Best Unflinching Poems
The child is a poet with innocent eyes
And a bumpity A-B-C rhyme,
A dancer whose feet with the rhythm of life
Move in jubilant one-two-three time.
The child is a doctor who heals with a kiss
And treats with a serum called smile,
A researcher who seeks out the meaning of life,
Then explains it with unflinching style.
The child is a chef who makes sandwich and Kool-Aid
And thinks it a royal repast,
A hero who battles the monsters and villains
And renders our land safe at last.
The child is a teacher, a sleuth, an explorer,
Controller of race car and ship,
Possessor of limitless spirit and mind
With holster and gun at the hip.
Reflections of children shine pure in the eyes
Of those who are watching them grow,
Remembering times when the sunrise meant journeys
To lands where adults cannot go.
Written in 1987
Categories:
unflinching, children, happiness, innocence,
Form:
Quatrain
land of lost shadows
and unweathered skies
five urban colours
through unflinching eyes
tall distant chimneys
and schoolyards at play
smoke drifting sideways
in stillness each day
sketches on packets
of stained cigarettes
strange brooding faces
and marionettes
people bent walking
with heads looking down
- if lowry was living
he'd have painted my town.
Categories:
unflinching, art,
Form:
Ekphrasis
Mama held me close to her bosom
wouldn't let me go astray
she shook the cradle of civilization
and to her wayward offspring
she paid attention.
She added a tinge of color to the cheeks of some
and tinted plenty with even more
for identification, as to whom they belonged.
While her purported gaze
stored us from mediocrity
she whispered silent pants
when our future's prowess
begun to shiver she remained astute.
Mana Africa! I call you by this name
You've nullified all bleak spectrum
situations bestowed on us
when frequent ill-health
pounded on our weary hearts
you trembled --never loss guard
We are forever indebted to your
unflinching affirmation of sheer solidarity
Mana Africa!
your goodwill seizes not to elude
Capricious speeches we confer
as we orate about the trying times
The soundbites of your caresses will never
be deserted; let alone our appraisal of celerity
The best of we your “Adeptus Children”
have supplied the melatonin
from your sacred womb
and you have followed us with
love and self determination
as we have toiled on foreign soil
Then as we have been scattered
to the four corners;
Innately we have held on to our sanity.
Stayed in tuned to our intuition
as we have maintained circadian rhythms
and overcame enough, clinging to
our dignity in one hand and our
lives in the other, still to rise above.
Nana has taught us to endure
to be courageous, outrageously
courageous we have been.
even as we achieved
Our circadian rhythms were off beat.
Sacrifices only a mother would make
from the alchemy of adoration comes her love
self-determination is the water of her blood
and she the blood in our veins
the blood passed on...a mother’s blood...
Mana Africa
Ase’
A collaberatetion withYoung Prince Kennedy from Ghana and Mama Oladeji aka Vicki Acquah
Categories:
unflinching, beautiful, inspiration, poetry, poets,
Form:
Verse
Friends, like candles, enable you to see
personal faults, through sympathetic eyes,
and never flicker, should you disagree.
Even subjected to the third degree:
standing steadfast, they will not compromise:
friends, like candles, enable you to see.
Offering unflinching friendship for free,
friends, rejuvenate and revitalize:
and never flicker, should you disagree.
Applauding your accomplishments with glee:
although others tend to trivialize:
friends, like candles, enable you to see.
Caretakers of your heart, they hold the key
to unlock the virtues they recognize:
and never flicker should you disagree.
Pushing you to be all that you can be:
they even defend your outrageous lies.
Friends, like candles, enable you to see:
and never flicker should you disagree.
Categories:
unflinching, 12th grade, feelings, friend,
Form:
Villanelle
Eye of the Tiger
Those eyes – piercing amber -
So like mine
Smoldering with uncaged curiosity
I drown in the golden pools
As I stalk across the floor
Captured in a tractor beam of curiosity’s wonder.
Who is this little one
Who stands so bold outside
The boundaries of my cage yet lives in me?
This little one who stands unflinching
As I approach
On padded powerful paws of rolling withers
How I long to gaze
Into her eyes
And tell my savannah stories – homeland odyssey
How I long to hear
Her small voice tell her biography –
The jungle chronicles and fables of her life
How could you have
Sun smoldering eyes like mine?
Child and tiger never conceive the same families.
Little one don’t leave me!
Don’t depart without sharing
The feral eye of the tiger!
Little one, your memory possesses me
Through the amber of our eyes
My emerging fantasies, epic midnight saga sequels.
6-24-22
Contest: Pet Personification
Sponsor: Constance La France
Choice # 7 – No Pet
My eyes are an amber color like that of a tiger. When visiting a zoo at ten years old, I stopped by the Bengal tiger display because I love cats of all sizes. A huge, male tiger lumbered over and looked me directly in the eye as if to say: “Where did you get my eye color and why are you out there instead of being in here with me, cuz!”
