Best Eddying Poems
sea-urchins in rock pools –
the flesh, a delicacy –
sparkle –
protected from the ocean
where anemones proliferate –
by a mist-glistening
heart shaped rock:
the keeper of my secrets –
a cache of memories
of mornings snorkelling
surface
eddy on the periphery
—homesick for my roots—
a keeper lost to shifting tides
white horses
masking risk in its wake …
a plastic wrapped sushi tray
on the kitsch kitchen counter
awash with the detritus of daily life—
a cold cup of coffee
milk skin
swirling like
liquescent marmoris
fluctuant under
fractured light
tender moments
where flaws hide in the spotlight
Laetrile induced
unsettling riptides
where occasionally colour swirls
marbling visions
the future liquescent …
I’m drowning in
proposals of memories
to be made with loved ones
family secrets to
be offered up
a dish that could be as
risky as Omakase …
smiling indulgently with my eyes
as a mirror-smooth ocean –
a north-westerly wind
whipping up the occasional white horse –
hides its turbulent depths
so a state of amenomania
settles over me
the final images
– as requested –
the secrets of my life
tucked away in an abditory—
eddying between past and future
the key to
unlocking it
—left in their hearts—
Categories:
eddying, family, introspection,
Form:
Other
When the pall of gloom overcasts my mind
And at cross roads bewildered as I stand
I tell myself
This shall pass
When my mind is full of fear
And I find no single soul to share
I tell myself
This too shall pass
When darkness invades my abode
And there is not even a ray of light inside
I tell myself
This too shall pass
When my burdens weigh heavier than I can bear
And when no one around seems to care
I tell myself
This too shall pass
When storm clouds gather in the sky
And my tensions rise high
I tell myself
This too shall pass
When the road ahead stretches strenuous
And the distance makes me nervous
I tell myself
This too shall pass
When those I love and trust let me down
And look upon me with scorn and frown
I tell myself
This too shall pass
When misfortunes flow in torrent
And am caught in the eddying current
I tell myself
This too shall pass
When the cycle of seasons keep changing
Life, from sorrows to joy will surely be shifting
Let us wait for the pendulum to have its full swing
And let our hopes heavenward steadily wing!
Love will again fill the air
Doves of peace will coo in pair
The wintry chill will lose its frosty bite
Spring will come on wings like a sprite
‘‘Nevertheless, the hilltop hour
Would not be half so wonderful
Were there no dark valleys to traverse”
Helen Keller’s words resonate in my ears
Placed Second
'Hope' Poetry Contest
Sponsor- Mohan Cutani
Categories:
eddying, inspirational, uplifting,
Form:
Rhyme
WATERFALLS, RIVERS AND DROUGHT
The frenzied forces of cold, icy streams
detonate explosively on the rocks below.
Their rapid currents wreak havoc
on logjams caught in crevasses beneath
the mist and rainbowed spray.
We blink in awe to see this
spectacular remonstration
of pretentious power abruptly
become whirling vortexes
of descending splash downs.
But then, almost as quickly, this despoiler settles
and begins to accumulate in multitudes
of rippling bubbles and froth
immediately bleeding onto the embankment
promptly losing much of its potential goodness
swooshed as sucking sounds
into the wild soils of the firmament.
What survives roams free and for awhile
flows in any direction, with no beginning, no end
as the river turns into riverlets
Eddying on without any selected steering.
The rains that used to drip down from the mountain top
cry to see the diversions of the most glorious river
dissipate and dry up knowing that the drought
which has appeared can not adequately supply
sustenance to a parched soil.
For that sunbaked soil to be reclaimed
the river must continue to extend its reach
and water the seeds of new growth.
and use its silt to fertilize the new life
that waits anticipating its turn
in creation's timetable.
CAK 6-04-2012 Revised 6-18-2013
Categories:
eddying, creation, earth, environment, mountains,
Form:
Free verse
A prodigious flock of seagulls
float seemingly, effortlessly
on a winter frigid river
like miniature polar floes.
Their harsh wailing and squawking calls
are muffled by the roaring sound
of cascade from an old dam.
Their idiosyncratic moves
manifest aquatic prowess:
Their twirling, swirling, eddying
against the current as though fixed
to each molecule of water
until they rise from the surface
into winters late morning mist.
