"tufted" poems
The Sun at noon to higher air,
Unharnessing the silver Pair
That late before his chariot swam,
Rides on the gold wool of the Ram.
So braver notes the storm-cock sings
To start the rusted wheel of things,
And brutes in field and brutes in pen
Leap that the world goes round again.
The boys are up the woods with day
To fetch the daffodils away,
And home at noonday from the hills
They bring no dearth of daffodils.
Afield for palms the girls repair,
And sure enough the palms are there,
And each will find by hedge or pond
Her waving silver-tufted wand.
In farm and field through all the shire
The eye beholds the heart's desire;
Ah, let not only mine be vain,
For lovers should be loved again.
4.2k
I
Half of the fellow father as he doubles
His sea-sucked Adam in the hollow hulk,
Half of the fellow mother as she dabbles
To-morrow's diver in her ***** milk,
Bisected shadows on the thunder's bone
Bolt for the salt unborn.
The fellow half was frozen as it bubbled
Corrosive spring out of the iceberg's crop,
The fellow seed and shadow as it babbled
The swing of milk was tufted in the pap,
For half of love was planted in the lost,
And the unplanted ghost.
The broken halves are fellowed in a *******
The crutch that marrow taps upon their sleep,
Limp in the street of sea, among the rabble
Of tide-tongued heads and bladders in the deep,
And stake the sleepers in the savage grave
That the vampire laugh.
The patchwork halves were cloven as they scudded
The wild pigs' wood, and slime upon the trees,
******* the dark, kissed on the cyanide,
And loosed the braiding adders from their hairs,
Rotating halves are horning as they drill
The arterial angel.
What colour is glory? death's feather? tremble
The halves that pierce the pin's point in the air,
And ***** the thumb-stained heaven through the thimble.
The ghost is dumb that stammered in the straw,
The ghost that hatched his havoc as he flew
Blinds their cloud-tracking eye.
II
My world is pyramid. The padded mummer
Weeps on the desert ochre and the salt
Incising summer.
My Egypt's armour buckling in its sheet,
I scrape through resin to a starry bone
And a blood parhelion.
My world is cypress, and an English valley.
I piece my flesh that rattled on the yards
Red in an Austrian volley.
I hear, through dead men's drums, the riddled lads,
******** their bowels from a hill of bones,
Cry Eloi to the guns.
My grave is watered by the crossing Jordan.
The Arctic scut, and basin of the South,
Drip on my dead house garden.
Who seek me landward, marking in my mouth
The straws of Asia, lose me as I turn
Through the Atlantic corn.
The fellow halves that, cloven as they swivel
On casting tides, are tangled in the shells,
Bearding the unborn devil,
Bleed from my burning fork and smell my heels.
The tongue's of heaven gossip as I glide
Binding my angel's hood.
Who blows death's feather? What glory is colour?
I blow the stammel feather in the vein.
The **** is glory in a working pallor.
My clay unsuckled and my salt unborn,
The secret child, I sift about the sea
Dry in the half-tracked thigh.
3.9k
Put the saddle on the mare,
For the wet winds blow;
There's winter in the air,
And autumn all below.
For the red leaves are flying
And the red bracken dying,
And the red fox lying
Where the oziers grow.
Put the bridle on the mare,
For my blood runs chill;
And my heart, it is there,
On the heather-tufted hill,
With the gray skies o'er us,
And the long-drawn chorus
Of a running pack before us
From the find to the ****
Then lead round the mare,
For it's time that we began,
And away with thought and care,
Save to live and be a man,
While the keen air is blowing,
And the huntsman holloing,
And the black mare going
As the black mare can.
3.3k
Bundled up and toasted
Stare to the exorbitant heavens
A dimmed electrifying spirit world
Leaving only one trifling light on
A slight single frozen tear
Rides the broad frigid air
To the glaring reality below
The silky cotton takes time
Flowing through a lingering life
Of chilled floating bliss
It taps the up turned nose
Tiny frozen feet make a stand
An intense tickle flows through the pumping veins
Leaving a feeling of pricking cherub kisses
Nervous life lungs squeeze
Releasing a single reclined breath
Concrete relaxed steam
Rubs the tufted sapped lips
Dissolving into the hazed sky
She has arrived
Mother Winter
Nov 30, 2010
Nov 30, 2010 at 5:09 AM UTC
It starts like a beige tuft of fibre
Protruding from a large burlap sack.
