Best Overheated Poems
In an open field of endless, noiseless distance,
Rolling clouds cast an impending gloom;
A welcomed and promised darkness descends.
My eyes shut as I breathe in the aroma,
In anticipation of
The cleansing that quickly approaches.
I cloak myself in the breeze, as it promises a release..
The cool wind, calming, so gently serene...
Sweeping over my overheated skin.
Finally, the fury is perfectly unleashed down upon me.
The winds, gusting in a frenzied rush
My hair whipping haphazardly around,
Stinging at my face.
I smirk toward the sky, as I silently, but eagerly
Await the onslaught -
This desperate release that I longed for in secret.
It sought me out, and found me.
I hear the angry sounds
The roaring, begging to weep alongside me.
When suddenly, the violent tears begin to fall
With a sudden, breathtaking destructiveness.
The thunder, like me, cries out in pain,
With such sadness, angry liquid bathing the parched earth.
It saturates my face, my body drenched.
As I stand in the midst of the deluge, in awe,
Crashing winds attempt to destroy me,
But cannot find the strength.
Until the tears eventually run dry,
The painful clashes and cries become silent..
The skies yield to light, as the great and
Terrible sun demands to be seen.
I open my tear-stained eyes,
And glimpse a different world before me...
Cleansed and made new.
And I cannot understand, nor
Fathom the reality...
Of the beautifully, perfect
Broken release.
NUN FUN IN THE SUN
There was in hot Tashkent in the orient
A religious uprising - a convent dissent.
Army was ordered in with gunnery,
The soldiers targeted the nunnery.
Here are the events in vista:
One lovely sista was forbidden a mista,
But a certain young soldier kissed her
Unaware of the portents
For the jewel of the convent’s contents.
In her cell he wanted his love to foister.
(She had made his cloister moister.)
His inclination was to osculate ;
The incident threatened to escalate.
Her kiss made him forget his gun,
Which overheated in the sun.
The magazine cooked until done,
Then bang, their love was gone.
Notice me! Notice me! I’m being maligned
Everyone is against me, and I am mistreated
How can these awful people be so unkind?
I feel like I’ve been overlooked, cheated!
My fantastic poems were denied a placement
Time and again others seem to get rewarded
While my poems are tossed in the basement
And all of my creative efforts are thwarted.
This is the lousy attitude of a perpetual loser
He isn’t winning so the sponsor has cheated
Five gets you ten, he’s also a habitual boozer,
Feeling sorry for himself, his brain overheated.
I have no sympathy for whiners like this,
Who think most highly of themselves, it seems,
Who think everything they do merits a kiss
Their poetics are lacking, only in their dreams.
Written October 9, 2022
[In response to little Freddie’s
criticisms of my contests and
contest winners.]
Ah, Red Macaw, you are the pestilence
of impatience
in my day, soaring far, far overhead
squawking and screaming
your face overheated and red
beak too portentous
for sweets, gobbling and demanding
if ever you stop, but the leaves
have no leavening, you’re all feed
and poop and mar my day.
Even though I seek you out
you escape, Scotch-free,
wearing a tartan of betrayal.
Who you seem to be
righter of words, merely mimics
what experience I bring
with my heart and days. I want to
wear flames, gold, drink juices
that drip from the blues of my mouth.
You wear my head where I have shadow.
You wear my flight, straight and narrow
Branching and diving and soaring.
You wear my hunger for the sweetness
of truth, but follow only my path
Where is yours? Where is your course?
Of course. Your caw, screams
Why don’t you speak your own language
Know your own. Your home.
Instead of mine.
Paralysed by my surroundings
Enduring the visions you hold
Deep paths burned in all corners
My brain is a multi track mind
Anxious in sleep, beating fast
Thoughts all eratic and twisted
No sense a numbness no flight
My body wrapped in your web
Struggling to escape this fight
My body overheated and sweaty
Suddenly awake - such a fright!
There is a state of mind known as woebegone
In which one feels like an addict on methadone
The more one tries to feel upbeat
The more one suffers mental defeat
And the mind plays on like a gramophone.
