"yardstick" poems
I was once a shape...
Equally jointed,
at four opposite points.
I was a square...
I never knew the way of the world.
Never open to new experiences,
even when they presented themselves bare...
Even when the shrouds of uncertainty
were wiped away leaving the future unfurled.
I grew up...
Huddled under the roof set above me,
with four walls that kept me safe and sheltered.
That was the entire universe.
That was all I saw...
Views so narrow and uneventful...
A life so bland with the fun bits all sheared.
Never brought up to question...
Never given the time and space to think.
There was always a yardstick upon which I was measured.
The sea of expectations was vast but shallow...
So I could wade forever,
but never sink.
I was once a shape...
No one then expected me to be other than a square.
I had everything I needed,
all within the confines of imposing cordons and tapes.
But the world would constantly rap on the windows.
Peddling its fantastical ware.
It would entice with its secrets and mysteries.
Boasting the wonderful stories it'd like to share.
Jan 18, 2016
Jan 18, 2016 at 4:49 AM UTC
In retrospect,
dredging up past events
that led to the here and now.
Pending course of actions in which to exact...
Reaching as far back as the mind would allow.
In retrospect,
studying the reflection
in the rear view mirror,
as the present freezes itself intact.
Sifting through past images...
Second by second,
frame by frame.
Identifying overlooked pitfalls
and margin of errors.
In retrospect,
straddling the realm...
Where my current state of mind
lapses into a minute-long sleep.
Sights on the future... Folded blind,
discerning the treachery
of impulsive thoughts and actions.
Diving up from oceans deep,
painting the backdrop beyond paths at
unmarked junctions.
In retrospect,
every detail deconstructed...
Deliberated against the yardstick
of what's done and the supposed.
Refracted memories snap back clean into place.
Over and over...
Layer upon layer...
Time and again forming
the looming weight
that pulls me to a stumble
into the stagnant puddle...
Of long gone days.
Nov 4, 2015
Nov 4, 2015 at 10:10 AM UTC
_Peace abides in the gentle velvet folds of patient time;
When industry is forgotten and rigid right angles
Give way to soft currents of inspiration;
Lacking definition, judgement or expectation
My yardstick shrinks and disintegrates into nothingness...
Inadequate to the task of measuring infinity._
Mar 13, 2021
Mar 13, 2021 at 1:00 AM UTC
Acrostic poem
Necessity of society
Intensity of people agitation
Redefined the common man’s power
Boiling over attacks on women
Hot-tempered youth
Ashamed to say
Yardstick of behavior
Assault on women go unreported
-Naveen
Dec 15, 2014
Dec 15, 2014 at 1:36 AM UTC
So tell me what you want to be
And what you think you need of me
For what you do
You will become
As habit makes it part of one
For habits grind and clearly shape
Rough edges smoothed,
some dreams may break
Then, from time to time
There’s someone who
Will melt or break a part of you
So once again your shape does change
Though it may feel you’re just the same
It may take another, looking on
To see the shape that you’ve become
So maybe that should be my role?
Some sort of yardstick of your soul?
But then again, I will change too
So perhaps we’d better muddle through
And focus on the spark inside
The flame that undiminished shines
And if, as said, that change is certain
It will never be the final curtain
So embrace the change in me and you
And love the flame that shines on through
Apr 2, 2015
Apr 2, 2015 at 8:13 AM UTC
Why wonder?
Oh great men from the east,
For the irrefutable expedition
Is full of joie de vivre,
Now see, the executioner does not
Even know what to throw away
And what to keep,
For her words are always
Seasoned with stitches of
Honey in my heart,
See how the eternal shadow
Of thy beauty, put my angelic heart
To rest every rainy season,
Oh, my faithful firstborn love,
Sometimes wisdom has it all
Other times beauty has it all
But this time thou have it all,
Yes, hail the precious gift from Ethiopia,
For the wisest King of Israel cannot
Even comprehend the secret behind
This gorgeous eternal beauty and wisdom,
The seasonal sweet-scented
Shining moon that betrays my thoughts,
Thou art the fruitful beauty of Africa,
Indeed, Makeda is the yardstick of beauty.
