"unwinnable" poems
Down like an anchor,
Vision is shrinking as your eardrums burst through the grusome pressure, increasing the deeper you go in the deep, blue, merciless sea
A match unwinnable, a fight to the finish, to ones very last breath,
Tackled something so much greater, it has pulled back, after capsizing we made the decision when it came to swim or sink, that we drown,
Swallowed by the ocean, these great unfathomable depths, taken away our last breath of fresh, salty, stinging, yet very pleasant flavour
Our blanket is a billow, a stormy night which caused this tragedy,
Darkness under darkness, where light upon light once ruled supreme
Until our bodies have been taken apart, by this greedy sea and its desire to take us in, make us a part of it's glorious wide spread self,
Never to see the glassy surface once more, or will we be ship ghosts?
All lies and all sin, all dreams and all majesty, are swept away by swelling waves of the expanse someone may call the pacific ocean,
All ego and all deception, all freedom and all light is lost in its dephts
But we quietly, gently rest with pride in our hearts.
~ Umi
Apr 13, 2018
Apr 13, 2018 at 7:43 PM UTC
I am Ink
sweet blood of the
pen.
I **** the flesh of parchment with savvy strokes of timeless musings.
The poet is nothing without my inspiration to spur him forward forcing thought from mind into
visual conceptions of reality.
The written word is law and
I am law
We are one.
The ink ,not the pen, is mightier than the sword.
What is the pen without me?
The ink.
A wasted corpse
space used on a desk
worthless
to be without ink.
I alone am the soul of literature.
I alone raise words from the dead minds of deceased philosophers.
My word has capsized continents
waged unwinnable wars
I do not discriminate
I have killed men women children.
I have breathed life into centuries.
I am eternity
I am ink.
Jan 6, 2014
Jan 6, 2014 at 5:57 AM UTC
I am not a hero
I am no white knight
I try my best
But sometimes it isn’t enough
Good always triumphs over evil
Or so the saying goes
Since I lose, does that make me evil
I don’t cause pain purposefully
I try to help others
But I am no hero
I don’t fight an unwinnable fight
I do feel pain
And I listen to my fear
A hero has a destiny
Something greater than them
I simply do not
I’m freer than the hero
I can believe what I want
The opinions of what is good or evil
Doesn’t affect me
I know the world isn’t black and white
I don’t do theimpossible
I live in this world
Just like everyone else
I know who I am
And I accept it
I am not a hero
I am something greater
I am me
Mar 1, 2010
Mar 1, 2010 at 4:32 PM UTC
My soul lies at the bottom of a cold glass bottle,
I live my life full throttle conscious and wild,
With unfathomable sorrow in the bottom of my scorned black heart,
I play fast and loose with love and idle madness,
Its the fruit of my life that gets me through.
Everyday is like Russian roulette in my mind,
Everyday I take a sip but the truth gets harder to find,
It doesn’t exist at the bottom of a bottle,
Yet everyday I desperately search for the answers,
Everyday I fall just a little behind,
It’s an unwinnable game that I constantly lose
everyday I slip closer to the end with no light in sight,
Yet it’s the little fruit of my life that helps get me through.
Sometimes I feel like a god, sometimes I feel like a roach in a pool,
Sometimes I feel like a king, sometimes I feel like a fool,
Sometimes I feel like the very essence of life,
sometimes I feel like the darkest cold death,
But it’s the spark in my lungs, it’s the fire in my stomach,
The Uniqueness! of my essence, and the freedom of my will,
but I’m still just a slave with a bullet in my head,
I have to drench my soul and drown my burdens,
For now it’s the fruit of my life that gets me through.
