Long Bereft Poems

Long Bereft Poems. Below are the most popular long Bereft by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Bereft poems by poem length and keyword.


Cognitive Crutches

The familiar face looked grotesque.
Indelible imprints of blood stains,
scarred the contour of his body.
His skull had crushed on the windshield..
A rampage had ripped his nerves naked...
Kinetic ardour of the car, exiled him to static rust
in a vegetative state... bereft of cognition.
But his mind still addled... in lucid ambition.

His skin could still  touch rain..
His eyes could still  see lightning..
His ears could still hear thunder..
His heart could still feel pain.

Glint of two black marbles looked at the window..
Is it dusk or dawn?.. 
Searching for cognitive crutches....
Interim thoughts grope his head.....
Is he alive or dead?




29th December,2018

PLACED FIRST IN Brian Strand Jan Wk 2 contest  

Originally submitted to the Brainy Brevity Poetry Contest of Maureen McGreavy
The theme of contest : "BRAIN INJURY"


Premium Member Beside a Quiet Stream

I lived in a beautiful valley, beside a quiet stream
It was a place I escaped to when I needed to dream
surrounded by the tallest mountains in the world,
so I believed when I had been an innocent little girl

Pure until he walked down from the mountain high
He came to me without a word, we stood eye to eye
His only gesture was to reach out and take my hand
with that touch, the flames in my heart were fanned.

At last, 'hello,' was but a whisper from his sensuous lips.
He brought my hand to his mouth, kissed my finger tips
and then he said that he'd watched me for many a year,
grow from a child to a woman and I had nothing to fear.

I chose to believe every word that he breathed forth.
I took his other hand in mine and we headed North.



He asked me to journey with him and share in his life
He promised to take care of me as his friend and wife
He said with me by his side, everything we would share
and that for years he'd longed to have me as his lady fair.

It didn't matter where we went or even where we slept
but after a few years, what mattered was that I wept.
I cried because his promises all proved to be untrue.
I cried because I knew there was nothing I could do.

I walked away from him and headed South on my own.
Once again I dreamed in the valley where I lived alone.
The nights were cold as I lay down on the valley floor
there was no more warmth from the man I had adored.

When I slept I always saw the mountains fade away,
not the man who came to me beside the stream that day.



My ears heard a rustling, perhaps it was just the wind
but a shadow fell over me and the sunlight was dimmed.
"Hello," was all he said before he knelt beside me there
Once again he asked if life with him would I like to share.

How long we sat and stared at each other, eye to eye,
I'd not hazard to guess, nay, I'd not even care to try.
I asked, "What have you done in the years since I left?"
He said he'd almost died from a heart sad and bereft.

Four years it had been between 'hello' and 'goodbye.'
Years spent in my valley, where I thought I would die.
He stood before me now, this mountain of a man.
I rose up to my knees and then I held out my hand.

There is a kind of love one can only capture in a dream,
But some can be revived beside quiet waters of a stream.
© Lin Lane  Create an image from this poem.
Form: Sonnet

Premium Member I Wandered Lonely As a Life

"I wandered lonely as a cloud" -- William Wordsworth


I wandered lonely as a life
bereft of joy by reason’s cloud
to sling invective like a scythe
from perched on high, lofty and proud.
Naught from my lips but bile and scorn,
delight extinguished, long since shorn.

Imprisoned by my intellect,
I held my neighbor in disdain,
the simpletons who genuflect,
lift voice in praise to gods inane.
Devoid of purpose, meaningless,
inflicting pain, I caused distress.

Ensconced in fog, truth thus eludes,
for nothing blinds like one’s own will,
prolongs the moral turpitude,
bolstering self yet further still.
The darkness bears an evil grin,
a putrid corpse, lest dawn breaks in.

But worlds come crashing down, of course.
A penetrating shaft of light
that sears at first, causes remorse,
illumines one’s desperate plight.
A warmth then flushes on the face
by blood reborn, restored by grace.

----------

for the I Wandered Lonely as --- Challenge Poetry Contest
sponsored by Natasha L Scragg
written on 09/18/2022
© Jeff Kyser  Create an image from this poem.
Form: Rhyme

Premium Member -Years Gone By

Tonight I feel sad reflecting on years gone by
So filled with emotion….. I cry
Coming and goings, busy days
The home alive with a young family to raise 

Missing the ones who have already left
Leaving me feeling totally bereft
My heart now has irreplaceable voids
Each time a loss… part of my spirit destroyed

Times of planning ,creating our destiny
Exciting hopes and dreams for our family
Holidays, occasions, special moments and all
Now just cherished memories to recall 

