Long Swum Poems
Long Swum Poems. Below are the most popular long Swum by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Swum poems by poem length and keyword.
This day born an industrious Eve
Good on paper and better practical wise
Which Adam gets to have a view
How truly the combination would yield
Of himself in his Maker's image
Feel safe and relax-- caution free
Without mirror cum a true reflection
Today's atmospheric template perceive
The bliss, grace, and joy of age to apprise
Giving everyone an open hint to the right clue
How nature's agents naturally wield
Combining colors like rainbow in range
To celebrating her age in such a wonderful glee
Season is experiencing a nice actualization!
To celebrate you isn't a choice
A must if not would develop an ire
Be there soon with you and the cake
But as I prepare, don't wait the party
What a traffic quite aleatory can do?
Just woke up to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY
Meanwhile, such a moment can't be missed
Gain more wishes with the party noise
Let your dance steps electrify souls like wire
Many would have it a nice memory for that sake
Some will map it out footing such really arty
And laugh themselves all alone without a boo
Yet of you each will have h/her own say
And eventually take it a lovely twist
Over the year gone by, life has a weir
High or low, one can't jump in reverse
May be of laughter in memory, we can
Or of joy in abundance cum such dream
Like what regret can only adjust for us
Or the skills failure enriched our energy
To keep fit the focus of moving forward
Hang them all up in praise as to coffin by bier
And baptize each but only the lessons, don't submerse
To cool its repetitive heat, you need its fan
Alone in its drowning sea, learn how you once swum its stream
That is surely an empowering plus
To cope with a recurrence life lethargy
Aiming at a good time to drag one backward
Please shift to a clockwise direction, be veer
Past is such an insincere infection
Permit not its influence to interfere
Lest, you go ga ga ga in suspension
Instead of going gay gay gay for success
And unsteady motion will rest
Till comes out every of your timing best
Be good dear lovely sister
Be happy now and forever
Be nice to your darling mister
Be his pill cum natural fever ??
Make the best out of today
Make even the very beast go really gay
Make sure sky is not just red
Make sense of the say from each head
Courtesy of Adebiyi Anu O'Dayo
The campaign …
was over -
he, the last left alive on the
field of battle, and barely, at that …
his men had fought valiantly -
the odds were never theirs,
yet he was content in
their efforts, and more than proud …
the sky,
Payne's Gray and brooding -
the drab-but-stark background for
giant flecks of snow that
swung fro-and-to as they drifted -
as if sewing the aching February sky to
the crumbling castle bulwarks that
rose angrily from
the white-dusted hills below ...
or perhaps, like himself, just indecisive -
weary of wind and waft and
the willowy billows that birthed them,
as weary as he was of war -
war and weariness, itself ... its
ire filled his marrow with a longing for
love and life ... and COLOR ...
these wretched, barren highlands
were ashen and lifeless now,
dull and splotchy like
his rusted armor -
his once treasured fortress,
all but ruins and rubble and regret -
the only blush that met his gaze
was the crimson trickle of his own blood
as it drizzled from his beard to
paint the snow - perfect, white snow ...
faultless ... pure ...
and yet ...
in less than three full faces of the
moon, these slopes would
be bursting with heather and the
hues of burgeoning blooms -
pregnant with hope and heavy
with springtide wonder ...
he would never see it now,
his mortality written red in the snow,
but he could FEEL its approach!
he closed his eyes tightly,
sucked the keen winter wind deep
into his being - frozen flakes tickling his
nostrils and throat and lungs ...
he breathed in again -
each cold crystal inhaled, a tiny blessing -
a brisk reminder of special things,
moments of joy and pain,
marvelous things he had done and seen and felt,
tastes and aromas and aches ...
and lovers ... oh, most especially those!
precious, warm, bitter passions and
the beautied beings that
had conveyed them - the souls he
had swum up and lost all his senses in,
and the one - the ONLY one -
who had captured his much-too-jaded heart ...
he took one last, rooted breath,
counting the cold flakes as they melted
inside him - remembering each as a
kiss SHE had given him on special occasions,
and as darkness fell about him AND on ...
he opened his dimming eyes -
watched his final exhalation turn to frozen
mist in the Scottish gloaming …
and smiled.
