Best Steppes Poems
Written: November 06, 2023
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A swarm of herring gulls amassed
Nexus Nautilus nabbed by zealous winds,
whitening the black soil
we hold spears in our hands.
blood-stained thorns on the side
sullen squawks a skirmishing sporophyte,
dubious, grayish rumors must be buried
drave in a drizzle, drape to deities.
Installation of sentry fences
Sisyphean stones
anchor down using seal and string
flaws in the swings used by blacksmiths
Unborn burning bullion bludgeon
Savage sunless swords embryonic
Edgeless, with no reflections.
Each peak over the Edenic Steppes is sprayed,
using torn paper candles as bait
climbing scaffolds with lumber rungs
pounding of leather-heavy boots
darkened, grimacing features
Flocks failing feathers or flight.
Our hold slips on windswept
Windswept updrafts carry us away
as offspring of the royal family.
Categories:
steppes, analogy, feelings, fishing,
Form:
Free verse
"Syzygy"
Behind the wet dunes
fringed with seagrass
a blood crescent
kisses the forehead
of dreamer traversed
twin aeon syzygy
barefeet the velvet
sophia imprints
softly speak
like words seen
dancing across
the place between
heaven and earth
mapping deviations
non-standard
calibrating alignment
played forward through
unchartered jaded
emerald forests
where the satin skin
becomes sparkling
crystalline it shatters
like a shell disgarded, then
the body of no substance
becomes transparent
enveloped in rapturous
Devabani heralding
commands cast
from divine throats
lutes and sitars
whirling nightingales
dervishes wingspanned
accompany angelic legions
the journey melts into
deep blue mysterious oceans
easily walked, hypnotic the
transparent beckoning,
this is the way come,
come, come closer
closer, come forward,
on higher Elysian steppes
the bride smiles
an unspoken secret
and turns
the eyes are
twin windows
like doorways
opening
swallowing
(LadyLabyrinth / 2023)
Categories:
steppes, dream, muse, mystery,
Form:
Narrative
Oh guide us eagle spirit
towards our newborn spring
Lend your wings for our safe
passage, your voice we'll
follow as you sing
From your birdseye view, our
food and shelter we will gain
over mountains through our valley's
your wings beat loudly on the plain
Shadow us from danger, give us
flight on wings wind-swept
carve the light through
rained on forests, soar the
plateaus steer the steppes
Once spotted land for living, tip
your left wing then your right
we shall bless and name your
spirit 'Soaring Eagle Fear No Flight'
This is picture inspired by my favorite artist.
Her name is Bev Doolittle and she creates
amazing illusion works of art/ Mostly native american.
It is up to the viewer to stand back and find the
image(s) within her paintings.
This painting is called 'Season Of The Eagle'
But i put my own title to the poem i was inspired to write.
Categories:
steppes, native american,
Form:
Rhyme
A spirited moon skipped and skid
across the silent snowy steppes
as a pale sun sidled and slid.
Her passionate sensuous steps
softly seduced the stars to shine
across the silent snowy steppes.
I beseeched the night to be mine,
singing a sentimental song,
softly seduced the stars to shine.
The Milky Way formed a sarong
surrounding me with deep desire,
singing a sentimental song.
I followed lustily in dire
need of fragrant vanilla grace,
surrounding me with deep desire.
The mystical night chided me,
a spirited moon skipped and skid.
Her radiance had blinded me
as a pale sun sidled and slid.
Categories:
steppes, desire, moon, night, romantic,
Form:
Terzanelle
The Dilettante Diaries: "Finding Lost Keys on the Steppes of White Ivory"
Where do you place your hands
When the sands of time
Slip through the 4th
and like reading braille
you silently derail
to touch burning
black keys
on white ivory
you go about
removing cold hands
from the warm pockets
of trapped complacency
looking for
double sixes
roll the dice
tumble the love cup
upside down
soft-sucked
sugar cube
black tea leaves
soak up your
bespoke wet dream
slam danced
you're romanced
up against graffiti
walls, you
take a chance on
shadow dancing
with another hand
tired of shuffling decks
cutting cards with
Half-hitched knots
and sinking boats
that pass for
tiger sharks
playing for
white ivory
on the cool
Siberian Steppes of
silent aching skin
shimmering
secrets sans
translucency
and buzzing bees
burning
stings
the wanting
humming silently
secrets and
all those
lost black burning keys
within …
(Lovejoy-Burton/October 2018)
Categories:
steppes, imagery, longing, love, romance,
Form:
Romanticism
– |Life| +
I recall how I had surveyed you, guardedly from a rocky peak,
And why I left the shelter of the mountains, for you.
