Best Stenciled Poems
Man so mighty and wise
still has to define this
that another living being's life
has the same value as his
Boasted, brazened
written in stone
raised above
these highest places
where power reigns
crushing down
in white
clenched fists
gripping so tightly
to "history"
squeezing
draining the meaning
out of good intention
Those stones are weeping
as grass grows quietly around the edges
The future
chipping
crumbling
forgotten
Differences
are best listed
to be used like lines in the sand
some seen on the skin
most are though beneath
tracing
tearing
a cross marking
the surface
this land of the free
that the privileged paid for
from sea to sea
with the lives of lesser men
and their women
up for "grabs"
The women
best when big breasted
beautiful and begging
feeding their daughters
dreams of a better tomorrow
when that white clenched fist
stops squeezing her ****
before slapping
lips against her
drooling over her
in her ear
whispering
something sweet
like
"Honey
you're mine"
What lines of defense
Those lines lie on paper
written, signed and etched by those
elected and chosen
statesmen stating authority over your body
their dolls
their toys
smiling
serving their purpose
the good Word stenciled in stone
Equality
carved out in flesh
fresh cadavers
swept under the rug
serving their purpose
Gravestones weeping
as grass grows quiety around the edges
The memory
chipping
crumbling
forgotten
Keeping their hands clean
they wipe their mouths red
blood on their stained sleeves
the polish from their shiny shoes sully
the stars
and stripes
stripped of the value they once held
when they stiched us all together
and brought so many strangers home
How white clenched fists
hold power and privelege
held so high in esteem
like our stars
and stripes
teetering, unraveling
the threads shaking
as if stripped naked
and forced to wave
above that Capitol Hill
pivotal
and still
unchanging
unmoved
Our Lady
liberty
holds a tattered gown
Categories:
stenciled, history, humanity, poems, poetry,
Form:
Free verse
Winter whitewashes Autumn's decay,
and yet, you know that Spring will soon show.
But, as snowflakes bury Fall's array,
depression deepens with each fresh snow.
Snow-laden trees, like sculptures of clay;
stand exposed, chiseled by a sharp breeze.
And stenciled in statuary grey;
like outstretched fingers, bare branches freeze.
A brisk breeze wrestles your breath away,
in the grip of an unyielding cold.
And muting the sound of children's play;
melancholy thoughts start to take hold.
A stormy day causes nerves to fray,
for doldrums brood within shadows cast.
And folks speculate on Spring's delay,
damping hopes that this weather won't last.
Purple and scarlet ink the sun's rays,
and yet, sunset chills you to the bone.
For as twilight dims on dreary days,
you feel depressed, shut in, and alone.
Categories:
stenciled, depression, february, how i
Form:
Quatrain
Porcelain doll hangs on shadows and wings
Of twilight’s frame. Guarding an autumn child,
The toy lightens ink of stenciled dusk
As her enamel fingers gleam like candles...
Yellow the stars where she comes from
robed in fine lace . Through heaven’s print
An angel in disguise bestows love, as
Porcelain doll hangs on shadows and wings
Contest 236 Max 16 Lines
Categories:
stenciled, child, devotion, image,
Form:
Verse
The one room school house always was too full.
The windows oversized and chill on winter days.
You sat behind me, I thought you were real cool,
one day you passed a note to me to say...
I Love YOU, you wrote in colored pencil.
I kissed the yellow paper on that line,
then took out a red pen and I stenciled
a perfect heart, PLEASE Be My Valentine.
He blushed from ear to ear and, he scribbled more
a crumpled paper said, "Please meet me in the park...
on the bench, by the fence,".. too cute to ignore.
The bell rang, out we went into the dark to spark.
That day so long ago, now we're old and gray
I often think of that kiss, as near me, my man lays.
Categories:
stenciled, childhood, education, love, day,
Form:
Sonnet
No need for wishing
We waltzed on the moon
while the universe slumbered
Strolled through a maze at
the edge of midnight
Stenciled a heart on
the clouds found at sunset
Painted a garden
in jasmine delight
Watched as the day dawned
a silken mosaic
Laid in the grass
neath a heaven sent view
Bid a farewell to
our guardian angel
No need for wishing,
our dreams had come true
2/6/17
Written for the Chimera World Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Nayda Ivette Negron
Categories:
stenciled, dream, love,
Form:
Rhyme
My drowsy eyes turn to wander
Where window gazing, finds a crescent moon
Rifting the darkness, and against it's light
A magnolia branch is stenciled, black and keen
Three stars are tangled in the topmost bough...