© PRINCE NANA ANIN-AGYEI
Email: [email protected]
Apr 8, 2013
Apr 8, 2013 at 6:48 AM UTC
On this very day JESUS rose from the dead
because the holiest path He tread
He shone brighter than the rising sun
as He was/is Holy Father’s dearest sun
In fact, He and Father are the only one
The very thought of his crucifixion was an inexcusable sin
He dedicated his heart and soul to His Divine Father
The earthly pains He didn’t even slightly bother
Only He could pray for his treacherous traitors
Thus His name was written in Golden letters
HE became a yardstick for time
Although his mundane life was cut off at his prime
Let us all celebrate the historic Easter
like a renowned Christian pastor
All of us have a purification bath
And cover sinful body with Jesus’ divine White cloth
Apr 23, 2011
Apr 23, 2011 at 11:20 PM UTC
Inspired by “The Burning Giraffe” by Salvador Dali
I am defined by what clutters my drawers:
• Aortic—a tattered matchbook with a phone number I never called
scrawled to the inside cover as an inscription to everything
I never wanted. A half-empty can of butane with a missing
cap alongside a dollar’s worth of pennies that weight a scrap
torn from a newspaper tragedy: four killed, faulty smoke
detectors to blame.
• Ankle—a charred picture, curled in upon itself and kept as a reminder
of what I could become; a blackened nest as an omen of
losing all I’ve ever known and an ointment tube, squeezed
in the middle as a talisman against blistering tempers.
• Thigh—an empty Zippo with a scarred case, dull and pointless; a coiled
stove element with an ashen haze that could testify that water
doesn’t douse all flames; and an oily fuse, plucked from the top
of my head to serve as a yardstick of minutes, seconds, then
nothing.
• Knee—a fine layer of charcoal dust and half of a briquette from last
summer’s backyard barbecue when the wind kicked up to spray
red embers into the air like a meteor shower, streaking in bright
sparks and fluttering to shrieks and stop-drop-rolls along dry grass
until the itching ceased and the bubbles formed in small foamy
patches along arms and strapless backs and sun-red cheeks.
Oct 11, 2010
Oct 11, 2010 at 5:30 AM UTC
chants from red states and blue
and of course the tea partied new
blend into wicked white noise
and with complete lack of poise
we have become a nation divided
not that we were ever truly united
but our rhetoric is now so blighted
that whenever we open our ears
we are inundated with feculent fears
that our country is no longer grand
perhaps we were never number one...
except in matters of money and the gun
but when measured by the yardstick of the soul
did we ever really achieve a transcendent goal
or were we listening to our own lyrical lies?
‘twas not enough to denigrate
-those of foreign birth
-those of color
and the welfare ingrate
now we all chew and spew equal portions of hate
and probably deserve our feckless fate
Sep 14, 2012
Sep 14, 2012 at 10:58 PM UTC
For an immature poet like me the rhyme
Becomes the greatest crime
I want to write a poem on a piece of soap
Or the greatness of the Italian Pope
I talk about the faithfulness of a pet dog
Or the great utility of a school bag
I can write a poem on a match stick
Since I feel, for poetry there is no yardstick
Mr George J Jerry thinks My poetry is rather Awkward
I can no longer go any forward
He feels my poetry is meant for un-schooled
I don’t think I am even a bit fooled
He opines my poems are mere mush
And I am making unnecessary fuss
In fact I am very much cooled
Because I think I am correctly ruled
Dec 27, 2010
Dec 27, 2010 at 3:55 AM UTC
Ragged breath
pushed through lips
paperthin and dry
Clouded moons
in once sparkling eyes
Skin of face
folded and creased
by years of laughter
Age has wearied you
beyond repair
Your first foot treads
heavily upon heavens stair
And in this pastel room
the reward for a life of care
As we come to usher you away
to your final, hopeful jubilee day
All have come, none have missed
the opportunity to thank you
for, the gifts you gave...
One word of kindness, from your lips
ripples through the lives you touched
and all your students learnt well
to live, love and give freely,
of caring humanities touch.
In this pastel room, we stand,
touching one last time,
the gnarled and giving hand
And when we leave, we do weep
for loss, but also joy....
knowing your soul does keep
to the pieties of love.
So in the days to come,
know your grace will live on
through lives and generations
your teaching will be the yardstick
to which our hearts are measured
YOUR WORDS, YOUR LIFE,
REMEMBERED AND TREASURED
Sep 28, 2015
Sep 28, 2015 at 7:54 PM UTC
I can now see it coming
The sound of the end is drumming
From the fury of the dragon's head
Channel through a ceremonial head
It is the conspiracy of evil ideas
Molded in our psychic to adhere
And I feel it in my premonition
The awaited plot for a secular dimension
To be carried out through a device
In those who play antagonist to biblical advice
For my common sense is not blinded
To know where it was masterminded
Since sin is the only yardstick
To hinder our soul from heavenly pick
Let's stick with the scriptures to conquer
Their's is the world for now to conquer.
Jul 20, 2013
Jul 20, 2013 at 4:06 AM UTC
How is our life’s worth measured?
By offspring, actions, or wealth?
What are the components on the yardstick?
Worrying your value, affects your mental health.
If life is truly worth living
The joy and verve for life emits from within
Emotions are worn on your sleeve
Be at peace, and comfy in your own skin
Why let others conflict our minds?
External factors make us shout with dismay
Put them out of your head
Let Karma and intellect rule the day
Your peers will judge you behind your back,
Live with honor, integrity, and lack of spite
The value of your actions, not consciously rated
Know in your heart, you’ve done what is right.
Die with no regrets hanging over your head,
You can’t take it back when you’re six feet under
Years of life spent with compassion and service of others,
Validates your worth when torn asunder.
For today, live your life with an eye towards passion
Hold on to your ideals, use your heart for decision,
You’ll never go wrong with integrity and trust
You’ll grow old, and be free of ridicule and derision.
Apr 13, 2010
Apr 13, 2010 at 7:23 AM UTC
wonder of wonders,
the men at Love's door
when a ripe man worships a woman,
the stars wake
and rivets of harmonious song filter through the universe
love is a release of majesty
the loved ones are a measure in kindness
were it not for Love,
man would have dissipated long ago
worship this yardstick
sever your pangs of ill will
the one who clearly loves
has on his side an angel
the one who resents is not forgiven
war is the trademark of a man torn with envy
love is the fortress of the blessed
wash your hands in a pool of love
the waters there will cleanse you
like no earthly waters can
love is a gateway to God
------------------
-----------------------
..(C) 1986/2011 Spiros Zafiris
..channeled; spirit Ram
------------------------------------------
Oct 25, 2011
Oct 25, 2011 at 3:15 AM UTC
*In my room, the grandfather clock has been busy
Busy moving its needles around for over a century
Seconds, turning to minutes, to hours, days and years
A young clock growing old, pendulous pinions and gears.
That’s what passing time does, a chime unfixed
But truly, as I introspect, does time really exist?
Rising sun and the onset of night, an unending event
Churning of moments, past, future and the present.
Creeping on us, time is the rhythmic rhyme of history
A song sung by my clock, and its ubiquitous mystery.
A silent, unspoken, unheard, stealthy crescendo
The ever changing panorama I see outside my window.
But then what is the datum to know elapse of time?
Is it a mere yardstick of your evolution and mine?
Replacement of dying cells, a genetic work so complex
My grandfather clock, tick tocks unmindful, unchecked*.
