Billowed Poems

Silence of the West

 

Clouds of smoke billowed over ruined buildings 

That once were homes safe and welcoming. 

Schools where children were learning, 

Hidden now from view by dust clouds billowing. 

 

Out of the dust men came with guns began to fire, 

Indiscriminate in who they killed mothers, fathers. 

Such a wailing of grief rose to the sky above, 

Whence no one cared or heard no love. 

 

Who has the right to murder the seed of a nation, 

And showing no conscience or even a tear, 

Spreading death and abject fear, 

There are no messiahs riding to rescue, 

 

Andrew .p. mcintyre.

Beyond Rapture

Easy to get lifted up
billowed out on the wonder and awe,
yet who called the mountains, giants,
the forest bearing seed, small?

The rapture
of not seeing the white horses,
those waterfalls of white horses,
yet knowing that they are there
behind the giants and the seeds
all bursting out from nothing
back into nothing,

that kind of rapture
is very much more than
enough.

The Wind

I like the wind 
when it flutters
and flaps bed sheets
hung out on a line -
I like how it sweeps
patterns across fields
of tall grass and sends
whispers through 
the trees.
I like to see 
its breath billowed 
in coloured sails 
blown across the bay,
and how, in might,
it hurls clouds 
of seaspray 
high into the air.
But most of all
I like the wind
when it is all done
and curls up
into a drowsy calm
and falls asleep
under a warm
afternoon sun.

Collision Universe

I drove over the grass in their front yard. 
Probably didn’t do that on purpose. 
But when you’re about to be towed. 
You run.
You leave evidence. 
You can’t control it. 
As long as you avoid the collision universe. 
You can still keep your ten year old car. 

I could probably go back to my uncle’s house. 
He has a room.
He told me to put my luggage in the corner. 
With spider webs in that old cabin. 
So run. 

From the bee that is chasing me. 
I like the taste of honey. 
Sit in my car and eat a honey stick. 

There are memories. 
Even in the lake. 
So that the whole lake is like a pill. 
Which I can take anytime.

I probably didn’t do that on purpose. 
Drive.
Into the collision universe. 
The evidence left behind me.
Points to someone walking up the hill for help. 

I have a ten year old car.
And drove it very far. 
I fought at my old friend’s place.
Left a dead patch of grass that can’t be erased. 
My uncle died two years ago. 
I saw him somehow as the wind billowed. 

In the collision universe. 
Some cars are fixed.
And then there’s me.

When The Night Has Come

When night has come like a thief in the night 
blowing winds of fierce by a blinding light 
When the moon's nightdress is a billowed glance   
in the same dark sky where the stars have danced 

When your broken sleep is far too steep 
and your much too tired for arms to keep 
When the only glow flows through a lamp 
and your sheets are damp as a soggy stamp, 

It is time to raise your eyes and pray  
and hope He meets you, in mid-way !

Lifting of The Wreck

I come here often, stop,
and from the river bank, watch
the ribs of an old wreck break through
the surface on an ebbing tide. 
After all this time it still seems
to crave for breath, to air 
its last remains. 

Whatever past it has
no longer resides in living memory
but in a paragraph inked 
in a shipping registry sunk 
deep in the basement 
of the Maritime Museum, 
or is somewhere forever becalmed 
in a photograph,
time frozen on a sepia sea.

But this morning I took it in,
gave my mind 
to its hollowed out hull 
and let imagination
lift it from the mud and make
it whole. I sailed it
out of the suck of time
and set it upon an open sea
and as its sails billowed
across my mind, I got the sense
that throughout all the wear 
of passing time,
it had been waiting for me.

The Interview

"Conversation with the wind, theme #5."

Wind, will you whisper softly
murmuring low as you blow
lifting the birdies on your currents
swaying the wildflowers in the meadow
               very soon, my darling girl

Wind, oh why are you angry
blowing my long curls here and there
whistling down the lane
bringing with you rain
               it is spring, my darling girl

Wind, can I soothe you today
I want to plant my hanging baskets
and you are twirling and whirling them
I think you are playing a game
               will settle down, my darling girl

Wind, today I went sailing
and you filled my sails with love
they billowed and cracked joyfully
as I drifted on the aqua sea
               happy to help, my darling girl

wind dreams

Naught but a billowed vagabond
A breeze longing to shriek
Soar on an eagle’s up draft
Plunge, predator-like, to earth
Riffle the grasses as I pursue
The limitations of my fate

DISTURBING

DISTURBING

Last night at the witching hour,
I was woken from a dream
By the sound of ghostly howling
And a shrill primaeval scream.

I opened one eye cautiously
And there above my bed,
A saw an apparition
That filled me full of dread.

It hovered for a moment,
Then flew around the room,
Muttering incantations,
A harbinger of gloom.

The wardrobe door was slamming,
The light flashed off and on.
The curtains billowed in the wind.
I cried out, “Please be gone.

“Oh, all right,” said the spectre,
With a disappointed sigh.
Then it flew out of the window
And up into the sky.

I nearly used an expletive,
But I never use that word.
So I used initials only
To query  what had occurred

Defrosting Kindness

White sheets rattle in surging winds billowed free
I fly suspended dangling from stars dancing
Moon cajoles like my father laughing at me
Butterflies land in swarms gathering goodness 
Pouring syrup on waffles honeyed sweetness

When Doves Cry

Ice formed in craggy spirals 
Upside down and billowed
on the outstretched arms
of a winter dead willow
still awaiting Spring’s charm

sunlight peered through 
the glistening frozen crystals 
as the ice-dripped nature’s tears 
falling upon the cold gripped ground 
near the site of memories from yesteryear
 
loved one’s gathered in close circles
on the wet crunchy chilled lawns
while warm voices rang
a murmuration of hymns

in the dirge of grief to brave
amid sorrow and loss
notes fondly resonated in prayer
praising the life in death that crossed
in the crisp and wintry air
departing to the grave
imparting music to heaven’s gates

two doves embellished in pure white
soared while lamenting its lyric
with rueful cooing to ethereal heights
singing upon angel’s breath the loss, the love
stirring the clouds overhead
finding their way back home
following the footsteps of the dead

August 7, 2023

Prophet

Prophesies by seers may be derided and prophets may be lampooned. But time may prove them right"   By Poet.

There was none to listen to him. 

His words were like: 

-A cry in the wilderness
that broke and shattered on woody trunks.

-The howl of a lone wolf
that rose in the dead of the night.

-The cry of an infant
that told the world, it was hungry.

-The cacophony of discordant orchestra
that left a jarring effect on the listeners.

His words sounded meaningless, 
to a world that spoke a different tongue.

With no receptacle, his words like heated waters
evanesced into vapour and billowed upwards,
like coils of smoke to freeze into clouds.

One day it rained down, 
quite unexpected…….

with thunder and lightning!

Depth of Desire

I want to do with you what the spring does with the cherry trees.”
                                                              ~ Pablo Neruda

He quoted an intimate line from a Pablo Neruda poem,
in a voice that put a deep pink blush on my cheeks
and as my bud opened into a flower, fully bloomed,
he nearly drowned me in passion I'd never known.

One of such depth that it left me desiring another regnant
wave of his love to be savored as it billowed over me.
To be loved with anything less than the madness of the sea
is not complete adoration; merely a limerence of infatuation.


Quote from Neruda's 'Every Day You Play.'

Spring

Spring skips along over billowed clouds
peers down at the brown, drying glades,
many trees with branches bare, yet proud
all still in winter masquerade.

"This mustn't be," Spring cries in alarm
"where is the green, but a year ago?"
Sprinkling seeds with a rose flower charm
blows kisses to buds to help them grow.

Leaves smile as a gentle raindrop falls
and Rainbow sits near color-filled cloud
Lightning laughs at Thunder's roaring calls
as Skies celebrate brightly and loud.

Flowers awaken, shake off raindrops
and birds in trees sing curious rhyme.
Fairy Damselfly rests midst green copse
and Butterflies arrive right on time.

February 21, 2023
for Joseph May's "In Bloom" contest
First

The Clearing

My mind foggy with too much stress,
I chose to saunter along and imagine
pastoral scenes that I had seen.
I dreamed of fields and meadows 
all in green, painted with the colors
of the multi-hued perennial Spring.
As I walked, I felt my mind easing into
a comfortable stride with me.
We passed a calming stream
with fish and frogs and dragonflies.
Each bird sang its soliloquy
and I had only tranquil happiness, 
peaceful rhythms, and floating
clouds that billowed and shape-shifted with the wind, 
so grateful that I had found the clearing.

• Short Billowed Poems
• Famous Billowed Poems
• Best Billowed Poems
• Read Billowed Poems
• Long Billowed Poems
• Billowed Quotes