If l had to hand-pick fifteen poets from Poetry Soup
To meet and a share day
I know exactly who l would pick
Without doubt and straight away
We are all drawn to different personalities
Solely from the words we pen
Connections made , thoughts shared
We now have a poetry friend
The poets l would pick are varied
From different walks of life
Different cultures , different ages
Conversation and humour would be rife
Yet, when the day ended ….l wonder
Would l pick the same fifteen again
Or would l walk away thinking
Really?….what an absolute pain!
Artist Henri Matisse
wrote a learned treatise
Also many a model he did depict
maidens it seems all hand picked
Enacting this life’s script, for us hand picked,
even though memory has been erased,
our heart knows which boxes need to be ticked,
to navigate this fearsome maze unfazed.
Polarities tango dance in the void,
ambedo trance exits limitation,
whence no longer by lower mind decoyed,
we remain in all time meditation.
Standing erect, a flame of living light,
we observe the pulse dual orbit form,
spurred by divine magnetism day and night,
dissolving at last in love’s benign storm.
Vaporising ego in stillness slow ~
From the front row seat, we enjoy the show
Are we the shade of the shadow
or a shadow in the shade.
Are we sashaying toward pinhole dreams?
While trudging above an open grave.
It all seems like a giant garish gothic play
acts and players hand-picked centuries in advance.
Hobbled masses humbly kneel on crumbs to pray.
Realizing opinion nor ballot was ever worth a damn.
These two-legged, greedy, greasy snakes.
Eyes made of slag have no vacancy signs.
Clogging up our gossamer soul veins.
They're here to minimize, intimidate.
Project, disappear, dismiss, assassinate.
Straitjacket the masses with normalized madness.
We, the people, are not the ones playing God.
Poisoning water, field, sky...
Smiling in the light while eating innocents.
In the shadow of ritual and sacrifice.
These devils openly mock and taunt us now.
(byproducts of a boiling swamp).
Yellowing the face of flailing freedom.
A billion greenbacks can galvanize
such audacity and shallow bravery.
Of these deeply soiled oligarchs
and pathetic plastic kings.
Within our homes, what really matters,
Barring the décor,
Is how we feel, despite some tatters
Or an aging floor.
For if we’ve made a cozy haven
Where we can unwind,
The stress or tension we’ve been savin’
Can be left behind.
Each hand-picked tchotchke, rug or table,
Photograph or lamp
Creates a space where we are able
To imprint our stamp.
Our rooms reflect what makes us smile,
Chosen for ourselves.
If others do not like our style
Or what sits on our shelves,
It doesn’t matter even slightly.
We just do our best
To please the ones who, day and nightly,
Share our little nest.
I like poignant writings from the heart
clever lines that hook you from the start.
I admire a tall tale if you can spin a yarn
not pedantic but nothing suited for a barn
I love hand picked words that exude charm
and even the dramatic ones that sound every alarm
I love poetry that is sublime and elevates itself
the kind I say that I wish I had written it myself
AP: 3rd place 2025
You think you’re riding high, so high falutin’:
the fact is, you’re the dumbest ox in town.
There’s no-one as unfunny as a clown:
reforming is a thing, but you’re just looting.
Repudiating allies while you’re rooting
for enemies will never earn the crown
you crave: and, in advance of sitting down,
you showed your hand. You gave the game to Putin.
Stupidity does not deserve excusing.
It takes a man to take his share of blame,
a thing you’ll never do. You have no shame.
Your hand-picked team are taking drugs and boozing,
already reconciled inside to losing,
because (like you) they ever knew the game.
Caren sat inside her treehouse
Sequestered sixteen feet in the air
Camouflaged by two sparkly leaved cottonwoods
The Della Bettas were arguing loudly
In Italian
They live up the block on the corner
In a green house
There was no denying their tones
She reached into her book pile
Librarians limited her to seven books a day
What to read first? They were all hand-picked this morning
She chooses seven every morning in the summer
She looked up from her pirate adventure
Hearing two happy women
Meeting at the clothesline, pinning up laundry
Her mother and a neighbor, their happiest time of the day
A Red-Letter Day
Staid pilgrims grew leery, Thanksgiving Day,
When men came to feast, half-covered in hay.
"Where's Hester?" wives asked
And elders were tasked
To march to the barn and give her an A.
Santa Goes Truant
With trollop hand-picked and madam well-paid,
Dear Santa was truant from the parade.
He ho-hoed, "so what?
I'm old with a gut,
So do this perhaps just twice a decade."
“I traversed the path from blind faith to wisdom ~
Recognising within me lies God’s kingdom”
~ quote by poet
When I was a child, I was told God exists
but growing up, seeing chaos in the world,
I debated this concept in foggy mists,
deluded no more, when flag of love unfurled,
the elixir that resolves every conflict,
with fragrance oozing from rose petals, hand picked,
consciousness engulfing the sun and the moon,
ushering music of spheres, that makes heart swoon.
Heart contracts when there is conflict
and expands when love and light grows
so each vibration, when hand picked
manifests bliss between eyebrows.
Love is God’s refrain, free from stain,
that unties us from karmic chain.
Why would we resist, love’s bliss mist,
wherein ignition renewal
ushers rapture that our heart missed,
bestowing clear sight, non-dual?
We have the cake and eat it too,
watching dance divine continue.
Breath by breath, as we bilocate,
we find ourself at heaven’s gate.
playground battlefield
meticulously hand-picked
glossy armoured seeds
INDELIBLE
They waft across the ocean top as loose and separate notions leaving naught but hollow caverns where my intellect once dwelled.
I set them free with Spring's crisp breeze the day I guzzled potion
Now they meld into the casserole and join waves as they swell.
You hand picked Mother Nature's best for which I'm honoured, touched and blessed. You ground these down into a pulp. Mixed in some juice. Told me to gulp.
My faith in you spans far beyond words.
You have my back. I have been heard.
The demons and that thick dark muck flung from my mind.
My soul now finds the peace I've longed for night and day.
Five decades now on knees I prayed.
Today my prayers, hopes, dreams, desires create a self I can admire.
Your essence most remarkable awoke in me an indelible respect for who I have become.
A pride in battles fought and won that never stole the breath of day for your words, etched, remain in play.
The Speaker of the House believes
That he will legislate
Because he’s been hand-picked by God,
The heck with Church and State.
In his opinion, Trump should still
Be president because
The last election was a farce
And violated laws.
His worldview is the Bible,
Saying everyone should read it
For those “anti-God enthusiasts,”
In his opinion, need it.
Same-sex marriage is “unnatural”
And anybody gay
Lives a lifestyle he calls “dangerous,”
“Perversion” on display.
And abortion is a “holocaust,”
A reference that’s vile,
Yet Republicans apparently
He’s managed to beguile.
How can those in charge impose on all
Their personal beliefs
Which defy the founding fathers’
“Life and liberty” motifs?
I am saddened by the way this country’s
Permanently torn
And when standing on the sidelines,
All that we can do is mourn.
Woman-owned green beans won't string you along,
But if you're a man, it’s likely you're wrong.
Woman-owned green beans, our virtues extole,
Hand-picked from the bush, eschewing the pole.
Woman-owned green beans for the man of the hour,
We’d best make that two, they still need a shower.
Woman-owned green beans are never on sale,
‘Cuz working for less is beyond the pale.
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got a chuckle out of this label at the store...
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