Best Thrash About Poems
Pick a Title – Wild Is the Night – Sponsor: Edward Ibeh 1-9-25
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Wild Is the Night
Night wakes
In atonality of imploding infernos
Stretches,
Tossing matted tresses,
Throws off serene quilts
Of winter’s full golden moonlight
To thrash about with bare feet
On icy floors,
Tripping over the remains of dawn
Where shreds of crumpled thoughts,
Like shards of icy hailstones,
Claw at windowpanes
Clothed in nakedness.
Night shivers
As jumbled fangs of hunger
Rattle chimes and unbroken stares
When gusts of darkness ravage lullabies,
Gnaw on jawbones of savaged dreamscapes,
To race through hairpin curls of obsession
Night huddles
In tempests of dead ends,
Decorated by fixations,
By graffiti of the grotesque,
Where despair masquerades in cyclones of deception,
Storms of mania as solutions.
Whispers of wind driven earworms hatch,
Step in front of Heaven’s voice,
Cutting into Heaven’s heart
With blades of infected gales;
As the blood of angels stains doves
Anxiety floods in downpours
When the litany of the hours tosses and turns
In explosions of black noise;
Wild night paces in midnight,
Caught by scurrying tornedos,
Waiting
For the first light of resurrection.
Autumn leaves begin to mold;
as songbirds flee from the cold.
For Winter is on Her way;
clad in white, and feeling bold.
As night starts to eclipse day,
children go inside to play.
And when winter snows are nigh,
geese no longer wish to stay.
Fledgling birds must learn to fly,
before snowflakes dust the sky.
And thus escape Winter's freeze,
flying south as the leaves die.
Cold winds scatter fallen leaves;
strewn around the barren trees.
And rustic browns edged in gold
thrash about with each brisk breeze.
This door is closed
Feel free to scream and shout
No one hears you
Feel free to thrash about
Let it all out
I am sorry that it hurts
How could you not foresee
Your own destiny
Hold up a mirror
See your horror
And stop blaming me
Accept the stain
It will lessen the pain......
Bow your head to the Lord
An inner peace will be restored .....Feel Free....
We thrash about
in a pool of our bones
squirting ink into the eyes
of a million long-dead ghosts.
Beneath the blackness of our ink
we snip off the arms of our sanity
one by one by one... we slowly sink
into echoes of our snapping beak.
English sonnet
I'm way down here, once more ensnared in pits of my own choice
because I picked that shovel up, my shovel of revolt.
Lord, did you hear me thrash about, unmindful of Your voice,
when I began to tunnel down, the tunnel of a dolt?
Like Jonah long ago, I plunged and trouble follows me.
While in the deep, I find myself quite paralyzed by screams.
But when the dream is done, thank God, your eyes have helped me see.
Once I awake, Your light exposes foolish, willful schemes.
If I'd not made the journey down to worry, guilt and doubt,
I could not see Your advent bright in rays of morning sun,
I would not know Your upward pull and what You're all about -
forgiveness, grace, a clear, straight path. My nights of mourning gone.
When debt and darkness, fear and flight detain me in their sway
I pause awhile to recognize - the Truth, the Light, the Way.
Diane Perna
BURNT TEARS
I remember a tormented childhood with
Dad’s words laced with poison and Mom
tossed acid on my tears by saying no words
to stop it and even joined it.
I remember that even though I was a small
and frail child that didn’t stop them
these parents left me to thrash about life
with their painful insults.
I remember because my spirit was crushed
I wore an unmistakable frown
the wounds of my heart were inimitable too
as was the damage to my character.
I remember Mom laughing when I swallowed Clorox
and should’ve warned it wasn’t apple cider
what I was left with was swallowing burnt tears
and always wondered if anyone could tell.
I remember my sorrowfulness like
hot molten metal running over me but
I kept it locked up and bound because
I only found judgment that silenced me.
I remember pressing on through to another year,
month, week, day and minute with the blare in my
head of the brutal belittlement so evermore
I carry the memory of those burnt tears.
I hear the drums of my heart, loudly singing for my dreams to execute. I remember when I was little; ‘the greatest writer’ was my cadence. No, I haven’t forgotten my rhymes; I have just turned them to beatitudes. ‘Whoever is a hard worker will be the greatest writer’ am the commander of my dreams stomping heavily to lettering. Am by shank's pony a thousand speed per mile chucking in and out of the road. I remember when I once hurted my brain and lost my sanity; ohh I remember; How can forget? Everything was ambiguous with no future to reach the bastion. Although never recovered my lost wrecked pieces, but still hold to the stick of one day reuniting with my fellows. Life is a thrash about that I can attest. Sometime pinned to a cold yet rained on the slippery road. You might have sighted the grey clouds, started a marathon but you still lost the chase, at times you never saw it coming, you’re chicken poured with nobody to umbrella you. Life is like that, at times you lose, at times you break the record. Life is what you make it. Everybody tears down at times, but it’s how you feed the fears that counts. In most of the frozen falls you will stand alone, in the summer a thousand flies will flock your way. Life is all lessons don’t worry about the seasonal labels. Someday I will be at the peak with many beaks screeching my forename. Maybe am still the uncrown queen but someday princess of the playwright will be my designate. I can bet my blueprint will never say goodbye as it always lighting as the day, a souvenir that can’t go away. Now still a shadow searching for my right frame, neither a sinner to contain dozens of all this hope. Before a thousand crescents change their fate, I can bet I would have already revolutionized my state, that’s the least just wait and spot ‘the supreme authoress of the planet’ fitting my cranium.
Silently you watch me suffer
My cries for help unanswered
I thrash about in my pain
Driven insane by….
The Silence
“She will survive.
She will rise.”
You comfort yourself with these words
Sure that you will not be summoned
To attend a funeral
Ah, there is truth in that
You WILL not be summoned
For there are no attendees
At the funeral
Of a soul
A heart
A dream
Of Love
…….Silence……
The thrashing and moaning lessen
Time passes
The silence... d
e
e
p
e
n
s
You breathe a sigh of relief
It is over
And yet
The silence is broken
Something keeps playing in your mind
Music
Notes
Sorrowful wailing sounds
You cannot block out
It is the requiem
A dirge for my dead heart
Thoughts resurrect
A love still burns
Finally…
You come to search
To find
To verify...
S....i....l....e....n...c....e
Dead hearts don’t speak
You missed the funeral
And the burial
Now….
Do not disturb
My resting place
Yes, stand there
Stand still
With bowed head
Listen…..listen to the silence
A silence matching
The silence
Of your own dead heart
Listen....Listen to
THE SILENCE
Eileen Manassian Ghali
Rushing through the forest,
Scratching vines tearing at our all overs,
Tangled up in glorious torment, together
Tiny clearing for a spell,
It's all very well, but what about
The journey back? Suddenly lost and
Fearful, you stumble ahead whilst
I am caught breathless in the brambles,
You trip, foot catches hold of
A stray bramble branch, but
Instead of stepping carefully out,
You kick desperately, I feel a tug,
Twisting, trying to shake it free,
I scream, your panic piercing me,
Frantically you thrash about, the
Sharpest part tightens round my heart
Too deep, no tears, last shaking
Jolts as you break free, and run as
Fast as I am bound, dismantled forest strewn around,
Thorns snap off, embedded in my all,
As lone and foolishly I fall.
No snow, no moon, no fireflies
Just a mist on the forest floor
Untrodden, unspoken, unlightened
no telling of what's in store
A click of a branch behind me
A rustle in the trees up above
My feet no longer comply now
For i hear things never spoken of
I'm stuck in the same position
I have been for quite a while
When I finally gain strength to move
I am greeted by a bloody smile
I scream, but the scream is muffled
by a cold mist encasing me
It probes me, and I'm left violated
My neck in a noose by a tree
A voice, so vomit-provoking
Speaks to my unwilling ears
I feel shivers of cold run through me
heightening all my fears
Suddenly, In the woods, it is quiet
And the noose on my neck is tight
Another sound comes from above me
But there's nothing but darkness in sight
It's tighter, still tighter, and tighter
And it is slowly lifted up
An alarming odor hits my nostrils
And I see the white of the death cup
I fail to breathe- I'm choking
As I thrash about everywhere
The last thing I see, Is nothing at all
But the last I hear is laughter in the air
I thought of a moment when I came close to being lost and alone, and combined it with everything I knew of fright. I truly felt like I was alone in a forbidden wood, about to die.
In no real sense is he alive:
a wind-up toy, personified.
A message bundled with a drive,
he neither eats or can divide.
Two hundred million like himself,
each one distinct, yet all the same.
Possessed of vast genetic wealth,
new life’s potential in this frame.
Like pointing north, returning home,
he has no eyes to guide his flight.
A haploid on a beacon honed,
attractive forces are his sight.
A mitochondr’al battery
will keep him till it runs its course.
For five days, if it matters, he
is driven by an unknown force.
