Long Flotsam Poems

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


To a Nurse

Slipping away, 
then hands tuck you back in
arrange your sheets in the dark
while you float
connected to dank viaducts
that drain your body
only to feed a conscious
plasma back to you.

It is almost beautiful
this slipping away and returning.
As flotsam you are part
of a humming communion,
momentarily you belong
with those others
who have drained gently away.

The reappearance of yourself
brings with it a vision,
an unknown hand holding yours.

Though you cannot now place her,
it is beautiful how she knit you together
from a few threads of life
with just a lingering touch.

Stayed with you
amid your coming and goings.
You want to know her name.
to kiss her like a lover
or a mother

but no doubt 
she will not even remember,
or maybe she now needs you
and you don’t miss her enough?


Premium Member Waters Free

Streams of water
at diurnal disposal,
drip
dolce far niente.*

Lavish fill
of cavernous sink—
flotsam thoughts.

Spring up, O well!
Sing about it,
about the well that the princes dug,
that the nobles of the people sank—
the nobles with scepters and staffs.**

Paradise, O living water!
Songs bursting from pipes.
Wanderings soon over.

Like valleys they spread out,
like gardens beside a river,
like aloes planted by the Lord
like cedars beside the waters.
Water will flow from their buckets;
their seed will have abundant water.***

Water’s free
moving, soothing.
Lovely sprinkler,
O lovely splash!

Dare poet’s eyes
take time
to ponder; her lips
pursue splendor 
of fountain paean.

10/11/2021

*pleasant relaxation in carefree idleness
**Numbers 21:17-18 NIV
***Numbers 24:6-7 NIV

Premium Member Torn

Caught in the middle with nowhere to go
Between two strong-willed women
Manipulators according to their wiles
Related to one by blood
The other by dint of wedlock
Which one has the greater pull
On the tide of his wracked emotions
The chosen controller of his home
Or the one with the tidal power
of blood shared by her birth?
How he is tossed and torn
Amidst the twin but hostile competing tides
Mercilessly dragging him one way ,then the other
Swamping his compass of clear thought
With loyalty tested and doubted
By the partisan  and opposing currents
Whose anger remains unbridled
And unforgiving to the depths of their very souls
Fighting their unrelenting battle
In towering crests of  surging emotion
Hoping to gain total supremacy
Over him  who is no more than a piece of flotsam
In this relentless clash of tsunamis
Being dragged ever deeper by both irresistible forces
In the competing riptides of disturbed and irreconcilable passions,
Leaving him feeling helpless 
As he loses the will to live.

Happy Birthday George Andrew Dunning

would what that be junior? senior? sophomore?

since this brother in law rarely emails, 
     ye may scrunch countenance puzzled, 
     or on verge of emitting flatulence, 
     that if a ripper got let loose (by Jack), 

     would possibly find ja propelled, 
     thru Edgar Allan Poe's churchly 
     sepulchral tintinnabulation 
     (where for greater effect

     yukon envision imagistic ravenous bats 
     in belfry resonating air,
or perhaps blasted back 
     to the House of the rising sun), 

     BUT...gnome hatter, 
     no win tent may starkly appear
explaining inexplicable reasonable rhyme, 
     why aye dash communique 

    minus virtual trumpeting blare 
(sorry, but in the interest 
     of belated birthday cheer, 
without computer generated imagery) 

     rendered hoop fully readable, 
     sans black and white Scottish matted pixels 
constituting beloved appellation 
     unsure how to address ye perfectly clear

while sitting atop padded office chair,
pondering as already writ, 
     how to acknowledge thee, whither with dear...
meanwhile, this scribe experiences 

     comfortably numb derriere,
now scrambling, resorting, and toying 
     to fetch acceptable, catchy light hearted endear
mint, that seems tolerably acceptable 

     (of course) with flair 
acutely perceptive, though NOT overboard with glare
ring obeisance, NOR USE ALL CAPS 
     TO SCREAM so ye kin hear  

soap hull ease excuse this incurable 
     Harris scribe with thinning heir 
yes...oye gevalt, infantile regression finds me 
     burrowed in Schwenksville, Pennsylvania lair

still emotionally inchoate, though grown a mere
speck within the flotsam and jetsam near
to boyhood Collegeville abode NOT saved by a prayer
re: home companion bachelor Norwegian farmer

replaced instead by vinyl city 
     all in the name of progress
which (once a pawn a time) 
     open farmland did dis app pear

so...a gam bulling gambit 
     to avoid moseying down Level Road... 
may NOT seem *****
for insufferable sadness 

     with eyes bursting with many a tear...
(gulp) tis best to veer
away from topic uh viz er rated razed homestead, 
     and mainly wish ye another birth year!

adieu...from math tha hue
Form: Lyric

Premium Member The Beachcomber

Endless pulse of ocean's dance
carries flotsam to the sand.
Every day another chance,
prodded by an unseen hand.

Such a love I've never known—
waves crest on his brilliant mind—
after many nights alone,
sure there was no love to find.

