Best Reshaped Poems
I am more than your definitions
more than affixed labels
placed on my anatomy
more than your misconceptions
or even valid perceptions
I am more
I am more than what's written of me
More than what the eye can see
more than what the heart can feel
more than what you think is real
I am more
Yes, more...
I am even more
that the boundaries I set for myself
more than the limitations I conceive
more than what even I believe
to be me
I am more
emanating from my core
are little particles of truth
dressed in the light of poetry
a mystery revealed
a little of the universe
~~outer and inner~~
set free
your reality reshaped
from a different world view
and cultural dimension
religious hues
shining through
all part of who I am
now part of you
but then again
it's true
I am more than these...
I am a valid element of history
soul written in rhyme
truth confined to a time
lines someone will read
and be changed
for an instant
perhaps eternity
thus, I am
I was
and I will be
part of the continuum
of life
of eternity
I am more
infinitely more
than what you see
I am what's meant to be...
Eileen Manassian
Categories:
reshaped, poetry,
Form:
Dramatic Monologue
around the corner...just!
light brilliant...trees freshly brushed...
a breeze meandering through the grass...
a baby blue sky, an occasional cloud shaped and reshaped,
...a waterfall roars like a lion...its spray soft as a lamb.
around the corner...Just
a lovers breath against my neck...a lover's lies,
an ego lift...a seat on that pedestal men dream of...
a bold kiss...an us in a crowd...a lazy summer day
outdoor chairs...an overhead fan, an open door
around the corner...Just,
rollerblades...a mountain bike, a jaunt in the park,
a movie house...a why not...an invigorate,
a swim in a freezing cold lake...
a restaurant night...an evening walk, a club...
dancing...karaoke...being a little wild...
so many images paint my mind...
bittersweet
...my thoughts march one by one
to want something so bad
to fear it at the same time
Just around the corner
I get back my life,
just...
Around the corner
the loss of a life,
just around the corner...
yes I need to do that now,
yes I can wait longer yet...
responsible for her...
consumes the life I knew
the actors, the stage, the lights, the set, the techs,
a play, my life flow...directing stage.
Just around the corner my life waits for me
impatiently
Just...! Around that same corner, death waits for her
patiently
Be careful what you wish for...
Around the corner...just around the corner
two tears wait for me
one joyous...one mournful
Around the corner I want to be
Around the corner wait for me
not yet, caring for my mother...still she lives,
I can wait,
I can wait...
10~13~2014
Sponsor: Francine Roberts
Contest Name: Around the Corner ...
Categories:
reshaped, introspection, mother,
Form:
Free verse
Spiritual injection,
soul to the bone marrow gene therapy
Regeneration revived me,
when grace was bestowed abundantly
Dipped my soul in the water,
emerged with a spark of godly desire
I wanted to be holy ...
be elevated higher
I felt the fire
as it began to burn within
The flames of purification
burned away all my sins
And the fire kept burning within
Melted away my stony heart,
reshaped it into a new spiritual organ
More generous,
more compassionate
More empathy,
more circumspect
What now burns within,
grows more intense everyday
My old desires all burning away
Embers of the past cremated into ash;
buried under the tree,
next to the leaves of all my ill-gotten cash
Resurrected bones born in the fire ---
I walk by faith on the water of troubles,
every blessing from above now doubled
What burns within ...
is a gift from the Everlasting Almighty
What burns within ...
birthed a new spirit that guides me rightly
What burns within ...
cleared away all my doubt and pain
What burns within ...
fallowed my soul to be born again
Categories:
reshaped, inspirational, spiritual, truth, wisdom,
Form:
Dramatic Monologue
Silvery ripples and swirls of viridian currents
Moving through ancient gorges,
Molding and shaping solid shades of gray granite…
Soft and round,
Craggy and sharp,
Here and There…
Solid rock thrusting up
Shaped by shifting currents of the river
Rising and falling,
Rushing and fading,
Over time.
Who knows where
The current will go next
Or what shape the rocks will take,
Over time.
Nevertheless
The river and rocks remain,
One, solid and steady,
The other, fluid and ever-moving.
Sitting here
My heart longs to shed its burdens
To let them slide like a rock into the gently swirling water
And be carried away by the swiftly flowing current beneath the surface.
