Best Fibers Poems
“Peace I leave with you
my peace I give you
I do not give to you as the world gives
Do not let your hearts be troubled
do not be afraid” (John 14:27)
But I am scared
Blood runs down streets
Hatred, rage, violence dance
In a chaotic frenzy performance
of evil malice . . .
What do your words mean?
Are they void – empty promises?
Where is the peace in deafening explosions?
In the cacophony of rapid gun fire?
Screams of horror?
Tears of death???
“I am the resurrection and the life
The one who believes in me will live
even though they die
and whoever lives by believing in me will never die
Do you believe this?” John 25:26
Yes, I want too . . .
But fear creeps around my heart
Its cancerous fibers sinking deep – choking me
Doubts greet me in the morning
Panic sleeps in my bed
I am weak
Hear my cries of desperation
“Be strong and courageous
Do not be afraid
do not be discouraged
for the Lord your God will be with you
wherever you go” (Joshua 1:9)
Stay close – fill me
I cannot see –
Darkness surrounds me
Death, destruction, desecration, depression
Blood, bitterness, bile, blight
“I have come into the world as a light
so that no one who believes in me
should stay in darkness
If anyone hears my words but does not keep them
I do not judge that person
For I did not come to judge the world
but to save the world” (John 12:46-47)
I cannot begin to fathom this
How great is this love
Forgiveness over revenge
Peace over violence
Life over death
Love over hate
Help me I pray
“A new command I give you
Love one another
As I have loved you
so you must love one another” (John 13:34)
Love one another . . .
David Meade
11/18/2015
Love Generously
Welcome to my ----- life
A beautifully broken aura
Unsettled flakes
The sound of yesterday
Shattered winter glass
Transcend to the unconscious mind
Frozen, dead, yet alive
Hell, escapes my future of eternal suffering
Tiny buttons of snowfall to my feet
Firewood burns endlessly,
The hairs of her soft skin rise like wheat
Shadows by hand flip the hourglass
The possibility of change takes --- need
She stands on the outside of my dreams
Looking in;
Quietly she summons the cold legion
Confused, trying to cleanse her soul
She wipes off old fingerprints
White glitter, forgotten notes
Spiritual spells enhanced in a quiet villa
Shadows of hands toss the glow
Daydreaming inside another dream
Falling flakes in hopes of peace
A warm bedded cabin sits at ease
Observing, breathing, mind settling
Swirling into an earthy feel
Another long downward drift
Shadows of hands set the tide
She awakens, sharing the stars
She mocks the sun, her eyes sparkle
Covered in snow - aging peacefully
She fibers to soothe her soul
She reeks, neither heaven nor hell
Temporary punishment, rattling thoughts
Captured in a transparent globe
Passing through a purgatory world
No walls, no in-between
Falling far from the echoes of life
Sacrificed by death before salvation
Transcending to the unconscious mind
Shattered winter glass
The sound of yesterday
Unsettled flakes
A beautifully broken aura
Depart from my ----- life
By: PD
Dancing in space
Waltzing in the universe
Pirouetting on cloud banks
Aah yes
Come with me
Let’s dance together
Ancient flute notes echo
Amidst starshine and lost memories
I feel you there beside me
Peeking around planets
Your eyes seeking me out
Our fibers entwined
Through passion and loss
Our unspoken words
Spun like gold thread
Around our bleeding hearts
An inhale ~ a memory
Meeting you in the ocean
Immersing ourselves in blankets of mist and fog
Lavender foam adorned with turquoise sparkles
Glinting off wave tips
My nakedness enveloped
Salty tears
My mouth open
Searching for you
I walk through time
Through walls of water
The waves part
As I find my way
Inward
Onward
To the sacred place within
I feel the air ~ quiet now
My fingertips sense my surroundings
I smell your heartbeat
In darkness my palms touch yours
A vibration of heat
Of laughter
Of knowing
Of ancient memories
Coupling our souls
Forever
In my silent sanctuary,
my poetic garden blooms like sun kissed seeds,
carefully placed under a quilt of soil,
sprinkled with holy water.
In the vividness of morning mist,
spring dew drops are like crystals,
sparkling on greens of grass,
ready to vaporize virgin fibers,
as I spill idyllic ink upon each strand.
My muse is an enchanted forest,
where blooming butterflies kiss blushing blossoms,
as my thoughts spread like perky petals,
in shades of amethyst, ruby and sapphire,
mirroring the illuminations of my heart.
I smile at April showers.
In each drop there is mercy,
as I believe there is an adversity in poetry,
where words form like the most vigorous flowers.
