Best Portfolio Poems
"The Wormwood Portfolio"
Reams of stories
riddled with worms
wood for burning
all the children
cover their eyes
tears smoked
into the lungs
gender fluid
propheticising
bitter water
electric brains
chipped like
fine-boned China
downloading
overloads
dumps are
damp
the fuse
sizzles and
stops
green as absinthe
gauche ghosts
gone all grey skinned
scales of merit
charred unweighted
vacant and vacating
like dandelions
scattering over
the barren wombs
of the childless landscape
dreaming of biblical babies
suckling the wanton breasts
of Desdemona’s structural points,
a sharp essay, feeding insouciance
mistaken identities and confusion
side-blinded by the light
of the tempestuous kill shot
burnt and scarred
beeseeching open handed
faces turning like time dials
towards two suns
gold gone all black holed
dead verdant plants
hot feet blistering
make no more demands
skipping, games of patter-cake
powdered ochre yellow
here's the church and here's the steeple
open your hands where are the people
like viruses, germinating
no more prayers to enchant
daughters of eve
sons of man
when the Word finally speaks
there is hearing damage
Reams of stories
riddled with worms
wood for burning
all the children
cover their eyes
;
the ides of march
recant.
(LadyLabyrinth / 2021)
"A tear in the brain
allows the voices in
they wanna push you off the path
with their low-frequency wires..."
recant. v.
Wormwood.
Ides of March.
You feel that painting exists
Still upon the canvas
But it has lost its luster
When it keeps it growing
Inside yourself
Your heart beats faster
As the painting develops
Into a masterpiece
Of dimensions evolved
Into pieces of life
Shown by the colors upon
The white canvas
Showing where dips an sways
Revolve around the world’s
Only repertoire of truth
Thrust upon life’s grace
Where I see the painting
In my mind’s eye still
Such a grueling chore
Where the paint sends beauty
And laying upon the canvas
A picture of abstract
Proportions to random
Acts of nothingness
Still plays its tune upon
My desires to blend the colors
And bleed the picture
Into what art
Surely means to me
Russell Sivey
I, Davis, am the founding father of Chemical Engineering
It is something that many new scientists find endearing
The American Institute of Chemical Engineering started
When jobs, which I helped create, came and imparted
Unit operations is the Chemical Engineer’s key
To what we are truly desiring and meant to be
Other offsprings of the field are coming nowadays
Process Systems Engineering is one that stays
Bioengineering is another area at which I brought
So many offshoots did I create just by my thought
Chemical thermodynamics sounds hard to do
That is just another thing that I did venture into
This field is growing which I knew it would go
I put everything into it, all that I could know
Have kept an eye out for the difficulty factor
But I have never left this field, I’m not a defector
Russell Sivey
My supernatural portfolio--
a manuscript of imperfection,
full of hind and secondsight,
a circus without direction.
Angelic iron work
embellished with Rush.
The outburst overflow
grind to a hush.
There's the melody breakdown,
a lyric report.
A crazy graph from the 80's,
the visuals distort.
The corona of my aura
beams a rhapsody from every page.
The bottle's up, I take a sup,
because all the world's a stage.
Yet, on this astral dust I trod
and all the otherworldly debris...
I am meant to write it all down,
to unlock the world within me.
If you look inside
You may be amazed at what you find…
Maybe some small imperfections
Yet, heading in the right direction…
There is one, who does not boast…
But, has endured much and stays afloat…
Having peace in mind
Remains smiling most of the time…
Having not time to stop and gloat
Seeking, to help others remain afloat…
Continue to look inside
You, just may be amazed by what you find…
Braggadocio Obama
Junior senator melodrama
Created terrorist cyclorama
Over and over killing Osama
I look at my portfolio;
It makes me want to hurl.
For one day, all is calm and fine;
The swine then eats the pearl!
I do not mean to sound complaint
Like some great oafish churl,
But ups and downs like these of late?
My stomach flops and twirls.
I think that I may now know why;
I’m going to take a whirl:
The market tracks the hormones of
A thirteen-year-old girl!
Portfolio Queenie
Silhouette of hope
Stoned on herself
Drunk with empty hope
Portfolio Queenie
Entitled she is
Admiring faces
Routine in the biz
Portfolio Queenie
Motel door ajar
Overdose of self
Never got to be a star
Portfolio Queenie
A filthy, empty shell
Dead doll face
No longer casts a spell
Jelly incorporates my inner self
Lips concealed with the petroleum
The lid covers my insecure body
Where it’s clear to see me used
Stamped to show the year I would die
If allowed to exist, I might not be as strong
Along the time beyond
And seeing through me
Isn’t as easy as it once was
I carry secrets within my belly
Of jelly once lubricated on her lips
Russell Sivey
Move along pages
Youth complies little
Breathing swiftens
Novel leaves nothing
But a heartbeat lost
Towards the novel
The internal contents read
As time brings down the senses
No human can endure
The pages therein
And heartache ensues
Over nothing real
Russell Sivey
Evolution of the heart, mends the mind
Twirled through segments
And seasoned stargazing
Opens the eyes of bewilderment
Seizing upon the wisps of whispers
Representing what you have requested
Reinvested through your relationship
But never known to show a crown
Of bejeweled blackseed opened
And delighted by devils curve
And where whoosh, traveled there
I slip slowly through slippery
Sheets of ice that moves swiftly
Where I don’t ignite a thing of the ocean
Breathing the coldness of calamity
And worthlessness written on withered
Old paper, within the heart
Where mending seems to mediate
From open to oppressive measures
Only spoken through troubled waters
And frozen upon frozen eyes
Leaving me empty, without a heart
To mend any mind.
Russell Sivey
White fan blows quietly
Wacky USB dive sits near
Magnifying reading glasses
And some worn out pens reflect
Two puppies on a worn mouse pad
Placed under an intense mouse
The recorder and order of events
Of my computer, eight years used
Occupies the space front and center
Mobile desk holds all objects said
Moves on maple wood floor
I sit, I work, I laugh, I entertain
On my desk of multiple things
Russell Sivey
She pulls up the driveway...
The storm comes
The rain starts to pelt the Earth
It begins to splinter the wood
Cut into the hard ground
Like a knife made to cut
The lightning bears its own crackle
Shards of it splits the sky
And the thunder
Oh the thunder rolls
Like a bass drum the never ends
And brings the ears into fragments
As the wind slashes across
The landscape, brushing it with steel
The rain has no chance to survive
It pounds whatever is around
As the wind pulses through the air
Like a hurricane, lost and brutal
To the land it delves into
Moving, separating each
From its life, into darkness
Just like the sky, in the eye
Of the ravaging storm
Russell Sivey
Today I travel through light years to the edge of the universe. I will go past swirling gas giants posing their beauty with colors of red, yellow, orange, blue, and green shifting from one expression to another by their colorful designs. Due to traveling billions of times faster than the speed of light, Earth is at its infancy. Time goes backwards when I move so quickly through space. This includes the universe of quadrillions of stars. Instead of expanding outwards beyond, it is shrinking inwards towards the birth of stars saving them from their inevitable explosions of death. I travel to reaches where aliens circle their star with under a wave of timelessness. So, throughout my travels, they are always there, always the same, always existing as before, non-changing entities of space. Is it heaven I wonder, have I found heaven after all these years? I just want to touch heaven before I die.
Russell Sivey
Floating above my hand outstretched
Is a bubble--a reflective rainbow
Blowing from a wand in her fingers
Belonging to my one baby sister
She flies around, shouting all about
Bubbles float beyond my eyes
Seeing them lift above her head
While our parents laugh at the sight
Bringing their eyes upon her
Their interest in her every move
Running around with the dog
Showering bubbles around their heads
They try to hold each one in their hands
While they levitate above mine
Imagining their invincibility towards
My sister’s shrill voice, screeching
Along the yard like a siren, blaring
Without an emergency, save my ego
As the last bubble pops in my hand
Russell Sivey