Best Eighteen Poems
A Look Back at Eighteen Months Here-The Show is Over
When your poems reside in a shoe,
like mine,
pounding the pavement to nowhere.
The onset of blisters isn't imagined.
Those blisters take roots,
hindering your motivation
to move-
and to continue to write.
It hurts.
Seeing those poems take residence
in pity.
Sans the
comfort of
leather and lace,
shine and sole,
all of which would have been nice.
But all my eyes see are my poems,
tucked away in worn loafers,
unpolished,
unnoticed.
Not exactly eye candy.
But eyesores ...judging by the lack of views, here.
And undoubtedly my shoes made of synthetics
and sneakers
to the purveyors of good poetry
and good shoeshine.
I look down for good reason,
defacto
and stigmatized,
no contest wins,
no poems ever in the top 100 (new) list,
no scent of roses (or views),
nothing.
Nothing.
An abyss of sublimity,
save for the white bird
that chirps
to nobodies ears.
To wit.
For he who signs up for this site
got a handful of mixed emotions,
confetti less tomorrows,
a begotten rah, rah,
a ladle of spiel,
poems published ...
and in my case alone footnote
that I was a member
sans the shoe shine.
I really have to admit,
writing here,
eighteen months now,
has taken its toe.
I have no one to blame but myself.
Kind Regards,
connie pachecho
4/26/2018
The proprietor of the show has decided to call it quits, citing mental health issues here. The posse of black bears got to me. The guises, pretense, and hate towards me eroded my spirit. Tell her she can play with my insanity but not my spirit. To my readers, I really appreciate your patronage during this journey here even though the crops are bare and the barn fronts a blank stare.
The cows fight with the pigs, and bacon went to waste. One thing I take is the seed in me to aspire elsewhere, which I've already planted at HP under the name Logan Robertson. Thanks again. Wish everybody the best.
When I was eighteen....
I gave up on you....and never fought to get you back
I've let you down....When I know I should attack
When I was eighteen....
I've lost my heart and I've lost my soul
Aad people I care the most, I've lost them all
When I was eighteen....
I've lost hope so , I've tried to change my fate
But it seems that I've tried too late
When I was eighteen....
I saw people around me changing into the best but I stood in my place
I've failed in front of everyone, I've lost my water face
When I was eighteen.....
I wished to die very fast
But if I'm gone now, nothing of my memory will last
When I was eighteen.....
I've lost faith in what I write
I've tried hard to be out of sight
All of this and more when i was eighteen
I've wrote it down , so truth finally find the voice to scream
in love
with the idea
of being
in love
youthful naiveté
eager and out
to conquer the world
without a game plan
learning the game
the hard way
one hurdle at a time
one heartbreak to the next
AP: Honorable Mention 2020
In my eighteenth season, strangers used brotherhood as
decorative ribbons to gift me a feel and a truth that have stayed
my life long. At a nature adorned ranch flowed a celebratory
wedding reception upon soft green field carpets so lush that they matched the gentle generosity of my host's acceptance. I was a welcomed wanderer, a presence made to feel I belonged and was
valued. Old, wizen oak and willow trees provided a poetic, scenic
border for the velvet ground and shaded the serene river on the
other side of their mighty and graceful tree limbs. It was Fall, of
course it was Fall, the season of lusciousness and breezes that
render promising tickles upon titillated flesh. As music flowed,
love in sincere smiles became hand-to-hand holding, loose swaying
arms, and uninhibited kicks from dancing legs all moving carefree
bodies in a spontaneous, jubilant circle of dance. In a flash-know,
I felt harmonious sensations empower all to unite in the spiritual perfection from which we had come and would, in time, return as brothers and sisters gone home.
sun rays pulse pleasure
when perfect harmony sounds ~
leggy spirits kick
Vibrating elations brightened the sun’s own light and
dissolved all human egos’ need-feel to be acknowledged as right.
I knew none of the faces, yet I knew them all, just as they knew me because a mutual dance feel took us all inside core truth; all were
one in the same from the same one of perfect love. Such knowing
elated my dance with soul-intoxication. The air continued piping in
rock’s most poignant lyrics sung by genuine, emotive voices that
grabbed us all while drums beat as one with our hearts until our
pulses ignited, and guitars glided on soared, radiating nirvana highs through our inside-otherness. These sensations all led me to know
what I still know, dancing that unexpected afternoon was more
important in establishing my life’s philosophical purpose than many
of the priorities I had been taught were paramount to living a
successful life.
songs swirl inner depths
lifting souls in all who dance ~
nirvana buzzes
Though a delicate fever reeled on,
with zest, I stood up from the bedside
and prepared a racy jiggle of dance steps,
beneath a dappled Capricorn morn rising.