How we wandered on those plains together,
Endless long days and shorter nights.
You a gazelle and I an eagle.
Horned and barbed, we;
Leaping from earth;
Soaring heights;
Left behind;
– |Life| +
Right ahead;
Plunging depths;
Chaining us to earth;
To leap and soar no more;
My gazelle, your eagle, less we;
Each day numbered, uncounted nights.
Trudging thru mired fields planted with seeds,
Someone else chose for us and we unwittingly accepted,
Until the mystery of these once sweet green steppes withered.
Copyright 2013
Categories:
steppes, life, philosophy,
Form:
Concrete
BELIZEAN BLEND
In the beginning it was the Yucatec, the Mopan and Kekchi as well
Who came from the steppes of Asia where nomads dwell
They fished and farmed milpas, in paradise; away from hell
Some building great civilizations that, for many reasons, eventually fell
Then came the Spaniards whose ambivalence; mixed feelings
Caused them to waver in subsequent dealings
Killed some natives, driven off by others
In the end did not settle; wasn’t worth the bother
Displaced by the British, rowdy pirates turn woodcutters
Who made laws and build infrastructure down to the gutters
Cut logwood, then mahogany for powerful and wealthy folks
Then, to satisfy greed, sought others to enslave in yokes
Africans from Jamaica and Bermuda transshipped
Then as chattel they were frequently whipped
Stolen from Africa, becoming the major labor force
Dehumanized and tortured for centuries without remorse
Mestizos fleeing oppressors in the Yucatan
The War of Castes brought them from beyond
Working as chicleros and cane cutters
As a way of providing ‘ bread and butter’
Garinagu deported from St. Vincent as a form of punishment
Many dying in their odyssey , their massive predicament
Survive , resiliently, on the rebound
A proud people, with culture and learning very sound
Mennonites coming to enjoy religious freedom and peace
Avoiding persecution for a life of ease
Providing furniture, low cost poultry and eggs
Reducing the cadre of many that beg
From India and China they were duped and brought
As indentured servants who were hastily sought
Later as merchants and shopkeepers they came
Voluntarily this time, which is not nearly the same
Backpackers and excursionists everywhere
In a world where they’re free to choose elsewhere
Not part of the earlier diaspora
But manifestations of a new plethora
Categories:
steppes, community, poetry, political, society,
Form:
Epic
The embers burn like gold and red dreams in my bed
I feel them in the fall after summer has taken their lives
Smooth and crisp at the same time waiting for the fire to bring them wings
And dance upon the harvest moon beams of joy and forgiveness
It is a time of cold beginnings and losses never to be regained
We marched across the steppes into the land of spiders and boys
Little girls watch from afar never understanding the enchantment of the fire
It is for young men to make their winter beds and slip into cool streams
Float on a full moon night
Icy
Dark
Incriminating
Merciless
Down to the bottom of the Miller’s creek where the demons wait in satin
Smooth as time and as old as the four winds.
We cannot wait to see their tongues forked in the wind
Whispering out unto the sea. Entrancing dragons of old that sailed on the ships of the Norse.
Come into my bed. Breathe the danger of my musk. It will bring you back to the bars of Constantinople and we will smoke the opium of yellow men.
And in that smoke we will rise up and understand the fall of the Romans and the rise of the Muslim’s. For ours are not the dreams of great men.
They are the dreams of children playing with boats on a pond. To shallow to drown to dumb to live.
I give it all for you.
For you I burn the embers.
Categories:
steppes, lost love, magic, men,
Form:
Free verse
Ride, ride, ride thou figure from the East
In thy curse hath many a mother wept
On thy brow the furrows of distant steppes
Yield unto a steely mask of doom
Destruction follows in thy path and yet
Methinks I spy a flicker of regret
Extinguish it lest humanity engulf it betimes
As distant lands fall under your encompassing sway.
A fire burns, a coward trembles in his tent
What's won is rent from hands too numb to feel
The surging, coursing power of thy grip
Let slip thine enemies, let thy repute
Incite counsel of war then savor the fruit
Of a thousand-footed gathering of days
The purpled way, the jewel-encrusted chalice
Of wine claret. Drink to your heart's content.
