Long Unreasoned Poems
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The Discipline of Failure
By John Herlihy
There is a discipline to failure that no one can deny;
We are set up to fail miserably, by others on the sly.
Risk can be calculated into the mix to heighten success;
You cannot achieve higher goals if you settle for less.
There is more discipline to failure than there is to success;
Failure teaches us about caution and scrutiny, I must confess.
To examine what went wrong in spite of concerted efforts,
And to learn from our many mistakes like seasoned experts.
My individual success may produce unreasoned envy,
Coloring with darkness the meaning of the word friendly.
My failure only exposes me to the vulgarity of people’s insults,
But insults do not necessarily impinge upon my final results.
Success by definition includes the inevitability of failure;
Without the risk of failure, mediocrity will be our savior.
Failure makes the drudgery of digging holes into a fine art;
We dig our own graves and then lay down with a broken heart.
Risk-taking is now a fashionable impulse in the modern-day salon;
To ward off failure, we cling to it tightly like a police baton.
We take risks in the hope of achieving a glorious success,
To ward off evil and make sure that failure has every redress.
Make every effort to control risk, otherwise risk will control you;
What seems at first a pot of gold may only turn into a boiling stew.
There is a time to have courage and express the need to be bold;
But recklessness only invites failure and the feeling of being sold.
Hold fast to the discipline of failure as a means of achieving success;
By God, I will ultimately succeed in my goals and never settle for less.
It is no longer headline news,
If anything scientific happens
it happens for a rational reason
If anything violent doesn't happen,
does it not happen
for an irrational unreasoned
compassionate nonresponse?
It is no longer byline news,
toxic anthro-aggressive at-most-spheres,
dark forbidding climes,
cold winter
evil viral feelings,
relentlessly depressing
grey-clouded
chaotic
irrational
random thoughts
Complicate competing patriarchal
privileged supremacy
win/lose systemic media events,
stories monotheistically vengeful
OldTestament fundamentalist
Either my religious way
or you get to play
work
suffer the Prodigal Son/Daughter
loser highway
Monoculturing news
neglecting to mention white anthro-privileged
Caste cast with strictly partisan
polarizing eco-political rightwing supremacy concerns
And fascinations with capitalism happens
when compassionate democratic health
unrealistically
irrationally doesn't happen
while relentlessly furthering
white dogmatically "patriotic"
straight male dominance
Is not exactly headline news
but more the RightWing monocultural
Thing To Reactively Do
to find HolyBible scripture
to fundamentally cut
and evangelically paste
for ego-salvaging
narcissistic denial of democratic rationality
divine support
Furthering each individual ego-identity's
selfie bootstrap LeftCognitive
culturally superior to RightEmotive
win/lose religiously partisan
straight white capitalism
overwhelming win/win
systemic multicultural
democratically cooperative
co-arising compassion.
You've heard it said... "follow your heart"
For relentless desire bleeds for craven want
Yet when indecision weighs on life's many parts
Those opposed abandon not incessant haunt
Pin pricked light shines brighter
Through onyx colored scene
Weakness revealed when life is darkest
Specks of defect in the fortress of our need
Ones heart can be a complexity
An up hill struggle when obscurity feels blind
A quandary of perception in a house of mirrors
Reflections twisted by perplexities of the mind
Follow your heart yes live your dreams
Leave not your mind unreasoned
To walk the path less traveled leaves
A consequence of actions completed
So it is with indecision
To scale the weight of what's to come
When precious life hangs trembling in the balance
A calculated measure of the hearts true sum
Can we really overthink those choices we make
For somewhere every road has an end
Rugged or velvety destinations take root
And blossom where choices were stemmed
I've heard of double minded fools
Tossed like waves in the sea
Perhaps it's simply this woman's folly
To think it couldn't happen to me
Oh to measure the value of dreams
Which to follow or leave for not
Simplicity frowns on passions extremes
Such answers must be skillfully wrought
I pray that with my every tomorrow
I'll be wiser than today
Knowing when it's time to seek the dream
And patient if I must wait
For now I wish but only
To know my own heart in truth
And weigh the scales of value correctly
Then follow with greater wisdom when in naivety's youth
Ok, I'm not paid to think (like the TV shouting heads), I have no real voice (vote), and certainly no credentials - but I'm as invested in America as any high-school citizen can be. I've pledged allegiance 3000 times (hhmm.. do they doubt our loyalty?) and when it comes to loving America, I'd have to say my classmates and I are at the center of the spell.
