Best Uncoupled Poems
Last night's storm
has left its artwork on the beach,
a postmodernist exhibition
of brown seaweed strewn in clumps
like hair on a barbershop floor,
broken seashells
and a fallen rainbow of plastics
strung out along the shore
where now an exhausted sea
licks the leftovers of a meal.
Chaos has been distilled down
to washed up artifacts
and red bottle caps, drinking straws
and spoons buried deep inside a ball
of yellow twine. I cannot make
much sense of what is on display
or glean from this haphazard art
a hint of meaning
other than in its making.
All seems uncoupled, specimens
torn from lonely souls, bits
and pieces coughed up
out of the exhaust of a huge machine
whose pistons pump and drive
a spinning wheel that has no purpose.
I pick up a plastic sandal
and wonder whose foot
it once belonged to, then put it back
and walk home
alone.
Where has the romance gone
moonlit nights kissing 'til dawn
Where fled the tenderness
from our love once so strong
Where are the conversations
that used to matter so much
Where are the magic moments
when our fingertips touched
Where are the sparks that flew
from our hearts to our minds
Who uncoupled our souls ~
the ties of caring that bind
Have you ever heard the cry of the broken hearted?
Whose heart bleeds as it pleads as a result to losing, the one girl, he needs
Humble your heart and mind and access with empathy; well enough to perceive it clearly
I must warn you, it’ll be the worst cry you’ll ever hear, because it’s awfully too near to fear
Like how raindrops can replace your tears’ flowing outwardly from the inside
Falling like thunder-hunted by a lightning spear, shredding your thoughts to wander
As to what reality will be like to a dreamer, who cannot sleep; as he weeps and leaps?
Chasing memories which doesn’t exist coz’ he cannot resist but he persist on insisting, anyway
Whereas his heart plays jaggedly with the cards of sorrow, one bluff-it’s goodbye tomorrow
He bellows… like a rollercoaster ride, knowing, it’ll come again and again, turning boys to men
Turning strong men weak and feeble men weaker-all because he tried again, to seek her
All because he thought he needs her-He truly believes and grieves like thieves
Stealing time that was never his to reminisce inside a kiss only to see it spun onto this
Where his world gets weary as his eyes get teary watching the past unfolds to less than a theory
I digress, hoping that it’ll all be over in one second or less, unless, all, is but a test
I digress from digressing further, because everything’s a blur-like a nightmare slurring
He confuses me, when he talks about me as “I to a he” to a muse as though he too has lost his shoes
My head’s spinning-trying to find the right words to a song; a right place to belong
I’ve gone and reached ahead while the unknown future still trapped in my bed; unwed from reality
Uncoupled from normality where the only exception to the rule was to cry and so I play the fool
He cries as I cry, sending our “goodbyes” to the sky, trusting that one day, I will get to fly
As for now, I’ll embrace the pain with a little bit of salt and let it settle inside my private vault
Where all my promises and wishes and dreams can come true, and while I’m there… I’ll think of you
by: Wilbert Evangelista Dela CRuz
Tanka
Folk Heads Down in Flocks
waders stoop heads down
feeding uncoupled in flock.
like texters bowing
heads down to worship screen folk
disengaged with here and now
Heads Down, Engaged to Screen, Remote
Like waders at dawn sifting mud
with heads-down stance,
Modern folk in flocks with heads down, peer at screens
With thumbs a-tapping, eyes engaged
with friends on screen remote
But what of the here and now?
Those poor folk you are with, are ostracised,
displaced by 'You've got mail',
subplanted by there and then.
It is worrying how screen worship
has become such a priority.
It is infectuous when others all around you do it.
Interuptions to conversations now an accepted interlude,
not seen to be rude, when message calls
with bongs and rings,
demand heads-down bowing stoop
to worship screens.
Remembered the 1940s, the season of the holocaust.
Six million irons, disjointed from their ores
Were forged in bottomless pits of anvils.
The swarming bees in a ceremonious buzzing
Were uncoupled from their hives through Reichsbahn.
However, a tensed, stale wind of discord swivel
On the creeks of Dachau, Auschwitz, Treblinka
And other shores of darkness.
Never shall the bloody sky efface again
The innocent faces of seedlings in chains
Suddenly transformed into smoke under a silent sky.
