Best Breathlessly Poems
Somewhere in a dream,
Serene and blissful from the start
It comes to me again
The two of us in love, and eagerly alone
Breathlessly naive', and blissfully assured
that we would be as one
...that nothing in the world outside, could ever be compared
Two bikes took rest against a tree
We climbed the nearest hill,
Through foxtails, deep and thickets, high
Along a creek bed, far and wide,
wading through warm granite stones
Slick and wet, with velvet moss
littered deep with autumn leaves, and the urgent tender years
My darling...do you remember...?
We were like children, we marveled and swooned
at the shapes of the clouds in the lavender sky
changing their forms in a wink of the eye
We were wild with love, that stirred the stones
Discovering firsts, and thirsts unknown
Layers of years, now whisper here,
Imprisoned in this hidden place, with every breath of air
Not a fluent time that bends or moves
...but time fully reasoned, with ancient eyes
Unwound of it's youthful eyes and loves
Where dulcet words plucked out of space
Have not been tinged by autumn's breath
And innocence is scattered like leaves upon the breeze
And lingers, ...with a sweet wistful sigh
We who once made love, ...a thousand skies ago
Have slept with tossing shadows and lilting cries
Still tremble with the memory
Oh, ...I know the subtle ways of empty dreams
And I shall go by silent lanes and leave this day....and you....
....timeless here
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
To count the ways, I dare to comprehend
such finite love defined in written line,
for quantity shall never find an end
to love that lets infinity define.
A Summer’s day, to love shall not compare,
though shines to bathe your beauty in its light,
and as it wanes, waits breathlessly to share
the passion of a sultry Summer’s night.
To laureates and bards of metaphor,
each scribbled phrase, I bid them credit due,
but all their words and phrases heretofore
can ne'er describe this love I have for you.
When words fall short and poetry departs,
love's silence fills the cockles of our hearts.
O
the bane
of being so slavishly in love,
to face another bloodless sunrise alone.
Myself, I’m spun in silken strands enthralled
yet, still stung by the whip of your selfish whims.
Your fleeting presence flashes like iridescence in light,
an elusive rainbow whose colors escape my grasp.
I pine for possession of one I cannot possess,
my burning being’s bewitched.
This yoke of yearning pliantly possesses me;
ensnaring me in the exquisite twist
of the fervent temptations you weave -
as your amorous play strums the lusty lure
of a gossamer thread I wish to follow to your soul,
whilst my purring thirst is captured -- then ignored.
O
the woe
of being caught
in the frill of desire’s web,
aching for the thrill of arching pleasures,
craving to be melted by our molten fusion,
longing forever, wanting and waiting breathlessly
for your wanton appetite to ravish me
always and again.
Susan Ashley
July 3, 2019
N/A
Contest: 2022 Poetry Marathon Mile 4
Sponsor: Mark Toney
~ Poem Of The Day ~
July 5, 2019
~ Third Place ~
Premiere Contest: Slave To Love
Sponsor: John Hamilton
Abigail’s Spring
Beneath the shelter of winter’s barren arbor
My winter abused heart
Watches the day’s light linger in the sky resisting darkness -
Begging to play a little longer every day –
Pushing twilight away at arm’s length with pink and brilliant orange
Leaving wispy trails of color in the sky;
Urging empty branches and shivering wheat
Lift up their eyes from bruising rains
And crushing chill of wilderness storms;
Seeing here howling tirades of blizzards
Trade places with long sunbeams stretching slowly
Across my sun starved shadow, warming the winter’s wildness -
Coaxing pale green shoots to peek timidly at meadows
Covered with patchwork quilts of blue and yellow -
Orange scattered across arching hills –
Welcoming the face of spring with arms spread wide;
Listening for the bleating of black faced sheep
When they shed their fleecy coats;
Not looking back into the breath of moaning winds,
Longing sighs transformed into shouts of laughter
Chase themselves across the plains in children’s games;
My spirit, once wrapped in hibernation, feels the changing of the wind
Running up the road – knocking on the gate -
With a moveable feast born of abundance;
Stone cold frozen heart beats again in rhythm with gracious blessings
As the simple sparrow teaches
Her young to fly with the morning light
Rejoicing on warm nights filled with songs of mourning doves –
My face turns - embracing this greening valley -
As spring sprints breathlessly up the path.
