Best Bravura Poems
If I had but one last sorrowful day of my life left,
there would be words I would say without delay.
Too long have I struggled, uncertain and bereft,
my tongue silent as though mired in a pit of clay.
Until now, I found myself sifting sand from my soul.
Now, willing to bare my heart's unavowed affection,
I must find the bravura to proclaim it and be bold,
and yet I find myself fearing your gentlest rejection.
Time warily squandered shall never be returned.
So, I'm seeking courage to reveal what I am feeling,
while hoping my sweet ardor shall not be spurned
nor the love for you that I have long been concealing.
Gleaming are stars hovering aloft in evening skies,
but if gathered together, never could they outshine
the luster I descry in the fulgent light in your eyes
when the beat of your heart and mine finally align.
When the pale moon rises to Heaven at zenith height,
its glorious beauty shall emerge from a lunar eclipse.
Not as seductively alluring to be with you on the night
when alas I shall feel a kiss from your sensuous lips.
Thereafter, sunlight shall yawn on the edge of dawn
but your love shall warm me more than his golden rays.
No greater fire is there to be compared with love born
by your searing touch that easily sets my heart ablaze.
If this is but a fantasy, I dare not lift tremulous eyes to see
the response to my avowal, if on your face it is defined.
I shall not bear the heartache if you turn away from me,
for then it would be a benediction, if my eyes were blind.
January 29, 2023
2022 Poetry Marathon Mile 26 Contest
Sponsored by Mark Toney
Originally written in 2016
for a contest sponsored by John Hamilton
Categories:
bravura, feelings, for him,
Form:
Rhyme
Only love transcends the infinite skies,
Through portals of passion that resonate…
Vibrations amongst wings of butterflies,
Reaching distant dormant eyes to dilate.
My love shall find your hibernating heart,
Daunting desolate debris building walls…
To paint your smile upon exquisite art,
Our love to bravura in heavens halls.
Whispers of amour in the morning light,
The universe unfolds with surreal…
Secretions of suns amidst darkest night,
Spewing teasing temptations that conceal.
Only love transcends the infinite skies,
Through portals of passion that resonate.
June.29.2019
The Most Beautiful Sonnet
Sponsored by: William Kekaula
A video poem
Background music by PinkZebra...
"Beautiful Moments"
Using a male virtual voice
Written with the 2'nd scheme Sonnet...
abab cdcd efef ab
10 syllables per line
The sonnet will repeat in the video
Thank you, dear poetic sisters, & brothers...
for making this Video Poem an enjoyable 'POTD'
:0)
This sonnet has won the grand prize of $100.00...I've asked our dear poetic brother William Kekaula to forfeit the money to his favorite charity...or at least use it for another wonderful contest of his...for which I will not enter lol...thank you all...^WW^ :o)
Categories:
bravura, hope, inspiration, love,
Form:
Sonnet
The harvest specter
of Artemis levitates
in midnight sky
beyond a temple's frail bones.
Her aura imbues the marrow
as haunted zephyrs breathe imperial runes
culled from quarries
in the scintillating saffron
emblazoning Apollo's halcyon.
Atop graveyards of heroes
pillars weep dry pebbles to Aegean eminence,
from Alexander's subjugated Persians
to Agamemnon’s trickery
on the plains of Troy.
When marble shadows lengthen
and drift in her shifting light
the moon goddess
stills all whispers
as she mourns the spectacle of bravura
retreating to dust.
6/20/18
Categories:
bravura, moon, myth, night,
Form:
Ekphrasis
Airless Man Caves
by Odin Roark
We love to beat ourselves up.
We venture out from our cavern of dread
to once again feel the frustration of looking
for that special dance partner
in an empty ballroom,
our sanity always on the verge of…
Yes, that’s what we do.
We look for a finite connection,
for the single answer
to suffering’s multiple questions.
How adolescent our bravura
as we trust the armor
fortifying our exposed heart
to always fend off
any conspiratorial emotions,
buried childhood remembrances,
parental battles with each other and you.
How real-time naive we remain,
conceptualizing happiness
without a willingness to pay a personal price,
a real experience beyond the concept of love,
where we learn full enjoyment of pleasure
is bundled expertly with experienced pain.
