Best Pallbearer Poems
What in the ink whorl is papièr churl going on?
Ill quill vapors are trying to victimize me,
vex prose don’t belong
Word saber player haters trying to stick it to me,
throwing cursive stones
Their coarse paper tone is so digital angry
Blog blots got their writes all wrong
Sore spots ... ink stains
Rotted crease stroke brains
always wanna bring paper cut pain
Plenty briquettes blurt-y wanna dance dirty,
a-many ugly exchanges ain’t squid spit purty
If coal paper meet a diamond pen,
Crush Groove is gonna tango win
Counterfeit clone muse
using plagiarist, copy printer tools
Blank scroll troll fools
didn’t learn Poetry Slam old school
Any lip ink unwell with a lying spiel,
gets the clean-up Truth erasure deal
Epithet tongues liquor epitaph envelopes,
gin up troublesome, scarlet letter tropes
But when this Iron Will pen
meet their forged paper
Pallbearer finger caper
gonna press an eulogy send
Writ smack weakies think they’re grit summon strong!
In the late midnight hour, when death comes to call,
and we are at a loss as to how we could resist, we
therefore must answer its summons, leaving this world
and all our loves. We then shift from earth's time, to
God's time, which is infallibly accurate.
holy pallbearer
keeper of dreams my sweet Lord
final ecstasy
So, this is where butterflies go to die.
Atop this burning ochre beach,
Amidst the palomino stones
party streamers and chinook bones.
Chrysalis flutes swaying
beyond dunes, blue and gray
under a plush velvet shroud.
They fold their powdery dreams.
Awaiting the pallbearer tide
toting emerald caskets, silver lined.
Dreams crumble just like my thoughts,
At least when I think of you.
I'm left gathering myself'
My minds eye's mirror's breaking through.
Broken shards of silver glass,
Reflecting horrors of broken paths.
I've let down myself in everything I do.
And I seem to have lost myself in the process of forgetting truth.
Or at least what it used to be,
Before you fed it to the moon.
Now I'm fading with memory,
Just like shadows of you.
I'm a ghost in the night,
passing graves in pale light.
Cemeteries weep with me
echoing the requiem of an aria like the lullaby of fright.
Digging up the corpses of another dying life.
Condemned to walk in darkness,
A pallbearer weighing his own stone.
It appears i live in dust amongst mist & hollow bone.
Sleeping in a grave,
A bed I've made my own.
I turn tombs of my despair into a sepulcher's throne.
Collecting ashes of the dead longing to see the sun again.
Trapped in dirt for months,
I haven't seen the light of day in your eyes.
Winter chill drawing near,
Freezing all I fear.
The world frozen in white perfection,
My heart through the snow.
Walking through the gates i was Engulfed in a great light.
A voice said i was merely sleeping,
Dreaming everything's alright.
I saw visions of your ghost as you were leading me home...
Form:
A Good Deed Gone Bad
Of many jobs my hubby had
along with one full-time,
was pallbearer for funerals
whenever it worked fine.
One day there was a huge request
from owner of the place.
A man who died was cremated;
no next of kin to trace.
However, 'twas his dying wish
to scatter ashes wide
in local river close to home
and begged that they abide.
And so my hubby volunteered
to honor his last wish.
And to our home, he brought the urn
with Mr. James Crawfish.
Now it was winter when he passed,
the river froze with ice.
So in our den lay James Crawfish
'till weather became nice.
Then one spring day a friend we knew
took hubby with the urn
on his speed boat to ashes cast
with serious concern.
And as he did, a tail wind whipped
and ashes covered all!
His wife would never ride with him
again after that squall.
Sandra M. Haight
~9th Place~
Contest: Pink Domino
Sponsor: Sara Kendrick
Judged: 07/29/2016
True story except the name of deceased was changed.
Rules: Humor. Up to 7 stanzas (28 lines) with rhyme on line 2 and line 4 of each stanza plus use 8 syllables, 6 syllables, 8 syllables, 6 syllables.
In these a-dying days,
people are given mo’ grief news
Hope cost less than
a jug bottle of dirt cheap booze
While the crying game
is being played
over and over, time again hence
Death has a new name:
Covid-19
is the ICU cradle tomb pestilence
Folks everywhere are digging in,
with covered faces grim
As graveyards keep overflowing,
prospects be looking dim
Red Masque, Red Masque
19 hues of undertaker gurney blue
This ghastly number
be vapor fear burying lots not few
Red Masque, Red Masque
Tales of the Crypt be sew cerulean
Devil wearing a blue dress,
says the search party has just began
Flood of 911 busy signals,
gov’ment ain’t answering the phone
Twilight curfew dye vigils,
as loved ones face suffering all alone
Let the crying game
be sympathy fore played
Veil questioning is the “Why” snuff passion
Climax is the same —
Covid yourself,
bureaucrats do truly feel in a caring fashion
Folks everywhere are digging in,
with covered faces grim
As graveyards keep overflowing,
prospects be reaper dim
Red Masque, Red Masque
19 hues of constant code blue
White House doctor office is closed,
nobody is gonna attend to you
Red Masque, Red Masque
Oval lips don’t speak indigo true
White House bunker gala,
a welcoming party only for a few
A stricken nation in tear mourning,
awakens daily to no relief
Operation Neglect gives no warning,
alarm bell is cricket brief
While the crying game
is being played
over and over and over again
Passing the err blame —
Covid-19
chalks up another morgue win
As mo’ and mo’ blackbirds
keep a-perching ‘pon cemetery tombstones
Nary an Ivory rescue heard,
only coroner chirps of lies being prolonged
Red Masque, Red Masque: A cloaked cry
19 hues of pallbearer coffin blue
Last rite Lenin robes are all denim dyed,
eulogy threads was party issued
Red Masque, Red Masque
19 cryptic cues of cynical dark azure shade
White House pandemic task
was to have a masquerade party virus paid
11-20-20
Nicotine paid
by the experimental hour
Diseased lungs’ biopsy displayed
never made
this lab rat’s attitude
turn breath analyzer sour
Snuff was a lemon grass puff charmer,
in pursuit
of a higher dollar yield
for the tobacco crop corporate farmer
Double blind Snuff
loved to puff
the addictive, leafy stuff
From generic to the best,
Mr. Seabee lips couldn’t get enough
Snuff got his manly chest
so feminine buff
Tumor rumor has it,
Snuff ran out of placebo luck
In the umpteenth trial
of new-and-improved product perfecting,
Snuff got the top-tier
guinea pig bucks
But, Snuff
never got to spend a muddy dime
of the green paper slime
His number came up,
just when the cure for cancer
looked to become
market investment prime
Double blind Snuff
truly loved to carton puff
the addictive, leafy lethal stuff
At his funeral,
some sad loved one
took a long-draw homage deep huff
And with a tar-teary, coughing prayer,
they lamented for po’ Mr. Seabee ...
oh, so soul roughly
When the smoky-grey casket
took a pallbearer eulogy short cut,
the bereaved slowly
snuffed out
their favorite brand cigarette butt
As I lay me down to sleep, I start to sink and sink and sink and sink.
My body sinks, but my mind reminds.
I hope it doesn't lead me astray.
My inner shadow sees it go.
It seeps through my bed deep into the ground.
Dirt and grime, and I can't make a sound.
Further it goes away from my soul.
Through the coffins of the dead.
Where I would lay if I could just rest.
But it keeps traveling on.
I try clinging to pine box handles, be my own pallbearer, but I can't move.
It just float on.
Deeper deeper through the layers.
Lips can't even move so no need for prayers.
To Hell I go and back again.
Screams of jealousy pass my ears as I depart.
The devil knows he can't keep my heart.
I want to rest but find no end.
Up and up and up again.
Through the bodies of those I've lost.
Oh how I want to be that one at rest.
But on again I float through our earth.
Back to my room all over again.
Just to start it all again.
And no don't think of it as rebirth.
You don't want to be me, so don't even try.
Just cover your ears as I scream and cry.
Leave me be to dwell in my fruitless journeys.
Over and over again as Nelly said.
Never to end unless I'm dead.
Kill me now i'll hand you the gun.
No, please don't turn away and run.
I'd chase you down, but I can't move.
Trapped again in an abyss.
Yes hold my hand and give me a kiss.
Drink the vile by my side.
Star-crossed is what we're meant to be.
You were made just to lie and die with me.
Give up your soul to float with me.
Baucis and Philemon meant to be.
Oak and Linden us and we.
Hush and keep your arms wide open as I lie in you.
My body placed in yours.
Keep me still once and for all.
Now u can float and feel the fall.
But I'll be with you, don't you worry.
Just move on and continue my story.
forensic fears out on the potter's field
where fathers lie without a choice
and the ultimate enigma
has formed your white lies
formed your white noise
in the vale of missing tales
life isn't all cakes and ale
there, crystal clear
and cherry pale
I can see the umbrella man
the pallbearer man
in public showers
standing still, shapeless and wan
his heart in the can
I can smell your perfume
years after you've left
I've been damned by your beauty
blessed with your hate
your faith is unfaithful
I've been crowned too late
by my childish wish
hard to distinguish
I couldn't care less
groping in the shadows
of the underpass
Preacher E. Lye
He wears his white collar backwards
Piggy attenuated pagan wives’ tale
say the trigger Finger Man
has snake eyes in the back of his head
Got a gravelly-low, porcupine voice
that is cobra flatline prairie legendary
Using a lethal eighteen-wheel
hydraulic tongue roadkill,
he sermonizes with casket authority
Preacher E. Lye got one good eye,
and a black patch over his hollow socket
The last person who asked
what happened to the missing retina,
got buried
in an unmarked, dry gulch ravine pocket
Preacher E. Lye low rides
with malevolent, maverick posse power
Mister Pus Papal Evil Eye
walks double cross with uno orbital pallbearer pride ...
Hanging eulogy twine ties
from the BP church steeple belfry tower
His barrel jaw revolving lies
keep his baron territory on a fear cower
Terrified bottomless pit cries
of the weak townspeople reign hope sour
Preacher E. Lye loves to spew verbal caustic speech:
Potassium hydroxide vows
fire hot lead, full of lung roulette chambers emptied
Mister Pulpit Evil Eye, on the sulfuric snide,
preach yellow-belly worms give-it-up or die:
Collection plate extortion on the cactus side
E. coli talks with snow collar pestilent pride
Black Plague canon cloaked in blue gunsmoke attire,
Chesterfield veiled threats
got the long gun branding irons set in brimstone fire
Preacher E. Lye got one good eye,
and a black patch over his hollow socket
Bottomless pit bull preacher,
bullet lung blasting pie-in-the-sky,
got his casino hands deep in pew pockets
Lupus leper lip E. Lye
tear sow scorpion alibis,
thru his planted posse of doppelganger sons
Wil E. coyote clan cries —
dirt devils on a slithering bandito desert run
Preacher E. Lye got one good eye,
and a black patch over his hollow socket
Preacher E. Lye blows a dust tide
with malevolent, cougar bloody paw grit
Red Barren hope
flows down a cemetery canyon
White flag mope
leaves nary grave task undone
Blue metal smoke
is Preacher E. Lye’s kill clarion
Preacher E. Lye stalks the widows
with his condor one eye
Devour their body-and-soul vittles,
then bury their dead cry
Lot of money being made in death sales,
plenty pints of iron-copper deposits
Body bags coin-wrapped
are rolling out of the blood bank sin-ters
to the holey pocket hospitals
Everybody knows the 911 cellular bar code:
Zinc life is an Alloy toe tag,
double barrel ballistic stamped double zero
One tortured, journalistic soul Embassy killed,
ought not break a multi-billion dollar arms deal
The cost of a human life don’t amount to much,
Triggernomics factor out the index finger touch
Emergency peacemaker withdrawals,
blank spreadsheet cover cadaver E-transfer steals
Truth-stretcher gurney
scrap heap bound on wobbling, bankrupt wheels
Triggernomics is old school math killa culling skillz
Cemetery analytics is a revolving booming new field
Bio-metrics graveyard green ...
Diggers’ “Shovel Expansion Theorem”
is dirt money laundered clean
Pallbearer pearl handle, pandering profit spikes
are roadkill graded on a dire transit bullet Bell Curve
Numerical estimate figures are splatter imprecise,
double-talk dummy leaders on a heist getaway swerve
And all of the corporate, gator boot suits
are offshore investing
in scarlet cash flow Triggernomics
Sepulchre mathematics suggest infirm disdain:
the more genetic sell material DOA lost,
the more pocket health insurance twice gained
Triggernomics got a high mortality cost
I tried to hold my breath,
lacing plastic together with curdled finesse.
Days of remnants rolled around in a heap
and awaited it’s pallbearer. One final destination.
A graveyard necessary for human greed.
I guess everything has an expiration date.
We find these things, and love them
desperately until they die.
Enjoy it’s taste or fiddle with its edges.
We soak ourselves in their worth,
and hope it settles in our stomachs.
We need to know it’s money well spent.
We have to make ourselves believe that
we won’t end up alongside everything we’ve bought.
Like we’re something greater.
And yet, we will still rot under the same dirt
that we place the husks of our misguided and fickle creations beneath.
Burn me when I die,
I want to fly on the wind
and escape the sin that I’ve been living in.
I want to visit the trees and breath new air.
I want to be better than I’ve been.
-James Kelley 2013, All rights reserved
I was the only pallbearer at God's funeral
I dragged the casket the last 25 yards
They served Deviled Eggs and Devil's Food Cake.
The Christians brought
Mogen David wine
The other deity guests present
argued who should bare the blame
For allowing Nietzsche and Darwin
To spread blasphemous theories
Causing worshippers to question their faith
Jesus couldn't have cared less
Considered to be a prodigal son
he was busy cheating Catholics at Bingo
Acting like a false prophet
The Jews believed he was.
Shiva was eating his TBone steak.
Sitting alone at a table
The Entertainment was provided by The Church of Scientology
With the thetans rendition of
The Space Opera.
JSB
we're honored
to carry you home
in a simple pine chrysalis
engraved with your verse...
behind the procession
lie the whorls of living
pastels of decay...
from all the chaos the soul will ascend
beyond the cloud kissed steps
beautiful and delicate
dear friend
are all the answers .. now within your grasp
the breath of god-the heart of infinity
pulsating purity
from which all angels cascade
to glades of clover and mint
high in a hushed lavender mist...
no stresses of the flesh
nor erections of the mind
the black echo of doubt
cannot fiord that forever nest of time-
we're born foolish aren't we
and die with a few verses of veneer
panning for the shine of living
vomiting the remanence of life
like owl pellets
The biscuit is sitting on the plate waiting for a humongous date; the sardine is screaming in the can while she waits for the unfaithful man.
He is out dining and casting lot with a dollar fifty and his head wrapped up in a frock with beads in sheet and two dozen shilling wrapped around his feet.
I cannot remember the last time I saw such a fleet, hundreds of cars lined up one behind the other driving down the street and curious onlookers meandering around the corner leaning on the big boat that sits proudly in the middle of the street, with heat hunkering down at a hundred degree Fahrenheit.
The crowd began to swell and the people began to inhale a peculiar smell; the procession moves slowly through the street and I could feel my heartbeat drumming from a distance.
There was no sign of mourning yet the mood was somber, there was no sign of celebration yet the faces were restrained; there was no sign of happiness yet the emotions were subdued and so the minstrel took over from the stony heart beat and people began to scream and shout in the middle of the street and the procession drag along.
And somewhere in the dark hallway of parliament I can hear shouting and chatter, men and women in sharp attire crowd the rotunda with swollen faces and blistered lips. On the other side men without portfolio linger between the columns looking for votes that they will never have while the bid for speakership comes to a standstill and the man in the middle keep going around in circle and fail to the saddle horse.
The rowdy crowd watches with curiosity and trembling lips dripping with profound words cut through the heart ripping up the defiant men standing in the corner. They stood there all day wringing their hands and breaking their fingers and at the last minute a speaker could not be found and destiny had them bound. At last the casket reached the middle of the town and all the people gather around and Pallbearer hoist the casket and walked slowly and place it in the rotunda and so his ambition was backed up into a corner.