Long Overlong Poems
Long Overlong Poems. Below are the most popular long Overlong by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Overlong poems by poem length and keyword.
This room does not remember me.
Even when I pull the drapes
the bright sky
seems surprised by my alien eyes.
Some overlong nights
can unhinge you from time and place.
I have been ill,
the nightstand rattles with medications
and the bed is in recovery mode.
This walled-in dwelling
dwells apart from me,
it reluctantly makes way
for my substance
offering only a partial reality.
Who walks now
into my awakening space
as if they owned the place?
My familiarity is missing.
I am reflecting;
my thoughts flutter over a glass mind
as I piece together a history.
Perhaps I will explain myself later,
or by chance bump into my life,
meeting it again after lost years
astonished by how much this 'me'
has changed.
The handshake; a gesture, a sign of good will
If feeble, it may hide intent that is ill
Or is it the grip of a mind that’s unsure
Or shyness in one who’s not met you before
The handshake that comes with a heart-warming smile
Each, seemingly held for an overlong while
Should leave one suspicious as that firm grip lingers
That the other hand features two tightly crossed fingers
They say that a handshake’s a contract of sorts
The sort that shall carry no weight in the courts
So seek my advice and I’ll offer you this
A handshake means no more than ‘sealed with a kiss.’
But a hearty, firm handshake is hard to resist
So long as the thumb doesn’t tickle your wrist
For if you do not pull away then I fear
The antlers you’ll wear… of a sacrificed deer
But is there a handshake that stands true and good
A handshake to trust in, that maybe we should
The answer is “Yes” as you welcome friends in
But “No” if they’re wearing a big cheesy grin.
Pulling up in front of the address on the girl’s information,
I wondered again why I could not decline her invitation.
I saw the girl pull to the curb and exit her car.
Rushing to catch her, I was somehow sight marred
and lost her, but I saw the manor’s doors were open.
Coming in with, ‘Hello?’, my voice rose as doors closed.
Looking around at decay, I saw a note on a stand.
It read, ‘Drink this as I did, then find the Baby Grand.’
The girl must have inked this, so I sipped my drink down.
Suddenly, the manor filled with haunting piano sounds.
Heading towards the source, I stumbled off my course,
and heard shrill laughter when I tripped on my purse,
But, NOT HER laughter, so I asked, my teeth a’chatter,
“Who .. whaa – where ..” A piano tone groaned, “I am the girl
as you are me, and we three were once the sum of one,
until evil done allowed only one-third of us to view sun.”
The tone went on, “you now sleep deep and this night,
dark sights will guide your truth to abandon your aloof
and you will recall how you always stall your return,
leaving me overlong to burn for our body I so yearn."
Now nude, licking missed lips. her woman voice continued,
"Wee girl of third is too torture numbed to escape like us.
Now, do enjoy your body-less time as Baby Grand jacked,
because it may be centuries before I bring our body back."
... CayCay Jennings
January 20, 2019
If I'm not allowed to fall,
I can't learn to walk
Through peace with falling,
I rise again in strong faith
When I climb a mountain,
I see its lowest point
By peace with the lowest points,
all fears dissipate
Even while traveling,
I long to stand still
Thanks to such stops,
the journey feels more intense
Deep below my strength
I sense there is softness
Thanks to that softness,
much stronger I am
Do I choose to shine,
it illuminates what seems dark,
not remembered and
overlong unseen,
When I embrace with love,
everything that once fell
returns to a state
of purity
And just as I stand still,
I long to travel
Thanks to the traveling,
my path unfolds before me
Narrow but passable,
enlightened by love,
so if I do fall again?
Then I can only fall…
very softly
Take me where the ocean rolls bigger than the pain in my
soul. Let me lay upon shore sand and hold its grit in my hand
while the ocean claims ground again, so sure of where it
belongs to begin its own fated end. Let ships on the horizon
remind me how small I am and how little I understand.
My pain seems so very grand yet it, and my heart bearing it,
will be gone long before this sand, so small, so mere in tiny
bits, but more earthly significant than any of me I have to
give. I have no distinct pain, all I hurt once ached another
name that millions could easily claim.
I do not want to feel love's sentiments anymore. I do not want
emphatic care blood in my core. My worn bruises need the
confusing wave cycle to diffuse. My heart wishes to comply with
my soul's voice, housed within, as it does whisper of peace should
I let go and fling the heavy pains my emotions have overlong
nourished and sustained.
God, let me tuck my aches inside a shell, please allow them
to only there dwell. I promise, I will sail the shell by my own
hand to swim the ocean depths. Allow the sea to free my
stored pain in deep, endless, salty motions that I may be
free from more tears of lame devotion.
he watched …
as it fell to the slate floor
glinting its polished golden husk in the
late morning sun
it should’ve bounced, as any
ring would of normalcy
but this, it was NOT …
leagues and lifetimes from it, actually
its behavior betraying the
dark matter within
as it landed with a single loud thud -
‘too loud’, he thought, as he
watched his dear little friend turn and
trudge away down the shire path …
he stood static to the floor
head dipped and eyes peering suspiciously at
it over half-lens spectacles -
as if looking at the devil himself
(not far from the truth) …
and after an overlong consideration
he stooped slowly and reached,
pausing a moment
(more debate)
then pinched it between thumb and
forefinger to lift it from the floor
but … it stuck …
he pulled harder, then harder yet
and finally picked it off the stone tile -
with much too much effort afforded an
object of its diminutive size
and this, as he placed it on the mantle beside him
(leering at it all the more)
quite disturbed him …
so, as was his usual custom at such
concerning moments
he ‘humphed’ to himself,
sat down on a leather hassock behind him
and dug his pocket, deep …
another pinch, this one unseen, and out
came a wad of Old Toby
straight into his churchwarden pipe
and lit with care -
weed-scented brume rings circling
his straggly silver locks
and disappearing high into the
shadowed eaves
along with his now shadowy thoughts …
this simple gold ring had
no simple history
this was a dark object of malevolent intent
forged in the fiery bowels of Mt Doom
and melded with an evil power to
obliterate all such talismans that
had come before it
and all to be made hence
he knew its history well, as any
wizard of import would
and he knew with dreadful certainty
that his life AND his path had now
changed in a troubling and
sobering way,
and that nothing in his once bright and
enjoyable existence
would ever again …
be the same.
I dig
My target throws sigh
But to clobber siege
I need to ping
To erect distinctive peg
You dig
Looking far the bridge
You seem having edge
You need go far-flung
Where is your colleague?
We dig
Best groove to clinch
Driving with efforts much
To elevate our urge
Need endorser(s) to bag
They dig
By virginal strength merge
Pledge-driven set them step-on-the-gas
Success to make marks
Not adequate of gang
He digs
Striving to reaching for star
Thinking of going faster
There is an adage
Stop thinking of dotage
Backup the seeming fig
She digs
Deeming it so overlong
Curiously wants to dodge
Wishes for early log
Ends up in marriage
He's enough an energy
As with all preludes
there is much mummery and mockery,
a delirious glee to be
just below the overhanging wave,
yet dry enough to prance
and mimic the oncoming monster.
Now the windowpane is dampened
by a stupor of uprooted clouds,
if you touch its cold bare face
a crushed lambency drains into fingertips,
like sand through an hourglass.
The sky has been secretly smoking,
it has now rubbed the earth
with a last glowing stub.
The cabin fire flares as the generator
coughs up stutters of apprehension.
“It’s going to be a big one,”
proclaims the sequestered voice
of a wind-up radio;
a nervous twist in the sudden hush
jangles a teacup.
The prelude is still prepping.
Goats have to bawl first,
The cat must count its fine bones
with each pensive lick.
The ‘far-away’ suddenly jumps at you,
even though you have been watching it
leap across your mind for hours.
The hours themselves have left the stage.
The prologue was overlong,
now the first act has arrived
before its end.
Do you make sure to tap all the dirt from your spikes with your bat,
even if it takes two full-length TV time-outs for you to do so?
Do you cross yourself once, twice, thrice,
or perhaps fidget and fiddle with the letters on your uniform,
no matter that they're sewn on so tightly that Superman himself couldn't
budge 'em?
Do you rub your hands together vigorously enough to make 'em bleed,
perhaps because you've just spit into them in the on-deck circle?
Do you take myriad cumbersome practice swings with three weighted bats,
flinging them aside to wave the feathery club remaining menacingly as you
turn to face the pitcher?
Do you dance and prance to some hip melody, like an apprentice snake-
charmer, as you approach the plate, inviting fans to heap trashloads of scorn and abuse on the batting helmet perched atop your fashionably overlong hair?
Or do you stride to the plate purposefully without all of that fussing and
fumbling, or all that commotion, to focus on doing what batters have
historically tried to do, which is to hit the tarnation out of that little round
ball zooming toward them at upwards of 90 m.p.h?
---Well, if that's what you do, then I am sure you're not a major-league player:
They earn their $4.5 million annual paychecks by doing
all that other stuff.
Devotion Poem, The Black Dahlias
This morning, for a time, you seemed
To have disappeared. I called out to you
From my bed, but the words
Must have been consumed into mute syllables,
For any answering voice, if there was one, was not yours.
I asked the angels to go search for you
And soon they found the traces of your footsteps
Entering into the valley of the black dahlias, where those
Flowers in that valley loom thick, and overlong in season.
You must have entered the black dahlias valley
With some fear, for I am certain you felt unsure
About the consequences of treading
On beauty — wouldn’t some measure of suffering
Follow such an act? And who,
But perhaps the Lord himself
Defines the scope of beauty and
Could mark any count of its maiming?
Did you soon regret your stepping away
And your quick journey into that valley?
Did you then pull up to a questioning halt — having as yet
Sacrificed nothing — and spun around
Wondering how to safely retreat?
The uncountable burgundy/black petals of the dahlias
So closely pack the valley, all their growing
Overlaps, eliminating any sight of the earth.
The black dahlias impressed their image over centuries as
Symbolic of beauty and betrayal, much as
Humanity has done in overseeing its charge of our planet...
And we set our eyes to scan for viable paths
To green, fertile plains anywhere surrounding.
We try to gently reverse and re-claim, to
Over-cross the further striking of beauty.
But, this requires acts of going forth — beyond
Just dreaming or wishing: in the work for now and
New generations of new seeing and clear actions.
Your own return from the valley of the black dahlias,
Struck both our souls. The peace of returning
And the acts of new creation are
As reconcilable as heaven’s full plan for all life here.
While for us, there is no parting, no leaving. Our love
Travels the full labyrinths of the imbued
Patterns of the cosmic kingdom.
**********. ***********. *************
(C) sally Young eslinger10/15/2020
Thanks be to God!