Best Dredged Poems
Many ingredients bake writing inspiration.
This recipe combines a stirring sensation:
Heaps of desires never realized
as marinated in teary sore eyes;
Quantities of wide open spaces
caramelized by nature’s appeal;
Ageless genuine emotional traces
sifted thru heart rendered graces;
Equal parts family and romantic love
as roasted within, without and above;
Measured creamed ideals of peace
with blanched pain and battle grease;
Diced wishes braised with thrill
bearing aromas of tangy heat or chill;
Slices of awe from a glorious tree
breaded with traits strong and free;
I do not forget sour spices of greed
dusted with mankind’s violent seed;
A mix of fears dredged in anxiety
with stress jelled in complexity;
and, lastly, faith garnished spirit
grown in a soul conscious thicket.
If able, I mix love with ingredients above
before sampling my recipe once warmed up.
If savory, I enjoy serving in poetry cups.
Categories:
dredged, desire, food, how i
Form:
Rhyme
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That Which Held Me In A Magical Spell
That which held me in a magical spell
Dark, its winding infinity and heart
Its red beach, covered in sad broken shells
Shreds of humanity once torn apart.
Within hard gaping gasps and stormy sea
Beauty once trampled in mad haste and greed
Else sadden look at folly within me
Why on our own swords we oft fall and bleed!
Deep thoughts and those silent murmurs in life
Echoes of cavernous pains, woe'some woes
Memories dredged up by dire worldly strife
So well hidden that no fear ever shows.
Mortal wondering, malevolent things
Deep sorrows and aches they come and they go
Weak flesh blundering(s), as a dark star sings
Each a dead corpse as lost and blind we row!
That which set me in a revolving maze
Phantasms of meanderings through deep hell
Gasping fears brought on by insipid craze
To search those nightmares we should never tell.
LO! Dare we unsavory black explore
Dawn armor to such inner sanctums raid
Seek long sought answers while we ask no more
Than devil's touch and the cut of his blades?
Robert J. Lindley, 6-28-2020
Rhyme Dark, A bold look inward..
( On the inner ponderings of the human soul
and life's many paths taken )
Categories:
dredged, appreciation, creation, dark, deep,
Form:
Rhyme
Painting You
Before painting, I first sketch you
In my mind’s eye…To compose
The lines, shapes, shadows and lights,
That work altogether to form a semblant sight
Of you for any relative, friend or acquaintance…
Next, I embrace the required courage
To face the blank canvas; to dip my brush
In sublime tones for my wild orchid wishes,
Wanting to stroke across the heavens
For reflecting starlights bright,
Which I’ll situate to split the darker places
Where the inks bleed and branch out
Around you, smudging your purest colors…
That I endeavor to recover
When illness tries to smother
You with a viridescent blanket for on-going days;
Cloaking the glance of your azure blue eyes;
Pulling gray and white from your skull
To streak through your forest brown hair;
Rushing flag red moments to your cheeks
When you growl, “No. Don’t—“ when I
Try any way to help you through the fevers
That hang dredged plum-violet clouds over
The sofa — away — where you stay sleeping…
While I sit crimson awake worrying,
Watching you breathe…And asking
Through faith’s golden prayers for your healing;
For our holy Lord to send some ministering angels
— With their glistening opaline feathered wings;
Who side by side, place hands on you ~ veiling
My first view of prayers’ answers coming true;
Lifting me to a bloom of rosebud gratitude.
I paint you never far.
I paint your ocean blue eyes opening.
I paint you always beside me in a sandcastle brown.
I dapple the air over us an effervescent pink.
I paint your prism presence close.
I paint your mid-night’s Arora Borealis dancing hues.
Our love is a stippled, rolling color wheel
Of our linked diamond destinies: journeying
Together on amber roads under sapphire skies.
—————————————————
(c) sally young eslingwe 10/17-18/2023
Glory to God…
Categories:
dredged, color, devotion, feelings, health,
Form:
Imagism
No pagan crown of fossil lairs
Of him I write no verse nor song
T’is not a soup to stir nor share
When lending strength, to something wrong.
Seconds cloned from darkest matter
Mutated minutes dredged by fear
Mind confusion as reason shatters
Innocents lanced by emotion's spears.