As we pull it from the hidden source
It gradually reveals itself.
Simple and unassuming,
A uniform, coloured strand
Which we gather up into a tidy ball.
Sometimes another strand is tied
Onto the one we pull.
A different colour?
A change of texture?
And so we pull that one anew,
We build another coil,
While the original strand awaits.
The interesting new thread,
Reveals itself from the hidden reservoir.
The fibre slides through our fingers.
Slowly, when there is resistance.
Quicker, when it comes loosely.
Now coarse and wiry
Now soft and slippery,
Now thick and tufted.
Tough Scottish highlands perhaps?
Or rural Ontario?
Sometimes the hidden source seems like it may be
A hand-knit sweater that we are pulling apart.
The strands are still kinked and twisted in places,
Echoing a memory of a shape it has held for years.
We recognize bits here and there too.
Colours and textures from our own story.
"I had a pair of socks like that."
"Remember our scarves from those cold childhood winters?"
The collection of small skeins increases.
From a sheep's fleece, yes, but now too
From Alpaca, camel and rabbit.
Cashmere from Pashmina goats in Nepal?
But at last the final strand comes free.
You feel the weight of the coiled wool,
And see the diversity of the colours.
And for each coil
We remember again how it appeared
How it felt.
How the strands
Came together
And apart.
Aug 12, 2013
Aug 12, 2013 at 10:13 AM UTC
Catch the motes of dust in light
To feel the threads of time suspend,
In serenade of life’s allure
Where precious moments never end.
Silver tears run down the cheek
In swift departures curled embrace,
Poingnancy for moments few
Of entwined limbs and whiskered face.
Separations loneliness
In gnawing of the very soul,
The wish for time to dissipate
To make the separate halves a whole.
Anticipation’s rawness now
Throws arrowed light to early shroud,
The eagerness to touch and kiss
Brings clear blue sky to morning cloud.
Rationalize the wonderment
Of slender fingers through your hair,
In fantasy of sheer delight
Her silhouette reflected there.
Hold the tantalizing heat
Of tender fires of passion bound
In throngs of longing, deeply felt,
Within the belly’s tufted mound
Exhaustion in the tangled sheet
As bands of sunlight kiss your hair,
Gently now, in drifted sleep
And gales of pleasure fill the air.
Catch the motes of dust in light
To feel the threads of time suspend
In serenade of life’s allure
Where precious moments never end.
Marshalg
Victoria Park tunnel
Auckland
24 July 2010
Jul 23, 2010
Jul 23, 2010 at 12:27 PM UTC
Foster the light nor veil the manshaped moon,
Nor weather winds that blow not down the bone,
But strip the twelve-winded marrow from his circle;
Master the night nor serve the snowman's brain
That shapes each bushy item of the air
Into a polestar pointed on an icicle.
Murmur of spring nor crush the cockerel's eggs,
Nor hammer back a season in the figs,
But graft these four-fruited ridings on your country;
Farmer in time of frost the burning leagues,
By red-eyed orchards sow the seeds of snow,
In your young years the vegetable century.
And father all nor fail the fly-lord's acre,
Nor sprout on owl-seed like a goblin-sucker,
But rail with your wizard's ribs the heart-shaped planet;
Of mortal voices to the ninnies' choir,
High lord esquire, speak up the singing cloud,
And pluck a mandrake music from the marrowroot.
Roll unmanly over this turning tuft,
O ring of seas, nor sorrow as I shift
From all my mortal lovers with a starboard smile;
Nor when my love lies in the cross-boned drift
Naked among the bow-and-arrow birds
Shall you turn cockwise on a tufted axle.
Who gave these seas their colour in a shape,
Shaped my clayfellow, and the heaven's ark
In time at flood filled with his coloured doubles;
O who is glory in the shapeless maps,
Now make the world of me as I have made
A merry manshape of your walking circle.
1.7k
(for my brother, Martin)
I have sown the moon in the sky for you
so every night its there for you to see
I have stopped every clock from ticking time away
I have turned the tides back from the shore
I have stopped your world in blue belled Spring
and locked my in the falling leaves of Autumn
So now you can rewind the moments of the world
You can go back, to that one moment of choice
and never find the hose, nor set the engine deadly running
nor send those texts of fond farewells, to friends who looked away
nor write to me with love a comfort letter
for the dreadful loss.
No!
Just you:
the tufted, still blonde cowlick sticking up
the crinkled nose and cheeky smile
those sea blue eyes to drown in
strong brown arms, muscles flexed and toned
wrapped tight around me warm
and alive.
© M.L.Emmett
Jul 30, 2014
Jul 30, 2014 at 12:15 PM UTC
O'DRISCOLL drove with a song
The wild duck and the drake
From the tall and the tufted reeds
Of the drear Hart Lake.
And he saw how the reeds grew dark
At the coming of night-tide,
And dreamed of the long dim hair
Of Bridget his bride.
He heard while he sang and dreamed
A piper piping away,
And never was piping so sad,
And never was piping so gay.
And he saw young men and young girls
Who danced on a level place,
And Bridget his bride among them,
With a sad and a gay face.
The dancers crowded about him
And many a sweet thing said,
And a young man brought him red wine
And a young girl white bread.
But Bridget drew him by the sleeve
Away from the merry bands,
To old men playing at cards
With a twinkling of ancient hands.
The bread and the wine had a doom,
For these were the host of the air;
He sat and played in a dream
Of her long dim hair.
He played with the merry old men
And thought not of evil chance,
Until one bore Bridget his bride
Away from the merry dance.
He bore her away in his atms,
The handsomest young man there,
And his neck and his breast and his arms
Were drowned in her long dim hair.
O'Driscoll scattered the cards
And out of his dream awoke:
Old men and young men and young girls
Were gone like a drifting smoke;
But he heard high up in the air
A piper piping away,
And never was piping so sad,
And never was piping so gay.
1.6k
A land only nature has touched
A lion to its prey, clutched
Before that though
The Lion crept up real slow
Crouched down real low
He puts on a good show
Creeping and crawling
Absolutely stalking
His ***** orange coloring
Unseen by a prey so alluring
His big tufted paws are like a quiet breeze
Unheard by a prey totally at ease
His eyes focus, like a morning lotus
Finding the sun with such slowness
Silently stalking towards prey, not yet ferocious
A gleaming meaty meal ready to devour
Just another moment and little prey will cower
First a pounce with claws drawn out
Then a bite and a shake, making the prey shout
Now a *****
Chewing prey up before its deceased
Drug across the land only nature has touched
A lion has won it’s hunt, quiet now, be hushed
Can you hear nature sing, the way she does
With violence and beauty no matter if lion or cheetahs
Now humans are different! Or is it really so?
The desire the same as a beasts hunt, reaping what we sow
A need to ***** and overpower
A craving to devour
Jan 18, 2019
Jan 18, 2019 at 2:28 PM UTC
Hills of Annesley, Bleak and Barren,
Where my thoughtless Childhood stray’d,
How the northern Tempests, warring,
Howl above thy tufted Shade!
Now no more, the Hours beguiling,
Former favourite Haunts I see;
Now no more my Mary smiling,
Makes ye seem a Heaven to Me.
1.5k
Tufted ethereality, angelism of stock and store
pedestrian...alas, circusy.
Helm of streets bob...our supplicant pulls out
a mile or two of scripture from an enormous
pocket.
Fingers ink-blotted with grime, bent forth striding--
a heedless Beethoven tuned in immaculately.
Array's arrival stunned with scurry...planets of
conveyance pull at their elliptical wiring.
Some rare gigantism to the tenth of powers has
touched everything...all he could do from
going where he's arrived is futile.
From time immemorial, he...at present, its full
possessor!
What convoluted theorem of probability will
forcibly eject him from eureka...from where he's
vaporized his wears...naught...naught!
Some precipice's nudge knew best the wind for
his thought to take to, a majestic soar pealing the
spheres to show them their shape.
Life has exemplified its frugal capacity to him--
simmering creation tucked away for one fine day.
He, to outlive the closing energy that dances him,
an immortal...to be handled with care...with
universal intelligence--be, has let him...loosed.
He's broken the code of things in and of themselves...
he's a thing in and of himself--the Unitative factor erupts.
As the credits of glory pull upward...so he as them.
Nov 1, 2014
Nov 1, 2014 at 12:42 PM UTC
~
Beneath this dark…soft, silent sky (awaiting your smile)
Beneath this dark…soft silent sky
where starlight teardrops weep
in moon glow feathered sonnets…
my heart seeks
~
Clinging to every hope,
laced of tiny woven dreams
now filtered through weary eyes
and worried sighs
~
Collecting each moment shared
within my weathered hands…mixed
with essence of posy and
butterfly song
~
Woven together in melodic patterns,
colorful arcs on golden horizons
bidding me a good evening while
riding in on the sweetest of mystic zephyrs…
~
as another tear paints my cheek
in transparent worry
and desperate longing for that day
when your smile reappears
~
For here sits my whispered wishes,
behind tufted clouds of life,
touching me with poetic joy,
allowing me to breathe freely
~
Beneath this dark…soft silent sky
where starlight teardrops weep
in moon glow feathered sonnets…
I shall wait…for your smile
Apr 22, 2014
Apr 22, 2014 at 6:37 PM UTC
Show your teeth, Cheshire Cat
Your cunning smile, tongue flickers
Licks across small pointed teeth
Like the little fish, darting between
Glint in the eye, and then just eyes
Ravenous hair cascades
Neither too long, nor short
A lion's mane, frames quick eyes
Angered, quick to roar, fang
Claws, blood finger tipped
Panther, in the night
Lightly leaping tree to tree
A silent padding, not decent
From above she glides, wary
Waiting, to fall, upon such prey
Tiger stripes, orange, white
Grey and black, fierce bright eyes
In the tall grass from clump to lump
Coiled steel in her curved limbs
Long striped tail, snap, snap, snap
Wintery lynx, tufted ears alert
Twitch not nervous for sound
Whiskers long, and eyes a sight
White on white, silent again
Stalking a hopping long ear
Cheetah, cheetah, rely alone
In speed, quick and fight
A nip, bite with sharp tooth
Fast, slick swipe, claws deep
A hind, lacerated, meal tonight
Now a cougar, lithe wasp waisted, nice
Shapely leg, long and tight
Wickedly grinned, tipped in blood
Caramel pride, my most dangerous cat
It's time to come play with your twine
Sep 2, 2014
Sep 2, 2014 at 9:36 PM UTC
Aristotle at my fingertips,
not locked in soliloquies I may perform,
but heard from an Oxford don I have
in my pocket,
as I lean into each lesson and trudge
up and down my morning
constitutional,
where the firebreak meets
chaparral alive with cottontail
this morning, when I almost said, "it's too hot."
C'mon, walk a mile with me… like
on the road to Emmaus, but Christ, no;
this character,
a soldier in me, about to salt out, bids me,
walk a mile, "not two, one
does the trick."
The thought comes
as a dare from the Ralston Purina guy,
and I stepped onto my trail.
I dare think Aristotle's thoughts after Plato's,
thinking
I could have known this when I was younger,
but not to this degree,
if I had not dropped out, and never knew,
by rote,
to pass a test, that
"All men by nature desire to know."
This is
Curiosity, right? I suspect it is a gift.
The joy we find in sensation, proof
offered the gainsayer,
I say again, that which is good for nothing
never
never
naturally exists, so
what tool forms an eye to notice that…
see, through the window
of my poetic-pathetic e-thoughtic soul
a feathery
family of phoebe birds, flits by,
if that is the proper name
{Tufted-Titmouse, my AI replies},
tails reflecting a smokey blue hue,
they swoop and flutter past;
I see
in a non-imaged flashpast pattern
from a time in the summer of 1969…
Disneyfied trails
from Cinderella's dressing room
scene, not seen, but reminded of seeing,
the pattern, in this phantomind dance,
being witnessed now, as
this old soldier once saw it
performed by bluer birds than these…
Time skipper
shifts to another bubble intersecting mine
and
I hear a worried neighbor fret about the fire.
