Best Dumbly Poems
"Oh, dear! There's a lion in my tumbly,"
Winnie the Pooh, said, "I'm feeling numbly"
I'll climb up the tree and get some honey.
Nothing' like sweet honey on a sonny
Day near the honeybees playing dumbly.
2/16/2022
Categories:
dumbly, fantasy,
Form:
Rhyme
Hand reached through
to pull you through
Ill always do that for you
I held you closely, caring closely
you drench my shirt in tears
But after all the years
I've lifted, held you up
said words to build you up
You stand firmly now
tred your own ground
walk side by side, you and I
til that day I tripped fell
stumbled down swiftly
You never broke pace to lift me
Striding on, not looking back
I lay there, looking on dumbly
Its your heartless way that numbed me
Categories:
dumbly, people
Form:
Free verse
With women the heart argues, not the mind.
MATTHEW ARNOLD, Merope
1. The stand of old growth Melalucas, graces the lowlands of our farm.
For over fifty years, accumulations of leaves have formed small soft islands.
“With selective clearing,” my husband says, "larger areas of grassland will grow.
More grazing for the cows and less hay we’d need to buy in Winter."
Inwardly, I lament, not wanting to lose the beauty of these trees
with branches that rise like huge broccoli bunches against bright blue skies.
My husband, much harder, by necessity, over-rules my sentiments.
2. Conveniently, earth-moving machines appear early on the first day
of the New Year. They cut a long swathe
but on the dam are left a large row, marked by me,
for sanctuary.
They cast reflections on the still water.
3. The felled trees are piled into rough heaps. Prophetically, the car
of the Inspector for Primary Industries appears.
“You must know, these are protected trees.”
He asks for permits (not granted) and orders a ‘cease and desist.’
His scowling looks are an indictment.
4. For months the operation was on hold
and, then the rains came and the floods—almost our undoing.
Flocks of water-birds occupied the flats, nesting on the islands
formed by the grassy hummocks. When these waters receded,
an overgrowth of young melalucas sprouted, where the old trees
had once stood. A network of roots underground had signaled
a catastrophe. New nodes erupted along all the root-ways.
Dumbly they announced their guardianship of the swampy land.
“Give us back to time,” they said , but the un-relenting slasher
leveled them again, so grass could grow.
5. I go back into my house now, secretly pleased the trees are speaking.
The topaz flames from the fireplace, warm my bones.
The hoary frosts have come. The envelope containing the D P I’s
decision waits on the mantel shelf, propped by a row of grazing, ceramic cows.
From the window I see our cows enter between the Melalucas.
They graze on the new growth pasture.
I warm my hands, as the flames lick firewood.
The scent from Melaluca smoke haunts me.
Suzanne Delaney
365 words
Categories:
dumbly, angst, confusion, environment, nature,
Form:
Free verse
Put on a happy face
when I release taut fingers
from your pallid cheeks.
Promises and empty lies
are sported clichés
that spoil a silenced vocabulary.
A quieted understanding we've
vocally committed to;
barks a matted-jackal’s constitution -
perceiving morose consequences
of blind subservience.
Put on a happy face
and fetch me dinner.
Ever flickering nuances,
once ignited a Brigadooned morning sunrise -
where woolen-blackened comforters
backlit our sordid differences.
Now, our prom attire has been burned.
The carnations, the orchids - have perished.
The beguine hasn’t begun.
It has ended.
Finalized and fortunately forgotten.
A pale orchid-colored icepack,
for your left eye,
would match your handbag and shoes
quite nicely.
Put on a happy face
and lint-guard the
disheveled derelict.
Forever falling forward, we've suddenly landed.
No need for saline solution anymore;
I cry when I hap hazardously laugh.
A silenced vocabulary realized the words
tryst and trust was separated by one letter;
why or you…or me, for that matter
completes the unfinished symphony.
The disenchanted beguine
floats into a tear-filled
Cinderella dank nightfall –
as I stare into the cornea of a
brittled pink carnation.
My hand, like a fringed strop,
needs to remove the strains of
a “Mea-Culpa” leitmotif and flog
the iniquities of one’s self.
Put on a happy face, goddamnit
and tell me
why you’re gone!
Toasted marshmallows is a perfume
created for misguided Girls Scouts.
Fervent mongrels who refrain from selling
photo-pressed carnations and
poisonous orchids - dumbly courtsey
when idiotic
adolescent daydreams prevail upon
the blatantly obvious.
