Long Ineffectual Poems
Long Ineffectual Poems. Below are the most popular long Ineffectual by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Ineffectual poems by poem length and keyword.
Cowards die many times before their deaths…
Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene 2 ~William Shakespeare
spouse
a souse
classic grouse
a big girl's blouse
portent ominous
assertions blasphemous
obscure and anonymous
his skulking is nefarious
utterances acrimonious
and implicature often dubious
uxorious but still pusillanimous
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An example of a rhopalic verse.
Rhopalism: A rhopalic sentence is one in which each successive word is one letter longer than the previous one. In poetry: where each word is one syllable more, or it might increase each line in a stanza by one syllable (per my example), or a metric foot.
IN THE SAME CATEGORY OF CONSTRAINED WRITING
The Rhopalic Couplet, also called Wedge Verse, was first used by Homer in the Iliad (3.182). It is a poetic unit of 2 rhopalic lines where each word progresses adding one more syllable than the preceding word in the line, for example, 1, 2, 3, 4 … syllables. The sequence of the syllable count can be identical in the second line, or it may be reversed. The couplet does not need not rhyme.
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In The Coward, stanzas are broken up along the syllables of the end rhymes: spouse, souse, grouse, blouse; om-i-nous, blas-phe-mous, a-non-y-mous; ne-far-i-ous, ac-ri-mo-ni-ous, du-bi-ous & pu-sil-lan-i-mous.
LEXICON
acrimonious: (adj) (typically of speech or discussion) angry and bitter.
a big girl’s blouse: British idiom, meaning someone is ineffectual or weak; someone failing to show masculine strength of determination
disposition: (n.) inherent characteristics.
grouse: (n.) one who complains constantly.
implicature: (n.)* the action of implying a meaning beyond the literal sense of what is explicitly stated, for example, saying the picture frame is nice and implying I don’t like the picture.
innate: (n.) inborn, natural
nefarious: (adj) (typically of an action or activity) wicked or criminal.
portent: (n.)
1. a sign or warning that a momentous or calamitous event is likely to happen, an omen.
2. (literary) an exceptional or wonderful person or thing. [‘What portent can be greater than a pious notary.’]
pusillanimous: (adj) showing a lack of courage or determination; timid.
souse: (n.) a drunkard.
(alternately titled: impossible mission goes awry
probably mortal enemy cast spell binding jinx)
Both mental versus
physical tasks necessitate
laser sharp attentiveness
triggered within blinks
similarly on par when people toast
momentary instance utter silence
before more'n one
wine glass simultaneously clinks
cheering hurray, especially
if delicate circumstance
incorporates telecommunications downlinks
critical vital communique transmitted courtesy
think outlier (christened
Saint Matthew Scott Harris)
with acute instincts
held hostage between warp,
and woof fifth of dimension
far away beyond where
outer limits exhibits kinks
nsync with twilight zone
dwell alienated ratfinks
resembling authentic animated
Doctor Seuss characters
where one after another
third eye blind winks.
Lame excuse told cosmic speck (me)
sending yours truly on wild goose chase
an underhanded way to rub
inept feeble poetaster punster
out webbed wide world existence
purportedly great eats boasted
deep inside black hole sun pub
must make posthaste
to nearest galactic grubhub
mission control haint made no flub
boot deliberately thought
ineffectual doling out futile drub
cuz mister flibbertigibbet (me)
ostracized from highly selective club.
The aforementioned synopsis and
ultimate banishment cheered with big bang
decreed courtesy kangaroo court
constituting beastie boy gang
think star wars movie,
where farcical charges trumped
offering accused two choices,
either to hang
suspended (think piñata) and beat
to (fictional) pulp
torturers obviously ignoring pang
of utter emasculation, but rather sang
a song of sixpence*
while downing flasks of vintage tang
crafty entrepreneur William A. Mitchell in 1957
phallic drinking vessels
resembling Chewbacca's oversize wang.
---------------------------------------------------
*Lyrics
Sing a Song of Sixpence
BY MOTHER GOOSE
Sing a song of sixpence,
A pocket full of rye,
Four and twenty blackbirds
Baked in a pie.
When the pie was opened
The birds began to sing—
Wasn't that a dainty dish
To set before the king?
The king was in the counting-house
Counting out his money,
The queen was in the parlor
Eating bread and honey,
The maid was in the garden
Hanging out the clothes.
Along came a blackbird
And snipped off her nose.
Cycles
by Michael R. Burch
I see his eyes caress my daughter's breasts
through her thin cotton dress,
and how an indiscreet strap of her white bra
holds his bald fingers
in fumbling mammalian awe...