Categories:
eddying, nature,
Form:
Verse
Mother Nature, divine and yet so whimsical
Her flowing streams fall warm, healing and abiding
A darkened blue-green sea, maroon and sapphire shores,
cradle us asleep, with your gentle waves
harboring the dour rude awakenings
when eddying rapids currented by the tide
Consume the uncertainty and the lies of the day tearing the heart apart
Suspend judgment and attain tranquility of mind
White light and red, filters a pink-tint, nebulous fringed rose gold
I’m graced in your stellar light, a cosmic pearl
Garnered from my poems:
Mother Me
Weeping Nude
The Ocean Beckons
Human Nature
Lissa Marie
Strayed Sheep
Tell It Like It Is
Self-Existent Light
Woven Worlds Of Alice Lidell
The Pursuit of Contentment
Categories:
eddying, meaningful,
Form:
Free verse
In her slippery salmon swim
And red streaked Crawdads chute
Into her eddying pools
To stare at her from beneath rocks.
Whitewater rapids challenge men
To stand against her torrential frame
And face her, screaming out in pain
Torturous centuries of ecstatic rain
To be her solitary stone
To stand against her all alone
A true man to soften her cold soul.
And who’ll be her Reigning Lord
Echo her insanity
To lover her shade and slippery slopes
Crevices’ waiting, sharp inclines.
Once a current in the sea
So filled with green and mystery
To her a man did rarely come
Then, pulled up by curious shapes
Like lambs, in white puffs she flew
And traced her shadow cross the land
Till the puffs released her soul
In little flakes, gentle and slow
For a time entombed in frozen snow.
There men saw her as a sprite
Reflected in her cage of white
Men chased her form of watery light
In dreams that came hard in the night
Her body lucid, long and lean
A cold corpse, frozen to the earth
Blue hair, bent arm, frozen knee
The sun took pity, broke the back
Of the ice block and set her free
So through high mountains, cliffs
And rocks she trickled
In a gathering streams, in rivulets
Of tears, mouths open
Her bosomed skin slipped as ice
Pain built up the rage within
And sorrow brought it to the light.
Green – the color of fast and deep
White – the foam that came in waves
Along the long and joyous vein
She spreads her long body
Knee bent, her heavy breasts pinned
Blasted, rippled by the wind
She’s touched only by old earth’s hand
Its gravity like a naked man
Basking in her pools
Her faces and belly ghosting him, a mirror.
Watch her through the thickening trees
Her body sliding toward the sea
A torturous rape, a rapid ride
For all who’ve hung upon her side
Hearts pound, as she shrieks and sighs
With each down stroke a demon dies
Within the man who’s bourn the pain
Endured her crushing fingers round
Who’s felt the pound of her breasts soft
Been beaten by her to the blood
And awaits for centuries her cold flood.
Categories:
eddying, beach, beautiful, beauty, fantasy,
Form:
Free verse
from over the sea
waves clash, turmoil eddying -
sailboats search haven
Categories:
eddying, sea, storm,
Form:
Haiku
The old Hittite came through the gate
Battle sharp and dripping
With the blackness of an Ethiopian night
The Kingdom of Zion to replicate
The compass star of David's sight
And through that gate walked with him
A destiny invisible of all the world
The crisis of a man by sin made grim
And vaster yet
A family's sun about to set
In immense sea, a national grief
Beyond mere historic proportions.
Raising Yahweh's standard the Hittite went
Sent by a virtue spent
With shadowless sword against masked Ammonites
And she the vessel of his heart
Dripping the sapphire of her African skies
Her purging task did initiate
Before the uncurtained eyes of Israel's prying king
How she daggered his faith
And staggered him like eddying dust
Crawling before the throne of savage lust
Her beauty and her will to yield -
This limping, shallow Vashti overthrown
Sealed Uriah's fate
Great warrior of the ancient clan of God
Yahweh's noble steward
Canaan's scion and stem of mystery
Conscripted to a Gentile race
Dravidian's doomed cornerstone
Summoned from the battle heat
Had no trumpet in his heart to blast retreat
And suffered where his soldiers like victors hold
Where Jacob slept without a sheet
The light from beauty's breast is cold
A common curse and old
And did not know
When sent away defied because he would not relent
That in his hands like in our genes
He carried that cold warrant of his own death
And the prophetic time
When Israel's sun would set
Categories:
eddying, religion, warsun,
Form:
Free verse
Hurricane Epic Flooding
Alerts; emergency evacuation
is advised for people to leave their homes.
Some people stayed;
secured and board up windows,
sandbags against the doors.
Prayers were said;
“We will be OK, no reason to leave.”
were their replies.
Shadow of darkness slowly crawled over the neighborhoods.
The coarsen tempest struck
shattering the silent calm,
gales moaned and thrashed
with downpours of heavy rain,
slowly water raised filling every drainage ditch.
In shock, tears start to flow
as they watch the water rise up in their yard
creeping closer to their homes.
The downpour of rain doesn’t relent;
the cursed howling winds get stronger.
Weep holes on the brick siding lets water seep inside the home,
never thought to seal the holes as water trickles in.
The day turns into two, then three, then four,
still brown rancid water fills the streets
eddying around front doors and lapping at windows.
“Why didn't we heed the warnings? “
The water is up to our waist,
belongings float inside our homes!
The streets have turned into rivers
and the water have nowhere to go.
The whole city is underwater
and the scent of cold death is in the air.
9/9/2017
Categories:
eddying, death, depression, hero, storm,
Form:
Free verse
Nobody told me freedom was so cold,
When I tore myself away
From the uneventful warmth
Of an ordinary family …
Thrashing about me in my confusion.
Wounding anyone who cared …
The tears slashing my mother’s face
Like razor blades …
But I had to get away.
Feel the wind of freedom …
Feel the wind …
I feel it now alright …
Icy blasts, straight down the river.
Eddying round the vast bulk
Of city buildings.
Over-warm … on the inside …
But huddled here, on the outside …
No real shelter in them …
That cruel freedom wind
Sifts through my thin clothes.
I remember warm jumpers,
And coats, abandoned
In my anxiety
To catch the wind.
But I can’t go back
Can I? …
To that ordinary love
Of my ordinary home.
Not now I’ve felt the wind!
But, you see,
Nobody told me
Freedom is so cold …
Categories:
eddying, teenfreedom, me,
Form:
Free verse
Eddying in a commotion of color,
fall's dispensation of red, green and gold;
blended with Zephyrs' mysterious rhythms,
a stately ballet that never grows old.
Spread 'cross the firmament planets are spinning,
silently, cold and majestically clear;
gliding through eons in preordained tempos,
gracing the night sky all through the year.
'Shining Light' at the "Birth of Terpsichore"
a twelve-year old warms up and waits for her chance
to show those judges just what this young girl can do,
nothing means more than her passion for dance.
She dreams of fame and of making a difference,
the world is too large and her room is too small;
she's too young yet for abstraction and symbol,
in time she will grow, find her place in it all.
Categories:
eddying, dance,
Form:
Quatrain
There is a calm across the waters,
The sky tis sullen and laden,
As the heavens pail with discolour.
The sea bestills with anticipation,
Birds fleeing , seeking, haven.
A silence begins to fall, as the tempest, draws near.
Clouds begin to stir , as a shuffling rumble is heard .
A gentle zephyr lulls across the the sea,
Tis the beginning.
Slowly it draws nearer,
Ominously approaching, eddying, waiting,
With eerie intent.
A crackling whip is heard, the heavens explode with light,
A cacophonic symphony begins, all is ablaze ,
A myriad of sight and sounds,
Seas boiling, afroth,
Whipped unmercilessly , by hellish gales,
Bolts of unearthly radiance, flash and eminate the sky.
Sheets , and torrents, plummet down ,
In violent cascades,
Blinding , soaking in its fury.
I watch as nature releases its harness,
Unleashing the elemental forces.
Here I stand , alone the shore ,
Awed , in reverie, of such a power.
Yet ever , as always , the storm abates,
The rains begin to ease,
The winds , soften, clouds , drift away.
The sunshine , returns ,
Birds , begin to sing ,the sea gently, waves.
I am left , with , a longing, and a joy,
Of such wonders,
That I shall come again , to these shores ,
And watch the storms ,
Next time , hell ,unchains the shackles ,
To her door.
Clement Hardy.
Categories:
eddying, life, mystery, nature, sea,
Form:
Free verse
Solitude, aloneness, quietude
Replenish the spirit
Calm the soul
Open mind's heart
Spilling light into darkness
A milky puddling across time
Gather the wildflowers
To your bosom
Join with kindred folk
Clasp hands
Listen to the echoes
What a mystery solitude
Peopled with so many voices
Swirling and eddying they
Reverberate and explode
Cracking open the quietude
Leaving each alone
In the midst of so much activity
KDK 2012, revised 2016
Categories:
eddying, silence, solitude, song,
Form:
Free verse
The First Time
...for Juvie
Sounds will be sharper and keener,
and tastes have a fresh new appeal,
aromas will drift like the first breaths of spring
and all colours be vivid and real;
each of my senses will shiver and shift
in the wind like the eddying sand,
and I knew that my heart had at last found its haven
the first time that I held your hand.
Categories:
eddying, love
Form:
Verse
I have swum
The limitless abyss
Of your eddying indigo eyes
And yet ...
There are other
Deep, dark boundaries to delve
Of the landscape, You
Just as enigmatic
And just ...
As warm.
~ 1st Place ~ in the "Late December 2018 Any Form" Poetry Contest, Brian Strand, Judge & Sponsor.
Categories:
eddying, appreciation, body, metaphor, passion,
Form:
Free verse