Long Landscape Poems
Long Landscape Poems. Below are the most popular long Landscape by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Landscape poems by poem length and keyword.
Your ‘calling’ strings you out
into a gospel
of all that you were and are.
A written scripture scrolls on.
You are a witness. The poet that watches,
the one who shows up late in your own story,
diverse scribes feed you shape-shifting words
from the collective works of
other visionaries.
Every image has its alter-image.
This gospel of ‘you’
can gossip over a trivial landscape,
yet all is elemental and intrinsic
to an all-inclusive manifesto.
These secret teachings are parables,
allegory and metaphor,
revelations discovered by few or many.
Word of mouth becomes a testament
one woven by a history
of observers and spectators,
they scribble down both the immaterial
and the substance of reflections,
then hammer them into flowing water
where all poetry is enshrined.
Dear Love,
Just a quick note:
You caught me unawares
I thought I lived in circles
You taught me to accept squares
I write to ask for guidance
As straight lines tend to bend
The route we thought before us
Down a different path does send
You have a reputation
That has helped us through the age..
The compassion of a mother
The wisdom of a sage
So as I lean towards you
For some words of hope and care
Perhaps a new direction
Or encouragement you'll share
You released your piercing arrow
Varnished with surprise
Tipped to cut through layers
Under which my lost soul lies
You only took a moment
And before I knew my mind
My heart had led me forward
Out of prison cell, confined
Pah, you know all this already
So a question I must ask..
Are you wholly future focussed?
Is that even in your grasp?
Have you mapped how love unravels
As your arrow breaks these chains
Is destiny the angel
To guide through all this strange
Confusing landscape
Gnarly trees that twist and trip
While my mind is still in turmoil
Though my feet, they want to skip
I'll sign off here and ponder
All the wonders you possess
But thank you in anticipation
Yours truly,
My Heart's Address
Amidst the Snowflakes
Like thousands of soldiers in parachutes
they come out of the winter sky
One by one hitting the pavement
to claim victory for the season now unfolding
At first they are vanquished almost instantly
a price paid for those leading the charge
However as they begin to accumulate and cluster
a formidable foe is being created
Inch by inch, foot by foot, a fortress is being built
one that can be transformed into an igloo for shelter if needed
Soon the landscape will be covered by a heavy white blanket
left unattended it will run amok overwhelming all
As plummeting temperatures assault those not ready
once open lakes and river pathways no longer escape routes
A battering ram of inclement weather hampering travel
imprisoning those caught unaware of its fury
Snow drifts form obstructing passageways
entrapping those not prepared with an escape route
Waiting out the enemy a defensive strategy now in use
As it surrounds you on all sides building an oppressing presence
High winds and frostbite commingling in the air
that will dominate at the end of the day
Beauty or beast
The conflict yet to be decided.
Andreas Simic ©
The sign he reads out loud, “There’s holes ahead.”
The Rip Van Winkle Bridge quite disturbs me.
A story book that’s come to life — with head
To lose. My dad inches along bravely.
The chickens must brood o’er a dicken’s deuce.
We steer to the left and the right, afraid.
We stare at the grave pavement claim, the goose
Of golden time, the sleepy hollow shade.
The radio plays somber tunes, as Cole
Never imagined death— the Catskills fresh.
Diedrich Knickerbocker, lots of soul,
Could tread the troubled water’s edge — refresh.
Let’s build our solid homes, not on the sand.
You’ve guessed! We flew the coop, hopped on dry land!
5/18/2020
Bridge over troubled waters Poetry Contest
Sponsor: John Hamilton
Used howmanysyllables.com
1.The Rip Van Winkle Bridge - a cantilever bridge from Hudson, NY to Catskill, NY
2.There was a real sign on the bridge that said, “Holes ahead.”
3.Washington Irving wrote the story of “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” In the latter, there are people who lose their heads. At one time he wrote by the pen name, Diedrich Knickerbocker when he wrote a satirical book about NY history and politics.
4.Shakespeare used the term “dickens” - deuce being another term for the devil
5.“Chicken Little,” was a children’s tale where the chicken “was afraid,” the sky was falling - it wasn’t!
6. In “Jack and the Beanstalk,” Jack stole the goose that laid golden eggs.
7. Thomas Cole - created the first paintings of the American landscape
8. I grew up with the colorful history of Dutchess County and thereabouts.
When winter sleeps…
….earth’s colors drain, like falling rain
again and again
its steady strum, a hypnotic song
a quiet lull, a settling balm.