We wonder how our heart can be aflame,
but never open because starting fires
is the only passion we understand.
Or…
Upon losing ourselves in the excitement,
the euphoric possibility that “this is it,”
we continue avoiding the first glimpse
of our inherent and delicate vulnerability,
the tripping lever that sends us packing.
How persistent the obsession,
our battling the dread of intimacy
while remaining infatuated with possibilities,
rejecting reality that commitment
requires acceptance of an end game.
But, oh how seductive the rear-view mirror,
that ever present tool of caution,
ever ready to warn us of danger,
only to be ignored in the heat
of our high-speed commitment
to self-rage.
Our crash and burn habit
is often the only way
to chalk up another entry,
into our victimization syndrome.
For we create the same arrogant bluster
over and over,
allowing frustration to turn into anger
into self-loathing,
into sucking all the oxygen
out of our man-cave.
There is another alternative, however…
Step outside our cave of conceit.
Avoid the suffocation of false pride.
Take a deep breath of what’s beyond just us.
Epiphanies await the courageous.
Categories:
bravura, truth,
Form:
Prose Poetry
Such a grand memory I set aside,
Passing time in the French bucolic countryside
Passing lazy days away
Sipping sweet, sweet wine.
Lifting spirits, jousting melancholic ways
Experience expunging naivete
The Louvre, or the opera
Blessing a bravura shrine
Seeking serenity, here and now,
I long to stay, this place mine
Categories:
bravura, art, beauty,
Form:
Rhyme
Introduction: *A Piece for Islam*...Skins will olden, but souls will revive. Only if we believe and survive.
Islam is the way to freedom,
It's my pass to Thy Kingdom
My Taqwa, my Ibadah, my Tawbah
I shall never abandon
In this month I wear a vest
Where In pockets live the best,
Thy mercy is only I seek
My humble one request.
This rainfall, Thou bestowed Thy bliss
Upon our souls and bravura trees,
It's everything a Muslim as I
Should need to spend within my Deen.
Ya Rahman! Ya Rahim!
Ya Allah! My Allah!
Only to Thee I submit,
Only in Thee I believe.
At hours of darkness I prostrate
Thus every day Thy grant and heal
The scars I bear in fights for You,
To You my faith is beyond surreal
The struggle I admire to bear
It pulls me towards You so near,
In this month I share and care,
I won't wipe off my stream of tears
In the Night of Power,
In Laylat al-Qadr,
I cry for Thy forgiveness
I pray for Thy guidance.
O' Allah! O' Redeemer!
To Thee I do surrender,
My life in Thy presence it shines, I breathe so brightly; I survive
As long as I'm alive this way, Inshallah I pray I’ll do just fine.
Categories:
bravura, dedication, devotion, faith, forgiveness,
Form:
Didactic
WOMAN
The cruelty of civilization has failed the society
That coyness and awe matter less to bear
Left in nowhere
Discarded by modern evolution
The carnage of life; by the life we live
Life was modest; living adore
Even after the chastised glory of the body
Which was later covered in wool from head to toe
And left nothing to be seduce of friend and foe
And here comes a ballistic civilization
That pockets’ modesty for arrogance
And changes human living to inanity
Nothing is as bravura as an African woman
Whose curvy nature left no doubt in mind
Created to crack mans’ incessant campaigns
Yet found in the midst of civilization
Where reticence was surrogated with arrogance
But do you know how meaningful is blatancy?
Hmm! to others is modesty
It is the absurdity in nudity
Even, the whites in their nakedness
Cannot be as seductive as a clothed Africa woman
Whose creation was done without blunder
In the perfection of natures’ order
Though evolution fought the pride in her
A force to make over even upon her dark pigment
And scrounge from the hairs of carcass
To look like an Indian mermaid
A lot was lost to lust
Beauty, respect and pride
Like the traditional African attire
To piece of rag from the western world
And as it still remains the myth of creation
The whites alter creation via engine
The noise, the breast and the buttocks
That which is found in every new born African woman
Categories:
bravura, woman, , western,
Form:
Light Verse
Centuries of creations,
a bravura of celestial fireworks,
masterstrokes exploited,
tides of events vying between
gelid cold or searing hot.