The gentle wisdom in his voice,
urging wind-tossed heart to mend.
Remember, love is not a choice,
it finds its harbor in the end.

Such a kindness in his eyes—
passion sets my world afire,
and once more, to my surprise,
his whispers with my hopes conspire.

The sea has washed this love ashore,
and I, the beachcomber, unaware.

A glinting pebble, lost before—
just walking, I have found it there.
Form: Rhyme


Summer Solstice 2019 Part 1

Friday, June twenty first, two 
thousand nineteen at eleven fifty 
four ante meridian eastern daylight
time finds Earth's North Pole tilted 
closest toward sun. This demarcates 

most daylight hours of the year for 
people living the northern hemisphere. 
Just shy of high noon sun (less than 
twelve hours from drafting these lines) 
nearest star in solar system reaches 
highest point in the sky.

Hence hasty intent to beat buzzer sound 
dashing off riding figurative one seahorse 
open sleigh madly awk cross cyber sea, 
aye rudder sally forth (slogging thru 
virtual flotsam and jetsam) with poetic

obeisance paid to average size ball of 
Earth, wind and fire, my out of this 
world quasi stellar benediction, since 
Earthlings traveled thru space/time 
continuum circa Stonehenge, or perhaps

bajillion years ago, when predecessors 
of present day primates (coon sitter terribly 
less a bomb bin hubble), versus twenty first 
century *****sapiens predilection for total 
mortal kombat graphically spiraling downward

zeroing (kamikaze like), analogy drawn, 
viz subjective mathematical roulette curves, 
albeit hypotrochoids and epitrochoids staining 
countless grains of sand, count them yourself, 
yielding result (somewhere very loosely
Form: Elegy

Brave Surveyor

Cramped steps acquaint heavy hatch reluctant 
     Cushion hush cellar isolate, harsh sun migraines
     Catapulted myopic into apocalyptic destruction 
     Crumple of coastal community permits my gains


      Grim resilient, plotted alone, abided by rations
      Tidal wave treachery turned streets to swamps
      Flotsam tops remnants sea's fury didn't flatten 
      Successors gorge on corpses misfortunes crop

      
      Erased ocean era, crook posts pitifully campaign 
      Brashly I churn bathtubs of backstroked arachnids 
      Inhabit rainforest ripple stream, source I can claim
      Traverse canopy like trampoline, scout eyes active



       
      8th March 
      Out of Mangrove
Form: Rhyme

splinters

splinters

like splinters in the mind
thoughts that cannot be left behind
faded memories of self
like a photo on a shelf

behind that glassy shine
you're frozen forever in time
but as the flotsam rises
reality is divided
like shards of broken glass
are the shadows of the past
cutting you into two
as you march onward to your doom

you were fed from the bowl that they showed you
were bred to do what they told you
you marched in a line to a sleeping beat
you thought the world was at your feet

you've seen places you'll never be
heard things you'll never see
but you dream of being a big gun
to have played the game and won
tossed a coin and rolled the dice
for your chance to play in paradise

fighting against the tide
in the struggle to survive
to get back to where you began
up the stream to your end
from dust to ash
it's just another rehash
down the line you were led
your fears turned to dread
they told you you were free
they told you what to be
they told you what to see

Premium Member Autumn

Autumn unreeled
Forests shaken hollow
               settling
               like shipwrecked beauty
Tree masts of moss
Colourful mobs of decay
                 unspooling
Last strands of conceit
Rag tag laurels
        capsized
        casual drift of sacrifice

Diced leaves of October,
         change
         that drains potency
Resplendent wreckage
An unraveling season
                    faint
                    in slim, silvered light
Outcomes unavoidable
       with fertility plundered

Gold leaf patches 
                 fallen
        treasures washed overboard
        a trail of flotsam 
        in the lost ego of summer

 Ragged contortion
                in sea-water cold
                in a quiet that marks 
                                         transition











Poem composed: Spring 2020
(Revised September 29th, 2022)

Love and Dandelions

Blow-ball and Cankerwort,
words born from a common tongue.?
Lions tooth, ?
Priests Crown, ?
Moles Salad and piss-a-bed.?
?
English is most practical ?
when it is rustic and colloquial.

‘Swine Snout’ snorts loud upon the page.
The yarrow-yellow flowers last for hours
then overnight turn to fairy bones.

I recall us both sat upon the grass
blowing unfettered puffs into the wind,
our hair littered with stemmed parasols
the pirouetting flotsam of the airborne.?
?
The damply dunked sounds of sneeze-helicopter's,?
the muddy splatter of piggy snozzles.

Lions Teeth are its leaf, mix well with Burdock
for a low tea under a shady tree.
Beware of false dandelions such as ?
cats ears and coltsfoot.?

The Chinese, Pu Gong Ying is the real thing.

After we had covered each other
with dandelion kisses
we made hay the old fashioned way.

Get a Premium Membership
Turn off ads, get more exposure for your poetry, and get more features with a Premium Membership.
Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace