Best Shallower Poems


Premium Member The Listener

Start at the start
ask your questions
Although I’m no priest 
I will hear your confession
Divulge your sins
no judgement or correction
Within my skeleton closet
I have my own sin collection

Off the mirror of my silvered mind
 you might witness your reflection
Dive deep into my psyche
I’ll gladly offer protection
Our humanity is sacred 
within it find connection
Choose what power you need
embrace our connection 

Access to my mind 
is translucent screen thin
A bridge across the distance 
you can easily gaze within
I’ll instinctively grasp your hand
I’ve been where you’ve been
So let’s start where we’ve started
before the barrier of sin
Together finding treasures
hidden within

No need to worry
or regret your choice
I wholeheartedly embrace 
the sound of your voice
You offer me mystical music
free from vibrational noise
I hear and listen to you
free willingly by choice
Heart being deeply touched 
Joyful eyes become moist
Together our inner children play
as we both rejoice

Feel your heart beating slower
As your breath becomes shallower 
There is strength in release
it connects you to your power
A life can change in a moment 
or be transformed in an hour
So rise up, climb up
 to the top of the tower
At the edge of the universe
light up the night sky
You are born to be
a transcendent meteor shower.




Response to Elaine Perrin’s “Help Me Please” poem

Reaching the Deepest Ocean

My Beloved,
   Can you read me between the lines and verses,
   Can you feel my tender scarlet heart throbbing,
   with intense drumming emotions?
   Can you feel my fragile spirit,searching for you own?
   Searching in the corridors,reaching for your soul?
   as my ivory skin burns in flames of crackling fire.


My Baby,
  Can you feel the depth of wanting, and longing?
  Can you feel the aching for your touch?Can you
  feel me in your dreams,as my fingertips run down
  your spine in vertical motion,Needy for each and
  every part of who you are.Needy for that special
  man I came to care for and desire.

My Dearest,
 Can you close your deep warm eyes for just a moment,
 feel my pink soft lips brushing yours,as our toungues
 play in melodies of passion and love.
Yes,Love!Lust alone isn't enough for the broken hearted,
Everlasting Want is what we live for,two hearts lost and found,
Two Candles flickering in the darkness'Vast.

My  Love,
 Can you feel these Multitude of feelings,that I'm feeling?
 Everytime i mold your face in my imagination,sculpture
 you and all you are in my sweetest fantasy.Everytime I
 hear your voice echoing in the alleys and valleys of my mind.
 Can you feel these never ending emotions,shallower than the
 Missisippi River and Higher than the Alpi and Appenini.

My Sweet dream,
 Can you feel me in the Hiss of the night?In the gentle waft
 of waves hugging the rocks and secret caves?Can you feel me
 in the Wind'scented breeze,caressing your face?In the lullaby
 Of The Nightingale in sweetest melodies,till you fall so fast asleep,
 and dream,as a red robin dreams.

My Love,
 If you feel what I feel,and dream what i dream,Hold me in your 
 Misty dreams,and if you wake up to find me gone,Remember!
 Just remember,I love you,You live in my first awakening thought,
 and in my deepest lasting dream.

My Declaration of War On Self-Imposed Stupidity...Who's Coming With Me?!

All this hyped up glam and glitz
  giggly girls break down in fits
    these mascara clad boys devoid of wits
The shallower they go,  the deeper it gets
 
Sillouettes lacking inner angles and lines...
 The substance goes absent when the light shines...
Plotless drama without direction, still winds
 These tragically bad fads spread like vines

Overrun with Reality shows depicting what's REAL
  A mass zombie audience digesting their meal
Not In, but outside, this box they soften like veal
  Staring at a screen that numbs how they feel

When did the war on intelligence start?
  Losers not knowing that losing's not smart...
Cable providers gladly doing their part
  News channels selling half-truth ala carte

I will be a rebel and fight for your mind
 Hiding remote-controls where they won't find
Trading entertainment for knowledge in kind
  Giving books out to the voluntarily blind

 
It's gonna be a BATTLE!!!  WHO'S COMING WITH ME??!!


