"unlost" poems
*break
astonishment at perception
of
a third-world child making it
up that totem-pole
amidst paltry conditions
even
beyond the half-way mark*
1.
a standing man
in silent message
and the woman in red
with thin-sling shoulder-bag
holding lipstick, weekly-ticket and purse
oh, how she frightens honchos out their skull
draped round her sister's head
shroud eternal
coughing
sore
2.
grannies recount lively griot-tales
where hope is never barren
young boys play in swamped dirt-trails
drawing absent father-figures in the sand
the wind has carried them off to mines
deep in the crust of earth's ire
adolescent future sits on labour-farms
where keen spirit is dulled with worthless hops
keeps the sly farmer happy
and he tells them the fruit is free
yet they've already paid for it
manifold
when she reaches twenty
she will have at least two kids
whose lives lie in the granny's luxury
while she runs off to the golden city-lites
to jump through higher hoops
for ****** spoils
all cheapened by long-term neglect
3.
there lies hope
unlost
in every girl-child
who goes to school
who finds encouragement
from words kindly given
if but from a stranger
*no hand-me-outs
no forlorn begging*
she...
the empowered mother of boys
will
help them to grow
into young men
of such sensibility
as to keep their hands
to deeds of honour
who, in turn
become fine fathers to daughters
they love and cherish
raise to be
luminary
*each step up
from that totem-pole
such a steep climb
strengthens invisible wings
and unworldly rewards
and when final rung is reached
heralds
untainted take-offffffff*......
S T, 27 aug
Aug 27, 2013
Aug 27, 2013 at 11:01 AM UTC
Alone,
so timid.
Watching the world,
the lost faces;
the stone sky.
Black and white.
These people claim "crushed soul",
the town claims "no life left unlost...",
beyond this grey sky.
Rainbow?
Wake up.
This world is too full.
This world of "just too plain."
Feb 28, 2014
Feb 28, 2014 at 5:13 PM UTC
The solitary reminder,
a sole survivor,
hopeful-placed,
forgivingly encased
in little boxes decorative
hidden in plain sight
throughout our home.
Single and incomplete,
the lonesome leftovers,
openly hid upon bookshelf,
desk corners, fireplace mantels,
storage units of the
I am unlost,
I am unfound,
Raise your hand,
stand up and say
that is me,
that is me.
Minor treasure chests,
of carved wood, seashell real,
acquisitions of trips
to faraway places,
these boxes, they themselves,
visible but unremembered,
just there, no cares,
no one knows,
when or why.
that is me,
is that me?
Space fillers, memory taunts,
grandchildren's playthings, delight,
when they someday come visit,
weather and parents permitting,
finding keys for locks, doors,
from three homes ago.
Can they unlock me too?
Boxes hoard the things
we have lost, but cannot discard,
can't sacrifice, gotta keep,
an admixture of buttons,
dried flowers, faded notes that
once upon a time mattered,
shook someone's world...
Some kept in hope,
others, sequestered, lock-up,
jails that we are both
jailor and jailed,
the joke being on me.
Should we, you and I,
exchange these
cases histories of lost hopes, memories,
it would not be surprising,
if when opened,
the contents identical,
even if you are in Manila,
Leeds, places of need,
and yet,
we would be shocked,
asking,
*that is me,
is that me?*
Dec 9, 2013
Dec 9, 2013 at 6:34 AM UTC
To tell the story of the nice-guy
is to tell a tale of unlost innocence.
There is no complexity that circumstance can’t remedy. There is no effort
to niceness; only a ****** world that blossoms
on genetically mutated ideology, growing larger than generations past.
Tomorrow, in Houston,
a butcher will wake up to slaughter a cow he may have named.
There will no be no tears when he grills steak for the wife he wooed
and the children he prescribed himself.
Three daughters,
from fifteen to twenty-two.
Tiramisu for dessert.
Ten guns in the cabinet beneath the stairs
and innocence buried behind the woodshed.
Pretend now, that you are forgiven.
Mistakes fade like snow angels, regrets
float like chemtrails.
You love you as much as the world always did.
You have not seen friends struck down by powders or lunacy,
you have only lived in the glow of their light. Hearts remain full.
