Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Sunlight on my grinning face
Follows me from place to place
But it won’t do
Don’t know how long I can wait
Wandering this empty space
Searching for you

Up and down the barren coast
Listen as the riptide rolls
With so much to say
Probably what hurts the most
Is knowing when you’re so **** close
And still so far away

Once per while I catch a glimpse
Of unintended fleeting hints
To call out your name
Won’t make much a difference
Words don’t carry far upwind
It’s always the same

In the breeze
I see it’s just the wind
It’s a tease
To be at the shoreline again

Shepherd, call the sheep back home
Be thankful that you’re not alone
Round em up one more time
My, how much the herd has grown
With wool to warm your gentle soul
Leave no soul behind
Country song form lyrics, from home
Rainier Sep 2014
remains of busted beer bottles and cracked plastic jut from stinking tide-water mud     eyes narrow against sand saturated sustained winds grain sting and cling before slinging past    sleeping man scorched cedar red sloth snores against driftwood    his dog pants patiently pawing sand playfully    once roaring giant beside me sulks now  
those ******* dams    
superb river        I formally apologize for us       we the new humans injected our cement turbine barriers into you       so we can read bibles and bake brownies after dark     so streetlights can work grave shifts     convinced they’re delivering us from evil     I imagine how you used to roar      carve    tear     from your northern mountainous sources      converting wastelands to pastures and fertile gardens    feeding the starved   cleaning the rugged        assisting the ambitious     the old ones learned to cooperate with you    
we massacred most of them and now control you    
so anyways I’m here now    watching an old man fight bitter wind     his old sailboat approximately ten thousand times his size      I’ve seen men tack but this is different      powerful winds continue to whip westward       he heaves his body left and boat groans cooperating     pulling hard right      harder right      harder right       sail’s about forty five degrees off water now and I think         he’s gotta be gravebound      see now the ol’ skipper has gone and dove right again and the sail shakes snapping against gales but succeeds to the left      his boat follows and keeps inching upwind           inch by inch     in the back of his mind he considers retreat        but knows the more golden shores lay ahead
behind him are bruising bridges and barges and big trucks accelerating in left lanes beeping and blinking in blistering sun     there is a ******* on jantzen beach that is supposed to have great bbq wings    heard theyre to die for     and great women with giant fake       personalities     theyre hired for their personalities         theyre encouraged to show their personalities and put them on display so all the heavy men can enjoy their stay
my prized old man battles eastward upstream upwind to your golden shores      hes gone another thousand yards in the last hour      each cut strenuous muscles battle ropes sail     each cut seems dangerously intense and immaculate     below him solemn oppressed river travels reluctantly towards ocean
I lay back in gray-black sand and close my eyes       sand particles whipping the right side of my face       I think of what is next in my day     writing some ****** spoken word     reading some weathered whitman and wordsworth       watching some girl drink herself dumb    all the while hearing the sails and old man struggling     redskinned man snoring   dog digging   my eyelids look red with sun shining thru them
Walking to the river now      each step deeper down ***** freezing my      ankle       knee       thigh      dark brown-blue water continues to rise around as I sink down     when shoulder high I dive down to bottom and kick       lungs fully expanded begin to grow stale and I surface       I notice I have been pulled down river ten yards        eleven yards      for a while I float kicking eastward but the river wears on me      I exhale fully         sinking down
Alien world of thick green surrounds me   ive forgotten the meaning of breath time life     ten feet       eleven feet      below     shimmering surface rises     pressure presses ears persistently     each foot deeper water colder   whines of far off jetboat jetski engines and muffled airplanes pollute     I picture how I must look to unsuspecting fish     naked boy eyes open cheeks inflated arms suspended above     below weeds dance and baitfish prance     something about scene is other-worldly
lungs crave air so I kick back up      far from shore and from shirt      people look at me like I’m reduced to a       floating head    I swim back to shore    concerned red man approaches me    his dog licks my hand and its paws scratch my stomach  
i guess he thought i was drowning     i think i am too
Jai Rho Mar 2010
I sailed a laser
in the horseshoe bay
of an island
in the San Juans

The wind was blowing
from the south
at twenty
knots or so, it felt
like fifty on my cheeks

As I headed upwind
and felt the vessel heel,
my toes dug past
their strap,
I leaned to level 'til

My face was sprinkled
with the spray,
my hair was trailing
in the wake

And geese did glide
not far away,
just above the crests,
honking as I flew along
and just behind them

