Best Arcs Poems
And so it begins
The game of life
The dominos of love
Falling where they may
The timer activated
Fresh out of a box
Learning the rules
As we go along
No plan or ruse
No rhyme or reason
Just out for some fun
Moving game pieces
Taking turns
At winning and losing
Rising and falling
In endless succession
An ebb and flow of emotions
The tears the laughter
Riding a roller coaster
Of highs and lows
A detonated cosmic launch
Mingling interstellar orbs
Crisscrossing arcs of destiny
In a waltz of muses
Or divine intervention
Read on air by invitation ~ September 8, 2021 'WORDS & MUSIC'
AP: Honorable Mention 2020
Submitted on January 2, 2019 for contest FREE VERSE STYLE ONLY sponsored by EMILE PINET - RANKED 5TH
Thank you, Mr. Rogers (yes, his real name!)
for rescuing me from teenage purgatory.
Perplexed teenager, lacking social lumen
pulled C's in English, D's in History -
my dreadful retrograde trajectory
projected no collegiate acumen,
in prom discussions, practically subhuman!
Then, your poetical geometry
and sleek Cartesian choreography
became my sailing ship, and I, its crewman.
Derivatives soon danced in arcs non-static.
Pythagorean proofs helped me progress,
vectors resolved problems that once would vex.
Your agile algebra of joy quadratic:
my new hypotenuse of happiness
helped me to find myself... I solved for x.
Written 13 March 2020
Beneath this soft...dark silent sky
Beneath this soft…dark silent sky
as starlight teardrops weep
in moon glow feathered sonnets…
my heart waits
~
Clinging to every hope,
laced of tiny woven dreams
now filtered through weary eyes
and worried sighs
~
Collecting each moment shared
within my weathered hands…mixed
with essence of rose petal and
meadowlark song
~
Woven together in melodic patterns,
colorful arcs on golden horizons
bidding me a good evening while
riding in on the sweetest of mystic zephyrs…
~
as another tear paints my cheek
in transparent worry
and desperate longing for that day
when your happiness reappears
~
For here sits my whispered wishes,
behind tufted clouds of life,
touching me with poetic joy,
allowing me to exhale freely
~
Beneath this soft…dark silent sky
as starlight teardrops weep
in moon glow feathered sonnets…
where my heart waits…for your smile
Good Night Soupers
Rhythmic pose arcs lifting elegant ambience
Graceful dance enshrines artful renascence
Visceral posture invites emotional response
Festive celebration of aesthetic renaissance.
Attired in red and blue of simple elegance
Glorious style augments swirling excellence
Left arm risen high points gracious eminence
Finger tips lift vivid attire in quiet eloquence.
Golden bangles adorn wrists flirting in stare
A lone yellow flower crowns her silky hair
Folded right arm obstructs in a defiant dare
Index finger hides grief, eyes closed in prayer.
Head turned right, arched with sculpted flair
Tense neck muscles manifest muted despair
Open fingers gesture a stealth grievous flare
Air of intellectual grandeur opulently glares.
Ponder why the painter didn't show her eyes
Discover invisible pain vibrant colors disguise
Beneath the splendor lies a hidden surprise
Cultural dance-music echoes her silent cries.
September 22, 2017
Placed 1st:Poems that paint a picture
Painter: Anna Razumovskaya
Sponsor: Silent One
HM: Strand choice U contest by Brian Strand
skating upon saturn’s rings
endless ice cold arcs
innards of past moons shattered
blades reopen wounds
in my wake scars and chaos
proof ~ that I was never here
stelliferous arcs,
of chiffon-sewn cosmic chains
and rose-glazed silk yarns...
a tapestry of crystal ~
love-tendrils on eden's heart...
