Long Moorish Poems
Long Moorish Poems. Below are the most popular long Moorish by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Moorish poems by poem length and keyword.
"Westward, further out ..."
Dusk washes over you
warm like honey
saltry and sweet
immersed in amber tones of
apricot alerts and rose
swirling unfurling peonies
the blooming silent dancing clouds
rush over white horses
crashing against
bracken green emeralds
the depths open
and unfathomable,
who can read the eyes of
an unexplored ocean,
the shallows
slide under your feet,
you turn your face up to the Sun and smile,
you feel like you’re bathing in Manuka,
it’s moorish and incurably medicinal,
the salt spray chasing northwards
up along bare legs mid thigh
on another shore
the uncertain sure calls,
the stories are a legion
in multitude of treasures
like beached shells whispering
to ears that are not listening;
you think of wading out further
where the turning back is harder,
the song calls you evocatively
further westward like a drug
you’d gladly holster star shot
drinking life in like a last shot
like a burning addiction,
your world is sliding strong
tide-drifted under your feet,
flesh and bone trying to bed
the undertow and its
neverending mystery
dragging you further out
westward
incomplete
complete
(LadyLabyrinth / 2023)
Iberia, I long to breathe you in
as long ago I did. . . and then exhale
sangria nights with lace against my skin!
Sweet temptress draped in beauty, you unveil
Flamenco’s soul, exhuming history -
impressions left by ancients on your face -
from Roman glory’s remnants by the sea
to Moorish structures’ arcs of ageless grace.
Oh, how could I retreat with more to learn,
to make no sacrifice, nor question why
I had to keep my plans and not return
to your broad plains beneath Castilian sky?
Time stole my youth; I can’t go back again.
You could have been my home, belovèd Spain.
Feb 6, 2020
for John Hamilton's "Your Best Sonnet 2020" contest
(my best one that was not at least a previous winner in one of your own sonnet contests this year, John.)
I.
Seeds for the Earth, bread for the early
Vines for the fields, their fruits for the ones ready to perish
Gates for freedom, walls for a cover
Portals unclosed at king's pass
They bring us the way forward
As ashes of totem gods we renounced
Cladding ourselves in God's armor, we peacefully march
On our way home to the source, in love with his freedom
II.
New worlds reborn with no order
No laws, no form, no potter
No rules, no religions
Is this our sketch of freedom?
Moorish dooms rehearse themselves
No locks, no doors to keep out the legions of wars
Is this our portrait of freedom?
Knives for claws, guns for unbridled tongues that scourge
They speak abominably, they slander, they frame the innocent
Their only meditation is grave sin and gloom
Who could ever be in love with such a vignette?
How could this ever be the true picture of freedom?
III.
No water, no blood, no sun
No life, no spirit, no vessels to run
No fire, no drive, no light
No healing, no beauty, no revival
No joy, no glory, no memories
No battles for overcomes that crown us victors
No knowledge, no truth, no testimonies
No source, no men, no cherubs
No love, no energy, no miracles
No way, no signal, no time
No, how could this ever be freedom?
Not the great compass winds, but the lesser,
the local winds, the mapmakers.
Odysseus once bagged them, but they escaped.
Anemoi, like the wind that de-horns goats,
or the Moorish, Melteme,
the ill-tempered one. Simoom, the poisoner
who fills throats with its tainted garments,
or Rashabbar the black wind
whose nocturnal wings blind all men.
Named, visible winds that chisel our faces,
as if we were cliffs at the edge of the world.
The Squamish, the Elephanta, the Williwaw,
time-swirling thieves. They steal the young,
the babes in their cribs and when we look for them,
a swish of a hem or a hurricane are the same.
The children return, a sculpted dervish
spiralling within them.
Tebbard, the fever wind, wanders through our bones,
a sultry doctor adding fuel to the heat
until a storm breaks, then as driftwood we are salvaged.
The Fever-bringer itself dies,
dry now as mottled kelp on carrion shores.
Winds that gnaw themselves into Chinooks and Mistral,
winds that shape and follow us
to the rim of the sky, where those celestial dragons,
North, East, South and West winds
dream fitfully of once being human.
THRUST AND SLASH
A sword in a scabbard, hung from the belt
For the Teutonic Knights, it costs much geld
Heated and tempered but it does not melt
Most blades are l straight and double sided
Easy to draw as the long blade is guided
To the old Eastern mind, such is derided
The Moorish influence is in Toledo still
With a special steel that is designed to kill
For fancier guardsmen it would fit the bill
A cutlass is curved with cupped brass guard
Designed for slashing when stabbing is hard
But need sharpening if the edge is marred
Knives however, like most daggers, are hid
An arm for a lady to grip, and quietly slid
Ready for determined action, as many did
Some thin to a point, as a poignard will do
But there are other places to find them too
As for a Scot in a sock, that’s a Skean Dhu
'2022 Poetry Marathon Mile 19' entry, 03 Nov 2022. Sponsor=Mark Toney
In mid-June's heat, we wait inside the bus,
and everyone has said their last goodbyes.
The Moorish boy I’ve come to know is sad.
He says he knows I never will return.
The bus pulls out (his face just fades away).
We pass through streets that now seem not the same
as those that we first rode down when we came
here six short months ago. It seemed so strange!
Madrid, my first impression of you was
how everything seemed dingy and so grey.
But staying here, I found your treasures, and
enjoyed your many charms that I unearthed.
I’ve walked among your people, tasted foods:
paella, soups and pastries and much more.
I’ve visited Retiro Park, seen art
in sculptures on your streets and in museums.
I’ve visited your shops, your restaurants
where dancers of flamenco hypnotize,
your ring for fighting bulls, your theaters;
your streets seem now familiar, almost sweet!
The group I came with, now like family,
chat happily about their going home.
But I alone am missing you, Madrid,
before I even board that giant bird.
Patience,
Don't be greedy this is a 4 course meal save some of your appetite for desert trust me you will not be disappointed
It's the sweetest and most moist
of apple pie for you to eat from in to out
A recipe baked from right off the pages
of the feminine grand witches cookbook of seductive spells
It's
In part beatle bonnet
part butterfly
part eot of lemac
part pussycat
That comes delivered with a side of sticky fingers and lashings of my very own custard cream squirted right on
top
It's so darn sexy and moorish quite frankly i'd be
astonished if you don't ask for a 2nd or 3rd
helping
And ask if you can take the rest home
so you can have it for breakfast in bed in the
morning all over again
The Inland Algarve
The landscape is so oddly shaped.
Had once been a domestic landscape,
where the scent of wild herbs and the whisper
The wind through olive branches told stories of past lives,
Walking along a narrow cartwheel
Tracks I often come across the remnant
Of dwellings that once had housed
Poverty-stricken people who had
Ploughed small and reluctant fields
Olive trees had grown wild and tall
Bearing bitter fruit.
Some walls had no purpose, sinking.
Back to earth, becoming rocks again.
A haunted landscape in the inland Algarve,
a region rich with a history of Moorish influence
and traditional farming,
Algarve, and no one saw it doomed
Beauty.
Rabbits and boars peacefully roam, embodying
the natural serenity that still whispers through the land.
And sheep grazed in the gloaming.
Stillness, yet I sensed voices that once
Had loved and lived struggling
Against poverty and early death.
Inspiration from Frederic Edwin Church's
painting, The Arabian Desert
~
I press along this arid wasteland
thirsting for your eyes
beneath a mirage of low stars,
my airbrushes stroked in Arabia;
the cauldroned copper dunes
and your moorish fragrance
Become an oasis for this parched mouth--
the sinous dust blowing legends
murmuring Bedouin rites unsaid;
and through embers of a gas light
my imaginings weave in hynotic threads...
Syrian desert touched by midnight
as pores recall my ancient prurient cravings,
I memorize mules roaming by
yet this grandeur leaves me
distraught... for time rushes to steal
a filament of one torrid journey
it's end I cannot defy-- the lavish
fondling on needled sandunes,
I tell you, my rabid body alights
moist in flamed tincture of moonshine,
radiant as an orange gold portrait,
fog swiveling tumbling on scattered weeds--
airy tunes wriggling this jeweled belly
with smoky flavor penetrating my camisole,
where a migrant gull whistles the grit
of an impassioned night...
Alone, as finger-strokes deepen,
the concave blast of reveries
and winds carry your breath
sweet and damp upon my neck;
while one tiny cactus pierces my skin
oiled...watercolored
with faint longing.
Neck pulsating, close shave shines over whiskers
Stiff collar pressure, raced anticipation simmers
Key twist intrigue spurs engine's orange rage
Needle throws redline on wide torque gauge
Jaw rigid, fingers grip cockpit lethal leather wheel
G-force grabs chest, insolent beast thrusts surreal
Monster inflamed incredulously adheres to tar
Salivating lion's ravenous rumble has zero par
Ripping up bitumen, sardonic responsive tyres rivet
Road shred's exhausted under rocket fume exhibit
Airtight capsule, caramel cow hide hugs tamer
Eardrums hum, a hundred mile Hyundai shamer
Brawny tawny gold, hot bonnet chrome flashdance
Purrs her melting eclair aerodynamic performance
Pride's pilot elevated by moorish horizon hunts
Hungry headlights still prey with stealthy stunts
30th July 2022
Written for Contest: Joy
Sponsor: Regina McIntosh