Best Hardening Poems
October: I'm eighteen, shortcutting home
through an autumn-burnished churchyard -
copper-lustred leaves, moss-skinned stone -
a jaunty swing of skater skirt and arm,
college folder square-sturdy in my hand.
In the moment. In the last pale pulse of sun.
Hey, can you tell me...?
I halt. I turn...
Cold earth. Colder blade dimpling my skin.
My coral cameo earrings scatter,
daisy-dotting the green.
My back is spiked by needles of yews.
Sun skews, sky side-slides
until his face is the firmament.
I'm staring into the tumid blank-bloat of blue;
the ground hardening beneath me,
the death-spike trees stiffening.
Heavy Special Brew breaths.
Grubby, moist fingers
like grubs crawling over my breasts,
and, weirdly, I'm smelling pepper -
horror-spice of pungent lust,
its acrid nose-thrust -
and woodsmoke is drifting from somewhere...
lung-flame, tongue-flames
of searing words - his words -
blazing like the umber tumbling leaves.
Please...Please...I'll...
Fear-forced bargaining, but I'm beyond care.
And I'm aware
of the church steeple rising,
its phallus penetrating sky.
The tilting church could topple
as tears crystal-crush in my eyes.
Fear-faint, already half gone
in a soundless scream, my muted mouth
mouths silent goodbyes
to Sarah, to Mum.
Time slows to a crawl.
I try to call. Nobody comes
but the man who has me ground-pinned.
Bleachy stink of semen
whitening my ripped skater skirt,
but some things don't fade
and there is no clean in this, just dirt,
wet leaf-mulch, shame.
Ineradicable hurt.
Sacred soil is soiled, sullied.
Stunned, I stumble
shoeless, knickerless,
into the trees and heave
into the mud, into the leaves
strings of spittle-sick,
my thoughts strung out,
reality spun out.
From stinking, pulped leaves I retrieve
crushed coral earrings,
ground-grimy knickers,
my white court shoes
that whitely scream the 90s,
the scattered tatters of essays -
white, like fallen feathers, sunk in the sludge,
muddied, the red-inked words bloodied.
I gather them together.
Gather myself.
I go
forward into my future, stained from pain
and tainted touch, the smears of fear, self-disgust.
And oozing slime-soft into my ears
the mire of incongruous apology: I'm sorry
don't tell anyone - I won't.
I don't.
How long does it take
for a heart to harden?
for muscles to loose
that supple tone
to lose elasticity
to become...stone?
How long does it take?
I wonder
But I know
your heart has hardened
I never would believe it to be true
No, not you
Not...YOU
Your heart was my home
the soft walls my comfort
the rhythmic squeeze my treasure, my pleasure
But your heart has hardened
Turned...to stone
But even a stone would hear my cry
a stone would shed a tear
a stone would soften
with the beating of my breast against it
with the deluge of my tears wetting it
with my sobs moving it
a stone would hear
and come to life
to quiet my inner strife
but not your heart
NO, Not YOU!
Your heart is stone
I wonder if it yet beats
and why do I write this poem?
Perhaps you will see
Perhaps you will read
Perhaps you will be softened
and bleed
I write because...
My heart yet beats
for you...
Eileen M Ghali
There's a magic in snowflakes,
yet their majesty is only momentary -
just like you,
just like me...
They fall
so elegantly,
like enchanting
ballet dancers,
shapeshifting
in the air,
floating in a
bitter breeze,
so soft,
so tender,
so fragile,
so
vulnerable.
Gently
d
e
s
c
e
n
d
i
n
g
side
by
side
like
unique
pearls settling
upon empty surfaces
spreading softly
on spotless
emerald
fields
Rain is the
enemy of beauty,
the sun a
jealous confidant.
Drops of mercy
may feed nature,
but their influx
results in a massacre.
Their cunning conduct
is hidden behind
an illusion known
as the rainbow.
Snowflakes do not bleed red,
they discolour into ashen slush,
their remains hardening in death,
frozen, until melting into nothingness.
