Parapets Poems | Examples

Neighborhood Blockheads

When a pair of fighter jets
Buzzed over the parapets
They woke up the entire block

Though the pilots had regrets
But still the neighborhood frets
At each ticking of the clock

This deafening sound they battled
Their dishes chipped and rattled
And went crashing to the floor 

With nerves all spent and addled
The block packed up and saddled
No one lives here anymore

Allocation, Ally

Allocation, O ally?
Resources put where?
In the heads of those who fly?
Worry, hast thou care?

O ye spirits, I collect!
End Times, be my Muse!
Golden gods to genuflect?
Dare to disabuse!

Wrath of wind, thy cyclone?
It really must blow in.
Heaven and Hell, hie to hone!
Drenching downpour, din!

Ramparts of old castle?
They're slippery when wet.
Gods of death, call thy vassal!
How could we forget?

Tomb of ancient pharaoh?
A curse is on the door.
Folly thus to enter? Go?
Doom, thy pinafore!

Mercenary armies!
Become, O lords of hell!
Storm from thy cemeteries!
Legions, lead thee well!

Soar, O mighty eagles!
O parapets, take heed:
Fate and Fortune, full the fools!
Grind them in their greed!

Ache in heart of bygone race?
Lulled within thy chase.
Dithering is thy disgrace!
Seize the skin of face...

We Together

We together can change the way
our moral tendencies do stray.
Yet we build walls round our estate
and over parapets berate
the way that others go to pray.

Nation on nation joins the fray
some indignation to repay.
What harmony we could create;
we together.

Sweet dreams the children have who play
oblivious that they one day
will fight a war of unjust hate
their fathers wish to propagate.
It is a fate we could allay
we together.

Watchers in the Gloom

To that shadowed city round
Come those that are sorrow bound
In their multitudes alas
Through a Terminus so vast
For a city grim enabling
Their eternal laboring 
From the parapets looking down
Cold and timid souls abound
To shed their tears in torment rife
That shed they not for all their life
And from the masses on the wall
Does that gentle misery fall
It stains the heights in colors woe
And settles heavily on those below
Who join the marchers in their toil
Redemption seekers one and all
They wail and walk an endless path
Divined here by no mortal wrath
Their tribute to a city sown
By their tears and ghastly moans
For they seek in the hereafter
What risk rewards and all its laughter 
For they in life with trouble severe
Found not the will to persevere
And made a choice by many before
To embrace a simple life and ignore
The treasures offered and wisdom attained
That adversity's teaching hand ordained

Esuries L

Esuries (L)

(A lone voice whispers)

Has love's incandescent crimson light bulb
Illuminated your lonely soul yet

To help you forget 
Those quiet years

When you walked upon fragile parapets alone 

You'd rather now paint
Using poetry as your only form of catharsis

Before you are called home

(C)
Copyright John Duffy 

Esuries translated:
Hunger

Image shared under fair usage policy

A 21st Century Question?

A 21st Century Question?

Do people still need real human poetry in the 21st century 

Some still ask as AI plagiarizes when put to task

To be the social connectors
The innovation and invitation 

To new or old, writers
Adored heroes
Thought leaders

To breathe form from the intangible into their quiet lives

For them to taste the twist and guile of the Mysteries Schools

Poetry in all its many magical ceremonial forms provides

For soon
Each and every quest will end in a visit to a lone watchtower 

In the mind

And when one is on the other side watching from those parapets

AI won't help 

Because only real created human poetry will help you once again remember

Through someone else's shared experience 

In rhymes

All those people and things you once loved

So you don't forget 
With the passing of time

(C)
Copyright John Duffy

but to ask

must a man lose everything
    to divine those truths inside -
       must he bare his marrow else
         deny what flesh should hide -
          and will he open up his veins
         thus through his blood, abide
       there is a thrumming stronger
    than what beats in his breast?

           must a kingdom wage a war
       to stand and prove its might -
   pave its streets in solid gold
 and show its doctrine’s right -
oh must it build its parapets
 in stone, to grandest heights 
   to know without one question
       there’s a paradise that waits?

must a god be sacrosanct
    through all that he applies
       faultless in his form or law
         while innocence thus cries
          must he let his redress act
         midst truth as passion dies
       or is that err of humankind
    how love so finds its breath?

           for love is yet the only force
       that triumphs over … death.

Iberian Cross-Roads

We drive breakneck over hot roads.
Churches, big as cathedrals, rocket
from pocket villages.
Castillo's cast their campanile on the baking earth.

The Great Mosque of Cordoba,
the green Alhambra shades us
through a preaching dust.

The Giralda; its Christianized minaret
stretched like a tourists neck,
and above the Papal parapets,
a banished Allah.

The holy places have hollow guts,
their tubes are wrapped
around a torso, like alien spaceships.
One edifice dwarfs another
until awe sinks to its knees
attired in the black mufti
of old peasant women.

We are traveling fast now.
Nave and transept are our crossroads.
Basilica and sacellum our roadside naps.

The car parallel parks itself
beside every altar and shrine,
it's engine running,
as we chase God's works down,
ticking off only ourselves.

Seagulls

The gulls are low, not skimming,
but surfing spray
just above
the rise and fall of crests.

