Best Rootless Poems
POETS
Seems we be a restless,
often rootless, band
we poets.
Annuals
bursting forth
in fullness
only to fade,
blown away
on fickle winds.
Stringless kites
anchored
in the ethereal.
Voices adrift
on the mind’s
muse.
Tumbleweeds
in torment
pursued
by the winds
of our future.
©2/18/2018
submitted to – CONTEST NO 400
sponsor – Brian Strand
Categories:
rootless, poets, writing,
Form:
Free verse
Among a stand of pines I lived my life,
blissful in the ignorance of my own fate.
Tall and proud, my fellow trees and I
stood along a ridge that overlooked a lake -
its crystal surface mirroring our beauty.
Underneath big sky
and seeming to lean against a mountain,
we reveled in the gifts of our mother nature.
Oftentimes we felt the breath of breezes at our backs
and cooling downpours in the summer heat.
We saw and heard the scampering of squirrels and rabbits;
We watched as deer and other woodland creatures
stopped to drink at the clear lake or came to visit us.
Birds of many sorts serenaded us both day and night;
Crickets, bees and other insects came to see us too.
Seasons came and went.
Still young, I kept growing on the south fringe of my stand.
This winter as new snow glistened on the ground,
there came intruders to our happy spot.
Wielding axes, two men chopped me down.
Now I stand alone, uprooted and separated from my stand.
No birds adorn my limbs.
Instead I’m wearing garlands of garish gold
and big red bulbs are hanging from my arms.
No moon or stars of night shine above me,
but a silver plastic star is tacked on top my head.
I’m suffocated by this too-warm room
with blinking lights everywhere around me
And myriads of gifts brightly wrapped
piled high and pressed against my trunk.
No longer one of many, I am one alone
And the lovely stand of which I was but one small part
has been replaced by an old and rusty stand for Christmas trees,
a stand that now contains me,
for I no longer stand as one part of a whole.
Rootless and wondering what will become of me. . .
I pine.
Written 9/15/12 for Debbie Guzzi's "Stand" Poetry Contest
Categories:
rootless, nature,
Form:
Free verse
March
Sweet, bitter March,
last year tears haven’t dried out up
till now and yet you
are already at the door,
knocking lightly!
Sadness is still flapping over my head like
a frantic goose, what have you brought with you
to silence its primordial honking?!
I can see your hunched silhouette against the wall
Of my waiting, standing awash with shame,
wringing your empty hands desperately!
O' March , anniversary of tears and smiles,
Memories are pacing around nostalgically, sniffing
the withered roses, leafing through the pages of books
trying to put the haphazard leftovers of a once
beautiful image into shape…
The hurricane that accompanied you once
has subdued, leaving behind a nerve-tearing silence and
a deracinated life!
Don’t wonder; rootless hopes are still roving
over the corpse of a long dead dream, taking
strength from the ever pulsating stars…
March, March , embracer of birth and death,
the breath of eternity has abandoned
your rosy-cheeked child..
The resonance of its happy giggles are
haunting the vacant hours of night, sending me
reeling of longing!
Its face emerges from among the clouds of years, an angelic
Vision imprinted on the face of a mourning moon!
Categories:
rootless, nostalgia, march,
Form:
Prose Poetry
I wander the landscapes of solitude
Unchecked and unhealed,
Beneath heavens speared with bamboo rain,
A blade on my back concealed
Beyond where the eye can envisage and see,
Deserts burning dry,
Beyond where the temples sink in the dust,
Under a storm laden sky.
There is no one to swear allegiance to,
The loneliest decree,
To walk the earth as the years dissolve
And land crumbles into sea.
I wander the heartlands of yesterday,
Of feudal souls no more,
Where the killing fields were hearth and home,
My brothers men of war.
No master to slip the chains and unleash
Honour and ferocity,
Belonging to nothing, beloved of none,
Rootless, accursed and free.
Categories:
rootless, allegory, history, people, time,
Form:
Verse
Collecting shells, I walk along a beach
while carrying a basket in my hand.
I spy a lovely conch with whorls of peach
and reach down to retrieve it from the sand.
I see a cobalt spiraled shell and gasp.
Another beauty for my centerpiece;
I hold the blue of sky within my grasp,
and there is one the ivory of fleece!
I love these pretty flowers from the sea.
Contained within them is the ocean's roar,
and rootless, they can be plucked easily
from where they thrive along the sunny shore!
Unlike my garden's blooms, they do not die,
and blossoming all year, they please my eye.
April 21, 2021 / A recent N/A
for the 'Your 2021 N-A Choice' Poetry Contest
of William Kekaula
Categories:
rootless, sea,
Form:
Sonnet
7/18/02
In a tropical place, the climate
becomes a way of being.
