Best Strident Poems
On a still...ancient horizon,
Massive dragon wings emerge,
To the atmospheric battlefield.
Where two legendary beasts,
Clash for the love...of a dragoness.
A battle of mythic proportions,
Of two stonily serpents in the sky.
Only three dragons remain,
The two wary warriors,
And the dragoness they fight for.
The flap of enormous wings,
Thunders the air abroad.
The fire in the sky illustrates,
That the battle has begun.
Fierce deafening roars,
Rape the quiet Delphi skies.
In a solemn brave attempt,
To win the dragoness’ heart.
She rests...nestled in the mountains,
For the winning warrior’s return.
Strident screams pierce the heavens,
From the vicious violent brutality.
Aggressive attacks resonate,
Vibrating her lair of stone,
As she shivers in despair and wonder.
Sharp talons pierce the scales,
Shredding the tissue of life.
Effervescent mists spray,
Staining the clouds with gore.
A thud hits the landscape,
And her attentive attention reacts.
Waiting with complete ambition,
A second thud thumps the landscape.
Curious eyes creep from the cave,
She wrestles with the thought of extinction,
As both...her warriors are slain,
Laying lifelessly...in a crimson rain.
Categories:
strident, fantasy, love
Form:
Free verse
Un-nerved by formal sentencing assemblies,
Marks and Words, bound by conjunctive amenity.
The tried beliefs that short cuts speed words into action.
Made stuffy Old School feel out of fashion.
Punctuation board-slams her silver gavel;
“A shortened distance, yet far to travel.”
Marks are pushed into line to enter their plea.
Dash Dash Dash has trailing thoughts…
Comment remarks that it thinks too much.
Question Mark, curiously rotund and stout,
asks “What’s this meeting all about?”.
Proud Period, acquainted with the strident rituals of formality,
Quickly departs, leaving a daunting spot of terse finality.
Comma’s game of pause and snag,
grammatically adheres to one of tag.
Overwrought Exclamation Mark, nervously blurts:
“Unruly disorder can make matters worse!”.
Semi colon maintaining proper pauses,
Stays anchored between compelling clauses.
Colon fearful of growling barks,
snuggles closer to Quotation Marks.
Apostrophe’s like for word possession,
worries over changing word obsession
Oh, Oh! Oh? Oh…
These are shameful attempts to monopolize,
Even with trite words, of unassuming size.
.
Punctuation thinks her identity’s impaired
Might she be confused with the shrew, Grammar?
She calls to order a capitol thought.
sliding up to Exclamation Mark, shouts “’STOP!’
The object of this meeting,
Is not subject to self- beating.
No presence is here to criticize, or chastises,
nor harmonize.
If getting through is what stays true.
Will be understood by some , but always to you.”.
Categories:
strident, identity,
Form:
Free verse
Silence
The sweet rhapsody of quietness
Sit back and savor
the music of the void,
where no dissonant voices are heard
It's so relaxing in this soundless realm;
break not the peace, speak not one word
Stay muted,
let all unspoken thoughts flow within
a serene state of mind, cascading down
into a calm stream of consciousness
No discordant utterances echoes through this vale of tranquility
The absence of strident, background noise
causes
the ears
to fall
sound asleep
Not one disturbing word to be heard ...
There is only blessed silence
floating around you as you dream deep,
thinking of me,
in the heart of the night
This is as it should be
Categories:
strident, dream, imagery, love, sleep,
Form:
Verse
Pipe Dreams
Though I have a woman’s heart; it pounds with
dragon’s fire. Curled about the core of self,
I have lain in wait for Asia with claw, and horn.
Linked-locks and keys have spined beneath my hand
upon the tourist’s rails of China’s Great Wall where
builder’s bones rattle for redress upon the wind.
It is not China’s Long but Ryu ’s heart which pounds.
This was no place, no place for me.
Paper boats zhezhi have blessed my dreams. The
Divine Wind eases my way across a sea of longing
to Nippon. My two-chambered
heart can have but one loyalty—
I say no to the soldiers,
strident in beige and red—
Senkaku’s waves buoy me.
Buddhist temples waver mirage-like in
a gray-white haze of frankincense, the scent
of ever after, lays about me.
For links of love and family, are stronger,
than those of coercion and the gun—I will
island shelter—refine remnants—separate myself
from clay become porcelain—
beneath tori arches; I walk.
