Best Corrugated Poems
My Grandma smelt of peppermints.
Her kitchen of boiling bacon,
and margarine - it was always steamy
and 'welcomingly' warm.
The bathroom, off the kitchen,
smelt of carbolic soap, and a layer
of talcum powder dusted the cupboards
a reminder of its liberal use.
The garden, with a greenhouse,
had a glorious array of pinks
and Sweet Williams - it was always summer:
no winters here, always sunny, as I recall.....
The old corrugated air-raid shelter,
above ground now, was a haven
for childhood, childish games.
It smelt of paraffin from the heater.
My Grandma smelt of peppermints.
She would lick her hanky and
wipe my mouth if it was sticky
from the gingerbread she'd made.
My Grandma always looked the same,
never younger, never older:-
her memory etched in my cerebral
photo frame as I remember her ........
smelling of peppermints,
fingers deformed with crippling arthritis,
but smiling, wiping mouths, cooking,
or sitting in her little garden in a floral dress.....
She's been gone for thirty years now,
but still I see her there.
I see the tissue filled pockets in her
'pinny'and the pin-curls in her hair.
Yes, my Grandma smelt of peppermints.........
Gene stood. Skyscraper demanding. Cold steel.
Thirty-five hard years. Over now. Just like that.
Corrugated box. Family photo. Timex watch.
Bitter coffee.
Stale sweat.
He walked out. Sun blaze. Fireball. Air thick.
Sidewalk. Familiar corner. Man there.
Black skin. Weathered face. Cardboard sign.
Gene stopped. Eyes met. Silent understanding.
"Seen you," the man said.
Gene nodded. "Fifteen and a half years."
"Never spoke."
"No. Never did."
Gene sat. Concrete cracked. Chill. Hands trembling.
"Lost everything," he said, eyes downcast.
Shame heavy. Guilt girded.
The man waited. Silent. Eyes knowing.
"Wife. Cancer. Kids ghosted. Job now too."
Gene's voice cracked. "Wasted. Empty. Life."
The man reached down. Pulled out a bottle.
"Drink?" he asked.
Gene nodded. Took it. Swigged deep.
Bourbon burned. Good burn. Real.
"First honest thing. In years."
They sat. Shadows lengthened. City hummed.
Bottle passed. Back. Forth. No words.
Gene breathed. First time in years.
Bygone dreams. Flickered. Misty.
Husband. Father. Provider. Lost Purpose.
Night fell. Stars peeked. Traffic thinned.
Gene stood. Legs unsteady. Mind unclear
"Thanks," he said,
The man nodded. "Tomorrow comes" –
Gene stared out. Horizon blurred. “That was yesterday.”
Street light flickered. Old worn dress shoes.
A sound.
Empty bottle.
Spinning.
Parting gift. Timex.
Ticking...
As I
Soak in hummingbird’s exhale
I feel tragic sonatas
Trying to chain
Trying to crucify
My sedentary grip on instability
I smell the repugnant commoner
Blasting scattered shots
Against yesterday’s decent
I became the handsome error again.
The godfather of uplifting idle minds
Sedated within the bosoms of complacency
Because, indirectly, I was the inebriated screw-up
Immunized with community pride
As 420’d lyricists
Puff corrugated burns
To keep their spine
Fused in relatable,
Flaccid significance
They dodge flagrant accountability
Like an intentional cripple
And I
Slow dance with agnostic prayer
There would be no commandments
To remind me
That I am still beautiful inside
Beautifully flawed.
Beautifully demonized.
Beautifully improper.
Ugly.
Yet, Gaia’s sun empowers this stanza
To breathe better breaths
To see what refuses to be seen
And no longer accept what cannot be changed
I carve milestones upon gravestones
In friends’ memoriam, nevermore
It felt peacefully redundant to be important,
Chiseling away the vowels of animosity
Attempts to hold my hands
Within this ambidextrous nightmare
Right hand, red
Left hand, chained
Courteous disdain
For developing minds,
Their figure of speech
Meant no blissful harm
With their 40 lashes
Conjured by judgmental testaments
Oh, how they preach for better tomorrows
While stirring yesterday’s pot
Becoming the “end” in “friend”...
