Contrives Poems | Examples

List of Member Poems

Premium Member Mirror Of Life


The turning wheel of transient time 
contrives chameleon colors 
on the visage of mind’s panorama. 
I travel lonesome in sunny days,
across the gleaming wilderness 
or along the glittering garden path, 
lined with blooming spring saplings.
Mind turns into memory montage,
configures bliss in kaleidoscopic collage, 
reflection of joy I see in the mirror of life.

Tuesday Triumvirate

Love’s Goodbye

Those who ask
no questions
offer the greatest
comfort

Those who speak
inscriptive
tell the biggest
lies

Those who pledge
no fealty
to themselves
dishonor

Those who bear
no greetings
doomed to love’s
— goodbye

(Dreamsleep: February, 2026)

Misfortune Contrives

It’s in fashion
to wear
your heart
on your sleeve

A French poet
alarmed
that love may
deceive

Bleeding a wound
that
misfortune
contrives

Alone
in deception
your love
— circumcised  

(Dreamsleep: February, 2026) 

Epiphany Of Time

Once
you wrap
all existence
into this moment

You will 
understand the 
difference between life
— and its living

(Dreamsleep: February, 2026)

Hovering Moon

Where hovering Moon touches field of ripened corn

Lone ragged tree contrives to fracture perfectness.

Heavens jostling myriads eager to witness how Moon 

Responds to such deliberate and provocative arrogance.


------------------------------------------------------------------


Where the hovering Moon touches the field of ripened corn

A lone ragged tree contrives to fracture the perfectness.

Heavens jostling myriads are eager to witness how the Moon

Will respond to such deliberate and provocative arrogance.


Ethos Arbitrage

Emoted investment
dividends high
Buying then selling
as spirit contrives

Unlimited resource
consciousness fares
In debits and credits
— whose riches ensnare

(Dreamsleep: October, 2024)

Premium Member William Charles Lunalilo

William Charles Lunalilo
First King, chose by the people
Grandnephew of the Great King, as the people vote, was unanimous
Next year, King Kamehameha the Sixth died of tuberculosis

Hawaiian marriages are coconuts
Apple's eye, orchard nigh--girls uppercuts
Bees concede and confess
Honey is not the best
Lunalilo stings in-laws -- blood and guts.

Pacific divides paradise from lies, pulpit denies, missionary connives, fleece, devise hoax, and shanghais,
The native's supplies for whalers, all dives. At times, pearls for wider eyes, command contrives to control their lives.
Kings II & III foresaw their greed, the lands were a need to wed and achieve access was their way to succeed,
Lunalilo was short-lived, the people he decreed, as past kings agreed, a land trust deed, 'ere his life concedes.

Premium Member Some Fell Upon Stoney Ground

Seeds were sown on fertile soil while 
SOME FELL upon STONEY GROUND

(This is a poem about one of the latter)

Oh affluent lady in smart design
Scurrying to Tim’s bar to taste of wine
But one and all can see beneath the paint
Scars that pay heed to a lost soul so taint.
Consumption foremost doth addle her mind
When desperate to track a daily grind
Eyes witness testament of her flurry
A lustful grin contrives her to hurry.
With a shaking hand crystal flute to raise
Each sup hallelujah in silent praise
An embarrassing glance though not a care
Her inner most pain bared for all to share.
Hastily she consumes her liquid meal
Her body pulsates unable to heal 
A repetitive shot needed to please
No unsociable craving to be ease.
Silver Jag’s outside all bright and gleaming
She fights with the keys her body screaming
A need to be alone and get away
So she can measure the rest of the day.

© Harry J Horsman 2022


Premium Member Inextricably Untethered

I've struck a snag after a long develops steps.
To a recent attitude over alliance depth,
I investigate this frightening atmosphere.
On top, winning expresses me insecure.

 Because of my hearty assurance, I'm here today.
Divine grace has favored us for countless days.
I'm ailing back running with my unique mindset.
God, the Divine, contrives a chart for us, don't fret.

I can't travel to this area alone or by potent force.
It's all mercury; there's subtly nothing else sparse.
I'm defenseless to impact or succumb to anybody.
Every day, there is solely a requisite mission boldly.

But I'm evenly a pebble and embody no braw feeling.
Conception utterly lingers the power of God's crafting.
Despite our slightness, shapes harbor an awful misgiving.
In our style-driven culture, inner self-fosters are laying.

The fence of affection grows stouter as unfolding.
The Lord has appropriately arranged everything.
We are more poised than we reckon and form sound.
A wall that set us free, not the myriad way around.


Written: December 19, 2021

Premium Member Battle In the Id

In I'd slide, then slid, into the id.
Inside, the thorny thicket ten feet high
buried behind my mind, where it has hid
arising around me, no way to get by.

In the throes of the hedgerow, the ego goes
a word warrior of literate gore.
Sits there, a moaning monster, as it grows
each foe that is fought, it brings on one more.

The volley of verses is too insane.
Self survives, then thrives as ego contrives
why is there no reason one can explain
to take on all comers, ending their cries.

That battle that we wage and want to win
if you do, you have slayed the you within.

