Best Gibbering Poems
Metallic city howls like a wounded animal
scraped by nocturnal vigils
of grandchildren and elders
emaciated like tuberculosis lungs
gasping from chug-chugs of tobacco soot...
and the face of a night is hammered by
ripped moans like plucked strings in motel rooms;
pagan women opening limbs for a meal in silent fury.
This is the other side of town, so real...
beggars peddling hope; factory shoulders
ranting over shuffled cards and fired gin
as wives’ blistered fingers
clean rented pots, gibbering same monotone of hymn,
“give us daily bread, daily bread”.
Outside, the pier coughs off
the commercial honks of weighed cargo
reeked with labor’s perspiration,
where pawnshops buzz with greed's snicker...
the evening owl attempts winks
under the grime of bloodied moon…
it spits the larynx of tenants’ raged hoots
wishing morsels of fresh sunset
would pour some grace of life’s salve. I weep
before the shrill of red sets in... again.
------------
Truth Contest sponsored by Anthony Slausin
Re-post 5/28/2019
Categories:
gibbering, anger, angst,
Form:
Lyric
Surrounded by tranquil turquoise waters,
Guarded on sides by oceans three,
In the east by the Pacific,
On the south by the Celebes Sea,
And on the west by the south China Sea,
There is an archipelago on the blue water crescent,
A group of islands, called Philippines,
Encircled by a girdle of gleaming silver,
With its shores of stretching sandy swell
That lulls the restless waves to sleep;
A land of green vegetation and terraced terrain!
It houses picturesque and breath-taking views.
Vast beaches of ivory sand sprawl before our eyes
Dolphins leap over seafoam, palm fronds wink
Soft breezes waft and cotton clouds float above.
Anyone will fall in love with these tiny strips of land,
Of rugged hills and meandering rivers
Of placid backwaters and blue skies
Of gibbering monkeys and celestial monarch birds,
Of strutting peacocks, pigeons, pheasants, and parrots.
The powdery white sand of Boracay
The Chocolate Hills of Bohol
The Caraballo Mountain ranges,
And the Cordillera Mountain chain of Luzon,
The Rice Terraces of Philippine Cordilleras
All these give the country a solemn investiture.
Volcanic peaks, standing mighty and tall,
Proudly line the landscape, dotted with dense forests
Where birds sing melodies and Tarsiers with bug eyes
The tiny primates, endemic to the Philippines roam and jump
Amid the slumbering hills, there is fecund soil,
Turned into orchards and plantations,
Its population with perseverance and patience
Work in the soil relentlessly and in unison.
Well known for their hospitality, they receive tourists,
And outsiders with warmth and camaraderie.
In this paradise of mixed fortunes, tragedy comes unforeseen,
In the form of natural calamities like typhoons and cyclones,
But nothing can tear the people apart and they prosper,
With resilience, bent on sustaining their tradition,
Adding value to it each day and proud of an identity of their own
This beautiful land of velvet waves and crystal sands
Lying as a pendant in a crescent of emerald cluster
Rightly deserves the title- the 'Pearl of the Orient'
Categories:
gibbering, beautiful, nature, ocean,
Form:
Free verse
When panthers prowl and lions stalk,
the lone wolves howl and parrots talk.
The bee hives hum and wild boars snort;
the grouses drum; the deer cavort.
And as geese cackle, small hares peek.
They see a jackal, squeal and squeak!
Near streams are snipes where hoot owls hoot.
A nightingale pipes sound of flute.
Frogs croak and play as pigeons moan,
and rhinos bray through beetles’ drone.
Snakes hiss, and apes start gibbering;
no beast escapes this daily fling!
In this clatter, swallows twitter,
magpies chatter; every critter
can join in. Hyenas laugh
while in the din, each tall giraffe
begin to bleat. What reverie
of primal beat - this jamboree!
July 2, 2020 for Brian Strand's
Strand Completely New(4)Any Theme Any Form Poetry Contest
Categories:
gibbering, animal,
Form:
Rhyme
Guarded by towering hills on the East
And flanked by the Arabian Sea on the West
With its easterly shore of stretching sandy swell
That lulls the restless waves to sleep,
There is a land, my land of green vegetation
Nestled among palm trees and paddy fields.
Oh! I am in love with this narrow strip of land
Of rugged hills and meandering rivers
Of placid backwaters and blue skies
Of gibbering monkeys and singing cuckoos
What rich diversity you graciously provide
A land dotted with temples, churches and mosques
Where Hindus, Christians and Muslims cohabit
Where diversity flows through her arteries
And unity beats through her throbbing heart
Here souls dance to the timeless rhythm of music
Of diverse genres, vocal and instrumental
Classical and folk, sung either as solo or in groups
With the accompaniment of (2) 'veena',(3) 'tanpura' and violin
Their varying pitches beautifully synchronized!
