Long Percolator Poems

Long Percolator Poems. Below are the most popular long Percolator by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Percolator poems by poem length and keyword.


Premium Member Memories In Appalachia

Every morning at close to four
She made the coffee, percolated
Poured it into cups with saucers
And they each would have a cup
Pouring the potent black liquid
Into the saucers before drinking
The cooling solution from them

This was only one more glimpse
Into the heart of Appalachian living
A day by day extravaganza of insights
Carried down from the Irish ancestors
Who’d come to this land in America
Realizing it reminded them of the 
Wonders that were once their Ireland

As the coffee moved from the percolator
To a Mr. Coffee that sat on the sink
The children began to drink from their cups
But Granny and Pa still used their saucers
A reminder of all that had come before
And the things that were past that would
Forever remain ingrained in their hearts


Counting Dawns

If eyes open too soon
then a few mornings go missing,
but they are catching up
they will fly in backwards
tumbling out of windswept decades.

Eyes that open too late have to wait,
have to stare at a future blankness
while ears gatecrash the present.

Will the thrown newspaper
land on the lower or upper step?
It matters,
a quantifying arithmetic is essential
to determine next steps.

The percolator has mixed together
a thousand morning.
Dawn gathers enough gravity
to sink easily into an evening sunset.

We find ourselves on the verge
of all previous verges,
swinging one delving leg
to touch a floor
that rises up to meet us.
and its normal - too normal.

Premium Member Trench Town of Cicero

the reasoning the fishing in the trenches
beyond tire swings and monkey wrenches 
follies crawl behind the hanging logos 
of unseen filth across 124th street 

tassels dangled above an oasis 
of fine dining and soiled linen 
over the board rooms covered 
in a mesh of purple mustard 

beckoning ancient aura solid creed 
coming throughout hidden rivalry 
tampered with ankara's answering service 
gravely time passes abaundantly 

coarse and yet shunned quietly 
we remember the malitia moreover 
we began a new wearing gray hoodies 
offering our youth to silent the storm 

that brewed inside a percolator 
pot of copenhagan snuff chewing tobacco 
screaming a cure for cancer shall rise 
over bob marley's tears as we munster up 

courage a courage of faith challenged 
behind the wrecking ball of ground zero 
we count one more time mon 
freedom will soon come 
in our most sinful hope
Form: Qawwali

Premium Member UNPACKED

Nothing arrives whole.  
Everything comes folded~  
creased at the edges,  
tucked into itself  
like a secret that forgot  
how long it has been carried.

To be unpacked  
is to let the day exhale,  
to open the small, stubborn corners  
where memory hides  
like lint in a pocket.

I lift each moment  
from its hiding place~  
a peach warm in my palm,  
a kitchen light trembling  
on the rim of a glass,  
a childhood street  
still smelling faintly  
of percolator coffee  
and women laughing  
in their housecoats.

Unpacked,  
the world softens.  
It stops pretending  
to be tidy.

It spills~  
slow, honest,  
like a drawer finally opened  
after years of silence.

And I stand there
my hands full of the past
realizing none of it
was ever lost.
It was only waiting 
for me
to unfold it.
Form: Rhyme

Day Sounds of the Deaf

Cock-crow for me is the tring of the alarm clock
unheard but felt as it vibrates against the pillow .

Coffee percolator bubbles (and whistles?)
the puffs of steam tantalizingly call for a sip.

(The susurration of the shower screams to be heard)
but the sharp needles against my skin 
is music to me.

(The siren calls to work)- a flurry
 of movement is my cue.

(Motors hum their tune) - soft purring felt 
by experienced touch
proclaim all is well.

Much mime, smiles, lips  contort, form words
some understood, 
a blessing not to hear the babble
of bitching and politicking
behind backs.

Traffic moves silently 
on greased paths,
colored winks and blinks
in control.

Home again, music is on
and I dance to the rhythm
of blinking lights.

Night, and I shut off the lights
And enter the void
devoid of sight 
and 
unheard
sound. 

