Hulls Poems | Examples

Rivers Jumps Our Banks

Households unhitch, clapperboard hulls creaking -
the sound of storm-lashed rigging, as washing lines
and telephone wires twist
netting loosening foundations.

Where we once believed roots gripped bedrock,
planks bob in the swell, chests and their drawers
billow and fill.

Bed-springs gape, cupboards
turn inside out, what surfaces
is the face-up exposure
of our everyday innards.

Even as mailboxes are torn away,
we refuse to believe that a river and some wind
could move our lives so a far afield,

or that this world was really in fact,
just this shipwreck on a shore
that is always moving.

What we once thought of
as an address,
has turned out to be only a buoy
on an ever-moving wave.

Far Seas

River boats

drop down into sunken fog,

return
as buoyant as swimming seagulls.

A deep diving sky
spindrifts the hulls,
decks now ship airy waves
from far away seas.

The craft ride high and low
on this muted swell,

a cresting last beheld

in a shipwrecked China      teacup.

trickle

whirl …

where waters mingle -
the inky black that pulls down
swallows … enfolds …
the ballet breaks -
sun’s golden coins a-dancing,
birthing pixies to the brine
to draw the gaze with dazzled magic …
the glassy smooth that
dopplegangs a billowy azure and a
quivery, star-daubed vault …
the ruffled swells -
turning masts to pendulum poets,
ticking time as the hulls roll …
and rock … and roll …
and the foaming rage -
surf that breaks reefs to ruin
and howls at Calypso,
the salty sirens screaming at
her for just a taste of
jagged justice …
the seas roar and ebb and
sunder suns to ache
the rills run to the low to find them
and feed the confluences
water weaves and wells and works to
be the All of life -
the precious matter, miraculous
the shaper and sater and savior of
everything that actuates
yet …
the oceans, and washes, wild
and weeping heavens
in all their splendor and abundance
can not hope to accommodate
the love, sorrow, spirit, or
significance 
of one single, solitary
child’s …

tear.








Copyright © Gregory Richard Barden, July 27, 2024

July 2024 Britian dreams

The football is good, sir keir is in.' The sun is out
 Maybe some cheer is needed? So that tells
Me the clouds might stay unseeded? Soon the euro
Luvvies will be waxing, their hulls to sail the sea and
Show us the gulls'
There'll be promise and rhetoric and commonality.' Sounds
Rather like 'common-wealth?' Yet in market parlance.' Thats
( The hook ) you're not to see.! Around.) It'll be all about care
Of many people see!! While wars are raging and plauges
Are sleeping..' Kept in test tubes awaiting injection.? Creeping.!.On 
In some form? Once they get direction 'they'll be good'
For your gout..And aching back improve libido.?
Oh such invention.' Are
You all still upon track.? You come out at six to make great noise.!!
With pots and sticks' chase those evil spirits away..Like good girls and boys.' You' ll all be such bricks. (May it all sink in!)

On The Dock

The dark wood stretching from the shore,
nearby a rack filled with long oars,
ducks swim nearby in a long row,
towards the rocky beach they go.
Underfoot the dock shifts and sways,
responding to the gentle waves,
a little boy peers as the fish
zip underneath with a tail swish.
Old tires posted on each side,
so that boat hulls will not collide,
and bang up their expensive hulls,
right now they’re sporting lazy gulls.
Wood ladder nailed on to the end
for swimmers to return again...
I set my chair on this small peer,
to spend some quiet hours here.

Hey look, there’s an eagle…

The Storm Swept Through

I often write about the ocean. I went to see a museum exhibit, yesterday, “Dutch Art in a Global Age.” The paintings of sailboats on the sea caught my attention. Breathtaking and romantic, admired them up closely, then from the center of the room. One artist was Ludolf Bakhuizen and his painting was “Ships in a Gale on the IJ before the City of Amsterdam.”

THE STORM SWEPT THROUGH

the storm swept
through
sails white & gray

  clouds
    competing

ebb & flow
of catawampus rain

the heave-ho
of the hulls
crashing
         on
malevolent waves

the sky falls
squeezes out
thunderous soak

cantankerous whitecaps
        like
moon craters
              rise & fall

cerulean hope
bleeds through
  as
the sun bruises the
    hullabaloo

lightning shows
             off
a couple more
  times
than its lullaby
hushes

and the boats
gently rock

as if the infant
is sound asleep

the sea is smooth
it is a smooth operator
a breathing body
of fickle water

Fog On The River

The hulls of small boats
drop down into the morning fog
then return like rising seagulls.
The moored
slip in and out of the mist
then return painted
by a deep diving sky.

Sinking or flying, the small craft
slip through our vision
like leaking ghosts.

They roll upon an obscure air
shipping cloudy waves,
a swell last seen
in shipwrecked teacups.

Aquarium

Dim tunnels curve a segmented ocean.
Bat-winged feeding specters
browse glass. Scaly hulls
blow gas tanks. Rainbow skimmers
flick and soar.

A child’s sweet nose pressed
against a face so horrible,
bubbles of fear pop
in my brain.

