Prodded Poems | Examples

Butt out - humour warning!

Bill prodded his sebaceous cyst
‘Twas massive the size of his fist
It spurted green pus
His wife made a fuss
“Get treatment NOW, I must insist”

Blue lighted to the A & E
Huge spurting cyst medics could see
Bill’s livid butt boil
Made doctor’s recoil
Needs lancing now, they all agree

They bundle Bill onto a table
“Don’t sedate him” said his wife Mable
I will succinctly put
He’s a pain in the butt
I’m leaving him when I am able

The medics gave Bill’s boil a prick
Green gunky pus splurts, it’s so thick
Poor Mable was heaving
She said, “Bill I’m leaving
Because you’re an ignorant dick”

“You wouldn’t seek treatment for years
Your constant moans left me in tears
I’ll file for divorce
I’m leaving of course
I’m going to live in Algiers”!

Bills visage turned ever so pale
His final breath he did exhale
The cad passed away
There’s no more to say
I’ve finished the end of this tale!

Layers of Intention

Coming back to recapture and constitute whys,
To understand our train of thought, the path we seek with our eyes,
The external influence that suggests and surrounds,
Take it all away and what have you found,
Lay your heart bare and what do you see,
Under all the layers of your reasoning,
What you grip onto so tightly in order to let go,
Take it all away for a moment and reevaluate your soul,
What pain pushed you and prodded you to run into your ways,
What traumas made you run away from your pain,
Take away your fix it mentality because control is not in your hands,
Lay it down at the alter and give it away again,
Give and love freely without control and confined,
Stop trying to conform yourself to free your own eyes,
Love the freedom to love...love the freedom to give,
Stop putting rules on your freedom to live,

The Carrying of the Cross

He carried our sins as He carried the cross.
He walked up to glory through pain and through loss.
He fell many times but got up once again
As He carried our sins.

A man from Cyrene they had pulled from the crowd,
Who wished not to help, who protested aloud.
But in the end took up the cross of our Lord
And carried it forward.

A large crowd of people, women who cried
As they watched the Savior go forward to die.
They followed along, lamented and mourned
For the pain of the Lord.

He took up the cross, was prodded and pulled
On the way to Golgotha, the place of the skull.
Where He would do what He was born to do
For me and for you.

Take up your cross and follow Him.
Die to yourself and be born again.
Take up your cross and follow Him.

Creative Inspiration

There's no set list of motivational things I can name
because my inspirational impetus is never the same.
Often, I'm encouraged to pick up my pen and write
by celestial bodies glimmering upon me in the night.

What moves me to choose canvas and brush to paint
can be induced by flower, a child, there's no restraint
when it comes to what triggers my mind as inspirations.
It can be reading works of a Master Poet's compilations.

There are no bounds that hold back my impulses to act.
I'm easily prone to create from song lyrics. That's a fact.
I'm prodded to cook after coming across a good recipe,
maybe tweaking it with a bit of this or that to satisfy me.

I'm an artist at heart, finding inspiration in everything...
sunrise, butterflies, my senses honed by birds that sing.
I'm stirred by many touchstones that spur my imagination.
Remaining open-minded is a great source of stimulation.

I've been inspired by compliments and even disrespect.
They serve as catalysts, like an inspirational architect
that lead me to find new provocation; a spark to ignite
the fire of creativity within me to rise up and take flight.

Retention Pond

If displaced, found nowhere, but in water
     of the retention pond,
no longer in V-formation, nowhere
     in the bluest sky,
however, beneath and at the behest
     of angels, ruled by God,
it is my greenest eyes that you swim in,
     as I exit the highway.

This exit didn’t exist when Mom was alive,
     nor the quick stop, QT,
that I pass by, so close to my dad’s house.
     On a cul-de-sac, road’s end,
I pull into his short, straight driveway, push
     open the door, unlocked.

I quick-tell my story of the seized geese,
     it was only mine to tell,
of how I saw their takeoff as if they were planes
     leaving the lonely spot,
their brief stay with only my mind and heart
     to excite; somewhere lifting
into the gray, blue day prodded on by
     a host of angels.

Dad doesn’t recall the retention pond; is
     it nowhere
but in my imagination; oh no,
     it is so real, beyond nowhere, somewhere
where his eyes can’t see,
     for Dad drives straight to the liquor store,
prepared to see olives
     in his martini; but he’s happy to see geese fly
 out my retentive mouth.

Recalling Your Kiss

I recall the kiss of your lips, 
only to increase this feeling of desperate hunger. 
Striving to taste the sweetness in a ripe strawberry
 during the winter fast…
to quench my thirst in time of desert drought…
to capture fleeting youth with a net, broken and frayed.

Do memories mock the turning hands of the clock?
 Do they give us the power to travel through time?

 No.

For we are but ghosts in our yesterdays. 
Unable to touch, feel, nor taste the sepia snapshots
 of fallible memory.
Only one vibrant picture in bold color
 to be prodded with the shock of a finger in a hot socket…
the ache of pain in my difibrillated heart.

Caged Animal

We started off with being/
A human stuck in a tiny box/
Like a caged animal/
Day by day, we lose our senses/
To be poked and prodded/
Day and night for amusement/
This is a game to them/
Looking into the cage/
To rile the beast within/
The expected become unexpected/
The situation becomes dire/
Crying in desperation/
Remember,  it's a human being/
Locked away in isolation/
Treated like garbage/
No Gods hears the cries/
From within the walls/
Trapped like a caged animal/

New shoes

Newshoes

My shoes were falling apart
I couldn’t keep them anymore
So I threw them away

It felt weird without shoes
But I only had to deal with it for a little while
not long after my new shoes came
They were new and I believed them to be perfect

I loved my new shoes
I wore them everyday
We went on so many adventures
But my new shoes started hurting me 
Little by little the sharp edge prodded and poked at my feet
I thought these shoes would never hurt me like the last had 

Sometimes people laughed at me and my new shoes
I didn’t care though
I loved them

It’s like they had a mind of their own
My new shoes controlled every step I took
I told them to stop, they didn’t
They knew what was best
My shoes kept pushing me to do things I didn’t want to do
Everyone else noticed it too
They told me to throw out my shoes
I didn’t want to get rid of them
After all I loved these shoes more than any other I’d ever had

I woke up one morning with my shoes gone
I searched everywhere
My shoes had been taken from me
But I didn’t mind
I was happy that they were gone
The prodding and poking had left along with them.

Libera

As the thorny vines that had me tangled up were torn
I felt a single tear roll down my cheek 
I tasted the salt as more of them began to flow

As the weeds that crept up to destroy me were picked
I felt my whole body become overtaken with sobs
I gasped for breath as I realized I was still alive

As the branches that scratched and prodded were cut
I felt a new power arise in me as I stood
I was able to stand on my own and escape

As the feathers caressed me in a light embrace
I felt my arms open up
I felt them ache as I reached them to the sky

As the flower petals held and protected me
I felt myself fall into comfort
I knew I was finally safe

As the warmth of the sun shone and covered me in love
I felt myself being renewed as I basked in the light
I was free

The sun set and radiated its golden glow
I stood as a symbol of strength
A masterpiece of resilience, liberated and reborn.

Misunderstood

He fell into evil ways,
bit by bit
he became a poet,
one that goaded,
prodded and annoyed -
naturally,
he was both
beloved and hated.

“The gods made me do it,”
he often declared,
but when he grinned
a serpent’s tongue could be seen
slipping out
from his false teeth.

Secretly he craved the power
to seduce and beguile,
occasionally,
the gods let him have his way,
but not often,
and the devil kept on writing.

Hugs

Undecided, Aspen leaves turn from gold to silver to gold again.
Carnivals of colors, prodded by the wind, bow to end of autumn,
While brittle noise, as they fall, brings a symphony no songster could pen,
But these trees' starch and strength hug their roots to rise from soil at the bottom.

The grove is small with Aspens clinging tightly like sisters in hard times.
Their focus is a dying tree, once grand, but now black-burnt to cinder.
The Quakies, remembering the day when someone committed these crimes;  
Who chopped, defaced, set afire; this one in their midst now left to tremor.

Clouds

"Why so grim?", Old Tom Cat asked,
but Little Kitten turned away –
stared at the sky with wistful eyes,
withdrawn from this sweet, golden day.

"Why so gloomy?", Old Tom prodded,
flicking Kitten with his tail.
"No room for melancholy thoughts
when sun is heavy on the vale." 

Little Kitten turned his head,
shaking off his pensive shroud.
"I want to be a bird", he sighed,
"and sleep upon a silver cloud." 

Old Tom's whiskers twitched a bit –
he had these feelings sometimes too,
but cats were cats and birds were birds,
grass was green and sky was blue.

"See here, Small Kit, let's run about,
scampering in meadow weeds,
caper through the dandelions,
loosening their soft, grey seeds.

Depression will soon float away
with all the downy fluff.
We'll make a million tiny clouds
and that will be enough."

Renewal

It was the feathered purple of a blossoming iris,
kissing the laden air
with trembling lips.
I was awakened by its fragrance,
the newness of its ancient story,
told yet again by a moistening earth
in silvery birdsong.
 
Sometimes,
I have missed the turning from gelid and motionless
to the softening sway that unerringly follows. 
I have been embittered—
brittle and bare as a crooked branch,
scraping a vacuous sky—
 
but not this time.
 
This time, the tenderest breeze,
prodded by the fingers of a spreading sun,
finds me waiting—
eyes closed, smile turned eagerly upwards
to greet the renewal
of creation.

The Beachcomber

Endless pulse of ocean's dance
carries flotsam to the sand.
Every day another chance,
prodded by an unseen hand.

Such a love I've never known—
waves crest on his brilliant mind—
after many nights alone,
sure there was no love to find.

The gentle wisdom in his voice,
urging wind-tossed heart to mend.
Remember, love is not a choice,
it finds its harbor in the end.

Such a kindness in his eyes—
passion sets my world afire,
and once more, to my surprise,
his whispers with my hopes conspire.

The sea has washed this love ashore,
and I, the beachcomber, unaware.

A glinting pebble, lost before—
just walking, I have found it there.

Crabbing

A disturbance in the sand
betrayed their hide
and when prodded by a rake,
claws shot up
primed to latch onto
a careless finger or toe.

A big "bluey" had a fearsome
bite and seemed
to prefer to sacrifice a claw
rather than let go.  Their grip
on the rake, though, was their
undoing, hanging on whilst
being lifted up then shaken
loose to fall helpless
into a floating tub.
By morning's end
the tub would be 
a writhing fill of crabs
clawing to free themselves
from a hopeless fate.
It was a pathetic sight.

Hauled ashore, most 
were still alive when Dad
and I got them home.
They wriggled and bubbled 
in the damp bottom 
of the metal tub.
I can remember the salty smell
of what I thought was fear
let out by their silent screams.
Their suffering seemed 
too much to justify a feed. 
Then I would think of Jesus 
and the fish he caught
to expunge my childhood guilt.
Taken out and washed clean 
they would be dropped
into a big iron pot and boiled
until they turned bright red,
the color of demons stoking 
hellfire in a bible picture book.

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