"Bonjour, in the cocktail woods"
I see the waffled leaves of teal trees painting pink moon,
With diamond dahlia arcs, flowering an orchid boon
Sprinkling love of french perfumed spells and cocoa mystique,
Flickering in neon scented star seeds of rose-glossed antique
For, I'm the fragrant fluorescence of pure peace lilies,
Floating amidst dancing dove's glowing daisies
In a redolent riverbank, loving life like the sweet butter-sun,
Wandering in black forests, enveloping magic in red ribbons
Defrosting my white chocolate heart peeking through tinkles,
Singing beyond the glass petals of peony and snowdrop marvels;
Perhaps, plush strawberries too have starry scars,
On their silken ganache skin, bleached with calendula and mars
And my luscious butterscotch lips tremble at the blurry squeaks,
Ruffled by minty chills in my cherry-blushed cheeks
I search for addictive caffeine in gold-glazed dawns that bask,
Pouring nectarine reveries in lavender litchi hearts
Life's a bittersweet syrupy sea, coated with tangy rainbow hues,
Forlorn, this forbidden folklore is shaded with sycamore's adieus
They say, mocha pupils and vanilla haze of iris,
Can carve a melon hued watercolor portrait alive,
But I believe that the purest is never a sweet dessert survived,
In this delusional donut-shaped globe and tangerine beehive;
So, I shove my identity in Van Gogh's abstractly bejeweled canvas,
And let my caramel brown hair, gleam in golden hymns of aqua
Waving walnut "goodbyes" to velvet ochre sands and sapphire skies,
Forevermore, fluttering hummingbird's dreams in oscillating flamingo galaxies.
I want to take a drive tonight
through a maze of half-lit roads
paved in onyx shadows.
I want to follow starry streets
that roll in waves of cold concrete
beneath the opal moon.
I want to cruise across the city
through pockets of rose gold light
that bury me in brightness
before throwing me back into night.
I want to merge with this sea of speed,
hear that feline engine purr,
watch the world fly by in abstraction--
an incandescent blur.
I want to join the glowing ribbon
of headlight pearls on midnight highways
that twirl and spin in shimmering arcs
of taillight rubies.
When starlings were swimming in the azure lake,
When bats and owls began their nocturnal ride,
When all the Earth under a dark blanket lay,
And man and beast into sweet repose retired,
My Muse, like a sweet temptress, came to me
To set this captive free, to give free rein to my fancy.
She sang into my ears the lovely strains
Of a placid melody, bathing me in sheer delight
Creating in me a passion too intense
To articulate my disjointed thoughts
Into vibrant melodies of beauty and love.
Soon fireflies of thoughts came flitting,
Like bees around a looted honey comb.
In a butterfly net, I trapped them all.
They clustered together in a clumsy heap,
Making my darkened zone bright
With little arcs of shimmering light.
I placed them carefully in an ordered strain,
Word after word, in meaningful sequence,
Fashioning them into a beautiful symphony,
Arousing in me mystical spells of joy.
When your Muse comes knocking at your door,
Delay her not, but let her in
And go for a merry ride with her
Into some sleepy glades where silence resides.
There, let her magic wand kiss and caress you
From head to foot and all over,
Awakening your fancy from deep slumber,
Parading before you, scenes of beauty and wonder,
That, songs of passion are born from you
Gushing forth in streams of honeyed dew.
So, write on....!
This pen writes not a story,
but a life upon a page; its glory.
Love for the writing; the heart,
thumping, beat after beat, never apart.
Conceived of bones, the ash; this pen,
to ink bleeding veins, attached.
A cut, this scrap; of emotions peeled.
The scaring tissue; with Soul is healed.
Lightning arcs through nerve endings' link;
Dreams are sparks. Thoughts, the ink.
Not a story, but a life and a pen.
For this is a poet, his poem with no end.
On a walk after the worst of the Sandy storm
I slogged down the still dampening
Green grass valley rutted between
The moldering fences of the shadowed alley.
Under the low, ominously rushing, soggy gray clouds
I saw so many black birds silently
Clinging against the stiff breezes
To the broken branches of the skeletal oak on the corner
As if they relished the fate of the cruelly stripped leaves.
I saw a hundred crows there.
How many make a murder?
