Calling Card Thread (Poems by AWers)

tlblack

nothing simple here
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I sometimes write poetry when I am deep in thought but never on a regular basis. I tend to put too many of my own feelings about things into my poetry and it usually depresses me to write them. I find lately that I don't have time to write much at all and sometimes when I do have the time, I cannot get words to form on paper. I also find that once my thoughts on any particular poem I'm writing end, so does the poem. This poem reflects a lost relationship of one who couldn't move forward in life because of being stuck in a continual time warp of life's past and one who tried every way possible to make them see differently.


Waited

I looked but could not find you,
Waiting only for you to say what was in your heart.
Thoughts that were there, that could not pass the outer rims of your mouth.
Time passing by without resolve, time gone by so quickly.
Still I waited to hear the sound of your voice, telling of things unspoken.
Echoes resounding off the walls of great canyons, lighting fire in eyes so deep.
Emotions running over, taking no time to think of resolution.
Only pounding through the mind like millions of tiny insects, each having their own direction.
Waited for moments in time to share, for times to resolve those things unmentioned.
For they were stuck within a hardened heart of ice, not to be spoken of again.
Waited for you to resolve from within those things you hold most debilitating.
Patiently waited for time to heal that which is so great on your shoulders.
Time having no end, no force by which to nurture this heart.
Only a needing of which no amount of time could quell.
A vision, either together or apart.
Time to stop waiting - waiting for that which cannot be without resolve.
 

Pat~

Luftmensch Emeritus, A.D.D.
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I'll post 2 poems, (which I've posted elsewhere on AW). Most of my poetry is devotional poetry, religious in nature, but some of it is whimsical/humorous, so I'll post one of each. :) Both of these poems are very reflective of me and my life experience; the first one attempts to illustrate the profound love I have for Jesus Christ. The second one was actually written just a couple days after the critique group experience.

SHE LOVETH MUCH
(Luke 7)

I crept into the room where they reclined;
Alone I stood as all began to eat.
My weeping eyes were fixed upon His feet,
And kneeling as the men with Jesus dined,
My hair with tears of gratitude entwined
Those feet o’er which I poured my perfume sweet.
With such a gift my worship was complete.
Yet as I rose the Pharisee opined,
“If Jesus were a prophet, He would know
The depths of sin in one who dared to touch,
And He from her would all acquaintance cease.”
My Savior’s answer caused fresh tears to flow:
“She loveth much who’s been forgiven much—
Your faith has healed you, daughter, go in peace.”

©2006 by Patricia S. Baker
Publication pending, Live



CRITIQUE GROUP

i handed out ten copies,
then broke out in coldest sweat;
how could i let them read these words—
i was no poet yet.


i can’t remember what was said
as they critiqued my poem;
but i could’ve kissed that guy who asked
if he could take it home.


©2006 by Patricia S. Baker
First published in Writer’s Journal, (Vol. 27, No. 6, p. 42)
 

pconsidine

Too Adorkable for Words
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Though I'm hardly an active poet, I have managed to discover a personal style. I seem to gravitate toward short pieces with the barest fragments of images or thoughts. I think a very recent post sums me up the best (the original story can be seen here):


Depending where you are it may be a quiet night.
Iowa snow,
something like that, is amazing.
But its Sunday.

You still have power.


(My favorite is still the one I did for Blue Rock. :))
 

WriterUnboxed

caramello, per favore
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I'm usually a haiku girl, but I wrote this poem in a blaze of inspiration and have always felt it represented what I like best about poetry: tapping those raw emotions, going into the dark place and blowing it wide open. That's not to say it's perfect - I'm sure it isn't - but I would still hold it up as my best poetic effort.

The White Garden

There is a white garden thriving here that frightens me.
It isn't white with lilies or crocus or snowstar tulips.
There is no heady scent of jasmine or violet wafting through the air;
there are no orchids.
This garden isn't fragrant at all, actually.
Neither is it knit with beauty, colorless from snowfall or moonbeams,
or anything rooted in nature or poetry.
What it is is corpse white,
nuclear-holocaust white,
whites-of-the-eyes white.
Bloodcurdlingly white.

You can walk in this garden, though it's overgrown
and people have gone missing in its ratty maze,
disappeared completely.
White knuckled weeds choke out all that once lived and bloomed,
leaching all goodness from the soil until it's white, too,
like dry, caking clay,
embalmed earth.
Still, people go, though the Why of that
becomes more a mystery as time passes.
Maybe they don't believe it's as bad as it looks or as they've heard.
Maybe they think there's still hope,
that they'll find a four-leaf clover
--something, anything green and rich and alive—
hidden beneath the unnatural blanket.
Then they'll hold it up and cheer
and everyone will nod and say, "See! See?"
I think maybe their retinas are burned out by the glare of it all;
a decent excuse for blindness.
What other defense is there for missing the point entirely?