I almost say,
"One of the benefits of being
backedup to the cloud,
nothing to lose."
But I remember, she collects purses and shoes.
Sep 7, 2020
Sep 7, 2020 at 12:16 PM UTC
(for my brother, Martin)
I have sown the moon in the sky for you
so every night its there for you to see
I have stopped every clock from ticking time away
I have turned the tides back from the shore
I have stopped your world in blue belled Spring
and locked my in the falling leaves of Autumn
So now you can rewind the moments of the world
You can go back, to that one moment of choice
and never find the hose, nor set the engine deadly running
nor send those texts of fond farewells, to friends who looked away
nor write to me with love a comfort letter
for the dreadful loss.
No!
Just you:
the tufted, still blonde cowlick sticking up
the crinkled nose and cheeky smile
those sea blue eyes to drown in
strong brown arms, muscles flexed and toned
wrapped tight around me warm
and alive.
© M.L.Emmett
Apr 25, 2016
Apr 25, 2016 at 8:12 AM UTC
Swift bee, the gilded messenger of bliss,
Begirt with golden stars of Heaven’s span,
What draws you to the clover’s gentle kiss?
Sweet nectars, that the strongest drinker can
Carouse with dreams and dizzy waves of sleep,
Or mocks the freshest breath of summer’s clime?
Swift bee, a flame-plumed star of black and gold,
Why do you with your mouth, completely reap
The liquors that each golden bud does hold,
And lulls with somnolence the might of time?
Oh, bee, you spread the tufted pollen clouds
Like nebulae of opal stars crossways
The delicate, soft digitalis crowds,
Which passionately garner sunbeam rays
Within their coral shells. I can’t express
How much your toil’s worth to coming spring,
And how so passioned glide your wings around
The purple, gentle harebell’s loosened dress,
And make, through pretty hums, spring’s hopeful sound
Oft too profaned by your most fearsome sting!
Oh, pretty hummer! Hearty worker! Bee!
I see you roaming round the garden’s bend,
Where sweet, white daisies wreathe a canopy,
And make you but a hearty, cheerful friend.
Swift bee, the aching, swollen heart of mine
Desires comfort where pain knows no ruth
The buds hold, like rich garners golden grain,
Ambrosia of the gods, dream’s honeyed wine
So bring and let dear bee, such moisture stain
My lips and warm my heart with spring’s bright youth!
Apr 10, 2014
Apr 10, 2014 at 10:07 PM UTC
the night cares
and we are it's batteries
it licks us like a daring child
and the night avian raptors are tufted
and their prey is energized
and the chase/escape scenario is a burly-hurly
flight night
and the trees push around the winds
and breath is the current of life
and the furnaces tick down
and an unreal peeling
of the church human bells
(calling the hour or the faithful to prayer)
aids my constructive dreaming bleed
chimney awoke
the night licks me
like a daring child licking a battery
but caring also
like a cat removing the amniotic sac
from it's newborn
Dec 22, 2023
Dec 22, 2023 at 3:08 PM UTC
.
Rolling on the carpets,
In coyest plead for a belly
Rub and groom, little Fae,
Each day a Saturday morning,
Shining as hot coffee, wafting
In cool sun, with blue, mist deep
Eyes, lazily ensconced in a glaze
To the out of doors— I set her free
As a casement window sprung, let,
To roam the grass canopies and hunt
All the lovelorn hours of the cying day.
Sparrows flutter and milky doves gurgle
From on high and leaves rustling pound
As she prowls in motions slow, so much
To pounce upon, when all too sudden,
Fish or fowl are flung in a golden bowl
Mealtime turns in rings from a can to her,
Wilding, famished ear.
In long mood afternoons she returns,
Furriously plays with flicks of shadows
And twine, then a knap on a tick
Of whiskers and cream,
In the garden jungles
Of the drowsy fawn
And mince of mice
Scurries of heed
In the silence—
Of lollIng breeze,
Gentle days, sways
Of terror and yawn,
Tufted cubby roaring,
Wee tiger of the lawn.
