Best Spar Poems
Cauliflower clouds drift past broccoli trees,
where bright carrot paths lead to vegetable seas.
Tall corn sentries stand straight in a row,
while wild little radishes have no where to go.
Straight stalks of celery spar with asparagus heads,
with an audience of onions and green lettuce beds.
Big juicy tomatoes go look for a thrill,
they stomp on the squash but fall flat on some dill.
Fresh cut potatoes walk boldly around,
quiet cucumbers make barely a sound.
All of them gather; sliced, cut, skinned and pearled,
as I survey my great edible world.
Inhaling, hushed, from hashed cigars
my mind implodes in Malimar
where Naiads bathe in caviar -
I dream of dwarves and three-eyed tsars.
The captive kiss of Princess Mars
(who talks in tongues at seminars)
burns red beyond Her blue boudoir -
I writhe within Her pale peignoir.
Her Maids gloss lips with cinnabar,
bedizen cheeks in dusts that mar,
serve teas beside the reservoir -
I sip them from a samovar.
Disguised in smoke and lamps of spar
Her Genies gender gold dinars,
evoking flames in ginger jars -
I plea before the Commissar.
At Princess’ neighbourhood bazaar,
white shadows slip through doors ajar
to drape my dreams in ash and char -
I long await the Avatar.
Her Merchants (preening, proud Hussars)
paint pretty scenes on VCR’s
while sailing ships to Zanzibar -
I strum the strings of warped sitars.
Her Prophets sometimes cruise in cars
else while at each and every bar
to speak of space and time bizarre -
I pass my pride for small pourboires.
Her Necromancers trace in tar
tall tales of wisdom flung afar,
transported by the Registrars -
I hitchhike on their handlebars.
Her seers conjure repertoires
where She and I are on a par
in infinite surreal memoirs -
I sometimes sense the void is ours.
My Princess never sees the scars
cut by Her whispered “au revoirs” -
I often wake to ask ‘who are
these Gods that sail the distant stars?’
Once significant and alluring, your luster faded.
Perhaps it was the treachery in hollow eyes jaded.
Was there ever a light
in a soul dark as night?
Promises of love only heralded grief;
faith I once had turned to disbelief.
She was younger, pretty, but above all newer.
Agony in my heart came from betrayal’s skewer.
How could I blame her when I knew that soon
your allegiance would change like the inconstant moon?
She would then feel the fickle pitchfork of pain -
those knots in her stomach twisted by emotions feigned.
Only now can I see you for what you are.
Anger settled; no longer do we spar.
Bitterness made way for resignation again.
Maybe I shall once more learn to trust men.
Then I can guide your latest castaway
and ease the surging sting of her dismay.
Your fate rests on a tremulous shore
where, as looks fade, you can offer nothing more.
*Written November 21, 2014
Behind the parchment screen and eye to eye Punch chided.
Who are you? Who is she? He’d point it out. You’d see.
No marionette with strings was he. Their paths collided;
Judy stands and faces his animosity
The play is writ by man and maid and staged to teach,
the right and wrong of woman’s position, our place.
Standing on two legs, she meets his gaze without speech.
What shenanigan have brought on this crutched lambaste?
Let us ponder Mr. Punchinell’s stance, his missing leg
let his two-eyed profile tease, has Judy been upstaged?
Stumped by the shadow lore, the punch, the audience begs
for the stiff-necked tirade to end her pick engaged.
Speared by humour, we see two realities spar on
with no means to run, the missing third prong’s a pun.
First Published by The Ekphrastic Review
Who can know the mysterious
ways of the clouds?
They travel in white whipped masses
and gather like solemn pinnacles
looking upwards in reverent penitence.
Silent clouds slowly form and move about
like floating fields in a heavenly marsh
or like soft suspended pillows
making themselves vulnerable
to the temperamental ways of the wind.
Sometimes they seem almost helpless
as they wander in a ghost like state
like wastrels, weighed down
by the prospect of an impending storm.
The yawning blue sky
has become quickly overwhelmed
by clouds’ alluring apertures.
Now they collectively amass
in billowing silence
crowding the vast
sweeping hemisphere.
Slanting sunlight breaks forth
to spar with clouds’ menacing shadows
that threaten to overtake the light
like competing shadow puppets
during a midday matinee.
Clouds are endlessly breathtaking
and appear seemingly mute
except for faint whispers from the winds
as if time stopped to hold its breath
within the boundaries of earth and sky.
