jimmy to listen to her heart raise
Tie her down, bring her back home
Liberate and let her fly like a wild bird
Apr 28, 2016
Apr 28, 2016 at 6:42 PM UTC
I
Reg wished me to go with him to the field,
I paused because I did not want to go;
But in her quiet way she made me yield
Reluctantly, for she was breathing low.
Her hand she slowly lifted from her lap
And, smiling sadly in the old sweet way,
She pointed to the nail where hung my cap.
Her eyes said: I shall last another day.
But scarcely had we reached the distant place,
When o'er the hills we heard a faint bell ringing;
A boy came running up with frightened face;
We knew the fatal news that he was bringing.
I heard him listlessly, without a moan,
Although the only one I loved was gone.
II
The dawn departs, the morning is begun,
The trades come whispering from off the seas,
The fields of corn are golden in the sun,
The dark-brown tassels fluttering in the breeze;
The bell is sounding and the children pass,
Frog-leaping, skipping, shouting, laughing shrill,
Down the red road, over the pasture-grass,
Up to the school-house crumbling on the hill.
The older folk are at their peaceful toil,
Some pulling up the weeds, some plucking corn,
And others breaking up the sun-baked soil.
Float, faintly-scented breeze, at early morn
Over the earth where mortals sow and reap--
Beneath its breast my mother lies asleep.
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All her hours were yellow sands,
Blown in foolish whorls and tassels;
Slipping warmly through her hands;
Patted into little castles.
Shiny day on shiny day
Tumbled in a rainbow clutter,
As she flipped them all away,
Sent them spinning down the gutter.
Leave for her a red young rose,
Go your way, and save your pity;
She is happy, for she knows
That her dust is very pretty.
2.9k
i fall and ascend in a sea vantablack
spiral light
fire ghosts and ice
that cut the soul to pieces
like scissors
that split rabbits
industry of a hissing creation
polluted altar of sleeping lakes
and scythe
bludgeon and howitzer
prods of push and pull
in a grindhouse
necropolis of craters
scattering satanic eggs and tumors
i am here born to you thin of bone
mother of catastrophes
on a colossal ball of scab and callous
that moves sonorous dazzling shapes
careening through
ephemera workhorse torches
of doom
you fill me with knots of terror
and desperate dreams of stairway wings
veils and glimmers
resolutions dissolving
petaled apertures of desire
and night whispers
in a spider web of sonic bulls
before undertows gravity
i was vibrant
but then i died into the rock ash of earth
they called it my birthday
my parents with party hats and balloons
blinked fetters
against nights of granite and stone
i got deader still
until i was nothing
but an imagineless gob of mud and breath
an eye looking out
behind red nerve forest fires
and tears shook tambourines
down heavy lashes
cascaded fluttering tassels
i am born to you mother of senile seas
citadel of shattered glass
in a slate cube of cyclones
mute and screaming
my fate deep shock
encased in mausoleums led nautilus
blatting hells jaundiced shriek
Pluto conjunct Saturn
Jun 11, 2019
Jun 11, 2019 at 1:05 PM UTC
The birches are mad with green points
the wood’s edge is burning with their green,
burning, seething—No, no, no.
The birches are opening their leaves one
by one. Their delicate leaves unfold cold
and separate, one by one. Slender tassels
hang swaying from the delicate branch tips—
Oh, I cannot say it. There is no word.
Black is split at once into flowers. In
every bog and ditch, flares of
small fire, white flowers!—Agh,
the birches are mad, mad with their green.
The world is gone, torn into shreds
with this blessing. What have I left undone
that I should have undertaken?
O my brother, you redfaced, living man
ignorant, stupid whose feet are upon
this same dirt that I touch—and eat.
We are alone in this terror, alone,
face to face on this road, you and I,
wrapped by this flame!
Let the polished plows stay idle,
their gloss already on the black soil.
But that face of yours—!
Answer me. I will clutch you. I
will hug you, grip you. I will poke my face
into your face and force you to see me.
Take me in your arms, tell me the commonest
thing that is in your mind to say,
say anything. I will understand you—!
It is the madness of the birch leaves opening
cold, one by one.
My rooms will receive me. But my rooms
are no longer sweet spaces where comfort
is ready to wait on me with its crumbs.
A darkness has brushed them. The mass
of yellow tulips in the bowl is shrunken.
