Long Chewed Poems
Long Chewed Poems. Below are the most popular long Chewed by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Chewed poems by poem length and keyword.
Nero the god! I had a dream.
There I was at the foot of Mount Olympus.
Mother was with me as usual.
As we reached a cross-roads, Agrippina said:
"Come Nero, here we turn left" But I said:
"No, mama, 'WE' do not. I'm gonna turn right!"
And that's what I did. She shouted after me:
"Become emperor, Nero, though you slay me".
The path led upwards toward the snowy heights,
past the lush vernal pastures of the lower slopes,
past vineyards and groves of olive trees,
through forests of oaks, birches,
willows, elms, yews and poplars and all holy trees,
past the crags where the chamois chewed stunted grass,
and the last brave wind-blasted pine
tossed and raged in defiance of the elements, I ascended,
till there was no other thing under heaven
but burning, blinding snow,
a conflagration no less fierce than that which now I see.
I looked down at the world of men,
and what should I see but -- ants!
The air was thin and pure - then the prize!
The summit appeared from behind a cloud-rift.
Treacherous thoughts welled up from within me:
"High climbers play with death –
death by freezing, death that lurks
in the shadow of a measureless abyss.
Was I not trespassing on holy ground? ‘
“Remember Icarus, remember Prometheus,"
sighed voices in the wind,
but then a louder voice from within me
bade me fear no counsel fit for the craven.
And so to the summit.
And what should I see when reached the Olympian heights,’
other than .....fierce Jupiter? Mighty Zeus?
I'll tell you what I saw!
There seated on an ivory throne, a frail old man,
whose long white beard fluttered in the wind.
His expression was more torpor than aught else.
That was it! He looked rather like...
some doddering old patriarch
that was Consul before Caesar's time.
As I approached, he tried to look grave and austere,
pathetically shaking his hoary senile head.
His trembling hand reached down –
I saw a quiver full of arrows
and a pile of thunderbolts at his side.’[
Now was my chance!
I seized him by the scruff of the neck,
and flung him down the mountain-side.
The last I saw of him was as he reeled
head over heels into a ravine.
Then I shouted in triumph to the four winds.
"THE OLD GOD IS DEAD.
Now I'm Top Dog. I got de thunderbolts".
Only a dream?
Perhaps. Dreams pass,
but not what they portend.
One morning I sat down with Ernie to explain English,
I know you're a mouse but that squeak can only go so far.
He looked up at me blinked and then bared his teeth,
I said I'll take that for a smile so let's get started.
Ernie, quit staring out that box car door at the scenery,
You'll never learn to talk the King's language that way.
This is no tiny feat for you so please pay attention,
He sat up on hind legs and truly seemed to listen.
I told him that I was a young vagabond train traveler,
And explained that he was the smallest hobo of all time.
So if he could just learn to speak he would become famous,
My tiny friend it's just a matter of adjusting vocal chords.
Remember that if I can mimic your squeaks than why not,
Why could you not imitate my simple gibberish stated?
My God, right then I could see he understood my point,
Ernie's eyes lit up and he proceeded to write hobo on wall.
Actually he chewed the letters into that wood for me to see,
I knew all creatures were intelligent but what a revelation.
My friend Ernie could write so how far from speak was he?
Was so amazed was almost afraid to ask him next question.
Still I asked him where all his intelligence came from?
He turned his back and curled his tail into a question mark.
Was then I knew that not only did he understand questions,
He was asking me what I thought made me so extra special.
That night he chewed some questions for me into that wall,
Why war? Why kill unborn humans? Why kill nature? Why?
There I was the glorious teacher with no definitive answers,
Yet now that I've grown older I've also grown a conscience.
So easy when young to think you are center and will not die,
Those immortal thoughts soon withering on flesh bone tree.
To think it took my dear tiny friend Ernie to wake me,
It is truly humbling to bow before wisdom of a mouse.
That next day Ernie and I just sat there watching scenery,
He atop my knee and I marveling at my wonderful friend.
This train we rode directly through American history,
Passing by old settlements and battlefields of sorrow.
He saw my pain that day and nuzzled each tear from my eyes,
Knowing useless deaths with no respect for nature lived on.
We would travel together after that as ocean ship stowaways,
Still I will finish telling of our train travels together.
To be continued!
