A split second
a mere centimeter
separates champions
from fame's cheated ones
Who came in second
no one remembers
dust-covered records
airless embers
The loneliness of night cloaks a desolate sky.
Drizzling rain clings to devitalized windowpanes.
Staring, longing for an escape from reality.
Ruminating thoughts keep sleep at bay.
The flicker of the television hums in the other room.
Dragging myself, I sink into the doldrums of a discarded sofa.
Turning up the volume, the weatherman describes a tempest coming from the northeast.
Burnt out, silhouettes of notions run rampant.
Even the soft glow of the TV has become too much.
The wind is starting to howl now.
I can feel it whip around the boards of this old house,
Like ancient bones rattling through the ages.
The porch blinds suddenly, violently thrash.
Getting up, I close them before slipping into my pajamas.
Preparing for something just out of reach,
Always a centimeter from my grasp.
I lay in a desperate bed.
Ever-expanding darkness shrouds me.
Yet no relief arrives.
Swollen eyes no longer produce tears.
Vocal cords no longer produce sound.
Just silent screams going unheard into the mattress,
As sanity finally slips through the threads of unyielding fabric.
Time with you, a pleasure,
is a thing that I can't measure
with a centimeter or an inch,
a quarter teaspoon or a pinch.
It's a priceless treasure.
Help! I stand desperately on a precipice,
and ask you, poet, what kind of bug is this?
I am not an entomologis.
It was on top of my laptop computer.
Is it male or female or is it neuter?
I can't afford an entomolotutor.
It gazes at me through a compound eye,
I see no wings. Does it walk or fly,
strangely across the ground or sky?
A praying mantis it is not.
It has six legs. That's quite a lot.
his photo of him is all I caught.
For this question, I apologize,
I've no skill to entomologize.
It's less than a half centimeter in size.
I knew you'd know it - happy you could assist.
This sort of bug is too easily dismissed.
Thank you, poet entomologist.
The start is marked by a gravy weapon,
Puppy barks answer the trumpets' call.
The muzzle is loose, whispers are free,
The light shines through the metal canvas wall.
Gold insulation, thin as wool,
The warmth is hard to find.
The ember processor cools,
And the processor servant leaves the silicone.
A penthouse phallus on the street of rape
The laptop is for the spouse.
No need for a centimeter polisher,
Just a sail and a television in the house.
Grease the radio, pour the smoke,
Liquor is for the cat.
No solid pills or silver hats,
Just a woman feeding with vinegar, that's all.
A thousand stars bore their pinpoint holes
into a centimeter of dark sky.
If that drifting cloud disappeared,
ten thousand more
would pierce through perception.
If we were to shift our sight
just one fingerbreadth away,
a universe might leap into our eyes,
and remain there,
to shine out,
in the brightest of daylights.
“Look carefully and see if there could possibly be pain like my pain, like the one bestowed by You upon me.” – Lamentations 1:12
I walk the width of 2000 pound bomb crater in the densely populated refugee camp, searching centimeter by centimeter for the pieces of inhumanity littering the ground, reminding me of the legionnaires of the fascist air force bombing Guernica brutally, wondering how Picasso would paint this tragedy?
Gaza, now the biggest open graveyard in the world, with the bombs breaking the record in Guinness book of record, guttering hospitals, bakeries, schools, and convoys of war refugees, after decades of oppression.
There are cries of the wounded under the rubble, with no way to reach them,
and the stench of death spreading to the distant shores, to the throne of God.
Into Gaza I go, to find hell and retrieve my conscience.
But, you hear the voices? They don't stop singing, over the abyss of war,
Palestine will be free.
The Egyptian Cubit
is said to be
52.36 ... cenTIMEter
but as you can see...
I multiplied
to find the Mayan...
52 x 36 = 1872
I asked about frogs
and bacab and the lion...
"... an arrangement made ..."
and it said, "...this way..."
The Structure is Fine
and the lines all rhyme
... So I wrote it again...
J E S U S
10 + 5 + 19 + 21 + 19 = 74
and then dear god...
I could see your name.
I lie without consequence
A wasteless existence that stands between heaven and hell
Though I don’t believe in it.
I’ve lost my way with no way to be found
But in the dark of the night I look for a way home.
I lie without consequence
A wasteless existence between heaven and hell
I am afraid of being alone
Of standing with just my soul in its glanced reflection
Reaching for a hand that no one will grasp
I’ve looked in there eyes with promises, afraid to lose them, fearing to be abandoned and lied
I lie
And hate every centimeter of my being
Wishing every part of me would die.
I’ve feared me for far to long, God has no dealings with this soulless, passion.
Tears forever fall in the shadows of me, for I am alone
A weakened presence that dies for love, a constant wanting that will never be granted.
I lied
In efforts to rid the clutch of being rejected, I’ll do it before you try
Lied to keep afloat, a calling, a need that was never needed.
Lied to hold
Lied in fear
Lied to erase…me
But In the darkest part of my trepidation, I found a way back home
Home…. to me, a being I was once loved in raptures.
I no longer lie
But now I am alone
And that’s…okay
I grew up with inches, yards, miles, and feet.
I knew the difference, it was easy, and neat.
But today I am far behind in the dust because
Metric scale is what the new math does.
Millimeters, centimeters, cha cha cha.
Pencil thickness is about one centimeter. Rah Rah Rah.
Ten Millimeters is one centimeter, reminds me of cents to a dollar.
I may be catching on, so I stand up and holler.
One hundred thousand centimeters is a kilometer, friend.
One hundred centimeters is a meter, did you know that, Uncle Ben?
Millimeters, centimeters, cha cha cha.
Paper thickness is way less than a centimeter. Rah Rah Rah.
Now I think of my recipes. Did they change the tablespoon too?
Do I have to worry about cups, pints, and gallons for my glue?
I used to know my measurements, but everything is new.
Don’t even show me the rest of the new math. It is a boo hoo.
It was the exam of all exams to test the mind....The Soul....Phyiscal agility...Years of Coordination, and Comprehension Skills.... I went for a walk and the pool had a leak I happen to go ito the store and found a New Hubba Bubba Brand..... I looked at it before I chewed and saw that it had a new sugar wax on the side ... I looked at my pool and thought to myself with a pool full of water and 2 ft deep.... What do I do but make an imprint too... It was a centimeter round and had to go just right... I aimed correctly with everything I could see in sight.... Hand in the air and visualizing my aim.... I thought of a cue ball and racked balls ... It only took a few seconds .... if that at all .... I made it perfect right in the hole ... Took my index finger and smoothed the surface.... With a perfect seal I complimented myself was this this the final exam??? An Eight Ball in the Side pocket and now I am an ace...
If 12 marching inchworms moved a centimeter how far did they travel would it be a foot?
11/28/20
Written words by James Edward Lee Sr © 2020
I love staying out until dark
dusk is my favorite time to embark
going home causes me to become eager
there's nothing to do for the seeker
television is okay but it's not productive
playing cards is fine though deductive
I tend to travel to deep inside myself
I must learn to inactively propel
It seems they continue inventing things
to hinder self-sufficiency without strings
it's not called boredom for this I fight
we can't drive he can't distinguish at night
there's so much to say but I won't attempt
it's not worth the repercussions for to kempt
I can't relieve but to notice on this page
the lines are much longer when I have words to engage
I still don't understand an Iambic Pentameter
or I'd be writing Sonnets in place of rhymes in centimeter
all I need is the right teacher
I learned algebra from another dreamer
I surely didn't learn it in school
monotone didn't work for me as a rule
privacy would be admirable as I jot down this theme
one could dream
Mutter mutter mutter. Gutter gutter doo.
Cutter cutter cutter Hutter hutter boo.
Ebony sat staring, could not look away.
Twas a yearly event on Halloween day.
Witch T snorted and cackled and laughed as she dunked.
Stew splashed out as apple heavily landed in totally well plunked.
My best brew ever she bragged with a wink and a whistle.
She tossed in kerosene, fingernails, goat’s milk and a thistle.
Ebony sat mesmerized, watching her friend, the witch.
She moved not a centimeter. Her tail barely gave a twitch.
Witch T threw in mushrooms, the poisonous kind.
Knowing whoever found it would consider it a terrific find.
And now for my sister, she said with a snarl and a laugh.
In went an elongated head of a quite dead giraffe.
A bag of marshmallows and two cups of rancid puppy chow.
She could not stop dancing or adding stupid stuff now.
Worlds Within Worlds
Quick- open up your human hand-
a microbe-laden nasty world
is thriving there clandestinely!
Though most will die with sudsy wash-
not long before more take their place.
Within their unseen realm of space-
in their tight time tween life and death,
they eat, divide- to millions grow
and wait to migrate to new worlds-
through all the human hands you touch.
Sandra M. Haight
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How many germs are on your hands?
It's fair to say a lot of them, particularly if you haven't washed your hands recently. Every time you touch an object or shake someone's hand, you are probably picking up bacteria and potentially viruses too. We're estimated to have around 1,500 bacteria living on each square centimeter of the skin on our hands. Google
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