If I were thou and thou wert I my friend
I should not pause to see the ground below
For lonely be the lofty heights, perpend:
Far art faren, far remains to go
Nor bride, nor bairn, nor comfort in repose
Hath sped thee on thy way from whence we ride
The rudest nutriments, the barest clothes
Sans bed, sans friend, sans tout, bare ground thou lie'.
Now polished steel glistens, mirrors gray
The slanting dome of sky's inverted bowl
Oiled leather on black courser's velvet skin
And restless hooves an inch in sodden loam
A leathern mask, five halberds thus skyward
Stand, barren hillock's strange reeds
Sprouting in the wind-swept smoke
Of morning's hasty decampment. Thus proceed
These men unto a destiny untold.
Of Indus, Asia, Europe, northern climes
Of snow, of sand and vine, the watery strand
I sing. Dismount and pluck the crocus sweet
But brief, then crush beneath thy heel. Spur on!
Ghengis Khan!
Of Afrique dark and thrice-looted Rome
Thy story-tellers may rhyme and make song.
Home, home rider from the East return
Scorch the earth and burn to cindered ash
Laugh with all the mirth thy new-found freedom
Might yield unto thy solitary path
Unlearn the lessons civil, richness hath
Bone and marrow, thew and sinew softened
Thy courser turn the sod, horizon calls
Spur on! Sing thy song, thy name live on
Ghengis Khan
Categories:
steppes, adventure, education, history, writing,
Form:
Iambic Pentameter
Athens, quite a place, so full of mythology
Buenos Aires, in Argentina, a place I'd love to see
Canberra, is just antipodean class
Dublin, a pint of Guinness in a glass
Edinburgh, the capital of the Scots
Freetown, a city, now violence is never sought
Georgetown, a place where Jim Jones left a scar
Helsinki, in its mountains, where reindeer herd so far
Islamabad, one of the greenest cities of the east
Jakarta, very close to where the Komodo's live and feast
Kuwait City, the start of Saddam's downfall
La Paz, is the capital, that looks down on them all
Monaco, where the rich and famous live
Nassau, with her golden beaches, where the breakers finally give
Oslo, in the land of skiing and fjords
Prague, with its architectural hoard
Quito, is the second highest in the world
Rome, to the lions, the Christians were hurled
Seoul, in the lands of the 38th parallel
Tripoli, where many an Anzac's fell
Ulaanbaatar, in a country full of steppes
Valletta, amidst the Mediterranean set
Warsaw, the ghetto's in World War II
Xi'an, its all i have to see this through
Yerevan, near the Biblical mountains, of Ararat
Zagreb, escaped being a Balkan War stat
Written 3/1/2010.
http://www.thehighlanderspoems.com/the-world.php
Categories:
steppes, war,
Form:
ABC
Too much, too much
Too much, perhaps -
The barren beauty of the steppes,
The fire lacing through the skies
Before the night draws down
Her jewels ignite through her Eternal locks
- As do the sparks within your hair, My Love,
Alight within the scattered ash of magic years,
They tell their tales into the dark
As we lay down to dreaming-time;
Too much, perhaps
For such an one as I.
Too much, too much
Perhaps too much
The thunders of the sea
The silence in the snow
The way the years steal past,
Ghost hands upon our shoulders
- As rests your voice upon my heart, My Love,
When you speak to me of memories
We built of stone or straw together
Too much, perhaps,
Too much, too much.
Perhaps too much
Too much, too much
The Tiaga's green magnificence,
The jungle's deep malevolence
Starlight shine on deep still lakes
No craft of Man has ever touched
- As shine your eyes, My Love,
When you smile at me day's end,
Bright with subtlety and secrets
Warm with dreams and desire
Too much, perhaps
For it not to steal my breath.
Too much, too much
Too much, perhaps
The furious strength of Spring,
The howls of wolves in the Winter
The way life chases life
Harrying it ever onward
- As burns the life in me, My Love
Fanned to flame by you;
Against the crowding dark it leaps
Its mad Defiance to the end -
Too much, perhaps,
Perhaps too much:
Though, finally, not enough, alas.
The man who brought our Frantic Age to being
Once said, "Nothing is too wonderful to be true."
It must be so, for were it not,
Fate ne'er would've sent me - You.
