Mawkish could crack into pieces,
pieces that easily draw blood;
Blood that was never set on fire,
fire was not made for the mawkish;
Mawkish heart in a glass bottle,
bottle that was much too fragile;
Fragile hung by hesitation,
hesitation breeds from mawkish.
The wordsmith’s art is a game of chance,
Where meanings dance and ideas trance.
A deft hand wields the pen with grace
A subtle symphony, a nimble chase.
From arcane whispers, and secrets told,
To audacious strokes, both bold and old.
An amiable muse, with a gentle heart,
Inspiring words that tear apart.
A clandestine plot, a cunning scheme,
With boisterous laughs and jovial gleam.
Words ebb and flow, a vibrant tide,
Capricious, and whimsical, they cannot hide.
Some dance with flair, with eloquent might,
While others fade, ephemeral in the light.
An egregious error, a poignant plea,
An insidious plot, a symphony.
We seek the luminous, the serendipitous find,
A moment of joy, to soothe the mind.
With cunning wit and a sly remark,
A raucous laugh, a playful spark.
Through boisterous humdingers, and shenanigans,
A wistful sigh, or a sweet, mawkish stance.
The playwright’s art, a dance so grand,
A poignant twist, with a skilful hand.
Let us savour this exquisite game,
Where words intertwine, an artful flame.
So open your heart, let language soar,
The play of words, forever!
Like an avian roosting when his cawing has spilled,
I mourn in grief as this shadowed night grows cold
Crushed and grieving from promises unfulfilled
Sorrow burgeons my heart, in bitterness enfold
like unspun wool on a distaff or a poem not quilled
I am overwhelmed with fear; somberly weeping
beneath my rowan tree. In dour thoughts, I dwell
Wisps of silver moonlight cross the sky, sweeping,
signaling hope in darkness, as if it were a death knell
In my den, I feel protected; sanctuary of safe-keeping
My troubled eyes are in search of benevolence anew
For faith and courage instead of such dismal dread
How I long to take flight, trading grey skies for blue
to locate a paradise where happiness can be spread
sharing a drink of wassail; fruited ale of sweet brew
I shall swiftly soar among shining stars at great height
Fluttering my wings on journeyed path of poetic volition
Never again to be lost and alone on any mawkish night
No shadows holding me in their melancholy perdition
for I've learned how to ignite flames of lambent light
Carve into the birch trees, pollen breeze my air to breathe.
One more cough and one more sneeze until it’s over.
Tissue paper mottled with blood and yellow-green mucus, tearing and dissolving from tears.
There is always salt in my mouth these days.
Veiny leaves in the fervent winds remind me that I am an animal, and my skin gets filthier with each mawkish phrase that erupts from a faraway throat, but it feels like mine.
Beautiful and pathetic soliloquy fills up the air.
I am the only one.
I am the only one.
With the grasses' pedagogy and the flowers' instruction, I stand up and walk to the water.
Its chill cries out for help, my pollutant and contaminant is all but too much to be cleaned by a simple stream.
“I am sorry,” I say. “I am sorry Mother.”
I should have been listening this entire time.
I was crushed and miserable from love unfulfilled
Like a mourning dove whose blood had been spilled
I cried in deep lament as shadowed night grew cold
Sorrow burgeoned my heart with miseries untold
Overwhelmed with fear, l fell to somberly weeping
Wisps of silver moonlight crossed the sky, sweeping
It was a pale light in darkness; my hopes were felled
On the edge of oblivion with sullen thoughts, I dwelled
My eyes tormented, I searched for benevolence anew
How I longed to take flight, trading grey skies for blue
In need of faith and courage instead of dismal dread
I yearned for paradise where happiness is daily bread
I longed to soar among shining stars at great height
No longer bemused and alone on such a mawkish night
I wished for wings so I could soar with poetic volition
Without fetters keeping me tied to melancholy perdition
May 15, 2023
Couplet Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Sotto Poet
When the wind shifts to the south,
When the leaves wither and die,
I begin upon my path again.
Once again.
When the air begins to bite,
When the skies are beryl-blue,
My mind begins to wander,
And I wonder.
When folk titivate their lawns,
After leaves fall like summer rain,
My introspective whimsy awakes at last;
I study myself again.
Year after year,
Time after time,
Without fail, my inquisition is roused,
And I see myself again,
Like through a crystal glass.
I can see myself.
Year after year,
Time after time,
I catch the psyche’s wind,
And drift despite invective,
Despite mawkish thoughts,
And drift despite.
I’m learning a lot, dating Peter. For instance, I have a whole new awareness of how clueless older Americans, like people in their mid-twenties, are about things in the modern world.
I think Peter’s learning things too. Like the other night, I was 30 minutes late because I was gluing little, glittering rhinestones to my eyebrows. Was he mad? Yes, we had a little drama, but that’s just because he hasn’t learned to respect my lifestyle choices.
“Don’t be mawkish Peter,” I softly advised him, while fixing the caller of his shirt, “look, let's just pretend that we squabbled over this, and I won?” I suggested, helpfully. “It’ll save us time and WOW, we’re running late, OK? Seeing some small, lingering irritation, I promised, “We can still makeup later.”
The rhinestones looked spectacular, I got a LOT of compliments and in the end, I think he liked them. You know, sometimes I’ll catch him looking at me, like the moon or something, like I’m out of reach.
Guys are so.. (Searching for a word).
.
.
mawkish = exaggeratedly or childishly over-emotional.
I.
Ode the thrill of a tango
curled in clutches sleek
Elegance, a prerequisite
Add on a spun euphoria
Nimble is a turgid swoon!
Arms conduct to the aria
New skin, feels no tocsin
It's deeply in a you and i
Glazed, to the tightening
and a strangling organza
Necked into a suffocation
So go the tunnel deaths…
(1/27/2021: '02 Silverton MY; Alameda ...contest theme was murder in the tunnel)
II.
Ornately, I gild over my days a’ la fresco
Carefully, I wield molten gold, enigmatic
Elaborate must these life undulations be
as metallic sheen screens all insipid aura
New cantankerous crack? Just weld upon
and smooth the jagged with flowing flora
Now the feckless plaster sparkles golden
I spurn mawkish, like the silvered literati
glossing my craven, to caverns gleaming
Aurum weaves, in its narcissistic miasma
Nothing malodorous in self-love / loathin’
So imperious my bombastic art, it glazes!
(8.17.21 Redone at Willow Berm and DBW; theme was Craig’s Broken contest relating to Kintsugi)
Like a mourning dove, my lament is spilled
I cry in grief as shadowed night grows cold
Spirit crushed from love's promise, unfulfilled
Burdensome sorrows in my heart unfold
Succumbed by tears, I piteously weep
In sullen thoughts and restless sleep, I dwell
'cross the skies, Luna flies in lambent sweep
With consoling hope, or my tolling knell?
On winds of change, I'd soar to zenith height
With wings fanned in poetic volition
Never again fearing a mawkish night
No room for gloom, nor fear of perdition
My eyes long for benevolence anew
Where the world is adorned in hues of blue
11~17~2020
Winds of Change
Sponsor: John Hamilton
A bird sings.. mawkish
Sings and dances smooth
She... by doing so
has naturally
forgotten her world.
Soars high upwards
aims to touch moon
but sadly can't..
falls back in nest
the bird is
unable
to achieve
her dreams..
being
"leashed".
15-5-2020
~DEEPA~
Placed as Honorable Mention in the Contest.
Note1:*Diminished Hexaverse Poetry Contest*
Sponsor:Emile Pinet
Placed as Honorable Mention in the Contest.
Note 2:STRAND no 770 any theme any form'
Poetry Contest sponsored by Brian Strand.
Close your eyes
‘Close your eyes…..’
That mawkish haunting tune
But there is something wise
In it which I’ll see soon
I’ll close my eyes
And so will end
That visual cacophony
Which I hope will mend
I’ll close my eyes
And go to sleep
And hope returning eyesight
Within my lids I’ll keep
And wake again to find
Please God I am
No longer blind
Enverated by the history; man's
Credulity, his weakness;
Give upon yesterdays, cause
It will hurt, day's risibleness...
Time is a fulsome mate, let go
Of her mawkish cast;
Hope is all but that is reigning,
Peaking the sinking mast...
Lives as ransom we ought
To pay, for the life meek
Fallen before the past as prey
Redemption do we seek...
To lean upon the future,
Promising rapprochement;
Eternity of brighter days strike,
Seeking each morrow'd mend...
To soar up and repay history's
Debts by making history,
Knowing not what's the best,
We still hope for the story...
The depressing stares to
No more meet, let's abjure;
Ambling the little strech of life,
The world, let's conquer...
Mitigating notions, unravelling
Sorrows into fading
Oblivion far apart, causing
No worry for the coming...
The future let's embrace,
Cause morrow has got its
Own promises, vibrant and vigil,
It's mesmerizing bits...
If you wish your future triumph,
Then let past be your tutor;
Dare do your part, for, as said,
"Tomorrow is the today of the future"...
I don't need mawkish photographs to see
the drowning rowboat tethered to the dock,
a withered seahorse clinging to debris
as umber water seeps through feeble caulk.
The cord grass will have grown up through the planks
to marry splinters teeming on the pier,
putrescent pillars tilted by the banks;
a pallid corpse beside the marsh's bier.
Those summers when we sailed through brackish mist
have long since gone the way of floating sculls
that languish in the asters to be kissed
by empty oarlocks perched atop their hulls.
Your August ghost still flounders on the fen
then sinks beneath in nightmares now as then.
In times oft-forgotten great freight trains rolled through.
Each boxcar was tagged in a swashbuckling hue,
Flamboyantly hawking some stale, mawkish view.
Now all that remains is the desolate track.
Clickety-clack, clickety-clack:
Our eeriest memories’ ethereal track.
Those heart-pounding engines, in Santa Fe red!
Their sheer mass of metal would thrill me with dread.
With full sound and fury they powered and led,
Not seeing they followed that rigid steel track.
Clickety-clack, clickety-clack:
Time’s mindlessly marching, immovable track.
I wonder too often just where they’ve all gone.
What exploits or griefs will their odysseys spawn?
Then, hearing their whistle, I’m fearlessly drawn.
I shadow their ghosts up the unexplored track.
Clickety-clack, clickety-clack:
Our haziest days’ inevasible track.
You Fall ...
the ground of your reality dissolves in this
stream of distraction, this inconvenient passion
the mawkish pop music you mock
is now singing your story, as
your thoughts, your breath, your blood
all consumed by his eyes, his voice, his words
all the moments of his notice of you
painting your gray paper with extrinsic purple
and lavish green, filling your thirsty cup
with intoxicating attention, until time
is measured only by your meetings
You Stall...
hitting the invisible, inimical wall
penalized and ostracized
for presuming the right to ask why
for waking from complicit worship
for retaking your will and your mind
for staining his golden idol
with faith of the atheist
You Call...
for all his proud proclamations
he is a needy, greedy child
your adoration is his sun
your life force he feasts on
disenchantment is your release
from the prison of submission
his hollow heart, his churlish charm
all merely a false alarm-
9/10/18
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