"zealot" poems
How dull the wretch, whose philosophic mind
Disdains the pleasures of fantastic kind;
Whose prosy thoughts the joys of life exclude,
And wreck the solace of the poet's mood!
Young Zeno, practis'd in the Stoic's art,
Rejects the language of the glowing heart;
Dissolves sweet Nature to a mess of laws;
Condemns th' effect whilst looking for the cause;
Freezes poor Ovid in an iced review,
And sneers because his fables are untrue!
In search of hope the hopeful zealot goes,
But all the sadder tums, the more he knows!
Stay! Vandal sophist, whose deep lore would blast
The grateful legends of the storied past;
Whose tongue in censure flays th' embellish'd page,
And scorns the comforts of a dreary age:
Wouldst strip the foliage from the vital bough
Till all men grow as wisely dull as thou?
Happy the man whose fresh, untainted eye
Discerns a Pantheon in the spangled sky;
Finds sylphs and dryads in the waving trees,
And spies soft Notus in the southern breeze
For whom the stream a cheering carol sings,
While reedy music by the fountain rings;
To whom the waves a Nereid tale confide
Till friendly presence fills the rising tide.
Happy is he, who void of learning's woes,
Th' ethereal life of bodied Nature knows;
I scorn the sage that tells me it but seems,
And flout his gravity in sunlight dreams!
7.9k
I find as I get older
I have to censor what I say
I can't say that a happy man
Seems very, very, gay
I never got the memo
When certain words were made taboo
I never got that message
I' missed that one , did you?
My Nan would send my brother
To the shops to get her ****
I know we aren't allowed to say this
I've been told by P.C nags
I remember the old story
Of Black Peter and St. Nick
Now you can't say either one
or you'd be branded quite the *****
There, I used another one
***** somehow made the list
Has anyone seen the memo
It's the one note that I missed
You must call someone Richard
You cannot call him ****
**** political correctness
Just brought me back to *****
If you sit and watch the telly
you can't put your feet up on a ****
that gets us back to gay again
The PC folks would hit the roof
Don't start me on Brazil nuts
Remember what we all called those ?
If I put that down in writing
I'd be PC'd in the nose
Men and Women are all persons
This PC stuff just makes me sick
But, just look at them both naked
There, I've worked back round to *****
It takes the fun out of saying swear words
You have to censor all the time
There might be a PC zealot
waiting for a language crime
So, in closing let me tell you
And I will do it with some class
They can take their PC memo
And shove it up their....buttocks (I think is the term used nowadays)!
Jul 26, 2012
Jul 26, 2012 at 8:19 PM UTC
Zinging the zen-zone I was in
A zany request zig-zagged my way.
Princess Zinnia from the Zuider-Zee
Required a zippy line or two
To paint the zeitgeist of our times.
With the strength of a Zamboni-
With the power of a Zeus-
And an uncommon zeal I set out
To zap the doubt that slowed me.
With the flair of a Florenz Ziegfeld
And his zoftig choir of beauties,
I morphed into a zealot
Gamboling in the zephyrs
That wafted in from Zurich and Zaire,
Not to mention Zanzibar.
I felt like a Zacharias
When my zealous work went bust.
The writing turned into a zonk-
The accolades were zilch.
I felt like I’d been zippered up
Like a zebra in a zoo.
I lost my zest for going on
And slopped around in old Zoris,
Listening to zydeco’s beat
And feeling like a zit.
But then the Zodiac-
My zinging-singing sign
Came to my rescue
And I was marching off to Zion.
I was one wowie-zowie-zucchini
As I zipped across the pages
And zoomed from one idea
To an even zippier one.
So here, Sunprincess, is your verse
I’ve used up every letter zee
And gone from very bad to worse
But of this challenge, I am free.
ljm
Mar 5, 2017
Mar 5, 2017 at 12:58 AM UTC
it hurts to know that my Temple is of another faith than you care for
and it hurts to know that my Temple
might be burned to the ground
by your zealot hands
but this fear
and pain
and sometimes rain
can only last so long.
Dec 30, 2013
Dec 30, 2013 at 2:56 PM UTC
The End Times
Repent, the zealot dinner guest, invited
For purposes of theological correctness, chides.
