Extremis Poems | Examples


List of Member Poems

Premium Member EVERYTHING IN EXTREMIS -:-

EVERYTHING IN EXTREMIS -:-

unbridled
  featured
feelings

unpredictable
genius

in CULTURED CIRCLES

confront
  susceptible 
concerns

sympathetically 
supposed
 
in OVERT ALLEGIANCES

evoking 
  sublime
precedents

equivocably
redolent9

Tree

1. Firm and old, aging forever.

2. Touching the hard surface
It blooms with the little things 
Seeing my face, smiling as I do it 
It’s small, simple, and working.

3. Roots are strong and tight
It binds everything together 
Spreading far and wide
To the cores of the Earth.

4. Look at the tree’s bark, so jagged and uncertain.
Like a maze for ants.

5. Feel the bark, where the heart is 
It’s the pulse of a sad tree 
Knowing, Remembering,
and Soon in extremis.

Heroes All

On the 70th of VJ Day we salute the Forgotten Service the Red Ensign heroes 

of the longest battle of all, the whole war: the only good war for Freedom's cause.  

When a merchantman got hit, the employers' did a nasty trick, stopping pay on the 

day, one in four of the heroes all died in the forgotten the Mercantile Marine. 

Not just Brits served their time, but others from the watery the globe, of all 

religions and none; some sacked at the end of the War, to go home to wars. 



Let us raise a glass or two to all our Allies too and be thankful that former enemies 

are allies and friends now, and remember Milton who knew a thing or two about 

war: "Peace hath her victories no less than war" yet if we really have to fight that 

we have the people and the ships and allies if we are in extremis. 

                                      Salute the Red Duster All. 



 

 athat  let us raise to   ons and nonether countries different of different otemn      afrredom's cause long bloody


Premium Member The Exact Moment

It would be odd 
	but somehow comforting 
	knowing the exact moment 
	when I die 
	yet live on. 
	No, not a resurrection 
	or reincarnation, 
	but rather a destruction 
	of the facades I live behind.
	 
	Do you think what I see 
	in another’s eyes is real? 
	Or In the mirror each morning? 
	Do you believe that what 
	others see of me is the truth? 
	The answers are always “no.” 
	I am made of reference to myself. 
	I keep my true self from myself, 
	not even knowing who I am 
	until I am “in extremis,” 
	when I act without regard or filter, 
	when hard pain 
	or the pain of others 
	or death 
	or birth 
	or joy 
	or deep love 
	or touching God, 
	as did St. Joan inside the fire,
	strips away vestiges of my last defenses. 
	
	I think about this: 
	To have a film, 
	made by some cosmic cinematographer, 
	capturing the instant
	of subtraction of all my masks, 
	to be able to relive the moment 
	they are stripped from me, 
	to see the eyes that see me,
	to see me, 
	to see it happen, 
	to know when it’s done.

Looking for the formal definition, structure, and history of this poetry form? Visit the Poetry Dictionary entry below. Then return to explore how PoetrySoup members bring the form to life through their own poems.

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