Best Stippled Poems
I woke trembling on the threshold of dawn
as dappled sunlight through my window shone
Upon my primed canvas there had been drawn
a masculine image with finely chiseled cheekbones
What virile fantasy had I born while in flight
for my hand to have created such a dashing face
In stippled darkness of my dream-filled night,
a handsome fantasy did I dare fondly embrace
His eyes stared in wonder; tantamount to my own
No angle shielded me from their deep penetration
I held my breath, then released a soft guttural moan
as his strong hand guided mine without hesitation
Warm colors defined muscular features I painted
His dark eyes were flecked with dustings of gold
Flushed with desire, in a warm blush I was tainted
when he faintly whispered, "To have and to hold"
My palette was awash in shades of crimson. Soiled
with streaks of scarlet were my hands and gown
My brush strokes lingered on his full lips as I toiled
imagining passion's kiss, in whose depth I would drown
I could not bear the thought of tearing myself away
On and on I painted where his gentle hands led
until finally wearied from hunger, upon my bed I lay
Unsated was a craving within me, a desire to be fed
With eyes closed, I hoped to dream of him once more,
of this man who had completely captivated my heart
Come, handsome stranger. Find me as you did before
I cannot endure life if we must live it in dreams apart
Artist
Color me naked with your sighs
Scribble me stripped
Stabbed
Slashed
Stippled on your skin
Paint me black
Seething in charcoal amber
Writhing in lines
The brush strokes of your tongue
Beseech
Craft me artist eloquent
With feathered quill
On the spine of desire
Etch me
Deep acid in your eyes
Brush in the sticky fluid oil of centuries
Canvass hung sacrificial in galleries
Martyred to your beauty
I am
Capture me in sketches
Paper trees and graphite inscribe
And draw me
With your soul
On the timeless wall and halls
Of love
Chiseled I am from marble cliffs
Statue pantheon
You my ancient legend
Artist
In murals cast
Upon the unforgotten forms of beauty
You are primitive
Preordained to the hand-print of stone
Set in caves prehistorical
With spit and pigment molded
Bonded
Eternal
Paint me naked
In your eyes
Serging through life, I whipstitch, weft, and welt,
But always, my thoughts are pick-threading.
As stippled patches of emotion rise and fall in me,
See me, feel me, touch me, heal me
Just too many scars.
The mindless mind stresses itself through mental snares,
I waste away beneath it all, piecing and pondering.
Where the struggling soul and pleating body meet,
I seek significance in life’s lucid-lined layers.
Confronting my inner fears as an owneress,
Time leaves its cursed mark in starched stitches that cut.
Each moment experienced is like a closing zipper,
My calm exterior ridges are often rough, ready, and ruffled.
A life full of scars.
While unique experiences blend like transient ombre shades
My essence feels like a needled complex knit.
Memories form patterns from life’s four-patches
Challenges scissors cut are like shredded sharp diamonds.
Yet more paths diverge along life’s shifting chevrons
I strive to fit somehow; this square is what I do.
Yet my world stands out like tri-recs blocks
Creating stars and pineapples to fight fifty-four forty.
Scars that are hidden and visible, surface and deep.
Like trapezoids, I sense those oblong obstacles loom
Worth or less by my own limited gauge, I measure.
I pray each day new chapters begin casting on
While others exhaust, reaching their bind-offs.
I do seek a pattern master, and I need to pray for one.
I contemplate constantly along selvages of thoughts.
They hang like dangling tails…
I start to visualize my purpose slowly seaming.
Look as I whipstitch, weft, and welt through life, serging.
As I graciously and sagaciously test life’s many swatches,
I devote my life to the Master Seamster the…
Healer of scars.
Painting You
Before painting, I first sketch you
In my mind’s eye…To compose
The lines, shapes, shadows and lights,
That work altogether to form a semblant sight
Of you for any relative, friend or acquaintance…
Next, I embrace the required courage
To face the blank canvas; to dip my brush
In sublime tones for my wild orchid wishes,
Wanting to stroke across the heavens
For reflecting starlights bright,
Which I’ll situate to split the darker places
Where the inks bleed and branch out
Around you, smudging your purest colors…
That I endeavor to recover
When illness tries to smother
You with a viridescent blanket for on-going days;
Cloaking the glance of your azure blue eyes;
Pulling gray and white from your skull
To streak through your forest brown hair;
Rushing flag red moments to your cheeks
When you growl, “No. Don’t—“ when I
Try any way to help you through the fevers
That hang dredged plum-violet clouds over
The sofa — away — where you stay sleeping…
While I sit crimson awake worrying,
Watching you breathe…And asking
Through faith’s golden prayers for your healing;
For our holy Lord to send some ministering angels
— With their glistening opaline feathered wings;
Who side by side, place hands on you ~ veiling
My first view of prayers’ answers coming true;
Lifting me to a bloom of rosebud gratitude.
I paint you never far.
I paint your ocean blue eyes opening.
I paint you always beside me in a sandcastle brown.
I dapple the air over us an effervescent pink.
I paint your prism presence close.
I paint your mid-night’s Arora Borealis dancing hues.
Our love is a stippled, rolling color wheel
Of our linked diamond destinies: journeying
Together on amber roads under sapphire skies.
—————————————————
(c) sally young eslingwe 10/17-18/2023
Glory to God…
It has been said you are all just bricks in the wall -
confined and coffined in concrete, your moments
magnified in mortar, souls stone-stippled.
But listen: you are as flowers, individuals efflorescing -
shy eyes of violets, fragile forget-me-nots
unforgettable in pews of blues, sunshine celandines
beaming from sunless corners, strident daffodil trumpets
with everything to tell. Some will grow apart -
wayside wanderers, wayward and cast out.
Some forever up against the world-wall.
You unfold as petals, to sing in tongues of the sun,
in golden tonals, corolla contraltos, a floral choral,
soprano sepals, hibiscus hymns to him and her.
Flowering through stone, blossoming through gloom,
though shadow-dusted with dusk's lilac bloom.
Baptised in the dew of the new which forges
a world anew, transformed by the higher light
which highlights your days, gilded pollen-gold.
Days lengthen as rays warm walls, edges and corners
sun-softening, souls becoming sun-stippled.
Listen: these are the petalled messages to you.
Splatter painted, Pollock blessed, leggy I stand,
among the green grass and healing Plantain
in a kaleidoscope of color panned.
A walking canvas in the meadowland
stems, humorously stippled to entertain
splatter painted, Pollock blessed; leggy I stand.
Blush brushed by daylight, a cheeky garland;
a stand bloomed within thin skinned constraints
in a kaleidoscope of color panned.
Pistils between petals unknown unplanned,
joyous the sound of honey bees restrained,
splatter painted, Pollock blessed; leggy I stand.
A plantigrade intrusion, a new brand
surface mounted digits adorned prearranged
in a kaleidoscope of color panned.
So bright the upright parts, so very grand
one can but dream the crown gloriously manned
splatter painted, Pollock blessed; leggy I stand
in a kaleidoscope of color panned.
Mused: Bella online Literary Review Winter 2015
Eroticism -
a supple spine in a wanting curve
and a foolish fever simmers a scarlet heartbeat—
temptation is an aphrodisiac
and guilt— a red kite lost in a hot hurricane
a strand of blue moonstones plunge to titillate
illicit points of contact caught by starlight
restless yin-nerve-endings take an edgy stance—
primal presence pearls beneath parted flimsy fabric
ah.. gossamer chic taken and tossed by windy hands
freeing moons and earth captured in your orbit
golden hair a dirty tangle flies— streamers
of infidelity seized in someone else’s hands
heat-seeking rhythm throbs within walls
a slappin’ poppin’ bass line frenzy
our bodies wild like a warehouse rave
a driving beat hugging hips caught in a fishnet shimmy
high on oxytocin and fizz of affaire du jour—
unbridled breakers breaking vows in a whipped up gale
as hedonistic hot spots revel in unrestrained spindrift
.. it’s a jungle for conjugal love ..
volcanic ash streaks a feral romance
carnal cat (a hungry stippled stray)
pins me down like prey in a dopamine storm
where edges rendezvous soft and hard and fuse
a silhouette of geometry body-painted in black sands
as the surge uncurls the waves—
dreamscape escape on a slick onyx sheet
nakedness blurs in the rough charcoal smudge
shapes shaded with a roll on the rim of a graphite night
the art of cheating sins stain a seedy portrait on skin
yet basks in the moonbeam’s push into the pulse
without mercy or justification—
just unadulterated
adulterated
euphoria!
Those leaves, like fire before our eyes,
fell down as flames from autumn skies,
then twirled like feathers to the ground
to weave a blanket wrapped around.
Like a chameleon, fall leaves turned,
from scales of green to crimson-burned.
With brushstroke blends of orange-gold,
Bright autumn paintings did unfold.
And like Monet's bold stippled hues,
fall gifts her canvases of views.
Dappled Winds
Phantom gliders in the sky rise at day
To rush the firmament on dappled winds,
Heaven’s piebald appaloosas at play,
Brindled tempests ruffle zephyr’s fringes
On stippled flurries in mistral tinges -
Flecks of dirges – the haunting calls of loons –
Laugh with ecstasy at mosaic breeze,
Born from the mottled rainbow’s pure cocoon,
In a dappled dance of impish teases.
2-11-22
Contest: D Forms - Dizain
Sponsor: Constance La France
As moonbeams settle softly on her face,
lay bare the gaunt and haggard visage there,
a woman whose whole life was spent in care
for those who ran and won another race.
Those stippled hands, the measure of her grace,
her shriveled arms, now wasting in despair,
her saddened eyes so sorrowful and spare,
a broken soul who cannot keep apace.
Wilting now, her slender body gone,
wishing there were something left to say,
countenance once sparkling, now wan,
as she prepares to make that final trip
to glory, to the everlasting day
when pain no longer whispers from her lips.