©D.J.E.
Inside this temple made of brick and clay
the many shades of your heart
are the prisms of my soul
Pinioned and shackled to your fires
we are vaulted by our own desires
two lovers breathing as one
Outside this prison of hell stands my nemesis
buried behind its boulders I am decaying
like a rotting apple de-pitted then discarded
Bitwise assaults to my soul,
I summon courage and finally break out
of this ridged corrugated pas-a-deux.
In the arctic frozen sky of the enchanting land the midnight sun
leans on the horizon briefly in bright summer and again it rises,
I didn’t know when a new day actually would have or had begun.
The frosty sky in winter night burns in flashes of aurora borealis.
The North Sea stretches the long arms through the blue fjords,
the visible heritage of the glacial deep scoop of the Pleistocene,
dissects the corrugated coastline as if sliced by the Viking sword.
I was held captive there for a long time by the magnificent scene.
To unravel the petrified mysteries of the Nordic Caledonian rocks
I crossed many dales and ridges of the geologic arc west of Bergen,
walked for days across the uninhabited islands where eagles flock.
In the cold crystal rains the shelter of the ancient caves I had taken.
On my travel I stayed a number of days in Lyderhorn, a small village
overlooking the tranquil turquoise waters of the narrow Loddefjord.
A gracious lady of the pretty house, Julia Aasen in her advanced age
gave me a furnished room at a rent that at the time I could afford.
She used to invite me for dinner at her place almost every evening,
offered me plate full of peppered boiled potato and hot fiskeboller,
slices of brown bread she baked with thick Jerlsberg cheese topping,
showed fondly the faded pictures of her late husband, a fish seller.
Time came to leave and say heart-felt ‘tusen tak’ on a freezing day.
She presented me a pair of woolen gloves she had specially knitted.
Years later when I wear these her frail touch they remotely convey,
I feel the warm heart of Julia of Norway although she has departed.
September 28, 2017.
Grant me pancakes trolleys
Rocket-fueled swingsets
Marmalade mountains
with high-crusting cream.
Seattle strings its polite passers
Among misting choirs of clouds,
So begging I go for dixie cups of chili
Steaming block by block, as a harsh July
Has every fourth day blue.
I wish for weather with wiggling hues
of pinks, rouge, and mauve,
Landscaped with blazeberries, lazer lemons, and fudge.
Fudge, fudge, for all with small children,
Young puppies, and dwarfed camels,
So we can ride slow, strong, and merry
in bliss-hoofed patterns.
My final wish of this corrugated ten,
Is to speak of such long tales, once rested and spent
Along the shores of our Lord, at the edge of these dreams.
In froths of a sky never ever ending,
she throttles like a half—shelled woman
slow to prance in the midst
of obedient breeze,
her movement wrapped
like a hundred cider vines...
How orange are her nights.
This hue burnt by sways
of corrugated leaves ; a crown
adorned with pearlized sequins
turning tangerine in kaleidoscopic
swirls of atumnal hues, this drift of
charmed elegance only fall can muster.
Seasonal Bliss Contest, Regina Riddle
I thought other people into little boxes
me over here and them over there
I thought I was being oh so enlightened
forward thinking and completely aware
I thought boxes would clarify my thinking
show me who's different and who was alright
Somehow I couldn't get people to fit them
it seems my little boxes were way to tight
I couldn't see what made them all loveable
What I was judging was tied to my own shame
Little boxes were my way of being superior
if they were in boxes it's them I could blame
I needed to escape my cardboard thinking
division and labels confused my closed mind
It blocked out the light of my compassion
no good in people was I able to find
Rain poured down soaking the boxes
baptizing my brain, expanding my heart
As my eyes opened, I started seeing
these corrugated boxes being torn apart
People where happy, my world expanded
Colour and kindness ruled the day
For each person, I became truly thankful
In their company I wanted to stay
Each person that I meet is a true treasure
I celebrate that they're different than me
Labels and boxes, they can destroy us
preventing us from being who we're meant to be!
