Long Cropped Poems
Long Cropped Poems. Below are the most popular long Cropped by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Cropped poems by poem length and keyword.
Misshapen Characters
They stood overlooking us like monuments
Carved wrong, titles raised, Integrity cropped
Down to a particle.
Their shoulders were uneven- One Organized
With authority, The other clamorous where
Empathy be required to have lived. They
Walked through corridors that extended
To fit their swollen names, each plaque
Polished more glaring then the truth on
The other side of it. Their decisions fell
From great heights, heavy as stone,
Landing hardest on the ones who never
Learned to cite loud enough to be heard
Spiraling.
They measured us with rulers arched by
Bias, weighed us on measure titled by
Convenience, and called the imbalance
System methodology. Their power grew
Disproportionate, A skyscraper built on
Crooked joists. Inclination further each
Year toward self-interest away from the
People holding up the cornerstone with
Tired hands.
Yet even Misshapen Characters cast dimness
And our began to rise, expansion long across
The ground, evoking them that height is not
The same as honor, and soaring is not the
Same as standing tall.
A free afternoon
So we heeded advice.
We strolled by the river;
The streets did entice.
We wandered down alleys
In neighborhoods where
Unexpectedly, ruins
Cropped up here and there.
To keep us from flagging,
I turned to gelato.
My spouse had espresso -
He liked it a lotto.
But when we were ready
To hit the hotel,
We vetoed a taxi,
For back where we dwell...
We travel by subway,
By foot or by bus.
It's quick and it's cheap,
Which of course is a plus.
Yet we're tourists and don't
Know the routes, like at home
But we figured - we'll ask.
After all, when in Rome...
So we purchased two tickets
And made our way back
By bus and by subway;
The code we did crack...
With the help of some locals,
For at every station
Were "Grazies"* and smiles,
Which don't need a translation.
*thank you in Italian
Boy gets up at six
Needs no alarm of complaint
To shake
The brief night of sleep
From his hay-cropped hair
Brushes his teeth
Smokes a two dollar holler of cigarette for breakfast
A pack a day is like tax day for him
Paid by ten in the morning
Then the day is free and clear
Holds down his car as it bucks to life
Lurches away
Stops at Starbucks
Spends another hour’s dough
On two large black coffees
Picks up three buddies at the far edge
Of the Walmart parking lot
Drives two hours to arrive
At a dismal road to tame with asphalt
The boys dissolve and stick to the road
Buns of thick shoulders
Rise and fall in the oven of sun
Shoveling boils of oil and coal
Throwing
Their boots to stomp the steam
His car limps back to his driveway corral
At 9:45 in the summer evening
Devours another hour
Of Coors and McDonalds at his kitchen table
Prays very hard to God
Maybe it could rain tomorrow?
His girlfriend stands behind him
Rests her head on his shoulder
A dim light buzzing from the ceiling.
Two wheeled commuters with heads booted with helmets, dotted the highway;
The four wheeled rich hooted at pedestrians daring to cross their path,
While rental three wheelers heated them all, filling even places like foot path;
Traffic winked red, green, and yellow to jam, trim, and brim the highway.
Like water discharged from flooded reservoir, humanity flowed on the highway,
Down to their destined ends, discharging spray and smoke, littering its path
With fed up lives, held up to the grave; lawmakers floated on the crest of the path.
Only the hapless found themselves fighting for space in the helpless highway.
On this highway, at the peak hour, popped up a human head as if cropped
From the ripe body as a yield to the reapers blooding the streets with sickles;
The highway halted; heads craned above wheeled carriers; questions hurried
Everywhere with worries and wonders; “Hyderabad has a head chopped;
Is it for ‘Biriyani’?” Some quickly tweeted like men of booze oozing for pickles;
Cops looking for the lost head, severed by train, at last sighed, with heads retrieved.
[Cops in Hyderabad, India retrieved a severed head from a railway track, put the torso and head in a sack and took it to hospital for postmortem. But on the way, the head slipped down from the sack and caused a commotion]
"Subversive"
That woman -
she isn’t me
she
(small s)
watches me
silently
with hatred
of what
light and darkness is
unknown of me
burns in her belly
bends her knees
To the world,
all seems aglow
She, prescient?
an anagram,
1 high above
1 buried below
she is neither one
nor the other
1 high above
1 buried below
Counting numbers
children
that are not hers
poems of me
she will never know
a child missing
the essential stronghold
tries to grow her own
garden path home, lost,
a long story
for short minds
unfolds
Business as usual,
sons like the father, or not,
The read by the writer
is swiftly cropped
Summers that come fast
well past swollen Spring
and here she is in Winter
casting another spider's web,
that other woman
over dreams dreamt
and wasted time spent
of who she thinks
she really is
On a hallowed path
another woman
she meets,
stronger
than other poems
she has ever read,
the you that is me,
she thinks
she has sung and bled
Another woman,
so much stronger
subversive
in Autumn
with silence
Met
(LadyLabyrinth/2019)
nm
2/8
Agnes Obel – Chord Left
https://youtu.be/bbU31JLtlug
"Hell is empty and all the devils are here."
"The True Mother"
https://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/the_true_mother_1165956/center>
MOM
I still can't grasp the thought that you are gone
cuz you were the rock in which I perched my strong
Forever in your debt I will be
and grateful for the heart that beats in me ;
Its the day after your funeral, and I am home alone
washing your favorite pink sweater in suds and warm
yes the one with the silver shiny threads
the one you loved to wear with a smile;
I also went through all your faux beads and trinkets
searching for those little flowers you clipped
atop your silver cropped hair ;
the ones you wore with unabashed flair...
The boah colored scarf is also in the soapy bucket
beside the pink sweater ;
Surrounded by all your belongings I breath n' sigh
for I know that you didn't really die;
You turned into an angel and you are watching
from on high....
As I cut the grass I curse Ben Franklin
He fell in love with France’s close-cropped fields
However, in the land of Kings and Jesters
Who never ate an orange wasn’t peeled
Knew not the toil of trimming, or re-seeding
Knelt before no one save for their King
Walked slowly the gardens of the peons
Felt not the thorn or hornets nasty sting
Strode beneath the banners of their quest
An ancestry of poison, knives and lies
Powdered wigs, perfume, a silken jest
To clip the wilting flower ‘fore it dies
Curse you Ben for being France’s pawn
For ever setting foot upon a lawn
John G. Lawless
©7/2/2023
Mirth-filled, children converse boisterously
Presenting their future jobs jovially
As the best and greatest, well-said pridefully
Midst innocence, sans ignorance of witty perspective cheerfully.
Child A: I’ll be an actor with varied roles distinctly
Ruling as president, then reigning as king honourably
And I can just command here and there constantly
Then if tired, I’ll call for my “double” instantly!
Child B: Aside from doing good works tirelessly
I’ll be a minister, very kind to everybody
How nice it would be to hear Grandmas sweetly
Call me “Father,” though I’m so young obviously!
Child C: A pilot I will be courageously
Soaring beyond the clouds gleefully
Greeting eagles ecstatically
While people look up above, waiting for my landing excitedly!
Child D: I’ll be a barber with finest style awesomely
Instructing officers, even the king to bow down carefully
For their hair to be cropped handsomely
And become good looking winsomely.
Child E: Well, I’ll be your teacher who smiles triumphantly
Inspiring you to reach your aims diligently
Commending you for your noble jobs victoriously
Thanking God... you humbly shared you contributions jubilantly.
*Ephesians 5:20 - Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
July 24, 2023
Honorable Mention, "Humorous poems # 2 contest"
Sponsored by Jay Narain; judged on 7/25/2023; and additional lines were added after it was judged.
As dusk their line visibly bows
Cropped heads beneath mounds fold
Glum shadows through addle fields row
Listless turrets sprout o'er demarcated woe
Sallowed eyes in bleary sockets rolled
As dusk their line visibly bows
Shocked ears to concussive barrage close
As sighs from clogged lungs are paroled
Raspy shadows through addle fields row
Smoldering smoke in singed heavens glows
Vaporous cloud o'er scout binoculars scrolled
As dusk their line visibly bows
Each rifle into a sterile stack goes
Rumbling caissons to dark corners doled
Steel shadows through addle fields row
The fog of war o'er dazed minds flows
An eerie wind curdles each silent mold
As dusk their line visibly bows
Wispy shadows through addle fields row
lids black out and allow me to write
while eyes shut tight
bring back four legged friends sprite
and though many years passed quite
I can remember those precious creatures
who barked at night
howling at inaudible sound or invisible light
casting silhouettes that fight
punctured the air with verbal byte
and now I list long gone
smart pets in alphabetical order – alright?
Baron – substantially German Sheppard
met his demise chasing a car on level road
the advantage overtaken
per vehicle with greater lode
which accidental death
found him buried in an unmarked grave
i.e. underground abode.
Georgie – a combination Boxer and Dalmatian
(with his cropped tail to boot
grew up as my canine brother
an essentially gave up the ghost
from organ failure of one or another.
Lady – this fur certain white German Sheppard
uncertain how, when or what
led to her body to collapse
perhaps while listening to snoop doggy dog raps
found on base near first stair
when rigor mortis set deathly traps.
Ruff – he and his litter mate Teddy
(listed below), an alpha beast o man’s and
woman’s best friend with moments of rage
as applicable to a dog, and seemed
to evince an intelligence like a sage.
Schultz – he apparently vanished in thin air
without a trace, not e’en
a filament of fur like hair
hopefully taken in by another pet lover,
but who knows where.
Shadow – pride of eldest sister,
he succumbed after becoming thermally ill
though diminutive for a black lab,
his absence left a void quite large to fill.
Socrates - dealt with harsh mistreatment
and distemper than tossed out
like trash, mine to sisters,
who nursed him with tender loving care
from his faux paws to a keen snout
which maintained his longevity no doubt.
Teddy – another throw away pet
found at Jacobsburg –
near Easton, Pennsylvania.
one lame leg (damaged
during his puppy hood)
lived til olde age.
my younger sister ( Shari)
brought him and Ruff home,
where their entire life he did stay
inherently evincing intelligence
that happiness found that chance
provided a doting owner this way.