Those who stand in grief can only wait
and ponder just what might have been,
but death is drawing nigh, it's much too late,
her appearance now so sallow and so lean.
Thoughts turn to their own brief mortalities,
as they reflect on how they will atone,
and justify their improprieties.
We cannot cheat the Reaper, foil his plan,
and live a life of immortality,
His grip is irresistible, and none
can bypass destiny, its fickle charms,
so may she sleep in peace, in purity,
and rest forever in His loving arms.
A clement breeze brushing over skin,
A salty scent breathed deep.
Eyes closed, waves heard below,
A muffled crashing,
A cool, gentle spray.
Eyes open, ebony ocean,
Stippled with touches of moonlight.
Rushing air caressing fingers,
Higher above the water.
A million grains of sand shifting under foot.
Still.
*** This Painting I Do ***
(A Devotion Poem for Jim)
It is my heart
Painting your portrait
Out over this paper
After I caught your profile,
When you weren’t looking,
Casting your attention
In another direction,
While I blended in
The colors of your chin,
And you hadn’t known that
I’d peeked over
Your well-kept
Walls of mystery, which
Usually…no, always even I
Do not cross…But
Today the artist, I,
Let my sight spy
To set down the contour lines
Of your portrait, which
I promise when completed
To then hide this artwork
From the view of anyone else:
Beneath a cross-hatched weave
Of a thousand tiny strokes
Of glittering beams of gold,
And shining rays of silver,
Stippled stars overall to consume
You — silhouetted by all the light
Of God’s gracing and
My loving heart’s way
Of seeing you.
———————————————————————————————
(C) sally young eslinger 12/10/2022
Thanks be to God…
———————————————————————————————
(C) sally young eslinger 12/10/2022
Thanks be to God…
seagulls surf the wind
my escorts home
across the waves
streamlined gannets
sacred isle in view
saffron tints
ocean flower breezes
with scents of heather mingled
island essence
rites of spring
frolicking hares
scattering morning dew
eagles flying high
above the pagodas
sharing with angels
spectral in shadows
castle walls in moonlight
white stag foraging
eloquent landscape
shrouded in mists of time
stones with stories
ears pricked on full alert
deer transfixed in morning mist
ice cracks the silence
snow on distant hills
wind in ancient rowans
new stars twinkling
melting ice
slips down stippled bark
weeping cherry
beyond the twisted gate
flag irises bedeck the shore
beloved playground
fragile and fleeting
foxgloves in summertime
granite enfolded
exotic rhododendrons
sumptuous and alluring
bumblebees besotted
by the waterfall
dippers watching
trickle or torrent?
rhythmic shoreline
ageless slumbering hills
touching paradise
music for the soul
the lilting of the seasons
an Arran symphony
home again, my soul refreshed,
pilgrimage complete.
with Arran heath beneath my feet,
content- and feeling blessed.
A Romios Midsummer’s Dream
In any weather, whether it be sun-kissed
or intensely stormy.
Is to find residence and warmth in the
incandescent,arms of her loving honey!
His olive-skinned arms encircled her,
like stippled, gold, giant butterfly wings.
His citrusy, warm breath, Mon Dieu,
makes her body both shudder and sing!
In his forever, velvet, house she chooses
to abide.
Listening to his Hellenic heart beat, as
strong as the Aegean Sea's tides.
Nothing in this merciless world does she
desire with her soul, more than this.
Her butterfly winged, home and a forevermore
Greek lastling, delicious kiss!
7/4/2024
Glimpses I caught between the swishing traffic
on that sidewalk in cold rain and colder wind
and a cast-off Cleveland Browns windbreaker: a man
tottering a mime of an off-center grandfather clock,
and, oh yes, in a dirty orange unrav'ling
woolen cap with flopping pom-pom.
Then he caught himself, a sudden vision
in that plate glass, and froze as one struck,
arms spread, splayed fingers for balance,
gaping at himself and his wobbling pom-pom.
And I too caught him, uncanny in the black
glass beyond a CLOSED sign, among
the white tablecloths.
And then, my god, he started to dance.
Well... Okay, more of a gaucherie than dancing.
Shuffling, spread-legged tottering (he'd a clubfoot, I noticed)
interspersed (and this is the point) with little
leaps; but now without progressing as
before (if progress is the right word
for going nowhere) along the wet sidewalk.
Minutes — or was it seconds? — he gaped and leapt
and danced while busy folk eddied round him.
Then a rain-beaded bus of limp-faced,
stippled tourists stopped right there,
and I lost him, the pom-pom man, who danced among
the tables of the Café Boulevard.
Well, it was for him, you see, a vision
(for me a far feebler thing, a philosophy)
grand as Milton, Dante, St. John the Divine,
oh, even St. Simeon in the Temple. The ecstasy
of an achieved leap ignores how high you rise
(pace Nijinsky, Nureyev, Barishnykov).
It's how low you started.