Sep 10, 2014
Sep 10, 2014 at 2:20 PM UTC
give them an inch
and theyll take a measure
rules make rulers of men
to be measured against
and to be found to be lesser
Sep 29, 2013
Sep 29, 2013 at 5:28 PM UTC
*The only redress to all my pain
comes when I reside in my poem.*
no matter what I write
buxom thin trivial trite
common rhyme mundane style
in poems I find the escape awhile!
Ask myself where I would be
if the ink never flowed for poetry
this mind never vented even one poem
born for me bear my name!
When my worries burst at the rim
agonies seem an endless stream
I board this carriage for a heavenly ride
reach the dreamland on the other side!
There so long I roam the corridor
tasting the treasured and the abhorred
I forget the measures all earthly yardstick
in the rainbow bubble taste the escape I seek!
Apr 8, 2014
Apr 8, 2014 at 5:48 AM UTC
The apple is gone.
It departed today in the wake
of Gonzalo’s sting.
The sting in the tail
of a hurricane that
should never have touched our shores.
And so the symbol
of tenacious life
no longer bears witness
to my own tenacity:
my own survival in an
irresolute world
now seeks another yardstick
on which to pin a shaky faith.
Oct 21, 2014
Oct 21, 2014 at 12:16 PM UTC
when i was a little girl,
during that span of time
when years weren't the yardstick
but rather the speed with which
my popsicle would melt
or the days awaited
when wands of pine
would cover me from
sun-burned scalp to scraped-up toe
with sweet sap,
i would run about the tall grasses
and name every wildflower
that brushed my ankles
oh-so-tenderly.
i would keep a journal,
all in cornflower blue crayola,
about my findings,
my voyages through seas of green
and the whispers heard
in rustlings through the waves,
all turning to fae fairytales between my ears.
everything was named beautiful,
and everything was soft as a cloud
as i laid with my shoulderblades in the earth,
sticky fingers outstretched towards
projected memories far above me.
and now
i often find myself in a similar position,
ribs heaving heavily
as the floral essence
fills my lungs so amazingly--
the leaden comfort in my limbs
making it almost as if i had never left.
it's as if those fae fairytales have finally come true,
the ponderings finally rippling anew,
and the poppies lulling me to sleep
for hundred of years,
millenia stained with
the purity of august's finest daisies.
their perfume roused me one morning,
the sky still bruised and fluttering,
head sticky with a misplaced exhaustion and the woes of age;
the circumstance to which i awoke was this:
the buds,
the lilacs and hyacinths,
the baby's breath and dandelion
fluff
i had made delicate wishes upon since my earliest days
had found themselves a home wrapped around my spine,
fragrant petals gracing my stomach with their presence.
as if influenced by draught,
the ache did not place itself
but rather my fascination
with each tickling floral
forming fissures in my abdomen--
i took mental note
of their names
and characteristics,
as many as i could fit in that sap-lined cavity of my mind,
just as lovely as ever.
the soil was as soft as a cloud,
childish glee filling my heart to overflowing.
some things never change.
sometimes, the beauty of flowers
remains
the beauty of flowers,
whether it is plush under foot
or pushing through
bone and sinew.
Jun 27, 2018
Jun 27, 2018 at 5:47 PM UTC
Unless it gets you free time
Why **** the self for the dime
Dec 25, 2022
Dec 25, 2022 at 1:10 PM UTC
six decades later i'm still saying
i've read the bible
not really. it was too big a tome
to start with and to read along like a novel.
yes, there were lots of little stories
that were drilled into us as guidelines
to a better life
but now at the *** end of life
these stories have worn thin
with the changing of the times. thank god.
all of us are prodigal sons in some way
wallowed with pigs
spread our wantonness
swore and cussed
been adulterous
broken every commandment
(except ******
and lived unholy lives
when measured against biblical yardsticks.
so be it.
imagine a world without sinners.
can you?
me? for sure, i am a sinner
my yardstick is eternity long.
