Shadow Casters
The blaring light casts a superfluous shadow
upon the timepiece, in a garden full of weeds.
As empires have fallen; iron and clay, once gold,
the gnomon stands strong, versus snake, won't concede.
Venom-fed nutrition, people beg, cheat and steal;
sacrificial skins as misnomers for the lamb.
The blaring light casts an intention to conceal,
false shadows point fingers, as deception is planned.
Pretentious accusations, a slant used to blur,
guarded homes, shoot to kill; open borders, humane?
The spot lights, the actors, politicians concur;
'your eyes will be opened', with the promise, they ate.
The blaring light casts upon the dead leaves and vines;
the gnomon pleads WARNING: of a source not the sun.
This gardens devastation, as Rock shatters time;
A new garden waits, with humility, and love.
© 2019 Jeffrey Spencer
Categories:
gnomon, faith,
Form: Rhyme
I only tell of sunny hours...
I,Gnomon,
Sundial yeoman;
Suntanned sentinel
Stand watch,
Shedding tears for unrequited love.
My cooling shadow stalks sun;
Caresses with timely sunscreen
Sweet sundial’s gilt Egyptian face.
Ask me time of day;
“Shadow knows,” I’ll say.
Shadow will not rest
‘Til sun does nest.
Categories:
gnomon, love, sun, time,
Form: Personification
I only tell of sunny hours...
for I can’t penetrate the dark.
Light is a weaver of colors,
whose rainbows clothe a naked sun...
I perceive shadows as they creep...
and set their pace, in league with time.
My gnomon, bathed in golden light,
imbues me with the time of day...
I track the sun arose the sky...
holding time hostage to its flight.
And basking in its rays all day,
I can feel my face glistening...
Animated by light’s warm touch...
it anoints my face with its rays.
And I can’t compare how that feels,
at least in my reality...
I'm frequented by butterflies...
licking the salts from my worn face.
And that bond between life and light,
makes me glad, I’m a sundial...
Categories:
gnomon, 10th grade, fantasy, hyperbole,
Form: Personification
I only tell of sunny hours…
For me the trail of time disappears
in the depth of darkness at sundown,
but my mind doesn’t harbor any qualm,
I dream drenched in stardust of stellar sky…
I’ll trace the blazing heliacal trail
across another dazzling day waiting.
Let the beam of each new sun
slip on time-telling edge of your style,*
count the tides of time on the dial of life.
The chronology of your journey I’ll chronicle
as the defined shadow of soul revolves
around the static centre of timelessness
till it glitters in bliss eternal.
Watch with me the girdle of rotating time,
you’ll see the dawn open petals of wisdom,
in the best of times you’ll live the sunny hours…
(Note : *style is the edge of the gnomon which casts a
shadow on the sundial)
Written : February 4, 2019
April 13, 2020
Contest : Strand Pick 11, Any Theme, Any Form
Sponsor : Brian Strand
Categories:
gnomon, analogy, life, sun, time,
Form: Personification
SUNDIAL WISDOM--
I only tell of sunny hours;
And my face looks toward heaven's skies;
And a gnomon, which casts a shadow onto my dial;
My eyes gnomon clouds ruin my view;
Glaucoma vision clouding my decision;
I yet still can't see my time;
Numerically can't read the sign;
The earing of sun-block, keeps me from buying a watch;
As time goes by, shadows lie;
Numbers Roman or old English;
Without the sun Can't be read;
I have no, No time stone-face;
Wish someone would tell me what time it is;
1/30/19
For Sundial Wisdom Poetry Contest
Sponsored by:Julia Ward
Personification poetry form only
Categories:
gnomon, analogy, appreciation, introspection, visionary,
Form: Personification
O Fingernail Moon
have you sent us Morning Sun
to show us building?
And Morning Sun
are you sliding
down the mountainside
to hint at pyramids,
how to build them,
before you take time into the sea?
O Fingernail Moon
did my father sip nectar
from your crescent lip
before he conned the Sun’s descent
down the mountainside?
I am an architect’s son who watched
his father’s hand trace imagined walls
upward from foundation stone,
his design contemplative
of what might become a home.
I am an architect’s son. I learned
from him how the lift of dream calls
skill to cloathe a naked place,
nature’s skien rewind
into humane living space.
I am an architect’s son. I would match
my father’s hands with heft of words
to build from a resonant base
a scene enlivened by sound
and touch perchance poetic grace.
