Best Abutting Poems
Royal blue sky scattered sapphire clouds
On horizon embroidered in navy blue attire
Summoned by the onset of marigold sun
Emitting amber gold on tuscan yellow fire
Where tapestry of fluffy lavender floats
Decorating patterns of designs periwinkle
Mosaic of colors then spray-paint the water
Spreading a layer of golden yellow cover
Shimmering gold dust on twilight ripples
Abutting brushstrokes of dark blue egyptian
I saw you briefly where first time we met
On the lonely bridge that extends into bay
But as the dark landmass peeked its head
And the lifeless vegetation glinted despair
The tangerine breeze announced your exit
Quivering our aura beneath glittering riffle
For you refused to witness impending flame--
Broken vows ablaze in last breath of sunset
Written: August 4, 2018
Submitted on February 6, 2023 to:
2022 Poetry Marathon Qualifiers' FINAL Placement Contest
Sponsor: Mark Toney
Submitted on December 7, 2022 To:
Placed 3rd: 2022 Poetry Marathon Mile 22 Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Mark Toney
Poem of the day on August 7, 2018
Placed first in standard contest #180 by Brian Strand
NEW YORK-STYLE HUNGARIAN STEW
In the darkest corner of her living room,
she waits to eat. A stone’s throw away,
her ex lives with their kids, his goulash
wafting reek into her open windows.
Through the one in her master bedroom,
the man could easily catch sight of his successor
swaddled in goose-down, identical in color
to the old comforter she could see, if she cared to,
just beyond her window, on the bed where
she’d been fed, “I’ll cherish you always.”
Abutting that room, the den with surround-
sound TV, where the vulgarian had charmed
the panties off her during commercials, turning
up his volume so she could grasp every syllable
of his accented endearments, his excuses.
Adjacent, their son and daughter’s rooms
(now, with suitcases the children bring back
and forth each weekend); and down the hall,
the state-of-the art kitchen where her louse ex
still plays chef. How she’d wished he’d played
spouse with as much know-how and gusto. Oh,
how he’d cooked and cooked their goose, served it
up every chance he got, till she got good and fed
up and fled to an old flame in a brownstone
across the way — where, at this very moment, she sits
with the stench of the dish her ex is, no doubt, cooking
to death, and the essence of her Crock-pot stew
cooking up a storm, inextricably mesh.
The Jackal's line of demarcation ye souls' furlough for interim...
Today, cockcrows perturb in a gala thrice for thee quiescent stay,
God's Park of Ephemera, sashays the daggled the minder harks,
a chest not in to rest, of dais edicts, cudgels so contagious;
haughty wheels peddle rashly between two havocked hearts,
foisting wintry fobs of progeny pleating to let pigeons exeunt,
if bedlam trotting by pothers ye, the cob, yet calmly sings,
"Fare-thee-well, Oh snowflake in dwindle, hallow me next spring,
via crepuscules, cleaved like vacant aulas crescendo conveyance,
wholly abutting city lights, this chimney calling cannot sight!"
Jolly pedestrians twinge at our capitol! Touring a mindful chance,
Ample of verve, knowing mortuary amblers must get their fight!
"Fountains, thawing ye? Janitor, what does the blind really see?"
tryst squelch time, squirm squander squalors n' ante antiquated feet,
Jocund or beh£s belief! Ye! Behind bellicose belletrists by beggars!
When baubles full-fledged, hast consummated thee to hobnob no more,
jongleur sloshed anchors on mimes bare laid laic stoolie, loupe aims,
Headmost, request lasting breaths above broadcasting fortune n' fame,
Then fated fires the Sniper jostles from home to goad n' prod,
Ye kindred stanchion and I, skimmed, the sunset even with me...
