Break open your alabaster box of worship,
Let precious praise rise, a fragrant ship.
Do not let the enemy steal your song,
Unlock your praise - it fits you strong.
Let praise be on your lips day and night,
The praise factor will disarm the fight.
Your songs lets go of yesterday’s sorrow,
And positions your heart for a brighter tomorrow.
Lift up those hands inscribed with victory,
Lift up your eyes to the Lord of ancestry.
Not through the scales of your situation’s mist,
But see Him rightly for who He is.
The Bread of Heaven, the Sovereign King,
In this season, greater fruitfulness will spring.
Be settled in His Word, press in and stay,
Let it be unto us according to His way.
Written: May 25, 2026, for a contest sponsored by Silent One
2nd place contest winner
*************************
Quote: "Don’t grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form.” — By Rumi ( With my honest wishes of a long and healthy life— Very Happy Birthday.
The moon still glows—an alabaster flame,
memory’s mirror, never the same.
Spume drifts, shimmering and bright,
not shadowy, but limpid light.
You watch sunsets and softly muse—
Do you fade, or do you fuse?
Their shades shroud loss and gain,
a peculiar parity of pleasure and pain.
Lessons grasped don’t be acrimonious,
regrets mollified primarily harmonious.
Time’s conundrum teaches clear—
Delicate days are a deep fear.
To your tender time, you’d tell and attire,
Beware quixotry, yet seize the desire.
Do not anathemize your fall—
Failure’s anodyne heals all.
Though tristful shadows at times prowl,
still you liaise with joy, still you howl.
Twilight or dawn, the soul’s refrain—
amaranthine light will remain.
watercolors stir
from alabaster rime.
Your presence shapes
a spacious stillness
Sleep wraps my brain like a pink present
Dreams fly around like a purple pheasant
Not always red realistic nor always pleasant
Perhaps affected when moon is a crescent
Watching dreams as if view yellow star
Wondering if they teal tell who you are
Will life be blessed or a messy sour tart
Whether good or bad messaging heart
Sometimes I wake up to cranberry confess
Hoping to grasp power of dream at best
Inspired to change a view or revisit test
Like it throws candy clue that I must digest
Picking up pen or paper or using cell phone
Sewing together chocolate conscious poem
Needling nagging neon thoughts so strong
Ideas thrill like lavender lullaby silky song
Satisfied with words that tap dance on air
Flying as blue birds from my kinky hair
Soothing my mind able to relax cherry care
Back to sleep I go hosting rem dream’s dare
Written: December 29, 2025, for contest sponsored by Line Gauthier
*****************
Alabaster dawn hums a pearlescent melody;
dappled dreams brighten the fading hours.
A wandering breeze lifts a soft-lit tiara,
prowling russet hues that loosen their grip.
Even clamor yields to the bliss of silence
as the year surges, washed in rising radiance.
Pontius Pilate facing Jesus questioned what is true.
The answer stood in front of him not a what but a who.
But a breath away from perfect truth if only he knew.
Lord may I never be so blinded that I miss you too.
One man hung on a cross finger tips from the almighty.
Salvation within his grasp but too proud to clearly see.
Instead hurling insults for a fleeting moment of glee.
Lord may I never be so proud I fail to bend the knee.
Jealous leaders plotted to extinguish God's holy light.
Foolishly loving darkness acting like tombs washed in white.
Eyes so deceived they could not see the dire of their own plight.
Lord may I never be so fooled I walk by my own sight.
One woman abounding with love anointed with weeping.
With expensive alabaster perfume kept on pouring.
Overcome with thankfulness she just kept his feet washing.
Lord may I be like her with thanks and love overflowing.
Written: July 29 2025, for contest by Brian Strand
***************
s
t
a
t
u k
e n
s n e i
v e l
r b ~
yet in a l a e
y
b a s e
s
t e r
g
m-i-l-e-s-t-o-n-e-s l k o
| | g
o — o a
The night unfolds her velvet veil
Paints the heaven with alabaster clouds
They drift like ghosts, whispers of air
Dancing in rhythm with the moon’s beam
Its silver glow, serene and calm
Rolls gently over vales and hills
The stars, like gems gleam
In the sky, a cloth with sequin glitter
The earth, entranced by nature’s quiet beauty
Pauses as time dissolves without a trace
The moment carved in purest grace
Weaves a dreamscape stirring fleeting thoughts
Of lover’s skin smooth, radiant and flawless.