Author Notes
Yep.I own up. I was grinning when I wrote this poem. Just this morning I had two lovely people wander up to my doorstep, telling me where I was so wrong in my belief. I listened for a while. Then gave up. They had a colourful magazine, nice colourful ties and pink rosy cheeks too! But they were trying to change my pagan ways to their side of the fence of thinking.
I thought it was too late. As someone who knows how long his biblical yardstick is, there was really no point. I could argue till the cows came home and it wouldn't work. So, blah blah.blah.
They said what they had to say, i listened, now more convinced that the world is full of jokers like me!
© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved, 3 months ago
- See more at: http://allpoetry.com/poem/11437496-the-yardstick-by-Marshall-Gass#sthash.6P7TaJez.dpuf
Jul 28, 2014
Jul 28, 2014 at 7:09 PM UTC
Happens for the good.
With every loss
I turn a better man,
Seeing clearer
Learning
That wouldn’t have come in any other way
Then shedding as I move on
A piece of rotten me
Blinded by ego
Seeing what was not there
Hearing what was unsaid
Evaluating only by my yardstick
Stuck in the muck of my own making!
Whatever happens
Even when that makes heart bleed
Burn and break me
Make me
A better man.
Jan 18, 2014
Jan 18, 2014 at 1:58 AM UTC
Amidst roving and pondering, appeared a clear portrait of greatness
An imagination that eludes man, with rich thoughts of a fortress
Girded by tides of frequent passages, of whom to bear
A wall with no boundaries or limits, deep-rooted foundations to harden
Yet barricades stand along, the ones to conquer
A fortification every mortal craves to bear, each moment with a record
While kings and mighty men work endlessly to behold,
Toiling day and Night, with sweat and blood, they stood apart for this reward
A ceaseless search for the prized asset, But at what price does this feat come?
Strength and intelligence wrestle, to be or not to be
The mantle of power being exchanged for glory
Glories of celestial hopes, of foretold divine beings
Faiths mankind is yet to bear, but still with a yardstick to present
Has Nature evolves, memories and revelations of heroes never cease
Time after time, yet we still run same race with poles apart
With priceless ego, men converge to fight
The fight for what seem to be theirs
Some miss it, others win it
To live as a villain or die a hero, Men of valor martyred for glory sake
Captured by the pictures of the black and white, false memories prevailed
Crave for good tidings swathed the hungry minds of men
Diverse minds of weaklings and that of great men
They pondered, either vague or carnal
The creed of Greatness lies within the mantle of belief
May 21, 2017
May 21, 2017 at 1:58 PM UTC
this alteh kocker nostalgically reflects
being ma late mama's boytchik
(now, she long since deceased,
whose cremated remains of day
scattered to all points on compass)
fondly referencing
both sisters as dabchick
incongruously sprinkled her Brooklyn brogue,
especially when angry, she quickly segued
from mild expletive fiddlestick
the latter playfully aired,
when kibitzing wit bubeleh
reminiscing being dirt poor,
nonetheless zee mother
every now an again homesick
regaling the whole mishpokhe
(meaning us brood of kids)
interrupting herself
with frequent non sequiturs
discombobulated anecdotes switching subjects
as if external forcefield
jimmying a joystick
interleaving disparate threads with subsequent
tangential linkedin snippets
with feigned lovesick
chatting 'bout cockamamie
"Grandpa Moishe"
and his chaim yankel posse
(to escape hen pecking nudnik
"grandma Rebecca"),
a trenchant termagent bubba,
not averse to incorporate dreck
in the same sentence with zayda
ostracized him
scoring figurative placekick,
whence upon his schlepping back home
met with "silent treatment" dampening rollick
king atmosphere choking tearfully
"mother" recounted
farblunget anger thick
lee palpable extremely discomfiting,
particularly when ("mom's")
girlhood friends bore witness aye gavalt,
where penury churned moribund thoughts
viz empty cupboards
devoid of bare necessities
a figurative apropos yardstick.
May 31, 2018
May 31, 2018 at 3:48 PM UTC