Repent, and sin no more, he advises, for the end is near.
But isn't that like asking a carnivore to turn vegan
Moments before the serving of a pampered calf's liver
I ask
he takes special care in the fall of a sparrow
The zealot replies, eyeing me as I set
My peas to one side with my fork.
Yes, but it was just that one, I retort.
His first.
Aug 25, 2015
Aug 25, 2015 at 3:01 AM UTC
Barren halls, devoid of children
echo with the ghostly staccato of gunfire
and the mockingly musical tinkling of spent brass.
Specters of children set free through violence
mutely stand vigil over stained tile and carpet,
shocked by their sudden transition.
Parents, siblings, grandparents and family reel
from the sudden void caused by the senseless
and cowardly actions of a 2nd Amendment zealot’s son.
Christmas presents without recipients sit untouched
in secret places – never to light up the eyes
and faces of eager and happy children.
Flags fly in solemn respect at half-staff
signifying a nation in mourning, yet a nation
so reluctant to address the core of these issues
which have made these crimes so common-place.
Bumbling and incompetent politicians – securely
in the NRA’s and gun-lobby’s pocket are quick to *****
the party lines: “Guns don’t **** people.” “My fork and knife made me fat.”
All the while the mentally tormented and dangerous
continue to take up arms and slaughter innocents –
as apparently their constitutional rights are more sacred
than the life of a first-grader.
How long America, will you dip your pens in the blood of children
and write the laws that take their lives?
How long America, will you wrap yourself in a blood-stained flag
and spew the toxic and hateful lie that guns don’t **** people?
How many more must bleed your ink and feed your mill
before we cry, “enough is enough!!”?
© 2012 Michael Hunter
Dec 20, 2012
Dec 20, 2012 at 9:47 PM UTC
This will be the best poem
I will ever write.
Who's to say if it will be my last, but one thing it is not is a first attempt at finding the right words to convey to you.
And finding the right words
has never been a challenge for me,
but ********* if you aren't giving me a run for my money presently, insufferable me with bleeding
tongue resentfully.
I say that word with an intrepid disposition, because I do not resent the person, but the action: The act of unwarranted silence.
I'd like to think you have a limpid conscience of the beautiful woman you are, at peace with yourself, when at the present time you are consumed with future maybes and counting seconds. So maybe adding myself to your equation was selfish, and brought complications when thinking about anything linear, considering all of the variables.
There was only intention to
rhapsodize the zealot I met on a mutual wavelength, a double helix we all share that some of us forget about, yet here is the reversion, the Neanderthal, the ******* who grew a beard to expose himself, looking at this whole experience all wrong.
Instead, there is Royal Purple Prose to look as extravagant as you are stunning.
Now all that's left is cognitive dissonance to later become
addictive retribution.
Sep 28, 2015
Sep 28, 2015 at 7:16 AM UTC
Alone
But
Constantly
Devising
Energetic
Faulted
Game-plans
Hanging
In
Jupiter
Killing
Love
Makes
Notions
Of
Partnership
Questionable,
Rest-assured
Sedation
Tonight
Unifies
Virtues
Within,
Xanax
Yearned
Zealot
Apr 22, 2014
Apr 22, 2014 at 1:22 AM UTC
Arguably benign
Collecting dust, eventually
Forgetting...
Graciously heroic
Intrepid justification, knowing
Legalese...
Mistakenly nerdy
Or perhaps quite
Reasonably serendipitous...
Triumphantly understood
Validating wisdom
Xenial...
Yellow zealot
Apr 20, 2015
Apr 20, 2015 at 2:18 AM UTC
The graceful flowing of her night gown as she walked slowly throughout the house
Her hair I would play with when I was a young boy
Somehow, she is gone
I was there when she stood up in church praising a god who may or may not exist like a religiously fanatic zealot
But she was not a fanatic
She was full of love and passion
The one woman that got me through my childhood with her kind advice and her wise words
A sage that I seek now in desperate times.
