Best Self Reliant Poems
Ah, the fortitude of a circle
the circular wisdom
of spring to summer fall to winter
the spinning wheel’s twist of threads -
at once both self-reliant and reliant
my soul to embryo seed to seedling
the mettle it takes for the genesis;
for my poppy pod to wake and break
a tiny speck of matter a fleck of duality unleashed
I surrender my dormancy to the earth -
roots reach deep like pale squiggly fingers
..for my kernel was laid to rest to bustle to life..
while my headstrong head pushes up through the soil
I come to be.. like a new idea taking shape
a physical being grounded
while seeking the realm of the Sun
the source of spirit as essential
as the dark womb from which I emerge
with a heart budding with the universe from nothing
I sprout as a sprig from a rounded grain
conceived in a gold-dusted flurry of furry buzz..
a bumblebee's dalliance with the center of a whorl
a mote of pollen so mite-like -- but
m i g h t y
in purpose potential and power
woven together in the art of creation
wind-driven autumn rains and sips of melted snow
..mother’s milk during the passage of time..
sweetly feeds the gentle needs for my tender birth
daystar’s dabble-dance with shadows
charm the chill from the cradle of the garden floor -
warm ginger dapples flit to find me between
canopy gaps in swish and sway..
mini-spots mirroring the disk of the Sun reminds me;
the image of what I’ll become
when my solar heart shines in a petal-chalice of flame..
rapture stirs the layers of humus
penetrating my essence with a ripening
stoking my fortitude to fulfill my destiny
to break free of that which holds me down
and reach ever higher inspired by a promise;
the golden circle of solace.. the bull's-eye in the sky
whose glow does kiss and grow my soul -
my inner space of bright sure to blaze
in a blossom cup’s confinement
my soul to embryo seed to seedling
sown to assure my flowering
my earthy ascension fulfills Nature’s cycle of nativity;
above the loam I rise to unfurl
and lift my airy leaves’ uncurl up high
in praise of the light
as the end of a gray season curves
into the festive yellow equinox of resurgence
Categories:
self reliant, birth, faith, flower, garden,
Form:
Free verse
Foxy ponytail got a sharp tongue,
her pretty jade eyes blink-blink lashes
really cut to the chase
Keep the skirt hounds on the run,
obsession scent spur their mad dashes
Her pause give ‘em all a digital trail erase
She cracks the estrogen whip ...
let cheeky fools taste the pointed quip,
if they don’t mane macho lying back down
Amelia Earhart flygirl cool attitude,
soaring pioneer spirit air-to-ground
Indie Anna Jones' outback boots
love kicking the salty sea dogs around
Never yet met a man to meet her match;
to strike her fire
with a sincere, fingertip touch
Self-reliant souls are the hardest catch,
free space desire
oxygenate a bonding kiss rush
Indie Anna Jones
is looking for the next archeology dig site
to soul carbon date
So dust off the adventurous bones,
have a hopeful heart that’s gonna do right
And you just Dr. Feelgood might
be her perfect mate
Categories:
self reliant, cool, identity, romantic, word
Form:
Epic
Yesterday I was oblivious and carefree,
looking forward to seeing you,
talking with you on the phone -
your teasing voice glimmering with laughter . . .
Today my heart is a deep abyss
that knows no bottom;
I cannot find you in the darkness
for you have slipped beyond my reach.
No one can share my pain and loss;
only I carried you within me,
nestled just below my heart,
your forming body responsive to my voice and emotions.
Others may be familiar with this grief;
but mine has its own individual, bitter taste.
You are one of a kind,
no one just like you in all the universe.
My heart swells with aching sorrow;
you passed in the deep of night
with no one by your side,
alone,
except for the angel who came
to escort you from my world to His.
Waves of loneliness sweep over me;
I am capsized!
My baby boy you will always remain
although you grew to be six feet tall,
an independent, self reliant man.
There is a loneliness I know very well . . .
each birthday,
every holiday,
it stands beside my bed
waiting for my eyes to open.
It is my companion through every day,
raising its head at unexpected moments
to remind me that you are dead.
I could not bear this loneliness
if One did not walk with me
who knows it better than even I do,
God who gave His Son for the world.
Copyright, November 16, 2014
Choose a Topic Contest
Heartbreak and Loss Topic
Categories:
self reliant, death, grief, loneliness, loss,
Form:
Free verse
We live today in a world of great tumult
And of rising uncertainty and anxiety
Which pervade the world stage like a cancer
Despite soaring technological advances
Our environment and our home Earth
Are bearing an unimaginable burden
People are wondering what must be done
To right these wrongs and adjust our course
Before we turn the corner to “No Return”
Tyranny, Poverty, Disease, and War
Are still with us today since the beginning
Of time and are mankind’s greatest shame
God may be with us intellectually
But mankind must be self-reliant
To survive an inattentive, distant deity
People see answers to these enigmas
Sounds are made, echoes are heard
But nothing comes back in response
Frustration reigns supreme for many
Fear and anxiety multiple all concerns
There can never be easy answers
*******
Tyranny still reigns alive in many countries
As the actions of tin-eared dictators abound
And are on ample display for all to see
Poverty is still a shameful, terrible curse
Which afflicts the most unfortunate
And is paid lip service by the wealthy
Disease is a scourge still in our world
And still felt by those most in need
And never enough is done to change this
War is the ultimate insult to mankind
And its wide-felt swath and affliction
Plagues yet our modern, enlightened world
What to make of all these challenges
Is not easy for any of us to digest
And let alone understand why
Yet understand, comprehend we must
If we want a better world for all to live in
A Sisyphean task at its very best
Man still holds the key to make change
Positive and real for our troubled Earth
But can it ever be really so in the end
Gary Bateman, Copyright © All Rights Reserved,
Schoeningen, Germany (October 16, 2014)
(Tercet unrhymed poetic format)
Categories:
self reliant, allegory, change, earth, history,
Form:
Narrative
Trump Shields The US From Becoming A Carcass Full With Ants
Trumps draws a line in the sand
He's shaken all the trees in the land
Call him whatever, okay an ass
Yet keep in mind his motto USA first
From the civil war to now
No other's brought out the plow
Like how Trump has outlined in his model
In stomping his foot down full throttle
In Trump's twelve days in office
He's raining on the bureaucratic chorus
Telling big business to fear
Of outsourcing jobs from here
He's taken on the pharmaceutical giants
To lower their prices, and be more compliant
He set a visa moratorium on 7 Muslim countries
Prompting protester's chastises, so bluntly
He's opened dialogue for domestic oil exploration
Setting the country's future more self reliant of oil importation
He's befriended the Brits, and hired a cabinet of friends
Some of which are the richest, so one hopes it pays dividends
To this he silences his, what, ... critics?
By calling them, okay, ... idiots !
Trump's IQ some say it's one of the tops
One hope pressure doesn't make it pop
Trump also seen as grandstanding his wall
For the Mexican President to take the fall
Yet he may be right on all of this
For it's a lot of walkovers from the border
That's soaking up the jobs, social and welfare
Taking up space for the ones already here
Trump may be xenophobic and not a tulip or rose
But he can't be accused of tiptoeing in
He needed to stem the colony of ants
Instead of letting them bred and expanse
connie pachecho
2/1/17
Categories:
self reliant, perspective, political,
Form:
Rhyme
I AM THE HERON
There is a stoicism to me
silent, self reliant, pensive posturing
suddenness of intent and action.
My aggression is calculated,
measured in response to need,
activated by impending threat.
Stillness is the garb of my determination,
patience in the solitude of calm
spring loaded – a sharpened, piercing, beak.
I still retain my forebears ways,
their ancient chiseled features,
dedication to the rookery’s domain
amid the din of springs cool birthright.
I will cross swords defending nests
asway in natures treetop rocking chairs.
There is a stoicism to me
//Heron – aggressive, self determination,, self reliance//
submitted to – Picture Yourself As a Bird – Poetry Contest
sponsor – Andrea Dietrich
5/16/2015
Categories:
self reliant, bird,
Form:
Personification
On either side
Of a crowded family dinner table
There are signs of ambition and resentment
Success and failure
Marked by those who pass
The plate
And those who only take.
A lighter than air blimp
Floated
Lazy circles
High above a City
Of breadlines desperation
As New York struggled
Through the Great Depression.
Hank was tough
Self reliant and hungry
Eager to impress
He washed
And waxed
His uncle’s car
Calloused hands
Carefully caressing
The sleek curves
Of a 1938 V16 Caddy.
Catching his reflection
In the chrome grill work
He ignored
The rough lines
In his face
Focusing instead
On the money
And power behind
The car.
Wet sponge
Going up and down
The rich’s man car
Sweat pouring down his neck
Pails of water
Clanging an alarm
Under an August sun
Having never owned a car
Hank
Was dismayed
When the wax
Clouded
Up
In the summer heat.
Well dressed
Republican
Hands on hips
Uncle was upset
At what he saw
Incompetence
Was wasted time.
