Sleight Of Hand Poems | Examples

Love is a corpse

Love is a corpse, 
a slab on table and a checklist of finds,
6’ 2’’, rich, educated, white, slim,
a post-mortem on a body still fresh

Love is a casino,
a gamble in bright lights,
a bargaining of chips falling where they may,
an under-table sleight of hand

Love is a firework,
a hallucinogenic bonfire blaze
that spirals and swirls with a forever
waiting, a waiting for the bang, the explosion,
the sizzle from cosmos down to earth

Love is a house
with a cupboard for stale secrets
and a creak in an old spine staircase,
flagging passion hung out to dry above
yellow grass in need of water, can rusted

Love is silence is shout is cry is shake
is laugh is let down is let up
is cloud is volcano is dormant is erupt
is triumph is disaster is trust is tryst

No More Mister Gneiss Guy

Geologists say ‘by your leave’,
we’re famously polite:
we wear our heart upon our sleeve,
rejoice at rhyolite.
We’re very patient people, but
I tolerated stuff before
that I’m not taking any more:
up with this I will not put.

Don’t bring to me your xenolith,
preposterous, fantastic:
I’m done with make-believe and myth:
my ire is pyroclastic.
Don’t tell me pressure makes a gem,
discomfort forges what’s sublime:
the aimless drip of frameless time
creates a speleothem.

Some things improve with age, it’s true,
while others just feel dated:
to sleight of hand, to me and you,
I’m simply indurated.
I’m wise to every move you make –
I’m distanced from your wiles,
meanders, stratagems and smiles -
a placid oxbow lake.

Legerdemain

The magician wore 
my mother’s perfume
and conjured family 
from thin air—
a brother renamed uncle,
a wife recast as mother,
a daughter vanishing 
behind a tale of bees.

Each sleight of hand was tender—
a hush, a smile, a bowl of soup
cooling on the Formica
while the truth was sawed in half
and tucked beneath the linoleum.

No one told me why
my “uncle” broke my father’s ribs,
or that dad’s flu came in a bottle.
No one told me my brother 
had been in prison.
No one told me 
I was adopted—
until Aunt Mary dropped the card
like an afterthought,
the queen of spades
sliding from her sleeve.

They said Virginia 
died of a bee sting—
a prettier tale than 
what swelled inside her,
the blood pressure and seizures,
the silence that followed 
her body home.

And no one told me
that my mother wasn’t my mother
until dad blurted it out
on his deathbed.

I didn’t know the word for it
when I was little:
legerdemain—
sleight of hand,
sleight of memory,
the practiced art
of not quite lying
while saying nothing true.

Master of Illusion

Worlds from sleight of hand,
What you see is not what's real,
Magic in the air.

©bfa051725

Hazy Don’t Faze Me

I catch junk with a stick
Whip it like batter
Make it thick

Set it firm in an oven brick
A sleight-of-hand trick
Flipping a well-rehearsed schtick
Pulling it out of the fire quick

Cool…then plate with a crispy breadstick
Sink your teeth in…taste the kick
A feast of rhyme…a bold remix
Juicy lyrics on a drumstick

Fall

Tell me, do you feel anything ?

I believe you do.
But you possess the sleight of hand
to put up a wall.

And I, feel like a fool
without any professional magic
to protect me,

and I always helplessly fall.

(11.03.2025)

Photographs

Captured memories.
One glance will take you back.

It feels like time hasn’t passed;
everything feels the same—yet nothing remains.

Your mind, playing tricks…
a fleeting sleight of hand,
leaving tears spooling from your eyes.

You don’t know what you have until it’s gone—
a simple cliché, but it’s true.

When all that’s left are photographs…
one day, you’ll feel it too.

Your Angry Heart

Please let it go , your angry heart.
The blame was mine, I played a part
I truely believed, at the  start.
But life got in the way
Unaligned on our starstruck chart
My love could not hold sway

We always seek to understand
Not knowing what cruel fate has planned
And sometimes dreams just crash and land
As I was soon to find
Our love was like the sleight of hand
A trick that made me blind

Forgive me please for causing pain
I never meant our love to wane
I pray you find such joy again 
And suffer Cupids dart
A love so strong it will sustain
And heal your angry heart

Handheld Mike

I remember the two nights
You we’re up on the stage
With your handheld Mike
I was up but it was you
With your handheld Mike
We swayed herkie jerky
Yes I enjoyed the way you moved on stage
It was your motion
My delight was your sleight
Your sleight of hand 
And as the dance was about to end
You caught the bouquet in
     and with your handheld Mike in hand
You also caught the Mike stand
This is dedicated to my Belle
Into Mike’s mic sing girl sing
Remembering those two nights
Hearing Belle's pealing

The Mirror Sees Only Itself

The corpse of this world has been easy to find
it has followed my footstep,

and yet,

beauty is here to astound
its glory confounds.

A bell in a towering light
knell's as it weds death to life -
the hideous to the beautiful.

The loathsome spins its exquisite webs,
The world nurtures both nectar and venom,
perceptions sleight of hand
mocks and bedazzles. One beholding eye
always opening, one always closing,

while my beggar's bowl is emptied
and washed
again, and again.

vote early and often

It is said that our ballots are secret
And that is the way we should keep it
A trip to the polls
No chads, marks, or folds
Just some deft sleight of hand to delete it

They vote early and often
Some vote from the coffin
A nod and a wink
Was it blue or soft pink
There’s a bucket right here to put that in

THE CIRCUS IN ME

Yes, my life is a circus
A product of illusion
I heal souls lost in time
While taming the beast within me.

I am the juggler
Skillfully bouncing others' griefs
I am the stunning acrobat
Bending and twisting through my struggles.

With a sleight of hand
I create wonder from my woes
Have them flicker away
By simply ignoring them.

Yes, my life is a circus
I am the roller coaster
Spinning my troubles
Into an invisible bin.

When night falls
And I finally look up
At the empty stands
I realize my life is but a joke.

Blue Smoke And Mirrors

while 
letting the 
great magician
pull a white 
fluffy rabbit
from out of 
a black stove top hat
with
a sleight of hand
only through
the dark arts of 
blue smoke and mirrors

Evolving Doors

He was dealt a bad hand, so of course he flushed
it down the drain
The house of cards collapsed on faulty grounds so
he built again on new terrain
He set his sights on new foundations with the intent
to build anew
Blueprints were drawn on solid ground to keep the
plans from falling through
The glassy house he was seeing through was nothing
more than a mirage
The games that are played are exercise, now he's
exorcising all facades
The deck was stacked from the beginning so of course
the push went to the house
Behind the scenes he was pulling strings while staying
as quiet as a mouse
His sleight of hand is David Blaine in the realm of those
that imitate
With every hand that's dealt he levels up, now it's up
to you to speculate
What you see as water he sees as wine, & he's getting
drunk off every glass
He just gets stronger with every sip while using adversity
as a form of gas

Magic

They say it's just a sleight of hand 
Or just a flick of magic wand 
But true magic has more to show 
Than the mere touch of mystic blow 

Like the shine of her mystic smile 
Like fair charm that could go for mile 
Like when she speaks, my every vein 
Tickles all the lobes of my brain

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