"uncontained" poems
The joyful heart is the buoyant heart—
empowered to rise above its circumstances,
unweighted, unburdened, unbound,
tied only to that which would lift it higher,
untethered from anything which would
pull it down, pull it under or suffocate it.
It's the free heart, quiet and at rest
yet jubilant and uncontained,
the celebrating heart, the praising heart,
the thankful heart, the heart set on pilgrimage,
bent on adventure, journey and romance.
All the while it's a waiting heart
because it's a yielded, led heart—
a heart which doesn't run ahead of the LORD
but willingly, quickly to the LORD—
a heart that though eagerly anticipating each
twisting turn, next horizon and changing path
keeps its eyes fixed not on the scenery
but forever on the Shepherd
because it's a heart persuaded
that He alone is the Great Reward
for which it has always been looking.
True joy is only ours when we find an endless
source of satisfaction, and of these I know only One!
The secret to all joy is to crave Him above all else.
The joyful heart is the one addicted fully to Him,
desperate for Him to the expense of all else,
willing to sacrifice everything to have that craving satisfied.
Joy and idols, I have learned,
do not easily reside together in the same heart.
So if I find that joy is chased away
the most likely culprits are my own desires.
What am I wanting more than Jesus?
For if intimacy with Him is the supreme goal of my life
then nothing can arise which I'm not enabled to bear with joy.
There is, I suppose, nothing so reliable as suffering and loss
to expose all of the hidden idols within me.
It's surely those who have suffered the greatest
and most frequent losses for Christ who are also
most capable of knowing the deepest and most abiding joy.
For it's when we've been stripped bare of everything else
that we begin to know for certain that our joy is based
not on the temporary blessings of our circumstances
but only on the presence of the Eternal Blesser Himself.
Sometimes He offers to us all that is in His right hand,
but for any with eyes truly opened to see
the most precious of times may be those
when He offers to us only the intimacy of His right hand.
Rivers of sadness can open up
into wide gulfs of endless delight and
are often the very courses needed to carry us there.
When all is lost, we find to our amazement
that, even so, we still have ALL
and no one can rob us of it.
When He takes everything from us
He proves Himself to be EVERYTHING to us.
Jul 26, 2017
Jul 26, 2017 at 4:11 PM UTC
...a diary of the falling dominoes chapter
invisibly dying from the inside out
no one is looking into unseen eyes
no one can hear a muted voice fading
no one is close enough to be near
the deafening thrums echo
anxieties’ racing heartbeat
within morphing flesh shell ,
gasping for new breath
in a hovering stale silence
from a distance
the broken mirror ricochets a subdued light ;
much closer the reflection reveals
someone I once knew by heart
now an unrecognizable mask
enshrouds a terminal emptiness
inconspicuous at a fleeting glance ,
impossible to discern what storms rage
from the inside out ,... unnoticed
an uncontained wildfire
smoldering within, lies in wait
for the imminent winds of change
to fan the flames into the final
eternal silent ashes
a poet reaches out demurely
offering a candid look
into the window
of the imperfect human soul
there is no poetry
met by indifference
just gathered unread words scribbled,
squandered time
dripped slowly on an empty page ;
moments turn into days
days turned into years
invisibly dying from the inside out
an unfinished life trickles out
like seeping blood evanescing
from a bottomless puncture
wounding ... penetrating the heart,
leaching out the slow death of a poet
for poetry is only words unless they touch someone ...
befallen to indifference is poetic death
by salted paper cuts ...
a muting suffocation
that hiddenly erodes away,
silencing the passion
of a musing soul
one unread word at a time ...
© harlon rivers ... all rights reserved
Jan 18, 2017
Jan 18, 2017 at 12:16 PM UTC
You had not joined me
My totem-journey to the wellspring of the Colorado
to seek the source of things uncontained
the stars washed over me with asphyxiation
the breathless gasp of space
--In the deserts;
Rocklands--
the emerald barrel cactus
is watered as the earth
and the passerby
Cheyenne
cut into the crust
to sip the wine-flesh
to be drunk
and exhume the inhibitions of living
Forbidden berries
in the garden of quills, spear thistles
trust upon the air to protect her children
a good, silent mother
does not refuse
the gift of deflowering
as she is stripped
of her sharpness
and laundered
bestowed in salted bison skin of a war-chief's pouch.