In the serene dawns and dusky evenings
The atmosphere gets abuzz with the soft strains
Of (1) ‘Sopana Sangeetham’, the ethnic music of Kerala,
It comes floating from inside the Hindu shrines
Flooding soul’s enchanted shores,
And opening the floodgates of piety
In healing murmurs and throbbing notes,
As the symphony builds up its circuitous round
It descends down as a stream of blessing
Drenching devotees in its moistening sweetness
Like the drizzle of dew drops from heaven
Making hearts ride in the palanquin of joy!
May.21.2023
If your Birthplace- Country was a Poem Poetry Contest
Sponsor - Anoucheka Gangabissoon
This poem is about Kerala, a small state in India, which is my birthplace and its geography and culture.
1.Sopana Sangeetham is a form of Indian Classical music, developed in the temples of Kerala. It is sung, sitting by the holy steps leading to the sanctum sanctorum of a shrine.
2.Veena- a stringed musical instrument, one of the oldest of Indian musical tradition, played sitting cross legged, capable of producing all oscillations of Carnatic music
3. Tanpura- a drone instrument of Indian origin used mainly in a concert of classical music, creating a melodic background, but not a melody.
Categories:
gibbering, appreciation, home, music,
Form:
Free verse
Suddenly from somewhere
A street urchin-
An untamed bird of the wider sky
Dropped down
Into the circus tent
Before him was unfurled
Scenes eerie….awesome!!
Roaring lions and tigers,
Gibbering baboons, caravans of camels,
Animal tamers and acrobats,
Artists balancing on poles
Swinging from bars to trapeziums
Pliant girls with plastic limbs
And pouting breasts,
Walking on tight ropes.
A strange world,
Peopled with beasts and men!
His face, painted white and red
In motley dress, he was arrayed
And a tall tapering cap, placed
On his forcibly tonsured head
He hardly knew what it all meant.
He heard the bells ringing
And it was time for the show
He was told
He would henceforth be a clown
And should make people laugh
A thousand sunsets passed him by
He forgot the familiar alleys of the streets
Lost sight of the endless pathways of the sky
In a world –
So populous- so empty,
He buried him
In the hidden caverns of himself
Nursing a hundred bruises
Inflicted by Time’s sharp razors
Often he was reminded-
“You should make others laugh”
He did make people laugh
While a fountain of tears lay frozen
In the slivers of his broken heart!!
Jan.7. 2023
~ Placed Fourth~
Tatters Poetry Contest
Sponsor- Mystic Rose Rose
Categories:
gibbering, angst, childhood, heartbroken, smile,
Form:
Free verse
Nestled here beside you, night fell without a single care,
though pins and needles may soon claim arm's clutch.
Precious time all mine, drunk on the smell of you so near,
would stay beside 'til last loss of feeling touch.
Is that your heartbeat caught in soft pulsing fingers..?
or perhaps mine, trembling now in anticipation.
This magic voice under bright crescent moon, lingers,
finally rememb'ring love's sweet translation.
We quit all the old games, forgot their petty names..,
two lovers, sought youth again, with loving wings.
No, that's not a tear of sadness, my heart alight in gladness,
this luckiest of fools, caught in rapt angel eyes, sings!
Irrational, gibbering song grips moonstruck heart so thrilled,
though I really don't give a damn.
Passion felt in quivering, longing lips, more any wish yet fulfilled,
makes me glad that I'm a man.
Categories:
gibbering, fire, kiss, moon, passion,
Form:
Rhyme
No,
not I,
I see clearly through
the rotten wedding veil,
clogged by cake turning stale,
framed by arachnid pageboys;
I see cracks on pale pink lacquer,
on the mannequin face below,
eyes mad and staring, aglow,
the sick dead holes of eyeless toys.
No,
not I,
my dear,
I see the madwoman in the attic,
frozen in her rocking chair,
cobwebs floating in her hair,
gibbering to her inner void;
I see the child she used to be,
alone beneath opiate skies,
pulling wings off butterflies,
things of beauty she destroyed.
No,
sorry,
no trace of me at all,
no reflection cast of me,
I am not real, don’t you see?
but, of course, that doesn’t do;
I watch the self-delusions form,
your mechanisms justify,
projecting blame on passers by,
when all there really is,
is
you.
Categories:
gibbering, death, health, life, loss,
Form:
Verse
No one seemed to take much note at first.
