Best Market Poems
In an endless night,
time is my nemesis.
In the realms of sleepwalking nightmares,
where trumpets blow an eerie tune,
I can see the Grim Reaper,
perched upon my tomb.
I search for the sandman
in the domain of dreams.
Where hope is an alchemy of potions,
igniting stars to cremate calamity.
In the marketplace of hallucination,
I barter with misty, moody moonlight,
before reality returns to spoil an ephemeral fate,
wishing to remain where imagination illuminates.
Sprites and Sylphs guide to a secret passage,
a labyrinth where ancient secrets sleep.
Yet their black gates are like Hercules' Twelve Labors.
Constant knocking results in the death of spirit.
Defeated by delusions of utopia,
I surrender to a tangible conclusion.
If you wait until the sun goes down,
a thousand suns will rise.
Artificial, bright, igniting
tangled clouds in smoggy skies,
and flooding dingy streets
with fluorescent streams of light
that carry waves of people,
cresting, crashing, clashing
across mismatched sidewalks.
They speak in foreign tongues
that lick like wild flames
and burn with glowing strangeness
as cockroaches skulk and scurry
beneath makeshift stands
where pairs of busy hands
prepare the strangest foods,
from skewered squid and snakes
to crepes and pineapple cakes,
cubes of deep-fried tofu
and the freshest dragon fruit.
Watch them badger, hear them barter
over onyx rings and jade bangles
beside rose quartz beads that dangle
from scratched display cases.
The market throbs with energy,
a living entity that swallows me.
And when I think I've lost myself,
I focus on that giddy sound,
the universal language
that transcends all others.
They laugh, and I smile.
*Based on a night market I visited in Taiwan last year
When I am afraid
I close my eyes
I hear a sweet symphony
A thousand music tunes
All at once coming through
Young girl in the market
Yes, that's me, all alone
Eyes all full of mystery
As I sing away the loneliness
They say the most awful things
But I hear violins when I close my eyes
As I fly off to the center of my sun
So I cannot be hurt by anything
This wicked world as done
Young boy in the marketplace
He's taken by the men
As he wakes, can't remember anything
They break the most beautiful things
But I hear violins when I shut my eyes
And fly off to the center of the sun
So I cannot be hurt by anything
This wicked world has done
As I look into your eyes
I'm at the center of my sun
The boy in the marketplace
Sees the girl all alone
Have you lost your way home?
I look up, I hear his voice singing.
I hear sweet symphonies in his words.
As I look into his eyes
I'm at the center of my sun
And I cannot be hurt by anything
Of what this wicked world has done!
11 12 2012 10pm Monday
“You two melons are crowding me in a bad way.”
“Are you kidding, Bermuda? You must be gay,
‘cause all the potato heads think we look fly!
Yeah, see them? They’re giving us melons the eye!”
“Well, you’re squeezing me in; I’m a delicate guy!”
“Good grief, Mr. Onion, you’re making us cry.
Oh, here comes a cucumber right in our space.
Bet you won’t be complaining with HIM in your face!”
At the flower market
I found spice, holy water,
cobblestoned obsidian dreams,
but no flowers.
The blustery Tuscany day
showed me its underlying graffiti,
incantations of poetica esoterica,
and yet another way
to excavate the mystery.
Nostalgic Roman nights,
Spanish palabras, Sicilian incantations,
idyllic panoramas; promises
enough to purchase the moon.
Such a foolish sacrifice to
fresco up for portfolios in
sanctuaries precious
and profane.
Sue lurks in the shadows of the night
She stands on the street corner in the red light area of town
Her body is silhouetted by street light flickering through the naked trees
Wrecked by years of drug abuse she craves her next fix
Skin-tight clothing outlines every curve of her aching body
High-heeled shoes and fishnet tights complete her seedy outfit
It's a bitterly cold November night; Sue pulls her jacket around her body,
it only just skims the hem of her miniskirt, giving no protection from the elements,… she struggles desperately to keep warm
Eventually a car pulls up,
A guy rolls down the window and she saunters over
After a brief conversation she gets in and they drive away
He’s in the market for sex
Desperation forces her to sell her body
Inspired by but not for contest
3/23/18
I design cards for eighteenth parties,
And every other birthday.
And I design cards for condolences,
For folks who’ve passed away.
My designs can be happy, sad or plain,
Whatever you really want.
And I can make them easy to read,
In an “easy to read” sort of font.
