He sits
Before life’s easel
Passersby
Taking a quick peek
The colors await sunrise
The brush longs for a vibrant streak
A dash across the coming day
And still he sits
Awaiting “his” moment
Staring at a blank canvas
Dreaming of a crayon past
The canvas is contorted
The sun morphing into an angry cloud
Sapless trees shivering in silence
A cold mirror replacing the lake
Reflects the grin of a cold moon
A thinning wolf howls
Love,they say has many a cloudy nomenclature
Lang of metaphors and figures of virtual stature;
Those who resort to it live in the wild cavern
Of blown up false images and chronic concern;
An enigma that makes one go out of oneself!
Romeo and Juliet have left behind the Mawn--
Tall claims and a bright aura around Eros's crown
Have not many been tossed and whirled across
The endless yards of the illusion pursuing dross,
Leaving the chaser sapless , febrile and thirsty..?
Who is wiser :Narcissus who loved himself more
Or Echo who killed herself to dote and adore..?
Strangely, the height and depth of fond limerence
Has no meter or measure to gauge its reverence;
May true intent prevail ,aye over the strong urge !
The cud I rechewed // in the riverside // was from a sett of dreadful hemlock // that struck the aquifers of my soul.
Blight glue my night // as mournful as the grave-in my streets // silence defeats me.
I weep formaldehyde // I would go mad —naked // struggling for precision.
Until I bite through the pages of poesy // that charges the sapless pulse in my arteries: hope has feathers and many more.
In those poems I chew away murderer's hand // lurking around my shadows & ravaging it beyond repair.
In a short while // I would calligraph about God // for crafting out poets // who are small "god" in his image // I envied // yet, I'm a poet.
Damn me if I ever doubt that poetry isn't a panacea for poets.
He was a sapless namby-pamby
but my cousin loved the idea that he was a blank canvas
She had taken other canvases and turned them into Pollocks and Rembrandts
Or so she thought…..
She would paint him in vibrant colors.
She would use a variety of her carefully honed and tested techniques
She bought a bunch of new brushes and paints.
Ready to begin her creation!
She spent years and years
Perfecting her craft, only it did not comply as she had surmised it should.
She spent all that time trying to change a rabbit into the Easter Bunny.
He finally hopped away.
Showing spunkiness and spirit
for the first time since they met.
Not to be outdone, she took the credit for it.
A small path
stippled with the print
of wind slurries,
it runs along a snowy edge,
scrub-oak nails down
tilting stumps of ice.
How old must the year become
before a cockled bark
sheds its wind-blighted hide?
The creek is a stretch;
I tread through a sleet blurred flurry,
zag a rooted track to its frigid bank.
Standing by the water, crow wings
flying form my black overcoat,
I watch a flotilla of ducks
pilot a channel through small ice floes.
Then the ducks disappear; we disappear together
as a hard mist crashes-in.
I hear the creaking of tree-hung clouds,
the crunch of frost-bitten shoots,
a grinding of raw jaw bones,
on sapless sprigs.
Only my hot breath pushes
through a clearing of sky -
all has returned with tints of sunlight.
Saplings are carried by blackened limbs
toward lichenous openings.
And is that a greening moss -
is that a young crocus leaf reaching?
My words fall down and skitter around
like leaves from an autumn tree,
dry and crinkly.
Sapless.
Lifeless.
Vestiges of prouder times
when language used to speak my mind.
The summer sun sucked the simmering sky desert dry,
clumps of grey cloud spawned by the moist horizon,
torn in thwarted winds of failed storm they tried to fly.
The clusters desiccated except for a pained lone one.
In the course of scorched and sad sail it could save
for the aborted summer storm a swelling tear drop.
The squall decimated and seared in the heat wave,
the molten grief dripped morphing into a raindrop.
At the edge of the wasteland a solitary tree grieved,
the parched foliage drooped, rains didn’t hear its call.
Still holding hope on the slim stem an upright leave
found on its wilted and sapless face a raindrop fall.
In the summer sky the adrift and saddened lone cloud
didn’t whimper as under the sun it felt its future burn
for quenching the thirst of a dying leaf it was proud.
Waned life saw in tear raindrop emerald dream return.