Premium Member Perhaps Not the Mountain

Perhaps not the Mountain -

Perhaps even not the lone hermit, atop said mountain...
sitting as still as tea leaves, left in their jar.

Perhaps not the Mountain.
So unneedful of needs.
Of deeds.

Now moving as imperceptibly, as slowly, as wakefully
as the ‘still’ tea leaves, damp on the saucer;
unfolding like mornings in morning’s new light.

Perhaps not the Mountain.
So unmindful of mind.
Of mankind.


Perhaps not the birds, resting in nooks in rookeries
by snow lines and greenlines. 
Perhaps not the lizard or sheep,
one sharp-edged like the low-edges of shiftrock,
the other white-topped like lost-edge of the hightop.

Perhaps not the leopard, rare as the swear
from the hermit; still stretching...
out her morning.

Perhaps none know the mountain
is a slow wave
of Earth.

A Slow Wave

come crashing 
    so slowly into
shallower Earth.

A great primeval upheaval.

Time Stamps In the Sand - Collab With Darren White

Aimless foot prints mark a wind torn shore 
deserted rifts splitting a secluded scene, 
(where romance rocked a heart between 
painted paradise and realness once adored) 
our heads inevitable drift even deeper inside 

And as blood red curtains paint a choppy sea 
where last sun rays die a temporary death, 
(so wondrous how they hold their breath 
to pat one later on the back with glee) 
even shallower time stamps left by our feet

Everything erased a minute after we passed by
incessant and unrelenting a water without feel,
(your hand in mine, I bend over and steal
evening breeze kisses, almost shy)
and find myself in you a place to hide

An uncertain future held without hope
washed away shores with unfulfilled dreams,
(but because nothing is as bad as it seems
with you by my side, I can certainly cope)
together our spirits and lives are complete


                    Darren White
                    Tim Smith
© Tim Smith  Create an image from this poem.

The Power of a Panic Attack

The powerful palpitations pounding in my chest,
Will my heart with stand this test,
Another attack has just begun,
Abracadabra out it sprung. 

Piercing pain constricting my chest,
My ribs collapsing, the attack conquering its quest,
Each breath harder, sharper, shallower than the next,
My fingers hastily clawing at my chests raw flesh. 

Panic awakens my pale plain face,
Every gasp leaves a lingering lifeless taste,
Time is of the essence, prayers wont save me now,
The devils claws run deep and are dragging me down.

Awaiting me, a fiery hell of tortured terror,
My lungs burn is my soul to be condemned forever, 
Just one deep breath to save my soul hear me saviour,
I beg of you I am not ready to meet my maker. 

Finally the attack releases my air way, 
The fatal fear and fantasies begin to fade away,
I have survived another panic attack today.
© Sarah Cope  Create an image from this poem.


The Downward Spiral (With a Nod To Nin)

She sees herself suddenly as a small girl
bare feet on the cold black and white tile
little toes curled
sees the white porcelain tub and
how pretty the light blue water was
so deep it almost came to her chin
as she climbed in

For hours she'd play with her dime store sailboat
loving it though it would hardly float
always taking on water
listing, never level
her wet skinny back hunched over
shoulder blades like primordial wings
every few minutes she'd have to shake the thing

Trying desperately not to break the spell
of pretend
and when
it was time to let the water out
she'd always stay to watch the water drain
weighing the emotional pain
both fascinated and horrified,
as the suction intensified,
by the force of the water
the unstoppable slaughter
waiting for the inevitable rotation
to begin
the dizzying spin

Slowly at first growing faster and faster
a miniature cyclonic water disaster

The dime store boat of course on its side
circling faster in the relentless tide

Then the drain would give a horrible belch
much satisfied with itself.

