Best Guesswork Poems
The subtle scent of lilacs rides the breeze.
Cascading flowers brighten in sun’s sheen.
On crisp cool nights there rarely is a freeze.
And autumn leaves seem always to be green.
As moonlight changes daylight’s atmosphere,
Big cats and fox roam through the forest fair.
The starlight sparkles bright when nights are clear,
While families inside say night-time prayers –
When daybreak falls, the children go to school.
The bus ride quickly drives through rural routes.
Adults, then, go to work; some people rule!
The pecking orders known since kids were sprouts.
If freedoms remain free, it’s no guesswork.
Small towns down south will never go berserk.
12/30/2016
Written for Silent One’s Contest: A Sonnet About Where You Live.
This poem is about Live Oak, Florida, U.S.A.
I'm lost in there
battered between form and function
existing in the guesswork
institutionalised by containment
figured out on the block
measured by what takes up space
every layer perfectly in place
to provide freedom to conform
I merge and merge again
despite being part of no plan
unstoppable in my inexplicable existence
tip out my untapped potential
lay me on the table
busy yourself with dissection
broken up into components
I can do no more
cannot be put back together
an empty head
with no view of itself
an offered up cadaver
any day of the week
THE TERRAIN OF ABSENCE
I think I've finally understood why distance makes
love tremble like a flame held in strangers' palms ~
it isn't distrust that shakes it, no, but that concrete lack,
a hunger for the body, for air breathed in the same room,
a territory of absence with maps drawn on water,
where your name is a city I can no longer touch.
When you're near, I learn you instinctively, the way skin learns rain:
the way you go quiet before saying something important,
the faint tremor in your voice, like a spider's thread in the wind,
the shadow that crosses your face when you remember something old,
the gestures you make without knowing you're making them ~
I know you through evidence, not guesswork, I hold you in context.
But distance leaves white spaces, clearings without footprints,
and the mind has this cruel habit of filling them
with whatever it finds in its darkest pockets:
with versions, with mistranslated silences, with scenarios
grown overnight like mushrooms in the basement of thought,
and every silence of yours becomes a room without a door.
That's why I believe closeness makes love more certain ~
not because distance would shrink the love itself, as people think,
but because presence gives certainty a body, bones, weight,
a breath that confirms, a hand that signs
everything the soul says and cannot prove over the phone;
truth needs a temperature in order to be believed.
When I can't see you, all I have left is to believe, and faith is beautiful
and dangerous in equal measure, like a glass bridge over fog,
because there, exactly there, in the gap between believing and knowing,
uncertainty builds its nest, that white and greedy bird
that pecks at night along the edges of your face
until what's left is a love built only out of memory.
Maybe that's why long-distance love is a cult without an altar,
a prayer spoken to a window that never answers back;
and yet I wait, the way a field waits for the snow it was promised,
I stitch my days to one another like unopened letters,
and I tell myself that one morning you'll simply walk through the door,
and all the white spaces will fill, all at once, with you.
The Western world will breathe easier when Kim Jong Un
starts the denuclearization of North Korea.
And the Russian dictator Vladimir Putin gives
Ukraine back its lost peninsula of Crimea.
There will be celebrations worldwide when Israel
and Palestine stop the hate and settle their dispute.
And the constant threat of war is no longer looming,
for both nations' right to exist is deemed absolute.
The world will breathe easier when Bashar al-Assad
ends his civil war and finally leaves Syria.
And the militant Islamist group Boko Haram
stops raping girls and is driven from Nigeria.
Democracy will win when President Donald Trump
is exposed and reduced to a political quirk.
And global warming's threat is taken seriously,
so the fate of our planet is not left to guesswork.
(Quatrain)
June13, 2018
"You've got six months, nine at the most.
If you opt for chemo, we could stretch it some.
Maybe a couple of years,
but first six months of serious treatments."
When he said nine months
I thought that's the normal prenatal life
So I have possibly a pregnancy left.
Decisions, Decisions, Decisions
Let's see two years minus six months
minus maybe some more for recovery from chemo.
Or nine months of wondering,
could this be the day?
My neighbor was sick as a dog for most treatments.
She couldn't eat; she couldn't sleep.
Just a forever burning sensation, dry, lifeless, pain
My cousin said his was not so bad, but
then he died only two months afterward,and
they had said he might live five years.
My last nine months, what will I do?
I will get ready to die - prepare to enter a new life.
Wait a minute ...
I am doing that already ever since
I decided to put my trust in God's Son.
My eternal life began at that moment sixty years ago.
