Best Boulder Poems
One must imagine Sisyphus’s
boulder, marble-sized these days
And Ozymandias’ plaque,
spinning despair into praise
Look on, ye hypocrites,
and sneer at my undoing
Your universe is a giant sandpit,
entropy accruing
Their legacies long crumbled,
eroded by rust
Gods built the wrong way,
on scaffolds of dust
Virtue or vice register
equally the same
Except between stars,
there’s space for one more grain
Down here, we clock in daily,
stack hours like prayer
Worship strong Wi-Fi,
evangelize on thin air
Imagine heavenly echoes,
because the silence isn’t fair
Some develop connection,
others a thousand-yard stare
Our Earth splits naturally,
along seismic lines
Greenwich claims centre stage,
only for the meantime
Sisyphus, still aching,
gets an epidural at last
But only in hindsight,
for his hump blocks the past
Redrawn are our own lines,
watchtowers in the sand
Sketching new borders,
carving up the promised land
Exhume ancient treasure,
and black, viscous stuff
Addicted to all things buried,
as if our dead weren’t enough
Still we write blindly,
tracing glyphs already faded
Helps lift the mood
when depressed and jaded
Gods stand on shaky ground,
myth holds them together
In schisms that bind billions,
then sever forever
Oh, look on—ye poet
Sisyphus now rolls his eyes
He’s seen the apps, wars,
hoodies, and cable ties
His hamster wheel’s a meme
for gods who merely try
Small wonder he mutters,
at least Ozymandias gets to die
And sometimes I pray to gods,
or maybe their ghosts
About versions of me
I’ve been missing the most
They don’t directly answer,
but do leave this guess
In the end, to keep on rolling
may be my passing success
By David Kavanagh
...upon emerging from the fury of
swimming just a few feet out in the Grand
Old Lady
Boldly upright in surf
Fog races in and cloaks her surface
Alive! I grip the bottom for the crush
As waves crash my glistening face
Freedom has found me!
01/19/14
Formation of a lush mossy garden
Surrounding a large mossy boulder
Years have come and gone across the morning sky
Sunrise palette red, yellow and orange glowing streaks
Shade and moisture makes the conditions right
Excellent compost materials nuture and thrive
Nature has other chances to arive
A beautiful scene across the garden
Successful can only transform
Colors and textures galore
Simple pleasures in my found treasure
Garden with a heart of stone
THE WAX-BOULDER
I made you an empress of my heart's castle
The towers on which doves of trust nestle
The curtain wall has your name enshrined
With gushing river of my love the moat occupied
Your gracious smile each stone in the high wall admired
Flowers of committment on the ramparts bloomed
Draw-bridge on its bosom received your foot-steps
Great hall in your welcome threw royal banquets
Your image in intricate weaves, set at the high- table
My prayers for you, echo from the holy chapel
Emanates the scent of my love, care and affection,
For you the potpourri of my respect, sacrifice and devotion
Savouries of my feelings cook at the hearth in the kitchen
Castle yet defenseless!!painted with unconditional love
With stark acceptance for the way you are my love
But your rejection of my love, like gun-powder ripped
through this fortress
Bleeding stones and my weeping soul stand the witness !
©Manoj Kumar and Anulaxmi Nayak collaboration,2015
For contest: Partner Up
Sponsor: Shadow Hamilton
Date: 27th August 2015
A lovely flower dowsed upon the lethargic rocks
Gruesome idiocy lead to the battlefield of soldiers
Cynical viewpoints closed like a lock
Peace crushed in between the burdened boulders
Fickle truces built upon greed
Fighting oneself is our demise
It's usually about what you and your family need
How sorrow does arise
To whom are we really fighting
If we are only fighting our own
Rage stricken lightening
Many go without a home
Why begin an age long war it it defeats its purpose
Instead of killing each otherwhy not protect instead of being so hopeless.
The Boulder
The anchor ripped through the seabed, lurching and banging trying to get a grip,
Dragged forward at a pace, cutting grooves in the sand under, the belly of the ship.
The anchor locks on to a great rock, knocking part of its shoulder,
The loose rock rolls on down the side; in fact it is a boulder.
The new boulder comes to rest on the bottom of the sea,
Confused he looks all around and then realises - he is free.
Whoopee, this is great, he sits there looking, because his view has finally changed.
The boulder can’t believe his luck, to be free from the underwater range.
He rolls around as the waves push forward bits, being knocked slowly from him.
Many years down the line, he his is getting really quite thin.
A great storm hits the sea one day, and lifts the rock high in its swirling waves,
It pitches him so high and so far the rock himself cannot save.
He is belched out at the end of the storm, and for the first time land, he does see.
‘Oh wow this is great,’ he say’s to the shell he finds next to him, as he rolls to a stop gently.
This sun is hot how cool is that?, I’ve never seen anything like it, I really think its grand.
The shell looks at the rock and asks “Do you really like this sand?”
Just then a toddler walks on by, a bucket in his hand, he scoops the rock and shell up in a shovel full of sand.
Well is bit annoying the rock says, it’s getting in my bits,
Well you look quite smooth to me, the shell declared, trough his shell-like lips
And don’t worry to much, the shell said his voice sounding near to tears
Because that sand is us- in about a thousand years.
There is something I just did realize
Flower seeds have different shape and size
Which were made by God to accommodate
All their abilities along with each trait.
A cactus can make water out of oxygen
When mixed with moisture again and again
End result will be flower for you to choose
Which itself always continually renews.
Maybe it might be to my surprise
After a while I finally did realize
Beauty is in each eye of the beholder
That may be growing on a big boulder.
James Thomas Horn
Retired Veteran
Don’t take for granite who you are
Just be a little boulder
Remember that you’re made of stars
And someday when you’re older
You may be a marble statue
That the pebbles gaze upon
And the world shale marvel at you
And of quartz you will rock on.
When will my boulder become too heavy for you
to push up this mountain?
Crushing you
the beetle underneath the heel of my misguided foot
When will you look down at your hands
to see the scarlet wounds in your flesh
your skin crying crimson tears
All because you were trying to repair the glass vase
that a child carelessly threw on the ground
If you are my light
what happens when my darkness swallows you?
What happens when my demons
seep into your soul?
Then the mold and rot envelopes us both
forever sinking into darkness
How could I forgive myself for destroying you?
Your comforting words ease my soul
"For you, anything"
"You don't need to feel bad"
But the ease only lasts for a moment
I would rather crush myself than you
So until I can be my own light
I would rather be in darkness
I
RELAPSE
Waiting for she who will bring me my heart
I lay on my sofa
Arms outstretched
Reaching for my heart far astride.
I try hard sweeping a cursory look round my enclave
My neck stiff; life is full of pain.
My eyes clueless, what I see
The cobwebs and the dust of yesterday’s misery
My teeth frosty in the silhouette
A life is at stake.
A heart is meant to be soft, subtle
But when I feel my chest, all I feel is a stone,
A large formless stone
Every feel, every sense, every thought
Seems worthless, meaningless
For my heart has been sucked dry
Off the last vestiges of emotions
The window blinds high up,
Stealing momentary flashes at the world that lies
Beyond the windows,
What I see is a cruel world, a world full of scavengers
A world of greed and avarice
I pull at my ears, I feel nothing
It seems I have lost touch with sound,
All I feel, all I hear, all I see is silence.
Am I alive?
I keep asking myself
But within these same walls I smiled, I laughed, I danced
And she sat on this same sofa with me
We even drank from the same glass of wine
What must have gone wrong?
Life is full of changes
That I know, but I never envisaged this type of change.
II
RECOVERY
My eyes up, focused on the ceiling
Then some words begin to form…
With my lipless mouth, I form out the words
“Hope is what keeps you going even when all hope is lost,
So never you lose hope on hope, hope will one day take you to
The place of your dreams”
…from a distance I hear the chirping of the birds and
The sounds of a tom tom singing the song of a new day.
WE WILL ROCK YOU
Growing older
Pushing his boulder
Sisyphus retired to the valley
And there he yearned
To be the ball return
In the bowling alley
Here in my haven, the Flat Irons in full view
A benefit to the loss of leaves as winter ensues.
To my left is the bustle of a town in motion.
Before me, fire blazes, warming chill’s potion.
Dragonfly dances in her coppery cloud in the tree
Sunlight dazzles and blue sky is what I see.
Surrounded by my carefully chosen new delights
Comforted by the photo of my family in sight.
Boulder isn’t cobalt, blue ocean and warm island breeze;
But it is all and everything that does seem to please.
Adaptability must be my middle name.
Wherever I am, I am the same.
A tragic mass shooing has occurred once more.
This time, in a Boulder, Colorado grocery store.
Today, it seems there is no safe place to go.
Incidence of gun violence seems to grow.
The number of murdered victims amounted to ten.
It looks like we cannot keep this from happening again.
From a news story found on CNN.com
The moon is full above the canyon
listen to the call...
The music of the river
echoes between the walls.
A love song for the brave
who boldly choose to walk,
The path of their true destiny
as the drums begin to talk.
The boulder on the ridge
catches and holds the light,
Providing a mystic place
for passion in the night.
Hearts beating to the cadence
of the drums far below,
Sharing souls and secrets
only the moon will know.
Breathe deep the magic moment,
It is here by more than chance,
Come out of the half shadows,
Listen...Live...and Dance.
The summer sea sky has traveled inland
and the rolling of the Spanish hills make me hungry for adventure
I am feet on the dashboard, a mouth full of salt water,
a nosebleed that is somehow romantic
I am lost in the vast wilderness of summertime,
the gray-green galaxies of 9 PM daylight,
and all I see is you
Every star, every blade of grass,
every partially patched pothole on the road to church
I can taste your breath after I brush my teeth,
hear your voice after I turn off my records for the evening
I smell you in the lilac that blooms by my parent's house,
feel you in the linens that hang on the clothesline
I lay in the grass and your face stares at me from the clouds
I wish to be free from this love.
This soul-consuming, mind-burning, gut-wrenching love.