A stream in Kyoto
a bronze statue of a ballerina
dancing on point
within a circle
of gnats—
First Published in the Spring of 2017 by Illumen
Categories:
strident, analogy, symbolism, travel,
Form:
Free verse
"The Great In-Between"
Oh jolle
vision green
shining
black feather-framed
emeralds
spilling over
the mask’s rim
walls fall while
Jericho doors close
lockdown
unravels
like a mind ribbon
travels
through words
swimming in
an ocean like
tadpoles
growing
tales
evolving
through
the singing hooks
in the mouths
of whispering
phantom poets
listening
with the
eyes
and
mind
fingerprinting
tomes
glowing
embers
pages along the path
with a legion
of tall poppies
marching strident
and barefoot
over broken glass
like the leaves
falling
from
tall stories
still standing
stalwart trees
basking with
winged warriors
strange angels
all forest creatures
in Blue Sky’s Light
sometime soon seen
In the Great In-Between
(LadyLabyrinth/ 2021)
"Looking through the looking glass
All that seems won't ever last
Broken glass in every tree
Natural I never see
Slipping through my fingertips, like sand
Slipping through my fingertips, like sand"
Categories:
strident, i am, muse, mystery,
Form:
Free verse
this cooler air seems to mottle the trees
spinning leaves like my thoughts in winded dance
befalling trails of tears on crimson breeze
as they fall grounded beneath the oak's stance
i hear the crumble of death beneath me
as i shiver within its strident gasp
chaotic roots reach out beneath its quay
piquing me with tones of your final rasp
dubious mind much like bare branches snaps
within the disdain utter from dead lips
as it echoes remorse in lifeless slaps
freeing only my body from its grips
my soul stands colorless, naked and numb
mirroring the trees in this autumn glum
December 27, 2019
Entered into Best Sonnet of 2019 Contest
Sponsored by John Hamilton
September 30, 2019
*Quay is pronounced as Ke
Categories:
strident, autumn, death,
Form:
Sonnet
Strident howling I heard and feared it was my cat
Ran to the porch to find a ball of fluff at bat
A large hawk dive-bombing on a wee baby owl
To find it unprotected evoked a fierce scowl
I stood between the aggressive hawk and its prey
It lunged at me viciously ‘fore it flew away
The barn owl sat on my porch, puffing for a while
I christened the babe “Grace” and continued to smile
She seemed content to stare at me that morn in spring
It was at least ten minutes before Grace took wing
When summer arrived with exhausting, dreadful heat
I was swimming at night when I heard such a treat
Grace had never even left my backyard, you see
Her repayment for kindness was to croon to me
As I moved some years later, I shed a few tears
Knowing Grace’s nightly song I’d no longer hear
Loyalty is built on faith and trust over time
Though she’d once been small, I left her in her prime
*True event. I later learned that owls are very loyal creatures. Written July
29, 2014 and dedicated to Grace.
Categories:
strident, bird, relationship,
Form:
Couplet
The spool of twine grows thicker
with the winding up of days,
the garden vines, yellowed, hug the ground;
the air, intoxicated with over ripened fruit,
grows loud with strident voices, the insects' final song.
The cooled night breeze shoves us gently toward the fire
and the love-large harvest moon bends low to kiss her dying child.
Copyright, September 6, 2014
Faye Lanham Gibson
Categories:
strident, autumn, night,
Form:
Free verse
Traversing Iceland's National Park, a timeless place, where daylight fills each passing hour
and twilights ever brief. While volcanoes stand by sentinel, amidst dark lava fields.
Amazing geysers so magnificent, vent angry clouds of steam. Our route wlnds through
wild landscapes, laid down by ice and fire. Breathtaking scenes see lustrous skies, change
colour constantly. To marvel as wild reindeer herds migrate, in seeking pastures new.
We rest awhile to take respite beside a waterfall, avoiding midday's heat. And bathe in ice
cool waters crystalline, refreshing tired feet. The time soon comes for us to climb to high
plateaus,where vast glaciers with melting ice, cascade torrents down below. From this
vantage point we sight, the coastal waters where we aim to spend the night. Eventually, we
make our descent, crisscrossing mountain streams, and wend our way carefully, to stroll
through pastures green. Wild ponies graze as we pass by, observing us with watchful eye.
Unbroken and unbowed by man, a force of nature, likens them to this rugged land.
At journey's end we reach the fjord, this tranquil scene gains our accord for
camping wild. Waiting patiently until the midnight hour to take some photographs.
All panoramic landscapes, and taking centre stage this star, still shining bright our sun.
Waking early to the strident sounds of seabirds raucous calls. Our experience seems
so surreal, without the break of dawn. Today our destination will end our brief sojourn.
Eventfully we stand beside where continents divide, Eurasia and North America's
tectonic plates collide.
arctic midnight sun
shows creations finest hour
land of ice and fire
6/ 24/ 2018.
