"wherewithal" poems
There’s a menacing chill
on the air
this evening.
“Had I the wherewithal
I’d leave this place,”
I think to myself
as the first warning is issued
by that unfriendly cloud
hanging low and dark
over the mountain.
While once I thought that
the rain would fall with purpose,
I’ve come to understand
that floodwater has no manifesto
except to place the scumline as high as it can.
We can stack these sandbags tall
around our hearts
without regard for what’s on either side of the dam.
They’re only transient monuments to ineffectiveness anyway.
An assassin stands at the corner
wondering if I’ll ever leave my house
and its warmth.
I have news for him, though…
There’s nowhere to go, and
the weatherman thinks we’ll have a storm.
Jan 25, 2017
Jan 25, 2017 at 3:49 PM UTC
Strange question indeed,
So I asked one and all;
Explain to me:
“What's a plumber's ball?”
Family and friends
Heeded my call,
But none could confine,
Refine or define it,
Yet Paul was sure
He could design it.
Still, none could satisfy
My caterwaul:
“What the hell is a plumber's ball?”
Does it sweat the pipe
Or wiggle the snake:
Can it clamp the ******
For Heaven's sake?
Could it snap on the cock-hole cover?
All these queries
Made me wonder.
Has it something to do
With hardness leakage,
Or ******** the ball-cock
To stop a seepage?
Has it anything to do
With a saddle valve dripping,
Electric eels,
Or two pipes mating?
And, I heard of male and female fittings,
And should I worry
If I'm standing or sitting?
If you're discharging the head
Or elongating the pipe,
Does the plumber's ball
Help it snug tight?
Is it in my tank,
Or in my bowl,
Beneath the floor
Near the drainage hole?
Is the plumber's ball
In the back of the truck
(Jeff laughed and said
One could rub it for luck).
I asked Michel
If he could tell,
He sensed it was something
He could smell.
I sought out Ray,
Perhaps he'd know,
But he was on call
To restrain a back-flow.
I couldn't ask Gary
For his wisdom and sense,
He was wigglin' the snake
To unclog a wet vent.
Henry, Rick, Scotty and Brian,
Gave shameless answers
I couldn't rely on.
It's not a crapper, tail piece
Or Johnnie-bolt,
Or catch basin, reamer,
O-ring or pipe dope.
So I searched the Net
With a fool's wonder,
And read of ball-checks,
Gas ***** and plungers.
I know it's too late
To ask Rolly or Ross,
For both of them knew,
And that's our loss.
And Ernie's gone golfing
So I can't ask the Boss.
With final resolve
I fell to my knees,
To pray St. Ferrer
With grace intercede.
His silence left me
In a state of depression;
Had Ferrer washed his hands
Of the plumbing profession?
So nothing could settle
My wherewithal,
I still didn't know,
What's a plumber's ball?
Suddenly, it hit me,
He's never wrong,
The Dalai Lama of dip-tubes,
I'll ask John.
Where others did falter,
John's a rock:
He knows the difference
Between a gas and ball ****
With a knowing smile
He embraced our Hall:
Here, good friend, is your Plumbers' Ball.
Sep 22, 2014
Sep 22, 2014 at 9:10 AM UTC
In a world full of fact and numbers
you are exceptionally unaccountable
a vision in the mind of an engineer
who had the wherewithal to create
not just one Human but billions.
Aug 22, 2016
Aug 22, 2016 at 3:55 PM UTC
We were a beleaguered bard born,
a chief in chatoyant charms charged with
the principle petrichor of passionate paramours;
to drive the dainty dalliances
of incipient ingénues immured in
glamourous gossamer gowns;
lilting, lead lissome lads 'long labyrinthine love;
mischeiviously make mellifluous mondegreens;
sing of such serendipity: surreptitiously susurrous sessions
scintillas of Spring's sempiternal sentiments!
But fetching fugues fade fast, felicity's fated to fly. For
penumbral poets, it portends a pyrrhic pay.
We wander woebegone, waiting wistfully.
Lovers leave lyricists to languish in lonely lassitude.