All I can do is wait..and hope to see you again in the beyond
RIP Betty Faye Presley (Nana) 1931-2012
Sep 23, 2013
Sep 23, 2013 at 4:56 PM UTC
The drops of rain
Play a leaf like a drum
While desperate men
Are murdered
By a faceless enemy
My eyes are drawn near
Until the drops
Begin drawing lines
On my face
And my vision becomes blurry
Between life giving
And indifferent existence
I wish to become
As nature is
In harmony
Soothing
Instinctual
At times heartless
But beautiful
And without worry
I must ask
In what world of deception
Must the magic of caring
Overcome its daily death?
Where good men remain silent
Preferring to live anonymously
For fear of losing everything
Or the respect
Of a zealot
Who wrote the rules
That bind us mercilessly
Inside the pressure resonates
With looming consciousness
Where the end provides comfort
To rational thoughts early death
As time is killed needlessly
Take from me
The lashes of my weaknesses
Hurtful pride
Ruthless selfishness
Contrived masculinity
Look not my way for your ambition
For I will not die for you
I will not bow down
I will not pretend to understand
I will exchange your judgment
For my self-respect
All that remains is true integrity
Washing over me
Until I can no longer accept anything
But the truth
Of the horror
That you peddle endlessly
Feb 9, 2012
Feb 9, 2012 at 9:09 AM UTC
Antara sheddad a man of letter,
Born to suffer and to write,
For worse or for better,
He thought he was doing right.
Antara found himself in a pickle
Over a mighty promise,
His love went, although fickle,
From a melody, to a hiss.
Antara voiced his mind,
A lustful mouthy dirt,
Mindful he might find
Joy in agony and hurt.
Antara wrote for a nickel,
Not to expect a dime,
Clever and whimsical
With a rhythm and a rhyme.
Antara wrote a little and knew
His audience expected a lot,
He went cold on the few
And on the rest went hot.
Antara wept and laid down tall,
Now out of breath
His dying words call
For life and for death.
Antara lived in rumpus
No home, no rest, no treat
They named after him a campus
A library and a street.
Antara Sheddad lived a helot,
Unfed on Obedience,
A heart of a zealot,
And an ill-fortune expedience.
Oct 17, 2012
Oct 17, 2012 at 1:10 PM UTC
I got hummus and pretzels,
but I wanted a bag of chips.
I got creamer and cheesecake,
but ate corned beef hash with a pepsi.
I don't quite think I'm lying about
who I am to myself, but
on the other hand I'm feeling
like there's something behind
those curtains. Friends I don't
give a **** about, and an increasing
incentive to just start walking
and never turn around. There's
a diner somewhere out there
with a meat and potatoes dish
just as good as mom's, I bet.
I'd sincerely like to give a ****
Sometimes I wonder if life seems
easier for people who feel gung-ho
about dying in military slavery
and ********** to FOX news.
If you're reading this,
hey, maybe we're not so different;
You play a zealot's game of
love and peace, but pull the trigger
right in their children's faces,
and I tip-toe around people
I couldn't care less about.
We nourish each other in the way
that chairs aid discussion
in an episode of Jerry Springer.
Doesn't have to be comedy,
but I wasn't going to cry about it.
I'd probably just fib and say
everything's aces.
May 1, 2014
May 1, 2014 at 9:12 PM UTC
No gods, no fate,
not even yielding to chance
To live this one life
in full acceptance:
This will only happen once!
A stubborn strength
born of a conviction
That there is no soul
in need of absolution
That life is not made meaningful
by abstract metaphysical contortions
in favor of a jealous,
angry, cruel
deity
Purportedly in love with creation
Such is the choice of the humanist
in staunch opposition
to the zealot, the spiritualist
To stand on one's own feet
Acknowledging the grand mystery
Not willing to submit.
Jul 11, 2020
Jul 11, 2020 at 10:24 AM UTC
Lashed to the side .washed by the rolling tide
I have traversed the oceans wide.somehow. my cursed soul
Cannot find surcease.
Seasons go and decades flow.
Down, down to the depths we go. A watery grave
I stubornly craved ,no such. Cursed beast.
"No whale. No cursed devil."
Release me to darkness.
To hell and gone.
Vengeance is mine saeth the lord
I Ahab spat defiance.