There is a tragedy
in snowflakes,
which recurs
time
after
time,
yet we keep faith
in our seasons,
just like my life,
just like yours.
Walls of silence hold,
Me prisoner,
The child held within,
Cries out for release.
Relative solitude comforts,
Not the tortured soul,
Inward coiling withdrawing,
Deep inside.
Shedding its outer skins,
Protective
Layer thus preserving its,
Inner being.
Innocents shroud lies in ruins.
Gentle spirit, cast aside wings,
Damaged appendages.
The fallen angel kneels in,
Shame,
Shadows before mankind.
Unanswered prays rest upon,
Deaf ears.
Muted sobs, echo on stilled,
Winds breath.
Hardening to stone, the
Chilled heart
Reflects frozen repose.
Forgotten amongst mine own,
Kindred,
Childhood symbolizes a betrayed,
Victim’s refuge.
Small fragile hands reach out,
Into nothingness,
Hollow space grasping into,
Oblivion.
Chained shackles twist,
Imaginations warped view,
Somber tones cloud troubled,
Thoughts.
Amidst life's trials, I'm aimlessly,
Adrift,
Without any form of stability.
I, alone remain shambles,
Wreckage.
Displaced and damaged,
Beyond repair.
A broken doll thrown away,
By those who should have,
Cared for her the most.
BY: CHERYL ANNA DUNN
GIANT CUPCAKE
With raisins, nuts and cinnamon
Quite moist all through
Not the usual 3-minute egg on toast
Oh no! I’m taking a chance on something new
Just a crack of dawn
Splotches through the trees
And with smoking black coffee
This special morning promises to please
Mondays, like any other
Count increasing wants and pains
All constipated within this hardening frame
Aching to evacuate, enflatulate
All with awareness enflamed
My simple wants are for those lost
Those which children possess
A healthy excitement and joy
Dramatic imagination –
Yes, that’s it, I guess
Ah, mind’s eye has gone sick white
For only sleep will stir imagination’s sight
I shake my head
Twist the catch from shoulder and neck
Sigh, and take a bite
Dave Austin
Is He watching?
When my tongue thirsts for sin,
Gamble my faith with filth,
When my tongue spills its worst,
My ears long to be filled with corruption,
When my fingers linger to steal,
My feet tread over and along faults?
Is He watching,
My unrepentant soul thrive?
Growing more in strength and glory?
Hardening it’s shield against good,
Gambling what is right and wrong,
Yet making the choice to dwell in the wrong?
Feeding itself with shades of deceit?
Is He watching,
When I am unrepentant but care less?
When I don’t consider His feelings?
Strive to please me rather than Him?
Meddle in the pleasures of earth?
Dump off the cares of my Christian race?
But I know the truth but become blind to it?
Is He watching,
When I return spite for His care?
Neglect His expensive price of love?
On a daily routine visit the gallow of sin?
Clad a false Christianity in my personality,
Yet judge others at the slightest fault? Still nurturing the hypocrite I protect.
Is He watching,
My unrepentant soul thrive?
My unquestionable strategies of pride,
When I stay balanced in the kingdom of the enemy?
Stain my soul constantly in mire,
Even when the truth hits me hard.
Brings to my realization how wrong I am?
Is He watching?
When I lay finally to my last rest,
And stand before Him to be judged?
When my soul headed to Him is rebuked?
When my deeds in my face is reproduced?
How my own vanity has chosen for me doom?
So helpless to reality I stand.
Is He watching,
My guilt wager my strength as I spare not tears?
My offense like chains stroke my existence,
Hangs my living in the face of death?
When my past with pride divulge my wrongs?
Plastered with faulty stains I forever I’m gone,
Lost to the sins I once chided unethical.
A flush of adrenaline
A river running high
To fight against a carnal harmony
No dam can be erected
Was it the builder's creation?
Or a flaw to be ignored?
Butterflies abandon
Surge over sinew
A course, not yet to dry
Pleasure or pain
Cycles unknown to me
Besides the motion
It strives to drive the dancers out
The partners to lure in
As music screamed
Pounding churned the walls
Where the drapes were once scarlet
Now white streamers
Ran silkily to sigh
Veins and vessels away
The apartments were stable
No alarms sounded
I slept unfeeling
Forgotten by the party
Missing their advance
On feminine, the virility
A chargers onslaught came
While I had no thoughts to disturb
Judges at the ready
Curling, hardening to guard
Against an inevitable trial
The doorbell rang incessantly
Banging and scratching around panes
To be desired and devoured
My core shattered
A dividing ecstasy began
Soft and red, a breath taken
Then I conceived I was
There is a darkness in my life,
a forecast of torrential rain that drowns my heart with sorrow,
and its gloom clouds my mind,
washing away any hope for tomorrow,
This darkness overshadows me,
eclipsing whatever light that remains within my soul,
and the more I try to fight it,
the less I feel in control,
Tears spill onto my cheeks,
tracing the outlines of a smile seldom shown,
as I sit alone in this cave of a home,
hidden from the world and hardening like stone,
It's as if I'm dying inside,
trapped within the confines of an epidermis tomb,
while my cries for help echo through the barrenness of my existence,
resonating with apprise of my impending doom,
But in this aphotic zone in the depths of my core,
my words are a sconce on the walls of my heart,
illuminating the halls of my soul,
so that others may navigate their way through the dark.
The warmth no longer comes
it seems to only leave.
The furry ones, all
caught in hypnotic disbelief:
hardening ground's
taken root
where once
gardening grounds
(forsaken, mute)
were once and again
makin' fruit.
Each beast, shaking
like a leaf
(though, truth be told
I've only ever
seen 'em dance)
as if to compel
the sun to
sidle up
'n stay a bit.
The butterflies are all turned
to windblown, drying leaves.
The biting clouds of gnats
are now
the biting cold of early flakes.
All hatched and reared
(the secret thrush, the ungainly, splashtering loon,
the burly snakes)
as evening hurries home
to be home for the night.
It's so early, so late.
The fatted robin's gone
just as the field mice hid
from barn-now-lapcat.
This constellation of crows,
a raucous perch, tried
that hiding ploy: their clotted knotted
silhouetted faux-leaf blackening hide out
where the leaves’d lived but crows are not
meant to blot the low sun as they’d plotted...
And so it was as so its been since Oh, so ever since -
a bird of prey, answered their
plaintive caws with painted claws -
a fracturous startle from above
a crash! a cry! a scattering!
one down, one murder
still.
Nothing softens, nothing greens.
No flowering as Southern urges
force flocks into making V-lines.
Each nest left: all break routines.
Summer is souring, as frost emerges
and last-one-picked, the pines -
lefties left in left field;
icing soon, their needles their shield
and, the coach never intervenes...
The light more slow to show
more tugged and bent to slant.
The sunshafts seem to push
the cold ahead as snow by plows.
And for our part we too as well
well, we turn away, turn indoors.
We turn our dreams to
make-it-through this.
We turn our collars up,
and too, our eyes to floors.
We turn our (each seems to)
thoughts inside this shell
not towards Inner but
rather, of course, truly from-
far and away from the
Cold & Falling, closing crisp.
How unlike the Scholar's Cup!
Our husks indoors,
our thoughts follow
but burrow deeper still.
Don't blame the light
for not keeping company
so deep where hides
a fearful, frigid 'you.'
It's Autumn
all turns on
one point.
It's Autumn
Fall burns on.
It's Autumn
sun burns on
one point
(of light.)
I have never felled so alive
as now.
Desolate,prideful,terrible and sick
People have created themselves a new brick
Sinful bricks have planted a wall
Wall has brought a major fall
Pride eyes are seen every where,
Hatred is blowing and flowing no care
Hardening their heart is enjoyable for them
Staring eyes is nothing but pride in them.
The wax drips slowly down the hardening ripple
Hours pass by as a second, I hear:
. crickets
birds
the wind
water drips
fingers tapping against the chair
The shadows have closed into night
My candle has long ago burned to ash
I hear silence on the porch
Your boot scrapes are missing
Signaling the end of my day
No need for roast and carrots cooking
Your boot scrapes won't come home anymore...