And I remember long cycles into the bruised dusk
of a distant park,
hot blushes,
wild, disembodied rushes of blood,
portentous intrusions of lips, tongues and fingers...
and now in him the memory of me lingers
like something thought rancid,
proved rotten.
I see Another again?hard, staring, and silent?
though long-ago forgotten...
And I remember conjectures of panty lines,
brief flashes of white down bleacher stairs,
coarse patches of hair glimpsed in bathroom mirrors,
all the odd, questioning stares...
Yes, I remember it all now,
and I shoo them away,
willing them not to play too long or too hard
in the back yard?
with a long, ineffectual stare
that years from now, he may suddenly remember.
Photographs
by Michael R. Burch
Here are the effects of a life
and they might tell us a tale
(if only we had time to listen)
of how each imperiled tear would glisten,
remembered as brightness in her eyes,
and how each dawn’s dramatic skies
could never match such pale azure.
Like dreams of her, these ghosts endure
and they tell us a tale of impatient glory . . .
till a line appears—a trace of worry?—
or the wayward track of a wandering smile
which even now can charm, beguile?
We might find good cause to wonder
as we see her pause (to frown?, to ponder?):
what vexed her in her loveliness . . .
what weight, what crushing heaviness
turned her auburn hair a frazzled gray,
and stole her youth before her day?
We might ask ourselves: did Time devour
the passion with the ravaged flower?
But here and there a smile will bloom
to light the leaden, shadowed gloom
that always seems to linger near . . .
And here we find a single tear:
it shimmers like translucent dew
and tells us Anguish touched her too,
and did not spare her for her hair's
burnt copper, or her eyes' soft hue.
Published in Tucumcari Literary Review (the first poem in its issue)
Keywords/Tags: youth, puberty, teen, teenage, teenagers, teen love, sex, sexy, lust, desire, date, father, daughter, chastity, virginity, abstinence, hormones, photograph, photographs, effects, ghosts, phantoms, time
Self reliancy stimulates political independence,
pragmatic critical thinking spurs revocation of spurious Partisan information,
vigilanteism guards against the Juntas,
systematic interdiction of peoples' ability to to procure food, self educate,
self medicate, and to self defense is a vital instrument in disabling citizens' morale,
it is true that several Companies provide 'civil rights' that are subject to repeal,
but these liberties must conform to security & production for the State,
the more detached we become from the land the more immense our collective ignorance,
Will to struggle recedes like red from the dying rose, spirit is sterile,
sciences are employed to subvert the passion of men, to mire the maternity of women,
to emasculate the youth, to assault the temperance of ladies,
as the bison were decimated so to fascilitate the conquest of the feral Indian,
the Anglo-Saxon farmer & tradesman were displaced by manipulated Markets,
corporations rabid with greed, fawning to increase world trade
and to blowt stock exchanges, enlarging theaters of war & dictating foriegn policies,
an arsenal & circus of judges, lawyers, politicians, academics, entertainers,
elastic options such as Inflation, minting money, loans, and criminal dockets,
Abraham Lincolon & John Kennedy desired to reestablish democratic banking
and were both slain as dangerous heros,
cartel suzerainity always wins,
an agrian ethos is too intractable an opponent for oligarchial commerce,
as laws are ineffectual to dissuade a starving man, leaves don't stop the rains,
there is no need for insatiable government when one can grow crops, build homes & and micro manufacturies, where trade is honest& equitable, no swindles,
division of labor for maximum productivity at the expense of individual health,
eradication of heritage to ease trade, passivity in exchange for integrity,
can libertarianism be retrieved from the vice of the mold maker,
will we deliver this odious model into the depths of the galaxy,
will there always be captivity,
regulated life is controlled life, and that is enslaved living,
words ' make the world go round ',
we are subjects of international law codes,
Freedom dwindles -
J.A.B. Copyright 2012
This Composition Is Entered For Skat's " Democrat Vs. Republican " Contest -
Are we testing open waters?