Five ducklings feeding
The back of the camper bus
proudly sported the family
seven yellow stickers ducks
five little ducklings in a line
feeding on life presented to
the world growth sustenance
nourishment and meaning
For every fellow traveller
to ponder smile anticipate
what little team was to alight
at temporary destinations
sheltered tented playgrounds
swings and roundabouts
cul-de-sacs and traffic lights
To get all ducks into a row
once they emerged enriched
our little feeding station
food bank vital well and
fields of plenty needed
diverse and un-divided
attention chaos letting go
Meal times at times with rubber
ducks in bathtubs burping
passing winds of change
incorporating kilojoules
compassion love and swirling
compromise uncertain certainty
floated in the ocean of life
yet to be swum and dived in
with the buoyancy of living
Little duckling was still small
and sat beside as older
sister eager helper supervisor
when our triplet power three
in one as courtesy of nature
and individual little mouths
to feed lay on their backs
on sleeping bags as wonderment
in waiting for the spoon with
apple mush and cinnamon
to take its turn to reach their gums
To complete the pentagon
of childish folly serious fun
and exploration another little duckling
observed from inside womb in
its fertile spring to yet conjoin the river
contemplated when and where
to splash out into beauty question marks
and tribulations sparkling brotherhood
and food for life and pleasure
whirlpools cascades and little ripples
The spoon went one to one
and to another next to here and
there forward backward and beyond
my wildest expectations of what food
and feeding holding precious gifts
in hand released from nature
into nature ingesting measured
unimaginable and definite provision
nurtures nourishes what was what is
The birds have flown the nest
they feed and feed me just the same
and it is not just those trivial stickers
sign posts on the buzling bus
and more than ever and for
every one who wants to see the
picture depiction metaphor
the unsurpassed experience
which reminds me of simplicity of
gratitude and feeling warm inside
24th May 2016
Not the first time...........
I cheated death......
Last week...
What a narrow squeak!
The car narrowly missing me........
Yet determined to run me down
Put me underground.....
The time was not meant to be
The airliner crash last year..........
me...........
The only person to walk free!
So many lost lives
More than I can bear
Two months past
The train....
Did I fall or was I pushed?
My fuddled brain!
It seems so long ago
How did I last?
What a week it's been!
The wife ,tripped and fell
Carving knife nearly put me in hell
What a life!
Still, I am sure it was an accident
Her insistence..........
That it was pure coincidence
Now I am thinking........
That meteorite
From five years past
That landed on my house
My life,nearly my last,
as well as the spouse
Nearly had the last rites!
Is it me?
Or is it me?
That accidental drowning
Mother in law frowning.
Thought I was done!
Still, I swum away from that one!
Now,I am thinking...........
Is this some sort of sick joke?
Why me?
I am an ordinary bloke
The ship did its' own sinking!
I stepped outside..........
The building crumbled to the ground
I looked around
Everyone else died!
What a week it's been!
Still, life is on the up
Half full
Half empty
It's my cup
You know what I mean!
Life is to be enjoyed!
stuff the insurance from lloyds!
Hang these narrow squeaks
These past weeks
At my insistence,
it's all a coincidence!
Now, I am thinking
that bullet
Was it meant for me?
It dropped at my feet
My name engraved
I was saved!
You see!
I wear it as a lucky charm..........
I have come to no harm
This I know
Wish I had it weeks ago!
The lightning strike.............
I didn't like
Frightened me!
Not as much as the resulting fire.............
Could have been my funeral pyre.........
Hence forth, I will....
Carry on as before
Defeating nature's law
Avoiding the kill!
But old age might get me
But I don't know..........
It will take some years.......
you see..........
I have no fears
Bring it on!
I am the star of.......
The Narrow Squeak Show!
A Shining Afterglow
we have rambled together
along the Ganges river
just you and me
gazing at each other
we have trodden together
the streets of Bombay
through narrow
tortuous lanes
goading each other
we have sauntered together
along the Delhi boulevard
eyeing each other
and some of the wonders
of the world
we have ambled together
along the snow-capped hills
of Kashmir hand in hand
skating down the snowy slopes
we have ascended together
the steep Tripura hills
laid with thorns
pulling up each other
we have braved together
the desert of Arabia
strolling side by side
under the torrid sky
till our throat had run dry
we have explored together
the Kenyan reserve forest
with its wild fauna
breezing together
with our lips fondling each other
we have roamed together
in British public parks
meandering amidst marvellous
alleys of red roses
vying with envy
at cherry blossoms
and inhaled their intoxicating scent
we have swum together
in the cerulean waters
of the Mauritian shores
with the setting sun
reflecting its pink afterglow
on the leisurely undulating waves
where we lay in close embrace
atop ivory sands.
we have for so long
shared the same roof
during the summer
of love and care
when the salutary
shine of the salubrious sun
illumined our lives
during the winter
of dark despair
when woeful wild winds
threatened to blow down
the façade of our home
we have for so long
been duty-bound
caring for each other
since the break of day
during the sweet glow of the day
at the dim twilight hours
during the darkness of night
we have for so long
seamlessly shared
our joys and sorrows
our fears and hopes
our pains and pleasures
our daydreams and nightmares
now that the autumn of our life
life Is at close
let the afterglow
of our love linger on and on
shining until will last our breath.
