Looking at the miracle
is the sound of something lyrical.
Holding fast and listening still
to the sound of nature’s will.
The frame is full of written sights
that forever speak of blight.
You listen close and are certain still
that your opinion is always right.
I wish that I had a river filled
with all the sanctimonious trill
one swallows like a bitter pill
like nothing that a conscience kills.
So, look to your rumors now
while the oars fill the prow
and find the gold upon the mound
of the once forsaken crown.
A tusked wolf dips its paw into the brine
the sea is its restless mother.
A proto creature, its bones already growing
razorback fins and horns, it must seek a shell
to hide beneath. The fanged manatee dies for love.
Before the porpoise leapt, before the whale shipped
its gray prow,
Jekyll and Hyde clawed each other
through a gibbosity of flesh. Where the skin flew,
rat tails grew gills and jagged jaws, while
blind behemoths burst out from small pods.
a saline transitioning that even now
wave-washes my naked feet, as the sea
plows me deep -
and does this cold moonlight reveal
the hidden talons of my ever-flowing father?
His very bones smell of ocean
beard lashed with its salt
On land, rubber legs awkward
he gapes and he gawks
But rig him up a mast
billowy sails to go with it
Prow boldly juts forward ~
Thirty knots an hour, his ticket
Asclepius, one cannot build from sand,
Such light and shifting grains as mortals be.
The wind and tide shall warp what e’er is planned,
Foundations fade before the pounding sea.
And yet, when grains of sand flow through my hand,
I smile at warmth and richness I know not.
Through falling columns have the sea I scanned,
As through a fog, and this the vision brought.
Once, weary, weary, weary on the sea,
One weary, wandering sailor, long away.
‘Tis torpor, tempest, tedium, weary he,
When wind-whipped waves whisk words on salty spray.
“Rain-hardened sailor, welcome now,
The ocean storms here mend their ways.
No lonesome mists embrace the prow,
Here glegful otters tend their bays.
This oaken isle, this Avalon,
O’er the futile, beating sea;
This dream-cast realm, this jewel at dawn,
Where thought is regal, talent free.
And here beyond the reach of might,
Where ancient tribal flaws decay,
With cobbled streets and spires alight,
New thought, new form, new love, hold sway.”
When whence these words surveyed had he,
Before his eyes a visage be.
‘Twas older than eternity,
That face that sank beneath the sea.
Do unto others as you'd have done to you.
Real is what you can not buy.
Eye for an eye.
Watch the explosions brew.
No one takes in account for their actions though.
People try to groom and coerce.
They wanna see you in a hearse.
God forbid if you wear a halo.
It's a trap!
No one to care.
It's there.
Zap!
Legions on the prow.
They act like angels.
But they're devils.
It's a lie, even the vow.
Seaspray hits your face
like a slap, wakes you up
cupped in the prow
dipping up dipping down
watching for fins
coming up dolphins
you lick the salt
from your lips
and speak of love
to the Sun
the anchor, chained,
is stored below deck,
it won’t drop
for a while
Candide Diderot. ‘24
As the shadows start to lengthen
And the colors turn to gray
The sun concedes its dominance
For night it's making way
A barque for you is waiting
To take you out to sea
To sail you to the sunset
The captain of it, me
Please come aboard my bonny
I've made a place for you
The best seat on the forward prow
The sunset in full view
I've got your pink knit slippers
And yellow blanket too
You'll be warm and comfy cozy
As we sail the ocean blue
I know the deepest channels
The surface smooth as glass
The journey will be pleasant
Though it won't be very fast
Against the tide we're sailing
The reason why is clear
The longer it takes to get there
The longer you'll be here
I can sit and think about you for hours without end
In fact it's what I do most days and I'm so glad I spend
The time I do dwelling on you, you're such a precious gem
I've found my buried treasure, on your head a diadem
You're my royal bluebird, I truly love you so
More valuable than the pot of gold
At the end of the rainbow
And what do I mostly think about?
Well on that let me expand
Sunsets watched together, walking hand in hand
Or a ship that sails the seven seas
With you sitting at the bow
I'm the captain guiding
But it's your name on her prow
Amulet graced by gems
clad for stratum prow
tawny glyphs
margin of witticism
& quagmire
extravagant dictum
trivialize shores trails
summer ousted
& waves of wrangles
sundered the ocean
& swapped my spirit
in crimson burst
swirl to scatter
In demolishing ruins
& twilight crumble
slump of man
glittering Phoenix fire trail
scribble a cyan-xantos rhyme.
bore a shallow rostrum
defective soothsayer
haunts dreams?
hilltops & both
oceans & skies
cyclone of emotions
&
lethargic sadness
soul storm mulling.
5TH Place Contest winner
Written: July 19, 2022
A BRIAN STRAND PREMIERE CHOICE Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Brian Strand
Opened up to fixed Lord
Told my heart what's nix'd Lord
Offered up to tricks Lord
Can't believe it's not gored
Can't take home what's lost Lord
Must make up for cost Lord
Can't get right what's tossed Lord
Hope and Pray I'm not bored
Talk and walk the walk Lord
Act and play the block Lord
Make and take the shock Lord
Glad we had this talk Lord
I'll be gone for now Lord
After all it's how Lord
I'll be right for thou Lord
Opened up and bow'd Lord
Making time for wow Lord
Host and toast to plough Lord
Haste and waste to sow Lord
Taste and chase to prow Lord
Rocking fast with vow Lord
Cost and task to tao Lord
Cast and passed to cow Lord
Asking that you're Now Lord
Lastin' asked for dow Lord
Asked and basked to crow Lord
Masked and task to chow Lord
Brassed and cast to ciao Lord
Spirits wander in and wander out
met usually with a painful shout
They give me chills but also wonder
are they real or tales from dark under?
This story is true, happened few years past.
We keep telling so memory lasts.
Four friends were at Joyce's house one day
when Niece Sue stopped by on her way.
Likes genealogy she says now;
found great-grandma with Ancestry's prow.
Her portrait is on my bookcase, Joyce notes.
We'll look before leaving, a friend votes.
She might have died in disgrace, Sue states:
abortion is what her obit relates.
Back in the year eighteen eighty-nine
quite common--birth control unrefined.
just then a loud crash in bookcase room--
sounds of glass breaking--impending doom!
All rushed in to find, faded and worn,
Grandma's portrait had been cut and torn.
No living creature was in that room
to push the portrait to final doom.
Her spirit may have disliked words said
she wants to leave that incident dead.
I believe spirits are here night and day,
rather not see them, if that's okay.
January 10, 2022
for Angela Tune's Ghost Story Contest
Frau cow now chow
How thou plow prow?
"Pow wow!" vow sow
The sudden mist against my cheek
awakens me in an instance
lifts my chin to feel its crispiness
the tickles of wet tingles my awareness
as a late evening breeze blows my hair as if
on the prow of a sailboats’ deck
sending the verge of cold little shivers
along the nape of my sweater
with the incoming sea crashing ever closer
tide flow just below as I sit to watch
twilight upon us in plumb burnt to orange
soft light a vibrant impression in glorious sunset
hand painted of watercolors spread loosely
I find soft harmonies played by waves mighty song
amazed to find each days’ gift living here
hearing the daily ballads pour from doorways
and sharing connections of new found happenstance
in this dusty towns’ neighborhood in Mexico
5-4-2021
ALL YOURS (May 5) Poetry Contest
1st Place
Brain Strand
achingly ...
he still recalled
as if but a day hence ...
the air still moved, tender
the earth a-sole, still trembling
grasses parting like swells for a mighty prow
dust from bulky feet in diaphanous clouds ...
swept up and woven like a thin shuka
as if a Maasai blessing
to grace the hips of the coy Kilimanjaro ...
yet naught remained but the beautiful white
the echoes of the poachers' rifles
and the countless cries of a grand species, ghosted
lost to the thirsty Serengeti soil
shamed red by the rills of blood let
for a sake, sadistic ...
and the inexhaustible glut
of greed.
Submitted on November 26, 2020
To the "On Your Marks, Naturally" Poetry Contest
Julia Ward, Judge & Sponsor.
I who have dwelt long
On the keeping of a vow,
That which is folded into
Steel --
And hammered and drawn --
The making and remaking --
Melded and beaten into one,
Sat now pondering
Upon all thus whence forged
At the battles heightened
Pitch...
For where else do men
Discover a truer kinship
Than when engaged in fierce
War?
Immersed in deep thought --
Mesmerised by glint and glare;
Drawn into the fractured glass
As a distracted man,
Ensconced at the bright
Hearths side,
Stares vacantly into flames.
Images, memories;
A mind, pliable as water,
Crowded with dead, long ago
Faces
Of those comrades slain...
For no promise ever made
Was truly made unless kept.
My little craft stirs
As rousing from idle dreams;
Shrill birdsong from woodland
Fringe,
Glib mallards laughing;
Incessant lap, lap, lapping,
Mist dissipates at lakes edge;
Prow swings slow about
As if turned by unseen hands.
And out across the vastness,
This wide emptiness,
Faraway voices calling...
Then gone like evening breeze.
Related Poems