Categories:
unflinching, animal,
Form:
Personification
Frozen to perfect, stiff, fixed and fast,
Forever replicating exact,
Transparent colours of love and beauty,
Forever being abstract,
She’s a water kingfisher, with a purple song box,
Or ocean wave smashing to shore,
Forever being a shimmering dog,
Or a magnificently powerful horse,
She can be hard and solid, reliably strong,
Unflinching to hurt, rage or pain,
Or she can be a delicate fragile of perilously weak,
Carrying your toast of champagne,
She’s our beautiful glass, our goblet of glaze,
Our sculptured trichromatic quartzite,
She’s everything beautiful wrapped into one,
Illuminating a rainbow of light.
Categories:
unflinching, art, beauty, growth, peace,
Form:
Personification
Side by side we lay,
She breathes shallowly
and I feel her chest rise
slowly, gently against my body
her breasts press against my side
And I quiver, electricity shoots through my nerves
quickening my heart and melting me into warmth
i watch her peaceful in her sleep
at rest, safe and unflinching beside me
I touch her silken hair, so soft
she is the image of beauty
An angel without mercy
Flawless creature - lips calling quietly
To be captured and enthralled
I am a prisoner of her spell
I brush her skin with my fingertips
It is so hard not to touch her
But I keep my hands back
refraining from roaming where they long to go
drawing circles down her belly and lips
aching to kiss every line of her skin
her breasts warm beneath my hands
squeezed and nipples flicked
and then brought against hungry lips
Where I would suck on them,
softly and then harder until she were squirming
whimpering as Id drag my lips down her body
over every curve licking the honey from her skin
Until reaching that luscious spot between her thighs
and gently spreading her to her surprise
my tongue dancing a million ways
diving deep to surface quickly for air
and dive down, down into her taste
kissing her thighs and nibbling her softness
and the taste of her skin makes me high
I do everything not to let myself get carried away
And yet watching her sleep is sexy to me
I lie beside her, wet and warm
aching to touch her, aching down below
where I want her to touch me
And make love with her for the first time
I'm squirming more every second I look at her
The need to love her ever growing
The need to leave and step away from this insanity
And yet I already know I wont leave her side
I'd suffer for eternity if it meant keeping this right
Categories:
unflinching,
Form:
Free verse
I embrace the nocturnal shade
coiled beneath tangerine lamplight
on the corner of the street
in case a certain little lady walks by.
I am ever watchful
in the telephone kiosk bathed in smells of damp
directories, of urine and pubescent vandalism;
silhouetted at the mouth of the
tubeway entrance;
sat in the rusting Lada across the road;
ever watchful,
gaze unwavering, unflinching.
I have perfected the dead-eye stare.
I am the vigilant sentinel.
I am watching you.
Wherever you choose to go I am
mere footsteps away,
dogging your trail.
At the salon I watch your pale tresses
cut and blown dry
through stencilled window glass.
That time I got a lock of your hair.
I like to collect souvenirs.
They bring us closer.
I know you know I am here,
I make certain of that;
dead certain.
I want you to know I am here,
always present
on the periphery of your vision;
live ghost haunting your existence.
The police have made empty threats,
charges of loitering with intent.
Intent to do what, though?
That is the question.
Intent to do what?
It is for me to know and you to discover.
This is the game, my sweet,
the game we play.
I feel your fear when you pick up the 'phone
and no one answers,
only the romance of dead silence;
I can smell your sweat leaking down the line,
taste your breath, sharp and spicy with fear,
burning down the line.
I sense your arousal,
the wetness of your loins, slick
with the lubricant of anticipation,
of desire,
of surrender.
But we do not speak, no,
not yet,
but soon.
Be patient, beloved, be patient as I am patient,
stoic and timeless and patient.
I hear you sobbing, crying down the line,
hear the crystal crash of vodka glass shattered
against the wall. Be patient, calm yourself,
for soon, very soon, we will meet...and
then my intent will become clear... as
clear as those shards of shattered crystal,
my sweet...
Categories:
unflinching, death, mystery, social,
Form:
Blank verse
I am worried
I am in despair
I am tensed
I am in low spirits
My song sounded melancholic
My thought turned pessimistic
My emotion became lifeless
My life seemed purposeless
My heart lost its rhythm
Cold shivers rippled my blood
My pulse missed its beat
Vacuum nested every nerve of my head.
I started my journey from somewhere to reach nowhere
I found myself toiling in the sands of dreary nightmare
I continued my cruise on the shoreless ocean
Searching for a home in an unknown destination
Life seemed to be a battlefield and I transformed into a weaponless warrior
Fighting with an unknown enemy for a mysterious reason
Tears were racing with the valley of blood
Anguish supplanted the graveness of a flash flood
Having fed with very little hope of survival
I gravely waited for the life's arrival.
Sailing unchaperoned in the gigantic world,
I realised that life is a personalized game and the triumph embosoms the unflinching souls.
Categories:
unflinching, life,
Form:
Rhyme
As related by my father;
Once, long ago,
he rear ended a cop car
Not a happy thing you know...
The cop had stopped short
But he wasn't the sort
To admit what he ought
He could find little reason
for legal action,
So he sought another sanction
He had my father tested
by a mental doc
Who asked stupid questions
You know that crock...
His defining question,
"What would you do if
you saw a flying saucer?"
Unflinching, my father replied,
"I'd shoot it down with my
battleship!"
The doc scoffed,
"And where'd you get
your battleship?"
Quick as a whip, he replied,
"The same place you got your
flying saucer!"
Categories:
unflinching, father, funny, imagination, father,
Form:
Bio
His life now has permanently changed
Costing him more than aches and pain
As slowly he walks on prosthetic legs
Humility reigns, taxing venturous brain.
Propelling courage fiercely he fought,
Defying death, meeting face to face.
Concealed within his unflinching image,
Torment open wounds of unholy place.
Unsteady mind roams haunted now,
No longer capable to hold a steady job.
Death and destruction hammer his mind
Where angst and hurt relentlessly throb.
Determined as ever but he feels restless
Having acquiesced to tallies of life,
When his toll was counted in unpaid bills
And loss of dignity to agonizing strife.
Able man he was before he went to war
Returning home after he almost died.
As a grateful nation sincerely thanks him
Resolutely he moves to restore his pride.
November 9, 2018
Dedicated to veterans of war
Categories:
unflinching, courage, hero, hurt, war,
Form:
Rhyme
I want my anger
In the dark of the night it protects
Nourishes
Provides
It is useful
It keeps me wary
Ripe
Watchful
Without it I will crumble
And be reduced to smallness
softness
sadness
I need my anger
It makes me a woman
Feral
Untamed
Fierce
Anger faces unflinching what
Would reduce me to a girl
innocent
vulnerable
invisible
And isn't that what he wants
That thing that makes him feel
Hungry
Forcible
So I keep my anger
Close to my chest
Burning
Expectant
For the day I will let it fly
Searing
Straight
Extinguishing at last the monster
Living inside.
Brainstorm Contest
Sponsor: John Hamilton
10.18.18
Placement: 2nd
Categories:
unflinching, abuse, anger, anxiety, conflict,
Form:
Free verse
Struggle
Let me see you resist
I have tied you naked
Taut between the line of bone and soft curve
I have done this
For my eyes to devour your beauty
And with a rampage tearing through my soul
My passion burns
To eat you, to touch you deep within
And be blessed I, by whimpers a soft supplicant moan
Struggle
Let me hear you cry out, let me feel those breathing gasps
As I taste the soft tender dew on your lips
And press to muscle and hard unyielding flesh
A grip for each sensuous and compliant contour
I shall take what is mine
Let me hear you refuse
Demure as your body flexes on the shackle
You ignite the blaze in my eye
And the blood in my veins
Struggle
And if I could I would force my mind to your thoughts
Hold every part of you to me
Complete, unflinching
Between body, rapine and surrender
All we are for this moment
Break me
And through the torrents release me
In a brutal tenderness
Curse me, foul mouthed and belligerent
Struggle
Quiver my lover in breathless tones
Cry to God, oh God! Oh-wa oh……! God!
Let this famished animal bare you away
Give up to me your subjugation
So naked, so exquisite, so heat of woman tied to my wall
So kneel now as I
Before these tumble bricks
These barriers, these bars, these fences of life
Let me hear you giggle in an exhausted sleep
A wisp of your hair left to………………
Struggle
Categories:
unflinching, love, passionme, me, giggle,
Form:
Free verse
2025 Poetry Marathon Mile 6 Poetry Contest// Sponsored by: Mark Toney
( 7th Place )
Written: August 10, 2025
I run the miles deep within,
a subdued race, an unspoken intent,
devoid of spectators-- no finish line,
just breath and heart, both entwined.
The shades lengthen along my path
but still a soft dawn finds its way turning into gray.
Stage by stage a tale, flaw, and goal,
rushing, steady flow.
The road stretches far, but I endure—
a counterfeit concealed, strong and pure.
through storms that howl, nights that weep,
I keep the pace, I am awake.
With each mile that challenges my thoughts,
I find a surprising wellspring of strength.
not in the roar or triumphant--
but in the stillness, I transformed!
A marathoner not of feet,
but of the unflinching heartbeat,
so when the world drifts apart,
I run the internal reach.
Categories:
unflinching, hope, inspirational, journey, life,
Form:
Lyric
There are “functional psychopaths” among us,
different from their murderous counterparts
who use their detached, unflinching and charismatic personalities
to succeed in mainstream society,
and in some fields of work most shockingly
the more psychopathic individuals are more likely to succeed.
We all possess psychopathic tendencies.
It's a scale along which we all sit within varying degrees.
The brilliant neurosurgeon who lacks empathy
has more in common with a Ted Bundy than we'd like to believe,
and that mugger in the parking lot lit very dimly
may well in fact have the same nerveless poise as a titan of industry.
Society as a whole is more psychopathic than it could ever be.
Fearless, confident, charming, ruthless, and focused are all qualities
that are tailor-made for success in the twenty-first century,
and all of the above mentioned qualities
are very dominant in every psychopath's personality.
It is our much maligned dark side that often reveals
the trump cards of success functional psychopaths conceal.
Categories:
unflinching, people,
Form:
Rhyme