Then it occurred to me there’s money here,
There’s a market for being kind.
To make cards for people suffering alone,
Alone in silence in their mind.
For people cutting and for suicide attempts,
Like people overdosing on a pill.
To design intimate encouraging cards,
For folks who are mentally ill.
For the opportunity contest.
The German Christmas market was in town
Stalls emptying fast and looking quite bare
Last minute shopping before it closed down
T'was Christmas eve seems everyone was there .
A cold wind blew with flakes of snow falling
Kids in the square, carols they were singing
In the distance the church bells were ringing
On market stalls the lights they were twinkling.
The tree in the square with a star so bright
Folks drinking mulled wine to keep out the chill
The Oompah band were playing silent night
And everywhere smiles, laughter and good will.
T'would be wonderful if all this good cheer
Was every day and not just once a year.
Written 26th November 2019.
I am watching a flipper show
Where pairs of two
Run around
A Flea market
Making deals
Competing with the other pair
The entire show Intrigues me
Delights me
Excites me
I want power tools
And goggles now
Which is ridiculous
When you realize I am afraid of a glue gun.
I really wanted a chainsaw
For my birthday once
I got it too
Sadly my wing span
Was not long enough
To pull the cord
I had an electric
Mower at the same time
But of course I ran over
Her power cord making her rather useless
Here I sit in my Lazy-girl, watching others with fascination.
Rogue Market
Rogue market
hidden in plain sight
tilted sign
a crooked arrow irony
childhood’s
bittersweet
Lemonade.
©4/8/2018
submitted to – A Hidden Market – Poetry Contest
sponsor – Julia Ward
The world of money is still there
Beating its way
into one's brains
Poetry is fluff
omnipresent dollar
But still.....
A few lines can touch
the Jewish Soul, the Christian soul,
the atheist and agnostic soul
So if you get the
chance
Write or listen to a poem
They are not from Chiang Mai,
they are a tribal people
who speak a hill language.
They ride through the night
on bicycles to settle at dawn
beside the Ping River.
Girls' unroll rattan mats
squat beside straw hats brimful
with the tang of burgundy chilies
They have vegetables
grown in lime green waters,
parched salty anchovies,
and plump spearheads
of opalescent fish -
all these are bargained for,
bundled in newspaper,
tied with pink raffia.
Our lives cross here.
A few coins dropped into an open palm,
nods and smiles by a river,
a common currency bridging
alien worlds.
With takeovers bankers are set
But Capital One's is a threat
Owning Discover
As surrogate mother
Makes Visa and Mastercard sweat
Saša Milivojev - TO THE DREAM MARKET
I throw memories down the well
And, leaving, I hear the echo of tears
I do not want to have my face
Treading on my own verse
Tied in knots
Like a frightened doe
I run across the glass bridge
To the old place
Where Light and Darkness part
Where sweet dew awaits me
To play a man again
To hear the sound of a horn
To reach the market where dreams are sold
Where they cure aches and memories
You will never hear me laugh
For I still mould my sin
And wait
Wait for you
To cross the glass bridge
Saša Milivojev
viisit: www.sasamilivojev.com
The noise broils over in the heat
And spread out like wares along the street
The haze of crowd, the jungled feet
Fresh scent of soil and the aroma sweet
I see the bright cloths, and the fashion shows
The haggling voices and their temptations
The big Trelawny yams that twin footed grows
The paltry cents of private hesitations
The market is abloom and abundance tease
The native hunger from its native ease.
There is guinep, the same we cracked
At school, a single seed to feed a twenty pack
The hog plums and the apples red, stacked
Like a lean-to shack, melons dripping and the sack
Of cherry tomatoes besides carrots on the mat
Two orange in bags and the eggs in their flat
Cabbages plump and green callaloo fresh and fat
Mangoes early, and seasonings for the pot
The magic of eyes the sleright of nose, the taste
That tells us how much to know goodness we haste
And among all this passion of colors, this fragrance
Of fruits, I see a richer, sweeter elegance
Our people bright giving this place its romance
Women subtle of eyes, whose bodies dance
Like fireflies around a shaded lamp, and men bold
Though bent beneath their unforgiving loads, hold
Work sovereign and do not crringe from sun and sweat
The building is dingy with crumbling walls and parapet
But like the lustered fruits that in cadence to the call
Rise above the struggle turning back the ancient fall