Best Dwindling Poems
Apple cheeked autumn eyes bashful skies, as
Yellow frocked summer says her goodbyes to fragrant
Earth's seeded spring, to wild bouquets
Arranged by careless care, for the
Roses and daffodils to compare
Dandelion sprinkles of buoyant cheer on
Windswept wishes from children's magic, landing
In water lilies and long looping lanes, woven in
Nests of chirping, fragile hope
Delicate shadows of feather and wing
Lingering through flickering whiplash steam where
Ice caves lost to reckless flame
Northern flocks under southern stars to map
Greener seasons slipped through graying rain
Drowsy flutters the pale sun's
Oscillating gusts of sleeted night as
Wan, wanting branches undone by
November's surrender to darkling winter.
10/09/20
These days, i avoid the mirror...
Shunning my reflection, as a hunched Gollum
Ducks his head from the sun’s incendiary stare –
I do not want to see…
Do not want the mirror’s truth,
Etched in the hollows of my cheeks,
In the death’s head darkness that dwells in my morbid eyes
My demise lurks in the mirror,
Watching, biding his sweet time
And the child that I was is just a memory I chase, desperately
Through dream-dappled meadows,
In a haven that no longer exists…
My life has dwindled,
Shrunk to the point of light on the head of a pin,
i survive on mere seconds of borrowed time,
Snatched moments here and there,
Handfuls of dust trickling through my fingers
Into the greedy belly of the hourglass…
It is all just a half-hearted dance macabre waltzed on a floor of shadows
Lies and truth are demon partners at my shoulder
And love is Eurydice flitting in my wake from the depths of Hell,
She calls my name but if I turn to look,
Even to savor a final incandescent tryst of souls –
I will burn to ashes and die
As I combed your hair so fair,
It glistened strawberry red,
We embraced nature’s bounty
Through the stories that I read
Content, tranquil, restful
As you laid upon your bed
Crisp sheets, below your chest,
I tracked your every breath
Palm cross beneath your pillow,
Same place it's always kept
Your elegant, fine eyelashes
Curtsied graceful as you slept,
I took a million photographs
Through the lenses of my eyes
As legend Frank, sang us out —
Reminisced memories, joy and lies
As I combed your hair so fair,
It glistened strawberry red,
Stitched my heart back together
With your loving, golden threads
My audience is dwindling here on the Soup
Perhaps I should write about love stead of poop
Seems I've lost my way
Need help I must say
To come in from the wilderness and get back in the loop
pain matures sorrow
trimming each firm will to try
reducing labor
Faith is dwindling
A leak inside my dead heart
That I can not stop
Hope
Dwindles
Changing course
Of time and space
With glacial winds suffocating my whole
And absence of color within the snow
With the harshness
Of yearning
Dwindles
Hope.
THE EVER DWINDLING FEW - USA Version
Beach Omaha
At Omaha an old man stands and limps down to the shore,
Where on this sand he crawled and ran so many years before.
The skirl of pipes still in the air, the ceremony o'er,
He knows the ghosts who haunt this coast in the fading wake of war.
Huddled in their landing craft, together yet alone,
Some join a cheer to quell the fear that turns young limbs to stone.
Others lost within the thought that chills them to the bone,
Not knowing if they'll see again the fields and hills of home.
A sudden stop, the ramp is dropped , Omaha revealed,
Bullets frothing water, flying shards of red hot steel.
A thrown grenade, a shattered leg, his private war soon done,
Sheltered by a parapet, he prayed the beach be won.
Young men who fell upon this beach who lie not far away,
Are still young men among his ken, not having aged a day.
They gave their all when duty called, hair never turned to grey.
They grew not old as he grew old, no feeble steps for they.
For their lost years he'd shed his tears, he'd been there yesterday,
Where snow white stones mark where the bones of all the young men lay.
They cried “Hurray!” and “USA!” and braved the gates of hell,
Now walking slowly down the beach he wanders where they fell.
Where chaos reigned and lives were claimed by death's uneven hand,
The shore of war is quiet now, a peaceful stretch of sand.
Old men in chairs with snow white hair are wheeled down to the shore,
They are the ever dwindling few, soon there will be no more.
Some there among are the proud sons of those who fought before,
Believing they were there to win the war to end all wars.
But strife will always be our lot and war will have its day.
Silent prayers for those who dared with home so far away.
So once a year some come back here where many came before.
Warriors then, now ancient men who gather near the shore
To honour those who lie in rows, and comrades still beside.
A time to grieve and to receive a grateful nation's pride.
They are the ever dwindling few,
Soon there will be no more.
Ellis Pringle Craig, 2023.
Hyacinths in a trance, bewitched by hysteria,
Amid the shadows of a mythological eclipse.
Elixir of roseate red oozing out loose progeria,
In islands where the sea weeps azure breaks.
Amid the shadows of a mythological eclipse,
Daunting me subtly with its crimson smell.
In islands where the sea weeps azure breaks,
From golden dust to smooth bristly as well.
Daunting me subtly with its crimson smell,
The fading breaths of sinister falsehood.