Categories:
gnomon, assonance, father, metaphor, moon,
Form: Free verse
O Fingernail Moon
pointing down at the ocean
what goddess clipped you?
O clipped fingernail
without your acute reply
can I scratch mind’s itch?
Scratch may be:
the swipe to light the match
the breech that summons blood
the spouse of pad
the early exit before the race
the gelt to stay and play
the flaw on the record’s face
the mindless cry of the itch
How do I scratch mind’s itch?
Pray to the word to guide you:
O Scratch, light the way
of mind’s blood
into my poems.
One possibility:
If you can swipe the match to light the mind
and from the slice follow the summoned blood
until ripe words spill upon the sorting plane
and weak entrants leave before the race
while hope sticks to build on the opening ante
you may at last scratch out a piece of verse
that justifies this frenzied motion back and forth.
O Fingernail Moon
does the goddess know or guess
what she has released?
Categories:
gnomon, assonance, moon, repetition, sound,
Form: Free verse
So I now come to that same blessed mound,
witness of much that memory still holds dear.
Though now these fields grey-sullen clouds make drear,
they once outspread a carpet royal around
our feet, when in those branches dank and bare
birds sang in summer sweetly as we bade.
Here was my home, my backdrop as we played
the game, whichever pleased. No fear, no care,
dared cloud the sun. Yet now, who hears my breath?
For you have gone and I am here alone,
that house a shell engulfed by tides of death,
my parents’ place marked by a head of stone.
As here I stand, do wind and trees console
the one whose joys Time’s shadow-hands once stole?
Categories:
gnomon, bereavement, memory, time,
Form: Sonnet
A constant reminder of what’s surrounding me
The vacuum of evil that seeks to suck me in
That the light will fade and I too will cease to be
Along with my warped blank paperweight twin
I walk in the omnipresence of his gnomon stair
The onrushing day’s crowd evades our inert figure
But an oncoming stranger’s sneer smears my stare
I shrink as he augments in a meagre shudder
At the end of day's rush to everywhere he’s nowhere
But everywhere in the sea of the projected black of night
And in the artificial light he’ll again reappear everywhere
Only to disappear into the dark alleys in a slight
His carbon sheet envelopes my retired lumber mind
As we're posted expressionless into a new realm
Still as the dead of night as we shadow dance blind
Folded through nightmares with my shadow at the helm
Categories:
gnomon, how i feel,
Form: Rhyme
As the day lengthens
and sun grows high,
your shadow shortens
as the day goes by,
and i think of you
in noon's repose,
and wonder where
your shadow goes.
Then there you are
on the other side,
in shadow's length
you no longer hide,
afternoon shadow
you slowly slide,
abiding once again
'til your light's revived.
One more thing I'll say
before I'm through,
I've never before met
a gnomon like you.
(April 26 2016)
Categories:
gnomon, sun,
Form: Rhyme
A brass sundial awaits
Sol's kiss, of glistening gold.
And aligned with the North Star;
its gnomon stabs at the cold.
Tarnished and weather-beaten;
it waits for Sol to come back.
Standing in pools of darkness;
dripping drops of liquid-black.
Sol soon crests the horizon,
finally free from Night's clutch.
And sunlight strikes the dial;
gilding its face with its touch.
Time gets tethered to its face;
and is subject to its whim.
And silently creeps along;
chasing shadows at its rim.
It radiates like magic,
with a luminescent glow.
And denotes the time of day;
as the sun casts its shadow.
Categories:
gnomon, fantasy, feelings, imagery, imagination,
Form: Quatrain
You fall behind the maple so umber
Soon to close and slumber
Broadcasted light mesmerized
Like a painted picture accessorized
Shine your twilight still
This earthly chamber you fill
Your task is done for today
Tomorrow you shall begin another day
So timeless and taken for granted
The way you radiate it’s so enchanted
I fear without you our existence would be bleak
Upon a wondrous sunset streak
Red-orange kiss across a sky
to reminisce, and sigh
Lightly dusted with a violet trim
Slightly caressed pink brim
Distant parting birds vanish in the winds
gently pushed into natures crosswinds
Pastel painted from the heavens above
Sheer wonderment to the eye on a powdered blue sky
Our human chronicles measured by the gnomon
By our sides since the history of this phenomenon
Reflected, deflected and shimmering with balance
the sunlight behind the valance
Categories:
gnomon, mystery, nature, science,
Form: Rhyme