Best Uncoiled Poems
PROLOGUE
The Flame, aflicker, licks and flays,
illuming evening’s negligees
With braided curls she swirls and sways,
and flits and floats in light ballets
APOLOGUE
A Flame, to conquer creeping fog,
flew dancing towards a random log
Her flight perplexed a leery frog
beside a silent somber bog
The Flame, a ripple, all alone
alit on leaves where birds had flown
The aching twigs began to moan
A rising breeze began to groan
The Flame arrayed an ancient oak
with torrid tongues and veils of smoke
A beaver bailed, the dam had broke
The leery frog soon ceased to croak
The Flame uncoiled and lashed midair,
consuming crowns with utmost care
A crazed coyote fled her lair,
left in the lurch bewildered bear
The Flame, unfurled, went wild and grew,
enkindled cats and caribou
Remaining... not a residue,
as reeking vapors bade adieu
The Flame revealed her strength unshackled
Flora, fauna crisped and crackled
Fire Witches clucked and cackled
One more forest stripped, then hackled
EPILOGUE
The arsonists were well aware
the Flame would travel everywhere
The weirs are gone, the land is bare,
and soon you’ll find a city there
From outfield judging eyes await your plight,
though sweat and stupor feign to your ruin.
Now pull up your trousers, cinch your belt tight...
glaring down from mound, pitch straight and proven.
Blurred ball unleashed, pitcher's swift arm uncoiled...
tho' bat be av'rage, the batter may not.
Cauldron-like blood boiled, fever'd swing loyal,
now away to skies, all eyes on prized swat.
Faithfully she watched from merciful stands,
clouds roll away from fancy, fated rush.
His chance to meet life, alone in her hands,
though startled by a bat's powerful crush.
Will you strike true in life's bewilder'g plan,
carried on shoulders of heavenly fans?
I am being told to let go
By almost everyone I know
Release, let it out, let it be
Plunge into passivity
While I cling to bitter beauty
My bruises bloom a thorny tree
Guarding roses of agony
This pain is mine, it belongs to me
My torment is my blood, it breathes
with every breath, it beats with my heartbeats
Within my tears, it weeps
It shrieks, uncoiled, beneath my skin
Where the sin of suffering begins
It is my fertile fury, my hellish choir
My savage soul, my cathartic fire
It is large and lush and livid
Conquering and vivid
It is too precious, too valuable, to trade away or wallow
in trinkets, or flimsy platitudes, or empty cliches, or hollow
promises of unfulfilling fortresses to follow
Their learned words I dare spurn
For to recover, I must burn
So I will keep it, for I know its worth,
even if their unsolicited, unwarranted, intrusive,
Questioning and questionable, inconclusive
Unadvised advisors do not grant it girth
It is here I find
What I want most
Where rage of kindness blinds
My grieving ghosts.
06/06/20
Entered in 'N/A Rerun 7'
1st Place
A slow red sun cut through the soft gray sky,
To warm my eyes with layered painted light.
Birds shadows glide on the wind's goodbye.
Their fragile wings carry them from the night.
Day's end changes coats as night creatures sing,
To bring harmonies to the ear's delight.
Night's dim stars appear like an uncoiled string.
The dark cloth of time envelops twilight,
To end the sunlight's quiet turning spool,
As I watch in awe of this changing scene,
I find my silent presence minuscule,
Only my whispered thanks will intervene.
This moonlit cathedral with rising face,
Has ended this day, it has been replaced.
written 12/4/14
Duchess, Kate Middleton
Fiddled with The Royal Son
Fate uncoiled a jovial consequence...
A nation awaits with loyal suspense!!
_______________________
7/9/13 for Heather's Contest
Redemption
She slowly uncoiled her gray streaked hair that fell to her waist. She removed her
spectacles to see more clearly the windswept icy snow clinging to the branches. A
pause, settling something deep within; then her gaze shifted to me.
I reached out, but found my reach was frozen, too stiff to touch her. For if I touched
her, the burden we shared would lapse and slide away, slinking off to be buried,
uncoiled under the ground.
