Long Survival Poems
Long Survival Poems. Below are the most popular long Survival by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Survival poems by poem length and keyword.
i was eight
the first time-
i saw Yin-Yang Mountain.
the height of it’s peak
contrasted by
the light on one side
dark on the other.
as the sun travels
from east to west
the color of the slopes change-
the light becoming dark
the dark becoming light.
i stand on the peak of Yin-Yang Mountain
watching the shifting
light and dark.
the line dividing the sinuous halves
is my being.
am I dark or light?
a white line or
a black line?
i am the curve between.
i am the difference.
i am the deciding factor.
i stand now
beside the River of Life.
my feet bare-
i step into the cool waters
observing the shifting reflection
and shadow.
the current swirls the dark and the light.
this life giving, fluid filled gully
brings darkness when one is consumed
by its waters.
above the light is reflected-
below it is swallowed.
soothed i sit-
resting below the shelter
of the Tree of Constance.
the trunk is thick
made of layers of living matter within-
dead matter out.
the dead bark surrounds
the living core-
protecting.
from this sturdy core
branches shoot towards the light.
from those branches shoot buds-
which contain life-giving seeds.
the seeds fall to the ground below.
laying upon the dark
mineral rich earth-
i imagine.
below my body burrow
insects and roots.
they depend upon the fertile
ground for survival.
humans have turned this earth into
a burial ground for the fallen.
the rotting bodies consumed in darkness
feed the creatures who dwell
in the earth.
these departed whisper
knowledge to fallen seeds.
imparting wisdom-
to ensure growth.
I return to the peak-
of Yin-Yang Mountain.
from this peak i observe
the mixture around me.
here on this peak I know
the answers.
i am the wisdom.
this knowledge has paralyzed me.
with this gift i have been silenced.
i am the dividing line-
i am the question.
with faith I fall-
from the peak of Yin-Yang Mountain
into the icy waters of the
River of Life.
it’s turbulent ebb and flow
fills me with life
and destroys me when dragged upon its floor.
i wash upon the shore
gasping for air-
clinging to the root.
I succumb.
i begin to rot-
feeding the earth-
that feeds the tree-
that thrives beside the river-
which dwells upon the slopes
of Yin-Yang Mountain.
here i will remain-
until discovered-
and then understood-
this
my Youth in Asia.
Who is responsible
domestic violence?
in the home...
responsible for rape?
while bullying in schools
escalates?
fact anti-social behavior
begins in the home!
millions of excuses used
drugs-sex-mental illness-debt
alcohol-infidelity-uncompromising
ass-hole
why not blame stress!
to name but a few...
thats' new, slap on a label
anti-social cripple
self centered compelled
subservient with a death wish
co-dependant on a mission
many incapable of raising
families successfully
matching crime to criminal
sooner rather than later
people who want children
most should be screened
the ones that have violent
tendency maybe steralise
these...
protect the unborn spirit
this cycle of perdition
simply 'cause some can
protection remains
the question...
until we fill up our prisons
or doctors fill out prescriptions
or do drugs - prostitution
or some souls
simply disappear
abuse of the sexes disaster
children
lives destined for remand
some cultures self destructive
buck the system for a laugh
self discipline escapes them
some victims choose suicide
alternative families to the rescue!
marriages deplete
truth uncovered
primary social group
breaking down
mere survival havoc wreaks!
social injustice
social acceptance
to live in a relationship
without independence?
when we break the cycle?
we immerge stronger-
children safer
home wreckers
so yesterday
some sexual couples
complete disasters
I deserve a happy life
a happy life I've got
living without violence
is where we all need to start
repeat not the acts of
your fore mothers forefathers
the violence does not work
mental physical verbal abuse
is a hostile mind at work
he's weak disqualified from life
primal evil reactivated strife
programmes of violence repeated
not strong enough in mind deleted
disrespected, feared, without
honor in most cases cannot repair
don't be a victim, of archaic hatred
suffer little children NOT!
this world though numb
Is nevertheless disgusted
authorities ears to the ground
we have heard your cries aloud
take it from one who knows
let all that s@%t go!
don't repeat their mistakes
look inside make new choices
you decide fill your life with
love...