The word swagger hasn’t been hijacked by hip hop
and bluejeans still mask imperfections. Sunsets are memorable,
and so are first dates and last kisses.
Sun won't blister fragile shoulders.
Fields blossom just in time to suit your irregular taste buds,
satisfying sweet corn cravings on Christmas.
Forget your father’s words
or a stranger's hand.
Forget improbability, impossibility,
impotence, importance,
impatience
and improper goodbyes.
Forget the tears cried alone
into ***** filled sheets at midnight.
Forget the effect but remember the cause,
camouflaged like a landmine of good ideas.
Forget the fights and slow-turn walk-aways
that turned words flaccid.
Forget friends ******* ex-girl friends
and amphetamines crashing into hallucinations.
Nice-guys vanish like good ideas,
lost in the shuffle,
looking for pen and paper,
just like house cats die
on the forth of July,
and all that’s left are ashes
on a mantel
alongside fraudulent grins.
Oct 29, 2011
Oct 29, 2011 at 7:42 PM UTC
In the back of my stair storage
I have a bin
within my old sins lie
Otherwise I'll forget
as soon as it leaves my eyes
I'm liable
Distracted
Careless
Unmindful
I have lost so many things
some misplaced
forgotten
stolen, I’m sure
I've lost people
For the same reasons
Its enough to drive me manic
I can’t trace
where the last place
I had it
was
The worst
Is when I don't even know
I've lost it
until the universe
decides to taunt and tease me
with that information
I've lost songs
that hold memories
of my childhood within their lyrics
I've lost movies
Some I've just watched too many times
I've lost feelings
at least all the intensity in them
So,
I've started hoarding
I told myself I'm not losing that nostalgia
So I'm boarding them up in boxes
I'm being present in my past
and these are the paradoxes
In which my unlost will hopefully last
Not to be dramatic
But I love to be dramatic
You're one thing I look for every time
But I couldn't find you if I tried
No crumbs, no remnant
nothing in these boxes
will cause remembrance
One day, I'll be going through
and one day, I won't care to find you
Sep 8, 2023
Sep 8, 2023 at 1:03 AM UTC
the absence of darkness in the city
fragile upon the edge of light
empty and eerily awaiting the demise of the sun
lifeless city, ruthless in its takings
your decadence
sad and unheard by passers on the quiet streets
singled by the sounds of your own footsteps
unlost but wandering
for what you seek in a star
is hidden by shrouds of impurity
Feb 27, 2013
Feb 27, 2013 at 1:42 AM UTC
Bottled, bound in a brume blue-green,
a mist of Listerine again descends.
And slick, with what’s like shower’s
sweat, there's wipes of writing
on the wall. One thought, on
an endless loop of overcast,
warm marks on rippled sobbing glass:
o u t.
Seated, seeping. The mute little girl
fallen down the town well.
We are half-aware of the consequence
of these dreams of outside air. Clarity.
It kills me, but I suspect that now
a good deal of this vial’s moisture is mine.
Chewing cautionary label gum,
(Do Not Swallow!)
We churn the potential
over and over in our mouth--
it taunts a minty tingle.
A curved black mark.
A chasm shadowed.
A welling up of a desire to gulp.
Desire for just one breath, one vision past
this germicidal upturned glass.
To live unlost, unwet, unmasked
a lifetime halled with gorgeous mirrors,
mirrors free from fog.
Oct 23, 2014
Oct 23, 2014 at 4:01 PM UTC
I see you have someone else now
Does this one make you want to continue to live?
Is this one brave enough to embrace your storms and waves?
Is comfort found in their arms, their calm
and home in their clouded thunders?
Is this someone worth the dive?
Can they escape your love?
If they can, don't let them read this.
Don't tell them know our secrets.
Eager as they are,
let them walk alone with your angry jagged pieces
Make them want to go back in time
just to experience you over and over
This one maybe better than the last
Have you told yet?