© Copyright 2014 Robert William Gruhn - All Rights Reserved
Our convergent joint
The rallying point
Mecca to the Pastors and Sisters
Jerusalem to the “Alhajas and Alfas”
Refuge to the weak
Shield to the strong
Nowhere on campus like our building
Life made more lively
Added life to the lifeless
Ever enliven to light up a dead soul
Restore spirit to the soulless body
Nowhere on campus like our
World Trade Centre
Goods and services are synchronized
Prizes are greatly subsidized
To augment sense of belonging to our belongings
No wonder, young and old ones throng in and out
For more copies of pieces of paper
Scrupulously they stay glued to
Modern screen for good job
Ours is the biggest edifice in Nigeria
Ours is the best in Africa
Ours is amongst the best in the world
Swimming pool completes the unparallel
Beautiful scenery that I behold every
Midnight that I lay my head on the
Cushion to cushion the tedious effect
Incurred in my sojourn on campus
Twenty four hours was for
Wisdom chicken and chips
A delicacy prepares with wisdom
Which often times leaves Couples off wisdom
As they whisper pouring out farrago of lies
Unto each others hearing
In a latter day hobo’s manner
Like a Romeo in the world of a Juliet
Savoring the dishes
Drinking all drinkable and all gulp-able
Browsing and dancing to the
Rhythm of Yahoo and “Aluta” gyration
Ours was unarguably the best
Our building clad a chamber
Where the Honourables meet
Where ideas and views are chewed
Where political and cerebral jaw jaw are cross fertilized
Where rhetoric and oratory seed are swallowed
Where we read and blessed with “8 points”
Where we digest skills to become splendid
Managers of human and material resources
Our library is incomparable in quantity and quality of materials
All these before they came
They came, they vandalized
They came, they destroyed
They came, they extorted
They came, they collected and replaced for man
Receipt of hopelessness and anguish
They came . . . killed the spirit
They came . . . gauged the soul
They came . . . stole the body
But . . .
Like the Son of Man
The spirit will rise again
Like an “Ayekoto” bird
The gauged soul will escape and fly away
Like the Biblical Zion
The stolen body will be returned
And restored for better glory.
Alayande Stephen Tolulope
August 12th 2005
4.00am
Form:
VOICES”
There are voices crying out loud screaming for help in the wilderness
In need of spiritual healing Im uncertain if anyone else even notice or are they hearing them
They are lost and broken draped in total despair
Thirsty spiritually starving in famine visually impaired
Chewed up and swallowed by the noxious cracks of the asphalt
After relentlessly roaming the undefeated streets
Blind tunnel vision in survival mode they could never compete
Devoured by the trauma in life they simmered in their bottomless pits of defeat
Mis-led by lack
Neglected in lax they would impulsively react
Wearing careless unnecessary consequences across their backs
Immune to daily afflictions
Their paradise was the hood that they live in
Tragedy, Poverty, Hustling, Guns, Death
Fatherless figures oppressed
Driven by currency as the enemy put them to its test
In their minds streetlife is the only life I know mentality dressed
Our young minorities are now the soldiers on the front lines making ruckus
Enticingly introduced to straps they’re lost their focus
Juvenile bred hitman so the stiff felonies wont stand a chance
How can we reach and assist them to cope with their voids
Without any possibilities of hope how could we approach
The lost and broken toys
Thats in the wilderness making all that noise
How can we manage their self-sabotaging outlets of addictions
Whats healing and fixing
The abusing distributing or using
Premeditated death dates
Suicidal temptations another form of escape
The mind is a battlefield and its hard to find peace in the midst of confusion when life on life terms get real
So their reality is only an illusion in the midst of their confusion
I hear voices crying out loud in the wilderness
And I pray that someone reach them in enough time to heal them
Before this lurking evil kill or steal them
Lets be the beacon that guides them toward the light
Exposing them to a more significant purpose
Oppose to living life so reckless and worthless
Expressing to them that all things are possible with a reach
You can find your significance by defying the odds if you just stop and listen to the words that the redeemer speaks
A change will come
Even with gradual progression we all will eventually overcome and make it to our real paradise up in heaven
Voices
Have you ever opened your mouth
and chewed on your foot, extra BBQ sauce please. Our words come rolling out, while our brain is napping. As we blush and gasp for air, we try to say~I am sorry. Feelings are now hurt, maybe even the friendship. After all, we are just human~right. Harsh words can cut like a sharp knife, loving words can also heal. As we ask them and God to give us, we must also show forgiveness to others. Holding a grudge helps no one, and hurts everyone. Tonight as I wash my mouth out with soap, I pray to be the person God wants me to me.
Date Written:1/6/2023
2 Place
How to Feel When Your House Burns Down
The home you are raised in is a mother tongue.
I was four when it was built, an age when innocence
turns river water and all that lives within to blood.
First birthdays and first dances fortify the mantel.
This home transports milestones, our own vessel
to move us from sidewalk chalk to the attempt to outrun
the stagnancy found only in the debilitation of the long run.
At seven, I held him in my arms and love upon my tongue.
Promises danced on my lips and ran rampant on my vessels.
College funds started in a baby bottle, tiny wishes held in a cent.
I remember grappling with his growth, attempting to mantle
the affinity we pinky promised deep into our own blood.
At twelve, my father taught me to dance in the blood
and glass on the hardwood. Still, I watch his fingers run
to sow flowers in my mother's hair, her back, mantling,
the image of infatuation, true love, in our minds. A tongue
of tenderness has our childlike innocence
giggling and shouting at the inamoratas and the vessel
of devotion in which each of us was vesselled
into this life. Each of us was born in the fervor of blood,
so sweet. My mother threaded honey, burned incense,
and chewed lemon slices whole to hold us near. She ran
baths of salts and oils, to cleanse the ever growing tongue
of infernos that caressed, more captivated, our mantel
of consciousness. For many years, we tied sheets to mantels.
With pillows and blankets, we’d build ourselves a vessel
to a land of fairies and warriors who shared the same tongue.
Pool noodles became swords. Here we spilled blood,
convincing ourselves if we were to sprint, leap, run
fast enough we too could fly amongst the rest, innocent
to the world around us. At nineteen, I watch the innocence
leave our home. Adolescent memories that kiss the mantel
turn to sharp licks in the wild fire that is running
through the bones of our sweltering home, the vessel
of affinities, dances, compassion, imagination, and the blood
that connects it all, now lapped up with tongues,
too heavy for the innocent, a cancerous burn in our vessels.
The mantle of snow is no relief to the flames that drip like blood.
And still, we do not run, we wait for the final lick of a mother's tongue.
They’re cute, little opossums; riding on Mama’s back;
her tail rail, secures precious brood.
They’ll grow to be lethal rats;
they’ll try to eat your dog or cat and they will probably win their battle, as they have, giant shoulder chips.
My Manx once tangled with opossum female and
since she had little tail;
great mouthfuls did her hinny make.
Proud of the white upon her chest,
she quickly cleaned up the mess and us,
none the wiser be.
For several days she laid around, our little calico clown; but she was aged and likely to do so.
Around the house she trod; with no marks or blood on bod; until she could no more and it puzzled us to our cores,
why she’d stopped eating.
We took her off to the Vet; a virus, we surely bet and
what a shock we did get, when Vet said,
“Opossum’s chewed up her behind!”
Surgery was our next option;
because an opossum went’a‘chomp’in.
In a couple of days we’d have to stop in and
pick her up, once again.
Listless at home, as our tabby roamed;
her little sister, her ego blistered;
examining tube sticking out her butt;
wouldn’t leave her alone,
so violent hisses and growls ensued.
For days on end, our humiliated furry friend;
would her long days begin, in such a moody brooding.
When that tube came out, happy calico clown,
like “Tigger”, bounced all around.
Table to table and chair to chair she leapt and
made us all shout; “Bad cat!”
Nevertheless, not one thing was broken.
Her sister, how she sniffed at the stitches,
in her hips; our Manx finally laid down the law and
let a big paw rip! Swatted Tabby was offended!
The hissing, spitting fight ensued; with Tabby rolling through the room; Manx, she released such gloom and doom that made Tabby a bit smarter.
Perhaps Manx’s situation, demonstrated by her jubilation, coupled with her agitation; rejuvenated her.
A lively “kit”, she was again
and I tell you, my Manx friend,
enjoyed her newfound days again;
happy that she was saved.
For a while, Tabby quivered;
dazed, she sat and shivered,
because Manx had sent her up proverbial river.
A double lesson, it had been;
though Tabby did irritate Manx again;
Manx from then on did engage in more careful play;
but not with an opossum.
(witch role an unavoidable mandatory phase)
that nowadays breaks the piggybank
like a dropped fragile vase
you most likely nod assent if offspring grown,
or ponder new found challenge
expectant motherhood costs of progeny
take the following precendent all ways.
deux daughters desiduous teeth comprise
sum total of forty milky pearl white
whereat each healthy tooth
a miraculous bite size bit
of jaw dropping wizardry to in vite
a tasty morsel to get chewed,
until at some arbitrary time
(incumbent on each individual biological clock),
the second set thwart aside
(or sometime literally override)
these baby choppers right
fully as sought after treatures for the tooth fairy
(oft time disguised as part
of canine corp) offer sterling sight,
but fascinating as each replicated, punctuated,
lacteal dentition adorned with a pulp,
dentin, enamel, and cementum quite
a complex miniature edifice,
or a more apropos metaphor fielding sprite
would be a picket fence with important slats,
and thus a challenging plight
arises when a child shows their mother or father
gapped smile, and understands
to place tooth under pillow at night
when quiet as a mouse (who to be honest
create scratching sounds) the might
tee tooth fairy doth descend (nowadays
resort to global positioning
satelline application)
to find their way without turning on the light
soundless and still as a dust mote
feign being a knight
less to rescue a damsel, maybe
one baby step ahead of her/his insight
expecting to disover a modest wad of cash,
if stood on end, rather sizable in height
and essentially necessitating po' papa
to take out a loan, or hope flight
of fancy wish to win the lottery,
which would exite
self or spouse, but reality in league
with the fickle finger of fate doth disappoint and delight
son or daughter boasting to classmates,
how the rich tooth fairy (iz actually a faux pas
sham shaman, dirt poor father, bled dry,
whose coutenance (visible after break of day)
reflects that of one who barely survived a catfight
with finances in tatters as if
one money hungry toothless fairy took a bite.
Form:
Her Cheekbones, smooth as pebbles
Grasped tightly in his sexed up hand, sweating indelicately
Resembling that night the thoughts between the sheets were conceived
Weighing like soaked white carpets
Beneath flea market stands
She Is Beautiful, she is beautiful
Belladonna, noxious
Dusty eyes and wavy hair
Neruda book shoveled away somewhere deep
Inside her closet full of chewed up bones
Illumination, dying in Latin never seemed like
A juxtaposition before the closing of the soul
At least his eyes are a Cambridge blue
Jazz muted in Mortality sings on dangling participles leaking out
From the saxophone
What is that worth?
Thick waist, hourglass coke-a-cola
Mama-sita, mira mira
Lolita-like N.Y.M.P.H.O.ed up eyelashes
Coating tears with manufactured glob
Somebody put in a bottle
The higher your skirt the more your face value
Goes up, up, up pass the mystery between monogyny and the thighs
Right between the slit ice
Like Mmmm, and he slides past the first three bases
Oooh Girl you look so good in those Six Inch Heels
What is it worth,
to throw away your
Worth
For a toaster oven and a washed up guy sitting on your back porch
Scratching his head waiting to be given a pardon for his misdeeds
While American Media stole him away
And blamed it on the graffiti on the Church Walls when it was really
Hipshot for the Hip-Hop , This shameless act of cytotoxicity
when it was really
The Devil trying to slow dance with the pretty girl behind the stage
Eyes that lie time after time and are almond shaped but see no further
Then 6 feet deep and a saxe blue sky
Baby girl, on auction in the club
(Going once, going twice, it’s okay we’ll sell her half price!)
Like a slave, a sycophant child to some sick twisted game
Dancing in the Matrix style of killing the clock
Biting off the hands, to chew them up, spit them out
To pretend like the world isn’t ending over our heads
Seven kids, bloated waist, waitress fingers and lips
Smile, Misfortune dotes on you, Lucky One
What are you going to do when your looks run out?
Heyyy girl, what’s your face value?
Eating alphabet soup with a straw so you can play Scrabble with the leftovers
Lyrics from an obscure band is music to your ears
Shaving off the November scruff that was plastered on your face
Nightmares are less frequent yet still take their toll
Promises that I will wake up - drink some water - and fall back asleep
The medication makes my mouth arid
spitting out vowels and consonants and shaping them into poems
choking on the nouns and verbs that populate my speech patterns
laughing to oneself and thinking "Maybe I don't have an accent."
Raising one's glass to wish good health to a room full of people whom you cherish
breaking down into tears - but you're in the shower - so it all blends in
trying to remove the dirt from underneath your fingernails that you have anxiously chewed
dancing to a song that has been over for five minutes but the chorus remains in your mind
choosing not to look up the lyrics to the songs on your vinyl album
holding, breathing, remaining pure to the one young woman whose heart you protect
Remembering the words of your late grandfather who told you not to wonder too much - or you'll get lost yet I found the courage
to look into the eyes of Death
and say "Check Mate."
All of my dreams end up with me doing some project and looking down - just to find my exposed body
I even watch what I eat before I go to bed - but the raw and gritty details remain
to tell the truth - that things are terrific - I'll tell my therapist
I was born in the December of '92.
Walked this Earth for seven years.
Decided I know what I am destined to become.
Emerging from a crystalized coocoon.
I spread my wings and learn to write
Poems about loss, love, and human nature
Rearranging the pasta in my bowl to spell out
some SAT word I have only used twice
in conversation
laughing at my grammar, my spelling, and my love of the Oxford Comma.
Captializing Words That Don't Need Capitalization
because Oscar Wilde and Walt Whitman did it first
Taking time to think things through and telling yourself : "You're stronger than you know."
My weakness: "Carbs and late-night with Craig Ferguson."
My strengths: "I am a writer and a Poet I shall remain."
Do we have any more alphabet soup?