Bristly Poems | Examples

Falling Winter Sends Rain

Rain follows the fading winter's breath

In the tangled field,
where bristly ryegrass sways

Emerging green, the blades do rise
glimmer in the verdant hue of shamrock

like the lively notes of the cuckoo's call
Whispers dance upon the undulating meadows

The fragrance of the soil—
its charm, a whisper of rain-kissed ground

Silver whispers of yearning
Softly sung, a memory lingers still.

An All Night Rain

An all-night rain: the smell
of sogged-down leaves and woods
stirs up feral urges: to tramp
the wetness like a snouted creature,
kicking up dead leaves, poking
deep for squirming things, sniffing
earthy scents for spongy roots,
gulping down mushrooms
with black grit, the bristly haired
skin taut and wet, until the belly
bloats and sags, generating heat
like a boiling cauldron.

Nilgiri Tahr

Sure-footed on rugged hill
Likes life on mountain range
Rolling grassland fits the bill
Short horns reveal their age
Ovines in endangered stage

Males change from Brown, grey to black
Deft climbers blend with rock
Bristly manes, white saddleback
Female has agile walk
Dusky females never baulk

Feeds on various grass, leaves
Spots danger to snort, run
Predators - tigers, dholes, wolves
Humans poach, shoot for fun
Human deeds have their life done

Seedlings

We all start out like seedlings
Just emerging from the earth,
Alike in that we’re each of us
A product of a birth.

Depending on our genus,
We may grow up tall and straight
Or be scraggly or bristly,
Rooted down by luck or fate.

We’ll be nurtured and be nourished
Or be totally ignored,
Grow in gardens gently tended
Or be trampled and abhorred.

Some of us will sport some flowers
To embellish and adorn,
While for others there’s deception
Waiting in a hidden thorn.

Though there’s sun and rain and shelter,
Nature doesn’t really care
If each seedling has an equal shot,
For life just isn’t fair.

Brushing

Circling and scraping.
Bristly and comforting.
When I brush my teeth.
It’s never that bad.
But getting out of bed is the hard part.
I find myself wishing someone would bring me my toothbrush.
I could brush my teeth in my sleep.
Instead, I’m lonely. 
I’m late so I spring out of bed, suddenly.
Circling the room, anxiously.
The carpet scraping my feet.
Fearful that my toothbrush will somehow hurt me.
I have to leave soon.
I don’t have time to brush, so I cry instead.
I daydream all day, 
About going home to brush my teeth over and over…
Alone, brushing my teeth.
Until everything is clean and fresh.
But when I get home, it’s never like that.
I’m tired so I brush my teeth meekly and hopelessly.
Circling and scraping.
Bristly and comforting.
I don’t really brush my teeth enough these days.

Tired

He thinks he killed me.
So he rolled me up in a rug.
I thought I died too but then I wiggled my toes.
Rugs are bristly and hot, so I felt that too.
When I try to unfurl, I just get wrapped tighter.
Until I relax and fall asleep.
I always wake up from that nightmare,
But I’m lying on the floor from passing out.
They are worried but it’s just a dream, I say.
I’m tired, so I close my eyes again.
To get a little more sleep.

Charlotte

Charlotte

You were smiling at me
As you were looking right 
Through him
Or were you 
Looking right through me
As you were smiling at him?
False subtleties 
From dew to dust
From dawn to dusk
All the things that you have to weave
I’m sure didn’t mean to deceive
Well I never really had a doubt
After all the things I found out
I can’t get out
Charlotte
Too caught up in the web you wove
In the lies you told
Head first for you I really dove
The web you spun
Right here where it all began
As I sing along
The cricket’s song
Just as I realized
Summertime can’t last forever
AsI  hang onto something 
a little tighter
I wondered if I
Should  hold on to nothing
A little bit longer?
Your hourglass body
The bristly patch I crave
Too many things on my mind
So many past better left behind
That also told my woes to you
That is all I can do
No one can ever take your place 
In my heart
Blood thirsty 
Looking pretty 
That’s all you do
Charlotte
I’d still like to believe 
That you really 
Didn't mean to deceive.

Witch

Witches are wizened hags
With long nose and loose hair
Wart nosed ugly spirits
Wicked ramblers of night
Who ride on bristly brooms
Wielders of black magic
Weird sisters in Macbeth

Crux

Crux is a craggy, seasoned, sunbaked fisherman from Missouri.
Never one to speed up a story, and never in any kind of hurry.
He has no grandchildren of his own, but likes my daughter Grace.
Grace is three, and loves to run her hands over bristly whiskers on his face.

I never saw this side of him before, my mother said to me, but I had.
Don’t you remember when he used to come and visit with my Dad?
They would stay up all night laughing about wild tales of the sea.
And who was feeling his bristly whiskers? That little lad was me.

We Are Flowers of Life

You are a rose, with prickly words and thorny ways.
Your life is hardy like a mum and a bit dull like one too.
My cousin is an orchid, delicate and bristly, brittle.
One strong wind could end her.

My twin is a sunflower, bright yellow with a friendly face
Greeting everyone with positivity and warmth.
I am a hydrangea, ready to change color,
Angrily waiting for the right plant food again.

Cracked

down the road
       past the slips 
       and fallen power lines 
a massive macrocarpa pine tree
 90 feet of sprawling bristly dark green 
    all wild spiky branches and cones
       squat and ugly rough barked trunk 
150 years old 

cracked completely in half 
   suspended 
and hanging arched over the road 

a shocking reminder of the last three days of cyclone Gabrielle 
torrential rain and screaming wind 
relentless noise and fear 

shuddering, I think ...should I drive under it? 
it's the only road out

Mr Otter Nursery Rhyme

Frisky frog forgot to bathe
So off he went, to the creek
Alone in the water, he decided
He’d be so clean, he’d squeak

Silly squirrel, scattered his nuts
Along the bank where Frog swam
Sinking into the clearest water
Frog told the squirrel he should scram

Friendly fish whirled in the waves
Swaying with the chug of the water
Reminding Frog he was surely clean
So he could visit the king’s daughter

Bristly bear came across the ridge
Rattling the leaves with his great paws
The others saw him and left the creek
Recalling the fierceness of his wide jaws

Frisky frog went to visit the king
While silly squirrel packed his lunch
And, friendly fish worked up the nerve
To glide by bristly bear – and on a hunch…

They all thanked God for this water
Where they finally met Mr. Otter!






Be Creative Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Eve Roper 
November 6, 2022

Foxtails Haiku

Weeds~ what a nightmare!
the pesky, bristly mean seeds;
prickly spikelets

Falsehood Dwindling

Hyacinths in a trance, bewitched by hysteria,
Amid the shadows of a mythological eclipse.
Elixir of roseate red oozing out loose progeria,
In islands where the sea weeps azure breaks.

Amid the shadows of a mythological eclipse,
Daunting me subtly with its crimson smell.
In islands where the sea weeps azure breaks,
From golden dust to smooth bristly as well. 

Daunting me subtly with its crimson smell,
The fading breaths of sinister falsehood.
From golden dust to smooth bristly as well,
On black graveyards to azure seas, we stood. 

The fading breaths of sinister falsehood,
In the sunken bronze halls of antique disease.
On black graveyards to azure seas, we stood, 
Teals are being tormented by nightly noise.

In the sunken bronze halls of antique disease,
Elixir of roseate red oozing out loose progeria.
Teals are being tormented by nightly noise,
Hyacinths in a trance, bewitched by hysteria.

Written: May 22, 2022

I Am In a Murderous Mood

I am in a murderous mood.
You will have to be dealt with
And you and you and also you two.

But what did I do?
Did you mean me?
Not me right?
I did not start the fight.

I am in a murderous mood.
I am coming after you all.
I am bristly angry, and five feet tall.


But what did I do?
It was him, not me.
Not me right?
I do not fight.

I have been up since three.
I mean everyone.
Oh, wait. Are those flowers?
Planting is such fun!

And is that a pup?
And coffee in a cup?
You can live today
But your time is nearly up.

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