"unheeding" poems
All lovely things will have an ending,
All lovely things will fade and die,
And youth, that's now so bravely spending,
Will beg a penny by and by.
Fine ladies soon are all forgotten,
And goldenrod is dust when dead,
The sweetest flesh and flowers are rotten
And cobwebs tent the brightest head.
Come back, true love! Sweet youth, return!-
But time goes on, and will, unheeding,
Though hands will reach, and eyes will yearn,
And the wild days set true hearts bleeding.
Come back, true love! Sweet youth, remain!-
But goldenrod and daisies wither,
And over them blows autumn rain,
They pass, they pass, and know not whither.
7k
Lift not the painted veil which those who live
Call Life: though unreal shapes be pictured there,
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spread,—behind, lurk Fear
And Hope, twin Destinies; who ever weave
Their shadows, o’er the chasm, sightless and drear.
I knew one who had lifted it—he sought,
For his lost heart was tender, things to love,
But found them not, alas! nor was there aught
The world contains, the which he could approve.
Through the unheeding many he did move,
A splendour among shadows, a bright blot
Upon this gloomy scene, a Spirit that strove
For truth, and like the Preacher found it not.
2.5k
GLEAMING through the silent church-yard,
Winter sunlight seemed to shed
Golden shadows like soft blessings
O'er a quiet little bed,
Where a pale face lay unheeding
Tender tears that o'er it fell;
No sorrow now could touch the heart
Of gentle little Nell.
Ah, with what silent patient strength
The frail form lying there
Had borne its heavy load of grief,
Of loneliness and care.
Now, earthly burdens were laid down,
And on the meek young face
There shone a holier loveliness
Than childhood's simple grace.
Beset with sorrow, pain and fear,
Tempted by want and sin,
With none to guide or counsel her
But the brave child-heart within.
Strong in her fearless, faithful love,
Devoted to the last,
Unfaltering through gloom and gleam
The little wanderer passed.
Hand in hand they journeyed on
Through pathways strange and wild,
The gray-haired, feeble, sin-bowed man
Led by the noble child.
So through the world's dark ways she passed,
Till o'er the church-yard sod,
To the quiet spot where they found rest,
Those little feet had trod.
To that last resting-place on earth
Kind voices bid her come,
There her long wanderings found an end,
And weary Nell a home.
A home whose light and joy she was,
Though on her spirit lay
A solemn sense of coming change,
That deepened day by day.
There in the church-yard, tenderly,
Through quiet summer hours,
Above the poor neglected graves
She planted fragrant flowers.
The dim aisles of the ruined church
Echoed the child's light tread,
And flickering sunbeams thro' the leaves
Shone on her as she read.
And here where a holy silence dwelt,
And golden shadows fell,
When Death's mild face had looked on her,
They laid dear happy Nell.
Long had she wandered o'er the earth,
One hand to the old man given,
By the other angels led her on
Up a sunlit path to Heaven.
Oh! 'patient, loving, noble Nell,'
Like light from sunset skies,
The beauty of thy sinless life
Upon the dark world lies.
On thy sad story, gentle child,
Dim eyes will often dwell,
And loving hearts will cherish long
The memory of Nell.
2.2k
The poet sang of a battle-field
Where doughty deeds were done,
Where stout blows rang on helm and shield
And a kingdom's fate was spun
With the scarlet thread of victory,
And honor from death's grim revelry
Like a flame-red flower was won!
So bravely he sang that all who heard
With the sting of the fight and the triumph were stirred,
And they cried, "Let us blazon his name on high,
He has sung a song that will never die!"
Again, full throated, he sang of fame
And ambition's honeyed lure,
Of the chaplet that garlands a mighty name,
Till his listeners fired with the god-like flame
To do, to dare, to endure!
The thirsty lips of the world were fain
The cup of glamor he vaunted to drain,
And the people murmured as he went by,
"He has sung a song that will never die !"
And once more he sang, all low and apart,
A song of the love that was born in his heart:
Thinking to voice in unfettered strain
Its sweet delight and its sweeter pain;
Nothing he cared what the throngs might say
Who passed him unheeding from day to day,
For he only longed with his melodies
The soul of the one beloved to please.
The song of war that he sang is as naught,
For the field and its heroes are long forgot,
And the song he sang of fame and power
Was never remembered beyond its hour!
Only to-day his name is known
By the song he sang apart and alone,
And the great world pauses with joy to hear
The notes that were strung for a lover's ear.
