Best Swamplands Poems
THE MEDICINE MAN
When I was a girl,
We lived way out back,
In the swamplands where life,
Was hard but no lack,
Of love and good humor,
And inventive fun,
We were tired but happy,
When day was done.
One evening my uncles,
Were chasing me,
In a game of tag,
Near a big Oak tree.
I couldn't see,
The tree in the dark,
So I hit it full bore,
And there made my mark.
I was down for the count,
Out like a light,
They took me to Grandpa,
Who, seeing my plight,
Set to work right away,
To bring me around.
He reset my nose,
Made sure I was sound.
My face was a horror,
A regular mask,
But with his tender care,
I was soon the same lass.
He made poultice, used herbs,
To take down the swelling,
Relieving my pain,
And discomfort quelling.
He was quiet and gentle,
And didn't say much,
But he knew a lot,
And he had the touch.
He doctored our family,
He doctored our friends,
And many an animal,
He came to tend.
He was just an old Indian,
But I never forgot,
The things that he did,
Proved he knew a lot.
He lived his life quiet,
The best that he could,
And he did his best,
To live like he should.
He never stole,
Wasn't given to drink,
Said too much booze,
Made it too hard to think.
Didn't hold much store,
In money or fame,
But he knew the importance,
Of a good family name.
What others think,
He said with a grin,
Depends much on you,
So try not to sin.
He taught by example,
And he taught us a lot,
And the things that he taught us,
I never forgot.
Judy Ball
For Tell Me A Story Contest by Debbie Guzzi
everglades
the slicing sawgrass sways
paradise to the "gladesmen"
the caterwaul of a panther
swamplands
The mad masquerade is a vile and venomous and villianous thing
Masks in front hide bad beasts within...while wearing their smiles and their innocent
grins
Thoughts and ideas turn into iniquity and sin
Held together with needles and pins...their false facades start to rip and tear
Best beware as truth starts to win
The mad masquerade is nearing its end
Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light...confusing and confounding...
Making wrong seem right
Sweating as time slips away like snakes in swamplands
It slips through his fingers like grains of invisible sand
Deceiving and devouring every single soul he can
The mad masquerade is his last and final stand
Disguises,devices and insanity inventions...in the name of medicine,man,and science
they make deep and dark indentions
With evil intentions the masquerade keeps marching on
They're leading to perdition as the band plays on and on and on...
But soon the lightning flashes from the east into the west and their masks all burst
into flames
God watches and He waits...truth kills the lie like torches in the night
Tick tock the clock stops on a dime
The mad masquerade is running out of time
"The sounds of Earth is the music of my soul."
Narcissus woos a butterfly; waves strong,
Genteel stages filled pages; memoirs sound,
Earth graces life faces, pleased heaven bound,
Wrens and bluejays consonance their birdsong.
Lively swamplands prep and hopped air aloft,
Rising field beds here bells spread Heather mound,
Climbed rose still impose fragrance all around,
Dragon fly whiz bye, hunt or naught so oft,
Dogs yapping; cats hissing; a bit delayed,
Gardenia's much scents nice touch unwound,
Wintry Holly, cool Heartsease, best are found,
Ants are sprinting up an anthill; dismayed,
Mountain rams straddle rock hills, not fall down,
Forget Me Nots in flower pots, e'er crowned,
Baby Breaths pleased nearby Sweet Peas, basks ground,
Beavers build damns, scrams, otters like a clown,
Eagles and hawks birds like rocks, circling sky,
Morning Glories backed stories bloom foreground,
Lilacs possess purple hilltop spellbound,
Antelopes will elope grass field is nigh,
The desert, plains, steppes, mountains, and jungles,
Lily pad ponds, chartreuse fronds, all year round,
Daffodils glow star; crowd-pleaser astound,
Rural, suburbs, cities, the Earth humbles.
2022 August 07
*2nd Place*
Let Your Muse Be Inspired - R Form
~~Constance La France: Judged 2022 September 01
*Enclosed Rhyme
Reminiscing of past and present
Wadding through the swamplands
Hiding from the ominous intruder
Decieving the manic attempts
Partly relying on the defenseless
While still behind the strong
Standing tall beyond the enemy's grasp
Watching detailed movements
Yeah, though I walk swiftly
Amoung a violent crowd
Carrying torches and pitchforks
I'm empty handed and the victim sought
How is it that they're blind to me
I'm within their grounds
They call my name and show my photo
But still, they past right by
As I run, beyond their hands
Beyond the weapons' tips
I walk right through a sword
Yet, I'm not split in two
I stand firm, unscarred, intact
How is it that I'm alone in this
By myself in a crowd of strangers
Just because they search me out
How is it that I'm alone here?
The weapons aimed and held, but
A faceless body lay among the crowd
Hole forms as they step back and around
This is my body that lies upon the ground
Take me home, would you take me home
I see my own blood dancing on my fingers
My own self in my hands
Eyes pouring a mirror in the sands
An extinct personality's gone
Mirror in the sands is empty
Faceless escape of my own life
My own fear a melody forgotten
Lyrical injustice taken from this
Breathing a song I'm singing
As the blood dances on my fingers
The prophecy came true in the swamplands
She rose from the bowels of an alligator’s belly
Disengaging herself with the hands of a sorcerer
Those who saw were struck as if by lightning
She was confident and unhurried as predicted
The storms are coming for sure, an old timer said
Alligator wrestlers rose from the bottom of the swamp
Following their queen through the jungles toward town
She is coming! Some of the less fearful were screaming.
The town began to shutter itself. Storm Ali was here!
The Great Sahara desert as large as the continental United States
a deadly vast searing wasteland of sand dunes mountain high
The expansive buckle of the world's desert belt void of color
dotted by scarce oases of what once was.