Premium Member In Praise of the Naked Truth

I'm up to my eyeballs in tawdry disguises - 
let women wear auras or no clothes at all!
Let men naked roam too! Dark skin, white, sans tattoo,
and the light of day see just what's bought and what's me!
Should my poems more suit you or dress down all sizes,
Conflate cows deemed sacred with pigs that appall?

Do metaphors obfuscate, or catch one napping -
do meter and rhyme feed or threaten belief?
Is a Lotus one drives, just a bloom one contrives
to take focus away from crass things one might say?
Is a plunging neckline more release or a trapping,
(gill net) for unschooled? There's allure, but no beef?

God's truth can't be mine though my head's a humdinger -
all-natural, unswollen, upstart in art!
I'm a retrograde poet, who feels more a butt
for colliding with free verse, that others traverse
as if skiing downhill. But for me, rhyme's the bringer
of what's in the pipe! My brain plays a bit part!


Brian Johnston
25th of June in 2020

Premium Member Meditations a Tribute

waiting to retreat
enduring
   then turning courage
in a
   moment
     of change
to bravery

no longer deceived
truth
    replaces remorse
rooted
& blessed
        by reason
riding the tide
across
the evening
            into night

grief prevented
innocence deserted
the positive
           rejoices
&bids farewell
estranged&
              changed
survives
         the revolt

uneasy sleeps
the lonely
loud
    the sounds
of feelings
of alarm
in
default of loving
                    care
in the pursuit
of
pleasure

in the mirror
notice&belief
&discipline
quiet
elements
     with gestures
of praise
to admire&observe
in wonder

designed to shield
&display
authority
    in the temporal
&imbibe
      the possible
secrete
     the lovely
float
   the concrete
into the valley
                of self

to escape the threat
which beckons
in the
     voice of passion
to invoke
      lapsed glory
&its reward

dogma speaks aloud
concern
      listens
contrives
         to open
the seige ahead
with
a
tale
of joy

Wishes Still To Pray

Are they waiting for me patient,
  as I’m caught up in the game

Are they counting down the moments,
  till I breathe my last refrain

Do they wonder why I dawdle,
  with an opening so wide

Do excuses stoop to waddle, 
  as my tardiness contrives

Is that light beyond my tunnel,
  to burn forever long

Is the torch that lights my funeral,
  one to mark and count upon 

What now keeps me in this moment,
  as new paths have cleared away

Is it something that I haven’t said
  —or wishes still to pray

(Villanova Pennsylvania: September, 2016)

Premium Member Rutilated Quartz

She lies in slumber
pending release,
in Gaia’s womb.
Case of needles;
rutilated quartz,
hair of angels
contrives balance;
administrating pleasure and pain,
essence of yin and yang.

She blesses her own
with self-control,
willpower,
protection...
Mother Nature’s
anti-depressant
miracle;
strength of composition,
she is air and fire.

Premium Member Epitaph of a Wandering Soul

Throughout eons she contrives
to casting seeds and see what thrives
as she has done for countless lives.
Experimental.

Traveling through time and space
on cresting waves of light and grace
to be here in this time and place
of great potential.

By the trauma of rebirth,
and crashing on this spinning earth
to walk a path of woe and mirth.
Experiential.

To the beat of her own drum;
to laugh, and love, and overcome;
to act in ways both wise and dumb,
and unprovincial.

Tending to transplanted souls,
traversing over burning coals,
to wet her feet on earthly shoals.
Developmental.

Until her own angelic claque
blasts their trumpets ‘til they crack,
to guide her home; to call her back,
as transcendental.

Premium Member Villanelle: Don'T Some Live Life the Way He Or She Wants It

Villanelle : Don't some live Life the way he or she wants it

Don't some live Life the way he or she wants it
Look around and see who lives resounding lives
If I were Life's Playwright won't I so fix it

Make both Yang and Yin agree to make things fit
Into the entire Scheme of Things which us drives
Won't some live Life the way he or she wants it

No playwright can banish conflict from his Script
He'd play to empty seats actors who mime lives
If I were Life's Playwright won't I so fix it

So Evil-Doers reign supreme to make it
The way the Play devolves on stage each scene contrives
Won't some live Life the way he or she wants it

Not to shift blame on either won't I judge it
Best to make Authorities live double lives
If I were Life's Playwright won't I so fix it

Doubt not why Evil-Doers always make it
Protected pardoned cherished Queen Bees in hives
Don't some live Life the way he or she wants it
If I were Life's Playwright won't I so fix it

© T. Wignesan - Paris,  2018

Wishes Still To Pray

Are they waiting for me patient,
  as I’m caught up in the game

Are they counting down the moments,
  till I breathe my last refrain

Do they wonder why I dawdle,
  with an opening so wide

Do excuses stoop to waddle, 
  as my tardiness contrives

Is that light beyond my tunnel,
  to burn forever long

Is the torch that lights my funeral,
  one to mark and count upon 

What now keeps me in this moment,
  as new paths have cleared away

Is it something that I haven’t said,
—or wishes still to pray

(Villanova Pennsylvania: September, 2016)

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