Short Knell Poems

hump fell
death knell

8/28/2019...

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autumn leaf fell
left branch shell shocked 
all’s well say roots...

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The hawk swooped down with a loud scree,
a death knell for the small chickadee....

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I probe
the globe
implode
explode

I smell 
the fear
death's knell
is near!

We live
to sing
all hail
the King!...

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eight tolls of the bell

I wait in the pause

to hear six more

even her death knell

has kept Aunt Nell's age secret...

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Patrick Henry Brace US modernist
at painting did not persist
His semi abtracts did not sell
and suicide was his death knell...

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Love is but a second’s tick
Recorded by the cruel clock of Time.
Hear those meshing gears revolve and click!
And listen…for Love’s final chime....

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Love is but a second’s tick
Recorded by the cruel clock of Time.
Hear those meshing gears revolve and click!
And listen…for Love’s final chime....

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The home we shared, an empty shell
  Robbed of grace by death's cruel knell
Its face, once sweet, now dully stares
  ~ I'd tear it down, your life to spare...

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The progressive death knell sounded
  —one final serpent to mount

With excuses now abandoned
  —the dragon’s fire is out

(Villanova Pennsylvania: June, 2016)...

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Hear the bell knell
Hear it knell again

A tree dead
but for leaves
Ravens watch
Leave the dead
To watch the slain

Hear the bell knell
Hear it knell again...

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ZeAL its synonym and enthusiasm I think,
Earnest I'll pursue around every wave and kink
Still aware of the goal to excel,
Till it ceases the chiming of the beckoning knell!...

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a limp flag
hangs at half-mast
the silence broken
by the church bell
and village gossiper


-------------------------
A Brian Strand Contest
Placed 1st
June 2021...

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Too soon the bells will toll for me
I must cross the narrow channel
And set sail for unknown eternity
Where untold joys await the knell
After which, solemn bells will tell.

written June 17, 2021...

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alert cormorant 
                   dives for fish in eventide …
             …hooked prey hears death knell











Written on 3/18/2022
For Bird Haiku contest
Sponsor: Tania Kitchin...

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As the rain poured down 
On the solemn town
You could hear the cries of the wind
As the knell unpinned
For a vehicle in all black 
And a family of no luck
Were stationed near a grave
And as the knell rang one last time...

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Pell
a bell
in a seashell
and the echoes will dwell
resonating to dings that swell
to crescendo, a carillon of bells
that befells the hearer to quell,
and knell
bell


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5 June 2017...

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What signals for Autumn
Its death knell?
This last felled leaf, sad as slow
It may tell.

Whilst not yet conceded
Led up out
Old lamped park's chiller diffused
Mists, surreal
City-stept, more lone, for it
Winter feel....

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a glimpse of heaven
   a taste of hell
 that's what he perceived
   at death's dreaded knell

 summoned to court
   he gasped hard when he saw
 the judge and the jurors 
   his wife and kids ~
           his maw and paw...

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Humble,bumble bee
One season's life,fly free

Working the summer scene
Unless crowned,as May Queen

Sometime cousin cuckoo,comes to stay
Her offspring eggs to lay

A nursemaid,then,Spring to Fall
'Til Winter's death knell,calls...

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The door rings,
I look up,
someone with someone else,
back to my eggs and hash browns.
The door rings
Spatulas knell the griddle.
The skinny cook yells in Kentucky Yiddish.
Flapjacks slap in midair,
syrup dongs in jug and jar.
...

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Cat
menace,
fierce predator,
But which mouse has paws up
to bell the cat with warning tell.
It takes courage to risk stepping forward
with so much pain, for gain in vain:
Knell rung
Bell


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5 June 2017...

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Rondelet: Obama hear


Obama hear

Chance of an age to set right things

Obama hear

Abraham lambs call - you hear

Run the gauntlet before knell rings

One life may quell voiceless suff'rings

Obama hear



(c) T. Wignesan - Paris, 2012...

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Lovely is the sound of water
Lapping on the teeth of Pelee
Island shores, when lanced on its
Crests thrusts some ferry's horn—the knell,
Some tarnished brass bell (I have heard)
Maddens beneath it, and breaks apart,
The rhythm of marching water....

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First
Bell tells
that passing looms.
Second bell tolls death knell.
Third bell calls mourners to echo
their sad sorrow at the loss of loved one,
with wake to cherish lovely life.
Three bells
Slow


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5 June 2017...

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