Best Lacerated Poems
I'm here because.....
I need you to believe in me
You...Yes, YOU!
My fellow poet..
You who understands
my love for words and their nuances
denotations, but even more...their connotations
their play and interplay of emotions
I need you to believe in me
believe in my voice
my selection and word choice
believe that I can make a change
with my catalytic composition of rhyme
in this present time
when the world is in pain
when there is so much to gain
by the prophetic cry of a poet in the wildness
I need you to believe in me
I'm here because...
I need you to empathize with me
you who sees my words dripping
the blood of my lacerated heart
I'm incomplete
scarred
I'm scared
I'm holding on by one last thread
at times overcome by dread
life is hard
I need you to empathize with me
to write a little word
that will lift my heart
and caress my soul
with the balm of poetic love
friendship's bandage
Cover me....
I need your empathy
I'm here because...
I need community
others don't understand
this is not just a pastime
a cute little way to occupy my time
It's my heart and soul
my ever present dream...my goal
to live on when I'm gone
in some remembered little song
that you helped we write along
I need community
I need the you and the me
In the communal dance of poetry
They don't see
what words mean
to you
to me
I'm here because...
I need your wisdom
I fall short
I see only within my vision
my periphery
I cannot keep in store
all the mysteries and more
you bring wisdom daily to me
a feast for my hungry mind
to relish all the truth I find
your wisdom nourishes me
I bloom into what I'm meant to be:
a writer of sincerity
I'm here because....
When I'm not
I'm so incomplete
the missing parts of me
are here....
they live in my lines
they breathe in your rhymes
you write; I read
I write; you read
and life is born
and I am
whole...
I'm here because....
I belong
Here are people who understand
who help me to stand
who lend me a hand
I'm part of a band
of people like me
who taste the ecstasy
of a life that is blessed
by sweet
poetry....
For Jerry's Contest (Why are You Here)
December 30, 2015
Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.
Proverbs 16: 18
she stood tall on the jagged edges of the cliff
face worried as she noticed the rough seas
whilst above high dark clouds rumbled
though the sun shone straight at her face
could it enlighten her about what had happened
thoughts came and went, as she remembered
the letter he had sent her and wondered
was she deceived by her soldier and sister
he insulted her refusing to marry him
and she insulted him back vowing
she would never marry him come what may
still thoughts rumbled inside her mind
was he really proud or was she prejudiced
the jagged edges of a knife pierced her soul
could there have been some half-truths in his insults
she still hated him but admired his handsome face
facts churned in her head and confused her even more
could she face those jagged edges of truths
she turned and walked down the rough cliff
her soul lacerated with truths and pride
Placed 1
She sits.
She writes.
She feels lost and alone.
Clenched fists.
Scary night.
Passion turned to stone.
I tore up a book of lost verses written to my lover,
since she left there are no more journals to discover.
Humbled emotions penned with a quill on red paper,
the blood bled dry because I just couldn't save her.
I tore up her final letter written out of despair,
it may be ripped into pieces but her memory's still there.
Disoriented words making no sense cuz' intoxication,
so confusing we could not understand the interpretation.
“Good bye to my family, I can't handle anymore pain”,
she left this world cleanly, but I can't erase her stain.
I can't believe five years ago today she was found,
in front of a fountain sleeping peacefully on the ground.
She was feeding the ducks bread, we found remnants,
for so long I carried too much anger and resentment.
Under a blue spruce pine is where she took her last breath,
No words can explain what we've been through since her death.
I tore up her final letter written out of despair,
look at her picture once more, lacerated beyond repair.
I never want to read that filthy missive for as long as I live,
She was so exhausted, eyes closed, with nothing left to give.
***Five years ago tonight we found my sister who had been missing for three months. Along with her, came her good-bye letter.***
For The Contest, Any Poem Not For A Contest, Ever, Sponsor, Broken Wings
Date Written: March 17, 2016
In those final moments
before you breathed your last
all you heard
was spat out at you in hate
insults inflicting wounds
deeper than the nails
that riveted your body
to that cross
Out of eyes
swollen almost shut you saw
the ones you’d come to save
foaming at the mouth
in a rave
no time to swallow saliva
because the fast paced taunts
had no pause
your ears filled
not only with blood
but with curses that lacerated
your breaking heart
flaying it
with ever word
how absurd
that these humans
couldn't see the nature of the One
Who could with a WORD
make them all cower
stripped of their power
and He could set Himself free
but...it was not to be
because of His indescribable love
for you...
for me...
Oh, Jesus!
One day
Your ears will fill with praises
songs of victory
dedicated to you
pouring from the lips
of a very different throng
those who to you belong
the saved and the strong
singing at Your feet
lifting Your name high
where it was meant to be
above all names
Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12).
Only you know if I’ll be there
if your eyes will fix on mine
shining love that's Divine
as I sing with the rest
a love song to You, Jesus
Only by Grace
only through You
Jesus…
“What a beautiful name it is!”
Eileen Manassian
Inspired by What a Beautiful Name it Is by the group Voice of Lee
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tiIMtID54K8
"a dagger of pain, a tear of grief" - Quote by - Constance La France
With the melodic cadence of my fervent heart,
pulsated the charming tinsels of the mesmeric night,
gleamed my love for you with the enticing tinge,
suffused with the sequins of the silver moon.
I felt in a trance the sweet touch so tempting
of your captivating charisma intangible,
but you drifted away from my engrossed perception
like the autumn cloud wafting in the twilight sky.
In the barren valley of flowers my cataract heart,
cascaded as the stream of melted glacial mind
beyond the turquoise course of lingering longing,
on the desolate plateau I wandered going nowhere.
From the ebony edge of the gloomy night
storm clouds surged with blades of shearing pain,
lacerated the lilting facade of the sky I call my heart,
where the shards of dream floated in tears of grief.
______________
May 16, 2023
Contest : Writing Challenge A Quotes
Sponsored by : Constance La France
Incomprehensible are the
Petty landmarks that linger in a person's life
It happened so long ago
That I'm surprised I still remember.
In St. Thomas' parochial school
When Sister Elizabeth held a ruler
In her pale white hands
Any signs of mercy
Mysteriously vanished from her blue eyes
Religion was her weapon
Corporal punishment it's end
Fueled by frustration
She held the class
In fear.
Every school day
Was a grey morning
Of my longing to be somewhere else
Standing by the door
In a robe
Of darkest wool
Sister Elizabeth counted us in
One by one
As we walked in silence
Hair combed
Little backs held straight.
From her glance
The message was clear
Grade school was not about deep thoughts
Or clever ideas
Originality was not in vogue
It was about small things
That grown-ups winked at
And often ignored
Issues, important as the color of beige.
One dull morning
I whispered to a classmate
When I shouldn't have
Called to the front by Sister Elizabeth
I was given the ultimate punishment
The ruler and then some
In her capable hands my palms were lacerated
When I cried out
She turned my hands over
Until my knuckles bled
Darkening the cuffs of my white shirt.
That evening my mother cried at my bruises
And my father uttered a string of curses
Long into the night
True
Sister's time was not easy
Teaching mindless brats
Such as myself
Only added to her
Disappointment.
Over the years
Attitudes changed
Commitments weakened
And Sister, childless and alone, realized
Much too late
That her days of sacrifice and Catholicism
Chastity and prayer
Had been a life against nature.
Even now my hands cringe
To a fist
When someone holds a ruler
For the wounds are marked deep
In memory.
Continued from Part 1
The trees, they hang in time and space around me –
trees, which in time before had swayed,
so gently tugged by ocean breezes,
trees, which in time before were lightly lit
with emerald tinted leaves,
trees, which in time before had reached to space above
with twisted tangled fingers,
grasping fingers,
fingers drenched with golden tears
shed by the Mighty Eye.
The trees, they hang in space and time,
benumbed and frozen motionless around me
chilled with rooted premonitions of the void,
their branches clutching darkness
and their leaves foreboding doom.
The muted winds begin to whisper tales
of many frightened things,
which, with mournful apprehension
have hunkered down behind the haze
and ceased their joyful play.
