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the following poem was written as part of an online poetry class; responding to the image above
We tuned the dish to static,
listening for God’s cough~
a blip, a hiccup in the cosmic hum.
The night shift drank coffee
thick as engine grease,
the kind that left your tongue
tattooed with bitterness.
We waited…
and still, the stars
bled silence.
You said, Maybe we're dialing
the wrong frequency.
I said, Maybe God’s just shy.
Then the power died.
The dish froze mid-sweep,
like a man catching
his own ghost in the mirror.
We stood there, necks craned,
waiting…hoping…
for the dark to whisper
its secrets to us.
In remembrance of 9/11/2001
A skyline, once two-headed,
a postcard promise.
I saved it,
that future view,
my feet on the ground,
neck craned back,
in the shadow of steel giants.
They took the dream first.
Not just the view,
not just the towers,
but the postcard, torn.
The future became a past I never lived.
I saw them fall,
and a part of me fell with them.
My anger, a hot fire,
against the smoke,
the dust that buried my dream.
The broke the glass of the window I was looking through,
shattered the symbol,
Left an empty space.
But the broken glass became a mirror.
And in it, I saw us,
not broken, but reflecting.
A million faces,
not shattered, but hardened.
Holding each other up,
in the place where the towers used to be.
The dream changed,
it became something new.
A different kind of strength,
forged in the space where the twin towers stood,
built not of steel, but of spirit.
We were not broken,
we were made stronger.
Was the article illusive
In transparent approach
The suitor in study
As students with rome?
Cause and able, yet
There she isn't
Ive died in your dear wifes eyes
tell me i never loved her
hurt after the dancings done
ive died in your dear wifes eyes
and theyve been taken away
tell me i never loved an angel
hurt after the dancings done
thugger enter the idiom
corner unpainted, love irish
b, low, c nuttin
craned, exam, deliver the news
leave all these younga brohtas bent
kneckin on a fence
weezers
the boy's in t.o. puttin on advisors
saw you a step out
ob gy n you thoughts
why you catchin trash
yo mama radio no latch
free rides for too strong
mama and daddy silly idols
al dented the news racks
elbows up
Bliss as words like wine pour over a pure slate,
staining it with their meaning
and reddening it with their tones.
Fervor takes over;
the scene unfolds like something already decided
as one letter follows another
like drops from a chalice,
dripping until it overflows.
My neck is craned from fatigue
and out of reverence
as ideas become flesh before my eyes.
Each word is holy—
each character is bread to the wine of emotion.
Sleep is a martyr,
dead on the altar of my craft.
My hands shake from the caffeine
flooding my bloodstream
and the adrenaline joining it
as the ritual continues.
This story is my body.
These words are my blood.
I do this for remembrance—
the hope that I can become something more than
what I am.
suddenly in a gap between talking, he was taken over
by a new page, turned mid flow, as he clutched his chest,
creases betraying a defeated face as a thousand thoughts
bottle-necked the wasp-waste of an end, the hourglass
about to crash to the floor, his hourglass, his time, his eyes
and through the mist and haze, he had never felt so alone,
clamminess whitewashed his pain as the seat shuddered
beneath him, his eyes overwhelmed with fear, dewing
wetter with each fading beat, my heart thy final judge,
only tomorrow would know whether he was going
to start his life sentence for murder as the courtroom
looked on before an ushered and craned departure
Subtitle: Send In The Clowns
Doctor Embroil you are wanted at ER
the nurses teary eyed never did once stir
as a child that lay on a gurney, after a sprint incur
mumbled with delirium
SEND IN THE CLOWNS, SEND IN THE CLOWNS
A four year old boy who called everyone one Sir
lay dying at the center though he spoke with a slur
his hearing was intact, though quiet was his purr
father promised me, ...
SEND IN THE CLOWNS, SEND IN THE CLOWNS
His matted curly hair smelled of African rain
his little hands clutched a moment insane
Dr. Embroil put your red nose on, so he craned
I got you boy, ...
SEND IN THE CLOWNS, SEND IN THE CLOWNS
his mom outside a corridor leaning on her cane
begged for a miracle" God take away his pain"
as a finger full of light touched his apterium,
the boy smiled and said,
DON'T BOTHER, HE'S HERE
Japan Skytree 2080ft
They began by digging down
So two directions could be
built at once
Premade sections built on the
ground
Scaffolding added with
netting surround
to prevent anything falling down
Each section craned into position
Above the Load a gyroscope
preventing mid~air transition
Made of tubes angled for strength
Structural integrity
An architect's Dream
The engineer's Mission
On reaching the top 2 cranes
to be lowered
from atop this ingenious free~standing Tower
smaller cranes hoisted to perform this function
Each crane smaller 'till all
were grounded
The last of which the final
stage
Dismantled and carried down
in an elevator
Such ingenuity is characteristic of
Japanese engineering behaviour
Completed in a narrow triangled arena
It stands
World Tallest Free~standing
Communications Tower
There may be many poets who do desire,
To read and enjoy all of my entire satire;
Did disturb;
Found on curb,
Like some garbage that started to sour.
Jim Horn
Writing my poems have always enjoyed,
Presuming that with you will be annoyed;
Throwing in trash with thought we toyed.
While in wheelchair appeared to be short
Of any common sense needed in a court,
Neck craned;
Back sprained;
Who we doubt even God should support.
Sharks have been know to be awful cruel;
Like to crunch up people in swimming pool;
Good by waving,
When shaving;
Play sad piano music forgot to bring stool.
Jim Horn
Will just put all of my poems into one
to allow for room to approach 7,000.
Impecunious news hunters on Oxford Avenue
Craned over newspapers spread on the floor
To gather ammunition about who knew
The last gossip about a politician shown the door
By hacks in his political party for consorting with the sworn enemy
Sent to Coventry in corridors of power
Or which celebrity a court of law ordered to pay an alimony
Or who among supporters of Venomous Vipers FC sent a rose flower
To a big carrot’s girlfriend, raising the temperature in her home
Where her incensed husband puffing and huffing threatened to disfigure the alleged culprit
Whom he accused of destabilizing the genome
Insisting the culprit he would ill-treat
As news hunters speculated on merits and demerits of the law of the jungle
The aggrieved husband contemplated inflicting on the innocent man
News hunters felt didn’t deserve the bungle
The husband riding a rickety van planned as a ban
That would serve his wife right as she could no longer go to the market
To buy beef, cabbage, tomato
Even if she wasn’t involved in any racket
To sell or buy at low prices an Irish potato.
Wave after wave of reverses
Upon my life rained
Although Bible verses
My heart craned and strained
To read
To divert
To knead
To insert
Into the dustbin of history
Which in the pain served a cathartic purpose
As in empathy and sympathy my story
It did endorse
To keep my bearing on an even keel
Assuaging my pain
Endeavouring to kill
The despair I felt in the rain
As the full horror
Of the betrayal he committed
In the context of the egregious error
He admitted
Into the love I felt he gave
In full measure
I could no longer save
From the ephemeral pleasure
I felt he pretended unto me
To offer
Cos for once my way clear I could see in the blues sea
Where I could no longer suffer
As a doting wife
Whom he took for granted
To rain wave upon wave of strife
Although I dare say for good reasons I sometimes ranted.
It was a night so dark, so damp; the fog swirled thick about the lamp,
a night not fit for man or beast, a night on which tender hearts ceased
to care about mankind's suffering, so nasty was the storm buffeting
the tiny humble New England town, its weathered cape cods all battened down.
When of a sudden a cry rang out, piercing the fog with a shriek and a shout:
Did it herald the dawn of a better day? --Or just proclaim, "Man's lost his way."
Shutters opened, blinds upward flew; Denizens craned their necks for a ring-
side view.
Where was the man who'd issued the cry? Was it a sign of life, or would they
all die?
Just then a riderless horse galloped down, streaking its way through the town,
tossing its mane right then left; of its mystery rider long sine bereft:
Whence the cry had come, no one could tell; when an unearthly voice, straight from Hell
split the night with a ghastly shriek; shutters slammed tight--no one dared
peek,
As the horse veered away, frightened itself, by the Devil's advance along with
his elfs,
Crescendoes of wailing blackened the night--of a poor humble town in a fight for its life.
Friends and I saw the movie, “Thor” last night
Totally blown away by this spectacular sight
Of visual effects
As we craned our necks
A fire in our imagination it did ignite
A tissue like a white hibiscus like the one in the garden of Demetrios
It fell on my shoulder, as if from the scarlet mist of my unconscious
Emitting a maddeningly possessive aroma
Forced me to look at the spotted cheetah
Seated under a very old yellow forest birch in an appetite ageless
As I craned my neck a little up my eyes came across the pink furnace
His flowing hair resembled an amber cascade in a hill in Darjeeling
His face held the finely drawn painting of Michelangelo, revealing
Hypnotic heat of passion for my deep river
At the bend looked up the restless shiver
The crimson coloured crests rushing toward the inevitable healing
In reckless submission to the cuddling curving crashing and crushing
What happened then is not difficult for you to visualize dear readers
An elegant embroidery of diamond desire from the rainbow breakers
Looked down in delight the birds from the clouds
How in sweet heat dissolved the cultural shroud
In the fountain of eternal flesh and blood the lilacs of Atlantic laughter
Thousands of butterflies under sunlight set sail in flamboyant lustre
October 24, 2017
I do not know what lies ahead
The path is cloaked in mystery
A thick fog clouds my weary head
The future spells uncertainty
I craned my neck to get a glimpse
A glimpse of the foggy future
In agony, I sighed and winced
Some things in life can't be insured
I do not know what lies ahead
But God knows every mystery
On Christ, I rest my weary head
To Him, there's no uncertainty
Jane complained, "Pain!" on a chain plane to Maine.
Insane Jane's feigned pain was the bane of the plane' she main.
Jane complained the veins strained; unwaned, gained Jane pain.
Jane complained, 'twas engrained in the brains of the same on the plane.
The sane complained, "why not a train? Or a drive down the lane in the rain?"
Jane's head craned- "but trains and down lanes in the rain to Maine are mundane!"
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