Best Thistledown Poems
The balmy breeze wafted over the prairie,
Where yellow cowslips huddled in patches.
And here and there I heard a whisper echoing:
Love her, love her, love her.
But she seemed deaf and preferred the wounded wind.
How easy it was to forget and never recapture
All my wistful whisper, I would always love you.
Those sweet nothings of past affections.
We no longer trudged the path made up for two.
Forgotten were those bygone days
When we believed that thistledown tufts
Were really friendly fairies in disguise.
Thus she escaped my clutches
And like a unicorn disappearing in an eclipse,
I headed for a dull and empty living
Blaming her uselessly for I still loved her.
Weren't we the product of our time?
We slammed the doors of love in our own faces,
Building woeful walls around us
Painting it with a tinge of misunderstanding,
When we could lead such a colorful life,
Giving our hearts a chance,
Laughing at ourselves.....
And sending a whisper,
a woeful whisper to the moon above.
Placed First
a seed I am, my silky hair loose without band.
a voyager on a hammock of wind-
drifting up and down with no compass to direct.
the sky warmly greets, nothing to obstruct.
I carry no heavy burden or luggage
if I plunge on land, I will manage,
to tether my roots deep down,
into soil to be reborn a thistledown.
I don’t know
where dreams go..
Maybe they take form in the sky
a genesis of nothing but cloud castles,
building subdivision into an eternity
where no one’s ever home.
Or maybe the winds drift them through time,
lazily pacing histories progress
searching to reseed on fertile ground.
Thistledown dreams.
Some of them might
be that kind.
Like the prayers whispered through battered lips
where the fight for freedom
blood lets on the ground of reason
for what the bible was reputed to have said.
Prayers for Acceptance,
Peace,
Love
and Wholeness.
Prayers for freedom
wave flags to the breezes
that blow on by,
looking for that fertile ground
that we have yet
to prepare.
I don’t know
where dreams go..
But I want my field ready
my mind open
my heart warm.
I want the dreams of my people
of all my relations
to have a place to be..
Life is good and serene I sit,
For I never need to question it;
There's much I know that's odd no doubt,
But nature knows what it's all about.
Could things be different than they are
When all's in place from stone to star?
With thistledown that dips and flies,
On the wind with butterflies.
We try to feel the cosmic touch,
And know that we don't matter much;
A million stars up in the sky,
A million planets fall and die;
A million lives created you,
A million more have died for you.
Immortal we spend eternity,
With other lives we never see.
But sad to say, don't blindly grope,
For lives we live beyond our hope;
With never death but ever change,
Eternal walk on earth to range.
With sorry lives we tell to all,
Of life's amazing carnival.
Just live the life that in you lies,
With love for life that never dies.
Life is good and serene I sit,
And loving every part of it;
I place my trust in my Father's plan,
And try to help Him all I can.
And in a million year or so,
We'll know more than today we know.
So I'm glad to come and take my place,
To hold hands with you and run the race.
Early in the morning of 13 February 1692, in the aftermath of the Glorious Revolution and the Jacobite uprising of 1689 led by John Graham of Claverhouse, a massacre took place in Glencoe, in the Highlands of Scotland. This incident is referred to as the massacre of Glencoe, or in Scottish Gaelic Mort Ghlinne Comhann, or murder of Glencoe. The massacre began simultaneously in three settlements along the glen—Inverness, Inverrigan, and Achnacon—although the killing took place all over the glen as fleeing MacDonalds were pursued. Thirty-eight MacDonalds from the Clan MacDonald of Glencoe were killed by the guests who had accepted their hospitality, on the grounds that the MacDonalds had not been prompt in pledging allegiance to the new monarchs, William and Mary. Another forty women and children died of exposure after their homes were burned.
the air brisk
as it moves across the clover
rolling thistledown
heart tendered tears cascade
through, sacred sod of Glencoe
riding on
a puff of wind
thistledown
plumed gems
flit and flutter
from whitest Queen Anne's Lace
To purple thistledown roadside
treasure
The Queen of fairies fell asleep
upon a bed of thistledown.
And didn't notice the hours creep
as she dreamt of a golden gown.
She was to meet the setting sun,
so she waited with bated breath.
For at dusk, they will merge as one
and together conquer death.
Darkness shrouds the sun as it dies,
draping the night in ebony.
But, she was too sleepy to rise,
and missed her date with destiny.
She woke to find there was no sun,
its light would never shine again.
And such things couldn't be undone,
despite her overwhelming pain.
She sent her magic to the sky,
but all the stars silently fell.
And alone, she began to cry,
like she'd opened the gates of Hell.
(Quatrain)
6/19/2015
Thistledown wus his name and sometimes he stung, well actually his stem stung. The stinkers gave him a bad name, they did! Handsome wus he. Aye, the ladies loved him. Coming near to his full bushy head of royal purple pomp, thought he smelled good too, they did, bees to his honey.
Summer time was his time, the time to bloom. His thorns served as fairy swords. An', on mass, he an' his guarded the fey's mound. Thistledown kept the cows from trampin' the wee ones. An' the cow plops from offendin' the Royal's wee noses. No hoof falls made treacherous the field's lay.
Suren, he wus sharp this fine boyo. He did 'ave a soft side, a sure sweetness. When fall's goddess Mordron* brought the chill down, he softened. Queen Mab* sent fey to catch his whitened crownin' glory, as each strand, a silken treasure, soft fell and so, Ole Thistle lost his head, for from his crown, and its down, wur made sheets of silken softness for the Tuatha De Danaan's* beds.
*Goddess Mordron/Welsh mythology, Modron ("divine mother")
* Queen Mab of the Fairy
* Tuatha De Danaan pre-Christian gods represented as heroes or fairies.
[Tribes of the goddess Dana]
His Velvet voice
Rusty growl
Gentle pauses caress the veiled swell
Her secret beneath a tailored vest
Radiant warmth spreads
thistledown
shuffles through the tunnels
to balance twixt her dancing fingertips
His breath
tucks a dalliance of warm air
a butterfly’s gasp
electric current peek a boos behind her fragile ear
(Pause)
His Breath
orchestrates a dazzling jazz duet of earlobe and heartstrings
(Pause)
Her Eyelids
gently shutter
her shy but weary countenance
Encase this memory, my darling,
Store it safely
well
beyond the reach of gossip’s grubby fingertips
and muddy maw.
Savor each harmonious heartbeat
Thrum with yellow birdsong
Accompany Divinity’s duet of dawn.
Feathery Love
Take to the wing—
Without a blush or backward glance.
V. Anderson-Throop 2015
Valdez, Alaska
Blowing up
On the thistledown tail
Dancing in grooves
Of Vulcans palm
Printed in a horses ear
Swimming in a fish's gills
Cleverly caught
To be spread on butterfly wings
Shouting, “I want the sun”
Til’ our buttress burned
In an atmospheric tumble
Down to a rotten oak stump
Swallowed by a spider
Who creeped into a castle
To spit me out
Onto a mousetrap of mirth
Finally freed
To be knighted
By the goddess of doom
Flicked on the rose garden
Hastily honored
From the tip of the royal thumb
Stomped under sauntered shoes
Of the blackfoot blues
So off I went
Only burgundy beside me
I believe I've had enough
Of this dime-store romance
On vaccinated vine street
There was an old woman, who lived in town,
She had seven cats, all of whom wore frowns,
When crimson butterflies left, each sundown,
Off to their sweet dreams, in the thistledown.
Much more fun to run in sun and green grass,
Then going to bed, with pearl moon, at last;
But, in puss dreams, butterflies made a splash,
They were all colors flying, while cats dashed!
Written on 2/22/2023
For: Nursery Rhyme Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Eve Roper
With fanciful thoughts swarming like locusts,
When my mind runs bizarre, I look for a quiet spot
To sit and jot them down, not bothering if they ring or rhyme
At times, like gurgling streams, so noisy, they flow.
Or like dew drops, gently moistening the grass,
They come and quietly settle, on the white surface.
Unable to be imprisoned within
The structured frame of a song,
My thoughts, at times, take wings and fly,
Like Aladdin’s magic carpet.
They carry me along to lands unknown
And regions never travelled!
As we fly, we watch from above the magic tapestry
Of sculptured rocks, green arcades and silvery streams
And lose in the beauty of this spinning globe,
So amazing to view
The ride being so pleasant, soon the elements dissolve
And time runs out.
I even forget, I do exist
Ascending higher and higher, with a rare lightness of being,
On wings so weightless, the world of truth fades completely out,
Until like a thistledown so weightless I float along with clouds,
Propelled by the buoyancy of the air.
Looking from those alien shores,
At times I catch a glimpse of Heaven,
Beyond the far rims of the horizon.
Then my soul leaps in such exquisite rapture
And my unuttered thoughts burst into a song!
Nov. 29.2022
2022 . Marathon Mile.26. Poetry Contest
Sponsor- Mark Toney
ON SEEING A BIRD FREQUENTING
A PERCH BEHIND MY WINDOW
Shot with grape dark beauty
Perches behind my window –
My love-
Hops to tickle my heart
Skims my dream to chariot
Making me speechless
With her raw silent crop.
With a burr of arrow-tail
She darts through my ears;
Light as thistledown
She roller-skates my vision
Black as coal full of steam
She drives my horizon.
She has no mobile to cheep
Yet more mobile
Than time and speech
She wrights an ornate spot
Like an evening green..
A few minutes’ gaze
At that winged vibes
Holier high than years of youth
Scathed by fire of lips.
The wild asses' rough hair
Similar to their diet of briars and thistledown
Kicking and braying and sit down
A wild donkey was he
Not understanding nor had sympathy
Much like the wild ass when he said,
"You do not realize that it is better for
you that one man die for the people
than that the whole nation perish."
Caiaphas one wild ass of a man...
He did not understand at all for
Christ's death brought Salvation
Redemption to all who believe..
By His death, all can come into
His Kingdom and have life eternal..
Scripture reference: John 11:49