Nov 12, 2023
Nov 12, 2023 at 9:11 PM UTC
,000 drafts of poems proposed,
some but a bit, a title, a bob,
some wondering why are they kept
in suspended animation, the fire of exiting
from placenta to screaming baby, most,
patient waiting, over the undivided divide,
the Cumbersome Attention Gap to cross,
to the state of hallelujah completion
this race should be an Olympic one,
it is unwinnable, but only open to poets
who willing to go the unlimited distance,
every finished oeuvre, spawns bornes two
more, so you, fool, even a fifth grader,
intuits the higher math of you’ll never
catchup, but rise invigorated to meet,
greet the wonderous sunrise challenge…
and the promised ones, “next one for you,”
the unconditional incompleyedy poems
so overdue, the muses send an armored truck
to collect just the largesse of fine fines…
as my old West Village friend sang, you poet,
“might as well try and catch the wind”
this leads me to observe a new day’s first
birthday, even as Leonard sings Yom Kippur
hymns of mortality, and all the ways humans
can pass thru the gap in the morn clouds that
is the passageway to the Higher North…
you see, this is this poems day of naissance,
one day, one candle, now extant, but sooner
to be a not, one more poem sent heavenward
after a brilliant brief coexistence with the
innards of my mind…
Aug 14, 2024
Aug 14, 2024 at 10:37 AM UTC
For this game
We don’t need a Nintendo
We don’t need a Wii
Not even a switch
The rules are simple:
Peachy can defeat Bowser only if Bowser removes his mask
He can do this himself or let it fall off in time
Peachy sees Bowser differently than everyone else
She doesn’t notice he’s not as appealing to the eye
She doesn’t notice that he breathes fire whenever he speaks
His grip is tighter than what she’s used to
He’s not always himself but snaps back when she realizes it
He adores her as an object, not as a Princess
She cries, he comforts her
But eventually her tears becomes his rage points
Each and every last one of them
Peachy is confused
He says he loves her
He says he’ll be ****** if he leaves her
But she knows he means well
Even if she doesn’t always believe it
Even if she doesn’t always understand him
Bowser stops caring
Bowser goes behind her back to pick another peachy
But he fails
Miserably
And he takes it out on her
Peachy stopped wearing pink
Bowser didn’t like it
She stopped wearing makeup
He said she can never match it right
She even stopped wearing her gold crown
Bowser can’t stand it on her
It reflects everything he’ll never be
It makes her attract the looks of Mario & Luigi
Peachy wouldn’t give away what’s Bowser’s
Initially, at least
But Daisy inspired her
And Rosalina guided her to better
While Pauline reminded her who she was
Peachy is herself again!
Bowser loss his own game
He thought he was smarter than Peachy
But Peachy outsmarted him long before they crossed paths
She wore her crown with grace
With elegance and with confidence
Things Bowser couldn’t dream of on his worst day
What was once a daily unwinnable final boss battle
Has turned into a well won victory for Princess Peachy!
-Mia J
7/7/2025
© 2025 Mia J
Sep 3, 2025
Sep 3, 2025 at 9:00 AM UTC
thump, thump, thump
Marching in place
Never advancing
The war never ending
thump, thump, thump
Bullets wiz by
gasp
A soldier goes down
Screams echo across the line
Soldier after soldier collapse
In our unmoving lines
thump, thump, thump
We continue to march
In one place
Soldiers in a straight line
Side by side
Fighting an unwinnable war
Each shot from us
Is a shot in the dark
The occasional screech from the other side
Today's the day
We will win this war
Today's the day
We need to stop keeping score
Yet
We still march on
In our worn down spots
We yearn for our bodies to halt
We long for a day of rest
Yet
We march on
We march on
With our blazing bullets
Our pained screams
We march on
Shooting into the darkness
Hoping to hit someone
Something
Anything
We are the soldiers of 2015
We are the unmoving army
Marching in one place
We are soldiers
Oct 21, 2015
Oct 21, 2015 at 4:54 PM UTC
A lovestruck boy went in for an adventure -
To win the heart of the most beautiful girl
in his neighbourhood.
She would smile at him and stroke his hair
with her fingers.
Just when he thought he got her heart
She walked away like smoke from flames
leaving him to burn to ashes
Nov 28, 2015
Nov 28, 2015 at 4:24 PM UTC
And here we go again like two children
You’re mad at me, I’m mad at you
Over and over, it just never ends
Seems like everyday it’s something new
In an ocean of words
You want me to find the ones
That will make everything better
Believe me if I could, I would
And i’d drown us in every last letter
But as the questions fall unanswered down your face
I know the truth is, it’d still be too late
Maybe we’re both wrong, maybe we’re both right
Maybe this is simply an unwinnable fight
Maybe we’ve been trying to move mountains all this time
So maybe we should just call it a night
And if tomorrow we wake up to find
That both of our hearts have died
Well at least we can say that we tried
Frustration has made us believe we don’t care
Till it feels like there’s no point in trying
And every second spent getting nowhere
Is just another second spent lying
We lie to ourselves because
Nowadays it’s easier to pretend
Instead of finding our way out
Of all the broken pieces,
The building tensions,
And all our growing doubts
But as the questions fall unanswered down your face
I know the truth is, things will never be the same
Maybe we’re both wrong, maybe we’re both right
Maybe this is simply an unwinnable fight
Maybe we’ve been trying to move mountains all this time
So maybe we should just call it a night
And if tomorrow we wake up to find
That both of our hearts have died
Well at least we can say that we tried
At least we can say we tried…
And we just keep falling
Falling between the cracks
With nothing
Nothing to lead us back
And as the questions fall unanswered down your face
I know we'll never be too lost to find a way…
And if tomorrow we wake up to find
That both of our hearts have died
Well at least we can say that we tried
At least we can say that we once loved…
Jun 20, 2012
Jun 20, 2012 at 1:31 PM UTC
here, another night
writhing
I should be asleep, comfortable
I should be… normal
instead I writhe
or I lie so ******* still trying to pretend
trying to will it away
inside I am clawing to get out of this body
inside I picture myself flailing, jerking,
thrashing, punching, kicking
I visualize breaking my own bones with how hard I fight the pain
I see it in my mind, I let loose and walk away bloodied, bruised, all cut up… but I won.
