Quote: Know your value. Confidence breeds success. Act like the person you want to become, and people will start seeing you as that person.
Mark M Ford
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Those who embrace, avid ambitions of heart,
To them shall the reigns of future belong;
From charted path of passion, they never part
For earnest is the promise treasured for long.
O, how they strive, aiming for heavenly skies,
Flexing audaciously to conquer higher highs,
Fixated on life’s goals with purposeful eyes,
Focused mindfully, primed to win the prize.
On might of confidence when achievers roar,
On strength of willpower their dreams soar
Employing fortitude resolutely brought to fore,
Sailing to shores, dreamt in travails of yore.
Glumness they defy of shroud and sorrow,
Planting seeds of hope in despair of woes,
Aspiring bright horizons on dawns of morrow
Overcoming hapless shadows cast in throes.
O, the doers and believers instinctively know,
Hurdled with failures is the road to success,
As they drive dreary nights to mornings aglow,
Fueled by aspirations, dreams revered possess.
Categories:
glumness, confidence,
Form: Rhyme
Calm halts clouds swollen with snow,
they will resent the continuous blow
of the four winds of bitter February;
an unleashed snowstorm is pure fury!
An elated mood rises amid the air of glumness,
April rain is far from the mornings of tearfulness;
snowy meadows will return to their vivid lushness...
even winter birds can't wait for spring cheerfulness!
I fret thinking about isolated days,
activities are limited to sceneries;
be a skier and be ready for thrills:
see deer leaping on foxes' trails!
Walking is exploring the quite wilderness
under the glistening coat of magical whiteness;
Jays that ate berries miss their sweetness...
all birds rely on feeders on those harsh winters!
Travel the whitened roads of the stunning wilderness,
they offer reflective poets joyful quotes of stillness;
a long ride on a saddle horse going at a slow pace
opens up the landscape to a stream with a lively dace!
Categories:
glumness, animal, beauty, bird, february,
Form: Rhyme
In clutch of loneliness she wasn’t alone
For grief always readily came along
When her happy path destined for love
Detoured sadly to lovelorn mirage.
He was an affluent handsome man
Yet, wealth of life he didn’t have
Being fueled by an unworthy heart
Poverty of thoughts reigned inside.
She found love when love was elusive
But elusive was the love she found,
Though she chose a budding ruby rose
Alas, its splendor had prickly thorns.
Summers of bloom she longed for
Agonized in gloom of monsoon storms,
When colors of love autumn invoked
Trees of joy shuddered in wintry throe
And leaves of affinity began to fall
Spreading glumness on pristine lands.
Silence she endured spoke volumes
When solitude starved for dialogue
And harmony of voice echoed discord
As overtures to reconcile faced a wall
While everything right, yet so wrong,
Left her feeling she doesn’t belong.
Passions her own, warned of trespass
When unrequited lure yearned romance
Attempting to litigate a case long lost
As hope of despair mocked her heart.
November 22, 2020
Placed 2nd: Juxtaposition Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Silent One
Categories:
glumness, loneliness, love hurts, stress,
Form: Free verse
When I am reveling in love of family
Toasting virtues of revered friendships
Savoring freedoms that let me be
Luxuriating on sandy white beaches
Endowed with means to live carefree
I wonder if my life is laden in dreams;
When sadness reigns face of anguish
Bearing glumness of stygian grief,
In harmony of the galaxy solace I feel
Purging clouds of bleak melancholy
As moonlit gleam rescues my evening
I wonder if my life is laden in dreams;
When new day glints wondrous valleys
As I bask in hues of resplendent prairies
Admiring nature’s ebullient beauty--
Golden sun beams on tenor of streams
Rushing to rivers and mighty blue seas
I wonder if my life is laden in dreams;
When I rejoice in tranquility of music
Strumming rhythms of euphoric lyrics
Cherishing chorus of happy memories
Turning setbacks into success stories
Comforting soul in misery of defeats
I wonder if my life is laden in dreams;
Or is this divinity’s sacred blessing
Evincing revelation of stellar deity:
There is a star with my name on it.
November 10, 2020
Placed 2nd: There is a star with my name on it poetry contest
Sponsor: Silent One
Categories:
glumness, blessing, introspection, life, star,
Form: Verse
Blushing cheeks of horizon--
A kiss of golden sun,
Periwinkle on magenta--
Caress of amethyst dawn.