I'm afraid we're growing up in the age of hate.. the age of phony outrage where each position large or small is high noon and violence is underfoot even when policing ordinary citizens.
We won't address the multitude of old problems in this new age.. we'll just unleash a marquetry of half-truths to dispute the proven until unreasoned arguments reach their paranoid fullness.
The real world is alarming enough - let's just push that away and ignore it - while we're at it let's s1ut shame the poor, the old, the sick, the unemployed, the hungry and the hand of mercy.
I realize America was never one moral atom bonded for better.. but those anvils that forged us appear neglected or forsaken. I'm afraid what's happening now, what we're seeing and hearing now, is a symphony of erosion - that by the time I have any say at all, the middle class will be gone - America turned slum - where even the voice of despair will be turned traitor.
We'll only be able to see our greatness in museum souvenir shops where nothing is affordable, and everything is made elsewhere.
.
.
This was one of the short essays in my Yale application. I post it now as an election classic =]
My first wife wanted more than I could give her,
My work she told me robbed her of attention,
All my energy focused on ‘provider, '
Caused much more trouble than I care to mention.
What wives really expect can be a killer
When you dismiss their tears as just invention,
Even if you love her like Henry Miller,
And serving marriage is your sole intention.
Believing her tears were just unreasoned whim,
My own efforts destined to save the marriage,
My selfless piety filled me to the rim,
And without outside voice, who could disparage?
Many years later, I can now see my plight...
Both educated, I feared she might earn more,
And her doing so would show me in bad light,
My fear wed me to my job, a loveless whore.
I lacked heart to say I feared losing her heart,
Which would surely reveal that I felt 'less than, '
Give her one more reason to think we must part.
So trusting in love wasn't part of my plan.
I suspect young couples oft make the mistake
Of really thinking that life's under control
They think what 'they' give is worth more than 'they' take.
And feel sure that 'their' path will honor 'their' goal.
But a couple is always more than just one,
The other's opinion surely worth seeking.
And yet when at long last your searching is done,
Don't be surprised if you find love is peaking.
It is good for the soul to release some goals
And friendship might just be found in the rubble,
Sometimes a rest to just see how the thing rolls...
It is a great way to stay out of trouble.
Poetry to me is a very beautiful thing,
It’s about your identity and community,
About friends, family and kind feeling,
And it’s about how you place in society.
It reflects upon your sexual partners,
References them as your mind’s pivot,
What love’s base is, about its garners,
And what should be loves fine ingot.
It explains sociology, culture and trends,
Shows your diversity, admits your choices,
Specifies any displacement for kind amends,
Any disorientation for your readers’ voices.
I believe poetry can just be for yourself,
For your own edification and collection,
Because if by it you identify as an elf,
You won’t be defined as uncanny deviation.
Indeed, deviation does not exist in poetry,
Nor does it form the reason for its writing;
Poetry embraces honesty, love and sobriety,
With an imagination where truth is flying.
The credibility of poetry goes unquestioned,
Because if you lie by it, you’ll feel the traction,
It always takes you seriously unreasoned,
Never disqualifying a difficult emotion.
Your awkward emotions are disquisition, code,
Eagerness and enthusiasm are their reception;
Sociology by it can become your chatting mode,
And politics can become your injuring person.
Poetry as a literary art is fructuous with stance,
Offering a handshake to any from a dumb;
Sets alight concepts and feelings to enhance,
Lives that may otherwise be under the thumb.
Ok, I'm not paid to think (like the TV shouting heads), I have no real voice (vote), and certainly no credentials—but I'm as invested in America as any high-school citizen can be—I've pledged allegiance 3,000 times (hhmmm ... do they doubt our loyalty?) and when it comes to loving America I'd have to say my classmates and I are at the center of the spell.
