think …
of the abyss …
unimaginably, unbearably cold
pressure that turns bones (and flesh) to vapor
eight tons - sixteen thousand pounds - per
each … square … inch …
a darkness quite unforgiving -
blacker than black
and yet …
LIFE …
burgeons in multitudes
otherworldly creatures that create their
own light in rhythmic patterns
fantastic organisms that
are so strange and striking they look alien
such an inhospitable world
yet things thrive …
I …
am such an abyss
intensely cold
a darkness beyond black
deep and desolate and bleak
compressed by encumbrance and a disquiet
that can turn bone to vapors …
pain that has no nerve
unbearable wretchedness … without origin
acerbic tears that do not drip -
they burn … and fester
but …
things live
odd creatures exist here -
freakish beasts of indeterminate shape and ire
that feed on joy … and purpose
they crawl and creep
and shiver …
and wait.
Written: July 7, 2026, for a contest sponsored by Suzette Richards
*******************
Conceive a star in search of shelter!
Flickering ember lost in cosmic abysm
chiaroscuro its glow with fringing darkness,
draining ardor into night's hollow embrace,
within space orbs, stars find their cradles—
Shelter flickering glow, embrace orbs. . .
Spirits of the woodland deep.
Gather, please, at gate.
Shadow, dark fire, through me seep!
Hummingbirds can hate!
Where the prickly pear was grown?
Deep beneath a lake.
Where the angry god was thrown?
Someone made mistake...
There to build, O pyramid!
Tumble down the step.
Deterrence means getting rid?
Soldiers, step with pep.
Stars above the forest?
From heaven, do ye swing?
Harpsichords, harpy, ne'er rest.
Sight-line, foe to sing.
Awkward position? Well, done.
Servants of the One.
Oracle, scion, vision.
Blink and it's begun...
Whiplash? Sword, deliver slash?
If you've got the cash!
Otherwise be-fevered bash.
Dessicate the dash...
Crater, thy rim. Tyrant, whim.
Abysm to swim.
O dark chasm, lights a-dim?
Except moment grim...
Let me hear no talk a-fast?
From the master home?
He who always comes in last?
Soul made out of chrome?
Better long days, seamstress work?
Iron rations hard?
Brazen bull, such jobs! To shirk!
Poet, prophet, bard!
Thought-fire, sing in all of us!
Lightning-gods, blessed be!
Cannonball and Blunderbuss!
Fling, O fancy-free!
Tombs ought be avoided?
By living men, and how!
Feet a-sure when out of bed!
Sacred sight, thy bow!
Wild as ocean rhythm!
Say, oracles, sing!
Dark backward, black abysm!
Envy, how you sting!
Hospitable to many?
Perhaps. Who is to say?
I don't talk to any!
O Judgement, have thy day!
Sisters, hearken thus unto!
From below I shriek!
Charon Boatman, need a crew?
End Times, give a peek!
Sound, fill each with learning?
A message for the world:
Choice must be discerning?
Yes, sir! Discus, hurled!
Well, oh well! We are in hell!
Doubled over, trees?
Coven Witch, cast well thy spell!
Honeyed, honeybees...?
Sycophants, thy future.
On what does it depend?
Gold upon the ground, be pure!
River, yield thy bend!
Tormented, ye prophets?
Pleiades, rescue me!
Toolshed, art thou Tophet's?
Fly, O fancy-free...
Gain upon in rhythm?
By what right, friend and foe?
Onward, black abysm!
Dark backward, well ... Although ...
Reign of conquerors endless!
On this doth all things hinge!
Forward, O ye stark friendless!
Heart within all, twinge!
White sand, will ye countermand?
One man gang or band?
Prison walls about us planned?
Better that we stand!
Robber, burglar, thief, thy grief.
Defy, my belief.
O ye Indians, stern thy chief?
Ten thousand foot reef...
Tentacles, reach upward!
Tangle, root! Enchant!
Golem, gate! Break fast, my guard!
Feet of mine, just plant...