On my darkest Day you make me shine
Forever you will always be mine
The Twinkle in your eyes light up my soul
Your Spirit moves through my body and makes it whole
The virtue you have could change the world
I was a sleeping Volcano and you awaken me
The crust was hard and filled with lava
A hot molten rock by just the sight of you
Awoke this Volcano and Lava started to flow
Deep into the ocean seas beyond our control
The lava flowed across land with it’s crust hardening
Then penetrating the land
Once the eruption had ceased this volcano
Was fast asleep bringing peace back to the land
Once causing this land to tremble and become weak
Now brings peace and harmony to the one I speak
Sponsored by: Eve Roper
Contest name: Sleeping Volcano
Date: 12/30/2018
Palliative Poetic Pain
Throwing and trashing
Flowing and flashing
Breaking and bashing
Screaming and smashing
Mixing and mashing
My love is lashing
Frustrated and fighting
Exploding and exciting
Sinning and sighing
Careless and crying
Deep full and defying
My death is dying
Sleepless and starving
Countless and charming
Damaged and daunting
Holy and haunting
Healing and harming
My heaven is hardening
Saddened and silent
Voiceless and violent
Quest full and quiet
Venomous and vibrant
Peaceful and private
A genuine gentle giant
Battled and burning
Tossing and turning
Nerves and numbing
Hiding and humbling
Tearful and tumbling
My world is crumbling
Evolved and enslaved
Saintly and saved
Bowing and behaved
Caring and caved
Wondrous and waved
Dramaturgically dazed.
A poet and artist's world before and after they begin their craft...or is it just me? lol...
02.13.2017
WHAT LIES BENEATH THE LIES ...Contest
Sponsored by: John lawless
a post from 2014
for my beautiful granddaughter, Alexandra
After 13 days of confinement,
a caterpillar broke out of her butterfly egg,
Then ate the shell and pipevine leaf,
upon which it was laid,
A small fuzzy caterpillar,
with red spikes sticking out her sides and top,
She noticed on her middle,
a bright yellow colored spot-
Pipevine plants are toxic,
to things that are alive,
But for Queen Alexandra,
they would help her to survive,
These leaves would be her food source –
a repellent to her foes,
And if a predator caught her,
they’d vomit up and go-
Queen Alexandra wondered,
where on earth she might be,
Glancing at a tree canopy,
1,300 feet above the sea,
She noticed the thick greenery,
covering all the ground below,
And knew that only in a rainforest,
could this kind of vegetation grow-
Queen Alexandra didn’t know the name,
Papua New Guinea,
The tropical rainforest home,
to the largest butterflies that be,
Loggers destroying habitat,
collectors catching this species fast,
Predictions for her family –
only until the year 2021 to last-
Queen Alexandra as a caterpillar,
ate and grew for 120 days,
Shedding her skin six times was work,
not any fun or play,
Then she tightly clung
to the underside of a pipevine leaf,
And changed into a pupa,
the outside hardening as a protective sheath-
Inside changing her looks,
” metamorphosis” in her safe cocoon,
Forty days later emerging as a butterfly,
in hours long before noon,
Her 12 inch wings were mostly brown,
with pale yellow hues,
Her brother’s wings were smaller,
with streaks of iridescent blue-
So flying up they joined a group –
Queen Alexandra and her brother,
A gathering of butterflies together, you see,
is referred to as a “flutter,”
For about three months they’d fly,
at the top of the tree canopy,
This endangered “Queen Alexandra” Butterfly,
a beautiful rarity to see!
My heart is old in love years
the flesh not as supple
There has been a hardening
brought on by years of toil
years of care
a heartache or two
or maybe more than a few
have made it quite callous...
My heart is old in love years
and yet...
there is a soft spot in my heart
a tender place
where the flesh is young and strong
beating along
swathed in oxygenated flow
not toughened by age
or hardened by rage...
It is soft
It is warm
It is moist
and fresh
virbrant and alive
full of love...
Yes, there is a soft spot in my heart
for.....you
Eileen Manassian Ghali