Tonight will pass ,tomorrow a new day
For now sad memories will have been wept away
Tomorrow I will live in the here and now , I will not cry
 Until next time I reflect on years gone by…..
© Deb M   Create an image from this poem.
Form: Rhyme

Reverse Polarity

REVERSE POLARITY

If I’m negative, you are positive
We’re like both magnetic poles
I am North and you are South
Top and lower lips on a mouth
As opposite yet attracted souls
Both good, and always sensitive

Plus to minus the current flows
But electrons go the other way
Like us, there’s little logic left
But without each other, bereft
And no laws of physics to obey
Just biology, as everyone knows

It is a case of reversed polarity
One to the other and back again
Both needed to make a circuit
Like dough, both must work it
It seems too complex to explain
In a continued search for clarity
Form: Rhyme


Premium Member Audie Leon Murphy

At five feet, five and a hundred and ten
The Marines said, “sorry, too small of a man.”
Yet he became greatest of World War men,
The Army’s David to Goliath stands.

An orphan at the early age of sixteen,
Enlisted at nineteen then off to war.
As part of the 15th infantry team,
Lived four hundred days of front-line gore.

Audie earned honors for courage and bravery,
Every medal of valor, his story. 
Through the horrors of war so unsavory;
The most decorated soldier in (U.S.) history.

He embodies the greatest generation,
Yet today, we are so bereft.
Are there any of Audie's persuasion
To redeem what valor is left?
© Tom Valles  Create an image from this poem.
Form: Quatern

Blue Hole

Vivacious children, drama Queens and Kings 
wearing mother rags and big old father hats 
One held a pot with a silver spoon for bang  
the other held an old guitar bereft of strings

Gathering their peers they opened up the show   
in Jimmy's huge garage, a row of plastic chairs   
One played the flute the other favored drums 
picking up the tune  they all began to croon; 

Later when the sun emerged behind a blue hole,   
the starlet brave and sure wearing filigreed barrettes   
sang and clicked her heels to the rhythm a 
cacophonous band, playing on and on and on.  


May 27, 2021

War and Peace

Sometimes, I do opine
To secure, to establish my rights;
Peace is an eglantine,
Advising to cease the age-old fights.

We all become a pensive pendulum
Between human rights and pure peace;
This dilemma must, must be overcome;
We must, we need, we'll obtain bliss.

In the era of such decadence,
We need to claim our rights;
Still, bereft of over-confidence,
We can cease our prolonged fights.

We do, we do need an antidote;
What can it be then? What?
Let's not become a stupid scapegoat;
We must try none to hurt.

As long as we all do exist,
There must be both war and peace;
Ourselves we must restrain and resist;
Philanthropy brings us bliss.
Form: Quatrain

Premium Member A Magical Journey

I hold three magic rocks, in my hand
Rolling them over and over and over
Leaving this reality behind, far behind
Allowing the currents to carry me
To domains beyond reach of ego-mind

The first rock takes me to an astral realm
It has heaven and hell and all in between
Cause and effect here is borne by desire
Wondrous as it is, I choose cessation
To reclaim within heart, God’s eternal fire

The second rock reveals the noumena
A singularity positioned outside space-time
Dwelling in peace, I feel therein complete
Yet awareness bereft of love is barren
So I roll the third stone towards God’s feet

Both duality and singularity disappear
I see God’s heart, a globe of golden light
Suffused with love, our hearts become one
Whence returning to form, I finally understand
As God’s child, we are love and light of the sun
Form: Rhyme

Premium Member Poet In Recluse

I relinquish my pen before the storm
of her tears falling upon my bare arm
her gentle whispering breathed in my ear
Muse of mine, adieu to your wit and charm

With piqued reasons I have come to deduce
It's time to say fond farewell to my muse
She should seek a new poet and lay claim
for my words have grown utterly abstruse

Spare me sullen eyes, from cries in refrain
I shall not weep in sadness nor disdain
Bitterness does not become a recluse
My poet's heart weakens, I dare not feign

Time's drawn the shades in darkness of night
No candle flame shall glimmer enough light
in which I may be tempted before morn
to doubt seclusion and attempt to write

Cloistered without pen, I shall ever be
From thinking in rhyme I shall be set free
Poems half written on bits of scrap paper
I shall lock away and then toss the key

My hand has retired, this last poem now penned
No more idyll thoughts of mind will transcend
Bereft of rhymes and abandoned of verse
This poet knows her time has reached an end

Ink no longer flows through my tunneled veins
Expressed emotions in poetry wanes
And when interred, on my stone I shall read,
"Reclusive poet" over my remains
© Lin Lane  Create an image from this poem.
Form: Rubaiyat

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Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace