Best Vigils Poems
Metallic city howls like a wounded animal
scraped by nocturnal vigils
of grandchildren and elders
emaciated like tuberculosis lungs
gasping from chug-chugs of tobacco soot...
and the face of a night is hammered by
ripped moans like plucked strings in motel rooms;
pagan women opening limbs for a meal in silent fury.
This is the other side of town, so real...
beggars peddling hope; factory shoulders
ranting over shuffled cards and fired gin
as wives’ blistered fingers
clean rented pots, gibbering same monotone of hymn,
“give us daily bread, daily bread”.
Outside, the pier coughs off
the commercial honks of weighed cargo
reeked with labor’s perspiration,
where pawnshops buzz with greed's snicker...
the evening owl attempts winks
under the grime of bloodied moon…
it spits the larynx of tenants’ raged hoots
wishing morsels of fresh sunset
would pour some grace of life’s salve. I weep
before the shrill of red sets in... again.
------------
Truth Contest sponsored by Anthony Slausin
Re-post 5/28/2019
Categories:
vigils, anger, angst,
Form:
Lyric
*Note: A 60-year annual tradition that involved a mysterious visitor leaving three
roses at the grave of writer Edgar Allan Poe on the anniversary of his birthday
ended in January 2010. Curators of the Poe House and Museum are at a loss to
explain who left these gifts and why they stopped. On many occasions people kept
vigils near Poe’s grave during this period that began in 1949, but no one ever saw
someone leaving the roses. In the morning, however, they were always on his
grave. Poe is considered the father of the American short story and
his poem The Raven is one of his best known works.
Once upon a midnight dreary, Poe heard a tapping at his window
While grieving the loss of his young bride, a maiden “angels named Lenore,”
A radiant teen whose long, black hair in gentle breezes would billow,
Tapping at the window ceased, but suddenly it was heard at his door
Upon opening it, a Raven flew in repeating, “Nevermore”
At first he welcomed this odd visitor until Poe whispered, “Lenore”
When he heard his word echo, the strange Raven he began to abhor
He asked if he’d see his bride again and the bird replied, “Nevermore”
Though Poe died in eighteen forty-nine, a mystery evolved much later
A century after his death, his grave had an annual visitor
Roses were left on his birthday by someone whose love appeared greater
Who had left these floral gifts forever stumped the Poe House curator
Perhaps the answer can only be explained by reincarnation
Did the Raven embody the spirit of Poe’s beloved Lenore
If so, perhaps the Raven returned again in a life rotation
In human form she visited to lay roses on the earthen floor
And upon her death in two-thousand nine, she took to the skies once more
A Raven who now joins the flock circling above her late husband’s grave \/
Could it be her spirit remains with Poe, as it did in life before \/ \/ \/
Bringing him in the afterlife all the roses a poet could crave \/ \/ \/ \/
For those who consider this possibility totally absurd
Just consider the fantasies Poe created with the written word
By Carolyn Devonshire
Contest Title: “Among the Dead,” sponsored by Constance LaFrance ~ A Rambling
Poet ~
Categories:
vigils, mysteryhouse, loss, birthday, grave,
Form:
Narrative
(Please read The Park -- Part One first ...
This is a continuation from Part One, due to space limitations)
Yes, kids at play are bold and wise
with flashing smiles and knowing eyes.
Children tire easily of grown-up prattle;
thoughts turn to cakes, to toys that rattle.
They think that Belles and Bills tell lies.
Tme is a birthday gift or a new surprise:
games to play; a windy day for a kite one flies;
coins that shine; toys that squeak;
a trip to the zoo at the end of the week.
Belles and Bills persist in their story.
Some even mention forgotten glory.
Children go home to eat, to sleep,
as Belles and Bills their vigils keep
then wearily drift back to flats
to listen to the rustling rats,
to sip their beers or gins or rums --
to wait until the morning comes.
They stand and stretch, look all around,
surveying the world to which they're bound.
Then they shuffle away with airs of sadness
at being always on the verge of madness.
They'll see once more the sun's first ray,
the birth in the park of another day.
Eyes are glazed and minds are dazed;
the atmosphere grows dim and hazed.
An eerie echo of an unheard bark
reverberates throughout the park
amid falling leaves and a darkening sky
and the nightly proof of the chilren's lie.
Categories:
vigils, nostalgia, people, sad, time,
Form:
Rhyme
Like a gecko, that one changes their colours
speaks in tongues long then short blue
climbing up and down walls clicking
translating the draconians’ poetic profusions
all are night creatures in the absence of light fluctuations
they scurry along the cracks over the white and the black
5 fingers 5 toes, quite quite reptilian,
efficient in the chosen environment, useful,
amusing a muse, then, when the mourning sun rises,
contradictory, scurrilous, misplaced, undeniably ugly,
yet cute
Night creatures, light framed
lone vigils, velvet skinned strict vigilantes
on all fours preying Carthusian monks
nakedly bathed in absinthe chartreuse
through their clicking chants, looking for true
through the glass onion
peeling back layers
shedding skin
on a wall
5 fingers, 5 toes
amusing a muse
Candide Diderot. ‘24
sadeness.
enigma.
Categories:
vigils, mirror, muse,
Form:
Free verse
I did not know that one could feel death cold in summer sweat,
as images of you flash lightning fast, the wind remains still and vigils
past the midnight hour, no relief comes from the short rain shower.
But images are not enough when the cold of the night yearns for warmth;
for the bed never used to be this big, the sheets this chilly to one’s touch,
the hours never used to be parched lips waiting to be moistened by your kiss.
If only dealing with feelings was as simple as watching scenes from old movies
where in despair, the heroine can just crumple the letter to throw in the bin,
only to pick it up later and lovingly remove the creases, to be read again.
So as a patient farmer waits for the grains to grow from green stalks
and a mother who calmly expects to see the face of the child in her womb,
I will soothe the sorrow in my breast, till fate deigns for me too, to rest.
12 July 2015
Open Poetry Contest - 6th Place
Sponsor: Charlotte Puddifoot
Categories:
vigils, angst, loneliness,
Form:
Free verse
Death
won
that night -
that foggy
night when the Black Hawk
crashed into the murky Santa
Rosa Sound. Vigils were held on the beach, candle light
casting an eerie glow through the fog as people prayed for survivors - but there
were none.
3/13/15
For Rob Carmack's Fibonacci contest.
(This happened on 3/10/15 near where I live. 7 marines and 4 National Guardsmen
lost their lives in a training mission.)
Categories:
vigils, community, death, military,
Form:
Fibonacci
Threading Hunger’s Needle
by Odin Roark
Acumen's voice smolders quietly
When deafened ears respond only
To discords of witlessness.
Perception's heat invites comfort,
Its embers remaining alive,
Its wake of constant resolve
Lifts vigils of swirling persuasion,
Choking away illiteracy,
Ignoring cross or sickle waved ominously.
Ever present, creation’s insight
Remaining airborne in a void for those
With causeless breath being held,
Affecting not its surroundings,
Forever stale within ether locked,
Where roiling chasms of fear
Exude odiferous spoilage,
Rotting,
Polluting,
Repelling.
Such misery holds steady,
Amidst the multitudes’ repeated indulgences of flesh,
Where masses’ quintessential reptilian skin
long overdue for shedding
remain stagnant.
But cling it will,
This resistance to reflection and growth,
Feeling falsely safe in unknowing
The rewards of philological pondering,
Literature’s sign and verbal,
Touch and smell,
Eye and ear,
An all-sensitive motion
Making ready transference from literal
To one’s personal ethereal possession.
For some…
A chosen distance remains preferred.
A huddled observation from
Deep in the abyss of ignorance,
Convinced personal importance is to perish alone
Amidst a cacophony of unresolved noise.
Always close by, however…
Wisdom’s whisper continues to nurture hunger’s tenacity,
Knowing a needle unthreaded is of little use.
Categories:
vigils, wisdom, , literature,
Form:
Free verse
A - After Thanksgiving, minds reset,
B - because about a month away,
C - Christmas will be our holiday.
D - Deliverance of peace it brings,
E - especially when we hold dear,
F - forever in our hearts so clear,
G - God's Son, our Savior was born.
H - Held in a manger filled with hay
I - inside a stable, mother near,
J - Jesus Christ was sent to us.
K - Kind shepherds came to find him there,
L - led by Star of Bethlehem, saw
M - Mary and Joseph with their child...
N - not just a babe, but Son of God.
O - On that blessed and holy night
P - people knew that Christ was born.
Q - Quietly from the clouds above
R - rows of angels appeared to them
S - singing glorious hymns of joy
T - to announce the Savior's birth.
U - Until now from long ago,
V - vigils are kept on Christmas Eve;
W - we gather, pray at Midnight Mass.
X - Xmas or Christmas, all the same;
Y - your "X" means "Chi" or Christ in Greek.
Z - Zealously, keep Christ in Christmas!
January 4, 2016
Contest: ''X'' Contest, New Or Old Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Constance La France
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It turns out, “Xmas” is not a non-religious version of “Christmas”. The “X” is actually indicating the Greek letter “Chi”, which is short for the Greek symbols meaning “Christ”. So “Xmas” and “Christmas” are equivalent in every way except their lettering. http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2011/12/the-x-in-xmas-doesnt-take-the-christ-out-of-christmas/
Categories:
vigils, christmas, spiritual,
Form:
Abecedarian
Tragic tale of woodland magic;
magic expounds on what's tragic.
Dying unicorns start crying;
crying unicorns are dying.
Hosts of fairies attend their ghosts;
ghosts can't console those grieving hosts.
Clear streams fouled by a pixy's tear;
tear-tainted streams that once ran clear.
Stars bleed their sadness onto Mars;
Mars flushes with the blood of stars.
Night flickers with candles of light;
light vigils, confetti the night.
Categories:
vigils, fantasy, imagery, imagination,
Form:
Rhyme
I was just a kid
Lost in a world of grownups
I was often with a sad eye
I never admitted the cry
The street was not a happy place
Seekers of the dark
With adult leers
I was so so filled with abject fear
Twm mocked, even though de-frocked
Chasing the pains and nightmares
Glamorgan was full of bridges
Under which the trolls held vigils
For Twm chased many to death
As I ran and I ran, as fast
As my little feet can
I reached the bridge
On top I stand
A child’s fear drowned
I jumped
Categories:
vigils, abuse, anti bullying, bullying,
Form:
Free verse
*
*|*
**|**
*|*
Son
of God
our Savior,
was born. In a
manger filled with
hay, in a stable,
his mother near, Jesus
was sent to us. Many
came to behold and, led by
the Star of Bethlehem saw Mary
and Joseph with their child, not
just a tiny babe, but the Son of God.
On that Blessed and Holy Night
they knew that Christ was born. Suddenly,
from the clouds above, spirited angels
appeared to them singing glorious hymns
of joy to announce the Savior's birth.
Until now, from long ago, vigils are kept on
Christmas Eve; we gather- pray at Midnight Mass.
Xmas or Christmas, it's all the same;
the "X" means "Chi",
or Christ in Greek.
With
love
keep
___Christ in Christmas___
______________________
| |
** JOY TO THE WORLD! **
|______________________|
December 1, 2018
Note:
Chi (or X) is the first letter in the Greek word for Christ. In the early days of the Christian church, Christians used the letter X as a secret symbol to indicate their membership in the church to others. If you know the Greek meaning of X, Xmas and Christmas essentially mean the same thing: Christ + mas = Christmas. (Google)
Categories:
vigils, birth, christmas, joy,
Form:
Shape
He knows how He made you
He knows the thought He put in you
What you are thinking is came from Him
He made your heart and controls your heart beat
He made your desires; leads your movement
He vigils upon your life, you are His creation
Do not worry about what you fear or hear
Remember what I say, that He knows your name
He created you to live not to die
He made you to win not to loose
He formed you from the vase of wealth and health
I made you as channel of love and peace
All in this earth made for your achievement
All around you is made to sustain your accomplishment
Do not worry about what you see or hear
Remember what I say, that He knows your name
He made the waters to quench your thirst
He made the air to breath in your soul
He made all kinds of aliments to feed your hunger
From the day you came, the air was at your side to breath
The earth will always carry your steps as long as you live
The stone and trees will walk with you in this journey
Do not worry about what you miss or hear
Remember what I say, that He knows your name
He has a task for each one of your days on the earth
Your life is designed according to your calling
Pain and joy work for your vision
Suffering and glory work for your greatness
Failure and success work for your righteousness
He made each day a step to your destiny
Do not worry about what you doubt or hear
Remember what I say, that He knows your name
Categories:
vigils, allah, baptism, beautiful, faith,
Form:
Ballad
a freedom-fighter with a gun
a Jihadist with a gun
a lone-wolf with a gun
a redneck with a gun
a survivalist with a gun
a good-guy with a gun
a bad-guy with a gun
a hate-monger with a gun
a vengeance with a gun
a first-person-shooter
vigilantes and vigils
a patterned proximity
© GoodGuySoul 2015-02-12
Categories:
vigils, death, introspection, society,
Form:
List
Heart
by Odin Roark
Can an enigma be weighed?
Many would hold the heavy heart
Is indeed noticeably of greater weight
And yet…
What can the heart do
When all its wishes is respect
As real
As both tangible
And insoluble?
The heart has few friends
Its bodyguards
Lung left
Lung right
Hold 24/7 vigils
Knowing without aeration
Man’s lifeline is severed
Storms
Good times
Makes no difference
Pumping continues
The gasp of birth
Forever faithful
Still
Comes hurt
Comes denial
Come battles lost
Our hearts panic
Asking lungs
To take the bullet
Like mothers
Fathers
Secret Service
Internal instincts
Obviate thinking
Risk death at any cost
So goes the miraculous nature
Safeguarding the one institutional identity
One can really trust
Life’s experience
Most likely has no measurement
But we know heavy
Don’t we?
Categories:
vigils, heart,
Form:
Free verse
In these a-dying days,
people are given mo’ grief news
Hope cost less than
a jug bottle of dirt cheap booze
While the crying game
is being played
over and over, time again hence
Death has a new name:
Covid-19
is the ICU cradle tomb pestilence
Folks everywhere are digging in,
with covered faces grim
As graveyards keep overflowing,
prospects be looking dim
Red Masque, Red Masque
19 hues of undertaker gurney blue
This ghastly number
be vapor fear burying lots not few
Red Masque, Red Masque
Tales of the Crypt be sew cerulean
Devil wearing a blue dress,
says the search party has just began
Flood of 911 busy signals,
gov’ment ain’t answering the phone
Twilight curfew dye vigils,
as loved ones face suffering all alone
Let the crying game
be sympathy fore played
Veil questioning is the “Why” snuff passion
Climax is the same —
Covid yourself,
bureaucrats do truly feel in a caring fashion
Folks everywhere are digging in,
with covered faces grim
As graveyards keep overflowing,
prospects be reaper dim
Red Masque, Red Masque
19 hues of constant code blue
White House doctor office is closed,
nobody is gonna attend to you
Red Masque, Red Masque
Oval lips don’t speak indigo true
White House bunker gala,
a welcoming party only for a few
A stricken nation in tear mourning,
awakens daily to no relief
Operation Neglect gives no warning,
alarm bell is cricket brief
While the crying game
is being played
over and over and over again
Passing the err blame —
Covid-19
chalks up another morgue win
As mo’ and mo’ blackbirds
keep a-perching ‘pon cemetery tombstones
Nary an Ivory rescue heard,
only coroner chirps of lies being prolonged
Red Masque, Red Masque: A cloaked cry
19 hues of pallbearer coffin blue
Last rite Lenin robes are all denim dyed,
eulogy threads was party issued
Red Masque, Red Masque
19 cryptic cues of cynical dark azure shade
White House pandemic task
was to have a masquerade party virus paid
11-20-20
Categories:
vigils, death, imagery, pain, sorrow,
Form:
Ode