Nov 24, 2014
Nov 24, 2014 at 10:58 PM UTC
There is a sacred path
that winds through
my heart
It sings God's Name
as I dance ecstatically
along enchanted gopi banks
and over
whirling, warbling brooks
I marvel as a black and
white checkered,
red tufted woodpecker
carves God's Name on
a thankful tree trunk
Mirabai, Kabir and Rumi
wave their colorful prayer flags
verses of pure love
and devotion cling to the
very air we breathe
The Bhakti path forges
unafraid through
the bleak, brooding
forest of desires
Husky winds blow around
ghostly, skeleton branches
that claw helplessly
at the night skies
whispering valiant stories of
Rama's exile and
Krishna's triumph
Another tree it's hoary arms
outstretched
resembling a cross
bleeds, remembering the sacrifices
and love of Jesus, The Lamb of God
Trekking further into the dense
unforgiving jungle
seated in Lotus pose
a Golden Buddha
immersed in
rapturous meditation
opens His eyes for an instant
The sun rises in the east
I kneel and kiss His
glorious feet
Leaving the tangled woods
behind
suffering, godforsaken
figures of homeless people
sleeping alongside
this good samaritan road
emerge
Embodiments of God
spirits marred by defeat
and agony
stare listlessly, flies circling
oblivious to the
blistering desert heat
I stop to share a prayer,
cup of water, some fresh
baked bread from my knapsack
and a ray of hope
The path abruptly ascends
purple mountain mists
crown the summit
holy footprints of saints,
yogis, fellow pilgrims
indelibly christen
and guide my steps
Angels sweep the road
ahead tossing rose petals
and victory blossoms
Om peals
across the enlightened
Bhakti path
...and an ancient God awakens....
Feb 28, 2014
Feb 28, 2014 at 2:07 PM UTC
Scarlet tufted malachite sunbird
Ruby, emerald, sapphire
Feathered jewels take flight
Apr 25, 2018
Apr 25, 2018 at 5:16 PM UTC
I feel your eyes emblazoned as stars
stitched into a river of ebony
your hands, how they extend from heaven
wading across our distance
tasting of cedar and salt to my mind
of every dream I've yet to realize
I squeeze the rind of you
from coastal sunsets
drinking your essence as blood red pulp
you sing within the cicadas' song
as I wander through tufted sea oats
searching, longingly, for your voice
the whimsical splash
of your laughter is a brilliant fusion
of lemon, fuchsia, and tangerine zinnias
framing my cottage pathway
you become the smile
of every face I encounter,
the tickling glimmer of sunlight
between scrolls of Spanish moss
dripping like lace from my heart
you are wisteria and wine
late summer afternoons spent
in naked conversation
I want to be drunk on you today,
tomorrow, every day
we're promised tucked
beneath your chin,
slumbering to the sound
of your cool rain
coating oak leaves
Aug 2, 2020
Aug 2, 2020 at 7:59 AM UTC
His eyes blindfolded by sleep, he densely gropes about grabbing my hand between both
of his.
Enclosing mine own between his Faberge egg of callouses and scars.
He holds my hand as if made of porcelain between his blonde-tufted, chiseled pectorals.
The tufts shift beneath the weight of our hands with each heave of mellifluous breath, silhouetted by pthalo blue lights from the electronic tomes casting their oceanic net about the room.
Chronographs edge further into their rotation, and his tides of breath bear the gentle weight of his hands more heavily about mine.
A dulling crash of sleep furls about my hand - starting at the top and settling somewhere between the tufts.
I begin to wonder if the heartbeat I feel in my hand is his or mine.
As I begin to drift back to sleep with disregard to whether or not I will wake with a functioning hand; a yawn encompasses his form pulling the Faberge egg apart, and shocking a syncopated known trumming through my hand.
A smile washes over both of our faces; in blindfolded sleep for him, and me with an interest in illumination within his maniform Fabrege clasp.
Jan 26, 2014
Jan 26, 2014 at 9:25 PM UTC