That is to say, unknown to him:
the enzyme, ABHD2,
creates the urge to swim and swim;
there’s nothing else that he can do.
And swim he does! Five body lengths
traversed before a second’s passed.
If salmon-sized, this feat of strength
is fourteen miles per hour; that’s fast!
And not just fast, but also far;
a mile or two would be the rule,
approximate, but close, on par,
for swimmers swimming in a pool.
And now we know he does not flail
or thrash about while in the water;
a corkscrew does his path entail,
much like an eel or playful otter.
The journey’s end, target in sight,
the bodies littered all around.
A chemical and wondrous light,
a flash from zinc when they are bound.
It seems two things come with this flash:
the door is closed, he’s merged herein.
He does not care; his merry dash
fulfills the goal: new life begins.
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for the 2022 Poetry Marathon Mile 21 Poetry Contest
sponsored by Mark Toney
written 05/14/2022
Patchwork Musings
Vying for order
This square
That corner
One's center
These squared-off life experiences
Know well jockeying for position
Is fraught with chance
Disappointment
Acceptance
The waking state knows
Nothing resolves naturally
No stitch in one's original design
Arrives at needle's focus point
Matching perfectly the original intent
Red threads
Clash with its attracted yellow
Black outs white
One's colors
Opting to make permanent
That square
Or the next
Find unraveling threads
But a question of time
Permanence better hung
On the wall of one's imagination
Still
We hope
Will our dream impressions
Be nestled beneath chin
Or atop restless feet
Where nightmare's fragilities
Thrash about
Disturbing tucked images
That lovingly comfort
Dream's Neverland
So long
This task of bringing together
The peach trees of youth
Nestling next to briar bushes of adolescence
Awaiting adulthood's gnarled disappointments
One's patchwork cover
Taken every night to bed
Merely wants the blanky of security
Insuring a safe slumber
Until tomorrow
Where more patches await
Your vibrant smile
haunts me every now and then
Sashaying strut like a peacock
is how I remember you
How come I recall only good things about you?
In my present condition,
I'm morbidly disaffected
Clear blue skies look to be dull grayish
In my pond of friends,
I thrash about like a dying goldfish
Ever since we split,
we remain a gossip item
The loss of your personal connection
has filled me with such disaffection
I loathe sleep,
being awake zombies me
Trundling off to work each day
in a coal miner way
So dark,
deep down in the tunnel
of my heart
Three weeks without a shave,
hollow nights of delta blues lullabies
in a den of flashing neon lights
Disaffection
has taken hold of me
Remembering your last words;
they rattle around in my head,
trapped in the throes of misery
While I sit here, distraught and destroyed,
while I thrash about, weeping for all that we were,
while memories make my eyes overflow with unending tears,
do you even bat an eyelash at the past?
While I walk alone, on this lonely, clouded path,
while I rail against this fate, forever missing you,
while here I remain, mired in misery and woe,
do you ever regret even one thing?
While I've spent just over six months drifting,
while I've spent them confused and weary,
while they've ripped me open, torn me down,
have you even once missed what we had?
While I've been wishing, pleading to forget,
while I've been wanting nothing but to be gone from this,
while I've been defying myself by yet loving you,
have you even once had a feeling for me?
Once, our lives were so linked,
and I never would have had to ask this;
I knew what was going on in your life,
what made you smile, what made you cry.
But now, all that's seemingly forever changed –
apart we live, and apart we stay;
I miss you, in every possible way,
and I just have to know.
What has been happening, inside your head
and inside your heart, while we've been apart?
What has the universe done to you or for you,
while it's been eating me alive?
I may never know, the answers to my questions,
I may never again touch the magic that you are;
I will never again be the man that I once was,
but I pray I won't stay this mess that I have been.
Besotted, beguiled, bewitched,
I walked outwitted and benumbed
into her web of love willingly.
She stared at me like
a black widow sizing up her prey.
What draws a moth
to flirt with the flame
or a nimblest fish
to bite the deceitful bait?
What lures a fawn
to step on the snare?
What heavenly bliss do
fools in love seek to attain?
As the moth
singes in the flame
and brings not its wings
to steer away
Nor the feisty fawn
set itself free
try as it may,
So does he
who’s smitten with love
to wiggle and thrash about
like the foolish fish
until his last breath!
He who dallies with a maiden
With rue his heart is soon laden,
Dabble not with this flame of love--
A firestorm from the heavens above.
Slip away, oh, slip away
at the first light of day!
~Form: 3 Freedom