Long Repelled Poems
Long Repelled Poems. Below are the most popular long Repelled by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Repelled poems by poem length and keyword.
These are nature poems about unusual plants like the moonflower and agave.
Moonflower
by Michael R. Burch
after Robert Hayden
Marveling,
we at last beheld the achieved flower—
both awed and repelled by its alienness,
its moonlit petals,
its cloying fragrance,
its transcendence,
its shimmering and wavering intimations of mortality ...
To Flower
by Michael R. Burch
We are not long for this earth, I know—
you and I, all our petals incurled,
till a night of pale brilliance, moonflower aglow.
Is there love anywhere in this strange world?
The agave knows best when it’s time to die
and rages to life with such rapturous leaves
her name means Illustrious. Each hour more high,
she claws toward heaven, for, if she believes
in love at all, she has left it behind
to flower, to flower. When darkness falls
she wilts down to meet it, where something crawls:
beheaded, bewildered. And since love is blind,
she never adored it, nor watches it go.
Can we be as she is, moonflower aglow?
When Pentheus [“grief’] went into the mountains in the garb of the bacchae, his mother [Agave] and the other maenads, possessed by Dionysus, tore him apart (Euripides, Bacchae; Apollodorus 3.5.2; Ovid, Metamorphoses 3.511-733; Hyginus, Fabulae 184). The agave dies as soon as it blooms; the moonflower, or night-blooming cereus, is a desert plant of similar fate.
Our English Rose
by Michael R. Burch
for my mother Christine Ena Burch
The rose is?
the ornament of the earth,
the glory of nature,
the archetype of the flowers,
the blush of the meadows,
a lightning flash of beauty.
This is my translation/interpretation of a Sappho epigram.
Keywords/Tags: nature, moonflower, agave, flower, petals, rose, earth, beauty, beautiful, night, mortality
To claim more imperialist Russian land.
An invasion of a neighbor was planned.
Unbacked slander was said about them.
Creating for the world a major problem.
Putin claimed they were a pro-Nazi harbor.
But the truth really couldn’t be any farther.
Ukrainians have always been their target.
The Holodomor is a genocide not to forget.
Between wars one and two, Joseph Stalin
orchestrated the starvation for many fallen.
To feed communism, millions were deprived.
The empty breadbasket for Europe arrived.
So generations later the bully is back.
But now other countries cut no slack.
While they attack innocent civilians.
It’s obvious they are truly the villains.
Destroying homes and those trapped inside.
Soldiers with unjust orders forced to abide.
Attacking neighborhoods of peaceful kids.
Willing exterminators as the Kremlin bids.
But their target shoots back and hits hard.
The fighter won the crowd on the undercard.
Like a hard uppercut from Mayor Kltichko.
The Ukrainian’s counterpunch is on show.
The other Vladimir is a modern David.
Daily turning the Russian Goliath livid.
Shoring up defenses as the underdog.
Battling through heavy gunpowder fog.
Swaying global leaders to invest in defense.
Convincing nations Soviets make no sense.
In this invasion, the bully is being repelled.
As global Ukrainian patriotism has swelled.
Depleting the Russian tanks by the hundred.
Forcing civilian involuntary enlistment dread.
Fleeing their nation to avoid an early death.
As troops are rushed into their final breath.
Unprepared to invade into mortal combat.
Putin’s propaganda machine caused that.
Forcing battles soldiers don’t want to fight.
Knowing the motives for war are not right.
Nations give Ukraine billions in military aid.
Causing global inflation to devalue our paid.
So we cut jobs with layoffs for bottom lines.
To fund fatal battles in forests full of pines.
It was lonely, but I was searching for a dumb excuse, so I could explain that I only needed a break.
A breath of fresh air would do me great wonders, for these
harsh words I fought to contain.
If I said I was wounded, or that i was constantly panicked, then those words would be the only ones you would take.
Bold of you to assume that I ran in fear of the dark. I embraced and befriended that shadow, for I am far from plain.
A fool would think I did cry. A royal guard would scoff and spit as if I had asked pity.
I am sorry to disappoint, for such acts are paralleled of that which i desired.
Pointing all of the blame towards me, what a shame of what has come to be.
I repelled your charred kettle, spurned from the hell of which you have conspired.
Suppressing my sullen expression, I regress as I roll my eyes at your tantrums, thrown in a manner like that of a child.
