Long Toiled Poems

At once she paid a visit. In her colorful dress, so revealing and appealingly suited to her slendern torso. I to gaze the door way, mine heart pounded viciously,  a death knock. I was...

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"Sick Art"



I walk the streets
still and quiet
I do not lie
I do not betray
what the heart belies
pickled kidneys 

I am a ghost
of my former self

ears lent to hear 
the sweet music
of the sounds so fraught
caught up...

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I saw how martyrs longed for love, and so began the play of my flitting heart
A strange girl had I become, with airs of fickle dream,
My heart an embodiment of wonder to all that dared...

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Within the frame a sepia scene
a dusty porch   a rickety chair   
the fabric of your dusky face creased
with ceaseless sunbaked woes
your old pair of getaway feet gives 
a different walk of...

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Three cousins played a “game’ of war
A map of Europe spread across the floor
No adults there to keep the score
As each of them wanted more and more

Three of four empires lay upon that map
As they...

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Tim’s father had been a refugee once he put down his fight and his gun

The story is that he embarked on the very last ship leaving East Prussia

Under siege tanks and bombs from above fireworks...

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Quietly, the memory of my grandfather manifested itself,
In the colors and shimmers of the Holy Spirit, 
I saw his human face,
The familiar lines, the flesh,
The pair of oceanic eyes, slowly blinking 
Smiling,
Like a heavenly beam
Splashing...

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Along the desert SANDS of what seemed to be a 'no man's LAND' in Eastern Mesopotamia, there was discovered a KING and a people group of unknown language and ORIGIN. No one ever knew for...

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This is a very sad tale, indeed. Does anything hurt more than a shattered heart?


You asked me for a story from the days of long ago, of unrequited love…of broken hearts…and love betrayed. 
This brings...

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JOE VERSUS THE RACCOON 
By Kate H. Stark


Each night ‘twas the same old proverbial shout. 
“Hey Joe, will you please take the garbage bags out?”

Joe sighed, rolled his eyes as he walked toward the door....

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Waiting waitng...... 
For the all-mighty godot 
godot godot.....I ask myself 
Where are you? 

I have searched the 
tempestuous seas 
I have toiled the arid desert 
All to no avail 
I have defiled timidity into the...

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I Felt the Earth

There in the valley reaching for the sun
Our younger days were such fun
Though the struggle to be
Was so much for me?

The valley walls were so tall
That I would fear they would fall
Then...

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*LETTER TO  MAMA*

Iye omo to r'ewa 
Iya ni iya mi owon
I know you wonder if your  prayers don't ascend to heavens
You keep asking if the promises won't come true
You're beginning to doubt the...

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Those rarer men I once fondly 
knew...                            ...

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Cybersurfing netizen flounders...
analogous to a fish out of water

Ever since being a little gull hubble buoy,
I bobbed (while donning square pants)
like spongy flotsam and jetsam at sea.

Now as one decrepit
humble lumpenproletariat neopoet,
I experienced existence
with pronounced...

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Double, Double, Toil and Trouble
Or Dragon Hood and the Secret of the Burning Pants


Our traveling actor trolls, came home to help with ‘Shakespeare in the Park’.
We wanted ‘Romeo and Juliet’, our neighborhood witches wanted ‘Mac...

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Stevie Ray's guitar spurred the 1980s blues boom.
He wasn't like any other guitarist.
Inspired by Buddy Guy, Albert King, and Albert Collins...
He linked blues and rock in the late 1960s.
He ruled the American blues from 1983...

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I heard something on the wireless
As i went about my day,
Some new strain of virus
In some province far away.

I didn’t pay much attention
As it seemed a distant threat.
Well that was my contention
So I didn’t break...

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NINETEEN FORTY TWO
by
JOHN M. ARRIBAS


As a young man in Jersey I wanted to be a cop
One sunday morning that dream came to a stop
Our nation had been a victim of a vicious attack
By an aggressive...

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"Freedom's Lament"

Oh sweet Freedom how quick you have gone from Groom to Widower.
How saddened are those who succumbed and labored so freed we could all be after Freedom had so long toiled and quarried to...

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After nearly three million years had passed , 
The Journey to the place, pre ordained and between two great stars was reached by the ancients.
Their Dormant Ark at rest for so long was now awoken...

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As one grows old, when evening approaches, memories too lengthen like shadows. Now I remember more often my parents wondering how much sweat and toil they had shed to make their children comfortable, how much...

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No winter postcards of deep snow and bliss
No winter postcards of mistletoe kiss
Winter was cold, winter was tough
Winter was long and we all had it rough
No Father Christmas, no presents for us
No wide eyed kitten...

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Alms Inn, there is the place again, and here
I, far away, muse in the house I grew
O this village of my love, has grown too
The golden hills with lilacs filled, the sweet
Soft of morning dew,...

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I was a happy fruit farmer, growing delicious, healthy fruits for consumption.
Since we'd bought the farm ten years prior, all the family lent to its function.

It was a large, productive farm, and we ran it...

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