~20 Jun 2016~


Grounding Out

My percolator lost its balance
While it was a’bubble,
Spilling all the coffee grounds
And causing lots of trouble.

Below the burners there’s a space
For storing pots and covers,
A perk (no pun intended)
For apartment-living lovers.

Well, coffee grounds were everywhere
As well as brew half-finished
And suddenly my leisure time
For breakfast was diminished.

An hour later, all was clean.
Still, though I wasn’t shirking,
I noticed only 3 of 4
Gas burners now were working.

I made another pot of joe,
My morning meal much later
And took no chances, using
A much bigger percolator.

The stubborn burner got in gear
And soon was back on fire.
I’m glad my stove (from 1951)
Need not retire.
Form: Rhyme

Premium Member A Sense of Holidays

A sense of holidays! 

Blueberry pie hot out of the oven with buttery toppings 
popcorn popping in the pot with oil on the stove 
Lemon and lime are the sour balls used for drinks or garnish 
Take that hot pan out of the oven with your glove.  

Coffee is served with a biscotti, black coffee, strong, steamy 
Fresh coffee beans ground and gurgling through the percolator 
Unsweetened coffee, hot, burns your lips, bitter to the tongue 
Cold ice in the freezer and the glass shelf in the refrigerator.  

Uncle Joe’s gas problem and Aunt Emma’s feet 
As Grandfather breathes and snores through his nose.  
The last crumbs of cinnamon, the last glob of whipped cream 
Take Grandma’s hand when you walk out, she hates to impose.
Form: Rhyme

Hard Rows Well Hoed

It was a Wednesday;
a day woven 
into prison blankets and dish towels.
A day to assess hours unnoticed.
A time of trivial hungers.

The hard heft of earlier times: -
not fitting into anything,
teenage fluff and huff. Heartbreak,
rearing and loss. The fallow traipse of age.
The clinical clunk of clay feet.
Making room in a grave-yard moon,
for faces mislaid.
Those hard rows were all well hoed.

Washing a closed face in a misty mirror.
Listening to the coffee percolator.
trying to shave before its last burble,
ears catching the dark drops of a winter rain,
he creeps again too close 
to a hole in his mind.

He should not be doing this still,
but the hole keeps tugging him.
He must keep throwing raw meat
into that roaring silence.
The hole is deep, and the end of it, is no end.
He wishes he could at least,
install an elevator.
for his ghosts to ride up and down on.

It would give him time
to drink more coffee, and write 
some polite, well-adjusted poetry.

Morning Time

Previous dawns flock together, 
gather.
The hedgerows accumulate 
with old and new. Sprigs and twigs 
bend under the weight of 
heaping feathers.

If eyes open too soon
then a few mornings go missing,

some are still catching up
they will fly in backwards
tumbling out 
of windswept decades.

Eyes that open too late have to wait,
have to stare at a future blankness
while ears gatecrash the present.

Will the thrown newspaper
land on the lower or upper step?
Such collective collections
determine next steps.

The percolator has mixed together
a thousand morning
yet it arrives in normal time 
as one brew.

Outside, beds creak in the tree tops.
blankets unroll.

We find ourselves on the verge
of all previous verges,

swing legs to touch a floor
that rises 
to show up once more.

The Coffee Making Ceremony

An unreflective Bodhisattva
nods to the unwashed dishes.
Once again I seek my morning 
liberation by ways of a dark libation

Next a phlegmy mantra
gummed through spongy lips.
“I sleep, I wake. I sleep, I wake”

The mug is perfunctorily rinsed,
the stains of past desires
ring the rim like hungry ghosts.

I am aware of not being aware.
Ipso facto: I am aware,
but only in the cracks
between random thoughts.

Sweetness comes in pink packets.
The sacraments are torn open
two at a time with habitual practice.
A Zen-like work,
by rote and thought-free.
 
The percolator bubbles a last breath.
Like the Tathagata, I am truly gone.
An arm pours black oozing bliss
Into my mug.

A beatific smile
escapes from grungy features.

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