Above us, jellyfish swim,
dendritic minds dangling.
tentacles of electric awareness.

Sharks circle waiting to be fed.
shark lovers, perhaps fantasying’
swimming in and out
of their bloody teeth.

It’s a movie - we gawp and admire,
shiver and savor
between margins of beauty
and grotesque gulping’s.

Red and blue squadrons
of directional floor arrows,
lead us out into the light -

a place that some believe
is a safer landscape.

Freighters Tableau

Old ships come to die
on a silent beach;
once they ferried freight.
Side by side, they lie
broken hulls; now each
bide their rusty fate.



Image #1

Timeless Tides

It greets me at daybreak
That subtle stench of fog
Tinged by yesterday’s fish.
A rhythmic chatter
Tide tormented boats
Counting coup on weary hulls.
Voices lost in a drone of tedium.
Another day captured
In the same colors, and textures
Of an endless moment.
Time, entrenched in a now,
Tethered to a then
Anchored to a distant shore.


©8/12/2023

No Anchor For Rancor

When the lights of evening dusk have eluded me long enough 
I shall not walk through the hallways of death
with resentment at my side  
nor shall I hold any grudges against my fiends and 
family members 
When the sun in faded gold retrieves above the ocean  
I shan't use force to make it stay, I will let it go 
and if the good Lord hulls me in like he did 
with Peter, I will not anchor my ship in deep waters of rancor, 
for I know that for every dying sunset there is a brand new sunrise. 
  
I won't waste time on pity nor greed,  
I will happily be hulled 
and when I'm finally finished cruising the world, 
I will let go of that mast that I have grown so fond of, 
and join the seagulls in the sky.

Sitkan Spice Merchant

Fish flesh ceiling marinades evening in mandarin
  Paprika streaks Alaskan sky, an exploded pumpkin
  Garish stretch marks bruise tumid buttocks
  Jack-o'-lantern flicker silhouettes summits 
  
  Door open draught steers me over masts, a compass
  North chill Turmeric tingle bitterness burns sun jus
  Snuffs frail wick candle into cavern skull sockets
  Frigid fuselage discarded from flamboyant firey rocket

   Hulls doubled on calm harbour curl fetal forget me not
   Petal precious postcard sends rocking sleep to yachts
   Resistant pristine peaks poke holes blood gush painful 
   Ski slid accident on apex restores pale flesh to angel

   Pressed panes mist to witness her wings in awe, glory! 
   Nest of pick up sticks prickle, due dusk warns me
   Crept shadows of chalets' thatched porches protect
   Navy as battle ships torn apart, needle inks inject

Dont Quit Your Day Dream

Eureka of Archimedes was part of his daydream,
Thomas Edison nurtured his dream in bright light like gleam;
Could sleep ever overwhelm Alexander Graham Bell,
Till he heard the noise from the other and fell in a spell...?

George Washington Carver, who found in peanuts and soybeans,
Utilizations, like treasures, hidden abundant gleans;
Eli Whitney's constant daydreams gave birth to cotton gin,
That separated seeds, hulls and wastes; hearts of all did win...!

Johannes Gutenberg’s innovative printing machine,
Or John Logie Baird's mechanical television sheen;
Benjamin Franklin's lightning rod and the iron furnace,
Or Henry Ford's ventures into automobile sternness...

No invention has found its sphere devoid of day-dreaming,
This should be coalescence of action-vision creaming;
Together with concentration-shift toward internals,
Should bring forth spiritually resonant externals...!


21 November 2022
Don't Quit Your Daydream Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: craig cornish

Red Squirrels

The red squirrels forage among the fallen leaves
Searching for peanut hulls magically appearing,
After an old man comes out in rolled-up sleeves
Scattering special treats for the animals endearing,
They think he is friendly, though never too close
Keeping their distance they observe him carefully,
Those humans always a threat to animals pose
But they accept his nutritious offerings gleefully.

Chattering to each other while stuffing their jaws
The red squirrels are storing up food for the winter
Ripping open the hulls with their razor-sharp claws
They fill their bellies with these kernels for dinner.
Afterward, they curl up in their nests for a snooze
Content with their habitat, they do as they choose.

Written October 30, 2022

Japa

The land is being ravaged by plague
Our children have started to flee-
The weakening homestead
To the call of foreign lands
Like pilgrims willing to embrace its glamour or glee.

They have suddenly forgotten
The wars their fathers fought
And the limbs their comrades lost
To the eeriness of the forest of fire
With dreams lost in the onslaught.

They say they no longer see hope
In the land of the Blackman’s pride
They say they no longer want to be married
To this land, its food and its people
As they flee like a runaway bride.

They say they prefer to become slaves
For just a moment’s happiness
In a land where their fathers were once shipped away
In shackles of shame
And in hulls across the sea’s wilderness

But our fathers were not cowards
And why should we the children be?

• Short Hulls Poems
• Famous Hulls Poems
• Best Hulls Poems
• Read Hulls Poems
• Long Hulls Poems
• Hulls Quotes