the city's sick scar, fuels my descent, into this abyss, where twisted creatures writhe, in the darkness. cyclops with one eye, on the ball, three-headed puppies, sealed behind glass, strippers selling tickets to the apocalypse. a demon, a door-to-door salesman, asks for my dough, my scratch, my entire lunch budget, think i’m some golem, bred for his amusement. newsflash, satan, inc.: i’m not buying what you're selling, not today, not ever. i unleash the nuclear option, a superwoman uppercut, his face hits the cranial drain, and my hand screams in sweet agony. this just got real, this just got weird. this is my life, where lunacy is currency, and I'm the clerk, jacking waivers to the outskirts of sanity.
*
cankers of the damned, blinded by the sun of self-importance, rot in your own stagnant depths. i’ve swum in this abyss, feasted on the carrion of the city's discarded dreams. the abyssal labyrinthine, where the absurd and the grotesque, dance in the candlelight of a lonely night. the demon's words, a siren's song, luring me to the shores of chaos, i’ll take the punch, in the face, in the gut, in the depths of my own haunted psuche. for in this twisted wonderland, i am the madness, and the madness is me.
*
i stumble through the ravaged streets, a flautist of the fragmented, my breath a thanatopsis for the unreal. i’ve collected the relics of a thousand midnights, the whispers of succubi and the fiddles of the dying. the world's a circus of somersaults, and I'm the ringleader, juggling the shards of a shattered mirror. the devil’s chuckle still echoes, a calliope tune in the halls of my mind. i’ll grab a bottle of venom, a vial of hellfire, and dance with the shadows, where the darkness is my solace, my home. in this city of broken dreams, i’ll find my song, my opium for the masses, my requiem for the damned. tonight, i’ll give the monsters a show they'll never forget, a festival of freaks, a bacchanalia of the grotesquery.
*
as my body sits here on the edge of pandemonium, my mind wanders for what the true meaning of all this is, will they meet in some back alley so my frame can be the structure it needs to be, stay tuned.
I sat in restless chairs
I breathed stilted air
what feeling compares
with feeling squandered?
I’m not sadfishing,
I was bored in a 5-star hotel.
I’d swum the Atlantic - in the underground pool
and I felt like I was marinating in boredom.
It was as if the loudest thing in our suite was
the sound of my eyelashes flapping up and down.
I wasn’t in solitary confinement,
Lisa was there too - and just-as bored.
She didn’t complain, 'cause she’s ‘New Yorker’ stoic.
So I started complaining for her - for the team.
We’d filtered every boutique,
sampled every eclectic café,
there’s just nothing to do in Geneva.
It is an implacable reality.
Peter (my bf) was at work all day and we were on vacation.
It’s different when he’s around.
He walks into the room, and I feel like
a phone that’s been placed on its charger
- the world lights up and I get - charged.
“We should make a list,” I'd announced, “‘the pros and cons of boredom.”
“No,” Lisa said, “Let’s name fun things.”
“Fruity Pebbles popcorn,” I started.
“Girl panda makeup” Lisa offered,
“Foot massages and bubblegum”
“Cotton candy and sunflowers”
“Holidays and sparkly things!”
- we went on and on and on and -
“kittens” I updogged dreamily, then I switched subjects completely.
“We need to go to Paris.” I announced, with a tone of relief.
“Oh yeah?” Lisa asked, with a little side head-bob.
“Actionable intel,” I whispered, “Grandmère wants to see me.”
Lisa gasped, adding, “You’re in TROUBLE,” drawing the last syllable out slowly.
“That would be a first,” I laughed.
“Kisses!” She exclaimed, resuming the game.
I remembered the first time I thought of kissing Peter. The thought was a flash, an emotional Rorschach test and I smiled. It was like a movie kiss, an abstract heaven - not the breathy, erotic kisses of real life.
“Where’d you go?” Lisa asked, grinning.
Some emotions are too thick for words.
.
.