Floating random motion
Are hazy white clouds,
Humid air combustion
Aroused by the oceans
Is birthing new storm,
As albatrosses glide
On stone-color heights.
Nascent ashen canvas
Exuding accents gray--
Garb of celestial glumness
Harboring fleeting rain.
Behind misty rain drops
Rainbow colors lurk,
Spectrum that glitters--
Radiance of smart prisms.
Music that is heard
Is call of singing birds,
Winds can be seen
Where leaves flutter,
Soft twilight bending--
Art of mauve evening.
Onset of charcoal dark--
Day’s sullen goodbye,
Twinkles in the night--
Welcome starry smiles.
May 20, 2020
Placed 1st: Brian's Choice O Contest
Categories:
glumness, imagery, nature,
Form: Free verse
Inviting is the vibrant smile, glistening visage of spring
Exciting sensuous hearts in nature’s alluring song
Sighting on marigold arc rising blush of magenta
Lighting dawn’s flamboyance awaited all winter long.
Blazing colors adorn exuberance of flaming-red lilies
Gazing at flowering trees, lilting in tender breeze
Raising tempo of romantic dreams, yearning bliss
Praising gift of ruby roses--beauty blushing to please.
Raining upon parched vegetation new season unfolds
Gaining on glumness of drought giggling river flows
Waning reign of sluggish tones in rear view mirror
Staining sunlit horizon gold, decimating frosty woes.
Sowing crops, tilling lands, farmers under the sun toil
Crowing about growing corn, weather mild, blue sky
Glowing in vibes of new life, hearing chicks’ feeble cries
Showing off emerald vistas where singing Blue Jays fly.
January 26, 2020
Placed 2nd: Writing Prompt- Let’s Write a Lento- Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Dear Heart
Placed 2nd: Strand select F contest by Brian Strand
Categories:
glumness, imagery, nature, spring,
Form: Lento
“...fallen into the sere, the yellow leaf”
As the Bard penned, describes eloquently
How old age steals up on us like a thief
At night, invisible and silently
We frown at the mirror in disbelief
At wrinkles, lost teeth and vitality
So, something that brings a smile to one’s face
Helps roll back the years and glumness displace
The label promises blooms from this box
Each yellow sunflower yields thousands of seeds
Which lure insects in swarms and birds in flocks
Its cousin, cosmos, will out-climb the weeds
Nigella (or love-in-a-mist) grows stocks
Of blue flowers enough for all our needs
Oh, and then there’s the lovely red poppy
No other garden flower can copy.
Antirrhinum (from Greek) means `like a nose’
Called snapdragon it opens for a bee
A cold weather plant that can survive snows
Midget, medium or tall it might be
But each red, white, pink or yellow bloom glows
Like a hot ember incandescently
Last, lavender exquisitely scented
If they all grow, I’ll be well contented
Categories:
glumness, age, beautiful, flower, happiness,
Form: Ottava rima
I tried, I failed, I tried again
I lied, I bailed, once more I sinned
But I got back up
and smacked down the cup
That emptied me so
Of my plenty and fallow
My drink became drought
On the brink of my doubt
I stood in the luminous numbness
Full of voluminous glumness
And decided to stop for good
Provided that I could
Done with despair
I am one squared
Over the distress
My motor of success
Continues to run well
As my issues are quelled
Categories:
glumness, addiction, analogy, anniversary, birth,
Form: Rhyme
Are You Skew-Whiff?
Are you feeling rather skew-whiff?
Awkwardly placed and standing?
upside-down
back to front
inside out
topsy - turvy
Are your senses damp and unresponsive,
Beckoning confusion and despair?
Does your heart pound even when there’s nothing exciting there?
Forlorn, sorrowful, despondent,
You patronise your grief,
Focus on your problem,
To attain some relief;
You keep flitting to your pleasures,
Lack, for contemplation, a quiet place,
Force your troubles into the backroom,
You’re not to dignify your face.
Tomorrow is for thinking,
Will exist to accommodate,
The glumness and the wretchedness,
That seems to obliqueness and gloom proliferate.
Rhoda Monihan
13th October 2015
For the contest Creative Layouts, sponsor Broken Wings
Categories:
glumness, confusion, crazy, grief, memory,
Form: Concrete