"toppled" poems
upon the elephant rode a boy prince,
his royal command, he was there to evince.
dark with grace and dripping with youth.
bringing his men, his crown and his couth.
town after town he strode fierce through the gates.
and any detractors were left to cruel fates.
and on one windy day, as they strode into town.
the faces where tenfold and a hush passed around
the grey of the creature with knowing black eyes
swayed left towards the crowd as if to capsize.
and the mass gasped in horror; bairns seized by their mam.
men flung at young ladies, babes pulled from the pram.
the bewildered and flustered
tired elephant sat.
in the center of all on the bald pastors hat.
the old pastor looked stunned to see such a disgrace.
until he remembered, and composed his face.
'your highness' he bowed. his manners restored.
but the poor prince was toppled his mighty seat floored.
they gasped for the prince, just really a child
dressed in fine silks on this elephant wild.
pastor said, 'here now' extending an arm
hand wrinkled and gnarled from the land that he farmed.
then the guards sprung to life as if sudden awake
guns point to the man of whose life they would take.
and just as they squinted their eye for the aim
a boy sang out sweetly, 'sire he's not to blame!'
and the prince from street where he lay in pool
held up his hand and recovered his rule.
he looked at the crowd and he said 'boy now speak'
the boy said, 'prince it is the prayers that you seek.
the prayers that you'd visit. the prayers that you'd stay.
lord must of heard them and granted this way.'
his eyes wide with truth and the love of his church
the prince laughed a beautiful belly filled lurch.
the carriage was called as the prince shared a feast.
and even some water was splashed on the beast.
such a good time as he danced and he spun
till the horses arrived in the dust of a run.
to thank the town and the lovely haired boy
the young prince gave up his own precious toy.
the beast stays quite put in the center of town...
but prayers said no more...so the prince won't fall down.
sahn
04/10/2014
Apr 11, 2014
Apr 11, 2014 at 6:08 PM UTC
Home is where the heart is but the heart is a broken place.
I hate
how loud I must barely scream so that people can see my face:
I am dark
and this is a time of shadows.
Sometimes what worries me most about us
is not that we are forced to carry guns and **** our own mothers
is not that we are pulled from our classrooms back into our homesteads
is not that some of our leaders feast while we become skinny UNICEF models
is not that if only one molecule of my DNA was different I could have lived without ever knowing how to read even a single word
is not even that the smallest of things can wipe out entire villages in an instant-
mosquitoes, viruses, locusts; slave ships.
Sometimes what worries me most is that
my headphones carry more sounds of strange places
than my heart will ever know- that not even my brothers and sisters
sold off to those strange places ever knew, as their children are hung off
the trees of Jim Crow and we call them strange fruit, and that
maybe our first president didn't marry a white lady; the white lady might have married him.
Sometimes what worries me most is that for just over eighteen years
of seeing thinking feeling breathing being I couldn't
have ever told you what Africa meant to me past the occasional 'dumela'
to my mother's mother but never, never did I know or now know or will know my mother's mother's mother's mother's mother
because
she can't fit inside the cellular America that I hold in my palm.
And this is why they call us lost.
Because home is where the heart is but the heart is a broken place.
One time, my five year old cousin said matter-of-factly
that black is ugly. In my Primary School days
everyone said I should stay out of the sun lest I get darker.
But
I'm here to tell you that I don't even bother wearing a sun-hat anymore.
I'm here to tell you that I don't cut my hair because to do so would feel like oppression.
I'm here to tell you how vivid and lovely and blessed I do feel to have been born in broken-heart home because at least it has soul.
I'm here to tell you that, yes, I do remember
that time when the whole world knew what to do about ****** and Bin Laden but never could get round to talking about Cecil John Rhodes.
I'm here to tell you that
Today, that conversation starts with a toppled statue.
Today, that conversation starts with my voice.
Today, this conversation starts with a poem which proclaims-
child I am, child I am, child I am, child I am, child I am-
that this is my day. This is my day.
The Day of the African Child.