And because deep loveliness is there,
I turn to you...
You lay in half light
As the fringe of dawn approaches
Breeze stirs the sheer lace curtains
Our room is infused with crimson hues
I’m wishing you might soon awaken
But you are sleeping soundly
With such contentment
It seems all the worry lines
Have disappeared from your face
Your legs are tangled
In the softness of the sheets
Your familiar hand now lies
Gently on my waist
The profile on the pillow
Is that boy from long ago
I love watching you
Your lashes are fluttering
What are you dreaming, my love?
How could one explain
That a love like this exists
Before coffee, on a Thursday morning in a shadowed room?
......................................
PD's Contest: Any Valentine Will Do
By Carrie Richards 9/26/11
Categories:
stenciled, devotion, love, love,
Form:
Free verse
Drenched of hell’s insanities
Sending chills this tortured spine,
as aches precede the worded fiction
Sorted truth does rest sublime
beneath the light of benediction
Broken dreams of compass flair,
directions cast a blinded waning
Trusted roots abridge the square
of all that’s lost and is remaining
Washed along this fertile beach
of sanded hope and history
Tasting o’ thy patterned speech
as common phrases come to me
Desolate my cornered mind
of images I pray be true
Dangling the lost to find
retaliation in my view
Pray, oh be, as life does rattle
chains of only mist to turn
Laughter like some long fought battle,
in amongst we tend to learn
When the calling comes so random,
names are lost on open seas
One by one in columned tandem,
drenched of hell’s insanities
Take me of thy deepest suture,
so that I may feel the end
Black as night o’ bleakest future,
paint your shadows once again
Razored claw and broken arrows,
filled with such, the violence
Playing through the endless narrows,
falling to my own expense
This, a life that's not worth living,
not this day, not anymore
Breaths so tethered in their giving,
pull the drapes and close the door
Take a seat your exits' waiting,
frozen hinges squeak in time
Find the map for navigating,
somehow through this wicked rhyme
Follow me, I know the heading,
down this staircase, up the hall
End those futile tears you're shedding,
she's not waiting for your call
Through this doorway stenciled broken,
toss your heart there on the floor
It is but a useless token,
you'll not need it anymore
You’re now privy to the meaning,
whether you do understand
Motioned light, this night is leaning,
let it take you by the hand
Now of time and missing portal,
through the lens of sights unknown
Nothing whispers you’re immortal,
for this day you have been shown
It’s Halloween my souper friends.
Posting a few dark ones today. : )
Categories:
stenciled, dark, horror, scary,
Form:
Rhyme
He was always at the same spot, least everyday I passed
In the snow, rain, cold or really hot his shadow was cast
He never really said much or took people out of their way
But many people he did touch his sign just saying to pray
Some people would stop and talk, some a smile on their face
Others would just continue to walk uneasy in just such a place
Some would toss a wave or a smile and that became everyday
And yet all the while it was the man with the sign just saying to pray
And as the subways roared in and the next wave would pass by
We have all fallen in our own sin as so being one reason why
And there read other reasons too all stenciled neatly on his sign
But today there was something new right there on the very last line
Perhaps you never gave Him a thought each day in passing him by
Up until now you never sought and didn't think that you'd ever try
But it was that last line wasn't it that finally did draw you near
The fact that the old man never quit, to you that finally did adhere
Categories:
stenciled, beauty, courage, faith, fishing,
Form:
Rhyme
~ ~ ~** ~ ~ ~ ** ~ ~ ~
a torn sun once wholly wise, the kind that sparkled whistling eyes
now a broken porcelain ,echoing screams from windows’ stain
booming through shattered rooms, waters of black -skinned moons
swish-swash slammed again, those gulps that cannot quite explain
why serenity obi-sashed in stenciled rite, as current raged into that night
of damp coal rimmed with mold, of hours drowning seismic cold
until each mouth a frozen ice, a scarred evening’s genocide
faltering without one chance, like rakes in dark shadow’s prance .
oh, rage that flung in past times, they murmured lantern chimes
in every road and churn, more fires ate the swelling burn
bones splintered from space; some offered vows, some said grace
now, thousands seek felicity, to slowly walk in dignified tenacity
hands pluck the soil, the rice fields; etching fresh name with gentle shields
as if to trace what’s left behind, on crepe stars a new hope they will find
the promise of a waking sun, to toil and build till weary nights are gone
and once more claim the gold of sky, until hearts’ wounds are mended dry.