Fruits and flowers on shirts and dresses,
breakfasts of bananas,
pineapple flavored passions of
afternoon, pathways to the moon on
evening seas, coconut-milk tipped waves at dawn,
palms tilting horizons and gulls gliding
the edge of time.
Yet, where I live does not define me.
Not like the Irish dairymen, who
rain or shine, milk cows they
could easily set their clocks by.
Here on this perfect stretch of sand,
I am rootless - envious
of those who have never moved.
I feel puppet-ized by modern life;
a little schizoid - liking where I am,
hearing the voices, while
a part of me pines
for pastoral beginnings.
Categories:
rootless, destiny, environment, ireland, life,
Form:
Free verse
along the sunflower sunrises
you can watch butterflies quiver as if they were nature's kites
I just hope that there’s another rootless person
who wakes to dance in the bloom of morning’s first lights
on days of fair cotton candy clouds
you can fix your eyes past all the single tree silhouettes
I just hope that there’s another roaming person
who looks outside of life’s branches instead of using them as nets
in the mystic tangerine sunsets
you can actually see the paints spill along the horizon’s ledge
I just hope that there’s another drifting person
who watches the colors trickle along dusk’s cliff edge
in the low phantom moon
you can only see his orange peel grin in his half exposed expression
I just hope that there’s another nomadic person
who smiles back as they dream away their day lit depression
and on the clearest chestnut nights
you can always smell the fog that floated over an anonymous pond
I just hope that there’s another wandering person
who takes it all in all, but never forgets that there is always more beyond
Categories:
rootless, nature, peoplehope,
Form:
Rhyme
Who are you, my Lord?
And what am I standing here as a weather-beaten tombstone,
O Lord, reveal yourself to me on the tombstone standing here alone.
Long, long ago
Cain averted his face from the light,
the condemned river, surrounded by a dead
Cain laid atop of his own brother, flows into the valley
carrying the curse.
And the condemned river flows to the dark side of the sun
since the time Abel’s blood cried out.
My eyes grew so accustomed to the darkness
and, thus, though I am no longer able to stand in light,
I face you, the Lord of the origin of light,
standing here as a tombstone.
O Lord, are you the very person whose voice I hear?
are you the man who is rolling and tossing on the ground
under the out-pouring lashes who moans:
“forgive them,” each time I call for aid of my destiny?
O Lord, are you the one who crawl on the path
that leads to the Place of the Skull
in the mixed air of cries as the fools shout,
mockeries of the evil ones affront,
and the useless tears the women shed?
Are you the one who mutters: “forgive them,”
while falling under a rootless tree
for the weight of the tree is too great to bear?
For the good nature of humankind is numbed
by the weight of sins too deep to break loose.
The emotion of human kind becomes cold and cruel
and, therefore, O my Lord,
do you groan with pain unbearable:
“forgive them,” when those stone-hearted drive spikes
pierce your hands with no compunctions?
Are you the one who stands as a decaying wooden pillar
on atop of Golgotha with a darkening sun on your back
to close the shamefully-mistreated hard life,
the miserably-humiliated painful life?
Are you the benevolent kind-hearted one who looks up at heaven,
and at mobs who accused you, appealing with tearful eyes:
“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
When the wooden pillar collapses from its own weight
and darkness falls onto earth to cover the unsightly world,
I, the tombstone with no name or epitaph,
see a sad image standing atop of the Place of the Skull
tightly holding the world’s anguish.
Categories:
rootless, cry, dark, emotions, faith,
Form:
Free verse
Angels live in heaven, so I heard you all say,
as the pristine celestial beauty they ascend
like the sparkling stars in the far away milky way,
but I know on the mortal earth they often descend.
If you ask me how do I know, I would aver,
I have seen the radiance of my mother’s heart
as bright as adoring shine of a splendorous star,
suffusing me with love even destiny made us apart.
In troubled times when the family was adrift in unrest,
she toiled to settle down secured in a land unknown,
gave a precious gift to my rootless uncertain life, a nest,
from where I spread my wings in the sky and have flown.
I soared high under the caring cover of her weary wings,
my aspirations the wild winds couldn’t blow away.
I live in the shadow of her undying love, memory brings,
for it’s her hands that sculpted me what I am today.
She has left me for her new home a long time ago,
when in dismal night the glistening north star I see,
guiding me to my final destination, I then know,
she is the star, shining with angels in heaven for me.
______________
April 29, 2022
Contest : A Mother's Love, Tributes Of Love For Mother's Day
Sponsored by : BJ Legros Kelley
Categories:
rootless, analogy, angel, mother, star,
Form:
Rhyme
Empty shells I find on the beach
can be looked at in two ways.
