Best Bivouac Poems
Long arm gendarme
My mistake namaste
Backpack bivouac
On the Road with Kerouac
Brilliant stars, silent nights
Fireflies, Northern Lights
Mountain streams, fresh air
Fall asleep anywhere
Small town, take a chance
Pig roast, barn dance
Allemande left! Do-si-do!
Spontaneity here we go!
Long arm gendarme
My mistake namaste
Backpack bivouac
On the Road with Kerouac
Beat Zen's hey-day
Doing things our own way
Nonconformity, anything goes
Kerouac-Ginsburg-Burroughs
Shot to pieces, picking skin
Benzedrine, adrenaline
Don't forget the Phenergan
Notify our next of kin
Long arm gendarme
My mistake namaste
Backpack bivouac
On the Road with Kerouac
llllllllllllllllll
Uncle Peacock was a cock of the walk
Chucked his job to camp in a bivouac
He met Charles Lee Ray
Who sprayed pepper spray
All hell broke loose, Cock, a real out of whack
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Ode to a canvas print
Background: a sullen sky, pale
light at horizon. Green-water sea
of snowcapped swells, hint of
nightfall in the breaking waves.
Foreground: a bivouac of logs stand
watch, side by side like siblings,
darkened by salt and storm, oddly
illuminated at base, as if from
some celestial flashlight. Shaped
like a ship's prow, or nave of
a church, alpha at shore, omega
in the sea, signaling the way
to an infinity beach.
"Here, You Enter," seems
the summons, cradled for a while
in a circle of safety, their gate
to the winds, your weary body's Zen,
O Passenger, en route to the skies.
Here you enter, here you end,
in the arms of the sea. She,
who absolves all pain
and compromise.
When a puny mind
with no virtue of humility
Tries to reach the heights above
But threatened by a fall into
the depths below
A life with no intentional destiny
No bivouac
No ideal but tedium
Quivers full of arrows
But with no fixed target
An unforetold obscurity
A menace only to whom who wants
The plaudits of men
The morning falls from wings of day
beaming light in the fields of hay
and thine smile is now in sight
passions do rise through its heights.
as river runs in the silent brook
so my sentiment in madness soak
and the moonlit on the bay
shines brightly to close the day.
swift as the speed of light
is the sentiment on it's might
and the beaming spark of passion
reminding me the sweet illusion
the whispering of Zephyrus wind
reality to me it sends
and the curtain of ebony
engulf my emotion's tragedy.
as the howling calls of time
the sentient of mine sublime
in the bivouac field of life
within the windshield of the the strife.
Guv, tell me, not without the reason
our Moscow in the fired treason
was burnt and left for French.
Oh, there were fights I see their splendours
so awesome and we have the embers,
No wonder Russia still remembers
Borodino’s black trench!
It was the time there were the people,
The modern tribe looks like some cripple,
They’re Heroes they’re not you.
Their fate is bad their fate is sorry:
Not many had returned with glory,
God will be done and our story
left Moscow beauteous view.
We were retreating long and silent
So sad we waited fight and quiet
The old men grumble so:
What? Winter quarters willy-nilly?
Can chiefs tear up strange tunics killing
with Russian bayonets and feeling
that French would have to go?
And field was found: it’s large and ample
There was the space to walk or trample
Then we had built redoubt.
We kept our head; it is warning,
The cannons lightened with the morning,
Crowns of blue trees were full of dawning,
The French’s right here; they’re proud.
I put the ball in cannon tightly,
I thought I will regale “friend” lightly,
Oh, little wait, monsieur.
Do not be cunning, soldiers. Action!
We’ll go as wall against their faction,
We will stand head and shoulders. Passion!
For Motherland, hell yeah!
There were two days of endless shooting,
I saw no point in this duty,
Third day we waited for.
The speeches were among blood splashing:
“It’s time for case-shot for the smashing!”
And night fell down on field of slashing
with shadow pausing war.
I lay to sleep near carriege boring,
I heard that French exults for morning
over the battlefield.
