over occupied world
bewildering hodge-podge of people
pushing stress where it ought not to be
in the slim rays of late day
in the splattered mess of guttered streets
a homeless man asks for a light
for a half burnt cigarette
then money for food
nerve knotted living squeezed between soiled fingers
his fingers
most shove by him like gnats late for breeding
people in pinup poses
keep silent midst foul displacement
shun soiled annoyance like shoddy prospects
does a story untold, matter?
does all humanity deserve recognition?
maybe things just fall apart all on their own
maybe once there was a time when lushness oozed like honey
from a jar
homeless man seeks a light
unflagging energy to be seen
girdled by grit
a real mission
not to wipe away self like crumbs from a plate
sometimes we move in gray clouds
a pretense, unseeing squalor
as vagabond pleas jar at comfort
our aligned security by uttering "No"
such feel good factors
defending synthetic spheres
that peer at screens
as light loses traction
Poem composed April 12, 2023
Categories:
guttered, care, city, light, poverty,
Form: Free verse
The candle guttered in the draft,
She paused in her thoughts.
Life had been good today,
She had eaten a little.
Gazing out to gather her thoughts,
Children cowered in the filthy lanes.
They had not eaten in a long time.
They scrambled out to the laden cart,
Hoping something would fall, it didn't.
The men were away in some distant land,
The women alone had to make a stand.
No money to buy, nothing left but to cry,
Trying to survive in this pitiless land,
Where once folk danced hand in hand.
War came and took men by train and truck,
Only to be buried shallow in foreign muck.
The candle guttered and she prayed,
Hoping his return had just been delayed.
© Dave Timperley 18/10/2021
Categories:
guttered, conflict, world war i,
Form: Free verse
Six magpies brought their mourning squawk,
soon joined by several others,
disturbing all their neighbour's talk
and waking sleepy lovers.
Some hopped and did their swaggered strut
between a felted flat roof top
and a guttered water but.
Some preferred a higher perch
and troubled nearby taller tops of green leylandii.
All the while their squawk increased
and shattered suburb's morning peace.
Two black crows flew overhead and settled,
one on gable top, the other found his place to stop
and watch from nearby psychamore.
Upright, silent, silhouettes,
not bearers of the magpie pall
but undertaking nonetheless
to show crow's dignified respects.
They joined this congregation
to recognise corvid's connect.
They joined this chorused agitation
while magpies mourned their murdered son,
crumpled feathers low on grassy ground,
til course of squawk and strut had run,
and one by one they flew, without a sound,
and all was done, and all was done.
Categories:
guttered, bereavement, bird, death, death
Form: Rhyme
Among the souls of empty hearts
O distant bells of steeples chime
in echoed hymns of saddened weep
Comes again the midnight hour,
down dampened cobblestone to creep
Along the darkened streets they roam
of alleyways and torches fed.
To reap the fortunes of desire,
black shadows, piercing eyes of red
With fingers crawling guttered dreams,
slicing realms through endless mist
Empty hearts which now they seek
with blade of sharpened steel now kissed
To carve the tears, come wailing fall,
neath worried frowns on window sill
Collecting that which no one knows,
until such bellies have their fill
With carpet bags and tethered rope,
a list on which your name is scrolled
When heard the knocking on your door,
just close your eyes of nightmares told
Soon you’ll wake to find your place
among the souls of empty hearts
Where clouded paths shall be your guide,
this valley as your soul departs
Categories:
guttered, fear, horror,
Form: Rhyme
A Sonnet For Bloody But Unbowed Heads
The hands of my children’s raised arms
Have become like released skeets;
Their ebony hued bodies, a circled bull’s eye.
Their blood flows down the guttered streets---
Clotting here and there like a red stained dye;
As justice stands by balancing her scheming charms.
Liberty and equality have become moaning echoes here;
Even death has been denied its amazing democracy.
Respecting God given rights is no longer held dear;
The whore-mongers of injustice revel in their mockery;
Yet with the spirit of our ancestors, we must persevere---
Plodding onward with audacious faith in a greater hierarchy.
To the Courts of injustice, let’s not cower and bow;
Our Lord did not bring us this far to leave us now.
Categories:
guttered, america, analogy, betrayal, black
Form: Sonnet
DRIVE BY…
In chilled onyx morning
Silicon tears flowed
Down the plowed valleys
Of ebony skin.
Silicon tears
Leaking from sunken craters:
Red orbs bleeding residues of pain.