*each line is a rhyme in itself
all rights reserved
©
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SPONSOR: Debbie Guzzi
CONTEST: Tribute to Japan
Categories:
stenciled, hope, natural disasters, people
Form:
Rhyme
Being a dreamer is never boring,
Its like a boat without its mooring,
You can pretend to be a fish,
Swim a bit, laugh, act so childish,
Or you can fly to the nearest tower,
Dig a hole and plant a flower.
When the moon is howling full,
Pensive ideas make their pull,
Grinding, grueling, gritty grains
Stenciled stuttering standing stains.
Eyes transfixed by things oblique,
Ennui is only of and for the weak.
In rapid jests of poemy words,
Vowels flutter like milky birds,
A leap of faith in corrupted phrases,
The rhythm amiss like crooked faces.
You take an apple but taste a pear,
You brush your teeth but get white hair,
It’s never boring like I said,
A pickled world can’t raise its dead.
(Which methinks is kind of like saying:
Signs and symptoms are always dismaying)
Play is a losers infinite no-end game,
You draw some circles straight and same,
Make from the hip and cross a heart,
Go figure out how, just promise to start.
Categories:
stenciled, childhood, humor,
Form:
Quatrain
The yellow pages wither away in this red undertone
Our world once reconnected behind wood and glass
When two hearts were disconnected by the world so vast
To the love posted in units of time…get me a coin fast!
At the corner of Cosmos and Maxwell two minds meet
The hour midnight to your noon, ‘see you soon’…we greet
Hello…and we both smile, in spite of the thousand miles
Between us is an unbreakable cord…glad to have dialed
Driving past there…it’s now a newspaper stand
The line long cut, but you’re still holding onto my hand
Something other than my aching heart making headlines
Your travels have brought you back home to the phone
The change kept us in touch, nothing much has changed, but
It’s a lot cheaper, easier to say I love before the funds run out
I had our names stenciled above the receiver to remember us both
You’re first in my phonebook…as you were to the telephone booth
Categories:
stenciled, i miss you,
Form:
Lyric
The breeze stenciled in gray as night dims low
Engraving war's moments, blood of sorrow.
Rhyme Battle: Round 6 , Juli-Michelle
Categories:
stenciled, introspection, war,
Form:
Couplet
Mother Nature picked her paintbrush up
and stenciled in some hues
soft yellows, purples, reds and pinks
and pastel powder blues.
She rose from a snowy slumber
it was now time to ignite
her color wheel to replace
a world still dressed in white.
Ushering in a tranquil breeze
commanding the sun to smile
casting out remains of winter chill
so in a little while
wild flowers would dot green rolling hills,
songbirds would return to sing
the prelude to sister, Summer,
is the magical season of spring.
liz10240
Categories:
stenciled, nature,
Form:
Quatrain
Valentine’s Day:
The annual sabbath of pacifists,
exhibitionists, and abiders,
conflated into a single wilting of wills,
destined to the jaws of a shredder,
or landfill,
blocking the visibility and scent
of sustenance for buzzards
and other parasitic organisms,
designed to sustain
the ecological balance of decay,
when if forgotten,
will leave one
in a similar state of graces
with the non-recipient
of manufactured gestures.
So don’t forget the impassioned poetry
stenciled across
a stock photo of strangers,
or the waxy bister
of formed chocolates,
or you might find yourself
listed among the outcasts
who take a break from love
on Valentine’s Day.
Categories:
stenciled, love,
Form:
Free verse
A heart as white as snow
Opened the runway to Santa's sled
His wish a gift for his joy to show
All year long for the good example he's led
Inflated balls bounced around
His excited mind racing like go carts
His eyes lit up like a Christmas tree
With the love messages he stenciled in the Christmas card..
It read, "My family tree is my Christmas tree
Mother's cookbook, hmmm, a recipe for my joy
And for all the smiles I see around me
I'm thankful for my home and this wonderful toy."
Categories:
stenciled, boy, christmas, joy, love,
Form:
Rhyme