in my mind.
in reality I have no energy to thrash.
i lack the spoons to fight,
and this,
is an unwinnable war anyway.
so I lie still.
or I writhe, sigh, and cry.
May 2, 2023
May 2, 2023 at 1:53 AM UTC
Why do we struggle against life
fight in opposition to time
we all know we cannot win
Time, no matter how we perceive
always passes
and life
well,
is only our idea.
We still struggle
our combative minds focused
on trying to win
an unwinnable battle.
Although....
is it a battle?
a fight
a struggle
perhaps we are not
in combat.
Why do we journey through life
striding along times route
we know we will never reach
journeys end
times path arrows forever
into the horizon
and life
well,
it is the road we walk on
yet still we move forward
our hopeful minds fixed
on the end of the road
trying to walk
a never-ending path.
Although...
is life a journey?
an adventure
a path
perhaps we are
not moving.
Why do we dance in life
tapping along to times tune
we know we will never move
that final step
times harmony echoes through
our minds
and life
well,
it is the song we move to
yet still we flow
our bodies sway toward
the end of the beat
Trying to complete the patterns
of an unending dance.
Although...
are we dancing?
moving
swaying
perhaps we are not
Dancers.
Although...
maybe we are.
May 6, 2014
May 6, 2014 at 5:21 AM UTC
An owl hoots,
a warning?
I head East into the thieves market,
lucky horseshoes for sale and without fail they are in good supply.
Make no mistake
as they take no prisoners here.
Passing through the untied shoelace of cobblestoned lanes
I spy the woman through a postage stamp window, barred as if franked by the mailman, she plays patience and always with two cards missing, an unwinnable task, but she's old and if old becomes a memory then she becomes one too.
An ocean, if red is the ocean, of slanted tiles stretch beyond my imagination into an expanding horizon, I
smell coffee and sit local to the river watching the elegance of Portuguese pigeons, it's dreamlike in its quality.
This morning,
the earthquake shook me awake even though that was centuries ago and still the owl hoots.
Earlier outside the church of Santo Estaveo
I am bound to its steps by my own chains,
this will change as the sun which works by its own memory rises above the fishing boats.
So easy to be here and to fall into the trap
So easy to tap dance my way through the one eyed shadows that wink over the bay, in the distance, a tram, a man and his day stay longer than this moment in time.
To close the eyes
clues and sighs
It's a splendid life
and though full of lies at incredibly cheap prices the thieves market is the place to be wary.
Each shadow now stronger as the day becomes longer and the hours get shorter.
Caught,
I have sought solace in this place and found peace from within,
sin
is yet to find me.
Mar 27, 2016
Mar 27, 2016 at 3:01 PM UTC
Casting stone through my eyes towards empathy
Its a thing as abundant air hydrogen or water
Emanating from the heart of a cynic, feeling what others feel, is a waste
That which makes others
Yearn and ache for sympathy
Makes the grey greyer
Turn your back and the person in earshot is long since dead
A racing mind hurries them into the oblivion
That they fought against just enough to smile
A winter evening
Is like a siege, famed and vexed
Fairy tales of doom
Wake up with a colossus standing sentient over your hope
The weight breaks your jaw
So you cant talk yourself out of these lies
Unwinnable wars
All destroying comets
Swathes of doom and dirge
All carved into your mind
Acid rain corrodes the gold foundation
On which your joy lies
Suffer silently
With words too big for speech
Lamenting and unspoken
The joker god lives in you
Speaking only lies
In the form of sad sounds a dark colors
Melancholy fades
Only to hang in the air
Maddening, distant
The faceless, the vengeful
Mouth of hatred
Takes an ever changing spectral form
Unblinking, staring
Estrangement, your visage
Becomes familiar
Strong duality
Makes a war grounds
In a space of zen
Mar 25, 2016
Mar 25, 2016 at 1:05 AM UTC
The dream of your face
I chase
oh I chase
an unwinnable race
in a hypocritical place
I hate you
Do I hate me?