Flowers edge the steps and fences
Prayers are uttered near a shrine
Notes of love, as grief commences
A vigil wrought by hearts sublime.
Picking up the scattered pieces
Light must shine to crack the dawn
Support can smooth the furrowed creases
Only hope can make their spirits strong.
Categories:
dredged, confusion, dedication, places,
Form:
Ballad
My boat rocks gently under a reddening sun,
is it wrong to wish for a Viking burial,
to ponder a last journey West
into the dying light?
Strangers have always been my friends,
they intuit
the liquid and inflammable nature
of this thing we do.
I could rest my soul here in this skiff
on this one long warm wave of evening;
let the wooded lands and sloping meadows,
the dredged, smoke-stacked barge brimming ports,
the patched up river towns slip on by
under the kindling sails of evening clouds.
I am laid out like a homeless person
bundled up in my rags and tinder,
a shadow in a small boat, drifting.
Night falls to the water
the words of strangers flame high
fire starters and their poems gleaming
as the dark rushes in.
I hitch the boat to a stump of land,
still imagining a Viking funeral,
but also resigned to a tomorrow -
yet another strange place
to play with this fire.
Categories:
dredged, poetry,
Form:
Free verse
Dredged from the depths of a shaken Sennen seashell
she hears once more his voice, low, sonorous tones, sees the bones
of her past laid out, splayed out, another story
playing out, can feel it in her bones,
his voice burrowing in, deep beneath skin,
a cold blade digging in, the tide coming in,
shrouds of sea mist closing in, the veil blowing thin,
membranes of memory breaking...She sees anew the drowning seas,
sees for the first time his strangling hands,
pebbly skulls, seaweed ropes, skeletal fingers of coral
forcing bone-white wrecking lights into her cove...
Bone-bleached semen strands, Sennen's strand stretching
soiled sand before her like life or fate, grains like pulverised bones.
His dark-dune lurking, water-window watching,
waiting for riptides; a ripping of fabric, ripping of hymen,
sea-hymns now silent on salt-sheened lips
plump-pouty with youth. It's sordid, uncouth,
the salt sprinkle of sea-sweat sheening his skin,
the breath and the fingers quickening,
the coral's rough rigidity piercing, ejaculation of sea foam...
Buried deeper than bones, the sudden rush of memory waves
rattling bones of the past, shaking Sennen seashells.
Gulls screaming into the guilty hush.
Secrets hidden by sea-silenced sand.
Categories:
dredged, abuse,
Form:
Free verse
When fearful voices in the night began to cry,
Roaring from countless dreams behind the scream,
Dribbled eyes gazing into darkness at the vast sky,
This darksome turn, down into a wet pool of frown.
Perhaps the living of everyday hurts so much
Being stuck in this world always fooling around,
Dredged with pain and despair of being watch,
Drowning with whatever pleasure can be found.
But I feel far away from the depressed bridge
Hearing echoes of merry din sounds in the distance,
Lapping floating charge, cleared and cheered the barge.
Sent in the midst, to bring glorious untwist deliverance.
Into space where stars reside in overwhelming glory,
There is only thing in life more radiant and beautiful
As the reflections beaming from an infinite galaxy,
It is a sultry truth that slides down far into our soul.
The jewels of love shines brightest in the human heart,
With universal temptations from acres of diamonds,
Shining brightly in the vast atmosphere of perfect light
Filling all the void of emptiness with unique demands.
Let love break down the walls that surround the region,
With the Eternal Light selected source of happiness,
And move belief to fill our days with deeper expectation,
By discovering love, the smoothest jewel of bliss.
Categories:
dredged, allusion, beauty, dream, faith,
Form:
Imagism
TO PRESERVE YOUR HEALTH
YOU MUST RESERVE YOUR DATE AND TIME
TO ENTER THE EMPIRE OF DEATH
“Arrête, c'est ici l'empire de la mort!"
Sign in Paris Catacombs
SKELETON OF PARIS
i dared each dank step
into the catacombs of Paris
thank the Lord
each step was not
creaking bone
i’d descend, of course
my choice, my feet
move into the nether
the deep dark secret tomb
a heavy door
surreality adorned
below the stinking streets
the foul history
of death
dredged up
from six feet deep
dusted and cleansed
the mandibles,
joints, heartless
bones
the boneyard quarry
accentuated death
having a new spin
on “putting our heads together,”
a collaboration of dust
the bleak hallway, I dare
not touch, i cross myself
ashes to ashes, dust to dust
attempting to stay in the center
of the narrow way
O the clink and clank
the synergy
that will fuse these bodies together
at the end of time
who will be the first to awaken?
will he or she faint away
as they discover
their dissected bones?
The artful remains of Robespierre, Lavoisier,
Danton - the dearly beheaded come to life,
guests of downtown…way downtown Paris.
Upwards of seven million squeezed together.
The leap of disease…the health crisis relieved.
1/13/2022
Categories:
dredged, death, paris,
Form:
Free verse
The sea was a whisper before it was water,
cleaved through the wind.
I stepped into its silver mouth,
waves curling something pressing in
a wistful longing for a past I never knew.
Seagulls traced ethereal designs across the expanse
their wails scattered like fragments.
Somewhere underneath the foam,
the past was fossilized within sedimentary strata
waiting for my hands to delve deep enough to find it.
The tide came in more forcefully
and I thought of to how love in this way
always arriving, always leaving---
sometimes tender, sometimes intense enough
to split the coast in two.
When it ebbed, it left behind more than remnants of a disaster,
it embodied the ideal I sought;
calmed by the steady undulations of the sea,
gleaming in calmness;
as if the tide dredged up
on the verge of being forgotten.
Categories:
dredged, emotions, longing, loss, love,
Form:
Lyric
It was the day I wanted the most
Yet dreaded as the worst,
Seeing the jumpmaster’s eyes
Way up there in the sky,
Waiting for the scream
“This is a paratroopers’ dream
Stand in the door—lean and mean!”
C130 paratrooper’s Jet, 1500 feet above earth
M16 Weapon by my side, ready to hit the dirt
Knees bent as a dog’s leg on the ledge
Crackling nerves on screeching edge
Cotton dried mouth like a Sahara’s wedge
Soldier before me threw up his lunch
Stomach flipping—fear gripping
Paratrooper’s static lines scraping, moving
Shinny brand new paratrooper’s boots
Shivering to a shuffling groove
Trembling to its new roots
Cold palms slippery from sweating
Camouflaged face twitching like electric shocking
Eyes like a road map dredged with red
Boots shuffling towards the elliptical edge
Heard the jumpmaster’s words
“Go, go, go—jump soldier!”
I felt like a lonely hanging leaf
Growing from the side of a cliff
Just dangling in the breeze
Like a trapeze with distance in between
The moment of truth arrived
Saw the green paratrooper’s light
Heard the Jumpmaster’s voice—“Go!”
Cannonball leap into the rushing breeze
Wings of angels—still praying all the more
One thousand…two…three…four…
Parachute opened above—“Puff!”
Then I knew from the Lord
As I descended safely below
I am still His beloved!
Categories:
dredged, adventure, dedication, faith, life,
Form:
Narrative
Like many merchant vessels
That sailed from our Mersey shore
This sturdy piece of timber
Can hold its own in tales of yore
A dried up piece of flotsam
Washed up on Wirral banks
Was dutifully cleaned and dressed
And a verse written on its shank
Amid the other bits of timber
That made up the Black Pearl
This poem had taken its place
With the many flags unfurled
Everything in Pearl had stories
Of pirates tales galore
Made up, true or invented
No one really knows for sure
But each made up this pirate ship
That was not built in any dock
Neither wind nor tide could shake her
Sturdy on her rock
And then one day a storm rolled in
December Twenty thirteen
Unleashed torrential fury
That until then none had seen
Tempest battered Black Pearls flanks
Steadfast in the wind she’d sway
Ripped viciously at her robust planks
Sadly some things were washed away
One of these was this poem
That a little boy had wrote
Whose parents could not see the ship
Now at sea awash did float
Although lost in the Mersey’s waters
Both brown as murky tea
This poem on wood was never lost
Nor did she sail back to sea
Instead with the tides it ebbed and flowed
Liverpool’s docks had called it there
From where it may have started
No one knew or even cared
And then one day some months ahead
Lewis Baigent found sure fame
For bobbing in dock waters
He found the very same
Words still clear upon the wood
Not a letter out of place
The chain and rope still part of it
And the skull and crossbones face
The word got round to Black Pearl’s crew
The booty was held and fast
They sent a party to redeem her
To be returned again at last
To take its place once again
Upon famed Black Pearl’s hull
And stories, myths and legends
Will abound ‘til we are full
Of yarns and tales and stories rich
One greater than the other
Dredged from imaginations
And narrated without any bother
So gather round my children
Mums and dads and more
Dogs and cats and grown ups
And you loiterers on the shore
For what I have to tell you
Is not all just hearsay
This poem has ventured near and far
But has been returned this day
Categories:
dredged, adventure, boat, celebration, community,
Form:
Ballad
I frequently have a day,
When I merely need space;
To clear my mind of things,
And get thoughts in place.