Jun 16, 2015
Jun 16, 2015 at 1:38 PM UTC
The missus bought a Paperback
...at Val Village, Saturday,
I had a look inside her bag;
....T'was "Fifty Shades of Grey".
Well I just left her to it,
And at ten I went to bed.
An hour later she appeared;
The sight filled me with dread…..
In her left she held a rope;
And in her right a whip!
She threw them down upon the floor,
And then began to strip.
Well fifty years or so ago;
I might have had a peek;
But Mabel hasn't weathered well;
She's eighty four next week!!
Watching Mabel bump and grind;
Could not have been much grimmer.
And things then went from bad to worse;
She toppled off her Zimmer!
She struggled back upon her feet;
A couple minutes later;
She put her teeth back in and said
.....I am the dominater !!
Now if you knew our Mabel,
You'd see just why I spluttered,
I'd spent two months in traction
For the last complaint I'd uttered.
She stood there **** and naked
Bent forward just a bit
I went to hold her, sensual like
and stood on her left ***
Mabel screamed, her teeth shot out;
My god what had I done!?
She moaned and groaned then shouted out:
"Step on the other one"!!
Well readers, I can't tell no more;
About what occurred that day.
Suffice to say my jet black hair,
Turned fifty shades of Grey.
Sep 4, 2014
Sep 4, 2014 at 8:30 PM UTC
Red birds flew into my window every day for years, especially during Spring
and I asked my mother
what they were called.
“Cardinals,” she said,
“but I think they’re called to you,
I think—
I think they are for you.”
“Mom, I’ll give that one a name.”
And I did.
——-
I still see cardinals.
The red shocks me,
like a bloodstain in a new house.
——-
When my father almost died,
I was not worried and I did not ask many questions,
only saw his body in the bed, a green-blue-yellow-black mess,
a broken-bone nest,
with sticky pads stuck to his skin, sending electricity to his nerves, lest
they forget themselves.
——-
He had the car turned into a cube, and it is somewhere now,
the cage collapsed,
the rust blooming inside of itself.
The day my father chose to drive into a wall,
going somewhere from 100 to 200 miles an hour (I never asked him), they dubbed him Rocketman.
He flew.
The car toppled and twisted and regurgitated what it could;
it was an illness,
and it could have killed us.
My father is okay.
——-
My father went to an air show months ago to see how those streak clouds are made by planes,
and there was an accident
and he saw peoples’ bodies lying and dying.
He told my mother how he saw hands separate from their owners.
He has not told me these things.
——-
The cardinals have started to scare my father.
He sees them too
like bloodstains in a new house.
Sep 27, 2012
Sep 27, 2012 at 2:29 AM UTC
land's moniker
mulls utmost care
Kalinga
branding the ox
of men with glaringly
immaculate chiaroscuro,
atop hills flourishing
with the fruits emblazoning
reticence.
chase angel-ward, the synopsis
of meaningfulness,
jagged, indelible accoutrement
akin to the brand of
chaste heritage,
galvanizing this epitaph
with aesthetic nativity,
gallant mambabatok - fill my bones with the ache of your past,
carve in me what the rippling
shrill of air has toppled
in the highlands
you have us shaking the blood
of this archipelago like boughs
breaking free from water's ebb,
frenzied by the river-warm
serpentine embellishment
the strike of the thorns
mints in our untouched bodies!
altogether in this numerous hike
we go in pursuit, hunting the
nibble from flesh to bone,
revealing the rebel, body
to soul.
Sep 30, 2015
Sep 30, 2015 at 5:10 AM UTC
A dancing Bear grotesque and funny
Earned for his master heaps of money,
Gruff yet good-natured, fond of honey,
And cheerful if the day was sunny.
Past hedge and ditch, past pond and wood
He tramped, and on some common stood;
There, cottage children circling gaily,
He in their midmost footed daily.
Pandean pipes and drum and muzzle
Were quite enough his brain to puzzle:
But like a philosophic bear
He let alone extraneous care
And danced contented anywhere.
Still, year on year, and wear and tear,
Age even the gruffest, bluffest bear.
