Long Borrows Poems

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


Premium Member News At Noon

It's hard for him to buy a gun--
He's already got a rap sheet on him
His driver's license is suspended-- 
So he borrows one... 

His clothes are grubby; sometimes he smells bad
Teachers make fun of him in the staff lounge
Other kids tease him behind his back
But he knows...

He can always hang around the south parking lot after 10:30 a.m.
The security guy goes around to the north lot for about 45 minutes then
Look! --a car with the keys in the ignition and the doors unlocked
He slides into the driver's seat...

It's 11:15 now.  He drives over to the north lot. He's got 45 minutes in here
He sees the knot of kids at 11:47 a.m.  They're heading his way 
A fiendish howl wells up within him  ~ It sits behind clenched teeth

  He ducks down under the steering wheel.  They can't see him
  EEEEEE! A screech of tires and he's on them instantly
    ~ a tiger on its prey
       ~ they freeze
           ~ they're roadkill
              ~ BAM! He's got 'em  

  Headline News at Noon:
  Four dead, three injured critically, including suspect
  at school in sleepy village hamlet...

                May, 2018
Form:


Premium Member Remembering Winged Warrior

Four and a half years ago we lost a fine poet, 
a knightly gentleman, and a friend to many of us.  
I'm reposting my tribute to him today.  

Warrior is an adjective used for a hero or a knight
I knew one, briefly, whose wings have taken flight
Not just a fine poet was John, but also very kind
Generous and caring, is how he would be defined
Endearing was his 'love and light' message to all
Departed now, but his memory I will always recall

With words of tribute, I honor his humorous wit
Always a positive attitude, he was a candle ~ lit
Rest peacefully, ^WW^ ~ You're missed, my friend
Reflecting Ripples is a poem John sadly penned
In it he wrote about "shadows" and "silent sorrows"
Oh, If from fate, I could be the one who borrows
Respite from death, you'd have more tomorrows
© Lin Lane  Create an image from this poem.
Form: Acrostic

Winged Warrior

On 7/4/2020, John wrote, "Who Mourns For The Poet." 
https://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/who_mourns_for_the_poet_1266152


Warrior is an adjective used for a hero or a knight
I knew one, briefly, whose wings have taken flight
Not just a fine poet was John, but also very kind
Generous and caring, is how he would be defined
Endearing was his 'love and light' message to all
Departed now, but his memory I will always recall

With words of tribute, I honor his humorous wit
Always a positive attitude, he was a candle ~ lit
Rest peacefully, ^WW^ ~ You're missed, my friend
Reflecting Ripples is a poem John sadly penned
In it he wrote about "shadows" and "silent sorrows"
Oh, If from fate, I could be the one who borrows
Respite from death, you'd have more tomorrows



January 26, 2021
Capture the Essence Contest
Sponsored by Margarita Lillico
Form: Acrostic

Premium Member I Have Gained Nothing From White Supremacy

I have gained nothing from white supremacy
with singular power, sans The Almighty
My faithful friend with sheets of white
my pal, poised, unpen itself to make things right
How squeaky clean each new beginning?
that borrows from the dead, and those still living
I arrived blank naked and undisguised
my soul redeemed in light of sunrise.

I have gained nothing from white supremacy
its dubious power sans The Almighty,
Where would I be without coloration on the scene?
life would be deserted as though obscene
I'd fall through the cracks to a singular world
where boys play god to control every girl.

I have gained nothing from white supremacy
with singular  power sans The Almighty
I've read of Sodom and Gomorrah's crude ways
that glorified false light, as before the flood days
Now, there's liberation theology for you and me
the God of our understanding is of mercy
What race of men thrives without grace?
where would we be without speck of faith?

I have gained nothing, from white supremacy
what dubious power sans The Almighty -
A garden with grounds as fertile as love
who charted each course? Only One from above
I think of evergreen, and majestic pines;
and my roots unending; yet not one of a kind, because
The humanity of man was molded by divinity
and hand washes hand, to ward off calamity.
Form: Couplet

His Right Leg

A note pinned to the thigh reserves it,
the whole cadaver is parceled off.
Legs are a late harvest of the indigent.
Their limbs carry a visual poverty
long after the body is plucked.

In a small room, I separate
muscle groups, filter large blood vessels
from fibrous runnels. 
My scalpel seeking out fascial planes.

The leg is devolving to scraps,
yet ingrained in the tissue,
I sense residual shades of a life.
Seaside postcards and old photographs,
war ribbons and yellowed newspaper clippings.

The gray flesh retains its memories.
There’s a wife behind his knee,
bone whittling winds have not erased her features,
her youthful form still entwined
around ashen ligaments.

A child climbs up from an ankle bone,
as a sinewy plasma -
it has no substance of its own,
but borrows and gathers a varicose presence.

Sights and scenes invest 
a limbs mangled landscape.
Images that can’t be cut away
by living hands.

Some imagine they dissect a limb,
but I turn bloodless pages,
read images once squirreled away, 
that now form these sinews
of a journey’s end.


Premium Member Elysiums Lost Melody

In dreams of yonder, wishes wistfully conceive,
A cradle of lost tomorrows, where shadows sway;
To a realm unseen, where hearts believe,
Past where twilight’s lulling lullabies lay,
A world where reverie and reality secretly play.

Through the veil of verity… 
     …Aisling nocturnally creates,
Mountains of moonlight, rivers of rhyme,
A world untouched by changing tides and capricious fate.
In this land, where we lose track of all time,
A place where voices harmonize; oh, so surreal, so sublime.

A city of silence, a forest of fears,
The cloud-kissed towers, an ocean of sorrow,
Beneath twilight's gentle, silent tears.
An ephemeral world free of yesterdays and tomorrow,
A dreamscape unfolding where sleep freely borrows.