Categories:
steppes, devotion, for her, love,
Form:
Free verse
THE MALEVOLENT GOLDEN HORDE
By Roy Merritt
They rode out over the Asian steppes their ponies hooves flashing
Their arrows taking wing their blades brutally slashing
A river of blood they left in their horrid wake
Their victims cursing their gods for those they did forsake
They went along the Urals and further moving west
And all who opposed them these monsters did suppress
On to the Danube they rode this murderous eastern tribe
And rested their haggard steeds and these waters did imbibe
And others went to the east into the Siberian cold
To conquer all before them their terror to behold
They rode in the name of Batu the grandson of Genghis Khan
And ruled these lands for a century and even years beyond
And yet they were destined in these lands near and far
Rebellion was their plight in the days of the Tartar
And now they are but a faint memory their infamy long ignored
But history shan't forget them The Malevolent Golden Horde.
Categories:
steppes, history,
Form:
Rhyme
Sgt. Bedlam of heavy artillery reporting sir
Bedlam I want you to pick the runt of the litter
and turn him into an agent assassin
with the clandestine power of hypnotism
yes Generalissimo I am here to obey
decked out like a burlesque revue warlord
his Mauser cigar lighter on his belt
a curlicue mustache and a pie tin helmet
Opal his opium fiend gun moll squirming in his lap
was our Generalissimo
Bedlam weighed the coming abrasions
concluded we are our scars and furthermore
if adaptation is survival so is parasitism
cleared his throat noisily and bowed an exit
later that fate laden candle lit night
he made a deep study of his globes and charts
Europa Asia Oceana the Steppes the Savannah
the Scorched Hills of Malibu
a map addict re-educated in the cleanup of '89
his bell-shaped curve insisted love me
server and served a beautiful thing
if one enjoyed giant jungle arachnids and leeches
and centipedes that crawl up your butt
to lay millions of eggs when you sleep
where the laws of physics become
a tumbling burbling retinal stew
geysering steam and sulfur and mud and
where was I oh yah
yet a thing of beauty was Opal to Bedlam
he heard scratching and purring at the door
it was she incognito in an iguana skin
we must escape this hideous circus of shame
she coo coo rooed as her tongue dove into
the holy fissure in his brain
and he threw caution to the feral hogs
forgetting good posture he oozed upon Opal
I bet you think you make your own decisions
she cloyed and again he tossed caution
into a cauldron of grunting mammalian rut
for several hours perhaps the entire weekend
it's easy to rewire a human
you just give them a little epiphany
and bingo ownership
his hypnotic gambit paid off in ducats
the Generalissimo slept like a corpse
the pet centipedes concluded their labors
his ex-kingdom rejoiced at their new liberty
and that's anarchy for ya
From "Engine of Didactic Beauty" available on Amazon
Artist Portfolio: http://walteralter.byethost32.com/
Categories:
steppes, how i feel,
Form:
Free verse
behold now everything on this earth;
the fields with abundance of grain,
palm-grove harvests rich and fruitful,
the forests that separate kingdoms and the fires that scorch them;
the brickwork of ancestries and the towers that reach our gods.
behold these crop-fields that we call life and death,
grown on the back of a sludge-like entity
sowed, and heaped, in granaries of self-doubt;
collected by children's dirty hands;
bronze-sickles, charcoal-eyes;
while the storms unwrap in the south...
gales have swept these homes and huts of clay,
the dog-faced pazuzu gnarls at the moon, as inimical as it is revered;
a mother's love for the murderous son is as complex
as the children's dependence on these fearsome steppes.
behold now everything on this earth;
the countenance of the origin-beast-mother carved in the mountains of the north
and the efflux of her genitals streaming to the south of the marshes,
into that great ocean whose shores we know only by myth
and whose waters is the abode of the primordial one,
whom hurls the long-spear of flood and storm
deep into the sides of these lands - for these lands are hers:
when all comes about, has not the lands risen strongly
from her bottomless and abysmal womb?
was not the pleasure that shook the members of the old, old gods
into ejaculation, indeed, the motion of her scaled loins?
is she not the temple to which all sacrifices are offered, all libations put forth:
is she not the shrine; the death-black ziqqurat; the lighthouse emitting darkness?
is she not the stele inscribed with all words of grace,
and the eloquence of our beautiful poets?
over the lapse of a thousand millenia,
she has been constricting the gods of the heavens
in a strong leather noose,
f o r i s n o t v o i d o r i g i n a l t o a l l ;
c h a o s , d i s c o r d , o r i g i n a l t o o r d e r ?
Categories:
steppes, mythology,
Form:
Tracing unmet steppes
In bedroom microclimates -
Sour paper futures.
Categories:
steppes, adventure, future, inspiration, international,
Form:
Haiku