Best Nuanced Poems
I long to write a poem just right
Between the somber and the light
To tease the edges of a heart
To hook the reader from the start
Seduce them with a metered plea
A nuanced message: “follow me”
For I invite you to ascend
The peaks we’ll reach before the end.
To wander lost across the page
To tap the knowledge of the sage
To walk away wondering why
The answer is the endless sigh
Why poetry will never die
For words are fashioned without guilt
In whispering poetic lilt
That holds a hand, that tugs a heart
Bids you adieu as you depart
Rejoices in that gentle touch
That poems long for oh so much.
©5/24/2022
I gave you a balloon,
It held my life inside.
Within a shiny rubber tube
components of my soul aligned,
a sign,
I became something new
for you...
Memories
Feelings
Ideas
Each speck
a tickle upon my breath,
a tiny bubble
of nuanced personality;
The strengths of me debrided
the secrets of my lungs,
pink and untold
for you to confide,
ease trouble
in eyes before me.
Yet
were you astute?
Could your mind compute
the depth
of the beautiful find
floating before you?
You bent,
my unique particles ended
their show of strength
broken in length;
You twisted,
crushed and divided
my dreams subsided...
Molded to an unrecognizable form,
I became your norm.
Though you never knew,
my secret hope to survive
my own gift
thrive and lift,
lay within you.
Your grip thirsted control so long,
the pieces of me left burst
to skitter away in song
among soaring clouds,
leaving shrouds of pain
grounded and gone...
Flying far from the land
one beautiful day,
away
from you
and the broken balloon that laid
in your hand.
Going inward
Receiving moments of grace
While time unfolds
Touching your heart with my breath
An expansion
Doorways to enter
Each gift revealed through my willingness
Vulnerability my partner
Coaxing me towards unimagined pleasure and pain
Letting my mind expand
Memories of days
Exploring and discovering
Baiting my first hook
My Father’s deep voice guiding me
Watching his strong hands
Red wigglers in dirt
Alive in a styrofoam cup
We bait our hooks together
Plunge our fishing poles into the pond
A silent communication
Connection shared
Anticipation
Sunlight dancing off the ripples
A moment I carry with me now
Always grateful for my
Depth of consciousness
Inhaling, I travel through time
Naked, I make my way through
Beckoning aqua kissed waters
I look ahead and swim
Allowing sunrays to bathe my body in their warmth
Marbled hues sing out
Bubbles rise
Shadows and sunbeams in a lover’s embrace
I perform a weightless somersault
Smiling in delight as I catch glimpses
Of the watery kingdom encompassing me
Vowing to keep this sacred moment
Alive in my soul forever
From behind a towering coral
You appear
My royal rainbow Parrotfish
Who I have dreamed of
For an eternity
Come to me dear one
Show me your tapestry of glittering scales
Allow me to touch your soft skin
So I may delight in the magic
Of all that you are
Let us glide through the
Nuanced waters of life
Let us experience all the shades
Of dark and light as one
Fill our souls with laughter and love
Let’s ride these undulating tides with kindness
Touching the hearts of others
Joining hands with those in need
Creating an arena
Where all will be heard
Swim with me now
Let’s journey forth
Together my love
4/16/2023
A BRIAN STRAND PREMIERE no 1208
Poetry Contest
Sponsor:Brian Strand
SECOND PLACE
I rise when gilded starlight still replete the skies
Never have I beckoned hours of abstruse sleeping
I hear elegiac trills as a lone nightingale cries,
evoking memories that conjure tears of weeping
In halcyon moments before the paling of dawn
I contemplate my sentiments in tranquil solitude
Before the world awakens with an unstifled yawn,
the moon, sun, and I rendezvous; tryst in interlude
When velvet darkness fades to soft aurorean glints,
there, upon the horizon is painted a nuanced murk
Colors of daybreak; a blended mural in pastel tints,
created by a grand Artisan's hand; the Master's work
The poems I never wrote are exquisite
Deep clear pools that reflect and reveal their readers
Nuanced and subtle, full of symbols and hidden meaning
Peeling back new layers upon each return
The poems I never wrote are bestsellers
Attenborough voiceovers and roadhouse storytellers
On bedside tables, dog-eared and marked up
The subject of disagreements over coffee house scones
The poems I never wrote are a perfect sigh
Lyrical, rolling off the tongue, effortless as breathing
Resolved with delight on the final line
Lacking nothing, possessed of no excess
The poems I never wrote are an enigma
An unanswered question desirous of much
A doorway into a new world fraught with possibility
Mysterious and unresolved, yet satisfyingly so
This is not one of those
—————
Written on 10/06/022
I'm nestled in daydreams, safely tucked in a halcyon haven
away from the stress that greedily feasts on me like a raven
My Utopian realm offers a peaceful kingdom; a sanctuary
where there is no arguing with any acrimonious adversary
I take flight to a lowland vale, with gardens in full bloom
safe from life's burdens, as if I'm still inside my natal womb
Fields of wildflowers and carpets of moss are my landscape
Orchard of grape vines and a citrus grove is where I escape
Showers and sunshine are nuanced in my Eden of tranquility
I live harmoniously with forest animals in absolute affability
Blue skies brighten every day, darkening to indigo each night
Wrapped in my lover's arms, beneath stars and soft moonlight
l live in a multi-level tree house, sprawled in a stand of pine
My neighbors are feral mustangs; a roaming herd of equine
I built a porch that overlooks the view of my pastoral land
watching eagles as they hunt and soar with feathers fanned
I watch each stained glass sunrise as it surfaces from the sea
and each sunset, when dusk paints pastels with grand esprit
No fence surrounds my oasis, no flashing lights or blaring horns
and I've hybridized my roses, so no longer do they have thorns
There's some sanctity to be found in a divine place like this
One of spiritual symbiosis and a bounty of benevolent bliss
There's no known place on Earth where everyone gets along
but in my sanctum, no one ever tells me I'm too headstrong
I long for a refuge where I can take ample time to just relax
where I'll not be faced with the entity of fear, called parallax
When fire storms of frustration blaze much too high to douse
I'll be daydreaming while climbing the stairs to my tree house
August 18th, 2020
Sanctuary Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Silent On
Daybreak usually greets me when it ascends each day.
Yawning, I drowsily rise from the comfort of my bed
as the horizon glows with colors in resplendent array.
Dawn announces, "The warmth of Ra is on its way!"
Soon, over land and sea, aureate beams will spread.
Daybreak usually greets me when it ascends each day.
Sunrise shines on foxes in meadows where they play,
illuminating their coppery coats of orange and red
as the horizon glows with colors in resplendent array.
In shallows, sunlight dances with waves as they spray,
creating prisms in nuanced tones of variegated thread.
Daybreak usually greets me when it ascends each day.
It does not matter where I wander or aimlessly stray.
Mornings are idyllic once somber darkness is shed
as the horizon glows with colors in resplendent array.
How I'd dread a cause for the rooster's crowing delay.
What a folly if the moon continued her reign instead.
Daybreak usually greets me when it ascends each day,
as the horizon glows with colors in resplendent array.
August 11, 2022
First Person Villanelle Contest
Sponsored by L Milton Hankins
The Fool sat listening as her sweet words filled the air
each nuanced syllable sending chills through his body,
each glance cast upon him, a moment of eternal ecstasy.
Does this fool not hear me, the Queen thought to herself.
I’ve spoken in plain speech that even a fool should understand,
If not my words than my glares should make it clear.
She speaks to me he thought to himself,
but how can this be, she is the Queen
and I, with nothing, am but a mere worthless, meaningless Fool.
Just because I smile at him on occasion, he thinks there is more.
Yes, his hugs are warm, and candies are sweet,
but he must know he means nothing to me.
Pansies, roses, lilies, all but fading flowers.
Compared to her beauty they pale and hide in the shadows,
but she never refuses them, when I pick them for her she smiles.
More flowers, a sweet gesture, why does he give them to me?
Doesn’t he know this could never be, her lips curl gently.
She looks down at the flowers unable to look into his eyes, fool, she thinks.
I, the lonely Fool, the lonely fool, beneath my smiling mask,
I listen to her words that sting, but feel the warmth of her touch.
I bathe in her beautiful eyes yet feel the pain each time she turns away.
…I am such a fool!
He is a fool, my Fool, he is always there for me, good or bad.
Even in my cruelty he listens, with respect, without judging.
I wish for his happiness. I wish him love, I wish things could be different
…for this caring, beautiful Fool.
12/27/2017
Refrain:
You shimmering waves on the ocean blue
Dance not again, he cannot dance with you
You weeping forests where the winds wail too
Let your bright tears fall in the pool of dew
The world of pop will never be the same again
The king is dead, and life is a dream so vain.
O day most callous like the callous world, how
Did you come about? By whose love designed,
Whose genius bore him, gave him life? O now
Do tell us of his human coming, since maligned
It's oft forgotten that he was somebody's child
Context in a world where his skin was reviled:
And yet some marveled that he parted from it
To build a world different from base to summit.
Genius is a gift and not a choice, and he was all
A moment's glimpse of earth's troubled paradise
For Michael was not mere mortal he was our tall
Selves transformed to art, so nuanced to the wise
That understood how his dance moves were silk
Syllables of protest and regret, a symbol cocooned
In loneliness, a man pining for the rare social milk
Of happiness against a material breast, festooned
With a race unhappiness. He was more than we
Saw with naked eye, Michael was an artist true
Context in all our history. And yet his mortality
Was not less not vulnerable due to fame, a blue
Note then sing for him, remember this day's despair
How the fickle fans in fragile praise came again
Away from the media's maddening glare to share
This moment of dark our universal deluge of pain.