...or misery will connect the dots
My phone died this week.
I’ve ordered a new one—
I’d like to say I’ve enjoyed the silence,
just lo-fi music playing, slipping into a flow state.
But I’d be lying.
Only a handful of friends to tell.
Enough to register
the tragedy of going off-grid
like it’s 1503—
where I imagine
I’d be decent
at throwing logs on a fire,
but useless at hunting.
No survival instinct.
I get sentimental when it gets quiet.
It's surprising
that this is how I finally understand
what Black Mirror really meant.
Slick glass, dark and dead,
reflecting back:
smeared rectangle
of myself
slack-jawed, staring.
Neither of us blinking—
only one of us
alive,
allegedly.
I’d had that phone
since before the pandemic.
It held more than my cache:
its shape, my memory—
my hand
aches
for its frictionless drag,
but I had to get a replacement.
I picked the same model,
not out of loyalty,
just me hoping
it would backfill the imprint
of its ancestor.
I'm not too proud
to admit
I miss the constancy,
companionship,
the fugue-state afternoons
given over to scrolling.
I’ve been more alone than I expected.
And lonelier still,
realizing
how much of me
was never here to begin with.
It's a disorienting false north,
this gatherlessness; I'm still sitting with it.
By the way, it's untrue news
that tech is soulless—
it's been up
at least one mortal ever since
my husband powered it on for me,
a gift,
ersatz affection
in response to a lack of discretion
he'd only recently admitted.
And get this: apparently, I cry now.
Despite half a life of spent
convincing myself
I’d therapized it out—
that tears were just poorly timed
girlish things I'd evicted
due to their silencing effect.
I was wrong,
they were only hiding in the attic—
turns out all this noise was just insulation
from every soft place.
Evenings with him feel longer.
He’s older, closer
to death than me. He’d hate that I said it.
I won’t tell him. We’ve learned
to steer clear of each other’s art.
No rules about who we kill
on the page.
Best to leave it that way.
I wonder if we'll go back to old habits.
I think I already know answer.
This screenless space hasn’t been clarifying—
just absence,
with no metaphor to cushion it.
At the risk of repeating myself,
I do know this:
I miss her, Distraction—
"Do you really think I am that heartless to just leave my parents in danger without any shame? Guilt? I felt all of that. Many times in my journey I almost turned back, but I could not win against my heart's desires. I could not avoid the fate the gods had laid out for me. I too am a victim." At this point, Princess Layla was bawling her eyes out. She knew she had the Lady of the Gods eating out of her hands, when the old woman bent down and hugged her tightly whilst also crying.
"It's okay, my child. Your parents are alive. The king did not sentence them to death, because the empress bore a son resulting in the pardon of everyone who had committed a crime.Thank the merciful gods." The news of her parents survival did nothing for Princess Layla as they too had sacrificed her to the king , but she was glad her escape had not caused any bloodshed.
In the moment of distraction, the old witch raised a dagger and mercilessly stabbed Princess Layla in the back. "Wh..y", the princess inquired as color drained from her rosy cheeks. The old witch stood and left but as her silhoutte faded to a black shadow, her final words rang loud in dying ears. "A princess who betrays her nation deserves nothing less than death."
"Outrageous! What kind of play has such a... a stupid end?" That's all Princess Jasmine could think of as she watched the princess take her final breath on stage. She finally understood why her mom insisted she see the play. It was a warning, a friendly warning. As the truthness of it all hit her, Princess Jasmine was ever so thankful to be sitted. Her insides felt queasy as fear gripped her. She could suddenly feel a cold blade on her warm skin. No. No. No! She had to get out of here. Tell Robert that they couldn't run away together. Tell him she loved him but had to marry the king. How could she betray her kingdom? Granted she hadn't done anything but she'd thought of it and mother knew. Oh, no! Mother knows. Is Robert okay? She wouldn't do anything to him, would she? Oh, no! No. NO. As her thoughts spiraled out of control, Princess Jasmine stumbled out of the suffocating theater like a drunkard. In her hurried, haphazard exit, she bumped into a dark figure. For a moment, a handsome smile invaded her line of vision. When she tried a sorry, she really regretted scoffing down all the those cakes they gave out during the cursed play.