For not four thousand micrographic scrolls
Of antique Pharaoh, hieroglyphics could symbolize
The petrifying carrions glutted by black vultures.
Two rivers parted by mountainous fiend
In no time of twilight
Laid eyes into the seas.
Two branches glued to tree trunks
Would in a bit of an eyelid
See those white balloons.
The mockingbird is set among the pigeons
And doors of golden rainbows
Crept in the fog.
Everywhere, the white dove’s skull
Is at the bottom of the picture
While the frogs and wasps play their lyres.
But, the wild hyacinths grew among Linden
The lion; among hummingbirds
With every twist, Lynx's eyes.
He put ten years on her eyes in a single morning.
He didn’t do much to her except walk away.
He never raised a hand and he never raised too damned much money.
But he left her fifty-per cent of his final pay.
She’s holding two jobs and she’s holding her little heart together
The children make their own beds and breakfast, too.
The women’s magazines provide advice—and coupons.
And her Mama and her sister drop by, to see her through.
There’s no hard feelings, they’re the best of friends, still.
He takes the children on Sunday afternoon.
She’s liberated from love, she’s her own person.
And no one sees her cry except the moon.
She’s taking two classes down at the local college,
A book-keeping course and volleyball 101.
She’s twenty-eight, she’s changed her hair, she’s jogging!
And her friends down at work say her life has just begun!
But you know, fifty-per cent of the American dreams get broken.
One-half of the brides and grooms pay lawyer’s fees.
And fifty-per cent of the couples are coming uncoupled.
But the precise percentage of tears nobody sees.
He put ten years on her eyes in a single morning.
He didn’t do much to her except walk away.
He never raised a hand and he never raised too damned much money.
But he left her fifty-per cent of his final pay.
She’s holding two jobs and she’s holding her little heart together
The children make their own beds and breakfast, too.
The women’s magazines provide advice—and coupons.
And her Mama and her sister drop by, to see her through.
There’s no hard feelings, they’re the best of friends, still.
He takes the children on Sunday afternoon.
She’s liberated from love, she’s her own person.
And no one sees her cry except the moon.
She’s taking two classes down at the local college,
A book-keeping course and volleyball 101.
She’s twenty-eight, she’s changed her hair, she’s jogging!
And her friends down at work say her life has just begun!
But you know, fifty-per cent of the American dreams get broken.
One-half of the brides and grooms pay lawyer’s fees.
And fifty-per cent of the couples are coming uncoupled.
But the precise percentage of tears nobody sees.
1981
I was blinded by the sky today
it stared at me,
without a blink,
so I did the same,
just to avoid missing
the very moment,
when it would speak about you.
But it fooled me:
it took away my sight
ousted the breath of my soul
far, far away
and uncoupled me
from the hope of the living.
But I still remained,
stayed to listen to the wind,
asked the sun to swallow me
and prayed for you
to recognize me this way.
My jaunt through over crowded hallways
past bodies grouped like gulls gathering
a grey murmuring
patients on overdose
their creased faces like glaciers streaked
by warming
pink white rings that circle their eyes
rabbit pinched
unfocused
glances not easily discarded
Henry, slumped in his wheelchair
his body uncoupled like a skylark
cut from song
thin shoulders falling to trembling limbs
He greets me, barely audible
words that leave soft traces
that sometimes choke on their own silence
What oozes forth,
fragmented stories of acting on the stage
till footlights dimmed
Time vandalized history
Roots in a cushioned land
Beseeching, he asks "Roll my wheelchair to the
train tracks. Leave me there."
Panic closes in like shutters
to darken the wood of smiling
I wedge words, can brook no paths criminal
A quick embrace to soothe unmoored grief
to appease the unprotected
My blunt exit (slowed momentum)
on floor stickiness,
waste-brine that coats my soles
anchoring displacement
Poem revised June 9, 2021
A most wonderful thing, natural observation
Copulating on the wing, butterflies on mission
Mostly pure white on this summer day –welcome cool -
Like delicious Autumn, but breaking the rule
Of long hot summers on the Eastern Cape
Mostly white butterflies after the rains; none escape
Being pursued. I’ve seen singles dart into the bush
Made by a clump of Mulberry saplings, win mate or friend
The shady vale next my window is a love-ly battleground!
