Best Ballooned Poems
Written by Gail DeBole
Phillip Buster could fluster a room -
Full of men whose anger ballooned
When came his turn to speak,
Congress snored for a week,
All dreaming he'd peter out soon.
Note: Illustrated in Coloring within the Limericks available on Amazon.com and other retail websites.
Gail's note: Filibuster - Type of parliamentary procedure.
Right of the individual to extend debate allowing the lone
member to delay or prevent a vote on a proposal. -Wikipedia
Contemporary Ode To A Mother Crying Out
To Her Children…2015
Sprawled out on life’s stage,
her world turns and runs
river red with the blood of her children:
flowing like a wandering stream.
Bloated ballooned bellies
mock aborted pregnancies;
once luscious breasts
sag in parallel union
with sinking faces
of lost hope.
Lost hope—whirling
like solitary ghost smoke
of abandoned fires:
abandoned fires
dying in waning time.
Hollowed red eyes
of fleeing lovers look rearward:
the wholeness of nothingness simmering;
as smiling death sits—
waiting and anticipating the wonted feast.
Heartbeat of hope struggles—
murmuring in the valleys and shadows;
searching the gods’ penurious mercy.
In the midst of the Dante, hazed hell,
a wretched mother clings
to time and history—once again.
Rooted in her audacious faith,
she cries out to her wandering brood in Diaspora:
those liberating souls spewed from her precious womb.
Scattered liberating souls—umbilical bound;
destined to restore her great grand glory:
With sage seasoned good courage,
sagaciously she squats—
awaiting the victory.
~~~~~*~~~~~
Philippines ballooned and floated over poverty
Population exploded and still exploding molding the humanity
And reached 101,833,938 mortals in the society
With just a matter of 115,830 sq. miles
Approximately 879 Filipinos in every square mile
Really just a wink of an eye rate of mortality growth
As the 55th poorest nation in the world, CONTROL is a worth
But not through B.C. with RH Bill
Where artificial control of mortality rate spill
" Against the bill, this is just a MESS "
That's all ... Less talk ...Mistake be Less...
===============================================
B.C. - birth control
He's burnt obsidian black
Tall and handsome as a matter of fact
This son on scooter, around Town.
If you could see him now
He's tireless Veteran with duodenal ulcer
That ballooned in the Middle East.
He hailed from land of Carib breeze
Forgotten sons drenched in pain
Suppressed
Some faced deportation at their own command, from frustration.
At home, in Belize, he's "Yankee"
He's self-employed and commands attention, with ambition
He's builder of homes
Does electrical, plumbing, and landscaping
He must stay poised
This son without suit and tie.
*
*
Memories of Love – Ten Words
Love like a twirling tempest,
whirled us to an uncharted shore
of unbridled, sublime, sensuality,
gifting me with moonlit memories
that would never be forgotten.
How I savored those kisses from your lips…
milk chocolate lips flavored with the
lingering tangy taste of fresh, luscious,
wild, ripened, crimson raspberries…
dipped in cool whipped cream.
Creating sterling silver ripples
on the ocean, we waltzed by the glow
of a yellow, ballooned, harvest moon.
Like a singular, silent shadow, we fused
as one igniting entity…silhouettes
painted-in by the black of night.
Youth and dreams may fade away
like scenery from an old water-color painting;
but I’ll always recall, like it was yesterday,
the ecstasy of love shared,
when we floated away on a carpet of
tinsel-lined clouds, cloaked in the grace
of blue-gray, early misty morning.
04-13-2018
Contest: 10 Words
Sponsor: Joseph May
Placement: 2nd
10 words used: love, tempest, shore, forgotten, crimson, harvest, shadow,
yesterday, grace, misty
I had a love, but it flew like a bird
out of the cage but never heard.
I had a voice that spoke with tenderness,
rendered softly, but now I digress.
I had a charm that melted like butter.
Now it's forming artery clutter.
I had ballooned lungs that clung to your air,
but your absence left a pulmonary tear.
I had wide eyes indulged with your beauty,
but they can't relay what a heart can see.
I had a heart like a tender, ripe plum,
but it's been chewed like shoe-stuck gum.
I had honey dance in my playful mouth.
Now it's tasted onion, hard to brush out.
I had a belly that held butterflies.
Now they've come out like powdered lies.
I had tickled ears filled with your melody.
They pranced like deer... into a tree.
I had pennies wasted on vain wishes.
Now they're poisoning the fishes.
I had a nose filled with rose's scent,
but it blew with the breeze, a memory spent.
I had smooth arms secure in your care.
Now they're free, yet lonely, bare.
I had soft hands, interlocked with yours.
Now they hold open their own doors.
I had silken legs you loved to caress.
I keep them neatly under my dress.
I had eyebrows raised with arousal.
Now they're abased, full of sorrow.
I had a smile like a child's for cake.
I still wear one, but it's a fake.
I had instincts, but I let them go
like a rambling tongue for ego's show.
I had a notion that this would end,
but remained devoted like an owing friend.
I had regrets of yesterday's crime,
but they've been bleached like toilet grime.
I had cavernous wounds, dripping with blood,
with prints that followed like galoshes of mud.
I had a self, differently sorted,
once vibrantly alive, now aborted.
Mosiac Black Panther
There is a mosiac black panther caged in my warm breast
Does what's his name even have a clue there's a yearning in my brain I know?
For a long endless time of mine, know what it is that drives him as though
Forward or backward in a long relentless of yearning of quest.
His silent rage had ballooned into an unrealistic unknown unsuppressed
The unperturbed fibers of those stealthy feet that surely walk and go
Over and over my body feels like it's in a prison coming to and fro,
Within these walls it's forever trying to continue to reap with much rest.
All through the day I at times feel him living in my hardened of heart
But as the night sets forth, its becoming to bring his dreams and stars,
And in a hesitant inexorable moment of frenzy it alas awakes:
His violent wrath trembled and hurled upon the steel bars.
His long eternal passion stretches me beyond and sweeps me apart
Then after I lie in subliminal bliss as my whole body skillfully shakes.
The family ties are frayed by a festering wound
The siblings are fighting over their parent’s will,
The oldest brother a younger sister has impugned.
As fighting continued, another sister was marooned
Months have passed and the arguments rage still,
The family ties are frayed by a festering wound.
Threatening behavior, accusations, anger ballooned,
Some children are refusing to pay the funeral bill,
The oldest brother a younger sister has impugned.
Several in-laws have found themselves lampooned,
Although they have kept their hands out of the mill,
The family ties are frayed by a festering wound.
Sadly, the children and cousins are being groomed
Even some family “friends” have come in for the kill
The oldest brother a younger sister has impugned.
Now, some have hired lawyers who are fine-tuned
And anxious to get their greedy hands in the till,
The family ties are frayed by a festering wound
The oldest brother a younger sister has impugned.
[Festering Wound]
FIRST PLACE WINNER
Written March 4, 2022
Especially for “Pick-a-Title Vol. 29” Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Edward Ibeh
Anxious in Ancona (1)
His plan, as he’s boarding his baldachined barge
en route for the easterly sea,
(arthritis allowing) is giving it large,
but the pain is as bad as can be:
though Rome is his home, he must go and take charge:
Cortona is cortisone-free.
One thousand four hundred the Christian years
(and then we’ll add sixty-four more):
Pope Pius the Second, that subtlest of seers,
is bound for the Umbrian shore.
He’s even less warlike than Billie Joe Spears,
but wants to be wading through gore.
He’s running a fever, his legs have ballooned,
but he won’t be deflected or swayed.
He’ll not be impugned or dragooned or lampooned:
undampened his rodomontade:
the mention of mercy, mere salt in the wound –
hell-bent on a pious crusade.
The portents are palsied: a bargeman is drowned:
this project is just getting sillier.
“Venetians are keeping us hanging around:
we can hire troops for Tyre in Sicilia.”
The Middle East! Pius wants boots on the ground
(now why does that sound so familiar?)
The ominous omens are gathering thickly,
but no-one could call him a quitter.
He’s scrofulous, suffering, sallow and sickly,
but boyishly buoyant, not bitter.
They land him on sand on the strand of Otricoli,
and lift him aloft in a litter.
When we first MET, you were so young and FAIR,
A hundred twenty POUNDS in your underWEAR.
We tied the KNOT, and the next thing I KNEW,
Your weight ballooned UP to 300 and TWO!
Your weight GAIN ended my infatuATION.
Lovin' YOU is like a chemical castRATION.
Several times a WEEK when your mom stops BY,
She starts in on ME, and I just want to DIE!
She gripes and NAGS, got nothin' good to SAY,
Then you and SHE just eat bon-bons all DAY.
Your family TIES only add to my frustRATION.
Lovin' YOU is like a chemical castRATION.
You decided that YOU'D take a drive in my CAR,
Just go to the STORE, it's not very FAR.
That short DRIVE ended up in a WRECK,
And my sweet RIDE was shot all to HECK!
I just wanna SHOUT IT all across the NATION:
Lovin' YOU is like a chemical castRATION!
(The form for this poem is accentual verse.)
Fat you were, beyond description.
Jabba the Hut had nuthin' on you.
From a scruffy little Brillo-pad sized stray
Your appetite ballooned you
To an incontinent continent of feline adiposity.
A fur covered Butterball turkey
With attitude
You never failed to fall below expectation,
Seemingly unable or unwilling
To grasp the concept of the litterbox.
To think we named you Shadow.
Even that part of you looked heavy.
You'd just sit on something that groaned beneath you,
Paw draped across that vast white belly,
And look at me like, "Well?"
Then one day,
Too chubbed to make it across the street in time,
Some car bopped your noggin
And knocked the life outta you.
They brought you to me
Unmarked yet dead;
I crammed your soft bulk into a bootbox
And buried you under our big tree out back.
Death gave you a measure of dignity
Unattainable in life,
As I suppose, in the end, it does us all.
One more drink and just my essence
remains. My speech is owned by another
and my body moves beyond my control.
I can smell my ego and taste my vileness.
I walk the road of champions and fight
the fight of heroes. Another drink
and my fists are iron ingots,
my prowess unrivalled.
I am what every woman desires
and every man envies. I am Saturday
night dancing, without the Sunday
morning blues.
One more drink and I am a friend to the world .
And, as my ripple affects everything around me,
I become complete. No shyness, no redeeming qualities.
The bull to my harem.
So why am I bleeding and broken?
My words were strong and my stance
even stronger. Yet here I sit, undone
like a cork from a bottle.
Where was my prowess, my touch
of steel? Lied to by the contents
of my glass, I am bitter. I paid
my money, where was my victory?
The taxi home, the swollen eye. My ego,
ballooned at the bottom of a glass, deflated
by the prick of a fist. And my voice, once baritone
in timbre, has become timid in frame.
The morning wakes with screeming echoes
of the night before and phone calls from
laughing hyena's that I'll meet at work
on Monday morning.
Leverage your preamble yes you almighty you
The dawn is showing with no silky waves nor satin ripples dare to stand and welcome the upcoming morning dew
There'll be no cover and no shining armour would be able to cushion that protruding permeating pulsating heat accrued
Through the true truth running into that thick, into that thin, into that mine mind of succulent bulls
Alluding to the supposed faint desperation that is not yet evident yet appearing as if its cool
Hovering, building up in the hidden bubbles of each and every unconsciousness ever brewed
Ever breathed, ever uttered, ever shouted and ever imparted to the air, the space, the wind and the full fool of pools
Waiting for the right moment for the bubbles to ballooned buffoon bloom
To burst and impacted on timed and ticked revelations of baby booms
Giving birth to pseudo-prophets claiming for, looking for, pointing at and defining to the hard embellished truth
The moment the truth defines itself and crystallizes into a physical tomb
That moment would become irrelevant to many fools who drools for tool
For being is never about becoming and becoming is a far cry from being the supposed expected true you
When Elvis Presley dreamed on high
All he wanted to do was fly
Like Priscilla's blue moon
He ballooned with each tune
And it sure made his mama cry!
my curtain flickered furiously to the beat of an ever increasing new day
my hands all withered like a weather beaten out of season holiday
my eyes sunk down to the pit's of last night's cringe worthy hear say
my face as ballooned and bloated as a recently exhumed body.
my thought's tainted by the trigger of early day psychosis
my psychosis triggered by the thought's of early life tainting
if hope is but a breath away then i am emphysema
and you are the ever increasing need to chain smoke
still, all is not lost to the vast sways of shade blue
i see green when wearing your rose TAINTED spectacles
my mood's deify even the most salacious of rainbow's
my eye's burn vivid against the injustice of all comer's
my skin's no match to your already and readily sharpened wit's
my stomach car'nt muster a fight for it's food
scrutinize everything scream's my mirror of moan's
and the scrutiny show's on all people's faces
all corner's are closing and wall's pressing in
the same wall's that are marked with my footprint's
if suicide was an option i'd make the world commit it
so the only thing committed is me to my hospital bed
like all people I've the propensity for great good and great bad
and that certain battle rages without one clear candidate
my sky is covered by one large and looming stratus
come redemption and feed my under nourished soul
inseminate light through my insidious handicap
and flutter free my wings of mercy full exemption
these word's are the chain's bound tight by my demon's
loosened by my wish to resolve