Nov 27, 2018
Nov 27, 2018 at 12:44 PM UTC
i am shåï
and im here to stay...
lipstick stains
left on your
swollen cheek
love uncontained
red pen marks
drawn carelessly
i have not forgotten you
my dear
you came home
the other day
why did i even bother
to kiss you away?
the stains
still remain
on a carpet
that cannot be cleaned
your cheek was swollen
i cant think
i forgot
a heart stolen
you were here
maybe you once were gone
i cant think
just the mere thought
(b.d.s.)
May 4, 2014
May 4, 2014 at 7:28 PM UTC
My mind could be saying all manner of things
when I read your messages;
the truth is,
my uncontained smile
betrays my thoughts
every time.
It has a dialog all its own.
Sep 30, 2012
Sep 30, 2012 at 10:59 PM UTC
*Language is a skin: I rub my language against the other. It is
as if I had words instead of fingers, or fingers at the tip
of my words. My language trembles with desire.
-Roland Barthes*
My language is a skin I have outgrown.
It sloughs off in flakes,
leaving letters or the occasional
ill-suited, illegible word
trailing behind me.
I pick at adverbs and articles
hanging from my fingertips;
This morning I pulled a whole phrase
off my arm like a sunburn.
My language, once alight,
now settles like cinders
on the ground,
around the shower drain,
upon my sheets;
My language no longer serves me.
Peel my vocabulary off my back,
tear my diction from my shoulders,
and my syntax from my chest;
Scratch the punctuation off my face—
my lips are chapped with parentheses.
Tomorrow I will have shed my language—
Unbound from an ill-fitting lexicon—
coughed the alphabet from my lungs
and exhaled the last serif
like cigarette smoke
to find the world new,
uncontained and undefined.
Apr 7, 2011
Apr 7, 2011 at 4:15 AM UTC
Bubbling up
Unabashed
Unbridled
Uncontained
Volcanic
Inappropriate
Inadvisable
Irrefutable
Eruption
Contagious
Infectious
Endemic
Free flowing
Molten
Life affirming
Giggles!
Jun 23, 2014
Jun 23, 2014 at 8:03 PM UTC
Friends like fickle timepieces,
I'm studying these circling arms.
Today we're rubbing off the gold,
we're turning pockets inside-out
as I'm peeling off your clothes.
*The dandelion seeds are dancing,
tube between your teeth
lifting up the bell jar
to release the waning fumes of me.
We're disappearing
into shapeless smears on my white ceiling
I'm waking up
to shapeless smears on my white ceiling*
The dewy density of days
between our poems spoken wet and blooming
is just a thin and runny equinox
where sweet abstraction
becomes messes uncontained.
My fingertips and lungs are stained
with your stale and flavorless tepid rain;
hands still moving though I've stopped winding.
I don't know where, I don't know why
nostalgia shriveled up and died
now I'm just remembering.
Aug 5, 2013
Aug 5, 2013 at 2:46 AM UTC
Lady, the dew of years
Makes sodden the world
And yet there is no morning.
Lady, we cannot think you
Indifferent or far,
And we lean and call after
You who in the night,
As a morning, among
This our heaviness came
And our eyes called you maiden.
We are in the darkness,
Our eyes turned to the door,
Waiting. Because you passed
Through the room where we are,
Your form not cumbered
With our weight and gesture;
Waiting, because you went
Uncontained by our shadows,
As a light, quietly;
Leaning, as though you might
Come again where our eyes
Are lost that follow after
You who as a light
Through the room where we are
With grace carried a flower.
1.6k
a series of random questions
all asking,
some ending in,
a few beginners,
where from...
from where,
do the haters come from?
the pleasure of mass ******
in what gene,
from what cell, possessed,
that you seek it as a life's rationale,
so easy?
from where,
derived
the notion that you,
politician professional
behind closed doors,
bend over to the private interest
your public pretense,
couched lies,
the idea mocking me,
you know what's better
fraud,
from where,
did this despotic greed arise?
from where,
this endless depression,
a session with no end,
don't recall the beginning,
whence the end,
where the end,
freedom from it,
climb out from Joseph's pit,
the exit come
from?
from where,
does inspiration come from?
from
intimacy with the inanimate,
the population of objects,
coarse, beauteous that provoke,
the museums, the gutter, the worn,
the just unrealized, imagined,
from
learning to speak hearts
to speak the heart language
from
from animated blood, eyes, taste buds,
when you pass thru the molecules of me,
by contact real or imagined,
desperation, satisfaction organic,
from where,
from where do these questions arise,
the answers as well,
they are tangible, yet intangible,
even
from,
a notion indistinct,
an untraceable path,
hidden routers,
deflecting reflecting,
even a current direct,
invisible to the naked
from where?
a fair question,
answers, unreliable,
for in the forming,
froming is always
transfigured,
distorted
so let's agree,
the
mother, mater, matters not,
of from,
unsolvable, soluble,
the origin, source,
the river-head is a wasted search
only the acts of yours,
even/or the poems,
all realized ~
undeniable
from you, your hand
that is the only answer to
a question,
from where,
wherein from
comes both,
the contained,
and the
uncontained.
Nov 15, 2014
Nov 15, 2014 at 11:15 AM UTC
The secret taste, my own hand is completing, ice cream.
A private joy, the moaning, the fleeting, ice cream.
My unplayed sonnet craves for a maestro's crescendo.
A freezer’s siren song, I’m powerless, beckoning, ice cream
My desires, untamed garden, unexplored, ignored,
A frozen bliss, in pleasure's heat, I'm needing, ice cream.
Remorseful echoes haunt my yearnings, an abandoned hall,
Useless empty calories to be worked off, sinning, ice cream.
A painter’s brush, my hands splatter ecstasy, uncontained,
Flavor's colors, in pleasure's heat, dripping, ice cream.
Wisp of my scent, a memory of vanilla and sea salt,
Sugar cone explodes, no napkin, fingers sticking, ice cream
Imagined lover, I cup myself, between fingers, a slow pull,
Creamy soft serve cup, caramel drizzled, spooning, ice cream
Flavors of passion, spices of desire, I’m taste-testing,
Wandering endless isles, reading labels, discovering ice cream.
In pre-dawn mist, my sighs rise soft to kiss the sky,
Candy sprinkles scattered on hot fudge; uplifting ice cream.
Beneath the stars, my haven whispers, Gaia’s soothing grace,
In every touch, I find my truth, my love embracing, ice cream.
Jan 10, 2025
Jan 10, 2025 at 7:07 PM UTC
Your sacred place is where you can find yourself again and again. The great attractor. On a Sunday morning, near the river bank, soaking in sun rays filtering through wispy clouds that peek through tall oak trees, you sit on fallen orange leaves. Hint of chill still present in the early spring breeze. Calm water talking only through the language of small waves brought by soft wind. You see smoke coming out of a cabin chimney not too far away. Breakfast will be here soon. You feel excited to share sandwiches and simple joys of this morning with your soulmate. The conversation between nature and your silence only to be interrupted by the sight of your love. Radiant and natural after a great night's sleep, those glistening eyes gaze at the shimmering surface of water. You eat and you soak all scents of nature. You hum an old song. The urge to live the moment is just too strong. You want to scream out of uncontained joy but don't. Because it feels silly. Then out of nowhere ***** screams loud. Amazed, you laugh greatly and shout too. Both join in a song. Time stands still, lying with us together on dried orange leaves. Maybe that is why you find yourself here again and again. Because time slept alongside both of us lying down on the earth in embrace.
Jun 26, 2017
Jun 26, 2017 at 2:55 PM UTC
thus concludes a text
from a dear friend whom
I have never met, but this a,
concluding statement is
both convulsing and
uncontained
autumn is a her, a self-selected
gender unique, that picks its
own pronouns, pronunciations,
for women greet us with
warmth+chill skill
combinatory, to
make ordinary
our daily green
reform into
a multi~variable aristocracy of colors,
a forest of expressions,
each a statement leaf,
stating look at me,
I’m transformed, resurrected, disguised,
though essence unchanged, for
I am the possibles of ad
infinitum and I am:
***not-nearly as potent
as the sparks of god
within a human being***
3:58am
10-20-24
Oct 20, 2024
Oct 20, 2024 at 4:03 AM UTC
that place with comforting as theme overriding,
essentials of dream, complex, shelter, cocoon,
which/whether, almost irrelevant,
if and or,
don't matter when you are at home,
light, fierce sun rays eyes filled,
moonlight stars invading one's composure
now!
time
to alight, feet on the grounding,
rain,
pelting, not an inhibitor to the poem
in me, its resonating drumming me up,
to a beating, a lyric, a thyme of rhyme,
fragrantly repeating in my head, home,
home is where the flagrant poems are
born, delivered by no midwife, from
the ***** of my entirety, all five sensoria,
commanded by multiple generals on
different battlefields, coordinating a
battle plan, exhale, attack, coordinate,
brain, eye, smell, movement, urgency,
taste, words gushed, light emitted from
the fingertips, you cannot write as fast
as required, you, self, afired, and afeared,
losses will be greater than expected, but
no matter when we carry the tide behind
us, sweeping the obstacle of ego, pinging
pain, the hesitation that collapses courage,
oh god, oh me, be brave, lead me into the
breach,
the hole, the aperture that will allow a totality
of me to exit, to escape, to compose, p r o p o s e,
the confines of my uncontrollable uncontained
unconscious natured being and fervent annouce,
on this day,
*this poem shall be
written in its fulfilling, exiting fulsomeness,
&
entirety,
and let me rise, raise up, lift and shout,
one more last time, like the first time, praise and glory,
hallelujah to the parts of me that gifted me this
poem in-the unity-of-unison, uncensored, un~
inhibited and finalized momentarily perpetual,
with an amen amendment offered up too all and to
me…
amen, amen, amen
and let us rise up to morrow and once more,
write up to ride to birth the essentials of my next
homebound
be-ing
Aug 18, 2025
Aug 18, 2025 at 5:15 PM UTC
She walks
Such a lithe/! feline step all of hips and she knows not
I am tempted so by the organic process of her
When she looks into my eyes
A Loadstone glow
A flicker - spark
Now an inferno uncontained rages
Between us a cloud of electricity
Static
Waiting
SilentlyI dare glance
into those eyes
Let me
The polarization so instant at our first touch
They tell me she is not mine
She belongs to another
But her eyes
Aug 14, 2013
Aug 14, 2013 at 11:25 AM UTC
Observant misconstrued glances weaving conclusions
of what is above your paygrade of perceptiveness.
imperfections of what you glance upon.
A child in the confinement of misunderstanding,
Only the turbulence of reality like ocean waves.
Solitude of emotions then surges of confusion crash.
Lost in the tall trees of emotions as the leafs of
disorientation venture to cloud a mind of needed calm.
The conciseness needs the rhyme of routine to balance.
Heed this thought those of ill-conceived notions that
when this little miracle has a moment of uncontained
emotion, it is not for your misconceived wordings.
"My little one mummy is here, daddy too,
"Hear our voices like a calm ocean over you,
A mother embraces the worries of your thoughts,
easing the confusion of the world away..
Others may stare in ignorant stances.
*"But nothing is wrong with you, you're our baby
cuddling the confusion of your surroundings away.*
Jan 18, 2017
Jan 18, 2017 at 7:09 PM UTC
Hasta la pasta?
Annoying filament knots
of spaghetti spools.
The squeals of delight
flow from all fishing children
with uncontained joy.
Sounds of spinning spools
always brings me much comfort,
for I’m not at work.
Floating down the stream?
Not a dream, after dropping…
A bag of bobbers.
In early morning
anxious fish are awaiting
the autumn school bells.
Author Note:
Learn more about me and my poetry at:
http://www.squidoo.com/book-isbn-1419650513/
By Joseph J. Breunig 3rd, © 2006, All rights reserved.
Nov 15, 2012
Nov 15, 2012 at 10:28 AM UTC
A lurid tiger billows,
Across the charcoal sky,
Uncontained by nature,
All’s sanguine beneath it’s stride.
Zigzagging electric segments
Crack like ice in spring.
Spitting biting droplets,
Which spatter, whirl, and sing.
Mar 2, 2011
Mar 2, 2011 at 2:20 PM UTC
young, so full of youth,
filled to the brim with
*** and desire and the
quest for flesh,
we are living the lives they
write about
we the young, so full of
uncontained emotion, so
happy to be alive and yet
not even realizing it, we
talk of suicide but never
believe it exists
we are perfect in our
decided ignorance of
our imperfections
(it gives us strength like
nobody knows)
-
spreading across the globe,
to China, Europe, and the
Southern Lands, our disease
is no plague
to the youth of the enslaved
places, to the poor countries,
and those shackled in the old
traditions:
we give to you our itch,
our burn, our aching and
hurting that drives us to
go out and do what needs
to be done
we give to you a reason
to make things better
(just as we give ourselves)
we are the reason
the earth still spins
we are the drive
behind every new
empire
we are the innovators
and the diviners
the makers of tools
and seekers of
riches
the creators of gods
and the gods
themselves
we, so young, so full
of energy and zeal and
lust, we the ones who
create and destroy, we
who so thoughtlessly
hurtle the human race
forward
we take ourselves to bed
each night, not wondering
with whom we sleep or
where we will awake;
knowing only that adventure
is worth having in itself.
that the morning is our treasure
and the new day is more fulfilling
than any golden trinket in the
tombs of the old kings
this we sleep with, smiling,
dreaming of the wild chances
we are challenged to tame
-
so young, so full of youth,
filled to the brim with ***
and desire and the thirst for
a definition in this grey and
blotted world
we awake each day
and drearily attack our
lives
we the pioneers, the philosophers,
and historians
humanity cannot live without us
(and I mean to say they have no
choice)
Jun 24, 2011
Jun 24, 2011 at 9:48 AM UTC
[you the drug] murmurs to my lips.
the visions pound: a deep
bass [pushing and pulling]
shooting up:
the memory, passion, a high,
the feelings,
(and touches, lingering
slipping into empty
wisps of air)
uncontained, unrestrained,
ticktocktick: [we the clock] that
doesn’t sleep, doesn’t slow,
doesn’t forget.
(being itself a point of reference,
uncontrolled unrelenting time,
being a point of origin,
weighing me down in
the churning waves
in the pounding bass)
[we the clock] that loses me,
that consumes me,
that (being itself a reference)
is unreadable and blindingly
invisible
[clutching sand].
The [ticks of memory] bring
tremors:
the bass pulsing nodes
into my skin, (pushing me into
the drug,
drowning me in the frenzied,
methodical
ticktockticktickticktick of the clock.)
[me the ****** longing and desire]
I cling to [we the clock], love every second
minute, hour. The echoes of the
thrashing
movement of empty time
in the ticktock tears [me]
(kicking and screaming, locked in my head
behind a wall of miles, distance seeping
through the cracks.) from the visions
from [you the drug],
from the bass,
the addictive additive
to living:
You.
Apr 28, 2012
Apr 28, 2012 at 5:25 PM UTC
Eyes meet
Hands touch
Breathing heavy
Pressure drops
Eyes meet
Eyes part
Bodies meet
Hands find
Eyes meet
Skins touch
Hands find
Breathing heavy
Eyes part
Lips move
Mind changes
Contained apology
Pressure rises
Blood boils
Lips starve
Fingers find
Hands slap
Mind races
Throats scream
Shatter
Crash
No
Yes
Uncontained apology
Whispered forgiveness
Skins part
Lips close
Bodies dress
Sun goes down
Jul 13, 2011
Jul 13, 2011 at 7:59 AM UTC
the
faint odor of soup cans
and well water wafted through the pumice stone
of recycled air and a faint hum. you thumb through the turbulence of your heart's bone
as it fractures. you catch birds to mock turtles.
with no alice.
the sun adds this... true moons and canopies
soft shouldered earth and dead moths. we're taught
but more lost. the sea chops
so the horizon is a great wave
on a seahorse.
cozy stars applaud. a wisp of pure force.
you're uncontained.
you might be immortal;
but how could you live
with that ?
Feb 1, 2016
Feb 1, 2016 at 1:59 PM UTC
darling, there will be days when our cheeks are slicked wet from the rainstorms within our hearts, when i will be rendered unable to disengage from the safety of my blankets, when i will ask for you to hold me until i no longer feel as if i am breaking. there will be nights when i smoke countless cigarettes until my throat is ragged & it is easier not to speak, when i will not allow myself to eat because i believe i do not deserve it, when i will call long after you have fallen to sleep, desperately seeking your voice through the static because i am afraid i will forget the way it resonates in my eardrums.
but even this certain pain, my love, my own one, will make us better. you will see me destroyed & vulnerable, flawed with need. we will strip each other bare to our truest of selves & fall in love with that sheer beauty beneath. i give you my undying adoration, the ever-present reaching of my arms, my boundless, uncontained love.
you are the spark of stars illuminating my night sky, you are coursing with urgency through my bloodstream, you are everywhere & our time is now. i will love you fragile. i will love you strong.
oh darling, i will kiss your fingertips each & every night before together we dream.
Oct 23, 2013
Oct 23, 2013 at 9:37 AM UTC
Super moon, freshly minted gold coin
tossed high up, to what mortals blindly lose
their hearts to,wanting to hold on open palms,
each one claiming, pointing up "This beauty is all mine"
You are the one who plates silver to my sweet sins
when she and I,roll on the open balcony in a frenzy uncontained
til it's waves lash higher and higher,spill out and get placid
for that time I forget the play of dark matter and other secrets
of cosmos, still to be brought to light, by billion droller projects.
Let hydrogen colliders work day and night on it,
it doesn't interest me at this time of full moon joy
let me wallow in your illusion for now, it's enchantment pure
to me a lover, it speaks,words more real,than the forces hidden.
Mar 1, 2015
Mar 1, 2015 at 8:11 AM UTC
In response to your letters, all together,
Your love forever kept in my drawers, pretty whispers on paper
In exchange for the pieces of your heart I keep in my room,
A little piece of me for you.
You were mine before you knew me
You were a song I already knew the words to
And when my eyes first shook hands with yours,
I heard that sweet melody play.
I was yours before you had me
My Soul forever tattooed with love for you
A throbbing that kept me awake at night
As my heart screamed your name.
Two fires burning so brightly together,
It was rushing, it was fervent, it was passion uncontained.
It was heat on my cheeks when you kissed my teeth
And declarations of love filling the darkest nights.
It was the goodbyes crushed together tight
Clinging and kissing like we were dying.
It was your fingers fitting perfectly in mine,
It was sweaty fire nervous in your bed.
You opened your hand and offered me the world,
You kissed my neck with promises of tomorrow,
You wanted to walk beside me forever
But I only wanted to fly.
With you I grew stronger,
Without you I grow stronger still.
Young love too beautiful to understand,
Two lives tangled together by coincidence or fate
Violently ripped apart by infidelity,
The Flesh's betrayal to the Soul.
Maybe our paths will cross again
But until then all I offer is this;
This letter perfumed with soft kisses and memories of yesterday,
Ghost finger tips tracing my backbone,
I breathe in the scent of your skin
And wonder.
Jun 19, 2011
Jun 19, 2011 at 6:43 PM UTC