Uncoupled after one mating as with birds against sky
Those single white missiles shoot faster and high
To locate another unhitched butterfly. And how! Threesomes are found
But not for long – two seem to enter the smallest circle
Until Number Three has to leave, shooting off like missile …
Until the most special sight, a string of couples closely
Crisscrossing the spaces among the trees like confetti
(Two insects - smaller, yellower - dance closer to the ground
Just to remind us, earth has other lives in reproduction)
I see the whites circle and circle in addictive lovemaking
Often alighting on branches of the neem (we call slingeberry) trees
O how wonderful, beautiful, they render this youthful afternoon
As if twilight has come: “NEW ROMANTIC MUSICAL starting SOON”
A tall, chain wire fence
surrounds the perimeter
of the power station, casting
its evening shadow over a wide
bank of grass leading down
to the river. Sometimes I sit there
just to listen to the sound
of the wind make music through
the wires.
It is a soft, melancholy music
that carries a certain sorrow.
Uncoupled from a name,
it seems a composite
of the sadness accrued
in the wordless wells of the soul
that finds voice here.
It has a strange attraction,
an addictive beauty
which keeps me coming back
though each note strums
a nerve giving a little hurt.
At times I can almost hear
human voices weaved
into the music, a tone
echoing out of places
made restless with longing.
It is the music that lovers make
and gently plays at the center
of all good art, sad prisoners
of time, composed by the heart
to mourn when what is loved
and what is beautiful in this life
passes from us,
and let go.
There is no mental pain
to one with no expectations.
All fears transcended
by one whose fetters are extinct.
It does not occur to me, "I am"
nor that I live or exist, so
what is there to lament?
All afflictive formations are destroyed
when one sees with uncoupled wisdom
the world as empty, substanceless--
seeking nothing to own as "mine"--no "I" or "me"
one does not desire nor grieve--arrive or leave
there is---no loss no gain, no ego no pain
such is the power of mind liberating itself from
all manufactured sufferings of a cyclic existence.
Seek out the waiting, awakening path--the true one
with the karmic stairway to nirvana.
(*An expansion/variation on a Buddhist passage by the arahant monk Adhimutta)
courtesy sharp pointed objects
(that string of words
doth hoop fully connive fist
(cuffed) around handles of knife
discounting divorce (from wife)
i.e. remaining uncoupled
mandated eventually note hissed
unbridled love and apology
toward thee missus and progeny
who forever did blacklist
das scribe, how objectionable
now, he profusely kissed
mouth of other voluptuous
(zoftig) older women
(consensually, flatteringly, indiscriminately)
and amazingly enough spouse did insist
to forgive, boot never forget.
Absence makes the heart grow fonder
thus very little paternal (filial) love expressed
and she chose to live yonder
Oakland, California her temporary dwelling
no matter, her papa blatantly confessed
YES, more'n his eye did wonder.
At present petty coated junction irreparable schism
doth rank as horrendous on par me adopting fascism
forever sullied image ("daddy's girl")
who once thought the world of me
selfish misdeeds buzzfeeding swelling egoism
no more how enlightened I became
ex post facto, pure unconditional acceptance
refracted light risque behavior thru prism
where primary parental accountability
not satisfactorily explained away courtesy
Darwinism (to seed genes), nor chauvinism,
whereby ever since time immemorial
men disregarded and hardened libido
against marital covenant.
Given a slight remembrance of an uninvited birth to a past forgone,
the power to recognize/dwell/surpass in a remedial present and a physical/cognitive forethought to seek an immediate, undeniable trek, and all of its nearness to a future yet unannounced, with unquestionable scope, pragmatic silence and an undeniable desire to embark on an enriched, uncoupled, untitled, yet redundant verdancy of universal integrity.
With this, I hope to evolve a being of true being-ness
of unconditional love,
peace and forgiveness,
for whomever comes to
call
on my countenance.
Only tell, no show, can't imagine the picture.
Cells of heart, don't tickle in lingering pain.
Coherent words, do they flow in cadence?
Rhyme and theme, do they hum in euphony?
Hmm..the ending, perhaps not so endearing.
Unstressed syllables uncoupled in meter.
Wasn't the other one little worse or better?
I will judge by lottery, "All are good poetry "!!
Contest: You Be The Judge
Sponsored by: Bobby May
Date Created: 20 th March 2019
Your Judgment Rating: Rubbish...Last among N/A
in lottery option I am always lucky