Categories:
strident, fire, summer, sun,
Form:
Haibun
On Lindisfarne, they say,
St Cuthbert took a hooded crow,
A jackdaw and a jay,
And on their strident tongues bestowed
The gift of harmony.
No more did ugly croaks and caws
Dispute above the sea,
Or trouble those sequestered shores.
They sang all day, those three;
And as they drew their corvine kin,
The devil wept to see
His shrinking nursery of sin.
Categories:
strident, bird, christian, faith, sea,
Form:
Rhyme
Jealousy, envy, strife, lies, and, fire.....
What bitter and poisoned fountains, these surely are
Spewing forth both fresh and salt waters, at the very same time
These houses built upon the shifting sands
Tilting towards their inevitable crumblings....
Always learning but never growing, these petals of strident deceits
Fragrant and putrid, mingled scents of their truth!
Revealing themselves always, to the eyes which matter the most
Eyes that within their blindness, they can never see?
Walking along the shoreline, of tempered sight, these tempest
Unaware of the approaching waves, poised, to carry them away, forever....
Such are the fruits of their instantiate labors
The reaping, of this their soil blackened harvest!
For a tree does not bare, olive branches with figs
And hypocracy within Heavens sight, has a dire price
For to be hot or cold, is one thing altogether
But to be mired within the middle of a puddle of mud
Is a petal of a different color, of darkened hues
Razor sharp stems, spewing forth their venin
As they spin within the wind....
An image of many faces, these chameleons, of disorders discerned
Straw built houses, sitting upon the fault lines of eternity
Biding their time, while unaware, of the storm of the centuries soon to arrive
Like ivory and ebony, this twisted marble, of its own perverse
Waters, pouring from its fountain, flowing in reverse....
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
{Hypocracy!}
Categories:
strident, life, sympathy, time
Form:
Sleigh bells jingle as o'er the crystal snow they glide,
To the little country church this Christmas Eventide.
Folks anticipate the fellowship that awaits them there,
As they celebrate His birth with carols, love and prayer!
Steeds were eased to hitching posts with a gentle "Whoa"!
Faithful and patient horses snort and paw the drifting snow.
Folks greet others with a special glow upon their faces,
With a "Merry Christmas to you" and unabashed embraces!
The old pastor had arrived about half-past five o'clock,
To stoke the potbellied stove to warm his faithful flock.
The organist who'd served nigh on fifty years in that capacity,
Was at her post pedaling the organ with strident tenancity!
The pastor with a short Christmas homily had his say,
Followed by the Sunday School's annual Nativity play.
A warming glow flooded the church with candlelight,
As the service closed with the singing of "Silent Night".
Though on this Holy Eve ,from cathedrals oratories occurred,
And ancient cantatas sung by thunderous choirs were heard,
The souls of this faithful, God-fearing congregation,
Were just as blessed by their simple Christmas celebration!
Robert L. Hinshaw, CMSgt, USAF, Retired
© All Rights Reserved
Categories:
strident, holiday, christmas, christmas,
Form:
Rhyme
Shredded remnants of foolish desire
Binding me long to this earth
Fade now
To small regrets
Of wasted time.
Strident bits of childish dreams
Holding me strong to this world
Fill instead
With pure reflections
Of grace.
And I sleep upon
Quiet pools of love
Sparkling brilliant blue
Against the harsh pull
Of arid pain.
And I dream awake
In visions of exultation
Binding me fast to heaven,
Borne along
By streams in my desert.
Categories:
strident, inspirational, visionary, me, me,
Form:
Blank verse
"The Deafening Colours"
Silence is the killer.
Never
the winner.
True power and control
possessed by the strident
voices of Courage
to be different -
through Unity,
reveals
the deafening colours
Soul Sovereignty
arrives ascending
through equality
Loud and vibrant
becomes Peace,
The Real Revolution
(LadyLabyrinth / 2020)
"I have a dream
that one day this nation will rise up,
live out the true meaning of its creed:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all men are created equal."
Dr Martin Luther King
Categories:
strident, courage, freedom, future, humanity,
Form:
Free verse
It was not the sound of babies crying
Or anger,
fear
Old folks dourly discussing
Nor disputes,
debates
Strident voices of cussing
It was not the sound of children weeping
Or taunts,
doubts
Young people rowdily ruminating
Nor oppression
craftiness,
Ungrateful tones of murmuring
It was not the sound of grown ups mourning
Or dementia
regrets,
Middle age crisis managing
Nor depression,
unforgiveness
Poisonous tongues of viper stings
The last sound heard was the sound of death dying
Categories:
strident, hope, sound, spiritual, visionary,
Form:
Verse