As she grew the tub got smaller
with shallower water
less and less room
for pretend to bloom.

Years later, dime store sailboat long forgotten,
life having been mostly rotten
working with the most cynical of cynics
ER nurses bitter that it's more like a clinic
runny noses and coughs that folks thought were urgent
working hard to save those who were truly emergent

Hearing from them the phrase: "circling the drain"
memories suddenly flooding the brain
almost able to feel herself as that young girl
watching the sailboat beginning to swirl

Feeling the blood drain, face going pale
she sees vividly the boat with its bright red sail
yellow hull and blue plastic deck
fine hairs rising on the back of her neck

She realizes now the fatigue of age
is from fighting the pull with defiant rage

The closer you get, the faster you spin
and soon the dark whirlpool draws you in

With a knowledge that seems to be purely primal
she now understands the downward spiral

And she knows that she will not put up a fight
she'd rather go silently in the dark of the night

And the dime store boat comes to rest on its side
so it's all come full circle at the end of the ride.

SADNESS
©Danielle White

Parasite Alley

The moon sunk her teeth in a sky of black,
Over city backdrops and the scent of crack,
Neon spilled burning through traffic veins,
Dead man's handles on subway trains.
I tasted of acid in the end of night,
Snow descended dirty, off-white, 
Staring through curtains at six a.m.,
Into the kitchen and back again.

All currency spent in the cheapest of bars,
The ones beside wreckage of burned-out cars,
Drinking from morning 'till midnight chime,
With stoned stool-pigeons and lives of crime.
I hurt nobody, only hurt myself,
Sat in the shadows, toasting my health,
As sleep comes calling I start to fall,
A dreamer washed-up with no dreams at all.

Don't tell any secrets, don't tell any lies,
There's enough depiction in these blood-red eyes,
Don't require religion or my soul to save,
Or a shallow legend on a shallower grave.
I could preach you sermons to warp your mind,
I could show you things to strike you blind,
But the world won't listen, it remains the same,
Always leaves me stranded with a crying shame.
© Tony Bush  Create an image from this poem.

Premium Member Denial

Johnathan, Innsley, Marie, and Paul ---
Tom, Trish, Bea, and Jack:  all of them.
Black, white, asian; Jew, gentile, zen...
Sex, art, love, mores revolved,
entering ever-shallower circles of discovery.
Clear ice cubes clanked on glass;
religion, sex, quality imported Scotch
and Cuba made the rounds.
Conversation calmed, each with his own idea:
the ultimate word.
Fake furs, donned, drifted into oblivion.
Feeling alone, J. C. cleaned up.
From the dulled Johnson's Wax luster
on a genuine Duncan Phyfe table,
his distorted rumpled reflection
stared up at itself.
J. C. looked away, noticed four new white rings,
picked up a soiled Canon towel,
and wiped away three beads of water,
a few ashes, and himself.

Cherry-Pits and Foggy Air

anxiety, care, corruption, creation, destiny, environment, rainforest,

CHERRY-PITS AND FOGGY AIR©

Miseries mount on high
If only I had that again
Too little too late too much
Life’s no bowl of cherries
And the rain fell hard today!

Skies sheathed in dust and smog 
Pollutes the once green terrain below
 The ‘fresh’ air demotes to shallower breaths
Intakes ‘tanked’ to partings of out rage

The taste of ‘bottled’ flavoured water rises
The ‘breaths’ of air when bottled will increase
And next it will be one costly ‘purification’ deed
For those left and known to mankind.

Losing Grip

Future held such initial promise
But shallow dreams disintegrated
Coalescing into shallower reality

Despite my youth, pain cripples me to geriatric apathy
General interest long gone, death has become the single concern
A welcome embrace, a welcome friend
Tardiness is expected, as well as encouraged

Release me from these eternally shrinking walls
Allow the peons to continue their superficial pursuits
Never meshing well into the fold, I yearn simply for permanent isolation
There is not enough joy to justify the agony that life forever guarantees me

Nihilism and anger, desires for maniacal retribution, the only feelings I've ever known
Clouded over now by perpetual physical torment, my formerly hollow shell continues to exist without capacity for optimism
Yet without hate, there seems nothing left
Shall I forever be adrift?
© Joe Hess  Create an image from this poem.