The sudsy water
Drained away
Any hopes of
Hank getting a job
In his uncle’s firm.
The Depression was a disaster
For some it came sooner
For Uncle it came later
Packing a surprise punch
That was catastrophic
Uncle lost everything.
The house
The fancy parties
And the ‘38 Caddy with dual spare tires mounted on each front
Gone for pennies on the dollar.
Ever resourceful
Hank got a job as a clerk
In the US Patent Office
One day
He realized
Beef and potatoes
On a modest clerk’s salary
Tasted better than Uncle’s lavish dinners
The seeds of disappointment
From that summer’s day
Occasionally came back
To remind him what was meant to be
Thinking of his red faced Uncle
In a starched shirt
On that hot August afternoon
Hank broke into a wide grin
And ordered another plate of beef stew.
Categories:
self reliant, lifeaugust,
Form:
Narrative
Guess they may be minute in your eyes
But this tiny insect can pack quite a surprise
The sheer strength of these little ants
May make you give them a second glance
Scientists have now discovered an ant can lift
One hundred times it’s body weight – what a gift!
Just because it’s tiny it doesn’t mean
The power of this insect cannot be seen
So next time you see a teeny ant remember if you can
It has so much power but it’s simply hidden from man
In actual size it may not be considered a ‘giant’
But for psychical strength it is self-reliant
Contest - Giant Animals
Sponsor – Nathan D
Poem inspired by this article
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1252481/Pictured-Incredible-gravity-defying-ant-carry-100-times-body-weight.html
08~25~15
Categories:
self reliant, insect, nature,
Form:
Couplet
We are all improbable in our own way,
and who can augur the future?
I never could have laid out my course in advance,
though in looking back it all makes sense,
even if it was me flipping a coin (or if somebody flipped it for me).
Hindsight smooths the probabilistic waves,
and here I sit, having cast the coin,
having had the coin in pocket,
having gotten change at an early age,
the cashier having had a drawerful of metal,
the mint having stamped to its heart's content,
the metallurgists having had their smiles,
the miners having ground fault wiles,
the cosmos having performed admirably, elementally.
Here I sit, tonight's chautauqua taking place in a goblet of garnet, yea - a very phrontistery of fuchsia. Far be it from me to understate the euphonious manner in which the cork leapt from the bottle, the Olympian olfactory embrace, the bathykolpian brand of this elixir. The wind outside the window - what is it telling me? Am I entangled, unawares, in my ebullience, a ptarmic influence in the decoction escaping my notice? Am I blind to the greater reality, my words falling like amaurotic husks to the ground? Or, that given ground, does it emit the mephitic essence? Is this the supernatural revenge of some aspect of the wine's terroir, rendering the drinker typhlotic to the usufruct of this very forum, to an iatrogenic principle at work? Are we held at bay by external sternutatory Influence, all our self-reliant suppositions trumped by errhine externals?
Here I sit, wondering if 'tis no more than the contest of the Ego, Superego, and Id, grinding against one another in tribologic sculpting. Or is a spiteful, chthonian influence at work, stemming from that same terroir? Can the wine be blamed? Can we cry out, apotropaically, to rescue ourselves? Are conscious forces arrayed against us, or are we our own worst enemy? Is there a soil/soul for a wine? And is it only a fancy of Fortuna that I sit here tonight, deterministic tendrils floating around me in a manner that threaten my assumptions? Am I free of myself, or is there no such thing as such freedom? In the end, do all things come to one? Obfuscatory clarity - yes, I know, and peace won't sleep in the transparent bottom of my glass.
Categories:
self reliant, addiction, drink, earth, wine,
Form:
Prose
My heart breaks as I enter the room,
And see my mother sitting in her wheelchair,
Gazing with unseeing eyes
Through a strangers window
Waiting…
For the occasional visitor
For news from her beloved grandchildren
For death…
In her silence she remembers
A loving mother, taken too soon
A small child, mistreated abused
Surviving alone
Self-reliant, self-sufficient, independent
A lifetime of habits
Too hard now to break
She longs to be loved
To be held, to be needed
To not be so alone
She has given all she can give
Accepting nothing in return
Does she know how much we appreciate
All she has done for us
How much she is loved
How deeply she will be missed …
Her world is passing
I give her a hug, a kiss
She smiles
She knows…
Categories:
self reliant, death, love, mother, thank
Form:
Blank verse
Sadness scrambles to survive
and tears become termites
Self reliant moles taint speechless lips
and form explanations yet to ripen
Tears that reject wiping
smear pride's respiratory system
leaving heart beat unpuffed
Humility is Reality
What makes sense
is not always understood...
And weeping ensues.
Categories:
self reliant, spoken word,
Form:
Free verse
To my future boyfriend I do not want a “price charming”. I do not need to be rescued from this ivory tower that I have built around myself to protect myself-worth and esteem that so many boys before you have left trampled and damaged in defeat without even a glance back. I do not want some Henry Cavill, crew cut, perfectly chiseled chest, hair slikced back, predatory white smile of a boy disguised as a man. But when I yell down to you that I am okay up here I know you’ll attempt to climb it anyway.
To my future boyfriend, I have set myself up so high that I simply cannot be touched. guarded by dragons built out of doubt and distrust. I’m sorry I’ve grown accustomed to protecting myself because my father died when I was two and my half-brother left when I was four. So I never really learned how to look a grown man in the eye or ever heard one say, “ It’s okay I got you, I’ll always be here no matter what.” Instead I learned to be independent, self-reliant listened as my mother and sister’s said, “ Its okay fathers day isn’t that important anyway.”
To my future boyfriend I won’t make you sit through a rom-com snuggling up on the couch as I dreamily wish it were us riding away into the sunset. Because I know those sunsets don’t last that those astonishing shades of blue’s, pink’s, and orange will become dull and fade over time.
To my future boyfriend there will be day’s that I won’t even recognize myself day’s I’ll sit and wonder “Who are you really?” But I hope you’ll come and search for those missing pieces with me dust them off and glue them back together so maybe I can finally see the other half of me that stare’s back at me in the mirror. That when you whisper you love my body will become ridged my heart will tighten its chains and my mouth will utter complete ******** as I tell you love is just a word that holds no meaning to what I feel for you. Because love is exactly what I feel for you and words will never be able explain how my heart thunders like a summer storm in late June just from a quick kiss goodbye as you leave.
Categories:
self reliant, angst, boyfriend, dedication, feelings,
Form:
Free verse
Pocomoto was a cowboy who inspired dreams galore
With adventures and heroics that lit up my days of yore.
He survived the cruel killing of a ravaged wagon train
Was adopted by ‘old-timers’; lived in camps across the plain.
He rode fast across the prairie pushing forward on his steed;
Bronco Buster, Buff’lo Hunter, helped the Rangers when in need.
Pocomoto the Li’l Fella went in search of desert gold
Single-handed fought the bandits, constant evil, heat and cold.
Independence, resolution were the traits that showed his best,
Self-reliant, conquered hardships in the wild and famous West.
There are plenty years behind me but I often tend to find
Pocomoto’s recollection in the corners of my mind.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
6th May 2014
Contest: Howdy Pard
Sponsor: Shadow Hamilton
Placing: 2nd
Categories:
self reliant,
Form:
Rhyme
Happy birthday baby and my first born
Created by God for me to adorn
From the top of your head down to your tiny little toes
You were cute as a button as everyone knows
Seeing you all grown up, looking at what you've become
Is the sum total of many prayers and the blessings of some
You are wise for your years, this I can tell
By the decisions you make, you learn lessons well
You are tough and you're strong, please stay that way
You'll need this type of strength as your hope and stay
You are self motivated, self reliant and a self starter, too
You complete whatever you start when you do what you do
You are straight forward, mean exactly what you say
There is o confusion ever, you are clear that way
You are loving and kiknd, always giving your best
You can be depended on, relied upon, there's no test
Respectful and obedient you've always been
Loving you is a pleasure, a sure nough win
I love you dear daughter from the depts of my heart
Letting you know how I feel is just a start
I thank God for His precious gift 31 years ago
I'll cary you with me no matter where I go
Categories:
self reliant, daughtergod, self, god, me,
Form:
Rhyme
IMPRESS ME SON
Brevity is the span of life, it is so short ;
But linear is victory without any short-cut.
The world you see now is a battle field ;
Doggedness is the only mean to the yield.
A hand that sowingly itself deceives;
Cries in vain upon what it later receives.
Be not a leaner but self reliant;
Hunt not fly nor ant but kill the giant.
Remember,the whole world is yours;
Limitation is in nowhere but in us.
Impress me son now that I may smile;
That I may be proud of you in Niger or Nile.
Behold, you are the last leg of my race;
Fail not son, in your hand is the ace.
User’s name : Kayod5.
Contest : Impress me ll !.
Sponsor : Giorgio V.
Categories:
self reliant, life,
Form:
Couplet