The Silent One
6 April 2021
I lift you up, delicately
like a bouquet of flames in pink patient fever,
romantically, I rove your surface with fingertips that tingle,
the texture of your treated cover tempts an impatient lover,
I read your Title, Her World, Her War
subtitle, Surviving Sorrow & Love,
your emblem, embossed in opal
a quill spun across a heart spelling your soul,
I spread you open with both hands
my grip holding the breadth of your body
a scent of sensuous ink unfurles into my inquisitive senses
raising you into my fascinated face
smelling the cleavage of your binding
sailing my lips down the center of your special secret
having your silky ribbons root around my fingers,
breathing, in warm curiosity on your exotic fibers,
Loving me as I hold you in wonder,
as I finger your pages with fawning pursuit of pleasure,
speedily you whisper my name with no refrain
as my moist voice recites
your poetry of paradise and pressure points,
I venture deeper into your voluptuous volume
feeling sensations of starlight I do consume,
in your tome of thick passion I find a home,
I like to read you in the suspense of night
searching your love lines, tasting your grape vines,
touching your emotions, embracing your sweet seductions,
you get into my nerves like electric sugar
illuminated by your poems of ardor and prose of candor,
intrigued by the penmanship of a Princess, curvaceous and calculating,
I turn to the Introduction, to see a photo of the great Authoress
a face pretty in courage, a smile of beautiful strategy
your body of work legendary,
I kiss you because I must -
J.A.B.
The farm
and the porch light hums
the sound of another
orange dawn.
Burnt up – crisp
aching new reaches
of the imagination turn
from corn
to wheat
to the pungent shade
of dried blood on hands –
kissing corners of a mouth
never kissed.
Sweeping ‘cross in whispers
two thousand years
and more, come
words on the flat-line horizon,
dripping sideways,
like a red cat's eye marble
on a circular seesaw
that knows no bounds;
rolling infinitely back
and forth -
ringing through ears that were once
in that ago (can you hear it?)
hearing the coming of a storm
being heard
by another set of ears,
in some other when –
some other marble.
When, speaks the unspoken.
When, treads where none may tread.
When, grips the barren outcroppings of space –
playing the unending moments –
where no other question hence forth
can grip.
Night sounds come in floods
of mauve,
and quiet apricot;
slicing through oceans,
unsung,
where no ears hear.
The farm: echoing, lowing and fawning –
Trying to stay true
to form,
bleeds into the fibers of a dream
once lived –
recognizing its existence
through the act of a moment,
lived.
The girl turns to face
the enormity
of all she has yet to hear upon
the brazen, blazing horizon;
she strips down to goose bumps
on the skin
that God gave her;
opening her mouth to hear all
that she is –
breathing in the dawn
as it breaks.
The farm notes this coming.
The sky knows;
The wind knows.
The earth knows - relaxing
at her feet
exhaling
through her soles,
resounding through the mouth
of the un-kissed,
breathing through this land;
humming through porch lights,
spinning through atoms,
sifting though heavens,
recorded through lifetimes,
and through into another’s
open mouth.
© Kristin Reynolds 1/9/09
When I gaze into this realm, I see more than the dazzling array
of golden starbursts floating in a cosmic sea of blue-green-gray,
photoreceptors painting post-Impressionistic explosions of colors,
fibers and dilator muscles servicing your ocular aperture.
I see distinctive melanin patterns of a truly original individual -
a retinal scan of exceptional singularity,
each nebula unique, every supernova peculiar,
no quasar like any other.
I passionately absorb with one brief glance
an infinity of nuance,
an eternity of historical archives,
a heaven and earth of emotional journeys.
I am reading your autobiography, the encyclopedia of you.
I remain a student of your sclera,
a pupil of your pupils,
a Vincent of your irises,
going half-mad with the dizzying vastness
of the starry night within your eyes.
Music and romance are camarilla comrades,
just like poems are my shield and arrows.
But not all lullabies of lovers,
harmonise like a street choir of angels.
If love resembles the weather,
then poetry is like a snowflake.
Its fragile abstract nature
can betray the innocence of a poetic heart -
serenading in slaughtered symphonies of silence.
When lust burns in assailable impurity,
love suffers in small doses,
performing a masquerade concealing truthful tones.
So what is the purpose of poetry if it offers no remedy?
Whispering winds form hailstorms in my mind,
wondering if there is a sanctuary
for lonely spirits suffering as seasonally sad souls.
In the midst of melancholic misfortune,
I wish to drown in tepid tides of holy water,
because fate is frozen in winter wanderlust.
Heartache taught me how to be a poet,
each scar inflicted from profound lies and cries.
But what is the purpose of poetry if there is no muse?
In the perception of imagination,
I search for the one
who left frozen tears on my pillowcase.
But her eyes see celestite waves kissing
ecru shorelines under blue pearlescent skies,
blessed with the radiance of saffron sunshine,
in the heavenly harmony of relaxing music.
So, I wonder why she resides in ebony emotions,
refusing to dance, lost in lyrical lament.
Some spirits evolve into envious entities,
but mine just misses the rose window to her soul.
When wine dark skies glare in misery and gloom,
composing ashen clouds to pour in plentiful rain,
I feel the chills of an Antarctic iced leaf on an ice covered lake,
but maintain an evergreen glow,
hoping to forever illuminate like cathartic moonlight -
reflecting upon her bronze fibers.
Opposites attract like fireflies in the night.
I am the bridge and you are the chorus.
so I follow footprints in the snow,
under the guidance of devotary sincere stars.
In the hope we will make melodies at midnight -
merging into rivers of unassailable purity
And If I can't be a poet, then I'll become a poem.
I cannot predict how my ink will spill,
so will you guide each verse to give it a purpose,
breathing my words into life?
Will you love me more than poetry?
Kissing all those diamond promises
into my rhinestone heart -
or will you massacre the music,
abandoning me like an unfinished symphony.
You didn’t notice my tears.
As you both kissed each other
like two lonely plungers
who just escaped from plumber’s solitary confinement,
your eyes open and wander up.
You didn’t look across that banquet hall
with my feet planted against wood polished tendencies.
Its creaks motioning time towards yellow-signal identity.
As my breath declares sudden death
against lake’s dripping reflections…
…you didn’t think to set your photo album on private.
Advertising lust
wrapped in pretentious cloak
sewed in recycled fibers of “love”.
With ignorant enablers speaking chic-flick tongue,
“Oh My Gawd! I’m so happy for you! I wanna ovulate!”
As I, put my head down
returning to this moment in time,
I had to let my song…cry.
Lenny Williams begins to exude “cause I love you” chorus,
as I walk towards bar
sensing your seductive retinas
stroking against my Latin swagger.
Your ring finger
chained by 3 carat, naïve cut, diamond
motions an intense, streaking caress
against wine glass filled with Zinfandel sin.
Because you know I am your addiction.
Your diabetic lips never forgot
that taste
of my
brown
sugar.
But, you didn’t notice my tears.
I wish you had.
For all this time, these tears
were of joyful splendor.
Because solace holds my hand
with candlelight warmth.
Slow dancing with my soul
in mystery Salsa sway.
While you stand on home plate,
holding your 2nd place trophy,
with 3 strikes against you.
A reminder that my heart,
was flexible enough
to dodge
a bullet.
© Drake J. Eszes
"Wearied Wanderlust"
upon a gilded meadow glows a bottle of tender tears
scattered ashes burnt and laden carpeting of stone
ravished emotions turbulent feasting on flesh and bone
filtering through fibers as escalating fears
harbor broken dreams evaporating in waning years
as visions petrified reside in somber tone
upon a gilded meadow glows
Life's chilling chant of haunted love still stalks
a tattered heart is wandering, wearied and all alone
swallowed a bittersweet taste of vacant cone
in endless patterns of desolate walks
upon a gilded meadow glows..
In my hunger,
I saw a hallucination of heaven.
From afar, visions of a golden glow,
lustered, lingering above a crowded crossroad.
This aura of agave aromatherapy,
left an amorous aroma of romantic ruminations,
so I became a devotee, desiring her divinity.
But, such was her evanescent existence,
those effervescent eyes now seem ephemeral.
Adrift in the angst of absence,
I feel the lament of an autumn leaf,
yearning to be evergreen, clinging to your stalk.
Or to sharpen and shape like a tenacious thorn,
honouring your rosso corsa, roseate radiance.
If I was a polyamorous poet,
my abundance of adjectives and alliterations,
would be disloyal like daylight,
so my vibrant vocabulary vows to
allegorise you in my anthology of analogies.
My mellifluous muse, I care not if
your verses are vintage or virginal,
as you are my most memorable metaphor -
the assonance to compliment my consonance.
In your majestic moonlight, I'm fluorescent,
portraying a perpendicular penumbra,
craving for you like a citrine crescent
hoping to become complete.
I'm a bard with a baritone ballad,
blossoming words like spring sepals,
into a boundless bouquet for my beloved,
so remove the veil behind your verbs and
reveal your velvet vermilion lips once more.
There is an alluring art to an aubade.
In an aureolin and amethyst aurora,
our lantern of love will forever scintillate,
serenading in smooth and soothing susurrus sounds,
soaring in a serene sapphire sky,
ascending like a saffron sunrise sonata
and if cumbersome clouds,
colour horizons in charcoal,
delicately descend, pouring in holy drops,
soaking my soul like spilling ink
on unblemished ivory fibers.