A day came when he scarce could prance,
And when his master looked askance
On dancing Bear who would not dance.
To looks succeeded blows; hard blows
Battered his ears and poor old nose.
From bluff and gruff he waxed curmudgeon;
He danced indeed, but danced in dudgeon,
Capered in fury fast and faster.
Ah, could he once but hug his master
And perish in one joint disaster!
But deafness, blindness, weakness growing,
Not fury's self could keep him going.
One dark day when the snow was snowing
His cup was brimmed to overflowing:
He tottered, toppled on one side,
Growled once, and shook his head, and died.
The master kicked and struck in vain,
The weary drudge had distanced pain
And never now would wince again.
The master growled; he might have howled
Or coaxed,--that slave's last growl was growled.
So gnawed by rancor and chagrin
One thing remained: he sold the skin.
What next the man did is not worth
Your notice or my setting forth,
But hearken what befell at last.
His idle working days gone past,
And not one friend and not one penny
Stored up (if ever he had any
Friends; but his coppers had been many),
All doors stood shut against him but
The workhouse door, which cannot shut.
There he droned on,--a grim old sinner,
Toothless, and grumbling for his dinner,
Unpitied quite, uncared for much
(The rate-payers not favoring such),
Hungry and gaunt, with time to spare;
Perhaps the hungry, gaunt old Bear
Danced back, a haunting memory.
Indeed, I hope so, for you see
If once the hard old heart relented,
The hard old man may have repented.
4.6k
He crinkled the daily
paper and thought out
loud, "You're my
best friend."
She scuffed her
kitten heels, prodding
for more. Far inside she
told herself to take it lightly.
He knew she knew
that he knew it was
temporary. Acting as if
she made him happy.
She sunk deep in
the velvet green
couch. Cons and pros
of being the leaver or the left.
He stared past Valentine
cards and the spot on
the carpet, where they
laughed and spilled tomato soup.
Their faces drooped and became
that soup. Sodium and protein
soaking into the ground
every which-way.
She resided and sat
up out of their yard-sale
bought couch. She set her
mind on staying by his side.
He toppled over on
the yard tools he never
touched. Now next to his
side was the Earth's crust.
She was left in the air
and he laid in muck.
His voice played over in her
head, "You're my best friend."
May 10, 2012
May 10, 2012 at 2:32 AM UTC
see, atlas nearly dropped the world at the first sign of tremors
and gaia would've blown her top with wrath
and it nearly toppled sisyphus' boulder til it crushed him
but the 'nearly' doesn't matter 'cause the world's still in his grasp
and if paris picked selene, we might've had a heart-shaped moon
but we got the trojan shitshow, millions died
and we nearly went extinct just 'cause some ******* greek was *****
but the 'nearly' doesn't matter since we just about survived
Nov 22, 2018
Nov 22, 2018 at 4:39 AM UTC
Little girl with your tiny hands know that whatever you build for yourself will one day be destroyed so tread carefully on this glass universe.
This meticulous life, a house of cards that you're going to spend a childhood building and playing house in, so easily toppled by a breeze. Know that one day life is going to be a hurricane. And the little world that's you poured your soul into is going to be gone.
That empty hole in your chest is going to burn like hell. That ***** that pumps the blood and keeps your cheeks rosy is going to catch aflame. And that raging fire is going to ignite the blood flowing through your fingertips. Your going to fall in love and that boy is going to pour gasoline all over your little mess of a life. And that's when you'll realize that a fiery heart does nothing but burn you to to the ground.
You'll be six feet deep in ashes and regrets. Lies shoved so deep down your throat that you won't be able to scream for your release from the chains that bind you to this ground that you used to call home.
Little girl take those broken heart shards and all build yourself a wall. Lock your gates baby because the loneliness that will freeze your blood. May just help soothe the burns.
Jun 10, 2015
Jun 10, 2015 at 8:14 PM UTC
-
*****************
(haikus)
***********
Wine glass lay empty
toppled on the ground...its edge
smeared with red lipstick
Luster braved the dark
opals, sapphires couldn't hide
a face...so lovely
Stilled...supine...voiceless
stripped of fame...name...evil game!
success? envy? shame?