Will or wool, O brazen? Bull.
Mea culpa, pull.
Green fire? Clean death due a trull?
Fate and Fortune, full?
Divine magnetism power,
where like will attract like;
and souls open like a flower,
magnetism alike.
And the pure of heart twine,
with calm truth of divine;
spiritual entwine.
With boundless abysm;
divine magnetism !
What we radiate to the world,
our beauty and words;
will a thousand times be unfurled,
like sweet fluttering birds.
Let your heart surrender,
be a person kinder;
just listen and ponder.
Let your truth swirl and twirl;
radiate to the world !
found
midst the
moonlit sheets
I swim your soul
my flesh, wild water
bound by blue beams
swirling, deep
your sea ...
lost.
Written and submitted on June 7, 2020
For the "Ninette" Poetry Contest
Emile Pinet, Judge & Sponsor.
Systemic symmetries of destruction,
gorging with thoughtless consumption…
Within the bowls of corruption,
enslaved by the sanguinary skins of seduction…
Butterflies bloom to demonic deeds,
of the feeding frenzy that surely bleeds…
Voices that spread their saintly seeds,
only entrapped within wrangled weeds.
Fake media the soup of the day,
cabalistic constructing illusions they portray…
While the appetites of the abysm display,
as the deceptive delusions foreplay…
Habitual hunger that they manifest,
of the manic misconceptions we ingest…
For we suckle on the beastly breast,
as they occupy the obedient oppressed.
Jan.04.2019
Food for thought
Sponsored by: Silent One
Placed 2'nd...Thank You
Silver blades in deathmatch, sound of thunder, lightning cuts flesh in half.
Robotic feet march, shaking redwood trees, frightening bird wings.
Bobbing heads in claustrophobic helmets, decomposing.
Cannonballs block out the sunny skies — fate’s abysm.*
Fat furry rats scurry, from trench to trench that reeks,
With dead men’s bones and meat, like drowning flotsam.
Tears like a raging hurricane scream out,
For their mother’s arms to hold them tight.
How is it, the sun’s glow appears?
The nightmare’s invisible.
You tuck your son in bed
Then kiss his sweet head
And shake with fear.
Will war grab
His soul?
NO!
3/19/2018
Line Gauthier’s A Melting Snowball Contest
*syllable counter counted abysm as two syllables but dictionary has 3
The upbeat moon
becomes dazed, when you
start, the dance of death.
Personified, lone word,
unloved; changes the
choreography.
Given space, a sick
crowd, expands, unsquares,
for the throne.
The abysm from which
the cicadas are crawling out
to devour our being.
I do not want to
control you, your song.
I am burning in my own holocaust.
Satish Verma
despair knocks the door
hallucinating the mind
tormenting the soul
darkness dispels light
sinister black shadows loom
unhinging spirit
an evil fiend tempts
execrable ideas
drowning to abysm
3-31-2016
I am hollow for I want what is out of my reach
Things I cannot have at that precise moment
My will struggles inside like a chained monster
Trying to get lose and devour whatever has the
Power to make my silly selfish dream come true.
Then the fortune wheel spins my fate round,
And brings up change, causing the unlikely to be.
Happiness happens unexpectedly as a lightening
Lasting no longer than a lightening does in the sky,
Making me want more, and different, and new things.
Hollow I’m found again, lost in my delusional aspirations
Restarting a cycle made purely of torment, angst, darkness,
Everlasting unsatisfaction that leads indeed to inherent conquests
As well as to the deepest abysm of a restless unfulfilled soul
Who will never comprehend the meaning of the word “enough”.
I turn my eyes to the abysm,
twisting my hands nevoursly.
I don' t love anymore, I brood over.
This stormy sea in me - it's an obsession
that calms down only when you come in
and then, when you did I remember,
all the sorrows were gone.
with the messed waves
Your faded face,
I wish I could feel it through the picture but I can't.
Oh, this abysm...
When I turn my eyes to it
it looks me back
Patricia Evans
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