From golden dust to smooth bristly as well,
On black graveyards to azure seas, we stood.
The fading breaths of sinister falsehood,
In the sunken bronze halls of antique disease.
On black graveyards to azure seas, we stood,
Teals are being tormented by nightly noise.
In the sunken bronze halls of antique disease,
Elixir of roseate red oozing out loose progeria.
Teals are being tormented by nightly noise,
Hyacinths in a trance, bewitched by hysteria.
Written: May 22, 2022
"Dead leaves lay still until the wind takes them
here and there: even the last flower is withered:
yet there is a beauty in decay. "
Quote by _Constance La France
Desolate, weeping, she mourns the past
In silent tears – her memory decides
Hues, both beautiful and vibrant, trembling
With the melancholic thoughts – heartbroken
Feelings erasing the serenity, the sweet
With bitterness, defeat…
Inconsolable, her tears fall all over the autumn’s
Tenderness, fears breathing a sorrow through the darkness,
Distraught by the godless dread, the agonizing
Memories floating, dancing through the make believe
Fantasizing in weary stillness, quietly consoling
Mourning the moments when yesterday’s peace
Blazed through the heart, breathing grace wherever
It touched a thought…
Devastated by the urgency of a prayer, the harvest
Has come to those who remember – like life
This is the final promise stirring up gentle flames of regret,
Rotting, crumbling, dwindling away into a past,
Alive with colors – visions twisting through dark branches
Portraying a past who delights in remembering
Love, hope, forever…
With the heart perishing, the wind unsteady, robbing the
Dreams, nervous – shaking like the leaves who waltz
Through the intensity of a thought, a wobbly ache, truth
Displayed in melodies of remembrance, evoking
Memorials in the crisp air of an autumn light, fallishness
Vibrant with flames in crunchy snaps, leaves washing
Away all the melancholy with the urge to despair
Over the coming of this frozen wish defeating even
Memories, leaves decaying…
Over the spice of a question mark feeling,
The blending of yesterday’s sunset and tomorrow’s
Fleeting freedom from the onslaught of regret,
The making of a weariness that never restores the
Burning dejection of a past who portrays only the doubt,
The dismal ache that rides on wings of flaming
scarlet, tangerine and brilliant gold, buttery soft – leaves so stunning
Even the autumn’s darkest stories can’t paint them
Silent or downhearted!
Writing Challenge - D Quotes Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Constance La France
Quote Three
June 6, 2023
A
Year set stained by grief from invisible foe,
Enraged in anxiety’s malicious chains.
Accosting not only a nation but world,
Reaching the farthest, secluded parts,
Devilishly leaving no stone unturned.
Withholding grandpa from grandson,
Idly stripping people’s livelihoods,
Needlessly voiding human liberties,
Disabling dictators from their seats.
Looking now,
I see chains now fastened to skin,
New normals of ill compensation.
Grief that forms the setting of each day,
Daily death tolls alike to weather.
Only when
We are free of this eerie foe, shall
Normal be fit again to reside.
Contest: Pick-A-Title, Vol 23 - Seasonal Acrostic - Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Edward Ibeh
Date: 10/07/2020
Back & forth
The swing dwindles and fluctuates forever caught in a spiraling breeze
Time & again
Steeply, a mingling of the breaths occurring,
With ashes of raw pearls that were burned,
Preciseness is masked by contrasts of shading,
Pallid and toxic myths reap the rot observed.
With ashes of raw pearls that were burned,
After the ecstasy spell, the disillusion dwindling,
Pallid and toxic myths reap the rot observed,
Is it true that we are completely cognizing?
After an ecstasy spell, the disillusion dwindling,
Nirvana signs the deal for the crux forum,
Is it true that we are completely cognizing?
Being a slice of the universe's delve is awesome.
Nirvana signs the deal for the crux forum,
Preciseness is masked by contrasts of shading,
Being a slice of the universe's delve is awesome,
Steeply, a mingling of the breaths occurring.
Written: May 15, 2022
Time tracking quickly, dwindling days
now gently golden- but yielding yearnings.
Fast fleeting years slide swiftly
leasing lesser time for loving life.
God grant me hopeful hows
to still share life's remnant roses
in blissfully blessed pending peace.
April 30, 2023
Contest: Alliterisen Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Joseph May
Syllables per line: 8, 10, 7, 9, 6, 8, 8
RZ HMS
A turn and tilt from earth to sun
Your hot desire for summer fun
Eases into autumn’s tempering mood
A mellow scene of colorful cool
Restful, contemplative soothe.
Dangling leaves restless to descend
With bright flare, a path to transcend
In metamorphosis from living to dying
Needing a break from ever striving
Decomposing after its release
Life’s dizzy cycle, thus to repeat
Idle summer gives way to fall
Now ancient pulse of season’s call
Gathers its own to its beckoning bosom.
Daze of heat wanes within the valleys
O’re the hillsides rich crops rally
Waking harvests to reap in peak prime
Nearing nirvana with abundance sublime.
Written on 9/27/2020