A pinched, dour expression settled her features into a mask that would never
betray the inner darkness which created a shadow of an existence. A mask that I
must wear as well, to ward off the hopeless life within me, growing every moment of
the day, days upon days retreating into the too long nights, hopeless to survive in
the world we have created, together as “want” and “ruthlessness”.
“I carry no idolatries, no false hope.” A breath are these words as I receive them,
knowing they are too bold to give forth a safe humility.
The nurse, starched clothing as stiff as her countenance, paused, a look of
condemnation briefly shadowing her face, the sun passing in and out of the clouds.
She could not help herself. No matter the role we are chosen to play in this world,
we are not free of a deeply flawed human nature, ice softening dangerously on a
winter’s pond. I turned away.
I came to hours later, the rejected life in me gone, a searing through flesh never
immune to a free will taunting, tearing the fabric of life so fragile. I would not cling. A
passing briefly witnessed, a single brown leaf blown by the window in the darkened
room where we sit for tea, hopes slowly elapsing like the sea waters
receding.
Tomorrow we can only envision; today we must let go of a part of us we will never
again possess. A coursing through the veins of life no more, we push, and push, an
existence wishing to sink into the yawning chasm of what is unknown and coming
for us.
I am being told to let go
By almost everyone I know
Release, let it out, let it be
Plunge into passivity
While I howl to bitter beauty
My bruises bloom a thorny tree
Guarding roses of agony
My pain is mine, it belongs to me
This torment is my blood, it breathes
with every breath, it beats with my heartbeats
Within my tears, it weeps
It shrieks, uncoiled, beneath my skin
Where the sin of suffering begins
It is my fertile fury, my hellish choir
My savage soul, my cathartic fire
It is large and lush and livid
Conquering and vivid
It is too precious, too valuable, to trade away or wallow
in trinkets, or flimsy platitudes, or empty cliches, or hollow
promises of unfulfilling fortresses to follow
Their learned words I dare spurn
For to recover, I must burn
So I will keep this, for I know its worth,
even if their unsolicited, unwarranted, intrusive,
Questioning and questionable, inconclusive
Unadvised advisors do not grant it girth
It is in my pain I find
What I wish most
Where rage of kindness blinds
My grieving ghosts.
5/20/18
As I walked through a meadow singing a song,
I heard a hissing voice say, "Hello. Come along."
It came from beneath a patch of thorny weeds,
whispered, "Are you one of those good seeds?"
I feared the snake would strike from coiled position,
but it seemed to be waiting for my admission.
There was a fiery light burning in its beady eyes,
as distant thunder rumbled in graying skies.
I dared not let the reptile know the fear I felt within
so, I answered the snake, with gold glistening skin.
"I don't think of myself as a righteous good seed.
but I do my best to perform many a helpful deed."
"What of you, snake? What is it that you like to do?
Tell me why many people are always afraid of you."
He flicked his tongue to catch the scent of me,
took some time before replying, then he did decree:
"Snakes like me have always been misunderstood."
Then he rose up higher and the cobra fanned his hood.
"We're called "Lords of Evil," but we're merely snakes.
Some of us are poisonous, but for goodness sakes,
many of us do good things on the land of Mother Earth.
Shouldn't that mean that we have a measure of worth?"
He uncoiled and slithered under an apple tree's shade.
I should've walked away, but couldn't, so I stayed.
My mind was overflowing with things I wanted to query.
He beckoned me to come nearer, but I remained wary.
"Do not fear me for I'll not sink my fangs in you, child.
I'm sick and tired of snakes being slandered and reviled.
We're thought of as devils and demons from Satan's lair,
beheaded and killed for no reason, and that's not fair."
I listened to its complaints and with him I had to agree.
Snakes always get a bad rap. Not all of them are beastly.
Suddenly, he stopped talking, and I thought he was asleep
until he opened one eye, asking if his secret I would keep.
"I won't tell anyone about the conversation we just had,
and promise to spread the word that not all snakes are bad."