4/18/2023
I turn to my girl highlighting Mayday is near
A day of spectacle that the whole village views
There's Jesters of folly and Knights without fear
Witnessing lances and jokes, always going askew
To view such we can venture along different ways
We can stroll by the river listening to many sounds
In awe as we walk amidst most wondrous displays
That on any given day beautiful vistas abound
Decisions, decisions, as we contemplate which way
It's such a special day wondering what to wear
Beauty personified will my Olive be on this day
Knights or Royal Princes, all they can do is stare
So tomorrow we've decided to be our chosen route
Two hearts in decision, declaring what's their suit
Mayday morn now greets as I turn next to me
She my guiding light as beautiful as the dawn
Excitement illuminates for into her eyes I see
Onto my back I lie, that feel she's now upon
Into this day we go heading along the river
Crystal clear translucent such serenity in it's flow
Under greened canopies cooled shaded deliver
Wafting leaved dress in delightful fanned throw
We sense the clearings near for scents we sense
Sporadic clusters in capture of welcoming eyes
Mayday games have started, distant heard suspense
Knights on horseback mounted, now in espy
Now we're in amidst encapsulated we now are
She's here to cheer, her Sir James, soon to spar
Balcony she now awaits, white steed he's now astride
Blinkered pairings gallop towards intended foe
To win this Mayday he, to fight for her his bride
Eliminate his enemy, witness his crimson flow
His lance in now connect, thrown metal disperses
Petals of beauty hurled of rainbows selected
Images of we, now thinking marital rehearses
To know on this day, her intended she's elected
Moments of their previous now in recent past
Knowing they're now free in kaleidoscopic stream
Spectrum of feelings now in view full cast
In colourful extremes, fight for your dreams
.
My brave son of seven is leaving!
to spar with military jaws.
And I repeat, Lycurgis taught me these three laws:
to keep the wolves away: if I say three words today,
may they be concise and may they be brief-
"Equality, austerity, and military pay."
And stole my son at seven, a Thief.
Equality lives in every mothers' grief;
-' my son the soldier is fit and neat.'
Austere and upright, conditioned to bow and beat.
Yet, I remember seven years ago
his curls when I bore him to breast,
and fed him into a peaceful rest.
In the dark haze before sunrise, I awake to work.
Weave my sandals tight and high on my calves;
My tunic, short and stark, unadorned and Spartan.
I draw water from the well and bake the bread in halves.
One for me and one for him, to reconcile my every sin.
D.Goodman
Laconic contest
I met that star, with my name on; I met
That twinkling star, a beacon, lovely one;
I met her in a hamlet—less spoiled—yet
We met when homeward sun his cart did run.
She often tip-toed with her mother star,
To the field to cut grains or feed her cow,
While blinking slyly, like an angled spar
At her love, as she’s doing here, just now.
She was the peahen, and I...the peacock.
Drowned in our astral love, we did dance;
Just forgetting how other stars did flock,
We danced, diving in our hypnotic trance.
I gaze in my dreams at blue star-lit sky
And then see two lovely stars gleaming high.
Revised
* A 3rd Place* in the following contest (judged on Dec. 31, 2020)
Dec. 29, 2020
Podium placing promise (2) Poetry Contest
Contest sponsor: Brian Strand
* A 2nd Place* in the following contest (judged on Nov. 12, 2020)
Nov. 10, 2020
There is a star with my name on it Poetry Contest
Contest Sponsor: Silent One
The pieces of peace were handpicked
Picked in the heart of the night
Shredded for an aspiration
To clutch the lone torch contained by the dark
A glimpse for some unusual rank
Then comes the arrival of time
With the angst that grow by day
Comes the fast ticking of time
Hastening all; unnerved in the bay
At this moment
Love was censure by lust
In the euphoria of the game
Featured by despair and shame
The eventful spar between the dogs and the baboons
And then comes the contest of blood
The Spartans, the spectators all flood
Melancholy yet to befall
Then it begins
Passing through the span of day
Scotching rage of the sun
Little rain, little dry, little sounds of gun
But the dogs and the baboons
Tailback in fear; scowl
And little by little
Comes casting and counting
And after a little while
Anger was unshackled
Accompanied by lament
Yet, not enough raison d'être to toss away the tot and the bathing water
Then comes the voice of command
We were deprived!
It is our time!
Kill them anywhere you find them!
Rigging, rigging, rigging!
Peace was shattered
Broken into pieces
Like a bowl that fail out of safe
And pandemonium overtook all
After a little calm
Scores of guiltless essences met their Waterloo
Mostly in the cities they ad-hoc
Like those trapped for a catch
And their figures continue counting
Some unassumingly lost to the swampy woods
Searched by trained dogs and their masters
Into the depth of the swampy woods
Bled; death; covered in mud.
to be so far apart
in so many different ways
brings a hunger to my heart
a sorrow to my soul.