A dog and a frog
(with the names of Bull)
sit on a log
abutting a synagogue
drinking eggnog
until they are full
Suddenly agog
(by a fog in their bog
that makes them slog
like a cog
when they jog)
begin a dialogue
with a demagogue hedgehog
"Start a blog monologue
regarding this smog"
voiced to the hog by Bull
"You've had too much grog"
stated the hedgehog
offering a prologue
raising self up with a pull
"and regarding this blog
I have a backlog
know just analog
and expect my payment in wool"
Volition, orientation familiarization aahing
and oohing within restrictive paradigm molding
inviolable honorable gentility -
flagrantly, desirously, clearly boyz abandoning
willfully skirting, panting (heavily)
forfeiting abominably, (no Joe King) abiding
chomping at bit, damning delineated, or obscure
parameters, between one acceding
Earthlinked selfish living
psychosexual pining human bing,
and another ardently avowedly ambitious
altruistic agent provocateur (lol)
at first blush hinting Moulin Rouge adulation
under dim (witted) lighting accenting
individual randy salient
traits savoring tête-à-tête
tasty hors d'oeuvres accentuating
nuances highlighting flirtatious countenance
initially unconditionally stubbornly accepting
dire hormonal straits
as prickly fledgling acquaintanceship
quivers, negotiates, kickstarts abolishing
inchoate biochemical protracted coupling
conveniently interpreting accessing
breeching, catapulting Dickensian estuary,
non verbal communication nsync abridging
painstakingly erecting complex edifice
suavely, urbanely, wittily accessorising
tried and truevalue tricks acclaiming
debonair heroic manliness princely
qualities dutifully dominate directing
demure damsel in distress absconding
convincing, foreplaying, jimmying,
rollicking readily acclimatizing
challenges thrust up gracefully parlaying
most savvy serious similarly sophisticated
totally tubular testosterone tactics
versatile repartee accomplishing
dynamics cultivating atavistic romantic ballet
on duh poe whit tick abutting
metaphorical foot accoutering
trappings adorned since mythological
Adam and Eve accrediting
latter, sans virile unavoidable temptation
savoir faire verboten fruit, accelerating
action whereby unsuspecting, slithering,
lurking serpent teen accounting
rattle unheard by apse cent church fathers
subsequently excoriating, condemning, accusing,
nonetheless indomitable transcendence achieving
pinnacle of prostrate poignancy
inexpressible ecstasy acquiescing
nonpareil acquisition adulation activating
ascendence assaying administering
amorousness activating. aching.
outside
inventoried oval-stoned
cathedrals appealing
chiming crimes of passion
woke citronella
fog
hung in cement-hamocked snowdrifts
cloaked slow on slick-stained windowsides
tenement sheets
with the pomegranate notes
of rhythms unrhymed
while all the uptown laundromarts
rising up
from insomniac-scrambled sidewalks
corked-copper moon tumbling earthward
like a sweet
sweatshredded pennants
of sun-saliva silks on rain-dribbled cotton
then
cherry-flat footsteps lust-percussive
under shamble-wracked sills
pause and then pass on
momentarily appeased in time by
blued bars on fly-fouled panes
bell tower-balanced above
taverns abutting back alleyways of
need
by fireplace mantle-pieced nooses
of nylonic shirts and poly slacks
and musts dusted-down
past stockinged-lidded faux plastic lampshades
passed on past magnolia movements
of fingertips on muscle surfaces
in-side
defoliate-spun spinnakered islands
chocked choked
in passing lynched adhesion
ignoring nicotine-papered stripteasing walls
or scotch-spat skirtings
creeping pedestal for
a moulded tangerine ceiling stuccoed into sudden mute
breath
rinsed down a night-scented-taking-stock
split-mirrored motel door
they go lunging over greasy chapels of
grit-grained
breakfast jasmine-tea-stained mock vinyl rugs
squeaking cot now like some
concreted river bed's of slump
of stun-spurned wants broken down
consciousness half-considered
stirring
“Who was The Man in Black Checkered Pants?” my parents have asked from time to time.
They recall with curiosity about my childish and surely exaggerated fear of this figure in my mind.
I feared the backyard at the farm abutting the woods from whence he might again see me.
I screamed after my nightmares in which he hid in my closet and beckoned to meet me.
They reckon it’s a product of TV or something, and they might be right.
The Head Start teacher told them maybe it was simply a childish fright
Of an elderly man at a nursing home we visited who may have worn plaid pants
‘Cause such a threatening man is certainly not part of any stories we had in class.
When they ask from time to time who The Man in Black Checkered Pants is, I have yet to say to even my family and kin,
I didn’t know the word for thermal underwear, and I only recall the way the black undergarment stretched as he kneeled down to me, and on his knee I saw black squares stretched over the skin.
Since then, I have developed quite a vocabulary, and I can explain many things I tried to communicate as a young child – now.
But for all the words in the world that I have in my mouth, I still can’t spit that one out.
Because maybe it was just my imagination, after all, and there’s really no proof.
And if I say it aloud, this memory that might be imaginary might still gain truth.
So when they ask from time to time about this figure in my mind, still amused by this little riddle to put together
I just shrug, look away, and in most honesty say, “I don’t know. How are you liking the weather?”
O you, Dear Zephyr! Blow, blow, blow
Over the vill. that’s beneath the hill
Abutting my heart and opened hand’s claw
Never be stopped and never be slow.
Not be so hot, not be so chill
So that much comfort we feel
To lessen the heat of the sun’s glow
In a pleasant manner you have to flow
So please, dear zephyr! Blow you blow.
The ones who would soak
the mother who drowned
her children in serpentine
seas never floated a child.
When splashed amongst
the horror-stricken,
we too feign revulsion.
Evoke higher powers and
baptismal pools: the fluidity
in the womb. The commingled bond.
But single us out, and buoys
snare our feet as we swim for
shore. Weighted down and engulfed
with load in tow – bondage.
Admit it!
Not a one hasn’t considered
suffocating that incessant
whining beneath the softness
of a comforting wave or lifejacket –
has not wished we could hurl the
wailing one at a shoreline just to make it
Stop.
That shrill that turns all heads at
a pool party where somehow
every 4-year-old but yours is
peacefully partaking in cake –
But yours must splash the dry.
Or don another’s pink towel.
Or dive off the high board.
Just five more minutes.
Drown.
This is not a topic a mother can
bring up casually over coffee.
Too fierce for me, possibility bobs to the surface.
Since the time her sucking
rubbed my areolas raw, we’ve had
our moments – times when I could’ve
river rafted her
perhaps reclaiming her upon maturity.
I need alone time, I explain
inexplicably to the baby blues
locked on with innocent revulsion.
I have drowned her out with work,
and she notes the behavior –
will avert her own children’s guilt-
provoking glare when she
demands alone time.
Craves it.
Even as I type, the whine is still there,
abutting my every keystroke,
pushing my buttons until I wish to
gurgle deep and low, like a wave that comes
up crashing then subsumed by the next
and next until their edges blur.
Toni got the blues. Allowed herself
the chance to drown one out in fiction.
She was a mother after all.
Right now, a single drop at the surface
might take hold and pull me under.
Please abandon this line
before you immerse your baby
for a poem.
Coach shouts out:
Slow your stroke and focus on form…
and try to remember: breathe.
But despite that advice,
I gurgle like she did.
And then I remember
to love.
Unsmiling gray wisp fingers drift and bore
A helical ridge around the vast sky;
Down abutting poignant horizon floor.
Alga blooms a huffy infectious cry.
A tree hollow bears nestling hanging high.
Lively songbird-swallows touched by the stir
Swift cry, swell and disappear till late by-
Passing hours of summer ruffling shower.
In a warm sleeping bag in a small tent,
Newlyweds lounge engaged with sweet hush sound
And lambent flame. Could not be better spent,
To wake with the morning dawn bodies wound.