Was the purpose of your absence an attempt at causing me pain?
That crippling feeling, a spider spinning its web inside my mind.
That arachnid, poisonous, jeers the word space like a handicap.
That parasitic relationship forms a cloud covering the moonlight,
A fog that swirls like a whirlpool in your absence. How rapturous
Your paradox forming a bridge made from our memories. Broken and
Reshaped they become the foundation to a journey in that sea you
Created within me. Your withered emotions and fleeting empathy
were a false proposition of hope only a jester would find funny.
An exhibition of animosity lies in the silent waves – waiting –
for our sunset. How beautiful its rays are against the black water;
falling into the abyss, hidden under that rain your pseudo blanket.
Does the sunrise when you are blind? Does the moon set when
You can’t see the sky? That colorblind man sits there on the beach
Looking in silence. He cannot see his reflection within the water, he
Stands and walks to its surface. There he finds a crow crippled, limping
In the ripples where his reflection should be. That psychedelic feeling
Draws in his drowning breathe, falling into the sea. Paramount to his
Survival the man drowns, his understanding a paradox in his memory.
Only he, the crow, remembers the light of the moon. Its pompous shape,
that transcendent light, a memory to your decay. Only when yellow hits
the eyes of the crow will that white light fade beyond the thunderstorm.
He cries to the heavens, yet his speech murmurs under the weight. That
Black water suffocates his prayer, but he finds comfort in his anonymity. In
the presence of absence the crow longs for loss. He who is stolen from
wishes to be further buried, lost in the waves. That siren sings a fading
melody back into his ears. His own prayer an anchor tied to his feet,
crippled in your memory. Fractured in his own faith, what god heard
his suffering, his murmurs clots of air in a salty sea; black as the blood
from the wound you carved out in his chest. What blessing filled
his misery, that pseudo composition you create is a platter filled
with the feather of the crow. His words held sweet your grace,
an ensemble dancing in the mind of the forgotten. in the sea of
his followers he is Poseidon, yet still the crow sank, anchored in misery.
He was an atheist.
He was proud of it.
Those who believed in the existence of a
Supreme being, and in the survival of the soul after death,
Were, for him, dim-witted people worthy only to be
The laughing stock of his "superior intelligence."
He never concealed his denial of God,
He did not need to believe in such a divine being
Because
He knew that himself was the superior being, and
As far as the idea of a soul was concerned, there was none.
One dies and that's it! Game over!
The time passed and as he was mortal he died one day,
However
As soon he was declared dead,
Surprised the atheist was to ''see himself " hovering
All over his inanimate body.
He had no arms, no legs, no head, or any other organs
Just pure consciousness he was, pure thought, and
Pure light.
A sphere of a whitish color " He " was
With some sparkling particles distributed around its periphery.
In other words, he was a soul.
Confused and bewildered with the situation that the atheist,
Himself has now found,
Did not know what to do and what to him was coming.
In a little while though,
A luminous being approached him,
Wearing the broadest of possible smiles.
The being was emanating love, compassion, warmth, and
Understanding.
As the entity came closer to the "atheist" with his mind these
Words to him transmitted:
" Do not be surprised, my dear friend, for I am here to
welcome you and lead you to your creator whose existence
you have throughout life, so vehemently, denied!"*
© Demetrios Trifiatis
09 June 2021
* This story is inspired by a debate that I once had with the head of the Computer Department of a renowned university, who was an atheist and who called me silly to believe in God and in the afterlife. When I asked him: " Why I am silly?" He replied that I was silly because I believed in these theories and went on to tell me that I will be surprised when I die because I will find nothing of what I expect to find. At that moment I retorted: " My dear friend, Nigel, it will not be me that would be surprised but you, because if your theory is correct, I will not be there to be surprised but if my theory is correct then you will be the one to be surprised." He looked at me for a few seconds and then he said: If you put it like that, Demetrios, you are right. I will be the one to be surprised."
