I am empty of empathy
come sympathise with me
Cue the violins,
or just fiddle
like a bad-tempered Roman
Offer me hope:
bring flamboyant symbols,
cheap gold pendants with wings
Maybe a big gaudy
unflappable albatross
nothing too flash,
mind you!
Take my hand,
lead me towards the edge
it’s time to fledge
Sidle me onward,
watch as I waver
Try not be over-critical
of the albatross
He’s become a hanger-on,
too far gone
and addicted to flattery
If I drag you down
or appear inhumane,
it’s all secondary
I’m merely feeling depressed
by a pouch in my brain
A séance sensed
it was next of kin,
X-rays revealed tiny pleats,
masses of tissue within folds of skin
An exorcist said it’s
my vestigial twin
Google diagnosed
(Visual agnosia)
taking shape from within
Oh! And the indifferent
chatbot I confided in,
has begun self-harming!
We used to go to grandma’s for Christmas
She had bubble lights on her tree
Dangerous ones that will burn your fingers
We all learned it the hard way
We had one cousin who was awkwardly mean
Everyone did their best to make him happy
Willy was an unhappy guy; we finally learned to leave him alone
Because he liked being a bully
Many Christmas days we visited Willy in prison after we were grown
I thought it was a waste of my time; he did not seem to want us there.
But after our grandparents died, I continued to go
Because I wanted to please them and I knew they knew I was there.
Willy never changed; he was surly and bad-tempered.
After awhile I stopped going on Christmas, because it made me sad.
But I did go once a month, because I felt sorry for him.
Incarcerated for fifty years must have been hard.
Sadly, he deserved it though.
It’s unanimous
uncontested
irrefutable
no doubt
no conjecture
I am an arsehole
bad-tempered
foul-mouthed
and irredeemably crass
all my conversations
revolve around me
my opinions
about everything
are always right
I have done everything
I have been everywhere
it has taken almost seventy years
for this message to reach home
but
upbeat and eternally optimistic
agony aunts aside
it is now too late for me to change
so, do I remove myself
and not be missed
or, do I forge on
unliked but endured
‘tis a quandary
that has bested me
if truth be told
most days
my choice lies
but a hair’s breadth away
from the former solution
do not be alarmed dear reader
the above are merely the musings
of a crusty old bullet
I shall remain
irredeemably crass
until the lights go out
aah life
what a thing it is.
Does life seem to you,
as love does to we,
that virtuous circles
engage healing intent
While viscious squares
of bad-tempered stomping
marches much less gayly
toward escalating drama
with harmful trauma
and persistent
discontent
Positive engagement
does not engage negative performers
as if some lives
are divinely entitled
to redemptively matter more,
and thereby attract glowing floodlights
Upstaging those worshipping lesser
unstraight
unmale
unwhite gods
and goddesses of trust
and compassion
without boundaries
Backstage,
opening opaque
and closing vulnerable curtains
breathes diverse gender icons,
sexualized idols
Muses
recomposing noted feelings
from inside out,
hard erect warriors
embracing soft receptive catchers,
absorbent empathizers
Integrity's copassionate healers,
pulling and pushing together
1 way
with 0 means.
I’m bad tempered and upset,
Feeling tired isolated alone
Sitting hopefully waiting for
Someone to answer the phone .
I just want to hear
A normal human voice
But these days my dears
You don’t get a choice.
Androgynous, emotionless
It’s going off again
Promising an answer but
Never saying when,
Any second now and we
Know what it will say,
Your call is important
Please don’t go away.
When somebody invented
Automatic answer machine
Life got more complicated
Than it had ever been
Then the multi choice options
To save wasting their time
But they just don’t bother
About them wasting mine.
There used to switchboards
With real people to call,
Probably shoved out on the dole,
Machines don’t need wages at all.
The inventor of this obscenity
Is over the seas living in style
A successful and much lauded
Multi faceted rain and tax exile.
All I can say is,
Enjoy it while you can.
One day you may meet
One very angry man
Who’s spent ages feeling
Isolated and all on his own
As he’s waited and waited
To be answered on the phone
Every doggie has,
In time, their day
And, oh brother may be mine
To make him slowly pay.
The geese have come.
They congregate in
parking lots, preen and strut.
Today they waddle in line
as smug as fat gangsters
as they slowly cross a busy road.
We are not allowed to shoo them,
hurry them, harry them,
besides they are always bad tempered,
always ready to throw a hissy fit.
We wait, engines idling,
feel good about being this patient,
this considerate for their well-being.
I wonder what they think about us;
we who daily get in their way?
In less sensitive times
we would tuck a plump goose under an arm
on our way to Christmas.