Our bivouac was very quiet
Some cleaned his shako after riot,
Some sharpened bayonet untired
Biting moustache and chilled.
P.S. This is my translation of poem by Mikhail Lermontov.
In the bivouac field of life's main
All things are uncertain
From the wide spread of the elms
'Til the motion of the films.
A life's solemn swear
Is not to let the tear
Drop in vainless mortality
Nor fall on cup of insanity.
In the belfries of life
Clangs of pains and joys unite
Through out the coldness of the night
By the reflections of the eyes.
A chaotic world in vain full realms
Announcing its awful psalms
In myriad times it broke
Divinity of peace if took.
Time is fleeting
Things are changing
As the days that closeth at nights
So the harmony within its heights..
The pilgrims wash
their inner stains out
with the wet words
in Uttarakhand, the
land of gods.
The unexpected flood
rises above all her
expected blessings.
Her father floats away
like an empty bottle.
Gushing water gulps
her mother’s shriek.
She lies being separated
from her sense at the feet
of a concrete statue.
Though an army helicopter
flies low, the binoculars
miss her.
Calamity lets loose the
lawless. Some shapes
smelling arrack pluck
her arms out from the
feet of the statue. Lust
stretches like an elastic.
A breathing corpse
remains.
Sona opens her eyes in
a bivouac after a blackout.
But no army can repulse
the infiltrating and
invading thoughts.
He taught me how to catch a trout,
To take it home and clean it out.
Fillet the bone from head to tail,
With nothing, but knife and pail.
He taught me how to bivouac,
To stake a tent and find a track.
Pursue it slow, with not a sound,
As if, our prey could hear the ground.
He taught me how to chop a tree
To smaller pieces, mostly three.
We burned it in the fireplace,
I miss that heat upon my face.
He taught me how to shovel snow
And fish the ice at two below.
With frozen face and icy ear,
Aside the hush, I still could hear.
SingleSting MingleFling
GreatFate MateDate
KissBliss MissPriss
EagleSpread RegalBed
GownDown FrownDrown
RudeDude NudePrude
SlyTry ThighHigh
FlankSpank DankCrank
SlamBam ScamLamb
NeedFeed SeedBreed
LewdMood BroodBrewed
FlowSlow GlowGrow
MaidenFell BellySwell
LadMad DadSad
ElopeNope DopeCan’tCope
HitchGlitch DitchWitch
DoltMolt BoltColt
DrapeCape EscapeApe
FleeKey DecreeFree
StarMar CarFar
ShookHook RookBook
FawnSpawn ConGone
GuyFly ByeCry
DaddyRat DrattyBrat
PiperHype DiaperGripe
PrudeGlued CrudeFood
FiledChild RiledWild
DaycareSnare FareImpair
SutureHeart FutureTart
ShameCame DameTame
LustGust TrustDust
ForlornMorn BornTorn
Clairvoyant the love,
Which nature can give,
Which you can heave,
In the heart very deep.
Caress it with your presence,
In this bivouac,
Asseverate your presence,
With the hymn’s in its favour,
Rejoice yourself in this oblation,
Of its creator.
In this animate creation of god,
With man and animals as its cord,
Plants and trees as its beautiful sword,
All joined together to form a bond,
“The Bond of Love”
The bond of love is so great
That it keeps them mate in this stage,
With man and animals playing its vital trial,
To make his creature a supernal.
The bond of love is so great among man,
That it doesn’t discriminate
Between caste, creed and stature,
Helping each other in such a gesture,
Which glooms his creation with this texture.
The bond of love is so great
Among plants and animals,
That they remain modest in all season,
Glittering and jovial,
That his stage lament with jubilant.
The bond of love is so great,
Even then there is so much of caous in this stage,
Ransack your brain box and find out,
Why is it so?
Is it to satisfy our vanquish ideas?
God has emancipated us in this stage,
In order to sit and meditate,
But not to fight and retaliate,
In this broad field of battle.
The bond of love is not so weak,
That it will break with this shirk,
But then why to test its strength,
When there is so much to achieve and pursue,
In this bivouac of life.
Danke Bitte und Mehr
David J Walker
It was a land of foreign thought
And I was the denizen drifter
In uniform that hid my ignorance
and poverty
In an OD Green costume that was
Barely me
Rarely me on weekends
One who could pass for a different class
Of vagabond wandering across
the borders alone
So far from home
That I was thoughtless
And homeless
Eager to be accepted even if it was as
Young and clueless
If not mysterious in my ways
The heady days of youth
Learning truth in a different language
Beginning with three words
Danke Bitte, Und Mehr,
Which opened the door for
Life-changing opportunities
Danke, Bitte, Mehr
Seemed to be the key that
Could open a locked door
Or
A locked heart
For a young man willing to
Accept the path into
Migrants quarters
On the distant borders of
An expatriate's temporary bivouac
Finally
Leaving was leaving a home again
Wondering if I would ever belong again
In my native land
with my adopted tongue
Thick with memories that would
Follow me forever to my grave
A band donned... Around ring finger of left hand
Yes folks (meaning,
whomever espies these lines) alas and alack
I attest thy spouse located future heirloom -
while tentatively asleep in her bivouac
though far less likely,
(yet near more rewarding)
than finding bullet in gunnysack
and/or locating needle in haystack
constitutes the missus
(thru... worm my going with fluke...?)
She discovered logical whereabouts
concerning whaddya believe
simple 14 carat (ha - just kidding)
no custom made
tooled bejeweled purchased,
but symbol of marriage
originally acquired as prize
within box of crackerjack
and treated as goodluck
which find accompanied with
wife merrily drumming upon me buttucks
an old chestnut nursery rhyme named
knick knack paddy whack.
Emotional moment found
yours truly uttering yippee
while straddled upon rushing limb boughs
verbally punctuated courtesy warranty
said treasured ring kept guarded
by hand sum vigilant trustee
kissing me darling dumpling
as adequate reciprocity
suddenly husband experienced himself
as figurative payee
delivered out his
(mine) emotional melee
courtesy lucky find
more precious than fine spun gold.
Now bonafide marriage signifies
stronger invisible bond,
whereby Western Culture accepts
how wedding band doth correspond
unlikely once philandering quirky poet
will draw attraction, anyway
cuz insinuations he won't respond,
nor at this matrimonial juncture
(approximately two dozen plus years)
will one bard **** troubadour abscond.
How great if woebegone
misfortune could abate
such as obsessive compulsive
mailer daemons that create
psychological distress and chronic depression
whereby suicidal ideations will elevate
impossible mission to oust melancholy
against psyche doth grate,
though chatting (over telephone)
with eldest sister,
who lives within Woodbury, New Jersey
can figuratively illustrate
how solitary existence
encompassing isolated kalifate
only breeds despair within,
emotionally remote bailiwick
therein still stews
emotionally unbridled wordsmith
whose entire being does marinate.
We set up our bivouac of life
by the world's battlefield,
It befits us then
that we live not in peace
nor die free from strife.
There’s got to be more to life
than work, marriage and kids,
Life can’t be there just for tackling tasks
and achieving goals,
It’s got to be more than just
wooing fortune and fame,
It all seems so mundane--
Life can’t be there just for living and dying.
Life cannot only be of love
or of absolute faith,
It’s got to be more than
the trusting heart
or the fanatic fervor,
More than dogged devotion
or persistent prayers.
The idea of heaven and hell
oh, seems too far-fetched,
Life cannot just be the good and the evil,
It cannot just be for lauding the lord
and damning the devil.
Nor it seems is for life
to foray into the unrelenting
realms of the heavens.
There seems something of life
too close to us to seek,
too familiar to identify –
Like our hopes
Like our dreams
Like our thoughts
Like our will to live...
Too precious to own
Too elusive to grasp.
~"How Precious Life Is" contest
by Line Gauthier