Have you told why you fall so easily
Why at the breath of your favourite words you cave in
Why being told beautiful you easily feel like a treasure
Once hidden, now unlost
Taken cared of and practically important
*Why you’ve always mistaken good words with promises
And staying for one night meant forever
And crying meant dying inside
And that falling apart is part of life
Inevitable and just meant for you*
(6 times in a row, wow)
Why you’ve always thought of the clichés as pieces of precious art
Only meant for you, to feel, to realize, and to kiss goodbye
Why you’ve always settled with the good enough
Thinking you’re not capable of having more
Not worthy, to be precise
You're just standing there, staring at me with your dead eyes. You haven't, have you?
Apr 8, 2015
Apr 8, 2015 at 7:37 AM UTC
The task I pay for change
With my thumbs I make my choice.
My very own choice without coercion
Oh! Hear me, my dearly pay for change.
The balance in my diet has flown.
See me and how I have become.
The 2nd to none to Iya oni Jedi
Since the constant change I chose,
Is nothing but inconsistent starch.
Tearful, I gaze at the Umbrella man.
And he mused:"Tunde!,
The task you paid for change"
My fresh fair skin has flown,
Replaced with spots as guinea fowl
Upon my flesh the night beast fed
For in darkness, my fair body lay
In night and day, no power
For my blade to blow away the beast
Ha! Bitter tablet becomes my mint.
Again he mused:"Emeka!,
The task you paid for change"
In abundance of what we own,
I drove to fuel, and got stuck.
Early at dawn under crescent sky,
My car, the endless queue has snatched
Alas! I now seek water and grass.
My keys unlost, but horse I ride
Since I starve in what abound.
Again he said: "Danladi!,
The task you pay for change"
Poet: Oluwatimilehin Adejumobi Alabi
Nov 2, 2016
Nov 2, 2016 at 10:39 PM UTC
My hands are there
just like an instrument
in need,
to feed
to embrace
to **** out your space
And so do people
as they like
to disguise themselves
unlikely greedy
to feed the world
with love of none
to scare the others
who are finding them
dumb
And what a frightenance
to seek a skeleton
like wind blows
imence
in a greater atmosphere
of the 8th sky over divine.
Unlost.
Halle lujah , who will praise
who will try to seek their own
way.
As sparrows eat the seed
and narrows finding their ****
The babys still can grow
the world needs more to show
and when you are there
you hope and find later what was worth
was an ego of longings
to enter the harder ship
were humans are contaminous
into sensitive.
fragical,
Just gaze, what is there
and the beauty appears
rehealing the one and beauty
of Gods,
were humans still can
that little
feel.
and powers reheal
your hands ,
and you Breath.
Mar 18, 2017
Mar 18, 2017 at 8:53 PM UTC
Then when the pens
Of oriental scribes
Descend, I find
Grief which undermines
Unstudied tombs of unlost time
Foundations of existence flood
Over me, as if in ambush lay
Unendurable pain is felt within
Its blame the extinguishing of the day
Mar 7, 2012
Mar 7, 2012 at 2:47 PM UTC
stop.
breathe.
slow.
leeee.
my heart races as i watch your gentle paces but everything you do seems gentle and every time i see you it's monumental because my mind moves so fast it even falls behind itself as if a thousand thoughts are moving, but with stealth, because as i see you walking by, each second seems to beckon a thousand more thoughts, leaving me a thousand times more fraught with emotions i never do process, yet in acknowledging this i have made progress, progress that will undoubtedly be undone by some internal battle that remains unwon and unlost, a stalemate between two sides fighting for the same thing, my hands stuck to my face like a magnet to a steel plate, two things uniting oppositely charged particles, as my brain continues to write this long, boring, hopeless article, understanding that as you walk away, the feeling doesn't stay... and everything.... slows..... down...... in....... the........ worst......... kind.......... of........... way............
don't.
leave.
love.
meeee.
Oct 9, 2013
Oct 9, 2013 at 10:19 AM UTC
Haang overs
feel like heaven
And my
long drawnout hell is
hotter than any oven
I feel the ****
i feel it through
i didnt quit it
when me mates said i was done.