I never should have stationed there
We were not prepared
Through the shame and sacrifice,
I was getting there
All we know is shelter,
Survival,
Yet we were unprepared
Mark the way
through tunnels we mistaked for urgent care
No one’s dying on my watch
If our fathers were here, they’d tell us not to stop
If our grandfathers were near,
They’d tell us what they went through has prepared us all along
They all came back, singing their war songs
with scars as big as my arm
Father’s leave
Whether emotionally or physically
Mother’s try too hard to be seen
While father’s don’t try hard enough
I mourned that past a long time ago,
Lighting candles for every expectation
That was left ineffectual
And we let the flame linger for the ones that we now realize,
Were never manageable
Her funerals in a week
But when she left me in pieces,
That’s when she was dead to me
I mourned our sacred whispers a long time ago
I’ve never met a person filled with such lies,
Such hatred,
And so much cynicism
I told her she could play every character on a reality show
Her funerals in a week
But when she left me in pieces,
That’s when she was dead to me
Father’s leave
Whether emotionally or physically
Mother’s try to hard to be seen
While father’s don’t try hard enough
I’ve never met a person filled with such lies, pettiness,
And so much arrogance
I told her she could play the cast of a reality show
Oh, the irony of what it’s called,
Verus what it really is
I mourned the past of “what you see is what you get”
A long time ago
Lighting candles for every character on our favorite TV shows
That lost their lives along the way
And usually my eyes water
at the beauty of your inspired eulogies
But this time,
There was nothing I could say
And though I mourned that past long ago,
I was left standing there unprepared
Are we testing open waters?
I never should have stationed there
getting off the d-train one morning
@ the 125th st. nicholas stop
&
walking toward the soup kitchen
where i was going to work that
day
i saw a young girl of maybe 6, 7 or 8
(i’m not good with age)
sleeping underneath a black garbage
bag---
she was sleeping outside the soup
kitchen,
no doubt, waiting for it to open---
& when i had crossed the street
completely
she rustled and got up from where she had been
laying
and moved out from in front of the
establishment
whose large gates were still drawn down &
locked.
what can there be said about this image
that would make it any more clear in your
mind?
when she was walking quickly away
i wondered where she was going &
what would become of her---like
any person with an ounce of
compassion in them
would---
still, i felt as ineffectual as a doorstop that
won’t keep a door open.
because when you don’t have money yourself
to pay your own rent & you are living in
an american city
where you walk past people who have been
forgotten
or
ignored
or worse yet,
they are being pushed away, out from in front of
stores on 5th avenue & the like
you are crushed by the weight of
hopelessness---
when you understand that there isn’t
enough that one person can
possibly do---
& no matter how much your heart could
bleed
you are still just one person---
and in a manner of speaking,
you become just another component in a
failed system
in a
failed city
that perpetuates its cruel reality in a
failed country
that has left nothing to the imagination
when it comes to
neglect.
this vulgar truth
more profane than anything your ugly mouth
could ever muster
smacks you in the face as if someone
blindsided you with a baseball bat & like a
domino falling---about to hit the next &
then follow, colliding, one
after the
other---
you might find yourself sick to death of the
obscenity of it
all---
wanting to burn it all down
& to start over.
It's...
irrelevant
we're two stories, picture books rubbed raw and torn pages, he's
ripped
up the middle, down the lines of his face on the left and his right ear
dangles
over my toes when midnight falls, I watch him, inconspicuous, listen to my sleep.
I'm breathing, I'm attacked by May and I used to know lavender beneath the fog, I used to
know dawn, I blanketed myself with scratches and wrote love letters to April when I missed
the rain...
but now I write letters to him, hoping, somewhere, my handwriting can tattoo his skin.
He...
feels...
sometimes, I think it's love, that's what he's termed this undiluted destruction of me and
it's a shame I didn't stain him, it's a shame my blood doesn't laugh at him from his
palms, it's a
shame
I don't crawl over him like fleas at midnight, biting, itching and tearing him to shreds...
it's a shame I still make him smile.
I know the shape of Tuesday evening, she turns sideways beneath the moon, and my thighs
become blue with memories and reflections but I leave the window open to confuse tomorrow
I crack the glass and pray I don't bleed, I...
slice through sunlight, I'm
tired
and he's sleeping, his eyes are always closed....
and I whisper to Wednesday to steal his eyelashes, I cry to April to blow them to me and I
promised, I promised Thursday I'd make these wishes....
but I don't know
how to collect.
He's ineffectual as long as I'm cold, he's problematic and I sweat, swatting at headlights
and curling under blankets, I'm trying to fool myself but
my eyes don't close...
and I've spit on last January, indignant in her youth, she'll never hear the screaming
pain of forgiveness...
and my mouth
won't
close, my teeth won't crash and creek and grind him down...
not this close to May, anyway, not this close to
Wednesday.
Assassin
A hooded figure watches over the sleeping.
Peacefully, suddenly colder, soon to be weeping;
A body of a thousand slumbers.
Tonight will be its final number,
For without sound or any sign of remorse,
Death has come, and in due course,
The time will come when the sleeper breathes no more.
The clock has not yet struck midnight.
Witches are waking their feral beasts and al-
So, their frogs are leaping,
And all the while he lays there sleeping.