In one aspect, they are seeds of death -
the only tangible remains of once-living creatures
now planted randomly in the sand,
but also it can be said that
rootless - they still blossom beneath the sun
with their beautiful spiraled patterns
as flowers from the sea.
Categories:
rootless, sea,
Form:
Free verse
elysian
adorned with faultless time-dream
bits of insight
trigger dim emotions
memory gives warmness
spooky how light needs
haziness to thrive
drew me away from
odyssey I cling to
Inner peace exists in the sky
awaken the sun
egg-yellow in tone
In the midst of
oceanic aurora with blue shells
Half bleared-eye
embraced in soul stance
of shrewdness
as though prevail
intertwined
In a vast ocean of you
forgotten rootless
cast to the verge
we each
without lacking land
Written: June 24, 2022
A BRIAN STRAND PREMIERE CHOICE Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Brian Strand
Categories:
rootless, analogy, appreciation, dream,
Form:
Other
Lost in Shade
I am a blur in the mosaic, painted, not placed
a borrowed hue in a gallery of dream and machines.
Voices whirl like prayer wheels spun too fast,
each syllable a wind that forgets my name.
Skyscrapers bloom like cold steel flowers,
rootless, like me, fed by wires, not soil.
I chase the scent of home through alleys of memory,
but find only the dust of vanished names.
My past is folded in a drawer no one opens,
forty winters pressed into brittle silence.
I carry nothing but breath and a blank refrain,
I am lost in a shaded world
But with no shade of my own.
Categories:
rootless, emotions, feelings, london, loneliness,
Form:
Free verse
Hand in hand glued I walk with you
I am a waveless sea without you
I am a honeyless bee without you
I am a rootless tree without you
You are my fate a true soulmate
I am a feelingless kiss without you
I am a peaceless niche without you
I am a pondless fish without you
You are my love which you deserve
I am an aimless life without you
I am a ruthless knife without you
I am a pitiless strife without you
With you I hit dart bullseye every try
I am a wingless bird without you
I am a meaningless word without you
I am a shameless nerd without you
I admire your piose beauty so cutie
I am a handless clock without you
I am a prongless fork without you
I am a humourless joke without you
I enjoy each moment with you a brand new
I am a seedless fruit without you
I am a useless dilute without you
I am an endless dispute without you
With you I am complete a man concrete
I am a powerless king without you
I am a diamondless ring without you
I am a bloomless spring without you
Let us not apart any day that's I pray
I am a heartless body without you
I am a worthless roadie without you
I am a themeless melody without you
Love is still, love till date, forever innate
Again I would say, you are my fate a true soulmate...
Categories:
rootless, first love, i love
Form:
Verse
My little grandson is sincere.
He tells of me: “Grandpa stinks!”;
He tells of me; “Grandpa’s belly is big!”;
“He looks like Santa Claus with his paunch!”;
“And stinks too, he smells bad!”.
So, since he is sincere, I have no choice.
As a flower, I am the huge Rafflesia,
The largest flower in the world,
Which stinks too of rotten fish,
Nauseating and large as me!
But Rafflesia is beautiful to see!
Rafflesia Arnoldii
A rare, parasitic, rootless and leafless plant, Rafflesia arnoldii has the largest known flower in the world.
Categories:
rootless, flower,
Form:
Free verse
In Africa you were born
In deep serenity
To the sounds of mighty drums
And rhythm’s authenticity.
Stole you from your righteous land
Cut it up like a birthday cake
Gave it back to Anglo hands
But your birth was no mistake.
Hot sun baked your deep skin
In their souls your people knew
Down in the delta the cotton moved
By the ***** spiritual, you grew.
The teachings of gospel embraced you
When Abe’s 13th had you lost
When the choir called you responded
Learned you could share your talent, but at a cost
A burnt cork mask for the audience
Buffoonery and minstrelsy, Jim Crow and Daddy Rice
Exploitation in a racist Nation
Theatrical vice.
You got the blues
Had a melancholy mood
Broke down walls with the drowsy tunes
That free and rootless attitude
On the shoulder of Scott Joplin
Mesmerized with how his fingers played
Ragtime floats on running notes
In New Orleans your future lay.
The melting pot, jazz hotspot
Black people, white people, blue, and green
Creole heritage swirling all it meets
Street smart, fine art, everything in between.
Jazz is about freedom
You have to improvise
The band prides the electric ride
Sharing music with each other’s eyes
A jazz baby was born in the USA
Dare I say the American way
Day by Day by Day
A growing Jazz Baby played.
Categories:
rootless, beautiful, black african american,
Form:
Personification