The dark rooms of my mind take me to a new place every night,
This place beams of sunshine, with beautiful sight.
This feeling is indeed real, but far from reality,
Still, this place thrives my personality.
This is a dream, but I did not choose it, it chose me,
It is a new era in a different country,
Where it is normal to be a 'she.'
I can't recall the year, but maybe it is 1976 or 1983.
This era, back in 1976, History ribs were still not broken,
The pages of humanity were still not blood-soaken.
That time, mothers worried about her girl,
About what she'll have for lunch or in which dress she will twirl.
The time where footsteps don't dissolve in dust,
When pedophilia, child marriage was considered a crime of inhumane lust.
The time when ambitions were praised,
And healthy children within healthy families were raised.
The time where father, husbands, and men were true protectors,
And not Satan, whose role was of autonomy and tormentor.
The time where women like me and you had power in their ink and voice,
And the institution of marriage was a choice.
The time when daughters were not restricted to breathe fresh air,
And mothers did not gulp in guilt of having a girl as an heir.
This city was none other than the city of Kabul,
Back in the day, in the year 1976, back when the city was a fable.
Convince me all you want,
Tell me I am a wannabe,
But I know a gender apartheid and genocide when I see.
Every day where massacres are happening in shadows,
Still, everyone except people in power can hear the echoes.
Why did I choose this timeline, you ask?
Because this is clearly an injustice, which you call culture as a mask.
I may not live in that land, but those screams drag themselves to my city,
Begging for freedom and asking for our pity.
Why did I choose this era, you ask?
Maybe, because even in my own land being a lady is a frightening task.
The way a girl measures her skirt,
Because her dignity is defined by the length of the shirt.
The way a no feels like an invitation to fight,
And the constant worry of safety is the pain we hide.
You call it culture?
You call it a tradition?
But I know a cage when I see one.
That's all the reason for my choice to stay in that utopian time,
Because as you are reading this tonight,
A little girl is going through a horror, and she can't fight.
I'm not the greatest of all-times, but when I'm done,
I'll be an all time great in this lifetime of mine
Like the late great who came before my time
I will breed a new lifeline, that will breathe life like march of dimes
My story lines, will bring truth life; like troops who fight
Overseas, for rights of those who believe that death is life
Now that ain't right!
As the rich is getting richer, eating fillet me-non, while we barely feeding our appetite
Night after night
Survival has waged a war that gave us no choice but to battle and fight
Although, we'll be all right
They say we a dying breed, but that ain't right
Instead we're the light to a lying greed
That will enlighten life to a brand new seed
A man of God indeed
Freed from the Son that bleeds
Like the summer breeze
He's the sum that equals the amount of air I breathe
The air that please
A satisfaction like the birds and the bees
My word's words are the keys
That will fornicate with the mind and give birth to a seed
A seed of social change, that'll change our social economy
So shall our comradery
That will bring comfort to a struggling society
A synonym...similar to a civilization seeking for unity
Unifying the physics of theory
That seeks to explain the synopsis of a dying philosophy
Similar to the Cosby
X-cept my scrip-tic will speak more about our reality
Like life's calamity
And everything else in life that's destroying us systematically
However, I've discovered a system
That can mathematically destroy ignorancy
And turn our state of mind intellectually
I elect that He (God) selects me to be
And be that man who may lead this community
So that they (My Peoples) may commute with me
En-route to a destination, destine towards our destiny
Like we were destine to be
We were meant to be "Great" like the late great that came before we.
Because we are...
The reflection where perfection gave birth to the definition of greatness
Where great means Competent, Skilled, Well Informed, and Tremendous
Our potentials are endless
And only we not even the enemy can put an end to this
So it's time we put a stop to this
The biggest enemy of self
And that's envy and jelousness
Cause after this is Heaven or Hell and that's all there is
A promised made sealed with a kiss
Knowing this
Is the next best thing since "In the beginning"
In the first chapter of the first verse in Genesis!