Opals, bright sapphires,
graced her neck...muted...like the
doe-eyed beauty...dead.
Sally
Copyright April 2015
Rosalia Rosario A. Bayan
May 1, 2015
May 1, 2015 at 5:00 AM UTC
I sank to the ground and all came to halt
Birds flocked east before all shook in vigour
Windows shattered under the weights of roofs
Stone homes toppled before acknowledgement
Clouds of dust rained jagged stones upon us
The turbulent waters foreshadowed more
For waves of sharp heights dominated us
They carried us, and whirled us intensely
Earsplitting cries now silenced by water
And when all had come to a halt once more
The bodies succumbed to the ocean's pull
I was supposed to die, but I hadn't.
Oct 30, 2018
Oct 30, 2018 at 12:28 AM UTC
Our mother, Gaia, shall never die
Though for us I cannot speak
When Terra does turn her back to our kind
Our might shall seem so meek
Roaring flames do lick her skin
While Chaos’ storms do rage
But Mother Earth will retreat within
And turn to a blank new page.
Zeus will fall when the skies go black
His wife, Hera, to follow when families dissolve
Once the gods fall there’ll be no way back
And hubris will be our final resolve.
Chronus may falter when there’s nobody alive
To observe the passage of hours
When the clocks have all stopped,
Gears unturning under toppled clock towers
No grandfathers left to chime.
But Gaia will live on in sleep so bereft
Long after we’re lost to time.
With no men to wage wars, Ares will fade
Athena too as innovation runs dry
Aphrodite may weep when there’s no love to be made
Hermes, when there’s nowhere to fly
And though our sun will live past our end,
There’ll be no chariot of gold
No homes, no hearths for Hestia to tend
And no music for Apollo to behold
We have long lost one of the faces
Of Artemis, the huntress under moonlight’s reign
And civilization (so-called) now erases
Pan, the wild god, and his sacred domain
What next, I now ask, shall we bid our farewell?
What aspect of humanity lost?
As we stumble along nearer to Hell
Whom shall be the next forgot?
But fear thee not, for life’s most precious gift
is the transience, the temporal nature of Earth
All will change, all will shift
and perhaps a different Cosmos may birth.
Once the stardust settles, a new something to arrive
And we shall perhaps there meet once again
Tied by fresh cords of fate to share new lives.
And all the while, she’s waited for us
Watching and loving those souls immortal
Taking new forms now from different dust
She’ll rejoice and rebirth the primordial
They will rise and then fall and eventually make way
For the pantheon of a new universe to arise
Perhaps not all will look the same--
But close enough for essence to find.
Sep 5, 2023
Sep 5, 2023 at 3:54 PM UTC
It started with Guitar.
It ended with Snarky comment.
Guitar hit Song.
Song hit Smile.
Smile hit Happiness in a time of sadness.
Happiness hit Laughter and Laughter couldn't help but tip too fast.
Laughter hit Feelings.
Feelings hit Observation.
Observation hit Friendship, but more like Crush.
Crush hit Heart.
Heart hit Words.
Words shook a bit, but hit Send anyway.
Send hit Waiting, but Waiting brought Maybe.
But Maybe wasn't stacked right.
Maybe never fell.
But the other ones did.
The ones that didn't spell your name, but his.
Love hit Replenish.
Replenish hit Happiness.
Happiness hit Life with my true love.
Your name just lingered there, Maybe still standing.
But then Maybe toppled.
Maybe hit Conversation.
Conversation hit Doubt.
Doubt hit Curiosity.
Curiosity hit Coincidence and Coincidence was just too big to miss.
But that was the last part. Coincidence.
Because his name was prettier, nicer, and actually said yes.
But Coincidence just kept begging. Coincidence decided to get there anyway.
Coincidence pushed Alcohol and Alcohol tapped Texting on the shoulder.
Texting plummeted into Conversation.
Conversation hit Argument.
