We can build an orrery
Yet turn the sky into a junkyard
We're abecedarian, quirky contrarian
Stare decisis from cosmic ovarian
Subaltern, suborbital
Small steps on the heavenly stairway
Pedestrian stardust walking around
Tariffing penguins to tear up the ground
But the stairway is spiral
And it's spiraling down
No escape from the gravity
Found all around
Eyes searching the cosmos
For myopic bliss
In a fallacy galaxy
Far from star-kissed
We're worst when we're first
At least in our mind
Quoting chapter and verse
From each tract that we find
On the ground underneath us
That shifts with each step
Tract's gotten infected
Yet onward we schlep
Each bearing the burden
Of truth stumbled across
When we can patch the thatch
On the roof that we've lost
In that storm of ideas
That threatened the shelter
We've built for ourselves
Unstable ideas full on the shelves
We've forgotten to look
For the beauty inside
While we're gathering dust
From under our feet
Instead of uncovering
What's come from above
While planting our hopes
In the promise of love
I've never been to Kathmandu
it's highly unlikely I'm ever going to
and I don't consider macaques the least bit holy
while some there choose so to do
tho' they may be Nepalese aristocracy
no they won't make a monkey of me
such couldn't leave me any colder
as it's all in the mind's eye of the beholder
and who decides what is 'God'
of all possibilities chapter and verse in the universe
why give such Old World primates the nod
how about a slug or a ladybug
polyphyly and insects are equally relevant too
in fact if we're allegedly created in 'His' likeness
why not me... or even you?
What The World Needs Is Jesus
What the world needs is Jesus,
In trying times like these,
He's the answer to our problems,
For in Him there's peace.
There's also joy and righteousness,
That is in the Holy Ghost,
It says so in the Bible,
In book, chapter, and verse.
We need to have the Bible,
Read and taught in our hearing,
And after which obey God's word,
Until His second coming.
Vivian L. Shaw
The world must come to a recognition of unity
While struggling with a sense of separation
Realizing that we are all genus human being
With no reasonable excuse for alienation,
Our arteries flow with the same blood of life
Long accepting each other’s for transfusion,
[Only good and evil are polarities of exactitude]
Why must we contend with phony exclusion?
We share the earth and all its magnificent riches
For the good of all regardless of race or creed
We must eschew thoughts of personal ownership
Sharing with each other as each has the need.
A sense of separation permeates our daily lives
The ideas of “we” and “they” as entities diverse
While in truth we and they are the exact same
It’s just that we read different chapter and verse.
Written November 1, 2022
Submitted to “Rotate Consciousness Polarity" Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Unseeking Seeker
There is a boy called Rick
who who took to hurling; with bricks'
He let loose with a low'un,
It looked like it was throw'un
And knocked pastor down into the c'rick.'
The pastor fell backward right in'
He never, had learn't quite how to swim'
He sat on his behind,
and thought wasThis a sign,
that some heathen Had targeted him?
He attempted to climb up the bank
Thinking I'd better try stopping this crank'
As he got to the top,
a girt blooming rock'
Hit him straight in the chapter and verse
Some money spilled out of that purse,
Not too thrilled And now feeling much worse,
He let out a prayer
Asking everyone there
If there was a nearby; district nurse?
When Judy plays Doctor & Nurse
She always quotes chapter and verse
Then whacks off a tad
(The Rabbi's her dad)
And that's how young boys learn to curse
Does heaven have an address, a specific place in time?
Could it possibly be expressed with dance, song or maybe rhyme?
Will it be here on Earth, or beyond our blue sky?
Could we ever understand, how or even why?
We have organized religion; each faction is diverse.
Right down to each core belief, chapter and verse.
Who am I to judge? I’m no better than any of you.
I would just prefer if we didn’t argue, until our faces turned blue.
As for me, I think of Heaven as a place we all go.
When our time here is up and we’ve watched our last show.
A place to be happy, with laughter all around.
Where everyone gathers, with no hate to be found.
Whatever you believe, I hope it all comes true.
If I was somehow granted a wish, I would make it for each of you.
My wish would be for peace and some happiness in the light.
Whatever would give you comfort and help you through your night.
12/3/21
Winter Wishes Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Chantelle Anne Cooke
Donald Trump tweets, "Its all a big hoax!
Dreamed up by Democrat 'Loser' folks!"
The GOP vow,
"We believe you now!"
Morticians enjoy insider jokes!
The doctor said to expect the worse
The vicar quoted chapter and verse
"Oh, no!" said the wife
"You must save his life
Because he's the man who drives the hearse!"
When I was in Kenya,
And I heard those words,
I knew we going to get chapter and verse.
It always started long story, short,
But we’re yet to get how short is short?
Would his brothers be involved,
Or the government,
As we’d already been told the trials and tribulations of the Father.
But to our surprise.
we were entertained to the tales of boys and men who worked and toiled
To pots of ugali boiled.
But for all the tales,
And the repetitive journey down memory lane
We sat and wondered where was Tarzan and Jane?
Mike Singh 1/08/2020
The places I’ve been
all part of me now,
roadmaps of intention
tracking landscapes endowed
The history I’ve written
covers chapter and verse,
of promises made
and commitments diverse
The road ever widens
my scope narrows down,
the past out of focus
leaving town after town
Tomorrow unbeckoned
I search for today,
the future unreckoned
—the moment in play
(The New Room: March, 2021)
I’ve heard it said that time kills all love
Nothing can last forever, not even the stars above
It’s a sad paradigm
Mortality can be a blessing and also a curse
I’ve written my own book on love, each chapter and verse
True love sublime
My heart does not follow the rules, chapter one; verse two
Our love is very special, I will always be in love with you
There is no mountain I won’t climb
Last but not least, in my magical book of spells
Final chapter and verse, my love now tells
My love is stronger than time
July 31, 2020
Tail Rhyme Stanza Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Emile Pinet
Young Love
BEHOLD, that special soothing tides of youth,
wherein it surges per paints blending times,
dries up in seconds treasured as it climbs,
up or down, a portrait life brushed in truth.
HAIL, the call of the free that pulsed the veins,
while an enjoined wax stilled against candles,
hours ere blazing unleashed their love handles,
the real flame dies, the soul fire remains.
HARK, love starts on the blanks of the canvas,
paints are the veins progress, be rosed or fall,
as brushing touched heartbeats inspire the sprawl,
stained e'er in stillness extends love chances.
HEED, the distinct words that are been spelled out,
trickled ink contained, volumes of bled heart,
stacks of blank sheets, await love to impart,
instills the mind, imprints the heart throughout.
BLESSED, are twain souls, holding candles as ere,
portrayed gorgeously, passion be revealed,
started book, a chapter, and verse unsealed,
too young whence start, still grows sweetheart affair.
2020 March 12
*2nd Place*
STRAND CHOICE F,any form,any theme
~~Brian Strand
Howmanysyllables;
20 lines x 10 syllables per = 200 syllables total
This horny shaft of ruffled feathers
Is hollow and needs to be filled
This shaft has become a hard ballpoint pen
It needs secretion within parchment
It is filled with ink wanting to write
Without you I have writers block
I will glue your pages together
Placing my hard cover around you
I need to be in your table of Content
I will turn your pages over and over
I will never dog ear anyone's page but yours
My Quotes will be long and hard to understand
With each stroke of this pen thinking, then
Writing and filling this book from cover to cover
The Main Chapter and Verse
Is You, the most interesting book I have ever read
A man in an HOV lane
Was driving in desert terrain.
A trooper passed by
And he asked the man why
When the HOV sign was so plain.
For restrictions require that two
Must be in the car subject to view
But the driver just said
Of his passenger, dead,
“I assumed that he counted. Who knew?”
See, the man drove an occupied hearse
Yet the rules, listing chapter and verse,
Don’t say occupants must
Not have bitten the dust,
Though a corpse at the wheel would be worse!
written 7/3/19
Wherein this life I do my thoughts rehearse
Therein is found my unique chapter and verse
This finite earth may be my physical home
In spirit I live within this timeless tome
As tired faculties begin to ebb with age
My legacy will still live upon the page
Dispelling my moments of deep,dying gloom
The welcoming web nurses my verse volume
Let it then clear and stark become my epitaph
So that my poems stand as my autograph.
What emerges from reading between the lines?
The splitting of the physical from the divine.
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