The gardeners are fanged and greedy beasts.
Hang them, or put a stake through their hearts.
They rarely appear, having moved on
to better flowing arteries than this;
certainly, I've never seen them tending to their plot of despair,
though I've seen them in it from time to time,
gazing with potted cheerfulness at their surroundings for the masses,
ignoring the crunch-crackle of some formerly living matter
beneath their feet
--dry stalk or bone; no matter; inconsequential.
"Isn't it purdy," one might say to the rest
and pluck at a white smear and call it a bloom.
He'd breathe in its unfragrance and sigh,
the great puppeteered idiot,
even while the vast fiction disintegrates in his hand.
White ashes drift up and stipple his nose,
and still the others nod and call it beautiful.
 

Rich

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Good 'un, Therese.
 

hermit authoress

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Growth

Although I still turn out poetry, it's very seldom that I'm moved to do so, saved for the most moving moments. Anymore, I save them for my own greeting cards. I felt it appropriate to post my first and last, repesenting my movement from strictly poetry and my discovered love of fiction. (IMAGINATION has a secret...can anyone guess?)

IF I COULD LOVE LIKE POETRY
1983 - 13yrs

If I could love like poetry,
My words would never fall.
They’d bring to mind the beauty
And pain that’s worth it all.

If I could love like poetry,
In mists the sounds would echo
Far above the light year star,
To undersides of seas below.

If I could love like poetry,
No greater love, but God’s, there’d be.
My words would cover everything
From here to eternity.

When I can love like poetry,
I will have taken my last breath
For in this world it’s impossible
To explain those feelings in depth.

IMAGINATION
2006 - 36yrs

Without form or solid sound
In wind, flying around

Birds laughing, chairs spin
Box to brush - polka again

Shock, calm, or nothing at all
Holds only as long as its call

Do what you would, could, or might
Formula is out of sight

Sink in paint, blow rainbow sky
Unlock autumn to a spring dry

Crack hurt, all subsiding
Jump within joy inviting

Touching, holding, kissing - not stopping
Upon rain's pouring, dropping

Don a cloud or six atoms
As a crown, shining fathoms

Rid of ambition, catching flight
Vision onward throughout night

Drawing to a finish
Imagination hasn't limit
 
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carlylyncoe

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I write. I love to write and do a good bit of poetry.
Here is one I wrote recently.......




A Wrong Turn
by carlylyn


I took the long way home today
not by design, but accident
although there wasn’t one, an accident, I mean.
I turned left instead of going straight,
something I have never done till this day,
but I am happy I deviated.

Though the road began well,
it soon became dirt packed; hardpan
smooth with large potholes
scattered about
like errant bolts of lightening had
struck in bygone days.

Driving slowly, with much attention
to the holes, (which looked big enough, at least some of them, to swallow my small vehicle)
I drove towards something, or away from something else.

The road narrowed and became less
like a road and more like
a cow path.
Which it was.

Encircled, surrounded;
bathed in a sea of black and white...
mesmerized by the lowing and groaning
crawling from large, smooth throats
the Order of the Udder,
heading to the barn for sweet relief.


The sea parted to my dismay;
I loved the helpless feeling…
swept away from the real world, I was
a sailor on an ocean of dipping and swaying
waves of potential cream and butter.

Quiet returned and I backed into a turnaround
heading out to my mistaken road and
turned left, once again
towards home.

Dogs barking and running,
children laughing in summer sun;
my family
my frolicking sea
my ocean of love
waves of potential poets and artists,
with perhaps a teacher thrown in for good measure.
 

swvaughn

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First time here. I write haiku sometimes.

you must forgive us
our endless scribbled crammed words
we abhor white space
 

CurtisPutnam

Tuning in on Life
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Of course my favorite poem is always the one that I have just written. Here is one from an exercise in the Poetry Games section "Fibonacci Turns". It says a lot about what I like and the games I like to play with poetry.