Argument hit Apology, but instead of Apology hitting Acceptance, it hit Snarky comment.
And that hit Resentment and a bit of Anger too.
Started with Guitar.
Ended with Snarky comment.
A Domino Effect into Catastrophe that I think about everyday.
Feb 13, 2013
Feb 13, 2013 at 5:08 AM UTC
i am of the light
despite
my shroud
that crowds the villains in the toppled telemetry of my steeds
galloping gallantly from the burning cities of my dreams
i shall gleam from her or he
that which delivers
their truths faithfully to their dreams
open wounds turn invitation
in the pity of hungry thieves
who dared to dream
of peasants king-ed.
as we sing
sing
of desperation
in passionate confessions
of jaded wisdom
passed on through every failure
never to falter
in the betrayals of Walters
lost
in loss-less flac files
i have miles to go
smiles to grow
daggers projectiles
from mild mannered children
freshly ridden
of maniacal miracles
spiritual
but not stupid
we are troopin
this lucid movement
grooving
to the repetition of the drum
the gas blow back of a gun
the bursting bubbles of bubble gum
having fun
i learnt goodly on the run
learned nothing in victory
learned nothing in simplicity
complacently
snickering it all away
bullet by bullet
case by case
and eventually the blade
in my compassionate displays
we shall congregate
and hate ourselves
**** the donks to hell
dwelling on the cellar doors
that darkos teacher adored
in verbal massacre
of the written literature
of cracked brain fixtures
seeping the lines
in cold tingles
down the spines of maniacs
just relax
mix it down on a track
spit the thesis into pieces
through the creases of cracked sneakers, and out the speakers
of trouble seekers.
mistakes make us
deliberate chaos
tossed
upon the fakers
who cry to think
the dream
became a reality
mistake us
for serrated blades that rip the hearts from beasts
sometimes i stop to think
while having a drink
conclusive brinks
of sanity creaks
of my humility
secreting
frivolously
the disposing of my jealousy
of your feelings
hellaciously
i rip a felony
from a face
in appealing agony
antagonizing me
in the frenzied forensics
of my oblique
outlooks
none of us
were ever crooks
speaking to self
while being booked
in hell
Sep 5, 2012
Sep 5, 2012 at 1:36 AM UTC
brick by brick.
piece by piece.
there was that night in the alleyway
when you confessed that you loved me
[*the words pouring out of your mouth
like oil onto water*]
and these words collided with my wall
dropping abruptly
to the ground
like the raindrops that were
falling from the heavens
onto our eyelashes.
day by day.
each by each.
it was that night in the alleyway
when you admitted you love me
and you see me
and you hear me
and you
know me.
and i know you.
it was that night when one of my
bricks toppled to the
ground, liberated by your
perfect imperfection.
we are insane, yes.
having known each other a
minuscule fraction of
a lifetime and wanting to
spend the rest of it with
one another.
but these bricks
[which were
lying heavy on my
sprightly soul]
were ****** to the ground,
emancipating me from my
encumbering wall
as you began to
pour into the spaces
where they once persisted.
you replace my opposition to
vulnerability with the kind of love
i have fervently yearned for,
craved and desired
night by night.
each by each.
the clock strikes 11:11,
it's always you i had wished for.
for now i know;
if you hope hard enough,
it works.
for a person like me
[a person like us]
letting this guard down
is almost as arduous as
quantum physics.
or advanced chemistry.
or seeing someone you love
in tears.
i feel that i am destined for you
so much so that i can
easily
imagine being this older couple
i once saw at the park,
holding hands and living like they
were still 21.
and i wished to God that i would
find that love.
dear God, i don’t even know
if i believe in you but...
thank you for
sending him to me.
he is it.
he is endgame.
there are some things that a
heart just knows. my god, i
feel him with me when i am alone,
[i can barely breathe without him]
and know that he should have been
holding my hand all along,
holding my all, all along.
he is my ultimate karmic
retribution.