Progress I guess.
Do you sometimes see a Zulu Warrior
Staring back from the mirror in the morning
A nasty fierce looking bad tempered dude
Obscenities flying out without warning
Crabbing bout having to make a living
But enjoying all the many accoutrements
If it wasn't for that, it'd be something else
People just love to complain and vent
A shower and shave, you're almost human
Not one person will ever suspect
That a member of the Zulu Warriors tribe
Was a coworker of great respect
Do you sometimes see a Zulu Warrior
Staring back from the mirror each morning!
Whenever I’m able I raid the bird table
I snap up some mealworms and go
The nearby house owner a bad tempered moaner
Berates me because I’m a crow
That snotty Rob Robin just sits there bob bobbing
And snaffles as much as he can
He’d better stop soon he’s the size of the moon
But this doesn't bother the man
Those flashy goldfinches are only five inches
But make a cacophonous sound
Like lambs to the slaughter they come down for water
But I’ve called the sparrow-hawk round
But hey what’s point of a crow having brains
If not to get ill gotten gains
Raiding that fella’s bird table is fun
Caw blimey... he’s got a big gun!
24 May 2021
Contest: Personification poem 150
Sponsor: Caren Krutsinger
bee in the bonnet
bad tempered flowers poisoned
climate in the hive
© Harry J Horsman 2019
Do you sometimes see a Zulu Warrior
Staring back from the mirror in the morning!
A nasty fierce looking bad-tempered dude
Obscenities flying out without warning
Crabbing bout having to make a living
But enjoying all the many accouterments
If it wasn't for that, it'd be something else
People just love to complain and vent
A shower and shave, you're almost human
Not one person will ever suspect
That a member of the Zulu Warriors tribe
Was a coworker of great respect
Do you sometimes see a Zulu Warrior
Staring back from the mirror in the morning!
A bad tempered brat from Nantucket
Drops her phone, but claims that a thief took it
The girl will not calm down
Her swearing makes dad frown
She raises her fist shouting ‘suck it’!
The meaning couldn’t be misconstrued
Her father says just quit your foul mood
She says she trashed her phone -
dropped it on her way home
She’s grounded for lies and being rude
5/20/18
It comes across as anger
But really it's despair,
It may seem bad tempered
But it's just because you care.
For you know where they are going
You know what's up ahead,
And you know that you have no control
And it fills your heart with dread.
Once again dragged down a path
Where you don't want to go.
Anxiety for company,
Watching your worries grow.
But you bite down on your worries
You push aside your fears,
For there's nothing that you won't endure
For those you hold so dear.
Maybe you have no control
But what you do is care.
So whatever path they stumble down
Your love will take you there.
This tempest of emotion
In time will surely ease.
It very nearly broke your heart,
And brought you to your knees.
But God, he gave you courage
The strength to endure all,
To be there for your loved ones,
And catch them when they fall.
The Fest
The Christmas Eve began with smiles and laughter,
where I come from Christmas day is a hanger over day
after excesses the night before.
Plenty of food and drink, aquavit and beer this was long
before wine came the in thing to drink and we sang and gave
presents and had a jolly good time for a while.
Someone made a sarcastic remark that was met with
a bad tempered answered, suddenly everyone remembered
a slight going back twenty years ago and more
A fight broke out the yule tree ended up in the snow
police were called to calm things down and mother
came out of the kitchen serving coffee.
Next morning my father went out and collected tree decorations,
good for next year`s Christmas party he wearily said,
and for once no once no one was arrested.
The Last convict
I sit in the front yard it has a high fence that
make the privacy intense I have created
a prison and now it is too late.
I see the top of a Cypress it looks like
a Christmas tree blowing in a bad tempered
Nordic wind. I think I will go to Norway this
year, mother died at that time and I hope it
will snow, overcast and rain make me sad in
a way that is morbid. I will bring her flowers
and I will cry, she was a lousy housewife but
a great mother. In the chair next to me sits
loneliness and says: so this was your dream
to flee, find freedom yet shackled to the past.
You will die alone not as a whisper in the wind
and you will not be on the plane going north
Metropolis…
a cackling cacophony of confusion
energizing some and enrages others.
Concrete and steel giants,
loom forebodingly over the masses;
blocking out gifts of the sun.
The maze that tires me from constant searching;
why am I here in this overcrowded and hopeless abyss?
The bang-clang trucks and trolleys,
beat out their metronomic, one…two...beat
and the drone of engines,
sings a tired ballad of the modern world.
Cities are the lairs of bad-tempered dragons;
harboring too many precious trinkets.
Vulnerable souls are the noonday snacks,
devoured by cold-blooded sharks.
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