Skipping now and then,
my windswept face
like a stone
The lightning crackles
Like a rattlesnake rattles
The sun burns weary
evaporating the teary
The soul unfolds in sin
squeezing life out of wind
Stay down upwind
of my ginaceous grin
My favor is South
always South . . .
by Southwest
Jamison Bell Jun 2017
Imagine you have a marble collection.
Spherical objects of varying sizes and colors.
Now imagine everyone has a collection of marbles.
Every single individual on the planet,
has a collection of marbles.
These marbles are your thoughts, feelings, and ideas.
The object of life, the fabric which binds us all.
Is the idea that we cast our marbles in the table.
We share them.
Albeit selectively.
We throw our marbles,
not all at once mind you,
on the table.
We show ourselves to others.
Sharing our perspectives
and ideas.
We observe and recognize
other marbles.
I exist through you,
and you exits through me.
In turn we are able
to see ourselves
for who we truly are.
Any resistance to this idea,
as safe as it may seem,
only serves to weaken the whole.
Jai Rho Mar 2014
I felt it on the back of my neck,
a puff at first, licking at the sweat
soaked threads of tangled hair
that lay complacent on a broad reach

Telltales of the human kind that
whisper to the meta states before
transforming into siren calls of
change, something different,
something new, something
longed for in the quiet doldrums
trapped by endless drifting
on the boundless sea

My body turned instinctively
to face the tease, while my mind
remained behind, still stuck in
the quicksand grip of fading
memories, and slow surrender

And then the spray, from a swell
across the bow, a jolt of innocence
against a wall of indecision,
splashing hard my cheeks and
forehead, stinging splintered
lips and wincing unfocused eyes

A sudden rise came next, followed
by its fall, to weave their way into
a gentle roll that slowly
rocked the beam

Announcing arrival of the gusts,
scattered bursts at first, a panoply
of warm and cool that pressed
against my back and swam around
to fill, then leave the yearning sails

I hauled the sheets in closer, hoping
to capture the moment of the wind,
and though my preplanned destination
called the course I had been on, I
turned the wheel against the grain
and bid farewell, to the lee shore

I gazed out into the distance, where
whitecaps smiled at me, I smiled back
cranking sheets to the full
measure of the keel, and rode the
surging waves oncoming, taking
the howling wind on filling,
with its breath

my lungs, once again
Hildegarda Ares Jun 2010
In a throbbing coccon seized by ablazen web
thou viscid meanders woven by an unabating tempest
then hoarded in a rapture... by the sylph of the sands.

Rising rider, captive of an upwind sail
meadowy sky lover, worshipper of the ephemeral
fettered Why mooring the eluding eons to a transfixed now

as if the twined dreams of a wayfarer,
nomad of the seas, the sands and the skies
trapped in an ethereal time warp.
Copyright Hildegarda Ares©2010
A tough
guy still
his place
relives Spanish
Inquisition and
gossamer upwind
only prorogue
yesterday with
those Oxfords
on shoes,
shirt and
Otis for
trusty returns
easily now
a ghost
ware of
his Aberdeen.
James Otis an Amercan Statesmen known for revenue impose in Massachusetes.
Reece Jan 2016
I could have saved her
Wasted, waste down
Caroline, oh Caroline
It could have been me
Distorted noise
friends upwind of the screams
It's never enough
They never had enough

Beach chair, mangle
Tripod, classic
Ripped from the great novels
Footage with a sun kissed tint
The foliage underfoot
Face down
In the bloodied mud

Where is the love
It's not enough
There's not enough love
Guide her above
Clouds like gloves
Caroline, oh
Caroline oh where do you go

Traffic warped noise from the boys
Explicit wickedness
Extrapolated desires
Extraordinary circumstance
Circumvented rent cheques
Caroline are you at rest yet?
Jai Rho Mar 2014
It was a day like this,
in March; smiling blue sky,
cheering wind, chill and brisk

A day like this, on the Charles

It was a good day
for sailing, hiking out
side by side, racing upwind
‘til feathers by the bridge
rocked us like babes,
laughing verses of Rimbaud
lamenting Milton
and the Arch-Fiend

We sailed circles round the eights
sculling their way to Henley;
we called them slaves
and gestured like Merry Pranksters

We tacked and jibed, glided downwind,
and on a broad reach, we saw Prufrock
standing on shore, downcast,
as mermaids slipped on board
and sang with us:

A verse for Nausicaa
A chorus for Eidolon
Kiernan Norman Oct 2015
June took root in the same way you learned to scream
but now it's fall and you're trying
to sing.