And all the while dank shadows gaily dance
a dismal dance,
for their time is soon to come.
The fitful shore lies suddenly still.
Unfeeling stones and hollow shells,
are paused a little,
stalled,
and dropped haphazardly,
midst their mindless random journey,
now abandoned by the sea,
for fickle waves have slipped away
to greet a falling prey.
And as the Mighty Eye droops lower,
laminated molten lips
are pursed and pucker higher,
sucking in the sky.
Within a trice the Mighty Eye
submits and squints, distended red,
perhaps tormented by fantastic thoughts
of imminent demise,
or else of being lashed beneath a lid
of distant faithless waves.
And as her dying flash dissolves,
two lurid lips arise,
three lusty lips -
a thousand parted limpid lips
which asudden,
though with little haste,
consume the Mighty Eye.
EPILOGUE
The trees are now but lurking shades
amongst the murky shadows.
Relentless fog slips slowly by -
her floating tongues drip silence
as they slink like snakes in stealth nearby.
The lacerated faithless lips have once again returned
to kiss the vacant vapid shores
in a brief eclipse of time.
END
The Yellow Head of the Hummingbird
Yellow hummingbird head,
Lopped off by feline fangs,
And left as a gift
On the welcome mat.
Short sharp black beak
Arches downward hopelessly
Like the collective heartbreak
Of a million lost souls.
Misbegotten and forgotten.
Lacerated and left for dead.
This continuous marathon dance.
This never-ending lunge.
This eternal stroll in the park.
This incessant spasm in the dark.
I close my eyes and reach for something ahead of me.
I don't want to see it.
Because I am afraid,
Afraid of what it might see.
Afraid of what it might say.
Past my eyes
Past my soul
Past the lost days and nights
Of an entire lifetime.
Look.
I hold in my hand an empty bottle.
It once held the liquid refreshment of my youth.
Now I see the scum marks
The black residue of a thousand forgotten thoughts.
I throw the empty bottle down
Down into the darkening maelstrom
Of rippling voices, screaming and crying,
Like gulls in the afternoon
When the sun compels the vulnerable to the surface,
And the feeding frenzy begins.
The yellow head of the hummingbird
Is swept up with the shattered glass.
Now, there’s no more emptiness.
Ticker tape life into a single frame
Moon and stars silhouettes look down upon the sane
All the pristine porcelain faces lifted up to care
Intertwined fingers optimistically seeking out repair
Tolerance is not the toiling only of the brave
To find unified understanding is what the species craves
Eating of chrysanthemums call to darkness, be eclipsed
Bathe pure enlightenment producing innocence
Causing hearts to swell with love, beating live balloons
The “Perfect world” residing within Fabergé cocoons
Ticker tape life into a single frame
Darkness and misery secreted from disdain
All distorted tarnished faces sodden with despair
Lungs expanded beyond capacity, choking on the air
Hollow heads full of sorrow roll in like crimson waves
Crashing upon hopeless steely shores with desecrated pain
Soaring far from absent shadows into the great abyss
Bitter taste of hateful words linger on pursed lips
Lacerated tongue, swollen, bleeding from its wounds
Inhuman world residing within lanolin cocoons
This is copyrighted material. All rights are reserved. Reprints must be requested in writing to
the original author. © Alisha Groves
We raced with giants and stalked Jabba Jab
Climbing on gates of metal and wood,
Fierce skin lacerated from thorny spikes
Our innocence excused by the gods.
With our light sabers in a clone menace
The troopers moved to protect all borders
From evil DarthNess and his invaders ;
Brave were our young minds with imaginings.
Weary from the Third Encounter
Our jerky knees brought us home,
Five knights reveling about our winning match
As we devoured heaps of steak in one fast round!
Carol Eastman's You're A Super Hero
new poem
by nette onclaud
Crystal tears fell from the sky,
over mountains and leaky valleys,
freeing echoes from another time and space...
through lacerated seams in Mother's wall;
funny how ancient wounds still bleeds.
Just the other day I caught sight of the shine,
finally looking through eyes that see,
but time is not ours to replay...
too many sins to repay
for casting stones at mother's house.