In the cold guttered streets
A father’s son lays dead:
A lifeless body riveted with lead.
Another father must now defend
The cardinal sin
Of a living son
Who fired the fatal gun.
Categories:
guttered, anxiety, bereavement, children, grief,
Form: Prose Poetry
July 29, 1890
Colored daubs and swatches
crave artist’s practiced hand.
Justice, nearly blind, yet watches—
unwrought art upon a stand.
Regard the brushes in a row—
the palettes and the sponges.
Genius maimed by status quo,
vain a hope that fate expunges.
Guttered myriad lifelong dreams—
in desperate ruination.
Fading now the piteous screams
of self-inflicted termination.
Time Passes
Abruptly then adoring praise—
contrived their sudden expertise.
Rude cabal who would appraise—
byzantine their guileful sleaze.
Each masterpiece a servant
of craven yearn and greed.
Bang the gavel, swift and fervent;
sate purveyors’ inveterate need.
Justice now is truly blind;
vanished those She would impute.
His final piece is left unsigned;
and undisclosed, for now She’s mute.
4th Place: I Love Rock and Roll
Inspired by Don McLean's song, Starry Starry Night
Categories:
guttered, betrayal, corruption, evil, vanity,
Form: Quatrain
Torturous curves bending vision,
twisting to hide beyond today
what the prism of the future
holds captive down the whispered way.
Lost to us Love's fledgling glory,
gazing too long at cindered skies
till the velvet flame of passion
just guttered out in harsh good-byes.
Frail moths chasing bright illusions,
our palpitant attempts denied. . .
just down the road - to our mem'ry -
we'll lay a stone, "Here sweet love died."
Copyright, May 7, 2014
Faye Gibson
Categories:
guttered, first love, goodbye, lost
Form: Rhyme
chased such a long time
I was behind myself
cobbled roads with water
streaming down the guttered edges
pouring into the end of a river
I chased myself there
alone
nothing this end of town
I forgot why I'd been running
a perfect figure
well colored and clad
walked toward me,
"You needn't run, the chase is ended."
With both hands, he touched my shoulders
I have smiled and watched the river
ever since I can remember
once, there was a boy running
and I caught him
Categories:
guttered, heart, inspiration, time, visionary,
Form: Free verse
Love.. one of the four letter words that is strong
But yet is guttered out of your mouth
And captured by a faded kiss that you gave me
The eyes that I once believed was innocent
Became the wicked criminal I never thought you'd be
Categories:
guttered, lost love,
Form: I do not know?
Snow fell upon the marble eyes of the dead,
And the magpies pecked the buttons on the coats,
Drawn by the gleam of dulling brass attract,
As the ravens sought the softness of the throats.
Trees in naked staggers scratched the skies,
And the guns in the distance snapped like cracking ice,
In the pools of oil, flames guttered slowly out,
On the scalps of corpses froze the cooling lice.
In the minds of the generals thoughts akin to grief
Wept not for the loss of life but loss of war,
And men growing hypothermic in retreat,
Felt the stilling of their blood forever more.
How to withstand the burning reap of cold
When it bites with frost the toes ‘till black and gone,
How to withstand the march of retreat in winter
When winter marches on and on and on.
Categories:
guttered, death, history, life, nature,
Form: Verse
Time is the fire in which we burn,
ripples of lava on inner landscapes,
eddies and swirls which twist
and turn.
Kerosene progress burns me now,
I feel
the pain of sweet conflagration
dead cold and real.
Hypnotic the effect, I embrace
it’s dissolution,
dissembling before a mind’s eye mirror crack’d,
denied absolution.
Reminiscing on the snow-queen wife I knew,
awaiting her fascist husband’s demise;
I see her alabaster skin and feel
the succulent texture of
her tongue in my head;
even now I shiver and drown in her eyes.
A scent of burnt toast
in the kitchen
(she slowly licked butter from her fingers),
a Machiavellian aroma
of stale coffee and strawberry perfume,
even now it hangs, kicking dead air,
it lingers.
Time it slow burns me
from frost-bitten toes on up;
I still want her and need her
as the air I breathe;
her haunting aura feeds
the flames and this fire
it sears;
time flame-throwers my existence
for what feels like years;
if only I could cry
I would shed
ashen tears
for the torch which guttered and died
at the click of her manicured fingers.
Categories:
guttered, lost love, love, sad,
Form: Verse