I will tell everybody I know how good God is.
But I have cancer; is cancer good?
I look at it this way.
Cancer is a chapter -
the last nine months of my life on earth.
It defines me and with
God's help I can deal with it -
without chemo.
He has a plan and cancer is
part and parcel of it.
The rest is just guesswork.
now we come to the taboo part of our presentation
in which the secret of all time will be revealed
to those who wish to understand understanding
characters arranged in uncharacteristic sequence
a nice little codification on toasted bagel
hitched to the static measurement wagon
so many pretty numbers so subdivisable
into both shape and penetrated substance
down where the cognitive revolutions
splash about cageless canaries preening in song
what is it we perceive if not dimension
floating upon a squirming ocean of magnitudes
of enormous potential in zero space
is pretty much it see not so difficult
10,000 years of hocus pocus gurus
couldn't begin to tell you this eye to eye
being knee deep in spirit and guesswork
and various intuitive instruments of torture
while still thinking in 3 color caricatures
mystery on her own is something to bother about
this assessment brought to you by the same 10k
a constant ball park estimate for side arm pitchers
following the contours of the cracks in that great glass
where the buzzword signal meter needles
are perpetually evermore bouncing off the peg
trying to tell a story that hasn't been told before
to your narrator who is all ears all the time
bringing the reign of the ephemeral cortex
to the light of day much to everyone's disgust
irretrievably drawn to the abandonment of ornament
and their many delicate sedimentations
chased by a brace of Tennessee blueticks
baying like a steam whistle spitting sparks
assured of the one validated certainty
the wax was melting off his wings
apparently this is not a trial run
with God whispering in my big bunny ear
you probably want to be like me right
the wavy haired platinum blond at his elbow
adds a lascivious every day has its price
naturally I had to agree and nodded heedfully
knowing a single sliver of the future
the bogs will take them
*Image of Couple Love Nature by Pixabay*
Splendor In The Grass
Humbly, I forage nigh the Irish springs,
In earnest quest of a four-leaf clover,
Augments my spirit a bit of luck brings,
A rainbow bridge where love can crossover.
Lucent fairies wand dreams magically,
As waxen clasped wick gifts a spark inflame,
Said be true interludes that passion be,
Deep within vessels for lovers to claim.
Moist arrow tips with a potion of lure,
Propel assuredly for patient hearts,
Pierce beating veins and ignite the amour,
Serenade a moonlit dance, hope imparts.
Guesswork fumbles in broad daylight splendors,
As nightfall conspire diverse stargazers.
2019 November 28
*1st Place*
A BRIAN STRAND 1093
~~Brian Strand: Judged 2022 March 21
*3rd Place*
Love Me Like You Mean It
~~Julie Leigh Rodeheaver: Judged 2020 January 20
*HMS & RZ
When I think “next time I’ll”
And realize there will not be a next time,
A pressure pain twists my head a notch.
A mistake unfulfilled by repetitious learning.
A twinge says: if there is a next time,
You will err next time.
And if you err next time,
And you happen along the same path again,
Under mostly the same circumstances,
Ah,
Then,
My Boy,
Then you will learn for good.
He continues:
But that’s the small lesson,
And so see it now.
Perhaps you repeat the mistake.
Now
Think of the larger fracture
The event that lent your mistake.
Can you spot the break?
Point it on the print-out.
Were it an x-ray,
Would you worry malpractice?
You may get a call six-months time:
Misdiagnosis; there was no break.
Take off the smelly, itchy cast.
Hit the showers.
Soapy clean.
But in the amnesia,
Recall your other half.
Admit to guesswork.
Think how seldom you trust speculation.
You
The rational one
My Boy
Stroked it off easily this time.
As deft remain, engender all else claim
obedience call so sacred but to twain,
the waterways dividing in remain
and never coinciding with norm's plain!
And so the answer chiding must refrain
while backing not away, impatience name,
the guard rail so defining enters main
the guesswork none exciting, none in vain!
What certainty reciting soul's arraign
and pieces fretting, hiding the mundane,
this quiet mystery, upon the focused gain,
God's purpose not inciting riots of fame!
That one address, faith's riding speaks the aim
my silent share complying, rest's contain.
That silvery sea of gliding unknown reign
is freedom . . . thought's arriving from profane!
Romans 13:1 - “The authorities that exist have been established by God”…
Though that seems more of a facade, long shot and a fraud from a world long gone
Since sin no longer seems fiction in this depiction of friction with biased predictions
An election... with no intention of protection for the derelict despite respective messages
Seems like these cycles are a hit-miss of plot twists and taut fists that obscure who God is
But we make no connection that contention from our own predilection sows dissension
And without intervention comes resentment, we need spiritual direction
But instead of resting in God’s embrace we attack others with a verbal mace
while we brace our own heart for impact, still intact, rate of pace faster than light in space
We’re caught up in the race but instead should race to erase the rays of hate from our own race.
Why do we debate the debates as we relegate and castigate with hate, then demand a rebate
or hammer their manner like it’s grammar, then try to conjugate what they obfuscate
Our minds are lost in space while propaganda confiscates our thoughts of late
Then traps them in relapse, perhaps inaction would produce the largest fraction of satisfaction
But our thoughts are funneled and fueled into to a brew of psychological stew
so heated and cruel it boils over derision and division, it’s no wonder we have tunneled vision.
Then when the door unhinges, pops open, it’s rigged with bigoted dissonance, explosives
that spring from an ocean filled with commotion from springs of offense overflowing
because we dared to confused fact with opinion and reasoning with motive
America caught between a persona gargantuan and aroma of pantsuits and emails scandalous
The purposes of service is not to deter with private servers or privates and perverts with backers
in reserve or greenbacks in reserves, we reserve the right to deserve more than this disservice
So when we venture into this realm of guesswork where conjecture is turned into adventure
When the cyclical turns visibly unbiblical with violently physical intervals fueled by the visceral
Instead of surrendering our heart’s rhapsody of magnitude into apathy and lassitude
...let us pray for strength to maintain a God sustained attitude of positive aptitude
The so-called experts have been saying lately
There's a slow down in global warming
It's true, it hasn't been very tropical lately
Global warming is under performing
Do you think it's possible it just could be
A normal fluctuation in the world's temps
But who am I to offer this assessment
Why they're fluctuating to this extent
Could it possibly be the experts have it wrong
Oh forgive me for suggesting such a thing
After years and years in “forecasting” school
With diplomas under their wing
Weather forecasting is a lot of guesswork
Next to impossible to predict the future
There's so many variables to affect the outcome
Even with all those fancy computers
© Jack Ellison 2014
Dont you worry about
my cloudy sky,
for I was born
under it.
The reasons why,
is right here,
and It's here,
where I sit.
But that's the concern,
of the authorities,
as precious time,
still ticks away.
There's reasons why,
A heart stopped beating,
call me a fool,
call me a liar.
Anyone with a nose,
can smell it,
the poison,
the stench of cover ups.
She put them in the grave,
then dug them up,
because they weren't,
dead enough for her.
Sackcloth and ashes,
the height of her fashion,
her strange and vile little world,
surrounding herself with grey.
Her light was dark,
the black and white,
of right and wrong,
didn't matter to her.
Not with knowledge,
but with guesswork,
she hung the laundry out,
already dried.
It's the reason I sit,
under clouds waiting,
for the rains,
to justify.`
General grammar generates guesswork gaining great glitches grammatically
Contest: Tautogram
Sponsored by: Eve Roper
Date created: 10/21/2019
So oft I'd heard its soul intent
the performed center, not rebound
could bury once and then compound
the years between, cycle's renown!
Now given over to the Earth
no search or wandering can contain
the final call, summized in worth
and vestige given, subtle gain!
What final makepiece can entail
a journey's fare or life's enslave,
does hold in bondage, fortune's quake
and guesswork yonder not remake!
Conditions squander for the take,
the spirit of coward's, sentiments fake
for counterfeiting sameness sake
relying on its own uptake!
And tears can last beyond the grave
arrangements scattering the poise
a lifelong treasure, so denounce
all moments contrary or brave!
My footsteps falter, not held up
by urgings from all else, so mean
this only once, my saving's cup
respect my feelings with esteem!
Oh, childish pondering, to and fro
so wasted, while the dead lie still,
a life too soon has gone to flow
some spot eternity will fill!
Uncertainty breeding tolerance or default
that openness forever I exalt
my weakness, as new weakness, not assault,
would execute new justice by strength's lack?
So bridging some infirmity, take back
the homicidal structure of exact,
unknown to self the causing, still impact
all differences demeaning, all retract!
By stating my contention, not react
I clarify my purpose ~ in contrast.
So let me delve in empathy, Faith's last
and let me live in sympathy, my bast!
As still injustice learning, am aghast
by fortunes interacting, through War's path,
the flagrant guesswork erstwhile marring lathe',
I loosen my indemnity ~ God's wrath
is so determined judgment . . . . mine unclassed!