8
The boys outside the bar appeared rapscallion
Their actions were downright reptilian
Every time a girl would walk by
One would let out a loud cry
Acting just like an overheated young stallion
8
There was an old lady from New Jersey
Who recently moved to Poughkeepsie
She met this old fart
In a local Kmart
And the two proceeded to get quite tipsy
8
Roger was smug and a bit of a grandee
Others viewed him as somewhat of a dandy
The girls giggled and downright snickered
Because they knew he sought entry to their knickers
But alas, with buttons and zippers he just wasn’t handy
8
Bobby was well known for his generosity
But also known for his excessive gulosity
He would take you to lunch anytime
But always state “what’s left over is mine”
And clean the table with the utmost ferocity
8
There was this old man from Toledo
That liked to parade around in his speedo
The old ladies would giggle
Watching his sagging butt jiggle
But it did little or nothing for their libido
8
There is this retired gentleman in south Buda
Who would like to vacation in Bermuda
But his poem book didn’t sell worth squat
Now he’s stuck with who knows what
As he reads travel brochures in his pad in south Buda
8
There is this Colorado guy in the Springs
Whose Windows computer does unusual things
The damn screen turned permanently black
So he went out and bought a new Mac
Now he doesn’t answer when his telephone rings
8
Waters so thick with codfish,
the Basques caught them in handbaskets.
A river turned red as
salmon returned from the ocean.
Tropical seas teeming with billfish
and beaches thick with turtles
inspiring tales by Hemingway and Grey.
Waters without oxygen and
jellyfish so thick, you can collect them
with handbaskets, if you have good gloves.
A red tide runs up the coast
poisoning our oysters.
The ocean's covered by plastic scum
while reefs sink as corals bleach
in an overheated acid sea.
My fantasy, that history
may someday be reality.
The old man lived out by the desert, selling postcards and gasoline,
He sold road-maps and Navajo silver, and True West magazine.
And under his Gabby Hays beard beat the heart of a dashing young man;
With arthritic fingers he cleaned off my windshield…he once was a Dapper Dan.
He said “Take care on the desert, carry plenty water to spare—
And look out for mirages that float like a dream—there’s all kinds of dangers out there.
“And you better watch out for that sweet senorita, the travelers all agree…
They call her the Queen of the Mojave Desert…but she once belonged to me,
Yes, she once belonged to me…”
I thought the old man was demented, from too many years in the sun;
But there in his gas station office I noticed a Winchester gun…
And I saw a faded brown photo—a Mexican beauty was she…
Right next to a newspaper clipping…about a murder in 1953…
Then later that night on the desert, my car overheated and died—
And I saw the Queen of the Mojave Desert…with a bullet hole gaping wide!
So I hoofed it on back to the station, ‘left my automobile behind…
And that grizzled gas station attendant, he told me one final time—
“You’d better look out for that sweet senorita, the travelers all agree,
They call her the Queen of the Mojave Desert…but she once belonged to me,
She was unfaithful to me…back in 1953…she was unfaithful to me...”
Gulls circled above, spiralling through car exhaust
Kids fidgeted in the backseats of chaos
Eerie silence, interrupted by overheated transmissions
Someone blasting The Doors...theme music
Stern, heavily armored Homeland Security soldiers
Slowly approached, assuming insurrection
Just another day in the new Amerika
Land of the free, home of the brave
Large signs proclaim:
"All contents must be declared, please exit your
Vehicle when stopped"
Off to the side, transport busses waited
Like praying mantis seizing their victims
Filling quickly,
abandoned cars quickly towed
Destination unknown
Destination
Unknown
04/12/13
© All Rights Reserved
Beautiful downtown Atlanta
Sunny, blue, cloudless sky
Tall, wide, massive buildings
Window glass glistening in the sun
Beautiful, well-dressed people
Gainfully employed people
Taking care of business people
Running essential errands
Contributing to the community
Pursuing positive, purposeful lives.
I take in the sights, sounds, smells
Sounds of people walking, talking
Engines revving and car horns honking
Smells of restaurants and fast food vendors
Engine exhaust and overheated brakes
Feel of the sidewalk
Under my expensive dress shoes
Heat of the sun on my face and neck
Exciting hustle and bustle
Of a thriving metropolis.
A faint, “Please, sir …” reaches my ears
And a homeless man appears
Dirty, disheveled, hirsute
“Please, sir, could you …”
I divert my eyes, quicken my pace
Ignoring his petty pleas
His weak speech trails off
As he disappears in my wake
Bothersome soul, good riddance!
