You seem immune to worry or concern,
you haven’t a care in the world.
Perhaps you think you’ll somehow live forever
defying laws that have ruled time itself.
Disturbs me to see time wasted away.
Are we possibly stuck at an impasse ~
tangible reality juxtaposing mundane absurdity?
You close your eyes the world stops,
how are you so carefree?
Perhaps you cater to the ludicrous delusion
that by ignoring time you’ll outrun it.
Pains me to see time wasted away.
I’m beyond comprehending such nonchalance,
time is irrefutably a most valuable commodity.
Moments elapsed are irreversibly gone ~
their squandering an unforgivable crime.
Kills me to see time wasted away.
Lineku: 3 stanzas of 5-7-5 lines, each line has 5 or 7 words
Perhaps, I were your wife,
Would you have made me a paper tiger,
one that looks fierce but cannot bite?
Perhaps, I were your husband,
Would you have used feminism to emasculate me,
turning me into a yo-yo at your whim?
Perhaps, I were your friend,
Would you have made me a clown,
one who makes you laugh but lives in sorrow?
Perhaps, I were your servant,
Would you have made me a sea squirt,
eating his own brain just to serve you?
Perhaps, I were your parent,
Would you have made me a burden,
one who bends his back to feed your pride?
Perhaps, I were your child,
Would you have made me subservient to your greed,
one who loses his future to your ego?
Perhaps, I weren’t yet born,
Would you have been proud to weave me in your DNA,
one you breathe life into to erase your doubts?
Perhaps, this were only a poem,
Would you have thought of it a classic,
one that would stand the firm test of time?
This soulful hour comes after dusk
when failing sun breaks through
the pillars of trees... I roam alone
maybe to find rest on a hilly granite,
sit around and there, let my body
embrace light pouring down
into the woods, nourished by
all shades and colors of things.
Hearing my own silence
with a hint of windsong,
should i wonder if peace
be near? ...perhaps:
Like so, the higher self climbs
through the trellis of breeze,
arriving in a funnel of light like a ray
to gaze at, touch a god-like image...
Enthralled by an unknown pour
of surrender , I gently wander
through a holy city inside myself.
I watch sun slide into the sea and leave the sky behind.
Perhaps, a poem will beautifully slip into my mind.
A fierce storm and then an arc gleams above the glen.
Perhaps, a poem of peacefulness pours forth from my pen.
I thrill to spy a group of deer that from a brooklet drink.
Perhaps, a poem then flows onto a blank page from my ink.
Emotions, whether good or bad, can flood me like hard rain.
Perhaps, a poem spontaneously springs into my brain.
News of human degradation and of deprivation -
Perhaps, a poem soon takes shape and shouts my indignation.
The sight, sound, touch and scent of one that I hold dear -
Perhaps, a poem of tender love will magically appear.
Reflections, recollections, things I believe are true:
Perhaps, a poem from my soul informs or inspires you.
I saw....
Two black crystal balls
Rimmed with white
Reflecting an indefinable emotion
Glowing with some intense passion
Riveting,
Entrancing!
Two eyes of oceanic depths
Relaying the most intimate message
What did they commune?
PERHAPS- they said silently- "I love you" (?)
So piercing were those eyes
That I couldn't stand their electric glare
From those eyes, rose the Promethean fire
Glistening like molten gold,
At once sending out,
The light of a hundred galaxies.
In the fire bursting through those eyes,
My body was turned into a conflagration
And my soul rippled like fermented wine.
Why didn’t I respond instantly
PERHAPS, I was so stunned,
That my body couldn’t follow the sense’s urging
An ocean was stirring within
Whose whirls could never again be tamed
In those flooding pools,
Let me cast my fishing net.
What catch, can I expect?
PERHAPS, the boon and bliss of a lifetime!
Perhaps the wind will turn today,
or perhaps it will drifts elsewhere,
keeping the echoes of what we never said
if quiet were not already there...
Perhaps the rain will choose to fall,
or perhaps it will hold its tears,
leaving the streets unkissed and all
our waiting hearts postpone in years.
Perhaps I saw your smile at sunrise,
or perhaps the night was weaving deceptions;
perhaps what is gone still lingers
and perhaps we gather more than we notice.
Perhaps, my words are not enough,
yet still I write, in quiet prose...
for perhaps a poem is just this:
a maybe that nobody knows.
Perhaps ...,
if I were to hold the whole world
in the palms of my hands amidst
the wavering and not its weights
nor the blinded truth burrowed
its mountainous out fathomed
with tethered skin turned about
scoping its expansive route
of its veiled pit succumbed
to twisted fate as the sinner buddies
innocence, gripping the willful
to withdraw slipping its handful
of a woeful world's fallacies
albeit afeared spirit stirred
warmth deceived cold corrects
quivering under vain texts
whilst folly sifted, lest perturb I'd
perhaps ...
One slow motion jagged tear
found me after you left me here.
Its wetness still sits upon my face
as I stare at absolutely no place.
What I do live and what I dream
and all sundries fitting in between,
now struggle in a frenzied dance
passing thru, in and out, this circumstance.
My brain is mush circling a clueless groove.
Surely, I need an enlightened next move.
Calm failed to enter when you shut the door,
and life as I knew it quit being anymore.
I simply cannot find my identity.
Maybe it left with you and my clarity.
I seek to ease a primal urge to shout
at frenzied thoughts dashing about.
Perhaps I knew years had grown weeds
while I prayed for fertilized love seeds.
Perhaps I knew time long held this bleed
while I prayed true love would succeed.
Perhaps, I shouldn't have learned to play the sax.
Perhaps, I shouldn't have started that food fight in the cafeteria back in junior high.
Perhaps, I shoulda said yes to Tanya back in 5 th grade.
Perhaps, I should've asked for a raise last year being my 3rd year in the company.
Perhaps, cauliflower would've been a better pick over broccoli tonight.
Perhaps, my kids are better off after the divorce.
Perhaps, this swelling in my right toe will go away on its own.
Perhaps, things aren't so bad after all.
Perhaps, my patience with myself is improving.
Perhaps, temperance is simply not in my nature.
Perhaps, God will forgive me in the end.
Perhaps, there is no God.
Perhaps, our concern should simply be the here and now.
Perhaps, there is not real past or future.
Perhaps, it's all in the journey.
As my old man said: "the journey till the gurney."
Perhaps, my dad never said that.
Perhaps, it's all just for a poem named
"Perhaps..."
P erched between choices, I linger in the gray,
E very whisper of possibility tugging both ways.
R isk sits heavy, yet comfort hums its quiet song,
H oping one path proves right, fearing both could be wrong.
A ll days I balance fear with longing, want with need,
P recious moments slipping while I hesitate to lead.
S tep forward at last — though trembles chase the will to proceed.
Perhaps I'll write a poem for you
to gently touch your pain-filled heart
that I may caress your frightened world
to make a diamond from your coal
Would you read the words I write?
to heal your heart, make it whole
I'll ask your senses tenderly
to read this poem from my scroll
Will words save you from being lost?
When shades and shadows surround
hurt by trusting tenderness
When your faith has broken down
Can my poem reach your heart?
touch the hidden tears you cry,
will it change your shackled bond,
to golden wings of butterflies?
Will my poem free your storm?
Will it help you to transform?
Perhaps a poem,
created from the stardust
in your eyes.
Perhaps from the hum
of bees as they harvest
the last of the vines.
Perhaps from the thump
of the deepest bass drum
marking love's lyrical time.
Perhaps from a token,
an effigy,
of two souls entwined.
Lo! Death bestowed its final blow
Ye saddened thoughts- can't let them go
Perhaps, a poem... perhaps, a Poe
Will raise thy head, from lying low
Written: September 15, 2025, for a contest sponsored by John Lawless
*********
Perhaps it was never love—
just a fipple of breath in velvet dusk,
a suction of names unspoken,
burnished by the stygian hush
between your glance and mine.
Perhaps the ossuary sang first—
an aria of alabaster bones,
each note a necrotic lullaby.
We writhed in the molten ache,
palliating truth with ephemera,
inveigled by the aureate hush
of what we dared not name.
Perhaps this is the Desideratum—
a triptych of sacred forgetting,
Lethe in a chalice of dedication,
The hex of hope is still undulating
beneath our slack-jawed silence.
“Perhaps,” he asked her nervously,
“There’s a movie you would like to see.”
She smiled at him and answered, “Yes,
There is this week, how did you guess?”
“Perhaps I’m psychic,” he replied.
“Shall I pick you up or meet inside?”
“Ah,” she said, “I have a confession.
Perhaps I gave the wrong impression.
I want to see the film, it’s true,
But there’s no way I would go with you!”
Related Poems