Twenty thousand years ago with just a wobble of the earth's axis
monsoon rains seasonally showered the Sahara plains
Feeding waterways of rivers and mega fresh water lakes
abundance of sea creatures thrive
Green Sahara was alive.
Witness from cave paintings of a world the winds of sands
erased.A world of green savannas full of animals to hunt
and herd. Elephants, giraffes, gazelles, ostriches and lions too.
People in villages fished and swam the mighty lakes.
Beware of hippos , crocodiles and turtles that bite
Fossils of shell fish tell the tales of a lush time long ago.
Cattle and goats domesticated, crops grew and ripen
in fertle soil. Was this the Garden of Eden now guarded
by deadly heat and buried by time and shifting sands.
Swamplands and rainforest stretched through North
Africa. Life was good and plentiful for our ancient
ancestors.
Even whale bones bare witness to a time of a
great sea. Of bays and lagoons and shores
of beaches tropical in air. A different time
blown away by dry winds and buried beneath the sands
Green Sahara will return again
Like clockwork the pendulum of wet to dry
happens every twenty thousand years
We are in the fifth millennium of a dry spell
Within fifteen thousand years a tilt
a wobble of the earth's axis and
Green Sahara begins again.
Why for push and pull,
akin to a bull
just raging away
by night and by day?
Illusions confound
and its dark forms hound
but our joyous soul
sways not from its goal.
Slow down now, slow down
or in swamplands drown,
blown away as dust
by lust thrust unjust.
Oh monk, hush that blush
that bliss throbs may gush,
bursting forth as joy,
without thought form ploy.
That soul’s light not dim,
sing to God a hymn,
doing what is right,
transforming as light.
02-January-2022
Lipogram Poetry Contest (vowel omitted ‘e’)
Sponsor: Emile Pinet
PS Grammar, HMS, Rhymezone
Feeling within consciousness contraction
We recognise its origin as fear
Arising from desire borne stagnation
Fearful to lose illusions we hold dear
Ghosts of our mind grips us thus in terror
Avalanche of arrows feeble form spears
Fear type any, it grows like a creeper
If unchecked, envelopes us in darkness
Permeating our form like a cancer
How may we then, liberate consciousness?
What may we do, to rekindle our joy?
Beseeches thus hermit in earnestness
Attachment to objects, an ego ploy
Miring our attention in swamplands deep
Hypnotic stupor has us therein buoyed
To transcend our fear, the climb is not steep
We just let go of fleeting illusion
Plunging into the void, in one swift leap!
We are free, upon vaporisation
In but not of this world of forms fleeting
Flowing nonchalantly in elation
We disappear, there is no more fearing
What is, is a bliss mist, celebrating!
28-November-2020
(syllabic Terza Rima)
Reminisce
Oh, to go back to the Woodlands.
To the woods that I love so.
That sheltered my first great sorrow.
In that shadowy long ago.
Oh, to go back to the swamplands,
Where the gentle breezes blow.
And the dark waters hide the catfish;
In a place the raccoons know.
I want to go home to a quiet place;
To a soft and gentle breeze.
Where the dew shines just like diamonds,
On tall magnolia trees.
Where the Whip-o-will sings in the morning;
And the honeysuckle grows on the vine.
To kind old Mother Nature,
I took my restless mind.
The quietness of the forest;
Soothed my troubled brain.
I found solace in my sorrow;
In the cool silent rain.
Oh to go back in my sorrow;
To the balm of yesterday.
Where I found sweet peace and comfort;
Alone in the woods to pray.
As we look back at life journey thus far
Freezing the frames of whirring memory
Our soul within etched by many a scar
Borne of ego urge delusionary
Upon slowing down sway of attention
Ego borne fears and desires vaporise
Exiting thus swamplands of stagnation
Aglow in the now, each throb a surprise
Fundamental learning is simply this:
Ceasing grasping, shifting to connecting
Feeling within rapturous bliss caress
We abide in hues of love delighting
Lower mind yields, melting in surrender
Vibrant thus; all hearts one, none asunder
16-November-2020
circles within circles
harmony of sticks and stones and gems
his foundation flows
around my ankles
flooding ‘tween the trees
baubles of aquamarine
circles within circles
harmony of sticks and stones and gems
paradise soaked with many suns
storehouse of spinnerets
orange, yellow, blues
shining, twinkling, twirling
those leggy-legs
brown and skinny twigs
in swamplands of serenity
soaking up the sea and sun
circles within circles
harmony of sticks and stones and gems
my mind in wonder -
ivory pearls, like roots,
surrender to the soil of wafting sea
my pinwheel irises whirl
swoosh in waters?
climb vainglorious bark?
play with the suns?
the artist tempts me with his brush
circles within circles
harmony of sticks and stones and gems
8/17/2021
Doubt
contracts
our being,
as also fears
and ego desires,
in realm of illusions,
thereby stifling aliveness,
anchoring us in stagnation,
making us captive to lower mind,
enmeshed in dark swamplands of delusion.
Doubts, borne of urges, rooted in doership,
we surrender instrument of thought,
resting in awareness alone,
uncaring of all outcomes,
content in blissful peace,
in the here and now,
as a witness,
delighted
in the
play.
08-November-2020
Spiralling thoughts and specious logic repeatedly reinforce their affirmations rooted in swamplands of delusion with the singular aim of nurturing lower mind, continuing to shroud the self evident truth of our luminous divinity. As such, the shift, so to speak, is a journey without movement, being simply stilling mind-body identification and with it, resting cravings arising from attachment to maya borne illusions.
Lazy is better
With attentive mindfulness
The nightmare now ends
Lotus beauteous blooms with joy in swamplands
Vibrant bliss throbs within wherever we stand
27-November-2020
(syllabic couplet)