When winter sleeps…
…the weighty clouds, like blankets cover
they hover…over the colorless landscape
nameless shapes, in washed out dreams
all creatures pause to rest…it seems.
When winter sleeps…
….fairy tale dustings of snow
fall freely over groves of trees
where tiny sparrows huddle with relief
nesting, wing on wing, for warmth and peace.
When winter sleeps…
…snow locks the earth in shackles
and captures the burrowing bear
to submit to the rhythm of the season…
…when winters sleeps.
El Paso, Texas
desert landscape
mountain tops
cactus’s so green
sand storms
dry air
Footprints of a lone coyote
beige sand
rocky mountain ledge
leads the way
to a
sun-filled sky
dry heat
winter in the morn
spring at noon
summer by four
El Paso, Texas
a
small
fragment of
the Lone Star State
Home
03/12/2021
My first attempt at an Ekphrasis poem
Written for All Yours (March 14th) Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Brian Strand
Tranquil Waters
Steady goes the stream of pure tranquility
Clear blue water rushes over smooth polished rock
The landscape is so green near this water of fertility
To this mountain lake nature's Beings tend to flock
All the sounds of nature make it so peaceful here
Admiring from above this breath taking treetop view
The frigid waters look so very pure and clear
Dazzling with its very own enriched color of blue
The wind is dead calm stirring no ripples in the glass
Watching the colorful fish in their under water dance
Blue ones, pink ones, red sunfish, trout, and bass
All together in this classical mountain top lake romance
The sound here is so silent exemplifying the word peace
A world full of panic never touches the beauty of this lake
Here there is no need for armies, government, or police
It is so sad the things for granted we as humans do take
05/17/17
Submitted for poetry contest: "Mountaintop Lake"
An anonymous artist had named the painting:
'Bertram Crumm'
it was simply a depiction of a man
trudging over a blank Landscape.
No one had heard of this man,
but this enigmatic fact alone was intriguing,
and now he was perfectly framed.
After many years
an art critic tracked him down.
Crumm claimed to be a meatpacker
who worked in Allen Town,
yet no one could see him as a meatpacker
working in Allen Town.
Some saw nobility in his gait and posture,
some saw a furtive mindset, most declared
emphatically that Crumm was definitely
a poet!
If we had known
that Crumm had often confessed to his family
that he loathed poetry and was indifferent
to art in general
then that landscaped/portrait
would still be gathering dust in a Goodwill shop.
However, a billionaire owns it now,
and ironically,
he also can't write a lick of poetry either.
balance can be found in the offset
the heavy water jug your posture tilts for
a mirror of the landscape
sparse, endless, lonely
distant from the body
swept up and onwards by the wind
all held together, poised
hoping that's what saves you -
when you want, need, fear your knees will buckle
everything to smash
for it all to lay in p i e c e s
where you decide you'll pick none of it up
never carry that weight again
never return to the place it all
f
e
l
l
never look upon that ground
never feel so tightly held in place again
so tightly bound
as a means of survival
just collapse
and lay still a while
feel the same wind, now as a breeze
feel what you held together ~ unbind
spin on the spot
let your clothing flare
take up space
release.
every.
pent.
up.
emotion.
that.
you.
thought.
needed.
holding.
in.
scream
dance
run
sing
be free from balancing the offset
free from the trek
roll down the hills laughing
smile whilst you
cry-the-whole-thing-out
let it go
stand unburdened
don't carry it any further
you can let it go
The sky staggers
in s
p
i
r
a
l
s of sleepless blue,
a celestial storm stitched from sapphire and sorrow,
where stars swell, simmering seeds of unstable light
trembling like thoughts too vast to be contained.
Above the village, night kneels in restless reverence.
Roofs rest in rigid resignation,
windows dim as quiet witnesses to cosmic unrest,
while the steeple stretches upward like a hesitant prayer
that never quite reaches its answer.
A cypress rises, black, brooding, blade-like
a funereal flame fixed in the soil of silence,
cutting through the composition like grief given form,
binding earth to the fevered heavens above.
The wind is unseen yet insinuated,
a wandering whisper weaving through the whorled sky,
stirring stars into spinning, shimmering syntax,
as though the night itself has lost grammatical control.
Nothing here is still.
Everything leans light lurches, darkness deepens, distance dissolves.
The world holds together on tension alone,
as though the painter captured not a landscape,
but the moment reality began to tremble.