Best Vicinity Poems
In the land of finite, measurable calculus of existence,
You are a silhouette of mystique, esoteric obscurity,
A symbol ambiguous, living among realm of precision,
Unreachable to quotidian and simplistic enumeration,
Unamenable to honoring bounds of constrained world;
Yet, allured in metaphors, much alike a pretty woman,
Serenaded by poetic adulation in verses of fascination.
We invoke you when enormity we can’t comprehend
Being clueless of its reach or whether its journey ends:
Numbers uncountable, we postulate, seek your vicinity,
Universe we can’t grasp, we claim, expands infinitely,
Time propelling future, we surmise, ticks into eternity,
Whether space or distance you’re un-fathomed entity;
Oh! Infinity, the truth is, we can’t clasp your immensity.
Why, O, why you chase the unknown and the elusive?
Such a dry emotion to be everlasting without feelings!
Being eternal or endless ~offers not a beloved meaning
Unless you can be sensual, evermore of love romantic
Or the vows tolling forever in unbreakable relationships
Or timelessly striving to create treasures of memories
Or a paradise on earth blooming heavenly, perpetually.
Oh! Infinity, be laudable as can be, to instincts of poetry
But, remain true to self ~unknowable, nebulous intrigue.
November 22, 2021
Placed 1st: This or That, Vol 8 Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Edward Ibeh
Title chosen: Of Infinity
My head feels like it's being squeezed in a vise. Eardrums must have blown out from the explosion since I hear absolutely nothing, not even my own breath. Slowly rising to my feet I survey the damage. Left arm gone from the elbow down. Flesh hangs from my right forearm exposing bone and sinew. I don't even want to know what my face looks like but my cheeks are burning white hot.
Suddenly, I am keenly aware of the immediate surroundings. The twenty story office building I call my second home is utterly destroyed. Smoke and haze are everywhere. An acrid odor fills my nostrils with each breath. Scanning the vicinity I see body parts strewn about. The urge to vomit overwhelms me. Afterward, I begin to shake and sob uncontrollably. My God, why?
Home is five blocks away. My wife, my daughter are they alive? No idea how many bombs were dropped. Must get home. Each step brings excruciating pain, but the adrenalin pulsing through my veins impels me forward. Finally reaching my neighborhood, it quickly becomes evident that it too was targeted. Rubble and debris surrounds me. In the distance, what was my house, leveled to the ground. The cries, the screams of others sifting through the debris make me question my sanity did my hearing return or are the screams in my head?
Reality sets in coldly as I discover the bodies of my family, partially buried under the rubble. I have no more tears in this moment. Instead, my mind drifts back to former days happy times. Myself, Najwa and baby, lying in our back yard on a comfy blanket, staring up at the stars, watching the fireflies softly flicker in a dreamy, summer night sky. We had peace then. Now there is nothing but bitterness and hatred in my heart. I gaze at the sky, now black as sin. All the stars are there. But the fireflies they're gone. I can't help but wonder, what will become of me?
Flicker flicker fly
Stars above to light the sky
Angels weep goodbye
Written: September 24, 2023
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I care, I search, for the spark of divinity,
That resides within every soul's vicinity.
In the eyes of a child, so innocent and pure,
I descry the answer, as simple and sure.
In the embrace of a loved one gentle and warm,
I find the solace that can weather any storm.
In the laughter of friends, so joyful and bright,
I decry the link that bestows everything right.
I care, I search, for the meaning of life,
For the purpose that transcends all strife.
In the depths of my heart, a quest unveiled,
To grasp mysteries that have long prevailed.
Through mountains high and valleys low,
I journey on, letting my curiosity grow.
Winds were among first to notice
Fragrant air blowing fresh breeze
Stemming from your pristine vicinity
Extolling prospects of your visit,
Announced by the birds in flight
Message circulated far and wide
Into the emerging scenic twilight
Pushing far away the opaque skies,
Cotton clouds then adorned charm
Scattered in ways of scenic art form
In orange hues peeking from blue
Amid aerial vistas painted for you,
Sprinkling rays on mosaic colors
Layers of fabric spun florid display
Anxious for you to take your step
Into this arena of majestic stage,
But all that passion suddenly erased
Prompting egress of darker motifs
When sun plunged below horizon,
Dismayed that you never showed up.
April 12, 2018
Placed first in contest 515 by Brian Strand
It’s a smooth and tasty way to get high.
Try my distillation of mash made from corn and rye.
I make it from my family’s secret recipe.
The only one who knows about it is me.
The stuff comes out of my trusty hidden still.
I have it standing in the woods on top of the hill.
My woman did something that made me mad as hell.
She took the last batch I made, and dumped it into the well.
Soon, gathered around the well was a big crowd.
My neighbors were laughing and singing out loud.
There were old folks and little children staggering along the lane.
It did not seem like any of them was feeling pain.
Nobody else in the vicinity readily understood
why the water in the well was tasting so good.
Standing at the edge of forever
as one thought leads to hell
for I stare at the empty never
the other to a heavenly dwell
I must choose before the eyes of infinity
my soul torn between the hallucinogen hollow
passing through the vector vicinity
where dreams are created for me to swallow
Seeing visions of a hellion hive
soon thoughts fill with divinities divine
a conspiratorial conscience before I dive
where ambient angels dance and dine
Still I must choose before the end of time
a perplexing panegyrical pantomime.
Sept.16.2019
Crossroads Poetry
Sponsored by: Silent One
Placed 2'nd...Thank You
Off to Nain, Jesus, his disciples and the crowd.
See the gate! Approach the fate of Nain.
Coming out of the gate, a widow, and a crowd.
Her only son was being carried out of Nain.
This son of Nain, was in a wooden box.
The widow’s only son carried through the gate.
Tears of the earth touched the heart of heaven.
Jesus stands before the gate, “Don’t cry.”
Moving amidst two crowds, Jesus touches.
He pierces eyes & ears. The crowd is silenced.
Jesus touches the coffin of the widow’s son.
The pallbearers stand still as sentry guards.
Later penned, “Jesus wept,” when Lazarus died.
Just for now, his heart goes out, “Don’t cry.”
“Young man, I say to you, get up!”
The dead man sat up and began to talk.
The son of Nain, the widow’s son, began to talk,
and God’s only son gave him back to his mother.
The disciples and two crowds, filled with awe,
“Praise God! Praise God! Hallelujah! Praise God!”
The news spread. “God has come to help his people.”
The good news spread throughout Judea and vicinity.
One crowd going in. One crowd going out.
Both stopped in their tracks as a miracle occurred.
The fate of Nain was in the hands of God. He said,
“Don’t cry.” This Christ will wipe tears from our eyes.
Later crowds would dissipate. They would abandon
a broken body upon a wooden cross, that of Christ.
The crowd would mock, “He saved others. Why
did he not save himself.” He was our salvation.
The crowd didn’t believe it. The crowd couldn’t see it.
Saving, you better believe it. Christ is the sacrificial lamb.
The lamb resurrected. The news spread.
The good news spread. Hallelujah! Praise God!
Luke 7:11-17 inspiration
Let’s fly to the celestial fiesta of the cherry blossom,
In the North Eastern Region of Shillong, named, “The Scotland of the East,
The abode of the cloud,” in the lush mesa of the magnetic Meghalaya!
The wheezing Pine forest of the whispering waterfalls in the Khasi hills,
is bustling with the nature’s fairytale of pink, white and ivory!
As far as the eyes can see, the rolling tableland is ringing, ridden by the radiant petals of cherries!
Neither Japan, nor Paris, a mere remote region of Indian plateau,
Glowing in nature’s sublime glory of pellucid picturesque pinks!
Nicknamed, Prunus Cerasoides, the cherry blossoms,
a delightful boon of Himalayas,
are blooming profusely in the magical
verdant highland of the East Khasi hills!
The November is rippling with
moonlit music, plethora of flamboyant folk dances,
pageants, stalls to cater to the globetrotters’ penchant for the ethnicity
of the fur-flung region’s tribes’ cuisines, wine, arts and cryptic crafts!
Such bedazzling is the serenity of the panaromic platonic plateau,
As folks of the vicinity, are traversing despite the rampant pandemic,
to glimpse the shangri la of the richest biome of the floral magical lane!
The resonating frolic of the chirping and twittering from the cheerful cherry bushes
are teeming with the twirling bliss, intoning,
in winters whistling whiff!
A nature’s bounty, a pamphlet of picturesque hamlets’ terrains of aromatic sensuous purity!
Blessed are they, who have witnessed the once in a lifetime scene of crystal clean roaring rivulets, murmuring brooks, the ravishing orchids, quirky root bridges, aesthetic lakes and rills, scented wild flowers, encompassing the enigmatic cherry blooms of the mystic land of the majestic mountains!
An euphoria to have a ride amidst the clouds of the misty moorlands,
gliding languidly to take the signature of the mementos of the moments;
to kiss the plateau of wild orchids, flowering Cherries and sacred woodlands of those Khasi hills,
crackling with the sprouting, cherry blossom festival of the far East!
Theme for collaboration suggested by Tim Smith
Two enormous old toads crossed the road
On Tom’s back lounged Thomasina toad
Both are ugly and warty
Thomasina’s so naughty
As her bowels on his back she’d download
06-16-17
WRITTEN BY JAN ALLISON
When Thomasina toad dumped on old Tom
He thought her poop explosion was a bomb
He hopped in the air
gave her a mean stare
shouting, "I'm not taking you home to Mom!"
WRITTEN BY LIN LANE
Ribbit rubbit robbit 'n ro
this crazy toad has got to go
She's turning quite mean -
Fifty shades of green
No time to chat but still does crow
WRITTEN BY TIM SMITH
"Why don't we do it in the road?"
Said Thomas, the old horny toad
Thomasina hissed,
"Get a load of this!"
and a "blessing" on him bestowed
WRITTEN BY LIM'RIK FLATS
Thomasina was on a road trip
Her taxi was Tom's back she'd grip
But she strained as she held
And her bottom expelled
So she said "I've just left you a tip"
WRITTEN BY RAY GRIDLEY
Tom and Thomasina were the perfect pair
They were ancient toads without a care
He had a huge wart
She gives a mean fart
Anyone in her vicinity better beware!
WRITTEN BY ALEXIS Y
Now Tom was an over achiever
He wanted the lady, not leave her
He sprayed his back with Scotch-Guard
and rubbed down with lots of lard
the dumper was now the receiver
WRITTEN BY DALE GREGORY COZART
Tom gave Thomasina the boot
Got sick from the smell of her poot
told her to get lost
right after he tossed
She gave him the one finger salute
WRITTEN BY DANIEL TURNER
Thomas and Thomasina loved to hear
the waterboatmen rubbing their gear
Thomas tried and started to croak
causing Thomasina to choke
you two will never get it right I fear
WRITTEN BY SEREN ROBERTS
When T'sina hopped on for a ride
Old Thomas reminded his bride,
"Though you're my sweet dish,
on the road we'll get squished",
"Just do it!" was her terse reply.
WRITTEN BY CRAIG CORNISH
Thomasina and Tom a heavy load
Lingered a little too long on the road
He could have kissed her all night
shocked at the oncoming lights
Croak and ribbit was heard; two flattened toads
WRITTEN BY EVE ROPER
PLEASE SOUP MAIL ME ANY SUBMISSIONS FOR THE COLLABORATION
06-16-17
I: in the 70s
At sixteen, looking through a magazine,
I came across the picture of a girl
whose character was Mary Ellen in
“The Waltons” show I watched on Thursday nights.
Her look was that of mine when I made up
my face and styled my hair a certain way.
It gave me pleasure seeing someone who
was somewhat famous - looking just like me!
And so I clipped that picture out and saved
it in a scrapbook of my memories.
II: in the 80s
Inside a bank I stood in line one day.
Ahead of me I saw a child who stood
beside a woman and I felt a shock.
The little girl looked like my five-year-old.
In fact, she looked so much like Angela,
I had to ask the lovely lass her name,
ascertaining that kid was not my own!
How very strange to see a thing like that.
III: in the 90’s
My husband had a doppleganger who
lived somewhere in our own vicinity,
for three times Joe was in a hardware store
and was approached by people thinking he
was someone else, a framer too, it seems.
I wish that Joe had learned this fellow’s name
and wonder if today they look same
and if his look-alike was also forced
to find another line of work to do!
IV: in the new millennium
I also have a doppleganger in
this area. A few times I’ve been told
I look just like another woman, but
the time that made me feel sixteen again
was when my chiropractor told me that
the structure of my face and how I looked
was like Mcdonnell’s, star in the best film
of Kevin Costner‘s. She had played a Sioux.
Her name is Mary, like the character
I thought I’d looked liked from the Walton show!
V: now
I have a doppleganger here at Soup,
except we do not look that much alike.
She’s fairly young and I am (almost) old,
but nearly everything she says to me
reminds me of myself; however, she
writes free verse and is wackier than me!
She’s more my doppleganger spiritually,
and if you cannot guess who she might be,
I’ll give a clue: she likes to change her name
here at the Soup, a thing I doubt I’d do!
For Matt Caliri's Doppelgangers contest
I'd have loved to see the bluebirds fly
above the white chalk-cliffs of Dover--
and as they were blithely soaring over,
immersed in thought I'd lie
in calm repose upon that beach,
admiring their swooping forms,
evanescent, in fleeting storms,
like ballet ... far beyond my reach.
Frisking, fragile, carefree birds,
symbolic through intrinsic meaning --
like sterling hope and freedom's words
light English springs, forever greening:
while England fought the bitter fight
to hold at bay the 'fall of night.'
Author notes
November 20, 2004 - approx 112 words
What makes Britain great? The entire world would be speaking German and Japanese right now if not for British courage in the face of overwhelming adversity.
Setting, approximately June, 1941, Dover Beach, immediately following the Battle of Britain.
This is a published poem, copyrighted, and it takes you to a specific place as well as a specific time, when the world was at war and the fate of all mankind hung in the balance. It is relevant because we are fast approaching another such time. Bluebirds are not found in the British Isles, but I wrote the poem before I became aware of the fact. The curator at the Dover Museum said I should just leave it that way, as bluebirds, since the song, The White Cliffs of Dover, specifically named bluebirds.
Update: BLUEBIRD is an old country name for swallows and house martins, which have a blue sheen to their plumage. These migrants arrive from the continent in spring and leave in autumn, crossing the English Channel. So these bluebirds appear at least twice a year over the white cliffs and no doubt many spend the entire summer in the vicinity of Dover. As portents of improving weather, swallows and martins are traditionally believed to bring good fortune.
The poem, a quasi-Petrarchean sonnet, is being archived with other writings about Dover and The Second World War by the Dover Museum, in Dover, England.
This sonnet was published in Sonneto Poesia, Volume 3, Number 1, Winter,
2003-2004
Written July 20th, 2003
retweets of alarm -
owls in the vicinity . . .
chick-a-dee-dee-dee
Jan. 18, 2021
for Tania Kitchin's A Cardinal, Blue Jay, Or Chickadee Haiku Poetry Contest
(had to totally change this one. Soup does not allow the fun little word for
chickadee which the whole haiku was originally based on)
Scaling the skies and beauty of her wonder world
A fairy saw a sparkling thing down in a valley
Intrigued she flew up to it
Mesmerized she was, when she saw it
A big ,sparkling ,blue gem with lustrous shine
Thrilled by its luster ,she touched it
And woof!!!
Her magic wand disappeared
She lost her wings and all her powers
In desperation ,she touched it again and again
But to no avail
Disheartened she walked up to the nearby brook
With her head in her lap ,she started crying
Suddenly she heard a soothing music
The music of rumbling, ruffling brook
Freshly scented spring air wiped her tears
Dusky splendid skies brought her smile back
A new world was unfolding before her
Elated she was, when she walked on the dewy grass
Her eyes shone, when she saw a small pink flower, growing under a rock
Her heart skipped a beat when she touched the bark of the tree
Intoxicated by this beauty, she wandered around
And unknowingly reached back to the vicinity of the blue gem
On seeing it again ,she felt that it’s beauty had increased
Again mesmerized by its luster, she touched the gem
This time with an enlightened heart and a beautiful mind
And woof!!!
Her magic wand reappeared
Her wings and powers restored
Since night was befalling on her
She with an elated heart ,flew hastily up to her abode
Resting on her couch ,she felt something stuck to her feet
It was the fresh dewy grass
Holding the grass blade in her hand
She smiled ,as she knew
She had learned a lesson that day
Had seen a new world, a world beyond her magic
and had learned to keep her feet grounded….
.
It’s a recurring thought –
Over and over again –
Reverberating in my head,
Bouncing back and forth,
Reeling up and down like a Yo-yo,
Like a boomerang that keeps coming back,
Like a song stuck in your head,
A thought that gnaws at your will to live,
Like an army of termites devouring
your soul making you hollow inside,
Like the waves of the sea
lapping its shores ceaselessly.
It’s a nagging thought
to just shut off everything,
Like turning off the light switch
and walking away;
A thought to strip off all my
worries and cares of the world,
Like a snake shedding its skin,
And just wandering away,
Leaving behind petty rivalry,
envy, jealousy, shallow ties,
The promises and perils of life,
And to step forth renewed, reborn,
into a new place with no identity,
no name, no past, no aspirations--
just living for the day
As I like, As I please,
With no vagaries of life,
No yearning for paradise.
Walking away folk free
unrestricted by time or space,
customs, creed or the rules of the law.
But this thought
Like an active volcano ever brewing
and rumbling but never erupting,
Like a seed sowed with care and nurturing
but never sprouting, never coming to fruition.
It just keeps kneading and churning
Forever bobbling in the doldrums
Performing boondoggle tasks
Bearing the burden of the world like Atlas,
Unable to sigh or sneeze,
Fearful that a sudden moment
The slightest shift might cause
an upheaval in someone’s life.
Ah, the woes of life!
Why thou linger willy-nilly in my vicinity?
Why thou not forsaketh me?
Go and befriend the dark, foreboding clouds
And burst down upon some distant shores.
Let some sun shine upon me,
Let love gather me in her warm embrace,
Bequeath to me days rife with joy
and mellow moonlit nights,
Let my path run some distance straight
and not twist or turn at whim,
Let there be spring in my seasons
instead of the cold and bare winter,
Let me rejoice in the day’s toil
And earn me the night’s repose –
It’s a recurring thought,
Over and over again,
Reverberating in my head...
Wait just a minute!
Didn’t we go over that already?
~09/10/15
"Inside My Head" contest by John lawless
My spent colors still speak with my environment
Gray frost seeking a golden sun however little
Dulcet sounds if any come out of this interaction
When words like birds come and take seat in joy
From the lattices of thought is born a poetic line
The lines seek dance of words in melodic intellect
Flashes of suggestion through forms and colours
Movement of phrases for an impression of life
In a definite language in which the poet lives
The lines get together in cohesion to sit in a stanza
Whether in rhyme or in prose matters little
The stanzas love the light and shade of poetry
Even when you say: your touch in the bread
Exudes an warmth this morning, sweet heart
I’m glad that like the stars you’ve excused me
The guitar has to strum in voices of modernity
Instead of saying violence now we say swords
For love you the modern prefer pink whisper
Dream you say is weak and need replacement
I look for shapes which have blurred by now
As I write this my grandson plays with a blue ball
Stripes of sun and starlight raising ripples in air
That meets the happy birds flying towards it
Leaving the yellow and red mango tree in summer
For another taste from another tree in the vicinity
However strongly you plead for prose in poems
The fact remains that we live in a prosaic world
Of cut glass rat race fat loss suicide bombers
And for a lemon shadow in a melancholy corner
We obviously look for poems and not prose
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31 May 2017