Like a young pixie in dreamy wonderland
guided by notes of a band’s entranced songs;
my hands trailed away around the room,
while male escorts gracefully led the pace.
Eighteen roses and more adorned a hall
enlivening my cheeks reddened by bliss,
while velvet toes regaled in eased motion
unmindful of a high fever which lingered on .
Radiant in a crimson gown sewn by Mom,
O joyous Dad grasped me for a slow waltz
to highlight a crossing unto adulthood
as new moon flashes a debutante's snapshots!
Judy Konos' Contest:Let's Hear It
2/8/2016
~ Memoirs of my debut at age 18,
sophomore college
Inspired by Timothy Lee
Since he first walked, he made the outdoors his
while at home, paternal love was shown with fists.
His Mother’s love wasn’t enough for him to resist
leaving home and his Father’s frequent body hits.
He fell to his knees, “God, I need to be a man
and I’m only fifteen, so please hold my hand.
Father, help me become a good, good man.”
He worked many farms, rooming in barns.
He learned about crops, he learned to build,
he developed farming and carpentry skills.
He paid his bills, never let his loneliness spill.
He bowed his head, “God, thanks that I am fed,
I have a roof, a bed and work skills in hand.
Please, help me, God, be a good, good man.”
He grew to love labor under nature’s sky.
He felt he and the country saw eye to eye,
but in society, he wasn’t sure how to get by.
So, at eighteen, he gave the Job Corp a try.
He locked his fingers, “God, bless my stand,
as I find my way in more industrious lands.
Help me grow to be a good, good man.”
A new widow stands by her husband’s fresh grave
feeling the love-grief flashes their sixty years made.
She looks at their grown children, searching for his strengths,
and sees his traces in these faces, love linked.
Later, at twilight, alone on their country porch,
she sees city skyline in yonder darkness approach.
She knows each night, she will sit here most –
with the lit outline of skyscrapers he designed,
spied from their home he crafted in his beloved sunshine.
In tears, her head bows, “Thank you, God. Glory to your plan
that blessed me with the love of a good, good man.”
Raindrops pelting your window,
commiserate with your pain.
And mirroring trickle teardrops;
trickle slowly down the pane.
You left home; a naive girl
chasing love, barely eighteen.
And though he promised never,
he abruptly fled the scene.
Reality devastates
you: realizing your fate.
For your trust has been betrayed;
and love has morphed into hate.
Left all alone and pregnant;
you cannot conceal your shame.
And as your eyes fill with tears,
you know life won't be the same.
Your hands begin to tremble;
watching your life fall apart.
And anguish starts gnawing
at the insides of your heart.
In a fetal position;
you curl up and start to cry.
Listening to the raindrops;
falling from a sobbing sky.
Note:
Bing! I didn't forget the last word
Red Orange yellow
Green Blue Violet spectrum
Somewhere over the
Plaster of Paris
The phantom that will be missed
When casts are long gone
Welcome now, two-thousand-eighteen.
Two-thousand-seventeen you've replaced
so quickly! May you keep your sheen
well until the time you are erased.
While you can, you must brightly shine.
Welcome now, two-thousand-eighteen.
Shine for us; be for us divine -
the best of any year we’ve seen!
Much from you we all hope to glean.
Bring us love and peace, health and cheer.
Welcome now, two-thousand-eighteen.
I am pleading, bring us naught to fear!
From now until next December and
all the other months in-between,
do not be anything but grand!
Welcome now, two-thousand-eighteen.
For the New Year Contest of Janice Canerdy
18 YEARS, JUST LIKE YESTERDAY.
18 years ago, just like yesterday,
I remembered how it all happened.
A life, his life was ebbing away with the breaking of dawn.
I held him but could not hold back the fleeing spirit,
swiftly taking its flight to its eternal abode.
I held him but could not hold back the tears as I watched him breathed his last breath.
*Erin wo lojo ojo yen,
*Ajanaku subu ko le dide.
The cock crowed, innocently heralding the end of an age,
Of a soul, a father and a husband.
He was a fighter,
full of funny banter.
a warrior,
of no terror.
