Best Trudge Poems
"Jesus Born in a lowly stable, a symbol of forsakenness became the redeemer of the whole world. It doesn't count how poor has been our birth. What matters is who we finally are or what we become"- By Poet
On a bleak and frosty night
Vexed and weary two travelers rode
Along the pathways-craggy and ragged
From Nazareth, trudging miles on end
Full pregnant, was she with child
Mary -the Virgin, suffused with Spirit Holy
Divinely ordained to bear the Godly Prince
Conceived before, she had known her spouse.
Abiding in Heaven’s Providence n’ care
They had rode past miles behind
Far too fatigued by the trip
Mary, now badly needed a place to rest.
Heading towards the blinking lights
Not far from the city’s guarded gate
Joseph sighted a tavern-small
Perched high on a tiny hill
A sense of relief beamed past
They have come at last to the journey’s end
Finally found a place to rest!
An interim home away from home
Tethering the donkey outside the gate
Joseph helped Mary alight the brute
In eager search, he hurried inside
With Mary, following with faltering steps.
But the couple, to their dismay found
Within the tavern, room, there was none
For many a man had gathered round
To halt there on that freezing night
Sundry folk from surrounding lands
Had reached Bethlehem for the yearly census
Tradesmen selling clothes and cheese
Nomads of varying clans and clime
Petulant camels, braying donkeys
The place was littered with man and beast.
The tavern small, so packed to full
Had no more space to harbor the crowd
Mary and Joseph, though dejected,
Were encamped within a manger- warm
With tender concern, Joseph joked,
To ease the strain on Mary’s face
“Gaze upon this palace of gold
Where a son shall soon be born to us”!
Mary smiled a gentle smile,
Humored by her husband’s jest
Under the gaze of tethered hosts
In veiled privacy of the midnight gloom
She gave birth to a radiant child,
The great Redeemer to all Mankind
The star studded sky suddenly glowed
With a rare brilliance never beheld
And a celestial voice trailed along
Delivering ‘tidings of joy’ to the globe around
20, December 2021
Nativity New poems Poetry Contest
Sponsor- Eve Roper
Resubmitted for Old Christmas Poetry Contest
Sponsor- Constance La France
Harsh tunes of blending sorrows
Bursts from my heart with delirious bellows
Oh! Pray I shan't be turned out
When to God, my heart I open in and out.
For I have seen the other coin in pain
And returned and desire with the world to be twain.
What groove I moved to be tested and proved
By those who my heart later reproved
And the heavy weight I pulled
When vigorously the lead of sin I dragged.
Oh! That thou wouldst forgive
And grant me that which I cannot achieve
Salvation, the greatest freedom from the world
Even as I heed and obey your Word.
The mind is a traveller,
on an earnest quest apart,
link road to the innermost,
signpost for bold hunch,
meaning is a hazy sky,
lay-by as mere pause,
quietly we trudge in tight bands,
but never wonder why?
time doesn’t play that well,
showing few if any paths,
language can be strained,
notions, slants, angles, terms,
tangled oxymoron at risk,
stifling broad consensus,
world weary air a plague,
night shift, day shift,
life belt for the toiler,
spoken in camp phrases,
that spur to vocal fringe,
who might alter vacuums,
now passively endured
Monday, our hearts were hefty with dread.
Hoping postman fetches bucks for bread.
It will cape with the psyche's desires well.
Under a grasp, swirling, we felt the spell.
Tuesday would alter prompts the shame.
We may gaze at how they weave the tame.
Critics condemn this real issues speed.
A halcyon act can only atone for an evil deed.
Wednesday is a day of wait, wilt, and fade.
The days run crazy till buried and ruined.
The note on the front door says no more.
The homeless were not a packed store.
Thursday's rain taunts those who work gleefully.
Its fleeting pleasures continue to be costly.
Firms show their devotion to their service.
While sweat-soaked hands act as a safety device
The Friday treatment is just ephemeral.
The weekend issue covers the workday as well.
No fish, no dish, no lush gems, no taste.
A hoodlums exit is short and should haste.
Saturday dream topic is a sweet relief.
No one's ever won the lotto in alter his life.
From a mindset of misery to one of saving.
No quaint will be there by day's ending.
Bill payment and relax are served on Sunday.
Ignored and rigid to others, alike a decay
People accept forgiveness with confidence.
No apology or remorse for the appearance.
Daily facts involve stress, sorrow, and deceit.
All are outcomes that may arise in the present.
It is fundamental to have a daily routine.
As a particular version, no blooming is seen.
Written: August 1st, 2021
A Brian Strand Your Choice Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Brian Strand
Without half-hissed complaint he trudged on
Through many heat-crimsoned sands of fate, Humming sadly uncheering anthems to ease
Countless tripping odds that beset their mate.
Over slowing mounds snow-capped with chill,
He labored on across freezing heights and hill;
Yet not even beyond the homely horizon ahead
Did he espy the rest sought with a biting dread.
Faithful to the ideals in gallant soldiers' creed,
He strove on with unyielding energies and gut;
Equipped with nothing but the reassuring hope
That morn dawn's when all night's terrors shut.
Creepy trails in eerie woods eternize his walks
Into odd lands where spookiest serenity stalks.
Echoing cries devoid of soothing tears well say
Just what awful ills he saw in life's testing way.
Long trek on lone paths with gloom overcast,
Carries on oblivious of all grisly oddities past.
ALWAYS. ********
Understand. I MUST go
On these clearing acts of
Instinct and inspiration, these flashings
As they come. For a blizzard has
Been moving in and the snow is
Piling up by the foot...So the doors
Must be kept cleared. The temperatures are
Not rising. The storm pounds in
From the west, but I part the curtains awaiting
The sun to gleam up from the east. These
Enemies — oppression and fear — have come
Disguised as beautifully rising white drifts,
Satisfied that I will drowse by the window
As snow turns the entire landscape into silence.
Understand! Encroaching dark shadows are easier
To overcome, for they reach forward bringing
A dis-ease that I must fight and know
They will tremble upon my call to Jesus.
But, this massive blizzard is a masked, deceitful
Effort of death to try my will to live
And act upon what remains to me:
Instinct and inspiration, as born within me.
In the ‘70’s, in Chicago I survived a massive dropping
Of snow over days of falling. Snow was
Shoveled and packed into chest-high,
Undulating routes to trudge as a necessary
Innovation for sidewalks. Once, I stood at
A stoplight on a mound higher than my height.
That was practice in preface for now. See!
All things have their meanings. All things.
I am confirmed. I will shovel
Out from this blizzard with prayer and poetry
And love...I must. I must.
Thanks be to God!
***************************************
(C) sally young Eslinger8/24/2020
I have a cobble stone weighing down my heart
Into the dark alleys and abbsies of lethal despair
Where i am scared and afraid that
I will be lost in the jungles of fear
With nothing to retrace my footprints
To where my soul is familiar and steady
Where i can dance in the dusty rains
And in ghastly winds with my eyes wide shut
And where worry isn't my everyday neighbour
But all that are dreams that sweep my mind
like a mist on an overcast night that disappear by day break
only to return as the night falls
To torment me with ghostly haunts of hope
I keep sinking deep into a darkening hole of worry
Hanging on a thin rope of hope
That keep thinning as i slide
Right down into the depth of helplessness
Where my hands turn into shadows that have no grip
My legs into thin pudding that cant take a step
And my thoughts scattered like small clouds that cant gather rain
My faith fading away like the sound of a passing drone