Beaks scythe and catch
tracking troughs.
They seek the in-between fish
thrown
between tumbling parapets
of ocean.

Trawling gullets
scoop,
gulp the spew.

Swigging necks
do not glance back
but plow circles of light
upon the water,

then they dive upwards
into
the wings of the wind.

Daddy Never Came Home

Daddy never came home,
he kissed mommy goodbye
and hugged sister and I
as he flew out the door
and went to work in a tower
that reached the sky with power.

Daddy never came home,
our phone was ringing all day long,
mommy looked sadder with each call,
she looked out the window for daddy
hoping he was at the front door,
in her heart she knew he was no more.

Daddy never came home,
all three of us cried for a long time,
it was hard to go to school and not sob,
teachers passed tissues around for everyone,
they told us that our nation was mourning
as many lost their lives without any warning.

Daddy never came home,
seventeen years have passed since that day,
each year we visit the World Trade Center site,
bronze parapets have three thousand names
including daddy who we still miss so much,
recalling the time and his loving touch.

(I Will Never Forget Contest)

Crossroads

We drive breakneck over hot roads.
Churches, big as cathedrals, rocket
from pocket villages.
Castillo's cast their campanile on the baking earth.

The Great Mosque of Cordoba,
the green Alhambra shades us
through a preaching dust.

The Giralda; its Christianized minaret
stretched like a tourists neck,
and above the Papal parapets,
a banished Allah.

The holy places have hollow guts,
their tubes are wrapped
around a torso, like alien spaceships.
One edifice dwarfs another
until awe sinks to its knees
attired in the black mufti
of old peasant women.

We are traveling fast now.
Nave and transept are our crossroads.
Basilica and sacellum our roadside naps.

The car parallel parks itself
beside every altar and shrine,
it's engine running
as we chase God's works down,
ticking off not only Him
but ourselves.

Barricade

I built my shrine ...
        My brittle heart, sheltered to hide
      Choked so often by trust's entangled vine
        Strong stones, placed side-by-side ...
  I raised each wall sound and tall for my castle keep
  The parapets high, the foundations sure and deep
    Yet ... it all crumbled to a heap ...
  With but a single soft press of your lips ... to mine.





~ 3rd Place ~  in the "Writing Challenge 1, June 2019, Crumbling Rhyme" Poetry Contest, Dear Heart, Judge & Sponsor.

* This is a form called Crumbling Rhyme, created by the sponsor *

(Syllables = 4, 8, 10, 6, 12, 12, 8, 12, counted at HowManySyllables.com)

Bougainvillea

Some orange, purple and magenta...
Some crimson, yellow, red... 
Cascade walls in soft rainbow shades.
Fountain of colors flow rooftop to  balcony,
parapets and gates in gorgeous radiance.

An awestruck seduced bumblebee, 
in abundance of pink champagne, cried
"My god, you are so beautiful"....

The bougainvillea vine, a triplet cluster, 
unassuming small petals, dull, pale, white.
"With no fragrance in my poor heart within,
only a cosmetic trick of colorful bracts.
Leaves in disguise show off bright camouflage,
beacon butterflies, they come close to me.
Paper glamour withers, brittle, soft, thin,
 My beauty is deep, only up to skin !"
    


Dated 15th April,  2019
Craig Cornish 's Bougainvillea Contest

The Battle

The glittering gold and shimmering crystal of palatial proportions 
Scarlet red carpets, as if the blood itself were loosed 
Quivering pulsation's wracking the soul to it's core 
Like the walls of Jericho before their fall 
Armored knights, swords aloft, defending the parapets 
Shaking with hidden fears, hoping for truce 
Knowing in reality there must be a great toll 
The whole Earth trembles at the destruction of such beauty 
For which, shame must fall upon man himself 
In seeking such glory, to conquer worlds, to have it all 
Never content with riches and splendor 
Nor one another in complete surrender 
Destroying what's good, enveloping that which will destroy the soul 
Self destruction on such a grand scale 
Never content until he burns in Hell

Freedom of Restriction

Deflected, crushed by the social retardation, 
Not loved, ‘cos he’s altogether unaccepting, 
Active learning the robot’s mouth action, 
So he can't contextualise, there’s no blessing.

Neither me nor him meet and we sweep by, 
There’s no connection from his ANDs and ORs,  
Only citadels to weather the reactive cry, 
When my nouns are pocketed by many cursors. 

Where’s the memory bank and why the chat? 
The bus is long gone and I'm open, vulnerable, 
There’s no room for social construction’s mat,  
To yield identity’s dynamic, recursive turntable. 

Yes, microchips and logic gates shouldn't enable, 
Machine learning at the cost of root foundations; 
Your group, community, your niche and fable, 
Ignite the necessary conversation of care situations. 

Ok, so can we build a robot? A care robot? 
Indeed care assistance is definitely reducible, 
To only a small number of abstractions, clot, 
‘Cos love does not evade the comprehensible. 

Doors class as access, also pavements, steps, 
Only three types of garments, two of people, 
Friend or foe, but a cloud for certain parapets, 
And who’s boss is said before, it's programmable.

• Short Parapets Poems
• Famous Parapets Poems
• Best Parapets Poems
• Read Parapets Poems
• Long Parapets Poems
• Parapets Quotes