Mountains grew, valleys sunk
oceans divided and storms struck.
Dust, sand, dunes, soil, decomposition.
Then came life!
All was controlled and peaceful,
for God created all things good.
Alas, it was the calm before the storm,
for after man was born
all hell broke loose
And deadly fireworks never ceased.
Categories:
bravura, creation,
Form:
Free verse
....on listening to Bach's Sonata No. 1,
performed by Henryk Szernyk
Beauty glows in every bow stroke,
bravura beyond compare;
golden notes like dew drops falling
shimmer brightly through the air.
Like larks aloft they hover lightly,
soar like angels from on high;
bring honor to the Lord Almighty,
swell His praise through earth and sky.
'Glory, glory, in excelsis,'
with compelling artistry
he raises us to heaven for
a glimpse of immortality.
Categories:
bravura, music,
Form:
Quatrain
....on listening to Bach's Sonata No. 1,
performed by Henryk Szernyk
Beauty glows in every bow stroke,
bravura beyond compare;
golden notes like dew drops falling
shimmer brightly through the air.
Like larks aloft they hover lightly,
soar like angels from on high;
bring honour to the Lord Almighty,
swell His praise through earth and sky.
'Glory, glory, in excelsis,'
with compelling artistry
he raises us to heaven for
a glimpse of immortality.
Categories:
bravura, inspirational,
Form:
Verse
The ship has docked in Sydney harbour officials
have come and gone now the ship is eerily silent,
yet noisy slamming of doors and someone taking
a shower…laughter. How can I sleep tonight with
the engine stopped? How can I read and not hear
human bravura? Sod it all, someone strums a guitar,
and I hear the fizzing sound of canned beer flipped
open. No this can´t go on better go ashore, a bar,
drink a few schooners, try joining the hubbub of man
at ease and not think of the sea, dolphins blue,
white crested waves and the hum of the sea goddess,
that teases me for my cowardice for not taking
the plunge and be as beautiful as the seascape of my
impossible dreams. Easy, tomorrow will be a mundane
Tuesday and we, if the dockers do not strike, should
be bound for Brisbane where the beer tastes the same,
of amalgamated breweries. Yet, despite my lack of fine
culture, I saw Sidney opera house casting dignified light
into the bay…
Categories:
bravura, adventure, parody, sea,
Form:
Blank verse
seminal squirt didst sanctify
an anonymous boulder
when mercury dipped below
hashtag mark registering colder
than usual temperatures circa
winter of year 2000 in proximity
to the sacred chapel
at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania
(house zing carillon player)
rifling thru manilla folder
first inn search of apropos
mailer daemon organ muse sic,
thence finely pitted secretly riddled with holes
encoded sheet threaded thru bell jar contrivance
sans, handy dandy mechanical holder
to accompany prurient powerful phallic pang
bubbling (like the dick kens), and didst smolder
especially, cuz a free ranging
NON GMO, puss in boots
hello kitty sauntered
(emanating pheromone heat
hand dill lee pronouncing feral passe faux foots),
dripping, seething with hormonal secretion
uttered via vow welled roots
gluten and monosodiumglutinate free pussy
hapt tabby on the prowl ready
for par laid view penile piqued Saint Peter
to enter heavenly labial shoots
rather than suffer frost bite
the above mew wing tigress attempted
to keep toasty warm
('thou minuscule tunnel
lacked add dick quit light)
prickly endowment fired
raging testosterone
with braggadocio, brio, bravura and might
owing pretentiously pusillanimous feline
fur reed black as night
hood hit attempt to cap cha moxie orgasmic
thus ensuing a mutually satisfactory plight
until a park ranger back his utility truck
than gregarious, felicitous, erogenous
then quick as greased lightening
horny creatures disappeared out ta sight.
Categories:
bravura, betrayal, body, father, funny
Form:
Mideast Peace: Oxymoron
Though descendent of Jews,
I feel boggled at the brutal,
nasty and wanton war between
Israelis and Palestinians.
Many innocent victims
bred to know and hate their enemy
impossible mission
to reconcile one Semitic
group of peoples from another.
The bloody English
begat and fomented
debacle between Israelis and Palestinians.
little more than a century ago,
particularly usurping territory
courtesy aggressive premise
might makes right.
