Long Outworn Poems
Long Outworn Poems. Below are the most popular long Outworn by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Outworn poems by poem length and keyword.
O Muses! What is genius? Is it born?
Or is it taught? Why do some possess it,
and some do not? These questions are outworn!
As riddle over which to obsess, it
matters only that genius brings forth art,
music, poetry, mathematics, dance,
religion, and science to endow heart
and reason to mindless souls which, by chance,
we know as “Fools.” Genius is not for wasting,
or for consuming it upon one's lust:
rather, it is meant for God Everlasting;
to bring Him praise before one turns to dust.
Whatever genius's mystery is, it's His
to give as He pleases—of that there's no quiz!
Frightened to take two
Her soul was clenched in the hand's of evil, A strident deafening scream reverberating in her mind,
Searching for where she's broken the most, Trying to collect shattered pieces that are hard to find,
Even the faintest of lives light disappeared, Leaving her to confront dark thought's for a while,
Blindly stumbling through saddened day after day, Constant loneliness hovering making her fragile,
Others oblivious to her heartache retaining her struggle, A chaotic mind confused and lost in every form,
Ardently staying as strong as can be,
Undoubtedly the personification of frail is outworn.
The morning breaks, but brings no golden ease,
Only the gray and unforgotten road.
Before the rushing of the waking breeze,
A quiet spirit gathers up its load.
Not with a shout, nor with a rebel cry,
Does strength awake to face the heavy day;
Beneath the vast and indifferent sky,
A single footfall measures out the way.
The shoe is worn, the quiet heel is old,
The ankle aches from paths too long and steep;
A story told in silent, heavy mold,
Of promises a weary heart must keep.
It is the step that knows the rocky ground,
That feels the pressure of an unseen stone,
Where not a single cheering voice is found,
And man walks through the valley, quite alone.
Weighing the arch, the sinew, and the bone,
The gravity of all that must be borne—
The secret griefs that cannot be outblown,
The silent battles of a life outworn.
Every single movement takes a hero’s grace,
A slow descent, a pressing to the floor,
To set the footprint in its destined place,
And push the heavy hinge of time a bit more.
Yet in this weight, a quiet power grows,
A dignity that lighter feet ne’er find.
For deep within the soil the pressure goes,
Leaving a mark of courage far behind.
The earth receives the impact, deep and true,
A signature of suffering turned to might;
With every heavy step it struggles through,
It carves a pathway toward a softer light.
So let the journey test the aching limb,
And let the road demand its heavy toll;
Though all the distant mountain peaks are dim,
The pace is kept by an enduring soul.
No winged flight is needed for the brave,
Who find their triumph where the shadows crept—
And conquer time, and cross the open grave,
Upon the turning of a burden step.
Who decides what historical events adorn
textbooks students read,
hence a starry notion born
grew up while
this lumpenproletariat day dreaming,
Asian aw shucks husky
husbandry furrowed brow gritty farmer
barnstorming across
expansive fields of baby
(barely) barley corn
crib bed crop 'pon harvest time,
(an maize zing genre), especially
when enriched with humus
laden loamy muck cob bra,
then aye delightfully
trumpet from dehorn
of good 'n plenti kernel Sanders gave me
saluting rank and file fool's capped
fecund fashioned earthborn
dunce sing tassels,
versus growing seasons gone by,
when draught of ideas forlorn
despite futilely blowing on my flugelhorn
high and dry reap peat head paltry yield,
asper when this strapping chap
a sweaty backed greenhorn
pondering why agrarian laborious life of toil
omitted as part and parcel of "newsworthy"
posterity sagas deeming
shenanigans of highborn
and/or "FAKE" headlines crowd inborn
noble folks,
who grease palms of industrialists,
whose quaking self importance
thwarts aside rural cosseted
krummhorn grounded bumpkin mor'n
how kapellmeister coaches bourgeoisie
helping determine
zero absolute value of newborn
fated to slave away
till body electric outworn,
yet paradigm shift of
(butter late then ever)
jiffy popcorn version
sown by seeds of Jethro Tull,
whose bonhomie with brio didst reborn
agricultural revolution took root,
whence before long some did scorn
and lamented machinations
ordered simple existence ripped and torn,
where antithetical views suppressed
and unto revolutionaries
became legion and well-worn.
This wreath is in your eidetic memory, yet you should live.
Can you receive my lament, which is almost to happen?
There is no garland as I plummet, rattled by the sieve.
Died with you, can't revive, as you lie on plush and satin.
Earth collapses beneath its weight—why was it to be that way?
The words reflect that living beings are welcome today.
To read the stones, the lost will return home shortly to stay.
The shade of gloom fosters a dark and virtuous decease.
Stashed spaceship shrines to scold scintillating stars in peace.
Among the outworn headstones, the moss knows the lease.
There's a hushed quiescence here; no birds to chirp up or hive.
The wind moans, the agony is veiled, and the heart blackens.
Trusting that I would rest here, bereft of any rich ray.
Leaving behind all my acrid-gained assets through a name cease.
Written: February 25, 2023
This poem form is the Fragmented Rhyme invented and Conceived by Constance La France. It has 14 lines with indentation, and a rhyme scheme, as follows: ABABCCCDDDABCD
A parody of Wordsworth's "The World Is Too Much with Us,” which appears under the parody
The mall is too much with us, spring and fall.
Getting and spending, we lay waste each pay check.
There's little in nature we won't someday wreck.
We've given our hearts away to cholesterol.
Beach beauties bare too much to one and all.
The howling dopeheads raise all kinds of heck.
Pollution worldwide makes me say, "Oh, yecch!"
Hey, wary youth, we'll leave this all to y'all!
I'm moved to yell, "Great God, we're out of tune!"
Had I the choice, I swear I'd rather be
A lone coyote howling at the moon
Or a jabbering monkey swinging from tree to tree
And sharing branch room with a shrieking loon.
Of earth's abominations these are free.
“The World Is Too Much with Us” Italian sonnet by William Wordsworth (1770- 1850) The sonnet is one of his responses to the Industrial Revolution.
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not. Great God! I’d rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.
June 21, 2021
Contemporary Sonnet Contest
Sponsor: Charlote Puddifoot
It’s all falling on me
And it’s all falling on you
It’s clear as crystal to see
There’s not much that we will do
The responsibility
The onus, the burden of proof
In the court of stability,
The dragon is on the loose
The bridge is falling on me
The tower is falling on you
In the dungeons of senility,
Your heroism isn’t of use
The fork-tongued demon will speak
Possessed by illegitimate truth
The culture gives it mystique
A bill of goods sold to the youth
Condemnation won’t free
Any from the chains of abuse
The blind beggar still won’t see
The deformed cripple still won’t move
And if by some decree,
They let the stilled waters loose,
There’ll be no safe harbor to be
And no hopeful port to move to
The boughs stripped from every tree
The feathers plucked from each goose
And in hapless humility,
We’ll concede there’s no solution to choose
If you have outworn your one dream
If you’ve outlasted your only use
If your soul’s muscle is atrophied
If your heart’s detective hasn’t a clue
Then this is where we let off some steam
From the locomotive to the caboose
And as we slide down into ravines,
Let the next ones hear the good news
If the sun sets on me now, let it!
I have no more use
for the light of day,
Just hold back the dawn awhile,
I have to shed some light
upon the night’s shady ways.
Tell it to the vagrant wind
To hold its breath
and pass not this way again
lest it bestirs
the dying embers of my aspiration.
Let the spring know
to hold back its reins,
There are no more
flowers to bloom here now.
Tell the wayward road
to follow me no more,
I have to hang up
my outworn footwear now;
And let my dreams know
I have no more
wistful nights to spare.
~12/05/19
~Contest: Your Best New Poem
~Sponsor: Emile Pinet.
Time's flowing tributary; the future changes the past.
Our burial cortege concludes its course at the graveyard.
Falling leaves collapse, crafting new fates; feel the weight of dust.
Some are wagered in a pitcher with burnt bones and ash charred
We tread the twisting trails, yet in the end, all come this way.
The funeral site was bleak and hushed with death and decay.
Where death reigns and no one recalls who under earth lay.
I find peace in the abyss, grasp sky, and haze through the grave.
The woods are gray guiding the cars and assuaging the crave
Nothing appears in the night when it is too brief to save.
With outworn obelisk, only the moss knows the rent draft
You have rote recall for this wreath, yet no time in this yard.
Trusting that I would rest here, bereft of any rich ray.
Leaving behind all my hard-gained assets by a name waive.
1st Place contest winner
Written: February 22, 2023
Writing Challenge - G Words - Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Constance La France
This poem form is the Fragmented Rhyme invented and Conceived by Constance La France. It has 14 lines with indentation, and a rhyme scheme, as follows: ABABCCCDDDABCD
—The Geography of Tears—
I know not where thou art, nor whence thy breath
re-enters me—yet when thy name is spoken,
my guarded blood, that had outworn its death,
breaks rank, and bears thee through the sluice unbroken;
whilst all the world proceeds, and engines grind,
some secret firmament within me alters,
and tears, more treacherous than the mind,
unseal the place where distance fails and falters;
I seek thee not in roads, nor years that flee,
but where remembrance, stripped of its disguise,
becomes a country having none but thee,
whose borders vanish inward through my eyes—
for absence loses all jurisdiction there,
and thou arrivest where my tears declare.