Long Jetty Poems
Long Jetty Poems. Below are the most popular long Jetty by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Jetty poems by poem length and keyword.
The summer fog has not yet lifted from the enclave. The candyfloss glow of the sun suspended above the horizon of the valley in the Jock of the Bushveld Concervancy where I have made my new home reflects on the ghostly blue of the dam in front of my house.
early morning
dense fog blanket--
burn off reveals
One of the nesting pair of fish eagles does a low flyby. The distinctive call of the fish eagle is synonymous with Africa, pulling on my heartstrings like no music can. A primordial longing fills my very soul. Banished to purgatory for the best part of my life, this paradise is my just reward in my autumnal years.
young fish eagle—
shadows cast by papyrus
teem with silver carp
An African Jacana teeters with its long toes on the emerald green leaves of the pink water lily flower. It pecks delicately at something at the edge of the flower, before taking flight; long legs dangling behind it like superfluous appendages—its sharp, ringing tone cleaving the morning silence.
a black mamba
slithers off the jetty—
tropical winter
I am not alone; a blouapie (marmoset) with his distinctive cobalt blue and crimson genitals surveys my progress along the path to the jetty. Damp, golden leaves carpet the pathway, the pungent smell assailing my olfactory receptors, alerting me to the many unknown vegetation growing in abundance on the embankment—names of which I need to learn and applications I need to discover.
long winter of
dormant passions—
spring stirs in loins
On a pier
Long and angulated off to the left
Each board hammered by a man
long gone
my foot falls
on each board
each hammerhead hit
each nail
means something
to me
Perhaps I am simple
or
too complex
board after board I walk
amongst the waves and the metaphorical eddies
with birds winging by
the wind crosses itself over me
in intermittent silence and raucous-ness
It is in these silent side hours
I need you least and most
I still need... but not you?
I think
A strange
single silent song.
Each of my steps ...each without you
Each board on this jetty bares a name
death on board
etched deep into the wood
Engraved
into the very soul of the pitch and pine
How I love you
Loved all you've created and pray you create still
Stillness you do create in me
and a radiating warmth...an irrepressible joy
I rest my hand upon the rail
clutch it as I would your wrist
were it
resting on your arm instead
Momentarily I will it to be true
to give you comfort
No need for judgement's clothes
I am stripped bare into perfect gentleness
Speaking the language of your weary ways
....and bent head
Upon it to lay my hand!
Oh... I wish!
and mine own head to bow to yours
in Grace to Grace
In dreams that she shall wait for me
On misty banks of weathered shoreline,
deplete by ocean’s endless play
Of scattered seas in ageless voyage
and sunsets formed on borrowed bay
Horizons beckon with a daydream,
in distant lines on forward flow
To breezes captured always welcome
as if someone you once did know
A jetty sits in foam laced waters,
eclipsing cold against its skin
Within the sights it surely witnessed,
moon beamed patterns once again
This solitude of thoughts provoking,
a heartbeat dances on a wave
For memories we’ve long forgotten
and many which our hearts have saved
Now here I sit in meditation,
alone of nature’s melody
For this is where my love has spoken,
my woman of the evening sea
This night and every there before me
brings soft, a touch of love so kind
Beyond the washing waves of splendor
for but a voice to call her mine
And now I face this grand conclusion,
what’s meant to be is all I ask
For on the sun’s due north arrival
I stand a’ ready for the task
To send my love to her unending
so far beyond this echoed plea
And pray to find her perfect whispers
in dreams that she shall wait for me
Good night Soupers
He sat on this patch of turf,
and if not this exact place a piece of a place nearby.
Naturally, I try to feel his companionship.
Did he write a line of poetry on this small island
or was he simply being Walt Whitman,
honored guest,
a person he hardly recognized from his youth.
I feel his old bones not his youthful step
also, his spacious poetry,
that storied ever travelling imagery
passing-by
upon these Ohio river currents.
His sweeping insights navigating
slow wide bends,
and the churning history
of these waters.
I imagine his hand on the ground,
it heaves my body up from the deep grass
and quilts me to a shared terrain
a place where beating heron wings
count the pulse of two lives.
I feel the mutuality of crossed roads,
the cadence of restless breezes
as they ruffle a coat
he left draped over a rail
of this same wooden jetty.
The Mystery ship
I have read about things like people from March
with dinner-plate eyes and long, thin bodies
If these people are among us, why aren't normal
like Elon Musk, he is smart and will be as well
for a small investment in his business
can give us
riches and free electricity.
Sometimes, when the now and the past collide
we can, in a few seconds, see people that are
no longer among us, we can also call these dreams
as for ghosts, no, they don't exist, but they are great
evil has happened, we might sense a residue of
a whiff of the horror.
in 1950, a ship with scrap iron left Bangladesh
bound for Australia
a day before her captain had
sent a cable requesting a place to doc.
That was the last message
the ship disappeared
wise heads thought they must have sunk
due to a gas- explosion! On a vessel carrying scrap iron?
60 years later, a ship by the name of "Peik" asked
for a harbor pilot, a ship no one had heard of
but looking in the archive, there was a ship with that
name, but she had sunk
they birthed the vessel at an unused pier
and the pilot
when coming ashore looked pale and shaky
said the people onboard looked normal
her captain
wore an old-fashioned uniform, like the crew
was there yet, but seeing them through a film
of layers of time
When the customs officers came on board, they found
product no longer legal, like cigarettes and whisky
only marijuana was legal if smoked in moderation
the populace had stamps to ensure they
stuck to the moderation,
The authorities observed, that if
someone over-smoked, they tended to talk about
freedom of choice
The next day, the ship was no longer at the jetty
The Coast Guard's boat
was sent to sea to apprehend the ship, but no trace of her
those who had witnessed this were told not to talk about
the public must not know, but the pilot did,
lost his job, sent
to prison for spreading false alarm
Still, in my pajamas, cold, ‘tis Winter.
Purple and gray wool socks, and still, cold feet.
Yet i’d walk down into the oaks, with sun’s
light be soaked, at the Summer-plumed heartbeat.
Into the glowing moss and down the hill,
like my grand, who’d make glorious foothold
into the street. Still, alone, basking in
happiness, woolen feet waltzing, toes cold,
knuckles chapping, clapping of my steepled
fingers. dry and joyful lips, arising,
Dizzy, I'd survey the amphitheater -
steam of cold-heat, underfoot apprising.
O my soul, the crooning blue signature,
expansive, inexpensive, pensive sky.
Behold God’s goodness directed my way.
Though fibbing from inside, I do not lie.
The arms of my chair, still, caring, hold me
or i’d jetty into my imagination.
There the birds stir up woozy fairyland
with tea and serenity’s coronation.
2/10/2021
Contest: All Yours (Feb 10)
Sponsor: Brian Strand
In time shadows in an old windy shed
are names of sojourners who've passed this way;
now my wandering boot does older tread
where I passed on a long forgotten day.
I see their faces on wall and jetty
drinking beer, watching the wind and tide turn,
where on horizon across a dark sea
aerodrome Air Squadron lights brightly burn.
Time and tide fade in this hidden cove
where beneath the waves the taniwha rove.
By the salt marshes of this cold gulf sea
I carved my name for a posterity.
On its seawall and rocky jutting shore
the white breasted gulls and shags flit the sky –
yes, there was a time but not anymore
I gazed the stars over Whenuapai.
Crazed by lunar tide and hearts asunder
fumbling some Anglo lass or native girl,
or some legless dumb fool fallen under
feeding the fishes with a mighty hurl!
Into its riptides we dived bombed its depths
on a leap of faith into the drop zone,
and from its pull clung to those ocean steps
where over the Skyhawk war birds had flown.
Time and tide fade in this hidden cove
where beneath the waves the taniwha rove.
By the salt marshes of this cold gulf sea
I carved my name for a posterity.
Those dark undercurrents still rip below
when its flood of memories ebb away,
and now all I am is a time shadow
where I passed on a long forgotten day.
Written: December 1991
PART II.