April, 2020
Contest: Personal Favorite No. 2
Sponsor: L. Milton Hankins
5/16/20
Contest: Poetry Marathon Mile 13
Sponsor: Mark Toney
30 Lines
First place - Brian Strand Your Choice B - 5/17/20
Number 1 Best New Poem - 6/13-20
Poem of the Week - 6/20/20
First place - Brian's Choice G 6-21-20 - Brian Strand
First place Your Best Poem of 2020 - John Hamilton
Top Ten, #10, Poet Destroyer 11/7/20
Chosen for publication in PS It's Poetry
My cherished one...
Here I am ,alone with stone wall paper
in the silence of my room.
The pit-pattering raindrops upon my windowsill
help me to remember, outside is cold and vacant too.
Here I lay , on my dark brown couch
like on other nights and many afternoons.
Here I stay ,undisturbed ,with a pen in my left hand
Provoked to put black ink to paper
Seduced to write down unconscious thoughts
Terminal thoughts and deepest aches
wrapped in the echo of your absence.
If only you 'd knew , my rose was not seasonal
Its crimson still bleeds ,like in yesterdays , now gone.
Its perfume still lingers between forgotten postcards
and the impossibility of separation.
Its petals once blown , still float across the boundless ocean
The same ocean that moves ,that spreads breathlessly
between our lands , our lips and hands, but not our hearts
Nor the hundred fantasies that still reveal your footprints
along my distant winding paths .
Inspired by Adele's latest song - 'Hello '
Dance for me beautiful butterfly
Flutter me wise
Carry me upward to blue skies
Reveal rainbow effervescence to my eyes
My perfect moment encased in time
Within my heart you plant a hopeful seed
Like many wild flowers you fill my need
Waltz in my garden please take the lead
Dance for me beautiful butterfly
Reveal all the colours I long to see
Psychedelic wings defying simple gravity
I sit in wonder watching you breathlessly
With nets people try to capture infinity
Angelic beings in this world are far too few
My hope through painted eyes you do renew
Heavenly glimpses when into my life you flew
Dance for me beautiful butterfly
On pleasured currents help me rise
I am but an observer I wholly realize
Reveal rainbow effervescence to my eyes!
Waltz in my garden please take the lead
I sit in wonder watching you breathlessly
Heavenly glimpses when into my life you flew
Revealing rainbow effervescence saying I love you too!
I dedicate this piece to the love of my life. My sweetie makes my heart flutter,
25 years of joy and she makes each day special.
. I am the moon
hanging solitary in the sky
watching sails fluttering by
breathlessly against the wind.
I'm just a rock ,dark,unknown
without a light that is my own.
Yet He ,He sees hues I cannot see
and the true colours in me.
He, He is familiar to my face
This face that shines less brightly
without his full embrace.
He is the sun, He is the one
Never so close , always too far
yet still staying behind me .
He casts his softest glow
reflecting orange and soul,
He penetrates his warmth
A fire ball of wants ,
Then fades ,fades away in the horizon.
He is the sun, He is the one
in a universe of nothingness .
He fills our gaps,hopes and regrets
Never so close ,always too far
yet still staying behind me.
I am the moon ,He is the sun
He is the one...He is the one
One Halloween night when I was five
Rain pelted city streets, we stayed inside
Dad lit the Jack-o-lantern candle
Told us the tale of a famous vandal
One “Headless Horseman” in Sleepy Hollow
‘Twas Ichabod Crane he chose to follow
Crane ran breathlessly, was terrorized
(At this point my father’s eyes looked wild)
Thundering behind him through the forest
The hooves of a horse and a rider headless
Carrying a sword to strike Ichabod
(Dad grabbed a spatula, swung it like a rod)
Not just we children but our mother too
Gasped at the thought of Ichabod pursued
High winds cut off our electrical power
As in our kitchen three children cowered
Orange light from the pumpkin’s evil eyes
Showed Dad seemed to have dematerialized
The youngest, I felt something run through my hair
I screamed aloud in horror and despair
The lit pumpkin fell from table to floor
Darkness as I ran through the kitchen door
Leaping into bed, pulling up the sheets
Dad snuck into my room, whispered, “Trick or treat”
So if you think I am a drama queen
Please realize that it’s all in my genes
Happy Halloween!