I hate knowing
the things we could be
I hate knowing the fact
that you can't see
I hate seeing
the person you've made me
The dream of your face
The time that I waste
I'll soon make my case
time takes the time
time takes.
Jun 3, 2016
Jun 3, 2016 at 4:44 AM UTC
Love is a merely a fable of fairy tales
A simple mistruth that propels our wishful sails
We invest ourselves in this lie
To convince us that we won't be alone when we die
We think of love as some heavily bliss
Something to be cherished and missed
But it is just a tale to keep us warm at night
It's better to give up now than loose an unwinnable fight.
Jan 23, 2014
Jan 23, 2014 at 9:30 AM UTC
there we stay
twisting, snapping, following
each other
round and round and round
locked
in battle unwinnable
teeth sunk into
my thigh
hands at your furred neck
grasping, growling struggle
neverending
Jan 25, 2019
Jan 25, 2019 at 11:13 AM UTC
In a different land my dreams bring me to explore..
Lands Anew..
Where Clean Green Grasses, Mystic Songs, the Scrolls, and the Maps of The Orient's Past.....are for me to discover and enjoy more..
The true meanings of the elders..I relate to them... I live within these lands....
Closing my eyes to sleep. Flying to this beautiful and untainted country
On dreams leading to astral plains of plenty.
I run freely and strongly, there
Like a flame on the kindle to which it fuels......
I stand stronger, here
Like a tree well rooted..Standing tall from the ground....
I become A monument to those powerful and magical spirits which speak into me as I escape waking bonds.
Flowing like a clean artisan stream.....
Brightening my world like a huge lighthouse torch.....
Free as a monkey playfully sounding his voice in the mystic tropical lands...
My Heart is called to motion
As hope is a reoccurring dream.
I hold a deed to a space in this land
A newer place seen as "lost in another time and place."
This is where I belong.
As hope lights my way, it will not take long...
To Follow the wise messages in those "Astral Travels"
Where I've left behind despair,broken homesteads and the dark people behind..
As I awaken from the belief of the small and unwinnable battles called "self made limits"
I shall be awakened by hope's light.
For the land in my dreams
Such Safe traveling shall replace the "old" pathways that lead me astray
Then,delightfully,I shall be traveling newer roads...
To arrive at my destination to "Lands Made For Me To Reside."
Jul 22, 2015
Jul 22, 2015 at 4:39 AM UTC
I wasn't born this competitive
I was forged
Because they strongest metals
Are forged
In the hottest flames
I still feel
The heat of the forge on my skin
Pushing me
To be better then everyone
Pushing me
To fight unwinnable battles
And sometimes
I make it out alive and stronger
And sometimes
I barely crawl away with my life
So the forge
Fires up again pushing me to hate
And the forge
Makes me resent those who are better
Til I can't stand
Being around them or knowing them
Til I can't stand
Doing something I can't win
So the forge
Turns off and makes quit
So the forge
Crumbles onto me and I'm crushed
I wasn't born this competitive
And this lust for victory
Is what's holding me back
From being the strongest I can be
Aug 7, 2017
Aug 7, 2017 at 9:35 PM UTC
She sat by the window, wondering about the odds of life
As the torrential rain lingered by her window
The relentless battle between the mind and heart seemed unwinnable.
Brighter prospects appeared more like an unrequited dream.
She drew the curtains to let the storm into her
Instead she saw a silver lining behind the iridescent clouds
And rainbow smiled across the horizon
Dec 27, 2018
Dec 27, 2018 at 9:31 AM UTC
Maybe I ate too much that night
Maybe I acted immature
Maybe I didn't consider you feelings
Maybe I loved you
Maybe I hate myself
That May be
Maybe I wanted that phone call to last one more minute
Maybe I didn't want you to be a lesson learned
Maybe I could lose a couple pounds
Maybe I could dress different
Maybe I should grow my hair out
That may be
Maybe I could've opened that car door
Maybe I fought the unwinnable
Maybe I cried too loud
Maybe I texted too fast
Maybe I believed in us
That may be
Maybe I am insane
Maybe I needed more time
Maybe I listened to the wrong people
Maybe I can make it to you
Maybe I can have one more chance
That may be
May I
Aug 3, 2020
Aug 3, 2020 at 1:05 AM UTC