All the while my jar of swarming bees have settled to a light buzz. Why has my own zen gotten you all bent and riled?
That spicy flavor which once burned my senses now tastes of sweet honey. My bee hive will neigh again become defiled.
The clanking migraine from the loud chatter emitting from your flapper, has taught me how to adjust when all goes wild.
In eighteen seventy nine; twenty second of January
Was the day of a great battle and for the Zulus victory
At Isandlwana the Zulu army showed no fear
Against British guns, armed with shield and spear.
Twelve thousand warriors from the Zulu nation
Wiped out the British, a total annihilation
With such a large force the camp was soon overun
With hand to hand combat, under African sun.
Nearly a thousand British soldiers died that day
A few played dead and managed to get away
Some headed for Rorkes Drift never looking back
Warning the soldiers there of an impending attack.
Not far from the battle stood the mission station
By the Buffalo river a tranquil location
Five thousand warriors marched on Rorkes Drift
A hundred and thirty nine stood ready to resist.
Dispite wave after wave the British repelled their attack
With rifle and bayonet; they pushed the Zulus back
The Zulus regrouped and moved in for the kill
An officer gave the command to fire at will .
The battlefield was covered with the bodies of the slain
With spears, shields and blood all over the terrain
It wasn't until the morning of the following day
That the Zulus retreated and went on their way.
Eleven Victoria crosses were won at Rorkes drift
For courage and bravery; shown in that conflict
Five hundred Zulu warriors paid the ultimate cost
Whilst seventeen British soldiers in battle were lost.
Against overwhelming odds the British held the line
And Rorkes Drift today is a museum and a shrine
Tour guides at the site will tell you the story
Of those brave British soldiers and their hour of glory.
(The Victoria Cross or VC is the highest and most prestigious award given
to members of the British armed forces for valour in the face of the enemy.)
Lithuania has told Vladimar Putin to keep out of our nation
They've been shifting freight to and from the Russian federation
Putin has said they'll take action, it's just another hollow threat
But if he takes any kind of military action with force he'll be met.
Any hostile act against one, is a hostile action against us all
Lithuania has nothing to fear and it's Vlad Putin who'll fall
Because any hostile action will then trigger article five
NATO will respond with force, and Putin will be lucky to survive.
If Vladimar Putin wants to send freight to the Kaliningrad region
He'll have to find another way, the west won't give permission
But NATO' s eagle eyes are watching, Vladimar Putin's every move
And certainly won't back down, the west has nothing to prove.
Russia's botched special operation so far, has been a total disaster
They think Ukraine will give in to bombings, atrocities and slaughter
Ukrainians are proud and would rather die, than lose their sovereignty
And have repelled the Russians in battle with acts of sheer bravery.
Written 21st June 2022
Ah! Yes! Yes! You say my poetry
reminds you of a great musician;
the ear to feel and a heart
to impart—so the conductor
motions his vessels to sail:
a pianissimo or great crescendo!
I think that breeze, that wind
that went into us all
should always blow out,
a journey full, an ocean roar
as we are commissioned to assimilate,
translate, define and refine
the creator into something
even more loftily created:
Each cell with its own vibratory sound;
independent while attractive--
repelled by others
be-spelled by sirens,
as the snake its victims
and the saint
its helpless devotees
entwined;
whether toward or away
one flees the entombment--
breaking the shell of fear
we blossom while unfold--
we write a new reality;
The discord!
The harmony!
Volumes that chase
then surround—the ever
splintering light we pursue
a multitude of wands--reconstitute
and tune,--Ah! Such exaltations
can be violent, can be harmony;
Yet they are all divine--beauty
and pain fall and rise
as smoke dissipates leaving
a beaming new sky.
Should we be less
than a symphony of all sorts?
And those players of Shakespeare,
should we not be
players off the stage as well as on?—anything less
would be true hell, transcending those fictitious demons,
powerless were it not for our complicity;
and so possessed the stage itself...and the theater
pillars, and the sky translucent,
a cathedral dome for our blessed cradle,
heaven peering in on its young,
adoring man's perfect, soulful evacuation,
each poem a religious icon of sorts--
No, we should not think ourselves merely children
of the sun and moon—nor those
limited by music of enchanted spheres,
for we are
at our shores
and depths
the effulgence of
all blessed
composing tears.
I can vividly remember the day we met and the occasion that led to that. It feels like it was just yesterday.
