Best Deceptively Poems
They flutter and hover
And float on the breeze.
They shiver and shimmer
And weaken the knees.
Fickle and fragile,
They tickle and tease.
Fleeting and flimsy,
Deceptively free.
These frivolous creatures,
These knots of desire.
Once spindles of yearning,
Now spools of barbed wire.
Once pulling like petals,
Now pricking like briar.
Once soothing like honey,
Now burning like fire.
Violently thrashing,
It struggles to rise.
The truth comes up gasping
From whirlpools of lies.
Shed this charade
And discard your disguise.
I know you enjoy
Drowning blind butterflies.
Categories:
deceptively, loss, love,
Form:
Rhyme
How fondly he recalls when doting moon stared
Blush of her radiant smile gleamed opaline skies
While cuddling stellar vibes love they declared
And embracing her allure he venerated his prize.
In womb of romantic night passions-grand aired
Exchanging fervent vows, longing dawn of sunrise,
When revealing prurience every intention bared
In rhapsodic titillation euphoric feelings surmise.
Alas! soon emotions hid—dispiritedly impaired
When blissful times saddened hearing her cries
As souls, deceptively beguiled, no longer cared,
Silence between them grew stoking sullen guise,
For rise of whimsical day, woefully unprepared,
Shadowed glamorous arc, deeming fate unwise,
And upon sanguine horizons stygian storms flared
As the pledges of forever, destiny chose to revise.
She pleaded to forget the love they once shared,
Its flame was extinguished by whim of disguise;
Dreams they dreamt could no longer be repaired
Once the spark of aspirations abandoned her eyes.
Suppressions of emotions left them bereft, unpaired,
As lovelorn inhibitions roared, to spell their demise
Exiting prized fervor, forsaking dreams unrepaired,
Trapping unrequited love-vibes where passion dies.
May 10, 2022
Placed 1st: Pick-A-Title, Vol 30 – Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Edward Ibeh
Title Chosen: Internal Inhibition
Categories:
deceptively, angst, heartbreak, lost love,
Form:
Rhyme
Is there enough adjectives I can use,
to sew these sensitive sensations to you,
when my dandelion heart is
dense with combustible phrases,
and my sunken soul is weeping
into the weariness of wildfires?
They say beauty can never
be found in the dark,
oblivious to the
vibrancy of neon nights~
streaks of fluorescent flares glaring
above forests of flickering lights,
there iridescent colors run through the
skyline like vast vibratos,
filling my lungs with iridescent phrases
too enigmatic to roll of my tongue.
Yet your flourishing name
flows in flawless
frequencies through
this forsaken surface,
and I wear these wings drenched
in burning fresh-spring waters,
glistening in immeasurable
shades of opalescent feathers,
as the majestic moon still graces
my somber sky with all those
stolen smiles I’ve left unseen,
for I am but a floating spirit just
above demonic halos
that shine so deceptively,
carrying my strength wreathed in
fireflies fortifying
my faceless complexion,
where the only home to
my name is beneath the stars
in the wilderness of your
ambrosial affection,
whilst I keep sprinkling
traces of what is
now left in my empathy
that has been pinioned~
to the grains of gratitude
in gardenia love.
If only you knew, without you,
I’ll be trashed in turmoil,
wrecked in disarray~
you are the poetic reason,
I am an inked poem
woven with an iron quill,
rippling with amorous alliterations
and magnolia metaphors,
as the nightly creatures still lurk
in the shadows of
our twin-flame footprints,
constantly trying to seize
the alluring aurora that lessens
the miles between my electric dusk
and your honeysuckle dawn…
Categories:
deceptively, deep,
Form:
Romanticism
Satellites in space keeping an eye on the human race
Independence in place a parental pacified pallid pace
Gods of war prepare for their cadaverous command
Narcissistic lair in control of the deceptively damned
Obedient in oblivion MK ultra has barbarously begun
Facing fallacious delirium bullets bleed of killing done
Tyrants of time tenacious terminators of our humanity
Hellions in prime pandemic behind a venomous vanity
Evaporating echoes of morality ephemeral of the state
Thespian theological amnesty thermostats that negate
Idols of invasion indestructible in their satanic structure
Mellifluous minds into evasion ready to rapidly rupture
Escaping evil entities of illusion diner drugs of the day
Seduced by enemies of confusion that are here to stay.
April.23.2018
Sign of the times
Sponsored by: John Hamilton
...my thoughts and prayers go out to all the victims, family and friends…of the horrific Toronto truck massacre chain of events that happened April.23.2018… to the Toronto Police, first responders, and pedestrians who had to witness this great tragedy…for these are truly sign of the times…
Categories:
deceptively, conflict, destiny, humanity,
Form:
Acrostic
It was in July of 1945
And the USS Indianapolis
Had a crew of nearly 12 hundred alive
But a Japanese sub fired and did not miss
American sailors had completed their job
Delivering parts for the first atomic bomb
Some sank with the ship, others in the sea did bob
No food, few lifeboats, ocean deceptively calm
Surprise attack, no distress signal had been sent
It was four days later those floating were spotted
The survival rate was just 25 percent
With hundreds of sailors’ bodies the sea was dotted
In the movie “Jaws” as Captain Quint had related,
“The sharks came cruisin'. So we formed into tight groups.”
Six men per hour were killed while for help they waited
All were lost but 316 Navy troops
Some victims died of exposure or starvation
But far more were killed by the sharks that had attacked
These men lost their lives in service to our nation
But bomb parts delivered had a deadlier impact
One of the last ships that was sunk in World War II
The Indianapolis had turned the war’s tide
With a mission carried out by a courageous crew
Victory was soon celebrated by allies worldwide
This is an entry for the History Poems contest
Categories:
deceptively, history, sea, war, lost,
Form:
Narrative
deceptively black and white, like night and day
touching everyone yet never truly felt
colorless emotions lucent like crystal water
as ice fades into warmth of day, destined to melt
but a specter, a phantasm, a ghost am I
no more than a visitor in your dreams
unseen, a diminutive reflection of you,
a broken mirror, a thousand silent screams
no one sees me, no one hears me, no one
alone, so very alone, you look through me
like mist in the morning I fade in the light
am I here or a figment that you can't see
just a breath that tickles the back of your neck
invisible, easily brushed away, a mite
LOOK AT ME! I am here! a rainbow that needs love too
I'm real, I'm not so deceptively black and white
04/23/16
Categories:
deceptively, depression, loneliness,
Form:
Quatrain
Night's silent shadows softly fall
from moonlight's muted, mellow glow,
that shroud the land with sunless shawls
on cold ground glazed with glinting snow.
Tree branches, seen with broader breadths
by shadows that bestow their form,
splayed stark atop the snowy depths;
by wind, they swirl like snaky swarms.
Small bushes sway between the trees
to shadow snow like ghastly ghosts
that dance deceptively to tease
and harrow wary human hosts.
Pure, peaceful pageantry at night;
such lovely landscapes, to be viewed.
But, sometimes shadows strain our sight-
with varied visions misconstrued.
March 27, 2018
Premiere Contest: 2022 Poetry Marathon
Mile 6 Poetry Contest
Categories:
deceptively, moon, night, winter, word
Form:
Alliteration
Within the subtle soundless silence
There exist echoes of a lingering loud
My pendulous heart decrees in defiance
Such emotions plundered and ploughed
Like a geocentric giant guillotine
My lamenting love sacrificially sliced
My soul slaved in the Enigma machine
Where dreams are deceptively diced
The loving light battles the darkest day
And sorrows surrender at portals gate
For love barely escapes the submissive sway
Marauding memories reminisce and recreate
Stained surreal abiding accumulative art
A priceless painting of my Pendulous Heart.
May.20.2017
Pendulum of Time and Place - Contest
Sponsored by: Kai Michael Neumann
Categories:
deceptively, deep, lost love, pain,
Form:
Sonnet
*** Awaiting Inspiration ***
(written for my brother and sister poets)
Reaching for dreams in the black of my closed eyes, but sleepless,
I go on in music, out past radiant lights —
Bright and brighter — spreading beams that hold back off every
Fright plotted by the cornered, infernal shadows threatening
To overwhelm as they amass over meadows bordering
The forested wilds’ protection of those — hidden therein.
Those, who, in their God-graced innocence, their divinely destined lives,
From infant cries to elder wise; and who will survive
Keeping in the depth of their beings a spirit of truth with
A visible valiance — seen upon a look deep into their eyes;
While —- in this place — in this secrecy thick with trees — I alone
Am ready with pen in hand...to be their mirror…
For I am a documentarian of the hopes held
In humanity’s array of feeling hearts:
Whose stories I note
In the bounce of continuous city din; in tales recounted by farm folk
Walking between their grain-growing rows; and told in chanted
Prayers rising for the ill, the poor, the despairing…needed and answered.
Thus, holding visions and voices, I persistently proceed with my work,
First, with a necessary pulling at these pliant walls
Of the creative cocoon — its soft, loose weave deceptively
Can seem easily penetrable. Possibly God will respond to these
Cries for his collaboration. Meanwhile, alone, awaiting inspiration, I stay
With crayons in hand, watching the approach of a very rare snowfall in May.
*****. ******. ******. *******. ******. *****
Inspired by Milton & Dante, may be Part i of a longer work.
Thanks be to God…
Also for Charlie and Jim with thanks.
11/21-28 (c)S. Young Eslinger
Categories:
deceptively, character, christian, god, humanity,
Form:
Rhyme
Once there was
a tiny tree,
who wished itself
a lofty, wide-spread
oak;
longing to have
on him song-birds light...
to share a tune
to strum some beams
on full-moon night –
but the cat was
about, with a silent
foot...and the birds
knew Whiskers
like they wrote Grimms'
book – so the tiny tree
never got a second look –
but an angel up high
shrank deceptively small
and with a purposeful
stall, settled on the dwarf's
most prominent, yet near
ground branch
introducing herself
as a lost parrot
named Blanch –
and they sang
and hugged all the long day
only stopping at times just
to briefly pray (gratefully pray)
– and the cat,
quite lonely, for also a stray
made a fiddle of its whiskers
drummed with its tail
tapping a rhythm beat
on an old discarded pail –
Categories:
deceptively, cat, happy, humorous, music,
Form:
Free verse
I don’t answer
Intensely personal questions people ask
For these shreds to pieces what is truly me
The pieces are of no use to them though.
The effort seems to stem from veiled envy
Incisive curiosity or even subtle insult.
I am forced to uncover and introspect
Ask myself why I’m under the prying lens
For my life’s energy dissipates reorganizing
The dislodged pieces in place once again.
I don’t react
When caustic comments people make
On the manner I behave seems odd to them
Or on the way I do or don’t do things
For them when they ask or even for myself
For these are innate traits I am born with
Discarding or changing which for their sake
Or walk on their footsteps they set would be
To dispense with a vital part of my psyche
And to exist as a void entity of no identity.
I don’t demonstrate
The feeling of appreciation articulately enough
If people do something good to me sometimes
For that action appears an expression overdone
Deceptively laden with fake display of gratitude
Which in essence hides the tacit expectation
That the good done is what is deserved and due.
When for this trait people criticize my insensitivity
A part of my mind inherently obliged though
Is tortured to premature and painful demise
I can’t endure for I don’t deserve the treatment
And they aim to maim part of my bruised persona
I can’t rejuvenate for it does no longer respond.
People say
I have gone or going mad.
I tell them, yes, I’m quirky
If self-preservation makes one so.
That’s why I am alive still
As a mad man at my will.
I say to me
So let it be.
February 6, 2018.
Categories:
deceptively, me, psychological, relationship,
Form:
Free verse
i life
Reflections in the mirror increase resentment.
Tarnished heart pursues vengeful contentment
Disillusioned, you hide in fictitious make believe,
possessed by demons who purblind and deceive.
In your bogus twisted fabricated state of mind,
answers to your questions you shall never find.