'twas fate dictated our destinies
that we were to be starcrossed
in love.
bittersweet is our portion,
though we did fleetingly taste
of intimacy's pleasures.
that is the one memory we can cling to
like the shipwrecked Odysseus
clutching at a spar.
you have lived locked
in a loveless union too long.
we were drawn together too late
by a force momentarily
too strong to resist.
thus did nature play
its cruel,insensitive trick.
Oh how it must have been to watch the ship
as bright flames licked the sky in Pitcairn bay,
before the Bounty's mighty hull would slip
with dear home England half a world away.
Along with dreams and hopes, regrets were drowned
- a cheer, a tear, for bittersweet release,
yet paradise is not so simply found
nor climates where the sins of conscience cease.
Two centuries had passed and dreams of yore
were carefully detailed in spar and mast;
Her Majesty's lost pride would sail once more
- the Bounty's tropic grave was not her last.
Its perfect likeness slipped and down the stairs,
the model broke apart beyond repair.
written - 1/27/19 for Movie Magic Contest
for Sponsor Gregory Barden
Subject Mutiny on the Bounty - Fletcher Christian and crew
“You are not earth, water, fire or air
Nor are you empty space
Liberation is to know yourself
as Awareness alone
the Witness of these”
As the kundalini ascends
From root to sacral to plexus to heart
Either straight up or through bends
Even as breath flows in and does depart
There are stirrings within from a source enigmatic
We see no difference between form & formlessness
And whilst within form we are enlivened & ecstatic
We feel within our heart the Absolute awareness
We know too at this stage of energy centres above
Which may endow us with enhanced enableability
Yet having awakened at the heart we know only love
Our awareness as love is our being in certainty
Knowing love alone our awareness thus free flowing
Observing & witnessing happenings upon earth
We are as we are in sync with love so blossoming
With blissful joy and an equal eye in bubbling mirth
Epilogue:
What’s love got to do with witnessing & liberation one may ask
Well says the witness when we truly know ourself and so align
The knowing is in the warmth of divine love within which we bask
Both receiving & transmitting exalted pulsations of the Divine
(19-August-2019)
~~~~~~~~~~~
Verse revisited on 22-October-2021
Here we are
We no longer spar
With matters of loss or gain
Equal, as of now, be it sun or rain
True it is, kundalini has risen
Yet did we truly wisen
Sushumna ignited
Heart delighted
Seat of our soul
That makes us whole
Beckons us from the heart
Where bliss ignition renewal starts
We sail through earthy illusions
Tranquil , free from confusion
Revelations intermittent
Yet heart is content
Both light and sound
Within and around resound
Reverberating like soundless thunder
As we imbibe bliss elixir in rapturous wonder
Teleported in a continuum of bliss delight
Renewing within through day and night
What to say, touched by God’s hand
Open secret we alone understand
Wise Men Had Been Following
Wise Men had been following a bright star;
Distance they had been traveling was far
And in the night,
Should turn right;
With their camels they did start to spar.
Jim Horn
God shrouded the universe in darkness.
Is there a human or divine side to blackness?
The young dictum's star shines brightly here.
I dream when I look at the stars with calmness.
Despite my utmost level of grief and fear,
In the glittering stardust of a blueish-light, clear.
Were we attracted to the bait or a star?
When I stroll to the beach dark sphere.
To clear the fog from my mental scar.
I savor observing the lighthouse's bizarre
Sky penetration and rivalry of a laser beam.
I reckon I view a gleaming star over a spar.
I designate this as my single-star dream.
I promise myself to you; my one-star to seem.
Boldly shown to gleam brightly in my soul
I hear each pulse of my heart as it streams.
Fathom a single star in the universe to the extol.
I agnize you are my only hope and condole.
One star I could view twinkling with delight.
I shed a tear on a magical night for that dole.
On my birth, you swept from skies with insight.
I'd crave for you to kiss me on my lone, starlit night.
Fear weaves into shapes, the elixir of love.
It focused our psyche life on earth on this site.
You are the light of hope, oh anchorite! Move.
A birth means God can heal us from above.
Guard each itinerary and decompose the ego.
Someone who gave the soul evidence of love.
Written: November 06, 2022
The Only Star For Me Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Mystic Rose Rose
We all are one, simply know this
Let’s see ourselves for who we are
In God’s image, love, light and bliss
No need then to struggle and spar
Voids within fill, if we be still
Let’s see ourselves for who we are
On choosing to relinquish will
Bliss magnetism pervades our form
Voids within fill, if we be still
Suffused with divine currents warm
With Holy Spirit, we connect
Bliss magnetism pervades our form
We’re both the object and subject
The truth is, we’re He, who we seek
With Holy Spirit, we connect
Simple is wisdom, yet quite deep
We all are one, simply know this
The truth is, we’re He, who we seek
In God’s image, love, light and bliss
06-June-2023