Splintered hope shards,
despondently adrift in tear stream,
reflect the remnant rays of resurgence,
designs the last lattice of dream,
lacing the listless life.
Oh, sad moon,
you float
alone
in what used to be,
your cloud nine,
looking down
despondently
at me.
I remember
your illuminating glow,
so gleeful at twilight.
I remember
the smile
you wore yesterday
when billions
of your friends
shared the sky
with you.
But tonight
the sky is starless
and you're now so blue.
Smile, moon.
Smile again!
I'm here.
I'm a friend
Submitted for...
All Yours (Feb 5) Poetry Contest (Winner: 1st Place)
Sponsored by: Brian Strand
Date written: 02/04/2021
You've lost your mate one decade gone,
a longshoreman who bode his time
upon the seas from dusk till dawn.
Knew every route, when he should climb
the towering waves to safely ground
his skiff, bring men home in their prime
to families, lovers, safe and sound.
After those years spent in your arms,
to deal with him not being around,
you potter in an empty farm
where laughter used to scrape the sky.
Despondently, you sought to calm
your loneliness with Kentucky rye.
On certain days it's overdone,
like anniversaries. You sigh
about the past, thinking if the one
thing that can save you is a smoking gun.
When I was a boy I repudiated you
Your cooties chased you out the crew
The innocence across the playground blew
I ran and ran and ran
Later I was taught how to communicate to you
Your dress had black borders and dotted lines I retained the view
I remember in that moment my curiosity for you grew
Soon we, little men, inscribed our names onto manhood
Its hard surface wore my pencil dull and no good
At bonfire we threw in our graphite and wood
I watched it burn and burn and burn
By adolescence I turned despondently shy
On a shadow of descry over your moniker
My drab feelings moored, to an anchor,
Swayed back and forth out in the middle of the water
As a young man I sat and listened to her voice
On that day my pencil lead and made a choice
It walked out the boat and drew uniformed waves
colliding under a mountainous view to rejoice
And I wrote and wrote and wrote
Once in a while I wish I could dial
The day back to right where it started.
I’d then reconcile with things that did rile
And left me despondently-hearted.
It isn’t the norm but some days just swarm
With episodes rank and annoying
And in such a storm, it’s hard to transform
A dejection into something buoying.
Still, all things must pass and greener the grass
We will spot on our side of the fences.
We’ll relinquish the crass and begin, smooth as glass,
With a fresh start when morning commences.
My Love, lest I grow weary of the wait
And get entangled in a web of hate,
My longing’s driving me swooning insane
My cruel maiden! Save me from this pain.
With sorrow I sit despondently forlorn
Oh come, with anguish my soul is torn,
It is drawing me down into a dire fate,
My Love, lest I grow weary of the wait.
If you are wary of the world and its devise
And seems shy of our trysts and think wise
to forgo our love and leave me in this state;
Lo, I may at my heart’s behest forbid to wait.
Has someone cursed our love and cast a spell?
Why do they envy our love and wish us unwell?
Bereft of your love this pain is least to abate
Lo, I breathe my last as I grew weary of the wait.
~05/05/2017
~Lost Love contest by John Hamilton
I want to go
where there's no pain
and all I feel
Is gentle rain
I want to go
where flowers bloom
and cheerful sun
does banish gloom
I want to go
where words are true
and passion falls
like morning dew
I want to go
where love can sing
where untrue hearts
will never sting
I want to go
where I am free
and where I'm loved
for being me
I want to go
where I can dance
and all is love
and sweet romance
I know there is
no place as this
where truth is like
a lover's kiss
where passion reigns
and is supreme
where I can taste
my sweetest dream
where brazenly
I make wild love
and none can see
but stars above
where I can live
each fantasy
not cry at night
despondently
I want to go
I'll leave tonight
I'll say goodbye
to living light
I will repose
in blessed sleep
don't gather round
don't dare to weep
You loved me not
when eyes could see
and soon I'll taste
eternity
I will wing up
to heaven bright
a happy end
to this dark night
I want to go
I want to go
I want to go
tonight
Eileen
Skulking between the thinning clumps
Of tattered sedge
A balding coot despondently calls,
Scratching Blackbirds scutter deeply
Into a Hawthorn hedge;
Whilst, creeping stealthily,
Gathering darkness onwardly crawls.
The blackened Moorhen washes the clinging
Soot from his feathered form,
Rising above the mirrored pond in awkward
flight.
Gathering clouds mumble softly of an
Impending storm,
When, silently menacing, inwards marches
The approaching night.
Listening intently, between murmurs upon
A breeze,
I check my step and briefly pause -
To catch a low sigh whispered from among
The sullen trees...
A last desperate plead of their lost cause.
For now billowing cumulonimbus sags
And begs to stall,
As, slowly homeward bound, I gather
About me to hastily make;
Where, circling high in rushing element,
The ragged Buzzard begins to fall...
Upon Heavens gathered Furies -
That so conspire to thunderously break!
Through the Mist
It feels like a lifetime has passed since my beloved I last saw,
Bedecked in shining armor, my brave Geoffrey did gallantly gallop,
Riding his silver steed, through a soft silky blue morning mist
That like a tender lover enveloped and amorously embraced him.
Now overtaken by dark despair, silently willing my love to reappear,
Despondently I peer through this most mystifying mist, realizing that
On this fateful day twenty years before, he had unwittingly succumbed
To its seductive allure because man and mist had merged becoming one.
08-21-2014
As the lights die down in this old town
I sit and sip my beer;
Self-consciously I wear a frown
On the loneliest night of the year.
The revelry spills over distant hills
As the midnight hour looms;
Resignedly I raise my glass
To toast the lovelorn tombs.
For the buried days of all her ways
Seem to animate in my head;
Despondently I plead them live
And come back from the dead.
The sweetest face I cannot replace
With an ocean of spirits and wine;
Convulsed with tears, I taste her mouth
And grieve for she was mine.
Acting tough is never enough
And neither is alcohol;
Unfulfilled I fall to bits
For she who meant it all.
I sit and stare at an empty chair
And find that I believe
In self-destructive self-pity
On this coldest New Year’s Eve.
The fire goes out and I fully doubt
That the passing of a year
Might signify some bright new hope
For love and life and cheer.
I will drink some more then hug the floor
With nothing else to do;
For nothing is all I have become,
Nothing without you…
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