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Best Neatness Poems

Neatness

Everything was in the right place; the shoes, books, furniture, utensils, remote control…. His house always smelled of fresh air, although it was hundreds of miles away from the ocean.

“Your house smells like a beach-house!” his friends told him.

He knew his house was far from being called a beach-house. It had no fishing harpoons, fishing nets, scuba diving suits or shells. In fact, he hated the ocean.
 
Three years back, his perfectionism had landed him a job in an environmental movement company. A research lab was set for him close to the beach.

One Saturday morning, he saw a turtle floating close to him. It was still, its body dancing only to the motion of waves. BP oil spills and chemical wastes suddenly haunted his mind. He now saw oil rigs and floating marine animals all around him. Quickly he jumped out of the ocean as though he had spotted a shark’s dorsal fin, a dozen feet away.

“I’ll never stay around imperfection!” he swore to himself.

Neatness then became his pilgrimage. He took one last bottle of vodka to erase the memories about the ocean, and moved to live in a place not close to any water bodies.

Sometimes he eats fish and lobsters with difficulty. An imagination of a contaminated ocean close to him scares him stiff to hold his knife and fork.    



Current Contest Name: Take The Dagger From My Heart, Please - 2

Previous Contest Name: SHORT STORY

Date the Previous Contest was Finalized: 9/27/2016

Categories: neatness, identity, imagery, life, metaphor,
Form: Narrative

choosing neatness over people

His sloppy slipshod attitude
Was picked up by both daughters
His son took after his wife
A minimalist who never abided a mess
The son never let the hoarders into his house
Losing touch with his father and his sisters
Choosing neatness and cleanliness over people
Just as his mother had done.

Categories: neatness, life,
Form: Free verse

It Is That Kind of Room

I am sitting at a teacher’s desk.
Not my desk, a borrowed room.
Staring at an orange backpack with
A broken zipper and a cat emblem.

This desk is familiar. There is a torn paper
Plate, a half-eaten sucker, two paper clips, and 
Several stacks of ungraded papers dated
A couple of months ago on this desk.  

With a two-inch pencil, I dig out a small half
Broken daisy key chain from the rubble.
The edge of one paper has cocoa or pudding
Spilled on it. I am comfortable here. This
Mess is familiar.

Part of my day entails going class to
Class. When the teacher leaves, if I’m
Comfortable I might pry. I’m at a new desk
Now. A recently sanitized desk. I slowly
Pull the top drawer open. There are two
Crisply sharpened pencils. Nothing else.

I slam the drawer shut, uncomfortable
Poking around in this desk, knowing 
When the teacher comes back she will
Know if I have switched these pencils
Or even looked at them. It’s that kind
Of room.  There is nothing on the
desk top.

Categories: neatness, how i feel, school,
Form: Free verse

Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry

Standard Neatness

S-tandard neatness is applied, 
E-rasing the morbid mystery; 
A-trocious ailment is avoided, 
N-astiness is eerie enemy.

G-ruesome grime is washed away, 
R-eliable alcohol stops the menace; 
E-nhanced hygiene kills the germs, 
E-mploying standard
N-eatness.

Topic: Birthday of poet Sean Green (June 20)

Categories: neatness, birthday, poets,
Form: Acrostic

Neatness Protocol

N-eatness protocol cleans
I-nvisible dirt of the devil; 
K-illing the pandemic plague
K-eeps one from being
I-ll.

G-et neatness protocol
I-nto the glorious victory; 
O-bliterate the vicious
V-irus of morbid mystery.
A-pply the health standard, 
N-icely use the alcohol; 
N-ew normal now employs
I-ts neatness protocol.

By Bernard F. Asuncion
Topic: Birthday of poetess Nikki Giovanni (June 07)

Categories: neatness, birthday, poetess,
Form: Acrostic