Long Room Poems
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Written: May 22, 2026, for a contest sponsored by Daniel Henry Rodgers
3rd place contest winner
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They found it in a cellar no one remembered building—
a small box of tarnished brass, hinges soft as old breath,
a warm lid that felt like it had been pondering for a long time.
Scholars termed it a mnemonic engine,
while clerics labeled it a sin-counter.
Children claimed it housed a star that forgot how to shine.
The lady who inherited it—
The one with the quivering hand and the always-paused voice—knew better.
She had seen the way the box listened.
When she approached, the air thickened,
as if the room were holding its breath to avoid spoiling a pledge.
The box never opened for her or anyone else.
It often shifts its weight on the table at night like a dreamer rolling over.
She kept it despite demurs that it buzzed, projected shades in locations,
no lantern may explain, and knew things no object should recall.
When she tried to leave it behind,
the silence in her chest grew heavier, as if the box were
only keeping her unspoken life from collapsing.
She swore she heard it whisper, never words, some nights.
A quiet, rhythmic counting sound.
Counting her unspoken regrets, options, and lost selves.
Maybe the sum of times she walked back from a truth.
The reliquary kept its secret.
It waited, watched, and held what she couldn't say.
After she died, they found the box beside her,
still closed, warm, and listening.
No one dared touch it, but someone claimed they heard it exhale—
a long, relaxed breath, as if it had stopped counting???
There's a moment everyday where we choose to listen to love or ignore its cry.
Though ignoring it gets easier when we don't even try.
We get so caught up in our own lives that we no longer endear.
Everyday we need to love ourselves and also our peers.
And to care about what's living in the world and not possessing things of the world.
Theres no victory at the end, for the most money someone has gained.
Only being alone with all the possessions that was strived to obtain.
All the while, having life wasted on things that clearly don't matter.
After all, it will be left behind with whatever was our stature.
Before its realized,a little too late,
Take time to love someone and someone's love, appreciate.
If were not willing to love one another, how can we expect a change?
By doing nothing, everything remains the same.
If we don't allow love to drive us, then evil gladly will.
There's plenty of vacancies awaiting love that we need to instill.
As time pushes us along, we continue to develop our own self-distractions.
We're becoming slaves of the world, instead of having love steer our every action.
Consequently, evil's tree of hate continues to grow.
And as long as we're helping it pollinate, then hate will bestow.
We all have a part in how the world blossoms.
To be a benefit, we need to look at ourselves and weed out the problems.
Once we rid ourselves of whats choking our soul,
Then love has room to spread and it's good will surely grow.
Unfortunately, love has been sadly pushed to the wayside.
It's even deemed ludacris and only in our mind.
Contrarily, love is meant to be the focal point of our lives.
And to do what's right knowing God is by our side.
Let's not allow satan to lure us into his game.
For it will only bring hardship and a life full of pain.
Some things of beauty is based solely on deception.
Like an oleander, so alluring, but has deadly poison in its possession.
In order for the radiance of love to flourish, it needs us to convey.
By us being it's vessel, and allowing it to guide our way.
For the next three poems I choose "I don't know?" and "baptism" since these are old poems that I found that survived the burnings. I no longer write like this, but the last of the three is more my slant towards Robert Creeley.
pairs of praying hands, perched
upon flowers, unfold and take
to flight as butterflies.
streams applaud in passing,
dashing water upon rock,
the sound of no hands clapping.
pebble splashing ripples
echo claustrophobic feelings
of the ceilingless room.
in the sunset, rows of reeds,
standing in standing
ovation, fade and fuse into oneness.
and there you are,
a barefooted ballerina
caught in kinetic
storm sway hip gyrations,
dancing a top a music box
of mud.
Form:
I rose up from my bed, feeling better than I have in weeks;
With energy that has been absent, feeling rosiness in my cheeks.
I felt like I could dance and waltzed across the floor,
Twirling an imaginary partner I danced and waltzed some more.
I was light on my feet, feeling like I was floating in the air;
The shortness of breath I’ve had - no longer was it there.
Then suddenly I realized, there were people watching me,
How they came to be in my room was a total mystery.
I started recognizing faces of people from my past;
Some of whom it was many years since I’d seen them last.
Their faces were aglow; they smiled from cheek to cheek;
I turned back toward my hospital bed – where my body laid in its final sleep.
I felt an initial shock, mixed with panic and some fear,
When the meaning of my feeling good to me had become clear.
Then a nurse walked in my room and my pulse she tried to take;
She turned off all the monitors and covered up my face.
I felt a tapping on my shoulder and recognized her at first glance;
My wife who passed four years ago asked, “May I have this dance?”
Gina getting ready for bed, in her three-bedroom bungalow. She was waiting for her eldest son to get home from a night out. He often stayed with friends but hadn’t informed her yet. It was eleven o’clock already. She gave up and went upstairs.
Her bedroom, wooden flooring, flower wallpaper and a four-poster bed. She liked to keep her bedroom dimly lit.
Today, for some reason she couldn’t understand, she thought she was being watched. The light flickering didn’t seem to help. She thought she saw a shadow of a man standing behind her. She got the chills. She undressed into her night gown feeling uneasy. She looked round the room but couldn’t see anything. She climbed into bed and put the night lamp on, rested her head on her arm on the pillow.
She dazed a bit and thought she saw the man again this time sitting on a chair watching her. She stared at the empty seat, alarmed.