Old-timers on park benches passed a comment or two,
Somebody wrote a letter to the local rag,
but no one (who mattered, that is)
really seemed to mind.
Of course, you will always have
your bellyachers and woolly romantics
with nothing better to do than whine
about the way things are going, -
the loss of bird life, the silenced dawn chorus,
the vanishing English hedgerow,
you know the sort of thing.
The leaves began falling long before autumn.
"Funny," they said, "curious," "that's one for the book."
This was all very interesting for botanists,
environmentalists, chemists and the like.
Such words as "pollution," "soil erosion"
and "deprivation" were bandied about,
but no one was much the wiser though
the experts were agreed on one point.
"Photosynthesis provides the basis of all life."
This was interesting but nothing like
as interesting as the favourite for Ascot,
the football results, the Top of the Pops,
the late night thriller or the FT index.
All that changed.
Foresters and timber merchants became concerned
about the decaying cores of many trees.
The government became concerned, too,
(not so much about the fate of the trees as such
as about the effect the scarcity of wood
was having on the paper industry and inflation).
Then the doom-watchers caught the scent
and there was talk of an imminent ecological collapse,
but the man in the street still
passed it all off as the usual load of rot.
Then Kew Gardens, Epping Forest, Central Park,
the Everglades and the Bois de Boulogne
went the way of all wood.
A tramp, locally known as Nat the Nut,
was found in the village cemetery gibbering,
Before being bundled into an ambulance,
he was heard to say:
"With these very ears I heard 'em groan,
and this is what one of 'em said:
'Tonight we are dying, yew and I,
and the morrow sees us dead.'
And the willows wept in the valleys
and the trees on the hills pined away."
When the harvest failed,
the church bells tolled
for a woe no man could gainsay,
for none doubted then the trees were lost
or held it was only they.
Categories:
gibbering, angst, autumn, humanity,
Form:
Elegy
I am a drunken pen, or at least thats what they call me in the betting shop at 4.55pm on a Saturday afternoon. Kept deep inside the cavity of a old polyester jacket to converse with a packet of wrigley's extra strong mints in the dark. I often find myself just listening intently to my master as he begins the day in articulated fashion, and slowly slivers his way towards a gibbering wreck of despair & destruction. He is struggling desperately to make ends meet, as i frequently share space with 1p & 2p. Yesterday i heard him chatting to himself in the kitchen whilst trying to open a tin of spaghetti hoops. Bills haven't been paid in weeks, and the odour that fills the atmosphere can only be matched by that in the backstreets of Calcutta...not that i've been there to experience the aroma.
My use is simple, i write bets! nothing more, nothing less. Starting the day in a elegant manner and posture my nib floats around the paper like a ice skater at the Montreal Olympics, and quite often i will polish the ego by scoring myself 6.0,6.0,6.0 for artistic impression. But as the hours roll by, and my master takes in the full range of liquid refreshment i find that my posture and style have deserted my being within three turns of a clock face. My master is slowly sinking into the abyss of life, and he sits in the towering inferno of middle aged obsurity with no exits. Everytime i appear from the deep well of his pocket i continually keep praying that this journey shall be my last. Maybe i will break, maybe i will have a blockage. Or even better than that, my master may be fortunate to win a cascading amount of money that prompts him to fling me to the gates of pen eternity allowing the master to purchase the Rolls Royce of pens....The Parker!
Until that moment arrives i will continue to be everything my master wishes me to be. Because at the apex of this life's voyage, i am only as good as my master's intensions.
Categories:
gibbering, funny, imagination, me, day,
Form:
ABC
from the book WOW! TATTOO MY BUTT -
MORE MAD POEMS AND VERSE BY NICK
By Nick Armbrister
Zuni
I'm the defective detective.
I marvel at the whiteness of frozen snow.
Left right upper leg.
Do you like beer?
No I like Ricky Gervais.
I'm inside the tumble dryer spinning in space.
Just made a hillinit bloody hooooot.
Why do I let the last 5 years drag me down?
Chained to me,
self destroying me from within.
I'm the Phantom Ray bombing plane with no pilot.
She ticked the opt out box and became
a peace loving vegan vampire bi-sexual lesbian called Sultry Sheba.
Dave can roll joints with his toes and smoke them with his bell.
Curtain rail caterpillar coloured purple and beige.
Gibbering old people flying Messers over Russia.
Retirement?
Humbug flavoured gumdrops.
Silver beer cans tasting tinnily of champers.
Aldi luxury potatoes for tea.
Join me and talk gibberish.
Categories:
gibbering, fantasy, funny, nonsense, silly,
Form:
Verse
Sobriety
Lucid self-possession.
Clear-headed, composed, steadied
Abstention, temperance; Carouser, lush
Staggering, tottering, gibbering.
Intoxicated high.
Drunkenness
Categories:
gibbering, social,
Form:
Diamante
We treaded beneath the harvest moon
cursing the viper beneath the hideous act
that had left a man gibbering "Ave Maria",
too frightened to predecease his age mates
he lay lifeless on his death bed
a cosy platform made of fine bamboo
and his eyes spinned as if in a hex
drum beats acclaimed our arrival
at the abode of Sango the wizard of wizards
of course we had with us a black heifer,
snout enough to entice the gods
we entered the rounded hut willy-nilly
and quietly we fell on a Columbus skin
the accustomed comfort for the doctor's guests
the famed hermit displayed his aptitude
arrayed in mysterious amulets he looked creepy
and sure indeed our ticks palpitated
dancing in circles marked the preliminaries
before moving on to palpate,
his already awe-stricken patient
slowly the patient was made to gulp
a mysterious potion from Sango's secret recipe
which we all thought tasted like tonic water
that was one of our visit to a warlock
and sure enough it proved fruitful
for the patient -that- was lives to tell
of how magic had beat science
Categories:
gibbering, magic,
Form:
Narrative
An ABC Menagerie
“A” is for apples and animals like ants.
“B” is for baboons with bright blue balloons.
“C” is for the circus clowns calling big cats.
“D” is for a dozing doggies dreaming delights.
“E” is for elves, elephants, and enormous ears.
“F” is for fantastic fun, and fuzzy-furry friends.
“G” is for giraffes and giant gibbering goats.
“H” is for harps, harmony, and happy hopes.
“I” is for imagination, imported igloos, and ice.
“J” is for jolly jesters, jiggling jell-o, and juice.
“K” is for kettle-corn, kings, and kangaroos.
“L” is for lively lovely ladies laughing loudly.
“M” is for monkeys and magic merry-go-rounds.
“N” is for noses, necklaces, and nuts.
“O” is for oranges, opossums, and oats.
“P” is for parties, pansies, and pokes.
“Q” is for questions, quilts, quail, and queens.
“R” is for raccoons, rushing rivers, and rats.
“S” is for sugar, shiny shells, and sunshine,
“T” is for tadpoles, tough turtles, and tots.
“U” is for unicorns under umbrellas.
“V” is for violets, vines, and violins.
“W” is for windows, windsocks and west-winds.
“X” is for xylophone, Xerox and x-ray.
“Y” is for yodeling yaks yanking yellow yarn.
“Z” is for zooming zebras zipping zealously.
© August 3, 2010
Dane Smith-Johnsen
Categories:
gibbering, children
Form:
ABC
Those heavenly bodies,
they'll rend your mind to ribbons.
It's true;
But first, you must be willing to play the part.
Only the blind, deaf, dumb, and pious need apply.
You'll sit in your padded seat, nodding.
So sad, it's true, and who are you?
Lips blue, eyes black. A warm cadaver to be filled.
Don't bother looking back, the end of the tunnel
disappeared
long ago.
Surely, to turn from the rising sun is blindness,
to spit on sacred ground is folly,
to face the abyss without fear is madness and abandon.
Sometimes, in the ragged dusk I hear a shallow murmur,
a call to arms for the dirty and faithless.
It's true, so who am I to ask why?
I, of these tired lies, and small, evil mind.
Not so evil as the silent engines that propel my quest.
A sojourn fetter'd in shackles of taunting realities,
held above our brows as a beacon to the journeys of tomorrow.
And blessed am I, to vanquish the marauding bandits.
The unwanted and foul.
Those who would not accept the gift.
Gibbering with thoughts of lust, hatred, and pride I prevail.
Breathless, at the peak of that wretched descent,
we'll see the fabled reward, cold and pale.
To those who mock or doubt my tale, may the mercy
of fools be upon ye.
Categories:
gibbering, journey,
Form:
Free verse
Hitting your thumb with a hammer
Is liable to make you curse
But stubbing your unprotected toes
Is likely to make you swear even worse
You feel such a bloody idiot
For being so stupidly clumsy
As you moan and writhe on the floor
In unimagined agony
Until the pain has abated
To a level more tolerable
You are little more than a baby
Gibbering like a fool
When you’re feeling better
You examine each injured toe
Imagining the worst case scenario:
To hospital you’ll need to go
But there’s nothing wrong that a sock
Won’t conveniently hide
All that’s really hurting now
Is your bruised and battered pride!
Categories:
gibbering, funny, humorous, pain,
Form:
Couplet