Yes I'm aware of what I'm saying because since I met you I had always wished the days ran slower so we would together spend tomorrow today
I had always told myself that I wasn't ready to fall in love or be in a relationship so my heart always repelled emotions.
But the moment I met you, my ticker rebelled my notions
I thought I was still in control till I realised that anytime we spent together, I never wanted it to come to an end.
You had somehow succeeded in driving a wedge between my heart and the principles that guided my head.
...and somehow I was comfortable with the uncommon feeling.
My brain tried to make sense of it like it always does but this time, it couldn't because it was way beyond unravelling.
"This looks like a job for the heart" the head said, so I gave in.
Gave in to the feeling of what I feel for you and this feeling is fulfilling.
I know my heart is confused bout a lot of things but not this.
Not a moment goes by that I am not happy my principles lost that feud, because if I hadn't gotten to know you?
That would have been terrible news.
Now, I'm not saying I love you
I'm saying there is no existence of love without you
I'm saying I wouldn't know what love is, if I hadn't found you
I'm saying, I never really thought 'love' was real in this life till I met you and now I think life isn't real without your love.
I'm not trying to explain how you make me feel
I'm trying to explain the way you changed how I feel
For a task to be completed, you need the complete set of tools. My existence has always been missing a rib; you complete me and I with you by my side I have achieved life's goal.
Which is it: you can't get started unless
you're riding some current bigger than your reporting voice
or the best time to write is when you don't have much to say
and without plenty to say about everything you'll get better right away.
Form is very often a betrayal of reality
or, although we are initially drawn to poems by their passion and urgency,
we are convinced by the formal means invented
for their impelling motives. Every accidental crack or dent.
Not just mildly disquieted but actively repelled,
running for the River Styx, the doors of Hell pell mell,
there must be a crack, deep and unmendable, in the poet
that the poet must forever try to mend. Or not.
While mortal poets imitate, immortal poets steal.
That's plagiarism. Fortunately the public feels
less strongly about poetry than television,
communism and aging gracefully through meditation.
Now I'm being silly. My silly indefatigable lusting,
silly sadness, silly arguing and silly trusting.
All I do not know about our nation's history, wars
and what showering the people you love with love does.
Ransacking apothegms, algorithms
and selling the loot as memes,
dissemblings. Or bearing fardels
with the warrior's skull.
A Poem Of WW1
ANZAC Day
25th April 2018
Let’s have at Johnny Turk
Winston Churchill said,
We’ll secure the Dardanelles,
Keep our Russian trade fed.
His words so casually uttered
May have had to be eaten
Johnny Turk was well Generalled
And not so easily beaten.
The naval campaign to start
Was, at a price, repelled,
The following land invasion
Was resisted and held.
After eight cruel months
Our forces were withdrawn
Half a million dead and wounded
Left for both sides to mourn.
They came from India, New Zealand,
Australia, Canada, Europe as well
Only to leave their bones
In Gallipoli’s Hell.
And so it ended,
A campaign of disaster
With massive repercussion
Felt for so long after.
Constantinople never taken,
The Ottoman Empire in shreds,
Turkey arisen from the ashes which
Gallipoli General Attaturk led.
Words attributed to Attaturk
On a plaque overlooking the Bay
Honouring the dead of all Nations
Still stands to this very day.
Eighty one cemeteries and memorials
Now overlook that battle’s scene
The only mute and grim reminder
That a disastrous campaign had been.
And so we parade each year
To respect and honour the memories,
Of those that survived and those
Resting in foreign cemeteries.
This Poem was read out by Padre Ralph Catts, our Honorary Padre, at Hull Cenotaph ANZAC Day Parade. I had the honour of laying a wreath on behalf of Hull Veteran Support Centre. The Poem was written for the occaision.
Imagine that you could alter reality:
and let your imagination reduce you
to a tiny, itty-bitty, microscopic cell;
inside the human body.
Your world would be a strange one indeed:
reduced to a single cell,
afloat in a sea of plasma;
teeming with white hunter-cells,
and blood-red corpuscles.
Now, let yourself shrink down even further;
to an atom, complete with a halo of electrons
that is paradoxically attracted and repelled
by the core of your being.
A singularity,
you're a microscopic universe
onto yourself.
You're now the foundation of reality,
an essential building block of life.
Yet, you're so infinitesimally small,
that you're oblivious to
the big picture;
which, but for you, would not exist.