Short Pawning Poems

Tall men spit messianic prose
To disciples pawning choice
Their knowledge like a cancer grows
A doppelgänger's endless voice
...

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Words left borrowed
 heavy on the heart
Actions defaulting
 stillborn and dark

Pawning the foundling
orphan on loan
Love unbequested 
— dying alone

(Dreamsleep: April, 2024) 
...

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I have note in my hand you want me to 
meet with you this night at Hotel Le Six. 
I'm adrift, Mon Amour, I’ve not a sou. 
Colette needs not know that I’m in a fix.
Life of pretense leads to many problems.
I’ll have need of pawning Elvis albums....

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I was holding onto lackluster material,
In hopes it would grow into gold
Deep down, I knew that this jewelry had no value 
Fear of pawning my assets, had me perplexed 
Eventually, I knew I would have to let go and let God 
No longer will I hold onto fools gold 
The shimmer will never reach the shine...

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Everything tended 
to darken around her
The light from the sun
all feelings deferred

Her winter foreboding
sucks air from the room
Constant denials
predictions of doom

Pawning tomorrow
the price of today
Happiness bartered 
her dreams steal away

Everything tended
to darken around her
Shadows descending
—the future interred

(The New Room: July, 2023)...

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I met the dear man I would marry
Quite by some lucky chance
At big neighborhood dance.
He attended with my cousin Harry.

Harry left with a girl name of Kitty,
Pawning me off on him
The dear friend he called Jim,
Who stayed with me, I feared, out of pity.

Jim asked me if I cared to dance.
The dance music had charms,
And floating there in his arms
Was the start of a lifelong romance....

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Spring tide
pounding against
a rocky relationship

between the
new moon and
earth’s pie in the sky.

On an island
of one’s own making
in the mind —

like a whirlpool
when imagination
slips away

on a one-way
ticket to disaster —
no peace to find.

Stonewalling
rest with stress
and anxiety.

No sleep
on a tidal bore
without soporifics

in a
midnight typhoon
pawning fantasy.


by Berteena
Harmony of the Soul
February 3, 2019...

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Propping up their drooping
Posture on dizzy stools,
Parched lips overly pleased, 
Pockets drained of money,
Prisoners of excess 
Pander to last resort:
Phew! Pop goes the weasel.*

[*An expression describing the spending of all your money on drink
 in the pub and subsequently pawning your suit to raise some more.]

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A Pleiades ‘P’ Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Kim Merryman
       Placed 1st
© 11th April 2021...

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