**** your rules mister liver
**** you right up the ****
makes me feel like im in school
and im about to skip class
I feel it all in
ever growing emotion
and all these words
cause no devotion
I smoke i drink
i love my addiction
and i ****** into the night
with only dereliction
May 28, 2013
May 28, 2013 at 1:53 AM UTC
"I roll the window down, and then begin to breath in
the darkest country road and the strong scent of evergreen
from the passenger seat as you are driving me home"
And I am taken back to Yellowstone and Yosemite
And Patrick's Point and Brookings Oregon
And every other woody green-land I ever found myself
I can smell the pine infusion of moss and mist
The chilly and moist feel of it in my lungs
"Then looking upwards
I strain my eyes and try
to tell the difference between
shooting stars and satellites
from the passenger seat as you are driving me home"
And I am on the ground in the dirt that smells like trees
I am in a sleeping bag without a tent or a mattress
I am next to my grandparents and they are telling me
Where the north star is, if that blinking light is a plane or a meteor
I see the strange and mysterious we found at 10 pm
And the deep dark beauty of space from the Great Basin
I see the intricate details
Of stars and planets and galaxies warped together
Against the all enveloping pitch black nothingness
"Do they collide
I ask and you smile"
And I remember every question ever asked
Every story ever told
The geography of the land
How to get unlost
The mountain lions and the swainson's thrush and the bears
Ghosts and water-babies and aliens
I've heard it all
And I remember everyone who ever told me these things
Always with a proud smile
"With my feet on the dash
the world doesn't matter"
And I remember my rides home from school
The clunky white van off in the farthest parking space
The way it creaked and receipts fell out every time I opened the door
How you would always let me get away with leaning back
Tossing my feet on the dash
And cursing and rapidly reciting my day for you
Every boring and gruesome detail
"When you feel embarrassed I'll be your pride. When you need directions, I'll be the guide for all time"
And all this does is remind me of my family. My wonderful family, whom I will always cherish
"For all time"
Jan 21, 2018
Jan 21, 2018 at 3:36 AM UTC
I remember us calm and wild and calm
lost, unlost, and lost again
I remember us sleeping in tangles together,
and waking in tangles alone
I remember us happening slowly
and both so quickly
I remember us seperating so unexpectedly,
as I always expected,
no other way
no other way
Dec 10, 2013
Dec 10, 2013 at 4:48 PM UTC
As the winterly ice case bubbles
untrace the tracks on cobbled streets
at the visible foot prints of ecstacy
unleash the angelic coded chords
Let's lay under the moon haunted rays
diving with whisks of shiny anticipation
on the icy silky sheets, shaking the undrunk
inside the claused trays of the eyed desires
See the moonlight on our unlost chins
unafraid of the highs and the lows
above the rocketed skylight highlights
sailing deep in the caves of unclouded holy vice
Sweep your breath on my satin satiable lips
as your saliva washes the sins of the sun tilts
to lure and uncover the sainted desires of within
on the layered victory of the unconquered stars
Jan 12, 2017
Jan 12, 2017 at 10:08 AM UTC
How to describe a sudden flight
when you stay inside your body yet soar...
There is fear. great fear. You hardly breathe.
But at the same time you feel free from anger,
from any emotion that clutters your mind.
It's the glorious finding of yourself outside of self.
And when you return to body after some minutes,
there's a feeling of great calm.
Such calm that was unknown to you before.
You just feel...found.
Apr 7, 2019
Apr 7, 2019 at 10:11 PM UTC
I want to tell you a story of the rainbow
that faded on the rays of the sun stroke
ohh the ground that I walked all the way
torrential rains on the side of the river bed
eroding all there is over all that is ever was
They see, see numbers sinking
inside the tray of the memory
fixtures of the broken marbles
overshadowed by the cardinal
I want to walk you in the green forest range
that ever rising vocal lullaby mileage
of love and true redemption certainly
the harvest a triage of unlost path
eroding all there is over all that is ever was
They see, see numbers sinking
inside the tray of the memory
fixtures of the broken marbles
overshadowed by the cardinal
Jan 31, 2018
Jan 31, 2018 at 5:47 PM UTC
I have begun to be uninspired.
Little pieces of poems with a blank, surrounding screen.
I do not remember when writers block set in.
I do feel, however, that I can escape this listless typing.
With a little help and a lot of research on new words,
I can become un uninspired and unlost.
Dec 18, 2019
Dec 18, 2019 at 10:54 AM UTC