A tremor runs through castle walls,
     A sigh escapes the forest deep,
Twilight's tears turn into calls
     Of roosters waking from their sleep.
The ocean's sorrow shimmers pale
     A canvas primed for sun's first brush.
The mountains, caught in morning's veil
     Dissolves to silence, whispers hush.

As a new dawn dances 
     the dream dissipates
The illusion shatters 
     reality reinstates.
For the land was an Elysium delight
A mere mirage in the moonlit night.
Dissolving in dawn's delicate dance 
     …like a mist in morning sacred light.

Fading Starlight sifts through leaves, painting emerald shadows on the ground.
Lost in the morning's mellowness, 
          a sigh escapes, 
               the dream departs, 
                                   unrenown…

Though dawn reclaims the waking world, 
     a yearning in my heart resides, 
For Elysium's lost melody, 
          where time and sorrow gently subside.
Form: Lyric

Premium Member Bougainvillea

To cut or not to cut...that is the question
whether to allow thorns to again draw blood
or to watch as a gentle hand is pierced

Could that I seek a simpler answer
as bougainvillea exposes passions
from its different colors and brings such a glorious sense

Alas,  their beauty is a curse
giving to my flesh the wounds of battle
leaving scars upon outstretched arms 

My kingdom for a stem without thorns!

What is a bougainvillea, is it a sweet blush of a flower?
Is it a vine that intangles or a shrub that borrows space?
Is it a way to see an ornament of nature
bloom without fragrance or a false rose with little promise
a flower with thorns or thorns with flowers?

Yes is it nobler of the mind to live with bougainvillea
which needs no care and can sustain itself 
or seek out roses which take more prudent care?

Ah! This realm...this yearning...this heartland, needs both

3/17/19 contest Bougainvillea

Premium Member Augenblicte

Augenblicte 
David J Walker

The flash frame scene 
seemed to last 
In a fevered forever 
more than 50 years 
beyond today's dawn  
beyond a horizon that changes
		without ever-changing  places
and never aging faces 
		imprinted in vivid color 

who says forever is never 
and never-never happens 
and never neverland 
                never lands 
in the planned races and 
planned spaces 
                faces extinction 

the distinction is in 
the same time frame 
its twilight zone light 
replaces convention
and might inoculate conviction 
 
a golden sun sang low & slow 
sad songs of convection 

yesterdays reflection comes and goes
		at night 
and borrows against
tomorrows borrowed sunlight
Form: Rhyme

Clutched By Anxiety Compliments Vladimir Putin

Yours truly borrows a phrase
courtesy the great bard
also known as
William Shakespeare's Hamlet:
"For 'tis the sport ...
Hoist by one's own petard
meaning "victimized or hurt 
by one's own scheme”.

The aforementioned excerpt
hopefully describes the fate
to befall president of Russia.

Nevertheless, unseen 
talon sharp claws...
dig deep into mine
psyche soft underbelly
piercing bedrock of
core (puss) being
akin to butter knife
slicing thru peanut
butter and jelly

unable to preserve
an iota of calm 
while stuck in said 
emotional jarring state,
which eruption of cataclysmic
agitation analogous to a bomb
going off inside my head,
where a mishmash
of frenzied discombobulated
brainstorming angst doth glom,

whereat the "little boy"
inside this man
called for his mom,
who when this aging
"baby boomer" chap
just a kid and experienced
devastating, jarring,
and paralyzing tom

malt chew hiss in dom
mitt able inexplicable fear,
though NO obvious
danger threatened, NOR
warning signaled "BEWARE,"
nonetheless adrenaline
coursed from head
to toe as if clear

and present harm
lurked quite near,
inducing a host of
physiological fallout symptoms
darkly freighting this
sole son with nightmarish scare,
whereat no escape,
nor exit no matter

how fast a sprinting tear
found me running
mile a minute only
to end up nowhere,
except smackdab right
in the same place
in relation to despair,
which translates to mean...

yours truly could not
run and hide,
as quickly made clear
to me then, and now,
though at present
scores years older, the balm
courtesy of prescription
medication popped inside

mouth from palm
olive smoothed hands,
as if this teetotaler
betook himself prom
men aiding albeit
with tumblerful of liquor
getting feigning noggin all a jam
aware that nothing amiss,

would be evident,
sans lower gastrointestinal exam,
nonetheless diet
restricted to graham
crackers and broth
distilled from ham
hock, once again thwarting
vegetarian ambitions damn!

Paul

In the dust of Thessalonica’s street
where sandals scuffed the stones
and rumor of the sky splitting open
hung like thunder not yet born,
Paul stood—
tentmaker’s hands still smelling
of leather and labor,
thread pulled tight through hide
as through the conscience of men.

Some had folded their arms to the sun,
waiting for trumpets,
for clouds to blossom with fire,
for the Lord to descend
before supper.
But the ovens cooled.

The nets lay slack by the shore.
Bread thinned on the tables
of those who still rose
with morning’s ache.

And Paul wrote—
Not with cruelty,
not with a clenched fist,
but with the stern mercy
of one who knows
how hunger humbles a man.

“If one will not work,
neither shall he eat.”

Not for the broken hand,
not for the widow’s trembling bowl,
not for the child whose ribs
count the days—
but for the idle heart
that borrows breath
and gives no song in return.

For faith is no hammock.
Hope is no excuse
to sleep through the harvest.
He stitched the tents.
He bore the scars.

He preached with calloused palms—
that waiting for heaven
does not excuse
neglecting the earth.

And somewhere between
the needle and the Word,
between hunger and grace,
Paul taught them
that love
is the greatest of works.

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