O Indiana, this is your son, O America this here
Is your native child, weep here ye poets, weep
For him, the poet of the broken soul, Let no tear
Leave a eye that's dry for the lullaby of his sleep
Come ye world that felt his charity, beg angels
Hear us and welcome him; Michael, forever we
Will keep our hearts beating for you, in citadels
Of shining peace when your songs bring memory.
I rise when gilded starlight still replete the skies
Never have I beckoned hours of abstruse sleeping
I hear elegiac trills as a lone nightingale cries,
evoking memories that conjure tears of weeping
In halcyon moments before the paling of dawn
I contemplate my sentiments in tranquil solitude
Before the world awakens with an unstifled yawn,
the moon, sun, and I rendezvous; tryst in interlude
When velvet darkness fades to soft aurorean glints,
there, upon the horizon is painted a nuanced murk
Colors of daybreak; a blended mural in pastel tints,
created by a grand Artisan's hand, the Master's work
And there they are
as if it were their duty to bloom
... like slow notes on a piano
from the depths of earth
suddenly rising
to fill the world with grace.
Much like writing a poem
a duty to ourselves
... inspired moments
bare, inarticulate strands
nuanced over time
suddenly rising
bursting onto the page.
Her tender, delicate limbs
rivaled a young Magnolia
Her every move, a nuanced sway
Oh, the glory of youth
in its sympathetic day
As age and circumstance
have stayed her dance,
her elegance remains
There’s still the lilt of childlike song
gracing spoken word
And eyes of deep, expressive blue,
still tell you, you’ve been heard
And though, her humbled stature bears
the scar of broken stride
and wheels of fashioned metal
now her slippers have decried,
the beauty of her fragile spirit
still lives
3/16/18
Dedicated to my dear Godmother
So faith comes from hearing, and hearing
through the word of Christ. (Romans 10:17)
----------
I often wonder what we settle for
in texts handed down to us through the years,
so far removed in time from days of yore,
not recognized by those were first to hear.
I’m told that meaning is indeed preserved,
but not so much the nuanced words in play.
The process leaves me no small bit unnerved;
their spoken word, not what we have today.
For we arrive at faith by what we hear,
but only when that is the word of Christ
and so I plead, oh Spirit, do draw near,
deliver me a word that will suffice.
The message of the messenger is trust,
and so believe that I receive, I must.
An evanescent bouquet of skewed briars,
is how a tinsel laden tawdry essence wickedly unfolds ,
scuppered signpost to a fetid human compost,
faint light pendant on soul crushed quantum migrant,
who might chortle at vivid veil flimsy vacuum,
skirt recklessly around bogus symbols,
peer behind the squalid limp sodden hedge,
mock myopic moribund mist upon boundary busting dawn chimera,
sneer at synthetic spectrum elastic in its irritating tidal wave surfeit,
cerulean fabric‘s milky way escape plot,
in a perilous quest for that eternal tape loop mantra,
the synaptic heart of that vainglorious horizon,
self-knowledge under charcoal moon and silver cloud veneer,
or feral waste rapid fire contagion,
the indecisive day glow dither on the margins ,
of fly weight feeble frantic dash,
that velvet shadow treason daubed pettifog,
known as tangential wanton cobweb fester creed,
the mind a bloated ripple vortex numbing in its scope,
golden mirage but faux fur real concoction,
against the banal backdrop of complex-ridden superficial eddy,
from floral garland poseur stricken en train,
some vox pop indignation mere shrinking violet showcase waver,
the gleam-hued truth has this dastardly demonic derailment,
that I brush aside as spiteful oxalic sting repost,
that deceptive mint green forest of chameleon cant,
sly nuanced molten maple syrup hint,
from out of kilter tree pierce otherworld,
unseen yet bliss-edged virtual garden of firm conviction,
not just from isolated enigmatic individual script,
such as torrid turbulence or mindless scattered rim shot,
when conventions can be altered in exotic prose,
human zeitgeist has this far too often penchant,
for silkworm rapt effervescent double speak,
whilst plain unvarnished uplifting utterance,
resides within the deep crystal spring well,
of us torch aloft emerald earthling sages,
please augment the rock buttress stark phrase,
whose bluntness is a carrier pigeon of candor,
devoid of muted gray cloud blind waffle,
aromatic sprig to giant spasm of bold pluck,
quandary of human race at hearth,
frightened cliques, hidebound yes men who yen,
to swim the azure gulf of august freedom,
to the Eden where lucid tongues herald pristine witness.
where values at the centre of our being should blossom
All Rise to meet the challenge, heed the call
let us bear arms to meet the aching need
to share our voice, our colors and our words
the pen and brush be our artistic steed.
Damn not the silent cowards, let them be
for fear is at the core of their disdain
there’s nothing you can do will set them free
from living in a hymn with no refrain.
Be not saddened for few will comprehend
how you have separated from the herds
the essence and the beauty of your life
your nuanced and ironic flow of words.
They could be but a clueless passerby
or poet with a jaundiced golden eye.
John G. Lawless
4/23/2021