A gentle tickle belies the sadness
as the corner of my eye swells and my vision blurs.
The beauty and the joy fading from my mind,
the "what was" and "what could be"
but longing memories and lost dreams,
like fading shadows, of a wasted life,
and all that is left is the loneliness.
Lying alone lost in somber reverie,
the welling in my eye inches ever closer
to flooding past the impenetrable fortress
created by my, now, tightly shut lids,
the specters of my past slowly filling my unseeing eyes
with visions of all of the special moments
and the caring caresses that we once shared.
My lashes quiver and moisten as I breathe in deeply.
The words of love we breathlessly whispered
now only wisps of meaningless expiration
hidden among icy, broken emotional shards,
a million pieces of sharp frozen feelings
piercing so deeply inside of me, freezing what remains
of you in the deep crevices of my broken heart.
The tingle sharpens as the dam breaks,
one forlorn drop escaping slowly down my cheek,
meandering, lost, in the creases of my aged face.
I reach up to wipe it away, but can't
for everything I am, everything that is me,
everything that we were and could ever be,
I've set adrift inside of that tiny, tickling, forsaken tear.
06/19/2017
Winter’s Fantasies
Winter walks the mountain hills at nightfall
Breathlessly awaiting evening’s first flakes of snow,
An alpine carnival that rowdy clouds threatened to toss upon their faces;
When, at last, the brumaled storm releases a snowy masquerade
Sweet serenity fills dusky eyes with wistful fantasies of twirling snowflakes,
Visions of barren aspen arms embracing shivering jewels of glittering glitz,
A carnival of crystalline jubilee in wind whipped flakes.
Winter smiles as the evening sky slowly turns her dark side inside out
From black to white to turquoise and to blue
The moon slow pulls herself above these mountain hills in festival
To ride a winter sky watching over midnight’s silver shimmering earth
Alive with twinkling moonbeam stars, bright refractions of sisters in the sky,
When the mountains glimmer cold as midnight – blue as stars –
Wearing new ermine alpine furs -cloaks of argent sparkle.
1-12-22
Contest: Winter Wonders within Nature
Sponsor: M.L. Kiser
Winter Fantasy
I love to walk through twilight
In mountain hills
Breathlessly awaiting evening’s first
Flakes of snow in a winter carnival
That rowdy gathering clouds
Threatened to toss upon their upturned faces
And,
When at last, making merry, the storm releases
A snowy vision descending on a dreaming world
A lullaby of sweet calm
Transcends sleepless visions like twirling snowflakes
To fill nocturnal eyes
With visions of barren aspen arms
Embracing shivering jewels of glittering snow.
Between wind whipped flakes
I see
The warm and cozy lights of homes
Resting in the trees
To cast a revelry of amber shadows
On the pure whiteness
Of a crystalline blanket falling from the sky;
They hide their eyes
Among the spruce
As love
But
With inviting looks
Beckon me abide
As I pull my hands into warm sanctuary pockets
To walk upon the gala of snow serene.
In a carnival of swirling flakes of snow
My footsteps
Quickly
Lose their warmth –
Now
Hidden by
My brumaled friends
As the evening sky
Slowly turns
Her dark side inside out
From
Turquoise to blue
To white.
And when the storm finishes
Emptying
The clouds
As feather pillows opened wide
The moon slow pulls herself
Above these hills in festival
To ride a winter sky
Watching over the silver
Shimmering earth
Alive with twinkling moonbeam stars
On outstretched limbs
Of aspen trees –
They twinkle in a jubilee – bright reflections
Of a sister in the sky.
The air turns colder –
Cutting right to the very marrow core
With sharp and brittle winter bite
When the mountains
Glimmer cold as moonlight –
Blue as stars –
As
They stand above the valley
Wearing alpine ermine furs
Sentinels of the day
Now past –
Guardians of tomorrow
And
Though they change their winter masks
For summer’s green masquerade
Their faces never change –
I would know them always!
1-1-21
Contest: Winter
Sponsor: Emile Pinet
I don't need to remember what it was like to be a kid
I don' t need to memorize where all the fun had been .
It was in the unique moment of a first-born spirit
without obligations and responsibilities .
A Brief moment recalled and lived in a dream.
Immersed in the body of a little brown-eyed girl
How I danced with the flutter of a butterfly ,over and over again.
Dressed up neatly in a white collar shirt ,and a navy blue pinafore dress,
How I ran , breathlessly , in evergreen fields
full of yellow buttercups, dandelion buds, and almond trees
which barely blossomed through the eyes of women , and men .
How I jumped like a frog earning its freedom , doing my utmost to catch the sky,
to reach the soaring hand-made kite ,which kept moving far and high.
My left -hand never letting go of that special red balloon ,
Mama's reward , on a windy afternoon.
Each following morning, feet too tired to get out of bed
but that lasted only till' I saw Uncle Frans'hat.
How happy I was to sit on his lap ,, and listen to bible stories He read.
How happy I was , to lick early fresh raindrops running down
my cheeks,so different from the ones
I feel when I'm out of my sleep.
Moments to preserve. ..
There on the back seat of papa's olive- green car ,
Our Chitty -Chitty Bang- Bang , travelled so far.
Mum,dad, my brother and I ,face 'gainst the wind,
Open mouths , Indian sounds , humming along ,
waiting for birds'wings to flutter as they sing.
What a moment , of hide and seek,musical chairs ,
Of midnight mass and Christmas prayers .
I lived them all ....
Splashes of waves, shovel and buckets on sands ,
Autumn's foliage , picnics with cousins
uncles,aunties ,and friends.
Immersed in the body of a little girl
with long noichettes french -braids swaying in the breeze ,
Playing hopscotch,running wild in vacant cobbled streets.
I do not need to remember what it was like to be a kid
I am there, in the dream , I had lived .
I tasted pure honey before I'd been kissed
Before years took their toll , wiped off
sugar -frosted pink from my innocent lips .
I might forget you for a little while
but when the last desert hues of sunset roses
wrap the bareness of these arms
Out of nowhere and without reason I think of you
Darkness falls and so my tears
but then the wind wafts its zephyr breeze
and exhales away my fears
My fears,the deepest of fears I ever fear
A pearlescent moon rises above an unshaped horizon
casting its opalescent glow upon my face
making me feel your warm embrace
Silver dust descends so softly
like your lips over my skin
It confirms you've returned back
from wherever you have been
Your return brings back the melody
as you love me unexpectedly
Oh my love come close ,Come lean on me
How you make the stars hush breathlessly
Once again you play your music
on the muffled strings of my heart
Once again the fluting sound of distant birds
fulfill two souls that can never truly part
Oh my love come close ,Come lean on me
How you make the stars hush breathlessly
Still,so still they keep our secrets
and would not reveal life's destiny
Tnks for the inspiration,not for the contest
(For those who wish to participate its the contest
-'How you make the stars hush')
The whisper of your skin
dissolving into mine -
the weight of it is kin
to that of wings of butterflies - divine
deliciousness I can’t define!
My precious love -
We meld into a sky of night that’s never been
so breathlessly partaken of
nor ever will again.
Exquisitely you paint my sweetest sin.
For PD's Any Poem # 28 Free Poetry Contest
She felt his presence by her side
Her first reaction – unimpressed.
She turned her head, a toss of hair,
The situation she assessed.
Maybe it was the dauntless smile
Perhaps the wicked twinkling eyes
The self-assurance in his poise...
Do warning bells ever suffice?
She sipped her drink and options weighed
He praised her looks and wispy gown
His flavoured words - delicacy
Her guard she weakly lowered down.
Till late at night beneath the stars
They danced to music, hands on hips
If ever doubts had crossed her mind
Erased they were by burning lips.
She found him suave and debonair
His face, ethereal, divine
Attentive eyes looked deep within
His lips still tasted of sweet wine.
The music played; he held her tight
Each sense alive and needing more
She whispered breathlessly to him,
"There's more to me you must explore."
Behind closed doors, he lay her down
And kissed each part that he undressed
Before her nakedness was shown
Her face he tenderly caressed.
"I will not take what is not mine;
You will not be a one night stand."
"My love," she said with bated breath,
You'll guide my life; I'll guide your hand."
A Callman Collaboration (Paul Callus and Eileen Manassian)