Best Chided Poems
Behind the parchment screen and eye to eye Punch chided.
Who are you? Who is she? He’d point it out. You’d see.
No marionette with strings was he. Their paths collided;
Judy stands and faces his animosity
The play is writ by man and maid and staged to teach,
the right and wrong of woman’s position, our place.
Standing on two legs, she meets his gaze without speech.
What shenanigan have brought on this crutched lambaste?
Let us ponder Mr. Punchinell’s stance, his missing leg
let his two-eyed profile tease, has Judy been upstaged?
Stumped by the shadow lore, the punch, the audience begs
for the stiff-necked tirade to end her pick engaged.
Speared by humour, we see two realities spar on
with no means to run, the missing third prong’s a pun.
First Published by The Ekphrastic Review
Cliffs were sentinels reaching to the sky
Gulls chided my presence with loud decry
I scaled a hilltop to glimpse the sea
Piety washed in gentle waves over me
Never had I felt so humbled before,
watching fingers of foam fondle the shore
October 26, 2021
Bite Size Poem no24 Contest
Sponsor: Line Gauthier
Rose petals floated in the dusty air.
A few landed at my feet as I sat weeping,
remembering the playful way she teased me
on the day she painted the old picket fence.
"It needs to be painted," she chided.
Fingers of a brisk March wind
brushed through her hair. All I could do
was stare at her beauty, the blush of cheeks
much more lovely then her roses.
"My climbing roses are much too pretty
to rest upon this dreary old faded fence,
but I can do it all by myself."
She smiled and plucked one of her pink roses,
tipped it in white wash and presented it to me
with the most graceful curtsey I'd ever seen.
That rose had been drying on the mantle
since that day, now brittle, gathering dust
and as hard as I tried not to touch,
when I held it, the petals fell, one by one.
She's been gone for too many years,
and through each one of them I've cried.
Today I white washed that fence again,
and when her roses come in to bloom
my heart will be consumed with the vision
of her smiling face and the gift of a rose,
white washed by her gentle hand.
Tania Kitchin deserves to be honored for her courage. If you would like to honor her, send me your thoughts in couplet form. Thanks.
I have some recognition that I'd like to bring forth to all.
Thanks to Tania for having our backs and standing tall.
I’m proud of your character and standing up for what you believe.
I just want to say you’re awesome, and I hope you never leave.
Mark Koplin
Tania Kitchin, cheers to you for writing with lucidity
Your poem of the day carried its weight with validity
For the courage to write the truth, you were chided
But you should've been praised and not derided
Tania, you're being honored for taking a stand
You didn't merit the need for a harsh reprimand
Jenna Logan
I thought that I’d better pitch in
adding support for Tania Kitchin
She wrote her lines straight from the heart
though the POTD honour was soon to depart
I feel there was no need to apologize
Cos nasty soup trolls we all despise
Jan Allison
Why reprimand Tania? this really isn’t right
She was only highlighting not starting up a fight
My support I bring to this wee collab
Your back...so stand tall, we have it, we have!
Angela Tune
When confronted by trolls and bullies, Tania will speak her mind
A lady of integrity and steel, I think that you will find.
She like many of us here wants a quiet life without any fuss
And if what she wrote that day was wrong then I'm Sparticus.
Tom Cunningham
He tills within the buzzard's flight
this cruel land he calls his home,
ewe and wether, milk and bucket,
broken spirit, ne'er to roam.
He's stuck for good, the laws of nature
guide him, be they right or wrong,
gone his hopes and his compassion,
save for the curlew's mournful song.
Courted by the country lasses,
love can't penetrate this soul,
pain and grief his only help meets,
daily toil his only goal.
Mother, father, gone to dust now,
confidants who'd calm his fears,
struggling with a heavy heart,
internalizing all his tears.
It's back to digging, discompacting
stones and boulders from the earth,
working 'til there's no more sun
in Wales, the cradle of his birth.
Striving against the elements
he stretches every nerve and bone,
every muscle, every sinew,
'til exhaustion brings him home.
Ne'er a smile adorns his visage,
there simply is no time for this,
haggard, careworn, slave to nature,
racked by weather's wantonness.
Two weeks gone, and there they find him,
chided by the wind and rain,
cadavered and condemned to fester,
never to be sad again.
*******
...dedicated to the Welsh poet R.S. Thomas
and his book, 'Song At The Year's Turning.'
Is He watching?
When my tongue thirsts for sin,
Gamble my faith with filth,
When my tongue spills its worst,
My ears long to be filled with corruption,
When my fingers linger to steal,
My feet tread over and along faults?
Is He watching,
My unrepentant soul thrive?
Growing more in strength and glory?
Hardening it’s shield against good,
Gambling what is right and wrong,
Yet making the choice to dwell in the wrong?
Feeding itself with shades of deceit?
Is He watching,
When I am unrepentant but care less?
When I don’t consider His feelings?
Strive to please me rather than Him?
Meddle in the pleasures of earth?
Dump off the cares of my Christian race?
But I know the truth but become blind to it?
Is He watching,
When I return spite for His care?
Neglect His expensive price of love?
On a daily routine visit the gallow of sin?
Clad a false Christianity in my personality,
Yet judge others at the slightest fault? Still nurturing the hypocrite I protect.
Is He watching,
My unrepentant soul thrive?
My unquestionable strategies of pride,
When I stay balanced in the kingdom of the enemy?
Stain my soul constantly in mire,
Even when the truth hits me hard.
Brings to my realization how wrong I am?
Is He watching?
When I lay finally to my last rest,
And stand before Him to be judged?
When my soul headed to Him is rebuked?
When my deeds in my face is reproduced?
How my own vanity has chosen for me doom?
So helpless to reality I stand.
Is He watching,
My guilt wager my strength as I spare not tears?
My offense like chains stroke my existence,
Hangs my living in the face of death?
When my past with pride divulge my wrongs?
Plastered with faulty stains I forever I’m gone,
Lost to the sins I once chided unethical.
DO NOT STAY GENTLE INTO THAT SHELL
Do not stay gentle into that shell,
Old age and death sails to snatch your day;
Wake up against the quenching bell,
For many will think the dark is theirs to sell,
Because time has failed to open the heap of their bay,
Do not stay gentle into that shell.
Great men with great talent, now the wail in hell,
If they had had, the legacies would in silence pray,
Wake up against the quenching bell,
Wise men, who had their gifts in use and so well,
And now too late, they’ve chided with grief on way,
Do not stay gentle into that shell.
Grave men, rot with these gifts, I’m sorry to tell,
With great minds and ideas not heard, what I have to say,
Wake up against the quenching bell.
And you my comrades, with gifts and wisdom, I quell,
Pull out and do the unimaginable now and not to play,
Do not stay gentle into that shell,
Wake up against the quenching bell.
Some children arrived dressed as ghouls,
I asked don’t they learn dates in schools -
They’d come one day early,
Were rude and got surly,
I chided them as stupid fools!
A NEW Halloween Inspired Limerick Poetry Contest
8,8,6,6,8 checked with how many syllables
Sponsored by Tania Kitchin
10/21/19
Gather 'round me, my dears,
I'll continue the tale
Of a princess and her pirate lover.
Of her crown unencumbered,
They pillaged and plundered
As they wandered the seven seas over.
Crimes maritime were elating
And invigorating
'til Jack noticed a bulge in her tummy.
The princess first was offended,
But then she comprehended
He would soon be a dad, she a mommy.
Two months later, one morn,
Daphne's baby was born,
She said, "Time to rethink our position.
If we stay here, our child
Will grow wicked and wild,
We must provide better, milder conditions."
Jack's crew were confused
When he told them the news,
All they knew how to do was be pirates.
None of them had a dime,
And all too far past their prime
To go home and move in with their parents.
Jack chuckled and chided,
Their fears he derided,
And then much to their mirth and enjoyment,
He said, "We'll start a new industry
That sells hospitality
And offers year-round and seasonal employment."
Do you remember the king?
That mean, stingy old thing
Died alone in his big empty palace.
But before his reign ended,
His will was amended,
And Princess Daphne inherited alles.
She thought the place would work well
As a swanky hotel
Or a posh B&B just for pirates.
But Mad Jack and his gang
Were arraigned and then hanged,
They should have kept their retirement more private.
And thus, dear ladies and dudes,
My narration concludes
About Daphne's and Jack's days of glory.
She turned her dad's mausoleum
Into a pirate museum
And made a killing, some say,
Conducting tours every day
For visitors who'd pay
To hear a pirating princess' story.
Europe's concerned
The world will burn
Russia's a tad worried
Her ambitions may be buried
Mr. Obama's lashed out and chided
His country's withdrawal as "seriously misguided"
Ordinary residents of the Middle East
Do not want to unleash war's beast...
High up in the sky
Beyond where eagles dare fly
One angel confessed to the Good Lord, his Friend:
I was counting on Mr. Trump
To act like a Chump--
Did he? ~ 'Think the world's gonna end?'
A spirited moon skipped and skid
across the silent snowy steppes
as a pale sun sidled and slid.
Her passionate sensuous steps
softly seduced the stars to shine
across the silent snowy steppes.
I beseeched the night to be mine,
singing a sentimental song,
softly seduced the stars to shine.
The Milky Way formed a sarong
surrounding me with deep desire,
singing a sentimental song.
I followed lustily in dire
need of fragrant vanilla grace,
surrounding me with deep desire.
The mystical night chided me,
a spirited moon skipped and skid.
Her radiance had blinded me
as a pale sun sidled and slid.
Treasure Once Found Within An Enchanted Forest Dream
With cravings of Love's joyous shout
as warmth of rose in full sunlight
casting its dappled shades about
hot flames, ardor's red-throes excite...
and within soft glows, its amber shine
the fairy goddess became mine.
Robert J. Lindley, 10-09- 2019
Romanticism, (What A Young Poet Once Dreamed To Find )
Note- After be chided for my not more often writing any softer, sweeter , romantic pieces, I took note and decided to sit a spell and let passion send its romantic fires to kindle flickering flames that once so burned my soul in my youth.
This short piece flowed forth and resisted my mighty tempting urges to lengthen it.
Actually, about forty years ago, I wrote about a hundred poems similar to this, in content ,in passionate embrace of the blasting fires that once stirred a young poet's seeking heart.
They say just there beyond the valley, that
there lived inside a house, a little cat
who never went outside to run and play;
she had to spend her time indoors each day.
Beside the window, curled up on a chair,
her heart was saddened by the nasty glare
of every cat that passed within her sight-
with eyes of fear and looking for a fight.
One day, a while back, she’d gone outside,
but never stayed out long- came in to hide.
The kitties laughed and chided her, and so
would not befriend her; she became their foe.
They called her Rainbow Cat- her owners named
her that, because her fur was brightly flamed
with colors- yellow, green and red, and blue
laid out in arcs; like rainbows, her fur grew.
Now Rainbow Cat, aware that she was shy
and different from others that passed by,
began to think of other ways to cope-
to make them like her- so there was some hope.
She thought and thought, whatever can I do
to let them know beneath this colored ‘doo’
there lives a nice smart kitten just like them
and, not a kitty cat they should condemn.
That night it came to her within a dream;
come morning, she began to smile and beam.
Her owner left the door somewhat ajar
as they left home for shopping in their car.
Her bowl of yummy dry food in the room
was filled up to the top and without gloom,
she carried dry food nibbles, one by one,
out through the door onto the porch, till done.
She stood beside her feast- began to eat;
and soon the cats came by, did not retreat-
But, closer to the porch they came to see
that Rainbow Cat had planned a cat party.
They came to share the feast each, one by one,
and Rainbow Cat was happy they had come!
The cats now saw beneath her rainbow fur-
she was a kitty just like them and purred.
November 2, 2014
~1st Place~
Contest: Sweet Fairytale For Children
Sponsor: BJ Legros Kelley
Judged: 05/06/2023
~1st Place~
Contest: Fable to the Rescue
Sponsor: Carol Eastman
Judged 11/18/2014
Moral: Never judge people by how they look:
What is inside is what really counts.
Girl
Baby
Born last month
To brother’s wife
An ocean of joy to grandma,my mom
Were you so glad Ma, when my son was born
I dared to ask
Teasing her
Just for
Fun
Shush!
Stop it
Silly girl
Gulp down envy
She chided me like I was ten years old
Written on:07/15/2016
One percent milk chided the butter about its worth,
And the eggs got all cracked up at the stock boys’ jokes.
Nutty candy bars laughed joyfully at all the mirth,
But all shunned the outcast; a pack of generic smokes.
Ground Chuck had just been through the grinder
Yet he was glad when he encountered fresh, hot buns.
Over in health and beauty, condoms became a reminder,
Trash magazines spreads all; Hot and cross rolls share puns!