Songs for this:
Good Luck, Babe! by Chappell Roan
Disco Boots by Gavin Turek
yeah ...
there was someone ...
a long time ago,
lifetimes, really ... eons,
and she burned me ...
oh, I don't mean in a bad way,
like betrayal,
I mean inside - DEEP inside,
like torch burns steel,
she seared herself into my being -
fired her name into my marrow,
with immutability and intent ...
like gods etch their ids on
the pillars of eternity,
she changed me ...
forever ...
by the simple act of dripping
my name from her lips,
she altered the course of my destiny,
and became the very breath of my soul ...
now, tell me -
what, in the name of heaven,
is a person to do with that??
my eyes have become muddled with the
endless fix of faces that have
danced in them in the
forty years since last I saw her,
yet everything I've done,
every triumph and tragedy,
every love and lie and loss,
has been tempered by the standard
that she set THEN, in her resolute sublimity ...
her fingertip melodies,
the agile ease of her limbs,
her exhuberance and wit
and command of my gaze and reason,
the shine of her regard …
there is not a single hour that
passes that does not SOMEhow wind
back with inexorable relativity to
the ideals that she placed within me,
yet her dazzled eyes have not
swum in mine for more
than four decades ...
I have not heard the lilt of her voice,
smelled the mystery of Je Reviens
upon her skin,
or felt the warm wonder of her
flesh beneath my hands,
for nearly five hundred full moons!
how, in all humility,
is a fool like me supposed to
bear such a yoke?
how do I let go of something that
will not let go of me?
how do I purge a poison that is
my very lifeblood??
what are we sad, silly, human creatures
supposed to do with the
numberless questions we pose,
that have, in all seriousness,
no chance of an answer?!?
yes ...
there WAS someone,
a long time ago ...
lifetimes ago, really ...
eons …
yeah.
Copyright © Gregory Richard Barden, October 20, 2022
Goosies
Jennifer Lopez gets them a lot
when she listens to singers on American Idol.
Perhaps it happened to me a few times, but I can’t recall
the specific time that a song gave me the goosies.
Those crazy little pimples above which the hairs stand erect
most usually on our arms
occur when people are moved by things:
music, dance, emotions.
Also things that creep us out or give us great fear
can give us the chills or goosebumps.
My mother used to say, “When you get a sudden chill
for no specific reason, it means that someone
just walked over your grave.”
That happened for me just a couple of times.
Maybe my future burial spot is a little bit remote!
As I think and think about it, I can recall at least one time
this strange phenomenon known as goosebumps
caused not just my arms, but nearly my entire body,
to resemble that of a plucked bird!
It was back in ‘74 and I was with a small group of students
visiting the coast of the Mediterranean Sea off Spain’s beautiful Valencia.
It was late winter (or perhaps very early spring).
All my life I wanted to say I had swum in a sea far from America!
Though the temperature was extremely cold for swimming,
I dared myself to venture out into the Mediterraean that day.
As the others in my group dared only to poke their toes into the ice-cold water,
I submerged my entire body. What a shock it was!
Nevertheless, for at least twenty minutes, I lay on my back,
letting my body float and float,
drifting with the tide while making sure to keep close by the shore.
When I noticed the group was wanting to leave, I swam back.
As I sat in the bus with a towel wrapped around me, I shivered uncontrollably
and my skin puckered up as the hairs rose up on both my legs and arms.
I had been foolish that day, but I felt proud to say
I had swum in the Mediterranean Sea.
Nov. 14, 2019 for the 'Goosebumps' Poetry Contest of Delilah Ventura
yeah ...
there was someone ...
a long time ago,
lifetimes, really ... eons,
and she burned me ...
oh, I don't mean in a bad way,
like betrayal,
I mean inside - DEEP inside,
like torch burns steel,
she seared herself into my being -
fired her name into my marrow,
with immutability and intent ...
like gods etch their ids on
the pillars of eternity,
she changed me ...
forever ...
by the simple act of dripping
my name from her lips,
she altered the course of my destiny,
and became the very breath of my soul ...
now, tell me -
what, in the name of heaven,
is a person to do with that??
my eyes have become muddled with the
endless fix of faces that have
danced in them in the
forty years since last I saw her,
yet everything I've done,
every triumph and tragedy,
every love and lie and loss,
has been tempered by the standard
that she set THEN, in her resolute sublimity ...
her fingertip melodies,
the agile ease of her limbs,
her exhuberance and wit
and command of my gaze and reason,
the shine of her regard …
there is not a single hour that
passes that does not SOMEhow wind
back with inexorable relativity to
the ideals that she placed within me,
yet her dazzled eyes have not
swum in mine for more
than four decades ...
I have not heard the lilt of her voice,
smelled the mystery of Je Reviens
upon her skin,
or felt the warm wonder of her
flesh beneath my hands,
for nearly five hundred full moons!
how, in all humility,
is a fool like me supposed to
bear such a yoke?
how do I let go of something that
will not let go of me?
how do I purge a poison that is
my very lifeblood??
what are we sad, silly, human creatures
supposed to do with the
numberless questions we pose,
that have, in all seriousness,
no chance of an answer?!?
yes ...
there WAS someone,
a long time ago ...
lifetimes ago, really ...
eons …
yeah.