I'm afraid we're growing up in the age of hate ... the age of phony outrage where each position large or small is high noon and violence is afoot even when policing ordinary citizens.
We won't address the multitude of old problems in this new age ... we'll just unleash a marquetry of half truths to dispute the proven until unreasoned arguments reach their paranoid fullness. The real world is alarming enough—let's just push that away and ignore it—and while we're at it let's $lut shame the poor, the old, the sick, the unemployed, the hungry and the hand of mercy.
I realize America was never one moral atom bonded for the better—but those anvils that forged us appear neglected or forsaken. I'm afraid what's happening now, what we're seeing and hearing now, is a symphony of erosion—that by the time I have any say at all, the middle class will be gone—
America turned slum—where even the voice of despair will be termed traitor.
We'll only be able to see our greatness in museum souvenir shops where nothing is affordable and everything is made elsewhere.
Will this world be the same after we are dead?
Will the bylanes and kerbs be replaced
Dusty pathways by cleaner, wider roads
And the poor, homeless ones to alien hordes
Will the sun rise and set the same old way
On these celibate lands that rain has just wet
Will colorful bows pop out of wholesome greens
Or will all fade into the polluted brink of our sins
Will there still be separate Gods for these men
Who believe their Gods made them different
Will their prayers still hold gaudy puritanism
Or will they kill each other on peaceful reserve
Will they laugh and laud like their usual banter
Or will times impose a more courteous manner
Will there be unreasoned madness and romance
Or will these grow unfashionable, get advanced
Will they resort to freedom in the clink of shackles
Or line their souls against the comfort of fables
Will the winds still haul the sails and blow the mills
Will the waters rise and ebb, or flood these hills
Will the kings fall on knees or fight the titans
Will the tales come true or more secrets be spun
Will devil consume us or will the angels be killed
Will governments do good or will they turn evil
Finally, if I come back home, aeons after my death
Will I find it's grace and comfort bequeathed
Or will it all, just like me, disappear into oblivion
Hope the yearning for past remains in times beyond!
Pushed up from stomach's abyssmal pit
Choked off cries, constraint deformed
Packed with panic's punches
Right here where words are formed
Throat cords tightly gripped
Resistance rules my holding back
While mouth stammers mind blown shock
Fear sped thoughts fly blindly
Wild-eyed in disconnected space
Beneath pain's radar, dead-ends faced
Cant find escape through tiny slits
In self expression's cut free places
Stripped sounds,unreasoned, so distraught
I'm cramped, wrapped tight, shut up,
Curled up, gone again without a trace.
Mind flails blind at hidden threats
Going to die, my heart attacks me
Going to die, my only thoughts
Half- crazed, clownish acting out
Breathe in, breathe deep, breathe out.
Breathe in, breathe deep, breathe out...Slowly...
Breathe in, breathe deep, breathe out...Slowly...
I feel myself levelling out...Slowly...
Kindness holds keeled heart upright
Kind words rein me in, damp down fright
Caught unawares by calming help
Relief seeps through, soothing thoughts
Shifts gears back to lucid tracks,
Take it easy, take it easy, pressure's off
Life's plain sailing once again
Breath in, breathe deep, breathe out...Sigh...
03/06/2017.
[Written with much love and bonhomie in
response to Milt’s Poem ‘Hearty Poetry Soup’]
*
Not so long ago in a land called Soup
A warlock gathered a talented group
These were the wordsmiths who writ all Soup Lore
But the warlock decided that they’d write no more
For he had been born to be ‘Soup Laureate’
A role he’d hold longer the more folk he ate
Even a warlock is sometimes unreasoned
Not much consolation…when you’ve been lightly seasoned
So here in this cauldron we boil and we bubble
Somehow I sense we’re in some kind of trouble
My hope is this as I cling to the edge
I hope I’m the meat and not the two veg
But, lo, I discover that Milt’s being mother
He’s spotted my need to write something or other
His warlock-like methods at first seemed remiss
Until this old turnip sat down to write this
But still I find one thing decidedly troubling
I look like a beetroot from all of that bubbling
My poor scalded feet are developing bunions
So at my next barbecue… Milt’s in the onions!