Long Stymied Poems
Long Stymied Poems. Below are the most popular long Stymied by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Stymied poems by poem length and keyword.
Every day’s a puzzle
And we contemplate the clues.
The blanks are right in front of us;
We either win or lose.
We cannot know if we’ll succeed
When we rise up from sleep.
The crossword boxes wait for us,
Their secrets veiled and deep.
Some days we sail right through and solve
Each riddle, quick and fast;
While others leave us stymied,
With some traps we can’t get past.
The challenges are little tests
And sometimes, we might fail;
But if we don’t give up, perhaps
We’ll possibly prevail.
When nightfall comes we check the page
To see what we’ve completed.
We might feel satisfied and smug
Or tired and depleted.
No matter what the outcome,
If we’re high or in the tank,
Tomorrow is another day
And all the boxes blank.
Way back when, I learned to read
And I was super proud, indeed,
When, with my new-expanded brain,
I read the road sign, “Stay in lane.”
Of course, I didn’t get that sign.
I thought it should say, “Stay in line.”
My dad, the driver, set me straight,
An easy fix to navigate.
My reading’s helped me all these years,
But not so much when switching gears,
For in this world of tech galore,
I’m not as smart as once before.
There’s much I do not understand
And language not at my command,
So I am stymied when I try –
My reading skills do not apply.
I guess that long-ago advice
That I first read must now suffice,
For with computers, it is plain
That I have ventured past my lane.
Skagway, Alaska in the late 1890s was sure a rowdy place alright!
It was seethin' with humanity a-raisin' hell all through the day and night!
'Twas the gateway to Chilkoot Pass beyond which lay Klondike gold!
Why! You could scoop up nuggets by the bushel, or so it was told!
Jefferson Randolph 'Soapy' Smith 'owned' the town and was so very brash.
He came up with nefarious schemes to relieve newcomers of their cash!
Madame Gertie arrived with her soiled doves and set up houses of ill repute.
Among the ladies were Ethel the Moose, Mollie Fewclothes and Maude the Mute!
Tinklin' pianos and screechin' fiddles played in saloons invitin' boozers in.
Hordes of horses whinnied, dogs howled and mules brayed addin' to the din!
The Home of Hooch, Red Onion and Mangy Dog saloons flung open their doors,
To sate the thirsty sots before they tried their luck at diggin' by the scores!
Hawkeye Blevins, notorious gambler, grabbed a table at the Hungry Pub Saloon,
And with slight of hand relieved many gullible rubes of their moolah all too soon!
Even preachers tossed aside Bibles and grabbed shovels to join the endless queue,
To foolishly struggle up Chilkoot Pass in the dead of winter with that motley crew!
A few hardy stampeders found their Eldorado but many more came to naught!
Death, disillusionment and starvation stymied the quest for which they sought.
Many a hapless feller lies beneath that frigid land never more to roam.
Infamous Soapy Smith lies at rest in Skagway Cemetery, there, his final home!
Robert L. Hinshaw, CMSgt, USAF, Retired
(c) All Rights Reserved
Incomprehensible space/time continuum intrigues...
One insignificant, infinitesimal
incomprehensibleness cosmic speck,
who doth readily confess
swallowed within
infinite cosmic wormhole, nonetheless,
he feels mind boggled, fascinated,
transfixed... helpless to express
following concept suddenly
gripping his feeble mental compass.
I haint never gonna get
smart enough to understand
supposedly how universe
under contract to expand
subscribers embracing divine
intervention ascribe to invisible hand
cosmographical phenomena defies
garden variety *****sapien
understanding schema so grand
feeble analogy whereby
Neanderthal apt to understand
lingual mechanics predicated
I grammatically, markedly, pointedly...
exclaim with ampersand.
No particular reason nor rhyme
prompted contemplation
Einsteinian/ Stephen
Hawking concepts sublime
defy one average guy
way past his prime
ideal, optimal, universal... time
to fortify i.e. cognitive ability
brewing, immersing, steeping... gray matter
within astrophysicist clime,
now punishing ignorance mime
limited aptitude climb
stymied best taught during childhood
undoubtedly education pioneer - Haim
Ginott speculate would even
advocate buzzfeeding fetus
with intelligent boosting enzyme.
I chomp at the metaphorical bridled bit
and chafe not being genius like Trump pit
ing president (gag me with a spoon),
and lemme don pith helm mitt
this crash test dummy, whit
no shadow of doubt ready to quit
human race if said nitwit
nabs 20/20 election twit
tilling, spindling, mutilating,
fondling... constitutional sacred writ
issuing dynastic emperor gambit
hastening cremated ashes (mine)
launched into distant orbit
bajillion light years
careering, hopscotching, zipping
eventually reincarnated into runny Babbit
ironically enslaved for profit
blindly obedient dagnabbit,
indentured as intergalactic caddy
fired while under probation as apprentice
up Paul ling lee forced to exit
Sartre's stage door left sporting
embarrassing MAGA prison outfit
hustled away courtesy
as laughingstock exhibit.
Thus, I helm ship of state into black void
alone within cosmos, yes...overjoyed!
Questions are proliferating,
people search for answers
in old pants pockets
in long discarded purses.
The scampering feet of baby philosophers
can be heard from the moon.
The media is stymied, they are manipulating,
confiscating and hiding behind the backs
of massively overgrown ballers,
willy-nilly they scribble an alternative reality
upon indoor swimming pools.
The manic mayhem of our daily grind
is wearing our hair thin,
Somebody should take control of the truth,
but it keeps dodging questions
and slamming doors behind it.
Mark my words with invisible ink,
scratch a cat behind its ears,
somersault all you like
but we are all getting overrun
by imperfect pontifications
by the indecent Doctors of spin.
and all this endless self-questioning
keeps replying over and over again
but only in unbreakable code.