Thirteen stitches
and a numerous array
of callous welts
reprised our endless beguine.
Passion is said to perish in embers.
One last charcoal
for us
to eye and envy.
A burnt carnation.
A scarred, trembling orchid.
The smoldering remains we'll inhale -
when this lost and lonely
soldier removes the
smudged greasepaint from
his broken fingertips and eyelashes
to painfully and pitifully
put on a happy face
just for you.
Categories:
dumbly, on writing and words,
Form:
Free verse
In the silence lies a mortal wound
a voiceless arrow has struck
dumbly it thunders
identifying
final innocence crushed
Exquisite is the torture of a silent stare
holding every vanquished embittered care
Somewhere beyond an emotional peek
where tears find a language to speak
The silence of utter failure
the throws between a life and it's death
the hush of a dream at once impoverished
as you witness it's final breath
Sound buried in the void of explanation
mute the muse of words
suspended only notwithstanding
owned hope of his and hers
An endless pause hangs in between
as your grip slips knowing what it means
Words so deafening only silence can bear them
when the strong have no defiance left to live
in the soundless silence already condemning
the living who can't endure it again
In this silence so inaudibly hearable
so cruel so brutal it's sound
the pitch of which is so unbearable
the deaf cry... Turn it down!
Categories:
dumbly, hurt, sorrow, sound, spoken
Form:
On July first
There was a lockout
Players couldn't play
It almost knocked me out
Games got canceled so I couldn't see
The New York Knicks play on TV
But how did it happen?
Do you really know?
I will tell you everything
That you want to know
First it started with people getting greedy
That's why the deal is not 50-50
Its both the players and owners fault
It should have been 50-50
From the start
Never should have been 57-43
In favor of the players was chosen dumbly
But now there is a new CBA
BRI is 51-49 to this day
And now the season starts on Christmas day
Now you have heard what I have to say
It started on Christmas
That's checked off my wish list
Now it is a lot of fun
The NBA is not done
66 game season
That’s a reason
To give all you got
And to take the open shot
There were games on Christmas
You didn't want to miss this
I got to see the Knicks
Plus Carmelo's new kicks
There were a lot of cheers
Six days from New Years
New year of basketball
All teams will have to fall
It is all the same
It is not a new game
But no teams are locked in
For playoff contention
But who will get there?
30 teams are in the air
Categories:
dumbly, sports, christmas, christmas, new
Form:
Rhyme
Corpulent cottagers clapping like clowns
a fat Friday festival, gobblers and gowns.
Merry mad munchers of muffins and mirth
do-si-do dumbly, eaters of earth.
Champagne sugar shoved in a shoe
If love lasts not long, love handles will do.
Categories:
dumbly, devotion, family, happiness, husband,
Form:
Alliteration
The poet to his garden went
To ease a potent, lingering grief;
He thought his sadness might be spent
If he could eulogize a leaf.
The sunshine was as fresh as mint.
The crystal dew, the virgin morn
And some lone songbird dumbly lent
Their succor as relief of scorn.
And so he penned the songbird's trill,
Perfecting it in hours late,
Not knowing that the sweet and shrill
Melodious call was for a mate;
Not knowing, too, that what he wrote
Beneath the fire muses sent
Was word for word and note for note
Exactly what the songbird meant.
Categories:
dumbly, bird,
Form:
Lyric
Why was I given these eyes that hide
Behind this clumsy heart-
Hands and knees forever searching
For an honest soul?
It feels as though we're wringing water
From a dusty rag.
It feels as though we're submerged in longing
Ever drowning in our thirst.
Why was I given these eyes that grope
For another’s warmth,
When love is fired through a gun,
Or taken from a calloused hand;
Sight has cursed my heart to see
The naked spent to dust.
Blindness,
Kiss me with your tasteless lips and I will see no more.
I will not see their tears through mine,
I will not see their laughter;
I will not see their careless words,
Looking dumbly after.
I will not see their hateful glares that only’ve seen hateful eyes.
I will not see their broken ears that never hear my broken cries;
They’ll all be black to me.
Jacob Reinhardt 09/11/2013
Categories:
dumbly, addiction, angst, art, beauty,
Form:
Blank verse
Some metallic beating of a Drum like heavy rainfall resonated through the night
as the wind swept through the trees and across the somber ponds of The West.
Some nights: these nights—fireflies are the sparkling blue-green dots scattered across an aloof sky.
And how the onlookers stare dumbly at the Horizon and the clouds!