It slipped away from muddy lids like lifting a veil,
like stepping into a bath,
(toes, sole, calf. toes, sole, calf.)
and crawled unseen behind apartment-light echoes;
crooning sultry half-truths,
weighing down vascular walls.

My heartstrings aren't laundry lines but the conversations
we never finished (last night, last week, last year)
hang from them; pinned to sheets, unbothered.

It's pulling on my sleeves;  heavy and damp.
The wind isn't howling but
I don't want to hear about the dream you had
where I was a Priest,
where I was hitchhiking,
where I cut off my hair in a taxi's front seat,
and gave it to you in ziplock bags.

A hazy sky; slow and sweet,
coats my traipsing moods like honey
and sticks to the bottom of your favorite mug
(yes, that one, with the chipped rim and your rival
high school's logo.)

We're still here, springing forward and listening.
It's growing, humming cold verses in a new language
while we watch his name take shape in the mist accidentally.
You don't mention how fiercely I'm blushing and I'm grateful I don't have to laugh it off. Some days laughing feels worse than puking.

We are still here.
We are still.
We are.

I'm looking for something important and I won't know it until I see it.
It's morning, it's warmer and we lift our chins to coastline.
I blow smoke upwind;
today physics is purely speculation.
Today I feel like secrets are extinct and I'm certain the day is so much clearer through my Atlantic eyes than their protesting embrace.

You can keep June, I'll take the sky.
whaaaa
dilshé Apr 2021
A blue blanket crystalline
                         stretching out to infinity
glistens in the limelight
                         of the sun's affinity.
The horizon paints its' golden rays
                                upon the august rippling waves,
& feathered fiends all sail upwind
                                       For the spectacle the sunset gave~~~
Louden Holler Jun 2015
I thought I was flying in slim and sure
Coasting on air,
Sliding upwind smooth like a float plane,
Touching down on a lake of glass.
You saw disaster coming
And set the world on fire.
You were right.
JAC Aug 2017
Every time it feels like the evening
Upwind of cigarette smoke
I become aware of the holes in my shoes
And the holes in my eyes
And the holes in my logic
And the holes in me.
Mark Armstrong Nov 2017
There’s a man off his chops selling tough for a tenner
But the mercury drops in his ugly temper
And gets lost under Victorian modesty
When faced with their war on fallopian sovereignty

Girl wears her mother’s mittens for earmuffs
Until they’re far enough upwind
“See they’re paraphrasing Jesus dear-but
I’m not so sure that’s what He meant”!
Kurt Philip Behm Mar 2021
A hunter
not skinner  
with quarry
so vast
Whose path
through the forest
is first
—never last

(Garrett Hill Pennsylvania: January, 2021)
liz Apr 2018
versione inglese

Dear Italy

I smoke, I go in, I change my face
We already know how it ends
I have to be careful, ****!
If I knock her up then my mother...
Because I am still a child
A bit Italian and a bit Tunisian
She's from Puerto Rico, if that happens it's a disaster to Trump
But what "politics" is this?
What's the difference between left and right wing?
Ministers change but not the broth
The ******* is here to the left, the toilet is down there on the right
Straight towards my own path
Better than nothing, more than anything
Anyway, just wait outside
If mom doesn't like you, I don't like you neither
You tell me: "I knew it" but I don't fall for that
It's not like I'm a fool
There's always someone who is close-minded and is staying back in time
Like in the Middle Ages
Newspapers over do it, they talk about the foreigners as if they're aliens
With no passport, looking for money

I feel lucky
at the end of the day,
When I'm lucky
it's so great
I'm a crazy person who reads, a crazy outlaw
A maverick, who writes: "Whoever reads this is stupid"

Oh eh oh, when duty calls
Oh eh oh, I answer: "I'm here"
Oh eh oh, you tell me: "Listen to your mother"
Oh eh oh, one, two, three: I'm already there
Oh eh oh, when they tell me: "Go back home!"
Oh eh oh, I reply: "I'm already here"
Oh eh oh, I.L.Y. dear Italy
Oh eh oh, you're my better half

Wait, I hear my ears ringing
Suspense, a moment before the sequel
Appearance fee doesn't include money
Crash Bandicoot, harvest the apples
Nice faces in my group
Like a ni* on his way to Benin City
I don't waste words, I don't talk to Siri
I'm happy to make music for kids
Before leaving a comment, think
Before peeing upwind, steer
Before frittering the salary away, wait
I go back to Baggio, or I won't feel up to anything without it
Shake it!
Your phone maybe doesn't get a signal in the hinterland
We end up freestyling on a raft in Darsena
My WhatsApp chat looks like the Instagram one
Love and ambition already are in my starter pack
Azkaban prisoners escaped from Alcatraz
We did our homeworks just to get it by

I feel lucky
at the end of the day,
When I'm lucky
it's so great
I'm a crazy person who reads, a crazy outlaw
A maverick, who writes: "Whoever reads this is stupid"

Oh eh oh, when duty calls
Oh eh oh, I answer: "I'm here"
Oh eh oh, you tell me: "Listen to your mother"
Oh eh oh, one, two, three: I'm already there
Oh eh oh, when they tell me: "Go back home!"
Oh eh oh, I reply: "I'm already here"
Oh eh oh, I.L.Y. dear Italy
Oh eh oh, you're my better half
Oh eh oh
Oh eh oh
Oh eh oh
Oh eh oh
Oh eh oh, when duty calls
Oh eh oh, I answer: "I'm here"
Oh eh oh, you tell me: "Listen to your mother"
Oh eh oh, one, two, three: I'm already there
Oh eh oh, when they tell me: "Go back home!"
Oh eh oh, I reply: "I'm already here"
Oh eh oh, I.L.Y. dear Italy
Oh eh oh, you're my better half
Sto
Ghali is my favorite Italian rapper :)
Timon chukwuonu Mar 2020
My honor was Dishonored by horns
As I Approached the end part with
so much greed inside my mind
As I picked this words to construct
a sentence bullied in pains
I quote in my sentence :
Im trying to live his legacy
but Im dying digging my grave with Satan,
Like a dumb child on his first day at school
My honor look for a relationship to rewind,
As I upwind life inside a boom box,
Im confusion but still a toolbox
Weird as my brick mansion built with grey hair from Satan skin
As I was trap taps  inside his kindness
It's an illusion
Im in a lawsuit duck
They plug in the electric chains chair
And I cry inside a shower cap
until my vocal chord
Could auspices my name .


Did , I discharged my honor:
Destroyed my ugly heart
Simply  an amazing  honor
As no differences between you and me
My honor.
Dis believe
Ryan O'Leary Sep 2022
Downwind


On a day such as today I’d

never contemplate urinating

au nature behind what could

also be, the front of a tree.


On a day such as today I

would never contemplate

hanging out washing on a

line from the above branches.


On a day such as today I

would never contemplate

leaving any of our windows

or doors open, even ajar.


On a day such as today I

would never contemplate

going outside because of the

nuclear power plant upwind.
Devon Brock Nov 2019
Out, among gray and cloud-spliced
verities, beige and stubbled hollow stalks,
a doe held her place on the rise.

And I, slippered and robed,
gathered the costs of my comforts -
the papers and pages of heat
from a white and resin box.

She tasted the air of me,
upwind of her, and the twin steams
of her core beat out, split the chill -
pulsed and sinuous.

Her black eyes unmoved,
she stroked the ground once
with a forefoot and her left ear
funneled toward me.

It is winter now and what hides
beyond the rise, before the snows
and thin forage is for her to know,
not I, for I am not that dear.
Mike Brubaker Feb 2020
The recycling plant burned last week
fire consumed acres of unprocessed scrap.
Flames licked at pieces of metal scrap,
burned the rubber tires and melted plastic.
Undrained gasoline and oil added to the smoke.

Tuesday morning a black mushroom cloud rose in the sky.
No worries, though.
The wind carried the smoke into the other county
Monticello will suffer but Becker lives to pollute another day

Wednesday morning the black mushroom cloud rose in the sky
The weather is cold
icicles grow on useless car bodies.
The firemen need dry socks.
Families live in safe hotels, upwind

Thursday morning gray clouds rose in the sky.
School is cancelled to protect the children.
The fire is controlled.
Protection is superfluous.

The recycling plant burned last week.
The fire is out.
People return to their homes.
Time for investigation and clean-up,
place some blame and show concern.
While Becker lives to pollute another day.

— The End —