Divine angelic embodiment...
amazingly graced yours truly -
And the missus earlier today
December thirtieth two thousand nineteen
ah... charming angelic gal heaven sent
voluntarily drove us from CJ's
(2009 Hyundai Sonata needs alternator)
1405 S Township Line Road,
Royersford, PA 19468
to 2 Highland Manor drive
Schwenksville, Pennsylvania 19468
upon overhearing conversation
whereby our 2009 Hyundai Sonata
necessitated replaced alternator.
Thus toting another mortal
(worth her weight in gold)
random act of kindness to behold
I felt incumbent to repay,
yet no money in billfold
thus random stranger
need be given and/or told
pro bono favor, lest
good nature within me will scold
Matthew Scott Harris,
perhaps even exact chokehold
regarding being recipient
exhausting list to enumerate,
yet nonetheless manifold
instances since boyhood
until thyself languishing
and getting farblondjet and old.
Found friends, Romans, teaser
countrymen... (think Julius Caesar,
salad days by William Shakespeare
if alive, a very old geezer
occurring in Act III, scene II),
perhaps also incorporating Ebenezer
Scrooge as greater dramatic pleaser.
I feel farblondget, farchadat,
fardeiget, and stymied
as cumulative intercessors
when this schlemiel in need
especially when a wee thing
how eldest and youngest sister indeed
countless occasions far exceed
ding dewey decimal, emotional,
financial, remuneration recompense
such focus on self, I willingly concede
at this age (scoring few till orbitz) read
ding those earlier years of mein kampf
in retrospect this bloke now freed
with less self centeredness and greed.
That's too much information
Speak slower
Oh my, that was too loud
Be quiet
I don't like when you talk
Be still
Words...so many WORDS
...restraint
How does one find balance
Truth must be spoken
DISLIKE Declarations
Have left me broken
...silence
Pressure builds
Hope thins, like ice inviting a skate
Movement feels like plodding
Toward an armed gate
...stymied
Breathe of life, failed
I can not sense my heart
It may be beating, yet
I know not where to start
...lost
Trust feels odd, out of sync
No forward, no going back
Nervous system, reset
Discernment has gone black
...grace....whispers
You are loved
Written by Trudy Schrader on 02-18-2026
When I was just a little boy
we picnicked under alpine skies,
one time a mule deer strolled out
and fed in the meadow nearby.
Tall, curving antlers rising up
from a regal, tan-grey head
“The finest buck I’ve ever seen,”
were the words my father said.
Then I noticed something moving,
a tawny shape slinked through trees,
suddenly my father leapt on up
and put himself in front of me.
But it wasn’t me in danger,
though the cougar inspired fear,
that stealthy cat had yellow eyes
fixed upon the stately deer.
“Get on out of here!”Dad shouted,
and the deer froze in alarm,
out bounded the great cougar,
In one leap moving so far.
Then the buck, he startled,
In a stott he flew away,
for a few frantic moments
the cougar, he gave chase!
But cougars are cast as sprinters,
not built for marathons,
in seconds the cat gave up
and the buck kept running on.
That’s what I remembered
as a boy of only four,
though when I did grow older
I remembered something more...
I could recall the flashing teeth
plunging into the deer’s neck,
I could recall my mother screaming,
my dad shouting,”Get back!”
I remember seeing the cougar
stare back and snarl at us,
and I remember leaving quickly,
my dad picking me up.
I suppose that my young mind
had to block out what I’d seen,
far too young to deal with it
I started misremembering.
A strong defense mechanism
built up by the conscious mind,
but the subconscious saw it all,
and waited patiently for its time.
It reappeared at twelve years old,
the truth my youth blocked out.
It had an effect, a serious one,
it filled my head with doubts.
How could such violence coexist
with a world of such beauty?
And if that proud deer went down,
what awaited a budding teen?
Pondering such for long hours
did not make me popular,
yet the more I blocked it,
the more uncertainty stirred.
I kept asking those deep questions
about power, evil, and will,
unaware that they’d stymied
minds of far better skill.
To this day I have no answers,
though asking was good for me,
turned pondering into a job
writing pop philosophy.
All of it traced to that day,
my first brush with mortal fear,
when I learned Earth is the type of place
where the cougar eats the deer.
I
F
only I
could navigate
to stay so far away
from the idle brambles.
Transcending into oblivion.
Melding onward in transition,
Forcibly blocked continuance,
A mouse stymied in a maze.
Not any forward progression
My endeavour, to look back,
To retrace the journey so far.
Abandon the will to proceed.
Return from whence we were.
No wise, guiding light to follow.
Search for a better way forward.
Seeking from my Spirit in the sky.
He releases the confusion suffered.
Leading from this halted way of life.
Still illuminates His pathways onward.
For eternal bliss is granted by His presence.
Freedom unhindered by God’s Almighty Grace.
As He makes the bell toll for me as He rings it with
His
Love
!
How do you go from what you know
To a place you've never been
I trusted in the flow of water
To quench thirst again...and again
This time is different, without a grid
To weigh and measure progress
No anchor for this vessel
To feel safe where a nomad could finally rest
Provision changed to daily bread
The system of fear is finally gone
His mercies are new each morning
Bringing peace from darkness to dawn
It's the judgment that kept me away
It stymied movement in what should be
WORD requires one to follow
Without confirmation from brothers in ministry
No money, no car, no home, no job
The four walls have become flying air
What is the point of true freedom
If no mark in time can define when soul is "there"
Just over the threshold of the new
We wait for the water to move us on
So difficult, for thoughts to cease
When the old ways are still not gone
Written by Trudy Schrader on 06-01-2026