A wooden keepsake strapped to my knee.
A bitter morsel for mobey **** who bit and spit the cursed zealot
Away to drift.
Now strapped astride.his sworn foe
His soul long dead .sent ahead.
Ahabs sentence
To prowl the depths
To see the unseen.
Fathom for fathom.dark and deep
Never to sleep or feel the touch.
A horrific Dutchman to end of days
To repent for his blackheart vengeance.
Forever cast
Away.
Dec 10, 2012
Dec 10, 2012 at 11:49 PM UTC
I hope you suffer,
wounds deeper than
emotional scars beneath the dermal layer.
You're truely not worth the air,
you consume.
A zealot. Heretic turned holy.
An abomination hiding behind closet alcoholism.
I'd hate to be your liver.
Jul 11, 2017
Jul 11, 2017 at 6:34 AM UTC
The mirrors whisper secrets
Little tidbits of advice
Reflections of a washed up zealot
Being optimistic to pull me from this ever-clenching vice
Torn, tattered, broken, battered
Claimed exaggeration from these hushed murmurs
Self destruction evident, nothing really matters
Tugging on my mind; the zealot’s cheery sermons
“Happiness is key
And the key is universal...”
But no one ever thinks to be
Something ultimately omniversal
A tool to be used constantly for general amusement
A tool to be ignored when no longer needed
A tool to be picked for sadistic abusement
A tool to be deluded, guilted, always twisting to the greeded
And like the calm before the inevitable storm
The tool dances to the tunes the varied user creates
Suicidal pursuit nightly, heart never warmed or warned
Staring back at the zealot is me; whispering dogmatic secrets of self-hatred.
Sep 11, 2015
Sep 11, 2015 at 6:35 AM UTC
Zealot; standing tall against the screaming winds
Ingenious; looking at the world through the eyes of a God
Optimistic; waiting for the apocalypse that will bring my exaltation
Nearer mine God to Thee; though farther we've never been and they can only save those who save themselves.
Feb 26, 2010
Feb 26, 2010 at 7:36 PM UTC
Some would say I have the dignity of a queen,
The affections of a man,
The heart of a child,
The righteousness of a rebel,
The daydreams of a poet,
The bitterness of a *******
The restraint of a soldier,
The faith of a zealot,
The cleverness of a thief,
The sorrow of a widow,
The stubbornness of a youth,
The doubts of a skeptic,
The weakness of a fool,
The humility of a freak,
The joy of a survivor,
The weariness of an old man,
The suspicion of a king,
The strength of a proud woman,
And the passion of a lover.
You tell me
Where I belong.
Feb 21, 2014
Feb 21, 2014 at 12:47 PM UTC
Rant and rave
Scream and shout
You don't know what you're talking about
Screech and yell
Wail and cry
Their flaws are blind to your eye
These people
You worship
Are not gods
And this obsession
You have
Is not healthy
They are flawed
Not perfect
Nobody's perfect
And yet
You rant
And rave
Oct 22, 2014
Oct 22, 2014 at 9:30 AM UTC
Your parade makes me purple, it makes me thin as an alphabet, I don't know, I don't wanna understand. I'm an estimation, I'm over and not in great abundance. Don't defend me, I'm not the header atop your letter.
Open me, I'm like your chimney, inside your mouth I am the lips you dip your tongue through, growing with sensation. See me and seam me to threads and tow me through your ****** lines-
little piece of flesh
Just a little dance, Just a little romance
Keep me in your pants let me be your postcard
I'll float across your eyelids.
Let me know your name
You can taste my skin. You can see my seams bend, my hours grow a little tired
Lifting up your dress, I can taste your pastes, your pastel belle comes floating at me sideways.
Ours and again, you ask me, "is it a nightmare?"