Provocative dreams fail me now,
replaced by a myriad of faces
with jaded eyes and
mindless stares,
holding their eviction papers.
The moment I walked in on this scorching room,
I saw innocent faces of sorrowful bloom.
You stared at me when I shook everything off,
Holla don’t worry because I can’t be so off.
We spent 5 months of knowing each other,
I’m happy enough with the words that you utter.
You may sometimes don’t get what I want you to do.
Pretty good things are all I want just for you.
I often don’t understand how you always feel,
Seeing your good deeds is contentment and real.
I love that childish mind in your wealthy young age.
A movement of prissiness is such funny beige.
When you wrote sorry in a white crumpled board,
This heart was lacerated by your one holy sword.
You may have not noticed these sacrifices that I’ve done,
One day of change is your realization in down.
I’m your commando in a most fashionable look,
You’re my soldiers who are fearfully all always hooked.
I’m looking forward in your ramp of achievement,
Seeing that white gown in you is so much fulfillment.
Who Am I?
Because I was born out of wedlock,
My mum and dad taught me that the poor were good,
And that so many just needed a doctor,
To understand them when they were crook.
No-one else had ever treated them,
Doctors in Israel only attended rich people’s houses,
And the prestige of being wealthy,
Was derived from our interest in their happiness.
It was imbued into me that love was given,
From the heart by acts of kindness, not by money,
And that you could love somebody, anybody, anytime,
Out with social rhetoric or rhyme.
I was good at joinery,
But my inquisitive mind took me into medicine,
Into making people better, healthier, fit and able,
Not paralysed, dying or suffering from epileptic seizures.
Day one, and I just hoped I would have a cold,
But that was not to be you see,
So I took a deep breath and grit my teeth,
And in humility treated the first poor person ever.
Shock and horror and the neighbours talking,
Nobody there to wipe my slightly embarrassed sweated brow,
Only John my best friend hung around outside,
Whilst I bandaged up the labourer’s lacerated leg.
But soon after, when I had set my practise,
Luke befriended me bold and stalwartly,
Because he was just a normal Nazareth doctor,
And I’d been predicted as the people’s saviour from bad health.
Not noted as the original national health service,
But respected thereafter ‘cos they said I’d resurrected,
They gave me a voice when I was dead and long gone,
Said that they believed in me with everything they had.
Everyone knew what was meant when they admitted,
“I believe in Jesus!” because it was a stand,
For the freedom and life of the poor, for a just society,
Which gave these supposed sinners access to medical doctors. Grand.
Conflicts have raged upon the disputed soils of earth since before men began to record them. But there have been other conflicts less recorded, less lauded, but more redoubtable, oh, so much more. These were no less bloody than those who drained the life from promising generations, but they were more certain in their calculated rage, and arguably precipitated those lesser skirmishes. For they did not inhabit those regions of memorialized ground, but were carried within by those who fell there, and were carried away by those who lived to tell. For these were those conflicts within men of which none other could compare. In ferocity they were rivaled by none, and of that blood which flowed, unnumbered hearts proved an endless wellspring to slake the thirst of a thousand earths. And so, from the lacerated soul pours a bitter bile, a perpetual disquiet. This is the madness within every walking corpse, the insanity shadowing every potential good. Such is a sadness beyond all tears ever shed. It is the mutant upheaval within every son of man. Bowels of a deep and groaning lament, seething within and without; the fetid breath of a million rages. It is the conflict within... G.R.L.
Ghosts of the past
Return to haunt
The tortuous memories resurface
Pain so intense
Chilling my frail bones
My body physically drained of all hope
The taunting continues
Through nights lonely and dark
No slumber or rest for my mind
In turmoil and conflict
With my wounded heart and tired soul
The ghosts slash my smile
If it ever dares to appear
It stays hidden most of the time
My heart lacerated by cruel written words
Not to be taken back but used as bait
I pray for this anguish to end
To relinquish my fears
Lay my ghosts to rest once and for all
Allow my smile
Present myself with consent
To move on
Make new memories
Lock you in the past
Banish the ghosts forevermore