Humidity


hot
hand
cools neck
combust fuse
pulse to finger tip
palpitating soul in union
flailed drum is me
flame heart she
flush we
flee
free
 

Teena

Bennie's Mom
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Disappointed dreams
broken like a looking glass
slivered
into seven years bad luck
and more
heartache heartbreak
pounding rhythmically
like the song

You came when he had gone
second glances
second chances
then puff
like the gasp of wind
that took my hat
silly, dusky straw hat
with a red paper sunflower
you left me standing
bareheaded
barefooted
bare-hearted in the grass

 

Ali B

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A Military Family

Being in a military family means waiting for the phone to ring
It means changing friends with the seasons
And homes with the school year

Being in a military family means babies born without their daddy there
It means running to the mailbox
And finding a tattered letter postmarked three months ago.

Being in a military family also means pride
It means Independence Days that mean a little bit more
And Veteran’s Days that sadden and honor

A military family is strong.
A military family is durable.
A military family is resilient.
 

onestepp

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October 17, 2007


Mostly enjoy doing poems for children, but I've done some literary poems.
Here's some poems for October and Halloween spirit.

Still learning the ropes.

Dracula's Tea

Count Dracula's fancy teapot

Is covered with bat wings and rot.

It bubbles and boils,

and gurgles like oil.

He serves his tea blood-red and hot!



GRAVEYARD RAP

Let's go to the skeleton dance,
where skeletons prattle and prance.

They dance the hip bone bump
where boney hip bones thump.

Their fingers, toes and ankles snap,
yakety-yak, their jaw bones flap.

Jingling and jangling bones
rattle so loud, they shake the stones.

When Rib-Cage Jones sings "Graveyard Rap",
tall black trees go tappity-tap-tap.

Giant brown bats whirl in the air.
Cats strut together by the pair.

Sliding, slithering, scaley snakes,
sway with the lyrics, beats, and breaks.

High pitched yowls ripple over the band,
from scraggy grey wolves who stalk with land.

Come one! Come all! Join in the bash.
Become part of the graveyard smash!



October Haiku


Yellow harvest moon

bountiful, plentiful shone

cornstalk amazement,


open meadows hum

lyrical melodies sing,

country lanes depart,


cool, eerie shivers

spin delicate moonlight webs,

mysticsm lives!
 

NeuroFizz

The grad students did it
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Paralytic Paralipsis

I will not talk
of love caught up
when I can’t abide
expectation’s net

And never mind
my soul’s return
I think not of
its dividend set

I shan’t discuss
my fevered chills
but wrap my flanks
and expose them still

My mind won’t flip
around the noose
that tightens twice
around my will

I’ll plug my ears,
my nose, my mouth
but leave my heart
to detect your sigh

I’ll equivocate
but not confess
to a breast that feeds
my daily lie
 

Rich

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These were published in Rosebud Magazine in July. I can't call it my style, but it does contain my voice.

Haiku Literary Review:





Moby Dick



Whale sinks whaling ship

Captain and most of crew drown

A Greenpeace top pick.




The Iliad



An epic tale of

setbacks in naval custom:

Fleet follows the girl.





Gulliver’s Travels



Wee Lilliputians

and horse-like Houynhnms, yes,

but non-web Yahoos?





Genesis



Flora and fauna

thrive for first couple. Tabooed

apple munched, snake wins.





Walden Pond



Man lives in cabin

Shuns quiet desperation.

Masses seek flush bowls.





For Whom the Bell Tolls



Tom blows up bridge and

makes earth move while making love.

Macho, macho man.





Hamlet



Being, not being

All major characters die

Fat chance of sequel.





Gone with the Wind



An uncivil belle

in a civil war is torn

between two rebels.





The Gift of the Magi



Lovely pair exchange

gifts. Go into hock before

birth of credit cards.





The Godfather



Flick-ready novel

Whacking-fest, but big roles saved

for mucho sequels.





A Christmas Carol



Miser cheats his help

Sees light and atones—unlike

Enron VIP’s.





The Purloined Letter



Sleuth finds swiped letter

without the assistance of

a Google dot com





Ulysses



Needs punctuation

Needs more familiar wording

Needs emoticons







The Great Gatsby



The Roaring Twenties.

Wealth, big bashes, mistresses

Few soccer moms here.




Catch 22



This is a great book

You’re crazy not to read it

“Why” you say? Don’t ask.
 
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nerds

of all the gin joints
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Rich, I love all of these. Reading them was a nice start to my day.

:)
 

dafooey

our smiles come easier
laughs last longer
kisses more passionate
our hearts beat quicker
bodies come closer
our hearts beat faster
love grows stronger
our hearts beat together.
 