You ask me, "is it a car crash?" You say, "I can feel you breathing." This is not a spell, there's nothing left, not even a little lie I can play with in my fingers, you say, "is it the moon in the stars." And I stop you from ruining the sound of words to preserve a moment. Something a silence and a dollar doesn't buy you. I ask, " is this you my love? You're an imaginary process I'm never going to be interested in prosecuting perfectly. I'm not- an extroverted invert, a spirit floating in the corner of your eyes. I'm over zealous, a zealot, full of youth, using grief to keep your eyes
Oct 30, 2016
Oct 30, 2016 at 10:15 PM UTC
A Zealot Beauty,
Young Cat,
Xerxes Dolts,
Witting Earnestly the Very Ulterior Feelings,
Truly God Signs Her Rights Into
Quacksalver
Just Pretending Killing Omnipotence Leads New Money
Nov 15, 2011
Nov 15, 2011 at 9:40 PM UTC
My love must be a kite run
Tight wrung ribbons
Separate the knots in my knees
Knots from wine
She moves about the kitchen flicking flames off candles
That wine at the table at which I sit is a good wine
I think of the troubles of writing at a screen
I'll consider the problem of writing in a notebook
When I find that **** notebook.
Speaking honestly to a tray of napkins
They can't help the Merlot that's polishing the table
Dark wood is well stained. She asks if I
Remember the small room wine fests in my dorm
My sheets came home from college dotted purple
I remember.
Lurking in the shadows
These thoughts free themselves
Releasing the inescapable passion of a zealot unheard for centuries
Now, in this miniature pressing of keys a wire company will see every idea that spills out of me
The pigs
I hope they come to my door wearing black.
Honey, your hot, don't get mad,
She appears out of the smells
I'm drunk, not mad, I'm spilling the Merlot
We have more, dear.
I love that woman right there and none other
Lets jump out the window and roll through the grass
Come on child, cant you see we got cliffs to catch.
**** on up your hind legs and lets get to moving.
Don't you know its half past seven and the turn tables grooving
I like that, she says, reminds me of the pictures of you as a boy
I turn to thank her but I can't find her
She dissolves into the smells of the kitchen
And plus, I'm gone.
What is human nature unless covered by an aesthetic, who am I, if not an imposer?
What poet is this, if not the first?
A line of a poem is a poem in itself
I'll regret this next week
But, sand over rock will polish something smooth
In a thousand years, no regret
A mesa stands grounded
In an ocean of wind
Herring cries
Through the morning leaves
What makes them mourning?
They're just a different shade green.
I like that too, she says to me
An Ibis will wind through a pond
But is it just his wake we see, or can
We really spot that bird?
Aug 10, 2013
Aug 10, 2013 at 11:42 AM UTC
(with apologies to Elizabeth Barret Browning)
Arrogant
Book Soldier
Conceited
Con Artist
Covetous
Cunning
Deceitful
Disingenuous
Egoist
Egregious
Envious
Entitled
Evil
Haughty
Hypocritical
Ignominious
Immoral
Jealous
Jumped Up
Machiavellian
Martinet
Mendacious
Nit Picky
Obsessed
Peck Sniff
Perfidious
Persnickety
Pompous
Popinjay
Predatory
****
Rapacious
Regimental
Sanctimonious
Self Important
Shylock
Smarmy
Sophist
Supercilious
Unctuous
Unethical
Vile
Vicious
Zealot
ljm
Mar 31, 2017
Mar 31, 2017 at 1:52 PM UTC
War is all around, everyday,
Mother’s and children dying,
Yet, ask any politician, any,
They could tell you, instantly,
(No they won’t, not honest enough.)
War is good for lining pockets.
They could also tell you,
If we don't supply arms,
Then someone else will.
(Is this not obvious to all?)
Yeah right, of course, my, my,
How stupid we are; so unseeing.
Truth is, we folk of conscience,
We vote these people into office.
Sure, freedom has to be defended,
Alas, humanity - bah! what humanity?
- has gone way beyond defending,
Into extremes of propagating.
It hurts so much, so very much,
That I have no feasible solution,
I think, you think, we all think,
Yet, we cannot think, or act,
In any possible way,
To halt war!
Sad.
(While reading this, somewhere in the world, no doubt, another innocent has died in a war. Religious zealot’s justification, politician’s justification, perpetrators of organised violence justification, arms dealer’s justification; we have a surplus population. Fine, then cull all those who justify war; problem solved.)
© Paul M Chafer 2014
Aug 1, 2014
Aug 1, 2014 at 5:57 AM UTC