Then before her eyes a dark shadow formed on the seat, it was a man staring at her.
She grabbed her pillow and sunk her face, shaking.
The shadow was a tall friendly face man in his forties, deep black eyes and a suit on. He spoke, “Hello, Gina, are you frightened”
Gina in all her strength looked up and stared at him. She was blurting nonsense.
In response the man got up and walked toward the bed staring deep in her eyes. Gina saw he had black eyes; she couldn’t see any pupil but just dark eyes, they locked and she was motionless.
Fishing boat
A man bought an old fishing vessel
it had a steering house, but the door was rotten
he got a new door a painted it sea green.
Sometimes he forgot to close the door and a sea lime wave
swept him on to the deck, when tried to find the handle
a flounder hang on it he slipped hit his head on the ladder
on the step leading into the steering room.
He painted the door black but when he after navigating
rough sea he turned and found the colour ominous, so he
painted the door in rainbow colours, this made the head spin he opened
the door, but the emerald sea came in.
washed him back on the deck.
And I have no idea how to end this story ends, but his boat
was full of tunny fish.
Stage Fright
This has been a long Sunday it started off with two toasts with cheese and the glucose rose to stratospheric, insulin is needed where the heck
Is the bloody needle, mlg if you please followed by a thundering heart and unwanted anxiety, I have tried to overcome for over 60 years
In my younger days, I tried to overcome my nerves by drinking whisky as a calmer which made me annoyed with anxiety-riddled myself
My wish was and still is to be a brave person, who is able to express himself with confidence But, no deal baby, I ended up alone in a room
It is not like I don’t know what caused my total lack of confidence, our dysfunctional family was poor and I was literary farmed out
I was fourteen years old when I was set free to get a job as an errand boy in an office of nice people, who made me feel loved and wanted
Somehow, despite my nervous hands and clumsy manners, I was able to get an education, which was well-paid, in the Norwegian merchant navy
Later in life, I was in the café trade both in Britain and in Norway a business one has to be social and I had the hope to be cured of awkwardness
Finally, I sold out and went to live in Portugal where I bought a ruined house, fixed it up, and for years lived alone with a dog as companion
My dog died, and my aloneness became ghostly until I met a woman and my life changed, but my nervousness didn’t, but it didn’t bother her
I look back on my life and ask how the hell, did I managed this, with a lump of fear in my stomach nervous hands, and a lack of self-confidence
The house on the prairie is sold, and my rustic dream is over, what the hell man, stop worrying about where to live tomorrow
As I sit in my chair, I stretch and feel, without hesitation pleased with myself, a voice utters, you are a jerk, now, take Elon Musk……
Halloween at the Bates Hotel
The attendant in the Ghostface rig was kinda creepy,
When I came in to pay the gas I owed.
“Is there a motel nearby? I’m really sleepy.”
He pointed down a dark and dreary road.
No kids were Trick-or-Treating that Halloween night,
Nothing was open. I couldn’t buy nor sell.
I could barely see. There wasn’t a single light.
Then I saw the sign for the Bates Hotel
The clerk in drag, carrying a dripping blade,
Said they had a sudden opening;
But first he had to get the room remade.
“Why don’t you stroll outside, see what’s happening.”
Some spaced-out dwarves were shuffling ‘round the mortuary,
While a Tall Man looked down from up above.
Nearby a big dude in a goalie mask was swinging a machete,
Taunting a burned guy wearing a freaky glove.
Another dude was gardening, cutting something at night,
Sporting a leather mask and a gas chainsaw.
But a walking-talking Good Guy doll gave me the biggest fright--
He was probably the weirdest thing I saw.
I decided to head back; this town gave me the ‘willies’.
A big shape and a clown grabbed me outside the Bates Hotel!
“I’m Mike Myers, and my friend’s name’s Penny.
We’ve come to convey you back to Hell.”
I loved the old films, as a kid; their monotone pictures of theaters golden age, presented shadows that allowed a viewers imagination to soar to great heights in unknown realms. Movies today don’t allow room for imagination to expand; it’s all there in color; the worst part of films today…they leave the viewer unchallenged and often bored. One’s imagination is halted, leaving the viewer unable to anticipate the plot of a sequel; there’s no inspiration for a viewer to create their own story either. I want the golden era back.
Life gifts all creatures
With an imagination;
It gives zest to life.
They would ripen all at once
under a hot sun and hang
in a sugary glut only for a day
or two before starting to spoil.
I had to be quick and when
the time came,
I hurried home
from school to clamber up
the tree and seize
the fruit. Each was a warm,
engorged globe of flesh
with just a hint of give
when a finger was pressed
into skin.
No command,
not even from God,
could have held back a bite.
Mouthfuls of sweet peach
sent every pleasure bud
on the tongue into a spasm
and spilt the overload
oozing out of the corners
of stretched lips.
Great gulps
were hurried down the throat
to make room for another bite.
No savoring restraint held
me back, this was volume.
All afternoon
my face and hands
dripped a sticky syrup,
coating my shirt.
Finally I would have my fill
and sit bloated beneath
the tree surrounded
by peachstones some still
encased in leftovers
of pinkish flesh. Sorry evidence
to convict. Afterwards,
a terrible remorse always
took hold. Next day
I thought my stomach ache
was punishment from above.
Every year of my childhood,
in the heat of late summer,
I repeated the same sin,
suffered the same consequence,
hoped for forgiveness
from a wrathful God.