The halcyon heyday has harbingered
inbroglio in the inured inventor of infatuation.
Why? With what wherewithal?
Often our offerings off us, opposite of, obviously, obtaining, or,
lucidly: lyrical lacers of Love likewise lack its livening lagniappe.
Sep 28, 2012
Sep 28, 2012 at 11:59 AM UTC
eye cantaloupe
batshit Midas
writer's iambic
within usurp
ender's egret
wherewithal
nearly Mykonos
orangutan elsewhere
eye dye.
Oct 19, 2015
Oct 19, 2015 at 10:55 PM UTC
*Unity in diversity
This is indeed an exaggerated paucity
Of information by think tanks
Advancing this school of thought regardless of their money in banks
Towns and cities boast of cultures varied and eccentric
Despite a people having an intrinsic
Nature of sense of purpose and wherewithal
Matters accentual,
An amorphous issue subject to constant change
Either way it’s a cake in the oven of fabrication, hope we don’t cringe
When fruits of this intellectually deprived charade
Become realized by a people with minds renegade.
Isn’t it “well-placed” being a pessimist?
Of the mind than an optimist of the heart hence an intellectualist*
Dec 31, 2013
Dec 31, 2013 at 2:45 AM UTC
if i were to bread my tongue
with rocoto and cornmeal
and twist to reach the andean soil
my tastebuds long for so many nights
out of the year
olfaction and your left-sinus blockage
would stay cradled
in broken-baguette bread-crust baskets,
a trebuchet's missile,
naïve to the horn of the world,
and brittled to a carcinogenic crisp
caped in my earthenblood geysers
en el humo, en la tierra del fuego
in(fierno)
i recount by the tally marks of black felt
resorted to in the puddling of spilt tea,
(like broken china, you never missed
a beat to correct potential error
and my memory),
i count them to remember
the epiphanies standing over a red faucet
a gallon water jug, whistling snail-trickle,
wishing away the cracks in the grout
or the grout itself,
wishing away the cracks in the pottery
or porcelain facade of which
you're so fond and grace with singing cuticles
the fingers of a pianist
lacking the wherewithal
and solid brick gall
to answer the ivory's summons
i am not a piece of clay,
i respond poorly to your sculpture of my surface,
covered in oxides and baked in
hell's oven, your mountain fire
scathes me as it does cedar resin
and i am similarly embittered,
pooling sap & draining smoke
in the embers and dead charcoal
of your embrace
avant le corps, sans l'âme
sans le corps, avant l'âme
Jan 28, 2014
Jan 28, 2014 at 9:30 PM UTC
See here: I’ve been to Arkansas, and New Orleans at Mardi Gras. I’ve traveled south of Panama, did Dublin, Thames, and Wichita, I went, I saw, though full of awe, I couldn’t help but find such flaw in everything and all. An outlaw in my old rickshaw I draw my paths and highways, y’all, and always come back home. I’ve seen the summer, felt the fall, I love the fields and hate the mall I rob from Peter, pay back Paul and haven’t found the wherewithal to turn **** in on time. I do recall a cell phone call, and built up walls to break the fall, lose a little, lose it all, the breaking down, the overhaul, now take me up to Montreal, I’ll see you in the spring.
Aug 19, 2012
Aug 19, 2012 at 9:03 PM UTC
By your leave, let I slumber once forever..
And my moment shall never realize itself.
My portfolio possess no wherewithal wager,
My seat of affection is now dull and rough.
Sepsis leak a foggy black since blight is nigh,
The sea is feeble whilst the sun shine naught.
The corpse of venal men flow unhealthy dye,
Henceforth pervade the soil with miasmic malt.
Lest my mistimed demise be not remembered,
Shall the script mark y'all failed to deter abuse.
Today my ember is snuffed and plundered,
On the morrow a bright star will rise, I muse.
Heed thine auguries borne from frigid stupor,
Vicious tendrils cascade upon my rigor mortis.
O gray vision as though gazing through vapor,
Hear that silent gasp veiled under my spicy lips.
Aug 28, 2010
Aug 28, 2010 at 5:11 AM UTC
The spring’s efflorescence,
the sunshine halcyon,
the withering rose fetching,
the ripple in the lake a talisman,
and the birdsong mellifluous,
is ephemeral,
yet quintessential.
Through wherewithal of it all,
we find ourselves pyrrhic,
because it passes like a scintilla,
but in our hearts, it’s eternal.
Jun 17, 2012
Jun 17, 2012 at 12:27 AM UTC
Amazing how one feels like Mexico on a late October morning.
Fall classic brings rain.
Life brings chain.
Chains change.
Treat me like u found me.
How do I respond
How do I bounce back
How do I make muffins out of yeast
I seemed two
I seem to have misplaced my transitions
My wherewithal
my imaginary heart full of illgotten gains.
My Layers seem crooked love
a flow chart if and when then I.
May spring Ching June.
I will eat u alive
mean
how surreal.
make u drive losses into gains
positively jump street
chance to stay respire drink jump.
Respite
Don't not
not to mention current urge by currency
regarding real ******
lost It all on the football market.
Mad I am at her smelly juices that drop drip.
Jul 15, 2013
Jul 15, 2013 at 9:13 AM UTC
my naked bees are stinging knees and never dream more kind
the honey, black... they lack the knack of natural acts. they pine.
they surly fume. they bark at doom and dangle chintz and fiend,
they serve a nerve as raw as words that pinch a finch’s wings.
my wherewithal, with all your spots, are not my dots; but sod.
by all accounts, it counts for naught...but sounds a lot like god.
the absent one. the ubermensch. the lint i sent you, cracked !
a dagger’s mind. a hellish hive of worse than curse. a laugh !
la mort, petit. du jour, for sure the purest night to bleak... the white !
the eye:; it seeks to sink at least a league beneath the widening gyre !
fie ! and thunder pun my plums
of glumful dungeons, one by none.
and glory wrack my sycophants.
and ransom damage done and done
Jun 2, 2012
Jun 2, 2012 at 11:13 AM UTC
ive been brooding,
lurking your pages,
thinking of how we would conflate so well..
do you think of me?
do you ever ask yourself, "does she exist?"
i admire your cynosure.
& i hope my eloquence impresses you.
will we ever be?
erstwhile.. maybe
im tired of relationships that are evanescent,
so when you get here, will you be here awhile?
i will imbue my love in you..
it'd require you to have interest in a non-ingénue being.
a being so brilliant that you will start to question your soul and the size of your crown, my King.
you will not become jaded,
inure,
for i am a Queen of lagniappe.
i will have you twisting and turning at the quakes of my soul..
is your mind as beautiful as mine?
is your soul as deep?
can we be panoply, i hope.
can our love be sempiternal..
wherewithal of our love.
Feb 13, 2015
Feb 13, 2015 at 4:02 AM UTC
What surmounts the best of best
What surpasses excellence,
Where resides the wherewithal
To top the prize of prescience?
How to master that which hurts
The song which wears you down?
Limitations splendour son
The fool who fools the clown.
To climb the bleak forbidden peak
To sleep with guts and gore,
Endure a cancer's world of pain
Where moments shut the door.
Resurrect a broken life
When love has fled the room,
Found the strength to seek again
And find light in the gloom.
Hold an old man's withered hand
And listen to his tale
Of life's travails and hardship
Where broken dreams prevail.
Take that cute kid on your arm
And kiss her with a hug,
Treat her like a Pixy Queen
And cuddle dolly snug.
What surmounts the best around
What surpasses all,
Where resides the wherewithal
To claim the prize recalled?
How to master songs of joy
Tunes which wear the crown?
Limitations laughter son
The fool who fools the clown.
Capture magic's glow around
Make each moment ring,
Fling confusions net away
To let your heartstrings sing.
Smooch a mountain maiden
Cry for great things done
Celebrate your life my friend
For it's a fact.... We've Won!
Marshalg
In Sweet Celebration.
27 February 2013
© 2013 Marshal Gebbie
Feb 27, 2013
Feb 27, 2013 at 3:29 AM UTC
***Autumn is icumen in,
With all its tricks,
Its treats and whims.***
I can't mourn
Summer's passing;
Those days
Of idle slumber.
Summer suns
And midnight moons,
The silhouettes of June;
Holiday highs,
Mad July;
The robust garden
Lust of August.
I won't.
Autumn air
Affronts my senses,
The Arctic cool
Dips and rules.
The moss has left
The trees;
Arthritic twigs
Let lose
The leaves.
Autumn is icumen in
Autumn,
With its foils
And foibles,
Rakes us in
With harlequin sins,
And all its
Wherewithal.
Embrace your fall.
Winter is icumen in
Sep 23, 2015
Sep 23, 2015 at 8:02 AM UTC
wasting well water wishes
while in wastewater wading
waiting waist-high wailing
weeping, wailing—
what a waste!
wasting well water wishes
while we're waxing waning
waning waxing waging
waging, wasting—
wherewithal!
wanting well water wishes
while whole world wishing
wasting wishing wanting
wanting wishing—
whole wide world!
welcome well water wishes
while we're wakeful watching
wakeful watchmen warning
warning watching—
wonderful!
whew!!
Mark Toney © 2022
Mar 6, 2022
Mar 6, 2022 at 11:02 PM UTC
I foster an incremental relation to the cosmos, enticed regularly by its indefiniteness and appeal.
Its evolutions, innate behaviors, and formidable sciences are recompense for earth’s meager discrepancies.
I often engage in the caprice to dismount much dissatisfaction by the constancy of riveting celestial events.
These beings possess no artificiality.
Its prophetic order, ornate and stupendous architectural facets have allowed a crescendo of dispositional hysteria.
Prosaic imprecations are deduced from its auxiliary wherewithal.
There is no contrition in immersing in enthrallment nor is there fickleness in trust.
Magnificent bodies orbit in finesse and probability, achieving universality and control.
Though these incitements are exponentially cheering, my origin is but connoted in despondency.
Usurpers and ill-suited vandals proliferated by the intemperance of the Ptolemaic discipline.
Rustics, miscreants and idle minds misdirected by less virtuous planetary derision.
My cognitive severity asserted by ominous consummation.
Oh how these preponderant truths confine me unfortunate.
Soliloquy is but an affliction amidst this era of anachronistic reign.
Grandiose passivity is intolerable at this time.
I plan to dichotomize my adamant fate from precepts and conditions anew.
The deposition of malfeasant kings will be sought.
Ploys I have already configured; propagation is near to instigation.
I will exhort my ascent to prime eminence.
The stars will sanction me to a rightful end.
Sep 1, 2014
Sep 1, 2014 at 8:49 AM UTC
Walk thee behind me, woman
Cast down thine eyes; thy mind
Deposit thy wealth in my account
Pay a penny at this coast of mine.
Moonlighting is imperative to survive
Veil thy face and hide thy tongue
Do obey my word upon thy ear
Bother not with thoughts at all, *****
Seek not a soul to assuage thy pain
Fall upon me in eternal gratitude
I grant you the wherewithal for my pleasure
And always behind me, thy feet shall be.
Star Toucher, 20 March 2013
Mar 20, 2013
Mar 20, 2013 at 4:18 PM UTC
She became brazen
or so he thought,
having come home with Monday's rain,
so he forgave her.
She thought out aloud
Stoke and pottery classes
once the greatest of eases
but with the wherewithal -
in parenthesis to "gently nurture".
Jun 5, 2013
Jun 5, 2013 at 5:59 PM UTC
The Gods have forgotten how to die,
in the Serengeti the Lion fills his cup.
Gerrymander those dreams furnished as overkill,
for safekeeping store them in a crucible so that,
Warriors pledge wherewithal returns,
a monstrous bounty to wrench
the loadstone enduring.
Nov 14, 2012
Nov 14, 2012 at 3:41 PM UTC
*
i know at times i have lost my ways too
forgot 'bout efflorescences of truth
denied all of the good hidden within
for my nature itself quite demurin'
wherewithal we all do have times like these
wherein we fail to recognize beauties
to see life to be ever so comely
when a heart feels only felicity
tho as faremost 'n' so quintessential
to lose focus of the sempiternal
will not bring us further into this life
when forgettin' the knowin' how to lithe
for i know now which thread to hold onto
'n' the very Bein' to put all of my trust into
**
..love always...*
عرفان بن يوسف © AH 08/05/1437
**
Feb 17, 2016
Feb 17, 2016 at 7:26 PM UTC
a poet who taught college
night school ventured out
during the day to find rare
books of poetry to assign
his class to read out loud;
a small bookshop destined
to fail opened up on the
sunny north eastern corner;
selling no books at all, the
enterprising intellectual
proprietor resigned to the
inevitable but was surprised
when the poet [seldom
seen during the day & she
had never seen him before]
burst through the door &
demanded she order all the
books on a handwritten list,
shoving it in her face; so
overwhelmed she stayed
late at the bookstore on the
telephone & computer
ordering the rare & obscure
books; that night the class full
of wanna-be poets groaned in
despair at the poet telling them
to read every book on the list
& the wherewithal to find them
Jul 25, 2018
Jul 25, 2018 at 3:36 AM UTC
I see reflections everywhere.
Brick walls reflect the shimmering green blade summer days,
with 4-square games in a gated yard- wherewithal a Huffy backboard and bent rim- I was LEBRON JAMES!
Glass window panes reflect the exit of dad's leather silhouette.
Tie-dyed walls reflect blue/red splatters traced with a syringe paintbrush.
And you reflect me, because I am you, and you I.
You are more than a piece of me.
You reflect everything I ever was or wanted to be.
Apr 8, 2015
Apr 8, 2015 at 10:48 PM UTC
Why do you repel death
As if you stepped on an uncouth reptile
That stupified your mirth with a sting
and stiffled your brearth with dark coils round your girth?
The sibling death was with you ever since your birth
As close and distanced as the self-effacing unmouthed mammoth earth.
Throughout your path
And passage along childhood to Man or
Motherhood
You did not see the truth
That death was with you ever since your
Being to becoming growth
As a naive and native
Star in the north.
When you giggled and smiled in sleep-shell
the death was smiling with you as well.
When you dreamed and deemed yourself immortal
The death was kind at your daring mettle.
When you forgot to know the worth
Of the Love Smith
Who carved you as the crown of creation
The death was with you, an emphatic narration, a gentle witness of your lavished wishes of yourself.
Death was around you
Embracing your kiths
With valour indepth
And a love of eternal strength!
Still you strolled uncontrolled to count your mortal home and hearth,
Ephemeral wherewithal
Death was ever loving
And lent you a free living
Even when you were ailing.
Still you failed in your mirth
To listen and learn
From what its worth
Still he is mute and modest as earth
And a caring and guiding north star.
Then why do you loathe
And show dearth of love to the one who
Loves all in equal strength
And blanks out all balance sheets,
That credit and debit all accounts on earth
To the remembrance bank of infinity
without showing any disparity?
Nov 26, 2018
Nov 26, 2018 at 12:51 PM UTC
Love Is Not Love
by Michael R. Burch
for Beth
Love is not love that never looked
within itself and questioned all,
curled up like a zygote in a ball,
throbbed, sobbed and shook.
(Or went on a binge at a nearby mall,
then would not cook.)
Love is not love that never winced,
then smiled, convinced
that soar’s the prerequisite of fall.
When all
its wounds and scars have been saline-rinsed,
where does Love find the wherewithal
to try again,
endeavor, when
all that it knows
is: O, because!
Published by The Neovictorian/Cochlea, The Deronda Review, Better Than Starbucks and Stremez (translated into Macedonian by Marija Girevska)
Keywords/Tags: Love, zygote, binge, mall, soar, fall, wounds, scars, tears, persistence, hope, fetal ball, sob, sobs, sobbing, shake, shaking, throb, throbbing, wince, wincing, smile, smiling, convinced, prerequisite, wherewithal, endeavor, just because
Mar 4, 2020
Mar 4, 2020 at 3:28 AM UTC