“Let me be strong, for to be anything else is to languish in the abyss of compromise and to descend to places of impoverishment so destitute that they will squelch my soul and crush my heart.”
Craig D Lounsbrough
When left to languish in lament.
Metaphorical swords become tired
from words portrayed through bloodshed.
Misery is a master of manipulation,
pulling strings of sorrow,
personifying portraits of puppets in pain.
When dreams and desires disappear,
nonchalantly negating nocturnal nigrifying nightmares,
a heavy heart hoarding hurt is helpless,
crawling like a caterpillar without a cocoon.
In an anthology of anguish,
spirit withers in a lyrical language,
lost in lanes of latent lament,
so we search for signs to our secret sanctum,
to heal broken wings of bandaged butterflies.
When hope, like carnations of death, crumbles,
resembling crying chrysanthemums.
Tepid tears of tribulation,
trickle in trails of tired tinges of insecurities -
yet we still yearn for an expurgated Eden.
In the internal insanity of suffering,
sanity searches for a relief from repression,
as our existence can emanate into
a chalice full of missed challenges,
if we do not learn from life's lessons.
When trauma reverberates on repeat.
Words are as fragile as a beautiful ballerina,
without a ballad in a ballet of broken hearts.
Yet our pens crave to dance on virgin fibers.
Our souls are an essence of evanescent emotions.
There are no winners in battles with silence.
In the rationale of reason.
raging rutilant ink pleads to pour
puddles of purifying poetry,
gracefully releasing breaths of suppression -
A speechless saviour for timid tongues.
Scarlett thought she was promised permanent security.
Satchels of resilience bound her fragile wrists.
Woodland deities hailed her.
Underworld demons feared her.
The curious townsfolk simply stood in contemplation -
Inviting epee's gleamed in their eyes
as the garden shears, in their hands, smiled.
Scarlett oft pretended she was Joan of Arc.
Threads of meshed titanium webbed her sheltered heart.
Sour Grimm moppets heralded her.
Skeptical fairy godmothers chastised her.
The relentless wheel of innocence spun without interruption.
Persnickety rogues sashayed in dumbed silence -
permitting their sordid counterparts unwelcomed invitations
into a void where reverend satchels are tragically punctured.
Scarlett donned spiked eye patches in her latter years.
Protective velour swatches masking mass and the masses.
Myths and urban legends empathized with her.
Gods and martyrs appropriately buried her.
The dumbfounded spirits circle Scarlett's broken window with raised eyebrows.
Quizzically staring at rotting barrels littered with skeins if shredded satchels -
yards if tainted fibers being hopelessly spun into yet another
dark, forgotten midnight.
Who am I to take her innocence.
To caress her untouched virgin fibers.
This is not a negative connotation of lust,
it's an intimate overtone to show affection.
I tell my heart to be patient,
yet it irks from the rub of lingering
and it's flustered - feeling lost,
as tomorrow has no guarantee,
but she lives in a fantasy of dreams,
where her mind paints a different reality.
Art of the heart is not so simple -
in our predicament of sensibility
and it would be selfish
to convince her to stay,
but tragic to let her leave
and then she tells me how
she cant live without me,
so we remain helpless,
two souls on two different shores -
content with being lost at sea.
Simple Musing
Silent One
30 October 2019
Introspection
suspends in dark blue amnion
as rainwater blooms a reflection pool
an oasis of energy for contemplative embryo;
in stillness I grow.. my pulse a flowing stream of raindrops
my body the rhythm maker
my mind the artiste
in a cocoon a rhythmic womb —
a primal nest gestates my om
b r e a t h i n g i n
b r e a t h i n g o u t
saturation of breath
soaks and stretches my cortex canvas;
within the indigo sphere
I paint a mural
upon my sacred temple walls
a self-portrait
with a benevolent brush dipped in starlight –
I surrender staying and portraying within the lines
uncaged colors roam
beyond my human extremities and Earth’s edge
a gouache-plash of teal and fuchsia
fraternize with fibers of flesh and marrow
conceiving abstracts as airy as sparrow dreams
as I - a mindful explorer flies an inner cosmos
beyond the confines of the canvas white
outside the frames of physicality and reality
to throw open window panes to the unlimited
to banish pains of the limited — free
my meditative spirit making art with the universe
Susan Ashley
September 7, 2022
~ Fifth Place ~
Premiere Contest: 2022 Poetry Marathon Mile 18
Sponsor: Mark Toney
~ First Place ~
Premiere Contest: Brian Strand Premiere Choice
Sponsor: Brian Strand
Photo: The Seer; Laurie Bain Hamilton - owner of primalpainter