Your fraudulent mask poses, deceptively concocted,
mocking with a grim masquerade you have adopted.
ii death
As your heart blackens with the absence of light,
Lucifer summons you closer, to his sheer delight.
Loved ones cannot save you from hell's burning heat,
there's nothing behind you but shadows of deceit.
Now that your toxic nature has begun to expire,
you can no longer suck energy like a vampire.
Nobody cares to listen to your forged confession.
There is only joy in the absence of your aggression.
iii after life
Pain like hungry howling wolves irritates skin deep.
After all this time, why do you sabotage my sleep?
Am I cursed that I see your silhouette in my dreams,
I'm struggling to ignore your torrid smouldering screams.
Why continue to haunt me like a vicious viper?
Firing shells of cyanide like a silent sniper.
iv remedy for change
I'm fortunate that my quill has become my shield,
for every wound, poetry is my remedy to be healed.
My ink is my saviour, bursting through my vein,
a catharsis for peace, as from hate I abstain.
Categories:
deceptively, angst, emotions, father son,
Form:
Rhyme
Alone together, we enjoy our time
and mostly we act naturally well.
We can be seriously funny too,
but deafening silence is hard to quell.
Found missing sometimes, a minor crisis of
impossible solutions that are made,
like eating tasty, tender jumbo shrimp
along with hot chili and marmalade.
And quite deceptively honest are we...
good grief, we are what's called terribly good.
Low-key, festive tranquility is ours;
we never are clearly misunderstood.
So pleased to be each other's larger half...
sweet-tart and butt-head, we are such a pair;
tight slacks, light tanks, and we are good to go.
Life's magic realism we do share.
Categories:
deceptively, fun, word play,
Form:
Verse
If anyone is impatient, by chance or choice,
Or too impatient to read my poems,
S/he must read this poem—at any rate!
Hopkins once heckled God:
“Why do sinners’ ways prosper?”
And did not stay for an answer!
The answer is:
Sinners, whether saboteurs, burglars, assassins,
Or any other characters of their ilk,
Seem to exercise far greater patience
Than virtuous humans!
Murderers are an exception,
Notorious for their impatience—
By courtesy of Daniel Goleman!
What is patience?
A deceptively simple question.
The dictionary equates it with waiting,
Putting up with annoyance,
And also associates it with work.
Its opposite is impatience,
Whose synonym is haste;
And its symptom restlessness.
Patience may be regarded as a frame of mind
(Based of course on some personal philosophy)
In which to wait and or work:
The spider is exemplary in both these senses.
Instances of waiting are aplenty:
Waiting for solution, resolution, results, etc.
But what do we do in the meantime?
Only patience and positiveness can tell us.
For Michelangelo, as for Newton,
Patience meant work,
Working presumably against odds
And towards perfection,
Which, in Gandhi’s idiom, is karma.
Work, then, becomes pleasure.
But waiting endlessly, eternally
(For whatever it may be)
Is something inconceivable, at any rate,
In God’s scheme of things.
Surely, there is some mistake—
Maybe in perception,
Or interpretation or computation.
God may be subtle, as admitted by Einstein,
But could never be wicked—as Satan was!
Categories:
deceptively, philosophy, psychological, religious,
Form:
Free verse
why cry thou of corrupt leaders?
why wailed of bribery and corruption?
which had feasted deep into the system
we all are victims of circumstances
stranded with an strange fear
In us it all started from the genesis
Because we we wanted too much
So much of the luxuries
Materials which fadeth in a hurry
however, in us discrimination grew hope and liveth
In us came selfishness smiling deceptively
in us lies wickedness of the soul
with wings so black and red like the crime some
In a thought that nature is a child
Who in hurry forget that which the law says
Have you forgotten the foretold prophecy?
We came naked and naked we must go
winds are tossing things about
High anarchy is loosed upon the earth
Chaos, and drumming of war sounds more dangerous
than hell.
things fall apart leaving the center sagging
We kill, betray, dump ourselves and,
nothing to hold unto in the terrible nightmare
who's fault?
In us lies the fault.
Categories:
deceptively, freedom,
Form:
Prose Poetry