November 18, 2018
Immorality conquered the mind of youth
Devil in disguise they called it fun
God's word and devotees consider boring
Motivation from insanity
A generation living on the knife-edge of reality and a twisted fantasy
Choosing visionless minds their leaders
Brainwashed by a society of advertent incorrectness
*********** an entertainment for teenagers
Prison the home of future leaders
Drug abuse and illicit sex the prerequisite for street credibility
Talents and creative minds extinct by narcotic
Non-inspirational music of crime and violence surmount the beauty of poetry
Curse by Freedom and Human Rights
Immorality conveyed the acme of youthfulness
Invading and subjugating the moralization creed
Hopeful voices of effulgence nonviable
Gone is the doctrine of life
Terrorism a religion and sapless words an ism
Where are the minds of enlightenment
A sad day for mother Earth
Her most precious jade gone rogue
There's no safety in her sphere
Animal species on the brink of defunctness
Great invention (nuclear weapons) made for the human race
God's creation happily worship idols
Life a prison
Typification of the devil like a threads in a suit
Please, Storm!
Let the children live!
Give milk to the sapless breast.
The desert spreads a spill so dry
it stretches wider wings of death.
Lightening shocks our eyes.
Thunder’s anger bolts.
Angels weep their own relief
relieving tiny throats.
May 2, 2016
for EVEN THE ANGELS WEPT - Poetry Contest
sponsor: John Lawless
Money name fame
take it all
and buy me peace
save me from my fall
I ran on easy street
like a deranged man
but when i looked back
chilling winter wind palpitated my heart
Some are born with silver spoon
i arrived with a wounded fate
and i ride success hill by a crazy train
but this eclat will fade to black
Sometimes i fall in love
but everytime i endure pain
yet i want to burn in this sweet flame
like a sapless man in the rain.
People love me, people hate me
i do not care much
once fell from you
oh' tree , fruit is not yours.
Where do i go now
i have house but not a home
my dream castle is falling
and affinities are burning to coal
Now i am sitting here
with corrupt heart and rusted mind
dark lord is devouring my soul
i do not wish to live anymore.
This worriment is not only mine
masses are suffering
dwelling in the land of commotion
waiting for cessation, asking the solution.
The answer is
Life is beautiful, ocean is more blue
trees are greener and beauties are true
love is so real, so is harmony and peace
you can feel it if heart is open and vision is not blur.
Bid on my love
Sobs sapless fragment of my thirsty soul,
as cravings of illusive heart condense to mole,
Intense passion inked into scroll of trust,
Bid on my love first to later escape disgust !
Written Dec 4th, 2015
For contest by Tammy Reams
Awarded HM
as I sit here sapless most unable to see
my memory recalls one who truly loves me
your fragrant rose I press in this page
The crackling of stem overtaken by age
our bodies trembled on cold winter's night
as you covered my lips in naked moonlight
how shall I live when my true love's gone
but through a dead rose moonlight lives on
- - - - - - - - -
Judy Konos
9/15/15
Mixed Senses
Evening
Lotus, whose sapless roots
Deep in stream’s muddy soul,
When lost the mossy bond below
Is turned gray in deeper gloom.
Her mate the light of all that live,
In pain he sinks in golden waves,
And the verge of seas are found
Billowing clouds that wailing loud.
Life is but a sweet and snappy scent
That keeps the pulpy mass in place
On frames of bones big and small,
Veins, sinews, marrows in tones.
When is lost that fragrance blest
We are, but a fetid maggots’ feast.
Current Events
Frozen pants dance stiffly
to the mad beat of sapless
drumsticks choreographed
by a wicked whimsy of the
winds baton. Birds cling
tightly knowing that if the
gale subsides for but a moment
they will fall over, be blown
like feathered fur balls on
lone unchartered trips. Cats
hiss in meek response to
whistling whine of wind’s
failed grasping at the trees.
Children pick up speed as
parents chase them through
the cyclones of debris
quick swept by nature’s
crazed custodian. Hats,
hang glide in mocking
merriment above the tousled
heads of their former captors.
Skirts balloon Monroe like,
fashion’s flair taking on airs.
Trash can covers play Frisbee,
as barrels beat steel drum staccato.
This wind, this rush of Winter
clearing the table, cleansing its palate,
preparing us for the next course.
John G. Lawless
1/25/2014
1.Can love be constrained?
lover’s tears reveal.
2.Love-less live selfish but
loving men generous.
3.Fruit of body and
soul is love.
4.Love sprouts longing which
metamorphoses lovely friendship
5.Ecstasy of kind-hearted is
reward of love.
6.For ignorants love, charity
but for gallants?
7.As sun burns worms
charity harms loveless
8.Loveless life as sapless-trees
grow in desert.
9.What use lovely outlook
if loveless soul?
10Life means love, rest
skin covered skeleton
------------------------------------------------
Dedicated to Thiruvalluvar(31B.C), the author in Tamil
Translated by S.Kandasamy, MUSIRI, TAMILNADU, INDIA
Published in poetry.com on 7-12-13
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