I feel the tinge of a windblown face
And set my sails to open space
Leave behind my shadowed sorrow
To explore wind-fed days of tomorrow
I'll find direction from the wind
Let it guide and not rescind
It's pushing force that moves me on
To await the light of every dawn
And seek life's measure far beyond
These churning waves I sail upon
Horizon's thread I'm sure to reach
From tethered sails, I do beseech
There I'll find a life unspoiled
To be free, to be uncoiled
And feel the sun upon my chin
Always turn to face the blowing wind
8/24/17
The Dilettante Diaries: "Open Door Barefoot"
Open door to closed room
Ceiling smashed
Stars in a very clear sky
Fresh air
taken into lungs
Risen
from
the
Lake of None
Arrival of White Doves
Broken glass, careful where you step
Barefoot Bleeds Love
(Lovejoy-Burton/October 2018)
for my daughter, Georgia
"THAT crazed girl improvising her music. Her poetry, dancing upon the shore, Her soul in division from itself Climbing, falling She knew not where, Hiding amid the cargo of a steamship, Her knee-cap broken, that girl I declare A beautiful lofty thing, or a thing Heroically lost, heroically found."
The Poet Pleads with the Elementals
THE Powers whose name and shape no living creature knows
Have pulled the Immortal Rose;
And though the Seven Lights bowed in their dance and wept,
The Polar Dragon slept,
His heavy rings uncoiled from glimmering deep to deep:
When will he wake from sleep?
Great Powers of falling wave and wind and windy fire,
With your harmonious choir
Encircle her I love and sing her into peace,
That my old care may cease;
Unfold your flaming wings and cover out of sight
The nets of day and night.
Dim powers of drowsy thought, let her no longer be
Like the pale cup of the sea,
When winds have gathered and sun and moon burned dim
Above its cloudy rim;
But let a gentle silence wrought with music flow
Whither her footsteps go.
(William Butler Yeats)
"Fly On" /Coldplay
https://youtu.be/qtooMN9QZKw
A breath of fresh air, after the table was cleared
we had poured ourselves, one last sip of wine
We marveled a bit over the dip of the sun
An interlude, before the tint had resigned
to the gun-metal gray, and a time to reside
Our solitude broken and it changed on a dime
Unprepared for the guest, which came in a flash
A gash cut by lightning lit up through the dust
without even hinting, as flint hit the stone
A grumbling sky, turned the blush trembling cold
A roar of the wind, where a beast could be heard
all that was peaceful, became quite disturbed
Over rolls of the hills, it stalked like a cat
a monster, of clouds, on gray bobcat feet
with lynx-like eyes, and with billowing fur
that spurned tranquil eyes, on the softer retreat
A fierce witch's brew, uncoiled with wrath
with wind from the breast of sage and the dunes
Gliding in from the fields, to rage and to seize
where pillars and posts would snap, just to please
Eerie sounds whistled through the long window sills
The peace no longer held calm or a still
Angry whips with each breath, cracking fearsome with sound
Pounding with rain, gnashing teeth, with each round
Shingles turned loose to mingle with limbs
The thunder, was plundering, and peeling the plains
Rain gushing down, forging new creeks
pushing fast rivulets and forging new steel
We wait until the wrath has spent all it's worth
With gusto, and grit, .... until a last final vent
A tantrum with wiles, till the cat takes a bow
The monster has gone, to climb to the hills
_____________________________________________
For P.D.'s Contest: "Epic Sightings"
Picture #2
The Nefarios Scream
Camping in isolated lands of parks and creeks
Untold experiences of adventurous beauty
Nefarious acts eclipse joys of freedom
Blowing up cars to bar any escape
Tents knifed through in the darkness of the night
Wakening frightened sleepy eyed tourists
Throats slit of those who rebel and abuse
Serial killer chases the gutsy that escaped
Muffle the defiant eye to jab out screams
Clanging chains, barrelled guns, hammers et al
Adorn his barricaded blood stained dungeons
Adventures in foreign land turn uglier than nightmares
Destinations of destined stumbled into zones horrific
Families and lovers pine with unrequited inquiries
Investigators baffled over the ambiguous maniac
Who finger by finger tortured the life out of tourists
Exulting over his power of creating a world of zombies
A bomb he carried to blow up the next tourist van
Helpless travellers plea's rippled his blood
Slow and steady steps he came closer to van
An unseen rattler uncoiled rattling his next step
Hissing his breath away in the loudest scream
Balveen Cheema
September 20, 2015
Contest: The Dark and Twisted
Sponsor: Nathan D
I'm
Bronco Don visits….
