"unstudied" poems
I go to bed again without brushing my teeth.
Cornflakes for dinner, and coffee and tea.
Four cups, of course, will keep me from sleep,
From dreams of cars-money-dread-gasoline.
I used to love everything that tasted sweet.
Now it’s the black, bitter, burned and caffeine.
Except, sometimes, the way you make it for me:
Milk and sugar.
I know I always scoff at how much you need.
Two or three spoons, then add the cream.
Drink off the spoon, unstudied, guilelessly;
The world hasn’t caught you and made you be mean.
Dear deer-eyes, sweet-tooth, rabbit-knees:
Pour a sugar mountain as high as you please.
Apr 13, 2015
Apr 13, 2015 at 11:46 PM UTC
Globally dense, our ailing nation
makes one weep for sheer frustration
thoughts and dreams grow numb.
Tech-addled students scroll on phones,
‘midst scent of android pheromones,
wafting digital dumb.
Pop-culture, narcissist unkind
dispenses with the human mind
which, failing further, falls behind
the grimly global curve.
We read, in writing on the wall
arithmetic’s impending fall
while numbers loiter in the hall
to get what they deserve.
ENQUIRY, tagged as D.O.A,
a sheeted stiff, is wheeled away
her mourners left to grieve.
entitled maiden, full of sass,
LIBERTY begs a bathroom pass
her bladder to relieve.
When zit-faced rebels run the show
the dismal ratings plummet low;
a vulgarized cartoon.
Descending to unfathomed levels,
Ignorance applauds her devils
calling out their tune.
PATRIOTISM, tarred and feathered
headless, claws its cage untethered
foul, unloved, unfree:
Another casualty of time
which fell for want of noble rhyme;
to water FREEDOM’s tree.
CURIOSITY, half asleep,
now stirs and murmurs from the deep
uninterested, untaught.
She grows yet duller in her ways
returning to her ocean daze,
(her schools of fish uncaught).
HISTORY, dormant, lies in dust
a narrative no man can trust
a book no scholar reads.
Events unstudied as designed
wherein the heart of humankind
for want of context, bleeds.
DEMOCRACY degenerates
until God wills and activates
a nation’s drive to learn.
Curricula will be made void;
disheartened teachers unemployed,
their wisdom fit to burn.
You think the past was less obtuse?
Less prone to youthful thought-abuse?
Perhaps… back in the day.
And though it may have been the same.
this poet opts to place the blame
on digital delay.
May 1, 2017
May 1, 2017 at 6:55 AM UTC
A traveler on a dusty road
Strewed acorns on the lea;
And one took root and sprouted up,
And grew into a tree.
Love sought its shade at evening time,
To breathe its early vows;
And Age was pleased, in heights of noon,
To bask beneath its boughs.
The doormouse loved its dangling twigs,
The birds sweet music bore-
It stood a glory in its place,
A blessing evermore.
A little spring had lost its way
Amid the grass and fern;
A passing stranger scooped a well
Where weary men might turn.
He walled it in, and hung with care
A ladle on the brink;
He thought not of the deed he did,
But judged that Toil might drink.
He passed again; and lo! the well,
By summer never dried,
Had cooled a thousand parched tongues,
And saved a life beside.
A nameless man, amid the crowd
That thronged the daily mart,
Let fall a word of hope and love,
Unstudied from the heart,
A whisper on the tumult thrown,
A transitory breath,
It raised a brother from the dust,
It saved a soul from death.
O seed! O fount! O word of love!
O thought at random cast!
Ye were but little at first,
But mighty at the last.
Charles Mackay
May 16, 2013
May 16, 2013 at 7:39 PM UTC
I am a paper of a people
A silhouette of a human
The memories of a soul
We are nothing put paper people
Living in paper towns
Having Paper fun
Living paper lives
Everything explained
Calculated
Elaborate
Created
Nothing goes unstudied
Everyone formed and fitted
to the 2D image of life
I am not a picture on a screen
Number on a form
Name on a list
I don't want to be one of you Paper people
Being good and bad as one expects
Knowing as little and as much as another
I am done being what you want
Mar 19, 2012
Mar 19, 2012 at 12:37 AM 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
A glance. Then another.
Where a thousand smiles,
and laughter, hiding, finally found light;
Though lips moved no more than eyes.
Caught. Captured. Drawn in.
Like inescapable black hole gravity,
Taking us to an unknown realm;
The start of a glorious adventure;
A destiny we've always known.
In late nights, where questions became our partner;
Where longing had become our friend;
Where songs of Mississippi blues origins,
Teased; mocked, our souls;
Laughter, passion, shared thought,
Replaced them with answers.
We found memories that have yet to happen;
Comfort, yet to exist.
Tenderness, following seizured passions,
Burned audacious passions within our chests.
Fallacious reasoning? Imprudent coordinates plotted?
Not from the pilot's seat;
Mind; heart; spirit; guided the inevitable course of your soul's smiling gaze.
Now we are lost again;
Unsure of which path to take;
Questions as our company; longings as our friends.
Is it unfair to wonder? To wish? To dream?
Is that only torture? The life unseen?
The passions, only distractions from past and present obligations?
Were we stealing away what wasn't ours?
Or are the choices of the past, stealing away from us?
I know I can't answer those questions,
Sitting with my old friend, the blues, strumming;
haunting twangs in darkness; without laughter; without passion;
with your thoughts frozen and alone.
I think; I feel, I know. Yet your late night friends are a part.
They murmur quietly, indiscernibly; as if unstudied answers on a test.
Ones you feel you know; but frightened too much for rest.
It all could have been just one more life quiz;
To redirect our life's journey; asking what we shall miss.
If that be the purpose; no regrets will have claws.
I'll cherish the connection;
I'll remember the glance;
The smile of your soul has sparked in me, again;
A passion for a chance I'd hidden as if not wanted for fear of loss.
And though it might seem crazy, as weirdness abounds my being;
I DO feel loss. I DO miss memories unseen; swaying dances unrealized.
Yet, the silliness of pain is tolerable. I'll sleep again someday;
And dreams awakened, once lost, will guide our way (s?).
--Shane Bowles
Dec 20, 2014
Dec 20, 2014 at 3:25 PM UTC