The strings of my Stradivarius
have waited too long
for you
Crows are breaking the sky
with frantic, angry feathers
and lawn mowers cut straight lines
with the raucous killing of sound
Quieter, more sinuous
strings should fill the thirsty air
Play ‘Promontory’
by Trevor Jones and Randy Edelman
so I can feel
the meaning behind things
through metal
and resonant wood
You control the bow
like a desperate, dying dancer
creating new colors
through the rubbing
of horsehair to steel
and goat gut
Beautiful things sometimes come
from raw origins
That I were your Stradivarius
Pony Life in a Dreamhouse
Dreamy creature,
With ocean eyes and batting lashes feature,
Still looking like Barbie,
The pony's glittering saddle guarantees.
Horsehair dipped in gold paint,
A dazzling smile can't escape.
The moment Pony meets Ken,
His eyes softened.
He looked at her like the stars were jealous,
As if she had been his wish when he wrote to Santa Claus.
Her. Half-Pony. Half-Barbie
Always have been, always will be.
Ken stroked her mane warm and Pony clung,
Letting out a soft purr from its lips,
As if testing the reality of it on its tongue.
Well, Pony is whipped.
Pony will be the sun that can shower Ken with rays.
Pony will be his moon, with a glow that never wanes.
Because Barbie can be what she wanna be,
And her Shape-Shifting Pony will gladly.
Though born half-Pony,
in a Dreamhouse that's unpredictable,
Barbie had Ken's unwavering loyalty.
Pony is one of a kind after all!
Violins plucking strings
of horsehair, satin ribbons
violet violate a dark
foresaken world
like a beautiful dream
romance unravels
the sweet pain
comes undone
then those wild horses
dance macabre neck-to-neck
racing all the way home
for want of a better country,
these beautiful creatures
limbs racing all lathered
opening wide
and unconquered
plunder new territory
in the red seeded seat
royally the hidden thing
beats like a machine
underneath the skin
a ripe juicy red apple
no cherry pip
feeds the mind of
marquis de john donne
and dorian's sybil vane
gone all wrong
Violins the shape
of a woman
the music inside
her intense jungle
prowls around
like an exotic
soft pawed purring
black leopard
something wicked
or wonderful
in the garden
this way it comes
the soft satin
that binds metaphoric
minds like wrists
the will to resist
comes undone
something wicked
or wonderful
in the garden
dappled in shadow
shining and hidden
like a solitairy secret
like a morning star
this way, it comes
Candide Diderot. ‘24
Pick a place you want to go
The answer never will be no
How about a rustic inn?
One where we have never been
With cottages on private coves
Overlooking lilac groves
Horse and buggy romance rides
Snow capped, pine tree mountainsides
Cozy, warm, big fireplace
Reflecting, glowing off your face
Nooks and crannies, old heirlooms
Like corn cob pipes and horsehair brooms
Mornings, evenings, crisp and cool
There's only one unbending rule
You have to let me do it all
Breakfast, lunch, and dinner call
Clean up after, make the bed
Wake up early, plan ahead
Have your coffee, fresh and hot
Waiting for you on the spot
Bring it to you where you are
Serenade you on guitar
Songs of love I wrote for you
Other playlist favorites too
Solely you for company
I only want you there with me
I am drugged by music
the horsehair bow,
key and peddle
the blow and boom'
of windpipes and drums.
Unfinished symphonies
leave me mewing like a wounded gull
forever beached on that last note.
My love is dressed in crinoline
in the 18th variation of a rhapsody,
It is my joy and pain
to be a member of a ghost orchestra,
to sit on a hard chair as a soft shadow
listening to the fading smoke
of hollowed-out wood
and I am drugged.
unplugged from myself.
for as long as it takes
for that musical blend of joy and pain
in its endless moment,
as it walks through singing bones.
Bought home in a battered case one day
He took it out and and scratched away
Playing out of tune and terribly flat
He scared the daylights out of the cat
The horsehair that ran along the bow
Had escaped and departed long ago
Never mind, he played without a flinch
While next door the neighbours winced
Melodies unrecognisable to human ear
He can't keep time or bum notes hear
'I'm a virtuoso!' he likes to boast
But in truth - he's as deaf as a post
20 April 2023
V words writing challenge poetry contest
Constance la France
On the Isle of Skye, water runs down the Cuillin mountains into waterfall streams
It's a beautiful and tranquil place
Where the local fairies live, play and dream
A red-bearded Scotsman walks from his village
He carries his beloved bagpipes in hand
He heads to the magical Fairy Pools
To play for the fairies hiding among the heather stalks growing in the lush green land
Clad in a kilt of dark blue and green
They know it's their friend that's come to play
His emotional bagpipe songs are the only things
That make them emerge from their hideaway
The fairies love the skirl of the bagpipes
It brings their soul delight
Their tiny wings flutter with joy and elation
While they surround him in flight
When he's finished playing, he reaches into his horsehair sporran
Hanging from his waist
To feed the fairies bits of wild-grown raspberries
They absolutely love their taste
He will come back to play for them soon on another day
They love their friend in the blue and green kilt
With his beloved bagpipes and the songs that he will play
A lonely fiddle, its strings once taut tense and
stretched, waiting to be tuned and played.
The limp horsehair bow, longs to be tightened
and drawn in sweet reverberations.
From the poem "Strings"
posted Jan 27, 2018
for Greg's Arbitrium Divisa contest
The judge is snoring for victory of my conviction
Every night, I merry in comfort of his spouse
My skin has become a palimpsest of fleeting sensation
And each layer bore the imprint of my Doxie
Instead of a red carpet, to flaunt my asset
I walk on a green mile, toward an electric chair
With fans on the other edge, cheering my conquest
I am the champion of the west wing with horsehair
Dawn is here and I must face the light
In a roll of two, I lead
To cast my secrets in light without weight
I always lead, whether it's death or food
Without doubt, I am the best on earth
I have fans cheering me at death
A lonely fiddle, its strings once taut tense and
stretched, waiting to be tuned and played.
The limp horsehair bow, longs to be tightened
and drawn in sweet reverberations.
A grounded kite, too long flightless -
too long not tethered to laughter
and coaxed to fly in a summer sky
on the breath of smiles.
A forgotten puppet - still strung;
a keepsake perched like an ornament
that never moved, never danced and
never brought smiles nor tears
to those with inimitable imaginations,
waits patiently for a child to say,
"Daddy, will you help him dance once more?"
B52s above the Aleutians?
It never was a Red Dread global mission.
Fidel was just Galician patrician,
and Ho and Mao were scholarly Confucians.
They wore those uniforms like horsehair vests,
to carve from abject nothingness an entity,
a national and regional identity,
ingredients which only coalesced
when nascent nations donned that soviet skin,
abhorrent to the blinkered Baywatch mind:
unowned, untethered, boundless, non-aligned –
but with Kalashnikovs airlifted in.
As Mary Jane moved in on moonshine stills,
the five-year-olds rehearsed their fallout drills.
her fingers play like spiders
nimbly dancing on a web of iron
it lies on the smoothest rosewood
her prey is built of horsehair
such powerful vibrations!
such music to her ears!
quickly her prey dances back and forth
tho never does she escape
the wooden casket sings songs of old
still the iron waves dance
nimbly does our spider creep
and back to her position
And once again the horsehair prey
Dances to the casket song
They waltz to the beat to the spider legs
Until they cannot dance anymore
Goin alone,
Why must my travels be so stale.
No love to quote, no tales to tell,
I'm on troubled waters, no beacon to see.
At home I'm always alone.
Why O' why?
No satiation in my soul,
I'm idle and dark like a noir stained bowl.
Pale face, lonely state,
O' blind man I be.
Imagine no walking cane to take,
and pierced with a cold blackened stake.
Alone, no life do I see.
Why am I on an a empty isle?
No paddle or ship to sail,
and my inner self is so blatantly pale.
Fore my painting is alone.
A horsehair brush I must take,
to paint me a new mirage,
without loneliness in my forage place.
Being Painted Alone says a thousand words.
Your voice is tossed on the breeze.
I'm flying kites that have no anchor string,
my conversation forever lost with no words to bring.
Cloudburst Louis
Paints in colors bright
Imagination driven
With all of his might
Blessed canvas glows
Pure horsehair magic
Beauty born from pain
Muse favors tragic
Autism schism
Torn from the world
Quiet little dolphin
Oceans unfurled
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