A cancer took my father away,
The smokers curse he had to pay,
But he returns, we hear him still,
When he pulls my big toe,
With subtle skill,
As he did when I was little,
“Come on boy up you get,”
In dream we are horse riding yet,
Left handed holes in the Coolabahs set,
Where the Cubbie tribe got bird eggs,
The latch behind the door did flog,
It woke me up from sleep, agog,
I asked what is it mate
“ring your mother she is upset”
so I phoned little Nelly then,
she was tortured in her mind,
so we talked for an hour, when?
2 am the bloody time,
and back to sleep again,
just a sitting in my chair,
a tug on hand I felt it there,
the voice it came “come with me”
white ants, bubbled paint I did see,
in my purple room the termite tracks,
renovations for the slack?
not me,
The smell of smoke the uncoiled whip,
When he is around the ether slips,
Cecily took a photo of the wall,
A face appeared looking part of it all,
Like a painted mask it fits,
Bronco Don does visit,
As time and space recalls,
It…..
Don Johnson
yes the old veil slips between n betwixt,
where souls have cause to wonder,
old friends reach back ,
through soft veil cracks,
like Bronco Don down-under....
Bullwhip Bob settled in the cafe
and ordered fried spuds and beef.
A railroad man in Bingham’s Town,
he came here each noon to eat.
He’d gotten his name not for his job,
but because each and every day,
he went about his job with a whip
coiled high up upon his waist.
Nobody had ever seen it used,
but the message it sent was clear,
luckily Bob was the amiable type
with little need to inspire fear.
But behind him there rose a ruckus
out in the town’s only street,
Geena was chasing Big Tom Roth,
accusing him of dastardly deeds.
“You stole my money for medicine!”
Geena cried out in despair.
“My sister’s sick, your heatless thug,
stop walking and give it here!”
Big Tom did stop, and hollered at her:
“Back off it you value your life!
I ain’t got nothing to give to you
except for this here knife!”
Bob frowned, stepped to the street
and uncoiled his long whip.
His heart pounded in his chest,
he said,”Bob, that’s enough of this!”
Tom had twenty pounds on Bob,
but fear came to his eyes.
He took one look at the long whip,
then dug a pocket on his side.
He removed a pouch of coins
and tossed it on the ground,
then he stormed off grumbling,
stomping his way out of town.
Geena picked up her coin-pouch,
and kissed Bob on the cheek,
Bob went red because on Geena
he had always been sweet.
She hurried off as Bob slowly
coiled the whip up on his belt,
hoping against greatest hopes
that she knew how he felt.
He’d put himself at risk for her,
he’d done what he felt right.
He didn’t want to image if Bob
had chosen to start a fight.
For though he carried the great whip,
to look all intimidating,
he didn’t have the slightest idea
how to use the gol-darn’d thing.
A nonchalant paw hangs, eye’s shut, ears open
My sentimental pretence maintains your interest
You do not know my cruelty, my brutality, my malice
Your sustaining hand is safe…for now
Lithe shoulders slink in alternate motion
Unblinking, gyroscopic saucer eyes bore into my target
Locked on, committed, beyond recall, the safety is off
A spring now uncoiled, scribes an arc, sudden death from above
I gaze through you, aloof and unimpressed
A carefree yawn, a stretch then, back to murderous fantasy
Surgically sharp, speed and precision is my marque
I am death, the consummate killer…Oh, my name?
…It’s Tiddles