1.9k
Now it's over, and now it's done;
Why does everything look the same?
Just as bright, the unheeding sun, --
Can't it see that the parting came?
People hurry and work and swear,
Laugh and grumble and die and wed,
Ponder what they will eat and wear, --
Don't they know that our love is dead?
Just as busy, the crowded street;
Cars and wagons go rolling on,
Children chuckle, and lovers meet, --
Don't they know that our love is gone?
No one pauses to pay a tear;
None walks slow, for the love that's through, --
I might mention, my recent dear,
I've reverted to normal, too.
1.8k
Well, I was tired of life; the silly folk,
The tiresome noises, all the common things
I loved once, crushed me with an iron yoke.
I longed for the cool quiet and the dark,
Under the common sod where louts and kings
Lie down, serene, unheeding, careless, stark,
Never to rise or move or feel again,
Filled with the ecstasy of being dead. . . .
I put the shining pistol to my head
And pulled the trigger hard -- I felt no pain,
No pain at all; the pistol had missed fire
I thought; then, looking at the floor, I saw
My huddled body lying there -- and awe
Swept over me. I trembled -- and looked up.
About me was -- not that, my heart's desire,
That small and dark abode of death and peace --
But all from which I sought a vain release!
The sky, the people and the staring sun
Glared at me as before. I was undone.
My last state ten times worse than was my first.
Helpless I stood, befooled, betrayed, accursed,
Fettered to Life forever, horribly;
Caught in the meshes of Eternity,
No further doors to break or bars to burst!
1.7k
Crackling. Rocking. Crackling. Creaking and oscillating, a century old Mahogany Wood seceded to the paSsage of time.
Particles of sand, confounded by the Peninsula’s chaotic, blasting breeze now revealed a shade of burnt tar.
Outside of the second floor Maissonette, sways the rocking chair once warmed by Grandpa.
A Tactless, impatient, rhythmic Requiem Bashes near the wiNdow pane as the sunset falls Under the frame.
Empty Folklore presides like the Residue of a once lambent effigy… SwOosh. Hush!
Cocktails were a Preamble to lunch like diabetes to Nephropathy.
Corrosive Rhetoric seeped in to expose the ego of a Sommelier.
A smile would Parachute down when you needed it like Nicotine to remind that no Precedent had been set, just an Anomaly.
Cutthroat beginnings, this was no Analog man.
In grade school his Cosmos found Zion and “The world to come”.
This baby’s Cradle, abandoned High atop a mountain was blown by a Chinook towards the Atlantic.
“I was found swallowed in a stained Table cloth by Balkan children on a treasure hunt, with no Guarantee and no resignatIon. "
The boTtle narrates these chronicles and a smile parachutes down when you need it like nicotine.
Dionysus Crafted his accounts while most Garnered his spiels with Snide. As they witnessed dream remembrance; he thought his memory was Presumably accurate, and although his tales were triFling to the gathering audience, they became his Heliocentric history.
Calling me a young Galleon and handing me a map, Grandpa scanned his hand across the vast land
guaranteeing trEasure would be found if I had no resignation.
This Asinine assertion to my teenage sister Symbolized the Barring of her unheeding imagination by time and then a smile parachuted down just when she needed it like nicotine.
_TRF
Dec 14, 2016
Dec 14, 2016 at 11:13 AM UTC
I turned the key and opened wide the door
To enter my deserted room again,
Where thro’ the long hot months the dust had lain.
Was it not lonely when across the floor
No step was heard, no sudden song that bore
My whole heart upward with a joyous pain?
Were not the pictures and the volumes fain
To have me with them always as before?
But Giorgione’s Venus did not deign
To lift her lids, nor did the subtle smile
Of Mona Lisa deepen. Madeleine
Still wept against the glory of her hair,
Nor did the lovers part their lips the while,
But kissed unheeding that I watched them there.
1.4k
In life,i dithered,pussyfooting,
Cringed,thought,delaying,
waited,holding ****** on,
feared you, all and sundry
argued futile,to myself!
philosophized idly, like hell!
reacted sensitive! norms as per,
mouthed bull, pitied empty!
gave little,grabbed in shovels,
didn't even hate properly!
thus loving only timidly!
fought causes unworthy,
sat bang mid on the fence,
foot each in pastures green,
mind,ever weighing the soul,
civilized,polite and gutless,
to even say,damn,screw you!
you evil sob, to hell you go!
polite to kids,dogs, folks old,
lovely ****** and dumb bores,
swallowed angers,conceded points,
knowingly with a mind sharper,
died some death everyday small,
got lost so, mirroring ****** all,
unheeding ever, a decided heart!
Truth hit,mirror shattering!
Fully clothed,stood I naked,
unreflected in things any,
staring at nothing,blank
here, in this place and time.
feeling all the garbage pent-up,
priming to manure, catalyzing,
some part of being, unvisited.
knowing somehow, all I did,
or not,mattered,was worthy,
leading me here,to this place,
Beware,of Existence Point Blank!
Nov 29, 2012
Nov 29, 2012 at 4:58 AM UTC
It is an ancient Poet
and he stoppeth me.
“Beware of poetry, my son,
She’s a gold digger.
She’ll chew you up and spit you out,
leave you penniless and lying in a gutter,
drunk on absinthe,
while the rich novelists and scriptwriters
step over you, laughing.”
“Hold off! unhand me, greybeard loon!”
Unheeding, I slunk off to my garret
to compose a villanelle,
heavily derivative of Dylan Thomas.
I only wanted to get girls,
but before I knew it
I was roaming with the Romantics,
bopping with the Beats
and cruising with the Classicists.
Popping some Pope, shooting some Stevie Smith
or hitting up Heaney,
I was hopelessly addicted.
And I never did get the girl.
Feb 20, 2015
Feb 20, 2015 at 2:44 AM UTC
Wotton Hill, you are a cage
for my wife’s deceased body and
my mind, blushing furiously as
I recall our times –
twenty spokes for those who
climb ladders backwards, the trees
leaves spilling into a driveway
and I would bundle the biggest
under my jacket, or my hat,
even a tulip for her bonnet’s tip.
She looked like a Redcoat,
and I, midnight’s dove,
lingering on some lane far from
our home, golden even for us,
fell back on a landscape of
solstice, each pine has a lady
inside waiting to be released for
God’s unheeding eyes:
when he weeps for his children,
I do not remember mine, but
my wife along dusty ways
and singing her seasonless song,
with every color flora against
her scalp, her retinas, her breast.
She looked her best when
she was guarding a sad head –
Wotton Hill bringing her face to
one heart-shaped windowpane
swaying in forest unhappiness
and now along this circlet,
my wife lays dead.
Dec 1, 2012
Dec 1, 2012 at 5:08 PM UTC
We met on the morning when the sun waded
through the window
mopping up the nights shadows as it invaded
every corner of my working space.
I was ready to react to other poets at work on AP.
She came along with a blistering title
and abundance of words, beguiling
and packed with imagery, dark and dense,
laced with succinct and sinful metaphors
wolves and watchmen, ****** energy swirling
around in thickets and primroses
promises broken and bleeding on the threshold
of their hearts, but gone, each on their own
sun and sin sprinkled pathways to other partners.
Only she wrote poems
He wrote her off!
Who was this stranger, tearing her heart out
on these pages, soulful and sinful, unheeding,
unashamed at being beaten and bruised
by her lovers tantrum now
migrated to a new nest of instant **********
She bled her words out in rhyme and rhythm
Holding on to fragments of a dream
fast fading at the edges.
I wrote her some lines of happiness
instinctively telling her to calm down
and think about what freedom meant
and where it lead in the rocking horse world
of thin relationships.
She replied with two words
in acid structure: **** off!
I never heard from her again.
The sunshine continued to invade the day.
Author Notes
True story. Old story. Love story are born and die this way. There are hundreds of poems on this site that used just those words when either gets dissed. Bad luck goes good luck comes. The sun continues to invade the day.
© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved.
Apr 19, 2014
Apr 19, 2014 at 1:18 AM UTC
Taxi from El Alto spirals towards the clogged streets
A thousand metres down from hell to high-rise
Thanksgiving in America a daily struggle in Bolivia
Street lamp effigies signal certain death to thieves
Two bodies on road surrounded by yellow tape
Hombres sleep-like stillness an uncovered curiosity
This morning neither knew it would be their last
Fifty police listen to chief behind mahogany lectern
Death brings them 15 minutes of news-time fame
Cars and peasants pass by with unheeding speed
Is death the end or just another part of life in La Paz?
Nov 25, 2012
Nov 25, 2012 at 9:35 AM UTC
Accompany the good always,
Free thyself from alluring delusion,
Tide over the turbulence of mind,
And seek liberation of Soul.
Believe in boundless bliss beyond ……9
Whither bound kin so keen,
When wealth is withered out?
Whither paled out lust and lucre,
When youth is lost in transit?
Akin to drained out pond on land.
Believe in boundless bliss beyond ….10
Behold the fugitive wheel of world,
Of lustrous wealth and wishes to seek.
Bereft you are to be, as time swipes off,
All ephemeral illusions in its course.
Believe in boundless bliss beyond ….11
Dawn n’ dusk make day n’ night,
Spring and winter take their turn,
Time plays the game of ebb n’ tide,
Yet, ignoramus hugs the storm of desires.
Believe in boundless bliss beyond ….12
None can save the rotten humdrum of life,
Save the sane and wise who guide n’ ferry,
Like a rescue boat in stormy ocean,
Of life revolving in birth and death.
Believe in boundless bliss beyond ….13
Be it an ascetic of ochre robes,
Or one in tucked from tie to toe,
Always strives only to fill his belly,
Thoughtless to the truth behind.
Believe in boundless bliss beyond ….14
Upper age freezing the warmth of life,
Unheeding head heading bald n’ grey,
Sickly face ******* toothless smiles,
Yet the soul clings to the pangs of life.
Believe in boundless bliss beyond ….15
Enslaved by the ire n’ desire,
Even in uneven evening of life,
Posthumous, none to carry or care,
Yet, one is passionate to the core.
Believe in boundless bliss beyond ….16
Feb 7, 2015
Feb 7, 2015 at 5:00 AM UTC
Driving and thinking
pondering possibilities
five days of silence
seems an eternity
wanting and needing
deliberate delusions
unheeding of reality
some things I can't let be
wondering and wandering
feeling foolish
a familiar aching
my heart won't stop dreaming
sleeping and awake
incandescent illusions
drowning in the imaginary
frozen by what is reality
known and unknown
avoiding asking
it's sometimes better
to let it all go
writing and pleading
withering words
some how elusive
unable to capture deeper meaning
May 17, 2010
May 17, 2010 at 11:00 AM UTC
A Heartless act
#
I let you put your signature
in my throbbing heart,
how could you heartlessly erase it,
unheeding my pleadings and part?
#
Wistful thought about the one who left
#
Without a word, she left,
her soft whispers still reverberate,
would she remember our days together,
I realize, her silent presence was my succor.
#
Oct 21, 2012
Oct 21, 2012 at 2:47 PM UTC
She's crawling these days,
And it's a joyous throwback to
The wordless days, when the
Eye reflects sunshine instead of tonic
And there was someone,
Always someone up
To take over when it was too much. up
up
She's crawling in her own spit-up
And learning how to drown.
There's a certain effortlessness
To a downward spiral
And she's mastered it with the
Dedication of a carnie's mid-night
Reflections in a backdrop
Of cotton-candy and ****** expulsion.
The world has painted itself white
And she's the little blemish
Of hangnails and spilled cognac
When Atlas would rather decorate
With her broken winter smile;
Teeth to match the whites of his eye
And shattered eggshell.
She's crawling these days, amidst
Broken bottles that reflect such starry eyes
The way puddles muddy the sky
And house the most optimistic birds,
Unheeding the poolside signs saying
Shallow end.
The water is dedicated to darkness
And she's dedicated to falling.
Dec 9, 2016
Dec 9, 2016 at 4:31 PM UTC
Lord,
God of many names
I come as a pagan
So that the right One
Might hear my moans....
You are not a God that is either
Republican or Democrat,
You are partisan and unheeding
To their propaganda,
You do not need the popular vote,
Nor do you speak lies in speeches.
About the monsters You left in charge....
They speak sweet nothings in Your name
While they rush to cameras when
A thousand die.
They secretly take in the money
For the poor and raise funds
For their bunkers when the
Day of Reckoning comes.
With their atomic know how
And the fear mongering tactics,
Tney seek to rule me imperialistic,
They seek to destroy me moralistic.
Will you deliver me from their policies,
Save me from their budget cuts,
Confuse their sinister programs?
When the day of final Judgement comes,
Send me an Angel,
Be my refuge from the socialist control,
Keep me safe from their propaganda
Mind alterating political promises,
Save me from their campaign commercials,
Keep those who seek You
Under your safety and
Bullet proof vests.
Dec 3, 2015
Dec 3, 2015 at 1:32 PM UTC
There was a stage in my life
When I accepted what was told me
Thoughts etched, the acid leaving indelible patterns
Currents and tides of being
That invited loyalty
Tastes of doubt's power
left me dispossessed – finding new songs,
vainly pressing my own.
Tramping not so slow
warned - unheeding.
Unsensing to the shivering fault
I’m left to wonder
which rocks on the beach
found their smoothness the right way
and which did it all wrong?
Apr 27, 2015
Apr 27, 2015 at 10:10 PM UTC
Clasped a coffin handle, cold and bronze,
Felt the weight of earth's return to land,
Solemnity a clammy sweat upon my palms.
Six quiet men, prepped to stand and bear
The loaded cask, our passenger unaware,
Unheeding lids held tight her sightless stare,
While I, her nephew, stood wondering there.
Scarce breathing in my fear and grief, I strained,
Unwilling soldier forced to march in train
Toward a punctual station beside a mound of earth,
The period ending to a sentence spun from birth.
Feb 16, 2017
Feb 16, 2017 at 8:28 AM UTC
My wild dreams still run
Through the fugitive night
And I still laugh and howl
At an unheeding moon
That forgot my name long ago
But the blood in my veins
The gypsy DNA
Can't forget the wild pulse
Or the wilder lusts
That drove me from life to death
And death to life
Stony day after deafening night
Sickening month after exhausting year
Too wired to stop
Too tired to sleep
So come and get me
Find me and hold me down
Down to earth at last
By Phil Roberts
May 29, 2017
May 29, 2017 at 3:02 PM UTC
My life is not going to last that long
This body of mine will wither quite soon
My heart though it loves forever strong
Will be a distant echo as the unheard beating that once came from my womb
My mind can be occupied still
And withstand the time impeding
Yet do not rely so proudly upon assumed will
For time to your bidding is unheeding
Patience I have and more do I gather
For you I have foreseen are worth the wait
Yet as my death approaches the less I can fathom
And so too deceases our predestined fate
Sep 22, 2015
Sep 22, 2015 at 7:24 PM UTC
I move into some private space
looking for what brings me here
to this place at this hour
the church clock strikes midnight
bringing me out of my reverie
the last note sounds out across the green
rolling out beyond the sleeping cottages and farms
past the nearby meadows
over the silent flowing stream
finally fading to nothingness
in neighbouring valleys
outside I look up
brilliant stars shine down
on the dark unheeding village
I move on looking for what brings me here
to this place at this hour...
Oct 20, 2012
Oct 20, 2012 at 8:30 PM UTC
Come softly, stranger
Step inside the light
Here is home of a sort
Here is nowhere else to go
Such staggering ambiguity
Such all-consuming cruelty
I see it all so clearly now
Wide-eyed and unheeding
Unaware of double-dealing
I was an innocent
And then I was born
Wise to the lies of the womb
And with a grudge for being disturbed
By Phil Roberts
Apr 16, 2016
Apr 16, 2016 at 3:39 AM UTC
It was the night of the thundersnow,
Meteorological harpie normally reserved for our northern brethren.
She stood grimly at the window,
In wait for a dawn which would not come
Save for the odd light, the incongruous rumbling,
Mock forbearer of those easy languid evenings of August.
She'd made some noise approximating a sigh,
Then returned to undress,
I hurriedly unlacing my boots, removing my pants,
(My feigned nonchalance a foolish, pitiable thing)
And I remember her ******* as oddly demure,
Her ******* bewitching gumdrops,
The triangle below her waist downy, almost kittenish.
I'd broken her maiden clumsily, eagerly, all unheeding haste.
We'd lain next to each other for a short while afterwards
(The schools already closed for the next day,
Her father recently gone to the boneyard on Ludlow Hill,
She soon to be shuttled off to some spinster aunt in Dillsboro.)
I'd nattered on about summer vacations and thens and laters;
She'd said little, simply studying me with the bemused half-smile
One saves for sad dreamers not intimate with the knowledge
That notions of tomorrow and forever are strictly for suckers,
And as I strolled home come mid-morning,
The sun implacably straddled the sky,
Leaving the sidewalks and shoulders of the road
Completely dry, as if the night before had been a thing
Of perhaps-only, of dreams and tales for a later time.
Mar 7, 2018
Mar 7, 2018 at 8:54 AM UTC