I've little to talk about,
No worthwhile thing to share.
Eyes frozen on something,
I just sit, think, and stare.
I think about moot things,
Or perhaps friends I've known.
Dredged deep from my past,
For whom fondness has grown.
So don't take it personal,
Those times when I seem distant.
I just desire some space,
That's why I'm resistant.
Categories:
dredged, space,
Form:
Lyric
All wars scourged bodies and souls--
Torn spirits and dredged feet of the fowls
Ravished by rabid gargoyles of prey
Scuppered dreams of the reapers of hay
Wars circled the world of May
'tis emblem are ruins and remnants of flay
Wars for peace can be penned on paper
Words and spikes of chivalry of the bleeder
Ink flowing out are veins of the fighter
Scrawled blood purged from the might of the writer
Categories:
dredged, conflict, death, dream, peace,
Form:
Verse
Your waters cleanse
my red-stained night,
my dredged thoughts,
rich petals drenched
between crystal and lace.
Do not pretend to dry of earth
or lips or veins.
Do not speak
without a moistened tongue
of love or spring in bloom.
My softest buds shall wilt,
brittle without your flume
flowing free in streams of rouge.
My reddest rose shall close,
alone to wither, brittle and brown.
For now, deepen in your sleep.
My love's rebirth shall lift your dreams
before they drift away
in June's tides, and I shall
float like moon beams
over your rising waves.
Categories:
dredged, flower, night, passion, spring,
Form:
Free verse
They were as Jonah was,
cast down into the belly of the whale
They were soon to experience
every unimaginable horror on this ship of hell
On the voyage of the damned,
you hear the cries of the condemned
Be prepared to die as well,
unless God chooses to intervene
A lot of souls won't make it
on the food they were given to eat
Rancid water, spoiled bread
and maggot infested meat
That rank disgusting swill,
you wouldn't even give to a dog
It had the most foul stench ever,
as if dredged from the filthiest bog
On the voyage of the damned,
you hear the cries of the condemned
Be prepared to die as well,
unless the captain wants to hear you sing
You got whipped for moaning too loud,
'cause you're hurting from being whipped before
You got beaten longer than the last time,
as someone you knew was getting beat even more
The drunken prince and the devout priest
are both chained and bound together
The greatest as well as the least
are each tossed off during stormy weather
On the voyage of the damned,
you hear the cries of the condemned
Be prepared to die as well,
unless the cook becomes your friend
Tortured wails in the night
prevent you from getting much sleep
You can't afford to get too sick
from the rough waves of the deep
Or you'll get pitched overboard
to the insatiable trailing fins
Don't be the last to follow orders,
or you'll be the next one thrown in
On the voyage of the damned,
you hear the cries of the condemned
Be prepared to die as well,
unless your body can satisfy ten men
You're surrounded by diseased walls
and an unbreakable trap door
Your clothes reek of a piss odor
from laying on the excrement covered floor
Each day you desire death
within this cruel house of motion
Each night you always pray
this death ship sinks in the ocean
On the voyage of the damned,
you hear the cries of the condemned
But if that ship of woe reaches land,
a new and different kind of hell is awaiting
Categories:
dredged, death, evil, pain, slavery,
Form:
Epic