IV.
there's no turning back...
when the landscapes change, when the rains come
submerged in solitary conversations
I'm unworthy to left gifts at your feet
so I wait and sleep in this desolate bothy
shattered and painfully conscious
and it's like descending the slippery cliffs
even if some of them have withstood a thousand storms
it's been a mindless voyage led by the lack of sobriety
right when you found my incomplete letters
and your blurred outlines were drifted ashore
leaving the white lines carved in the sand
V.
how far...
would we go in a bottomless boat?
that's where I seek the point of continuation
but one day they'll throw away all of your belongings
down to the bottomless chasm of memories
and it will stalk me through the mainland
haunt me even at the bottom of the ocean
knowing that life of unfulfilled desires is like an immortal pilgrim
shrinking in the darkest nook of guilt
but I believe that our paper boat is unsinkable
in loving memory of sweet melancholy
we'll sing the shepherd's ballads by the jetty
VI.
I'll hold your hand...
through the final ascend from hazy lowlands
'cause I know there's certainly a rebirth awaiting
as lost love leaves scars in the countryside
and each night I can't resist
the lighting of the south side beacon
the ageless beacon that will shine on our way
when your shy retinas turn to flowers
and hide away from moonlit skies
I'm sinking in smoothness of your skin
stitching your heart to mine
and letting it sail away in a bottle
while you're still shivering beside me
as a reminder of our mortality
enchanted by the divine music
flying in a great heights like two starving gulls
over the freezing sea of abstractions
waterlogged and malcontented
we will abandon the terminal beach
we'll leave together in the air
and greet every star without exception
A light wind gently rocks our sailboat as
breezes begin to pick up on the sun drenched dock.
Cable wires rap and tap upon the mast as
daylight filters thinly through the clouds.
Egrets begin to peck around the gangway
foraging for scraps from bugs or grubs.
Great blue heron busily prepares her nest
high upon the eucalyptus tree.
I sit and daydream on the harbor deck
just enjoying the sea breeze, sights and sounds.
Kelp beds sway rhythmically with the currents
lapping the rocks at low tide, while
massive flocks of birds perch purposefully
near a lonely lighthouse high on the jetty.
Open seas spread toward the horizon where
pelicans busily dive bomb for fish.
Quarry rocks surrounding the harbor create
rocky protrusions, allowing ground squirrels to
spy sailors earnestly jibing on ocean water
tacking swiftly through the northwest winds.
Under the pylons and gangways
various starfish and mussels cling
with schools of fish swimming in tandem.
Xylophone sounds drift with music from a
Yacht club hosting a spring concert.
Zeal for the beauty of harbor life moves me.
Written on 2/11/2015
I remember the land of drums I was born
bedded beneath great hanging nets;
the sound of the conch and the horn.
My blue suitcase filled with stuff,
the red tricycle and pedal car
that made me race and made me puff.
I remember the hounds of revolution nightly howl
on the streets of my island home.
Now I reign afar in the land of my exile
as might a king given up his throne
I remember my first day of school so bleak,
a gingerbread house on Picton Street
where I first kissed a sweetheart cheek.
Hearken tales of men in Sherwood,
Nelly Stone in her rocking chair
reading The Adventures of Robin Hood.
The loud guttural yard turkeys’ gobble and flap,
and kids singing their songs of joy.
I remember the year, the girl, the songs
in all its virtue when I was a boy
I remember the front yard we would play
and the annex rooms we called home
watching The Riki Tiki Show at 17 Gray.
Waving at the Queen’s royal parade
down on Saint Clair Avenue
in the crowds following her motorcade.
I remember huddled around the old valve radio,
long siestas in the hot afternoon
till late beneath a corner streetlight halo
raving drunk slumped Blue Moon
I remember sticky chewy peanut brittle
with my cold Nestle chocolate milk
while gorging my tummy little by little.
Behold down-de-islands dashing
in a pirogue out on Grand Fond Bay -
the sea spray across the bow crashing.
Watching as darkness fell on high moon and tide
shining on bay and jetty so bright,
when as young eyes grew weary I would
rest at peace all through the night
I remember all dressed for Sunday School
and afternoons at the Country Club
splashing around in the swimming pool.
And at sea playing captain and sailor
on board a ship Panama bound
in my cabin with my toy boat and trailer.
I remember the ports and voyage of no return
into the yonder crossing the equator,
when old Neptune rose from the undersea
to bless our ship and navigate her
Written: September 1990