Depression

It’s normal to feel a dark cloud’s shadow
Rise above us every once and a while; 
And to feel as though the sun has faded
Behind a mountain we can’t seem to climb. 
To choke in the icy, blue waters of 
Sadness; struggling for gasps; struggling to grasp
A hold; to relieve of that depression. 
And somedays we wish we would just drown; 
But breathe, still, no matter to the struggle.
So we harm ourselves to satisfy needs; 
To feel a control over our own lives
And unoppressed by the world around us. 
To remind us that we can hurt ourselves;
More grievously than the world can hurt us;
More courageously than our friends hurt us; 
But with scars shallower than on our hearts.
Depression emanates real bravery; 
Where in rain an eagle soars above clouds; 
A sad survivor does so without wings. 



This is a poem I've written to remind me when I'm at my lowest 
that it's okay to be down and out; that I'm not a coward for not 
feeling "normal". I was bullied a lot throughout my school years- through all of 
them in fact- and with depression sometimes you're on top of the world and 
sometimes you just want to dig your own grave.

The Fog

I can no longer see past the trees
They stand solemn in line. 
Their dark outline 
Weeping from the sky.
All I can hear 
Is the faint heartbeat 
Coming from my chest. 
It’s getting faster 
As my breaths 
Become shallower. 
It would appear 
That I am choking 
On the fog.
My lungs can no longer take 
This dense air 
That’s creeping in my mouth 
And filling me. 
I start to run 
Into the forest  
How far can I go in?
Before I’m halfway out 
The fog chases
Until it has consumed
Me.

Premium Member Blackbrush

Blackbrush -- Coleogyne ramosissima
the dominant understory shrub
in the pinyon-juniper canyons.

Mountain-mahogany -- Cercocarpus montanus and ledifolia.
Single-leaf ash -- Fraxinus anomalus
and possibly a western hophornbeam

by the small birch-like leaves
and the shredding bark
in a moist stretch of joint trail.

The joint-fir, green ephedra
looks like an ocean plant.
Could the wind or white water rivers alone

have shaped these sandstone, red rock forms?
Network of canyons, inverse of mountains.
It had to be ocean

ebbing and flowing, emotionally, like wind,
moving atmosphere, thicker
shaving, scraping, polishing, gouging, digging

fish canyons
then, shallower, dinosaur swamps
now, dry, rock gardens.

Explain the human history with water:
did the Anasazi visit neighbors
along the canyon rims and deep within,

combination caves and red-rock houses
small windows, doorways, just crawlways,
with corn gifts on summer evenings

when the canyon bottoms held permanent, not intermittent,
streams? After them
came the Ute and Navajo, Spanish and English.

Ravens dine on road kill.
A few long red roads connect some canyons.
The unprotected flats are overgrazed, rabbitbrush.

It is interesting
that as I learn the woody and herbaceous plants,
walk the desert foothills, I too could stay.

Premium Member Peaks and Valleys

Everyone enjoys cruising easy street 
Hits keep playing around the clock
Everything flawlessly falling into place
Puzzle pieces effortlessly interlock

Humming along until hit a speed bump
Your momentum derailed by a detour 
Diverting your good vibes off track 
Unsure if you will be able to endure

Then reminded of our ability to bounce back
That has craftfully carried us this far 
Have tackled tough times like this before
Know that we'll be able to raise the bar 

So now when we find ourselves in a rut
Realize that it is shallower than before
Because the bottom begins to get filled in
Restored with resiliency from our core

Get a Premium Membership
Turn off ads, get more exposure for your poetry, and get more features with a Premium Membership.
Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace