Short Keening Poems

rage
sadness fury 
kicking screaming keening
incest rape happiness peace 
dreaming creating loving
joy hope 
calm...

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I know my soul wisely
in the most wonderful of ways
with absolute love and conviction 
that I am headed in the keening
direction of my heart....

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Amid barking clouds death evanesced 
fighting grieving hesitantly inclining 
for justice keening for life moaning 
not obeying only persevering
quarrel remaining, soul tearing…...

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The keening myst'ry in my breath

          Is brought thru auspices of death

               It's not that it has come too slow

     'Tis that I passed 'way ... long ago....

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Able bodied children dead! 
Even fate grieves hopelessly 
In justified keening, lamentation, mourning.
Not one pacifier! 
Queens royally sejant...
Troops under vultures' wings,
Xylophones yack zealously......

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Siren,

your fluid
hymn lures
me past tense 
gray gulls

who eye me, 
anxious 
for my safe
return

They circle,
keening...

and the tide
moves to
free me of
               my moorings

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

May 13, 2019...

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A white out
A snow bomb
Homes snow blanketed
Whited sepulchres
Cars abandoned
Stuck in snowdrifts
An arm sticking stiffly out
Above its embedded body
Deep in  its shroud of snow
The wind howling and keening
The banshee's delight in its kill
With the thaw 
will come the count...

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A cut-throat razor is being stropped.
A chin lifted, neck extended,
a soaped throat exposed.

There will be blood,
not in the close shave,
but on the keening blade
of that singing steel
we all must feel.

A shank unseen
where a thin-lipped death
trembles
with expectation....

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Weep with me

I hold my breath in
I won't let this free
 There's no stilling this ache
That's inside of me
The grief and the pain
Rip away and break out
To flow like a stream
From my eyes and my mouth
A high, keening sob,
A deep, throaty sigh,
Escape with great force
And I finally Cry.
...

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wolf stands at top of only timber he can find
studies barren wasteland 
which used to be home
destroyed by man’s fire 

lone wolf keening 
searches for lost mate
not understanding this devastation
hating man more than ever before 

family gone
clan gone
lone wolf, stands alone 
too devastated to howl...

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wolf stands at top of only timber he can find
studies barren wasteland 
which used to be home
destroyed by man’s fire 

lone wolf keening 
searches for lost mate
not understanding this devastation
hating man more than ever before 

family gone
clan gone
lone wolf, stands alone 
too devastated to howl...

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doubled in the bathroom
mind races in denial
oh no can't be losing this child
has to be
something 
else
something
else
long aches and sharp pain clears my head
knot my hands in my robe I push myself  to the sink
weak
I see your face in the doorway
weeping 
keening I am in your arms
we've lost our girl...

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One person can light up a room.
I have seen it, and it is wonderful.
People can be sobbing, wailing, keening.
But one soul with the heart of joy
Can come in, and re-do everything in an instant.
People who did not want to feel a glimmer of joy
Are suddenly smiling through their tears.
It often happens during funerals when a grandma arrives....

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The Hole in Me
 
There’s a fist-sized hole inside me
Bitter air blows through it
Listen to it keening
It’s where my heart used to fit

It flew away long ago
Looking for kinder shores
It waved to me as it lifted up
And smiled sadly
As if it didn’t want to go

I reached up 
To try to pull it back
But it was out of my grasp
Hearts have a mind of their own...

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Tidal breathing lunar pull ocean
Heaving  monthly passion waves.
Measures of timing in surely repelling  
Slow steady repeating gravity law
Winds of tomorrow and yesterday's keening
Fill canvas dreams as  keels argue sorely
Rippling and driving in moments of yaw
Time tied in tidal moon fluctuation
Swinging and tolling to crash on the shore
As we spend our days
Hoping for more....

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I hear an ambulance and I wonder if they are coming for me.
Have they heard my keening and wailing?
Have the neighbors reported my strange noises of pure pain?

Hardly likely. 
We live in the country where houses are spread way out.
The ambulance noises get further and further away

I lie back in the grass and try to get comfortable.
Not me.
Not this time.
Maybe later....

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I dreamt my mother mourned a broken doll,
porcelain, sad brown eyes, and five feet tall.

Entombed it in the finest place she could,
a cottage encircled by sunlit wood.

She danced a silent waltz with it, keening,
encouraging life in the wretched thing.

And it mended as she was worn away.
She did not hear when warned of her decay.

I was left a pristine porcelain doll,
and a broken mother in its enthrall....

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All around
birdies bicker
cats creep
doggies dig
every evening.
 
flowers flirting,
greening grass,
heather hedging
invading insects
juicy junipers.
 
keening kin
life lost,
mournful mending
nurture needed.
 
ominous omens,
praying penitent
quietly quaking
redemption rendered.
 
sweet scents
tease, tickle
unarm ugliness
vivacious violets
 
warmly witness
xeroxed xanthous.
yonder yawn
Zany zinnia!...

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A fawn was ousted into light
At Moira’s playful whim;
Its mother’s keening birthed delight
Too rapturous to limn. 

If Circe were to steer your craft
To her Olympian shore, 
Into your hair the wind she’d graft
Your favor to restore. 

Into that fawn you’d then be turned
To quell her jealous lust, 
Which never has so brightly burned
Nor risen quite so fast. 

Find my poems and published poetry volumes at www.eton-langford.com...

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Every time I see this happy-go-lucky person they are wailing, keening, 
But in a subtle way, pretending pure happy, wearing a plastic Barbie smile.
Their perpetual red mask is firmly in place, attached with cement glue
I realize they can never share, for they trust no one; it is too late for that.
It saddens me, but I fully understand, as I am wearing my own perpetual mask
Firmly affixed, holding memories in place that I will never share, keening also....

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On this side of Neverbeen
holding fast to truth so keen
ever circling hawk or shark
in instinct driven tunnel vision
world of red surrounding white
berserker rage surrendered flight
Thus the other side of Never
thunders blood in pounding ears
A sight to see to startle shiver
cause of swift unfounded fears
racial memory of steel
swinging to the  piping screel
violent keening silent screaming
hairs all tall in taut attention
back aquiver with delight
so we dance into the night...

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