Black pointy wraiths;
Scattered commas lined up like
Iron shavings stuck
To magnetic branches.
Dull steel skies slid in vast arcs around them.
Sprinkling windy foreboding,
Their clouds reached down
To Collect their talons.
So many eyes I know they see
Spiny black needles poking out of me.
Bloodless murder, muffling gray gauze No need to caw…,
A hundred crows see it all.
Ribbon arcs across skies;
Red, orange and yellow
Revel with blue, green and
Ravishing violet
Romanced by indigo --
Revealed by raindrops’ slick
Rifts of the sun’s white light
Susan Ashley
April 15, 2021
~ Second Place ~
Contest: Pleiades R Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Kim Merryman
howmanysyllables.com: six syllables per line
But wherever you are, I no longer want to be:
for you are thunderstruck moonlight,
and I am a scarred sunset ~ a secret in saffron,
melting into the myth that floats forever,
within silenced dunes of scorpion stones,
where the cryptic coldness of sand feels like~
Cupid’s daggers piercing through
my aching skin and bones.
Frost-kissed vines wrap around
my wintry heart,
screaming for a sacred release
from the tethered torment
of satanic sapphires,
breathing within the haunted caves
of unending nightmares ~
and the twilight that wanes
behind flatlined promises.
Tonight, I feel like arrows of angst,
ricocheting within these woeful walls
of my melancholic mausoleum,
mirroring the heat of a burning breeze ~
like an epitaph lost in the sweltering air.
The clover of golden green glimmers,
like fireflies around my wrists,
luring distant ravens,
croaking above paralyzed dreams,
to untangle the crooked lines of lies,
crawling within clouds of comfort,
oblivious to Lilith’s serpent slithering
around my fragile feet in slow cadence,
pushing me to the darker dusks
drawn above the prying
valley of putrid prunes,
where these wistful musings
will remain as mere voiceless ashes,
cremated in vain,
with flames of forgotten folktales
echoing as faded music within a glass urn.
So, if tomorrow I’m gone, remember me ~
I still breathe silver snippets of hope,
a frozen quiescence,
etched in seven arcs of stardust,
longing to be anywhere but here.
Perhaps as the last verse of your poem,
or could I be the lone rose,
forever thriving in the galactic gardens of love,
where hate and greed, tangled in
jinxed jewels,
dissolve into nothingness ~
like rusted ribbons of the crestfallen lunar.
I hope lilacs and lavenders will bloom
in hypnotic hues, to calm raging rivers flowing
within the arctic arteries of a dark poet,
longing for a home
away from hellish hands,
so I can serenade songs of survival
and rhapsodies of resilience,
while watching every tear I’ve shed
crystallize into pearls and diamonds,
like born-again stars in violet skies.
The fire logs glow, flickering to and fro
in her eyes he sees champagne dreams of love
the soft adagio plays a velvet tune of jazzing blow
right atop the hearth, she's fitted like a glove
Red hair flaming, ruby lips untamed her rubicon
a blush, acclaims her cheeks await the dawn;
Each dancer holds on cue precaution to the wind
style and grace in every move "amour est bleue"
with burning eyes of here, go rescind ,
a love is built on arcs of passion's queue;
Scarlet thoughts roseate skin enflamed a marathon
of amoureuse, bending arching longing one on one ;
Her hair a crayon colored Autumn proffers romance
and all the philharmonic musings of a lovely dream
together they loop meandered agile as a water dance
rushing towards each other skin to skin seam to seam ;
Wine colored kisses taking in a world of bless
garnet hearts of shine never to confess
they once lay dormant in the crook of night
now fired, ready to ignite....
Contest Name: SEASONAL OR UNSEASONAL
Sponsor: Kim Rodrigues
October 22, 2018
Skywardly yearning,
wheeling and turning,
an exaltation of larks!
Lines interleaving,
wings interweaving
an orchestration of arcs!
Just shadow and light
imbuing their flight,
shape-shifting magic they fly.
With artistic flair,
their canvas the air,
this brush of wings paints the sky!