He was my father,
the muse who triggered poetry in me.
It’s been eighteen years now, we are no more the same
The teenagers have become father and mothers of men and women.
The little boys have become men.
The young widow has become a grandmother.
And the inheritance which triggered acrimony among kith and kin,
is now in shamble,
a total mess, with no allurement
Those who drummed the tune of discord,
can no longer hold their heads tall,
But the souls that suffered the hate, the sneer,
have moved on
Yes, for eighteen years,
we have laughed together,
we have played together,
but we have hidden
our bitterness,
our hatred,
our rivalry,
under the shroud of deceit.
Now,
eighteen years is enough to heal the sores festered
by rivalry,
by hatred,
by bitterness
Eighteen years is enough to let go of many pains.
Eighteen years is enough to sheathe our weapons of war.
Eighteen years is enough to remember our last end,
And show love to friends and foes.
It’s been eighteen years, just like yesterday.
The Ruba’iyat of Créteil Lake – Part Eighteen
Even as the lower rubbed its dazed eyes over Her hillocks
The light-foot Lass of Lahore made her way past the boating docks
Past the Marie’s dank reedy banks over Her heaving breast
Tip-toeing over the complaining boards of Her nose-bridge locks
Hugging a bottle labeled “OMAR” where Her bust cut an arc -
A left-behind lame garden warbler tweeted its dirge dark
While the doe-eyed Lass tilted the bottle at the water’s edge -
Her own secret message to save the Sufi Khayyam from wreck:
“Oh! Illustrious Beacon of the Saljuk Empire!
Pray! Let me so much as I might deign to sing sans lyre!
The WORD is out: Your Eminence’s proscribed by penal mettle:
The Republic’s Procureur Général wants you in pyre!”
“Your humble sister begs your esteemed bardic indulgence:
Two fitful summers gone past we did cross each other’s presence
Me a mere slip of a girl from yon Ghaznavid Empire
Heard the clamorous reed warbler’s Himalayan penance!”
“This bottle with the missive I know the Lady of the Lake
Will to you waft: tidings dire as to keep me awake
Through bitterly biting lonesome nights you stumble and rove:
Take heed! POLICE cycle-brigades have tripled round the lake!”
© T. Wignesan – Paris, 2014
ON LONELINESS
Simply gaze around
what do you see?
I see nothing and am deaf to an offensive sound
and that's precisely the eay I want it to be
lonely people alone in a strange place
all of us have nothing of substance to do
its sort of like a ninety mile race
and i'd forget about me were I you
they speak but the subjects are obscure
and this is what i've been ordered to endure
ordered by my Lord to tell you there ain't no cure
not for a man like me who is impure
so forget me miss but I must take my leave
ordered by my Lord incarnate
everything i've written you can believe
because I ain't nothing but a traveler's bait
© 2012....copyright PHREEPOETREE ~free cee
The hours tick by, snatching the strands of my hair
(Still blonde, but growing darker by the day)
The sigh of the shadows casts the sunbeam upon me
As I walk barefoot into the polluted bay.
How have I gotten here? Who am I today,
To call this body at the age of eighteen?
My fingers shake, but not of old age,
I am afraid of what more life would bring.
The days roll by, like the clouds over the sea
crashing down when they've gone too close to shore.
Oh, that I could just be one of the seagulls,
Nevermore would I cry, nevermore on the floor.
How have I gotten here? Who am I to run,
To run from this body at only eighteen?
My sapphire eyes are open, taking in the possibilities,
Ready for whatever this life may bring.
Let my life for you sacrificed
His name lovely himself lovely Muhammad
Come and intercede to this helpless servant
His name lovely himself lovely Muhammad
Faithfuls suffer in this earth a lot
Hereafter there will be plesure and enjoyment
From eighteen thousand worlds' selected
His name lovely himself lovely Muhammad
Traveler of seven leveled skies
Above bound of Creator flied
In his ascension for Ummah prayed
His name lovely himself lovely Muhammad
Four caliphs are his paradise neighbor
Who is in love with him is away from evil
He is sultan of creations as a whole
His name lovely himself lovely Muhammad
What Dervish Jonah does in here without you
Real prophet without doubt and mistrust is you
Whom don't obey you faithlessly as an infidel go
His name lovely himself lovely Muhammad
Written by Dervish Jonah (Yunus Emre)
Translation Onur Ünlü