His silk pajamas and knitted blankets.
The bottle he was given, he slowly drank it,
And now through snores, he hears no more,
The open door downstairs where footsteps call.
If only he could hear them passing,
Maybe he could somehow foresee the morning happenings,
But this is not a happy ending tale.
This is a time for woe; a rose upon a grail.
A dearly departed letter of discontent.
A scarlet rose has been placed upon his deathbed.
As the clock strikes, a metaphorical piercing knife.
The depths to which some men will delve,
And all in aid of a silent war.
A change in fortune for another who did not fall.
For this assassin was bought and he sold,
His service to another victim old.
For as he stood above his prey,
A bag of monies did come his way,
And with no word, a swift hand grabbed,
The jewels inside the felt covered bag.
All that needed to be said:
“It is not yet my time; send your services back instead.”
Now riches bulged from spoils of war.
The hooded figure waited until he could wait no more,
And on the chime of the seventh call,
The end appeared, a discovery made, the snorer was no more.
Only silence, through such violence.
The hooded figure was never seen again,
But the world had swiftly and suddenly changed.
His services would surely once again be called upon,
Lest his deeds become ineffectual and his tale too soon forgotten.
(C)2018 Aa Harvey. All Rights Reserved.
Form:
Man, I remember the thrumming of that last bell of the school year.....
Like a prisoner being furloughed into the warm sun, buzzing of grasshoppers.
Field stickers burrowing into your ankles, joyfully, while you take the wrong way/long way
back.
The sound of whispering gold as your armplane wings dislodge future assaulters of ankles.
I always liked sighs in the summer.....those sweet drones were the tones of freedom.
In the distance you hear Shirley scream as Brad tells EVERYBODY she likes Ralph...
You knew you should be gettin' home, but, confound it, this one brief moment was yours.
Eternal.
There was a sound, like a shell to the ear, of all you had learned, escaping as if under
pressure.
To thwart it was to stop a tsunami with an umbrella.....ineffectual....unnoticed.
But, also vacant, was common sense; probably why I went Jake's way that day....
Oh, he was there, lurking...lying in wait for my almost clock-work arrival.
Many a day I had screamed a million insults at him as he chased me like Satan,
Hoping "today" wasn't the day he caught up with me.
His exhalations never sounded labored, as if he was letting me get ahead.....
But not today!!!!!.....I JUMP......He LUNGES......and his teeth gain purchase on my seat!!!!
However, I escape....My bottom, that much cooler than it was before and will probably be
later!
........................
.........
.....
...
Home.......... you see mom in the kitchen, drinking sun tea and waiting for you to arrive....
"So, How was school?"..."Uh, fine, I guess." "What did you learn today?"......."Uh, to never
underestimate the value of Gym Class!!"......"Well," she says, "if you took home economics,
you'd be able to fix up your pants before Dad gets home and sees your underwear!!"......
Parents NEVER respect an Adventurer's near-fatal exploits!!!
In words, straight from this writer's heart ~
my soul, or some other sensitive anatomical part,
I consider a poem a failure, without success
when poetry readers consider it a bloody mess.
Sometimes I write in the midst of discombobulation.
It's catharsis in a bottle of ink to a confuzzled mind.
Relief to me when I'm puzzled, not when I am blind
for to see what others don't, soothes my frustration.
In my thoughts, black and white scenes are flitting.
There's an urgent need of color, but none seem fitting
that my pen and ink consider worth transcribing.
It's discombobulating for me, as if I'd been imbibing.
Trying to sound cohesive when using clever metaphor
can weigh me down until I am prone, crying on the floor.
There are themes in some contests that seem ill-defined,
when I've no clue about a subject and I feel confined.
I'm drowning in quicksand, and no one can pull me out.
It's grimly perplexing to be filled with such brooding doubt.
My words begin to ramble, and I get lost in a blunder fest.
Seriously, it's a conundrum. About this woe, I wouldn't jest.
I wind up scribbling sonnets without meter or hint of rhyme.
A saturnine absurdity and a complete waste of my time.
An infinity of feckless, ineffectual lines without vitality,
so much so that my poem winds up N/Ad. Another fatality.
I need to find a way to make other poets savor the taste
of what I breathe in and then exhale so that it's interlaced
with profound meaning that others might comprehend,
instead of mere words on a page, that no editor could mend.
I don't mind constructive criticism. I'd be a foolish ingrate
to not accept well-meaning advice. Wisely, I'd contemplate
changing the course of a poem that simply doesn't mesh.
I'm not so discombobulated to realize when I need to refresh.