Corrugated rhythm of the perforated heart
in the pulse of inspiration torn asunder, peeled apart
with the movement of discovery proving false in every start
as we danced the dance with no interpretation
Celebrated virtue of the lasting and the free
who have bent the will of romance glowing blind until they see
that the wise man is the single lonely voice in his decree
as they waltz the waltz with loneliness of footstep
Convuluted memory of the passion as we age
as our brain re-reads the paragraph on one determined page
where we left our heart with someone who in love did us engage
as we stepped the steps of someone else's dream
Corolated stringing of the music of the mind
in the heart beat of the moment I'm abated yet in time
with the fit of inspiration telling me you once were mine
as I pass the past a shadow reminiscing.
I have a picture of a barren land,
a moldy tree devoid of fruit and leaves.
Above the moon amid clouds rise gloomily
as no rays reaches the muddy land.
Look behind the tree, you'll see me there.
An evil stench carried on the night breeze,
sounds of horror coming from the dead
as clouds hide even the small consolation
of the rising full moon, yellow and bane.
Virulence rules, malevolence masters.
The breeze turns into a whipping wind
moans of ghouls and demons uncouth,
peace and common sense buried in the mud.
A cat named Satan walks up to a tree,
Scaly, sallow skin, corrugated and cold
evil eyes, oozing blood, look balefully at me.
Yet I am strong, I never give in.
I fought the inner demon and I won.
Tribulations come our way,
Temptations come, temptations go
for God will always care for me.
This is my Sgt Pepper Song
The 1 that never got on
Because this was not a Pop Song
More a delve into the truth a mirror of reality
Take a Drive with Me
And in less than an hour
This is what you will see
Amarulla Fruit covered in Beatles and buzzing Flies
Being sold in battered Old 1.5L Plastic Coke Bottles
By native women with babies strapped to there back
Anything for a Shilling or a Dime
Under African Sky
Burnt Red Sand under Bare Foot
Where the children while the days away
Yet
Some see poverty
Some cry slaves
Because they cannot comprehend
They measure not happiness
In terms of acquiring things
But take refuge rather in the simple things
A long walk to frreedom drinking water
And a Plot called Home
with a Corrugated Shack upon it
And nothing but Love
To reside within it
But ask a question
Speak no lies
Ask me if I wished to swap
My pampered life with 1 of them
Honestly I would have to reply
Sadly
No
Because selfish is
As selfish be
The Rich live Poor
And the Poor Die Happy
Bound by a communal sense of Electricity
That cuts through condescending patronizing sympathy
And unwarranted Charity
That in Reality
Only makes the Giver feel Better
And the Receiver a Debtor
Written: September 12, 2023
Ocean Poetry Contest Sponsored by: Ink Empress
“The sea is an underwater museum still awaiting its visitors.” – Phillip Diole
______________________________________________________________
In the endless expanse of the ocean's domain.
Calm, circumfluous crystal collides coiling terrain.
A bed of iridescence behests the view.
Turquoise riddles, azure feral, and true
Humpback whales waltz on the horizon stage.
Their majestic demeanor, the ocean's sage
Waves akin to a shroud, coral reefs below.
In a cerulean ebony, enigma utopia to know
Tidal waves waltz ripples in a twirling thunder.
Foams that fizz and fatuous horses canter under
An aphrodisiac shore, paradisal and grand.
Where quicksilver spume kisses saffron sands.
Barefoot on the shore, spate, and pelagic breeze
The brine in the breeze, a savor of the seas
Seaside pearls and garrulous nautical dreams
A seamount allure, where kelpies do gleam.
Waves wreck as cymbals, water splashes spray.
Unplumbed bedrocks where sunfish play.
Blase naiads and abysmal gaunt cries
In the abyss, the embrace of diastrophism rises.
Swell of the abyss, corrugated, and red.
Balboa sails in pits due to intricate coastal spread.
Nebulous littoral shores, worldly and true
In Japan splurge, a seabed quells the view.
With a caper and a queen, the gulf turns alive.
Natal seaboard, where nexus coldness does thrive.
Beyond the gloom, where ocean waves are silver,
Moonlight pulsates, spritzes, and yelps as a river.
Whipping and splashing, an aqua symphony
The ocean's orchestra in idyllic harmony
From abyss to surface, the music does swell.
A symphony of water, where stories do tell.
In the moonlit dusk, waves waltz and sway.
Their silvery, pellucid shimmer steers the way.
With every pulsating and splashing sound.
Ocean's placate melodies and quiddity abound.
Abyssal symphony is a seraphic sight.
Where nature's cynosure beauty bears flight.
Waves, akin to dancers, gracefully behoove.
In a rhythmic squirm, their sapidity grooves.
Susurrus slipshod secrets of the steep
Splashes of euphoria, sojourn, and sweep
A symphony of splendor, a chorus of grace
The ocean's melody is in every embrace.
2nd place contest winner
Please strike
the piñata
i have made for you
out of the stripes of paper
and the glue,
In the midnight hour
i have labored long
on this plump pig
of collaged letters.
with corrugated metaphors
Sightless Find the weakest point.
let that guide
your hand
the transparent rose
cellophane
wrapped candy
shall flow
in libation of sound
pour down
like a quirky rainstorm
bouncing
like silver
coins
on the sidewalk
of your mind.
Bouts of lightning flashes,swirls
And lightens up the pitch, black night
Of our neck of the woods
Tailgated by stealthy footsteps
Of growling, grunting, moaning and roaring thunder,
As in gnashing and grinding of canine
As rain, like beads of sweat, acne and goose pimples
Break out on my forehead and entire body,
Sprouting like yam tendrils from the earth;
meandering as water in rain gutter
From a million hair follicles,
Teasing my entire body
And finally docking by hook or crook
Like a boat at it's embedded tributary
Between my negritude toes
I google in consternation, bewilderment
At your obstinate attempt
As pestle on bits of grain in motar
To pound a defiant, renegade earth
Back against the wall in rope-a-dope
To submission and surrender
Powerful strokes of koboko whips
Descending from heaven
As plague upon pharaoh and his kinsmen,
Drumming endlessly on thatch roofs
And corrugated iron roofs alike
Concocting rhythms more intoxicating
And damning than heavy metal music
Images of African women
Resiliently scurrying, shuffling,
Between thatch huts and drooling rain;
Scuttling to retrieve rain water in pails
And ebony children
Drenched in rain like weather beaten bats
Savoring every drop from the whinning sky
Rain,
I yearn for your spirit
But dread your fiery, fury,
Flash and flood
Come rain, soak me in your mist;
Drape me in your dew and moisture
Rain,
Your ghost evokes succor and misery!
HEAT BY DEGREES (a semi erotic poem)
Feathered shivering fingertips
give way to erotic heat by degrees,
the hot-cool beat of lovers in cadence.
If, when on this journey of perplexing events
one learns about love's secret itinerary,
it would be wise to remember,
passion invites, the possession of which
varies in heat by degrees.
and with most individuals save a few,
like a drug, it subdues withdrawal pains
for just a short time.
When the caresses have begun to mellow,
trysts, in heat by degrees, again start to ascend
stealthfully lurking, to buoyant rising from
places deep in the corrugated shadows
of man's frenetic mind.
Infused, and fired with singular intention,
heat by degrees unabashedly exposes
greater levels of agitation and rushes forth
unrestrained by any rational reasoning.
Ah, but when basted by the tested
and proven love of blended familiar flavors,
the savoring of remembered exotic delights,
becomes richer and more pleasing and
the heat by degrees flames evenly
and ever so slightly down, waiting for love
to be served at just the right temperature.
C.A.K. 2-10-2013