[*chapped lips,
countless kisses.*]
never be scared, my dear.
never doubt my love.
for as you say you will never
leave me, it will be in my arms
that you will always stay.
there are just some things
a heart knows.
brick by brick
piece by piece
day by day
each by each
we will crush our
doubts and fears.
hesitations and tears.
i am madly, madly
irretrievably and
blissfully
in love with you.
my dear,
we are meant to be.
you are living,
breathing poetry.
Mar 5, 2013
Mar 5, 2013 at 3:11 AM UTC
Gold shed upon suckling gold,
The time of the bole blackens,
Of the dark mounted through dapple,
While in the sealed apple
The seed cradled toward cold.
A gold on gold spent,
Put by from an elm in its years
Now its gilded of days,
Over turf’s dishevelment;
Where all which is green sickens,
All the fresh shall be sere.
All which is green sickens,
And it is but for a time
Those embered veinings blaze
A year’s delirium;
Or neared of other space,
Unportioned azure shall close
One of more, and which is,
One which goes.
Let the little pupils that will,
Of vision, gaze for salt
To whet their gazing, wit
In one weather is high
From burrow and lair, by
Nether providences’ default
An all’s accrued.
And apposite, beyond
Such primer beholdings, has
Its long accounting known
The beetle’s morsel thus
Was rich, and the slug’s bed on
The oak’s generations, deep
Over the lark’s bones.
In slough of Edens fast
Wit in one weather shall stand,
While millennia nibble at
The sensual apple
Toppled it net,
Plenty in the palm of the hand,
And the fallen not fallen, not lost
From out its certitude—
For our unbeggaring
Has been gross. Few and late
To cherish an immoderate
Wish, hope’s calculus,
Love’s hope; few to miss,
From natural tally ******
In the lime-girdled space
Of choice, where alone
Man can abandon what
Is only his own;
And in cold and tarrying
Their rearisers sleep:
While to the granite cheek
Light’s purples bring
Infinite their ministering,
And past our finial
And ragged crests, to keep
Time’s ambient stood,
Propose horizons from
Their shadowy quarries; while,
In an unwandered wood,
Or under the indifferent foot,
Is let fall, let fall a fruit,
Through eternal leisures down,
For but time’s unravelling.
2.9k
I build a house of cards with the deck of hearts and present it to you.
And upon seeing all my full, red expressions of affection, you shuffle and deal out my imperfections until
one by one,
my house falls down.
Your diamonds aren't as illuminous as they were after your first sip, you say.
So all your glitter isn't really gold, you say while
shifting my diamond to a rhombus never to turn it right side up again.
Your clubs beat me over the head and cause my brain to swell with a smooth aftertaste as you
see through my lack
of a poker face.
Breaking through my walls and exposing my weak points.
Flooding over my defenses and ensnaring me in a trap
weaved only by the highest proof
and I know you have won.
Because my ace of spades has been found.
Trickling your jokers over the rocks to my hearts,
they climb over the rubble that has been laid at the ground, the foundation, the base.
And your clubs tear it up!
And the jokers, you! race to the top of the south and with your strongest clubs,
break into my ace of spades!
Pinning it to the ground and forcing it to turn around and flee!
And I can hear it! I hear it calling for me... to help us get away
but my hearts are dull and my shifting rhombi are ablaze.
For this infinite moment in time is dazzling and my own eyes aren't aligned to light the way
to free me.
Gleaming rays of the sheen from your diamonds slice through my illusions and
wake me up to the aroma of fresh debris.
My hearts, toppled. My diamonds, demolished.
My clubs, sleeping and my ace of spades,
removed.
And the sky never changes. The moon ripples in the puddle left behind by the design
of your jokers and spades and your hearts remain untouched. Your spades are buried behind walls of
black and your diamonds are so far back that I couldn't tell if they were even there at all.
My deck of 52 is now a deck of 51 and without a solid set,
I'll never have the chance to play this "game" again.
Oct 27, 2012
Oct 27, 2012 at 2:46 AM UTC
The dead lie like Rome,
Like toppled sunshine in stone,
From a boy who had blown
Into the seashell of the Forum,
Heard back in restoning, the alley of home,
The narrow, basket-flowered angiportum…
But, lips too strong, let out unknown
The stone-witherings of Medusa
And the bone dust of empire.
May 23, 2019
May 23, 2019 at 9:13 PM UTC
Life is a but chest board and
we are the players, some
are pawns they may seem
weak, but to others they are
the best players in life. They
can move any where they like,
they are many, but are the
first in life to fall. The down
trodden, those deemed weak
are the ones who will pay the price,
for the wrong move ends all.
The knights the protectors
of the people, but always
sacrifice them self's if to
save the king or queen
of the land if the rooks all fall.
the bishop it is only has one
way thinking, never will it let
its faith change, same coloured
square all through out its life of
the game.
The rook not a person but a
place to keep those from harm,
but a place Is only as safe, for
as long as it doesn't fall. For
where this rook is placed
depends on if it will keep
those from harm or be toppled
an burnt to ruins on the floor.
The king and queen of this
wooded land, but will only
survive if they can play the
board with the right moves
and hand. For if rule is misplaced
then even a rook can topple a
kingdom if played in the wrong
way and down will fall a kingdom
pieces and all.
Apr 18, 2014
Apr 18, 2014 at 3:57 AM UTC
Bored of beauty.
**** and ***
blizzard white teeth
insertable parts switched out like lego blocks.
Inching away from this faulty form
with which I was imbued in genesis.
Long live that junk, ******
Gimme those thighs!
Let free that emotional magma
boiling up from beneath, ready to burn this world
or at the least leave your laces singed.
The tip of this iceberg will bring you all down
so ready the life-rafts.
Gimme that.
Don’t give me blizzard teeth, silent in a quaffed muzzle.
Be the jaws, the howl, the tender tongue on young necks.
Great stories don’t read “one day I was beautiful”
they say “the world seized me and tore off my limbs, and I toppled end over end til I came to rest between the legs of the Colossus
and that’s when it got interesting.”
Jul 30, 2015
Jul 30, 2015 at 3:36 PM UTC
**Long brown dream
her legs akimbo
apex flushed dark
arms bowed at hip
******* accusing
Breathless, the
******* seesaw
tight curls crown
angry beauty
teeth blaze hot
golden eyes
spit hate
spinning slowly left
proudly curved
bending exposed
face framed a
toppled heart
lips lick entice
three rising paces
the suite bar
long fingers reach
the glass held
waist high
pivoting back
all swift motion
a somersault roll
landing grinning
******* bouncing
a silent scream
lashes out blinding
red wine**
*All loves promises
tumbling bouncing emotion
an ****** spite*
**leaving me
naked rivoletto
sashed red
seeing blurred
ghostly negatives
of forever young
screaming
bouncing *******
I say “Goodbye
true love” to
the tall glass
on the bar
my coat and
open door
to the
clothe strewn
bedroom**
*Clothed party act
a pint spinning somersault
quaffed down brim full*
May 14, 2010
May 14, 2010 at 5:11 AM UTC
all i see now are the silent ruin
of words teeming with wisdom
in every trail. you are gleaming
in the moony boondocks,
Ibabá remembers you as you were -
timeless and ruminative,
pursuing the source of rivers.
our sublime versifier,
the crucifixes now tremble without
the fullness of your flesh.
each page is turned without
the hover of your voice yet
stills its resonant message in my mind's premises like redolent graffiti.
striding river-pace,
once in moonlit Orfeo
graced by your sibilant being,
leaving only the strongest of impression
on the surly couch, a toppled glass
of Shiraz remembering your attendance
leaving the clamor of the audiences
real to touch, elusive in thought.
before the war was the ever-present word, and after the fray was
the armistice of the Sun where in
humdrum Sampiro, your fire's genealogy
is in the hands of the muse!
idly go the hours, wading everlong past
Calle Herrán - the bells of Paco Church
tell in this imperfect hour
the roads where you once traversed,
travailed and perhaps beer-maddened,
putting a face in the metaphysical!
in your banquet i partake
the wisdom of your wine
and the reason of your flesh -
the gods delight in you,
o, Manila of all Manila.
Oct 2, 2015
Oct 2, 2015 at 2:05 AM UTC
living a charmed existence in the
shade of the seaward palm tree
but a telltale whisperer in hearts depth
sends doubters and scaremongers
like skulking figure's into the late day shadows
something darkly this way comes
some nameless faceless thing stalks this heartland of light
few pondered the night
few thought about what lay out there in the deep
brazen the lighthouse keeper
stokes the fires and keeps the lamps burning
no rumor of night will lay darkness at this door
no faint echo of footfall shall haunt this hour
again and again the lighthouse keeper
treads the midnight cold path of stones
along the seawall checking that all is well
raising his lantern and peering with old eyes
at the crazed cracks in the ancient wall
but none gave sign of weakness
none gave sign of peril
far out in the deep of the wider world
for the love of money and the greed of gasoline
something set in motion
some terrible beast of steel
and just as the moon set
in the final hour before dawn it came
heaving and rattling with such horrendous sounds
with bone rattling force laid its terrible hand on the seawall
and smashed the stones like it was no more than sand castle
this terrible thing so darkly come
unforgiven of wretched creature misguided soul
come to harvest the land of light
breathed with heavy burnt oil
breathed with mechanical labors
pulling its weight onto the shore
toppled the lighthouse extinguishing its light
darkness fell upon the scene
and with dreadful night returned once again to this shore
the seaward palm tree wither and die
no charmed place safe
from savage of dark
morning light never to return
in the shade of metal and oil fires night
the savage of darkness
May 4, 2014
May 4, 2014 at 9:10 PM UTC
What can we do once we are ordinary?
Mother Teresa an ordinary nun, just a woman.
Oscar Romero an ordinary cleric, just a man.
The Beatles an ordinary band, just musicians.
An ordinary office worker changed all of China when he stopped the tanks in Tianamen Square.
An ordinary woman changed the rules about ****** harassment in the American workplace, by accident, just trying to embarrass a Supreme Court nominee.
An ordinary housewife changed the world. In a peaceful way. In a non-violent way. Corazon Aquino toppled the might of the American-backed Marcos regime.
We need moms and dads, teachers and technicians, people who work and people who play.
Pearl divers and trash removers. We need ordinary people doing ordinary things everyday - like being a carpenter - to make our world an extraordinary place.
What can we do once we are ordinary? We can save the world.
Jul 14, 2015
Jul 14, 2015 at 7:59 PM UTC
concrete shades the yellow-lighted symphony.
The peso-heavy take taxis;
security valets motors steaming castle gates.
I ask, which way is the 158?
Indifferent, they say, walk straight neath the freeway —
there is a bus stop two blocks away.
****
****
****
Clocktower hands transpose Cindarella-brick
to embers of electricity,
a factory aside scrawled graffiti;
fingers timidly ricket pitchfork fences.
Palermo is 11 km north.
Where is the north star?
I look straight ahead, repeating what
the travel blogs said like,
Be lost, don’t look lost;
flappy plastic maps scream vulnerability.
Be lost, not rich;
iPhones in gotham alleys are batman signals.
Walk fast.
Don’t pay attention to the eyes that pass.
Careless ponytails and brass hair attract
glances back.
Two blocks deep into the homeless shelter
beneath freeways, blankets
in shopping carts toppled over,
cars screaming away the symphony
into shadowed silence between heels striking.
Tunnel breath emerging on the other side,
gasping past stacked Jenga towers,
wired with antennas and empty clotheslines;
families and crack ****** sleep inside.
Safety’s herd thins as couples dart left down
cobblestone tributaries
that either lead to bus stops or parked cars.
I walk straight ahead with
sleeve-covered hands that swing like sticks
in the wind.
The symphony turns to
heartbeats and footsteps
plucking quickly;
fearing the 180 behind,
to zombies with sunken eyes,
thirsty for a thirty-cent high.
Sep 5, 2014
Sep 5, 2014 at 8:45 PM UTC