In the open, they lie there, on their camp site,
Beneath the infinite clear twilight night.
written on 4/7/2020
Ambient Music N/A Serenity- In Scenes Of Mother Nature -Chantelle Anne Cooke Yes 4/9/2020 4:12:00 PM
N/A , Judged on 5/6/2020 for the contest
"Serenity In Scenes Of Mother Nature"
N-A Re-Run 8 Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: John Hamilton
(Land that doth marry mother lode
of sublime earthen land and sea).
Age of exploration
ushered cruel fate
against “red” men living
in bliss by agents
patch of eden north
o the Mason Dixon line
latitude: 39.64839
longitude: -75.95591 alee
perchance designed
by divine providence
with dyslexic humorous bents
Cecil county Maryland
lies like plump backward letter “e”
witnessed topographic erosion
pocked imprimatur marked
meteorological dents
thru inundation of
oceanographic propensities
melding coastline like the Galilee
in particular by Chesapeake Bay,
that body of water
abutting like natural fence
first witnessed by captain
John Smith in 1608
mistaking himself tong tied
in sole of Italy
learned faux pas, when crossing paths
with Susquehannas hence,
offered tobacco sticks to natives
while recovering
from injured wounded knee
said other sundry tribes curiously eyed
then (I utilized poetic license)
took smoke from packet of Kents
which twist on actual
historical facts manipulated by me
but more truthful account awash
and replete with more
than interspersed nonsense
and incorporates tract situated
in so called Fertile Crescent – see
settled by Europeans of English stock,
who emigrated with nary a pence
“taming” shrew like “noble savages”
plied Leviathan sized ukuleles
whose might exploited for felling forests,
which timber built cabins with vents.
They may whisper and jeer behind my back,
Coz they stand no chance abutting my way
They may even write long letters and hip upon rack
I’m sure you might have been convinced in a way
But aren’t you strong enough to ask me?
They pay attention to the red rosy
And totally forget that it too can prick
What they all imagine is getting cosy
But not every rose is sweet to lick
Why not ask me for a snippet?
I’m not out to sound rude
Coz my lessons aren’t free
Am still pristine and my core crude
As I’ve never had random blows and free
Climbers up my tree
So why so hurt?
I`ll hate when told to slow down
Just to snail as they do
Am told my hurry is like fawn
Destined for the fall, being the lion`s pawn
Why worry at my speed, if my peril to them be relief?
Tell them to look a little bit closer
Coz I promise not to be stopped
They should have a clear view of anticipated loser
And to clap louder when I’m roped
Not with failure, but with gallant rupture
Of the destined future
And so what?
Stop keeping records
Unless they exhaust inkwells writing me asunder
Unless they burn midnight oil with knives
Sharpened to slice into an imaginary plunder
Unless in my face sigh and lay bare their hives
Of bittersweet schemes they’re keeping under
So I am, So I am.
So I am, So I am.
A Place in the Country
By Elton Camp
I finally got tired of living on a tiny lot in the city
With the woods and open land, to stay was a pity
So I bought a cabin located on 100 acres of land
Abutting a national forest where to build was a ban
It was a pleasure to be of bothersome neighbors free
So I could walk around outside and nobody to see
All went as I expected for a time after I moved in
Then one dark and stormy night the trouble did begin
In the woods behind my cabin I heard a scary yell
I went outside and was revolted by a horrible smell
A dark and shadowy form crashed through the trees
I frowned with annoyance at distractions such as these
The next morning I went out searching for any track
Because of the muddy ground there wasn’t any lack
Standing behind thick bushes, the intruder I did see
Huge, hairy and gruesome, Bigfoot looked back at me
Moonlight magic philter sweet fragrant.
Dark grows the night within and without
Whilst restless wandering the wind walks
With heavy mumbling steps through the woods.
Moonlight magic philter arousal.
A lone tree, abutting windswept limbs,
Left to expire alone, replaced young
And graced with Moonlight magic philter.
5/8/2020
for
endorsed, backed
encouraging, enabling, accompanying
contribution, solidarity, rejected, ambivalent,
opposing, challenging, abutting,
anti, adverse
against
Date created: 05/06/2021