Every familiar object is changed and dwarfed.
I am shaken, broken against a might
that splits comfort, blows apart
my careful partitions, crushes my house
and leaves me—with shrinking heart
and startled, empty eyes—peering out
into a cold world.
In the spring I would be drunk! In the spring
I would be drunk and lie forgetting all things.
Your face! Give me your face, Yang Kue Fei!
your hands, your lips to drink!
Give me your wrists to drink—
I drag you, I am drowned in you, you
overwhelm me! Drink!
Save me! The shad bush is in the edge
of the clearing. The yards in a fury
of lilac blossoms are driving me mad with terror.
Drink and lie forgetting the world.
And coldly the birch leaves are opening one by one.
Coldly I observe them and wait for the end.
And it ends.
2.5k
?????????
Time is not flying
the evening hours are so slow, inching by
and spent tossing and turning
my restless mind roams dark avenues
my restless feet roam the bed,
left...right...then back, over and over.
the bed, that was my hammock....no longer sways
a promise of peaceful slumber, flies away,
???????
new and strange images
start to trail me...they're heavy tassels,
tagging on the hemlines of my mind,
seeking to connect...to be known
???????
this late hour, i recall
a forked road, not far from a winding road,
from afar, a child admires a white castle
high as the clouds, its windows, foggy,
its high fence, mossy...on its front lawn
is a treehouse, perched...resting like a bird
inside a very old tree, leaning to its left side,
with a long set of steps...all painted white.
just below the white steps are gathered,
doyens of poetry...seated in their own chosen
corners...tacit, yet, empowered by their brilliant minds
the tips of their feathered pens, smoothly sliding on
paper......strange, that they're waving at me,
why, they could be dead!
???????
i must be dreaming...my muse is showing
me paths, i would think twice of treading
???????
a quartered moon selfishly glows
unsettles even more, my murky thoughts...
yet....my pressing thumb is on my journals
i must heed.........the need.
???????
"o' my elusive unknown poem,
kindly show me...lead me to your home
let my pen give light to your dim path
give second wind to my weary mind and heart,
deny, even a bit of a space......for wrath,
help me, push me...my efforts musn't cease
show me your face...we'll both have peace."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
~ ~ ~
~
Sally
© Rosalia Rosario A. Bayan
April 21, 2018
Apr 21, 2018
Apr 21, 2018 at 2:32 AM UTC
606
The Trees like Tassels—hit—and swung—
There seemed to rise a Tune
From Miniature Creatures
Accompanying the Sun—
Far Psalteries of Summer—
Enamoring the Ear
They never yet did satisfy—
Remotest—when most fair
The Sun shone whole at intervals—
Then Half—then utter hid—
As if Himself were optional
And had Estates of Cloud
Sufficient to enfold Him
Eternally from view—
Except it were a whim of His
To let the Orchards grow—
A Bird sat careless on the fence—
One gossipped in the Lane
On silver matters charmed a Snake
Just winding round a Stone—
Bright Flowers slit a Calyx
And soared upon a Stem
Like Hindered Flags—Sweet hoisted—
With Spices—in the Hem—
’Twas more—I cannot mention—
How mean—to those that see—
Vandyke’s Delineation
Of Nature’s—Summer Day!
2.2k
The girl with the emerald eyes
Is the girl who can see through your lies
She is the girl who can unmask your disguise
And show you what you have yet to realize
Layer by layer she will peel and peel
Her beauty exceeds past the realm of unreal
Shy but strong
the girl with the emerald eyes can see past your wrong
With vision so perfect she is never blinded by love
Her heart searches for the knight in shining armor sent from above
To sweep her up and carry her to a castle
Somewhere fancy where the demask curtains have gold tassels
I hope she sees what I hide to say with my general lies
Just be careful you don't get lost in her emerald eyes
Dec 13, 2014
Dec 13, 2014 at 3:02 AM UTC
To the tune of "Rinsing Silk Stream"
Saddened by the dying spring, I am too weary
to rearrange my hair.
Plum flowers, newly fallen, drift about the courtyard
in the evening wind.
The moon looks pale and light clouds float
to and fro.
Incense lies idle in the jade duck-shaped burner.
The cherry-red bed-curtain is drawn close,
concealing its tassels.
Can Tung-Hsi's horn still ward off the cold?
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