Why doesn’t the city do something?
Days later the encounter troubled me
I was so proud of the way I handled myself
How easy it is to dismiss a soul in need
Months later the encounter tormented me
Instead of the clever human I thought I was
I had become unfeeling, unkind, uncaring
Years later the encounter still haunts me
Never will it ever happen again
Never … ever …
(from The John Poems)
Transplant my heart;
I need it no more,
And remove my libido too.
Neither’s required
For this life I live,
Useless as love for you.
Lobotomize
The caring part
Of my overheated brain.
Then proceed to excise
The urge to dream.
I’ll never love again.
The equivalent of a cosmic flat tire, the star collector overheated again.
Should've topped off the subzero heat transmogger back at Stuckey's.
Yep we have 'em too.., who doesn't need a Pecan Log Roll, now and then.
Two Roadway startruckers snapped up the last Elmer's paste pies., the luckys.
Right between filling stations to boot, no triple A for a gojillion miles..
and one of my best pint sized, non-binary service robots on the blink.
Not my best idea, feeding her moonshrooms, peaked all his cortial dials,
eventually caused them to puke it up, all over my excremental sink.
Frazusoosh it! not even a UPB (Universal Phone Booth) to make a collect call,
to my mother (planet), which, by the way, is also useful for transmitting matter.
That's assuming you can find someone to accept the charges, of course, LOL.
Had to wash dishes for an eternity, last time, including dried on crupecake batter.
Drack's balls! stuck on this puny planet with obnoxious fumes corroding my chromium tail.
No wonder they call it air; the sixth least favorite word in the Corpadian lingo, P.U.!
Those creatures keep staring, I've tried to reason with them, even tried telepthy to no avail.
When I type in their reply to my trans-googling translator, all it comes back as is 'Moo'.
Oh thank goodness! A family of grubbers in a U Haul pulling over., whew!
Though probably have to sit on a lap, luckily they each have two.
252 words, including these
Faulty compass of drifting swain
Freelancing on arid, desert plain
Passion fires mind of careening train
Burning loins long each satin sheath to stain
Sculpted dunes seductive beauty do feign
Smooth, silky curves do the froward eye entertain
But the silted grains proffer momentary gain
Entrancing mirages with frothy water holes detain
Anon, overwhelming desires the burgeoning libido enchain
Strained limbs long the rite of passage to explain
Scrubby growth shrouds the perimeter of fragile domain
Pubescent psyche with confusing, hormonal signals overlain
The overheated circuits a disoriented path ordain
As eroding winds of doubt doth the surface disdain
Insecure conduits more and more inward shame drain
Seething shadow flutters in constantly changing terrain
Each step on serpentine course causes more growing pain
Until stumbling on rational plateau containing deep, emotive vein
Conquering the debilitating elements that immaturity did restrain
Winter came early that year
Between colours of the rainbow
snowflakes maneuvered
floated up
whirled down
Frigid winds chilled our smiles
as drifts line the pathway
of fresh footprints
indentations
two by two
You asked me for some warmth
I offered you my mittens
Because my hands
were needed
for snowballs
That is when you began giggling
then kissed me shivering
I closed my eyes
Forgetting
The cold
On your hair snowflakes played
hide and seek, behind us
the undergrowth
surprisingly
split and
Whap, you hit me with a snow ball
when I wasn’t looking
I reached down
with my hand
and scooped
You up, and while holding you tightly
fell in the snow backwards...
Two smiling, overheated
frantically flailing
snow angels
***
October 15, 2017
Copyright © Chris Green and Darren White
en*L*I*G*H*T*ened babbling shocks
burst out of bubbling rocks
bright spots erupt over a smoldering landscape
(hot inflation begets Pomp & Circumlocution)
snowballs explode in a gritty paradise
yellow dust smothers moaning misfits
balloons hover over missing minds
(Look on the BRIGHT side!)
it’s simply a B*r*I*g*H*t uproar
skyscraping warriors lock & load
happily pull heat-seeking triggers
(taking out floating bull's-eyes)
Operation OMG has commenced!
guided by blowback from barreling behemoths
chasing mercurial probes flying with hypersonic ease
(gilded ghosts pierce an overheated stratosphere)