Winter arrives as a snowflake
tumbling down from the skies above.
For the Earth's set for a remake;
that calls for a labor of love.
Whitewashing a colored landscape,
Autumn's dead are shrouded in white.
For streaming down like ticker tape,
snow swiftly buries all in sight.
Ice crystals conceal Fall's decay,
creating a fairyland scene.
And tucked under Winter's duvet,
the land appears pristine and clean.
The trees don alabaster gowns,
spun upon Nature's frosty loom.
And white replaces brindled browns,
lifting spirits above the gloom.
Crimson's luster illuminates a brilliant bead
satin strokes of beauty a bottle bleeds
scratch softly across this barren chest
and along with moonbeams, shall you rest
Silver streaks of goodness held in place
passion's pure pleasure soon will trace
circle past tiny smudges born in haste
where one more night we shan't waste
Starlit moments soar as solace sleeps
dear reflection of radiance forever keeps
in gentle arms of hope true love is staged
consoling promises from battle's waged
Alabaster bursts of heaven gently weave
Another night in comfort we shall receive
Light workers ! Melt orange sediment
For homes without leaks
Our hot hearts and hands
Becoming liquid stars
Lord of lavender and laughs
Bring the turquoise serpent here
Put before us bread and cheese
Mould flexible our knees
Light workers ! Walk quietly along
Corridors of Stone
To find the alabaster jar in your
Sun of suns
Work your will and wisdom
Become flames across the stage
Holding antennae high to
Hear adoring breathes
Transcend tears of
Longingness
Fragile as alabaster white dry as your sin
so sweet I want to caress to cradle and suffocate.
I feel that dry course texture of alabaster
and sin, the skin you are in, I feel the sand in my teeth…
The tang of its bitter taste the smell of parchment
dry as desolations rage, I recoil at the touch of your alabaster skin.
I feel the bones without and within brittle as suicide of time you sit with that sinister grin n that hellacious light in you inner eyes, spin!
I figure you are the one to be waiting before the son with the blade as sharp and keen slicing your alabester skin.
Slicing away your dry fragments of sin I keep it all in the dry rot of my mind the turn of my stomach
I want to cress and suffocate…
Your candlelight…
The lies that the eyes tell, that watch me caressing your delicate skin all alabaster and white dry as stone and l...
Fragile as alabaster white dry as your skin
so sweet I want to suffocate all, within!
as fragments of you drift
over and around
like the sand
thought
the hourglass…
Alabaster Skin
Alabaster white, brazen in bold
can’t be bought or sold!
Silent as it is Sinister
somehow that alabaster glows?
Surface, a bony texture; cracks, fissures
like something living once long ago
in antediluvian halls…
A house sits in its red marrow, bone-white walls!
not knowing tomorrow only knowing what is heralded
of bone white, gold intricate
filagree serpentine, imagery!
Of alabaster, old brazen n bold like cast bronze figurines
of unknown deities calling out
to touch fingers tips…
Caress, seeing the texture of bones
cracks n fissures like ancients skulls at rest
this thing of alabaster, cold!
Silently sitting sinisterly.
…alabaster bold somehow defies eons that fold
alabaster white blazing of an unknown…disaster!
Cryptic life resting in antediluvian wombs
a forgotten world borrowed deep
in the red marrow…tombs!
forgotten by tomorrow pushing faster
unknown, cold, old encrusted in
Ancient
...Alabaster
alabaster Rhapsodies
alabaster moon
skips across midnight waters
trails silver ribbons
singing wind song harmonies
with two loons in rhapsodies
5-28-21
Contest: Tanka
Sponsor: M. L. Kiser
there's no lingering hush
in this morning's bold blush
through alabaster trees
befalls a whistling breeze
it wraps me in its cold
like frozen thoughts of old
yet warmth becomes anew
in lingered thoughts of you
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