?
John Keats - I continue to adore Keats's lush, sensuous language and his odes to beauty, nature, and love, which can deeply resonate with some of my own poetry's yearning and delicacy.
Emily Dickinson - Dickinson's quiet intensity and exploration of death, eternity, and inner life has appeal to my introspective side.
She and I share a fierce independence of spirit and a love for solitude.
Edna St. Vincent Millay - I admire Millay's bold, feminist voice and her exploration of desire and independence.
Millay's mastery of sonnet form and ability to capture the fleetingness of passion has after multiple readings come to resonate with me.
Pablo Neruda - Known for his passionate love poems and deep connection to nature, Neruda has come to enchant me with his visceral imagery and emotional honesty.
His poems about the natural world might feel like kin ship to me, my own.
Mary Oliver - I feel at home in Oliver's reflective, nature-based poetry.
I have come to love Oliver's reverence for the world, finding in it a continuation of her own themes of beauty and spiritual communion with nature.
Sylvia Plath - I would definitely appreciate Plath's courage in delving into the complexities of self, identity, and mental struggle.
While my tone of poetry has now through evolution grown more gentler, I feel a kinship in Plath's exploration of one's inner life.
Rainer Maria Rilke - With his mystical tone and contemplative exploration of love and solitude, Rilke would be a poet that I have come to admire.
His 'Letters to a Young Poet' would also resonate as advice one might give to aspiring poets.
Louise Glück - Known for her somber tone and introspective lyricism, Glück would fascinate me with her exploration of loss, longing, and family dynamics.
I admire Glück's precision and haunting imagery.
Langston Hughes - I would appreciate Hughes's musicality, social consciousness, and exploration of personal and collective identity.
His poems on love, hope, and perseverance would feel to me like hymns of survival and resilience.
Ada Limón - I would likely be drawn to Limón's modern voice and her intimate, conversational style that draws readers into an emotional landscape. Limón's poems of self-acceptance, connection to nature, and resilience would feel like a refreshing evolution of the lyricism that I have come to cherish.
It was like the apocalypse
Dark skies
Lined up in rows
How we got there
No one knows.
Chatting all around
Most seemed to have a good
time.
Then he came around
Unseen but heard
Voice so shrieking it made
children cry
And just like that
There was a dusty light in the
sky
First came the wind
So sharp it cut humans
Like diamond needles going
150mph.
All you could see,
Selected rows
They turn into dust.
Searing pains of emotions
They flow through all
Watching as many family's fall.
When rows filled with people
Turn into ash of dust
That's when people started
moving,
Survival of the fittest is so it
seem.
But then came the lights
So bright and blinding
Going across rows where
people moved,
But not hitting those who stood
still.
Moving at the speed of light
This light came and went
Before anyone could blink.
Once a row of people
Now piles of ash
Going through isles
With no intent to stop.
As soon as it came
It was all over.
And what was a population
Was now only a few thousand.
Covered in dust
We heard a noise,
Telling all of us
To line in fours.
Three lines were incredibly
small
But the first line
That was way too full.
Was the worst mistake to
make.
Inside the voice that was heard
That shirked when spoken
Turning into a figure
Dark as night.
There was no face
There where no visible parts
Black robe
Black coverings
And a scythe so silvery clear.
Walking down a black building
That had just appeared.
What was heard next were
screams!
From death himself
About how the first line
Was way too long.
Without a chance to move
A quick breeze went through
Split the line in half.
With one quick swift.
The front started to run.
As for the others, blood went
down their faces
They lined up in the other
three.
Then something weird
happened
Line three started to run
As line two became frozen.
But one.
So brave
She walked out of line
Heading straight to death.
Given a chance to speak,
One thing had been said.
"Death, when can we go"
As she stared
Waiting for a response.
Scared for her life,
At this black spooky figure
He turned to her.
And then what was happening
Became nothing,
And she woke up
Back into the real life.
Where everything she just seen
Had all been a dream.