The human species
hell bent on making war
reprisals rank as a ,
and can never even the score
I harken back to childhood,
when our family lived
at Lantern Lane, and the Dailey's
(who threw rocks at Georgie
our Dalmation/Boxer)
rightfully earned before their time
the title fear thy neighbor
an altercation such
as aforementioned above,
would easily earn a spot
on Investigation Discovery
though deadly crimes violently hardcore
reenacted minus the explicit killing
fields not healthy for children
and other living things,
nevertheless even the most pious
and peace loving
exhibit fervent bloody ardour
if kith and kin held at gunpoint.
The annals of civilization
since time immemorial
replete with chronicles
of battlefield bravura
touting (with laurels of profuse praise)
for ultimate sacrifice
unnaturally, unstintingly, and unwaveringly
bravely giving oneself
to father/mother land.
Beneath the surface of the skin
we all bleed;
mortal kombat inked
in Mesolithic Europe
likewise dates to circa 10,000 years ago,
and episodes of warfare appear
to remain "localized
and temporarily restricted"
during the Late Mesolithic
to Early Neolithic period in Europe.
Idyllic as the fantastical utopian yen,
I feel pessimistic patriarchal wheelman
who steer autocratic
leviathan of state (witness Tiananmen
Square student-led demonstrations
known in Beijing, China
as the June Fourth Incident
lasting from 15 April to 4 June 1989)
cuz twentieth century ruthless demagogues
wanted to squelch
pro-democracy movement,
and not only stole demonstrators thunder
but forcefully co-opted with lightning force
their toys such as:
sophisticated erector set and playpen
for dolls loving buoys Barbie and ken
the former coming to life
as a miniature equestrienne
experiencing magical realism.
Categories:
bravura, abuse, anger, angst, arabic,
Form:
Rhyme
The glorious end and her shaking beginning
The majestic night and the bravura morn
The dark night and the blue morn
December and January
Today tells a tale of yesterday
Today a retrospect of what it was
Break-up’s siamese, make-up
Child and mother
The egg and the fowl
The egg, oh the egg
The rain and the sun
I and we
Can I stand the tall test?
I, I! Like a ram charging
Can I stand the test?
For her patience is wild wild wait.
Categories:
bravura, inspirational, love, on writing
Form:
Verse
*Image of Between Doors by Hope.
As Shadows Mend
A lingering bravura form ... dawn midst twilight's brilliance,
It sprung a length of an unscathed course -- accidentally,
The mute vim snugly stamped unfilled, credulous of malice,
Flightiness stemmed from this silhouette, soulless oddity,
Fractured sewn plots hint of ambrosia, ere glint of the sun,
Crept o'er beauts dead asleep flit promenade the *Champs Elysees,
This undertaker gleams green edges, tickling haunting fun,
Furtive's sourced the virgin-less dove, resting on eggs well pleased,
Furtherance strengthen cloaks, catnapped air revives to a squeeze,
Contingent hollow burdened by hyped growth and fancy streams,
Swarming hodgepodge, dynamism idled, abandoned, charms ease,
Consequential happenings, capricious woodland's sprite dreams,
Curiousness provoked benchmarks, advance said grey graveness,
Flummoxed o'er see-through luminance, that occult pseudonym,
The breathless saunters towards pronounced distant concaveness,
Prompts closeness of wormed anomaly, like some phantom limb,
Chanced, faced with faceless, instantaneously, sensed a warmth,
'Twas pacific this heightened soul tried to claim yond circumstance,
A cleansing consumed me whole, doleful went yielding a formed,
While Lunar's wanting depth, Sol's dawn, striking a winks askance.
The darkroom flights emptiness to illuminate alone,
Receptive rays liberates imprisoned eyes to wander,
Aims set, spirits exalted, aids cognizant chaperone,
Nippy night solicited valor, daydreams come yonder.
*Champs Elysees (SHOHNZ-eh-LEE-zeh): a major avenue in Paris famous for elegant shops and cafes
~~Happiest 2022 Dreamers, Aloha!~~
2021 December 28
Categories:
bravura, dream, imagery, meaningful,
Form:
Rhyme