Evanescent, blue…dark shades cover a bush and how the stars are
Climbing (!)
the black cloth of night like spiders,
Oh! the inherent beauty of the world?
And the iridescent flowers are laid dead over the infinite fields.
Some metallic beating of a Drum like ponderous footsteps circling a room fills the gracious day.
The sun with her full smile sends streams of gold and orange to sneak through the
crevices of
the cracked ceiling of the abandoned theater to illuminate the dust.
Random in their intent and brutal in their delivery, the messages of light assuage the gentle Earth
She hands over her key…
Such madness! Madness!
Pools of water scattered across the open fields; coquettish waves undulate under the gale.
Such madness! Madness!
The ethereal beats of the Drum like stolen heartbeats boom! Boom! Boom!
Such madness! Madness!
And maybe the Lady can answer such idling question as to why the cacophony:
“And could you tell us of the day you found this disorder dancing like daft Pagans?”
And she says: “No, for the beauty of absurdity is that the very idea of order contradicts
its existence”
Hypnotic chanting: Chaos makes order chaos makes order chaos makes order…
Some metallic beating of a Drum like a steel box in the bosom of Space
It spins like the burning Earth on a bender
Oh, the cacophony! Oh, the madness!
Such Madness…
Categories:
dumbly, allegory, america, dream, metaphor,
Form:
Free verse
To the end, the Home will uproot itself in nomadic urge -
The Flesh will ache to lift as paper from its delicate strands
with their reddy pulse, to float off as the slip of a dove
and bask with the world in a kitey splendor
and unbound from bitter ink,
and proudly Naked to the next beginning.
The Skin wishes to dirty itself,
soles in urban sewage and belly in a ritual mud.
The Skin wants to be tattooed, marked, and symphonically
Undefined. The Skin wants to be held.
And what of the Brain? Oh, You clumsy, grey thing,
How You whine to create, how You noisily rustle with blurred Eurekas
in Your shaking box, how stubborn! And too clean!
You must train each day to soften Your concrete,
and finger the soil in. You throb to be spoken to,
And Tongue: You throb to speak.
You want an exercise that dumbly bends You in
unfamiliar manner, You want Your spine to heavily crack,
to be understood and answered in turn
by another fluid, pink leech.
Lungs, You must breathe!
Expand proudly, thin sails!
Exhale rusted screams and gossamer whispers
to tell them who You are.
To proclaim Your bit of earth,
to which You are purposed a return,
a carbon christening.
The two jelly-eggs of the Eyes beg the colors,
They stubbornly will the whitened pokes in a black-blanketed sky.
And They must recognize the special ones They dilate for,
memorize each canyon and all their pebbles
for the day they are curtained.
And ears, You flat, blushing roses, You micey rounds;
You know Your purpose well. Let the instruments seduce You,
And the words of another prick Your delicate hairs.
Receive the good news -
that You are loved.
Now, scatter, scatter!
Seek every crevice,
and fit yourself to each corner untouched.
Cradle the empty, fill the cups.
It is not until You know all the world and hold every bone
That You will join to birth the infant Soul.
Categories:
dumbly, birth, growth, imagery, life,
Form:
Free verse
drowning...
Screaming silently for that one breath
of life...
that whirling maelstrom of beaten-down loss upon wrap-around defeat
of life...
that mercilessly shovels heaps of leaden rubble as you try to get back on your feet
drowning...
mute and dumbly flailing in the raging torrent
of being...
but a mere speck of dirt on the tapestry of a world, that at times, is quite abhorrent
drowning...
quietly wishing to surrender to the nothingness that seductively beckons, as you gasp
while...
hoping against all hope that a lifeline would appear suddenly within your grasp
drowning...
yet caught in the ghastly waters of unchartered isolation
feeling...
a trickle of hope amidst the gushing liquid of sheer desolation
drowning...
whilst holding on to slivers of sanity when blistering madness calls out to you
as...
faltering weaknesses snap and gnaw at your state of being, out of the pristine clear blue
drowning...
i have felt the pull of life's devious current as it has stripped me of my self and left me naked and bare
and still...
i fight with every suffocating breath left within
to surface and to cling onto
another gulp of life's coarse and putrid air...
Categories:
dumbly, angst, cowboy-western, depression, dream,
Form:
It has gone on for far too long.
Lightning will smite me for my wrong.
On my honor, I gave all that I could,
Vicious fate will still get me; I knew that it would.
Even now, you gaze at me with shimmering eyes;
Yearning, I hide from those azure skies.
Open arms forced to stay at each side,
Unworthy Casanova, swallow love as pride!
Kindness that I never deserved, shall soon depart-
Run away! Run far from this fool’s heart.
Instead of your man, I could be your brother,
Somehow then fall as dumbly for another
Touch you, I will not; never as I am touched,
Ever in your hand a heart lays unclutched,
Nevermore to care, roaming directionless and hurt.
Only one can tell why I hold you close to me,
Bringer of my sorry end, a light I cannot see.
Raging passion held behind exhausted eyes,
In a prison so deep you cannot hear its cries.
Enchanting, your smile makes a pulse stop still.
Not even I could destroy my love, nothing ever will
Categories:
dumbly, loveme,
Form:
Rhyme
Ephemeral online moment...
Yours truly plagiarizes himself with zeal
courtesy mental cogs and rusty wheel,
thus no literary crime committed to steel
I broadcast material shown thru rickety
black and white Roman Times newsreel
forthwith shoddy wordplay exempts me
against copyright infringement meaning
only I own privilege to take self to heel,
nevertheless yours truly hoops longshot
to score brownie points a higher power,
I will not cajole, bribe nor appeal...
while sitting on haunches horsing around
contemplating how to clearly expound
idea that the here and now does not exist
cuz no sooner then present moment
experienced than bitta bing bitta bang...
little block of time immediately gone,
hence quite profound...
Whereby present, i.e.
2:24 PM March 4th, 2021
instantaneously becomes past.
Linkedin thru tenuous
webbed world wide
electronic thread defied
no matter flurry of emails/
messages exchanged flattery applied
courtesy transient online
tête à tête downside
cyber venue offers convenient exit
personal aversion, I chide
brevity figurative thorn in side
futile effort Androcles tried
I haint lion, familiarization denied
fledgling cyber acquaintanceships
dead on the vine, yours truly sighed
potential friendship never fortified,
cuz immediate value judgement cast,
instantaneously prejudiced aversion
perhaps hidden agenda implied
maybe intimated illusions of grandeur
netiquette nuances overstepped, I chide
yours truly vouchsafe
absolute zero great expectation
love smitten wounds pride,
the Italian girl in Algiers
inchoate mystique forever unknown
nonetheless fantasize bartered bride
figment of overactive imagination
hence grist for poetry mill
grateful fleeting rapport tried
to take flight before sputtering
doomed to dustbin of history (mine)
filed within memory as template guide
against future unnecessary disappointment
best stick to your guns abide
against infatuation lest
conjured lass doth override
focus on reality no matter who espied
Facebook post, tis foolhardy
to allow, enable, and provide leeway,
hence aimless thoughts elide
dear boy, ya never learned always denied
rapture becoming ensnared
noose sense and sensibility stride
ding blindly, dumbly, foolishly...,
into own perilous entrapment, verstehen?
Categories:
dumbly, absence, earth, imagery, inspiration,
Form:
Rhyme
Linkedin thru tenuous
webbed world wide
electronic thread defied
no matter flurry of emails/
messages exchanged flattery applied
courtesy transient online
tête à tête downside
cyber venue offers convenient exit
personal aversion, I chide
brevity figurative thorn in side
futile effort Androcles tried
I haint lion, familiarization denied
fledgling cyber acquaintanceships
dead on the vine, yours truly sighed
potential friendship never fortified,
cuz immediate value judgement cast,
instantaneously prejudiced aversion
perhaps hidden agenda implied
maybe intimated illusions of grandeur
netiquette nuances overstepped, I chide
yours truly vouchsafe
absolute zero great expectation
love smitten wounds pride,
the Italian girl in Algiers
inchoate mystique forever unknown
nonetheless fantasize bartered bride
figment of overactive imagination
hence grist for poetry mill
grateful fleeting rapport tried
to take flight before sputtering
doomed to dustbin of history (mine)
filed within memory as template guide
against future unnecessary disappointment
best stick to your guns abide
against infatuation lest
conjured lass doth override
focus on reality no matter who espied
Facebook post, tis foolhardy
to allow, enable, and provide leeway,
hence aimless thoughts elide
dear boy, ya never learned always denied
rapture becoming ensnared
noose sense and sensibility stride
ding blindly, dumbly, foolishly...,
into own perilous entrapment, verstehen?
Categories:
dumbly, 11th grade, 12th grade,
Form:
Enclosed Rhyme