Eliel Takavian

Here we go again
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Apple of my Eye

I saw him then a boy
A blond leafed willow tree he grew
The apple of my eye

I saw him stand in strength
A wise man resolute
In justice rightly tempered
With grace and honor
Stamped upon his breast

The guardian I
And self appointed keeper of his soul
Would stay the hand of death
And give my life a sacrificial gift
But when the hour came to prove my worth
I shook with fear a thousand miles away

Then Heaven opened wide her yawning gates
And washed the beauty from the beautiful
The mighty arm of omnipotent God
Did rake and tear a furrow in my breast
Where once the fragrant willow blossoms bloomed
A weeping wound and ever-spreading stain

Curious then the freedom that I felt
When from the burning pit of grief I crawled
I found that death had straightly been deposed
The fear of death a childish afterthought
The memory of some near forgotten dream

And so with iron soul I hurry through
I throw life’s cautions to the rising wind
I laugh and cheer when day dawns into night
And Mother Black consoles me in her arms

I seek him now anew
Beyond the circles of this dying life
He waits in peace for me
The apple of my eye







 

ddgryphon

King of Sloth Town
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We Are

such
sounds
will bond us:
as this harmony
and melody flow together--
one sound from many--
one song: us.
we are
such
sounds
 

brad_b

Knight Errant
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Somewhere in my mind... it echoes in here ...
Passing Life

Passing Life

Valiant hopes and noble dreams
Into youth the sunlight streams
Fervent passions, strength of earth
So distant is the day of death.

Hopes held high, the road ahead,
Consumes passions that were fed,
By wide-eyed, uncorrupted dreams
Confused, confounded by worldly schemes.

Fortune's frown, dreams slowly fade
Forgotten promises once made
Winds of time rage through strife
Winnowing the littered chaff from life.

Stand naked now, beyond the storm
See the past, the day you're born.
So long the journey that lay before
Now one last footstep - one last door.

Enter there and grateful find
Relief to the weary, stumbling mind
Forgive transgressions that were cast
And silence demons from the past.

Light-hearted youth that once had been,
Creeps silent behind the walls within,
Time the teacher - Life's struggle charity
Irreversible the slide - one goal - eternity.


In penance bow 'neath the weight of youthful indiscretions

And lament the passing innocence of dreams.

But new dreams will arise,

New visions of tomorrow


bnb © 2002
 
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Fiat Lex

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I hope one day to have some sort of desk I can put this up on the wall behind, so people sitting on the other side of it can have something to read when not making eye contact with me.


Currency

Diamond
evaporates;
bright metal melts away.
Attention is the hardest thing
to pay.
 

dclary

Unabashed Mercenary
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The Good Ship Deek

No one looks at a ship
long at sea
and marvels at the gleam of its brass
or the snow-white purity
of its sails.
They see the strain
of a nor'eastern storm,
they see the brittle teeth marks
of cannon fire.
A man new to the sea may
tremble at such a sight.
The sailor of worth says
"She's been through it, and come back out.
Good sailing, mate,
Sail on."
 

semilargeintestine

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I just noticed that I forgot to post on this thread. I hope it's okay if I do it now. :D I just wrote this moments ago.

A Robin

A robin
has just landed
on my deck.

I like it
when I see
fat creatures.

Lets me know
not everything
starves to death.
 

Emz

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To be a Whore

The truth is never so dismal nor unset’ling
As when I’m granted all I desire from you
By the hand of he whose touch mean’s nothing.

I feel the heat overload
As the incessant motion of his revolting body
Becomes more than mine can bare.

Pain is all I feel,
As again and again his body thrusts so mercilessly against my own.

Pain is all you feel,
In the knowledge that so priceless a beauty should be another’s commodity.

Pain is what keeps us a part,
Making a mockery of all that we feel.

Oh, that you were the source of this pain insufferable;
That this infliction were cast by the hands that heal
No longer would each chapter of reality force the fantasy.

I keep your image securely locked in my mind’s eye
That my body may yield to all it must endure,
As his becomes yours and we are at last as one.
 

wannawrite

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I'm depressed, today. Don't know why. Feel like posting my bad poetry.


there is a calm
between anguish and fear
when all hope is lost
and time stands still
and in that void
there is no shame
there is no panic
nor even pain
for nothing can
steal inside
the tranquil refuge
where I hide
in quiet defeat
each time
he raises
his fist
to
me
 

Steppe

...
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Graveyard


after
the long journey
home

the silence
of graves

a voice there
out-sang
my sorrow

when I questioned
the wind
it gave no answers

the deer
grazing
the grass


note- When I was a young boy, I was hurt several times in the head. And there was the depression of home life we sometimes had to deal with. I think it all hurt my memory recall so now it comes in bits and pieces rather than a whole story.

I just learned to write poems with the bits and pieces. It suites my memory.