I want to know …
Can I remain solid and steady, yet fluid,
As the currents of change swirl
Around me?
I want to know …
Can I be molded and reshaped
As the river of life courses
Through me?
I want to know …
Can I be moved in new directions by love,
Harmonious and true to the voice of my heart
Echoing in the ancient gorge of my own soul?
The only answer that comes
Is the flow of my tears and
The sound of the river as it continues
To ripple and run around the rocks.
Maybe
That
Is enough,
For now.
Categories:
reshaped, introspection, natureheart, heart, river,
Form:
Free verse
SOMETHING HAPPENED TO ME WHEN I WAS JUST A GIRL
IT INVOLVED A BAD MAN, & IT RESHAPED MY WHOLE WORLD
A NEW SET OF DEMONS WERE INTRODUCED INTO MY LIFE
PAIN, & SHAME, DESPAIR, ANGER, & STRIFE
THERE WAS GREAT CHAOS IN MY LITTLE SOUL
AND IT GREW, AND IT STAYED, AND INCREASED EVERMORE
THERE WERE NO PSYCHOLOGISTS, OR THERAPISTS FOR THE RAPED WHO WERE POOR
AND THE DREAMS!
OH, THOSE DREAMS
SO GRAPHIC, SO REAL
I BEGAN GOING WITHOUT SLEEP
I BEGAN NOT WANTING TO FEEL
I COPED WITH THE INNER-TURMOIL IN A NEGATIVE WAY
I GRASPED ON THOSE DEMONS WHO WERE WITH ME
BECAUSE PAIN BEGETS MORE PAIN
AND SO, THIS WAS MY REALITY & THE JUST OF MY LIFE
HURTING BUT SMILING, DEAD BUT ALIVE
THEN, YET MORE CHAOS....WHEN I BECAME MOMMY & WIFE
THOSE DEMONS, MY COMPANIONS, THEY INVITED SOME FRIENDS
THEY HAD TO, THERE WAS MORE OF ME TO SHARE, IN THE FORM OF CHILDREN
BUT GOD......
SAID, “ OK, THAT’S ENOUGH!”
THEN HE BREATHED IN AND HE BLEW......
“HI, I’M JESUS, GOD’S SON,” SAID A VOICE, “AND I DIED JUST FOR YOU.”
“ALL THAT STUFF THAT YOU’RE HOLDING, GIVE IT TO ME.”
THEN HE HACKED AND HE CHASED AND SPOKE AND HE PRUNED
AND WHEN I THOUGHT MY FOOT WAS SLIPPING
HE SAID, “ MY GOOD WORK IS NOT THRU! FOR MY LOVE IS ETERNAL.”
“AND WHEN YOU HURT SO DO I. NOW IT IS MY TURN TO RESHAPE YOUR LIFE.”
YET ANOTHER VOICE APPEARED, AND IN A WHISPERED HE SAID
“ I AM GOD. I’M YOUR FATHER, AND I’VE MISSED YOU SO MUCH!”
“ I’M GONNA TURN THAT PAIN INTO PRAISE!” THEN HE GAVE ME A TOUCH!
“THIS IS HOLY SPIRIT, AND HE IS ALSO ME.”
AND SINCE THEN, MY NAME’S BEEN CHANGED TO ‘BEAUTIFUL PEACE’.
OH, LIFE ISN’T PERFECT, AND I AM STILL QUITE FLAWED
BUT, I AM NOW ALIVE, AND I’M LIVIN’ WITH GOD
AND MY FAMILY IS BLESSED
NOT DEMON-POSSESSED
MY WAYS ARE THE LORD’S
AND I’M FREE FOREVER MORE
Categories:
reshaped, childhood, inspirational, lifeme, pain,
Form:
Free verse
A lump of clay upon God's wheel,
Twas such a simple start.
The gentlest of hands I could feel,
As He reshaped my heart.
If wrong things I may do or say,
Discard me he does not.
Like an earthly potter and his clay,
God uses what He's got.
A perfect vessel when he is done,
Nothing fancy yet you see.
But with God I must be number one,
For He still works on me.
Categories:
reshaped, faith, inspirational, life,
Form:
Lyric
Blue topaz delight constantly in motion
forcing up salty waves of might
Feel the sand under your feet,
feel it ride back to the sea
Cool wet ocean aroma
crashing on the rocks of the border
Spray forth into the air
Dried sea squirt upon my face, skin and hair
Drift wood beaten by the master,
you lay stretched out with seaweed stuck to your side
dehydrated from the sun, reshaped, unworn, overdone
The sea is unkind to all that enter her blind
For she has a mind of her own
To many a tale she’s has claimed
twisted ships, boats and all that were maimed
Rest quietly now on her sands of splendor
For when night approaches all must surrender
Categories:
reshaped, mystery, nature, sea, sea,
Form:
Free verse
Let the words of my mouth have backbone
Buoyed by the sinew of thoughtless thoughts
May they be freely formed and fashioned
On the smooth surface of an unyielding anvil
Hammered in the heat of passion’s angst
Molded in the flame of sightless vision
Nurtured by the touch of unfelt hands
Polished in the innocence of love’s longings
For how else will they be my words
If stolen, reshaped, reworked, weakly rekindled
Would I not be but a chirping echo
Scratching at a stained-glass soul
Would that my words and meditations
Be the reflection of my heart’s belief
Set free within the moments calm
To stir a gently passing breeze
Categories:
reshaped, words,
Form:
Verse
I'm watching you age
into wiser smiles, measured steps.
(Your lines look beautiful)
Gravity of life reshaped
our foolish expenses of energy
(Oh, the hurrying we did together)
wasted vanity of emotions.
I love our becoming...
more vast of vivid moments
(Our expanding normal bits)
gnarled with experiences.
Categories:
reshaped, family, growing up, husband,
Form:
Free verse
Under inexorable gravity’s pull,
galaxies often move toward one another.
Closer and closer they come to each other,
till astronomic smashups happen in full.
For no less than two of them, possibly three,
such a scenario has been predicted,
as computer simulations depicted
through the Hubble images researchers see.
Milky Way will have a new identity.
It’s destined to get a major makeover.
Andromeda’s bound for a broad takeover.
Milkomeda’s what they’ll call this entity.
In that head-on cosmic collision in view—
a colossal stellar encounter full-blown—
it is indeed likely our Sun will be thrown
from its present locale to a region new.
The galaxies into each other will plow,
but our planetary realms won’t be destroyed
nor be propelled into an outer space void,
though stars will not have the same orbits as now.
They’ll go round a novel galactic center.
The fate for our own solar system in store
is perhaps to be tossed far off from the core
of the reshaped ellipse that it will enter.
Of course, by the time the collision takes place,
the surface of Earth, without intervention,
will be much too hot for water retention,
because of the Sun’s super-luminous face.
This means no terrestrial life could subsist
or think that the heavens are seemingly strange.
Thus no one we know of would notice the change,
and our worldly woes will have ceased to exist…
For a while, the night sky will be all ablaze
with new star formations in radiant rays,
but at last in the merger’s more final phase
it will look like spilled milk in a bright white haze.
Still there’s no need to fret or to get upset.
This melding won’t start till four billion years hence.
And that’s way away in the far future tense…
So it’s no use crying over spilt milk yet!
~ Harley White
Categories:
reshaped, earth, image, space, star,
Form:
Rhyme
Like a dirty stain that should be removed,
the once clear distinction between men
and women has become murky and gray.
The stain grows and smears lines and
edges, the shape of men and women
are remolded. Gone are the curvy
feminine lines of a womanly figure,
replaced by more angular lines.
The bold, masculine lines of a man
are softened, erased and reshaped
into a nondescript form.
Fuzzy, blurred lines appear on the
facial features, hair is neither short
nor long, but shapeless.
A vague, pastel colored jacket and pants,
no tie, casual shoes and a side saddle
purse complete the picture.
Like a prodigal son, men try to take
what God has made and remake it
for their own purposes. Yet, one day
every man and every woman will
stand before their Creator, and
He will have no trouble telling them apart.
Written on 2015
Categories:
reshaped, society,
Form:
Free verse
There were times, long ago,
when the young, preteen me
would intertwine herself
with the age-limp branches
of one of the two odd trees out.
But now, five years later,
the new me has reshaped her story,
gazing back on the memory
of a childhood lost forever.
The rough, tangled bark,
painted with decade-old blood
and knifepoint carvings
and skin interlaced in its valleys
where her knees had once tread.
I remember it and her tearless eyes;
where has the fearlessness gone?
There was once birdsong there,
mingling with my ignorant laughter.
The occasional scream there sounded, too,
when a prepubescent girl saw eight legs
and two beady eyes:
just as scared of her
as she was of it.
Most of these things are gone now,
replaced by year-dried leaves
and tripping roots.
But I have left my mark there,
my own memory at its roots:
a pool of purple tinged wax
and a skunkline of ash
halfway up its trunk;
a mirror to the pain
I felt that day.
Now, when I return,
the smoke is still present,
clinging to the hairs of my nostrils.
Although, one scent has always lived there,
even before I arrived,
beaming from the skies:
the smell of dew-coated leaves,
the sunrise,
of a child’s first breath.
Here I can find peace,
lost in the memory of my old life.
How I wish to forget it;
and yet each month, I find myself
crying beneath its love-lost leaves.
Categories:
reshaped, growing up, life, nostalgia,
Form:
Free verse
I'll never forget the dream I dreamt
That reshaped my very being
I have no doubt, need not attempt
Whole heartedly believing
My soul left my body vacant
But not to my demise
My imagination couldn't fake it
Too beautiful for human eyes
Loving limbs cradled me
Hovering over my vain vessel
Blind eyes could suddenly see
Two arms became my trestle
My familiar surroundings vanished
Stripped bare of my possessions
A state of calm, established
By undeserved discretion
I saw beauty like never before
Though it was there all along
Kept safe behind an invisible door
Of angels in peaceful song
I saw things as they stood
Without the shiny polish
I'll tell you now, it wasn't good
Beneath the tree of knowledge
The wind didn't feel like wind
As we flew through what we call the sky
No beginning or end
A repeating lullaby
I recognized many faces
Though they weren't familiar at all
I knew exactly who they were
Despite the faces that I saw
We shared a warm embrace
They knew who I was too
I was just piece of space
But they could see right through
Just then, like an epiphany
A lightbulb flipped it's switch
A delightfully elegant symphony
At just the perfect pitch
The angels parted, one by one
Revealing a magnificent figure
Holy Ghost, father and son
The epitome of pure
Though I had no shell
I hit the floor
Gravity aside, I fell
I wanted for nothing more
My knees weren't knees at all
Only a perfect spirit
Yet still I felt the fall
My ears could even hear it
I can't remember what I saw
My eyes are too sinful, you see
I know it was glorious and humbly raw
More than I expected it to be
I awoke from my travels
Still seeing things where they stand
When truth and time unravels
I'll see beauty once again
Categories:
reshaped, beautiful, destiny, dream, god,
Form:
Free verse
Rain falls on granite.
Glaciers unwind.
Snowflakes decrystallize.
A murmuring stream collects,
in the confluence of the melt.
A river is born.
Her banks expand.
Nutrients collect in the torrent.
Rocks tumble in the frothy white water.
Speed and power intensify,
with the reshaped swell of common elements.
A river grows.
Transformation is slow and muddy.
Men build obstructions,
harness the river with turbines.
Irrigation canals siphon liquid gold for crops.
Barges navigate goods over current.
A river is tamed.
Sediments build in the depths.
Reflections dominate.
A serene shoreline nurtures abundance.
The hasty flow has noticeably slowed.
Every mile traveled increases breadth of verity.
A river ages.
Some vanish with anonymity in vast deserts.
Others clash violently into endless seas.
A few form rich, braided deltas.
Inland lakes, without drainage, capture some.
Geologists and children are in agreement.
All rivers end………
Categories:
reshaped, liferiver,
Form:
Personification
Forever I had dreamed of my “Happily Ever After” scene.
As a child, I became Snow White or Cinderella in my dreams.
Never had I imagined living all alone and fancy free!
Childhood fantasies included lots of children and tire swings.
Yesterdays dreams were replaced; my future was yet to be.
Friends married and drifted away; education reshaped life.
Reality kept me busy without an inclination to party although I was fancy free.
Eventually, biological clock ticked fast; then, came marriage, children, and more children!
Each day, as a senior, rare free moments dream of being fancy free.
5/20/2017
Written for Julia Ward’s Fancy Free Poetry Contest
Categories:
reshaped, family, freedom, growing up,
Form:
Acrostic